HAPPY 100TH CHAPTER IN THE BLUE MOON SERIES, EVERYONE. So excited, thank you so. much.

DEDICATED TO HIGHJACKLUV BECAUSE IT'S HER 15TH BIRTHDAY!!!

OKAY, FAMILY, READY, ONE, TWO THREE:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO HIGHJACKLUV

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

(queue consecutive applause)

HAVE A GREAT DAY, BEAUTIFUL!

PRONUNCIATION GUIDE: 

Archer- AR-cher (duh)

Mansar- Man- SAHR

Leeviah- Lee- VAI- uh

Videl- Vee- DELL

Music: Titanium (David Guetta)         End of the Line (Captain America: the Winter Soldier)

Edit: me (will be up momentarily)

okay, on to the slightly depressing chapter. 

slightly. 

~Sierra~

Chapter Fifty

"Loki, I want to leave."

Thea's voice is small as she walks into the main room, the one with the stove and the tiny, unused cot. It is clear that the past few days have worn down on her: she's thinner, has hollows underneath her eyes, and her eyes are perpetually bloodshot and weary.

Meanwhile, Loki looks up from the table, where he has been reading a leather bound journal, "What?"

"I want to leave." Thea hesitantly looks at him, "I know something's wrong. I don't want to stay here any longer."

Her words are strong, although her voice wavers slightly.

Loki purses his lips, "Thea, I'm not cert-"

"Please, Loki?" Thea shakes his arm and her lip trembles, "Please, please, please?"

He gives her a look, "Thea, stop trying to be an innocent angel. It won't work."

"Loki, please?"

He considers her through narrowed eyes, "Thea, two hours ago, you nearly scratched out my eyes."

"Um," she says, "Well-"

"Thea, quite frankly, you're still dealing with an incredible loss. I do not know if venturing out-where there are creatures hunting you down as we speak- is such a good idea."

The fact that Loki is trying to be gentle makes Thea even more resolute.

"Look at me and tell me without lying that everything is fine. That nobody is hurt or in danger."

"I can't do that, kitten."

"Who's hurt?"

"I'm not sure if anyone is hurt. I told you there are only three people of whose location I am aware."

She considers this, "What happened? Why aren't they together?'

Loki rather looks like he would like to end this conversation, but he says anyway, "After Videl...left, he must have reactivated the pearl, using the blood he took from you," He nods towards the cut in her arm, "Now, he is looking for you, because he wishes for your blood to help keep the Velah in power, although technically, he doesn't need you: he only wants an enhancement of sorts. Regardless, after the Velah awoke, they began hunting for you, and in turn bunted for the others. From what it sounds like, they were forced to separate and take refuge amongst the trees."

Thea looks down, "So we don't...we don't even know...if they're...alive?"

Loki shakes his head, writes something in the journal, then stands and briefly puts his hand on her shoulder before walking into his room, "No."

There's a pause, and then Thea follows him into the room- he has taken out her backpack from underneath the bed and is putting the journal inside. "I still want to go," says Thea in a soft voice.

Loki looks up from where he's tossing Thea's cloak into the bag, but doesn't say anything.

"I just want to...get out of her," she says in a tight voice- she's trying not to cry, "I need to do something...I want to kill him." She looks up at him, "Let me kill him. Promise me you'll let me kill him."

He shrugs, "Done."

"What are you doing?" she asks as Loki takes out what she recognizes as Max's gun, her dagger, and her cell phone from the nightstand, and then tosses the latter to her.

He shrugs again, this time with a barely discernable smirk, "I'm getting ready to leave."

"What?" Thea squawks.

He chuckles, "I know full well there is no changing your mind, and so there is no point in attempting to change it."

"Oh," says Thea with wide eyes.

Loki stops throwing random things in the bag, and then looks at Thea, who is casually looking outside the window, "Thea."

"...yes?" Her voice is squeaky.

"Come here Thea."

She stands rooted in one spot, watching as the sun begins peaking from the clouds, and doesn't move, although her face is contorted and her lip trembling, this time for real.

Floorboards creak, and then Loki wraps his arms around Thea. For a fleeting second, she doesn't move, but then she buries her head in his chest and begins to sob, her shoulders shaking.

"Oh Thea," mutters Loki, squeezing her shoulders, "Oh Thea, stop crying."

"I...can't..." she bawls, "I...I killed he-e-e-r!"

"No..." Loki picks her up and sits her down on the bed next to him, "Darling, no you didn't. You didn't."

"Yes...yes I di-i-i-i-d!"

"Thea," his voice is stern, "Thea, look at me."

She shakes her head rapidly, leaning her forehead against his arm.

Loki raises his eyes to the ceiling and then says, speaking over Thea's persistent cries, "Thea, you did not kill Leah. Videl did. It was Videl, Thea, not-"

"Don't say his name!"

He rolls his eyes, which thankfully, Thea cannot see, "I swear, none of this was your fault."

"But...but I stepped into the porta-a-l. If I hadn't, this wouldn't...it wouldn't have happened."

"Don't be delusional, Thea. Vi- he would have hunted you down no matter what you did. It's not your fault, and if you say it is again, then I'll...well, just don't, and we won't have to find out what I will do."

"Lo-o-ki!" she wails.

"What?" he asks.

"Can't we...can't we just leave...now...?"

He chuckles, then says, "Not yet. Be patie-"

There's a loud knock at the door, and Thea jumps violently, jamming her arm on the wall, "Who's that? Loki, who-"

"Calm down," says Loki, getting up and walking silently into the main room- Thea notices him subtly unsheathing his dagger.

Seconds later, Thea hears footsteps and Loki re-enters the room, with someone else. This someone else is tall, has golden hair, faint signs of facial scruff, a narrow, exotic face, and crimson eyes.

"Archer?" Thea's voice is slightly cautious.

Archer smiles at her, "Hello, Thea."

"You're alive!" To the surprise of everyone in the room, she throws her arms around him. He hesitates, and then hugs her back. She backs away quickly, "Where- where is everyone else? Are they okay? Do you kno-"

"Thea, hush," says Loki, his voice firm.

She closes her mouth.

Archer looks at Thea, "I know where Thor, Steve, and Jane are. They are trying to contact the Iron Man right now, I believe."

"What about the others?"

"We are trying everything we can," says Archer, "But they took the majority of our phones, so communication has been slim to none. I can only hope that-" He cuts himself as, from behind Thea, Loki gives him a curt shake of the head, "I'm sure everything will be fine," Archer says hastily.

Before a suspicious Thea can say anything else, Loki says, "Take us back to my brother and his companions with all haste."

"Very well," says Archer, "So you are ready?"

Loki tosses Thea  her backpack and then sheathes his own sword and dagger, "Yes."

*

When Thea staggers to her feet, she is met with a dismal sight. There are only two tents erect, and they are sagging pitifully from the constant rain. Jane is the only person in sight, and when the black mist disintegrates, she jumps up from the folded-up chair and runs over to Thea, then hugs her tightly.

Thea does not hug her back, guilt heavy on her heart, but she is more than thankful for Jane's affections towards her. Along with Thor's, who hugs her next.

Nobody, as it seems, has arrived at the camp, and efforts to contact Tony have fallen flat. Although nobody says anything, everybody is tense. The mood is tense. The air is tense. Dinner is silent.

Thea gets in the habit of pacing around and around, squeezing her eyes shut, trying to block out the swirling thoughts around her. She feels numb, but not so numb that she doesn't have any emotions. She tries to forget, but she can't.

"Do you think they're okay?" she asks Steve in a strangled voice for the twentieth time.

Steve offers her a grim smile, "We're doing all we can. All we can do is hope."

"Damn hope hasn't done anything for me," growls Thea.

But she wishes on every star that makes an appearance through the cloudy night nonetheless, as she opens her cell phone and looks at her pictures. When she goes through the images, she skips through pictures of her and her family and looks at the ones of her new one.

She can't help but smile when she finds the collection of pictures Kyle had taken when she had left her phone at home one time during school- some of them are of Max, too. She has some pictures that Peter had taken of the skylines of New York, when he had texted her promising that he would take her up onto the buildings next time she came to New York- but that hadn't happened.

When she comes across the screenshotted Snapchats of Jack goofing off in Stark Tower, her smile wanes as she wonders what possibly could be happening to Jack right now, if he is even alive.

*

That night, Thea lies in a tent between Jane and Steve, on her back, trying to look through the fabric and into the stars. She can't sleep, as she is tense with worry. Finally, she gives up and walks outside, to where Loki and Thor, who are guarding, are standing next to the extinguished fire. She glances upwards and sees the silhouette of the lone Archer standing on a rock about a hundred yards above them.

She leans her head against Loki's arm, and he glances down at her, "Not tired?"

"I'm exhausted," she says honestly, "But I can't sleep."

Thor's eyes are drawn, "I understand."

As Loki begins to play with Thea's hair, she asks, "Anything yet?"

"Nothing yet, kitten."

"Thea, you should go to sleep," says Thor in a paternal voice, "You need your sleep."

"I can't," Thea repeats miserably, "I just can't!"

"Brother," says Loki quietly, "Let her be."

Thor nods and puts his hand on Thea's shoulders, and the three of them stand the vigil, looking out into the darkened night.

Then, bushes crackle, and for a moment, Thea jumps, and Loki and Thor subconsciously reach for their subsequent weapons.

But then, Thea lets out a scream of joy, and runs across the clearing.

Someone with a strong build, short brown hair, green eyes, stubble around his chin, and a dirty and worn face seizes her in an embrace. She begins to cry into his shoulder, and he walks forward, still holding her, and a few tears leak from his own toughened eyes.

"You're...you're okay," sobs Thea as he holds her tightly and Loki and Thor look on with concealed relief. From the rock, Archer jumps down and begins to walk towards the four of  them.

"I'm okay," says Max in a thick voice, squeezing Thea as if he had never thought he would do so again- which is exactly what he had thought.

"I'm okay".

 *

Jack is alive, but he's worried to death.

Leeviah comes back the next night, walking under the archway that is unusually embolded in Latin words, and although Jack tries to pry her interests away from his cousin, she evidently prefers Kyle. Evidently, she is in a rush, as she hisses, "I have to go hunting for your little friends again."

"Ooh, why aren't you sticking around?" asks Kyle, whose voice has strengthened over the day, but not by much.

The Velah ignores him, then sinks her teeth into his skin once again. Kyle clutches the bars of the cell, and the dungeon echoes with the sound of his strangled yells. The ground around him grows damp with his blood.

Jack kicks the stone wall of his own cell hard in frustration, scowling and contorting his miserable face every time Kyle cries out.

The hold Kyle has on the cell grows weaker and weaker until finally, his fingers slip from the bars and sink to the ground.

At this precise second, Leeviah releases Kyle, who once again slumps, motionless to the ground. She leans down, feels for Kyle's pulse, and then rolls her eyes. Nudges him with her satin-toed shoe and then sighs in fake concern. Then, she walks out of the cell, banging the door behind her. Glancing into Jack's cell, she calls back in a cackling voice, "Looks as though you'll be next!"

Jack's breathing grows more and more rapid as he looks at the still and prone form of Kyle lying on the dirty cell ground. Kyle's face is white, made whiter still by the bright crimson blood on his neck. His eyes are closed.

Jack reaches through the bars and is barely able to touch Kyle's hand. It's cold.

"K...Kyle?" Jack whispers.

Kyle doesn't respond.

Jack's eyes widen, and he pushes Kyle's hand.

But Kyle doesn't move.

Jack's face loses its color.

"KYLE!" Jack screams.

 --------------

*braces myself*

OkAY

Love you, mean it :D 

*dashes off*