Torture
Thanos’s torturers figure it out in the end.
They figure out that Loki is beyond physical torture. They had done their jobs too thoroughly last time. But then they consult with Thanos and he knows exactly what to do.
Loki will not react to his own torture anymore. He does, however, react to Thor’s.
The first time, he lasts about two minutes, bound fast to a chair while Thor howls, before he breaks. He struggles to get out of the chair, twisting in his bonds.
“Please, please stop,” He shouts, over Thor’s pained cries. “Stop!” They don’t gag him, like they had Thor. Evidently they like hearing him beg. It amuses them.
This time, Loki is already shaking when they lead him to the chair and tie him down.
“Brother,” Thor says. “It’s okay. It’s okay.” Loki just shakes uncontrollably. They whip him, flaying the skin from his back. Then they bring a stove, full of burning coals, and heat a metal bar.
“Are you afraid of fire, little frost giant?” One of them taunts, holding the red hot poker up to his eye. They press it to his cheek and he yelps. They leave him with the burned stripe on his cheek and turn the iron on Thor.
“Please, I’ll give you whatever you want, just stop,” Loki wails. “Stop this.” They don’t. They never do. “I don’t understand what do you want from me!?”
“Enough.” The torturers are silenced by a deep, tinny voice. Loki freezes in place.
“No,” He whispers. “No. No, no, no, no-” Nebula stalks into the room. Of all his tormentors, she had always been the most clever. Perhaps because Thanos had been so inventive in his own tortures of her, replacing her body parts with mechanics at his will.
“Leave us,” Nebula says.
“Why has he sent you to replace us? Is the Titan disappointed in our work?”
“Father thinks you could do better. That you are doing well, but he wishes the prisoners broken faster.” Thor struggles to lift his head, blood dripping from his hair. He looks to Loki, a question in his expression. Loki tries to fix his features to something reassuring, but his fear of Nebula supplants any ability of his to be reassuring. “Go!” Nebula insists and they reluctantly leave her. She picks up a blade from the table of instruments and goes to Loki.
Loki flinches away, recoiling from her. She brings up the knife and Loki braces for the cut, but it doesn’t come. Instead his bonds fall away. She has sliced through the ropes fixing him to the chair.
“We don’t have much time,” She says. “Thanos could be back any moment.”
Loki blinks at her. “What are you doing?”
“You need to go. You can use the Tesseract to open a portal, yes?” Loki nods. Nebula goes to Thor, unlocking the chains holding him up. Loki rushes forward to catch him as he collapses. “When Thanos returns, he is planning on taking the Stone from it. This is our last chance. Use it to connect with the Mind Stone, go there and warn them about what Thanos is planning. Come.” Thor is barely conscious, but Loki manages to support his weight as they stumble through the corridors.
“Why are you doing this?” He gasps.
“I am going to kill my father,” She says. “That gets harder with each stone he gains. Rest assured, he will pay for what he has done to you and the others.”
“Is this some new torment, some lie to lull us into a trap?”
Nebula rounds on him. “I hate him more than anyone, I care not if you do not believe me. This is your one chance. You can take it, or you can die here. It is your choice.”
This still could be some plot. But Loki doesn’t think he has a choice not to take the risk. “Where is the Tesseract?”
“Here.” She leads them into a room. The Tesseract sits on a pedestal, blue and glowing and indifferent. “Work quickly.” Loki takes it in one hand, his other occupied holding Thor up. It knows him after he twice has used it to create a portal, so it responds, even to his weak magic. It pulls on him, wanting to be used, and he reaches out for its connection to the mind stone.
It could be his own weakness, or the distance between the space and mind stones, he’s not sure, but the portal is slow to form and rapidly disintegrating. He pushes harder, trying to stabilize it. He hears a crash from the hallway that nearly breaks his concentration.
“Quickly! Go now!” Nebula shouts behind him. The portal’s not perfect, not half as stable as it should be. But he’s running out of time and strength. He just has to hope it’s enough. He tightens his grip on Thor, closes his eyes, and lets the Tesseract’s power fold over them.
They hit the ground hard. Very hard. But there’s grass brushing his cheek and dew beneath his fingers. He opens his eyes to the dark night skies of Midgard. He is exhausted, drained, and aching ferociously. But they were on Midgard.
“Thor,” He croaks. Thor is unconscious beside him, breathing shallowly. “Thor!” There is no response.
In the distance, the sound of a propulsion jet.
“You have disappointed me, daughter.” Nebula hangs suspended from wires on the ceiling, immobile. “A spy? Really? And now you have lost me the Asgardians. You wound me, Nebula.” He clenches his fist and she is pulled apart, screaming. The new blue Stone sparkles in the gauntlet. “I would end you. But I suspect you will be useful to me in time. Especially if I am to find your sister.”
He leaves her then, in the hands of the torturers, who are instructed to send periodic currents of electricity through her body.