The realization
Tony walks up behind Thor and puts a hand on his shoulder, to which Thor snarls and shrugs him off, rounding on him.
“Do not touch me you-”
Tony holds up his hands in resignation to interrupt Thor’s impending rampage.
“Woah there big guy, caaaalm down. We have some information you’d probably like to hear, so before you go ripping anybody's heads off how about you take a chill pill. Do some breathing exercises. In for four out for… whatever you get the idea, just come over here and let us show you, yeah?”
Thor’s frown is mighty indeed, but he relents and stomps over to hear the conclusion Bruce and Tony have come to. They form a kind of huddle, as if that would stop Loki from hearing them. Bruce beckons to Captain spandex, and Steve uncrosses his arms and slowly makes his way to their little secret circle in the corner. Seriously, childish behavior for a group of people supposed to take Loki down, talking about the perpetrator right in front of them.
At least, that's what Loki thought.
But surprisingly, their little secret circle is working. Loki can hear none of their quiet little whispers, only suffer their glances at him. He tries not to look surprised as He feels a little bit of his control and his seiðr return, and with it comes a message. Listen in on them. Anxious to flex his seiðr, see if after all this time he hasn't unlearned his centuries of hard work, he tunes in to the familiar push and pull of the energy around him. He makes his best effort to look like he’s annoyed, although he doesn't have to try very hard. From his surroundings he pulls the sounds, and now he can hear everything in the room. The whirs and clicks of the machines, the shuffling of feet in the corner, and the voices of the idiots those feet belong to whispering about him. He enters the conversation while not-so-big-and-not-so-green is still talking.
“-nd none of this makes sense, Loki shouldn’t even be functioning! It’s like he’s 7 or so people at once! His brain activity is off the charts, his heart rate is through the roof, and every scan we tried to take came out slightly blue! Not to mention that his temperature is fluctuating from below zero to over 150 degrees. By all means and standards, he shouldn’t be alive right now!”
And doesn’t he know it. He’s used to his body temperature being really weird, that just happens all the time anyway. One of the perks of being a Jotun forced to grow up in a near tropical climate, his body had to find some way to deal. But everything else had been killing him for a while now. Constantly the voices in his head that aren’t his own, and one that is his but isn’t him, one he can’t control. The pounding of his heart, like it’s trying to work overtime for 7 different jobs. He’s surprised it hasn’t jumped it’s way out of his throat by now. Tony pipes up from the huddle party.
“So, if his everythings in overdrive, how exactly is he still in one piece?”
Loki sees the x-ray Bruce pulls out from the pile of papers on a nearby table. What he sees is certainly unmistakeable to him, his own green seiðr running through his muscles, reaching down to his very bones. A layer of protection he has on himself at all times. While he could never think it to be anything else, he doubts these Midgardians would recognize it. They have seiðr, but they write it off as magic and try to disprove it with their sciences. They would know nothing of this. Thor however, he just might recognize it. Gods Loki hopes he does…
As if he had just manifested the action itself, Thor snatches the x-ray from Bruce's hands and looks over it frantically. Tony seems to catch the recognition in his eyes.
“Something you recognize point break?”
Thor nods.
“This,” He points to the green wisps that seem to run through Loki’s very being.
“This is supposed to be there. This however…” He points to the blue on his brain. “Unless my brother has changed very much in a short period of time then this very much does not belong.”
Go Thor! For once being useful to the conversation! Bruce puts his hand on his chin, then takes the papers and lays them out on the table. He points to the green on the charts.
“If this is supposed to be there, and the blue isn’t… what color were Barton's eyes when his mind snatched?”
Yes yes yes! A little more… connect the dots!
Captain captain takes a step forward, arms crossed.
“Fury says they were shining blue, like the tesseract.”
Thor smacks his hand down on the table, and Loki can see the steam coming out of his ears. Thor stomps over to the glass and glares as hard as he can right at the captive snake in the Chitauris cage. Loki, for as long as the Chitauri allow him, looks right back into Thor’s eyes. He tries to give Thor, dense as he is, the best opportunity to see the blue covering his irises and blanketing the whites. He tries to let him get a good look at the veins in his bloodshot and no doubt tired looking eyes, not red like the facade he puts up but completely blue. Thor narrows his eyes, and Loki widens his own intent on making sure Thor notices.
Loki can tell when it hits Thor, that he’s right. He always gets this confident smirk when he’s right, like he’s only ever been right and nothing else. He turns in triumph to… honestly Loki doesn’t know Thor’s relation to these dunces and at this point he doesn’t care, but Thor turns to them and points at Loki, smirking all the while.
“I have figured it out!” Thor announces, as triumphantly as if he didn’t still have to get Loki out of his predicament and everything had just been fixed. Nonetheless he continues.
“This is no imposter, my brother is being controlled! How one Earth the Chitauri overpowered him is not known to me, as the Chitauri are fairly weak, but what he did to the hawk man has to be what they did to him first! That staff must be the key to all this!”
“Yes! Finally you oaf!”
All heads turn to face Loki and a plethora of emotions are seen on all the faces of the people gathering around his holding circle. Thor looks shocked and confused, and his face becomes even more confused when Loki gasps and touches his hand to his head.
“I’m…” Thor sees the spark of chaos return to his brother's eyes, and a smile plays out on his lips. “I’m me!” The joy stays only for a second though, and is quickly replaced by confusion.
“They… they let me go? Thats… unexpect-“
As he talks, Loki’s face goes stiff and his eyes wide. From where he’s sitting on the floor it looks like someone has placed a board down his spine. Thor takes a step forward, his concern growing.
“Loki?” He says, taking another step. “Loki this is not the time for your games…” Loki does not move, just sits and stares blankly forward. He looks empty, hollow even. Suddenly, a blood curdling scream escapes his lips and he drops to the ground, twitching and sputtering out strangled noises. His hands clutch his head as to much information pours in at once, the worry and the fear of the Chitauri. He had been found out, their most crucial pawn had been compromised. He was of no use to them anymore now that the heroes of Earth had their eye on him. They would find other ways to get to Earth, they still held direct control over the pawns who had the tesseract after all. So when the chattering stopped Loki was left with one simple order.
Die.
And then they left. He can no longer feel their presence in his mind, only the pain they're leaving him with.