When he wakes, he remembers things in waves that slowly creep up on him.
The Frost Giants. Odin's betrayal.
Thor ruining everything. Again.
Falling, and falling, and falling.
And Jane.
Loki sits up clumsily because his body feels foreign and heavy, as if he has slept in his armour. He hasn't, of course, because the air is warm on his bare shoulders and so tangible he can almost smell the desert sun on his skin. His pants... well not HIS pants, are surprisingly comfortable. He dangles his legs over the edge of the bed... well not HIS legs.
Loki sighs because besides the sheer convenience and amusement factor provided by the ability to shapeshift, there is ONE glaring drawback. If he does not hold his focus, his mind instinctively rejects what he sees, and he risks slipping back to his old form.
There is a small mirror off to the side of his bed, and he has to steel himself before he turns to face it. He expects to see the wild blond hair and clear blue eyes. They are both familiar, and at the same time completely foreign in this particular context. What he does not expect is the weary sadness reflected back at him in those eyes, or the slump of his broad shoulders that suggests a weighty burden.
"Hey, big guy. How's it going?"
He turns to see a young girl staring up at him from the doorway, her eyes wide and a big grin on her face.
"Jane's friend?" He says the words carefully, trying to sounds like he's confirming rather than asking for the answer.
"Well yes, but... Darcy. So much easier." She eyes him hungrily, but her expression borderlines on parody so he reads it as some kind of friendliness instead of... well. He self-consciously rubs his arm until she points to a clean shirt thrown over the back of a chair, winks, and disappears into the other room.
"Right," he mutters to himself. This is not what he remembers from the last time he impersonated his brother, but that involved a great deal more placating his father and playing pranks on Sif than anything. Though perhaps not in that order exactly...
Now properly dressed, Loki emerges to the bright sunlit room. There are empty tables standing, purposeless, around the room and Darcy sits at a rickety table in the middle, completely engrossed with a small device that she pokes at.
Her face lights up when she sees him. "Nice! Though it does make you wonder what kind of crazy doctor Donny must have been to fit into that, right?"
The name flicks past him before he catches it, but it doesn't seem important because a series of notes from her device distracts her again.
"Jane's been bugging me all morning, which is POINTLESS because I mean - last time you fell from the sky AND we hit you with the van a couple of times, and that still didn't stop you at all so..."
Loki realizes he must look a little dazed, as he takes in his surroundings, because Darcy starts to walk towards him hesitantly as if to steady him.
"Yeah, also pointless, because what exactly would I do if you fell over? Nothing. Exactly." Despite her words she doesn't back away, instead shepherding him to a chair using a shooing motion. When he's settled she returns to her own chair.
"So... what happened to Meow-meow?" she makes a little swinging motion with her hands.
"Mjolnir," Loki corrects, absent-mindedly. This particular problem had occurred to him already, but his strength and magic are powerful enough on this planet that he felt he could get away without conjuring a copy of his brother's toy. "It, as much as any of us, is a servant of Asgard. It belongs where it can protect its people."
Darcy nods, though it is clear he could have said "Not here" and that would have been just as acceptable.
"But you went crazy looking for it last time, and were all..." she made a deflating noise and let her arms loose imitating what he assumed was a mortal Thor, "And then you left as soon as you got it. What was up with that anyways?"
Loki doesn't answer, but instead reaches across the table and pulls an open book towards him. Books in general catch his eye, and this one is open to a picture of his brother's toy.
He would never understand humans.
"Check it out, you're in here too!" Darcy yanks the book back long enough to flip to a page with a brutish looking man in armour. Loki smiles.
"I don't look the brightest of sorts, do I?"
"Really? You're like the ultimate jock and you're complaining you don't fit in with the chess club?"
"Yeah, I don't actually understand..."
"... what I'm talking about? Sorry. We're gonna have to work on this whole blending in thing a bit more before we get to lingo."
There's a knock at the door, and the pair turn to find Erik fumbling with the door. They watch him try to balance the equipment under one arm, a large flat box in the other, and the doorknob somewhere in between. After a moment he stops and glares at Darcy.
When they are all settled again after Darcy has had her fun, Erik lifts open the box and gestures inside. "I know how much you eat, so I figured you'd be hungry already."
"Hells yes!" says Darcy, reaching for a slice.
Loki is actually hungry, but the food in front of him is confusing and watching Darcy grin at him while she chews is enough to put him off.
"Thank you, but no."
He realizes he might have misspoke when Erik and Darcy stare at him, the latter with the slice half raised to her open mouth. She begins to say something, but Erik raises his hand and changes the subject.
"So SHIELD has been in quite a tizzy since Jane informed them our friend here had returned."
Darcy laughs and winks at Loki as if they are in on the same joke.
"Did he break all their equipment with his rainbow bridge again?"
Erik shakes his head, but he is staring at Loki as he answers Darcy.
"That's just it. There was no interference. No storm. No sign at all." He sits back in his chair and relaxes slightly. "But, then again this whole thing is utter madness. Gods and children's tales." He makes a dismissive noise.
Loki clears his throat and chooses his words carefully.
"The bridge was destroyed. My brother..." His breath catches a little. "I couldn't overpower him. The only way to keep him from destroying everything was to destroy the bridge. I knew it meant I would likely be stranded here forever, but it was a risk I was willing to take. And so I fell. I suppose it dropped me in the last place the BiFrost connected to here."
Even Erik is leaning forward in his chair by this point. Darcy has abandoned her food entirely.
"Fell," she says incredulously. "Like, really and truly just fell from the sky without your teleporter? How are you not dead? That's gotta be a god thing right?"
Loki smiles. Humans.
"A god thing," he agrees.
Erik lets out a low whistle, but a noise from Darcy's device distracts them.
"Jane?"
"Shit, SHIELD's on their way. Can't they just stay in their batcave and stop bothering us?"
"We can't let them find this laptop, it took me ages to compile the data we hadn't stored here."
"Right." Darcy and Erik jump up, when they remember their guest.
"Go," says Loki, "I'll be fine. I can finish this..."
"Pizza. Good." When Darcy gives him a look, Erik shrugs. "He's the God of Thunder. He has a pizza."
The two of them disappear out the door.
Now that he is alone and can get a better look, Loki pulls the book closer to him and flips backwards.
"Loki, God of Mischief. Companion to Thor, the God of Thunder. Son of the Frost Giant Laufey." Even the damn humans knew. His lip curls in a cruel sneer.
Enough.
He shoves the book away so hard it goes flying off the table. In a moment, that too goes flying, knocking over some equipment stands in the process.
There is something freeing and incredibly visceral about letting his anger run its course. It is actually quite unlike him. Like Thor, he thinks bitterly. Loki runs his hand through his hair, so roughly that it feels like his hand will come away with a clump of tangled blond hair. Instead, he shimmers ever so slightly, feeling his magic course through him. When he sees the familiar dark black strands cling to his fingers, he shrugs off the last of his disguise.
He runs his hand along the side of his hip, feeling the slim, tailored fit of his grey trousers. The crisp, white dress shirt feels cool against his feverish skin. A green tie is loosely looped about his neck, regrettably sloppy, but appropriate in this heat. He chooses to leave the suit jacket off, and instead, drapes it over the back of his chair.
It feels good to be in his own skin. He stretches and moves his limbs as if he was trying on new clothes. And then he smiles.
What fun!
It took those foolish humans long enough to leave him alone. He had to get somewhere more alive. He needed information about this feeble realm, and to be around people who had no reason to suspect him.
He would have to leave without saying goodbye to Jane. Loki didn't understand why this troubled his mind. She was Thor's woman, and a complication. In fact, she was the only reason why Thor was able to destroy his careful plans in the first place... But he did not hate the others; Darcy who hid her intelligence behind quips, and Erik who watched him so suspiciously.
To tell the truth, he did not hate Jane either.
Still, there was his sense of self-preservation, and staying in a town with the only dedicated government force that knew he existed was unthinkable.
"It's too bad really," he says, to no one in particular. It occurrs to him that Heimdall might be watching, and his resolve to give them a good show back home only hardens.
"What's too bad really?" says a voice that startles him.
Loki turns sharply on his heel, and comes face to face with a man so scared he is literally shaking. His gun is drawn, but even that poses little threat to the god.
"Who are you?"
Loki's smile is as cold as ice. "Who are you?"
"Agent Black. Are you a SHIELD agent?" When Loki's smile widens, he shudders and tries to puff out his chest and steady his arm. "They'll be here any moment. Even if you..."
"Even if I... what?"
Loki begins to walk towards the agent, slowly. Menacingly. He makes a small gesture with his hands as if he is running them under a pipe, and suddenly he is holding a snake.
"Tell me Agent. What is it that humans fear most? What is it that you fear most?"
The snake slides from his hands, and begins to make its way towards Agent Black. It slithers closer. Closer. It is now a lean, hungry looking wolf that snaps its jaws and lunges. Now it is a puff of smoke from which pour wailing half-rotted ghosts. Black loses sight of Loki as he pulls his arms up to defend himself from the descending spectres. Now it is a soldier in a reflective helmet and full kevlar body armour, with an automatic weapon pointed at his head.
It's not real, he thinks. It's not real. "It's not real!" he screams out loud.
There is a loud bang as the soldier's gun goes off, and Black's body crumples to the ground. The soldier lifts up his visor, and Loki's icy smile once again shines out at the agent. There is no blood. There is no bullet. But Agent Black is still undoubtedly dead.
There is a noise outside, cars pulling up, and booted feet hitting the ground at a run.
Loki pulls off the helmet and the sharp edges of his features blur slightly, just enough that there is nothing to focus on. When he is whole again, he is wearing a suit identical to Agent Black's. He quickly tightens the tie, and rummages through the dead man's pockets. He pulls out some papers and the man's credentials. Loki frowns because it was irritating enough to look like his brother, let alone this weak human in front of him, but there is little time and he has to do something quickly.
He flicks his wrist in a deft motion, and the credentials come back with a more appropriate picture. Just in time too.
"Freeze!"
A group of SHIELD agents burst in, guns drawn. One in particular, clearly the leader, takes a moment to look around the room before he comes forward to stand right by the agent's body. It is surprisingly easy to miss under Loki's cloak of magic.
"My name is Agent Coulson of SHIELD. We just heard a gunshot. Identify yourself."
"Agent Lukas Black. I'm the specialist Director Fury requested. I was told I was to meet everyone here." He offers up the credentials.
Coulson takes them and hesitates a moment, as if reading Loki's face, then nods at his men to holster their weapons. This time he offers his hand.
"So that's your car out front? We were sent to collect Thor for a debriefing, and we thought... where is he anyways?"
Loki looks out, through the glass doors and into the desert as if searching for the missing quarry. "Gone, I should think."
"Great," Coulson throws up his hands, "First we have to deal with a billionaire with enough money to BUY us. Then an octogenarian who is terrified by computers. And now a god who needs a GPS chip embedded in his thick skull. This is going... really, really well..."
"What about me?" Loki's voice is calm, but he is itching to let loose his magic and make good his escape.
Coulson nods.
"We can have someone deal with your luggage and car. You'd better come with us right now."
A/N:
This one is quite a bit longer than the last (I think). I feel like I've got to introduce some sort of internal story rules about Loki's powers/physical presence here, as well as starting up the bigger storyline.
Once again, reviews/advice always appreciated!