Loki x Reader: Into the MCU

Chapter 49: Assemble

Notes: Kinda shorter than usual, this one is around ten thousand words which I know is a few thousand less than usual sorry. But the battle is the focus and I don't like drawing out fight scenes unnecessarily. I also could have gone further in the end, but decided to save material for next week just cuz it'd fit better that way. As usual, I did some on my phone, so autocorrect might be a pain in the butt. Let me know if something is off. Enjoy!

Everyone changed from their quantum suits or past outfits, with Cap putting the 2012 costume back on the shelf in favor of his modern one. Loki found himself switching to Midgardian clothes, with a long sleeve black shirt on black pants. Over the last month he'd found himself wearing their clothes infront of them more often. In the past, Wren had gasped at his use of Midgardian pajamas. What she didn't know is that he'd lounge in their style of clothing often, though he'd never let anyone see. Keeping his Asgardian clothes on for show was such an afterthought in the midst of the last month's events that he'd simply not cared enough to change before coming down.

Everyone waited impatiently for the nerd boys to get the stones in order. It took longer than they thought, with Rocket, Tony, and Bruce doing everything as slowly and carefully as possible. They had to crack open the Tesseract, get the mind stone from the scepter, and consolidate the Aether into stone sized containment. They managed to accomplish the third chore by extracting the Aether from the box holding it. Using essentially the same device they'd have needed to get the darkness from Jane, they pulled the red sludge from one source and injected it into another.

Lastly, they had to design the glove and move all of the stones into position. Rocket jump scared Tony after he delicately placed the stones in Stark tech gauntlet, earning him a glare from the billionaire.

The team gathered around as the finishing touches were completed.

"Alright, the glove's ready," Rocket said, "Question is, who's gonna snap their freakin' fingers?"

"I'll do it," Thor stepped forward.

"Slow down," Tony said, stepping in his way.

"Thor just wait," Cap added.

"What, we're all just sitting around waiting for the right opportunity?" Thor asked, "Sitting here staring at that thing isn't gonna bring them back. I'm the strongest Avenger, okay? So this responsibility falls upon me."

He wasn't as emotionally flustered as in Endgame. He wasn't a broken man trying to do something good when he felt he hadn't in a while. He was genuinely trying to take the weight on his shoulders for the team because he thought he should.

"He's not wrong," Loki said, "Both of us could survive the damage. In theory."

"In theory?" Scott asked, "Well maybe we should discuss it more then?"

"Loki's just being stupid," Thor waved him off, "We could survive it. So one of us has to snap, and I'm not letting him do it so---"

"And what makes you think I'd let you do it?" Loki countered, pushing off of the table he was leaning against to walk to his brother, "You're not the one who let all of this happen---"

"Loki---" Thor began.

"No, Thor, I don't need to hear it. I know what you're going to say. Mistakes were made by everyone, we don't know how things would have gone, all of the advice you've already given." Loki let out a sigh, a sad look in his eyes. "It doesn't change what I did. And it doesn't make me feel any better. Not really, not enough."

"Guilt's part of the job description," Tony said, "If that were the requirement for who snaps we'd need a few more gloves."

"Why are we arguing when Cap knows who does it?" Clint asked.