Eyes half-lidded, Kari reluctantly fought against the urge to sleep in the chair she was occupying. One too many past experiences had taught her a neck-aching lesson in regards to that particular snoozing stop off. If things got dire she could always climb on top of the board meeting table and sleep there she supposed, even with all the busy bees pushing buttons around her.
Forcing herself out of her slumped form, the overly full, way past her bed time, curly haired woman took the time to treat herself to a languishing stretch and slouch sideways, head braced atop the palm of her hand, as the table now took some of her three course meal weight off the chair legs. Across from her position, the vessels bridge continued on several more feet of consoles before opening out into nothing but over the top floor to ceiling windows and a magnificent view of darkness. Where were they exactly? Over the ocean of course but even the ocean had some sort of lights, right? Other ships, islands and stuff. People, lights and McDonald drive-thru's were everywhere. As if to prove her point, Thor, suddenly decided to take that moment to walk in front of her view of nothingness, and block the window from further along a gangway, in great hulking fashion.
Coulson, the goon from earlier, was stalking the blonde bimbo as they continued what she could only assume was some kind of deep conversation – the way Thor's brow crinkled certainly made him look as if he were trying to calculate fusion and reach a consensus of cream pie. Her mind was beyond repair by this point however, her eyes finally fluttering closed though her ears made a good show of continuing to work.
"What are you asking me to do?" Thor's voice drifted over, past the pinging sounds surrounding.
"I'm asking what are you prepared to do?" A new person had apparently joined the two-way making it into a threesome of sorts; Kari's mind dimly aware of this and casually pegging him into the box of possible persons taking her to a bed, what with every other need having been met already by the secret agents society.
"Loki is a prisoner."
"Then why do I feel like he's the only person on this boat that wants to be here?"
"I second that." Kari thought she retorted but in actuality snored causing an agent nearby to peer away from his console in disgust at the gravelly rasp that refused to quit.
Her dreams were a confused ramble for the next few hours; all the insanity of days, weeks, months a decade attempting to formulate an understandable narrative but failing miserably when a fractured mind at the helm. Everything had been survival mode for so long, not even just during those recent weeks in literal Hel. Not that she was out of the woods yet, even.
Faces bobbing in and out of focus, bodies moving in the mist and words on the edge of her hearing as she strained desperately to comprehend what everyone was saying about her – because of course everything was about Kari, especially in Kari's own personal wonderland. The echo, wherever she was, was intense and oppressive as her feet moved forward, tripped and continued through her dream finding nothing but doorways and people she used to know walking casually through opening doors before slamming shut in her face. What was going on? Why was nobody answering her? Why could they not hear her, see her?
She reached out, grabbing a mans arm as he brushed past her, he paused on his way to stare down at the touch as her eyes widened at his voice of accusation even though his mouth did not move.
"Why did you leave me?"
"I told you, my grandfather ca-" She tried to reason with her ex-boss, one time afternoon quitting delight.
"I needed you." He frowned; face growing grey and fading as she got caught up in the intensity of his increasingly distant eyes. "I needed you to cover next Wednesdays shift."
"What?" She cupped both hands over her ears, as sound around her seemed intolerably loud yet far away at once. "I don't understand."
"I just wanted to get off early and visit the exhibition."
"Sarah?" Kari spun around, the voice of her colleague assaulting her sense of hearing despite the fingers in her ears.
"Why you? I wanted to see Asgard, I needed to see it for my finals but you always have to have everything, Kari!"
"I was only trying to find you, I swear!" She was trying to placate the angry looking memory ghost.
"Whore!" Sarah screamed at her, but this time it was not the younger woman's voice as her body dispersed like smoke revealing a colourless room behind her and an angry woman somewhere in her late forties wafting a wooden hairbrush above a crying preteen, covering her head amass with curls with both arms.
"Shut up!" Kari yelled as she tried to push her way into the room past transparent silhouettes that oddly reminded her of old social workers.
"Useless tart!"
"I said shut up!" Now free of one obstacle the ex-waitress found an invisible barrier blocking her from progressing any further.
"I see you. Don't think I don't see you fluttering your eyelashes at my husband!"
"SHUT UP!" She screamed forcing her way through the invisible wall, the girl on the floor startled by the approach and getting up to run from her attacker and the uninvited guest both.
"Get back here you little-"
"GET YOUR HANDS OFF OF HER!" Kari bawled her full running weight into the older woman, before she had the chance to swing the wooden brushed at the child once more.
Two bodies were thrown out of the large sitting room window, glass shattering around them in slow motion as the outside world exhaled into nothing but a passionless white. Kari felt weightless, as if she were floating, and closed her eyes as she sneered back the prickling of tears. At least it was quiet now but a sense of falling was overwhelming her senses until a jolt told her she had landed on something soft, as a soothing scent filled her nostrils.
"Good night my love, your mummy is kneeling besides you."
"Mum?" She opened her eyes, blinking in the sight of a small black and white television across from her that flickered in and out of focus playing some old Shirley Temple movie.
"Good night my love, to dreamland the sand man will guide you." The voice of her mother continued to sing, fingers stroking through her daughter's hair as the young girl rested her head in her mother's lap. "Come now you sleepy head, close your eyes, go to bed. My precious sleepyhead, you mustn't play peek-a-boo."
"Darlene!" An impatient sounding man's voice called from the other room. "You've got another one."
"Mummy don't go!" Kari sat bolt upright startling her mother at the speed of movement.
"Hey, it's okay, bright eyes. Mummy just needs to take care of someone real quick." She soothed her hands over her daughter's equally curly hair once more with a reassuring smile.
"No…" Kari shook her head, brow furrowed as her too big eyes widened in worry.
"Can you do me a big favour?" Darlene smiled, leaning her lips closer to the girl's ear as she whispered conspiratively. "I really need another one of your beautiful drawings. The ones on the fridge are getting lonely."
"I can do that!"
"Darlene!" The man from the other room was calling again, anger rising in his tone.
"Good girl." She patted her daughter on the head flashing a toothy smile before getting up from the sofa and straightening her clothes as she exited the sitting room.
Kari watched as her mother left, her chest feeling heavy with a sense of fear that her mother would not return but she had a task to perform. Her mother wanted another picture, perhaps this time it should be a great grey wolf – it was not as if there were any other colour of crayon on the coffee table in front of her.
Climbing down onto the floor, she kneeled over a blank piece of paper and began drawing. A head, two legs, a great bushy tail all surrounded by snow-covered trees. Blinking in the finished product she smiled writing her name at the bottom in shaky cursive before a groaning sound disrupted her pleased expression. Head swiveling towards the open doorway, Kari, rose onto her feet and trotted closer to the dark hallway and stared at its endless appearing length. She would have turned, gone back to her colouring in but scraggly fur brushed past her short six year old body instead. A wolf, the one from her picture, panted as he padded into the dark space ahead and paused with the wag of his tail to whine at her to follow.
"Tom?" Her fuzzy memory of the old wolf brightened the world around her, making the dark seem more twilight.
Grasping onto his back, her fingers entwined in the wolf's fur, Kari allowed herself to be lead by his safety. Light was filtering from another room along the corridor; a small kitchen containing a well-decorated fridge freezer smothered in lovingly crafted animal scribbles. Pausing at the doorway, Kari, stared up at a tall man leaning on an open window sill smoking and paying her no mind.
"Dad?" She queried of the smoker.
His black greased back haired head turned, cigarette braced between two fingers, as predatory green eyes sort her out. It was her father but at the same time it was not, the details were all off like she was staring at a masquerade. Before anything more could be said, at that moment, footfalls of someone descending the stairs leading up to the first floor grew in volume to her left. She turned just in time to catch the sight of a mess of brown hair appearing from the stairwell followed by the rest of a purple shirt wearing man in blue jeans.
"Hey kid." The strangely familiar man patted her on the head as he past her on his way into the kitchen.
She was crying but she was not sure why; Tom whined for her attention which she did not give reluctantly allowing the large creature to guide her from the house and out into the street. The tears continued, however, her fingers losing their grip on her protector once more so as to allow her body to droop to the pavement and weep profusely like the small child she appeared.
"My dear?" A soft male voice hovered above her wrapped in an aura of concern.
"Granddad?" she blinked up through tear blurred eyes at a magnificent blonde moustache wearing a man's body.
"My dear, you need to wake up."
"What?" She shook her head not understanding her dream grandfather's words.
"Engine three is on fire."
Shaking her head again, Kari, continued to frown but everything was already changing. Her grandfather growing further away, her head feeling strangely heavy until she could not fight against the way her body flopped onto its side. Her sight grew darker until engulfed by blackness and finally her lungs burned for her to breathe, making her squirm at the discomfort.
"Engine three is on fire!" A random agent was shouting as he jogged passed the surprisingly still sleeping woman – despite the whole explosion and ship rocking.
"What?" Kari righted herself rather suddenly in her board-meeting chair and took a luxury second to hiss at the kink in her post-sleep neck.
Getting up from her seat, rubbing sand from her eyes, the curly haired woman dodged all the scurrying agents, as they appeared to be in a rushed panic about something very bad going on. Asking did not get her any answers – only scowls of annoyance or shoves out of peoples way- and even mister goon Coulson had no time for her as he ducked down some stairs leading to a magical place under the star trek bridge. What the heck was going on? Where was she supposed to go? Was there a lifeboat or something to get to? She was so not freezing to death like that titanic movie out in the middle of the ocean; that so did not look fun.
It was then a strange man wearing a matrix style black long coat and a pirate eye patch appeared shouting out commands. At least someone was apparently in charge and doing something other than pressing buttons and shouting about fires. Though, it probably was not the best of ideas to irritate the ship captain, he kind of looked a bit on the angry death dealing villain side of the good versus evil spectrum. It was not as if she had a chance to so much as wander over and open her mouth to spew out garbage any how. Some asshole had thrown a grenade into the room; she knew this because a lady agent was shouting about it right before everybody with enough sense ducked out of the way.
Kari being Kari however, instead stood like a game of statues, chin braced against her neck in a rather ugly expression of 'I don't know what to do' as a flash of bright light stunned her onto her rear with a squeal of pained confusion. Whimpering, curled into a ball on the floor, in her fleeting blindness the sounds of fighting and gunfire rang out around the room only terrifying the decidedly less full but still malnourished woman. If things could not get any worse, people were now walking over her and occasionally kicking her with their booted feet as they scrambled about doing things and finding her an irksome obstacle chilling out on the gangway.
Sight returning, she crawled her way over to some railings, out of the way of others and hoisted herself up rubbing at her blood shot eyes. This was some serious madness and these people were kind of dicks now she had a chance to get to know them better – who just keeps kicking a girl whilst she is down? The pirate king was hanging out across from her on the bridge, firing a pistol at the way out as armoured S.W.A.T teams kept trying to get inside. It was at that point a new horrendous thing started happening, like a gift that just kept on giving, and consoles started exploding around her like a borg ship invading the enterprise. Maybe she was still asleep and this a horrible fiery dream with plenty of imaginary bruises but who was she kidding, Karian Motter could never be that lucky. Nope, her dreams came in grey and this place was all in colour – now she knew why Captain America was not so into the whole colour television being an amazing thing. Oh and now engine one was dead and the whole vessel tilting like the end of a game of jenga.
"Fuck you all, I am so not dying here!" Kari screamed out as she ran passed a shouting pirate captain telling her to get her butt down on the ground.
A member of the enemy S.W.A.T team was coming out of the bridges exit, gun raised, as she flew at him like a startled rabbit. Luckily for her she still knew how to do that whole weak magic shield thing and haphazardly bounced back an incoming bullet, with a petrified squeal, that managed to find its way into her attackers 'huh'ing mouth. Hopping over his slouched form, languishing in an increasing pool of blood on the floor, she then made herself invisible much to the pirate kings confusion as he called out an accusation of her being a 'motherfucker' – not that she gave a damn whilst fleeing.
Jostling uselessly through the corridors, her feet darting left to right as she traversed hurrying guards on who knew who's side, she tried to make her way as quickly and quietly as possible to wherever safety was. Fast was definitely the operative word as she continued to fight against the drain holding herself invisible was racking on her body. She was no Loki, no sorcerer, these things, this magic as weak as it was exiting her pores was like a gym membership both her figurative wallet and endurance could not keep up the payments on. Taking a chance in a quiet corridor she paused, throwing herself at a wall as she rematerialized for all to see and half keeled over sucking in oxygen and trying to ignore her sweaty skin – it was only recently she had finally got a real honest to god shower and already it had been ruined no doubt because of Loki. Stupid Loki, stupid… well, more stupid Loki.
"NOOOO!" Thor's rather unmistakable cry boomed ahead of her like a sirens call.
Staring from her spot in the direction from whence the pain filled voice came, the curly haired woman bit her lip in torn surprise. Should she follow after the bimbo, possibly the only safe person she knew that would actually help her on this death trap of a ship, or run away from his direction as he appeared to be in some sort of danger or other? Oh, what was she thinking, Kari was a coward at heart yes, but her grandfather would be so upset if his friend got squished and died or something. Okay, fine, she just needed to sneak on in there and…
"Loki, what are you doing?" Kari, having given up her original plan of the covert assessing the situation variety, had wondered on in to the 'big jar' room of previous Loki captivity, with safety abandonment, at the sight of the big blonde looking angry and vulnerable whilst his brother was busy gloating and holding his finger over a dangerous looking console. "What have you done?" Her voice lowered dangerously as she paused her strides further along the metal mesh flooring having come across a still alive but bleeding out Agent G. Coulson; bending to his side for an inspection between victim and stabber in an increasing frown.
Coulson's eyes shot her a warning flash as she reached out to touch his arm – apparently he did not trust her even after all their interrogation bonding - stilling her movements in time to turn her attention back to an eyebrow raised Loki. He had no time for her, not at this moment when about to finally defeat his brother and as if a bonus to his plotting in quite an embarrassing, for the warrior, way. Thor stepped back in his cage, a mixture of hurt and anger straining every muscle in his body, the mischief maker tilting his head into an intrigued 'oh' of silent pleasure as his fingers tapped the big red button that sent his long time nemesis to his abrupt, thousands of foot drop in a steel cage, death.
Sucking in two max capacity lungs full of air, Kari threw herself at the railing that once lined the edging of the glass prison. Oh, that was a long way down, a really, really long way down. Her mind could not even begin to comprehend just how high up and far Thor was possibly falling at that very second; and as if a second thought the trickster did not wish for her to dwell on any further, or perhaps just himself now fate was decided, the shutters below her swirled closed leaving her to stare wide eyed at what her imagination was conjuring up.
"Oh god…" She uttered between shallow breaths, cognitive abilities failing to reboot back to their basic operating system for the umpteenth time as she shook her head in a slow repeating swish.
"You're going to lose." A dying Coulson, as calm and carefree as a man on vacation, really seemed to be trying to push forward that ticking clock of his.
"Am I?" Loki took the bait, turning to do a little victory gloating over his previous victim – because ego's need love too.
"It's in your nature."
"Your hero's are scattered, your floating fortress falls from the sky, where is my disadvantage?" He chuckled at the foolish mortal, obviously suffering from some sort of debilitating death brain stupidity.
"You lack conviction." Coulson nodded as if he were pretty sure about this subject, having earned a doctorate in knowing people better than they know themselves.
"I don't think I-" Loki began only to be cut off by a laser blast to the gut and propelled backwards several feet and through a wall.
"So that's what it does." Mister goon gave an appreciative and curiosity satisfied nod at the large weapon in his arms – Loki probably should have taken the toy away but hey mad men had a lot on their minds in general to bother wasting time on such trivial things.
With her mouth gaping open, eyes wide enough to accommodate the majority of the room at once, Kari made a short sharp 'huh' sound before soon followed by an out of her mind laugh at the situation. All this time, she was sure Asgard was the most insane danger hole in the known universe and all along Earth was hiding these shenanigans. Well at least the agent was not pointing the weapon at her, then again he seemed kind of busy happily dying on the floor cradling his new favourite thing since ever – who was she to break them up.
Nonetheless, she held her hands up in surrender as she walked slowly past him, moving towards the gaping Loki shaped hole to check the bastard was really dead or something. No luck on that front; groaning, sure, but pretty much just livid dusty Loki getting to his feet in angry fashion like Godzilla waking up from a really annoying dream.
"You're such a dick!" She could not help the words vacating her mouth, it really needed to be said after all.
"Motter!"
The look in his eyes made her shiver, the tone of his voice made her squeak but it was most definitely the hands reaching out and grabbing her hair that made her want to pee her panties. This was so not loveable – wait ,what, when had he ever been that? – 'here have your memories back' Loki anymore. He really was just a green-eyed monster.