When she drags herself through the door that night, the only thing on her mind is sleep.
No matter how much she wants to drag her gear on the ground, she does her best to tiptoe through the hallways. Her bag scrapes against the wall and she shushes it and in so turning, her backpack clicks into the other wall the buckles clatter on the plaster. She curses quietly and breathes deeply, trying to stay quiet. Hah. She's a bull in a china shop; clumsy is her middle name.
When she finally makes it to her room without waking any of the other people in their condo, she drops her bags gratefully onto the ground, sighing in contentment as the straps fall off her shoulder and the blood returns to her arms. She really needs to stop this crazy schedule of six am to ten pm out of the house. It means she has to take all her belongings with her and lug them around all day. It's such a different and surreal experience for her after having literally nothing of her own for twenty two years of her life.
Shuddering with sore muscles, she pulls her tight long sleeved shirt over her head, wincing as her aching arms twitch. She kicks off her running shoes and strips out of the socks. When she's finally de-layered enough to feel comfortable, she wanders out into the hall on bare feet.
In the kitchen she barely suppresses a groan when she opens the fridge. There is no such thing as leftovers when you live with Thor. He doesn't even leave anything leftover, not a scarp. You'd think that a god that muscly wouldn't want the carbs and go for the protein but Thor seems to be addicted to anything that has high fructose corn syrup in the label. She pounds her head gently on the fridge door in frustration and then heads to the pantry. She really doesn't want to cook at this hour, with the microwave clock digits reading eleven twenty seven, so she spends only half a frustrated moment in front of the bare pantry before sighing and heading for bed.
As she turns to leave the kitchen something prickles on the back of her neck like a premonition. She turns slowly, expanding her mind.
She might not be an Avenger right now, but Jaycee Strong knows how to use her powers. Over these past seven months she's been practicing and telepathy and telekinesis are always at her fingertips now.
When she opens up her mind, she doesn't feel another consciousness around her. Just a chill? She doubts it. Twenty two years of high adrenaline fighting for your life teaches you to trust your instincts. Something is off but she can't tell what. It might not even be here, might be something else. She's gotten better at picking up emotions over the weeks since the battle on the Bifrost and she can sense something but can't place it. It doesn't feel malevolent or threatening. Maybe she's just picking up on the dream waves from upstairs; after all she does live with crazy scientists, a god from Asgard and a sassy undergrad intern.
She can't dismiss it entirely but she lets it go for now. Exhaustion in rising in her in waves and when she's tired, she can't think as well. That's from lots of experience. Well, bed it is then. She killed a three hour CrossFit training workout combo today and she's feeling pretty good endorphin wise but her body is going to rebel tomorrow morning if she doesn't rest.
With one last furtive look at the shadows in the kitchen, Jay goes to bed.
"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
She can't sleep.
She rolls over onto her other side but her mind is working a thousand thoughts a second and her legs feel twitchy. Normally when this happens she tries to clear her mind but she finished her workout so late tonight that she's buzzing on a runner's high. That and she got close to working out an astrophysics equation today and the numbers have been swimming in her head since class this morning. Ugh, this sucks. She actually really does want to sleep tonight.
Reluctantly Jay gets out of bed. First she does some yoga sequences to try and lengthen her muscles and calm her breathing. When that doesn't work she contemplates going on a quick nighttime run but realizes that will probably just exacerbate the situation. Grrrrrrr, she thinks and wishes she didn't have such an overactive imagination because if she's being honest, she's still up because even when she falls asleep, nightmares plague her, running on the backs of her eyelids like film.
It's bad enough that voices fill her head all day long but now they also haunt her at night. She has too many memories now, when all she wanted when she was little was the recollection of her parents and life. Now she has so many memories that she hasn't even stumbled upon them all yet. They are painful; she didn't live an easy life. That and she has memories that aren't her own.
She finds herself wandering in Jane's lab, bare feet cold on the tiles. She decides that if she can't sleep, then she might as well get some work done. She pulls up a chair to her usual desk and pulls her jacket from the back of the seat and wraps herself in it, rubbing her toes against the top of her other foot to try and warm up a bit. She plops down into the chair and clicks the desk lamp on, a small circle of yellow light illuminating her messy desk. Maybe she should use her extra energy to actually try to organize it. Now there's a thought. But she does know where everything is right now and she'll forget if she tries to order this chaos. Go figure.
She pulls out a book on nebula formation from under her scribbled notes and doodles. Jay slumps to her elbows and rests her chin in her hand as the scratches out notes about stardust.
A crash and rattle of metal splits the silence and Jay is up and out of her chair, going for the knife she keeps in her waistband before the noise has settled. Her book crashes to the ground in a flurry of pages and the spine snaps. Adrenaline floods her system and her eyes expand to allow the maximum amount of light in. She tilts the desk lamp down so her eyes adjust better to the gloom. She glances quickly at the clock on the wall. Two thirty one am. No one with honorable purposes is making such a racket at this hour.
She hears footsteps shuffling on the slick floor and the shadow of someone hunched over fills the doorway.
The galloping thunder of her heart drowns her ears. She wants to try and reach out her mind but she's so terrified right now that this is someone to take her away again that she momentarily shuts down. Please, no, anything but that. The terror is primal and instinctive and although she can calm herself marginally, it still presses against her other rational thoughts.
The figure takes a stuttering step forward and she can tell it's a man. She fingers curls around the hilt of her knife and she steps backwards, out of the lamplight. She sees a glint from the eyes of the person in front of her, catlike in the gloom. A garbled, fluid-filled plea comes from the figure and he suddenly collapses in front of her, crashing face down into the light.
The sight that confronts her is not what she expected but she doesn't relax her defensive stance. She's trained enough with the Hawk lately that she already has three plans in her mind that run through different scenarios. But her dagger tip lowers slightly.
A bleeding man with tangled black hair and ragged, shredded clothes is sprawled facedown at her feet, giving jerky spasmodic movements that clearly say he's in pain. She doesn't release her hold on her knife for several moments. Then she kneels down at his side and feels his pulse, ready to snatch back her hand in case this is a trap. The beat of his heart is sluggish and he seems to be trying to move the weight away from his ribs. She knows that she's too trusting but she can't justify sitting here watching a man in agony gasp at her feet. Gently she grasps his shoulders and rolls him over onto his back.
Without realizing what she's doing, she moves his arms to comfortable positions and then looks at him, his face covered by his dark, unruly hair. Her fingers drift to his jawline and she carefully brushes the hair from his face.
Her gasps when she sees his face is accompanied by a fast scurry backwards, a hand over her mouth.
Loki is lying on the ground in agony, a tight black thread binding his lips together, blood crusted all over his lower face and jaw. His eyes turn towards hers and weakly he tries to say something as she looks at him in shock and horror. But she can't understand and then a familiar voice, hurt and pleading sears into her mind with that vivid intensity she remembers.
Jaycee, please…. Jaycee…please…..