Chapter 5 - A Couple Sandwiches Short

One of Frigga's handmaidens had followed her holding a large basket, and after setting it down on the blanket, she curtsied to her Queen and left. Frigga and Jane settled themselves on the blanket across from Thor and Loki, with the basket between. Jane chose to sit directly across from Loki, though Loki supposed that if they all angled themselves towards the center, she would be sitting across from Thor.

But even then, she would still be sitting between Loki and Frigga, and not next to Thor. Or on top of him. All but the shiest and most reserved women Thor had courted in the past probably would have chosen to sit practically in his lap, if not actually on it. Even Sif had clung to him constantly when they were together, always seeming to find excuses to touch him.

Not that Loki had been jealous or anything. He had found it repulsive, seeing all those women debase themselves. How could Thor stand it? Sigyn had acted that way around him for a while. He had found it flattering at first, but then he had found it tiresome.

Loki found himself liking Jane a little more than he already had. At least she had enough class not to engage in public displays of affection in front of her boyfriend's mother, who was also the Queen of Asgard.

A few uncomfortable moments passed in which no one said anything but seemed to be staring directly at Loki. He sighed to himself and stared down at the cloth they were sitting on, unable to meet his mother's eyes when he spoke to her. "How ever did you convince the All-Father to allow something like this?"

"Your father can be reasonable, so long as you catch him in a good mood," said Frigga.

Loki wanted to say that Odin was not his father, but he had no desire for a repeat of their last conversation. Frigga could call Odin his father all she wanted, and he would just ignore it. "I must have the worst luck," he said instead. "I don't believe I've ever caught the All-Father in a good mood."

To his surprise, no one challenged him on that, or told him it was his own fault that Odin was never in a good mood around him. Instead, his mother began taking things out of her basket as Loki watched. Most of the food consisted of his own favorites, or at least things that had been his favorites in the past: miniature pies with ham and cheese leaking out of them, smoked salmon sandwiches, sliced root vegetables that had been salted and dehydrated, rice pudding with the kind of wild berries that were so dark blue they were almost black, and butter cookies topped with slivers of almonds.

What was this new strategy his family had developed of bribing him with food? Granted, they seemed to be worried about how little he had eaten since the beginning of his imprisonment. It had not been an intentional hunger strike, and he had not done it to make them worry. As he had told Thor, he didn't seem to get hungry anymore, and prison food was not particularly enticing. He had not been fed anything substandard; it was just the kind of simple, bland food that made eating more of a chore than an enjoyment. He hardly thought he was going to waste away just because he skipped a few meals, though.

He wasn't particularly hungry now, but he did not wish to upset Frigga by refusing to eat out right. Instead, he pushed things around on his plate and picked at them, wishing he had his magic so that he could covertly move the food a little at a time into his dimensional storage, or onto Thor's plate, the way he had when he was younger and had been told that he couldn't eat dessert unless he ate all of his dinner first.

Frigga was staring at him again, and he had the distinct feeling that she knew what he was doing. "I'm sorry, I'm just not hungry at the moment," he told her, though he was not at all sure why he should apologize for it.

"I heard that you were not eating well, but I had hoped it was only prison food that didn't agree with you. Perhaps we ought to have Eir look at you," Frigga suggested.

"No Mother, I'm fine. I don't need to see the healers. There is absolutely nothing physically wrong with me." All of his injuries from Midgard had healed correctly, he was fairly certain. Some of the injuries inflicted on him by Thanos and his Black Order that had been slower to heal, but the majority of those wounds had not been physical.

Jane made a humming noise, as if she wanted to say something, but was not sure her opinion would be welcomed. As far as Loki was concerned, it was not, but that didn't stop her. "You know, lack of appetite can be a symptom of depression," she said.

Loki glared at her. "I thought you were an astrophysicist, Doctor Foster. Are you also a psychologist now?"

Jane looked at him as if he were a dog that had somehow learned to talk. Clearly, she hadn't expected him to know what either an astrophysicist or a psychologist was. That did not surprise him; Thor probably still didn't have a good idea of what she did, and the poor woman had assumed all Asgardians were as equally clueless when it came to the sciences of her realm. He wondered how long it would take her to conclude that Thor really wasn't too bright and leave him for someone who was more clearly her intellectual equal.

"Don't be rude, Loki." Frigga pursed her lips at him, signaling that she was disappointed in his behavior. "Jane is only trying to help. Besides, I could just as well ask if you think yourself a healer now, since you have already concluded that the problem cannot be physical."

"There is no problem," Loki insisted, even though he knew he was destined to lose this argument. If the Queen decided he needed to see the healers, he would no doubt be taken to see the healers.

Perhaps if they did find something wrong with him, he would be laid up in the healing rooms for a while, and he would have a bit of a break from his cell. Which could potentially be dangerous, he reminded himself. The healing rooms were just that much closer to the royal quarters. Being near his Mother for a short time, with his brother close at hand, was one thing (he just wished his brother had enough sense to have brought Mjolnir with him and to not have bound his own powers along with Loki's). But he didn't want to be close to her for longer than it took to eat a meal.

As usual, Frigga seemed to know what he was thinking. "Your brother told us that you refused your Father's offer to bring you up to your own rooms in exchange for information about those that threaten you."

Jane made a strange noise, and for a moment Loki thought she might be choking on one of the slivers of ham bone that occasionally made it into the pies. Loki had to wonder which part had taken her most by surprise: that they would be willing to let him out of prison for any reason, or that he was currently under threat. Likely, Thor still hadn't told her why he had brought her to Asgard.

Thor was a lot like his father, in that he had never had any qualms about manipulating people. He wouldn't think of it as a manipulation, because he would not technically have told her anything untrue. He had simply omitted information, like when Odin had forgotten to tell him he was , Loki found himself becoming annoyed on her behalf, and he turned to his brother to glare.

Thor rolled his eyes. "Did you think I wasn't going to tell Mother and Father of your refusal?"

"Of course I knew, you idiot," Loki said.

"Loki, don't call your brother an idiot," their mother interjected, but it was with the sort of detachment that indicated she was aware the phrase had lost its meaning over the centuries.

Thor sighed. "Then why are you vexed with me this time?"

"I suppose it isn't me that ought to be vexed, but your Lady Jane. It's clear from her expression that she has been brought here under false pretexts."

Both Frigga and Jane turned to Thor, their raised eyebrows demanding an explanation.

"I did not bring her here under false pretexts," Thor argued. "I simply wanted her to get to know you a little before I asked her for help on your behalf."

"Thor, how do you think I can help?" asked Jane. "It's like Loki said, I'm an astrophysicist, not a psychologist."

Of course she would assume that was the kind of help he needed.

"What is a 'psychologist?'" Thor scowled at the word, which was one of those words that had no translation in All-speak. They had been taught by one of their tutors to decipher such words by breaking them down, but when Thor did it, it hardly ever worked, because he tried to break the words down into similar sounding words, including words that were longer than the original word, instead of root words. Right now, he was probably thinking a psychologist was a lumberjack with psychic powers.

Loki decided to answer Thor's query before Jane could. "They are Midgardian healers that treat madness, Thor. Lady Jane is under the impression that I am insane."

Thor looked to Jane as if to ask if it were true.

Jane held up her hands in a placating gesture to Thor, but when she spoke, it was to Loki. "I didn't say you were insane, Loki, and where I'm from we don't use the word 'mad' anymore. But from what I've seen and from what Thor's told me, it's pretty clear that you aren't okay. Seeking professional help is nothing to be ashamed of." Her face darkened. "Actually, Erik—you remember Doctor Selvig, right? The one you brainwashed? He's been in a psychiatric hospital since May."

This, Loki realized, was her passive aggressive way of bringing up what he had done to her realm. "Have you considered that Selvig was mad before he ever met me?" he asked, trying to keep his tone neutral. "The man ate anchovies and pineapple on pizza."

"He was always a little eccentric," Jane admitted. "But before the invasion, there had been exactly zero incidents in which he called me in the middle of the night, convinced that aliens had been trying to contact him through the FM radio in his alarm clock."

"And have you considered that aliens might be trying to contact him?"

"Are you saying that it's a possibility, in your opinion?"

"I'm not sure what purpose the radio would serve, to be honest. When aliens contact me, it's usually via a direct telepathic connection. Sometimes in a dream."

Jane's eyebrows shot upward. "Okay—well, like I said, seeking professional help is nothing to be ashamed of. Lots of people do. I even saw a therapist for a while, and Darcy's been bugging me to go back, because she thinks I have an unhealthy obsession with—" Jane paused, and her eyes darted momentarily to Thor and back before she concluded with, "my work."

Frigga looked at the young woman with a thoughtful expression that said she was considering Jane's words carefully. Loki hoped she wouldn't decide that she agreed with Jane's assessment and send Thor back to Midgard to fetch a psychologist for him.

Loki sat up straighter. If his wrist hadn't still been bound to his brother's, he would have crossed his arms in front of his chest defiantly. "I don't know what Thor has told you, Jane, but I am in full possession of my mental faculties."

Jane arched an eyebrow at him. "People who are don't usually starve themselves, trash their own living spaces, and try to seriously injure their sibling one minute, only to act completely calm the next. Don't even get me started on what you did in New York. If I wasn't starting to suspect that you might actually need help, I'd slap you for that."

Loki grinned lasciviously at her threat. He'd always had at thing for vindictive women with fiery tempers (when he was younger, he'd had a bit of a crush on Sif, but Thor had gotten to her first). Both Frigga and Thor glared at him warningly, and it was only for Frigga's sake that Loki decided torefrain from saying anything to make Jane change her mind about hitting him.

Thor cleared his throat. "Jane, whether or not my brother is suffering from madness, that is not what I meant to ask you for help with. The truth is that we suspect Loki's former associates might still hold some sort of psychic hold over him. However, there is little we can do for it, as we believe it to have been accomplished with some combination of what we call magic and what you call technology. I was hoping that between you and Mother, you might come up with a solution."

Jane looked at him as if she did not understand. "Psychic hold? What does that mean, Thor—are you talking about brain washing, or some kind of mind control? I've never heard of technology that could do something like that, but then, I'm not a tech expert or an engineer. You would probably be better off asking someone like Tony Stark."

Loki snorted derisively. "Right, I'm sure he would want to help me, after I threw him out a window."

Thor furrowed his eyebrows thoughtfully. "He may, Loki. He is a good man, and I do not believe he is one for holding grudges. He is the one who assisted me in finding all the Midgardian foods you requested, after all."

"Probably because he understood that I'd requested those things to be difficult, and he wished to vex me."

Thor chuckled. "You might be correct about that, but Stark enjoys vexing everyone. I still believe he would help if I explained the situation. Perhaps Banner would help as well. It is my understanding that he is some sort of scientist as well, and possesses skills as a healer."

A wave of panic washed over Loki. His brother could not possibly be serious. "The green berserker? Thor, I beg of you, do not bring that thing to Asgard."

"Banner is not a thing, Loki. So long as you do not threaten him, he will not harm you."

Loki had a feeling Thor was overestimating either Banner's control or his own, but instead of saying so, he simply glared, hoping Thor would get the message.

"You know, if you offer them the chance to come here, I can't see either of them saying no," Jane said. "As humans, we don't normally get to see worlds other than our own. I've never met either of them, but from what I do know about them, I'm sure they're both naturally curious people."

Judging by his brother's expression, Thor had already made up his mind. Loki could only hope that Odin would put his foot down to prevent him from bringing any more mortals to Asgard.

(・∧‐)ゞ

Thor had caught Stark alone this time. "Spy Verses Spy," as the man had called them, were out on a mission for SHIELD, and the Captain had been called to Washington. According to Stark, SHIELD liked to lend him out to the United States government sometimes as a gesture of goodwill, so that they could parade him around as if they still owned him. Banner was in the tower, but he was probably asleep, because Banner slept at night "like a normal person."

When Thor had arrived, JARVIS had directed him to Stark's lab, where he was busy dismantling something. Perhaps it was one of his suits of armor, but it was in too many pieces to tell. "So, you think your little brother was, and still is, under the psychic influence of—who? The Chitauri?" Stark asked, as he fiddled with a piece of green board etched with something that reminded him of the sigils used in Asgardian magic. He tossed the board into a pile of similar boards and picked up a tool that was pointy at one end, and had a cord protruding from the other, which was plugged into the wall. Stark touched the pointy end, and then pulled his hand back, shaking it as if he had burned himself.

Thor shook his head somberly. "Not the Chitauri, but whoever gifted him both the Chitauri and the scepter."

Stark absentmindedly touched the end of the pointy-burny tool again and dropped it. "Shit—are you saying there's still some other aliens out there that want to take over the Earth?"

Thor hadn't thought of it that way before, but he supposed it stood to reason. "Yes, I suppose there probably is."

The tool Stark had dropped had rolled off his workbench, and now dangled above the floor by its cord. Stark grabbed it by the handle this time and reached to unplug it, but the base of the plug sparked as it fell out of the socket, causing Stark to jump back. "Damn. Why are aliens so interested in us, all of a sudden?"

"I cannot be certain," Thor admitted. "Perhaps there is something here they seek. But Midgard also serves as the gateway to the rest of the nine realms. That is one reason Asgard is sworn to protect her: if your realm falls to a force that lies beyond, the rest of the realms will be vulnerable, including Asgard."

Stark turned to face Thor for the first time during their conversation. "Fantastic—so Earth just happens to be an intergalactic truck stop on the way to Shangri-la."

Thor wondered if his All-Speak was failing, because he hadn't understood a word Stark had just said.

"Don't worry about it, Point Break. What I meant was, someone might invade us on the way to your fancy-pants realm."

Thor nodded, slightly less confused about what Stark meant this time, but still wondering if his All-Speak had become scrambled. He had no idea what Asgard had to do with pants. However, he only ever seemed to have this many problems when speaking with Stark, so he had a feeling it had something to do with the way the man spoke. "I do not believe there is an immediate threat to your realm," he clarified, hoping that he could focus his friend on the problem at hand. "Loki was only able to travel to this realm and bring the Chitauri through with the aid of the Tesseract, which is now safely secured in Asgard's vaults."

"Yeah, still not sure how I feel about how we sent the Tesseract and your crazy brother off to the same place."

"They are not in the same place, Man of Iron. The Tesseract, as I said, is in our vaults, while Loki is in the prisons."

"Oh well, that's a relief. Glad to hear you didn't decide to keep them in the same room."

Thor knew that sometimes, relying on All-Speak made it difficult to detect sarcasm, but he couldn't not hear it when it was that blatant. "I assure you that both are properly secured."

"Cool. If that's the case, why worry about whether or not your brother is under someone's 'psychic influence?'"

Thor was beginning to suspect that Loki might be right about The Man of Iron not being inclined to help. "If you had a brother, would you be willing to leave him to that kind of torment, no matter what he had done?"

Stark arched an eyebrow at him. "So he is your brother now? Because when you first heard about his antics during the invasion, you were pretty quick to let us know he was adopted."

Thor shook his head. "That was wrong of me. Loki is my brother no matter what he has done. Even if he screams at me that we are not brothers, it does not matter."

Stark wandered towards a refrigerator in his lab, where he pulled out a tall can of something. "All-natural, organic energy drink?" Stark offered. "It's full of—" Stark squinted at the side of the can. "Goji berries and guarana, whatever that is."

Thor shook his head, not quite adventurous enough to try something that Stark didn't seem sure of himself. Stark pulled the tab on the energy drink, and it made the oddly satisfying popping noise that Midgardian drink cans make when you open them. He tilted his head back and poured some of the drink in his mouth, then made a face. "Okay, so little brother is under the 'psychic influence' of the space invaders. How do we know this?"

Thor shrugged. "Loki believes it to be so. He hears their voices in his head, I think."

"Er, right. You do know that if a human said something like that, our solution would probably be to put them on anti-psychotic drugs? I'm an engineer, not a psychiatrist."

"Is a psychiatrist like a psychologist?" Thor asked. When Stark blinked at him in a way that made it clear he was surprised that Thor knew what a psychologist was, he explained. "Jane was the one who suggested that Loki needed a psychologist."

Stark nodded. "A psychiatrist is like a psychologist, but one that's qualified to prescribe medication. I'm pretty sure that's the main difference, anyway—so if you ask me, Loki probably needs a psychiatrist, because I'm pretty sure the hearing voices thing usually requires pharmaceutical intervention."

"I see. So you and Jane both believe that my brother is ill. And this medicine would cure him?"

Stark winced apologetically. "Er—no, probably not? Mental illness usually can't be cured, just treated. You learn to manage the symptoms. Kind of like with Bruce's Hulk condition. Hulk's not going away, but he can control when the transformations happen most of the time now."

"I see." And the comparison did help. His brother did seem to have moments in which he would lose control of his actions. Loki seemed even to be aware of it, which may have been why he had been apprehensive about having Mother around him. "That reminds me, I was going to ask Banner to help as well. Loki begged me not to bring him to Asgard, but I assured him that as long as he did nothing to antagonize the man, he would be perfectly safe."

"So Loki's scared of the big bad Hulk now, huh? Guess I can't blame him. But you're right, Bruce is just a pussy-cat unless you really piss him off."

"He can also transform into a cat?"

"Uh, no. I just mean he's a nice guy. Sorry, I always forget that slang goes right over your head."

Thor looked up in the air, trying to catch a glimpse of the "slang."

"Okay, just forget I said that too. Anyway, Bruce is also 'not that kind of doctor,' as he tends to remind me whenever I try to unburden myself on him."

Thor frowned as he realized something. "You do not believe that my brother is truly under the psychic influence of his former allies at all, do you? You think it is madness that causes him to think so."

"Well, again, that would be the assumption we'd make if he were human. But then again, your brother is a bad ass magical alien dude from Fantasyland, and we know aliens are real now that they've knocked one of the hood ornaments off the Chrysler building, so who knows."

"He is not from—" Thor blinked as he came to a realization. "You are a very sarcastic person, aren't you?"

"You've just figured that out?"

"I was beginning to believe my All-speak to be corrupted."

"All-speak?"

"It is a universal language that allows us to speak and be understood without having to know the language of the person we are communicating with."

"Shit, you're talking about some kind of universal translator. Like a real-life babel fish?" Thor didn't know what that was, but Stark didn't really seem to be asking. In any case, he immediately spit out another frantic question that was much easier for him to answer. "Are you saying you're not speaking English right now, and whatever I say gets translated into whatever language it is you really speak?"

Thor nodded. "My brother speaks and reads English and several other Midgardian languages fluently, but my own English is not good enough to converse fluently. I never saw the point of learning other languages where All-speak seemed to suffice, whereas Loki has always been quite fond of reading literature from other realms. According to him, the only way to truly appreciate it is to read it in the source language, without All-speak." Thor had always assumed Loki was just being snobbish, but this conversation had demonstrated for him just how limited All-speak was.

"So Loki's a pretty smart guy, huh?" Stark asked.

Now that was a truly easy question. "He is one of the brightest minds in Asgard. An adept mage and the greatest strategist I know."

"Seriously? A brilliant strategist? Because his strategy for the invasion kind of sucked."

"He was not acting like himself at all," said Thor, frowning as he realized just how true that was. "It was almost as if he did not plan at all, unless his plan was to rally us against him and ensure his own failure."

Stark shrugged. "Could have just been hubris. Like he really thought we didn't have a chance, so he didn't bother. He didn't seem to have much regard for us 'insignificant mortals.'"

"That is also a distinct possibility," Thor admitted. An overinflated sense of self was likely a family failing, but it just didn't seem right for some reason. Loki favored plans that showed how clever he was, and his plan for the invasion had not been clever at all. He wanted nothing more than to have a conversation about this with his brother now.

"You're starting to think little bro really wasn't in control of himself, aren't you?" asked Stark.

"In one way or another," Thor admitted.

"Damn it. I'm really not sure what I can do if he's actually having his mind tampered with." Stark screwed his eyes shut and rubbed his eyelids with the fingertips of the hand that was not holding his drink. "I dunno—put a tinfoil hat on him? But then again, I'm Tony Stark and I'm awesome, so I guess it's worth looking into. And I get to go to Asgard, right?"

Thor remembered what Jane had said about how neither Stark nor Banner would likely pass up a chance to explore a realm not their own. "Yes, and while you are there, you may ask any questions you wish of the scholars living in the palace. If I can arrange it, you will be allowed access to the Hall of All Knowing, the greatest library in the nine realms."

There was really no need to tell Stark that the only 'scholars' living in the palace at the moment were his mother and his brother. Now that he thought of it, scholars in Asgard tended to go mad and either destroy themselves or live as hermits, and most eventually became menaces to society. Perhaps you could count Eir as a scholar, but it was against the rules to teach mortals the secrets of Asgardian healing, so he could hardly introduce them to her.

For that matter, he would try to get Stark and Banner admitted to the Halls of All Knowing, but the knowledge contained in the Halls of All Knowing was generally considered too dangerous for mortals, so it was a bit of a long shot.

"Do you think that Banner would come as well?" Thor asked.

"We can ask him when he wakes up in a few hours," said Stark. "I'm pretty sure the answer will be yes, though. I mean, who could turn down a free trip to Xanadu?

╮ (. ❛ ᴗ ❛.) ╭

Author's Note:

I could have edited this chapter more, but I'm determined to stick to my Tuesday/Friday posting schedule. Generally, things are supposed to get shorter when you edit, but when I "edit," my chapters tend to get longer-I'm always adding jokes or fleshing out parts that need fleshing out, and I could probably continue doing that indefinitely.

Thank you to everyone who's still reading, especially those who have left comments. Comments let me know there are still people reading this fic, which helps me to stay motivated.

I've been using Japanese text emojis and ASCII art for my text breaks. Do these seem to be displaying correctly for everyone? Apparently, Unicode symbols work on Ao3 but not on FanFiction. I had to replace the textbreak in the middle of this chapter, which had originally been made up of Unicode chess symbols. After I uploaded my file to doc manager, it deleted the entire line, causing the two scenes to run together.

(Also, if your document contains anything that looks like a web link, the "link" gets deleted, including the name of this site if you write it with the top-level domain. This is now the third time I've added this chapter.)