(Originally written 7/1/24 21:35 Mon)

I never should've volunteered to be the one to lead the team inside the building.

Really, what was I even thinking?

Or maybe that's just it—I wasn't thinking.

Of course, in the moment, I wasn't even thinking about the fact that my anxiety was really not for the idea. But, clearly, I wasn't listening.

And now I'm stuck under a piece of building debris after failing to disable the bomb before it could demolish the Hydra base we came to download information into the hard drive currently digging into the skin of my tightly curled hand.

And now, in short, I'm stuck in a small, cramped space, with a broken communicator, and a dwindling spark of hope that someone will find me.

I mean, underneath all this rock and debris, how could they?

But, then again, maybe I'm just underestimating Tony's technological capabilities.

Either way, at the moment, I'm just trying not to freak out from the growing awareness that the piece of debris keeping me trapped between the ground and freedom, is slowly crushing me at an excruciatingly slow yet terrifying rate as it looms over me, which does nothing to slow my already racing heart.

Don't worry, Y/n. They'll find you before you're crushed . . . somehow.

But even as I attempt to assure myself I'll be found soon, deep down I know, I'm buried too far under the rubble to be easily found.

In addition to that, I highly doubt my dried up throat will make my voice of any use even if I wanted to try to yell for someone's attention.

And with that, my thoughts begin to spiral downwards as the heavy chunk of debris above me starts to slowly crush me into the ground below me.

The weight is impossible to hold alone. Thus, I'm fairly unable to wriggle free, even as I see a sliver of space I could crawl through, because now my leg's stuck in between a sharp, jagged piece of metal in the piece of rubble above me and the ground.

I clench my teeth at the sharp—no doubt, rusty—metal that's torn into my suit and is currently cutting through the skin of my leg.

But the more it continues to do so, the harder it is to stop the pained cry from slipping between my chapped lips, the excruciating, burning pain only growing by the second.

A warm, liquid begins to puddle around my now impaled leg.

Reaching my hand down to my leg, I touch the puddle of the warm liquid to confirm that—as I retract my hand and stare at the red staining the pads of my fingers—there is, indeed, blood pooling around my leg.

I start to feel the effects of the gradual blood-loss when I begin to feel lightheaded after barely a minute.

That definitely can't be good.

As seconds stretch into minutes and still no sign of help appears, the very small sliver of hope I previously had entirely disappears.

Despair weighs down heavier than the piece of rubble keeping me stuck as hot tears trickle down my cheeks and sprinkle onto the grimy and dirty ground I lie on.

I'm just about to finally admit defeat and accept that I'll probably die here when I hear the faintest of shouts echo from somewhere down the hall of the destroyed building.

I shake my head to rid my brain of the likely delusional trick my mind's playing on me—a desperate attempt at false hope—but I won't be so easily fooled.

However, the second time I hear it, I begin to wonder if there really is someone calling my name.

So, deciding there's no harm in making sure—and allowing myself the little bit of false hope—I strain my hearing to listen for the voice I could've sworn I heard.

To my relief, my ears don't fail me and after several quiet seconds, I hear it.

"Y/n!"

I'm not entirely sure if my voice even works but I try to call back anyway.

"I'm here . . ." It comes out as more of a strained, weak croak and it's only now that I realize just how dry my throat is—just how much my strength has dwindled down to almost nothing.

"Y/n!" The voice yells again, this time sounding much closer. Close enough for me to put a name and face to the now clear, familiar voice.

My chest stutters at the face that identifies with the voice as I somehow find the strength to lift myself up onto my elbows to better call back to . . . Loki.

Loki's looking for me.

I mean, no doubt so are the rest of the Avengers, obviously, but for it to be him specifically . . .

My tears have become a mix of exhaustion, pain, and relief all at once as I struggle not to move too much out of fear I'll do more damage than good to my already impaled leg.

Loki's voice is so close it brings more tears to my eyes. "Y/n, darling, are you there?"

"I-I'm here, Loki!" I somehow manage to yell after I've cleared my throat—although, it sounds more like a pained shout when I move too abruptly and the piece of metal piercing my leg slices deeper into my skin, making my head spin from both the blood loss and the almost unbearable pain.

Loki's footsteps approach.

"Y/n?"

No longer having the strength to speak as I grit my teeth to bear through the sharp burn slicing through my leg, I grab a pebble beside me and throw it through the narrow space at his foot.

A second later, he bends down to peek under the rubble. "Y/n!"

"Please, help me..." I manage to say through my tightly clenched jaw. I could care less about how helpless I must look.

"Are you hurt, darling?"

The question causes more tears to surface and spill down my face as the realization of just how much pain I'm in washes over me. "I'm stuck...my leg..."

His face twists in deep worry. "Alright, stay where you are, darling, I'm going to lift the piece of rubble out of the way so you can crawl out, okay?"

"Okay..."

He disappears from view, before I hear him step around the debris to find a good leverage point to lift the piece of rubble.

A pained cry slips out before I can stop it when the piece of metal stabbing my leg lifts, unsheathing from where it was impaled in my limb.

I bite down on my tongue when the piece, along with the chunk of rubble is lifted from the ground, the metal cutting more flesh when it retracts from my skin as it lifts out of the way.

The second it's removed, I immediately—as best as I can manage—crawl out of the cramped space, collapsing with relief once I'm in the clear.

A wave of excruciating pain hits me and another cry leaves my lips as I weakly sit myself up to put pressure on the wound still mercilessly bleeding a new pool of blood around my leg.

Panic squeezes my chest at the sight of the severity of my wound once I can see the full scale of it. Something about the way I can so clearly see all the damaged layers of ruptured skin—the deep redness of the blood oozing and leaking from in between the torn section in my leg, the deeper layers of skin peeking out through the small gap of the wound—sends a rush of fear surging through me—one I've never felt before.

(A/n: ^that's how I would genuinely feel if I ever had a wound like that. Random example but I watched The Shallows—with Blake Lively in it—once and she gets bit in the leg by the shark at some point and I just remember it was so hard to actually see the deepness of the wound. I dunno, it was just so disturbing on a really weird level and I just know that if I were ever in that kind of situation, I'd be in too much shock to have any time to panic lol.)

My brain scrambles to even begin to comprehend both the pain and the reality of the fatal wound. This kind of situation always seemed like something that would happen to someone else—anyone else—but I never would've guessed one of those 'someones' would ever be me.

And yet, here we are.

"Hey, hey," Loki rushes up to me, kneeling beside me as he gently rests a hand on my shoulder and raises his other hand to cup my face. "Look at me, love."

After many seconds of refusing to meet his eyes out of panic and pain, I finally do. A mix of worry and determination is set firmly in his expression as he stares intently into my eyes and gently assures me, "We're going to get you out of here, alright?"

With a shaky breath, I lift a trembling hand to his, still pressed against the side my face, and nod.

"Can you walk?" He asks, gently wiping away the tears from my face.

Despite our current situation, I still manage to give him a look as if to say, 'did you seriously just ask me that?'

He tries—and fails—to hide the smile creeping onto his lips at my expression. "Right—stupid question."

"Yeah, no crap," I mutter under my breath, trying not to focus too much on the pain coursing through my leg.

He turns his attention to my wound. "Alright, well, first, we need to stop the bleeding before we move you..."

"That would be the preferable choice, yes," I joke, trying to hide the pain behind my comment, even as I clench my teeth to better endure the waves of it washing over me with every passing second I sit here with a wound as severe as such.

Loki gives me a sad smile that almost makes my eyes start watering again, before redirecting his attention as he suddenly turns and tears off a piece of his cape.

"Wait, don't—" I weakly protest.

"Don't worry, darling," he assures me with a light laugh and a small, amused smile on his lips. "I do have more than one cape."

"Still..." I mutter, feeling a little bad about using his cape for a makeshift bandage about to be drenched in a mixture of blood and dirt.

Taking the piece of green fabric, Loki gently lifts my leg to slide it under to better wrap the wound.

I wince in pain at the movement, dreading the moment he'll have to carry me all the way back to the Avenger's jet and how much it'll hurt then.

As if reading my thoughts, Loki reminds me, "I can teleport us back," before adding, "But I do need to pick you up in order to do so..."

Relief washes over me like a cool blanket. Before it's replaced with dread once again at Loki's following words.

"I'm sorry, darling, this is going to hurt but I need to keep pressure on the wound to prevent further blood loss," he gently warns as he ties the surprisingly thick piece of cape fabric into a tight knot.

I bite my lip to stop myself from crying out in pain, a few tears trickling down my cheeks despite my best attempts to suppress them.

Once Loki's done, he positions himself in preparation to pick me up.

"Are you ready, love?" He asks, fixing a worried gaze on me as he braces his arms to lift me off the ground.

"No," I whisper, not caring how weak and childish I must look to him, tears beginning to well up along the edges of my eyes as I stare up at him, struggling to keep the pain and dread from showing in my expression.

"I'll try to be as gentle as I can," he softly assures.

I nod, not entirely reassured and bracing myself while I wait for the agony to begin.

Then Loki carefully slides his arms under me, before slowly and cautiously lifting me up.

Although he moves slowly, an excruciating jolt of pain shoots through my leg where my wound resides, and I have to cover my mouth to stifle the cry of pain that threatens to escape my lips.

Squeezing my eyes shut, I let the tears burning my eyes to pour down my cheeks and stain my dirt streaked face, turning to lean my head against Loki's chest, desperate for any source of comfort or relief from the pain.

Then, slowly, I begin to feel the effects of the blood loss taking a heavier affect on my body as my brain starts to go fuzzy and black static closes in around the edges of my vision.

"Just hold on, love..." Loki's voice sounds faint and far away, a soft whisper brushing against my ear as I gradually give into unconsciousness, letting the darkness pull me under into its silent embrace...

A/n: Okay, so this is really just something that I randomly came up with. It's not great, but it's something. I kinda eventually lost my train of thought which is why it's not super long...um, anywayssss......*totally not me cringing at my work and critiquing every little detail*

Thanks for having the patience to read this (cringey) one shot or whatever it's called (I can never get the terms right...), love you my babesss, God bless!!!<33333