Disclaimer: This fan fiction is not written for profit and no infringement of copyright is intended. Beta read by the awesome Katya Jade. Thanks for their reviews go to Renaissencebooklover108, Rocking the Redhead, LadtyK1138, Brytte Mystere, Katya Jade and Poodle Warriors. And now, on with the carnage...

~ The Desolation of Smug ~

Oh, John thinks when he opens his eyes. Oh my giddy aunt.

He's only gone and built himself a Mycroft Cave.

And he looks past his best friend's brother to stare at the massive, domed, vaguely Bond villainesque room in which he now finds himself. His mouth agog, wincing as he realises that he landed rather more haphazardly than he would have liked. Grinning as he realises that Serrure- eh, Loki- did likewise.

To his right there's a massive bank of what look like Cold War era computers, buzzing and flashing like something right off the bridge of The USS Enterprise. To his left Sherlock is cradling Molly in his lap, having broken her fall whenever they were- beamed up? Teleported?- to this place. She's blushing and stammering that she doesn't need his help, but John can't help but notice that she's making no move to disentangle herself. Sherlock's cheeks are a matching shade of red and though he knows it's profoundly unwise to do so, John finds himself wanting to yell, "get in there, mate."

After all, for all his elegance and charm, Molly doesn't look at Loki the way she's looking at Sherlock right now-

And one glance at the glowering, pouting, would-be god tells Watson he's not the only person who's noticed that.

Not that sentiment is why they're here, apparently. The elder Holmes rolls his eyes heavenward- "Oh for pity's sake," Mycroft's snaps impatiently, "let her bloody up Sherlock: She's spent six months training with the Avengers, I very much doubt she's so much as bruised herself-"

Molly blushes again, this time in embarrassment, and John sees Sherlock shoot Mycroft a furious look. As if to make a point, he hauls himself to his feet and holds his hand out to Molly, allowing her to do likewise. She puts her fingers in his with a small, sweet smile, their earlier disagreement apparently forgotten. Sherlock exerts a little too much pull in getting her to her feet though- coincidence? John muses, I think not- which results in her nearly falling over again, her body smushing into his in order to stay upright. It's adolescent and it's juvenile, but it gives the detective an excuse to wrap his arm around Molly's waist, the better to steady her, even if he does nearly head-butt her accidentally in the process-

It belatedly occurs to John that his friend may not need as much help wrangling his man-parts as he had previously assumed.

Oh joy, John thinks. Nice to know that's how my subconscious decided to put that.

He shakes his head to himself.

I really have been spending waaay too much time with the Mrs.

Whether that's true or not though, he supposes he should turn his attention to the person who brought them to the Mycroft Cave. Manages to get to his feet, crossing his arms and shooting Mycroft his patented, long-suffering wince. It's been passed around the Holmes Boys like Red Bull at a stag do for as long as he's known them. Unfortunately, however, Mycroft would appear to be immune to its effects, shooting nothing but a cocked eyebrow back at Watson. Clearly he's decided that now he's brought them to his lair- And somehow, John has always suspected that he had a lair- the need for embarrassment has passed. Or maybe he's just trying to brazen it out.

After all, a big, brassy (if usually unused) pair are sort of part of the deal, if your surname is Holmes.

From the corner of his eye John sees Loki move forwards, one hand held delicately out before him. John follows his line of sight and sees a tiny pinprick of wavering red light hanging, suspended in thin air. Its colour seems to… bleed into everything surrounding it, the very air in which it hangs wavering as if it emits great heat. It looks beautiful to John, but somehow...dangerous? Hungry? too. Loki reaches out and makes to touch it, his eyes glittering with something, something glittering and excited and ragged-edged and feral-

"Loki," he hears Molly say quietly. "Loki, you can't."

And she leaves Sherlock's side, walks over to her boyfriend.

Sherlock does not, needless to say, look happy with this eventuality.

"Why?" Loki mutters. "It's calling me… It wants me…"

Molly puts her hand on his arm. Squeezes. "Maybe," she says calmly. "But you don't want it. Not after last time." She stands on her tiptoes, kisses his cheek. Turns his had to face her despite the slightly forlorn look this produces in Sherlock. "No, love," she says firmly. "No. Pure magic is too dangerous for you: Remember Nornheim."

And as if coming out of a daze Loki blinks. Looks at her. Looks down at her hand on him, then back up into her eyes. For a split second longer that glittering, hungry expression continues, prompting both John and Sherlock to take a protective step towards her-

And then, as suddenly as it arrived, it's gone. Loki moves away from the glowing orb of light, takes a deep breath, pushes it out through his nose. Takes Molly's palm and presses it to his lips- "thank you, sweet," he murmurs into her skin as Sherlock pouts- before turning to face Mycroft Holmes.

The look on his face is not exactly comforting.

Mycroft however, being Mycroft, merely straightens himself up, his trusty brolly held before him like a weapon. His expression is, to be kind, unrepentant.

Personally, John would go with smug, self-satisfied berk to describe it, but hey, that's just him.

Loki gets within three steps of him and stops. Looks at the umbrella's tip askance, then smiles. That shark-like grin of his is really rather intimidating.

"Ah, you've brought some protection," the alien says. He gestures to the umbrella's tip. "Dwarvish technology, unless I'm very much mistaken. And on Midgard too- The Norns will be less than pleased to discover you have that."

Mycroft shrugs. Makes a show of looking at his fingernails. "And what makes you think they didn't give it to me?" he asks dismissively. "You don't honestly imagine you and your brother came here without some rather… intricate negotiations on our part, now do you?" His smile is predatory. "We Brits are rather more cautious than our colonial brethren, after all." He sniffs. "More clever, too."

Loki throws back his head and laughs. "You, negotiate?" he barks. "As if this tiny mud-riddled orb-" There's a chorus of protesting Hey!s from the humans in the room- "could honestly stop another realm if they tried to come here-"

Again Mycroft shrugs. "We- what is that phrase Agent Barton uses? Ah yes: kicked your skinny arse back to Asgard last time," he says placidly. "Do you think that we couldn't do it again?" And he nods to Sherlock. John. He doesn't look at Molly. "The tools are here. The know-how too," he says calmly. "For all you know, this is some sort of simulation to test how you'd react- After all, isn't that what our glowing little friend over there specialises in?"

And Mycroft nods to the mysterious pinprick of red light, smiling.

The glare from it makes him look slightly diabolical; The bowler hat doesn't help.

John sees understanding flit across Loki's face- "Oh, I say," he mutters, "a portal in both time, dimension and space, that's rather good, that is,"- and the dark-haired man smiles. Walks back over to the red light as Mycroft inclines his head in what is obviously false humility. He looks at Mycroft slyly. "But isn't setting up something like this a little dangerous for someone like you?" he asks. "Considering what might happen?"

Mycroft's smile is icy. "Danger is my middle name," he intones solemnly- Sherlock, John and Molly all treat this assertion with the contempt it deserves and he shoots them a look of magnificent disdain. "Besides," Mycroft points out, "I'm far too clever to have made a mistake with something so basic as this-"

And he grins insolently. Leans on his (apparently magical) umbrella.

John somehow doubts that owning an enchanted umbrella is going to do anything to enhance Mycroft Holmes' capacity for either humility or cop on. But then he doubts a meeting with the Almighty could do that. Loki snorts though, moves away from the elder Holmes and towards the light: This time though the orb does not appear to have so hypnotic an effect on him.

In fact, this time he doesn't look wary of it at all.

"Thor," he calls instead, directing his voice to the pinprick of light. He sounds as if he's speaking into a phone with a particularly bad connection. "Thor, brother dearest, are you and your little lady friend in there?" The light flares, grows brighter for a moment. Loki grins. "What are you doing?" he calls, "that you had to sneak away from this plane of existence? And is it something that Father won't like? Because if it is I want to help…"

The light brightens again, widens, and from the corner of his eye John sees Sherlock ghost forward, equally fascinated. But when he gets to just outside Loki's line of vision Molly takes his elbow. Stalls him. Sherlock looks at her, frowning, but she shakes her head, murmurs something too quick for John to make out. It looks surprisingly funny to see Molly manoeuvre herself in front of Sherlock; she's watching Loki and the little scarlet bauble of light as if her life depended on it. Keeping her body between Sherlock and her boyfriend and oh but that is interesting.

John's fairly certain however that he doesn't want to find out why.

Not that he has time to do anything about it, though. Loki grins and shoots Molly a smile, apparently unwilling to get annoyed though Sherlock is so near her. Maybe he really is looking forward to seeing his brother, John thinks. As soon as his attention is turned away from the orb though it balloons out, rapidly expanding in size until it's about the circumference of a manhole cover. Something moves in it, a shadow against the brightness: there's a silhouette of what looks like a large, masculine hand waving a cudgel? Hammer? Some sort of medieval weapon of the big, blunt, Cimmerian sort? John frowns, trying to get a closer look, and suddenly the orb's red light turns blinding, brightening until even John has to shield his eyes-

"Oh bugger," he hears Loki mutter, and soldier that he is John knows that can bode no good.

A boom sounds then - rather like the boom that preceded them being brought here- and without any warning the orb stretches out to the width of a London bus, a blast of heat smashing into John and nearly knocking both he and Sherlock off their feet. He hears a whoosh as if a massive amount of air is being displaced and then suddenly shadow and light are battling one another in the portal, flickering like wildfire against the walls of the Mycroft Cave. The sound as sweeping wings- massive sweeping wings- fill the cavernous space, and as John watches something enormous simply flies through the orb of light and out into the room, as easily as a bird might fly through a window. The only difference being that that's physically possible and what John's seeing really, really, isn't. Because the thing which has exited the orb is not a bird. It's a dragon.

A giant, copper and jade, can-anyone-direct-me-to-the-Lonely-Mountain-please-I-swear-I'm-not-a-burglar dragon.

And John might be getting paranoid in his old age, but he thinks it looks a bit… miffed.

Not that he has long to ponder that though: The dragon opens its jaws and lets out a violently inhuman roar, so loud the ground actually shakes beneath John's feet. Yup, he thinks, it's definitely miffed. As he presses his hands to his ears he feels the back draft of the creature swooping into the air press against him, watches as it darts around the Mycroft Cave, flicking a long, spiked tail at every occupant of the room. Even Mycroft doesn't escape its ire though he's poking at it- somewhat ridiculously- with his umbrella. With nary a pause it swats him aside, its eyes narrow in on Loki though. It hisses, diving downwards to strike with deadly precision: The Asgardian yelps- there is no other way to describe that sound he makes- and darts out of its way, his walking stick starting to glow with an eerie emerald light as he tries to draw the thing away from the humans (or alternatively, simply tries to run away, John's not sure which).

There's a loud string of curses and John spins to see Sherlock grab Molly and pull her out of the dragon's way just in time (something which might be the single weirdest thing he's ever thought). Watches his friend swing her into him, shielding her body with his as the dragon glances by them, its tail snaking out to try and strike again at Loki. Sherlock grabs Molly bodily and hauls them into a relatively safe corner, pulling her tightly against him even as the dragon twists sinuously in the air and makes for Loki once more, swift and deadly and inescapable. Its eyes are sharp, intelligent, bright, but something moves in them, something which John almost fancies might be… emotion?

And by emotion, he means unbelievable, uncontrollable rage.

Loki follows his line of vision, sees what he sees. As Watson watches recognition flickers through the other man's face, something curious, then understanding, then panicked moving in his eyes' depths. The dragon twists in midair and dives, taking another shot at the alien. As it does so Loki starts yelling to it, his voice slightly panicked, his eyes wide. "Sweet," he's calling it, "Sweet, now you need to calm down-"

The dragon gives another inhuman howl of rage, but this time the sound separates, twists and winds until it becomes recognisable words. "Calm down," the dragon hisses, and though its voice is inhuman it sounds almost… feminine to John's ears. "Calm down? You do this to me, you lying, cheating, heartless, faithless ganchree fwachach-"

Loki tries to speak over it. "Now, name calling is completely unnecessary, Sig," he says. "You and I both agreed we needed a break-"

The dragon's tail collides with one of the computer banks, just beside Loki's head. I explodes in a shower of sparks. "A break from each other," the creature screeches. "I did not need a break from having opposable thumbs-"

And the dragon- Sweet Sig, apparently- dives at him again, opening her mouth and spraying the entire room in fire. Loki swears but doesn't seem worried; the dragon must notice because her eyes scan the room and they come to rest on Sherlock and Molly, both still huddled in their protected corner. At seeing the creature's gaze, Sherlock pushes Molly behind him and tries to square up to the beast- of course he does, John thinks, the pillock- but the dragon isn't interested in him. Her eyes come to rest on Molly instead, and there's something entirely feminine and completely terrifying in her gaze-

Something which John recognises from the last time he and Mary ran into one of his exes.

The dragon lands lightly, folding her wings in on herself and tilting her head, snaking her elongated neck out towards Molly. Her jaws open, showing row upon row of silver-bright, razor-sharp teeth. Sherlock's presence seems utterly immaterial to her- it's not like one little human's going to present much of a challenge to her, after all- and she shuffles closer to Molly, hissing. Sneering. Snapping her jaws, and John is reminded of nothing so much as a cat toying with a mouse. The dragon's eyes are bright as emeralds and pitiless as hellfire, every ounce of her considerable concentration focussed on Hooper. Loki hisses something, makes a gesture with his walking stick but though several versions of him appear the dragon sends him a derisory glance, neither impressed nor fooled-

And then with a single, terrifyingly quick flick of her tail she sends the "puny god," flying.

Silence descends then, for a beat. The dragon staring at Molly and Sherlock, Molly and Sherlock staring at the dragon. Hooper tries to push herself in front of Sherlock, but he won't let her; They glance at one another in irritation, apparently on the verge of another argument, the danger of the giant, fire-breathing reptile apparently forgotten. Sig rears back on her haunches suddenly though, bats at Sherlock with her tail. Her jaws open, flame flying out and Holmes is sent flying. John runs to him, knowing that unlike Loki he's going to be in need of medical help. Loki cries out, calls to Molly from where he's fallen. He appears suddenly before her, reaching for her even as the dragon's flames surround her, an army of replicas of himself filling the room but it's too late. Sig has Molly cornered and John suspects that she's moved on from miffed to royally bloody pissed. It's the furious look on her reptilian face which gives the game away.

There's a spit of flame, a scream as it comes for Molly.

Sig darts into the air, claws extended, her destination and motivation clear.

Molly looks around, terrified, trying to find a way out, a way to escape all this-

Which is when the gay porn star with the hammer whom John's Mrs. fancies- Thor, they call him- appears. He lands on the beast's back, shoots Molly a rakish wink and proceeds to smash the beast on the jaw with his massively big… tool. Laughing like an idiot and calling to his brother to join in with him. If this is what family bonding looks like on Asgard, John finds himself thinking, no wonder one of them tries to take over the world. Loki forces himself into standing, bringing his staff down on the beast even as Molly runs clear and makes her way to Sherlock. It's probably telling that she's more interested in his safety than she is in watching two gods fight a dragon for her, John knows. The two aliens rain down blows on the beast, laughing as if this is all some great lark, some great adventure-

But Molly sees none of it, though: her eyes are all for Sherlock.

John suspects he's be really delighted with that, if he had a bloody pulse.

A/N What could happen next? Interested? Let a hobbit know. Hobbits away, hey!