Special Agent Loki Laufeyson

Chapter 28

Late that night, Loki lay in bed in Gibbs' spare room, staring up at the ceiling. Tree branches knocked gently against the window sill as wind blew through the open window. The sound was soothing to the Asgardian.

Sighing, Loki rolled out of bed and walked over to the window. Leaning on the sill, he stuck his head out the window and took deep breaths of the fresh night air. It cleared his mind from all the excitement and mystery of the past few days.

His mind returned to his scepter, now in the hands of Clare Leopard. How in the heck did she get that scepter? The Avengers, or S.H.I.E.L.D., was supposed to be in possession of it. They had taken it from him after stopping his invasion of New York. He assumed that it had either been kept in some S.H.I.E.L.D. location or in Stark – no, Avengers – Tower.

Also, who helped her? Loki didn't care what this Clare Leopard could do – there was no way she had stolen the scepter without outside help. Without dangerous help. But who?

Loki ran his teeth over his bottom lip, contemplating exactly who could have aided Leopard. If his assumption that Thanos was somehow behind all this was correct, it could easily have been one of his Children sent to Earth to initiate another attack. He'd need to start tracing Leopard's background to try to find out who it was.

Shaking his head, Loki was about to return to his bed when he heard a soft rustling noise in the branches outside his window. The god of mischief froze, his total focus on the noise. He had been hearing those branches and leaves move all night. This new noise had been irregular to the pattern he had become accustomed to.

As he removed his daggers from his belt, Loki slipped out of the window, relieved it was on the first story. His boots made no sound as he landed on the ground. Peering up into the branches, Loki could just make out the shape of a slight figure in the tree. It was a woman's figure.

Leopard! Loki bent his knees slightly and then leapt up into the tree. Grasping the first branches to come within reach, the Asgardian propelling himself up higher....

....right into the leg that came swinging around at him.

The force behind the blow knocked Loki into a thick branch. He gripped it as he flipped onto it, avoiding her next kick. Spinning around, the Asgardian launched himself forward, his daggers out for the kill.

The woman was turning just as Loki hit her, and he felt one knife sink into flesh while the other hit something unyielding with a dull clang. The force knocked them both out of the tree and they tumbled towards the ground fifteen feet away.

The woman landed first, Loki hitting beside her. She lashed out with her right fist, socking him in the jaw. Loki rolled away as she sprang to her feet, reaching for a case that had been concealed at the base of the tree.

As she moved away from him, he was able to get a good look at the intruder. Turns out his first guess was wrong; she wasn't Clare Leopard.

The woman had dark brown hair pulled back tightly, with dark eyes. He couldn't see any of her features; they were hidden behind a mask that concealed the lower half of her face. Her forehead was covered with a band of dull grey metal, that wrapped around to her temples. It must be part of the mask. She wore a black bodysuit, just like the one Clare Leopard had been wearing when DiNozzo and Loki had confronted her.

As Loki gripped his daggers and prepared for another lunge, the woman yanked something out of the case and pointed it at Loki as he jumped towards her. It was in midair that he realized exactly what had been in that case.

A sniper rifle.

The woman touched the trigger slowly, almost leisurely, and Loki was treated to the pleasure of watching the bullet fly at him, almost in slow motion.