@thetimidtimetraveler and I made a prediction bingo card for the Loki finale! Some of these but were just a shot in the dark but if the wilder predictions turn out to be true then you heard it here first folks 😌
AN ~ and with this fic I dub my @mcubingo complete! don’t worry though I will still be filling the prompts I’ve got for squares that I didn’t end up filling. see this post for more details. in the meantime, enjoy some FitzHunter ft. innuendo, eye sex, and Unnecessary Physical Contact
Relationships/Characters: Leo Fitz x Lance Hunter
Prompt: “weapons” for @mcubingo
Rating: T
Warnings: N/A
Other Tags: Sparring, Flirting, Innuendo, Kissing,
Summary:
Hunter decides Fitz is up for a challenge.
Fitz agrees.
Read on AO3 (~800wd)
disarming
“I think it’s time for a challenge,” Hunter announces, and Fitz feels frustration flare through his body. His muscles are starting to ache and he’s getting a headache from concentrating so hard, willing himself to shoot straight. He’s always been good with guns when it has been about the physics, the engineering; when it comes to holding one steady and still, especially since his injury, every passing second is a challenge.
Hunter is unfazed, and swings his arms to stretch his shoulders out as he fetches a drink of water. So they are moving onto the next thing then, and for that Fitz is glad - especially when Hunter abandons the gun range altogether and slips between the elastics on the sparring ring. He leans on the top line with a sly smile on his face and offers -
“Whaddaya say? Do you wanna fight me, mate?”
Fitz is frustrated with him, but not that frustrated.
Then again, it would be fun to get in a few swings. Fitz quite enjoyed the cocky look Hunter got about him when he was winning - and refused to surrender when he was losing, because the key according to him was to always pretend you were winning. He liked the challenge, liked getting caught up in it - it wasn’t so calculated as taking aim. He had to learn to trust his instinct.
(Plus, if he were being honest, he did enjoy getting tossed around a little too, especially when Hunter had that little glint of mischief in his eye. There was a reason they called it hot and heavy, after all.)
So Fitz follows Hunter into the ring, all but ready to pounce, and that’s when Hunter declares:
“Knives!”
“What?”
Fitz blinks as Hunter pulls out two small fake wooden blades from the array at the other side of the ring. All of a sudden Fitz is feeling much less ready to pounce sexually and much more like decking Hunter for real. Only, he’s not sure his hand is capable of making a fist right now. He flexes his fingers, and grimaces. But Hunter still has that infuriatingly smooth smile, and it’s hot, and both of them are breathing just a little heavy, and it doesn’t take much for the desire to come back when Hunter takes a little too long to pass him the knife.
“Here,” Hunter reminds him, letting their fingers linger together on the wooden shaft. “Remember, especially in a combat situation, you’re going to be tempted to hold onto this thing for dear life but nobody wants that. All you’ll get his hand cramps.”
He adjusts Fitz’s hand, rounding it, and there’s no way he doesn’t know what Fitz is thinking but he smiles right on through the heat that creeps up the back of Fitz’s neck.
“You wanna be loose with it,” Hunter instructs. “Trust the knife. Like this.”
Almost effortlessly, or so it seems, Hunter begins to twist and turn his blade between his fingers, over his knuckles, forward and back easily as though it is an extra limb. Fitz can feel his hand cramping up at the very thought, and hums indecisively. Hunter stops showing off - or does he, because as he backs up to invite Fitz into an armed spar, he shrugs and offers some advice.
“Don’t worry, you don’t have to get that fancy with it. I just like doing that to distract people. You can just as easily do it with your mouth.”
“By talking, you mean?” Fitz challenges, with a raised eyebrow and a whisper of a grin of his own.
“I never said that,” Hunter clarifies, with just the slightest hint of teasing in his tone. “Why? Did you have something else in mind?”
He tosses the knife, catches it, and runs his finger softly along the hilt. He’s watching the knife, not Fitz, and he’s left his defences open on purpose. Fitz takes the invitation, charging him with a kiss that pins him up against the far side, straining the elastics under their weight. The knife falls from Hunter’s hand and he wraps his arms around Fitz, pulling him closer. The air grows hot and heavy as promised, and then, after a moment, their lips pull away.
Fitz beams.
Hunter’s smile is softer now, a little more dazed, but still victorious. It was, after all, what he had planned all along.
“I guess you win,” he concedes.
Fitz is distracted by the taste of Hunter on his lips. He remembers that there is a name for that type of smile Hunter was giving him before, and that funnily enough that word is disarming, and that that realisation is going to make an excellent pun one day.
But not today, he promises himself as Hunter pulls him into another kiss. Today, he has other things to do.
A/N: This’ll be the first of my @mcubingo fills. Because I’m ambitious (read: stupid) I’m going to attempt a full blackout. So here we go with number one!
**
01: Dancing (Loki/Jane)
Jane wasn’t looking for a dance partner. Then one found her.
“May I have this dance?”
There were a lot of ways Jane could’ve imagined seeing Loki again. This wasn’t one of them.
That he’d faked his death (again) was not news to her. Thor had messaged her from his hijacked spaceship full of displaced refugees that Asgard was gone and Loki was back. A nice sentiment considering they’d only just broken up.
That he’d then died for real, only to come back to life along with half the universe thanks to some vaguely explained timey wimey BS (Darcy’s words not hers), was a bit more of a shock. But even knowing Loki was alive and freely roaming the earth, she never thought their paths would cross again. Surely, he’d have better things to do than seek out one of his brother’s exes, of which she assumed there were many (not a crack against Thor just an observation given his age).
Yet here they were, at Tony Stark’s wedding of all places. Jane had donned a respectable green dress for the occasion- which coincidentally matched the accents of Loki’s suit perfectly- and a marginally comfortable pair of pumps. Somewhere on the dance floor was Darcy, leading Ian in their fifth dance of the night, because that girl was incorrigible and poor Ian didn’t have a proper ‘no’ threshold. They weren’t likely to be back any time soon. Jane would have to face the music alone.
“Seriously?”
Loki’s smile, which definitely did not make her toes curl, widened. “You haven’t had a partner all night. It’s wrong for such a beautiful woman to be ignored.”
“Maybe I just don’t want to dance,” Jane countered, which was kind of true. She hadn’t come here looking for a date, but watching Tony and Pepper have their first dance as man and wife, followed by twenty more couples joining in for the next song, she was increasingly aware of the cold, empty spot at the table next to her.
“If that’s the case,” he intoned, “tell me you don’t want me, and perhaps I’ll leave.”
“Okay, I don’t want you,” she said, which was definitely true. “Now leave.”
“I don’t feel like it.”
“You said you would.”
“I said perhaps I would.” Then he sat down. Right in that cold, empty spot, which was now full of his presence. “I’ve decided I’d rather not.”
It wouldn’t occur to Jane until sometime later that she could’ve just gotten up and sat somewhere else. By then, she’d be glad she didn’t, but for now, Loki was about as welcome in her life as a swarm of mosquitos. In an attempt to dissuade him from further conversation, she turned her attention to the dance floor. There was Darcy, spinning a green-faced Ian. Vision and Wanda, wrapped in each other’s arms, floated an inch off the ground and seemed to be hugging more than dancing. Contrastly, Peter Quill and Gamora had decided a disco routine was perfect for an adult contemporary love song. Bruce was leading a slightly unsteady Valkryie, and after five straight minutes of Peter Parker stammering compliments at her, Shuri finally realized he was asking her to dance and they were now on their second number.
“Are you not jealous of their happiness?” Loki asked.
Jane feigned a look of boredom. “Oh, you’re still here? Thought you left ages ago.”
“Only if you’ll go with me.” Damn that grin.
“Why would you want to dance with me in the first place? You know I dated your brother, right?”
“Indeed you did, and are no longer. Unless you were hoping for a reconciliation.”
Jane glanced at the mile-long refreshment table, where Thor had spent the last twenty minutes trading stories with Steve Rogers and King T’Challa. He hadn’t spoken to her all night and might not even know she was there. Once upon a time, she would’ve ached with a need for his acknowledgment. Now, she just eyed a tray of shrimp cocktails and reminded herself to grab one later.
“Tonight, I’m just hoping for something to eat,” she said. His eyes sparkled mischievously as she pointed at him. “Do not make an innuendo.”
“I wasn’t going to.”
“Yes, you were.”
Loki hummed, one long finger stroking his chin. “You know me too well, my dear. Shall we have that dance now?”
Jane closed her eyes and wondered what the hell ever happened in her life to lead her to this. “I’m not getting rid of you until I give in, am I?”
“You said it, not me.”
He offered her a hand. Common sense dictated that she should not even think about thinking about letting Loki lead her anywhere, even if it was just a dance. Fortunately, Jane was never known for being sensible. That was how she won the Nobel prize.
“I hope you know all the steps,” she said as they arrived on the dance floor in time for a smooth R&B song to start up. “Because… I honestly don’t.”
Loki quirked an eyebrow. “Not much a dancer I presume?”
“I think the last time might have been my senior prom.”
“And here I thought you were just being coy.” He pulled her close, much closer than necessary. Jane would’ve pulled away except his arms were like metal cords, and God he smelled good… “No matter. I’m always happy to take the lead.”
“Okay, that was definitely an innuendo.”
“Only if you want it to be,” he whispered huskily in her ear.
This fills the “FitzHunter: under the bleachers” square in my MCU Bingo Card. I’m accepting prompts for it and for my MCU Kink Bingo Card too. For @theclaravoyant who needs a small FH pick-me-up.
Part of the love bites so deep verse but can be read as a stand-alone.
Summary: Fitz is invited to give a talk at his old high-school, but memories are not so easy to swallow as he was expecting. Luckily, Hunter is there to comfort him.
Sneak-Peak:
Fitz half-scoffs, half-sobs, and somewhere in between those, he finds his voice again, “I can’t do that, Hunter.”
“You can do whatever the hell you want, love. If you are not feeling it, no need to explain it, I will craft an excuse for you on the spot. You know I’m skilled like that.”
There is a long stretch of silence, and Hunter tries to come as non-imposing as possible, keeping his caresses but lowering his eyes.
“What if I want to explain it?”
“What?”
“Not to the school. But to, um, to you. Tell you why I am freaking out. Would that be okay?”
@mcubingo: Written for the "sleepy or exhausted" square on the Steve Rogers/Loki Laufeyson line of my bingo card!
Loki kinda wants Steve to have sex with him while he's sleeping. Initially, Steve is reluctant, but he sees the light.
Readable as a standalone piece, in the vague future of BTJ. Rated E. Somnophilia. Trans&intersex!Loki. 1.8k.
My Ao3 | Send requests | Tip jar!
“It’s a rather arousing thought, if I’m to be entirely honest,” Loki murmurs, softly. His breath is cool against the shell of Steve’s ear, so cool that Steve thinks for a second he could be back in the ice again, and Steve swallows, tightly. “The idea of it… Me fast asleep, deep in the depths of unconsciousness, and you, you simply taking what you want, what you are owed.”
“Is that right?” Steve asks, and he’s surprised by the sudden huskiness of his own voice. Loki’s tongue flicks cool against the shell of Steve’s ear, and Steve hisses out a sound, leaning back against Loki’s palms where they settle on his shoulders.
“Oh, yes,” Loki says. “Oh, yes. I’ve done such ills in the world, and the thought of taking back from me, taking your pleasure from my body where I can neither confirm nor deny it is yours, use me as a thing. I owe it to you, don’t I?”
“You don’t owe anybody anything,” Steve says. He is surprised by the sternness in his own tone, the fierceness. “Your body is yours, not mine.”
“It’s just a fantasy,” Loki murmurs, his voice slightly defensive, and his hands come away from Steve’s shoulders. “Do forgive me if I insulted your delicate sensibilities. You needn’t take every sexual desire of mine for some emotional confession I intend not.”
Steve watches Loki sleeping. He’d nearly worked himself to exhaustion the night before, healing heroes and civilians alike, and now it’s over, it’s all over, but… God. Steve’s never seen Loki so tired.
And yet…
“Would you really want me to?” Steve asks, weeks later. “Would you really want me to… While you were sleeping?” Loki turns away from the circuit board he’d been deconstructing, his eyebrows raising.
“Well, I’d be in no position to complain.”
“Loki,” Steve says, lowly. “Come on, take me seriously.” Loki stares at him, a soldering iron in one hand, and he delicately turns the pen off, setting it down on the desk.
“I can’t imagine anything I should like more than to wake with you buried inside me.”
“Really? World peace, unlimited power, unlimited wishes… You pick me slipping into you while you’re unconscious and you can’t actually say yes or no?” Loki laughs.
“Every time,” he says. Steve’s heart begins to speed up a little in his chest.
Loki is sprawled out on the bed, his fingers fisted in the pillow, his head pressed right into it – and Steve’s felt that pillow, the thing is made of stiff foam and it’s like a damned rock. Loki had gotten too hot in the night – Christ knows he hates the New York summers – and thrown off the sheets, so that they’re now tangled around his ankles. Loki’s skin is marble-white and pale, and Steve reaches out, slowly. His palm slides featherlight over Loki’s left thigh, and then dips between them.
In his sleep, Loki grunts quietly, and he shifts his position: his legs fall open, and Steve can see his cock, soft and small in his sleep, rest against his thigh. Steve drags his fingers over it, just gently, as gently as he can—
Loki lets out another soft sound, barely a whisper of a moan, and Steve bites down on his lip. Guilt coils within him – Christ, all those lessons about consent, all those discussions about Loki’s self-esteem and how to set his boundaries, and here they are. Steve’s playing with Loki’s cock and the guy isn’t even awake.
Steve’s fingers dip a little lower, and he plays slowly over Loki’s lips, feeling the cool, soft flesh, so yielding compared to the rest of Loki’s body, so easy and open. Steve’s fingers dip, and yeah. There he is. Steve’s fingers press against Loki’s entrance, and he can feel the way he’s slightly wet.
Steve swallows. God, no, no. Does it really matter that Loki’s said to him that he wants this? If he can’t say no in the moment? And yet— Christ. Loki’s hips tilt into Steve’s fingers, and there’s something heady about this feeling, something that makes Steve’s blood sing with the power of it, the excitement—
How can be turned on by this?
He circles his finger over the wet ring of muscle, feels his hips tilt slightly into the touch as Steve plays over the curve of his inner lips, plays over the sensitive skin on the outside of his hole. More wetness gathers, clinging to Steve’s fingers like dew on grass, and he just can’t resist.
He presses two fingers in all at once, feeling Loki tight around his knuckles, wet and wanting, and a low moan begins in Loki’s throat, his fingers tightening on the pillow. Usually he’s just a light sleeper, but he’s so exhausted after last night that he’s just out for the count, completely out if it…
Loki clenches around him, and his thighs shift open a little wider, inviting Steve in, begging him wordlessly and desperately. Steve begins to rock his fingers within him, crooking them slightly as he does so, playing over the spongey flesh on the roof of the entrance there, feeling the flesh engorge with blood, feeling him get so wet he’s dripping.
“I want to taste,” Steve murmurs, and he shifts, carefully insinuating himself between Loki’s legs. Dipping down, he drags his tongue slowly over Loki’s cock. It’s fully hard now, and God, it’s… Steve loves Loki’s cock, no matter how nervous he is about it. It’s just… Mouth-sized. Easily mouth-sized, slender and short, and sure, Loki can make it bigger if he feels like it – Loki can do anything with his body if he feels like it – but like this? Steve loves it. Dragging his tongue up the length of it, his tongue dipping into the little slit at the head, he feels Loki gasp in his sleep, feels him twitch under Steve’s attention, and yeah, yeah, yeah—
Steve drags his tongue through the slick gathering there, dipping his tongue just inside and feeling how cold it is, how thick the wetness is compared to how it would be on a human, and Loki’s breathing is beginning to get faster. His hands on Loki’s thighs, pressing against the hard skin, Steve can feel his heartbeat speeding up too, and this is…
Yeah.
Dawn is breaking, light shining in through the windows – Loki refuses to sleep with the blinds closed – and Steve shifts forward, slides himself out of his pyjama pants and lines himself up. He pushes Loki’s thighs apart, feels him give way so easily, he’s so damned pliant, and slides home.
Loki groans, and for the first time, his eyes flutter open. He’s barely conscious, still in the sleepy throes of almost-awake-but-not-quite, and he mumbles something incomprehensible, but Steve can tell it’s said in a Jötunn language because frost forms on his lips as he says it.
Steve can feel the icy-cold clench of Loki around him, so cold that it shouldn’t feel good, shouldn’t be so damned hot, but Steve is careful, so careful: he gently puts his hands under Loki’s knees, pushing them up against his chest, and he draws himself out. Loki’s snack-sized, Steve… Steve, yeah, the serum did a number on him, and he’s pretty well-proportioned, pretty—
Pretty big. Big enough that he can feel Loki stretched around him, feel the desperate shift of his muscles. “Loki,” he murmurs. “Loki… Hey, hey, Loki, wake up.” Loki mumbles something else, this time in something like English, and he opens his eyes fully.
“Mmm, I’m— Steven, I’m most fatigued, I—” Steve slams his hips forward, and Loki moans, arching his back, his exhausted limbs pressing up and into Steve’s touch, and it’s incredible. Steve sets up a hard pace, thrusting his hips at speed, and Loki is letting out the most debauched sounds Steve’s ever heard, choking on every moan, pinned uselessly against his own chest, and Loki’s tired eyes are brightly blue, his lips parted. Steve’s fingers dig harder where they grip at the backs of his knees, and Loki is whining, clenching so tightly around Steve it’s actually hard to drag his hips back, and yeah, this…
Why hadn’t he done this months ago?
Loki’s eyes are wide and still thick with sleep, his lips shining with spit, and his hair is messy around his face, strands flying all over the place. Steve shifts his position slightly, just to make sure his cock really drags over roof of Loki’s channel, and oh, that’s a good noise, a high keen as Loki goes boneless underneath him. “This what you wanted?” he asks as Loki comes, spattering against his own belly, and Loki whimpers, pressing his face hard into the foam of his pillow. “This what you wanted to wake up to? Me cleaving you open, huh? Me breaking you apart?”
“Yes,” he whispers, breathlessly.
“What’s that?” Steve snaps his hips so forcefully he’s certain Loki will bruise, and Loki’s breath hitches. “Can’t hear you. What’s the point of that silver tongue of yours if a little sex freezes it up?”
“It’s not frozen,” Loki gasps out between thrusts. “I’m still half-asleep.”
“Allow me to wake you up,” Steve says, and he wraps his hand around Loki’s cock. It’s oversensitive and half-soft, and Loki nearly screams, and now his hands do move: one of them grips Steve by the throat, the other one gripping tightly at the sheets beneath him, so tightly they rip, and Steve laughs. “What, too much?”
“Little bit,” Loki admits, and Steve lets him go. “Are you going to spend like this? Fucking me awake like I’m some sort of plaything?”
“Probably,” Steve says. “It’d be a bit of a waste if I didn’t come, right?” Loki laughs, and the things that does to Steve’s cock, the way it makes him clench— “Shit,” he mutters. “I’m gonna—”
“Come on,” Loki purrs, thumb playing over Steve’s jaw, his grip tightening just a little – not even enough to restrict his breathing, just enough to make him feel it. Steve feels his balls draw up, feels his cock jerk and pulse, and he thrusts through it, feels the heat of Loki’s walls as Steve’s come settles inside him, and Loki squirms and writhes under him, his teeth gritted and breathless noises escaping from between his teeth. When Steve finishes, he lets go of Loki’s legs, let him slowly set his feet down against the mattress.
Both of them are breathing heavily, and the hand around Steve’s throat moves to cup his cheek. Loki is staring up at him, his jaw slack. “Did you like it?” he asks, softly. “I know you were— You were reluctant, before.”
“It was pretty good,” Steve admits. “How did it meet your expectations?”
“Oh, far exceeded,” Loki says, and he laughs, quietly. “I really ought wash.”
“Nah,” Steve murmurs, and he carefully draws himself out of Loki, hearing his grunt of loss, and he pushes the other man across the bed, away from the wet patch. “Go back to sleep.”
“Really? With your spend still hot inside me?”
“Why not? You slept through my tongue inside you.”
“Did I indeed?” Loki reaches for him, and Steve drops forward, pulling up his sleep pants as he slots himself against Loki’s chest. Loki’s hands wrap around his belly, pulling him closer, and he feels Loki’s lips drag against his shoulder. “Keep me warm, then.”
“You’re plenty warm,” Steve says, even though Loki is chilling his skin gloriously compared to the humid air, and he closes his eyes. He doesn’t sleep himself, but within minutes Loki is completely out of it again, and Steve can’t help but smile. No waking him up again today, Steve thinks, but maybe… Maybe some time next week.
Would you write something with Fitzskimmons after they get cryo Fitz back? Please and thank you
AN ~ Thank you for your extraordinary patience. I’ve had a lot going on (including but not limited to a BUNCH of fics I hope you’ve been able to enjoy in the meantime). This is quite a cathartic fic, especially between Fitz and Daisy, as I felt I had to acknowledge that trauma - but with only vague references to the actual content of 5x14. I hope you like it!
(I also don’t mind if people want to read this as platonic, up to you).
Relationships/Characters: FitzSkimmons (Fitz x Daisy x Simmons)Prompt: “comfort” for @mcubingo (see the rest of my card here)Rating: TWarnings: N/AOther Tags: Angst/Hurt/Comfort, Post S5 Finale, Vague 5x14 References
Summary:When Fitz gets out of cryo, Jemma fusses over him and Daisy avoids him. A man can’t help but wonder why, but the answer is as horrible, and yet as simple, as it seems.
Read on AO3 (~1900wd)
the other shoe
“How are you feeling?”
Jemma couldn’t help but smile at Fitz as she crept into his hospital room. He smiled back, wearily, and confessed with a haggard voice.
“Honestly? Like I haven’t slept in a year.”
“Well, to be fair to your body, you probably haven’t. Not really.”
Fitz nodded. His head was heavy. His eyes ached with the pain of staying open and yet - when Jemma ran her hand through his curls he felt such blissful relief. He hardly remembered what concrete felt like, at the touch of those beautiful fingers. When he breathed, and she was standing in his space, he could smell her, and she smelt fresh and floral and it was probably just some sort of soap or laundry detergent but it was heaven to Fitz’s senses, who’d had nothing but grit and crime and sweat and fear to clog them for so long.
Jemma took a seat in the chair that somebody had already pulled to the bedside, and looked over the things they’d brought Fitz so far. A small shaving kit. His good old trusty copy of The Hobbit. So much the same as so many times before.
Squeezing Fitz’s hand, Jemma took a deep breath.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” she said, trying not to let her voice crack too much. “But I really want you to get some rest. You’ve missed a lot, but just - rest. Please? After the Framework and prison and… well, I suppose only you know what else…”
“Jemma,” Fitz crooned, her name as light as a dream on his breath, as he lifted one hand from under hers, and placed it on top, warm and steady. “You’ve got nothing to worry about. I swear. This bed is comfortable, I’m knackered, and even if I wanted to jump back into things, I don’t think my knees would have held me up another second. Now that you’re here, there’s no reason to leave. Except…”
Fitz felt a pang of pain in his heart, and he saw the slightest grimace cross Jemma’s features. She knew, then, what he knew. She’d noticed Daisy ignoring him, hovering back, making excuses to stay away. She’d noticed, that Daisy couldn’t quite look him in the eye, and there was a pain in her, in that grimace, warning him that it was not a matter of grief. Something had happened in his absence. Something bad.
Worse than the Framework? He could only wonder. Thinking that far back made his head hurt.
Jemma drew a weary breath, the kind that meant she was steeling herself up to something- that she didn’t want him to worry, though he’d started seeing through that long ago.
“It’s going to be okay, this time,” she insisted, adjusting his blankets and giving him a firm, determined smile as if she could will her outcome into existence. Indomitable, that one. But…
“What do you mean, ‘this time?’”
Enoch had warned him there’d be time travel involved in this somehow, but since getting him home nobody’d had the time - or apparently, the guts - to explain what role exactly it, or he, had had played. Well, except for the fact that he’d died the last time round, but he had a feeling that was not what Jemma meant. Not when she couldn’t quite look him in the eyes.
Worse than the Framework? Maybe it was, after all.
He wanted to ask Jemma about it. He had to. The desire, the need, rose up in his chest like the need for breath but before it could bubble out she must have seen it in him; she must have felt it coming. She couldn’t bear to let it out, so she cupped his hands in her own and fixed her big brown eyes on his and he wondered what could be so bad that Jemma - usually so matter-of-fact, usually a strong believer in ripping off the proverbial bandaid - could want to delay it. Perhaps she was trying to protect him, or perhaps herself, perhaps even both, but either way Fitz was struck by the desperation in her expression.
“I love you,” she said - but what she meant was: Not now. Not just yet.
“I love you too,” Fitz replied, a strange tone to his voice as he watched her. She seemed so haunted. How could he ever know what that meant? What could he do?
Before the answer came to him - if indeed, it ever would - a knock on the wood beside his doorway seemed to start time going again. Both Fitz and Jemma looked toward the sound, and found a downcast Daisy standing uncomfortably there, waiting to be invited in. Waiting to get up the nerve to take another step.
Fitz cleared his throat. “Uh, Jemma. Could you get us some water, please?”
“Of course,” she agreed, glad for the excuse to leave. She wasn’t sure what was about to happen between these two and she almost didn’t want to know. She did not envy her lovers their fight, but she gave Fitz’s hand one last squeeze before she slipped away, and brushed Daisy’s arm on the way past. None of them knew how this was going to go. They could only hope for the best.
Daisy could hear her own heartbeat in her ears. She could feel the vice around her lungs, waiting to snap shut. Jemma had left now, there was nothing between them but a few lousy feet, and Daisy could do nothing but stare at Fitz and wait. Wait, for the crippling fear to set in. For the flood of anger. For the complex, tainted grief, even, that had plagued her in these intervening months. It had been so long that everything that had happened was like a nightmare within a nightmare, and she had dreaded this moment for so long. The moment she looked into his eyes, felt his blade, heard herself screaming. She had dreaded finding him alive and never being able to look at him again. She had dreaded it so much in fact, that she had forgotten to consider… this.
Finding him alive.
He was just sitting there, rosy cheeked and starry eyed. An unflattering hospital dinner had been cleared from a nearby plate and his fingers picked halfheartedly at the scratchy apricot blanket and his eyes - his eyes - looked over at her with such unspeakable love and gentleness and a terrible sort of grief.
“Daisy?” he breathed. “Are you okay?”
Suddenly, the vice in her chest was not fear, or anticipation, it was tears. It was grief, and relief, and it was the memory of his arms around her all those years ago. It was his lips on her skin. His hand taking hers. It was everything, every moment before the nightmare had begun. The nightmare this Fitz hadn’t had - the one she’d wanted nothing more than this Fitz, her Fitz, to pull her from. This was not the man who had hurt her, and if she had any say in it, he never would be.
“Everything’s great, it’s fine,” she promised. Her feet crossed the floor with an uneasy gate, her knees very nearly buckling beneath her until she caught herself and lowered her into Jemma’s chair. Tears stuck in her throat and leaked out of her eyes and she couldn’t get over the way Fitz looked at her. Reached for her hand. Stroked her face, ever so gently - even more so than usual, like he was waiting for her to tell him to stop.
She cupped her hand over his instead, holding it against her skin.
“I missed you,” she said. “Things have been crazy without you.”
Just like Jemma, Fitz thought, Daisy was avoiding the question. The question that was on all of their tongues, but his most of all, and though it pained him terribly to ask, to poke the bear, he had to know.
“Did I hurt you?”
Daisy closed her eyes. Cherished the warmth of his hand against her skin, just for one more moment. Nightmare though it was, she still remembered what the other version of Fitz had done, and she knew he would hate himself for it, but she couldn’t lie. She nodded, and some of the pain flushed out of her, but she felt him recoil. Of course he would. And she could offer no recourse; all she had was her pain and her fury, and in her opinion whatever hate this Fitz had for his other self was well deserved, hard as it may be to face. She could only hope that it would teach them what it needed to teach them, take them down the right path. Every nightmare, after all, had its purpose.
“I’m so sorry, Daisy,” Fitz said. And it was infused with such passion and remorse, Daisy wept. It was all that she’d wanted to hear all these past few months, as the shards of her shattered faith in him had hardened into unforgiving edges. This Fitz didn’t even know what had been done, would be sick at the sight of it, and still all he wanted to do would take the burden off her shoulders, no matter what it was. He made no excuses, he needed no reason or loophole or prize. He’d hurt her, and that was enough.
Watching her every step of the way, for even the slightest flicker of discomfort, Fitz wrapped his arm around Daisy’s shoulder, pulling her in close. Embracing her, as best he could from this angle, with all the love and comfort his exhausted, confused, aching body could muster. Every emotion under the sun flooded through Daisy and out in her tears and Fitz sat with her every step of the way. Every moment. He did not know exactly what she’d been through, what he’d done. He did not know if she’d ever be up to telling him the details of it, but it didn’t matter: he of all people knew what it was like to have a horror, a trauma, that could not be explained; only exorcised. It hurt to know, but he’d got what he’d wanted: his question was answered. Truthfully it even felt good, it felt cleansing, to be there for her after what was clearly such a horrendous failure on his part. He’d sit here for the rest of his life if he had to, he knew, and heal every sorrow in her he could find.
It was not long after that, that Jemma returned. She entered in silence, feeling the heavy air of the room, and she slipped a tray with three cups of water onto Fitz’s bedside table. She had been planning to stay, but things were so private in here. She couldn’t tell if Daisy was crying or napping or somehow both, but she left her water, and took her leave.
All the same, her heart felt lighter when she paused outside the door. It was a heavy scene, but a healing one, if she’d read it at all correct. There was light at the end of their tunnel yet.
She slipped the ‘do not disturb’ sign on the door, and for the first time in what felt like a year, smiled as she walked away.
AN ~ for @mcubingo, and comprised of a few combined prompts for @liz-a-bell. Fluffy hurt/comfort, ft. Daisy & the Team. I hope you like it!
Relationships/Characters: Daisy & Team
Prompt: “Under the Bleachers” for @mcubingo
Rating: T
Warnings: N/A
Other Tags: Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Mild Coarse Language, Mild References to Childhood Emotional Trauma
Summary: When a successful mission leaves Daisy unexpectedly reeling with feelings from her past, she needs somewhere to hide. And some friends, to help her through the darkness to the other side.
Read on AO3 (~2100wd) or below
Sardines
“Thank you so much, again!” Linda cried, pulling her daughter into a hug. Abby grinned and squeezed back, too overjoyed to bother with the politics of being a teenager. She’d had a long, hard, actually honest-to-goodness life-threatening day, and she wanted nothing more than Linda’s hugs and sappy music on the ride home, and Mark’s homemade pizza, and ice-cream in the lounge with the both of them. She couldn’t thank the Shield team enough.
Usually, Daisy would have been overjoyed watching such a reunion. Abby had performed bravely and her mother’s love was absolute and genuine – if nothing else, she could tell by Abby’s response to it. The pride and protectiveness and relief emanated from their embrace with a soft glow that Daisy would have thought would lift her spirits and help wash away the weight of fighting. Instead, and very much against her wish or will, she felt a rotting sort of feeling clawing at her heart.
“Ex- excuse me,” she stammered, waving her leave. “I’m just going to get some water. Long day, you know how it is. I’ll catch you later, hm?”
The rest of the team looked subtly thrown by her odd behaviour. Had she caught sight of another enemy, perhaps, and didn’t want to alarm Abby and mother before she took care of it? Was she overwhelmed, having saved not just Abby, but in doing so, her entire school? Or was she maybe even injured and trying not to let on? She had, after all, taken the brunt of the fighting. No, it was this terrible sickness, that seemed to get worse the more she tried to figure out where it was coming from. It clawed up her throat like a panic attack, and when she ran to the drink fountains and drowned it in cool, if coppery, liquid, she felt like she was choking.
Outside. She had to get outside.
But she couldn’t very well go back to where they were. Whatever this was, it was coming from them. Was it jealousy? Was it fear? Had she been poisoned? No, surely not, she could remember feeling like this before and not dying, but how? When?
Daisy staggered through the school and out the back, fortunately avoiding most people as it was long past home time. By the time she made it out to the other side, to the track field she felt like screaming. Like throwing herself into the air until pure suffocation lulled her anxiety into cloudy, dreamy, nothingness, and survival made all other thoughts into nothing. Unfortunately for her though, it seemed those who were not headed home had come out here for training. She saw the football team, running laps, and a couple of cheerleaders throwing each other into flips that turned her stomach. She couldn’t flee upwards with so many witnesses. Not least because it looked half like dying, unless she was to make a scene blasting herself out of the arena entirely and running off into the suburbs of this poor town for no reason other than a strange and sickening fear. Or was it loneliness? Or was it both?
And so, with nowhere else to go, Daisy’s body led her on autopilot to a very familiar place. A place where people had come to mourn and fear and skip and shoot up and cause mischief since the dawn of time. A place where you could hide even in a crowd; a place amidst some of the most everyday lives in the world, where anyone could take a time out, however small.
She sat under the bleachers, hugged her knees, and waited for the feeling to pass.
-
She was still waiting when a familiar set of footsteps approached. Stopped. She heard the crunch of the grass and grit and dirt, the hiccup in breath as her observer bent over to catch better sight of her, and made his way around. A few seconds later, Fitz knocked on one of the load-bearing pillars, with a soft but inquisitive expression. It wasn’t often, after all, that one found an agent – however newly minted – freaking out like this.
“Knock knock?” he posited, when he saw that Daisy didn’t seem to be entirely against his intrusion. At this, she rolled her eyes – and wiped at them, just in case, though she was not crying – and turned toward him, slowly uncurling from her ball as he came over and sat down beside her. A smile touched her lips as he glanced around himself uncertainly, afraid of gum or spider webs or who knows what, before turning back to her.
“How did you find me?” Daisy asked.
“Well, I couldn’t exactly check the girls toilets, could I?” Fitz returned. “You’ve been gone for a while, is all. Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” Daisy snorted, shrugging it off, though the stormy sickness was not yet quelled. Fitz, of course, saw straight through this, so she pushed on and tried to forge him a vague but convincing answer, and failed. After all, how could she be vague about this feeling when she didn’t know what it was to be vague about? The more she tried to circumvent the point, the more she realised what the point was, and it was like sinking a hot knife into her chest. Tears finally spilled over as she realised exactly what it was she was feeling.
“I don’t know what happened, I just- I saw Abby with Linda, how lovely they were, and it made me remember some… bad things. About growing up. I thought I’d forgotten what that rejection felt like, you know, I’m good now right? But something about that, it just reminded me, I’ve felt like this before. I had good parents, some of them, in the system. I had families I thought I would be with forever, and they thought I’d be with them too, and- and they sent me away anyway. Nobody told me anything. They rejected me over and over again, even the good ones, and it hurts so much...”
Fitz shuffled around in the dirt to sit beside her as she paused a moment in her speech to pull herself together. It wasn’t jealousy after all, or fear for Abby’s safety or her own. It was just a memory, buried for over a decade. The memory of an abandoned child.
“You know they did it to keep you safe,” Fitz reminded her, as gently as he could. He took her hand, and squeezed it reassuringly. “Some of them, anyway, right? They loved you very much. It wasn’t your fault.”
“I know that now,” Daisy promised. “Fifteen year old me didn’t know that. Twelve year old me didn’t know that. Eight year old me didn’t know that.”
Now Fitz was starting to tear up too. He, of course, had his own experiences with abandonment and rejection from his father, and with never feeling good enough. He hardly dared to imagine what it would have been like if, rather than helping him through it, his mother had turned on him too. If it had happened over and over…
“Damn it, I’m sorry, I didn't mean to bring the mood down," Daisy backtracked halfheartedly. “Let’s just go-“
“How many was it?” Fitz asked.
“What?”
“How many?” Fitz repeated, meeting her eyes. “Houses.” He re-thought his question, and dropped his gaze to where their hands still sat intertwined. “I mean, you don’t have to answer, I was just...”
“Nineteen,” Daisy said. “Yeah. I got kicked out of more houses than years I was alive. Then I got to thinking, fuck that noise, you know? I ran away when I was sixteen, moved into that van, lived there ever since.”
“Wow. That’s brave.”
“It was stupid. And really dangerous.”
“Doesn’t mean it wasn’t brave.”
He squeezed his hand again, and smiled at her. She smiled back, but for all she wanted to, she just couldn’t quite let the moment sit.
“What about you, supergenius?” she teased, nudging him with their joined hands. “You moved countries at that age, didn’t you?”
“Well, I mean, I was technically fourteen,” Fitz pointed out. “But I had a support system. I called my Mum every week. She sent me biscuits in the mail. I got teased relentlessly o’ course, but I also had a PhD at fourteen, so, what did they know, eh?”
“What did who know?”
Fitz and Daisy glanced around for the voice, and found Jemma picking her way down the under-bleachers toward them. She sat promptly and primly, studying their tearful faces and sad smiles.
“Welcome to the pity party,” Daisy greeted. “I had a freak-out, Fitz came and found me, everything’s all good now but I still kinda feel like there’s concrete in my lungs. Just a quick update.”
“Have you had enough water? Since the fight?”
“No, Jemma, I haven’t had water. So unless you-”
“Well, here then.”
“- of course you do.”
And the concrete might have got a little lighter, as she took the water bottle from Jemma. Satisfied that her mother-hen duties were complete for the time being, Jemma shuffled around to sit on Daisy’s other side.
“Watch out for the spider webs,” Fitz warned.
“Oh, never mind that,” she assured him, brushing some aside with her hand. She contemplated wiping her hand on the ground, but a look at the ground warned her against it. Instead she cleared her throat, tucked her hand into her lap and asked; “What are we talking about?”
“Moving out at 16.”
“Oh, I was fourteen, actually, when I attended an American university,” Jemma corrected. “I got myself into some rather sticky situations under bleachers like these. I found I quite preferred the library, though it’s not as good for crying.”
“I wasn’t crying-“ Daisy protested.
“Having a panic attack, then,” Jemma corrected. “You don’t have to give me the gory details, I’m just glad to know you’re okay. I’ve messaged May. She thought you might have taken off and done a runner somewhere in the suburbs.”
“I was close,” Daisy confessed. “I didn’t want you guys to have to go running around after me, that’s all.” She snorted at the irony.
Above them, the bleachers creaked and thudded under the weight of someone’s footsteps. The three of them huddled together a little on instinct, unsure where their current threat level fell, between imminent mortal danger, and children who had stayed up past curfew at a sleepover. But their fear was, fortunately, unfounded, as the head that shortly found its way to glance down between the gaps was none other than Coulson’s. He smiled at the unexpectedly cozy image.
“Hey guys,” he greeted. They blinked up at him, bewildered, and he had to ask; “Watcha doing?”
“Hiding under the bleachers while we wait for May to come get us?” Daisy offered in much the same tone. There wasn’t much left to explain by now, anyway, and when nothing more was forthcoming, Coulson nodded to himself.
“Cool,” he said. “Mind if I join?”
Upon their affirmative, he trotted down the stairs and jogged around the back, watching his head and glancing around at the things people had written, scratched, tied, and otherwise left under here. Eventually he sat, flicking the tails of his jacket out of the way and then pulling out a packet of Red Vines. Fitz’s eyes widened.
“Did you have that in there the whole time?”
He was quite sure, at one point, Coulson had flipped over a table. What kind of magical pockets did he have?
“Yeah. Want some?”
“Uh, yes,” Daisy answered for him, reaching out with enthusiasm. “I was the first one here, I get first pick of the Red Vines.”
When Fitz did not protest, Coulson moved the packet to offer them to her first.
“Why are we here?” he asked.
She ripped the top off a Vine with her teeth and gestured to her mouth as she vigorously chewed. Coulson glanced at the others, but in true high school clique fashion, they were taking Daisy’s lead and refusing to talk. He looked to her once more, studying her expression to check whether or not he should be worried. Perhaps the issue was resolved, or perhaps she simply didn’t want to talk about it any more, but either way he was glad to note that the sense of crisis that had been in her eyes when she’d left them, was there no longer. He nodded his appreciation to the three of them, for having worked out whatever it was, and bit into his own Red Vine at last.
If this was to be Loki’s penance for his crimes, maybe he should’ve just gone back to prison. At least then he wouldn’t be stuck chasing foolish mortal scientists who couldn’t leave well enough alone across the nine (pardon, eight) realms.
Exactly how Jane Foster got herself all the way to Alfheim with her primitive Bifrost ‘prototype’ was anyone’s guess. Not even Stark could figure it out, and he’d been watching. According to his account, Jane said something about rising temperatures at the core sight, and then she vanished into thin air. It was only thanks to the tracking device in her phone that they were able to pinpoint her location. Thor, ever the thoughtful and conscientious brother, graciously volunteered Loki for the honor of retrieving her. He couldn’t do it himself because the people of Asgard needed their leader as they built their new home on the soils of Midgard.
It was actually because he was a coward unwilling to face Jane Foster so soon after she left him. Before Loki could say so, Stark activated the bridge and he was on his way. A full day had past and he was ready to give her up for dead when he spotted a scrap of cloth hanging from a thorn bush. It was of poor quality and stained with coffee. Beneath the brown splotches were the hideous discolored squares commonly referred to as ‘plaid.’
He followed the trail as more signs of her presence popped up. Another scrap here, loose sheets of paper covered in numbers there. A dense circle of bushes was just up ahead, her pitiful moans just audible beyond the thick leaves. Seemed whatever the great Jane Foster found in there had finally brought her to her knees. How disappointing.
Loki founded her curled up in the grass, clutching her midsection and squeezing her legs together. She was coated in a layer of sweat, and that alone would’ve told him what was wrong even before he saw the creeping vines with their luminescent red fruit.
“Oh my,” he said, smirking even as he kept a safe distance between himself and the plant. “What have you been up to, Dr. Foster?”
“Help,” Jane squeaked, crawling toward him. “It hurts…”
“Yes, I’ve heard it’s quite painful. I don’t envy what you must be going through.”
“I need you. Please...”
“Need me to what?” He asked, getting down to her level. Her pupils were completely dilated, making her eyes look pitch black. “Didn’t your mother ever teach you it’s rude not to finish your sentences?”
“Fuck you.”
“Fuck you, you mean,” he pushed her hair behind her ears, almost but not quite touching her skin.
“Please,” she begged, all fight gone from her. Oh if only Thor could see this. “Please just do it. Do me. Please.”
“I’m afraid I cannot.” Loki drew himself up. “You’ve been exposed to a mind-altering substance. Taking you now would be a gross violation of your autonomy. I would never dream of it.”
“Are you kidding me?” she gasped, rolling onto her back. “You trying to be the moral one here? You were a bad guy!”
“The keyword being ‘were’. I’m reformed now.”
“Barely!”
“I still won’t do it without proper consent. Which you cannot give in your current state. We both know in your right mind, you wouldn’t dream of going to my bed.”
“Yes, I would!”
“That’s the toxin talking.”
“No, no I mean it.” Jane exerted all the strength left in her body to push herself up. She reached for her pack, tossing it at Loki’s feet. More papers and a few notebooks spilled out. “Read- read the green one. Read it. I write about you in there.”
Loki furrowed his brow. About him? Unless it involved new ways to knock his teeth out, he couldn’t imagine why she’d have even one thought of him, much less enough to fill a book. He found the slim tome with no trouble. It stuck out among the blacks and browns of her other books. He turned to a random page. It was nothing except musings on her days in the lab running tests and yelling at her servant girl until Loki himself appeared to drag her out of her chair and rip all her clothes off and-
“I…” Loki was not often lost for words, but as he read through Jane’s utterly sinful fantasy of him taking her on one of her lab tables, there were very few things he could think of to say.
“I started thinking about you,” Jane groaned, “after we met. Fighting Malekith. I had dreams about you. It wouldn’t stop, and then I broke up with Thor and it got worse. I just started writing it all down to get it out of my system. Never thought it would really happen, but…”
She had to stop as a fresh wave of heat pulsed through her. She clung to his leg, her desperate pleas shattering what little resolve he had left. Frigga forgive him.
“If we do this,” he said hoarsely, “you understand it cannot be taken back. Once the poison leaves your body, you will remember what we did.”
“I’ve wanted you since day one,” she said. “The only difference is now I need you.”
There were far more differences than she realized, but even without her secret desires, they didn’t have much of a choice. The pollen she’d ingested was clearly a more aggressive variety. Without proper relief, her mind might not survive, and hers was not one to waste. Loki swept her into his arms as she attacked his neck with kisses and nips. He grit his teeth and focused on creating the walls and furnishings of a standard Asgardian suite.
“Wha-?” Jane took in her new surroundings as Loki laid her on the bed.
“It’s an illusion,” he explained. “If we’re going to do this, we might as well be comfortable.”
Jane nodded, and that was her final act of sanity before crushing her lips to his and grinding against him. It wasn’t until hours later, when she was fast asleep with her head on his chest, her pallor and heart rate slowly returning to normal, that it occurred to him to conjure a lab table instead of a bed.
