Chapter 4 - Latverian Women Don't Wear Pants

Loki had always enjoyed nature—some of her fondest memories were of spending her time alone in her mother's garden, or alone in the Asgardian woods, or lost in the wilderness of another realm entirely—but there was such a thing as too much of it. Had she not tripped over one of the exposed roots of the sprawling beech tree she now sat under, she might have found its canopy of yellow leaves gorgeous. She decided to take the opportunity to try to find the pebble that had taken up residence in her sneaker.

"Sister, you certainly do seem clumsier now that you are mortal. Do you wish for me to—"

Loki cut him off. "You are not carrying me. I am perfectly capable of walking on my own, even if I trip a couple of times." Thor had already asked once before if she wanted him to carry her on his shoulders, and if he asked a third time, she feared she might take him up on it. She turned her shoe upside down and shook it. A pebble much smaller than she would have estimated tumbled out onto the ground.

Not more than ten minutes after they started moving again, Natasha stopped. "Alright, let's take a break before someone collapses," she announced. Loki almost snapped that she wasn't about to collapse but stopped herself when she realized that Natasha hadn't been talking about her. "This is why you ought to train with the rest of us," Natasha told him when Bruce finally caught up with the rest of them. "I think you might actually be in worse shape than you were before you started living in the tower."

Breathing heavily, Bruce practically collapsed onto the fallen log at the edge of the clearing they'd come out into. "Yeah, I think you're right. Usually on missions, I'm either sitting in the Quinjet, or the other guy's taken over—sorry, guys."

Mjolnir had changed herself into a walking stick when they had entered the mountains, and Thor laid her gently to the side as he sat down beside Bruce on the log. "Father always told us that one should be prepared for battle, even in times of peace."

Loki took the large rock across from them. "Who cares what that old windbag said."

"Sister, you have to admit that some of the things Father said were wise, even if—"

"I don't want to hear it, Thor. Odin could be the wisest man in the universe, and he would still be a narcissistic, abusive liar."

"Father may be many things, but I do not recall him being abusive. He never raised a hand to either of us."

"Verbal and emotional abuse is still abuse, and so is neglect. Also, he did routinely allow other people to brutalize me, so there's that."

"What do you mean, he 'routinely allowed others to brutalize you?'"

"He let Sif knock half my baby teeth out."

"I'm sure it wasn't half of them. You're exaggerating."

"He let you electrocute me several hundred times."

"Most of those times were accidents, Loki. I had poor control over my powers when I was young."

"As you say, most times were accidents, but not all."

"And as I recall, you used to stab me quite a bit."

"Yes, and Odin allowed that as well."

Thor became quiet as he seemed to contemplate Loki's words. "Perhaps you are right, but that's just how things are in Asgard. We are a warrior culture, and such play-fighting as children is meant to make us better warriors."

"Stabbing and electrocuting one another isn't play, Thor, and you know it. You're just making excuses for him. As for any claims that 'that is just how things are' in Asgard, I would like to point out that your Father is King of Asgard, and that what he does, or allows his children to do, sets the tone for the rest."

"I hadn't quite thought of it that way," Thor admitted.

Natasha opened her bag and tossed them each a bottle of water and a granola bar. Half her bag seemed to be stuffed with supplies, which made Loki wonder again where her dress was.

✿ 彡lミ ✿ εїз 彡lミ

The sun had just come up over the tops of the mountains when they came to the edge of a village. They had all gotten a modicum of sleep when they had stopped in that clearing, except for Thor. As an immortal, he didn't need as much sleep as the rest of them, so he had insisted upon keeping watch over their camp alone. In fact, the trek through the mountains hadn't seemed to have much of an effect on him at all, and he seemed in much better spirits than the rest of them.

Loki found this highly irritating.

Mother had told them that Latveria reminded her of Asgard, and the village did remind Loki quite a bit of an Asgardian village. The architecture looked to be what mortals would have considered "medieval," with cobblestone streets, and wooden buildings, many of them with thatched roofs. There weren't any modern Midgardian vehicles. Instead, wooden carts were pulled by horses large enough to be the one Loki was rumored to have had an affair with. Loki pointed to one, and Natasha explained that it was a "Clydesdale." When Loki had expressed surprise that she knew anything about horses, she had shrugged and explained that she had only recognized the breed because of commercials for a particular brand of American beer.

The villagers seemed to be busy preparing for some sort of festival, and every one of their buildings had been decked out in green pennants and what Loki assumed was the Latverian flag. It looked a lot like the flags of other Midgardian countries, with its black cross in front of a green background. The insignia in the middle of the cross was likely Doom's own.

"Does it seem like people are staring at us?" asked Thor, as he twirled Mjolnir the walking stick around in his hand like a baton. "Not that I haven't gotten used to being stared at in Midgardian public spaces. I suppose you Midgardians are not used to having a god walk among you."

Loki rolled her eyes. "People are usually staring at you because you've committed some sort of faux pas, be it social or fashion. I keep telling you, you can't drink out of public fountains,and you shouldn't wear neon orange after Labor Day. Or any time, really."

Thor was right, though. As busy as they were, everyone they passed had time to drop what they were doing and stare at them as if they could tell that they were aliens from outer space. Natasha swore under her breath. "It isn't Thor they're staring at. You and I should have changed before we entered the village. Look, there's an empty barn. Let's duck in there and change now."

Loki scrunched her nose up. "You want me to put my ball gown on now? In a barn?"

"Look around you, Loki. Latverian women don't wear jeans. We're standing out too much, and if we keep standing out, we're probably going to get arrested."

"Norns, it really is like Asgard." Here he had thought that Frigga had been excited to have an opportunity to start over, and she'd managed to find the closest thing to her old life that she could.

Loki didn't want to change her clothes in a barn, but she didn't intend to disobey an order from their glorious leader right off the bat. The time to disobey orders would be later, when she could more believably claim to have forgotten the discussion she and Bruce had had on the plane. That didn't mean she wasn't going to complain a little. "Natasha, I thought you said this barn was empty. There is a cow in here."

"So? It's a cow, Loki."

"It's staring at me."

"I'm sure that's because it's wondering what you look like in your underwear."

"It might be. Who are you to know the thoughts of cows?"

"Just change clothes so we can get out of here. It smells like a barn in here."

"That is possibly because it is a barn. Why do you have Bruce's suit bag, by the way?"

"Because my dress is in it."

Loki peered into the bag as Natasha opened it, and noticed that in addition to Natasha's dress, there were two suits in the bag. "Is the other suit Thor's?"

Natasha nodded as she pulled out the dress, which was silver, had long sleeves, and a slit up the thigh.

Natasha and Thor had both taken turns carrying the suit bag that Bruce had been carrying initially, but she'd assumed they'd just been helping him out. It would have been a violation of the supposed "you brought it, you carry it" rule, but Loki had learned long ago that most "rules" didn't apply to anyone but her. "If everyone else put their clothes in one bag, why did I have to carry my own?"

"Because you chose a dress made from enough cloth to make a parachute? It wouldn't have fit in the bag with everyone else's. Just change Loki, there's no use worrying about it now."

Loki supposed it was true that it wouldn't have fit, but the thought that the others had coordinated with one another and left her out of it still put her in an irritable mood. Instead of putting her dress on, she turned herself into a cow. As far as she was concerned, this still counted as following orders; Natasha had said to change, she didn't say what to change into. How now, Brown Cow, Loki said to the other cow.

How now, Black Cow, said the other cow, in the traditional greeting between cows.

How goes it with you, Brown Cow? What news?

Tis the wedding of our Lord Doom on the morrow.

And what know you of his bride to be?

She is the Goddess Frigga, a fit bride for our Lord Doom. I hope I shall be chosen to make the milk to feed their babies.

Don't count on it, Brown Cow.

"Damn it, Loki." Natasha had come out from around the post she'd gone behind to don her own dress, and it had only taken her a couple of seconds to register that there were now two cows in the barn, and no Lady Loki. "This is not the time to turn yourself into a cow. You'd better turn yourself back right now, unless you want me to ride you the rest of the way to Doom's castle."

┗(›´ω`‹ )┛

"Yes, we look much less conspicuous this way." Thor had gotten better at getting sarcasm across, even though he was speaking Allspeak. "There is nothing conspicuous at all about a couple of men walking along a woman wearing a ball gown, riding a cow."

"Loki refused to turn back, so I didn't have a choice," Natasha told him. "By the way, can she understand us when she's a cow?"

"I am quite certain she can."

"In that case—Loki, you are a very naughty cow, and when you turn back, we are going to have a serious conversation about your behavior."

Thor started laughing first, and Bruce couldn't help joining him, although he'd tried to keep it to a few stifled snorts. He knew it shouldn't have been funny—they'd been in Latveria for ten minutes, and Loki had already found a way to make things more difficult for them—but there was just something so bizarre about the situation.

"It isn't funny," Natasha told them, which only made it more difficult not to laugh.

Both he and Thor stopped laughing, though, when they almost ran straight into a couple of what appeared to be Victor Von Doom clones on the road in front of them, and a moment later more appeared to their side. Bruce glanced backwards, and sure enough, more had approached them from behind, pinning them in. He let out an audible sigh. "Those are Doombots, aren't they?"

"Stop where you are," said one of the Doombots. "The two of you, as well as your cow and your woman are under arrest in the name of Lord Doom."

"We've been invited to Doom's wedding," Bruce told it. "We've got the invitation around here somewhere." He searched through his pockets; luckily, Loki had given the invitation to him for safekeeping. He pulled out the invitation and handed it to the Doombot.

The Doombot scanned the invitation, then asked, "Which one of you is Loki Friggasdottir?"

Bruce, Thor, and Natasha exchanged glances. Then with a sheepish grin, Thor pointed to Cow Loki, who mooed and swished her tail as if she were proud of herself. The Doombot nodded as if it made perfect sense that Victor Von Doom had invited a cow to his wedding, and soon they were being herded in the direction of the castle. It felt almost like a parade. Everywhere they went, people lined the streets to see the strange foreigners and their black, oddly green-eyed cow being escorted to Castle Doom by Doom's sentries.

When they reached the castle, the Doombots ushered them inside, into a huge foyer where a grand staircase led up to the second floor. Green and silver tapestries covered the walls, and light green foliage entwined with yellow flowers, covering the banister of the staircase. At the top of the stairs, another Doombot appeared—no, it must have been Victor Von Doom himself, because on his arm was Frigga, beaming happily at them. She wore a golden gown with a long train, with her hair curled and piled on top of her head.

She let go of Doom's arm and ran down the stairs to them. "Oh my, you've all come. I wasn't certain you'd make it. Loki did not send an RSVP."

Doom cleared his throat loudly as he loomed over them from the top of the stairs. "I thought we were only inviting your daughter. The rest should not be here. And why is your daughter in the form of a cow?"

"I told you that Loki is a shapeshifter, Victor."

Victor Von Doom shook his head. "This is not acceptable, Frigga. Doom will not have a cow at his wedding, nor as his stepdaughter."

"I'm sure she'll change back before the wedding, mon chou."

Thor's eyebrows knitted together. "He is your cabbage?"

"I was speaking French, darling. It is the Midgardian language of love."

"Still, your cabbage?"

Doom cleared his throat again. "She will turn back now, or she will sleep in the stables tonight."

Loki swished her tail and mooed loudly, as if to let them all know she didn't care if she slept in the stables.

Frigga patted Loki's neck. "Darling, I do not know why you have chosen to be a cow right now, but could you please turn back for Mother?"

Loki mooed again, but a moment later she had turned back into a girl. It happened more or less instantaneously, and Natasha, who had still been sitting astride her, somehow managed to do a half twist in the air and land in a crouch instead of falling onto her back.

"That's a good girl," Frigga said, patting her cheek and smiling at her. Loki wasn't smiling back, though.

Doom seemed even less happy now, though it would have been difficult for Bruce to say how he could tell with the mask. The man did have extremely expressive eyes, he supposed. "What is your daughter wearing, Frigga? I will not allow her to wear blue jeans while she is here. Blue jeans on a woman are a symbol of the vulgar American capitalist agenda."

Loki's frown turned into a sneer. "I'll wear whatever I like, you metal-faced megalomaniac."

"No one speaks to Lord Doom this way!" There had been a dangerous edge to Doom's voice that time, and Bruce felt the other guy's desire to jump to Loki's defense as a crawling, itching sensation just below his skin.

It's alright, nothing bad has happened yet, he tried to assure him.

Doom puffed out his chest and stabbed his finger in Loki's direction. "Young lady, you will change into more appropriate clothing immediately, or there will be consequences. Doom does not tolerate dissent from his subjects, and he will not tolerate it from rebellious stepdaughters."

Luckily, Frigga put herself between Doom and Loki before Bruce had to. "Victor dear, please let me handle this. I'm certain Loki is just tired from her journey here. She always gets a little cranky when she's tired."

"Very well," said Doom, deflating somewhat. "But I expect her to be dressed appropriately for dinner."

Frigga nodded. "Just give me a chance to explain your rules to her, Victor."

Doom nodded regally, and Bruce must have blinked, because in one moment to the next, he seemed to have disappeared.

"Mother, you can't be serious about marrying him!" Loki shouted as soon as he had gone.

"Loki, lower your voice and calm down please. Use your inside voice."

"I will not lower my voice! This is insane. The man is a narcissist, a misogynist, and a bully—he's just like Odin."

"He isn't any of those things, and he is nothing like Odin," Frigga argued. "You don't even know him, Loki. You haven't given him a chance."

"I don't want to give him a chance!" Loki stamped her foot, then turned to her brother. "Will you please try to talk some sense into her? Obviously, my voice isn't even registering here."

Frigga also turned to Thor expectantly, and Thor's attention shifted wearily between his sister and mother. "Mother, does this man truly make you happy?"

"Oh darling, yes. He treats me the way that your father used to, when we were first married."

"And that turned out so well," Loki groused.

"Frigga, you do realize that Victor Von Doom is an enemy to most Western governments, including the government of the United States?" asked Natasha. "He's considered to be a dictator."

"I know what they say about him, but he is simply misunderstood. Lord Doom is a monarch, not a dictator."

Loki rolled her eyes. "That, Mother, is bilgesnipe droppings."

"Language, Loki. While you are here, I expect you to act like the young lady you were raised to be. I know I taught you better manners than you have so far displayed. You have been very rude to Victor, and when you see him later, I would appreciate it if you would apologize."

"Absolutely not, Mother. I refuse to apologize to that man, nor will I ever call him Father."

"No one has asked you to call him that, Loki. All I am asking is for you to be civil. And while you are in his kingdom, you must follow his rules. Can you at least do that much for me?"

Bruce thought that Loki might fly into a rage, but then she looked at her mother, and then at her own feet, and then at her mother again. "And what are these rules I am supposed to follow?"

"You are to speak respectfully to Victor, and to conduct yourself as a proper young lady while you are here. That means you will respect your host's culture by dressing like a young Latverian lady. I trust you brought dresses with sleeves that cover you to your wrists and skirts that cover you to your ankles?"

"Yes Mother. I have a dress in my—Natasha, did you get my suit bag, or is it back in that barn?"

Natasha rolled her eyes. "I've got it, Loki."

"In that case, I have a dress."

"You only brought one?"

"Yes, Mother. We were forced to traipse through the mountains in order to get here, and I still don't have access to my dimensional storage, so—"

"Why did you not call me? I would have opened a portal for you."

"We tried to call! You weren't answering your phone."

"I don't believe I got a call from you, Loki. In fact, I don't think I've gotten any calls at all for a while—do you suppose my phone might be broken?"

"You probably don't get very good cell service out here," Natasha told her. "I've been getting pretty spotty service ever since we landed in Sokovia."

"Oh well, no matter. I'll just have to—"

Loki cut her off. "No, Mother, please. I'll just wear the dress I brought."

"Nonsense, Loki, you can't wear the same dress to dinner that you're going to wear to the wedding." Frigga raised her hand, and a green light covered Loki. When it faded, she wore a forest green velvet dress with a high collar. It looked almost Victorian and had silver buttons at the neck and cuffs of the sleeve. Frigga stepped back to admire her work. "Yes, that should be very pleasing to Victor, for you to wear his color."

"Green is my color," Loki sulked.

"And it is also Victor's," said Frigga. "See, you have something in common already."

(* •́ ヮ •̀ )⊃ ﾟ. * ･ ｡ﾟ \( ͒˃⌂˂ ͒)/

After Frigga used her magic to dress Loki, she did the same for the rest of them, though for Natasha, all she did was change the color of her dress to the same green she had dressed everyone else in. Mjolnir had turned herself into a fancier kind of walking stick, which Natasha teased Thor about, calling it a "pimp cane." Frigga had then showed them to a couple of guest rooms, one for Loki and Natasha, and the other for Thor and Bruce.

Loki flopped onto the bed, burying her face in the dark green coverlet. "Well, are you going to scold me too, now, for how I acted earlier? You said I was a naughty cow, and that we'd be having a serious discussion about my behavior."

Loki felt the bed dip as Natasha sat beside her. "You were a naughty cow. But I'm not going to kick you when you're down, Loki. I know today has been pretty rough."

Loki started to tear up, despite her best efforts not to. "Why can't Mother see that he's every bit as horrible as Odin?" she asked Natasha.

Natasha sighed as she rubbed the area between Loki's shoulder blades for her. "I don't know, Loki. Why did the people I thought of as my parents just hand my younger sister and I over to the Red Room?" She didn't wait for a response from Loki before answering herself. "Because people, even people we love, do horrible, disappointing things sometimes."

"What do you think I should do, Natasha? I don't want to apologize to that man."

"Then don't."

"And I don't want Frigga to marry him," Loki added.

"That you probably can't stop. Frigga is an adult; you can't stop her from making her own decisions even if you think they're horrible. Obviously, she isn't being coerced into this like we thought."

"I'm not going to call him Father."

"No one asked you to; not even Frigga. But Loki, please don't try to pick a fight with him. Victor Von Doom is dangerous. He might actually be a sociopath, and he might really try to hurt you if you cross him. So let's be smart about this. While we're here, we play Victor's game. We dress up like proper young Latverian ladies and say 'please' and 'thank you' and mind our p's and q's. We attend the wedding tomorrow, which we will in no way try to obstruct. Then we get the hell out of here and go back to New York. Sound good?"

Loki nodded, even though she had already begun running through possible scenarios to put a stop to her Mother's wedding.

Frigga ❤ ( (*◣m◢) \

"What are the others doing here?" Victor asked Frigga again. "You said you were only inviting your daughter. You didn't say anything about three Avengers. The Avengers are yet another symbol of the vulgar American capitalist agenda."

"I know they make you uncomfortable, Victor, but one of them is my son. He assumed his invitation to have been lost. Do you want to be the one to inform him that we thought it best not to invite him?"

"No dearest," Victor sulked. "I suppose that now he is here, we cannot send him away. But what of the others?"

"Their plus-ones, I suppose."

"You allow your daughter to date a man who turns into a beast?"

"I do not think they are actually dating, mon chou. In fact, I am fairly certain that Doctor Banner is involved with Loki's psychiatrist. I've told you about Doctor Samson, have I not?"

"I thought that Doctor Samson was a man."

"He is."

"Ah, I see."

"Victor," Frigga said reproachfully.

"I know, my love. Lord Doom is evolving on this issue."

"Truly, I did not think Loki would come on her own. I thought I would have to drag her through a portal to get her here. I have been sending her letters, trying to get her to visit for weeks."

"Your daughter does not seem to like me much," said Victor, his eyes darkening. "It is those Avengers that have poisoned her mind against me, and filled her head with their vulgar American capitalist agenda—"

"Always with the 'vulgar American capitalist agenda;' really Victor." Frigga shook her head. "I imagine she does not like you at the moment because you threatened to make her sleep in the stables, and because you threw a fit over her clothes."

"What she had on was completely inappropriate."

"You still did not have to demand that she change. You could have asked her nicely." Frigga reached for Victor's hand. "Victor, darling, I've told you that Loki has some issues with authority because of the way my ex-husband treated her. For now, she believes you to be no better than Odin. You are going to have to win her over."

"And how do I do that, my little turnip?"

"Perhaps you simply need to spend some time together. After dinner, why don't you show her some of the experiments you've been working on?"

Victor nodded decisively. "Yes, we shall try this. Later this evening, Victor Von Doom will attempt to bond with his stepdaughter to-be."

...φ(ｰ￣*)

Author's Note:

I've taken some liberties with the character of Victor Von Doom here, since he hasn't appeared in the MCU yet. I guess what I was going for was "over-the-top cartoon super villain." I'm not sure Doom has ever referred to himself in the third person quite so much as my Doom, but feel free to picture him flexing his arms in a low budget 1960's animation "super villain" pose every time he does it. I do.