C18H27NO3

When Natasha got the call, she could say that she was disgruntled. A well put together plan, right when she was getting all the information and then the call from Coulson just came. She thought Coulson should consider himself lucky that she took out her frustrations on the men in front of her before picking up the dropped phone to return to the conversation.

“Where are Barton and Loki?”

“They’re fine, on their way to SHIELD headquarters. I’ll brief you on everything when you get back, but first we need you to talk to the big guy.”

She rolled her eyes, holding the phone against her ear with her shoulder as she slipped her heels back on, not wanting to step on a piece of glass or something in the dank room. It happened once—she did not want a repeat. “Coulson, you know that Stark trusts me about as far as he can throw me.”

“Oh, I’ve got Stark.”

She can hear him moving around on the other side of the phone.

“You get the big guy.”

She tried to not think about how she’s pretty sure her heart just stopped. If she lets a few words slip in her shock, she ignores it as her grip on the phone tightens almost imperceptibly. She can practically feel Phil’s smile, though she knows there’s a note of sympathy. Phil’s not cruel enough to not feel a bit bad about essentially sending a lamb to the slaughterhouse.

The call ended and Natasha listened to the dial tone before slowly resuming her walk, trying to somehow restart her heart without needing to pound a fist against her chest.

Nope, Tony Stark did not need an interruption right now. He was more than happy to ignore the fact that a certain Agent Coulson was there wanting to get in touch with him. He was more than glad that JARVIS obeyed his commands as he drank his champagne happily.

His eyes weren’t even on Pepper, just focused on the ceiling where the lights were and a slow lazy smile pulled at his lips as he realized that this—his entire building was running on completely clean energy. The energy from the arc reactor, the very instrument keeping him alive, was running his entire building.

He, Tony Stark, former weapons manufacturer and former CEO of Stark Industries, now Iron-man, hero of America, built this. He made this. He accomplished this—he succeeded.

He did something worthwhile.

He tried not let out a hysterical laugh as he pressed his eyes shut, eyes admittedly a bit wet beneath closed lids.

“Sir, the telephone—I’m afraid my protocols are being overridden.”

His eyes snapped open as JARVIS’s voice quickly infiltrated his thoughts, shortly followed by Agent Coulson’s voice.

“Mr. Stark, we need to talk.”

Sighing, he attempted not to roll his eyes, picking up his phone and staring at the screen. In most cases he would probably pick up and yell at the person to leave him alone for a blessed few minutes and that he’d get back to them when he was done being busy—which normally resulted in never, but it was the thought that counted—but he was a bit too high of the happiness of his success to bother.

“You have reached the life model decoy of Tony Stark. Please leave a message.”

“This is urgent.”

“Then, leave it urgently.”

The elevator doors dinged open and he dropped his phone next to him on the couch, releasing a soft groan which really only sounded like an exhalation of air because what did it take to get this man to leave him alone?

“Security breach,” he moaned, pointing a lazy accusing finger at the SHIELD agent while Pepper snorted delicately from the seat across from him, thumbing her nose in an attempt to cover it up. It didn’t make much of a difference.

“Mr. Stark, we need to talk.”

He tried not to cry in his head.

The bag in front of him looked absolutely decimated, he noted with no small amount of amusement. He remembered the days when he would have barely been able to land a solid punch on even the immoveable sack.

The sickly, gangly boy from Brooklyn with too much heart and a body barely able to contain it; it had only been a few years since then—at least in his mind.

Seventy years, though…

That was how long he had been ‘dead’.

He hooked another punching bag up to replace the battered one from before, trying not to look at the splattered insides of the bag. It showed a much different picture in his overwhelmed brain.

He heard the steps behind him before he the figure even entered the room. He clenched his fists and gritted his teeth as he went about landing blow after blow on the bag before him until the voice from behind him spoke up. His shoulders tensed still at the sound in what had formerly been silence filled with only his harsh breathing.

“What do you need? Do you have a mission for me?”

He busied his hands, quickly moving to uncoil the bandages around his knuckles to protect them from the blows. Movement was something he craved, something to occupy his mind as he struggled to adjust to the twenty-first century.

If he was being honest with himself, Steve craved a guide—just someone who wouldn’t mind breaking it down for him and spoon feeding it to him because currently, trying to take it in, he was rapidly becoming overwhelmed. He could barely manage to figure out how to work his Stark phone and it was supposedly made ‘easy to handle and ergonomic’.

It was admittedly comfortable to hold, a suitable size that fit the average hand size—even broad hands like his own—but it sure as hell wasn’t easy to figure out.

“What do you know about this?”

Director Fury let the manila folder rest in his hands and he opened it, jerking in surprise as his eyes focused in on the bright blue square on the picture there. A lump formed in his throat, images flashed through his mind.

The leader of Hydra as he held the cube—the whole reason this started. He remembered driving the ship into the water after that, remembered the all encompassing cold.

Jerking back to the present, he flipped to another page, trying to get his mind back on track. It was easier than before—he’d been doing it the entirety of the time that he’d been out of the ice.

Get out of the memories, stay in the present. It happened, it passed—he’s fine. There’s no ice, no cold. He’s out, he’s warm—he’s fine.

“Where did you find it?”

“Howard Stark found it during his search for you.” There was a lull where silence settled before Fury drew in a breath, letting Steve read through the contents of the folder. “Anything else you can tell us on it?”

Steve sighed, jaw clenching and he moved, shoving the folder in his bag and picking it up along with a spare punching bag. As he brushed past, he sent Nick Fury a sidelong look, blue eyes troubled and serious.

“Yeah—you should have left it in the water.”

When Bruce Banner imagined the government finding him, it had certainly not involved a certain red-head who was currently pointing a gun at him or being offered a job. In all seriousness, he did not exactly know how to deal with this situation. His nerves were a bit all over the place, but he managed to get them into control and not let the beast out.

The last thing he needed was the other guy making an appearance.

The green hulking beast wasn’t a fan of signing autographs and all that jazz.

“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I just wanted to see what would happen.”

The woman in front of him stared warily and as she cocked her head and spoke the words ‘stand down’, he tried not to grin. Tried, but failed a bit because he knew that there was a smile on his face, nearing a smirk.

“I thought you said it was just the two of us.”

He wondered if it had been another person, would she be rolling her eyes. She probably would. Maybe if he hadn’t lashed out she would be. She seemed like the kind of person to enjoy sarcasm and wit. He was proud to say he possessed some sarcasm and wit, though he didn’t show much of it.

The sick and dying didn’t exactly appreciate the art of it. How would you sarcastically tell someone they most likely weren’t going to make it another week, let alone the night?

“Please sit down. We can talk. I won’t do it again.”

He lowered himself to sitting and he watched her eyes following his movement, watched the tension in her shoulders bleed out just a bit.

“Could—could you stop pointing that at me, though?”

She jerked, stiff and calculating, and slowly lowered the gun and then herself into the chair. Her gaze was sharp and cutting and as she opened her mouth to speak, Bruce wondered if maybe he should have planned ahead for this, should have thought of this possibility.

Of course, that was meaningless now.

It had been almost a week since the attack and the tesseract was still missing. Director Fury had assured them that he had gotten some people to come and work on it and that they were supposed to be arriving today, but Loki couldn’t help but feel antsy.

Natasha was back, thankfully, and she was sitting next on the chair provided in the private room they were in as Loki paced back and forth, fingers tapping against each other in a display of nerves.

“I don’t understand why it took so long to get them. Do they not understand that this is a matter of great urgency? I mean, I can understand they probably have their reasons—I’ve seen their files, but—”

Natasha stood, walked over and grabbed his shoulders, grip tight to halt him from his pacing before drawing him back with her to the chair and forcing him to sit down. His knee bounced slightly.

Normally he was good at keeping himself in check, calming his nerves before they got control of him, but with the fact that it was Amora of all things that was here, he couldn’t think of calming himself for the world.

His mind was only able to seem to focus on her expression when she had been dragged out of the castle that day. The cold words Thor had spat at him. The fact that his relationship with Thor had never been the same since that day was all his mind could focus on.

And once it went there, it focused on how much he missed Thor. And then how much he missed his family—well, just his mom; and consequently his brother because despite not having seen him in about a year and a half, feelings for him still lingered, though they had slowly been going away.

He had been doing so well until the sight of Amora brought back all those unwanted emotions.

Gritting his teeth, he let Natasha gently card her fingers through her hair, whispering soft soothing words in Russian. Her hands slipped to his shoulders, gently massaging the tension out of them and he slowly slumped back into the chair, letting his head loll backwards.

She gently coaxed him through the relaxation, pressing a soft kiss to his forehead when he was finally as relaxed as he was going to get in the short time they had before they had to go out. Fury was waiting for them, no doubt, with Clint, probably.

“Tell me—why are you so tense?”

Her voice was soft and Loki hadn’t realized how much he had missed her and her comforting touch while she had been gone, but now that he had her here, he just wanted to melt into her touch—to just curl up into her side and forget the world existed for a bit.

She was his first friend here on Midgard and she was the one that knew the most about him, knew about the feelings he had—and still sort of did—possessed for his adoptive brother, knew about most of his fear, most of the things that stressed him out and had been there for him when he needed her during the initial transitions.

“Amora was that one I told you about—the one that tried to make my brother get her—”

Natasha nodded in understanding, holding out her hands for him to hold onto.

“It just brought back memories and…”

“Feelings,” she finished understandingly.

He nodded in response, sighing slowly as he squeezed her hands with trembling fingers. “I’ll be fine, I just haven’t had the time to get—well, everything—under control.”

She nodded once more in complete understanding and pulled Loki forward into a hug.

By the Norns, he loved her. She was always supporting him, no matter what. It was nice, to finally have a friend that helped him through everything. It made him wonder how he had been so desperate for a friend all those years back that he had accepted friendship from someone who very clearly had not cared for his feelings at all.

Amora was a woman out to get the best for herself—screw who she hurt. And she had almost had an entire kingdom at her feet, if Loki had only been a few seconds too late that day.

He could only imagine what she would manage if they dawdled in this situation—what would happen if they were just a few seconds too late.

He could imagine—but he didn’t want to.

Meeting the great Iron-man and the infamous Captain America in a Quinjet where they proceeded to glare each other down wasn’t as glamorous as it sounded. He had seen the files for both and as a child of neglect himself; he could read Tony far easier than the others.

When he looked at the good captain, he saw a man like Thor, not just in terms of appearance, but a bit in personality. Captain America was headstrong, stubborn, had a drive. Thor was the same, but his drive changed constantly, whereas Steve Roger’s seemed pretty solidly fixed on just helping people.

He was a man with a heart too large and had endured a shocking amount of loss and stress.

But as they stared each other down, Loki found himself counting down the seconds till they broke into an argument.

Captain America’s anger was clearly righteous indignation at having been left out of the loop on the bringing in of Howard Stark’s son. A bit of his anger was probably also due to the fact that Tony was throwing around jokes and expressions he didn’t understand.

Tony’s anger seemed to be long coming, more of a silently harbored resentment for the birth of the star spangled hero. After reading the rather vague file of Tony Stark, Loki was pretty good at putting the pieces together.

He was the god of mischief for a reason.

Natasha was behind the wheel of the Quinjet, Clint next to her. Loki sat in the back with the two heroes, trying not to crack under the tension between the two.

The skies rumbled, opening up to let out gallons of water, dropping like bullets onto the metal of the jet. He tried not to flinch, attempted to keep his expression neutral, but he couldn’t help looking up at the roof with apprehension.

The air crackled, thick with electricity, and it was with a sinking feeling that he realized that this was not exactly normal for Midgard. No—it had come too suddenly, out of nowhere. Weather reports reported less than a three percent chance of rain.

Definitely not normal, he concluded and he tried not to let his nerves flare up.

“Not scared of a bit of thunder, are you?”

Two pairs of eyes were trained on him now and Loki gritted his teeth. He could feel it clearly now and he caught Clint’s eyes through the reflection of the window, sending him a silent look—a warning. He could see the cogs turning in his brain as he turned to murmur something to Natasha.

“I’m not overly fond of what follows,” he responded, simple and vague, though as a resounding pound echoed throughout the jet, he realized that they were out of time.

The time bomb in his head checked to zero.

The detonation was silent, but he could feel everything he built crumble, the tentative life he had constructed slowly falling to pieces. His blood rushed through his ears, his mind jumped to run at incomprehensive speeds.

“Time’s up.”

His head was dragged up, his body thrown to the side.

His body ached, his muscles quivered in the permanent tension now seated in them, his bones running with a cold that had nothing to do with his heritage.

Shuddering, he gasped, mouth opening to let water spill out as his body lurched, head tilting to the side as his body rolled with the movement. Throat straining as his body rocked forward with the motion, crawling up onto hands and knees as water spilled from his lips in rough coughs and painful breaths.

His head pounded, his blood roared, but his mind was quiet, a soft silence coaxing him into oblivion, but his body disagreed.

He tried to ignore the sound of his heaving, the sound of water spilling onto already sodden ground. Raven strands clung wetly to the sides of his face and neck, an uncomfortable sticking and he reached a shaky hand to push the locks away, fingers stiff with fear.

Eyes wide, he could feel the coughs rocking his body, the shaking of his arms and the stiffness in his joints. His knees creaked as he slowly fell to lie on his side panting and shaking next to the puddle of water next to him.

It was a conscious mantra not to look at the water, to ignore the feel of his clothes clutching his body, wet, cold and uncomfortable.

Don’t look at the water—he didn’t need to develop a fear for it; he couldn’t afford to develop a fear for it.

The Warrior Three and his brother didn’t need another thing to laugh at him for, another weakness.

But he peeked, looked at the river and his body seized up in spasms as his lungs felt the reminiscent memories of water filling them, forcing out the life from his body and his body suffered a series of spasms before he was out, unconscious, lying next the river he almost drowned in at the puddle of water from his lungs.

Detachedly, he wondered if it was possible for his lungs to have held that much water and with a morbid sense of curiosity, he couldn’t help but wonder how much longer he would have lasted in the water before black consumed his vision and his mind followed into the darkness.

There were days where Loki was grateful for his seidr. When he was on Midgard, working with Natasha and Clint, on a mission for SHIELD, he was grateful. When Laufey visited, he was grateful, and when he healed Natasha, he was grateful. When he was with the Jotun mage, he was grateful for his seidr.

When he was in Asgard, he was rarely grateful for his magic. He detested that part of him with a vengeance, wanted to tear it straight out from inside him and toss it away because it wasn’t normal. He figured: maybe if he didn’t have magic, he’d blend in more, he’d make a friend, he’d meet someone, get over his childish crush on Thor that was more than inappropriate the older he grew. He figured that without it, everything would be better for him.

Maybe he’d be a bit more like Thor.

Maybe the reason he didn’t look like his family members was because of his seidr; then he found out about his heritage.

Maybe the reason he didn’t grow in bulk was because of his seidr. Maybe the power of it made him have less muscle development.

But now, as he found himself doubled over under Fury’s desk in the Helicarrier, he was never more grateful for his magic. It took him out of that Quinjet, got him where he needed to be, put him somewhere hidden and safe where the only three people with access to walk into this room wouldn’t judge him.

His stomach heaved, muscles convulsing as he tried not to acknowledge that his world was crumbling down around him, the safe haven he had made for himself tearing itself apart all because of the arrival of a certain god.

A certain blonde haired god whose emotions tended to be reflected in the sky, and really—why couldn’t his life be just that slightest bit easier?

Pale fingers curled into fists, nails biting into the skin of his palms and he tried not to think about it. He closed his eyes against the truth, repeated it in his head like a mantra; don’t look. He didn’t need this.

Admittedly, he knew not everything was crumbling, but history had a way of repeating itself.

The only friend he got back then gravitated to Thor once given access to him. He feared—and maybe it was irrational, but he couldn’t help it—that his friends would gravitate to Thor now that the blonde was there. Sure, Loki had told the stories about his brother and his life on Asgard and the majority of his stories weren’t exactly good experiences, but whenever he spoke of Thor, he couldn’t help but always clarify that his brother was a good man.

“He means no harm, his heart is usually in the right place, but he doesn’t think much farther than him the majority of the time and of what he believes is right. It’s his fatal flaw.”

Maybe everyone would just go to Thor and slowly forget about him. It’d probably be gradual. Natasha and Clint were loyal people and his use probably wouldn’t run out for SHIELD, so he still had that to look forward to, but slowly they would go to Thor and his warm smile and strong arms.

They would realize which one was the better one of the two of them.

Thor appeared far more trust-worthy. He was easy on the eyes, candy for them, actually. His voice was a smooth, but rumbling baritone and he was loyal to a fault. His heart was as large as him and he had his beloved hammer.

A hammer forged from a fallen star that believed Thor was worthy and Loki was not. If that wasn’t a symbol for whom to put their trust in, he didn’t know what was.

It wasn’t a matter of who they had known for a longer period of time, it was a matter of who would you trust to throw their life away for yours when the clock ran out.

It was always Thor, though.

Even if you just put their titles together from the Midgardian lore.

Thor, the god of thunder versus Loki, the god of mischief and lies; there wasn’t much a decision.

It would never be Loki.

His carefully constructed illusion of safety was coming apart and his entire being felt like it was being stretched, pulled apart and scattered amongst the stars to take eons to find its way back together.

Don’t look, don’t look—do not look.

But like when Sif and the Warrior Three nearly drowned him, he pulled his eyes open just slightly and his body shook and curled in on itself at the sight. The force of his dry heaves made his body lurch forward, fingers scrabbling for purchase on the floor as his breathing became ragged.

It had taken him years to overcome his phobia for water. He could only imagine how long it would take to get over the fear of abandonment. It had long since been coming, it had been festering deep in his heart, but he hadn’t acknowledged it because he never got anyone anyway, so why did he have to fear about being abandoned if that’s just how he was by default?

Now, he regretted it. Regretted not paying attention to it because his fear was all coming true, rearing its ugly head, but no—he couldn’t think about the abandonment.

Think of the present, not of the future. The future holds only pain and suffering if you try to imagine it. The present was just as bad right now, though, because even if his friends didn’t leave him, even if his little family remained, Thor was here, which means it wouldn’t be long before word got back to Asgard.

If word got back to Asgard, Heimdall wouldn’t need to see Loki to know where he was. He would only need to follow those he held dear to him and Loki would be with them, by default, because how could he not be.

His heart thudded in his chest while he tried to pull in ragged breaths, but it was like there wasn’t enough air in the room or his lungs were large enough or his airway was clogged.

Desperate fingers pulled at his pouches secured around his waist.

“Loki!”

It was Coulson’s voice, loud and commanding, but he could barely hear it over the blood rushing in his ears. Then there were slack covered legs in front of him and strong arms pulling him up to his knees and closer so that he was leaning heavily on a chest.

“Where is it?”

He wheezed—words failed him, unable to get past his mouth as he struggled to retain enough oxygen to breathe, let alone speak.

His fingers pulling at his pouches, though, seemed to be enough indication because then Phil was searching them, holding his trembling frame with one arm while he searched with the other and then it all stopped.

There was a slow spreading peaceful bliss going through him and Loki slowly fell limp, going slack against Phil’s body and letting the man hold him close, arm wrapped around his shoulders, his other hand rubbing up and down his back soothingly.

Harsh pants were pulled out of parted lips as he drank the air in greedily, the shakes of his body slowly subsiding to soft tremors.

“How much?” he whispered, pressing his sweaty forehead to Phil’s shoulder, fingers slowly regaining feeling.

“Two shots—it should take about ten minutes for your system to clear it out.”

Loki nodded and allowed Coulson to shift them about so that the man was leaning back against the desk with Loki against his side as he slowly coaxed the god down from the panic attack.

“What happened?”

“Thor is here.”

“Your brother,” the agent mused. It wasn’t a question, but a statement and Loki took it as such, not bothering to respond as his heart slowly climbed back down from its formerly erratic pace and his breath came easier.

Ten minutes passed quietly as his body slowly wiped out the two shots of liquid nitrogen, his Jotun heritage wanting to cling to it just a bit longer, but soon it was gone and Loki regained full control of his limbs again as his panic receded.

They both clambered to their feet, Loki swaying a bit before regaining his balance. Phil made sure he was alright and stable before finally letting go, looking at Loki seriously in the eyes.

He liked Phil.

Agent Coulson was a good man and took care of those around him. If you caught him when he wasn’t working, he was also downright pleasant, though during working hours he could seem a bit strict and off-setting.

The man was able to be trusted, he knew that.

“Your brother can’t take anything away from you if you don’t let him.”

And then Coulson was standing up straight, adjusting his suit jacket and looking at Loki as he straightened as well, folding his arms behind his back.

“Come along. They should be arriving soon if they haven’t maimed each other without you there.”

He kept to the shadows.

Although he wouldn’t admit it, his magic created a shield around himself, making him less noticeable to the passing eye, so as long as Thor didn’t focus specifically on him, he’d be completely looked over.

He thanked the Norns for small miracles.

Arms crossed over his chest, he could see Coulson eyeing him worriedly from across the room, but he just focused his eyes on Tony Stark and Bruce Banner who were discussing thermonuclear astrophysics. Clint’s eyes dragged over the room and landed on him. His brow was furrowed in confusion, lips pulled slightly downward.

Nudging Natasha, he jutted his chin towards Loki who had now turned his gaze over to Fury. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw Natasha’s shoulders slump with relief and he smiled softly at her, the smallest upward quirk of his lips to assure her further that he was fine.

Coulson seemed to notice the exchange because he too seemed to relax just the barest bit as he went through documents on his tablet slowly, eyes scanning over words as he slowly put images up onto Fury’s own monitor on anything pertaining to Amora.

Loki then turned his eyes to Thor as an image of Amora appeared and he watched the tension rise in the god.

“One of our agents has mentioned that you knew this woman personally.”

“How would they know?” Thor bit out, voice deep and rumbling and Loki pretended that it didn’t affect him as his seidr wrapped around him even tighter, slowly shrouding him from the searching gaze of his brother who was staring Fury down.

“That’s not your concern—”

“It is if someone from your ranks somehow knows of matters taken care of privately within the safety of the palace of Asgard. Spies in the King’s ranks will not be tolerated,” Thor all but growled and his gaze swept over the room, furious, and there was a jerk of an agent near the windows as thunder boomed in the skies.

Loki tried not to roll his eyes.

Thor really needed to learn to control his emotions.

“There are a number of stories written on you and those related to you in folklore on this planet. One of our agents probably found out in a story and assumed it to be true since you’re here,” Agent Coulson quickly stepped in and Thor tensed before relaxing slowly, nodding his head and grunting in response to show he submitted in face of the problem being now resolved.

It was a wonder how he even knew that the people of Midgard wrote stories on them. It wasn’t as if Thor paid any attention when their tutors taught them about the realm.

“Alright,” Fury grunted, “now that we’re back on track—this is what we know.”