Chapter Two

Is There Even an AFTER?

It has been two nights.

There isn't much to do except sit and wait in the glass cell Loki sits in. SHIELD agents come and go some with trays of food and others with nothing but insults. Loki barely touches the food, but he eventually gives in to the uncharacteristic rumbling of his stomach, remembering that he is now mortal.

Is this -minus the cell and the way the agents looked at Loki with disgust- how mortals lived everyday?

Loki notices that humans have routines. Routines they follow on a daily basis. They may vary, but there will always be an everlasting protocol that will stay forever, and it comes in different forms. This piques Loki's interest, but it isn't enough to drive him away from his anger. The only thing keeping him from scratching the cell's glass is the flame-thrower gun that will be aimed at him to incinerate him. It is a cell-trap after all.

As Loki sits on the cold tiles of his cell, his back turned, he doesn't hear the soft padding of boots walking towards the glass. Glass that is supposed to be fragile, but instead, it is strong. Glass that should've been so easy to escape from, but it is meant to restraint Loki. Loki growls loudly, and startles some agents standing off idly near his cell, but he is surprised to find them walking away. "Your presence is scary enough, Loki. You don't need to be feral" a soft, berating voice speaks clearly from behind him. The clacks of the owner's boots are louder now, the owner of the silky voice making itself known to the former god. Loki doesn't need to turn around to know who it is, so he snarls "come to gloat, mortal?" "You can no longer call me a mortal, because you're one too." Loki's chest tightens. The former god stands up, and turns around to find Natasha Romanoff standing rigidly, her arms crossed over her chest, a gun strapped to her waist. She didn't even bother to hide it. Loki smiles sardonically, and he said "why is it always you who comes to pay a visit?" Natasha retorts "I'm not visiting, Loki. I'm here to make sure you know what exactly you've done." Natasha walks forward slowly, each step calculated and even. Loki stands his ground inside the cell. His emerald eyes focus on Natasha's orbs. They were the same color, but in it, Loki finds a different light. A heavy, surprising fist smashes onto the glass, but this doesn't intimidate Loki.

Natasha looks down onto her feet, before looking at the former god with so much pain and hurt but it leaves her eyes completely. They turn hard. They turn cold. "You deserve pain, Loki" Natasha lowly mutters "you deserve so much pain for what you did. You don't what we all have to go through each and every night. All that pain" Natasha doesn't stop. She slams her fist again and again onto the glass, and doesn't stop. "You" SLAM "HURT" BANG "HIM" Loki slowly walked away from the glass, finally allowing the tiniest bit of fear worm its way into his heart. He wouldn't have done this if Natasha didn't look so intent on making Loki tremble or at least break. He wouldn't have done this if Natasha had a wild, crazed look in her eyes. She looked determined. This looked planned. The pounding stopped, and the only mark it left was a jagged hairline fracture, and this made Loki realize that the glass wasn't as strong as he thought it would be. Natasha turns around, breathing heavily, clenching and unclenching her fists. "Tell me, Loki. Do you know pain? Have you ever felt even just one jab, just one cut, just one stab?"

Yes Loki wanted to say I have. Instead, he forces out a humorless chuckle, until it erupts into a cruel laugh. This is the laugh of someone who has lost control. This is the laugh of someone who doesn't know what happens after this, if there is even an after waiting for him. This is the laugh of someone who's experienced so much pain and wishes there was end to his nature to fail.

But he doesn't say so. Honesty is not his strongest point. He is not honest.

Loki replies "I am immune to pain, Agent Romanoff."

His mind is now muddled with the sound of Natasha walking away.

Loki doesn't remember falling asleep, but he remembers every detail of his dream.

Everyone's dying. Asgard is in shambles, golden shards of the palace melt in the tongues of fire, men are dying on the ground, and blood seeps into the soles of Loki's boots.

Except that in his dream, Loki is a child.

Loki -the child- walks around, emerald eyes horrified. A garbled cough arouses him from his horrified trance, and a cry emits from his mouth as he sees Thor. "Brother!" Loki cries out and he is about to run to him but a taller man walks towards the body of Thor slowly, a sick smile slowly spreading on his pale face. "Get away from my brother!" the child Loki shrieks, but the taller man looks at him, and they both stop. The taller man before him is Loki, as an adult. As the man, so eaten by pain and jealousy.

The taller man kneels on the ground, and briefly runs a hand down Thor's cheek, but he turns to the child-Loki, and says, eyes downcast on the bloodstained ground "do not grow up to be me, Loki. I am the monster that parents tell their children at night. I am the very definition of a monster. Not because I am not who people perceive me to be, but because I decided to live up to their perceptions. Never, ever do this when you grow up, Loki" the child-Loki doesn't understand.

All he knows is Thor's dead, and he is watching his older self relish in the fact of his very own brother's death.

"I never want to be like you! I never want to do this! No! I'll NEVER be you!"

A frustrated scream tears itself away from Loki's already sore throat. Loki knows it's breakfast because a trembling agent slides a tray inside his cell before the agent runs away. He sits on the floor, hands curled around raven strands of hair. A tear runs down his cheek without his permission, and Loki only angrily wipes it away. Another scream echoes against the glass, but it is fueled with fury and hatred. But now, everything's a mess. Loki doesn't know why he's so angry, and why he's filled with this hatred.

Maybe he's not angry at the world anymore. Maybe he's angry with himself, for always failing. He took both sides. He couldn't be good, neither could he be bad. He has no more magic, no more powers, and no family. So what is he? Where is he in this world? What is he in all of the Nine Realms?

Behind him, Thor's voice is garbled and drowned out by his screams he is no longer aware of doing. Behind him, he feels the eyes of the Avengers watching him with such satisfaction that it makes him sick. Behind him, he feels Natasha Romanoff's eyes glinting with sadistic humor, a slight curve of the lips, and the satisfaction.

Maybe he does deserve pain. Maybe he does.

But he doesn't want to show this.

The screams gradually stop, and he caught the Avengers by surprise by standing shakily before them, a weak smirk fixed on his face. Loki coughs and he speaks "enjoyed the show?" Is this all he could do? Is this smirk always going to be present on his face, his lips forever fixated into that look of pure distaste yet cruel humor?

"It's almost ready, Sir" Agent Hill speaks behind Nick Fury quietly, still entranced with the footage from the Stark Tower. They float high in the sky, the helicarrier their most prized possession. "Good" a gruff reply worms its way out of Fury's tight lips.

Slowly reaching for his earpiece, he speaks "Natasha Romanoff, do you copy? Good. Now go to the HQ, get into the helicarrier. We have a special mission for you."

Loki sees Natasha leave, and he feels satisfaction for a fraction of a moment. Had he managed to make Natasha somehow guilty throughout his whole episode? So he starts cruelly laughing, spitting out insults like it were a part of a normal conversation, relishing in the fact that it takes Clint almost the whole team for him to not throw himself at the former god. Satisfied with Bruce's struggling against the creature inside of him.

Dread spreads everywhere in Loki's body, and he doesn't know if what he's doing has an after.

An after.