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Part 2 of Steve's Ending Fix-It
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Published:
2022-04-12
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2,378
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1/1
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I Don't Like Bullies

Summary:

The Time Keepers (or whoever is in charge of the TVA) miscalculated when they decided to send Steve Rogers back in time and thought he wouldn't try to change things.

Loki nods his head in the direction of the closing elevator doors. "Is he here a lot?"
Mobius looks up. "Oh, Steve?" his mouth crooks up. "Yeah, he can be a handful. I swear he's here as often as you sometimes."

Or, Loki finds an unexpected ally.

Notes:

(See the end of the work for notes.)

Work Text:

 

Loki first comes across Captain Rogers in the TVA trial room. He is standing in line, waiting for this ridiculous farce to be done and over with when he hears an unfortunately familiar voice up ahead, sounding rather loud and irritated.

“Well, what was I supposed to do?”

Loki looks up, curious, and sees the Captain leaning over the stand, his eyes narrowed as he addresses the judge. He is wearing the same beige jumpsuit that Loki is, the cursed collar around his neck. He doesn’t look the same as the Captain Loki had just fought. This one is older, his hair a little longer, his face bare of the stiff formality his younger self had exuded.

This one isn’t hiding behind a soldier’s mask. He is angry, the prison uniform doing little to lessen his stature. His shoulders are pulled back, straining the cloth, and while Loki can’t get a good angle on his face, he can almost feel the heat from the glare he levels at the judge.

The woman on the stand raises a single eyebrow, unfazed. “Captain Rogers,” she says, her tone giving Loki the impression that this is not the first time she is repeating herself. “You are accused of deviating from the sacred timeline by attempting to prevent the recruitment of Arnim Zola to SHIELD—”

“Of course I did,” Rogers cut in, his voice a dark growl. “There was no way I was going to let Howard recruit him knowing he’s a Hydra operative.” Loki knows little of the war the Captain had fought beyond what Barton had told him, but Rogers’ tone doesn't leave much to the imagination in regards to this so-called Zola. “What was I supposed to do? Just let him infest SHIELD?”

The woman on the stand sighs in irritation. “So how do you plead?” she asks, ignoring the questions posed to her.

“I shouldn’t have to plead anything!” Rogers snaps, his hands clenching on the podium. “I was doing what needed to be done.”

“Not according to the Time-Keepers,” is the cold reply. Loki glances at the three wooden sculptures in the walls behind the stand and scowls. Who were these ‘Time-Keepers’ who thought they could dictate everything as though their word was law? The woman raises her wooden mallet and levels Rogers with a look. “Guilty or not guilty?”

Rogers pulls back and folds his arms, looking as stubborn as a bull. “Not guilty.”

Loki watches the judge’s mouth purse in distaste. She shakes her head and sighs. “Captain Rogers, the Time-Keepers have given you a great gift by allowing you to go back to your time and live out your days.” She catches his eye with a sharp look. “However, that does not give you permission to go trespassing all over the sacred timeline and defile their work.”

Far from repentant, Rogers raises his chin, meeting her gaze. “If respecting this sacred timeline means living under a rock and letting everything happen again, then I think your ‘time-keepers’ are going to have a hard time finding a version of me that doesn’t cause you problems.”

That seems to hit a nerve because the woman leans forward, her voice as cold as ice. “We just need one, Captain.”

He recoils, as though slapped.

The judge closes her eyes and breathes in, leaning back to gather her composure. She opens her eyes and gives the Captain a small smile, reaching for her mallet. “Captain Rogers, considering the evidence against you, this court finds you guilty of attempting to disrupt the proper flow of time. I sentence you to be reset.” She bangs her gavel over the rising protests from the Captain. “Next!”

It takes several guards to drag Rogers from the room, and Loki watches with interest, remembering his brief fight with him before his capture. Evidently this older Captain had not lost his strength. The interaction fades from his mind as he is brought up to the stand, the sharp woman staring him down.

“Next!”

oOo

 

The next time Loki sees him is only for a brief flash of recognition as he bolts through the TVA hallways, using the controls for the collar on his neck to keep out of reach of the guards. He pops into the lobby and spots another version of the Captain, this time before he had been processed.

He is older again than the Captain he had known. The lines around his eyes deeper as he regards the guard hanging on to him with dislike. He is wearing a white and red suit, much unlike the eyesore he had worn in Loki’s time. A Timedoor opens next to the pair and another guard steps through, this one pulling a woman dressed in a blue dress, her hair falling in graceful waves around her face.

She has the exact same look of indignation on her face as her partner, and while Loki doesn’t recognise her, she is known to the Captain. “You’re taking her too?” he snaps, tugging away from the guard. “Of course I was going to tell her about SHIELD. Neither of us were going to let that stand—”

Loki has just enough time to see Rogers get timelooped back into submission before he blips away.

He lands near the evidence room, glancing both ways down the hall before creeping closer. TVA propaganda posters line the walls and he rolls his eyes at the garish colours. Nobody spots him as he eases his way inside the evidence office, rows of clerical desks painting a depressingly corporate picture. There is a screen at the front of the room, a single golden-strand weaving across the screen, representing the sacred timeline.

That isn’t right, he thinks to himself, eyeing the strand. Living in one single timeline and being confined to one set of predetermined choices is the most unnatural thing he can think of. He is the god of chaos for Norns sake! It is against his very nature to live within the narrow lines the time-keepers denote. It is no wonder the TVA drags in so many variant versions of himself. The universe yearns to break free.

And Mobius mocked him when he claimed freedom was an illusion.

He shakes off his thoughts, focusing on the secretary who had taken the Tesseract. He will not conform so easily as his other variant selves may have.

A few minutes later, while staring at a drawer full of Infinity Stones, he spots another object, tucked away near the back of the drawer. It is a small metal compass. It sits open, the photo of that woman who had been with Captain Rogers nestled in the top compartment. He wonders briefly how many variations of that man the TVA had snuffed.

 

oOo

 

He has no idea how much time has passed, time works differently in the TVA after all, but he sees the Captain again. He has just had a rather brilliant breakthrough about how the other lesser Loki variant is hiding from the TVA and had even managed to convince Mobius to let him test his apocalypse theory off the books.

He is busy waiting for Mobius to come back with his Tempad when he sees Rogers again. This time he is brought in with his hands cuffed behind his back, several minutemen needed to drag him through the Timedoor. He is wearing a blue suit, somewhat similar to the one Loki had seen on Earth. It is riddled with scorch marks and clearly battle-worn. The man’s hair is dishevelled, his face smeared with soot. His shield is missing.

Behind him, more minutemen step through the door, bringing with them another variant. This one doesn’t struggle as much, seeming bewildered and touch-shy of the guards. He is dressed differently than the Captain, his uniform predominantly black, a mask covering his nose and mouth. His hair is short, but needs to be cut, the brown strands hanging in his eyes and moving with his every flinch. He turns, keeping his eyes on Rogers, and Loki sees that his left arm is made of metal, the silver gleaming in the low overhead lights of the TVA.

As if sensing the eyes on him, Rogers twists around, determination and anger clear on his face. “Don’t touch him!” he barks, straining against his guards. “Leave him alone!”

He jerks and nearly yanks himself free, several minutemen going down as he struggles. Loki is reluctantly impressed at the show of strength. He can see his wrists working furiously in the cuffs, his gaze focused and calculating as he eyes up his opponents.

His momentum is cut short as a guard wacks him with a slow-mo baton. He falls in painful slow-motion, his face contorting as he tries to flinch away. The other variant gives a start, a strangled noise sounding from behind the mask. Before he can do anything the slow-mo baton is turned on him too. The slow, laboured movements of the two men are cumbersome for the minutemen as they drag them towards the processing elevator, but obviously the benefits of stunning them outweigh the costs in this situation.

Loki thinks back to what Ravonna had said during the sentencing. How the Time-Keepers had for some reason allowed Rogers to go back in time and live there. That hadn’t broken the sacred timeline, but it would appear that any deviation or misstep from Rogers is not allowed.

How tiresome, he thinks, raising an eyebrow. Why even bother letting him stay?

He turns at the sound of Mobius’ approach and nods his head in the direction of the closing elevator doors. “Is he here a lot?”

Mobius glances up, following his gesture with a look of surprise. “Oh, Steve?” his mouth crooks up. “Yeah, he can be a handful. I swear he’s here as often as you sometimes.” Loki’s brows raise in interest and Mobius shrugs. “It comes and goes in waves,” he says. “Sometimes things’ll be quiet for a while and sometimes we’ll get six of ‘im in a day. Glad he’s not my division. He can be a pain.”

He gives Loki a sideways grin. “What? You jealous?”

Loki scoffs, turning away. “Hardly,” he throws over his shoulder. “Do you have the Tempad? Time to prove I’m right.”

 

oOo

 

Much later, although Loki could never know how long, he finds himself in the void at the end of time, his nerves tingling with aftershocks from the pruning baton.

He peels his eyes open, bracing himself. “Is this Hel?”

It isn’t. Instead he is met by other versions of himself. Variants who had been pruned, but hadn’t died. Because Lokis always survive. The discovery gives him a burst of hope for Mobius’ fate, the moment his friend had been burned away still fresh in his mind.

He follows the other Lokis, hiking over grassy terrain to avoid the beast Allioth. He has about a thousand questions, but most of them get stalled when he sees a familiar figure in the distance.

It is Captain Rogers. Another version of him. This one is dressed in a uniform that has clearly seen better days, the colours faded and worn. A loose brown poncho made out of ripped fabric whips around him in the wind. He is standing on a raised hill, looking out at Allioth when he spots them.

Child-Loki looks up and the two hold each other’s gaze for a moment before Rogers nods once. The wind howls and Child-Loki dips his chin in reply. Rogers looks for a moment longer at Allioth before turning away, the outline of a broken shield strapped to his back. Loki watches him go in surprise, glancing between the retreating figure and child-Loki.

“Does he work with you?”

Child-Loki doesn’t pause, clambering over mossy rocks and half-buried ruins as Allioth rages behind them. “When it suits him,” is all he says.

 

Evidently it suits the Captain to aid them when he comes across them stumbling through the wasteland, having fled the power struggling gaggle of other Lokis. He eyes Mobius with some distrust, but listens seriously as Loki and Sylvie explain what they know about the TVA and Allioth.

He looks rugged, aged, his hair carelessly windblown. His cheeks are covered in scruff, his brows drawing downward as he hears of the fake Time-Keeper puppets and Allioth’s role in keeping them here. He sits with his knees bent in front of him, his shield resting by his feet. The thing had been completely shattered in half, jagged edges of metal dulled with dirt and ash. Loki frowns and wonders if the shield is something he had come with or if he had salvaged it from somewhere.

Roger twiddles with a piece of grass and catches his eye, the corner of his mouth pulling up. “Looks like it’s time to put the guard dog to sleep.”

That is the conclusion Loki had been coming to as well.

Their plan to enchant Allioth is built on sticks and a prayer, but it is the only option they have if they want to know who or what is behind the sacred timeline and the Time Keepers. When it comes to parting, the other Lokis don’t come with them. “This is our home,” Child-Loki says simply as he watches them get ready for an impossible battle.

To Loki’s weakening surprise, Rogers stands and slings his shield over his shoulder, his poncho fluttering as the wind picks up with Allioth’s approach. “I’m coming,” he says simply.

Loki appraises him, tilting his head. “You know, Captain,” he says slowly. “When I fought you on Earth, I would never have predicted there was a version of you somewhere that would willingly team up with not just one, but two of me.”

Rogers lets out a laugh that is more air than sound. He shakes his head. “I do a lot of things most people don’t expect of me. As the TVA has learned.” His mouth widens into a cutting smile, a hint of something wild and untamed behind it. He turns to look towards Allioth, a sharp, bright light entering his eyes.

“I don’t like bullies.” He rolls his shoulders and glances back at Loki, a streak of mischief growing in his smile. “I don’t care where they're from.”

Notes:

My friends and I had this headcanon as soon as we started watching Loki. It's just absolutely hilarious to me imagining TVA staff quietly cursing the Time-Keepers for deciding to send Steve back in time because he won't stay put.

Also, I'd like to think that Steve went back in time fully planning to do his best to change things and the TVA had to hem him in from all sides before one non-variant Steve squeaked through till modern day.

I don't have the brain power to write a full AU for this, but I sure hope you enjoyed this exploration into this headcanon!

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