Control (Ship of Nails: Part 1)

[coldsong]

In the days after Harley’s ordeal with the Joker, Loki is hard to live with. He was terrified of losing her, of course, and he’s given up trying to pretend otherwise. But that is an emotion so big and overwhelming he can’t cope with it on top of everything else in his head. The past pushes aside the present and the potential of the future, love crushed beneath the weight of something dark and sickly.
There was a wound in his mind still, from what Thanos did to him. He’s known that all along, known it was festering, and there were times he tried to express that, but for the most part, he failed.



Maybe he didn’t want to succeed. Maybe he wanted to keep suffering, somewhere deep down. He doesn’t believe in atonement or penance or forgiveness, but he does believe in vengeance.

Now the frail scab of functional behavior he’s built over the wound has broken, been split and torn away, and all the necrosis, corruption, infection it held back, has spilled free. It’s drowning him. He wants to hurt and be hurt again and again and again...

He pays Mrs. Hedgeworthy extra to stay overnight. He’s afraid to be alone with the children.

He’s afraid to be alone with the children.

Brushing out Sigrid’s hair before bedtime, he’s always so delicate, untangling elf-knots without pulling, and she trust him utterly, but when he looks into the mirror of her vanity, her face is going grey, eyes bulging, mouth gaping; her hair is tangled around her throat and he’s pulling it tight, tighter, tighter, grinning a slasher smile as she struggles--

No, no, no! He springs up and backs away so wildly he falls over one of her shoes left behind on the floor.

“Loki??” She’s fine. She is untouched, he was hallucinating, but now she looks horrified by his unexplained panic. “Loki, what’s wrong?”

Mrs. Hedgeworthy appears in the doorway in a fuzzy yellow bathrobe with a duckling print all over it. Her eyes are sharp as she looks him over. He feels like prey, pinned down, seen through. He feels like a predator, ready to spring and snap and break necks. It’s too much. His stomach heaves and he has to cover his face with both hands, fighting back the need to vomit.

For a moment he’s not there, ears ringing, vision gone, and when he becomes aware of the room around him again, Sigrid and Agnarr are both there, with Mrs. Hedgeworthy, all standing around him with wide, frightened eyes.

“...call Thor,” Sigrid is saying, words rapid-fire, anxious. “Or maybe Kelly's dad, or Harley but she’s sick, or the other Loki, the one with the bar--”

“No!” He grits out. “No. Not now. Nighttime. Call in the morning.” He gulps air, pulls himself back together so forcibly his teeth rattle. “Mrs. Hedgeworthy, if you would please get the children ready for bed, I--th-think I will take a bath.”

As if water could wash him clean of the Black Order.

He rises, shaking head to toe but able to walk the few steps down the hall to the bathroom. He closes the door, locks it, turns the water on in the shower as high and hard as it will run, then puts his back to the wall and curls up in the smallest knot he can.

He’s not sure how long he stays there, insensate. Eventually he becomes aware his back is against the full-length mirror on the bathroom wall, and he turns his head to look at himself, fearful of what he’ll find.

Did you think you could quiet me forever? The figure in the mirror asks softly. Ivory skin, inky hair, green and gold armor, it regards Loki with a mocking smile, peering from beneath a twin-horned helmet. But his eyes-his eyes are very, very blue. Scepter-blue.

There’s no point talking to a hallucinatory vision of himself. Loki doesn’t bother. Just stares into the glowing cyan of his reflection’s eyes and waits to hear what it wants. After a long moment, its confidence wavers; its smile fades.

Say something! it snarls at last, frustrated.

“Something,” he answers. And then, “Go away.”

It’s just like himself to want to have a moment, here, he thinks. Give a grandiose speech about the inescapability of one’s dark nature, utter a breathless ode to the Mind Stone, perhaps. The only voice from the dark that ever truly understood him.

(The Mind Stone's voice in his head was always female, exquisitely soft and sweet, a music he could not ignore or deny. It's all right, Loki, my sweet little Loki--nothing matters. Freedom is life's great lie.

But he is the god of lies, and that is the only thing that saved him.)

But maybe Loki is learning from Thor. He’s not willing to play along. He lies where he is, dull eyed, watching his doppelganger, his anti-conscience. No protestations that this is not him, that he’s changed. Just: “Go away. Leave the children alone.”

Oh. Your children should remain untouched, it says. How many did you slay with the Order? How many deaths have you held a candle to?

He knows the answer, or at least a rough estimate, but he won’t give himself the satisfaction of saying it.

Your greed for peace and comfort will tear apart the people you purport to love. And after they are dead and gone, you will forget them. You have no heart. You only have me. Get used to it.

He doesn’t think that’s true, but he can’t muster the strength to argue. Remembering Thor throwing objects through his illusionary bodies, he gives a quiet grunt, lifts his hand, and touches it to the mirror’s surface. The steam collecting there from the hot shower suddenly starts to condense, coalesce, slithers between the glass and the silver backing, and the whole thing cracks and shatters, cascading down upon him in a glimmering shower.

A few seconds later, Mrs. Hedgeworthy is pounding on the door. He doesn’t feel like answering.

She’ll probably call someone.

He doesn’t care.


((OOC: Musical Inspiration))

Comments

[malcolmeffect]

"Then rest." Ian comments. "I..." his eyes shift over to Thor before coming back to Loki. "We'll uh be here to watch."

How many people had watched over Malcolm since the island? He couldn't remember but if memory served it was everyone he knew at some point or another. The revelation of what he had seen in his mind draws a long sigh from Ian. Waking terrors were a horrible thing. Sympathy and understanding was all the human had for the god and that came through in touch and expression.

"I..uh.. ask myself these questions all the time." It wasn't Ian's way to expose his mental state or vulnerability, especially with a stranger in the room, but this was for Loki's benefit alone. Thor could think what he wanted, if it became something negative it would not be the first or last time it happened in Malcolm's life.

[pirateangelbaby]

This would be so much easier if they were alone, Thor thinks, and yet having the human here does seem to be helping Loki get his runaway panic under control. It's absurd to be jealous over such a thing, though Thor can't exactly help how he feels, but Ian's presence is grudgingly accepted for the good he's doing here. Thor spares him only a small glance, most of his attention focused on his brother, giving his hand a squeeze of reassurance.

"It's okay," he says quietly, worry in his eye, his own fears and anxieties shoved aside for Loki's sake. It's his turn to be the strong one, the shoulder his brother needs to lean on, finally rallied enough to bear the weight for a time. "We've got you. You're safe here."

Vaguely, he gets the impression that Ian is not quite in his element here, missing context perhaps despite whatever Loki has told him. Thor does not entirely understand either, because he knows that there are things that Loki has not shared with him, only hinted at through words or actions. It may even be so that Loki does not have the words to speak of any of it, his silvered tongue no match for the near-eldritch ways a mind can twist in on itself in defiance of all description or explanation, unmoored from any sense of reality. And truthfully, Thor is afraid to understand what abyss his brother has gazed into, to truly grasp the horrors that live not in imagined dreams but agonizing memory. His own are nightmare enough.

But even if he does not know the exact shape of Loki's dread, he knows enough, and understands too well how this sort of madness can break even the strongest man. Even gods.

Thor, too, is reluctant to expose any weakness on his part in front of a stranger. His own struggles are public knowledge in Asvera, and it's quite possible that the Midgardian gossip channels have picked up on it by now, but it is a very different thing to speak of it himself in front of someone he doesn't know. And yet Thor's pride has been bruised enough that it does not sting so much more to admit to such things if his brother may benefit from the sharing. "I don't know either," he admits, tucking a strand of black hair behind Loki's ear, though it needs no smoothing. "No one... no one can tell you who you are. I'm learning that every day. But you need not do it alone."

[coldsong]

"You do?" Ian is the first to respond verbally to his fears, and Loki's gaze flits over to settle on him. He's genuinely surprised to hear this, but maybe he shouldn't be. He's caught subtle glimpses of rage buried deep in the man's heart. Wounds beget wounds.

He wants to ask more, but he's equally conscious of Thor's protective presence and stolid reassurance, and that neither of them really needs to pour out their secrets in front of a man they've just met. He wants them both right where they are, but he also wants the freedom to talk with them each freely alone. How frustrating!

Well. Not so frustrating that his weariness and their gentle touches can't combine to wash the flicker of discontentment away. He manages a wry smile and tells Ian: "I'm sure you haven't actually killed as many people as I have. I'd bet money on it."

It's a weird sort of joke, but if Loki's getting any semblance of humor back, that's an improvement.

His eyes flutter closed when Thor strokes that stray lock of his hair, battle-calloused fingers that he fancies still smell faintly of the greenhouse. Loki lets out a long, quiet sigh, sinking into the blankets as his body loses its tension, slow but sure. Words are usually his preference, but a friendly touch, he thinks, might be underrated.

"I don't always know which of my memories are real and which aren't," he admits, more for Thor's benefit than Ian's. "Sometimes I think I'll turn around and the Mind Stone will be right there talking at me all over again, and all of this will turn out to be a dream."

"Reality is weirdly malleable," he adds. "Especially here. All three of us are proof of that, with alternates and with faces shared with people we'll never meet."

He opens his eyes, brow creased, and looks from Ian to Thor and back. "If you do meet someone here who looks like you except older," he tells the human, "try to get away from him expeditiously. Or call me or...something."

He's not sure what the Grandmaster would think of Ian, except that he'd probably be curious and interested and that would be anything but safe for all concerned.

[malcolmeffect]

"Yes." Ian confirms but doesn't say more. He didn't mind talking to Loki about his darker past, but it was something he hid deep and didn't want to find its way to rumors.

"Uh.. with my own hands, no..." He gets a little self-amused chuckle from the human. There have been deaths because of him, some bore guilt from people not listening to him when they should. Others had been vicious and underhanded but not physical deaths. This was not the time for it to be talked about but the thought keeps the smile in Ian's expression.

Ian doesn't know a lot of what Loki is mentioning, but as a Chaos theorist who now knows there are many, many universes he can accept anything at this point. With enough iterations, in enough universes, the improbable should be common place. Reality had truly become malleable.

"The Grandmaster?" Ian asks, remembering when he first met Loki. Hindsight gave him a lot more insight and pushed home the idea that leaving in a hurry was for the best.

[pirateangelbaby]

It's Thor's first reflex to assure Loki that this is real, that any such fears would manifest only in hallucination or dream, and that he need not fear a sudden waking to being the Titan's thrall. But that is what a hallucination would say, wouldn't it? How can he give Loki the anchor to reality that he needs, when the falsehoods created by his own mind would be just as convincing? He can't. Thor of all people knows that words alone are not always strong enough to break through the barriers that your own mind raises, whether to your benefit or to your detriment.

All he can do is be present, solid and breathing, a listening ear to share his brother's deepest fears. And say the words anyway, as many times as Loki needs to hear it to believe it. "I'm here. I promise you, this is real. And if you find you cannot trust your own memories... ask. I will help you, if I can."

It seems such a small, paltry effort to uproot this deep-seated poison in Loki's mind. But Thor would offer anyway, even if it's all he can do.

He continues the repetitive soothing of combing through his brother's hair with careful fingers, and gives Ian a wary sort of look out of the corner of his eye. "Ruler of a planet called Sakaar, with a taste for cruelty. I was sold into servitude into his rigged gladiatorial games for a few days."

[coldsong]

Loki is dazed, still coming up from the crisis, but not so out of it as to miss that expression on Ian's face. That is very interesting, indeed. Chaos and mischief do often go hand in hand, but until now he rather assumed the man was more or less upright. Maybe not? They'll definitely need to chat later.

For now, he'll just refrain from calling attention to that, and hope Thor doesn't notice.

His brother's physical presence and soft, cajoling words are nice, and he closes his eyes again, with a fleeting smile. "Some of it should not be spoken of, especially not now...ohh, but if you have more stories about when we were boys, perhaps? I remembered the snake story, I never forgot that one, but I couldn't help smiling when you told it to Banner and Brunnhilde, because it was good to hear it confirmed."

He's quiet a moment, letting Thor explain the Grandmaster, but feels the need to add his own perspective, then: "Not cruelty. Just complete amorality. He's one of the Elders of the universe. I'm not sure he sees anyone around him as important or even immediately real, except inasmuch as they can entertain him. He told me we were all like fireflies, once. Blink, and then gone."

"I could have gotten you out of the ring entirely, you know. He liked me. Would've gone bad eventually, but I could have bought us time." But it's probably not worth arguing about, not right now.

"I made myself part of the Grandmaster's entourage," he explains to Ian. "Only cost me a little dignity. But I had it under control."

[malcolmeffect]

Ian falls into intent listening as things go beyond his knowledge. However, he is a quick learner and can start to piece things, fill in gaps, as he goes.

As the two brothers counter about the Grandmaster, Ian's expression begins to pull with worry. Not only because there was some being of questionable character with his face, but the nature of the being was too close to home. How many times had discussions passed between him, Sattler, and Grant about whether Hammond was cruel or just uncaring. It certainly wasn't on a cosmic scale but the content was entirely too close to home.

Instinctively, he starts stroking Loki's hand still in his thumb over the back. For the moment he can't say who he is trying to comfort. That point driven home when the concept of joining someone at the cost of dignity, by the sounds of it to keep an eye on them and potentially stay safe drew the parallel to even closer. A cosmic level, amoral, John Hammond running rigged gladiator games sounds like more madness than Ian can process.

He does manage a small smile and humor despite how unnerved the concept is. "Uh.. so I have an older, evil twin like a comicbook hero."

[pirateangelbaby]

“You could’ve-!” No, no, now is not the time to get upset over something done and gone more than a year ago, not when Loki is so vulnerable. Not when he needs Thor’s love, and not his ire. They’ve fought, and bickered, and gone round and round and Thor is so tired of it all. The secrets, the manipulation, the way even now perhaps Loki is trying to drive him away to protect himself, consciously or not. A younger Thor would’ve allowed himself to get upset, to unleash his hurts and grievances, never realizing just how petty and useless they were.

So he closes his eye a moment and takes a breath, before he opens it again and gently lays his palm against his brother’s cheek. “Admit it, you just wanted to see Hulk throw me across the arena for a change,” he says instead, the sides of his mouth quirking up in a little smile. As if he hadn’t also caught Loki in the act of trying to resell his own brother back into that same servitude. There is no point in bringing that up now.

He glances over at Ian, resuming the slow soothing caress of Loki’s hair and half-wishing he was in a better position to braid it, as their mother used to do for them. “Something like that. If you never meet him, consider yourself lucky.” Idly he wonders if the Grandmaster might take a stronger interest in someone sharing his face, and finds that he pities Ian if that were to ever happen. Finding oneself under such a being’s scrutiny is someplace no one should have to be, especially with any reason for him to take a special notice of them.

[coldsong]

Loki genuinely wasn't expecting a vehement response from Thor. Perhaps the things that have actually hurt his brother and the things Loki assumes have hurt his brother are not one and the same. From his perspective, he offered to help him as soon as he could, and withdrew when Thor refused to listen. As far as reselling him into servitude, well, Loki has always been willing to do whatever must be done as a means to an end, and was relatively convinced Thor would die fighting Hela, let alone Thanos, therefore betraying him was saving his life. Was it solid logic? Maybe sort of. Was it manipulative and morally questionable? Absolutely. It was Loki.

From Thor's perspective, he realizes suddenly, he threw him under the bus repeatedly, as he has done so often in the past.

Clearly they have a lot to hash out here, still; Loki thought that work was mostly done, the more fool he, and the flicker of anger in Thor's voice prompts a flash of bewilderment across his face, tinged with fear, not unlike the look he had when they fought on the transport on the way to Svartalfheim.

The fear fades when Thor touches his face, although the confusion lingers. He manages a faint laugh at the joke, aware that's what it is, although he's not sure even now the Hulk is all that funny. "No, I didn't know it was him until he stepped out into the arena," he says. "But I admit I did enjoy it a little."

"Ancient," he says to Ian, curling his fingers around his carefully. "Ageless, unkillable, evil twin. You're definitely the good twin. I wouldn't let the Grandmaster anywhere near my children."

"Thor, I think you'll find Ian is a better man than I am. Maybe just as abrasive, but better." He gives his brother a smile just weak and shaky enough to suggest it's in part an apology.

[malcolmeffect]

Ian nods to Thor's warning. He's out of his league talking about infinite beings. He's only human, and until recently hadn't met anything beyond mortal. The comment that he is the good twin does get a laugh from Ian due to his reputation in his own realm.

He's still sorting through the information he's getting from the two. It is fragmented with so much shared history that it is hard to get any connection between comments. What little he knows of their past, He can imagine that some of the darkness Loki faces is related to this being. Both of them, despite differing opinions neither speaks of anything positive.

His hand tightens on Loki's as his fingers curl. Then the self-deprecating, snorting laugh comes. "Uh.. setting the bar low?"

Ian's not serious, and is honestly flattered to be called a good man. He can't remember anyone ever stringing those words together to describe him, and mean it.

[pirateangelbaby]

The anger is short-lived, at least, a flash of lightning that is there for a moment and gone the next. Whatever happened, whatever Loki did or could've done, there's nothing that can be done to change any of it. If only Loki did not have such terrible timing when it comes to revealing such things, sometimes.

There's concern and a sort of fond, brotherly exasperation in Thor's eye when he looks down at his brother, and shakes his head slightly when he sees that confusion still lingering in Loki's gaze. As far as unexpected revelations go, this one is perhaps one of the easiest for Thor to dismiss. "Reminds me of the first time I fought a bilgesnipe. Do you remember?" He turns slightly toward Ian, now, as if telling the story for his benefit, as if he did not need to worry that Loki may genuinely not recall the incident. "They're these huge, brutish beasts, kind of a pest on Vanaheim. They'll trample your crops and half the village without even knowing you're there. We were... six hundred or so, I think?" He glances to Loki as if asking for him to confirm the tale, but really watching to see if this is one of the memories his brother can trust. It seems foolish perhaps to protect Loki's pride at this stage, but the least he can do is afford his brother some of his dignity in the face of this catastrophic meltdown. A safe harbor of sorts, sheltered in his older brother's tales of more innocent days.

"Anyway, we heard there was a particularly ornery bull terrorizing a farm and I got it into my head that we should go hunt it to save the fields, be a hero, that sort of thing. It wasn't too hard to follow its tracks, but when we found it, it wasn't very happy to see us. I tried charging it head-on and it flung me into a pond with its antlers. Lost my sword, took me several minutes to swim back to shore. By then it'd chased Loki up a tree, and I had to resort to throwing rocks to get its attention, only to realize I had no weapon. If not for so many trees in the way I don't think I would've been able to outrun it long enough to hide. Got out of it with a broken arm and bruised pride on my part, plus Father was furious."

[coldsong]

Loki's weak smile softens into something more genuine as he looks up at Ian, amused by the self-deprecation. "Remember who you're talking to, friend. I can only set the bar as high as I can reach, myself."

He looks back to Thor and calms at the shake of his head. No, there is definitely more to be discussed here, and Thor may have misunderstood Loki's comment, but he's right. This isn't the best time for either of them to go in-depth with respect to past injuries.

For a moment, Loki is caught between delighted laughter at the memory being recounted and worry that the idea of battling dangerous beasts will tread too hard on Ian's traumas. Perhaps it will help that Thor hasn't described them as scaly? His hand squeezes the man's gently, thumb stroking across his knuckles.

"I remember," he tells Thor, "but clearly you have forgotten some details, including why I ended up in that tree in the first place. My idea was to trap it, which would have been easy enough either in a pit or by getting its antlers tangled in the trees. I was sure the thing must have been in a late musth, so I figured we could lure it with the right scent. I bought half a waterskin of female bilgesnipe urine from a hunter, and I was looking for a place we could lure and trap it, but you had to go and charge it like the great oaf you were, as soon as we spotted it."

"And then," he looks at Ian, "he goes and gets himself dropped into the pond while I have the bilgesnipe scent more or less in my pocket, so of course the damn thing comes right for me. It did not want to fling me anywhere, I can promise you that. Thank the Norns I'm a good climber."

"So, here I am clinging to a tree limb with a bottle of bilgesnipe piss in my pocket, and that is the time Thor decides to use ranged weaponry rather than rushing in like normal. I should have just thrown the waterskin at him."

[malcolmeffect]

Loki is right to worry, though Ian is able to keep a poker face as the subject comes up. Though, it's when the topic of being thrown comes up that the fingers holding on to Loki's hand tremble and the human's palms start to sweat.

He listens to the story with interest but it does bring up too many memories. They keep bringing up being thrown and he starts to shift, the weight of his leg brace becoming uncomfortable as thoughts of the Rex return, Grant's stories about the kids in the tree. It's enough that Ian has to stare pointed and focused on Loki's face to keep panic down. Obviously, they didn't suffer the same effects from the encounter.

He does laugh at the image of some raging deer-like thing; Ian is imagining something like the cross between a moose and a bison at this point; treeing Loki over a pocket full of urine. Even so the laugh is nervous, revealing the discomfort. Another laugh comes but more to dispel his anxiety than to be humorous. "I've.. uh been thrown. I don't recommend it."

[pirateangelbaby]

The way that Thor tells the tale is like an amusing anecdote, something you might've even laughed about at the time, rather than something traumatic or frightening. For a few moments, he even gets caught up in both the telling and in hearing Loki's rebuttal, some of the tension still holding tight around his heart loosening at hearing that this is one story of misadventure that his brother remembers quite clearly.

"It's not my fault it saw us so soon," he says with a deliberately casual shrug, knowing full well that it actually was, tromping through the brush in the beast's wake. But he'd been impatient and eager for glory, and utterly overconfident that brute force would be enough to take down the creature without tricking it into a trap. But then he'd been the only one actually injured by his misstep, so clearly he fairly paid the price for his error, right?

But something about it is clearly bothering Ian, though Thor cannot even begin to guess at why. He doesn't notice at first, too focused on Loki's reaction to see it, an old fear creeping up quietly until suddenly it's there and has been all along. The human is handling it pretty well, whatever it is, though Thor can't help but feel a little guilty for causing it in the first place. However that happened. Thor has learned the hard way that sometimes fear can spring forth from the most innocent of sensations, and he wishes that on no one.

Perhaps the aftermath might not be so bad? "I had to muck out the royal stables for half a year," he laments, but lightly so.

[coldsong]

Loki holds Ian's hand firmly through the tale, stroking the backs of his fingers. Calling a halt would, he assumes, make for an awkward moment for Thor and probably not help the backsliding into darkness for Ian, and so he doesn't interrupt the flow of the telling. Just remains attentive and prepared to interrupt if it becomes dire.

It's also, in its way, a pleasant memory for him. He was furious at the time, but Thor was the one who got more severely punished for it, so Loki got over it quickly. Now it just seems hilarious, boyhood antics worth remembering.

"Mother had me tending the garden for the same length of time, as I recall," he tells Thor with a smirk. "Spreading what you were shoveling out, to fertilize the plants. I got the better side of that, but I think the message to get our shit together was quite pointed and well-designed."

Hm. There are a lot of scatological elements to this story.

"Mother always said we were difficult children to raise, because you couldn't just tell us not to do something. We both took it as a personal challenge. You had to let us foul up and discover the consequences on our own."

He's still a little shaky, but the reminiscence seems to have him mostly stabilized, enough so that he's watching both their moods now. The whisper of the Mind Stone, or the echo thereof, is quiet now. "No," he says, turning his head toward Ian and meeting his gaze gently. "Being flung about is never fun."

It's almost tolerable when doing 'Get Help', but only because it's Thor doing it, and he gets to complain about it loudly before and after. Upon reflection, that's probably why Thor thought Loki enjoyed it. Because he got to kick up a fuss about it.

"You, of course, were a perfect angel as a child, I suppose," he squeezes Ian's hand softly. "All equations and quiet research."

No, he doesn't truly believe that, but it's an opening. So's this: "But don't tell me Kelly's never gotten herself in a fix. She's a bold little one."

[malcolmeffect]

It takes time for Ian to force his focus away from his own memories and onto the story being told. It's not easy, it never is, but the small offers of comfort help bridge the gap enough to bring his thoughts away from the rex.

Loki does manage to pull a muffled snort of a laugh from Ian. "Ah.. well that is why Kelly likes you so much. She does the same." He gave up telling Kelly not to do things at a very young age and started focusing on only voicing the effect just because of this reason.

However, the talk of his childhood fades any humor he had found. His lips pull tight as he fights the instinct to scowl. Memories of his father were not pleasant despite caring for the man in some odd way. Ian's interests were always at odds with what his father demanded and they rarely got along. He's glad the conversation immediately turned to Kelly. " She's a thinker more than a doer.. uh.. she'll con you out of everything if you aren't careful with your words."

[pirateangelbaby]

Thor is far more focused on Loki than he is on Ian, still quite disturbed by what he's seen thus far but hiding it far better than he was, putting on a front as much for Loki's sake as it is for his own. As Loki calms, so does he, more and more assured that he isn't about to lose his brother to the abyss of memory, though the thread of worry wrapped tight around his heart refuses to fully release.

As his brother's attention turns to the human, though, so does Thor's, at least in part. Now it is his turn to feel uncertain, lacking the shared ground these two have created, grasping what he can from context and guessing at the rest. "Sounds familiar," he says at the last, giving Loki's hand a squeeze.

Children... the thought prompts him to glance towards the door for a moment, hoping that the children aren't too frightened by what happened to Loki. The sound of the television still reaches his ears, quiet though it is, but it would not surprise him if they might not be fully soothed until they see their caretaker well again. But now is not, perhaps, the time to mention it, not when his brother is still gathering himself, still shaken by what he'd thought he'd done.

[coldsong]

"You'd like her, Thor," he says, though his attention is divided, drifting between them. He has a leftover instinct from his youth, to play diplomat, to bring disparate cultural and personal elements into balance. He was good at it, before, capable of sweet-talking angry Vanir, flattering delegations from Alfheim--really, his talent only failed him with the dwarves of Nidavellir, and only once with them. He's acting like a host now, trying to build bridges between his brother and his new romance. Unfortunately, there's only so much energy left in him, and it's bound to collapse before long.

"She was full of questions, when she met me first," he adds. "And a little reckless. I think children should be allowed to be a little reckless. They have families to catch them when they stumble, so they should explore."

His eyes drift closed. "It's all high-stakes after you grow up. No safety net but the one you knit for yourself, and if you do a bad job it just tangles you up when you fall into it."

He's rambling again, but it's not the same kind of panicked attempts to explain himself as before. More like the stream of consciousness coming from someone drifting unwillingly into sleep. "I hope you have children some day, Thor," he murmurs. "Adopted or birthed, doesn't matter. Not now, but maybe in a few decades. And you should have at least one daughter."

[malcolmeffect]

For all of Ian's usual abrasiveness, through arrogance or just personality, he knows when to be diplomatic. The brother of someone close is one such person as far as the chaotician is concerned. With or without Loki's attempts to be the diplomat, Ian was likely to play nice and be on his best, or at least better, behavior.

"Wait until she knows you better." Ian pushes a smile, not too forced, but for his benefit or Loki's, he's not certain. "She has a.. uh.. better chance to be caught thanks to whatever strings you pulled."

He still wasn't sure what the god did to the trial, but the gratitude is clear in his words. "It will be a long time before she is without a safety net."

Ian didn't always feel like living but where Kelly was concerned he'd pull himself through anything, if he could. His eyes finally turn away from Loki to look at Thor, and totally amused. "Kids are great. Anything can and will happen with a kid around."

[pirateangelbaby]

Thor's heart twists in his chest, the same heartsick melancholy that comes with reminders of how he thought his future would be. The throne, his legacy... a queen and heirs, the dynasty of Odin and Bor and Buri held secure in an unbroken line spanning thousands of years. That future is gone now... or worse, it never was, built on lies and secrets. And yet... there still is a future, even if it's not the one he'd thought he'd have. One built openly, learning from the mistakes of the past, a new Asgard beginning with Thor.

He looks to Ian, a total stranger wearing an enemy's face, offering him comfort and wisdom of experience in fatherhood, and does not wonder so much why Loki might have found a bond in him. "I don't doubt it. The trouble that Loki and I got ourselves into, when we were small..."

Thor doesn't know who might one day accept his affections, but he has hope again that there is still time, and Loki's words speak to the part of him that still deeply yearns for as much family as his arms can hold. "I hope so too," he agrees, leaning forward to lightly smooth back his brother's hair again. "Rest now, and dream of that day."

[coldsong]

Ian's unwittingly hit just the right note to ease Loki down a bit further. The reminder that oh, yes, he did do something helpful not that long ago, didn't he? gives him a brief little glow of pride. "It was fun," he says, and smiles drowsily at neither of them, eyes closing.

That little boost, coupled with the thought of pleasantly chaotic children, is enough to settle him at last. "You'll be...a good Allfather," he says to Thor, and then the smile drifts into something more neutral as he turns his attention to resting deliberately, letting himself drift off. He says nothing further, though he slides a little deeper into the bed and shifts to get more comfortable before his breath slows into the rhythm of sleep.

[malcolmeffect]

Thor's comment about their childhood brings a genuine smile to Ian's features. He could only imagine what it would be to be the father of a young Loki. He might even have an edge on Odin for his natural expectancy that chaos was going to happen at ever increasing intensity.

Ian remains still when he sees Loki settling in to sleep. So many people had spent days sitting at his side in similar circumstances. It was probably time he did the same for someone else. Once the quiet comes to his breath Ian looks over to Thor and nods toward Loki.

"I will stay with him, if you want to check on the children." It's an offer and honestly, he's internally scolding himself for tossing his cane aside out in the hall. He's in no mood to hobble out to grab it right now.

[pirateangelbaby]

Oh... even after all this, Loki still knows the right thing to say, somehow. Thor smiles a little, glad both for hearing Loki's faith in him, and to see him finally give in to the rest he so desperately needs. It speaks also of his trust in Ian that Loki is willing to be defenseless in his presence, that he finds either of their presence comfort enough to seek refuge in sleep.

By all the Nine, what a day this has already been.

With Loki asleep at last, the lines of fatigue in his face smoothing out with the slow slide into dreams, Thor sits back and gently lays Loki's hand down at his side. He doesn't want to leave the two of them alone - for his own peace of mind, mostly - but the children deserve to know that everything is all right, and he does seem the more mobile candidate between the two of them. "I'll be back," he says, not without some reluctance.

[malcolmeffect]

Malcolm understands the reluctant tone, whether it is from distrust of a stranger or unwillingness to abandon the side of an ill family member. Ian imagines both are true. It is that feeling that leads him to say more. Things he wasn't exactly comfortable saying but necessary perhaps to keep the calm.

"I can handle it if he wakes." Ian's own reluctance to speak showing. "I've been .. uh.. like this myself."

He motions toward Loki's sleeping for. Sure it wasn't exactly the same but terrors of dinosaurs tearing into the house or paranoia that people were going to try and shoot him had a vaguely similar effect.

[pirateangelbaby]

Were it not for Loki's show of trust, Thor might suspect that Ian wants him out of the way for... whatever reason. Leaving his brother vulnerable does not sit well with him, especially now, after everything that's happened.

But Loki does trust the human. And even though he wears the face of a man that Thor would never trust in a million years, that counts for something.

"I believe you," Thor answers instead, tilting his head slightly. "Watch over him."

He doesn't plan to be gone long, anyway.