The Syndicates || "MARVEL: Avengers" || COMPLETED

T H I R T Y F O U R | ' ...means home '

. . . MARIONETTE . . .

Marionette's hand shuddered as she raised it slowly to her lips, remembering the soft caress of Loki's touch not a moment ago. She remembered the weight of his arms snaking around her waist, the pressure of his hand cupping her cheek, the way his hair tickled her neck...but she couldn't dwell on any of it now. Their troubles were far from over, yet all she could think of was the emptiness that he had left her with.

No, she had left him.

And what had it gotten her? Was Silver safe? No. Did she have a semi-decent plan? No.

Now, they were both stranded on a strange, doomed planet at the mercy of a cold-blooded madman whose motives she couldn't hope to understand. After weeks of torment, enclosed in that tiny cell she had thought her situation couldn't get worse. HYDRA had begun to look like a safe haven in comparison to what she and Loki had endured, and yet the fear that this planet wrought on her nerves managed to be worse. Once again, she was out of the frying pan and into the fire.

But this time, her life wasn't the only one at stake.

She had latched onto Enoch moments before Silver teleported the two of them away and miraculously, the next thing she knew, she'd woken up here. Features sketched with anguish, she turned abruptly, her eyes raking over the still form of her friend's body lying on the dirt of this strange planet. She didn't know where Enoch had gone but as she knelt by her side and healed her, she hoped he wouldn't reappear. She didn't think she would be able to control herself if she ever saw him again and the Avengers probably wanted him alive. It was unfortunate, but bringing him back still breathing might be the only thing that could redeem her.

Silver's eyes fluttered open, squinting in the darkness for a moment before they focused on Marionette's face. She tried to speak but her words escaped her lips as weak moans. Studying the rest of her body for injuries and grateful to find none, Marionette sat back on her heels. Enoch's experiment hadn't produced many physical consequences but Marionette knew that only healing Silver would prevent the threat of a concussion or related memory loss in the future. If they intended to ever leave this planet, they both needed to be performing at peak capability.

"Where, where are we?"

Silver said, turning on her side. The night-sky was sprinkled with glittering stars but the sight of three pink moons dazzling like precious rubies over their heads was what made her mouth fall open. They were lying in the middle of a devastated town square. Little white specks shone in the darkness which Silver soon realised were the shattered remains of someone's bones. Several people's actually. The canopies of dilapidated tents which had been market stalls at one time fluttered in the wind and what seemed to be alien technology panelled parts of the floor. Decorative but practical lights strung on golden wires swung in the breeze, flooding the streets in pale white hues. Silver was terrified.

"We're on another planet, how is this possible?" She whispered, awestruck.

"It doesn't matter, what's important is we find Enoch. He got us here, he's the only one who can get us back."

Marionette climbed to her feet, scrunching her nose up as her fingers slipped into a gooey substance on the floor.

"You know where he went?"

Silver asked, watching a small wind turbine above a cage-like house twirl and creak in the wind. It was shaped like a snake with a shield between its fangs and decorated with the same serpentine symbol she had seen outside the laboratory.