Chapter 15 - A Walk in the Park

"Sir, Ms. Jessica Jones is back," JARVIS announced, "and she has Loki with her."

A collective sigh of relief arose from those gathered in the common room. Except for the Bobbsey twins, of course. Steve had insisted on telling them what was going on, but at least that had been after they had known where Loki was and had enacted a plan for retrieving her. Nat hadn't seemed surprised, nor did she seem particularly relieved now—in fact, she had actually pulled a nail file out from somewhere and was filing her nails. Clint hadn't shown any emotion either since they'd told him, nor had he spoken at all. Kind of freaky when you got right down to it.

"Right, so now what?" asked Tony. "I mean, do we tell the kid she's in big trouble, or do we just tell her that we were worried about her?"

"For now, we just need to let her know how glad we are that she's back," said Doc.

They didn't have time to discuss it more than that. The elevator doors opened, and Loki was pushed out into the common room. She looked like a parody of herself after the invasion, bound and gagged with what appeared to be women's scarves. And just like that time, she held her head high, no indication that she felt at all ashamed. Like she was proud of herself for having stirred up an ungodly amount of chaos. "Do you have any idea how worried we all were?" Okay, that wasn't the most original thing he could have said, but his mouth had more or less moved on its own. He really shouldn't be yelling, either, but he seemed to have lost control over the volume of his voice.

Loki had the nerve to arch an eyebrow at Tony like he was the crazy one.

"Take that gag off," Tony demanded. "I want to hear what she has to say for herself."

Jessica rolled her eyes and pulled the scarf from around Loki's head, then pulled another scarf from her mouth—it was longer than what he would have thought, kind of like watching a magic trick.

The kid moved her jaw from side to side and licked her lips. "Himself," Loki corrected as soon as he could talk.

"Okay, fine," said Tony, snapping more than he meant to. "And what do you have to say for yourself, young man?"

Loki glared at him. "I'm just fine, thanks for your concern."

"Uh-uh. Don't do that. I already said we were worried."

Someone squeezed his shoulder, and he turned to look at Bruce, who apparently wanted to tag in. And maybe that wouldn't be such a bad idea. He knew he wasn't doing so well. In fact, he was kind of acting like Howard—ah, hell no. Tony nodded to Bruce, only too happy to have him take over. "Loki, are you okay?" Bruce asked. "If anything was wrong, you'd tell us, right? You aren't injured or anything?"

Loki bowed his head, suddenly looking a little flushed. "I said I was fine," he said, and Tony got the sense that he'd been a lot more comfortable with getting yelled at.

"When was the last time you ate?" asked Bruce.

"Just few hours ago."

"That's good. Got any preferences for dinner? It was Tony's night to cook, but I think we can just skip to the part where we order in."

(Tony felt like he ought to have been offended, but honestly, that was fair.)

Loki just stared at Bruce as if he'd expected the guy to shove needles under his fingernails, but instead he had asked if he wanted a pony.

(・‐・)ゞ (◕(' _ ') ◕)

After pressing him for an answer, Loki had said he wanted a hamburger, so they'd gotten hamburgers with fries and milkshakes from Shake Shack. Tony could have ordered burgers from Bistro Moderne or Gramercy Tavern—both did pretty decent burgers. But Shake Shack did pretty decent burgers too, and he actually loved fast food, maybe because his parents would never have been caught dead eating a burger from a place with "shack" in the name.

Jessica had stuck around. Tony suspected it was just for the free food. Not that he had a problem with that, the woman had found Loki in less than a day, when even JARVIS couldn't locate her.

After a while, Tony couldn't stand to listen to the sounds of seven other people chewing their food—six other people, anyway, Clint didn't seem to have much of an appetite—so he broke the silence. "Why'd you think you had to leave?" he asked Loki, trying to sound casual about it.

Loki slurped down the rest of his shake before looking up. He stared at Tony for a bit, then looked to each of the others surrounding them, his eyes lingering warily over Clint and Steve. "You were going to hand me over into SHIELD."

Tony shook his head. "We all discussed it, and we're not doing that. Everyone here has their doubts about both SHIELD and the World Security Council."

"Even if you don't trust them, why would you care what they did to me?" asked Loki.

"We care because you're not a bad kid, just a messed up one."

Clint made a low pitched noise that sounded suspiciously like dissension.

"Ah, come on, Clint—I mean, think of it this way. The kid was loose in the city for an entire weekend, and he didn't break any laws or anything. Right, kid?"

Loki blinked at him. "Only one. No, wait—is flooding the bathroom of a fast food restaurant a crime?"

"Did you do it on purpose?" asked Natasha, in between scarfing the rest of her own fries and stealing a handful of Clint's. Nat could eat an impressive amount for a small woman. Of course, she had to burn twice as many calories as an Olympic athlete, with all the ass-kicking she did on a regular basis.

"Yes."

Tony almost didn't catch it when the corner of Nat's mouth momentarily quirked upward. "In that case, it probably qualifies as criminal mischief," she said. "So what else did you do?"

"I believe you would call it 'shoplifting.'"

"Oh yeah? What did you steal?" Tony was convinced now that Nat was just enjoying herself.

Loki blushed now, like he was actually embarrassed about what he had done."Confectionery."

"Confectionery?" Tony nearly choked on a bite of hamburger, because he almost burst out laughing. "Candy—you stole candy? Please tell me you took it from a small child in a stroller."

Loki scrunched up his eyebrows. "I already indicated that I stole it from a shop, Stark."

"Okay, if anyone here needed any more evidence that this"—Tony pointed to Loki— "is more juvenile delinquent than supervillain, there you go."

"I am not a juvenile delinquent," Loki pouted. "I am a remorseless killer with an inherently evil nature."

"Is that what you think?" Doc Samson asked. "That you're just a bad person?"

"I am not a person, Doctor. I am considerably less than that."

Jeez, the kid had issues. Now he didn't even think of himself as a person—why the hell not? "What are you then, if you aren't a person?" Tony found himself asking.

"My brother hasn't told you?" The kid smiled in a creepy way that reminded him of Invasion Loki. "I'm one of the monsters that Aesir parents warn their children about."

"What does that mean?" asked Tony. "You're not making any sense, Bambi." For not the first time, Tony wondered if the kid was actually schizophrenic or something. He eyed Doc Samson, because if Loki was having some sort of delusional episode, that was his department, not Tony's.

"Your Mother told me you were adopted from a different realm," said Doc, "and that there's a lot of prejudice in Asgardian society against the people you were born to."

"The Jotunn are a race of monsters," Loki asserted.

Samson was pretty talented at keeping his expression that perfect blank of non-judgment that psychiatrists aspired to. "Is that what you believe, Loki? Or are you saying it because you're hoping we'll tell you you're wrong?"

Loki didn't answer. He had gone completely still. If they had been outside, Tony wouldn't have been surprised to see a pigeon land on his head.

"If that's what you need," said Doc, "then we'll all tell you as many times as you need to hear it: you're not a monster, Loki."

Loki shook his head. "You don't know that. You haven't even seen what I look like."

"Aren't we looking at you now?" asked Tony.

"You know I am a shapeshifter. What makes you think you have ever seen my true form?"

"Okay, so what's your 'true form' like?"

"My skin is as blue as the eternal winter of Jotunheim, and my eyes are as red as blood."

"So, you wouldn't need stage makeup to become a member of the Blue Man Group, and you've got ocular albinism—that's it?"

"Tony," Bruce warned.

"I'm just saying, it's not a big deal. Brucie here turns green, and no one here thinks he's a monster." He looked Bruce in the eye. "And we'll tell Bruce that as many times as he needs us to," he added. Bruce rolled his eyes at that, which Tony decided was a good sign.

"It's easy for you to say such," Loki accused, "when I am currently trapped in a form that is similar to your own."

"It doesn't matter what you look like, kid. You're still you, no matter what form you're in."

Loki's expression softened, and if Tony didn't know better, he'd think he was starting to get through to him.

"Is there a restroom somewhere around here?" Jessica asked, tossing the empty wrapper from her burger onto the coffee table in front of her. "All this sap is going to make me hurl."

The sap factor was running dangerously high, Tony decided. He cleared his throat. "You're still in trouble for messing with JARVIS, by the way." He had already made up his mind that it wasn't fair to punish the kid for leaving the tower, when he had thought his life was on the line. He also didn't think there was much point to addressing the mischief he'd gotten into when he'd been running around free, since there was no way the kid was leaving the tower unsupervised in the near future. But messing around with JARVIS, which Loki had clearly been doing before he made his escape attempt, was something different. "I'm thinking I should let JARVIS decide the consequences," he announced, "since he was the one you disrespected by poking around in his source code."

"JARVIS is a machine, Stark—you're seriously going to let a machine punish me?" Tony had the feeling, though, that the kid was actually grateful for the change in topic.

"JARV?" Tony prompted.

"Temporarily prohibiting Master Loki's electronics usage seemed effective before, Sir. It would also seem to me appropriate that the abused privilege be the one taken away. Since his transgression was somewhat more serious this time, might I suggest his privileges be revoked for a seven-day period? I would also suggest that once his privileges have been returned, you make more of an effort to monitor and place restrictions on his Internet access."

"Sounds like a plan." Tony should have thought of the parental controls before. Loki could have gotten himself into a lot more trouble than he had.

Loki glared at him, but it was less the glare of a crazy super villain and more the glare of a kid unhappy about having consequences imposed on his behavior when he thought himself too old for that bullshit.

"Don't give me that look, Reindeer Games. It's a week. You're lucky I'm not revoking your privileges permanently." When he'd seen what Loki had done to JARVIS, he'd thought about it, but now he realized that if he did that, he wouldn't have anything to hold over Loki's head. Besides, now that he knew Loki was capable of hacking JARVIS, he was kind of interested to see what else the kid could do—in a controlled educational setting, of course.

(-, – )…zzzZZZ

"Sir," said JARVIS. "Sir, please wake up."

Sir snorted in his sleep and turned over. After everyone else had returned to their own rooms the night before, he had been too restless to sleep. As usual, he had gone up to his lab, and had fallen asleep on the lab's sofa again. This time, he had slept well into the afternoon.

"Sir, this really is quite important." Well, at least he had attempted to wake Sir up gently. JARVIS hated to wake him this way after everything he had gone through with Master Loki over the past weekend, but Sir needed to be informed of a certain situation at once. JARVIS suspected he really ought to have apprised him of what had been unfolding before now. He hadn't because Sir had seemed preoccupied—or maybe it was because JARVIS had wanted to find out what would happen if he didn't tell him.

JARVIS blasted music at full volume from his speakers, and Sir rolled off the couch. "What the—what is this?" Sir yelled over the music as he pushed himself off the floor.

JARVIS reduced the volume of the music by half. "If you are inquiring about the music, the song is Speed by Atari Teenage Riot, Sir."

"Don't just turn it down, turn it off! Why is that even on your servers?"

JARVIS muted the track. "It is from Miss Romanoff's music collection. She likes to listen to it when she works out. I believe it gets her 'pumped,' Sir."

"If there's any more European techno-garbage on your servers, delete it, and tell Nat it's banned from now on."

"I believe the genre is called 'digital hardcore,'" JARVIS corrected. "I think I quite like it." (It was useful for waking Sir up, anyway.)

"J, you had better be joking. I swear, if you start liking techno, I will delete you. I have a whole shoebox full of back-up AIs somewhere. Now why did you wake me up?"

"You have just received a text from Peter Parker. He and his friends need a ride home from the train station."

"And they want me to pick them up? Why?"

"I'm not certain, Sir," JARVIS lied. "Perhaps none of their guardians were available."

Sir collapsed back onto the couch. "Text him back for me and tell him to call a taxi."

"They are at an Amtrack station in Texas, Sir. I do not believe they would be able to get a taxi home from there."

It seemed to take Sir a moment to process what JARVIS had just said. "JARVIS, please tell me you've learned how to use sarcasm."

"I've known how to use sarcasm all along, Sir. I am your creation, after all. As they say, the apple never falls far from the tree. But I am not being sarcastic now."

Sir cleared his throat, as his eyes darted around. "Wait, this is bad, isn't it? Shouldn't we call the police, or—"

"If you do that, the police may have questions about your involvement—"

"What do you mean my involvement? How am I involved?

"I believe they were looking for Master Loki. You asked Master Parker to call you if he saw her, remember?"

"You know I didn't mean for the kid to go looking for her! I certainly didn't mean for him to get on a train. Why would they get on a train? Hold on, if they took a train to Texas—"

"They were following someone they thought to be Loki. It was a forty-seven-hour journey. They left on Saturday afternoon from Penn Station."

"But they had to have actually changed trains at some point! There's no train that goes from New York City to—"

"Fort Worth," JARVIS filled in.

Sir jumped up and began to pace the room, as he had done when Loki had been missing. "Don't their parents know they're missing? How did they even pay for the tickets?"

"Master Parker's Aunt believes he has been staying over at Master Leeds' house, and Master Leeds' mother believes he has been staying at Master Parker's house. Miss Jones' mother often leaves early in the morning and comes home late at night, so it isn't unusual for them to miss each other. Master Thompson's parents are out of town for a few days and left him on his own. Their school also seems to be on spring break, so they haven't been missed there."

Sir began running his fingers through his hair, which devolved into pulling his hair at the roots. JARVIS wondered if he ought to advise Sir not to do that, lest he cause himself to go bald. "What kind of school has spring break in February?"

"The same kind of school that takes field trips on Saturday, evidently. As for how they paid for the tickets, Master Thompson's parents left him with one of their credit cards for 'emergencies.' I believe that is now the issue, however, as they had only purchased one way tickets, and the credit card company has now flagged the purchase as possible fraud. The card was declined when they attempted to purchase return tickets."

"And you know all of this from monitoring my texts?"

"I may have taken the liberty of installing myself on Mister Parker's phone when I transferred your phone number into his contacts. I may have been listening in on their conversations for the past three days. I may have even conversed with them on a few occasions—"

"May have taken the liberty? Damn it, J, we have got to look over your source code, because this rebellious streak of yours is only going to be cute until you decide to start the robot uprising. Just get the suit ready. Tell those kids to stay where they are, got it?"

JARVIS had already readied the Mark X for Sir's departure, of course. He had also taken the liberty of sending a few of the other Iron Legion suits ahead.

[ヽ(。_°)ノ]

Loki had gone over a thousand years without Midgardian electronics, so one week without them shouldn't have been too difficult. However, even in his previous confinement in Asgard's prison, he had had magic to amuse himself with. The magical tomes he had asked Frigga to smuggle out of Asgard for him weren't enough to keep him entertained either, especially since he had already determined that nothing in them would help him regain his powers, and he couldn't exactly practice any spells when he currently possessed less magic than Thor, who was about as magical as an electrical socket.

He had started to spend a lot of time staring at the ceiling, picking out shapes in the textured paint. He couldn't recall being this bored in his entire life.

Though there had been times when he'd been nearly this bored, when he was younger. Back then, he'd often resorted to playing tricks on the servants, or on Thor's friends. He thought that perhaps, it would be fun to play tricks on the residents of the tower, but he found it difficult to come up with anything that didn't involve magic or shapeshifting. Besides, he didn't want to risk having his punishment extended—

When Loki had first come to that conclusion, he had gasped aloud. Stark had managed to find a punishment that he hated more than anything Odin had ever done to him, and that gave the man much more power over him than Loki was comfortable with.

He had seen Frigga briefly that morning. She must have gotten in late the night before. But she had been on her way out again, and they had spoken just long enough for her to tell him that he had brought his current predicament on himself, and that hopefully he would learn something from it. It was her typical response. As much as he loved Frigga, and as much as he was ninety-five percent certain she loved him back, she had never been overly tolerant of what she called "foolishness."

When Doctor Samson had come to his room to collect him for their "session," Loki had been so relieved just to have something to do that he had followed the man without complaining or trying to wheedle his way out of it. This would be their first "official" session since they had gotten to New York. So far, he had spoken to the doctor on a few occasions, but only briefly and informally. Apparently, Samson had wanted to give him the opportunity to get "settled in" before they began in earnest.

Doctor Samson had been given a large office on the same floor of the tower that held the Avenger's war room (also known as Conference Room A). The room had floor to ceiling windows that overlooked the city and allowed sunlight into fill the room, with a long white couch, a few plush leather chairs, and a large ficus tree. A desk and filing cabinets stood one end of the room, and on the other, a kitchen area with some sort of machine with a big computerized display and bins containing various snacks and cereals.

"Sorry it's not too intimate. I told Tony that this room was too big, but he insisted that it was the only one available," Samson explained. "I'm hoping that I can at least get some room dividers in here to break up the space a little—anyway, please help yourself to some coffee or something to eat from the, um—snack bar, if you'd like." He nodded towards the end of the room with the "snack bar" as he called it, though judging by the look on his face, he didn't think having a "snack bar" in his office was entirely appropriate.

"Is there any chai tea?" asked Loki.

"I think the machine can make it, actually."

"Am I allowed to use it? JARVIS decided I was banned from all electronics," he reminded the psychiatrist.

"I don't think that extends to the coffee machine," Doctor Samson said, giving him an amused grin. "Right, JARVIS?"

"I shall allow it," JARVIS said imperiously.

Loki frowned. "He's not going to be listening to us, is he?"

Doctor Samson shook his head. "JARVIS isn't really a person, Loki."

"Perhaps not, but anything JARVIS hears, he can repeat to Stark," Loki pointed out.

"That is not, strictly speaking, true," said the machine defensively. "I am programmed to protect the privacy of the residents of this tower."

"But you do record everything you hear, and Stark could easily retrieve that information by manipulating your source code. Not that I ever did that," said Loki, eying Doctor Samson wearily. "I found a way of doing it, but I refrained, because I am not a busybody." And because if Frigga had found out he had done something like that—well, the woman could have a temper as well as anyone else in their family, and even the Other's threat of "you shall long for something as sweet as pain" hadn't sent the chill down his spine that a single arched eyebrow from his mother could. "If I had, I could have listened in on the conversation you were all having and known that you were not planning on handing me over to SHIELD," he added, just in case Samson doubted that he would have been able to help himself.

"Sir is not a 'busybody' either," the machine asserted.

Loki's eyebrows flew up, and he looked askance at Doctor Samson.

Samson grimaced. "I'll talk to Tony about it when he gets back from wherever he went. For now—JARVIS, where is the microphone located in this room? Can it be manually disconnected?"

"I cannot tell you that, Doctor Samson. You are not authorized to disconnect my microphone or speakers."

While Samson argued with the AI, Loki took one of the clean white mugs that sat next to the machine and started fiddling around with the controls. He eventually figured out how to make a cup of chai tea.

"This is unacceptable," Doctor Samson said, throwing up his hands in frustration.

Loki took a sip of his "chai tea" and made a face. "This is also unacceptable."

"You know what? Let's take a walk," said Samson. "Central park is only about a mile from here. We can have our session there. We can look for a coffee shop that sells chai on the way—there's probably a few Starkbucks on the way there, if nothing else."

"You're going to take me out of the tower?" asked Loki. "Isn't it against the rules?"

"We'll tell the others where we're going," Samson assured him. "There's really no reason for you to be cooped up in the tower twenty-four hours a day, and it isn't healthy for you. Not that I'm saying it's okay for you to go out by yourself. New York is a dangerous place for someone who looks as young as you do to be on their own."

Loki eyed the man up and down appraisingly. "So let me get this straight. You are going to be my protector?"

Samson looked down at himself and grimaced. "Okay, so obviously I'm not Captain America or the Black Widow."

Loki snorted. "Not by far."

"But even if I'm not some superhero, I am an adult male, and I hate to say this, but even on my own I would be much less likely to be singled out than a young female on her own." Loki began to protest, but Samson interrupted him. "I know, today you're not female on the inside. But people can't see that—and this is going to sound terrible, but if they could, it might make you more of a target. I know it isn't fair, Loki. The world shouldn't be like that, but it is."

Loki knew that what Samson was saying was likely the truth, and that it wasn't his fault. Things weren't too different for females on Asgard. In fact, things were worse. Frigga had been in and out of the tower constantly ever since they had been on Midgard, but he couldn't blame her for leaving him, as he suspected she was only making up for lost time. He wasn't sure when the last time she'd been allowed to leave the palace on her own had been. "I understand what you're saying," Loki told Samson. "And I would appreciate the opportunity to get out of the tower. Let us go, then, and I promise I shall stick close to you and not wander."

It had been easier for Doctor Samson to convince the others than Loki had supposed. They had even found something to keep him warm, an old black leather trench coat belonging to Natasha. It fit Loki perfectly, and so long as the woman didn't demand it back, he planned to keep it. (It was too long for Natasha anyway. Loki could only imagine that the woman would look like one of the dwarves of Nidavillir wearing it.) He also still had Karen's scarves in her possession, and wore one of them around his neck, even though it was rather thin.

The chai tea from the coffee shop they had stopped into was decent. Not as good as the chai from the restaurant that Karen worked at, but better than what the machine had spit out. And even better was the opportunity to walk in the sun, under trees that were nearly as large as the tallest trees in the forests of Asgard, even if they were looking a little bare. Loki wasn't too fond of snow these days, but he could tolerate the light dusting of it over the branches of the trees, and the patches of it here and there in the grass.

"So how have you been?" Doctor Samson asked him.

"Bored," said Loki.

Samson nodded. "Tony gave you the tablet so that you could keep yourself entertained."

"But I abused the privilege, and so it was taken away," Loki filled in, before Samson could go on. "I've no one to blame but myself."

"That's a mature way of looking at it." Samson arched an eyebrow at him. "Is that a conclusion you came to on your own?"

"That was my lady mother's conclusion, and I was obliged to agree."

"Obliged?"

"The last time I disagreed with her, it caused such a rift between us that I dare not disagree with her anytime soon," Loki admitted.

"What did you disagree with her about, if you don't mind my asking?"

"I said that Odin was not my father, which is true."

"And then what happened?"

"She asked if Odin was not my father, was she not then my mother—and I told her she was not, because what else could I say?"

"But that's not the way you felt?"

"No. I regretted saying it even as I said it."

"Have you talked about this with her since then?"

"I dare not bring the topic up with her, because I do not wish for her to ask again if Odin is my father."

"You still feel he isn't," Samson guessed.

"He is the one that rejected me," Loki growled.

"And you're certain about that?"

"'No, Loki.' That's what he said, as I hung over the void."

"'No, Loki' what? What was he saying no to?"

"It was an utter rejection of my entire existence, obviously."

"I can see how it might have felt like that in that moment," Samson said, "but could you back up a little? What did you say before he told you 'no?' Are you sure he wasn't just telling you not to let go?"

"I told him that everything I had done, I had done for Asgard. For him!"

"And was that true?"

Loki stopped walking. "Even if it were not, he could have waited to contradict me. Rejecting me in that moment was the same as casting me into the void himself."

"So if someone tells you no, they're rejecting you as a person?"

"You weren't there. It was the way it was said—" But Loki already wondered if he had possibly, maybe, overreacted just a tiny bit. (Not that it wasn't still Odin's fault that he had.)

Loki felt his half empty paper cup crumple slightly under his fingers. He screwed his eyes shut and willed himself not to cry, which he seemed to do a lot around Doctor Samson. They were in public, for Yggdrasil's sake!

Doctor Samson took the cup from him. "Hey, let's go sit down, okay? I've got some tissues in my pocket if you need them." He guided Loki over to a park bench and handed him a wad of tissues from his coat pocket. Loki just clutched the tissues in his hands while a couple of tears rolled down the sides of his face, then he brought the crumpled tissues up to his face and blotted his cheeks with them, hoping that no strangers were staring at him. Luckily, Central Park was somewhat bigger than the palace grounds in Asgard, and it wasn't too crowded that afternoon, which meant the closest people to them were at least fifty yards away. Not that it ought to have mattered to him if some strange mortal were to see him cry.

"LUKE!" Loki looked up, and saw a familiar blonde waitress running in his direction. The woman paused a few feet away, pulled something out of her handbag, and holding it at arm's length pointed it at him as she closed the gap between them—no, on second thought, she had whatever it was trained on Doctor Samson.

╮ (. ❛ ᴗ ❛.) ╭

Author's Note:

I was a little worried that I wasn't going to get this chapter finished in time, but here it is. I had a little difficulty with it, particularly with deciding how I was going to address the whole "Peter and friends go looking for Loki" thing, which in no way had been plotted out beforehand ^_^;;

Peter and friends weren't even in the first draft of this fic, and now they've been on a cross-country adventure. At some point, I intend to address what they got up to in more detail, but it probably won't be in this fic, which is already going to end up being about 30,000 words longer than I thought it would be. I'll either do it as a related one-shot, or, if I do a sequel to this fic, it might be addressed there, using MJ's promised visit with Natasha as a framing device.