A Bag of Cats and Flying Monkeys [Loki and Esmi]

Loki paused, not even out of breath after sending the last robot soldier flying across the factory’s concrete floor.

“Really?” he taunted the hundreds of unconscious cyborg bodies laid out in pieces before him. “That wasn’t even a challenge” he scoffed. “BLOODY peasants.”

Tony Stark's voice interrupted the white noise in his com, “Language! You know how Cap hates that kind of talk.”

“He should get used to disappointment” Loki deadpanned.

“All right, all right.” Steve Rogers’ voice cut in, his annoyance clear this time as the other two began chuckling at the running joke for a fourth time in as many hours.

Perhaps three is his limit on short missions? Loki pondered. Thor's silence was odd. That joke should've gotten a laugh. Sulking, no doubt. Stark had taunted him after all, boasting just minutes ago that he was about to ‘lay the hammer down,’ on purpose, of course, to irritate Odin’s Firstborn.
I like this Ironman! He’s almost as mischievous as I am.

Loki pointed his staff at the factory’s main power generators and its energy beam arced across the distance, overloading the circuits. The sound of machinery grinding to a halt, and the electricity dying in a long cascade could be heard as the factory shut down.

Thor was perhaps occupied with the army of robots at the city’s center, forgetting his com. Again! Tech was not his strong point. Even Jane was unable to help with that. She had been silent, too.

Irritated at the thought of the two of them, so happy together in their little nest these days, Loki searched for other targets, but the factory was silent. His gleeful destruction and clearing out of the place had gone on for more than 45 minutes, yet it seemed more like a 30-second flex. And without any genuine cleverness to hold his interest, too.

Damn it.
So boring! He’d missed the fun of a good war.

A shimmer to his right attracted his attention and he whirled toward it, staff in hand, anxious for more battle action, but it was neither a cyborg soldier nor one of their off-world Praetorian Masters.

“Esmi?” he whispered, the ache of grief that Loki carried when not immersed in battle or in sleep descended on him like a weight—because it couldn’t be his beloved Esmi.

The shimmering apparition took physical form, resolving into the exquisite form of Eshmeri, Goddess of Lust.
"Esmi!"

She was wearing her signature green and gold cape and very little underneath it. Her smile was faint and then more indulgent as she watched Loki’s face at first register shock, then overwhelming relief, followed by naked hurt.

“Loki” she acknowledged, tilting her head just so, a far more formal greeting than any part of their relationship dictated, and it cut him deep.

For a moment Loki couldn’t breathe, eyes misting over, “How—” he began, struggling to speak.

“I thought it was time I interrupted your latest temper tantrum.”

“It’s not a tem—" Loki pulled himself up short, cut deeper still, recognizing it for the bait that it was, unable to believe she was speaking to him this way. As if they’d never even met. The corner of his mouth quirked, pulling his face into a sneer. He needed to know how she’d returned to life after dying in his arms.

I watched you die! He didn’t speak aloud, but if she were indeed his Esmi and not a hallucination or an enemy’s cruel trick, she could hear his thoughts.

His com gave several staccato bursts, its technology affected by her siren energy, and despite the omissions, he could make out Thor’s voice asking if he was all right. Thor must have heard him say her name. He ignored the com. He didn’t want to explain this to himself never mind to Thor or the Avengers. He couldn’t speak, even though to his core the relief coursing through him was overwhelming. But why was she here on Earth? Had she been transported to another realm? Or trapped somewhere and unable to find him? His heart clenched in his chest at the thought.

You’re alive! Why didn’t you come back to me after the battle?!
Brow furrowing, he wanted to scream at her, but said instead, “Esmi, you were . . . gone” it took an effort to get the last word out, to steady his voice. It was also the wrong word; he couldn’t bring himself to say dead, not even with her standing there in front of him.

Esmi waited for a beat before approaching him. Their collective breathing loud in the otherwise-silent factory. She held his eyes until she was mere inches from his face.

Her smile had faded, though it had taken all her effort to force it away. She’d missed him more than she could admit to herself.

Loki’s hesitant speech and tone were all the signs she needed, but she was grateful to be close enough to him to catch the dilation of his pupils as she approached him, and his more telling reactions to her alive state—the warming flush to his skin, musky pheromones leaking from every pore, the increased pulse at his throat, and the flashes of hurt and confusion across his face at her formal greeting before his guard came back up.
I must be quick.
He and the Avengers were fighting and that meant Thor might intervene if she took too long and she couldn’t have any of them spoiling her plans. Not yet.
“You once promised me” she spoke in a whisper, moving closer, close enough for her breath to puff against his lips, continuing to lock eyes with him “that you would do anything I asked.”

Flashes of lust, anger, was that love? washed across his face at the memory of his 15-year-old self’s undying pledge to her. Loki’s adam’s apple bobbed, but then the blank mask slammed back into place.

“I did.” His voice was breathy but steady, and his eyes on hers, wary.

She lifted her chin “Did you mean it?” her voice was even softer, her expression more suggestive. His face fell for a moment. He was ever the pushover for any invitation to mischief and mixed with the flavor of her kind of naughty, he was powerless and she knew it. His face became ice again, his Jotun-self taking over, she could almost see the blue tinge emerging but he maintained his control of it, despite the muscle in his jaw twitching.

“Don’t get me wrong, Esmi, I’m thrilled you’re still alive,” Loki said, his voice a blanket of false levity, “but you owe me an explanation, darling,” sarcasm laced the last word.

She would regret the hurt she was causing him, but if she had flown into his arms after arriving, it would have ruined what she must do now, even though it was tearing her own insides apart. But his life and the future of all the realms depended upon her keeping her distance now. She had made a promise upon her life to Odin and Frigga when Loki was a young man, and she must keep that promise no matter the cost to either of them.

She settled an index finger onto Loki’s lips, “Yes. I do owe you an explanation, husband.”

His inhale was sharp when she removed her finger and replaced it with her lips. Loki let his staff fall to the floor as he returned the kiss, gripping both her arms and crushing her against him.

Time melted away and they were back in Asgard again.

She could hear his thoughts as her own. He was remembering their first meeting and his youthful pledge to her. And then the moment dissolved and it was years later, the day he realized she’d fallen in love with him as much as he’d fallen for her when he was 15.

Esmi had been exasperated with his insecurities and called him on it when he was whining about Thor and lamenting about being the ‘less-loved son.’

“Loki, you are the son of four gods! Not two. Four! Power inherited from two realms completely at your command. More gifted with power even than your brother. Twice over! Do you not think he should be jealous of you, not the other way around? How can you begrudge him? How can you be angry at Odin and Frigga? They could have taken your frost power from you as an infant and buried the truth beyond repair. Stop the petulance. Be the god I know you to be and wield the power of both the realms you hold in your hands!”

He’d realized then that Esmi was the first being beyond his parents to see all of his faults and all his potential and still love him for everything that he was.

Esmi felt as if she would fly apart, her resolve about to crumble, she broke the kiss, stepping back from his embrace. The look on his face made her chest hurt in a way it had not done since they’d first met.

She reached down to retrieve Loki’s staff, “I promise that you’ll have the answers you’ve asked me for,” backing up as she spoke she pointed the staff at him, reaching out with her other hand and using the staff and her own power, she drew his power from him as if breathing in a mist, ignoring the incredulity and hurt on his face as she did it, “But you’ll need to have patience, my love. A quality I know you have never possessed. You need to acquire it in the days ahead.”

Loki made a choking noise, falling to his knees as Esmi pulled his god powers from him, using their bond as a net. When she finished she began to disapparate the way she’d arrived.

Esmi, no! Please, not again—

“Thor!” Esmi yelled out as she began her transition, knowing her voice would be picked up by Loki’s com, “Your brother needs you. Help him!”

The com crackled to life with a cacophony of voices, no longer suppressed by Esmi’s siren power.

“Wait!” Loki croaked “Wife—“ it came out in a whisper as she left, carrying his staff, all of his powers, and what remained of the heart he’d still possessed, and then she was gone.

“Loki, hang on, I’m coming!” he heard Thor’s voice, distant.

Did you have to break my heart again, Esmi? Was twice not enough for you?
He was alone.
He was mortal.
And Esmi had left him for the third time.
What did I expect? he thought and keeled over onto the concrete floor as everything went black.

Over the com, Thor yelled to Banner, who fought alongside him, “Hulk, take over for me” as he let Mjölnir pull him skyward.

“Hulk smash!” Banner yelled after Thor.

“Wait, did Loki just say ‘WIFE?’ asked Stark. Someone wanna fill me in on what the hell’s going on?”

“I think there are two bags of cats now, Stark,” said Clint, which drew a growl from the now airborne Thor.

“Mother of pearl,” said Cap, which was as close as he got to swearing.

“Goddamn flying monkeys!” yelled Fury, who’d been monitoring the mission from the Helicarrier.

“Language!” Nat, Stark, and Clint all yelled back in unison.

Cap's sigh was audible.

On his monitors, Fury had seen the power anomaly flare and then disappear as he watched Loki’s readings change, his power signatures had just evaporated, leaving a human’s heat signature behind and even that was now diminishing.
“Shit!”

“You kiss your mama with that mouth, Nick?” Stark queried.

Fury transmitted Loki’s fading life readings direct to Cap to bypass both Thor and the team’s broadcast mode and held his tongue for the moment because Jane was on the flight deck running support. He barked into the com “Cap, Stark, help Thor retrieve Loki and return to base, pronto. Nat, help the Big Guy finish up and then both of you get back here now. Move it, everyone!”

The com blared affirmative responses, complaints, and roars in rapid-fire succession as Fury pinched the bridge of his nose trying to hold off a migraine.

Loki’s loss of power was a harbinger of serious trouble.

Half a world away, Vision paused as he sensed the events that had haunted his nightmares had begun.

CHAPTER 2 PREVIEW:

“Does this kind of thing run in the family, Thor?” asked Jane through the com as Thor, Cap, and Stark flew back with an unconscious Loki, the worried tone of her voice evident.

She had good reason to ask. She was pregnant with their first, though none of the Avengers knew it yet. It remained between the two of them though she suspected that Loki had guessed.

Thor didn’t answer. He was angry at her right now for fighting in her condition even though she was doing it with drones and her new weather anomaly tech from the distant safety of the Heli.
Men! They never worry about the things they should and worry about things they shouldn’t!  She shook her head when he didn’t answer.
“Gods” she complained under her breath.

“I heard that” Thor growled.

“Heads up, Fury, incoming honeymooners spat,” Stark quipped.

“Shut up, Tony” Pepper said, from her seat next to Jane on the Heli, her tone making it clear that it wasn’t a suggestion.