Avengers

Loki Arrives

Thor roars as he leaps at Iron Man. Mjölnir clashes with iron gauntlet. Inside his suit, Tony Stark grunts with pain. When Thor draws back his weapon, a large dent has been left in Iron Man's arm. The two metals clash again, sending sparks wheeling into the air.

    "Why are you doing this?" Stark yells over the continuous crashes. Thor just growls something indistinct, and lashes out. Mjölnir connects with the side of Stark's head. 

He screams; falls back. Blood trickles from between the cracks in the side of his helmet.

Thor draws back his hammer once again, and raises it high for the kill. Stark whimpers.

    "No, no, Thor. Why?" Thor glares and, with ferocious intent, swings his mighty hammer down. There is a crunch, a muffled cry, and all is still. The Norse god pulls the bloodied head of Mjölnir away from the shattered remains of Stark's face. He sneers.

    "Because I have to." Thor's face ripples; his body thins. The armour changes. The cloak as red as veins hanging off his back turns green. The messy, dirty blonde hair morphs into slick, black hair. The Norse god of mischief grins down at the dead man on the floor.

   "And because I can." 

Thor sat bolt upright in his bunk. Clint Barton, Hawkeye, glanced over from the arrow he was polishing. He raised his eyebrows as if to say: Whoa, slow down!

Thor slowly shook his head. Hawkeye turned back to the repetitive motion of cleaning the shaft of his arrow. Thor looked around the small room. Natasha Romanoff, Tony Stark, Bruce Banner, and Steve Rogers all snored quietly in their own bunks. 

    "I… I had a very vivid dream. Where Loki killed Stark," Thor murmured.

Hawkeye grunted, barely registering what Thor had said. Thor watched Hawkeye's polishing job, before turning over to get back to sleep.

    "Up! Up! Up! Stretch as high a you can, then touch your toes!" a woman barked.

Steve Rogers looked up to see a young, pretty woman with a short, dark perm.

He gasped as he recognized the sharp features, but the gentle, kind eyes. 

    Peggy Carter stared at him. Her features blurred; her image wavered. But even while her beautiful face distorted, there was no mistaking a frown on her face. Her mouth opened, and she began to shout. "You said you'd be there! I waited the whole dance, but you never appeared! I waited decades for you! Years and years of hoping, praying!" the spectral image shrieked angrily. Rogers blinked as spittle hit his face. As he watched with growing horror, Peggy aged dramatically with every word of hatred. 

    Her face grew bonier; her figure, limp and sharp; her hair seemed bleached and drained of colour; her complexion turned from rosy to frail and old. Suddenly, she stopped dead.

Rogers grabbed her falling body, and sobbed as her skin slowly aged away: years of nothingness transformed her to dust. As a last resort, her eyes flickered to him. Her mouth shaped soundlessly. Rogers cried her name, over the dust on her body.

    "Captain! Captain!" came an urgent voice. Rogers' eyes snapped open.

Bruce Banner was shaking him awake. Rogers sat up, and his forehead connected with the base of Banner's nose. He reeled back in shock, and reached up to feel his nose.

He didn't frown, as Rogers had expected him to. The manic sound of laughter echoed. 

    "What is it? What's the joke? Please don't say I talked in my sleep for the first time!"

Natasha Romanoff, Black Widow, rolled her eyes.

    "Actually, that would have been the fifth. And you didn't. Last time you screamed - I think I'd wake up if that happened!" she said. Rogers explained, but his voice trailed off when he saw the look on Banner's face. The shaking man raised a trembling hand to point out the window. The rest of the Avengers crowded round, and gasped in shock at what they saw.

    It was Nick Fury. Standing on the wing of the ship. And he was getting closer to the edge.

"Boss!" Maria Hill screamed, but her desperate voice was yet again whipped away by the wind. She glanced around for help, and saw the pale faces of the Avengers staring at Fury through a window. She beckoned, and Stark saw: "Guys, I'm helping Fury," he said. "Don't try to stop me." With incredible speed, he dashed from the room.

    Meanwhile, the pod of his suit shot through the corridor. As he ran, it connected with his body. Before he jumped from the ship door, everyone could hear the boots of his suit clanking. Iron Man was formed, and ready for action. Stark gritted his teeth, and jumped.

    Stark gasped - just as he dove from the door, Fury jumped. Metal gauntlets grabbed the flailing man. Fury roared angrily. His saviour checked the angry man's eyes, and was shocked to discover that they weren't blue. Was Fury doing it without Loki? he wondered.

    Fury twisted, screeching, and it was then Stark realised: he was clutching not Fury, but Loki. Loki smiled, an almost kind emotion, excepting the fact that it was twisted with evil. Loki materialized his spear, but it was different. The orb at the tip seemed much more powerful. He stuck the blade into the glowing pacemaker on Stark's chest, and all the energy seemed to be sucked out. Inside his suit, Stark's face grew paler and paler. The pacemaker was slowly, but steadily, being drained of power.

    Stark's heart beats began to grow irregular; his limbs began to twitch as the blood was cut off. The suit spiraled out of control. Loki laughed, removed the spear, and materialized into thin air.

Natasha Romanoff, Black Widow, was watching worriedly out of the small window. Anxiously, she craned her head out. She saw Loki. That mendacious freak! she thought angrily. She suddenly spotted something that made her gasp: Stark, in his suit, was unconsciously plummeting towards the earth. She snatched Thor up.

    "Go get Stark, now!" she yelled. The Norse god of thunder is stupid! she screamed inside, how does he not understand me? Thor grabbed Mjölnir, and smashed out of the large door. He saw Stark, swooping in the wreckage of his suit, towards the sea. Thor plunged towards the limp, flailing metal body. He was too late.

    The suit hit the water's surface with a splash so colossal, it was as if a meteorite was hitting earth.

The suit immediately sank, taking the unconscious man with it. When Thor reached the surging waves, Stark was all but gone. Thor ground his teeth in frustration and panic. He scanned the choppy waves, and spotted a glimmer of red and gold. He sucked in all his breath, and dove beneath the waves.