The battle of New York had been hard fought and hard won, but it had been won. Now all that was left for Natsha and other Avengers was to gather in Stark's tower to confront Loki.
He was on the top floor, lying in a crater perfectly fit to the size of his body. Natasha kept her gaze on him as the Avengers silently took position to confront him. Loki's eyes were directed towards the ceiling, but Natasha thought his expression seemed too fraught, too distracted, for him to actually be looking at it.
He looked lost in his own thoughts. Knowing what she knew of him, though, that face could just be a ploy, an attempt to get the Avengers to let down their guard so he could strike. She noticed a slight twitch of the fingers on his right hand.
The Avengers kept silent, waiting on the Captain's order, waiting on Loki to acknowledge that they were there. A few tense moments passed while Loki lay on the ground and the Avengers, ready to attack, watched.
Natasha tensed a little at the creaking wheeze that came from Loki, breaking the silence. The rest of the Avengers startled as well, each of them shifting in anticipation of Loki's next move.
Trembling, Loki's arms unfolded from where they had been resting over his stomach and moved to his sides as he began to push himself up. With a grimace and a groan, Loki slowly managed to sit up, his eyes still unfocused.
For another moment Loki sat there, his torso bobbing slightly as if he was having trouble staying up. His eyelids flickered, nearly shutting, but eventually remaining half-open. With a small shimmer of green, a knife appeared in Loki's right hand.
Natasha could hear the tension of Clint's bow string as he pulled it back.
Loki- seemingly still unaware of their presence- focused his sight onto the knife, as though he was taking in its details. He rotated his wrist so the blade was pointing towards him. With a deep inhale, he held up the blade and tilted back his head, like he was going to-
"No!" Thor boomed, lunging forward- Natasha heard the thunk of his hammer hitting the ground- and grabbing Loki by the wrist just as Loki brought the blade towards his own neck.
Thor's grip forced Loki's hand to open, the knife clattering on the ground. With another shimmer of green a knife appeared in Loki's other hand, but before he could do anything with it Thor grabbed that wrist as well, making Loki drop the knife.
"You don't get to do that!" Thor bellowed as Loki struggled to pry himself from Thor's hold, "You don't get to avoid the consequences of your actions by trying to end your life! Not here! Not again!" Loki was momentarily flung back and forth as Thor shook him by the wrists.
Loki began to thrash against Thor's grip, throwing his whole body into his desperate movements. Thor's hold on Loki was unrelenting, keeping Loki's wrist in place in the space between them. Loki jumped up and planted one of his feet on Thor's chest as he used the other to kick at Thor.
"You get everything!" Loki snarled as he tried to stomp on Thor's face, Thor tilting his head to the side to avoid the blow. "It is all yours, Odinson!" Loki's next stomp managed to hit Thor right in the nose, Natasha heard a crunch. "Can't you let me have this one thing?" Loki's tone almost sounded pleading, but that couldn't be right.
Thor, blood now running from his nose, turned himself quickly with what seemed to be an immense amount of force, spinning in place to make Loki's legs fly out away from Thor. Thor stopped abruptly and Loki- wrists still locked in Thor's unrelenting grip- fell onto his knees.
"Midgard is not yours to have, Loki!"
Captain America spoke so softly that Natasha almost didn't hear him when he uttered "I don't think that's what he meant," in a concerned tone.
Oh.
Oh, of course.
This was his ploy.
Loki was trying to get the Avengers to treat him with sympathy, probably so he could find a weak moment to strike, or steal back the Scepter or the Tesseract, or escape, or manage whatever combination of those options he could.
To Loki's credit, it had caught Natasha off guard… for half a minute. She hadn't expected someone so proud to purposefully lower himself to acting so pathetic, no matter the benefit. But against all expectations, here Loki was, playing suicidal.
It was embarrassing.
Natasha must've missed something Loki did, because the next moment the Captain surged forward and shoved his balled fist into Loki's mouth with a grunted "No you don't."
"What are you doing, Captain?" Thor demanded.
"Loki was about to bite through his tongue," the Captain turned to look at Loki, his eyes meeting Loki's with a stern expression, "which I've seen plenty of guys try, and let me tell you, Loki, it does not work. You're only going to cause yourself a whole lotta pain. So I'm going to take my fist out, and you're going to cut it out, got it?" Loki broke eye contact with the Captain and looked down to the floor. Captain America grabbed Loki's shoulder and shook him slightly, "I said got it?"
Loki's eyes darted up to meet the Captain's and he nodded- near imperceptibly because of the obstruction in his mouth. The Captain pulled his fist out, he shook his hand out as Loki stretched his jaw into a toothy snarl.
With the Captain no longer in the way, Loki returned to struggling against Thor. Trying to pull his arms away as he leaned back onto his feet, Loki attempted to stand from his awkward position on the floor.
"Would you quit it?" from behind Loki, the Captain placed his hands on Loki's shoulders, pushing Loki back down into a kneel. "You lost, it's over, quit struggling."
This only made Loki more defiant against the hands on him, trying to push up from the Captain's hold and pull away from Thor's grip at the same time.
Thor let out a sudden yell and pulled away. Around Loki's wrists, his armor flaked and fell away, revealing blue spreading on his skin underneath. Natasha could track the progress of the spread as more and more of Loki's sleeves fell away. Soon the Captain pulled back with a hiss just before the blue reached Loki's shoulders.
"Loki! What trick is this?" Thor yelled, but Loki did not seem to register what Thor had said, he was looking at his blue hands with panic in his eyes just as the blue passed over his face, turning his green eyes red. Lines etched themselves onto his skin, making a simple pattern.
Loki's armor had fully fallen away now, revealing an under layer of a sleeveless shirt and pants that were snug to Loki's body. Natasha thought for a moment that the dark blue and purple color scheme of it didn't seem to fit what she thought of Loki. Blue skin and raised lines were visible along his exposed arms. His fingernails were black and sharp almost like they had been manicured by a goth teenager.
Loki made a movement like an attempt to stand up but stumbled onto the floor, his hands leaving a layer of frost on the stone as they made contact with it. Loki stumbled up and then back down again. Natasha realized too late his objective as Loki reached out for the discarded knife, the Captain seemed to notice this at the same time as he reached out to grab Loki, only for Thor to intervene.
"No!" Thor cried, grabbing the Captain's arm to stop him from grabbing Loki, "His skin will freeze yours!"
With a desperate grab, Loki got his hands on the knife. A high pitched squealing noise emitted from the knife as it shattered, nearly exploding, into miniscule pieces in Loki's grip.
"No!" Loki cried. Without the bulk of armor and leather covering him, Natasha could see his chest heaving as he struggled for breath. Loki shot out to grab the other knife just as the Captain made a move to pick it up, but Loki managed to snatch it out from under the Captain's hand, but just as before the knife came apart under Loki's touch.
"No no no!" Loki yelled, his voice cracking with the exclamation. There was another flicker of green at his fingertips but nothing appeared. Loki frantically looked around, his eyes coming to rest on something behind Natasha, it only took Natasha the slightest of turns to realize that Loki was looking at the Hulk.
Again Loki tried to force himself to his feet, launching himself up in the Hulk's direction before stumbling back down to the floor, his knees hitting the stone with a crack and the palms of his hands slapping onto the floor. His face hovered inches above the floor as he took a few shuddering breaths.
Loki pushed himself up to a kneel, flinging his hair back, eyes fixed on the Hulk. "Well?" he demanded between the heavy wheezes, "finish this, monster!"
Natasha felt her heart stop at the sound of the Hulk's growl in response. She took a hurried step away from the Hulk and turned to see just as he began to change back into Bruce Banner.
Loki looked on as Bruce stumbled back into his form, holding his head with a groan as he steadied himself against Stark's armor. "Oh come now…" Loki paused to take another breath, "you can't…" he wheezed again, "pretend to be a man now!" Loki heckled between gasping breaths.
He pushed himself to his feet again, and this time managed to stand all the way up. But the moment he reached a full stand his eyes flickered close and Loki collapsed onto the floor. He lay where he landed completely unmoving.
For the next fifteen seconds, the Avengers stared at Loki's motionless form in such silence that they could've heard a pin drop.
Bruce, having steadied himself enough to stand on his own, with one hand clutching the waistband of his oversized pants so they still covered him, asked, "What happened?" finally breaking the silence.
"Well we won- hooray!-" Stark exclaimed, "and when we came to capture Loki he tried to off himself, and then turned blue and fainted."
"Yeah, is he dead?" Clint asked, and Natasha couldn't tell by his tone if he was hopeful or irritated at the prospect.
"I know not." Thor said, his voice dripping with worry, "but we cannot touch him to check."
"He is still alive," JARVIS announced from the ceiling, causing both the Captain and Thor to look up in surprise, "My sensors can detect a heartbeat. I would recommend wearing gloves to touch him as my readings show his body temperature is currently about thirty-three degrees Fahrenheit, and though that is over one-hundred degrees hotter than his body was a minute ago, it is still ill advisable to make direct skin contact at such a temperature."
'Noted, JARVIS, thank you." The faceplate of Stark's helmet flipped up. "So, what the hell is up with reindeer games suddenly turning into Mr. Snow Miser?"
Thor did not answer, his face was clenched into a frown as he pulled a small pouch from his side and reached his hand- which Natasha noticed was now black on some parts of his palms and fingers- into it with a grimace. And then reached near his whole arm into the pouch- eliciting a "Whoa!" from Stark- seemingly rummaging around a much bigger space than was logically possible.
"Loki is a shapeshifter by nature." Thor told them as he continued to search through the pouch. "He shifted himself into a frost giant to force us to let go of him, as their touch is cold enough to burn skin." Thor exhaled a soft "ah!" and then a pained grunt, and pulled his arm and a pair of Asgardian handcuffs out of the pouch.
"Didn't shift into much of a 'giant,' did he?" Stark joked as Thor knelt down next to Loki and placed the handcuffs on him so Loki's arms were locked together in front of him, "looks like he's just frost to me." Tony laughed. "Though it's not like he could just make more matter, the laws of physics still makes him its bitch just like it does everybody else."
Thor stood up, "No, no, Loki has taken many forms, regardless of size." Thor looked down at Loki with a deep frown on his face. "He has, in past, described the process of shifting as reflexive, never having to consider the specifics of the form he was changing to for it to be accurate. I…" Thor looked up at the rest of the group, "I do not understand why he looks so much the same. He should be the size of a frost giant."
"Can we back up?" Bruce asked, pressing the hand that wasn't holding his pants to his temple, "Loki tried to kill himself? How does that make sense for a guy like him?"
Natasha responded "He was faking," at the same moment the Captain said "It makes a lot of sense," and Thor grumbled "He has tried before."
The three looked at each other. Thor just as quickly turned his gaze down to the floor.
Stark clicked his tongue inside his cheek, "Yeah I'm gonna go with Natalie- Natasha?- Nat. I'm going with Nat on this one, he's faking," Stark turned to look at Thor, "probably was when he 'tried before,' too."
There was a rumble as a clap of thunder echoed through the New York sky.
"I am not sure," Thor began with a rumble in his voice rougher than the thunder that preceded it, "how one 'fakes' falling into a collapsing wormhole."
Stark's face paled.
"Loki traveled through a collapsing wormhole and survived?" Bruce asked in the tone of someone who was genuinely shocked by what he just heard. "Your species can do that?"
Thor shook his head, "We all thought it was certain death for him when he fell, as it would be for any of us." Thor turned to look down on Loki again, his eyes narrowing, "perhaps he shifted into a form that could survive…"
With that Stark regained his composure, "See?" he exclaimed, "faking it! He knew he could shapeshift! He was playing you then and he's playing us now!"
Natasha nodded, "yeah, this is a play." There was no doubt in her mind that Loki would never try to end his life. "He's hoping to prey on our sympathy."
The Captain crossed his arms. "I don't think he is. He…" The Captain frowned, looking at Loki with a deep expression. "I've captured a lot of enemies, seen… seen a lot of guys try what Loki did just now." The Captain's frown turned into a proper scowl, "some guys are just scared, acting on orders to not get captured no matter what. They don't actually want to die, and if they don't succeed at first they don't try again. But…" he looked at Loki's unconscious form, "some guys mean it, and some of them won't stop trying until they succeed."
"This psycho's whole shtick is manipulating people!" Stark said, "He knew he wasn't going to succeed and was just trying to scare us!"
The Captain took a strained, irritated breath, "You think he knew he wouldn't succeed when he tried to goad the Hulk into attacking him?"
Banner reeled his head, "He did?"
"Yeah, but you turned right back into yourself when he tried." Stark told him.
"I did?"
"Yeah, and he continued to goad you into changing back and attacking him as you did." The Captain huffed. "But sure, he, 'knew he wouldn't succeed,' right."
When Natasha had first met him, she hadn't realized that Captain America could be so scathingly sarcastic.
"If he's resilient enough to survive… space? he probably knew he was resilient enough to survive the Hulk." Natasha pointed out.
"I believe Miss Romanoff is correct." The voice of JARVIS echoed from above them. "Loki was attacked by the Hulk during the battle."
A screen appeared over Stark's bar, security footage of the room they were in now began to play, showing Loki crashing in through the window, hitting the opposite facing wall (Natasha now noticed a corresponding bit of missing masonry to where Loki collided,) shortly followed by the Hulk, charging at Loki. Loki yelled something at the Hulk, causing a brief moment of pause before the Hulk grabbed Loki by his ankle and repeatedly smashed him against the ground like a child with a doll they didn't like, leaving Loki lying in the crater they found him in minutes ago.
"There we go!" Stark declared, "he knew he would survive the Hulk! He was just trying to fake us out!" He looked pointedly at Steve, "so stop trying to get us to feel bad for the genocidal maniac!"
Steve pulled back with an expression of offense. "Feel bad for- feel bad for him? I'm not saying we should throw a pity party for the guy, I'm saying we need to treat his attempts seriously because an actively suicidal prisoner poses a huge threat to everyone around him."
"And is the guy that's been trying to kill us any more of a threat now that he's 'trying' to kill himself?" Stark asked sarcastically.
"Obviously he's more of a threat now than he would be when he actually valued his life!" Steve shouted in clear frustration, "A prisoner that's not afraid of being killed is going to be willing to take bigger risks because the consequences don't matter. He tried to piss off the Hulk, even if it couldn't kill him, do you really think all of us would be so lucky had Loki succeeded in riling him up?"
"You make a good point, Captain," Thor said, "even if this is one of my br- one of Loki's deceptions, we should still treat him with caution."
"Okay but, like, why not just let the guy off himself?" Stark asked, a slight jovial tone to hide behind with the claim he was joking should the suggestion not go over.
"Because that isn't justice!" Steve proclaimed as Thor thundered "Absolutely not!" Banner said "That would be messed up," and Clint mumbled "Fuck no."
"Okay, jeez, I was just joking." Stark said predictably.
"So what do we do now?" Banner asked.
Steve launched into a lecture about practices for keeping a suicidal prisoner. The takeaway Natasha got from it was that Loki's mobility would need to be restrained so he couldn't attempt to harm himself. Thor piped in about the chains he had that should be able to hold Loki, and Stark told them about the weapons testing facility in the basement where they could secure Loki against one of the building's support beams.
Steve was in the middle of explaining how to set up and interrogation when Thor interrupted-
"I think questioning Loki may be useless. He is a liar by nature and has spent a millennia honing his craft of deception." He spoke solemnly.
Natasha frowned at that, taking offense. "I was able to get him to reveal his play with the Hulk."
"And that was all you were able to get him to reveal." Thor rumbled. "I do not think he gave you anything that he was not willing to give up. Any attempt to get him to speak now will only serve to his advantage, he will talk circles around us."
"If I may, I think I have a solution for that, my prince." A velveteen voice projected through the room, causing Natasha and the other human avengers quite a shock. There was a translucent golden head floating in the middle of the room.
"Heimdall!" Thor exclaimed, a relieved smile stretching across his lips. "I have been calling for you since I arrived on Midgard, what happened?"
"As soon as Loki became aware of your presence, I was no longer able to see Midgard. He was blocking my sight until a short while ago. I believe Loki lost his concentration on the spell when he ended up in that," he explained, nodding over to the crater where they had found Loki, "I thought you would benefit to know that there is, a short distance from here, a man with the ability to tell if someone is speaking the truth or lying."
"What." Stark said flatly in clear disbelief.
"And you think this man could question Loki, and see through his lies?" Thor asked.
Heimdall chuckled lightly, "Well not see through, per say," he said, "but I believe he is skilled enough to engage with Loki in a battle of words and come out with more information than Loki intended to reveal."
"Who?" Clint asked, straightening his posture to attention, "Where? How do we contact him?"
"I can speak to him and lead him here if that is what you would like." Heimdall told them, looking pointedly over at Thor at the last bit, making it clear to Natasha that Heimdall would only do this on Thor's request and no one else's.
Natasha frowned, she didn't like having her own capabilities dismissed, being told that she couldn't manage to get info from Loki. But. Also she was curious about what this man (god?) meant by someone who could tell the difference between a truth and a lie. And, she would never admit it, but she'd want to test her own ability to lie against him.
"Well, fuck yeah, send the lie detector our way!" Stark exclaimed with a laugh that Natasha thought sounded a little hysterical.
"Yeah, bring this guy here right now." Clint demanded. Heimdall looked over at Thor.
"My prince?" He asked.
Thor stood with his arms crossed and a frown lining his face as he looked down at Loki's unconscious form.
"Call him here, Heimdall." Thor eventually said. The golden image disappeared from the room and everyone was silent for another moment.
"Alright, so we need to bring Loki down to the basement and get him set up for an interrogation." The Captain led.
Natasha and the others nodded in agreement, setting out to do what was needed. Natasha, Thor, and The Captain brought Loki down to the basement while Stark took Banner to his room for a change of clothes and Clint contacted Fury with an update on the situation. As Natasha was on the elevator down to the basement, she heard confirmation on her com that SHIELD agents were coming up on the other elevator to secure the Tesseract and the scepter.
A few minutes into securing Loki in the basement, the glowing golden head of Heimdall returned to tell them that the man was on his way, and would arrive in approximately a quarter of an hour.
Natasha and the others finished securing Loki and setting up the area for an interrogation. Loki was held standing up against a nine square foot pillar by a long thick chain wound tightly around him and the pillar several times over, his torso and arms near completely covered by chains. A table and chair was set up in front of him. Natasha communicated with JARVIS to ensure the cameras in the room were pointed towards Loki.
"And he won't be able to… magic himself out of this, right?" Captain had asked as he'd held Loki's unconscious body up against the wall by his shoulders while Natasha and Thor wound the chains around the pillar and Loki.
"No, the cuffs I put on him drain the wearer of their magic. Even if he managed to get the cuffs off he would need to regain his energy before he could use his magic again." Thor told him with an air of confidence.
Natasha frowned, "What would he need to do to regain his energy?"
"Loki would need the same things I imagine a midgardian like you would also need, food, sleep, time." Thor said with a casual air, "though he would need much more of it than mortals like you."
They took a last check over the setup they had in place, and with a confident nod from Captain, they left Loki in the room, locking the heavy, near vault-like door behind them before they took the elevator back up to Stark's penthouse.
When they arrived the room was a flurry of activity with SHIELD agents securing the room. As they exited the elevator a group of strike team agents were waiting to get on the elevator, one of the agents holding a long case that Natasha noted was just the right size to hold a certain scepter.
Sitting at the stools by the bar were Stark and Banner, both now wearing a change of clothing that clearly came from Stark's closet. Banner looked slightly uncomfortable with the pants he was wearing, shifting his legs awkwardly as he sat. Stark had a drink in his hand. Clint was leaning behind the bar counter, typing on his phone.
"So you got Mr. Frost Miser all tied up in the basement?" Stark asked as they approached.
"Yeah, he's secure." Captain answered as he sat down backwards on the stool next to Stark so he was facing mostly towards the group and away from the bar, "We won't have to worry about him for now."
"Good, good," Stark nodded, taking another sip, "and we're ready for this lie-detecting guy to interrogate him?"
"We shouldn't just throw him in a room with Loki," Natasha told them, "We need to talk to this guy first, make sure he's as good as Heimdall says, and to make sure knows enough about the situation to actually be helpful."
"Yeah," Captain agreed, "and we should make a list of questions for him to ask Loki."
"Sir?" The robotic voice of JARVIS interjected, "A man has just entered the lobby of Stark tower, he says he was requested, I suspect he is the individual you're discussing."
"Okay, Jarv, send him up." Stark said with a swish of his drink to bring it to his mouth as he finished speaking.
A moment passed before JARVIS announced "Done. He's on the elevator now, sir. Arriving in 43 seconds."
Natasha glanced over towards the elevator and then towards the rest of the group. They all had done the same as her, all looking towards the elevator in anticipation. She looked back to the elevator, watching the number above the doors rise as the elevator got closer to their floor. Natasha had no idea what sort of person was going to come out of that elevator, she didn't know enough to even be able to make a prediction.
The numbers changing above the door slowed down and stopped finally at the number of their floor. Punctuated by a ding, the door opened.
Natasha was right that she couldn't have predicted what sort of person to expect.
The first thing she saw was the disheveled state of the man. He was dressed in a cheap suit that had a large tear on the shoulder seam. Covered in dirt, blood on his split lip, and a redness and swelling on his face that made Natasha conclude that he had recently been hit in the jaw.
And it took a moment to notice, but his knuckles were freshly bruised.
Which was especially notable because judging by the (cracked - probably earlier today) sunglasses he wore and the white stick with red lines on the end that he held, the man was blind.
"So you're the human lie detector?" Stark said in what Natasha assumed was meant as some semblance of a greeting as the man walked into the room, swaying the cane out on the floor in front of him as he walked.
"If that's how you want to put it." The man said, turning to walk towards where he heard Stark's voice and stopping when his cane hit the wall of the bar, "Hi. My name's Matt Murdock."
So how about that Loki season 2? (⬅️ has not watched it, was too busy rewatching the storm scene from ofmd season 2 on loop.)
I posted this on Ao3 like a week ago, I have other Loki fics and art there that I haven't/wont post here, link to my ao3 profile in my profile.
I started writing this fic with the intention of the first chapter ending at a much further point than this, but then realized I needed to split it up into three chapters or else it would have been over ten thousand words, I've got chapter two mostly written and I'm aiming to post it within the next week, and I have chapter three outlined and I'm aiming to have that posted by the end of November.
Sorry to anyone who got tripped up by Thor using the term "collapsing wormhole" but I simply did not want to derail that conversation with clarification over terms, plus Thor shortly lived with astrophysicists so I had him say "collapsing wormhole" and called it a day.
At one point writing this I ended up thinking "is this too much of the avengers arguing with each other?" and then I remembered that that was in fact also a significant portion of The Avengers (2012) and paid that worry no mind.
Aaaand if you're wondering about that ship tag... let me direct you to my side tumblr
Frostdevil Central that is dedicated to shipping Loki and Matt Murdock. But if you're not willing to delve into that pit of insanity, the surface level gist of it is: Loki is known for lying and Matt Murdock can tell when people are lying. Have they ever interacted in canon? No. But one time in the comics Daredevil threw a sword that got swallowed by Laufey, who had recently eaten Loki, and Loki used the sword to cut himself out, so it's basically canon, right? Right?
I have a 49 song playlist that I made for this fic, songs that go with this chapter (or at least listened to a lot while writing it) are: Knockin' On Heaven's Door (specifically the live cover by Avril Lavigne), The Great Below (by Nine Inch Nails, also specifically the live version), Loki x Daredevil (a theme mashup by Krutikov Music), IM FINE (by Royal & the Serpent), and Run From Me (by Timber Timbre)
I hope you guys enjoyed this! To say I enjoy comments is vast understatement, please leave comments, I will jump for joy and go "yippee!" when I get one.