Thor pulled his brother to stand and grasped both of his shoulders to keep him still. Loki stared, wide-eyed, at his brother as he began to speak in his booming, golden voice. With some sort of other-world manipulation John was too dazed to recognize, golden armor materialized across Loki's chest along with a golden-horned helm on his head.

"Loki, your crimes against Asgard and Midgard are vast. Everywhere you go, destruction follows. Even now, under the thumb of Thanos and faced with the kindness of my human friends, you do not offer a word of thanks or humility. As heir to the throne of Asgard and your elder, I hereby take your armor." He reached up and tore one of the golden horns from Loki's head; even as his younger brother cried out in protest, it vanished mid-air like smoke. "I take your powers, just as Odin Allfather once took mine as punishment for your wrongdoing."

"No, Thor-!" The second horn was taken with another scream of despair.

"You shall live as a mortal, until such a time that you have redeemed yourself in the eyes of man." With a swipe of his enormous paw, the golden breastplates dissolved from Loki's armor just as his horns had. John watched in awe as Loki fell to his knees and cried in anguish. Dropping to a kneel before his brother, Thor grasped his shoulder. "Have faith, brother. It is not so bad to be human, and I shall remain by your side until Asgard is in need of me."

Loki sobbed furiously and beat at his knees with clenched fists, very closely resembling a child in the throes of a violent fit. He looked strangely small in all the ways he had once been menacing. "I did not think you capable of such cruelty!" he screamed through tears.

"And you ought to be glad I did not take your silver tongue as well!" With an apologetic look at those around as if to silently say 'Little brothers are such a pain, right?' Thor brought Loki to his feet once more. "It would do well to find Banner and the Captain now, and leave us to discuss my brother's fate in privacy, would it not?" he said pointedly.

Immediately John turned to leave, eyes trying very hard to roll back into his head and knock him back out at the sudden movement, not waiting for Clint or Natasha. An unsettling sense of dread pooled in the pit of his stomach as it hit him that he had been under some malicious force's control for eight weeks. What had he done at that Thanos' bidding? He recalled seeing Natasha wringing an old man's neck without a second of thought; had he done the same, or more?

"Always assume you did the absolute worst, it makes the truth a lot nicer," said Clint, predicting John's uncertainty. "I killed other agents, people I liked, people I worked with."

"Why?"

He shrugged. "'s not like I could help it, could I?"

"No, no, I mean..." John gestured helplessly, and his hands left fleshy trails in his aching eyes. "Why me? It's not like I've been around long enough to know any government secrets." In actuality, he knew precisely four government secrets, two of which would make even Mycroft's hair curl, but he was going on a limb in guessing that this Thanos character had no interest in the United States' defense strategies, and wanted to know more. I need more data.

Clint shrugged again, looking more irritated with John's line of questioning every moment. "You'll have to ask King of the Shits, John, I dunno, let's just get Banner some pants and get out of here," he sighed like a fed-up teenager.

After Tony did a quick scan of the building he led the way to Bruce and Steve, who were in the smoking remains of a control room now filled with smashed computer equipment. Bruce, shining with sweat and still breathless from his apparent rampage, was just fastening the button on a pair of jeans Steve provided when they came in. "John!" he practically shouted, stumbling forward and hugging him. "Hey, man! You okay?"

To be frank, John was taken aback for a long awkward moment before bringing up his hands to return the embrace. "Yeah, yeah, I'm okay." He'd been working with SHIELD for over ten months - a year, actually, as he would figure out later, but his mind was still eight weeks behind - and though the team had shown him only respect and kindness, especially with the webcam and helping him train, they had never shown such open affection with him as Bruce was showing now. Even if he was sweaty and shirtless and smelled a bit ripe, John was grateful for his friendship. "Thanks for coming to get me," he added.

Steve was grinning from ear-to-ear when they stepped away from one another, and clapped John affectionately on the back while Bruce turned to talk to Natasha and Clint. "Welcome back, soldier. Guys, Natasha-" She glared at the exception and he gulped apologetically. "-we probably want to vacate this area in case of any noxious fumes. Tony, is Loki properly contained?"

"I'd say so," snorted Tony, and he explained what Thor had done when Steve looked puzzled. John listened with only half an ear, starting to feel tired and getting dizzier by the minute. Considering that he'd been clocked in the head by a Norse god, he figured that a concussion was definitely not out of the question. He would have to check on Natasha when they got back to the tower as well, even if Clint had clearly agonized over hitting her only just hard enough to snap out of the trance.

By the time they were all gathered in the narrow corridor and had retrieved Thor and Loki from the other room, John felt queasy and had to blink against even the dim lighting of the bunker. It wasn't entirely uncommon for a concussed person to hallucinate, especially in a dim bunker with everyone around casting shadows, but then he turned his head and could have sworn he saw... Well, it didn't matter what he saw, he was a bit bonkers, anyway, and started staggering toward the vision without making the conscious decision to do so. The dark shape vanished around a corner with a rustle of heavy fabric that screamed at him right out of his darkest dreams, and just as suddenly as John saw it, it may as well have never existed.

He propped himself against the wall with one elbow and waited with his head bowed until he felt Steve grasp his shoulder. "Think I have a concussion; I'm hallucinating," he mumbled, and rubbed his eyes. There wasn't anything Steve could say to confirm or deny his claim, but he kept a hand on John's shoulder to make sure he didn't run off again before they got to the jet - since when did SHIELD give the, a jet? John had to protect his eyes from the intense afternoon sun, but he gathered that they were in the desert from what he saw of the ground.

Bruce checked his pupils in the softer lighting on the jet and gave a low whistle. "Oh, man, he fucked you up. You're definitely not sleeping tonight, sorry John. Tasha, come here, let me look at you too..." John's eyes drifted hazily to the other side of the jet's cramped belly and found Loki strapped into the seat beside Thor's. He was looking around with wide eyes, as though everything had changed colors now that he was mortal, and straining to stay as close to his brother's side as possible. It had to be frightening, being as close to immortal as one could be for hundreds - if not thousands - of years, and then suddenly being turned into something that could be as easily destroyed as a human.

At least Tony, Bruce, and Steve offered to stay up with him that night. Natasha was in the clear to sleep so long as Clint woke her every two hours or so. Tony was almost as excited as a kid to stay up all night, even after John reminded him that concussed people couldn't have alcohol. "Let's have movie night!"

"Just as long as it isn't Die Hard."

"Actually, I was thinking Mission Impossible, but now that you mention it-"

"No, come on, Tony," sighed Steve. "Can't we watch something else? Action movies are only good to a certain extent."

That, however, had given John an idea that he couldn't dismiss. It reminded him of a night three years ago, after he'd just moved into the Baker Street flat and he'd called a blog post Diamonds Are Forever. "We could have a Bond night," he suggested.

Tony briskly clapped his hands and jumped out of his seat. "Doctor's orders, guys! We're watching Bond! Good thing I have the whole collection. I mean it would take approximately 45 hours and 36 minutes to watch them all, but we can get through the good ones tonight! JARVIS, we need popcorn and booze! And a soda pop for the concussed man! And strippers, lots of strippers, at least four strippers!"

"Tony!" Steve looked absolutely scandalized.

"Fine, dancers, whatever makes you feel better, Cap."

The blond man muttered something about that not being what he meant, but JARVIS seemed to have either been programmed with common sense or not been programmed with the ability to order strippers, because they never showed. There were cookies, though, with the popcorn, booze, and soda, so that bolstered Tony's bad mood, and Bruce kept him from drinking too much. It was nice, after nearly a year of working with SHIELD - and there had been far more incidents than he could recollect where Earth's Mightiest Heroes needed an outside party to step in and take control - to be taken care of by the people he had invested so much time looking after.

In a few days he was back to rights, Natasha much sooner, but no one was nearly as damaged from the last eight weeks than Loki. He languished in Stark Tower, never leaving Thor's apartment for longer than absolutely necessary and flinching away from the slightest attention shown by anyone but his brother. Mortality suited him ill, but after reading his file John had to admit it was the perfect punishment. The germs and bacteria of the human world, combined with his already vulnerable state because of whatever Thanos had done to him, gave him a nasty flu that lasted over a week; John and Bruce took turns looking after him because Thor knew nothing of Midgardian illness. In all respects and purposes, he was every bit the little ass Tony and Clint made him out to be, but behind his furious rants and lies John could see self-hatred, a terrified child crouched in the shadows of his eyes, when his fever reached its peak just before breaking. Only when he brought it up later would Bruce admit he'd seen it too.

"Why did he choose us to possess?" John asked once Loki could venture out into Stark Tower again, even thinner and paler than before. "You had access to all of Stark Tower, and yet you only took me and Natasha."

Loki shrugged, idly flipping through the pages of a book without reading a word. He looked very strange in Thor's hand-me-down Midgardian clothes, not just because he swam in them. "When I controlled the Tessaract, I took only those who would serve my cause," he mumbled. "I do not presume to know the deeper machinations of Thanos' insanity. Though, if I had to venture a guess, I would say he took the weakest of you. The assassin, softened by childish love, and the cripple without a crutch." He grinned wickedly over the top of his book as John glowered; it was a game he liked to play, pretending to tell the truth until bare teeth gave away the lie.

"You remind me of my friend," said John as passively as if he were discussing the weather. "The crutch, I guess, according to your metaphor. He was a younger brother too. Sometimes, for his work, he could invent whole lifetimes in a matter of seconds and act it out like a play right in front of me. I mean, he literally became another person."

"What bearing has that on being a younger brother?" sneered Loki, though he looked as if he immediately regretted rising to John's level.

John smiled. "His brother was shit at impressions. Sometimes he would come to visit, and Sherlock - my friend - would answer the door as, I dunno, a wig salesman - or once a woman in full makeup and everything - and refuse to break character until his brother left all flustered and red in the face."

Two spots of color appeared high on Loki's cheeks but he didn't budge a single iota of attention away from the book in his hand. John wasn't certain if he noticed the book was upside-down - or, for that matter, if Norse gods-turned-mortal could even read English.