Mirror, Mirror ↠ Steve Rogers

Chapter Six

When they arrive back at the helicarrier, an unofficial Loki-based summit is formed on the platform behind the bridge. Leila's not sure how Stark and Rogers convinced Thor to work with them; she assumes it involved some level of violence, if only because Steve was out-numbered two-to-one by men who seem to shoot first and ask questions later, but she doesn't care enough to ask.

Mostly, Leila would really rather just get to work on copying Loki's powers. Between what he did with the scepter and how hard it was to copy the first time, not knowing what he's capable of is making her anxious. Especially given that he's on the helicarrier with them. Staring at them, even. Through a camera, but still.

He's talking to Fury, technically, but he's clearly directing his Shakespearean monologue to them. Loki wouldn't be roasting Banner like that if he didn't know Banner was listening. The mindless beast, makes play he's still a man. Jesus.

Finally, Fury leaves Loki to his solitude. The God or whatever continues to smirk at them through the screen, but at least he's shutting up for the moment.

The room is quiet for a moment, and she glances at Banner. Please don't be sad please don't have feelings please—

"He really grows on you, doesn't he?"

Thank you. She silently moves Bruce Banner into the "tolerable" folder in her brain. Then she glances at Steve pointedly, as if to say See? This guy gets it.

Steve isn't looking at her, though. "Loki's gonna drag this out," he says. "Thor, what's his play?"

The other God-or-Whatever seems distracted, upset even. A far cry, she thinks, from the guy who tore up a plane, stole an entire person, and peaced out less than six hours ago. It's probably connected to Loki's theatrics, but she doesn't have enough context vis-a-vis their relationship to figure out the exact A-to-B causation between said theatrics and Thor's current expression. She files the observation away for future reference.

"He has an army called the Chitauri."

"Chitauri," Leila repeats. That sounds fake.

"Yes. What about the Chitauri?"

"It sounds fake."

"I can assure you, they're very real." Thor sounds annoyed at her skepticism, which is generally a red flag for her, but maybe it's just the general situation that has him on edge, so she lets it go for now. "And they're not of Asgard, or any world known. He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the Earth. In exchange, I suspect, for the tesseract."

There's a beat. Then: "I'll take your word for it." She smiles innocently under Thor's annoyed gaze.

Steve holds up a hand. "Wait, go back. You said an army? From outer space?" There's a very clear note of seriously?? in his voice. Steve Rogers did not wake up from a 70-year nap only to find out aliens exist and are about to invade the Earth, Leila is pretty sure of that.