Dreams

The next day, I arrived at 8:45, eager to make a good impression on the rest of the team. I quickly parked in the special parking area reserved for Avengers in the basement of the Compound, confirming my identity with JARVIS as I went. I grabbed my backpack from the passenger seat and headed in. As soon as I walked through the door, I saw the icon of my country, out of costume and eating an apple. 

“Hello.” I waved awkwardly. “You must be Mr. Rogers, or Captain America. It’s nice to meet you.” 

I held out my hand, which he grabbed after taking one last bite of his apple and wadding up the core in a napkin, shaking with a strong grip. I guess the Super Serum made everything about him stronger. Unless he always had a surprisingly strong grip? Alright, now’s not the time, focus. I shook my head, snapping myself out of my thoughts.

”You good?” He asked, eyebrows raised.

”Yeah, I’m fine. Just need a good jerk once in a while for my brain to let me do what I need to do.”

Steve nodded cautiously. “Okay. Well it’s nice to meet you too. I’m hoping that you may be the solution to our little Loki problem.”

He turned and started walking away. I took me a second to realize I was meant to follow, so I had to jog to catch up.

”Up until now,” he continued, hopefully not noticing my small jogging spurt, “one of us has had to stay with Loki to make sure he doesn’t escape or get rescued. Thor is too sentimental to do it, and Barton is too filled with rage after what he put him through. Dr. Banner is too scared overall to even get near Loki in case he accidentally sets off the Hulk. Tony wants to spend more time in the lab than with Loki, and I frankly have better things to do. Nat’s been covering for basically everyone, but even she has to sleep at some point, and those two having a stare down everyday isn’t helping anyone.”

We stepped into an elevator, heading to the floor Thor had told me housed one of the greatest threats to all of humanity. The elevator descended so far down that my ears popped as I tried to listen to the blond figurehead of America. 

“From what I’ve been told, you may be the only one of us who is calm and composed enough to deal with him without giving away anything or wanting to hurt him. I was reluctant to have you join the team at first, but that’s something that we desperately need right now, and you come with Maria Hill’s recommendation, which is good enough for me.”

The elevator chimed and the door opened into a long hallway. Captain Rogers promptly stepped out and walked down the hallway with long strides. I still had to jog a little to keep up with him. 

“Um sir,” I stammered, “would you mind slowing down a little? It’s just that I have much shorter legs than you, and I walk a bit funny, so it’s hard to keep up when you zoom around.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. And there’s no need to call me sir. Steve was good enough for my mother, so it’s good enough for you.”
I smiled. “It’s a genuine pleasure to meet you Steve. My friends call me Andi, and I consider you to be on my list of friends now.”
Steve chuckled. “It’s nice to have someone so upfront and honest around here. Stark and the others like to talk in futuristic references and slang.”

“I think I could be of use in catching you up. There are some amazing shows out now, and they’re, no offense, so much better than shows and stories from your original time. Like, they actually have gay people and people of color now, which is a major improvement.”
“Ah yes, I know that things are a lot more advanced now compared to when I went under. It’s one of the few changes that I have no issue with. All of the best people in my life back in my time were people told they couldn’t do something, and then turned around and did it.”
I nodded. “I heard through the agent grapevine that you were close friends with Howard Stark and Peggy Carter. First, I want to congratulate you on that, those two amaze me, especially Agent Carter.” I sighed. “She was truly a force to be reckoned with.”
Steve nodded, smiling faintly. “Yeah,” he murmured. “She was really something.”

“I also want to thank you for not being an asshole like a lot of men from your time were and are,” I continued. “You really are a great guy, Steve. Not everyone would have the guts to do what you do, sticking up for what’s right no matter the consequences.”

“Thanks kid.” Steve stopped walking halfway down the hallway, clapped my shoulder and smiled at me, almost in a pitying way. “We’re here. Just remember, we have cameras in there covering every inch of the place. Stark has assured me that there are monitors in all main rooms of the compound so we can keep an eye on things, and all you have to do is yell if you need any help. Now, are you ready to meet Loki, the so called ‘god’?”

“Just give me one second.” I vigorously shook each of my limbs, getting out all the excess energy and jitters that could otherwise manifest as tics and twitches. I inhaled deeply through my mouth, and let the air out slowly from my nose. “Okay,” I nodded. “I’m as ready as I’ll ever be, so I might as well get ahead of the issue.”

Steve nodded before entering a few identifying details into a tablet built into the wall that JARVIS revealed upon request. As soon as he had finished, two panels of the wall were pushed out of place and slid open.

“Good luck, Ms. Berch,” said a robotic, accented voice, coming from every direction.

I smiled nervously and touched the wall. “Thanks JARVIS. It means a lot.” In I strode, doing my best to imitate the way that other people walked, projecting calmness and confidence without seeming overbearing or overly-authoritative.

The room was remarkable similar to the photos I had been shown of Loki’s cell in the helicarrier after he was captured when he first arrived on Earth. The walls were lined with complicated looking panels of buttons and holographic images. In the center of the room was a circular glass containment site, partially cast into shadows by a particularly towering pile of wires and presumably important mechanical components. As if on que, a voice spoke from the shadows.

“Well, well, well,” drawled the voice. “If it isn’t another Avenger.” Loki stepped out of the darkness. His long dark hair was oily and stringy, although he had obviously done his best to keep himself looking presentable. He looked surprisingly well maintained, still as proper and royal as he had on television during the battle of Manhattan.

I guess you can take the prince out of the palace, but you can’t take the grace out of the prince

“What are you here for now? Want to interrogate me?” He chuckled. “When will you learn that in a battle of wits, your kind will always lose?” He eyed me up and down. “Still, I appreciate the fresh meat. I might have some real fun with this one before she cracks.” He smiled wickedly, clearly liking the idea of breaking the spirit of another human.

“Actually,” I chimed up, “I’m here on your behalf. Or rather, for your protection. It seems that you have managed to make all of my friends here dislike you. I have to admit, it is rather bold of you to be so antagonistic given that last time you guys squared off it ended with you…” I glanced around. “Well, with you in a glass cage. Like a pretty butterfly with poison wings.”
Loki smirked.

“Ah, so you think I’m pretty,” he said slowly. “I appreciate the compliment, Agent…?”
“Berch is my last name, but you can just call me Andi. I think we’re going to get on first name basis rather quickly, given the nature of my work, and I’m certainly not going to take the time to call you Odinson or Laufeyson when you have a perfectly fine first name.”
Loki bristled at the mention of his adoptive father.

“I am not an Odinson,” he said quietly, eyes fixed on the floor.

“Then what are you?” He spared me a fleeting glance. “I’m serious,” I insisted. “Hey, I’m adopted too, but my dad isn’t any less my dad because we don’t share blood, or because of the mistakes that he’s made over the years. Thor has told me a bit about Odin, and frankly, he sounds like he could use a good slap to the face for what he put the two of you through, but especially you.” I tried and failed to catch his gaze. “Even with Thor’s biased retelling of events, it seems pretty clear to me that you were raised to believe that you would be given a throne, only to find out at the last minute that your younger brother was preferred because he was more “normal” than you.”
Loki clenched his fists.

“Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that I get where you’re coming from. I obviously wouldn’t have gone on a murderous rampage over it and attempted to take over another realm, but hey, we all have our ways of coping with trauma.”

Finally, Loki looked at me, his gaze cautious yet calculating. He had beautiful eyes when he wasn’t using them to stare daggers into people.

“So,” he began hesitantly, “you say that you are adopted too? How is your situation at all similar to mine? I was not ‘adopted’ by some saint-like individual in order to protect me or provide me with a better life. No, I was stolen away from my own kind to be used as a pawn in a game I didn’t know I was playing. So please, tell me exactly how it is that we are alike?”

I shrugged and held out a hand to count on.

“Well, for starters, both of us have horrible abandoning pieces of garbage for biological fathers. Both of us were adopted by people of a different race than us, although I guess yours might have been more of a cross-species sort of thing than just a race thing. Both of us have mothers who love us, but don’t understand us, and who I’m going to go out on a limb and say have tried to change us in order to make us more palatable to society, even though there was nothing inheritely wrong with us in the first place, we were just different. On top of that, I’d sprinkle in some seriously severe shared brother hatred and jealousy over the attention you missed out on as a child, and the desire to turn to, how should I say this? Alternative methods of proving your strength and culpability. For you, it was becoming God of Mischief, King of All Nine Realms. Me, I joined a theater troupe, ran three businesses for a decade, and became a spy. Point being, our lives may not be identical, but that doesn’t mean I can’t relate to and care about your problems.”

“You’re right,” Loki said, his voice low and dangerous. “Our lives aren’t identical. Especially because I won’t be the one to have to watch in silence as all their friends are killed in from of them, slowly, painfully. Once I get out of here, and believe me, I will, my army will descend, ready to demolish your so called Avengers. I will allow them to have their fun with your friends,” he spat out the word, “but I will stop them from killing them, so that they too will know what it is like to be kept in captivity, forced to watch as their world is destroyed around them and rebuilt in my honor!” He panted slightly, his shoulders rising and falling.

I stared at him expressionlessly.

“Alright,” I finally set after several seconds of silence had passed. “Now that we’ve gotten that little spiel out of the way, I was thinking we could discuss our options.” Loki quirked a brow, clearly confused and struggling to understand my breezy tone. “I was thinking, I could start getting you back to normal a little bit, as much as the circumstances allow. By that I mean, I could play you some music that you like, I could talk to Stark about getting you some books, or we could just talk.” I held my right hand up. “And I promise, we don’t have to talk about heavy handed stuff. We could start small, with some basic get-to-know-you type of questions.”

Loki seemed unimpressed and slightly hesitant, although he did perk up slightly at the mention of music and books.

“And what happens if I refuse to interact with you?” he asked cooly. “Am I to be shocked?

“No, but you will be bored. Now that I’ve been hired, you getting other company is going to be a rarity. I might even go so far as to say that Thor and I might be the only company you get for a while.” I knew that that would get his attention.

Loki rolled his eyes, turned away, and started pacing while muttering something about stupid Midgard and stupid Thor.

“So,” I continued, “I recommend that you come around soon to my offer. I may be the only truly human contact that you get for a while.” With that being said, I plopped down against the wall, took a textbook about statistics out of my backpack, and started reading.

It wasn’t long before my studying was interrupted.

“Why did you react that way?”

I looked up from my book. “What do you mean? Are you referring to your threats?”

Loki nodded, before smirking. “Do you not have people who care for you? Are you alienated from those around you?”

“No, I have lots of people I care about. I don’t know. I don’t relate to words the same way most people do. A lot of people lie and talk big, but rarely follow through. I guess it’s just a calculation of how likely I think it is that you’ll escape. And,” I added, “just for the record, I may be different from a lot of people, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t still care about each other. Our differences make us individuals, which is great, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t help each other like a community. I don’t think less of anyone when they don’t want to be around me because of my differences, I just feel bad for their limited pool of diversity, and am glad that my friends appreciate me the way they should.”

Loki frowned and turned away from me. I took this as my cue to return to my studies.

For the rest of the eight-hour shift, he did nothing but pace, mutter, freeze in place, curse, and resume pacing. It was obvious that his mind was working things out from every angle to find a way to cheat, lie, or manipulate his way out of the situation.

Once the eight hours had passed, with a phone alarm to announce it, I got up, stretched thoroughly, gave a polite goodbye to Loki, and told him I would return the next day.

The rest of the week passed in a similar fashion, with me arriving, Loki halfheartedly taunting me, followed by me sitting in the corner studying while he paced. On the ninth day, though, he finally cracked, even if only a small splinter.

“So…,” he drawled as I worked on a workbook about acids and bases, “what fun fact about yourself were you desperately wanting to share with me the other day?”

I stuck my pencil in the workbook before closing it and setting it aside.

“I didn’t have anything in particular that I wanted to mention, but one thing that people find interesting is that I don’t have a sense of smell.”
Loki stared at me icily. “That’s it?” he deadpanned. “I wait all this time, suspense building, and that is all you have to offer?”

“Well, it’s not as impressive as your ‘people think I’m a god’ thing, but it’s something.”

Loki scowled. “People don’t think I’m a god, people acknowledge that I am a god.”

“Okay, if you insist.” I held my hands up defensively. “I just meant that I don’t really believe in gods. I just think we’re different species with remarkably similar physical features.”
“Actually,” interrupted the ‘god’ before me, “this is one of my many forms.”

I tilted my head in confusion.

“I’m have the power to change my form,” he said with a hint of pride.

“Like, solely from this humanoid form to another humanoid form, or could you turn into, I don’t know, a cat?”

I blinked and Loki disappeared. In his place sat a particularly regal, although ungroomed, black cat with bright green eyes.

“Holy shit, I love magic. Dude, you’re so cute, Loki! I’ve got to admit, that’s really cool. Like, out of all the weird stuff I’ve seen during my time with SHIELD, this is a top ten moment for me. Can you talk in this form, or can you only communicate in the way your current species can?”

Loki mewed and flicked his ear dismissively.

“Okay, feel free to return to your usual form, not that I don’t appreciate the sight of your cute little kitty face and whiskers. I have a few more questions that you should probably be in human form for, just so I can tell exactly what you’re saying.”

This time I was careful to watch as Loki transformed. He flicked his tail once and was enveloped by a semi-transparent cloud of green mist. It swirled briefly around him and elongated to account for his now much larger form. Just as quickly as it had appeared, the mist dissipated, leaving Loki standing in his glass cell, smirking slightly.

“Okay,” I said, “I obviously have a lot of questions. One, how in the everloving hell do you do that? Were you born able to do this kind of magic, or were you able to learn it with no innate natural ability? Two are you only able to transform into creatures that actually exist, or would you be able to become, say, a dragon? Side note, do you have dragons on Asgard? If so, I absolutely have to visit. I’m an absolute sucker for unusual or mythological creatures. Three-“

“Hang on,” Loki interrupted, is smirk beginning to turn into a slight smile. “I can’t honestly be expected to answer that many questions at once. Now let’s see. I was born with magical abilities, but it took me years of training to become the master that I am today. I can transform into any animal that I have seen an image of and have a general sense of, although there may be some errors. With humans, I can design my own physical form to create a new persona or role. It’s simple enough,” he said proudly. “Dragons in your sense don’t exist in Asgard, but there are creatures out there that closely resemble your mortal renderings. As for you visiting my so-called home realm, I don’t suppose you would let me out of here if I promised to take you with me?” He smiled exaggeratedly.

I stifled a laugh at his goofy expression. “Sorry pal, but no can do. I can, however, answer any questions you have about Earth, if you have any. You’ve answered my pestering questions, it’s only fair I should return the favor.”
“I’m assuming I can’t stockpile these favors in exchange for one big one?”

“Now you’re catching on.” My phone began to chime. “That is the signal that it’s time for me to go. I suggest that you write down any questions that you have for me, and I will do my best to answer them when I see you tomorrow.”

Loki sighed. “Well, I don’t have anything better to do, so I may as well amuse you for the time being. I shall see you tomorrow.”
I put away my workbook, stood up, and slung my bag over my shoulder. “Bye Loki, see you tomorrow.” I swiped my ID card, and confirmed with JARVIS that I was in fact myself, not Loki in a clever disguise, and headed out. Before I left the Avengers Compound, however, I went to find the others.

“Hey, JARVIS?” I asked out loud, standing in the hallway feeling more than slightly foolish.

“Yes, miss?” answered the polite AI.

“Could you please have everyone here gather in the conference room? I feel like they will want an update about how things went today, and I’d rather get it all out there at one than repeat myself to everyone.”
“Of course, Ms. Berch. The other Avengers have been alerted of a meeting in the conference room in 10 minutes. Is there anything else I could do for you?”
“No thank you, JARVIS. You are quite kind though.”

“Please tell me nothing bad happened,” said Tony as soon as Steve, the last person, walked into the conference room.

I shook my head. “There was a bit of unpleasantness, but c’mon, it’s Loki. We knew that’d happen going into it. By the end of my time, he was no longer openly hostile, which I take with a grain of salt, but consider to be progress nonetheless.”

“Be careful,” interjected Thor, his words laced with concern. “Loki may seem charming, but that is often part of his greater scheme.”
I nodded. “I appreciate your concern, but I assumed as much. I believe he’s using his charm to attempt to manipulate me into trusting him or being overly affectionate towards him, which could then allow him to persuade me to let him escape. I’m not going to let that happen,” I said bluntly.

Thor chuckled, a deep, hearty chuckle. “Easier said than done, my dear maiden. Loki has gone as far as to make many people, men, women, and others alike, fall in love with him before, only to betray their affections.”

I nodded. “Thankfully, I am more resistant to this type of attack, an attack of charm and charisma, than the average person is. I will keep in mind what you’ve said, Thor. I promise I’ll do my best not to fall in love with your brother.” I raised one hand solemnly and smiled at the huge man before me, who smiled back, reassured by my words.

“Anyway,” I said to the room, “things are going as well as can be expected. Loki threatened me earlier this week, my family, everyone I love, blah, blah, blah, all that classic stuff. He seemed pretty annoyed when it didn’t go his way with me freaking out. It was actually kind of funny. But he actually talked to me today. He didn’t threaten, or gloat, or anything bad, he just held a conversation like a normal, non-murderous person. That can’t be a bad sign.”

Around the large table, Avengers slowly nodded in agreement.

“That’s all I have to report, but I felt like it was a good idea to keep everyone in the loop about new developments, especially the good ones.” I glanced at one of the large displays built into the table. “And I’m late for dinner with my roommate. We’re trying to work out some compatibility issues and my being late certainly won’t help.”
Steve rose from his seat. “Here, let me walk you out.”
I smiled.

The captain and I walked down the halls together quietly. It was unusual for us not to talk, but it had been a long day and he was probably just tired. The last thing I wanted to do was pester him with questions or annoy him in any way. As we reached my spot in the parking lot, between two of Tony’s vibrantly colored Lamborghini’s, Steve open my door for me and finally spoke.

“Please be careful, Andi. And I don’t just mean about getting home. Loki is a serious threat, and he’ll see a pretty young girl like you as a pawn to use in his own sick game. The other and I just want to keep you safe.” He made eye contact with me. “If you ever feel like you might be in danger, or that you’re starting to like him a little too much, please come to me. I would never judge you for putting in your best effort.”

I quickly threw my arms around him in a hug, surprising the super soldier. He quickly recovered and wrapped his arms around me.

“Thanks,” I said into his shoulder. I drew back a bit to look him in the eye. “Steve Rogers, I promise to come to you if I’m ever feeling overwhelmed or scared, for myself or others. And I really appreciate you, not just as the justice serving badass you are, but for being such a respectful and sweet guy.”

I gave him one more quick squeeze and then let go to get into my car, whose door was still standing open. I looked up at him as he gently closed the door behind me. 

"I'll see you tomorrow, Steve."