"Stark," Tony Stark said, answering his phone. Loki heard tension in the billionaire's voice. Good. They should all be tense. This was not a social call to chit chat and catch up.
"I take it you've also deduced that something is wrong with Jak?" Loki asked.
"The FBI is claiming that they don't have her," Stark responded, "I'm trying to figure out if they're lying to keep her away from us, or if she never made it to the city."
"If they are holding her, they took her phone," Loki told him, "This is the second morning she's been gone and she has not called me. One morning I could understand, perhaps she is busy dealing with agents. But she would have at least texted me back by now."
"I'll track her phone."
"Find her, Stark, or I will forget all vows I made to Odin about my reformation. Heads will roll. I don't care if I have to burn down your whole government," Loki hung up and looked around the room. Thor raised a brow at him, but did not ask questions or caution patience.
Rogers had his arms crossed and raised a brow at Loki, signaling him to relay the conversation.
"Stark says the FBI claims she is not there. He will track her phone and see if he can find her that way."
"I am not opposed to raiding a federal building," Wanda said from where she sat in the corner. A lamp floated next to her and the lightbulb shattered when she flicked her wrist. "How long will we give Tony before we try to find her ourselves?"
"Three hours," Rogers decided. "That's more than enough time to track her phone. He'll let us know where it is, we'll go to that location, and we'll see what we can find from there."
"That agent," Loki seethed, "Agent Feuer. I knew there was something of a lie about him. We should have never let her go with him."
"We should have escorted her ourselves," Thor finally spoke up. "I should have flown above the vehicle to ensure it made it to the correct destination."
Loki was surprised to hear the genuine regret and frustration in his brother's voice. Thor liked Jak, but hardly interacted with her most of the time. He'd made more of an effort since Loki had started dating her, but still, it was a bit of a shock to hear that Thor cared so much about her safety. Loki didn't let his surprise show, instead nodding silently when his brother looked at him.
"Janitor or no," Thor said, "She is one of us. She was under our protection and we failed her. Do not worry, Loki, it will not be long before we locate her."
They dispersed, planning on coming together in three hours, or whenever Stark called next. Wanda said that she would try to locate Jak's mind from a distance. Steve was going to call up any of his former SHIELD friends who had gone to the FBI after the fall of SHIELD. Thor and Loki walked off together, in the direction of Jak's room, to see if they could find anything there.
"We will find her, brother," Thor said, patting Loki's shoulder as they walked down the corridor, "And if we cannot, then I will go to Asgard and see what Heimdall knows."
"I'd rather no one in Asgard learn of my relationship with Jaklyn," Loki said tensely. He did not want Odin to ridicule him or take him away from Midgard as a punishment.
"Father might be glad to know that you have found someone- "
"Or he might use her against me," Loki interrupted, "Honestly, Thor, he barely tolerates Jane. Do you think he will have any more kindness for Jak?"
"He barely tolerates Jane because she is mortal," Thor said quietly, "Father… does not want me to love someone who he expects to die soon. Jaklyn could live as long as we do. You never know, Father may like her."
"I doubt he would care," Loki replied bitterly, "He would see her past of villainy and detest her at once. You know it to be true."
They both fell silent for a moment.
"I will not tell him you are seeing her," Thor assured, his voice soft, "But I hope you will do so in your own time. Father may not deserve to be part of your life, but he does still love you."
Loki scowled and made no response, though a dozen snarky ones bubbled to his mind. Rather than insult the man he'd once called father, he instead opened the door to Jak's room and began looking around. Thor joined him, but there was nothing to be found.
She kept her space neat and tidy. The majority of her personal belongings were clothing and had gone with her in her suitcase. Everything else was, for the most part, bland and looked to be standard issue prison items. Or, the luxury Stark version of standard issue prison items.
The blanket on her bed, however, was still the green one that Loki had made for her out of his coat. He'd seen it in the room before she'd gone missing, but seeing it in this space without her around made him notice it more. The whole room lacked personality, but she kept using the gift he'd given her.
"Perhaps we should check her laptop?" Thor suggested, picking up the small silver device. "I'm surprised she didn't take it with her."
"She may have forgotten to pack it," Loki remarked, taking the computer and opening it to the lock screen, "I was… distracting her while she was packing."
"I don't want to know the details," Thor declared immediately. Loki could have assured him that nothing had really happened, or that the real reason she might have forgotten was because Loki had brought up the Winter Soldier and made her nervous. He still felt confusion and anger when thinking of what Wanda had told him. And he'd never gotten Jak to clear it up, so he was left to his imagination about just how close she and Bucky Barnes had been when they'd met before.
"I wonder what her password might be," Loki considered the device in front of him. If they wanted to learn anything from it, they would probably have to give it over to Stark. Or, perhaps Natasha Romanoff.
"It's a longshot that there might be anything helpful on there anyway," Thor shrugged and looked under the bed for more clues. "It would only help if she left of her own volition, which we know she did not."
That sentence threw a punch into Loki's gut as he remembered the conversation he and Jak had before she left. She did say she wanted some time to herself. Perhaps she had run off. Maybe she'd grown tired of the FBI's mistreatment and decided to start over somewhere else. Or maybe Agent Feuer had succeeded in convincing her that Loki was showing signs of an abusive partner. And now the FBI was pretending they'd lost her so that they could hide her away under a new name, with a new identity.
"What if she did leave on purpose?" Loki asked, sitting in her chair and setting her laptop on the desk.
"Why would she?" Thor popped out from under the bed and looked at Loki in confusion.
"She came to her senses," Loki shrugged, "Finally saw me as the monster that everyone else does and fled."
"No," Thor said immediately. He stood up and put his hands on his hips. "Do not weave a falsehood to convince yourself of this nonsense, Loki!"
"It makes sense!" Loki argued.
"It does not!" Thor took a step closer and poked Loki in the chest, "Sometimes you act as if no one could ever love you and you need to stop it. If I can love you after you've literally stabbed me in the back dozens of times, then how much more could Jaklyn love you when you have taken such care with your relationship?"
Loki opened his mouth to protest, but Thor shot him a glare. He smiled wryly and started to say something about how Thor was simplifying the situation, but he couldn't finish the statement before his brother pulled him into a hug. Then he couldn't have finished his sentence if he'd wanted to, for all of his breath was squeezed from his lungs.
"You have done monstrous things, but you are not a monster," Thor told him sternly before letting him go and looking him in the eye, "Whoever took Jaklyn is a monster and we'll make sure they get what they deserve."
"And what if we find Jak and she tells us that she wants nothing to do with me?" Loki challenged. "What then?"
"Then we do as the Midgardians do," Thor patted his shoulder, "Buy a gallon or two of ice cream, watch a sad movie, discuss how you could do so much better than her anyway, and then move on, yes?"
Loki couldn't help but laugh at the image Thor conjured in his mind. He wasn't sure that he agreed that he could do much better than Jaklyn, or that anyone else in the nine realms would ever be romantically interested in him again. But Thor was right. He was a prince of Asgard. He had dignity to uphold. If they found Jak to be safe and wishing to be away from him, then he would let her go. Even if it hurt and he wanted to hold on. Besides, he hardly knew Jak. He wasn't madly in love with her or anything. Just concerned. And protective. But it wasn't like he was obsessed with her.
Loki's phone rang and he nearly fell over with the speed at which he fumbled with it to answer it. It was Stark.
"What did you find?" He demanded immediately.
"Her phone didn't make it far from the Compound," Stark said, frustration in his voice, "It's in town. Looks like probably on a curb or sidewalk. I already contacted Vision to go find it and see if he can get any other data from it."
"What other clues do we have?" Loki asked. He wanted to set out to find her immediately, but he didn't know where to start looking. "I could disguise myself as Jimmy Woo and go investigate the FBI dorm she was meant to be taken to, perhaps they are hiding her there."
"Whoa there, Reindeer Games, let's not jump straight to breaking the law," Stark said, "Jaklyn's lawyer is working on the FBI to see if they have her. Let's work off the assumption that they're telling the truth for now and that we need to find her elsewhere."
"Let us assume the Winter Soldier succeeded in his mission," Loki said, pacing the small room with Thor watching his every step. "What measures have you taken to locate him?"
"Steve wants us to keep it a secret from most of the world that Bucky is still alive, so we don't have much to go off, but one of my people has a possible sighting near the border."
"Mexico?" Thor asked.
"Canada," Loki corrected, "We're in New York, Thor."
"Right."
"I have someone on it already, and Sam is flying out to help. I've got Friday monitoring as much camera footage and social media as she can to keep an eye out that way, but there's only so much we can do. This guy has been a ghost for decades, he's a master of staying hidden."
"He has not had to contend with me before," Loki snarled, "We're going to find the bastard and I don't care what I promised Rogers, I'll tear Barnes limb from limb."
He briefly recalled what Wanda had said: Jak would not be happy if Loki killed Bucky. In the moment, with frustration rising, it only made him want to hurt the other man more. Let the so-called ghost actually die as everyone thought he had in the forties.
Loki and Thor went to find the rest of the Avengers and fill them in on the situation. Rhodey and Natasha were on a mission, but the rest continued to plot how to get their janitor back.
A note from the author: I love writing Thor and Loki bonding. It's so fun to have some brotherly love in fanfics... I wish we could have gotten more of it in the MCU canon.
Anyway, thanks for reading! Special thanks to CrimsonWitch008 for your review!
Until next time!
