🔪Partners in Crime🔪(loki x reader)

Part 2: Unforgiven

A/N: part 2 yall here goes nothing

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My brain wakes before my body does, which is quite annoying because I want to open my eyes, but it's like pushing against a wall of solid concrete. My brain is surveying my surroundings before seeing how my body is doing first. Voices in the distance. It's cold here, wherever I am, which tells me that I'm not in the same place I was before when I got hurt. That battlefield was burning with fire and smoke, and it made me sweat and ache like hell. This place, though, feels strangely cold. I can't decide if it feels good or not.

Not without effort, I force my eyes open. Blinding, bright white light greets me harshly. The place, when I finally get used to the light, is a plain beige hospital room. The walls are a blasè tan adorned with about two boring paintings of vases of flowers. I see two chairs and a small, round yet empty table. The door is ajar, people standing outside. I can hear their voices.

I'm convinced my bones are made of lead. I don't even want to try to move. Here, laying unmoving and quiet, the pain threatens tears to spill from my eyes. There's an IV hooked up to my hand; I wish whatever is flowing through my bloodstream would work faster.

Suddenly the voices in the hall cease abruptly, like students whose teacher has just caught them talking. There are footsteps that come increasingly louder as three figures enter my hospital room.

All of them look like absolute shit, and not because they probably just came from the battle. I can see streaks down their cheeks traced by tears and circles under their eyes and faces hollowed out by something heavy as if emotion were carved out from them with a merciless knife.

Tony was the first to walk in, looking tired but otherwise unreadable. He was wearing his glasses so I couldn't see behind his eyes. I don't know what they would look like right now. Perhaps sad? I think that's just what I want him to be. I know he's angry with me. He would be stupid not to be.

Natasha follows him, and some involuntary force makes me smile at her presence. I see her pretty copper hair, the one that reminded me of a good-luck penny. She had shown up to save me during the battle. I guess she was my good luck. But she didn't look happy either.

Steve entered last. The thing is, Steve is always unreadable. He has one of those faces that, when he's happy, it's such a rare occasion that you just have to smile. Right now, he's not even trying to hide behind his stony Captain America mask. You know how moms sometimes say when their kids mess up, "I'm not angry, just disappointed"? Well, Steve managed to portray both of those emotions simultaneously. Which is about as bad as it can get with him.

Tony crosses his arms like he's angry, but his first words are soft. "How are you feeling?"

It takes me a moment to remember how to talk. My mouth feels like it was stuffed with cotton. "It hurts."

"We need to talk."

I close my eyes because they begin to ache, but also because I don't want to have to look at any of them. I know I let them down. I know I fucked up.

"I'm sorry," I say at once.

"No, you're not," Nat spits.

"Well, that's rude." I still don't open my eyes. "I just swallowed my pride to apologize and now you're invalidating it."

"It was invalid to begin with," Steve says. "You know what you did. We know you don't regret it."

I don't know if they're right or not. Of course I feel bad for what I did, but I had to do it. How could they not understand that? There were too many lives at risk if I decided to play the "noble hero." And yet they already pegged me as a traitor without even hearing what I had to say.