They'd done it. The battle was over. They'd won.
Though nagging at the back of their minds, most of them anyway, was the thought that even though Loki had fallen, he was still alive beneath the dark waves of the Pacific Ocean. S.H.I.E.L.D. had wasted no time arriving on scene to begin combing the water for the fallen god's body while medics treated the wounded members of the team.
Save for one, who stood on the beach alone, praying that it was a rescue mission rather than a recovery one.
"Thor…you're injured, you need to see someone," Bruce said as he made his way over to his friend, leaning heavily on a crutch, his left leg bandaged. He'd been watching Thor standing alone for a while, staring out at the boats and helicopters as they scanned the churning water.
Thor didn't reply. His wounds weren't fatal, and he wasn't a mortal; they would heal quickly enough on their own without the efforts of Midgardian medicine. He only cared for his brother at the moment, wanting to see more than the divers surfacing as the search continued.
"He's been in there for hours, Thor, and when he went down…" Bruce began, not entirely sure why Thor was so upset over the demise of Loki. Sure, it was his brother, but he'd try to cut them all down on his path to global domination.
"He is a god, what would kill a mortal man a dozen times over would only wound him," Thor said, his eyes not breaking their focus. "He will be alive."
Bruce wasn't going to point out that his last statement sounded more hopeful than sure. Nor was he going to say that what they'd done to Loki could kill a mortal man more than a dozen times. He would have been surprised if they found the fallen god's body in one piece, much less pieces at all. Though, in his exhaustion and pain-killer induced haze, he felt pity for his comrade and his personal loss, if not the loss of the greatest adversary he'd met in battle.
As he tried to organize his thoughts into something vaguely sympathetic, Bruce watched as Thor dropped his hammer and began to step towards the water.
"Wait, what are you doing?" Leaning on the crutch he tried to hobble after Thor, sliding in the sand clumsily.
"I tire of this; I am not waiting any longer!" Thor yelled, pulling away his chest plate and cape before wading out into the sea, his injuries ignored over his concern for his brother. If the men of S.H.I.E.L.D. couldn't find Loki, then he would.
"If they can't find him with spotlights and divers, what are you going to be able to do, Thor?" Bruce shouted after him, not about to follow him into the water with his leg in the shape it was. He'd have called it a suicide mission with how rough the waves were, but he doubted Thor was putting himself into any real danger, physically anyway.
"I can find him!" Thor shouted back before diving under the dark water, kicking as hard as his pained body would allow as he swam against the tide to where his brother's body had fallen. He didn't care how much his muscles hurt, how the salt water stung at the open cuts, or that twenty yards out, he was already unable to see a thing, or know which direction he needed to go.
The only thing that mattered was another hundred yards away, and time counted more for him than it did for Thor at the moment.
Back on shore, Bruce had managed to make his way up to the makeshift medical tent where the other members of their team were either being tended to or recovering. He doubted there was anything any of them could do to stop Thor, he was already a good distance out at this point, but putting in a call to Fury was in order. They were already pulling one god out of the ocean, now a second had been thrown into the mix.
"What do you mean he's in the water? What the hell's he doing in there?" Fury yelled over the sounds of the helicopter, sounding as irritated as Tony looked. "Why didn't you stop him?"
"For one, my leg is broken, and secondly, do you think I could stop him like this? By the time I realized what he was doing, he was gone, he didn't give me enough time to get pissed off," Bruce snapped, feeling like he could accomplish getting pissed off quickly without an issue at the moment. "He's after his brother, he says he can find him. I don't know, maybe he can, I don't know every single thing he can do."
"If he could do that, find Loki whenever he wanted to, he would have said before, right? At some point, he would have said," Steve said, shaking his head.
"Agreed," Natasha said, wincing slightly as the last shards of broken glass were taken from her arm. "Or he would have dove into that water hours ago instead of just staring at it."
"Goddamn it…" Fury sighed, wishing the night would just end already. "Alright, we're sending a boat to get him, he better be easier to find than his damn brother."
Closing the connection with the crew in the medical tent, he sent a message over the radios to the recovery squad, notifying them of the second person in the water, and that he might not be as willing to leave it as the first.
Thor had no idea how long he'd been in the water, surfacing only when he needed to before plunging back into the frigid abyss. His body was weakened by the earlier battle, and unable to go without as oxygen as long as usual, every second underneath the water counted for more. He wasn't sure how deep he was swimming down, or how much area he was covering, all of the rocks felt the same under his frantic hands. All he could do was fumble blindly in the dark, begging his father for his hands to travel in the right direction, before he had to surrender to the needs of his own body and swim for the surface. Each time his head burst from the water, he wanted to scream in frustration as he drew in the air he needed, barely giving himself time to recuperate before diving down again.
He wasn't sure how many trips down he'd taken, his body exhausted as he moved through the darkness, numb fingers brushing across the rocks. He was vaguely aware of a light approaching him, though he didn't know how far it was or if the diver it belonged to even noticed him. He appreciated it, it was a directional point for him, and he knew which direction he was moving in. Though, as the light got closer, he found it both helpful and almost distracting, he wanted to look over at it, but he didn't have the time. He would need to head to the surface soon, and he had to finish this area before he would let himself.
As his lungs began to ache past the point he could ignore it, Thor finally tilted his head up towards the light, and in the split second between his eyes leaving the ocean floor, and his first kick to propel him upwards, he saw it. A pale hand, palm facing upwards, fingers curled, looking like a piece of a marble statue rather than one of flesh and bone. Thor's first instinct was to turn back, to push against the upward momentum and turn back for his brother, but the burning in his chest grew impossible to fight against. Loki was in the light now, the diver would see him, and if he didn't, Thor knew exactly where to look.
When he broke through the water, gasping desperately for air, he wasn't expecting to see the boat right beside him. The crew was standing ready to receive the body that had just been radioed in by the divers, and the swimmer that had been spotted trying to help.
"We have him, he's being brought up," one of the men called to Thor, shining his light at the ladder thrown over the side. "Orders are to bring you aboard, sir. The situations under control."
It was under their control he meant, a thought that Thor didn't like in the least. His brother's body should be with him, not with strangers who only viewed him as an oddity and an enemy. He'd wanted to find him first for more than the sake of finding him, he may have aligned with them, but he didn't trust S.H.I.E.L.D. with this. He remembered what they'd done around Mjolnir when it fell to Earth, he could only imagine what they had planned for Loki if he lived.
Climbing up the ladder, he stood back as ordered, his jaw clenched as he heard the voices of the men both on the boat and under the water as they discussed his brother as if he were a treasure. They spoke not of getting him to the surface as soon as possible, but of taking photographs, getting his staff and any items around him, and securing him. Nearly ten minutes had passed before the motor on the winch beside him began to spin, the wet rope flinging drops of water against his arm, though he barely noticed them through the anger and fear writhing inside of him.
"Ten feet…clear the deck…" one of the men called, spotlights on the ship's surface switching on to the area cleared for Loki's body. The agents on the ship drew their guns, standing ready to fire if there was any sign of a fight left in him. There was no one ready to help, no medics or physicians, and Thor had to wonder if they'd help Loki even if they could.
They wanted Loki dead, it was clear, though Thor would make it even clearer that he wouldn't let that happen if need be. He would dig down past the exhaustion and pain to find the might to take out every person on this boat if he had to.
Though the strength he had left him at the sight of Loki's body as he emerged from the water, dropped onto the deck with little care.
His armor had been removed underwater, stripped down to reveal his pale, bruised torso, the deep gashes bloodless without a strong heartbeat to pump it. Loki's arms had been twisted behind his back, locked metal cuffs bracing him from his wrist to his elbows, a similar set of restraints on his lower legs confining them together as well. Though it wasn't the wounds upon his brother's body that chilled Thor so deeply, nor the measures that had been taken to imprison him.
Loki's eyes were half open, glassy and dull, as if the sea had washed away the brilliant green he knew.
"Loki!" Thor called out, not recognizing his own voice as he moved towards his brother, dropping to his knees as he shoved past security, not caring about the consequences. "Brother, awaken, you are safe now. I am here, I am not going to let any harm come to you, but you have to wake. You have to let me know you are alright."
He felt a hand close on his shoulder to pull him away, his arm swinging out without hesitation to send the man flying backwards before turning back to his brother. He was vaguely aware of voices over the radio, though the words meant nothing to him as he pushed Loki's wet hair away from his brow, fingers tracing over a gash across his temple.
"You of all people can survive this, you are stronger than anyone ever gave you credit for, myself included," Thor said, almost begging, his hands and voice shaking. "It took seven of us to best your one, Loki, you can beat death now. Please, I can't be the one who sent you to your death, Loki…brother, please…"
As Thor broke down, he pulled his brother close, resting his forehead against his still chest as he wept out his anger and heartbreak. He hated himself in that moment, that he was part of his little brother's demise, a large part of it based on how hard he'd fought. Though now he had nothing but regret in his heart, not caring any longer for Midgard and it's people, not when it had cost him Loki.
He was unaware that the boat had docked, his energy focused on Loki, looking for any small sign that he was still with them. Any movement, a pulse, the return of life to his glazed eyes, he was desperate for a trace of hope that his brother would return to him. As Fury boarded the ship, his heavy footsteps slowing as he approached the two gods, his men poised and ready behind him if either were to lash out.
"Thor…stand back…" Fury said, wishing he hadn't volunteered to be the one to separate them. He'd dealt with one unhinged god today, now he was standing before another, asking him to do what he obviously did not want to do.
"You will not take him from me…" Thor's growled, pulling Loki closer, wanting to rip the metal cuffs from his arms, though he wouldn't risk further injury to his brother. "He is my brother, and I will not stand back and let you take him. He is a prince of Asgard and you confine him like a wild animal, I will not have this!"
"He's dangerous, and I'm sorry, but it is obvious you can't contain him. If he's alive and he recovers, what is to stop him from attempting this again, but getting it right this time?" Fury argued, crouching down to look Thor in the eye. "You can't control him, Thor. He needs to be detained."
Thor wanted scream and lash out at everyone around him. He could summon Mjolnir from the beach, and before anyone knew it, he and his brother would be gone. To where, though, who would shelter them? And what would he do if Fury were right; did he have it in him to attempt to take down his brother a second time? Could he begin to?
"…I can make arrangements for you to stay with him, that's the best I can do," Fury said, his tone gentler, hoping to calm Thor rather than risk making this situation a whole lot worse. "You're going to have to play by our rules, but you can be there."
Turning his eyes down from Fury to Loki, Thor's hand moved to run through Loki's hair again, his thumb brushing the deep cut on his brow, his heart stopping at the trace of red on his skin. There was more in the wound, slowly welling, a small rivulet trickling from the corner of the cut towards his eye.
"…I accept," Thor said softly as he wiped the blood away.