I just want to first thank so much to Redgrave, Britt601, ena, DarkFay, Mrs. Marple Poirot, Guest, Queen Amaryllis Kay, mfaerie32, Ribke D'Crazy, CrazedLoki, XLil MEkoX, guminola, Lokigurl, miemae04, Joy915, Lokabrenna, thephoenixandthedragon4ever, IloveStBerry, Night Companion, analise17 and ProperEnglish for all your wonderful reviews! I could not have continued without any of you! Your reviews mean so much to me and they bring out the spring in my motivation. Please don't abandon me, I would be so sad to stop writing this, but I need all the help I can get from all of you. Also thanks to everyone for just reading, favoriting and all sorts, you give me the will to keep going. And if you stay with me, I will do my utmost best to finish this!

CH6 – May the mortal throw something

What on Midgard? Thor peered perplexed upon the wood and metal stick that had been dropped to the ground after he had slugged a human across his face with utter satisfaction, wondering what use these puny things were that humans seemed to have donned as some kind of weapons. The staff-like object possessed neither a good bulk for smashing, nor a sharp edge for slicing, and surely trying to throw such an unbalanced clunky thing would ensure more of a hit on the surrounding scenery or even the outer space rather than on the intended opponent.

In the meantime, the Midgardians seemed to have decided to flood the place with lights that could have blinded a sightless burrowing creature of Vanaheim, as if it had not been lit up enough already, and the loud, piercing sound that was coming out of a peculiar unmoving bell would no doubt be heard on Asgard in a hundred years' time.

He should make haste to reintroduce himself to Mjolnir and then smash this little human festival of unworthy wannabes in the strangest plastic-looking costumes he had ever seen back to where they came from. How dared they, and how absurd! Did they not know that only he was worthy of the hammer? Did they not realize that no other was mightier than he? A sudden but unsurprising urge to throw something truly overwhelmed Thor at that very moment and the enraged brute grabbed hold of the said pitiful stick laying on the muddy ground. Hidden behind a vehicle taller than he, Thor flipped the rifle in the air like a toothpick Volstagg would have used to clean his teeth after a great feast and hurled it at the offending metal transport that was trying to burn off his suntan by shining the brightest of lights right into his arrogantly grinning face.

A deep, satisfied, rock-cracking chuckle escaped past Thor's curling lips as the metal part of the stick actually and against all nature managed to smash straight into the spotlight, instantly neutralizing the cosmic stream of blinding particles coming out of it, glass and debris flying into the raging night.

"Ah, so throwing works", Thor appraised the precariously well rotating stick out loud with an impressed shine that danced like the flicker of the brightest stars in his eyes. He could start to smell the power of Mjolnir that charged the surrounding air just as a mighty bolt of lightning cracked through the blackened sky.

"Well, you would think that everything is made for throwing," Loki's sarcasm appeared right next to Thor, aloof expression gracing Loki's face, his fingers clasped nonchalantly together behind his back.

Loki had thought it wise to render himself invisible except to Thor to safeguard his hard-earned image for a number of reasons he could not be bothered to count. Well, for instance, fighting with Thor in his delusional human capacity could not have yielded anything spectacular, it was becoming rather muddy and hence unsatisfactorily unpleasant, and not last, the obtainability of Mjolnir still begged some conviction. Truthfully, yes, Loki could easily feel himself worthy of its power but he might as easily not. And should the latter transpire, as he was not as naïve and narrow-minded as his eager to be led to a hopeless situation brother, no one would be able to see his failure this way, be it this bunch of too nosy for their own good mortals or the supernaturally nosy for Loki's own good Heimdall.

And Loki wasn't delusional in the slightest not to expect that Heimdall's galactic eye knew everything they got up to, and hence that the king the enigmatic gatekeeper was sworn to obey and spy for would also know. And no doubt at all, the Allfather would have been excessively proud to see his two only heirs running around Midgard like two starving Asgardian goats chasing after a prized whimsical cabbage that was in fact coated in gold and hence completely inedible. Rightly, Loki could just picture Odin bursting into an unstoppable laughter at their pitiful efforts, yet then again, since when did the Allfather actually ever laugh? Perhaps Loki could throw in a few amusing moments to prolong his father's diminishing health? After all, father needed to loosen up a little after all that effort he had expended to banish them both across so many galaxies.

"Of course, Loki. How else is the next king of Asgard meant to fight?" Thor appeared so impressed with his throw, he could have flown out of there even without the help of Mjolnir.

"With cunning, magic and knives, would be my best guess," Loki said matter-of-factly, rocking on his otherwise invisibly rendered feet.

It took a while for the jibe to settle in Thor's obstructed mind, but the frozen, smiling stare Loki was belatedly adorned with was truly priceless, as if all the delusion had darted away from Thor like his precious hammer and the gift of lucid deduction has finally settled in its place. For all three seconds.

Thor gave a contemptuous laugh in his booming voice. "Indeed, dear brother, I do appreciate your continuous motivation for me to best you in all the ways I can," Thor expanded his chest, making himself even taller than the enormous six and a half feet he already was. Hence, still very much delusional.

"And how do you intend to best me exactly? Do you propose to fight the remaining hundred or so humans by flinging their own firearms into their faces? And would that be one by one or all at once?" Loki leaned an inch closer to Thor, interested to hear his big master plan.

"Truth be told, besting you is as easy a feat as convincing Volstagg to eat food at a feast. If you must know, I will simply walk into that tunnel over there which will lead me all the way to Mjolnir. And what of you, brother? Perhaps you had in mind scaring all the humans to death with your invisible little knives?"

Instead of rolling his eyes, royally, Loki decided to go for an irritated squeeze of his lips for a change. Enough was enough. He was about to retort with a very much educational repartee, when his eyes wandered to the car that Thor had maimed with his mighty throw, the said vehicle now speeding downwards uncontrollably as it had bounced off the crater's edge, now on a trajectory towards the web-like structure built around the mythical hammer.

The mortal Gods both watched as the ex-light bearing transport veered off its high-speed path after its driver had jumped out of the out of control car, causing it to hammer it down straight past a generous group of heavily armed humans who stood near a part of the tube exposed to the night.

The guarding men stared ahead sternly in trained apathy which promptly transformed to disbelief as they followed the car with their eyes before panicked expressions sprouted on their faces as realization seemed to have hit home. Faster than Fandral rushing to a pretty lady they abandoned their posts to give chase to the runaway human transport as if they could stop it from smashing right into the structure and shower the place with colourful sparks like cheerful bifrost on a vacation. Ah, too late.

"See? I told you I would simply walk inside…" Thor bragged as he commenced marching out from behind the cover of the roofless jeep towards the now unguarded entrance and instantly gained the ability of a backward flight when he got hit hard by a fast driven transport that zoomed it past from the other side.

"You were saying?" Loki bent down to observe Thor flailing on the muddy ground a few mighty paces away from him, seemingly having lost the bearing as to what was up and what was down.

"Jane?!" Thor billowed out in his thunder resembling voice just as a real thunder cracked the sky in half as if to amplify his angered state.

"No. Strangely, not this time," Loki deduced calmly from the way the car had turned around so swiftly and accurately, hence the driver was highly trained and skilled in driving, and therefore definitely not Jane. Well, at least there was still hope for the human race after all, if they were not destined to exterminate each other with bad driving.

There was not much hope left for Thor however as he was still very much dazedly stumbling on the spot as if he had just wandered off at the end of an Asgardian party, which was never anywhere close to sober, and shot himself accidentally off to a deserted realm, loudly pondering where in the cosmos he was and where his hammer got to…

And…Thor did not disappoint. "Hammer?! Hammer?!" The big guy demanded louder than Volstagg's belch to the pouring wet heavens, no attention paid to the large beast of a car that had him now in its sparkling bright sights, readying to rush out at his stupefied oaf of a giant brother and whisk him to the happy and pretentious glory of Valhalla.

Loki sighed, hard. This was one of those not so uncommon moments where he would save the day and yet again no one would see anything at all. Perhaps he should be resorting to less magic after all? But what would be the fun in that? Indeed, it would have been more entertaining to see Thor learn his faults the hard way, yet the mere thought of his annoyance of a dearest brother dead sent a shiver much colder than the winds of Jotunheim down Loki's invisible spine. And just like Jotunheim itself, that was a cold he was not prepared to endure.

So reserving changing his mind for another time, Loki teleported himself right next to the human driver and seated himself in the empty passenger seat, another story of his life and the more reason for a much needed sanity boosting entertainment. After all, boredom was just as bad as ignorance since both had the great tendency to produce something absurdly stupid. Only Loki was the master of conquering boredom and denying ignorance, and therefore if he had ever done anything stupid which was rather rare, it was usually from some form of inexplicable manifestation of destructive feelings…like those for his amazingly still alive and breathing brother.

So, holding that thought, Loki leaned close to the man's face. The mortal henchman was so concentrated on running down Thor with his instrument scarily too similar to Jane's, startling the guy was going to be a child's play. If only the human didn't smell so badly from some kind of a nose-wrinkle-worthy smoke, as if he had rolled himself in Svartalfheimien puddle of tar and afterwards set himself on fire, for some reason actually inexplicably surviving. Well, at least this would not take too long…

"I do hope this doesn't run on gas as I truly don't enjoy exploding," Loki breathed like a ghost into the human's ear, enjoying the view of the man's universally baffled face that snapped to the space next to him occupied by nothing.

The guy did not even finish swearing to Helheim before he swerved the thing on four wheels and managed to overturn it on its side, missing Thor by the short length of Mjolnir's handle before colliding it with the maze of tunnels on the opposite side of the first collision for a good balance.

Loki, of course, was already back beside Thor, admiring how his brother snapped back into a battle stance, looking for something to throw upon hearing the explosion and the salve of sparks that the second crash had created.

"Here, would this help?" Loki asked Thor simply as he handed him no less than Mjolnir itself.

Truth be told, Loki had expected some interesting face on Thor at that very moment, but the wicked smile that sprung up amongst the blonde stubble was so sizeable, it would dazzle the ice right off a gigantic Jotunheim beast in hibernation.

"Is this…is it what I think it is…?" Thor held it in front of him in utter disbelief, straining hard not to kiss it.

"Well, evidently it decided to finally silence all that excessive noise you were making earlier. After all, only you are truly worthy with a voice as mighty as yours." Loki commended Thor with a small pat on the shoulder, his hidden smirk of pure pleasurable satisfaction could scare the whole race of dark elves back into their underground caves.

Thor though suddenly did not look so enthusiastic anymore. "You held it."

Damn. "Did I?"

"Loki! I am going to make you sit on your own helmet once I have the real hammer!" Thor bellowed out in a pent up longing for his massive tool of destruction, throwing the fake hammer at Loki who had meantime backed away in a scarily instinctual sense of self-preservation. The thrown not-Mjolnir held some promise of actually flying for a very short momentum, before it plopped to the mud unceremoniously a foot short of Loki's booted foot.

"Much more delightful than sitting on yours and being tickled to death by feathers," Loki grinned sincerely.

Thor was about to throw back something insulting instead of physical this time, but hammer throwing hijacked his thoughts way too much, causing him to contemplate on the fact that hammer throwing was not as easy as it should be anymore, and hence he should do something about it fast. Speaking of which, why did Mjolnir not come to him? He better go and remind it who he was.

"The handle was even shorter than usual. It threw my throw off balance," Thor quickly assured himself as an excuse in guise of his mildly felt embarrassment.

"If you say so," Loki mouthed amusedly after the big guy, watching as Thor sprinted in a sudden hurry towards the tunnel's entrance that was now completely devoid of human presence, the said humans busy attending to the two crashes that had ripped new decorative holes in their intricate palace of plastic tubing. Speaking of a palace, truly, their sense of aesthetic appeal was rather appalling. What passed for a structure anyone was supposed to live in even for the shortest of times would send even Asgardian rats out screaming. Have they never heard of gold?

And perhaps it sent the humans out screaming as well, as two of them just happened to do that, two big, mean as Helheim guards who rounded the corner utilizing the same time and speed as Thor, causing nearly an astronomical collision with a bone-shattering force like three hormone driven Bilchsteim fighting for a female in heat.

Loki could literally hear the pain-inducing thud that made him shudder inwardly at the agony Thor surely must have been experiencing, the rolling and blinking of his brother's blue eyes a clear indication of his deep but temporary discomfort.

Yet it wouldn't be his bull-headed brother if that didn't in fact charge him up for more. No, his brother had no sense at all, always letting a hammer make all his decisions, and in the absence of a hammer, there was a thundering cloud of testosterone to take up its place.

So, Thor, his head still thudding from the impact, gave out a suitable war cry prior to him smashing his own forehead against those of the two large human men, no doubt thinking that there was no room for more maleness in that constricted plastic definition of inadequacy apart from his own.

And as it goes, to Loki's continuous mild grievance, it worked. Having successfully head-butted them to the ground Thor then charged through the worm-like corridor like the victorious Bilchsteim eager to claim its prize, mowing down, tackling and punching humans of all shapes and sizes, left and right. There was nothing that would stop him, nothing at all, not until he got to the centre of this maze of the mortals and reclaimed what he insisted was his by his own right.

If only this damned human form was not slowing him down! Thor began to feel fatigue and muscle wear he had not felt before, and all that after taking down only about twenty five men! He was truly getting annoyed with this inhuman intolerability, not to mention the added nuisance of his brother who had been trailing after him as if he was on an evening stroll through their mother's freshly manicured gardens, without landing a single hit on anything, only providing an unwelcomed verbal commentary on Thor's valiant efforts and thus serving to fuel his close to erupting storm of all frustrations and impatient irritation.

And it finally erupted…

Thor snapped his head to Loki, his sizeable body following fast in an impressive one eighty turn. The tentatively dumbfounded look on Loki's face at that very moment was ever so nearly consoling. But not near enough.

"Brother! Should you feel the need for usefulness, either stop this nonsense or become an Yggdrasil and leaf!"

Loki stood there with an unreadable expression for a short moment before unperturbed he gestured somewhere behind Thor. "You might want to…"

"What now!" Thor exhaled exasperatedly, then realized his tiny omission and swiftly like a very large whirl of wind dodged the guard who was coming at him from behind like a giant stony beast, causing the guy to instead smash into Loki, leaving the God of All-things-annoying and the human beast to reel to the ground in a tangled, half-invisible heap of merino wool and S.H.I.E.L.D.'s armoured Kevlar.

The bulky, ape-like agent blinked a few times, trying to figure out what exactly he had smashed into when his intended target was still standing behind him, instead grabbing something scarily soft and unnaturally cushy in his hand. The agent's face scrunched in rage at this violating degradation of his tough-guy status and started to punch at the imaginary softness that presented itself in the empty air in front of him.

Thor, on the other hand, felt suddenly so much better. Laughing came so naturally at seeing Loki's utter surprise when the ugly man's big fist landed square in his perfect face and began to redecorate his up to now perfectly maintained visage. He would even let Loki hold Mjolnir with the help of Thor's hand for whole five seconds to see that look on him again.

Thor's openly rendered show of mockery though was more than enough for Loki to rapidly recover. In fact, the dark prince had never felt more like sending Thor's face beyond the current expanse of cosmos for some ice field exfoliation than at that very moment.

Magic power streaming into his body on its own volition, Loki arched himself back and kicked up a wave of air at the exuberantly violent man who was still trying hard to remould his face, sending him flying out through the roof of the plastic tunnel and close but no way far enough into space. He then instantly leapt for Thor and tackled him to the metal walkway, holding his hands to Thor's sizeable neck, all quaking and ready to squeeze out some arrogant air.

"I have been no other than supportive, understanding and patient with you ever since you had us landed in this ridiculous folly, or in fact ever since I was born. But you, you take nothing seriously, you see nothing and you learn nothing. All you want is your precious hammer and the throne and you don't care who suffers whilst you get what you want!" Loki could not believe the words of actual sincerity coming from his mouth for once but it was as if some magic door opened and it all came pouring out.

He had lived obediently in Thor's too large to fill shadow and he had been content enough to do so, yet for some reason in this particular moment it had become too long since he had waited for some acknowledgement, a nod or even a little thank you from Thor. Perhaps it had been the sudden disappointing possibility that things could have soon go back to where they were without any change or the fact that they were in each other's sole company for longer than was healthy. But the true reason did not really matter as what needed to be said had now been said and it was too late to think of a plan to avoid the consequences.

"This is not the time to be resolving two thousand years of pent-up slights," Thor sent Loki's hair flying with his naturally booming voice as he grabbed hold of Loki's wrists and flipped him over onto his back.

"This is as good time as any!" Loki protested ever so louder as well, trying in vain to kick Thor off, his magical energy temporarily depleted.

"Not when Mjolnir is so close to my reach!" Thor tried to knock some sense into Loki by pounding his shoulders into the floor, deciding to go for his face when it wasn't working.

"Precisely my point!" Loki would have resorted to displaying a fully angered face as Thor had not listened to a word he had said, for the umpteenth time, but his face was now being squashed down into the floor and so he couldn't.

"You always envied me my hammer! And don't think I don't know you were behind its shortened handle!" The punch Thor delivered across Loki's jaw only resulted in a knee shoved hard into his gut.

"Evidently, I should have made it much shorter! In fact, my disappointment that it was still fit for throwing was endlessly boundless!"

Thor gave a light, cocky chuckle whilst fending off Loki's elbow that had a near rendezvous with his stubbly cheek. "You forget that I can throw anything, no matter how short the handle," Thor's hard voice dropped to a boomingly amused tone, though his heart now thumped wildly with all that fighting and potentially, though deniably, from the fact that for the first time, his brother's words might have actually struck some chord inside of him he didn't know he had. Too bad that it made him even madder.

"Have you not ever considered that perhaps that might be your biggest flaw?" Loki gave him a doubtful look as he too ceased his efforts to kick the mighty hammer out of Thor, metaphorically.

"What. Throwing? No," Thor said confidently, back to grinning off his sparkling teeth. ""I never considered it," he added full-heartedly and truthfully.

Loki sighed. Hard. He would see the Allfather grinning like a goblin and skipping ropes together with his ravens on his golden throne before Thor would change. Therefore Loki's destiny was to forever creep in the shadow of a hammer-wielding idiot, an incarnation of an arrogant knucklehead, and fix his blunders with no appreciation for his esoteric heroic deeds. Luck was never Loki's best quality. But he would as Helheim make up for it with trying.

"Not all can be simply thrown and you certainly cannot throw all your faults away!" Loki snapped at Thor, attempting to flip his way too heavy brother off of him.

"Oh, really? I can even throw you and you have no handles at all!"

"Oh, do try!" Loki's eyes begged him, daringly.

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"What's happening now?" Coulson, the high-ranking agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. in a perfectly ironed suit, had meantime abandoned his station by the haywire monitors, and headed towards the tunnels, talking on the radio to agent Barton.

Barton shifted one eye from the scope, all perched above the suspected extra-terrestrial find like a hawk with a high-powered rifle aimed at the brawny maniac who had been skilfully dispatching the entire populace of the not anymore secret establishment.

"He's…now fighting with himself, sir," the agent announced deadpan, his voice politely formal.

"And why on earth would he do that?" Coulson enquired, somewhat puzzled.

"My guess would be that he run out of other guys to fight with, sir," Barton concluded informatively, his voice as steady as the unmovable alien object sparking up electricity below him.

Coulson stared at the radio at that for a while before replying. "Then, should I send him some more?"

"To beat up? Great plan, sir."

"Thank you. But…in case we have no one else, do you have a clear shot?" Coulson wanted to check but only a crackling of static came back from the radio in response.

"Barton? Agent Barton?! Do you copy?"

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Well, this was rather unexpected. Thor was still undoubtingly strong, but how was this possible? Loki pondered wonderingly whether he could in fact land back on Asgard as he had found himself flying up high, looking back down at Thor's face that was smug with a very much annoying 'I told you so' satisfaction. Yes, Loki's saving grace at that very moment was the pure thought of leaving his brute of a brother stranded on Midgard whist he'd float endlessly through space which was eons more appealing than watching Thor gloat about his greatly overrated, short-handled, extremely fastidious hammer yet again.

But it was not to be as Loki's ponderous moment was cut short and instead his entire body was slammed against something still decidedly on Midgard, from the human-like swearing his hard-felt landing had received in turn. Perhaps he could throw the said something back at Thor to teach his brother that the art of throwing could go both ways?

But when Loki turned his hurting head to have a look at what he had hit, after doing a now much practiced healing number on his bruised insides for what felt like the millionth time on this planet, he had gotten a much more interesting idea…

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That was weird.

He as Hell didn't see that one coming at all. In fact, he was still seeing nothing as he looked up at the now empty nest he had been so inexplicably thrown out of. Dangling down with one hand clutching his rifle at the ready and pointed at the nothing that had hit him, the other hand's fingers wrapped around the edge of the crane's frame to hold on, Barton speculated with the knowledge of his extensive training what could have dislodged him off his impeccable balance.

After some consideration that had nothing to do with actual science he was satisfied to deduce that it was most likely some magnetic flare shot out of that weird as Hell sledgehammer stuck in that piece of stinking space rock down below. The weird hammer was probably complaining that its handle got hacked in half in the undoubtedly very impactful fall from outer space.

Well, what else could it have been? He would never lose balance on his own and he'd certainly not get knocked out by some stupid storm that was raging so unimpressively all around them. No doubt the scientific idiots at S.H.I.E.L.D. had no idea what they were doing as it had been the norm and poked at that thing one time too many with something they definitely shouldn't. To be honest, they might as well have brought tweezers to try and lift that thing as all those instruments they had beeping at the thing sure weren't doing any good either.

They always messed around with all things strange and alien, causing stuff to explode or turn already mildly mutated people into some psychos in dire need of a life-long therapy, and they called themselves the S.H.I.E.L.D? Like darn Hell, he was the S.H.I.E.L.D's shield! Keeping a keen eye on anything that could possibly mess up their spare of the moment guess work; maniacs, the said turned psychos and mutants or the stuff that was exploding, name the lot. And he had been expertly putting a short end to all those threats while all they did was…cause him to lose his balance. He never lost balance! Dammit!

Barton completed his mental rant in a record time of about three seconds before he assured himself that there was indeed no one there and pulled himself back into his eagle's nest with one muscular arm, when he froze in a sudden feeling of sheer panic that he was missing something, something incredibly important…

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Thor looked back down from Loki's unimpressed eyes, unable to be happier at his impressive throw of his tall, not what one could call light or easily handled brother.

"And now, I am going to get Mjolnir," the God of Thunder exuded his old self-assurance as if their fight had never happened. After all, how could his proud, royal upbringing ever admit that he could possibly be the one at fault?

He turned around to finally take a step towards the proof of his ultimate brilliance and power, almost ready to reach out and grab it with his eyes burning, when a giant fist landed across his jaw and sent him reeling to the floor. Splayed out on his back and seeing Loki's face spinning high above him, Thor could not deny the very strong need to smash the face in of whoever had the audacity to keep him away from regaining the right to his ultimate might.

After all, what more did he have to prove? What had the Allfather in mind for him to do or learn? Surely he had shown already that he was worthy, and that he could fight even without the help of a mythical weapon and punch these humans endlessly as if Mjolnir had lived in his hand itself? Was it not enough? How many more mortals did he yet have to humiliate and ridicule to prove to father once and for all that he was the mightiest of them all?

Or was this the final test set upon him, no doubt the most challenging last opponent who stood between him and the ready to be reclaimed power of Thor?

"You are big," Thor admitted with a huge smile tugging at his sculpted lips whilst he sat up and stared the biggest human he had seen right in the eye. So this was supposed to be the final trial of his ultimate worth? How laughable. This was going to be a walk in Vanaheim's green forest that had been trimmed daily and paved for the elderly Vanir too frail to afford the smallest misstep, Thor thought arrogantly as he grinned up at the human giant.

"Fought bigger," the blonde God did not omit to boast as he was already tasting victory on his slightly torn lower lip. He slowly wiped the blood from his mouth without a single flinch before he sprung up and tackled the guy faster than either of them could blink, the combined weight of them crashing them through the tunnel wall like it was a sheet of paper and right into the lashing rain and muddy slope outside.

"This will not take long," Thor said cockily to the silent giant as he skidded down the slope with mud across his face, his smile appearing like he had just eaten an Asgardian mutton stew whilst omitting to flush it down with a tankard of ale.

The God of Lightning thought he was going to be fast when he planned to ram his feet into the guy's chest while he had the up-the-hill advantage, but to his surprise, the huge mortal bent down in front of him with an unexpected speed, causing Thor instead to jump on the man's substantial back and skid down it like a Frost Giant on a sled.

Angered at his failure and landing with his Godly backside an inch deep in the mud, Thor whipped around in an instant with rain and droplets of blood detaching from his dirty face, the impetuous smirk he could imagine on Loki at that very moment driving his sense of righteous brutality insane. He would not be defeated by a mere human. He would not be defeated by anyone, especially not when his brother and his father were watching from up high, one with unreserved enjoyment and the other with reserved disappointment.

"All right, maybe a little longer," Thor growled in a low rumble at the overgrown agent before he stood up from the ground, the rain and mud pouring down in ribbons from his dirtied face and long, messed up hair. In that one momentous moment he recalled all the tireless training he had ever done, all the glorious battles he had fought and all the strategic wisdom his father had ever drilled into him as he stood there in the rain, with aching muscles and heavy breath, in front of the giant human who would have one day gone to Valhalla for he was a warrior worthy of such a great honour.

He'd have to be cunning, and fast, and exercise the best moves and tactics he had ever done and learned, but then again, that would take way too long. Thor gave his trademark grin of pure, unadulterated cockiness as he stepped forth to the huge man and punched him with all he had into his lower gut.

There, who needed millennia of training and advice when simplicity won every time? Now he truly hoped that Loki and Odin had been both observing closely and learnt something from Thor's highly effective ways. Staggering in the mud from the mighty punch, Thor watched with a triumphant shine on his face as the giant toppled to the ground and wasn't coming back up again.

"I told you it wouldn't take long." Thor looked up at the sky victoriously, whipping his head ostentatiously to shake off the excess water from his hair, then afforded a smug glance towards Loki who somewhat inexplicably sat grinning instead of staring sulkily in the face of Thor's triumph, high above in…what was that thing? It appeared in likeness to a trash basket for catching whatever refuse fell from outer space and it happened to catch his brother. Now, wasn't that quite fitting?

Excitement gripping his insides at his unchallenged might, ready to do war with the entire universe if he truly had to, and to shove his victory in Loki's annoyingly smug face, the big guy turned to the outer plastic wall that surrounded the central cube and ripped it open with his bare hands. Thor stepped inside to finally stand face to face with the only thing he thought made him who he was, electric currents swirling in greeting through his veins. He felt the power rise from Mjolnir at his Godly approach, the runes flaring up on the sacred metal of Uru with bright lights of gold and silver, beckoning to Thor with powerful lightning summoned from the churning skies above.

Absolute certainty of the final moment of his unbecoming mortality accompanied Thor's slow approach to reclaiming his birth right, his bulging arm arching to grip the handle, tingles of raw energy slipping into the tips of his strong as bull fingers.

Thor closed his eyes in anticipation and lifted his chin for this historical moment, letting his large hand wrap itself around the object of his wildest dreams and desires…an object made of…soft cotton!?

Lokiiii! Thor's eyes snapped open in a wide arrangement of blue and white and in an instant landed with a mortified refusal on what his hand was actually gripping.

His hand let go so fast Thor didn't know what to do with it for a few seconds, finally ending up wiping it vigorously into his muddied jeans, feeling as though he had just touched the bottom of an Asgardian skunk, something he had had the misfortune to experience only once in his very long life and had no desire to repeat it again. He was going to kill his brother this time, he was actually going to kill him for real and not as an empty threat in jest. If only he could get his hands on him now…

"You didn't actually think I would let you try it first, did you?"

The sudden voice of Loki so close to his ear made Thor on impulse instantly reach for Mjolnir again when he remembered just in time that there were someone's undergarments wrapped around its handle, on top of it all visibly worn. And who in the glory of Valhalla would be comfortable enough to wear this abomination to the male species? Thor looked again, somewhat closer against his best judgement to see whether it could in fact belong to a woman instead, briskly dismissing the idea at seeing what looked like a baby version of a very hairy Bilchsteim staring back at him from the frontal centre of the thing, surrounded by a joyful sprinkling of red dots in a scarily familiar pattern.

"How dare you desecrate a mighty a weapon as this with this…with such unworthy earthly undergarments!"

"Ah, my sincere apologies. Allow me to remediate this inexcusable indiscretion of mine," Loki proclaimed with an apologetic incline of his head and with a discrete wave of his hand the boxers vanished from Mjolnir's handle. Thor nodded in somewhat tentative thankfulness; knowing he might have been premature which proved justified a second before the festive pants landed over Thor's smiling face and dishevelled head.

"I believe this is a more suitable arrangement," Loki said amusedly with a matching grin, quick to evade Thor as his hand flung itself at Loki's face before attempting to shake off the offending garment, flailing about as if he stood in the midst of an angry nest of Asgardian bees.

Now it was time to take advantage of his brother's well-timed preoccupation, Loki discerned with a happy glee as he placed his hand over the handle of the legendary hammer, inhaling a brief breath of air to take in the feel of something he had wanted to do for so long in his life. Shame that his moment of secret truth was made a little too short lived by Thor's annoyingly speedy ability to fend off Midgardian objects, a giant hand too soon griping the hammer over Loki's own.

"I'll show you a more suitable arrangement," Thor bellowed out in his staggeringly deep voice, blue eyes flashing with the wrath of a great consequential battle as he tried to shoulder Loki away in vain.

"What arrangement. You holding my hand?" Loki rejoiced as he enjoyed himself more than ever while he refused to budge, now pulling hard at the handle with both of his hands while using his back side to try and shove Thor aside.

"No, you idiot. The hammer. Only my hand can hold it, so admit defeat now and remove yourself from my hammer!" Thor fought back, wrestling with Loki over Mjolnir with both hands pushing and grappling both Loki and the handle in turn.

"What, afraid I might actually take it?" Loki's sarcasm was unleashed in his voice, reaching newly discovered heights.

"You can never take it!"

"What, the hammer or the throne?" Loki taunted.

"Neither!" Thor was livid.

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"Barton!" Coulson barked into the radio, wondering if the agent fell asleep in that favourite eagle's nest of his. He was spending way too much time in those high up places and who knew what he was doing up there, probably using it to catch up on sleep. But how could he sleep with this racket going on?

"Sorry, sir," came back hastily from the receiver, some rustling and mild swearing followed before Barton composed himself again. "I seemed to have lost…never mind."

"Glad you are back, Clint. Having a different perspective from up there, I need your take on the situation. What do you make of it? Mental patient?" Coulson asked, watching as the situation developing at the alien artefact seemed to have taken an unexpected turn. He would have thought the big guy wanted to try his luck at lifting the thing but what on earth was he doing? Practising his terrible dancing moves?

"From up here, it more looks like a highly trained form of PTSD, sir," Barton suggested firmly.

"Seems more like a PTAD to me," Coulson re-evaluated thoughtfully.

"PTAD, sir?"

"Post traumatic arrogance disorder, agent Barton. Something you should be familiar with."

"Me?"

"Yes. It's something Stark suffers from but without the initial trauma," Coulson elaborated simply, not having to think on it too much.

"Yes, sir. Although I do prefer this guy. He does not need a piece of metal to beat everyone up."

"I don't know Clint, I don't know. Something tells me that this guy wants the metal more than Stark does."

Considering that for a second, Barton spared an inspiring thought to Tony Stark. "Should I eliminate him, sir?"

Coulson stared pensively at Thor. Being in the field with nearly the highest security clearance, he had seen things other mere humans could only have nightmares about. And this object, they all had tried to lift it, with bare hands or heavy machinery, it made no difference, even used high-tech equipment to try and decipher its secrets yet it remained unmoving, dark and cold. And now, it had sparked to life as if it had been greeting this guy that just happened to waltz right in like an oversized ballroom dancer and it was all for his taking. This was no ordinary man.

Coulson knew that at this very moment his decision could be very important, and right in a time when the security of the entire planet was in question and of the utmost priority.

He didn't take his eyes of the stranger as he announced steadfast in his calm, professional manner. "No. I want to see what he does." Coulson moved his mouth away from the radio but then slowly, moved it back in again. "There is one thing you can do for me though."

…

"Tell me…why is the Velcro of your underpants stuck to his hair?"

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A/N: Before you ask how Coulson recognises Barton's underpants, let's just say that Natasha gave them to him as a joke for Xmas during an all Avenger party. Yup, they have all seen it and the very cute reindeer on them. Hope you enjoyed! And a Happy New Year!