I can almost hear the groans, 'Another theory about the current whereabouts of the Infinity Stones in the Marvel Cinematic Universe'. Yes. Sort of. As far as I am aware no one else has come up with this theory which makes me a bit worried incase it's so farfetched or I've completely missed something.
Anyway, his is my first time writing here so I hope you'll join me in my possible delusion.
Ready?
I'll start with a simple statement and then explain my reasoning. The Mind Stone is not in Loki's Scepter.
I, like many other people, saw Avengers Assemble at the cinema and I thoroughly enjoyed it but I did feel a bit let down by the Chitauri. The first thing which struck me was the simple idea of a vast swarm of destructive, drone aliens. I understand why they chose to do it this way- a faceless enemy that the Avengers could shoot, stab, squash, smash etcetera without the audience caring. A mindless army you could say (cough *hint* cough)
The second thing which struck me was the easy defeat of an almost undefeatable armada of killer aliens with superior technology. They all took a power nap. At the same time. On first viewing I reasoned that they could be part of a hive community, not unheard of when it comes to quick and easy defeats. But when I recently rewatched the film, now with the knowledge from Thor: The Dark World and the Guardians of the Galaxy, I came up with a different theory.
The Mind Stone was on the Chitauri Command Centre and Loki's Scepter was a vessel for the power in the same way that the Hydra weapons in The First Avenger could harness the power of the Tesseract. One of Thanos' generals (personally I hope Ebony Maw) was in possession of the Mind Stone and the Chitauri fleet but were out of reach of the Mad Titan for some reason (maybe they were just too darn far away) but with the aid of the Space Stone a portal could be opened for access to both the army and the Infinity Stone. But then the meddling nuclear missile went and blew up the Command Centre leaving the Mind Stone to float about in space.
"Drat" - said Thanos.
I hope I've explained it clearly. Thank you for listening and, as always, Make Mine Marvel.