It is the middle of the night when Loki wakes to hear someone whispering to another someone in the hall outside of his sleeping quarters. He hears rustling, as if several someones are jostling for space. More whispering. He tenses, immediately wondering when the attack will come. Then giggling? Loki is thoroughly confused by the time someone very lightly knocks on his door.
He stands and groggily stumbles to the door, opening it to find the archivist who brought him his supper standing among a group of four other people that look to be about the same age, wearing the same uniform, and all of them bald, "Er...may I help you?"
The person he'd met previously nods, "Well...we're wondering if you might let us ask you a few questions?"
"In the middle of the night? What time even is it?"
"It's late, but...well, time is weird here."
Loki sighs, "And it can't wait until morning?" They all shake their head. Loki sighs and gestures for them to enter his room, "Fine. Come on." He slips back into bed and pulls the covers up over his legs, "So...what do you want to ask and why can't it wait?"
The familiar person plops down on the end of his bed and sits cross-legged, facing him, "Well...some of us haven't ever met a someone who wasn't made here. And since we don't know what they're going to do with you tomorrow..."
"Ah. Well, I suppose that would make this somewhat urgent."
Another of Loki's guests sits close beside the first speaker, another behind them, a fourth stretching across the bed in front of their friends, laying on their back. And the one other person kneels at the side of the bed, elbow leaning on the mattress, chin propped up on their hand.
The person on the floor speaks, "What's it like to be a child?" they ask.
Loki stares, shocked by the question, "Excuse me?"
"What's it like to be a child?" they repeat.
"What Ayshi means is that we're all made beings," the archivist Loki knows says, "we'd like to know what it's like to grow up."
"Well, I'd suppose it's like coming to learn about any part of yourself, at least a little. We learn how to be people and how to work together and we practice all this in the daily games that live in our imaginations. We are incredibly vulnerable and must be cared about by those older than us, generally parents." Loki pauses, "If you were never children, how did you grow into yourselves?"
Ayshi replies, "I remember waking up and everything feeling foggy. I couldn't see very well. Like I was in a haze. And sounds were muted, too. Existing was overwhelming. It was dizzying when my vision cleared and I could see the others. Because we were made for a certain task, we were naturally inclined to do what we do. So we learned quickly and were running the archives before our first awakening anniversary."
"That sounds terrifying."
"Oh, it was," Ayshi says. "How is it when you were made?"
"I was born of a mother," Loki answers, "And when one is born of a mother, they don't really have much of an awareness of the world early on. It gradually fades in, but I don't really remember anything before I was around three years old."
The person draped across the bed looks over to Loki, "Can I ask a question?"
"Hmm?"
"We've watched a lot of lives on film, but...what's it like to not be here? To actually live one?"
Loki stares at the asker, somewhat floored by the enormity of the question he's been asked to answer, "I don't even know where to begin."
"Yeah, Tam, how's he supposed to answer that one?" Ayshi says, nudging Tam's shoulder.
"I'll try," Loki says, "But...well, don't know what it's like to live here, so I can't tell you what it's like to not be here. Living, though...is complicated. Other people are complicated. And every day is a series of choices, some of them simple, such as what to wear or when to eat, while others...others can change the course of history as you know it. Well, not as you know it. You know the single sacred timeline. But until today...or perhaps it's now yesterday, I didn't know my choices weren't my own to make. I had a role to play- I grew up the child of a king with an older brother set to inherit everything. I had so much at my fingertips. And when everything fell to pieces...well, you've seen my life's reel, haven't you? I made decisions out of rage. And sometimes, that's what it's like to be living. While other times...other times it's joy."
Tam nods, "I suppose in that way, then, it's got some things in common with life here. Though here, we don't have a lot of big choices to make."
"No, only if we're going to sneak an extra reel here or there to watch while we wait for someone to call for the archives," the person farthest from Loki says, "But life here...has patterns. We just get to live through other people we'll never meet."
"You aren't allowed to leave the archive?" Loki asks.
"No, we are," they reply, "But we do. But it's just to this city. And the archivists live together. We were initially just all grouped based on what area of the archives we managed- so we watch Earth lives and a few adjacent inhabited planetary systems. But we've kind of shuffled around a bit. Tam lives with the Xandar adjacent archivists."
"And Ayshi's from the Asgard and Jothunheim archives, but lives with Earth" Tam replies.
"Wait, so how did my reel come from the Midgard archives?" Loki asks.
"Oh, the reels move when the people move," the farthest from him archivist answers, "So yours was delivered to us when you arrived on Earth."
Loki nods, "I see. It seems you're answering more questions of mine than I am of yours. But allow me one more- what are the rest of your names? Ayshi is on the floor. Tam is laying down, but what do the rest of you call yourselves?"
The archivist farthest away speaks first, "I'm Jemmi."
The one person who hasn't spoken speaks very softly, "I'm Iris. I picked it myself. It looks like it must be very beautiful in person."
And lastly, the person who delivered his supper answers, "And I'm Cyd. I watched the life of a dancer and that was her name. She was so graceful..."
"You named yourselves?"
"Yes. We were sent to work without names, only numbers, like the Minutemen. But we wanted names, like the agents have, so we gave them to ourselves and insisted on being called by them," Cyd answers.
"That didn't upset the Time Keepers?"
Tam shrugs, "We exits outside of the Sacred Timeline. What are they going to do about it? Prune us and have to make more archivists over something as silly as a name?"
"I see," Loki says. "And now do you have any other questions?"
"What's it like to be in love?" Iris asks quietly.
The question hangs in the air a moment before Loki answers, "None of you have been in love?"
"No," Iris replies, "But what about you."
"I don't know. Things were...complicated."
"So sometimes it hurts?" Iris asks.
"Yes. Sometimes it does. But other times...other times just seeing the other person brings an overwhelming sense of joy. Sometimes just being with them, even if all one is doing is little chores of daily life...those moments are pure contentment. Their presence can raise one's heartbeat to a quick flutter, and a kiss can bring around such an immense sense of want that touch and intimacy feel inevitable. Love is often linked to other ways of attraction."
Tam tilts their head, "I don't understand. What other sorts of attraction?"
Loki looks to each of his guests and all of them look somewhat confused, "You've never experienced a physical attraction to another person? One sexual in nature?"
Ayshi shakes their head, "No. We've watched it on the reels, and it looks like those people are quite enjoying themselves, but...why does it happen?"
It is at this moment that Loki realizes two things. The first is just how out of his depth he is at being an expert at being alive to the five people in his small room with him. The second is that these people, while likely so many millennia older than he is, are, in some ways, children in the ways of living. He tries to think of a way to explain the answer to the question at hand and finds himself at a loss for words.
"I...I can't explain it. It's something many people just feel. I've only felt it rarely, and only in the case of a few people to whom I've grown exceptionally close. But it's both in one's mind and in one's body. At it's most basic, sex is made for reproduction- for people to bear children. But it is also something much deeper at times, a connection to another person that can't be forged another way. To others, it's simply fun. Every person has their own ways of being in this regard, and often it is quite different."
"Huh," Cyd replies, "I don't think any of us have ever had that experience."
"Have you ever been attracted to another person in any sort of way?" he asks.
"We're all close and have deep friendships, but there's nothing physical about it beyond curling up together, whether during the day or in sleep. A few of us tried kissing after we saw it on a reel, but it really didn't feel like much. I mean, it happened, but...it was no different than any other closeness and it didn't really appeal to us."
"Is this simply how you were made? Do no archivists experience this?"
Tam shrugs, "I've never met one who did."
Jemmi nods in agreement, "Nor have I."
"But we don't procreate, either- we don't need to. So maybe that's why," Cyd adds.
"I don't think we have the right parts to," Iris says. "We've most of us seen one another undressed, but it doesn't match up to what it looks like on the reels. We only have one set of characteristics and none of us have the other kind."
Loki feels deeply uneasy about the idea that a group of archivists in another realm may have been watching his most intimate moments with brief affairs in his youth, analyzing them as though they were simply curiosities, watching bodies for study, stripping away the significance.
Iris notices the changes in his expression, "You're upset with something."
"Just...I didn't expect to find out that you could have been watching deeply private moments, ones I consider as close to anything sacred as I'll ever experience or hold with deep reverence," he answers.
"If it makes you feel any better," they answer, "We didn't watch yours."
"I'm not sure it does, but...thank you for telling me."
Jemmi hugs Cyd from behind and rests their chin on Cyd's shoulder, "So...can we ask another thing?"
"I'm not sure I'm ready for that."
Jemmi nods, "OK. But it's not a really personal one."
"Oh?"
"Can I ask?"
"Fine, go ahead."
Jemmi smiles, "Do you ever want to join us for music in the archives? We've got literally all the great performances of all time at our fingertips. We can't request any from the other archives- only the agents can request transfers that aren't related to movement along the timeline, but...Earth had some pretty incredible musical periods. I like the one they called Motown."
"My favourite's the one they call Broadway musicals," Cyd answers, "There are sooo many different kinds of songs in them!"
"I like the stuff they call pop- most of what I like is pretty shallow, but it's fun to dance to," Tam says.
"I like the impressive volume of orchestral music," Iris says, "Harpsichords are pretty. And I like sitars. And bagpipes. There are just so many deeply interesting instruments out there! I wish I could see them. Maybe even learn them. But they don't exist here."
Ayshi nods, "And I like things with drumming. Steel drums. Hand drums. Things from older cultures that were threatened and lost by others coming in and insisting their ways were right. Ways of music that didn't need complicated instruments, but those that were made by hands and treasured for generations of singers and tradition-keepers."
Jemmi leans a little on Cyd, causing them to sway, "So...do you want to come listen with us?"
Loki shakes his head, "I don't think I'm allowed."
Cyd laughs, "Allowed isn't the question. We're not allowed to be here, either, but here we are. The Time Keepers must not mind too much that we sneak around at night. I think they'd say something if they did. We'd smuggle you with us."
"You're part of this place. I'm not. And I'd like to not get dissolved or whatever it is those sticks do," he answers.
Ayshi stands and stretches, "Well...if you change your mind, we'll be around. I think Cyd's insisted on being the one who delivers you things, so long as they let them. Let them know. But now it's very late and I'm about to fall asleep on your floor." The others stand and head for the door, thanking him on their way.
Cyd is the last to exit; they turn back to Loki as he says good night and then replies with a message of their own, "Thanks for sacrificing some sleep for us. I hope they let you keep existing, even after whatever Mobius has planned for you. I like you and I'd like to keep learning about life from you." They turn and close the door quietly behind them.
Loki lays back in bed and turns the lights out, "Is this what parenting is like? Because I feel like these are the questions parents answer when their children are old enough to ask," he says to no one in particular.
As he falls off to sleep, he imagines. He imagines a late night dance in the archive, which he has never seen and tries to picture in his mind. He imagines teaching them his dances while they teach him others from around the universe. And once he is firmly in the land of dream, his mind wanders and lets him see a future where he is curled up with the archivists in a pod apartment high in the sky with an incredible view of the city below. They are simply talking to him, granting him the freedom to simply exist with them without question or interruption.
Just before he drops deeper into sleep, he rouses enough to understand just how wonderful this future could be.
That thought fades he falls asleep. The final thing he wonders is if there is any way he would be allowed this simple existence.