Sylvie meets her alternative universe mother who gives her a big confidence and love boost
that she desperately needed..
â
WARNINGS
For the briefest of instants, Sylvie didn't think she'd remember what her mother looked like. It had been so long, and sometimes their faces blurred into one giant memory that swirled around. Sometimes Thor had the eyepatch, sometimes Odin was too young to have children. She remembered kind hands and hearts though, and it had kept her warm when no fire could during those early days. Eventually, the pleading for her parents to save her turned to cursing them when they didn't.
And with knowledge (and some trial and error), she learned that they were simply gone. The ones that were in the world didn't know her. They looked at her without any recognition, and it had crushed her once upon a time.
Frigga was here now though, and seemed to know she was a Loki.
Everyone on campus felt entirely dull and lifeless. Even the myriad of creatures someone created couldn't shake the feeling that this was a trap. It was a trick. Renslayer was behind this, and she was walking straight into her trap.
But in case it wasn'tâŠ
The clearing opened, and upon seeing the All-Mother there, it was like the entire world had gone from greys to full color. Her chest tightened to the point she thought she might explode, but she didn't say anything. She couldn't. If she opened her mouth, she might discover this was nothing more than a very vivid dream.
Sylvie froze at the edge of the clearing. Her fingers dug into her palm, and her throat felt as if she'd swallowed a bag of sawdust. Every muscle in her body was tense and poised to run.
Frigga wore a different dress for this meeting. With her son she wore the dress heâd last seen her in, the coolness and tranquility of aquamarine. For meeting with her daughter (because of course she considered Sylvie as such), she shifted and changed her attire with magic - it was now a bronze dress with bare shoulders, earrings that elegantly dangled and golden curls woven and tamed in a half updo, otherwise sweeping down her back in a way that was, of course, deliberate.
She had so many questions. She wanted to know this Loki, wanted to see and understand all the different parts of her - Frigga hadnât been there when Sylvie was young, so very young, untouched by grief and sorrow. Their circumstances and lives were different but she believed that souls remained the same - whatever she could do for Sylvie here, she intended to do just that.
Arriving at the clearing, she waited and watched - her face broke into a beatific smile when Sylvie appeared, and it was like Frigga had known this would happen all along. Everything locked into place, puzzle pieces slotting together as if they were meant to be. âIâm so glad you came,â she spoke up, stepping closer. But carefully - she knew that Sylvie was delicate, fragile, but not in the way that meant weakness. Rather, in the way that meant she was a hardy flower who closed up in cold weather and needed coaxing and care to open up again - prickly and ferocious, she didnât let others in.
Frigga would respect that.
âIs it alright if I hug you or would you rather not?â she inquired. So much pain. Torment. Sylvie was not kind to herself - it broke Friggaâs heart a little.
She'd forgotten the All-Mother's voice. At least, she thought she had. The soothing tone unlocked some memory inside her that she thought had faded. Maybe Sylvie had locked it away simply because it was too painful to think about the family she'd been stolen from for some unknown trespass against the sacred timeline. Locked it away like she'd locked away her real name.
Her mouth opened, to say something, to answer the goddess, but the only sound that came out was a huff of air between her teeth. Her throat was still too tight to let sound escape, but she etched this memory into her mind. She studied every line in the All-Mother's dress, every curl, the way the color of the dress made her feel like Warmth personified. Frigga was the sun, and Sylvie was some debris simply caught in her warmth for the time being.
"I â don't know." She wanted to feel those arms around her, to feel a tiny piece of home after all this time. How did you ask for that though? Without feeling desperate? Without cracking? Without shattering into a million pieces for something you thought was gone forever? Without worrying that you'd just betray her too? "You're â as beautiful as I remember."
She didnât move quite yet, not into an immediate embrace - Frigga felt it best if she eased into it. But she did step even closer and took one of Sylvieâs hands, holding it between her own - her touch was warm and meant to be comforting, a pot of hot tea enjoyed after coming in from the bluster of a cold day. âThank you,â she exhaled, finding the compliment to be a sweet thing to say. âThere is so much beauty about you too. There is heart.â
Sylvie had grown up in the shadows, literal ones - evading death, watching the world burn down around her over and over again. She had no place to call home, no friends, and nary an escape from that nightmare. âYou deserve peace,â she told her daughter. âI hope you know that.â
She was here. She could stop running (even if, technically, there wasnât much of a choice about leaving). But in Friggaâs view, her future was limitless - she could be Sylvie, something beyond any concept of doomed.
It didn't take long before Sylvie's hands unclenched in Frigga's, in part because it seemed rude to leave it balled up, nails digging into her palm. Partly because every part of Sylvie was telling her that this was her mother. She belonged to another universe maybe, but everything she could scrape together in her memory felt like this. Like being home. Like she was loved. Like she was a part of something.
"I've done bad things," she told her, in a small voice that sounded suspiciously like a child's. "I lost everything, and I decided I wanted revenge. They killed my family. They took everyone I ever loved and sent them to the void to be devoured by a monster for their plan. I was too different to fit." She shook her head. "I don't know what I did, and revenge just left â it didn't work. I thought it would make me whole again. Or better."
Instead, she lost Loki in the process.
âPerhaps those things you have done are not good things, from a moral perspective,â Frigga spoke - and it was difficult to imagine a timeline where everything was simply obliterated. That an organization could come in and wipe out everything, including her - including her love for her children? Sylvie wanted what the Loki she had raised wanted too - love. Acceptance. To rest. âBut they considered you an aberration. They wanted you dead. Itâs difficult to blame you, daughter - I know I donât.â
She really didnât. Then something else occurred to her, as she held Sylvieâs hand - something Frigga saw, and felt; she relied on that a lot, the instincts and the feeling and the knowledge she absorbed. A way of Knowing had always been a gift. âYou were trying to free yourself - but them too,â she said. All of those people - caught in the shackles of an organization that cared nothing for their lives, or the lives theyâd taken. âYou never wanted power for yourself.â
Sylvie may be a Loki, but she had never acted out in the same ways Friggaâs son did - she was truly her own person. An individual. Who, as Frigga stated and knew to be true, had heart.
And what other choice did she have? To run the tool that destroyed her family, that was the reward for her pain and her suffering? No. Frigga didnât blame her for choosing what she did. She wanted Sylvie to know that.
Sylvie wasn't completely unLokilike. She had, after all, betrayed the one person who was trying to help her. Except⊠he would have left the Sacred Timeline in place. He wouldn't have stifled all those people â all those Variants like her, and him, and the older Loki who just missed his brother â and that had not been their deal. He was supposed to go to the end of it with her, and then they were going to decide what they would do together.
"Infinite timelines." She told herself that she was helping all those timelines. If they destroyed one another, that was on them. That wasn't her fault. She was giving people free will, but free will never came without a price. She could never go back to her timeline, and she was still just as lost even after having accomplished what she'd set out to do. "Infinite possibilities."
Sylvie turned Frigga's hands over in hers, looking down at them. Those hands used to brush her long, dark hair. They used to soothe her tears, and no doubt, at some point, those hands would have taught her magic as they taught Loki. "They said that Lokis were meant to be failures, that we were only there to make other people the best version of themselves. But I met a whole bunch of Lokis who made each other better. They depended on one another and trusted each other. How could they just erase that?"
Keepers of the Sacred Timeline, apparently - not necessarily more powerful than something like infinity stones, but something that didnât acknowledge their inherent power at all. The organization that Sylvie had been constantly on the run from was its own pocket entity - within its confines, none of the outside world mattered at all. But why?
âPower struggles make for unfathomable situations, unfortunately,â Frigga replied with a sigh - and that was the crux of it, wasnât it? One hand came up to brush some of Sylvieâs crinkled curls from her face - the blonde suited her, she thought. âThey were wrong though.â
Sheâd also just talked to her son about failure - it was what he feared, and she had reassured him that she didnât see him as anything close to the concept. The collective âLokisâ may be considered Gods, but that didnât mean they werenât human - and there would be no catalyst for personal growth if they too didnât face new, unexpected situations.
âWhile I do wish I had gotten to care for you and teach you myself, you taught yourself incredible magic regardless,â she said, in awe of what exactly Sylvie could do. âYou didnât turn to genocide or planetary destruction as a way to deal with what had happened to you. Nothing about that is failure - you are not a failure. You can do anything, Sylvie. I truly believe that.â
"That's what he said." The other Loki. The one she'd fallen for. "And Mobius says."
Sylvie didn't want to ruin this by telling her alternative mother about the countless numbers of Minute Men and Hunters she'd killed in her quest to stop the TVA. They were all Variants â though mind-wiped â like her. They'd just been given a specific quest, whereas she was just going to be destroyed. She wondered how they were chosen. Did He Who Remains pick the ones he knew would get Sylvie and Loki to where they needed to be? Sylvie marveled at the sheer number of Variants who died.
"Loki told me that you were the kind of person you'd want to believe in you," her voice wavered. The other Loki, but she imagined the one here would say the same thing. She'd hidden her envy on the train when he spoke of her. She'd sniffed to the side at his display of her magic. Really, she'd been eager for him to share more about their mother.
She really hoped that original offer for a hug still stood, because Sylvie threw her arms around the woman with absolutely no finesse and held onto her. She didn't have to imagine what it might feel like or the perfume she'd wear, because it was all here. Sylvie knew this week wouldn't last long enough, but she was determined to make the best of it. To get all of the time Frigga would allow her out of it. "I wanted to be a Valkyrie when I was little. Do you think I could have been a Valkyrie?"
The hug was very much welcomed - Frigga was hoping that Sylvie would decide to take one, and her mother gave freely. She wrapped her arms around her daughter and squeezed, a comforting hand rubbing her back. âDo I think you could have been a Valkyrie?â she repeated, sounding delighted with the revelation. âAn elite female warrior? Of course, Sylvie. You would have made for a wonderful Valkyrie. Or if you decided you had interest in a more royal setting, I believe I would have trusted you with the throne too. I believe in you, no matter what.â
Period. End of. It was quite clear that Sylvie was beyond capable - her circumstances had molded and shaped her, and sheâd been damaged, and Frigga couldnât fix it all in one fell swoop while she was here.
But she could hug her daughter. Tell her she was loved and wanted and that, even after everything, she was proud of her. So very proud.
Sylvie turned her face against Frigga's shoulder, listening intently for her heartbeat. This couldn't be real. Even though this wasn't her mother, exactly, she still felt the warm love of a mother for her child. She understood all of Loki's feelings and reminiscences of his mother in this moment, and wanted to hold onto this feeling for as long as she could.
Time and the violence of apocalypses had worn down the memories she had of her and Thor and Odin as a child. This chance meeting, though, brought so many of those memories to the forefront, as if they had just been stored in a box in her mind, waiting to be opened and re-explored.
Just one week.
It wasn't enough time, but Sylvie would take every moment that Frigga would offer and keep those precious memories close to her heart.
"Thank you. For this. You didn't have to â and I'm not really the trusting kind â but thank you from the bottom of my heart."
âYou are very welcome - and thank you,â Frigga replied quietly, resolutely. Sylvie didnât have to even meet with her at all - it wasnât this All-Mother who had nurtured her for those few precious years, and it was possible that Sylvie wouldnât have wanted to kick up the dust on long-buried memories or disturb what beautiful moments she could recall. Not for a stranger. Not for anyone.
But she was here regardless - she had met Frigga in the clearing and let her hold whom she considered her child. That meant so much to the Queen as well.
She also wanted to take advantage of every moment with her children. Because she knew she would return to the golden splendor of Valhalla, reunited with her husband and those who had fallen - honored dead and honored warriors - and when she did return, she hoped that it was with the knowledge that sheâd done as much for those still living as she could.
These moments were sacred. She would cherish them. Always.