Loki had been insulted.
To be fair, this was a condition he usually managed by doing something very clever. In this case, he raised the Mind Scepter and drove the tip toward Jordan's unguarded chest—a technique that had worked on every human being he'd tried it on since arriving on Earth, without a single exception. The Mind Stone's influence reached through the scepter and into the target, and that was that. Controlled. Done. Simple.
Ding.
Loki's smile developed a fault line.
The scepter tip had stopped ten centimeters from Jordan's sternum, embedded in nothing—or rather, in something that absolutely should not have been there. Polygonal force field patterns flickered in a brief visible ripple as the Mind Stone's emanation hit the AT Field and stalled. The energy of an Infinity Stone, infinite-tier cosmic artifact, bearer of one of the fundamental forces of reality—
—bounced off.
Jordan understood the gap immediately. The Mind Stone was, yes, an Infinity Stone. But the Mind Scepter was a constructed housing that Loki was operating—and Loki, for all his gifts, was not someone who could fully channel the true output of an Infinity Stone any more than a child could direct a river. What was reaching Jordan through that scepter was a filtered, limited, Loki-scale fraction of what the stone could theoretically produce.
Against someone with a properly established psychic defense, it wasn't enough.
Loki poked it again.
Ding.
Again.
Ding. Ding.
Nothing.
"...How." He lowered the scepter slightly, the arrogance recalibrating into something more like confusion. "How is this possible."
"That's all, little brother?"
Loki's face went white, then red. Several things happened in his expression that he would later choose not to remember. He straightened, pointed, and drew breath for what was clearly going to be a comprehensive speech about divinity, superiority, and the correct relationship between gods and mortals.
"Enough." The word came out at something between a roar and a declaration. "You dare—I am a true god, and you will—"
A shadow crossed his vision.
His left foot left the ground.
The rooftop tiles came up very fast.
BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM. BOOM.
Stark Tower's structural supports registered the impacts as something seismic and rhythmic, the kind of vibration that travels up through concrete and steel and arrives in the floors above as a shudder. On the rooftop, two symmetrical human-shaped craters had been pressed into the surface from alternating angles, left then right then left, the God of Mischief's considerable cranial durability being stress-tested against Jordan's grip and gravity in rapid succession.
Jordan released his ankle.
Loki lay in one of the craters with his hands resting peacefully on his chest, eyes wide at the sky, experiencing the particular cognitive state that results from a severe concussion intersecting with profound existential recalibration.
His Frost Giant lineage—more durable than most divine biology—was the only reason he was still technically conscious.
Jordan rolled his shoulders. Exhaled.
This was, he reflected, deeply satisfying in a way that he hadn't anticipated. So this was what Banner felt like when he let the green one handle things. The directness of it. The physics of it.
He looked down at Loki.
Gathered himself.
"Ha—tui."
"What a puny god."
He didn't take the Mind Scepter immediately.
Instead he leaped from the rooftop and converted into a streak of black lightning, angling upward through the portal into the deep space above New York—and F-boy pinged him before he'd cleared the city's cloud cover.
New card. Delivered.
[Fantasy Card: Frost Giant's Constitution] Type: Ability Card • Rarity: SSR Source: Loki (Frost Giant royal lineage, Jotunheim) — Marvel Universe
Absolute Cold Resistance: Frost Giants are adapted to extreme cold environments and can withstand the temperature output of the Casket of Ancient Winters. Weakness: significantly vulnerable to heat and high temperatures.Frost Aura: Active and passive control of frost energy. Passive effect: the environment chills automatically in the user's presence. Active effect: directed frost attacks. Royal bloodline carries the additional ability to suppress this aura completely when desired.
Jordan ran the assessment as he accelerated through the portal threshold.
Effect 1's heat vulnerability was a potential liability—but F-boy's analysis confirmed it would be overridden by the Eternal Titan constitution at higher purity. Non-issue.
Effect 2 was the point.
Frost Aura. Frost control.
Which meant—
He emerged into open space. The portal below him was a disc of churning deep-blue energy against the curve of the Earth, city lights visible through the gap like a lit window. The Chitauri forces between him and the mothership were considerable. Hundreds of soldiers on hoverbikes had just cleared the portal edge and were orienting toward the city below.
They saw Jordan.
Jordan raised one hand.
The crystalline aura came naturally—no effort, no learning curve, just the Frost Giant's royal bloodline expressing itself through a new host. The temperature in a fifty-meter radius dropped several hundred degrees in approximately one second.
The hoverbike formation became a formation of bluish-purple ice sculptures.
They dropped.
Jordan watched them go with mild satisfaction.
"Frozen Breath," he said. "It actually works."
The clones deployed on the way through the portal—Shadow Clone Technique, white chakra smoke, several identical figures materializing in open vacuum. Post-Thanos upgrade, post-Frost Giant integration, their baseline output had climbed another tier.
They spread formation and accelerated, choosing vector.
The attack that followed registered somewhere between a natural disaster and a targeted logistics problem. The shadow clones carved through the Chitauri deployment in converging lines, picking vectors the way a precision instrument picks cutting angles—the "water droplet" approach, smooth and total, the force of their magnetic field acceleration behind each contact point transferring completely through whatever it touched.
(The Trisolarans, observing from another fictional universe entirely: ...The reference is noted. We feel seen.)
Leviathan-class bio-ships detonated in cascading sequence, each explosion lighting the vacuum with brief, vivid color before dispersing. The heat vision swept in surgical straight lines from multiple angles, the crimson-gold geometry of it slicing formation after formation with an efficiency that left nothing wasted.
The Chitauri fired back. Ceaselessly, comprehensively, everything they had.
The force field registered the impacts as a light static.
Jordan left the clones to finish the clearing operation and accelerated toward the mothership.
Inside the Chitauri command bridge, the alert tone had been continuous for three minutes.
The general—a senior Chitauri commander, visage arranged in the specific way that indicates years of leading successful campaigns—stood at the tactical display and looked at what was happening to his forces in the space outside the portal. The display updated every few seconds. Each update was worse than the previous one.
His face had gone the color of old ash.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Writing takes time, coffee, and a lot of love.If you'd like to support my work, join me at [email protected]/GoldenGaruda
You'll get early access to over 50 chapters, selection on new series, and the satisfaction of knowing your support directly fuels more stories.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~