usavatar | I WAS MADE TO HIT IN AMERICAAAA

I WAS MADE TO HIT IN AMERICAAAA

He should know not to go out at night by himself. Not because he's in any danger - Captain America in New York City on a less-than-average day doesn't have much to worry about. But because, almost without exception, he gets lost. Steve tucks his hands into the pockets of his jeans and squints up at the buildings around him, ignoring the college student who staggers by, stops to stare at him, and bursts out laughing before moving on.

He's used to that, too, by now. Apparently dressing conservatively these days isn't a reflection of care for the resources of the country, or a side-effect of living life as a soldier for two years - it's just "dorky." At least he doesn't feel like someone's taped a sign to his back, not since he asked Darcy - Agent Lewis - why he kept getting that reaction.

Of course the fact that she had to explain what 'Because you're a dork' meant didn't really help his... street cred. He chuckles to himself, only a little ironic, at managing to use both terms in one train of thought.

A few streets later he's getting very confused. Usually he's able to find at least one familiar street or landmark to point him in the general right direction, at least until he finds a cab to get him the rest of the way back to the mansion. He's done this enough in the months he's been here that his assigned SHIELD shadows don't pop a vein unless he's not back by morning - in this case, though, that's probably working against him.

Finally Steve sighs and digs into his pocket to pull out his cellular phone. He looks at it for a moment, smiling to himself and wondering what Howard would make of all this. Tiny phones with tinier batteries and communicators and jets that don't need runways to take off.

Well, for all Steve knows, Howard invented most of it. He still hasn't been able to bring himself to look at history texts to see how his friends lived out their lives. There's something too much like admitting he's never going to see them again in doing that.

He flips the phone open gingerly, poking the tiny buttons with his pinky because he's not sure how else to manage the thing, and dials in what he's fairly sure is Darcy's number. Agent Lewis's number. He could try calling someone else, but she's friendly, in her own way. She doesn't treat him like a loaded gun waiting to be pointed at the next Big Bad Guy.

Steve lifts the phone to his ear with a frown. "Uh. Hello?"

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"Isn't it?" he asks quietly, conspiratorially. As if Steve can tell him honestly and he'll never tell. Arching an eyebrow, he twists the spear in place idly, careful to draw back the tiniest bit so it doesn't gouge - but the blade almost-scraping over skin promises that indeed it can should he change his mind.

"What if I were to say that there was another option, captain?"

Keep it simple, Steve. The part of himself that always sounds a little bit like Bucky right now sounds impatient and a little exasperated. He's got a big pointy weapon against your throat. He's the bad guy in this situation. So get up and punch him already.

He waits a breath after the another option before he throws himself into a sideways roll, trying to gain his feet before Loki can bring the spear around to impale him.

Privately he decides he's not going to leave the mansion again without at least wearing a kevlar vest.

The Kevlar vest would indeed be a good option - especially as when Loki thrusts, he aims for the meaty part of the right shoulder. It's a clean jab and, hardly fatal and not all the way through, but more than enough to keep Steve in place while they have their chat.

"Ah, ah, ah... Now was that polite? I asked you a question, captain." He crouches, cloak pooling around him as his knee jabs in between Steve's shoulder blades. "And it's the sort of question that demands an answer." Since Steve can't see, his smirk warps into something feral; but his voice remains civil and commiserating. "What if I were to tell you that with a word I could wind back the clock for you? That I could return you to the world as it was, with all the familiar faces I'm sure you find yourself searching for in the crowd. Hm? Thoughts?"

He jars the point of the spear, using the pain to emphasize the other point he hopes to impress upon the spangled one. "I'm really quite magnanimous when you get to know me."

Edited 2011-09-13 15:40 (UTC)

Steve doesn't scream - not loudly, not more than a strangled noise that he swallows as much as he can. It doesn't matter how tough you are. Getting stabbed through the shoulder hurts.

He gives a little wheeze as Loki kneels on his back. The man is heavier than he looks by far. He knows Loki is talking again, but Steve's mind is still fogged with the numb agony from his shoulder and the flash of calculations that he's always been good at - what his options are in the here and now, what chance he stands dependent on his immediate actions and Loki's response.

You're the skinny kid on the playground again, Cap, he thinks.

"I could return you to the world as it was," Loki says, and Steve goes very still, something knotting in the hollow of his throat.

"With all the familiar faces I'm sure you find yourself searching for in the crowd."

Silence. Steve curls both hands into fists. When Loki wriggles the spear, Steve forces himself to relax, the movement just what he needs to get his hands under him. He lets the groan of pain out, gives Loki that much, and then grits out, "Liar."

He throws all his weight and anger into shoving up from the ground as fast as he can, yelling as the spear digs the rest of the way through his shoulder. He's going to lose that arm in a minute, at least lose the use of it for the purposes of this fight, but if he can overbalance the man on his back he might still stand a chance.

Grip instinctively tightening on the haft, Loki quickly rises to his feet as Steve makes his move and the spear goes with him, the blade of it ripping out the way it came. He dances a few paces backward, razor-sharp grin glinting in the dark. He brings the point back up as it drips blood, ready again for whatever the captain may think of next.

"True, I've been known to stretch the truth a time or two," he says with a half-shrug, knowing full well how very much of an understatement it is. "But you've seen what I'm capable of, the power I can command. Temporal sorcery is a much more sophisticated art than most others, but it's hardly an impossibility."

He pauses, cocking his head in feigned curiosity. "But to dismiss such an offer out of hand, without even considering it at all... One would think that there is absolutely nothing that you find yourself missing. No one."

Steve presses his hand against the wound until he can feel his pulse pumping against his palm. He's bleeding. A lot. Enough for it to ink his shirt maroon around the injury and start oozing blood between his fingers.

His earlier sympathy is gone.

"You're lying." He says it in the exact same tone, flat and nearly emotionless. For him, it's tantamount to screaming. He remembers being this ready and willing to kill. After he lost Bucky, before the final assault on Schmidt's stronghold - before he had the comfort of knowing that one way or another, things with Hydra were about to end. Before he lost everyone. And the irony of it, the miserable irony of it, is knowing he didn't lose anyone. That they lived, they died, that he can look back at the records and see how their lives played out if he wants to.

That's not how life is supposed to work.

He hefts the parking meter again, one-handed, and it slips slightly in a palm smeared with blood. He can't cover the distance between them before Loki pops himself into a different location. But he can hurl the meter at the Asgardian's head in a blur of gunmetal gray.

Loki spins the staff, smacking the projectile aside with a sonorous clang that echoes itself when it hits the asphalt and bounces to a stop. Then he spreads his arms wide and half-bows, eyes piercing under the brow of his helm. It's all mocking, almost daring the man to rush and tackle him in his current condition.

"If that's what you wish to believe," he replies innocently, his mouth still bared in that going-for-your-throat grin. "If you're honestly contented with your lot at and in this present, then please, pay me no mind."

Straightening himself, he returns the staff to the ready position and continues, dripping gentility and manners. "Of course, if you aren't of a mood to do business, I suppose you won't begrudge me ending this. I am terribly busy of late." And with that, he lunges forward.

In the time between Loki not answering his phone and, well, now, Darcy was operating on a mix between guilt, panic, anger, and fear. Guilt because she's not calling in S.H.I.E.L.D., not calling in the Avengers who have practice with this kind of thing to save her own skin. Panic because she knows her father and knows that nothing good can come of whatever he's doing and she's only got a small window of time. Anger - how dare he attack her friends when she knows about it and yet of course he would, he's a supervillain, it's what they do. Fear... fear that she won't get there in time.

Not that Steve actually told her where she'd be, but she takes to the streets all the same, calling a number it tells her is unavailable. Shit. Shit. And oh, she said that last one out loud. Fine, she can do this. Hacking a Stark phone while jogging through New York City? Yeah, she's got this.

Five minutes later and the last known location of Captain America is shown on GPS and Darcy fistpumps, screw the crowd. She's good. Except that good means she'd actually be there instead of three blocks down and two over. No time like the present, so she kicks her jogging into gear fuck yeah agent training in running.

Just in time too, and her eyes widen as Loki lunges forward - fuck, fuck, fuck - and Darcy throws herself towards Steve, hoping to at least have enough momentum to get him out of the line of fire.

Thank all the gods above and below that Loki's in control of himself enough that he's able to stop in time. As things stand, the spearpoint is barely a hair from having pierced her throat. The crazed glint in his eyes has dimmed down to a dully shocked stare at what might have happened.

He gathers himself quickly enough, shuttering the concern behind a tired, put-upon annoyance. Pulling back the spear and resting the butt on the asphalt, he pinches the bridge of his nose and exhales sharply. "I don't believe I have to note your exceedingly bad timing, do I," he says, voice dry as the New Mexico desert.

"You could have killed him," is the automatic response before she can actually stop and think about what she's saying and who she's saying it to. Now that her heart has stopped being lodged somewhere in her throat and she's taking large gulps of air for her burning lungs she can fully assess the situation.

Which, as it stands, is one genocidal alien, secret deadbeat father, with a spear -- "Oh my god, is that blood?" Fuck, she knew this was going to come and bite her in the ass eventually. "You were trying to kill him!"

So what if she's pointing accusingly at him, clutching the stitch in her side and trying to breathe? Loki should know better than to try and murder one of her friends when she's aware of what's going down. Or something.

Even pumping blood from one shoulder and bruised from Loki's spearhaft, he's too solid to go down, but the impact makes him wobble. When Darcy dives for him all Steve can do is yell "No!" with all the panic and hopeless desperation of someone convinced they're about to see another friend die inches away.

And then Loki... stops.

Steve has his hand on Darcy's shoulder arm and it half-way to throwing her out of the way when Loki does, and he just sort of... leaves his hand there as she points that arm at Loki and talks like her accusation means something.

Steve is so, so confused. "Darcy..."

He sways and drops down on one knee, his hand still on her arm. He has to get her out of here. First, though, that means getting her to listen to him.

Loki levels a look at Darcy that if a teenage girl were to employ, would be accompanied with a disdainful duh. Yes, he's well aware of the effects a spear through the torso of a mortal man. He does not require education on that particular point.

"Yes, it is, in fact, blood," he says casually, dropping his hand to properly display how his eyes roll as he does so. "What, pray tell, did you assume I was going to do with him? Invite him to luncheon?"

He casts an appraising eye over Steve distractedly before ignoring him in favor of Darcy. "Are you quite all right? You're breathing is rather labored." Yes, he is more concerned with her being out of breath than him bleeding out on the pavement.

For once in her life, Darcy is just going to ignore Steve. Now that she has time to think again she realizes that she's going to have to answer at least his questions. But that can come later.

"I don't know, maybe injure or at worst, seriously maim. Not kill." Another deep breath, though she casts a worried look at Steve at his movement onto his knee. Darcy doesn't shake his grip on her arm - it's kind of a comforting weight in that she's not trying to face down Loki on her own.

Even though she kinda is.

"I ran all the way here from my apartment." Darcy waves her other hand in dismissal, because he should know how far away that is. "I'm fine just... need to catch my breath."

"Darcy." There's a warning and a reprimand in her name, though it mostly comes out dazed. There's something he should remember about the way he's feeling right now, but it takes a while to filter through the fog sinking in around him. He's bleeding out.

"Darcy, where's..." He tightens his grip briefly and uses her to lever himself back to his feet. "Sorry.... Where are the others? Go to the... Get out of here."

"Perhaps you should have a seat, then." Loki sounds only vaguely concerned, but real worry lurks in the back of his eyes. He's perfectly aware of the distance, and for her to have run all that way - agent-in-training or no, it was still a sizable jog, and Darcy is only human. ...Mostly, anyway.

Steve's vague mumblings are dismissed out of hand until he pulls himself up; Loki glances at his efforts, barely more than the time it takes to blink, and assesses him in about as much time.

"If you're that terribly concerned for your friend's health, perhaps you'd best see to him. Unless you'd prefer to call in for your... 'Healers'." The amount of disdain with that last word is more than evident. Compared to Eir's ministrations, the medical practices on Midgard are practically barbaric. "His wound was much less dire when I first stabbed him," he says in a tone that says just how much this isn't his fault, "but he insisted on thrashing about. Careless."

Darcy leans into Steve, offering to take some of his weight in order to make this work out a little bit better. Even if she's not the tallest person around. "There isn't anyone else. I'm it - a one woman rescue act," which is directed to Cap though she wouldn't be surprised if Loki was listening in and totally disregarding proper rescue rules. Or something.

"Yeah, he kind of does the whole 'not giving up, not giving in' thing really well. Probably one of the reasons people like having him as Captain America." But he's got a point and she sighs melodramatically. "Right. We'll just be going now but." A pause and she levels Loki with a look. "We're having a talk later."

She shuffles a bit, trying to reposition Steve's arm so it doesn't become pure dead weight against her shoulders. "I don't suppose you could send us to my place?" A long shot, but never let it be said that Darcy doesn't try her luck in everything. "People will stare."

...He must be hallucinating from blood loss. This conversation is too surreal to be real. But he's leaning on Darcy, who is surprisingly solid, and in fact feels a bit like a tree.

"How do you say that tree name again?" It's vacant and he's looking slightly to the left of Loki's head.

Loki frowns disapprovingly. Running off without a single person to back you up is Thor-level planning, and he knows Darcy is leagues smarter than that. "Perhaps you would do better to ride in with some cavalry next time," he says, delicately scolding. As for the promise of a chat a later date, he merely looks resigned to the fact. "You know how to reach me. We'll see where we've a mutual opening."

They're overdue for a lunch anyway.

Arching an eyebrow at the request, Loki lets it hang in the air long enough for one to assume the answer to be such a resounding no that it hardly needs to be said. But then he nods, and his free hand sketches symbols in the air. "As you wish," he says amenably. "Try not to let him bleed on the carpet too much. Cleaning up after such things is an ordeal I trust you'd like to avoid."

"I was in a bit of a panic, okay. But if it means that much to you, I'll call for the Avengers." Or at least one of them. Maybe Clint. But she takes the scolding in stride, and nods in agreement - she'll call him tomorrow after she's passed out for a few hours and managed to get Steve some help.

At his agreement Darcy lets out a breath she didn't know she was holding, shifting to get a better hold on Cap. "I don't even know what'll take blood out of the upholstery anyway." And then, just as she can feel the magic starting to work "Thanks. For not killing me or him."

There's the rather unnerving sensation of suddenly being somewhere else - she's never going to get used to that - but the comfort of her own place is overwhelming. Okay, deposit one Captain America somewhere, stanch the blood, call Coulson. She can do this.

"He likes you," Steve says as he finds himself sprawled rather bonelessly across her upholstery. "Loki. Does. He likes you. He hates his brother, but he likes... you."

He squints at her, pawing weakly at his shoulder in an attempt to put pressure on it again. "That's... Where did we get here?"

There are two questions in there, somewhere.

"Maybe. It's best not to think about it too much." Because Darcy doesn't even know if Loki likes anyone, let alone her. All signs would point to some sort of familial affection if he was a normal, well adjusted individual. But it's Loki and he's anything but normal and well adjusted.

She's gone for a second before returning with a clean rag - pressing it down on his shoulder with one hand before fumbling for her phone. "Loki teleported us to my apartment." And Darcy hopes to hell he's not going to ask how Loki knows where she lives.

"Okay, try not to die and I'm going to call Coulson."

"Yes ma'am," he says. "Agent. Peggy was Agent. Was an Agent, I mean."

He closes his eyes. "Probably should let Coulson know I've got about five minutes until..."

Steve trails off for a second. "Conscien... Consh... I pass out."

"Kay. Who's Peggy?" Keep him talking, keep him talking...

Keeping pressure on the wound, Darcy thanks whatever gods actually exist that she has Coulson on speed dial. She doesn't even wait to tell if she's got his voice mail or him before she starts talking as soon as the dial tone ends.

"Coulson. It's Darcy. Steve's hurt, really hurt. Five minutes to passing out hurt and he's bleeding all over my couch and I need you or someone to get over here as soon as you can and. Don't ask questions."

A breath, and she hopes that she's actually got him on the line as she pauses to see if he responds.

"Peggy Carter," Steve says, sounding briefly lucid even if he doesn't look it. "I had her picture. They said they didn't find it, when they pulled me out, but in my compass. I had her picture."

There's a pause on the other end of the phone before Coulson says "Once he's taken care of, you're debriefing me on what category of 'don't ask' this falls under."

He hangs up.

Steve closes his eyes and tries for a deep breath. It rattles and feels a little wet and tastes like a mouthful of pennies. "That's bad," he thinks, and realizes he said it too. "She was with me. The radio, on the radio, in the plane. Peggy."

All the bad categories, but she breathes a little easier knowing he's on his way. Okay, on thing down now just to deal with the super soldier on her couch.

"Wait, you had a girlfriend." Steve Rogers. Having a girlfriend. Darcy needs to adjust her world view for a moment. But as it's something he sounds pretty lucid when he talks about her, she's going to go with it. As well as to make a mental note to find a picture of her for him, kind of as an apology for almost getting killed by her father.

"What was she like? Peggy?"

Darcy knows all about Captain America, it's kind of hard not to. But knowing about Captain America and knowing about Steve Rogers are two completely different things as she's coming to find out.

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