Summary: Takes place during Endgame. You return to the Battle of New York in an attempt to steal the Tesseract. Along the way you run into Loki; still grieving his death you attempt to control your emotions and convince him to give you the Tesseract.
The approaching sound of tears forced you into a narrow, secluded alley. You doubted these people would take notice of you, or even care, considering the dismay shrouding their approach, but you hid regardless.
Whilst nowhere in the city seemed entirely unscathed, the destruction evident after even a cursory glance about your surroundings, this alley seemed quieter than most. This day had felt so different in your memory; you had, of course, remembered a certain degree of chaotic destruction but mostly you recalled the fighting, the overbearing noise throughout and, the eventual relief of victory.
The aftermath had been largely wiped from your memory.
“Well, what do we have here?”
Your attention had been so rapt upon self-reflection that you yelped in surprise, wheeling around immediately to face whoever had approached. Despite all your training, all your years of experience, you were entirely unprepared for who was before you.
“What?” He began, full of mirth and mischief, “Don’t tell me you’ve run out of fight?”
Your lips moved, almost of their own accord, but the sound that escaped you was a jumbled mess of murmured noise. He advanced on you, his steps echoing softly throughout the alley, smirk faltering once before pulling back up. “I’ve shocked you into insanity,” he observed, with an almost forced humour.
“You’re here…” you finally managed to force the words out, whispered as they were.
Another languid step brought him right before you, almost close enough to touch. “Yes,” he drew out the word, eyes darting to your surroundings before fixing upon your wide eyes, “here I am, the villain of the piece.” With a flourish he raised his once empty left hand to reveal the ethereal, blue glow of the Tesseract. As your eyes fell upon the surreal visage of the space stone, your mind struggled to refocus. “And here you are,” he continued, “the hero.”
“Loki,” his name left your lips a murmur of mixed emotions, among them; confusion. “This… this isn’t how it happened?”
Seemingly a little deflated that you were not indulging his more dramatic side, he watched you silently for a long while. As he silently considered you and your likely strange seeming response to his appearance, your gaze flickered between his now blue hued features, and the object balanced in his almost outstretched palm.
You wouldn’t be able to snatch it, even if you could there was a high chance the object was nothing more than an illusion of the real thing, and you knew there was no chance of you overpowering him even despite his recent defeat
Taking a steadying breath, you caught his intrigued gaze with a sharp and determined one of your own. “Loki, you can’t run from him forever.”
Whilst to the outside observer his stoic expression seemed never to slip, you knew him better than that. You watched as he battled with your words, his eyes betraying more emotion than any other feature as they swept over you.
After a drawn out silence, punctuated only by the wailing of distant sirens, he relaxed his posture. “This isn’t your world.”
Even now he managed to seem so certain.
Feeling drained, you shrugged. “Not exactly, no.” Braving another step closer, indulgently reaching out a hand to him, you smoothed over his dark hair and rested your hand upon his cheek. His first instinct seemed to be to move away, untrusting if still intrigued as he was of you back then, but he quickly settled in to the feel of your touch. “I need you to give me the Tesseract.”
The ethereal glow that had lit the small space between you quickly disappeared with a wave of his hand as he tried to pull away. Your hand slipped from his cheek to the lapel of his green, gilded coat, softly pulling him back to you.
“This is my only chance at freedom,” he sneered as he spoke the words, his performance of disdain almost convincing. “From my insufferable brother and from you. You whisper so sweetly to me about morality and yet your own is so twisted that even you can’t comprehend it.” The younger version of you had been pulled into this argument countless times throughout your strange, entirely untraditional courting period, but you were no longer that person. This argument was meaningless now. “Tell me, does it get tiring pretending to be the hero when we both know you’re more of a villain than even me?”
His attempt at verbally pushing you away was pitiful considering the physical hold he allowed you to maintain upon him.
“I have spent enough of my life debating morality with you already, Loki.” You told him calmly, not waiting for any type of reaction before barrelling on. “The future is bleak and I’m trying to fix it.” Softening the grip upon his lapel, smoothing a hand over his chest, you finished earnestly; “I need you to help me, I need you to give me the stone.”
Genuine conflict flashed, however briefly, over his features.
“I’ll bring it back to you. I swear.”
He stepped back, the shadow of the alley obscuring his features and making his likely response impossible to read. A sudden illumination of blue light sent a spark of hope shooting through you and you stepped forward to take it from him.
Immediately, his hand recoiled back – keeping the object from your reach.
Opening your mouth to work on convincing him once more, you stopped sharply as he began to speak in a low tone.
“If your little mortal hands were to take hold of this,” he held the Tesseract pointedly up, “your body, mind and soul would be entirely torn apart.” As he spoke, an ornate box encased the cube, dimming the blue glow entirely before he held it out once more. “Saving the world after that, would be quite impossible.”
With that, he lightly placed the surprisingly light box into your grasp; his hands lingering upon your own for a long moment.
Savouring the feel of his hands upon yours you moved forward and gave him a chaste, indulgent, kiss. “Thank you.”
Summary: Reader and Peter have had a little to drink and the reader is a little bit tipsy. Peter, in an attempt to look after her, is trying to sneak her into his home without alerting Aunt May. Reader, however, has something else on her mind.
This is pretty short guys, as I just wanted to give a taster of what my writing is like, but I hope you like it! Plus this is from Peter’s POV not the reader’s, so a bit different to your average imagine!
“Do you think cactuses get lonely?” Her words were slurred somewhat but oddly sweet in a way. Or, perhaps, they would be if he weren’t concentrating on trying to sneak her into his apartment at 3am without alerting his aunt. In an attempt at a quieting response he gave her a low chuckle and put a hushing finger to his lips.
Ignoring this gesture entirely, or maybe just not understanding it in her inebriated state, she hooked her finger around his raised one. With a careless wind of her arm she clasped her hand around his and let them fall to the side entwined. Heat rushed up his neck at the innocently intended gesture but the volume with which she spoke next distracted him from any budding giddy nervousness. “I think they do, people stay away because they’re all prickly.” A huge, and much too loud, emphasis was placed on the last word and he would have wondered about it if he weren’t so distracted by the key he couldn’t seem to find.
“Do you know where I put my key?” He whispered rather pointlessly, she was drunk enough to be lamenting about cacti, he doubted she would remember where he had put his key.
“Peter,” she grumbled unhappily, “you’re not listening!” Lips pressed together in a pout she practically stamped her foot and looked him over with wide eyes.
“Sure I am,” this was at least partially true he reasoned. “You want to hug a cactus?”
Rolling her eyes she let a dramatic sigh pass her lips as she released his hand and held hers close to herself. “No, I don’t, that’s the point!”
Watching her look dejectedly down to her feet, and feeling a little disappointed that she had dropped his hand, he finally pulled all his focus onto her. “Er, what?” He was admittedly confused by the entire drunken conversation.
“Well, would you hug a cactus?” As she asked she leaned heavily against the wall and let her eyes slip shut just briefly.
Weighing his options for a moment, unsure what answer she could possibly be looking for, he scratched the back of his head. “No?”
Sluggishly opening her eyes she looked him over with a frown, “but what if the cactuses were really really lonely?” Straightening her arm she pushed herself from the wall but her balance betrayed her and left her swaying towards a fall. Springing forward he placed a cool hand on her arm, steadying her. Apparently not noticing her near fall, she continued, “would you hug them then?”
“Yeah, cactus spines aren’t that bad... I guess.” The uncertainty dripping from his tone went unnoticed by her as she allowed her lips to quirk just slightly upwards.
“What about me?” Eyebrows raised he felt his mind swell with confusion. “Wait, what?” Had he missed something in the conversation? What did she have in common with lonely cacti? “People say I’m prickly,” she told him lowly, a tinge of disappointment laced through her words.
Fiery? Sure. Blunt? Maybe a little. But prickly? He sure didn’t think so.
“I don’t think you’re prickly,” he told her earnestly. Lips twisting unhappily she looked away from him. Not sure at all what to say to make her feel better, having never attempted to comfort an upset girl before, he stepped forward and hugged her.
She was incredibly warm in his arms and he could feel her relax against him. Pleased that she seemed to be feeling better he squeezed his arms around her a little tighter - still careful of his superhuman strength. The action had served both to reassure her and to finally give him a cause to show her affection. It felt as though they had crossed some invisible threshold. Somewhere past a platonic friendship and a step towards the romance they had both timidly desired.
Gesturing to his left arm he shot her a warm smile, “see, no cuts.”
She giggled then, a sound he had never heard pass her lips before, and his smile widened. They remained that way for a long while, smiling dumbly at one another in silence.
The door opened suddenly and his Aunt appeared with tired eyes and a muttered “what the hell?”
Panicked he turned to face her with a half smile. “Hey, May,” he greeted with an awkward wave.
