Chapter 22
The med bay still hummed faintly with containment magic, golden glyphs shimmering in the air like frozen fireflies. Inside the circle of light, Loki lay unmoving—skin still blue, veins still glowing with icy seidr—but his chest now rose and fell in a fragile rhythm.
Stephen stood at the bedside, fingers weaving subtle adjustments into the spell. Every few minutes, the frost beneath Loki's skin surged, straining against the wards, and Strange calmly rethreaded them. His face was pale, sweat beading at his temple.
Behind him, Tony slumped against the wall, refusing to move. His eyes were red-rimmed, jaw tight, fingers still wrapped around Loki's hand through the thin opening Stephen had left in the barrier.
"You need rest," Stephen said quietly.
"Not happening," Tony rasped.
"Tony." Strange turned, cloak rippling. "The spell is anchored. He's stable—for now." His voice softened. "Don't make me add you to the cot beside him."
Tony bristled, then sagged. The fight drained out as quickly as it had sparked. He scrubbed a hand over his face.
"I don't trust him to keep breathing if I look away."
Strange crouched to meet his gaze, voice steady and low.
"You trusted me once. Trust me again. Even Iron Men need hours, not minutes."
Tony stared at him, caught by that calm certainty. Finally, his grip loosened. With effort, he stood, brushing Loki's cold fingers one last time.
"Fine. But if he flatlines, you portal me back here before you blink."
Strange nodded. "I'll hold you to that."
He watched Tony stumble out, Friday's soft voice guiding him down the hall. When the door shut, the med bay felt too silent. Strange turned back to the containment field, jaw tightening. Time bought—nothing more.
He needed answers.
Kamar-Taj
Hours later, a portal flared open into the candlelit library of Kamar-Taj. The air was thick with incense and parchment dust. Strange's fingers trailed across worn spines until he reached the section he dreaded: Asgardian relics, inter-realm conflicts, the half-truths Odin's scribes had left behind.
He read. And read. The story unfolded in ash and blood: Jotunheim burned, relics stolen, lives erased. A weapon, locked away. A lifeline severed from its people.
Strange closed the tome slowly, his reflection warping in the gilt letters.
"Odin didn't protect him," he murmured. "He shackled him."
The flame beside him flickered in a sudden, unseen wind. Strange pressed his palms together, resolve hardening behind tired eyes.
I know what can save him. But how do I tell Stark?
Stark Tower Med Bay
The containment wards hummed like a second heartbeat. Golden sigils pulsed faintly around Loki's bed, pressing the frost into uneasy stillness. Tony sat hunched in the corner, elbows on his knees, eyes hollow. He hadn't moved in hours, except to tighten his grip whenever Loki's fingers twitched.
A portal rippled open behind him.
Tony's head snapped up. "Stephen?"
Strange stepped through, cloak trailing. His expression was carved from stone—no triumph, no relief—just the weight of grim knowledge.
Tony was on his feet in a heartbeat. "Tell me you've got something. Some ancient miracle, some shiny cure-all tucked away in that library of yours."
Strange hesitated. His silence was an answer before the words even came.
"I found records," he said finally. "Odin stole an artifact from Jotunheim centuries ago—the Casket of Ancient Winters. A reservoir of pure Jotunn seidr. It could stabilize this kind of awakening." He paused. "But every source agrees—it was lost when Asgard fell."
Tony blinked, disbelieving. Then he laughed once, dry and hollow.
"Lost. Just like that. Billions of stars in the sky, and the one thing that could save him is sitting in some cosmic junkyard."
"Tony—"
"No." He turned away, both hands in his hair. His voice was sharp but trembling. "Don't give me history lessons. Don't stand there like you're reading the weather report. You're telling me Loki's dying, and the one thing that could save him went up in smoke with the rest of Asgard's golden furniture."
Strange stepped closer, voice gentle. "I'm sorry. I searched every archive. If it still exists, it's beyond my reach."
Tony stilled. His arms lowered. The fight drained from his shoulders. He looked back at Loki—pale, unmoving, barely clinging to life.
Something in him broke. No sarcasm. No armor. Just raw grief.
Strange's chest tightened. He had seen Tony furious, reckless, brilliant—but never like this. Never stripped bare.
"I promised Vision," Tony whispered, almost to himself. "I told him I'd fix it."
And for the first time since stepping through the portal, Strange couldn't meet his eyes. He'd rather face Dormammu again than that look—the quiet, devastated kind that said Tony Stark would rather tear the universe apart than fail another person he swore to save.
"I'm sorry," Strange said again, his voice rough and human. And this time, he meant every word.
Part 2
Tony's face fell, color draining like someone had ripped the arc reactor from his chest. He staggered back a step, pressing a hand over his mouth. His other hand clung harder to Loki's.
"Don't," he whispered. "Don't tell me the Stones dragged him here just for me to watch him die."
The words hit Strange like blades. He wanted to steady Tony, to reach out—but stopped himself. He could not offer a promise he didn't yet have the power to keep.
"I'll keep him alive as long as I can," he said quietly. "I won't stop."
Tony turned away, shoulders trembling once, hard, before forcing himself back under control. He didn't answer. Instead, he pressed his forehead against Loki's icy hand, his breath fogging against skin that felt almost lifeless.
3:45 A.M. – Med Bay Containment
Strange's spell work thrummed steadily, gold and frost intertwining like the heartbeat of two dying stars. Then something shifted.
The frost-veins beneath Loki's skin pulsed brighter—erratic, deliberate.
Strange stilled, every sense sharpening.
This wasn't random collapse.
This was instinct.
Loki's unconscious magic was reaching—groping for something familiar, something bound to his survival. Strange closed his eyes and extended his senses along the threads of frost and seidr. The resonance wasn't blind. It was focused.
And then he felt it.
A pull. A presence.
Not gone. Not destroyed. Hidden.
The Casket.
Still bound to Loki. Still waiting tethered somewhere deep within the folds of his pocket dimension.
Strange's pulse quickened, relief colliding with dread. He knew what this meant—to act, to intervene, to risk ripping open a relic of pure Jotunn power. But the image of walking back to Tony with empty hands… of watching that man's eyes hollow completely
No. Not again.
Strange set his jaw. His hands rose, sigils flaring bright and sharp. He followed the frost-thread through the veil, calling the ancient power home.
Golden light spiraled tighter, grinding against the pull of the void. The pressure in the room deepened—the air itself growing heavy and cold—until a new weight pressed into existence.
A shimmer.
A distortion.
Then, with a deep, echoing thud against the med bay floor—
A crystalline chest appeared. Blue and pulsing with a heartbeat of its own. Frost spilled across the tiles like living mist.
The Casket of Ancient Winters.
Tony's head snapped up, wild-eyed. The air crystallized in his lungs as he stared at the artifact that shouldn't exist.
"Stephen?" he rasped.
Strange stood motionless, both hands extended, cloak flaring in the cold. Sweat traced down his temple as the relic's power bled into the room.
"It was never lost," he said hoarsely, voice trembling between exhaustion and triumph. "It was with him all along."