"Amora! Tell me what you have to do with Thanos, now!" Thor roared.
"What could you possibly be talking about? I have no idea," Amora said with a forced smile, something Thor noticed immediately.
"You are weak. Your power is stronger than before, but somehow you look like you are on the verge of death. Does it have anything to do with the deal you made with Thanos?" he asked.
But Amora simply kept smiling.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
At last, Thor had enough.
"Fine, don't answer. It isn't necessary. I tried to be kind because of our past relationship, but I'll leave this to the professionals."
With that, Thor left the interrogation room, leaving several people with Amora.
However, after ten minutes Thor still had not returned. Instead, a soldier arrived, ordering everyone who remained inside to leave the room.
Thus, only one person stayed behind.
The soldier who remained, clearly weaker than those who had left before, looked at Amora nervously.
"Quite the silence, isn't it?" Amora asked, noticing not only the silence inside the cell, but also outside it.
In truth, it should not have been possible to hear the outside from there, but Amora ignored it as if it were nothing.
"Y-yes," the soldier replied nervously, not knowing what to say.
After that, Amora remained silent for five minutes, until she finally stood up.
She did so slowly and elegantly, stretching as if she had only been resting.
"S-stop! Don't try anything," the soldier said.
Amora ignored him and walked toward him.
"Those cuffs nullify your magic, you can't do anythi..."
He did not get to finish the sentence. Amora was already at his side and, extending her hands, broke the cuffs as if they were made of paper.
The soldier opened his mouth in shock. He only closed it again when Amora placed her hand on his head and whispered:
"Sleep."
The soldier fell unconscious.
Amora left the interrogation room and began walking through the corridors. She observed her surroundings carefully. There were hardly any soldiers in sight, only a few weak ones and others far too strong.
The latter attacked immediately upon seeing her. Amora used what little strength she had left to control them mentally and force them to walk away on their own, as far as possible.
"That should last a while," she murmured as she advanced toward the vault of Asgard, which was not actually hidden, "Despite their strength, they are still nothing more than barbarians."
Upon reaching the interior, she surveyed the treasures with satisfaction until her gaze settled on a golden gauntlet, with dull gems embedded in it.
She took the gauntlet with both hands and smiled.
"At last," she whispered to herself.
Then an unbearable headache struck her, making her collapse to the ground. She barely managed to cling to the gauntlet as she screamed in pain.
Finally, she pushed herself up, kneeling, one hand on the gauntlet and the other pressed against the cold floor of the vault, and looked ahead.
"Loki. You could have cut the control over the Asgardians earlier, but you did it all at once, just to weaken me. I don't know if you are smarter now and think things through carefully, or if you are still the same as always and this is a stupid trick to you."
"Sounds like you know me. I always thought you were only obsessed with Thor. Did you change? No… better tell me, who are you?" Loki spoke, not believing this was truly Amora.
"Does it matter who I am? Better tell me, do you want to betray Asgard again?"
Loki did not answer. He suddenly appeared in front of Amora and pierced her heart with a dagger.
"Trying to buy time with me? I invented that trick."
He mocked her, watching the dying Amora.
Amora spat blood and looked at him with hatred… and something else.
"I liked you… cough… more, when you were a puppet… cough… in the hands… of… Lord Thanos."
Loki looked at her with understanding.
"Ebony? How? What kind of madness have they done?"
Loki said, knowing how dangerous it was to manipulate souls.
But his attention soon shifted to something else. He immediately tried to take the gauntlet from her, but Amora hugged it as if it were her most precious treasure.
Before Loki could react, Amora's body, Ebony's soul, and the gauntlet vanished, leaving behind a frustrated Loki, comparable to when Thanos escaped from Thor's grasp.
---
In an almost dark space, inside a ship drifting in the void, Ebony appeared before Thanos.
Thanos observed him. Fury and sorrow were reflected on his face, but only for an instant, before being replaced by firm resolve.
Ebony did everything he could to kneel and offer him the gauntlet.
Thanos noticed the wound piercing his heart, something that would have already killed anyone else.
"It seems you were right," he said in his deep voice.
Ebony smiled weakly.
"That's right… Loki… is no longer the same… the rest… are no longer the people we knew… Lord Thanos… you… have… to…"
He did not finish the sentence. He collapsed to the floor.
Thanos caught the gauntlet before it fell and placed it on his right hand.
It was not empty. The Time Stone shone in one of its slots.
Thanos placed the other two stones he possessed, the Power Stone and the Soul Stone, and then looked at the space before him.
After that, he looked at Amora's body and ordered it to be taken away.
"Cull Obsidian, killed in the first incursion on Earth by Hulk and Thor.
Corvus Glaive, killed by Thor.
Proxima Midnight, killed by Thor.
Ebony Maw, killed by Loki.
Nebula… abandoned me.
Gamora…"
He looked at the Soul Stone before continuing.
"In the end, I am alone again, just as when I began," he sighed,
"But this is not the time to dwell on losses. Ebony, you were always the smartest of them all. I understood your final message. Earth is no longer the same as we remember. If we want to secure victory, we must go all out."
Thanos spoke with a firm voice to the high command of his army, gathered before him from different corners of the universe.
"All forces, move to Earth immediately."
---
At that very moment, Earth was on maximum alert.
All the Avengers were gathered at the Watchtower, which functioned as their base.
Standing before them was Fury, explaining the situation.
After half an hour of explanation, he finally reached the end.
"...Thanos is coming for the Infinity Stones. To obtain them, Earth is his greatest obstacle. All organizations on the planet will act in direct cooperation alongside Asgard. We will make sure that no one is hurt and, above all, we will put an end to this threat that has been in our minds for so many years."
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(just delete the hyphen)
80 power stones = 1 extra chapter (cumulative)