Loki: Jonathan Larson

[moonshadows]

It’s got to be robots, Loki thought as he watched Hulk do what he did best from the safety of a nearby roof. The SHIELD helicopter had deposited Banner and Rogers and was hovering, which meant that Thor was once again on Asgard and that the robots, or whatever they were, were both safe to smash and too hardy for an unaugmented human. So, robots. The Hulk was quickly decimating the bulk of them while Captain America herded civilians off the street and to safety, fending off the occasional shot or attack and hurling them bodily in the Hulk’s direction. It looked like they had things well in hand, actually.

Suddenly, a shot ricocheted badly off Cap’s shield, causing the metal to ring in a grating, high-pitched way. The Hulk immediately abandoned the last of the robots, tossing it casually behind him to impact against a wall and slide brokenly to the street as he charged for Rogers – and the fifty-some innocents cowering just behind him.

Magic cloaked him, carried him to halfway between Hulk and target in the space of a heartbeat. “Halt, you miserable creature!” he declared in a ringing voice. “I am-” One enormous green fist passed harmlessly through the illusion, and from the Hulk’s left side, he continued, “-a god!”

Another fist left a crater in the pavement, and yet another illusion dissipated harmlessly.

“Kneel before me!”

Crunch.

“I command you-”

Smash.

“-to kneel!”

By degrees, he turned the Hulk around and led him back to where the ruined machines lay in scattered glory before allowing himself to be pummeled into the asphalt where he lay as though defeated. The Hulk huffed a few times, anger satisfied by his victory, then sat heavily and shrank until Bruce Banner climbed tiredly to his feet and wove his way into the helicopter that landed nearby. A few minutes later, the silhouette of Captain America blocked Loki’s view and the Asgardian slowly began pulling himself from the broken asphalt cradling him. Romanoff was there in a flash, enchanted manacles clicking shut around his wrists which were held meekly out for that exact reason, and then she was waved off by the leader of the Avengers.

“I know what you did,” Rogers said solemnly. “I know you didn’t have to do it, but you did.” He swallowed, bracing himself. “Thank you.”

Loki smiled in relief. “I saw children; were any of them hurt?”

Cap shook his head. “No, not a one. They’re all safe thanks to you.” His eyes flicked to the helicopter, regret and doubt clouding his face briefly.

“Then it was worth it,” Loki said quietly as he turned and climbed obediently into the chopper.

Shaking his head slowly, Captain America followed.

 ~*~*~*~*~

Director Fury said nothing as four SHIELD agents escorted Loki off the helicopter. He merely watched, his expression impassive, while beside him Rogers looked uncomfortable.

“It’s not right, sir,” Loki heard him mutter reluctantly. “He didn’t-”

“This is neither the time nor the place, Captain. My office. Later.”

“Yes, sir.”

The cell they put him in this time was little more than a box made of crackling force fields. A selection of biology and calculus textbooks were waiting. He made no protest as they let the field down, removed his handcuffs, and gently ushered him past its boundaries. He ignored the field as it leapt to life again behind him, turning to the books with the single-minded intensity of a horse nosing at its grain bucket.  In fact, he had no idea how much time had passed before a verbal scuffle broke out. He only caught the tail end of it, that the guards would let the visitor speak but they would not leave their post, and looked up.

A nondescript man stood just past the field, looking somewhat shaken. He was one Loki’d seen around, a mid-level agent of the general rank as the ones that usually guarded him. “I just want you to know,” he said in a quavering voice that sounded on the brink of tears, “that my partner and our son were in the group of civilians Captain America was protecting when the Hulk charged. You saved their lives.” He swallowed, blinking rapidly. “Thank you.”

Loki smiled. “What’s your son’s name?”

“Jonathan,” the man said in surprise.

“Do you have a picture of him, Agent…?”

“Larson. Yeah, lemme get it out…” He fumbled in his wallet before holding out what had to be a school photo of a smiling boy no more than six.

Loki put his book down and stood slowly, hands held open and away from his body, moving as unthreateningly as possible to the field where he bent slightly and peered at the photo.

“He looks nothing like you,” he said softly to Agent Larson.

“My partner and I adopted.”

“Does he know?” Loki kept his eyes on the smiling brown ones of the photo.

“Of course,” Larson said warmly. “He knows that we picked him because we fell in love with him, and we tell him that his parents must have been going through something horrible to not be able to raise him themselves, and that we’re grateful they chose to let us have their beautiful baby boy so that he could grow up loved.”

Loki wanted to turn away, but this cell had no privacy. There was nowhere he could turn that his tears would not be seen, so he raised his pale eyes to Larson’s hazel ones. “You are a good father,” he said huskily, blinking as the tears crept slowly down his cheeks. “Your son is very lucky to have you, and knowing that he is safe makes this-” a motion of his head indicated the cage they had him in. “-all worthwhile. Thank you for showing me his picture.”

“You’re welcome,” Larson said, stunned by the raw emotion being displayed by what was supposedly a dangerous enemy. Questions bubbled up, but he swallowed them.

Loki saw them anyway.

“You’ve seen images of my brother, have you not?” His smile warped into something bitter. “I was adopted as well, only my father never told me until I confronted him about it.”

“That’s horrible!” The words slipped out before Larson realized what he was doing and he shut his mouth with a snap, flushing. “Look, I have to go back on shift. I just had to stop by and thank you.”

“And I thank you for that,” Loki said smoothly. “I get few enough visitors to break the monotony of my day. If you ever desire a hungry ear to pour stories of your son into, well, you know where to find me.” Another smile, this one charming.

Larson smiled. “I may just take you up on that.”

 

Larson visited every day for the next week, cheerfully babbling about Jonathan while Loki hung on every word, absorbing the affection in his voice like a dry sponge. He almost regretted it when the power to his invisible cage flickered and died, the entire room plunging into absolute darkness. For such an “accident” to have occurred so soon after his capture, however, Fury had to have sided with Rogers in feeling that his imprisonment was in fact punishing him for having done a good and selfless deed. He took the opportunity to escape as the apology it was and, apology accepted, slipped out of the building in the confusion.