Author's Note: This is my first fan fiction. Ever. Please be gentle. Formatting Suggestions are welcome, as are corrections, as this is unbeta'd. This will be multi-chaptered, eventual Lokane, and contain graphic violence, language, and eventual lemons. This will probably also be a variant of the Alpha/Omegaverse, though I am not entirely decided. Reader discretion advised if you don't like that sort of thing.
Jane sighed, resting her head on the table for the briefest of moments before looking back up to the cold glow of her computer screen. Equations and theories all began to blur this late at night, turning the screen into hazy dancing blobs. Coffee. She needed more coffee to focus. Or maybe sleep. What the hell time was it anyway? She squinted her eyes at the dancing blob of the screen, trying to focus on the tiny clock in the corner. 3:43 AM. Alright, she thought blearily, I'll just finish compiling the data on this mock trial and then pass out. It's almost finished anyway. Leaning back in her chair, she blew out a puff of air, staring up at the ceiling of the lab.
At least SHEILD had squirreled her away someplace nice for a change. She was sick of underground bunkers and being hurried from one base to another and never seeing the stars. This old farmhouse out in the middle or rural Michigan had big bay windows and a wrap around porch. There was plenty of room and a fairly open floor plan, allowing her to convert the first floor into a lab space for all her equipment. Three bedrooms upstairs, a full basement, and an attached barn which housed her van rounded out the living spaces. All in all, it was more space than she thought she could use, but over the three weeks she'd been a resident of the farm, she'd spread her meager possessions all throughout the house. She still hadn't unpacked the few very personal belongings she'd been allowed the bring, though all her lab equipment was up and out of it's carefully packaged boxes almost as soon as she'd arrived. Subconsciously, she couldn't bring herself to relax enough to unpack the rest, always tense that she'd have to pack up again in a hurry if another call from SHEILD came.
The machines surrounding her sang with their soft electronic hum, mixing almost pleasantly with the gentle whir of her laptop. It lulled her into a rare relaxed state, and her eyelids drooped. She leaned her head back in her computer chair and pulled a knee up to her chest, feeling the stiffness in her joints. Jane rolled her head to the side drowsily, staring out the large open windows with the curtains flung wide to see the full moon and stars. They illuminated the nearby treeline; most of the acres that the house sat on was heavily wooded. Pleasant summer smells and a light wind rolled through the windows, easing the heavy heat of the July night.
Glancing back at the screen, she noted the program was ninety four percent done. She smiled, knowing that a soft mattress and dreamland was in her near future.
And then all the lights went out.
She startled, then dropped her head forward and groaned. The generator had a few instances of brown outs before, it might have something to do with the amount of electrical equipment she used, but it hadn't failed her yet. It was only a matter of time before something like this happened, she mused. She would have to go check the generator and the breaker box in the basement. Jane thanked whatever gods were watching over her that her laptop immediately went to battery power and continued running the mock trial, else she probably would have screamed in frustration. She slowly fumbled her way to the kitchen, the light of the full moon pouring in through the windows allowed her to not trip and die on the papers and machinery strewn somewhat haphazardly all over the first floor. The flashlights and the spare batteries shared the same drawer in the kitchen next to the sink, and she dug out the hefty flashlight with a rattle of metal on metal.
Flipping it on, She made her way carefully to the basement door, noting how eerily quiet it was without the constant hum of machinery. It made the soft step of her feet and the creak of the floorboards echo that much louder into the silence. Continuing forward, she thumped lightly down the basement stairs and made her way through the piles of assorted junk towards the far corner where the breakers and generator were. Some of the stacks were taller than her, and racks of old clothes occasionally had to be shoved out of the way. This stuff was here well before she was moved in, judging by the dust. Jane supposed it must have belonged to the former owners.
Finally making her way to the far corner where the breakers and generator resided, she popped the box open and peered inside. Nothing seemed to be out of the ordinary. A brilliant flash of green appeared out of the corner of her eye, and she whirled, shining the flashlight wildly towards where she thought she saw the movement. There was nothing there. She flashed the light around the cavernous room, still nothing. She checked the corner again. Maybe it was just that ugly green jacket on the end of the clothes rack? She shook her head, trying to clear it.
"You're jumping at shadows Jane, relax, you're fine." Saying the words out loud did little to convince herself of that fact, but she pushed her uneasiness aside and instead focused on the generator. Dropping to her knees, she poked and prodded at the machine, digging around in the parts and popping off the protective coverings. Still nothing. She could find no reason her generator has just… stopped.
With a deep sigh, Jane hauled herself to her feet and padded back across the cement flooring, pleasantly cold against her bare feet in the sweltering Michigan summer. SHEILD had forgotten to spring for air conditioning. She made a mental note to request a unit for the lab space to keep the computers cool if it got any hotter and thumped her way semi-gracefully up the basement stairs. Semi-gracefully in that she didn't trip and fall back down them in the dark, anyway.
Jane mounted the last stair when she heard a sound that made her heart drop – her phone was ringing. It was just any ring though, it was Secret Agent Man, the song Tony Stark had jokingly put on her phone as the ringtone for SHEILD. She had thought it was pretty funny at the time, but she had begun to dread the song, as it usually signified she had to move again. She rushed to the kitchen counter, tripping on a piece of equipment, dropping the flashlight, and stubbing her toe before she managed to dig it out of her purse, cuddled next to the pink taser Darcy had gotten her for Christmas.
"Yes, hello?" She sputtered into the phone, breathing heavily from her rush to get to the kitchen and hopping on one foot while she rubbed at her stubbed toe.
"Jane! Get out now. Your agents didn't make the last check in. Get –" And the cell went dead.
A deep chuckle echoed softly through the kitchen and Jane tensed in rising panic. She whirled around with her back to the counter, grabbing her purse and looking wildly around the room, seeing nothing in the moonlight falling through the open windows.
The soft laughter came again, echoing so she couldn't place where the sound was coming from. She shivered, eyes darting about as she tried to figure out what to do through the fog of creeping fear.
"Jane…" came a velvet whisper along with the ghostly sensation of a touch on her cheek.
That broke through the haze and the contingency plans hammered into her head by SHEILD came flooding back to the forefront of her memory. There was an emergency pack in her van, and a secondary emergency pack in the woods. She bolted for the lab and ducked behind a large desk housing paperwork and a now-dark computer. Dark laughter echoed from the kitchen, followed by heavy footfalls that creaked the floorboards as it walked through the lab.
"My, my, dear Jane Foster. How do they say it here on Midgard? You can run, but you can't hide."
The voice and heavy footfalls moved through the spacious room, heading towards the foyer. He was almost far enough… almost far enough… there! She crept back towards the basement door and slipped as quietly as possible down the stairs, trying not to fumble in the dark. Trying to remember the layout of the basement, she felt her way through the junk towards what she hoped was the door leading to the barn. Instead, she stubbed her toe on the generator, knocked part of a stack down as she hopped backwards, then froze and held her breath and she heard footsteps coming down the basement stairs.
Oh god. Oh god. Literally, a god. Was coming down the stairs. She desperately reached around in the dark and hit something made of wood. A wardrobe. She remembered it now as she opened the door and slid inside, thanking her lucky stars that it didn't squeak. Old, standing taller than her and lined with cedar, the wardrobe was empty and felt more like a cage than a safe haven. She shuddered and listened to the approaching footsteps and the mocking voice that came with it. Her skin felt alive with unpleasant tingles of electricity.
"Oh Jane, do come out. Though I admit, I haven't played hide and go seek for a millennia." His footsteps drew closer, stepping carefully through the junk. "It is rather enjoyable, isn't it? The tension, the joy of the hunt." He chuckled. "Not for the hunted, I suppose. If I listen closely, do you think I'd hear your heart beating out of it's chest?" She held her breath, trying desperately to still her rabbiting heart. His footsteps paused, shuffled a little, and she began to panic, but then they began to recede, heading towards the other side of the large room.
She refused to let out her held breath until his footsteps sounded their way up the stairs and began to creak across the floorboards into the kitchen. Ok. Now all she needed to do was sneak across the room without knocking any more junk over and get to her van. Oh boy.
That's when Loki, in all his armor and glory, the horns of his helmet brushing the ceiling, threw the doors of the wardrobe open wide and grinned ferally down at her. "Found you Jane Foster. I win."
And that's when she tased him.
He didn't drop, oh no. But he did real back, hiss in pain, and double over. She got the darts right in his uncovered neck. Jane took the opportunity presented to her, dropped the taser, and ran, adrenaline rushing through her veins and fear fueling her flight, miraculously dodging the piles of junk and running headlong towards the door to the barn. She had no idea how long he'll be immobile, but she suspects it won't be long. Jane thought briefly to herself as Loki manifested right in front of the exit not 3 seconds after, that it wasn't fair that he could shrug off 50,000 volts, and that it also wasn't fair that she had no traction to stop in time and was going to slam directly into his armored chest.
To her surprise, she went right through him and continued running up the stairs to the barn, not allowing herself to pause and think about what just happened. If she thinks about it too much, she'll slow down, and right now she's running on panic, adrenaline, and the single minded need to get away. She doesn't let herself think about the ways loki may plan to kill her, but allows the fear it provokes to fuel her burning legs and tensed muscles.
Up the stairs, bursting through the door, and into the shadows of the moonlit barn she runs, one hand digging in the purse she keeps in a death grip for the car keys. Grabbing them, she unlocked her van in record time and manages not to pull a classic horror movie move and drop them. Starting it up and throwing it into gear, she hit the gas and braced herself for the impending crash – she didn't bother opening the main barn door. With a resounding splintering and crash, the van flattened the old wood and streamed down the long packed dirt driveway.
Jane again tried to slow her breathing and calm her hammering heart so she can focus on the road, but she could see large things moving in the moonlight across the lawn and hear piercing shrieks over the roar of the van and the buzz in her ears. Large things with armor that glows. And laser rifles. Shit. Chitauri. Shit. Shitshitshitshit. Drive faster Jane. She really needs to start taking her own advice. The headlights shone brightly on two Chitauri standing braced in the middle of the road just around a curve and Jane panicked, jerking the wheel left as the Chituari opened fire. They blasted the passenger side off the van, and the force of the blast combined with the veer to the left started the van into a tumbling roll.
The shrieking of tearing metal and shattering glass drowned out the roars of the aliens in Janes ears as she was thrown head over heels, rattling around the front of the van and smashing into the windshield and steering wheel as the van rolled to a stop on it's roof. Laying on her back on the inside roof of her van, Jane can only dazedly think that she forgot to put on her seatbelt while she rolled onto her belly and crawled from the wreckage. The Chitauri are nowhere in sight, they must be approaching from the other side of the van.
The woodline. The trees are so close. There's another emergency pack in there. If she can just get to it…
Jane feels oddly light, can't hear, and feels no pain. She stands and starts to run towards the trees, but her ankle isn't working right. She keeps stumbling and her vision keeps blurring on her. Idly, she wondered if she's going into shock as her senses slowly come back to her. Hearing comes first, as the shrieking war cries and what must be the laughter of the Chituari comes echoing behind her. Smell comes next; the coppery tang of blood, leaking gasoline, and what smells oddly like burnt pork chops register slowly in her cloudy brain. She feels wet as she stilts her way towards the trees, but still feels no pain. She recognizes it's a bad sign, but the gravity of it hasn't hit her yet, adrenaline and fear sending chills through her limbs and keeping her moving as fast as she can.
Loki manifested in front of her again, but she kept up her staggering run, expecting to run straight through another illusion.
Jane slammed directly into his very real chest, the force of the impact bouncing her backwards to fall on her ass and knock the breath out of her. She blinked, flat on her back, breathing heavily and wondering dazedly what color green that is that's creeping in on the edge of her vision. She blinked again, unable to focus her chocolate brown eyes on anything around her until a blurry green, black, and gold shape overwhelmed her vision. The gold looks more silver in the moonlight.
Loki's face slowly came into focus, staring down at her with a predatory smile rife with wicked glee. He bent and reached down, fingers ghosting over the flesh of her throat. Jane shuddered and tried to swat his hand away, but she discovered that her right arm wouldn't obey her commands, and her left arm pushed feebly at the unwelcomed touch, unable to so much as move it a millimeter. His arm may as well have been rigid steel. Loki ran his thumb down the center of her throat, slowly wrapping the chilly fingers of his right hand around the back of her neck. He caressed the skin gently, almost like a lover's touch, and she shivered. Loki's smile grew and he tightened his grip, pulling her quickly up by her neck to dangle helplessly above the ground. Jane choked, his hold too tight, blocking off her airway. She scrabbled uselessly with her left hand, trying to rip at his fingers, trying to loosen the hold enough so that she could breath, but his fingers were as iron bands. Her right arm was still not obeying her, dangling uselessly at her side.
Loki looked into her eyes and tilted his head ever so slightly. The green stare caught her and held her, she felt like she was drowning, little black spots slowly closing in. "Well my dear Jane Foster, what a merry little chase you've led me on. It would've been so much simpler for you, and probably hurt far less, if you'd simply played by the rules of the game." He admonished. Loki gave her a little shake, then dropped her. If she'd had any air left, Jane thought she surely would have screamed when she hit the ground, as she landed on her bad ankle and blinding spikes of pain cut through her senses. Having no air, though, she merely choked and coughed, trying to pull oxygen into her starving lungs. She curled up on her left side, hair splayed out in brown waves on the dirt. Her left hand felt tenderly at her throat. He must've bruised her windpipe; she was still gasping and coughing like a fish out of water and her neck burned and throbbed.
Loki frowned and rolled her over onto her back with his boot. "Oh dear. I think the Chitauri have gone and damaged my new toy." His voice was velvet and venom in one. "Don't worry little Jane, I'll have you fixed up. After all, I can't have near as much fun with broken playthings."
Jane felt herself being lifted into the air as she tried to grasp what was going on, but the heavy pull of unconsciousness was calling to her. Her adrenalin was giving way to exhaustion, the stress taking it's toll. Jane stared almost unseeingly up at the clear night sky full of stars. She idly wondered if her mock run had made it to one hundred percent before surrendering to blackness.