Loki, Unraveled|| NovaVerse 2

17|| Beneath the Surface

Word Count: 3,915

They all jumped up and got in a fighting stance facing the broken window, when a bony hand with rough, grey skin gripped the inside of the windowsill and pulled itself into the room. Its face was scared and appeared as if it had been melted off some time ago and the flesh was glued to its skull, tufts of grey hair grew in random patches, and its eyes were beady and looked pushed into its face a good inch.

It pointed at them and let out a monstrous screech, and pointed a finger towards Loki, who was shoved against the wall by a mysterious force. "Loki, son of Laufey," its scratchy, high pitched screeching voice echoed in the room. Nova summoned her power and blasted at the creature, but with the lift of another hand it sent the blast towards Natasha instead, knocking her out. The creature made a hand into a fist, and suddenly, Loki began choking in the air. He kicked at it and gripped at his throat, trying to breathe. "Thanos wishes to remind you of the consequences to breaking your bargain. He hunts your brother as we speak."

That was enough.

Nova flipped over him faster than he had time to react and blasted him. The light was so bright it was blinding. The creatures unearthly screech filled the room and Nova covered her ears. She felt drops of blood fall from her face. She tackled the creature with all her might and hit its head against the broken shards of the windowsill. She felt searing pain burst through her body from her hand and quickly withdrew it from the sun.

The creature took this as an opportunity to lift all the daggers in the room -why did Loki have so many daggers? - with a thought and hurled them at Nova before she could realize it. Green lights flashed and suddenly, all the daggers flew in the creature's direction.

Loki stood beside Nova. He raised his hands and formed them into fists as tendrils of green energy bound the creatures' limbs to the floor. Nova hit it with a blast of red light. It screeched. Another. It writhed in pain. Another, another, another, another. The creature laid on the floor with its eyes closed, smoke rising from its body.

Natasha stirred and got up from the floor, saying groggily, "What did I miss?"

The creatures' slimy eyelids opened, and Nova marched towards it, power and anger filling her veins. The red power that pulsated around her fists, circulating in her blood, was hot- burning. Perhaps it surpassed even the heat of the sun. She stepped on the creatures' slimy arm, and the heat of her made its skin sizzle. It groaned in agony. She pressed harder. "You tell Thanos if he ever pulls another bullshit move like that again, if he ever harms anyone I love, I will go after him. I will hunt down anyone and everyone he holds dear, I will destroy his army, and I will make him watch as I do this, before I kill him, very slowly and painfully. Do you understand?" She pressed a hand to its throat and the flesh started smoking and it gasped for air. She released the energy slowly, watching the red seep into its veins.

She was going to burn him from the inside out.

Loki reached out to gently pull Nova away from the creature, but he pulled away the moment her skin burned his. He knelt beside Nova and whispered, "Nova, you've done enough. You're better than this." Her hand loosened around the sizzling near-corpse and the red energy started to dissipate as she leaned into Loki's touch. He pulled her away gently and handed her to Natasha as he leaned in to whisper to the creature, "And if you so much as look in her direction, I will do so much worse." The creature looked at him with fear in its beady eyes as it crawled and trembled to the window, jumping out and dissolving into the wind.