Given the Arctic climate, there was one more possibility: ice.
That would explain everything.
If Lucas's diary entries were factual, then Cap had to be alive. But if he was alive, why had there been no trace of him for seventy years?
It couldn't be that he'd gotten tired of the war and gone into hiding. Steve Rogers had a lover—Peggy Carter, one of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s founding mbers. There was no logical reason he'd abandon her to disappear. That didn't fit the psychology of a man like him.
And it didn't match Lucas's phrasing: thrown seventy years into the future.
That left ti displacent as the only explanation. Fury had initially considered temporal rifts, but now a simpler answer erged: cryogenic suspension.
If Steve Rogers had been frozen in ice seventy years ago and preserved until now, everything made sense.
That was another way of being "thrown" seventy years forward.
To the outside world, seven decades had passed. But for Steve Rogers, his last mory would still be that final, deadly mission. From his perspective, no ti would have passed at all.
How was that different from ti travel?
It wasn't.
And if he'd been frozen, he wouldn't have aged.
True, no ordinary human had ever survived being frozen and thawed. Those wealthy drears from the '70s who'd paid to be cryogenically preserved—hoping future dicine could cure them—were all still dead.
But Steve Rogers wasn't ordinary. He was the peak of human potential, enhanced by the Super Soldier Serum. His body could withstand what others couldn't.
"That's it. It has to be," Fury muttered, his pulse quickening.
If Captain Arica was truly alive, the Avengers Initiative would have its leader. Who better to embody the spirit of Arica than Steve Rogers himself?
Captain Arica.
As for why Cap could lift Mjolnir? Fury didn't care. If anything, that made him morevaluable. Unlike Thor, Steve Rogers was one of their own.
"If the Captain's alive, we need to find him imdiately," Coulson said, barely able to contain his excitent. "We can't wait two years like the diary says."
The thought of eting his childhood hero—of seeing Captain Arica in the flesh—was almost too much to process.
"Agreed. I'll deploy search teams to the Arctic imdiately," Fury said. "We can narrow the search zone based on his last known coordinates. If he's alive, we'll find him. We'll sweep every square mile if we have to."
The Arctic was vast, but with S.H.I.E.L.D.'s resources and modern technology, a systematic search was feasible.
There had been expeditions before, of course. But after years without results, the search had been quietly abandoned. Most people assud Steve Rogers was long dead—his body rotted away in so forgotten corner of the frozen north.
But now, Lucas's diary had given them a second chance.
If this information leaked to the public, it would ignite a dia firestorm.
"This stays classified," Fury said sharply. "No leaks. No one outside this room can know."
Everyone nodded in agreent.
Except Thor.
The Asgardian glanced around at the mortals, all of them buzzing with excitent over this "Captain Arica." His jaw tightened.
Wasn't the point of this conversation supposed to be figuring out how to restore his powers?
Then the diary updated again.
[The legendary tragedy of Thor, the Cursed Brother, is only just beginning. Everyone he loves? Dead or dood. But you know what they say about sibling complexes—no matter how many tis his brother betrays him, Thor will always forgive Loki. Loki could stab him in the back a hundred tis, and Thor would still treat him like his beloved little brother.
This ti, Loki really screwed him over. Told him Odin was dead, and Thor just... believed it. Didn't even ask follow-up questions.
What Thor doesn't know yet is that Loki is the biological son of Laufey, King of the Frost Giants. So even if Asgard's throne skipped Thor entirely and went to Hela, it would NEVER go to Loki.
You can share love with an adopted brother. But you don't hand over the ancestral kingdom to an outsider.]
Silence.
Everyone stared at the screen, then at each other.
"Loki is a Frost Giant?" Hawkeye was the first to speak, eyebrows raised. "Well, that tracks. Norse mythology always said Loki was a giant. I just didn't realize Asgard adopted him into the royal family."
"That's... impossible," Thor stamred, his face pale. "Loki grew up with . We were raised together. He's my brother. He—"
But even as he spoke, doubt crept into his mind.
Loki had always been different. Smaller. Weaker. While the warriors of Asgard were hulking, battle-hardened brawlers, Loki was lean and wiry. Thor had beaten him in every sparring match since childhood. Loki's retaliation always ca in the form of pranks and tricks—never direct combat.
That's why they called him the God of Mischief. A polite way of saying he relied on deception and sches instead of strength.
And Loki's talent for sorcery far outstripped his skill in hand-to-hand combat. He was a mage, not a warrior.
Everything about him was... different.
Thor had never questioned it before. But now, looking back, the signs were glaringly obvious.
Watching Thor struggle with the revelation, the others exchanged glances. They were starting to believe it.
This guy really was the ultimate doting older brother. My brother can betray a hundred tis, and I'll still love him like it's the first day we t.
Even now, with everything staring him in the face, Thor didn't want to believe Loki had deceived him.
What a saint.
The humans couldn't help but feel a twinge of envy. Imagine having a brother so devoted he'd hand you the throne without question. That was the kind of sibling loyalty people dread about.
Too bad Loki clearly didn't appreciate it.
From the sound of things, he was actively trying to destroy Thor.
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