Bruce got on the cab without thinking too much about it. Maybe it was the Doctor in him (and this was one of his patients, after all) maybe it was pure curiosity.
"What on earth happened?" He asked right after sitting on the backseat, facing Loki and taking in the handcuffs and the SHIELD uniform.
"To shorten a lengthy tale, Fury and his agents narcotized you and apprehended me and tried to question me. I managed to escape stealing his weapon, and then this fine gentleman was kind enough to stop his taxi and bring me here."
"And you asked for me." Loki nodded, weary. He was too tired for explanations.
"I... I need to be able to manage this pain if I want to keep being on the run, so I asked my driver to ring your door and ask for Dr. Banner. He obviously knew who you were and intercepted you. Were you leaving?" Loki asked and Bruce wondered how he had gotten so death-pale and wheezy when that morning at breakfast he had looked like a normal person.
"Yes, to look for the others... They are probably at SHIELD, complaining. You were planning on going back to the tower?"
"I would prefer somewhere without cameras, if you know of such a place, so your law agents cannot take me prisoner again."
"Good idea. I don't feel like being tranquilized again either."
Banner gave the driver an address and told the driver he would get an extra 100 dollars if after dropping them off as discreetly as possible he drove to a place he had in New Jersey. Just in case SHIELD was keeping tabs on them. It never hurt to be careful.
Loki was relieved when he saw that Banner had money and Bruce noticed. Of course, he didn't have any magical wallets with himself when he space-jumped.
"Yeah, don't worry, I can pay for the ride. I've got your back."
"The man was kind enough to stop for a chained man like myself. I am trying to avoid getting into trouble with your law... one more time."
"We'll get those cuffs off when we arrive, don't worry." And Banner smiled another one of his awkward little smiles. You are excessively kind, Loki thought looking at the strange man.
Bruce tried to contact his friends. But his low battery and the SHIELD's HQ's bad reception (it was a secret place after all) made it impossible. Beside him, Loki was as wet as if he'd been showering with clothes and had his eyes closed, an expression of pure pain crossing his features. Knowing the lengths he would go to show strength and the high pain threshold he had shown (breaking his own cast with a hammer, etc) Bruce figured it had to be really bad to be that way in front of him. Odd, he seemed so much better that morning before the attack". Could the guys at SHIELD have done something to him before he'd escaped?
"You feeling all right?"
"Not really, no." He looked at Banner with those pain-filled eyes. "But I am glad to be out of that cage. Not a prisoner anymore."
He managed a small smile but then the pain was back. Just when he thought everything could finally go right (he could escape from whichever prison they put him in, he knew he could) and Thor and his friends seemed to be helpful, that damned sickness came back, strong as never before. A lone tear escaped as he grimaced trying to control the pain. It was never going to be right again. There will always be something, some new defeat, to remind him that he was worthless.
A mere shadow.
Everything that was rotten and deviant.
A monster.
Bruce looked at the man with growing anxiety. It was quite clear that the guy was in a lot of pain, and that none of his previous ailments had improved. And he still didn't know what had happened while he was out or where was the rest of the team. It was a bit unsettling.
Back at SHIELD, Tony, Thor and the rest were watching the footage of Loki's escape, to see if there was any sort of clue as to where he may have gone. They had checked the face-recognition programme but it only saw him walking on a taxi that got lost among thousands of others taxis in downtown New York.
There weren't many clues but Tony was clearly impressed with Loki's antics. He had played Fury the same way he had Bob, but in less time and left with an epic sentence in his lips (Remember this next time you try to put me in a cage). All while handcuffed, limp and after being tasered. He wondered how the Asgardians had kept him caged all that time. And then he remembered the state in which he'd arrived and how he mistook him for a guard. Oh, well.
His phone was ringing. Bruce.
"Glad to see you're back in the land of the living, sleeping beauty!" Stark greeted.
"Hey. Where are you guys? What the hell happened while I was out?"
"Didn't JARVIS tell you? All you have to do is ask, you know? Whatever, we went to SHIELD to rough Fury a bit and retrieve Loki. Turn out he escaped before we got a chance of helping him. But- good news is he didn't kill anyone on the process, so we still stand by him."
"I'm happy to hear that, because he's in one of my places right now." Banner said, calm.
"What?"
"Yeah, he found me. He's in pretty bad shape, too. Do you know if Fury or the others did something to him?"
"I don't think so, we found footage of his escape and he was in basically in control all the time... So, where you guys at? You need anything?" Stark asked, happy not needing to start an international search for the god.
"I'll send you a text with what I need and the address, but, Tony... He doesn't want Thor to come."
"But the second I tell him he'll go!" Tony complained. Thor was quite an obstinated guy, indeed.
"I know, but try to understand the guy... He was practically abandoned in that cell. And Thor did nothing. I would be mad too."
"Ok... I'll try to handle it the best way I can."
The rest of the Avengers looked serious. Natasha and Clint were talking with each other, Thor and Steve were rewatching the footage. Ok. This was definitely not a time for half-truths and hiding things. And besides, being straightforward had never been a problem for him.
"So...Search is called off, Loki was found. He is with Banner at a safe place." He could already see Thor opening his mouth to speak "But... he would rather not see you, buddy. Seems he's still a bit bitter about you leaving him to die and all. I'm gonna go back there to help 'em, why don't you dig a bit further on the op-gone-wrong against us? Hill seemed quite oblivious to it all, which is weird. Also, I'd like to know if it's only tranquilizers or if they have weapons and plans against all of us. Keep me posted."
The god of thunder just stood there, as if frozen. He could defend him all he wanted, but Loki would not forget his hurt. His resentment. He'd hated him before the cell and now he hated him even more. He didn't even want to see him. It was a bit harsh, wasn't it? Maybe he deserved it. Maybe what had happened to his brother was partly his fault.
He had to do something to fix it. And he would repair it, all the damage. He wasn't going to give up on his brother's love just yet.
In Banner's place, Bruce was trying to be calm, trying to figure out the mystery. His patient's fever had gone up and there were dark shadows under his eyes, surrounded by sickly pale skin. He looked almost as bad as he had when he had arrived, which made no sense. Even if it was not completely environmental, he should have gotten better being apart from the source. If the remaining energy of that old spell was harming him, why was he still this sick after being days away from the place? And if it was a steadily declining kind of thing, how had he gotten better that morning, healthy enough to escape Fury in a matter of hours? It made no sense.
The god was sprawled in one of his beds, having thrown all the sheets to the floor. Moaning softly in a trance-like state between awareness and fevered sleep. Concerned, Bruce put applied a cool rag on Loki's forehead, and the green eyes flew open.
Startled by the sudden cold, Loki focused on the face looking at him. Not Thor, the eyes were too dark.
"Loki, you with me?" Midgard, he remembered. They had brought him down there for something. The voice kept speaking. "I'm trying to help you but I need to know more, because what I know now makes no sense. Is there anything particular about the pain? Anything else that started with the sickness, any other symptoms?"
Loki could hear it clearly now.
"There is a voice." He whispered.
"A voice? You mean in your head?" Loki nodded. This was not good.
"Whenever somethings looks promising it's there, reminding me of my own worthlessness."
Loki knew he shouldn't be saying those things to the Midgardian. They were not his concern and made him look insane, as well as weak. But it was too late to hide his weakness now, wasn't it? It was all that he was.
"What does the voice say?"
"It says No peace for you, monster. You're only getting what you deserve. And then there's pain."
He was so tired now and felt so miserable. He just wanted to go to sleep and never wake up. No more cells, no more asking for Thor, no more Midgard, no more fights and words and pain. No more.
The voice kept speaking.
"Loki, is it your own voice or someone else's?"
"Mine."
The eyes of the god were closing, the battle for consciousness being lost.
"Loki, stay with me. Don't stop fighting. I'll find a solution for this."
And then the black haired Asgardian went totally limp, green eyes closed, skin still pale as death.
Damn.
Amongst the things Bruce didn't like hulking out unwillingly and losing patients were part of the top three. He realized with horror that his hands were shaking, after briefly seeing his own self in those green eyes. No peace for you, monster. He tried to focus, but there was not much he could do with the limited amount of things he had there. Where the hell was Tony? He tried to get himself together, try to figure out the mystery. That voice could be some clue... but it could also be Loki's mind breaking. He had never been an example of sanity. And it was his own voice, probably just his conscience.
Bruce knew what it felt like, trying to move on and having yourself whisper that you are a monster. That you don't deserve happiness... that you never will. But how could that be connected with the man's physical symptoms? He had no idea.
Tony was there shortly, bringing a smile and the things that he had asked for. He told Burce about the incident at Stark tower and what they were planning on doing. They were not going unpunished, that much was clear.
"So, what happened to lone ranger over there? He was perfectly fine when he kicked Fury's ass."
"Yeah- I...I don't really know... There's something going on here, something we don't know about. I mean, why would he get better and then worse if it's an environmental thing, right? And it has happened a couple times now... He was bad when we found him, he got better, then Bob beat the crap out of him, he got better, was tasered, escaped a federal building and got much worse."
Tony looked at the pale alien. He had gone from looking beaten up to guy-with-a-terminal-illness in mere hours. There was something not right, there, just like Bruce had said. The Doctor told his friend about Loki's voice, about those words. Maybe it was too personal, but he needed an outside opinion to see things more clearly, with more perspective.
Tony had an idea he didn't like. In fact, he'd been having ideas he hadn't liked all day. Sometimes he cursed his very brilliant brain.
"You know, I was wondering earlier how they had kept him locked up so long in Asgard. I read the file on him, he's quite the badass. This guy can get out of a bad situation with no weapons, no support, even injured. He talks, and bam! He's out. Even if there's no one there, the guy's agile, he got Fury's ankle weapon while handcuffed. So, if you were a mighty ruler who had to protect his land from a potential very dangerous villain, how would you go against him? Sure, put him in the cursed jail, but Thor said only four or five people got it in the last century. Even then, the guy is a different species! You don't know of it will affect him at all. So, how do you stop him?"
Ok, Bruce was getting an idea too.
"You go against his mind."
"The guy is all the time thinking, so what if you could turn a particular thought into paralyzing physical pain? Into weakening fever? If there are healing spells there probably are hurting spells, too. And this prisoner's disease provides for a perfect cover. I mean, it's only a theory but..."
"And it's the perfect thought, too. No peace for you, monster. The one that appears in the back of your head when things start looking up to keep you grounded. And I'm sure it's not the first time it has crossed his mind." Bruce started thinking back and paced in the room, close to solving all. "He was in a terrible shape because when he arrived because when you are alone you keep thinking about yourself, your defeats, what has made you be in prison. Thinking those same thoughts over and over. He gets half catatonic, the fever goes haywire. But we provided a distraction, something to be aware about. When he has to act, he acts, no time to feel sorry for himself. But when things start going well... when I was healing him and showing some interest before Bob, the pain was back... in the cab, he was just commenting that he was happy he was no longer a prisoner and I had paid for the ride... there was nothing wrong... And then there's that little voice that says you don't deserve this and it fills your mind and somehow that becomes blinding stomach pain and fever and shortness of breath. Your mental weaknesses become real and hurt you."
Bruce ended his little speech, horrified at what he just said.
"That's so cruel." Tony said, still shocked. They were using the guys self-worth issues to hurt him. From the inside. And tear him apart. Bad, bad thing.
"Bruce?"
"Yeah?"
"We cannot bring him back. Not now, not ever."
On the other room, Loki was not aware of his surroundings.
He was back at the cell, trying to break down the bars, feeling like a failure. Again.
He went back to the walls and found, with horror that they were made of ice. And when he touched them his skin went back to being blue and wouldn't change back.
Monster.
He screamed.
Thor, Odin and Frigga were on the other side of the bars, watching him with hatred.
You're only getting what you deserve.
You monster.
You abomination.
You were never good enough for us.
And there walls were closing in on him.
A/N: Weirdest chapter EVAH. Hope you don't hate it. Sorry for the delay, too, I have a big french exam coming up and I've writing angsty Loki things in french. Probably not good enough to publish, but entertaining. Also 100 favs! Thank you so much! And for all the kind reviews... Even if I lose them all with weirdnesses like this. But you remember how mean Tony was in the beginning of this story? I like the evolution. Anyways, tell me if you thought this was total crap or not! Really not knowing what to think about this chapter and I would love your input!
Reviews are love! ^^