Who: Loki narrative Where: Asgard, Oklahoma When: July 8, 2014 (backdated) What: Events are very similar to how they transpire in Journey into Mystery #622, in which Kid Loki receives Ikol, his hidden magpie companion. Much of the dialogue is heavily quoted directly from canon, and thus must be credited to Kieron Gillen's brilliance. :) Rating: PG
The dust of his old neglected room swirled about him once more. Loki pulled back his hood, green eyes dancing within the gloom as the gently muffled sound of his footsteps echoed off the old, watchful stone.
L.L. had not really understood why he needed to go to Oklahoma. Nor could he truly explain what he was seeking. Still, when he told her he was going to hike and possibly hitchhike halfway across the States, she wouldn’t hear of it and had gotten him bus tickets. Wanda and the Vision were likely unhappy with him when they found his note saying he would be back in a few days. His phone kept beeping with worried texts. He’d given a few vague ones in return to note he was well but had not responded to the demanding inquiries. L.L. he kept a little better updated. But then, he very much owed her for shaving some days from his journey (and really it was keeping the Houston lady from informing the two non-parental units of exactly where he went).
“I missed something obvious when I was here before…” He closed his eyes, opening his senses. “One for sorrow. Two for mirth. Three for a wedding. Four for a death.” He sighed, opening his eyes and looking up at the thin sliver of moonlight coming through the shutters. The beam set white spark to the floating speckles of dust. “Or birth… Four for a death or a birth, but it may very well have been one and the same for me.” He looked around the room, palms up. “Five for silver. Six for gold. Seven for a secret…”
The black and white feather float down in his vision. Loki watched it fall to the floor at his feet, then bent to pick it up, turning it in his fingers silently. Then his green eyes sought upward.
“... Never to be told.” He straightened, looking up in the black reaches of the ceiling arches. He exhaled heavily. “Right.”
Climbing up till he found the entry was not easy. Loki even fell a few times, yet that seemed fitting that a curse or two be elicited. He managed at last to the ceiling, allowed his senses to guide him and produced the once-bloodied key.
The opening between the pillars lift upward, a perfectly round portal allowing him into the waiting darkness.
Oh! He blinked at the utter blackness. I know the story now…
~~~
Loki had turned to blood and ashes, burned from the inside out. When that happened, seven black and white birds took to wing.
The first magpie stopped to mourn. A god’s death--even a wicked god like Loki--was no small thing, and a bird’s heart--the smallest of things--couldn’t hope to contain it.
The rest? They flew on.
The second magpie left after days at sea. The magpie knew oceans are endless and all oceans are one. So on one shore there would be a beach where, in his youth he saw a hen that left him eternally a-flutter.
The rest? They flew on.
They lost the third in Alfheim, where he stopped to feed on the eyes of a fallen elf girl, torn apart like an over-optimistic dream. He couldn’t bear for eyes so pure to stare up at the uncaring sky forever.
The rest? They mocked him. “You’re not a carrion eater, you fool,” they chirped. “You’re not a stupid raven, stupid bird,” before flying on.
The fourth died of shock, without warning, falling from the sky with an empty breast. Loki had been reborn, and he wondered with his last choked breath what the fates would say.
The rest flew onward with uncertainty.
The fifth was shot with an arrow of silver when passing through Hela’s Valhalla. The silver in heaven is so pure he barely felt a thing.
The remaining magpies were getting worried. Yet what could they do but fly on?
The sixth died in hell.
The last?
~~~
The last winged his way among wonders and journeys too much for Loki’s mind, and it smeared with dark, scratchy images before it finally returned to Asgard. There it had waited and died at the sight of him. Loki held his temples, teeth grit until the moment passed. When he breathed, the dark was gone. An ambient glow of green lay here. And books… So many books in this tight cylinder of a room that lay in his tower that had been both his haven and prison. How he knew the foremost and latter, he could not tell.
“Ah… And now we look for the final question.” All riddles started with a question and ended with a mark of question. All the clues had left the final query. Thou must look for the answer in the final question.
Dust was an eloquent thing. Whereas the room below was caked for lack of disturbing, here there were signs of motion far more recent. Green eyes trailed along the edges of the shelves and finally pulled down a book toward the slanted writing table. He cast a curious look to the inkwell when its feather quill turned swift and sudden within it. Brow pinched, he stared at it for a long moment before finally opening the book.
Loki read.
He read of the turning of enemies, of betrayals of sons against fathers, of a falling city and sins. He read of a burning tree, of a brother stabbed far too close to his precious heart, and then of a rising serpent. A waking god stopped the city from falling, but not the son and serpent. Both fell dead of each other. The weary, grieving father took both bodies and left, the city abandoned to Midgard. Loki…
His eyes skimmed the words. The God of Mischief fell at his own conniving hand, having summoned up his treacherous son to swallow the flames, but in turn perished himself. Yet, the fallen prince had promised all of Asgard would burn and be lost into darkness. It has left a question for which there is no answer. Why did Loki do it? No one knows.
Why did Loki do it??
Loki’s green eyes widened as he stared at the question mark, at the final dot below it. Then suddenly the blackness of it loomed up around him, and he was falling.
The fall was strange, like when one falls in a dream, all scurrying stomach and trying to wake before the ground came too close. But he didn’t wake. Loki winced as he rolled off his bruised back. Even giantkind couldn’t fall from too great of heights without injury. There were wreaths of green fog circling about the area, and fathomless velvet blackness beyond. The small circle of light from above lit the immediate area, and shone off a colorless floor onto a pedestal.
And there, resting atop a helm with back-curving horns sat…
“Oh.” Loki pushed off his hands to his knees gingerly. “Hello Mr. Magpie.”
The bird tilt its head at him, dark eyes glimmering. Loki bit back a yelp as the fog erupted around him, hot flames causing his hair and clothing to whip to and fro. Then it died down and his eyes dilated at the figure before him, horror making his pulse freeze. You…
He was staring at his ghost. No, it looked not like him, but he knew exactly whom this was. Tall, lean, mysticism and secrets clinging about the frame like a shroud… and malice. Young Loki had felt malice before, but not like this. This was an old predator, a snake saturated in schemes and selfish plot. Such meticulously clung to jealousy and wrath permeated the initial flare of this creature’s presence, and it had wrought its havoc. It was a deeply lined face that stared down at him hungrily, aged with lack of good things to nourish Loki of Old. The chin tilt up imperiously, and his words seared as young Loki stared with parted lips.
“I am Loki!” the ghost announced, each word causing the flames to calm and the menace of the presence to simmer. “Whose whim brought Asgard crashing down. I am Loki whose tongue was an anvil that forged the sharpest of lies. I am Loki, and I have things to say that thou must know. I am Loki whom thou must not trust.”
Have no trust in myself… This I now know. This was a dangerous game, more than he had realized before he had known what laid at the end of his clues. So far all that had been spoken were truths. That he knew. But half-truths were the best covers for ugly truths. He would have to be sly.
So it was slyness that looked back at the hungry ghost that fold its long-nailed hands into hiding within the billowing, ethereal sleeves. “What are the chances? I’m Loki, too. We should be the very best of friends.” He stood, looking about at the dark ring of green flame. “Where am I? What are you, precisely?”
“I am the echo of a scream. This room is hidden behind a whim, buried in a daydream, covered in bad thoughts and malice. To find it involves a little reading and even proper punctuation. It is a place which Thor would never locate.”
Thor. A shadow of an image circled by blue lightning flashed in young Loki’s mind, a new determination setting in.
“It is my message from me to thee,” the taller Loki continued. “From me to me.”
Loki spread his gloved palms. “Then speak it, Elder-self. I have solved your riddle. I demand amusements. Explain what puzzles all of Asgard so. You promised them oblivion on the heels of horror, the hammer of your hate to them all… then sacrificed yourself to save it.”
The words were silky, brows arching. “Is that right?”
Loki quickly responded, the answer suddenly obvious. “No, it’s not.” His hands fell to his sides as he spoke the rush of his thoughts aloud. “If you had wanted to live, you would have hid yourself beneath the rug of the universe before the final blow was struck. You chose to die. That means you wanted to die. That means you needed to die. There is only the “Why?”.”
The horned helm nod slowly, staying tipped as ghost held his palm toward little Loki. “There is only one who Loki would sacrifice himself for.”
“Aye. I was a creature of spite and will.” The flames writhed closer to the ghost as he looked at his own hands. “I was the god of chaos. But in my capriciousness, I was totally predictable… No god of chaos worthy of the name could stand such a thing. I wrote myself out of the Book of Death. I slipped predestination’s noose. All I had to do is escape my personality’s… After a glorious death, I would be found or find my way back. A new Loki: a fresh page with fresh ink to write a free future.”
“You went into oblivion with nothing but the hope that there was something out there? Or that someone would show you the path home?”
The elder loomed over him. “The people of Midgard have a saying: Change or die. I would rather die than not change. I would rather be nothing.” The hungry eyes looked loftily down at his young reborn self. “Thankfully it did not come to that.”
Loki closed his eyes briefly, turning away with folded arms. “I should tell someone of this.”
“Thou should,” the elder agreed grimly.
“If I wanted to be killed, I should.” Loki frowned, remembering how people had looked at him when they realized he was Loki, the Loki. The Aesir were a war-like people. Parting him to death would not be difficult for them. It was why he knew better than to stay without someone to protect him. Someone like Thor…
Whom he had apparently slain. He had not delivered the final bite of poison, but it had been caused by him all the same. Loki thought about the waiting elder behind him. There was more to this than the god was saying. Chains of destiny were well and good to escape, and Loki’s chains were ill-wrought indeed in the legends, but something had changed to make them too unbearable. The creature behind him was power and malice, but burning. Something had made the risk of death more pleasant than existing, something that could torment even a wicked god.
Young Loki watched the flames dancing as he spoke, turning possibilities in his mind. “No one could keep them from my head. They would think me part of a some plan, a scheme beyond the grave.”
“I think thou art correct.”
Loki looked sharply over his shoulder. “They would be correct, too. This is a scheme beyond the grave. But one beyond their imagining… What now?”
There was a faint smile around the aged lips. “Power corrupts. Therefore thou wilt have little. Thou must become a new Loki, with naught but thy wits to guard the nine realms.” He leaned down, pointing. “For soon they will be in peril.”
“A peril looms?”
“They cursed Loki’s name, but even without he, there was enough wickedness to assure threats as common as the tides. Those waves must be survived. A trickster is naught without a playground…”
“You would offer me advice?”
There seemed almost a glint of approval as the elder god’s hands disappeared into his sleeves solemnly again. Even so his tone was nearly reluctant with truth. “Yes, but thou should pay it no heed. Knowledge is what I have and what thou should take. Lifetime upon lifetime of mysteries, packed into this old spirit by thy dead older self. I will be whatever thou wishes…”
Then it was Loki’s move, feeling the fire hungry but patient around him. Wishes were dangerous, worded desires and untruths a peril here beyond what the boy wanted to imagine. He needed to chose correctly, or this old dragon would devour him like a sweet meat and roam the world free once more, spreading his torment. Of course safest would be to walk away and pretend he found his old self not at all. But I can’t leave myself here to burn. Even I, reborn from this wicked creature, cannot bring myself to such cruelty, even to myself. Besides, Loki knew his old self was right. He needed his knowledge. There was one force of nature that would be certain to check any evil intentions his old self would endeavor to. That knowledge would be needed to bring that force back into play. A trickster needed a playground indeed. If that was so, Loki would stack the pieces against himself if he needed to.
“What I wish…” He wished for so many things. He wished people did not stare at him with hatred or past hurts. He wished he knew what evils he had done so he could correct them. He wished he could be loved. He wished his old self was not in pain and burning and so full of hate. He wished legends were not cruel and the Fates were not so conniving to gods of mischief. He wished for a past without chains. But young Loki wanted none of the consequences of wishing for such things. He could not unravel what was done. The past was already writ on the pages with ink that could not be erased. No, his steps had to be taken toward the future without fear. What was done could not be undone, but it could be reforged into something new. The new could be good. Change would be good. If he wished for anything else, old Loki would be all too free to do as he pleased. It wouldn’t do. He looked up, fire in his youthful eyes. What I wish… "... is to be Loki.”
Loki raised his hand, and the magic flood the space. The ghost seemed aghast. Why would he wish to be such, after he had seen what he had been? But it was done. The words spoken, and they were hiding in a book where words had gravity. All words here had power, even from one with little power such as little Loki. The flames whipped and writhed, and his elder self shrank toward the horned helm where the magpie rest still, guide there by Loki. “You are done. You are gone.” The old god disappeared, and the magpie shook its head and gave its warbling chirp, wings flapping chaotically. Loki beckoned to it, and the bird flew toward him. “You are now Ikol, my opposite, bird of mine, pet supreme. Whisperer and worm-eater. You’ll tell me what I want and nothing more.”
The magpie rest on his waiting arm, head tilting in the swift click motions of birds before it partly spread its wings and bowed. “Yes, Master.”
“Good,” Loki said. He gave a final glance around, the horned helm resting on its pedestal and the green fog disappearing into the blackness. “Let us go. We have much to do and you have much to tell me.”
“What do you ask?” Ikol queried.
Loki turned away from the horned helm, looking upward. The light seemed to reach down for him. “Of everything I have heard, there is one wrong that must be undone.” He closed his eyes briefly, remembering again the terrifying power of a lightning storm circling someone who was a mountain of power and had a heart huge enough for the both of them. What I wish... His eyes opened as the blackness started to disappear. “I need my brother. I need Thor. You will help me find a way to bring him back.”
“Thor...” Ikol repeated.
Then the room disappeared from around them, and suddenly Loki was back in the hidden library above the tower, tumbling onto the floor awkwardly.
Leaving Asgard was not as smooth as his sneaking into it, for he ran into people on the way. In the end he left physically unscathed, if a little inwardly shaken. Having one’s throat saved from a slitting only by Volstagg’s timely intervention caused such nervousness, after all. But there was no reason to let it last. He had a lot of steps remaining before him.
Loki pulled out his phone from his leather belt pouch as he walked from the floating city at dawn, opening a new message screen.
Mission accomplished, L.L. I’m on my way back! Milkshakes later?