The wormhole did speed up matters, but it hardly deposited Loki and Brunnhilde in the middle of Chitauri territory. It took fifteen dull, yet frustrating days of travel before they reached their destination. Brunnhilde wasn't timid about critiquing Loki's choice of supplies for their journey or his steering technique whenever he took the pilot's chair. Loki, for his part, knew only so many ways of telling someone to shut up.

Yet, as Brunnhilde banked hard and the hundreds of asteroids that made up this section of the belt came into view, Loki was tempted to tell her to turn the ship around and head for some civilised part of the universe.

'Where are we supposed to be landing?' Brunnhilde asked sourly. 'If you knew what you were doing, Odinson, you'd have procured at least a basic map for us.'

Loki ran his tongue over his lower lip. 'From whom exactly? The smugglers? Their word isn't worth the dirt on my boots. That big one there seven points to the right of us is the one to steer towards. If you are going to live in an asteroid belt, you'd at least pick the biggest hunk of stone you can possibly cling to.'

'Or you are worried about being found and are intelligent enough to hide among the smaller asteroids.'

Brunnhilde wasn't wrong. The bulk of Thanos' followers, both willing and unwilling, were spread across four main asteroids, the largest of which rivalled Asgard in size. However, Thanos and his inner circle often retreated to the seclusion of the smaller asteroids. Loki wasn't about to explain this to Brunnhilde, of course. This was the sort of information he was supposed to be gathering during this trip.

'If someone wants to hide, they are unlikely to welcome the unannounced arrival of a pair of strangers. Take the ship where I told you to,' Loki said.

Brunnhilde rolled her eyes as she turned the ship towards the asteroid Loki had pointed out. They had already slowed significantly since their reached the edge of the asteroid belt, now they had to slow to a crawl. Hundreds of asteroids little bigger than their ship speckled the space around them and there was local ship traffic as well. Loki gestured to Brunnhilde to follow the trail of a decrepit troop carrier. Over the years, Thanos' men had learned to navigate this maze; Loki and Brunnhilde were safe from collision as long as they could leverage off local expertise.

'This is a decent location for a base,' Brunnhilde remarked. 'Out of the way, true. But it'll be a bitch for your enemy to bring their army in.'

'Not just an army.'

They were now close enough to Theta-Three, as the inhabitants of the Sanctuary referred to it, to have a perfect view of the vast open mines that dominated this sector of the asteroid. Thanos' forces procured rare metals and sophisticated technology from Sakaarian smugglers and at times even through legitimate trade. However, the sheer bulk of raw materials needed to equip the military was staggering and the costs no less so. As Brunnhilde had already noted, it was near impossible to pilot any sizable vessel through the belt, so Thanos had turned to a native solution. Even at this stage in the game, his men had already hollowed out several asteroids.

Their ship glided above the broad crest that ran like an ill-healed scar across the asteroid's length and they were suddenly above the outer reaches of Sanctuary City. Loki remembered this view well - lines of quickly thrown-up barrack buildings, rising smoke from the smelters and messy outlines of half-completed warships.

Less a city than a military encampment.

Beside him, Brunnhilde mumbled something under her breath, but it was too soft for him to hear. He gestured towards the horizon where there was some glimmer of grace to be found in the well-built administrative centre of Thanos' madness.

Loki realised he was holding his breath as Brunnhilde guided her ship to a docking bay in the city's main port. He forced a sharp exhale. 'Obviously, don't tell anyone why I'm here. If someone asks you who I am, tell them you know nothing about me apart from my first name and you don't care enough about the job to learn more.'

'What's your cover story? You had to have told me something to get me out here,' Brunnhilde replied.

'It's what you first heard in the bar - a man whose years of idleness have left him jaded about the world and who now seeks something he can't put into words. Rumours of Thanos sparked his curiosity. He is just sensible enough to hire a bodyguard, but lacks the forethought to check her credentials or to keep her around when it would be most prudent.'

One by one Brunnhilde flicked down the thruster switches. 'He sounds less of an arse than you are. So I'm not to be around? Good. I got tired of your face two weeks ago.'

'You're my scout. I want to know the layout of the place, who goes and who comes, what the local politics are and so on. There won't be time for either of us to be lounging about.'

'Joy of joys.'

Brunnhilde made the last few expert flicks of the switches and the ship shuddered through its transition from flight mode to standby. With a soft click, her seat belt snapped open. She swivelled the pilot's chair, ramming the armrest into Loki's side.

With a wince, he grabbed her arm. 'Hold on.'

'What are you doing?'

'I'm covering your tattoo. Hold still, please.'

She didn't listen to him. The more she tried to pull away, the firmer he held on. No spell was made easier when it had to be performed on a moving target. By the time he was satisfied no trace of the tattoo remained visible, he had left crescent-shaped indentations in Brunnhilde's arm.

'Find something physical to cover it as well, in case the magic fails,' Loki said.

'Fine.'

He sighed. 'Now, for me.'

He released the concealment over him.

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Brunnhilde cocked her head, evaluating him anew. 'You're way short for a Jotunn.'

'You're absolutely right. I try not to think about it, but late at night I lie awake and the truth taunts me. Odin must've lied. My real mother was actually an Alfheim pixie,' Loki said dryly.

'Gross,' Brunnhilde replied. 'Do you know how they reproduce?'

'I heard it gets loud.' Loki shrugged. 'Get used to this charming look. The fewer links there are between me and Asgard, the better. Now, come on, let's explore.'

----------------------------------------

Brunnhilde raised an eyebrow. 'So that's him?'

Loki followed the line of her gaze to the garish mural above the triple doors to the city's main Mess Hall. Thanos stood in the middle of a host of his followers, his arms stretching out wide and smiling vapidly. Such an expression had never crossed his face, Loki was certain of that.

'Must be,' he replied. It was a trial to keep his voice light. 'You know, I'm not hungry. I'm going to continue looking around. You go on though. Once you're done, ask around about decent accommodation. If I keep sleeping on that bed back on the ship much longer, the kink in my neck is going to become permanent.'

'I should stay by -'

'It looks perfectly safe. I'll see you back on the ship in say, four hours?'

Brunnhilde shrugged. 'Whatever you say.'

Loki permitted himself a shudder as he turned away and headed back down the street. He had anticipated this homecoming (for lack of a better term) to Theta-Three would be difficult, but even if one knew something was coming, it wasn't necessarily possible to avert it. So, after the first few hours in Sanctuary City fear at the thought of being discovered still caught his breath and the guilt he had carried with him from the future twisted his stomach anew. Worst of all, however, was the way this place made his skin crawl.

Slaves toiled in the mines just over the mountain range that dominated the horizon, slaves suffocated in the factories on the city's edge and closer yet, slaves were tormented into submission in the vast complexes mere blocks away from where Loki now stood. Yet the streets in the city's centre were paved, clean and lined with flowerbeds. Children played in designated playgrounds and street musicians had to have their licences on display while they performed.

This wasn't Thanos' doing - he had no patience for these sorts of minute details, but this had a definite stench of his philosophy. Just as Thanos cloaked the waves of violence he unleashed in proclamations of coming peace and prosperity, someone tried to cloak the brutality of life in the Sanctuary with this veneer of civil order.

Despite the time Loki had spent in the asteroid belt previously, he wasn't particularly familiar with the streets of this sector. There had been few opportunities for excursions among the public back then. He ended up taking a meandering route to the compound he was after.

The building was inconspicuous, almost a twin to the one next to it, but Loki had been inside before. Coming to the Sanctuary was risky enough, entering this place was nothing less than walking out in the middle of a battlefield and taunting the enemy into attacking you.

On the other hand, Loki had more or less done precisely that during his last encounter with Thanos. He survived. Not many others had. Loki sucked in a breath; his mind was all too quick to make a count of that debacle - the roaring fire drowning out the screams of the doomed and the stench of his own blackening flesh.

You've come this far. Can't back out now.

He pulled open the door and strode inside.

Corridors spun off the central, hexagonal atrium. About a dozen people, none of them belonging to species Loki could name, stood at the mouth of one corridor, diligently listening to the barking orders of their commander. Loki ventured in the opposite direction, to the corridors that overlooked the fizzing swimming pools and past the low gravity chambers. He didn't need to look at the signage helpfully placed throughout the complex. Once upon a time, after Thanos had decreed Loki had worth, he had spent weeks here, trying to coax his body back to health.

Loki moved slowly in an effort to understand as best he could who was using the facility today. The common soldier - a Chitauri wired into the hive mind or a half-rabid Outrider - wasn't worth the expense of treatment and rehabilitation, but their commanding officers were a more precious commodity. Loki needed to befriend someone from this class of Thanos' followers if he were to find a path to Thanos himself.

The pickings were slim, however. Most of the pools and the training rooms stood empty. Disappointed, he was about to turn back toward the atrium, when he came to a little-used side corridor. The edge of Loki's lip curled up. There were all of two rooms down the short passageway - a changing room and a training hall. Neither of them had been occupied when Loki had first found them nor had he been interrupted in the weeks he had holed himself up in there.

But the training hall was occupied today. The whirring of machinery was audible out in the corridor. He cautiously pulled the door open and slipped inside. The person who sequestered themselves in there probably didn't want company. Loki certainly hadn't.

Nebula?

The young woman pitted against the practice dummy in the centre of the room did have the right physique. However, Loki had never actually met her and knew her only from the few photographs taken during her brief stay on Midgard. He hadn't spent a great deal of time studying these either. And what details he remembered, he struggled to match to the woman before him now - she moved too quickly for him to catch a good look of her face.

A knife spun from her hand and whistled past Loki's ear. The weapon found its mark in the padded door behind Loki.

'I beg your pardon,' he said. 'I didn't mean to intrude.'

The woman took steps back from the practice dummy. 'But you did.'

She turned to face him as she spoke and Loki's heart skipped a beat. It was Nebula. He had to bite the inside of his lip to stop himself from grinning. Finally, the Norns had smiled at him. Everything he tried to achieve of late was like trying to chip granite with bare fingers. This was a welcome break.

'Is there something you want from me?' Nebula asked.

'Ah, no, not as such.' Loki allowed some of his fluster about meeting her to come through in his words. 'I've heard this was a good place to sharpen one's skills. I'm a bit rusty, so I didn't want to embarrass myself in front of a crowd, so I was looking for somewhere quieter. And then I lost track of where the entrance to the complex actually was.'

Nebula clicked her fingers and the dummy fell silent. 'It's quite an achievement to get lost with the signs all around the place.'

'I suppose my father was right to say that being lost is my natural state of being.'

'Your father must be a wise man.'

'I'd hardly know.' Loki pulled Nebula's knife out of the door and walked down to the matted area where she stood. He flipped the weapon so the handle faced Nebula, then offered it back to her. 'He never had much time for me.'

Nebula snatched the knife back from Loki and brought the blade up to examine the tip. The kink in it was unmissable.

'Must have struck the metal frame within the door,' Loki said. 'What's the knife made out of? It's not very durable by the looks of it; you can get better quality.'

'It's a practice weapon, it doesn't have to keep its edge,' Nebula replied.

Loki nodded. 'Fair enough then.' He glanced to the practice dummy. 'You looked like you know what you are doing and knives are my favourite weapons. How about we go through a few rounds together? A dummy can only do so much.'

Nebula frowned, her mouth hanging slightly open. With a steady influx of new faces in the Sanctuary's training halls, a culture had evolved of welcoming the newcomers, no matter their background or skill level. It had been one of the few things Loki had appreciated about the place. On Asgard, he had been made unwelcome on the training grounds far too often. Clearly, Nebula didn't want a training partner, otherwise, she would have chosen one of the bigger, more popular halls, but she had grown up in Thanos' realm and had been well-indoctrinated in its customs. She didn't want to refuse him either.

'There's a particular thing I am working on,' Nebula said finally. 'An enduring inadequacy after an injury.'

'Then let's start with that.' Loki smiled, drawing his knives.

Nebula forced a smile. 'Ok. I guess.'

They pushed the practice dummy off to the side and positioned themselves in the centre of the matted area, knives at the ready.