Spiderwebs - Chapter 12

As a man with one of the most dangerous jobs in the world, Clint Barton had faced innumerable instances of pain and desperation. He had undergone tortures of many varieties, physical, emotional, and psychological. He had suffered many wounds and known agonies that would cripple most men. But nothing, nothing in all his years of experience could hold a candle to this.

Ultimately it was the uncertainty that was the worst part. If he knew for sure what he had seen, he could take some sort of action, and do something about whatever was happening. The problem was that he didn't know. Was Natasha aware of Loki's presence, or was he observing her without her knowledge? Was he holding her by force of threat, or was she under the influence of his persuasive magics?  Was she a slave to the same sorcery that had once held him against his teammates, or was the Asgardian just blackmailing her in some way? If she didn't know Loki was there, Clint had to report it to someone so she could be protected. If she was under his control, and he turned her in, he risked something happening to her—Fury didn't have much of a conscience where collateral damage was concerned. And the others didn't understand what it was like to be fully under Loki's spell. They would hold it against her.

One other awful, unthinkable possibility gnawed at the corner of his mind, and he tried in vain to dismiss it. Maybe, it whispered, maybe she does know….and she wants him there. But that was impossible. But it explained so much…

No. Not Natasha. She would never….would she? He didn't know her anymore. The possibility wrenched his stomach in searing pain, and he felt physically sick. No. No. It wasn't true. He was just letting his own emotional entanglement get the better of him. No sense in letting his imagination run wild just because he had his feelings hurt. It was childish, really. Just a nightmare fantasy.

Oh god what if they were--

He shook his head, trying to regain his soldier's composure. Natasha was a fine agent. And a one-time partner. She would know better than to let her guard down around someone as dangerous as Loki. And Natasha Romanov was the last person to get swept up in emotion that way. It was obviously a purely tactical situation, and he owed it to her to get her out of it if he knew something was wrong. The only question was, how? Should he report to Fury? Or try to handle it on his own? No, that was no good, he was the last person she wanted to deal with. It would only make things worse. One of the other Avengers, then. But who?

Thor was the obvious choice. He knew Loki better than any of them. But he also had a troubling blindness where Loki was concerned. Thor would rather let himself be pushed to the brink of death than believe his brother had lied to him. [Wasn't Loki supposed to be, like, the god of lies?] Stark wouldn't want to believe his systems had been so spectacularly ineffective. And if he did, he'd just want to go in after Loki with barrels blazing. [That did have a certain appeal to it, really…] The Cap would err in the opposite direction, wanting to go through the proper channels, and Clint wasn't so sure he wanted to follow textbook protocol on this one. That left him one choice, and he wasn't particularly crazy about it. [But then again he also wasn't crazy about Natasha getting cozy with--]

Banner it was, then.

He made his way to the doctor's quarters, finding every possible distraction in his environment to keep him from thinking about the situation at hand. He found his keen observational skill to be a blessing in this exercise, enabling him to fixate obsessively on minute details like the number of dust motes in a given corridor, or the differences in lighting between various rooms. By the time he reached Banner's room, he had mercifully disbanded the more painful mental images that had threatened to invade his thoughts earlier.

He knocked three times in quick succession, willing time to pass more quickly.

"Who is it?" He heard Bruce's voice from within, muffled by the door. Banner didn't much care for personal interaction, but at this point, Clint didn't much care for inconvenient neuroses. This was serious.

"Someone really, really important. Just open the door."

He heard a heavy sigh, and then footsteps as the room's solitary occupant approached the doorway.

"Agent Barton," he said in a tone of surprise as he opened the door. "What brings you—"

"I need to talk to you about something. A very bad something."

Frowning, Bruce nodded and stepped aside to allow Clint to enter the room. No one ever came seeking Dr. Banner if the news was good.

**

Natasha Romanov was a different person in sleep. The typically hard set of her eyebrows softened, her intense emotionless features blurred into delicate tranquility. The proud set of her shoulders relaxed in carefree abandon. Her curtain of crimson hair fell in a thick frame around her face, glowing softly in comparison to her pale skin. Loki stroked it unthinkingly as he considered her, the gentle sweep of his fingers keeping time with his thoughts. She looked so utterly…peaceful. It was a feeling he envied. He could not remember a day in his life that had ever been so serene. Even in his early childhood, the fondest memories he could conjure of his existence, his mind had always turned with insecurities and unanswered questions. Why did Thor curry favor where he could not? Was Father's smile warmer to his other son, as it seemed, or was it only his imagination? Why did he never catch cold, as others might do?  He now of course knew the answers to all of those questions, and they had brought him even less peace than the questions themselves ever had.

Here, sitting in this strange chamber on Midgard, with the Black Widow curled in sleep at his side, he perhaps had more peace than he had ever known before—but still it eluded him in its entirety. His was a questioning mind by nature, and there were too many of them unanswered even now. He was increasingly aware of emotions he felt toward this woman, emotions he didn't understand. Asgard had its share of women who were pleasing to the eye, and as he matured, he discovered the feeling of physical desire, before quickly dismissing it as an annoyance and a weakness. The Black Widow was of course quite appreciable to look upon, and he couldn't deny that he enjoyed the touch of her skin against his, or that he wanted even now to kiss her again, maybe more roughly than before, but his feelings toward her were not purely physical. She excited and confused and frustrated him, but even those very familiar emotions were not adequate to express what she stirred in him. It was nothing he could rationalize.

His thoughts were briefly interrupted as she stirred in her sleep, shifting positions so that her head rested on Loki's lap entirely. He lifted his hand momentarily, surprised but bemused by the strangeness of Midgardian sleep habits, and then returned to stroking her hair. It was soft and thick, pleasing to the touch, and he delighted in running his long fingers through it in much the same way a young child might thrill to caress a kitten. He wondered idly what it might be like to call a woman his own. The blind loyalty that Queen Frigga had always shown to his adopted father had frequently disgusted him, but he thought that perhaps it could be a becoming quality in a lady, if he had one. He had often imagined himself on the throne of Asgard, but he had never imagined a queen beside him. The idea was new and, as any new idea, it fascinated him. He tried to picture this woman, Natasha, presiding over the great hall of Asgard, and the image made him breathless. Yes, she would strike quite an intimidating figure. All of the other ladies would pale in comparison to her magnificence. The Aesir would be filled with jealousy and desire, and Loki would revel in the prize that adorned his reign, in his excellent spider queen. He grinned widely, pleased with his fantasy, but it quickly faded.

It was, he immediately realized, a foolish impossibility. Even if, by some incredible miracle, the throne did fall to him [but it couldn't, he was a monster and an outcast, even if Thor were to disappear entirely he could never rule] Odin could never forgive a Midgardian to sit upon the throne. He had suffered Thor's love for his Jane Foster only in light of the circumstances and actions that surrounded it, but even then, Loki realized [as his poor foolish brother did not] that Odin had no intention of allowing it to continue overlong. When Thor ascended to kingship, he would do so with the understanding that an honorable lady would grace his hand. More than likely Sif would sit as Asgard's queen, a thought that caused Loki to scowl outwardly.

Foolish, stubborn, impetuous wench. How was she superior in any way to this woman?

"Ow!" Natasha cried out, instantly awake, as her hands flew to her hair in surprise and pain. Confused, it took Loki a moment to realize that he had clenched his fists in his frustration, causing himself unintentionally to pull sharply on the hair in which they were still entwined.

"Oh," he pulled his hands away from her immediately, a comical mixture of surprise and awkward embarrassment upon his face. "My apologies."

"What the heck was that all about?"

"Erm. I must have fallen asleep. I'm afraid I seldom have pleasant dreams. Please, return to your slumber."

"Remind me to buy you a dreamcatcher, then," Natasha mumbled, laying her head down on her pillow as she turned away from him to fall back asleep.

Loki frowned. He had much preferred her to be touching him, and he felt insulted by her rejection. He was flooded with the desire to seize her and hold her against him, to twine his fingers in her hair again and kiss her and make her regret turning away—He blinked.

What a ridiculously irrational idea, he thought to himself, thoroughly irritated that such foolishness would enter his head. He swung his long legs over the side of the bed, rising to leave.

"Where are you going?" Natasha asked, alarmed by his sudden change in temper.

"I'll be back," he replied curtly. He stepped out into the hallway and began walking to clear his head, with absolutely no idea where he aimed to go. He walked hidden from the cameras and shrouded from eyesight, assuming that no observer would be able to detect him.

For the most part, he was correct. However, there was one exception. And unfortunately for him, the one person capable of seeing him was the one person who least wanted to.