Loki, the Undying
Rated: T
Summary: [Set immediately after Infinity War, Spoilers inside.] After his encounter with Thanos, Loki is found adrift in space. After finding that he is too late to attempt to help Thor save the universe, he is determined to find out the fate of his brother. After all, Loki is still the God of Mischief, and he may have a few, albeit drastic, tricks up his sleeve.
000
Loki's paranoia was through the roof by mid-afternoon, which, he decided, was just ridiculous. He was a god! He had survived Thanos! What could one woman, or, well, person, do to him? However, he was more concerned about why she was caring for him. Certainly, it couldn't be out of the goodness of her heart. If she had taken such lengths to create a false identity, surely, she had something up her sleeve.
He had been staying with her for weeks at this point, and thus far, Cassiopeia had done nothing outwardly harmful towards him. She really had healed his bruising, and he was gaining some magical abilities left… but that could have also have been his natural recovery time.
After discovering the photos, he paced around for a bit, occasionally glancing at Kylepo. How long would it have taken him to realize something was off without the stupid cat? How pathetic of him…
"Alright," Loki finally said, stopping to stare at the cat. "We're going to her room. Let's see what we can dig up."
The cat perked up and then raced across the house to the stairs, Loki following after him. Up they went and to the right they turned, heading for the master bedroom. He had never bothered to question it, but her door was always shut. Why should he have worried? In any other case, he would say that there was nothing that a simple farm girl could have offered him.
Upon placing his hand on the knob, he found that it was locked. No matter, it was still a basic door, and he was past the point of hiding his snooping. He pushed his shoulder into it roughly, breaking the lock with relative ease.
For the most part, the bedroom was just a bedroom. There didn't seem to be anything outright suspicious in the room. He stepped in as Kylepo weaved through his legs, nearly tripping him. The cat didn't hesitate to jump on the bed and begin to shred the blankets and pillows. Loki merely shook his head and began checking drawers for anything of note.
The room wasn't particularly large, but nothing in the house was. There was a desk, however, against one of the windows. It was covered in leaf cuttings and ground powders. A mortar and pestle sat on the floor next to the desk, too big to sit with everything else on it—including a few books
Loki flipped through a few and found that they were herbalist books, which, he supposed, was hardly surprising.
One of the books, however, seemed to be deliberately in the middle of the pile, as if someone had tried to hide it in plain sight. The corner of one of the pages was folded over. Loki filled it open to the marked page and saw a drawing for a leafy green plant with blue veining.
Glorel: suppressant, often used to slow the effects of poison or disease. Glorel, in liquid form, acts as an inhibitor, targeting ailments unnatural to a body's chemical makeup. Extensive testing has shown negative side effect on species with natural healing, regenerative, or other advanced properties. Glorel is safe for use on most species.
Loki growled to himself and set the book down on the desk. He took a deep breath, and then tore the page out of the book. Cassiopeia, or whoever the fuck she was, had some explaining to do. He shoved the torn page into his pocket and then closed the book. He tried to remain calm, knowing that when he did not—
Ah, it was too late. The temperature started to drop around him and Kylepo scurried out of the room. The window in front of him frosted over until it shattered completely. Deciding it wasn't worth it to hold his anger in, he reached down, tore the desk from against the wall, and tossed it to the side. It broke into large pieces and the contents of it spewed everywhere.
He turned, stomped out of the room, and decided to start packing up anything he wanted to take with him. He would be leaving his planet, one way or another.
000
"I'm home," Cassiopeia called out, "and in time for dinner too. Why are all of the lights out?"
The woman barely had the chance to walk into and flick on the light before Loki rushed from the side of the room. He grabbed her by her neck, his hands instantly beginning to turn his skin black from his Jotun skin, and held her against the wall. He knocked over a chair as he did so, which Kylepo jumped over to sit on the kitchen table. Apparently, he was a part of this interrogation as well.
"Please, you're hurting me!" Cassiopeia cried out, grabbing at Loki's wrists. He only succeeded in turning the skin on the palms of her hands blue and then black with each hit. "Loki!"
He held up the torn page of the herbalist book, waving it in her face. "You may be able to heal quickly, but if I choke the life out of you, you won't come back from that."
"You did," Cassiopeia choked out.
"I'm a god," he snapped, his face a mere inch away from hers, "you're just a deceitful wench."
Perhaps he underestimated his own strength. Cassiopeia gasped a few times, her brown eyes becoming bloodshot as he cut off her air. His stomach turned slightly, knowing exactly how she felt—the way her pulse pounded in her ears, the pressure building up in her skull, the tightness forming in her chest… But he was so angry—and not just at her, but at the world in general—that all he could do was watch as he strangled her. By the time he realized she was dead, her neck, collar, and cheeks were black.
He dropped her, and she hit the ground with a sickening thud, bouncing a bit. He backed away, dropping the paper, and putting his hands to his head.
"Dear Odin," he muttered and paced around. He had not meant to do that, he had meant to scare her into submission. He wasn't used to his Jotun body, and it had been a very long time since he was in a fight with someone who couldn't take a punch from him. He really was a monster—a monstermonstermonster—
Kylepo growled and then hissed, but not at him. He was staring at Cassiopeia's fallen body.
Except, it wasn't Cassiopeia, or at least, not the form he had come to know.
There was a different woman on the ground now. Her frame was smaller than Cassiopeia's, and her clothes were now a bit baggy. Her hair was just as dark, but her neat braid was messy and coming apart. Most importantly, however, was that the black on her skin was disappearing, leaving behind pale, scar riddled skin. Bewildered, Loki turned on the lights in the living room so that he could shed more light on the corpse.
Once the black had completely disappeared, which hadn't taken more than a few minutes, there was a sudden gasp, causing Loki to jump backwards. Once again, his dagger materialized in his hand without him so much as thinking about it.
"Son of a—" Cassiopeia, or whoever, slowly sat up, rubbing her neck. She coughed a few times and cleared her throat. "You know, I've been nothing but nice to you. How do you repay me? You kill me. Fantastic, thanks."
Loki stared at the woman, and then looked at Kylepo, who was backing away from her.
"What are you?" He asked as she turned her brown eyes upon him.
"One of a kind," she replied bitterly and stood up, turning away from him a bit. She straightened her shirt and closed her eyes. Loki watched as her skin rippled, and she returned to the form of Cassiopeia once more. "Now listen, we could go back and forth all night, or, we could talk it out like grownups. How's that sound? Think you could handle that?"
Loki adjusted his grip on his dagger and licked his lips. Well, he was nothing if not adaptable… But he wasn't sure if he was happy or worried to know that he hadn't killed her.
"Okay, great. I'm going to go grab another bottle of the wine. Absolutely killed me to not drink it around you. Damn good stuff, am I right?" She sighed and headed towards the basement door, stopping momentarily to make as if she were going to kick Kylepo. She didn't, but the cat went running. "I hate that beast. Too smart for its own good."
Loki contemplated running now that he had an opening, but even then, he wasn't sure to where. He didn't know where the closest town was—the Trading Post, as Cassiopeia has referred to it—or where there might be a vehicle to get to it. Finally, he sighed. He had survived Thanos. That's what he kept repeating to himself. He had survived Thanos.
The woman returned a few minutes later, two bottles in her hand. She set them on the kitchen table, grabbed an opener, and popped them both open. She walked into the living room and shoved one of the bottled into Loki's chest.
"Don't break it or I'll have to get you your child's cup," she said, a jab at the wooden cup he had been using, he supposed.
"What happened to the real Cassiopeia?" Loki asked, turning the bottle in his hands and taking a deep swig. He had watched her open it. It probably wasn't poisoned. The woman followed suit and dropped down onto the couch. She crossed her legs and threw her arm up on the back, reclining a bit.
Whoever this woman was in front of him…. She had done a very good job at impersonating another person. It was clear that her mannerisms, if natural, were drastically different from the timid persona he had met before.
She shrugged. "Dead. Disappeared, just like half the other people in the Universe I suppose. I didn't kill her, if that's what you're thinking."
"So you just, what, took over her life?"
The woman smirked, tilting her head to the side, "don't sound so judgmental, Loki Odin-son. I heard you did something rather similar before Asgard burned. I think we're birds of a feather."
"I'm nothing like you."
"Are you sure? You don't even know me."
"There's no one like me," he replied, his voice a low growl.
She smiled and shrugged. "There's no one like me, either. So there's that."
Loki set his dagger down on his lap, confident that he was the quicker of the two if it came down to a fight. He wiped his hand down his face and shook his head. "Who are you, really? And what am I doing here, really?"
"I don't have a name. Call me whatever you want," she replied and took another drink from her bottle of wine. She sighed contently. "Snagged this case from Sakaar, during the rebellion. Things got boring there once peace and order was introduced. It was far more fun when you were there."
Loki raised an eyebrow and sat up a bit straighter. "You were on Sakaar? While I was there?" He was about to say that he didn't recognize her, but of course he wouldn't. She was a shapeshifter of sorts, clearly.
"I was. We even chatted a few times. We'd have probably gone to bed together, had your brother not shown up. Don't feel bad, everybody did. I picked a beautiful form for Sakaar. Lived like a queen, for a while. But, like I said, it got boring. I hopped off the planet with some scavengers who had managed to get off the planet—did you know there was a pretty easy way out? It was a portal in the sky, like the others. The Grandmaster needed only to activate it—which he did. He got out of there as soon as everyone turned on him."
Obviously Loki did not know that, or else that's how they would have slipped off the planet in the first time. Well, the past was the past…
"Scavengers? So, were you the one to find me in space then?"
"Sure was. I even killed my companions for you."
Loki looked at her in disbelief. "Oh, really now? And why would you do that?"
The woman shrugged. "They didn't want to bring you aboard. Planned to leave you there to die. I figured if it came to three nobody-scavengers or the Prince of Asgard, you'd fetch the bigger price. So I brought you do Cass. She really was a friend of mine. I dropped off loot for her periodically and stayed here from time to time. Knew she'd know how to bring you back from the brink of death. She did. Then she disappeared. I became Cassiopeia—thought you'd like her better."
Loki leaned forward a bit and rubbed his temple. "You know you sound insane right? You expect me to believe that not only have we met before, but you just happened to stumble upon me, then knew exactly where to take me to heal, and had the perfect cover because your friend just happened to get wiped out of existence? Awfully convenient."
"Fate is funny," she replied and raised her bottle. "Anyhow, I tried to suppress your magic for as long as possible til I could find a buyer for you. No such luck, as it turns out. No one believed I actually had you. Those what would want you, like the Collector, are apparently dead."
Loki jumped up, bottle of wine in one hand (it was really too valuable to drop), and dagger in the other. He took a step towards her, dagger aimed out in front of him. "So you admit freely that you were going to sell me? Are you insane?"
The woman shrugged. "Wanna put that dagger through my heart? Go for it, really. I'll just heal. I always do. But yeah, I admit it. My plan's gone to shit anyhow, so what's it matter?"
Muttering to himself, Loki paced around a bit before ultimately sitting back down in his chair. "Well, now what?"
"Now what?"
"Yes. What's your plan now?"
"Oh, I dunno," she replied and returned to her wine. "I figure I'll finish off most of this case of wine since Cass never touched in, go through all of the shit I've dropped off here over the years, figure out what I wanna take, and head out. My ship's probably close to being fully repaired by now."
Loki frowned deeply in annoyance. "You… have a ship."
"Of course I have a ship. I took it off the hands of the scavengers. That's how I got you here, remember?"
"I could have left at any point in this past month, and you hid it from me."
"Yeah, yeah. I tricked you. Bet you hate that, don't you? Anyhow, you were the one who was dead set on not leaving until you weren't blue. I just offered you a bit of encouragement to stay by inhibiting your magic. It'll be out of your system in a few days, I imagine. Then the rest is up to you." The woman stared at him, a small smile on her face. Loki hated it. He really did want to sink his dagger into her chest, but he wouldn't. Not until he had her ship, at the very least.
"I'm going to try to take your ship, you know that right?" Loki asked sitting back again in his chair and making himself comfortable. If this were going to turn into a game of wits, then he felt he had the upper hand.
"Of course. I think it's more likely I'll end up going along for the ride though."
"You think I'd let you?" He asked, amusement in his voice. As if he would…
"I think that if you're going to try to undo Thanos's work, you're going to need all the help you can get."
Loki's shoulders tensed and he looked away from her. He took a deep drink of his wine. Damn it, she's right.
000
Author's Notes: I generally have a sort of vague plan, and then I word vomit until I get there. And hey! This is what I came up with. Like I said. I like to reuse characters. This female character was rather well liked the last time around, but I felt like she was highly underutilized. I try very hard no to make her a mary-sue, and I now have a very specific purpose for her (which currently isn't romance!) If you think you figure out what's going on, DO NOT post in a review! Feel free to PM me! Don't worry. Lots of other canon characters to come. I anticipate this story to be somewhat lengthy.
Paid the Should-Be Avenger: I'm so glad you reviewed. When I saw you set an alert/favorite, I was thinking "I really want to type out that pen name," it made me chuckle! No romance vote, got it! I feel like Loki would not be really 'romantic' unless he was fooling someone… But I feel like he would be possible for him to make 'a romantic connection', if that makes sense?
Zblue: I agree… TEAM LOKI FOREVER!
XXCinderzXx: Thank you for reviewing! Seeing that people are still reading helps me want to keep updating!
The Tribute Initiate: Haha! I admit, this wasn't my best, 'build up suspicion' as I more or less threw it in everyone's face… But this story isn't really a 'mystery' so why draw it out?
MidnightLokiLover: #LokiDeservedBetter… sooo very true. Unfortunately Valkyrie I think is dead since she was on the Asgardian ship and Wanda… well, she went off into dust. So for you, I'll count that as a 'no romance' vote haha!
Optymistka: You make a good point. Why have more Trauma? I have started to entertain how exactly I want this to end, and… it could be Bittersweet? I'm not sure. Haven't decided. Thank you for your review!
Henrytheshrimp: Thank you for your review! I'm glad you're liking it so far! When it comes to 'connections,' I think, by the end of this story, Loki will have made some good connections/friendships/relationships. This will revolve around him, primarily from his limited point of view, and it will be about his continued growth. So, I hope I can make you happy in that regard!
SailingFXforGold: Thank you for reviewing! I appreciate every one of them as it keeps me writing!
Ever Your Servant,
A.F