A few minutes later the call from Fury came. Thor, Clint, and Natasha were in the gym, the spies sparring good-naturedly and Thor destroying punching bags, Tony was sipping a whiskey on the rocks and playing with blueprints for his new suit, and Bruce was replacing the stitch that Steve had pulled out.
"Call from Director Fury, sirs and madam."
"Put him through." They all chorused with varying degrees of apprehension.
Fury's face popped up on the screens nearest them. "Avengers, suit up. I'm getting reports of some sort of alien with a ray gun blowing shit up on a residential street. I'm sending the coordinates to your phones."
"Anything else you can tell us?" Bruce asked, drawing Fury's attention to that module of the video feed.
"Humanoid but blue as a smurf, making a mess, no spaceship sightings yet…What's wrong with Rogers?"
Steve opened his mouth to try and claim that he was fine, but Bruce beat him to it. "Training accident. He's going to be leaving the circus tricks to Clint in the future, right Steve?"
"Yeah. Yeah. I am."
Fury huffed in irritation. "I'll leave it to you to decide then whether he's cleared to go out. But I expect the rest of you to suit up and go deal with the alien." The call ended.
They all reactivated their coms. "We just got the call and are suiting up and heading over. Sounds like you're having fun?"
"Hardly. Hurry up and scare me off, I'm not feeling well."
"Still capable of teleportation?"
"For now."
The Avengers traded a look. "You know, I think I'm not going to clear Steve to go out today. You can handle first aid until I get back, right?"
"I think I can hold down the fort."
It was nervewracking watching the others prepare and leave without him, even though Steve knew there was no actual threat. It came as a relief when he heard Tony warn Loki that he was coming in fast at his six. Ten seconds later, Loki, still in Jotun form, materialized a few feet away from him and promptly collapsed. Not even thinking about the danger of frostbite, Steve lunged to catch him.
But he didn't get frostbite. Loki was still an ice cube, but not nearly enough of one to cause frostbite. It suddenly struck Steve that he'd spent quite a bit of time near a large fire while in a form that was naturally very cold. Heatstroke. Crud.
"Loki? Stay with me. Can you change back to your usual form? It might handle earthly temperatures better than this one." He scooped him up and made a beeline for the nearest bathroom, trying to ignore the weird feeling as the body in his arms flickered between forms before finally changing for real. "That a bit better?" He was heartened to feel his boyfriend's arm tighten around his shoulders. "I'm going to stick you in a cold bath to try and get your body temperature down." He set him in the tub, clothes and all, and turned on the water. "Can you do me a favor and not pass out while I go fetch you some gatorade quick?" A weak nod. Ignoring the pain from his leg, he all but ran to the kitchen and back.
An hour later when the rest of the group returned, it was to find Steve and Loki cuddling on Loki's bed, Steve in a heavy sweater and Loki shirtless in lightweight pajamapants, with the air conditioning cranked way up.
"How- holy cow it is freezing in here." Bruce entered and immediately shivered, as did the other Avengers crowding behind him.
"Apparently proximity to fire causes frost giants to suffer heatstroke." Steve told him, "Who knew, right?" Loki made a muffled noise into his chest that might have been a smart remark had it been audible. Steve unthinkingly pressed a kiss to the top of his head.
Thor surveyed them thoughtfully. "I will tolerate this relationship if I must."
Well. We have to give him points for creativity. And destructiveness. But not self-preservation.
Gah workload. I have my talk written that's coming up, though. That's a load off.