AN: I wanted to thank my beta-reader as usual for the work she does. The next part will be posted before the week-end's out, so look for it before Monday!

A huge thank you goes to those who have left reviews again, and favourited this story or added it to their alerts - much appreciated! :)

Credit lyrics: Kate Havnevik.

I wanted to answer to a couple of people's reviews in particular, so if you reviewed chapter five, please read this!

Tbnasib: I appreciate that you have stayed with this since the beginning, I truly do. :) As for how it all ties in with chapter one, I hope this chapter and the next will clear up the left-over confusion! I hope to hear from you again, and that you will no longer be confused! Thanks for the review.

Gigi: Yay, you're still here! :) I hope this was fast enough for you! ;)

Trinigyal: You shrieked for joy - eeep! :D I'm really happy you're liking my bone-chilling Loki so far, and yeah, he has been pretty creepy especially in the last chapter. But that's about to step up to a whole other level, heh. I have certain plans for Loki, and the road is yet mysterious and long. ;) I hope your patience has been rewarded with this chapter! Please continue leaving me your thoughts! :)

CHAPTER SUMMARY:

In which Loki ensorcelles his victim and tortures her in the dark cage of despair he created for her. He obliterates her real memories and replaces them with - something else.

*Chapter six: The never-dawning day*

PART I

The stars, the moon

They have all been blown out

You've left me in the dark

No dawn

No day

I'm always in this twilight

In the shadow of your heart

I tried to find the sun

But then it stopped, and I was in the darkness

Oh, darkness I became

Then I heard your heart beating,

You were in the darkness too

So I stayed in the darkness with you.

- 'Cosmic Love' by Florence & The Machine

.

.

-o-o-o-

The black inkiness was littered with spots of bright white light, a stark contrast to the encompassing hues of blue so dark in some areas it was black.

It was floating there, emotionless and purposeless. It did not know its origins, nor if it had a name.

Name. What is … name?

What does it mean –

- words. Speech. Language.

All these thoughts were confusing.

It did not know anything. What was life? What was death? Was this living? Where is-?

As moments – eons, eras, millennia? Or mere seconds? – passed, strong was the sense of timelessness.

In time a certain sense of self – a consciousness – returned.

Consciousness … ? What was … consciousness?

Cognition began ebbing back in small tidal waves, rippling across its consciousness.

What manner of creature was … I? I? Who am I?

Sharp bursts of light engulfed everything, as it floated in this limbo, but it did not know if there was peace, or a profound nothingness so overcoming that it erased all else.

A voice.

There was a voice inside. Or was it outside? But then, what was in … and what was out?

Breathing-

Breath. Palpitations. Heart…?

Beating.

Pulse.

Lungs, diaphragm … expanding. Air in.

Air out.

Air. Oxygen.

This was good. This was necessary. This was life.

Life …

Why … so hazy?

Why … so confused?

It is an everyday occurrence, after all.

Disappearances … happen.

(Pains go phantom.)

Blood … stops running.

(And people …)

People fade away.

People, yes people. Was it a people? No, not 'people'. Person. A person. She. She!

She, no longer it. She was a person, a being, a creature of the stars. Were they stars? They had to be, these white lights glowing bright in the blackness.

(Timeless. Love is a cure -)

Did she love?

She was a … woman.

Oh no, no … what was her name? What was her name?

(-a promise. Still so pure.

Rise like the tide.

No need to hide.

Fearless, just like before.)

There were images that she saw. But her eyes. Were they open?

(Oh,

Here we go

They're all waiting

For a cure.)

Did it matter? She watched these images with a polite curiosity. What did she care for them, they weren't hers after all. They were bright and colourful, and they tugged at her insides, as though she was supposed to know their meaning.

There were so, so many; but only a handful truly registered and stayed in her brain. They were no more than floating feathers, just as light and just as flighty.

There were brown eyes looking right at her. Her heart … oh, her heart. It belonged to them, these soulful eyes. He was a child.

No, not a child. A man.

The thought of this man, it made her burn with longing, made her yearn fiercely, made her …

Her eyes brimmed over and sorrow spilled down her face. This ache … oh, she didn't want this ache! This was so painful. This was … this was agony.

(Breathe in

And let go)

Beloved! Where have you gone, beloved?

The images continued. She knew they were memories. And they flooded her with so much hurt! But … they were of him. She could never not want something of him, even if the pain was so physical it tore at her flesh.

(I have seen

How you crawl

Flicker and hover-)

He was brilliant and funny, brave and generous. A man-child spoiled and selfish, immature and deeply insecure, used to wearing dozens of faces more than he was used to being himself: sometimes briefly stark, and exposed.

She liked him in all his disguises.

She liked him when he was bare. When he lay naked in the darkness beside her. When his hands were on her flesh, holding her and moulding her, setting her on fire, that burning handshake, those drugging kisses.

She liked listening to his voice, when he rambled about his genius, when it was low and serious with all that lay heavy on his mind, when it was playful, when it was tender and delicious in her ear, hot intimate whispers that made her stomach flip-

A tingle travelled up her spine and at the same time a cluster of colours entwined, as they melted… into one.

"Amore. Look at me. I want to see you…" his breathing was ragged and hers stole away as she couldn't help voicing her ecstasy. "Come for me, Pepper."

(Still changing colours

But nothing can break this calm-)

A fissure broke open on the surface of her heart, ad it spread all over until it cracked, until it all cracked-

Pepper.

Tony.

Tony and Pepper.

Tony… Tony…Tonytonyton-

-Her eyes snapped open as the synapses continued firing in her brain, his name a tortured wail on her tongue. The momentum of the spasming in her muscles brought her to a sitting position, but her sight was dimmed and the world around her was indistinct, as thought a mere dream.

Then a dark figure loomed over her, and she tumbled down the hole into breathless terror again, her sense screaming at her that this wasn't right, that there was danger-

He bent closer to her and she felt his breath on her skin –which crawled at the contact- as he spoke into her ear. "Hush now, Pepper. Quieten down. Just let it take you. Let the sleep engulf you again."

His voice was swirls of colours that compelled, icy snakes that crooned cruelly in loveless mockery. She was helpless, in her state. Helpless to resist the heavy tsunami of sleep that crashed over her, induced by his dark trickery. She wanted to sob. She wanted to cry out, and beat away at him with her fists, but her arms were no stronger than a new-born kitten, and she didn't even have claws.

His hands locked on them, held her fast. Held her paralysed outside just as much as she was inside. He held her rigid body with his strength, bending it to his wishes, folding her back down onto the soft surface beneath her, supine and boneless again. Floating … floating.

"That's it, my little bird. You're so pale, and so cold. Rest your weary mind, my fragile one. I will look after you."

-o-o-o-o-

She was in the darkness again, but no matter how fiercely she fought back, it kept her a prisoner, unable to wake up.

But this time she wasn't alone in the darkness. There were things that moved there. They were as insubstantial as smoke and mirrors, mere impressions like plumes of ink gliding eerily around her space, crowding her. And they spoke to her, these voices, like far-away transmissions of anguish.

She didn't like them. She squeezed her eyes shut, and wished them away.

But there they remained, whispering words of poison to her. They blackened her hope and fed her bitter morsels of despair.

And the images accompanied them, all in her head, squeezing her heart. It was a tale that was more like a dream and a wish, mixed with nightmarish tinges fraught with heartbreak.

It was something utterly new, and yet bits of it she already knew, they were familiar.

They told her to listen, and to accept it as truth.

She did not trust them.

So they howled.

She cringed and tried to shy away, to crawl into an empty space, to evade them, but they were always there, always with her, always whispering things.

They spoke of a love so profound that it stole her breath, and threatened her reason. But there were strange images intruding here and there.

-A wedding ceremony; melodic tunes and a flowing white dress. Two rings on twin fingers, and laughing brown eyes-

-Love that grew, and strengthened and soothed at her soul.-

-Flashes of intimate embraces and endless peaceful mornings, awakening next to her husband; he with his arms tucking her against his side (so safe, so dear), she placing a hand on the blue of the reactor in his chest as she bent closer to kiss him lovingly.-

-Cars, and nights, and friends, and worry as red and gold armour flashed whilst it revealed the tired man inside; fights and misunderstandings, but always unity.-

Then—

-His eyes again, always his eyes. There was a most peculiar expression in them. His hand was big and his fingers light when they rested on her swollen belly; his face held infinite gentleness, and an intense, quiet adoration she had never seen before. He leaned in close to the balloon that was her stomach and pressed a tender kiss on the firm roundness. He looked up at her again, with eyes beaming like twin suns.-

This … wasn't real, it couldn't be real, it wasn't real! … Was it?

-He embraced her from behind, resting his chin on her shoulder. There was a sweet weight in her arms now, a tiny bundle of blankets where a tiny face burrowed deep, but she couldn't see it clearly. A sweet bud of a mouth latched on to her teat and suckled with adorable abandon. "You're so beautiful. He's so perfect, isn't he?"-

But the voices weren't done, and the images were worse.

He flew out one day, and returned barely alive, only to die in her arms.

No more! NO MORE!

The writhing smoking figures ceased their restlessness, and left her alone.

She whimpered, feeling as though the very air she breathed was poison, clutching her gut and seaming her lips shut. The skin of her body felt as though it had been brushed at with sandpaper, leaving trails of fire whittling down to her bones.

But still, she slept.

-o-o-o-o-

He looked at her, helpless and immobile in his dark cage, trapped within her own body, drowning in his bleak dreams that invaded her mind and became memories of events that had never happened.

A few pitiful sounds escaped her lips, and her face was twisted in dire distress even in sleep.

He grinned, all white gleaming teeth, in approval and appreciation of the beautiful art, this master-piece unfolding before him.

He touched two fingertips to her forehead, and let out a malice-tinged laugh at the havoc he wreaked on her. He sealed the false memories with the beginning of the end –her leaving everything behind, even her fatherless child, to wander through the world, wraith-like with a burning grief that would eventually engulf her and swallow her whole.

He then straightened and brought his hand away.

He swept out of the room and began the preparations for the next time she would truly awaken.

End of part I - expect part II by Monday! Please leave me your comments, I LOVE reading them! ;)