Loki is going to escape.

The whole situation seemed off to him from the beginning, but Agent Coulson couldn't have said why. As soon as the engine explodes, though, he understands. They never captured Loki. This is a game, his game, and he manipulated them as easily as pieces on a board. E3. Hit. You sank my helicarrier.

It's chaos on the bridge with everyone trying to do everything at once, getting in each other's way. Reports coming in over their radios constantly inform them of the damage to the ship, of injuries, of the status of their heroes. Everyone is scrambling to get navigation back online or keep the other engines running at all costs. Stark and Captain Rogers went to repair the engine. Thor's busy with the Hulk. Agent Romanoff isn't answering her radio. Luckily, Fury still seems to be in control. There are orders coming in over his earpiece and, with relief, he hears one for him. It grounds him immediately; the barely controlled confusion around him fades into insignificance. He has a job to do.

Coulson isn't special. He isn't an assassin, or a super soldier. He just does his job. He can't face off against Loki, who is literally a god, practically immortal. He knows that. But he might, at the very least, be able to slow him down. And, he thinks as he makes his way to the armory, they have something that just might inconvenience a god. Hopefully. They haven't exactly tested it yet.

No one is there to question him about taking a Phase 2 weapon, which is just as well because explaining would take time that he doesn't have. The cage is already in the deepest part of the ship and with people rushing back and forth through the cramped halls every step is going to be a battle. Luckily, people seem all too happy to move out of his way when they see the massive gun he's carrying.

He's hurrying down a flight of stairs, two, sometimes three at a time, when the lights flicker. He senses a change in the ship's omnipresent rumbling; another engine down. The world starts to tilt.

He might have stayed on his feet had the weight of the gun not overbalanced him. But it's far too heavy and the floor just keeps tipping, so he stumbles on the stairs, struggles to stay upright and keep hold of the gun and keep moving. Losing his balance, he collides with the guardrail, which doesn't do much guarding when it's at a forty-five degree angle, and pitches over it. He meets the unyielding metal floor with an unpleasant thunk, knocking the breath out of him. The weapon crashes beside him with a dangerous sound and immediately begins to slide away across the uneven floor. Coulson groans and rolls onto his side, forcibly sucking air into his chest because there's no time for this. He half-crawls across the floor towards the gun, not quite trusting himself to stand.

He reaches the gun as the ship begins to level out, someone on the bridge doing their best to keep them at an even keel, but a disconcerting feeling in the pit of his stomach assures him they're still falling and falling fast. Only part of him worries about plummeting to the ground. The rest of him can only think that this is exactly what Loki wants, fear and panic and chaos.

He heaves the gun into his arms and runs as fast as he dares down the empty corridor, afraid of falling, of dropping the extremely dangerous experimental weapon again, but also afraid of arriving too late and finding the mad god missing. No one's down in this part of the ship now. The unarmed Asgardian locked in a cage strong enough to hold the Hulk shouldn't be a concern, isn't a priority especially when the ship's in freefall, but Coulson knows, he knows, this is Loki's play.

He's almost there now and he can hear Loki talking to someone. He's still there.

"...think us immortal. Shall we test that?"

Coulson rounds the corner into the detention level, absorbing and assessing the situation in an instant, relying on instinct and training so deeply ingrained they were practically the same thing. Thor in the cage, Loki hovering over the release button, a single guard between him and the rogue god. He gives the guard a single thump at the base of his skull with the weapon and he crumples to the ground. Loki turns at the sound of the body hitting the floor and looks genuinely surprised. Coulson can't help feeling proud at that.

"Move away, please," he says, surprisingly calm.

This is what he's good at. Being unshakable, pretending he deals with crazy gods and falling out of the sky on a daily basis. Pretending that playing babysitter to a group of unbalanced superheroes is the most normal thing in the world. Pretending he isn't scared, oh yes, he's very good at that.

Loki backs away from the control panel with his hands held in front of him, not quite in surrender, more like a non-threatening gesture. Coulson keeps talking because this is what he's good at and the longer he talks the longer someone bigger and stronger has to find them and put Loki back to bed. "You like this?" He lifts the gun a fraction, flaunting it, hoping it's big enough to make Loki hesitate. "We started working on the prototype after you sent the Destroyer. Even I don't know what it does."

He presses a button near the trigger and the barrel glows orange, a compressed firestorm, the weapon giving a satisfying whine as it powers up. "Want to find out?" And Coulson thinks this might actually work, thinks it right up until something is thrust through his back, out his chest, tearing him in half. It's so cold it burns, or so hot he goes numb. Someone is yelling very far away but he can't be sure who it is, only aware of a hole in his chest where no hole should be and the spear being ripped back out of him and collapsing against the wall.

Loki steps around him, his scepter bloodstained, and for a moment there are two tricksters before one gives a grin and flickers out of existence. Coulson can feel Loki's attention sliding away from him, a pest that had been dealt with, and he knows he should do something to get it back, to keep him talking, but there's no air in his lungs and he can only watch as the trickster sends his brother plummeting to his death. Thirty thousand feet straight down in a steel trap, though they're not that high anymore, he knows, still falling, falling fast.

The god steps away from the controls and starts to walk away, Coulson all but forgotten, and he has to say something because Loki's going to escape. He struggles against the pain in his chest, just breathing hurts it would be easier to stop he could just stop. But Loki's turning to leave and he can't let that happen, so he pretends he's not scared because that's what he's good at.

"You're going to lose."

And Loki stops, turns to look at him, the mortal bleeding on the ground, and hesitates. "Am I?"

"It's in your nature." Coulson tries to ignore the blood dripping from the corner of his mouth when he speaks.

And Loki's stalking toward him now, not away, not escaping. "Your heroes are scattered. Your floating fortress falls from the sky. Where is my disadvantage?"

Coulson had only said it to keep Loki there, hoping he would gloat, but as he asks the question Coulson can see the answer in god's, in the man's, eyes. For a moment, he sees a child alone in the dark, lighting fires for warmth, for light, for company, anything to drive away the shadows. A lost creature, not so different from those humanity had called to defend them.

"You lack conviction," he says, not just words this time, but truth.

There's something raw in the other man's eyes now and he starts to speak, but Coulson doesn't hear. He realizes he still has the gun, it's across his legs, the barrel pointed at Loki's chest. He doesn't think because there's no more time, he just pulls the trigger, cutting the trickster off mid-sentence as the beam of energy forces him through a wall.

"So that's what it does," he says, satisfied.

Coulson starts to drift then. It isn't happening as fast as he'd like, the dying. He sits propped against the wall, dragging air into his chest because he doesn't know how to stop, and Loki lies smoking in the rubble left by the weapon's blast, and Thor's falling to earth, falling even faster than the rest of them, except maybe Coulson himself because he feels like he's falling awfully fast now.

He hears something, a shuffling sound, a wheeze. Loki's getting up, brushing the dust off his leather armor like nothing had happened. The god glances in his direction and their eyes meet. He doesn't smirk or grin or anything Coulson expects; he just nods, once, before taking off down an access corrider. Coulson doesn't try to fathom it. He just lets his head fall back against the wall and closes his eyes because the room's too bright and too dark at the same time, and he doesn't think about how he failed, pretends he's not scared.

He wonders about what happens next, because doesn't everyone when the time comes? He hasn't believed in much of anything, not since he was a kid, not for lack of trying. Maybe Valhalla exists. If Asgard does, and all the Norse gods of legend to boot, why not? It seems about as likely as any of the other theories. But only heroes go to Valhalla, he recalls. He wonders if being stabbed in the back counts as a warrior's death.

At some point he becomes aware of a change, a subtle tug downward as gravity increases. They aren't falling anymore. Most of them. Coulson smiles. "Stark," he breathes to no one. "You bastard. You did it."

He hears footsteps on the stairs, and suddenly Fury's there in front of him, lifting the gun off his lap. He had forgotten it was there. "Sorry, boss," he chokes out. "The guy rabbited." He failed.

Fury gives a little shake of his head, his brow furrowed in concern. "Just stay awake," he says, his hand on Coulson's cheek, turning his head so he's looking into the director's one good eye. "Eyes on me."

"No, I'm clocking out here." The hole in his chest doesn't hurt anymore, which is a very bad sign. But he isn't scared. He doesn't have to pretend.

"Not an option." Fury says it like an order, but Coulson can see they both know it's one he won't follow. There's a first time for everything, he supposes.

"It's okay, boss." And it is, it really is. But he keeps talking because the director needs him too, even though it feels like he's breathing underwater, he fights for the words. "This was never gonna work...if they didn't have something...to-" Avenge, he tries to say, but his mouth won't cooperate. He wants to say it, though. Because maybe he failed, but they might be able to use this, to turn it around. Maybe he can be the push they need, so they can stop Loki, because he couldn't. Avenge. But there's no air in his lungs now and the room goes dark and blurry, Fury's face slipping out of focus, and Coulson hates to leave him like this, hates to leave at all. But it doesn't hurt anymore, and he's falling, and the darkness rushes up to claim him.

When he greets it, Phil Coulson isn't scared.

Tony was right; she was a cellist, and they weren't married. She had wanted to, had talked about it sometimes, but Phil always turned the conversation aside. He knew he wouldn't be able to settle down, wouldn't feel right starting a family and trying to live a normal life, not with the work he did, not when every day there was a chance he wouldn't come home.

One day she came to him and demanded that he choose. He had known this day was coming, expected it much sooner, but she was surprisingly tolerant and that was one of the reasons he loved her. And so he let her go. She moved to Portland to live with her sister. She never told him why, all of a sudden, she had confronted him.

After Fury sent out condolences, she came back, finding solace in the places they had shared. Somehow, she found herself socializing with Earth's mightiest heroes on a regular basis. They were good people; she could see why Phil had loved them. Slowly but surely, when it became impossible to hide, they all found out why she had run away, and why she had wanted Phil to come with her.

They were infatuated with him the instant he was born. They taught him biology, and archery, and quantum physics, and knife-throwing. Uncle Steve signed all his trading cards. He was the only kid in school who had a team of superheroes to back him up if anyone gave him a hard time, which they all promised to do, loudly and often, if he just gave the word. And most of all, they told him stories.

His favorites were the ones about his dad. They all had memories to share, happy ones, funny ones, sad ones. Uncle Tony told the best one, though, when he'd had a little too much to drink at Christmas, the one about how his father helped them save the world.

They always told him his father had been the best of them, superpowers or not. With every new story, they helped make sure he believed in an old-fashioned notion. He lived as his father had died; believing in heroes.