Into the Unknown

Auld Lang Syne

Tony, of course, throws a big New Year's Eve party. My first Tony Stark party. It is being held at the Tower since his house in Malibu was destroyed. He had already saved Pepper from the formula Killian had injected her with. I'm not sure how he did it but Tony always figures out everything.

Currently I am at the bar set up for the party, waiting on my drink. The bartender hands it to me and I smile. Drinks are "free" since Tony is paying for everything but I do give him a tip. I take my mixed drink and find a quiet corner to watch the people dance and have fun while I sip on my drink.

"Hey, why aren't you out there dancing?"

I look to see Natasha walking towards me.

"Cause I can't dance. I'm fine right where I am." She stands next to me.

"What are you drinking?" She asks, looking at my drink.

"Sex on the Beach. I don't like alcohol so I gotta go with the fruity drinks." I raise my glass to her and take a sip. "Also I didn't know you were here."

She opens her mouth to say something but I interrupt her.

"Before you say anything, no, the movies don't go into any detail about your daily lives. They just show the action stuff."

She smirks and shakes her head.

"I was invited. I heard you helped Tony and Pepper."

I take another sip of my drink and frown. "I think I was more in the way than anything else."

Natasha is quiet for a minute. "So who or what's next?"

"Thor. None of y'all are in it though."

She looks at me. "Is Loki involved?"

I nod. "Yeah, he helps Thor."

Again she is quiet for a minute. "So you said that he wasn't behind the attack on New York. Can you tell me anything about that?"

I sigh and take a bigger sip of my drink. "Loki...fell in with the wrong crowd. Horrible, awful things happened to him. He was forced to attack Earth. He doesn't really care about us and really doesn't want to rule over us at all."

Natasha studies me. "And him taking over Clint and Erik?"

"Again, he was being forced to do that. If Loki had really wanted to take over the Earth, he could've easily done so. He was being watched the whole time so he had to at least act like he was trying."

"You mean that was all an act?" She asks in disbelief.

I nod and look at her. "The guy who tortured him is way worse."

Natasha narrows her eyes at me. "Are we going to have to deal with him?"

I look down again. "At some point. But not right now." I look up at her. "I need more people to join the Avengers before I can start worrying about that."

A half lie. I was already worrying about it. I had bought myself a notebook and had already started writing out what I could remember from the movies and what needed to happen and what I could possibly keep from happening. I still had no plan to prevent everyone's deaths or how to beat Thanos. I still need to think about that. Preferably some place quiet.

Natasha stays with me and we watch everyone for a while.

"So what are your plans for the rest of the night?" She asks after a while.

"Probably going to stay until midnight and then head back up to my room."

"Pfft, boring." She says.

I raise an eyebrow at her. "Oh yeah? What are you going to do?"

She smiles at me. "Dunno yet."

I laugh. I see Bruce walking over to us and I smile at him. "Hey, Bruce."

He gives us an awkward smile. "Hey guys. What are you two doing over here?"

"People watching. Plus I don't have a date or know anyone else here." I answer him.

"That shouldn't keep you from dancing." He states.

I point to my feet. "See Bruce, it might look like I have a left and right foot but actually I have two left feet."

He laughs. "Well do you two mind if I join you both. This seems to be the safest place for me."

I move to the side and he moves to stand between me and Natasha. We chitchat for the rest of the evening until the music stops, signaling that it's almost midnight. There are big screens behind the DJ and they show the famous ball just waiting to drop.

Finally the ball begins to descend. The place is quiet until the timer shows ten.

"Ten. Nine. Eight," the entire room shouts in unison, "Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. HAPPY NEW YEAR!" The room shouts.

Outside fireworks start going off and inside confetti begins to fall and the song Auld Lang Syne begins to play. I see couples and "maybe not" couples kiss and I can't help but feel lonely. I swallow the loneliness down and when the song is over I look over at Natasha and Bruce.

"Happy New Year guys. I am going to bed." I smile at them and make my way to the hall that will take me to the elevator.

Only certain people could access the upper floors and luckily I was one of those people. The doors open to the small entrance way on my floor. The entrance leads out to an expansive living, kitchen, and dining room. A hallway to the right leads to my bedroom with an attached bathroom and an extra room. The second bedroom is empty at the moment, but I am planning on turning it into a gaming room once I start getting some money. I strip off my clothes and head into the bathroom and take a nice long hot shower. Once I am dry I get into a pair of pajamas and crawl into bed. I open the drawer of the nightstand next to the bed and pull out the notebook and look over what I have written so far.

It's not much at this point and I'm still not sure what all I can do. I'm still debating on telling them everything or not. I sigh and put the notebook back in the drawer. I knew one thing, somehow I was going to have to get in touch with Thor and tell him what was coming up for him. But he hasn't come back to Earth since New York. I frown and roll over onto my side and close my eyes.

The next week I start my job on one of the lower floors. Tony had given me a set of instructions on where to go and even a "company phone." Since mine was from the year 2022, we both agreed that I needed something that wouldn't make me stand out too much. It turns out to be an easy data entry job and I can listen to music or an audio book the whole time. Perfect for me.

Several months pass with nothing exciting happening until one day, the lights of the Bifrost appear outside the tower and Thor steps out.