There was something soothing about being dead.

Rage, hate, pain, and everything in between melted into peace. With a clear, metaphorical, mind, Loki could flip through his memories like a book, without wanting to set it aflame.

Here he sat, watching the wind blow through the fake trees, the horses running in the distance, bugs buzzing calmly in the forest to his left.

Valhalla.

When Loki was seconds from his passing, he remembered, he was terrified. He had not even considered or allowed the idea of Valhalla being his fate. However, when he arrived, being welcomed by those who he swore to hate him, he rethought everything.

Thus, peace ran deep into his muscles, easing his screaming soul. He finally knew. He finally knew that he was not a monster.

Loki, the monster he swore himself to be ever since finding out about his blue heritage, was, in fact, worthy of peace in Valhalla.

Letting out a sigh of contentment, Loki sipped his glass of water and sat back in his chair.

Green eyes suddenly were hidden behind eyelids; Loki let himself revel in the calm.

"You'll have to try harder than that to sneak up on me," Loki said, not opening his eyes for the man.

The man huffed out a sound of acknowledgement, before walking closer. "Yes," Odin mused. "Your mother was always much better at sneaking around than I was."

Another chair was suddenly beside the God of Mischief, as Odin sat down beside his adopted son.

Opening an eye to glance at the man beside him, Loki ignored the sudden pull in his chest. He couldn't ignore the fact that Odin clearly had something on his mind, from the habit he's always had. If there was something on his mind, he would clamp his jaw tight, and breathe deep and slow. Odin reminded him so much of-

Of?

No, Loki thought, there's no reason to link the living to the dead.

"I know you don't want to talk to me, Loki," Odin started, staring off into the field that was once filled with galloping horses. Where did they go? "But we need to talk."

Finally sitting back up, Loki cocked his head to the side and rose an eyebrow. "About what? I'm quite at peace here, I don't feel the need to converse about minuscule things."

"It's not minuscule, and you know that."

He does know that.

He knows it so much, it hurts.

Wait, what pain?

"You don't belong here."

Loki could have sworn he saw a tiny Odin in the air, driving a curved blade right into his chest. He noticed the pinched look on his fath- Odin's face. Perhaps it was a double ended blade?

"Not like that, Loki," Odin put his hand on Loki's shoulder, and squeezed. "I know I was a fool in the living. Death brings clarity, I can see it in your eyes. However," He suddenly smiled sadly, and in that moment, Loki saw Thor. "You're still in pain. You're ignoring it, my son. Bottling up pain seems to be your speciality."

"I know not of what you're talking about," Loki lied. "I'm perfectly at peace, and I'm not in pain. So, whatever it is you are trying to do here, it will not work. I won't let you take me away from here."

Happiness was something thought to always be present in death. Loki was taught by his own mother, that in death there is a new beginning. Happiness should always be present when leaving the living.

And yet...

Loki knew exactly where this conversation was going. Loki may be at peace, but happiness was not present. As he felt the life draining, or being squeezed, out of his body, he was not happy. Happy to finally be out of misery? Perhaps. Happy to leave the living? Debatable.

Happy to have a new beginning? That's where it all crumbles.

"You're lying, Loki," Odin's eye caught his own, and he felt his breath hitch. "Would you like to know why you have yet to see Frigga?"

"I know why," Loki answered, pushing Odin's hand off his shoulder.

"Do you?"

Yes.

Rain was suddenly falling from the clouds, and onto Loki's face. He could feel his hair becoming wet and sticking to his face, and shoulders. Were the clouds crying? Loki wondered, glaring up into the sky.

Both Odin and Loki pretended to not notice that not all of the drops on Loki's face was rain.

"You will come back, my son," Odin wiped the tears off his cheeks, and embraced his youngest son. Loki struggled in the embrace, but Odin held on, powered by love. "It is peaceful here, physically. But deep inside you, masked by calm, is a war. You have to go back."

Loki clenched his jaw, still struggling in his father's grip.

Fathers?

Suddenly, Loki reached up and put his own hands over his fathers.

Yes, fathers.

"I still died," Loki told him, close to biting his own tongue. "He gripped around my throat, like you right this moment, and squeezed."

For a few moments, the two of them shared silence.

"I don't want to go back."

Odin chuckled, brushing the wet hair off his son's face. "Stop lying to yourself in fear."

"My lies are what keep me alive."

"Alive."

Loki jerked back, shutting his eyes. "Safe. I meant safe."

Even then his lies couldn't accomplish these. He was still crushed by Thanos' hand, and let himself fall into danger whenever it came around.

In one moment, it hit him.

His lies got him killed.

He needs to stop lying to himself.

Oh, Norns.

When Loki opened his eyes again, Odin was no longer present, but he could tell he was present. Watching over him, with his mother.

It was still lost on him, he did die.

So, how could he possibly-?

If one thing that his time on Midgard had taught him, was the term fuck.

It seems accurate, Loki agreed.