Thank you ever so much for the kind reviews! To those I couldn't reply to: Anon (Sept. 1), thank you, I really was hoping to hear from some locals from the places I've written about, and I'm always so glad to get a stamp of approval from one who knows better than I. You have much to appreciate! Guest (Sept. 2), I am so honored! I think Loki approves of stalking, BTW.
Continued thanks to Timid Timbuktu who was immense help in getting McMurdo's geography straightened out in my mind and having all the places Jane and Loki go there make sense. And oh my goodness, I almost forgot, thanks also to Celeryy who also got research-happy and sent me some cool pictures and South Pole station walk-through videos which are truly truly awesome. Google it for yourself if you want to see where Jane and Loki are going to be hanging out for a while.
Chapter 12 "Opening" came tumbling out of me, probably from words getting pent up following how ridiculously long this chapter took. But this was not actually due to any plot reasons, it just came down to my obsessive need to get the details right as Jane and "Lucas" reach their destination. In any event, that means another chapter goes up pretty quickly, ironically enough the chapter it took me some three weeks to write in the first place.
Onward then, there's one more flight to go!
/
Beneath
Chapter Eleven – Unpacking
Jane stood outside sweating in Antarctica. She really hadn't expected that. Big Red was slung over her carry-ons.
Half an hour ago she had taken another long, slow ride on Ivan the Terra Bus out to Pegasus airfield. The LC-130 Hercules – a military aircraft flown by the New York Air National Guard – had already landed, but it had to be refueled and prepped before it could take off again. Among the others loitering on the ice were three others bound for the Pole – Rodrigo Ortiz, Gillian Waters, and Lucas Cane. She had chatted with Rodrigo for a little while, but found it difficult to keep up her side of the conversation. She was uncontrollably excited now that she was about to get on the final flight – at last! – and standing around and staring at the plane that would serve as that final link to her destination and not being able to actually get on it and get this thing underway was making her childishly antsy. She was full of pent-up frustrated energy with no way to expend it.
The previous evening had been crazy busy, with little time to think much beyond the moment. She, Morgan, and Cody had hurried down Ob Hill as quickly as was safe – during a previous stay at McMurdo Cody had sped up the descent by sliding and wanted to try it again, but Jane looked at the rocks and the rather patchy snow cover and was too nervous about ending her Antarctic trip with only a single day at McMurdo and a broken leg to show for it, so they went down the same way they came up. Back in town they bade hasty goodbyes as Jane raced off to Building 155 and her dorm room to lose the ECW gear she was now sweating into and grab her bags for Bag Drag Round 2. Cody and Morgan had offered to help, but Jane was stubborn and had never liked it when people thought she couldn't do things for herself just because she was petite. So she dragged and lugged and rolled her bags back for weighing and check-in, and then it was off to the briefing for travel to the South Pole and more safety and procedures and do's and do not's.
She'd first met Rodrigo and Gillian there, both repeat offenders to the Pole and both stuck in Mactown for the last three days after their initial flight had boomeranged due to bad weather. Rodrigo was on his second trip and would be the satellite communications tech, subbing in for someone who had to go home on a personal emergency; he was friendly and warm and sporting a solid stubble that could not quite qualify as a beard. Gillian, on her fourth trip, was relaxed but reserved, apparently uninterested in conversation beyond answering questions put to her. The distance she was putting between herself and everyone else was almost palpable…mostly, Jane thought with a guilty glance toward Lucas, because she recognized the behavior. We're not going to be friends so let's not pretend otherwise.
Lucas seemed aloof…and overdressed. He wore stone gray slacks and a long sleeve button-down shirt in a rich brown color and made from much nicer material than anything in her closet. The shirt was tucked in and the pants were cinched at the waist with a belt, and whatever those shoes he was wearing were, they didn't exactly look practical. At least he'd foregone a tie. Rodrigo had on a multi-colored knit sweater and jeans and Gillian had on a short-sleeved blue T-shirt over a long-sleeved black one with cargo pants, while for the sake of time Jane had stuck with the Carhartts and flannel she'd had on all day. One of these things is not like the other, she thought. Probably he'd grown up rich. He looked like somebody who'd grown up rich, and was taught proper behavior and things like that. His posture was impeccable and she'd never seen anyone make sitting down look so elegant. She remembered something he'd said back in Sydney, that he was estranged from his family. Not so estranged that he didn't have a healthy trust fund, she figured.
After the briefing she'd asked Lucas if he wanted to go for a drink with her, Morgan, and Cody, but he repeated that he planned to turn in early; Rodrigo and Gillian had other plans. So she headed out to the prefabricated steel Quonset hut that was home to the Coffee House, a coffee and wine bar with walls covered in hardwood paneling. Jane immediately found it warm and inviting and could imagine herself spending a good portion of her down time here if she were staying at McMurdo. With the hike, bag drag, and the briefing, Jane had missed dinner, so Morgan had grabbed her a sandwich and some kind of chickpea salad and a lemonade, and it was waiting for her at the table they sat at with two other guys. Jane relaxed into the chair they'd saved for her and enjoyed the evening, lingering for over two hours when she'd meant to stay only one. She did limit herself to just one glass of Australian shiraz, paranoid about the deleterious effects of alcohol in the Antarctic that the earlier briefing had warned about…although no one else seemed all that concerned.
She'd hurried back out into the sunlit night, gotten ready for bed, closed tired eyes under the covers, and fallen asleep in minutes, never even waking when her unmet roommate showed up sometime during the night.
In the morning she'd been ravenous and raced to get ready and head out to the galley, quietly so she would not disturb her roommate. A hot hearty breakfast later she'd said final farewells to Morgan, Cody, and a few other friendly faces she'd met along the way in case she didn't see them at lunch. They had jobs to do and she had e-mails to send.
She had internet access from her dorm room, but she'd heard the views from Crary Lab were outstanding so she took her laptop there, Erik first and foremost on her mind. She'd sensed he was struggling since what Thor's brother had done to him, and hadn't been able to see him in person since it happened. She'd made a commitment to "be there" for him as much as she could even though she couldn't physically be there at all. She owed him at least that much. She spent a couple of hours sending Erik and a few friends descriptions of her ECW gear and of her kayaking and sheep farm tours in New Zealand, uploading a few pictures from her phone to send. The sheep farm reminded her of Thor and his parking lot visit, and remembering Thor's visit reminded her that she'd again failed to get a photo of Thor; and this time – as far as she knew – no one from SHIELD had been following her in New Zealand snapping pictures they could later send her. Of course, it would have been in seriously bad form to ask this time around. I know you're busy trying to prevent a war, but here, say cheese!
She wandered around exploring McMurdo for a while then went to a lunch she wasn't hungry for but figured she should try to eat anyway given the day's schedule. After another round of goodbyes she went back to her room to prepare for departure, took her carry-ons, handed in her key, and headed out for check-in and her appointment with Ivan the Terra Bus.
She couldn't believe this was real.
When they were finally signaled to board, Jane tried to catch Lucas's eye to share her excitement with him, but he was studying the aircraft. She tried to study it too, but didn't really know anything about airplanes or have much interest in learning. It had kind of a fat nose, four propellers, and red stripes on the wings and tail, or whatever you called those parts of a plane. Still, this one was special, because of where it was taking her…and because of the giant skis it used in landings. She climbed up the handful of stairs and was surprised to find how claustrophobic it felt on the inside, stuffed to the brim it seemed with cargo, most of it carefully wrapped in anonymous giant shrink-wrapped boxes, plus their luggage secured in oversized green bags and a few bulky random items, such as a piece of machinery that looked something like a giant piston. The women's bathroom, in turned out, involved a veritable obstacle course of climbing up and over that cargo; Jane was glad she'd gone right before departing the station, and decided not to drink any more of the water she'd brought with her, regardless of the medical briefing. She figured since this was one of the last flights of the season, they must be trying to pile as much cargo as possible into every flight.
She settled uncomfortably into a red paratrooper jump seat; it wasn't that the seat itself was so uncomfortable, just that it was a paratrooper jump seat. If parachuting out the side of an airplane was part of the standard training for going to the South Pole, SHIELD had skipped that section, she thought with an uneasy laugh. She was about 98% sure that the jump seats had nothing to do with anyone actually using a parachute over Antarctica.
The ramp started to close up, blotting out more and more of the bright sunshine. It was February 9. Amundsen-Scott Station closed for winter on February 15; from then on there would be no more flights until November. She glanced around at her fellow passengers as they were sealed inside the plane – Rodrigo to her right, and Lucas and Gillian across from them, largely hidden behind the cargo. This was it. In three hours they would all be at the South Pole, with no turning back.
/
/
While Jane had been out climbing Observation Hill, Loki found her dorm room, which turned out to be just down the corridor from the room he'd allowed her to lead him to earlier, and just one corridor away from his own.
He made it there without incident and found himself standing before her locked door. He had expected this obstacle and was prepared for the consequences of what he would have to do. The lock was a simple design of pins and tumbler, not often encountered on Asgard, at least not on its own. Simplicity aside, Loki was no locksmith and he could not see what he was doing. He bent over a little at the waist, closed his eyes, reached his fingers toward the keyhole, and felt for the shapes inside the lock. He concentrated until he could visualize them, and tried to cast aside the concern that in the long minutes this was taking someone could come along and observe him paying an unnatural amount of attention to a doorknob.
He knew he'd been successful even before the doorknob turned from the familiar pain that shot up from his right foot up into his knee. He stumbled inside and closed the door behind him, quickly assessing his surroundings. Three sets of bunkbeds, two of them made, Jane's laptop carrier on top of the one to his right, no one else in the room. He'd knocked before beginning on the lock, but even so he couldn't be certain he wouldn't walk in on someone until got inside.
He only needed the laptop, but decided it made more sense to take it in its bag. Making sure the door remained unlocked so that he wouldn't have to expend any further magic that invoked "Curse Number Two," as he had taken to thinking of it, Loki crept out into the corridor again, clenching his jaw against another wave of simmering rage at again having to stoop to what was essentially a petty criminal act.
In the end, it turned out to be much easier than he'd hoped; she hadn't even logged out of her e-mail. SHIELD's misguided confidence that the one to whom Clint Barton had revealed everything would not be coming back continued to pay off, and while Loki was downloading what he needed onto Jane's laptop using the internet connection at the Coffee House – his own room was wired for this but was also occupied by three men he had no desire to interact with – he took a cursory look over the other files on her computer. He internally filed away bits and pieces for potentially useful later reference, but only one item gave him real pause. It was rather a series of items, eight images of Jane and Thor – side-by-side, holding hands, embracing – which she had uploaded only a couple of days ago. Loki recognized the background visible in some of the images depending on the angle; it was the same phenomenon he'd observed outside of Melfort. Given the upload date and the fact that an aurora was only visible near the planet's northern-most and southern-most areas…Loki's eyes narrowed.
Thor had gone to Jane in Norway.
Loki had seen for himself how tired Odin was; he was almost certainly again postponing his restoration. Thor would not have remained long. Just long enough to warn Jane to keep an eye out for his wayward outcast former brother.
In retrospect he should not have taunted Thor with the comment about Norway; there was no need to plant the idea that he may have known where SHIELD had sent Jane. But Thor was so delightfully tauntable he'd simply been unable to resist, and his reaction had been entertaining even in its predictability. And in the end it seemed no harm had come of it. At least he hadn't seen any sign of unexpected thunderstorms yet, he thought, swallowing and flicking an involuntary glance upward.
The process took around 45 minutes, most of that due to the slow internet connection. He was soon back in Jane's room, the door mercifully still unlocked and opened with a simple flick of the wrist. He checked again that the stuffed animal she'd bought in Sydney was placed in her laptop carrier exactly as he'd found it, that the location and angle of the bag's placement was also precisely matched, that the blanket on her bed was no more or less rumpled than it had been before.
His hopes for a rather flawless day crashed when he heard a woman's voice at the door – not Jane's. He had only a second to come up with a plan, and in the end there was only one other person who was supposed to be in this room.
"Oh, hey, I'm Wanda," the woman who came in said. She should have seemed short but now seemed oddly tall.
"Jane," Loki said, fresh needles of pain shooting up his leg. He couldn't hide the grimace that came with this one; in his haste he'd simply reacted and forgotten Curse Number Two. He cleared his throat and through the pain knew he'd failed to come out with anything that approximated Jane's voice. He could create of himself at least a passable version of just about anything he could see, but he hadn't exactly had a chance to study the details of the anatomy of Jane's vocal tract to be able to produce sounds at the proper frequencies.
Wanda started to say something else but Loki only wanted one thing: the most rapid escape possible. The pain in his leg was already fading but his ability to mimic Jane wasn't going to get much better. Clutching his/Jane's stomach he mumbled, "Sorry, I have to go," in the closest he could get to Jane's voice. He hurried to the door, pushed past Wanda, and turned into the corridor toward the restrooms. He heard the door close behind him, followed by another door further down the corridor. He took a quick glance around, found himself alone, and quickly reverted to his own form with a shudder. That had not been pleasant. He hoped it wouldn't create a problem.
And so far it didn't seem that it had. He had glimpsed Jane as she went for breakfast in the morning, and nothing had appeared amiss. He glanced at her now, waiting at Pegasus airfield, and she seemed lost in thought. He hoped she would feel his eyes on her and turn toward him – he would let her see the disdain he held for her, just for a moment – but she did not. He looked back at the airplane and waited. When they were finally told to board, he dawdled, getting on after Jane so he could make sure he did not sit near her.
Things had not gone entirely according to plan at first, but they were most definitely back on track.
/
/
Jane and Rodrigo both spent about half an hour of the three-hour flight hanging out in the cockpit with the pilots. The views of the Transantarctic Mountains with their ridges of rock undulating out from beneath the snow were breathtaking. They reminded you that for all the snow and ice, this was not the Arctic, this was Antarctica, an honest-to-goodness land-mass continent. And strange as she knew it would sound, Jane couldn't help remarking that in places they made her think of a brown-and-white version of Arizona's Painted Desert. The pilots had interesting stories to tell, having served between them numerous tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, and they weren't averse to telling them, even over the roar of the engines.
Jane snapped off some pictures on her phone, and was really beginning to regret not investing in a decent regular camera. SHIELD wasn't making her rich but she could've afforded a camera; she just wasn't used to having any excess cash that could be put into personal luxuries instead of the expensive components needed for much of the equipment she used in her research. Her five-year-old two-generations-ago cell phone wasn't exactly going to cut it in seriously sub-zero temperatures.
Back in her seat, she tried to read, but found herself re-reading the same page and even the same paragraph over and over when the words wouldn't sink in. At one point she worked her way around the narrow walkway looping between the cargo in the middle and the seats along the bulkheads to say something – she wasn't actually sure what – to Lucas, but he and Gillian were two peas in entirely unconnected pods, both appearing to be asleep, Gillian with headphones trailing wires down to a probable Mp3 player somewhere. Jane returned to her seat to Rodrigo's shouted "Not long now!" and fell back into an old strategy of relaxing through rote repetition of facts she'd memorized to a beat in school that helped her still recall even things she didn't need to actually remember anymore. She began with reciting the elements of the periodic table, but it didn't work very well because she kept getting stuck at whatever came after cadmium, which only further agitated her.
Then at last as Jane gripped the edge of her seat in another attack of nerves – skis were supposed to maintain your momentum, not slow it – the plane did in fact come to a stop and competing heady emotions swirled in her enough to moisten her eyes. She shook out her fingers, which had gone a little numb, and self-consciously dabbed at her eye as though she'd had a tiny bit of debris in it rather than a tear that threatened to fall.
The door isn't boarded up, Jane thought, remembering what Young-Soo had said. It's opening right in front of me.
Rodrigo was nudging her. "Gear," he shouted over the roar of the turboprops. He was already in Big Red and was pulling his facemask on.
Embarrassed, Jane pulled on her jacket and started grabbing for the rest of her gear. As soon as she was properly bundled up she stood and gathered her two bags. Cold air was rushing in through the open hatch; Jane could feel it but with everything on she was pretty sure she'd experienced New Mexico winter nights that were colder than this. She followed her fellow passengers out the door, down the steps, and onto the packed snow that the plane had somehow landed on.
The air got colder and packed a real punch now that she was off the plane and the wind was whipping from the turboprops – they'd been briefed that at the Pole they left the engines running to prevent the fuel lines from freezing. If the pilot had announced the temperature she'd missed it, but it was definitely colder than McMurdo. She could feel the altitude, too. Her bags felt heavier than they should have and each full, normal breath of air felt like it wasn't quite enough. Definitely not your typical New Mexico evening. Tromso hadn't been this cold in winter, her lungs were telling her.
Boots crunching over the ice, she kept her head down and followed Rodrigo's back as their group moved away from the plane and its propellers, and when he stopped to turn, perhaps to check on her or to look back at the airplane, she got her first real view of the station. Gun-metal gray, the large building's four wings stuck out and obscured portions of the long central area they each connected to. To her right were numerous smaller buildings, a few heavy-duty vehicles that looked as though they belonged in this climate, and large wooden boxes of various sizes. To her left – just a few buildings and endless snow and ice, all the way to the horizon where the sun was up but low.
A little further from the plane some 40 or 50 people were standing around with familiar carry-on bags and lots of red, and a small knot of people were approaching the new arrivals. Jane couldn't help staring at the larger group, those who were perhaps saner than she and getting out while they still had the chance. She laughed at herself, then coughed on the dry cold air that rushed in after the laugh. Someone clapped an arm around Rodrigo's shoulder and the two started for the station. Someone else approached Gillian, but Jane's attention quickly turned to the two men coming up to her and Lucas.
"Cyrus Wright, call me Wright," said a burly bearded man in an unzipped brown jacket instead of Big Red, extending a hand to first Jane, then Lucas.
"Selby Higgins," said the taller man, balding though he looked rather young, sporting the familiar red jacket, all zipped up.
Jane and Lucas briefly introduced themselves, and were welcomed by Selby and Wright.
"We're the winter team for the South Pole Telescope, but we'll talk plenty of shop later. Come on, let's get you inside," Selby said, and started to take Jane's two bags.
She protested, but he insisted and she gave in reluctantly. Lucas seemed happy to let Wright carry his bags; he must have been feeling the altitude, too. When they made it to the main building and started up the exterior stairs – the building was elevated to allow for snow drift – and Jane's legs and lungs began to burn way more than they should have for just one flight of stairs, her reluctance turned to gratitude.
A thick heavy door opened and Jane followed Selby through it, grateful for the warmth that hit her and the decreased strain on her body when she was walking on level ground again. On the right were stairs leading up to the second level; they turned into the first room on the left, a lounge with couches and chairs and a flat-screen TV.
Jane sank gratefully into a green sofa in what they were told was the B3 lounge, having quickly returned to the more familiar condition of sweating in all her gear. Big Red was unzipped and shrugged out of; she slung it over the back of her chair. Gillian was arguing that it was her fourth winter here and she shouldn't have to stay for this orientation, but Ken Ryan, the station support supervisor, was adamant. Apparently Ken's predecessor had been more lenient.
They filled out a few papers, watched an orientation video, and then Ken made a few remarks. They would all meet with the winter site manager at 8:30 the next morning, and Jane and Lucas would then meet with the science support manager at 9:30. They got their room assignments, and when they went back out into the hallway they found Selby and Wright loitering there as promised. This time Jane insisted on carrying her own bags, though she noted that Lucas let Wright take his again. She and Lucas followed Selby and Wright, while Gillian and Rodrigo headed off on their own, already knowing their way around. They passed through more industrial-looking corridor with exposed ductwork and pipes in the ceiling and metal doors with portholes in them and the occasional brightly-colored tiled square patterns on the wall until coming to a stop in a corridor of the A1 wing.
"This is it, home sweet home," Selby said quietly in case anyone working nights was sleeping in nearby rooms. He pushed the door open for Jane.
She stared at the door knob on the open door for a moment, realized she hadn't been given a key. "No locks?" she asked.
"No need," Wright said with a grin. "Our closest neighbors are the Russians at Vostok Station and they're a very long way away with a whole lot of ice and cold between us. Uninvited guests aren't exactly a problem here. Nothing's locked. This is the safest place in the world."
Creepy, Jane thought, but shrugged it off and glanced at Lucas, who had stopped with Wright at a room just two doors down. Wright then ducked into Lucas's room and came back out without the bags.
"I'm in the next room down, by the way, on the inside," Selby said, pointing past Lucas. "I guess this is the newbie strip. So, you guys can find your way back to the galley? Good," Selby continued when he got two nods. "We'll see you in half an hour or so then?"
"Sounds great, thanks," Jane said, stepping into the room and flicking on the light. The first thing that caught her eye was the bed. She was going to need mountain-climbing gear to get into it. Then she noted a little white plastic stepstool at the foot. So, okay, no mountain-climbing gear necessary, but middle-of-the-night barely-awake trips to the bathroom down the hall were going to be pretty risky. She pulled the stool over and tested it out, decided she was going to have to find a taller stool or make herself a booster seat version of this one. The desk and chair looked perfectly adequate, and with the armoire closet plus the drawers under the raised bed she figured storage wouldn't be a problem. She took a few steps over to the narrow window – she could feel the cold coming through it – and had a view mostly of the next wing of the station, and off to the left snow and various small structures.
Although it was cold right by the window, the station was quite well heated and Jane started shedding layers, then opened up her boomerang bag carry-on and pulled out a pair of jeans to go with the white T-shirt and unbuttoned blue-and-white plaid flannel she already had on. She tugged on a pair of sneakers – plain old sneakers – and sighed with contentment. She felt like herself again, normal, full of a rush of energy, ready to conquer the world. She looked back toward the window, reminded herself that she and her sneakers and worn jeans and flannel were at the South Pole. She chuckled at the sense of disbelief that had so quickly washed over her; in these clothes she could be just about anywhere and easily forget.
Turning to look at herself in the mirror, she grimaced at her unruly hair. Balaclavas were not helpful in that regard. She found her brush and began working on it. A ponytail would have been easier, but she suspected that with only two two-minute showers per week allowed, there would be more than enough ponytails in her future so it would be nice to leave it down for now. Hair reasonably in place, she glanced at her watch, then struggled to get her too-tall bed made with the linens that had been left in the room. When she was done with that, she still had a few minutes to start unpacking her things. Just setting her laptop on the desk and plugging it into the LAN connection made it start to feel like her desk. After nearly three weeks of hotels and a whirlwind of travel and sightseeing, this really was her home-sweet-home until November.
She opened the shallow top right-hand drawer to put away her thick black notebook and found that she could not slide it all the way in. Reaching her hand into the back of the drawer, she grasped something hard and pulled it out. It was a hardcover book, Roses by Many Names, with a captivating close-up shot down into the opened petals of a peachy-pink rose. According to the cover it catalogued over two thousand rose varieties with photographs and detailed information on where and how to grow each one.
Jane pursed her lips, glanced around the room. It was empty save her carry-ons and the furniture, with no vestiges of the prior occupant. It had been cleaned well, yet somehow this book had been missed by whoever cleaned it and forgotten by the resident. She raised her eyebrows as it occurred to her it may have been left deliberately, a gift to the newcomer, a warm reminder of the life that existed outside this harsh, barren environment.
She stuck her notebook in the drawer and the book on top of it – she could at least start out being neat, she figured – and decided she'd try to read about one rose per day. It would be good for her to focus on something unrelated to work each day, and the connection to her mother appealed to her as well. She added a couple of pens and pencils and some draft paper to the drawer, then shook out her hands; they'd started to tingle a bit. She could feel a headache coming on, too, but ignored it and continued unpacking her carry-ons.
/
/
Loki boosted himself up onto the bed with his satchel and consciously let the tension drain out of him. His muscles went slack and his eyes drifted closed. He hadn't slept since leaving Asgard – and he hadn't slept well there. He could admit to himself, now that he was truly at rest, that he was exhausted.
He took another glance around the room. Meager was putting it politely. His prison cell had been larger and had not required him to walk down a hall to reach a communal bathroom; the bed in his old room in the palace had been about the size of this room. There was a pervasive chemical smell that spoke of a recent thorough cleaning and still Loki discerned the scent of the previous occupant.
None of this bothered him in the slightest.
He had made it. He was in the door, the uninvited guest that Wright was so unconcerned about. A lazy smirk crept over his face as he pictured Wright carrying around his bags, an unwitting servant of that uninvited guest. He had made it, and no one was the slightest bit suspicious.
Jane might have lingering doubts, but he could fix that. His smirk turned into a laugh, a real laugh absent of malice or darkness, making him feel as light as air. Jane thought SHIELD had sent him. I know exactly who you are, she'd said. It had actually given him a brief moment of apprehension. Him, working as a spy for SHIELD. The irony was too much. He would have to tell…someone…about it…someday.
He sobered; the smile fell from his lips.
This room would suffice. Meager though it was, it was his for as long as he needed it to be, and lock or no, he would not be disturbed here. He could blanket the room to block sound waves and sleep without any concern. He could shed these uncomfortable clothes and put on something much more pleasant from his satchel.
As soon as that thought occurred to him he jumped off the bed and started pulling off the layers of rough garments as rapidly as he could. With uncharacteristic disorganization he opened and upended the satchel, dumping its contents on the bed. Everything inside was from Asgard, all except for the horse hat he'd been given in Melfort. Rifling through the few garments that had been packed for him he found the thin soft long-sleeved black tunic and loose pants he usually wore to bed and pulled them on. The association of sleep with these garments was strong, and he found his eyelids growing heavy. He could skip dinner; he could skip the tour. He hadn't come here for Cyrus-call-me-Wright or Selby and he didn't care about sports facilities and greenhouses and saunas. He would let Jane show him all these things later.
He ran a hand down his body and went to Jane's door back in his basic issued gear after tugging on his actual boots, scowling over the right foot that felt much better bare.
/
/
A strong sense of déjà vu struck Jane as she stood in her doorway looking at Lucas. It was him, and yet not him in some way, a different him. Less energy, less…something. So when he told her he was feeling tired and not going to dinner, she didn't try to press him to go.
"Do you want me to bring you something? I could leave a tray outside your door."
"No, thank you. I'll be fine until breakfast. I just wanted to let you know so you don't wait for me."
"Well, okay. I'll see you at breakfast then?"
"Probably so," he answered with a tight smile. "Goodnight," he said with a quick nod, then turned back to his room.
"Goodnight," Jane called softly after him. She closed her door with a sigh. She would bring him something anyway. This wasn't going to be easy.
/
/
Back in his room Loki let his clothes revert to his own and pulled off his boots again for sweet relief. He quickly began putting away the things from his satchel that were scattered over the bed so he could get to the sheets that were stacked underneath it. He had never made a bed before in his life but if he could avert wars, start wars, and orchestrate the death of a king, he could certainly figure out how to properly put sheets on a bed. Still, if only he had that lovely little scepter, he would find Wright and happily make him do it for him.
He picked up the satchel and stuck his hand inside, feeling around to make sure it was empty. His hand brushed a small protrusion in one of the pockets. He opened the satchel wide and grasped the leather tie that lashed the cover down to a metal prong on the pocket, pulling it away. Reaching inside, he found a clear glass container of dark red liquid, slightly shorter and fatter than his forefinger, narrowed at the neck and capped by a clear glass stopper. He knitted his brow; unlike everything else in his satchel, he had never seen this item before.
He hopped up onto the bed and held the container up closer to his eyes, and when his eyes told him nothing new he reached out with something deeper.
Loki.
He blinked, startled. He glanced toward the door, then around the rest of the room. No one was there. No one knew his real name. He sealed the room from all sound waves; no sound would come in and none would go out. He reached out to see the energies around the bottle again. They were muddled, odd, unnatural. Bent and wrongly colored and dark.
Loki.
His mouth fell slightly ajar. He knew that voice. It was his mother's. He closed his mouth, focused his attention again, and this time did not lose that focus when he heard his name.
Loki. My son. Listen carefully to me; you will only hear this message once. In this vial is a tonic of strongest magic, a link between me and the enchanted gem I will have given you. Thor has told me of the enemies you have made, and his fears for your safety. I fear as well, Loki. You will learn that your father has not left you defenseless. Magic has not been forbidden to you, only its inappropriate use. Defending yourself in true innocence is not inappropriate. Yet so much of your innocence has been lost, I still fear for you. No one knows what I have done; your father would have forbidden it. He can be severe, Loki, but do not see this as a lack of love; he has been equally severe with Thor when he believed it was merited. And if there had been time to prepare, when Thor was banished, I would have done the same for him that I am doing for you. This is my love for you both.
Listen carefully, my son. So long as you wear the necklace I will give you, if you drink the contents of this vial, you will be immediately brought to safety by my side. You mustn't do this lightly; the journey would not be an easy one. The ingredients were difficult to obtain, and there will be consequences for us both if it is used; I wouldn't be able to give you this means of escape a second time. I hope that it will not be needed a first time. Please, Loki, learn. Seek understanding and compassion for others and you may find it for yourself. Remember the love you have felt for us and we for you. Let go of your anger and let your pain heal. We will always be your family. And we will anxiously await your return.
Loki stared at the vial and listened as hard he could, as though he could pull forth more words through sheer will. But none came. He laid it down on the bed, then picked it up again. Silence. He relaxed his grip on it, realizing that in the intensity of his efforts he was squeezing it. It wouldn't do to shatter this little surprise.
His head began to hurt. From whatever magic was used to impart his mother's words, from fatigue, from Odin's curses – any or all, he thought, shaking his head. It was too much to take in. Words and phrases echoed in his mind. Some that shocked, some that warmed his reluctant heart as only his mother could, some that evoked a familiar rage and a desire to lash out and harm. For now, he could focus only on the shock. A secret escape route. There was something slightly distasteful in the idea of being rescued by running to hide himself behind his mother's skirts, but he had to admit there were probably no safer skirts in all the realms. Although she rarely exercised it, his soft-spoken mother wielded powerful enchanting magic. And although there had been no indication that the threat against him from an unknown realm would be made good on, this was the only thing he truly feared. An escape route could prove useful. He put the little glass bottle back in the pocket of his satchel and fastened the leather tie over the metal hook to keep it secured inside. He would take this satchel with him everywhere, and he had already promised not to remove the chain. Now there was nothing to fear.
Now there was one less variable, one less reason for being in this frozen wasteland, which would permit him to pursue others with greater attention.
Tomorrow he would begin pursuing variables. Pursuing Jane, in his own way. Tonight he would sleep.
/
Now's as good a time and place as any to give a public thanks to the men and women at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station (yes, right now, 2012 winter season, they have about a month and a half to two months to go), a number of whom have so graciously responded to my initial e-mail and then answered my questions about layout and equipment and schedules and furniture and group dynamics and procedures and just about anything you can imagine, and sent pictures and links and diagrams. I literally could not be writing this without them. (OK, I could, but it would be bad.) That doesn't mean I won't miss something somewhere and get a few details wrong, that's obviously not their fault but mine. I won't continue to mention them here, but I owe them an awful lot for pretty much every chapter that follows here, and to varying extents in earlier chapters as well. Guess what the Polies watched for their Midwinter celebration? The Avengers!
Teasers for Ch. 12 ("Opening") - Tony Stark puts in an appearance (sort of!), and "Lucas" challenges Jane's assumptions about what can and can't be done.
And excerpt:
"Okay…so…maybe we should get to know each other, huh? One step at a time. We've still got" – she paused to glance up at the screen hanging from the ceiling – "about an hour before our meeting with the winter site manager. Let's get started."
"All right."
(I realize this is just "she" and "he" in this particular bit...but come on, now, I'm pretty sure names aren't necessary.)