In the morning, Loki was just as silent and sulky as he had been last night. Even when the SHIELD agents said he had to ride in the car with Jane and Darcy so that they could properly escort them. He just sat in the back and stared out the window, a vacant expression on his face. He didn't even apologise for making them an hour late because he wouldn't get out of bed.
Darcy didn't say anything either though, after all, it was a morning.
"What's it like," A voice said in her ear as she closed the door of the car. "Knowing that you finally have a purpose at SHIELD?"
"Well I suppose you wouldn't know." She snapped back.
Jane had carried on walking but Loki was standing a few feet away watching their conversation. She wished he'd go away before remembering the pain she'd receive if he did. She was glad he remembered the charm because she kept forgetting. Then again he had a lot more to lose from it.
Dan smirked at her. It was an ugly smile, it made his wide nose look bigger and his far-set eyes squint.
"And it's not even because they trust you," He continued. "You just got a spell, right? Still as useless as ever."
She rolled her eyes, she found him sort of amusing by now because his comments were just so childish. She reminded herself that he did it to everyone.
"Yeah, alright Dan." She said and walked away. As much as she would love to slap him she knew that he got his joy from getting a response from her and she wasn't going to give him the satisfaction.
Loki walked next to her. Well level with her, he was still a few feet away to make it clear that she wasn't to speak to him. He wasn't watching her anymore but looking around SHIELD with his cold, calculating eyes. She could have sworn a smile was playing at the corners of his lips.
As they entered the lab his eyes lit up with amusement. He was probably thinking how primitive it all was. The wall by the corridor was made of glass so the guards just stood by outside.
Jane pulled on her coat and walked over to one of the desks before scribbling on pieces of paper which Darcy would eventually have to file away. The benefit of thinking of nothing but work, or your boyfriend who you need to work in order to get back, was that you got straight into the job when you arrivd. Darcy however walked to the instant coffee machine in the corner, having woken up late from not sleeping until the early hours of the morning she had been unable to make her usual cup and therefore had to settle for the watery burnt coffee from the one machine in the entire building that was more than five years old.
"Hey Frost Brain do you want anything?" She asked. Loki had been watching Jane work but turned to her as though she were an annoying fly. That or he was contemplating turning her into one. He sharply shook his head once and turned back to Jane.
Darcy rolled her eyes again and sipped her manky coffee.
"Look." She told him. "I'm trying to be nice. I don't have to be. You haven't given me any reason to. So the least you could do is stop being such an asshole."
All he did was look vaguely amused until she clenched her teeth and walked over to Jane.
"Can you type this up please?" She asked, handing Darcy an equation.
"Sure." She replied, looking at the page as she attempted to decipher Jane's handwriting. Slim fingers plucked the page from her hand before she evenrealised he was with her. He scanned it, his eyebrows rising sceptically.
"This won't work." He said.
Darcy tried to take the sheet back from him but he lifted it out of her reach without even looking at her. Her fingers curled into fists in anger.
"Excuse me?" Jane asked, turning round to face him with her arms crossed, her expression incredibly unimpressed and challenging.
"It's wrong." He said, holding the paper up.
"I have a degree in astro-physics." She said with a slight grin. "I th-"
"And you're wrong." Loki interrupted bluntly.
Darcy sipped the coffee as she watched their confrontation.
He inhaled as though she was frustrating him. "You are trying to reach Asgard, correct?"
"Yes." Jane said cautiously.
"Well then," He grabbed a pen from the side and crossed out some of the numbers and wrote other ones instead.
"Wait! I'd really rather you didn't!" Jane protested feebly but he was done and shoving the paper back at her.
Jane took it suspiciously and read it through narrowed eyes. "This uh," She said at last. "actually makes more sense."
"Obviously." Loki said derisively.
"Could you type it up please?" Jane asked, handing it to Darcy but not taking her eyes off of Loki who glared at her challengingly. Darcy looked at it, Loki's hand writing was a lot clearer than Jane's and kind of old fashioned. Not cursive or anything but like the kind of print you expect to find in an old bible. She looked at Jane.
"Can I have a word?" She asked, her eyes flickering briefly to Loki. "In private?"
Jane nodded reluctantly and walked to the corner with her. Loki remained over by the wall, watching them with that same annoying smirk. Darcy didn't understand, he seemed to have two modes: sulky and silent or condescending and patronising.
"Are you insane?" She hissed.
"Not the last time I checked..." Jane said.
"Why would he help you?" Darcy asked.
"I don't know." Jane admitted. "But the equation makes sense and I've been working on it for months."
"How do you know it won't crash the entire machine if you try to use it. He might try to prevent us reaching Thor."
"I don't think so." Jane shook her head. "If anything he'd want us to, surely. Thor would just tell us in person to keep him around, he's already getting pretty good treatment."
"He's up to something." Darcy said firmly.
Jane shrugged. "Probably but that doesn't change the fact that this is right."
"He's up to something." Darcy repeated before smiling mischievously. "And I'm going to find out what."
"Great." Jane said sarcastically. "But could you type that up first.
Darcy glared at her but went over to the computer anyway.
"How did you know that anyway?" She heard Jane ask Loki.
"Not all of us left our education at 'the realms connect like a tree.'" Unable to stop herself, Darcy laughed and turned to see Jane's expression which was just as gormless as she'd hoped. Loki gave Darcy a wary glance before turning away again.
"H-h-how did you know he told me that?" Jane asked flabbergasted.
"He likes showing off his...impressive...knowledge to lesser mortals."
"Lesser what?" Jane asked, annoyed. Loki ignored her.
For the next few hours Loki and Jane worked on Jane's research while Darcy was kept busier than she had been in months, photocopying things for Loki and typing things up for Jane. When she told them it was her lunch break, Jane looked at the clock on the wall shocked.
"Okay." She said.
"Umm," Darcy started awkwardly. "I kind of have to steal your partner."
Jane looked from Loki to her and her eyes widened. "What you want to take him to the canteen?"
"Why not?" Darcy asked back.
"Won't he cause a riot or something?"
"There's barely ever anyone in there." Darcy replied. "And I'm sure Frost Brain promises to be on his best behaviour, don't you?"
Loki predictably ignored her.
Darcy refrained from rolling her eyes, deciding that she'd done that much too much today already. "Come on." She hoped he was following her because she didn't really want to encounter the magical barrier.
"Woah." Dan said, stepping in her way as she tried to walk through the door. "Where do you think you're going?"
"To the canteen, idiot. It's my lunch break."
He looked passed her shoulder at Loki, a flash of fear showing on his face before the 'holier than thou' expression returned. "You can't go up there."
"Oh yes I can, it's in my contract." Darcy smiled and pushed her glasses back up on her face. For once she was thankful she'd woken up too late to put her contacts on, her glasses worked for great expressions.
His eyes flicked to Loki again. "That was before...him."
Darcy crossed her arms and shifted her weight to her right leg. "Well if you'd like to take it up with Fury..."
It worked. His face visibly paled and he stepped out of the way. They both knew he wouldn't bother Fury with something so trivial though he did tell two of the guards to follow them.
The thing about the canteen was that more often than not it was empty. The base in New Mexico was primarily a research facility. Sure it had its fair share of guards but most people were scientists. And most of the scientists were like Jane, too busy with their work to come up and eat.
So it was that when Darcy and Loki entered only three people were sat in the large room. For some reason they kept it well staffed, they could have got away with just vending machines but mostly, such as on this occasion the five workers just stood around talking.
Darcy didn't pay attention to the people as she walked in, knowing that she and Loki were getting looks. She just kept her chin up high and ignored them before marching to the opposite side.
"Are you hungry?" She asked Loki. At this point she would have been shocked if he did respond. She rolled her eyes. "Go sit down then, asshole."
Loretta, the normally friendly and chatty lunchroom worker said nothing as she passed Darcy her sandwiches, one for her and one for her to take back down to Jane. Instead she just glared at her suspiciously.
Darcy started to search the room for Loki before her eyes fell instead upon Matt. He grinned at her as she walked over and she felt the vice on her lungs unclench slightly, she hadn't realised how nervous she'd been of his treating her differently.
"Hey," He greeted through a mouthful of chilli.
"At least swallow first, God." Darcy complained in way of response.
He choked it down and wiped his mouth with his napkin. "Nice to see you're in a good mood." The guard replied. The nice thing about Matt was that he really made an effort to get on with everyone, though Darcy severely doubted that that would extend to certain Norse Gods. He was also one of the few who didn't look down on her for not going through the usual recruitment process of being handpicked from whichever university or army you were at.
"I'm fine I just don't like seeing all that." She said disgusted. He leant closer his eyes narrowing at her.
"You are fine." He said at last, sitting back up straight done with his scrutiny. "Shouldn't you be distraught or cowering or something because of your new roomy?"
Darcy snorted. "Yeah right, the scariest thing about him is his haircut." He could probably hear her but she didn't care. If he was going to practically use her as a magical hostage and then be rude to her she was going to be just as rude back.
"You called him a 'asshole.'" He commented. She couldn't tell if he meant anything by it.
"Yes?" She prompted.
"Well most people would be a bit wary about calling homicidal maniacs names."
"Trust me when you've seen the guy frown over cereal he stops being quite so intimidating." She replied.
His hand reached out and grabbed her wrist.
"You can't get comfortable around him." He whispered. "He's dangerous."
She yanked her arm bag. "For christ's sake, Matt, I know that! I'm not an idiot."
"Just making sure." He said, putting his arms up in surrender and leaning back.
Her eyes flickered to Loki who was sat in the back corner of the room, not paying attention and looking bored. The guards stood on either side of him. She wondered how she was expected to find that intimidating before she realised that anyone else guarded like that would look pathetic. Loki must have been pretty intimidating to come off as merely bored.
"Hi." A voice said from behind her. She jumped and span round, people had really got to stop sneaking up on her.
"Adam!" She said in reply. He slid into the seat next to her, his expression as always, unreadable. "How're you?"
"Fine." He replied, eyes flickering briefly to Matt. He'd always been kind of jealous of Matt. He was good looking she supposed, with his bronze skin and curly black hair but it was in a pixie kind of way and there just wasn't anything romantic between them. Matt however was six foot of pure sexiness, from his messy brown hair to his bright blue eyes.
"Well that's good." She replied. He was normally quiet like this and she normally enjoyed the challenge of drawing conversation out of him but today she just wasn't in the mood. "I tried to text you last night, no signal." She told him, hinting at an explanation as to why he hadn't texted her at all, even when she got to work.
Luckily he got the hint. He was really intelligent but utterly hopeless when it came to relationships. Which they weren't technically in, just a few dates but still.
"Ahh right, I figured I'd let you spend some time settling in. I heard you volunteered to keep an eye on Loki." He spat his name and for some reason it made her angry. Loki was her problem, not his.
She shared a brief look with Matt who had higher clearance level than Adam and therefore knew about the magical complications.
"Ahh right," She said. "Well it was more Jane y'know, seeming as her and Thor..."
"Right." He said nodding. "So you want to go out on Saturday? I was thinking we could go up to Santa Fe?
"Uh yeah," Darcy said awkwardly which was most unlike her but she wasn't very good at lying, she preferred to just be blunt with people. "I'd love to but Fury says both of us have to stay in the house with-"
"No problem." He interrupted, colour had risen to his cheeks and Darcy felt slightly guilty. He was so awkward sometimes, like now, that she got second-hand embarrassment. Matt was also trying not to laugh so she kicked him under the table. "Some other time."
"Yeah, some other time." She replied.
They ate most of the rest of their lunch in silence but when Darcy looked up she could have sworn Loki was smirking.
Chapter title from Give A Damn by A Rocket To The Moon. About the whole song lyrics for chapter titles thing, it has two parts. I tend to associate chapters or stories with songs (like this was originally named after A Beautiful Lie by Thirty Seconds To Mars so it just feels right naming them after lyrics. The second part is that I'm too lazy to think of chapter titles. Anyway I hope you like the chapter.
PS Thank you so much for the reviews. I think this is the first time I've ever had reviews on a story and it means the world so thanks x
