Disclaimer: Thor/Avengers©Marvel
Warnings: (temporary) hearing loss, hospitalization, hurt/comfort
Notes: Written for Round 2 of Dreamwidth's hc_bingo, the prompt being "hearing loss."

Resurrection

This really wasn't one of his better ideas.

To be perfectly honest with himself, he hadn't been having very good ideas at all since falling from the Bifrost; even that itself hadn't been a stellar idea. He'd simply thrown himself to whatever the Norns had outlined for him, and apparently those wenches had a twisted sense of humor.

A suicidal drop from the Bifrost had only been the first of a long string of bad ideas. Falling to Midgard should have been viewed by him as a second chance, an opportunity to build a life for himself where he wasn't overshadowed by Thor's achievements, all he had to do was go anywhere but Puente Antiguo. Yet for some reason it had seemed like a good idea to render himself invisible and possess the mind of one of his brother's pet mortals.

This was followed by manipulating the old man into a position where he could ride along to snatch the Cosmic Cube for his own use, getting his ass handed to him by his brother's new playmates (and yes, this world was detrimental to his vocabulary but added some nuances to it as well), slinking off to Europe to lick his wounds, falling in with Doctor Doom, all of which lead to right now:

In the middle of a fight with some star-spangled fool in a mask while his idiot brother, the metallic-armored nitwit, and the Jolly Green Giant took on a hoard of Doombots. His erstwhile comrade Doom (and to be honest? The man was a bit worrisome, and he honestly feared for his virtue if he continued working with the Latverian ruler) was having trouble of his own with the Fandral wannabe, and he had long since lost track of The Woman.

Most of his attention was focused on his own troubles, but he still noticed when Doom managed to lose his opponent and pick up the weapon he had claimed would put an end to all of their collective troubles. At the time of its invention, he'd still been furious with his fath— with Odin and Thor by extension (never Frig— Mother, she had always been there for him and was truly who he missed the most while trapped here on Midgard with no way home and no pardon if he ever did) and therefore thought it a grand plan. Now, however, he was starting to doubt his own thoughts, beginning to wonder if there was something wrong with him; all his plots since coming to this world had been designed to hurt and harm, none of the harmless, innocent, joyful pranking of his youth.

And for some reason, when Doom turned the weapon onto his brother, Loki had teleported away from his own fight and shoved Thor out of the concussion beam's range.

His eyes snapped open, briefly panicking until he remembered what had happened and where he was. Loki let out a faint sigh that he couldn't hear at the moment and turned his head to the side. As he'd expected, Thor was still in the chair next to his bed, right where he'd been when the younger dropped into a drug-induced slumber.

It had been a little over two days since the Avengers (whom Loki was still privately thinking of as Thor plus the Lady Widow and the Warriors Four) had arrived in Latveria to stop him and Doctor Doom's scheme. Even during the fight, he'd been having second and third thoughts, and it had come to a head when he took a shot meant for Thor.

He really should have been paying more attention when Doom was explaining it (he'd tuned out in an effort to keep from feeling utterly filthy under the man's gaze), because while his magic had kept both himself and Thor from being reduced to ether, his focus had been on protecting his brother; he'd kept them both alive but he'd been effectively rendered deaf for the remainder of the fight.

And maybe a little closer to unconscious than to fully conscious, but he'd still managed to weave a pox on his former ally. It would be at least a month or two before the "good" doctor set foot outside of a sickroom; even if the man had received a vaccination for Midgardian smallpox, Loki's magic had rendered a variant of the disease that wouldn't be counteracted by anything but time and bed rest.

He wasn't the god of mischief for nothing, after all.

Loki was drawn out of his thoughts by a hand resting on his shoulder, and he turned to the other side of his hospital bed to blink in confusion at the man standing there; Thor slept on (which was just embarrassing given that he wasn't deaf at the moment). He hadn't seen this one at the fight, but that didn't mean he was unfamiliar with him. After all, there weren't many who spent time around the Avengers except for their advisor.

Although it probably would have been expected for him to sneer at the mortal, Loki didn't much feel like continuing on as he had from his first moment on Midgard, so he just offered an apologetic smile when the man spoke words he couldn't hear.

"I'm sorry," he said, knowing the words were coming out but not hearing them (and wasn't Ithat/I an odd experience for Loki Silvertongue?), "but I still can't hear anything."

The man nodded slightly before pointing to the bedside table. Loki followed his silent directions curiously and noted a small computer (laptops, he thought he'd heard them called) set up on the surface. There were words on the screen in English, and he scanned them quickly.

He was a bit surprised to see his own words rendered into text, situated below what the advisor (Special Agent Phil Coulson, according to the screen) had asked him.

"That's to be expected," Coulson replied, the laptop dutifully recording his words so that Loki could "hear" him. "Our doctors said that the damage to your eardrums was extensive but there's nothing more they can do. Your brother, however, thinks that once you're feeling better you'll be able to correct the problem on your own. Until then, we'll communicate with you through Stark's speech recognition program."

"Thank you," Loki said, finding that he meant the words. "What happens after that?"

Coulson looked at him for a moment, and it was all he could do to Inot/I squirm; it reminded him a bit of when he and Thor would cause a bit of harmless chaos as children and were called out on it by Odin. He didn't know if this man was a parent or not, but he certainly had the Ilook/I down.

"That's up to you," Coulson finally said. "You kept one of my team from harm, even if you were initially part of the problem, and that puts you on my good side. Once you've recovered, you're free to go wherever you like. Just know that if you cause any trouble, I will not hesitate to handle the situation myself.

"Or," he continued, "you could choose to stay. I'm sure your brother would be happiest if he knew where you were at all times. He has this strange tendency to worry."

"He's annoyingly like Mother that way," Loki grumbled. Louder (for Coulson, since he wouldn't be able to hear himself until his magic was strong enough to correct the damage) he asked, "And do what? Be a permanent houseguest of your band of warriors?"

"I was hoping you'd be one of my 'band of warriors.'"

Loki blinked, any response he might have made muted by shock. He knew exactly what he'd been doing since arriving on this world, and none of it was exactly what one would call even vaguely heroic with the exception of his most recent actions. Yet this total stranger, who only knew him through iall/i of those actions, was basically offering him a job.

No, more than that, he realized slowly (and it was almost as embarrassing as his brother sleeping through this, how slow on the uptake he was today): this stranger was offering him that second chance he'd neglected to take at the beginning.

A second chance and someplace new to call home.

"Let me think about it," Loki finally managed to say. He already knew what his answer was going to be, but he wanted to talk to Thor first; he wanted this, more than he'd realized, but he didn't want to intrude on his brother's life.

Coulson smiled. It seemed like he already knew the answer, too.

End Notes: And thus, by the way, is how Loki joined the Avengers and is there to pull his shenanigans in 4 People... and the 1 Person.