Chapter Three: A Bit Longer
Fury scowled at his ragtag team of misfit toys. For the third time, he said, "This is ridiculous." Each Avenger, apart from Tony, avoided his gaze expertly. "Well?" Fury prompted, his agitation close to breaking his usually smooth voice. When no one responded, he rubbed his forehead and took a few steps closer to them. "Let's go over it again. What exactly happened."
"Loki was infuriating me, it was suggested that I get some air to cool off," Thor contributed.
Fury pursed his lips. "And who suggested such an excellent idea?"
Tony raised his hand. Before Fury could start shouting, Tony shook his head defensively. "Let me explain before you lose your mind, there, Nick. He really was angry-did you see the dent in the wall in there? He punched that there. So I figured that if Thor took a quick break from that smartass, it wouldn't be the end of the world."
"Well it just so happens that it might be," Fury sneered, "what happened next?"
Tony raised his hand again and Fury's eye wandered back to him, irritation practically coating his skin in a physical grime at this point. "Clint suggested we get something, like a gag, to shut him up. Which-let's be fair, here-is a great idea. So I decided to-"
"New rule!" Fury shouted, interrupting him and shutting him up. "Stark doesn't get to decide anything. Next."
Tony turned his head to Barton. "You're up, bud."
Steve put his hand on Barton's shoulder. "How many times are we going to go over this? We know what happened," he defended his teammate. "What we need to be doing is thinking of solutions. How do we find him?"
Bruce fiddled with a pen in his hands and chimed in for the first time. "What about that guy in Asgard-the one who sees everything? Thor, you were talking about him one of the times when we were babysitting Loki together. Thanks, by the way, for getting upset and messing things up-that's usually my job, nice to have a day off."
Thor turned to him thoughtfully, not tickled by his humor. "Heimdall? Yes, of course. Heimdall can find him for sure."
Fury clapped his hands together. "O-kay! As soon as the tesseract has been stabilized, we will send you straight back home to confer with him."
Most of the team rose in shock. "It's not even stable yet?" Natasha snapped.
"It will be soon. There was a slight hiccup in our plans when the reason we were stabilizing it disappeared," Fury snapped back, trying to set the world record for angry faces made during a single conversation, "it won't be long-and then we can go get that son of a bitch."
Elsewhere
Loki was amazed at the girl's ability to sit quietly. If sitting quietly was an Olympic event, oh, she would bring home the gold. She still had her knees up for comfort and just stared ahead. What exactly she was staring at couldn't be discerned, but he could tell from his side of the couch what she wasn't looking at-him. "Do you think that if you just sit there like a well-behaved animal, I'll vanish into thin air?
Eve shook her head. "I'm hoping I'll wake up."
He rolled his eyes-he had a feeling he'd be doing a lot of that-and went on. "I don't know how long I'm going to be here. Are you just going to sit like that until I'm gone?"
At last, she looked at him. "Yes." She stated definitively.
"Well, this is going to be no fun at all." He sat back and gazed at her. In her distress, she was admittedly poised. He truly believed she could just sit and ignore him and possibly starve to death out of stubbornness in the process. That just wouldn't do. "What's your name?" He forced an air of curiosity to coat his voice, which was ultimately a great challenge, seeing as he couldn't have cared less.
"Eve," she replied slowly.
"Well, Eve, you must have questions for me. I'm happy to answer them." She hesitated, eager to accept this offer but not sure it was genuine. "Fire away." He narrowed his eyes to encourage her.
"Okay, well, how did you get away?"
He examined his fingernails. "I'm simply too cunning to be held by that group of mismanaged cretins. Next."
"Why…" she paused, searching for the correct phrasing. It turned out to be just one word- "here?"
"I chose to teleport, but I couldn't know where I was going. It's hard to explain, and I'm afraid I don't want to waste my time explaining something it would take you years to understand. Ultimately, I let fate bring me here."
Eve's mouth hung open a bit, on the brink of words, in a muddled mix of offense and curiosity. Being called stupid turned out, after internal deliberation, not worth losing her life over. As it seemed, lots of things weren't worth that. She licked her lips and moved on. "The Avenger with the hammer is your brother or something, right? Thor?" He nodded cautiously. This was not something he wanted to talk about in any capacity. He hoped that maybe that was the extent of her questions about his brother, but on a deeper level he knew that was impossible. She went on to ask, "Why don't you two get along?"
He was now risking getting trapped in his own cyclical thoughts. They used to get along, to the degree brothers do, but- "We just don't, anymore." He silenced his internal ramblings by speaking, shifting his thoughts back to the nosy girl. Although not entirely fair to call her nosy, as he'd prompted her to ask questions, he wasn't necessarily a heavy supporter of the concept of fair. It had never done him any favors.
"Anymore?" She tilted her head slightly-much like a dog-and waited patiently for his response.
"I suppose this was my doing," the words dripped out and fluttered back in to make way for the next, "I didn't realize when I prompted you to ask questions that they would be so entirely foolish."
Eve finally let her feet touch the floor again and leaned forward defensively. "I should have known this was some sort of trap. Ask questions-fire away! If you're looking for a reason to kill me, just find it already. I'm not going to sit here and play games with you until you make up your mind. I've said I'll comply, and I will. I don't see why that means you get to mess with me."
Loki watched her face fall as she realized she'd overstepped. He sighed in delight as the toxic panic sunk into her again. He waited for her knees to come back up to her chin, but they never did. "Are you sure you want those to be your last words?" He chuckled, overly entertained by the way she'd betrayed herself. "You seem to be a slave to your emotions."
She nodded jaggedly, tears appearing in the corners of her eyes now. "Fine. Fine, fine, fine, fine. One last question, why don't you just kill me?"
"Darling, I wouldn't want anyone to come looking for you." She bit her cheek and blinked once, twice, three times-and then one tear escaped down the curve of her face. She looked at him, eyes glistening the way sad eyes do. "A pretty girl like you surely can't claim your death would go unnoticed."
Eve's thought's darted back and forth until she came to a depressing realization. The only person who would notice her absence would be Sam, the very man she had spurned the week before. Then she arrived at a slightly more pleasant thought. She had told Sam she would call him the next day. When she inevitably didn't, he'd come by to check on her. He'd woken her up from sleeping too late in the day a few times this way. Resilience coursed through her with each new heartbeat and she decided to appease the God of Mischief until then. "No," she assured him, "my death would not go unnoticed."
He abruptly took her hands in his, moving closer to her on the couch to do so. "Excellent! Then what do you say we stay alive a bit longer?"
She forced a smile. "Yes, I'd like that."
"Wonderful! Marvelous!" He squeezed her hands then let go of them and stood. "I'm starving," he confessed as he meandered to her kitchen.
After Lunch
Eve had made sandwiches for them both, all sorts. It seemed that Loki enjoyed them immensely-unless his happiness was sarcastic, who could tell? She began to gather the plates and cups strewn across the island. As she placed them in the sink, she felt a hand on her shoulder and instinctively kneed the man in the stomach. She gaped, shocked at what she'd done, and tried to find the words to apologize.
Loki held his hand on his stomach, rubbing slightly, and looked at her in stunned disbelief. They were both at a loss for what to say. Eventually Loki exhaled forcefully, half smiling, and closed the distance between them. "Why are you so brash?" He asked, inches from her face. "Why are you so…" he took a step back, "stupid?"
Her breathing was unsteady. "It was a reflex," she explained, "I was taught how to fight at a young age by my father. After he died, I took self defense classes, and then martial arts-all kinds. It was just a reflex, I wasn't trying to harm you."
"I should hope not!" Loki scoffed. "By the way, it didn't. Hurt, that is. Where were your reflexes when I was threatening you before?"
"You had a weapon. It makes no sense to try to fist fight a man with a weapon. Let alone a sorcerer! Plus, I didn't want you to see me as any sort of threat. Look, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. It won't happen again. I'll turn my reflexes off. Click! Ha! See! Off!" She sat down on the floor of her kitchen, tasting the edge of a very serious panic attack.
He crouched down beside her. "It's alright," he mock comforted, "even if you were the most skilled fighter in your realm, you would be no threat to me."
A/N:
I would just like to let you know that this story had been officially planned out right to the very end! Woo! No worries about getting stuck or wandering without a real point. Though, Loki is an abrasive character and he doesn't always cooperate :P
