Steve Rogers stepped out of an adjacent office, pulling his T-shirt down as he did so and fishing his cell phone out of his pocket. He was gradually getting used to modern technology-with a little help from Tony, of course, but it was still odd for him to talk into a phone that was both so small and cordless. He headed for the snack bar that Tony kept stocked and grabbed a seat on one of the stools, flipping his phone open at the same time.
"Call Leon," he directed the device, and then waited while it rang.
He'd known Leon since the War, though the man was a trifle older than he. Leon had been an army chaplain when he (Steve) had enlisted, was embedded with Bucky's unit in Germany, and had helped him a lot when he lost his friend. Fury had helped them reconnect after he finally woke up. Now he saw him at least twice a week, for services and for Confession. It just wouldn't be right to confess to someone younger than him, and there weren't many older. And Leon was old-just over 100.
"Archbishop Pietro Gentry," said the voice on the other side of the line. Still firm, after all these years.
"Leon, it's Steve," Cap announced. Steve Rogers was one of the few people to call the oldest Archbishop in America by his familiar name.
"Brooklyn! Good to hear your voice," the old man exclaimed. "How are you? Not needing to come in for Confession already this week, I hope?"
"Nah, nothin' like that," Steve said easily. "Listen, I need a favor. More like a professional consultation, you could call it."
There was silence on the other end of the line for a moment. "You need a consultation: from my profession? What have you gotten yourself into this time, lad? More of that Avengers business, is it?" The Archbishop was also one of the few people who could call Captain America 'lad' and get away with it.
"Well, er, um, yes."
"Hmmm. Well, you're always welcome here, you know..."
"Sorry, Leon. I'm afraid this time I'll need you to come to me. The situation is classified, and we need to keep it...how do the kids say it today?"
"On the DL?" Leon was always a little sharper on modern slang. Of course, it helped that he hadn't been asleep for 70 years.
"Yeah."
"That could be a problem. My chauffeur has the day off."
"Hmmm. Wait a second," Steve said, and then turned to Tony. "Can we send a car to pick up my friend Leon? His chauffeur is out for the day."
Tony Stark frowned. "What, he can't drive himself?"
"He's over 100, Tony, so no."
Stark's eyes widened a little at that. "I'll send Happy with a limo, then. Where is he going?"
"The Diocese in Newark, New Jersey."
"Right." Tony pulled out his cell phone and punched a button.
"We're sending a car for you, Leon. Look for a limousine with Stark Enterprise plates. Oh, and you might want to bring your hat."
"It isn't a 'hat', Steve. It's a miter."
"Right. Well, there are official dignitaries here from, well..."
"You're serious."
"Yes."
There was a sigh. "We can't keep anything on the DL if I go outside in robes, Steve. I'll pack them and change there." There was another pause. "Really?"
"Yep."
"I'll bring my red phone, then. The Boss will want to hear about this right away, as well. See you in an hour?"
"Sounds about right."
"Ok, then. I'll get packed. God Bless you, Steven."
"Thanks, Leon."
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ /\/\/\/\
Pepper fumbled for the light-switch in the adjacent bedroom, and then clicked it on, flooding the expansive suite with a soft glow. A king-size bed dominated the room, surrounded by a nightstand, a few chairs, and a large dresser. Victorian roses graced the walls, complementing the bedspread, and fresh flowers had been placed on the nightstand, while an old-fashioned landscape globe decorated the dresser. A walk-in closet occupied one wall, and a door on the far side of the room teased with the promise of a hot shower. Several boxes lay on the bed, and Pepper began opening them, revealing different articles of clothing.
"Do you want to shower first?" the red-headed CEO asked Sauer, who answered her with another distressed look. "You still can't understand me, can you?"
"Pepper, what the hell's going on?" the younger woman asked, obviously. "I..."
Pepper cut her off with a hand motion. "No talking," she insisted, making a closing motion with her hand. Next she pointed at the bathroom and made sprinkling motions at her own head. "Shower," she commanded, walking over to a linen closet and pulling out more large, fluffy towels.
The young woman sighed in relief. "Oh, gods yes," she exclaimed, wobbling over to grab the proffered towels and washcloth. Something caught her eye, though, and she stopped at the dresser, staring down, her mouth hanging open.
"Hon, what is it?" Pepper asked, closing the distance and touching her young protégé' on the arm.
Sauer was staring down at the globe, one hand caressing it almost...lovingly...and Pepper saw tears starting to form in her eyes. "Midgard," she whispered.
"Honey, we call this 'Earth', ok? Only Asgardians call it 'Midgard'," Pepper corrected her, patting the hand that caressed the top of the bumpy globe. "Earth," she insisted again.
Sauer shook her head and sniffled. "Loki told me. 'Midgard' means 'Keep of the Men' in their language. It's kind of poetic, really. The world is somebody's home, not just a clump of dirt, or earth." She frowned down at the metal sphere. "I wonder what the other one kept," she mused sadly.
"What?" Pepper said. When Sauer turned to her, Pepper made a shrugging motion and a questioning face, and the young woman nodded.
"I could see it," she whispered. "The other Gard, the other Heimr..."
"Heimr?"
"Homeworld," Sauer answered, still looking at the globe in front of her. "It was so beautiful...green and white instead of blue and white, like Midgard. Swirls of purple clouds at the poles, but no ice anywhere; it must have been so warm..." she choked up. "It was so beautiful," she whispered.
"Sauer," Pepper urged her, "Come. Tell me later. Shower now," she insisted, and tugged her towards the bathroom.
The young woman caught a shuddering breath and nodded as she was pulled in the right direction. Pepper started some warm water in the shower as Sauer tried-with shaking hands-to pull off the remains of her soaked clothing. She looked around for a place to put her ruined blouse-she couldn't keep it now-and her eyes found a crack in the tile wall. "Pepper?" she croaked, pointing.
It was just a piece of cracked tile, damage left over from Loki's attempt to take over the world two years previously. Pepper shrugged. "Loki. Manhattan. Remember?"
Sauer's finger traced the sharp piece of broken tile, her bottom lip starting to quiver.
The crack ran from one pole to the next. She could see the entire planet start to shake, and red fire glowed at the center of the break...
"Sauer?" Pepper asked uncertainly, concerned at the young woman's sudden ashen appearance.
Prisoners wailing, children screaming, ships carving up a green and white marble like a watermelon...
"Honey, what is it?"
"Look well, little worm. Run home and tell your people what awaits them. Better yet, taste for yourself..." A goblet was forced to her ghostly lips, and a glowing substance forced down her throat...sweet and yet horrifying... "So shall your children be to me...such dainty morsels...a fine wine..."
Sauer collapsed to her knees, hugging the toilet. "He made me...he made me drink..." Her stomach finally rebelled at the horror of her memory, and Sauer threw up, retching over and over until her stomach was empty and her body shook, weakened. "Fifty billion people," she gasped, "he killed fifty billion people."
Pepper felt her blood turn to ice, and she looked up into Tasha's face, horrified at what she heard from the doorway. "See if Dr. Banner has a sedative," she snapped, suddenly in charge again.
The assassin nodded, and disappeared.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
"So, this All-Tongue of yours," Banner was saying...
Thor nodded. "T'is one of our native languages: one of the first learned in childhood by all Aesir. While members of the royal family," he motioned to Loki and himself, "and other dignitaries are required to study many languages, the All-Tongue works as a handy substitute between realms, especially for those who cannot afford the education Loki and I were granted."
"So, is the magic in the speaking or in the hearing?" Banner asked. "I'm just wondering if Sauer is somehow working magic all of a sudden," he explained.
Loki shrugged. "It's a bit of both, really. The magic is not in the speaker, per se, it exists more between both speaker and recipient, though the speaker must still have the necessary syntax."
"Sounds kind of like the Force," Tony quipped. A blank look from the Aesir prompted a quick explanation of Star Wars theology, and Loki nodded.
"Crudely explained, but roughly correct," the blue prince conceded.
"And now Sauer is spouting your language, which there's no way in Hell she could have known," Fury said darkly. "Any ideas how? We really need to figure that one out."
"She did not start speaking the All-Tongue until she closed her eyes in the middle of our conversation," Thor mused, stroking his beard. "When she looked at me, she switched immediately from Swahili to the All-Tongue."
"What about the other times she switched languages?" Loki pressed. "Did she close her eyes and open them then as well?"
"Yes," Dr. Banner offered. "She switched from Swahili to Russian by looking at Tasha, then to Irish-Gaelic when she looked at Miss Potts."
"What about the Swahili?" Stark wanted to know.
"She looked at me," Fury volunteered, "but I don't speak Swahili," he protested.
"Any more than Pepper speaks Irish-Gaelic, but I bet your respective ancestors spoke those languages," Tony pointed out.
"So, Miss Sauer's mind is resetting her language filter on the perceived ancestry of the first person she sees when she opens her eyes," Loki mused. "It's almost as if the magic at work doesn't recognize the passage of time or the evolution of language...or..."
"Or?" said Tony?
"Or the person who tried to give her this gift wasn't allowed to finish," Loki said thoughtfully. "In her moments with Thanos, Sauer encountered at least one other person who was gifted with Tongues, and who tried to pass it along to her. Fandral mentioned the presence of other prisoners; they may not have all been physical."
"But they were there all the same," a shaken Romonov interrupted the men's banter. "Doctor, do you have any sedatives on hand? Sauer needs one right now."
"Why?" asked Thor.
"She collapsed into hysterics," the assassin explained. "She keeps going on about fifty billion people and something Thanos made her drink. When I left she was still retching."
"Damn," Loki muttered darkly. "That explains a lot." He rose swiftly and headed for the room where Pepper still tried to comfort Sauer. Thor jumped up after him and grabbed his robed arm.
"Brother, what meaning do you take from this? Did Thanos made her watch the destruction of another realm?"
"She should be so lucky," Loki insisted darkly, "to just have to watch. No, Thor: Thanos did more than make the maid watch," the red-eyed prince caught the eyes of everyone else in the room, "he made her participate."
"In the genocide of fifty billion people," Fury looked, for the first time, shaken.
Loki shook his head. "No: in their cannibalization. Thanos is a soul-eater; that is how he has lived for so long, by stealing the life-essence of a planet's population."
"He made Sauer drink somebody's soul?" Tony was aghast.
"Probably from his own personal stores," Loki nodded.
Thor turned a delicate shade of green.
"Do we even want to know?" Barton muttered darkly.
"She will need you to," Loki said sternly, "for this was not of her doing. Thanos has a sweet tooth, you see. He prefers children," he snapped darkly, then turned on his heel and stalked into the bedroom with Potts and Sauer.
"I think I'm gonna be sick," Stark muttered, reaching for the brandy again.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\ /\
Loki let himself into the bedroom, Sif following close on his heels, and they both followed the retching sounds to the bathing chamber in the back. Loki could feel his magic gathering; he wasn't sure exactly why, but some things were not questioned.
"Miss Potts," he said firmly, "I must ask you to leave. I will attend to Miss Sauer."
The CEO looked up at the blue God of Mischeif and frowned.
"She is very upset, sir," Pepper protested. "I don't know how much a stranger can help. Apparently she saw..."
"This stranger knows exactly what she saw, and was forced to do. Your servant needs someone who understands where she has been and how to deal with it, and that. Is. Me. Please leave," he said coldly.
Pepper stood from where she had been holding Sauer's hair back, and washed her hands. She walked over to the dark prince until she was a breath away from his face and looked him in the eyes.
"She isn't a servant," Pepper said with quiet firmness, "Sauer is my friend. Kindly remember that."
Loki returned the look, red eyes meeting blue, and nodded. "You have a brave heart, Miss Potts. I can see why Stark is taken with you. Do not fear for your friend. I will do her no harm."
Pepper nodded and stepped past the blue giant, nodded at Lady Sif, and walked out.
"You as well, Sif," Loki turned to her, and his eyes started to glow, "out."
"But she needs a woman to..."
"I said OUT," Loki bellowed, and the Aesir found herself flying backwards, out of the room, to land unceremoniously on her backside. The door closed of its own accord, and a trio of locks that had not been there before clicked shut. The last she saw of the dark prince was a pair of glowing eyes and an outstretched, pushing hand.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
Sauer's stomach was empty, but the retching feeling would not subside. She could still taste it: the golden fire that had been poured down her not-physical throat, sticky and sweet like honey, but coppery like blood. It reeked of sweat and tears, perfumed with torment, spiced with the misery of lost and abandoned children.
How could he do this?
The foulness of the brew clung to her, slime in her throat and smoke in her eyes. Sauer thought she could retch for a thousand years and never be free from the filth...
"Are you finished?" a masculine voice asked: familiar somehow. A large, warm hand steadied her spine. She shook her head.
"I can't...I can't stop..." she croaked.
"Up...get up," the voice insisted, and another strong hand found its way under her armpit. Then the pair of them tugged her to her feet and walked her into the shower, where warm water started pounding a tattoo into her scalp. Sauer's hands reached for the wall, she wasn't certain she could stand on her own. Her stomach threatened to keep her bent over, and her hands slipped on the wet shower walls.
A safety bar appeared out of nowhere, and she grabbed it reflexively.
"Good, yes. Hang on," the voice commanded.
Strong hands started lathering her hair with something from a nearby bottle: vigorous scrubbing that was part cleansing, part massage. The touch was firm enough to almost be painful, but not quite. A mound of foam had formed on Sauer's head, and the hands moved down from the crown of her head to her temples, then behind her ears, then the base of her skull. The scouring, massaging hands reached the base of her neck and found the collar of her blouse, and Sauer heard a disapproving "tch".
Strong fingers worked their way inside the collar on both sides, and with a sudden RIP the remains of Sauer's blouse-and her bra-lay in the shower floor. It their place appeared a terry-cloth like shift; sleeveless, it began at her neck and dropped straight to her knees. The scouring continued, strong hands working lather into her shoulders, arms, and hands, before proceeding to scrub with the shift itself. By now the garment was well-soaked and soapy.
"This is an Asgard bathing shift," the voice explained. "Aesir maidens wear them in the public baths to signify their status and to ward off predatory warriors. Here," he handed her a wet washcloth, "scrub your face. I don't think I can be gentle enough to make it safe."
The scouring hands began massaging down her back, somehow hitting every...single...spot. Sauer ducked her head under the pounding water, the shampoo stinging her eyes even as it cascaded down her face, and she started scrubbing at her skin. She welcomed the pain...deserved it.
"No, you don't. You did no wrong." The voice was suddenly dark, almost harsh, and suddenly its owner's identity clicked in her mind.
Loki.
She turned to face him, her back hitting the shower wall, and his hands stopped scouring long enough to cradle her chin.
"You did no wrong;" he repeated fiercely, "the sin is his. You did not ask for this, you did not want this, you did not choose this to survive. Do not blame yourself."
Water continued to cascade around them, and to her puzzlement Loki seemed both to have grown and changed color. He was now a mottled pale-flesh and blue, like a speckled fish, but with red eyes. Sauer's wonderment turned cold as she realized what the dark prince was saying.
"You know what he made me do..."
He nodded. "I was his...guest...for a year prior to my invasion of Midgard," he said darkly. "I know quite well how Thanos...feeds...and how he tortures his victims, be they solid or otherwise."
"He made you drink..."
"Daily."
"I'm sorry," her hand, tiny compared to his, reached for his face, and Loki allowed the contact. It staggered him to realize that even now, fresh from her soul's torture, Sauer was trying to comfort him.
The All-Father hadn't seemed to care. Neither did the rest of the Aesir. In war people died, many of them innocent. Bad things happened. A real warrior was expected to shrug it off and go on, not surrender to the sentiment of mourning. Wailing over dead innocents was for women and children and argr, not warriors or princes.
"I don't know how to do this," she whispered again, snapping him out of his contemplation. The look he gave her prompted an explanation. "Mourn fifty billion people," she explained. "Is it ok to cry?"
He nodded. "For a while, but don't let it cripple you. Let us finish cleaning you up, and get you dried off and garbed."
So saying, Loki returned to scouring nearly every inch of Sauer's body. He missed little, and even with the bathing shift in place Sauer was acutely aware of Loki's hands under her breasts, between her thighs, down her legs. He did not linger in any single place, however, and seemed intent in scrubbing every inch clean of any dirty sensation, rather than replacing it with anything titillating.
Sauer couldn't remember being scrubbed like this even as a child, though she knew she must have been. She wondered, briefly, if Loki had children. He was quite thorough.
Soon enough she was rinsed and done, water streaming down the shift and her shaking legs. Loki reached for a towel, but scowled in disapproval at the size of the bath towel provided.
"This won't do," he glowered, and with a strong snap the towel popped out to 5 times its original size. This towel he wrapped snugly around Sauer's body, and with a tug at the bottom the wet shift fell to the shower floor. A regular-size towel began massaging the water out of Sauer's hair, and then the whole-body scrub began anew, only this time Loki sought out every drop of water on her flesh. He scrubbed until every inch of her was dry and pink. Sauer felt like a little girl again.
"That you certainly are not," he assured her, smiling at the look on her face. "Yes, I can hear your thoughts. They are quite loud at the moment. Not surprising, considering all that has transpired." He turned, tugging her out of the bathroom, and led her to the highback chair that sat in front of the desk. "This will do," he said, waving a hand over it.
A large, ornately carved rocking chair took its place, and before Sauer could ask Loki what he was doing he had scooped her up-as he would a child-and sat down, cradling her in his lap.
It was just too odd. There were rocking chairs in Asgard? Not to mention she was being held and rocked-like a toddler-in an Aesir prince's lap. Why?
"You mentioned crying," he said, beginning to stroke her hair, "for fifty billion people, and for the souls Thanos made you drink. Let it out," he said huskily, "it will be more than I was able to do."
He pulled her head into his shoulder, and suddenly crying was all Sauer could do.