Avengers Moving Beyond My Past

**Author's Note: Two things; 1) I'm sorry this isn't a chapter to What More Is There?. I'm almost done with it I swear. 2) I got this prompt, if that's infact what it was, off of Tumblr (which is weird because I don't have one but oh well) from a post by assguard (that is the Tumblr name of the who posted it) I read the idea and found myself really wanting to write it. I don't know how well I'll write Thor/Loki, but I'm giving it a shot.**

**This is the Tumblr post word for word. The idea is not mine, but the following story and details are. If someone has written a story already based off this idea, no plagiarism was intended.**

_**AU. Loki attempts to kill himself by jumping off the roof of his building. He wakes up in the county hospital to find himself under the care of Dr. Donald Blake. At first, he refuses all treatments, but the doctor does all he can to make sure he is all right. And much to his surprise, Loki ends up falling in love with him.**_

**I do not own/profit from the use of Avengers characters. All belong to Marvel/Disney.**

It was rather cold up there.

Of course, what did he expect? It was mid-January in New York. Any place that wasn't a street or popular walk-way was piled with three feet of crystalline snow, and any store with central heat found itself crowded not with customers, but people getting away from the chilly air as cutting winds blew right through their heavy winter coats and designer scarves, stealing away all warmth and reminding them of the freezing temperature.

But Loki, perhaps more so than any of them, felt the harsh weather far more closely, more personally.

Though, he was currently on the roof of his four-story building, exposed to the frozen climate with only a leather jacket to keep the chill at bay. But it didn't bother him. The possible threat of illness lingering after today was something Loki didn't have to worry himself with, and he hadn't properly felt the icy hands of winter for weeks. It no longer affected him.

Yes, it had been a while since Loki had really noticed anything, be it the sharp bite of the air or the collection of snow or the bustling daily life of the city. But from where he stood, looking down at everyone, at everything, he could see it all. Traffic at a pace that would make a snail proud with drivers keeping the slick roads in mind as they drove toward their various destinations. A group of teenagers huddled together in front of a café across the street, warming their hands with their Styrofoam cups full of freshly brewed coffee. Two middle-aged adults, a blonde woman and semi-balding man, undoubtedly a couple, walking their dog, guiding the small thing away from the snowy mounds it would be sure to jump in given the chance.

All of this brought a bitter-sweet smile to his face.

Loki closed his eyes and inhaled; the ice mixing in the air, the emissions curling from tailpipes, the occasional smoker, the scents of a dozen restaurants and fast-food places all within a block of each other. He exhaled and re-opened his eyes, watching momentarily as his breath was carried away by the wind, then casted them downward once more. Nothing.

Loki was not afraid of heights, he never had been. He didn't even have a fear of _falling_ from a great height, and being at this pinnacle, both literally and metaphorically, hadn't changed that. All his fears and worries had been taken from him quite abruptly, stolen away hand-in-hand with his joy and reason for life. What, exactly, was left?

It had been a rather sudden decision for him, nothing thought through, nothing planned in advance. Loki had been walking up to his apartment on the third floor, living in the haze that had consumed his whole being for the last two months. Looking without really seeing, watching everything with an unrelenting apathy. Hearing what others were saying, but unable to listen, unable to know what was being conveyed. Talking, but with the voice of a shade of a man, one that spoke but never placed anything behind his words, no weight, no meaning, no need.

This numbness had taken its hold in the very center of Loki's being, piercing into his bone like the unforgiving winter never could. With it, Loki had been plodding through life, time flying by, completely unnoticed, completely inconsequential. And everything done had a mechanical, functional purpose:

Wake up because you must begin your day. Eat because your body needs food. Go to work because you need a job. Go home because your job is over. Eat again because your body needs food. Sleep because your body is tired.

Nothing had a point besides that fact that it was _necessary_, and Loki was very, very tired.

But, as Loki moved up the stairs, slowly and without purpose, keys in hand, did he stop. Today, for whatever reason, be it fate or coincidence, Loki chose to take in what he'd been living next to for almost a year, perhaps desperately hoping to find some comfort in surroundings so familiar.

He looked over the tarnished numbers of those next to and across from him, glancing over the faded paint layering the walls, the frosted window at the very end of the floor's hall that couldn't open, and . . . never, could Loki recall, at least recently, did he pay much mind to the next flight of stairs. His green eyes traveled along the carpet-worn steps, snagging on a transparent stain and a balled-up newspaper, but continued on, following the old-fashioned carpeting leading to the fourth floor . . . which, if he were moving, would eventually bring him to the roof.

In that moment, in that thought, did a light return to Loki's dulled eyes, a spark of something aware. Dropping his keys, the noise barely registering as they hit his welcome mat, Loki began walking those stairs, finger-tips gliding along the handrail and steps muffled by the covered floor.

He was mildly surprised that this thought hadn't occurred to him before.

He went past the fourth floor, looking down the hallway of doors only to ensure no one saw him on his way up the last few steps. Loki did not know if the door leading out to the roof was locked, though there had never been any complaints of unruly disruptions up there from tenants or neighbors, and the only person who would have a key was the land lady; a kindly woman well into her seventies.

Surely she was prone to forgetfulness.

But the only way to know was to try, so upon the final step, Loki reached out a hand, devoid of any shaking or hesitation, to the brass handle of the roof-accessible door and turned the knob.

And whether it was good fortune or bad, the door opened.

A blast of freezing air hit Loki, delivering a shock as it sapped the warmth he'd had just coming from inside the apartment complex, but it did not deter him, not now that he had motivation for something, a _drive_. Sunlight was refracting off of the snow laden roof and Loki had to shield his eyes, gently moving toward the far edge of the roof, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the glittering brightness.

A minute later and Loki was staring out at the city that he'd called home for the last year. But the sight did not strike him with anything profound, no startling realizations or deep feeling. He felt just as cold as the earth around him, and Loki didn't believe it had anything to do with the weather.

However, the spark that had lightened his eyes, the drive that brought him to where he was currently standing, morphed into a voice, soft and sweet, whispering into his ear "Why not?" as he looked down, "What is stopping you?"

With a curt laugh Loki realized nothing, nothing was stopping him. What had been keeping him tied and thriving to this world had been cruelly taken, leaving nothing but a void and a past that had no perseverance now. No, Loki had nothing, but it would seem, in return for this recognition, he was being given something.

An end.

And it was more than he could ask for.

Which was why Loki was standing on top of the roof of his building, mere inches from the end of the edge, watching people below as they continued on with their lives, neither envious nor happy for them, but he looked on nonetheless.

It wasn't a perfect plan, being of the moment. It wasn't as assured as a bullet through the head, or as elegant as a knife across the wrists, or as discreet as a mouthful of sleeping pills, but it was his plan, and he was going to see it to its end, because he couldn't keep going on like this, like a house abandoned to rot, or a car left to fall apart and rust away.

Another gust of wind blew past him, and Loki was struck with the sudden urge to spread out his arms, a childish antic, but . . . it came with . . . a certain fondness . . .

"_Look Daddy! I'm a bird!"_ An odd, pathetic noise broke free from Loki's throat and it took him a second to understand that it was a sob.

"_Daddy! Are you looking? You hafta look!"_ Heat built up behind his eyes, clouding them before his inevitable tears spilt over, cooling almost instantaneously as they quietly ran down his face.

"_I'm looking, I'm looking. Though I would love it if you told me what bird uses three bags of purple feathers and sticks them to herself with -oh dear, hahaha- glue." _It was getting harder to breath, Loki felt like the inside of his chest was collapsing in on itself. Why? Why after nearly two months of nothing was he was finally breaking down?

Now. Before he crumpled to the ground, a confused mess of rage and sorrow and loss and before the haze lulled him back into a state of pure, retched melancholy, a lost echo masquerading as a man. He had to stop it _now_. Loki held himself steady and raised his arms, as far as he could stretch, the position a mockery of one who would wish salvation. It was almost as though he looked to embrace the air that would slip through his fingers, promising no holds or protection . . . or maybe it was to embrace the earth that would put an end to this half-life, the earth that would become his savior as well as his executioner, in way of thanks.

Hair whipped around by the careless wind, frozen tear stains along the sides of his face with red eyes and chapped lips? He must look quite the sight.

But this was not about attention, and Loki did not want an audience. The longer he stayed up there, the more people would begin to notice him. So without one more thought, one more memory, or one more glance to a world he no longer cared for, Loki reached toward his gift, putting one foot over the edge and leaned forward, ever patient as gravity took over and sent him falling to his soon to be lasting reprieve.


End file.

Avengers, Drama, Romance