When he awoke a again the word was blue. Dim and dark and warm. He glanced down at his hand and saw it pink. He wondered if he should be worried. He didn't think so. He'd think about it later. Tiredly he sat up, green eyes gazing hazily around his surroundings. All he could remember was the talking box and big Thor and the shapeshifter and the man with the metal arm and sleep. Suddenly and dizzy, his memory just dropped off into sleep. Snuggled into the shapeshifter's side was the last thing he remembered. But when he woke up the man with the metal arm was carrying him. He could feel the steel against his back and the steady beating of a heart next to his ear. He was so warm and so safe. He looked up a he man. Green eyes glowing sleepily. The man with the metal arm looked down at him an smiled. He smiled back and reached out, taking hold of dark brown locks like he did with mother. Then he buried himself back into a shirt and curled up. He felt safe and sleepy and therefore he would sleep.

When he awoke for a second time he was alone and it was dark. Something that felt like moonlight was streaming down from a window in the corner and the room was cast in a eery bluish white light. The bed was large and fluffy, almost as large as mama and papa's bed in their chambers. He was covered in thick, heavy blankets and his body steamed underneath them. He was too hot, far too hot. For as long as he could remember he had disliked the heat with a passion. During the hot Asgardian summers he would slink down into the deepest, coolest parts of the castle and refuse to come out in fear of burning and now, even in this strange place, he was too hot. He wondered how the Midgardians slept with all this installation he would never know.

Eyes blinking open and legs kicking furiously he managed to flip the blankets off himself, leaving him slightly less hot and panting.

He wanted to go home, he wanted to go home where he could take midnight baths when he got too hot, where he could go climb into bed with mama and papa when he was upset. The Midgardians were nice, but half of them were terrifying. The shape shifter was the only one he would take home. At least he and the green one had protected him from the beginning. He just wanted to feel safe.

Without thought he lowered himself to the floor, tears already welling in his eyes. He needed to stop crying, he had to be strong. He had to be strong for papa, he had to go back, he wanted to go back.

But he didn't know how.

He rubbed angrily at his eyes, disappointed in his own inability to keep his eyes dry. As quietly as he could he pottered on short legs away from the bed, eyes twitching nervously from end to end, taking in all that the room had to give. The room was bare and impersonal, there were no pictures on the walls, no ornaments or collections. Just a bed with too many pillows and blankets, a vanity in the corner, a closet and a desk of draws. The soft carpet fibres sneaked in between his toes and the moonlight from the corner made his hair shine.

A thought struck him as he reached for the door handle.

"House?" He whispered tentatively, feeling silly. He assured himself it was just the same as talking to Heimdall.

"Yes, Master Laufeyson?" The house responded immediately. Loki couldn't understand why the house continued to refer to him as Laufeyson, he was Loki Odinson, not Laufeyson. He had met the king Laufey once, during a peace meeting between he and papa that Loki and Thor had come to. The king of the frost giants had gotten down on one knee in front of him and even then they hadn't been level. Loki had looked up at him with his thumb in his mouth. Odin had been in a meeting all morning and Thor hadn't wanted to explore with him so Loki had wandered off on his own. He had met the king in a corridor and the two had stared at each other for such a long time. Something was so familiar about him. Laufey had smiled at him, but the smile he had been greeted with when the king had introduced himself to he, papa and Thor hadn't been this shaky. The king's crimson eyes had welled with what seemed like tears. He had looked so sad, his jaw quivering just slightly. Loki had looked at him in worry that he had angered the king. Unknowingly he laid his hand on a blue forearm. He didn't notice how similar the king's long dead black was to his own, or how he didn't even think about how he didn't flinch at the coldness of he man's skin, even though it was rumoured that a single touch could kill.

And then the man had moved.

Muscled, evening blue arms wrapped around him, pulling him close into the king's chest. He should of felt alarmed, but bedding. He had felt calm, content within these arms. When Laufey had pulled away, holding the boy's thin shoulders his skin matched the king's. He had looked curiously at his hand and traced the slightly rained lines. He had touched his face, feeling other lines there as well and looking up at Laufey, grinning with delight. It made since. He hated the summer, he always over heated so easily and favoured the cold. He was a frost giant. Laufey had looked at him in something akin to relief, but then someone had yelled out his name a few corridors past. Loki had wanted to go see who it was so that they could take him to father and he could show him his new discovery, but the king had grabbed his forearm and suddenly he was being dragged along on the corridor. Apparently Laufey had found his stumbling insufficient so he leant down and Loki was swept up. As they had stormed down the corridors Laufey had told him of how he must never ever tell anyone of his blue skin. Not his mama, not his papa, not Thor, not anyone. Loki had struggled to keep up, but he still savoured every word the man said. When they came to the outside of the door where he and Thor had been told to wait the king had out him down and held his cheeks.

"Remember what I told you, my boy. Tell no one" then he had kissed the boy's cool forehead and the blueness had receded back into his skin. Then he left, his cloak floating behind him.

That was the first time he turned blue. Sometimes when he was really mad it would come out, but he never let anyone see. He would run until it went away, even if that meant hiding for hours.

"Can you open the door?" He whispered to the house in hope that the door would just swing open, he could already tell that it was locked.

"Certainly sir" the house responded. Loki had never encountered an entity like the house. Sometimes he would be able to hear his mother's voice inside his head when he wandered too far away from home, but this voice, this voice was part of the house, coming from nowhere and belonging to no one.

It was strange. Almost scary, but the voice was so friendly. He doubted anything that sounded so friendly could harm him. Then again mama always told him not to trust those who sounded so tempting. Still he didn't think that a voice in the celling wished him any true harm. Though he was still wary of the Midgardians

He watched in delight as the door swung open and he crept out into a light corridor. For a moment the lightness burnt his eyes, but as soon as his sensitive irises adjusted he was off. Darting down the corridor, feeling too exposed and too nostalgic to be loitering in some open place. He wanted to explore, he wanted to get his bearings, he would do what he wanted. His papa always told him that he should never let anyone say what he could and could not do. Not because he was a royal prince, but because nobody deserved his respect and obedience unless they did something to earn it. Until someone managed to do that he would do exactly as he wished… because papa… because papa told him to.

The corridors were long and riddled with locked doors like the palace. Everything was made of steel, it was all cold and lifeless. Sometimes the house would ask if he needed anything and he would say no and the house voice would disappear again. After a while he came to a found a large room with a few sofas, an even softer floor and mortals sitting in it. He recognised the shapeshifter and big Thor. There was also the man that sort of looked like papa with his weirdly shaped beard and the tall, scary man and the man with the metal arm. He crouched down low so that they couldn't see him and tried to listen. Somewhere in their hushed, serious voices he heard his name, though he didn't hear anything else. Something about fury or a… a shield. That didn't seem to make any sense. Sometimes papa had conversations with people that made no sense, but mama always assured him that it just didn't make any sense to him. He could of done with some reassurance at this point. Thor looked so big among the tiny furniture

Turning his frenzied mind away from them and his inability to figure out what they were talking about he slunk along the wall, small feet making no sound as they hopped from floorboard to floorboard like a dancer from the markets. Nobody saw him. Nobody saw through his charm, the veil of invisibility cast over his form, even his shadow. When his mama had asked him why he would want to learn an invisibility he had had to explaining great detail that sweet buns from the kitchen weren't going to steal themselves. Without hesitation he headed toward the door to the balcony he could just see. Open air was what he craved. Open air was safe.

Somehow he managed to convince the door to open without a sound and he slipped out all the while keeping one eyes fixed on the small party of talking adults. The cool night air caressed his face like an old, welcoming friend. It brushed up his nose and lifted his hair off his neck. The night sweats he had awoken with cooled on his skin. He let the veil sink to the floor to feel the full exposure to the coolness. He ran to the edge of the balcony. Excitedly he stood up on the rail and leaned over, feeling the wind on his face and staring down at the streets. Midgard had changed so much since he had last been here. It was so beautiful, all of the stars and the shining lights. A city. So beautiful.

Suddenly someone yanked him back, arms around his waist. He looked up, toes still clinging to the shining rail, hands covering arms around his scrawny middle. He blinked, wide eyes at the squarish face that frowned down at him.

"You don't want to be doing that squirt" The voice was gruff and familiar, but not entirely hostile. Just growly.

"Oh" he responded quietly. The boy let himself be put to the ground while he wondered what a squirt was.

"I thought you were asleep, kiddo. What are you doing out here?" They stood together in the night, he and the man with the bow and arrow.

"Got too hot" he answered blankly, still staring in fascination at the man that was presumably an archer like of home. The archer looked up, where the building continued upwards.

"You want to go higher, squirt?" Loki continued to stare, but still trotted after the archer went and stood in front of one of the walls of the building. The party inside still hadn't noticed them. They were still deeply immersed in a very serious conversation concerning something about fury and shields. The archer looked down at him. "Well?"

Loki tried to shrug nonchalantly and nodded.

Immediately the archer grabbed a hook hanging from his belt. In moments Loki was laughing from the very top of the building. Eyes bright and staring out onto the horizon where the Midgardian sun was just beginning to rise on the water. His feet sat on the top rail of the roof, the archer hanging tightly onto his hips so that he wouldn't fall. The wind was violent and filled with life giving abandon up here. It was all graceless and bright.

After Loki had tired of leaning into the expanse of air the archer and he sat on the edge of the building with their elbows hooked over the rail, the archer holding tightly onto the back of his collar incase he slipped. They watched the sun rise and Loki wondered if perhaps this place, these people, this experience, wasn't so bad after all.