Bruce and Natasha had been at the hospital with Tony for what felt like lifetimes. Pepper was in a coma; and, though Tony knew it'd be a permanent coma if she was lucky, he still refused to leave his old friend's side.
Natasha had parked down an alley from the hospital, and Bruce had come in Tony's car, but both needed to go home, and to see about bringing some of Tony's home to him while he camped out there.
Neither of them really expected what came next, but neither of them expected nothing to happen.
Cap was standing in his uniform at the mouth of the alley, his shield glinting in the diffuse light. "Steve, no. Please, no…" Bruce breathed, seeing the blood on the rim of the shield, "Tell me you're not the one that killed that agent today…"
Natasha stepped in front of Bruce, always armed and dangerous, "You betrayed us." She growled, her crimson waves flopped over into her eyes, "You're breaking Tony, you selfish bastard. You two...You made me believe that maybe love was real and it could really make you stronger."
"Power makes you stronger, Natasha, but you already know that." Cap said coolly, sickeningly, oil-and-honey in his tone.
"You've killed Pepper; you've turned your back on us!" Natasha hissed, as if the anger were turning her into something almost inhuman. Behind her, Bruce felt it begin to tug at him. "You could've come back to us, Cap! Tony could have forgiven you!"
"I'm not the one that should seek atonement!" Cap bellowed, taking a step towards them.
Hot, acidic tears that hadn't fallen since she'd been orphaned and abandoned and alone, left to become something other than what she was meant to be as a six-year-old, fell down her cheeks, made her breathing difficult. "We were a family!"
"Ah, poor little orphan girl." Cap sneered, and Bruce broke.
The Hulk roared down the alleyway, dropping Natasha aside and barrelling down towards Cap.
Natasha opened her mouth to scream at Hulk to stop, but it was too late. The Hulk's mighty fist closed around vapor that should have been Cap's waist, and the magic took hold of him. Natasha pushed herself to her feet, limp and struggling, sniffling and helpless. The real Captain America appeared from the shadows as if they'd become a part of him. "You...you should've...come home…"
Steve's brilliantly blue eyes were the cold, lifeless eyes of the perfect soldier. Natasha got in three half-hearted blows before Cap had reached for her neck in a grip that snapped her spine in his hand.
Cap turned his eyes to watch his more human counterpart's friend get zapped and run through, chained and taken away by the Trickster's magic, left for dead somewhere between galaxies, where no one would ever even know he'd existed. Cap almost felt bad he couldn't give Tony a body to bury; Steve Rogers screamed somewhere behind the strangle vines that had started to block him off in his mind.
Tony sighed, closing his aching eyes in his aching head and trying to block out the sound of the neon buzz. "I don't know what to do, Pepper. Steve asked me to trust him, and I do, but...I don't know if I should. Pepper, I know that I shouldn't…" Tony was in tears again, like he hadn't done enough of that lately, "it was supposed to save lives, Pepper, I swear it was. He and I...we were meant to save the world together, I could feel it...How did this even happen?" Tony looked at the pale, waif-like woman who'd saved his ass in so many ways, "Yeah...yeah, I know how it happened. I happened. I ruined him. I ruin everything. I know." Tony turned his head, looking briefly out at the skyline he'd seen a thousand times before. "I ruined you. I ruined Steve...everything I love gets taken from me, but I think it's more like everything I love leaves before I can taint it any further. God, what good am I?" Tony's fingers fit around the edges of the arc reactor, his eyes distant.
Tony let out a sniff, dashing the tears from his eyes as he came to the sound of his phone going off madly from his pocket.
"Tony, get down here. There's a black hole opened up about a block from where you are."
"I'm on my way."
Seeing Natasha's body was bad enough: seeing the Hulk-sized hole in time-space made Tony want to scream in agony.
Thor and Tony sealed the rift shut quickly, but half the alley was simply gone. "THIS...THIS WAS MY BROTHER'S DOING." Thor announced, but Tony shook his head, walking to carefully pick up Black Widow from where she'd been dropped in a heap to the ground.
"No; this is Captain America's doing, too."
Never had Tony been more intimidated by the Norse god, but Thor's wrath was directed at Steve for having betrayed him; for having betrayed, now, all of them. Thunder crashed down on them, and Tony turned his face up to the rain, trying to wash away the actual hurt in his heart.
"It was meant to be a ruse. Steve was meant to break my heart and leave us all, outcasting himself like Loki did, trying to get in good with him so that he could figure out a way to permanently take him down. We couldn't talk about it with anyone; we knew that Loki would be watching as much as he could, and, honestly, your performances couldn't be faked. We all loved Cap too much to put ourselves behind casting him out-"
"Then how did you?" Clint demanded, harsh and furiously angry.
"Because I wasn't expected to, not fully. It wouldn't matter how much he hurt me, I'd forgive him for it. I knew I would the moment I woke up broken in that hospital bed and the only thing I could think was 'thank god it was me and not him'. I knew what Loki would be playing at; I figured it out that he'd be trying to kill us with each other. If something had happened to Cap, I would have been a complete waste; wrecked beyond repair. I would've been unbelievably easy to take out, or he simply would've let me do it myself."
Clint, Coulson, and Thor were all silent for a moment, and then every muscle in Thor's body locked down, "JANE!"
The remaining three Avengers and their handler ran out of the safe-room Thor had locked down for them to talk privately in, and left it blaringly open for Loki to slip into.
The demi-god smirked to himself, but the sounds of a real fight stopped him short.
Cap was taking out Clint, heedless of Coulson shooting at him.
Tony Stark stood there, frozen, watching as some monster he refused to believe was Steve murder their friends, helpless to do anything about it. Cap's eyes met Tony's, and, as if sensing that Cap was going to make Tony snap once and for all, Thor wound up and swung, his hammer carrying Cap through the balcony.
Coulson was on his knees, trying to stop the bleeding from Clint's chest, and Tony fell the ground, limp and catatonic.
What had he done?
"YOUR PLAN WAS A WORTHY ONE, MAN OF IRON, BUT MY BROTHER IS TOO SNAKELIKE AND CORRUPTIVE. EVEN STEVEN COULD NOT RESIST HIS TEMPTATIONS."
"Thor, Tony's not...with us...right now." Coulson said heavily, trying to rub blood off his hands that wasn't even there anymore.
Coulson's whole body was shaking. He didn't blame Tony exactly, but the wrongness of this entire situation was pressing on his chest and taking away his option to breathe. "SON OF COUL, YOU APPEAR UNWELL."
Phil took a shaky step backwards, and knew what was happening to him. Coulson reached for his heart, groaning. Coulson stumbled and fell, Thor reaching for him, but too late. He was having a heart attack, and he knew that he wouldn't live through this one. Not with the sting in the centre of a larger ache where Steve had punched him.
Coulson died staring past the catatonic face of Tony Stark, eyes resting on the archer that had been enough to break his heart.
Thor turned to Tony with enraged tears in his eyes. His brother had done enough. Too much. He'd torn apart Thor's family, and he'd torn apart the family Thor had made himself on Earth. "MY BROTHER WILL PAY FOR THE CRIMES HE HAS COMMITTED AGAINST US. HE HAS MADE THE GOOD CAPTAIN A FOE, AND HE HAS CAUSED HEARTBREAK AND DEATH AMONGST US. I SWEAR TO YOU, MAN OF IRON, YOUR LOVER WILL BE AVENGED. WE ALL SHALL BE."
Thor left the genius trapped in his own mind, two dead bodies of their friends to keep him company as he drove himself over the edge and into a hopeless oblivion.
What had he done?
"How does it feel to kill the people who were meant to love you?" Loki hissed, smiling at Cap as they watched Tony lose his mind.
"Natasha's death left them vulnerable; Bruce's left them almost-defenseless; Clint and Coulson were both almost mercy killings, they weren't a threat with the others gone. But it's left Tony where we wanted him."
"And my brother enraged enough to be almost too easy to defeat. You played your part well, Captain, but our arrangement has not been completed yet. First, you take down my brother; then you put the Iron Man out of his misery. Then I shall rebuild this world."
"Your magic...it will give me the world I want?"
"You kill my brother, and my magic will give you everything you want."
"And how am I to kill a god?"
Loki smiled, leading Cap into the shadows, whipping back a shroud from the dias, "With a weapon made to kill gods."
I had to get this out because I was getting a lot of confusion: I hope this clears some of it up.
Also, I hope none of you hate me.
Thor and Tony's bits may be drawn out into individual chapters, or they may not be, I haven't decided yet.