Author's Note: *hysterical sobbing*. I am sorry that this took so long, guys! I feel like a dead horse emotionally and that people came up and repeatedly kicked at my corpse for a while (which is rude), I'm honestly surprised this got completed as quickly as it did. Anyway. =)
This chapter turned out being much longer than I thought it was going to be at first. I couldn't get Loki or Thor to shut up. Urgh, its been almost a month since I updated this, sorry about that. I have so many fanfics in progress right now it's slowly driving me in to madness. ;) Thank you guys so much for your reviews and interest in this, it warms my heart. :) You're all amazing.
I am so nervous about this chapter, and I'm not entirely certain why. :/
Disclaimer: I own not a whit!
Sorry for any grammar/spelling errors!
Warnings: Implied/referenced torture.
By the way, I imagine Asgardian's to use the twenty-four hour time layout for their days, so referenced time is in that. For those to lazy to do math (I am among you ;)): Fourteen: 2PM, Eighteen: 6PM
Chapter Ten:
Anger, is, perhaps, his greatest weakness.
He doesn't remember when he decided that it was an easier emotion to deal with; neither he can put a finger on the exact moment when he traded feeling panic or worry for rage and hate. Simplicity has always been a welcomed friend to him. Emotions are complex and ugly to spar with; it is just easier to hide behind a wall of anger. It always has been. He used to court anger and let it embrace him, now he is sickened by it.
Thor has not thrown up properly in close a century (as that was the last time he was fervently ill). He has often gotten drunk within that time period (though not within the last year or so, now), but the most he's done is dry heaved and complained violently in his hangovers. He used to proclaim it like a badge of honor to his comrades that his immune system was stronger than their own.
Now?
He barely manages six steps outside of Stark Tower before his knees give and he crashes onto the pavement roughly, his stomach lurching and promptly releasing it's contents all over the sidewalk. The anxiety pulsing in his stomach lessons at it, almost relieved that he has properly humiliated himself in front of the captain, and will now quell its complaints.
Thor squeezes his eyes shut tightly, hands wrapped around his mid-section in an attempt to hinder the urge to continue the vomiting. He is grateful he had the foresight to tug his hair back when he was helping Bruce, or else the blond locks would likely be covered in his stomach's contents. He will not throw up. Nope. Nay. Zero percent. No more for him.
His stomach is rioting against this proclamation.
"...Thor?" Steve's voice is quiet, almost hesitant as it prods at him. Thor doesn't want to talk to him, he doesn't want to talk to anyone at the moment. All he would really like to do is rewind to about two hours before now and stop himself from returning to Stark Tower.
"Thor?" Steve repeats. A hand rests on his shoulder and Thor whips his head in the soldier's direction, eyelids ripping apart to reveal the captain's concerned face. His eyebrows are pinched in a way that over the last three weeks or so Thor has come to learn is for concern. There's still a quiet anger hidden in his iris; along with buried surprise and shock.
Thor is sure that his pinched expression looks little different.
Steve gives a infinitesimal sigh. "I texted Tony about the vomit," he gestures vaguely towards it with his hand that is holding up his mobile. Darcy insisted he learn how to text after the Battle of New York and proceeded to spend and entire afternoon showing him how it worked the two of them occasionally getting up to grab Jane a pen, paper or a refill on her coffee. When she is in "the mode" as Darcy put it, Jane often refuses to leave her work unless the threat of death is upon her. Thor thinks it's both admirable and adorable.
Thor ducks his head into his chest to hide his embarrassment.
He feels Steve's gaze on him for a moment longer before the blond grips his forearm, beginning to drag him to his feet, "Let's take a walk." He suggests.
Why?
To where?
Thor is not as familiar with New York as he is New Mexico, he has hardly spent any time in this city. He knows that his companion has not wandered much, either. Is his purpose to get lost? Steve is persistent with this, however, and once he has dragged Thor to his feet begins to pull at his elbow to simply drag him along. Slight annoyance sparks through him and Thor tugs his arm from the Soldier's grip, setting his pace to match the captain's.
He would much rather find a quiet, empty room to lock himself in.
Why is he such an idiot?
His stupidity is one to marvel at—from afar, lest the watcher be tainted with it. He's often been teased for being "brawn with no brains", but he's not certain he has believed it until now. Idiot. Idiot. Idiot.
Loki would have sa—
Loki.
His back.
The brand.
His stomach jumps again, threatening to make an emergency exit through his sternum. Thor grips his fingers into tight fists and presses his lips together firmly. The overcast thickens in his agitation.
"You're still angry." Steve notes. Is he? Steve sounds tired.
An exhaustion that he caused.
Idiot.
He does not know if he is as angry as he is sickened. Thor has never been able to hold his tongue when angered to the point of seething, but Loki always, always goes completely silent as he prepares your funeral to the point of knowing which flowers he'll leave on by the memorial stones. It was just another difference between them. Another gap, but a proof that even through everything that happened over the last year, not everything is different. He doesn't think this is a good thing, who he was last year disgusts him.
He still shouted words that he's wanted to scream for over a year now.
Loki still went quiet.
You have changed little.
So he has.
Thor bites at his tongue, uncertain how to answer Steve's remark. Evidently he goes with the easier, less confusing answer: "I am."
Steve stares at him, head tilted with thought, "Why?"
The two of them dodge past a biker barreling down the sidewalk and Thor's tongue tightens in his throat. Why is he angry? Shall he list alphabetically or as it comes to mind? Should he make Steve a chart? "Loki is my brother." He says at last. It is not so much as an answer as it is a deflection.
"Yes." Steve answers promptly, not deterred in the least, "And?"
Norns.
"I don't…I can't...he should have..." He pauses, trying to gather his muddled thoughts, "he is an idiot."
And so are you.
Steve looks mildly amused by this. Thor quenches his sudden desire to punch something. "I failed." Thor says simply, "I am supposed to protect him and I failed." Steve's amusement slips off his face and Thor wishes it would come back. He hastes dealing with seriousness. Thor takes the silence as an invitation to continue. He has no idea where he's going with this, his thoughts are a mess. "He tried to kill me and I don't—I'm not supposed to be angry with that? I don't want to be, but I am." Thor squeezes his eyes shut as a faint echo of his words rings around his head.
Loki's scarred back crosses just as quickly.
Torture.
Mind control.
Thor was blind to it.
Idiot.
"He isn't going to forgive me." Thor relents at last.
"You don't know that." Steve argues.
So hopeful. It's cute.
"I have known him for over a thousand years, Captain," Thor sighs, he grits his teeth together, and glances back at the Tower. "I know how his mind works."
Is it madness, Is it? Is it!?
But he doesn't know him as well as he thought he did.
000o000
Loki longs, sorely, for the safety ignorance contained.
This is not what he wanted; this isn't what should have happened. Had it been left open for question, he would have kept it to himself for the rest of his sorry, miserable existence. He's been gutted and laid bare on a table for all to gawk upon.
He hates this.
Oh, how he hates this.
If the loss of his sight has done little else, he has come to the conclusion that New York City is loud.
The roaring of their traffic, their flying machines, and the city itself is one he quietly marvels at. Asgard was not a silent city by an means, Serenity—the capital—especially, but the noises he'd long since learned how to ignore and draw comfort from. These are similar sounds, but they don't fade into white noise. Sleep has been difficult. He is often kept awake by Midgard's loud droning, and though neither one of them has mentioned it, he knows Thor is as well. Although the Void contained nothing but the lack of sense, he finds himself disturbingly wishing for the silence. It wouldn't matter, because he wouldn't sleep anyway, but it is something else to do beyond try not to slip further into insanity.
Loki grinds his teeth slightly before tugging the blanket around his shoulders tighter and shifting his head so it presses against the couch closer. Hair lingers at the edge of his mouth, annoyingly close, but the most it does it mildly tingle. The couch smells strongly of paint and vinegar, but he cares little of it. Everything in Stark's Tower smells slightly acidic or strangely cinnamony; the couch hardly phases him anymore. He doesn't know how long he's been on here, but he's guessing it's been hours. He fell asleep probably two hours after retreating here and for the first time in months, it was completely dreamless. He has no idea how much time has passed. His rest was unplanned and deep.
He's never been much of a deep sleeper (Thor is), but he didn't wake up when (and has no reconciliation of) the blanket was put on him. He doesn't even know where it came from. He didn't have it when he fell asleep, and can only guess at it's arrival. It's not unwelcome—remarkably soft and not as thick or heavy like the blankets on Asgard. The fabric is similar to the one's Thor shoved against the rough edges of the kitchen when he kept ramming his feet against them (fleece, he credences). Shoes or no, the hard edge wasn't pleasant.
He knows that the blanket isn't from Thor (he's more likely to have stabbed him long before offering comfort at the moment), but he's wary to admit it was from one of the Avengers. He can't fathom why they would do such an action. He is their enemy (unwillingly or not), and he being held here. This is a prison. They tolerate him and why shouldn't they? He has earned their indifference.
He accepts this.
The cushion against his face is strange and oddly rough. He has no idea of it's color, or even how it contrasts with the rest of the room. It could be the only neon thing present in a space of only black, and he can't tell. The only way he can find his way through a room is listening to his feet and some elementary hand magic. Through sorcery he is able to group the basics of a layout in the room. It's something he's been doing for hundreds of years before hand. Now, he relies on it as a crutch. A pathetic, broken crutch.
His sedir is so depleted that if he attempts anything further than rudimentary he will likely accidentally knock himself into a coma. An outcome he doesn't, surprisingly enough, want. Even teleporting from Stark's—possibly bedroom—room exhausted him. It's likely the source of his lack of dreams.
What time is it?
Is it still the same day? Does it matter anyway?
"Mr. Silvertongue?" Jarvis inquires. Loki's muscles seize, but he forces himself to lay as still as he can. He does not want to deal with him, or whatever he will say. It's usually never pleasant. "Are you awake?"
No, he is not.
Loki bites at his tongue, hard. He hesitates for a moment before exhaling through his teeth and slowly rolls from his side to his back. He doesn't bother trying to land his gaze on the computer's camera. It will not matter anyway, he is blind, he has accepted this. Waking to black is not unfamiliar, not anymore.
"I am." He answers, his voice sounds enervated.
He is tired.
An exhaustion beyond sleep's ability to rest.
Jarvis is quiet for a moment, thinking, if Loki were to postulate. "Mr. Barton is on his way to this floor, I thought you would want to be informed."
Oh, swell.
He is just thrilled—consumed with rapturous.
Perchance the man has finally snapped and is on his way to murder him. It would save Thor the trouble.
Loki buries a groan in the back of his throat and childishly tugs the blanket over his head. The air supply is immediately stifled, but he cares naught of it. If he is to die, at least it will be a warm, comfortable end.
The doors to the elevator open and Loki hears the soft patter of Barton's footsteps. He has become accustomed to the movement of their feet after listening to them for fifteen (sixteen? Fourteen? Twelve? He lost count) days now. He had to, it's less tiring. Every person has a distinct signature through magic, and the Avengers are no different. Loki can sense their auras will little toil with his sedir. It is something that as a wielder of the art, he has ingrained into his very being. Barton's reminds him of the smell of old cards and perhaps leather; it is also warm.
Barton moves towards the kitchen, but stops; likely at spotting him. Loki does not blame him. He can't. He knows that the violation he did on Barton's mind is not one that is easily forgotten. It may not have been of his own choosing, but he still did it. A sword is only as wicked as the welder, but does the sword still not do the killing?
Barton does not move.
Loki slowly blows out a breath before tugging the blanket off his head. Stray pieces of his dark hair fall over his face. He's certain that he probably looks marvelous at the moment. He hasn't seen a mirror or used a brush/comb since before he fell.
"For whatever measure of closure this may bring you," Loki starts, his tongue is sliding around his throat and refusing to allow the words through. He is choking on it. Everything is dry and aches in a way he can't express properly. "I am not proud of what happened."
He is sickened by it.
They think him proud. That he is jubilant in what he did mange to accomplish. His failed attempt is no more than an annoying piece of dust to clean off. At Midgard's prison he remembers through his blurring vision and pounding headache looking up towards Director Fury's one-eyed cold and detached, yet livid stare. "I know you take pride in what you did," he had said, "and you'll have a lot of time to stoke it—the rest of your existence in fact. Maybe by then you'll have decided to change your opinion. Welcome to your boot."
The analogy had made no sense to him at the time. His puzzled expression must have amused the director, because the last thing he can recall before the prison door hissed shut was his slight smirk. He spent five days working through blue haze and attempts at possession from the Other again. Another three trying not to throw up as the memories assaulted him without mercy.
He didn't truly fall asleep until twenty days into his capture, and his vision only continued to deteriorate the more he slept.
What he did disgusts him and there is no way to change that.
He was a murderer long before he was found by Thanos.
Barton still has not moved behind him, Loki cannot see, but his hearing has yet to waver. The thick inky blackness that swallows everything does not consume sound. It is not like the Void. When he screams, he can do more than feel the rattle in his throat.
Barton is silent.
Loki's teeth latch onto the edge of his tongue and squeeze. He tastes the familiar metallic tang of blood. His apology is weak at it's best and paltry at the most. "I am sorry."
Still nothing. Is he listening? He knows of the hawk's hearing issues, he volunteered the information to him during his siege and Thor remarked on it after learning of it, though he doubts it was intentional.
Saying a simple "sorry" isn't going to do anything. It will not return the dead, it will not offer solstice to the mourning. It is not until his blood has been split on the chopping block that the families will be able to find relief in knowing the murderer has finally been brought to justice.
Barton is quiet, almost thoughtful—he can't tell. Loki longs for his eyes. He has always been skilled at reading people, stances, expressions, gestures—a part of him died when his eyes did. The rest of him has been dead for far longer. How long will the world suffer his rotting corpse to walk upon it? Can it not see what he has become? What he is?
The silence is like an irritating itch.
He wants it gone.
He can't stand the quiet.
He presses harder against his bleeding tongue, ignoring the way it squirms in the back of his throat attempting to escape the death hold. Loki's fingernails dig deeply into his open palm, finding the previous cuts and reopening the scabs.
"Do you honestly expect that to be enough?" Barton's voice is soft. It is not angry, it is not laced with his frustration, but Loki can taste it in the air nonetheless.
The childish part of him wants to cry out yes. Wants to fall to his knees before the archer pleading, please accept this. I cannot make up for anything else I have done, please grant me a small mercy. I am penitent, but he knows it will not be enough. Barton is angry and there is little he can do to waver the archer's mood. He is the torturer who bore the weapon of the Mind Stone and the archer is forced to look upon the memories—however fuzzy they are. It is a mercy. To not have to remember clearly. What he has gathered of the assault is from his own strained mind and what has been repeated to him. He himself is angry at his wielder, why should he not allow Barton the same?
Loki allows a small frown to tip the edges of his mouth, "I do not." He admits, his voice low, "I can't."
Barton silences. Loki breaks skin in his digging and feels the slow warm trickle of blood leak across his fingers.
"Have you eaten today yet?" The question is so bizarrely off topic that Loki jerks upwards, ripping his useless eyes open and the blanket falls onto his lap. His lips part, but he can't get any sound out.
Food.
Barton is asking about food.
Why is he inquiring after his well being?
Loki's tongue untangles from the roof of his mouth, "I beg your pardon?"
"Hungry," Barton clarifies, "are you hungry?"
Starving. Aching for food in a way he has grown numb to. It will not stay down and he will be forced to humiliate himself by throwing up again in this blasted tower. Romanov was already present for that. Why does Barton care to know?
He can't eat.
"No." He affirms.
Barton is not fazed, nor believes his lie. He hears the man move across the floor, stop, before returning again. Loki's head is poking over the edge of the couch and if he still had his sight, he would be able to see past the edge. He is helpless as to where the archer actually is. He could be walking on the ceiling for all he is aware. This is just fabulous.
He hates this.
"Sure." Barton sounds doubtful, "Heads up."
Loki does not understand what the expression means. Confusion whispers through him before an object smacks into his face—namely his nose—and falls into his outstretched hands. Pain pulses through the area and his fingers scramble towards it, bracing for further pain that doesn't come. The object in his fingers is smooth, a sphere and has dips in the top and bottom. He runs his fingers over the surface several times. He can't place it. Midgard's food is almost always alien to him. He, unlike Thor and most of Asgard, often visits this Realm, but he hardly stays long enough to dine here. Admittedly, it had been close to fifteen years since his last drop by before Thor's coronation. Loki chews on the inside of his lip; he has no plans to eat it, but all the same: "What…?" He trails slightly, lifting the thing in where he assumes Barton to be.
There's a moment of silence, "It's an apple." He says, his voice strangely quiet.
Oh.
Oh. Yes, that makes sense.
An apple.
Barton just tossed an apple at his head.
Ah. It is not a proclamation of war, then.
Asgard's apples are rougher and have a thicker outer skin. The thinness of it Loki recalls being startled by when he first held one. Loki's fingers tighten around the fruit subconsciously. He hears Barton begin to shift in the kitchen and his lips thin. "Thank you." The moment of quiet is long enough for Loki to reassured the archer heard him.
Loki slowly lays back down, flicking his free hand's fingers slightly to find the location of the coffee table. His seidr whines loudly in protest and Loki mentally slaps it over the head. Shut it, he chides silently. Usually for this spell he doesn't need to use hand gestures, but at the moment he doubts his ability to do it without. He is as helpless as a newborn kit and it is repulsive.
Loki lifts his hand out, apple between his fingers and rests it on the edge of the table. He gathers the edge of the blanket and pulls it over his shoulders again. He does not want to do anything but exist today—night—whatever time it is. Most would likely call it childish (and he quite honestly does not care), but he is hiding. Hiding from Thor.
They are well beyond the age where petty name calling and tears will solve a problem.
Only fists and blood.
His grip on the blanket tightens as he hears the doors to the elevator open and then quiet murmuring of voices. Stark and Banner, if he were to make a gamble. As they come closer, their signatures slide through his sedir, proving him correct. Whatever they are discussing has something to do with "phone towers", and possibly Thor. He's not certain. Even with his enhanced hearing, the conversation makes little sense without context.
"Good morning!" Barton greets them cheerfully. Something clatters against a hard surface, rattling several times before settling; it sounds intentional, because no one comments on it. What it is, he has no idea, but it isn't a threat. He forces his tense muscles to relax as best as he's able and squeezes his eyelids shut.
It's easier to pretend this way, like a small child. At least with his eyelids closed he knows it should be dark, no matter how many times he opens them with the prior knowledge of the stygian, it still sparks a slight hitch of panic through him. This isn't the first time he's spent days in darkness, the Void is the most obvious of this. When he was much younger, however, he and Thor were kidnapped by Alfheim and Loki was poisoned. They managed to find a counter for it before an untimely death, but he spent several days hobbling around, humiliated, as he waited for it to wear off. It was two days. Forty eight hours. Not weeks.
And he knew that it would disappear.
Now he is helpless.
He is aware that Banner is not officially a doctor by Midgard's standards, but considering their view on him at the moment, he has his doubts that he can receive a different opinion on it. He's grappling for any knowledge of what happened and if it can be reversed. He and Thor were trained under Lady Eir in their youth, and Loki's quiet analysis of what he can feel and touch and Thor's has come to the same conclusion that Banner did.
He's blind and the only thing they can do is wait and hope it fixes itself.
"—ou think that about cranberries? They're cranberries." Stark sounds indignant and Loki realizes with a slight jolt that he missed most of whatever the beginning of their conversation was. He forces himself to pay attention and not be swept into his thoughts again. It is a trap from which he can't stop tumbling. His mind used to be a haven from everything, now it is a prison. But it is no less than he deserves, a wild animal that needs to be caught and tamed or beaten into submission.
"Exactly." Banner states, disgust on his tongue, "No one likes cranberries, Tony. They're the bane of existence."
A thwauking sound rings up, from (maybe) Stark lightly whacking the doctor. "Rude." Stark scoffs.
"He has a point," Barton says, hesitantly, "I don't like them; I don't know anyone who does."
"What!? No. This is unacceptable. Now you know someone who likes them, so you can't say that." Stark argues, "Pepper's allergic to strawberries and replaces it with cranberries. Either of you ever had strawberry shortcake but without the strawberries?"
Strawberry what? He has no idea what this food is...if it is a food.
Thor loves strawberries, almost to an insane point, Frigga does as well. Loki has personally been more partial to tart things, but he's fond of pineapples and grapes.
"Er...no." Banner answers, "That sounds gross."
"Same." Barton agrees, "That is not my—hey! Hand out of the dough!" Another thwauking noise and Stark gives a small cry.
"Ow! Dude! If you use a spoon instead of beaters it's free game." Stark says, his feet shifting across the floor. Loki doesn't know if it's from pain or he's moving away from the dough and Barton. As much as he wants to sit up and open his eyes he knows it will be useless.
"Bruce, will you find the pan?" Barton requests, his feet also shifting, probably away from Stark and his picking fingers. Loki wouldn't have guessed that about the man at a first glance, he seems to...clean to submit himself to picking at foodstuffs like that. Loki would have, he has no qualms about it, and the cooks in Asgard were often trying to stuff food down his gullet at any given opportunity anyway. Frigga thought it was hilarious. He was indifferent.
A cabinet (?) opens and a loud noise shifts before another clatter on a hard surface. There's a sort of wet noise following before a drawer opens. What are they doing?
His mouth opens to ask, but he stops himself, biting at his raw tongue to halt the noise. He isn't sure if Stark and Banner are aware he is in here and he doesn't want to chase them off, or be chased off. He hasn't listened to a normal conversation about crass, inane things such as cranberries since before the Void and the sound is strangely comforting.
The elevator doors shift again and the signatures of Romanov and Rogers quietly slink towards his sedir, intertwining with the strangled magic. "Good morning!" Stark greets the two cheerfully, pauses, then adds:"Annnd, they're both drenched in sweat. Disgusting." Stark declares happily, "You two go running together?"
He hasn't see—heard Rogers since yesterday—today?—when he dragged Thor off. Is Thor coming here right now? He sincerely hopes not. He knows that the others are either unaware of his presence or are ignoring him, but Thor wouldn't.
Rogers laughs at the statement, and Loki strains to pick Romanov's feet from the others shifting. "No. Neither one of us could sleep and we've been sparring for a while; besides, I don't think I'd be able to keep pace with her."
Wait. Sleep. As in...through the night? They've greeted each other for the morning, but surely it can't be—he went to go find Thor at a little over fourteen hundred hours; if it's morning and at least eight, that means he slept for over fourteen—possibly fifteen—hours straight. He hasn't done that since being violently ill with an outbreak of a disease in Serenity a few decades ago—and even then it wasn't more than twelve.
How long has he been in here?
"Ah." Stark hums. Small conversation picks up from there, discussing either Romanov's hair or some sort of weird plant in the room (Loki isn't certain), but he can't focus on it anymore. Footsteps move towards the couch and Loki can't help the slight tense that slides into his limbs at the action. It doesn't stop and he hears someone shift before sitting (maybe) on the coffee table to his left. His breath is coming out rigidly. Please go away, please go away, please go away...
"I know you're awake." Banner says, his voice is strangely gentle. The conversation playing in the background does nothing to quell his voice. Good for him. Is he proud?
Loki releases a breath, but doesn't bother changing positions or opening his eyes. "May I be of assistance?"
"I wanted to talk." Banner starts and Loki bites back a groan. "We discussed what happened yesterday well you were sleeping," so they know about that, too? "And came to the conclusion that we're keeping you here under asylum, at the moment, not a prison. We still can't get a hold of Director Fury to inform him of the events, but we'll take the blame if things go south."
Why?
What has he done to merit their mercy?
They see a few scars and suddenly he is something to commiserate?
"Why?" The question slips from his tongue with bite.
Banner is quiet for a long moment, thinking. Loki wishes, not for the first time, that he could see the doctor's expression. "Everyone deserves second chances, Loki, including you." No, he doesn't. Banner and his group of misfits don't know half of what a mess he is. He is irredeemable. It has been assured to him enough it might as well be carved into his skin. "Are you hungry?"
Why is everyone suddenly over his eating habits?
Barton was a surprise, he wouldn't expect the man to look twice if he fell off a building, but Banner? Why? Is it some sort of strange show of trust on Midgard to feed your prisoners? Asgardians are not immune to starvation, they can just last longer with it before succumbing to its claws. He is not close to that point, as far as he is aware.
His stomach twists at the suggestion, and the apple Barton offered flips through his head in vivid detail. He shakes his head, not trusting his voice.
He can feel Banner's stare of disapproval; "Loki—" he cuts himself off, clearly attempting to figure out a way to revise what he was saying, Loki sighs in annoyance and his eyes shift under their lids in equal irritation before he rolls onto his side away from Banner. He doesn't want to talk to him at the moment. He wishes they would continue ignoring him.
He hates this, he hates that they know.
Even with the blanket wrapped around Stark's thin shirt, he still feels exposed as if every stretch of scarred skin is showing through the fabric for them to gawk at. It itches and is uncomfortable. He shouldn't have moved, at least with his back against the couch it felt less in the open.
"Food was one of the ways they tortured you, wasn't it?" Banner's voice is quiet, but Loki's spine stiffens anyway. Torture? No. They never saw the point of anything beyond making him bleed and keeping him from resting. The further his physical fatigue the more his mental shield slipped. Food was a way to heal faster, a mercy that was never shown to him.
A strangled noise escapes his throat and he hears Banner shift slightly. He can't tell if it's discomfort, pleasure, disgust—he doesn't know. He can't see it. Sight is a necessary part of him and he can't do this anymore. At least with the Avengers ignoring him, he only had to interpret Thor. He's known him for over a thousand years, it wasn't a hard task.
This is different.
He barely spoke to some of these people during his attack. As far as he can remember, his memories from the events are fuzzy and painful.
"I'm sorry." Banner murmurs. His sympathy is unwanted and disgusting. "We wouldn't do anything...like that; we're not like that." He appends in a slight fumble.
Loki shakes his head slightly and forces himself to turn towards the doctor, resting his head on his elbow. "I was not offered food, Dr. Banner; and when I was—it was...wrong, somehow. Poison, rotten—it matters little. I can't...I can't keep the food down." He explains. It's hard to explain this, he doesn't know how. His words are failing him.
"They starved you?" Banner's voice is almost surprised.
"What else did you expect?" Loki queries. Does everyone honestly believe his stay with the Chitauri was a vacation? Thor seemed quite determined not to believe else wise. "I was their prisoner, not a guest of honor."
Like here.
He is not guest, whatever terms of asylum Banner falsified or not.
"I know." Banner says, "I know. But still, I just—why?"
Loki's lips press together firmly before he blows a soft raspberry, "I am one of the most powerful sorcerers in the Nine Realms, Doctor, they knew this. I was the prince of Asgard, it wasn't an unknown world to them."
He wishes it was, maybe they would have just granted him quarter and killed him.
"Yeah." Banner agrees.
"Sorcery works through channeling energy through a magical core called a sedir. A sorcerer can draw energy from both outside himself and within. The sedir, however, relies strongly on energy fed to it and won't function properly without it. The sorcerer is still perfectly capable of drawing energy from outside, but without anything to channel it through, it's mass chaos. They knew this, I was starved to collapse my sedir."
Banner is quiet, a soft "oh" noise escaping him. "But you can fix it, right? By eating again?"
"Yes." Loki agrees, "If I could manage to keep something down. I can't."
"Why?"
Loki blows out a breath, "The body can only be fed poison so many times before assuming everything is."
Banner is quiet, thinking, before he asks almost in a blurt: "Don't you want your magic back?"
He didn't lose it. Magic isn't something that can be lost; it can be taken, but only for the non-inborns, who are unable to keep a sedir. They just draw the energy from around them. That is what Thor is, Odin simply took his focus (Mjolnir) from him; and sense Thor's abilities were stopped. Taking magic from him would be impossible unless someone ripped his veins and beating heart from his chest. Magic is as a part of him as his blood is.
Does he want it back?
Of course. Can he? Not until his body decides everything he eats isn't attempting to kill him.
Loki breathes out through his nose sharply, "You need no other reason to fear me."
He doesn't want another reason to be held back and restrained. Asgard isn't even aware of half of what he can actually do. Only Frigga was mildly aware. He didn't get the label of 'among the best' from card tricks.
"I didn't—I wasn't—I-I'm just…" Banner awkwardly starts, before stopping and switching topics entirely: "How long were you there?"
He...doesn't know. Time blurred in the Void and he lost count after month two there, he'd started hallucinating by that point. Loki shrugs helplessly, "What year is it?"
Banner seems startled by the question, because he's quiet for a moment. "Two-thousand-twelve," Banner answers, pauses then adds, "A.D."
Truly?
"Your month?" Loki asks, slightly wary of the answer.
"September."
Oh.
Thor was planned to be crowned in late May, a month exactly from his birthday, June twenty-third. They way they originate their calendar isn't much different from Midgard's, they gave them the basics of what it fanned out to today. Thor was banished later that day and Loki was regnant/king for three-four days before the Bifrost bridge that would make it roughly...May twenty-eighth. He has no idea how long he fell for, but he knows that he was found by the Other before November.
That's...nine or ten months. It seemed like so much longer.
It is barely any time.
"Ten months." Loki says, trying to wrap his head around it. Ten months. Not even a full year. He didn't even last a full year. How weak is he? No one else would have snapped as quickly, especially not Thor. Not any of the other Asgardians. No wonder everyone scoffed at his abilities on Asgard. It wasn't his first time being tortured, centuries with Thor has ensured that, but this was somehow...worse.
Loki knew no one was coming for him, he'd always had that reassurance before. He'd known Asgard probably declared him dead. He would have been; frozen to a rotting corpse if not for his heritage. He didn't want to fight through the pain, he didn't see a point.
"Ten?" Banner sounds indignant.
Loki doesn't know why. Probably surprised at how quickly he gave up.
"Thor was on Earth in May last year—that doesn't add up to ten. He said you…"fell" a few days after he returned to Asgard." Banner says.
Loki huffs slightly, "I was in the Void for some time; I don't know the exact dates."
He's glad of it. Pretending it was longer helped him endure.
Not even a full year.
Pathetic.
"The "Void"?" Banner asks.
"Open space between...planets? You call it here, yes?" Loki says, trying the word along his tongue. The way Midgard has adapted search from the normality of Asgard sometimes amazes him. Nonetheless, he's worked hard to keep his vocabulary relativity up-to-date.
"Yeah." Banner confirms. "Wait. You mean, you fell through open space for months?"
"Yes." Loki answers briskly, confused.
"How—" Banner stops, catching his tongue, "Asgardian. Right." He mutters under his breath.
Asgardian.
Ha.
"But still! When was the last time you had an actual meal?" Banner inquires.
Not of your business.
Loki pauses, thinking back. He was too stressed before Thor's coronation to eat properly, but he thinks it was a few days before that. The Chitauri were never particular on eating habits or meals.
He doesn't answer.
Does it honestly matter?
He's just going to be back in the Raft soon, anyway, there's no need to pretend otherwise. Thor is, and that worked out well for both of them.
Banner rises to his feet and Loki flinches despite himself. He hates this, he can't assess his surroundings properly and wildly grapples for standing. "No." Banner says, firmly, "This can't go on any longer, you are literally starving to death right now. It has to stop."
Loki smiles thinly.
He can feel Banner's agitation from his position a few feet away and is wary at it. His ribs are still tender from the last attack, even if they are mostly hale. It's a dull ache that hurts when prodded at; without his magic, he would likely have died from organ failure or internal bleeding on that floor a few months ago.
"We can work through the vomiting. Clint just made muffins, without cranberries, do you want one? Wait—no. We should start with liquids—smoothies; I'm sure that Tony has a blender somewhere in this stupid tower." Banner mutters the last part under his breath.
Loki sighs through his teeth, "You are not going to drop this, are you Doctor?"
"Nope." Banner assures, seeming distracted, "Don't move. I'm going to go find the stupid blender and you're going to eat—drink something." Banner storms off in the direction of the kitchen, Loki assumes. It's in that moment that he realizes that the conversation in the background is absent. Were they listening to everything?
Well.
Swell.
He's thoroughly done with today and any day after until mid next week.
"The blender, Tony," Banner demands, his voice further away, "where is it?"
"Err," Stark stutters, "I'm not sure. I know Pepper used it before she left, but…"
"I saw it," Rogers offers, "I think it's—" footsteps and a cabinet opens, "—in here. Yup."
Are they really so intent on this? He...he has done nothing to earn their mercy. He wants to know why. He doesn't understand. He doesn't know why they're doing this for him after everything he did.
"Clint, grab whatever fruit you can find." Banner commands, "Nat, help him. Steve, Tony, you start cutting it." Footsteps sound as they scramble to follow the doctor's orders. It's one of the strangest things knowing they are doing this for him.
They are making him, their enemy, food.
"Loki," Bruce calls from the kitchen where cabinets are opening and blades being drawn, "do you have any allergies we need to be aware of?"
They...are not angry by the suggestion? Allergies are not uncommon in Asgard, but they aren't spoken of often, quietly shamed, even. Stark mentioned something about his beloved being allergic to strawberries, offhandedly, as if he was perfectly fine with it. "Milk," Loki admits, raising his voice a little louder than normal to be heard, "and I can't stomach anything with hot spices."
An inheritance from his birth parents, he's guessing.
"'Kay," Stark calls from the kitchen, blade slapping down onto the surface of the counter. Light banter begins to shoot between them, and something about a "cutting merit badge" is brought up that he doesn't understand the context of. They sound as if they have been friends for a lifetime, rather than barely known each other for two (possibly) months now.
Loki envies them.
Around five minutes pass before a jarring, loud, buzzing noise swings through the air. Loki jumps at it, startled, and when it doesn't cease after a few seconds, slaps his hands over his ears. It's fortissimo, grating, and extremely high pitched. What the Nine are they doing? Murdering a cat?
Loki doesn't count the exact amount of seconds it takes for it to halt, but when it does, he peels his hands away from his ears warily. It doesn't begin again, the cat is probably dead. What on the Nine?
There's more scrambling in the kitchen and another murmurs of voices Loki can't pick out distinct words of before he hears the footsteps gradually shifting towards him. Loki forces himself to relax and his sedir quietly prods throughout the room to find the location of the Avengers when the footsteps stop.
All of them are to his left, next to the coffee table.
Why?
"You need to sit up," Romanov commands, her voice is firm, but doesn't hold the distinct layer of venom it did when she forced him into eating the banana a few days ago...perhaps a week now. His sense of time is a mess.
Loki slowly shoves himself upwards and the blanket topples into his lap. The shirt that Stark lent him is sticking to his skin uncomfortably despite how much it hangs off of him. He peels his useless eyes apart and is greeted by the ever present black. He flicks his gaze in the general direction of where he's fairly certain the gathered group is.
"Hands up." Barton orders and Loki bites back irritation at the array of commands, but nonetheless faithfully lifts his hands, palms up towards them.
One of them shifts forward, he's uncertain who, but he thinks it's Rogers and rests the base of a cup in his hands. The fingers don't move until Loki has grasped the cup without it tipping and he slowly draws the…"smoothie" was it? towards him. Loki lifts the rim towards his mouth and sips from it. The explosion of flavor almost makes him choke. He's fairly certain they put any fruit easily available to them inside of it, and it is an extensive amount. It's sweet, but strangely bitter as well. It isn't thin and hardly runs through the cup stiff and sparkling with flavor.
His eyebrows lift up of his own accord with surprise and he hears someone snicker quietly at it before being lightly whacked. The smoothie settles in his stomach uncomfortably, but isn't immediately rejected like everything else he has tried. Encouraged, Loki continues to drink it.
Loki has scarcely tasted anything so amazing in his lifetime.
He doesn't stop for anything but air, and when the final bit of the juice slides from the cup, he can't help the sudden stagger of protest that whips through him. The cup is cold around his fingers, but it doesn't bother him. The Avengers are quiet as he holds the glass in his hands, slowly shifting into butterfly position with his feet.
Loki's fingers tighten around the glass with their silence.
Why do they have to watch him? He isn't some sort of bug for them to perusal.
"Thank you." He forces out, he lowers his gaze to his lap. It does nothing, but he imagines being on the receiving end of his blank stares are unpleasant.
"Of course." Rogers assures, his voice quiet. "Do you want me to take the glass or—" Loki lifts the object towards him in answer and Rogers shifts forward to take it.
"You're welcome to chill out here and long as you want," Stark assures, "but I personally smell some not—cranberry muffins I want to eat."
Barton groans, "You're never letting that go, are you?"
"Nope." Stark assures cheerfully, beginning to walk away. The rest of his team trials after him, but Loki can feel their eyes lingering on him.
000o000
Three days after the fight, Thor scarcely makes it two feet into the communal room before Loki's head turns, dull gray eyes lazily locking onto him. Thor forces himself not to freeze and continues to move forward. He's been thinking this conversation over for days, trying to find a way to discuss the...topic without making Loki explode again.
He hasn't been hiding, not exactly, but he knows Loki has. It makes him ache in a way he can't quite explain to know that his younger brother is afraid of him.
"Brother." Thor greets, coming to a stop next to the couch, Loki's gaze has followed him, as dead as it may be.
"Thor," Loki says curtly.
Silence stretches and neither one of them moves until finally, Loki, gnawing on his lower lip shifts on the couch, tugging the blanket wrapped around his shoulders tighter. Thor recognizes the invitation for what it is and hesitantly takes a seat beside him in the newly opened space on the couch. Loki's legs are tucked up next to his chest in a way that indicates his discomfort in volumes.
Thor bites at his tongue, firmly, before opening his mouth and forcing the words out. He fears that if he stops for breath, it will get tangled in his throat and suffocate him. "Loki, I'm sorry. I don't know what I was thinking—or even if I was, but it all came out wrong. I wanted to...I don't know what I wanted, but I just—I think that I don't understand, but I want to. I don't know why you did what you did, or what happens after the Void, but I wish I did. I want to understand, but I don't know how. I'm sorry about what I said—I—you know how the words come tumbling out when I'm angry, I was an idiot, and I'm sorry."
Loki is quiet for a long minute, his head tucked onto his knees. His expression is blank, but Thor tries to read it anyway.
"You meant most of it." Loki sounds tired.
Thor winces.
He did.
He hasn't spoken to anyone about it before and it all came tumbling out in one big mass ball of chaos. Father refused to discuss it or anything that had to do with Loki in his grief and Mother couldn't hear his name without weeping. Thor kept quiet, his frustrations building until it came tumbling out onto the one person he didn't want it to.
He did tell Heimdall of it in brief, when he came to visit the edge of the broken bridge for Loki's day of birth as he checked on Jane.
"I wouldn't have chosen to say it like that." Thor argues. "It just sort of...fell out."
"Hmm."
"Loki," Thor pleads and the younger's murky gray eyes lift to him, "please."
He doesn't know exactly what it is he's pleading for, and he doesn't think Loki does either.
The younger's jaw clenches, and his eyes flick away from him towards the floor. Thor releases a quiet breath through his teeth and leans forward on his knees, looking away from him. Neither one of them says anything, they just sit in silence for a long few minutes.
Loki's breathing is shallow and sounds pain ridden, his stance to taut it can't be comfortable.
Thor's breaths are too heavy and posture collapsed in a way that his mother would snip at him for hours on.
He sighs and feels Loki's eyes lift to him. "We're a mess, aren't we?"
A laugh escapes Loki's lips, but it sounds strangely bitter. "Yes."
Thor half glances at him and clasps his hands together, running his thumbs over the opposing knuckles. The silence is long and awkward. Thor doesn't like the quiet, it makes him fidgety and uncomfortable.
"Are you angry?" Loki's question is soft, but there's something earnest in his voice.
Angry?
Angry at what? His anger for the last year has already come tumbling out leaving him exhausted and drained. "At…?" Thor queries, turning his head to look at him. Loki's lips are thinned and he hasn't shifted from his uncomfortable position. With the thinner material Tony offered him that sticks to his skin, Thor can see the outline of his ribs. It sickens him and rouses a protective desire he isn't sure how to follow anymore.
"Me." Loki answers, smoothing a stray piece of hair back.
"Yes."
Loki's expression grows tight. "I didn't want the attack." He says, his voice curt, "I knew if I made a big enough show, Odin was bound to send you and we'd go back to Asgard, and I would explain."
Thor frowns, "You could have told me. We could have sought asylum, rather than your imprisonment."
Loki's fingers begin to play with the edge of the blanket wrapped around his shoulder, "The Avengers have offered asylum and I—I didn't...didn't..." His words fumble and Thor realizes what he means to say: didn't think you would believe me.
Oh.
He would not have. He would have claimed that he was fibbing without proof and the webbing along Loki's back is that.
"Loki…" He breathes.
A physical ache slices through him at the words and Thor feels his lips part slightly with disbelief before he leans across the couch and wraps his arms around Loki. His sibling feels bony and stiff under his hands, but doesn't immediately pull away, which he takes as a plus. They haven't embraced like this since long before his coronation; Loki has never been one for physical sediment and Thor respected that.
"I do not fault you for your mistrust; I can't," Thor murmurs into Loki's soft hair, "but I will listen now, I swear. Whatever it is you want to say. Please let me help, Brother."
Loki's frame shudders before something seems to...break in him. His younger sibling collapses into the hold, head landing heavily on Thor's shoulder, but his arms do not return the embrace. Thor doesn't care, if Loki is going allow Thor to hold him, he isn't going to kvetch.
Loki murmurs something that Thor doesn't catch into his shoulder before shifting his head down so he can breathe easier, than he begins to speak. His words are a soft murmuring in Aardent that gradually shifts from ramblings to lightly glance over the Void and his imprisonment by the Chitauri.
Thor doesn't interrupt, just allows Loki to speak and quietly stuffs the anger building with the Chitauri to the side to think of later. Anger will not help right now, it isn't what Loki needs. It isn't what Thor needs.
Loki's whispers slowly become further apart before coming to a stop completely. It takes Thor nearly two minutes to realize that the younger has fallen asleep in his arms. He doesn't move, with fear of waking his younger sibling. Loki has ever been a light sleeper, but after everything that happened the last year, it's only gotten worse. Thor shifts as best as he's able into a comfortable position and closes his eyes, tipping his head back.
000o000
Thor doesn't realize he'd fallen asleep until he hears the quiet murmuring of voices and slowly picks them apart with his foggy brain. He hasn't slept well since returning to Midgard and the sudden respite is welcomed, if strange.
"—y gosh it is adorable." Tony murmurs.
"Shh," Natasha chides, equally quiet, "you're going to wake them."
Wake who?
"I am being quiet," Tony defends and Thor hears a slight clicking noise. What on the Nine? He peels his eyes apart and blinks several times to clear his vision distantly noting that his left arm is asleep and prickling dully with discomfort. A warm sensation is leaning against his left shoulder and upper part of his chest. Thor's gaze flicks to that first and recognizes the messy head of Loki's hair.
It wasn't a dream, then.
Loki's breaths are even and deep against him, but Thor can still feel his bones jutting out uncomfortably and pressing against him in a way that isn't normal. Loki has always been thin, but this is a new level. It makes him ache.
"Sure." Natasha retaliates, her voice is thick with her disbelief, "Do we wake them?"
"I don't know." Tony says, his voice is still low, "We can just put the smoothie in the fridge. Bruce said that Loki was supposed to be getting a new one every six or eight hours apart, right? We can just stretch the time."
Thor lifts his head up from staring at Loki's dark hair towards his teammates who immediately flick their gazes towards him at the movement. Natasha is holding a tall glass cup filled with a brownish sort of liquid that has frosted the cup slightly. Tony is beside her, hands crossed, but Thor sees the edge of his phone poking out from where it's buried in the crook of his elbow.
Pictures.
Tony was taking pictures.
Great.
Loki will be thrilled.
"Oh," Tony breathes, staring at him, "sorry did we wake you?" His voice is still quiet.
Thor glances at Loki's frame before looking up at Tony again, "Yes." He admits, "What are you doing?"
Natasha and Tony share a look and appear to have mastered telepathy for a few quick words between them. "Bruce didn't tell you?" Natasha asks at length, her voice still soft.
Thor glances at the glass then them and shakes his head. Whatever it is that the doctor shared between them wasn't heard by his ear. He's only seen Bruce twice in the last three days. Tony frowns, "Huh. 'Kay. Loki's extremely underweight and we're working to solve that problem, he can't stomach anything beyond liquids at the moment from all the poison that messed up his insides, and Bruce conned us all into helping him in the feed-the-Loki thing. We've been waking him up or bothering him every six-eight hours and forcing him to drink something. He's only thrown up twice." Tony sounds proud of the last part and relief tangles through him at it.
Only twice.
Not at every meal.
Thank the Norns.
"Thank you." Thor says in relief and realizes half a second too late the words weren't whispered. Loki shifts against him before his head lifts slightly and his posture tightens. He doesn't immediately leap away, however. Thor gently bumps Loki's shoulder with his elbow, "Good afternoon, Brother." The sun has yet to set and Thor is guessing it's somewhere close to eighteen hundred hours.
Loki gives an unintelligible grumble of words in response that don't sound particularly cheerful. Thor smiles lightly in response. "I have your smoothie." Natasha announces and Loki shifts away from him, lifting his hands out towards the woman. This is clearly an established pattern that Thor completely missed.
Thor rolls his shoulder, attempting to get the blood flowing again. It tingles, then sends a sharp pain down to his fingertips. A light grimace escapes him, before Loki freezes suddenly. Thor can't see his expression from this angle, but Tony and Natasha pause, staring at him.
Loki's fingers slip and the cup slides down in his grasp, but doesn't fall from it.
"Thor." Loki's voice is breathless, but desperate. "Thor."
Thor frowns, worry nagging at him and leans forward, lightly resting a hand on his shoulder. "What?"
Loki turns to him, murky gray eyes wide. There's something strange about them today, the gray seems a little less...prominent. He doesn't know if this is a good sign. Loki's mouth parts a slight noise escaping before he manages to form a breathless, but vivified sentence: "I can see shadows."
Author's Note: I am slightly curious though, how many of you guys actually like cranberries? Personally, I'm neutral towards them, but I don't know anyone who actually likes them, Tony would be so disappointed. XD
Admittedly, after Ragnarok I was a little put down at the lack of hug, so: hug! :)
Next update will be...I don't know. I will aim for before the end of October, but make no promises. Thank you guys so much for your support! :)
Until chapter 11!