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.
You can also find this story on ARCHIVE OF OUR OWN under the same title and pen name along with a place to post suggestions.
Don't forget to check out the Photobucket album listed on my profile page too. (My apologies. I didn't realize FF removed the links. I have corrected the problem in what way I can, so for those who like the visual additions, feel free to check them out.)
DAY THREE
CHAPTER EIGHTY
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1331 HOURS
OHIO STATE REFORMATORY
MANSFIELD OHIO, USA
NORA
"Leave him alone Loki." I heard the cadence of Loki's footsteps change as they stepped through the door. The quick pace that spoke of eagerness slowing as his mind processed the sight, then his steps growing heavy with hostility. I only let him take one step toward the doctor I stabbed before I told him why there was blood dripping of the syringe in my hand. "I just wanted to see if I could."
Plastic stole my brother from me, my lack of perceptional awareness stole my brother from me. The wide pink scratches on the side of my hand because Clint only made the zip tie tight enough to slow me down, that stole my brother from me and replaced him with iridescent blue eyes.
They put me here. After I saw those eyes I felt nothing. Just hollow, and the pressure of their hands on my skin as a pair of men, I think one of them was the blonde doctor, carried me into this room.
I didn't know where Loki went, but it didn't matter because I knew he was near. That was enough 'You just need to wait for me, here with him' and too much. Clint gave up himself, his freedom, his mind, his GODDAMNED FAMILY for me, to Loki. I wanted to hate Loki for that, I felt I needed to, but I only felt that when I forced myself to, and that felt worse.
I really just wanted someone's arms to hold me. I wanted figment, a broken dream, a ghost in my head. My god, I want a set of dogtags, stubble, and a cold hand without a name, I think I want 'him' more then I want anyone, save her. What is wrong with me.
I think I worried the doctor then because I let out a huff, that continued with a staccato pattern and a started rocking back in forth with my arms around me knees. I know I definitely worried him with what I did next.
In an effort not to upset Loki's 'woman' he was explaining what he wanted to do. Duncan stuck me with something, so he just wanted to take a little blood, and put it in a plastic container. If there was any drugs still in my system and certain colored lines would show up on the cup depending on what kind of drug. The technology was originally developed to warn people if something had been added to their drink, and S.H.I.E.L.D simply borrowed and improved upon it as a way to test in the field. He said it would be a simple procedure, and that's when I snatched his syringe.
Then first of my action I think was inspired by indiscernible panic. I knew something was horrible about those words. There was a soft echo over those words, a voice and an accent my mind didn't know, but made me stiffen like it was a snarl in the shadows.
I stuck a needle in his arm like one sticks a potato to see if it's cooked, punching a tiny hole into a man and yanked the syringe right back out, not even acknowledging or sympathizing with the fact humans feel pain. Not even when he stumbled back a step in surprise and covered the brimming red dot on his arm.
The second after it my intentions evolved into a sort of sadistic curiosity. I healed Clint, I hurt Duncan and I wanted to see what I could do to him. Now that I was calmer, now that no one's life was in danger, I wanted to see what this 'magick' I had actually was and would do. So I just grabbed his sleeve and his arm back up, his self preservation making him catch the instinct to hit me.
But nothing happened. With Clint, and Duncan, it just 'did'. All I needed to do was let part of me touch them. This time though, even with me touching his skin the blood just continued to bead as he freed his arm. I couldn't close the hole?
Then Loki turned the doorknob and saw a bleeding man with anger on his face.
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1333 HOURS
OHIO STATE REFORMATORY
MANSFIELD OHIO, USA
LOKI
When she stumbled out of that room, her shoulder leading from her use of it against the door, I saw the moment her heart broke at the sight. I pulled the scepter back from his chest, the shudder travelling up his spin as the darkness crowded in his eyes and faded as the glow pushed its way out.
There was pain on her face, and in her voice as her body lost all its strength, with the exception of her hand. She struck away my attempt to catch her fall with stinging force, choosing the feel of the ground hitting her knees over my embrace.
A sob bordering on a scream leaving her, before it echoed silently in the shaking of her shoulders until it stilled out of existence. It's only evidence the tears soaking into the dust beneath her.
Letting her see that was a necessary cruelty on my part. I could have easily done it out of her view, all it would have taken was the turn of a bolt in the door to keep her eyes from that sight. She needed to see it was truth though and not some trickery. She needed to see him stand there calmly and pay the terrible price he pays to make up for 'her mistakes', to give her a reason not to make them again.
It may have brought too much I noted with my own feeling of unease. The way her muscles didn't even twitch in reaction to the feel of the ungloved hands from strangers as they hauled her up to her feet. Was her heart so broken, it touched her sanity, or was this something else?
That concern grew when I returned to her after to checking on the preparations, finding her seated on the edge of a bath tub, with a drop of blood clinging to the end of a needle in a battle against gravity.
I placed the blame on him instantly, whether it was in truth or not, since I have no intention of punishing her over a mortal. Though I didn't know the reason she drew his blood, I imagined it was an act he provoked, intentionally or not. His 'intense academic curiosity' in her, in us, was not lost on me, even before I took possession of his mind.
But then she told me to leave him alone, and the emotional investment she filled that sentence with intrigued me. She spoke to save a man's life, but she spoke as if she was discussing produce. Does she really care that little now? The prospect of that, of her disregard for human life makes me dismiss him from our presence with equal investment, my curiosity taking precedent.
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1334 HOURS
OHIO STATE REFORMATORY
MANSFIELD OHIO, USA
NORA
The door closed and the first words Loki spoke to me are "Arnora, may I have the syringe?" and my first words as he lightly cradled my hand, seeking permission with his touch too, are "I-I fucking healed a dying man, but I couldn't stop the blood from a needle poke."
The sound of leather shifting greets my ears as my eyes notice the drop of his legs as he bends down to meet me at eye level, and the feel of his fingers hooking my chin to make that process quicker both start after I let out something between a huff and a chuckle. The next sentence I offer him and his concerned gaze is "Am I dangerous?"
"No." He said it to reassure me, his hand shifting from my cheek in a gentle gesture, but my next sentence seems to steal all purpose out of his touch in a very disquieting way. "Then can I see her?"
No... The look in his eyes can't be right, I'm just misinterpreting it. ...I can't be wrong, she has to be here. "Please, I want to see her, I have to see her. She's here right?" That's not sorrow in his eyes, I'm not seeing it right.
"Arnora." It's a lot harder to pretend I'm miss hearing his tone when he says my name.
"No..." I shake my head stubbornly, pulling my hands back away from his own gently pursuing one's. "No, you can't do this to me, you can't take this from me too. She's out there, she has to be. TELL ME SHE IS OUT THERE!"
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1335 HOURS
OHIO STATE REFORMATORY
MANSFIELD OHIO, USA
LOKI
Of course she wanted to see the child. I knew the question was coming, most likely sooner rather than later, just like I knew what it would bring out in her once I told her the 'truth'. "She is not."
At first she obstinately refuses to accept it, and tries to storm out of the room to search the complex herself, at least until my hand imprisons her wrist, then she resorted to what I was expecting and tried to hit me, with equal success. After that it was just a matter of outlasting her.
She struggles against me, trying desperately to wrench her hands out of mine as much as she tries to drive them into my own flesh, both efforts cripple as I manage to twist her around and put her back to my chest, with her own limbs tying her down.
After that her struggles took on a much more vocal variety, the volume of them amplified slightly thanks to the ceramic tiles and cement of the room.
I waited until she exhausted herself with both, her muscles resting weakly against mine as I held her up, and her cries wordless and hoarse from overuse. Only after that did I answer the questions I knew she didn't have the voice to ask. "She is in the Halls of Eljudnir and there is no one who can harm her. You have my word in that. She is safe and well."
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1337 HOURS
OHIO STATE REFORMATORY
MANSFIELD OHIO, USA
NORA
That name, Eljundir, means nothing to me, though the words safe and well bring some comfort, meager though it is. I wanted to hold her. God I wanted to hold my baby so bad.
I was so sure I was right, I had myself convinced. Loki was just waiting for me to remember her first, and then he would bring her through the door, because she had to be here. She was probably older then I remember, I don't know how we age, just that it's slow. Maybe she looked ten. She was probably in a purple dress just like in my dream, and her hair was in braids. She would laugh and be so happy to see us. We would be a family again. It would be worth giving up my brother.
But she wasn't here, and all that hope just hurts now.
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1338 HOURS
OHIO STATE REFORMATORY
MANSFIELD OHIO, USA
LOKI
When another minute passes in still silence I let my grip on her relax, her body slumping no more an inch before I lift her in the cradle of my arms. Now that her struggling was over I didn't think it right to leave her in a bathroom with broken tiles, chipping paint and a layer of dust from years of disuse.
In truth I found the whole complex to be subpar at best, despite the fact it suits my purpose for now, but at least the bedroom on the other side of the door would prove a more appropriate place for her to work out her grief.
She showed an equal lack of reaction when I set her legs against the crochet afghan, and then her side as I carefully laid her down, taking note of her closed eyes. I didn't believe that she had fallen asleep, but given the physical and mental exhaustion she was still recovering I thought it wise to give her that option, since I knew well enough she no longer had the disposition for a conversation.
The feel of her thin fingers curling around my wrist stop me before her words do. "Don't go."
THURSDAY, MAY 3RD 2012
1338 HOURS
OHIO STATE REFORMATORY
MANSFIELD OHIO, USA
NORA
My brain told told me to let him leave, but my tongue was a traitor, a tiny little traitor that ran on desperation. "Please don't leave me alone." I'm begging him not to leave me in here, and I hate myself a little for the relief I feel at the sound of his boots pivoting on the weathered floorboards.
I can feel the tension on my arm slacken as he and the wrist I'm still clutching reclaim the few feet he moved in his journey toward the door. I feel the mattress dip beneath his weight too as he settles on the mattress next to me, his uncaptured hand resting warmly over the back of mine. "You should rest my dear, you're exhausted."
"I can't, I won't." There's a desperation in those words that makes him catch my chin and turn my face to meet his, the request to see my eyes granted before he asks for it.
"You're afraid to sleep." It's less of a question from him and more of a statement of the obvious. "I am, I'm, I'm... losing. I'm losing Loki, these memories, this magick, I'm dreaming of blood, and battlefields and piles of dead dog." Consciousness has a way of clarifying things, or at the least rationalizing them and I think that grey scene in my dream was a battlefield, perhaps something from an old picture or film. The 'Red' though, I only want to believe its blood, but some part of me knows whatever that color represents is so much worse.
"This 'energy', I can feel it. It's like an itch deep inside my skull, inside my skin! It's so uncomfortable, like my limbs were asleep this whole time. I can only make it stop when I use it, but I can't even do that anymore." At this he finally sees fit to interupt me for a moment.
"Your powers are reemerging after what could be decades or centuries, the feeling will not seem so foreign in time, and you will remember how to control it. You just need to be patient."
"I DON'T WANT TO BE PATIENT LOKI! I..." It's not quite a shout but the volume does elevate before my exhaustion drops it back down just like my face does into my awaiting hands. My frustration is expressed silently, and in the heels of my hands pressing into the sockets of my eyes. "I feel like there is a fight going on in my head to stay myself, and I'm losing it. I can't do this, not this way, it either needs to slow down or speed the hell up."
"I need your help." I need a distraction. and after everything I think that's the first time I really asked Loki for something for me.
"Arnora, Nora." His use of my 'name' here is a bit of a surprise to me, and it shows by the way he smiles softly down at me is he continues on. "I never imagined this would be easy, I know you did not either." He whispers gently as he refers not just to my time here with him but what he knows has been true for me all along. Even when I believed I was just a human in S.H.I.E.L.D I knew conquering my amnesia would be a long, painful and probably frightening ordeal.
"It is more than a memory that I love about you. By whatever name you go, and whatever person you may become now, no matter how different, my affection for you will not change. I will not abandon you."
The hand of his that brushes against my cheek has the thumb now lightly tracing against the thin line of skin just below my bottom lip, those jeweled eyes of his searching mine at the show of emotions in them, right before those emotions show in my lips.
Sometimes thinking just gets in the way. Sometimes words just get in the way. Sometimes it's just actions that explain yourself best, what you want best. I've wanted to touch people for three years, to really touch people. A handshake, hug, a distraction. A kiss. Why shouldn't he be able to kiss me, the man I have a child with?
I caught him off guard. The pupils in his eyes are still wide as I pull back my lips from his still ones, the hand still on my cheek like he forgot he could move it. I almost want to chuckle at why I know the reason for his surprise. Clint, the Kenna, I have so many reasons I should be furious, should be fighting him, but... Dammit just for once I don't want to be alone, I don't want to lose anything else, I just want to be a little selfish. I think I deserve that.
"Don't be afraid of me?" He says it like a question after a moment and a decision flashing over his eyes, even though those words shouldn't be a question at all.
I don't fear him in this, I know what he's asking, a courtesy he doesn't have because I already gave this too willingly, just now and before I even really knew who he was. I don't speak my answer, but he seems to see it anyway.
The first soft caress of cool plush skin as it tugs lightly against mine draws a soft gasp from behind my lips. It is only when the second brush happens I realize my own are moving now to match him in his efforts. I can see the smile I feel against my lips in his eyes. Then I don't see anything else, because now my eyes just want to close. The feel of his hand drifting into the hairs on my neck making me shiver for other reasons than his cold touch.
NOTES FOR THE READERS:
If any of you check the PHOTOBUCKET albums, I was behind on posting those due to a lack of internet for a while, I was using my phone's HOTSPOT to post the chapters. Anyways, the albums for chapter 73 and onward are now up.