Loki had lived a long time. He'd seen many things, faced many horrors. He'd known war and suffering. He'd known pain - unimaginable pain. He'd known loneliness. Hopelessness. Emptiness. He'd unknown himself - he'd come undone learning the truth of his lineage. He'd abandoned his home to the vast nothingness of space. He'd suffered at the hands of Thanos. He'd lost. And he'd lost. And he'd lost.
And through all of it, the thing he'd learned to fear more than anything else was hope.
Hope was dangerous.
A person could suffer - could learn to suffer. They could learn to endure it. To crawl through it, and come out the other side pretending that they still possessed something resembling a soul. A person could even become a shell - emptying out what once was inside so that they might just... exist through the horror.
This is one thing Loki had never quite managed to achieve. He'd never learned to empty himself. He'd learned to hide himself, learned to mask the endless storm that raged on within him. But he'd never figured out how to void himself of it all. And so he'd had to learn to live brokenly instead.
Because try as he might, he could never let go of that one thing he cursed with every breath he took - hope.
Hope left something alive. A light in the darkness - and exposure.
Hope was an chink in an impenetrable armour - cleaving it open and laying the wearer exposed, vulnerable to decimation.
Hope meant that no matter how tall one might build their defences - no matter how one might attempt to steel themselves for the worst - the universe still had a way to break you.
Hope left a way in.
Hope was weakness.
Hope was fatal.
And Loki had been a slave to it since the moment he'd gazed into an orb and glimpsed the future - learned the existence of a girl made of fire. He endured centuries of what he believed to be empty hope that he could become more than whatever he was that this woman was going to loathe on sight.
And when he found her at last, and that prophecy had come to fruition - well, it was strange, how one year compared to hundreds. How time could shift and bend and moments could start to feel like a lifetime. Perhaps it was because he'd been trapped in a cell - condemned to spend eternity isolated and alone - that every little, unexpected moment he got with her felt longer, calmer - more right - than anything else had felt in such a very long time.
Maybe it was because it felt like the next chapter. Loki had been in the before of finding her for so very long, and then suddenly found himself in the after. And he'd told himself not to hope. He'd willed himself not to be weak. Because hope was deadly. Hope could lead only to pain.
But every time she looked at him...
Every time she smiled.
Each time he made her laugh.
Every single time she came back.
There it was.
Hope.
At the start it had driven him to bitterness and anger and cruelty.
Until slowly, over time, hope had somehow managed to morph something else, like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis.
Hope became the beginning of something - a flower, blooming to life within the thickets - just a small green, insignificant-looking bud at first that exploded into a plume of glorious colour.
Hope became warm and welcome - the first blades of sunlight cutting across an orange and purple sky as the sunrise first peeked beyond mountains in the distance.
Hope... hope became fire.
And that's where he was now.
On fire.
Loki wondered if this is what his mortal felt like when she burned.
He was certain this moment was the closest he'd ever come to experiencing it - this hope that burned so brightly within him that felt like strength when really it should incinerate him entirely.
Because against all odds - against what he'd tried so desperately to prepare himself for - that mortal lifespan of hers, there was a way for her to stay. They could stop the sands of time, just turn that hourglass on its side and... walk away from it. Together.
Here it was - a gift, handed to him on a platter. A gift, no less, that he wouldn't have to steal away from the universe. No, this was offered freely, in exchange for nothing more than kindness he'd offered for want of nothing. It seemed a rather inconceivable thing.
So much so, in fact, that it filled him with fear. A breathtaking kind of fear. One like Loki had never dared to believe could exist.
Everything Loki had ever wanted, wrapped up in one strange, stubborn, infuriating, wonderful little mortal.
Love and acceptance and safety and home.
But the thing was, he'd never asked her. Loki couldn't bring himself to even mention her mortality, how rapidly the few short decades he'd have with her would pass before he'd watch her fade away. And so he couldn't bring himself to ask her if she'd want to stay with him if he ever found a way to keep her. Because it would have meant facing the reality that such a thing were near impossible.
And certain as he was that this revelation held unimaginable gravity to Reagan, he knew full-well this meant more to him. Because he was the one who would have to be left behind. He was the one who had had to carry that hope. He was the one who had had to wait. To endure. The before and the after.
Her wanting of him was new.
And he was all too aware how long and desperately she had desired something else.
And if she chose that - the something else - he could accept that, he told himself, fully aware that it was a blatant lie. He could watch her be happy. That could be enough for him. So long as she permitted him to remain by her side where he sorely longed to be.
Because Loki had already sworn an oath to himself - he swore that if he found a way to extend her lifespan, he swore to himself that he would not force it upon her. He'd leave it to be her choice.
Loki was under no illusion about his capacity for selfishness. It had driven him to do such hateful things in his past. He'd sullied things, made them dirty. Loki didn't want to act hatefully when it came to Reagan. Not her. She was something so... good. He wanted to love her selflessly. Even though he wanted to behave so very, very selfishly when it came to keeping her.
And so he was going to keep his oath. He was going to let her choose.
And that is why - though he'd never expected this day to be that day, and he was so unimaginably unprepared to face the answer - he forced that question up his throat and past his lips.
"Is it what you would want?" he asked her.
And never before had he felt more breakable. Like he were made of glass. Never - not ever - had another person had more power over him. Because in that moment, it were as though every last molecule of him was forged for hope.
He watched as her brow knitted together as if the question confused her.
And she was looking up at him so gently, in this moment that was supposed to be about her, she sought to comfort him still. Because this... it was too much. This he couldn't contain. And she could feel it, no matter how he tried to conceal it from the bond - Reagan felt the force of it. Terrible guilt pulled in his chest.
And perhaps it was selfish of him, but he couldn't stand it, and he was trying with everything he had in him.
"Is it what I'd want?" Reagan repeated in a whisper.
Her hands were rested on him - tightened a little in response, anchoring him.
"She speaks of you," Loki began, taking a shaky breath in an attempt to banish the quake of emotions from his words, "as if you're some prize she can bestow upon me. That's not what you are. You're not some gift she can hand to me for deeds I've done. This isn't up to me- It's not up to her."
Reagan ran her hand gently over his chest as he spoke, as if trying to soothe the ache there.
He could feel the confusion in her, the way she couldn't quite understand his distress. The way she was trying to soothe the bond - she was trying to be so achingly gentle with him. He could hardly bear it.
"I know how you feel about your powers." Loki said at last, and loosed another shuddering breath.
The truth he was so afraid of, out there in the open. That perhaps this strange woman supposed she was offering up the gift of immortality, when really, what she presented instead was Reagan to be free of powers she'd been trapped and tormented by for all these years. He saw it instantly, in the way her expression shifted - that she hadn't realised it yet, but his words were enough to draw her to that same conclusion. A chance at freedom.
"If..." Loki forced himself to speak again. "Reagan, if you want her to take them back instead - if you want to be rid of them, then I'll make her do it. I'll make her free you. I won't- I won't ask you to endure something that I know you've loathed, not even a moment longer. If you'd rather be rid of your burden and live a mortal life... I'll make her undo it."
Reagan looked up at him - saw the anguish in his features, but she could see it that he meant what he said. Despite the fact he'd started searching - looking for a way to make her immortal. It sounded such an impossible thing. And yet Loki... there was so many things about him that seemed impossible - should have been impossible. And now that he'd found it - a way to keep her from having to age and wither and leave him all alone again - he was willing to throw that chance away for her. If she asked that of him, then he'd do it. He'd help her to be... normal again. She could return to an ordinary life. Where she fit. Where she could belong amongst the crowd. Where she didn't have to be afraid that she was a bomb. He could let her go to give her a chance to feel like that again. Her heart clenched almost painfully. She'd never even imagined being loved like that.
"You'd do that for me?" she asked, softly and she moved just a little closer to him.
And Loki had to drop her gaze then, because he was afraid that what he'd heard in her voice was hope. And if it were, then he'd have to make good on that offer. And he would. He'd do just that. And he'd find a way to hide his own anguish. Learn to live in that pain - it wouldn't be the first time he'd had to do such a thing.
Loki nodded, unable to put voice to it as he stared down at her hand on him.
They stood in silence for a moment as Loki allowed her to contemplate. He couldn't bring himself to look at her though he could feel the way she studied him.
"Can I tell you something?"she murmured.
"Yes, anything."
"I was scared she was going to ask for it back."
Almost against his will, Loki's eyes flicked upward to hers, uncertain, to find her watching him with a gentle, understanding sort of smile.
"As soon as she told us that it had come from her, I started to worry that she'd called me here because it was time to give it back. And I didn't want to," Reagan's expression turned pained, wetting her eyes just a little. "I realised I wanted to keep it. Because it feels like mine now. It's mine, and I don't want to give it away anymore. I can't tell you how... incredible that was."
Loki remained silent, watched her as she spoke as his heart began to thunder in his chest.
"I'd been afraid of it for so long," Reagan continued. "You know all this, obviously... That I was so angry that it had happened to me - that I felt like I was cursed. I hated it about myself... I guess, I just- I didn't realise that, over time, I found a way to accept it as a part of myself. It stopped being something that I needed to fight or hide or suppress. It wasn't something wrong with me anymore... it wasjust... a part of me. A part of me that I didn't realise until today, that I'd started to love."
She inclined her head a little as she smiled up at him.
"You did that, you know," she told him.
Loki loosed a small, wet laugh and shook his head.
"Reagan, you did that," he insisted gently.
"You had a lot to do with it. A lot, Loki. You have to know that," she said. "I spent so long feeling lost and alone. Thinking that I wanted normal. There was just this longing in me. From the moment I first woke up burning, I had a longing. I though it was to undo it. To be free. The thing is... that feeling started fading away whenever I was with you. And now? That feeling isn't in me anymore."
"It's not?"
Reagan shook her head and Loki felt a pull along the bond, coaxing him to it.
"See for yourself," she said with a small, simple shrug of her shoulders.
And with as much self-control as he was capable of, Loki took the permission and delved into the bond. Into her. He moved with caution - near reverence - as he search. Despite wanting to claw it apart - to search tooth and nail for any shadow of doubt that he was so sure he was going to find in her.
But there was nothing of the sort to be found. A cacophony of emotions whirled within her wildly. But not doubt. Not about her fire. Not about him.
Emotion gripped at his throat as he drew back into himself and met her eye once more.
"Besides," she said gently, reaching to card her fingers through his hair. "I made you a promise. I told you I wasn't going to leave you."
"No. No... This can't be for me, Reagan. I-"
"Hey," she hushed him gently. "Listen to me. It's okay. I want it. Of course, I want it."
And he couldn't bear it, had to lean in to press his lips to hers. So hard it was almost painful. As if he were trying to breathe her in. And as he pulled her closer to him, she moved willingly, melting into him. Her arms laced around his neck gently as he clutched her to him desperately.
"I want it. I want you." she promised when their lips parted. "I want to be with you. Loki, I want to stay with you."
As her promises washed over him, soothing wounds that hadn't had the chance to open, Loki held her tight to him, his face buried in her hair. He forced himself to breathe, revelling in the feeling of her fingernails scratching lightly against his scalp as she carded her fingers through his hair in an attempt to soothe him. Moments passed and they each fell silent, savouring in the proximity of the other - the warmth they offered.
"Are you sure you think this is a good idea though?" Reagan asked when she eventually broke their gentle silence, a hint of amusement in her voice. "It'll mean that you won't be able to fall back on my old age if you get sick of me."
Loki couldn't keep a pained noise from escaping him.
"That's not funny," he managed to squeeze out.
"Isn't it? Sorry," she murmured with a meek sort of smile. "I don't really have a read on the vibe right now cause this whole concept is kind of completely terrifying."
Perhaps it was the fact that she'd managed to calm him that she now had room for panic of her own. Loki could feel it rising within her.
"Terrifying?" Loki asked, unsure.
"I mean, yeah? Don't look at me like that, you're freaking out, too!"
Loki's expression shifted to something mildly indignant.
"I am not 'freaking out.'"
"You absolutely are."
Loki shook his head, he reached up to tuck her hair gently behind her ear.
"Not about this. Not about you saying yes..."
Reagan softened as she gazed up at him a little pained as she felt through the bond just how sincerely he meant that. She swore if she wasn't careful around him, Loki had the means to make her heart give out entirely.
"Okay..." she said shakily. "But you're not- you're not afraid you'll get tired of me?"
Loki laughed, a tragic, heartbreaking sound.
"You're ridiculous."
"No, I'm not."
"It's the last thing I'm concerned about, Reagan."
"Shouldn't you be though? Have you thought about, like, buyers remorse?"
And that was it - the moment - where he truly was steadied again. Certain. Everything else washed away and Loki was left feeling like them. Just them. As they had been in a prison cell below Asgard. And in a swirling sand storm on a dying planet. And alone in a log cabin on Vanaheim by the light of a fireplace. Two thoroughly differing forms of chaos that shouldn't have worked - that should have led to utter disaster - and yet, somehow balanced perfectly. Equaling to calm. Again and again. His peculiar mortal. Somehow calming him in her chaos. Forever doing the opposite of what he expected.
Surprising him.
And she wanted it. She wanted to stay. Loki gazed down at her, as a familiar confused amusement swirled up within him all at once, smothering out the fear.
"What is buyers remorse?" he asked at last, barely concealing a smile.
With her own panic brewing, Reagan didn't seem to detect this newfound calm settling over him.
"It's like-okay, you know when you want a new car? And you save and you save and you save - for ages - until you can finally afford it?"
It was apparent to him that Reagan had momentarily forgotten that Loki was an insufferably wealthy, royal immortal from a planet with technology far advanced beyond the use of 'cars.' He decided it wasn't exactly prudent to point that out.
"And so you buy the car," she continued, "and you're so excited to finally get it. But then you're driving home from the dealership, alone, in this stupid hunk of metal that you just dished out thousands of dollars for and so this little voice in your head just starts nagging at you like 'Oh my fucking God, this so wasn't worth it. I can't believe I wasted all that money on this. What have I done? What have I done? What have I done?'"
"Darling, I hardly see this being a problem that would arise," Loki interjected, teasingly. "I haven't any need for a car."
She let out an exasperated huff.
"Look, I don't know the proper word for it, okay? I don't know the relationship term for it. Or-or the person equivalent for it. But it's like... Loki, I'm new and exciting and shiny to you, right now, right? And you're really into me because you think I'm only going to be around for a little while. It's like Heika said - I'm fleeting. And so maybe I'm more special to you than I really am, you know?"
Loki did not know at all. He smiled down at her as he watched her ramble - caught up in her tangent. More special. His mortal. It was so unfathomable to him that she had grown so used to people leaving her. They'd needed to find one another. He saw it clearer in that moment than ever before. He'd known just how desperately he'd needed her. He'd been broken - filled with nothing but rage and hate. So convinced that this life held nothing more for him than solitude and disappointment. He'd needed her to bring him back to the light - to find himself once more.
But now, he could see it, that she truly needed him in return. She'd said it. She'd meant it. But now, he could see it himself.
How impossible a thing it seemed to him that this mortal of his had ever - even for a single second - felt unlovable. That she could even entertain the idea he'd ever want to be rid of her. He'd devote the rest of his days to undoing that damage - to helping her unlearn it.
Just as she was trying to do for him.
"And now," Reagan continued, "you get this chance to have me longer than you expected, so you're like 'oh, this is great!' Except then it turns out that it's not great because then I'm just there. All the time. And I'm always going to be there. And maybe you realise I'm not quite as exciting as you thought. Maybe I become boring or tedious or something, I don't know. And then you're just stuck with me and you can't-"
Loki his fingers along the curve of her jaw, guiding her face up to his as he leaned in to press his lips against hers, silencing her, the way he loved to do most. Swallowing her words. Her doubts. Reagan made a rather small, half-hearted sound of protest, even as her eyes fell shut and her body curved in closer to his. How strange it was to think that little more than a year ago
And Loki opened the bond between them, let it flood - near overwhelmingly - with sheer adoration.
I love you, he told her. I love you.
I love you.
I love you.
"You're utterly insane," he told her, amused, once their mouths parted and he drew back to look at her, still cupping her face with one hand.
"I'm actually making a valid point," Reagan insisted, though her voice sounded smaller now, as if in that moment she didn't fully believe it herself as she leaned into her touch.
"Not this time, I'm afraid," Loki replied. "Not on this matter. Reagan, trust me. I can think of nothing better than to be thoroughly and undoably stuck with you."
She couldn't help but to duck her head, blushing as she laughed a little.
"You say that now, but..."
"But I've yet to convince you entirely?"
Reagan couldn't quite bring herself just to voice it, so instead she gave him a small nod.
And in spite of that, Loki smiled at her softly. He hooked his finger beneath her chin, guiding her back to him as he kissed her once more.
"Then watch me prove it."
Reagan let out a sigh as Loki's forehead pressed to hers.
"Stay with me," he whispered, his eyes closed.
And as he felt Reagan's head nod gently against his, warmth flooded through him.
The bond was alive now - a brilliant, bright thing. Full of hope and excitement and happiness. There was fear there too - her fear - and so Loki cupped it, coated it, protected it, rather than any attempt to smother it.
"Stay with me," he repeated.
And with all the storming emotions that raged and dazzled and danced along the bond, there was also peace there too.
"I will," she murmured back at last, a slow smile blooming upon her features.
The bond hummed, blindingly bright.
"Stay with me," he said again.
And Reagan felt as though she might burst.
"I will."
"Forever."
"Forever."
"Even when I inevitably find a way to drastically make a mess of things and earn your unparalleled wrath."
"Even when I, no doubt, have to thwart your plans to steal a throne again."
Loki hummed his approval.
"Even after I endure years upon years of ceaseless - and, on occasion, unanswerable - questions about everything in existence."
"Even if I assault you with so many Earth-based references that you'll slowly lose your grip on your own reality and forget you're not actually Midgardian?"
Loki laughed gently, nodding still.
"Even then."
"I mean it," Reagan said, warningly. "I'm even going to teach you memes."
"Do your worst, mortal," he murmured.
"You'll be saying things like 'yolo' by the time I'm done with you."
"I can assure you with all the confidence I possess that won't be the case."
"Alright, but don't go putting any money on that. You'll lose it."
"I adore you."
Reagan beamed at him, before hesitating just a little.
"But I... I need something," she said.
"Anything."
"If I need to... if I need to burn, I need you to find a place that I can do it safely," she told him, growing a little solemn. "I have no idea how hot it's going to get or how big my flames might actually grow. I don't want to risk hurting anyone else. I won't risk hurting you."
"We'll find something," Loki promised.
She breathed a sigh of relief and let her head fall to rest against his shoulder.
It was at that exact moment that Reagan felt a strange impatience in him. She drew back to look up at him, concerned. His entire body seemed to be tensing.
"What wrong?"
"It's Asta," he all but snarled. "She's trying to draw us back."
Reagan's brows drew together. As soon as he spoke the words Reagan felt it too, the aching lure of a foreign magic. It was subtle. Like a strange longing, but the moment she became aware of it she could feel the way it would grow until it was all-consuming. Her brow furrowed then.
"She said we had two hours," she murmured to him.
Loki only scoffed. "I'm hardly surprised that she'd try to short change us."
"Maybe something's wrong?"
"With Asta? I hardly know where to begin."
"Loki," Reagan chided.
As if on cue, they heard a slow shuffling from the hallway. The pair turned, Loki's hands still resting on Reagan's waist, to find Heika reentering the room, a knowing expression on her face as if she'd sensed her guests preparing to take their leave. Reagan drew away from Loki then, and he let her go, willingly, watching as she moved toward the older woman.
"Heika," she said gently, taking hold of her hands. "What you've given to me... I can't-I'll never be able to repay you for it."
Heika touched her face with the gentle affection only a mother is capable of.
"There is nothing to repay, sweet girl. Just be happy. Just be happy."
There was one more question. One that Reagan needed to ask, even though it felt like such a cruel thing to bring up after Heika had bestowed them with such an unrepayable gift. But she had to know
"You said... you said Jonas 'was'..." Reagan said, not quite able to finish the sentence. Not quite willing. "When did he..."
Reagan's throat tightened, she couldn't say the words. Heika squeezed her hands reassuringly.
"I lost him in the winter," Heika answered, and Reagan couldn't stop her expression from crumbling but Heika shook her head. "It's alright, dear. I'll be with him again soon enough. It's part of why I've called to you now."
"What do you mean?" Reagan asked, already sensing the answer.
Heika's smile was gentle, accepting.
"Cancer, stage four. I've refused the treatment. These old bones of mine aren't built for the recovery process anymore."
"Heika... wha-you can't-"
"Hush, sweet girl," she cupped Reagan's face soothingly. "You needn't pity me. Jonas is waiting for me when I go, I can still feel a whisper of him there. I've lived a wonderful life, my darling. Emilie and Nora have four younger siblings, all grown. I have eighteen grandchildren. And twenty-nine great grand-children - and counting. I've watched my family grow and thrive. I've lived a life of indescribable happiness. I promise you that."
She smiled at Loki over Reagan's shoulder.
"I think it's high time the two of you did the same."
Loki stared back at Heika, emotions storming in his gaze, though that hate he had entered her home with was no where to be seen. He desperately wanted to put it into words - what it meant to him, this gift of hers - but he found that there was nothing - nothing - he'd ever be able to say to do his gratitude justice.
Slowly, Loki brought his fist up to his chest, resting it over his heart, before lowering himself into a reverent bow before the old woman. A prince of Asgard, bowing to a commoner. Reagan was sure that she didn't fully understand the weight of such a gesture, but watching as Heika inclined her head to him in return - there was something about that unspoken exchange that made her throat tighten with emotion.
When Loki righted himself once more and he looked Reagan's way. He opened his mouth momentarily to speak but then appeared to think the better of it.
What is it? Reagan asked.
Something is wrong, Loki said, his features darkening. We need to go.
You don't still think that Heika is-
No, Loki interjected. No, not here... Asta's urging is growing stronger. She wouldn't do so lightly. She wouldn't risk the years she bartered from me.
"I'm so, so happy to have gotten to meet you," Heika said to Reagan, smiling warmly. "I waited so very long."
She seemed to hesitate before she drew Reagan into her, wrapping her arms around her and hugging her tightly. It surprised Reagan, causing her to pause for just a second before she wrapped her arms around this strange, familiar woman who had given her a gift she'd never be able to repay.
Tears stung her eyes as the woman squeezed her just a little tighter - it reminded her of the way her mother used to hug her. Reagan was so swept up in the tenderness of it all that she almost missed the words Heika whispered into her ear.
"Burn the poison out, dear."
Reagan pulled back to look at her, confused. When her eyes locked with Heika's again, something in her gaze had changed, as if Heika were staring... into her, and yet, beyond her all at once.
"What?" Reagan managed to whisper, watching the way the woman watched her.
But just as quickly as the trance had settled over, it seemed to dissipate. And as Heika's smile returned, she cupped Reagan's face in a gesture of farewell then moved past her and towards Loki. Loki's gaze remained on her, still slightly uncertain. But when Heika beckoned him forward, Loki leaned in, allowing the old woman to whisper in his ear.
Reagan studied his face as the old woman whispered to him, and it was unreadable. She prodded at the bond then, but whatever words were spoken to him, Loki kept them concealed. Her brow furrowed just a little as she watched the way he concealed his reaction from her, the way he studied the old woman with rekindled mistrust.
But then he looked at her, and the strange tension in the moment eased. Loki moved towards Reagan, his hand coming to settle comfortingly - groundingly - at the small of her back.
"Run along then," Heika told them. "Onto the next adventure."
And the portal opened then - almost desperately - as if it were that exact millisecond that it was given permission to do so. The urge to pass through it suddenly threatened to overwhelmed her. No longer just an annoying niggling at the back of her mind, no, now it was almost something primitive within her, a survival instinct. And yet she knew it was so very, very wrong. Reagan glance up at Loki's face, his already gaze fixed upon the portal, as though he'd known exactly where to expect it. And Reagan couldn't help but to wonder how much power Loki had had to devote to holding back the force of Asta's magic so that she could listen to Heika's tale and process what she was being told in that dingy little mortal kitchen.
Her gaze flickered to Heika then, and she was stunned to find the woman had turned away, retreating slowly up the creaky hallway she'd led them down not so long ago, as if she wasn't even aware a hole in space had been cleaved open in her very kitchen.
"What did she say to you?" Reagan murmured under her breath to Loki, beside her.
"Later," Loki promised, his jaw set tight.
Confused, Reagan's eyes trailed down his profile, they fell to the veins in his neck. Her eyes widened at the sight; the were utterly bulging. Veins and muscles, corded, strained beneath his skin. Beads of sweat trickled from his brow. As if he were fighting for his life. The hand at the small of her back nudged her encouragingly and Reagan wanted to protest - knew that she ought to - but her feet seemed to move of their own accord.
As soon as they past through the gate, back into the musty atmosphere of a cobwebbed tavern on the other side of the universe, Reagan knew it was a mistake. A deadly one.
The colour drain from her face the second her eyes fell on Asta. She wasn't standing there waiting for them with that smarmy smile on her features as she had expected. She wasn't lounging in her chair sorting through that macabre pile of bones she'd seemed so fascinated in.
No.
Instead, she was on her knees.
Horror swelled within Reagan as she took in the sight. The witching wasn't just kneeling, she was folded in half, her chest pressed to her thighs. Her hands were bound behind her back, so tightly her hands had blued. And heavy chains bound her body to the floor, pinned her into that humiliating posturing. Beside her, two towering figures flanked her, as if they'd been waiting. Creatures - there was no better word for it - with the most inhuman faces Reagan had ever gazed upon. Fleshy holes where a mouth should be, lidless eyes and skin that rippled and shifted and hypnotised as though it were alive, ink black, cracking open to reveal an underlayer of orange flesh that reminded her vaguely of lava.
As she felt a sharp pain in her neck, Reagan gasped. Her hand flew up to find a foreign body there. A... dart of some sort. Dread filled her. She'd seen enough movies to know she'd just been tranqued and instantly her lucidity began to slip.
Beside her, Loki roared in outrage - in protest - but her head seemed foggy and he seemed so far away, as if time around her was beginning to slow.
"Is it them?" One beast snarled in an impossibly low rumble.
"It is," the other answered. "Take them."
"And the witch?"
"She's of no use to us now. Kill her."
"No!" Asta screamed. "No, wait! Please! I gave them to you. I gave you what you wanted! Just let me go! Please, just let me go!"
The creatures ignored her.
Asta loosed a desperate, outraged shriek. She let loose a wave of impossible, stifling power but the beast just stood among it as if it were nothing more than a gentle Autumn breeze. The one given the order stepped to her, vibrant crevices of shades of reds and orange rippled beneath midnight skin as it raised a blade high above the Witchling's head.
"A curse on you, Odinson!" she shrieked at Loki, who still struggled hopelessly against the clutches upon him even as the serum begin to steal consciousness away from him.
"A curse on you for bringing this to my doorstep!" Asta screamed. "I'll make you pay for this! I'll make you bleed! I'll make you burn! Do you hear me, Loki? I will make you b-"
It was the last words she utterly before the creature brought down it's massive blade and cleaved Asta's head clean from her body. And Reagan would have screamed at the sight, had the final grasp of consciousness she was clinging to slipped from her fingers.
As her legs gave out and she began to collapse, large hands - so calloused they felt like stone - caught hold of her, cutting her fall short. As her head lulled to the side and her vision faded at the edges, the last thing Reagan saw was Asta's headless corpse slump lifeless upon the wooden floorboards. A sickening dread managed to sweel within her in those final moments as her eyes fell upon the stump that, just moments ago has served as Asta's neck. Where there should have been blood and viscera and tissue, a dark, impossible hole yawned open in it's place - strange unlights, dancing in the darkness. It was emptiness, a void, sulking, pulling, collapsing in on itself. Reagan watched helplessly, as Asta's body began to shrink in on itself, collapsing into the void of itself - becoming that void.
And as Reagan slipped away into darkness, she was sure she could still hear the Witchling's screams.
...heyyyy hahaha I'm so sorry I disappeared for so long! Guys, writer's block hit HARD and with moving and all the rest of it I was just in a big ol' burn out. I just needed to step away for a few weeks. It was a way bigger break than I wanted to take.
But I'm home alone tonight! And I've had a couple of glasses of wine and I thought 'damn it, I gotta update. it's time' so this chap might get a bit of a face lift this week (grammar and possibly missing sentences and whatnot, not storyline) but I just wanted to post and let you know I'm still here and committed to finishing this story.
Speaking of, book one will be wrapping up soon, but chapter 1 of book 2 is ready to go, picking up basically where this one leaves off. I can't wait to post it, I've written some stinkin' cute scenes for you all.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed. Next update will be MUCH quicker. Pinky swear :P
Also if you've started the new season of Loki, no spoilers pls I haven't had a chance yet!
Love you all :)
