Author's Note: There is talk of Arianna's past trauma in this. There's a part where she is opening up about it to someone and so it's in her own words, what happened to her.

Chapter Nine

Tony and Arianna made up over the next week. She was still upset that he had looked something up about her, something he'd had no right to, but he hadn't mentioned it since then. She hadn't really thought he would, but that part of her life wasn't something she liked people knowing about.

Tony had insisted that no one would ever be able to use those files against her again. The files had been deleted from SHIELD's database and from their source of origin. She had no idea how it had happened, but she was thankful nonetheless.

They continued her physical training and the testing of her abilities, Loki now helping her with both. They had to build up her strength before she could continue sparring, but she was doing well with the magic part. Tony tested her responses when she used her abilities. Her heart rate elevated each time and her brain waves went wild, but there were never any negative side effects. Tony never pushed her enough to cause a headache or a nose bleed.

At the moment, however, she was enjoying a hot chocolate while watching a movie with Loki, who was also enjoying a hot chocolate.

"This is very satisfying," Loki said, taking a sip from his cup.

"Mm-hm. This is the good stuff, made with milk. They have the kind you make with water, but it's gross."

Things were silent between them for a few minutes until Loki spoke again.

"You and Stark seem to be on agreeable terms again."

"We are. I still don't like what he did since he didn't have permission, but I have forgiven him."

"SHIELD is no longer able to use you. You no longer have to stay here, nor do you have to be responsible for me."

Arianna's cup stopped halfway to her mouth, and her attention snapped to Loki's face. He was trying to remain closed off, but she could see he didn't want her to up and leave.

"Loki, SHIELD never used me in a way I didn't want to be used. I healed people. I would've done that with or without government backing with SHIELD. And I chose to stay here, and I didn't take care of you because you were a responsibility. You know that. Or part of you does."

Arianna reached over and squeezed his hand briefly before letting go and returning her attention to the movie.

Loki was not paying attention to the movie. It was about a boy with a yellow car that used radio stations to talk. The car could turn into a large robot.

The movie wasn't boring, but Loki had other things on his mind. Ever since the first attack on the tower and on Arianna Loki had been waiting for another attack. Granted, Arianna had been under strict supervision since then, but the fact that nothing else had happened didn't set well with Loki. Maybe SHIELD's leaders hadn't expected them to fight for the girl, let alone kill for her, and were regrouping.

"Loki?"

He hadn't realized how tense he'd been, that he'd let himself become, until then. There was pain in his palms from clenching his hands into fists. He hadn't broken the skin, but his fingernails had been digging in sharply.

"You're not enjoying the movie," she said, almost teasing. He could hear the concern, though.

"My head is full of other things."

"Yes?"

"SHIELD has known about your ability all along. Fury said he didn't, but his superiors must have."

Arianna was silent as she nodded.

"That's what they had on you. They knew you could do more than heal people. They didn't come after you, though, until Fury knew and until Stark started researching."

"Okay?"

"So what changed? They were obviously keeping watch or they wouldn't have known about the blood sample or where to find it."

"Tony's new security system should block things like that in the future."

"I'm sure it will. I hope it will. But the point I'm trying to get across is that I do not think the timing of the attack was random. I think SHIELD does not approve of you progressing your powers. They are likely afraid of what you can do. Not to mention, you did side with a terrorist."

"Loki . . ."

"I helped terrorize Manhattan. I brought destruction to this city. You can still see the results of that if you step outside. Your power combined with mine, if I were to get it back . . . who knows what could be done with that? That's probably what they're thinking."

"Loki, I don't use my power that way."

"No," he agreed, "but you could, and that is what frightens them."

Arianna caught her bottom lip between her teeth and bit down for a few seconds before speaking.

"When I first got my powers – or at least when I first found out I had them – I . . . accidentally hurt someone. Fury found out about me through my healing people. His superiors are the ones who looked into my background. That's why they knew and he didn't."

"See? They know you could hypothetically hurt someone."

Loki noticed that she seemed relieved that he hadn't really reacted when she'd told him about her accidentally hurting someone when she'd first come into her abilities.

How could he blame her, though? It had been an accident. He knew she would never want to hurt someone. She hadn't even wanted to hurt him when she'd first met him and he definitely would have deserved it if she had.

Loki and Arianna went to bed around midnight, the hallway dark and without windows. They could've asked Jarvis to turn the lights on, but what was the point? They could've found their way in complete pitch darkness.

"Have you been sleeping better?" she asked.

Loki shrugged as if it didn't matter, which was answer enough.

"Are they happening every night, the nightmares?"

"No. Mostly, but no."

"Well, that's good." Arianna gave him what she hoped was a reassuring smile. "Believe it or not, but dreams help you. Psychologically, the dreams mean your brain is trying to process everything. It means you're healing."

"Hm. Funny way of healing. I think I prefer your way."

They had reached Loki's doorway and both stopped as he pushed the door open.

"Well, um, good night, then," she said softly and turned around to go to her own room.

"Arianna, wait," he called after her. "Please."

That word seemed like an afterthought, but she obeyed nonetheless and turned back around to find him close enough to almost run into. Heat filled her cheeks at her almost blunder.

"Sorry."

"My mistake. I did not realize I was standing so close."

"It's okay. What did you need?"

"You and Stark . . . you care about him."

"Um . . . yes."

"It's been said that the angrier you can get at someone the more you care about that person."

Not knowing what Loki was getting at, Arianna remained silent.

"I realize he is older than you, but –"

"Oh! No," she said, finally catching on. "I know what you're thinking and no. I've known Tony for about as long as I've known you, which isn't that long in the grand scheme of things, and he's more like a brother anyway. Or an uncle would probably be a better word."

"Oh."

Arianna could almost feel the relief that seemed to roll off of Loki as a small but genuine smile graced his lips.

"Good. I don't have to pretend to feel guilty."

"Pretend to – why would you have to pretend to feel guilty?"

She didn't have to ask. She knew from the way he was moving his face towards her own and from the way he'd threaded his fingers of one hand through her hair what he was going to do.

"Loki." Her voice was barely above a whisper.

Part of her wanted to shove him away. She wasn't capable of giving him what he wanted. She knew she wasn't. It wasn't like she hadn't tried with other men before; she just couldn't get her body to respond the way she thought it should.

The other part of her wanted to be able to respond to Loki's advances. She liked the way his fingers felt as they caressed her scalp, but she still turned her head slightly when his lips nearly met hers. He brushed the skin of her cheek instead.

"Loki, I'm – you don't really want this with me."

Surprise flickered in his green eyes at her words.

"Why would I not?" And then, "Am I not doing this properly? On Asgard, it is all arranged marriages with no real courtship rituals. How does this work on Midgard?"

"Marriage? I never plan on getting married. It kind of fills me with a childlike terror at the thought of ever being married. In fact, relationships in general terrify me. They're not my area of expertise."

"We are friends. That is a type of relationship, is it not?"

Loki refused to step away from her, but he did let go of her hair. Arianna tried not to let it show when she decided she really wanted him to continue massaging her scalp.

"You are a very compassionate person. Why would you not do well in a relationship?"

Arianna didn't know what to say to that. Her idea of a good relationship included complete trust, support, and commitment on both sides. She'd never seen a relationship work that way outside of movies. Maybe her standards were too high or something.

"I don't know what you want from me, Loki, but whatever it is . . . I can't. I don't know how."

She worried her bottom lip with her teeth, not liking the situation or the conversation at all. It was too personal for her.

"You have to know more than I do."

That made her smile softly.

"Most Midgardians date first . . . before they kiss."

"Date?"

Loki seemed to really not know about Earth relationships. It made her feel a little better.

"A night out or whatever, depending on what each person likes. I prefer movies or dinner, or even just drinks and talking."

"Hm."

Loki took one step back, appearing to be thinking. Maybe dating would take too much effort and he would want to just be friends.

"Tomorrow, then. We can have dinner and we can talk," Loki said, grin on his face. "If you are amenable."

Amenable? She was not amenable, but she didn't want to hurt Loki's feelings, either.

"A'right, but just a date. I want Chinese food. Get with Tony. He'll tell you how to order food over the phone."

Was Loki serious enough to go through Iron Man o get a date with her? Tony was very protective. Plus, he knew Arianna's past now and would probably give Loki the shovel talk – not that she thought Loki needed it. He hadn't gotten mad or aggressive when she'd turned her head away when he'd tried to kiss her.

That had to be a good sign.

Loki waited until he was sure Arianna was down for the night before he left his own room to find Stark. He knew the genius would be in his lab doing something. Most nights Stark fell asleep there, if he slept at all.

On the elevator ride down, Loki thought about Arianna's weird yet fascinating reactions to his advances. At first she had appeared awkward, and then she had appeared nervous. Worst of all, she had seemed afraid and ashamed, maybe even insecure.

Someone had made her feel as if she was unable to love someone else, which was a load of rubbish. She wouldn't exert all of her energy into helping people if she didn't care, if she didn't love. On Asgard, it was the people who loved the most that went into the field of healing.

When Loki arrived in the workshop he found Tony working on his latest Iron Man suit. He didn't know what was being done to it, but the chest area had been pulled open.

"Stark," Loki said, gaining the man's attention. "How do you order food over the telephone?"

"You havin' late night cravings?"

"No." He stepped toward Tony and said, "Arianna and I are having dinner tomorrow night, and she wants Chinese food. She said to ask you."

"Dinner? Together? What made you think that was a good idea?"

Loki had to admit he was offended even if there was amusement in the other man's voice.

"I have made my intentions quite clear, and she had decided to give me a chance."

Tony stopped what he was doing and crossed his arms over his chest.

"And what exactly are your intentions?"

"Well, I believe she called it dating. Is that the proper term?"

"I wouldn't know. I don't date," Tony quipped. "And I mean on the more physical side of things. What are your intentions there?"

Loki could hardly believe the audacity of the man in front of him.

"I do not believe that is any of your business."

"I'm making it my business. It's a thing I do when something happens that I don't like. And I don't like you trying to cozy up to our littlest Avenger."

Loki wanted to tell Tony that littlest wasn't a real word, but correcting the genius wouldn't help his case at all so he kept his mouth shut on the subject.

"I would not be here if Arianna had not made it clear I should ask you about this. I remember your promise to hand me over to SHIELD if I dare hurt her. I can assure you it is not and never has been my way to force myself on a woman."

Tony's body tensed to the point that he looked as if he would shatter with one hit.

"That is what you were implying earlier, was it not?"

"What do you want with her then?"

"Has it not occurred to you that I might just fancy her? She has been nothing but kind to me even when I didn't deserve it. Why would I not fancy her? Why would I not want to date her?"

Tony surprised Loki by grinning and then by briefly laughing.

"What? What did I miss?"

"You actually care about her. I knew you appreciated her as the one who made sure you were kept safe, but . . . you like her."

Loki rolled his eyes. "Yes, that is what I just said. Are you going to help me or not?"

Tony shrugged, turning back to his work.

"Come find me in the morning. You'll need a little touch up before your date."

The next morning came and went without Tony helping Loki at all. He had bigger problems to deal with. The problems being SHIELD agents following everyone around. Natasha had come to him around six that morning to let him know that she'd seen at least three undercover agents watching every visible exit of the tower. There had been two men and one woman.

"They were good, Tony. I might not have noticed them if I hadn't had as much training as I have."

"Do they know you know about them?"

"I don't think so. I went on with what I was doing. I mentioned them to Clint. He's noticed them too. They're clearly staking out the place."

Tony added installing extra security cameras outside to his 'things-I-need-to-do' list. Maybe add in some facial recognition programming as well.

"I've only noticed them since your meeting with Director Fury. Maybe they are his people. I don't want to ask him, though, because if they aren't . . ."

"It would let other people at SHIELD know we know."

"Yes. Those people that I saw, they followed me. Again, I wouldn't have noticed had I not been trained. They would've appeared completely normal to anyone else. I don't know if Aries would've made the connection. She's never been that into the training part of being an agent."

"You're sure these people are from SHIELD?"

"If not, they were trained the same way. They use the same methods."

"Hm. If it's only three people, I'm not worried. If they try to get in, my security system will let me know."

"And Jarvis."

"He's part of my security system."

"Obviously."

"Are we both in agreement that it's Arianna these people are keeping tabs on?"

Natasha nodded. "Makes the most sense."

"Speaking of keeping tabs, did you know your friend has a date tonight?"

"What? She doesn't date."

"Apparently she does now. Reindeer games convinced her to give him a chance."

"What?"

"He asked for help getting ready. I should probably go find him."

Arianna was in the gym, sort of working out but mostly watching Steve hit a punching bag. He'd already knocked a few off of their chains and onto the floor.

She'd done several sets of crunches and pushups already. She despised exercise of any kind when Natasha wasn't with her to encourage her, but she had an excess of nervous energy at the moment and it had to go somewhere.

Steve was silent as he continued beating up the very non-threatening punching bag. To be fair, he wasn't much of a talker anyway. Unless he had something to contribute, he usually didn't speak. He wasn't anti-social, he just didn't feel the need to fill the silence with useless chitchat.

Arianna usually didn't mind the quiet, but she needed to talk to someone and Steve was right there. Plus, he probably wouldn't make fun of her for what she wanted to say.

"Steve? What do you think of Loki?"

Steve grabbed the punching bag, bringing it to a standstill, and glanced at her. She was seated at the edge of the mat he was standing on.

"Why?" he asked, seating himself beside her.

She shrugged and refused to meet his eyes. "Just asking."

"Oh. Well, I don't know. He's not trying to take over the world, which is good. But he's also human and powerless. We don't know what he'd do if he got his magic back."

That was not the answer she wanted and she didn't want to admit that it was true that Loki didn't have access to the power he'd once had and they didn't know what he would do if he ever got his abilities back.

"I think he cares about you though. He cares whether you live or die." Steve's mouth formed a small smile. "I don't know how he feels about the rest of us, but he's proven he'll protect you."

Her heart skipped a beat when she noticed that Steve was looking at her with such pure compassion. It was as if he already knew her problem: her upcoming dinner with Loki. He'd actually gone to Tony for help. Loki had set aside his own pride just so he could find out about dating and what she would expect from him. He knew nothing of human dating traditions.

Maybe Tony wasn't the best option to give advice on that after all.

"Loki asked me to have dinner with him tonight. Just him and me."

Steve tensed just a bit as he processed that information and then he nodded.

"I'm nervous," Arianna admitted. "I haven't dated in – well – years, really. Not, you know, properly dating. Not getting-dressed-up-and-having-dinner dating."

"Are you afraid? Of him?"

"Not exactly. I mean, not of him exactly."

This was what she needed to talk about. Even though she hadn't wanted anyone to know, she needed to talk about it now, needed to talk to someone who wasn't Natasha because she already knew what the redhead would say.

"You know those files Tony had Fury delete?"

"Yeah."

"There was this guy that I hurt when I was younger. He was – I thought he was a good man, but . . . but he wasn't. I had – I had known him for years. He was a friend of my parents and he was one of my teachers when I was a senior in high school. He would always bring me gifts when he came over to our house. They were just small things like cute stuffed animals, things like that. I just thought it was because he knew my parents and he'd started looking at me like an uncle would. I was . . . unbelievably stupid."

"You were young," Steve said, placing a hand on her shoulder. "You were a kid, by the sound of it. He took advantage. It wasn't you fault."

Arianna knew that. For the longest time after it had happened, she had blamed herself for not seeing the signs – and for seeing them and not realizing what they meant.

"He told me he loved me, and I thought he had to be telling the truth because he treated me better than all the other students. That's what I thought then. Now I know he didn't treat me better. He just treated me differently."

Arianna shut her eyes as they began to sting with tears.

"I . . . enjoyed the attention until he started to become physical. Even then, I never thought he would hurt me."

Arianna took a few breaths to steady herself before continuing.

"The night I was . . . raped was the night I got my powers. It was like they were triggered or something. I didn't know what was happening, so I hurt him. I didn't mean to. By the time I was done with him, his insides were so damaged the police said it appeared as if he'd jumped off a very tall building. Most of his bones were shattered, his organs ruptured. Needless to say, he was dead.

"I did that. That's something I can do, what SHIELD might want me for. The murder and medical records, police reports . . . Those are the files Tony unlocked, that Fury deleted. SHIELD threatened to have me locked up because I was a danger they didn't understand. I chose to work for them instead."

There it was. Her story laid out in front of her and Steve. She'd left out a few parts, of course, but Steve now knew what had happened to her. He didn't need to know the details, didn't need to know that David had been needlessly rough with her, or that he'd hurt her even more because she'd been scared and tense, didn't need to know that David had been the first man to ever touch her that way and had tarnished her mind against intimacy for a long time afterwards. It still forced its way in if she even thought of becoming close to someone in that way.

"Have you told anyone else?" Steve asked, his voice gentle and curious.

"Tash knows, and Tony, obviously. I think Loki knows something is wrong, just not what it is. He knows I was hurt and that I got my ability because of it. But he doesn't know how I was hurt."

She brought her knees up and wrapped her arms around them. She hid her face against them as tears began to fall.

"Please don't tell him. I don't want him to know."

Even though her voice was muffled she knew Steve must've heard and understood because he suddenly had his arm around her and was letting her lean against him. She didn't mind because Steve was just a friend and wasn't looking to date her or kiss her or eventually have sex with her.

He was safe, and he was Captain America. He had a pureness about him that settled her nerves.

"I don't know why you came to me with this, but thank you for trusting me with your secret. Loki will never learn about it from me."

"Thanks."

She just needed to put her big girl panties on and get ready for her date. She would do this for Loki, and if she didn't have a good time or if things went south, then at least she could say she had tried.

Loki couldn't believe what he saw in the mirror. He actually recognized himself.

Tony had made good on his promise of helping, and Loki had gone through a series of changes over the past hour, the most obvious of which was the haircut he'd allowed himself to indulge in.

His reflection showed that he looked much like he had before allowing himself to let go of Thor's hammer only to fall into the place of torment he'd landed in.

His hair was clean, shiny but not oily, and he knew the dark locks would be silky smooth. His skin was pale but not sickly-looking, not like it had been when he'd first arrived in Midgard. His eyes were different – he didn't know why, but they appeared more peaceful than they normally did.

His clothes weren't new exactly. They were from the batch of clothes he'd been presented with once Tony had decided he could stay there at the tower. He had chosen a dark blue sweater and a pair of black jeans that fit his form quite well. He'd seen Arianna glance his way once or twice when he'd worn the sweater before, and she'd seemed to like it.

He would never admit out loud that he'd chosen it for her. It was a casual outfit, but if they weren't going out, then it wasn't supposed to be formal, right?

They were having dinner and hopefully stimulating conversation. Tony had recommended planning for a movie just in case conversation didn't come easily.

Loki was to meet Arianna at her bedroom door at six-thirty. It was six now. He didn't know what else to do other than wait, so that was what he did.