Electrocution
When they put the block of rubber into his mouth, Loki doesn’t understand what they’re planning to do. He glances across the scene of their nightmare at Thor, bound identically opposite from him. He’s gagged and shaking. Loki lets his head drop back. He’s so much more used to this than Thor. He’s so broken that the tortures barely affect him anymore, not after the first week of his second stay on Sanctuary. He endures the pain, he endures the darkness of their cell, and one day they will tire of their games and kill him and it will all be over.
Vaguely, he understands they want to transform him again. They want the Loki that they had sent to Midgard back. Thanos thinks if he keeps torturing them, eventually Loki will do anything to escape, and he will again become that vicious, vengeful god. But all of that’s been burnt out of him. There’s nothing left.
But they’re going to keep trying. Maybe it’s Thor they’re trying to break now. That would make sense, Loki thinks idly. He’s not even paying attention to what Thanos’ children are doing to him as he muses on his own brokenness, the futility of this torture. They’re twisting something sharp and cold around his fingers, testing and tightening the straps that secure him to the chair.
Then a switch is flipped and burning agony surges through him. Every muscle in his body seizes, every nerve screams. Since the first week, he hasn’t made a sound during their tortures, but now he howls, half involuntarily, the scream torn from his throat.
It stops and he’s left limp and twitching in his bonds, breathing raggedly through the gag. He realizes it’s electricity, a current passed through him from electrodes attached at various points on his body. He’s barely given a moment’s rest before the current is turned back on, its hum soon drowned out by the sound of his own screams reverberating in his ears. It’s held for longer this time and when it’s finally turned off Loki’s heartbeat is stuttering. Black spots float through his vision. Through them, he can see Thor straining for him, furiously screaming wordless curses. The current’s turned on again and Loki really thinks he’s going to die this time.
Somehow he doesn’t. He comes to when they turn it off again and realizes he’s weeping, tears dripping down his cheeks. He can’t control it. He’s writhing against the restraints, sobbing wretchedly, before he even realizes he’s doing it.
“You see how he suffers?” The torture master’s voice drawls. “You see what the power of the voltage does to him? How it hurts him?” The current again, agony and seizing muscles and screaming, then he’s limp and panting. “What your power could do to him?”
Oh Thor, no, Loki thinks. He wants to look at his brother but the lingering pulses of electricity traveling through his nervous system make his muscles weak and uncoordinated. He can’t even turn his head.
It’s not the same. The lightning that is his brother’s power and the electricity being pumped through him is nothing alike. But no doubt Thor is remembered another incident, one from early in their time on the Ark, before Thor had full control over his powers.
He barely remembers what they had been arguing about. It was nothing, a drop in the ocean of their fights, but it had dragged on and Loki had lost his temper. He had shouted, used his words as a knife to wound. Then Thor had lost his own temper, grabbed Loki’s arms in his fury. The lightning had jolted through him then, silencing his tongue. Thor’s eyes had gone wide with horror as Loki’s body had seized, as the air had been driven from his lungs and he had collapsed to his knees. Their argument had been quickly forgotten as Thor frantically made sure he was okay. He had been, then. He wasn’t so sure he was going to walk away from this now.
They’re trying to drive them apart. Make Thor afraid of himself around his brother. Trying to associate pain and lightning for Loki. But whoever devised this torture knows nothing of magic. Knows nothing of how Loki can feel his brother’s soul through his lightning. How he can taste familiarity through the pain. This won’t work, just one more futile torture.
He doesn’t know how long it goes on for. By the end, he’s twitching uncontrollably, small pained noises driven from him. The skin under the electrodes is scorched. They drag the brothers back to their cell, dumping Loki unceremoniously onto the floor. He lands facedown and doesn’t move.
He blacks out for a while. When he comes to again, he’s cold and shivering, painful little twitches passing through him. And alone. He presumes. If Thor had been here, he wouldn’t still be lying on the ground like this. They’d taken to curling together after these sessions; holding onto one another like they were still children, to take what limited comfort was available on this dark ship. If Thor was here, he’d be in his arms. So he must be alone, and resigns himself to have to wait for Thor to be brought back to him.
It takes effort but he rolls himself onto his side. And with a jolt, realizes he’s in fact not alone. Thor is watching him from the shadows, grief plain on his face.
“Thor,” Loki croaks. “Brother.” He reaches out a hand towards him. Thor doesn’t make a move towards him. “Please.”
Thor makes a small choked sound. “I can’t. What if I-”
“Fool. He was lying.” Loki manages to roll onto his back, but the effort leaves him breathless. He rests his hands on his stomach and has to take a moment to breathe before he can speak again. “It’s nothing, not the same. Please just, come here.”
“But-”
“Thor, please,” Loki cries, tears stinging in his eyes. “We have nothing else left here. Don’t just leave me lying-” Thor lets out a shaky sob and inches closer. Slowly, cautiously, he takes Loki into his arms. He touches him like the lightest brush of their skin would send the electricity surging through him again. Loki clings to Thor, not letting him release him. They curl together in their now familiar position, Loki tucked under his brother’s arm, head on his chest. He lets Thor cry, just as Thor in nights past has let him cry.
After a while, Thor relaxes, tentatively starting to stroke his hair. “I’m sorry.” Loki turns his face into Thor’s chest. “I’m so sorry, Loki.”
“Stop. Hush.” He takes a shaky breath. “Not your fault.” A tremor passes through him, the aftershocks of the assault. Thor smooths back his hair, kisses his temple.
“I’m going to get you out of here. I’m going to get us out of here.” Loki can hear resolve in Thor’s voice. Resolve is dangerous. Resolve means there’s still something in him to break.
He closes his eyes and breathes in the smell of the storm as it clings to his brother’s skin.