you scream and everybody comes a running

take a run and hide yourself away.

The decrepit steps, made of asteroids and existing for millennia, seem to stretch on limitlessly as he drags his feet up them. He is fearful of who waits atop them – for both the rumbling fury of the being itself, and the news he must bring him are unpleasant.

The Other pauses as he reaches the top, struck once more at the massiveness of the man in front of him. In both physical size and the power he holds, his master is dwarfed only by a sun, he thinks.

His master turns his head every-so-slightly his way, and this is his cue to fall to humble knee. If his master were any lesser, he would feel humiliated.

But, no. The Other feels honour and pride (and fear) course through him.

With lowered head, he reports, "My Dark Lord… I come bearing both news that I hope will please you so, and news that may… disrupt the advancement of your plan. In theory."

There is a sudden, invisible pressure pushing down on his neck, now, and the Other chokes back a curse. He scrambles to say something, anything that will placate the man in front of him.

"Loki has the Tesseract, my lord. And the captured minds and willing bodies of a group of soldiers, all in thanks to the generous gift you bestowed upon him." The pressure lightens, but he can still feel fingertips itching to dig in once more. "A-and the disruption, sir… I-is minor, simply, sir. Unexpected, yes, but may- can possibly work to benefit us - to benefit you."

His masters mouth twitches slightly, and then the only pressure upon his neck is a set of narrowed, steady eyes.

"I have a... theory, my lord."

A pause that makes his throat tighten.

"…I'm listening."

And then he is staring at the Tesseract.

The picture doesn't do it much justice, Steve thinks to himself. It pales in comparison - in colour and grandeur and power - when he imagines the real thing. His stomach twists uncomfortably staring at it; it makes him think of falling and ice and sleeping through the fall and rise of empires.

"Who took it from you?" Steve asks, flipping to the next glossy page as Fury stands above him with ill-contained tenseness radiating from his form.

"He's called Loki. He's not from around here. And…" Steve glances up at Fury's pause, to see him pulling a compact device from his pocket. Its screen turns on with the flick of his finger, and a blue-tinted holographic screen is projected with another simple flick.

In it, appears a dull, concrete room filled with debris of men and machine alike. The crackling blue energy barely-visible at the corner of the screen doesn't detract from the people standing in the centre - a tall man in dark green robes, facing away from the camera, and a woman crouched will tense readiness in front of him.

Steve leans in slightly, taking in the bizarre colouring of her hair - a rosy pink, of all things - and the energy that surrounds her fists. She stands, slowly, and the CCTV camera adjusts, zooming in tighter as the energy around her hands fades away. The woman opens her mouth, speaking one word that he cannot make out from lipreading alone. The crackling of machines drowns out her quiet tone, so Steve looks to Fury briefly for explanation.

Fury's eye is trained on the image in front of him as well, but he can feel Steve's gaze on him, still.

"She asked if he was a foe." Movement on screen brings Steves attention back to the video, to see the man - Loki, he can assume - take the hand of the woman. Her body immediately coils, to strike, and Steve recognizes the traits of a soldier when he sees one.

But the woman cannot strike, as he witnesses her eyes roll back and her body fall limp. Loki lets go of her hand as she falls, twisting his neck with mock-curiosity to take in her unconscious self. There is a slight pause before he snaps his fingers, and two men rush forward to pick up the limp woman. A man steps forward purposefully, holding a silver briefcase, to guide the group out of the room. The screen flickers briefly before disappearing entirely.

"He told her he was a king," Fury says, placing the device within his jacket once more. "We have no idea who the woman is. No trace of her anywhere, no name to match the face. She appeared after Loki, from the same wormhole he did. Looked confused, but displayed signs of combat experience, and some sort of energy focused around her hands. Loki didn't seem to recognize her, she didn't seem to recognize anything at all, but now he has her. Whether that's something we need to worry about, we don't know yet. But our priority is finding Loki and recapturing the Tesseract."

Steve nodded minutely, responding seriously, "With all due respect, sir, that doesn't look like someone voluntarily joining the bad guys. She looked lost, more than anything. I don't think it would be wrong to call her an unwilling participant."

Fury frowned slightly, "She's an unknown variable, for now." He took the files from Steve's hand, glancing at them briefly. "There's a lot we'll have to bring you up to speed on if you're in. The world has gotten even stranger than you already know."

"At this point, I doubt anything would surprise me," Steve exhaled, coming to stand.

Fury, humourlessly, replied, "Ten bucks says you're wrong."

When Sakura wakes, it is to artificial lights and a cacophony of movement and noise.

She is separated from said rush of sound by thin plastic curtains, and the cot she is lying on takes up the majority of the makeshift room she has been placed in. Her head and body aches, but something in the back of her mind reassures her the pain in her body will soothe soon enough.

Sakura closes her eyes tightly, hoping the source of her pounding migraine is the unforgiving fluorescent lights above her. The headache only seems to throb harder, and she mutters a curse at the same time a hand draws back a section of curtain and a set of feet make their way towards her.

She has to clutch her head tightly when she tries to sit up quickly and receives an angry, pointed pain at the base of her skull in response. Though her body is sore in places, it seems to react with instinct to the perceived threat that has just walked in.

"Open your eyes, girl." A voice reminiscent of mist unfurling upon the ground instructs, and Sakura forces herself to open them with grit teeth and clenched fingers.

The man in front of her is the same she encountered the day (or days, as her concept of time isn't exactly solid at the moment) before, and wears the same infuriatingly-pleasant smile. "Ahh, there we are. I believe you arrived after my introduction, hm?" He tilts his head in a thin imitation of an acknowledging nod, preening, "I am Loki of Asgard. And I have one very important purpose for being here."

"…You struck down those men…" Sakura murmured, drawing her bright green eyes up to his duller ones and seeing them narrow slightly.

"Repetition is tiresome, girl," Loki says, taking a step forward, "But I am guided by this sole purpose. To bring enlightenment, to lead those with no path. No spine. If I am to succeed, and bring this world to a grander state of being, I am unafraid to strike down any that stand before me."

Sakura sat up straighter, matching his narrowed gaze. "And am I counted among those? Those with no purpose? Those you intend to strike down?"

The whir of machine and and voices is drowned out by the rushing of Sakura's pulse in her ears. She thinks she could probably defend herself, if need be. Her body tells her that.

But her body and mind haven't seemed to synch up with each other, nor with the world around her. Things still feel off, wrong, and Loki seems completely and entirely in control of both himself and every movement around him. She cannot challenge him, not now - and from the smirk on his lips, he knows that.

"That… remains to be seen." Loki holds his hand out to Sakura, but she simply stares at it briefly. "Your name?"

Saying anything to this man feels as if she is speaking one of her darkest secrets, but he is the only person she can rely on for answers. And so, she replies.

"…Sakura."

The name is foreign on his tongue, but Loki repeats it, "Sakura, hm. And where is it that you hail from?"

Sakura opens her mouth to respond, but the answer dies before it can be spoken. He sees a flash of some brief, chaotic emotion in her eyes.

He understands, in that moment.

"You…" An indulgent grin stretches across his face. "You have no memory. Of anything else." Her jaw tightens, and Loki knows that his ability to read others remains irrefutably just.

"How curious." He leans forward, slightly surprised when she stands swiftly to stare him down. Loki can tell it pains her to move so suddenly but takes great satisfaction in seeing her attempts at standing her ground.

"I know that my name is Sakura," she says, "And I know… that I can fight." Loki lifts his eyebrow, prompting her to continue. He is, truly, curious as to what she believes she needs to say. What she believes he wants to hear.

"I don't know who you are, or what you intend to do with me. What you intend to do with that…" She trails off, peering to his left and causing him to turn and do the same. The Tesseract sits, pulsating gently with light and energy and promise.

"…that power." Sakura finishes - Loki peers at her out of the corner of his eye, body still turned to the force that attracts and guides him so. The woman in front of him is astounding in her contradictions; soft in colour yet brimming with power, with a body and mind weakened (temporarily, he guesses) yet a gaze that is permanently strong. Another earth-thing to play with and unravel, he muses.

"But I also know that I don't have much of a choice. Not now."

"Allow me, then, to guide you," Loki says without pausing, "I help you. And you help me. I do right to ease your uncertainties, answer your questions. You lend me your… ability to fight."

He holds his hand out, once more, but her eyes do not stray to it this time. She hates this, he knows; sees it in the steel of her eyes and the clenching of her body. She is smart to stay suspicious.

But she is also desperate.

So she shakes his hand.

"Don't worry," his voice barely louder than a whisper, tightening his grip minutely. She responds thusly, and Loki is smiling again.

"You can trust me."