Sorry it took so long for this update. I've been a little busy bee! Enjoy this new chapter, and don't forget to fav/review/follow if you feel so inclined.
Hunny x
Jane feels a tug deep inside her stomach the moment Loki's fingers touch her forehead. It's a feeling of being tugged downward, no, flushed downward. It's a dizzying sensation, her thoughts, subconscious and conscious minds swirling together and enveloping her in a massive tidal wave.
Then, she finds herself standing in the ruined landscape or volcanic rock and dust. The air swirls hot and thick with the smell of decay.
"Do you know where we are?" Loki steps from behind Jane, his eyes drawn to the sky. He looks different somehow. His hair is shorter, his face brighter, younger, and cheeks flushed with color and not drained of life. He looks innocent. Is this the Loki he lost in his quest for power? What happened to this Loki that changed him into the monster he became?
"Yes." Jane nods slowly. This is Svarthalheim. Home of the Aether. This dead world…it calls to the power inside of her. "What happened to this place?"
"Did you ever wonder who created the Aether in the first place?" Loki crouches and samples a handful of the ashen landscape. He rubs it between his fingers with a deep scowl, the winds carrying the earth from his fingers and into the breeze. "Svartalheim used to be a realm of beauty and life, much like Vanaheim. It was ruled by the Elves before they were darkened by black magic. One such elf, Hel, took it upon herself to create a force with unlimited power," Loki pauses, looking back at Jane as he stands.
"The Aether," Jane whispers, "But, how could she control it?"
"She couldn't," Loki says with a dark expression, "The Aether consumed her and then the realm, turning it into a wasteland. The Aether grew powerful enough to live without its host and Hel fled with her remaining powers to Niflheim where she now rules as Queen. The Elves polluted themselves with dark magic in an attempt to control the Aether. Only one was successful." He didn't need to say the name. Malekith, Jane shudders.
"And now," Loki approaches Jane with a finger pointed to her chest, "that power rests inside you. Do you understand now why this is so important?" Loki asks. Jane nods numbly, hugging her arms around herself.
"What are we doing here? In my mind, I mean." Jane feels a deep pang of fear prickling at the edges of her mind. The sky reddens, a faint ringing in the wind. The Aether calls on the horizon of the dead world with a blood-red sunset. Loki takes notice, nodding to the horizon.
"Searching for the Aether, and if possible…"
"Destroy it?"
"No," Loki chuckles humorlessly at Jane naivete. "The Aether can never be destroyed, only subdued. Tamed." Jane inspects the rolling hills of ashen earth, the ringing growing louder. She raises her hands with a growl of frustration.
"Well how the hell are we going to do that? If the Aethers taking control, won't it be like finding a needle in a haystack of needle?" Jane sighs, her voice echoing through the wind. Loki's lips press into a thin line, worry wrinkling between his brows.
"I'm afraid that finding the Aether is up to you, Jane." Loki looks to the horizon just in time to see the red light as it approaches, a shrieking ring in its wake. "This is your dream after all."
"It's coming," Jane whispers. She knows she's had this dream before, over and over and over again but all of it somehow feels new. She knows where this road leads but at the same time she is uncertain of her steps. Perhaps because the details of this dream have always been tucked away in her subconscious, roiling beneath layers or denial and fear. But now, Jane can't afford to be afraid anymore, especially if what Loki says is true. Jane knows she must be brave now, and follow this rabbit hole and face whatever lies at the bottom.
Jane listens to her instinct, and follows the dance that's she's rehearsed night after night. She glances at Loki, who gives her a stern nod. He'd be with her, and though she knows she shouldn't, Jane finds this comforting. She knows that somewhere in this nightmare is her salvation, and this time, she wasn't alone.
She turns runs from the descending light, Loki hot on her trail. The wind whips and howls, the ringing growing closer, and closer. And in a moment's breath, their feet pound the loose dead earth of Svarthalheim and the next, their footsteps echo in an empty kitchen. Empty, say for the two mangled corpses. Jane freezes.
"Jane, it's just a memory," Loki says, sensing Jane's panic.
"I can't do this," Jane feels everything inside her shake like she were a one person earth quake as she takes in the memory.
Pale, reddish moonlight filters through the sheer curtains, painting Janes face horribly. Tears spring to her eyes transfixed on the two bodies, their bellies torn open. Their faces are paralyzed in a silent scream of terror, cut short by a knifes edge. Their hands are clasped together, faces pale and eyes glossy, wide, and dead. So much like those animals she sketched.
"Jane, stay focused." Loki's voice is soothing against the horror of this scene. She can't see him but she can feel his presence close to her. She clings to that sensation, that comfort of knowing that she is not alone.
Jane hears the door open from the vestibule down the hall, the jingle of keys and scuff of boots. She remembers that night so clearly.
"I'm home!" Jane hears her own voice. There's a pause. Jane can't see her dream-self but she remembers. She remembers entering a house like walking into a sarcophagus. She should have never walked in the house, she should have turn and run. "Erik, Darcy?" Dream-Jane calls, "Any one home?"
Dream-Jane rounds the corner, setting her purse on the kitchen table, still unaware of the two bodies that lie not 6 feet from her. The Jane in her memory looks strikingly familiar to Loki's image. Not in features, clearly, but that same innocent glow. A face untarnished by death and terror and ghosts.
"Where is everyone?" Dream-Jane says, peering around as her expression grows paler with every successive moment of silence.
"Don't look away, Jane, you need to find the Aether. It's somewhere in your memories, feeding off your pain." Loki touches Jane's shoulder, but Jane feels everything inside her dance on a knifes edge. She knows this scene, played it out so many times in her head. She knows every move of this dance.
"Guys, this isn't funny." Dream-Jane's voice grows smaller. Jane remembers how hard her heart slammed against her chest. Remembers knowing she was going to die the moment she heard that voice.
A figure steps out of the shadows towards dream-Jane, as if they were made of shadows themselves. Then, that familiar devilish laughter echoes around the darkened walls.
"Oh, dear, why wouldn't it be funny?" That woman whose face Jane has memorized, reveals herself in the moonlight. Her bright green eyes hold a predatory glow as they size up the small mortal woman.
"Who…What have you done with them?" Dream-Jane backs away from the woman until she steps into something wet. She nearly slips in the liquid, and she turns to see two bodies. The woman's laughter is all-consuming. It drowns out Dream-Jane's scream. It bounces from the picture frames holding image of friends and family, it bounces off the kitchen table where stale memories of dinners haunt, it bounces in the corners of Jane's mind where she can imagine their terrified screams as Erik and Darcy were cut down in the dead of night. Jane clasps her hand to her mouth and stifles a sob.
"I couldn't save them, I might as well have killed them myself." Jane's voice is horse, her throat clenching around her words. She feels the whole world spin as she stares at the blood seeping from their wounds. Her knees knock together, sobs racking her body. A rush of panic and rage and every horrible other feeling she'd locked away comes rushing back.
Loki remains close to Jane, watching the rest of the scene play out. Fury boils inside him, watching what Jane went through alone and with no Thor to come and save her.
"I'm terribly sorry about your friends," Amora cleans her blade on one of Jane's kitchen towels casually, "It was really only supposed to be you, but alas, plans change."
"Please…Please don't kill me…" Dream-Jane begs, horror paralyzing her to the spot.
"Oh please, we have a little while until then," Amora approaches Jane and brings the edge of the blade to Jane's jaw with a smile growing on her lips. "I can see why he was so taken with you. You are surprisingly beautiful for a mortal, if not a tad quaint."
Dream-Jane trembles, her knees knocking together terribly like a new-born colt.
"Please, please," She whispers, tears rolling hot down her face. Jane falls to her knees, watching herself, helpless to change the past. Helpless to save herself from this moment.
"Skurge darling…" Amora calls and another figure approaches Jane from behind. A large hulking man with brutish features stalks from the shadows.
"I hope you didn't wear yourself out with the other one. I have fresh meat for you." Amora twirls the blade in her hand with a playful grin. Dream-Jane shivers, a sob tearing through her lips with her eyes glued to Darcy's body.
Skurge takes a lock of Dream-Jane's hair in his hands delicately, and brings it to his face to inhale deeply. Dream-Jane whimpers as the man presses himself against her spine, his hands roaming over her body. The moment seems to last for an hour before he releases her with a sneer.
"She's too soft for me. The other one had more…fire." He says coldly, then leaning to Dream-Jane's ear whispers, "I like it better when they fight."
"Please…please don't…I'll do anything." Dream-Jane cries softly.
"Anything?" Amora smiles wickedly, pausing the twirling of her blade. Dream-Jane nods fast, hurried sob wracking her small frame. "Well then," Amora says, lowering the blade. "I want you to die." Amora plunges the blade deep into Dream-Jane's abdomen, twists the hilt, and drags it across her stomach. Blood and guts begins sluicing out of the open wound. Jane and her dream-form share a scream, and Loki shakes. All he can do is watch as Jane's dream-form sinks to the kitchen floor, her abdomen a fountain of lifeblood.
"I couldn't save them," Jane sobs. She clutches her stomach, her scar burning with pain as her sobs turning into a howl of rage.
"I'll kill you!" Jane screams, surging forward to pounce on Amora but the figure dissipates into smoke. The scene freezes and an iciness consumes Jane's sensations. Her breath comes in puffy clouds. This is different, something has disrupted the dance, the flow of the dream.
"I didn't do it for him." Loki's voice comes from behind Jane. It's not the voice that's she's used to. It's a whimper, it's a plea. She turns to him and sees a far different Loki than she had seen at the beginning of this dream. He is kneeling, limbs bound in thick chains. His raven tresses fall into his face, battered with cuts and dark bruises. They blossom at his jawline and peppering down his chest, where his ribs jut from his skin like a starved animal. Those shackles, they tear into the skin of his neck and wrists, blood and yellow puss oozing from the wounds. He looks…broken. But what arrests Jane is his lips. His lips are stitched shut, and blood dripples from the needle-punctures circling his mouth.
"Loki…" Jane murmurs. The dream ripples like disturbed water, the scene changing. It's all too fast, lasting mere moments but Jane can see it clearly. Jane stands beside the kneeling Loki in the grand throne room of Asgard. There are so many faces, a crowd, onlookers to the beaten Loki. The voices are garbles, the dream breaking up as an image of Thor approaching with a needle in hand. He isn't fully formed, a fogged image of the god. But there is one face that is clear above all others.
That woman…she stands beside the blurred form of Odin, clad in kingly armor and a winged helm. The same woman that murdered Erik and Darcy, stands at Odin's side. Thor's side. Suddenly, the dream shatters, and as quickly as Jane was flushed into her subconscious mind, she is reeled out of it.
She lurches forward with a choked gasp, her hand clawing at her chest and stomach. Loki crouches beside her, his face pale and expressionless.
"I never want to do that again," Jane gulps for air, feeling a wave of nausea overcome her. Loki pants, regaining his own breath.
"You know you have to if you want to survive this." Loki musses his hair with his hands, looking deeply unsettled by what he saw. Had what he witnessed affected him so much? Or was it merely re-living his own pain?
Jane shakes her head, her chin quivering and eyes threatening a fresh onslaught of tears.
"Please don't make me do that again. I can't." Jane crawls on all fours and uses the edge of the couch as support as she stands. Loki eases himself upward, the same weariness she feels drawn on his face.
"If you give up now, the Aether will consume you. Do you want that?" Loki asks callously. Jane shakes her head, chewing on her lip.
"Of course not." Jane huffs, wiping tears from her eyes before they have a chance to fall down her cheeks. Loki steps close to Jane, and she's surprised at herself that she lets him get so close. At the moment, she's too numb to feel anything, not even hatred for the god. He puts a hand on her shoulder and squeezes in a comforting gesture.
"Then be strong, it is the only option that you have left," He says in that lulling voice, "Tomorrow we will try again. For now, rest." Jane looks up in his eyes, not knowing what she is searching for but searching in earnest regardless.
"Loki..." Without even thinking about the action, Jane brings her fingers to his lips and traces the outline of the scars dappled around his mouth. Loki's body goes rigid and still under her touch. She notes how soft his pale ivory skin is. Jane's thumb slightly drags at his lower lip as she finishes her outline. Could Thor have really done something like that to Loki? The brother he claimed to love so much? Her gesture is more of a question than a statement, a silent asking for further explanation to those scars. To all of them.
Loki's eyes widen in shock and his hand flies to grip her wrist. His grip isn't hard, not even aggressive, but more surprised. Jane feels a cold twisting in her gut, knowing immediately that she did something wrong, completely out of line. Had she forgotten who he was? Jane's cheeks heat. She could blame her audacity on her fatigue but she knows that deep down she had deep-seated curiosity to find out what Loki had gone through. And now that she knows, Jane feels... she doesn't know what to feel. Compassion? Empathy? No. How could she empathize for a monster like him. If anything she feels a kindred spirit in him. He was right. Loki had an intimate understanding of pain.
"I'm sorry," she shoots out, a blush rising on her face. She slips her hand from his loose grip and stumbles away. Loki stands frozen, bringing his own hand to his mouth in a curious gesture that makes Jane's face heat even more. He doesn't look at her, Jane doesn't think she could bare it if he looked at her. His emerald eyes fixate on the floor, his hand over his mouth for a moment.
"It seems as though we were both left to the mercy of the ones we trusted the most." Loki's voice is hollow and Jane doesn't know what to say, doesn't know what excuse to give for her gesture. She opens her mouth to speak but Loki disarms her with an icy glare.
"Don't." He says, "Don't you dare say you're sorry."
More to come soon ;)
