So it goes with saying that only things I own with any connection to MARVEL I bought on Ebay or Etsy. MARVEL COMICS & MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE are their own creatures and I have nothing to do with either of them aside from the fact I enjoy reading or watching them, and am grateful for the ability to play in their world. I claim nothing, and I receive nothing for this, expect the pleasure of putting something out into the world.

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DAY TWO

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

WEDNESDAY, MAY 2ND 2012

1306 HOURS

SUBTERRANEAN BUNKER

LOCATION UNKNOWN

DUNCAN

MERCENARY

"I thought I told you to send for me when she woke up?" I knew right away when he came in, with the way his quick pace stopped the same time his eyes found her awake that I was going to be in trouble; and the frown that was forming when he took his eyes off her and finally turned them to me just confirmed it even more.

"Yoo did sairrr." I reply back just is quick, not bothering with an apology since I know damn well it didn't do that other poor bastard any good, and going straight for the explanation route. "She jist woke up. Ah thocht Ah shoods make sure she took th' medicine ye left afair Ah sent someain tae git ye."

I expected a response to that, especially since I could see the edge of that frown grow into something more of a scowl, but it wasn't his voice that spoke out when he started to open his mouth. "E-Ex-cuse me, M-Mister Blackwood?"It was hers.

What is she doing? Asking for me now?! I almost want to say she is trying to get me in trouble. It doesn't take a genius after all to realize this guy is just is possessive is he is unstable, and I know she knows that too. There's no way she can't after what he had us do to her earlier, so why would she ask for me in front of him unless she is...

"I-I kn-now I a-a-sked t-to do it my-mself, a-and I re-really a-ap-prec-i-iate it, but..." at this point she holds up the little bottle is she drops her face in shame. "...I, I...my h-han-ands st-till..." and doesn't even finish the sentence, but the glisten of a tear she wipes away does it sufficiently enough.

...trying to help me?! I think she is, in fact I'm pretty damn sure that's what she's doing. She didn't ask me that question, or any question except if I was gonna hurt her or not. She's trying to protect me from him by drawing the attention to herself and making me sound like I treated her well, not that I didn't, but she is making it sound better than it was.

She is gambling on the idea that he might not to want to let things get violent in front of her. You stupid girl, if this backfires it's going to burn you first, and you know it!

But it's out of my hands, because it looks like it worked. " I will take care of that. You may leave now." and there is nothing I can say but yes sir and accept that clipped dismissal, walking out of the room before he has the chance to change his mind about letting me go, and leaving her to whatever fate she receives once that door shuts her in there with him. Dammit.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 2ND 2012

1308 HOURS

SUBTERRANEAN BUNKER

LOCATION UNKNOWN

NORA

SELFLESS CAPTIVE

Don't call him back Nora, don't call him back. You said that so he wouldn't get punished, so don't call him back! It's true, even if I'm not really sure what my reason for that was. It isn't like I owe the man anything, or even that I can say I like him at all. Sure he was polite and patient with me just now and I suppose that counts as being nice, but he was also the man who bear hugged me earlier so they could stick those needles in my arm!

I guess I just don't want anyone to get hurt because of me, especially over something that really isn't really worth it. Thinking like this is why I always knew I would never be much of an agent, not like the one they told me I used to be; wanting and trying to protect everyone sounds like something noble and good, until it evolves beyond a theory. It can't be done, and in a world like S.H.I.E.L.D's it almost shouldn't be done. Trying to do that sometimes means you can't bring everyone home, or they can't bring you home.

Acceptable losses, I know what those are. You have the knowledge in your head, but you really don't understand. I should have let Duncan have whatever the man holding me captive was thinking of doing to him, but I interfered because I am just too soft. I've always felt like losing anything was one loss to many.

"May I?" It's why I can't stop the gasp that escapes when my ears hear those two words, even though I knew they would be coming eventually. I'm too soft, I'm too scared.

"Shh..." He soothes, leaving me to realize thankfully that he seems to have drifted back into the role of the gentle caretaker. "...It is alright, let me get that for you." He makes it sound like he is 'asking' permission, but it isn't really a question as he doesn't even give me a chance to answer before I feel the first delicate brush of his leather-covered fingers across my naked ones.

I don't resist him this time, nor do I let myself give in completely to my urge to flinch away. I may not be a genius, but that never stopped me from picking up on things quickly enough, and I already learned the penalty for upsetting this man. He made that lesson very clear.

Still, it wouldn't be a proper phobia if I could control it all the way. Once the pill bottle is out of my hands I can't help but pull them back, cradling them almost defensively in front of my chest, with the burnt one shielded behind its opposite. And he wouldn't be himself if he didn't seem to realize the implications behind that gesture.

He says nothing about it though despite the brief arching of his eyebrow. I think it's so he doesn't embarrass me with the observation. Which is really considerate of him, and I do appreciate it, but it's also very unnecessary because it's quite clear what I am here. I'm not a guest here; I'm a prisoner in a very nice cage.

He goes through the motions of shaking out the correct number of pills for me, checking the label briefly to make sure, before he finishes recapping the container. Then, holding the pills in one hand he takes the glass of water in the other and 'offers' them both to me.

I don't refuse him either, I don't even consider it this time. This man is that frightening to me now. I would whether to take something even if I can't confirm what it really is than do anything to make him so much is frown at this point. It's just like I'm back there at the beginning, 'waking up' all over again, surrounded by strange people with strange motives and in a strange place.

My fingers flinch back from the first brush, almost like they expected some sort of painful shock to come from touching his leather glove, and while they turned out to be wrong about the sensation being the usual electric pain they were surprised by the fact that his hand felt cold!

Even through the leather barrier on his hands the temperature difference was pronounced. Either he had been outside for to long and it was cold wherever we were, or I am running a fever. Both hypotheses are concerning to me because unless my guess on the time of day is wrong it should be hot outside, and secondly because if I have a fever it means I'm sick for the first time in my life, and if I am sick it means I'm going to become weaker. I don't want to be weak here, I can't!

With the second touch I don't flinch back, due to sheer will power, but they still tremble as I take the pills between my fingers. My effort earns me a bit of a sad smile from him, but I accept it because I think it's still better than a frown, much better actually. Pity is always better than pissed off, right?

If I wanted him to pity me my next action seems to follow that plan precisely as my other hand takes hold of the water glass, causing the liquid in it starts to ripple toward the center. I try not to dwell on that particular detail because even if I tell myself it's what I want it still makes me feel terribly ashamed.

You're one of the strongest people I know. That sentence meant so much to me in my dream, but out here in reality it loses all its weight. Yes, it's something that boosts my courage a little, but it isn't what I really want right now. I want more than the memory of words in my head to make me strong, I want someone to come and be strong for me!

I've conquered every obstacle that stood in my way in the past, both from my phobia and my amnesia. This time it's different though because this time it's a person, and I have no idea how to conquer that. Mantra's, repetition, and mental exercises won't make this obstacle go away.

The first question he expects me to answer doesn't come until after he takes back the empty glass. He politely waited until I finished taking the pills, and downed the water first. He even waited as I made sure I drank every drop, not because I was that thirsty, but just because I was being nervously thorough and stalling a little.

"Are you aware of who I am?" It's a normal enough question, there isn't really anything special or unusual about it. Except that I'm paranoid it's going to get me killed if I answer it wrong. Not that I have any idea what he would consider a right answer, I mean I either tell him the truth and say no I don't have a clue who he is, and it makes him upset or I lie to him and say yes only for him to ask me to prove it and then get really upset when I can't backup my claim.

So I suck it up and shrink back into myself in preparation as I let out a tiny "No. H-He did-didn't say." And pray for whatever he does to be over quickly.

"Are you certain of that?" It wasn't a response I could say I expected at all, but I've begun to realize that this man is just as likely if not more likely to do the unexpected. So by that logic his unusual question in response and the bemused smirk that goes with it aren't that surprising, but it still makes me feel terribly uncomfortable as I make myself nod my head yes.

"How strange then that I have already heard you speak my name." This time the unexpected response is really a surprise, and my eyes move to meet his in alarm, as my mouth starts to dispute it "No, I..." before my memory betrays me suddenly and sides with him.

I did say his name! I was crying, or more like I was begging then, and was saying anything I could think of to make them stop attacking me! I was trying to get through to Erik, or Duncan whose name I didn't even know at the time. I was even trying to get through to Clint which only made him smirk at me, before it eventually turned into a sneer because I was so pathetic it was annoying him! And I even tried to persuade...Loki.

I begged him, half screaming and sobbing is I swore up and down that I would do whatever he wanted if he just made them stop touching me, and I used his name! A name no one told me, that went with a man I've never met. A name I shouldn't have known...so how did I know his name? Did I hear it and just not realize it?

No, I know I didn't, so how would I know an Asgardians name? Erik. I know Erik. Of course, Erik told me.

He talked about Thor and Asgard all the time. Finding Thor, a homeless man in the desert ranting about realms and bridges and puny mortals before his young friend Darcy tazed him. Then Miss Foster taking him to the hospital, and the subsequent rescue from the hospital that involved running him over again. The man's strange behavior involving coffee cups and potential insanity. The encounter with S.H.I.E.L.D that put all four of them on our radar. The arrival of the Warriors Three, Lady Sif, and the Destroyer that followed.

He told me about all of that, and more. He talked about the myths, and the things he saw that backed them up, as well as theories on what else might be true. These discussions were always full of details too. I had all that knowledge in my head, I just wasn't thinking about it at the time, but I must have noticed something about him that made me guess who he was. I was just too caught up in my panic to realize what I was saying.

And, as stupid as I would be to not be able to think around him, I almost want that mind numbing lack of focus to come back. I mean it's one thing to be held captive by a man, but Loki, son of Odin, son of Frigga, brother of Thor. Loki. Prince of Asgard. Loki. The trickster. Loki. It is entirely different when you're being held captive by a God.

"Y-Yo-You're-re..." My stutter is interrupted by another of those dull twinges of discomfort, but this time it blessedly isn't followed by an episode. "...Lo-Loki, of A-Asgard?!"

"The very same." The way he says it, it's clearly a mark of pride. I can almost see the bow that should and would accompany it if he wasn't sitting down. I remember thinking he held himself almost regally before, but I never imagined I'd be so right! I can't stop the nervous swallow that follows that confirmation this time. I'm being held captive by A GOD, oh god I'm going to die!

I can see that my reaction makes his smile dip into a bit more of a frown, but I no longer have the ability to care much about that. If I had asthma, I would say I was having an attack, and if I'd eaten something I might think I was having a sulfate reaction but even without either of those I can't manage catch my breath!

I think I might be having another anxiety attack!

"Breathe child..." A tiny part of me wants to tell him I look about the same age as he does but that word, God, is still echoing in my head and shuts me up before I follow through with that stupidity. If he really as is old is I think, then being called 'child' is probably much more respectful than what our real age comparison might be. So instead I just make myself nod, and do my best to follow his advice. "...you will be fine, just breathe through it, as you did before."

It takes me a second, but I finally manage to win against the panic attack, on a wave of sheer willpower alone. I just couldn't let myself lose to it. I couldn't risk the chance that this one might be a serious enough one to make me faint!

I can't faint in front of a God, it would make me look bad! That thought isn't so much a matter of pride or shame as it is my desperate attempt at a much needed excuse to convince my body to listen to me! It doesn't have to be a good excuse, it just needs to exist.

"I-I'm s-sorry..." I force the smile even though I know it's weak, but I do it anyways is I give him an explanation for my reaction. "...This is j-just a lot t-to ta-take in." He returns my effort with a gentle smile of his own, and while his less forced than mine, I can't help but notice it still seems to lack something.

"I understand. You have been through quite a bit, and the situation is considerably less than normal." Less than normal? I have to bite back the bout of hysterical laughter that threatens to come out at those words. I don't see how this situation could even be considered in the same universe as normal! It's yet further proof why I just wouldn't be a good agent. They deal with 'less than normal' all the time and they barely bat an eye!

"I-I just..." It's only fear Nora, fear can't hurt you, you know that. You'll be okay, it's only fear. It's amazing what lying to yourself can accomplish, and what it can't. I'm trying to work up something that looks like courage, but it just keeps getting swept back under the tidal wave of fear. "...I don't understand..." Because once I say these words to him, it's gonna make everything that's happening real. I'll lose any chance I have of hanging on to the bliss and security of ignorance. "...What do you want with me?"

"What I want from you, Arnora" He stop, just because his focus turns to reaching for a piece of fruit, which involves him leaning over me a little, and mine turns to not trying to back up right off this bed to get away from him! "is the chance to make you whole again." But after hearing that part, the pain of falling off the bed almost seems worth it.

"A-Arn-nora?" I knew the reply I'd get even as I said that strange name back to him. "It is your name, your real name. Arnora Dagnysdottir."

"No..." Except it isn't my name. Its close, the only difference being two extra letters that he tacked on the front. It's got to be a mistake, he thinks I am someone else! He wanted someone else! That thought is relieving and terrifying for the same reason. He doesn't really want me, so what's he going to do with me then when he realizes Im not 'her'?

"...That's not my name. My names Nora, Nora Elaine. I'm not her, the one you want." but I keep pushing forward because is frightening is the thoughts of what he might do to me for not being the one he wants, they aren't is scary is the chance that I am.

His reaction is a strange one; he smiles softly, but it's a sad sort of smile, and it seems to be directed at the apple in his hand more than me for a moment as he lets his thumb polish away a dull spot on it's perfect skin. "You think I have made a mistake then. That we do not in fact know each other?"

"I-I..." I swallow the stutter because I know this is a moment I really have to put strength behind my words, I have to speak with conviction, and own them, or I'll never make him believe me. "...Yes."

I deliver that word perfectly. But he still manages to rips the world back out from under me with a series of his own. "What is your proof?"

"They told you that too." The sentence starts with a surprised inhale, and ends with a disappointed sigh. Of course they did. I should have known they would tell him. They told him about my phobia, so why wouldn't they tell him about my amnesia too.

I was on an assignment when it happened, they told me that part. They told me what they could. My team was unique because my team was my family. Most people join S.H.I.E.L.D, not a lot are born and raised in it, but I was. Both my parents were agents when I was conceived and I was raised on S.H.I.E.L.D base after S.H.I.E.L.D base until I was old enough to be an agent myself. That's why we got the assignments we did. Who better to pass is a family than a family?

It was an RPG in Bangkok on New Year's Eve back at the end of 2006, it was an exploding car with them inside and me reaching for the door. It was me, thrown by the force of the explosion, and lying on a pile of rubble with blood seeping from the back of my cracked skull. It was Clint defying his orders and breaking his own cover on a nearby assignment to find and carry my unconscious body to safety.

It was 'Clint' who told him all that too I bet. Not my Clint though. My Clint would never have said anything to him, my Clint wouldn't even tell me all the details after all because he knew it would only hurt me in the long run. We even fought about that once. He only ever told me what I needed to know, but because it was a S.H.I.E.L.D assignment, and one that failed, 'it never happened'.

It was classified information by the time I woke up. What the assignment was, what we were after, who we were after, who we pissed off and who we were. The whole thing was nothing but black REDACTED bars.

My parents didn't just die, they 'never existed', I 'never existed'. S.H.I.E.L.D wipes you right out of reality if you die in the field on a failed Op, that's part of the agreement; you and what killed you never happened. If you're lucky, if you died well enough you get to keep one little piece of yourself and your name goes on a wall that only S.H.I.E.L.D gets to see. We got that much at least.

So I 'died' is far is the world was concerned, and spent almost three years in a coma, only to wake up with nothing. I didn't have a name or a past, not just because S.H.E.I.L.D got rid of it, but because the head trauma did as well.

I have no proof, because I have no memory beyond the day I woke up in a hospital bed, confused, afraid, and surrounded by hands.

"Do not fault them for doing their job, my dear." My expression must have told him what I was thinking or maybe he simply guessed. The thing is, either way he is wrong about it, I don't blame them, 'Clint' or 'Erik'. I blame him. I don't care if they told him really, but I care that he would use that information against me like this!

He is cruel for turning my suffering and misfortune to his own gain, and if I blamed anyone for how I feel right now, it would most definitely be him.

Its not as if I could ever tell him that though so instead I tell him the only safe thing I can think of, "I don't." A simple lie of omission "I should have known they did." And a truth. "But I, I still don't know you." And a risk.

"You sound so sure..." He leaves it hanging, waiting for me to fill the silence with the reasons behind my argument. "Well, I, I...you're a Prince." He still remains silent despite that attempt, but his lip does lift up a bit at the corner with the last word "From another..." I use the word "...realm." recalling Erik's voice telling me the vikings called them that instead of planet. "S.H.I.E.L.D would have told me if I knew a... " I deliberately do not use the word alien to avoid the risk of offending him and go instead with "...man from another world."

And still the silence continues from him, now though it happens without his gentle smirk to give me some confidence, and for the life of me I almost wish it would come back. I'm looking for any kind of reaction from him, just something, anything that I can judge his what his thoughts are at this point.

I was too focused on his face though. I'd been watching as he turned it to the side and let his eyes close, shaking his head softly, then I felt his fingers, no longer shielded in leather despite me seeing him make no motion that could have removed them, wrap their way around my wrist.

The grip is terrifyingly gentle, and unbearably secure. I know because my immediate reaction is to try to pull back from it; its skin on my skin! My body 'knows' that it's going to cause me pain, and result in horrible things! It's absolutely sure of it, it knows it will come, even if my mind 'knows' there shouldn't be anything painful about being touched.

After all, I'm touching him back. The hand he isn't restraining as wrapped around his other one, because it is tenderly cupped around the back of my neck, denying my retreat even more than the headboard already was!

My frantic "Please!" is interrupted by his soft order of "Look at me."

My eyes don't even consider denying him, in some sort of desperate hope that if I do what he wants he will just let me go!

But I'm so wrong. I know it as I feel his thumb trace an old scar below my wrist.

I know it more as he leans forward; ignoring my tiny whimper as he presses a kiss to the top of my head. I can feel effects invading my chest, its bony fingers crushing my lungs in their grasps, and those ghostly talons seek their way into my heart to spread their poison to the rest on me!

I know it more when my mind overcomes the delay and registers the words he whispered before he stood up, and walked away from me, taking that suffocating phantom with him and letting the air back in the room so I can at least breath is I relax into a creature of trembles.

"No kjære, a man...from yours." he said and when I remember how to make my mouth and tongue work to form words, the only word I can manage is "No."

NOTES FOR THE READERS:

The event I mention in Bangkok is a real event. If You Google "2006 Bangkok bombings" it will take you to the Wikipedia page. The death toll in that event is three, not including the injured of course. I am using the even for creative purposes only and apologize if anyone reading this is offended by my use of it or connected to the real event.

So, is it stands now Nora's list of conditions include her Amnesia, her Phobia to touch (Haphephobia is the official name if you were wondering), and her sulfate allergy. The sulfate allergy is less important than the other two but it will be explained later on in the story.

TRANSLATIONS OF DUNCAN BLACKWOODS SCOTTISH ACCENT.

IN STORY: "Yoo did sairrr."

TRANSLATION: You did sir.

IN STORY: "She jist woke up. Ah thocht Ah shoods make sure she took th' medicine ye left afair Ah sent someain tae git ye."

TRANSLATION: She just woke up. I thought I should make sure she took the medicine you left before I sent someone to get you.