Loki Misses the Asgardian Prison System

Chapter 108

She's so preoccupied with what's directly in front of her, she wouldn't notice if anything strange happened. She doesn't notice when one gunman shoots another in the head. She doesn't notice when he then turns his gun on himself and puts a bullet through his own brain. She doesn't notice the look of confusion, of terror on his face as he does, unable to comprehend the invisible force controlling his weapon.

She certainly doesn't notice that she's not fighting these men alone.

When it seems she has everything under control, Loki disappears, following the chaos back to the rest of the team. Each and every one of them – Bruce excluded, he notices – is hard at work, fighting robot after robot without making so much as a dent in the population. It doesn't help that the kids are fighting against them, too, but he can't bring himself to do anything about that. He doesn't mind murder. He just murdered a few people mere seconds ago. But kids? Maybe he should leave the kids alone. There are plenty of other targets.

So Loki forgets about them. He forgets about the Avengers. All of his focus, all of his thoughts, are directed to the robots, and the robots alone. He can't touch them, but his telekinesis has gotten stronger. He can tear them apart, rip their limbs from their bodies, send their severed heads flying across the room.

And he likes it.

He hasn't gotten to fight — to really fight — in years. Now he gets to twice in as many days? Potentially world-ending situation aside, he's thriving right now. He's never been so glad to fight somebody else's fight before. He just wishes he and Thor could do it together, like old times.

Speaking of Thor...

Where did he go?

Loki hasn't seen him for a minute. Not that this says too much — with all this chaos, he hasn't been keeping track of anything but the robots he needs to kill — but he'd like to make sure his brother is okay.

He finds Thor just in time to see the girl put a spell on him.

She disappears as soon as she came, and Loki runs up to his brother — run being a relative term when he's not physically there. Thor can't see him, but he can see Thor, and his eyes scan his brother's face frantically. He seems to be okay. He's not falling to the ground in agony, so it could certainly be worse.

"The girl tried to warp my mind," Thor says. He must have a comm in, because he's certainly not talking to Loki. "Take special care; I doubt a human could keep her at bay." He begins to walk away, far calmer than he likely should be. "Fortunately, I am mighty."

Loki can see the exact moment Thor realizes that's not necessarily enough. He pauses, his eyes flickering around the room. He's long gone. There's nothing Loki can do about it now, short of waiting to see if he snaps out of it. He will. He must. The girl is only human, it seems, and a human's power is only so strong.

But if she can render Thor incapacitated, she can do it to anybody, so he begins his search for the other Avengers. He's not sure what he's going to do – he can't warn them; they can't know he's here – but he wants to at least lay eyes on them.

And he does.

He lays eyes on Steve right as the boy throws him into the wall. Mere seconds later, the girl has cast her spell on him, too. It's too late to even try to help him.

Loki grimaces. "Oh, this is bad," he murmurs to himself.

The girl's head snaps up at his words – words he's spoken only to himself; words that should have been shielded much the way his appearance is. And yet, she seems to look right at him. She cocks her head to the side, eyes slightly squinted as she watches him.

Loki furrows his brows. "You can see me."

The boy by her side gives her a weird look. "What is it?"

She just smiles, an almost mischievous look in her eye. She flicks her hand in his direction, and a small blast of red shoots out from it.

Loki's vision goes black, and all he can feel is a sudden pounding in his head. He clutches it in his hands as though he can hold back the pain, and when he finally opens his eyes, ready to throw back a blow of his own, he finds himself back in his room. He groans and falls back in bed, hitting the pillow with far too much force for a man with a pounding headache.

Who is that? What kind of human can take out a god? Two gods, even, with what she did to Thor. Is she not as human as she looks? Do the Avengers know that? Do they have any idea what they're up against?

Loki squeezes his eyes shut, letting out another groan. He can't remember the last time he had a headache like this. Even when Thor hit him with Mjolnir, it didn't hurt this badly. This is a different kind of pain, one that comes from within, one he doesn't know how to clear.

But he doesn't want to leave the Avengers alone. Between this girl and Ultron, they have a lot on their plate, and he's not sure they're in the right headspace to do it. Not with that girl making the rounds on the place, taking them out one by one.

He tries to project himself back to the factory, but the pounding in his head only gets worse when he tries to use his magic. He can barely last a few seconds before he has to stop, and he clutches at his head helplessly.

Maybe he won't go help the Avengers. Hopefully, if that means the world ends, it will be sooner rather than later. He doesn't want to live with this headache any longer than he has to.