Ohmygosh people read this? Squee! Hope it's to your satisfaction, sorry it took so long ^^;


For two weeks, no one heard a peep from the God of Mischief. That was just fine with everyone concerned, though Tony did wonder what the crazy guy was up to. But with no new information and plenty of things to do, trying to understand Loki Laufeyson was moved to the backburner. Tony finished his new arc reactor, installed it (this time without Pepper nearly killing him) and was working on improving the armor. He still remembered Thor wreaking havoc on his suit with his bare hands… it wasn't exactly fun trying to get out of the suit that night. He was trying to find a way so that next time he and Thor got in a spat, his suit wouldn't get crushed like it was made of tin foil.

But while Tony was secluded in his workshop, the other Avengers slowly began filtering back to Avengers HQ. The Headquarters used to be at a SHIELD base, but working under someone, especially someone like Fury, just wasn't Tony's style. Perhaps without Fury's express permission, Tony outfitted one of his spare mansions into a high-tech, well guarded headquarters designed specifically with the Avengers in mind. Mainly that just meant separate rooms, but he did make sure the walls were reinforced with pretty much everything he had; just in case Hulk wanted to have some fun around the house. It would be decidedly less fun if everything collapsed.

Eventually all of the team members cottoned on, and began outfitting their individual wings to make it theirs… sort of. Widow's was always locked, from the moment she moved in. Clint seemed to enjoy creeping around in the air vents more than he liked his room. Banner promptly made his into a lab (which Tony often enjoyed visiting) And the Captain furnished his like… well, an old fashioned house. The most technologically advanced item he had in his room was a radio. Tony had tried, many times, to convince him to use a computer, or hell, just a smartphone, but to no avail. But Tony would corrupt him with 21st century gadgets eventually.

And so that's where he was, eating a bagel under the Captain's watchful eye, when JARVIS spoke. Sir, Thor has entered the mansion –

Anything else he was saying became irrelevant, for the god in question had just burst through the door. Mjolnir was being brandished about in one hand, his expression panicked. Sparks leapt from his hammer as he quickly crossed the room to them. This wasn't good.

"This has to be a new record," Tony said thickly, his mouth bulging with bagel. "Two weeks to not only get off Asgard, but rip off SHIELD as well. Amazing."

Thor stared at Tony for one moment, then charged him. Tony took an involuntary step back, and Thor's expression was so enraged that Steve quickly stepped between them. Thor impatiently shoved the Captain out of his way, clearly keen on speaking his mind.

"This is not a jest, Stark!" Thor shouted, raising Mjolnir menacingly. "My brother is now in sole possession of the Tesseract! If he wields it as I fear he will, the Ragnarok will finally be upon us, and all the realms shall meet their ends. Is that what you want, Stark?"

Tony raised his hands in a non-threatening fashion, swallowing noisily. "Simmer down, big guy," He said in a soothing tone. "No one wants that." Thor did not back down, his eyes blazing. Tony was not entirely sure he did not intend to strike him down – his brother's escape appeared to have broken something in Thor. What exactly was broken, Tony didn't know, but it was just plain scary to be in the demigod's glare.

He really wished he had his suit.

"No one wants that, Thor," Steve seconded. Thor's head snapped around, finally freeing Tony from the fiery stare. Whew. He was going to have to make a valiant effort to get the wisecracks at a minimum for awhile; failure might end with getting smashed and electrified by an angry god.

"When did this happen, Thor?" Steve continued in a calm tone. "What do you know about it? Tell us everything."

"I know little that will be of use," Thor said, finally lowering Mjolnir. "Jane… Jane had finally returned from her place of safety. She wished to see Eric Selvig – I accompanied her to the SHIELD base." He broke off as Steve convulsively gripped the table, scattering wooden splinters upon the ground.

"Peace, friend," Thor reassured him. "Selvig was not taken."

Once the Captain had calmed a little, Thor continued. "The heavens smiled upon us – we were not in the room when Loki arrived. We saw and heard nothing of it until he was gone. The Tesseract was discovered to be missing, every guard and scientist slain. Save for the bodies, there was no evidence he had ever been there. But the Tesseract is gone."

Even Tony could not think of a single thing to say. The idea that Loki was again loose and powerful, so soon after the battle, was a terrible thought to bear. It made Tony feel almost hollow, filled with nothing but a deepening sense of dread.

"Well," Steve finally said, crossing his arms, "I think it's time to assemble the team."


Fury, for unknown reasons, had not yet contacted the other Avengers. He didn't seem in a very big hurry, either. Whatever Fury's reasons for waiting, though, Tony didn't share them. He quickly called everyone, telling them to meet at the mansion as soon as possible. Everyone agreed, but he hadn't been able to reach Banner. Natasha agreed to search for him, and that would have to do for the moment. He slapped on one of his tracker bracelets, just in case… and his preparing was done. While Steve stood stoic and Thor paced, Tony settled down on the couch with a glass. He was in the middle of throwing down his second scotch when Fury finally decided to phone in and spread the news.

"Already called everyone, boss," Tony said before Fury could speak, adjusting the telescreen so both Thor and Steve could see Fury as well.

Fury did not look pleased. "And what exactly did you tell them?"

"That Loki was Loki, the Tesseract's gone, and they needed to get here ASAP," Steve recited quickly.

"Hmph." Tony expected him to rant and rage, but he settled with looking disapproving. Taking advantage of his lackluster reaction, he asked, "Why the wait? Did you want to give Loki a head start, or what?"

"The wait, Stark, was for us trying to get everything back online," Fury snapped. "Whatever Loki was up to, he messed with our security systems. And our computer systems. Anything electrical that was connected with the Tesseract's vault went haywire. And that includes any means of contacting the lot of you."

Tony turned slowly around to stare at Thor, eyebrows raised. "No mention of that in your rundown, Thor."

The god shrugged. "I did not notice." He seemed unconcerned about whatever power surge Loki caused. Then again, his opinion on electrical objects in general was condescending at best, and he seemed to deem most of them quite beneath him. So yeah, he wouldn't notice when half the SHIELD computers started going crazy. He probably didn't see a difference.

"Anyway," Fury said, reclaiming their attention, "We're working to get it back online and salvage what we can from the security tapes. Where did you tell everyone to meet?"

"Here," Tony said promptly. He leaned forward, all ready to dish out a counterargument when Fury inevitably disagreed, but the head of SHIELD merely bowed his head. "Good. We don't know how compromised this base is yet, and won't know for some time. Your…. 'mansion' is, as of yet, off the map. Have them meet and stay there. Until then…"

"Sir!"

Agent Maria Hill strode into the camera's range, looking very disturbed. This, more than anything, unnerved Tony. From what he knew of her, she had the constitution and fortitude of a boulder. She never showed anything so trivial as fear in her expression, much less any other emotion. To have her so clearly shaken was not a good sign.

Maria glanced once towards the screen – Steve waved – then turned back to Fury. "Sir, the doctors examined the bodies from the vault. They're…" She shook her head. "Sir, you need to see this."

Fury nodded and immediately began following her out. "I'll be in touch," Fury said over his shoulder, then the screen went black.

Tony stared at the blank screen for a moment, then drained his glass, hardly feeling the burn of the alcohol as he considered the implications of the little Fury had said. His machinery was crafted with more finesse than SHIELD's, but…

"JARVIS?" He called, getting up from the couch.

"Sir?" His AI immediately answered. He was reminded forcibly of a butler, and was about to say so, but curbed himself just in time. JARVIS never liked that particular comparison.

Huh, Tony thought, feeling another splash of self-appreciation of his genius. My AI is actually more sensitive than the average human. He'd made a robot that could get miffed at being called a servant. That was fun to think about.

But there were more important things to do right now. "JARVIS, back up all important files and blueprints to the home database. Anything not strictly necessary to run this place? Shove it over there too. Make sure that if he hacks us, all he'll get is some circuits to run the lights and the show scheduling for DIRECTV."

"Of course, sir," JARVIS said. "Shall I leave the refrigerator running?"

Tony grinned. And he had a sense of humor. "Go ahead," he sighed with a wave of his hand.

"So what now?" Steve asked.

"Well, without Banner, not much I can do so far as Tesseract tracking. JARVIS is pulling all that stuff right now, but Banner's tech is portable. And besides, I'd rather waste time now than hand all our research over to Loki on a silver platter." It wasn't that he didn't want to work on it – quite the opposite. He really wanted to dig elbow-deep into his workshop and just start throwing everything he had about gamma radiation and try to find the Tesseract himself. But if Loki was now capable enough to shut down the entire SHIELD base, he would be able to steal from his files. Tony was sure of that.

With a sigh, he strode over to one of the many computers and switched it on. It was rather depressing to watch the folders wink empty one by one, leaving nothing but names behind. "Take the folders too, JARVIS," He added as an afterthought, but somehow it was worse when those disappeared as well, leaving nothing but an empty desktop on the screen. How depressing.

Wallowing on the absence of his precious technology would not help anything – even with that knowledge, he was dangerously close to doing so anyway. But with Steve in the room, he probably wouldn't get away with any more alcohol as a distraction. With a sigh, he grabbed a roll of paper and sat down at the kitchen table. There was nothing stopping him from making physical blueprints, tedious though they could be. Still, it was a project, and an important one at that. He forgot the existence of Steve and Thor in the room as he sat down with a long sheet of paper, blocking everything from the world except for the sketch of a new gamma ray detector.


It took two days, but finally, everyone was present at the Avenger's mansion. Banner wasn't actually that hard to find – he'd been in Spain just like he'd said. Natasha had found him in less than an hour. It just took much longer for the two to retrace their steps back to the mansion. Bruce seemed surprised at the less-than-happy reaction he received upon entering the house. He didn't seem to find his lack of communication worth any fuss.

"Then why didn't you pick up the phone?" Steve asked Bruce as they all took a seat at the conference table, with the telescreen at the head – a stand-in for Fury, who was still at the wrecked SHIELD base.

Bruce, apparently, had been in the middle of a Spanish bog, searching for herbs that were rumored to have restorative properties – though he knew better now than to try to get rid of the 'other guy', he still wanted a modicum of control over his angry alter ego. And bogs, apparently, didn't get the greatest cell service.

"My phone didn't ring, guys," He said as they all converged upon the doctor, asking what he'd been up to and what he knew. Evidently, Clint had gotten it in his head that Bruce hadn't called because he had super-secret information that couldn't be shared via telephone. Tony hadn't the faintest clue where the quirky archer had come up with that one.

Banner shoved away his eager questioners to set up a tiny screen on the table in front of him – a direct feed to the Gamma Ray satellite, currently trying to track the Tesseract as they had before. So far, all it had returned was a resounding negative.

"Would you all please settle down and shut up?"

Fury had joined the meeting, and his flaring temper seemed to be on a shorter leash than usual. Everyone quieted at once. Tony longed to speak out just then, just because he could, but the need for new information stopped him. Fury knew more – that much was clear.

"So. We managed to salvage what we could of the security footage."

Fury's visage blinked and disappeared, replaced by an image of the Tesseract vault. Tony leaned forward, absorbed, as the video began to play.

The first minute was peaceful and crystal-clear. Guards stood at their posts, the scientists ran their experiments. Then, with no warning, a cloaked figure appeared in their midst. Immediately, the footage started to ripple, as though they were viewing the scene through thick heat waves. The figure in black raised something small and thin – a modified scepter? – and fired at the personnel, smiting them with green light. Whatever it was, it was effective – within a minute, Tony had witnessed the murder of two dozen personnel. The only living being left was the cloaked figure. It raised the thin stick high, and the footage grew more corrupted, rippling and shivering so much it was almost impossible to make out. Tony could just barely see the Tesseract rise free of its bindings, then disappear. The figure in black disappeared as well, and all was still.

Two minutes to kill everyone and steal the Tesseract, with no one the wiser. Horrifying, yes, impressive – but something seemed off to Tony. If there was one thing that he knew about Loki, it was that he cared about the attention. Gloating, showing off. Everything he destroyed, he destroyed in some spectacular, dramatic manner. He wasn't one to be subtle. He remembered only too clearly the whole 'eyeball' incident – didn't that show that he had a flair for the dramatic?

If that cloaked figure was Loki, he'd certainly changed… which obviously was not out of the question. But still… he swallowed his doubts and looked around the table. Their expressions ranged from shocked to horrified.

Fury appeared back on the screen. "Loki isn't taking any chances this time," He said heavily.

Tony continued to frown at the screen, though it looked like he was frowning at Fury now. "What was the nature of the corruption?" He finally asked. "What it a virus, a hack, or some sort of magical crap?"

"Magical," Fury said. "Or at least, we think it is. When Loki used Barton to shut us down before, it was a planned virus. This was just… wild, with no clear target. We're still not sure what the target was."

It was unlike Fury to answer questions so directly – Tony guessed that their noble leader was more shaken than his stony expression let on.

Natasha spoke up for the first time. "The bodies," She said. "What was so unusual about the dead?" She said this as calmly as though she was discussing the weather. Nothing was new about death for Natasha.

"They shouldn't have been dead, that's what's unusual," Fury said. "They were all examined, and there was nothing wrong with them except for the fact that they were dead!" He slammed his fist down upon an unseen table, but they could all hear the thud.

"Whoa." Tony threw his hands up. "Loki –" Or whoever it was, he added mentally, "Fried them with the laser light thing. We all saw it happen."

"The bodies showed no signs of any attack," Fury retorted. "No marks, no poison, no nothing. But they were dead."

Silence reigned in the conference room. Scepters and alien armies were all very well, but the looks of this green light was somehow far more frightening.

"That should not be possible," Thor said slowly, appearing shell-shocked. "There is no magic upon Asgard with such a power. Even the Jotuns do not claim such a skill."

"Would you like to tell that to them?" Fury snapped. "It's not possible. It still happened. Impossible is not a word I believe in."

They continued to bicker and speculate, but Tony had checked out of the conversation, busy reviewing every possible technical trick he knew that could somehow protect against the deadly green light. So far, he was coming up empty. He was only brought back to Earth when an incessant beeping echoed throughout the room, originating from the computer in front of Bruce.

"I've got a lock on the Cube," He gasped, frantically scrolling through the information. "Just one burst… couldn't be anything else." He looked up at the suddenly frozen team. "What are you waiting for?" He nearly shouted. "Get down to the hangar! I'll program the coordinates on the way!" And he was out the door. The rest hesitated.

"Just one burst?" Steve muttered. "Could be a trap. Why wouldn't we have detected anything before or after?

"Maybe he accidentally blew himself up," Clint offered hopefully.

Tony was uncharacteristically quiet. A trap was likely, but it also seemed kind of stupid. Loki had stayed undercover for two days, that was all. That didn't seem like a long enough time to do anything significant or worthwhile with the Tesseract, or even enough time to set up a viable trap. Releasing the energy was a good way to draw them in, but the Avengers wouldn't go down easy. Why else would he broadcast his location, then? Maybe it was a mistake after all.

"Well, it won't hurt to check," Tony said, getting up from his chair, though of course he knew no such thing. Thor, Steve, and Natasha stood as well, but Clint stayed put, a petulant frown on his face. "I've had more than enough of his mind tricks," He said stoutly. "I'm worth more dead and sane than alive and under his control."

Fury thought about his statement before finally saying, "That's my decision to make, Barton." Barton's frowned deepened, and Tony had a feeling he would voluntarily glue himself to the chair if it meant he didn't have to go.

"Natasha, you're to stay." Natasha immediately slid back into her chair, her expression blank. Tony had no idea whether she was upset or pleased with her designation. Fury then sighed and said, "Barton, stay as well." Clint turned away from the telescreen and grinned.

"The rest of you – fill me in on the way."

And Fury disappeared from the screen.

"Well, team," Tony said, clapping his hands together, "We've got a god to destroy. Let's go annoy Bruce!"

That earned him one strained chuckle from Steve, then the group broke apart. Tony headed up to his floor of the mansion, stepping solidly onto the cool metallic circle in the middle of his room. He stripped to his bodysuit and was about to activate the auto-assemble… until he remembered JARVIS had removed all of that. Sighing, he told JARVIS to activate the suit itself instead. JARVIS did, and he tried not to cringe as huge chunk of metal hurtled toward him, slowing just enough to make the application process extremely uncomfortable as opposed to painful. But then the suit was on and he was ready. He opened the window and flew down to the hanger to find everyone else had suited up as well. Reindeer Games better be ready for this, Tony thought as the jet took off. Because we definitely are.


Yeah, this chapter didn't quite turn out like I wanted it to... sorry if this comes as a disappointment. But fear not, just a few more chapters of boring setup and then we'll get to the good stuff. :D Also, Harry Potter fans, that green light is what you think it is. And the corruption of the security feed? In the books, it was said that magic and electricity don't mix. Well... they mixed, and electricity lost, big time.

Thanks for all the reviews and follows and favorites! This is so exciting ^^

Oh, and edited because the doc manager ate my page breaks D: