It was a month after I had been discharged and it was another month until I saw my father.

The Raft had once been my prison now it was a bitter reminder of how wrong I had been. It had been a year or so, I couldn't remember. A lot has happened and it felt so forever ago, my cell was just a memory, I could barely remember it.

I think what hit me the most was show sterile it was. It was so ridiculously bleak.

Some would call it poetic justice that my father was in the same cell that I forced myself into. Now looking at him through the bullet proof glass I could see how people once viewed me. I internally thanked Fury for giving a chance at a semi-normal life. Oddly, I couldn't imagine living in a place like this.

"Maya," my father rasped. His words were distorted by the speakers giving it a more ominous tone. "Look at you."

"Raza," I said in the same way.

Calling him father had been nothing more than a formality, the word was empty. Blood didn't matter anymore, it was just blood. It didn't mean anything.

I guess I felt like I was dehumanizing him when I called him by his name. It didn't make me feel better but it didn't make me upset either. It just felt to hollow.

Raza sat in his cell, the bruises on his face a paling pink and the cuts on his lips barely healed. He looked like a madman (which he was) in a mad asylum. His eyes which reflected mine were bloodshot and puffy as if he had not been sleeping or crying. A straight jacket had been placed on him only adding to his haggard image.

A flash of pity hit me before I squished it remembering that this man had been a source of misery for a majority of my adult life.

"How does it feel?"

"I'm much better now."

"Not that, little dove." I cringed visibly. "How does it feel to kill your own family?"

I rolled my eyes at him. Of course he would.

"I feel nothing." I admitted. "You're children are dead, the Clan is dead, and you've been dead to me for a long time. So, Raza, if you think that anything you say will cause me to feel anything you're totally wrong. I'm no longer afraid of you, there is nothing you can do to me."

He chuckled darkly, his expression morphing to show the madness.

"Are you sure of that?!" Raza laughed again. "Do you really think you've won?!"

"I've won." I said. "I've won and you've lost. Everything you have ever built I will tear it down."

"You think you're a saint, don't you?" I narrowed my eyes slightly, he was grasping at straws. "You have so much blood on your hands than you can never wipe away! No matter if you no longer call me father or if I don't have an empire, I'll always be apart of you. You can't run from blood, Maya! You can't run from destiny!"

"Destiny," I snorted. "Please. You're nothing and destiny is just a farce. My mother, the one who you've tormented for so long, and I will live on while you will spend the rest of yourself in this cell."

I stepped up to the glass, glaring passed it and into his eyes which widened considerably. He looked so scared and lost.

It was almost pathetic.

"So, Raza?" I asked, a little more confident than I had been before. The fear dissipated as I spoke. "Tell me, how does it feel?"

I stepped away from the glass, casting a last glance at the husk my father used to be making sure to engrave it into my memory.

He wasn't even worth a second glance.

I strode down the hall to the entrance with a smirk on my face. I don't know why, it was just there and there was a feeling of satisfaction that bloomed. I wasn't naive to think it was over yet, there was more of my father's organization to destroy and more things to discover.

My family's secret could stay where it belonged, somewhere in the ruins of a long forgotten desert.

*********

By the end of the day I was exhausted and spent, emotionally and physically. There was still a slight pain in my chest that persisted right where the scar was. I had taken some pain meds earlier to ease it but it looks like I'll need more.

The Avengers said nothing as I passed them by. They could tell from the look on my face that i was in no mood for talking. I went straight to my room, throwing open the room and barging in.

I had to go and see Dr. Franz right after the whole incident with Raza. It just felt right to talk to him, it helped even if I begrudgingly said it didn't.

There was still some damage that I knew would never go away. Sometimes I shied away from people and sometimes my hands trembled and sometimes I woke up from night screaming but I was strong, I could live with it.

The nightmares would always exist as would the scars on my body.

Being banned for missions for an entire months was like watching your friends have Birthday cake with out you. It had been only a month and I wanted to scream into a pillow.

I chucked my shoes off in random directions as I plopped onto the mattress face first not caring if I disturbed Loki who was sprawled out watching tv.

Trix had been nesting near the window. She chirped loudly, flying over to nest in my hair. It had grown in the last months as I was in the hospital. She found it more comfortable than the nest that she had built.

"That bad?" Loki asked looking away from the T.V.

I mumbled something into the pillow before I crawled over laying my head in his lap. Loki lifted his hand running through my hair automatically as I glared tiredly at the screen not really registering what I was watching.

"It's only a month since you've been discharged," Loki reasoned as he tried to calm my fuming.

"But that's forever." I huffed.

"Who sounds like a child now?" I weakly grabbed a pillow and tried hitting him with it. "And you call me a drama queen."

"You are a drama queen," I said as I closed my eyes. Just because I was banned from missions didn't mean I wasn't allowed to train.

"Tired?"

"Yeah," I said feeling the early morning jog and practice catch up with me as well as seeing Raza and Dr. Franz in the same day. Usually I'd throw out a sarcastic one liners but as I mentioned before, I was simply too tired. "I feel like shit."

"This is why you listen to your doctors when they tell you to rest."

"And let Natasha and Bucky win?" I scoffed. "Not a chance, Lok."

Loki shifted underneath me so that I now laid my head against his chest.  I liked the sound of Loki's heartbeat. If I ever needed to find him, I just had to feel for his heartbeat.

This closeness we had, this comfort, it was a strange thing. I liked it. I just couldn't explain what I had with his but I could definitely say it was something. Being close to him had just happened, it was so slow and gradual it surprised me when I realized it. If Loki had anything to say, he refrained of (as I suspected) he liked it too.

If it grew into something, I wouldn't mind it at all.

Sometimes when I dreamed I could still see his blue eyes baring down at me as he twisted the knife in my chest. All I had to do was look into his eyes, green as the forest, to remember that was (ironically) an illusion.

"Get some sleep." He whispered.

"No," I said shaking my head. "I'm okay."

"Now if there's one thing you're too stubborn to admit it's that you're not okay." Loki's hand left my hair to wrap around my shoulders. "Did you forget that I'm a God?"

"No, Mr. 'I'm-Loki-of Asgard.' I did not." I narrowed my eyes at him. "You were reading my mind again, weren't you?"

"I promise you I did it for the right reasons."

"Mhhhmm." I hummed as I gave him a look.

A hint of a smile played on his lips.

"Please get some sleep, Maya." He said, more gently this time. "I can't stop the dreams but I can promise I'll be here when you wake up."

I didn't say anything as the sounds of the tv grew into a dull murmur. I drew lazy circles into the sheets as I fought my heavy eyelids. Sleep was something I craved yet the dreams were something I didn't want. They were an endless plague through the night that reminded me of what had happens or what could've happened.

"Loki," I said. "If I start screaming, promise to wake me up."

"I promise." He said and I beloved him.

I raised myself up as I wrapped my arms around his waist and tucked my head underneath his chin. His hand found its way back to my hair. I closed my eyes curling closer to Loki who was staring at the news with mild disinterest.

"Wake me up for dinner?"

"Of course."

"Thanks, Lok."

"Of course, darling."