“Really? Is there really some big purple asshole threatening to destroy the world again? Looks like this is someone I will enjoy beating the shit out of this time.”
A/N: This takes place after New York (isn’t canon with MCU)
TITLE: The Tormented
PAIRING: Loki X Reader
RATING: M
SUMMARY: Loki has one of his PTSD episodes and you’re trying to calm him down.
NOTES/WARNINGS: possible angst?
WORD COUNT: 1,720 words
It was a cold night. It usually was in the city you and Loki lived in on Earth, and whenever Loki slept with murmurs resting against his lips followed by some slight gasps and small jolts. He’d normally would be warm, if only he’s having a peaceful night. Which, tonight, he isn’t.
You woke up sometime during the night, somewhere in the early hours of morning, from Loki shivering and clutching onto the large sheets that you two shared to his bare chest, leaving half your body exposed to the chilly air.
When you look over at him, he was trembling, body cold to the touch in his Asgardian form, as his lips quivered and his face scrunched up with fear accompanied with pain. You could tell under his eyes, they were searching around, looking for something. Loki’s skin was drenched in a cold sweat. The bed sheets were damp with it.
As you propped yourself onto your elbows. You noticed that his hair was damp against his head, his face flushed with fear.
You rubbed your eyes with your wrist for a moment, placing his hand against his arm and gently shook him. “Loki?” You say, starting to hear whimpers escaping his mouth and words like “No no please…” being uttered. You continue to lightly shake him, hoping he’d wake up but he didn’t. Loki gasped loudly, still asleep, his body curling up and his eyes squeezing shut. “Loki? Loki!” You cried as you saw that he was crying and scratching his skin.
You gripped his arm tightly in your hand and shook him roughly until he gasped awake and flailed out of the bed sheets. You pulled back as he did and watched him sit there, his body shaking with sweat dripping off his face. Adrenaline and fear was clotting up his veins and he breathed heavily.
“Loki…” You whisper, gaining a big-eyed, fearful look from him. You were sitting up now with him, hand on his arm. He looked down at you before Loki leans down and presses his head against your chest. You gasped lightly for a moment, surprised at the sudden gesture but you gently inhaled and took his long black hair in your fingers, gently stroked it. “It’ll be ok baby…” You tell him softly.
Loki shakes his head against your chest. The sheets were all strewn over your laps and over the side of the bed, mostly Loki’s side.
His hand rests on your knee before he barely musters out, “It won’t be ok…” His large hand was sweaty, damp and clammy, not the usual feel of his hands.
“Tell me what happened?” You suggested but Loki just shook his head in silence. You never knew that he had PTSD, never experienced any of the sessions he had while you were with him. You thought that maybe he hid his emotions from you. You didn’t know. Maybe he had those terrible sessions alone.
Loki continues to stay silent as you held him for however long you did.
“He’s coming back…” Loki whispers against your chest.
“Who’s coming back?”
“The man that tortured me…”
You were silent. “Do you mean…”
Loki nods. “Thanos.” He finishes your sentence with a destroyed sounding tone of voice.
You swallowed hard at the sound of his name. Loki had rarely talk about the mad titan that wanted to destroy the world, the one that forced Loki to destroy New York by torturing him nonstop for two years. It’d been years since you heard that name, and years since you’ve ever experienced Loki’s PTSD. Your thoughts wandered to how you’ve never encountered such a thing with Loki.
Fingers stroked through his hair, down his sweaty back. His hands wandered your body for a moment before he gripped your back and pulled you in his lap where he continued to rest his head against your chest. His hands were clutching onto your shirt for comfort.
“Oh baby…” You whispered as your arms wrapped around his trembling shoulders. “Tell me what happened, please.” You pleaded gently, wanting to get rid of the worry plaguing your chest. You were pretty sure fear was blinding Loki’s eyes with the past of torture as well.
Loki was still silent. All you did was press your lips together, shower the top of his head with tender and loving kisses. You didn’t want to pressure him to answer you, make him feel like he needed to so you stopped asking altogether.
Your eyes closed, fingers running through his slick black hair that reached just an inch past his shoulders. Loki’s face was pressed into your chest, breathing in your scent and feeling your heartbeat against his cheek. It calmed him. It calmed him to feel your heart speed up against him, calmed him to know you were worried for him and that you were there if he needed you. He takes a long but deep breath.
You rest your chin against the top of his head, his trembling and shaking lessening the more he calmed down. “Oh (Y/N)...” He muffled gently against your chest. “I’m sorry I worried you.” Loki’s hand lets go of your shirt and he snake’s his hands up your shirt to stroke your skin for a more sense of security. “I didn’t mean to scare you, it’s just that I…sometimes have these sessions.” He explains, moving his head, pulling it back and looking up at you. “I’m sorry I never spoke about them, I never wanted to make you scared or worried,” His gently glowing green or blue eyes flicker in between your (E/C) eyes in the darkness of the room. “I should have told you before….”
You look back into his eyes before moving your hands from his hair to his face, taking his cheeks in your palms and stroking his cheekbones with your thumbs gently. Your legs wrapped around his sitting form and you both looked at each other with a loving and soft gaze. “What happened? What happens in your dreams?” You asked him softly, hearing rain starting to pitter patter against the windows outside.
Loki’s eyes lowered for a moment before looking back up at you. You could tell he didn’t want to answer the question but he will just for you. “Just reliving my past with Thanos….the man who tortured me. Tortured me so I could obey his commands.” Loki tore his eyes away from you for a moment and sniffled. “He wanted to make sure I knew what he wanted and how his game plan was going to go. So to make sure I understood,” his voice went low suddenly. “He made sure he hurt me.” And with that, you watched Loki close his eyes and his illusion fall from looking like a normal Asgardian to a scarred God.
You let out a pained breath as you saw the large burn on the side of his head, which he said was from Thanos pressing one of the infinity stones, the power stone, against his head. Long deep and prominent lashes that ran across his back were from his children, the black order. Ebony Maw, his eldest which he described as tall, slender, white haired and skin the color of grey, marked his back with whip lashes. His front was littered with burns and more cuts.
“Thanos,” Loki started as he looks down at the bed sheets. “He’s been inside my head for years, tormenting me and haunting me with visuals of destruction and torture. Of me.” He says in almost s trembling hateful way. “The flashbacks of pain keep entering my mind and a day does NOT go by when all I want to do is end it all, end it right here, right now just so I could get away from him.” A pause. Then a deep sigh. “Of course I won’t do that, not when I have you here with me.” He says.
After hearing that, after hearing how miserable Loki was, a tear fell from your eyes. Loki looked up at you and gave you a sad look. “Oh love,” He whispers as he pulls his left hand away from your back and presses it against your cheek, wiping away your fallen tear.
You sniffled. “You didn’t deserve any of that.” You whimpered gently.
Loki smiles softly but sadly as he leans in and kisses you lightly against the lips. “I’m glad at least one person thinks so.” He tells you with a small laugh, making you breathe in a shuddering breath. “I know you’re people here don’t like me for what I did.” He says.
“It wasn’t your fault,” you say, wiping your eyes. “You were forced to do what Thanos said. They don’t understand that what you were doing was for your own life.”
Loki shrugged gently. “Or, well, I could have done it just to mess with you midgardians.” He jokes, trying to change the atmosphere of this damp night.
“Well, if you were,” you say, hoping that playing along would help you two feel better. “Then you need to help pay for the damage you’ve caused.” Your hands moved from his cheeks to his scarred chest now. Loki’s were resting on your waist, his fingers slightly under the fabric of your shirt. He lightly smirked and started to hide his scars but you stop him. “No, don’t.” You say. “I want to see the real you.”
Loki seemed hesitant to keep his scars above the surface at first but he does it for you. You smiled gently.
You started giggling when Loki had suddenly flipped you over so you were on your back and he was on top of you. He leans down and presses his lips to yours, kissing you deeply as he slides a hand along your thighs, hooking his fingers under the crook of your knee and bringing that leg up around his waist. Your arms flopped around his neck and you pulled him close as you kissed him back deeply.
Loki’s deep groan filled your mouth before you pull away for breath and rest your forehead against each other’s.
Lightly panting, you whisper up to him, “I love you, my king.”
Loki chuckles softly, smirking back down at you before saying, “I love you too, my queen.”
You kissed him deeply again. “Good. Now, you better take those sweatpants off before I do.”
