☪ Day 7 of Week 19, just before the Reset ⛿ Rooftop of Peaslee Theater
A conversation before the Reset, and a loosening of that Loki
armor.
⚠
Mentions of death and murder
Sylvie didn't exactly know why, but she had one of those gut feelings. That feeling was telling her to pop up to the top of the theater building. She'd done it the night of her first reset, not realizing that Loki would be up there. She hadn't meant to encroach on his personal space. At the time, she'd been playing Dodge-The-Lokis and hit one without even meaning to. Since then, they're gone through a lot of rubbish together. All of them, the Lokis.
This time, she climbed up with the intention of beating him there.
She was as charitable as she could be, given that she hadn't been to any of the interesting places to gather interesting things, bringing several snacks she'd found in the kitchens, some of the candies she collected when there were monsters, and a few varieties of carbonated soda. She'd brought her own pillow, assuming he'd bring his.
TemPads could do amazing things. The technology was super insanely advanced, but the graphics left something to be desired. This one, this phone, wasn't bad. You could actually watch something on it without wondering what color it was. Pity it couldn't save everyone. She turned on some music in the background while she stared a little too hard at the greying sky. Come out, come out wherever you are, Void Monster.
And then she waited.
Three times made it a tradition, right? The first time, it had been running into Sylvie up here -- a surprise he hadn’t banked on. Then, the second time, there were monsters, but Ikol had risked it because he could stay quiet and hidden with aid of his magical accessories. The Reset came and was met with gratitude, then.
This time, in the ever-progressing nature of things, he climbed the interior of the building with Thori tucked beneath one arm. The small hel-hound snarfled, puffs of smoke escaping his nostrils as he squirmed with small indignation. Under Ikol’s other arm: a pillow. In his grip: a canteen with some tea. If the night amounted to a quiet outing with Thori, then he was braced for it.
He pressed the rooftop door open, then looked immediately to his left. A grin settled on his face. He stooped to set Thori down, and the puppy zipped over to sniff everything Sylvie had brought up with her with prejudice. Just hel-hound stuff.
“Void Anomaly hunting tonight?” Ikol settled his pillow down, permitting Sylvie her usual breadth, and then took his usual seat. “Anything interesting, or just… you know, grey and more of the same?”
She had not accounted for Thori. Damn. She should have found some sort of meat or whatever rubbish the dog would eat. Well, he could have her sandwich at least. She'd brought enough for days, if she was carefully planning and limiting her meals. All of this stuff should reset though, so she didn't think about rationing.
Well, except the candy. That wouldn't reset, but candy was only good if you ate it.
She'd gained quite the sweet tooth, living in apocalypses without a parent to tell her what to eat. Sometimes it was just what you could find on the shelves after everyone had stocked up so you took what you could get. It had been hard in the beginning; she didn't know what half of these things were in their colorful packages. There was a lot of trial and error. Canned versions of fresh fruits and vegetables were sometimes satisfying, but they were almost always overly salted. Or so soggy that they became chewy.
Eating during an apocalypse was sort of depressing anyway. Most people were too terrified to do anything, but eventually Sylvie learned to ignore them. There was nothing she could do for them. Nothing that wouldn't draw attention to herself, and a Loki was nothing if not self preserving.
"It usually comes out when it's darker. Did you see it last night at the party? It was definitely more hopping." Nevermind that she steadier got drunker to the point that she'd gotten into a fight — on stage — with Loki and Rocket.
Ikol wrinkled his nose. “Ah, no. I skipped out early. The rambunctious one over here was trying to get into the liquor.” He jabbed a thumb at Thori, who was too busy keeping an intense vigil down on the campus below. He looked something more akin to a bird of prey than a dog. “And, I reminded him that he did not have a… licker license.”
Terrible. Truly. But that was the point. The whole story was a sham, and if anyone prodded at exactly what possessed Ikol to flee the stage, then he was determined to hold to the lie. And it was easier to do that if he slapped a coat of humor over the whole thing and kept everyone at arm’s length away from the truth.
He settled backwards a bit more, letting the pillow mold around his upper body and then he cast his eyes towards whatever qualified as a sky in Derleth. It meant he didn’t need to look at Sylvie and accidentally catch her scrutinizing anything he was saying or doing. “Ah, or maybe it should have been flicker license. Fire pun? ...that might be a stretch.”
She should have expected it. It was the kind of joke she would have loved as a kid, would have made if she had much experience with dogs. Her "home" life wasn't exactly conducive for pets. Though, she supposed she could have saved a pup or two along the way. Except, she absolutely knew she'd leave them behind if the TVA came around. No choice really. Survival wins out.
"Licker is better. It's more … dog relatable," she answered. There were several feet between them but he'd setup shop somewhere close enough that she could set the bag with her collection of candy for him to reach it. "Or something."
Sylvie got better situated to watch the Void. If he looked at her then, he'd see a tiny smile. She didn't trust him, of course, but this was infinitely better than being alone. Especially after letting all of her rubbish out the other day. She was loath to admit it, but she needed the prodding. She likely would have ended up getting so angry — with herself — that she would have had to let off some steam with a massive scream and a burst of green magic.
"Sorry. I don't have a lot of witty banter. Or know how to do a lot of small talk." Being alone for a thousand years would do that to a person.
“Licker,” Ikol agreed. In the distance, Thori was yelling something over the ledge, plausibly at one of Derleth’s residents. Possibly at a blade of grass he didn’t like the look of. The general noise of the dog had been easier to tune out after a few days. He muttered and growled at everything, but only a small amount of the threats were ever real enough to worry over. It made most meetings follow along a line of Ikol apologizing for the obscenities uttered and Thori bristling even more to be called ‘cute’ despite best efforts to be malicious and fearsome.
He was aware that Sylvie had set something between them. The sweet scent on the air suggested candy, which was about right in his mind. As soon as the world of Midgardian sweets had been at his disposal, he’d also taken to them with acute affection. That same thing made him look down, brows raised as he rustled through her stash for something chocolate-based. Twix would do. He gave her a nod of thanks and caught that tiny smile.
“Small talk is an acquired skill, anyway. You learn it when you’re distracting someone from something else. Put bells on this one little throwaway piece of your life, of your day, and give it a jingle.” Was that advice? An admission? Ikol knew it might be more the latter, but he had to admit that for all the jingling he did -- watch this hand, never mind the other -- it was also a game of bait and switch. Give a lesser truth, avoid the bigger one.
Ikol shrugged. “Everyone does it. Except Death on Four Legs over there.” Speaking of... “Thori. Thori, don’t chew on that.”
In response, Thori chomped on part of the theater’s gutters and pried up a small piece of the metal.
“Well, that shouldn’t matter. I don’t think you can have rain without a sky…” Ikol mused.
"It should just reset anyway," she reminded him.
His advice — however it was given — was frowned at. Not because it wasn't sound advice, but because Sylvie couldn't imagine that anyone would be interested in anything she had to say. Her life had revolved around survival and taking down the TVA. She didn't have many hobbies — did tricking and killing TVA agents count? — and her day was just that: a day. She could not imagine a duller conversation.
"Is small talk just for a distraction? I thought it was supposed to be a prelude to normal conversation?" It was an honest question, coming from an honest place. She'd always assumed that small talk was how you eventually worked your way up the ladder to normal talk. Like a set of staircases. Small talk, slightly less small talk, normal talk, friendly chat, deep conversations.
"It should," Ikol agreed. Watch it not now, out of spite.
"Well, maybe that's overly cynical of me to say. Sometimes it's to debate which candy is the best. It's Kit-Kats, by the way. I'll settle for a Twix, but wafers are just the right amount of crunch. Put them in the freezer, and they're even better. My wisdom, imparted to you." He gave a loose salute, then unwrapped the Twix and popped half of one into his mouth.
"Besides, what's normal conversation for someone like us? Would you like to trade traumatic stories of childhoods gone awry?"
"Mhmm," Sylvie disagreed, shoving her hand into the bag and retrieving Twizzlers. She peeled open the bag and held one jiggle stick in her hand, waggling it back and forth. She just liked the sugar rush of gummy type candies more than chocolate. Chocolate was too rich, and weirdly reminded her of home which made her sad when she was younger. "Chocolate's too delicate to be keeping in your pocket when you might be stranded in the heat of climate crisis."
"At least if we go somewhere cold, us three are alright, yeah?"
They'd survive at least, because that's what Lokis do. We survive.
Speaking of traumatic stories, she figured she should fill this Loki in. "I knew another one of him — looked like this Loki."
“A melted chocolate bar does sound awful.” Ikol munched on the rest of the Twix bar he’d already broken in half. The caramel was chewy, and it stalled him from moving on too quickly. Mouthful of gooey sugar? He still had his Asgardian raising. Straight back, manners of a prince, and definitely no showing off whatever he was chewing whilst in conversation.
But, also, Sylvie had sauntered onto what could be deemed ‘small talk,’ and he knew there was a desire to feel out where there was crossover between their histories. He wondered as much, himself, but limited what he offered. It was teetering on a fine line, walking a tightrope.
“Jotun lineage has a few small perks. I can’t actually call to mind more than the specific one where chills are few and far between, but…” Ikol shrugged. Most days it barely registered that he was Frost Giant at all. His reflection hadn’t looked that way in ages. He was certain he wouldn’t even recognize himself if one day he awoke to find himself a little more frosty than usual.
“Anyway, I digress. You’re speaking of Variants?”
"They — we — make ice or something, yeah?" Sylvie, on the other hand, didn't have all that proper upbringing. She ripped a chunk of Twizzler off between her teeth and began to chew on it. There was an idea to grab one of the sodas she'd brought, and after digging around some more, she found one. Pineapple soda. She liked the bubbles, and yeah pineapple was pretty good too.
"That's what the TVA called me. Variant. Had a number and everything, but I've well forgotten that ages ago." Most of her memories from home were vague at best and forgotten completely at worst. The only truly stand-out memory was playing with her toys when the TVA came for her. She nodded. "Anyone who stepped off the Sacred Timeline's path was a Variant, usually a Hunter and several Minute Men showed up with 'em. They slap a collar on you which means they can pretty much do whatever they want. Don't like you standing too close? Rewind you to when you were a few feet away."
It was old hat now, telling what they did. She could recite in her sleep. She hoped she didn't talk in her sleep. "I dunno what I did, but I was small when it happened. Eight. I was playing when they came in. They refused to tell me anything, except that I'd been arrested for crimes against the Sacred Timeline. I found out that Lokis have the most Variants."
She gave a tiny grin, almost feral. "I wonder why?"
Ikol raised one brow at Sylvie, and he had to look over to see if she was kidding with the guess at Frost Giants’ innate abilities. He recalled her confession. That she was an infant when she was adopted. Taken. Whatever one wished to call Odin’s claim to fatherhood.
“No. No, we don’t really make ice. Frost Giants are more aggressive than… let’s just call it magic-wielding. Tactile stuff.” He swept a few recollections of that tactile nature of Laufey in particular away. His father had been cruel. Cold in a way that wasn’t just due to his being a Frost Giant.
He caught Sylvie’s grin and returned it with his one of his own. “I don’t know any Lokis who haven’t messed about with the bigger story. It’s either time travel, or bending outcomes, or jumping the divides between worlds. Look, you…” He placed the second Twix bar down, freeing up his hands. This was a moment to talk with gestures. “Say the TVA is concerned with this Sacred Timeline. Fair play. But does that mean that at some origin point…” He formed his hands into an enclosed clasp. “Here. In this little bubble. There is some fundamental Loki being? And from there springs this Loki you met? Loki Prime? Yourself?”
Sylvie frowned a little at that. There was something in his eyes that warned even Sylvie, who had no social skills to speak of, that it was best not to push the bit about Frost Giants. She'd never met her father, Laufey, and she hadn't wanted to. He'd abandoned her to die, Odin and Frigga said. She believed Frigga.
She sat up to get a better look at his hands and what he was trying to explain, then she shook her head. "It's more like — " She reached into her bag and pulled out several Twizzlers. She held one up " — Sacred Timeline Loki, yeah?" She set it down on her pillow. She bit off a piece of another Twizzler, held that up. "Me. Eight years old." She set it slightly upward, but the end of the piece was connected to a point on the Sacred Twizzler. She held up another bite sized piece. "Kid Loki." She set that one down, branching off a little further from where her line was, but not too far. Another piece. "The Loki I knew." She set this one down very close to the end of the line, branching off. Her finger lingered just a little longer.
Then she snatched up all the tiny pieces and shoved them in her mouth. "Pruning Loki's timeline. The one here with us — I think he was my world's Sacred Timeline version."
Ikol hummed, something of a noncommittal response, as he watched Sylvie explain. She was definitely speaking of timelines, not Multiverses in the way he knew them. Funny. Even at the edge of what was known, there was variation. More. One more layer beyond the furthest wall you encountered. Open a door, and find one more across the room that hadn’t been tried yet.
“First, we’re never calling him Sacred Loki or insinuating that he has a right to some holier-than-thou attitude. Can you imagine?” That was waved off with a tch. Ikol leaned to the candy bag and fished out a few pieces, prising out a few of the same types and putting them into small groups. He gestured at the spot where the Twizzlers had been. “You, Kid Loki, various and sundry types along your timeline.”
Then, he nudged forward a group of hard candies and placed another group of chocolate-based bars beside it. “Me, my timeline, all Lokis contained therein…” He pointed to the chocolate group. “Named as 616. This over here, Jolly Ranchers and the like? Oh, I don’t know, maybe that’s 1610. And there are oodles more, stretching out to infinity. A Multiverse, everyone in their little bubbles. And sometimes…” He picked up a grape Jolly Rancher and tossed it into the chocolate bars.
“Someone takes little journey.”
"See, this is what I was trying to do —" Sylvie pointed at his multiverse. " — because they told us, there was just this one and everything that didn't, well, it got sent to a void at the end of time to be eaten by Alioth." It was a shame she couldn't have just hopped over to another one of those multiverses. Maybe then she could have just plopped right into Asgard there, grown up, done something more with her life.
Instead, all she had one just one good memory, and a lifetime of loneliness.
She hoped here didn't have to be more of the same.
She suddenly looked up at him. "Do you have an Alioth? Big purple cloud that eats dimensions and dimensional energy?"
“Alioth?” Ikol sounded out. He let the name swirl around his mind, but ultimately all he could offer was a shrug. “I’ve been around, but I can’t say I know an Alioth. It might exist in my world. Maybe just outside my world, even.”
But, also, that was hardly the most interesting thing that Sylvie had told him. He picked up another Jolly Rancher and idly tossed it into the chocolates. “So, you were actively trying to restore your Multiverse because the TVA was trimming it from being able to… well, for lack of better word… grow?”
He looked at her again, and he was quiet. It was almost as if he was readjusting the vision of Sylvie against this new information. She’d seen a box and when someone said to jump in it, she jumped on it. He wished he knew how to do that. “If you succeeded, then good on you. Truly.”
Her eyes widened in surprise, though it wasn't unhappy surprise. She had to get used to compliments, or she wasn't going to get very far without getting embarrassed or giving away everything. She tried not to show she was pleased, which really just drew more attention to it. She cleared her throat.
"Loki and I — the other one — he got pruned to the void after we found out that the Time-Keepers were fake. So I —" She hunched in the courtroom with Ravonna and the Minute Men, thinking about what to do and how to survive. If there was truly a void at the end of time, then she could save Loki. Then she'd enchanted Alioth, and a whole new plan was born. "I thought that was it, he was gone, but it turned out the TVA can't destroy whole timelines, but Alioth can."
She thought about it now. That must have been where her mum and dad had gone. Where her Thor had gone. The older Loki had said that it had devoured entire timelines in seconds. Did they have any time at all to figure out what was happening to them? And if they knew it was her that caused it.
"So I pruned myself to follow him. We found a castle behind Alioth, his guard dog. We fought though; he didn't think it was a good idea after hearing He Who Remains — what did you call him? — had to say. I was just so focused on revenge. And the timelines, that was just a byproduct."
Ikol didn’t know what he expected, but it certainly wasn’t a full summary. He’d picked up his earlier-discard Twix and took the impromptu storytime to finish it off. His expression stayed fixed somewhere in the impressed-but-somewhat-bemused range with a small lift of the brows and the occasional nod. If it was trust fueling Sylvie onward, he wasn’t about to suggest she could be misplacing it.
She could definitely be misplacing it.
Somewhere off to the side, Thori was howling, but he wasn’t chewing the scenery in any literal sense, so that was good enough to let the hel-hound carry on.
“Oh, Kang,” Ikol supplied. “A Kang. Suppose the name could be something else, but the reputation carries forth. Either way you stack it, the one you met -- met his end. I recall you mentioning that.”
She turned to watch the hel-hound who had plopped his butt down near the theater's edge. Every howl brought a new puff of smoke wafting upward, but at least there weren't any real flames to worry about. Yet. Sylvie had the notion that he might before the night was through. She kept her eyes on him while Ikol talked.
"I think he'd been there too long by himself." She should know. A thousand years was likely nothing to Kang, but she'd practically gone feral. She'd forgotten how to interact with people, and not use them for whatever she could in those apocalypses, purposefully forgetting their faces. "Gone a little bit mental."
Especially if he actually believed that two Lokis should take his place, guarding the Sacred Timeline. Two of them he had pruned! What was wrong with him?
"What about you? What was going on in your world before you got here?"
The last question caught Ikol somewhat unaware. He was used to the ease of replying to the other two Lokis -- well, Loki and Sylvie -- and them fueling the conversation with just a cheerful nudge. Any pivot onto his own life, his own grievances and all the things he’d been through, was usually funneled back around with a joke. Loki was so caught in his own vanity and ego that it didn’t seem to take much to redirect him. Sylvie… always seemed to be reflecting on a life clearly lived under duress.
They let him skate by, whether intentional or not.
But Sylvie had just laid bare so much, that…
He could feel more keenly in that moment the hollow spot inside him. Would it hurt to entrust something to someone else here? What was the endgame to keeping his cards to his chest and bluffing his way through each interaction?
What was going on in your world before you got here?
“I think I was about to find out that my Mother had bet against me,” he finally said. “Unpleasant business, that.”
"Why would she do that?"
After having heard that Loki's mother taught him he could do anything, taught him magic, it was a surprise to hear Ikol say that his had bet against him. The multiverse was often as cruel as the Sacred Timeline. She reached for another Twizzler, feeling like an arse for having asked that question.
How did people manage it? Juggling other people's emotions and your own? It seemed like such a roundabout, with everyone chasing each other's tails.
Much like Thori was doing now. He'd managed to grab it once, and that had spurned him around in a circle. Sylvie held out her hand, pulling it back, then back out again just in case the dog went over the side. She had a feeling hel-hounds were durable, but the theater was much, much taller than Thori was.
Ikol released a held breath. It was the sort of exhale that a person didn’t realize they were trapping until the pressure built up and they understood it was out of being so deeply focused on something that they merely forgot to breathe. Clenching without consciously making the decision to. He’d arrived here weeks ago, and after some preliminary sniffing around Loki and vice versa, all talk of the All-Mother and home had been swept under a rug.
“I don’t know,” he finally told Sylvie.
He furrowed his brow as he gazed outward at the gray sky. It dowsed everything around them in a broody shade. Only Thori’s flame had brought some color back into the rooftop with licks of orange, red, yellow.
“I was doing her work. I was doing everything she and the rest of the All-Mother asked of me. I was doing good.” He drew his legs up, knees tucked in. He could still see King Loki’s visage clearly. Sneering at him, taunting him for not seeing the obvious answer about who had gotten the All-Mother’s ear despite the agreement Ikol himself had made with them. “But I suspect there’s an answer here that a Loki’s worst enemy… is Loki.”
What work could anyone be doing for the All-Mother? It almost sounded as if there were multiples — rest of the All-Mother — aroused her curiosity. His world seemed so different from the one she'd come from, from the one the other Loki had. Had he been keeping this bottled up all this time?
A Loki's worst enemy is Loki.
That was something that spanned all universes.
She looked at him, dropping her hand to her lap. She suspected that if Ikol wasn't worried about him, then it was alright to leave Thori to his own devices. Sylvie's expression was concern mixed with curiosity. She had a feeling this Loki played things even closer to their chest than the rest of them. "Did you self-sabotage… or?"
The question lingered where Sylvie left it. As ever, the answer was yes, no, and both. No straight lines, no easy conclusions. Ikol had prided himself on being a complicated little contraption, wound up on a spring and let loose -- whose path and choices were unknowable because he was one step ahead of everyone.
But that was a sham, wasn’t it? He was a simple machine. He was a trap that had been set by someone else, and when the time was right, he’d sprung. The ghost of the boy whose life had be snuffed out by that mechanism trailed him still, haunting his thoughts and reminding him that he had blood on his hands. Even now, that specter had found a spot beside him on the roof. His ever-present guilty conscience given form gazed at the side of his face, imploring his executioner to take notice. Ikol willfully kept his gaze elsewhere.
“In a manner of speaking, yes. I met my future. Maybe it’s best that I’m here.”
"Like — actual you? Or what you think you'll turn out to be?"
Because those were often not at all the same. Her experience had been that nothing ever turned out the way you wanted it to. And even when you got what you thought you wanted, it turned out to not be the thing you needed at all. What Ikol was talking about seemed much more confusing than multiverses made out of Jolly Ranchers and chocolates.
"Maybe, but it depends on who actually put us all here. What if it was your future? Or my TVA? Or Loki's Thanos?" Because it clearly had to revolve around a Loki, right? That's how things worked in the Lokiverse.
"Or a hundred thousand other things. What if all the universes have collapsed and we're all that's left in some tiny little bubble in the middle of nowhere? Just floating around going to places that no longer exist until we're just stuck here in this void resetting forever."
It was hard to walk anything back now. Inwardly, Ikol knew that was the point. Talk it out. Share something. Let a little pressure out.
“Actual me. My future. Or, well, one future that had played out, and thought he might take a little journey back to where it all began to hurry me along on my way to becoming him. Don’t suppose the TVA ever covered what happens when someone intentionally travels the timeline to ensure something specific plays out in their own past? It’s a neat trick. A royal headache to wrap your mind around sometimes, but…” He was rambling. The humor was siphoning in, as well. The confession wasn’t nearly as casual as he was playing it off to be.
“I’m a sum of parts, Sylvie. Some of them weren’t my choosing. I would like to think the rest were my choice…” He shook his head. “Are…? Will be...?”
Then, he swept a hand outwards at Derleth, framing it roughly. “But this place isn’t the work of a Loki. This place is one more thing that we don’t get a say in. Direction-less, time-less. This is a holding place.”
He was right about this place: it was a holding cell. Just one more prison they couldn't get out of. Goddess of Mischief. God of Outcasts. Break free, and the TVA will pull you right back in. You have one purpose: to cause misery and suffering wherever you go. She'd done that alright. She knew Loki had. And this one? She suspected the jokes, the witty repartee, the banter — all of it was hiding something painful. Because that's ultimately what a Loki was, right?
The God of Bullshit and Lies.
"Don't let anyone tell you who you are — not even some future version of you, because there's thousands — millions -- of us out there. We can do whatever the hell we want. We're survivors, and that future doesn't have to be."
She was vehement in her speech which thickened her accent and made her features animated. She reached down and grabbed one of the green Jolly Ranchers. "This future you?" She opened the wrapper and popped it into her mouth. "You can swallow him."
She had him paying attention, and he’d finally looked over from the vacant spot in the sky to see Sylvie in all her splendor. There was a spark she had, and he could see clearly the fire inside that he suspected carried her through all her solitary moments up to the point when she freed the Multiverse. It was a good speech. It was.
He watched the Jolly Rancher vanish, but then…
He felt a cold grip him. On his other side, a distant and small voice whispered something. He knew only he could hear it. “...you can.” It drew nearer, as if it were right beside his ear. “You know how to consume...”
Ikol turned away from both, his gaze directed down towards his feet before he dug his palms into his eyes.
“Stop!” His voice was strained in a plea, and he twisted his shoulder quickly, as if to shake off some unwanted touch. “Just st --”
And maybe there was ironic justice in Derleth, after all. The last second ticked by, and finally… it was 1:32. All stopped. And Derleth began the cycle anew.