CHAPTER FOUR
FLYING MONKEYS

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It took twenty minutes for them to finally hear what happened when Tony and Steve jumped out of the quinjet after Thor and Loki. They were contacted over the comms system by Tony, who informed them they had gotten Loki back after managing to get through to Thor. And the god of thunder was now willing to work alongside them.

Agent Romanoff flew in the direction of the coordinates Tony provided immediately after hearing the news. They eventually found the four of them in a clearing large enough to land the quinjet in, Thor holding Loki by the back of his collar as Tony and Steve stood idly by.

Once Loki was secured on board for the second time that night, Agent Romanoff set course for the helicarrier, hopefully this time with no interruptions. Now with two Asgardians on the plane, Estelle could tell her brother was keeping his guard up. Despite agreeing to help them and not setting Loki free, it was clear he still didn’t trust Thor. She suspected part of his apprehension was because of her and his constant worry for her, but Estelle wasn’t worried.

What she was, though, was tired. It didn’t take long after they were back in the air for her eyes to grow heavy. Estelle laid her head on her brother’s shoulder, letting herself relax. She hoped it would show Everett that there was nothing to be worried about if she was comfortable enough to fall asleep. Within forty minutes, she was asleep and her mind drifted off to pleasant dreams she would no doubt forget by the time they landed.

There was light coming in through the windows of the quinjet when Everett shook her awake and told her they were landing. After getting some shut-eye, she was feeling refreshed. She yawned and stretched out her limbs, then instantly began complaining about how desperately she needed a coffee right now.

When Agent Romanoff had landed and began shutting the engines down, the rear hatch was lowered and they noticed several SHIELD agents waiting at the bottom of the ramp with weapons. The agents quickly boarded the quinjet when the ramp was completely lowered and they grabbed Loki before escorting the god back down the ramp, most likely to his cell.

Another set of agents grabbed the scepter and brought it inside, presumably to the lab so Bruce could begin working on it. Or at least that's what Estelle assumed. Seemed most likely to her. Otherwise why had Fury brought the scientist here?

The rest of them followed Natasha inside to the bridge, where she told them they'd wait for Fury, who she knew would want to speak with Loki personally before meeting up with them to discuss their next course of action.

Everyone took a seat at the table, Everett and Estelle sitting beside each other on one side with Steve across from Estelle and Natasha at the head of the table. Bruce, who had joined them a little late, probably because he immediately began working on the scepter once it was brought to him, stood idly by with Thor. But Tony was nowhere to be seen. They weren't sure where he'd disappeared to. None of them had even noticed he left the group on the way in.

Natasha pulled up multiple live feeds to Loki's cell on the table's surface, which apparently doubled as some sort of computer screen. It was quite remarkable, really, all the technology and weapons SHIELD seemed to have at their disposal. It made Estelle curious about what else they had up their sleeves.

They all watched from their respective live feeds as Director Nick Fury walked up to a control panel for the cell as he spoke to Loki directly.

“In case it's unclear, if you try to escape, if you so much as scratch that glass,” Fury paused, pressing a button which opened up a hatch underneath Loki's cell.

Gusting winds immediately filtered through the room, and as the god peered down the best he could from his glass cell, Loki realized what his prison was capable of. Instead of the reaction Estelle was expecting, he stared back at Fury with arrogance. Almost like he was unwilling to let Fury see any cracks in his armour. Estelle watched with curiosity because it could only be arrogance which made him think people couldn’t see those cracks. She wondered if anyone else had realized that the god looked like he hadn’t slept in days, if not longer.

“It's thirty-thousand feet straight down in a steel trap. You get how that works?” Fury's rhetorical question was left unanswered as he reached out, pressing another button on the control panel, closing the hatch. They watched as he pointed first at Loki, then the control panel while saying each word. “Ant, boot.”

Loki chuckled, a smirk spreading across his pale face. “It's an impressive cage. Not built, I think, for me.”

“Built for something a lot stronger than you,” Fury confirmed the god's suspicions.

Everyone in the room turned to look at Bruce, who shifted uncomfortably and ignored them, continuing to gaze intently at one of the monitors.

“Oh, I've heard,” Loki mused, turning to look at the camera. “The mindless beast makes play he's still a man. How desperate are you, that you call on such lost creatures to defend you?”

“How desperate am I?” Fury's voice was low, dangerous, as he approached the cell with a slow, intimidating walk. “You threaten my world with war. You steal a force you can't hope to control. You talk about peace, and you kill because it's fun. You have made me very desperate. You might not be glad that you did.”

“Ooh,” Loki taunted. “It burns you to have come so close. To have the 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 smiled as he turned and walked away. “Well, let me know if ‘real power’ wants a magazine or something.”

They watched as Loki turned to smirk at the camera one last time before the footage cut out now that the interrogation was over. Next to her, Everett leaned back in his chair, turning a worried look towards her. Sensing just how bothered her brother was by the god’s behaviour, Estelle returned his worried look with one of her own.

“He really grows on you, doesn't he?” Bruce said, breaking the silence.

“Loki's gonna drag this out,” Steve stated the obvious as he turned to look at the other Asgardian they had encountered on their mission. “So, Thor, what's his play?”

“He has an army called the Chitauri,” Thor explained, slowly turning around to face them. “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.”

“An army?” Steve said.

“Like, from outer space?” Estelle said, the excitement, curiosity and fear she was feeling at the prospect unmistakable in her tone.

“So, he's building another portal,” Bruce concluded. “That's what he needs Erik Selvig for.”

“Selvig?” Thor repeated.

“He's an astrophysicist,” Bruce explained.

“He's a friend,” Thor corrected.

“Loki has him under some kind of spell, along with one of ours,” Natasha said, a twinge of sadness in her voice.

The twins had learned that one of the SHIELD agents that had been taken along with the Tesseract days earlier had been a close friend of Agent Romanoff. Clint Barton, better known as Hawkeye, according to Agent Coulson, who had briefly informed them on the matter before they left to apprehend Loki.

“I wanna know why Loki let us take him,” Steve said. “He's not leading an army from here.”

“I couldn't agree more,” Everett spoke up, earning an appreciative look from Captain America. “I've always had a strong intuition, ever since I was a kid.”

“It's true,” Estelle confirmed.

“And after we got Loki,” Everett continued, “I don't know, something just feels off about this whole thing. It's like he wanted us to bring him here.”

“I don't think we should be focusing on Loki,” Bruce said. “That guy's brain is a bag full of cats. You could smell crazy on him.”

“Have care how you speak,” Thor warned. “Loki is beyond reason, but he is of Asgard. And he is my brother.”

“Some brother you have there,” Estelle scoffed, folding her arms across her chest as she shook her head.

Estelle couldn’t help but think of how grateful she was to have a brother like Everett. A brother who always put her first, who practically doted on her. And while she was, reasonably so, closer with Everett than her other brothers, none of them were like Loki. It was hard to imagine how she’d handle one of her siblings losing it in the way Loki was.

But then, of course, it wasn’t just something that happened overnight, was it? She remembered the bags under Loki’s eyes, evident even over the camera feed, and the way his pale skin bordered on sickly. Something had been done to him and that was why Thor still believed in him. That was why he’d taken Loki out of the quinjet, why he’d agreed to help them. There had to be something they could do, if only for Thor’s sake, to help Loki.

“He killed eighty people in two days,” Natasha deadpanned.

Thor hesitated, “He's adopted.”

“I think it's about the mechanics,” Bruce said, getting back on track. “Iridium… what did they need the iridium for?”

“It's a stabilizing agent.”

All heads turned at the sound of Tony Stark's voice. They watched as he walked into the room, speaking briefly with Coulson before walking towards them to elaborate on what he'd said about the iridium.

“It means the portal won't collapse on itself like it did at SHIELD,” Tony continued. He stopped near Thor, slapping the god's arm. “No hard feelings, Point Break. You've got a mean swing.”

As Tony walked away from Thor, he referred back to the iridium. 

“Also, it means the portal can open as wide and stay open as long as Loki wants.” He came to a stop at the command center on the bridge, where Director Fury would give orders to those below at the monitors, and he began to jokingly give orders to the crew, who all looked up at him in confusion. “Uh, raise the mizzenmast. Jib the topsails. That man is playing Galaga. He thought we wouldn't notice, but we did.”

Everyone turned to look at the man Tony had accused of playing a video game over working, and they found a middle-aged agent looking up at them with an innocent expression. His monitor, however, didn't show any indication that he'd been playing a video game, which didn't necessarily mean the man was innocent, but who knows.

“He was so playing Galaga,” Estelle whispered to her brother.

“Would you focus?” Everett scolded her.

“I am focused.”

“Yeah, right,” Everett scoffed, earning himself not only a glare but a swift kick under the table to his shin. He grimaced and glared at his sister, who flashed him an innocent smile.

“Are you okay, brother?” Estelle asked with fake concern.

Everett didn’t say anything, simply turning away from her innocent smile and mischievous eyes, only to find Steve Rogers glancing between them with raised brows, obviously having witnessed what happened between the twins just now.

Tony lifted a hand, covering his one eye as he looked around, trying to get a sense of how Fury worked up there. “How does Fury even see these?” he asked, referring to the computer monitors that would be in said man's blindspot.

“He turns,” said Agent Maria Hill.

“Sounds exhausting,” Tony said before he turned and began messing around on the monitors. “The rest of the raw materials, Agent Barton can get his hands on pretty easily. The only major component he still needs is a power source of high-energy density. Something to kick-start the Cube.”

“When did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?” Agent Hill asked, seemingly impressed.

“Last night,” Tony replied. “The packet, Selvig's notes, the extraction theory papers. Am I the only one who did the reading?”

“Does Loki need any particular kind of power source?” Steve asked, the question obviously directed at Tony since he was looking at the man. But it wasn't Tony who gave him an answer, it was Bruce.

“He would have to heat the Cube a hundred and twenty million Kelvin just to break through the Coulomb barrier,” Bruce explained in words that left everyone else dumbfounded except for himself and Iron Man.

“Unless Selvig has figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling effect,” Tony said.

“Any idea at all what they're saying?” Estelle whispered, leaning over to her brother.

“No fucking idea,” he whispered back.

“Well, if he could do that,” Bruce went on, “he could achieve heavy ion fusion at any reactor on the planet.”

“Finally, someone who speaks English,” Tony smiled, motioning towards Banner, who sheepishly looked away at the compliment.

“Is that what just happened?” Steve asked with raised brows.

“It's good to meet you, Dr. Banner,” Tony said as he shook the scientist's hand, a glimmer of mutual respect for each other in both their eyes. “Your work on antielectron collisions is unparalleled. And I'm a huge fan of the way you lose control and turn into an enormous green rage-monster.”

Bruce looked away. “Thanks.”

“Dr. Banner is only here to track the Cube,” Director Fury made clear to the billionaire as he walked into the room, drawing everyone's attention as he did. “I was hoping you might join him.”

“Let's start with that stick of his,” Steve suggested. “It may be magical, but it works an awful lot like a HYDRA weapon.”

“Like the HYDRA weapons you went up against during the war?” Estelle asked, excitedly leaning forward against the table as she stared across at Steve. “I don't recall seeing anything or reading about anything like Loki's scepter in any of the newspaper articles. And trust me, I've read every single one of them. My mother, Grace, would take me to the library all the time so I could read everything the library had on you in their archives and—”

“Miss Hargreeves,” Fury interrupted her rant, his tone laced with annoyance. “Now isn't the time for your childhood obsessions.”

His words caused the blond woman to frown and lean back in her chair with a pout, mumbling the word asshole under her breath.

Fury then looked at Steve, responding to what he'd said before. “I don't know about a HYDRA weapon, but the scepter is powered by the Cube. And I would like to know how Loki used it to turn two of the sharpest men I know into his personal flying monkeys.”

“Monkeys?” Thor repeated, utterly confused. “I do not understand.”

“I do!” Steve exclaimed, causing the room to grow quiet as everyone looked at him. Tony rolled his eyes in annoyance, but Steve remained proud of himself. “I understood that reference.”

“You really are too cute,” Estelle smiled across at him, causing Captain America to become flustered again.

Everett nudged her. “Focus, Stell.”

“Shall we play, doctor?” Tony asked, turning to face Banner again.

“This way, sir,” Bruce replied, leading the way out of the room.

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A

fter hours of once again waiting for something to happen, Estelle’s growling stomach got the better of her. She hadn’t had nearly enough food since they’d agreed to this mission and if there was going to be a battle ahead of them, not to mention how her brother had just been in a fight. They were both practically running on fumes. After telling her brother of her intentions, Estelle had approached Agent Hill to ask about a cafeteria or, really, anywhere they could get food and hopefully some coffee. Luckily for her, Hill offered to escort her to the cafeteria.

She was surprised by the cafeteria on the helicarrier as, aside from the view out the large windows on the far wall which looked down to the water far, far below them, you wouldn’t even be able to tell they weren’t on the ground. Estelle was beginning to wonder if there was anything S.H.I.E.L.D. didn’t have.

Estelle quickly got in line, grabbing a couple of sandwiches for herself and her brother. She was so focused on the thought of finally getting to eat that she didn’t even notice someone getting in line next to her until she heard their voice as they spoke to the agent working at the cafeteria.

“They starving you, too?” she asked Steve.

He looked over at her in surprise, clearly having not noticed her either. “I don’t think they meant to, but my—”

“Metabolism?” Estelle guessed, earning another surprised look. “Super soldier’s got a super metabolism, it’s not that hard to guess. Though I guess I’m not the best control group for that.”

He was still wearing his new suit and she took a moment to look him over again from out of the corner of her eye. It really did look so good on him. She still thought the vintage suit looked better but this one definitely had a much better fit.

“Right, Fury mentioned a childhood obsession?”

Despite her cheeks immediately growing warm, Estelle kept a confident smile. “Yeah, like I was saying before Fury so rudely interrupted me, my mother, Grace, used to take me to read the archives on you at the library. Anything I could get my hands on. She used to tell me all these stories about you.”

“Really?”

“Oh yeah,” Estelle said, nodding as they moved towards the end of the line, keeping her eyes on the agent carefully wrapping her sandwiches instead of Steve. “Can I tell you a secret? Just between us?”

“Sure,” Steve said, looking confused but intrigued.

“You were my first crush.”

Estelle looked over at him for a minute before quickly looking away again. But it was long enough that she saw his surprised expression, the way his eyes widened. And, despite the surprise, he didn’t look totally annoyed or upset. In fact, it looked almost like he was even blushing a little bit, too. God, this mission just gets better and better.

“I was?”

“Uh-huh,” Estelle said, nodding as she took her sandwiches. “Let’s just say… Coulson isn’t the only one with trading cards…”

Now that she had her sandwiches, Estelle didn’t wait for Steve, immediately moving to the coffee station and beginning to pour two cups for herself and her brother. She was delighted, though, when a moment later, Steve appeared again next to her, grabbing himself a cup of coffee. Neither of them spoke as Estelle took one step over so she could grab a tray for the two drinks, but she couldn’t fight down the smirk growing on her face.

Just as she was about to settle the two sandwiches in the middle of the drink tray so she could carry everything back without dropping it, Steve finally broke the silence between them.

“Here, let me,” he said, sliding the tray away from her and slotting his own cup in as well.

“Well, then let me, too,” she said, taking his sandwich from him. “Off we go, then?”

“After you.”

Barely able to fight down her absolute glee at being told that from Captain America himself, Estelle turned and started walking out of the cafeteria, keeping her pace a little slow until Steve was walking next to her.

“So, I gotta ask, since I shared a secret with you, how long have you been… awake?” she asked, carefully watching his face. “It just… it can’t have been all that long since I don’t think even S.H.I.E.L.D. could keep that secret quiet for long.”

He was quiet for a minute as he thought about his answer. “It’s been about six months.”

“That’s not a long time,” Estelle said, surprised herself. “Though I bet it’s also felt like ages. The adjustment must be hard.”

“I’m managing,” Steve assured her.

He gave her a confident smile, but Estelle saw right through it. No one would be doing well with that kind of change so abruptly, even a super soldier. He’d missed out on seventy years. He probably thought even those people he hadn’t lost in the war were now gone, too.

“You don’t have to give me the official answers,” she said. His brow furrowed in confusion. “Look, it’s obviously not the same, but when Everett and I left home for the first time, it was like stepping out into a whole new world. We’d been raised in such an isolated little bubble with no concept of what the world was like outside of the Academy. If we struggled, you must feel like you’re drowning.”

“How did you cope?” he asked her.

“I had my brother to lean on. I wasn’t alone, we were in it together. We started small, didn’t leave the house much. And hey, we still may not have any friends, but if a stranger makes a Star Wars joke at me, I know what they’re talking about.”

“Star Wars?” Steve echoed, his brow furrowing in confusion again.

“Right, you’re not at that stage yet,” Estelle said, laughing at herself. “My best advice? Start a list of things you need to catch up on or do or learn. Then you can feel accomplished whenever you cross something off the list and you’ll have tangible proof that you’re learning.”

“I wouldn’t even know where to start,” he admitted.

“You could borrow my old list if you wanted,” she offered.

“I’d like that.”

As they neared the doors Estelle recognized as leading to the bridge, she couldn’t help smiling. “When we get the Tesseract back, I’d be more than happy to give it to you.”

The two of them walked over to the table and Steve didn't hesitate to pull out a chair for her to sit down.

“Such a gentleman,” Estelle complimented him with a wink and a smile before she sat down in the chair that was opposite of her brother.

When her eyes finally met his from across the table, Everett raised his brows at her in a teasing manner. So this is what took you so long, huh?

Shut up and eat your food.

Estelle passed out the sandwiches to the three of them as Steve sat down next to her and did the same thing with the coffees, making sure that everyone got the correct cups Estelle had marked in the cafeteria.

“Thanks,” Everett said.

Though she was starving herself, Estelle couldn’t help notice how her brother immediately tore into his sandwich like he hadn’t eaten in a week. Between the fight with Loki and not getting any sleep, he must be in worse shape than she thought. After a moment, Everett must have felt her eyes on him and looked up at her.

“You look tired,” Estelle frowned.

“I'm fine.”

“You don't think I can feel how tired you are?”

“Estelle, really, I'm fine,” he insisted.

“You should get some rest,” Estelle persisted. “I can come get you if anything important happens.”

“Not gonna happen,” Everett said, chewing a bite of his sandwich.

“Why are you always so stubborn?”

“Estelle, I'm not going to take a nap,” Everett said firmly. “I appreciate the concern, but it's not going to happen. So please just stop talking about it and eat your food. You need your strength.”

“Need my strength for what?” Estelle asked in confusion.

Everett didn't respond and instead took another bite of his food. She narrowed her eyes at him, trying to pick through his brain for an answer on what he meant, but he was pretty good at keeping things out of her reach by now so he simply continued eating his food. Finally, she was hungry enough to stop caring and start eating her sandwich. Since Everett didn’t seem keen on talking, she struck up a conversation with Steve instead, leaning sideways in her seat to face him, elbow on the back of her chair and her hand in her hair.

It wasn't much longer when Nick Fury finally approached their table and directed his attention solely on Estelle.

“Miss Hargreeves,” Fury said, capturing her attention immediately as she abruptly turned around in her seat to face him.

“Fury,” she greeted with a twinge of curiosity in her voice, wondering why it was he was singling her out.

“How would you feel about interrogating Loki on your own?” Fury asked.

Estelle's eyes widened. “Oh, um…”

“Are you up for the task or not, Miss Hargreeves?” Fury said, impatiently.

“Yes!” she exclaimed. “I can do it.”

“Good. Be ready in ten,” Fury said as he turned to walk away. “I'll have some men escort you there.”

When Fury walked away, Estelle turned to face her brother with even wider eyes. Though she’d told Fury she could do it, she felt much less confident at the prospect of facing the god all on her own. Everett gave her a reassuring smile.

“Don’t worry,” he told her. “I’ll be there the whole time and won't let anything bad happen to you.”

“Okay, yeah, no, I've totally got this,” Estelle said, trying to encourage herself but failing miserably as she was still totally terrified.

A few minutes later, two men approached their table and they followed them out of the room. Everett stayed close to her, which did wonders to ease her raging anxiety about how terrified she was to be using her powers against a god.

When they arrived at the room where Loki was being kept, they paused outside of the room.

“You can go in whenever you're ready, ma'am,” one of the men told her before him and the other agent positioned themselves on either side of the entrance in case of emergency, and to obviously escort them back to the bridge when she was finished with her interrogation.

“Thank you,” Everett told them on her behalf because she was far too terrified to even speak at the moment.

She was about to get into the head of a god. This was so far beyond the scope of anything she'd ever done, ever attempted. Not to mention how Loki clearly wouldn't go down easy, she'd seen the fight in Germany, he had abilities, he would likely be far more aware of what was happening than anyone she'd ever attempted this on, including the tests her father had run when she was a child and the mind she was invading was that of one of her siblings who knew what was happening.

They were mostly routine, none of her siblings were ever really surprised when they were chosen for a “head dive” by Estelle. One afternoon, her brother Diego was chosen. Unbeknownst to her when they started, Diego had been instructed to fight back. This was abnormal, normally Reginald Hargreeves just wanted to know what she could find out, how far she could go, how she did it. No one had ever truly fought back. There'd been cursory struggles, her siblings didn't really like her diving into their heads looking for information, but they were never told specifically to fight back. Unprepared for Diego to fight back, he had hit her with one of his knives while she was in his mind and she was left with a scar she still carried.

Before she knew it, she'd spent several minutes standing there, mumbling to herself in a lame attempt to encourage herself to go inside. She was startled out of her thoughts and the downward spiral they were taking her on when Everett turned her around and placed his hands on her shoulders, looking her straight in the eyes.

“Listen to me, Estelle,” he said sternly, yet with soft eyes. “I know you're scared, but I swear on my life, I'm not going to let anything happen to you in there. You don't have to be afraid, I promise.”

Almost immediately, Estelle stopped trembling and she relied on her brother's calm demeanor to soothe her own nerves. “Thank you, Ev,” she whispered before stepping away, a look of determination replacing the fear that had once been written all over her face seconds ago.

“You got this,” Steve said encouragingly.

Estelle turned to look at him and smiled, overwhelmed with a newfound confidence unlike anything before as she had the complete and utter faith of Captain America on her side.

She entered the room which housed the god's cage with Everett and Steve behind her. Loki turned to look at them at the sound of the door opening and then closing, his eyes narrowing in suspicion. He studied them just as she studied him, trying to get a good read on him. She didn't want to be going into his mind with no idea what she was walking into.

“If you're here to interrogate me, I'm afraid you'll be leaving disappointed,” Loki taunted.

Estelle looked back at her brother, sensing his distaste at the god's comment. Don't engage with him. When she saw him nod, she turned back to Loki. He didn't look pleased with none of them rising to his bait.

“Nothing to say?”

Sensing she was ready, Everett led her over to a bench along the wall a few paces away, yet in an area where they were still in view of Loki through the glass window. The god watched them, clearly interested in what was happening if not concerned, as she laid down across the bench and Everett took her hand.

“What's happening?” Steve asked, watching in confusion as Estelle closed her eyes and relaxed her entire body. “How is she supposed to interrogate Loki like this?”

“She was never going to go in there, at least not in her physical form,” Everett told him.

“Her astral form,” Steve quickly realized.

A few seconds later, she rose up from the bench in astral form, for only Everett to see. Estelle peered down at her unconscious body before meeting her brother's gaze and slipping off the bench.

“Be careful,” he pleaded with her.

“I will,” she promised.

Everett hesitantly released his sister's hand and stood, turning to watch as Estelle's astral form walked through the wall and began approaching Loki's cell.

“I assume it worked?” Steve asked.

“Yeah.”

She distantly heard Steve ask where she was and her brother answer, but she wasn't paying attention. All of her attention was on Loki now. It took her a few minutes, even in her astral form where she knew he couldn't see her, for her to gather up the courage to enter the cell and another few minutes to actually approach him. She could still hear Everett and Steve talking, her brother likely explaining this process to Steve, and let their familiar voices soothe her. She could do this.

Estelle took a deep breath and reached out, watching her hand phase through Loki’s head. She fell back on her old and reliable knot technique, imagining a string tying her to Loki’s mind, using her hand in his head as an anchor. It was taking longer than it usually did, but that was expected. Loki was fighting her, even as he wobbled on his feet and had to use a hand against the glass wall of his cell to support himself. She held fast, imagining the knot tightening and even making it a double knot, ensuring the connection would not only take, but hold once it had.

When Loki collapsed, Estelle got a single second to smile in triumph before she was pulled into the god’s mind and the world dissolved around her.

It had to be Asgard. She couldn't imagine the large golden palace in front of her could be anything else. Loki was supposed to be somewhere familiar, comforting, so it would be easier to look through his mind. He had to have chosen his home. Estelle wanted to linger on the sights before her, take it all in since she'd never see Asgard in person, but she had a job to do. She focused on Loki and the scene shifted around her, bringing her inside. 

Ahead of her, she could see a myriad of different scenes, all laid out next to each other. All of them different memories. A grand dining hall, Loki and Thor sitting there amongst others dressed in armour who she didn't know, all laughing and having a good time. An icy ledge, what Loki’s mind told her was a frost giant looming over him, Thor and the same group of people from the other memory before an older man, Odin, Loki's mind once again supplied, arrived to save them. Then she was watching Thor be cast out of Asgard. And then, Loki yelling at Odin as he cried and Odin got weaker, confronting him about not really being his father. She saw Loki’s attempt at grabbing power, at taking the throne, how the Destroyer failed to take out Thor before his brother returned to Asgard.

When she stepped in front of the next memory, instead of just playing out before her eyes, she suddenly found herself standing in it and realized it must be because this was a more important memory. This was more what she was looking for.

Beneath her feet, the road was patterned in a rainbow, stretching from a dome shaped golden building, all the way across the waters and towards the city. It was dark, with stars shining down from above. Ahead of her, she could see Thor desperately trying to pull Loki back up onto the road from where he hung off of it, nothing but the empty void of space below him. She could feel all of the emotion’s Loki was feeling in the moment and she was crushed by the realization of how he not only knew he would die if he let go, but that he was fully prepared and ready to accept it. And when Loki let go and began to fall, Estelle found herself falling through space with him.

When she landed on solid ground once again, she was inside of some kind of building or ship, maybe, if the distant and constant hum was anything to go by. As she looked around, Estelle realized she couldn't see Loki anywhere, which could only mean one thing. She had gone so far into his memories that she was seeing them as he did, as they happened to him, not just watching as a bystander. Normally, she was careful not to go this far, but she hadn't found the answers she was looking for yet.

The sound of footsteps growing closer immediately struck fear through her and the feeling of pain all over her body crashed down on her. She got brief flashes of torture, each footstep making it harder and harder to ignore. More was coming, of that she was sure. It was the only thing those footsteps could mean.

Estelle hadn't felt fear like this ever in her life as the door opened. She took in the person standing in the doorway, her fear only growing as she had to keep looking up and up and up. The person standing in the doorway was like no person she'd ever seen before, eight feet tall at least and built like any action movie star, wide and strong. She knew he had to be an alien, making this definitely a ship, because his skin was purple and his clothes were like nothing she'd ever seen before. All she could think was he was going to hurt her, again, and she'd do anything he asked if it meant he'd stop before she remembered this wasn't her memory and she wasn't in any danger from this man.

“Enough!”

Loki’s voice rang out, causing the room to fall away, leaving her standing a few feet away from him in a larger room which was only vaguely similar to the last.

“You have no right,” Loki accused her, fire in his green eyes. “Get out of my head.”

“What happened to you?” she asked, undeterred, stepping closer to him. She was in control here. “What did they do to make you do all of this?”

“This is none of your business, mortal, this is my plan, no one—”

“You were terrified,” she continued. “They hurt you, I could feel it. They did horrible, terrible things to you. You were ready to die when you fell off the rainbow bridge, you don't just go from that to trying to invade Earth with an army. What happened?”

“Nothing happened,” he said, his tone insistent in the way someone would only be if they were trying desperately to lie. “It's my army.”

“You forget I just watched and lived through some of your memories, I know it's not your army, I know that purple man did something to you to the point you were so scared you—”

All the air left Estelle's lungs in a rush as she was slammed back against a wall, Loki’s hand around her throat and more anger than Estelle had ever seen in his eyes. As she desperately tried to pull in even a small amount of air, she could see the walls beginning to flicker and lose their shape. She was losing her grip on Loki’s mind, he was pushing back too hard, he was getting closer and closer to being in her head. No one had ever been strong enough to push back into her own head and the only person she'd ever had to keep out was Everett. She didn't know if she had strong enough defenses to keep him out and she didn't know what would happen if he got into her head.

If that wasn't a scary enough thought, she also didn't know what would happen if she suffocated while in Loki's mind. Would she be able to leave? Would she actually die? Would either of them be able to wake up? She'd entered Loki's mind and knocked him unconscious so if she died and couldn't pull out of his mind and wake him up, would he be able to? And what would happen to Everett if that happened?

As soon as she thought about her brother, it was like Loki faded away, she was able to breathe again and she was looking at her brother’s face. He was holding her face in his hands and she watched as if she wasn't really seeing it as he shouted her name.

Estelle gasped, her eyes opening. The room around her was empty blackness and she was on her knees with Everett still in front of her. He looked worried out of his mind and she wondered what had happened in the real world to worry him so.

“Everett?” Estelle whispered in a mixture of shock and confusion. “How are you…?”

“I entered your mind, obviously,” Everett said, standing up. “Now take my hand and concentrate on me, not Loki. We have to wake you up right now.”

Estelle nodded and stood to her feet. She took his hands and they both closed their eyes, concentrating on each other. And when they opened their eyes next, they were back just outside of Loki's cell on the helicarrier where she had laid down and she was waking back up in her physical body.

Everett breathed out a sigh of relief as he watched Estelle sit up slowly on the bench, careful of the way everything seemed to sway around her. He sat down beside her and enveloped her in his arms. He pulled away a moment later and began cleaning the blood from her nose with his sleeve. “Are you okay? What the fuck happened? Did Loki hurt you? What did you find out from him?”

“I'm fine, just a little light-headed,” Estelle said, reaching up to massage her temples. “And I didn't get much before Loki found out what I was doing in there. But the things I saw…” She began to tremble and there was a faraway look in her eyes, like she was being haunted by what she'd seen. “None of it was anything like Thor mentioned before.”

She remembered the fear vividly, the flashes of horrible torture and pained screams. The feeling of being ready to die as she fell into the emptiness of space… She remembered all of it. How was she going to explain all of this to Fury? And, better yet, was he even going to believe her?

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an. damn. this chapter is so long. hope it's good!