Bant never imagined that just dropping by to remind Tony not to forget to rest would plant the seed for Ultron in his mind.
Still, even if Tony had the idea, there was no way he could pull it off in the short term. In the comics, Ultron was the creation of Dr. Pym. In the cinematic universe, it was Tony and Dr. Banner who worked on him together. Even with both of them, breaking through those technical barriers took ages.
Right now, Banner was still in Plymouth.
Tony alone could eventually figure out Ultron, sure. But that wouldn't happen anytime soon. At least for the near future, there was nothing to worry about.
Back in Queens for the first time in a while, Bant let himself enjoy a solid night's rest.
At the moment, the Sky Hammer Bureau was already building satellites according to his blueprints. Ulysses was still out searching. Tony worked around the clock on his new armors, though it was anyone's guess whether he could expand his armor vault to Iron Man 3 levels before the Chitauri arrived.
Peter kept busy doing good deeds and cracking down on criminals. Felicia poured even more time into training. Lately, she'd even been skipping school so often that Mary Jane started worrying about her.
Truth was, Felicia had wanted to bring Mary Jane along to train as well, but Hardesky refused. He didn't want more people learning his secrets.
In short, everyone was busy.
Only Bant found himself free again.
After transforming into a shapeshifter, he'd modified a Sky Hammer Bureau carrier and let Eunice pilot it, tunneling deep beneath the Antarctic ice in search of Anti-Vibranium.
Progress was painfully slow, though. The unique properties of Anti-Vibranium meant drill bits wore down at an alarming rate and had to be replaced constantly.
So Bant decided to shift focus and tackle the internal machinery of the Sky Union Space Station first.
He needed vast amounts of Vibranium alloy for the station's outer shell, making sure it was sturdy enough. But the internal structures and common equipment inside the station didn't require Vibranium alloy.
That part wasn't too difficult for him.
And just like that, Bant returned to school life as a way to unwind amid all the tension.
On the other side of things.
Thor woke up on a park bench.
It was another miserable day for him. He'd lost his hammer yet again. Or rather, he'd lost his hammer-swinging job.
At the start, SHIELD had set him up with a fake identity on Earth so he could find regular work and not starve to death on this planet.
Relying on pure brute strength, Thor had done pretty well. In the beginning, he moved bricks and cement and actually made decent money. He could do the work of three or four men, and his foreman paid him double. Thor didn't care much about that, though. Ever since he lost his hammer, life had felt hollow, like a eunuch who had lost his manhood. No amount of money could fill that void.
He dragged himself through the days in a haze, working from dawn to dusk.
Then one day, he discovered another job: swinging a sledgehammer to break down walls. That immediately sparked his interest.
The hammer wasn't his old one, and his divine strength was gone, but the moment he picked up that sledgehammer, Thor felt power surge through him again. Those days were the best he ever felt on Earth, his spirit brighter than it had been in a long time.
Every day he poured all his strength into swinging that hammer. At night, he carried it back to his cheap rented room and talked to it. His neighbor always thought he was a few screws short and never dared to bother him.
Thor remembered every single day of that job.
He remembered the time he went to a school in Midgard and smashed through a wall. The students there were kind—they took pictures with him using those things called phones and even gave him ice-cold soda.
That kind of life didn't seem so bad to Thor. No fighting, no killing, just peace.
Then one day, the people from SHIELD came looking for him again.
No, the way the Midgardians put it, those people were actually Hydra hiding inside SHIELD. Thor never quite figured out the whole tangled mess between SHIELD and Hydra, but he knew one thing: Hydra was Captain America's enemy. That was enough.
So when those people branded Steve Rogers a fugitive and smeared him as Hydra, Thor didn't believe a single word of it. A man who had lifted Mjolnir was even worthy of becoming the king of Asgard. How could someone like that be evil?
Because of that, when the Hydra agents approached him, he paid no attention to Pierce's nonsense. Besides, even if he wanted to do something about it, he couldn't get his hammer back anyway. Mjolnir no longer belonged to him.
But others didn't know that.
The people at the construction site only saw a group of SHIELD agents politely escorting Thor away. Later, those agents tore off their snake skins and revealed their true faces. Everyone realized they had been Hydra all along.
That led people to lump Thor in with those who had close ties to Hydra. They were baffled why the Sky Hammer Bureau had captured so many hidden Hydra operatives yet never arrested Thor.
Either way, because of that incident, Thor lost his job. His landlord kicked him out, and he couldn't even get his deposit back.
Jobless and penniless, Thor immediately sank to a life on the streets.
At first, he didn't pay his situation much mind. Back in his days of war across the realms, sleeping under the stars and going hungry were common.
But he forgot that he'd lost his divine power. He was no longer the god of thunder, immune to all sickness. He was just an ordinary mortal.
A few nights sleeping in the park and getting soaked in a rainstorm, on top of barely eating, quickly left his body exhausted. By the time he woke up that day, Thor was finally sick.
For the first time, he felt truly weak. His limbs refused to work, and his head was heavy as if it were packed with the Urn metal dwarves used to forge weapons. It weighed on him like a hammer.
In the morning, a tall young man with short hair jogged through the park and noticed how frail he looked. He asked with concern if Thor needed to go to a hospital.
Thor could not bear to show weakness in front of anyone. To a warrior, weakness meant death was near. So he bellowed at the young man, shouting that the son of Odin needed no one's pity. Even if he died, he would return to Valhalla and fight on as a heroic warrior for his king.
Flash figured the man was so feverish he'd gone delirious. How else could he be spouting such nonsense? He tried to drag Thor to a doctor by force, but the enraged Thor shoved him away.
Left with no choice, Flash wrote down his contact information and told Thor that if he needed help, he absolutely had to call.
Now the cool morning had passed. Though it was nearly October, New York still baked like an oven once the sun rose high. The heat pounding down made Thor dizzy, and his vision blurred. He felt like death was creeping up on him.
In this moment, he truly regretted not accepting that boy's help in the morning.
He wasn't afraid of death. But Thor could not stomach dying in such a miserable, cowardly way. He needed to die like a warrior, bravely on the battlefield, cut down by an enemy. He needed to die as a god, not as a mortal laid low by a rainstorm and a sickness. It was too humiliating, he thought.
At that moment, a fierce will to live surged inside him. Shakily, he picked up the slip of paper Flash had left. On it was the young man's contact information.
"This is… a phone number?"
Thankfully, his time on Earth had taught him that Midgardians loved contacting each other through telephones. It wasn't as convenient as the magic Asgardians used, but at least anyone could do it.
Thor made up his mind. He would swallow his pride.
With his already blurry eyes, he stared hard at the paper for a long moment. It took enormous effort for his sluggish mind to memorize the phone number.
"Good. Now I just need to call him and ask for his help."
He nodded and repeated Flash's number over and over as if chanting a spell. But after sitting there a long time, he heard no response.
"I don't know how to make a call…"
The realization hit him.
"Thor, Thor, you utter fool!"
He collapsed onto the park ground. He felt like a complete waste, someone who couldn't do a single thing right. This time, he was probably going to die for sure.
He wasn't afraid of death. Brave warriors returned to Valhalla. It was just…
"Am I worthy?"
Am I worthy?
The question had bound him like a curse, seared into his soul, trapping him in endless self-doubt each and every day.
"Can someone like me even enter Valhalla?"
Right now, he was nothing but a mortal. And he wasn't dying a warrior's death, fighting enemies to his last breath. If he died this way, was he worthy of becoming a heroic spirit, fighting alongside the gods in the afterlife?
Probably not.
He thought this with despair, his consciousness and eyelids growing heavier. He felt pain, torment. His heart clenched tight, as if a piece of it had been carved away. Tears spilled uncontrollably down his face.
He never imagined he would never return to Asgard before the end. He'd never see his father again, never see his mother, never take Mjolnir back into his hand…
And Loki.
Heimdall had banished Loki. Since then, there had been no news of him at all. Was he still alive somewhere, or already dead?
"You must be alive… because you always pull through." Thor shook his head, crying and laughing at the same time.
Through his tear-soaked vision, a hazy green silhouette slowly grew clearer. Thor couldn't see well, but he recognized that shape. It was Loki.
"Looks like I really am dying. I'm seeing things now."
"Who told you it was an illusion, brother?"
/-\
Enjoying the story? Want to read ahead?
Support the novel and unlock early access to unreleased chapters!
~ +20 Advanced Chapters Available on Patreon! (+1 Chapter daily)
https://p-atreon.com/Its_Zack
(Just remove the hyphen (-) to access Patreon normally)