#4

"Yeah, right." Although her voice was still breathy from deep slumber, Valkyrie's mind managed to shake off sleep astonishingly quickly. "In case no one has ever told you, you are a miserable liar."

Thor looked into her deep brown eyes, allowing himself to be soothed by the care and affection reflected in them for the fraction of a moment. Her hand traveled across the blanket, landing on his forearm. "It's Loki, isn't it?"

The way Valkyrie had asked the question, her voice full of both pity and exasperation, somehow angered him and he jumped out of the bed as if the sheets had suddenly caught fire. "I said it was nothing!" Thor shouted and fled his room in the residential complex of the Avengers Facility in upstate New York. His feet almost tripped over themselves as he ran through the large corridor that opened into a giant lounge room with floor-to-ceiling windows and a French door, which he opened hastily, sucking in the cold night air. His heart was still thundering in his chest as he gazed upon the coal-black sky, seeking for answers that he would find within himself if only he dared to look for them.

Valkyrie sneaked up on him as silently and gracefully as a cat on the prowl but he could feel her presence anyway and felt his entire body tense up. Thor did not understand why he was reacting so strongly against her compassion. On some mornings, the painful realization that he had lost not only both of his parents but his best friends, his homeland and his brother was almost too much to bear and he would sink back into the pillows, paralyzed with the desire to go back to sleep and never wake to that reality again. Thor knew he should have been grateful that she was there but he was not. He turned around all the same.

"You remember that time on Sakaar," Valkyrie asked, a slick smile flickering across her features, "when you told me that I was a coward for trying to run away from my past? Well, you are as much of a coward now, aren't you?" She had the thin white bedspread wrapped around her bare shoulders, a decanter of Tony Stark's whiskey in her hand, and was looking at him in anticipation.

"I suppose I am," Thor mumbled, struggling against that stubborn part of himself that wanted to shut her out even though he could feel his love for her filling up his entire body, pleasantly warming him from the inside.

Valkyrie took a few slow steps towards him, gauging whether or not he would bolt again. When he didn't, she placed her free hand on his shoulders and pushed him gently into one of the rattan lounges on the porch. She plopped down next to him, placed her legs onto his lap and took a swig of whiskey. "I understand your torment perfectly," she said after a long pause, her hazel eyes searching for his in the darkness. "You have lost everything and it seems like there is no way that you could ever pass through this experience and still come out … whole somehow."

Thor snorted in response.

"Believe me, I have been there." She took another swig before she handed him the decanter.

He took it, twirling the liquid in it absentmindedly before he took a large gulp. Yes, Valkyrie had been there. She had once battled Hela and lost everyone and everything. Thor knew that her words were not just empty condolences but that she could truly empathize with his agony. "I am sorry," he told her. "I didn't mean to—"

"I know," Valkyrie cut him off and he was beyond grateful for her understanding. She took the decanter from him and helped herself to another swig. "But I would still appreciate it if you talked to me about it."

Thor remained silent, his eyes still searching the night sky for answers that were a long time in the coming. If it had just been his bereavement, he was sure he would have been able to live through the pain. Unfortunately, it was not just that. What was even worse was that he had also missed the opportunity to defeat Thanos in the final battle on Midgard by making a foolish mistake and the persistent feeling of guilt assailing him almost every minute of every day was more crushing than any loss could ever be. Blinded by rage and despair, he had neglected the chance to kill the titan by aiming for his chest instead of for his head, which had allowed Thanos to still use the weapon after Thor's attack and turn half of the population of the entire universe to dust. Thor had been told many times that this outcome was not his fault but if Odin had drilled one thing into him, it was that the Gods of Asgard were responsible for the preservation of peace within and the protection of the Nine Realms and he had been in derelict of this very duty because of his personal torment. Because of Loki. Because his incorrigible little brother had once again lost his mind. "It wouldn't change anything," Thor whispered.

"There is something in your eyes that is usually not there when you recall these events," Valkyrie observed, leaving him once again speechless at how sharp her mind was despite all the alcohol she was consuming. "You usually do not scream like that, either, which tells me you are not just devastated. You are angry."

Thor exhaled a deep breath.

"A very specific kind of angry. Come on," Valkyrie prompted him, her foot pricking into his stomach. "Loki might have been a backstabbing little shit but he was your brother and I respect that you loved him. Tell me what's on your mind."

Thor reached for the decanter and she handed it to him, visibly pleased by the half-smile he felt tugging at his lips in reaction to how well she was able to read him. "Sometimes I hate myself for loving him so much," Thor sighed and took another sip. "Despite everything."

"He was your brother. Of course you loved him."

Thor winced at the past tense but forced himself to continue. "What baffles me, now that I am thinking about it, is that I feel like he did on purpose sometimes. That he betrayed me just so I would get mad. Almost as if he wanted to provoke a reaction, almost as if he wanted me to hate him."

"Why would he have wanted you to hate him?" Valkyrie asked softly.

"Because I think he might have actually hated himself," Thor replied quietly, feeling as naked and vulnerable as he would have if he had revealed his own feelings to her.

Much to his dismay, a snort escaped her lips. "Loki? Hating himself?" Valkyrie asked, her expression twisted by disbelief and amusement. "I've never met anyone as full of themselves as your brother. The entire time he was on Sakaar—"

"He was only on Sakaar for a few weeks!" Thor yelled, his heart threatening to finally crush beneath the weight of yet another sensed betrayal. "Do not ever tell me that you respect my love for him again if you doubt, even for a second, how well I knew him."

Valkyrie did not flinch but instead, almost nonchalantly, said, "Toxic mess, as I said." She narrowed her eyes before her eyebrows jolted up as if to challenge him. "You need to get this all out. Loki is dead now and you are not doing yourself any favors if you keep pretending that he is not or that he was actually a saint who deserves your unconditional forgiveness because neither of that is true!"

The sound that came out of him was half-laugh, half-sob. "You don't understand."

The problem was that he did not yet entirely understand it either. For the longest time, Thor had believed that a mixture of spite, boredom and jealousy had been propelling Loki to act in such incredible ways over and over again; that he had this mischievous part inside himself that came from his true parentage and that he did not want to or was too weak to fight it. He had also believed that Loki was entirely content with it, probably even enjoying it. He had only very recently understood that this might not be the case. During the four years he had lived on Midgard before discovering that Loki was alive on Asgard, Thor had learned that it was mostly insanity and not evil that was driving people to do inexplicable things. By Midgardian standards, Loki was not evil but insane. They used this term in a way that Thor could not completely grasp but, as far as he understood, Midgardians believed that emotional distress could alter the brain somehow and cause a disruption of the personality that was beyond the affected person's control. It was like a sickness of the brain that might or might not be cured by specialists who Midgardians called psychologists. Those would probably refer to him as "mentally disturbed" or "emotionally disturbed" and even though these labels appeared to capture Loki's state of mind perfectly, they were still leaving a bitter taste on Thor's tongue. For someone who had lived most of his life as a god, considering himself above the petty troubles of the Midgardian population, this was difficult to understand and even more difficult to accept. Nevertheless, it was providing Thor with another excuse to believe in the possibility of Loki's redemption and if not that—because Loki was actually dead—it was at least providing him with a way to understand the reasons behind his brother's behavior that had bewildered him for so long.

"Then tell me," Valkyrie insisted.

"I tried to tell you a minute ago and you laughed in my face," Thor reminded her and took another sip of whiskey, staring into the night and childishly avoiding her gaze as punishment.

She mulled this over. "I am sorry," she said after a while, fabricating an expression just contrite enough for him to regret his earlier outburst. "It's just that the way I came to know him … Let's just say, I never would have guessed in a million years that he might have hated himself."

"He knows how to conceal it," Thor mumbled, more to himself than to her.

"But does that … change anything?" Valkyrie asked after a long pause.

"It does," Thor mumbled, surprising himself with the words that followed, "if he got himself killed because of it."

Valkyrie took the decanter from him, absentmindedly drinking. "Do you really think he did?" she asked, her words dissipating into the night. "Get himself killed?"

Thor tried to breathe around the pain constricting his chest. "I think so, yes," he whispered, closing his eyes against the devouring emotions. "I think he was very scared and troubled and just wanted it to be … over." The words had a finality that made his stomach lurch. He reached for the decanter and grabbed it as if it was the only thing anchoring him to reality.

Valkyrie's hand brushed his forehead before her fingers landed on his head, stroking through his hair in a circular motion. "I am sorry," she whispered softly, well aware that no words could ever be of help in a situation like this. Still, she kept talking. "Both for what I said and for what you are going through right now and I wish that I could somehow ease the pain, believe me, I would if I could but—"

"I heard him calling," Thor cut her off. He had not meant to tell her but the words just came out. "Loki called out for me."

"Calling how?" Valkyrie asked to his genuine surprise. He would have expected her to insist that his grief was slowly maddening him, to tell him that he needed to come to terms with Loki's death and that it was probably for the better that he was no longer with them.

"What do you mean how?" Thor asked back, feeling her intent gaze upon his skin. He tried to backpedal immediately. "It was probably nothing more than a dream but …" His voice caught. What in the allfather's name had he been thinking telling her about this in the first place?

"What did he say?" Valkyrie prompted him.

"Help me, brother," Thor muttered, feeling foolish as soon as the words had escaped his lips. Valkyrie was frowning at him but he could still sense that she was taking him seriously. He raised an eyebrow at her. "Funny how you would believe in an instant that Loki is calling out to me from the afterlife after you could not wrap your head around the idea that how he acted on Sakaar was just one humongous show designed to fool you and everyone else into believing he was actually in control of what he was doing."

This finally made her laugh genuinely. "I am sorry, Thor, but I guess you cannot really blame me for being fooled by his performance. He was a great deceiver."

In spite of her continuous use of the past tense, Thor felt the smile on his lips. "I guess not. He had me fooled for many, many years. Our parents, too, I think. Even I believed until very recently that the narcissistic grin he flashes at you is his way of telling you he thinks you are beneath him but it is not. It is a mask. I saw the real Loki for the first time shortly before he died and the real Loki is … was … hagridden by something very dark."

"By what?" Valkyrie asked when he did not continue.

Thor took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "I don't know exactly but Thanos does. I know he does. They had some sort of connection that was almost tangible. I think they might have communicated with each other beyond the words that were spoken."

"How would that be even possible?"

"Through the power stone maybe," Thor mumbled. He closed his eyes against the recollection of feeling entirely powerless when Thanos had grabbed his head with the Infinity Gauntlet, discharging the destructive energy of the infinity gem against him and making him feel a surge of pain so intense that he had understood for the first time what the hitherto abstract concept of fainting actually entailed. He told Valkyrie about this, confiding everything to her, and then moved on to how Loki had previously been under Thanos' orders when he had attacked New York City a couple of years ago. How his brother's memories had been twisted by the mind stone that had been in the titan's possession prior to Loki's arrival on Midgard, where Loki himself had used it to brainwash a number of people whose services he needed for the execution of a plan that was born out of vindictive madness.

Valkyrie's lips had parted in amazement and revolt.

Thor's palms had become sweaty holding the decanter. He took another sip of the burning liquid before he continued. "He was not himself during all of this. He spoke of things that never happened and accused me of things I never did. Back then, I was convinced that he had actually gone mad but—" Thor helped himself to a slug of whiskey before he told her about the day he and his brother had been holding on to the collapsing Bifrost. "He let go of my hand and plummeted into space." He took a deep breath to steady himself. "But he did not die. Thanos found him somehow and I believe that he used the power stone to seize control of him. He only used it against me for a few minutes and I—" His voice was beginning to tremble and he took another slug, emptying the decanter. "Whoever wields the power stone can manipulate organic matter of every form and if Thanos was in possession of the power stone back then, he might have used it on Loki, too. Same with the mind stone. I believe Thanos manipulated the energetic manifestations of his thoughts, altered existing memories and fabricated new ones that led him to go out of his mind."

Valkyrie stared at him in consternation.

"He might have even created a connection to Loki's mind that never really broke off," Thor pondered aloud. "I mean, it did break off at some point but he was safe on Asgard. The minute Asgard was lost and Loki came face to face with him again on our ship …" His voice trailed off.

"Are you sure this is possible?" Valkyrie asked carefully after she had digested at least part of all the information he had just unloaded onto her. "That you are not just making up excuses for him?"

"I have never seen him this terrified," Thor persisted. "He was rigid with fear. If you had seen him … He was not himself. This version of Loki was not my brother. Something else was in control of him and I think it was Thanos."

Valkyrie asked the obvious question next, her mind connecting the dots as quickly as ever. "Do you think Thanos used the power stone to kill him?"

"That is what I think, yes," Thor replied quietly, his eyes glued to the empty decanter in his hands.

"Would that influence where Loki went after death?" Valkyrie went on, firing questions at him in rapid succession. "You don't think there could be some kind an afterlife dimension connected to the Infinity Stones? Is that even possible? That they play by their own rules?"

"I have no idea," Thor conceded. "All I know is that if Thanos is connected to Loki …"

"Loki might still be connected to him," Valkyrie finished his thought for him and then paused, if only for decency's sake. "Particularly if he was killed by the stone. And that means he could lead us to him if he was still here."

Thor nodded his approval and gently pushed her legs aside. "I need to speak to Tony."

Notes:

- I know that Valkyrie isn't actually her name, yes, but I like the name a lot, so I decided to stick with it.