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Chapter 20

It was unmistakable when Loki woke up.

One breath he was sleeping.

The next he was giving the restraint on his right wrist a half-conscious tug.

And by the third he was yowling and struggling.

Steve had him held down at the shoulders a moment later. "It's okay. You're going to be all right, Loki. We aren't angry with you. We're trying to help you."

Loki calmed a little but he kept up the tugging and the pleading little yowls.

And then Steve recognized the terror in his eyes, and immediately let up.

He cursed a little to himself. We kept wondering what they could have done to him. We never asked what they could have made him do to himself...

The restraint was Velcro-based, and Steve had learned enough about Velcro that he had Loki's wrist loose from the railing and reattached closer to his shoulders a very little while later.

Loki calmed down entirely, and then he seemed ashamed.

"It's not your fault they messed with you and your mind," Steve told him with a little squeeze of his shoulder. "But you're safe now."

He sat back down and held Loki's hand, and then Loki settled back down and dozed for a few more hours.

Bruce came through at one point to switch an empty glucose solution bag for a new one. He didn't say a thing about the changed restraint beyond a simple, "JARVIS let us know what happened," and that was that.

And then Loki woke up, more properly aware.

"I'm still here," Steve told him as he blinked awake. "Bruce changed out the IV bag a little while ago," he said with a little nod toward said bag, "but I think we all figured some Not Being Bothered time would be good for you."

Loki made a little sound as he looked up at the bag.

"Sorry. Can't do a thing about that. Not until you've recovered and you're eating enough again. And since you were dehydrated to start with, at least from what Bruce can figure out, that may take a while."

Loki glanced over at him, clearly not comprehending what Steve had said. He nodded up at the bag and repeated the sound.

"I just told you, I can't do anything about that... wait a minute. You're nodding toward the bag, not your hand..."

And it hadn't sounded much like a complaint, even though complaints and what could best be described as pain-notifications were the only sounds Loki had been using since he got here and according to Thor since he'd had the mind control ripped out of his head, so much as...

"You want to know what we're dripping into you." He gave Loki's shoulder a squeeze. "I'll be right back."

He walked over to the intercom on the wall, installed apparently so Tony could hide the fact JARVIS was a whole-house AI if he wanted to. He punched the button. "JARVIS, I need to talk to Bruce."

"Bruce and Tony are in their laboratory, Stephen. I'm connecting you now."

"What's up, Capsicle?"

"He's asking what's in the IV bag."

Dead silence.

"He's asking?" Bruce repeated, just calmly enough that Steve didn't see a need to get worried.

And besides, they'd picked that lab for a reason. If Bruce was going to be somewhere constantly, you picked a place where you didn't mind things getting a bit, well, smashed. And with JARVIS recording everything they did and the size of Tony's bank accounts and other investments, even an experiment getting destroyed wouldn't be a complete loss.

"Yes. Not with words, but it's very clear. First time I've heard him vocalize about something that wasn't pain or discomfort. I think he got a bit annoyed with me when I assumed he was complaining about the IV itself."

"It's just a plain glucose and saline solution?" Tony asked.

"Yes. Just that," Bruce confirmed.

"I'll be there in a few minutes. I just need to make one stop on the way."

Tony didn't know what to expect when he entered the infirmary.

He hoped it really had been a question, because that opened up possibilities of back and forth communication and that was what they needed even more than Loki simply not being a complete doormat anymore.

Even if he was months getting back even understanding words, just to have a little communication in both directions... for Loki to understand they would listen once he did have something to say...

Besides, everyone said Loki had a scientific mind and the idea of a scientist or engineer not being able to ask even a simple question with a simple answer chilled Tony right down to the bone.

Others had wanted Loki to remember things he already knew. Tony thought he'd be miserable if he remembered fully but then couldn't find out things he'd never known before.

"Shot glasses? Really?" Steve asked with a fair bit of complaint himself.

"They were the smallest containers in the kitchen that were clean and suited to the purpose."

Loki was wide awake now, alert.

"Hey, Loki. So I hear you're asking questions now," Tony joked a little at him, trying to lighten up the situation.

He got a glare from Steve for his trouble, but the way Loki relaxed where he lay on the bed - damn, Steve doesn't know how to get him upright with the bed controls - made it worth it.

"Just let me get you up a little. Steve, if you'll help him sit a bit, I think I can make him a little more comfortable."

He only managed about a two foot rise, not nearly enough to get Loki sitting up, thanks to the restraints. And Loki looked confused as hell while they were doing it. But then he seemed honestly appreciative once he realized he wasn't absolutely flat on his back anymore.

"Yeah, that's better. So, you want to know what's in that bag?" Tony asked with a deliberate finger-point towards the slowly dripping bag in question.

Loki made a noise that was absolutely questioning and nodded toward the bag.

"And this is why the shot glasses, Steve. Everything in that bag? Can also be found in every kitchen in America in some form or other. The world too. Things that are essential to life are essential to life. And therefore..."

"We don't need words to explain it to him."

"Exactly." He dipped one of his fingers into the sugar at the bottom of one of the shot glasses and got it close to Loki's face.

Which didn't work.

So Steve had to get Loki's head pinned and then Tony tried again.

Which didn't work.

So finally he just shoved it into Loki's slightly open mouth and trusted he'd be getting his index finger back.

Loki's eyes shot up to his after Tony reclaimed his hand.

"I think he got the idea, Steve." He held up three fingers in front of Loki's face. "Three ingredients in that," he explained with a finger point. "What I just gave you." He repeated the process with the salt. "And that too." And then he let Loki drink the water to wash out his mouth, because salt straight from the shaker was not one of nature's best taste sensations. "And finally that."

Steve let go of Loki with a quick 'no damage meant, wish I didn't need to do it' squeeze of his shoulder.

Loki looked at the shot glasses. He gave a little tug at his right hand again.

"He knows not to tug the IV out?"

"He hasn't been complaining about it."

Tony undid the binding on his right wrist entirely. "There you go. We were just trying to keep you safe."

Loki pointed at the three glasses, one at a time, and then up at the bag.

Tony nodded. "Nothing else. Just them." He held up his empty hands for emphasis.

A look came across Loki's face that could only be translated as "Well, that's all right, then."

And then, seemingly at the same time, they all realized what had just happened.

Steve tousled Loki's hair, something he did not seem to appreciate even shocked and frightened as he was, and Tony let out a whoop of celebration that he seemed to appreciate even less.

"Has he ever had a milkshake?" Tony asked.

"No." Steve looked confused. "And Thor told us Asgardians universally prefer warm food to chilled."

"Only he's just culturally Asgardian. Biologically he belongs to an ice world. And JARVIS said he's been taking cold-water-only showers ever since we showed him how to." Tony got up. "I'm going to go get him a milkshake. A man who's just figured out he can ask questions ought to have a treat."

"What flavor are you going to get him?"

"Vanilla for victory, of course."

"Not quinine for questions?"

"There's a reason they don't make that, Steve. But he could have chocolate for curiosity."

"Peach for preguntas?"

"Well, if you want to branch out to other languages..."

Loki stared at them confusedly, and then when he'd gotten their attention he quite deliberatively closed his eyes and acted as though he were asleep.

Only his breathing didn't slow. If anything, it quickened.

And then Tony remembered what Pepper had said one night...

"Strawberry for success. And because it's his favorite Midgardian fruit. Or at least Pepper thinks it is."

"Go get the man his milkshake, already," Steve laughed.

Bruce and Tony both came in some time later with the promised milkshake from Tony's favored nearest fast food chain.

Which was also the same chain they'd kept going to as they drove cross-country with Loki, Steve had only been slightly surprised to find out.

The same food no matter where you went, and for someone who did as much traveling as Tony and liked the world predictable...

Good luck with that predictable world, he thought.

And Tony's flavor suggestions did make sense now, if he'd been planning on going someplace that only sold strawberry, vanilla, and chocolate instead of the full range a proper ice cream parlor could offer.

One small cup of milkshake. One spoon. No straw.

Bruce noticed Steve looking. "We figured sucking on a straw was a bit too much active involvement to ask him to do."

"And given what we know of the rules they had for him... he'll probably consider high-value food offered for active consumption a baited trap, not a treat," Tony added. "So why put him under the stress when it's meant as a reward?"

Loki was looking at them with a vague sort of interest, but he seemed more interested in Bruce than in the cup Tony was carrying.

And then he settled into a strange kind of uneasy when they got over to his bed.

"So, you're feeling better," Bruce said lightly.

Still uneasy.

Bruce seemed ready to join in, but then a look crossed his face. "Oh. Yes, that is a strange situation for you to be in."

He got Loki's other hand free with a grumbled, "You should have undone them both when it was safe to undo one."

A moment later, he had Loki in a firm hug that was quickly and fervently returned.

"He understood enough to be scared," Bruce explained. "So he knows enough to know I saved him. But he also remembers enough to know surprising me can get him hurt. If I start the hug, then it can't surprise me, can it?"

After a moment, he let Loki lie down again.

"I think he does better with you, Steve," Bruce offered.

Loki didn't fight Steve holding him close, and pinning his head this time only seemed to make him curious. Or, rather, more curious.

And then Tony got the spoon in his mouth.

A split-second of balking, probably from the unexpected cold.

Stillness.

And then Tony couldn't get the spoon back.

"Loki, how am I supposed to feed you the rest of this if you won't let me have the spoon back?" Tony sighed and finally tilted the cup so Loki could see the rest of the contents.

Loki's mouth dropped open.

And then came the little, so daring Loki braced himself against Steve before he did it, whine of complaint.

"What..." Bruce started to ask.

"They use the same cups for sodas," Steve offered as Tony stuck the spoon in the cup and put his newly-free hand over his face.

"He thinks we were having milkshakes ourselves but giving him water all the way from New Mexico," Tony groaned.

Loki's mouth drifted open again and it was the first time Steve had seen his tongue-tip drift forward past his teeth while he was being fed.

Tony picked up the spoon again. "All right, all right, there's more where that came from."