The Light To His Lies (Loki)

F O R T Y - F O U R

This will be a longer chapter than usual, so get comfortable! Also, a message to all of my readers, if you like or dislike something about this story and would like to comment about it, please check my message board. I would really like to receive some feedback on the recent chapters of my story and how I could improve, and what you guys would like to read.

Thank you, and enjoy the story lovelies!

"Room temperature, Nebula?" The Mad Titan asked, standing tall and arrogant behind the protective glass.

His daughter had a light panel spread before her face, nonexistent brows pinched in concentration as her blue fingers moved figures on the light before her. She looked back at her father, or whatever the hell he really was to her.

"576 Fahrenheit, Father," Nebula obliged the information. Thanos wrinkled his forehead in disapproval and my breath caught.

Sweat dribbled down my forehead and down my cheeks, feeling an awful lot like tears. The heat made my breath come heavy in long, dreadfully hot pants. My arms were positioned in front of me, and from my forearm down, dull orange and reds danced on my bare skin. The pathetic flames circled around my hands, they crawled up my forearms and danced dimly on my elbows. The shackles that covered my entire hands had been removed, as they had been the last time I'd exhibited and released such power, but this time it was only to be replaced with a set that fastened around my ankles tightly and cut into my skin more than the ones on my hands did.

I was standing on a secluded side of the room, a translucent pane of glass separating Thanos and his daughter from me, the room I was in was similar to the one I had spent every moment in until now, a circular dome carved of black rock and small, inexplicable engravings into the ebony walls. Thanos had stuck me in this room and gave me simple instructions,

Burn, little bird.

My ratty hair stuck to my skin, its brown clumps plastered to my cheeks like a thin layer of glue.

A faint memory reminded me that my hair once fell in silky chocolate curls, now it was ratted and tangled, the ends singed by the fire that crawled along my arms.

Thanos paced closer to the glass and the mere sight of his massive frame growing closer was enough to send me into an eternal panic attack. So much of my pain came from his fingertips, I could hear whispers of my screams with every curve of definition he possessed.

"I know you can do better, little bird." Thanos said, his voice soft as if he were indeed coaxing a baby bird, but his eyes were menacing, terrifying, they wordlessly threatened me with endless methods of torture. I fought tears that brewed in my eyes, terror welling up inside of me by the thought of suffering by his hand again. Not that I could stop it, his game wouldn't stop, even if I pleased him.

The flames that encircled my hands were dull, nothing like when I first unlocked this flame in my heart, when they'd ravaged the walls and singed my hair and clothes from my body as if they were nothing. Now, they flickered around my wrist and warmed my skin. When I'd lashed at the Great Titan, my skin had gone unharmed, unaffected by the bright reds and oranges that had clashed. Now I fought to keep the fire from my skin, pink and red burns peppered my skin when the flames licked my skin, and a few blisters had appeared on my forearms when the fire grew to hot.

Still, even as I was drenched head to toe in sweat and my body was shaking miserably, I fought to bring higher heat to the fire that dwindled around me.

They was something wrong about what I was doing, like some part of me knew that my own fire shouldn't affect me. I felt like there was a barrier, severing me from my power, or blocking it, or....