Disclaimer: Not mine.

Author's Note: A HUGE thanks to everyone who has reviewed and/or added my other two oneshots to favorites lists. It gave me the courage to experiment with this story. Loki's POV, set directly after the movie and based off the credit scenes. This is the first time I've written in first-person, so please tell me what you think!

"Puny god," the beast growls over its shoulder as it walks away with a shrug of disdain. A wheezing whimper escapes my throat as if in agreement. The beast's words echo in my head in a constant refrain as I lie in the rubble, too stunned and in too much pain to move.

I can hear the war raging outside through the shattered windows. My war, my chaos, the turmoil and blood and death that was supposed to bring this pathetic human world to its knees before me—the war that was meant to buy my freedom from the Master who has given me the scepter. Another moan slips past my bleeding lips as I think of the Master and I hate myself for it. But the thought of the Master's anger—and of the agony, far worse than any physical pain, that the Master can and will inflict upon me—provides enough of an impetus to break through the daze that the beast's attack has left me in.

I shift slowly, hesitantly in the debris, wincing with each slight movement. My entire body is bruised and lacerated, and the leg by which the beast flung me against the ground feels tight and swollen beneath the metal greaves. Nothing is broken, however, and I struggle to sit up. The room seems to tilt as I do so, and the pounding in my head worsens as nausea sweeps over me. I let my battered body sink back against the broken tiles and breathe slowly, fighting my rebelling stomach. The Chitauri can fight on without me for a few minutes more, until this blasted world has stopped spinning around me in sickening circles.

I lift my hand before my face, blinking until my eyes focus properly on my fingers. I watch with a strange sense of wonderment as blood oozes out of a deep cut on the palm of my hand. How, how has a mortal been able to deal so much damage to me, the rightful king of Asgard? It matters not that the mortal is a fearsome, uncontrollable beast with the power of ten frost giants—he is still a mortal, a human, one of those weak, short-lived, pathetic creatures of which my brother is so fond. How many humans have I blasted out of existence in the few days since the Master had first opened the portal to this world? They are so easy to kill, little more than insects crawling in the dirt beneath my feet. Yet they have the temerity to stand against me, I who was born to be a king! Like that human male on the flying fortress, the one who had faced me so calmly, although he lacked any of the powers and abilities that make the so-called Avengers at all remarkable. Even though my scepter had slipped through the human's chest like a knife through soft butter, the human had still faced me with defiance, throwing a challenge in my face as his insignificant life bled out of him. Telling me that I was going to lose because I lacked conviction—

A thought strikes me like my brother's blasted lightning and every muscle in my body freezes, my hand clenching in a fist.

What if I do lose?

More importantly, what if the Chitauri lose?

It seems such an impossibility. After all, the Chitauri army is vast and far more technologically advanced than humankind, yet I can tell from the noises outside that the Chitauri have failed to breach the defenses put in place by the Avengers. What if the Avengers manage to hold off the alien invaders until the human armies can come to the battle? If one mortal can do this much physical damage to me, and if six humans alone can keep an entire army penned up by the portal, then is it possible for the Chitauri to be defeated?

I shiver. The Master would be extremely—displeased—if his Chitauri army were destroyed. And the Master would undoubtedly blame me for its destruction. After all, I was the one to assure the Master that the humans were weak, sniveling creatures who were so intent on murdering each other that they could not look beyond the boundaries of their own world to the dangers of the universe.

If I fail—if the Chitauri fail—then the Master will come through the portal himself to deal with this human world—and his servant. For a moment I long for the green beast to return and beat me into oblivion, and I realize that at some time since the start of the battle I have given up hope of succeeding in vanquishing this world. What was it that the human called Stark had said? Ah, yes. There is no throne. It appears he was right. For me, there will only be the pain of humiliation, the agony of defeat, and the certain knowledge that my suffering will never end, for the Master will never grow tired of punishing me for my failure.

Suddenly I'm laughing. This is a weakness of mine, a tendency that has always irritated my—no, Thor's father, the uncontrollable, hysterical giggling that ripples off of my silver tongue whenever I find myself in a situation of my own creation over which I no longer have any control.

A whining hum fills the air, drowning out my chuckles, and I lift myself on my elbows to peer across the room. The bright red blur of the human Stark's battle suit shoots by the window, steering what looks like a massive white arrow. I recognize the white device as one of the weapons of mass destruction the human Barton told me about under the Tesseract's influence.

A few seconds later I hear the explosion of the weapon detonating, and it seems both far away and incredibly close, the sound distorted by the portal. More explosions follow, but these resonate from below, echoing off the buildings surrounding the tower. Suddenly everything is quiet, and I hold my breath, straining to hear through the residual ringing in my ears.

The silence is overwhelming, unnerving, terrifying, and I cannot understand why. Then I realize that it is a silence I have not experienced in several months—or is it years? I still have no real notion of how long a time I spent under the Master's tutelage.

Now I know what is wrong with the silence. It is the Tesseract that is silent. The Tesseract, the gem of Odin's treasure room, no longer thrills and hums and dances in my blood, connected to me through the scepter. Instead, it sleeps once more.

The humans have done the impossible. They have defeated the Chitauri army. They have closed the portal.

They have closed the portal, with the Master trapped on the other side of the universe.

A sigh of relief shakes my frame like a leaf in a high wind. The humans will come for me, I know, full of righteous anger and a burning need to avenge their fallen comrades, preferably on my hide, but the pains they inflict on me will seem sweet in comparison to what I would have suffered at the Master's hands. Briefly I consider fleeing the tower, but I know that my brother will never stop hunting me, and I am so very weary. The connection I held with the scepter is draining away, taking its power with it and leaving me empty and alone, no longer burdened with my all-consuming purpose.

I decide to wait for the humans and my brother to come for me. I close my eyes and listen to the silence of the Tesseract's sleep.

It takes the humans much longer than I expect to come for me. The creaking of the elevator heralds their arrival, and pride forces me to roll to my side and crawl out of the hole the beast bludgeoned into the floor with my body. It is harder to move than I thought it would be, and I wonder idly if the beast has managed to fracture a few of my bones after all. I bend my knee as I crawl, and my leg screams in protest. I have barely reached the low steps leading to the upper part of the room when their shadows fall over me. I stop my painful efforts to rise and decide that my pride will have to be content with leaning against the stairs. I turn to face them slowly, and take a moment to observe them.

Stark stands on the far left of the small group, his bare head looking small and incongruous atop his battered armor, the circle of light in his chest flickering every few seconds like a dying firefly. The beast looms protectively over his shoulder, growling in a continuous low rumble. The soldier stands beside the beast, back straight and shoulders squared despite the ugly burn wound slashing down his side. The human Barton, my one-time slave, crouches in front of the soldier, an arrow aimed directly between my eyes. I can see the tension in Barton's arms and the hatred in his shadowed eyes. My brother stands by the archer's shoulder, and I know he has chosen that position on purpose, in case Barton's hatred gets the better of him and he releases the arrow, so that my brother—my idiotic, sentimental brother—will be able to deflect the arrow. I look at the female last, and am surprised by her once again. My brief verbal bout with her on the flying fortress has taught me to respect her skills and her determination. Of all the humans I have encountered, she is the most like me—not constrained by simpleminded notions of honor, but willing to do whatever is necessary to fulfill her goals. We had recognized the darkness in each other, and I know that she hates me for it. But she looks at me now with something akin to pity and cradles my scepter in her arms as a mother might hold her infant.

I find myself marveling at this small group, at these Avengers. I ripped them apart, using the scepter's power to influence their actions, I revealed their darkest secrets and turned their deepest fears into weapons to be used against them. I left them shattered, scattered, bitter, their every weakness opened like gaping wounds into which I rubbed my barbed words like the harshest salt. I thought them broken, yet here they are assembled before me, looking as weary as I feel. But they are standing despite their weariness and wounds, their heads unbowed, while I sprawl before them, surrounded by the ruins of my dreams.

My enemies. My conquerors. And, though they do not know it—and the words will never pass from my lips—my saviors.

This last thought, this final irony, makes me smile, and I grin at the Avengers, the boyish grin that had always gotten me out of trouble as a child. "If it's all the same to you, I think I'll have that drink now," I say in a winning, charming voice, wincing slightly as my voice rasps in my bruised throat.

The Avengers' reactions to my words and smile are as myriad as their personalities. The woman arches an eyebrow at my cheek, while the archer's eyes narrow, his arm trembling as he draws the bowstring even tauter. My brother sighs, hurt replacing the anger in his eyes as he remembers all of the times that smile had gotten us both out of trouble. The soldier's frown deepens, but he raises his shield, barring the beast's path as the beast moves as if to lunge forward to smash my aching body against the floor one more time. Stark shifts restlessly, his armor creaking.

"No," the human says shortly, his mouth shutting sharply on the monosyllable. I'm impressed by the venom in the word, by the emotions teeming beneath the single syllable. Stark jerks his head in my direction, and the green beast moves forward as the soldier steps out of the way. The beast picks me up in a crushing grip, and I wince but hang limp and unresisting in the massive green arms. My brother, the archer, and the soldier follow the beast to the elevator while the woman and Stark stay behind, the woman moving to assist Stark in peeling off his armor.

The four men who accompany me to the makeshift prison they have built several floors below are silent on the elevator ride. The beast has me in a grip tight enough to crush a frail human body and my ribs complain in protest, but my brother watches to ensure that the beast allows me enough air to continue breathing. The archer stares at me like the predator he is named for until the elevator doors open and he leads my odd honor guard out onto a concrete floor. My brother walks beside the beast, while the soldier brings up the rear. I cannot see him, but I can hear the slight falter in his step as he limps forward, and I wonder why he has been chosen for this duty, wounded as he is.

The prison they have built for me is a twisted mass of glass, metal, wire, and concrete. The archer punches a code into a console adhered to one of the metal girders and a door swings open. The beast tosses me inside and slams the door shut. I roll to my knees as I hit the cold floor and raise my head, trying to appear as if I am in their prison only because I desire to be here. The archer punches something into the console once again, and energy crackles along the wires and metal surrounding the prison. The smell of the energy is sharp and acidic; it burns my nose.

"Touch anything but the floor and you'll be fried," the soldier warns me.

Pride forces my chin back. "Do you really think that will prevent me from escaping if I so desire?" I taunt him, and I push myself to my feet, gathering my shredded dignity about me like a cloak.

The soldier's eye twitches. "Fine. Try to escape, and we'll let the Hulk smash you some more." The beast bares his broad, flat teeth in a gruesome smile at this reply.

My injured leg trembles even as he speaks, and now that the adrenaline and dread of the Master's ire is fading with the portal's closing, I no longer find myself desiring to face the beast once more. All the same, I force myself to smirk at my captors, hiding my weakness and exhaustion behind a mask of arrogance.

They ignore me and turn away, heading back for the elevator, the beast shrinking back into his human form, one hand holding his shredded trousers around his waist. My brother does not look back, saying nothing as he leaves me in this human prison, and anger boils in my stomach. "What, no guard?" I call after them. They make no response, they do not even pause, except for the archer, who makes a strange gesture over his shoulder with his hand, which I can only assume has an insulting meaning in this realm.

They turn the lights off as they step into the elevator, leaving me in darkness except for the blue flames of energy dancing along the walls of my prison. It is the same shade of blue as the Tesseract.

The archer returns a few hours later. He says nothing to me, does not even approach my prison, but he does turn the lights back on, freeing me from my hypnotic contemplation of the blue flames surrounding me. He perches among the rafters and stares at me unblinkingly. I stare back at him, insults and verbal jabs dancing at the tip of my tongue, but I hold them back. I try to tell myself it is because this is not the right time and that he is too easy a target, but the true reason is that I am weary, weary beyond belief, to the point where not even my pride can keep me on my feet.

So I sit on the hard concrete floor and stare at the human, and he sits on the metal beam he has made into his nest and stares back. Several minutes—or possibly several hours, I am so weary I can no longer judge the passing of time—pass this way, until the elevator clangs open and the soldier steps out, startling us both enough to break our locked gazes from each other.

"Barton," he calls up, and the smaller human swings down from the rafters, falling lightly to the ground beside him. The soldier murmurs something to him; I cannot hear what it is he says over the insistent hum of my prison. Whatever he says disagrees with the archer, who shakes his head and argues with the taller man in an equally soft tone. The soldier interrupts him, repeating his name in a firm voice. The archer sighs, nods grudgingly, and spares one last cutting glare for me before disappearing into the elevator.

Although I could not hear their words, their movements, their stances, every nuance of their brief interaction provides me with worlds of information. I smile at the soldier as he limps to my prison. He has changed out of his uniform into the soft clothes these weak humans prefer. I can see the outline of thick bandages wrapped around his torso beneath his thin tunic.

"They've made you their leader," I say to him, not bothering to hide the amusement and derision in my voice. "The man out of time, the warrior from a forgotten war—"

"Shut up," he interrupts, his voice clipped. He enters a new code into my prison's console and I am struck by the contrast between his movements now and Barton's from earlier when they first threw me into this cage. Barton had practically slammed his fist against the keypad, his hand moving with the swift, hard gestures of a terrible anger barely restrained and the easy assurance of a man well used to such technology, sparing a single glance at the placement of the keys on the console. The man who stands before me now, however, makes it painfully clear how out of time he truly is. His very hesitancy and exaggerated care as he firmly and slowly presses his fingers against the keypad betray his acute ignorance of such technology. He even looks momentarily surprised when a window slides open by the console.

The soldier tosses a small bundle through the window and it lands with unerring accuracy by my feet. Curious, I tug the bundle open, revealing a thin, soft blanket coiled around a roll of bandages, a tiny, yellow tube of ointment, a single bottle of water, and several square bars of what humans laughingly term food wrapped in strange, metallic paper. I open the tube of ointment and sniff it, recoiling at the astringent odor. I raise my eyebrows at the soldier. "I'd rather have the drink Stark offered me earlier," I comment drily. The soldier breathes heavily through his nose and hooks his thumbs behind his belt buckle, but remains silent. I shrug, disappointed and bored. I wish that one of the other Avengers had taken on the responsibility of feeding and watering their prisoner; even my staring contest with the archer or having to face my brother's injured look would be more diverting than trying to bait this mute statue of a man.

The ointment stings as I gingerly rub it into the lacerations on my face and hands, but when the sting fades the heat of my wounds seems to cool slightly. The soldier continues to watch me as I strip the metal greaves from my injured leg and quickly wrap the bandages around my swollen knee. He says nothing, his face impassive, as I reposition my armor above the bandages, loosening the leather straps by a mere hair's breadth—my only concession to the pain that still radiates up and down my leg.

I have become so used to his silence that the sound of his voice startles me when he speaks as I open the bottle of water and raise it to my lips. "You're taking this awfully calmly," he says, and I can hear the puzzlement and wariness in his words.

I take my time, swilling the water in my mouth, drinking half of the bottle before I reply. "Would you prefer that I rage and scream against my fate?" I ask. "Or did you desire to see me cower at your feet and beg you to spare my life?" I laugh softly. "I do so hate to disappoint you, but I will do neither."

His eyes narrow slightly. "For a man who wanted to take over the world, you don't seem to care much that you've lost." He steps closer to my prison, until he is almost touching the glass. "In fact, you looked pretty relieved when we captured you upstairs." His head cocks to the side. "Stark thinks that you just didn't want to go another round with the Hulk, but do you know what I think?"

I sneer at him. "Enlighten me."

"I think you didn't really want this war."

"Then you're a fool," I snap back at him.

He laughs, a single short release of air that is almost noiseless, the corner of his mouth twisting up in a wry smile. "Maybe, but I think I'm right. I've seen war, Loki. And I've seen men who want war—they don't hide away inside like a child scared of a thunderstorm. They're out in the blood and death, fighting and killing and loving it. But as soon as the invasion started, you disappeared."

The contempt in his voice infuriates me, and I realize I'm standing, so close to the walls of my prison that the blue lightning holding me in my cage singes my hair. "Perhaps you did not notice," I hiss at him, "but I was slightly preoccupied with your beast."

"And that took, what, all of thirty seconds?" he throws back at me. "I've watched the footage on the security tapes—what about the rest of the hour we were fighting against your damn army? Where were you then?"

"You were beneath my notice."

He laughs again. "That the best you got?" He's smiling now, but there is no mirth in his eyes. "No, you didn't want this war, Loki," he continues. "Thor said you told him it was too late to stop the war, which means that at some point you thought about stopping it, but you gave up and ran away instead of trying to stop it—just like you gave up without a fight at the end of the battle."

I shrug nonchalantly. "My hired army was destroyed," I pointed out. "Even I will admit that it would be very difficult to conquer an entire world singlehandedly." But not for the Master, I think and do not say.

"Where did your army come from, anyway?"

"From a place far beyond your pathetic comprehension, human," I answer. I am quickly growing weary with this mortal. He lacks the human woman's subtlety, or even Stark's brash, rapid-fire wit. Indeed, he is as simpleminded as my brother—

"Let me rephrase my question. Who gave you that army?"

Perhaps he is not quite as simpleminded as I thought.

I turn away from him slightly, peering at him from the corner of my eye, taking a moment to prepare my response, but my hesitation is a miscalculation. I have given him an opening and he takes it like the trained warrior that he is. "I think someone's been using you as a pawn, Loki," he says, his voice suddenly confident. "Just like you tried to play us, turning us against each other. Only this person has used your jealousy to turn you against your brother and against Earth."

I study him out of the corner of my eye. I am certain that he is—what is the human term?—bluffing. He is shooting in the dark, but his words are coming too near the truth, and I will not—cannot—mention the Master in any way. It does not matter that the portal is closed; the Master will find a way to come to this useless rock, and I am not foolish enough to betray his coming to these mortals. This human has dealt me a blow, though he cannot know it for certain, and it is time that I turn the tables against him.

"You should be thanking me," I tell him, and now I am prowling the perimeters of my prison, not a caged beast but a predator on the offensive, circling my prey.

"Thanking you?" the human repeats, disdain clear in his flat tone.

I am grinning at him now, a feral grin that bares my teeth. "Oh, yes," I say in a sibilant whisper, and my superior eyesight catches the minute changes in his stance, the stiffening of the muscles in his back and neck, the tightening of the jaw, the flat line of the lips—oh, yes, I repeat silently, because the human knows my attack is coming, his body bracing as if for a blow. "You see, I know all about you, Captain," and his title is a javelin that I hurl at him. "Barton told me everything that was in your file. The soldier," and the word drips with venom, "from another age, a warrior without a war, a fighter without a cause. Your precious realm forgot about you, left you behind in the dusty pages of history. What was it that Stark said to you? That's right—that you are of no use."

The human's face is still and impassive, but his knuckles whiten around his belt. My words have struck deep and hard, and I have only just begun. I can feel my heart pounding in time with my words, with my silver-tongued dagger. "You are nothing. Your friends, your family, your entire world has been dead and forgotten for generations. Peggy Carter, James Barnes, Abraham Erskine, Chester Phillips—" he flinches with each name—"their faces haunt you, don't they? Their voices whisper to you in the dark, they murmur what you know to be true, that you do not belong in this new world, that you failed them, abandoned them, that you should have died—"

Those blue eyes are open wounds in his white face, he is so easy to break, and I am panting now, the poison flowing from my mouth in a torrent of words. "How painful it must be, how pathetic you are," I spit at him. "The great war hero, the pinnacle of perfection for your generation reduced to a mewling, helpless babe! How many keepers did the humans assign to you, to protect you from a reality you cannot understand, that you refuse to accept? How many days did you spend hiding in the staged room they prepared for you, how many nights did you stand on the edge and dream about how much better it would be for everyone if you just took that final step into oblivion?" My words are chains that he cannot escape. "You've seen their looks, you know what your companions think. You've seen their doubts, their disdain, their contempt for you, you who are nothing more than a living relic, a museum piece! You name me a pawn, yet what are you, Captain? You are nothing more than a broken toy dredged up from some refuse heap only to be thrown at the ravening wolves for the simple fact that you are expendable. So, yes, Captain, you should be thanking me, for I gave you one last chance for glory, an escape from the empty charade that has become your life, a final opportunity for an honorable death—"

I pause, gathering my words for a final thrust. We stand facing each other now, our chests heaving as if we have been battling with fists rather than words. He is fragile, this human, the most fragile of all the Avengers. I can see the cracks beneath the hard surface, and I find the weakest point and strike in a quiet, deadly voice. "An opportunity you did not take, because you, you who speak with such eloquence of self-sacrifice, are too afraid, too much of a coward, to face the unending darkness, the coldness of death."

I expect him to shatter, to turn away, to yield to the depression and all-consuming loneliness that I know have dogged his steps for months—to run. Instead, he takes a deep breath, and I can almost hear the cracks in his psyche expanding and spreading. He reaches up, pressing a code into the keypad. The energy bars in my cage sputter and die. He pulls the door open and steps forward until our chests are almost touching.

"You done?" he asks politely, quietly.

His blue eyes are cold and shuttered; for the first time since I encountered him in Germany I cannot read him. "For now," I reply after a moment.

His fist moves faster than one of Barton's arrows and I can feel the skin of his knuckles splitting with the force of the impact of his fist against my jaw. The strength of every muscle in his body is behind the blow and I fly backwards through the air before I slam against the far wall of my prison. I fall in a heap on the floor, gasping like a fish out of water. I open my mouth to hurl another insult at him, but pain explodes in my jaw, searing my cheek and ear. I touch my face gingerly and feel something give way slightly. Shock and disbelief weaken my limbs to the point that I can do nothing but squirm ineffectively as he comes to stand over me.

"If I'm the one who's afraid, then why are you the one who's always running away?" he asks me. Blood drips from his split knuckles onto the blanket, staining the white wool a pale pink. "Because you are nothing more than a spoiled child," he answers his own question when I remain silent. "You get into situations that you can't control, and when you realize that you're in over your head, you run instead of standing and facing the consequences of your actions like a real man." He crouches beside me until our heads are almost level. His tone is not threatening like Stark's had been at the top of the tower. It is calm and even, and filled with such a determination that I begin to realize why the Avengers have made this broken creature their leader. "It must burn you," the human continues, echoing my words to Fury from the flying fortress, "to have come so close to defeating us only to lose everything you've fought for. That's the difference between us, Loki. Your immortality and magic don't matter, because no matter what you throw at us, we will always stand and fight, and we will never give up." As if to emphasize his words, he stands and walks away, a picture of perfect military bearing, throwing one last parting shot over his shoulder. "And you can tell that to whoever sent you here."

"A threat?" I mumble through my broken jaw.

He pauses in the doorway to my prison. "A promise," he replies. Then he tosses something into my lap, and I pick it up in surprise. It is the small tube of healing ointment. "Put that on your face," he orders, pointing at the tube. "It'll help with the swelling."

"Actually I think the swelling is an improvement," a voice calls from across the room, and the soldier and I both swivel our heads in surprise. "The red adds a bit of color," Stark continues, gesturing to his own face, "sort of breaks up the whole dead-white-thing-living-beneath-a-rock look you've got going on." The beast stands beside Stark in his human form, smiling and shaking his head in exasperation at the other's sarcasm.

"Stark, Dr. Banner," the soldier says, the tiniest hitch in his voice, and I know that he is wondering how much of my verbal assault against him the other men have heard. "What are you doing here?" He closes the prison door and reignites the energy bars, looking at neither the other humans nor me, focusing instead on the console.

"Den mother here was getting worried," Stark says in a carefully casual voice, jerking his head at the beast, and the soldier and I both realize that they had heard enough. "He said it's time to tuck you into bed, and he's not afraid to Hulk out on you if you argue." Then Stark grins irrepressibly. "Sounds like some kinky fun times to me, unless you wanna keep playing S&M with Reindeer Games."

The soldier finally turns to face Stark, frowning in confusion. I am glad that I am not the only one in the room who does not understand what Stark means by "Ess-and-Emm"—and what is a reindeer, anyway? The humans' use of their own language is often baffling, though considering that Stark is using the same suggestive tone from when he referenced my "performance issues," I find myself sympathizing with the suspicion lying behind the soldier's confusion.

"Tony," the beast chides before the soldier can respond. Then he smiles at the soldier. "Come on, Steve, Jarvis can stand guard for the night. Thor will be back in the morning with the restraints." The beast nods his head in my direction. "He doesn't look like he's in any shape to go anywhere tonight."

The soldier nods grudgingly and joins the other humans. He walks between them, the beast's hand resting on his shoulder, his head cocked to hear something Stark has said in a low voice with a wicked grin. During my entire conversation with him, the soldier had kept his back straight and his shoulders squared, but now his manner is relaxed, his shoulders slumping slightly as he finally lets his guard down enough to reveal his weariness to his companions. They enter the elevator, leaving me in darkness once again.

Watching the three humans, I suddenly realize my greatest mistake, the root of my defeat. I had accused Fury of being desperate to bring them together, these humans so haunted by their own failures and darkest secrets. I had not been wrong when I had called the Avengers lost creatures. They had not found themselves in the battle; they are still as lost in their own lives as they were before my invasion. I have wounded them, each and every one of them, and they are fragile, and more vulnerable than ever.

My mistake was allowing them to find each other.

I laugh, bitterness rising in my gut. "You should be thanking me," I whisper into the darkness.