"Please tell me you have a plan," Jason asked the second we were in my office and out of earshot of every agent. "I know I believe in that weird connection that you have with Loki, but even I can't condone allowing him out of his cell. As much as I trust you, I also can't lose my best friend."

"Relax, Jay Jay. As of this moment, I may not have a plan, but that doesn't mean I won't figure one out. Loki will not leave his cell until I have one. Deal?" I offered.

Jason hesitated, "I'm still not completely convinced."

"There will be eyes on him at all times. I'm positive you will stick to me like glue. Good chance Thor would follow us around because he's Loki's brother and is a God. Other agents will be following and keeping an eye on him from a distance. The Avengers might rotate and help watch him. I won't ever be alone with him. He won't be able to hurt me, and he won't be able to escape."

"I know that, but he is the God of Mischief. He was able to get out of S.H.I.E.L.D. 's grasp before by using their weakness against themselves. What is preventing him from doing that again?"

"I don't know. This is something we are going to have to figure out together. Until then, I just need you to be my supportive best friend even if you know what I'm doing is completely idiotic. Deal?" I asked Jason with a weak smile.

Jason let out a sigh, "Deal."

"Now if you could go be a bother somewhere else," I said shooing him out of my workspace. Jason rolled his eyes at my childish antics. "I have a PhD to finish obtaining on top of trying to understand a god. I need all the time I can get."

After a few hours of work, there was a knock at the door. I looked up to see Loki in handcuffs and Jason waiting at the front of it. I raised my eyebrows in question at the two, but neither one of them knew their manners and just barged into my workspace.

"What do you want? I'm busy and don't want to babysit either of you," I said, turning my attention on the machine in front of me.

Jason scoffed, "I'm fairly sure I'm the one that does the babysitting around here. Between you with your potentially uncontrolled powers and Prince Stick Up My Ass, I always have to make sure the world isn't going to get destroyed."

"How dare you," Loki snapped. Jason and I looked at one another, waiting for Loki to go onto one of his infamous rants. "I am a god, and you are just a no-good mortal. I was born to rule Asgard and was burdened with…"

"... A glorious purpose," Jason and I said at the exact same time in a flat tone. Loki just stared at us before sulking. After all this time, you'd think that the villain would get a new line. However, Loki never got the memo.

"Again, why are you guys here?" I asked. Loki decided to lean against the wall while Jason stood off to the side to keep an eye on Loki. "I thought I told you that Loki wasn't allowed to leave his cell until I figured out a plan."

"He wouldn't shut up about how you promised his freedom, so I brought him to you to deal with," Jason shrugged. I wasn't surprised by this. It's like this working with Jason on anything. The second he doesn't want to deal with whatever he's dealing with; he sends it to me to handle.

"And what am I supposed to do with him?"

"I don't know. That wasn't what I was trying to figure out. I just didn't want to hear him whine anymore about how you don't give him enough attention."

"What am I? A dog?" Loki spoke up.

Jason and I made eye contact with one another before saying, "Yes." Loki rolled his eyes at the two of us, unimpressed. He was tired of the constant bantering between Jason and me. We were bickering like a divorced couple over child custody, except neither one of us wanted this overgrown child.

I once again went back to the machine I was working on. I wanted to get more work done before I got stuck dealing with Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum all afternoon. Both of the men in front of me think the world revolves around them instead of the sun. If something doesn't go the way they have planned, they throw a tantrum.

Surprisingly, both of the boys behaved for a little while. Jason decided to be unprofessional and take a nap at my desk while Loki just stood there observing me the whole time I was working. He didn't say a single word. Just stood against the wall and watched me take apart and repair various parts of my machine. As weird and out of character as it was for Loki, it was comforting just to be able to do my job in silence.

At some point, while Jason was still taking a nap, Loki decided to hover over me to see exactly what I was doing. He still didn't say a word, but his presence was enough to cause me to start getting overwhelmed. I had no idea why I was suddenly feeling pressured while he was observing my work. It wasn't like he understood exactly what I was doing. Earth's technology wasn't anything close to Asgardian technology. Well, at least to my knowledge.

I felt his breath on the back of my neck when he asked, "What exactly are you working on?"

"Why do you want to know?" I rebuttal trying to keep my focus on the machine and not on Loki being close.

"Well, because you choose to work on this device more than you do talking to me. I wanted to know what could be more interesting than the God of Mischief." I could tell that Loki was smirking. He was getting the exact reaction he wanted from me. This Royal Pain in my Ass just wanted to see if he could make me uncomfortable without trying too hard.

"Well, unlike you, the goal of the machine is to hopefully be useful to someone one day. It will help determine if another person has similar powers as me at an earlier stage. That way they could learn to manage their powers sooner and conceivably better than I ever could."

Loki grabbed my chin and turned my head, so I was looking at him.

"I thought I told you that I was going to help you control your powers," he said with his eyes staring into my soul, it felt like.

"That's the thing, Loki," I said, not breaking eye contact with him. He wanted me to break first. "This machine should be dependable once Dr. Banner and I figure out how it will work. You, on the other hand, haven't done a single thing that could get anyone to trust you, Loki. You say you're going to help but are you just saying that so you can manipulate me into using my powers for you." Loki looked surprised at my response, but I just turned back to my machine.

Jason immediately woke up from his nap and said, "What happened? Did I miss anything?"