Thor teleported them directly into the palace and straight to the outer doors of the healing room Frigga laid in. Guards stood out front, well-armed. Loki turned to them and demanded, "Let me in!"

"The queen has asked for privacy at this time," one of them said as they both pointed their spears at them.

Thor explained, "It's alright, she's requested to see her youngest son."

The guards looked at each other and lowered their weapons. Loki pushed passed them and threw the doors open with all his might. Inside he witnessed his mother writhing in pain on the healing bed. It pained Loki to see her this way as he ran to her right side, "Mother, I remember you!" He said, grabbing her hand carefully, "I remember everything! Thor told me all that has happened."

"My son," she said, bracing herself, careful not to show how much pain she was in, "I'm so happy to see you again, memories intact." She squeezed his hand.

"I'm here," he whispered, "and I'm not leaving you again, I promise." He carefully climbed over her to lay down beside her on her left side. This way they could look at each other face to face.

She shook her head. "You must go."

He asked, "What are you saying? Go where?"

"Listen to me," she said, choking back her pain, "Malekith is unskilled in hand to hand combat. When I let my guard down he still only managed to give me a small scratch with one of his sickles. Someone must have gifted them to him. Do you understand?"

"He's a puppet?"

She nodded and continued, "Let me explain. Malekith poisoned me with a poison that only works on Asgardians. Because you're Jotun, it won't work on you. My son, you can fight him and win, for me, for all of us!"

"I don't have my magic," Loki explained, "I can't chase after him." He shook his head. "I won't do it, Mother. You need me here."

Frigga said, "Henceforth to your father and confess your wrongdoings-"

He asked, "My wrongdoings?" As if he were innocent.

"Yes!" she commanded, "Admit you were wrong to take over Midgard. Humble yourself before your father and swear your alliegence-" she sucked in a painful breath "-to Asgard and take the fight to Malekith! Convince your father to betow your magic back to you. The dark elves will return for the aether at any time. Asgard will fall without your strength."

Loki hugged her and said, "But I don't want to leave you, Mother, not like this."

Frigga unconvincingly insisted, "I'll be alright."

"Don't lie to me," he whispered desperately.

"I'll be here when you get back," she insisted, desperate to hide the pain in her voice, "I'm not going anywhere, I promise. Henceforth." She let go of his hand. "Go!"

He slowly got up off the bed and said, "Alright, I'll retrieve my magic, and I'll find the antidote you need, I promise." He wanted to stay and hold her hand forever, but seeing her in pain felt almost as bad as leaving her alone. "I love you."

She replied, "I love you too, my sweet baby boy."

Loki couldn't bare the thought of leaving his mother, but he finally managed to pry himself away from her.

Loki marched around the side of the throne room to see Odin seated at the top of the gilded stairs. "You know as well as I do mortals must eat every few hours!" Loki explained angrily, "And drink copious amounts of fluids, and on top of all that eating and drinking they must relieve themselves at least a half dozen times every single day! Yet you trapped me at the bottom of a collapsed building and had me wallow in my own filth, parched and hungry, for 76 hours!"

"Then you were one of the lucky ones," Odin retorted calmly, as if he were expecting his son to show himself, "I heard tell some mortals were trapped under rubble for more than a week."

Loki shouted, "You sent me there and filled my head of false memories of a fake family dying before my eyes!"

"That was what you subjected those poor mortals to," Odin said, "only for them it was real."

"Don't give me that," he said, "don't act as though they don't enslave and brutalize each other day in and day out. What I did was hardly out of their vocabulary."

Odin said, "Their insolence does not give you the right to rule them. Your arrogance knows no bounds. Have you learned nothing from your banishment?"

Loki shook his head in anger and said, "I didn't come here to be berated by you! It appears you have failed your duties as the Allfather. You let Malekith break through your defences and posion my mother, your wife! How could the all powerful king of the nine realms let that happen? You're supposed to love and protect her, and now she lays dying in your own home!"

"Such harsh language coming from a boy masquarating as a man," Odin said as he jumped to his feet. "I acknowledge you're only here now because Frigga sent Thor to retrieve you. Don't think I didn't see it with my own eye from my throne that sees all."

"Without my magic I'm of no use to you, Father, so give it to me now, or else send me back to that hell with warped memories," he replied. He crossed his arms sternly and watched as his father walked down the stairs to him.

"Tell me, my son," he said sternly, "what have you learned from your mortal experience?" He now stood before him on the same ground.

He snarked, "That the Midgardians who call themselves Americans know nothing of the geography of their own planet. One woman told me she was sure England was a city next to London, and a man once asked me how long it took for me to swim across the Atlantic to get to New York."

Unwavering, Odin asked, "What was it like to live in constant fear?" As he stepped forward, Loki stepped backwards. "Spare me your lies. This eye of mine have gazed upon your soul. I watched you cry yourself to sleep nearly every night because you missed your family so much. I saw the mortals treat you like dirt for struggling to use their machines. I know that no matter how cruel your words are to me on this day, you longed to have a greater purpose in life than to be a regular mortal man with no impact on the world around him! I witnessed your anguish and your pain and your anxiety day in and day out! So tell me what it felt like in your own words! Forthwith!"

Loki's eyes watered in anger as he flushed in embarrassment. He couldn't bare to look his father in the eye as Odin read his soul out loud for all of Asgard to hear.

"You saw everything I did," he whispered painfully, "you already know."

Odin pinched his shoulder hard and forced him to kneel. He explained, "I only do this now because Malekith's return is imminent, and without your help more will surely die. Your powers shall be reinstated, and the nine realms may now say the name 'Loki Odinson' once again." He tapped his staff against each of Loki's shoulders and his powers returned. He quickly used his magic to change into his green and gold Asgardian garb and rose to his feet. Odin added, "Loki, you are to remain here in this realm, inside the palace, until the dark elves attack. Is that understood?"

Loki answered, "Yes, I understand." He was so happy to feel his magic flowing through his veins again he shook off everything his father just said to him.

Loki spent his time in the library. He could always concentrate on books best when he read them without any gravity holding him down. He floated in the air, slowly turning upside-down and right-side up again, head over heels. When he was done with the books, he tossed them onto the table still on the ground with an unceremonious thud.

It wasn't long until Thor ran up to Loki with Sif and the warriors three in tow. "Loki!" he exclaimed from the ground, "We've been searching everywhere for you! Get down here! We've formulated a plan on how to save Jane and defeat Malekith." He paused. "What are you doing?" He watched Loki continue to read the book he was holding.

"Oh hello again dear brother," he replied, slowly rotating himself to meet Thor on the ground, "I've missed you too. How have you been? How has everyone been?" He slammed the book shut hard and threw it onto the table.

Hogan said, "We haven't been searching everywhere for you to stop and have idle chatter, Loki."

Thor explained, "We ask for your assistance with leaving Asgard and taking this fight to Svartalheim, brother. What say you?"

Loki used telekinesis to take another book off the shelf and bring it directly into his hands as he snarked, "Ready to commit treason again so soon, are we?"

Volstagg whispered, "Not so loud! Heimdall will hear."

"I'm sure he's well aware of your lovely clandestine group by now," Loki replied, "what exactly do you plan to do? Search for Malekith on Svartalheim, and then what? Sneak up on him and kill him with the hope he won't give you too much of a fight?" He searched through the book in his hands quickly.

Thor explained, "This is no joking matter. He stole the casket of ancient winters."

Confused, Loki paused and said, "Without a proper spell to harness it's power, he'll freeze over and die."

"Malekith clearly figured out a way around that little problem," Sif said, "otherwise why else would he have taken it?"

"Was that only thing he stole from the vault?" he asked.

Thor answered, "Yes. Whenever the dark elves return, they'll likely use it against us. We can't let that happen! He seeks the aether inside of Jane. If we take the fight to him, we'll spare Asgardian bloodshed. He must know how to remove it from her. Once it's outside of Jane's body, I'll destroy it and we can recover the casket before he gets a chance to use it."

Loki asked, without looking up from his books, "Where are they now?"

Sif answered, "We assume back on Svartalheim. Malekith is using some sort of spell to hide himself from Heimdall's eyes, otherwise the Allfather would have already sent everyone to go after him."

As Loki continued to read, Thor asked, "What are you searching for in all these books?"

He slammed another one shut onto the table and answered angrily, "An antidote for the poison currently coursing through Mother's veins."

Fandral asked, "What makes you believe that would be in one of these books?"

"The 27 universal principles of magic," he answered, picking up another one and quickly flipping through the pages.

The only one out of the group who showed any understanding was Sif. "Yes of course," she said, "I hadn't thought of that."

"What it is you speak of?" Thor asked.

"My dear brother," Loki replied, "did you never pay attention during our lessons growing up? There are 27 universal principles of magic, whether it's witchcraft or sorcery, that all follow the same unbreakable guidelines. Number 19 explains how magical poisons must also have magical antidotes, or else the poison is useless."

Hogan asked, "What makes you so sure Malekith gave her a magical poison?"

"My mother told me it was made specifically to target Asgardians," he answered, "there is nothing naturally occuring that does such a thing, so it must be magical. Unfortunately, none of these books appears to have the descriptions of the symptoms she has, therefore Malekith must have invented it all by himself." He slammed another book shut. "Bastard."

Thor said, "Loki, if you get us to Svartalheim you might be able to save Mother."

Loki thought for a moment before he answered, "Brilliant idea, alas you've neglected to see one small problem. The palace is under strict lockdown, never mind the rest of Asgard. And Father sits on the throne, watching all, never mind Heimdall who's likely listening in as we speak."

Volstagg said, "Like that's ever stopped you before."

Loki couldn't help but give an evil smile. "It'll take a lot to make it out of the palace, and even then, how do you plan on getting all the way to Svartalheim? The bifrost is still destroyed."

"We can use the tesseract," Thor explained, "all we have to do is collect Jane from the guest chambers and then get back to Father's vault-"

"Oo," Fandral said sharply, "you put it back?"

Sif said, "We'll never get down there to retrieve it, Thor. Your father placed hundreds of guards there after you stole it to aquire Loki."

Loki explained, "There's another way to get to Svartalheim from here, one even Heimdall doesn't know of. But leaving the palace still poses a problem."

Volstagg gestured to the warriors three and Sif and said, "We'll give them a big distraction."