Heeeey.

So I know I've probably taken far too long to update this. With all the other stories I've got going on [mostly the co-op with inukagome, which has ended up as one of my main focuses] I really haven't had the time.

Luckily, it is now summer! So I have literally all the free time in the world because now the only obligations I have are writing camp in July! And it is not July. So I will [hopefully] be getting a lot done.

Warning for a lot of swearing later in the chapter. And some messy stuff. I tried not to get too into the details but there's some nasty crap that happens to Loki/Gabriel. So if you're put off by people getting badly hurt and seeing/reading descriptions of it, then avoid the bits after I finish up with the India/Kali arc. Thought I'd let you guys know!

Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural.

1393 AD

India

Loki was fairly certain that he'd just about overstayed his welcome with Kali.

It was the little things that clued him in.

Kali hadn't stayed long after Holi, but she had been Parvati for ages - Loki got only short moments with Kali as time dragged itself on, a clear show of where the goddess's preferences lay. Shiva was acting more smug than usual, not that Loki hung out with him much anyway.

Bit awkward, since they were both partners with different aspects of the same goddess.

But Loki didn't want to leave.

He'd really enjoyed India - more than that, he'd been wandering for years before he'd found somewhere new to ground himself, to insert himself into the community and become a part of it. It hadn't worked here as well as it had in the Norse pantheon [they were too old for that, their religion too grounded in centuries of practice to change so easily].

He didn't enjoy being on his own.

1401 AD

"Are you sulking?" Parvati's amused voice startled Loki out of his thoughts, and he looked up to see the goddess seated next to him. He hadn't noticed her arrive, but he hadn't been paying attention.

"Not at all," Loki replied, turning to face her properly.

"You certainly look like it." Parvati said idly. She was smiling, but Parvati was always smiling, as far as Gabriel could tell. Nothing like Kali.

"Maybe I'm just thinking how I haven't seen you in ages."

"I know you'd like to see Kali." Parvati shrugged. "I don't control it, Loki. I prefer being Parvati."

She did now, at least, but Gabriel didn't try to contest it. "When, then?" He asked. "In another century?"

"I can't say when." Parvati sighed. "You are Loki. Perhaps India's not the place for you."

Loki's mouth twisted at the implication that he should go back to Asgard. "They'd hardly welcome me back there."

"I didn't mean leave." Parvati replied. Her smile had been quelled. "You take everything so seriously, Loki. I merely meant that you are a Northern god, and quite far away from-"

"Don't you dare say home," Loki said quietly, and Parvati paused.

"Asgard," she finished. "Like it or not, you are the outsider here."

"You didn't seem so concerned with that half a century ago."

Parvati shrugged. "You were new, and I was surrounded by the old. Of course I was fascinated."

"And what of Kali?"

"I can't say."

"Of course not." Loki considered the benefits of 'borrowing' a bottle from the bar. There was a reason he was there, after all. He settled for taking a drink out of the glass he already had.

He could feel the energy change, the power of the woman next to him shifting, and when he looked over again Kali was staring back and scowling.

"Happy?" Kali snapped. "I'd hoped I wouldn't end up like this. I swear, Loki."

"You swear what?" Loki retorted, not entirely in the mood for being polite to the woman who'd avoided him for decades. "That I'm too curious or something? Apologies if I can't help wondering what I did."

"What you did." Kali scoffed. "As if everything's about you. I was Kali for nigh on a century. And here you are, getting all brokenhearted because suddenly it's the other way around."

"I'm not," Loki said sharply, and it was true. He didn't feel particularly brokenhearted; just lonely. Kali was, whether he chose to admit it or not, the one god in India that he'd actually known beyond a passing acquaintance. It wasn't like there was anyone else to go to while he waited for her to get tired of Parvati.

The look Kali gave him made it clear she didn't believe him. "You're in a bar, Loki," she said. "As far as I can tell, you've been here for quite a while."

"That's not true." He'd taken breaks. Where else was there to go, anyway? Gods would start getting pissy if he started up with his real potential as a trickster god.

Kali still didn't look convinced. "I stand by what I said earlier."

"What, that I should leave?"

"That maybe you should take a break. Go somewhere else and stop wandering around India and pouting." Kali silenced Loki's protest with a sharp glare. "I don't have the patience to deal with you right now, and I don't want to have to constantly do this. Figure it out yourself, Loki." She got up and left, not once looking behind her.

Loki stared after her, slightly sullenly.

He'd gotten her message loud and clear.

Having no desire to go back west [he'd heard of the Holy Roman Empire, and had no desire to get mixed up in any of that], Loki kept going east.

The only problem with going east was that there was barely anything east of India, except for China and a multitude of boring oceanic countries. There was a particularly large landmass some distance south, but Loki had no way of knowing that, so he pretended he didn't.

Besides, it was full of all the nasty stuff, and even if it couldn't kill him that didn't mean he wanted to be anywhere near it.

So he wandered - here and there, causing a little trouble when the opportunity arose, always staying one step ahead of whoever might be behind him. Humans, as it turned out, had managed to organize into a sort of sub-group that dedicated themselves to eradicating supernatural ne'er-do-wells. Which, more often than not, included Loki.

They were particularly annoying, especially since a disturbing amount of them had actually figured out how to kill pagans. Loki had done his best to stop the information from spreading very far, but it was a little too late to stop them completely.

Besides, they did do some good. Ghosts and the like weren't very malicious, but they did kill people.

Loki only supported that kind of thing if said people deserved it.

Hunters notwithstanding [and Loki still had no idea how they'd managed to escape his notice for so long] Loki still wanted somewhere to be.

And, like it or not, that path always led back north.

Still 1401 AD

In retrospect, it really had been an idiotic idea.

Loki never should have gone back north.

Asgard was gone, the pantheon crumbled under the grip of the Christians - under what he'd engineered.

But its gods were not as gone as he would have liked.

And they were angry.

Loki lashed out at the first one that approached, sending him flying backwards into a tree. Others burst out of the forest on all sides, how had he not sensed them, how had they gone unnoticed?

He was backed up on the lip of a quarry, balanced on its edge, and if it was a fight they were seeking to pick then Loki would give them one.

Eight against one was hardly fair, but he was hardly an ordinary god.

A sword found its way to his hand. Not his angel blade. He wasn't suicidal. Gods whirled and blades clashed, the rasp of steel on steel loud in the forest. Loki gritted his teeth as someone's blade found its mark on his side. It cut past his clothes and leaving a shallow cut.

It wasn't like it would hurt him. Still-

The one-handed god in front of him brought his sword down heavily. Loki was forced to bring his up to block it. His free hand shot up to balance the blade. Magic crackled around him, keeping the other gods at bay, but it would only last for so long and he didn't dare use his Grace-

"How dare you show your face here, you fucking traitor," the one-handed one hissed, still bearing down on Loki.

He knew the god's name. "Not brave enough to confront me alone, Tyr?" Loki spat.

"I'm not the only one who wants revenge for what you did." Tyr's voice was low and threatening.

"And what, exactly, did I do?" Loki taunted.

"You know what!" Tyr abruptly drew back, Loki stumbled forward at the sudden lack of anything to push against, and the fight resumed at a breakneck speed.

Block, parry, duck, avoid the blades clashing and the gods who didn't care who they hit as long as Loki might have as well. His magic, green and angry, lashed out but they avoided it too well and Loki was so caught up in trying not to get himself killed [his god-self, he couldn't be killed by something like that but he'd hate to have to fake his death and it would still hurt] that they managed to get something tangled around his wrist that burned.

It yanked him off balance and Loki crashed to the ground. His other hand shot to the trapped wrist. He could already feel the magic woven into the cord that bound him. Wards and sigils and no, they couldn't possibly know, so why the hell were there wards for angels-

Tyr grabbed his hair and Loki's hand would have shoved him away, blasted him back with magic except someone had gotten the cord around that wrist, too, and how in fucking Odin's name-

"You think we didn't have a plan?" Tyr was unbearably smug, pulling Loki's head back uncomfortably far so they were looking at each other. "You, with your magic. None of us are as unintelligent as you seem to think."

"As if you managed to think this up on your own," Loki spat back. He refused to wince when Tyr shoved his head to the ground, hand tightening on his hair.

"As I said," Tyr growled. "Others were eager to help. Frigg was very interested in aiding us with this binding. Surely you've noticed you can't do anything."

Loki's magic roiled under his skin, searching for a way out, to blast these idiotic gods off the face of the planet, but the fucking cord kept it locked tight - along with his Grace.

How had Frigg guessed? How much did she know?

Tyr grinned sharply, mistaking the fear that had passed across Loki's face for panic. "We're getting our revenge, you fucker."

Whoever was holding the other end of the cord pulled sharply, dragging Loki across the ground. They didn't seem to care what happened to him. Someone's hands hit his back and Loki went over the lip of the quarry, landing on the stones below with a force that knocked his breath out.

He could feel his ribs snap, body breaking and knitting itself back together in the same second. The gods were still on the edge of the forest, making their own [slower] way down and Loki scrambled to try and get the cord off, but it had been wrapped too tightly around his wrists, cutting into skin and the wards burning at him in a way that they shouldn't with ordinary string and magic-

He realized what it was made of as one of the gods [Freyr or some other disgruntled hack] delivered a kick that re-splintered ribs that had just repaired themselves and sent an unprepared and under-powered Loki sprawling.

"This is how you try to catch me?" He spat, forcing himself to get back to his feet and face them. "By taking me unawares eight to one and trapping my magic? Is this the only way you admit that you have a hope of defeating me?"

"It's no hope." Freyr snapped. "It's a fact. Give up, Loki."

"Go fuck yourself." Loki hissed. "You'd defile what was left of an innocent just to get the upper hand, don't pretend you're any better than me." The cord wasn't string but taken from what was once blood and bone, the remnants of either Vali or Narvi, Loki couldn't tell which but they still dared-

One of them managed to scramble for the ends of the cord and pull and Loki's feet were swept out from under him, the stupid fucking thing finding its ways to tangle around him and damn Frigg's skill with magic, damn all of the circumstances that had led him to think he might have a hope of not ending up in some disaster by coming back north.

Loki was blindsided by a sudden blow, a rock coming down on his head and disorienting him. Without his power he couldn't heal fast enough to do anything about this situation, couldn't stop them from dragging him across the quarry and pulling his arms behind his back.

His wrists were pulled out, a rock flat against his back and he was being bound to it. This was their big punishment, to leave him here tied up and helpless. Loki didn't know whether to laugh or not.

Tyr eventually entered his field of vision again, looking smug. "Have fun, traitor," he spat. "You're going to stay here until the fucking end of the world - Odin's orders."

The fact that Odin had been behind the ambush didn't surprise Loki. "Odin can go fuck himself on Gungnir," he sneered. "Your world's already ended, Tyr, or did you miss that? Miss your big fucking moment of bravery?"

"Shut up!" Tyr's hands clenched into fists. "We're still here. Asgard won't be gone until we are."

"I was under the impression it already was." Asgard had faded with the faith, a shadowed version of what it once was.

"You know nothing." Freyr snapped.

"I know more than you, you bastard." If Loki was going to be trapped here then never let it be said he didn't go down swinging. "What were you planning to do with that sword, kill me? You'd be more likely to accidentally chop your own head off."

"You shut up, or I swear the moment we leave I'm going to track down that wolf of yours," threatened Tyr. "I might do it anyway, just for fun."

"Go ahead and try. I hope he bites your other hand off, and your head for a second course." There was no way Tyr would be able to take Fenris off-guard a second time.

Tyr made an aborted movement towards Loki and then seemed to change his mind, a snarling smile crossing his face. "You still think you're tough shit," he said. "Let's see what changes after a few thousand years."

It took a week for the snake to show up.

Loki heard it first, the rasp of scales on stone intimately familiar to someone who had spent so much time around Jormungand. He tried to crane his head up, see where it was coming from, but he was held so securely against the stone that it was impossible to look up far enough.

The noise was definitely coming from above him - and getting closer.

The first drop of venom scorched his neck, making Loki wince and try to edge away. It trailed down his torso, burning through the fabric of his shirt where it touched the cloth and eventually running out of potency, but not before there was a red, raw trail down Loki's chest.

"Those bastards," he huffed out, and then locked a hiss of pain behind his teeth as another drop landed on his shoulder.

This was what they had conjured up for his punishment; an eternity of torture, unless he could figure a way out from under the grip of the wards and sigils scorched into the cord. He couldn't untie it, couldn't get it off, and couldn't just magic himself out, even if he did use Grace.

Which he couldn't.

Fucking Asgardians.

Loki was sure the venom was wreaking havoc on his appearance as well, but he wasn't in a state to fully realize it until someone else vocalized it for him.

"You look horrible."

The snake moved occasionally, dripping venom all over, which meant that when Loki looked for whoever had spoken it was with one eye pinched shut to avoid what the other had already gotten - a drop directly to the eyeball. His vision was repairing itself - but slowly.

He heard the smack of liquid against a hard surface, and could make out someone standing in front of him with their arms outstretched, holding something over his head. The blurriness receded somewhat, and Loki thought he recognized the figure.

"Sigyn?" That didn't make any sense. "What are you doing here?"

"I'm not here because I want to be." Sigyn replied sharply. "What were you thinking, Loki? You know Asgard hates you."

"And they dislike you enough to send you out here to-" Loki squinted up at her. "What are you doing?"

"I'm making sure no more of this venom gets on you than absolutely necessary."

"They'll stop you."

"Apparently, it's what I'm supposed to be doing." Sarcasm drenched Sigyn's voice. "As if I don't have anything better to be doing than making sure you're alright."

Heart sinking, Loki realized their point. The venom would only feel worse if he was given a periodic reprieve from its effects. Odin was smart; he'd always been that way, but now that it was turned on Loki it wasn't nearly as much of a good thing.

"Why you?"

"Well, they are still under the impression that we were married."

"I still don't know how that happened." They'd thought Vali and Narvi were his children, too. Loki's hands, controlled by some desperate instinct, pulled at the bonds tying him. Now that his vision was clearer, Loki saw Sigyn's eyes flicker to where they held him.

She knew exactly what was holding him, he realized.

"I'm sorry about them."

"Shut up, Loki. I know exactly who was responsible for my children's deaths." Sigyn's mouth was a flat line.

"Is that why they kicked you out of Asgard?"

"Odin's no idiot."

"Unfortunately." If Odin was an idiot, then Loki wouldn't be in this mess in the first place. "It seems we're stuck here together."

Sigyn didn't immediately reply. Then-

"I suppose."

1403 AD

"Tell me," Loki said conversationally, trying not to betray how every time he moved the new, raw places on his body where venom had burned away skin felt like someone had lit a fire against him, "What does that snake look like?"

"Skaði's snake? Why?"

Oh, so it was her wretched snake. Loki had no idea what he'd done to upset Skaði, but it was probably just because everyone in Asgard and beyond seemed to despise him. "If I am to be stuck here for as long as I think I am, then I might as well have something to talk about."

"It's a snake."

"Give me something to work with here, Sigyn."

Sigyn sighed. "It's green."

"Absolutely fascinating."

"If you want conversation, don't be so sarcastic. How much do you expect me to know about snakes?"

"I don't know." Loki stared up at Sigyn for a few moments. "You could have chosen not to help me."

"What are you on about now?"

"You're stuck here. But no one's forcing you to hold that bowl."

Sigyn scowled down at him. "Maybe I feel like it."

Loki and Sigyn had never been the closest of friends; at best, they'd been passing acquaintances. "What did I do to make you think that?"

"You're an ass, Loki, but even you don't deserve this for an eternity."

1416 AD

"You've been quiet." Sigyn commented, after a few days in which Loki hadn't brought up some topic of conversation.

"I've been thinking." It wasn't a lie, by any means.

"About what?"

Loki took a moment to reply. "Thinking," he said quietly, "about how when I get out of here I'm going to snap Odin's neck myself." There was a slow-burning anger in him, anger at what had been done, at Odin, at the fact that he'd allowed himself to be tricked. He was the Trickster, damnit.

He could see a grim smile curve Sigyn's lips. "I'll help."

"No, I'm going to do it my-fucking-self." Loki snapped. The more he thought about it, the angrier he got. How dare Odin. They'd solved things - ended them. And now he wanted to restart the old fight they'd had, with no rhyme nor reason to his actions? "Maybe I'll see how much he likes it here."

He wasn't expecting the hand on his cheek, Sigyn forcing his head up so that their gazes met. She was balancing her bowl with one hand. "Anger is dangerous, Loki," she warned. "I don't blame you for yours against Odin. I feel the same. But make sure it doesn't burn you up."

Burn him up. How quaint, considering what happened when angels killed something. Burned them up, burned their essence from the universe. Gabriel considered doing that to Odin.

No. That was a horrible idea. Loki shook his head, dislodging Sigyn's hand and forcing Gabriel back down into the deeper, darker parts of himself. Odin didn't deserve going like that.

He'd think of something better. Something slower.

1438 AD

"What the hell did I do to deserve this?"

Sigyn wasn't there. She'd gone to empty her bowl, the one she held to catch the poison, stop it from landing on Loki, but it reached a limit eventually. Loki screamed up at the dark sky, clouds roiling and lightning flickering through them.

"What did I do?" He shouted. His arms pulled at the cord tying him back, catching his wrists painfully tight. He pulled until he felt skin break, but even then he couldn't stop, thrashing fueled by flat-out desperation.

He had never been meant to be tied down, but he couldn't shapeshift, couldn't escape, couldn't do anything to help himself.

The storm broke with a crash of thunder, rain pounding down against the rock. The venom on Loki's skin hissed in the rain, and he could never guess which of the drops was poison and which wasn't.

He flinched at every one of them, the pale scars running down his body a testament to why.

"What did I do wrong?" Loki didn't know who he was pleading to. He was looking for an answer, any answer, as to how he'd somehow ended up deserving this punishment, who had let it happen, why?

Gabriel was truly helpless for the first time in his very, very long life, and he had no idea how to deal with it.

Eventually, exhausted, Gabriel slumped back against the rock. He was a mess. A soaking wet mess. His brothers would look down on him, so pathetic that he couldn't even stand up to eight gods. Couldn't even get out of a few warding sigils.

Michael might even say he had deserved it, for what he'd done.

Water and blood ran down the rocks, and Gabriel watched them with a sort of detached numbness. He knew that it was his, but he couldn't bring himself to care.

He would heal.

It was one of the few things he could still do.

1456 AD

Loki's head was hanging. He didn't feel like expending the energy to look up. The drops were hitting the back of his neck when Sigyn returned from emptying out the bowl in the nearest stream. It was probably deadly now. Loki doubted any fish had lived in it beforehand, but any that might have would have died long ago.

Imagining the poison traveling downstream to some ill-fated village didn't make him laugh.

The cease in the burn of poison on his neck didn't either. Loki simply sat there, feeling his skin itch as muscle and all the other necessities repaired themselves. He wondered, vaguely, if the snake had managed to burn through to the bone this time. It had been over his neck for a long while.

"Have you stopped being angry yet?" Sigyn's voice was quiet. The air in the quarry was oppressive, a silence that made anyone wary to break it. Not even birds sounded nearby or flew overhead.

Loki didn't doubt that there would be a powerful spell on the surrounding area, to keep anyone from stumbling across him. Sigyn's question fell flat in the air.

"Loki."

The truth was, he had. So many years to let it fester and it had burned itself right out of existence.

Loki was just tired.

"Why is it," he asked slowly, "that they spend so much time despising me?" He hadn't done anything to them, recently at least, and there was nothing except Odin's word that he had been behind their pantheon's fall to Christianity at all. That had been hundreds of years ago. Why bother? Why hate someone so passionately just because?

"Gods don't let go of grudges easily," Sigyn said, sounding nearly as tired as Loki felt. "The Æsir least of all. They felt you slighted their honor. And you are the easiest scapegoat, being the cause of so much trouble."

"I fix what I do," Loki murmured. "I solve the problems. Chaos is fun but not if it's forever."

"They don't understand that."

At length, Loki lifted his head. "And you do?"

Sigyn's expression was unreadable. "I may know you better than them," she replied, "but we shall see how well I know you at all, in the end."

In the end. Loki's head dropped again. She only reminded him of what was wrong. That he was stuck here until he managed to get out or until the world shook badly enough to break underneath him, break the rock and the cord holding him.

Until the End of all things.

Which, for the Norse, had already come, but they didn't understand. They didn't understand that he'd already broken their pantheon, that they would never come back, that trying to break him back would do nothing to help regain what they had lost.

And if they didn't understand, they'd never stop chasing him.

The thought was depressing.

When Sigyn left again, the sting of venom was almost welcome.

It distracted him.

1485 AD

"What's happened to you?" The question was sharp.

Sigyn's feet came to a stop just before Loki, and the pause in the hissing, torturously slow drip of venom ceased. Loki's head was still down, so Sigyn's feet were all he could see of her.

"You're not even going to make a joke?" Sigyn demanded when the silence stretched on.

"What's there to joke about?" Loki could tell his reply has surprised her, even without seeing her face. He didn't particularly care.

"Loki, look at me." He didn't. "Loki." He stayed perfectly still.

"What are you trying to do?" Sigyn sounded angry. "Do you want to make Odin think he's won? You're better than this!"

"I was."

"You are."

Loki laughed dryly. The sound wasn't humorous in the least. "Can you look at me now, Sigyn, and honestly say that?"

There was a pause. "You look like you've given up," Sigyn said at length. "And I swear, Loki, if you tell me that's true I will walk away right now."

Loki stayed silent.

Sigyn swore, violently. "Do you think this will help?" She said furiously. "That sitting here like this will make them let you go? It will only make them think they've won, Loki!"

"I don't care."

Silence. Then Sigyn swore again, and her bowl clattered to the ground next to Loki, sending a trail of venom across his legs and wrenching a pained noise out of him.

Sigyn stalked off, feet meeting the quarry floor with a harsh slap at every step, and Loki stared at the holes in his pants and the fresh wounds in his legs and told himself he didn't care.

So.

Kind of extreme.

I'm posting this now because it's pretty long and I figure I might as well leave myself something to start the next chapter with.

As always, read and review, if I didn't freak you out too badly!