At ten o'clock, exactly, there was a knock on the door. Fran reluctantly poked her head out into the hallway. As she expected, there were two beefy agents standing there expectantly.

"Oh, hello." She smiled up at them. They looked back stoically and fingered their assault rifles.

"We're your replacements for the evening, mam."

"Sorry to say, but you're not really needed tonight. He's, kinda feeling under the weather, so I figured I'd stay and monitor him." She pointed vaguely behind her. Through the door, which Fran had been holding open, they spied a lump under the covers. They glanced at each other nervously and then the shorter of the two gave a slight shake of the head. He turned back to her and said,

"If you want to spend your off time with that,go right ahead, but we're still staying."

Fran frowned, but didn't say anything as they took their assigned places on either side of the door and fell into the classic at ease position. At least for tonight, they would be an inconvenience, but she was almost positive that the agents wouldn't ever bother to go into the room unless they heard something suspicious. She shrugged and let the door close. As she made her way back into the bathroom, she mussed up her decoy villain a little more, making sure that the covers concealed the Loki-shaped pillows from anyone that came in through the doorway.

In the hours that he had been 'chilling,' Loki had at least stabilized. His fever was still very high, but he wasn't getting any worse. Every so often, Fran scooped more of the melting ice on top of him, but that was all she had to do. He wasn't moving except to breathe and every so often crack a fever-crazed eye open. Her talk with the agents, as brief and quiet as it was, must have woken him up again, since when she went back into the bathroom his head was lolling around weakly and an arm had escaped the tub, draping down to make a giant puddle on the floor.

"Oh, Loki…" She muttered exasperatedly, but when she turned to swipe a towel from the sink, the corner of her mouth tweaked upwards. Loki blearily shifted his head towards her and then closed his eyes. She plonked his arm back into the tub, wiped everything up, and knelt to sift more ice onto him. Almost half of it had already melted, surrounding him with little ice chip icebergs that bobbled into his clothes and his hair. Fran didn't know how he accomplished it, but even out of his mind with sickness and crammed into a bathtub, he managed to avoid looking like a drowned cat. Instead, his raven locks dipped into the water and framed his face beautifully, floating gently on the miniature current stirred by his breathing. His clothes weren't bubbling up awkwardly, either. Oh, no. They had molded to his body, the green deepening to a rich emerald that caught the light and reflected against the porcelain of the tub and the black turning the surrounding water and ice into a miniature arctic ocean at night. All in all, he looked regal, arrogant, and oh so pretty.

It just wasn't fair. Not at all.

Finished with her task, Fran reached down, tweaked a particularly rebellious bit of his hair, and then pressed a hand to his forehead. Expecting it to be boiling, she was pleasantly surprised that it actually seemed cooler. When she saw the results of a hurried temperature check, she was ecstatic. His fever had broke!

She plopped herself back onto the toilet in relief and buried her face into her hands. As she sagged against the edge of the counter, there was a commotion in the hallway. She jerked her head up and craned around the half-closed door to look. When Thor burst into the room and headed towards the bed, she dove out of the bathroom, throwing herself between the Asgardian and his target.

"Hello, Mr. Odinson." She gave him a big smile and then waved jauntily to the gaping guards as the door slid closed on them.

"Thor, Lady Fran! I have told you to call me Thor!" He smiled at her panicked look, clapped a hand on her shoulder, and then swiveled around her towards the covers.

"Mr…Thor…No!"

But it was too late, Thor had pulled the comforter back just enough to reveal, not his brother's head, but a plump, white pillow. In an instant, the sheets were all ripped off. The prince stared at the faux-Loki, fabric dangling from a clenched hand. Slowly, he turned to the agent, his face twisted into a deadly glower, and ground out in a voice that many an enemy had heard right before they got their head smashed in by his hammer,

"Where is he?"

Without taking her eyes off of him, Fran pointed towards the bathroom. He dropped the sheets and stormed inside. As quickly as she could, the agent tossed the comforter back over the pillows and then followed. Thor was kneeling on the floor, one pale, dripping hand clenched in both of his.

"What has happened to my brother?"

"When I got him to the room he was already weak, but he just kept getting worse." Fran took a shuddering breath and then sagged against the doorframe. "I'm sorry. This was the only thing I could think of. I should have had him taken to the clinic, but…I just…he would have hated it."

Thor stroked Loki's forehead and then stilled. He couldn't remember the last time his brother had been sick. He couldn't remember if Loki had ever gotten sick. To see him so completely helpless terrified the hero. How bad was his illness that it had reduced his prickly, prideful brother to such a point that he didn't even recognize him? He wanted to haul him up and cart him to this Midgardian 'clinic' as fast as he could, but he agreed with the agent. In fact, she had done exactly what he supposed Loki would have done if he were aware enough. His damned idiot of a brother would rather die than get handled by Midgardians. If his experience in New Mexico had taught him anything, it was that being treated by their healers was not a pleasant experience. Would they strap him down and then feed tubes into his skin? Keep him forcibly drugged? Most probably. He tuned back in just in time to hear the agent say,

"But his fever's finally broke. I just checked his temperature before you came in. So he's doing better…" A pause. "I'm am really sorry about this. I…"

"No, Lady Fran. It might not have been the best thing to do for his health, but you showed my brother a kindness. He would not have wanted to go to your clinic."

"Oh." Was all she had to say.

They lapsed into silence, both unsure of what to do. Finally,

"You said he was improving?"

"Yes. I think in about an hour or so, he can come out of the tub." Fran slowly skirted her way around the blond mountain of muscle and reclaimed her seat on the toilet, stretching forward to carefully place a hand on Loki's forehead. Even in the minutes since she last checked, it had grown substantially cooler. It seemed as though this bit of sickness was to go the same route as the vomiting – hitting fast and disappearing almost as rapidly.

"I still do not understand how Loki has gotten so ill." Thor's nostrils flared in frustration and he twitched his head violently to the side as if giving himself a mental slap, "When we left Asgard he was weak, but…" He trailed off. Finally The agent picked up,

"And why was he weak, Thor?" For the tiniest instant, unnoticed by the superhero, her lip curled back into the echo of a snarl. Her words, however, remained politely concerned.

"As part of his sentence, our father stripped him of his magic, but he couldn't have known this would happen. No, he wouldn't have let us leave so soon if he had known…" He slipped Loki's hand back into the water, the resulting splash echoing into condemning silence. A slender hand fluttered over and then settled onto his upper arm.

"I'm sure he didn't realize. Unless our intelligence department is dropping the ball, Odin doesn't seem like the type to do something so awful to his son."

To many, Thor of Asgard might have been a tower of muscle and might driven by a huge heart and not much more. In fact, Fran knew that a good forty percent of the agents referred to him in terms of 'all brawn, no brains.' But the weighing, thoughtful look and the steely poise that pushed back pain were early signs of a very astute ruler. He put a still-soggy paw over her hand and then stood, pulling her with him. He tugged them out of the bathroom and sat them on the edge of the bed, mindful to keep a direct line of sight to the Jotun.

"You do realize we can't tell anyone about this, right?" Fran turned a pleading expression on the God of Thunder. He turned from his bathtub vigil to raise his eyebrows at her.

"You did a noble thing, Lady Fran. It is not something to hide."

So, not quite ready to rule, then.

"Thor…"She sighed, "I believe I did, at some point, tell you to call me just Fran. And yes, it is something to hide. Even if you told only Fury, in the strictest confidence, what I did, he'd know how weak Loki was. And I'd probably get in trouble for not taking him to the clinic. I really don't want to get into what might happen if you tell anyone else."

"What has been done is done. And as for Fury, I am responsible for my brother. If I do not take offense at your actions, he should not, either."

"Subtlety, Thor. It's called subtlety." Fran stared him down until he caved with a rough,

"Aye."

An hour later, Fran undid pillow Loki and Thor hauled his brother out of the bathtub, stripped him down, and settled him into bed. He paused in front of the agent, who had hunkered back down in her chair.

"He will not have any memory of this, will he?"

"If we're lucky, no." She snorted.

"And you are sure…?"

"Yup." She sank into her chair as if he'd try and cart her off to Fury right then and there and eyed him balefully. Thor just gave her a weak smile and, in what was becoming the standard greeting, in Fran's opinion, patted her on the shoulder.

"Take care, then, Fran. And get some rest."

Finally! A name breakthrough!

"Aw, I will. You, too, big guy."

After Thor was gone, Fran kicked back and propped a book on her tummy, settling herself in for a long wait.

Loki was naked. He was in a strange bed and he was naked. He immediately reached for a spell, but found a nothing at all. It was as if his body had rejected the very idea of magic. Paths that had been carved years ago had been smoothed and power cleansed so that his mind, his soul, was veritably virginal. The knowhow was burning away in there, but the execution just….couldn't.

'Oh. Oh, damn.'

He cracked an eye open and spied his nursemaid, oh-so-innocently asleep in a chair across the room. If he couldn't have magic first thing in the morning, then at least he could have a strangulation. He launched himself out of bed only to crash to the floor.

This, in turn, woke up Fran who jumped to attention, book rocketing off her chest. It only took two seconds of growling from around the bed to figure out what happened. She slowly walked over, making sure to stop well out of grabbing range. He made quite a sight, back ramrod straight, hands flexing at her throat, covers pooling over him. It took five minutes of cursing in around twenty languages and some failed swipes before his eyes stopped spitting green fire and he sulked back into the mattress.

"Are you done with your hissy fit, Mr. Laufeyson?" Her question came out in a concerned, detached way, without a hint of ill will.

Loki Looked like was about to pop a gasket.

"Before you explode – no, you are not naked; you have pants on."

Loki quickly peeked under the sheets. He did, indeed, have trousers on. He plucked at the waistband experimentally. They were stretchy.

"They're called sweats. And you changed yourself since you managed to sweat through the stuff you had on. You were pretty out of it last night."

The prince's nostrils flared as if he had gotten a whiff of a particularly potent lie and his lip curled into a snarl. "A fever and nausea do not merit memory loss. What did you do?"

Fran sheepishly shifted from one foot to another and then very slowly, "Mr. Laufeyson, I didn't do anything. You changed yourself. You practically bit my hand off when I tried to help."

With a snort, Loki struggled back onto the bed, ignoring the agent's calm offers to help. He couldn't have been that sick, could he? Was the idiot agent kindhearted enough to keep him, dreaded villain extraordinaire, from death? No. He'd much rather believe he'd been drugged. It was the more plausible explanation, after all. Knock him out while he was weak and…do things. And it would explain why he was feeling so much better. There was no possible way to rebound from such a sickness so quickly.

"Did they tag me somehow, or take samples?"

Like the agent would tell on her own people. And sure enough, she spluttered,

"Huh?"

"What did they do to me while I was out? Tell me, agent."

"Mr. Laufeyson, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Oh…!"

Politely plowing over him, she asked, "Now, do you want to take a shower before breakfast?"

And without further ado, she ripped the covers off of him, threw them on the floor, and traipsed into the bathroom.

"I'm leaving some towels and a change of clothes on the sink. Any toiletries you find are yours." Came floating out of the open door. When she came out to rummage in his closet, Loki watched her like a hawk surveying a particularly juicy mouse.

"You're evil underneath all that sweetness. Positively evil."

Settling on a nice pair of slacks and a black t-shirt, she turned to him in exasperation, "Mr. Laufeyson, I don't particularly like being forceful, but sometimes it's necessary to do my job. So please, just get in the bathroom."

Twenty minutes later, Fran and a freshly scrubbed Loki were sitting at a corner table in the cafeteria. The agent was happily munching on pancakes while her charge glared at passerby and stabbed his eggs to death.

"You sure you don't want to eat any more?" Fran eyed his half eaten toast while shoving a loaded, syrupy forkful in her mouth.

"No, you damned woman. You dragged me here, isn't that enough? Leave me be."

"Okay." A hand reached over and snatched his unopened fruit cup and milk. He twitched at the sight of his leftovers being carted off into enemy territory and moved to grab them back. Fran held them to her chest and jerked out of his reach.

"You said you were done!"

"I didn't say you could snatch the food from my plate!" He managed to wrangle the milk carton from her and stood. Quickly seizing his tray, he wobbled over to the bin he had seen other agents dump their trash in and pitched in the whole thing – tray, silverware and all. When he came back, Fran was pouting.

"Aw. That was a waste!" She turned towards the door and then started waving frantically, "Hey, Thor! Over here!"

The hero immediately rerouted towards their table, frowning at his brother, who started resolutely trying to rub a spot of dirt off the table.

"No cape today, I see." He was dressed in dark leather pants and a form fitting tank top, both shining with patches of silver plating. Fran got up and graciously offered him her seat. "Would you mind looking after him for a second?"

She left before he could answer. The Asgardian slowly sat down and watched in confusion as she dove into a trashcan.

"What…?" Fran pulled out a fork and gingerly placed it onto the stack of used trays above her. Thor crossed his arms and scowled at his brother. "Loki! Did you do that?"

He was ignored in favor of the dirt.

"Loki! Regardless of your situation, you have no right to be rude." He reached over and covered the spot. Loki curled his hand into a fist and slammed it into the table. "Fran is trying to help."

"Fran? When did you two get so chummy?" Loki finally looked up, his frosty stare freezing his poor brother into place. As adept as he was at reading the blond behemoth, he could see that Thor was definitely hiding something. "So you were in on it, too, eh? What did they do while I was out? Stick me with something? Brand me in some way that I cannot see?"

"What in the worlds are you talking about?" Thor finally managed to drag his gaze away, only condemning himself further.

"Something went on last night. There is no way I would change myself without remembering."

Loki could see Thor cave. He shrugged with an air of 'the jig is up' and said, "I guess she…"

A mountain of food was tossed between them, another tray sliding swiftly after.

"Damn it, you…!" An apple plugged Loki's howling.

"Eat up, Thor! Oh, and I washed my hands, so don't worry!" With impressive speed, she caught the furiously hurled apple before it reached her head and sat herself down next to the Asgardian.

Loki, too incensed to speak, pilfered his brother's spoon and grabbed the fruit cup from in front of Fran. He watched as Thor plowed his way through pounds of bacon, eggs, and pancakes. It took the giant less than ten minutes to consume a third of his weight in food. It was a sight the villain was quite used to and once the fruit cup was polished off he sat, arms crossed, fingers drumming against bicep, as he dodged flying hash browns with the least movement possible.

The agent was staring in wide-eyed wonder at the utterly clean pile of plates that had been amassed. Loki pounced on her astonishment,

"So, what exactly happened last night?"

His pleasant tone drifted over to Fran and she murmured, "Absolutely nothing, Mr. Laufeyson."

Loki bent his spoon in half.

With the last plate cleared, Thor heaved himself up, gathered his mess, and bowed politely to the agent. "Thank you, Fran. I now must go to a meeting of the Avengers, but I will stop by my brother's room later."

"A meeting? Is everything okay?"

"It is something to do with a boat being sunk in…New York, was it? I do not know more than that."

"Oh. Thanks, Thor." With a smile, Fran let him go. However, Loki could clearly see the worry she was trying desperately to hide.