Derleth by night didnât actually feel wholly different than Derleth by day. That was the one thing Bucky couldnât help but turn over in his mind. If there was any perceptible difference in how it felt to be outside in the daytime versus the nighttime, it evaded him entirely. It was dark. That was the sum total. Someone turned the brightness down, and Derlethâs inhabitants mostly tended to wind down to sleep.
It wasnât cooler.
It wasnât still in that quiet way that was hard to describe.
Bucky walked a path around the outskirts of the campus. The void existed beyond where Derleth supposedly stopped, but to attempt to find where the edges of that existed was impossible. As best he could figure this was a problem for the likes of some big brain. Bucky himself could only muse on how it made no damn sense.
He stepped onwards, pausing only because the next part of the terrain was forested and darker. It was a moment taken to make sure he was ready for an encounter. Something about dark forests just suggested that sort of thing.
Then, he ducked into the brush and past the tree line.
Sylvie was pissed.
The end of last week had frustrated her to no end, and the beginning of the week only saw that her body was no longer busted up. Her brain, however, was still fuming. If you looked closely, you might be able to see smoke wafting out of her ears.
The fight with the sentient city and its tree root system had left her with broken ribs and internal injuries. She moved very slowly after Dax had seen to her, and wasn't able to do anymore fighting at all. She'd been stupid and reckless, climbing onto that root as if it wasn't going to slam her around like a ragdoll.
More importantly, she had eliminated whatever evil version of Loki â haha, weren't they all? â had wormed its way inside of Loki's head. He kept claiming that he knew what it was she wanted most of all, but how could he, when she didn't? She'd managed to shut him up and kick him out, only for him to leave her with that stupid last line. See you soon.
So on the first night back in the void, she'd gone out to the middle of the Green where a patch of trees opened into a space where she could watch the sky intently for that void monster. It was more difficult now, with Loki's sky in place, but she could see the ripples of magic where most people couldn't if she looked hard enough.
She was so engrossed in searching for the monster that she didn't hear footsteps or notice anyone else around her. Her finger pointed upward where she thought she saw something. "You know me, don't you? I'm on the roof looking for you, so you stay away from me. You know I'll get inside your head and figure you out if you show yourself to me."
His footfalls were light and his movements were intentional. Being a scout had given him training to survive by moving quickly and quietly, but being an assassin meant honing that. Barring brash moments of emotion, he could cover ground without being noticed. It was easier when the light was mostly cut.
It was even easier if the only people around were lost in their thoughts.
He had stopped some distance away from the woman who was reaching upward. She didnât seem to realize he was there, and it was hard to say if there was a way to ease her into becoming aware of his presence without raising any sort of alarm. He tried to think through the faces on the network, to find a match.
Ah, screw it.
âIs there someone out there?â Worst case? This backfired horribly. Par for the course.
It was like something snapped inside of Sylvie's head. It wasn't often that people got the jump on her, but Derleth had her dropping her guard more than she cared to admit. Most of the people were the same ones that had been around for a while. Some of them had come and gone, but they were all almost always the same. Good people who wanted to help.
And then there was Sylvie.
(And the other Lokis, really.)
She spun around, hands immediately turning a glowing green, eyes wide.
"Who are you? What are you doing here?"
That was quick.
Also, the magic was noted. He recalled her talking around the network, but the name didnât stick. Green magic seemed like a substantial hint, all the same. Bucky raised his hands, sure that getting blasted by one of the Loki group wasnât a good time.
âBucky, and I could ask the same of you.â He remained planted to the spot, but put his arms back down. She could decide for herself if that was worth the trouble of attacking. âBut maybe itâs just that we both have insomnia and decided to take the same walk. Could be easy as that.â
>
Her hands remained lit up, but her posture slackened. Still on alert, but not quite as immediately ready to blast one off. Her brow furrowed together as she tried to place a name with the face. He didn't look like the other Bucky. No metal arm. Not permanently attached to Wilson. Her eyes flickered around the clearing, then back to him.
"I'm not taking a walk. I'm looking for the void monster."
She paused, clenching one side of her jaw.
"They tell you about the void monster? It's not in the brochure."
Bucky lifted his brows at how she didnât exactly stand down. The telltale glow of magic was still obvious in the dark. He looked from her hands to her face and noted the solemn expression. He didnât have much room to judge anyone for a dour look, so he let it drop. It was everyoneâs right to glower.
âItâs not in the letter,â Bucky replied, and he gave a nod upwards. âIs that who you were trying to talk to? This void monster?â
Not that he took someoneâs account at face value, but he did spare a glance around. Nothing to be seen at the moment. There wasnât wind to rustle the leaves, so everything was still.
"Yeah. Void monster. Imagine there's a thin sheet around the void â that's what Loki's magical sky is projected on â outside that is a monster that has been occasionally trying to feed on whoever is out late."
It's why she was out here late a lot of nights, but the damn thing seemed to understand her powers enough that it stayed far enough away. If she had a jet pack or Strange's cloak of levitation, maybe she could get up there and get a closer look.
She lowered her hands further, letting the magic dissipate. Threatening someone didn't often lead to friendship, did it? And Sylvie was always sorely looking for her place in the world. Maybe a couple of friends would help. She had Loki and Loki, but they also had a whole bunch of other people to look after, and to be looked after by. It wasn't a bad thing to want a friendship of her own, was it?
"It can't really hurt you â inside the void. Well, not really anyway. It can sort of gnaw on you, but the void protects you from any real serious injuries."
The green subsided and Buckyâs mouth incrementally lifted at one side. It was probably a lost detail without enough of a light source to bring the immediate area out of the dark.
â...wouldnât something like a monster stalking around at night be worth letting everyone else know? Whether or not it can hurt anyone.â It wasnât a judgment, just a question. He gave Sylvie a sidelong look between continuing a sweep of the forest around them.
She seemed standoffish. That instinct to brace for a fight was something Bucky knew well. He also knew a thing or two about stalking around at night on a hunt.
âSo what happens if you find it?â
"It's not in the letter, but I don't think they knew about it when that letter was written. Probably really needs to be updated." She reached inside a pocket and pulled out a hair tie. Nothing special about it, but she pulled the top of her hair into a small ponytail so that it was up and out of her face. "Among other things. We know why we're here. Because some alternate version of us in some other world lived in Dunwich Massachusetts and signed up for â " Her lip curled slightly. " â Julia's network in beta. That network was tied together with magic, and signing up meant we were tied to Derleth."
There was some animosity there. Julia had killed Loki, and Sylvie had a hard time with forgiveness. Julia was also friends with both Lokis, and she was on alert in case she honed in on the other one, the one who had always treated her with kindness. Sylvie wouldn't let Julia kill him if she could stop it.
"I find it. I get close enough to enchant it. I find out what it's doing there, why, and how, and anything else I can get it to tell me about Derleth and how to get off this ride."
It was a very matter-of-fact way of speaking, which Bucky appreciated. No easing into it, just a full dump of details while pulling her hair out of her face.
Heâd gleaned a certain amount of information about how and why they were all caught in Derlethâs cycle, but that was about the clearest and more concise version to date. And he caught the sour note that suggested that Julia didnât have a fan here. It was all taken down in Buckyâs mind just in case it ever became pertinent information for something down the road. This place seemed to suggest that having an understanding of which personalities didnât mesh was probably going to come into play one day.
âSo you get into peopleâs heads. Thatâs what Iâm hearing,â Bucky observed. It wasnât delivered with any sort of tone. He wasnât a fan of the concept of it, but the application here seemed justified.
He looked back at her. âYouâve been looking alone this whole time?â
"Yeah, I can take over their minds. I can show them memories that have been hidden from them. I can do a lot of things with magic, but that's my big one. I used it a lot." When she was on the run from a fascist organization. Maybe it was dumb not to say that part, but people had a lot of thoughts about enchantment. They didn't like it no matter why you were doing it. They had that luxury.
"Not the whole time. I disappeared for a while. And we're not always in voids."
A pause.
"And sometimes when we're in voids, there's other things going on."
Sylvieâs explanation earned a simple hum. He was biased on the matter of tinkering with someoneâs mind, but that was a story that wasnât going to be shared during what amounted to a first meeting. Maybe not even a second. He was typically private, but also just unwilling to offer up his history unless the situation demanded it. It rarely did.
Barnes crossed his arms, and he drew in a breath as he considered his options. The office of the private investigator was dimly-lit with the shades partly drawn, and a haze of smoke was making the individual strands of sunlight stand out. He cast a glance outside at the street below, making sure he hadnât been followed up here.
âLook, I told you,â Barnes told the PI. âSomething wasnât right about the shipment. Worked those docks my whole life, and Iâm tellinâ you that they snuck something into the city in those crates. I saw enforcers up high watchinâ the whole time.â
He reached for the string that controlled the blinds and lowered them the rest of the way before rounding on the oak desk that occupied a large part of the room.
âI think your missing persons case just took a sharp turn, and I think you oughta come with me before they get wise about who Iâm talkinâ to.â
"I've already looked into those crates. I don't know what to tell ya, but there was nothing there, but your typical shipments. Food, appliances, the usual." Sylvie stood up, sat on the corner of the desk, and held out a metal case with a cigarette. Her own cigarette bobbed up and down as she spoke. "I checked it out more than once. Didn't see no enforcers or anything shady in them crates."
What she didn't say was that those crates were small potatoes now that the Mayor had gotten her involved in another case. He was paying her quite a bit more, and judging from the pillow and blanket on the old couch, she needed that money desperately.
"I'm not going anywhere till I get to the bottom of this. I don't care where it leads me."
âMaybe the crates you saw, but itâs different this time. You know I wouldnât chase up this way for nothinâ.â Barnes reached out to take the cigarette case and tapped one out for himself. He produced his own lighter and lit the cigaretteâs tip with a quick flick.
âCâmon, come with me. When have I ever led you wrong?â He puffed out his smoke, directing it to the side so that it didnât hit Sylvie in the face. âAnd if I am wrong, Iâll owe you lunch at that diner you like. Howâs about it?â
He gave her his best smile around the lit cigarette. Even for a sooty dockhand, Barnes knew he could put on the charm in a pinch. It was especially true between friends.
She didn't have an answer for that, and while her gut was telling her there wasn't anything there, there was something that wanted to keep this friend of hers away from the docks. Maybe it would turn out to be nothing after all.
Sylvie stood up and reached for her jacket â
Then she was back in the Green, looking at Bucky Barnes with a curious look on her face. They had been friends in the 1950s? If she remembered right â and her memories from that time period were all screwed up â those crates were filled with Martians, prepping for the attack the next day.
"Did you â Was that â I'm sorry, did you just sort of blip somewhere else for a moment too?"
His face was steely in its set, unimpressed and definitely annoyed. Someone tinkering with his mind, with his memories seemingly? It was a bad way to endear the product of Soviet brainwashing.
But Sylvieâs words presented another option: a glimpse into another world? It could be.
âThat wasnât you, then? You just got through telling me that kinda thing is in your wheelhouseâŠâ
Sylvie wasn't thrilled with the accusation, even if she could see where he was coming from. Sure, she was going to do that right from the start. That was definitely not the way to win friends and influence people now, was it? She scoffed out loud and folded her arms across her chest.
"No, that wasn't me. Why would I do that when I can tell you're skittish about it? That doesn't make any sense."
But the memory did. It was during the time before the Lokians attacked. They were playing happy housewives â or some of them were. She'd been a PI, and part of it was to handle things clandestinely when it came to random shipments of what she was pretty sure were Martians in a box. Maybe it had been the gelatinous cubes. Who really knew?
"Besides, I really only use that one when I have to. I don't do it randomly for fun."
âHad to check,â Bucky offered with a small shrug. It wasnât really an apology, but he wasnât an overly apologetic individual. Something about Sylvie suggested that she knew how that went.
âYeah, got some flash of a timeline I donât remember ever being part of. Way I understand it, Derleth just does that. âCause I definitely donât think weâve met before here.â He couldnât help taking a quick survey of their surroundings to make sure the coast was still clear. âAnd I donât really make friends most places.â
Maybe Sylvie also knew about that. Something about the way she was out at night, trying to find a creature. Alone.
Most people seemed to be awkward and uncomfortable when she dumped her history on them, but it was one of those things that until very recently had taken up quite a bit of her life. She'd been on the run since she was eight years old, living in apocalypses and never able to truly make friends. Everyone in her timeline was gone, and everyone in the apocalypses was going to die.
"Yeah. Me neither," she said, sniffing and brushing the side of her nose with the back of her hand. She wasn't crying; it was a gesture to make it seem like she wasn't torn up about it. The truth was: she probably killed that version of him when they made their way to the docks to make sure he didn't spill the secret. Or at the very least, she had him locked up. She didn't think that was a very good way to make friends either. "Seems these alternate universes always do it for me. And then Derleth takes 'em away. I can count the number of people I wanted to be friends with who disappeared shortly after we started getting to know one another."
She shrugged her shoulders. "Now I'm back here again, and if we talk too long or get too friendly, you'll disappear too."
It was maybe a little more grim than he had expected to be told that her measure of friendship was lagging behind Derlethâs knack for sending people away. Really, it stopped Bucky, who felt himself to be a cynic most of the time. He looked at Sylvie, recognizing someone with even more cynicism. And he didnât know what to do about that.
âI donât buy into that stuff,â he finally offered. âBut if itâs true, then maybe you figured out how to get people home.â That was meant as a joke, his tone inflecting just enough to carry that across.
âThis monster youâre after⊠how about you tell me what to look out for, and Iâll join you. I wonât get too friendly, if youâre worried about that.â
That was unexpected. She'd thought that would have scared anyone off, but maybe he was looking to get back home. She didn't presume that this place was torture setup specifically for her, but who knew. Loki certainly thought every week was out to get him â long haired Loki, not the one she considered her â better not say best friend.
Sylvie decided to glance over the first part of that conversation and go straight to the monster. She waved him over, then looked up toward the sky. "It's a bit more difficult with the illusion sky up now, but you can tell it's like a projection, the magic. If you look closely, you can see â ripples every now and again. Tiny little ripples, and in those ripples, you can sometimes see a shadow."
As she explained, he cast his sight skyward. It was easy to discern the illusion once you were in on it: it was like a looping feed that didnât actually shift so much as it gave the impression it was. He scanned along a line of stars, but didnât see anything shift beneath the âskinâ, so to speak.
âI should be able to see that.â He tapped his temple, just beside his eyes. âSniper training. Also, better off with a job to do rather than listlessly wander around here like a lost soul.â
He stepped forward and nodded an invitation for her to come along. âItâs Bucky, by the way.â
"Yeah, that's why I'm out here. Something to figure out. Something I can actually do," Sylvie smiled slightly. It was nice that someone seemed to understand why she was out here. Even if it was a monster she was looking for. That monster could have answers though â at least to the question of what's beyond the Void.
"I'm Sylvie." She thought to say that she was also a Loki, but that would be like asking him how he kept his arm, assuming that everything was the same in all universes. "You're from the universe that Loki's girlfriend, Kate, is from?"
He caught the small smile, and he fashioned a small one of his own as he moved ahead. He couldnât say why. Maybe it was just that first tiny step in getting comfortable here, and it had nothing to do with Steves or Natashas. He leaned back on those two too easily, but had to remind himself that they werenât from his world. It wasnât really the same. Trying to pretend they were people he knew was just a lie to make himself feel better.
And then there was Clint, but.
Clint was Clint.
âIâm from that universe. You know her?â
Well, shit. She had to say it now.
"I'm a Loki.' She stumbled over her words, hoping this wouldn't mean the death of a potential friendship. The name was too polarizing, and to be honest, it was better to get it out with it now. If it was going to be a problem, better before than after. "Alternative universe. Changed my name because that's not who I am anymore."
If he wanted to know more details, he could ask. She doubted he would.
"That Loki is like a brother to me." She swallowed. "Haven't had family or friends in â a very long time." And in the lifespan of an Asgardian or a Frost Giant magicked to look like an Asgardian, that was a very long time.
He didnât stop walking, but he did narrow his eyes slightly as he continued to monitor the upper limits of the void. For one: a Loki was usually trouble. Two: being told she changed her name likely meant she wanted to get away from the stereotype, so number one was possibly stricken from the record.
Three: he knew solitude. Usually it wasnât anyoneâs first choice. That was true of a Loki or one who no longer wished to be.
âFunny way of things, I guess. Different world, but you can see similarities in others. Sometimes itâs enough to patch in something missing.â His mind drifted to that first meeting with the other Natasha. He kept his expression neutral save for a downward tug at one corner of his mouth.
"The Thor here â he looks just like my brother. Or what I expect my brother would look like grown up." Cue sad sob story that she didn't really want to overload on. She felt like telling him what she had was already pushing it.
She could hear long haired Loki in her head: Leave some mystery, Sylvie.
But mystery just seemed like a lot of trouble when you just wanted a friend. She knew that the other Loki considered her a friend, but he was a lot friendlier than she had allowed herself to be. And he had a girlfriend and other friends, and it felt selfish to try to lean on him too much.
"Your variant is missing an arm. Fell off a train in the Alps according to the records. You seem to be intact." He might be intact, but she lacked any.
The remark about Thor was caught. Sheâd said she didnât have family for a long time, so it followed that she might have lost hers from a young age. Again, he got that. Heâd been on his own and apart from his sister⊠the last of his family after his parents had passed. He just didnât push at those buttons. He hated when anyone knew enough to push at them with him. Turnabout was fair play, but so was breathing room.
No, he wasnât going to chase after lost families. Not tonight.
âI might seem to be,â he replied. âIt wasnât a train. It was a plane.â He raised his arm and tripped the disguise feature. The fingers glinted, metallic for a moment before they went back to looking like a passable human hand.
âPeople stare less if I keep it hidden.â He breathed out. âSame reason someone might change their name.â
Sylvie looked impressed. If she hadn't already attempted to show him where to look, she might have offered a drink or a sit somewhere. But she didn't want him to think she was hitting on him. "That's a nice piece of tech there. Next thing, you're going to tell me it can pull a Thing from the Addams Family and run across the lawn doing acrobatics on its own."
The mental image was funny enough that her smile became less stiff as she thought about it doing several backflips before rounding out with a layout backflip. How would it do the little gymnastics salute at the end? Would the pinky raise upward? Or the thumb?
Then she realized that if he was missing an arm, maybe he'd missed the Addams Family too?
He walked a few steps in silence, but gave her a sidelong glance. There was a mildly amused tilt to his mouth. His knowledge of Lokis and Loki-adjacent types wasnât great, but he didnât really imagine them to tap into âEarth cultureâ such as it was. She might even have him beat on her knowledge there.
Luckily for her, he knew the reference. Enough to get the idea, anyway.
âIt can. Works better attached nine times out of ten,â he answered. He continued to scan the sky as they ventured on, and although he was loath to admit it, the company was welcome.