Chapter Text
Humans were certainly more inventive than Loki had given them credit for. He lowered himself to the floor of his cell slowly, shaking, nauseated, and exhausted. In retrospect, perhaps fleeing to Midgard had not been one of his better ideas. Well, it was fair to say that none of the ideas he'd had in recent memory had been particularly good, but this one seemed worse than most, though maybe that was only because of how miserable he felt at the moment.
The concrete floor was cold, hard, and uninviting, but leaning against the wall—which was also cold, hard, and uninviting—required considerably less energy and concentration than standing upright. At least when he was seated the world didn't spin so badly. Loki tilted his head back with a sigh and let his eyes drift closed.
It had been arrogant and short-sighted, he concluded, to assume that because they had no seidr to speak of, the wretched Midgardians could not hurt him. But it had seemed so obvious, the risk hardly worthy of consideration. They had no enchanted blades to cut beyond the shallowest surface of his skin, no poisons he could not overcome; even the green creature's savage beating had not left him with worse than bumps and bruises and a short-lived headache. He had not been concerned. How badly could they hurt him?
Very badly indeed, it turned out.
Stupid. He had been oh so very stupid, and if he were not feeling so horrible, he would be cursing himself much more fiercely. Certainly he had been incredibly idiotic not to anticipate the Midgardians’ ability to cause him real pain and injury, and more fundamentally, for not truly believing that the Midgardians might be able to catch him in the first place.
He shifted and bit back a groan as something inside him moved in some manner it should not. Another failing on his part, to not realize that with his magic bound, his ability to heal would be so severely restricted. He must have been using seidr all these centuries to augment his own powers of healing, without ever knowing. Perhaps Jötnar were not so hardy as Asgardians, or perhaps they were, and he was just as lacking in that regard as he was in height. Had such a feeble, puny Jötunn ever existed before him? Probably not.
Probably that was why he had been abandoned in the first place.
He shivered, chilled from the inside out. He would know better than to underestimate the Midgardians in the future, if indeed he had one. He was very doubtful of the prospect at the moment.
He raised a shaking hand to his forehead. His skin was clammy and hot. He thought he might have a fever, from exposure to some dreadful Midgardian malady he could not in his present state fight off, or from the potions they infused in the food he was too hungry not to eat. Usually too hungry. At the moment, he was thoroughly nauseated, and his stomach roiled uncomfortably at the thought of ingesting anything, even the offensively bland mush served as the morning meal.
His stomach spasmed.
He would not vomit, he told himself sternly, gritting his teeth. He was no child to heave and spew so, nor a stripling youth taken ill by excessive drink. He would not, would not ... his body seemed inclined to disagree, however, and he scrambled across the floor on hands and knees to kneel for a few desperate, horrible moments over the small toilet, gripping the basin with white knuckles, swallowing hard against the fierce contractions of his belly. He prevailed, but only barely.
“You don’t look so good, pal,” came a voice, hardly audible over the rushing in Loki's ears. “You want I should call someone?”
Loki spat, grimaced, and spat again, then pushed himself back on his heels, sweating and feeling entirely grotesque. “I'm sure they're well aware of my predicament,” he muttered. “You cannot imagine these cells are unmonitored.”
“They might just be waiting for you to ask for help.”
“Then they shall have to wait a long time,” Loki said, wondering if he had the strength to drag himself to the flimsy, rickety cot that served as his bed. He doubted it. “I am not so far gone, Sergeant Barnes.”
There was silence from across the hall. “I know you’re just saying that to piss me off,” the soldier said eventually. “I’ve told you a million times-”
“Two dozen times at most,” Loki said. “And I have explained to you nearly as many times that ‘Bucky’ in my native tongue sounds—well, suffice it to say it is nothing pleasant.” Nausea momentarily abated, he risked moving enough to gain a little distance from the foul-smelling toilet, though the cell was hardly big enough to pace across and the stench inescapable. He twisted his head carefully to the side, mindful not to dislodge the gauze on his neck. “I do not see why you are so insistent on this small matter.”
Silence again. “It’s not small to me,” the soldier said sulkily. “Sergeant Barnes is ... he’s the man who became the monster. Bucky was just a guy.”
Loki sighed. “I do not understand why it is preferable to be ‘just a guy.’ It is ordinary and small. But very well. If you do not mind me picturing a flatulent rodent every time I speak your name, then Bucky you shall be.”
“You’re a pal,” said Barnes—Bucky. “So what’d they do to you today? You’re bleeding. I mean, still bleeding. I didn’t think they could do that.”
“Ah,” Loki said. He inched a little farther away from the toilet, toward the wall again, though the flimsy wash basin was in his way and he doubted he had the energy to maneuver around it. “It seems that a vibranium blade, wielded diligently enough, has much the same effect as enchanted elvish steel." He swallowed, tasting bile, throat burning. "Valuable information to someone, I am sure, although the question remains as to whether I am vulnerable due to my peculiar physiology or my current frailty, or perhaps both; I am by no means certain this is any sort of exploitable vulnerability in the Aesir.”
Bucky shifted in the shadows across the hall, fabric rustling. “The Aesir. That’s your people, right? You and Thor?”
“Thor’s,” Loki said shortly. “Not mine now, nor perhaps ever.”
Bucky made some noise, perhaps of confusion, perhaps of query, but he did not push further. Instead, he asked, “Did it hurt?”
“It was nothing worse than usual.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s an answer,” Loki snapped, suddenly irritable. His neck was throbbing, there was blood leaking into his left eye from a cut on his forehead that wouldn’t heal, and his stomach was starting to twist again in an ominous manner. “Just not the one you were seeking.”
Bucky grunted. “If it didn’t hurt, you’d have said so, so I guess it did.”
Loki put his head down on his knees and breathed for a moment, waiting for the nausea to subside again. “It hurt,” he said to his knees. “It hurt far more than it should have. My time here has weakened me. As a youth I took far worse daily on the sparring field, but now...” He took a few more deep breaths. “Do you feel pain, Sergeant Bar—Bucky?”
“Sure,” Bucky said. “I just don’t let it stop me. They, uh, they trained me not to care about it.”
“HYDRA?” Loki asked. “Or your American army, from before you were captured?”
“HYDRA. The Army—they didn’t talk much about pain. Just told us to try not to get shot or blown up.”
“It is quite sensible advice,” Loki said dryly.
“I suppose.” Then there was a long stretch of quiet, in which Loki managed to convince himself that he was not after all on the verge of vomiting. “You look beat,” Bucky said finally. “They don’t let you rest much, do they? You should sleep if you can.”
No, they did not let Loki rest much. It made him nostalgic for the dungeons of Asgard, his time in which had been hideously tedious yet included sufficient food, daily opportunities to bathe, and more rest than he had gotten in centuries—and which had most certainly not included physical mistreatment and exposure to foul Midgardian microbes. Loki kept his head tucked against his forearms, breathing shallowly.
“You’ll sleep better in the bed,” Bucky said helpfully.
Loki raised his head just enough to peer across the cell at his uncomfortable cot. “Undoubtedly,” he mumbled. Though the thought of lying down was enticing, he did not think he could stand without aid, and walking was out of the question. Crawling, he thought he could manage, but was perhaps too much of a sign of weakness to display now that he had his stomach somewhat under control.
“Crawl if you gotta,” Bucky said, disturbingly astute. Loki would have resented him for it if he had the energy to spare.
Instead, he pushed himself to his knees, and then stubbornly to his feet. Thor would have been proud. Loki's stomach clenched violently as he straightened, and for an instant he thought he was going to vomit after all, but then the nausea passed, and he stood for a moment, trembling.
“Jeez,” Bucky said. “You really don’t look so good.”
“Thank you,” Loki mumbled, and managed to lurch forward a few steps before collapsing onto the small cot, which creaked ominously under his weight. He fell asleep a moment later, to the sound of Bucky singing old war songs across the hall, in loud, off-key defiance.