My ears ringing from the volume, I did my best to move despite the ache throughout my whole body. The stinging scent of burnt metal made me wish I could shut my nostrils like an aquatic reptile. The force from that explosion must have been some pretty powerful stuff-that or I was just a wuss. I suspect that it was the latter; by the time my eyes had remembered how to focus, everybody was up on their feet already. Captain America and Hawkeye immediately sprang into the swirling smoke, closely followed by Black Widow as she blurted words into her secret ear-comm. Bruce offered me a hand, which I gratefully took. Tony was still on the ground, swearing fit to be a sailor.
"It always has to be poker night!" he snarled, trying to wedge himself out from under a sizeable chunk of wall. I was about to run and help him, but he got it off okay and proceeded to stand. "Why can't anything weird happen while I'm in the suit?"
I knew the feeling. Next to supers like the Avengers, I felt pretty exposed. Exposed? Downright terrified. But I couldn't let a stupid survival mechanism like fear keep me from doing the right thing. After all, that was the quality that made people like these so special.
Bruce put an arm around my shoulders and started leading me to the door, but I shrugged him off. I'd taken worse...nope, that was incorrect yet again. My everywhere hurt. But if I believed it, then I could believe in myself.
I took a deep breath to try and revitalize myself, and inhaled ground drywall for my efforts. Hacking like a cyborg, I nonetheless picked my hat off the shattered floor and repositioned it back on my head. Time to earn my stripes.
Waving away the agitated dust in the air, I stepped through.
The next room reeked even stronger of charred steel, but worse than that was the chemical odor that wafted up from a shattered glass case on the table. I grumbled a nerdy swear and took a corner of the room as far away from the table and the evil scent as possible. The others were crowding around it-lucky skunks. Do they have any idea how bad that smells to a werewolf's nose?
"Bruce, what was in there?" demanded Cap, reeling back from the scent. Interesting. The scientist in question followed us through the hole in the wall, not getting to cough now that the dust had settled.
"Lots of sulfrous oxide in there," he observed, eyes roving over the crime scene. No wonder. "presumably to keep what used to be in there stable. Too bad the glass didn't do its job."
"Take as long as you want to answer his question, by all means," grumbled Hawkeye, scanning the room behind his sunglasses. I felt like I could've been able to track the culprit by scent, but with the reek of the chemicals I couldn't even smell Captain America right next to me. Whoever had done this had been out of here in no time, and left everything spotless. Except for the glass case, of course. Who could pull off such a smooth job? Oh, and where the heck was Tony?
"Probably a chunk of highly reactive metal-" thought Bruce out loud. But what he saw next cut him off midsentence. Within the glass case was a square hole, with steel claws at each corner and side. It was the exact same size to fit…
"The Tesseract," he grimaced. Everybody took the same sudden breath.
"So that's why Director Fury wanted us to play in the room next door," mumbled Steve, running his hand through his hair. I'm fairly certain he earned several sarcastic looks from the room in general.
"That thing again?" I groaned, my voice muffled by my sweater sleeve. Everybody stared at me for a moment, not saying anything. "...what? This room reeks."
"But who would do this?" asked Natasha. Just what I was thinking. "Or who could do this? This must have been done by someone on the inside."
"That's impossible," stated Hawkeye flatly. "You know how tough we are on our agents. Disloyalty isn't in them, any of them. They would have to be immensely influential to persuade one of ours to do this."
Well, time to make myself useful. I went through my mental list of baddies. Dr. Doom, the Master/Mistress, the Riddler, Jim Moriarty…
...oh. Oh no.
"Frick," I snarled, bolting out of the room.
Obvious. Obvious obvious obvious.
But I hadn't seen it at first, because I didn't want to. I didn't want to believe that he'd abused my friendship and taken advantage of my warmheartedness. I didn't want to believe that he wasn't actually interested in redemption. Overall, I just didn't want to believe any of this had happened. But not believing in something doesn't make it un-happen or turn it untrue. What was I going to do about it?
I slowed down in the hallway, though my footsteps echoed still through the hall. That was an excellent question. I didn't know for sure that it was Loki. There was a chance that he still cared. But as little as I wanted to believe it, there was a greater chance that he had gone and shattered everything. How was I to know the truth without making my position obvious and spurring Loki into lying to protect himself?
Oh. Obvious again.
Taking a deep breath, I took a moment to forget all that had happened in that room. Forget the wall, the cards, the room with the smell. All the rage, all the betrayal, all the hurt feelings that had surfaced along with that realization. I let it all go, floating in my head aimlessly. But I still needed that truth. So I put it away in a drawer, and then rewrote that moment.
I went in to play cards. We played blackjack for a couple rounds, I won once, and then proceeded to poker. I won a little and lost a little, then was destroyed big-time when I tried to bluff out Clint. Basically I was out of the game after that, so we just had some small chat and such. Then, when the wall exploded, I was hit real hard in the leg by a chunk of flying debris, accounting for my right leg limp. Then I decided I was going to head back, since I was feeling a little ignored while everybody continued figuring it out without me.
Yes. That's my story.
I exhaled, continuing to walk on.
I tried to mimic John Watson for my limp, wondering with a mild pang of panic if it was really believable. If anyone were to see through an act, it would be Loki. But on the bright side, my leg wasn't actually disabled. Just wounded...though that sentiment did little to console me.
"Boo."
I whirled so fast I completely forgot my limp and my rewritten game night. &$#.
"You!" I snapped, barely remembering that I wasn't supposed to be mad at Loki. In an attempt to save face and my quickly shambling act, I turned away from his smug face and stormed off. He's too good at this, it's not fair.
"I thought we were friends," he called after me, quickening his pace to fall into step beside me. He only added the slightest tinge of hurt tone, using more of a confused voice in the mix to make me feel sorry for him. Freaking. Impossible. Him.
"I thought so, too," I growled, hugging my jacket closer and walking faster. This time he jogged a stride or two to catch up. He tried to bend low over me to get in my face, but I pulled my hat down and refused to look at him. Because in my heart of hearts, I wanted more than anything not to be mad at him.
"What did I do?" he asked indignantly.
That stopped me in my tracks.
He acted so innocent. Like it was no big deal that he had taken advantage of me like that. Like this was exactly the kind of sithspit that friends did to each other. He didn't even ask what was wrong. Because he didn't think anything could be wrong with us, ever, because he thought I could and would just take anything and everything from him, just because I was his friend.
Enough.
"What did you do?" I echoed quietly. I looked right up at him, straight through those all-too-human eyes. "What did you do?" I took a step toward him, letting the moment hang in the air before my breakdown. "You did…no, you're right. All you were doing is being yourself, and I should've seen that coming. I should've known that you would...that you wouldn't take this seriously. It's not about you, it never was. You thought it was, even I did. What did I do, however? I'll tell you, since you didn't even bother to comprehend what we could've had. I cared about you. I trusted you! I would've trusted you with anything-my friends, my family, my own life! And you just...you don't even care! I would have gone anywhere with you, and it's like you didn't even notice! I thought I was your friend!"
Silence. His face was completely blank. By now my voice was wavering, as erratic as the path my tears left down my cheeks.
"I thought you were mine."
I couldn't take it anymore. So I turned and ran away from the one friend that had needed me most.