I walk into the garden, an endless field of flowers laid out before me. A couple of people were in the distance, but I am practically alone. I bent down and let myself breathe the sweet air of the lilies, I sat on the bench Loki had sat me down almost a year ago.

That was the day he admitted he cared for me. Everthing about that moment was burned into my skull, forever carved into my memory. The smell of the lilies right in front of us, the taste of his lips, the gentleness in his eyes. I imagine his skin on mine again, but that reality had been ripped from me forever, this was my life now, watching the person I cared the most slowly slip away from me.

I'm smart enough to realize something bad happened to him wherever he landed from the black hole, but he didn't want me to find out. As I ponder about him, I notice a girl in the garden with me, dark flowing hair and blue eyes. I look upward to study her closer. Her cheeks are hallow and she has heavy bags under her eyes, she was covered in burns and she had tattered and worn clothes that looked almost 1500 years old, which they might've been.

I stand up, walking to the women, before she notices me she turns away to pick something up. "Pardon me, I don't believe we've me-" She turns around to face me, and she looked like a completely different person. Her beautiful ebony hair no longer covered in suit and clumped, her skin perfectly healthy and her she's wearing a beautiful golden gown. "Oh how long it's been." She says, clasping a hand of my own in hers. I started a bit at her show of familiarity. Her eyes shone with a joy that I couldn't recognize, and a sorrow all the same. "I'm sorry, do I know you?" I ask, her expression sinks, her now plump and healthy lips tugging into a frown. "Oh, you do not remember me? What a shame," she said, clicking her tongue disapprovingly. I furrow my brows but don't take my hand away from fear and making her angry or upset. "I'm not so surprised though, you were only a baby when I last saw you," the woman sighed.

Her skin was so tan and bright it was almost an amber color, resembling my skin tone myself. Now that I think about it, she does resemble me almost altogether, though her features were more defining and harsh than my soft ones, she did not have the natural bone structure of any Asgardian I know, and her black hair would've been strange and stood out had it been any other person, but it strangely only made her more beautiful. "Don't you recognize the face of your own mother?" She says, her grip starting to smother my fingertips. I struggle to wry from her grip but to no avail, her hand crushed mine harshly and I yelped out in pain, not sure I wanted to fight her. "You are not my mother, my mother is dead." I argue weakly, though that only makes her menacing smile grow.

A distorted chuckle escapes her lips, her face paced again and her smile doesn't leave as burn marks appear on her skin, it sizzles and leaves her face in a messier manner than before, I try and scream but her other hand clasps around my throat. "Hush, hush." She cooed, not menacingly, but softly as  if she was putting a baby to bed. The air is immediately pushed from my lungs, forbidding any more entry of it. "I'm sorry my dear. You cannot join me here any other way, though I take no pleasure in taking you this way." She said simply, almost sadly, her hand tightened around my throat and a squeezed with a large amount of strength, I tried to duck under her arms like I was taught, but she suddenly lifts me off the ground, my legs kicking at nothing, and my arms can't reach her nor can they pry her hands from my throat. Her face bore a sad expression, her other hand stroking my cheek comfortingly. Something otherworldly was draining my strength, making me forget all the training I've had and making me nothing more than a mouse in the claws of a panther.

Helpless and weak, with barely seconds left in this world.

-Loki's POV-

A sharp breath is all it took to wake Loki, he sits up, looking around the dimly lighted place. He heard raspy noises coming from Lyra's part of the cell, and could faintly make out her squirming body. As if on cue, the lights go one throughout the prison system, and Loki could see what was happening to the brunette.

Her legs were squirming and her arms were clawing at nothing on her throat. Panic racked through Loki's chest. "Lyra!" He calls out, standing up abruptly and rushing to the force field. She squirmed, her eyes still closed and bruises gathering in the shape of fingers around her throat. Her arms drop to her sides and her legs go limp. She wasn't breathing, he searched frantically for any signs of life but found none. Panic rose inside his chest, and even though the force field prevented much use of his magic, he threw every fiber of magic he could use into the weak field between them, roaring in anguish when he saw the bruises growing on her neck. "Guards! Guards come quickly!" He yelled, the field shattered and he ran toward her, landing on his knees next to her, touching her face and trying to shake her awake. Seconds later, palace guards rush to his aid. "It's Lyra! She isn't breathing!" He says, they deactivate the force field around them, and separating them and Loki stares at it. He could try and escape, but he couldn't. He wouldn't. He turns and rushes to her side, pushing a guard out of the way and checking her. her neck was bruising quickly and she wasn't breathing. All thoughts of what he was trying to protect her from exit his brain and the terrifying notion posioned his brain.
What if this was Thanos' doing?
Her heartbeat was very shallow, he notes as he checks her pulse. "What do we do?" One guard asks. "Wake her up for hel's sake!" Loki demands. They try, but to no avail. He brushes his fingertips over her forehead. "Lyra, Lyra wake up." He says, speaking loudly. One guard picks her up, he tries to push his away into her mind to force her awake but some other force unlike anything he's ever witnessed shoved him away, he stumbled back and his hand flew over his head as agony ripples through him. "Alert Eir! Tell her be prepared to save a life!" He yells for the guards ahead, then leaves with Lyra in his arms, head hanging loose and eyes still closed, having never opened in the first place

Once they all left, the fields reactivate, leaving him dumbfounded in the cell. The only one that wasn't activated was the one that separated both of their cells, which didn't matter. She wasn't in there with him. He sat on her bed, letting his head fall into his hands. What could that have been? It could not have been some dream of hers, she was actually dying. He looks over on her bed so see the machine she informed him was a Midgardian IPod. He notices a note on top of it.
Lyra,

I know you'll be awfully busy being a goddess and all, but I thought you could use a reminder of us when you're gone. Also, since you're an Avenger, you'll need your own super hero name! (I know, sounds super weird) but anyway, Thor told about your abilities.
So.... Welcome to the team, Mercy!
I know you'll probably fighting intergalactic wars and all, so try not to forget us too soon, okay?
Later Gator,
Steve

(P.S. Make sure to visit, or I'll bring all of SHIELD to your front door)

Loki can't help but feel a pang of jealousy, Steve had been the Captain of America, the one who oh so obviously held feelings for Lyra. But he couldn't think about that now, all he could think about was Lyra' s face turning blue as the circulation was cut from her body. He stood up and desperately tried to find something to distract himself or he would drive himself insane. Out of curiousity, he picks up the IPod.

He sees a button that says 'Play' and presses it. He's startled when music starts playing put of it, but he listens to it nonetheless. The other night dear, when I was sleeping. I dreamt I held you in my arms. But when I woke, dear, I was mistaken, so I bowed my head and I cried. You are my sunshine, my only sunshine. You make me happy, when skies are gray. You'll never know dear, how much I love you. Please don't take my sunshine away.

He quickly turned it off, that was not helping. If anything, it made it worse. His head fell into his hands, what was the last thing he'd said to her before that happened? He hadn't talked to her much the day before, just continued to ignore her. Thinking it was the best thing for her, that if he was out of her life she couldn't be harmed.

Was this The Other's doing? Was it Thanos'?
It killed him that everything he's been doing, forcing her away to keep her alive might've been in vain, that she thought he hated her, he ran his fingers through his hair and fought the urge to scream out.

He couldn't loose Lyra, he couldn't be able to live with himself.

He wouldn't.