If Loki Had Fallen In Love.

She ran to him, her melancholy lover. Her feet pounding the beat of a heart on the unforgiving pavement. The shackles around his wrists glinted with the same blunt light as the metal that covered his mouth. His eyes cast to the ground with the kind of regret one only saw in a damaged soul.

Loki looked up as he heard his name yelled in the distance and raised his head to see her, a racing current in the expanse of stagnant bodies. He lurched toward her only to be dragged back by the force of his confinement, a pang of desperation towards his brother spiked in his heart; of course he would have put such constraints on him, but the fact that his treatment was just made it impossible to place blame on him. Besides, it didn't matter, the only thing that was of concern to him now was the fact that she was here, the undeniable possibility that this would be the last time they saw each other was too much to even consider. He longed to call her name in return, to connect with her as two people do when speaking from a distance, announcing their knowledge and love for each other to the surrounding crowds, but his mouthpiece prevented any word from passing his lips. He strained against it and the rest of his restraints as she drew closer, his eyebrows raising and crinkling as she called his name again.

It hurt to see him like this, the kind of pain that sits in your heart and drags it to your stomach. Tears pooled in her eyes as she saw him struggle towards her, unable to move the sufficient distance to reach her. The only consolation she found was in the steps she was taking that brought her closer to him. She lengthened her stride and called his name again. Two beats and she was with him. She threw her arms around him and held him as close as was physically possible, breathing in his familiar scent of leather, ice and something unrecognisably beautiful. She didn't care about the general public's opinion of him or the awful things that he'd done; she knew him, the real him. She knew the way his brain worked, his reasons, his secrets, his hopes, his dreams, his flaws, his assets. She knew him the way he knew her, completely and without judgement. The chain linking his wrists pushed against her as he struggled wrap his arms around her, she stepped back quickly and ducked under it, joining him in his prison and letting his embrace envelop her the way only it could.

After what felt too short a time she pulled back slightly to look at him. Her eyes drank in his face, memorising each tiny detail the way he was studying her, like she was the last of an endangered species that was about to become extinct. Raising a hand she wiped at the dirt and dust on his face, stroking the tears from his eyes, keeping contact with him at all times. She noticed his eyes had reverted from Tesseract blue back to their familiar green, back to the eyes she had spent hours lost in, the eyes that followed her every move, that looked at her as though she was the most precious thing in the universe. She smiled at the sight and linked her fingers behind his neck, resting her forehead against his.

"You're back..." she whispered. Loki nodded gently and lifted his chain awkwardly over her shoulder to place his hand against her jaw, his thumb delicately caressing her cheek. His voice rumbled in his throat, sounds that were unable to be developed into words. His attempts to speak to her through his muzzle pushed the tears out of her eyes and onto her cheeks. Keeping their faces pressed together, she twisted her head to address Thor.

"Please," her voice sounded broken and weak, "Can you take it off?" She could feel Loki's warm breath on her ear.

"I am sorry," Thor replied, the sympathy in his features reflected the grief in hers. "There is no way; it is impossibility in this realm..." The Tesseract glowed a crystal blue where it was resting beside his knee. She glared at it angrily.

"I understand..." She looked back up at Thor and nodded dejectedly. Of course Loki would be held in the utmost incarceration while on earth, any possibility of an escape would have been considered and removed from likelihood, his return to the planet even more inconceivable. She sniffed and turned back to her lover, his eyes glistened with every word he was unable to say.

They held each other a minute longer while people busied around them, preparing for the brothers' return trip to Asgard. Hands twisted in hair, fingers brushing across skin, eyes never looking anywhere other than the person in front of them. They gazed at each other, committing each insignificant detail to memory - the way one of his eyebrows settled just that little bit higher than the other when he was upset, the way her fingers felt against his skin, the way their heartbeats seemed slightly more prominent when in one another's presence.

Eventually the time came for them to part, the people surrounding them seemed to move a little faster, the voices more urgent. Loki pulled away slightly and raised his chin as if to kiss her forehead. A broken choke escaped her throat as the cool burn of metal touched to her skin rather than the soft warmth of his lips she knew, loved, and longed for. The agony she felt was clear in what she could see of his face as he pulled back and looked down at her feet. Reaching up she guided his own forehead to her lips instead, placing there a kiss that he would feel for the rest of his mournful existence. Their faces wet with tears indistinguishable to either party, they clung to each other one last time. He stroked the back of her hair tenderly with shaking fingers, his other hand memorising the planes of her back. She buried her face in his neck as she felt a large hand grip her shoulder, it's warm, comforting touch told her exactly who it belonged to. Tearing herself away from him she ducked back under his chain and looked up at Thor with watery eyes, his face giving all the apology she needed.

After giving the god a swift hug goodbye she stepped away from the brothers. Loki's eyes locked on her own as she backed away slowly into the surrounding circle of Avengers. Thor offered him the remaining handle to the Tesseract, he wrapped his fingers around it reluctantly. A twist of his brother's wrist and they were concealed by a bright blue light.

A flash, and they were gone.