Chapter 23
"Samantha?" the voice fell of deaf ears, "Samantha~ Wake up, child."
She felt the wave of adrenaline that preceded the agony and instinctively balled up against what was coming. For what felt like an eternity, she'd been in her cell screaming as flames consumed her body, only to open her sore eyes once the agony abated and realize she was still whole. She fought against herself now and the Pavlovian cries that tried to tear free from her.
"It's alright. I've made it stop." A gentle hand under her chin prompted Samantha to roll over. Hands helped lift her into a seated position, "look at this, you've made a mess of yourself. Let me help," Loki's voice was soft, even kind. With a wave of his hand the sweat, vomit, and even blood from a night spent tearing at her own skin vanished. "There, isn't that better? More dignified?" He pulled lightly on Samantha's chin and, once her dry lips parted, poured cold, sweet water down her throat in a slow trickle, "You may drink your fill."
Loki was patient as her hand covered his and she slowly took the bottle of water from him, "Do you see, darling Samantha? I am not unreasonable."
"I can't tell you where the weapon is," Samantha panted weakly. Her throat burned from the screaming and it came out as a rasp.
"I believe you believe as much. Those words come neither from defiance nor bravery, but truth. Yet I also believe that you do not even know how much you remember."
She laughed softly, "Then dig around in my head and see for yourself, wasn't that what you did with the tesseract and Doctor Selvig? You used your staff to hijack his mind and make him help you?"
"Controlling someone in that manner and extracting memories are very different. Besides, I do not have my scepter anymore." Loki smiled sadly, "You are not ready to listen just yet, are you?"
"Go to hell." Samantha felt herself trembling as she defied Loki. She'd been water-boarded for hours on end, left to scream and writhe on a cell floor overnight, all for refusing his wishes thus far.
You don't have to sound, look, or even feel brave, you just have to be brave. Samantha knew the voice was her own, but she could imagine Steve saying the words to her and that brought more comfort than anything.
"Alright, but I want you to know the rules before we proceed." Loki stood, "I cast a spell on you that made every nerve in your body burn for five minutes, every fifteen minutes for six hours. Now, I will make it continuous for a mere four hours, yet every fifteen minutes, for five minutes, it will be ten times worse." He bent down to stroke a lock of hair back from Samantha's face as she paled and gently cupped her cheek, "When I come back, I will give you a moment to collect yourself and ask again. You do not need to give me the exact location, simply focus and try to remember what pieces you can. If you do, you may return to your fifteen minutes of peace. If you refuse, your punishment will be more severe. Do you understand?"
Samantha didn't reply, but Loki did not expect her to. He tapped her cheek with his index finger and stepped back, releasing her. As he turned to leave the cell he raised his hand and snapped his fingers. Samantha's screams were instantaneous and echoed in the small cell. Loki smiled over the roaring of her agony, raised the shield on her cell, and a moment later the screams were cut off as the barrier engaged. His Hydra guards showed no emotion, no sympathy for the girl's plight. Just as well, if they had Loki would have snapped their necks without a second thought.
"What do you think of my methods?"
"Our job is to ensure the prisoner does not escape or commit suicide. That is all we were instructed to think about."
Loki's grin was wolfish, "You are a credit to your species." he glanced to the other for a response to his question.
"If I may suggest something?" the other guard had a cruel spark in his eye.
"You may."
"You have the ability to change your appearance, right?"
"I do."
He shrugged, "She might be more cooperative to or for her fuck-buddy." Loki raised an eyebrow, "Captain America."
"Oh, that's wicked," he didn't understand all Earth slang, but the explanation helped, "I think you're my new favorite."
At some point, while the Avengers argued over how far to trust Dr. Kristen Gunvald, Bucky wandered off. Their decision wouldn't change how he approached handling her, and his half-finished memory was still eating away at his mind. Over and over again he replayed killing the SHIELD agents, walking down the hallway, and opening the closet door to find-
Maybe something. Maybe nothing.
Add to that the fact that he'd never finished processing the Ryker kid's murder and it was a recipe for sleepless nights even before adding Samantha's abduction to the heap.
Bucky found himself in Tony's lab before he was really committed to going anywhere in particular. He wanted to be alone to think, to figure out how to at least save Steve's girlfriend, kill Thor's brother, and plant himself firmly between some kind of zombie-Valkyrie-sociopath hybrid and her oversized carving knives.
"What are you doing in here?" Natasha's soft voice lifted some of the weight from Bucky's hunched shoulders, it always did.
"I'm going to the library to see what I can find on these 'Norn'," he quickly rotated his metal arm and began to press hidden levers and switches to release it, "JARVIS, tell Tony I need this when I need it, it's his until then." He set it down carefully on Tony's workbench and turned, mindful now that his center of gravity was totally skewed. It always felt strange- the arm was gone, but a part of him could swear it was still there. He stared at his human hand a moment, willing his other to join it.
Natasha's hands took his and she gently traced his palm, "There's nothing any of us could have done differently. You need to stop beating yourself up."
"Loki walked in here like he owned the damn place. Every Avenger on high-alert, the 'Earth's Mightiest Heroes', and only one puts up any resistance." He pulled away from her hands to rest his on her shoulder, "Nat, we couldn't even stop this guy in our own home. He steamrolled us."
"We've got some egg on our faces, yeah."
"Not all of us," Bucky offered a halfhearted smile, "you gave him something to think about. I just yelled at him and dropped like a sack of bricks."
"The first time we all got together, around the first time I saw Loki actually, Banner Hulked-out on me. All I could do was run for my life. While Coulson died, while Loki got away, I was shivering against a wall scared out of my mind."
Bucky snorted, "What? They didn't teach you how to fight a giant green immortal ballistic missile with rage issues in the Red Room? Sloppy."
"Yeah, it was week two, but I didn't pay much attention," Natasha smiled and rested her cheek on Bucky's hand a moment, "the point is, Barnes, we all have moments we regret. I can't make you feel better about Loki taking Samantha- we all dropped the ball with that one in different ways- but you have to take that and put it behind you. Chalk it up to youthful stupidity. You're older now, wiser." She winked.
"So how do we make sure the same thing doesn't happen with the sister?" Bucky dropped his hand and sighed, "Either she's Hydra, and we screw ourselves down the road by letting her out of that cage; or she's exactly who and what she says she is and keeping her in there loses us that weapon, Samantha, and maybe even the whole damn fight."
"It's possible," Natasha agreed. "But we both know how to handle a double-cross in our sleep."
"How much do you think we should be trusting this 'Coulson' guy?"
Natasha growled slightly, "I used to trust him with my life. He and Clint were my best friends in SHIELD. I didn't think he had it in him to lie to me like that, to let me think he was dead… He's a dick, but he's an honest one. If he says Gunvald is clean she's either a better liar than I am or she's totally legit. Not many people are capable of pulling one over on Phil Coulson, no matter how easy he looks."
"Well, at least we know we're on the same page about finding Samantha. We just have to make sure she doesn't get her hands on the Norn weapon. Just in case she decides to turn it over."
"Don't plant yourself in her way," Natasha advised, "you could be her target just as easy as that thing."
Bucky took Natasha's hand in his and led her from Tony's lab towards the library, "Asgardians, Valkyrie, Norn, Avengers, Loki, and Hydra. There are too many people making plays on this weapon. We have one and the Norn has one… We need to thin the playing field a bit."
"The Valkyrie are probably allied with the Asgardians, Loki with Hydra, and then there's the Norn and us on our own. Four teams, three weapons. Are you thinking we should be allying with someone?"
"That would be nice," Bucky shrugged, "but the only ones we can ally with are the Valkyrie and Asgardian forces and… I don't know Nat, something's not right there."
"What do you mean?" she was puzzled.
He couldn't quite find the words to describe what he'd felt from Odin, "Thor's dad… He's nothing like anyone described. The read I got on him was hostile at best, defensive, and downright dark. I don't think he's a good guy."
Natasha considered their predicament and simply shrugged, "There's not much we can do right now. You focus on Odin, I'll worry about Gunvald."
"Thank you," Bucky glanced around for the other Avengers before leaning in for a slow, sweet kiss, "for everything, but right now for keeping me sane."
"It's my pleasure. Now, come on, we've got someone to save."
"What the hell are you doing now?" Sam shut down the energy barrier holding Kristen in and leaned against the wall.
She was sitting with her knees up to her chest, her head down, and her hands tightly clasped. Her forehead rested on her wrists and he thought he heard a sound- a murmur? Something higher pitched and irregular. When Kristen looked up though it was with puffy red eyes that still ran bright with tears. She looked away, embarrassed, and wiped at her eyes.
"Oh, were you- you were praying?" he was embarrassed suddenly and straightened up, "I'm sorry I didn't think-"
"What? You didn't think what?" she asked. Her voice was shaking slightly, but the fierceness was still there, "You didn't think I would worry about Samantha? You didn't think I had the ability to worry about Samantha?"
"No I-" Sam didn't have an answer for her, "I was just surprised, that's all. I thought you'd still be pissed about everything."
"Well I'm not. If it's okay with you, I'll keep going between 'pissed' and utterly terrified at the thought of what Loki is doing to my sister right now, or what he will do before she's found." Kristen's voice broke slightly and she turned her back on Sam to wipe away fresh tears.
"Look, I'm sorry, alright? Coulson vouched for you, JARVIS backed up what he told us. I'm here to bring you upstairs so you can tell us what you know about where Samantha might have hidden the weapon."
Kristen almost laughed, "There it is… I don't know what scares me more- knowing Loki is torturing my baby sister as we speak, or-" she shuddered and wiped at her cheeks again, "-or the thought that you might be willing to sacrifice her to get and keep that thing."
"That's not going to happen, I swear to you on my life. No matter what it takes, we'll do everything we can to get her back safe and sound."
"I'll believe it when I see it." Kristen stood up and ran a hand through her long hair, "I narrowed the search area down to ten possible locations based on the call I got from Sammy when she hid the weapon. I give you one location at a time, we check it out, then move on if we don't find it. That's how it's going to work on my end."
Sam nodded, "Fair. On our end it'll be Natasha, Bucky, and myself as well as Thor, once he's back from the Realms. There's some kind of link between these weapons, we might need Mjolnir to find the Swords."
"Thor's hammer is one of these weapons?" Sam nodded and Kristen snorted, "Why am I not even surprised? What else should I know?"
"There's an undead Valkyrie warlord looking for the Swords too."
Kristen frowned, "Give me specifics, lots of specifics."
"Alright. Just- notice how I'm trusting you and try to reciprocate, alright?" Kristen rolled her eyes and nodded, "OK, so everything we know... This will take about as long as the walk to the elevator."