Chapter Text
The instant Loki sees Thanos’s ship appear is the moment he realizes that he has run out of time.
“We need to evacuate,” he says out loud, turning urgent eyes on his brother.
Thor frowns. He looks concerned, but not worried. Not yet. Norns bless him, but he doesn’t understand. Loki wishes he would never have to, but that’s a childish whim he should know better than to have.
“Loki, what’s —”
“Not now,” Loki interrupts. “I swear I’ll explain everything later—” if we’re still alive “—but right now we need to evacuate. Please.”
Loki hates begging, hates the sour taste it leaves in his mouth. Thor knows this.
(How odd is it, that his brother knows him now?)
“Alright.” Thor nods regally. The gesture looks to have aged him a thousand years, but Loki doesn’t have time to spare for the unwanted guilt he feels trying to take root in his stomach.
“Alright,” Loki repeats, but his mind is already elsewhere.
He doesn’t watch as Thor leaves.
This is his fault. Coming back here was stupid, bringing the Tesseract with him was a folly. He should have just run.
Bitter, Loki laughs. Sentiment. Looks like it’ll be the end of him after all.
Except… Except he doesn’t want to die — he doesn’t want to give up this weird, hard-fought peace he’s got with his brother and what’s left of Asgard.
That’s new, he thinks, a little bemused, and then his mind starts racing.
Loki’s always done his best — and worst — scheming under pressure. He rather thinks Thanos being on their literal doorstep qualifies.
So, what does he know?
Thanos is here. He wants the space stone, will stop at nothing to get it. Odds are… Odds are, Loki will have to give it to him. He could bargain for their lives, of course, but…
(Thor’s eyes, staring right past him. “I thought the world of you.” Thor, always Thor, and Loki’s pathetic need to have his brother think well of him again, to prove him wrong.)
No, there will be no bargaining here.
What can he do, then? What can he use?
Tricks. Tricks and illusions, and an infinity stone he doesn’t really know how to use.
There could be worse odds.
(Time to play his best trick yet.)
The stone doesn’t take kindly to his tricks. The cube fights back in Loki’s hands, its power burning against his skin, but Loki forges on. He almost feels like laughing — to think he would care for something so inconsequential as pain when the only lives he cares about hang in the balance.
He is acutely aware that their precious seconds are ticking by, that this could all be a waste of time if Thanos sees through his disguises, but… what other choice do they have?
At last, the Tesseract breaks open. The stone inside floats above his hands, suspended in the air by his seidr, and Loki starts to siphon energy off of it. His heart pounds in his chest as he pours it into a clear crystal — Loki’s loath to admit that storing energy that way has never been his forte.
The stone’s power is a heady thing, but Loki has no time to get lost in it. He pours as much of it into the simulacrum as he dares to, watching the clear crystal turn blue with a frenzied heart.
He hears screams, growing closer, and knows he is out of time.
Recreating the Tesseract around his fake is easy after that, and Loki spares a handful of seconds to stare at his creation. It looks and feels as the real one had, but will that be enough to fool Thanos?
Back in the corner of Loki's mind, darkness stirs. Loki pushes it back with gritted teeth.
This is no time for doubt.
The screams grow closer still, and then die down. Loki closes his eyes for one mournful moment — he hopes some Asgardians managed to get away, because this silence can only mean one thing.
Thanos is here.
And it’s time to see how good of a liar Loki can really be.
In all fairness, Loki would prefer never having to hand over the Tesseract, fake or not.
In a perfect world, maybe he doesn’t have to. Maybe the beast is strong enough to defeat Thanos, to let them escape and live on another day. Maybe in that world, Loki’s brave enough — or insane enough — to use the space stone’s power directly.
In this world, however, their assault fails. Thanos beats back the beast, laughing like this is fun, like this is easy, and Loki can tell they will lose.
In a way, they already have — so many of their people have died for this. Their corpses litter the floor, and while Loki knows they only stayed to let others escape, this doesn’t make their sacrifice any less senseless, or any less Loki’s own fault.
(They were supposed to have been saved. He was supposed to have saved them — and yet, so many of them still died.)
There is a second, before Thanos finally defeats the beast, where Loki can act. He meets Heimdall’s golden eyes, and his heart twists. It isn’t right, for Heimdall to have been brought so low. It isn’t right for him to die for Loki’s mistakes.
The healing arts are not Loki’s strongest suit, but he can still do something. It’s not much — more illusionary magics, really, meant to convince Thanos’s children that Heimdall’s wounds are worse than they are, that the man is already dying in the hopes that he’ll be ignored then — but it might just be enough. It’s all Loki can do, anyway.
Loki thinks he can see gratitude flash through Heimdall’s eyes.
Sentiment.
He doesn’t get to dwell on it — Thanos grows tired of the beast’s play, and just like that, the indomitable Hulk is beaten. Defeated.
He would have died too, if not for Heimdall’s timely intervention. The Hulk is whisked away on rainbow lights — no doubt to Midgard. It’s a gift, really, and Loki’s fingers twitch as an idea crosses his mind.
In retaliation, Thanos drives a sword through Heimdall’s chest, and Heimdall stills. Loki’s seidr, still wound tight around the man, quivers — but it does not die. To his surprise, Loki thinks he might actually be relieved at that, for all that Heimdall does appear dead.
Loki’s very careful to disguise the way his hands shake as Maw bends down to pick the discarded Tesseract, before presenting it to Thanos, who crumbles it in his fist to reveal the stone.
Loki’s heart has never beat faster. He almost believes Thanos will see right through the lie, that Thanos will simply know Loki tried to trick him, but…
The Titan doesn’t. He inserts the stone in his glove and smiles like he’s won when this — this — is the first step toward his defeat.
And now for the second.
Loki swallows, takes a deep breath, and steps forward. This isn’t the first time he’s faked his death — though none of the others were quite as planned — but hopefully, it will be the last.
Even with all his planning, Loki’s illusions almost slip right through his fingers at the most crucial moments.
He almost fails, almost truly dies, suffocating under the Titan’s fingers.
Almost.
Letting Thanos believe he’d snapped his neck is almost laughably easy, in the end — and Loki would laugh if it didn’t show how little the Titan truly thinks of him.
All it takes is the right sound, really, and Loki knows this one well. Loki lets his body go limp, dulling his heartbeat until only he can hear it, and Thanos discards him with nary a thought.
Ignoring the way Thor sobs over his body proves to be more difficult than planned. Every part of him yearns to reach back to tell him I’m here, but he can’t.
Loki consoles himself with the thought that this time, Thor’s grief over him will be very temporary — he’ll reveal himself when Thanos leaves.
Loki doesn’t anticipate Thanos destroying the ship behind him, though.
He barely has the time to reach out, to tag his brother with his seidr so Loki can find him again before the last of the ship finally crumbles.
Thor and him are torn apart, and they’re sucked out into the cold, unforgiving vacuum of space.