A brief history lesson
Tony has no idea what was going on. One minute he’s talking to Loki about the bracelets and then all of a sudden he’s looking at a grey-purple girl sitting in front of him. “So… who wants to explain what a dark elf is?”
The room was silent for a moment as Thor and Loki seemed to have a conversation with their eyes. Loki turned back to the girl, quietly speaking to her as Barnes watched on in confusion and concern. Thor, meanwhile, moved to Tony. “Perhaps we should speak somewhere more private.”
“I can’t leave them here with the barrier down and the cameras off, you know the others would have a field day with that.”
Thor sighs, puffing out a frustrated breath. He looks around, eyeing his brother and the soldier in the corner with the girl before turning back to Tony. “Okay, she can’t understand English anyways. This should be fine. The dark elves are a magical race similar to Asgardians that come from Svartalfheim, one of the 9 realms. Dark elves are considered an enemy to Asgard and we have had many skirmishes with them in our history. The most recent one was particularly brutal, it must have been…hmm.” Thor turned from Tony to call out to his brother, “Brother, how long ago was the last battle with the dark elves?”
Loki was still busy attempting to sooth the girl, but took a moment to turn to the other men, “I do not know, time is different on Asgard but I believe it was around the time I was around 800 years old. But it was believed that the dark elves had gone extinct.”
Thor snapped his fingers, “Ah yes, that’s right. It was about 200 hundred or so years ago by midgardian time. I remember now. And yes, it was believed that most were extinct though we know a few escaped throughout the universe. I cannot imagine that one chose to willingly come to Midgard though.”
Tony leaned on the table, tapping his fingers on the table as he absorbed the information he was just told and how it would affect his next move. “Okay. We need to do some planning, especially regarding what we are going to tell the team, because we have to tell them something. In the meantime, though, I’ll have to put the barrier back up and turn the cameras back on.”
Loki’s sharp gaze snapped over to him, reminding Tony that although he is no longer being brainwashed the God is still dangerous. “You expect us to leave her after just making her reveal her true form?”
Tony knew he had a point, but if he left them in there then likely the team would find out about it and all hell would break loose. When he explained as much to the other men, Loki growled but seemed to understand.
“Well, I have access to the room. I can stay here but on the other side of the barrier while you guys go plan? I won’t be expected to meet with the team so I don’t mind staying for a bit.” Barnes spoke up mildly from where he still sat on the cot.
Loki didn’t seem overly pleased but it was the best plan that they had come up with so far so he reluctantly agreed. Turning back to the girl he spoke quietly is a language Tony didn’t recognize, likely Asgardian, before green magic swirled around both himself and the girl. Tony was alarmed for a moment, his mind racing to all the worst case scenarios but the magic quickly faded and he could see that the girl now looked how she did before turning purple. Loki stood, turning away from the girl to walk towards Tony and his brother, “Is there a way for Barnes to be able to speak with her? It may make her more comfortable.”
“Jarvis can translate if you tell him what language he should translate to. I used Allspeak earlier which she seemed to understand but if there is a language that would be better then simply let him know.” Tony had begun gathering up the prototype bracelets as well as the broken cuffs, handing the prototypes over to Loki. The God slipped them on with no argument, seemingly pleased at the lack of magic suppression.
Barnes had stepped across the line of where the barrier would be, so Tony had Jarvis turn both the barrier as well as the cameras back on. “Okay, come along boys. We have some planning to do.”