Darcy never managed to get to sleep. She lay in bed, her entire body pressed against Loki’s in the dark, and stared at the wall beyond the bed. She had no plan for escape, neither from Loki nor from SHIELD. Every avenue she silently explored in the dark led to the same thing. She didn’t know the language. She didn’t have any means of leaving the country. Their allies seemed less and less willing to help them as time went on. This was going to be her life, and she would have to learn to deal with it.

Loki seemed intent on giving her plenty of practise in that department. He woke far earlier than he needed to, while the sky outside was still dark, announced by his hands touching and exploring her body again.

"Stop it," Darcy said before she could stop herself.

Loki did, but only long enough to roll back on top of her and force himself between her legs. "It is not your place to tell me what to do," he said, with a familiar dark edge to his voice.

"I’m sorry," Darcy said quickly, trying to shrink away from him as much as possible while being pinned beneath him.

She could feel his dick against her thigh, still soft in a way that suggested it wouldn’t be for long. She held still, hoping it would be enough, and knowing it wouldn’t.

He kissed her again, and his mouth stung with sulphur. He moved against her, getting hard against her leg as Darcy tried to squirm out from under him. When he forced herself inside her, Darcy whined loudly, no longer caring if he knew how much he hurt her. He knew exactly how much he hurt her, and he did it deliberately. He burned inside her, too big and too fast, and her too dry for any of it, and all she could do was try to get away. She pushed against him with one hand while using the other to punch at him wildly, knowing he was only going to hurt her no matter what she did. One hit connected with his face, and suddenly everything went still. Loki stopped fucking her long enough to grab her wrist, pinning it down with all of his weight. Then he leaned up enough to slap her across the face hard enough to make her see white.

“Know your place, or I will beat it into you,” he said through his teeth.

He started fucking her again, putting his entire body into making her hurt. He held both her wrists in one hand, pinning them above her head, while the other was on her shoulder, shoving her against him in time with his own motions. She cried and screamed and choked, knowing nobody would ever hear her. Still she tried to buck him off, to squirm away from him. She tried to kick him, but he had her pinned and unable to make contact in any meaningful way. Somehow, suddenly, she managed to squirm enough that he was no longer inside her. She cried even harder at the relief, but it didn’t last long. Again, he slapped her across the face before forcing his way back in, and something changed in his weight on top of her. He was too heavy against her, and she screamed at the feeling of her hips being pulled apart. She couldn’t fight back any longer, too consumed by the pain his entire body caused her. She begged him with her words and with her tears to stop, but he didn’t. Instead, he made desperate little noises in her ear like he was having trouble finishing. He fucked even harder, even faster, and all Darcy could do about it was cry. He bit at her neck, because that’s what he liked, while his hand moved from her shoulder to her tit. He shifted again, taking her with him as he found a new angle that let him get even deeper inside her, hurting her in a brand new way. Then his hand was on her ass, forcing their bodies together as he bruised and abused her body inside and out.

When he finally finished with a loud shout in her ear, he barely kept himself from fully collapsing on top of her. She could feel him trembling against her as he panted, rough and hot and ragged against her neck. She could feel his dick still pulsing as he finished deep inside her, and it burned. It burned like nothing she had ever experienced before, and though she needed to get away, her body was too wrecked to do anything but tremble in turn.

"I will not warn you again," he said after a moment. "I will only protect you if you do as I say. Or I can leave you here, broken and used for SHIELD to find."

Darcy nodded, but said nothing. She continued to cry, slowly running out of energy to even do that. It was done, and if she was lucky, he wouldn’t do it again.

Instead, Loki kissed her, still on top of her and inside her, and she wondered what he was doing. If the harsh taste on his mouth meant he was hiding her, or doing something else to her. She wondered if he could force her to do as he said. She wondered if that would make it easier.

Then he rolled off her and disappeared into the bathroom, closing the door between them. Darcy looked around the dark room, wondering if she should get up and leave. She still didn’t know where their bag was, but she could find it and get dressed and slip out before he noticed.

But she didn’t do any of that. Because if she did, she’d be in a foreign country, where she didn’t speak the language, dodging SHIELD agents that were lurking around every corner. She stayed where she was, closing her legs tightly together against the intrusion she could still feel as though he were still inside her, and pulled the blankets up tightly around her while the sounds of Loki starting the shower filled the silence in the room. She had plenty of time to leave. And it was the last thing she wanted to do.

Instead, she waited in a tense silence for Loki to come back out, still quietly sobbing as tears soaked her cheeks. When he finally did return, he stopped in the doorway, back lit against the light from the bathroom. She thought she could see him smile. He walked over to the bed and sat down next to her, leaning over to stroke her with a false tenderness that made Darcy want to scream.

“I will not tolerate disobedience,” he said, his words completely at odds with his touch. “Do not make me remind you again. I will not be as patient next time.”

Darcy nodded, and closed her eyes when Loki bent to lay a kiss on her forehead. He had delivered his punishment, and now he was back to soft words and gentle touch, and if Darcy put any thought into it at all, she might start crying and never stop.

“Good. Now put yourself together. We’ll no doubt be leaving shortly.”

Darcy looked toward the window, and the creeping light of a dawn that came late in the morning filtering through the curtains. A moment later, Loki got up and moved to the other side of the bed, pulling the bag from where he’d stashed it against the wall, just out of her sight. They were completely out of clean clothes, and she watched him dig through everything to find something that didn’t completely reek. All he found was another shirt, and moved to pick up the jeans he’d discarded the day before. Only once he was dressed did Loki leave the bag for Darcy to pick through. She didn’t care what she grabbed, or how dirty it was. She grabbed the first things her fingers touched, trying to dress behind the covers to keep Loki’s gaze off of her. As she moved, she thought she could still feel him inside her, a deep burn triggered by every tiny little motion. She thought about everything he’d left inside her, and realised that over the past week, he had fucked her and came inside her more times than there had been days.

Darcy felt her blood run cold as she recalled other things he’d said. Things that in the moment had been benign and harmless. He was so goddamn sure he could get her pregnant, despite being from the other side of the galaxy. And she realised with a sudden horror that he knew from experience. He’d been to Earth before. Some of the people they’d met practically spoke his language. Darcy wondered how many women had given birth to his children over the centuries, and why he hadn’t made any of them his so-called queen.

Or maybe he had. And maybe he’d got bored with them.

Darcy drew in a deep, shuttering breath as her entire body began to tremble again. She grabbed the sheet covering her and used it to dry herself, not even caring about the slick, sticky smear she left behind. In the dim light, Darcy thought she could see blood, and wasn’t surprised. She wanted to dig deep inside herself and pull everything out, but it was too late. Even if she could reach what Loki had just put inside her, it hadn’t been the first time he’d fucked her.

Most the time, she had even let him. Even after he had told her exactly what he wanted to do to her, she had laid back and allowed it to happen, without a single word of protest.

Loki had known he could get her pregnant, and at that moment, Darcy knew that he had. There was no possible way she could know, but something deep down inside her knew all the same. Maybe he could smell it and knew how to time it. Maybe it was magic that allowed it to happen, regardless of whether she was at the right point in her cycle. Or maybe he was just a tough motherfucker all around, and his sperm could survive inside her long enough to wait it out for the rest of the month if needed. But he was so goddamned confident at having already got her pregnant that she knew he had done exactly that.

Let’s not worry about things that won’t happen.

The words echoed in Darcy’s mind, over and over and over again. He knew, and Darcy wanted to puke.

Loki approached her again, sitting close against her. She had to fight the urge to flinch away, though she couldn’t stop herself from trembling as he wrapped his arm tight around her shoulders.

“Now what troubles you?” he asked in a voice that was as much false as it was calm.

Darcy shook her head, unable to find her voice. She could not force herself to give words to the fear that suddenly consumed her. She could not believe he had the balls to ask her that at all.

Loki smiled again and kissed her, and for once it didn’t taste of sulphur. It was just a kiss, and somehow that was worse.

“I’ll take you far away from here,” he said, sitting up again and pulling her close against his chest. “You won’t have these troubles any longer. Not if I can help it.”

She breathed deeply, trying to maintain her wits as the full weight of everything came crashing down upon her. She thought maybe he had only said those things to get under her skin, but she knew that wasn’t the case. He’d said those things because they were true. He told pretty little lies full of false hopes and assurances. The horrible things he said were always true. He was going to take her away and hold onto her until he got bored and found something else to occupy his attention. And then…

And then what? Darcy had no idea. He wouldn’t let her go home, and she wouldn’t be able to even if he did. She was stuck with no other options than to do as he said and hope for the best. And maybe the best would be that he did forget about her. Maybe the best would be Darcy stuck on another planet, ignored and forgotten while Loki turned his cruelty to someone else. Either way, she knew she had not just the rest of her life chained to him, but the rest of his as well. Because just like he knew he could get her pregnant, he knew that somehow, through some means he had yet kept to himself, Darcy would live long enough to forget anything other than a life chained to him.

She let him hold her, because she didn’t want to know what he’d do if she tried to move away. She ignored his gentle whispers of false assurances, and his soft touch. It was all fake, and she knew it. Sooner or later, she’d say something wrong, or do something else he didn’t like, and that soft touch would turn mean again. And every time he got mean, it got worse. He had never slapped her before. She didn’t want to even think about what he might do next. Even as she tried to ignore all of it, a tiny voice in her head reminded her that at least he’d only slapped her this time. That at least she hadn’t spent the entire trip being slapped around. Before, even when she’d hit him, he hadn’t hit back. But he hadn’t used his hands to hurt. He used his words and his body, and that tiny voice told her she was lucky for it. He hadn’t beaten her, leaving her bloody and bruised. He’d left marks on her body, but not from that.

And he’d left marks in other ways. Marks that couldn’t be seen by looking.

Until now. Now she had pushed a brand new button, and he hadn’t even hesitated. Her face still burned where he’d struck her, but she couldn’t bring herself to reach up and touch it, afraid of what she might find.

She knew soon those slaps would become something much worse though. Open hands would turn to fists. And fists would turn to weapons. And knowing that made her grateful that he had only slapped her. Knowing that had made her grateful that the abuse had not been worse.

He had done that to her, knowingly and intentionally. And now he held her as she tried not to cry, wearing only a shirt, in a hotel room in a foreign country, so far from anyone who could help her. He had done that too. When he took her with him, he had known that she wouldn’t be able to leave him. He had known she’d be too eager to help, until it was too late. She didn’t want to help now. He didn’t need it. He’d been getting by perfectly fine on his own, but now he kept her around for a different reason. She wasn’t here to help. She was his prize; his trophy. Something he could take home as a reminder of his victory against the people who wanted him dead.

She wondered if he’d planned it this way from the start.