Disclaimer: I do not now, nor have I ever owned the rights to Marvel Comics or its characters. It all belongs to Marvel, Disney, Stan Lee, and whoever else has the rights. I am not making any kind of profit off of this work, it is all just for fun and freedom of expression.

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Warning: Graphic descriptions of violence and sexual content.

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Broken was The Puppet, Unbreakable is the Prince

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Chapter 1

" What just happened?... Please tell me nobody kissed me." Tony said with a mild wheeze, having been jolted back into consciousness thanks to a well-timed roar from the Hulk.

From where they stood and knelt respectively, Thor and Steve both sagged in relief, having thought Ironman had made the ultimate sacrifice when he had flown an full-blown nuke straight into the portal from which the Chitauri had been pouring in to New York like locusts.

Thanks to Tony's actions, the mothership that had been supplying the Chitauri forces had been blown to kingdom come, and with it the vile gray aliens and their flying leviathans had all gone kaput in an instant, dropping dead where they had been standing and flying.

Breathing deep and feeling fondness flooding him, Steve looked out at the smoking aftermath of the battle for New York and spoke.

" We won." Steve answered with a nod.

Tony let his eyes fall shut and laid his head back onto the ground with a relieved exhale. Then with a groan he lifted himself up a little, as far as his slightly shredded and dented metal suit would allow and spoke.

" Alright eh, hey... Aright good job guys, let's just not come in tomorrow... Take a day." He said with a light grown before he remembered something of interest he had spotted during the chaotic battle.

" You ever tried Shawarma?" He asked, making Steve laugh lightly and duck his head before he sent the genius, playboy, philanthropist a warm look as Tony continued.

" There's a shawarma joint about two blocks from here, I don't know what it is but I wanna try it." Tony said with breathless eagerness.

Thor looked towards the mildly damaged Stark Tower off in the distance, an unhappy frown marring his dirt streaked face as he spoke.

" We're not finished yet." He said grimly.

Steve, Tony, and Hulk all looked to Thor, understanding instantly that they still had a problem to deal with.

Loki, the now defeated would be subjugator of Midgard, who the Hulk had left as a new fixture in the floor of Tony's penthouse. All four Avengers shared a grim silence, before Tony spoke with an eager hopefulness on his face.

" And then shawarma after." He declared.

About twenty minutes later found Tony, Thor, Steve, and the Hulk meeting up with a harried and exhausted looking Hawkeye and Black Widow at the base of Stark Tower.

" We had best be wary, friend Hulk may have smashed him thoroughly into the floor, but my brother is not to be underestimated in the least." Thor warned.

" I am gonna bury an arrow into his eye, nobody stop me." Hawkeye growled venomously.

" Maybe even let Hulk smash him some more." Tony smirk, feeling a wave of anger towards the psycho who had has the audacity to try and take over his world and defenestrated him from his own tower not half an hour ago.

Thor just sent them a grim look that was both angry and sad. Part of him still felt a wave of protectiveness towards his wayward brother, but most of him was just as pissed off. Loki would pay for all the destruction he had wrought, and no amount of whatever brotherly affection Thor had in him was going to stop that.

" Let's get up there first and see what we're dealing with. From what Hulk says, he got smashed up good but still looked only a little scratched up when Hulk left him." Steve said firmly, gesturing for Tony to lead the way since it was his tower after all.

" Puny God make funny whale noises." Hulk said proudly, earning a chuckle from Tony and an appreciative look from Hawkeye as the Avengers all made their way towards the elevator.

The ride up to the penthouse was made in a tense silence after they piled in, Hulk included, all of them gearing up for a possible last fight to the death with Loki.

As they rode the elevator up, Tony remembered JARVIS.

" Hey JARVIS, you got eyes on Loki? He called, waiting for the ever faithful AI to respond.

Not a moment later a posh, British accented voice sounded from up above.

" Hello Sir and company, I am glad to see you all well and moderately intact. As to Sir's inquiry, I do indeed have eyes on the wayward younger Odinson. He is currently still laying on the crater Mr. Hulk left him in. As I observed, he remained completely conscious even after the beating he received at the hands of the Hulk, he even managed to push himself upright into a sitting position before he suddenly and rapidly lost all sense and collapsed backward. He has not moved since." JARVIS reported.

In an instant the Avengers were all on high alert, wondering just what was going on, but before Tony or anyone else could inquire further, the doors to the elevator were opening with a soft ding. On edge and wary, the eyes of the Avengers all collectively zeroed in on the pale figure clad in green and gold who was laying a few feet away within a crater of crushed and cracked concrete.

" Let's go wake up sleeping psycho." Tony quipped as a glowering Hawkeye reached for the bow he had strapped to his back and notched one of his most lethal arrows into the bow.

Carefully, not wanting to take any chances, the Avengers approached Loki's prone form. When they were within a few feet of him, Thor broke off from them and stepped closer till he was looming over his younger brother.

" Loki wake up, no more of your tricks." He ordered sternly.

His response was silence, and Loki to so much as twitching.

As Steve observed his fallen foe, he felt a growing unease slowly seeping into his gut when he noticed that Loki's chest wasn't moving up and down, not even a little to show the semblance of breathing. Remembering what JARVIS had said just a few moments ago in the elevator about Loki slowly sitting up in the crater only to fall back down into it unconscious a few minutes later had him picturing the Chitauri after Tony had sent the nuke straight into the portal and their mothership.

How every single one of them from foot soldier to mighty leviathan had dropped stone dead in a matter of seconds. Steve caught Natasha's suspicious gaze and spoke quietly.

" He's not breathing." He said softly in concern.

Tony, Clint, and Bruce all turned their frowning gazes to Steve, having heard his words, but before anyone could say anything further, a frustrated snarl from Thor had them all turning their attention back to the Asgardian prince in time to see him sink down to his knees and reach out to grab his seemingly unconscious younger sibling.

It was just as Thor had nearly gripped Loki by his shoulder when a low hum began to emanate from Loki's staff, which Natasha was holding. The Avengers collectively turned their gaze to the glowing gem at the very top of the wicked looking staff and were stunned to see the swirling, blue stone glowing menacingly like it had not been just minutes before. Then in the blink of an eye the stone's glow went pure white, and beside Thor Loki's eyes suddenly burst wide open where he lay.

The next thing Thor knew, his ability to breath freely was robbed of him, a cold, long fingered hand wrapping around his throat in an unforgivingly tight grip. He turned his wide and bewildered eyes to the side and found himself gazing back at the horrendously grinning face of his younger brother.

His younger brother who's normally bright green eyes were bleached an unholy white and glowing... just like the stone in the staff was.

Clint raised his bow, ready to fire when Loki spoke, but the voice that came past his lips was not the cool, calculating, and begrudgingly pleasant one they had been dealing with throughout this entire ordeal.

No, the voice from Loki now was this deep, gravely, demonic sound as it spoke.

" Sorry little thunderer, dear sweet baby brother isn't in right now. He hasn't been in for a good long while. Pathetic little creature couldn't handle the fun we had with him." The voice said as Loki's face grinned maniacally.

The very bottom of the whole world seemed to drop out from under the Avengers when these words registered.

Thor felt his eyes grow wide and his sputtered as he tried to speak, to shout, to deny, to do something. He reached up and tried to pry his brother's hand from his throat and found it to be like trying to pull at the hardest stone. The vice-like grip around Thor's throat simply would not be broken that easily.

Still grinning, "Loki" pulled Thor, who was in fact larger than him by a good amount, to him as if he weighed nothing at all, getting right into the Asgardian prince's face as he spoke.

" You broke my puppet Moron of Asgard. No matter, I can always find something better. As a parting gift from me, you get to keep what's left." "Loki" said with a final, grotesque grin.

Then like someone had simply flipped a switch, the Mind Stone in the staff just stopped glowing white and went back to its otherworldly blue. With it going out, so did Loki's eyes.

Without a sound, Loki's hand eased around Thor's throat, and he fell backwards again into the crater with a light, final thud, and lay utterly still.

Thor still had Loki's wrist in his hand, and when he looked down at the appendage he felt all the breath leave his lungs. Before his very eyes the pale white skin faded into a pale bluish gray, and several of Loki's long and once elegant fingers were now twisted and dislocated at odd angles.

" Oh my God." Clint whispered, his bow and arrow falling from his shocked grip as he and the rest of the Avengers watched the rest of Loki's pale white skin fade away to that same blueish gray.

But then his skin grew a dark purple in several places, while splitting open completely in others. A large, wicked looking gash opened up across the top of Loki's dark head, starting to ooze dark, dark red blood into his long black hair.

The horrifying transformation continued, more blood starting to leak out the corners of Loki's parted lips, more bruises forming over his left eye and his jaw, his cheekbone and nose looking clearly broken and marred with even more cuts than the ones caused by the smashing Hulk gave him.

The fingers of his other hand started to lose fingernails, which looked to have been mercilessly pulled out. Worse still, the tip and one knuckle on his pinky disappeared, leaving a jagged, blood little stump, suggesting it had not been cut off cleanly, but bitten.

The green fabric bits of Loki's armor started to grow red with more blood, no doubt from wounds left unseen. More cuts and bruises peaked out from beneath Loki's collar and his under the gauntlets that covered his wrists.

Tony, Natasha, Steve, Clint, and Hulk all stood frozen, still trying to make sense of what the current situation meant. Tony, Steve, and Clint had naked horror on their faces, while Natasha kept her reserve, though her eyes were wide with veiled disbelief. The Hulk himself looked confused, his earlier rage momentarily forgotten. His heightened senses let both him and Banner know that everything had gone sideways spectacularly.

Thor knelt by his brother and simply gawked at him, unable to move, to speak, to even think. Mjolnir slid from his shock-slackened hand and hit the ground with a dull, metallic thud that seemed to shake Stark Tower to it's very foundation.

It was enough to finally shake him out of his stupor.

Letting out a slow, shaky breath, Thor hesitantly leaned closer, eying Loki with wide eyes as he carefully reached out and placed his hands on Loki's chest, a chest that was not moving up and down the way a chest would move had the lungs they housed been alive and working. Thor let out another shaky breath, looking into Loki's slack and battered face, taking in those once brilliant green eyes Thor remembers were now a murky and dull red that stared up at the ceiling unseeing... in death.

Loki was dead.

There was another beat of silence, and then Thor finally broke it.

He let out this blood curdling, inane cry that seemed to come up from the very depths of his souls as he scrambled for Loki, looping his arms under his brother's lax body and pulling him up out of the crater and to his chest.

Loki flopped around bonelessly as his older brother pulled him up, hanging loose in Thor's well-built arms as the blond prince seemed to almost cradle him. His head came to rest on Thor's shoulder, his dull red eyes now gazing vacantly at the rest of the Avengers, more blood leaking from his open mouth and lightly dripping onto the silver scaled sleeve of his brother's armor.

" Brother! Brother no! LOKI NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!" Thor cried over and over again, feeling a warm wetness under his palms that he hand splayed across Loki's back, knowing full well it was more blood leaking through his brother's clothes.

Thor's screaming broke the collective paralysis that had gripped the rest of the Avengers. It was Natasha who spoke first.

" It wasn't him." She said softly as she carefully set the staff down on the floor, not wanted to touch it least there be anymore surprises.

" Oh my God." Steve whispered before he rushed forward to a still keening Thor's side, coming to kneel before the two brothers, trying to see if there was anything he could do.

Thor looked up at Steve with his bright blue eyes gushing with tears, looking to Steve in askance, for direction, for anything.

Clenching his jaw and feeling his heart give a painful lurch, Steve reached out and gripped Thor by the shoulder, sending the Asgardian a deeply apologetic look.

Thor's entire face finally crumbled, and with a sob he buried his face into Loki's shoulder and started to weep without shame.

" Oh fuck, oh my God. Shit." Clint whispered as his hands went to his head and he witnessed the scene before him.

His hatred for Loki had been burning bright and full not five minutes ago, and in just about the same amount of time it was extinguished, leaving Clint empty and horrified.

His subjugator had become his fellow victim, the first victim, the puppet who's strings they had unintentionally cut.

From where he stood, Tony gazed at Loki with wide eyes, zeroing in on the prince's ajar mouth, seeing clearly that Loki's tongue looked like shredded meat. With his stomach lurching violently, Tony forgot all desire for shawarma and tried to think about what to do, how to deal with this unexpected development.

One thing was for sure, he wasn't going to allow SHIELD or the WSC to take Loki from Thor in any way, shape, or form.

A low groan a few feet from him had Tony, Clint, and Natasha turning to see the Hulk slowly receding aware, leaving a shaky and harried Bruce Banner in the tattered and stretched remnants of his clothes.

Tony rushed forward and grabbed Bruce before the Hulk's other half could fall to the floor in a heap.

" Thanks." Bruce whispered, sending Tony a grateful look, to which the billionaire nodded before they both inevitable turned their gazes back to the gut-wrenching scene unfolding before them.

" I didn't know." Bruce said softly as he took in Loki's battered body and Thor's heartbreak.

" None of us did buddy." Tony said in reassurance.

As they all stood and watched Thor's utter devastation, Bruce felt his own stomach curdle a little at the prospect of the future.

He was the trained medical professional among them, even if his field of expertise was nuclear physics, he was also an MD. Surmising that Tony was not going to let SHIELD anywhere near Loki, Bruce knew that the grim task of seeing up close and cataloguing just to what extent Loki suffered would fall on him.

For now though, everyone stepped closer, surround Thor as the thunderer wept, and grieved the loss of his brother for a second time.

A few hours later...

The skies over New York city and Stark Tower rolled with ominous thunder clouds, rumbling with dull thunder where once there had been bright sunlight and the relief that the invasion attempt on Midgard had ended with the Chitauri's defeat.

Down in the medical wing of Stark Tower, Bruce Banner, clad in stark white medical scrubs and a protective apron, stood next to a shiny metal examination table, gazing down at its single occupant.

Loki, laying with his eyes finally closed, looking almost as if he were asleep were it not for the stillness of his chest and the grievous injures to his head and face that were still leaking a little dark crimson here and there. It had taken a great deal for Thor to relinquish his desperate embrace around Loki, not wanting to let his younger sibling go. Thankfully, Natasha had been able to explain that they weren't going to do anything untoward to Loki, but they all wanted to know what the true extent of Loki's state was. They also wanted to clean him up and try to stitch up his numerous wounds.

It was the least they could do for the pummeling they themselves had given Loki, or rather his reanimated corpse.

With a heavy heart, Thor had agreed and then carried his brother's body to the elevator and down to the medical wing with his face grim and tears leaking silently from his eyes.

It was only when he had laid Loki down on the examination table and seen his brother's blood staining his own hands that Thor finally broke down into tears again. Steve, Clint, and Natasha had stepped forward, all of them volunteering to help Thor clean himself up and compose himself as best he could, Tony directing JARVIS to show them where the showers were upstairs and where they could all find some spare clothes that were more comfortable than their battle attire.

Tony himself had gone down to his lab to shed his busted armor and was due back at any minute, having volunteered to help Bruce with Loki's autopsy. Bruce had gone and tossed his shredded clothes and put on the medical scrubs, knowing they were the appropriate attire for the grim task that lay ahead.

A few minutes later a similarly white scrubs clad Tony Stark walked into the room through the sliding doors, without any of his usual bravado. He was serious faced, knowing full well that such a cavalier attitude as he had shown throughout the entire time they had all assembled and defended New York was not the appropriate way to behave here, during their examination of Loki.

Tony's dark brown eyes immediately went to the pale and battered figure laying in eternal repose, a look of sadness washing over the genius' face before he quickly schooled his features and spoke.

" Thor and the others are getting cleaned up as we speak, I'll go out and get us all something to eat later, if we're up to it." Tony said tiredly, wincing slightly when his eyes fell on the wicked looking wound on Loki's head as he came to stand on the other side of the examination table. Tony didn't say anything, but the wound was deep enough that whatever weapon had caused it had gone through hard bone, and exposed a sliver of Loki's brain.

" Yeah, thanks Tony. Now let's get started." Bruce said quietly as he too turned his gaze to Loki.

They each pulled on some thick latex medical gloves and together, Bruce and Tony set about first divesting Loki of his armor and leather garments.

They first went for Loki's boots, seeing as to how they appeared to be the easiest looking items to take off among all the straps, bells, and whistles of his ornate and intricate outfit.

After a little poking and prodding they each found the buckles and clasps that held Loki's shoes to the rest of his outfit. Once those were undone, Bruce and Tony each held a boot and braced themselves as they pulled. No sooner did the boots fall away it took all Bruce had not to Hulk out, and all Tony had not to regurgitate whatever meager contents he had in his stomach.

Loki's feet were a mangled and bloodied mess. Toes were missing, looking like they had been callously ripped off. Those toes that remained appeared to have some foreign objects imbedded into them, and the skin looked to have been burned, repeatedly.

" Oh God." Tony whispered, unable to stop himself, while Bruce breathed deep in an effort to keep himself calm.

They each took a moment to compose themselves as best they could, and then went back to undressing Loki.

They carefully pulled away the gauntlets on his wrists, and the spaulder and belt over his shoulder. Then came the heavy green and black overcoat and bloodied green cape. Each item was placed aside with care, arraigned neatly on a nearby set of long tables. Then together, Bruce and Tony set about using heavy duty surgical scissors to cut the straps of Loki's chest plate and leather under armor.

They pulled the chest plate away to reveal green cloth and dark leather completely drenched with dark red blood. The acrid, sharp scent on the blood hit both of their nostrils hard.

" JARVIS, please start venting the room ASAP." Tony ordered, swallowing thickly with effort.

" Right away sir." JARVIS acknowledged, sounding a bit strained himself if that were even possible.

Slowly and thankfully, fresh air began to circulate into the room, chasing away the horrid smell.

Sighing in quiet relief, Bruce started using his pair of scissors to cut at the cloth and leather starting at Loki's bruised up wrist. Catching on quickly, Tony started cutting at the end of Loki's pants leg. Together, and with infinite patience, Bruce and Tony cut through Loki's under clothes, steeling their stomach against the rivers of blood that seeped out into the exam table as they worked. Once they had cut through, Bruce and Tony had set their scissors aside and each gripped the cloth and leathers, Bruce at Loki's shoulders, Tony at his legs. Sharing a look and a nod, they both pulled away the front of Loki's bloodied clothing.

When the cloth and leather fell away, the bottoms dropped out of both Bruce and Tony's stomach one more.

Loki's chest and stomach were a mess of bruises, burns, and cuts. His arms had methodically placed slashes in different sections, and circular burn marks in others, and hand shaped bruises around each wrist. Over his left peck there was a circular wound around his nipple that looked like a brutal bite mark. More bite marks littered his lower neck, shoulders, abdomen, and hips. There were long, finger shaped bruises all over him, but especially on his sharp hips and his thighs. There were multiple stab wounds too, on his chest, shoulders, and abdomen.

Tony let out this low groan when his eyes went to Loki's most private area, seeing for himself that Loki had devastating, charred burns to his genitals.

" Tony, it's okay, you can go, I can handle the rest." Bruce said quietly, trying to keep the tremor out of his own voice as he saw the damage for himself.

Tony screwed his eyes shut tightly and breathed in deep through his nostrils for a moment before he opened them again and sent Bruce a mutely angry and determined look as he shook his head.

" I am not leaving you to this alone, or him for that matter." Tony said firmly as he gazed down at Loki's pale and bruised face with a look of bone-deep sadness. He then reached over to one of the tables nearby and pulled out a sheet from the folded pile. He unfurled it and draped it over Loki's lower half to cover him up and afford the dead man some dignity. Tony and Bruce did their best not to linger on the red that immediately started to stain and bleed through the thin cotton.

Taking a deep breath and nodding, Bruce looked to the ceiling and spoke.

" JARVIS, can you please run a preliminary scan, let us know how many injuries there are?" He asked.

" Of course Dr. Banner, commencing full body scan." JARVIS said, ever calm and collected.

Bruce and Tony stepped back and let JARVIS work, the AI projecting multiple beams of bluish white light over Loki's prone form. The scan took only a few seconds and then the beams of light shut off. There was a beat of silence as JARVIS analyzed the data he had collected. Then the AI finally spoke.

" Initial scanning complete, report of massive amounts of physical trauma to Mr. Odinson's body. Signs of prolonged starvation and torture, and trauma that appears to be sexual in nature. Estimated number of injuries... 115 wounds in total with 67 external and 48 internal. Analysis indicates that there are 25 foreign objects or various sizes and sharpness imbedded in Mr. Odinson's flesh and bones. Overall compilation of data leads to conclusion that the grievous head injury Mr. Odinson suffered is the probable cause of his death." JARVIS said with clinical detachment.

Bruce bowed his head while Tony scrubbed at his forehead and just breathed.

They each needed a moment to compose themselves and make some kind of sense of the tremendous amount of damage that had been done to Loki, and they were most glad that Thor wasn't here, not wanting to think about how the God of Thunder would have reacted to the horrifying details of his younger brother's torture and death.

The Hulk was roaring in despair within Bruce, wanting to come out and smash everything in sight. Bruce fought him down with everything he had before he shared a look with Tony. They nodded to each other and got back to it, they still had to pull off Loki's garments at the back. They had just moved to lift Loki when JARVIS spoke.

" Please be advised sirs, a very vulgar word has been crudely carved into Mr. Odinson's back, and analysis indicates that it was done so anti-mortem." JARVIS said clinically.

Tony and Bruce both shared a look, knowing anti-mortem meant that it had been done while Loki was still alive.

Grateful for JARVIS' warning and bracing themselves, Bruce and Tony reached for Loki together. They carefully hooked their arms under Loki's neck and shoulders, the long sleeves of their protective aprons and their gloves immediately getting stained dark red.

Together they carefully turned Loki's prone form over onto his front, being careful not to jostle him. Once they had Loki laying face down, Tony pulled the white sheet aside for a moment and he and Bruce each gripped the ends of the garments that still clung to Loki's back. In almost perfect sync, they pulled.

Bruce felt his stomach roll violently again, and Tony clenched his jaw tightly as they had to peel the leather and cloth off, coagulated blood making everything stick to Loki like a nightmarish glue. When the garment was pulled away from Loki's back, Bruce and Tony froze dead in their tracks as they finally beheld what JARVIS had warned them about.

There across the full expanse of the back of Loki's shoulders was a single word carved jaggedly and deeply into his pale flesh.

WHORE

Tony and Bruce both jumped when JARVIS' voice suddenly sounded through the room.

" Sirs, Agent Barton is at the door to the exam room, shall I allow him entry?" The AI asked.

" Let him know he's about to walk in to a living nightmare, ask him if he's up to handling it." Tony said gravely, quickly pulling off the lower half of the leather pants that clung to Loki's legs, nearly throwing up when he saw the state of Loki's lower half, the bites, cuts, what looked to be electrical burns and whip marks, and most upsetting, the signs of brutal violation, before he grabbed up the bloodstained sheet and covered Loki back up from the waist down.

Not a moment later, a grim-faced Clint Barton made his way into the room, still dressed in his battle suit but with a dark gray hoodie that had the Stark Industries logo emblazoned across the front in silver over it. He only got a few steps in before he too was freezing in his tracks, his eyes falling on Loki's appalling state.

" Oh God." He whispered, his eyes growing impossibly wide as they settled inevitably on Loki's mutilated back.

" What's the update on Thor Hawkeye?" Tony asked, hoping to break Clint from his stupor, hoping to distract.

Clint jolted a little and them swallowed thickly, tearing his gaze away from the one who had not actually hurt him and focusing on Tony as he spoke.

" W-We were able to convince Thor to take off his armor and shower, Steve's trying his best to get the blood off of it, Nat has informed Fury of the situation. He wanted to come in and take custody of Loki's body and have SHIELD do the examination but Nat and Steve told him in no uncertain terms to keep his distance for now, unless he wanted to deal with a berserk Thor coming after him for wanting to dissect his little brother." Clint said, a light tremor to his voice as he spoke.

Tony found himself smirking for a second, glad that Fury decided to be smart about it. But the smirk faded quickly as he saw the look on Clint's face, the archer hesitantly coming closer and looking down at Loki.

" They had all kinds of fun with him, didn't they?" He asked quietly, his eyes actually growing slightly over bright.

Tony and Bruce found that they couldn't really say anything, and did they really have to in the presence of such horror?

" Clint, you don't have to be here for this." Bruce said kindly, Tony nodding in agreement.

Clint shook his head and sighed as he spoke.

" Up until half an hour ago I was hating this guy with all my heart for what he did to me, for making me a puppet and pulling my strings. Now I come to find out he's been nothing but a puppet himself, that he was probably murdered before he even set foot on Earth, I just... I feel like I owe it to him to be here, to help you guys if you need it." Clint explained, before an empty, humorless smile made his lips quirk crookedly as he continued.

" Besides, more hands mean we can get this over with quicker, clean Loki up so Thor doesn't have to see him this way again. It'll be better, but not by much. The poor guy's coming apart at the seams upstairs." The archer said quietly.

Tony and Bruce really had no argument against that, so they both just nodded to Clint and waited for the archer to change into a white scrub top and protective apron and gloves, and put his new, comfy Stark Industries hoodie somewhere safe and away from he grim task he had opted to help out with.

Once Clint returned, the three of them got to work cleaning and patching Loki's body up.

When Bruce slowly pulled the bloodied sheet away from Loki's lower half, the three of them could not suppress the collective shudder that passed through them when they saw the whip marks that accompanied the jaggedly carved letters on Loki's back, nearly every inch of him close to flayed. Their horror only grew when they saw the state of Loki's other private area.

Steeling themselves, Bruce and Tony picked up the twin water hoses that were attached to the state of the art medical exam table and started to gently bath Loki's corpse with warm water. Thankfully the table had advanced tech in it that would collect and store blood and other biological samples, so that they wouldn't have to do anything more invasive to Loki than they needed to.

Rivers of dark, red tainted water began to flow freely into the table's built in drains as Bruce and Tony gently and carefully cleaned away the massive amounts of coagulated and dried blood that clung to Loki's mottled, blue gray skin and matted black hair.

From where he silently stood at the foot of the exam table and observed, Clint breathed deep and blinked his eyes, fighting back a telltale burn.

Outside, the skies over New York rumbled further with unhappy dark clouds. No doubt the rain would come soon.