Catharsis
by: snarkymuch
Written for @an-asgardian as part of the @marveltrumpshate event 2022!
Pairing: Steve/Loki
Rating: Explicit
Word Count: 23k
Modern AU, No Powers, Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Misunderstandings, Dom/sub, Loki goes to stay with Steve in his cabin in the woods, definite enemies-to-lovers vibes
Summary:
And then Loki moved to turn away, still standing despite the way he trembled, but Steve reached for his neck, gripping his nape and stopping him. His skin was sweaty and hot.
"Shh, none of that, now. It's time to settle for me. Just settle." He punctuated the words with a firm squeeze.
Loki has been adrift, an outsider in his family—a bastard child that Odin made sure knew his place.
He’s made a life of bringing shame to the Odinson name out of spite, which leads to his mother’s death, starting a spiral made of unsafe hookups and illicit substances.
But Thor refuses to lose his brother, too.
A plan is devised: Sending Loki to stay with Thor’s friend from the army, Steve, who lives in the woods of Maine, far away from the city and the temptation it brings.
Except Steve and Loki aren’t strangers—having once shared a perfect night that had made him feel comforted and safe, given him a taste of something more.
It had terrified him enough that he’d bolted before Steve woke the following day.
So now, misunderstandings and miscommunication, misjudging each other, all play out, as neither has all the facts, leaving them to realize a few truths along the way.
READ ON AO3
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so I’ve been thinking a lot recently about how Avengers (2012) might have been different if Loki had showed up looking even more obviously tortured, as he did in the original concept art by Andy Park (see below if you’ve not seen it before!), and specifically how his encounter with Cap in Stuttgart might have gone and I have no idea what happened in my brain but here! have a ficlet that seized my imagination and would not let go!
“Loki, right?” Steve said, straightening from the crouch he’d landed in. “I’ve heard a lot about you, but I’ve got to say: from where I’m standing, I’m seeing a hell of a lot more burden than purpose.”
Loki laughed, scarred lips parted on a smile. “You lack vision, Captain,” he said, his voice low and rich. “But I can fix that.”
And then he seized the edge of the shield with blackened fingers and tore it away as if it was nothing, hurled it into the crowd like it was a child’s toy, like Steve hadn’t been holding it so tightly he could feel the leather strap biting into his palm, and Steve felt the moment the scepter touched him like something blooming behind his eyes. Gleaming, dazzling power flooded his senses, scorching through him like a fever, burning out everything else, chasing infection through his veins until he was clean, until he was whole, until the memory of all his petty wants faded into nothing and he could see.
Steve lifted his gaze only slowly.
Loki’s eyes—still bloodshot, still dark, hardly a sliver of blue visible in them—were fixed on Steve's, watching him, and there was a strange, predatory heat to his expression. Then he smiled, scarred flesh stretching. “Hello, Captain,” he murmured. “Now do you see?”
Dimly, Steve was aware of his former teammates’ voices rising frantically in his ear—their fear, their alarm, their concern—but he only pulled the device out and dropped it on the ground beside him. He did not need it now.
“I see just fine,” he said. Loki’s smile widened.
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None of them could sleep, the night before the final battle, but they all had different ways of dealing with it—Clint and Natasha sparred with each other, Tony locked himself in his workshop with loud music and a lot of Red Bull, Bruce meditated and probably drank a couple gallons of herbal tea, and Steve found himself in the common room again, too edgy to sit still. It was stupid and impractical and he knew better, and he still couldn’t make himself settle long enough to take even a short nap.
Loki found him there, and he looked so perfectly put together at 2 a.m. that it had to be an illusion (either the magical kind or the mundane kind that Steve knew all about, because Captain America didn’t have the luxury of ever being anything less than confident). He made hot chocolate for both of them, dragged Steve over to the couch, and called up some Monty Python, and if neither of them were inclined to find it as funny as usual, at least it was a distraction. At some point Steve must have even fallen asleep, because when he came alert to the sunrise leaking in through the half-darkened windows, the TV was off and he was definitely slumped against Loki’s side.
And Loki was looking at him, something in his gaze that was simultaneously fierce and devastated, protective and lost, and for the space of a couple heartbeats Steve was positive that Loki was going to kiss him, that he wanted Loki to kiss him.
But he was awake, and Loki’s expression settled into something more neutral, with a wry smile and the teasing implication that Steve might have been drooling a little in his sleep, and the moment passed.
I got a donation commission from @haflacky (Tumblr is...not allowing me to make that a tag, I guess?) of a scene in one of my Steve/Loki fics, with all proceeds going to Ukrainians, and y’all...just look how beautiful this is, I mean seriously. Links are in the reblog to follow, because it’s for donations, so I’d really like this post to show up in searches/tags and I hope I didn’t do something else to screw that up somehow.
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of all the ghosts that bring us down | 16k | loki/steve rogers infinity war fix-it au
Thanos still attacks the Statesman, he still kills Loki, only this time that isn't where it ends.
It's just lucky for him Captain America is currently running rogue around Europe looking for trouble.
Or, the one where the Tesseract owes Loki a favor, Steve is...Steve, and it changes everything for the both of them.
Steve hopped the low brick wall with ease and sprinted across the darkened courtyard up the steps to the main entrance.
The communicator in his ear crackled and Natasha’s voice filtered through.“Are you seriously going in the front door?”
Despite knowing perfectly well she was four hundred miles away and probably not watching his tracker Steve swept the field automatically, peering through the blackness. “How do you do that?” He snagged a pick out of his belt pocket and stuck it into the door’s lock with an expert twist.
“Lucky guess.”
Steve smirked. “It’s fine, there’s nobody here.” He paused briefly, then asked, “You got the security system, right?” The handle clicked and he slipped quickly through the door, closing it behind him.
“Bit late to be asking that, isn’t it, Cap?”
“I’ll take that as a ‘yes.’”
---
my piece for the @lokirarepairbigbang in collaboration with my partner in crime, @oceanichymns, who is responsible for the gorgeous art!
rest of the fic is here on ao3!
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Whumptober
No. 1 A LITTLE OUT OF THE ORDINARY
Loki and Steve
Adverse Effects | Unconventional Restraints | "This wasn't supposed to happen"
He’d been back and forth to this realm for the last few years, but he still didn’t understand the bounds of human technology. His visit before his attempts to conquer had been so long ago, in their years, that they had gone from building with mud to living in the sky.
Which was, he reasoned, why he had ended up in his current predicament. How was he to know they had come up with containment to hold him? How was he to suspect they had the ability to discover his weaknesses?
Loki was sitting in the center of a round glass cage, much like the one he’d spent time in on the airship during his little invasion– only, they had modified it. It was clearly made specifically for him, now.
There was a circle on the floor that was roughly the width of a doorway across, and as long as he stayed in it, he was fine.
Crossing it, however, caused the heat to rise, sharply and immediately, until he retreated to the circle, and it slowly cooled back down.
And of course, due to his accursed heritage, even while in his seemingly Aesir skin, the heat would sap him of his strength, render him exhausted and weak and unable to think.
And so now he sat, careful not to so much as nudge his foot out of the circle. He’d experimented with that– it had ended poorly.
He had also curled up into a tiny knot of his own limbs, in an attempt to sleep. It had worked, in that he had nodded off, but at some point his body had attempted to stretch itself out, and the heat had been triggered, and he had woken, groggy and sweating and miserable. He’d stood in the circle in an attempt to dry himself, and it had taken, as near as he could tell, the better part of an hour for his cage to return to a temperature he considered comfortable. It took longer still for the sense of nausea and weakness to leave him.
He hadn’t tried sleeping again since.
It was difficult to say how long he had been here, like this, but he knew he was exhausted. He felt his body swaying, and held himself as carefully still as he could. The last thing he needed was to pass out and end up triggering the heat while unconscious– he wasn’t entirely sure there was an upper limit on how warm it would get, and it seemed easy enough to imagine that his captors would cook him alive.
He hadn’t seen any of them, but he assumed it was Fury, or some of his lackeys, who held him now.
That assumption held until the door at the end of the long room opened, and lights outside of his cell turned on, allowing him to see the rest of the room for the first time.
There were, as near as he could see, six such chambers. He was the lone occupant, though, which had been why his was the only one illuminated.
And the people who entered were dragging along another person– a second captive to join him. The man was clearly fighting back, and took several jabs from the electrocution batons that the guards carried, for his trouble.
He felt his stomach lurching, and stood.
“What is it you want with me? I would bargain– for food, for rest.”
He was soundly ignored, all of their attention on this new prisoner. Loki wondered if perhaps his cage had been sound proofed– that he was rendered mute, though he could hear them.
They pushed the man, bound with metal bar shaped restraints on each of his limbs and a bag over his head, into the cell across from Loki’s.
He had, in fact, a fairly clear view, which would have been of more interest if he had any reason to care. Whoever this was, whatever he had done, Loki was far more interested in their captors– and he noted, with some surprise, that they did not wear the regalia of SHIELD. They wore black plain human armor, and patches with red insignia of tentacles and skulls.
They retreated, only one of them so much as glancing in Loki’s direction before the door was closed behind them, and the greater chamber pitched back into darkness. He could see the other prisoner’s cage, though– and more importantly, could see the prisoner within.
They had locked his limbs to the floor, spread him out as much as possible– no wonder he’d fought against it. The bag remained in place, but with the way he was thrashing back and forth, Loki doubted it would stay that way for long.
And, of most interest to him, was the fact that Loki could hear the other prisoner. How he huffed and grunted as he strained against his bonds.
“Can you hear me?” He asked, pitching his voice to carry as best as he could, so long deprived of water.
The other man stropped struggling for a moment.
“Who’s there?” He demanded, his voice rough in a way that spoke of time screaming, or strangling– fresh damage, rather than Loki’s own mere neglect.
“Another prisoner in this basement.” Loki said smoothly, unwilling to identify himself, lest he have accidentally murdered this persons family, or some such thing. He would deal with the fall out his name would cause, once they were better established as needing to aid one another.
“Can you take this hood off of me?” The request was quieter, and Loki could hear in it the mental strain. He could sympathize; it must amplify the fear, not being able to see what was coming.
“We are in two separate tanks. Glass. I cannot physically reach you.”
Not a whole answer, but he had not done any overt magic yet– he’d kept his efforts to his own bodily comfort, thus far, unwilling to tempt them into cooking him again in punishment. Or worse, attempting to rob him of that power in some other way, before he could make a plan of escape.
“And they’ve got strong magnets holding me to the floor.” The man shook his head, the bag again rustling over it. “How often do they come in?”
Loki sighed, well aware it was unwise to speak thus; they were no doubt monitoring them.
“It has been days since I saw them. They do not bring food or drink. In fact, since I was captured, the only time they have opened that door is to bring you in.”
He heard the shocked intake of breath, and was surprised that it was so audible. But then, the relative silence of the rest of the room had been overwhelming, before.
“They’re starving you?” The man sounded indignant.
“It seems likely they will be starving us, given you aren’t in a position to be able to eat.” Loki pointed out, unkindness tearing out of him in rapid response to the man’s pity.
“Not if I have anything to say about it.” The man shot back, and returned to his wriggling, trying to get the hood off. It was, it seemed, wedged too far down under him, though– pinched beneath his shoulderblades, which were held flat to the floor.
Loki sighed, regretting having snapped. He watched in silence for a while until the man gave up on his efforts and lay still.
“I can describe to you our cells, if you like, though there is not much to describe. Both are rounded tanks, tall and glass, with lights above and tile floors below. Mine has a small circle in the middle, which I cannot leave without being punished. Yours lacks even the visual appearance of that aspect, which is lucky for you. The room beyond is dark, but there are four more cells such as ours, only unlit. There is one door. The floor outside is concrete, the floor in the hallway beyond the door is white and glossy. The men who brought you in wear black, and their identifying marks are a red skull and tentacles–”
“HYDRA.” The man answered, resignation telling Loki that he had already known as much.
“You know them?”
“I’ve fought them before. Every time I think I’ve taken the last of them down…”
“More rise up. A hydra in practice, hence the name. Charming. And how have they captured you now?” Loki was exhausted, and it showed in his voice. How was he to fight back, to escape, against an unbeatable enemy?
“This wasn’t supposed to happen. I was trying to help a couple of kids– I’m Captain America.” The man said next, after another long stretch, and he spoke as if embarrassed.
Understandable; he’d just admitted to being duped, bested, despite being one of Earth’s defenders.
It was good after all that Loki hadn’t identified himself, then. The last thing he needed was the Captain to know that he was just one more enemy he’d failed to defeat.
“Bad luck, Captain. It seems your SHIELD won’t be saving you this time.”
The Captain went quiet again, this time with a sullen, dogged sort of refusal to speak any further.
Loki had offended him, and, at length, he realized the Captain may well have fallen asleep.
Lucky him.
Loki sat, and stared, and stood, and stretched, and sat again, waiting for something– anything– to change.
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