AN: I'm very sorry this chapter took so long guys. That's all I can say.
Things are heating up, and the more the story progresses the fussier I become, worried about delivering a certain standard of writing and an enjoyable read. I hope I've succeeded. Thanks must go to my beta, The Thinking Woman; even when she has little time for this nonsense, she doesn't hesitate to lend a friendly ear.
READERS' CORNER:
LouBlue: Kudos for guessing correctly ahead of time; the 'woman who saw' is indeed very important, and you'll see more of that now.
As for Pepper pushing limits and buttons, and Loki's control ... well; I hope you enjoy this one, because this is the first stage of what I have planned for this story and their development. Pepper's involvement in Loki's existence is going to be crucial for ... read to find out! Love your MagOc, I hope you carry on leaving me your comments and that you like this story as much as I do yours. :) *fellow writer hug*
Trinilynn: Lol, thanks for your continued readership, it means a lot; especially since you want to do our boy Loki such violent body harm. ;) I hope the side of him you'll see in this chapter will live up to your expectations of my portrayal of his character ... and also, that it may stir such strong emotion in you, albeit maybe not quite so violent ... but then who knows? Maybe you'll love to hate him even more? ;)
Yoruichi89: Welcome to the fold new reader! I'm happy you love this story so far, I hope you'll continue to enjoy it so much and to hear about your point of view again. :)
AnnieO741: You as well, welcome to the fold! :D Yay for being sucked in, and for reviewing! Also, the appreciation you hold for my unpredictability means a lot to me. Writing this story in a way that is not clichè, as a plot that is completely original, I always try very hard to deliver the very best I am capable of.
You better put your seatbelt on, wouldn't want your-edge-of-the-seat to cause you harm because things are heating up!
I thank you for the cookies and I hope you don't wish me dead for the long wait! *bows*
General confession: Yeah, so I have plenty to say. Sorry, I have feels. This chapter was ... probably the hardest one I have had to write of the bunch, and I'm sure this will only be true until the next mammoth difficult chapter comes along. It's just the way this story has been brain-stormed. It's also because I am a very fussy person when it comes down to my art, and writing is one of the main artistic indulgences of mine; probably the most important one.
Thank you, dear readers, for keeping your interest alive, for giving me the incentive to carry on writing knowing that someone out there wants to read and find out how this is going to end - incidentally, we've a LOOOONG way to go before the end, heh I hope you'll be here for the ride.
It was my birthday this week, and I have received some amazing presents, which I am enjoying to the fullest. A person like me with inherent artistic tendencies can only soak up so much enjoyment from certain things, and it's all been very exciting. This is my gift to you guys, ending the time of reflection and recuperation, and giving you the next instalment.
Sincerely,
Enjoy and keep on writing to me, you wonderful, wonderful people. Vesper x x x
*Chapter Ten: The Gap in the Constellation*
I am torn open, unabridged, hot and a bit crazy inside. This is the feeling which belongs to me. She has always been mine. - Coco J. Ginger
-KIDNAPPED DAY NINE, LOCATION UNKNOWN-
"When will I see you again? Tony! When will I see you again!"
Pepper jolted awake with her heart beating a mile a minute in her chest and Tony's name on her lips. She was huddled on the sofa, and drenched in a cold sweat. The room was dark, and so was the world outside the windows.
The utter stillness of the room stifled her. She weakly rested her weight onto her elbows, then sat up and leaned tiredly against the backrest. Her skin felt clammy and as though it had been dragged mercilessly through sandpaper; any fleeting touch, from the very clothes she was wearing, to the fabric of the sofa, dragged painfully on her skin and set her nerve endings on fire.
Pepper squeezed her eyes shut and gripped the cushions underneath her as a wave of nausea and dizziness swept over her.
"Here you are…" Her heart clenched.
"I miss you too." And then she was crying, sobbing uncontrollably. Big gulping breaths. Fire licked her lungs; unrestrained harsh cries and the pain would never stop. His name on her breath a desperate, desolate prayer.
—(I need you)—
-"Here you are."-
-"Here I am."-
Here I am.
The alien (hated) weight of the rings on her left hand tried to squeeze her finger harder. With a convulsive movement Pepper grabbed the large engagement ring with her fingers, and tugged.
It did not come quietly, almost as if it had been welded onto her flesh. The harder she fought to take it off, the more painfully her head ached. She didn't care. She wanted it off now.
The ring started growing hot under her fingers and she exhaled sharply. It wouldn't budge. She'd take it off if she had to cut her finger off. Bright lances of pain shot down her arms, but Pepper ignored them. The platinum became uncomfortably warm. She fought even harder to take it off-
Then millimetre by millimetre it began coming loose. First phalanx. Middle of her finger. With a mighty wrench it came free. Pepper clenched her fist around it, uncaring that the large stone cut into her soft flesh, and then she angrily hurled it to the other side of the room. It hit the wall and landed with a dull thud on the floor. Pepper breathed hard. Next up, her wedding band. When her fingers returned to her left hand to remove the other ring, she discovered it gone. In the dark she fumbled with her fingertips over her palm and knuckles. But it truly was gone, almost as if it had never been there.
Pepper stilled.
Her mind had suddenly become more 'awake', and it began bombarding her conscience with memories, images and sensations, sights and sounds.
Her breath just about died out as memory returned.
-A dark balmy night in the Caribbean.-
-Palm tree fronds swishing in the gentle breeze that tasted of ocean and warmth.-
-Soft sand under her feet.-
-Her spine crawled with a terrible sense of looming danger… and then there was darkness.
Her mind was trying its hardest to catch with events, to make sense of it all. There was a bigger picture here to behold. And it was clear that up till now, she had seen but a tiny corner of it. She needed to take a step back.
The last thing she remembered which made sense was … their break. Turks and Caicos, Saadet House, the beach, sailing.
How long ago was this? And then… and then …
Oh, she had to remember. Something vital was escaping her. She knew it would help her make sense of what was happening to her.
Tony had surprised her by arranging for a break in the Caribbean, just the two of them. On the day of their departure something had come up at the company which required Tony's presence, but he'd insisted that she go on ahead. She took the jet, landed in a paradise island, and went to the villa he owned. She'd spent that day sailing and looking around the bay, taking photographs, walking on the beach, sunbathing –
Photos. She'd taken photos of her trip.
Pepper sprang up from the sofa and went in search of her laptop. There was no trace of it in the office. She honestly couldn't remember the last time she'd seen it. She went upstairs and looked into the bedroom and the guest suites. Why couldn't she find her laptop? But then her camera was nowhere to be seen either.
What the hell was going on?
She needed help.
"JARVIS, where—" Oh no. No, wait. There … there was no JARVIS… he'd downloaded himself into the company servers, removing himself from the house.
Wait, what?
Why would JARVIS –
Nothing made sense. Why would JARVIS, who had been created with the sole purpose of running the house and aiding Tony in his workshop, remove himself from the servers and install himself permanently over at the company?
When had this happened? Dammit, why didn't she remember anything?!
"JARVIS, override protocol thirteen, access code beta dee dee two three seven."
By design this override protocol would make JARVIS halt all operations except for house safety measures, and be ready to assist. He would respond immediately.
There was no answer. He truly wasn't here.
Pepper fought back the feeling of loneliness and loss and picked up the phone – but there was no dial tone. She stared at it, confounded and increasingly frustrated. In a sudden burst of anger, she hurled it towards to opposite wall, where it hit with a crash and crumpled in a broken heap on the floor. She breathed in deeply through her nose, and slowly exhaled through her mouth, again and again, in with the good out with the bad, until she felt calmer. Pepper was good at solving problems. She'd had to learn the ropes pretty quickly when Tony had made her his PA, because having so many aspects of his life to run entailed a certain learning curve in approaching problems and overcoming speed-bumps.
She would get to the bottom of this. Whatever the hell was happening, she would see the situation for what it was, and immediately begin to strategize ways of getting herself out of this fix.
This would end.
Loki grabbed the object nearest to him, swung it over his head and brought it crashing down onto the cabinet in front of him, repeatedly. The glass shattered loudly and sprinkled everywhere, liquids running down the furniture towards the floor, bottles smashing and glass shattering.
After he'd discovered that Pepper had managed to get past his psyche containment wards and escaped his dream dimension, he'd been almost apoplectic with rage. He still didn't know how she did it.
She'd managed to enter into a dream of her own making and her psyche somehow made a connection through time and a lot of space (thousands of miles of it) with Stark's psyche. They had effectively been in the same dream together. It was rare. It was almost unheard of for the people of this realm, because they didn't possess the powers, nor the skills to control such a thing.
And yet she'd done it.
For the umpteenth time, Loki wished that his powers had not been so greatly reduced. If only he still had the ability to travel out of Midgarðr and go stepping through the realms, the things he could do to her! But the great All-faðr must have known that this would truly damn him, these shackles, because he'd made damn well certain that it could not be done.
Curse him and his ilk! Curse Thor, the Æsir and all of Ásgarðr!
Loki knew what Odin had tried to do in his punishment, by sending him here; it was not by chance that Loki had been punished in the same manner as Thor, when both were cast out of the heavens and into Midgarðr for their deeds. Yet the foolish old man had left a way back for Thor to use; all he'd had to do was to grow up and develop a sense of empathy towards others, to stop nourishing his own selfish ego and voilà, his power was restored and he could go back.
No such measures for Loki though, oh no. Loki had been cast out for an indefinite period of time, several mortal lifetimes for all he knew, and with no certain way of returning. There was no way of knowing when he would be free again. There was no Mjölnir for Loki. The All-faðr had taken back Güngnir, so that was that. Loki was left here, alone and helpless.
The least favourite son, in the least friendly conditions. The Scourge of Ásgarðr, tumbled down to Earth and forced to stay there to rot.
He picked up a large piece of glass and felt satisfied as it crumbled to dust under the force of his squeezing fist. Oozing red welled up in his palm. Loki grimaced and lowered his arm, uncaring of the wounds on his hand.
Very well, then. If Pepper Potts wanted to have a game of who was the strongest, she would soon come to realise that no one played with the Trickster God and won. Certainly no lowly mortal quim.
And if he couldn't rely on his powers of auld … well, the arcane was here on Earth, too. Loki was sure he'd find something to suit his purposes. He had been going about this in the wrong manner. Perhaps it had been slightly foolish of him to imagine that Pepper would remain trapped inside the illusions he had crafted for her inside her mind; he'd underestimated her. That would stop now.
If illusions didn't quite do the trick any more … if she no longer succumbed to the power of the enchanted ring … there were other ways to enslave someone.
-KIDNAPPED DAY NINE, TURKS AND CAICOS-
Tony waited to be put through to Chris Lawson.
After the video clip he'd seen, the implications of it, and the coincidences with Pepper's disappearance, he was leaving nothing to chance. This was the only trail he could follow for now, because whoever had taken her had made sure to leave no trace behind, except maybe for this.
"Hello, Tony? I heard there's still no news on Ms. Potts' whereabouts. How can I help you?"
"Yeah, Lawson, I need you to do me a big favour."
"Of course, anything I can do to help. I feel responsible for this. For not raising the alarm sooner."
Good. You should feel responsible. Who was at fault here? And who could be held accountable for Pepper's disappearance? Me. I'm at the very top of that list.
"Listen, I have to talk to some members of your staff. Set up a meeting first thing tomorrow morning. I especially want to speak to every and any person who might have been outside of the building that night for any length of time between quarter to seven and quarter past."
Chris sounded hesitant. "Well … I mean, I have a lot of staff working here at the resort, Tony. Not all of them will be working here everyday. Contacting them all and setting it up by tomorrow morning is imposs—"
"I don't wanna hear that word. I'm not asking you Lawson, I'm telling you. Get me that meeting. I want them all there tomorrow morning. No. I don't care what it takes, just do it!"
Tony ended the call and turned towards the computer screen. He'd hacked into the police's systems to gain access to Pepper's missing person file, and the documents were now up on the screen for him to see. All the statements the police had taken, the house search results, the scouring reports, it was all like a tale that still seemed a nightmare to him, an impossibility. There were few leads. Whoever had taken her, they'd obviously timed it all perfectly. Just as she left the premises unescorted and in the dark of night, someone swooped in and took her, leaving none of her possessions behind.
The picture was incomplete to put it lightly. But then the fuckers only treated the case as a an abduction instead of a general missing person, for a couple of days. 'Protocol dictates that we begin the enquiry no less than twenty-four hours after her disappearance. And only if the investigation brings to light certain elements, can this case be considered as abduction by a third party.'
His closed fist tapped rhythmically on the desk, head bowed and eyes closed. Tomorrow morning he would get in the suit and resume his search for her on the islands. So far, he'd flown as soon as it was light over a grid of several thousands square miles. The islands had a thick vegetation and were pretty isolated in the middle of the ocean. There was a lot of ground and sea to cover, even for Iron Man. There was no way to tell where she could be. For all he knew, whoever had taken her had left the islands by now and taken her only god knew where.
Tap-tap. Tap-tap.
You gotta stay calm and keep focused. You know this; you've been through it, you know what it's like. If you stop thinking clearly you'll go under. It's not a luxury you can damn well afford.
Tap-tap. Tap-tap.
The bar was fully stocked with his favourite liquors. His longing for a drink was strong, but then he thought about letting his mind become befuddled by alcohol, and the resultant inability to look for Pepper, and so he kept his throat dry.
"JARVIS, from the top."
JARVIS spoke in the way Tony always found soothing, and he followed the mapping out of Pepper's day on the island as windows came up on the screen. Next JARVIS outlined the police investigation, and highlighted the locations on the map where Iron Man had already been to as he looked for her. There was a summary of findings from the searches carried out on all ships and planes leaving the islands.
Then there was that video.
Tony needed to speak to this woman as soon as possible. The more time passed and he looked at it, the more he was convinced she'd have something to tell.
The next morning Tony was early to his appointment with Chris. They wasted no time with chit-chat and conventional pleasantries, getting straight to business.
Although Chris, and the Spa Manager had already given statements to the police, he knew that his co-operation would be of a different degree now that Iron Man was involved.
He'd wanted Stark to do his questioning in several sessions with a pre-arranged group of employees; it was the most sensible and practical thing to do. The Shambhala was still open for business, and to meet his distinguished guests' requirements, Chris needed his staff. He'd tried to explain this to Tony but had been met with such obstinacy that in the end he'd had to fold and accept his terms.
Basically, the hotel would be all but shut down for a few hours, as long as it took for Tony to do his thing. Chris wasn't happy about it, but after all what else could he do? It was clear to him that his staff had already messed up when Miss Potts failing to turn up to her appointment hadn't been pursued whatsoever. If a phone call had been made to Stark's residence about why she was late and then failed to turn up, the search for her would have begun well before Stark's arrival on the island almost three and a half hours later. A lot could happen to someone in that period of time, especially under such circumstances.
"Before we let your staff in here, there's something you have to see."
Stark took a pen drive out of his pocket and inserted it into Chris' computer. A video file was brought up, and Chris watched the screen intently.
At first he was surprised to recognise his hotel's grounds on the footage, but when he studied it, he realised that it was footage from one of his hotel's security cameras. Confusion as well as anger welled up in him. How had Stark gotten a hold of this?
He must have hacked into the system, Chris realised. He looked up at Tony's impassive face for a second, feeling disconcerted at the lengths the man was willing to go to, and what he was capable of.
"I suppose that if I asked you how this came to be in your possession, you would tell me that it's not important, am I right?"
"You are." Tony's faced was carved and set in stone, his gaze penetrating.
"So then what exactly does this have to do with your circumstances?"
"That woman," Tony pointed back to the screen, where the video played on loop, "I assume, is one of your staff. At the time when Pepper was probably taken she was outside the building, and saw something that she found disturbing. I want to know where I can find her."
Chris nodded and got to work. In a short amount of time, he'd arranged for the woman to be identified and summoned to his office. In the meantime, Stark's right-hand man was interrogating as many employees at a time as possible, but it was a long process.
Once the woman who might have seen arrived, she was immediately waved through into Lawson's office. She looked unsure of herself and obviously uncomfortable.
Stark swooped towards them like a bird of prey and drew towards the computer again. Lawson stood to one side, arms folded and an with expectant expression on his face.
"Tanesha, thanks for coming so promptly. Won't you make yourself comfortable?"
"Have I done something wrong, sir? My supervisor wouldn't say nothing."
"No, you've done nothing wrong. We, that is my friend and I, would like to talk to you about something which happened not too far from the Shambhala, about ten days ago."
Tanesha wrung her hands in her lap and fidgeted. Her gaze flickered from her boss to the dark man standing across from her, who fixed her with his unwavering stare, making her squirm.
Lawson spoke up. "You must know, of course, about the woman who disappeared a few days ago and is now feared to have been kidnapped."
Tanesha nodded.
"Now Tanesha, the reason we wanted to talk to you—"
"I'll take it from here." Lawson abruptly closed his mouth as his friend interrupted him, then walked over to the bar on the other side of the room. Tanesha followed her boss with her eyes as far as she could without turning her head. When he was behind her, she turned back to look at the other man.
She studied him silently and realised distractedly that he wasn't imposing because of his height, but because of the sheer dangerous grace and power he radiated. Clearly he had a strong personality. The unyielding line of his mouth and the deceptively relaxed muscles of his shoulders were proof of it. Tanesha looked him in the eyes again, and immediately wished she hadn't; there was something in them that she found deeply unnerving. If she hadn't been sitting down, she was sure that her knees would be quaking right about now. His eyes were alert in a way that she couldn't fully comprehend, and the light in them was unsettling.
When he spoke again his voice was steady and his tone of voice commanded both her attention and obedience.
"Do you know who I am, Tanesha?"
In her mounting distress, Tanesha noticed other things about him; he stood remarkably still as he bore his eyes into her, but there was an air of kinesis around him, as if he'd pounce at the drop of a hat. He looked more than capable of it. Birds of prey moved that way, suddenly and so fast that their prey had no hope of salvation, and Tanesha felt like the proverbial rabbit about to be snatched into the predator's razor-sharp talons.
She cleared her throat.
"You the one who fly everywhere, all red and gold, looking for that woman. You Iron Man."
He nodded. Iron Man betrayed no expression on his face, just like when he wore the mask.
"Then you know why I'm here."
Tanesha looked down at her lap, her hands clasping at the material of her uniform. She didn't reply. There was a heartbeat of silence; then Iron Man stepped imperceptibly closer to her. Tanesha tensed and drew back against the seat, trying to put as much distance between her and what she perceived as danger, as she could.
"Why the silence?"
Tanesha couldn't look at him, but her heart beat sickeningly fast in her chest. When Iron Man moved again, it was so fast that she didn't see it. He walked back towards the desk, pressed a single key on the keyboard and turned the screen the other way so that it was facing her. Tanesha automatically looked at the screen. There was a video playing, of someone stepping out of a building and lighting a cigarette. With a feeling of dawning dread Tanesha realised she was looking at herself. She was the woman in the video.
Who was now turning to look at something the camera couldn't see, and as the video in front of her played out, her mind played its own images of that night like a movie reel.
She lit her cigarette, looked towards the far side of the court with the palm trees behind it, to the two figures barely discernible. She watched as the taller one grabbed the smaller figure in front of him, a woman with long hair, and forcefully dragged her back into the darkness of the trees, where they both went out of sight.
Iron Man looked at her impassively. He knew that she'd seen. He'd come for her.
"Why didn't you come forward and tell anyone about this?"
"I'm scared someone come find me. Scared of talking, 'case the police thought I had something to do with it."
"But you're actually making things worse for yourself by not saying anything, because now it just looks suspicious."
"Whut you wanna know?"
Iron Man's eyes caught fire, and she looked into the face of anger.
"What do I want to know? What do you think, I wanna know how you feel? Tell me what you saw dammit!"
Tanesha flinched. "Well… I … went out for a smoke. Everythin' s always quiet at that time o' the evenin'. Then I hear someone shoutin'. When I saw them I figured they was fooling around, cuz people on vacation here do that a lot. Then they shoutin' again, so I look at 'em again and this woman is on the other side of the court-yard. Someone thar, behind her and then she gets grabbed and they disappear into the trees. That's all I know."
"What did this person look like? And the woman? Can you describe what she looked like?"
"No, it was dark, I couldn't tell from all the way over where I wuz."
Iron Man pulled out a photo and showed it to her. "Is this her? Is this the woman you saw?"
"I dunno."
"Come on, look at her. Is that who you saw?"
"I dunno. Didn't see her face."
"Look at her. She's pretty hard not to notice with a face like hers and hair that colour."
"Ah didn't see the woman's face, she wuz turned. And it was too dark, and I was too far away. But she had long hair like that … I think … and it looked like … blonde maybe. It wuzn't dark hair fo' sure…That's all I know."
Iron Man tucked the photo away. "So it was her? Was she alone?"
"Ain't no one else thar, 'cept the one what grabbed her."
"And what did they look like?"
"It was dark-"
"Stop telling me it was dark, I get it! There must be something that you saw, that made you recognise some of their features, their gender, their age!"
Tanesha bit her lip, trying not to fold in on herself under Iron Man's blazing anger. "It was a man."
"Yeah? And what was this man like?"
"He … he wuz big, you know, real tall. Woman looked very small compared to him."
"And did you see his face? If the woman was turned with her back to you, you must have seen his face. You must have seen him coming."
The condemnation in Iron Man's tone brought guilt bubbling up in her gut. Tanesha fought back against the tears that threatened to fall, but her voice couldn't hide them. "I … I din'! I didn't see nothin'! I only turned when I heard shoutin'…He was taller than the woman, he looked tall from a distance. He had long dark hair, but I din' know whut was happenin', I swear!"
"How could you? How could you not realise that the woman was crying out for help while this tall menacing man stepped out of the darkness behind her, grabbed her and took her away with him? That's assault! That's abduction! How could you not get what was happening!"
Tanesha was sobbing now as she looked up at Iron Man, pleading. She didn't want to lose her job. She was a good person. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry! Please! I din' want to hurt nobody, I swear! I din' know what he was doin' to her! I was scared. I was – I was in shock! I din' know what to do!"
"Did he hurt her? When he grabbed her, did he hit her?"
Tanesha sobbed. "I dunno – I – I – he just grabbed her and went back into the trees and I din' see them no more! I dunno whut he did!"
"Didn't you hear anything else, no more shouting? Didn't she scream?"
"No, no, I heard nuthin', that's why I thought it was people foolin' aroun."
"So then what? You ran back inside, and went back to your job like nothing had happened? You didn't speak to your supervisor about what you saw?"
"No. I din' know it was serious! I din' know it were bad!"
"That's no excuse! When the police started searching for a missing woman who'd probably been kidnapped, didn't it occur to you that what you saw might have been relevant? Didn't it occur in that head of yours that you might have been a witness to an ABDUCTION! OF A HELPLESS WOMAN! Who needed HELP! That you might have helped if you'd told the police?"
Tanesha cried brokenly, huddled on the seat. Iron Man was heartless, he wasn't moved by her tears. "If you'd immediately told someone what you'd seen, the search would have started way earlier, maybe we could have caught up to the man who did this by now. You were there. You saw, and you could have helped. Yet you did *nothing*."
A fresh wave of tears barraged her, and Tanesha sobbed pitifully again.
Lawson stepped up to them and laid a comforting hand on her shoulder, handing her a handkerchief. "All right, Tanesha, it's all right. You did well by telling us—"
"She should have told someone earlier—"
"You're right, Stark-"
"-instead I had to find out about it like this, when it doesn't make a difference because the trail's gone cold."
"-your anger is justified, and I can understand how you feel-"
"-my *anger*, as you put it—"
"-what happened is a terrible, terrible thing that none of us could have foreseen, and we're doing the best that we can to help-"
"-is not due to an unforeseen event that couldn't be helped! It wasn't *foreseen*, it was *seen* by someone who kept it to themselves. Thanks to her, uncovering the truth is that much harder. Ms. Potts' life is at stake here."
"So don't. Don't lecture me about doing the best; if this is your *best*, it doesn't come up to the bar. It's not good enough. Your employee wasn't threatened, she wasn't even seen otherwise she would have been. She could have told someone. Pe—My girlfriend was in trouble, and the only person who saw what was happening to her, chose to turn her back on it all. So actually, yeah: my anger is justified."
Lawson looked at him helplessly. "I'm sorry. What can I say? Had I heard about this, I would have contacted the authorities immediately. If anyone of the security team had come to me with this footage before, I would have taken it to the police. I would have talked to Tanesha myself, and encouraged her to tell them what she'd seen."
Iron Man's voice burned starkly of bitterness. "Yeah, I'm sure you would have. But that's not what happened." He looked at Tanesha again, who wilted under his fiery gaze. "I hope you're going to 'encourage' your employee to take this deposition to the police now, Lawson. Either way you did me a favour. I'll see myself out."
Loki watched her from the shadows of what she thought was her bedroom in Stark's house. She was asleep now, still ring-free. Under the circumstances, Loki couldn't be certain of their power should he put them on her again, and if she found them on her finger when she knew she'd taken them off, it could be disastrous.
But without them he could no longer have a visual of what she was doing, nor where she was. Without them, Loki could no longer influence her dreams, and his magic tendrils of dark persuasion, along with the smoke he conjured to torment her with their voices, would also be greatly weakened without the ring's influence over her spirit.
The spells he had placed over this house would contain her physically within its walls, thankfully, but he still didn't feel secure anymore in the position of leaving to attend to business. Since he had no longer a way of controlling her and checking up on her remotely, he had to physically be in her presence to do all these things.
Hunger gnawed at his stomach, which he ignored with an effort. It was getting more difficult to just put it at the back of his mind, because he hadn't eaten anything for several hours, and neither had Pepper. They both needed sustenance. But there was hardly anything left in the house now; he would have to go into the village again and acquire supplies.
Pepper slept on, unaware of how close her captor and tormentor was now, blissfully soaking in the firstreal rest she was getting since this ordeal began. Loki seethed as he looked at her serene face. She had eventually succumbed back into sleep out of sheer exhaustion, whereas he felt out of control as sleep eluded him.
As silently as he had entered it, he left her room and the door locked behind him. He glided like smoke in the dark rooms, a grim reaper with glittering eyes of cold ice and an ever-present snarl on his haggard face. It was taking a toll on him. Had his powers not been blocked so thoroughly, had he not been forced to succumb to that weakened filthy state of mortality, Loki wouldn't need many of the things he now couldn't do without in order to survive, like food and sleep.
He tiredly let the glamour that changed his appearance engulf him, feeling its golden tingle spreading pleasantly over his body, and then stepped out of the house.
He ran his index finger across the invisible barrier that engulfed the house, and felt the ripples across the surface as it locked more tightly under his command. He didn't want his prisoner to try to escape in his absence, if she woke up.
Once he was several yards away from the house, he turned on the spot, and disappeared.
In the supermarket he lined up his purchases on the moving strip and waited impatiently for his turn. Three teenagers in front of him where looking at a magazine, whispering and giggling like brainless idiots, pointing at one image first, and then another. Time ticked by as slowly as the turning waters in the Well of Mimir. Loki gritted his teeth and stared resolutely in front of him, willing them all to just get the hell out of his way.
The cashier grabbed each item on the strip and beeped it at a pace as if she were physically incapacitated to do it any faster. A wealth of spells glittered dangerously in Loki's mind's eye, but were fought away. No magic out in the open, unless absolutely necessary, that was the top rule.
The little old lady who was collecting her things in her paper bag took the time to arrange them all in the way she preferred, uncaring or unaware of the people she was holding up. Loki fidgeted restlessly and his anger mounted. All it would take is one little fire lash, and they would all be incinerated, nothing but smoking ashes on the ground. He felt the air growing thick and hotter around him. That's when one of the teenage girls in front of him slowly turned back to look at him, her eyes furtively sweeping him up and down. Loki gritted his teeth; his palms itched and he stuffed his fists into his pockets, trying to maintain as impassive a face as he could. As if he hadn't just willed the air around and in front of him to become as hot as if a furnace had just been opened.
His eyes glittered malevolently at the insolent creature in front of him, who was still staring.
Having caught his message, she quickly turned back to her moronic companions and left him in peace. When it was his turn to pay for his food, Loki opened the wallet he'd 'acquired' from Trent Mason and silently handed the money to the apathetic cow chewing on her 'gum'. For a moment, Loki contemplated in his mind's eye what she'd look like if he were to truly transform her semblance into that of the herbivore. She looked at him with her flat eyes and her openly chewing mouth, and then handed him his change. Loki showed her his white teeth, collected his things and with a 'yes-I'm-simply-a-mortal-man-at-the-local-market-buying-liveries' look, he sped out of the accursed place.
The doors glided shut behind him but he hadn't fully quitted the space and therefore got bumped by them, rather painfully. Loki flailed, the tender meat caught in the middle of a brutal sandwich, trying to work himself free, stuck as he was between the metal frames. Just as he was about to make the metal fold in on itself with a mere thought and compromise himself in front of all these eyewitnesses, the doors clacked open again. He stumbled out of the entrance, lost his footing and almost spilled the contents of the paper bags on the ground. When he was standing up again he sent the doors and everyone inside a malevolent glare that bespoke of the things he would love to do to them all, then stalked away into the dark car park.
In the shadow of a trolley park, Loki placed his bags onto the ground and took out the wallet again. He silently counted the money that was still inside, carefully adding it all up in his head.
This was the last of the paper gold he had exchanged before coming here. Once this was gone, he would have no paper gold from the land of America. So the only way to procure more would be to use the thicker rectangles that mortals liked to call 'credit cards'. But he wouldn't do that just yet, not when there could be other ways of procuring currency without drawing too much attention to himself.
He placed the wallet back inside his pocket, picked up his shopping and, once he'd seen that the coast was clear, turned on the spot and disappeared.
When he appeared out of nothing back on the grounds of the house, sweat dotted his brow and face, and Loki all but collapsed on the ground, heaving breath into his lungs. Whatever limit he now had to live with, he'd just reached it. He needed sustenance, fast.
He couldn't get his legs under him, as his whole frame was trembling with exhaustion. He tried to get up only to sprawl again on the wet grassy ground. He choked on his own rage and bitterness, cursing the heavens above him for casting him down into this pit-less hell.
The thought that Heimdall the All-Seer might be watching him with his golden gaze right this instant made him want to curl up and burrow away from the pitiless eyes, and at the same time spring from the ground with the strength of an enraged lion and give voice to the roiling storm eating him from the inside out.
He breathed hard and closed his eyes, waiting for it to pass. It had in the past and it would do so again. He just had to get inside. He just had to reach a chair, sink down on it, put something in his stomach and that would be that. He mustered what little strength he had and used it to lower the shields he had placed on the house and enter. He cut it just right as he appeared back inside the kitchen right on top of a chair, sinking down onto it in a boneless heap. Once he had rested and felt capable of raising his head again, he waved his hands and the food unpacked itself from the bags neatly into storage. One of the paper bags unfurled and a chicken drumstick floated towards his fingers. He gently closed his fingers around the meat and brought it to his mouth, gnawing on it with tired hunger.
When he finished eating, his blood sugar levels replete, feeling more like himself again, he went back into the control room and tweaked the spells resting on the house and on Pepper Potts. The liquor cabinet lay in a shattered mess on the carpeted floor. With a grimace, he tapped the floor with his heel and watched as the splinters of wood and shards of glass flew back into cohesive lines and reassembled the cabinet as though it had never been broken. Unfortunately he couldn't do the same to the spilled liquors, so he took out one of the few that remained intact and started drinking.
As the liquor went smoothly down his gut, Loki reflected on the strangeness of this world. Magic was different here. It wasn't limited in comparison to Ásgarðr so much as it obeyed to different laws. He was a powerful practitioner, but the restrictive magic which set limits to what he had never thought he would lose worked as an addition to his problems here on Earth.
He wasn't born to labour – he had been a king.
If he couldn't do himself what was needed, he'd find someone on this planet who could. The sooner the better.
He went to an old desk and unlocked one of the drawers, pulled out a small wooden chest and set it on the top surface. He stared at it for one moment, contemplating what he was about to do, all the risks he was running with this. His face locked down into smooth resolution, ice-freeze in his eyes, and placed his hands on the chest. The intricate designs cut into the grain lit up brightly and then the chest unlocked. Slowly, he raised the lid and looked down at what it was holding inside.
Sparkles caught the dim light and danced across his cold face as if in greeting; the glitter of his bloodshot eyes was just as menacing.
End of chapter ten.
How much do you hate Loki right now? Is any of the pity you may have felt for him at all during this chapter's final part, still alive in any way? I want him to be a character that people love to hate, but with an inner dimension to him that runs deeper; he is essentially someone who is so *lost*, both psychologically and emotionally, that all he can do is wreak people's lives as a justified compensation he is exacting for the wrong that has been done to him his entire existence. And I say existence, not life, because in that he is so self-destructive he doesn't fully live, rather he merely exists. That his existence is a miserable one which he constructs all on his own goes without saying. Let's see how long this lasts.
And when the misery leaves, what will take its place? Could there really be happiness for someone like him? He firmly believes it; ruling will bring him a peace and satisfaction he believes will soothe his soul and satiate the hunger within. But Pepper has a role to play in this; neither she nor Loki can possibly imagine right now just how important that is going to be for him.
:D Teasing? Lol, sorry about that. More to come soon, I promise. And if you all leave a review, even a tiny one, it won't be so long either.