Chapter 30: Relapse

In abject misery, Loki stares at the closed bedroom door. Hours pass and he is unable to consider closing his eyes even as exhaustion seems to dry him out. The ancient couch causes an ache in his back, but he does not adjust his position because it would decrease his view of the door.

Eleanor sleeps just beyond the blocked entryway, out of his reach. Sleep without her at his side is unthinkable and he wonders if she longs for him as he longs for her.

Of course she does not. How could she?

Telling Eleanor of his secret plotting over these past months was no conscious decision, rather a confession that seemed to come forth from his lips on its own volition. He would like nothing more than to take back that truth, to have Eleanor carry on none the wiser to how he nearly changed both their lives.

Still, he is incapable of allowing any hurt to befall her. Now, it seems so foolish to have entertained the idea for as long as he did.

After last night's particularly brutal dream, Loki gave up all pretenses, finally admitting to himself that he could never allow Eleanor to die. There are no possible circumstances in which he is capable of putting his own selfish needs before her safety and beyond even that, he would sacrifice his own life gladly to protect hers.

She is his singular priority and perhaps he sought to make this clear with his confession, but the result is quite the opposite.

The revelation came in the calm moments after their frantic coupling this morning and for the first time Loki found himself believing Eleanor's near constant mantra.

You're not a monster. You're not a monster. You're not a monster.

For if Loki truly were as monstrous, vile, twisted, and evil as he once thought himself to be, he could sacrifice Eleanor to escape the tyranny of Odin's interference with relative ease.

But he cannot. He will not.

He is no monster, for Eleanor's wellbeing is of far greater import than his own.

Still, accepting Odin's continuing control left a bitter taste in Loki's mouth. Even after the earth shattering revelation that he cares so deeply, he was in a foul mood when they departed for the laboratory this morning for he would need to learn to live with Odin's meddling.

Eleanor eased this woe as well, explaining that the current situation was more his mother's doing. It may be Odin's magic that allows Eleanor's command to hold him, but the Allfather is displeased by the situation. Loki is reasonably sure of his mother's good intentions and perhaps this situation will be something he can tolerate.

As petty as it might be, Odin's alleged displeasure with this current arrangement is endlessly pleasing to Loki.

This brought him peace for a few moments, until he ruined it confessing his actions and plots over these last few months to Eleanor.

Even as he said the words, he knew he was not explaining correctly. In his hasty and ill-conceived spiel, he made the situation sound much more dire. True, there is nothing he did not consider when seeking a way to break the bond, but he had no actual plans to kill her.

Honesty is not a compulsion he often experiences. Perhaps his lack of experience with truth telling is the reason for his absolute failure to properly explain.

Eleanor does not see this a progress. This is no positive breakthrough for her mission to change Loki, but an unforgivable slight that has her hidden away behind their locked bedroom door.

Her expression has remained blank and utterly devoid of emotion since his great profession, and she refuses to speak. She will not so much as glance in his direction.

This was not an expected reaction. He thought she would be angry, but would calm after he explained himself. In this instance, her unpredictability proves particularly devastating, especially as she shook her head in such disappointment, cursing and calling him names that made him feel like the odd child on Asgard once more.

More potent than his offense at the way she spoke to him was the sudden, unmitigated fear that in her anger Eleanor would finally give up on him, as Loki always thought she would, and send him back to the mercy of Odin.

This is still a very real possibility.

The absurdity of the situation is not lost on Loki. After toiling fruitlessly for so long, searching for a way to lift this oppressive magic, Eleanor could very well be the one to do it only at Loki's moment of realization, when he is so desperate to stay.

For the first time he realizes that if he somehow did succeed in breaking their bond, Eleanor would have been free to leave him as well.

As she will probably do now.

The crippling knowledge that Eleanor may soon be worlds away keeps him from sleep and he dwells on this likely outcome. Loki would retreat into his head, unable to learn to really live without her touch and voice while Eleanor will be left here on this vulnerable realm, without Loki's protection.

Watching Eleanor turn her back and leave him this afternoon was a cruel lesson that showed Loki the true extent of his pathetic dependence on the half mortal. It is still somewhat shocking that Loki has no desire to take the necessary steps to end this dependency.

Soon he will more than likely be forced to watch Eleanor walk away from him permanently.

As he stares at the door, Loki ponders Eleanor's adverse reaction to his declaration that she would not die. Her life will be spared and Loki will stay a captive. Surely these are glad tidings but Eleanor is both furious and – much more disturbing – hurt.

A locked door is nothing to Loki but he dares not force his presence on her further lest it enrage her once more, pushing her to a decision that will once more leave him alone.

He wills the door to open, for her to emerge and allow him a chance to explain this all away with his silver tongue that seems to constantly fail in her presence.

It stays firmly shut to him.

In the morning Eleanor is up and moving behind the closed door, readying herself for the coming day in the room that he once considered theirs.

There was really never a choice and despite all his considerations, he would never have attempted to harm Eleanor. It took him some time and a nightmare to accept that the magic would stay between them. As she explained the true source of this punishment, Loki was further relieved.

She asked him to tell her what was "going on." When he told her, she withdrew completely, shutting him out of their room and possibly her life.

Loki's attempt to give her what she's claimed to desire for months – sharing his thoughts, confessing his actions – did not please her. As per the usual, Eleanor is preoccupied with the wrong, unimportant detail.

So focused is she on the fact that he briefly contemplated her death that she fails to see that he decided to stay her willing prisoner. He is committing to a life spent at her side, at her mercy, and she dismisses it as if it nothing.

Ultimately, he wants her to understand that she is the greater import than undoing the restraint and influence of Odin. It's a rather sizable decision and she is locked away behind a door, closed off from him. The revelation changes everything about him, and Eleanor is ruining the moment with this childish tantrum.

Some time during the long hours of his sleepless night, his fear that she would send him away evolved into anger.

How dare she remove herself the moment he decides to commit to a life lived with her?

It never takes long for Eleanor to make herself ready for the coming day and Loki is unwilling to be caught in this weakened, humiliating position brooding on the couch. Arising, he clothes himself in a Midgardian suit that never fails to induce staring from his songbird.

He clasps his behind his back and paces in front of the closed door until he hears the knob turn.

Eleanor is a wreck, wearing denim pants with holes at her knees. They hang low on her hips. The white shirt accompanying the destroyed pants is simple, but made for someone even smaller and it leaves a strip of her stomach bare as it clings to her chest far too tightly. Her hair looks as it would if they'd spent the night vigorously fornicating.

If only that were the case.

Dark bags linger under her eyes but worse of all, she does not look at him even as he stands before her, her face an expressionless mask.

"Good morning," he says, hopeful that Eleanor let go of this foolishness in the night.

She stares at the floor.

"Eleanor, you will cease with this foolishness at once," he snaps.

She moves around him into the kitchen without glancing in his direction and suddenly he is no longer angry.

For a fleeting, terrifying moment Loki thinks perhaps this is the titan's doing. Maybe Loki is trapped in this latest vision, a ghost doomed to watch Eleanor live her life without him, never able to touch her or speak to her again.

Loki's whole existence has been riddled with shadow and now he has become one himself. He is Eleanor's shadow.

Loki shakes his head, dispelling the doubt and forcing down the panic that tickles his throat.

"Eleanor," he says again, placing himself between her and the coffee pot. The intensity of her answering glare shocks Loki, even if it proves that this is happening in reality.

There is hate and disgust in her gaze. The expression is one he's seen many times: on the faces of his peers when he performed impressive bits of magic, when he said the wrong thing to the wrong person at the wrong time, and when he foolishly announced his monstrousness to the crowd outside his white cell, when they mocked him and mocked him and mocked him.

But this is Eleanor looking at him with such revulsion. Even at their very worst moments in the bunker when he laid hands on her or before when she slapped him out of her bed, Eleanor did not look at him in such a way.

Something in his chest shatters and he steps aside, fleeing the kitchen, unwilling to bear the weight of that look on her face.

He watches her brew coffee from his peripheral vision. Eleanor eats no breakfast, as she normally does, instead filling a large travel-mug half with coffee, half with whiskey. Despite the reproach on his tongue, Loki says nothing for fear of further enraging his songbird.

It is difficult to truly push Eleanor to the point of rage and this reaction is unprecedented. Loki struggles to understand the extent of her ire.

He will not let her die. He will allow the bond to stay. He will make no move to leave her as he begrudgingly serves this penance.

These are glad tidings and what she previously claimed to want.

Eleanor takes long gulps of her alcoholic breakfast and then tops it off with whiskey.

Without a word she exits their home, leaving Loki no choice but to follow.

There are two computer screens when there should only be one, but Ellie types merrily away, hoping – but not really caring – that her work is free of mistakes.

She is self aware enough to admit that this is something of a relapse into the destructive, lonely ways of old. She knows that the steady drinking and going silent is behavior she put aside two years ago, that will do nothing to solve anything, but she can't help it.

The very worst part – even with the new knowledge that Loki has been plotting her death for the last ten months – is her own stupidity. Somewhere between the ice cream and the sex and the companionship, Eleanor started to trust and depend on him. She forgot that he is stuck here, that being with her is Loki's punishment and she fooled herself into thinking that what they had was the real deal.

Loki is the God of Lies. How can she possibly be surprised that he's been tricking her since the moment they blasted down from Asgard?

And he claims that there wasn't a plot but a consideration to kill her as if there is any real difference here. He thought about killing her. After everything, how could he have entertained that possibility for even a moment?

Loki is watching her.

He's been on the couch, staring at her intently since they arrived this morning. Jane and Darcy keep exchanging concerned glances, but seem content to leave Eleanor to her silence and Loki to his staring.

Long before Loki, back when Ellie's life was small and she was sure of her place in the world around her, back when her parents were simply her parents, Ellie had simple dreams. With her simple high school boyfriend she wanted a simple life. She saw her future with the house and the kids and the yard, but mostly she coveted a life spent with another person.

In the years after her whole life shattered around her, Ellie gave up on the whole business of dreaming and found her old desire to really be with someone particularly laughable.

The only way to stay safe from hurt is to stay alone. She learned this lesson well, but Loki made her forget.

With him she started to want things again, not the house and the kids and the yard, but certainly Loki. For a few months there, she thought that she had him. She mistook Loki's punishment as a relationship and now it hurts to even look at him because for the last ten months Ellie basked in the joy of his presence while Loki was trying to leave her alone again.

She is deeply shamed to have been so egregiously wrong and she mourns the loss of something she never ever had.

"Hey, Eleanor," Darcy says, approaching with caution. "We're going to run to the cafeteria for lunch. Do you want to come?"

"No, thank you."

"Do you want us to bring you something?" asks Jane. Her tone makes Ellie wince. It is the tone the sane use to address the crazies. Ellie turned back into a crazy when she went to Asgard or maybe even before that when she visited him day by fucking day in Stark Tower.

"No, thank you."

They leave her alone with Loki and he crosses the room, standing in front of her desk. Ignoring him, she reaches for the flask hidden in a drawer.

"Eleanor." He is disapproving but Ellie drinks until her throat burns out the pain in her chest.

She looks at her computer screen and it blurs into two again. She waits for him to leave her the fuck alone.

"Eleanor, please."

Rage boils in her gut. He is begging for something but what else could he possibly take from her that she was unwilling to give?

She stands. The force of it knocks over her swivel chair. Without looking at Loki, she takes her booze and retreats to the bathroom, determined to stay there until Jane and Darcy return from lunch.

Jane and Darcy return from lunch.

Ignoring Ellie's professed lack of appetite, they bring her a sandwich. She picks at it, tricking her nosy bosses as she pretends to eat.

Only Loki knows that she doesn't put a single bite of food in her mouth. She can tell by the way he looks at her, even as she refuses to look at him.

She turns to look at the circular space that was once the end of a bridge between worlds. It would be easy to march out into the middle of that space, screaming her head off until Heimdall or Thor or someone noticed. They could take Loki away and she could go back to how she was. Alone, but safe.

It would be so easy.

She stays seated.

Ellie maintains a low level of intoxication for the rest of the week. Her bosses notice the change in her demeanor, but not the booze. They seem unwilling to demand answers from Ellie with Loki around.

And Loki is always around, a silent presence that won't let Ellie ignore all this painful crap he caused her.

He's been attempting to leave her for ten months but now he won't give her any distance at all.

He doesn't hang out under his tree. He makes no move to read and shows no interest in Jane and Darcy's work.

On the second day he stops trying to talk to Ellie. On the third he goes back to his most casual Asgardian attire and stops combing his hair. On the fourth he stops attempting to catch Ellie's eye and suddenly she is not the only one off food. Then it is Friday and the prospect of spending endless hours alone with the man that provides a harsh reminder of why she spent eight years alone to avoid this kind of hurt is unbearable.

She seriously considers throwing in the towel and handing Loki back over to Odin again, but she can't bring herself to do it. All this anger and hurt and she still can't find it in her to condemn him to a century alone.

But she will lose her mind trapped in the cottage with him.

After work she locks herself in the bedroom, as per the usual. Instead of drinking herself into a fitful sleep, Ellie rummages in her closet for clothes she has not worn in years. The black mini skirt and black tank top feel like old friends when she pulls them on.

In the bathroom Ellie straightens her hair and does her make up. Her eyes are smoky and the final touch is a bold red lipstick she stole from Darcy's desk. The color choice is admittedly a bit cruel. She doesn't care.

She grabs her jacket, sticks a full flask in the pocket, and is on her way to her car without every looking at Loki where he sits on the couch.

The car is already in motion when he manages to slide into the passengers seat.

"Eleanor." His voice is scolding, full of barely contained frustration. "Where are we going?"

She doesn't answer.

"And why aren't you wearing pants?"

Ellie blasts the music, singing along at the top of her lungs and pretending to be totally alone in the car, pretending that she's been totally alone this whole time.

"Another," Loki says, snapping his fingers at the scantily clad mortal on the opposite side of the sticky bar. After making sure she selects his desired brand of alcohol to refill his glass, he goes back to what he has been doing for the previous two hours and thirty-one minutes.

She sits at a table on the far side of the inadequately illuminated space, surrounded by mortal men all vying for her attention. Rage and guilt and fear and rejection prove an odd combination and this excess of unwanted emotion churning about in his stomach leaves him immobile and indecisive across the room.

He wants nothing more to pull her away, to kill all those who look upon her now, but dares not.

In this moment he hates her for deliberately causing him to feel so much with her behavior. She plays on his jealousy, seeking to hurt him as he hurt her.

But it was him who struck the first blow with his misbegotten confession, inadvertently destroying the fragile relationship they cultivated in an imprudent attempt to make it real and true.

Under archetypal circumstances, Loki would not leave her side in such a setting, intimidating any who dare look upon her and making his claim on her clear. Now – with Eleanor intoxicated and irrational and unwilling to listen – Loki does not intervene for fear that she will move to sever their bond, sending him to the Isle.

"You know, the staring is getting creepy." The mortal bar wench is addressing him. Loki glances at her as Eleanor laughs with her loathsome companions.

"Mind your tongue, mortal."

The tender of the bar laughs as if his words were spoken in jest.

"Do you know her?"

"Who?" Loki asks absently as Eleanor whispers in a mortal's ear.

"The girl you are staring at. Do you know her?"

"Indeed."

"Well, you need to give it up. Hottie like you can have whoever you want, but that one just ain't interested."

The keeper of the bar cowers under the force of his scowl and Loki is a moment away from unleashing a verbal lashing on the meddlesome mortal, but a man appears at his side. As it is, Loki jerks in surprise unable to stop the instinctual reaction to recoil from the unknown.

"Loki," he says. "What's going on?"

This is an agent of SHIELD. Loki recognizes him from the lab and he forces himself to calm.

"Eleanor is partaking in traditional Midgardian socialization," Loki snaps. "What of it?"

"This situation is concerning," says the agent. "We can't let you hurt anyone, even if it is to… defend her honor."

Loki rolls his eyes. "I will do nothing to incur the wrath of Eleanor. As much as these mortals deserve to burn."

"Um, okay. Great," replies the agent. He is outstandingly uncomfortable, much to Loki's delight. "Just know that we've got a team ready to move if you get violent. Is Eleanor the type to get drunk and reveal classified information to civilians?"

"Eleanor is none of your concern," Loki snarls, pleased when the agent jumps slightly on his stool. "Leave her to me."

The agent looks past Loki, to the table where Eleanor sits. His eyes go wide and he mutters a curse. Loki whips his head around, but Eleanor and two mortal men are missing from the table.

"This is your doing," Loki tells the fool of an agent before disappearing, leaving the SHIELD agent to explain Loki's sudden absence and to pay for his drinks.

Eleanor is smoking in the dank, dark gap between two buildings. Two beefy Midgardians loom over her.

"Is this all you got?" Eleanor asks, words slurring into one as she brandishes the fat cigarette between her fingers.

"I've got some coke."

"Jerry! You don't even know this chick. How old are you even, honey?"

Eleanor inhales deeply. The smoke she draws into her lungs smells different from the disgusting, slim cigarettes she once favored.

"Old enough," she replies.

"Well you look about seventeen. Give me a number."

"Back off, Rich."

"I'm twenty eight," says Eleanor. "Wait. No. I am thirty-four."

"Bullshit. You ain't thirty-four."

"You don't know how old you are?"

"It changes every year!" Eleanor giggles to herself and trips over her own feet, catching herself on a brick wall. "Some years more than others. Did someone mention coke?"

Loki is at Eleanor's side before she can finish her inquiry.

"Holy shit!" says one mortal.

"Who the hell are you?" asks the other. "Where the fuck did you come from, bro?"

The mortals are ignored. Loki is barely containing the impulse to eviscerate the pair. Surly this would be allowed per the defense clause of Eleanor's command, but she would not be pleased about such a violent action.

"Enough, Eleanor," he says instead, voice low and gruff.

She blows foul smoke in his face, reminding Loki of a different alley nearly two years prior when he forcibly took her as his own. Although a great deal has changed, Eleanor acts as though it has not. In her distress, Eleanor has reverted to the lonely, destitute create she was when then.

Loki will not be the furious, irrational megalomaniac he was upon their meeting.

"Do you know his creep, Ellie?"

For the first time in days Eleanor willingly looks at him. The smirk that twists her features into something hateful further shatters whatever she earlier broke in his chest.

But she looks at him and that is something to be treasured.

"Nope," she says with another giggle. "Name doesn't ring a bell. You don't look even vaguely familiar."

There is a mean cackle in her voice as she taunts him with the same words she uttered on a long ago night in a similar location in Washington DC.

"Did he give a name?" one of the mortals asks the other.

Loki knows not what game she plays as she attempts to reenact the night of her kidnapping, but he takes no part in it.

Closing his eyes, he gives himself a small moment to steel himself for the coming unpleasantness.

"Friends," he says, turning to the mortals. Despite his burning desire to kill these men, he is remarkably cordial, his tone absolutely reeking of sincerity. "This is my wife. My Eleanor."

He ignores her snort of disgust.

"I am afraid she suffers a rather severe addition problem," he continues.

"Liar," Eleanor says as Loki removes the fat cigarette from between her lips, handing it to the mortals. "He is the God of Lies. Literally, that is his fucking title. And I do mean literally, not figuratively. He is literally the God of Lies."

Her drunken babble and Loki's pleading gaze inspires the mortals to remove themselves from the situation with murmured apologies.

"What the flying fuck, Loki!" She is furious, but looking at him. She sees him and somehow validates his very existence in doing so.

"Eleanor," he whispers, cradling her face between his palms. "What are you doing, love?"

For a moment Eleanor's lip quivers and it appears that she will finally stop this madness and speak to him. He will find the words to make her care for him again. She then yanks away, nearly falling in her haste to put distance between them.

"I was trying to get high," she yells, staggering away. He follows. "Fuck you very much."

"This is no longer the way you deal with times of distress, Eleanor," he gently reminds her.

"Don't you fucking tell me what to do!" She looks at him again and it is a relief. "The guy I've been living with for nearly a year has been plotting to definitely leave me, maybe kill me. I think that warrants a little recreational drug use!"

"Eleanor, you warp my words. I was not plotting to kill you, I simply—"

"Just shut the fuck up!"

Loki flinches away at the violence of her tone and Eleanor turns from him. He feels the loss of her gaze acutely.

"Eleanor?" She is storming away, towards the lot where her vehicle is parked. "Where are you going?"

She does not answer, nor did he truly expect her to. There are keys clutched in her hand as they approach the vehicle. Before she can fumble to unlock the door, the keys vanish from her grip and materialize in his own fist.

For a moment she sways and stares at her empty hand before turning her rage on him once more.

"Give them back!" she shrieks.

"No."

"Fuck you. I'm going home."

"I will drive."

"You don't drive, Loki!"

"It will be no problem, Eleanor."

He reaches to unlock the door but she blocks his path, set on ensuring that she is safely tucked away. Once more her gaze is upon him. He vows to prolong the interaction as long as possible.

"Give me the goddamn keys, Loki." Her yelling is preferable to stony silence, but Loki's never experienced her quiet so loud.

"No," he says simply.

"I would have to be insane to get in a car with the dude who is trying to kill me behind the wheel."

Loki clenches his jaw, struggling against his own simmering rage. This childish behavior is infuriating, but he will not allow her to pull him into such an unproductive altercation.

"I have no desire to kill you," he murmurs. "The opposite is in fact truth."

"Give me the keys, Loki!"

"No."

"Give me the fucking keys."

"No."

"I'll make you," she says, wiping tears from her cheeks. "I can make you. Isn't that your whole goddamn problem?"

Loki stays silent, preparing for the inevitable moment where she breaks her promise. He's known from the moment she swore to give one command only that they would arrive to this point eventually. All promises are broken and Loki is unsurprised – and so very disappointed – to see he's driven Eleanor to break her word.

"So give me the keys, Loki."

There is no rippling power in her tone, no out pouring of magic bending him to her will. Even now she hesitates to break her promise. It makes the coming betrayal worse some how.

"Force me, then," he snarls, looming over her, demanding she get it over and done with.

Instead of bellowing a command and breaking a promise, Eleanor lets out an enraged growl, placing her palms on his chest and shoving with her meager strength. He is unmovable, but in his shock he takes a step back. Grumbling to herself, Eleanor stomps around to the passenger's side of the vehicle.

"Unlock the fucking door," she insists.

There is no command. Despite her rage and intoxication, she keeps her promise and gives up this battle, keeping her promise.

Loki is stunned.

"The fucking door!" She yanks viciously on the handle as she yells, spurring him into action.

They get settled in the car and Eleanor does not look at him.

"If you would only converse with me I am sure we could move beyond this unpleasantness," he murmurs.

He will find the right words. He will bring them back to the way they were.

Eleanor turns the music up to an absurdly loud volume, drinking more alcohol from a flask.

It is an extremely long drive back to the Stark Compound. They are trailed by the agents of SHIELD and Eleanor ignores him until they pass the check point to enter the property.

"Turn left," she says as they come to a convergence of roadways.

"Home is to the right."

"I can't go back there."

"Why ever not?"

"Turn left," she says again.

Loki turns left.

Their ultimate destination is the residential wing of the complex. He follows her curt instructions to park between the crude van of Jane Foster and the garish red car of Darcy Lewis.

"Eleanor—"

"Don't follow me."

He doesn't follow her.

For a few moments he sits in the car but there is panic rising in his chest. Enclosed spaces remind him of his various prisons and open-air assists with his breathing. Exiting the jeep, he finds a bit of brown grass beside the entrance and Loki lies in the dirt.

The position is unbecoming but in the warm months Eleanor insisted he lie beside her in lush green grass, stargazing. It was pleasant.

The lights far above him now offer no comfort and he imagines the worst possible scenario inside the building behind him.

Although in all likelihood she is with Thor's Whore and the buxom brunette, he cannot stop replaying the vision of the Tesseract that showed her lying with a faceless man, her eyes dead.

So this chapter got way too long and I had to split it, but my beta Heather is amazingly speedy so I might be able to get chapter 31 up by tonight.

I considered calling this chapter Eleanor Freaks Out Big Time, but somehow refrained.

Thank you so very, very much for reading!