My Friend Loki: The Price You Pay

Part 12

As we approached the waiting room, Coulson was immersed in reading a magazine - most probably the one he mentioned earlier - and Lowenstein was sipping a beverage from an insulated paper cup.

When we were in their sights, cup and magazine were put on the waiting room coffee table and they both stood up.

"This seems to be the best place as any to hold our meeting, " Coulson said.

"Before we start, would you and Thor like something to drink?" Lowenstein asked.

"Thank you, that would be great," I said, "a cup of tea for me, please."

"Coffee," Thor said a bit gruffly.

As Lowenstein left to get the beverages, Thor and I sat down, and for the moment, we were alone with Coulson.

"So, Loki spoke to you," Coulson asked me as he sat back down.

"Yes," I replied, taking a deep breath, "he certainly did."

"You don't know how much I'm interested in hearing what he said."

"I believe I have an inkling." I couldn't help but sport a smug grin.

Lowenstein soon returned with our beverages, and as I took my cup of tea from him, I asked, "how is Loki doing?"

Handing Thor his coffee, Lowenstein spoke as he sat down, "For the moment, he's resting comfortably. We're unaware of his healing rate, so for the moment, we're attempting some different approaches for treatment. As you and Thor observed, the battery of tests he had to go through has helped me figure out what has caused his injuries." He paused for a moment. Looking around at us and seeing how we were all listening, "I guess I'll go first, shall I?"

"Please do," Coulson said.

Lowenstein picked up a computer tablet that he previously left on the waiting room table and placed it on his lap, "I need to preface first, that Frost Giants have a tough exterior, making them mostly impervious to damage. However, if you hit them multiple times with a strong weapon you can cause them injury. Now keeping that in mind," he accessed his tablet, and with a finger scrolled through the data on its screen, "after my examination of Loki, I discovered a large contusion on his left side, three fractured ribs on the same side, a dozen or more small bruises on various areas of his torso," he glanced briefly at Thor (who shrugged and hung his head with embarrassment), then continued to look at the tablet's screen, "and some bruising on his back which luckily didn't affect his spine." Lowenstein paused and a troubling expression soon appeared, "The fractured ribs, however, seemed to be a side effect from something else. I ran several tests to be sure..."

"And..?" Coulson urged.

"That large contusion... it was caused by a very strong energy blast..." Lowenstein bit his lip, now hesitant to speak.

"And..." Coulson said, "you know the origin of this energy?"

"Yes." Lowenstein looked at me for a moment, then turned to Coulson, "the blast matches with the energy signature of a... Chitauri weapon."

"A Chitauri weapon?" Coulson said in shock.

Coulson wasn't the only one in shock.

I recalled from the news coverage of the Battle of New York on CBC, the Chitauri were the alien army Loki led in his attempt to take over our world... Their weapons were very powerful, causing much damage to buildings, vehicles... pretty much anything that got in their way.

However, I was also under the impression that the Chitauri army had been effectively vanquished by The Avengers...

"I know this may sound silly for me to ask," I began, "but just to be sure... there's no Chitauri still wandering around on Midgard, I mean, Earth?"