They flew over the water, and all Darcy could think about was plunging into it. She remembered what Ken had said, how drowning wasn’t going to be the problem. The frigid temperatures would probably kill her first, assuming she even survived impact. Every time the plane rocked or dipped in the air, Darcy took a tighter hold around Loki’s waist, hoping and praying that he’d be able to get them away if they did start to fall from the sky. Every time the plane rocked or dipped in the air, Darcy knew this was the moment they were going to fall from the sky. And every time, they kept flying.

When the captain came over the speakers, saying more things Darcy didn’t understand, Loki sat up a bit more straight in his seat.

"What’d he say?" she asked, looking up at him.

"We’ll be landing soon," Loki said.

He looked around the cabin, his own anxiety written plainly across his face. He looked even more like he had the night she’d found him, obviously scared and confused despite his efforts to hide it. Somehow they’d made it this far, and she knew exactly what he was afraid of, because she was afraid of it too.

"How far is it from where we’re going to Torshaow?" Darcy asked. "Do you remember?"

Loki shook his head. "A few hours, by horse," he said. "Assuming you can find a ferry."

Darcy didn’t know how fast a horse went, but she was willing to bet a car would be a lot faster. Which meant they were almost there. It wouldn’t be long at all before they were on another planet, with no more opportunities to get away. And Darcy had no idea what to do. She wondered if she might be able to slip away at the airport somehow, but the same problem of not speaking the language and not knowing how to leave an island on her own put a quick stop to that train of thought.

As the plane began its descent, Darcy could feel Loki tense up even more. He held onto her tightly as she pressed herself against his side, trying not to feel like her stomach was going to fall out. It was a controlled descent, and she knew it, but her entire mind, body, and soul was convinced that they were about to fall out of the sky.

"Listen to every word I say," Loki said stiffly. "And don’t run out of here like a maniac like you did last time."

Darcy nodded. "Okay," she said. "I won’t. I promise."

She could feel Loki looking around, and she knew exactly what he was looking for. SHIELD knew they were going to Tórshavn, and would probably be waiting for them to land. They knew because Darcy had told them. Maybe not directly, but it was her own words that had undoubtedly done it. She wondered what had happened to Lil, or Mike, or any of the other people who had helped them get where they were going. She wondered what had happened to Lil, and knew it wouldn’t be anything good. She wondered if anyone else had been arrested.

Darcy had done this all because what they had done to Loki had been wrong on every level. She was trying to prevent him from getting hurt by them again, and all she’d done was get other people hurt instead.

A tiny part of her thought maybe Loki wouldn’t be so mean anymore once they got to Alfheim. He’d only started going out of his way to hurt her once he thought she’d dobbed him in. She thought that maybe if they could get there without being seen, he’d know she hadn’t done it intentionally. She had to think it would be all right, because if she didn’t, Darcy didn’t think she’d be able to do what needed to be done. She had to trust him to make the right choices, because if she couldn’t trust him, she wouldn’t be able to do what he said. And if she couldn’t do that, the alternative would be even worse.

They landed, and the world didn’t end, and Darcy was still breathing. As the plane taxied to its spot on the runway, Darcy looked up at Loki to try to figure out what his next move was going to be. He watched over the small crowd, still frowning. Once the plane finally stopped and the hatch opened, Loki finally unbuckled his seatbelt and stood up. For a moment, Darcy thought he was going to leave their bag behind, but he fetched it out of the bin above them and swung it over his shoulder. They wouldn’t need it, but Darcy figured they’d look more like they belonged if they took it with. She didn’t know how long Loki could continue to hide them, or how well he’d managed it without smearing blood all over the place, so any little boost they could get would help. Even if that meant carrying around a bag full of disgusting, dirty laundry.

Once there was room for her to stand, Darcy unbuckled her own belt and shuffled into the aisle. They were the last ones to be getting off the plane, and every single person in front of them seemed to be taking their sweet time. One by one, the crowd in front of them got off, and they slowly made their way up the aisle. With Loki in front of her, Darcy tried to hide behind him, out of view of whatever or whoever they’d find on the tarmac. As he stepped out onto the stairs, Darcy braced for the worst; for shouting and chaos and another big fight with guns and government spooks. But it didn’t happen. There was no shouting. Nobody pointing guns. Just a crowd of travellers lazily heading across the tarmac toward the terminal.

Darcy quickened her step to keep up with Loki. He reached out for her, but before he could grab her wrist and crush it again, Darcy took his hand. He still held too tightly, but at least this way she didn’t feel quite so much like she was being dragged along.

"Not so tight, please," Darcy said.

He didn’t loosen his grip. He held on like a vise as he walked through the glass doors, taking Darcy with him as he lost himself in the crowd as well as a man his size was able. Once again, they had no idea who they were looking for, or where they needed to go. They were again stopped and checked for their documents, and again Darcy braced herself for chaos. But the man stamped their fake passports and handed them back, and that was that. Loki took them and handed the envelope back for Darcy to stuff into her enormous coat pocket and they were sent on their way. As they walked through the small terminal, they both looked around for whoever they were meeting next, but nobody stood out as looking for them. Darcy moved a little closer to Loki, hoping it would give her enough warning to start running if he did.

The terminal’s front doors opened right to the small pick up lane, where a few cars were idling. Darcy looked at all of them, but none stood out in any meaningful way. She felt like they were being too obvious by standing still for so long; that someone would notice they didn’t know what they were doing. It wasn’t long before she was proved right. One of the cars toward the front opened its door, and a man leaned out to look at the small crowd that was gathering near the doors.

"Mexico?" he asked.

It took Darcy a moment to realise what he was asking, and that something must have got jumbled in the grapevine.

"Yeah," she said.

They stepped close and Loki said something to the man in yet another language, which somehow sounded even more like he had before he’d learned English. She didn’t understand what they said, but they spoke back and forth for a few moments before deciding that this was where they needed to be. Darcy got into the car first, making room for Loki to crowd in next to her. He barely let go of her the entire time, keeping an iron grip on her hand even as they got settled. Loki spoke to the man again, looking around them in all directions as they began to get moving. Darcy looked around too, not sure what she was looking for, but too nervous to do anything else. They wound their way out of the small parking lot, and toward the main road. As they stopped at the junction, Darcy spotted a sign on the other side of the road with a few words she couldn’t read, but one she recognised: Tórshavn 49. She assumed it was in metric, but didn’t really know what that meant beyond ‘close.’ As they turned onto the little two-lane road, heading into more snow and rolling hills, she wondered if it might have been safer to try to walk if it were actually that close. But if Loki hadn’t thought it was safe, it probably wasn’t. He’d mentioned a ferry, and she wondered if they’d have to take one to get there. She wondered if they were only going to Tórshavn because it was the closest town or whatever to where they were really going, and if he wanted to conserve energy before they had to start hiking into whatever passed as mountains there.

Considering his care with lunch, Darcy suspected that was precisely the case.

They quickly came up to a small village, and another sign telling them that Tórshavn was now 45 undisclosed units of measure away, which seemed to have gone down way too quickly to be marked in miles. A few cars left the village up ahead, speeding off along the winding road, and Darcy watched as they disappeared around a curve. The village was full of more cute little multi-coloured houses at the foot of a big hill, before the road curved off to follow some kind of lake or fjord or something. It curved again as they followed it on its path, and the driver said something as he began to slow down. On one side of the road was a vertical rock face, and on the other, icy water. Spanned across the two narrow lanes were the same cars that had pulled out ahead of them. With nowhere else to go, the driver pulled over as far as he could and stopped, but before he could make any move to turn around, two more cars came up behind them. Loki threw his door open and sped out toward the water, dragging Darcy along with him. She stumbled out of the car, struggling to catch her footing as he pulled her along, trying to move faster than she’d ever be able to. The screaming and the guns she had come to expect were all right there in 3D colour, 9.1 surround sound as men in black suits demanded they stop. Darcy managed to stumble over the guard rail with Loki, but only a few steps away they were blocked by a tall wire fence. To their right, the fence cut them off completely, forcing them to head toward the roadblock. Darcy struggled to keep up as shouts came from every direction. She didn’t know where Loki thought he was going, but they were stuck on a small patch of land between the road and the water. Up ahead, a small path led back up to the road, just on the other side of the block, but the only place to go from there was back to the road. There was no way off it, unless they decided to swim, or try to climb a vertical rock face.

A shot rang out from behind them, and Darcy immediately stumbled, trying to duck away from it and keep up with Loki and his insane superhuman run. He tried to pull her back to her feet, but when she stumbled again, he let go. More shots rang out as Darcy fell to the ground, covering her head with her arms. When it suddenly all stopped, Darcy dared to look up, and found no trace of Loki anywhere. From behind, she could hear footsteps approaching, and thought she could hear someone speaking to her, but she couldn’t make out the words over the sound of her own crying. The motherfucker had kept his promise. She couldn’t do as he’d said, so he’d thrown her to the wolves. She lay face down in the snow, her entire body burning from pain and anger and humiliation and terror.

When she was picked up off the ground by two pairs of hands, Darcy didn’t fight it. Like so much else in her life, she let it happen.