Like crying out in empty rooms, with no one there except the moon

Seven days.

At least that's how long he thinks it's been. Seven days since Banner had come. He only knew by how many conversations and interrogations Fury would try to have each day. Eventually threatened food and water. Even though Banner had explicitly said not to.

Loki didn't care. Didn't care about any kind of sustenance anymore. He had stopped caring long ago. He could deal without meals, he had after he fell.

And he had come to enjoy Fury's interrogations. Appreciated having somebody talk to him, to see if he would answer. Actually wish to listen to him. He knew Fury didn't care. Fury would probably be happier if he dropped dead to the floor right now. But he still waited. Listening for an answer that would never come. Listening to the silenced Prince.

But then Fury stopped coming. Took the guards that surrounded his cell out too. Actually fulfilled his empty threats of no food. Loki shouldn't have minded. He knew he shouldn't have minded. He was a god, Skywalker of the nine realms. He would not be broken by mere silence.

He would not be broken. He would not break. He would refuse to have survived years of torment just to have silence push him over the edge. Refused to let the deafening echoes of his empty footsteps haunt him.

It's quiet. Too quiet. Quiet enough that he could hear his rapid heartbeat and panicked breathing. He said he wouldn't break but apparently, his body says otherwise.

And the thing that hurt him most was that for once in his life, he had no exit strategy. Because even if he could call out to Heimdall, why would he? When he was the one who betrayed him. Heimdall who ratted him out to the Allfather? That it was a crime to speak to his Mo-Frigga. He was responsible for the thread coating his lips like poison.

No, he would not even entertain the possibility of begging Heimdall to take him back to Asgard. Back to imprisonment. Back to the unspeakable punishment.

He was alone. Completely and utterly alone.

And it was shameful that isolation had been the thing to break him.

He couldn't do this. Loki couldn't do this. He couldn't speak, he couldn't eat, he couldn't exist. He was worthless without his words. Words were his power and without them he was nothing.

He sighed, lying in his uncomfortable bed. His head facing upwards, examining the glass ceiling and the piping lining the roof. He was tired, so tired. Tired of longing for a death that would never come. When Thor had dropped him into the abyss, he was falling. Falling, falling, falling down.

And ashamed as he was to admit it. He hoped it was the end. Wished that that would've been the end. So peaceful after a life of pain. Go to Hel and wander amongst ghosts in the afterlife forever. A world without memories and love. A world without pain.

He had to do something. Loki was bored. Bored, tired, and lonely. He sat up, that was something, right? Sitting cross legged on a wilted bed. He couldn't pace, much as he wanted to. Pacing would show anxiety, anxiety showed weakness. That their isolation methods were working.

And he couldn't scream. Couldn't mindlessly taunt others as a source of therapy. Couldn't yell at the Norns for cursing him this way. Beg them to give him another fate. Cry out to the world to make it stop. That he was done. The Fates had successfully broken him. Nothing more than an empty husk of the one confident Prince.

So he just kept sitting up, he would not cry. He would not cry.

He just examined the cracks forming in the cement.

•••

Bruce was conflicted.

He wasn't entirely sure what to do.

Granted, most people would have no idea where to go after treating a villain God who tried to take over the world. Especially a certain terrorist who forced Bruce to kill dozens of innocents.

But he had seemed so... broken. Like the Titan Atlas with the weight of the world in his hands. Seconds away from collapsing and falling apart.

Something didn't sit right with Bruce. The dangerously underweight, bony frame with tired green eyes. The delirium and half-conscious state the god had been in. It wasn't right, the way he seemed fevered, shivering, and sweating but his skin was still critically cold for a human. And his mouth...

The scarring around his lips. Tiny, delicate, precise holes. Bruce had nearly been sick when he saw them for the first time. And the fact that nobody realized it either maddened him. No wonder Loki hadn't been speaking. It had probably been agony to even open his mouth. He hadn't lied to Fury, no. Those weren't a battle wounds. That was torture.

And what annoyed him the most was that he knew something about it. Something in a Norse mythology book he had picked up after the New York fiasco. But he couldn't remember. It was something important to. Something important about the scars and Norse myths that would reveal anything. And he couldn't remember it.

Neither could he go to the nearest library to pick up a book either, as he was currently camping out in a small village in El Salvador. After the invasion, he had been compromised in most countries. And he absolutely refused to stay with SHIELD like Steve. Locked up like a lab rat for them to poke at him.

He had only come to SHIELD in the first place due to the... extreme circumstances. Then leaving in the middle of the night to go to another remote location.

He was tired, of all the running. Hiding and never getting to live a normal life. And stuck. He was also stuck. Unable to get the goddamn book he needed to figure out what was wrong with the murderer.

Bruce groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose with frustration. He knew who he could call, who would have the answer in less than a second. The problem was he just didn't want to deal with him. At least, not without a bottle of Advil and a healthy dose of alcohol.

He knew that he should contact him. Just like he knew that he shouldn't even care in the first place about Loki. The guy had murdered hundreds of civilians for the fun of it. He was a bloodthirsty monster.

Although, wasn't Bruce's other side the same way?

No, Bruce didn't have a choice. He had no control over what the other guy did. Loki, he did have that choice. And he abused that decision, using his power and scepter to hurt populations of people. He knew that morally, Loki probably deserved whatever had happened to him.

But the wounds around his lips...

Bruce was going to regret this, he was most certainly going to regret this. Calling the idiot with the books and helping Loki. This whole thing was a disaster waiting to happen.

Yet he still dialed the number on his tiny flip phone. An emergency Blackberry he had that SHIELD couldn't track.

Straight to voicemail.

That wasn't surprising. The guy probably got thousands of phone calls a day. But this was important, plus, they had saved the world together, Bruce figured that owed him a conversation.

So he called again. And again. And again. And-

"You have reached the life model decoy of Tony Stark. Please leave a message. Official consulting hours are between eight and five, every other Thurs-"

"Just cut the crap, Tony," Bruce interrupted the billionaire, already annoyed at the fact he hadn't had a drink on hand.

That stopped Tony dead in his tracks, a stunned silence before his voice rang out through the phone, "Doc Green? God, it's been so long, where'd you vanish off to? Italy? Greece? Bora Bor-"

"Norse mythology,"

"What? You went to Thor's big ol' home in the sky?"

Banner sighed, biting back a frustrated scream behind his teeth, "Loki. Norse mythology. What do you know about Loki in Norse mythology?"

Tony paused, the humor fading from his tone, "Why are we talking about this? It's over. It's done. Prongs got sent back to the golden sky place years ago," he rambled, and Bruce was unsure of whether he was trying to convince his fellow scientist or himself.

"Listen, it's probably nothing. It is nothing. I just- can you find some article and read it to me? About Loki? And... mouth injuries?" Bruce trailed off, wincing at how the last words came out.

Stark sighed, and Bruce could almost imagine his eyes rolling to the back of his head, "Yeah, just gimme a sec. Why can't you do this on your own by the way? And JARVIS, can you pull up... yeah, that's it," Tony spewed, words flying out of his mouth faster than he could keep up with.

Yep, Bruce was definitely going to need a drink after this, "Because I'm on a flip phone! Now what does it say?" He burst out before taking a breath. It was nothing. It was probably nothing. He just needed to be sure.

"Yeah, uh..." Tony hesitated before speaking again, "Apparently he made a bet with some dwarves, costing his head. That's strange by the way. What kind of idiot makes a bet with his head as the price? Anyways, apparently, he got out of it with, surprise, surprise, tricky words. And as punishment he, uh..."

Bruce couldn't help but groan, "What? He what?" But he was sure he already knew the answer. But it couldn't be. He had to be mistaken. He couldn't be what he thought.

"He got his mouth sewn shut,"

Bruce would not get angry. He would not get angry. He would not. He would not march over to whoever did this and Hulk smash them into the ground.

"Uh... Bruce?" Tony's voice cut through, "You okay?"

He glanced down, unaware the phone had even slipped from his hands. Shaking as he picked it up, he grit his teeth.

"Yeah, just... how fast can you get a plane to Mexico and get the other Avengers together?"