Of Greater Sires

More days passed. Raeyn’s nerves about being contacted by her friends calmed considerably since she hadn’t seen or heard from any of them. She grew more adventurous, even picking up her habit of frequenting the market places once more. In the end, this was quite a mistake.

It had been a couple weeks since the underground meeting, and Raeyn dared to turn into Ramona once more when she left Stark Tower. People at the market places seemed to recognize her face or clothes, and welcomed her more.

It was one of these evenings that Raeyn was weighed down with bags of groceries and other crafts she had bought from the artisans (plus a cooler with all Loki’s favorite ice cream flavors) that Lew suddenly appeared. And suddenly meaning, as Raeyn was glancing through some different home-made breads, Lew emerged from the depths and shadows of a nearby alley way and nearly scared Raeyn to death.

Raeyn gave a start, nearly dropping all her bags from the shock of it all. "L-L..." Raeyn trailed off, nearly positive that she didn't go by 'Lew' in the real world, and wouldn't appreciate Raeyn yelling her rebel name out in the streets. "What on earth?" she finally asked, resting a hand on her chest, making sure her heart rate went back to normal.

"Sorry for scaring you," Lew apologized. She still pushed her black rimmed glasses up, and she still carried her coffee mug everywhere, but there was an unnatural seriousness to her that made her seem less like Lew and more like... Agent, maybe.

Raeyn gave her a concerned look. "Is everything okay?" she asked, adjusting her bags on her hip to keep them from falling.

Lew gave a half shrug. "I can't say much out here, but I don't think you want to concern yourself with it anyway."

Raeyn gave her an apologetic expression. "Look, I'm sorry for dropping off..."

Lew raised her hand to keep Raeyn quiet. "No, it's fine. It's much better that you made the decision to quit before you got into anything serious."

The goddess shrugged a little. "So why are you here?"

The rebel nodded towards the alley way. Without further questioning, Raeyn followed her a few feet until they were out of earshot of anyone passing by, but they didn't go far. Raeyn assumed that whatever followed would be cryptic, so no one around would really be able to understand them.

"I know that you're not going to take any part in it, but I -- we, really -- wanted to tell you about it so that you didn't get caught up in it. There's going to be a demonstration, kind of, on 72nd street tomorrow night. That's --"

"Where one of the Chitauri headquarters is," Raeyn finished, looking at Lew grimly.

She nodded. "They have quite a few of our people. It's really not so much of a rescue mission as it is getting the word out about the rebellion. We're coming out, sort of. We just wanted to warn you so you knew to avoid it."

Raeyn tried to give her a small smile. "Thank you," she whispered before turning on her heel and speeding off down the road. For a small moment, she worried that Lew thought odd of her, but then she reminded herself that she had made several of these awkward get aways.



She sighed, closing her eyes and leaning against Stark Tower as soon as she got back. They had contacted her again, and not only that, but had given her the time and place of their first move. She didn't want to turn them in, but at this point they were honestly not giving her a choice.

The elevator dinged open, and Loki was, ironically, just walking by. He was speaking to several Chitauri, making Raeyn a little nervous when he turned to smile at her.

"Here, let me help you with those," he said kindly, and then turned to wave the soldiers off. He took a few of the brown paper bags as well as the cooler in his hands and carried them over to the kitchen. Silently, they began putting their groceries away. Raeyn wondered if he could hear her heart beating out of her chest, or see her twitchy hands. All this trust between them, was she about to ruin it all? Or would be just be happy that she told the truth? She sighed, crumpling the last paper bag with an air of finality that caused Loki to turn and look at her questioningly.

"I have something I need to tell you," she forced herself to say, not looking up into his deep raven eyes.

He nodded slowly, and as she watched his feet, he led her over to the couches to sit. He obviously sensed the seriousness to Raeyn's voice.

"What is it?" he asked, sitting down across from her. She sighed. She had thought of all the thousands of ways to say this, but that all vanished from her mind as the words began to tumble from her lips.

"A few weeks ago... a month or so ago, really... I met some people down at the market. They gave me fake names, and I gave them a fake name as well. They invited me over to their home. I -- I didn't realize who they were until I had already grown to care for them."

She swallowed, her eyes threatening to get pink and puffy. "I'm really, truly, sorry for not telling you sooner, Loki. Honestly, our friendship is something I value more than the nine realms. Please just... remember that."

Still, he said nothing. She sighed once more. "When we would fight, I would visit them. That's where I was those nights. Once, they even invited me to one of their meetings. That was just last week... They're rebels, Loki, but honestly, I didn't think they had any power. But now, they're talking about secret weapons and demonstrations and attacking the Chitauri headquarters and freeing some other rebels and I didn't know what to do Loki, and I'm really really sorry --"

"When? Where? " he barked, cutting her off. She looked up, tears lining her eyes as he gazed down at his folded hands. His voice was completely void of emotion, but his face told another story. He was trying to repress his anger, and everything about him told Raeyn to run now and run fast. This... this was a dangerous Loki.

"Tomorrow night," she whimpered. "Seventy Second street."

Loki nodded, and stood. His posture was rigid, his fists balled, and his jaw clenched. He strode past Raeyn, who sat and watched him in awe as he walked down the hall, turned, and delicately closed the door to his throne room behind him. But even then, she heard his growl and his fist go through a wall.

She, like all those before her, had betrayed him.