ENDGAME
Thanos sat on his throne, silent, a grin splitting his face, and Tony felt a shudder of fear race down his spine.
Thanos had already taken so much from them, too much- Tony wouldn’t ever be able to get the images of his slaughtered team from his mind, of Cap’s shattered shield, of Thor’s blood soaked cape, of Widow’s broken body, of Banner’s open and unseeing eyes.
No, Tony wouldn’t let that fear win today, not if he could help it.
Thanos couldn’t see them, couldn’t hear them, and Tony knew that, he knew that and he trusted Loki’s magic just as much as he trusted the god himself, but logic did not have a place in fear.
Tony cast a glance at Loki, who was standing stock still beside him, face carefully blank, and couldn’t help but reach out a hand to squeeze his boyfriends soothingly, earning a thankful smile in return, faint but there.
Tilting his head, Tony swept a hand outwards, a silent question: are you ready?
And then Loki grinned, cold and furious and beautiful, and threw his hands violently outwards, razing Thanos to the ground with a blinding flash of green.
Tony smirked as he heard Thanos’s cry of outrage and shock, and spun in the air, darting off through the doorway, trusting Loki to fulfill his part of the plan without getting killed.
He had to believe that. Had to repeat it, over and over and over again.
He knew he wouldn’t be able to bring himself to leave if he didn’t.
*
Loki was the distraction, and he knew how to be a damned good one.
The fear had wrapped itself heavily around his mind, but the rage and grief had burst through it like it was nothing, an eternity’s worth of pain at the hands of this ant who dared play a god, surging through his veins like ice, settling into his very bones and urging each furious slash of magic to hit its mark with cutting precision, pushing Thanos back step by agonizingly slow step.
Good.
Let him feel the pain that they had felt, that Thor had felt.
It was the absolute least Thanos deserved, and Loki would ensure he felt every hit down to the very core of his being.
The Mad-Titan roared when another icy blast of magic cut through his achilles and dropped to one knee, spitting blood, before his eyes lit up with pure, unadulterated fury and he threw himself forward, double edged blade coming up to block Loki’s bursts of magic and re-directing them unto their caster.
Gritting his teeth against the assault, Loki doubled the strength of his attack, attempting to push forward and gain traction once more, but was forced to take a step back as Thanos advanced; and then another, and another.
*
Finding the control room proved to be far more difficult for Tony than it should have.
After Loki had dropped the spell hiding them, all hell had broken loose- Chitauri were running around like headless chickens, desperately trying to find their attacker and even firing on some of their own in their confusion.
It was easy, almost too easy, to cut them down.
Oh, they were almost overwhelming in numbers, that was true, but one well placed miniature bomb and they were done.
With Thanos distracted and his children off world as they continued to search for the gems, there was no one to control them, no one to guide them; only their pre-existing orders.
But the closer Tony got to the control room, more of them appeared until there were hoards of them, practically crawling over each other to get to him, the shiny red beacon in the drab gray halls of Thanos’s ship.
Still, Tony pressed forward, placing the explosives as he went, firing repulsor blasts and shoulder lasers to clear his path, and threw himself into the fray, swallowed up by their numbers in seconds.
*
Loki’s magic was weakening.
Thanos was almost effortless now in his deflections of Loki’s magic, and the manic grin spreading across the Mad-Titan’s face showed he knew it, too.
Which meant Plan Z would have to come into effect, something Loki had desperately been hoping to avoid even though he knew it would work. The repercussions of aforementioned plan, however, had the potential to be much stronger than they could endure.
It was a risk Loki was only willing to take if he had no other choice, and it was quickly looking like he would not.
A stray dagger of his own magic was flung backwards and embedded in his thigh, and he snarled in rage and pain, letting the green blade dissolve before summoning up another one- this time, though, this time his hands bled blue, the cold seeping into his skin as he crafted a wicked, curved blade half a foot long, gleaming beneath the lights of the ship, of pure ice.
Loki dropped his magic and allowed his Jotun form to cover him fully, pale skin bleeding into blue with raised, intricate lines; green eyes fading into crimson, a dark grin splitting his face and revealing sharpened canines, small horns sprouting from beneath the wild locks of his hair.
And the monster was free.
Loki tossed his head back and laughed cruelly before throwing himself forward, blade ready to go for the kill, blood singing victories in his veins as Plan Z was officially enacted with a blood soaked battle cry.
Oh, this was how they would win, and all it had taken was a snap decision on Loki’s part.
One single, snap decision.
That was all it took.
A snap.
And the war was won.
*
They were dead.
Every single Chitauri that had been between Tony and his goal had been utterly decimated, and he couldn’t even bring himself to care about how many lives he had taken (not now, not yet), stepping past blood and guts and things he probably didn’t ever want to know about, finally getting into the control room.
And then he cut power to the entire ship, frying its backup generators, sending the hovering ship crashing into Titan’s ground.
With the Chitauri and the power taken care of, leaving Thanos without his army and without his ship, Tony flew back to the room he had left Loki in, a wide grin on his face.
Where it froze, giving way to an icy sort of confusion as he stared, dumbfounded, at the scene before him.
Thanos, grinning victoriously, spitting purple blood while standing in the wreckage of his own ship, Titan’s dreary sunlight filtering in behind him through the shattered windows and billowing dust, illuminating him in an eerie light.
And at his feet in a pool of dark blue blood, eyes open and unseeing, body gray and dull, was Loki.
For a moment, there was nothing but confusion and a heavy sort of numbness that froze his limbs, eyes on Loki’s still body.
Slowly, Tony stepped out of the suit. Clenched his single gauntleted hand into a fist. Unclenched. Stared. Processed.
Clenched.
And then came the anger.
Pure, incandescent rage, scorching through his veins, burning him from the inside out and setting his eyes alight, hands burning golden-red, blazing so hot and bright that Thanos took a step back, something akin to fear flashing through his eyes, there and gone in a second but most importantly there,inescapable, exploitable.
Checkmate.
It was as if the dam had been broken, and any chain that had been holding Tony back shattered, so suddenly and intensely that he could barely breathe past the rage and grief curling around his heart, and he threw himself forward, dodging Thanos’s startled, hasty swing with his blade and letting extremis heat him to the very core, surrounding the Mad-Titan in a circle of roaring flames.
Thanos snarled, both in pain and anger, and shot through the flames, snuffing out the few that clung to him.
And so the dance began.
Back and forth, hit after hit, some landing and some not, nothing but rage and pain and determination fuelling them, neither stopping until a distant explosion rocked the ground.
Tony paused, grinned manically as Thanos stilled in shock, gaze drawn to the flaming ruins of his ship behind them, the broken walls of their makeshift arena shuddering as another explosion shook the air around them.
“Cry ‘Havoc,’” Tony snarled his borrowed words, dripping with venom, a bloody grin splitting his face as another explosion caused the walls to crack. “And let slip the dogs of war.”
One final explosion, and the walls around them crumbled to the ground.
Thanos cast his gaze around, taking in the destroyed remains of his ship, of his army, of his home world, before the anger came back tenfold and he was on Tony, no longer playing any games, every swipe of his blade taken to cause the maximum amount of damage.
And that was when Tony knew he was going to die.
So he fought back with just as much vigor and little care to his own wellbeing, fuelled only by his own agony and rage, resolutely keeping the fight away from Loki’s body, the pair of them advancing on one another, one step at a time, until there was barely a foot of space between them (need to get close, need to finish this, one last stand), until there was only heat and fire and the clash of metal.
Thanos was saying something, something Tony could barely hear past the anger and adrenaline and pain making his heart pound loudly in his ears, an unsteady staccato, but he kept his focus on the fight instead of the words.
Maybe he should have known, after what Thanos said.
The grief made Tony sloppy, made him desperate, and he knew it would, he was prepared for his own carelessness that came with blue blood and empty eyes and gray skin, but he wasn’t prepared for the pain.
It hit him suddenly, agony spiralling through his chest and radiating outwards and he was wet, why was he wet, why couldn’t he move, why couldn’t he breathe, and oh god, please, it hurts, please, why...oh.
He’d forgotten the blade was double sided.
And that was all it had taken. A moment of forgetfulness. Of Weakness. Of grief.
That was all Thanos had needed.
One single, snap decision.
A snap.
That was all it took.
And the war was lost.
“Thank you,” Thanos drawled, eyeing the infinity gauntlet on Tony’s uselessly hanging hand with a desperate hunger. “For gathering these for me.”
*
Loki watched, silent, invisible, undetectable.
He had not wanted to do this, he knew Anthony may not forgive him, but he also knew Anthony’s pain would drive him- them- to their victory.
So, Loki stood and watched, felt shock jolt through him when Anthony’s eyes and hands blazed, his veins alight with fox-fire, an odd mixture of confusion, worry and pride soaring through him at the sight.
It was at that moment that Loki knew, really truly knew, that they would win.
And then.
And then Thanos spit victoriously, “I am inevitable.”
And then.
And then
t
i
m
e
s
l
o
w
e
d
d
o
w
n
.
Fear washed through Loki, paralyzing in its intensity, freezing him to his very core as surprise passed over Anthony’s face when the blade tore through his chest-
the man laughed in delight, tossing his head back to expose the muscled line of his throat, bright eyes wrinkling at the corners, callused fingers coming up to splay over his chest
-the first wash of blood spilled down Anthony’s chest and pooled darkly around his feet, staining the dirt red-
their legs tangled together beneath the sheets, pressing them together so wholly that there was not even an inch of space between them
-Anthony’s eyes widened with pain and shock, fingers coming up to scrabble uselessly at his chest, gauntlet clanking loudly against the blade-
anthony grinned sharply, something cold and dangerous hovering at the cracked edges of his sanity, red and gold reflecting brightly in his eyes
-before the man crashed to his knees, the blade coming free with a wet squelching noise, Anthony’s body hitting the ground with a dull thump-
anthony shrieked from the cold and danced around, attempting to remove the snow, and Loki laughed openly
-and Thanos bent, reaching for the gauntlet, ready to pull it from Anthony’s lifeless body while Loki stood uselessly, uncomprehendingly, unable to move, to breathe-
kissing each finger in turn before moving to the left and kissing each finger there as well, pausing over the golden band with a warm smile
-and Thanos’s moment of triumph was broken by wet, heaving laughter from the blood spattered body at his feet.
Thanos stumbled backwards, confusion and a flicker of fear on his face and Loki froze, felt hope squeeze its way into the dark recesses of his mind, almost crushing him beneath its intensity.
Slowly, Anthony staggered to his feet, a necklace dangling from his fingers and Thanos’s lips parted in shock, hand flying up towards his neck and finding nothing but air.
Anthony smirked, crushed the container in his palm, and settled the final gem into its cradle within the gauntlet.
And then Anthony laughed and laughed and laughed, and Loki could not help the fear that shivered down his spine at the wild, broken sound, even as he discovered he was unable take his eyes away from his lover.
This was his Anthony, entirely unhinged.
A manic grin pulled his lips too wide around bloodied teeth, his chest glowed brilliantly with fox-fire where his death once sat, the colors of the gems chased each other through his veins, and his eyes were blazing, flickering with fire and rainbow kaleidoscopes of color.
He was magnificent.
“And I,” Anthony rasped, spitting blood. “Am,” he continued, raising his gauntleted hand directly in front of Thanos, who had gone utterly still, defeated, head bowed upon the smoldering ruins of his legacy.
“Ironman.”
A breath.
A split second.
A moment.
A heartbeat.
A Snap.
And then Thanos was crumbling into dust, and the world burst into green.