Umbra

Chapter Seven

Grey, Steve, Tony, Natasha, Bruce and Thor were sat on the conference table of the Helicarrier, watching the video footage of Fury interrogating Loki in his hydraulic rig cell. Grey was sat next to Tony, her hands wringing worriedly in her lap as she flickered in and out of focus. Tony was only half paying attention, continuously distracted by the glitchy figure next to him. After another minute of her vibrating, Tony reached over and placed his hand over Grey's jittering ones, stopping her trembles and bringing her back to full view. She looked up at him, surprise in her eyes.

"Cool it, kid." He mumbled, giving Grey a soft smile. She looked down at her hands, before pulling away and nodding, quietly whispering a 'sorry' as she went back to focus on Fury and Loki.

"It's an impressive cage. Not built, I think, for me." Loki had said, wondering around the glass cylinder he was trapped in.

Fury had nodded, a grave look on his face. "Built for something a lot stronger than you."

Back in the briefing room, Grey watched as Bruce stared at the screen intently. Unbeknownst to her, Thor had fixed Grey with the same steely look. Loki and Fury continued to talk on the tape.

"The mindless beast, makes play he's still a man. How desperate are you, that you call upon such lost creatures to defend you?" Loki hissed from inside the cell.

"How desperate am I? You threaten my world with war. You steal a force you can't hope to control. You take one of my best men, and you force me to recruit a girl who just may not be ready to join us yet." Grey tensed as Fury said that, looking down at her lap as she felt everyone turn to look at her. "You talk about peace and you kill 'cause it's fun. You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad that you did." Grey felt the familiar warmth of a hand against hers, and despite not opening her eyes, she knew who's it was.

"Ooh. It burns you to have come so close. To have a Tesseract - to have power, unlimited power - and for what? A warm light for all mankind to share, and then to be reminded what real power is."

Fury chuckled, before smiling at Loki. "Well, you let me know if Real Power wants a magazine or something."

Loki smirked, before saying menacingly, "You brought the real power, in the form of a young woman."

The monitor the group were watching on went black as Fury left the room, and they all stand there in stunned silence, even Grey was shocked enough to stop shivering. What did he mean, real power? That's the second time he had mentioned it. She felt cold, clammy and her chest was tight. Grey gripped the hand which was on hers tightly to calm herself down, and Tony frowned, scooting his chair over slightly so he was closer to her.

Bruce cleared his throat, before looking up at the group and smiling weakly at everyone. "He really grows on you, doesn't he?"

Steve rubbed his hand over his jaw, thinking. "Loki's gonna drag this out." He looked up at Thor, who had joined the group from where he had been standing sullenly. "So, Thor, what's his play?"

"He has an army called the Chitauri. They're not of Asgard or any world known. He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the earth in return, I suspect, for the Tesseract."

Grey spoke up, straightening a little as she joined the conversation. "They're a race of shape shifting aliens. They claim to be part of the 'immune system' of the universe – they want to wipe out disorder and free will wherever they find it."

Thor looked over at her with raised eyebrows, a surprised expression on his face. "How do you know this? The Chitauri aren't of Midguardian knowledge."