There was once a time in Jane's life when all that mattered to her was science. She wrote her papers, did her studies and applied for grants to study what she wished to. There was no alien God coming down from the skies trying to seduce; no insane alien brother trying to conquer her world, and certainly, there was not a murderous horde of aliens coming to the latter's assistance.

Regardless of the many years she sat upon her roof, looking through a telescope and wondering to herself what life was beyond her planet, she began to wish that she never found out. Perhaps she should have just gone into a simpler field like engineering or maybe just psychology. Perhaps if she chose a different path, she wouldn't be laying on the street, covered in her own blood, hoping someone would find her underneath this car. Of course, she hoped that someone is the right someone.

The battle that surrounded her was winding down to a finish. She knew because the screeches of both aliens and people were getting quieter. The rebels were heavily armed, but human weapons weren't much good against alien technology and Loki's magic. Much the same could be said of other uprisings throughout the United States. What were their guns to an immortal God?

She regretted existing at this point. The pain from her wounds, acquired when a bomb exploded near her, was almost numbing now. She initially managed to drag herself through the wreckage and hide underneath one of the dented cars that were along the street. She laid flat on the cement, looking up at the engine and the bottom of the car, hoping this was not the last sight she would see. She was losing far too much blood to survive. Her mind, usually calculating and unerringly rational, was slowly beginning to swim in confusion.

She couldn't keep track of time. Around her was a cacophony of sound: gun shots, metal against metal, explosions near and from a distance.

Then, silence. Deathly silence.

She wondered if she was the last one alive at this point. She didn't want to peak her head out and see corpses surrounding her. She didn't want to be one of them. She knew if she kept laying here she would just be another statistic, and soon it wouldn't even matter that SHIELD managed to hide her away for so many weeks. Soon she would just end up like everyone else – the losing, the lost, and the dead. There would be no point in the research she managed while she was locked away in the bunkers. There would no longer be any hope of winning the war, saving her race. She knew Tony Stark was still out there somewhere. She knew he hadn't been captured just yet. Yet, her equations and formulas were crucial to this war against Loki…

And Loki knew it, too. That's why she was here. That's why she was here, nearly dead. It was here fault all of these people were dead, and that SHIELD took loss after loss. Her vision swam as her heart pounded.

If Loki knew she was still alive…

That was when she heard it. A faint thudding that could have easily been her heartbeat, but the sound grew louder and closer. Footsteps. Heavy footsteps, like boots and metal hitting the ground repeatedly. Her head craned around to see look, but she was losing consciousness. She could barely make out the black boots that were in front of her eyes. She felt a rush of air, and dim light blurred her vision further. She realized the car hiding her was gone, lifted like it was cotton and pushed to the side. Then, the voice. That voice. That soothing, sickening voice that spoke from radios and television sets promising an end to everything, if only they would surrender. She grew to hate it, even if she hadn't seen him in person. She knew who it was. "I found you," it said.

She saw a swarming array of black, green, and gold as the tall being bent over and picked her up. Cool fingers touched her forehead, and then the world went black.

Five months ago the Battle of New York was lost. The World Council sent a nuclear bomb through the wormhole; the intention was to stop the war before it spread, to deter the armies without the terrible complications of boots on the ground. Earth never had a chance; Loki's forces were overwhelming.

The city itself was completely leveled, regardless. Buildings collapsed, thousands of people were killed or injured. Wormholes opened up shortly after in Atlanta, Denver and San Diego. The Avengers and SHIELD retreated, giving Loki a conditional surrender before more people died.

The following week was fought tooth and nail. The National Guard was exhausted, and Loki's forces spread like a deadly virus, pillaging coastal cities before going west and east to Europe. There were areas that surrendered before the terror reached their country; others fought until the choice was between starvation and surrender.

Jane watched her world end on a television from an underground bunker. Thor requested that she be kept safe as he knew Loki might come after her, both because of who she was, and because he had already taken in Erik Selvig. She nearly went mad, with the white walls, the same people, the same food every day. She should be grateful, she knew. This was better than being killed above ground.

The first bunker had a lab where she and Tony Stark conducted research with regards to Loki's magic and the detection of wormholes. If they could determine where they would appear, their forces could be more prepared. They were together barely a month before her research was filed away and she was moved elsewhere. She didn't know what happened to Tony. She assumed he went to look for Pepper.

She had no one. No parents, no family to find. She could set out for Darcy, but she could only safely assume she was fine. She ended up somewhere is in the plains, relatively free from Loki's notice. It was the coasts that were getting ransacked.

A good third of SHIELD's bases were either invaded, destroyed, or wiped out. It was never the same thing twice. It was chaotic, unpredictable. The only way they would ever know where Loki might be sending his forces would be if Jane and Tony finished their research, but it simply was not so.

He was winning, and he was winning fast.

A month of horror carried on, as Jane and several other Agents went from bunker to bunker. It felt like hey were playing hide and seek, and Loki was winning battle after battle. The Avengers spread to cities throughout the world, hoping to make a small dent in Loki's progress, but there was no good to be done.

Then came the plateau.

Surrenders were growing exponentially throughout Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. Loki had a fourth of the world's countries under his sovereignty.

He made it apparent he was following her. Every city that they passed, Loki made an appearance as Jane ran. It was only a matter of time. It was reported that Jane and Tony's research had either gone missing or was destroyed. Jane gave up then. She fell deeper and deeper into despondency. There was only so much horror and death before she finally felt herself give up. It seemed that Loki knew she stopped caring, that he anticipated it and timed his strike appropriately. It was in Chicago that Loki found Jane, protected by the smallest possible gang of SHIELD agents.

She thought maybe she was dead, gone to whatever place people who didn't believe in religion went to. Wherever it was, it was quite cozy. Warm blankets were piled on top of her. The bed was almost like a memory foam mattress. When she opened her eyes she realized that she was not in the in-between, but rather Hell. Yes, it must exist. The walls were white and it could have been a prison cell but there was one wide window that overlooked a grove of trees and a road. It was like her dorm in college: plain and functional. There was a micro-fridge shoved into one of the corners and a door that lead to a bathroom. One corner held a low table, a desk and chair. It reminded her of the room she had the SHIELD bunker, before everything went to shit. It wasn't underground, which was a definite plus. Maybe they managed to relocate?

Perhaps it was all just a dream. Perhaps SHIELD found her after all and started to nurse her back to health. The wounds on her chest, head and leg were bandaged up. She remembered the explosion, the shrapnel flying into her. She frowned as she looked under one of the bandages wrapped around her leg. There was no blood. In fact, there was hardly any scar tissue. No stitches…

There was something very wrong with how she was healing. She couldn't have possibly been asleep so long that her body almost completely healed. She ached, as though she had just woken from a very long nap, but that was all.

She heard the door click open. Her eyes darted up in panic. Part of her wanted to act as though she were still asleep, so she didn't have to face whatever happened, but they walked in too fast. It was a nondescript man, wearing a black shirt with khakis and boots. He looked straight out of army boot camp. Stoically, he carried a bin of water and a cloth. There was something odd though about the way he walked. His eyes met hers; they were a brilliant blue – so light that they almost seemed unreal. It was like he put in fake contacts or something. He paused in his steps before turning around to go.

"Wait!" Her voice was hoarse, and it fell on deaf ears as the door shut behind the man. The lock clicked.

She rose out of the bed, her arms and legs feeling quite heavy. She was wearing a hospital gown of sorts, she noticed. Standard issue. Underneath, she wore only her panties and bra. She ran back to the door, trying to open it but failing.

She knocked on it.

"Hello? Why did you lock it?" She knocked several more times, continuing to try the handle before her energy gave out and she slid to the floor. This must be a nightmare. She wanted to wake up now. She cried out until her voice went hoarse.

If this was SHIELD, why would they lock her in? Why would this man not say anything? Why wouldn't they have a nurse taking care of her? Wouldn't she be hooked up to an IV? Nothing made sense. SHIELD was essentially destroyed. There was no functionality to it anymore, otherwise she wouldn't be here.

There seemed to be an inevitable doom no matter how she thought of her situation. She felt tears sting her eyes as panic rose in her throat. Perhaps she wasn't hallucinating before she woke up here.

She rose to her feet to go back to the bed but ended up stumbling towards the bathroom. The facts began to weigh down on her. She opened the door to the bathroom and emptied her stomach. She looked at her face in the mirror, white like paper with dark bags under each eye. She removed the bandage from her face, not a drop of blood on it. It looked as though nothing happened —no stitches, no puckered tissue from scarring, not even dirt or grime from lying under the car. Nothing. For the first time in a long time, she began to cry. What was going on? What the hell was happening to her? She must be dead. She has to be. This must be some fucked up version of purgatory.

She emptied her stomach once more, though there was nothing there. She realized how hungry she was. Her knees shook as she scrambled back into the bed to lie down. Her head spun. She shut her eyes, hoping that she would wake up from this nightmare.

The door clicked open again. A woman appeared this time. She looked blankly at her and Jane looked blankly back. She was finely dressed, though still very plain. A white button-up blouse was tucked into her black skirt. Her makeup unremarkable but her eyes were that same piercing blue color she recognized. The duffel bag in her hand, Jane recognized as her own. It was given to her by SHIELD.

"Miss Foster, I am instructed to tell you that the master would like for you to join him at dinner this evening. He hopes this will suffice for now. I shall return in twenty minutes to fetch you," she said. Her voice was unemotional, almost as though she were talking to Tony Stark's AI, but even JARVIS had more personality.

"I'm sorry," she asked, "who calls himself Master?"

"King Loki, of course." She spoke evenly, as though it must be obvious.

She felt the blood rush from her head. She knew that this was the work of Loki, but she didn't want to acknowledge found her. This must be the end.

Why is there such pretense in this? Surely he must need to kill her. He most likely has found her work, why would he need her anymore? She was why they were winning for so long. She was beating him at his own game for a good long while until he seemed to take the next step and be ahead of her.

"King?" Her voice cracked as she repeated it. She shook herself out of her reverie.

The woman nodded. "Yes, Miss Foster."

"And what if I don't want to have dinner with him?"

"He knew you might say that. He also said that if you do not wish to eat with him, then you can starve," she said. She sounded as if she were telling Jane the weather for all the inflection in her tone.

"No room service then, I guess," she scoffed. Her stomach growled angrily. She could probably last another few days without food or water, but she knew that if Loki were to kill her, it would certainly be faster than dying of dehydration or starving to death.

The woman showed no reaction but placed the duffel bag at the foot of her bed. "I shall return soon," she said and then quickly departed.

Jane shook slightly, her nerves catching up to her. If Loki planned to kill her, why was she still alive? She could have bled out under the car. He could have killed her so easily.

She sunk into a panic; her breathing was shallow and her palms began to sweat. She didn't realize how much time had passed, as she sat shivering in the hospital gown, until she heard the knock on the door.

"Miss Foster, are you dressed?"

"H-hold on!" She called back.

Alright, Jane, she thought to herself. Her mind teetered between panic and logic. If you get one more chance to die, it's not going to be shaking and bowing your head to a mass murderer. You're not going to lay belly-up in front of him. You're not going to give him this satisfaction. You can't. You're better than this.

With a shaking hand, she opened her duffel bag and pulled out the first t-shirt and jeans she found. She pulled on her worn-out tennis shoes, in case she needed to run, and quickly combed through her hair. She tried not to think about why Loki was so prepared and how he came by clothing and shoes in her exact size.

"I-I…" she began, but swallowed back the knot in her throat. "I'm ready," she said. The lady opened the door, allowing Jane to pass through.

She walked through the halls, also very white and nondescript. There were several other doors; she supposed they were also living quarters for whomever once inhabited this place.

They went into an elevator that lead them up a floor.

"Why are you helping him?" she asked, looking to the woman as she blankly stared at the closing door of the elevator. "Why would you betray your own race?" Jane asked. Again she received no answer, not even an acknowledgement that she was speaking to her. She must be some robot, Jane thought. A cyborg? But then again, it didn't seem to fit with what she knew of the Asgardians. Somehow they didn't seem to fit into The Terminator world.. Jane gave up trying to talk to her. She might as well talk to the wall.

The elevator stopped and the doors opened. She felt her knees shake, but she tried to remain indifferent. If Loki was the one who managed to heal her of whatever wounds she sustained, surely he wouldn't just kill her on the spot? Wouldn't that be work for nothing? Everything Loki did in trying to conquer her world was for a purpose. She must have some sort of purpose…

She couldn't seem to walk forward, knowing she must be close to meeting Loki face-to-face. He's just a man, she thought to herself. A powerful man, but nonetheless, still a man. Just like Thor. Thor…

The woman opened the door to reveal a dining room. It was relatively empty, save a long table piled with food in the center and a television mounted on one wall next to the SHIELD logo. Large windows covered half of the wall space, overlooking a lake. They seemed to be in the middle of nowhere, so why would Loki overrun this base in particular? And take residence here? Surely it wasn't the most convenient location.

She turned her attention back to the table. There was enough food to feed an army, though it only seemed to be feeding just her. A turkey, pasta, mashed potatoes… Her stomach gurgled at the sight of it. Surely Loki didn't intend on others joining them, so why all the food?

Speaking of the devil, she didn't notice him at first. At the far end of the table stood the tall man. He stood with his back to her, gazing through the windows. He was certainly Thor's height, if not taller, and lanky. His black raven hair was combed back, though it curled at the ends into seemingly unruly locks.

"Miss Foster," he spoke finally. His voice, a tenor, rebounded off of every smooth surface, and created the illusion that he was standing right next to her. He turned to face her, a thin-lipped grin spreading across his features. His collared tunic and dark pants made him look somewhat smaller than the pictures of him in full-on armor. His shoulders looked more narrow, his demeanor somehow less… demeaning.

"How good it is to see you face-to-face at last," he said. He walked closer to her. She felt herself move back as he stalked towards her. She continued to step back, until she realized this was not the impression she should give. Her mind kicked in. She stood her ground, unflinching even as he stood toe to toe with her.

His lips turned down slightly, when she didn't return his greeting.

"No words, Miss Foster?" he asked, tilting his head to the side. "How disappointing. I would expect some acknowledgement that you, in fact, would not be standing here were it not for me." He sounded almost proud. "Perhaps some thanks are in order."

She was silent, her eyes narrowed and lips pursed into a frown. "I refuse to thank someone who created the situation that nearly killed me in the first place." she said, her own confidence startling her.

"On the contrary, Miss Foster, you wouldn't have nearly died if your organization had just surrendered as I asked. But alas, it seems as they were willing to fight tooth and nail to protect you," he said. His hands dropped to his sides as he walked closer to her. His arm extended out, and his long fingers curled to rest under her chin. She never felt smaller than in his moment, as he looked down his nose at her. "It seems you are quite the treasured girl, aren't you, Miss Foster?"

She wanted to pull her chin away, but something seemed to lock it in place; t she had no choice but to look up at him. Her eyes slid away from his emerald gazeto the windows beyond his shoulder,, wishing she could fling herself through them.

"Look at me, Miss Foster," he beckoned. His voice was soft but severe. She continued to struggle, though it seemed like her body wasn't going to cooperate. What was he doing?

Magic, her mind supplied in answer. Thor had noted that his brother was an impeccable sorcerer. Which wasn't helpful. In any other case, she might have been fascinated. However, this was just downright terrifying.

Out of sheer stubbornness, she refused to look at , she would not give in to this man… this thing…

"I said, look at me!" His voice was thunderous. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw his free hand rise as if to slap her. Startled, her eyes snapped to his face, recoiling from the possible abuses.

A grin started to spread across his face once more. His hand lowered to his side. She imagined putting a bullet between his eyes just to stop that awful grin from growing. He was sick.

"This does not have to be difficult, Miss Foster," he said. His tone was calm again; when not colored with anger, it had a hypnotic, lazy quality to it. He brushed cool fingertips along her cheek. "If you comply, things will be quite comfortable for you. If not, I'm afraid, I will have no choice but to take away your freedom of choice. That is not something I wish for, nor will you. Are we quite clear, Miss Foster?"

"What do you mean, 'take away my freedom of choice?'" she asked. Her voice was shaking slightly; she felt as though she was about to be sick right here in front of him.

"You have met my servants, have you not?" he asked. "Miss Andersen, who led you here to me, provided your clothes – she opted for not having a choice. I do not wish to do so, you see. But often, I, myself, must decide what is best for them."

"She opted?" she asked. Her eyes narrowed as he dropped his hands back to his sides, allowing her to move once more. "Somehow I doubt that."

"She told me she'd rather die than choose to serve me. I am no murderer, Miss Foster. I did not wish to kill her. I simply suggested she not choose," he said, as though it were the simplest thing in the world.

"I doubt it was a suggestion," Jane scoffed.

"It was," he clarified, "and she complied, naturally. As humans do once granted the choice. They naturally find it easier to simply not choose."

Jane glared, finding his logic incomprehensible. She was flabbergasted. "You say you are not a murderer, though you walked though corpses to get to me," she said. "Thousands of people have died by your hand!"

"They died by their own cause," he spat.

"That's bullshit!"

Before she even realized it, he did slap her. She fell back onto the floor from of the sheer force, cradling her swollen cheek; tears prickled her eyes from the pain. She curled into herself, losing all composure.

"Watch your tongue, Miss Foster. I saved your life, but do not believe for one moment I cannot make you suffer," he snarled at her. "Now get up."

She stayed where she was, wishing to disappear into oblivion.

"Do not make me punish you again! Get up!" He barked. She got to her knees but could not find the strength to stand all the way up. She looked up and glared at him defiantly. Slowly, she rose to her feet. He looked pleased with himself. He seemed to shake off the anger in an instant. "Now then, if you please, Miss Foster. I would very much like to have dinner."