To be honest, this is more of a filler chapter than one that pushes the plot further. After all, they're still in Germany, and London is where everything would truly kick off. I'm sort of exploring their characters in this, I guess. And this author's note comes as a sort of disclaimer.
I want to thank everyone who reviewed, who favourited, who followed, and who so much as thought it was interesting and read it.
"You can talk with someone for years, everyday, and still, it won't mean as much as what you can have when you sit in front of someone, not saying a word, yet you feel that person with your heart, you feel like you have known the person for forever... connections are made with the heart, not the tongue."
― C. JoyBell C.
GERMANY
MIDGARD
"I am startled, to say the least, at how easily you're flouting international security," Sherlock announced, glancing at his companion.
Loki did not break his (Sherlock decided on thinking of him as still male)… stride. Passing through the scanners, he did nothing out of the ordinary… and Sherlock realized, with a certainty that scared him, that had he not known that it was the God of Mischief, he would've taken him to be a typical woman.
Growing up, Sherlock Holmes did not believe in magic, and neither did he see the sense in pretending to for his mother's sake.
"If energy is neither created nor destroyed," he'd asked once when he was seven, "How can you create something out of nothing? How can you," he's gestured a giant explosion with his hands, "destroy something just like that. It makes no sense."
Mycroft, who was sitting at the table at the time, said nothing, but Sherlock felt the silent approval.
"It's about believing," his mother said. "Not whether the action obeys humanity's laws of physics." She sighed. "Look here dear. We are one planet in a solar system capable of sustaining life. Every star you see in the sky is another sun for another solar system. Who's to say there aren't other sentient beings? And if they are, can't they be different to us? With a different spin to science?"
"You've successfully turned Sherlock's nursery rhyme lesson to a study of astrophysics. Congratulations mother," Mycroft said from the corner.
Their mother did not respond. She merely looked at Sherlock with a look that translated to the question, Do YOU believe me?
Sherlock could not remember how that lesson had ended. Not well, he presumed.
Magic, he learned from a young age, just could not be. If you lived in a world of black and white- what was either real or unreal- there was no room for the shades of grey.
But now, here he was. Striding through Sheremetyevo International Airport, as though nothing was wrong.
"One request," Loki said suddenly, as Sherlock was tying his shoelaces after the final security check. The detective looked up, and resisted rolling his eyes. Now he decided to speak?
"Yes, now I choose to speak," Loki replied to his thought with a smirk, "For it is of great importance."
"Well, don't let me stop you," Sherlock said, ignoring for the time being that he hadn't even voiced his annoyance, and the Norse God before him had… sensed it.
"I would have said it regardless, Sherlock Holmes," he said, "But considering the fact that we're going to be stuck in a metal cylinder flying across Europe, we should establish this now."
"Just get on with it, please." He chose not to correct the 'metal cylinder' comment, understanding fully well that Loki did not say it because he did not know; he said it with a sense of contempt that only he could manage.
"I desire the window seat."
He couldn't be seri…"No."
Loki's green eyes flashed. "You dare refuse me?"
"As a woman, man… it doesn't matter. Even Mycroft knows to back off when I say the window seat is ALWAYS mine."
Loki said nothing for a couple seconds. "You see this form, Midgardian?"
"It's difficult not to when you choose to look like that for an extended period of time," Sherlock could not resist saying.
"IT TAK-" He stopped, then began again, "It takes a lot of concentration to maintain this form. In controlled situations, it's no problem. Passing through your pitiful excuse of security, is child's play. But if anyone touches me unexpectedly, if they so much as compromise my personal space when I least expect it, the mirage would fail. And unless you wish to be seen with Loki of Asgard…" He left the statement hanging.
"No one would touch you," Sherlock said sardonically.
"Would they?"
Sherlock opened his mouth for another scathing comment, but shut it again. The truth was, someone might. A casual brush past. The flight attendant handing him his in-flight drink.
"Fine. You win."
"I do?" Loki said, attempting to colour his tone with surprise.
"Please stop. I'M resisting the urge to smack you now."
"Aren't there humans laws that, to protect delicate women like myself?"
Sherlock just got up and left him. Eventually, he'd find the waiting lounge.
It might be safer for both of them that way.
Being alone gave Sherlock time to think. It was one of the key characteristics of introverts that they became fatigued in social situations and always needed time alone to replenish their energies. In Sherlock's case, it gave him time to explore his mind palace for a while.
Logically, he knew why he was still there. His every decision did not revolve around Mycroft. And while this particular one hinged on the fact, it was not the only reason. Reasons that he didn't feel inclines to explore at that time.
Loki was a Norse God- THE God of Lies and Mischief. It seemed almost a paradox why any civilization would have a God for that sort of thing. Scandinavians were practical that way. Their anthropogenic Gods were, at the heart of everything, very human.
Loki was proving to be exactly that.
Annoying, sarcastic… he was everything he despised in people.
Yet what others saw in him.
Strange.
And the more he thought about it, the more similarities he stacked up, rather than differences.
By the time Loki took the seat next to him, the flight was just about to make their boarding call.
"You took your fair time," Sherlock pointed out.
Loki shrugged. "There was much I wanted to see."
Sherlock just nodded, turning away as he listened to the boarding call.
"That's us," he said, when their seat numbers were called. "We're flying first class."
"I believe that's due to your brother?"
"Technically. But he doesn't know."
Loki laughed. It was a strange thing, Sherlock though. He heard him laugh before- mirthlessly, sarcastically, darkly (though it was just his perception, perhaps)- but genuine laughter sounded odd. Unpractised even, if one believed laughing needed practice.
"Remember, no touching," Loki reminded him, as they walked towards the aircraft.
Sherlock rolled his eyes. "Of all people, I'm the last one you'd have to worry about."
Loki didn't answer. And why would he? Sherlock was always right.
First class had two seats on each side, each plush with faux leather and leg-room. Sherlock let Loki pass to get to the window, avoiding contact and barricading him almost by stepping between the businessmen who tried to get their carry-on on the overhead compartment.
"How kind of you," Loki murmured as he watched Sherlock buckle his seatbelt.
"Like you said, Interpol is one of the last people I'd like waiting for us back in London," he whispered back.
"Interpol?" Loki scoffed, "SHIELD is who you truly have to worry about."
"The Americans? They have no jurisdiction on British soil."
"They handle global threats," Loki replied more patiently than Sherlock would have expected, "Covert organization even that they are, I am surprised that you have never heard of them."
"They don't affect me. They've never affected me, or my cases."
"Because you're protected by MI6?"
"I doubt." But his mind palace had already saved the thought for later. It sounded like precisely the kind of thing Mycroft would do to annoy him.
They sat in silence as the people filed in.
Finally the last two strode in, and a man in a suit stood in the walkway next to Sherlock and Loki, to let his companion get the window seat.
First class passengers generally board first. Unless they're officials.
He watched the companion take a seat, saying nothing as the air hostess offered him something to drink.
He wore a jacket made of a heavy material, and gloves that seemed to be two colours of both hands- Silver and nude. Odd. He raised his left hand in the universal sign for no. It gleamed in the sunlight.
The man in the black suit, opened the overhead cabin, to store his briefcase, but the luggage already there was clearly blocking his.
"Do you need help, Mr. Pierce?" the hostess asked, her German accent prominent.
"I'm fine," he replied (American, Sherlock thought), and with a solid motion the bag slid into place. "Thank you."
He took his seat, and Sherlock couldn't help but feel as if he was on the brink of something big.
"Ignore them," Loki said beside him. He wasn't even looking at the pair, or at Sherlock even, merely gazing through the window, his head tilted against the head-rest.
"But…"
"They are not our concern. They are not your case to be solved. Forget it."
Sherlock opened his mouth to protest, "I wasn't even…"
Loki turned to fix his green-eyed stare onto Sherlock's. "The Tesseract is not only a power source, Sherlock Holmes. It's something known as an Infinity Gem. Of which there are six, associated with a particular facet. The Tesseract deals with the mind, which is why I can read people's if they are close enough, and unhampered by any physical barriers. I can hear that man's mind loud and clear," he said indicating the man known as Mr. Pierce.
"And the other?" Sherlock asked.
"There's silence."
"And that would mean…?"
Loki did not smile, but he spared a glance at the man who, like him, stared fixedly out the window, as though his thoughts were too large to be confined to the interior.
"I think it's being a rather long day, don't you think?" Loki said with a yawn, "And I'm exhausted. You go ahead and deduce. Once we arrive, we may just be too busy to think about sleeping... or anything else."
Sherlock cast a cautious eye across the aisle.
"They're just trying to get to Washington," Loki said beside him, "They're not going to blow up the plane… at least not yet."
"That's very comforting coming from you."
Loki didn't answer, and there was not much deduction that had to be done to realize that he had indeed fallen asleep.
Sherlock grew up with the thought that God didn't sleep. It probably didn't apply to Norse ones.