Raven Meets an Old Adversary

Raven awoke to a pressure on his face, and around his arms. His backside felt numb, so he assumed that he was sitting on a hard surface, perhaps a wooden chair? But with the blindfold so tightly bound around his face, he couldn't be sure. Common sense and an inbuilt survival instinct kicked in as he listened for noises, any noises, that would give away his whereabouts. He sniffed the air. As far as he could tell, it was dusty with a hint of..... wait a minute... was that disinfectant? And formaldehyde? He felt nauseous.

Yep, definitely a laboratory. But whose?

There was only one that sprung to mind and it was closed down a long time ago and it's inhabitors ran out of town. But surely they hadn't returned? Had they? They couldn't be THAT brazen? And what did they want with him? He cocked his head as he heard a door squeak open. Then close with a click. He clamped his mouth shut, and tried to stay calm.

"Ah, subject is awake?" a thick scandinavian accent announced.

Raven felt a cold chill. Can't be. How did he know I was here, I never heard the whirr of surveillance cameras. That meant only one thing. Raven swallowed hard as another voice, close to his ear, murmured, making him jump slightly.

"He's been awake for a little while now."

Had she been sitting there all this time? It creeped him out at the fact that she'd been here, watching him.

"Haven't you?" she asked, stroking his cheeky with a slightly cold finger.

He refused to speak. Or rather, fear glued his tongue to the roof of his mouth.

"Oooh, strong silent type," she crooned, "just how I like them."

He felt her fingers loosening the blindfold and he blinked sharply, expecting the lighting to be brighter, but it wasn't.

"We adjusted the lighting to accommodate your sharp eyesight," Loki said matter of factly, "in a contradiction of terms, we're not the monsters here. You are."

He jabbed his finger at Raven, his expression fierce. Circe stalked up to Loki and snaked her arms around him. As thin and delicately built as she was, for some reason, she managed to calm down her husband.

"Now now Loki," she crooned, "we don't want to give you a coronary. Not after all the hard work you've put into this project."

She kissed his cheek lightly and turned to Raven.

"You have ... or had," she corrected, "something that belonged to us."

Nervous. It had to be.

"You kept him a prisoner in ...." His eyes quickly adjusted and he scanned his surroundings.".... here!?!?"

It seemed so bare, so empty, void of all the lab equipment that was scattered around in the photographs he'd seen. His crack team had been quick and efficient. Whisking Nervous away and taking loads of pictures for evidence should they need it in the future. Before confiscating all the lab equipment and putting it into storage.

The place had been stripped bare and locked up after the Beakers fled empty handed. But now they were back. What possible dastardly deed would they commit this time? Raven felt cold dread at the idea of him being their guinea pig.

"That's right," Loki said finally, "we're home. MY home. My ancestral home to be correct. Or it was, until you confiscated and violated it."

"We had a tip-off that you were keeping Nervous a prisoner and under squalid conditions. We had to act on our instincts."

"You have no idea what you've unleashed. Do you know that?"

"By the time we got there he was fully institutionalized."

"And there was good reason for it." Circe replied, she paused before walking up to Raven and looking directly into his face, "I heard he put up a fight."

"He did, yes. Knocked one man unconscious and broke another one's arm in three places. He wasn't in his right mind."

"Too right he wasn't." Loki interrupted, rubbing his wrist tenderly, "and that's why we had him here. For his and everyone else's safety."

"He was a prisoner. We saw his living quarters."

"Was he not well fed?"

Raven paused, thinking. As a matter of fact, in all the photographs they'd taken of Nervous, apart from being a bit lean and wiry, he wasn't exactly undernourished.

"That doesn't explain the bruising though."

Loki smiled coldly. It sent shivers down Raven's spine.

"I guess you never checked him out an hour later and found that they'd mysteriously vanished?"

What??

Raven blinked.

"Oh yes," Loki continued, "he was very adept at healing his own body. He was a medical miracle. But for his 'flaws' he'd have been worth a fortune."

"There were blood tests," Raven pressed on, "that signified substantial drugs in his blood stream, how do you explain that one?"

Loki rubbed his face and sighed heavily.

"Haven't we been through all this questioning many times before? At interviews and hearings? The longer we delay, the more in danger the public will be."

"You didn't answer my question."

"You already know the answer. All I want is him back."

"To torture him again?"

Loki growled loudly and turned away, but not before slapping his palm onto the surface of the nearby side table. Raven noticed him wince in pain.

"Did he injure you?"

Loki turned, defeat written all over his face.

"I just want him back home where he'll be safe ... where everyone will be safe."

Editor's Notes:
I was impatient to get this update published that I never took the pics. So you're getting a sneaky preview for now. Got a very heavy schedule over the next couple of months, but the minute I get some spare time, I'll load in Sims and get the pics that I want for this and other updates.