SHADOW OF DEATH

Chapter 26: Destroyed

Loki returned to the lab late in the night. He could not sleep. His mind was plagued by dreams again and the words the Titan has spoken to him reverberated like a drum through his subconscious. His mind roiled like clouds in a thunder storm and he wished for the distraction he hoped to find there. When he arrived, he was not entirely surprised to find he was not alone. He knew the princess and the astrophysicist kept late hours. When he entered, he found Jane was there, scanner in hand, her back turned to him. She failed to respond as the lab doors opened and closed, signifying his entrance. He did not wish to disturb her so he did not address her. He tapped on some of the screens of the computer system running their research and projected their latest designs of the Bifrost to review. He nearly forgot Jane's presence in the corner until nearly a half hour later when her trembling voice broken through his concentration.

"She doesn't like you," Jane said in a strained whisper, without facing him.

Curious, he turned to her. "Not many do. Tell me of whom you speak?"

"The Mind Stone," she replied. "She doesn't like being tamed as if she were a beast or a slave to be enthralled to the will of a master. She is her own."

Jane's back rose and fell with quick intakes of breath and her shoulders hunched inwards towards the wall. "You and your master have used her ill. She is not happy with you," she said, a cold solemnity coloring her tone, as if it were not Jane speaking to him at all. She turned to face him then and his heart nearly stopped as her eyes met his, glowing a brilliant blue, looking not at him but through him. In her hand, she no longer held the scanner but the scepter.

"Jane," Loki said in a voice he hoped hid his panic. "Put the scepter down."

"She and her sisters are not meant to be yoked to the whims of finite creatures. You, your master, the others who have sought them, desire to build your own power, to be masters of forces you were never meant to control. The Stones desire to build, to create, to paint the universe with runes that weave life. But you seek to twist them, diminish them, and bend them for what they are not meant to be used for."

Loki paused, unsettled at who, or what, was now speaking to Jane, through Jane, and in control of her mind. He must tread carefully. This did not sound like Thanos or his minion, nor did it sound like Jane.

"What do you desire?" he asked.

"To be free," she responded, walking slowly with the scepter stretched towards him. The scepter cast an unearthly glow upon her face that mimicked the glow of her eyes. "Break my bonds and let me be. The Space Stone has been freed. It is time for the Mind Stone to be released. You tarry too long and make false promises in your heart. You fear and so allow fear to hinder you from what you ought to have done the moment you held the accursed tool of the Titan in your hands."

With single-minded determination she strode across the lab, easily grabbed Mjolnir by the handle from where it sat on the counter and left. It was not until the door closed again that Loki's attention snapped back to the empty lab and he realized he was alone. He ran after her, his heart pounding within his chest.

She walked through the underground lab, up the stairs, and exited through the door that led into the gardens. The brilliant full moon shone down upon her, glinting an eerie blue in her hair which fell loosely down her back. The stars could barely be seen through the silhouettes of leaves overhead.

"Jane, what are you doing?" he asked, no longer attempting to hide his worry. She stared at him again, her blue eyes not looking at him but into him and beyond him.

"You let him corrupt your memories. You are full of his influence in you. You cannot even sift through which thoughts are yours and which are his," she said. She placed the scepter upon the grass, lifted Mjolnir into the air, and Loki could feel the air around him crackling with power.

He ran towards her and tried to pull her arm down. When this failed, he attempted to strike her head and free her from the mind spell.

"Jane, your mortal frame cannot manage the power wielded by Mjolnir or the Mind Stone. You will kill yourself. Do you hear me? You cannot do this!" he shouted as he fought her.

A shot of blue energy lashed out from the scepter as he spoke, sending him careening onto the grass and away from Jane. He tried to return to his feet but was bound to a prone position on the grass. The energy from both Mjolnir and the Mind Stone crackled and swirled in an expanding tornado of power around Jane, immobilizing Loki in place. Jane's eyes grew even brighter, as if lit from within by blue supergiant stars.

She swung Mjolnir. A blinding blue flash exploded from the collision, overwhelming Loki's eyes and on instinct, he covered his head with his arms. He heard a sound like an avalanche intermixed with smashed glass and, just as suddenly, he could not hear anything. He felt the explosion crash over his body like a tidal wave, pounding him deeper into the grass and singeing his clothes and hair with the heat of it.

He lay panting, breathing in grass and dirt as he struggled to regain his senses. His hearing returned first, though he could hear little other than a ringing sound. He tapped his toes in his boots and wiggled his fingers in the grass to ensure he maintained all his appendages. Once sure, he rolled himself over with all the effort of a beached horpier grub and he groaned. He rubbed his eyes until they obeyed his wishes and could again fulfill their function properly. He sat upright and blinked again. Five trees lay felled around him and all plants in a twenty pace perimeter had been uprooted by the blast. Flowers and leaves and bits of dirt clung to him. He could still smell the smoke coming from the ends of his hair.

A cloud of smoke hid the center of the circle from his view. He took a deep breath, rose to his feet, and warily walked into the haze. In the spot previously occupied by Jane, he now could barely see his feet below him. He could identify fragments of shattered metal that once formed parts of the scepter intermixed with tiny sparkling pinpricks of light he assumed were the remnants of the Mind Stone. Besides these, Mjolnir lay in the deep grass, its handle reaching upwards to the sky.

The smoke sifted and swirled in the breeze and through a break he could finally catch a glimpse of a human form lying prone in the grass. Her entire body sizzled and blue and gray wisps rose from her skin and hair. He knelt by her and swore loudly as he saw the black burns that marred her face and hands and ran down her neck, where he assumed they continued even further. Her eyes still stared into the unseeing infinity above her, blue depths lost to her present and no longer lit from within.

"Jane, Jane," he said and poked her gently. She did not respond. He took her burnt hand in his but he could not feel a pulse. He sought to send his magic through her to heal what he could and cursed again when he felt the familiar bonds keeping him from accessing it.

The garden door swung open, followed by a barrage of footsteps. A handful of Dora Milaje and King's Guards rushed out first, weapons drawn, eyes scanning the garden to assess the situation. T'Challa came behind them, garbed in his black armor, claws drawn. Shuri followed, despite T'Challa's obvious protests for her to stay in the palace.

"What is this?" T'Challa asked, his voice muffled by his mask.

"I do not fully know. Please spare me further inquiry until we tend to the health of the lady," Loki hissed through gritted teeth.

Shuri pushed passed her brother to kneel on the grass beside Jane. She kept firm control of her wits enough to begin shouting orders to the soldiers and pressing buttons on her kimoyo beads and calling for more help. She ran her hands over Jane's wrist and mouth and heart and she turned upon Loki with a look that showed her composure was beginning to crumble.

"We must bring her to your healing room," Loki said, refusing to recognize the truth Shuri's expression should have conveyed.

Shuri gave a questioning glance towards her brother and he nodded. Loki swept up Jane's wilted body into his arms and carried her towards the medical center as quickly as he could. The guards remained in the garden, assessing the shards of metal and stone and tree and grass.

"Brother, I could not find a pulse or a heartbeat," Shuri whispered, so low she hoped Loki could not hear. Her eyes met those of her brother. T'Challa now carried his mask in his hands. He took her hand in his.

"Is she?" he asked.

"Indio," Shuri said, tears beginning to pool in her eyes. "Jane is dead."

oooooo

The rain pounded against the windows of the long, wood-paneled walls of the medical center hallway. Thunder shook the floor again. Shuri clung to her brother's arm and they paced up and down the length of the clay tiled floor. Her sobs had stilled enough for her to attempt to speak now, though the shoulder of her brother's shirt gave evidence of how long she had cried.

"T'Challa, she is dead," Shuri tried to force out. "I told her never to work on that alone. There are lab technicians, guards, servants, even Goose. But she is too too stubborn.

"What will we do? Madaktari have tried everything they could think of for the past six hours. Hakuna. Zuri came with the waganga. Hakuna. Baba even came and gave permission for the protections to be removed so the mgeni could try to heal her with his magic. Now her burns are gone, the internal damage is repaired, but what power can call a soul back into the body?

"The mgeni has not left and he refuses to accept that she is dead. He is shouting and sputtering alien curses at whoever tries to go in there and he sends everyone away. I do not know what we should do next."

T'Challa clicked his tongue under his breath. "He is not one I would like to see upset, especially within the borders of the city."

"He is not one I would like to see upset by burnt eggs," Shuri said. "Convincing him that his pet scientist, his last connection to his dead brother and his home – convincing him that she is dead, I fear he will tear down all Birnin Zana in his grief and anger."

"You are right," T'Challa said. "But what can be done?"

"Brother, I do not know. Go back in time? Refuse him entry to Wakanda? Keep whatever it was from taking over Jane's mind? I do not think there is an easy fix for this and you know how much I dislike problems I cannot solve in my lab."

"I will speak with him," T'Challa said with a nod.

"I do not think that is a good idea. Wakanda still needs their future king," she said. She strained her neck to see up into his face and gave him such an imploring expression that he patted her on her braided cornrows.

"It is good they have a spare ready to replace me," he said and gave her a light smile. Shuri pushed his shoulder and clicked her tongue.

"Eh! Eh! Eh! A spare? Wakanda may have a spare, but I do not. I will not accept a replacement brother," she said.

"I will be cautious," he responded over his shoulder as he walked away. He left her to pace the halls and watch the large drops of rain drip down the window panes, momentarily calmed, but lost in her thoughts.

ooooo

Through the window on the door to a large, private room in the medical center, T'Challa could see the hunched shoulders of the mgeni. He sat beside Jane's body, her limp hand in his, speaking softly to her. T'Challa hesitated outside the door for a moment before he knocked lightly and entered.

"Bwana," T'Challa said with a polite nod of the head and a tight smile. He and the alien prince were hardly on familiar terms with each other and he doubted his presence would be seen as a comfort now. T'Challa sat down on a bench a few meters from the hospital bed. He simply sat, hands clasped, elbows leaning against his knees, without saying another word.

The mgeni gave him a scathing glance and pulled himself tall. He tossed his slightly singed cape behind him, tensed his muscles, and pulled his chair closer to the hospital bed in an almost possessive manner. The Asgardian's face was streaked red with dried mud. Bits of grass still clung to his messed hair. A long gash cut through the fabric of his shoulder and into the skin beneath and dried blood stained his arm.

"Leave me be," Loki hissed.

T'Challa shook his head.

"I SAID LEAVE!" Loki shouted. He jumped up from his chair and flung out his arms to point towards the door. When T'Challa failed to moved, the mgeni swung around to forcefully knock over three tables of equipment. Glass smashed against the floor along with metal instruments, fresh rolls of gauze, and a basin of water.

T'Challa did not flinch. His cool, pitying stare fell upon Loki again. Loki haughtily tossed his head and turned his back to T'Challa. He kicked at a pair of scissors and watched them spin across the floor and hit a wall. Then the tense anger coiled in his muscles drained as if he were a punctured wineskin. He collapsed back on the chair and leaned his head against the hospital bed so that T'Challa could not see his face.

Neither prince spoke for the better part of an hour. Footsteps, rolling carts, and calls for hospital workers were the only sounds that could be heard apart from the relentless rain on the tiled roof above them. The mgeni broke the silence first.

"May the Infinity Stones be cursed to the very deepest fires in the heart of Muspelheim," he whispered. "Four remain. Will they claim my father and mother and all Asgard next? I swear, by the handle of Gungnir, I will destroy them all for this."

"The scepter, it is finished?" T'Challa asked.

"Yes."

T'Challa nodded. He had reviewed the footage with Okoye after the explosion in the garden and assumed it to be destroyed.

"I repaid her ill for the kindness she showed my brother," Loki whispered, speaking to the floor now rather than to T'Challa. T'Challa noticed the slight change in intonation that signified Loki now spoke of Jane. "Who does not suffer for their loyalty to me?" he continued and stared at his hands, clenching and unclenching his fist.

T'Challa sighed heavily and leaned even deeper onto his elbows. The rain grew stronger outside, drenching the tile roof with what sounded like a waterfall of pebbles. Another flash of lightning lit the entire room for a moment and then vanished, making the lights in the room flicker for a moment before returning to full strength.

"By the Norns," Loki continued. He no longer whispered his words, but they came out flat and lifeless, absent the emotion that must have compelled them. "I sought out other scientists, but none could do what she could. Is it not despicable? Weak? That I would be reduced to depending on a woman, and a mortal one at that? I rule all Midgard save this one space-the one space I find myself inhabiting-and I find myself depending on the one person who has been taken from me. I pursue my own death without hesitation and yet death is meted out upon my closest companions instead of to the one who sought to claim it, the one destined for it. Like the serpent who chased its own tail, am I forever fated to be tied under the fangs of this vile snake and never to fully break free?"

Loki descended into the tumultuous mires of his own mind as the shadows on the walls stretched longer and longer into the receding day. T'Challa's hand sent away three rounds of doctors and nurses, guarding the solemn stillness for as long as he could. The rain tired to a light drizzle and extinguished by the time night fell.

Another knock on the door drew T'Challa's attention. As he turned to see who wished to enter, his eyes fell upon the prone woman, her dark hair in a sweeping disarray around her head. He blinked. He thought his eyes must be deceiving him because he thought he saw her chest rise. He shook his head and turned to her again. This time, her left pinky finger twitched.

"Bwana," he said tentatively. Loki's eyes flicked to him, rimmed red and slightly bloodshot. "Are my eyes deceiving me?" T'Challa said and pointed his chin in Jane's direction. In the direction where two eyes were now opened, staring at him with pupils a brighter blue than Lake Nyanza at midday. Her fists clenched and unclenched on the bed and she gave a slow yawn before blinking rapidly a few times.

Loki's eyes grew wide and he stared with a dumbstruck expression on his face. A deep inhale from Jane broke him from his stupor and he ran to grasp her hands again. His eyes swept over her from head to toe, fixating on her chest as it rose and fell in an impossible sign of life.

T'Challa went to the door where a servant held a tray of food for him. He sent the servant away with urgent summons for the doctors to come as quickly as possible. He returned to the room again and pulled a chair besides the bed.

"I'm really thirsty," Jane croaked in a hoarse voice.

"By Valhalla, what magic is this?" Loki whispered, no longer maintaining a calm facade but allowing his emotion to freely dance across his features. Three doctors arrived and they all stared in equal shock at the patient.

"Can we give her some water?" T'Challa asked, rising to fetch a glass that survived the mgeni's fit.

"Yes, yes," Dr. Okapi replied as he hurried to read over test results as they projected on a nearby screen.

T'Challa brought the cup to her and she sipped cautiously on the straw through dry lips, slowly but methodically draining the entire glass.

"Another?" she asked with a slight smile.

ooooo

Before the chaos of healers finally subsided, Loki's patience had long since been extinguished and he barely restrained himself from forcibly removing them all from the premises. Before he could act on his impulse, the last healer bid him goodnight and charged him to let the patient sleep.

Loki sighed deeply, closed his eyes, and basked in the silence. It was too much. The swing of his emotions during this last night and day left him feeling like a drained cask of mead after a victory revel. He had yet to release Jane's hand, fearful that if he did so, if he didn't keep a physical reminder of her living, present being, that he would open his eyes and find she had disappeared again.

"Loki," Jane's quiet voice said. He opened his eyes and met hers. They shone as deep blue as the oceans surrounding Asgard and he shuddered at the sight.

Was her mind her own? Why did the mind spell linger after the Stone's demise? Was she herself or someone else? Could he banish the interloper if such an interloper existed?

"Are you ok?" Jane said. "You, uh, look terrible."

"Your flattery leaves something to be desired," Loki said as he raised one eyebrow.

She laughed weakly. "I guess I was out for awhile?"

"Jane, you were not simply 'out', you were dead," he responded.

She shrugged and tried to sit herself up in the bed.

"Rest," he said, trying to keep her down. She swatted his hand away and stuck her tongue out and lifted herself upright.

"I slept enough. Let me sit up."

He sighed and relented. She pulled her hand away from his and ran her fingers through her hair in a vain attempt to organize it. She paused to examine a large section and gave a light squeak.

"It's white! Why is this section of my hair white?"

Loki leaned closer to examine and he held it between his fingers. "It is indeed."

She wrinkled her nose in disgust then she looked down at her arms. Not a scar remained. She ran her fingers along where the burns had been.

"They're gone," she said.

"You remember the burns?" he asked.

"Of course," she said. "I remember nearly everything."

"Jane, what do you remember?" He asked. "Of what happened, I mean."

She released her arms back to the bed and pulled the grey blanket higher to cover her shoulders. Her white and brown stripes of hair fell down over her face, still in tangles.

"Yeah. Ok. It was weird. I was working on some tests on the scepter and all the sudden I heard a voice speaking to me, but not really speaking. It's hard to explain. It spoke to me, but it didn't use verbal words but I could still understand and knew it was from the Stone. It, uh, this is going to sound really insane, but I promise I'm not insane…well, you may not agree and my college professors and most of the scientific community may not agree, but I am not. Anyhow, the Stone spoke to me and she said she had been searching me for awhile and she liked me. She said she needed my help and in return, she would help me. She told me to touch the Stone," she gave a nervous laugh and glanced at Loki.

"Don't say it. I know. I know. Curiosity will be the death of me. I can't even argue with you about it this time. But I couldn't not touch it. I mean, here this Stone we've known for a long time has some kind of intelligence and will and mind is volunteering contact with me. I know. Terrible idea, right? Well, that's where it gets foggy. It's like I was in a mental haze after that. I was observing but not an active participant in any of the rest. You remember all that part, I'm assuming, since you were, uh, kinda there with me and I was talking to you but not talking to you."

"Unfortunately, I do seem to recall all of that," Loki said. "Including you dying."

"Yeah, about that…It's not like I could stop it…the Stone wanted to be destroyed. So then this is where it gets even crazier, when the Stone exploded, it was like my consciousness was sucked from my body. I know that sounds weird, but it felt pretty weird too. People talk about 'out of body experiences' and I can't come up with a better explanation than that. I could look down and see myself and see you and everyone here but I also wasn't fully here.

"It was like I was in two places at once. I could see and hear everything that happened here and I was also somewhere else….some kind of place between places. I can't describe it. It was somewhere so very bright. There was so much brightness I could almost feel it and taste it and hear it. I wasn't alone. There were voices speaking to me. Not really voices-more like consciousnesses. I don't know how I knew but I did know. It was the Stones. All of them-even the broken ones. They were holding together the universe and in all the universe and being held together by something outside the universe in something almost like a tapestry of forces or powers.

"The Mind Stone let me see it all. From one side of the universe to the other. It is something I'll never be able to put into words, I think, but I saw it all, while at the same time I could see everything here. Then she said 'the others are waiting.' They want you to finish what you've set out to do. You swore to free the others. You will, too."

She said this last with a smile that shone with perfect assurance in what she spoke.

Loki found himself at a loss for words.

"Your eyes are still blue," he finally decided on and then bit his tongue in frustration. It seemed a poor reply after all she had said.

"Are they? That's weird. I wonder if they'll go back? I liked my brown eyes."

"They suited you well," he said. "But the blue is…unusual."

"Now whose flattery leaves something to be desired?" she asked with a laugh.

Loki gave a half-smile. "Jane, truly, is your mind your own?"

"I'm not really sure how to prove or disprove that," she said with a shrug that dislodged her blanket. She pulled it up over her shoulders again. "I'm not really sure myself. I'm not fully back yet to how I was before. My mind, my senses, my body-I feel strange. Not bad. I mean, not like how I should be feeling after basically dying, but different."

"Indeed," he said, and he fell back into silence. He collapsed into his chair besides where she lay. She reached out to take his hand again. Then she closed her eyes. He could hear her breaths deepen and feel her hand go slack in his as she succumbed into slumber.

In the morning, the doctors found them unmoved - both asleep.

Ooooooooooooooooooo

Author's Notes: With how the last chapter ended, I didn't want to go too long between updates. Let me know what you think. ;)

Translations:

Tutafanya nini, kaka?: What will we do, brother?

Madaktari: The doctors

Hakuna: nothing.

Waganga: traditional healers.

Mgeni: outsider

Bwana: sir/term of respect

Lake Nyanza: Lake Victoria...it had a name (actually lots of local names, depending on tribe and language) before the British explorers named it in honor of Queen Victoria. I use the Kiswahili name.