this may or may not be the start of something bigger.
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National Poetry Month Day 28
This may grow. It may not. Rest assured that if a plot develops it does not negate the fact that this scene is wish fulfillment.
"Freedom, freedom, truth, justice, and the American way." Loki balances the curved blade against Steve's throat with the tip of his boot. "No, look up. Look me in the eye. Look me in the eye. Parading around your 'goodness' which is nothing more than fear. You have weakness down to your bones - no, don't interrupt. You have weakness in your arteries. You bleed fear, that's why they made you to be their symbol. A panic-stricken nation swaggering around with their arsenal pointed at anything that coughs."
Steve says, "Well, you'd know all about fear, wouldn't you?"
"Not from experience," Loki says kicking the blade.
The curved edge of the knife sticks in the underside of Steve's chin, and he flinches, because humans do that. They flinch at pain. Loki kicks it again, harder, until the point breaks through the tissues beneath the soldier's tongue, and there is no resistance.
"That all you got?" Steve wheezes, his body wracked with suffering, his skin sweaty with it. Loki takes his foot from Captain American's throat and regains his balance. There is blood welling up through the man's lips, and pouring down his neck.
"This may take a while," Loki says with an apologetic smile and a sincere dip of his head. "It's quite hard to smuggle weapons into here, as you'll have noticed." He draws his leg back for another vicious kick, and when it connects he can feel the ball of his foot smashing bone.
He leaves a bloody toeprint on the floor, but Loki is adept at covering his tracks when he wishes them covered. He has learnt strange magic in strange worlds, at terrible cost to himself.
"And I don't want you interrupting me again," Loki says. He picks up the sceptre, with its cruel horns and the crude depiction of a bull upon it. To the untrained eye it looks like brass; to the trained eye it is a terrifying concoction of elements from outside of the known universe, and to the observant it is not a bull that prowls the sceptre's surface. Nor is it a static engraving. The horned beast squirms inside its prison.
"I suppose you want me to beg you for mercy?" Steve says, dripping blood from his indistinct words onto the stone floor. The Citadel of Peace is impenetrable to those who come in wrath, and so they sent Steve, wondering aloud - for he had listened - how he had come to be within its walls.
Loki braces his feet at a distance from each other. The sceptre is too heavy for a mortal to wield, and even with his protections in place it is a drain on every atom of his being to hold it for long. He meets Steve's eyes. "Do not insult me by supposing anything of the sort," he says, softly. "Pretend for a moment that you have the intelligence to understand what you are a part of, and know as I know that I will grant mercy to no one."
Loki lifts the impossibly heavy sceptre. It bears within it the weight of an entire world.
He twists his long, lean body at the waist, and braces his foot against Steve's chest. The soldier does not flinch, now.
The might of his swing is such that it almost bears him to the ground. There is an ache in his shoulders that there has not been since he paid the sacrifice due to learn the whereabouts of the sceptre itself. Loki watches as if outside himself (as he has done so many times) the infinite prison and the horned beast smash through the skull of the Symbol of Freedom on the floor of the Citadel of Peace.
The sceptre ploughs through bone, brain, and blood like a falling boulder through snow. The head of Captain America disintegrates into a shattered mess, hitting the far walls opposite, streaking the floor with his last thoughts, and temporarily besmirching the vestiments of the true king of Asgard with his blood.
The sceptre is clean when it touches the stones. Loki can barely hold his breath or his grip on the handle from the will and exertion required, and were he not accustomed to the strange and to the unworldly he might think himself dreaming as the beast within the sceptre squirms, deforming the metal.
As the horned beast pushes against the outer walls of its prison, so the inner walls of the Citadel twist inwards as if pinched. Loki steps backwards out of the mortal remains of Steve Rogers, Symbol of Freedom, dragging the sceptre along the stones like a child with a too-heavy load.
The blood of their champion soaks into the stones, the Citadel which has been starved of sacrifice for millennia drinking down greedily a worthy meal. Loki breathes slowly and evenly as the walls pinch, twist, and squeeze inwards: as the sceptre bulges, throwing out a deformity in the shape of what might be a hoof. The walls smash inwards in a limb-shape before the hoof is withdrawn, and Loki's grip on the handle almost weakens as it grows hot to the touch.
He endures the burns on the palms of his hands for the message they impart: this is not enough. There must be others. There are other Citadels: there must be other sacrifices before the prison can be undone.
The horned beast shudders in its jail older than time.
Fortunately, Loki knows many other symbols to deface, and he knows how to call them.
National Poetry Month Day 28
This may grow. It may not. Rest assured that if a plot develops it does not negate the fact that this scene is wish fulfillment.
"Freedom, freedom, truth, justice, and the American way." Loki balances the curved blade against Steve's throat with the tip of his boot. "No, look up. Look me in the eye. Look me in the eye. Parading around your 'goodness' which is nothing more than fear. You have weakness down to your bones - no, don't interrupt. You have weakness in your arteries. You bleed fear, that's why they made you to be their symbol. A panic-stricken nation swaggering around with their arsenal pointed at anything that coughs."
Steve says, "Well, you'd know all about fear, wouldn't you?"
"Not from experience," Loki says kicking the blade.
The curved edge of the knife sticks in the underside of Steve's chin, and he flinches, because humans do that. They flinch at pain. Loki kicks it again, harder, until the point breaks through the tissues beneath the soldier's tongue, and there is no resistance.
"That all you got?" Steve wheezes, his body wracked with suffering, his skin sweaty with it. Loki takes his foot from Captain American's throat and regains his balance. There is blood welling up through the man's lips, and pouring down his neck.
"This may take a while," Loki says with an apologetic smile and a sincere dip of his head. "It's quite hard to smuggle weapons into here, as you'll have noticed." He draws his leg back for another vicious kick, and when it connects he can feel the ball of his foot smashing bone.
He leaves a bloody toeprint on the floor, but Loki is adept at covering his tracks when he wishes them covered. He has learnt strange magic in strange worlds, at terrible cost to himself.
"And I don't want you interrupting me again," Loki says. He picks up the sceptre, with its cruel horns and the crude depiction of a bull upon it. To the untrained eye it looks like brass; to the trained eye it is a terrifying concoction of elements from outside of the known universe, and to the observant it is not a bull that prowls the sceptre's surface. Nor is it a static engraving. The horned beast squirms inside its prison.
"I suppose you want me to beg you for mercy?" Steve says, dripping blood from his indistinct words onto the stone floor. The Citadel of Peace is impenetrable to those who come in wrath, and so they sent Steve, wondering aloud - for he had listened - how he had come to be within its walls.
Loki braces his feet at a distance from each other. The sceptre is too heavy for a mortal to wield, and even with his protections in place it is a drain on every atom of his being to hold it for long. He meets Steve's eyes. "Do not insult me by supposing anything of the sort," he says, softly. "Pretend for a moment that you have the intelligence to understand what you are a part of, and know as I know that I will grant mercy to no one."
Loki lifts the impossibly heavy sceptre. It bears within it the weight of an entire world.
He twists his long, lean body at the waist, and braces his foot against Steve's chest. The soldier does not flinch, now.
The might of his swing is such that it almost bears him to the ground. There is an ache in his shoulders that there has not been since he paid the sacrifice due to learn the whereabouts of the sceptre itself. Loki watches as if outside himself (as he has done so many times) the infinite prison and the horned beast smash through the skull of the Symbol of Freedom on the floor of the Citadel of Peace.
The sceptre ploughs through bone, brain, and blood like a falling boulder through snow. The head of Captain America disintegrates into a shattered mess, hitting the far walls opposite, streaking the floor with his last thoughts, and temporarily besmirching the vestiments of the true king of Asgard with his blood.
The sceptre is clean when it touches the stones. Loki can barely hold his breath or his grip on the handle from the will and exertion required, and were he not accustomed to the strange and to the unworldly he might think himself dreaming as the beast within the sceptre squirms, deforming the metal.
As the horned beast pushes against the outer walls of its prison, so the inner walls of the Citadel twist inwards as if pinched. Loki steps backwards out of the mortal remains of Steve Rogers, Symbol of Freedom, dragging the sceptre along the stones like a child with a too-heavy load.
The blood of their champion soaks into the stones, the Citadel which has been starved of sacrifice for millennia drinking down greedily a worthy meal. Loki breathes slowly and evenly as the walls pinch, twist, and squeeze inwards: as the sceptre bulges, throwing out a deformity in the shape of what might be a hoof. The walls smash inwards in a limb-shape before the hoof is withdrawn, and Loki's grip on the handle almost weakens as it grows hot to the touch.
He endures the burns on the palms of his hands for the message they impart: this is not enough. There must be others. There are other Citadels: there must be other sacrifices before the prison can be undone.
The horned beast shudders in its jail older than time.
Fortunately, Loki knows many other symbols to deface, and he knows how to call them.