Thank you all SO much for the wonderful reviews on the last few chapters! It's very encouraging - Hugs to all of you!
And now for the arrival of my favorite character... Enjoy!
Entry #7: Manhattan
The sky was darkening. Partly cloudy with a chance of rain.
Loki was in a stormy mood as well: mostly angry with a chance of pain… and the black glares he gave the pedestrians made most of them veer out of the way to avoid him, or cross to the other side of the street. "Mortals," he grumbled. "Weaklings. Underlings. Peasants. They should be my subjects! They should be worshipping me like the god I am! They should be bowing before me at this very moment!"
But nobody did, of course. Because Loki had no powers. Loki had no magic. Loki had no fine attire (just some revolting mortal-style clothes). And worst of all, Loki had no home.
Stupid brother.
This had been his brilliant idea: "Let's send Loki back to Midgard! He can 'cool his heels' there, as the mortals say… not quite sure what that meant, but it sounded appropriate."
And Odin had agreed. After all, it had worked on Thor, hadn't it?
Only because you are WEAK. I am NOT weak. I am, in fact, MUCH more worthy of a throne than YOU, Brother. But Loki hadn't said any of that out loud, as he had no desire to dig himself a deeper grave of humiliation and defeat.
A small building with the word "Starbucks" across the door caught his eye, and he moseyed toward it, hungry and thirsty and hoping that there would be something to eat there. Not that he had any money or anything to barter with, of course. Odin had made sure he had sent his adoptive son away with empty pockets.
Stalking in the door (which made an annoyingly cheerful dinging sound when it opened) Loki stomped to a table in the far corner and seated himself in one of the small, worthless metal chairs. How unlike the kingly throne he had envisioned himself sitting on at this time only a month ago.
Before he could blink, the door dinged again, and this time two mortals filed in, one after the other. The male was keeping quite a distance between himself and the shorter female, Loki noticed with some amusement.
"Nat, I swear you are going to pay for that. Why did you tell me it was that stupid spider before taking a closer look? Do you have any idea how embarrassing that was?!"
The woman he had called 'Nat' had her back turned to Loki by now—both of them did, actually—and she looked slightly familiar. She replied in a cool, even tone of voice. "I had no idea you were going to faint in front of everyone."
"Ssshh!" The man elbowed his female partner and shot her an angry glare. The instant his face was turned toward Loki again, the demigod's large green eyes nearly popped out of his head. Agent Clint Barton! What was he doing in a coffee shop in the middle of Manhattan? And Loki would bet anything that his redhead companion was Natasha Curse-Her-Lying-Heart Romanoff. He was still harboring a grudge against both of them, but quickly realized that they probably wouldn't be thrilled to see him, either. Especially Barton.
The SHIELD agent was without his trusty bow and quiver, but still dangerous, as Loki well knew. Having been inside that man's mind gave him special insight as to what physical prowess the former assassin possessed.
There was only one thing to do.
Hide under the table.
And so, the mighty Loki Laufeyson, Would-Be King, Slayer of Mortals, and Master of Magic glanced frantically around the room to make sure no one was looking at him, and then chose the nearest of the few actual booths that lined the wall. In less than two seconds he had ensconced himself under the table, as close to the wall as he could squeeze his tall frame.
Feeling sneaky and somewhat proud of his ability to improvise, Loki lurked beneath the table and watched them from the safety of his new makeshift fortress.
"Just coffee. Black coffee. Really dark black coffee," grumbled Clint, still glaring at Natasha.
"One Caramel Macchiato, please," Natasha requested in a much more pleasant tone of voice. Once they had been handed two steaming foam cups, the assassin grabbed Clint's sleeve and dragged him toward—oh horror of horrors—Loki's hiding place. For a moment, he was sure they had seen him, but when they began sliding into the booth, he decided that was probably not the case. Unfortunately, he had to press himself as far against the wall as possible in order to avoid being kicked by the two agents. As it was, Clint's boot was almost toe-to-toe with Loki's.
They began speaking, both in whispers. "Clint, are you sure you're okay? You hit the floor pretty hard."
Clint grumbled something unintelligible and drummed his fingers on the table-top, right over Loki's head. "I'm fine. But which one of those morons had the bright idea to wake me up by pouring a bucket of ice water on my face?"
"Actually, that was me."
"I thought so."
"You're not mad, are you? I had no idea that it was just a piece of lint. It could very possibly have been Mister Fuzzwell."
Loki made a face, arching one eyebrow and rolling his eyes upward as if could look through the bottom of the table and see Natasha and Clint having their very interesting face-off. Mr. Fuzzwell?
"Nat, there's nothing 'fuzzy' or 'well' about a Banana Spider, and if that thing gets out of its box one more time, somebody is going to face serious consequences: you, or Mister Fuzzwell. Preferably both."
A smirk crept across Loki's face. Arachnophobia? That was one thing he had not managed to pry from Clint's memories. How amusing.
"Oh, Clint. It's just a spider."
"Just a very dangerous spider. And where did you get that ridiculous name?"
"Clint…"
"Someday that thing is going to kill me, and then you'll be sorry."
"Clint!"
"What?"
"Drink your coffee."
For several moments there was relative silence. Loki gauged the distance between the table and the door, wondering if he should make a run for it, but before he could do so, Nat stepped on him. He had braced both palms against the floor, preparing to crawl out from beneath the table and dash for the exit. Obviously that had been a bad idea, because the female mortal was wearing high heels, and one of them nearly punctured the back of his hand.
Loki released a muffled grunt of pain, and then instinctively recoiled. However, there was no more room to scoot back and he ended up bonking his head on the underside of the table.
Natasha and Clint both yelled and automatically tried to get into their hard-learned defensive postures, but that proved to be rather difficult since they were both sitting down with their knees under the table. All in all, Loki received several partially-unintentional kicks to the face and a rude jab in his ribcage (thanks to Nat's high heels).
As soon as both agents had vacated the booth, Clint bent down to inspect the underside of the table. When his eyes met Loki's, he froze for a moment, and then yelled at the top of his lungs, "NAT! IT'S HIM! THE – THE DEMIGOD, LULU!"
Loki frowned, and then (as gracefully as possible under the circumstances) wriggled out from beneath the table and rose to his feet. "Actually, it's 'Loki,'" he corrected, annoyed by the mispronunciation.
Everybody in the coffee shop was either staring at the three of them with concerned looks, or evacuating the building as quickly as possible.
Both of the agents were glowering at him suspiciously. He knew they remained ignorant of his powerless state. That could work to his advantage. "Let me go, and I won't kill you," he offered.
"Come with us, and this situation doesn't have to get any uglier," Natasha countered, reaching up to tap her earpiece. "Director Fury? He's back."
"Who's back?"
"The demigod. Lulu," she added, smirking at Loki.
"Romanoff, I hope you know this is not April Fools Day."
"I'm serious. He's in custody as I speak."
Loki glared. What did they know? Silly little mortals…
Clint marched across the room, looking fit to kill, and Loki backed away. That was obviously a mistake. Clint sensed his trepidation and grabbed his arm, towing him across the coffee shop and out the door with Natasha trailing close behind. "Don't try anything funny, or you won't have time to regret it," warned Clint as he ungraciously shoved Loki into Nat's bright red sports car and climbed in after him.
That particular model was certainly not intended to seat three people, and the demigod ended up being uncomfortably squished between Natasha Romanoff and Clint Barton. And he had no seatbelt, of course: the first time the car stopped at a light, he immediately did a faceplant into the dashboard.
Loki thought his day could not possibly get any worse.
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~Alassiel
