Chapter Text
No alarms sounded, it all happened too fast and no one had given a second proper thought to the course of action. Containment was the priority.
Loki's eyes scanned the room as the guards ran around shouting about danger and getting everything ready and the god raised an eyebrow in a silent question. His answer came shortly after as the secure door of his cage opened.
"What is the meaning of this?!" His voice was demanding and his demeanor showed anger, but once Doctor Banner was inside the cage with him and the door closed, he didn't need an answer to know what was going on. It was fairly obvious that his plan to unleash the Hulk had backfired on him.
Bruce was breathing slowly, his fist curled at his sides, his eyes closed, but his jaw was closed so tightly it looked painful.
"Shut... Up..." the scientist hissed and his eyes snapped open.
Loki took a few steps backwards until his back collided with the glass surface and glanced uncertainty over his shoulder where the rest of the Avengers were waiting in doubt.
His eyes darted around the room, Black Widow's expression was blank, but Loki could see the unspoken statement there:
This was what you wanted, wasn't it?
Banner crouched and fisted his hair; a low growl coming from his throat rumbled around them and Loki's eyes moved from the spy towards the monster waiting to come out and back to the others.
Tony was looking between them and yelling at Fury, who was equally yelling back. Loki couldn't make much sense of their words; his mind was on the menace in front of him.
Banner finally looked up and his eyes were on Loki, then the scientist was gone and the manifestation of his rage took his place.
The sound of the beast sent a chill down his spine and his first instinct was to call on his magic. He pressed his palms against the glass, wanting to face across it, but the Hulk was having none of it. He grabbed Loki and promptly smashed him into the floor several times, then threw him against the glass.
Loki gasped in pain and then everything became a blurry picture.
There was an explosion and Loki thought of Barton coming yet being too late. The alarms now were ringing in all intensity and the cage moved as the Hulk tried to smash the glass, denting it.
"Stop it!" Loki yelled as he scrambled to his feet, "You will send us both down!"
Fury was yelling orders, Stark was shouting something about fixing the engine, the Widow was gone and the Soldier as well. Thor was pacing around shouting, Mjolnir in hand.
Loki tried to dodge the Hulk but he was once again trapped in his hold and promptly smashed against the glass like a rag doll.
There was a sharp pain and then dizziness. He heard and felt his skull cracking, warm blood falling down his face and smearing into the glass.
Tony was at the control panel, typing fast and desperately, trying to overwrite the protocols of the system, with Fury yelling at him.
The last thing Loki saw before the cage's system finally reached its limited point was his brother shouting his name and Stark's scream of denial, then everything was a free fall, a very painful free fall.
He had underestimated Fury's words and the Hulk's volatility and now he was paying the price.
Two bodies colliding inside a metal cage, falling, faster each second.
The Hulk was roaring, moving in the air and targeting his rage on him and Loki once again was smashed against the glass surface, finally breaking it.
Everything became white noise, pain and a free fall towards an unmistakable ending. When the explosion of an even greater pain assaulted him and the fall was finally over, he was all too glad of succumbing to unconsciousness.
---
He wanted to scream, yet he had no voice.
He could only stare with wide eyes as the pain assaulted his mind, pulling, pushing, ripping, tearing and then forcing everything back together in a different way.
His body was broken, he couldn't fight anymore. He couldn't even remember how long he had been fighting.
He felt cold and that made him realize in how much of a bad situation he was in, for he had never felt cold before, ever.
A voice was whispering in his ear. Sweet words and promises. Another was screaming for him to just let go.
His vision was clouded, his voice was gone and the ripping, tearing, pulling and pushing in his mind continued.
Someone was laughing and then he could hear his voice again, but the words were not his own.
The rightful King of Asgard.
No! No! I never wanted the throne...
Betrayed.
I never wanted this, I just... I could have done it, father...
I, who was, and should be King!
No... No... I only ever wanted to be your equal...
His own voice was mocking him, laughing at him and he couldn't make it stop.
Weak, runt, mistake, monster, bastard.
Not Worthy.
Loki wanted to scream, but his voice had been stolen.
---
Bruce woke up with a ringing headache and the all too familiar feeling of the actions done by the Hulk slowly surfacing in his mind. He blinked away dust and slowly sat up. He was sitting on a large pile of debris inside a warehouse.
"Are you ok, son?" Bruce blinked again, slowly turning his head to see an old man in a uniform kneeling a few meters from him, over another pile of debris, looking at him over his shoulder. "You two made quiet an entrance. You seem fine, though."
"Did I hurt anybody?" He asked, his voice giving away how guilty he felt.
"There's nobody to hurt here, but you scared the hell out of some pigeons," the old man was hovering over something in the other debris pile, looking concerned. "I left you some clothes there, I didn't think they would fit until you shrink down."
Bruce was still disoriented, but he was grateful for the clothes. He was in the process of getting dressed when he remembered the events more clearly and the old man's words.
"You two?" He asked out loud and jumped off the debris pile to climb to the other, kneeling beside the security guard.
"I'm not sure if he can make it, too much blood..."
Bruce was only partially listening; the image of Loki's body spread over the debris with clearly broken bones and blood all over his face and pooling around his head was almost mesmerizing, he couldn't look away.
"Is he, hem, alive?"
The guard gave him an odd look and made a hand gesture; Bruce noticed his fingers were coated in blood from where he had touched Loki to check his pulse.
"Yes, somehow," the old man frowned, "I think."
Bruce moved slowly and checked for himself, finding a pulse and slow breathing. Bruce didn't know if feel glad or disappointed about it.
"I, I need to contact, hum, someone," Bruce was fidgeting with his hands and the guard handed him a cell phone.
"You may want to call an ambulance, I wasn't sure if I should do it."
"No, no, no, thank you," Bruce's hands were shaking and he had to correct the number twice before hitting the dial key, "I know someone who can help."
The security guard didn't look fazed and just nodded absentmindedly as Bruce waited for Tony to answer his cell phone.
Loki twitched.
"Oh, he's waking up!" The old man smiled and Bruce almost dropped the cell phone.
He didn't know what he was expecting from Loki after their encounter, but the look of dread and confusion he got was defiantly not what he had in mind.
Loki instinctively moved to get away, but the pain assaulted him and sent him to the ground. He uttered a piercing shriek.
"Oh my God," the old man nervously hovered over the fallen Asgardian and gently placed a hand over his chest, "Don't move son, you will only hurt yourself."
"I-I-I... w-where am I?" Loki shuddered, "W-Who a-are y-you?" his eyes were moving way too fast, from Bruce to the security guard and around.
Bruce was watching in confusion when Tony's voice shouting on the phone finally got him out of his stupor.
"Tony, this is Bruce," He said as calmly as he could and put him on speaker because he couldn't keep his hands from shaking, "I'm with Loki in a warehouse—"
"New Jersey," the old man supplied looking over his shoulder and then turning back to Loki, speaking slowly, trying to calm the confused god down, "Oh my, we are not going to hurt you son, calm down."
"T-This realm, w-which r-realm?" Loki chocked and coughed blood, then winced in pain, his whole body shivering.
Bruce eyed him warily, "Something's wrong with Loki."
"What is not wrong with Loki?" He could hear how Tony was speaking to Fury and moving at the same time, "Son of a bitch was going to set the damn cube at my tower's roof! We stopped Selvig in time, by the way."
"Oh, that's, that's great."
"Tower?" Loki looked alarmed, "Cube, w-what?"
He tried to sit up again only to promptly fall back and the security guard took his jacket off to put it under Loki's head, gently touching his head to apply pressure to the wound.
"Come on son, stop moving," Loki blinked several times and shook his head, but the security guard gently cradled it in his hands to prevent him from doing it again.
Bruce was very puzzled and Loki was making him nervous. "Just... hurry up, please."
He almost jumped when Loki grabbed his wrist, but the look in his eyes stopped him. It was something Bruce had seen before, in his own eyes.
"Please," Loki said in a very small voice, "Talk to me... please."
Bruce narrowed his eyes and Loki let go, cowering away and swallowing another gasp of pain. Bruce didn't know what to make of it. He couldn't tell if Loki was pulling a very elaborate act or not, but a voice in the back of his head told him that such a stream of emotions had to have at least some degree of reality, so he made an executive decision.
"All right," he finally said and the old man gave him an odd look. "Let's talk."
---
Tony tilted his head sideways and blinked, then crossed his arms over his chest and repeated the gesture but towards the other side. He knew he was staring. Not like anyone would mind, really. They were supposed to be watching, anyway.
So the genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist was watching and getting more confused by the second; its not a feeling he was particularly fond of. Tony liked to have answers, not just get a bunch of questions.
When they brought Loki back to the Helicarrier he didn't fight at all, he just looked around with huge clouded eyes as the paramedics did their job – Fury had been reluctant about it, but Bruce just told him Loki wouldn't do a thing. Turned out his fellow scientist was right.
According to the report, Loki had several broken bones and had head injuries in the front of his skull as well as the back. He also seemed to be sick, for he was getting a fever and was confused as hell.
The report didn't state it like that, mind you, they used some fancy words, but Tony could easily see by the way he kept asking where he was, who they all were, and what he had done that Loki was one big ball of confusion.
Fury allowed Loki to be medically treated because Thor had let them use the magic suppression cuffs he had brought with him from Asgard to restrain Loki, but Thor hadn't been the one to snap them on Loki. The big guy wasn't allowed to see his brother just yet. It had been Tony and what surprised him the most was the fact that Loki didn't fight him at all. He just looked at the cuffs, surely recognizing the design and the runes and then at Tony, probably wondering how he got his hands on them.
In the end, Loki let the medical team to do their job, and the trickster remained in silence through the whole ordeal; he didn't even protested when they removed his armor and changed to scrubs and he kept doing what he was being asked to, he just eyed the cuffs with a strange look in his eyes and sighed.
Now those eyes were watching him. Thanks to the alien-asgardian-whatever healing factor, Loki's wounds would heal faster, or so he had told the EMT team in a small voice that was freaking Tony out, but the fever was not going down so he was in observation.
Loki was making everybody nervous, everyone but Bruce. He just blinked lazily and turned to look at Loki every time someone said something, they exchanged looks and Loki did as he was told, it was really weird. Bruce was talking about it right now with Fury and Thor.
Tony was getting very frustrated.
"Okay, what's your game?" Tony finally asked and Steve gave him a look he ignored.
"Pardon me?"
"Your game, Rudolf," Tony hissed, "You can't get the Tesseract back and you let SHIELD capture you again?"
"Tony..."
"No, no, I'm talking Cap, I'm not done talking!"
Loki gave him an uneasy look and mumbled a reply, "I do not want the Tesseract."
"Oh, sure you don't, is not like you destroyed an entire base while stealing it, dragged several SHIELD soldiers with you, including a master assassin and a scientist, and tried to open a goddamn portal over New York to invade the planet with whatever is at the other side!"
Loki frowned and lowered his eyes, spanning his own body, and then going completely rigid "The... other... side..."
Tony would later on blame his own big mouth for not being connected with his brain and thinking twice before spilling details to an apparently unstable deity. For the moment he was too busy calling for help because said deity was having a panic attack.
Just perfect.
---
Phil Coulson was very good at his job. For the same reason, he was very good at connecting dots and making theories and getting results. That is why he was currently talking with a recently cranially recalibrated Clint Barton, who was still pressing an ice pack against his temple.
"Side effects?" the agent asked. Clint glared at him and Phil just gave him an apologetic smile. "You know how this works, Agent Barton."
"Yeah, I know," Clint sighed, "Apart from the obvious headache, hum... nausea, confusion, my ears ring, I feel jet-lagged and the medical team stated I have a light fever, but I just feel cold."
"Selvig has more or less the same side effects." Coulson then opened Loki's file and exchanged a few words with the medical team via radio.
"Why do you have that file?" Clint grunted, looking around the room for Natasha, who left for a moment.
"Our alien friend has the same symptoms as you two, only in a very much large scale, his fever spiked a few minutes ago, after a very long and tedious panic attack... and he seems to be having hallucinations at the moment."
"What?"
Coulson made a face and slightly lowered the volume of his ear piece, but Clint was able to hear Loki's ear-piercing scream anyway. Clint frowned, trying to remember more of his time under Loki's command.
"Is his scepter is close to him?" He asked and Phil turned from the file to him. "His scepter, is it anywhere near him?"
"The laboratory, not exactly near—"
"Get it to the other side of the Helicarrier," Clint interrupted, "Just... I think I remember a couple of times that thing would make him zone out. See if you can get it away from him, I got a feeling."
Phil nodded and quickly gave the order then turned back to Clint. "What else you remember? We need more details about what might be going on with Loki; we cannot risk this to be just another trick."
"I was his second in command, without me in charge a rescue operation won't be set, at least not soon." Clint grunted again, it had been a while since the last time he ate or slept. That thought suddenly gave him an idea, "I have not eaten or slept much since Loki's arrival..."
"You can rest after this, don't worry, we just need to get as much information as we can; besides, it's obvious you need to rest, you look pretty bad."
"No, it's not that. I do need rest, but what I meant is that I have neglected my personal needs all this time and it has only been a few days. We didn't rest much, but we ate and drank, but I can't remember Loki accepting more than a water bottle the first night we were working. He seemed to have forgotten he has to eat, drink and sleep in order to function, unless crazy aliens don't need to do that."
"No, we are pretty sure they do, at least Thor does, and the medical team has stated that Loki is in the first stage of malnutrition and his hallucinations might be due the lack of sleep among other things."
Coulson placed a hand over his ear piece, turning the volume a little higher only to then take it off his ear as the screams started again.
"How bad is it?" Clint asked while looking at the ear piece on the table.
"Thor is trying to calm him down, but he keeps on shouting something about not being worthy and that he should be dead, he's also babbling about monsters and punishment," Coulson eyed the ear piece for a moment before turning it off again. "I not sure if I prefer the calm, cynical Loki over this one."
Natasha opened the door, "We got a problem."
"What is it?" Asked Clint, trying to get up, and failing to do so as dizziness overcome him again. Natasha was by his side in a second.
"The Tesseract is acting up again. Coulson, Fury needs you in the main lab."
Coulson took his ear piece and left the room while Clint and Natasha stayed there. Clint sighed heavily and stopped trying to get on his feet, instead resting his head on his arms over the table.
"If I feel like crap and if Loki is not lying... Then I have an idea of what he is going through, sucks to be him."
"Do you pity him?" Natasha arched an eyebrow, curious of the new situation.
"No, but I might feel a little sympathy for him, maybe."
Clint closed his eyes. He really needed to sleep.
---
Tony couldn't understand when the cuffs stopped being an instrument to restrain Loki from doing something against them and became an instrument to prevent the apparently-not-actually-deluded-maniac from hurting himself.
Even with a dangerous high fever and with his magic suppressed, Loki was putting up one hell of a fight and Thor had to pin him down to stop him from clawing at his eyes, not that he had been very successful. Loki had managed to slice his own cheek at some point, but after what felt like an eternity, he finally passed out.
Now Thor was at his brother's bedside holding his hand while Tony was using a small laser to trim Loki's nails; no one wanted to know what he could do to others if he had sliced his own face. They had given him a strong sedative to keep him unconscious; it was the safest option, for now.
"I do not understand," Thor said. They had been in an uneasy silence for a while now, but Tony just ignored it. He was having his own thoughts about the situation.
"Hmm?" Tony didn't look up, he was busy looking at the inside of Loki's arms and trying to figure out what the marks there were.
The more he observed, the more appealing the idea that someone else was behind Loki's actions, especially after seeing the Medical Team's report of the full extent of Loki's wounds. It was obvious that many had not been caused by The Hulk. Not the old ones and not the ones that clearly had been done by a blade or something equally sharp.
"This concealment, this lack of composure, this is not Loki's approach to situations; he would never pretend to be weak to gain sympathy, he is far too proud for that."
"I don't think he is pretending, Point Break," Tony gently lifted Loki's wrist to show him the inside of his arm, presenting the half healed scars there. It looked like someone had carved a counter in Loki's skin, there were several lines in groups of five all over it, "Unless he has a blood kink, I really don't think he would carve lines on his own flesh to count."
Thor examined Loki's other arm, finding the same half healed scars. He stood up and lifted the sheets to examine his brother's unconscious form in further detail. By his expression Tony could tell he disliked what he found.
"What is the meaning of this?!"
Tony finished his job with Loki's nails and made a gesture for Thor to sit down, "I can't solve an equation if I don't have all the variables, so I need you to talk to me."
"Talk?"
"Yes, I need to know what happened the last time you saw your brother and try to put all the pieces of this puzzled together to figure out what is the meaning of this." He echoed Thor's words for emphasis and gestured towards Loki.
"I only know what I experienced and what my parents told me. I cannot say I have the full story, for I do not know what was crossing my brother's mind at that time."
Thor looked pained to admit this, Tony could tell, and for some reason he wasn't totally surprised that miscommunication was an important factor in the situation. After all who greets family by throwing them off a moving plane?
"Just... give me what you got, we will figure out the rest later."
---
Natasha was holding Loki's scepter in the main lab when Bruce and Erik were trying to stop the Tesseract from acting up again. They couldn't afford it after what happened to the base.
She didn't see it coming.
The blue mist surrounded her and then it was as if someone had knocked the breath out of her. She wasn't in the main lab anymore, but a place dark and surrounded by strange creatures.
They were angry, very angry, yet they were holding back, waiting for command as they hissed and growled at her.
Some part of her knew this was not entirely real; this was not happening 100% around her. She could feel the floor of the lab under her feet, but the air around her was that of this dark and humid place.
This was happening in her head and that made it real.
Her survival instincts were at their peak and she was holding the scepter as the weapon it was. The waves of danger and mistrust she felt around her were overwhelming, but she stood her ground.
The hooded figure that advanced towards her kept its distance once Natasha made a defensive move. It spoke in a language she could understand, not because she knew it but because it was aimed directly to her consciousness, she just knew.
It spoke of pain and suffering, punishment for failure.
But it was not talking about her, no. Natasha understood this message was meant for Loki, and then a lot of things made much more sense to her.
Loki's words, the meaning behind them, the unconscious reflection of his own being.
This is a child at prayer... PATHETIC!
And there was nowhere for him to turn, nowhere to hide, he was so utterly alone.
Natasha glared at the stranger, a silent promise in her eyes.
When the world returned to normal, the Tesseract was contained again and she was kneeling on the floor, panting, and there were several people, including Director Fury, around her.
"I got Loki's notice of unemployment," she narrowed her eyes and Fury knew this meant more problems to the pile, "Looks like we got a refugee in our hands."
The pieces were slowly coming together; so far she disliked the picture they were forming.