A/N: Another chapter! I wanted it to be a little longer, but I feel I stopped at the right point. I also think I did a little bit better with Loki this time around. I just need to delve into his inner turmoil a little more. I sound sadistic, haha. Anyways, Italics are from the movie like in the last chapter. Let me know what y'all think! Oops, I think I just gave away that I'm from Texas. Howdy? Don't be a stranger!

Chapter Six: Family Matters

"We should never have let him go," Volgstaff said, sitting on a couch as the other warriors talked about Thor's banishment. They had found Loki in the room when they had reached their usual spot for conversation.

Loki stood near the opening of the room that held a wide view of the kingdom. Here he could look out at the vast stars and think about what was to be done.

He was sent back far enough to prevent crossing Thor and bringing devastation to Midgard. He could hardly believe he had the chance to change history in such a way. But first, Thor's problem needed to be solved. Could his brother get Mjolnir on his own? What would he have to do to make sure Thor proved himself worthy?

'Thor will have to die again,' he thought as the others talked amongst themselves.

He felt nauseous at the thought. Swallowing away a closing throat, Loki firmly set his mind to work.

Could he even begin to plan an attempt at Thor's life like he once had? It would be like stabbing himself in the heart with a dull knife. Lots of pain and forcibly done.

'I already have a plan,' he realized, but not liking the realization at all.

"There was no stopping him." Lady Sif declared, knowing there was no way Thor wouldn't have gone once he had made up his mind.

"Well, at least he's only banished, not dead," Fandrall reasoned. "Which is what we'd all be if that guard hadn't told Odin where we'd gone."

Loki briefly looked down at the hand that had changed blue, knowing that a part of himself was a little troubled by it. Oh, who was he kidding? The past him was mortified. He knew he was not an absolute vile being the rest of Asgard considered Frost Giants to be, but his past self still felt distraught. It was hard fighting against the emotions. They were so anguished.

His body was not his own. He felt like he was forced out of the skin he thought was Aesir and fitted into a cold blue one with blood red eyes. A bit of outrage and pain started to swell up within him.

"How did the guard even know?" Volstagg questioned.

"I told him," Loki blurted out before he could stop himself. 'Drat!' he thought.

"What?" Fandral said.

"I told him to go to Odin after we'd left," Loki responded, deciding he may as well come clean. He felt his old self craving to tell them it was him that had saved them all. He wanted them all to know that it was his actions, and his alone, that had saved every single one of them. A Frost Giant wouldn't do that, because he was raised Asgardian. His actions proved himself worthy of being prince.

Loki bit the inside of his mouth until it bled. The thoughts that had invaded his head belonged in the past. Putting a stopper on them was very difficult; the proof being the blood on his tongue. He had to gain control of himself, though, if he was going to succeed and do right this time around.

'Petty of me!' he berated the thoughts his past self had been spouting. 'It was my fault in the first place why Thor even went. Prove myself worthy of what? Deceit?'

"You told the guard?" Volstagg asked as if for clarity.

Loki tried not to sneer.

"Would you rather be dead?" he asked with contempt.

He didn't need approval from the Warriors Three or Lady Sif. What was he thinking the first time they had had this conversation? He was glad he had refrained from listing out Thor's flaws.

Had he actually thought pointing out Thor's less admirable traits of being reckless and arrogant were going to make them see the person they looked up to any differently? It was laughable that he had thought such a plan would work.

Almost the entire state they were currently in was a bit humiliating for him. But he didn't have time to deal with that now.

All he wanted to do at the moment was to find a way to help Thor get Mjolnir back without killing him.

'Thor's going to have to basically die again in order to get Mjolnir back,' he knew. Mjolnir would not accept anything less than his mortal sacrifice. Why did he have to be tortured so?

It was when he died that Thor had finally got possession of his hammer in the past. Well, soon to be future now.

Loki worried again if he could go through with it. His nightmares of Thor dying had been agonizing, but he was now going to have to kill Thor in order to help him.

'Kill him again, admittedly,' he thought guiltily, 'but I know for a fact that he will not be dead for very long. His godly powers will come back once his mortal life is gone.'

"Loki," Lady Sif said, standing and going over to him. "You must go to the Allfather and convince him to change his mind."

Loki was a little surprised that she would ask the exact thing as she did in his past, but it didn't last long. He should have known she would ask the same; that they all would. They were Thor's best friends. They loved him almost as much as he did.

"When you lose something you love entirely," Loki said to Lady Sif and the three warriors, reflecting on witnessing the grief all mortals experienced when death came to visit, "like the way Thor loves Mjonir, you find out its true value."

The warriors and Sif looked at him in confusion. This didn't sound like Loki at all. And what did he, the silver tongue, know about losing anything?

"Thor has not lost much in his life," Loki went on, pulling himself out of his reverie of the mother and her dead child. "I love Thor more dearly than any of you. He needs to stay on Midgard for the good of Asgard."

"Thor is entirely powerless without his hammer," Lady Sif said, as if Loki's argument was not worth listening to. "You speak against Thor while he's suffering a derogatory existence among mortals."

Loki looked at Sif and the warriors as if seeing them clearly for the first time. Thor was a lot stronger than any one of them realized or gave him credit for. They saw the brute strength of Thor and the weapon he carried, but did not see what was in his heart. How were they his closest friends when they did not know such simple truths about his brother?

"I'm pleased with the radiant faith you place in my brother," he said derisively.

The look of shock on their faces pleased him, but not for long. He could not bring himself to speak any more than that to the four after witnessing the dishonor they displayed in their view of Thor.

He shook his head and walked out of the room.

Loki found himself before the Casket of Ancient Winters just as he had in the past. The pull of his old self towards the object was too strong to resist. But this time he was more prepared. Both for seeing his hands turn blue and of Odin's appearance.

"Stop!" came Odin's shout.

Loki placed the casket down, wondering if Odin thought he intended to take it and use it as a weapon against Asgard.

"I am a Frost Giant," Loki said, reeling in the inner turmoil he felt raging inside him. His old self's trust decaying, heart breaking, rage swelling. Was there even a bit of disgust and hatred towards himself for being a Frost Giant somewhere in there? And the worst of all: shame.

Loki felt himself quivering with the bombardment of emotions. He had great difficulty taming them, but his future-self had a firm grip on the rising emotions. He did not speak until they leveled out a bit.

He wouldn't give Odin the satisfaction of watching him lose control. Not if he could help it, at least.

He turned to face the Allfather, knowing his blue skin and red eyes still hadn't faded away.

"Yes," was all the old man said.

"In the aftermath of the battle," he explained, "I went to the temple and I found a baby. Small for a Giant's offspring. Abandoned, suffering, left to die. Laufey's son."

"Laufey's son," Loki repeated.

"Yes," Odin affirmed.

Loki knew where this conversation went, and did not wish to repeat it. But the past him was suffering, and some of the distress and anger leaked through.

"So I am no more than another stolen relic, locked up here until you might have use of me," Loki accused, wishing his heart didn't hurt as much as it did. It had already broken long ago. And now breaking once more.

"You are my son," Odin responded, "I only wanted to protect you-

"Wanting to protect me," Loki sneered, remembering the excuse Odin told him when he had asked why he wasn't told of his heritage, "because I'm the monster parents tell their children about at night? Is that what you want to tell me- why you lied to me all these years?"

"Why do you twist my words," Odin asked, visibly deflating as the Odinsleep came upon him.

"The pure truth cannot be twisted," Loki hissed, "You could have told me what I was from the beginning, Allfather. No matter how much you claim to love me, by calling me your son, you could never have a Frost Giant sitting on the throne of Asgard."

Loki was proud that his voice didn't hold the desperate tone it had when he first had the confrontation with Odin. It had remained relatively calm except for the few tremors that had leaked in from emotions too strong to hold back. He breathed heavily as he looked down at Odin's sleeping form, both distressed and calm at once.

But then he cracked.

"Aaauuuuhhh!" Loki barely recognized the cry as his own and didn't realize the hot tears that streaked down his face.

Fiery anger coursed through his veins, a terrible hurt stabbed his heart, and an unrelenting shame colored his face and gnawed at his stomach. Logically he knew being ashamed of something he couldn't change was pointless. Illogical. But it was still there nonetheless.

"Damn you!" he cried down to Odin's motionless body.

By the time Loki had calmed down, blood covered his clenched hands where his nails had bitten into his palms. He half expected the color to have been a revolting blue.

'Wonderful,' Loki thought through a tired haze, 'it seems my old self is set on believing we're a monster.' He looked sadly down at his hands. He remembered what they looked like in his true form.

'Why bring a Jotun to Asgard at all when there was so much prejudice here?' he thought. Did Odin truly believe he wouldn't hate himself when he finally found out that he was one of the very beings that Asgardians abhorred?

It was easy to believe the Allfather did it for his own amusement if nothing else. But Loki didn't go down that path. It was too much like self-pity and would not help in the least. But he did have to wonder about the whole thing.

What were the reasons Odin gave for taking him? Forming an alliance with Jotunheim? What a stupid plan. How would such a plan have worked when all of Asgard saw Frost Giants as terrible monsters and inferior beings? Did he not despise what he was; what he was born as?

No respect could be developed within a days, weeks, or most likely even years for the majority of Asgardian citizens when it came to Jotuns.

Time passed slowly on Asgard and generations did not replace the ones before it in as quickly as Midgardian ones did.

'How I envy them that,' Loki thought.

As it was, Loki was hardly liked here to begin with. For someone who was supposed to be so wise, Odin did not look to the practical application of his plan. Odin's "protect[ion]" was an insult in and of itself. Loki was a Frost Giant. You don't 'protect' people from what they are born being.

He looked as coldly as he could at Odin's un-moving form, took a few second to regain his composure, and calmly called for the guards.

"Mother!" Loki exclaimed, his emotions bubbling over the tight rim he had locked them in since his encounter with Odin.

Frigga wrapped her arms around him, evidently taking his distress as a response to Odin's condition instead of his grief of living so long without her alive.

He hugged her tight, not willing to let go in the time one usually did when giving and receiving affection.

"It's alright, dear," she said, thinking he must really be distraught at Odin's sleep. "Your father is going to be just fine."

Loki shook his head, not agreeing with her about his concern.

"I've missed you so much, mother," he responded, feeling tears sting his eyes and grief coloring his voice.

Frigga let out a small laugh. "I haven't gone anywhere, Loki. You've seen me not too long ago."

"It seems much longer to me," he said, pulling back to look at her.

Frigga put a comforting hand on his cheek, wondering about his statement.

"Come," she said, walking them to Odin's bed where he slept, "let's keep your father company."

"I don't want to sleep tonight," Loki said, refusing to sit across from his mother on the other side where Odin would separate them. "Can we not sit here and talk?"

Frigga was truly perplexed now more than before. She was certainly close to Loki, having taught him everything about magic, but he hadn't wanted to speak or stay up all through the night since when he was a boy and had just mastered a very advanced spell.

She figured he was more upset about Odin's sleep than he let on.

"If it will help, of course," she smiled.

Loki only nodded gratefully.

"I asked him to be honest with you from the beginning," Frigga told him when he finally told her what he and Odin had been talking about before he went into Odinsleep. "There should be no secrets in family."

Loki forced himself to retain eye contact. If anyone could tell he was keeping a secret, particularly one that deeply affected him, it would be his mother.

He would never tell her he was from the future. Never speak of her death or how much he grieved at her loss. How it nearly destroyed him.

He gave her hand a gentle squeeze. He had her here, alive, and wouldn't put her life at risk again. He had told that Dark elf where to go, hadn't he? He may as well have her blood on his hands.

The resentfulness and revenge the old part of himself still held against Thor and Odin were his biggest enemies at the moment. But as he spent more time in the presence of his mother, seeing that she was truly alive and well, he knew he could overcome his past emotions.

'What good are they anyway when I will be mortal eventually? Nothing but unnecessary burdens,' he thought. If he could save his mother, Thor, and even Asgard, too, since it was their home, giving up his immortality seemed like a good trade to him.

"So why did he lie?" Loki asked, just to hear her speak.

"He kept the truth from you so you would never feel different," she answered.

'That's a nice illusion,' Loki thought.

"You are our son, Loki," she continued, making Loki's eyes blink a few times to stop the emotion from flowing from his eyes. His mother did see him as her true son, which he always knew. "And we your family. You must know that."

Loki looked down, truly appreciating her words more this time than before. Yes, she was his mother, and Thor his brother, but Odin was nothing to him.

"You can speak to him," she said, "He can see and hear us even now."

'I have nothing to say to him,' Loki thought.

"How long will it last," he asked instead, avoiding her indication to talk to Odin.

"I don't know," she answered, "This time it's different. We were unprepared."

"I don't think I'm used to seeing him like this," Loki lied. He was more than used to seeing the Allfather in such a weakened state while he was impersonating him. "The most powerful being in the Nine Realms, lying helpless. Till his body is restored."

"He's put it off for so long now that I fear. You're a good son," she continued, making him look over at her again.

'No, I'm not,' he thought, 'not to you.'

"We mustn't lose hope that your father will return to us," she said, "And your brother."

"What hope is there for Thor?" he asked with a different tone than the first time he had voiced the question. He hadn't wanted his brother's return the first time.

"There's always a purpose for everything your father does," she said as though it were the truest thing in all of Asgard.

Loki knew why he had looked up to Odin even as he always felt the distance between himself and the man. Frigga spoke about him with deep admiration and trust. There wasn't much wonder as to why he had try so hard to get Odin's approval when the person he loved as much as Thor would venerate him to such a degree.

"Thor may yet find a way home," she finished.

'He will if I can help it,' Loki thought.

Loki got up and moved a little ways about the room.

His head snapped up in surprise when the doors creaked open to reveal a line of soldiers out in the hall. He nearly forgot about this in the past!

The guards saluted and then kneeled. A high councilman walked in bearing Gungnir. Kneeling before Loki when he reached him.

He still felt his past self be a bit confused, but knew he was the king of Asgard now that he was the only prince able to take over for Odin. No one knew he was a Frost Giant. If they did, there was no way they would be presenting him with Odin's staff. Hell, they probably were reluctant to give it to him now. He was no great warrior like Thor, even though he could hold his own in a match even without magic.

He reached out and took Gungnir while his mother spoke from where she sat, catching his brief hesitation before he had picked up the staff.

"Thor is banished," she said in a strong voice, "The line of succession falls to you. Until Odin awakens, Asgard is yours."

Loki held the staff firmly. He could do this again, and he had experience. Maybe even addressing the homeless issues and those in poverty would help before they became bigger problems down the road. He may as well, seeing as he had the power to make a difference.

He didn't like the majority of Asgardians, but it was still Thor's home, and his mother's. He could at least make some positive changes that wouldn't be too time consuming.

"Make your father proud," Frigga said, making Loki suppress a look of distaste. He wanted to do nothing of the sort for such a man. But he would rule Asgard well for his mother.

"My king," Frigga gave a slight nod. It was good to know she always considered him worthy of the throne.

'Even when I wasn't,' he thought a little sadly.