The Avengers minus Bruce were sitting in what was left of the living room where Captain America was giving his report to Fury, the stoic man becoming slightly disgruntled when Steve reported the damages and the casualty. When that was done, Steve rubbed a hand over his face tiredly, looking at his team mates. They all sat around in varying degrees of solemness. Despite the fact that they had only known Percy for several weeks, he had wormed their way into their hearts, becoming the little brother that they all looked out for. No one was unaffected, not even the assassins, though the only indication they gave were the frown on Clint's face and the emotionless mask on Natasha's. Tony sat in a corner, uncharacteristically quiet, and though the rest of the team had told him that it wasn't his fault, they knew that the feeling of guilt wasn't so easily appeased. Tony carried the blame that he could have closed the portal earlier, even though the Captain, Natasha and even Bruce had told him that it was a matter of coincidence, the timing of the events just coincided at the same time. There was no way he could have gotten from the lab they were testing in to the level where his upgraded suit was held, to the rooftop immediately. Unless he could teleport. Nevertheless, Tony couldn't assuage the feeling of guilt, and carried this burden like he did with Yinsen's* a lifetime ago. None of them had suffered any fatal injuries, seeing as how there wasn't as many chitauri as the battle. They had mostly concentrated on the tower, aiming for the avengers themselves, rather than spreading out to the city, so there was hardly any collateral damage as well.

The only person who had been affected was Percy, and the teen lay in the infirmary with no sign of waking up. The five heroes were silent, Tony remembered the agonizing scream that ripped from his throat when the Chitauri sorcerer gripped his skull. They didn't know what the alien had done to the kid, only that it had been excruciating and that none of them had been able to do anything to stop it.

In a way, Tony mused, this is worse than Yinsen. At least back then, he hadn't seen how Yinsen fell, only the aftermath of it. Here, Tony could pinpoint the exact moment that Percy's scream was cut off. And he didn't know which was worse.

Thor had claimed that it was magic, or seidr, as the proper term was, but confessed in the same breath that he had little to no knowledge of it, only that it was considered a womanly art in Asgard. There were rarely any males who would dare to practice seidr, for fear of being disgraced and called ergi*, the highest form of insult to a male. The glare from Natasha would have sent him into a laughing fit if the situation had been different.

"Loki had always been the one to practice seidr, he surpassed his tutors and our mother even though Father discouraged him continuously." Thor said hesitantly.

Well, Tony thought, there goes our hope of finding out what's wrong with the kid.

The lift pinged and five heads swiveled to it watching Bruce step out of the lift. Steve looked at him, taking in the doctor's haggard appearance, "Bruce, what is wrong with him?"

Bruce gave him a look, "That's the problem, there isn't anything wrong with him."

The avengers traded confused glances, Bruce took off his glasses, pinching the bridge of his nose, "There isn't anything wrong with him physically. His vitals are normal, he hasn't suffered from any internal injury, he doesn't have a concussion, though there's a slight bruising at the back of his head, but not enough to render him unconscious or to cause any form of internal swelling. The only injury he has is the various small cuts and scrapes from fights, and a crushed wrist, which would not have sent him into unconsciousness. By all accounts he should be awake. Even his brainwaves are normal, and by normal, I mean when we are active kind of normal. Not the sleeping kind of normal. I don't know what is keeping him comatose."

The avengers all looked at each other, frowns apparent on their faces. "There isn't anything else we can do to wake him up?" Clint asked.

Bruce shook his head, "Tried it already, didn't work."

"Then it must be an enchanted sleep." Thor said, "I can try to ask anyone in Asgard for help. Although..." he trailed off, "I do not know if they would be willing to help a mortal."

Steve nodded, "We can't sit by and do nothing, Thor, you do whatever you can. But I don't want you to spend too much time searching for answers. If you can't find any, come back immediately."

He raised a hand to stop the protests from Tony and Bruce, "He is a part of our responsibility, since Fury entrusted his safety to us, but we cannot shirk our normal duties. Our priority isn't Agent Jackson, it's the Avengers."

Tony glared at him and huffed, stomping off to the lab to vent his anger. Bruce gave Steve a sad but understanding look and followed Tony. Clint and Natasha nodded at him, their faces grim, while Thor went out to the balcony, the Bifrost taking him away after his brief shout of "Heimdall!"

Steve was left alone in the living room. He looked at the destruction surrounding him and rubbed a hand over his face, he really hated being a leader sometimes.

Tony was in his lab, JARVIS blasting ACDC at the maximum volume while he worked. He was annoyed and frustrated at Steve's orders. Logically, he could understand that the majority was more important, the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few and all that, but hadn't the kid already suffered enough? The chitauri landed him in SHIELD, and now they landed him in a coma. They should be helping the kid, he just got placed in a magically induced coma for goodness sake! Tony banged his fist against the table, ignoring the twinge of pain in his hand. Okay so maybe he felt a little protective of the kid, but in his mind, he felt that the kid deserved to be protected. He didn't know what the kid had gone through, but he had eyes that were too old for a twenty-one year old person.

He sighed, guilt settling in his stomach like a heavy weight. He made no move when the lab door slid open and the music abruptly cut off. The sudden silence sent his ears ringing. "It's not your fault you know." Bruce's voice sounded from behind him. Tony gripped the edge of his worktable harder, ignoring DUM-E's whirring at his side. "I didn't close that damn thing in time. That's why that freaky alien thing could come out."

"Tony..." Bruce sighed, "We didn't know what that thing was. We still don't. We can't change anything now but we can work on preventing such a thing from happening in the future."

"Yeah well that would only work if we can even get anything concrete out of these fucking readings!" Tony snarled, slamming his hand against the table.

Bruce remained silent, he knew that Tony didn't like being responsible for someone else's pain, especially not after what happened to Yinsen. "I can't get anything at all. I've had JARVIS scan the living room for any residual traces, I've had JARVIS look through the entire attack, from when that thing blasted me to when it blasted all of you to when it did its weird alien voodoo thing." he said, wriggling his fingers in explanation for voodoo.

Bruce just frowned, "Nothing at all?"

Tony shook his head, "There are some traces of gamma radiation here and there from that thing's scepter, but there isn't any evidence of any energy spikes, and that's impossible because that thing very clearly showed off his power!"

Bruce placed a hand on his friend's shoulder, feeling his tenseness. "We'll figure something out Tony."

Tony snorted, "Will we?"

They didn't figure it out.

The six heroes were weary. There was tension everywhere, the team worked well enough in battle, but outside of battles, the friction between the team grew stronger. Tony and Steve got into more and more arguments, Bruce would disappear for hours on end to his own floor, the vague sounds of crashing telling the rest of the team that he Hulked out more and more often. Natasha and Clint stuck together more often, holed up on their floor and shunning the rest of the world. Thor more often than not went to the rooftop to brood, the perpetual storm clouds above the Avengers tower a telltale sign. The team was fracturing, and no one knew how to patch the cracks. A comatose boy-man, Thor insisted- lay in their infirmary, not showing any signs of waking. The team was called out of the tower to deal with more and more threats every other day, each more formidable than the last. They were strong, but not infallible. They prevailed now, but there would be a foe which they cannot overcome. and it seemed to be near. Doom had always imbued his bots with magic, but he had finally upped the ante. The doombots were practically indestructible now, capable of dealing ab explosive offense while having a near impenetrable defense.

Tony was ready to rip Doom to pieces. If the Avengers could even find the real him. Normal easy to smash robots aside, the sheer amount of doombots released each time was enough to give the heroes a headache. Add on Doom's newest creation of magic and technology combined, it left the Avengers with an even bigger headache. So far, only Thor could actually destroy the bots. The Hulk could too, if given enough time to smash through the spell placed on the bots. The rest of the Avengers weren't so lucky. No matter what they did, they couldn't get past the spell protecting the doombots. Tony and Bruce tried to analyze the robots when they managed to bring one back, but even that was unsuccessful as it self destructed mere moments after acquiring it.

Their comatose patient remained as he was a month ago. Tony would have cracked a joke about how he was Sleeping Beauty or Snow White waiting for their true love's kiss if he had been in the mood. Or if the situation hadn't seemed so...desolate. Tony Stark was not a man who liked to wait. He couldn't stand the fact that the villains were getting the upper hand over them and they couldn't do anything but try to defeat what was thrown at them. It didn't feel productive, it felt like they were just taking everything that was thrown to them. Thor hadn't managed to find anyone who knew of enchanted comas in Asgard, and like Steve had ordered him to, he came back to the Avengers.

Tony was sitting in the infirmary, beside Percy's bed. He looked at the boy who lay as still as death, covered by a white blanket. The kid looked normal, as though he was merely sleeping, but Tony knew better, they had all tried their own ways to wake him up, but all failed. He sighed, feeling his anger and frustration grow even more. Apart from the normal villains they had to deal with, there was also the occasional Chitauri attack. Despite their attacks coming in small numbers, this new group proved to be smarter and far more resilient compared to the group that the trickster god had led into New York three years back.

The people were becoming restless and afraid, and press conferences could only do so much to convince them that the 'Heroes of Midgard' had everything under control. No, Tony thought, the Avengers are losing their credibility. Already, four out of six avengers couldn't even defeat Victor von Doom, the esteemed leader of Latvaria. They couldn't even control the damage made by the Chitauri anymore. They could barely even save the hostages taken by a psychopath**. and that was the most basic of situations!

Not only that, but the Chitauri were becoming more and more bold, they switched between ambushes and attacking SHIELD bases outright, becoming unpredictable. He didn't know how the aliens even knew the location of some of the bases, seeing as how secluded it was. He knew, obviously, but then again, he had JARVIS. And he was Tony Stark. They were looking for something, but the Avengers just didn't know what. SHIELD didn't tell them anything either. Five of them were mere mortals, one of them not so much, while the sixth member was a god who was also a prince and as such had princely duties.

They had committed the most amateur mistake ever. They underestimated their enemy. And it cost them.

They had managed to find a handful of survivors, but that one SHIELD base was completely and utterly decimated. The Avengers had foolishly thought that the Chitauri were of the same make as the ones Loki had brought to New York three years ago, mindless and with only one thought in their head: attack.

These Chitauri were far from mindless. They were an organized group, any weaknesses they had were cleverly covered by their strengths. They were intelligent too, being able to sneak into the base undetected for hours until an agent discovered their presence by mere chance. The worst thing of all, this bunch not only had a sorcerer not unlike the one they sent to the Avengers Tower, perhaps even the same one, but they could shapeshift***. By the time Tony had managed to uncover who was a Chitauri and who was not, most of the base occupants had already been dead.

The guilt ate at Tony, he knew he should have been faster, just as he knew that no one would blame him. But the thing that grated at him the most was the fact that he had been present at the Alaskan base, and he saw firsthand how ruthless they were. Percy had told him about the Chitauri in the basement and the ones he fought against on that glacier. They'd known how to hide and concentrate their attacks, creating distractions so that they could fulfill their main purpose with none the wiser. The only reason why they failed in Alaska was because Percy had been there to stop them in time.

They weren't stupid, Tony knew, far from that, they were actually damned smart, and yet he still underestimated them time and again. Their technology was on par, if not superior, with the current human ones, and that was saying something because that included Tony's inventions and some of his inventions weren't even on the same level as the ones on the market. That, and they had learned how to conceal their portal.

Doom's magic was more than enough for the Avengers, throw in Chitauri magic, the occasional madman and crazy unrequited lover**** and they were scrambling around like blind mice. Tony and Pepper had been trying to do damage control, speaking to the press and the public about how the Avengers had everything under control. It worked for the first week or so. But as the attacks became more frequent and the death toll became higher and higher, the public lost their faith. The avengers were failing and crumbling and there was absolutely nothing they could do. The Avengers were faltering.

All the attacks and recent events did bring out one question though, and surprisingly enough, Clint was the one who had brought it up. They had just come back from defeating (read: attempting to defeat) another of Doom's newest creation. Magically enhanced doombots that apparently didn't break as easily. They had all just crashed on the various couches when Clint suddenly voiced up, "Hey guys...", they all looked over to him, seeing him frown thoughtfully, "I really hate to sound sympathetic or anything to that bastard but, what the hell was Loki doing?"

Thor blinked, slightly affronted on his brother's behalf but focused on his friend's words instead. "What is your meaning friend Barton?"

Clint hesitated, "I mean, we've seen how the Chitauri work, we've seen how they're capable of organizing an ambush and an attack. We know that they are capable of guerrilla warfare and it doesn't match their behavior three years ago, when they were mindless and following the orders of a madman."

Tony had just shrugged casually, "Maybe they evolved or something. Never know with aliens, no offense point break."

"No," Natasha voiced up, "I get where Clint is coming from, the attacks they have organised have shown that they already have a leader, one that knows exactly what he wants and is capable of planning and plotting clever attacks and distractions to obtain it. And," She looked at Thor, "if it is true that Loki is locked up somewhere where he has no chance of any interactions, then it is most definitely not Loki. Which means that, if Loki isn't their leader, then he wasn't really aiming to dominate Earth."

The avengers all shifted uncomfortably, it didn't seem right that their so called public enemy number one was apparently not the one in control. Things had been easier and far more convenient when the issue of the trickster god remained black and white. Thor on the other hand, felt hopeful, if his brother wasn't truly in control of the whole invasion then there was perhaps hope for him yet.

"We're all forgetting one thing though," Bruce interjected quietly, the rest of the team turning to look at him, "If Loki isn't the Chitauri's leader, then who is?"

Tony was cut out of his musings when JARVIS said, "Sir, Mister Odinson is back in the tower."

Tony grinned, finally, he thought, the god of thunder had been gone for several days now, promising to search for anyone who would be able to help them.

Percy's dreamscape

The barren wasteland extended as far as the eye could see, the black void hung above the planet's surface like a yawning abyss. Space whales flew through the crevices in the planet's surface, their armor creaking as they turned to avoid the rock walls. Chitauri soldiers scattered over the surface of the planet, fighting, squabbling, training. They steered clear of the monstrous whales, lest they become the creature's meal. Their armor gleamed in the dim light shed upon the planet's twin moons, the blood of the weak saturated the ground beneath their feet. In this place in the middle of the Void, only the strongest survived.

A portion of the planet jutted upwards at the highest peak of the planet's uneven surface, a grotesque mockery of a throne, metal and bone decorated the throne, reflecting whatever light reached the surface of the planet, casting a sinister glow upon it.

A violet colored being sat upon it, golden armor encasing his muscular body. Vicious red eyes stood out in the dark, the entire being's demeanor screaming malevolent despite the casual position the alien was sitting in, with one leg crossed over the other.

At the base of the throne, a figure knelt, hunched over as if to protect his body from an assault. The purple figure shifted, uncrossing his legs, extending a giant hand towards the figure. He gripped the boy by the throat and heaved him up, delighting in the pained gasps the abrupt movement caused. His grin only grew wider as bright oceanic orbs glared back at him despite the pain that must surely be filling the boy's body.

The purple titan grinned, "You would make a beautiful gift to Death, Perseus Jackson. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how you see it, I still have need of you."

Percy spat at the alien before him, stifling another gasp as the being's grip tightened further on his throat. He managed to spit out, "I've seen Death, and I don't really think he'd appreciate me as much as you think he would."

He smirked as the alien roared in anger and flung him against a rock, gasping as his back came into contact with sharp bits of stone, jostling his fractured ribs. He blinked harshly, trying to focus his vision against the pain emanating from his abdomen with every breath he took. A strangled yell escaped him as the giant grabbed his throat and dragged him up the rock, his back slowly shredded by the sharp surface.

He felt hot breath on his face, "You will not disrespect the Mistress Death filthy mortal." The titan growled, "Once I tear this power away from your veins, I will send you to her personally. Slowly, intimately, until you are screaming for her. And I will take pleasure in ripping your soul apart with my bare hands."

Percy choked out a laugh, forcing himself to stare directly into the titan's malicious ruby eyes, "You have no idea how many others have said that, and I'm still here yes?" He grinned, a blood-filled, terrifying smile, "The last people who told me that now lie rotting away in Tatarus." he hissed, "I'd love to see you try Thanos."

The purple giant tightened his grip and threw the hero onto the ground, slamming a foot onto his midsection, feeling bones groan and snap beneath his boots. He relished in the agonized scream that escaped the boy's throat, "I am Thanos, the Mad Titan, the one in favor of Mistress Death, I am nothing like those pathetic godlings on your precious Earth. I am far more powerful, you seek to destroy me? Not even Odin Allfather in his youth could destroy me, what more can a puny mortal do?"

The titan was rewarded with silence punctured by harsh gasps of breath, then, "Go...to...hell..."

A wicked smile adorned the titan's face, "We already are in hell little hero." He crooned.

The titan stepped off the boy, ignoring the hacking coughs behind him, turning around to beckon his faithful servant.

"Yesss massster?" The Other questioned, bowing before the titan.

Thanos smirked, "Break him."