Brothers

2012 Part Two

Updated 07/17/20

May 2012

"Loki's gonna drag this out," Steve says once he and Romanoff return with Loki, Iron Man, and Loki's brother, Thor, "So, Thor, what's his play?"

"He has an army called the Chitauri," Thor explains, "They're not of Asgard nor any world known. He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the Earth, in return, I suspect, for the Tesseract." Steve mutters something in disbelief.

"So, he's building another portal," Dr. Banner concludes, "That's what he needs Eric Selvig for."

"Selvig?" Thor asks.

"He's an astrophysicist," Dr. Banner explains.

"He's a friend," Thor states.

"Loki has him under some kind of spell, along with one of ours," Romanoff says explaining the situation.

"I want to know why Loki let us take him," Steve says, "He's not leading an army from here."

"Steve is right," Percy said, "He's too calm. Loki wanted to get caught, so he must need something from us."

"I don't think we should be focusing on Loki," Dr. Banner remarks, "That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You could smell crazy on him."

"Have care how you speak," Thor says ominously, "Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard. And he's my brother." Percy sighs, much like Loki, this did not seem like the Thor that Magnus told him about, who were these people?

"He killed eighty people in two days," Romanoff counters.

"He's adopted," Thor mutters.

"I think it's about the mechanics," Dr. Banner says, "Iridium...What do they need iridium for?"

"It's a stabilizing agent," Tony Stark interrupts walking into the room before muttering something to Coulson. "It means the portal won't collapse on itself like it did at S.H.I.E.L.D. No hard feelings, Point Break. You've got a mean swing," Stark remarks tapping Thor. "Also, it means the portal can open as wide and stay open as long as Loki wants." He walks over to Fury's screens, "Raise the mizzenmast. Jib the topsails. That man is playing Galaga. He thought we wouldn't notice, but we did. How does Fury even see these?" Stark ends his ramble.

"He turns," Hill replies curtly.

"Sounds exhausting," Stark remarks, "The rest of the raw materials Agent Barton can get his hands on pretty easily. The only major component he still need is a power source of high-energy density. Something to kick-start the Cube."

"When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?" Hill asks skeptically.

"Last night," Stark replies smugly, "The packet, Selvig's notes, the extraction theory paper. Am I the only one who did the reading?"

"There was a reading?" Percy asks confused.

"Does Loki need any particular kind of power source?" Steve cuts in.

"He would have to heat the cube to 120-million Kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier," Dr. Banner says.

"Unless Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling effect," Stark agrees.

"Well if he could do that, he could achieve heavy ion fusion at any reactor on the planet," Dr. Banner counters. Percy rubbed his temples; this was hurting his brain.

"Finally, someone who speaks English," Stark says.

"Is that was just happened?" Steve remarks.

"Yeah I could've sworn you were speaking Spanish," Percy jokes.