Father's Daughter

1.04

CHAPTER FOUR

Loki lounged in the glass cell, his hands resting easily by his sides, the weight of his cuffs now gone. His gaze drifted lazily across the transparent walls of his enclosure as if it were a mild inconvenience. But his smirk was anything but mild.

Fury stood at the control panel outside, his eyes narrowed, watching Loki with the kind of intense, detached scrutiny that only someone like him could muster. “In case it’s unclear,” Fury said coldly, “you try to escape... you so much as scratch that glass…” His finger pressed down on a button. With a deep, hollow clunk, a hatch slid open beneath Loki’s cell, revealing a dizzying drop.

Loki, barely shifting his position, tilted his head just enough to peer down into the abyss. The sound of the wind whipping up through the opening was deafening to most, but to a god? It was nothing more than background noise.

“Thirty thousand feet, straight down,” Fury continued, his voice unyielding, “in a steel trap. You get how that works?”

The hatch slammed shut again, sealing the cell once more. Fury pointed at Loki. “Ant.” He pointed at the button. “Boot.”

Loki didn’t even flinch. His lips curled upwards in that familiar smirk. “It’s an impressive cage,” he mused, his voice smooth, deliberate. “Not built, I think, for me.”

Fury straightened up, barely missing a beat. “Built for something a lot stronger than you.”

The god’s eyes flicked briefly toward one of the cameras, his smirk deepening. “Oh, I’ve heard.” He tilted his head, his words dripping with mockery. “The mindless beast makes play that he’s still a man. How desperate are you, that you call upon such lost creatures to defend you?”

Fury’s lips twitched, a mixture of frustration and satisfaction. “How desperate am I? You threaten my world with war. You steal a force you can’t hope to control. You talk about peace, and you kill because it’s fun.” Fury’s tone darkened. “You’ve made me very desperate.”

“Oh,” Loki’s voice was a soft mockery, as if to soothe Fury’s anger, “you might not be glad that you did.”

Fury’s eye gleamed. “Ooh, it burns you to come so close. To have the Tesseract, to have power—unlimited power—and for what? A warm light for all mankind to share, and then to be reminded what real power is.”

Loki’s smug expression didn’t falter, but the way his fingers curled slightly suggested the subtle strike of a nerve. “Well,” Fury added, stepping back with a wry grin, “you let me know if ‘Real Power’ wants a magazine or something.”

He left the room, the click of his boots echoing against the steel floor. As the door sealed shut behind him, Loki’s eyes lingered on the camera once more, his smirk still firmly in place.

---

The monitor went black in the briefing room where the rest of us were gathered, leaving behind an eerie silence that filled the space. Thor stood, arms crossed, his face unreadable, but there was a tension in his stance, a quiet battle playing out within him. Steve Rogers, eyes steely, leaned forward slightly, focused, analyzing.

Bruce Banner was the first to break the silence, leaning back in his chair with a sardonic smile. “He really grows on you, doesn’t he?”

Steve turned to Thor, his voice resolute. “Loki’s gonna drag this out. So, Thor—what’s his play?”

Thor’s brow furrowed as he considered the question. “He has an army, called the Chitauri,” he began, his voice heavy with the weight of the coming battle. “They’re not of Asgard, nor any world known. He means to lead them against your people. They will win him the earth… in return, I suspect, for the Tesseract.”