the trip back to the helicarrier was smooth. the guys didn't leave loki's side meanwhile the girls flew the jet back and sat up in the front.
once they landed back they put loki in containment and had a meeting to talk about their next move and what to do with the tesseract.
"okay so we know this thing is dangerous but we don't know exactly what kind of power it holds." chase runs by the obvious answers they have already.
marleen and dakota had managed to figure out the tech shield had in the lab and were currently scanning the cube for any type of geo signatures that they could pin point. the more they knew about the tesseract scientifically the more they'd be able to understand about how it works and the history of it.
"i can phone a friend back home. he's the only person that knows about my powers and he's helped me over the years. i have a library back home, maybe he can find something for us in the meantime." liam suggests to the group as he pulls out his phone.
"that'd be great. thank you, liam." brady nodded off to liam. liam walked out of the room to make the important call.
"whatever this thing is, it's not from earth. i'm not picking up any kind of matter that's from earth." marleen reads from the screen in front of her.
brady stood next to her and leaned over a bit to get a better read.
"mina, you got anything?" brady asked from his position.
"i don't know much. all i know is that it has the power to put people in a trance and follow whoever holds power over it. that's why loki wanted it. he's always been hungry for power for as long as he's been alive." minako explained with a shrug.
"what about you, maggie?" chase asked maggie who was standing in the corner of the room. she had been quiet the whole time which was weird for them since usually she's on top of everything.
brady grew worried but didn't bother showing it.
"i...i feel so drawn to it. like it's pulling me in and i don't know why." she explains softly. she had been staring at the glowing cube a majority of the time now.
possibly her magic was more drawn to it rather than her whole entire being. chase hadn't failed to notice the way she looked at it.
as if she was itching to touch it and steal it.
brady had noticed the guards that were transferring loki to his cell walk pass by the lab. he felt a hole form at the bottom of his stomach when him and loki made eye contact for the first time after their encounter.
loki couldn't help but smirk back at brady. a sinister, pitiful smirk at that. brady shook his head and decided to look away after that.
the group then decided to move to the round table they were once at before.
brady started messing around with the controls where fury usually stood at. the others either sat down or stood near the table.
"i just wanna know why loki let us take him so easily?" marleen questioned out loud.
"he's rumored to have some followers or army of some sort. why aren't they on his tail right now?" she added.
"loki shouldn't be our biggest focus right now. he's a walking vampire that sucks the peace out of everything. the guy belongs in a stray jacket." armando scoffed.
"hey! he might be a little two sided but he's asgardian. i know his family. i'm basically his family." minako was quick to try and defend loki.
"he killed 80 people in two days." chase reminds her.
"we're not blood related anyways." minako sighed.
"i think it's about the mechanics. iridium, what did he need the iridium for?" maggie questioned.
"it's a stabilizing agent. which basically means the portal won't collapse on itself like it did at shield from what fury told me." brady began to explain all of a sudden which caught the others off guard.
brady saw the looks on all their faces and proceeded to talk.
"it means the portal can be open as long and as wide as loki wants it to."
"i didn't even notice he was still here." armando whispered to marleen.
"raise the mizzenmast and job the topsails, would y'all?" brady lightly demanded from the agents that were working at desks below him.
all he received were glares.
"that man is playing galaga but thought we wouldn't notice. try using lower screen brightness next time so we don't notice, bud." brady straight up called out a worker.
"and she's online shopping for shoes and the ones she currently deciding to buy are the most hideous things i've ever seen." he called out the woman next to the man he had just called out.
"chill out, brady." marleen called him.
"also how the fuck does fury even see some of these screens?" brady turns to maria hill who was also standing at the table with the group.
"he turns." she answered.
"that must be tiring." brady muttered.
"oh! and i forgot the mention that the only major power source that loki needs is of high energy density. something to basically jumpstart the cube." brady remembers and tells the group immediately.
"since when did you become an expert in thermonuclear astrophysics?" maria asked him questionably.
"last night. on our way back here actually... in the packet we were given? selvig's notes? did no one else do the reading?!" brady raises his arms up in frustration.
"does loki need any other source to finish off whatever he needs to do?" chase asked.
"he would have to heat the cube to 120-million kelvin jjsg to break through the coulomb barrier." liam states as he walks into the room. he held the packet that brady was talking about in his hand.
brady smirks at liam and snaps his fingers at him. proudness is written all over brady's face.
"thank you, liam! but unless selvig, who was also captured, had figured out how to stabilize the quantum tunneling effect." brady further explains to the group.
"if he could do that he could achieve heavy ion fusion at any reactor in the planet." liam countered back.
"finally, someone who listens to me." brady had found himself walking towards liam.
"alright so basically loki is controlling a cube that can wipe out basically half of the planet. how the hell did he even get it?" dakota asked aloud.
"the better question is: how did loki even use that stick and cube to turn one of the sharpest men i know into his own personal flying monkey's." fury spoke as he walked up the small steps towards where the group was sitting at.
"flying monkeys?" minako questioned.
"i do! i understood that reference." armando said proudly, a cheerful smile on his lips.
the others just looked at him, a few rolling their eyes.
"alright well, me and liam are gonna go are try and figure out the purpose of the cube and such. you guys have fun." brady pointed his thumb behind him towards the lab before taking a hold of liam by his shoulders and leading him away from the group.
"did he just..." marleen points at brady and liam.
"apparently brady is also a fucking scientist too." chase scoffed.
"he's a pretty intelligent man. i didn't hire him just for his powers, guys. braden has more to offer more than any of you could ever know." fury explained in a bragging manner.
"he's one of the put together people i know." maria also commented.
"so we're just gonna let the illegal boxer take hold o—"
"the hell did you just say, maverick?" fury was caught off guard.
chase let out an irritated sigh before getting up from his seat. he steps in front of fury and looks at him in his eye.
"none of us have liked the idea of brady being on the avengers. you know this but what i didn't know was his past. the reason that he's the way he is..." chase started off.
"i read the file, the one you were trying to hide it from us. he was basically a hydra soldier and you just forgave him like nothing! he tried to kill you, nick!" chase exposed both brady and nick fury at the same time.
and that was his biggest mistake.
"what?" marleen said in disbelief.
"look, some of us do want brady on the team. or we did at least..." minako said in shock after finding out the information.
"so all of a sudden anyone associated with hydra is a horrible person?" armando asked in confusion.
"no. you're different. you were a good person before all of that. brady was already building up his record as a felon. joining hydra was his biggest accomplishment if anything." chase looks back at armando and explained.
chase then turns to the whole group and keeps talking.
"when brady and fury first met, it wasn't on accident. brady was sent to kill fury." chase looks back at nick who's just standing there with a poker face.
"chase, that's enough." maria attempted to stop him.
"his record has nothing but blood all over it. and you tried to cover it all of as it meant nothing to you. he killed dozens of innocent people. and you're acting like it's nothing." chase points back at fury and raises his voice at him.
"that's not true." fury said coldly.
"oh? it isn't? is that why you sent hush money to the families of all the victims?"
"i said that's enough!" maria yelled over chase for him to get the hint.
the rest of the avengers just stared at chase and nick fury before looking at each other in panic and worry. there was so much going on they didn't know what to do or say.
armando felt insecure and uncomfortable now due to the way chase spoke about brady being associated with hydra. that name always made his skin crawl.
marleen and dakota were confused to say the least. brady had never mentioned anything like that nor did he look like he'd gone through something like that.
brady was an asshole to dakota at first but now she's come to realized what he did to bring her here was for her own good. marleen was the first one to not judge brady for the way he acted because she knew he probably had a reason behind it.
this was it. this was his reason.
he was so nice and overall caring towards her. a monster couldn't possibly do that, could they?
minako just didn't believe a single thing that came out of chase's mouth. she sensed jealously if anything.
and maggie was just utterly torn between what chase said and what she wanted to believe. the brady she talked to at liam's house wasn't the same brady chase is talking about.
no, her brady wasn't a monster. he was innocent.
but the brady chase speaks about is everything maggie is against.
her throat is tight and she feels like she's gonna cry, throw up, and scram all at the same time.
"i need some air." is all she says before getting up from her seat and walking out of the room.
she walks through the hallway liam and brady went through to get to the lab. her steps seem to go in slow motion as she comes towards the lab.
she slows down when she walks pass the lab, a large window in the hallway where you could see what was going on inside, she could see everything.
liam is having trouble looking for something on the computer for a split second before brady comes to his side and helps him. liam smiles when brady helped him figure it out.
brady says something maggie couldn't really hear but whatever he said must've been funny. liam laughed at whatever brady said and shakes his head.
brady then left liam's side over to a machine that appeared to be some type of scanner. brady was pushing buttons and talking aloud, liam responding to him whenever he did so.
brady felt eyes on him which caused him to look up and look towards the glass window.
his breath hitches when he sees maggie standing there. their eyes are locked in on each other.
she looks like she's about to cry and that worried brady. she looked pretty keen in which he finally put his pride aside for once and mouthed to her:
"you okay?"
it takes her a second to process what she had just been asked. he gives her a small gentle smile and that does it for her.
she nods quickly before walking away from the lab before he could notice her tears.
she walks to her bunk and slams the door. she sits on her bed and sulks in her own sadness. she was so conflicted about the situation right now. she sits with her head in her hands as she sobs.
she's now figured out that she likes brady more as a friend. she thinks he feels the same way but is just ignoring her because of the mistake she made.
he was so gentle with her at liam's house. god, that memory of them in the kitchen cooking together always made butterflies form in her stomach. it was one of her favorite memories.
the words he told her that melted her heart every time.
"i'll take you wherever you wanna go."
his words echoed through her ears constantly at this point.
in the middle of her break down, the door to her bunk opened which made her take her head out of her hands and wipe her tears away.
it's one of shield's agents in which she assumed something had happened again.
"what's going on?" she asked but received no response.
the agent takes his gun out of his holster and before maggie would even process what was going on, he shot her in the neck with the bullet.
her eyes began to feel heavy and she falls to the floor from her bed.
and her world goes black once again.
SI SPEAKS !
ngl this kinda hurt to write 💀 i'm on my period rn so every little thing was making me emotional bruh
this was heavily inspired by luke hemming's song "motion" (hint the chapter title)!!
hope y'all enjoyed, i really did miss writing my dysfunctional queer avengers <3
take care of yourself for me, i'm always here for literally anything 💓