High ⊰ Loki ⅹ Darcy ⊱

Chapter 26

The news had been devastating.

Darcy felt numb now and cried out. She had flicked on the television to see if there were any news reports on what was going on at Stark Industries. Sure enough, a white faced employee was being interviewed.

"It was horrible. We accepted a delivery – a white Styrofoam chest. We weren't expecting anything like that so we took some precautions before we opened it. It seemed clear of anything dangerous, so we opened it." The camera didn't miss the guy's horrified expression. "It was Miss Potts."

The reporter faltered. "Pepper Potts was in the chest?"

"Just her head."

Darcy was grateful for the nearness of a trashcan, because she promptly puked into it. In between her wrenching heaves, she listened to the SI employee describe how he had immediately notified Tony Stark, and then how Iron Man arrived and began destroying everything after taking the head for safekeeping.

Poor, poor Tony. Darcy could barely breathe between puking and sobbing. Her throat burned, her eyes burned...she wanted to scream, but she didn't have the breath to do it. That was how Jane found her, and when Darcy managed to gasp out what had happened, Jane broke down with her.

It seemed that the Avengers would need to live up to their name. Darcy couldn't imagine that Stark would ever recover from this. Pepper was his other half. She completed him. Tony couldn't function without Pepper. Pepper, who had become one of Loki's biggest supporters after he saved Tony's life.

The Avengers would wreak complete and utter devastation on the person that had done this, but...

Darcy cried and heaved until she physically could do neither any more. Her head ached and felt like it was six times its size. Her abdomen hurt from the constant heaving. Her throat burned. She wanted to find a hole to crawl into.

"Jane?" she asked, voice rough and scratchy.

Jane hadn't stopped crying yet. For such a skinny thing, she had a lot of moisture in her. She was crying silently, shoulders shaking only a little.

Darcy blew her nose, and handed the tissue over to Jane. Gradually, her friend's tears dried up, and Jane just sat there, cross legged on the floor, staring at the floor. She finally looked up to meet Darcy's eyes.

"You look awful when you cry, Foster," Darcy noted dully.

"Likewise," Jane returned. "How could this happen? Who...who would do something like this?"

It was hard to swallow past the massive lump in her throat, but Darcy managed. "I don't know, Jane. But I know that the Avengers will find out. They'll make whoever did this pay."

Jane was trembling. "Tony...Tony won't be able to deal with this."

"No, he won't." Darcy wished she could still cry. "But we'll do what we can to help him through this."

The real question was would he be able to get through it? Would they?

Waiting and not knowing was horrible. Darcy hated this part. She didn't worry about Loki too much, he could take care of himself. But Tony was extremely vulnerable right now, and he might lash out against his friends. He might force a confrontation until they had to take him down.

The news didn't help. There was one brief shot of Loki going into the building, and another of the Quinjet arriving. There were also shots of windows exploding, and the speculation of a fight. Then nothing...

Darcy felt almost sick. Her mind was producing the most awful ideas and images of what could be happening.

"I want to puke," Jane said dully.