Chapter Text
“He won’t let me in,” the guard complains as they stand outside the cell at the SHIELD holding facility. “He keeps threatening me.”
It’s only her decades of practice in interacting with incompetent company leaders in the corporate world that keeps Pepper from rolling her eyes at this guy. “This is a high tech security prison. Mr. Laufeyson’s powers are rendered inert by the gamma frequencies in this facility, and he’s currently injured, all of which Tony explained to you yesterday before the team left on their mission. What exactly is the threat?”
The guard’s face flushes. “He keeps saying if I come anywhere near him with the medication he’s going to gouge out my eyes and eat them off skewers and remove my ribs one by one to fashion into a xylophone and…” He glances down at his feet and adds the last bit in an indiscernible mumble, “tiemydickintoabow.”
Pepper blinks at him. “He’ll do what now?”
“He’ll um, he’ll take my…” The guard trails off. “My, you know, my penis, and…” He mimics tying a knot near his belt buckle.
Pepper lets out an exasperated sigh. “Just give me the cream.”
The guard's eyes widen. “Um, I wouldn’t do that, ma’am, he’s quite hostile, uh…”
She holds out a hand expectantly. “Cream. Now.”
Warily, the guard fishes the extra-strength antibiotic ointment from his pocket and places it onto Pepper’s open palm. She snags the small medical kit from the man’s desk as she moves determinedly towards the cell door.
The guard calls over, his voice timid, “Uh, did you want some backup, or…?”
She ignores him, punching the access code into the keypad before marching straight in.
Loki is stretched out on the room’s twin-size cot, lying on his stomach, one arm hanging over the edge of the mattress. He’s shirtless and his right shoulder blade is thoroughly bandaged, though the gauze seems to be yellowing around the wound. He looks about as pathetic as Pepper’s ever seen him.
Without bothering to look up, he groans, “Did I not paint a graphic enough picture of what would occur to your genitalia the next time you entered this cell?”
“Honestly, I’d like to see you try,” Pepper retorts as she crosses the room.
Loki raises his head slightly, brow furrowed. “You’re not Dale…”
“Dale says you’re riding the struggle bus today,” Pepper answers shortly. “Sit up.”
Loki scoffs and turns his head back away. “No thank you. You may go.”
Pepper raises an eyebrow at him and crosses her arms over her chest. “I’m not letting SHIELD’s prisoner turn septic on my watch. Now, sit up. I’ve got places to be.”
Loki lifts his head again, this time looking almost amused. “As you wish, dear lady.”
It takes a moment, but slowly, the weakened god pushes himself up to a seated position on the bed. Pepper sets the medical kit down on the room’s small table and flips it open, locating a pair of latex gloves and pulling them on.
As Tony explained it the day before, Loki’s healing factor would normally have taken care of the injury in a matter of hours, but the magic-dampening field that currently prevents his powers from working also inhibits his healing. He’s just as human as anyone else at the moment.
Loki hisses a bit as she peels the old gauze away from the wound. Her nose wrinkles up at the yellow pus weeping from the edges of the gash. “This is infected,” she says simply. “You need to be nicer to Dale when he tries to help and it wouldn’t get like this.”
“He’s a moron,” Loki grumbles as Pepper opens the small bottle of peroxide from the kit and pours it over the wound.
Pepper huffs, putting the bottle back down and picking up the ointment instead. “I never said he wasn’t. But sometimes we need morons to get things done.” She smears a thick layer of antibiotic cream over the cut. “So be nice.”
Loki keeps quiet as she dresses the wound, taping the fresh gauze in place. When she’s finished, she removes the gloves and cleans her hands with the pocket-sized hand sanitizer from her purse before retrieving the bottle of penicillin from the kit and shaking two out into his palm.
“Humans are so weak…” Loki mutters, throwing the pills back into his mouth. He swallows them down with a grimace.
Pepper hands him a water bottle from her bag. “The team won’t be home until Sunday and my schedule is packed, so you better not threaten Dale tomorrow.”
Loki smirks. “We’ll see about that.”