It is bizzare to imagine nothingness. The brains of anyone within the Nine Realms function on the basis of materialising the already known concepts, even when coming up with something new.
And so even when one tries to think of nothingness, he gives it some shape. It may be imagined as whiteness, as vacuum or as the air made up from oxygen, carbon dioxide and other gases…the possibilities are endless.
Yet nothingness is just nothing.
Only that in this concrete case, the nothingness was accompanied by complete, black darkness.
People of Asgard used to say that the black colour does not truly exist. Every shade of black that could be produced or grew somewhere on their planet was some approximation of the idea of black they had inside their minds.
That's because they have never been in the Void.
In the Void, the nothingness was just nothing.
The black was just black.
Yet they could see Loki clearly.
Was it the memory aspect?
They didn't know.
They didn't care.
They were swallowed in the emotions and thoughts that Thor, to his horror, recognised to be his brother's.
…
The utter panic.
What is happening?
Loki fully expected to die when he let go of the Gungnir. Yet he found himself being surrounded by complete darkness while his brain was still fully functioning.
Was this Hell?
It definitely wasn't Valhalla.
Yet instinctively, Loki knew that he has moved on to neither Valhalla, nor Hell. Since he let go and Thor's panicked face disappeared from his vision, all he could see was the never-ending darkness. It was even more scary considering that Loki had no idea where up or down was. He found himself being absorbed in something he couldn't name. The lack of knowledge was an agony for the God of Mischief. Loki has always praised himself for being knowledgeable and witty. Now all his priced senses were rendered useless. There was no one he could talk to so that he could get himself from this situation.
The only so-called relief for the haunted god was that he was so swallowed by the nothingness and the feeling of physical panic that he did not really think about what had happened on Asgard. Loki was falling. Probably. In fact, it was difficult to tell as there was no wind or air to assess the situation. Anyway, the distress of his body floating in the daunting space didn't leave much place for the raven-god to think about what had happened. Only rarely has a thought hit Loki's mind like a ray of lightning.
Odin's disapproval face as he told Loki the no.
The no that symbolised much more.
Odin's face which didn't betray any emotions when everything finally began to make sense to Loki. The most terrible kind of sense.
It all makes sense now.
Odin has always favoured Thor.
Loki spent hours all alone, contemplating what he could do to make his father happy.
Why couldn't his father love him as he loved his brother?
Loki understood why the rest of Asgard preferred Thor over him; the Wielder of Mjolnir embodied everything that was treasured in Asgard. Power, the raw physical power and courage. Loki embodied qualities that Frigga kept persuading him were much more important. Intelligence, strategical thinking and perceptiveness. Yet no one cared about those. No one would compliment Loki's abilities the way they praised Thor's. No one would look at Loki's genius brain and be astonished by the way it functioned in the most unusual of ways similarly to how they stared at Thor's biceps.
Men would ask Thor how he did it. Women would giggle and ask to touch them.
The darkness again.
Loki welcomed it.
For a second.
Then he hated it.
Wished for the agonising thoughts to come back.
To keep his mind occupied.
He couldn't go like this anymore.
Why couldn't he simply die?
Mortals would be definitely dead by now.
Why is it so difficult to kill an Asgardian?
Wrong.
Why is it so difficult to kill a Frost Giant?
Maybe monsters don't deserve to die.
Why is the darkness so overwhelming?
Why…
Out of blue, Loki's vision was blinded by an invasion of light. He closed his eyes in a desperate attempt to block the piercing lightness out and so he couldn't notice the planet he landed on.
Loki saw the fateful planet for the first time now with the Avengers.
It was a hostile, inhospitable environment. The skies were dark grey, and no one could tell for sure where they ended and the Void began. The surface was barren and empty or covered in little, brick houses. All of them looked alike. They were big enough to host only one small room, and their windows embodied only tiny, dark holes. Above them, there was standing a castle.
Had one been colour blind, he could say that the palace was a true copy of Odin's palace on Asgard. It was huge and majestic, sending a clear message to the subjects that their master is not to be meddled with. There were warrior statues everywhere depicting the glorious victories that the master of the palace and the planet had achieved.
Only the palace was not shiny and gold as the one on Asgard.
This one was the mixture of unkind grey and radiating red.
Tapestries were hanging from the huge windows. Each of the windows looked like a little Void. The tapestries, as Thor noticed to his disgust, portrayed victories similar to the ones that were hidden in the throne room on Asgard; those that he was oblivious to until they were exposed by Hela.
Where Hela had an army of dead soldiers, the master of the palace had disgusting, scaly creatures that all the Avengers recognised as the Chitauri. Where Hela had Fenrir, he had a massive, metal looking monster. Where there was Hela riding her werewolf, there was a green woman walking beside him.
Where there was Odin, the conqueror of the world, the mastermind behind the operation, there was him. The master.
He was bigger than the rest of them. His features were cuboid-like. He would look like a robot, but no robot could give such menacing, revolting expression. He was wearing golden armour as the one Odin used to wear. But no cape. His skin was somewhere between dark blue and dark pink, creating a monster gruesome to look at. He was standing above them, the natural leader that would not be questioned.
"Thanos." Fury whispered, observing the tapestries as the rest of them.
Loki didn't see the tapestries. Nor the palace. Nor the pathetic little town underneath it. He wasn't even sure how it was possible that they were able to witness the planet he landed on now; maybe it was because later on, he would have the pleasure of discovering the cesspit of the universe. He wasn't sure. He just trusted his magic hoping that this dive would be over soon.
Suddenly, the attention of the Avengers was turned back to the falling figure of Loki and once again, the group found itself being swallowed in the emotions of the broken god.
None of them was ready for the collision.
The falling Loki never opened his eyes. He had no idea what was coming.
All he knew was that out of nothing, the black disappeared and was replaced by a light so bright that his eyes, too used to the darkness now, were unable to process it.
And so he didn't see the ground that was approaching too fast.
The pain of the collision was unbearable. Loki screamed and for the first time in infinity he was able to hear his own, hoarse, desperate voice.
Loki screamed his lungs out.
In hindsight, he wished he wouldn't.
His screams have attracted the attention of the Chitauri.
Loki was lying on the dirty ground.
The Chitauri were crawling out of their brick houses, ready to devour the victim that has so ungracefully landed on their territory.
Loki didn't know.
All he could feel, hear, see, smell or touch was pain, his own screams, the darkness of his tightly closed eyes, his blood and the coarse ground covered by his blood.
For some time, everything was a blur of pain.
Then, unfortunately, Loki's mind began to kick in and he was slowly beginning to be aware of his injured state.
He also understood that he was no longer falling.
He should open his eyes.
He did so.
At first, he was blinded by the light despite its dimness. When his sight adjusted to the new reality, Loki understood to be lying on the ground of some unknown entity. There was nothing around him, just a plain surface looking like the Midgardian Moon. The skies above him were grey.
The planet he found himself on looked as if someone has sucked the life out of it.
Loki was in agony. He must have broken each of his bones when his body collided with the hard ground. His chest was in immense pain and even the slightest movement of his tiny fingers shot pain through his body. He was weakly aware that he was lying in the puddle of his own blood.
The God of Mischief didn't have enough strength to form a coherent plan or assertion of the situation, but his magic began the healing process on its own. Loki knew that it would take a long time until he could stand up, but he was grateful for his body being able to endure so much and heal itself. He just wished he could be unconscious.
Loki fully intended not to move or do anything up to the moment he was healed. Then, he had no idea.
He did let go in order not to feel anything anymore.
What was he supposed to do now?
Could Heimdall see him?
In the end, he must be in some unknown part of the universe in the Void.
All Loki could remember about the Void was Frigga's patient voice explaining his curious little self that the Void was just the Void.
I swear there is nothing in there, love. Just darkness.
What would Frigga think about him now?
The expression of his mother's face when Thor burst into the chamber appeared in front of Loki's eyes.
Why don't you tell her?
How you sent the Destroyer to kill our friends, to kill me?
Your friends, Thor.
I don't have friends.
I never did.
And your friends betrayed me at the nearest opportunity.
I haven't asked to be the king. They showed Gungnir into my hands. Frigga said that I should make our father proud.
Your friends betrayed me. They might have been in the right to do so, had they been able to see into my mind. Yet they hadn't. And they betrayed me nevertheless, expecting my intentions to be rotten.
Loki's train of thoughts was distracted by a sound reminding of cracking seashells.
He tried to turn his head to follow the direction of the sound, but he was too injured and exhausted to do so.
And so he just waited, terrified of what may be coming.
What kind of creatures would choose the Void as their home?
Look at Jotunheim.
The ugly, empty, cultureless planet was home to the Frost Giants, the race of monsters to be slain.
Loki didn't want to even imagine what creatures could occupy this planet, a place that made Jotunheim look like a paradise.
He was almost relieved when a group of individuals appeared in front of him. The ignorance was killing him.
Soon, he would understand that it was a blissful ignorance.
When Loki's pupils, surrounded by the beautiful emerald iris, finally focused on the sight in front of him, his heart began beating rapidly fast.
The creatures seemed hideous and there was an uncountable number of them. They encircled Loki's lying body from all sides. They weren't carrying any weapons, but Loki was sure they weren't in any need of them.
They stood for dark, uneven, humanoid creatures unlike any Loki has ever seen. They seemed to be in symbiosis with the environment around them. It was impossible to tell whether they sucked the life out of the planet, or if the planet sucked the life out of them.
In any way, it was more than obvious that to these creatures, the ideas such as compassion, empathy or love were completely foreign. All they knew was the hardships of the hostile place, the infliction of pain and service to a creature even more odious than they were.
"Who are you?" One of them spoke, clearly addressing Loki.
Loki focused all his energy upon getting at least something out of himself, his chest burning in process.
"Hurts." The Trickster hissed.
The one Loki would soon recognise to be The Other, moved the corners of his mouth up in a caricature of a smile that would make anyone's joy flee.
"You will long for something as sweet as pain. You can take him." The Other commanded and made a step back.
Loki sensed the excitement amongst the creatures he would later call the Chitauri. He panicked as they crawled closer to him, ready to tear him apart.
"Stop." A deep, mechanic voice cut through the crowd.
Immediately, the Other and all the Chitauri fell on their knees, their heads lowered subserviently.
Loki breathed out.
He thought that the voice must belong to some kind of saviour of his.
Little did he know that it was the voice of what was to become his worst nightmare.
…
"I want to get out of here." Steve gasped as he observed the Chitauri standing around Loki's bloody body. The soldier's gentle heart couldn't stand the picture of pure suffering that was to surely become much worse at the hands of the one living in the sinister palace.
Yet no one heard him.
Steve, as the rest of the team including Loki and Fury, had no choice but to keep witnessing the events that Odin has never bothered to ask about.