This chapter is more about what is fun and what is not, you might say, though there is some actual fun itself here and there...

BTW, in case you don't happen to have a Word doc keeping track of dates and such (like me!), it has been about a week since King Gullveig's two-week deadline.

/


Beneath

Chapter Twenty-Seven – Fun

The walk back to the station, shorter than normal because the jamesways were much closer than any of the dark sector facilities, consisted of Jane trying to convince Lucas to go to the pre-party concert as well.

"Don't get used to this," he told her when he finally agreed.

"You got to name Pathfinder, so it's only fair."

"Fair," he repeated with a dark chuckle, muffled but audible underneath the balaclava. "You're far too naïve if you're still concerned with what's fair."

"Oh, relax, Lucas, honestly. We've just had a major success, the sun has set, we had good food with lots of freshies, now there's a concert and a party. It's okay to just let yourself go once in a while and have fun, you know."

"I'm not here to have fun."

Jane rolled her eyes and was glad Lucas couldn't see it. "I know, I know, I know. Enough with that already. Besides, you've already broken the 'Lucas-Cane-Does-Not-Have-Fun' rule today. You said you had fun playing darts."

They had reached the station, closing the thick metal door behind them and pushing through the dangling strips of plastic that always made Jane feel as though she were coming and going from a meat locker. Lucas had already removed his hat, goggles, and balaclava, and was shaking the melting ice from the latter. "I agreed to go to these events. I did not agree to enjoy it."

"Whatever," Jane said, tugging off her own gear, uncertain whether he was serious or going for dry humor…but she would have bet on serious this time. She was going to have fun tonight, and she was going to do her best to see that Lucas did, too. "You know, bad stuff is a part of life sometimes, Lucas. It's up to you how you react. You don't have to let it destroy you."

He started to respond, but Jane flashed him a smile and turned to go, calling "See you at the concert" over her shoulder.

/


/

Bad stuff. The reduction of a thousand years of rejection and failure and lies and second-best-on-a-good-day to those two words was almost vulgar. Bad stuff.

"Don't go wandering around at night, the Frost Giants are free to roam once everyone goes to bed," Loki remembered one of their nursemaids telling him and Thor when they were very young and had decided to sneak out of their room one night just to see if they could, and had gotten caught. Loki no longer remembered, but suspected it was Thor's idea, actually. Thor had slept with a wooden sword hidden under his pillow for a while after that, and Loki had wet the bed a couple of times because he was too afraid to get up and go to the bathroom. And Thor had of course ridiculed him for it. Later, when he'd been ten and had his own chambers, an older youth's story had so affected him he was certain a Frost Giant hid under his bed at night, and if he let his feet dangle over the edge they would be bitten off and the rest of him encased in ice alive but unable to move for all eternity. He lived in fear of turning in his sleep and inadvertently letting a leg hang over the edge even though part of him knew it couldn't be true. Little had he known the Frost Giant was in his very own bed the whole time. In his very own skin, hiding, but always there, whether night or day. He wondered what Thor would have done, had he known. "I'll hunt the monsters down and slay them all!" his brother had proudly declared to their father – his father, after being shown the Ice Casket and hearing the story of the Ice War. While standing right next to one of the monsters. The monster Odin had taken. And if somehow he weren't a monster, shouldn't Odin have said so, right in that moment? "Thor, don't say such things. Frost Giants aren't monsters. They're just like us. They're very nice, once you get to know them." Loki laughed out loud, alone in his room now, shrugging out of his heavy black overalls. He'd said something about both of them being born to be kings instead. So Odin had meant to install him on the throne of Jotunheim, a tamed and submissive monster? What a wonderful fate that would have been. He hadn't had any idea what it meant at the time, but it had sounded grand and exciting and he hadn't particularly questioned it, like everything else Odin had told him in his childhood and youth.

Bad stuff.

He had watched his younger brother struggle to breathe his last breaths, watched blood seep from his wound, watched him grow still, watched all eyes turn toward him, understood that life as he knew it had just ended as well. "Please, just go. I can't see you right now, Loki." Even his mother, who always had a kind word, a warm hug, a hand to wipe away a child's tear, had rejected him.

Bad stuff.

"No, Loki."

"Don't let it destroy you."

In a way, it was far, far too late for such patronizing advice. Loki had been destroyed virtually the moment he was born, a physically inadequate specimen of his kind, left to die and then "rescued" by his enemy to become a pawn in a game that Odin had apparently lost interest in somewhere along the way. Was it better to be a forgotten, useless pawn than a pawn actually put to use?

In another way, though, he had already adopted and adapted that philosophy, more than Jane would probably ever know. He had let himself be destroyed, when he released his grip on Gungnir at the broken bifrost. He hadn't desired death so much as he no longer desired life. And when death did not come, when he had a chance to forge a new destiny completely apart from his existence as a forgotten pawn, to prove he was so much more than they'd ever believed him to be, he'd seized onto life with a new zeal. He was alive. He was Loki. He was the king of Asgard. If he could not have that, he would rule Midgard. And if he could not rule, he would destroy. But he would never be destroyed.

Of course, what Jane had meant by it, as best he could understand, was that he should have fun tonight. That he should not sulk because his father had caused him a few seconds of pain on his wrist.

Loki considered it, genuinely considered it, for a moment at least. "Let yourself go and have fun." He tried to recall the last time he had truly "let himself go and had fun." Fun in the way he suspected Jane would define it. Signaling an aircraft where to land while wearing your hair in some odd style. Playing simplistic songs badly on a piano. Flying along over ridged snow in a snowmobile. It was difficult. And painful. How many centuries had passed while he barely noticed as his resentment grew and he faded more and more into the background? He hadn't truly realized just how angry he'd become until he'd unleashed it all on Odin that fateful day in the Weapons Vault. It had felt good to let it out, euphoric even, in its own way. For a moment. Then came the guilt. The weakness. He resolved to never feel guilt again.

He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to almost physically tamp down the anger that welled up in him anew just thinking about that day. Fun. He'd been trying to think of fun. The incongruity of the thought made him laugh again. This was his "fun." These were the things that made him laugh. Everything in him had become so dark. Or else it had been that way all along and he'd only discovered the full truth of it in the Weapons Vault.

Loki had always been drawn to chaos; that was certainly nothing new. He was endlessly curious and had been since childhood, delighting in the unpredictability and commotion in the world at large around him. The things he found fun were often tied to chaos, more so as he grew older and more and more of the simpler joys in life were eroded. Fear in particular often led to chaos, and Loki had found he enjoyed inspiring both.

He'd told Jane he had fun throwing darts. It hadn't been a lie. But it wasn't quite what Jane thought it was, either. Loki took pleasure in the win and in his own clear superiority in a way he knew Jane would frown on. Some strange part of him, perhaps a child who had never grown up, might have liked for it to be something different, true companionship, true friendship, like what he had experienced for a few moments with Mohsin and his friends at the hockey game in Melfort, but the greater part of him knew that those things could never be his and scoffed at the child inside who naively longed for it. He had changed, perhaps not into a better person, but into a purer person, someone who knew who he was as he never had before. He had grown beyond such things.

He wondered if Mohsin's family had been able to join him yet…

The random memories of loquacious Mohsin and the group of friends he'd been so easily permitted into – angering him because he should have been ruling over them and not sitting anonymously among them, but also pleasing him in some small way, he realized now with disgust – took him back some forty years earlier to an adventure on Alfheim. The bifrost had deposited him, Thor, and Volstagg on one coast of a large forested island and Hogun, Fandral, and Sif on the opposite coast; the two groups were then to compete to find a lake in the island's center. The first group to scale the cliffs of the tiny island in the middle of the lake and stand among the painted stone ruins of a mysterious ancient building there would be declared the winner and would have to cook for the others for the next five years' worth of adventures. The island had long ago been abandoned to an aggressive band of trolls, but as part of the adventure they'd agreed no one was permitted to bring a weapon. In the spirit of being fair, Loki had promised he would not use magic, either.

He'd lied, naturally. He used magic from the very beginning to ensure the grouping he preferred – on a sliding scale of his ability to tolerate Thor's friends Volstagg fell at the top, usually, and Sif fell off the bottom, nearly always. Then, when he found he was genuinely enjoying the adventure and the company was actually more than tolerable, he'd used magic to obscure the terrain with illusions, sending his group in circles through the forest. He still preferred winning to losing, though, so at night, after they'd eaten and told stories and sung old war songs over a campfire and Thor and Volstagg were snoring in the hammocks they built from local trees, he slipped over the treetops and similarly obscured the terrain for the opposing team. He'd even lied about not carrying a weapon, retaining his emergency knife, looped into his tunic by a thread from its hem and crafted from the same metal as his armor, making it impossible to detect. A four- or five-day adventure turned into a ten-day quest with unexpectedly challenging navigation. It was fair in the end, more or less. He may have created a few more obstacles for his opponents than for his own group. But Thor was a terrible field cook and Loki was not much better, and very little made it out of a pan tended to by Volstagg. He was doing them all a favor.

That had been fun. Thor had felt like his brother of old and Loki almost like his equal, something that had become rarer and rarer, and Volstagg's jibes were aimed evenly at both. They had gelled nicely as a team. He was hard-pressed to think of anything since. Anything that Jane would see the truth of and agree to call fun.

He took a deep breath and examined himself in the mirror. He was procrastinating now; Jane would be waiting for him. The seersucker slacks and vest had held up well, despite being crushed under the Carhartts. The white shirt was a bit wrinkled. He lifted a hand, paused to consider, then ran it over his shirt, satisfied that removing wrinkles would fall under the not-mischief category. He straightened his green silk tie, added the jacket that matched the slacks, slid his feet into the white bucks, and ran a simple straight comb through his hair. Not at all the impressive ensemble he'd put together for his grand entry among Stuttgart's wealthy and powerful, but it would do for this little gathering of people stupidly celebrating the loss of a sun still visible on the horizon.

/


/

Just when Jane was about to give up and assume Lucas had reneged on their agreement and wouldn't show, he appeared in the galley, where the tables had been rearranged again into small groupings of chairs, an area for the band, and a clear path to the makeshift bar where Scotch and leftover wine from dinner were up for grabs. Jane was nursing a glass of Malbec. She'd sought out Rodrigo upon arriving, feeling more comfortable with him than any of the others at this point, and saved a seat for Lucas. She waved him over once he spotted her.

"They're doing some weird mixture of 60's, 70's, and 80's, a little bit of more recent stuff," Jane told him once he slid into his seat. Austin, Carlo, Wright, Jeff, and Selby were on the chorus of The Moody Blues' "Steppin' in a Slide Zone." As far as Jane could tell, every song they'd played had something to do with the event at hand, this one rather tenuous. Jane's mother had loved The Moody Blues but she could remember her father saying this song was about drugs. He said that about a lot of songs, though, she remembered with a laugh. Lucas looked at her questioningly but she waved him off; it wasn't worth trying to explain over the music.

The song came to an end and a familiar keyboard tune started up. Jane laughed again. "Invisible Sun," she said, nudging Lucas's arm. He nodded and smiled politely. "The Police," she added.

"What?"

"Never mind." Jane took a sip of wine, and then gave Lucas a quick glance. "Hey, um, is this okay?" she asked, lifting her glass for a second. "If it bothers you I can-"

"It doesn't bother me."

"You're sure? I really don't mind putting it aside."

"It doesn't bother me. I choose not to drink alcohol because it dulls the senses. I only drink it on the rare occasion when that is my express intention," he explained, keeping his eyes on the band.

"Um, okay," Jane said, trying to convey more certainty than she felt. At least she knew she wasn't creating temptation for someone dealing with addiction. Or she thought she knew. His answer was kind of strange and maybe not all that definitive. She looked down at her glass of Malbec. She didn't particularly want it to dull her senses, or the glass she'd had with dinner. She simply enjoyed the occasional glass of red wine. And it's good for your heart, she thought with a small thread of childish defensiveness. She knew she'd heard that somewhere. Right next to the article that said a piece of dark chocolate a day kept the doctor away.

She chatted a bit with Rodrigo, whose eyes really started drooping with the slower "Away from the Sun" by 3 Doors Down. He assured her he was going to stick it out for a least a little while at the party, which was starting soon.

Lucas remained incredibly reserved, showing little interest in the songs and never singing along like several of the others were. Jane sighed, wondering how to make someone have fun, or if it were even possible.

"Okay, that concludes our set for the night," Austin announced after another number. He did most of the singing, sometimes with Wright or Jeff or both. "We'll take a couple of requests though. Give us some fun stuff, give us a challenge. Any decade, any century even. Carlo and Selby can do classical if you really want to get funky."

"Yeah, don't put too much effort into the challenge thing," Wright threw in.

"Spice Girls!" someone called out, gaining a smattering of laughter, boos, and cheers.

They got through a chorus of "Wannabe," Wright starting out in tortuous falsetto, Carlo just standing and shaking his head.

Jane got an idea. "Watch this," she whispered, elbowing Lucas again.

"Secret Agent Man!" she called as soon as the notes started to fade. Selby's eyes met hers and he looked away immediately.

They conferred for a moment; Wright was nodding his head, and strummed out the opening riff for Carlo, who wasn't sure he knew the song, but nodded once he heard the riff. Wright took singing duty on this one, too, and hammed it up with the lyrics from the Johnny Rivers song:

"There's a man who leads a life of danger.
To everyone he meets he stays a stranger.
With every move he makes, another chance he takes.
Odds are he won't live to see tomorrow.

Secret agent man…

Beware of pretty faces that you find.
A pretty face can hide an evil mind.
Oh, be careful what you say. You'll give yourself away.
Odds are you won't live to see tomorrow."

"You're trying to provoke him," Lucas whispered during the second chorus.

Jane gave a shrug and a pseudo-innocent smile. "It's just a song." Lucas was smiling, and not that false proper "I'm on my best behavior" smile, but something that seemed a little more genuine and reached his eyes. Maybe she could get him to have fun tonight after all. Maybe not the nicest way to go about it, she granted, but Selby had certainly earned a moment or two of discomfort, which actually he was handling quite well, though he wasn't getting as into the song as his bandmates. Maybe he would even own up to what he was really here for now that it was painfully clear she knew exactly who he was, if he'd somehow managed to not figure that out already.

/


/

"Bold choice, by the way," Jane said as they entered the gym, converted into a dance floor, with a refreshment table set up, a few disco balls hanging from the ceiling, multi-colored Christmas lights strung all around, and a table with speakers hooked up to an I-Pod quietly playing 80's music, until the decision was made to switch over to a playlist with more recent club music.

"The decorations?" Lucas asked, glancing at his watch.

"Your outfit." Some people had changed; she was back in her staple "little black dress" – she didn't have much else in the way of formal wear – and Lucas was back in his "I'm richer than you are" outfit. Well, that was a little unnecessarily unkind.

"What's wrong with it? I like it."

"Well, I would think that someone of your station would know that that, my friend," she said, pointing at his jacket, "is summerwear. And even I know you aren't supposed to wear white shoes past…which is it, Labor Day or Memorial Day? Labor Day. Assuming you have that in Canada." She'd learned about seersucker only after searching around online a few weeks ago to figure out exactly what that thing was he'd worn on the flight to Christchurch. No man in her life had ever dressed like that, not even her MD ex. Contrary to popular belief, doctors weren't all filthy rich. Don had been drowning under a mountain of debt from med school. And single income physics professors hardly fared better.

"Lucky for me I'm not terribly concerned with following rules."

"I wish I could say I didn't believe you," Jane said, raising her voice as the volume on the music jumped, shifting into the dance mix with "I Gotta Feeling."

"You know me too well, Jane."

"I love this song. It always puts me in a good mood. Come on, let's dance." She started to move into the center of the room where a few people, more women than men, had started dancing.

"Is that what you call that?" he asked sarcastically. "You obviously don't know me as well as I thought."

"Don't be such a sourpuss."

"Shall I remind you of the terms of our agreement?"

"I remember. Fifteen minutes. And you added the 'I absolutely refuse to have fun' clause." Jane tried a little longer to needle him into joining her but he steadfastly refused. As The Black Eyed Peas wound down she gave up and went out onto the dance floor, joining the small group Rodrigo was dancing with. Every time she looked back at Lucas, always with a smile that said as best she could "Come join us," he was watching her. Not in an "I'm interested" kind of way, she didn't think, which was a good thing since that was a complication she definitely didn't need, but watching all the same. If she hadn't already known him for over a month and a half she'd think it was kind of creepy, but…well, he was Lucas, and some things just went with the territory.

A couple of songs later when he caught her eye he was holding up his wrist and tapping his pointer finger against his watch. He gave a little wave and left. But he was smiling. Maybe in his own way he'd had fun.

/


/

"I don't need you at the meeting with the full council, Thor, but I want you at the meeting with Tyr before it. He has completed his survey of the records of the Vanir-Aesir War, the Ice War, and the smaller conflicts with Svartalfheim, and he has some recommendations prepared for us. Mordi's son and daughters will be there. Bring the Warriors Three as well. We must have strategies prepared for every type of warfare we may encounter. Much of this will fall to you, but you'll need guidance."

Thor nodded, for he could not bring himself to speak. He wanted to fight beside his father, he wanted it to be just as he'd imagined it would be ever since he was a little boy, all his life. But his father was old, and the degree of power he possessed and controlled now required recompense in the form of the Odinsleep. If Odin took Gungnir onto the battlefield the need for the Sleep would be hastened, a risk that Odin hoped to avoid. For now, the plan was that Odin would remain in the role of peacemaker for as long as possible, while Thor would prepare Asgard's warriors for battle.

Battle against any form of beast, any form of weapon, any form of magic, from any and all of seven realms. When Thor had imagined such battles, they had been magnificent tests of strength and endurance and self-confidence, the types of tests he had always excelled in. He had never imagined poring over 3,000-year-old scrolls to analyze enemy tactics that even the enemy probably no longer remembered, or trying to coordinate and plan command-and-control for distinct masses of warriors. His frustration and impatience were growing. He knew that this impending war was best avoided, for if the other realms joined together for a full-on assault Asgard's defenders would be vastly outnumbered and every citizen would know hardship. But with each passing day he grew more accepting of what his father had tried to tell him – that the All-Father was not All-Powerful, and he may not find the right words to convince the leaders of the other realms to relinquish their claims. Thor tired of diplomacy that went nowhere and threats from realms that had no business questioning Asgard's intentions. And as the sense of inevitability grew, so too did a desire to put Mjolnir to work in providing the kind of response such threats cried out for.

"It's a shame we lost Mordi himself," Frigga was saying as the three took breakfast in the family's private dining room on the top floor of the palace. Mordi had been Asgard's most powerful master of magic until his demise, nearly thirty years earlier.

"Loki's magic would probably prove useful," Thor put in, without really thinking about it before he said it.

"Loki's presence would be the worst liability. And we couldn't trust him to act on Asgard's behalf right now anyway. Don't dwell in the past, Thor. There's no time for that now."

Thor swallowed a bite of bread, thick with butter and honey, over a tight throat. He was angry, he was sad, he yearned for battle, he yearned for peace, he hoped Tony found Loki soon, he hoped Tony never found Loki and his brother would remain hidden – and safe – from this threat as long as it lasted. He glanced over at his mother; her hands were in her lap, her lips were pursed, and her eyes were cast downward and shining with moisture, though no tears fell. He remembered something he'd meant to ask her.

"Mother, the gem you gave Loki…"

"Yes?" she said, her gaze snapping up toward his.

"Does it have any…unusual energies? Anything detectable?"

She kept her eyes fixed firmly on his. "Why do you ask?"

"My friend on Midgard said it would be easier to find Loki if there were something distinctive about the necklace you gave him, something he could search for, instead of searching for Loki himself."

Frigga took in a deep breath and nodded, but it was Odin who answered. "The enchantment on that gem is a very simple one. I had it commissioned from a craftsman from Central Market and I watched him inlay the magic myself. It emits only low-level energies. I doubt it works at all from as far away as Midgard."

"It still says what I meant it to say," Frigga said with a sharp look at Odin.

"Of course it does. It was a thoughtful gift," Odin said, trying to placate his wife. This Thor had seen before, but usually in considerably less serious circumstances.

"Yes, it was," Frigga said, her expression softening.

And then Thor felt like he was intruding. And he was, really, for his parents usually took breakfast alone, just the two of them. He wiped his napkin quickly over his mouth and threw it down on the table. "I'd better go round up my friends if I'm going to get them to the meeting with Tyr."

Odin nodded his dismissal and he escaped. After meeting Tyr Odin would update the rest of the council and they him, while Thor took Tyr's recommendations out to the warriors to begin training to implement them, and hopefully release some of his excessive supply of pent-up energy. Later that afternoon Odin would travel to Alfheim. Thor no longer expected his father to return announcing there would be no war.

/


/

The pounding seemed to have been going on for a long time before Jane finally processed it and opened her eyes. She was just starting to sit up in bed when the door opened and Lucas stuck his head inside.

"What are you doing? Get out!" she shouted. She meant to shout, anyway. It didn't come out all that loud.

"When you didn't answer I was concerned that-"

"I didn't answer because I was sleeping. Now out, out!"

He frowned, took the half-step out that he'd taken in, and closed the door.

Jane groaned and ran her fingers through her long brown static-y hair. It wasn't like she was insufficiently dressed or anything, but people weren't supposed to just barge into your room unannounced and uninvited. The absence of a lock did not constitute an invitation to enter at leisure. Her alarm clock read 6:33 in bright red lines. Not fair. Not fair at all. She sat there for a couple more minutes, debating through a foggy brain and a headache whether she should get up or roll over and try to go back to sleep. She thought about Lucas and his chipper morning-person self. He was probably standing right outside her door waiting. She would have laid money on it.

She jumped down to her stool, grabbed her robe from the back of her desk chair and threw it on, then marched over to the door and yanked it open.

"Good morning," Lucas said.

She closed the door again. She let her eyelids droop into the position they longed for and her mouth curl up in an expression her mother used to warn her would freeze there if she kept it up. Then she remembered he'd had something in his hands. Maybe it was a double espresso. She opened the door.

He hesitated a moment. "Shall I say it again or does the first time count?"

"What is that?" she asked, pointing at the napkin bundle he held in his right hand. She was pretty certain it wasn't coffee.

He held it out to her. "Toast."

She wrinkled her nose in confusion.

"You…look like you don't feel well. I thought it might help. You have water? I can get you some if not."

"I, uh, yeah, I have water," she said, glancing over her shoulder at her desk where her water bottle sat. She accepted the toast-bearing napkin and opened it. Just dry toast, no butter, no jelly. Yum.

"I apologize for entering before. As I was trying to explain, I was concerned when you overslept, and when you didn't respond when I knocked. I'm glad to see you're all right."

Jane shook her head. "Overslept? It's 6:30 in the morning, Lucas. By what definition is that oversleeping?"

"By yours. You get up at 5:45 every morning."

"How do you know that?"

"I live two doors down from you, Jane. I know what time you get up."

She shook her head again. She didn't know what time he got up; she'd never even thought about it. But what did any of this matter? Why was he banging on her door and handing her dry toast? It would be easier to think if her head didn't hurt. And then it clicked. "You thought I was sick from a hangover? I'm not hung over, I just didn't get back to my room until two in the morning. I'm tired." She felt a stinging on her upper lip and brushed the back of her hand against it; it came away with a small red smudge. Great. She'd been so tired when she came back she'd skipped her usual Chapstick-and-lotion regimen and she'd forgotten to turn on the humidifier. She was lucky her hands weren't bleeding. She'd have to inspect the spaces between her toes later, and blowing her nose would probably be a bad idea at the moment.

Meanwhile Lucas was still standing there, just outside her door, while she stood there, just inside it. "I guess you may as well come on in," she said, opening the door the rest of the way. He was already in his Carhartts, and Jane couldn't help thinking they really didn't look right on him. Maybe it was just because she'd spent so much of the night before seeing him in seersucker and a coat and vest and tie. She would probably look strange in big black ECW work overalls right now, too.

She felt a strong sense of déjà vu as she sat on her worn sheet-covered chair near the window and he sat at her desk. But that time had been better; he'd actually brought her an espresso then. She picked at the toast and tried to tell herself it's the thought that counts.

"Did you have fun at the party?" Lucas asked after she'd taken a bite of the toast. He handed her the water bottle and she took it, taking a long drink before answering.

"Yeah, I did. Did you? The whole fifteen minutes you were there?"

"If you're attempting to make me feel guilty, I can assure you you'll fail. I did exactly what I said I would do."

Jane swallowed another bite of bread. "You didn't answer my question."

He exhaled sharply over upturned lips, something approaching but not quite making it to a laugh. He turned away from her and his eyes roamed over her desk. "I've had worse fifteen minutes. It was…interesting…to see another side of you."

"That was the side of me having fun. I wish you would've given it a try. Did you see some of those people, Lucas? A couple of them have kids too old for that music. But they were still getting out there and enjoying themselves. You can't be that bad of a dancer."

Lucas ignored her, not that she was surprised. "What's this?" he asked, pointing to something on her desk she couldn't see.

Jane leaned forward to see which one he was pointing to; she had several things taped up there. Things that reminded her of the people she loved, things that cheered her up. This one showed a little yellow duckling in the process of shaking dozens of tiny water droplets from its dry brown-and-yellow fuzz. "Oh. My friend in Australia e-mailed me that. 'Water off a duck's back,' you know?"

But he looked at her like he didn't.

"Kind of like…don't let your problems stick to you? Don't let things get to you. What, you don't have that saying in Canada?" she asked with a raised eyebrow. As if. She probably shouldn't have said anything, but he probably shouldn't have barged into her room without her permission and woken her up, either.

"Of course I know the saying. But there was no context. And I didn't grow up in Canada. I was born there but we moved around. I'm sure I missed out on a great many cultural triumphs. Such as Spice Girls."

Jane laughed despite her intention to remain annoyed. That explained a lot. "Where did you live that you missed that?"

"And this one. I like it."

She leaned forward again. He was pointing to the Tennyson quote she'd printed out and taped up above her laptop for ever-present encouragement: To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. She told him about her hike to Ob Hill back when they were at McMurdo, the cross on which the quote was written, and what it signified. "You should've come with us," she finished.

"You didn't really want me to. You still suspected I worked for the enemy at the time."

"Enemy? That's a little strong," she said with a laugh, because what he'd said was kind of true, and then another string of words started flying through her head that might describe SHIELD better, but none of them were terribly polite. She suddenly recalled that Lucas had at one point said something about wanting to "destroy" them. She'd had other things on her mind at the time and hadn't thought much about it, but apparently he hated them more than she did even though he'd had much less interaction with them, or at least he hated them in different way. It made a certain amount of sense, though. After what his father had put him through she could imagine he wouldn't respond well to someone trying to push him around. Like she had last night. Oops.

"Hey, uh, Lucas, I'm sorry if I pushed you too hard last night. I didn't mean to be…uh…I just wanted you to have a good time, you know?"

The laugh went a little further this time. "Dr. Foster, you'll know it if you've pushed me too hard."

Jane smiled weakly. Because that definitely sounded creepy.

He laughed again, and she knew he'd caught her reaction. "My apologies. Merely a jest. I agreed to go to that party last night, and I went. I'll admit I was mildly curious about it. If I were truly unwilling to go, I wouldn't have gone. Perhaps we can discuss other things now?" He continued after her tentative nod. "I'm anxious to have a good time this morning. There is the little matter of a probe we launched last night."

Jane's eyes flew open wide. Of course there was! How could she have forgotten? Lucas didn't show up in her room at ungodly hours to chat about parties. He showed up because he wanted her to come out and get to work. Maybe a leopard couldn't change his spots, as the expression went. If so, that was okay. She'd met worse leopards. She could put up with this one's spots. After all, some of hers looked pretty similar.

"Give me ten minutes," she said with a nod. "And Lucas?"

"Yes?" he said, already standing.

"Don't ever come into my room again without permission, okay?"

He looked angry for a moment, and she remembered he'd done it because he was worried…but still. The look faded and he dipped his head down and a bit to the side, lowering his eyes. She wasn't sure exactly what it meant, but it better have meant something along the lines of It will never happen again. Then he left, and Jane flew into motion.


/

Thor & Loki & pals' Alfheim adventure locale is sorta-kinda modeled on Slovenia's Lake Bled. Church on a small island in the middle of a lake, very quaint. No trolls. That I know of.

Teasers for "Chapter 27: Yggdrasil": Jane comes to a realization that changes a few things (no, not Lucas's identity, I don't want to be cruel - but that is not far off now); Loki waxes philosophical about microwaves but Jane isn't impressed; Jane takes a look at a few more pages in that book Darcy sent her on Norse mythology and finds the good, the bad, and the utterly baffling; Odin has an idea that Thor doesn't like.

And the teaser (this follows Jane having looked at the book):

And Loki…it fit with what Darcy had told her. It seemed almost like there were two Lokis. Cutting off someone's hair sounded like a mean prank – it wasn't exactly on par with trying to destroy or subjugate entire planets. Sleeping with your brother's wife – if it were true – that was what you might call stepping it up a notch.

She tried to picture Loki cutting off Sif's hair – because no way was she going to try to picture the other story – and found she could not. It was simply too far from what she knew of him, she supposed. It was also giving her a headache.

So, I chose this one because if you're reading quickly in the next chapter it may not jump out at you, but it's sort of significant. Jane's wrong about why she can't picture Loki cutting off Sif's hair. Little things like this have been hinted at a couple of times but it's fairly blatant here.