Luckily for Loki, even though he and Maisy were still tentative around one another the day after they'd made up, the Avengers left the day after that to take out a Hydra base of which Blaze had supplied the location. And absence had a tendency to make the heart grow fonder. Though they had a somewhat awkward goodbye when he boarded the quinjet, when he got back two days later with a painful wound Maisy clung to him as if they'd never had their fight.
In fact, she seemed almost pleased when Loki had told her that he'd done worse to his assailants than they'd done to him. Perhaps she was not so put off by death if it was to save his own skin.
"Are you sure he's going to be okay?" Maisy asked Dr. Cho for the thousandth time, gripping Loki's hand and staring at the gash on his back. It spanned from shoulder to shoulder, but it wasn't deep and it was already healing. He didn't dare tell Maisy that it was from a desperate Hydra agent who had come at him with a medical saw. She would probably find that terrifying and Norns knew she didn't need anything else to fuel her nightmares.
"He will be fine," Dr. Cho nodded and smiled, "He and his brother are always my best behaved patients."
It was fairly obvious to Loki that Helen Cho was infatuated by the idea of Thor. No one else seemed to be able to tell, somehow, or if they could tell then they didn't find it as amusing as he did. Thor was completely oblivious, of course, though how he didn't notice Dr. Cho openly staring at him whenever he took off his shirt to have some injury or another looked at was a mystery to Loki.
"Ha! That's surprising to me," Maisy laughed, but still looked concerned, "I'm also surprised you aren't sick of the pair of them yet, seeing how often they try to get themselves blown up."
"I'm not trying to," Loki chuckled as Cho sewed his back together, "It just so happens that Hydra likes to grievously wound me."
"If you keep giving them chances then there won't be anything left of you grievously wound!"
"Don't worry," Cho said, "Asgardians heal incredibly well. He will live for quite a while. If he or Thor would give me the chance to study how they do that I would greatly appreciate it…"
"I'm afraid not," he shook his head, "You humans are already advancing far faster than you should be in the ways of healing. That machine of yours that creates tissue is almost as easily used as what we have on Asgard."
"Ah, there is another idea! Take me to Asgard and I can speak with your doctors there."
"No. Odin would throw a fit and probably say horrible offensive things about the human race. And I would be scolded for years to come for allowing it."
"But we could learn so much from you!"
"Take it up with Thor," Loki smirked, "He'll be king one day, perhaps when that happens he'll give you a private tour of the healing rooms of Asgard."
He didn't have to see Dr. Cho to know that her face was bright red.
"Uh… right. Ahem, I will, maybe do that," she cleared her throat, "I've finished with your stitches. Let me bandage you up and you will be free to go!"
Once Loki was released from the medical floor of the Tower, he and Maisy walked hand in hand for the elevator. Before they could get away from the building completely, however, Loki's phone buzzed and he found that he was being summoned to the Avengers' meeting room.
"What do they want now?" He grumbled, slipping his phone back in his pocket.
"Debriefing?" Maisy suggested.
"We already did that on the jet. Whatever it is, I'm sure they won't mind if you come along."
"You sure? They like their secrets."
"As if you'd tell anyone anything confidential. If they can tell me then they can tell you. Let's go."
They arrived in the meeting room and all of the Avengers stared at Maisy. She waved nervously and sat next to Loki when he took a seat. On her other side was Bruce Banner, who looked exhausted. Loki didn't blame him for that though, they'd needed the Hulk at this particular Hydra base and it hadn't been a pretty sight.
"So I see she let you back in the apartment," Tony grinned at Loki, "How many times did you have to say you were sorry?"
"Hey Mr. Stark?" Maisy smiled pleasantly.
"Yeah?"
"Shut up please."
Stark laughed but didn't pester Loki any further.
"Now that everyone is here," Rogers said, "Let's talk about tomorrow."
"What's going on tomorrow?" Bruce sighed.
"We're hitting the base in Scotland tomorrow morning."
"What?"
"No way."
"We just got back from a raid!"
"Why can't we just hand this one over to whoever the UK has?"
"Tony and I got in touch with the local LEOs and they want us to handle it," Rogers replied, "I don't blame them. We have the most experience handling Hydra and with the Iron Legion we can ensure the least amount of damage to the surrounding area."
"Why are you guys going tomorrow?" Maisy asked, glancing at Loki, "Shouldn't you take a break? Heal up and stuff?"
"Normally, yes, but we want the element of surprise," Rogers answered, "Usually we don't know the locations of so many bases at once so we have to wait and heal while we find a new location. Hydra won't be expecting us to hit them tomorrow, so soon after the raid today. They'll be sloppy since they won't be on edge."
"Brother," Thor turned to Loki, "Are you well enough to join us?"
"Nope!" Maisy said at the same time Loki answered affirmatively. He found her hand under the table and squeezed it.
"Dr. Cho assures me that if I rest well tonight then I should be nearly as good as new tomorrow," he smiled slightly, "So if you will text me the information I need for our little adventure then I will go home and rest."
"Alright," Rogers nodded, "Maisy, I trust you'll make sure he actually rests?"
"He'll rest," she nodded seriously, "And if he doesn't he'll be in a heap of trouble."
A note from the author: Hi guys! Just a short one today, but I'm going to post another chapter tomorrow, I promise. Thanks for being patient with me!
Right now our poll results are at 2 (one by guest voter) for Egil and 2 for Lady Fulla. If you still want to vote then please feel free to do so and if you don't have an account but want to vote you can tell me your pick in a review. I'm not sure why I'm doing this poll beyond for fun, but I'm thinking about doing another poll sometime in the future where you guys get to vote on which one shot I release first. Because I've been writing a ton of random one shots for this story and when I've posted all the chapters of THATH then I'm thinking about going along with one of Ninja Squirrel's ideas and posting a story that I update with a bunch of one shots and maybe some deleted scenes and things like that. Anyway, I'm just kinda blabbering away over here, but let me know what you think of that idea! :D
Pillow Fort of Denial Update: One Lady Fulla of Asgard has been added to the hit list by Fort Member Ninja Squirrel. Please have your weapons at the ready, but do not kill on sight. Lady Fulla is still needed for important plot thing-a-majigs.
Special thanks to my reviwers:
xlokiswolfx: Lol, she could do that in Asgard too. She and Fandral would run a matchmaking service as well offering relationship advice. XD
Dragoncat: Now all I can picture is Tyr evilly stroking his goatee, cackling and saying "this just might work mwahaha". I don't know why lol.
Ninja Squirrel: I hope your first week of nursing school went well! I met someone who said they were starting nursing school this past Monday and I wished that there was a way to bring up fanfiction without actually bringing up fanfiction. Because I think about that a lot, like, what if I ran into someone I knew from the internet but never even knew it? That would be crazy. But anyway. Thank you for unofficially voting on the poll! I love making polls and seeing what people think. It's so much fun. Toodles for now!
Until tomorrow my pretties! *cackles like the wicked witch*