Chapter Text
“Luke, I swear to Christ, you need to get away from me!” you shrieked, dragging yourself towards the door, desperate to get away from the party as well as your aggressive ex, already five shots into the evening.
“Aww, Jesus, Y/N! We all know you dumped me because you’re such a slut!” he countered, making you stop in your tracks and turn around angrily.
You growled, both upset and embarrassed. “How dare you?” was all you could muster.
Luke advanced on you, his dark eyes looking ready to bore a hole through you. “Listen, I may be willing to take you back if you just--”
“--no!”
You attempted to dive away again, only for Luke to grab your hand, ripping your leather glove off, making you gasp, seemingly overreacting to a simple glove.
As you stopped down to quickly pick it up, Luke grabbed the sleeve of your shirt and pulled you back up to eye level, hurting you and forcing you to struggle against him. “You’re always wearing those fucking things, even in summer! You’re a fucking nutcase, y’know that?”
“Let me go!” you said, with a tone of warning to your voice as it began shaking.
“I need to put you back in your place, kid,” Luke grunted, the stench of bourbon on his breath making you want to gag. “Perhaps I’ll take you upstairs right now--”
“--fuck you!” you screamed. Without thinking, you brought up a hand and smacked Luke clearly across his left cheek.
A few gasps rang out from the sound of the hit, but it was already too late for you to try and take it back. You’d felt that sharp, pulling sensation that you always felt when you accidentally touched a plant with a bare hand, or swatted at a mosquito in the air in front of you. At that moment, you already knew that you’d just made a grave mistake.
Luke’s body instantly became cold and lifeless, dropping to the floor. You shook and quickly scooped up your glove, yanking it back on before you could kill again.
Someone dove to the floor and checked for a pulse. “Holy shit, he’s ice cold! Like….dead guy cold!”
“Not possible!”
“Did he have a heart attack?”
“Y/N hit him and he just went down like a sack of bricks!”
“She just slapped him! I saw! It wasn’t even a punch!”
As everyone began screaming and arguing about the newly-dead body in their midst, you quickly darted in and out of them before they could stop you, leaving the Christmas party and quickly running into the street, back towards your apartment.
This was the first time you’d killed another person. On Christmas eve, no less.
Oh god, oh god, oh god…
Having left the party so swiftly, you didn’t notice a man quickly take out a cell phone as soon as he saw what had happened, calling not 9-1-1, but someone even worse…
It all happened so fast.
You’d immediately begun to pack as soon as you arrived home, planning on skipping town and creating another identity before the whole village knew about you, now that the cat was out of the bag.
However, you’d barely had time to pull out the contents of a single drawer before your small apartment building was descended upon by what you thought was a S.W.A.T. team at first. The landlady, a scared little old woman, quickly gave the troops of men with guns what they wanted, ratting you out the minute they asked for any tenants with your description.
Four men entered your studio, seeing you frozen against the far wall.
“Get back…please…I really didn’t mean it…”
It didn’t matter. The agents immediately subdued and arrested you, placing a bag over your cuffed hands as an extra precaution as they forced you into their van and off toward New York City, which was only about an hour away.
The rest of the night, and the following day was a flood of hot lights, buzzing noises and rings, people talking in technobabble, and countless violations of your privacy and bodily autonomy. You were subjected to medical, dental, and ocular exams, all while still being gloved and cuffed. The entirety of Christmas day was spent being treated like a criminal, as well as an experiment, and by nightfall, you’d been stashed away in a glass tank somewhere underground, about the size of your bedroom, with only a pallet for a bed, a trick door to receive food, and a hole in the floor for a toilet.
Christ, I’m an animal in here, you thought, frightened.
Your prison was brightly-lit, sterile, and full of monitors, recording devices, and a guard was always posted at the door, facing away from you but towards a security screen. You felt like a helpless little mouse under it all. Yet, you felt it was necessary all the same.
I killed my ex, you thought, realizing how bad it looked. They won’t believe me no matter how hard I cry or yell. I am a monster to them. Maybe they’re right…some people just need to be dealt with like the garbage they are worth, and no matter what I do…I’m one of them.
The clock on the wall read 9:30pm when you finally had a visitor, an extremely handsome, chiseled blonde man, whose face you couldn’t avoid being familiar with if you tried.
“Hello,” said Steve Rogers, his voice wavering between anxiety and authority. “I’m Steve Rogers.”
You only looked him in the eye for a moment before deciding not to engage with your jailer (one of them, anyway).
“Do you have a name?”
You didn’t reply, looking ahead of you instead, at the wall, from your spot on the floor by the pallet.
“We need to run some tests on--with!--you for the next few weeks. We know what happened, and we know what you can do. You’re, heh, you’re quite dangerous.”
An awkward silence only served to put a bigger wall between you, larger and thicker than the six-inch-thick dome of plate glass separating the two of you at the moment.
“You need to understand why we’re keeping you here--”
You emitted an involuntary scoff, putting Rogers off.
“I can see I won’t be able to make any headway with you right now. Fury will be down to see you in the morning,” Steve added before making a quick exit.
What a jerk, you thought. He’s so haughty.
You attempted to lie down and see if you could manage to sleep this entire nightmare away, but the lights in the room were bright, white, fluorescent, and penetrated your closed eyelids. Not that it mattered, you couldn’t doze for more than an hour at a time without someone coming in to observe or attempt to engage you.
The famous Black Widow, Natasha Romanoff, visited around midnight, her impossibly red hair braided messily behind her, her eyes looking at you with relentless pity, making you squirm and feel more like a zoo animal. You also refused to speak to her, even though she had a bit more social tact than Captain America (America’s Ass, indeed!).
Early in the morning, Dr. Banner appeared. He also tried to speak with you but when you refused, he only accepted it and took some vitals. You got the feeling he’d sympathize with you at the very least, but you remained committed to your choice of refusing to give anyone an inch.
Finally, just after dawn on the day after Christmas, Nick Fury visited, much less of a ‘nice guy’ than the others had been.
“Y’know, if you really want us to see you as someone who doesn’t need to be here, you might want to try talking to us, instead of looking like you want to blow our brains off our skulls,” he said.
You refused to comply, deliberately turning your head away.
“You do realize that S.H.I.E.L.D. can keep you here indefinitely,” Fury added. “You’re a top-level threat. According to our agent, you slapped some bitch, and he was dead before he hit the floor! While, I’ll admit, that sounds pretty damn badass, that’s not something a night in the drunk tank fixes.”
You wanted to get it into his head exactly what had happened, how everything was unintentional, and how ever since you developed your ‘gift’ as a child, you were taught that leather gloves could contain the danger. You’d been able to manage nearly thirty years of this ‘touch of death’ you possessed without committing homicide before…and the other night HAD been a total accident…
Hell, take my hands if you want to! I can learn to eat with my feet or something! Just let me go home…
“Look, until you cooperate, it’s probably best that you know that your own neck is on the line, here,” Fury continued, warning you.
This finally got your full attention, and Fury noticed.
He went on and explained. “If we conclude that you’re a danger to the world, and let’s be real…you kill anything you touch with your bare hands, here, we may end up having to permanently contain you, and S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn’t exactly enjoy letting threats live.”
No, you thought. No way any organization would be allowed to snuff me…
One look into Nick Fury’s aggressive, angry eye was enough to convince you that he was not bluffing or bullshitting.
“Now, perhaps later you’ll change your mind,” he hinted, turning to leave you alone again. “I’ll be back at noon. I suggest you be in a better mood to socialize.”
Thus, you spend Christmas alone, imprisoned in a cage, without a friend in the world.
“Well, what can you expect from someone you dragged out of her home and arrested?” asked Nat. “Why should she want to talk to any of us?”
The Avengers were assembled in the library, talking with Fury about the situation regarding your acquisition.
“She probably sees us as the enemy already,” suggested Steve, taking a sip of water from a glass in front of him. “Lord knows what that will mean for us if she gets out.”
“She’s got to know how quickly any kind of escape attempt would end should she try it,” said Fury.
Steve shrugged. “She’s a loose cannon, Nick. She looked at me like she wanted to bite my nose off.”
“Perhaps that’s because you shot first?”
Loki Laufeyson, standing by the window overlooking the back lawn of the compound, finally joined the conversation with his question. “Why are none of you assuming this little reaper is merely being defensive against the swarm of soldiers who burst into her bedroom in the middle of the night?”
“Loki,” Fury began, putting his hands on his hips, openly expressing his continuing disdain for the God of Mischief, “What makes you think we want your opinion?”
He shrugged. “I’m hurt,” he said, sarcastically playing his hand over his heart.
“I want to hear him out,” said Stark. “Rudolph knows more about the Bad Guy Life than the rest of us, right?”
Loki pursed his lips. “I will pretend I didn’t hear the half-witticism.”
“Well?” asked Fury.
The god shrugged. “Aren’t we getting ahead of ourselves a bit? I mean, it isn’t like the woman did anything extreme, like--”
“--take over New York City with a herd of killer sky worms on behalf of a genocidal grape?” countered Fury, making Loki step back and shrug.
“Why are you standing up for her? You haven’t even gone down to see her yet,” said Steve. “What do you gain from being her lawyer?”
“Well, call me a gentleman if you must,” he began, smiling cockily, “but perhaps I relate to her in a manner the rest of you cannot identify with. After all, you voted to give me a chance at redemption!”
Stark rolled his eyes. “You know damn well that was reluctant, and mainly due to your brother having your back and taking responsibility for you.”
Loki sighed. After hearing that S.H.I.E.L.D. had captured a woman on the biggest holiday that Midgard celebrated for apparently slapping a man to death, he immediately wanted to know more. Any mention of magic fascinated him these days, now that he was under the watchful eye of The Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. To him, something didn’t add up, and he got the feeling that you were more of a victim than your target, and that you were far more likely to be selectively mute out of fear over spite.
He recalled the fear he himself stirred within the hearts of others, and how in the end, it only dulled his own feelings of superiority, for any tyrant who commands the terror of his people is only awaiting the day they learn that behind those defensive walls, was a truly inadequate leader with nothing but his wits to live on. After the defeat of Thanos, and after the world was restored, it was this idea of accepting the truth rather than coating it in a layer of glimmer that gave Loki the motivation to become a worthy Avenger.
Of course convincing the others took a lot of work, and even now less than half of them trusted him in earnest. While at first, it may have been an attempt at self-preservation, over the following year, the newfound respect he was gaining was reinforced by Thor, and after a while, the dust, for the most part, settled.
“Look,” said Loki, pacing about the room as the cogs turned in his mind. “Perhaps we can come to some kind of--”
“--oh hell no, I am not making deals with this clown,” Fury clapped back, gritting his teeth.
“Please, Fury,” asked Thor, finally chiming in. “Just hear him out!”
“Maybe it’s something she can learn to control,” Loki suggested. “And if she can, and if we can keep her on our side, maybe having someone like her would be advantageous to our reputation against everyone up there,” Loki gently pointed upward at the air. “As Thor and I have both assured you, Thanos is far from the only threat to the planet and the universe.”
“And, how do you suggest we train her?” asked Fury. “If she touches your knuckle, it's game over! So, who wants to volunteer to be her, uh, coach?”
Looking around, it was obvious that no one was willing to get too close to you. No one, save for Loki.
“Here is what I propose,” he began, “One year. Give me one year with her. I will even take her away from here, to New Asgard. From what it sounds like, her magic is naturally hers, as is mine, which means I know more about how it behaves already than most of you.”
“That’s a bit of a stretch to make,” Steve muttered.
“Why New Asgard?” asked Fury.
Thor chimed in. “So we can keep an eye on Loki too, to make sure he keeps his word. The King isn’t exactly his biggest supporter. She can ensure that this plan is followed through.”
“New Asgard is a more open environment. A lowly sort of fisherman’s village, but a place that doesn’t push a lot of stress onto a captive. We won’t make any headway with her powers if she’s constantly defending herself,” reasoned the Trickster. “She must feel comfortable. Only then will she trust us.”
“And how do we gauge the success of your little experiment at the end of the year?” asked Fury.
“I don’t know….some sort of exam? A test of progress?” suggested Loki.
Fury looked to Stark, then Nat, then Steve. “If she passes, she’s just free to go?”
Loki nodded. “It’s only fair if she manages to do it, yes?”
“As if you’d know a damn thing about fairness,” mumbled Fury. “And what if she can’t do it? If she proves that she really can’t be helped?”
The former Prince of Asgard reeled back, not wanting to state the obvious answer: if you couldn’t be helped, then you’d still have to be ‘dealt with’ in the manner S.H.I.E.L.D. preferred. Loki knew he was on thin ice, and that the only reason he was even able to keep his head was thanks to some quick, successful trickery that had kept the tesseract out of Thanos’ purple claws. Once the stone within was destroyed, even Fury couldn’t deny that utter catastrophe was averted thanks directly to his actions. You, on the other hand, had been given no such chance to prove yourself.
“I will take responsibility for her safety and compliance,” Loki answered. “Any crisis or failure will be on my conscience.”
Steve rolled his eyes, as if to imply that Loki still wasn’t sure what a conscience was.
Fury looked around the room, deep in thought as he made his decision. “I already regret this,” he said. “Give us a week, and we’ll make the arrangements. But I have terms, Laufeyson.”
“I would be disappointed if you didn’t,” Loki muttered with a subdued victory smile.
“You will have three-hundred and sixty-five damn days in New Asgard,” Fury demanded. “We will be allowed to drop by for a progress report at any time. If she passes her test at the end of the trial, she will be given full permission to leave. If she fails, we sit BOTH your asses down in that tank until the end of time, you got it?”
“Very well…”
“..and when I say ‘end of time,’ know that my range of said time is subjective,” Fury warned. “If she’s too dangerous to contain, we’ll have no choice but to terminate her.”
Steve cringed. “I really thought we learned a lesson about playing God with people, no matter who they are…”
Fury rolled his eyes. “Don’t add to it, Rogers.”
“Then it’s settled, and now, I’d like to meet my new student for myself,” Loki insisted, not waiting for an answer from anyone before leaving the room.