Please note, I'm referring to the superheros by their actual names, not their superhero names. If you're not so familiar with them, feel free to PM me or look it up on IMDB.
"Who dares approach Asgard?" Heimdall boomed, on full alert ever since Thor was taken by mysterious forces that, according to his friends, disappeared into a purple haze.
"We have come to speak with Odin to negotiate the terms of his son being returned," the leader of the group, a young dark-haired boy said.
"And who might you be?" he asked.
"That is not important. But we will speak with Odin presently. None here have yet discovered the world Thor disappeared to, and none will," the boy said in an eerily commanding voice that did not sound as though it should belong to one as young as he. "Thor is alive, but unconscious until such a time that we see fit to bring him to consciousness. The only hope for Asgard is for us to speak with Odin."
"They will escort you to his throne," Heimdall said, alarmed. He gestured towards the guards who had raced to him the moment he had alerted that someone was entering their world, although how they managed to get past him, he did not know.
The guards escorted the strange creatures led by the human boy to Odin. A guard went to whisper in Odin's and Frigga's ear to let them know they were finally confronting their son's capturers.
"You dare to come to my realm? You who have taken my son from me?" he cried out.
"We have come to barter. We merely have him as hostage, fully unharmed and unconscious so he will not even despair at the passing of time," the boy said sternly.
"Hostage for what?" Frigga asked quickly.
"We will exchange him for the one we truly seek, the one called the Trickster," the boy said. "I believe in this world he is known also as Loki."
"And just who are you to think you could deal with the likes of Loki? If you know he is a Trickster, why do you want him?" Odin accused.
"Our business is our own. And since capturing your precious son should make you dislike us, why would you care about whether Loki should harm us? We say again, Loki for Thor. This is the only bargain we have an interest in," the boy said unemotionally.
"S.H.I.E.L.D. has trusted that we would keep Loki safe and secure," Odin began.
"We can guarantee he will not escape our world. Asgard and Midgard would be safer from him should he be in our world than if he is here, where his allies could attack," he said. "We tire of this discussion. If we return home without the Trickster, we will slay Thor with his own hammer, for he is of little use to us," the boy said indifferently.
"Odin, please," Frigga begged, although Odin could not tell for which son she begged.
"Loki is our son," he pleaded, attempting another path.
"Who aimed to take over your world and that of Midgard. You must be so proud," the boy said, a sardonic tone taking over his previously unemotional voice.
"Just who are you?" Odin couldn't help asking suspiciously.
"Our business is our own," he repeated. "Do we have a deal? Loki for Thor?"
"I cannot trade my sons," he started.
"Then Thor will die presently," the boy said. Odin gestured for his guards so that they would stop the boy and his retinue.
"Do not move a step closer. It will not help you, for our portal is right here," the boy said, pulling out a small, translucently purple cube. "Take another step and we return to our world for Thor's execution."
Odin hesitated, but called off his guards.
"Now. Have we a deal or no? There's no need to think of it as trading sons. Thick of it as ensuring Thor's life, while finding a place to keep Loki out of the worlds you care about," the boy suggested tantalizingly.
"What do you want with Loki?" Odin pressed.
"Our business is our own," the boy repeated once again. "My hand is on this portal, ready for us to leave. Do we have a deal?"
"N-"
"Yes," Frigga interrupted. "If you ensure Loki will live."
"I can assure only that we have no aim to kill him. And with his wits, he should have little trouble surviving the strange dangers of our world," the boy said, slipping a little in giving them one little thread of detail.
"Then yes," Frigga said. Odin was startled that she would agree without him, but then nodded, gesturing for his guards to bring Loki before them.
"Oh, how delightful. You should really come over to my place sometime, Father," Loki said, a deceiving smile on his face. "And what is this about?"
"You're coming with us, Trickster," the boy said, catching Loki's attention for the first time.
"And just why are you entrusting me to a half-grown human?" he said derisively. The boy merely strode over, placing his hand on Loki's wrist before activating his portal.
"Wait. Do not touch him until Thor is in our hands," Odin said, halfway out of his seat.
But as the boy ignored him and the portal was almost ready, Odin gestured to his guards to also touch the boy and his companions so as to travel with them, for it was the only way to find Thor.
But when the boy ended up in Cair Paravel, for it he was after all, King Edmund of Narnia, the Narnians were ready for such a double cross with many guards surrounding the Asgardian guards, attacking them before they could even get their bearings after rough world-jump.
"Well. Thank you for that then. And if you don't mind," Loki began.
"We do mind," a rather young girl said, somehow menacing despite being rather adorable.
"This arrow quite easily knocked out Thor who has a significantly larger body mass than you. Interested to see what it might do to your smaller size?" Susan, arrow already loaded and string pulled taut.
"Perhaps lingering here for awhile might not be the worst of ideas," Loki conceded.
"It really isn't. After all, we were the ones who rescued you from your prison. You owe us," Edmund conceded.
"And just who are you to convince my father to release me?" Loki asked.
"You have the honor of addressing their Majesties, High King Peter of Narnia and his royal siblings, Queen Susan, Queen Lucy, and King Edmund," a rather pompous Faun announced.
"Well that just clears up everything," Loki said sarcastically. "I've never heard of you."
"We prefer to keep our lands out of the ridiculous messes the others are in," Peter said. "But there has been a prophecy. Of the return of one who has ravaged and enslaved our lands in a deathly winter for over a hundred years."
"I've conquered many a land, but don't recall ever doing quite that," he said cheekily.
"The prophecy continue to tell of the only one who could outwit her, the Trickster of Asgard," Peter continued, ignoring the jest. "We can only presume that means you."
"And just what makes you think I'd ever work for you?" Loki laughed.
"Because those who cross us end up like this," Susan said, taking one hand off of her bow to gesture to the commotion at the door.
Loki would have taken advantage of that small moment, but he was far too fascinated in a peculiar image of Thor.
"Well, well," he said, seeing the various critters carrying in his unconscious brother, drool dripping from his mouth and his skin turning a bit green. "You were being truthful about taking him down with your bow then."
"Quite easily too. I never miss and the poisons are grown by the Dryads and Naiads themselves," she said coolly.
Loki refused to ask what those were, not wanting to look foolish.
"Oreius, take a delegation to return him to Asgard. I'm sure they will be quite surprised to see we actually kept our word," Peter said, amused.
"You captured him…to trade for me? Little old me?" Loki said melodramatically. "Well, well. I'm sure Thor will not like to hear that his life is worth my humble assistance."
"Then you will assist us?" Peter asked, taking him for his word.
"What do I get out of it?" he said.
"We did just spring you from prison," Edmund said irritably. "Most people would be grateful for that."
"If this is successful, we can return you to whatever world you wish. And give you…this," Peter said, pulling something out of his bag.
Loki's eyes widened when he easily recognized Thor's hammer. "How are you carrying that?" he reacted.
"What do you mean?" Peter frowned.
"Only Thor's managed to pick that up," he said, insulted as he himself had never been able to either.
"And we couldn't either. Nor could any of the Narnians. Only you," Susan murmured to her brother softly.
"Is it another one of those High King perks?" Edmund suggested as a jest, but his siblings took him quite seriously.
"Perhaps so," Lucy said, slightly awed.
"I think we have a deal," Loki said, thinking about how he could then use them in the end. If this boy could wield Thor's hammer, who knew what else Loki might be able to get out of them if he befriended them? Such stupid little mortal children ought to be quite easy to befriend.
"Wait, what happened?" Tony Stark chortled. The Avengers had all come to hear what dire threat Thor needed to inform them of, shocked to find out he had been captured. But then Stark in particular was not impressed by the details of what had happened.
"It's not funny, Tony," Natasha Romanoff rebuked. "This sounds like a serious threat."
"We're talking children here, right? Thor got knocked out and lost his hammer to a bunch of little kids," he laughed.
"Says the man who also couldn't carry Thor's hammer even with his fancy suits. If the children could carry it without even breaking a sweat, what does that make you?" she pointed out, making Tony stop mid-laugh.
"The real concerning issue is what world. Fauns? Satyrs? Centaurs? That sounds like something out of Middle-Earth," Fury said.
"Why would creatures from Greek mythology be in the middle of the earth?" Steve Rogers puzzled.
"It's a reference," Romanoff said off-handedly. "Although Middle-Earth would be elves and dwarves and such."
"There were some dwarves and giants too," Thor confirmed.
"And yet their leaders were children?" Tony said incredulously.
"Maybe some sort of immortal elves?" Clint Barton suggested.
"In sort, we're dealing with an entirely new world here," Maria Hill concluded. "My section's tried running tests on Thor's blood to figure out what they used to knock him out. It's nothing we've ever seen before. It's almost…"
"Almost what, Agent Hill?" Fury asked.
"Well," she began, knowing Fury wouldn't like the response. "Almost like magic."
The rest all laughed.
"Magic's all in how you define it. I'd classify Asgard as magical. Or at the very least, supernatural. From our viewpoint that is. So perhaps this new world is similar," Bruce Banner supported.
"Then they'll at least be better equipped to handle Loki. Although I can't imagine what havoc he might wreck on their world," Rogers said, shaking his head.
"I'm not worried about them. I'm worried about a mysterious world we know nothing about knowing so much about Asgard, easily knocking out Thor, and then releasing Loki. Any ally of Loki's is our enemy," Fury said indignantly. "We need to get into that world."
"If Thor's willing to come over to my lab, I might be able to run some tests," Stark offered.
"What are we going to do even if we find our way into this world? After all, if Loki's stuck in another world, isn't that good for us?" Rogers pointed out.
"Yes, being there just waiting for the right moment to return. Maybe combining his abilities and their magical potions to make superweapons," Fury started.
"Figuring out how they control world travel so well so that he can portal into the heart of S.H. .D," Romanoff supplemented.
"He'll tell them our weaknesses to train them to fight us while we know nothing about them," Fury said, gnashing his teeth in annoyance of not having any intelligence on these strange forces. "We'll do anything we need to keep that from happening."
"We don't know they're our enemies," Rogers reminded. "Several countries sided with Germany but weren't considered so much enemies to America."
"These people aren't victims. They attacked Asgard – " Thor began angrily.
"You mean they beat you up as easily as a baby," Stark interjected.
"And have aided Loki," Thor thundered, even more angered as he ignored Stark's demeaning comment.
"Perhaps it's something an Asgardian did? You aren't always the most…thoughtful," Rogers suggested. "I just don't see how this is S.H.I.E.L.D.S's problem until they act against us directly."
"We're not just going to sit around and let them dictate the terms of our battle. They know they have the upper hand in knowledge. We need to find out about their world and dictate our own terms of battle," Fury decided.
