Infinity War: The Dreamer

Infinity War: The Dreamer

A Marvel Fanfiction

The Avengers, The Infinity War, Thor, Loki, Bruce Banner, Peter Parker, Tony Stark, Steve Rogers - these characters are owned by Marvel.

 

The others’ similarity to living people is not at all a coincidence. They are all included deliberately in this story. I am honored to be part of it, my friends.

 

 

Lo, there do I see my father.
Lo, there do I see my mother,
and my sisters, and my brothers.
Lo, there do I see the line of my people,
Back to the beginning!
Lo, they do call to me.
They bid me take my place among them,
In the halls of Valhalla!
Where the brave may live forever!”

Lo, There do I see my Father

Lo, There do I see my Mother and
My Brothers and my Sisters
Lo, There do I see the line of my people back to the beginning
Lo, They do call to me
They bid me take my place among them in the halls of Valhalla
Where thine enemies have been vanquished
Where the brave shall live Forever
Nor shall we mourn but rejoice for those that have died the glorious death.

(Viking prayer in two versions*)

Eighteen degrees Celsius below zero: the thermometer showed this, when I looked out in evening, before I closed the door that it’s all ok out there. There was silence, peace; the stars sparkled in the sky, as they could in such cold winter nights. Our two dogs have already gone to sleep, the noise of cars and the city has subsided for now.

“There is very cold”, I murmured, knowing that my son could not hear it. “And it will be colder in morning.”

“Did you say something, Mom?” obliviously he could not hear clearly through the headphone.

“I just think it is funny that there is currently colder here than on the North Pole. In spring.

“Oh well. Can I help you?” and the point. “Or could I play?”

“Another half an hour”, I locked the door and started upstairs. “Then sleep.”

Despite the worn furniture, draughty windows and the creaking floor I loved this house. I have renewed it with my own hands. I like the environs, as if we were not in a town. In summer there are all green, all life; the spring is beautiful, the thousand-colour autumn is nice; and the winter…Winter is quiet. It is often muddy and misty and grey, but at night… It is nice at night even there is no snow. And if it is snowing, the landscape will be wonderful. I like to look around from the window, to watch the barely bright scenery without man, to listen to screech-owls and the patrolling cats, as a pre-sleeping rite.

Everything was so calm that night.

I was woken by the dogs’ barking. By barking, that became a weird whining. I had a fade conjecture on it – I would not called it a memory – that I was woken by another noise; something what had woken the dogs, but I did not know what was it. I was groping for my glasses; then I sneaked into my son’s room; into the south-facing, courtyard view, tiny room. I looked at my child. The rapidly growing boy slept on his mattress, he has got eight pillows under his head, and huddled to his cat. The tabby cat seemed perfectly satisfied under the blanket. None of them made any moves as I pulled the curtain off and I looked out the window.

I saw my two dogs sitting at the corner of yard, beside the fence; they were looking out, stood up, sat back, then they tuned up holding their nose forward the sky again. And the neighbour’s dog, then all of dogs next to them had begun it.

“Oh shit!”

Outside the fence, a few steps from the corner where my dogs were pacing up and down, a dark pile laid in the middle of the road.

The Moon was decrescent, she gave a little light, and the hard-frozen soil was not covered by snow, but I recognized what I saw. It was a man lying out there on the road.

At the eighteen degrees Celsius below zero.

I went back to my room. What should I do? What happened? Who is the man out there? Is it one of our neighbours or somebody else who just went here? I have grabbed my phone.

Thick socks, bathrobe, lined boots, cap and a winter coat – I was a wonderful sight.

When I walked out the door, I thought for a flash that it was not so cold. Then my hand had frozen on the terrace railing. On the gate-key. On the street door. I excluded the dogs to their own yard lest they run out to the street and I opened the gate.

“I should to call ambulance” it was in my mind. I were listening all noises, because there was a huge empty plot on the right side, across the road.

I stopped at the corner – our house was on the end of street and the edge of the town – and I relieved for a moment: I can see an abandoned coat. Relief went quickly, and I walked further towards the dark figure.

A man was lying there, hunched and motionless. He laid on his side, curled up in fetal pose; his head was shielded by his hands. I couldn’t see his face.

I went closer to him.

It was a he. The man didn’t move.

“Sir?” I remembered what I have learned about first aid.

We should call him, touch him for some response.

But he didn’t have any reaction. He didn’t move, didn’t say anything.

He seemed dreadfully rigid.

“He is dead!” I was terrified, I was feared. “What the hell should I do? Maybe didn’t he die? I have to call an ambulance!”

“Mom!” I almost got a heart attack, when my son turned in the corner. He paused, appraised the situation and then run to me.

“He died.” I moaned. My son crouched and pulled away the man’s arms from his face. He leaned close to him and lit into the man’s face with his cell phone. The skin of the figure before us seemed pretty blue, his long, dark hair rimed.

“He has frozen” and I began to shiver. “We must call the ambulance.”

“I think he is alive” my son put his fingers to the man’s carotid artery with a self-evident gesture as a doctor did. “Not entirely cold. We have to get him into the house. Then we can call ambulance. If we leave him here, he will certainly die before the ambulance will arrive” he kneeled and took the man’s right hand carefully. “Help me!”

“Wait! We have to make a photo how we found him” and my phone just flashed. I was thinking of there is impossible to survive this cold and we need some proof. We literally dragged him into the house and we laid him on the carpet of the living room. We took our coats off and turned the lights and heating on.

My child got up wide-eyed from the carpet.

“Has he died? Is he dead, is he?” the kid only could shake his head for a moment.

“Do you know who this is?” he asked when he finally found his voice.

“He died. He is hard-frozen and blue.” I was on the brink of collapse. We have got a dead guy into the house. Police, investigation - what’s going to happen now?

“Mom! Stop it! Look at his face! His clothes!”

I looked at his clothes at first time. He wore black leather jacket, black trousers, both were torn, and his blue skin was revealed here and there. He wore black boots; I mean he wore one black boot only his left foot, because his right was naked blue.

I touched his hand carefully. I felt it icy cold. I swallowed a big one and I looked from my son’s face

“Look at him, mom!”

at our “dead man’s” face.

Bluish skin, narrow lips, high forehead, fine features. Marko threw his coat on the man with a single movement; he spun around, and run off, to upstairs. I heard, he jumped through the stairs threes. He brought his own blanket, and mine too, but even the coverlets.

Simply he dropped everything on the man.

“Did you realize who he is” asked. “Mom, this is Loki. Loki, who is a frost giant. The cold didn’t harm him. And their skins are blue.”

“Yeah. He's blue. And rigid. And he is dead.” I tried to take deep breaths. “Loki is a fictional character, and Tom Hiddleston, the actor is…”

“The actor would have frozen like anyone” Marko shook his head like an adult. “But he is alive. Pretty sure he’s Loki. I thought you’d be happy,” he added.

I knelt on the carpet and folded the blankets back. The body which seemed perfectly lifeless, now moved and begun to shake.

I almost fainted. I wanted to jump to get out the house.

“I will call an ambulance” I looked after my coat, but the phone wasn’t in its pocket.

“This will be funny,” my son grinned. “If they examine a god…”

“This is an unfortunate person who almost froze to death. It’s a wonder that he is alive. We have to care for him. Freezing should be treated…”

“Mom, really don’t you believe it?” he interrupted.

I stood up.

“Nope. Look, his frozen blue colour begins to vanish.”

Marko shrugged his shoulders.

“Yeah. He comes around and then will regain his human form,” he lifts off his coat on the floor and started out. “You can make a tea for him or whatever. Although, as I look at you, it’s better that I do than you.”

By then the heating system was on its maximum. I sat into the armchair and took off my fluffy lined boots.

“Where… am I?”

The sound from the heap of blankets was silent and weak, but it was a good performance from a man who almost frozen to death.

“In my living room.”

I knelt on the carpet and folded the blanket back.

“Do you feel any pain?”

“I’m … fine,” the guy dropped back to the carpet.

Marko, who had rattled in the kitchen with the teapot, now looked in the room.

“He fainted. There is no medicine for this?”

“I don’t think so. At least there is not near at hand.”

“Then stay at tea… please, mom, if he will come around, do not start that ‘hello, Loki’”

I took off all blankets from our guest; I was still worried that he might die there, under the quilts, on the carpet of my living room. At first glance, however, he seemed to be alive and even his skin was not in frightening blue shades.

He lay on his back, as we laid him down. His black hair was matted onto his head, was front of his narrow face. Somehow his high forehead, his delicate features suggested extraordinary intellect and the crow’s-feet around his closed eyes indicated that this man often laughs. His thin lips had nice contours. On his right temple were red gash and graze.

I brushed aside his hair from his face and left my palm on his forehead. His skin was neither hot nor cold.

Over his black shirt he were long, black leather jacket which parted, broke in several places, like the black trousers. There were wounds on the man’s knee, leg and were a cutting wound on his thigh. I unfolded the coat to see that he didn’t have further injuries. In the next moment something flashed; then I felt a cold touch on my neck and a vise-like wring on my wrist.

I turned to stone.

“Don’t touch me again!”

Sea-coloured eyes sparked and I held my free hand far away from myself.

“Everything is alright. Just relax. I just worried…”

“Let go my mother!” My child seemed to be pale, but I could see that his each muscle was ready to jump, holding his left hand fisted, and his right hand was behind him. “Let her right away!”

The man surveyed the child then released my hand, and I did not feel the cold blade on my throat. I moved back slowly, carefully.

“You have heart, kid” he said to my son then looked at me. “Like you.”

His voice was velvety and special.

In the next moment his gaze was clouded, his hands dropped as if he would have used the last crumbs of his strength.

I kept away from him. I could see that what has he to threatening me; the hilt of a slim dagger, which had dropped out of his hand, was decorated a wicker pattern.

He was breathing in shallow sips, now tiny sweat drops appeared on his forehead. I beckoned to Marko, who stepped beside me.

“Take the heat off, please,” then I turned to the unknown again. “Do you allow me to look at your injuries? I would like to help.”

He did not answer, but dropped his arms on the carpet. I opened his coat, unbuttoned the shirt, pulled on the vest under it and carefully touched his skin.

“Everything is alright. Everything is alright. I just take look…”

His right side was covered reddish bruising. Rib fracture? Oh, no! Pneumothorax, ambulance, hospital.

I had no precise thoughts.

“You’re afraid of me… Am I …right? Yet… you want… to help me.”

“I think at least one of your ribs broke. Maybe your lungs damaged. You should go to hospital where you will be treated.

He tried to get up and sit, pain appeared on his face. I didn’t dare to give my hand him.

“My name is Judit. He is my son, Mark. Could you say your name?”

The man looked at me. His young, beautiful face seemed timeless, but his eyes were very old and at the time I could see despair in there.

“I don’t know… I don’t remember.”

Marko and I glanced to each other.

“Oops” he moaned.

The man sat up and reclined to the sofa. I saw his effort to pull himself together. Despair disappeared from his eyes, there only left some uncertainty. He looked down at himself then felt his wounds.

“Maybe it is not so bad,” his voice sounded stronger than before. “Do you know what happened to me?” He looked away from me, looking behind me. “You should put down that knife, boy. I don’t want to hurt you.”

I just noticed that his daggers disappeared from the carpet. I didn’t comment it.

Marko left the room without a word.

“I don’t know… I have no idea.”

“You are Loki, the God of Mischief,” Marko held a stack of clothes on his arms which he leaned over to our guest. “I guess these are fit for you, because there are too big for me. When you get dressed, get out of here!”

While sitting, the man slowly drew his right leg under himself, kneeled up then stood up. He shuddered for a moment but he regained his balance.

“Pardon?”

“Get out of here! Before you hurt us.”

Marko straightened himself, but the man was still taller than him with a half foot. Marko looked at him, turned around and left us alone.

“Wait! How could I be Loki?”

As he did not get any response, he glanced at me.

“Should I really be Loki?”

He manifested the sign of focus again. It seemed to me that he didn’t able finally to dispel the pain and tiredness from him.

 “I don’t know. Rather you should be taken a rest… A tub of hot water? Or maybe bed instead of the carpet?”

He followed me to the bathroom, gazing silently as I poured bath salt into the water. The fragrance of the plants immediately diffused in the whole house.

The man began to undress, pushing each torn piece to the floor. I was standing on the doorway as I was bewitched, unable to turn away or look away from him. I could saw the bruises, grazes and cuts on his upper body; I did not even notice that my mouth became dry. Finally I came round.

“Sorry, I’m not here anymore. Sorry,” – and I went out.

I heard his voice in a minute.

“I am in the water… Would you come back?”

He closed his eyes and leaned back in the tub.

“Do you feel sick?”

He nodded. I knelt beside the tub and took a sponge into my hand.

“Well, it was not a good idea for the hot water but I was afraid you have frozen. When I found you, you were blue and cold.”

I rubbed his shoulders, his neck and his chest carefully. I dipped my palms into the water and dribbled it onto his hair. The water flooded became red on his temple.

“There is a wound on your head.”

He still did not open his eyes but sat up.

“Only one? I think there are many. I feel it so”

I washed his hair and his back and opened the shower.

“I’ll leave the rest for you.”

I closed the water, hung the shower head to its place but I could not leave him. He didn’t feel better after the hot bath. I put out the largest bath towel and I took the sponge again. I washed him from head to toe. He didn’t say a word and even did not open his eyes. The wounds were positioned on his right side as like he had slipped on something. I pulled out the plug and put the towel on the edge of tub.

“You are ready. I leave you alone.” I went to the kitchen, scanned the medication drawer; I searched for some ointment. I heard the key stomping at the front door. The man was standing there; the towel was wrapped around his waist and he dipped into the pouring icy air.

It froze my blood. He’s totally went crazy!

I jumped to there.

“Do you want pneumonia?” I grabbed his arm. “Close the door!”

Red light flashed in his eyes, he caught my hand and the next thing what I realized was that I were pressed to the widely opened door; his one hand was on my throat and the other on my right arm. Then the red light vanished, his eyes became sea-green again, his arms fell down and leaned back to the door. I snapped the door.

“Marko is right! Go away! Go!” I stared his chest with horror and he followed my gaze.

The enormous, reddish bruise barely seemed on his chest.

“I’m sorry… I am… I am so sorry. I… I didn't want to hurt you.”

“You did not hurt me. Yet. Just go away.”

He looked into my eyes. There were incredible depth, immeasurable knowledge, and loneliness over ages glittered in it.

“I don’t know where I could go. I don’t know who I am and how I got here, but I can see that I possibly can be dangerous for you somehow.”

“Somehow? Because you are Loki of Asgard,” the voice came over our heads. “I wanted to sleep, but it doesn’t matter. Come here!”

I let him our guest forward, and I went back for things that my son collected before.

“Dress up, please. So I can’t … concentrate.”

“I think we all have to sleep. Loki can sleep in my room and I sleep with you, Mom.”

The guest, who had just pulled the pants up, now straightened up.

“Enough! Loki is a god. A mythological being, but I am a flesh-blood man” his both hands clenched.

"And I'm a Pony Princess," my son nodded eagerly. “You know, mica powder and something like that. Now, calm down and look at this,” he held my phone on his hand, with the pictures of the frozen body. “We can say that you are twin brother of an actor, of course, but you would be in the morgue right now. So you are Loki, the Asgardian god. That is, you are a frost giant from Jotenthing.”

I was just sitting in my room in silence, I got my head and I had enough. From the explanation of Mark, our guest surely relaxed and immediately understood the situation.

“What?”

“I don’t believe it! Don’t you understand? Somehow you came here, to the Earth. Mother, how the Asgardians name it? Yes, yes, Midgard. And you are a god, the God of Mischief, the God of Dark Jokes, and God of Troublemaking. Thor’s brother. Odin’s adopted son. Copy that?

The man looked at me down then fell himself to the low bed.

“What am I doing here?”

I kneeled up.

“Tomorrow, okay? Let’s continue it tomorrow.”

He nodded, leaned back on the bed, on my bed, and seemed to fall asleep in a single minute.

“Good morning.”

I almost dropped the kettlebell which I was working with, so accustomed to loneliness. Somebody was sleeping in my bed… This is unusual for me. Ten years are very long times.

“Good morning. Sorry. But I’ll finish this.”

I have done my morning exercise quickly.

“Could I see your injuries?”

“I’m fine. It is not necessary… Thanks,” he added with some delay. “Hello, kid.”

Marko had arrived.

“Loki.”

“Let’s talk about this a little later, after I’ve flown cold water onto my head,” the man sighed. “I’ll find the bathroom, thank you.”

Half an hour later we sat in my room and we watched Loki.

“You can say whatever now.”

“All right. We found you at night. There was eighteen degrees Celsius below zero, your skin was blue; your ribs probably broke, there were bruises on your neck, on your chest, and on your entire right side. You struggled for every single breath. Now there isn’t any sign of it.”

“Your blue colour is due to the fact that you’re a frost giant, but usually you don’t seem that,” Marko added.

“Anything else?” the man stood up and started out. There was no sickness or distraction on his face.

“Really don’t you remember anything?”

“I remember falling. Endless falling.”

“That’s not a lot” my son twiddled one of his knives.

Our guest watched the blade.

“Do you have to play with it?”

“I’m not playing” the knife flew past the man’s head, and stopped in the jamb with a loud knock.

“A well-mannered boy” Loki’s smile didn’t seemed wholehearted. But my son’s smile totally disappeared because I slapped him while I was sitting.

“That’s for the jamb!”

I was near the door in two strides, drew out the knife from the wood, and the second slap, the bigger one was got by our guest.

“That’s for bucked him up…”

The man’s eyes darkened for a moment, bu then his grin became wider than ever before.

“I will love you… But if you say that go to your room…”

“You don’t need to go. It's enough to polish and paint the frame where it stabbed.”

I went to the kitchen and began to make lunch. Loki – for now I only could think of him as Loki – followed me, leaned back to this doorframe with folded hand and watched my work without a word.

"Your son is special," he said after a long silence, "though you are too, somehow he doesn’t look like you” he looked at his long fingers thoughtfully and then me. “Or at least your features don’t look similar.”

I still was angry for the door, the sleepless night and suddenly I’ve had enough. I wiped my wet hand on my red apron, stirred the soup and was waiting for what he wants to say.

“His eyes, his face and his hands… Are you sure I've never been here before? Say it fourteen years ago?”

My hands clenched.

“I’m just kidding! Don’t hit me again. I ease the tension. I’m only reliving the tension.”

“Good. When you have done, spread the table and eat. I have many things to do."

Spring had come suddenly in this year, but it didn’t bring back our friend’s memories. Apart from the fact that we lived together with a guy who did not know himself who he is, and of course we did not know about him too, our life returned to our ordinary routines. Meanwhile, we tried to find out who he is. An ex-policeman’s and an IT specialist’s support helped a lot, but we didn’t get anything. We didn’t found him in the list of wanted and missing people, nor somebody who looked like him.

Our friend has proven a valuable company for me because maybe he didn’t know himself, but he has lots of knowledge about the universe. I enjoyed every single conversation. He was very smart, amusing, he could easily and honestly laugh.

I wasn’t the only one who spends a lot of time with him. I often came home for unbridled cheer from my son’s room; they sat in front of the computer, and were playing, watching movies or talking.

Towards the end of that week, I decided Loki needed some clothes and other stuffs, if he wants to stay with us. I never liked shopping, but this time we have been over it easily and quickly. Our guest wasn’t an ordinary presence in his ordinary clothes. On the streets women stared at him openly.

In the second week after his arrival, the spring really took things seriously and gave us almost summer heat. I have felt terrible headaches more and more times.

In the third week, Mark decided to take Loki to Kung Fu with himself. I thought it was not a good idea, but I let it, and to avoid possible catastrophes I went with them. I haven’t been training for years, but the atmosphere immediately absorbed me.

“This is my old friend from Sweden,” I introduced our guest to the instructor. “His name is Stellan.”

“But he’s called Loki,” my son grinned.

I stood beside Loki at the exercises which did in pairs and let my son to one of his racing companion. We started at lightsome exercises, then we were doing a continuous line of action; we have had to attack from this. Our partner defended himself and fought back and so on. My friend took the tempo easily.

“All right, now do it vividly!” the instructor who was my old acquaintance, stood beside me. “Your friend Stellan is a good guy, he has the pace.”

“Let it be!” I thought and broke the circle; I attacked his chest with a straight blow. Loki should have been parried, fought back, and I’d have ended it somehow. I failed. That is, I ended it: I was lying on my back and struggled for breath.

“Nice,” the master clasped his two hands. “And now the knife loop.”

The final result was the same as before. I knew I will have some blue-green spots on next day.

“I hope you come to the next training session,” the instructor’s words pulled out me from my thoughts. “With your friend Stellan.”

I just stared and felt myself absolutely stupid.

Marko was very happy, he was continuously speaking.

“I watched you how do it. First was a Tan Sao, and then…”

Loki patted his shoulder.

“I’ll show you tomorrow, okay? Hey, what about you?”

“I have a headache,” and I locked myself into the bathroom.

Nightmares started roughly in this time. They visited me every night and I barely remember them, except wind and storm, fire and darkness and the endless space between stars.

Every single night.

And from all of them, I woke up struggling, gasping.

I already slept only a few hours nightly when the last day of April came. Loki didn’t remember anything yet, but I could see that he laughed less and less.

“You have sleep in my room for a month,” Marko raged, while he was playing with one of his shooter games. “What if I could get my bed back?”

Loki was lying on the kid’s mattress in this time; alternately watching the monitor and the old metal mug which was throwing into the air half-handed.

"I would be more pleased with a decent bed but everything can't be always perfect. Good night to you too,” he said it to Marko’s back, because the kid turned off the computer, run out and slammed the door to Loki.

He woke up when the door swung, to his mattress. He immediately became fully alert. The kid rushed into the room, struggling with breath, tears, drowning, and terror.

“Loki!” He bumped in a pillow near the bed, and fell his knees. “Come. Fast! Mom feels sick.”

Judit didn’t feel sick. She was obsessed by nightmares again. She was whimpering, writhing; suddenly touched her own neck.

He knelt beside her.

“Judit! You are dreaming. It’s just a dream. Wake up!” nothing happened. He grabbed her shoulders. “Come on. Wake up!”

Nothing.

”Do something! Anything! Please!” The boy started to sob. “She’s gonna die.”

“She will not die. Will not…” but he couldn’t move, just stared petrified at her.

“Do something!”

“What?”

“Anything! You are a god! Save her!” The boy grabbed the man’s hand and pressed his palm on his mother’s hot forehead.

And the Universe was frozen for a painful moment.

Then the boy fell back, the kneeling man stooped and the woman’s spine stretched as a string then her muscles relaxed.

Judit did not move, did not breathe.

“Mom!” Marko leaned on his mother.

He pulled the kid gently away and took the woman in his arms. Shock changed into a fiery anger, but he couldn’t scream, the air was not enough even to whispering, not to brawl.

At this point the woman took a gasping breath, began coughing, and he breathed with her.