ACATALEPSY ➺ loki

18 , the calm...

It had almost been twenty four hours since the Guardians had arrived already, and their plan of action to re-obtain the Power stone was almost complete. To make matters slightly simpler and less time consuming on them, we had decided that they would use the Tesseract to get to Xander as well, this time under Thor's guidance, as the second Gamora and Rocket had been told of who exactly Loki was, they had refused for him to come along on the trip. It pleased me to say that the man had actually looked a little upset, which in my mind meant he was actually starting to care about what the avengers and friends thought of him. But it also made me feel slightly bad for him, knowing that he wouldn't do anything to hard the rest of the team if he said he wasn't going to. Loki may have been a lot of things, but you could quite easily tell when he was lying or not.

Anyway, by the next morning, everything had been finalised—the Guardians and Thor would be traveling to Xander later in the day. I was nervous, not so much about their trip, but over the fact that I knew after they returned from Xander, that would mean it was time for me to pay doctor Strange a visit, which, even though I would have loved to get to meet him under any other circumstances, I was very scared for. The thought of meeting someone new was always a bit unnerving, add having to convince them to give you what very well could be their most prized possession? I was not looking forward to when I would eventually have to find Strange and speak to him about the infinity stones... but I also knew that if I asked him to check to future and confirm that what I was telling him was true, he would agree to give me the stone. I hoped.

Anyway, mindless worrying aside, Natasha finally managed to give me a proper training lesson that day after breakfast, since we had nothing else to do until after lunch. It went pretty well if I could say so myself, I was apparently able to hold my own pretty decently against her for a good few minutes before the black widow would eventually overthrow me, but that didn't upset me as I knew exactly how skilled she really was. Losing to someone that powerful didn't even feel bad, if I was being honest—but that didn't mean I wasn't ready to give our training my full attention, wanting nothing more than to be able to provide some physical help during battles as well when the time came, not just spouting out information that would help them through an intercom while I hid.

Her first comment had been that I was an unfit level of thin, giving me a sympathetic look as if wondering what was the reason for that. It had taken a lot not to just give in and just explain that it wasn't anyone else's fault other than mine, and how it was only because of the medicines I'd been taking ever since I'd tried to end my life six years ago. I wanted to explain that it wasn't all bad, because it meant I was doing better, and that... I was still around to even have the medications. Besides, over the last six years I had been made to stop a lot of the medicines, and was still doing pretty well without them. And, I realised, I hadn't even been taking them for the past week or so—since I'd fallen into this universe, and... I was alright. But some small part of me still felt like it wasn't the time to start sharing my life sorrows with the avengers just yet. They hadn't agreed for me to stay with them to hear a girl complain about her problems and I felt like it would only change their view on me in a way I didn't wish to happen... so I didn't say anything to Natasha as she instructed I have at least a toast and some fruit for breakfast, since I'd told her I was vegetarian and couldn't do meats.

The training session had gone on for almost two hours, and I was absolutely exhausted by the end of it, but I already knew at least fifteen different attacks and counter moves now to use in fights. And Natasha said she could see a difference in the way I fought already—I was understanding the strategy to attacks faster than most. It was hard to not let it get a bit to my head when I had the black widow praising my fighting skills, but I still tried to remember I barely knew what I was doing, and this was all in a controlled room with padding everywhere. Fights actually happening out in the real world were completely different, and that would be something I couldn't train for in here, really. I'd just have to experience that when I did.