Green sunrise | Loki fanfiction

Part 6: Monsters

I go into the room and Loki closes the door behind me. With his long steps he is still the first one at the table everyone is gathering around.
"Jarvis, where is the city being attacked?", Tony asks and stares at a hologram in the middle of the round tabletop.
Thor, Natasha, Bruce, Steve and Clint watch as the lines forming skyscrapers and houses rotate. Red dots pop up at two points, with a gap of several streets between them.
"Okay", Tony says. "Thor, Bruce, Clint and I will go to this point, travelling by hammer." He nods to Thor. "Steve, Natasha, Loki and (y/n) go to the other, you wont have to go far, this attack point is nearer than ours. Any other important information?", he adds speaking to Jarvis.
"The creatures attacking the city seem to show animalistic behaviour. They are spreading solely from these two points, what leads to the conclusion that they are coming out of portals. This mission requires hurry."
"Great", Tony says sarcastically. "Then we have to go. Everyone on their positions, the mission starts now!"
The Avengers storm out of different doors and in the first second it appeares to be complete chaos. Then I see that Tony's team uses a way to get to a platform outside while Thor whips out his hammer. Our team takes a way downstairs.
I stick to Loki's heels. "What are we going to do now?", I ask hastily.
"Getting there. Fighting. Winning", Loki answers while his full armour and his helmet appears. "What else do you expect?"
"I ... don't know. Guess I am just slightly panicking."
"Don't worry", he says and smiles, and I can't see if he is being sarcastic or not.
"He is right, we have everything under control", Natasha says, trying to cheer me up while we run down another flight of stairs.
"That was a blatant lie", Loki responds. "We never have everything under control. But we will always find ways to save you, so feel save ... or whatever."
Just as I think that this might have been the most caring thing he ever said to me, we stop and Natasha kicks open what I thought was a big window. I see that we are only halfway down.
"What -"
"Hold tight", Loki says. And he grabs me by my waist and jumps out the door 100 meters above the ground.
I scream. I scream a lot. I clench my arms around Loki, bury my fingernails in the leather of his chestplate while the never ending feeling of missing a step on the staircase makes my stomach feel hollow. Loki's magic begins to float around us and a green shimmering slide-like shape appears under our feet. Forty meters above the ground we become slower, and we slow down more until we land in the middle of the street.
As my feet touch the ground and the falling feeling disappears I take a deep breath. Loki looks down at me and smirks. "You okay? It's called a magical landing."
I stare him down as every version of 'I'm not okay' is running through in my head. "Yes", I say through gritted teeth. "You couldn't have SAID SOMETHING?"
In the corner of my eye I see Natasha and Steve landing and letting go of a rope Natasha held.
"It's nice that you are so cuddly but if you could let go of Loki we could continue the mission", Steve remarks and starts running down the street.
I throw him a very angry look and stiffly remove my arms from Loki's waist. I feel the sudden urge to put them back, but that is probably because we just fell down half of the Avengers Tower.
"Thank you", Loki grins and I can't ignore the impression that he enjoyed to scare me like that. Bastard.
We run down the street and round a corner. As soon as we can see into the next street, I understand the scale of the situation. Five big, firebreathing monsters run towards us, trying to eat the civiliants fleeing and screaming. They have some things in common with bears, the build and the head mostly. But they are huge. And they don't have fur, their skin is a mix between grey and brown hanging down from their bodys, making them look like they just jumped out of a mud hole. Oh, and gigantic beams of fire come out of their mouths.
"Oh come on", Loki growls next to me. "Fire, really?"
But I don't have time to ask. Natasha and Steve are already running towards the first one. He hits his shield on the creatures head and Natasha puts a big knife between its ribs. The monster dissolves into a brown steaming puddle.
I turn my head and see that Loki already attacks the second one. He has his daggers drawn and as I stumble towards them, I am pretty glad we revised my magic tricks this morning. Loki's daggers seem bigger than usual (what makes sense considering the size of the monster). He dodges a bite of its head, slides underneath it and drives the dagger into the creatures stomach completely. Just the handle is sticking out now. The creature is shaking and looks like it's about to explode, but then it gives in and dissolves.
Loki is almost quick enough to dodge the fluid, but a drop of it falls on his shoulder. His armour begins to steam.
"Loki!", I call and finally arrive next to him. "Are you okay?"
He seems almost surprised by my question. Then he answers. "Yeah. Just ... don't touch this."
I breathe in to respond, but a roar interrupts us. Two more monsters jump out of the portal and let their eyes wander over their buffet. Us.
"We have to close the portal!", Steve screams from the sidewalk opposite to us. They killed another monster and are heading towards the purple glowing portal behind the creatures. "Keep them occupied!"
"Keep them occupied", Loki mimics in a high pitched voice but quiet enough that only I can hear it.
I chuckle.
He throws me a smile. "Use your powers", he instructs me softly but firmly. "And try not to die. We take the creatures together." And he runs towards the next one.
I hurry to keep up with him and form a magic ball in my hand. Because of my fear it is a bit wobbly but hard enough to throw. It misses the creatures head by a few centimeters and hits the next one standing a few meters behind the first. It spins around and growls at me.
"Oh", I say.
I prepare the next ball while it jumps at me. The yellow ball, sparkling like a little sun, hits it in the stomach and it gets thrown on its back. Deep scratches of its claws remain in the asphalt. In the time the monster bobs up, I see Loki fighting. He tries the same trick with sliding under the thing again, but this time it doesn't work. Instead of biting, the monster spits fire. I scream and throw a net of my magic. I know it works because it has to work, and it does shield Loki from the most damage. But I see the fuming remains of his sleeves as he is lying under the monster which is now trying to bite the net. Loki's underarms are burned and I see them turn blue.
Horrified I see the pain in his expression and the net almost disappears. With an angry scream I throw another smaller balls with one hand: One that makes the monster struggle to stay on its legs and one that hits the second monster. Suddenly green magic pulses around Loki and it throws the monster into the next wall where it dissolves and runs down the concrete. Sizzling, it ruins a store window for nail decoration.
Unfortunately, my magic strikes Loki's magic and a green-yellow firework explosion glows up. All remaining four monsters turn to us.
I run to Loki who is still lying on the ground, holding his underarms. That is something that scares me more than him screaming or looking like being in pain. What did happen to him that he can't stand up?
I rush over to him, but the monsters are too fast that I could look after Loki right now. I raise my arms and create another net. Sparkling and glowing it hovers as a protective hemisphere above us.
It takes all the power I have to maintain the net. I clench my fists and teeth, the longer I withstand the fire, the biting and scratching from the monsters, the more desperate I become. My magic starts sparkling more, it soon looks like hundreds of sparklers now.
"You ... are doing good", Loki pants behind me.
I throw my head around and almost lose control over my magic. He stands behind me, lurching but standing. I want to uphold him but I can't really move and I do not dare to touch his arms. Loki takes a deep breath and magic flows around him once again. It flows around his fingers like a green glittering cloth, and then it shoots through the holes in my net. The magic pierces in the monsters eyes and leaves burning marks on their skin. They howl and retreat a little, but they continue to circle us.
I hear a loud bang. With a purple light I see the portal closing and Steve and Natasha run towards us. The two jump into action and in two minutes, the monsters are dead. As soon as the last one eats holes in the asphalt as a steaming puddle, I lower my hands. Now I am swaying too, Loki and I fall more to the ground than sitting down. Where the armour didn't cover his arms, Loki is completely blue and his skin is lightly smoking.
"Oh no", I whisper and slide over to him.
He turns his back on me. "No! You shouldn't see that!"
But the fight has drained all the energy I have for such arguments. "Do you think it bothers me that you are blue now?", I hiss. "Come here, I think I can help."
"How do you want to help?", he hisses back.
I don't say anything and look at his wounds. He just makes a very tensed face but doesn't retreat again.
Without me knowing what I am actually doing, I raise one finger. One yellow spark travels to my fingertip and I gently lower it on Loki's arm. The spark meets his arm and dies out, then ice spreads over the wound and fills in the missing parts. Loki and I both look at it surprised. When every centimeter of injured skin is covered in ice, the wound disappears and new, white skin covers his arms.
Loki looks up. "You can heal", he mumbles. Then we both lose the last bit of power to keep us upright and we fall over into unconsciousness.