Contest of Champions

55

"We did it," I tell Veers, allowing a smile to cross my lips. "We did it."

Veers smiles back as she starts to walk toward me. I know she's holding Clint's knife, I saw her pull it from her shoulder after she stabbed him. She tossed the katana to the ground but never the knife.

Good.

"I told you," Veers says, smirking. "I told you we could kill both of them." Her words add to the tension building in the air, as the audience waits for the last contender to fall. Only one can win the Contest of Champions, only one can keep the Balance. Right now, there stand two.

"I should have trusted you," I say, still holding my side. The audience can forgive me for not advancing to meet my partner, I'm injured.

The dagger in my hand, still slick with Natasha's blood, falls from my hand to the ground. "You know I love you, right?" I call to the Kree as she continues walking toward me, the knife hidden somewhere on her person. Perhaps it's in her belt, in the small of her back, just waiting until she's close enough. "You're incredible, Veers. I admire you."

"And I you," she replies, stopping in front of me. Lifting her good arm, she wraps me in an embrace and I return the gesture, waiting. Waiting. Waiting for the moment of betrayal.

It comes when Veers steps back.

I hear the dagger cutting through my skin before I feel it. When I look down, the blade is buried up to the hilt in the flesh of my abdomen, slicing open my scar from Carnage's blade.

"Veers?" I say, my voice questioning, my skin growing pale as I stare at her in confusion and pain. The confusion is acting; the pain is not. With a shove to the shoulder, the Kree sends me toppling to the ground and my breathing starts to quicken. I have to do this before I lose the rest of my strength.

"I never meant to kill Yon-Rogg," Veers yells at me, a tear tracing a path down her cheek. "I never meant to kill him! He was my mentor, my friend. My blood is his." She's gasping now as she speaks, her chest heaving with the emotion. My, my, is she doing an excellent job. "Yon-Rogg was the most important person to me in the entire world, and I killed him because of you!"

I give her my best perplexed-but-in-pain look. "Wh-what?"

"You influenced me," she snarls. If I didn't know better, I'd think she actually wants to kill me. Even with that knowledge, her intensity is startling. "You influenced me with your magic and illusions and you made me kill him! Made me love you! All this time, you've been influencing me, planning this down to the very last, and you were going to kill me when I stepped back from our embrace!"

This is when the spear, shrunk to its carrying size, is revealed in my hand, falling from my grasp and rolling away from me across the beaten grass. The whole plot lies before the audience now, all of it, and they must be beside themselves with anger and hopelessness and pity for Veers, poor Veers, who was manipulated and deceived and confessed love to a sociopath. It matters not that my powers of persuasion and influence are slight at best; the audience does not know that. Only my mother may suspect.

"Only one contender can achieve Balance," I hiss, allowing the confusion to fall away from my features. The pain remains, but it is mostly masked by rage. My plan has failed and everyone must see that. "Why not me? Whatever it takes."

Veers shakes her head, watching as my skin turns a deathly shade of pale. I take shuddering breaths as I look away from her, gazing up at the sky above as I cross my arms over my abdomen. My skin begins to change to a dull grey, spidery, minuscule cracks webbing across its surface.

"No, Loki," Veers says finally, her voice hollow and empty. "Not this time."

My eyes close and my chest stills. The illusion creeping over my skin finishes and that's it, I'm dead.