"They're actually making that arrogant moron king," said Naruko incredulous.
Loki nodded in irritation. He had come straight to the forest where Naruko lived to vent about this once he heard.
"Let me guess, you're stuck going to the ceremony even though you have no interest in seeing him become king," continued Naruko.
"Do I look like I want to watch my brother's grandstanding?" said Loki annoyed.
"Well you have two viable options. One, you suck it up and deal with the idiot and the likely to be boring as hell ceremony, then escape at the first possible chance."
Loki grimace. That was definitely not something he wanted to do.
"And the other?"
"We switch places, and you show up after. It also allows me to speak to Frigga since I know she's been hounding you about me for months now."
Loki snorted in disbelief.
"It would never work, even if you did dye your hair black and somehow change your eyes green..." started Loki, before he stopped cold and stared in absolute shock.
Where Naruko had been sitting on her usual branch was a perfect doppelganger of himself. Down to the last strand of hair.
"You were saying? Transformation and misdirection is a specialty of mine, among others," said Naruko, copying his grin perfectly.
It was rather...disturbing...to be confronted with a perfect copy of yourself.
However Loki got over it quickly. If Naruko could take his place at that stupid ceremony then he would gladly take her up on the offer. The last thing he wanted was to watch his brother's grandstanding.
Now to get his mother to agree to it. She was the only one likely to notice the switch.
"Of course there is the small issue of someone needing to take my place at the tavern," said Naruko, switching back.
"Absolutely not. Being a female once was bad enough, but if Thor ever learned I took your place he would never let me live it down," shuddered Loki.
"Got a problem with bar maids?" asked Naruko challenging.
"It's not that, it's the fact that the last time I turned myself female Thor thought it hilarious to try and pair me up with some lonely guards who were drunk," said Loki with a wince. Naruko flinched as well. No wonder Loki had been traumatized.
"For me, gender is entirely optional and it's so much fun to screw with people's heads when they attempt to figure out why a guy loses his bits without a second thought, only to gain the most impressive bust they have ever seen without a care," admitted Naruko.
She was one of those people who's gender identity was whatever amused her the most at the time. Generally that meant she remained female.
One of the few gifts granted to her from the fox was the ability to shift genders completely with fully functioning parts. It had baffled Tsunade when, upon seeing 'Naruto', she had discovered that the girl could actually get another female pregnant.
It was something that caused quite a bit of tension between her and the Third Hokage, because he insisted she remain a boy to prevent people from trying anything when she was a child.
It hadn't been until Anko had been tasked to teach her basic Sex Ed. (to both versions) and a few extra lessons from her courtesan neighbors that Naruko understood partially why Sarutobi had made her remain a male for the majority of her life, despite being born female.
When he died and Sasuke defected to Orochimaru, she said to hell with that order and returned to her original gender.
It had been a painful week of people finding out just how much she had snowed everyone. Thankfully they couldn't force her to marry the Uchiha since he was long gone, and Tsunade had enough Uzumaki blood in her to override any orders from the Council.
Though Sakura's reaction had been the worst. She absolutely refused to speak to Naruko when she found out that the entire time the 'boy' who had been asking her out was in fact another girl. Despite evidence to the contrary years later, Sakura would still persist in the belief Naruko was a lesbian.
"Still, the odds of us pulling this off..." said Loki.
"Care to see how long it takes your mother to figure out I'm not you then? This ceremony is only a few hours long, and I can last for days," said Naruko.
"Deal."
Frigga frowned at her son. There was something...off...about Loki today. It wasn't his appearance. It wasn't the way he moved.
If she had to put her finger on what was bothering her it was the eyes. There was an implied sense of mischief, but not the sort her son had taken to of late which implied cruel humiliation for whomever had annoyed him.
Finally she cornered Loki in a room an hour after dinner, and was surprised when he chuckled.
"Ha! I told him that switching places wasn't as difficult as he claimed," said 'Loki' who turned into a woman she had only seen once but never forgot.
The woman who had caught her son's attention. Red.
"Impressive you were able to disguise yourself as my son without anyone noticing. Even Thor was fooled," said Frigga evenly.
'Red' took an overly amused bow.
"Disguise and misdirection are my bread and butter, Lady Frigga. I'm afraid Loki isn't too enthusiastic about going to the coronation so when I offered to take his place he demanded we do a test run first," said Red before she asked "So what gave me away?"
"The eyes. Loki's have become more cruel in the past few centuries, but yours were of innocent mischief," said Frigga openly smiling.
"Ah. Knew I was forgetting something, but a prank of this caliber was too tempting to resist."
Loki managed to slip into the room without anyone noticing.
"Well?"
"She noticed, but only because I was so amused at the fact that no one figured out we had swapped places," said Red.
Frigga looked at her son.
"Is going to the coronation really that bad? You know Thor cares about you," said Frigga.
"Mother, while I can tolerate Thor and his more irritating habits, the last thing I want to deal with is watching him grandstand while being crowned king," said Loki flatly.
"Why do you care about the throne anyway? It's not like they care about scholars around here," asked Naruko.
Loki couldn't look her in the eye. Naruko's narrowed.
"Oh for the love of Inari don't tell me the only reason you are even interested in the throne is to get Odin's approval," she said pinching the bridge of her nose.
Loki stared at her, for she had hit the nail on the head rather easily.
"Dammit... looks like Gaara was right about this one again..." she muttered.
If the only reason Loki was interested in a throne that would suit him poorly was for attention from a rather distant father figure, then there was no way in hell Naruko was allowing this nonsense to continue. She would have to break Loki before something happened that would turn him evil.
Years before she perfected her the shattered mask, she had tried to reach Uchiha Sasuke. She would consider it her one and only failure, had she been unable to reform him years after he snapped. However to deny the Council and the idiots in the capital the Sharingan and to insure that the Juubi never returned, Sasuke took on a suicide mission and never came back.
However before he left, he gave everything to Naruko, saying she was the closest thing to family and the only one who had ever truly cared for him. Not because he was an 'Uchiha', but because he was Sasuke.
Naruko, in a bit of vindictiveness, sealed every last piece up and took it with her when she left...after leaving the Council directions to the trove of goodies.
Tsunade laughed long and hard when she realized the hat trick Naruko had pulled on them before vanishing. Not even a single coin had been left, just the buildings. And even those had been turned to rubble with a few well placed explosive tags that had gone off the moment her chakra quit running through it.
It was Naruko's biggest 'screw you' to the Council that made her life a living hell for years.
"That does it. The coronation is in a week right?" asked Naruko.
Frigga and Loki nodded slowly, unsure why she wanted to know.
"You and I are going on a little trip. I guarantee when we come back you'll be hard pressed to believe the difference in Loki's personality," said Naruko firmly. She was going to nip his bad behavior in the bud now before he had to deal with a major stress marker like this coronation.
Frigga hid a smile. It was clear this girl did care for her son, though she was curious as to what the girl had in mind for Loki.
"Why exactly are we here Naruko?" asked Loki tiredly. They were in the former home of the Dark Elves, and frankly he was wondering why she had dragged him there.
Actually, scratch that, he was more curious how the hell she knew the pathways well enough to take him into the only one on Asgard that lead straight to here. He thought he was the only one who cared about the older paths enough to map them.
"So I don't have to worry about Thor trying to take my head off or being arrested when you finally snap," said Naruko flatly.
Loki looked at her oddly.
"When you say snap..."
"I mean your snide trickster personality is going to break like a mirror when a rock is thrown at it. And since you know how to use magic there's a high chance your control will be shot to hell and cause a massive shockwave. And if we did it in Asgard it would bring the guard or worse, Thor and his idiots down on my head."
Loki stared at her.
"Exactly what is it that you plan to do that would cause that?" he asked, his voice full of disbelief.
He sincerely doubted anything she did would cause a shockwave of his magic to go off.
"Would you like to make a bet Loki?"
"What sort of bet?"
"The kind that gets you out of Asgard and away from your brother for a while."
"Very well."
"If I can get you to drop some of your dislike of Thor, we go on vacation."
"And if you can't?"
"Then I do another palace-wide prank of your choice," said Naruko immediately.
Loki's grin was evil. He had seen her work, and he would love to see it again. Especially if he could convince her to dye Thor's hair that orange color she loved so much.
Seeing as how Naruko was clearly going to do something, Loki found a rock and got comfortable. Or at least tried to.
"Actually it might be easier to do this in a spar. It gets aggression out and gets the blood pumping at the same time," said Naruko.
"Hell and no. I've see you spar," deadpanned Loki.
"That wasn't a spar. That was a beat down with a hefty dose of grandstanding. I want to see how you fight without holding anything back. All the tricks, all the sneak attacks, everything. This isn't going to be a battle of brute force. I want technique," said Naruko.
"Basically you want me to fight as myself and not as an Asgardian," said Loki.
Naruko had made it very, very clear how she felt about Asgardian warriors.
All brawn and little brains was the way she had phrased it. Loki couldn't help but agree, and the others usually mocked him for fighting 'like a woman' as they said it.
Even Sif fought like a man.
Loki's grin was rather disturbing...if you were anyone but Naruko.
It would be nice to go all out with his magic rather than trying to match Thor blow for blow.
So Loki summoned his staff and started them off by trying to blast Naruko. He knew it wouldn't work, but it would get things started.
She vanished, but instead of attacking him with her fists or a kick, she had an evil grin on her face as she called out "Shadow Clones Jutsu!"
Ten clones appeared, and Loki paid them little mind. He had used illusionary clones before.
That dismissal turned to shock when he realized that not only were the clones entirely solid, but they were completely autonomous from Naruko and could use her unique 'magic'.
He did pale when he saw one explode without warning.
"Exactly how many of those can you make?"
"Enough to make even Thor be afraid of explosions," she said cheerfully. Then her face gained an odd expression, "So why exactly do you want to be king of a bunch of testosterone laden morons who couldn't get subtlety if you smack them in the face with it?"
That question actually stumped Loki for a moment, because why was she asking about this now during a fight?
"I mean I can get why Thor would want to be king, but why would you want to be king of Asgard when there are so many more interesting places to be the ruler of? And what about all the paperwork you'll eventually have to do?"
"Because it's my birthright!" said Loki, dodging a blue ball of what appeared to be pure magic condensed. He decided to avoid it altogether when he saw the damage it did.
"Again, why king of the Asgard? They clearly don't respect your brand of fighting, they just barely tolerate you in their group, and they look down on what you like to do. So why would you want to lead them? I mean outside of Thor, they don't even pay any real attention to you at all!"
Loki winced. He had noticed that years ago, which was why he started doing more and more cruel pranks.
"So what's in it for you if you became King?"
"They would have to notice me if I was their king," said Loki.
"And what about Odin?" asked Naruko. Now she was getting to the crux of her ability. Forcing people to realize the truth without their mask to hide behind.
Loki twitched. He didn't like where this was going. At all.
Naruko didn't smirk or show any sign of emotion.
She knew how to break people in a way that they would thank her for later. Hell, she had a listing in the BINGO books back home because she could break people without any real physical damage to show for it.
"Let's be real Loki. The only reason you want to be king is so that Odin will acknowledge you the same way he does Thor. You want him to be proud of you for yourself," said Naruko.
"Shut up!" snarled Loki.
"Face it! You want to be king so Odin will notice you as his son! To see him as proud of you as he is of Thor!" shouted Naruko.
"I said... SHUT UP!" shouted Loki.
Without warning, Loki felt his magic slip. There was a shockwave that broke loose and sent rocks and dust from above.
Naruko pinned Loki to the ground. He was breathing heavily, partly from using his magic for longer than normal, but mostly because she was forcing him to see the truth.
Loki didn't want to be king. He just wanted Odin's approval and attention.
"You need to wake up and see the truth Loki."
Loki almost felt like crying. He had never wanted to admit that all he ever wanted was for Odin to be as proud of him as he was of Thor or Baldur.
That was when Naruko used the full brunt of her shatter mask ability.
"You need to wake up and realize that Odin is the last person you need to impress. The only one you need to care about is you. Are you happy with who you are? Are you satisfied with how your life is turning out?" said Naruko.
She slowly let Loki up. He took his time in sitting up.
"Why do you even care?" asked Loki.
"I see you. I hear you. And I acknowledge the person you really are, not the one people expect you to be," said Naruko simply.
Loki could tell she meant every word. And for some reason, he just started laughing. It wasn't even funny, but he was laughing.
Naruko took it in stride though. She had seen some bizarre psychological responses after she broke people. Laughter was one of the top three.
She felt something brush at the back of her head. It felt similar enough to the Yamanaka technique that she told Kurama to allow Loki to read her memories. Just enough to show him she wasn't lying about taking him as he was and not how people wanted him to be.
Seeing that she understood exactly why he had been so determined to be king and impress his father, Loki realized Naruko wasn't like anyone he was likely to meet ever again. He only barely realized that she was holding him and that he was crying...yet he didn't care.