As he walked, Loki pulled his phone out of his pocket, swiftly googling the United Nations' website to read up on exactly what being under their command would look like, precisely. The answer appeared to be very typical of Midgardian politics: slow, idiotic, and extremely vague in order to appear as a good thing to the general populace. With a sigh, and a roll of his eyes, he stuffed his phone back into his pocket and knocked gently on Crystal's door.

There was no answer, so he knocked again. "Crystal? May I come in?"

There was a second of hesitation, then, "…yes?"

Loki pressed his thumb to the scanner for the lock, and opened the door. She sat on the end of her bed, her hair in a loose braid down her back, arms crossed, eyes focused on him in concern. "Good morning," he greeted her with a smile. "Well, afternoon, now."

She said nothing.

"I hope you slept well," he went on, uncertain again. He was used to prisoners giving him silent treatment, but not when he wasn't actually planning on interrogating them. "I just wanted to say hello, and –"

Crystal suddenly jumped to her feet, eyes blazing, and lunged at Loki. He barely had enough time to throw his arms up in front of his face in defense before she had her hands around his throat, a deadly chill pouring into his flesh. A human would've been horribly frostbitten, but not him.

Crystal watched his face with impassive eyes as the blue of his true skin seeped up into his face, coloring his eyes a deep red, covering every inch of him, almost forgetting to choke him. Really though, he couldn't breathe while she held him like that.

Shoving his arms up between hers, he rapidly threw her arms off his throat in a quick motion that sent her off balance and stumbling backwards.

"That's very impolite," he croaked, rubbing at his throat. She really had a strong grip. "Please don't attack me like that."

She hovered a few feet away, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "You didn't lie."

"Not that time." He gave her a crooked grin. "Are you satisfied?"

"What do you want with me?" she demanded. "Why did you capture me? Why not just kill me?"

"I could ask you the same question," he retorted.

"It's very impolite," she echoed. Her voice showed no sarcasm, but the tiny smile blooming on her face spoke differently. Norns, she had her mother's smile.

"Alright, then," Loki grinned. "It appears we are now bound by the rules of etiquette to each other. We are forced to be nothing but civil in each other's presence."

Crystal had nothing to say to that.

Loki gave her a long, calculating look. "You're right, we don't typically give friendly visitation to most of our prisoners."

"Or let them out of their restraints on a basis of trust."

"Right," he sighed, and dragged a hand over his face. He wasn't emotionally ready for this. "I suppose… that's a conversation for later. Right now, I'm a little pressed for time; Tony's about to sell his soul to the government."

"I see." She clearly did not.

"But I'll be back soon," he assured with a smile. "I just wanted to check up on you. See how you're doing?"

There was another long silence with an unreadable stare. "I'm not dead."

"I gathered that much."

Crystal rubbed her arm awkwardly, watching him out of the corner of her eye. "…And?"

"Are you bored? Hungry? Warm?" He gestured to the room. "It's no palace, but I could make it more comfortable if you'd like."

"I require nothing," she said, an automatic response.

With a deep breath, Loki realized that she wasn't going to state any needs she had. They were exploitable weaknesses. But now, in his Jotun skin, he could feel how insufferably hot the room was. It was important to create a safe environment for her so she would feel comfortable asking for the things she needed. He just wished she was able to tell him already, so he'd know there was more going on than just inadequate air-conditioning.

"Alright," he reluctantly admitted. "I'll see in a few hours then, provided you remain in our pact."

"Pact?" Her eyebrows scrunched together in confusion.

"Our agreement." He rephrased. "To be polite to each other. I won't murder you if you don't murder me."

"Oh. Yes." After some hesitation, she took a step backwards and dropped a curtsey, only fumbling a bit at the end. "Many thanks, your highness."

She had a sense of humor, after all. And there it was. They already had an inside joke. This was already more than he'd dared to hope for. While they weren't friends yet, they'd still barely had two awkward conversations, he was sure they were going to get along, eventually.

His eyes stung and he smiled so hard his face felt like it was stretched out like silly putty. One hand over his heart, he did a gallant bow back at her. "It is of no issue, milady. Fare thee well, until the next time we meet."

Crystal actually smiled at that, and Loki couldn't hold back the excited giggle as he shut the door behind him.

He'd never have his daughter back, he told himself as he poked at the thermostat of her cell until the screen on the front had a number far closer to freezing than before, but the young woman she'd grown into wasn't completely a stranger to him. He couldn't exactly look at this as a father-daughter situation, but now that they'd sworn not to kill each other, they actually had a fighting chance at being more than archnemeses.

Either that, or Loki's relationship standards were still so unbearably low that "not actively trying to stab me" counted as "best friends forever" in his book. Either way, little victories were important.

She still saw herself as a prisoner, though. Perhaps she didn't have much of a perception of herself besides prisoner status.

How was he supposed to transition her out of that? Ideally, she'd be able to wander free around the compound, but how would he be sure she wouldn't try to escape – and beyond that, he didn't dare put the lives of his teammates on the hunch that she wasn't going to murder them in their sleep, especially since that hope was founded nearly one hundred percent upon blind hope.

He pushed open the door to the communal room adjacent to the one he'd left his friends in. Sure enough, they were all still bickering with each other over the accords.

"Tony, if someone dies on your watch, you don't give up," Steve was insisting. There was a picture from Tony's phone resting in a basket on counter, of all places, displaying a young smiling man. Probably a casualty of one of their battles, weighing on Tony's conscience.

"Who said we're giving up?" the engineer was retorting.

"We are if we're not taking accountability for our actions. This document just shifts blame."

Rhodey's eyebrows shot up as he turned to Steve in alarm. "I'm sorry. Steve. That… that is dangerously arrogant. This is the United Nations we're talking about. It's not the World Security Council, it's not SHIELD, it's not HYDRA."

"Excuse me," Loki spoke up. "Rhodes, I think you're misunderstanding the purpose of the United Nations. It's not a government. It can't enforce laws. Its purpose is to encourage peace and alliances. It doesn't have the jurisdiction to do this. The closest thing it legally can do is turn us into a branch of the United Nations police. They're called the Peacekeepers, and their uniforms look unfathomably tacky."

"Finally, someone who does their research," Sam cheered. "And what exactly would being Peacekeepers look like? Besides tacky?"

"We wouldn't be allowed to be deployed without a Grand Council assembly." Loki explained. "Which would involve flying in all concerned diplomats to wherever they hold the meeting, which would in turn last about nine business days."

The room echoed in silence as the full extent of nine business days sunk in.

"I don't mean to shut you down, Tony," Loki went on, "but these accords really are ridiculous. Imagine if you'd had to wait nine business days before the go-ahead to do anything about my invasion."

"Nine days," Natasha echoed.

"Nine business days," Steve corrected. "That excludes weekends. It could last up to two weeks."

"Two weeks!" Rhodes was dismayed. "Okay… No. Where does Ross think he's pulling this idea from?"

"Bear in mind, this is the same Thaddeus Ross who tried to have Bruce killed," Loki reminded. "He's not looking out for us. He just wants control."

"But we can't simply disregard the accords." Vision pointed out. "117 countries is nothing to take lightly."

"Ah, about that," Loki gave a bleak smile. "Ross already told us. They haven't ratified it yet. You do know what the word 'ratify' means, don't you?"

The gathered team gave other blank stares. "They haven't voted on it, yet." Sam clarified. "And nothing's been signed on."

"Do you really think this would be the first we'd be hearing of it if these were already signed into effect?" Loki gave them all a despairing look. "We're the ones this bill is about. 117 countries have publicly stated their approval. They're not going to sign in anything until they've given us a chance to state our case. That's what the meeting's going to be for."

"We don't have to pick sides, then." Natasha clarified, her voice heavy with relief.

Loki nodded his head. "I think we can all agree not to support these accords, but there's little worry. Ideas this bad rarely stick."

"Ross," The name dripped off Steve's voice like it was a curse word. "I knew that man wasn't trustworthy."

"Government corruption really is the root of all our problems, isn't it?" Sam had to laugh. "Tony, what's up? You're too quiet, again."

Tony had been silently leaning on the bar since Loki had started talking, pondering every word. "Alright. You win," he allowed. "The way they're going about these accords is stupid."

"Yes," Sam agreed.

"But don't you think there's some truth that they're based on?" Tony demanded, staring around the team. "We can't just do whatever we want. Regardless of the immediate threats, we're hurting more people than we should."

"Tony, last time the government tried to get involved in an Avengers-level threat, they tried to nuke New York," Steve pointed out. "Millions would've died if it wasn't for your intervention."

"The government's supposed to be for the people by the people." Sam chipped in. "Which means the people get to help when they can. We're a private organization, which means we're the people."

"It's true we do need accountability," Loki agreed. "You're absolutely right. But government accountability only means now we're the nuclear bomb they're throwing at New York. We lose our autonomy."

"If it's not the government, then who?" Tony demanded. "It's the government that's for the people, by the people, right?"

"But is it, Tony?" Rhodey asked. "Is it really? Not lately it hasn't been."

Tony shifted uncomfortably, arms folded across his chest. "Then we have to look at what the actual people are saying about us."

"Actually, I think it'd be a better idea to evaluate why it is you're fighting," Natasha quietly said. "If you're fighting to be a hero, you're going to fail. The public opinion is a shaky foundation."

"And you'd know about that, wouldn't you?" Tony snapped.

Loki shot Tony a glare and edged towards the door. If they were just going devolve into base insults, he wasn't sticking around for long. He wasn't feeling like a flyting session, today.

Steve's phone buzzed, and he looked at it briefly, his face going pale, as he stood up, pushing past Loki with a quick "I have to go."

The remaining members of the Avengers stared awkwardly at each other.

"You think he's okay?" Sam asked. "I should go check on him."

At least they weren't actually considering agreeing to the Accords just because they thought the only other option was illegal activity, anymore.

Loki collapsed onto the couch, curling up as he pressed his knees to his forehead.

What was he thinking? Why did all this have to happen at the same time? How was he supposed to deal with a major diplomatic event on top of Everything That Was Erika? And here he'd been telling himself they were already getting along, because they'd been joking with each other. He'd joked with common criminals, before, and it wasn't like he'd bonded with any of them!

She didn't even like him. They'd had two full conversations already, and eh still couldn't bring himself to tell her who she was to him. Would she even know what a "father" was? What it was supposed to be beyond a biological phenomenon? How could she? She'd been raised by Nazis and didn't understand why Loki would even feed her. Of course she wasn't going to understand, and maybe she never would. Maybe Hydra had messed her up so badly she'd never be able to feel love again.

"Loki." Tony's voice sounded very far away, and he flinched and looked up.

"Hello."

"You're not breathing right, kiddo," he said, sitting down next to him. "You want to talk about something?"

Loki shook his head. Tony already had a lot on his plate, and he didn't want Loki's emotional baggage on top of that.

"No, this is about the kid, isn't it?" Why did he have to be so good at guessing? This was the problem with being friends with a genius, although typically Tony was way more obtuse when it came to reading others' minds. "Look, if it means that much to you, I'll let her stick around. It wasn't like I was going to send her back to Hydra, anyway. What was her name? Anika?"

"Erika," Loki corrected. Tony was right, he had been hyperventilating. He forced in a deep breath, held it for two counts, slowly let it leak out of him like a slashed balloon.

"Right. I remember now. Ranger Rick."

"No," he said, smirking just a bit. "Erika. But now it's The Crystal Dagger. Left hand of Hydra, or something like that."

"Who's the right hand?"

Loki laughed, voice still shaky and laced with fear. "Exactly what I asked her. She won't say. My guess is it's probably the Winter Soldier."

"Oh," he replied, eyebrows crawling up, the realization sinking in like a bullet. "That's fun."

"Mhm."

"You bet they know each other?" Tony guessed. "Hydra buddies, or something? Maybe star-crossed –"

"Don't say it," Loki snapped, giving his friend an irritated glare. "She's… She's not…"

"Ooh, we already got boy trouble," He snickered. "What're you gonna do if he breaks her heart?"

"Anthony," He growled. "I'm really not in the mood."

"Sorry."

The room was quiet, all the other Avengers had dispersed to their own business. Tony was giving off awkward body language, shoulders tight, knee bouncing nervously.

"I don't…" Another deep breath. "I don't know how to do right by her. I never have. And… I wasn't… I didn't expect to be given another chance to. To do right by her. You understand?" He turned fully, uncurling from his armadillo shell to fully face Tony. "And this situation… It makes it so hard. She doesn't know who I am. I despair she'll get any further than Not Killing Me."

"Why, because that's as far as you got today?"

Loki glanced down at the couch upholstery. "Perhaps."

"Perhaps yes, or perhaps you got that far today?" Tony asked. "Look, she doesn't know you, you're right. And yet, she's already not killing you. As far as she's concerned you're her mortal enemy and captor who hates her guts, but has a slightly different moral code than the captor she's used to. But she's already not killing you."

"Maybe she just doesn't like killing people? Like a decent person?"

Tony raised an eyebrow. "You know Hydra would've smacked that out of her really quickly. She's got to be further along than 'I don't kill people because I don't wanna', no. She probably doesn't enjoy it, but she also probably wouldn't hesitate if she didn't see something in you."

"What's to see?" Somehow Tony was being both extremely depressing and extremely comforting. That was the problem with having friends who exclusively told things like they were. If someone can see the truth in something, it always reveals that the truth is both grimmer and safer than any fiction a mind full of anxiety could cook up.

"I dunno. She doesn't know what to make of you. You're nice to her. That's new. She wants to figure you out. And I don't think she wants you to stop, so she'll milk it for all it's worth. You should tell her you're her dad pretty soon, though. Ike before the meeting in Vienna."

"Hrmph." Loki did not want to figure out how to pitch that to her. It wasn't a thing you could break gently very easily. "I've got the weekend, then. I'll… I'll do my best."

"We love to see it." Tony clapped him on the shoulder as he stood. "I've got to go ignore civilized society until two in the morning, okay? You know where to find me."

TheOnlyHuman.