(This story takes place after the events of A Clear and Present Loki, and well before the Season 2 opener. Spoilers for the start of that season are possible; spoilers for the first are a given. Codex stories are slightly AU by necessity. Also, pre-emptive apologies for slower updates to come than the previous story; I'm spinning an awful lot of plates.)

Rolling Thunder: A SHIELD Codex

I must follow the people. Am I not their leader? ~ Benjamin Disraeli

. . .

knock knock – who's there

. . .

From the audio transcript, Creech Air Force Base, Northwest of Las Vegas, Nevada:

[0243.12, Creech ATC]: "Ah, this is Creech, good evening Nellis. We're tracking radar contact, fi – six bogeys coming in fast from your direction, holding SW at Mach 2, you got a squawk on that? They your boys?"

[0243.52, Nellis Main Communication Center]: "Negative, Creech Tower, this is Nellis. No squawk on un-ID'd boys. Repeating we do not have radar tracking on your bogeys. They're not ours. Tower, you observing?"

[0244.15, Nellis ATC]: "Observing, Captain. Creech, you got eyes in the air?"

-CROSSTALK, UNINTELLIGIBLE-

[0245.31, unidentified USAF pilot]: "Creech Tower, this is REDACTED, we got radar and visual, verify six bogeys incoming, they're gonna go right over Pahrump in about ten seconds, civs gonna get one hell of a bang at their windows down there. We're following."

"[0245.46, Creech ATC]: "Unidentified aircraft, you are in restricted airsp-"

*unintelligible, increasingly worried noises*

[0246.09, Creech ATC]: "Someone push this upstairs, we're going to have a live fire incident over US mainland airspace. Jesus Christ."

[0246.17, Creech ATC]: "Someone go wake up a general or something, what the EDITED is this."

[0246.36, unidentified USAF pilot #1]: "Tower, this is REDACTED, flying with REDACTED. These guys aren't doing no Mach 2. They're faster than th-"

*unintelligible, fragment of pilot #2 verifying for pilot #1*

[0246.37, Nellis ATC]: "Creech, this is Nellis sharing an all hands alert, all hands alert, we're track-"

[0246.44, REDACTED]: "Creech, this is REDACTED, there is an abandoned SHIELD depot on the edge of the Valley, our telemetry suggests they're banging right for it. Engage, you have top authorization to enga-"

[0247.02, unidentified USAF pilot #2]: *electronic screaming in background* "TOWER THEY JUST WENT WEAPONS HOT!"

*static*

[0247.07, unidentified USAF pilot #1]: "TOWER TOWER THEY JUST DROPPED PAYLOAD TOWER-"

-CROSSTALK-

[0247.19, unidentified USAF pilot #1]: "GOT A GODDAMN FIREBALL ON THE HORIZON, HOLY JESUS THEY TOOK OFF LIKE A BAT OUTTA HELL."

[0247.25, Creech ATC]: "Nellis, this is Creech! All hands support, I repeat all hands support!"

[0247.37, Nellis ATC]: "We're reading you, Creech, flight deck is scrambling. They're gone, we lost them on radar. Still sending our birds, just what the EDITED happened, man. What was that?"

[0247.44, Creech ATC]: "Roger that, Nellis. REDACTED, are you-"

[0248.12, REDACTED]: "Reading you. Sending in clean-up, ETA is-"

(The rest of this transcript has been ordered sealed by REDACTED, this document Top Secret or Level Seven only. If you have received this transcript by accident please contact your commanding or SO immediately.)

. . .

Pahrump, Nevada woke early to a series of sonic booms, townsfolk cursing out the local Air Force for what the morning was certainly going to reveal - several thousand dollars worth of shattered windows and rattled foundations. Tired night workers filed out of their workplace doors to glower at the clear black sky only to clutch at each other as the horizon lit up white fire, fading into gleaming orange. They looked out to where the 372 state highway led to the edge of California, towards the boundaries of the infamous Death Valley, and wondered what the hell had happened. When their heart rates settled down, they lit up the switchboard at Creech to raise havoc, immediately assuming that another test flight, either from there or Nellis out on the other side of Vegas, had gone horribly wrong.

By the time CNN got on the scene at a little after five AM, followed not long after by a sunken-eyed journo from Al-Jazeera America, the US military had collectively decided to let them think that was exactly what happened. They did not consult with the tight-faced new Director of what they still considered to be a defunct and rogue agency. They had nothing to say to him.

. . .

The US Disciplinary Barracks, Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas. Three days later.

He ran his palm over three days worth of stubble on his chin and debated whether this was the morning he was going to shave it or not. The boys in charge of the prison weren't going to play around on his timetable. If he stretched out the wait too long, they were going to strap him down and clean him up on their terms. That would mean losing the round. Grant Ward always played to win, and since they weren't letting him have a pack of cards, he had to make up his own games.

Ward considered the amount of humorlessness among his current security team and grunted once to himself, feeling the sound of it rattle in his still-gravelly throat. "Well," he rasped, testing the recovery of his voice and finding it acceptable, if slow. "Guess we try and look pretty today." He swung his legs off the bed to stand and took a long, assessing look at his too-pale, sun deprived face in the thick metal mirror. Always slightly distorted. That probably meant something to him on a psychological level, but he didn't care too much about the implications. Right now he was busy just marking the days and thinking up ways to get out. He hadn't come up with much yet. Place was well-built.

He picked up the dull safety razor they allowed him for five minutes every morning, then set it down again when a distant alarm began to scree, soft and insistent. Someone's getting cute, he thought. Good luck, you stupid son of a bitch. If the alarm went off in his part of the complex, your escape attempt was already over. He chewed that fact over for a moment, reflecting on what used to be 'The Castle,' the former main facility of the prison. Torn down several years back for a flashy, updated facility due north, where the country's known military troublemakers chilled out to wait their turn in the justice grinder. Grant didn't get to see any of them. He was in the Oubliette – a set of stone and steel warrens underneath where The Castle had been, and where SHIELD had once joined an agreement to dump their more 'ordinary' waste. He bared his teeth at the mirror while the alarm kept screaming and then decided to hell with it. The morning crew could shave him, if they cared so damn much.

Something thumped outside his narrow cell and he quickly flicked his glance towards the steel-reinforced door. He picked the razor back up, his thumb rubbing over the carefully dulled blades and figuring in the worst case, if someone was coming to mess with him, the eyes were always a good choice.

Another noise, a thunk! that had that distinct sound of bone colliding with hard stone. The metal door dented right after and Ward's eyes widened a little, stepping back once and knowing he had nowhere to go but through whatever was strong enough to dent Oubliette construction. He thought of Dr. Banner and allowed a grim moment of hoping like hell that wasn't what was coming for him.

The door flung open, bent sharply at the hinges. Oh, this is actually way worse, Ward thought, recognizing the figure, tall as himself yet somehow seeming vastly bigger, from a thousand tense briefings given by both HYDRA and SHIELD. Then the grinning, raging alien demigod flung him unceremoniously up against the wall.

. . .

Loki's pale hand kept Ward's face firmly in place, one of the human's own hands reaching up to slap frantically at his thin but steely wrist. He dug his thumb into the soft hollow of the man's cheek above the jawbone, the pain forcing Ward to still. "Careful now," he hissed at the prisoner, eyes alight with delight in the white face, floating above his armor of black and green and gold. "I might think you're not happy to see me."

Ward grunted in surprise, the only sound he could manage as Loki forced his face to turn from one side to the other, assessing him with narrowed grey-green eyes. "Oh, yes. You're the one I'm looking for. Grant Ward. HYDRA, I presume." The jaw hung in a jackal's wide smile. "I am Loki of Asgard, and you may rejoice. I am here to free you for my purpose, and my purposes are always glory." He rattled a low laugh and released Ward, watching him slump coughing to the ground. "Catch your breath and then you follow me. If you do not, I will break both your legs and carry you. I'll allow you that choice, for I'm feeling magnanimous today."

"Why?" Ward rasped.

"I already gave you an answer, you feckless and little mortal thing." Loki sniffed distastefully. "You are a tool, but I don't need my tools pristine, if you catch my meaning." He snapped thin fingers at the human, impatient. "That's enough air. Get up and move."

Ward balked, took a swipe with the razor still clenched in his fist. He'd kept in shape, thought it was worth the shot. Loki easily slapped it away, the force of his swipe breaking the thin blue plastic, then grabbed Ward's wrist and bent it until he saw the unwilling muscles in the jaw clench. "That hurts you. You don't want to show me, but I know all the ways to make your little bodies hurt." That smile again. It sent a ripple of gooseflesh down Ward's arms. Mad as a bag of cats. HYDRA said he was interesting. SHIELD, when it was livelier, had a stop-on-sight, kill-if-possible order.

This is the being that killed Coulson. Something must have showed in his face, as Loki leaned in close again. "I can see you know me better than to doubt what I can do to mortal flesh. Time is not on our side, and I tell you it never is."

"What do you want with me?"

"It rambles, testing my patience." Loki stepped to the doorway and looked down both stretches of the long hallway. "You hold the key to information I want, other tools for my revenge. I killed that little whelp and he lives. Not only does he live, but he thrives." He pulled himself back into the tiny cell and fixed Ward with a slow, sober stare. "I thought I did my best. I was thorough. This outcome... offensive, isn't it? Perhaps you can give me clues. Well, we'll discuss this later, as an insect may plead with the seasons and be humored by a mild spring. I am easily pleased this day. Keep it that way, and it will go better for you. I can and do reward those that serve me well." His lips quirked humorlessly. "Come now. Else I'll start with the left femur, and then the right. All the same to me."

Loki stepped into the hallway and whirled to give Ward a theatrically deep bow, his hands reaching to the left side of the corridor. "I've already secured an exit. Your decision?"

With a last second of hesitation, knowing Loki's given choice for a terrible one either way, he hurried after the alien.