So, hello there, everyone! This is my first Avengers story, and it's been dancing around in my head for weeks, so I had to write it down. I'll say right now that I haven't read any of the comics, and haven't seen all of the Marvel movies, so you'll have to forgive any mixed up info that you find. And when you do, please send me a review so I can try to fix it! :D And since I haven't seen all of the movies, I'm also worried about all of the characters remaining in character. So, if I ever step out of that realm, let me know. I always hate it when writers do that, and I would hate to be a hypocrite, you know?
All suggestions are totally welcome. I can handle constructive criticism, but let's not bash, please?
Leave a review if you feel so inclined! Let me know where I'm going wrong!
Disclaimer: I don't own anything remotely related to Marvel, comic books or movies. If I did, Loki would not be the bad guy in every movie he has appeared in. And he would be mine... obviously.
The fierce wind toyed with her hair, making it a mess of flames dancing behind her. Pink lips pursed, she stood stoically on the roof of Stark Tower, observing the destroyed remnants of Manhattan. Buildings' walls were torn open, leaving gun-shot like wounds in their wake. Glass was scattered all across the streets, the sun occasionally making them twinkle. The monotonous drone of construction trucks bustled over the shards, drowning out the no doubt loud cracking of the glass. It was incredible how fast the world was so eager to move on, to clean up and start over. Forget what happened and fix it. Make it seem like it didn't even happen.
"I can't believe Hulk did this to my house," she heard Tony whine. "I mean, it's one thing to beat the shit out of Loki, but really? Taking it out on my baby? You need to figure the Other Guy out a little bit better than that, Banner."
"You were the one who said that I needed to strut," Banner's smug voice rolled through her ears, and she couldn't stop the slight twitch of her lips as they tried to curl into a smile.
She should get back to S.H.I.E.L.D. They would need her help fixing everything that had been done. Her booted feet stayed glued to the roof instead.
Her green eyes darted over to the makeshift altar where Loki and Dr. Selvig had planted the Tesseract. All of this damage, this devastation, all caused by one small, glowing Cube. She had seen terrible things in her long lifetime, but never would she have expected for something like this to have happened to her planet. She hadn't even believed that aliens themselves were real, and just today, she nearly got herself killed by fighting them.
Despite being as aged as she was, everything of importance seemed to happen in a blink of an eye for Natasha Romanoff. This war with the God of Mischief only lasting days. Losing her best friend and getting him back in mere days. The Captain being found on the ice, Thor's first visit to Earth, all in the span of a year. Maybe it was her age that made everything seem short; she didn't know. She just knew that now, she was grateful for it all to be over at last. It was time to disappear again and be forgotten.
With a quiet sigh, she finally got her feet to move in the direction of the elevator. She ignored the jabs from Tony, demanding that she remain behind and help him clean his tower. And she ignored the stares from the other Avengers, simply pressing the 'down' button in the elevator and climbing aboard when the doors opened with a sweet 'ding'.
"Job well done, Agent," Nick Fury congratulated as she stepped aboard the flying vessel. "You're a hero today."
Natasha blinked her green eyes. "Where's Loki?" she asked in a gruff voice, avoiding the dark eye of her director, simply staring at the floor.
"I don't know if that's such a good idea," he replied slowly.
"We won, sir," she stated clearly. "There is nothing more that he can do. The Chitauri are dead, and Thor has the Tesseract. He couldn't trick me anyways; we've already acknowledged that," she debated, folding her arms defiantly across her suit and finally meeting his gaze.
Fury sighed and put his hands on his hips, giving her a small nod. "We put him back in the cage," he grumbled.
"Thank you, sir." Her feet carried her swiftly to the cage in firm and confident strides. Why she wanted to speak with the demigod was beyond her. She hated him with everything in her body, and she was least likely out of anyone she knew to be willing to provide a second chance for someone who had wronged her. But she wanted to see him.
It was the sick and twisted part of her from her childhood. The part that would never go away. To see a man's world crumble around him. To witness pain on her enemy's face. To provoke him and make him feel like the scum that he was. Loki had already treated her this way, and revenge was always something that the agent excelled at.
The doors slid open, a puke green colored cage appearing before her eyes, and a calm and collected Loki sitting on the bench.
So, absorbed in his own destructive thoughts, she crept stealthily up behind him. "Are you here to be a balm, Agent Romanoff?" his deep voice rumbled, making her pause in her advance.
"Depends on what you would call a balm, I suppose," she answered carefully, taking the same seat she had in their last interrogation.
"Surely not another strain of questions regarding my plans?" he continued.
"I don't know what kind of plans you could possibly have at this point," Natasha said snidely.
"I am the God of Mischief, or have you forgotten? I always have a plan."
"Not this time," she said coolly. "Unless it's a plan to be a kiss-ass to Thor and somehow escape and then take over another planet."
"What a lack of empathy you show for this other planet," he mused, and she could faintly see a twitch at he corner of his lips.
"I thought we already covered this. I'm Russian. I don't weep over fallen regimes."
"You were Russian, as I recall," he disagreed.
"It doesn't matter what I am. What matters is that you failed."
He chuckled darkly and stood to walk over to her. "And now I suppose it is your turn to verbally abuse me? Am I correct, quim?" Natasha blinked at the vulgar name, not allowing her mask to slip.
"I don't think that you could be," she replied.
"What?" He looked confused, eyebrows scrunching up together on his fair skin, and she almost smirked in delight.
"You don't have a heart. You're nothing but a monster with Daddy issues. Even when you were sure to win, notice how blessed Daddy stood by Thor. He doesn't care that you lost, does he? I bet he's just sitting on his pretty golden throne making a list of all of the tortures he can… concoct. Or better yet, he may not even let you return home."
"I don't want to go back there," he declared, but she could distinctly see his face losing its calmness and hurt taking its place.
"He could very well denounce you in front of all of Asgard. Thor told us everything." She smirked as she twisted his own words. "You're the monster that parents tell their children bout at night. You aren't even an Asgardian. Your blood is as cold as Jotunheim. Maybe Odin will spill the beans and tell everyone how much of a disappointment you are to his house. He regrets ever taking you under his wing. Should have left you to die in the cold wastelands as a baby. How could he love a monster like you? You lie and kill, but unlike me, you do it for fun, not even as a service. Your whole mind is goaled around destruction and pain, isn't it? How could anyone love pain? It surprises me that Thor even cares about you at all. You, who has threatened to kill everyone he loves, who has been nothing but a jealous brat, ungrateful. Maybe you have him under a spell too?" she sneered. "Just because you can't stand the thought that everyone hates you as much as they should."
"Bitch," he growled, turning away from her.
"At least I'm not going to be somebody's bitch when I go home."
"You got what you wanted," he barked. "You saved your precious Earth from me. Leave me."
"Oh how adorable. The Prince thinks that he has the power to tell me to leave."
"I may be in a cage, but I am not powerless here," he warned.
"Yes, you are. You could have done something hours ago to get out. Unless you like the abuse. I wouldn't be surprised it you did, you sick bastard."
In less than a second, he faced her once more, fist thumping viciously against the thick glass and making her jump in surprise. "When I do get out of here, and trust me, I will, you will be the first that I will kill. And I will enjoy every moment of it, I can assure you."
She scoffed and stood close to the glass, inches of glass the only thing separating their noses from touching. She could even see her breath land on the glass. "If you come back and you catch me, I'll enjoy every moment of it too. Hell, I'll give you exclusive rights to be my executioner."
He didn't respond, and she could tell that her words infuriated him. His nose was flaring dangerously, and his ice blue eyes trying to glare daggers into her. But she stared gently back at him, daring him to do something, anything that would give her reason to push that little red button on the console and send him to his death. "It's a shame," he finally commented after what seemed like hours. He pulled away from her and walked back steadily to his bench, taking a seat.
Natasha held her breath, trying to not let herself feel curiosity tremble through her body as to what he could possibly mean with his words. Silver Tongue indeed. Unable to withstand the build up, she huffed. "What is?"
"That you are not from Asgard. Surely, we would have been the greatest of friends," he replied with an authoritative easiness that unnerved her.
"I'm not friends with monsters, and I doubt that I would have been if I came from where you do," she bit back.
"Agent Romanoff, you are a monster," he debated with a full smile, sending a shiver down her spine. "You have been since your birth. It is who you are. And monsters typically can only befriend monsters. People who can understand them."
"Are you saying that you understand me then?" she retorted, feeling her control over the situation slowly slipping from her grasp.
"I would say that I understand you better than most," he agreed with a nod. "Just as you regretfully understand my motives and passions better than most. I would daresay that you know me better than Thor. And I suspect that I know you better than Barton."
"That's not true," she snapped. "You don't know anything about me."
"I know that your childhood was taken from you," he started, and her breath caught in the back of her throat, tears already beginning to surface in her green eyes. "Always meant to serve a greater purpose. As was I. Happiness was never something that you were meant for. You were meant for the cold, harshness of life. In order for everyone else in the world to be happy, one, solitary, abandoned girl was sent to be forever tortured."
"And you're the one, solitary, abandoned boy of Asgard," she responded, quirking an eyebrow.
"See?" His smile widened. "You understand more than you think, Agent Romanoff. We are the same." He made a gesture between the two of them, and she could feel bile rise up to the back of her throat at the accusation. It felt as if she had just been stung.
"I'm nothing like you. You kill for power, for pleasure."
"And you don't?" he questioned. "Every murder you committed in that Red Room, it was all for standing, wasn't it? With every kill, you were revered, congratulated. Even now, you feel as if you sit on a throne of power, being the only mortal who could possibly trick me, a master of lies. You love watching the life drain out of someone's eyes. It is your name, is it not? The Black Widow? A woman who kills for the pleasure, for the euphoria that a passing spirit brings. It is rather fantastic, isn't it?" he mocked. "When their life is gone, you are there to sweep up all of that dead energy, just basking in it, aren't you?"
"Stop it," she barked, marching up to the console and letting her hand hover over the button.
"My words frighten you," he remarked, unfazed by her outstretched hand.
"Your words are lies. Just like all of your words. You don't know me," she repeated.
"Then prove to me that you don't feel pleasure after the kill," he challenged.
"I don't need to prove anything to scum like you. You, who compromises everything you touch. Even the most beautiful of things, you turn into a dark and mutated thing. You're a virus, just here to suck the joy and life out of anything that you can land on." She didn't let him retort, turning on her heel and walking out of the room, pressing her back against the wall once she had escaped.
Her heart was pounding in her ears, and her breaths were ragged as she thought of her conversation with the god. She had had the upper hand at the start, and she knew that her words were going to bother him for a good long while. Most of them probably weren't even true, but they were the words that got her point across. But the words that he had retaliated with… those words cut her deeply, carving out even more of her humanity. Did she really enjoy the kill?
"Tasha?" she heard, jumping and meeting the clear eyes of her partner. Of Barton. "What's wrong? What'd he do to you?" he growled, hand falling on the gun at his waist and looking like he was going to charge into the room and kill Loki.
"Nothing!" she replied, reaching out and holding onto his arm tightly. "It's my own fault. I went in there to provoke him."
Clint scoffed at her. "And how did that turn out for you?"
Natasha gulped and looked down at the floor. "Not as well as I would have liked. But I got my point across. I returned the favor."
Clint looked long and hard at her, quarreling with himself over the possibility that she was fine. She didn't look it by any means, but Natasha rarely ever looked fine anymore. Beautiful, always. But the thoughts that were in her head were tearing her apart, and it hurt him to see how she was, in essence, destroying herself. And there was nothing that she would let him do about the situation either. He could preach that he was always going to be there for her if she ever needed to talk about anything, but he knew that it would only fall on deaf ears. She would nod and say that she may take him up on that offer someday, but that someday was never going to come. Because Natasha Romanoff didn't take help from anyone. Not that kind of help anyway. Because she could handle it. She could do it by herself, and she was convinced that she could do it better than anyone else too. She didn't need help. But he had to try anyway. "If you need to talk about it, Natasha…" he started.
"I may take you up on that offer someday, Clint. But honestly. I'm fine," she stated, flicking a piece of red hair out of her face. "I'm going to take a shower, I think."
Clint nodded and watched her trump off towards her quarters with well calculated grace. She probably didn't even know that she did that anymore. Parts of her old life remained, too deeply ingrained for her to erase. Like her walk. The way her hips teasingly swayed back and forth, and how her legs were made to look like masterpieces with every stride.
Shaking his head, he barged into the cage room, immediately seeing a smile break out on Loki's face. "Agent Barton," he greeted.
"Stay the fuck away from her," he started.
Loki merely chuckled. "I do believe that she was the one who sought me out."
"Bull shit," Clint spat. "You've been playing her ever since this whole thing started. You just didn't put the scepter on her to make it official."
Loki chuckled again. "Is this love, Agent Barton?"
Clint struggled for a moment, trying to make his face impassive and indifferent, but he knew that the God of Lies very easily saw through the charade. "It's none of your business whatever the hell it is. Just know that if you come after her with any of your dirty tricks, I'm coming for you."
Loki's grin widened, making Clint shuffle nervously on his feet. "Oh, didn't you hear? She's given me exclusive rights to be the one who kills her for the monster that she is. Check the surveillance. You'll hear it loud and clear."
"You manipulated her words on the tape," he accused.
"In a cage?" Loki retaliated, gesturing to the small fortress.
Barton didn't seem to be able to come up with anything in retort, and he left, running a hand through his cropped his, frustrated.
Loki watched as the door closed behind the agent before taking his seat again. He had almost forgotten that this hadn't been the cage that he had been in once before. That one had no doubt been destroyed when he tried to send Thor to his death. A failed attempt.
He snarled as the thought emerged in his head, along with all of Romanoff's harsh, well calculated words. He failed at everything in his life. He failed at being a proper son of Odin, a brother to the magnificent Thor, a king of Asgard, a destroyer of a demonic race… He had even failed taking over one measly planet that was eons behind his own. He simply could not win. You're going to lose. It's in your nature. The other agent's words ripped through him, and it was then that he finally started to grasp the seriousness of the situation. It was his nature. Never before had he fairly won anything in his life, and he didn't suspect that that would happen now, already a millennia into his life. He would never win. Fate had already determined him to be the loser.
The one, solitary, abandoned boy.
He frowned now, fighting the tears that started making their way behind his eyes. Perhaps he and the Widow were more similar than he had expected. Yes, he had tried to make her see all of the similarities in their lives, but now that he was alone with his thoughts, he really understood how much their lives were intertwined. Alone, tortured, devious, hidden.
Sentiment. What a foul word. Seemingly fouler when it applied to him. It made him sick.
Quick to dispense of the emotions tumbling through him, he focused his energy on a more chief situation. How to get out of here this time.
Steve Rogers was a soldier. Through and through. Made for taking commands and executing them to his fullest availability, even if it meant laying down his life for the cause.
But that didn't mean that he didn't worry, that he was oblivious to the turmoil that surrounded him on the job. He saw the anguish that Agent Barton was going through, saw how he looked like he was ready to explode out of his suit and put and arrow through someone's eye socket. But he remained quiet.
He noticed how Ms. Romanoff was secluded from the rest of the Avengers, sitting by herself in her room without moving, as if she were dead.
Everyone around him was joyous and relieved that Loki had been defeated with minimal damage, considering the evil. Everyone except the two agents, both absorbed in their troubles. What these troubles were exactly, he was unsure, as both were exceptional at masking their true feelings and emotions. He just knew that neither of them should be alone with those thoughts. Grieving over what was lost was not something to be grieved over alone. It was the quickest way to lose yourself in the pain.
With this in mind, he trudged to Natasha's sleeping quarters, knowing that she was in there. He had seen in on the cameras that seemed to be everywhere. He bravely knocked on the metallic door, not hearing a sound before the door swung open to reveal a tried looking woman.
"Cap?" she started, as if he was not the person that she had expected to see. "What are you doing here? Is it," she hesitated. "Is it Loki? Did he escape?" she turned on her heel, reaching for the skin tight cat suit hung on the wall.
"No!" Steve exclaimed catching her shoulders. "No, it's not that. Loki's still in containment. He's not getting out of there anytime soon either."
Natasha sighed and flicked a stray piece of hair out of her face before settling down on her bed. "Then why are you here?" she demanded in a tight voice.
"To see how you were," Steve replied carefully. "I know that losing Agent Coulson was not part of the plan, and it's okay to be upset over his death, but we need to move on now. He gave us that final push to ban together and save everyone."
"What are you talking about?" she asked curiously, looking rather confused as she gazed up at him with green eyes.
"Well, that's why you're secluding yourself from the others, isn't it? You're sad that Coulson is dead," he answered.
Natasha gulped and looked down at her hands on her lap. "Sorry to disappoint, Cap. I'm not one to grieve very much. Not like this anyway. I didn't even know him that well, besides. He was a great man, but… well, this isn't the first time that I've been around death. It doesn't faze me like it used to."
Steve took a step back, even more confused with her answer. "Then why are you upset?"
"I'm not," she replied readily, flashing him a breathtaking smile that made him blush. "I just can't believe that we won. The odds were so against us, and we won." She laughed quietly. "Winning isn't something that I can ever get accustomed to. And I don't like to handle my reaction around people. Don't worry about me. I'm perfectly fine. You should get back to the party. I'm sure that you're missed. Maybe I'll join a little bit later. Maybe after a nap."
Steve nodded nervously before turning back to the door and leaving, giving her a smile as he left. Well, it was a relief to know that she was alright. That only left Barton to confront.
Natasha breathed out a shaky sigh as the door closed behind her fellow Avenger. He was such a gentleman, sweetly caring about the fact that she was distraught and even willing to come and try to cheer her up about it. And what had she done in response? She had done what she was best at. She had lied.
Her thoughts sourly turned to the caged god several floors beneath her. A god of lies. Of tricks, of everything that was remotely evil. She chuckled darkly. Maybe if she had been from Asgard, like he had mentioned, she would have been the Goddess of Lies. Because it was as he had told her, they were far too similar to each other. And the fact disgusted her. But it was true. She and Loki Laufeyson were the same. The only difference being that she was mortal, and a lousy mortal at that. She was already beyond her expiration date, and she was expected to live for perhaps a century longer, probably more. She couldn't even find a gray hair on her head.
She was an immortal mortal, and Loki was immortal.
So, how did you guys like it? I'm a little iffy about how I portrayed Clint… I love him, don't get me wrong, but, like most BlackFrost stories, I think that he is going to need to be an antagonist. So, let me know! Thanks!
Love you all lots!
- Books