(Originally published in "The Many Adventures of the Avengers and Friends")
"No, no, you're missing the point. There is no throne. There is no version of this where you come out on top." - Tony Stark, "The Avengers"
Or is there?
Multiverses have the...
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°2019°
"It's too risky. You remember what happened to that group last week, right?" Bucky argued.
"Yes, I do, but they went and stormed in. We can be discreet about it." Carson replied.
"How? Our faces are pretty recognizable, don't forget." Bucky gestured to Carson's lilac shaded hair.
"We can use wigs and shears. You have already started growing a beard; that hides most of your face."
"Because we can't afford another razor, remember?"
"I rather like the beard, thank you very much. We can probably sneak into the back of that old costume shop and find a few things to use. We'll be fine. Everyone else will be in costume anyways." Carson said.
Along with being evil magic alien overlords, Loki and Olivia considered themselves acclaimed playwrights. Investment in the live arts was something greatly valued in their eyes. It explained why high schools could suddenly afford to do larger productions and sports teams had to use old equipment. Of course, people couldn't put on productions of shows like Les Mis, but the "fun" stuff was still fair game. Shows about witches and talking plants were always in high demand.
Midtown High School had put together a lovely production of "The Secret Garden" that spring and were able to have full moving sets to swap between the manor and the garden itself. Live ivy vines coiled around the front of the stage and they even had a real robin.
The bird was part of the deal that Loki and Olivia could attend one of the showings as they sometimes did to high school shows. They claimed it was to get a feel for how the new generation fared in the spotlight. Though, most everyone knew that it was really just a way to get free entertainment and intimidate the humans. Rumors had gone around that during one west coast production of "Evita" that Loki and Olivia had attended, the girl playing the titular role had gotten so frightened that she forgot half of her lines.
She hadn't shown up at school after that.
But, as Bucky and Carson knew, their alien monarchs enjoyed writing their own plays. And finally, they had one all to themselves. It was a dramatization of Earth's conquer through the lense of Loki and Olivia themselves. They painted their victory as some great service and the now dissolved Avengers as opposing fiends. The play was only ever performed for its writers, which made it that much more fear inducing for the actors they had selected. A lot of people who were brought in to be a part of the play never came out.
It was the perfect way to sneak into the Palace undetected.
The Winter Soldiers planned on posing as actors to stage an assassination by way of poison. Re-engineered Iocane Powder courtesy of HYDRA in the wine, to be specific. Odorless, tasteless, extremely deadly. All Bucky and Carson had to do was sneak in, don costumes, and find a way to get to the wine. But, of course, they needed disguises to get into the Palace in the first place.
