Hello everyone! I apologize for the wait for this chapter; this time of year is so busy! Here is more plotty goodness, and please forgive me of any grammatical/etc. errors, I wanted to get this out as fast as possible!
Consider this a formal invitation to **review**, follow, and favorite (but mostly review)! I'm assuming everybody is liking everything, but it sure is nice to know for sure! Thanks to everyone who has already done so.
Don't own. Happy reading!
Zeppelin IV
Loki left her alone for the better part of the afternoon, but about an hour after sunset, he put his book down (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban; he read very quickly) and paced up the ward to Zara's bed. She was in the middle of reading about his episode of birthing a horse and ignored him for as long as she could.
"So," he broke the silence.
She slowly lowered her book and returned his gaze. "So what?"
"The doctor would not give you morphine to sleep. Care to elaborate?"
"No, I don't," she responded, and started to bring her book back up to eye level. Its progress was halted by long, pale fingers. Zara looked back up at Loki and sighed, "What do you want, Loki?"
"A question so few have cared to ask. I want a great many things, Zara, but right now I want to know about you. I haven't quite been able to… figure you out, let's say. And since you have been given the gift of my magic, I think I deserve some explanation."
She put her book down and considered his request. "Why? Why would you want to know anything about me?"
"We have cohabitated for a time already, and I expect we will continue to do so for a while longer. Now that you are conscious most of the time, we should at least be friendly towards each other."
Zara laughed. "You might be the god of mischief and lies, but I'm pretty good at telling when someone is lying, too. You don't strike me at all as the kind of guy who wants to get to know anyone just for the sake of socializing." She paused for a moment and thought. "It bothers you that Clint didn't give you any intel on me, doesn't it?"
His face morphed from placid to a countenance akin cold aggression. "It infuriates me, yes." Capturing the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent had been one of the better parts of his plan; Hawkeye provided him with the professional, and many times the personal, histories of the members of the Avengers Initiative, including the periphery members, Nick Fury, Phil Coulson, and Maria Hill. At the time, he considered it everything he need to know. He had not planned on being captured himself, subject to an unknown woman's poorly veiled attempts at establishing a civil relationship with him. The only card he had left to play was her obvious attraction to him; the misplaced magic would only aid him here, although he was reluctant to admit it.
"I might owe you something if you transferred your magic to me on purpose, but somehow I don't think you did", she said sarcastically. "You only want information about me now to manipulate me with it later, I get it. It's not going to happen." She snapped the book closed and started to get out of the bed.
"Where are you going?"
"To ask Fury if you can go to breakfast tomorrow."
Loki looked utterly dumbfounded. He didn't understand her; she wouldn't indulge him with anything about herself, and yet she was making an effort to help him, in however small a way. "Why are you being... nice... to me?" he asked.
The look on his face was painfully vulnerable, like no one had treated him with kindness before. She knew that wasn't true, that he only perceived it that way, and somehow the fact made the situation all the more tragic. "Everyone deserves a friend, Loki. Even you." And she walked out the door.
"Did you really just ask me to let Loki roam around the most vital S.H.I.E.L.D. base in the country, Agent Shade?" Nick Fury's voice was saturated in disdain.
"Yes, I did, Director. You know better than I do that he's lost whatever power he had, he wouldn't even be a real security threat…" Zara was sitting at Dr. Allen's desk, the door to the office firmly closed.
"No, agent, absolutely not. If he got away from you, found a way into any of Banner's labs or into the Stark Weapons vault, it would be disastrous. I can't allow it."
Zara's brain whirred to develop a rebuke. "What if you stationed guards in the corridors. Some of the new recruits, give them a test. If we use the elevator, it's a straight shot down the halls from here to the cafeteria."
She heard him half sigh, half growl into the phone. "Why are you asking me to help him, Zara? You know full well he deserves far less than we've given him already."
"I do know that, sir. I've been trying to develop a psych profile on him, and from what I can tell, he believes that no one has treated him with any sort of humanity in a long, long time. We have him in a unique, essentially powerless, position. I think I can bring him to our side if I play this right."
"You've been inactive for too long, agent."
Zara laughed, "Only too true. Look, it's essentially a zero risk situation, and it's some real world training for the new kids. You know if anything gets out of hand, I'll take care of it."
She was met with the quiet sound of Fury breathing for almost a minute. "Ok, Shade. Not tomorrow, but the next. That'll give me a chance to brief the trainers at the facility. I'm only doing this because it's you, Zara."
"I know, Nick. And I really appreciate it. I won't disappoint you."
"You never have. I hope you know what you're doing. If this goes wrong, it's on you."
"I understand, Director. Oh, and make sure the recruits dress in civilian clothing. It wouldn't do for him to think we don't trust him."
"As you say. Now put Dr. Allen on the phone, please."
Zara pressed the hold button on the phone and left to get the doctor. Bo was standing at the filing cabinet, and she approached him after delivering Fury's message. She didn't know if their relationship was close enough for what she was going to ask of him, but she had to try.
The rest of the evening had been uneventful. She read on in the Omnibus of Norse Mythology, and Loki had progressed to Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. She listened to her Classic Rock play list (heavily featuring Zeppelin IV) for a while before going to sleep.
It started normally; Dr. Allen had given her a large dose of nighttime Advil, which she thought really did help her get to sleep. The weird half dreams of the space between truly sleeping and wakefulness were obviously her subconscious running through the day; Dr. Allen playing a card game with Loki, Director Fury yelling at her for burning a cake in the oven. As she was opening the door of the oven to pull the cake out, she was pulled into the darkness. A void, the void, between worlds. She knew it, could feel it pressing against her eyes and ears.
Figures emerged like a gathering mist, slowly becoming corporeal. Loki, on his knees with his hands tied haphazardly, messily behind his back. He wore a muzzle over his mouth. She was torn between feeling sympathy for him and gloating that, for once, he would have be silent. Her attention turned to the figure Loki was facing, and instead of sympathy or humor she felt immediately horror.
The figure, she thought it was male, wasn't particularly tall or broad, but possessed a presence so stifling she could feel it on every inch of her skin. Zara could sense malice radiating from him in waves, and complete confidence; power. It was then she caught the look in Loki's eyes, a look of utter defeat, infinitely worse than it had been on the roof of Stark Tower.
She couldn't move, couldn't even breathe. She couldn't help but watch as the Other mentally and physically tore Loki apart. She was thankful she couldn't hear what he was saying through the metal cage around his blood-red mouth, but her own recent injuries throbbed with empathetic pain as he railed against Loki's face and ribs. Loki's magic, she thought. That's why she was seeing this, feeling it so acutely. Why she knew the Other's name. This must have happened to him, and the magic was replaying the event in her mind the way it had happened originally. It meant she finally had some insight into Loki's state of mind; it meant the Other was real.
Just as she thought this, he halted his assault on Loki and looked straight at her, at least she thought he did; his eyes (if he had eyes) were covered by black, rotting fabric. So much energy, so much hate flowed at her she thought she would simply fall apart. The Other straightened, attention directed at her now. She couldn't tear her mind away, even to look to Loki for help, as if he could do anything other than try to survive.
No, Loki is alive! She clung to the thought, willing the magic to wake her up, to call to him in the hospital ward. Just as the Other was approaching her, he and the darkness around him dissolved into the familiar white tiles of the ceiling in the hospital ward of the S.H.I.E.L.D. base.
She was shaking violently from the adrenaline and gasped, "Loki!" He sat up from his bed quickly, obviously already awake. "Loki get over here, right now!" Zara was clutching at her heart as she swung her legs over the side of the bed, blood pounding in her ears.
Loki rounded the end of the bed and moved to stand in front of her when she clutched at his arm and pulled him the rest of the way. She pushed up the sleeve of his tunic roughly, trying to make contact with as much of his skin as possible, grasping his forearm with her good hand. The hand in the cast searched for and found his other hand.
Her breathing was unsteady and frantic. She closed her eyes, willing the magic to calm her down through its contact with Loki. What was that? How could the Other have known I was there?! Slowly she regained control of herself and realized she had leaned forward, her forehead resting against Loki's chest. She also realized she was gripping Loki's arm hard enough to bruise it, and she loosened her grip. She stared at the floor, his larger feet at the top of her vision framing hers, trying to collect herself.
She lifted her head and met Loki's eyes, bright green with alarm. She looked as if she had seen something worse than a ghost, as if she had seen…
"What did you see?" he asked, voice grave.
"You… you, and the Other." It was his turn to clutch at her.
"How did you know to call him that?"
"I don't know… I just knew, I felt it… You were, your hands were tied, and-"
"Go no further. I know what you saw, and it is regrettable that you did so" He felt her breathing even. "Are you well enough to release your hold on me yet?"
"Uh, yeah, sorry." She let go and ran a hand over her face as he backed away, leaning against the bed behind him. She took a deep breath before asking, "Who is he? The Other?"
He looked as if he didn't want to tell her, but felt obligated to anyway. "He is the leader of the Chitauri."
Zara let that sink in; she knew there was deep significance in what she saw, but she couldn't think on that right now. It was enough for her to keep from screaming out as his twisted face swam back into her vision. "He looked at me, looked right at me, so angry and…"
"What?"
"At first I thought I was just seeing a memory, residual in your magic," she shivered, thinking of Loki's abuse at the hand of the Other. "But he looked at me, like he was aware of me, but he couldn't have been… I wasn't there when… that… happened."
"No, you were not." Loki was truly afraid for the first time since his failed takeover of Midgard. He would have to lie to her, and hope she believed him, to give himself time to come up with a plan to defend himself from the Other and from his master. "I think the magic combined with the medicine and your weakened state are playing with your mind. It was only a memory, albeit a most nasty one."
"I wonder what else I'll 'remember'," she let out a hollow laugh. Flashes of pubescent Loki, sword fighting with Thor came to mind.
His only reaction was the arching of an eyebrow.
She wrung her hands (as best she could) before she asked her next question. She couldn't afford any more dreams like that, but the alternative, the only way to squelch the magic inside her, was the epitome of embarrassment. Fuck it.
"The only way to keep the magic from acting up is to touch you, right?" He responded with a nod. She continued, "I absolutely can not believe I am asking you this, but I don't think I want to see any more of this Other guy… can you… oh my god… can you sleep beside me?"
Loki's eyes went wide in astonishment and she hurried to talk over the awkwardness.
"Not in the same bed or anything! Just roll that bed over here, so I can, I don't know, hold your hand or something. I know it sounds childish and totally ridiculous, but I haven't had quality sleep in two days. Don't you want a good night's sleep, too? I'm sure I was making a ruckus tonight."
"It is the most outrageous suggestion I have ever been given. I would like to sleep uninterrupted by your flailing..."
Under any other circumstances he would have vehemently refused; he valued his solitude and physical person above all else. This was not a normal circumstance though, and he thought he could use their physical closeness to his advantage in his aims to win her allegiance, and ultimately to get himself out of his predicament. The feel of her warm breath through his shirt, heating his skin, had nothing to do with his answer.
"Fine." He turned and rolled the bed next to Zara's. Once he settled in, he extended his hand towards the join between the two.
"Let's just acknowledge how awkward this is and move past it, ok?" she said as she reached out and gently grasped his wrist, hoping it was be less awkward than holding his hand.
"You have no idea."
Before she fell asleep, her mind worked up a hazy thought. When Loki told her the dream was just a memory, his eyes were just a little too… blank. They held the same look when he tried to gain information from her. He had been lying; the Other was coming for them.
