Bronze Mettle (MCU/DC SI)

[Xavier Bronze]

Index+Archive

(First thing's first. I'm a tulpa.
If you don't know what that is, there's a brief summary and a few deeper research links on my profile.
If you don't feel like researching shit, shit isn't gonna make much sense to you until you figure it out.
Just an FYI.)​

Urgh… What on earth did I drink last night?

I feel sand between my fingers.

That better not be catsand. I'm still in charge of the body, which is pretty cool.

I open my eyes and where the fuck are we. The desert. We're in the fucking desert. Well shit. Where's the nearest desert to PA?

I notice something very wrong when I start to sit up and my boobs shift.

Since when did we have boobs? Not that I'm complaining. Is this some Freaky Friday shit we've walked into? Alex?

I start to panic and fall back to the ground.

Where the fuck is my headmate. I can barely walk without him! I can't live in a body all on my own! The fuck is going on.

I close my eyes again and take a deep breath of dry air.

Okay. Calm down. What do you know? Point 1: I just woke up in the desert, probably dozens of miles at least from where I was a few hours ago. Fact B: I just woke up in a female body exactly like the one I've always imagined for myself. And finally: I just woke up somehow in a brain all on my own, without Alex.

I open my eyes again and watch the constellations change.

Not thinking about that right now.

I stand up and dust off my red flannel shirt. My head is still throbbing and my eyes are blurry from waking up. I look around and notice the weird drawings in the sand around me.

Was this some kind of ritual site? Looks like some Scandinavian Lovecraft shit.

I hear screeching tires and something hits me in the back of the head like a truck. I fall forward on my face.

Ow.

I start to get up again.

Oh. It actually was a truck.

Frikkin' Queen Amidala runs up to me and helps me stand up. What was her name again? Natalie Portman? Or was that the other one?

She says something to me that I process only a second or two after the fact, "I'm so sorry! Are you ok? Where did you come from?"

I accept her help standing. I think I'm still dizzy from… something. Is this a hangover? "Yeah, I'm fine. Thanks. Just, not sure how I got here. I think maybe I got a little too drunk last night."

Well that's not true. I remember last night perfectly. There was that concert Alex went to. What was it again? Termerick Truck? Whatever. Maybe he took the wrong train home or something. Except we're in the wrong body. And he's not here. The fuck happened here again?

"Oh my god, Erik! Look at this! We have to move quickly before this all changes."

She's looking at the weird lines around where I woke up. Don't get what the big deal is. Someone got bored and doodled a bunch of squiggly lines around an unconscious person. In the middle of the desert. Ok, maybe that is weird. I think my weirdness censor overloaded back when the stars changed.

An older man, must be Erik, responds to her, "Jane, you ran into her. We need to take her to a hospital."

Padme waves him off "She said she'd be fine. Look! She's fine!"

Erik looks unconvinced, so I nod while I walk out of the sand circle, "Hey, ah, so Where am I exactly? Don't know if I took the wrong train or what but I don't live near any deserts."

Erik gives that old people smile with the laughing eyes, "Must have been quite the night. You're just outside Puente Antiguo, New Mexico. Where are you from? Wichita? Denver?"

I look back over at Padme, scrambling to record the weird lines, and see a third person. A brown haired girl with buck teeth and a hat. "Philadelphia. But I was in Atlantic City last night, on the boardwalk. So who the fuck knows how I got here."

The other girl speaks up, "Are you sure you're ok? You don't have memory loss or anything?"

I laugh and rub my aching head, "I remember waking up right before you hit me just fine, so I doubt it. I'll be fine. I just need to get home and get a drink."

Erik kneels and joins Padme working on the markings, "That might be difficult. There's no airport in Puente Antiguo and the trains don't travel north often. We can see about giving you a ride to the nearest town with a bus stop, but it's a long way to Philadelphia from here."

Well isn't that just perfect. "Well isn't that just perfect."

Erik shrugs, "I'm sorry I don't have better news."

They finish sketching the circle and start to climb back into their van. It's like a reinforced RV or something, with a bunch of bright lights tacked on to the top for some reason. Didn't Alex see something like that in an ad for Storm Chasers at one point?

Erik waves me over, "Come on in. We'll give you a ride back to town."

I follow them and climb into the back of the van. There's a bunch of equipment that looks like it came off a hollywood set, with too many loose wires and dials than could possibly be functional. A whole wall is covered by one of those stereotypical maps with the pushpins and marker circles and crap that makes it impossible to read for anyone who didn't build the damn thing. The other girl with the hat and glasses climbs into the back with me and closes up before we start moving.

I raise my voice to be heard over the sound of tires on gravel, "So what do I call the other two, Erik?"

He leans around to look back and gestures toward the driver. The driver who hit me. "I'm professor Erik Selvig. This is doctor Jane Foster. The lady in the back with you is Darcy, our intern."

Darcy asks, "And what about you?"

"Xavier. Xavier Bronze."

I guess a fake name might have been smart, but whatever. These seem like good people. Even if they did hit me with a car.

"Isn't that a guy's name?"

I look at Darcy, "Yeah. You're one to talk."

She narrows her eyes, "Touche."

I turn back to the two up front, "So are you guys some kind of UFO chasers or something? Why are you out here?"

Jane leans back from the driver's seat… looking away from the road in the process. How did this woman get a license? "We're astrophysicists. I've been tracking unusual weather phenomena all over this region for the past few weeks. I've been able to predict the last seventeen events down to the second, but this? These lines, the bizarre storm. This is unprecedented."

I turn to Erik, "And that means...?"

He rolls his eyes, "She's an astrophysicist moonlighting as some kind of storm chaser. She's brilliant, but this isn't her field."

Jane gets set off by that, "There has to be a scientific explanation behind these anomalies. They can't just be random! What did I tell you?"

He nods and mouths along with what she's saying for the next two sentences.

"I told you the next one would be here. I told you it would be the biggest we've seen. Now not only was I right, but we witnessed a spontaneous formation of unusual ground patterning with no probable source."

I look back at the map on the wall with probably weeks worth of data on it. I lean back in my seat as the nerds argue about what the fuck astrophysics has to do with the weather. I need a minute to rest.

So, I'm stranded in Shitsville, New Mexico. I have no idea how I got here, although the crop circle might have something to do with that. I have my own body. Alex is missing. An astrophysicist who looks just like Natalie Portman hit me with a truck.

Jane Foster. Why does that name sound so familiar?

 

[Xavier Bronze]

So they took me back to town, dropped me off at the hospital, and ran off again. The nurse told me to stay overnight so they could make sure I wasn't gonna go braindead, which is free bed and shit breakfast. So that's cool.

Right as they're kicking me out the next morning, look who comes storming back in the double doors but Padme, Senator Bubble, and Decoy the intern.

Jane walks up to me dramatically and pokes a finger annoyingly close to my face, "You. Xavier. I'm buying you lunch, and you're telling me what you remember about how you got here."

I lean back and grab her finger, moving it farther away, "I already told you I know jack shit. I fell asleep on the train out from Atlantic City and I woke in the middle of the desert. And then you hit me in your car. Thanks for that, by the way. They let me stay here for free. Way better than a hotel. Cheaper too."

Do I have money? It's worth checking. I never bothered to give the hospital any ID except my name, which is useless because I had a different body yesterday anyway. I pat my jean pockets and feel a wallet in the same place Alex usually keeps it. Interesting... I pull it out. Same dorky Star Wars design he had.

Jane starts walking and I follow her. Even if I do have money, free food never hurt anyone. "Do you know what that storm was that you fell out of? It was an Einstein-Rosen Bridge! This could revolutionize meteorology as we know it, and you're right in the middle of it."

I nod along, only half paying attention to what sounds like tv technobabble. Meanwhile, I'm frakking rich. One hundred, two hundred, three hundred, four hundred… Twenty thousand dollars cash by the time I'm climbing back into her truck. I hope I don't get mugged...

"If these bridges are a natural phenomenon, we might be able to harness them. Controllable, instant transportation from anywhere in the world to anywhere else. Can you imagine the number of potential uses for something like that?"

Also, I have what looks like a genuine ID for Xavier Bronze. I'm gonna guess that the picture is what my new body looks like. It says I was born in '91, which is kind of weird. And it looks like it expired a few months ago. Lame. Why would someone make me a new ID for my new body that's already expired?

"Hello? Xavier? Are you listening?"

Crap. I totally wasn't. "Not even a little. I just noticed my ID is expired. I don't even think I know how to replace an ID."

The car stops in front of a cheesy diner. We all get out and head inside. Smells like meat. Ooh, that's a perk. I don't have the vegan in my head to stop me from killing some things with my order.

Jane grabs my wallet out of my hand and shoves some thermal imaging pictures at me, "Will you stop it with the wallet! Look. Look at that outline. Do you see that dark spot? That's you, falling out of a wormhole in the sky. You fell asleep on a train in Atlantic City and fell out of the sky in the desert of New Mexico the next day. Aren't you in the least bit curious about how that happened?"

Before we sit down I set the pictures of clouds on the table and she passes me back my wallet, which I pocket. I sigh, and sag back into my chair, "Look, I'm totally overwhelmed here. Yeah, I want to know. Of course I want to fucking know how I got here, and why, and what the fuck happened to Alex. I'd love to know all that. But right now, I have no way of figuring that out, and it doesn't seem like you do either. So you can shut the fuck up and buy me breakfast, and we can talk about it later once I've had some time to deal, or you can turn around and just fuck off and leave me alone, because I'm not in the mood for an interrogation right now."

For the first time since I've met her, Jane is speechless. All three of the others awkwardly stare at me as I look at the menu.

"Who's Alex?"

I look up at Darcy. She's leaning forward, with captured attention. I swallow and take a deep breath, "He's a... friend of mine. Friend, brother, father figure, whatever. He was on the train with me yesterday. He's basically been by my side my whole fucking life, and I'm way out of my depth, and for the first time he isn't here to help. It's bullshit. I want him back."

The waitress comes by and I order a large hamburger and a coffee.

Erik is the first to break the ice, "I once knew a brilliant up-and-coming physicist, Martin Stein. We used to bounce ideas off one another. Gave us both fresh eyes on whatever we were working on. After a few years, I got so used to having his input that when he joined a new, confidential project, I was paralyzed. For months, I couldn't write or publish anything. ...It's never easy. But I grew past it. We still see each other now and again. I'm sure Alex is fine. He's probably back in Pennsylvania worrying about you as we speak."

Jane offers, "Do you want to use my phone? You could try and call him."

I shake my head, "Nah. He's fine. He's not gone... He's just not here right now."

A few minutes of silence pass.

I'm about halfway through my burger when I look up at Jane, "So Jane. Why do you look exactly like Natalie Portman?"

Jane smiles and tilts her head, "Who?"

I stop chewing, "Get out! Fuck you don't know who Natalie Portman is, have you ever seen a movie? She was in fucking Star Wars!"

Jane continues to look amused and confused in equal order.

"She played what's-her-name in V. She was in that art movie about birds no-one watched except the Academy. She played the obligatory romantic interest in the-"

Wait. No. Stop. Nonononono. Jane Foster. I landed in the desert surrounded by weird markings and then Jane Foster hit me in her van. What was it she said? Einstein-Rosen Bridge the fuck is wrong with me I'm in the MCU. Shit. Am I taking Thor's place? He fell out of the sky after Heimdal banished him. He got hit by a car, went to the hospital, got breakfast at a cheesy diner, and then heard about his hammer from some trucker dudes and went after it.

Jane looks at me funny, "Do you mean Keira Knightly? ...Are you sure you're okay? You seem a little out of it."

I look over at the two dudes sitting at the counter. This is it. If they say what I think they're gonna, this is for real.

"You missed all the excitement out at the crater."

"They're saying some kind of satellite landed out in the desert."

"Yeah, well we were having a good time with it, until the feds showed up."

"...Ohhw FUCK ME."

 

[Xavier Bronze]

Jane Foster: Interlude​

The last twelve hours have been a rollercoaster of exciting new developments. Ever since this woman literally dropped into my life, I've suddenly had more questions than I know how to try and answer. A purely theoretical concept of physics is not only no longer theoretical, but proven to be capable of transporting living things.

But that's far from the only peculiar thing about her. She seems to genuinely have little idea of how she got here. She talks about this friend, Alex, as if they've never spent so much as a day apart. She carries herself as if she's never interacted with other people before, but also bluntly states her frame of mind for all the world to see. And then she asks this.

Of course, I have been told I looked like other people before. My resemblance to Keira Knightly was a running joke on campus at the University. But she didn't say Keira Knightly. She said Natalie Portman, and then ran down a list of Keira Knightly films. Could she just be confusing the name?

I ask, "Do you mean Keira Knightly?"

What's she thinking? I almost always know. But then she'll suddenly flip a switch and become entirely inscrutable. This is one of those times. She just trailed off mid-sentence, and now she's staring off straight behind me. Maybe I did more damage to her head than I thought.

"Are you sure you're okay? You seem a little out of it?"

She doesn't respond. Is she looking at something? I turn around and see two men talking about something. I hadn't been paying attention, but apparently Xavier had. Something about a crashed satellite? I'm about to ask them about it when-

"Ohhw FUCK ME."

-Xavier stands up, yells, and slams her hands down on the table. She's really upset about something. The oddities continue.

What does she have against satellites?

...Her hands are on fire.

Her hands are on fire!

I throw my coffee at her to try and put it out. How and when did her hands catch fire? There are no ignition sources nearby. And why doesn't she look more bothered by it?

Erik tackles her to the ground and puts out the flames with his jacket. He removes the jacket and examines her injuries, "You're not burned."

How can that be? Her hands were totally engulfed! I rush around the table to see it for myself and stub my toe on the leg of the table in my haste.

Ignore the pain for now. I have observations to make that are more important.

I reach for one of her hands. One of the ones that were covered in red-hot fire only moments ago. I feel her very smooth, entirely unharmed skin, "That's… impossible."

 

[Xavier Bronze]

Jane, the movie character, throws her coffee at me. Rude. What's she looking at? Oh.

My hands are on fire.

...Is it too much to ask for two seconds from one world-altering revelation to the next? I guess this new body isn't exactly how I imagined it. At least I don't remember ever imagining myself with superpowers.

Erik tackles me and smothers my hands against the floor with his jacket. Surprisingly enough the fire actually goes out. I close my eyes and take a deep breath, running through the exercises Alex used to use to control his temper. Fire powers activated at a stress and anger high point. Doesn't take a genius to connect the dots and say my mood had something to do with it.

Erik removes his jacket and grabs my hands, checking them for burns. His face briefly imitates Archimedes seeing a Model-T for the first time, "You're not burned."

Jane kicks the table on her way over to see for herself. She grabs one of my hands and runs her thumb over the skin, "That's... impossible."

Darcy stands on her toes to get a look, "Woah." She takes out her phone and takes a picture.

I'm still reeling from the fact that I'm in a movie. If I'm replacing Thor does that mean I'm supposed to go get his hammer? Would Odin's magic consider me worthy? I don't think it would. But then, if I don't get it and Thor doesn't either, does it just sit there? Who else would be worthy? Vision isn't built yet, and won't be without Thor's lightning anyway. Didn't Natasha use it in the comics? I wonder if there's a Beta Ray in this universe and fuck am I ever getting sidetracked. The hammer so isn't the important thing right now.

Jane grabs my other hand and turns it over a few times, "This really can't be possible."

I pull my hands back and give her a glare, "And yet here we are."

Erik is staring past me, probably recounting the events in his head, "Quite extraordinary. Do you know anything about this?"

I shake my head and look at my own hands for a second, "Not a clue. Never happened before."

Jane is pacing now, "Maybe some kind of mutation from whatever transported you here? The same phenomenon could be responsible for the markings around where the wormhole dropped you."

Darcy butts in, "You're like Superman."

Erik looks like he needs an aspirin and I really don't blame him, "Mutation. Jane, you sound like you're talking about science fiction."

I steal her next line, "Frequent precursor to science fact."

Jane does a doubletake in my direction with her jaw looking like a nutcracker, before she finally resolves to pointing at me and saying, "Exactly."

Darcy smirks, "Plus, it's kind of hard to call it fiction when we all just saw it happen."

The four of us then remember where we are. We look around at the rest of the diner. Everyone's staring at me. Most at my hands. A few at… other places. Flattered, but on the other hand...

I stand up, "Let's go."

Jane nods wildly and grabs her bag, "Yeah, that might be a good idea. We could use a more private setting to figure this out in."

On our way out I review my situation again. Fuck me I'm in the past, aren't I? When did Thor even come out? It was one of the early ones, wasn't it? 2010? 2009? If I were gonna try and follow the story I'd have to become "worthy", whatever that means, steal the hammer from SHIELD and fight the Destroyer in a day or two. But would this fire stuff make the hammer obsolete? Is it powerful enough to fight the Destroyer? That hammer is pretty sweet. It would definitely come in handy. How did Thor manage that anyway? I feel like Jane was important somehow.

I briefly consider that I might be able to seduce Natalie Portman.

Then I see the G-Man in the driver's seat of Jane's truck. Oh, that's right. SHIELD stole her stuff in this movie. Fuck, SHIELD is stealing her stuff!

She runs past me and I too run to keep up. She yells at him, "Hey! What do you think you're doing?"

I roll my eyes. Does she really think he's gonna stop just because she's here to yell at him?

He's already started the engine. When he pulls out of the parking space I consider trying for a fire blast before I realize that even if it worked Jane wouldn't appreciate me blowing up her car.

We get to it just in time to catch some dust with our faces as he zooms off. I turn to Jane and grab her shoulder to get her attention, "If you want to save anything from your lab we have to get over there right now."

She gives me a "How do you know that?" look, before turning to run, full-speed. Apparently she opted to listen to me. Sweet. I follow her.

By the time we get there there's a small horde of Men in Black picking the place apart for anything that looks even vaguely scientific and loading it all into a series of black trucks. In the center of it all is the man himself. Jane doesn't know that he's anything different from the rest of 'em, but I know better. I remember.

I walk up to him and say, "Agent Phil Coulson of SHIELD."

That shuts him right the hell up, and I can see him reading through scripts and protocols in his head. After a second or so of pause, he finally decides none of it applies, "And who are you?"

 

[Xavier Bronze]

I just stumped the future Director of SHIELD. And doesn't that just make me feel like I could take on the whole goddamn world. I smirk openly, and reach out my hand, "I'm Xavier."

Coulson accepts the handshake in that polite but careful way that people do when they don't really trust someone, "Do we know each other from somewhere?"

I shake my head, "Not even a little bit. You don't know me, anyway. How's that 0-8-4 going, by the way? Still stuck in the ground like a bad piece of spinach?"

He's not showing any fear. But I can feel him sizing up the best way to take me down if things come to blows. I really don't want to have to find out if I can win a fight just yet. He maintains his practiced, pleasant smile, "I think you might know the answer to that better than I do." Oh, that's an excellent response. Giving me zero information that I might not already have. He's not falling for the false omniscience claim. "Care to tell me where your clearance comes from? I wouldn't want to commit treason by accident."

I see Jane shouting up a storm with the other agents behind him.

I cross my arms, "My clearance comes from me. I know about the 0-8-4 you recovered. I know it's shaped like a hammer and no-one you've got can move it. I know SHIELD has been active a hell of a lot longer than the few years you claim because Peggy Carter founded it not long after World War 2. I know the Hulk is real, and that its real name is Bruce Banner. I know about the Avengers Initiative and I know Tony Stark doesn't qualify, but you're gonna let him in anyway. I know about your girlfriend, the cellist. And I know that there's an invasion coming that's gonna kill you and throw Hell's Kitchen to the dogs unless we stop it."

I can almost see the motors whirring in his head through the vein that appears briefly as I'm talking. He takes a second or two to prepare a response, "So what are you? Some kind of Clairvoyant?"

While Jane is making a fuss and drawing attention Erik snags two notebooks into his coat.

"God no. That's not a title I want. Just someone in the wrong place at the wrong time." About five years wrong, actually. "Do you believe I know what I know?"

He nods lightly, "I believe you believe it. Whether or not it's true is a different matter."

I shrug, "From the mouths of babes. Believe it or not I'm only two years old, whatever my ID says."

He allows me to see him looking me over this time, "You don't look it. What would your parents think if they knew you were here causing trouble?"

Darcy trips and stumbles into one of the agents, somehow managing a perfect bump-and-lift pickpocketing. Gotta ask her how she learned that later.

"You mean creator, and he's not here. But he'd probably giggle himself silly. He loves you guys."

I can tell I've got his unbridled curiosity now, "Creator? You make it sound like you're some kind of android. It would explain the age."

Jane grabs some gizmo out of someone's hand with all the audacity she can manage. Erik and Darcy make a show of holding her back, and pocket one more item each in the process of returning and apologizing for what Jane stole.

"Or a synthezoid. So now you're searching your brain for all the most brilliant minds that might be behind this. Stark, Pym, Cho. Maybe Osborn or Parker or Richards. But that kind of technology's years off. And even then, it wouldn't look like me. But then again, I could just be lying."

"And it wouldn't explain what you know. You understand I'm going to have to take you into custody now. We can't just let a leak like this go unnoticed. Bad for publicity."

I hold my wrists up in a mock handcuffs pose, "Yeah, yeah. Take me home and tie me up and I promise I'll whisper sweet nothings into a polygraph for you."

The three others cut their losses and make their exit, Erik and Darcy pretending to drag Jane away. Or maybe they really are dragging her away. It's hard for me to tell if she's playing it up or if she's just naturally that overdramatic.

One of the other agents hands Coulson a pair of single-piece cuffs with no keyhole and he puts them on me, "You shouldn't talk like that. What would the cellist say if she knew?"

I test the cuffs, which holy crap aren't going anywhere, "I think she'd have a lot bigger questions if she knew everything you did at work."

Two agents grab me by either arm and shove me into the back seat of one of the trucks filled with appropriated goods. After a few seconds I feel a painful prick on my wrist, and something burrowing into my skin. My hands go numb, followed by my elbows, arms, shoulders, and the last thing I hear is the engine starting.

 

[Xavier Bronze]

I wake up with a bag over my head. Wow, real original guys. Someone pulls it off and I'm in the same brightly lit interrogation room they put Thor in. So far I haven't been able to change much about the course of events, so i better start rearing for a showdown tomorrow.

But wait a minute. Loki only sent the Destroyer to kill Thor. What happens when Heimdal looks and sees Thor's not on earth like he's supposed to be? Fuck, where is Thor anyway? That completely slipped my mind. Is Thor stuck in Alex's brain back home? What the fuck happens when the Asgardians can't find Thor? Would they avenge him after he'd been banished? They made him mortal, so they had to know it was a possibility. Then again, his banishment wasn't exactly a popular decision if I recall. Lady Sif and the Three Stooges will definitely be looking. Can they trace his disappearance back to me? I landed right where he should've. Who am I kidding, they're fucking magic gods. One of 'em is gonna know.

I should probably pay more attention to the puny humans who tied me to this chair now, "Hey Hawkeye."

Clint Barton nods back at me from the corner of the room, "Hey."

I smile, "You must be good cop. So where's the-"

My chair tips forward until the back is darn near parallel to the ground and then stops. I stretch my neck but can't get far enough to see anything except the floor. I hear boots as the person behind me walks around the chair, holding it back from crushing my face. I see combat boots and a black longcoat.

I couldn't possibly have kicked up enough shit to warrant a visit from him, could I?

A woman's voice, not Scarlet Johansson, "Who do you work for?"

I wonder what happens when I don't answer? "You're not who I thought you were. Where's Fury?"

My chair drops and I instinctively turn my head to soften the blow. I open my eyes a moment later to find my cheek about a millimeter from touchdown. If I hadn't flinched I'd have a broken nose now.

Barton sighs, "Look, Ms. Bronze, There are maybe a hundred thousand people alive who know that name. You're in deep already. The best thing you can do is be straight with us, and maybe then we can reach a settlement that lets you see the outside of a cell sometime before your bicentennial.

I nod what little I can in the given space, "You're right. Sorry. Just being a pill. Nah, it's just me. I don't work for anyone."

I get lightheaded at how fast I whip backward into an upright position and come face to face with… the not-mother, "SHIELD has the best security network on the planet and you expect us to believe you broke it all by yourself?"

I smile, "Agent Hill, I didn't break it by myself. I bypassed it completely by accident." She glances downward and I follow her eyes to a green light on the left arm of the chair I'm in. Must be a lie detector, "I hate fudge." The light flashes red and beeps at us. Yup. Lie detector. "I'm honored that I merit investigation from the Assistant Director, by the way. I didn't think I was that important."

She looks at me sternly, coldly, "You represent the most severe information breach SHIELD has suffered since its inception." I know that's not true, but if I say anything, Hydra will definitely hear about it and kill me, so I let her continue uncorrected, "Now I'm only going to ask this once. Where did you get your information?"

Just as I'm about to open my mouth, Barton interrupts, "She says once, she means once. The next thing that comes out of your mouth isn't the whole truth and nothing but, after this things get unpleasant, and you will regret not telling her upfront."

Thanks, I wasn't planning on testing that one, Good Cop.

"My friend Alex shows me a lot of movies..."

 

[Xavier Bronze]

I almost leave it there. But on the other hand... torture.

"A few of them are about you guys."

Maria looks entirely unamused, and Clint voices her concern, "If this doesn't start making sense soon-"

"I'm from another earth. Let's call it Earth Prime. I dropped through a wormhole late last night and found myself here. On this earth. Let's call it Earth 1."

Agent Hill looks down at the green dot on my chair that says I'm telling the truth, "Another earth."

I nod, "Yeah. Ever hear of the many worlds hypothesis?"

She groans, "That's not how the many worlds hypothesis works."

"Well whatever it is, it's real. I'm from a different earth, and that's how I know what I know."

Barton asks, "And how exactly does that work?"

I take a deep breath, "See, on Earth Prime, all the big events on Earth 1 are pieces of fiction."

Maria sighs, looking once more at the green light "Fiction."

"Movies and tv shows. I recognized all of you because you look exactly like the actors who played you back on Earth Prime. My friend Alex was a big fan of your movies, and he showed me pretty much all of them. Took me a while to realize where I was, but it helps that we're smack in the middle of one of those movies right now."

Clint questions further, "And what do you mean by that exactly."

"I mean there was a movie about someone landing in the desert of New Mexico. They met Jane Foster and Erik Selvig. SHIELD found a hammer that gave off wacko energy readings. The whole shebang. Except in the movie it wasn't me."

He asks, "Who was it?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you. But that hammer you found is his. If things stay on script a big magic alien robot is due to arrive in the town near here sometime tomorrow, and the guy who was supposed to fight it off isn't here. I have pyrokinetic abilities, and if you help me figure out how to use them, I might be able to beat it. But I can't do you any good strapped into this goddamn chair. So cut me loose and get me a punching bag or at least call in some reinforcements. This thing was forged by the gods, it's pissed off, and if nothing changes it's coming whether you're ready for it or not."

Ok, so maybe it's not coming. But maybe it is. Considering the circumstances it might be better for me if it is, so that's what I'm gonna tell them. And if I don't think about it too much I can even believe it myself.

Maria puts her head in her hands, "What reason do we have to believe any of this?"

I look down at my restraints, "Because this chair seems to think I know my shit. And you know I'm not crazy, because I know Director Nick Fury used to be the Sergeant of an elite group called the Howling Commandos, and that you have in your possession an object called the Tesseract that the Red Skull used to create Nazi superweapons. And I know you're working on the exact same thing, or at least planning on it."

The two of them look at each other and shuffle on their feet for a bit.

I look between them, "I could keep going. Tell you about the illegal human enhancement AIM is doing, or the story of how Agent Romanoff was recruited into your service. Where is Romanoff anyway? Is Vanko keeping her busy with his Hammerbots?"

Maria smirks at me, looking for all the world like she just checkmated Bobbie Fisher, "You don't know as much as you think."

I meet her eyes, "Maybe so. The movies are a bit vague on some points, and I don't remember them perfectly. But I do know that there's an invasion coming in 2012, and you aren't ready for it. The movies are very fucking clear about some things. The Tesseract isn't a toy, and there's a much bigger, weirder world out there that you just invited to come play. The battle of New York ravages Hell's Kitchen and kills Agent Coulson, even with the efforts of Stark and Banner and a literal divine intervention."

Hill is obviously thinking very hard about something, "He mentioned what you said about the invasion. He also said you claimed to be artificial."

"I never said I was artificial. I said I was created. And I was. No parents, no real childhood. It's complicated to explain, and frankly unimportant. I'm here now."

"You said you have "pyrokinetic abilities"? We ran a blood test. You're human, as far as any of our instruments can tell."

Time to prove my word, then. I think about how annoying it is that they don't believe me, even though they drugged me and hooked me up to this stupid chair. I think about how they stole all of Jane's equipment, even though she was the best possible person to use it. I think about my friend Jordan, and how I'll never get to talk to her again. And I think about Alex, and how fucking lost he's gonna be without me there to keep him on track.

Nothing happens. Huh.

I look back at Agent Hill, "I don't have enough control over it to show you, but you can ask anyone who was at the diner this morning. They all saw it. My hands caught fire and weren't burned at all after. I don't know how it works either."

Maria nods, "We could do that. Or there's a faster way to check your claim. Agent Barton? If you would."

She holds out her hand. Barton pulls an arrow out of his quiver that immediately ignites.

...Well crap. This is gonna suck.

Maria takes the arrow and walks back over to me. My hands are locked into a bracer type thing on the armrest, so there's nothing I can do to stop her when she presses the arrow against my skin.

It hurts. It hurts a fuckton. Fucking hell that hurts! It didn't hurt at all at the diner!

She takes the arrow away and looks at the severe burn on the back of my hand. I stop screaming. Not sure when I started.

In between panting breaths I speculate, "I guess I'm only immune to my own fire. Better to learn that now, I guess. Still… Fuck you. That was a dick move. You've already got me on a lie detector. And if your truth serum is finished yet I'm guessing you have me on that too. Besides, who'd make this shit up? It's weird as fuck."

Maria Hill and Hawkeye are both silent for a few seconds. I'm still recovering from the torture that I thought I had told them everything to avoid. Agent Hill is glaring at the chair's green light again like she can fix reality through intimidation, and Clint… looks a little bored.

Maria faces me again and states very officially, "We'll be back."

She gestures and Clint follows her out the door. The mirrored door shuts behind them and…

There's a god standing three feet from me. And I'm tied to a chair.

Loki looks at me with utter contempt,

"Where is my brother?"

 

[Xavier Bronze]

Loki: Interlude​

Thor shouts at our father, "You are an old man and a fool!"

I keep my smile hidden under the strongest conjuration I can manage. I could have never dreamed that disrupting his coronation would lead to such glorious recompense. Thor's avarice and hubris finally shine too brightly for Odin to ignore.

Odin responds, "I was a fool. To think you were ready."

Time to show support for my beloved brother, as is expected of me for my future king, "Father, I-"

The bellow that comes from the Allfather's mouth makes it clear my words mean still less than I could have hoped. After centuries of boundless praise, my father finally sees Thor for all he is.

Odin speaks in much more than sound. I can see the words in their true form as they reshape the energies of the universe to fit their will. The breath of life speaks in concert with him, "Thor Odinson, you have betrayed the express command of your king. Through your arrogance and stupidity you've opened these peaceful realms and innocent lives to the horrors and desolation of war!" His staff slides into the centerpiece of the Bifrost and the room around us writhes into action, "You are unworthy of these realms. You are unworthy of your title. You are unworthy!" I see the last word brand onto the bones of Thor's soul, "...of the loved ones you have betrayed."

The sweet irony falls lost on all but myself.

"I now take from you your power. In the name of my father, and his father before, I, Odin Allfather, cast you out!"

I… I never expected this. I knew great magics were at work on this day, but I never once would have dreamed he would go as far as to banish Asgard's most loved prince. The shock that graces my features has no need to be fabricated, as I watch my brother cast through the Bifrost, stripped of all the divine and mystic might he once personified.

"Whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy, shall possess the power of Thor."

The technicality is of course clear to my eyes. Thor need not be the only one to be worthy of his power. If someone else claims the hammer, Thor has but a century at most to live.

Odin throws Mjolnir through the portal into Midgard, and my greatest obstruction to the throne is removed by command of the king, my predecessor.

But then, I turn my glance toward Thor, and find… nothing.

I look again. I look near Mjolnir, where the Bifrost opened, across the seas in the land he once lauded his divinity, and everywhere else I can think of. I search for magic, only to remember that it won't work, because he's mortal now. I read the messages that the humans cloud their air with, and see nothing beyond images of his hammer falling.

I turn to the Allfather, "Father, something's wrong. Thor is-"

He walks out of the Bifrost chamber in a storm that invites no further discussion of the matter, "Thor is no longer my concern."

I relocate to wherever Heimdal is, "I need you to find Thor."

Heimdal pauses sharpening his sword for a moment, "Thor is no longer within my sight."

"Is he shrouded the same as the Frost Giants were?"

Heimdal stops and bows his head, "No. Your brother is gone. Where Odin sent him is not in the Nine Realms, days past, present, or yet to come. He is beyond, whether in the void or simply elsewhere I do not know. But his place is not mine to know."

I grow angry. The impertinent apathy of his actions and tone offend my brother's memory, "Does this not bother you as it does I? Even the realms of death are within your sight, and yet he is somewhere even more distant."

"Indeed it does bother me. But I can no more summon him back from a place I cannot see than I can change the Allfather's mind and reverse his banishment. There is nothing to be done."

I leave him, and go to my own chambers to contemplate. Thor is banished. More than banished, he has been removed. I didn't even know that it was within Odin's power to do. I've always dreamed of having Thor gone, but never had I thought it may come to pass. And now I find myself wondering if it was ever what I truly wanted at all. There's a part of me that the mask I wear is based on, that sincerely regrets his loss. And there's another part wondering why father would go to such extremes to punish such a small infraction. And there's a yet larger part that doesn't care, and simply revels in the glory of inevitable kingship.

I summon the materials I need, and prepare to scry the place and time of his banishment. After a few moments of setting the stage I gaze into the events once more, from a greater perspective.

Again, the sheer power wielded by the Allfather is a terrifying happening to behold. I see all of Thor's power removed and implanted in a seal on Mjolnir. Thor flies through the rainbow bridge and…

...is gone. The scry ends.

I reset and make the attempt once more, this time focusing not on him, but on the gateway itself. The Bifrost was certainly directed at Midgard at the time he was sent through.

I watch the path itself, carving its way across dimensions of time, space, reality, and mind. The scry struggles to comprehend it at the marvel of Asgardian engineering in play. But it holds, and I see everything. I see the bridge, Asgard, Thor, Mjolnir, and Midgard, all at once. I see Thor enter the Bifrost stream. I see him fly toward Midgard, at both dizzying speeds and at once slow enough for a safe landing. I see the other end before him.

And I see something else land in his place.

Thor is gone.

I see it again. He travels through the Bifrost. But he never arrives at Midgard. Something else, something that never entered the rainbow bridge, suddenly… is, right on the threshold of one realm to another.

This thing, is from Beyond. This must herald from where Thor is now. I reset the scry, with a new target at hand. This creature that dares enter my Nine Realms. It carries two spirits, one much mightier than its host. Its power pales in the shadow of a god. But I also see within it a great connection to something vast and dangerous. This... violation cannot be allowed to stand!

The humans have forgotten the might of Asgard, and it is not their time to be conquered yet. I can be patient. I will wait until the abomination is alone, and then I will rend the answers I need from its soul if it will not give them willingly.

But first, I must go to the Casket of Ancient Winters, and uncover an illusory deceit older than my deepest living memories. On this day or the next, I will find the answers I seek.

 

[Xavier Bronze]

Clint Barton: Interlude​

I follow the Deputy Director out of the room. She's on edge. This whole situation has everyone waiting for the other shoe to drop. And if this new mystery woman's telling the truth, that's due to happen sometime tomorrow.

The soundproofed door barely closes behind us before the Deputy Director is on the comms, "I need verification that the EKG and micro expression readers in the containment room are operational." She turns to me, "Do you think she's telling the truth?"

I shake my head, "I think those toys know better than I would. But if you're asking… yeah. She believes it, at least. She's scared out of her mind of whatever she thinks is coming."

Honestly, nothing surprises me anymore. In my years with SHIELD I've seen things most people would outright deny were happening in front of their eyes. Saw a few things before then, too. After the Hulk, Pym's old tech, Hydra's old tech, SHIELD's new tech, Stark's new tech, a few run-ins with the League, giant reptiles in the sewers of New York, plus whatever happened to that couple in Central City, not to mention the guy in blue… It's a long list that adds up to a crazy world. And if someone tells me that a magic alien robot is gonna fall out of the sky, I'm inclined to believe them.

The Deputy Director opens comms again, "Someone get me an advil." She turns back to me again, "Ok, better question. Do you think she's been brainwashed, or do we actually call in reinforcements for something we don't even know exists yet?"

"You know everything I know. It's your call, Agent Hill."

She growls for a second, "I don't know what to think. I'm asking you. SHIELD has been earth's first line of defense against the things no-one wants to know about for over fifty years. But could there really be other earths out there? She registers human, but there are no records of her except the falsified ID she had on her."

Someone gives her a pill case with a few low-level pain killers in it. I shrug, "Coulson's report said she mentioned synthezoids. She could be that, or some kind of clone. Doctor Dyne could be behind this. Implanted memories maybe. There are a lot of things she could be, but I don't think crazy is one of them."

"We need to think about this objectively. Risk assessment: How likely is it that something is going to happen tomorrow?"

Why is she asking me? I know she's stressed, but there are a lot of other people more qualified to advise her right now. Like Coulson. I could tell her to go talk to him. I could, "If someone put the memories of those movies in her head they did it for a reason. If someone's behind this, they wanted her to tell us. So either the warning's genuine, or it's a diversion. Either way the threat is real."

The Deputy Director nods and stares at the door, "I'll tell Fury to keep an ear to the ground."

"Sir, we may need more than that, if what she's saying is true."

"If what she's saying is true, we're gonna need more than we've got."

I fiddle with my new quiver, pushing the buttons on my glove that rotate between arrowheads. Ever since I got it a few weeks ago the sound of it clicking from one arrow to another helps me think. I'm not quite used to it enough for active combat yet, but I'm getting there, "Maybe not. Do you know where Project Icarus is?"

She gives me a look, "Project Icarus is still under construction-"

I interrupt, "Icarus has been 'still under construction' for the last two years. Do you know where it is?"

She meets my eyes and we have a quick silent conversation about protocol and clearance levels and plausible deniability before she responds, "Yes, I do know where it is."

"Then it might be time to call in a favor."

She squints at me, "Do you really think she's telling the truth?"

I think about it for a moment. After years of service, all I've seen. I look at that girl, Xavier. I see fear. I see the same fear in her that I had a long time ago. She's trying to stay afloat, but she doesn't know the water. She's dangerous. But in the same circumstances, who wouldn't be? She's not a spy, she's not a killer, and she doesn't want to be either. That makes her worth protecting, and that makes her an ally. Doesn't mean we have to trust her, but it does mean we can listen.

"Yeah. I do."

She stands there and thinks for a few seconds. And then, "Agent Barton, take a walk."

So I do. I go up and watch over the hammer for a bit. I watch the hustle and bustle of a bunch of people smarter than me doing things I barely understand. Maybe if this girl's right there'll actually be a reason for someone like me to be here.

My comms buzz alive and the Deputy Director calls me back, "Agent Barton, report to the containment room."

I head back and see her getting off the phone with someone, presumably Fury. I nod to her, and she nods back and we get ready to go back in.

I stop her just before she opens the door, "Hey, Agent Hill, mam, go a little easier on her. Coulson recommended you play Good Cop, remember?"

She nods again, "Yeah. Thanks, Barton."

Then she opens the door and we go back in.

 

[Xavier Bronze]

I almost try to form another fireball, but realize real fast that it wouldn't do any good. Fricking Asgardians. Literal gods or ancient aliens, either way they're overpowered as fuck. And if this is anything like when he visited Thor, he's probably invisible and intangible right now anyway, assuming he's even really here and not in a tea shop in china or something. He's got indestructibility, teleportation, illusions, mind control, fucking magic and whatever all else that can do. I've got fire I can't activate or control, and I'm tied to a chair. I'm not fighting my way out of this.

I make a point of looking him right in the eye, "I assume you heard everything I just said."

His lip jerks upward in a sneer, "Yes, that you're from another world. That none of this is real. What did you call it? Earth Prime? It's a nice story."

"It's the truth." That's really all I have to work with now. I'm hooked up to a SHIELD brand lie detector, probably with some kind of truth serum in my system, and the God of Deception is standing right in front of me. Lying now would be basically suicide.

"I know it is. You don't have what it takes to lie to me."

He stares at me, into my eyes. I feel thoughts that aren't mine and for the briefest moment I think it might be Alex. But it's not, of course. It's Loki. I know I can't stop him from reading surface thoughts, but I try to steer the juicy stuff out of his sight, like any movie he's in, or any movie that hasn't happened yet. On second thought I just try not to think about the movies at all. I focus on Loki's shoes, examining every detail. Those things can't be practical...

He cackles, "A fine effort, but meaningless. Even if I can't enter your mind directly, I know the truth in every word you utter, and if you refuse to speak I can make you."

The only reason my defenses are so good is because I'm used to having other people in my brain, and I know exactly how thought sharing works. Lucky thing. I think about smiling, but don't want to die, "Or you could just ask. I'm in no position to deny you, and I know it."

He repeats his question, "Then where is Thor?"

"If I could tell you, I would. Frankly, you terrify me. But I don't know where he is. I can tell you he was supposed to be where I am now. I can tell you anything you want about Earth Prime."

I don't have to fake my fear at all. On the screen he was silly as bubblegum shit, with the giant stupid hat and the poor man's LotR dialogue performed with all the ham Tom Hiddleston could serve. But in person… I know SHIELD is watching, and I know they can't see a damn thing because he doesn't want them to. He's a god. He's a fucking magic god. He could be stark nude with cheese on his head and there would be nothing funny about it. He could kill everyone in this facility, and the town nearby, and there's nothing anyone short of Iron Man could do to stop him.

He waits for a few seconds. I can feel him poking at the edges of my headspace a few times, almost testingly. I'm not thinking about anything dangerous, so a surface scan won't get him much. I'm too focused on not panicking like a cockroach when the lights just turned back on. Funny, that being scary is actually working against him.

Loki becomes more… where he is, like a probability field collapsing into a particle. And I think briefly that that may actually be what just happened. He finally asks, "You really don't know where he is."

I shake my head, "Sorry. All I know is that he was supposed to land in that desert instead of me. He might be back in Earth Prime. But he could be anywhere. If you're here I'm guessing Heimdal couldn't see him, which means we have to consider that he might be dead."

I expect an outburst, and I see him react to that last word. But being still alive a second later is nice too.

He asks, "This… Earth Prime. How did you get here, from there?"

I laugh a little, "I fell asleep? I'm pretty sure whatever did it came from this side, or somewhere else completely. I don't have the kind of power to open breaches like that. I'd guess whatever dropped me here probably took him away too, though."

He smirks, "No, you don't have enough power for that. But you do have power. I can see it in the dual nature of your soul, and the tattered corners of your mind. Is this the normal state for people whence you came?"

I freeze. Can… he see Alex? Or is he just seeing the spot where Alex used to be? Urgh! Stupid ominously vague Asgardian phrasing! Just say what you fucking mean! "No, it's not normal anywhere, as far as I know."

He tilts his head, "It surprises you that I can see, what you are, what you were. How can one achieve such clear essence of self without even the most basic study of psychic practices?"

I sigh. Better tell him what's up, "Can you see how old this body- my body is? Not biologically or anything. How old the actual body is, in time."

His gaze is more than sight. I can feel it penetrating every layer of my body, like a really fucking cold wind somewhere north. It's like if x-rays were done with knives, thin enough to not leave injuries, but sharp enough to go through anything. It's extremely offputting, and makes me want to take a shower.

He says what he sees, "This isn't your natural form. You were encased here, when you traveled to this realm. The stitching is expertly done. Nigh perfect, such that I didn't see until now what had been done." He turns off his god eyes and looks up again at my face, "What were you, in your own realm? Not human, I think."

"You think wrong. Human. As human as human can be, here or there. Just a little newer than most. Do you know how the Allfather created the rest of the gods?"

Loki sneers, "He didn't create all of us. But he possesses in his being the breath of life. He can grant life, and further divinity to anything he wills, with a simple touch and a word of power."

I don't remember that from the comics, "While that's interesting and all, it's not as useful as I was hoping in describing how I was made. And I can't reference Harvey, because you're from a different planet and I don't even know Harvey exists in this universe. Tell you what, just read my mind."

He's surprised at that, but quickly complies. I feel him, like a pressure. I think about Alex, and how he made me, and the years when he supressed me, and the weeks when he didn't. I think about what we read, about what I am. I think about the feeling of familiarity I had when we first saw descriptions of others like me, like getting a joke months after its been told. And I think about waking up in the desert, without him, with my own body, and how wrong it felt.

I feel Loki leave and he smiles, "You are a parasite of the mind, given form in a new world. Be thankful that he is rid of you."

My hands clench and I glare, "I'm a person. I've got the same right to brain and body as any other person. And since I've gotten here, I've managed to get hit by a truck, catch on fire, twice, get arrested by the most dangerous organization on the planet, and piss off probably your whole fucking pantheon of gods. If I had to guess, I'd say Alex isn't doing too hot without me either. We take care of each other… Or at least, we did." Who would ever choose to inhabit this bleak world alone?

We just sort of stay there and stare at each other for a few seconds. I have no idea what's going on in his head, and that scares the shit out of me. Metaphorically, anyway.

I talk first, "So are you gonna kill me?"

He opens his mouth to answer, and then smiles and he takes a step back.

The door opens again and my two agents come in.

And of course Loki's gone. Stupid Asgardian teasing cockbite.