Requests Open
Just a 35-year-old lady writing Internet nonsense for fifteen years and counting.
Doing my best to catch up, but being a real adult is exhausting.
Master List • New Release Schedule • Current Requests • Personal Blog
The rules are that if I don’t want to write it, I won’t write it. I don’t write smut. And I don’t write real person fic. Other than that, feel free to throw things at me whenever requests are open.
Want to request but just have a certain character or fandom you’d like to see me try out? Check out my character-only request list here!
Current Requests:
Rocket Racoon & GN!Reader: Complete (Will Post 06/06/2026)
btw i've decided i'm just gonna scrap Brightest and start over. it's icky. it's bad. it's old. but it's been with me long enough that i'd like to do it the justice of actually finishing it--just not in its current form. i can do so much better.
that's not gonna be my next big project because Blossoms in the Snow won my poll, but jsyk that is on my to-do list
Also: Requests are open again since I finally got my list down to five. I've already started the next one on the list, so hopefully that won't take too long.
Percy Weasley x Female!Slytherin!Reader: Pride and Pure-Blood Prejudice
Summary: "It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a pure-blood family in possession of a daughter, must be in want of a plan."
Rating/Tags: G (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Background Relationships; Reader Is a Hogwarts Professor; Slytherin!Reader; Female!Reader; Hogwarts; Romance; Rivals to Lovers; Post-Second Wizarding War)
Pairings/Relationships: Percy Weasley/Reader
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Ao3 Version
Word Count: 11,183
Request: "Hii! If requests are open could I have a Percy Weasley and reader where reader becomes a professor at Hogwarts post war and Percy comes to visit her while shes in class once?? And the students are teasing them obv, he tells her he came to give McGonagall the invite to their wedding and the students insist to hear how they got tgt, so she tells them? She was the head girl (was in Slytherin) and its just Percy and her reminiscing their days at Hogwarts? Really cute and fluffy??? Thanks!!!"
Requester: @acupnoodle
Notes: Another long-awaited request done and dusted! Originally, I had plotted out a much more dramatic story for this. Then I went back and reread the request--always a good idea--and realized it called for it to be "really cute and fluffy." So I scrapped that and came up with this instead. I don't know if it's "really cute and fluffy," but it is at least more cute-and-fluff adjacent than my first outline would have been.
Pride and Pure-Blood Prejudice
The approaching close of another year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry heralded many things, not all of them positive. More than half the students faced two months without access to any magic at all. Even the remaining small portion of pure-bloods would be at the mercy of their parents' thoughts about underage magic over the summer. And even before all that, the dark cloud of final exams loomed. Still, the warming weather, the thawing lake, the smell of the Forbidden Forest's awakening wafting through the castle's open windows all mixed together into a bewitching cocktail that drove all reason from the students' minds. Suddenly even the most-attentive couldn't Carpe Retractum two thoughts together if those thoughts weren't about plans for broomstick races after supper. Never had you experienced this phenomenon more than during your class of fourth-year Slytherins late that May.
"I take it by all the chattering you've mastered the reductor curse already?" you called from where you stood by your desk at the front of the room.
A modicum of the whispering faded. You heard a few half-hearted murmurs of "reducto" that couldn't have shredded a quill. Mostly all that changed was that the laughter grew a bit nervous. Exhaling sharply, you folded your arms across your chest and tapped at an elbow.
"You realize that I don't have to give you class time to practice for the practical exam. I'm doing you all a favor here."
"Yes, Professor [L Name]," the group recited—but you noted the blatant tone of sarcasm.
Did Aurora ever have problems controlling her classes like this? You couldn't imagine that somehow. Perhaps this was part and parcel of being a younger instructor. How could you expect the children to listen to you when you were only six years out of Hogwarts yourself?
"Mr. Talbot, if I see you point your wand at anything but what I placed on your desk again, I will deduct house points from you," you said.
The boy in question—the current Slytherin seeker with the dainty looks to match—flopped back into his seat with a cheeky grin. "From your own house, prof? You wouldn't."
"Professor—"
"Try me."
"Professor?"
"You wouldn't want us to lose the House Cup to Gryffindor again," said Talbot.
"Professor!"
"What is it, Miss Rao?" you asked in a tone of forced patience.
The willowy Indian girl didn't bat an eye at your tone. "Were we supposed to have a guest lecturer today?"
"When have I ever brought in a guest lecturer?"
"Well, then who's that that just walked in through the door?"
You followed her pointing finger up the rows of desks to the classroom's entrance to find that indeed someone had joined the class—a man far too old to be taking Defense Against the Dark Arts at this level. His shock of bright red hair and the spattering of freckles across his pale face made him instantly recognizable to you. He was no threat. Once he'd given you a miniscule wave hello, you pivoted back in Talbot's direction to say:
"Ten points from Slytherin, and detention tonight for suggesting I play favorites."
That got Talbot's attention. He sat up straight and opened his mouth furiously. "But we've got practice tonight!"
"I'll let the rest of the team know where you'll be. And don't think I won't have you benched during the next match if you say what you're thinking right now out loud."
That taken care of, you turned back to the redhead. Percy Weasley smiled somewhat sheepishly at your approach.
"And what are you doing here, interrupting my very important lesson, Weasley?" you asked.
"Oh, it wasn't all that important, Professor. Friend of yours?"
This question came from one of the girls closest to the door—a long-limbed blonde named Spencer—and was spoken in a manner you knew very well, having once been a 14-year-old girl yourself. You decided not to remark on it. At 25 years old, Percy knew better than to flirt with underage witches. He seemed to get Spencer's gist as well, though, and quickly bent to press a chaste kiss to your cheek. She let out a sad little sound at the sight of it while a few of the other girls tittered.
"I just came to deliver McGonagall's wedding invitation." After a moment of searching inside his robes, he produced the square of paper—enchanted so that the flutterby-leaf frame would grow straight from the page when read by the recipient—as if concerned you might not believe him without evidence. "Thought I'd drop in and see you at work on my way to her office."
Your cheeks warmed a little bit. If only he'd come on a day or for a session other than this one. If you hadn't known better, you'd think that he'd chosen that exact time to come because he'd see you completely failing. But you did know better. Percy Weasley had grown up—and it helped that all the eyes glued firmly to him had him shifting nervously from foot to foot.
"You couldn't have just sent the invitation via owl like the rest of them?" you asked.
He cleared his throat nervously, averting his eyes. "Given that she's the one that got us together, I thought she deserved to have hers delivered in person. That, and I thought it would be nice to see you at work for once."
One of the female students squealed at such a high-pitch that the noise could have been mistaken for a mandrake cry. You could have sworn you felt a nosebleed coming on. "Professor, is this him? Is this your fiancé?"
You thought you'd lost control before? Now you had no control, and it didn't appear as though you'd be regaining it anytime soon.
"Yes, Miss Yang." You gestured at the stock-still man beside you. Percy had turned a shade of scarlet you'd only seen once or twice over your years of knowing him. Well, what did he think would happen when he interrupted your lesson? That you wouldn't try to embarrass him a little?
Okay, perhaps you hadn't grown up as much as you liked to think.
You went on, "Everyone, this is Percy Weasley. Percy, this is...well, my class of fourth-year Slytherins."
A chorus of "awww"ing rose from the girls in the room. But if you'd believed that a brief introduction would get all of the students refocused, you were sorely mistaken. Once the expected gushing quieted somewhat, the familiar buzz of pure-blood confusion started up.
"Weasley? Why does that name sound familiar?" a burly boy called Acaster wondered aloud.
Talbot smacked him on the chest with the back of his hand. "Stupid! There's a Weasley on the Hollyhead Harpies!"
"There's a Weasley that works with aurors, too!" called a boy named Bruce.
"But Professor," a deep crease appeared between Rao's dark, perfectly-shaped eyebrows, "aren't all Weasleys Gryffindors?"
"They are," you said. "The most recent generation of Weasleys are, anyway."
"You're marrying a Gryffindor?" Yang asked.
Good news: None of them sounded angry. They simply seemed confused. This was a massive improvement, no matter what Percy's mortified expression indicated. You had to be willing to give these particular students grace. After all, they'd spent their first year at Hogwarts under You-Know-Who's regime. The aftereffects of that experience continued to linger, especially in the house noted mostly for pure-blood fanaticism for the last few decades.
“Well," you admitted, “it wasn’t exactly part of the plan.”
The room erupted. All the questions and comments blurred into one another until Spencer's voice rose above the rest:
"How did the two of you even get together?"
Percy coughed again. "It's something of a long story."
"And embarrassing. For both of us," you added as you laced your fingers through his that weren't clutching McGonagall's invitation like it would serve as a substitute for protego if the students decided to attack.
"Tell us! Oh, please, Professor [L Name]! Please?"
Several others in the class—mostly girls—joined her in the begging. Every single item meant to be turned to dust by the end of the period sat forgotten on the tables. Perhaps you could use this to your advantage.
"If I tell you, I'll have to assign extra homework in place of the missing lesson," you said.
"Okay!" "Sure!" "Oh, I don't mind at all!" All these you heard from various places in the classroom. And then:
"Absolutely not!" Talbot looked absolutely aghast. His friends around him, as well as several other boys scattered across the place, took up booing in agreement. You tried not to smile when you said:
"Tell you what. Anyone that can successfully use reducto on their object before I finish the story won't have to do more work after class."
"Can't you just let us leave early, prof?"
"No. Practice or listen. Your choice. Ah-ah-ah." You held up a finger as the young man opened his mouth furiously. "The option of being benched during the next quidditch match remains, Mr. Talbot."
He fell back into his chair, crossed his arms over his chest, and stuck out his lip in an unseemly pout. You stifled a chuckle at his antics. This became moderately more difficult when his friends rushed to cheer him up. Hadn't the house team player in your year experienced the same attention?
Seeing everyone settle into one of the two offered activities, you returned to your desk. Percy followed somewhat stiffly behind you. You looked expectantly up at him from your seat, but he only motioned for you to go on. Well, if he wanted to dump the responsibility of telling your love story to a hoard of teenage girls in the midst of puberty, you just hoped he wouldn't live to regret it.
"Percy and I met on our first train ride to Hogwarts..." you began.
******
The chill of fear seeped into your bones the moment the Hogwarts Express left King's Cross—as well as your mother, father, and baby sister—at precisely 11:00 a.m. that September morning. You could hear the eager chatter of the other students all around you, but you felt disconnected from it all. Never before had you been this far away from your family. A sudden desire to throw yourself out of the locomotive and forget all about your magical education sized you. How could you ever have thought you could manage to go to a boarding school? How could you have ever thought you could be entrusted with the plan? Just when you tightened your grip around the handle of your trunk and the stand of your owl's birdcage, however, you learned the hard way why no one else risked standing in the middle of the aisle once the journey started.
"Hey! Watch it!" someone snapped as you both fell in a heap to the hard floor.
Once you surfaced from the tangle of limbs, clothes, and chests, you spotted the boy who had crashed into you—red-haired and red-faced with anger and embarrassment as he, too, stood up, a task made more difficult by the fact he appeared to be wearing clothes several sizes too big for him. Well, no need to ask for an introduction from him; his bloodline couldn't be more obvious, and you doubted your parents would care much about your manners while interacting with a Weasley.
"I think you ought to watch out," you said as you brushed invisible dirt from your muggle costume. "It's not as though I was hard to see."
The Weasley boy's colored darkened. "You aren't supposed to stand where other people are walking!"
"Is there a rule against it?"
"If there isn't, there should be!"
"Well, I think there should be a rule against running straight through the train like a wild graphorn!"
The boy's eyes, hidden somewhat behind the lenses of his crooked glasses, roved across your entire body. You instinctively hugged yourself to prevent him from seeing anything he might be looking for, but too late.
"You're a [Last Name], aren't you?"
You couldn't miss the note of disgust in the question, and returned it with an equally nasty: "And you're a Weasley. What's your point?"
"My point—"
"Percy! There you are!"
A clatter of rapid footsteps heralded the approach of two additional Weasleys. The one that had spoken was the oldest of the two. You couldn't tell how much older he was, but old enough to have a red-and-gold "P" badge pinned to the front of his chest. The other boy didn't look much older than you. The first was tall; the second, somewhat broader and distinctly more freckled.
"Percy," the eldest said again, "Mum told you not to run off before I got you settled."
"I don't need you get me settled, Bill. Just get to your prefects' meeting, would you?"
"He says like his whole plan wasn't to beat you to that compartment and spy on the entire meeting." The second Weasley smiled knowingly.
Percy scowled, which was as good as an admission on his part. Bill rolled his eyes. They landed on you, and he held out his hand a little sheepishly.
"Where're my manners? I’m Bill, Bill Weasley. Who's this you banged into in your eagerness to experience school bureaucracy, Perce?"
You took the hand without returning his smile. "I'm [Name]."
"She's a [L Name]!" Percy burst out indignantly.
"So?" asked the currently-nameless boy.
Percy could only splutter in answer. During his display of abject incoherence, Bill bent to pick up Percy's trunk from the floor in a pointed motion.
"Good grief," he said. "You two haven't even been sorted yet and already you want to start with the house rivalries. Come on. Let's find you and Charlie seats. I'll tell you all about the prefects' meeting after. Okay?"
Begrudgingly, Percy followed, though not before throwing you a very dirty look. You distinctly heard him mutter, "We already know what house she'll be in anyway," as he sped to catch up with his brothers.
Your mouth fell open in outrage. Then you reconsidered hurling any insults after him. There was nothing wrong with being in Slytherin, and there was nothing wrong with taking pride in one's pure-blood heritage. But a boy like Percy Weasley would never under such things. So you snapped your mouth shut, finished gathering your things, and steeled yourself to go hunting for your true peers—peers willing, you hoped, to take part in a bit of bashing to soothe over any hurt feelings that a run-in with a Weasley might cause.
With any luck on your part, he would be sorted into a different house than you were, and you'd never have to deal with him again.
******
Long before the arrival of that highly-anticipated acceptance letter, your parents had made the plan for your life very clear to you. The future of the [L Names], potentially even of all pure-blood families living in Magical Britain, lay squarely on your tiny shoulders. You were to attend Hogwarts, get the best grades in your year, climb the social ladder, fill every single leadership role available, and land an important job at the Ministry—not as minister, of course, but someone positioned to make sure the right legislation found its way to the desks of the right people.
Quite the task to assign an eleven-year-old girl who had hardly set foot outside her family's grand estate. But you knew from the beginning that you would do it. After all, you were a [L Name]. That confidence did not last.
Of all the people to muck up your life's work, why did it have to be Percy Weasley?
You'd got your wish that first night at school a little over a year ago. Percy ended up in Gryffindor (no surprises there); you ended up in Slytherin (no surprises there either). Much to your dismay, sitting at different tables over meals didn't keep him out of your life completely.
"[Name]! Watch out! The fire's too hot!"
Busy grinding your teeth in the direction of the half of the dungeon the Gryffindors in the class insisted on skulking in every potions class, you hadn't noticed the growing flare from the end of your wand until your friend beside you yelped like that. Smoke curled from the burnt remains of your hair-raising potion. You groaned and dumped the rubbish out so that you could start from scratch.
"What is wrong with you?" the girl beside you asked. She was a petite blonde with a mastery of etiquette your parents envied on your behalf. Though her family did not have the same claim to wealth or lineage that yours did, they encouraged you to maintain the relationship in the hopes some of her good breeding might rub off on you.
"Nothing," you muttered.
"Something," she half-sang, blue eyes glued to her own work.
But you couldn't tell her the real cause of your problem, because it was Percy Weasley. Confessing that to anyone in your house would be a huge mistake. A muggle-lover like him? Constantly outperforming a pure-blood like you? That sort of confession would get you laughed out of the common room.
"Sorry, Natalia," you sighed after a minute or two of brittle silence. "I've just been a little distracted lately."
She snorted. "I'll say. That's the fourth class assignment I've watched you bungle this year, and we've only been back a week."
Sadly, her observation was correct. More sadly, your claim of being distracted wasn't even an outright lie. Ever since your final grades of first year came back after exams, you found yourself unable to think about anything except how you should have been top of your class if not for one boy beating you at nearly every subject—and you'd barely squeaked by him with a higher score in defense against the dark arts.
"How could someone with a family like that beat someone with a family like yours?" your fathered thundered when you gave him the news. You wondered the same thing all summerlong.
But your parents had granted you grace: Another year to prove your inherent superiority to Percy and everyone else at Hogwarts. Spending the entire period trying to knock him on his butt via nonverbal magic wouldn't do you any good if it meant scorching a second potion. Professor Snape's favoritism only stretched so far; you doubted he could overlook that sort of stench even for a member of his own house.
Keeping your eyes off Percy took some concentration on your part. Still, you managed until close to the end of class. Just when your hair-raising potion turned the required vibrant green, Professor Snape pounced.
"Weasley!"
"Y-y-yes, sir?"
You rolled your eyes while safe in the knowledge that Professor Snape couldn't see you from that angle. Always so falsely polite with the instructors was Percy. Anyone watching could tell he was terrified. The freckled skin underneath his shock of red hair had turned milk white.
When Professor Snape spoke again, his voice resumed its usual quiet vehemence: "What, exactly, do you call these rat tails?"
"Rat tails, Professor?"
"Do not simply repeat what I say and expect that to constitute an answer, Weasley. Why," Professor Snape scooped up a small mound of naked pink strips from Percy's cutting board, "are your rat tails sliced in such a manner?"
"They're...that's how they came, Professor."
"'Came'?"
"They were purchased presliced, sir."
A long, purposeful pause followed Percy's hushed confession that everyone in the room heard. Several of your fellow Slytherins, including Natalia, tittered on cue. Percy somehow turned even redder. Visible sweat glistened on his brow even in the dim torchlight. He kept his eyes trained directly at Professor Snape to avoid all the amused gazes trained in his direction.
Professor Snape dribbled the rat trails in his hand back onto the tiny mound atop Percy's cutting board, then tutted.
"Prepackaged potion ingredients, Weasley? Do you understand how slicing rat trails lengthwise rather than crosswise could affect the qualities of your hair-raising potion? And what of more dangerous potions to come? How far do you expect to go in my classes with cheap ingredients like this?"
Finally, Percy broke eye contact and muttered something about Bill needing the more expensive supplies for his N.E.W.T.-level potions course. Professor Snape merely sniffed at this excuse.
"Quite. Well, I shudder to think what condition the ingredients will be for any future Weasleys that stumble into this school."
With that, he swept away from the Gryffindors. Natalia and the others around you giggled a moment longer before hurrying to return their attention to their own work. Professor Snape said nothing as he glanced into each of the cauldron's on your side of the room—until he came to yours.
"An excellent display as always, Miss [L Name]," he said.
"Thank you, sir," you replied piously.
Professor Snape didn't linger. You kept your head down until he started on the row of tables behind yours. Only then did you look up and meet Percy Weasley's indignant stare. Your lips curled up in an obvious smirk. If he still thought he could beat a pure-blood like you for two years in a row, he was even stupider than whoever bought him those rat tails.
******
Quidditch season opened your third year with the highly-anticipated match between Slytherin and Gryffindor. Despite the truly abysmal autumn weather that November Saturday morning, practically the entire school packed into the stands to watch. Curiosity about Gryffindor's new seeker drew even the less-sports-inclined students to the stadium. And what a game it was—apparently.
Having never been interested in quidditch yourself (it had ceased to be part of "the plan" after your first handful of broom-riding lessons at the age of six), you'd quickly tired of the cold and the wet, and now you could only hear the alternating cheering and booing from where you huddled out of the wind underneath the seats. You shivered underneath your oversized green-and-silver scarf. Even down here, the breeze whistled through the wooden rafters.
"Gryffindor scores again!" the announcer shouted, their voice magically amplified to the point you could have sworn you could feel it vibrating in your teeth.
Another surge of boos rose from the seats that you'd only recently escaped from. You resisted the urge to clutch at your earmuffs as you thought longingly of your homework and the relative peace and quiet of the common room.
A sickening crunch somewhere high in the air caused you to grimace in sympathy just as much from the pain that lanced through your own head as the Slytherins took up cheering instead.
"Oof! That looked painful. And...yes, it seems he's lost the snitch! Better luck next time, Charlie," said the announcer.
God, you hated quidditch. But you couldn't just leave the match. Already you'd lost major social points for leaving to get away from the noise for a moment. If you slipped away to the castle now and your friends discovered you huddled over a desk in the library later, you would never hear the end of it. And somehow, you just knew that word of your flight would get back to your parents. Future leaders didn't lurk in the shadows while everyone else their age enjoyed a sporting event, even if those future leads did find the constant commotion overwhelming.
You took a deep breath of the damp, chilly air and braced yourself to make the climb back up to join the rest of the school. The instant you reached the bottom and could see a square of pale gray clouds overhead, you heard a loud thud followed by the Slytherins screaming "foul!" so loudly and insistently that they drowned out whatever explanation the announcer might have offered.
Your foot froze in the air mid-step. On second thought, maybe enduring some teasing from your friends and a handful of disappointed letters from your parents would be worth getting away from this place. You spun around at once to make a beeline for the nearest exit. A peek over your shoulder every few seconds ensured that no one would surprise you by coming to retrieve you.
Too bad you were so focused on what lay behind you that you neglected to consider what might lie ahead. You collided into something warm and hard that sent you falling to the ground.
"Oof!"
And who should it be that turned around to see you there but Percy Weasley, your least favorite person on earth? And he looked as immaculate as always. His robes were unrumpled; his scarf hanged evenly around his neck; even his glasses didn't have a smudge or a speck on them. You, meanwhile, must have looked ghoulish in comparison, having spent a good deal of time recently trying and failing to not run your fingers through your hair in distraction.
You had just opened your mouth to demand to know what he was doing here when Percy beat you to it:
"Excuse you. Do you make it a habit to crash into everyone you meet, or is it just me that's so lucky?"
"I'd rather not see you at all," no one could make you bristle like a knarl faster than this boy, "so why would I go out of my way to speak to you?"
Percy squared his shoulders, pushed his glasses further up his nose, and folded his arms across his chest. "Well, you wouldn't have seen me at all if you weren't lurking beneath the stadium, would you? Which, by the way, is absolutely against the rules. I suppose I should go find Professor McGonagall, so she can put a stop to whatever it is you're plotting to do to ruin the match."
"I'm not plotting anything!"
"Oh, really? Then what are you doing down here?"
You were not about to confess to Percy that you couldn't stand quidditch, the cold, or continuous loud noises. He might have been a Gryffindor and therefore embody all the irritating qualities of your rival house, but he was also a pure-blood. All pure-bloods knew how to find and exploit the weaknesses of their peers. The Weasleys wouldn't be exceptions.
"What I'm doing here isn't any of your business," you snapped in an attempt to cover up your obvious hesitation. "Besides, if it's so forbidden that anyone stand here during a game, what are you doing?"
After an equally long pause, Percy's ears went red. Your heart leaped at this obvious tell. Now was your chance to turn the tables. He had a weakness he wanted kept under wraps. Maybe if you could weasel (pun intended) this out of him, you could keep him from getting the teachers involved in your hideaway plot or even get a leg up on him in class.
And then an enormous, "Ooooo!" rang out from everywhere above your heads. Percy jumped at the accompanying echoing crack and the following thump that you both could hear even ensconced beneath the field.
"That was quite a fall for new Gryffindor seeker Charlie Weasley!" the announcer cried—and you saw every drop of color drain from Percy's face. It made his freckles stand out even more than usual. "Wait! Is he getting up? I think—no! He's down again! The ref is calling for a timeout. Is this the end of Gryffindor's hopes for an early-season victory?"
You could have sworn. Being down one seeker would only make this abominable game last longer; no one had much faith in Higgs; he couldn't find a gold coin if he had a niffler to do the job for him, and it was anyone's guess how he'd secured a place on the team to begin with. But before you could shove past Percy to be on your way back to the castle, you were stopped by his hands shooting out to grasp your upper arms. So taken aback by this were you that you let out involuntary, undignified squeal.
"What did you do?" he demanded.
"What do you mean, what did I do?"
“You obviously sabotaged him so that Slytherin would win the match!”
“And how am I supposed to have done that, genius? I’ve been down here practically the entire game!”
“And here comes Madam Pomfrey. It’s not looking good for Charlie Weasley staying in this game!” called the announcer.
Just as quickly as he snatched you, he let go. Percy’s eyes had gone wild. He looked so un-Percy-like that it caused you concern. You frowned, cocking your head to one side, and asked:
“Weasley? Are you going to be sick?”
Percy didn’t answer. Instead, as a sort of bored buzz took over the stadium, he turned away from you to race in the direction of the stairs to the Gryffindor seats. So great was his haste that he tripped over his own feet and bounced back up before you could check if he was okay. And then he disappeared.
After a moment or two of loitering there in stunned silence, you shuddered. You’d forgotten something very important: You hated Percy Weasley. So what did you care about his brother’s health or Percy’s apparent worry over it?
The answer: You didn’t. Not at all. Not one little bit. All you cared about was returning to your common room for a good, long moan about some blood traitor having touched you without your permission. With any luck, such a harrowing tale would prevent the rest of your peers remembering that you’d ditched them less than an hour into the game.
If you didn’t care, though, then why did you pause at the exit to look over your shoulder in case Percy had tumbled backward and cracked his head in his earlier rush? Only because you knew you’d react similarly if you heard your little sister crash spectacularly out of the sky in front of a host of uncaring onlookers. That sort of familial bond you could understand.
But Percy remained out of sight. You had to assume that he hadn’t hurt himself, then. Some of the tightness in your chest eased somewhat. This allowed you to push your way through the curtain hanging over the opening to the grounds. Thus began your long and uncomfortable hike back to Hogwarts itself.
Would Charlie be all right? Crushing Percy Weasley academically wouldn’t bring you the same sort of satisfaction if you only defeated him while he grieved the loss of a sibling. Besides, Charlie was one of the few Gryffindors that didn’t sneer when he spotted you in the corridors.
******
Everyone loved the last Hogsmeade weekend leading up to the Christmas holidays. The village always brought the Hogwarts students out in force that day. Of course, most of them needed a break from the drudgery of studying, but the trip had more going for it than that. Hogsmeade really pulled out all the stops that season: Magical, un-melting snow glistened in every window; living gingerbread families welcomed passersby into warm shops stuffed with free samples of sweets; butter beer flowed endlessly from the taps at the Three Broomsticks; and enchanted candles of cool flames flickered in the depths of the trees and the garlands and the wreathes that adorned every last building on the main street. All the festive decorations made it impossible for you look anywhere without being reminded of how soon you’d be leaving for home.
At least you could look forward to spending the holidays at your grandmother’s palatial home in Magical Spain. After several months of near-constant rain, you couldn’t wait to see the clear ocean waters and the sandy beaches. What you could wait for were the multiple high-class Christmas parties you’d be forced to attend, wherein all the members of your extended family and the upper echelons of magical society would feign interest in your life. You’d already begun mentally preparing how to answer the stream of questions over your elective courses and expectations for your upcoming O.W.L.s—expectations which were swiftly dwindling after you’d barely eked out the third spot in charms the previous year. And, yes, one of the people that outscored you again had been none other than Percy Weasley.
Was it really any wonder that you found yourself trailing behind Natalia and the others as you all trudged through the thick snow on the path leading up to the Shrieking Shack? You kept your eyes glued to the toes of your dragon-hide boots in a vain effort to keep your mind off your icy surroundings. The Slytherin common room might not have been cozy by most definitions, but it had a fireplace, unlike the dilapidated building your friends insisted on visiting after deeming the Three Broomsticks too boring to spend the afternoon there. Soon, you’d be headed for a warm armchair, though, and the small pile of books you’d checked out for defense against the dark arts research the day before.
“Oh, there’s the source of the foul smell,” Natalia’s voice lifted high enough that you could hear her despite having lost sight of the group around the next question. “Ghosts don’t often smell like dung.”
And there went any chance of a rapid retreat to school. You picked up your pace to spot the rest of your group surrounding a red-headed boy you knew all too well.
“When’s the last time you washed those robes, Weasley?” asked one of the boys.
“Don’t be an idiot. The stink’s sunk in. Blood traitors smell worse than Muggle-borns. You could burn his clothes and the stench would still be stuck up your nose,” said another.
"Can't you hear us, Weasley?" Natalia asked. "Or is there dung in your ears as well?"
Percy appeared to be bracing himself for a fight as he stared unblinkingly at the shack behind the broken remains of fence in front of him. Apparently, he only finished doing this mental preparation the minute you slogged up to join the rest of the Syltherins. With one of his trademark tremendous inhales that typically only preceded his most condescending in-class monologues, he spun stiffly in your direction.
His appearance ground every thought in your head to a sudden halt. It had been some time since you'd seen Percy up close. After your confrontation with him at the quidditch stadium the year prior, he had avoided you so completely that you suspected a banishing charm might be involved. And, Merlin save you, that absence of face-to-face contact with your nemesis must have done something to you, or to him, or to both of you. The moment his hard blue eyes met your [color] own, you simply froze. Percy noticed, too; some of the fight drained visibly from him—momentarily. Then he puffed himself back up to his usual arrogant proportions.
"[Name]. I should known you couldn't think of anything more than the most basic of insults," he said.
The abrupt vitriol thrown your way broke you of the strange trance that Percy's visage had put you in. "Me?"
"Yes, yes." He stuck his nose straight into the air and attempted to shove his way through the group without making eye contact with anyone else. "The impoverished boy smells bad. Very clever."
Your friends parted to let him through. They at least knew enough to avoid real magical fights. Your Head of House couldn't (and wouldn't) ignore outright rule breaking in the open like this. But once Percy got to the path back down to the village through the tangle of stifled snickering, he stopped, pivoted, and looked straight at you once more.
"If you're going to waste so much time and effort dreaming up different ways to embarrass me that you can't be bothered to keep up with me in transfiguration, I'd think you could come up with something more creative than commenting on my lack of wealth from time to time."
"Good point," Natalia put in before you could point out you had nothing to do with this altercation. "There's also your blood status, and the fact your parents decided to breed like puffskeins so they can make the real pure-bloods go extinct. Right, [Name]?"
"Because your blood status is doing what for you in charms? Are you going to blame your slipping rank on that?"
All ideas you had about protesting fled, as did any about how good Percy looked in his snug, handmade hat. A ringing sound filled your ears. How dare he. How dare he when you'd spent evening after evening after evening holed up in an unused classroom until you could perform the perfect summoning charm. So what if he could do that without the practice? At least you had the nerve to put in effort! And unthinkingly, your fingers curled tightly around the wand nestled in your robe pocket.
"What did you just say?" you snarled.
He squared his shoulders and said loudly, "It's sad you can't do 'real' pure-bloods proud because you're too busy thinking of excuses why I do better than you in every class."
"I could run circles around you in charms, Weasley!"
"Is that so? That's not what final grades showed last year."
"Depulso!"
"Protego!"
And so it began, the wild, magic-infused sort of snowball fight only unsupervised teenaged witches and wizards could have. No sooner had Percy shielded himself from your onslaught of snow than did Natalia step with her own "Wingardium Leviosa!" The two boys with you, Augustus and Mortimer, joined in as well. Soon, ice and slush and freezing-cold water were being flung every which way. You forgot in the rush of adrenaline how much you hated the cold and winter; all you wanted to do was teach Percy Weasley a lesson—for assuming you'd started this; for always, always, always being one step ahead of you; and for daring to get cute in the months you hadn't spoken to him.
"What on earth is going on here?"
All the levitating snowballs fell with wet crunches at the sound of an adult's voice coming from nearby. The laughter and screaming slowly faded into nothingness. There stood Professor Sprout, her eyebrows raised in shock at seeing students of your pedigree conducting themselves in such a raucous fashion. And there did not stand Percy. He must have slipped away in all the commotion. How very strangely un-Gryffindor of him.
"Miss [L Name]? Would you care to explain yourself?" Professor Sprout prompted you.
Thankfully, Natalia came to your rescue. She slung one arm around your shoulders and said, "Just a snowball fight between friends, Professor. We needed to blow off some steam before we all head home, you know?"
Professor Sprout frowned, but as her eyes roved from one out-of-breath student to the next, clearly she didn't spot Percy either—or anyone else she would believe a gang of Slytherin fourth-years might have been harassing. She let out a sharp sigh, then motioned behind her down the slope.
"Very well, then. But back to school now, the lot of you. Before you catch cold."
Natalia released you and gave you a jaunty wink before she skipped after your instructor. Augustus and Mortimer did not linger. You, on the other hand, straggled behind them even more so than on the hike to the shack to begin with. One mortifying thought burned so hotly inside you that it kept you distracted from the cold sinking into your wet robes:
Oh, God. Had you developed a crush on Percy Weasley? That was absolutely not part of the plan.
******
It came as no surprise to you when you found an angry Professor McGonagall waiting for you one night the early spring of your fifth year. It came as no surprise, but still you flinched at the sight of her thin lips and flared nostrils. So she had not got all her frustration out after scolding you for over an hour this morning. Someone on the path to becoming a high-ranking Ministry official wouldn't quail at a teacher's obvious fury, but you couldn't help it. You'd never been in trouble like this before.
At least Percy Weasley had got himself in the same boat as you. He had beat you to the assigned location, perhaps having been dragged in person by his Head of House. Your Head of House had simply relayed the message about detention to you, then coldly told you to get out of his sight. Somehow you still found Professor McGonagall more frightening. How did Percy have the gall to look ashamed instead of terrified? Her narrowed eyes followed you until you stood right next to Percy.
"Mr. Weasley. Miss [L Name]."
"Yes, Professor?" you each said in unison. You caught a flash of light in the dim hallway—Percy eye's moving in your direction and away again.
"I needn't reiterate how disappointed I am in the both of you," she said. "I needn't reiterate it, but I shall. You are the best students in your year. You are intelligent and resourceful. Not a single instructor here questioned either of your appointments to the position of prefect. And yet what have you done since getting your badges?"
You shifted uncomfortably with your gaze affixed to the space above her right shoulder. Next to you, Percy let out a shaky breath.
"Bickering," she supplied for you. "Name-calling. Petty insults. In short: Not working together."
What point was there in protesting? She was right on every count. Percy didn't say anything either.
"And now you can't even perform your duty to look after the younger students! When you were supposed to be patrolling, you were dueling! Did Professor Dumbledore not make it clear to you just how important it is that no one gain access to the third-floor corridor? Well?"
Jumping to attention, you said, "He did, Professor."
"And still you chose to place this ridiculous rivalry over the safety of your peers?"
Guilty silence answered her. She knew she had hit the mark and relaxed somewhat at your wilting. However, her voice remained tight when she said:
"You will clean up the mess you made without the use of magic. It will take as many evenings as it takes. Your approved supplies have been provided. I suggest you use this time to make amends and find some common ground. If this childish behavior continues, I will appoint a new Gryffindor prefect next year, Mr. Weasley, and Miss [L Name], I will heartily suggest to Professor Snape that he do the same. Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, Professor." The thought of ruining the plan in one fell swoop had all the blood draining from your face. Percy, too, looked pale when you risked a glance at him, but when he echoed you, his voice sounded much steadier than your own.
"Good. Begin," said Professor McGonagall.
Despite the command, you each stood at attention until the sound of her footsteps echoing against the stone walls faded entirely away. You eyed Percy warily in her absence; he did the same to you. Wordlessly, you grabbed a scrap of cloth from a pile on the floor and started the long, slow process of cleaning.
And slow that process stayed. One night of hard manual labor turned into two turned into three turned into five. You and Percy scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed at the magical muck you'd left stuck to the floors and the ceilings and the paintings, never once breaking the stuffy hush that fell over you the moment you each turned up for detention every night. The only noise came from the clattering as you and he moved the ladders around or dropped used rags to the ground.
It didn't take long until you knew another night of this would drive you mad.
"Say something, would you, Weasley? This is stupid."
You heard his familiar sputtering and then the faint clack of the paintbrush he was using to carefully clean a painting as it fell from his hand. After he'd picked it up again, he said:
"If it's all the same to you, I'd much prefer we go on as we have been."
"McGonagall told us to find common ground," you reminded him. "We're never going to accomplish that if we don't speak to one another. Or is being prefect too much responsibility for you? Are you looking for an easy excuse to get out of it?"
A pause ensued, then he said, "You first," somewhat sulkily.
Well, you had been the one to bring up the idea of communicating. You took a few minutes to cast about for any subject that might interest Percy. Truthfully, for a boy that factored so heavily into your life, you really didn't know much of anything about him. Finally, you settled on asking, "How's Charlie doing?"
"I'm not particularly interested in giving you any information about my family members."
"Fair."
You'd probably have given a similar answer in his shoes. But that did complicate things. How were you supposed to get to know someone as hardheaded as a bludger? Frowning, you went on scraping a glob of hardened goop for another moment as you followed that train of thought: bludger, balls, snowballs.
"I never said thank you." You didn't take your eyes off your work.
"For what?" he asked, plainly suspicious.
"For not getting us in trouble over that snowball fight in Hogsmeade last winter. At first, I thought you 'd run off like a coward. But you probably could have taken the lot of us with one hand behind your back, huh?"
He hesitated before saying, "Not you, I don't think."
"So you're not denying that you helped us out."
"Well, to be honest, I started the whole thing. You weren't really the one who wanted to get a rise out of me. It's just that I saw you, and that's all I could think about. And besides," he added, "I wouldn't want you to be stuck in detention so much you stopped motivating me to do better in class."
"Good to know you know I could have said something nastier, if I'd wanted to. But I wouldn't ever tell you that you stink. You don't."
"Commentary on one's lack of hygiene is a bit more pedestrian than I would expect from you."
"Yeah." You grunted for dramatic effect as you leaned back from the stubborn spot. "So was this spell. I never should have tried it."
"The Bat-Bogey Hex is deceptively difficult to perform."
"Are you saying that you could have done it better?" You turned to face him at last. To your surprise, he had done the same to you.
"Given your grades, I know I could have done it better."
Tension thrummed between you. Percy tipped his head up to look down his nose at you. You could have whipped your wand out and destroyed all your hard work. Instead, you smiled.
"I am catching up to you, you know. Little by little."
"I'll believe that when I see it."
"Oh, I don't think you'll see me coming at all."
"No one can see the approach of someone who isn't moving."
You stifled a laugh with one hand. If you weren't much mistaken, Percy did as well.
"Here," he said. "What you're cleaning with is filthy." He levitated a fresh scrap of fabric up to where you were perched with, indeed, a sticky square covered in yellow-green-brown goo. You snatched the clean one out of the air as you lifted a single eyebrow.
"I thought we weren't allowed to use any magic at all for this."
Percy shrugged as he returned to his job. "I won't tell if you won't."
And though you didn't realize it then, something had changed—and that something would put the plan you'd spent five years enacting in serious jeopardy.
******
Sixth year, spring, when the grounds of Hogwarts woke up from their long hibernation. The blooming flowers near the lake enticed many students outside to enjoy those first fine days of warmer weather no matter what horrors lurked (or didn't) inside the castle itself. Normally, you would have been among those students, eager to warm yourself after several freezing months of sitting as close to the Slytherin common room fireplace as you could without risking your robes catching fire. But you couldn't join them that evening—not that Natalia made resisting that temptation easy when she remained so constantly wheedling at your shoulder.
"It wouldn't be that big a deal if you skived off once," she argued for the umpteenth time since dinner. And you gave her the exact same reply that you each time as well:
"It will be a big deal if another kid gets petrified on my watch."
"Like that's your responsibility!"
"I am a prefect, Nat."
"If Dumbledore really thought the Chamber of Secrets had something to do with this, do you really think he'd be leaving unqualified witches and wizards in charge of protecting the school? I mean, you're good, [Name], but you're not that good." Her hand grasped yours to pull you to a halt the moment you placed your foot on the first set of stairs. "Come on! The guys got ahold of some Dr. Filibuster's last Hogsmeade weekend. We're gonna set them all off, and it's going to be spectacular."
You pulled your hand firmly from her grip. "Yeah, sitting around while you and Mortimer snog under fireworks sounds like a grand old time."
"You're such a spoilsport! Besides, if it's the snogging you've got issue with, I happen to know Augustus wouldn't say no to a session with you."
"Spoilsport's my middle name. Tell you what. You can have both the boys with my blessing."
Her exaggerated eye roll indicated that she'd given up her campaign at last. "Fine. Don't say I didn't try to rescue you from listening to Weasley pontificate on whatever-the-hell billywig's flown into his bonnet all evening."
"I won't," you said.
Natalia stuck her tongue out at you before she flounced off in the direction of the front doors. You allowed yourself to relax as she disappeared into the throng of those squeezing out into the last bit of pre-curfew sunlight. Only once you could be reasonably certain she would be too distracted by her boyfriend to give you a second thought did you risk returning your climb up the stairs to your assigned meeting place.
The corridor was empty when you arrived. That gave you some pause. Most people wouldn't find that strange; the majority of those inside Hogwarts had only recently finished eating their evening meal. But you knew that shaking Natalia off had cost you time. You were late, and that meant your partner ought to already be here. Holding your breath, you strained your ears until—yes—you heard a muffled combination of slurping and sighing coming from somewhere close by.
Faster than a flying horse, you strode across the hall, over to the false stone wall, and through its facade. Inside was so dark that you could barely see the contorted shape of two tangled bodies a few feet away.
"Ahem!" you said loudly, careful to make it very plain that you weren't actually clearing your throat.
The writhing shape rapidly split into two. A few murmured partings rose between them, followed by another couple of kissing noises, and then the smaller of the two shadows hurried right past you without so much as a hello. You kept your eyes averted to allow them some degree of dignity. Percy, as he marched out into the daylight, you did not afford the same privilege to.
"Really, Weasley? Clearwater?" you asked.
He bristled and whirled on you. This was all he had to express his embarrassment now, having turned so red already that his hair looked light in comparison to his face. "Yes. Clearwater. We've been dating for months now. You know this. I don't know what else you expected."
You pretended to think about this. "Well, I'd say what I expected was finding you here waiting for me, not taking the opportunity to cop an extra feel before patrol. More importantly," you added upon seeing him turn somehow even more vibrant, "you do realize she's a bore, and you could hook up someone more interesting, right?"
"Like who?"
Now it was your turn to blush. Thankfully, being a boy, Percy wouldn't notice. "Clearwater's not the only good-looking girl at Hogwarts. That's all I mean."
"I'm not discussing this with you again."
"Then quit snogging your girlfriend when you know I'm on my way."
Percy had no reasonable counter to this suggestion, and he knew it. He smashed his lips into a thin line before he turned to wordlessly march the direction from which you'd come. You let him get a head start so that your heart would have time to calm down from your tenth near-confession in so many days. No wonder you were the only sixth year not seeing someone—you'd set your sights on the one guy that had no reason to consider you as an option.
"Are you coming?" You realized with jolt in your stomach that he'd stopped to look pointedly over his shoulder at you. "I'm not interested in hearing another lecture about dereliction of duty from Professor McGonagall because you were lollygagging."
"Because I'm the one making us run late," you muttered.
"You are now," he said, and if you hadn't known better, you would have sworn he said it in a singsong.
But the moment came and went. Percy soon went back on his way. Embolden by his arrogance, you ran after him to settle into a comfortable stride equal to his own. Now to just wait for the most opportune moment...
"Are you about ready for finals?" you asked by way of distraction.
Percy took the bait. He smirked as he tapped at one temple. "As always. I've been making sure to spend more time practicing for the defense against the dark arts practical, too. You won't be beating me this year."
"Oh? So you haven't been shoring up the gap between us in potions?"
"That grade doesn't count! We agreed to that!"
"Are you sure I didn't lie to get you to put your guard down? I am a scheming Slytherin, after all."
His eyes darted back and forth. Some part of you hated that he almost believed you to be capable of that. You ignored this part of you to spring your trap. Quickly but deliberately, you brushed the back of your hand against his. This had the exact reaction you'd anticipated: Percy nearly jumped out of his heavily-freckled skin. Pretending not to notice his coming to a complete stop to gawk at you, you sauntered forward a handful of steps before tossing him an innocent:
"Something wrong, Weasley? We wouldn't want Professor McGonagall to spot you dawdling on the job, now, would we?"
His mouth snapped shut, fell open again, snapped shut a second time. You took some quiet pride in driving a pedant like Percy Weasley to speechlessness. Too bad it didn't take him long to recover. But as the two of you began in earnest your rounds of the school, you couldn't stop your heart from pounding or your mind from playing back again and against the moment that your skins touched. A brief twinge of guilt reminded you of your life's overarching plan. There in the moment, though, you couldn't find it within yourself to care that you might yourself smash it to pieces.
******
You found Percy in a predictable place after everything wrapped up for the year. The end-of-year feast had been its usual disaster: your newest defense against arts teacher turned out to be have been a werewolf the entire time; Percy's youngest brother had been injured again following Harry Potter into one nightmare or another; and Gryffindor won the House Cup for the third time in a row. All the cheering and booing and crying and screaming had long since faded away as the students drifted upstairs to pack for the train ride home the following morning. Your own trunk lay meticulously packed at the foot of your bed for the very last time. But once you'd finished with that chore, you couldn't sit still, and you'd slipped out of the somewhat sullen Slytherin common room in search of the one person you had yet to give a proper goodbye.
"Reliving your glory days, Weasley?" you called when you spotted him standing in front of the hourglasses used to track house points. The Gryffindor glass remained, as was now typical, filled to the brim with rubies. The emeralds in your own looked pitiful in comparison. But you didn't dwell; the House Cup no longer concerned you at all anymore.
Percy's eyes drifted in your direction, then away again. "It has been nice breaking your streak for the last few years."
"Oh, please. Gryffindor's only beat us because Professor Dumbledore has a soft spot for Potter."
"And we're the clearly superior house."
"But you don't argue that Harry Potter might have something to do with it?"
Percy scoffed, but the sound care across as less scornful than normal. You understood his mood without asking for clarification. Both you and Percy faced similar circumstances in the coming days.
"I'm getting ready to go on my farewell tour," you gestured behind yourself. "Care to join me?"
"We're not on patrol, so we really shouldn't. It's after curfew."
You rolled your eyes and tapped the embossed, shield-shaped badge on your chest. Percy had one nearly identical to yours pinned to his robes, though his was red and read "Head Boy." "If there was ever a time to abuse your position, it's tonight. You'll never have another opportunity."
"You're a terrible influence," he said, but one end of his mouth twitched.
"I'm the most fun you allow yourself to have, Weasley."
He left the hourglasses and walked over to you. Neither of you said a word for a while. You simply surveyed the still corridors of Hogwarts with a practiced scrutiny that came with three straight years of overnight patrols. Sirius Black remained at large, after all. But the silence between you and Percy felt stiff and strange.
He had become one of your closest confidants after your two weeks' worth of detention during fifth year. You knew about his guilt over failing Ginny the year before; he knew about your sister's first terrifying bout of accidental magic when you'd been home alone with her over the summer. He spoke to you about his businesslike breakup with Penelope; you spoke to him about Natalia confessing feelings for you that you couldn't reciprocate even if you wanted to. He told you all about his desire to surpass his father's legacy at the Ministry; you told him him all about the plan. But now? Nothing. Perhaps your friendship really wouldn't last past that final night at school.
You couldn't allow that. You had to try something to break the ice:
"Be honest, Weasley: You're not really ready to leave this place, are you?"
Though he didn't look in your direction, he chuckled. "Actually, I think it'll be nice to leave Ron in charge of everything."
"Ron? What about Fred and George?"
"No one smarter than troll would leave those two in charge of anything."
And you resumed the quiet walk again for another good amount of time. You'd gotten him to open up to you by begging him to talk once. Should you do so again? But Percy beat you to it, clearly noticing the uncomfortable atmosphere himself. He cleared his throat before he said somewhat awkwardly:
"Are you keen to get started with the Wizengamot Administration Services?"
"Ooh, yeah. I just can't wait to sit around doing paperwork for the foreseeable future. Seven years spent learning how to copy a document in triplicate. I'll be living the dream."
"There's nothing wrong with paperwork," he said stiffly.
"There isn't, but most of us don't live for it."
"Well, if you hadn't foisted all the Head Boy and Girl paperwork on me this year, you'd be a lot more prepared to handle your new position."
"True."
Your swift acquiescence put him off guard. He looked like he wanted to ask you something, but instead he just resumed the walk—for a little while. Soon, he broke the hush again:
"And shouldn't you be excited? You couldn't ask for a better starting place to—what was it?—'ensure pure-blood survival in an increasingly muddled magical world"? It's all part of the plan, isn't?"
"Bugger the plan," you mumbled, but by his shocked expression, you could tell that Percy had heard.
"Pardon me?"
You took a deep breath. "I don't care about the plan anymore. To be honest, I haven't cared about it for a long time."
"What—but—" He struggled to recover for a moment. "You've put all of this work into it. Why give up now?"
"I never said anything about giving up. I've just come to realize that I've made a few missteps. Besides, there are more important things in life than ensuring pure-blood survival."
"Such as?"
"Oh, I can think of one or two things off the top of my head."
The space between you and him pulled taught. You looked up at him. He looked down at you. Professor Dumbledore often spoke of the inherent magic found in love. You'd always thought that sounded a little sappy before. But not just then. Something deep inside your stomach trembled; your arms shook as you reached forward for Percy's shoulders.
And then you were kissing Percy Weasley, and Percy Weasley was kissing you back.
In retrospect, you deemed that kiss not at all inherently magical. You hadn't kissed anyone before that night. Your noses bumped into each other; his glasses crunched against your forehead; and it took a few adjustments on his part to guide your mouth into the proper location. Worst of all, everything concluded far too soon for your liking.
"For example, I'm pretty sure kissing blood traitors isn't part of the plan either," you said breathlessly.
Look a little dazed, Percy licked his lips and nodded. This very tiny response caused your heart to leap into your throat.
"Was that...okay?"
His gaze sharpened. "Won't your parents be upset with you for ruining the plan?"
"I've come an awful long way for them to write me off now." You shrugged. "And anyway, there's always my sister if I turn out to be a total disaster. Maybe she'll be better at following the rules."
Slowly, almost as though someone had cast Arresto Momentum on the two of you, Percy took your hand. You curled your fingers around his. He squeezed. And just like that, shoulder to shoulder, you and Percy Weasley took your first steps together out of school and into adulthood.
******
In the present, you and Percy stood next to one another directly in front of your desk. The shift in the lights in the window showed that quite some time had passed since you started your story. The fascinated fourth-year girls had surrounded you while you spoke, and they all let out an ear-splitting squeal now that you'd reached the end.
"You kissed him first?"
"You gave up the plan for him?"
"What did your parents think?"
"What did your friends think?"
"What took you so long to get married?" asked Rao.
"Well—" Percy began, but you smoothly slipped your hand into his before he could start to answer.
"What with everything that happened during the war, we needed more time to figure things out," you said. And you certainly had. All the ways life had transformed you and Percy into different people; the actions you both took in times of hardship; your messy breakup and your even messier getting back together—those sorts of gory details really weren't appropriate to explain to kids this age.
"But now you are getting married, and you're going to live happily ever after?" Spencer demanded.
"Something like that," said Percy.
"How good it is to hear that two of my best pupils have always been so casual about breaking the rules they promised to uphold," cut in a new voice, one far too past puberty to belong to one of these Slytherins.
"Professor McGonagall!"
You and Percy sprang apart. In the middle of the room, just behind the gaggle that made up your audience, stood the headmistress herself. She didn't appear terribly upset. Nonetheless, a few of the boys ostensibly still practicing their wand work let out soft, gleeful "Ooo"s.
"Mr. Weasley. Last I checked, you were employed by the Ministry of Magic. What are you doing inside of my school? And more importantly, why are you interrupting my defense against the dark arts instructor?"
"I—I came to deliver your wedding invitation, Professor."
"I might be old, but I'm not senile enough to mistake this classroom for my office."
Percy hung his head. Professor McGonagall approached him with her hand outstretched.
"Well? My invitation, Mr. Weasley?"
He hurriedly pulled the paper from inside his robes and offered it to her. Smiling, she pocketed the rectangle.
"It's about time that I received this, and that you finally got around to asking Miss [L Name] to marry you."
"Professor, I—"
She gestured for silence as the booming class bell rang out. Then she turned toward the watching students.
"I believe you all have another class to attend shortly."
Obediently (albeit with obvious snickers of delight at seeing their teacher get in trouble), they packed up their things. Talbot nearly managed to sneak by you—nearly. You touched his shoulder to get his attention before whispering, "Good work on that reducto." Soon after that, the classroom had emptied, leaving just you and your shame-faced fiancé with Professor McGonagall.
"Mr. Weasley, if you will follow me to my office, we will discuss what actions to take about your decision to trespass. I believe I have some biscuits you'll enjoy."
Percy looked less like a scolded krup at the suggestion of a snack. He followed her to the exit. Just as she made it to the door, Professor McGonagall had a parting shot for you as well:
"And, Miss [L Name], I will be coming by periodically in the coming days to ensure that the rest of your lessons are staying on task."
"Yes, Professor," you replied.
She smiled again for another half second. Then she left you to prepare for your inbound class of second-year Hufflepuffs. You couldn't help grinning as you used a spell to wipe the blackboard clean for a new set of directions—even if you knew Professor McGonagall would make good on her promise and you'd have to be on your best behavior until the end of the term.
Percy Weasley, as usual, was a whole heap of trouble, and harder to control than a bunch of fourteen-year-olds. But you'd never, not once, regretted giving up the plan for him. This new plan made you happier than the old one ever had.
Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers. Let’s spread the self-love 💗
~ @entishramblings // vaya
Gosh, that's really, really, really nice of you! Thank you so much! I had to think about this for a little bit, but I think I've selected my five, and then I ramble about them, because I am, in all things, a rambler (and I never really get a chance to talk about my stuff with people who are in a fanfic community).
Starship in a Bottle [Kelvin!James Kirk x Female!Reader]
Summary: Life is fragile. Life is beautiful. Life can be smashed to pieces in the blink of an eye. Such smashing does not require that what is left will not still be fragile and beautiful itself.
I'm really a huge fan of Star Trek. I started with the Kelvin Universe, then watched the entirety of pre-NuTrek series, and it turns out I'm an even bigger fan of that. The Original Series especially has a special place in my heart. And so this was an enormous joy for me to write! It's still very specifically Chris Pine's Kirk rather than William Shatner's, but I crammed as many references in to other televisions series as I could. And it's always a joy when someone trusts me enough with a request to let me do almost whatever I want.
And there was just a lot that could have gone wrong. I wanted to make sure the Reader was distinctly different from Dr. Carol Marcus (either version of her), and I wanted to make sure their son was distinctly different from David. I've gotten comments about how much people like Emmett, so I think I succeeded. To be honest, I love this fic so much that I named one of my cats after Emmett. And then Mr. Tanir was a risk, making an OC Vulcan, but people who have read the fic seem to really love him. I'm so glad!
And lastly, if anyone in real life asks me about my fic and my best friend, R, is around, she always hops in to talk about this one. She doesn't often read my fics, so it's really touching that she has a favorite! And so it's my all-time favorite as well.
And Whither Then? [Aragorn/Female!Reader]
Summary: Here, at the end of all things, you just might find a new beginning.
Another one where someone gave me almost completely free rein over what I was writing! It had been ages since I did anything Lord of the Rings-related, so I actually read several passages of the book before I sat down to write because I wanted to capture some of the writing style. This is another one R read, and afterward she told me that she felt like she was really reading Tolkien, and don't worry, I absolutely know that's an exaggeration, so I didn't let it go to my head, but it's also perhaps one of the nicest things she's ever said to me, and consequently it really stuck with me.
I was really nervous about posting this one. I grew up writing fanfic in the age when writing reader-insert stuff was considered massively cringe outside of niche communities, and even within them, Tolkien canon was sacrosanct. I'd always been careful to keep Aragorn/Arwen canon and to only maybe--if I was feeling brave that day--allude to a Tenth Walker. I just knew I was going to get nasty comments. But instead, I got a lot of really, really kind reviews. I'm so happy!
Where Gods Do Fear to Tread [MCU!Peter Parker x Female!Reader]
Summary: The best laid plans of mice and men often go awry, the best laid plans of teenagers even more so.
Gosh, for a while there, I was really the random pregnancy writer, huh? I'm sort of amazed that this one continues to probably be the most commonly read thing I've got on here. If I log on and see any amount of notes on my blog, odds are very good that one or more persons binged the whole story while I was asleep.
It was very much a fic where I just picked up random thoughts and threw it in as I went, whether or not they'd be a very a good idea to most. Making the Reader Tony's daughter would make things more complicated? Sure, why not. Some people head canon Peter as Jewish? Sure, why not. Pepper and Tony have a daughter of their own in Endgame? Sure, why not! And so it has no right to not be a cobbled-together mess, but it's the only one of my random pregnancy stories I can re-read without cringing now. I think that universally all the relationships are sweet and realistic, and I also think it's good for a grown-ass adult to occasionally write stories about teenagers and be reminded that hoo boy being a teenager is rough.
Every Breath We Drew [Q x Female!Reader]
Summary: People do crazy things, when they’re in love.
This was a fic challenge one shot, and I think still the longest one shot I've written since I decided to turn A Place Like Home into a story with chapters. And I still distinctly remember the person I wrote it for saying that the story was far, far darker than they had expected, and I also recall someone saying that the story overall is very predictable. (I'm not sure if it was the same person). And it is! But I think it is very different than my usual output, and it's one of my stories that I feel like I nail the character voices for the story. It's not perfect (predictability notwithstanding, there's other weaknesses on display), but I have a lot of love for this thing. I'm very pleased with the characterizations and names I gave Q's cats.
Torture [Steve Rogers x Female!Reader and Bucky Barnes x Female!Reader]
Summary: It never gets any easier.
I went back and forth on this last one for a while, but in the end I settled on this. Hardly anyone's liked it; no one's reblogged it; it has almost no traction whatsoever on Ao3. But it's still one of my favorites. I don't really like writing with the five-year gap in mind, but this one is just different to me, personally. I like writing sad things every so often; I like writing stories where the reader's behavior may not be unambiguously heroic. And I like making End Game!Steve sad because he sucks. And the description is good, I feel. I've been working very hard on trying to describe things better for a very long time, and it's gratifying to read something of mine where I think I got that right.
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 11]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 11: Truly a Lovable Creature
None of the occupants of the streams of cars below knew of the danger looming so menacingly near them. At any moment, the massive shape of Sanctuary II could cross over the sun and plunge them all into literal and figurative darkness. For the time being, though, they all had places to be and people to see. The possibility of a second, much worse alien invasion probably hadn't crossed their minds that morning. They all remained equally oblivious of the solitary woman gazing down at them from her precarious position on Avengers Tower's hastily-repaired launchpad.
And you had the power to keep things that way: the people ignorant, the planet relatively safe. You would keep it that way. But curiously, the moment your toes brushed the open air at the end of the walkway, the entire world around you spun. Before you could pitch off the building, you sat down at the very edge of the pad. Sure, you planned to go down eventually, but you preferred to make the choice of when exactly—go out with a bit of dignity, so to speak.
Your shoes dangled off into nothingness as you watched the traffic pass. Falling would be so easy. You were in something of a time crunch. If the team stopped arguing for any amount of time, one of them was likely to notice you'd never returned from your alleged getting of fresh air. They would die for you. You'd realized that during the meeting. Whether they thought you were crazy for thinking you didn't belong here, whether they distrusted you because of your relationship with Loki—they all loved you enough to give their lives to keep you safe.
And since you loved them, too, you couldn't allow them to do it. The fact remained you could be right. You might have caused all this. Real or not, you couldn't sit by and let them get hurt. Yes, you might have read the occasional whump or hurt/comfort fic back in your world, but reading about Natasha being tortured would be very different from seeing it firsthand after she'd spent an evening painting your nails with meticulous care.
That your inhale following your decision came so steadily came as a pleasant surprise. So did how readily you stood again. The street beneath you didn't spin this time. All you needed to do was taken one step forward...
"There is a shortage of perfect faces in this world. It would be a pity to damage yours. Careful!"
So great was your shock at being addressed that you had startled and wobbled dangerously at the edge of the launchpad. Loki—of course no one else would be here to see you in this state but Loki—grimly caught your wrist to tug you to safety. Against your better judgment, you fell against his chest and trembled there. Intention to jump or not, you still didn't want to manage it by accident.
When the fear passed, you pushed away to glare at him. "What are you doing here?"
"Several things," he answered. "First and foremost, I'm ensuring that you don't kill yourself."
"Well, that's too bad, because I don't remember asking for your permission to save the world."
"Won't you at least hear me out? Come. I'd feel much more secure with some distance between you and that drop."
You did not budge. Loki sighed, but it wasn't his usual over-the-top weight-of-the-world-on-his-shoulders kind of sigh. Very deliberately, he loosened his grip on you and dropped your hand. Then he sat down in your previous position with his boots hanging into the void.
"Very well. We'll do things your way. Will you please sit with me for a while?"
Your arms—which you'd wrapped tightly around yourself when freed—relaxed somewhat. But still you made no move to join him.
Now he rolled his eyes. Afterward, he lifted his right hand in the air and kept the left fully visible to you and said solemnly: "I swear by all the gods in Asgard, Jotunheim, and Midgard that I will do nothing to force you to comply with my requests. I only want to speak with you."
Now that your determination had been so rudely interrupted, the whipping wind at this height had you shivering. You took a seat beside him hesitantly all the same. Better that, you figured, than to shake yourself right off the platform.
"I think you said everything you needed to say earlier," you said.
Rather than respond, Loki unclasped his cloak. The warm weight of it settled over your shoulders before he said anything else.
"I'm sorry," he said at last. "I was...No. I am scared of dying."
Your fingers twisted around the edge of the cape to draw it closer around you. Despite the gale and the cold, the herbal scent you'd come to associate with Loki himself remained stuck to the fabric.
Loki's laughed humorlessly into the sky. "Pathetic, isn't it? I would do anything to escape the death that is my birthright. You would offer yourself in exchange for what you believe to be a lie."
"It is a lie," you said.
"But it isn't!" Now he turned to you. "Everything you've experienced here has been real, and everything you remember from before is real, too."
"So why did you try to convince me it wasn't?"
"I thought if we both could believe in the truth of this place, it would—what is the Midgardian saying?—seal the deal. That I could be saved. I see now that I was wrong."
"Too bad it took you so long to realize that," you said. "Maybe if you'd admitted everything months ago, Tony and Bruce would have had time to get the real Cinnabar back, and we wouldn't be in this mess."
"[Name], there is no 'real' Cinnabar. The only Cinnabar there's ever been is you."
"You just told me that all of this," you waved one hand wildly around your head, "is real!"
"It is! A wish become reality is still reality."
You stood with enough force to send Loki's cape billowing off your body. The wind soon whisked it away. "Then all of this is my fault, and I have to make it right."
Loki got to his feet as well. "Your fault? Whatever are you talking about?"
"'A wish become reality is still reality.' My wish became reality! I wished to be less lonely, and I woke up here. If I had never done that, everyone here would be safe. They'd never have known me. Thanos wouldn't have a shortcut to the stones. I—"
He silenced you with a hand softly cupping your face. "I wished to have lived a better life. As I lay dying on the Statesman, while in close proximity to several Infinity Stones, I wished to have done more, been more, loved more. [Name], you were the answer to my wish."
What possible reply could you give to that other than, "What?"
"So I am certain that you can understand," he went on, "that I cannot allow you to make this senseless sacrifice on my behalf. I cannot let you die on the altar of my selfishness."
"I can't stay, Loki. If Thanos gets ahold of me, he'll kill half the universe before you all can do anything to rescue it."
"I know. That is why while you were off having your fruitless work meeting with the rest of the Avengers, I was calling in a few favors to get my hands on this."
He held up the same satchel he'd once carried the photograph of your family in. Carefully, he opened the top of it. A thin current of blood-red liquid surged from the top like a tiny geyser before he sealed it shut once more. You could hardly believe your eyes.
"Is that the Aether?" you asked.
One end of his lips curled at your obvious wonder. "The Tesseract would never have gotten you home. You traveled realities, not distance."
"But it's not in stone form. How are you going to get it to do anything?"
"All I plan to do is undo my wish. I don't see that putting it in a stronger form will make the object more or less likely to bow to my whim, seeing as I never made my wish directly on it to begin with. It's just a sort of focusing instrument with fantastical powers beyond your imagination."
“So because it’s magic, you don’t have to explain it?”
“I’m so glad you understand. We really make an incredible team, you and I. It’s as though our souls were cut from the same cloth.” His winning smile faded slowly away. “I didn’t lie about everything, you know. I really do love you.”
“Because this universe forced you to love me,” you said.
“No. The love came later. Watching you, talking to you, sharing my fears with you, I found myself inexorably drawn to everything about you. You truly are a lovable creature, [F Name] [L Name]."
Could you believe him? You wanted to. Which didn't make a lick of sense, seeing as if you had just had an argument with a normal man back home, you wouldn't be so quick to put your guard down—but here you were, able and ready to do so for a self-professed god of mischief! Before you could give more thought to the question of trust, he added:
"And that is why I have to let you go."
Red liquid gushed now from the top of the satchel in his grasp. It swirled round and round and round your body, dousing the whole scene in a deep, dark scarlet. You could barely see Loki even though he remained mere inches from you.
"Wait! Come with me. You'll be safe there," you said.
"I rather think I've broken your heart enough to make up for multiple worlds by now."
"But just because I'm gone won't mean Thanos isn't going to come!"
"I know. But you'll be safe. And that is something I have come to realize I am willing to die for."
Your field of vision had shrunk to the point that all you could see of Loki were his eyes, two shiny, all-black spheres shining at you through the reddish-dark. The noise of the traffic and the wind had diminished.
"If there is a universe where I exist and you do not, and there is a universe where you exist and I do not," he said, "then surely somewhere there is a universe where we both exist. I will look for you there. I love you, [Name]."
Everything went black. The sound of a rushing river filled your ears. No wind stirred your clothing. It felt as though slick, opaque walls were pressing in on you from every angle. You tried to speak, but your tongue would not move, nor would any other part of your body. Only one thing remained to make clear:
'I love you, too.'
******
The sharp blare of your alarm cut through the thick darkness like a knife. Groaning, you thrust one arm from your warm cocoon of blankets and groped about until you found your cell phone. Only after you'd silenced the din did you sit up enough to expose yourself to the chill of the world beyond your bed.
Half a yawn later, realization struck. Your bed. You turned your head to one side to see the dust-coated blinds. Your room. You pulled the fabric covering your chest out so that you could give it a thorough examination. Your pajamas.
All traces of sleepiness vanished. One small leap had you out of bed with your feet on the floor. You rushed out into the rest of your tiny, one-bedroom apartment. Just outside your bedroom sat your crammed living-slash-dining room. Nearby was the kitchen, filled with feeble pre-work-shift sunlight drifting through the skylight, and—yes!—a pile of dirty plates rising from the sink. A calendar was pinned where you could not miss it; its pages were still open to December of the previous year.
Previous year?!
You clapped a hand over your own mouth to keep the weak laughter from burbling out of your throat and disturbing your neighbors. Just as quickly as you'd been filled with energy, you lost the strength to stand upright. The open bedroom door served to hold you up as you slowly slid to the floor, pulled your legs up to your chest, and buried your face in your knees.
Just a dream. It had only been a vivid, wild, exceptionally lengthy dream—one you could never share with anyone else. Anyone hearing the details of your fantastical Avengers life would surely remind you to stop reading on Ao3 at least an hour before bed. No, you'd just have to keep this secret to the grave.
Curious, you lifted your head and shifted to look at one forearm. You concentrated with all your might on the emotions you'd felt in that dream: anger, fear, anxiety, love, courage. Nothing happened. Even attempting to trigger yourself into a panic attack resulted in no change whatsoever.
Your phone chimed with a reminder that you'd better stop living in dreamland if you wanted to keep your job. Here in the real world, you still had rent to pay, so up you got. You finished your morning routine with picking up a to-go breakfast from the kitchen. Then you grabbed your keys and your purse and made to leave.
You saw it just before you stepped outside: Your corkboard plastered with memories. An enormous grin spread across your face as you locked the door behind you.
In one familiar photograph of your family, someone nearly hidden in the background had the wrong-colored eyes.
THE END
Final Author's Note:
Hey, thanks for joining me for this little surprise adventure. As I said previously, this was originally intended to be a one shot that just had the penultimate scene until I realized it really wouldn't have any emotional payoff unless I built up to it. The pacing is a little wonky, but, hey, I think this is the best paced multi-chapter fic I've written. And it gave me an opportunity to try some things, like writing action scenes (those always ground my progress to a halt) and trying to keep the romance ever-present even when Loki wasn't physically in a scene. I hope that I succeeded to some small degree in my goals. I've been studying plot pacing a lot recently, so I hope my next attempt (which through a poll on Tumblr will be Blossoms in the Snow) will show improvement.
As always, I have to give a huge shout-out to my IRL friend, R. Thank you for always being a text away from answering my bizarre questions such as, "Is it racist to say someone tastes like MSG after they eat Chinese food?" or helping me figure out an appropriate onomatopoeia; for almost always knowing what word I'm looking for when I describe it to you; and for enduring the all-important "bitching step" of my writing process and listening to me moan about how words like "herbaceous" don't mean what I want them to and English is a stupid language. Even after all these years, you complete me. You don't often read my fic, so it's unlikely you'll see this, but if you ever do: I love you, and I think you're pretty swell.
And perhaps most importantly: If you were kind enough to leave me any sort of comment that wasn't trying to scam me, I appreciate you very, very much. (And joke's on you scammers; I don't have Instagram or Snapchat!) This story didn't get a whole lot of traction, so the engagement you gave me truly mattered. Goodbye, and I hope to see you again once I get through my one shot request list!
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 10]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 9: But You're Still Here
The weeks that followed blurred by in a comfortable routine. Magazines bearing your image and crowing "Cinnabar is back!" lined the stands at bodegas. Between work and Loki and cooking and training, you hardly noticed the days fly by. You were happy, and felt as bright inside as the sunlight that filled the bedroom on mornings you and Loki had the opportunity to sleep in.
Hovering on the thin line between sleep and wakefulness, you focused on the sound of Loki breathing next to you. You were both tangled up with one another to the point of aching in one or two places, but if you could just hold still another minute or so, you knew you'd fall right back into slumber.
Someone knocking softly at the door had other ideas. Loki shifted toward the nearest edge of the bed.
"Mmm...five more minutes," you said as you wrapped your limbs even more thoroughly around him, like some sort of deranged octopus.
It took Loki no time at all to free himself from your grip. He chuckled at your whining protest, then bent to kiss the top of your head. "I'll be right back, darling."
You resolved not to go back to sleep until he returned. How could you anyway? The rapping, while remaining quiet, grew in frequency the longer it went unanswered. Everything that followed you heard but did not see: Loki's bare feet against the floor; the unmistakable (but indiscernible) rumble of Thor's voice once the door opened; a sharp intake of breath belonging to Loki; and, lastly, the sharp snick of the door being closed behind them both.
The longer Loki remained away, the less drowsy you became. You sat up with a yawn, the sheets sliding slowly off of you as you stretched. Just in case Thor decided to join Loki when the latter came back, you adjusted your pajamas to ensure you were completely covered.
But when Loki did return a few minutes later, he returned alone. Worse, once he'd turned around after shutting the door once more, his face had turned the gray of expired milk.
"Is something wrong?" you asked.
Loki started, as though he had forgotten that he'd left you behind in the bed you shared with him. His mouth opened automatically, but no words came out of it. He quaked as he moved otherwise mechanically to crumple on the very edge of the empty half of the mattress.
"Loki?"
His eyes remained fixated on the floor; his fingers latched onto the discarded sheets to prevent his hands from quivering. Though you thought you saw his mouth moved, you didn't hear him say anything at all.
"Sorry?"
"My mother, she's..." His Adam's apple bobbed up and down dangerously fast. "She's been killed."
You scrambled to join him and squeezed both his hands in yours. "What?"
"It happened last night. The dungeons had a breakout. She tried to stop them. They killed her."
"Who—"
"The prisoners that we've been delivering. The children of Thanos."
This information launched you to your feet. Your presence didn't seem to be helping calm Loki anyway. You began pacing around the room and scratching at your scalp. After a moment or two of this, you whirled to face him.
"But the guards caught them, right? They're back in the dungeons?"
He shook his head listlessly. "They escaped. One of them smuggled some form of transportation in with them. But first, they got into the treasury and took the Space Stone. That's when Mother found them, and..."
The sensation of being plunged into icy water drowned out any pang of grief you might have felt over Loki's loss (or your own; Frigga had always been kind to you). They'd stolen the Space Stone. Thanos had the Space Stone. And he had it far, far too early.
You gripped Loki's shoulders tightly, fighting down your body's natural instinct to send toxin surging into your palms. "We have to go get it."
That snapped Loki somewhat out of his trance. He scowled and pushed your hands off of him. "And what are we supposed to do to stop him?"
"I don't know, but we've got to try, haven't we? We'll take the rest of the team—"
He let out a harsh, mirthless laugh. "As though offering more sacrificial lambs will do anything to change the outcome of us taking on the Mad Titan."
"Fine. What's your idea, then?"
"You forget that I know them. I've spent time with them—Thanos and his children-cum-bloodthirsty minions. They will kill us the moment they believe we are coming."
"So what? We just sit here and wait to die?" you demanded.
Now that you'd sat down, Loki began pacing himself. He pulled his fingers through his hair until became even more disheveled than sleeping had made it. And all you could do was watch vacantly, mouth dry, one thought echoing over and over again in your mind: This wasn't supposed to happen.
Until you realized that the words weren't only in your mind. Someone was speaking them aloud, too—and that someone wasn't you.
"This wasn't supposed to happen," Loki muttered as he continued to walk back and forth, back and forth. "This wasn't supposed to happen. This wasn't supposed to happen. Everything was supposed to be better this time around."
Something deep inside you went cold and entirely still. You got up without conscious thought. You walked over to Loki without conscious thought. If you allowed yourself to think for a single solitary second, you just might fall to pieces.
"What do you mean?" you asked.
"What do I mean? What do I mean? Obviously, I mean that those creatures weren't ever supposed to get their grubby hands on the Infinity Stones! Now they've found one, and everything is ruined."
"No." You spoke with a terrible, dead calm that you yourself didn't understand. It felt almost like you were watching the scene from a distance. A roaring in your ears narrowed everything into one single focal point. "What did you mean when you said that things were supposed to be better this time around?"
His eyes went wide. If you hadn't been zeroed in on his face, you would have missed it. But you didn't. Neither did you miss the fakeness in the grimace-slash-grin he plastered on shortly after. "Well, no son wants to see their favorite parent pass away with so much life yet to live."
"And when you said that everything is ruined?"
"Things seem a little grim at the moment, don't they?"
All your anger burst out in your shoving him backward with all your might. "You knew!"
Though Loki didn't budge, some tiny self-aware part of you screamed that you ought to feel bad for striking him at all. You ignored this part of yourself and pounded on his chest with balled fists. He caught your wrists in his hands to stop you.
"Now, [Name]—"
"No!" You couldn't see for the angry tears flooding your eyes. "Quit lying to me!"
"What am I supposedly lying about?"
"Everything!"
Your voice cracked in the middle of the word. Something hot and painful pulsed through your veins. A pungent, vinegary aroma surged from your every pore. Loki took a step away. Although breathing deeply cooled your skin somewhat, it did nothing to rid the room of the sudden acidity in the air.
"You knew," you said quietly.
Loki's affect when he replied was curiously flat. "What, exactly, are you accusing me of knowing?"
"The truth. This whole time, you knew. You knew I was right; you knew I wasn't crazy. I don't belong here. You gaslit me into believing I had amnesia."
"And so what if I did?"
His frigid tone made you cough in shock, like a boot to your stomach.
"Were things better for you in your little pocket of the multiverse?" he asked. "Did you feel fulfilled? Happy? Optimistic about your future? Because I most assuredly did not!"
"That's not the point!"
"What is, then? The idea that I broke your fragile trust? As though something so insignificant as that matters anymore. Thanos is coming. You failed."
"Excuse me?"
How you could manage to feel offended with every other emotion soaring so high, you didn't know. But you did. Paradoxically, the stronger the emotion you felt, the more drained of life Loki became. He hardly moved, hardly emoted. Meanwhile, you practically vibrated with anger.
"I suppose that's not entirely fair," he said. "I must shoulder some of the blame. If I had convinced you more quickly of this reality, perhaps I would not be the only person that you couldn't 'save' by simple virtue of being here."
Did Loki notice how hard you had to concentrate not to send poisons into the air? The way your fists clenched so hard that your palms hurt where your nails met them? The way you mashed your lips so tightly together that they were no longer visible? Probably. He just didn't care, as he so clearly did not care about Clint's depression, Tony's PTSD, or even his own brother's grief over the loss of their mother—just as he so clearly did not care about you, and never had.
"If you're so disappointed about how I turned out here, why don't you try stepping into my shoes?" you spat. "The Loki I knew had the grace to die with dignity."
"The Loki you knew couldn't have got you to love him enough to save him either."
A pitiful whimper escaped your throat despite your best efforts to squash it down. What could anyone say to a remark like that? Tears flowed freely down your cheeks, and you no longer believed you could pass them off as irritation from your own toxin. You'd known from the beginning that everything in this reality was somehow your fault. But to hear that you failed even at the basic level of having loved someone that you had thought loved you first...
You forced yourself to breathe out. You slowly loosened your hands. Then you turned on your heel and left him to wallow alone in the room.
Loki Laufeyson might have given up. Nothing required you to do the same.
******
Tension filled the conference room air so thickly that you could hardly breath. The accompanying acrid smell didn't help, though, for once, such an aroma didn't come from you. It instead wafted from the plethora of SHIELD-branded mugs littering the huge, glossy table. Your condition when you'd demanded a meeting had been so great that no one wanted to wait for Tony's expensive coffee to brew, settling instead on instant. No one lifted a cup. Nearly each and every member of the Avengers were waiting for you to start speaking.
You gulped.
Not so long ago, you'd adjusted to sitting on their side of the room. Now you stood in the spot reserved almost exclusively for Steve, Natasha, or Tony. Only a single chair remained vacant. Your eyes kept getting drawn to it like the absence of its owner was a black hole. Even Thor had pulled himself together long enough to join the assembly. His eyes were red at the rims, sure, but he had come. If Loki had joined you despite your argument, at least you wouldn't have kept reaching for a nonexistent supportive hand at your side.
Then again, what good was a supportive hand when the only support it gave was for its own gain? Patient, caring, kind—all acts, all lies. Who could have seen it coming as clearly as you? You wanted to scream; you wanted to cry. Normally, at this point, you'd have a panic attack and pass the public speaking role off to someone more skilled with it.
But no. You'd brought down trained mercenaries, traveled the Bifrost repeatedly, ridden on the back of Captain America's motorcycle. Were you really about to let something like talking to your friends frighten you into backing down?
You wetted your lips. They all leaned forward.
"I don't know how else to say this, so I'm just going to come out and say it," you said. "We're screwed."
Natasha and Clint shared a confused look.
Tony unceremoniously let his almost-full cup clatter to the tabletop. "Okay. I know it's serious business that those guys broke out of Asgard last night. A tragedy, really." Here, he almost gave Thor a sympathetic pat on the back, but couldn't quite force his hand to connect. Thor made no indication he noticed either motion; Tony cleared his throat and went on, "But it's not like five space fugitives is the end of the world. It sounds like they got what they were after. If they come back here, we'll take them down again, and we'll do it in style. We have the intel for contingency plans this time."
"We faced them once each without the Space Stone. I fear now that it is in their grasp, [Name]'s summary is apt: We are screwed," Thor said.
"Hold up. Space Stone? I thought the merry band of misfits stole Cap's origin MacGuffin. What the hell's a Space Stone?"
Thor did not stop staring into the middle distance. He moved so little that he might as well have been carved out of stone. When he answered Tony, he spoke in an uncharacteristic monotone:
"Part of a set of six immensely powerful artifacts forged at the start of the universe, called the Infinity Stones. The Space Stone on its own is nothing to be taken lightly in the hands of our enemies. But they made plain they had grander plans. If one were to collect all of the Infinity Stones, they would wield the ability to reshape reality as they pleased, assuming they hold enough power to do so."
"And this Thanos guy has that kind of power?" Rhodey asked.
"He is a Titanian. Few of that race remains with which to compare him to. But in a word: Yes."
Steve looked at you. "Wait. The Space Stone. Isn't that something you were talking about before the first alien showed up? You thought it might be able to take you home."
"It is possible." Thor didn't give you a chance to answer for yourself, but he appeared to be operating on autopilot, so you didn’t get upset. "Many of the Stones have been housed in objects to lessen their power. The Tesseract was one such item. Loki's scepter is another."
Now Tony stood. "Wait, wait, wait! You're telling me that there were 'immensely powerful artifacts' here on earth this whole time, and you didn't think to share that information with the class?"
"We did not think it pertinent." How Tony didn't quail when Thor turned that stony expression on him, you didn't know. "After you Midgardians behaved so poorly when you came in contact with your first, it was decided to keep knowledge of the stones out of this realm."
"Well, it sure as hell seems pertinent now, doesn't it? Where do you Asgardians get off, making yourselves our divine babysitters?"
"Calm down." Natasha didn't have to shout. Her tone brooked no arguments. Tony sat, but his glare became no less mutinous. "We can discuss the ethics of hiding this information from us later. For now, if this Thanos person is as strong as Thor says he is, we need to prep for a really good game of keep-away."
"That shouldn't be too hard, should it? We just need to get rid of Loki's scepter. That's the only one on earth. Right?" Bruce put in.
"And they'll come for that one last so long as they think they know where it's located," said Clint.
"No. They're coming here next. Loki's is the only one they know where to find right now, but I...I know where the rest of them are," you said.
"How? Did Loki tell you?" Clint asked.
The gaze Thor leveled at you was shrewd. "No. Any knowledge of the stones that my brother has beyond my own would have to come from Thanos himself. And if that were the case, Thanos would have no need to search them out."
"[Name]?" Steve prompted you.
You could have heard a pin drop in the expectant hush that followed.
"You all will think I'm crazy," you said.
"We'll try to keep an open mind," said Sam.
Great. You had one person's promise. He couldn't say the same for the rest of the team. But what choice did you have now? A lie would serve no one. Taking a deep breath, you chose to keep your eyes on Steve. This prevented you from trying to gauge everyone's reactions all at once.
"Remember when I told you that I don't think I'm the [Name] from this universe?"
Steve nodded.
"Well, it turns out I'm not. And in the universe I am from, none of you are real."
"So we're your imaginary friends?" Bruce asked.
"No. You're all characters—not even my characters. You're from movies, comic books, toys...I was a really big fan of the movies. That's why I thought maybe I did dream all that up."
Your ploy to focus on Steve didn't keep you from seeing the rest of the group shifting uncomfortably in their seats.
"Say we buy into all this," Rhodey didn't look like he bought into a single word you'd said, "then you can just tell us how to we avoid this whole alien-apocalypse thing before it happens."
You sucked in a breath. This took one second too long.
"We don't," Steve said.
Before you could attempt to blurt out a denial, any denial, Tony turned his frustration on you:
"You expect us to believe you have knowledge of future events, but won't tell us what those future events are?"
"I only know how you lose!"
"So tell us that," said Natasha.
"So we don't do whatever it is that caused us to lose," Clint said.
"It's not that simple!" you snapped.
"Or it's as simple as that not being the truth," said Bruce. "Maybe you don't know because none of that was real after all. This is reality. And you can't see the future."
His lack of trust stung, though you could tell from the softness in his big brown eyes that he didn't mean to hurt you. As soon as you felt that spark of annoyance, a cold trickle of shame slid down your spine. Bruce wasn't Loki; he wasn't here to trick you.
"I can't take the risk that that's the case," you said at last.
"So just tell us where we went wrong," Natasha said.
"And don't try to pull any 'but it'll change the timeline' shit," said Tony. "You've already told us enough to do that."
"It's not about the timeline," you said. "It's that I don't know. It's too early for you to face Thanos. You don't have the connections or the experience to hold him off yet."
"There must be something we can do," Rhodey insisted.
"I don't know about you, but I was actually there for the last invasion. It's not an experience I'd care to repeat," said Clint.
"Clint—"
"Speaking of alien invasions," Tony pointedly ignored Natasha's withering look at being cut off; he stared down Thor instead, "where's this 'reformed' brother of yours?"
"Probably off selling his magic stone to the same people that killed his mother," Clint muttered.
"Do not think to sling such unwarranted accusations at Loki! He has a perfectly good reason for not attending these proceedings. He is in mourning," said Thor.
"So are you," Sam said, "but you're still here."
The argument faded out of your mind. What could the Avengers do to stop Thanos? Scott Lang ought to still be in prison, making a time heist out of the question. Hank would never believe any story that Tony (or anyone associated with him) tried to sell him to get access to Pym Particles. Stephen Strange? Working as a surgeon. The Ancient One would probably know you were telling the truth, but who said you had time to find her? And doing so would only put another Infinity Stone in close proximity to Loki’s.
All this ignored the fact that they had had all these options in the movies. The only difference in this universe was...you.
"Get rid of me." The solution practically clobbered you in the head. You said it a second time—unnecessarily, since they'd all stop shouting the first time—and looked them each in the eye one by one: "Get rid of me. That's the only way."
"You're telling us to get rid of the one thing your versions of us didn't have?" Tony asked incredulously.
Steve's jaw set into a familiar stubborn line. "Absolutely not."
"It'll buy you all time! If I'm not here, they have no reason to target earth early. This will give you a chance. You can contact Wakanda—"
"Wakanda?" Rhodey echoed.
"—find Bucky, maybe get ahold of someone at Kamara-Taj."
"Has she gone completely loony?" Clint asked in a stage whisper.
"No!" Your answer came across as too hysterical to convince anyone of your sanity, but you were way, way past caring. "All of the things I'm talking about are real. If you'll just look into it—"
"But we had all these advantages before, and we lost, right?" Steve pointed out.
"Not this way. Not this early. It took him ages to get to earth in the movies because he didn't think there was anything here but the Mind Stone. Get rid of me, and that's still true. I can make you a list of people to talk to. It'll still be a long shot, but it's better than nothing."
Sam was the first to speak into the resulting ringing silence:
"Yeah. If we've going to start executing members of our own team, I'm out."
"No one's killing [Name]," said Natasha. "We won't let them."
"Maybe you don't have to kill me to get rid of me. Bruce!"
Startled by the eagerness in the address, it took Bruce a moment to process you were talking to him. "Yes?"
"I asked you and Tony about researching how to send me home. Did you guys find anything?'
He bit his lip, then answered: "We did run a few simulations, but..."
"We didn't find any evidence that your wild claims were true," Tony said bluntly. "And as far as I'm concerned, we still don't have any."
You struggled to regain your optimism after that blow. "Then you'll just have to send me somewhere else. How fast can you build something capable of space travel?"
"Oh, sure, let me pull that right out of my ass."
"So you're just going to abandon ship like your boyfriend?" asked Clint.
"That's not what I'm doing. I'm trying to save all of you!"
"With completely useless knowledge about a potentially imaginary universe where allegedly none of us exist. Mighty kind of you."
Clint's expression made it clear he regretted his words the moment they left his mouth. You didn't wait for the inevitable apology. Natasha moved to grasp your forearm to keep you in place, but you pulled free and headed for the door.
"[Name]. Wait. I'm so—"
You smiled at him over your shoulder. "I just need to get some fresh air. I'll be right back."
The quarrel resumed the moment you stepped into the hall, before the door had time to close or you had time to walk out of earshot. None of the ideas fired off sounded useful. It also didn't sound like anyone believed you. Not a single voice lifted in support of your suggestion. Well, that was just fine. Their fighting was your fault. Hell, Thanos coming, the death of Loki and Thor's mother, Clint's divorce—everything wrong here was your fault, which meant it fell on your shoulders and your shoulders alone to do something to fix things.
One way or another, you would get rid of yourself.
Okay, saw a post about this, thought I would make a post explaining further. And this may make me sound like a bitch or ungrateful and that is not my intention. This is a conversation we, as a content consuming community, need to have—need to keep having.
And if you think we don’t need to have it, these are screenshots of notes on some of my fics—fics that have been posted for 7 months to 3 years. (And please keep in mind, I’ve been in the tumblr writing community for a while, so these numbers don’t even begin to correlate with new up-and-coming writers)
Does this seem right to you??? (the difference between likes and reblogs)
If you are saying ‘why yes, you are doing great. you have so many notes.’ you are not getting the point of this post—so let’s talk about it.
I appreciate the likes, believe me I do, but please understand: likes do nothing for content creators.
1. Let’s first talk about why reblogging is so important:
Tumblr works on the reblog system (it’s not like Instagram, twitter or tiktok). In order for content to spread and appear on people’s dashs, it needs to be reblogged. That is the only way for content to be seen.
2. Let’s also do a quick take on why people don’t reblog (this is just what I have come across/seen people say):
“I commented, isn’t that enough?” — comments are fantastic! I LOVE to hear what you have so say, but like…you can also comment on a reblog. A comment + reblog = a marriage proposal from me, I swear. Cuz just comments tend to say: liked it but it wasn’t good enough for me to share with others (-̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥᷄_-̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥᷅ )
“I don’t want people seeing what I read” — unless your conservative grandma is on here and you really don’t want her seeing you reblog gay smut, I’m sorry that’s a stupid excuse.
“I don’t want to clutter up my blog” — I’m sorry, what??? This is tumblr. We are not influencers on here. And if you’re tying to be, I gotta tell ya something, buddy: you’re on the wrong platform. But if it REALLY bothers you that much—I’ve seen some people make a sideblog where they reblog fics. Of course, this doesn’t give the same traction because those blogs tend to have less followers, but at least it’s something.
“It’s too much to scroll through” — bruh, that’s why writers put the ‘keep reading’ line break in their posts. And if they don’t, well, that’s a whole separate issue.
“Tags are enough for content to get spread” — this is simply just not true. People don’t always search through tags and the tag they look under might not be one that the fic has. And, even if people do stalk the tags, the content that is at the top is content that has the most engagement. This doesn’t help creators that don’t already have some traction and it doesn’t do much even for those who do. And before you say, ‘go under recently posted’ - not many people do that and, even when they do, they still miss content because ✮ tumblr algorithm ✮ (◔_◔)
3. And let’s be real—
Most of the reblogs and feedback I receive comes from other writers that I have befriended.
“Support writers” doesn’t just mean “writers support writers” it means “content consumers, support writers.”
Other platforms like AO3, Wattpad, and/or FF.NET — buddy, it ain’t better over there. trust me, I’m on em’ all.
Why do you think so many writers disappear from writing community? Why do you think so many of them stop creating? Why do you think we rarely get new ones?
It’s because they put hours upon hours of their sweat, blood, and tears into motherfucking masterpieces and those masterpieces just end up at the bottom of the void.
Yes, yes writers should write for themselves, ultimately, but it’s nice to get some validation—to get someone saying ‘hey, yeah I’m here. I’m seeing you.”
And that is why I try my VERY hardest to reblog with a large comment!
So, please, content consumers, support your content creators.
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 9]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 9: Can't Blame a Girl for Trying
You could have cursed yourself later for not factoring in Thanos' parade of lethal children when contemplating a happy future. Of course, remembering their lurking about earlier wouldn't have done you much good anyway. It just might have been nice to recall potential threats before two of them came by to turn Avengers Tower into an impromptu battlefield.
Neither Proxima Midnight nor Corvus Glaive were inclined to talk once they'd forced their way through Tony's launchpad and into the building. To be fair, after one look at the cruel smirk on the former's face and the way the latter drummed his fingers excitedly against the length of his glaive, you didn't find the idea of conversation to have much appeal either. They were each tall, bony, and horned, and you were all alone and completely unprepared for a fight against one abductor, let alone two.
And so the struggle commenced with you waging an internal battle over what would upset Tony more when he got back: Injury to you or injury to one of the more expensive bottles of liquor on his only recently-repaired bar shelves.
"JARVIS, do we have an ETA on Clint yet or what?" you shouted from behind the very temporary shelter of an overturned table.
JARVIS didn't answer.
Shit. Had they somehow disabled JARVIS? With that kind of technology, what else could they do? Your attempt to think of any other way to contact a member of the team for help got interrupted by one of your opponents kicking the table away, exposing you. You lifted your arms in a weak display of self-defense. Proxima let out a low chuckle.
"You think to fight us off with your pathetic toxins?" she asked. "All we must do is stay out of reach of your slimy Terran hands."
"Something very easy for us to accomplish," Corvus said.
God. Oh, God. Their weapons were much longer than your arms, and looked very sharp to boot. The blades grew closer as you backed away—until your back pressed against a wall.
"How sad it is to see that no one is coming for you this time, not even the backstabbing Asgardian," said Proxima.
"Not so much of a danger on your own, are you?" Her partner stopped the very tip of his glaive less than an inch from your throat. The place where Gamora had nicked you all those months ago stung in anticipation. "Why don't you just give us what we want and save your friends from having to clean up much of your blood?"
There was nowhere else to go. In the short amount of time since their arrival, everything you'd done to try to get some space between yourself and those two had resulted in nothing more than turning Tony's bar upside down. You could keep running, but not much else. And even if you ran to another spot in the tower, the place was empty. Of the usual team, just Clint remained—and you didn't seem to have any way to get his help outside of physically going straight to him.
"Okay," you said quickly.
Proxima's red eyes narrowed. "What?"
"I said, 'Okay.' You're right. I'm too weak to take you both on at the same time. So I'll give you the locations of the Infinity Stones."
The Vibranium at your neck didn't move an inch. "How do we know that you're telling us the truth?" asked Corvus.
"You don't. I could be lying. For all you know, I don't have any clue where a single Infinity Stone is. But what do I have to gain by tricking you? A longer, more tortuous death?"
The pair glanced at one another.
"A trap?" she suggested.
"Most likely," he said.
"Oh, sure. A specially-made trap for two aliens no one on this entire planet has even heard of before. We humans are definitely smart enough to put together something like that." Feeling that you might be laying it on a little thick, you paused—then decided to dive in headfirst. You grasped the shaft of the glaive in both of your hands and pulled it even closer to your skin. "I'll fight you until I die, which, by all accounts, won't take very long. So what would Daddy prefer? Murder the one potential map you have to what he wants more than anything, or play along to see if I'm lying? And if I am lying, he probably won't care much if Loki finds my bloodless corpse with your signatures on it."
Corvus grit his teeth, which did nothing to lessen his resemblance to the grim reaper. You prayed that neither of them would turn out to have some sort of innate ability to sense fear or deception. A swift but silent conversation took place between them that used nothing but their locked eyes. At last, he snarled and yanked his weapon from your grip.
You took this to be the signal that they agreed to play along for now. Every molecule in your body that hadn't sagged with relief over not having a blade at your throat anymore did so now. This required you to pull all your resolve together merely to peel yourself off the wall. With that done, you motioned for the pair to follow you out of the room.
"And where is it you think to lead us?" asked Proxima.
"The garage. It's only the other place that will work. You guys wrecked the launchpad."
Your trio left the ruined bar to enter the contrastingly pristine hallway. The walls here remained intact; the floor, clean and glistening. Daylight spilled inside from the windows at the far end of the hall—but no sign of incoming calvary. If JARVIS had been completely disabled, he wouldn't have been able to contact anyone outside the building for help either. You hadn't thought of that. Cold sweat gathered at the nape of your neck, but you had to keep pretending because your life depended on it.
The elevator doors opened without a sound shortly after you pushed the call button. Just as you made to step inside, something sharp and hot smacked the back of your calves. You tripped forward and fell to the ground, barely managing to catch yourself before your face smashed into the floor. By the time you stood, Proxima and Corvus had sauntered into the lift with you. The former looked all too pleased with herself for getting away with what amounted to an act of petty mischief.
You kept your eyes glued to the numbers above the door as the elevator descended toward the basement. Every ounce of your brainpower was focused on one thing and one thing alone. What everything hinged on now you'd only done once before to your knowledge—and you couldn't afford to lose your head like you had done then.
"You do realize," Corvus said in a conversational tone, without bothering to shift his gaze to you, "we will still kill you, even if we do get what want."
"I kind of gathered that much." Your voice shook, but nothing else did. Baby steps. You needed to take baby steps. Then you could get through this in approximately one piece.
Unfortunately, the ride to the garage didn't take nearly as long as you wanted. Both your captors remained upright and coherent. Now you no longer had them in a confined space. Proxima wobbled, though, as she exited ahead of you. You didn't let that go to your head. Her near-stagger could have just as easily been due to the slight heels on the bottoms of her sabatons.
They prowled forward, necks craning so that they could see in the relative gloom. No glass to show off the sky here. Only ceiling lights installed at regular intervals dispelled any of the shadows at all. This had the effect of making the looming shapes of Tony's covered cars appear like strange, humpbacked ghosts. Corvus paused by one of these to delicately lift a corner of fabric.
"Who would keep one of the Infinity Stones in such a place? Housed together with such—" He sniffed and dropped the cover back over Tony's Acura—"primitive methods of transportation."
"Eyes on the floor, please!" They both whipped around to glower at you. "The stone isn't here. We're looking for the gate to where it actually is."
They stared at you like they had never heard such a stupid remark. You swallowed and resumed your search. Given the faint glitter on the white fabric, there had to be a set of Bifrost runes burned in here somewhere. Heimdall wasn't likely to actually open the Bifrost if you asked, but you didn't feel the need to share that information with the other two. It wouldn't be long before they figured it out anyway. Tony's garage was only so big; most of his collection remained out in California where it was much less likely to encounter Thor or the Hulk.
"What is the matter with you, Proxima?" you heard Corvus ask.
You stopped watching your feet in time to see her spear clatter to the floor. Corvus rushed up to her as she woozily held a glove hand to her forehead.
"I do not know!" She ground the words out between gritted teeth. "My head is pounding. The room is spinning. I fear I might take ill at any moment."
Slowly, trying not to attract any attention whatsoever, you backed away. Corvus aided his wife gently to the hood of one Tony's cars. You winced and hoped it was the least expensive of those in New York. Still you did not stop your backward movement. It had not escaped you that Corvus kept a firm grip on his glaive with his free hand.
"My stomach is also in knots." A nasty pause followed his pronouncement. "When did your symptoms start?"
Now your stomach was in knots. You moved faster, glancing behind you to avoid tripping over a latent mousetrap.
"They began when we stepped inside the..."
She trailed away. Their heads snapped in your direction in eerie unison. The fallen spear sailed into Proxima's hands, and every sign of illness evaporated from her as she stood tall, her face a mask of fury.
"You!" she screamed.
"Can't blame a girl for trying to even the playing field," you said.
Here it came: the physical alteration you'd so wanted to avoid. Too bad you'd only managed to bring it into the garage. Tony might have actually preferred his alcohol bottles getting smashed over his collector cars.
Proxima opened proceedings by firing multiple blasts from her spear. These you dodged easily. Your toxin really had her off her A game—well, as long as you weren't an Audi R8. Corvus seemed less affected. He rushed forward only to seize violently, then fall motionless at your toes.
Well, that didn't seem likely.
Before you could wonder more how he'd gone down without you lifting a finger, something else in the room made a thud noise. You spotted Proxima hit the floor out of the corner of your eye. A double take revealed why.
"Loki?" you gasped.
And indeed, there he was, albeit in more casual garb than you'd ever seen him wear to battle before. He didn't even have his helmet. You raced over for him to wrap one arm around your waist. His other kept his spear pointed directly at the motionless figure below.
"I don't understand. I thought you were on Asgard."
"I called him."
Clint now crouched over Corvus to clap SHIELD-issue cuffs around his wrists. Jutting out from Corvus’ back, just above his bound hands, was one of Clint's signature taser arrows.
"Thank you," you said.
He wouldn't meet your eyes, but you hoped he heard the sincerity in your voice all the same. Clint simply shrugged, stood, and shoved his way around you and Loki to similarly incapacitate Proxima.
"But I asked JARVIS if you were coming. He wouldn't answer me."
"We thought giving you a strict deadline might also ruin the advantage of surprise." Now that he had both hands free, Loki had them on your face, moving your head in different angles to check for injuries. "You did very well distracting them until help arrived."
"Just like what the old [Name] would have done," Clint agreed. But he kept his gaze affixed to the opposite side of the room.
Remembering your promise to not force Clint into spending more time in your boyfriend's presence than necessary, you swatted Loki's probing fingers away and went to help Clint lug a slumped-over Proxima upright.
"Let's get out of here before any lingering gas gives Hawkeye a headache, too," you said.
"I certainly hope it doesn't do any damage to Stark's precious cars either. We'll never hear the end of it," Loki said.
The curse you let out had nothing to do with how heavy Proxima was, nor how quickly you dropped her once Clint let her go.
******
The mood permeating the tower the following evening could only be described as celebratory. No one got assigned cooking that day. Instead, Tony shelled out for an assortment of the best Chinese takeout New York City had to offer. Team members milled around the dining room and kitchen, where boxes and platters of fried rice, orange chicken, crab Rangoon, soup dumplings, and more covered the surfaces of the table and counters. Even Clint had joined the festivities, although he vigilantly kept a wide berth between himself and Loki.
You sat at the table with the largest group: Loki, Thor, Steve, Sam, and Tony. Eating had become a sort of free-for-all, and this positioning gave you the best opportunity to snag highly-desired morsels and listen to everyone talk.
"Just because we've got two more of them in jail on Asgard doesn't mean there aren't more to come." Of course, Steve would know how to expertly use chopsticks to slurp up a Lo Mein noodle. He could do everything expertly. "And there's still the question of how we're supposed to ensure they all get a fair trial. We can't detain them like that indefinitely. They have rights."
"Thanks for that input, Bill on Capitol Hill," said Tony. The ice in his glass of Chinese 75 clinked as he took a sip. And lucky for him, Pepper was too immersed in conversation with Natasha and Rhodey over by the fridge to overhear the conversation, or she and Steve would have turned the entire night into a debate, and you didn’t foresee it being one Tony could win. "Anyway, you're missing the point. We're not celebrating finishing our punch card for defeating alien mercenaries."
Sam, delicately nibbling on an egg roll, asked, "Then what are we celebrating?"
"The fact that [Name] only broke two of my liquor bottles and only melted some paint off of my Cobra."
"And," Loki picked your hand off the table where it rested, "[Name] getting back to her usual self."
You felt yourself blush at the praise. "I really didn't do anything but avoid getting abducted."
"But you did it all by yourself," said Loki proudly.
"And, again, with a minimum amount of damage to my things," Tony said.
"A toast!" Thor stood abruptly. Foam sloshed from the top of his enormous tankard. "To [Name]'s return!"
"To [Name]'s return!" The whole room echoed—even Bruce and Clint, who had been huddled together in a corner looking somewhat socially anxious.
You buried your face in your own glass. Despite this embarrassment, you felt an altogether different kind of warmth as well. Everything you remembered said clearly that you didn't belong here. Your existence was parasitic, sucking the love from the life someone else had built. But over the last few weeks, you'd thought about your old life and the original [Name]'s less and less. Now, surrounded by people who had once been mere figments of many imaginations cheering your most minor accomplishments, you thought you were doing something you hadn't since the crash that took your family: Belonging.
Thor sat down with a loud laugh and yet another hard clap on your back. Now you knew to brace for this. Once Loki finished chastising his brother for his careless disregard for the strength of your very-mortal bones, Loki looped one arm around you. You leaned in close, tuning out Steve, Sam, and Tony's renewed argument over whether or not assassins from across the galaxy who weren't even human had constitutional rights. Natasha winked at you from between Rhodey and Pepper. Clint, still shieled somewhat by Bruce, lifted his cup in silent acknowledgement when your eyes met.
Returning to the flow of conversation around you, you shifted your head to a more comfortable spot on Loki's shoulder and let the perfection of the evening sweep over you.
Things continued on in this vein for the rest of the day and long into the night. Groups mixed and broke apart as the time passed. The sun dipped lower and lower until it disappeared and the sky outside turned indigo. One by one, Avengers members with assignments the next day (or, in Steve's case, a grandpa-like bedtime) took their leave. Your own head bobbed once or twice when you attempted to suppress a yawn. Rhodey and Tony had began a game of one-upmanship in front of their rapidly dwindling audience, and you didn't know how long you yourself could remain upright for that.
Something nudged your arm.
"Loki?" you asked somewhat groggily.
He held one long finger to his lips and helped you up.
"Are we going to bed?" you asked. The idea occurred to you of begging him to carry you there. Then again, you'd probably been treated like a princess enough for one day. No need to press your luck.
"Soon," he promised. "I want to go somewhere more private first."
What could be more private than your own shared bed? Curious, you followed him to the elevator. Loki pressed a button for whatever floor he wanted to take you to rather than ask JARVIS aloud. You were too sleepy to try to sneak a peek.
The doors opened up to the bar. Already the equipment and supplies needed to patch up the destruction left by your brief skirmish with Proxima and Corvus had been piled up throughout the room. A string of "Caution Do Not Enter Tape" hung half-heartedly across the walkway from the lift to sitting room. Loki ignored this and strode right through it.
"I don't think we're supposed to go in here until the repairs are done," you said.
Loki dismissed your concerns with a flick of his wrist. "It's not as though the structural integrity of the place is at risk. Besides, these windows have the best view in the tower, and I'm sick to death of Stark hogging it."
Well, he was right about the bit where the bar had the best view. You cautiously picked your way through the dim light around the skeletal remains of broken furniture and chunks of wall until you reached Loki's side. And indeed the view was magnificent. You let out a sigh with obvious wonder in it as you came to a stop.
The amount of light pollution meant that you couldn't see many stars. Still, the scenery laid out before you was breathtaking—what you could see of it, that was. A warped reflection of Loki's pale face took up most of the glass. You stood there next to him without either of you saying a word for several minutes.
"I just wanted to say that I'm glad," Loki said at last.
"For what?"
"That you chose to stay. I wasn't certain that you would at first."
You cocked your head to one side and regarded the blurry copy of him. "Do you mean when we first met, or when I woke up screaming in the bed?"
One end of his mouth twisted upward. "Both, I suppose. You've had two opportunities now to leave me. And still you haven't."
The unasked question lingered between you: Why?
You watched yourself chew on the answer. Never far away from your mind was the fear of hurting him. But time had passed. You'd learned that emotionally wounding Loki took a lot more than you thought. As you'd forgiven him for his past misdeeds, so he would be likely to forgive your slips of tongue. Any pain you caused now would be momentary.
Exhaling slowly, you turned your whole body to face him. "I still don't know that all of this is real for me."
He took one of your hands and softly pressed it to his chest. You could feel the steady drum of his heart beneath the comically large shirt that he had stolen out of Steve's laundry the week before. "Does this not feel real to you?"
Though you tried to pull your hand back, you did not try very hard. "Okay. The world itself is real. You're real. What if I'm not? What if I'm not the [Name] that you knew and remember?"
"What if you are?"
"Then what if I never remember anything from before?"
Loki leaned in until his lips were mere centimeters from your own. His eyes roved from your mouth to your eyes and back again. "Do you love me?"
The word no caught on the tip of your tongue. You couldn't say it. All the memories you'd made since waking up in a cosplayer's bed flooded through your mind: Loki patient, Loki caring, Loki kind—never pushing, never punishing, only ever looking at you with something akin to hope. Every one of the Avengers had told you, in one way or another, that he loved you. Standing there just then, knowing it was nonsensical, knowing it was overdramatic, knowing as you had right from the start that it was pathetic, you believed that he loved you.
And the truth came tumbling out: "I do love you."
He didn't kiss you. He pressed his cool forehead against yours. "And I love you. No matter what you ever remember—or don't—that is enough for me."
You took the initiative. Your feet arched on to your toes so you stood just tall enough to bridge the gap between your lips and his to kiss him. The connection lingered this time. Loki tasted like winter air before snow with a hint of MSG. He placed one palm against your neck; your fingers curled into the fabric of his ridiculous top. When you broke apart, even he looked winded.
"Bed now?" he asked after a brief pause.
"Carry me?"
You'd only just lifted your arms into the air to beg when he swept you into the air. "Anything for you, princess," he said in a falsely aggrieved tone.
You giggled and wrapped your arms around neck to keep you steady. Exhausted as you were by the revelations and the party leading up to them, you fell fast asleep long before you'd even reached your floor.
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 8]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 8: It'll Only Get Better From Here
The soles of your athletic shoes squeaked on the freshly-cleaned training-room floor one afternoon a week or so after your impromptu Asgardian pub crawl. You winced at the sound of the door closing behind you, but this time not because of the lasting hangover caused by extraterrestrial liquors. Tony wouldn't allow his building as mundane a problem as noisy hinges, so by all rights the sound shouldn't have caught your attention. But the funeral-like pall filling the place that day turned the mild swish into a mighty screech.
The room wasn't empty. Someone had to be the source of the gloom. At the farthest end from the door, next to the massive wall of weaponry, Clint had set up shop. He made no sign that he noticed the commotion, nor your approach. His gaze remained fixed on the task at hand; namely, fletching his arrows. Of course he would do all that himself. You only wished he would stop long enough to acknowledge your arrival.
"I'm surprised you actually bothered coming," he said without looking up from his work.
"Was I not supposed to?" you asked.
Clint shrugged. "Natasha's busy with Steve today. Something big came up in D.C., apparently."
"And they didn't call you in for backup?"
"Didn't need me. Didn't figure you would either." He added something in a mutter that sounded an awful lot like, "Getting pretty damn used to not being needed."
"What was that?"
"Nothing."
You wondered if his obvious funk had anything to do with the call from Bobbi's SHIELD cell that morning—a good guess, now you thought of it, given Steve and Natasha's whereabouts. But asking Clint directly would be out of the question. He could bring up his ex-wife; everyone else had to pretend she didn't exist. Her weekly calls to "check on" him made doing so tactfully difficult.
Didn't you owe it to Clint to try, though? You plunked yourself down on the hard floor next to him as he went back to fidgeting with his arrows. Perhaps he just needed some company. Your presence, however, brought forth no more conversation on his end. JARVIS practically buzzed audibly in every inch of the walls surrounding you both.
"Clint, what's the matter?" you finally asked. Not a bad job, either. You'd implied nothing about Bobbi at all!
But his jaw tightened, and he said, "Nothing," again.
"Something."
"I don't want to talk about it or anything else with you."
"Okay." You dragged the word out at the same pace you dragged yourself back to standing. "If you don't want to talk to me, how about beating me up a little? I still have a long way to go relearning how to think up wisecracks while being shot at."
That got his attention enough for him to look you up and down. "You didn't expect a training session with just me, did you?"
Seeing as how you'd had no idea that Steve and Natasha were quite possibly out starting the events of The Winter Soldier until Clint relayed the information to you a few minutes ago, the answer was a resounding no. But you didn't think that was the right answer at the moment.
"Why not? Tasha's not the only one with appreciable skills around here."
His eyes slid around you like water around rocks. "Don't do that."
"Do what?" you asked, genuinely confused.
"Pity me. I don't need that."
Your mouth opened to unleash a protest before snapping shut having argued nothing at all. If Clint didn't need pity just then, he didn't need lied to either. Any insistence that the pity came from a place of genuine concern would make things about you—and you were not the injured party here. So you kept silent, though you didn't make any move to leave the area either.
After a moment or two of less-than-companiable silence, Clint dropped the arrow he'd been working on. It clattered to the floor. Then he lifted his free hand to scrape aggressively at the back of his head. When he spoke, his voice was raw:
"You don't need me. No one here needs me. Not Natasha, not Bobbi, not the team."
He left a natural lull for you to interject but I do need you. You didn't. You respected him too much to try to assuage him with falsehoods. Even if it had been the truth, he wouldn't be able to see that in his current mood. The two of you weren't exactly close to begin with; hell, outside of training sessions and meals, you hardly saw the man at all.
"Well," you tried for a self-depreciating smile, "I'm no one you need to need you, right?"
He scoffed. Not a denial.
"But you don't believe Natasha doesn't need you. Do you?"
The fact that she hadn't invited Clint to act as backup on a SHIELD-centric misadventure loomed ominously between you. Its shadow had you swiftly backtracking.
"H-hey! I mean, sure, she didn't ask you to join her today, but there's other ways to need someone. You're her best friend!"
"Am I?" His self-depreciating smile blew yours out of the water.
"You think I'm replacing you? Is this because of the slumber party? Because she told me you just wanted to see the natural color of your fingernails for a little while!"
"Forget I said anything." He sounded faintly disgusted.
"I will not."
"You don't want to hear it."
"Tony tells me things I don't want to hear on a daily basis."
"I mean it. You won't like it."
"Try me."
"You really care that much?"
"For God's sake, Clint, just spit it out!"
"Everything is Loki's fault."
Your mouth fell open. Loki had been the farthest thing from your mind since entering this room. All you could think to say was: "Huh?"
"See?" Clint shook his head at your astonishment, clearly mistaking it for being offended. "Everyone else around here's already prepared to hunker down around the campfire and sing kumbaya with the guy. What's it matter if I'm the one person who's not?"
Without waiting for you to answer, he plucked his discarded arrow off the ground and began to gather the rest of his things. Clint clearly intended to make a fast exit. You knew you needed to come up with an equally fast reply. But called upon to make a choice at lightning speed, your brain failed you, and what came out of your mouth (to make room for the inevitable foot) was:
"I think it matters a lot."
He rounded on you, obviously furious. Clint's shade of red wasn't nearly as endearing as Bruce's had been. You felt your hands and feet go numb from a combination of horror, mortification, and (probably) poison. This sensation made for an interesting juxtaposition with your suddenly burning face.
"You really think," his voice quivered slightly, "that everyone liking your sainted boyfriend is the most important thing in the whole world?"
"Clint, I—"
"My whole life is falling apart. It has been since the invasion. Can't anybody see that? I've lost everything! He got in my head for a few days, and I became a completely different person. What if I'm still not me? That's what Bobbi thought—or thinks."
His speech grew more rapid. The anger faded. In its place grew a cold terror you couldn't begin to fathom. A chill seemed to rush out of Clint's very person, and you could do nothing but helplessly sit back on the floor while he worked himself up into further lather.
"I killed people. I'd never killed one person before that. And what's more, he made me not care. I didn't feel anything. What if the only reason I feel something now is because he's let me?"
Soon he would reach his breaking point. Could either of you handle that? Clint didn't know you well enough to not regret crying in front of you if you let him.
"I'm supposed to be the good guy, right? The hero? Heroes are supposed to forgive. I'm supposed to forgive him. But I can't. So maybe I'm not a hero at all."
You heard a tightness in his throat that heralded a storm of tears. It was now or never. Grabbing his wrist reminded Clint you remained there, and he shuddered to a halt long enough for you to speak:
"I'm sorry."
His face with slack with surprise, so you went on:
"When I said it mattered that you're the one person who doesn't want to sing kumbaya with him, I didn't mean that you had to forgive him. I mean that seeing everyone else forgive him must really suck. I worded it badly. I'm sorry."
The limb in your grip trembled. "Y-yeah."
"He unmade you, Clint. Nobody else on the team went through that. You don't have to forgive him, now or ever. I'm not asking you to."
Although the deep breath he took seemed to steady him, the effect didn't last for long. He nearly pitched forward on top of you until you helped him a little more gracefully to the ground next to you. For another chunk of time, neither of you said anything. You wanted to give him the opportunity to recover. To aid in this, you kept your gaze wandering specifically across the other side of the room.
"If I don't forgive him, then you and I are always going to be at odds," he said at last.
Your shoulders fell with relief upon your hearing him sound more like himself. "Says who?"
"I dunno. Logic, I guess. He's your boyfriend."
"Look, I can't promise that you're never going to have to see Loki again. He lives here. You're coworkers. One day, you're probably going to have to work together to save lives. But I can promise that you don't have to be on civil terms with him to be my friend. I won't force you to hang out with him. You can put the limits on when and how we see each other. Deal?"
He eyed your outstretched hand for a moment. Maybe you'd pushed too far too quickly. It was apparent to you that Clint had been carrying this weight around all by himself for a long time. Even Bruce probably hadn't been approached with the issue. You had only just curled your fingers into your palm to retract your hand when Clint grabbed it—but not to shake on your pact. Instead, he pulled you into a tight hug.
"And don't you ever say no one needs you again, okay?" you murmured into his ear. "You're the heart of this team, and every single one of us would say the same. No one here is more human than you."
Clint didn't respond with words, but the way his grip tightened around you made it plain that he understood exactly what you were getting at.
******
Manhattan flashed and glittered as much as a tacky mid-2000s gif once the sun went down. The colored lights atop the buildings bled like watercolors into the dark sky above. One such light—the neon blue "A" now familiar to everyone in the city—sat about level with a series of windows blazing warm white. These led into the Avengers' kitchen, where you and Bruce were attempting to put together a dinner for the ever-growing list of tower residents—not an easy task for the usual eight team members, but each new occupant came with their own list of preferences and dietary restrictions as well.
Bruce stood at the sink that night, squeezing a cheesecloth wrapped around a lump of soggy cauliflower. You had patches of flour up and down your arms, across the bridge of your nose, and all over your top. Next to you on the counter sat wonky circles of wet dough.
"All this effort," said Bruce, "and at least half of everyone will be gone by the time the pizzas are ready."
"You're being optimistic, Bruce. I say two-thirds of the team will be gone by then," you said.
"Maybe you're the optimist. They'll probably all have left before the oven's preheated."
You caught each other's eyes. Nothing happened for a beat or two. Then you both burst out laughing. Well, okay, you burst out laughing. Always on the lookout for potentially dangerous emotional spikes, Bruce kept himself to a chortle. But the exchange really hadn't even been funny enough to dignify that. Probably you'd just grown giddy after spending several weeks at this point doing the exact same thing. No matter how many chore schedules Pepper pinned to the front of the refrigerator, most nights, if anyone wanted dinner, it fell on you and Bruce to work something out.
"I suppose the fact that anyone might find cauliflower crust at all appetizing is amusing, but I didn't think the idea was worthy of quite that level of mirth."
"Loki!"
You perked up at the sound of his voice. When you turned, you found him in the doorway. He was missing his helmet, but otherwise wore every inch of his battle regalia—stained and marred through it might have been. A few chunks of his usually sleek hair were stiff and mussed at strange angles, and noticeable cuts marred his smooth knuckles. Bruce raised an eyebrow at this atypical disarray on Loki's part.
"What's with that getup? Weren't you just supposed to be off with Thor visiting Dr. Foster?" Bruce asked.
Loki let out a dramatic sigh as he allowed you to pull him into the room by both hands. You could tell by the strong odor of ozone coming off of him that he had come straight to see you when he and his brother got back. He must have been exhausted, so you shooed him into a chair before going to get him a glass of water. Bruce returned to his wet sack of vegetables.
"Neither of you are going to ask me what I've been doing, given my only intention was to meet my brother's girlfriend?" Loki said incredulously, once several minutes had gone by without conversation.
"I'm really not all that interested," Bruce replied.
Loki scoffed. "Oh, that's fine, then. Thor and I have only been busy the last two days performing an impromptu rescue of your entire realm."
“Really,” said Bruce, not even looking up from adding his riced cauliflower to a bowl of whisked eggs.
Loki sat up ramrod straight, eyes flashing. “Surely the incident has been on your mortal news!”
“I haven’t heard anything about it. What about you, [Name]?”
“I don’t think so. It’s been nearly 24-7 coverage about how much it’s going to cost taxpayers to retrieve the Helicarrier from the Potamac.”
"Wha-bu—how?" Loki spluttered. "All of London was covered in portals! You all nearly entered a second literal dark age!"
"But we didn't, because you stopped it, right?" asked Bruce.
"Well, yes. But you still should have heard about it at the very least!"
"Like [Name] said, we've had a lot going on our side of the pond as well."
Although Loki seemed inclined to continue pushing his point, his weariness got the better of him. He sank into his vacated seat and chugged the glass of water waiting on the counter. Then, with the air of someone forced to play along, said: "You said something about Helicarriers and the Potomac?"
"Steve, Natasha, and Sam blew up the nation's next-gen security system," you said.
"There were Nazis involved," Bruce added.
"Who the Hel is Sam?' asked Loki.
You decided that now wasn't the time to lecture Loki on that being the lesser concern here. "New guy. Used to be in the Air Force. He and Steve met at the VA in D.C."
"So another terrifically boring Goody Two-shoes. How quaint. Anything else I should be made aware of?"
"Tony went back to Malibu to make up with Pepper," Bruce said, "and predictably got caught up in some astroturfing that blew up a small town in Tennessee and nearly killed the President."
"And we care about Tennessee because...?"
"And Pepper got superpowers! I'm not sure she still has them. If she does, she hasn't used them since she moved in. Too busy running Stark Industries from the penthouse, I guess," you said.
"Colonel Rhoades got the right to call his suit War Machine during Avengers missions," said Bruce.
Loki stared at him blankly.
"He was going by Iron Patriot? Had a red-and-blue color scheme like Steve?"
"I am certain I have no idea what you're talking about, Doctor, nor do I particularly care."
"Oh, and Steve's old war buddy isn't dead after all!" So joyful were you to share this news that you didn't even have to pretend the excitement over a development you'd foreseen. "Turns out he's been under the control of those Nazis this whole time. We're all on the lookout for Bucky now, so we can bring him to the tower and start his rehabilitation."
Which just might—though for obvious reasons, you couldn't say so out loud—avert the entirety of Civil War. Everyone would benefit from avoiding that tragedy, especially with Thanos sniffing around so early in the timeline.
But that news would mean nothing to Loki, and sure enough, he looked quite unimpressed. "So what you're telling me is that my first big heroic act on the planet got completely upstaged by your team's little domestic collection extravaganza?"
"Collection?" Bruce echoed, confused.
"Just how many people moved into this tower in the handful of days I was gone?"
"Three. Four, if you count the plans for Bucky," you answered.
"I leave for a couple of weeks, and you feel the need to compensate by adopting another batch of strays." His eyes went wide. Then he chuckled. "Oh. Oh, yes. I see. I leave for a mere handful of days, and already your need of me grew so great that you required four additional mortals to make up for my absence."
He declared this with such ringing confidence that you couldn't find the right words to contradict him with. Bruce, on the other hand, was not stunned into silence long.
"[Name]?"
"Yeah?"
"Get him out of here before I Hulk out and ruin all our hard work."
Loki leaned toward him, sparkling like some mid-2000s shojo love interest. "Why, Dr. Banner, why didn't you tell me you considered me such a cornerstone of your life? If you wanted me to pass on my excursion with Thor, I would have gladly done so. Now you have to meet and greet all these new people, and I know how distressing that must be to a man like you."
"[Name]."
Bruce spoke through his teeth. Something as common as Loki teasing him wouldn't be enough to cause a real Hulk out, something your boyfriend likely already knew.
"Please," he added in a stage whisper, "before he tries to 'help' us with dinner."
"What a marvelous idea! I'll just—"
You pulled him in the direction of the hallway just as an illusory chef's hat began to materialize over Bruce's curly hair. Worse even than the thought of the Hulk and Loki having a food fight in the tower kitchen was the potential result of Loki getting his hands on a pizza crust prior to it going into the oven.
"But I really feel like I could so something spectacular this time!" he protested.
"No one wants you around the food when you're so filthy." You marched onward without so much as a look over your shoulder. "Let's go take a shower."
The deadweight pulling your arm in the opposite direction lightened considerably. "Together?"
"That was the idea."
"Goodbye, Doctor! Do tell your little green friend that I miss him so."
Bruce responded in a manner that would have earned him a reprimand had Steve been around. Unfortunately, all that did was cause Loki further mirth. He spent the majority of the way to your quarters laughing, and only stopped when you paused to open the door. He gave you a fond, lingering look prior to following you inside. You felt his eyes on you as they crossed every inch of your body. His hand grasped yours to lead you toward the bathroom.
"Things have been going very well lately, haven't they?" he asked.
You thought of all the good going on, those things you and Bruce had shared with Loki and more. Maybe no one could claim life was perfect, but most everyone was doing better than they had been at this point in the MCU's timeline. Tony hadn't brought up Ultron even once!
"They sure have," you agreed, and entwined your fingers with his.
Maybe, just maybe, you could let yourself believe things would only get better from here.
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 7]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 7: Just a Good Actor
"Let it be known that I still think this is a terrible idea."
"So you've said about a bajillion times this morning alone, and a bazillion ever since I brought it up."
"Neither a bajillion nor a bazillion are real numbers," Loki sniffed.
"You wouldn't say that if I'd been nagging you so much over a personal choice," you said darkly.
You and Loki were having this spat on the front steps of the tower. A weak spring sun hung overhead, barely getting its rays through the halo of thin clouds surrounding it or the tall structures surrounding you. Already you found the temperature more comfortable than it had been in a long time.
The returning flock of more scantily-clad cosplayers seemed to agree. Several of them stole glances at the pair of you, but otherwise most visitors that day remained preoccupied with the truly spectacular animatronic Hulkbuster suit someone had shown up in. Thank goodness for that, too. You didn't need the entire world hearing you accuse Loki:
"You're treating me like a child!"
"No," he said in a tone of forced calm, "I am treating you like someone who is, as of late, incredibly prone to head injuries."
"I'm not doing anything that's going to result in a head injury."
"Yes, something I am certain that every mortal says before they get on a motorcycle. Then a few minutes pass, and they're nothing more than a greasy smear on the pavement."
Damn. You hated it when he had a valid point. Now that you'd gone a record amount of time here without suffering another concussion, it would be a shame to incur one now and break your streak. But Loki would take a mile if you gave him so much as an inch.
"Steve isn't going to let me hurt myself," you said.
"Tell me, is this 'Steve' not the same man known to arm wrestle actively flying helicopters?"
Another point in Loki's favor. You could tell that he knew it as well, since your lack of acidic response had him smirking at you. But you were not going to budge. You crossed your arms over your chest and said:
"I am going to brunch with Steve and Peggy and Daniel. You are not invited. So I am going with Steve."
"And I have no objection to his taking you so long as he does so via a safer mode of transportation, such as a bus."
"We are not taking a bus!"
Good grief, it was like Loki didn't understand at all how amazing it would be to ride behind Steve on his bike. Who did he think he was? Your parent? You hadn't had one of those in years, and thus far you hadn't handled having someone fuss over you again all that well. Getting on that motorcycle sounded more appealing the more Loki tried to dissuade you.
As though the very idea summoned him, Steve and the bike in question roared up to the building. Everyone present turned to look, tourist and regular alike. They moved like a surging tide to surround him as he dismounted. You tried to join, but Loki's firm grip on your shoulder drew you to an abrupt halt.
"Loki!" you snapped.
"Forgive me if I prefer that your brains stay inside your head. They're far too beautiful for me to want anyone else gawking at them when you crack open your skull."
"Hey, [Name], Loki."
Steve appeared at your side out of nowhere, like he had somehow teleported through the throng of people jostling for his attention. Or maybe you'd just been too preoccupied by Loki trying to turn his overprotective streak into a romantic moment to notice Steve's approach. Even Loki looked caught off guard. After giving you each a bemused once-over, Steve shrugged, then asked:
"Ready to get going?"
You wrenched your arm free of Loki's grip. "Distinctly."
Loki made no attempt to restrain you again, but the glare he leveled at Steve could have stopped the Hulk in his tracks. Steve didn't flinch. He did raise his eyebrows in wordless question, though. Of course, Loki didn't bother to explain.
"Can you give me just two minutes?" you asked, holding up the same amount of fingers.
Steve nodded.
If you were late to meeting Peggy Carter due to dealing with one of Loki's more theatric mood swings, he would never hear the end of it. You didn't want to leave him on bad terms either. So you took your turn to grab his wrist and march him a short distance away. Steve could probably hear your entire conversation nonetheless, but this way he could at least pretend not to eavesdrop.
"What is your problem?" you demanded over the murmurs of the watching crowd.
"I believe, in your words, I've gone over my problem a bazillion times today."
"A bajillion. And I want to know the real problem."
Though he might have prided himself on his skills of deception, Loki failed to hide the way his eyes darted in Steve's direction. The latter didn't notice; he was busy signing autographs now. But you? You noticed, and your anger melted away just a little bit.
"Oh, Loki." You pressed one palm against the side of his face. In a sort of marveling trance, Loki placed his own hand on top of yours. "There's no reason for you to be jealous."
The spell broke. He spluttered incoherently until you went on:
"This isn't a double date or anything like that. Steve and I are just friends. Right, Steve?" you lifted your voice for that last question.
"Right," Steve agreed, still several feet away, still surrounded by delighted onlookers. It took him a beat or two to realize he'd fallen into your trap. You saw his shoulders snap upward slightly when he did.
"See?"
Loki squirmed. You could practically see the cogs turning in his head, every one dedicated to finding some other reason to protest your actions. Then he hung his head. "Do you absolutely promise?"
"I promise." Spurred on suddenly by the rush of having got to the heart of the matter, you removed the hand on Loki's cheek and quickly replaced it with your lips for half a moment. "I only have eyes for you. Steve doesn't even compete."
Seemingly too dazed by your boldness to argue the point any further, Loki allowed you to drag him by the hand back to where you'd left Steve.
"Okay. Now I'm ready to go, for real this time," you announced.
"Great. Peggy's really been looking forward to seeing you again," said Steve.
You followed him back down the steps to his waiting motorcycle. The civilians parted like a sea before him. Too bad that didn't get Loki to step away. He stayed so close to you that you could have sworn you felt his hot breath on the back of your neck the whole way there. It made you want to goad him some more, but knowing that doing that would only cause more of a delay, you wisely held your tongue.
"You had better bring her back in one piece, Captain," Loki said stiffly.
"I have every intention of doing so," Steve said.
"No fights with trained assassins while she's in your care?"
"That I can't swear to, but" he held out a motorcycle helmet to you, "if we run into any trouble, I'll make sure she wears her helmet."
Of course Steve would be on Loki's side in this fun sucking. He still blamed himself for your scrap with Gamora. How could you start to believe you were a fully-fledged superhero when all your friends and coworkers insisted on treating you like a cracked porcelain doll? You seized the helmet and crammed it over your head with the visor up.
"You're both incredible spoilsports. Has anyone ever told you that?"
"Yes," said Steve.
"No," said Loki.
You rolled your eyes and gestured at the bike. "Get on, then. We don't want to be late to meet one of the founding members of SHIELD, do we?"
"No," said Steve.
"Yes," said Loki.
They eyed one another warily. Excellent. The first sign of division within the formerly united ranks of guy friends. Steve swung his leg over the seat and adjusted himself. Then you hopped on behind him to slide forward and wrap your arms around his abdomen.
God, even through his jacket, you could tell that you could clean clothes with those abs.
Loki deadpanned. Could he read your mind, specifically at times you were lusting after other men? Warming slightly, you blew him a kiss before shutting the helmet's face shield.
The engine roared to life beneath you. Anything Loki might have said was drowned out by the rumble and the eager chattering from the fans.
And you were off, slowly at first, then faster, faster, faster until the street in your peripheral—and Loki's expression of worry behind—blurred into nothingness.
******
The narrow side street stunk of urine. You tried your hardest not to think about that as you pressed yourself against the rough bricks at the corner. A fine drizzle fell from the gray clouds overhead, making everything damp to the touch. This didn't exactly help get your mind off the possibility of sticking a hand into an old puddle of pee. But you couldn't dwell on that, not while waiting to get into position. Everything depended on you knowing exactly when to make your move.
For what felt like eons, all you heard was your own deep breathing. The familiar rhythm kept you focused and steady. In for four seconds, hold for seven, out for eight. In for four seconds, hold for seven, out for eight. Nothing interrupted you. All the nearby streets had been evacuated as quickly as possible, so most of the resulting din couldn't reach you.
A faint rumble of thunder, more like a purr than a crash, caused you to momentarily stiffen until you recognized it as a false alarm.
More time passed. In for four seconds, hold for seven, out for eight.
"Come on. Come on," you whispered, gazing into the misty gloom ahead.
Then you heard it: Boom!
Your fingernails scraped the wall beneath them. You could do this. You'd been training to do this. And, really, the blame for all of this rested solely on your shoulders, so you should do this. Please, please don't screw things up now.
Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
You imagined a glass of water sitting on a dashboard, rippling with every echoing footstep. But what stepped out of the fog was something far more real than anything out of Jurassic Park. A huge, dark shape lumbered slowly but surely in your direction. Your muscles tensed as it neared. The closer it drew, the more easily you could hear the ragged blasts of air coming in and out of its nostrils.
Well, you supposed Cull Obsidian smelling you was a central part of the plan.
You waited for the brute to make it nearly to the intersection you crouched at. Every single muscle in your body quivered in anticipation; whatever it was inside you that produced toxins sang. Only a few moments left before you sprang your trap.
"Hey, ugly!"
Okay. Not the best quip to start out a fight with. Better add "banter" to the list of things you needed one of the others to tutor you on. But the insult did the trick. Cull came to a stop just a few feet away, grunting in curiosity. You must have been difficult to see with the bruise-black clouds swirling overhead.
"Looking for me?" you shouted over the growing wind.
He answered with a swing of his chain hammer. You just barely dodged its crushing blow. Rubble rose from the resulting crater. The sharper bits of broken cement cut through the legs of your uniform. Tears gathered in your eyes as you ignored the stinging pain. All you needed to do was complete one last task: Run.
Much like the dinosaurs he so reminded you of, Cull moved a lot faster than he looked capable of doing. You had just one advantage to stay ahead of him: your maneuverability. What you lacked in speed compared to his, you made up for in your finely-honed ability to duck, dodge, and dart. You might need to thank Clint and Natasha for so frequently cornering you in the tower for surprise drills after all.
You spun on the spot the instant you reached a wider, more open space.
"Oh, no," you clapped your hands to your cheek and spoke like an elementary school student reading lines for a play, "it looks like you've caught me. Whatever shall I do?"
Cull was ugly to begin with, but smiling did him no favors. No sooner did the hideous expression of joy flicker onto his face than did he swing at you again. You hadn't expected hostilities to resume so quickly. The blast of air generated by the momentum of the chain hammer slammed into you as you attempted a sidestep, making you wobble. Still a better showing than your skirmish with Gamora. And as strong as Cull was, it still took him time to wrench his hammer back out of the earth.
"Smashing your toy around the only play you've got?" you shouted after steadying yourself. "Even Maw gave me more trouble than this!"
If anyone capable of understanding English walked by at that moment, they would have been able to hear how out of breath you had become. Whether Cull noticed or not, you didn't know. Probably he couldn't understand a word you said anyway. He certainly did not try to shake things up afterward. Thus commenced another series of parries and blows, with each parry on your part growing sloppier and sloppier.
Breathing felt like razor blades twisting down your throat. The stitch in your side slid deeper as you weaved in and out of the way of his thrusts. You could tell the moisture dripping from your brow wasn't rain, but sweat.
How much more could you ask your body to give?
The next swing clipped you on the shoulder. You grit your teeth to keep yourself from groaning in pain. But as you slid out clumsily from directly beneath the hammerhead, it finally happened:
Cull moved as if in slow motion. You stumbled one direction. He followed. But now he couldn't match your sluggish movements. Despite your fatigue, you could now practically run in circles around him, coming close enough to land the occasional blow. Each was useless, of course, against his bulk, but you didn't have the goal of knocking him out. All you wanted to do now was stay close and let him breathe you in. His struggling to move his joints only made your job easier—but not easy. You'd pushed all your muscles well-past their limits already.
As if your legs had been waiting for you to think this, they collapsed beneath you. Your splayed hands splashed into a murky puddle to catch your fall. You had no strength left to stand. Hell, you barely had the strength to twist enough to see Cull lift his hammer high above his head again.
The following blow never landed. He froze there in that ludicrous position. You waited with mock patience for him to finish his thought, but he didn't. He couldn't. His inability to so much as twitch gave you plenty of time to stand even with every part of your body trembling from the effort.
"Well, that's that. Time to land the finishing blow!" You couldn't even pose properly before the heady combination of adrenaline and relief had you bent over laughing. "Oh, just get him, Thor."
Thunder crashed so loudly that your ears rang. A bright streak of light filled the makeshift arena. In its midst appeared a dark figure that lifted their own hammer and swung it sideways right into Cull's torso. He smashed to the ground without shifting an inch.
"Would you like to do the honors?" Thor asked. He offered Mjølnir to you handle-first.
Your fingers reached out unthinkingly. Then you did think, and retracted your hand as though the war hammer's mere aura burned. If you were considered worthy in this universe, you'd never be able to forgive yourself. Best to leave that mystery unsolved.
To Thor's confused expression, you simply smiled and took a step back. "Too tired. You do it."
With a shrug and a flourish, Thor struck one last time. It didn't take much to render Cull unconscious, nor to get him bound for later transport to Asgard. You helped where you could, but as the heat of battle faded from your veins, you found yourself shivering from cold and exhaustion. Your clothes were soaked through. Though the rain had stopped when Thor finished the job, a cold breeze continued to blow that chilled you to the core.
"There!" Thor latched the collar over Cull's motionless jaws. "Excellent work, [Name]! I myself believed you to be in danger on numerous occasions."
"J-just a good ac-actor," you said through chattering teeth.
"You are cold!" he observed. You could practically hear Loki's snide comment about the obvious being entirely Thor's domain. But before you could voice the retort yourself, Thor wrapped one massive, damp arm around your shoulders. "I know just what to do! We shall take our captive to Asgard right away, and there I will treat to the finest mead in the realm to celebrate your returned prowess!"
All hope of returning to the tower for a chance of clothes and a cuddle with your boyfriend near the fire vanished. Thor gave you no opportunity to turn down his offer. Before you could pry open your freezing mouth to say anything at all, Thor had hefted his hammer skyward, called on Heimdall, and sent you hurtling through the kaleidoscope of the Bifrost again.
Amazing Spider-Man!Peter Parker x Female!Nurse!Reader: Kaleidoscope Heart
Summary: It's been a long, long time since Peter Parker thought he had a chance at being happy.
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Amazing Spider-Man!Peter Parker; Post-Spider-Man: No Way Home; Nurse!Reader; mentioned Gwen Stacy; Mentioned Gwen Stacy/Peter Parker; Love Confessions; Hospitals; Secrety Identity Reveal)
Pairings/Relationships: Peter Parker/Reader
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Ao3 Version
Word Count: 3,501
Request: "Hello! I’m being brave with no anon lol I finally got around to seeing TASM2 and I loved it, so I figured I’d toss in a possible request for a TASM-verse!Peter x reader where the reader is a nurse at the same hospital where May works? Otherwise if that’s too specific I’m just very excited for this other TAS oneshot you dangled (heh) a few days ago."
Requester: @toy-flower
Notes: Wow, this request sure took me nearly five years to complete, didn't it? My sincerest apologies. Sometimes I go a very long time without writing, and then on top of that I really did avoid tackling this for a long time just so that I didn't have to rewatch The Amazing Spider-Man 2 because it always makes me cry. But I finally got around to it because I wanted to make this Peter sound like that Peter, not just write the MCU Spider-Man and call it a day. I hope that that makes a marked difference.
Honestly, I don't even know if the requester will see this. Again, I am sorry for taking so long. I decided to combine your request with the one shot idea I had at the time--I never could come up with a good plot to go alongside it.
Kaleidoscope Heart
Peter Parker thought he had never seen New York City so beautiful—his New York City, moody gray streaked through with gleaming red, smelling of manhole steam and Subway restaurant bread. He breathed in deeply. New York, New York! How he had missed home, not just while he'd been in the other New York City, but for the last seven years. Funny how a day or two trapped in a world of searing scarlet and gold could make him long so much for the perpetually muted colors of his own universe.
"Woo-hoo!"
The thrill of knowing that he and the other two Peters had succeeded momentarily caused him to forget himself. His voice echoing back against the windowed walls of the nearby skyscrapers reminded him. He clapped one hand over his mouth and moved away from the ledge he stood on. Yes, those were definitely his lips, not the smooth expanse of spandex he should have felt. Swearing, he hastily smoothed out the crumpled mask in his hand and yanked it over his head.
"Ow! Mother—"
Another important detail lost in the euphoria: He hurt, badly, not just his face, but every inch of him. Dr. Connors and Max being out there somewhere, safe and (hopefully) sane made the pain worth it. Even more hopefully, the return of their sanity would keep them out of trouble for the time being. Peter had two important things to do before he went to check on his former nemeses. At least he could get both things done at the same place if he played his cards right.
Peter took several swift steps back to his original position. Then he stopped. All he needed to do was take a cab. The nagging voice in the back of his head that claimed he deserved no joy—installed there when Captain Stacy passed and firmly rooted after Gwen followed—came back with a vengeance. Go home, Peter, the slow way. Forget you ever believed you could be as happy as the others.
For a long moment, he gazed out into the hazy night with his jaw set. A simple thought interrupted this familiar torrent of self-flagellation: No. Not anymore.
And Peter flew.
He soared. He swooped. Wind rushed past him, unable to get a solid grip with the speed he used. Each dip was lower than the last; each high, higher. A wild laugh rose unbidden from his throat. Though he had never quit being Spider-Man again—not since the Rhino nearly flattened a little boy in Peter's absence—he had not allowed himself to enjoy the gig either. Now, free for the first time in ages, the butterflies that erupted in his stomach whenever the street rose up to meet him went straight to his head, leaving him almost giddy.
Perhaps the source of his jubilance was the same thing leading him onward to his destination like some sort of homing beacon.
Of course, Spider-Man couldn't just waltz right inside. Doing so would cause undue commotion. Reluctantly—because every second he put this off risked his succumbing to the voice inside his head that said he shouldn't bother—Peter landed softly in a dim, brown side street containing one of his many stashes of civilian clothes. Moments later, he emerged to join the endless stream pedestrians. Despite the painful heartbeat in his palms making the moment feel eternal, it did not take long to find an opportunity to stroll through the automatic front doors of Forest Hill Hospital's emergency room.
Bright white light pierced his eyes. Good thing he knew this place like the back of his hand. The murky blur to his right covered in vague smears of various skin colors was the waiting area. The bright square ahead led to the hospital hallway. And up front sat a desk the same dingy white as the floor. Here Peter stopped and offered a winning (if still blinded) smile.
"Hey, Marge. How are you doing this fine—er—early morning?" he asked.
A dark-skinned woman wearing scrubs patterned in splotches of teal, pink, and purple looked up from her paperwork to turn an unimpressed gaze on him. "Peter Parker, you've been fighting again."
"What? No. I—ouch!" The simple act of casually leaning an arm on Marge's reception desk made his shoulder scream. He could only imagine what he looked like, and hastily amended: "Okay. I've been fighting a little. But I swear, this time, these guys came at me first."
"Don't they always."
Marge's attempt at staying annoyed fell flat. The crease of concern between her eyebrows became increasingly obvious until, a moment or two later, she reached for the phone next to her.
"What are you doing?" Peter asked.
"Paging May."
Peter forced a laugh that made his entire mouth taste like rust. "You don't need to do that. I don't want to bother her at work."
"Peter, you practically dragged one of your legs behind you the whole way in here. Now, she doesn't have to be involved in your care, but she should know you're receiving treatment."
"I didn't come here to get treated."
"What other reason would you have for coming to the emergency room in your condition?"
"I came to see..."
But he trailed away as the reply to Marge's question came walking straight through the set of doors leading to the hallway all on her own. Every other color in the room seemed to seep into her and light her up from the inside out: [color] skin with most of the makeup rubbed off after so many hours at work; [color] hair disheveled from running this way and that all shift; [color] scrubs splattered with vibrant yellow-brown vomit across their fronts.
[F Name] [L Name] did not show any sign that she noticed Peter standing there gawking at her from a few feet away. She pushed a wheelchair containing a squirming, booted child to the exit, all the while rattling off a list of instructions and advice to the concerned woman walking in step with her. And then the child hopped right off the chair and ran out to a waiting car idling just outside. [Name] waved them goodbye before finally, finally turning around to lock eyes with Peter.
Something behind him thunked—Marge putting the phone back down. She smiled at him knowingly. "If she's who you came to see, get on with it. We're busy. She'll make sure you take some ibuprofen anyway."
He returned her grin while nervously fluffing the hair on the back of his head. During this exchange, you marched wordlessly right past the desk in the direction from which you had come. Peter started, then jogged after you.
"[Name]!"
You stopped, arms crossed, eyebrows barely raised. "Peter, you've been fighting again."
"They hit me first."
"Don't they always."
"That's what I said," Marge chimed in. Peter motioned for her to stay out of it, but this only caused her to lean a hand on her chin to clearly signal she had no intention of doing so.
While he was distracted once again, you turned to leave. Peter reached out to grab your shoulder and stop you without thinking. He released you immediately, as though gripping you like that caused him pain—and it did, but his rapid retraction had more to do with the flash of warning in your [color] eyes than anything else. Just to emphasize that he hadn't meant anything by it, he shoved his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. The cuts on his fingers stung in protest, but he thought he did a passable job of not wincing when he asked:
"Where are you going?"
"To get May," you answered flatly.
"No!" Why did everyone insist on doing that first? Wasn't he a grown-ass man in his mid-20s? "I promise I will talk to May in a little bit. But I didn't come here to get patched up. I came to see you."
"While you're actively bleeding from the face?"
"Am I? Sh—" He'd taken your bait and pressed a thumb right into a gash on his cheek. "Not the point right now. I just need to talk to you."
You made to turn again. "If you're still here when I go on my break—"
"Now. Please?"
He didn't know exactly what got you to change your mind. You had seen him in worse condition than this since you'd met him. Maybe he'd made the pleading note in his voice just a little too obvious. After a moment of heart-stopping hesitation, you sighed in defeat.
"Marge, is it all right if I take my fifteen now?" you asked.
"Harper should be back any minute. Just don't take longer than fifteen," said Marge.
You flashed her a thumbs-up before pushing through the metal doors. No one objected to Peter following you inside, nor remaining at your heels as you weaved your way through the busy hospital corridors to the employees-only break room. He spent so much time there that some members of the staff probably thought he worked there, too. Thankfully, no such staff members (or those who knew he only came to have lunch with May and spend time with [Name]) were taking their breaks when the two of you walked inside.
The place smelled like stale coffee and iodine. That hadn't changed. But had it always been this gleaming in here? The cheap plastic card table blazed white; the wobbly chairs screamed orange; and the sofa glared blue. He soon became too captivated by watching you move to the back counter containing the coffee maker and a microwave to wonder more about the loud colors. All Peter could do was stare until you snapped him out of his trance via shoving a hot paper cup in his face.
"Do me a favor and try to stay awake and upright long enough to tell me why I'm giving up my break for you, won't you?" you said.
He grabbed the cup and took a sip without answer. Once the scalding liquid sloshed into his stomach, he coughed out a laugh.
"God, that's awful!"
"Peter? Are you...okay?"
"Fine. Better than fine, actually. Everything—everything's so beautiful, you know? Even Forest Hill's terrible coffee."
As if to prove his point, he gulped down the rest of the sludge, then smacked his lips for dramatic effect. This did not seem to settle your nerves. Quite the contrary; now you looked downright worried.
"Did you hit your head during the fight?"
"No. No, I promise. Listen, I need..."
It struck him in that moment that he might have skipped a few steps. If he moved forward like this, he'd only end up in the same old downward, on-again, off-again spiral that he had had with Gwen. Two ghosts bogged him down enough as it was. The last thing he needed was a third. And yes, Gwen had known, made her own decisions that played a part in that horrible night. But the other MJ—the MJ he had saved—knew as well. He couldn't not give you the same choice when he wanted so badly for this to work out.
"I need to show you something," he finished.
"Can you do it in less than twelve minutes?"
"Uh..."
"Peter, I need to keep this job."
"I'll try."
Then...nothing happened. The ancient fridge buzzed audibly in the background. You drummed your fingers against the sides of your cup. Peter held in his breath. Several precious seconds were wasted in utter silence.
"Well?" you asked pointedly.
Peter, having got lost in your eyes again, started. "Well, what?"
"Are you going to show me or what?"
"Now? Here?"
"I got the impression you thought it was kind of important, yeah."
"I can't exactly show you here..." he said, trailing off into a weak laugh.
You exhaled sharply, discarded your nearly-untouched coffee in the bin, and muttered, "I'm getting back to work."
"No, no, no, no, no, no, no. No."
He couldn't let this opportunity pass him by. That awful voice hissing about his unworthiness would only get louder the more time he spent with you without saying anything; it always did. Peter sped past you before you could reach the door. This time, he didn't apologize when he touched you. His fingers wrapped firmly yet carefully around your wrist, and he pulled.
"Peter!" you snapped as you stumbled after him.
The eyes he turned on you were pleading. "We don't have to go far. Okay?"
He took your silence—and the relaxing of your arm inside his grip—as permission to continue. But he knew that didn't pause the rapidly-dwindling countdown hanging over his head. Swiftly (although much less swiftly than he would have liked or was capable of), he led you down the hallway to a door with a gleaming red "EXIT" sign above it. This he tugged you through after he made sure no one else was watching.
Thank God, no one had chosen this moment to take a smoke break either. The early morning air was crisp, but the tang of nicotine lingered still. The barest hint of sunrise pink haloed over the tops of the buildings surrounding this backstreet.
"And what exactly are we supposed to be doing out here?" you asked.
"Hold on just a—hey, what's that over there?"
"What's what?"
In the half-second you turned in the direction of the closest street, Peter shot the lurking security camera with a wad of webbing. The camera probably didn't work, but better safe than sorry. And he did it just in time, too. You stopped craning your neck to see past the distant violet streetlight to shoot him a look of outright suspicion.
"I must be seeing things. Probably got conked on the head real good during my fight. Sorry about that."
"You've got less than ten minutes now."
"Okay. Hold on. Just...don't freak out, all right?"
"Why would I..."
Without breaking eye contact with you, Peter backed up against the brick wall, pressed his palms right to it, and slowly inched his way upward until he clung there several feet about your head.
"Oh, my God," you said.
Peter cracked a smile. "Surprise?"
You lifted your shaking hands to your mouth, lowered them, and moved slowly forward. Peter disengaged from the wall upon seeing your approach. He landed neatly on the ground just in front of you before digging around in his back pocket long enough to find his wadded-up Spider-Man mask. Your sharp inhale seemed to indicate you recognized it.
"I guess they really do always hit you first," you said, your eyes fixed on the red-and-blue material."
Peter chuckled, a hopeful sound. "Most of the time."
The way your eyes locked on his silenced that hope. You took one more step nearer. Then you asked the last question he expected:
"Why are you telling me this?"
Not Why didn't you tell me before? Not Who do you think you are? Not even How dare you burden me with this knowledge? Only curiosity as to why you could be trusted with his secret now—and Peter knew then that it was because it had never been about trusting you. It had always been about trusting himself.
His arm holding his mask flopped to his side. "Because I have something more important to tell you, but you needed to know this first."
The two of you stood close enough that your breaths mingled when you said: "And that is?"
"I love you, [Name]."
You shivered. Peter gulped and went on:
"I don't think I love you. I know it. I've known it for years, but I didn't have the courage to say anything about it. I still don't know if this is the right thing to do, but I—but I—but I—"
"Peter." A gentle palm to his chest quieted him. "Breathe. Just tell me what brought all this on tonight."
"I think you're my MJ," he blurted.
"Huh?"
"I got sent to another universe where there was another Peter Parker. Actually, there were two other Peter Parkers. And all of us are Spider-Man—well, the one from that universe is more of a Spider-Boy. Anyway, nothing was perfect for them either."
Your mouth fell open, and Peter went on:
“The younger Peter, he’s got these big plans to go to MIT with his friends. Can you believe it? Me? At MIT? And the other one—well, he's got a bad back, but he just had this calmness about him that I sure as hell don't have. And we got to talking, and it turns out they both have the same girlfriend—okay. Not the same-same girlfriend. That—that sounds really gross. The older one's nearly 50. But they're both called MJ. And that got me thinking about how I don't have an MJ, and maybe that makes a difference. Peter—the older Peter—he said—"
A distinct glaze had covered your eyes. Way to not stick the landing, Peter.
"Okay. I—I get it. Multiverses. Multi-Peters. It's a lot to adjust to. You just found out about the whole Spider-Man thing. Maybe take it slow. Maybe don't mention that magic exists in this other universe?"
You gave an infinitesimal nod in reply.
When Peter spoke again, he did his absolute best to speak more slowly and skip straight to the point: "I haven't let myself be happy since Gwen died. I didn't think the universe would allow somebody like me to be happy. But now I think I could be happy...maybe...with you...if you're interested?"
You stared. At least your eyes had returned to their typical sheen. That had to be a good sign, right? Peter held his breath and waited. Spiders could stay underwater for a long time, so he didn't have to breathe again anytime soon. But even his lungs began to burn before you said another word. He had just realized what in incredibly stupid thing he'd just done when you finally moved, launching forward to grab a fistful of the front of his sheet and yank his mouth right up against yours. HIs cry of pain was quickly stifled.
The kiss wasn't long—at first. You drew away almost immediately. Peter, on the other hand, stepped closer. He no longer cared that every single inch of body hurt. Both your lips moved together with such synchronicity that any passerby might have thought you and Peter had been kissing for years. His hands found your waist. Your fingers found his hair. When you parted, Peter's lips stung in the best way possible.
"Wow. Shouldn't you have taken me to dinner first?" he asked.
Your pupils remained blown wide even when you narrowed your eyes at him. "After all the years of flirting without any hint you reciprocated?"
"Yeah. Okay. I'll take you out first."
"You're gonna have to get a consistent job first, Parker."
"You might need to, too. Pretty sure we were kissing for more than what was left of your break."
With a yelp, you pulled your phone out of your scrub pocket. Whatever you saw there caused you to scurry for the door back inside. "If I get fired over a love confession, I swear I'll—"
"Break up with me?" he offered.
You paused for a second, then you turned a soft expression toward him. "Promise you're not going to meet a girl actually named MJ before the end of my shift?"
He lifted his right hand and solemnly said, "You're my MJ, [Name]. It just took me a while to work that out."
You disappeared only to reemerge a moment later. "Get some sleep before our dinner date. You look like death warmed over. I can't be seen with you out in public like this."
"All right, all right. I'll take a nap if you promise not to wear that top tonight."
The look on your face when you spotted the splatter of throw up across your clothes indicated you'd entirely forgotten about it during that kissing session. Still, you kept it together and did not deign to respond to him as you went back inside. Just as Peter went to turn and leave, you stuck your head out once again.
"And take some pain meds, or I really will tell May you got in another fight. And I won't tell her whose fault it was."
He lifted both his hands in surrender. Seeing this, you smiled, hesitated, and blew him a kiss. You didn't come back this time around. Peter slowly lowered his arms and laughed. The bright sound of it sparkled into the lightening sky, now Easter blue and pink and yellow above the familiar gray-brown tops of the buildings. Peter strode for the nearby street, only to stop a few inches away, bite his lip, and slip into the remaining shadows to change.
He thought, for the first time in a long time, he just might take the long way home.
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 6]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 6: Blurred Lines
Well, there was nothing wrong with spending time with friends until a casual outing with one turned into another life-and-death-stakes battle. You'd only been trying to have a picnic date with Loki in Central Park when your ominous prediction came true: Someone did come looking for Gamora, or at least to finish the job she'd set out to do.
"Maw," Loki said to the gaunt, noseless man drifting toward you from the clear blue sky.
"Loki," Maw returned with a smile.
Neither being reacted to the civilians fleeing in terror. Perhaps neither being registered them. Neither of them seemed to recall your presence either. And you couldn't blame the civilians for trying to get out of the way before anything started; Maw looked even worse in person than he had in CGI, and he didn't smell good either—like a wad of browning seaweed left out to dry on a hot rock in the sun.
"It's been too long," Loki said. "What brings you to this godsforsaken dung heap in the middle of nowhere? Surely not little old me."
"Everything revolves around you. Isn't that right? Even if indirectly. And you must be [Name]."
Maw shot this last sentence at you. Though your instinct was to flinch away from his cold-eyed stare, you balled up your fists and stood straight as a post. "That's right. To what do I owe the pleasure?"
"My dear sister came to seek you out here only a number of weeks ago. I wonder if you might tell me where she's gone in the interim?"
"Prison, where she belongs," you said around your dry mouth.
Something invisible wrapped around your neck and tightened. All the breath in your lungs swooped out as that something jerked you up to Maw's level in the air. There you dangled, legs kicking uselessly, while he drew near enough to chuck your chin with his clammy fingers.
"These things do happen from time to time. I'm certain she'll be out soon. And when she comes home, she'll find that I stole her treasure out from underneath her nose."
"Let her go, Maw!" Loki shouted from below.
"Oh, not to worry, not to worry. I have no intention of killing her." The grip on your throat loosened only so long that you could suck in one breath before your airway sealed shut again. "She's far too valuable for that."
A shot from Loki's scepter went flying into empty sky as Maw vanished from its path.
"You want me? You can have me. But leave [Name] be!"
Maw spoke from just behind and above your head. "Perhaps a fair trade at one time. But, you see, we know where the Infinity Stone you stole is. Why, you hold it in your hands even now. But she—she knows the location of them all. Gamora said as much in the last communication she was able to send us."
Another blast—several of them—too many to dodge. Maw flung glassy needles in Loki's direction, attention diverted just in time. You dropped like a stone, but oxygen, glorious oxygen reentered your bloodstream. Dizzy, you still managed to slow your fall by grabbing on to a series of tree branches to land on the grass in a three-point landing even Natasha would have been proud of.
Loki and Maw were a nearby blur. Your eyes couldn't keep up with their movements. One streak of green twisted in and out with a streak of gray. Loki's scepter intermittently lit its surroundings neon blue. They appeared to be evenly matched, each taking the advantage momentarily before the other regained it.
Then Loki's back smashed into a tree trunk. His arms spread so wide that his shoulders audibly cracked. Maw approached the pinned man at a leisurely pace. His near-invisible needles glinted in the sunlight mere centimeters from his knuckles.
"If you do insist on dying today, I'm happy to accommodate your wishes. Seeing you bleed out might encourage your pet human here to be more forthcoming with information in the future."
Loki stretched his neck away from the knives as Maw drew near. But he could only stretch so far. You didn't think. You just moved. Your legs launched you into the air. Arms extended, you slammed into Maw at the same instant he lifted his own to strike.
"You don't think I can hold both of you?" Maw snarled.
Actually, you knew that he could. Your muscles froze without your telling them to. But you'd anticipated that. What he didn't know was that you didn't need to move to use your powers. You'd been practicing. In a matter of seconds, you called up that same dusty sensation you'd experienced on Asgard.
"What are you doing?" he asked as a blue powder surged off your skin. "How are you doing that? You should be—"
His head flopped backward onto the earth. His eyelids slid shut. His chest began to rise and fall at regular intervals. And the unseen bindings around you released. The thud you heard about the same time must have been Loki falling free as well. You kept your gaze trained on Maw to save Loki some amount of dignity.
"Ugly fellow, isn't he?" Loki toed Maw's motionless form with a boot. "I'm not so confident that the Asgardian prisons will remain aesthetic if much more of his lot show up. Good job with the sleeping toxin, by the way. Just like old times."
You beamed.
******
Avengers Tower hummed at night. The soft, ambient noise made the place feel lived in even when its occupants were fast asleep or otherwise preoccupied by personal projects. Perhaps all the faint buzz signified was JARVIS's ubiquitous sentry. Either way, it gave you a sense of security when you left Loki's quarters in the early hours of the morning. You slipped into the kitchen alone, hardly giving the emptiness much thought. All you really wanted was a quick snack. None of the living quarters had their own kitchen (to encourage fraternization), which made finding something to eat after midnight quite the trek.
You didn't bother switching on the lights. The illumination coming through the windows lit the way well enough, and you made mug brownies so often that you didn't need to see clearly to make another. Around and around and around the microwave spun the Stark Industries-emblazoned cup. One second prior to the finishing beep, you opened the door to snatch the food off the tray.
Then you made to grab a fresh spoon from the silverware drawer. This movement required you to turn in the direction of the dining table—where someone now sat in the dark. You stifled a startled exclamation with one hand. Once your heartbeat slowed enough to allow you to speak, you squinted at the intruder and said:
"Tony?"
He sighed. "Sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. I didn't expect anyone else would here at this hour."
"I was hungry." You held up your mug in needless explanation. "Uh...want a brownie?"
He shook his head. Drawing nearer, you could see he looked bad—haggard, like he hadn't been sleeping. Probably he hadn't. It hit you with all the force of a pickup truck in that moment: Given your current position in the MCU's timeline, he would still be struggling with PTSD. With Pepper running the company back in California and Rhodey off performing Iron Patriot duties overseas, Tony didn't have anyone to help him through it.
"Did you have a nightmare?" you asked softly, sliding into the seat nearest him
The whites of his eyes flickered toward you. "How did you—"
"Just a guess. I mean, falling out of the wormhole must have been really..." you trailed away. Scary just sounded insulting when you tried it out in your head. Surely you could find some word that wouldn't risk bruising his ego—but you couldn't think of one.
Thankfully, Tony seemed to understand the gist of what you were saying without your having said it. "Yeah. Yeah. Every time I close my eyes, I'm back there. I'm falling and falling, and I just know I'm not going to make it out before the portal closes. So I just don't ever close my eyes."
"But you did make it out."
"That doesn't stop the nightmares."
"No, it wouldn't."
"Heh. Forgot who I was talking to."
The lines between the two [Name]s blurred across the sympathetic look Tony shot you. You remembered well the months following the accident. Though you hadn't been in the vehicle at the time of the wreck, your mental health still took a significant hit. Trembling, avoidance, intense fear—you might not have been diagnosed with PTSD, but panic disorder shared some symptoms with it. Tony wasn't alone in what he was going through.
"How did you do it?" he asked in a raspy voice.
"Do what?"
"Get over it. Forgive..." Tony motioned with his head in the general direction of the living quarters, "him."
"You're letting him live here. He works with the team. You must have forgiven him to some degree."
"Not enough to want to kiss him. Besides, I had to let him stay. It was part and parcel of keeping Thor's muscle around. And as much as I love Bruce and his little green problem, the earth could always use more muscle."
"Oh," you said with some discomfort.
Tony did nothing to break the awkward silence for a minute or two. He tapped his nails against the surface of the table. You scraped your spoon against the edges of your mug to gather any remaining brownie. Then he lifted fingers to rub his eyes—which, you realized with a jolt in the pit of your stomach, were damp.
"Seriously, how do you do it? I've been trying and trying for months now, and I'm still there. I'm still on the other side of the wormhole waiting to die."
"Tony, have you tried talking to someone about this?" you asked.
He snorted. "Sure. Bruce. All the time."
"Bruce isn't a therapist. And neither am I."
"I am not talking to a therapist."
"It takes a while to get to that point," you agreed. "How about Pepper? Have you said anything to her?"
He jerked his head slightly, but you didn't have to ask for clarification on the recoil. Tony offered it himself, slowly, like his tongue had difficulty lifting the weight of his words: "There's a reason I'm here and she's there."
"And that reason is...?"
"One too many acts of erratic behavior," he said shortly.
"Must have been some really erratic behavior if it's that compared to your usual."
One end of Tony's mouth quirked up in amusement. This gave you the courage to go on:
"But did you tell her what was going on inside your head?"
"I didn't think she'd care."
"Tony!" You all but slammed your empty cup down. "You guys kissed on a rooftop in the middle of your burning expo! And you think she doesn't care?"
"It's too much to put on her. Anyway, maybe things would have worked out if New York didn't happen. Maybe. But it did, and I came back different. Like you said, I was already a handful to begin with. I won't ask her to shoulder more."
"You put the effort in for the people you love. And she loves you. Would you abandon her if she experienced a traumatic event?"
"No, but that's different. I—"
"Are you suggesting that Pepper Potts can't handle it?" you interrupted hotly.
He looked aghast. "Absolutely not!"
"Then give her a chance, dammit! She's probably back in Malibu wondering why you ghosted her. You'll both be happier if you explain how you're feeling."
"Okay, okay. I'll call her tomorrow," he lifted his hands in surrender when you narrowed your eyes, "at a more appropriate hour."
The last of your anger drained from you. You slumped back in your seat, exhausted. Tony relaxed as well. Then his expression twisted with a thought you liked the look of not at all.
"Hey, how do you know all this about me and Pepper?"
You hesitated a little too long before responding: "Call it a woman's intuition."
His thought sharpened into outright suspicion. Obviously, he didn't believe you. But he didn't pressure you to come up with a better lie. Instead, he said, "If you're still offering, I think I will take a brownie. Now that the weight's off my chest, my stomach feels a little empty."
"I'll tell you what. I'll show you how to make them yourself. That'll impress Pepper more than your sloppy omelets."
"Deal."
More than an hour had passed by the time you crawled back under the sheets with Loki. You were a little less hungry, and a hell of a lot more tired. But the weariness was worth it, you thought as Loki shuffled closer to you in his sleep. Tony had looked happy when the two of you parted ways. Helping a friend out felt good. Falling asleep with Loki's warm hand on your hip felt even better.
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 5]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 5: One Day
"So let me get this straight."
"Uh-huh."
"We've had a medical doctor confer with you multiple times—one of the most brilliant geneticists in the world, I might add, the best that money can buy."
"Yep."
"We've confirmed that one of your poisonous abilities can cause memory loss."
"Right."
"Yet you still think that the most rational explanation for you not remembering your past is that you've swapped places with another version of yourself that comes from this universe?"
"You got it in one."
Tony threw his hand up into the air. "Clearly, your visits with our in-house therapist aren't doing you any good either."
"How many times do I have to remind you I'm not a therapist?" asked Bruce.
If Steve really planned to go around letting the whole team in on your secret, you’d made up your mind to beat him to the punch. So there you sat with Tony and Bruce over breakfast (a bowl of Wheaties) a few days after you returned from Asgard. You had hoped the two smartest members of the Avengers might have already had some working knowledge of how to solve your dilemma, or some interest in it, but all they did seem interested in was teasing you.
"Hey, could you at least stop downing Wheaties long enough to engage with me?" Tony demanded.
"If you don't believe me, there's no reason for me to stick around. I have other people to see, other things to do. So no," you said around a mushy mouthful of cereal.
He swiped the bowl right out from under you in retaliation.
"Hey!"
"I didn't say that I don't believe you," Tony said as he took the seat across from you. He also sent Bruce a meaningful look that clearly said don't you dare give her her food back until I'm done with her. "I just have a very important question to ask about your theory."
"Fine. What is it?"
"You're telling me that there's a multiverse filled with infinite copies of Pepper?"
"Tony, you can hardly handle one Pepper," said Bruce.
"That's not the point! And why aren't you thinking about the possibility of infinite Natashas?"
Bruce's face went blank. His brain appeared to have fried. You found this vaguely embarrassing, given how his romance with Natasha turned out in the films. And who knew Bruce could turn that particular shade of red?
"Before you guys go daydreaming up some insane orgies, I feel it is my responsibility to point out that I don't have any way of getting multiple versions of one person into the same universe. Hell, I can't even work out how I can get myself back to my own."
"We'll help you," Tony said promptly. He smacked Bruce's chest with the back of his hand. "Right, big guy?"
"R-right. Yeah. We'd be happy to assist." Bruce still looked dazed.
"Appeal to your smaller brains. Why didn't I think of that to begin with?" you grumbled.
Neither of them heard you. Now that it was apparent you wouldn't be getting your breakfast back, you stood to leave the room. Bruce and Tony continued to debate the best number of copies of the women they loved even after you exited into the hallway. Good thing Pepper remained in California for now; she would not appreciate the fantasy you'd just planted in Tony's head.
Ignoring the fact that she would find out eventually, you hastily prepped yourself for your upcoming training session as you headed for the lift. Neither Clint nor Natasha were above sneak attacks prior to you entering the room. You did feel something on the back of your neck that morning. Clint's eyes watching you from one of the remodeled air vents?
"Pssst. [Name]."
Instantly, you tucked your chin, dropped into a high squat, and jabbed both your elbows backward as hard as you could. Pulling your punches would only result in Clint mocking you later.
But the wheezing you heard from behind you didn't belong to Clint, and it was far too masculine to belong to Natasha. You straightened and turned on the spot to find:
"Loki? What are you doing?"
"Currently?" he choked. "Hoping you haven't put me down a kidney."
"There's no way I got anywhere near your kidneys," you said.
"You have no idea what differences in anatomy we might have."
"Uh-huh. So what are you doing, sneaking up on me like that?"
"Sneaking! I'll have you know that none of that constitutes sneaking."
"You got up close enough to whisper in my ear without letting me know you were coming."
"That has nothing to do with sneaking. I just didn't want your life coaches to spot me intercepting you on the way to your meeting."
"So you were sneaking, but because the sneaking was to avoid people who aren't me, it doesn't count as sneaking?"
"I'm so glad you understand. Now, let's get going."
You refused to budge when he tugged on your arm. "Loki, I've got practice with Clint and Natasha. They're expecting me."
"Trust me, you have learned all that you need about the art of beating your boyfriend."
"I still need to go. Gamora's not alone in the galaxy. Someone's bound to come looking for her."
"And if they do, I'll protect you."
"I want to be able to protect myself."
When you pulled your arm back, Loki let it slip easily from his grasp. A sticky pause ensued. Neither of you had dared to speak about what he'd said and what you hadn't said in his room back on Asgard. You couldn't think of anything to say now either in the face of his hangdog expression. So you flashed him a pained sort of smile before you spun on your heel to resume your walk.
"One day."
You paused, looking over your shoulder, and asked, "What?"
He approached you with a strange mixture of hesitation and enthusiasm. "One day, [Name], please. Skip one day, and then you can go back to wrestling with your friends. I just ask that you spend one day with me. I...I miss you."
Your heart sank. Who did Loki really miss? Not you. He would be spending time with a shadow. How could you, in good conscience, allow him to do that?
"Let me show you," he went on. "Perhaps more time is all you need. Perhaps I can prove to you that this is all real, that we are real."
Ah. That was how. Beneath his eager grin, he looked so much more broken than he had in any movie you'd seen. He only wanted you to patch up the holes, and with Tony and Bruce on the case, surely the real [Name] would be back soon to do that properly. A few hours spent with someone you'd grown to care about—figment or otherwise—didn't sound like too heavy a favor to shoulder.
You smiled genuinely this time. "Then where are we going?"
Neither the gentleness with which he entwined his fingers with yours nor his reply of, "Everywhere!" surprised you.
******
Loki limited "everywhere" to New York City that day. This allowed your roles from Asgard to be swapped somewhat. Thankfully, the city itself hadn't changed much from what you remembered, so you played guide while Loki regaled you with what he claimed were tales from your relationship. Nearly every stop saw him spin some sort of story. And despite the fact that not a single one jogged your memory, you enjoyed your time with Loki. His promise of future outings in different cities, countries, and planets filled you with excitement.
Later that night, you padded in your slippers down one of the tower's many halls, battling a happy kind of exhaustion and a vague burden of guilt at the same time. You stifled a yawn with one hand and rapped on the door you'd stopped in front of with the other. Loki waited in his quarters for you to come to bed, but you had one thing left to do before you joined him.
"There's our little truant," Natasha said when she opened the door. She leaned casually against the frame, so you decided she wasn't angry with you after all. Being in her pajamas also made it more difficult for you to be scared of her. "Did you have a nice day off?"
"I did. But I still wanted to come by and tell you that I'm sorry."
Natasha gave you a once-over before peeling herself away from the doorframe and motioning for you to follow her inside. You did, all the way to the coffee table in her sitting room, which was where she disappeared.
Her brief absence gave you the opportunity to look around the place. Her quarters were much barer than Loki's, with very few articles that weren't absolute necessities—save for the photos. She had dozens and dozens adorning every available surface: photos of the team; photos of her as a child standing next to a younger blonde; photos of you and Natasha together, grinning cheekily while sporting matching wounds, dressed to the nines at the top of some magnificent staircase, and even one or two selfies featuring you both making silly faces at the camera.
"Here."
She materialized at your elbow, now clutching a filled wineglass in each hand. You took the one she offered you. Then she collapsed (if indeed any movement by Natasha Romanoff could be described as a collapse) onto her sofa, took a sip of wine, and stared expectantly up at you until you took the hint and sat down beside her. Natasha patted your knee with approval.
"You really didn't have to apologize for playing hooky to go on a date with your boyfriend," she said.
"I know, but," you took a drink to give yourself time to think of a way to explain yourself, "I still should have told you guys I wasn't coming before I just left."
"Why? Clint and I can work just as well without the third wheel. Kidding," she added at your wide-eyed stare. "Seriously, though, I'm glad you went. I think spending more time with Loki will be good for you."
"Why's that?"
"Well, you love him, don't you?"
"Oh, save it, Tasha. I already know Steve told you what I've been doing at the library."
Her demeanor shifted at once. Still, she didn't seem perturbed that you'd seen through her deception. "Okay. You caught me. Now you're aware of my evil, evil plan to encourage you not to feel bad that you ditched me this morning to play footsie with a would-be dictator."
"That isn't your evil plan."
"Enlighten me."
"Your evil plan is to encourage me to spend more time with Loki so that I'll miraculously remember my entire life before my 'accident,'" you couldn't help the crack in your voice when you went on, "because you don't believe me about not being her."
"Oh, [Name]."
Why did it matter? You hardly knew Natasha. If you were right, anything you did know about her likely came from the depths of your subconscious, a muddled mess of movie canon and bits from fan fictions you'd read over the years. So why did her skepticism hurt enough that you suddenly had to put your wineglass on the table to avoid spilling tears into it? Her touching you softly on the shoulder didn't help much to quell them.
"It's not that I don't believe you. You have to admit you being the [Name] of a different universe is a little hard to swallow."
You shrugged, not trusting yourself to speak without crying or spewing a headache-inducing toxin into the room.
"Look around. So many of these pictures have you in them. We're friends. We've been friends." She looked away and bit her lip. "It's easier to accept that you forgot all that than that you became a completely different person when I wasn't looking."
"Let me guess. If I weren't me, you'd know," you said, not without an edge.
"I would."
So many people missed [Name]—the real [Name]—their [Name]. Natasha clearly treasured every happy moment with her found family, and she thought of you as part of it. But you weren't. You wished you could claw off your skin to prove to them you weren't the woman they thought they knew, but you couldn't. All you could do was try your best to fix the mess your wish had somehow created.
"I should go," you said, standing up.
Natasha made no move to stop you, but the corners of her mouth twitched down. You were nearly to the door when she spoke:
"[Name], wait."
"No. I should get back to Loki. Gotta work on my memory, right?"
"You don't have to go."
"All I came to do was apologize for running off this morning."
"Well, apology not accepted," she said bluntly. "Make it up to me by sticking around. We'll watch movies, eat junk food, do each other's hair. It's been a long time since we got to have a girls' night."
You hesitated, but she looked sincere. "You really want to have girls’ night with me? Even though I might not be the [Name] you know?"
"Clint will only let me paint his fingernails so many times." Sensing her victory, Natasha indicated the spot next to her that you'd recently vacated. "We won't talk about the amnesia-slash-alternate-universe thing. We'll just hang out."
"I guess I do owe you."
"Damn right you do."
She didn't need to coax you further. For whatever reason you didn't remember, for now one thing remained true: Natasha was your friend. And there was nothing wrong with spending time with friends.
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 4]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 4: Resplendence Not Withstanding
It took a few days for the team to agree on what to do with Gamora—conveniently the same few days Dr. Cho gave you mandated sick leave in the tower's hospital wing so that you could fully recover from your injuries. You understood why coming to a consensus would have been difficult; Steve felt responsible for giving Gamora unhindered access to your cranium, and so he spent most of his time with you. He might have also been intentionally avoiding the debate. Nothing you said could dissuade him of his guilt, nor could any of the blatantly jealous jabs Loki made at his expense every time Loki came to visit you and found you and Steve together.
As a result, you found yourself relishing your solitary ride up to the tower's launchpad. The gleaming walls around you gave you a good medium with which to see yourself in your Avengers getup for the very first time: mostly black, with a fiery red-orange jacket and other accents in the same color. Appropriate, you supposed, given your code name. And you didn't look half bad in it either.
A bright ding reminded you that you weren't dressed up for pleasure. Cinnabar had a job today. It didn't matter that, underneath your costume, a mess of cuts and bruises covered your skin. The constant ache in your head also didn't matter. You would see this through.
"[Name]! You are looking well today!"
The good news? You didn't have to do the job alone. Thor stood just outside the lift doors, grinning broadly as he often did. His cheer quailed some of your mounting anxiety. You put on your best wry smile as you stepped into the hall to meet him and his entourage.
"You are an awful liar, Thor," you said.
"No, truly! In comparison to how you looked when my brother brought you home only a few nights ago, you appear truly resplendent."
"Her apparent resplendence notwithstanding, I still don't think she ought to come with us to Asgard. She has clearly not fully recovered," Loki said.
Thor wagged his finger in his brother's direction. "What did Director Fury tell you about discussing women as though they are not there when you are upset with them?"
Loki heaved an enormous sigh before obviously forcing himself to look you in the eye, albeit only briefly. "I disagree with your choice to attend this errand. It is too much, too quickly. The transportation is not your responsibility."
"Loki, you're literally transporting the person who put me in this condition," you said.
At the word “person,” you heard rattling. This issued from two chains, one each held by Thor and Loki, that led to a pair of handcuffs. These were attached via a third chain to a collar that extended over Gamora's mouth. Above it, her brown eyes blazed with fury—and a bit of the darker, burned patches from your poison were visible as well.
"Being," you amended. "You're literally transporting the being that put me in this condition."
He gave the chain in his hand a warning tug, shifting Gamora's anger to him for a moment or two. "There's no need for you to be considerate of the prisoner's feelings."
"There's no need to be unnecessarily rude to her either."
"She gave you a concussion."
"Which," Thor put in before yet another quarrel on this subject could erupt," is quite impressive if one thinks about it for any length of time. [Name] could have come out much worse going toe to toe with the most dangerous woman in the galaxy."
"Yes. Thank you, Thor, for the reminder that my girlfriend narrowly avoided being decapitated."
"Well, we do no one a service by loitering here, weighing the pros and cons of a fight neither of us were there for. Come, let us hurry to Asgard so that [Name] may rest before much more time passes!"
Ignoring Loki's squawks of protest, Thor herded your quartet onto the nearby pad. The wind so high up cut through your clothes like Gamora's switchblade. You struggled to see in the raw, unimpeded sunlight. No sooner had your vision cleared enough to see the runes already scorched into the surface beneath your feet than did Thor throw his head back and shout to the sky:
"Heimdall! Open the Bifrost!"
"You know that Stark told you to stop calling Heimdall on his launchpad," Loki said.
Thor laughed. "It is either here or in his beloved garage. His choice!"
Any reply Loki might have made was swallowed up in a dazzling display of multicolored lights and an abrupt rushing noise filling your ears.
"Holy shit!" you gasped once you'd tumbled out of the rainbow less than a second later. Considering you already had difficulty balancing post-concussion, it was somewhat miraculous that you didn't wind up sprawled across the glossy floor.
And then you looked up, and you felt your breath stolen again for completely different reasons. Seeing this, the Bifrost chamber, in person, made your head spin. You woozily lifted a hand to your forehead and only just managed to prevent yourself from blurting out how much more nauseating traveling the Bifrost was than the movies made it look.
"Welcome, Prince Thor, Prince Loki, Lady [Name].:
A deep, warm voice greeting you stopped your inner griping cold. Startled, you looked around once again to spot a tall, dark-skinned man wearing enormous golden horns standing in the center of the room. You knew who that was without an introduction. Oh, God. Casting someone as handsome as Idris Elba in the role somehow hadn't done the Asgardian justice. He was so painfully good-looking that looking directly at him was no easy task.
Heimdall chuckled, and you felt a blush explode across your face. He could allegedly see everything. Did "everything" include your thoughts?
As Loki and Thor passed you with Gamora, Loki pursed his lips and rolled his eyes. Evidently, one did not need to be a mind reader to know what you had just been thinking. Fantastic. He had already been miffed with you from the start of this venture; now you'd been caught openly ogling another attractive man. You scurried after the other three before you could embarrass yourself even more.
You might have been wrong, but you thought you heard Heimdall laugh as you left him behind.
Only the gentle clinking of Gamora's chains accompanied your group while it made its way across the bridge. You did your best not to gaze too deeply into the darkness surrounding you. In doing so, you inched further and further away from the edge. You didn't notice—that is, you didn't notice until your arm brushed against someone else's. That other arm belonged to Loki. Although he looked cross at first, his gaze soon softened.
"Don't worry," he said. "I won't let you fall."
You swallowed around a lump of fear you hadn't realized was caught in your throat. But the spell of the abyss did not break, and all four of you remained quiet until the golden towers of the city appeared before you and you could hear the sound of a multitude of rushing waterfalls.
"Behold, Asgard!" Thor cried theatrically.
Gamora rolled her eyes. You, on the other hand, beheld. The whole city looked just like it did in the films, only a hundred times more dazzling. Your mouth fell open as you followed Thor and Loki into the streets.
"Beautiful, isn't it?" Thor asked.
"Yes, a beautiful place to keep our prisoner until she agrees to explain what it is she and her father are up to. I do hope she'll appreciate the view from her cell. Oh, wait." Loki did not bother to hide his sneer at the end of his sentence.
Well, if Gamora hadn't told them Thanos' plan yet, you weren't about to speak up. You saw no need to let her in on the fact that one, if not two, Infinity Stones might be close enough by that a well-placed prison break could put them in her hands. You saw no need to make Loki even more overprotective of you either.
"She might as well be somewhere like this," you said. "Even the cells are more aesthetic than the holding cells at the tower."
Thor and Loki exchanged a look.
"What?" you asked.
"Did you take her on a tour of the prison?" Loki demanded.
"I have taken her no such place! And," Thor added with some heat, "if you're that concerned, you should ask [Name] about it, not me."
"Yes, I do so enjoy having my gender sensitization courses incorporated into high-risk hero operations." Despite the snark, Loki turned a quizzical eye toward you. "When have you ever seen the dungeons?"
Too late, you realized you’d expressed something that the you of this universe wouldn’t have known. Had it really taken this long? Was now really the time to bring up the fact that anything you did know had been taken from a popular film series? Given the way Gamora held still without turning her head towards you, as though she were listening very carefully, you decided no.
"Oh, it's not that." Hopefully you didn't sound as frantic as you felt, trying to come up with a believable lie on the spot. "You know, everything on Asgard is more aesthetic than it is on earth. It just makes sense that the jail would be more aesthetic, too."
"Haha, yes. A reasonable assumption," said Thor, but his laugh came out weaker than usual.
Loki turned away without even a sarcastic observation about how often you had used the word aesthetic. His silence actually made you more nervous than the (not so) furtive glances you saw his brother shooting you as you all made your way into the city streets.
And how could Thor not be distracted? You, for one, had thought that you might go more unnoticed in a different realm. It did not take long for the Asgardian populace to prove you wrong. They threw themselves out of doors and windows to greet the princes and you. Everyone seemed more enthusiastic about your presence here than the people in New York did, even. At least you had some practice. After a mighty internal struggle, you managed not to hide your face and instead acknowledge each call of your name with a smile and a faint nod.
Your group had gathered quite the throng by the time you reached the palace gates. From your place in the back, you could see sweat glistening at the back of Gamora's neck. Either she wasn't used to these kinds of crowds (you could certainly relate), or the thought of being chucked into Asgardian prison frightened her more than she let on. Probably the former, since her posture relaxed somewhat after the guards turned the crowd away.
The peace and quiet did not last long. Only a short walk into the building took place before you were surrounded once again with joyous cries of welcome and a mob of flailing limbs. All the voices and bodies blended into one another for a few disorienting moments, then slowly began to solidify into recognizable individual beings who had their sights trained right on you.
"And you thought you'd wriggled out of ever seeing us again," Fandral said with a mocking wag of his index finger.
"How are you?" Volstagg asked.
"Who gave you the shiner?" asked Hogun.
Only Sif didn't say anything, but you could tell that she soon would. Her sharp eyes moved knowingly between your face, Gamora's, and Loki's. Oh, good. You knew these people, too—and knew even less about what they thought you should know than the team back at the tower. Your mouth went dry at the thought of having to answer any of them. That dryness seemed to spread across your skin, too. Just what you needed: another power to develop! It would be just your luck that Asgardians weren't immune to this one either.
Luckily, you didn't need to find out exactly what this sensation heralded. Sif got no chance to voice her question. Disaster struck first in the form of Odin and Frigga walking up to you. The former had but to clear his throat to get every single person (save for Gamora) leaping to offer the appropriate greeting to the rulers of the realm. Only after staring blankly at all the bowing did it occur to you that you ought to show the same level of respect. You scrambled into a clumsy curtsy before anyone could rebuke you.
Frigga and Odin chuckled. Your cheeks burned hotly. Had your curtsy really been that awful? When you risked tipping your head up to see them, neither of them appeared the last bit upset. Odin was smiling. You resisted the urge to glance over your shoulder to see what the king actually found uncharacteristically funny. Then Frigga stepped forward to embrace you.
"There is no need for that, [Name]," she said. "Loki has already informed us all about your memory problem."
"That explains it," Sif said to herself. The three men murmured in surprise.
You, meanwhile, could hardly react. What had Bruce said was a reasonable mortal reaction to a goddess of love and beauty? Crumpling? Because you definitely felt like crumpling at the thought of having worn pajamas gifted to you by this woman.
"You ought to have visited sooner," Odin added as his wife stepped away from you. "Surely our medics here have capabilities that far outstrip those on Midgard."
"Perhaps one can meet with you while you're here. I'll see about—"
Loki stepped between you and his parents. "[Name] is fine, Mother, thank you very much. Dr. Cho is doing as adequate a job of caring for [Name]'s needs as anyone can expect a Midgardian physician. Be that as it may, I'm certain she's very tired after what is practically her maiden voyage through the Bifrost—aren't you, darling?"
"Er," you began, but Loki clearly hadn't been interested in hearing your answer.
"You see? The poor thing needs rest. So if you all don't mind," he grabbed your wrist as he stuffed his end of Gamora's lead into a bewildered Volstagg's hand, "I am going to take her somewhere quiet so that she may recoup. It was ever so pleasant seeing you all again. Goodbye!"
He whisked you away so quickly that your feet left the ground. Soon, the two of you were flying down a gleaming palace hallway hand in hand.
"Loki! What are your parents going to think of us dashing off like that?" you asked.
He gave you his most winning smile. "Don't worry. They're used to it."
"So where are you really taking me?"
"On the grand tour. It'll be just like I'm giving it to you for the first time. Come on!"
******
And it was just like he gave you a tour of Asgard for the first time. You and Loki spent the entire day together, seeing Asgardian sights, eating Asgardian food, and dodging his Asgardian family and friends whenever you spotted them out at the same time as you. He ushered you so rapidly from one place to the next that you hardly had time to breathe, let alone speak to anyone. But you had fun. You had a lot of fun.
Night fell before you both sneaked into his quarters at the palace. And he'd been right about saying his parents were used to his antics, too, if the neatly folded sleeping clothes and towels waiting on the bed were any indication. You gratefully slipped into the buttery soft pajamas, followed by the smooth sheets in the room's single enormous bed. Then you did something brave: Despite the space available, you snuggled right up against Loki, your back against his abdomen.
His arms snaked out at once to wrap around you; his chin dug lightly into your shoulder. He let out a soft noise of contentment, like that of a cat sinking into a sunbeam. You relaxed somewhat at the touch. Even after you'd refused to sleep close to him since arriving in this universe, Loki made no move to deepen the moment. He seemed pleased just to have the opportunity to hold you close—and that made what you were about to do that much more difficult.
"Loki?" you said into the darkness.
"Mn?"
His attempt at trying to sound half asleep fell flat; you could tell he remained just as awake as you did. "Why is it that you'd rather be with the Avengers on earth than here on Asgard?"
"Perhaps you are unaware now, but I am not Asgardian."
"I know. But what does that mean?"
"It means..." he somehow sighed and grumbled at the same time, "It means I do not belong here."
You hated to move, really. Loki didn't run as hot as others you'd shared a bed with, and you were quite comfortable in your present position. But you forced yourself to turn over so that you could be face-to-face with him to say, "Explain."
"What is there to explain?"
"Well, it's nice here. You have friends, family. Everyone loves you. You wouldn't have to work so hard to prove yourself if you just stayed on Asgard."
"It doesn't feel right," he said.
"What doesn't feel right?"
"The whole thing. Whenever I'm here, I feel wrong, like things aren't supposed to be this way. I don't know how to have family or friends, or how to be loved, or how to stop trying to prove myself. Even though logically I know it would be easier for me, I have no desire to stay. All I want is to run."
"That's how I feel, too."
His expression crinkled with confusion lit by the mass of unidentifiable constellations outside the window. "About Asgard?"
"No. About the tower. New York. Back on earth. It's all wrong, even though everyone says it should be right."
Without noticing your own actions, you'd splayed your palms against Loki's bare chest. He picked one up, looked at your fingers from several different perspectives, then brought your knuckles up to his mouth—but you felt only his breath against your skin, not his lips.
"This is about your theory that this isn't your reality."
You stiffened. "How—"
"Captain Rogers said as much."
"Steve told you?"
"Just because he's an honest man doesn't mean he isn't a terrible gossip." Loki went on to add, "And he might not have been telling me. He might have been relaying the information to Natasha while they both remained blissfully ignorant that I stood on the other side of the door."
"I don't know which one of you I'm more angry with, him for blabbing to other people, or you for eavesdropping."
"Oh, him, certainly."
"I think I'll settle for both of you."
When you made to flip onto your other side, Loki's grip on your hand prevented you from doing so. He really did kiss it then.
"[Name], I know you. Don't you think that if you weren't the woman I love, I would be able to tell?"
"I don't know, Loki."
"When I am with you—when we are together on Midgard—that is the only place I am truly happy. I belong with you. Can you not say the same to me?"
Your mouth worked in anticipation of a reply, but you couldn't come up with one that wouldn't break his heart. He looked at you with such hope in his eyes that you wanted to believe all the crazy, sappy things Steve had described about your romance. If you were to say no...
You didn't. You said nothing. Instead, you laid your cheek against his shoulder. Loki let go of your hand to rub his fingers lightly up and down your back. He'd noticed your inability to answer him; you knew he did. But if your speechlessness hurt him, he didn't speak up about it. He simply continued to hold you until you both fell asleep, like you might slip away before sunrise, like you might turn to dust with the snap of a finger.
Male!Loki x Enhanced!Female!Reader: A Place Like Home [Ch. 3]
Summary: Be careful what you wish you for—the clichés might never stop coming.
Challenge: "160 Collective Drabbles" on Lunaescence Archives
Rating/Tags: T (Reader-Insert; Female Reader-Insert; POV Second Person; Not Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase Two Compliant; Canon Divergence - Post Movie: Avengers (2012); Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence; Alternate Universe; Enhanced!Reader; Redeemed!Loki; Not A Deconstruction; Established Relationship; Panic Attacks; Other Tags Not Added to Avoid Spoilers)
Pairings/Relationships: Loki/Reader; Avengers Team & Reader; Background Canon Relationships
Tag List: @imaginesfire
Master List
Ao3 Version
Chapter 3: Flawed Angles
You pulled your hat further down over the tips of your ears as you left the warmth of the library to throw yourself at the mercy of the unforgiving outdoor chill. Only 6:00, but already the typical blaze of lights momentarily overloaded your vision. A thick lavender ceiling overhead promised snow, and indeed a single flake landed (and melted) on the tip of your nose.
"It's Cinnabar!"
"You mean she's really here?"
"So the gossip blogs were right?"
Wrapping your scarf more securely around your neck unfortunately would not prevent people from spying on you. That old MCU adage about hats and upturned collars being the perfect disguise? Utter baloney—in this version of the universe, at any rate.
If you had any functioning brain cells left, you'd head back to Avengers Tower right then and there. All your recent pilgrimages to the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building had not gone unnoticed by the rest of the team. You could be trusted now to venture out into the city alone and not completely lose your head, but that didn't stop them from being suspicious about what you were up to, especially Loki.
And Loki in particular was the one causing you to hesitate over going home. The two of you may have shared that tender moment and a kiss a few weeks prior, but you had had a lot of time to think since then, and to research. The more you read about the Many-World Interpretation and Brane Theory and all the rest of the ways the multiverse might function, the more you thought it better if you kept your distance from him and everyone else that resided at the tower.
Your stomach growled at your decision to avoid dinner with the group yet again. Heeding this warning, you stopped at the back of a line leading to a street-vendor food cart. A soft pretzel with mustard would tide you over until you felt it safe to risk a trip to the kitchen for leftovers.
They'd all appreciate it once you figured out how to get home. The real [Name] would come back, and then everyone would be so relieved they didn't get taken in by an imposter.
"I thought I spotted you in the crowd."
The male voice behind you made you jump. When you spun on the spot, you found Steve standing there with a twinkle in his eyes. He looked good out of uniform. Dressed appropriately for an evening in January and with a dark beard growing in, he bore a striking resemblance to that photograph of Chris Evans women kept taping to the front of Mountain Lodge-scented candles way back when.
And when you made it back to your own world, even if you dared to tell anyone about this, they'd never believe you. How unfair was that?
Steve's sparkle diminished while he watched you stare at him. You could have kicked yourself for getting so distracted by another handsome man.
"Hey, Captain Rogers," you said once you'd recovered a little.
He chuckled. "'Captain Rogers'? I don't think you called me that when we first met."
"I didn't?"
What kind of person were you in this place? No one had indicated that you were behaving all that differently thus far. But if you were so rude as to be instantly familiar with Captain America, you wondered how any of the Avengers had come to like either version of you.
"We've been good friends pretty much since day one," Steve explained.
You'd almost forgotten your hunger in the wake of Steve's sudden appearance. Your stomach kindly reminded you when Steve held out one of two soft pretzels he now held in his hands. Since when had you been at the front of the line? More importantly, since when did Steve Rogers purchase you snacks?
"God, I am such a Mary Sue," you muttered as you took the pretzel. Dating Loki; working as an Avenger; automatic BFFs with Captain America—who was now throwing you a very confused look.
"You're a what?"
"Never mind!"
A hasty bite of food stopped him from investigating your statement further. Though it was apparent he wanted to press, Steve instead just quietly led you up the street in the direction of what passed for home. You both stopped at the next bench to sit down and eat. A few blessedly peaceful moments passed—you were slowly but surely learning to tune out the near-constant whispers and squeals and giggles that followed you and every other Avenger around out in public—before you thought of something less about you to say:
"Are you headed home from game night with the Sousas?" Normally, Steve drove his motorcycle there, but you saw no sign of his vehicle that night.
Steve brightened considerably at the mention of his scheduled Thursday activity. "The grandkids came this week. I think I'm well on my way to being on the list of top five favorite grandparents."
He looked so happy that you couldn't help grinning back. Not all the changes between this world and the MCU you knew were good ones. Clint remained awfully sour about his divorce from Bobbi, for instance. Steve, Peggy, and her husband all getting to know each other again was one of the best differences.
Unfortunately, this ember of happiness did not get to grow into a blaze. Steve swallowed a bite of his food and expertly swapped the subject matter back to you:
"Running into you like this on my way back wasn't an accident, though."
You stiffened. "Huh?"
"Loki asked me to check on you. He's been worried about you. We all have, actually."
"How did you know I'd be at this specific library?"
"The Internet." He laughed at your surprised expression before nudging your shoulder with his massive one. "Yes, I can use the Internet without help or supervision."
Well, that explained the mini-fan club that kept ambushing you at the doors upon closing each night. You couldn't exactly brush the whole thing off by saying you were fine either. By no stretch of the imagination—anyone's imagination—were you "fine."
Steve polished off the rest of his pretzel while waiting for you to answer. Suddenly nauseous, you nibbled at yours more out of a need for something physical to focus on. Then you sighed, watched your breath float up into the waiting flurry above, and said:
"He shouldn't worry about me so much."
"He loves you, [Name]." Steve said this as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. "He's going to worry."
"Does he love me? How does he know?"
"Everyone can see it. Ever since you met him, he's changed. None of us were really pleased when his dad just sent him back to earth after what Loki did. Things at the tower were tense. Maybe he didn't have his powers anymore, but we still didn't trust him. His own brother expected him to go back to causing trouble the minute we took our eyes off him."
Just like every other Loki-becomes-an-Avenger original-character fanfic before the start of Phase 2. It took some effort on your part not to roll your eyes at the cliche your life had become. Steve must have sensed at least some of your irritation, because he went on:
"He wants to be better in part because you showed him something the rest of us couldn't: the value of human life."
"Cap—Steve, that's great and all." Hard to swallow with a straight face, but great nonetheless." I didn't ask you how you know he loves me, though. I want to know how he knows he loves me."
"Is this about your amnesia?"
He'd given you the perfect out. Agree, and you could both move on without what would surely be a difficult conversation, and another risk on your part of being sent for counseling. If Steve gave you the benefit of the doubt—a big if—then he'd probably just give you a (truly stellar) pep talk about how everyone on the team was there for you, no matter how long it took you to recover. The yes was on the tip of your tongue...
...but you couldn't. Real or not, this was Captain America talking to you. It felt wrong to willfully lie to him.
"I don't think I have amnesia, Steve."
"Is that why you've been going to the library almost every day?"
“Yeah.”
"So what do you think is the problem?"
Poor pretzel. Purchased to be eaten; sentenced to death via being picked apart by your nervous fingers. "I don't think I'm the [Name] you all know. I think she and I are different people. I'm from a different universe."
You said this all this in a rush, eager to get the worst over with. Maybe Tony could use his funds and pull to get you imprisoned in a nice mental institution. All you knew was that if you hesitated a moment longer, you were likely to change your mind about telling the truth, and that wouldn't help anyone.
What you expected following the aftermath of dropping such a bombshell—astonished laughter, forced calm, a logical reminder that Dr. Cho had given you a checkup last week and confirmed the poisoned-into-amnesia theory—did not happen. Steve's eyebrows lifted, sure. He looked startled. But before he said anything, he paused to process your reveal.
"So what happened to our [Name], then?" he asked, and you could tell by his tone that he wasn't humoring you.
"I don't know. I just don't think I'm her. Maybe we got swapped somehow? But this isn't where I belong. Everything's so different. In the world I'm from—"
You cut yourself off with a splutter that you tried your best to cover with a cough.
Steve frowned. "In your world, what?"
"I'm not an Avenger." Telling Steve he wasn't real where you came from didn't feel like the best idea just then. All you had to go on was your gut instinct, too. Steve believed you now; that didn't mean you had unlimited permission to whittle down his willing suspension of disbelief. "Does this mean...you believe me...maybe?"
The hopeful bubble in your chest didn't last long. Steve took a long time to reply. He filled the anticipation by observing all your surroundings. Every second that you didn't get a response, the air in your lungs burned hotter and hotter. At last, he said:
"Let's just say that I'm not prepared to dismiss your theory out of hand."
All the tension vanished in one enormous exhale. "Really?"
"The world got pretty strange while I was frozen. And it isn't like I haven't seen an artifact capable of transporting people in the blink of eye firsthand."
"That's right!" So great was your shock that it propelled you to your feet. The remains of your pretzel fell to the sidewalk to be set upon by pigeons. "The Space Stone!"
"The what? Is that something from your universe?"
You hoped not. God, you hoped not. Forgetting yourself in the moment, you grabbed both Steve's shoulders in your hands. They were so wide that you had to painfully stretch your arms to manage it. Forget Doritos; this man’s figure was an entire slice of pizza.
"Steve, where's the Tesseract?"
This did not clear up his confusion. "Asgard, last time I checked. Why?"
You could have put both your hands on his face and kissed him right then and there. Only knowing that doing so would surely end up on the front page of some supermarket tabloid and ruin your alternate's relationship with Loki prevented you from doing so. Well, not only knowing that. Sure, Steve was handsome and all, but you'd always had more of a thing for antiheroes than dyed-in-the-wool Boy Scouts. So you settled instead for letting out a triumphant cry as you tried (and failed) to yank him up off the bench.
"Okay. You are definitely too heavy to manhandle. Get off your ass, would you? Let's go!"
He was kind enough to get onto his own two feet without making you prance on the spot for too long. But that kindness dissipated when he made a show of stooping over to pick your litter off the ground to deposit it and his own trash in the closest bin.
"Steve!" you groaned.
The corners of his mouth twitched. So he was teasing you! You opened your mouth to hotly berate him for delaying the return of his supposed friend, but he cut you off with an inquiry:
"Where are we off to in such a hurry?"
"Home!" Now that you had his attention, you eagerly raced toward the next street corner. Then you spun on your heel to add, "And to talk to Loki. I think I know how to get [Name] back, but I'm going to need his help."
"A pity, then, that that Asgardian has never aided anyone during his miserable life."
Why would someone say such a thing? Before you could ask as much, the words died in your throat. You heard the voice—deep and feminine—and immediately felt something long, cold, and sharp cut through your scarf to press against the soft skin of your neck. Your attacker remained behind you, so you could not see them. Steve, however, you had a perfect view from which to see his eyes go wide.
"[Name]!"
"Is that who this is? I thought she looked similar to the images provided to me."
The speaker forcefully wrenched you around to face them. Your fears were confirmed when you saw Gamora standing there. Talk about someone being taller in person—and much more intimidating. With her free hand, she grabbed the back of your head to move it this way and that.
"She is not identical. Some of her angles have more flaws than others."
You gulped, too frightened to be offended by such an observation.
"You!" she barked at Steve. "Is this truly [F Name] [L Name]?"
"Who wants to know?" you heard him ask.
"My father."
Oh, no. Ice rushed through your veins, leaving you effectively stunned. You couldn't have escaped Gamora's grip even if it hadn't been like iron in both hands.
"Well," Clang! Where the hell had Steve been hiding his shield all this time? "I have some bad news for you. I don't know who your father is, and I don't give a damn what he wants [Name] for."
Gamora's dark green lips pulled up into a smirk. "You will soon. Sooner than planned, perhaps. From what I overheard, my hostage has yielded me a second boon. The Asgardian's beloved here knows all about the Infinity Stones."
A deep chill sank into your bones at the realization that Gamora had heard your conversation with Steve. How much more did she suspect of you? You licked your lips and risked speaking despite the switchblade at your throat. "The what? I don't know anything about—"
The blade pressed in just enough to draw out a trickle of blood. You could feel the thin stream of warmth coursing toward your chest. "You may attempt to peddle your deceptions when in the presence of my father. We'll see just how well that so-called 'god' has taught you the art of treachery."
Steve predictably took this opportunity to heave his shield at the two of you. Equally predictably, Gamora saw this coming from a mile away. The vibranium at your neck withdrew only for her to wrap one muscular arm around you there to drag you out of the way alongside her. A few civilians heard the resulting noise of metal-on-concrete and foolishly drew closer to spot the source of the commotion.
"Let her go, and no one needs to get hurt," Steve called as his shield returned to him.
Though you couldn't see her face from this uncomfortable angle, you could hear the smile in Gamora's voice when she responded: "That's too bad. I do love it when others get hurt."
The handful of watchers you'd seen crowding around cried out in surprise and pain. You remained blind to just about everything but the grimy sidewalk beneath your feet. From the sound of things, you guessed that Gamora had done something to attack them—a smart tactic against someone like Steve. She must have really done her homework; the Gamora you knew hadn't even met Captain America.
What were you thinking? You didn't know Gamora. All you had seen was someone play Gamora on the big screen. Although you weren't entirely sure that that distinction mattered at all. Whatever was going on—alternate dimension, coma dream, some bizarre afterlife—you had to operate under the assumption that you were in a very Stay Alive sort of situation. Dying could not be on the agenda.
You tried to wrench free of her grip, if for no other reason than that your back didn't appreciate being twisted into such a position. Gamora didn't bother with a weapon this time. She simply smashed your face directly into the cement. Dazed, tasting blood, you rolled limply to one side—but your lack of momentum resulted in nothing more than you staggering right back into your assailant.
She gripped your neck in one hand, lifting you into the air as she looked you up and down. The faint tattoos serving as her eyebrows furrowed with disbelief. "You give yourself up so easily? I confess myself disappointed. Your dossier implied the one called 'Cinnabar' would put up more of a fight."
Dark spots crept in at the sides of your vision. Much more of this, and you'd black out. You used your hips to swing your dangling legs backward, then straight into Gamora's torso. She dropped you with a faint noise of what you supposed was surprise; you doubted such a blow had truly fazed her.
Now was the time to put every second spent having your ass handed to you by Clint and Natasha to good use. With a speed you wouldn't have believed you had in you during your training session only a few hours ago, you ducked her ensuing jab and tumbled almost gracefully over her leg sweep. Just two simple moves were enough to leave you out of breath. But you knew you couldn't stop then. Natasha had been kind enough to not allow real weapons in your fights (so far); Gamora would not offer you the same amount of latitude.
And just where had Steve gone off to?
Something far to your right, so far as to be out of your line of vision, exploded. You heard more screams. Distant sirens filled the air.
Well, that answered that question.
"Oof!"
And served as a distraction in Gamora's favor. She bowled you over. Perhaps you should have taken not being gutted as a sign she intended to take you alive. You weren't entirely sure you found that suggestion encouraging, especially when the back of your head smashed against the bricks of the buildings lining the dirty, empty street she'd lugged you into. Gamora flashed you a triumphant grin from where she had you pinned by her knees just before she swung one fist right at your face.
You had barely enough wits about you to block the blow with the back of your hand. In response, she wrapped her fingers once more around your neck.
Perfect. This was something you remembered.
Your knees went up. Your hands curled around her wrists. Your leg pressed against one of her feet. Up you arched your back, then flipped over with all the strength you could muster.
Here was where you ought to take the opportunity to fight back—punch her in return or stomp on her stomach. But you didn't like your odds of getting much more than that done before Gamora got back on her feet. You instead got up and backed away with your palms facing her.
"Please," you said into her confused silence. "We both know you don't really want Thanos to get his hands on the stones."
Gamora's eyes widened at your pleading, albeit not by much. Slowly, she stood. You let out a short breath of relief at having reached her. No one had to know that you knew anything about the true nature of the Tesseract. No one had to know you had a good idea where every Infinity Stone had been hidden. She could leave and get back to her life in time to join up with the Guardians of the Galaxy, and you would be in an entirely different reality before any of Thanos' other children returned to Earth.
Then, in one lightning-quick movement of her legs, she had you flat on your back again. You found her sword brandished directly at your face while you painfully tried to catch your breath.
"You must be confusing me with my bleeding-heart sister. I assure you that I am quite content to aid my father in his quest, and much more capable of managing it than Nebula could ever be. At any rate," Gamora stooped to grab your hair and roughly pulled at it until your shoulders left the concrete, "the Asgardian stole from us, and now I will steal something of equal importance to him. Your knowing about the Infinity Stones is merely a small incentive to keep you alive. You ought to rejoice. I don't believe a jellyfish like you could manage to live that long otherwise."
Oh, God. Was this it? Was this the end of one long, weird dying dream? What lay on the other side? Your world, hell, something stranger still? And would getting stabbed still hurt?
Gamora lowered her blade to make a final query: "Why would the Earth's mightiest heroes ever include someone like you in their ranks?"
"Because I can do this."
"What—"
You lunged upward awkwardly—but awkwardly did the trick when all you needed to do was clamp your palms onto Gamora's cheeks. She shrieked upon contact. Steam spewed from the places your skins touched. All you felt was a strong buzzing in your hands. She, on the other hand, lurched out of your grip in apparent pain.
Well, now what? You made no move to pursue her. She gasped for breath as she gaped at you. Angry, dark green patches bloomed across Gamora's face. If she had looked hostile before, now she looked downright malicious, and you had just used up your one and only parlor trick. The continued commotion a block or two away made it clear Steve wouldn't be available to bail you out anytime soon either.
Gamora took a deliberate step in your direction and growled, "You will pay for that."
Of course you would; you had no doubt about that. Your first instinct was to screw your eyes shut to avoid seeing the moment of your death. But no. Did you really want to go out in as undignified a manner as you'd arrived in this world? So you forced yourself to keep your eyes open as she drew nearer and nearer.
Then she froze. Her eyes rolled back inside her head. And she collapsed like a sack of potatoes.
Behind her stood Loki done up in full costumed regalia, gleaming horned helmet and all. He gripped his scepter in two white hands. "Well, it seems as though I arrived just in time." His eyes met yours. "No more solo trips to the library for a little while, hm?"
All you could manage in reply was a shaky nod. At least that was a step or two above bursting into tears.
