Standard disclaimer applies; I do not own the Marvel character Loki Odinson or Thor Comics.

Author's notes: This is based on a prompt (see below) and is set Pre-Thor (2011). Includes death of original characters and children (non-graphic).

Prompt: "This day, the next, a hundred years, it's nothing! It's a heartbeat. You'll never be ready."

In Thor: The Dark World, Loki says these words to Thor about his love for Jane. Thor thinks he is being racist. Loki is speaking from experience.

Love and Mortality

thebestIcan

Prologue

The wind and drizzle becomes heavy and the roses on the casket begin to flatten under the weight. The large drops of water roll along the polished mahogany and brass and into the grave below. The service had ended hours ago and the reception was probably done by now. The priest had left. The rest of the crowd gone but for two figures standing next to casket.

The older woman reaches out to the young man, grasping his elbow and pulling gently. He does not budge, unfocused green eyes still fixed on the casket. He shows no sign of having noticed her tugging, her attempts to catch his attention. The woman tucks her coat closer to herself and leans in, changing tactics.

"Liam? Sweetheart? I think we should go back to the apartment."

The man blinks slowly, as if in a trance, but again shows no sign of noticing. The woman puts her hand on his shoulder, shaking it slighting. He turns to her slowly and she gives him a sad smile when he meets her eyes. She is holding back her own tears and takes a shaky breath before speaking.

"Please Sweetheart, we should go back to the apartment. Grace will want to see you."

The man stares at her. The mention of his Mother-in-Law seems to shift something and he finally focuses. He looks back at the casket, his jaw clenched and his eyes suddenly steel.

"I think I'll stay here a while longer. Send my apologies and love to Grace, would you?"

The woman doesn't speak again, but nods. She leans up, places a gentle kiss on a high cheekbone and walks away.

Loki Odinson watches her go before stepping up to casket, laying his hand on the cold, wet wood. He has done this before. Many times. Too many times. He knows the blissful numbness he feels now will end. The cool exterior would crack, the carefully constructed mask would shatter, and white fire rage would burst out. He would go on a bender, a self-loathing spree in which he will do all he can to destroy himself until the tidal wave of grief puts the flames out and he drowns.

It happened every time.

Ami Reid had been his twelfth wife. His nineteenth lover. The fifth mother of his children. Many thought that the Trickster was too cold, too distant. But his problem was just the opposite. He cared so intensely that it was masochistic.

Since being a small child, much to the chagrin of his father, Loki had taken great pleasure in sneaking along the paths between worlds to his beloved Midgard. He would watch the creatures that lived there with fascination; running with horses, swimming with the whales. But Loki loved the humans the most.

With them he would stay for days, months or years. Frigga knew that it was just her beloved son's curiosity getting the better of him. She cautioned but encouraged his activities, seeing the passion in his eyes as he talked of their customs and languages, their beliefs and myths. He found the ones about the family particularly amusing. Odin thought that Loki's activities were deviant and unseemly, the humans a child race. Loki had vehemently disagreed.

In many ways they were like Asgardians, more so than any Asgardian would admit, but they had a thirst for life that was unique and contagious. He would walk among them, sometimes in his own form, sometimes in disguise. He'd been a peasant, a farmer, a military nurse, a veterinarian, a factory worker. He'd been to battle and balls. He'd sired and birthed children. He'd held them, weeping, as they died.

He had met Ami in 2006 in the Art History section of the Vancouver Public Library. She was brilliant. They all were. Loki had been living under the guise of Liam O'Neill, a British-born librarian working there for a little over a month. She'd come up to him looking very overwhelmed with a stack of books obscuring most of her face, desperately trying to find some lost Monet book. Despite himself, he'd been taken right there.

Loki slipped back to Asgard to tell a disgruntled Odin that he would be gone for a while before rushing back to pick Ami up for their first date. She was fierce and smart, stubborn and incredibly kind. Even Frigga had liked her, but cautioned him. 'She's only human.' He didn't care, he never did. Ami would make him laugh until he choked and he would watch her paint for hours. They moved in together six months later. They married when she finished art school after another two years.

She had wanted children, and though he knew that one day it would cause him more pain, he couldn't deny her. Ami was pregnant on the first try and Loki couldn't help but get swept up in the excitement. They picked names and he read to her swelling stomach from stacks of books that littered their little apartment.

Loki had been pulling the kettle off the stove when he heard the knock on the door. The police officer said that a drunk driver jumped the barrier into oncoming traffic, colliding with Ami's tiny Corolla and crushing its front end. On the way to the hospital, he learned she'd lost their son at the scene. When he got there, he learned that he'd missed her last breath by six minutes.

He'd never lost his whole family at once before, and it tore through him. Frigga, by her incredible powers of Sight or some divine motherly instinct, arrived at the hospital shortly later. She picked her sobbing son off the floor, taken him to the now empty apartment and held him as he wept himself to sleep.

The next day, Frigga told him that she had come with news. Thor would succeed Odin on the throne. His absences from Asgard meant missing important events, and though Loki was well educated in political matters as a prince should be, Odin felt he simply wouldn't be able to catch up. His father's condolences had been added almost as an afterthought.

Neither were able to attend the funeral. Political preparations for the shift in leadership in Asgard meant that the All-Mother and All-Father were unavailable to leave the realm, despite Loki's begging. Thor had not even known Ami's name. His wife and child had been mortal, so naturally they had not cared. To his birth family, they are not people. They were not loved ones that Loki would gladly follow into death. They were seen as nothing more than pets, or playthings that Loki kept himself amused with. To them, they did not matter.

Loki's hand clenches to a fist on the casket, his wedding ring digging almost painfully against his palm. His teeth are clenched and his shoulders hunched, a deep growling emitting from his chest. Their names flash before his eyes, their faces and laughter. That tearing feeling returned and he screams.

Ami, Baby William, Julia, Raj-

They all mattered, each and every one of them! Ami mattered! Their son mattered! Fury boiling over, Loki turns, grabbing a nearby chair left from the funeral and hurtling it over nearby headstones. He keeps going, kicking at the chairs and shouting in Norse. He punches a nearby headstone, knuckles splitting and he hears a shout behind him.

-Baby Emily, Ross, James-

Someone grabs him from behind, dragging him back from the headstone. A voice threatens the police if he doesn't calm down. His breathing is ragged and he struggles against the hold on him, but doesn't lash out. Over the pouring rain he hears some sort of broken sound like a wounded animal and when he feels the hot tears roll down his cheeks he realizes it is his sobs.

-Embla, Baby Rose, Baby Heather, Lucas-

The arms on him tighten for a minute and release. He briefly registers the words of the groundskeeper, saying he's sorry for Loki's loss and for him not to hurt himself. Silence, then footsteps and he is alone again. It is then that he realizes that he is kneeling in the mud next to his wife and child's grave. He looks up at the casket through his soaking hair, eyes overflowing with grief.

He thinks of going back to their apartment, of facing her family. He thinks of the pictures they had tacked everywhere that will only serve as painful reminders. He thinks of how her side of the bed will be empty again tonight. He thinks of the empty nursery. He will not do this anymore.

He cannot do this anymore.

He spends a few more moments on the ground before his sobs die to whimpers and his whimpers to the occasional hiccup. Sniffling, he pulls himself up out of the mud, not bothering to wipe off the smears of it, and stumbles to the casket. He rests his palms and forehead on the casket, whispers a prayer that Ami and Baby William's spirits be taken to Valhalla despite being mortal, and straightens.

Loki considers leaving his wedding band behind on her casket as he had always done. He reaches into his pocket and can feel Ami's own rings on a chain, another thing he'd always done. But this time he decides against it. He pulls her set out, slips his band onto the chain, and slips it over his neck; As reminder.

Love and mortality only cause pain.

Loki takes one last loving look at his wife and son before steeling himself and turning away. He will not come back to Midgard. He will not love again. With each step the god adds to the ice around his heart.

And jagged pieces to his plan.