Choices

Chapter 132
Thor slipped into the bed behind Jane. Before coming to bed he'd checked in on their prisoner and was satisfied with his new accommodations. Jane seemed to be fast asleep and he hated to wake her.
He leaned down, gently pushed her tee shirt sleeve up and kissed her arm. "You're back," she murmured.
"I didn't mean to wake you." Thor apologized.
Jane rolled over and looked up at him with a hazy gaze, but she did not smile. Her lack of enthusiasm, even in her half asleep state, worried him. "I didn't mean to be gone for so long." He told her thinking that must be the reason she seemed uneasy.
"You didn't tell me you were married," she said, a look of deep disappointment furrowed in her brow.
Thor didn't know what to say. He wondered how she'd come to know that at all. "I didn't think it was of any importance," Thor said and knew that was certainly not the right thing to say.
"Not important? I feel like I hardly know you." She sat up, wide awake now. "Don't you trust me?" She asked looking hurt.
"My marriage was a childish decision back when I was young and foolish. It means nothing." He continued to dig himself further into his hole.
"Thor, part of a relationship is being open and being honest with one another. Secrets destroy people." She shook her head in disbelief. "It doesn't matter that you and your wife are no longer a couple, I wish you'd have told me."
"I'm sorry Jane. I hadn't been thinking. I think very little on the fact I am married as myself and Sif have been the best of friends for decades now." Thor explained.
"Sif? I met her, twice and you didn't think you should tell me." Jane looked shocked and was possibly more disappointed than before.
"Sif has no ill feelings toward you," Thor assured her.
"I'm not worried about that, I just...," she trailed off. "I would have just liked to have known instead of being blindsided during a normal conversation. I should have heard it from you." She sighed with a frown.
"You're right, I should have been more forthcoming. I'm sorry." He felt bad. He hadn't even thought about it. Hadn't considered how Jane might feel finding out from someone else.
"Thor, honesty is important to me. Being open with each other is important." Jane told him touching his face.
"I'm sorry. I did not think it through. I have been so happy to be with you nothing else crossed my mind. Especially not my past." Thor felt ashamed. "Jane, you know I love you, right?" He became afraid suddenly that maybe things were not as happy as he thought
"I know. I love you too. We'll work on this, on us." She gave a half smile before pulling him down to lay within her arms.
(Loki)
He was big and yet still so small. Loki woke before Cephera and aware of her mood the night before, he knew she was still hurt and angry. He would not push her limits.
Instead, Loki went to see his son. Ikol was sitting up wide awake in his crib and toying with what was left of a plastic toy that had once been hanging on the side.
Cephera had warned Loki that their son was strong and tore many things apart. He was also developing his motorized skills fast. He was not yet a year old and he was sitting up, and crawling when he felt like it. Soon he'd walk and then his strength would become a problem.
By the look of the plastic toy, the crib would soon not hold him.
Instead of trying to take the remnants of the toy, he picked up Ikol. He didn't put up a fuss. He stared at Loki with wide eyes and touched his little hand to his face as if exploring it in curiosity.
Loki smiled.
Even though he was yet considered young, he'd always dreamt of children with Cephera. He was glad he hadn't been in prison longer or worse. He might have missed far more than he already had.
Still, there was a worry hanging in the air that his end would still come early. In this short time he would do what he could with his family.
"Do you hear that?" Cephera asked Loki coming into the room with a robe wrapped around her sleeping attire, her hair still bedridden, and a look of curiosity across her face.
"Hear what?" Loki asked straining his ears in an attempt to hear anything but the usual sounds of the household.
"That faint beeping noise." She shook her head smacking her ear and then frowning. "You don't hear that?" She asked again.
"No." Loki replied. "Are you ill?" He asked in concern.
"No." She answered. "I'm going downstairs to see Dr. Banner." She announced.
"I was unaware he was that kind of doctor." Loki blurted, feeling slightly irritated that his wife relyed on his human enemies for health care. He'd have rathered her go to a hospital than have any of the people within the tower examine her.
She didn't answer his observation. She instead went back to the bedroom and threw on a midgardian dress. Loki hadn't said anything the night before about her clothing choices, but he was also not satisfied with so much of her skin showing. He much more preferred her long elegant dresses over these tiny ones that barely touched her knees.
Unlike Thor, however, Loki was smart to keep his mouth shut. Cephera would not allow him to push her around and tell her how to dress or who to talk to. He wouldn't dream of treating her like his servant, but still, these little things bothered him.
All these years she'd been his and his alone. Only he had seen so much of her and he was comfortable with the best of Asgards healers watching over her. Here he felt he was surrounded by enemies and so his discomfort only grew.
He followed her from the room all the way down to Stark's workshop where his other self was in a cell surrounded by some sort electric bars.
Dr. Banner was stood beside Stark looking over some digital layout. "I'm beeping, why am I beeping?" Cephera asked immediately without so much as a greeting of good morning.
"Oh, she's ovulating," Tony said to Bruce who smiled and obliged Tony his high five.
"It works." Bruce smiled and waved Cephera over.
"I'm ovulating? This beep is due to the implant than?" She asked. Loki looked between them all, becoming more uncomfortable by the second.
"It is. Your sister hasn't come to us yet. Neither has any of your people, and we actually told them what they should expect." Tony replied.
"Why didn't you tell me or Seraphina?" Cephera frowned while Bruce took her temperature.
"Everything beeps here. We didn't want too many false alarms. Now that you know what it sounds like, it'll be easier to identify it." Banner explained.
"What is going on here?" Loki finally asked attempting to keep the grit from his tone.
"Calm down, no reason to get your panties in a twist." Stark's demeaning tone made Loki want to throw him through another window.
"We're helping her people to learn more about their anatomy and understand why they can't conceive." Bruce jumped in before Stark could say anything else.
"You've allowed them to examine you? To implant something inside you?" Loki spat glaring at them all.
"They examined volunteers from Mechanova, but yes I let them place a device inside me that would help." She equally glared back. "The beeping is gone now," she said to Bruce.
"That was quick." Tony noted. "JAVIS, make note of the event. We'll see how long between them."
"I cannot...," Loki began and stopped. His anger at the situation stalled as something he'd once heard came to memory.
'She probably cares for them a great deal. Would do anything for them. She would betray you for your enemies.' It was one of the many whispers he'd heard in his nightmares.
Loki turned to look at Tyr who was smirking through the cells charged bars. He created this animosity inside him. The humans were not harming Cephera, nor would she commit any unthinkable acts with any of them.
"Ikol still needs feeding." Loki changed his tone and swallowed his previous statement.
"Yes." Cephera replied. She knew Loki had been about to explode in anger right before he'd turned to Tyr. The thought of her experiments still made his stomach turn, but he bit back any harsh words he'd wanted to say.
Cephera took Ikol from him and headed back upstairs with Loki behind her. He didn't speak the whole way up.

Notes