[FIC] The Thousandth Man, Part II
Title: The Thousandth Man
Pairing: Thor/Loki
Warnings/Ratings: See Part I.
Summary: Our heroes arrive on Earth and meet Jane, Darcy, and Erik. Pop tarts are consumed and secrets are shared.
The blinding power of the storm spat them out, Thor hitting the ground first with a solid whump, making a Thor-shaped impact crater in the sand. He sat up, blinking as his vision struggled to clear, grabbing handful of sand. The wind lashed at him, tearing at his clothes and hair like an angry lover.
Seconds later, Loki appeared, tossed facedown between Thor's legs. "Arrgh," Loki moaned as he gathered his limbs under him. "Where are we?" Slowly he lifted his head, first to the level of Thor's crotch, and then another moan later, higher to look Thor himself in the eye. "Hel," Loki answered his own question. "We've been banished to Hel."
Sand streaming through his fingers, Thor said, "This is Earth, isn't it?"
Bright white lights appeared from the gloom. "A metal dragon!" Loki screamed, leaping to his feet. "It's coming right for y--"
The metal dragon honked a challenge. It's glowing white eyes left Thor frozen in shock. Before Thor could stand and fight, Loki iced his arm into a spiked club and swung out at the monster, caving in its skull. Screeching in its death throes, its eyes dimming, the metal dragon shuddered to a stop. Smoke billowed from its cracked skull.
"You," Thor stammered as he stumbled to his feet, "you saved me."
Loki's icy arm returned to normal. "Yes, well, don't get used to it," Loki sniffed.
The metal dragon's side split open and three small human forms tumbled out, coughing and shaking. One, a tiny and beautiful woman, stared in shock at Loki and Thor, then regarded the sad remains of her dragon. "You destroyed my van," she said wonderingly. "Why did you -- what are you doing here, anyway? There was no one here before."
Thor put on his most winning smile and swaggered towards her. "I am Thor Odinsson, heir to Asgard," he said. "Did this beast belong to you? It attempted to maul us, but nevertheless, when I am king I will have you sent a chest of rubies to compensate you for the loss of your dragon."
"My dragon?" The woman gawked at him. "Who did you say you were again?"
Her male companion pried open the beast's metal skull. "Oh, no," he said. "They smashed the head gasket."
"Is that bad? That's bad, isn't it?" asked their third companion, a dark-haired girl. She too was staring in wonder at Thor and Loki. "You," she said, pointing at Loki. "I saw you punch the van! Your arm, it was all -- blue-y and stuff."
Loki drew himself up to his full height and pulled his cloak tight around him. "You imagined that, mortal!" he declared.
"Okay, whoever you two are," said the other woman, "my name is Dr. Jane Foster, and you just turned my research van into a big paperweight. So since we're all stuck here in the desert until the tow truck gets here, how about explaining how you appeared out of thin air?"
In the hour it took for the tow truck to arrive, Thor had given the three humans a crash course in Asgard, the Nine Worlds, Yggdrasil, and of course, his many adventures and exploits. Loki sat off to the side, arms crossed, trying in vain to ignore the humans very existence.
"Oookay," Jane said, cutting in before Thor could launch into another tale about defeating fire-demons, "um, Thor, assuming this -- incredible story is true, what are you going to do now?"
"I'll fetch my hammer and return to Asgard," Thor said blithely, as though nothing had ever been more obvious.
"Odin banished us from Asgard," Loki grumbled from his seat a few feet away. "Why should it be so simple to return?"
Darcy plucked at Thor's sleeve. "What's with Bela Lugosi over there?" she whispered, pointing to Loki.
"Ah, that is Loki Laufeyson, Loki Giant's Child, my consort!"
"Is he from another world, too?" Darcy giggled. "Transsexual, Transylvaniaaah-uh-huh-huh!"
Loki, utterly failing to understand the pop culture reference, drew himself up. "Are you insulting my parentage, mortal?" he asked indignantly.
"Oh thank god, the tow truck's coming," Jane said, standing up and dusting off her pants.
After the van was secured, everyone squeezed into the tow truck, which proved difficult with the addition of the two newcomers, who seemed to take up the entire back seat of the extended cab with their elbows, knees, and broad shoulders. Finally, Erik rode shotgun with Jane perched on his knee, Darcy sitting between them and the driver with the stick between her legs.
"All right back there?" called the tow truck driver to the two in the back.
"Never. Better," Loki gritted out through his teeth. He was wedged against Thor, and with every bump in the road Thor's knee rubbed against a very intimate place.
Darcy wiggled around and stuck something into his hand. In the dim light given off by the dashboard, Loki could make out a tiny box connected to two bits of string, with small buds dangling from either end. "Here ya go," she said. "Listen to this while we ride."
"What am I meant to do with this--" Loki began to say, but Darcy mimed sticking the little buds in her ears. Doing that, he pushed a button and discovered that the tiny contraption emitted music.
"So you boys don't have anywhere to go until you find your, er, your hammer, correct?" Erik asked Thor as they bounced along. "We can lend you sleeping bags for tonight, and tomorrow you can head into town and find out if anyone's seen your hammer."
"Excellent!" Thor said, his face lighting up. "I will remember your generosity when I come into my kingdom, this I vow."
***
The tow truck squeaked to a halt, and after the van was unhitched, it was time for the five passengers to climb out. Jane, Erik, and Darcy popped out of the front seat, followed by a grinning Thor, and then finally Loki, who was walking oddly for some reason.
As Jane and Erik talked to the tow truck driver, Loki accosted Darcy. "This town we are going to tomorrow," he said. "There will I find this Evanescence?" He held up her iPod, the front screen displaying Evanescence: Bring Me to Life. "For they alone speak to the pain in my soul."
Darcy stared at him with her big eyes. "Wow, you really are from another planet."
Thor approached them, holding sleeping bags tucked under one arm and an entire box of Pop-Tarts in the other. "Come, Loki!" he said. "Our hosts have supplied us with bedding and with these edible confections. Humans are generous indeed."
Loki ran after him as Thor went to spread their sleeping bags out on the ground. "You should not have revealed our origins to them," he hissed. "Humans cannot be trusted. They are vicious and cowardly creatures."
"Who told you that?" Thor scoffed. "Your father? He only wanted to turn their world into a frozen wasteland. So thoughtless of humans to be in his way."
Loki's mouth twisted. "Very well then!" he said petulantly. "Trust them with your life. You are powerless and lost among them, and when they turn on you, do not expect me to save you." He flopped down atop the larger of the sleeping bags. "And I claim this bedding for my own."
Thor sighed. He sat on the other sleeping bag, pulled off his boots, then reached across and lay his hand over Loki's. Loki froze, then looked down at their hands, then up at Thor, his mouth open a little. "Listen," said Thor. "I know that I have caused you much misery, and my rashness has gotten us banished from Asgard. I would move the Nine Worlds and the nine skies above them and the nine hells below them to make right these wrongs. Believe this, Loki."
Loki swallowed. "I-I would like some of those treats the humans gave us," he said at last.
Thor smiled, then removed his hand to pick up the box. Soon enough they had a little pile of foil and an empty box, and bellies filled with Pop-Tarts. "The humans aren't so terrible," Loki said after some minutes. "They did give us food and bedding even after I killed their dragon. If it had been my father's dragon, he would've turned us into toothpicks."
Thor coughed softly. "About that... is Laufey your father or your mother?"
Loki blinked rapidly at that. "We jotnar have not the same words for parents as your kind. We count only the parent that births us, not the other who begets us. So Laufey bore me, if that answers your question."
Thor gazed up at the strange constellations in the sky. "Your entire race is fatherless?"
"Jotnar do not mate for life." Loki sighed. "We mate to create strong offspring. He who begets the youngling takes no interest in it. As I told you, we are not a sentimental race."
Thor turned to him once again, rubbing a little at the scratchy stubble on his chin. "So it is foreign to you to be married at all, much less to an Asgardian like myself."
"It is not our way," Loki said, and he took a deep breath. "But you've never asked me so many questions before. Why do you wish to know?" He looked sideways at Thor, his brows furrowed. Guarded, always so guarded.
Thor pondered this a moment. He had spent the last few weeks thinking only of himself -- it is unfair that I must marry this creature, he does not talk to me, he does not touch me, he does not lay with me, he does not kiss me -- but now, banished to Earth, he had a taste of what Loki himself must've felt, tossed into a foreign world alone and friendless. But I'm not alone, Thor thought. I have Loki with me. "I'm learning not to think of myself so much," he replied.
Loki and Thor burrowed into their sleeping bags, both of which were about a foot too small for them. They bundled their shirts into pillows for their heads and lay sprawled on their backs, staring at the cloudless night's sky.
"Can Heimdall hear us?" Loki asked.
"Heimdall hears and sees everything. But he is loyal to the king, and he will not disobey him. I must find Mjolnir, and then we may return to Asgard."
Loki seemed to consider this for some minutes. His breathing grew so slow and so even that Thor at first thought he had fallen asleep, only to hear Loki softly say, "Thor?"
"Mmmm?"
"Do you know that the only reason I am alive is because of you?"
Startled, Thor rolled over on his side to look at Loki, who remained on his back, arms splayed above his head, staring at the stars. "No," Thor admitted. "That I did not know. What do you mean by that?"
Loki's eyes slowly slid shut. "When I was born," he said, "I was so small and frail that it was thought best to leave me to die. It was thought a mercy."
"Laufey thought it a mercy," Thor growled. He could imagine King Laufey holding tiny Loki, Laufey frowning at his stick-thin arms and legs, imagine Laufey tossing Loki outside and leaving him to die.
"But Odin came, and said a boy-child had been born to him, and he wished for an alliance." Loki's eyes opened again, and they glistened. "It was decided that I might prove useful yet. That being so small, I would grow to an Asgardian's size and with magicks I could appear to be one. For that and that alone, I was allowed to live. As a youngling I was told many times that I owed every breath to you. So you see, Thor, you have only had to live with me a few weeks. I have lived with you all my life."
Thor clasped Loki's shoulder in his hand, wanting to pull Loki closer to him, to console him, and not knowing how. He had resented Loki, yes, and then desired his attention, his admiration. But he knew not how Frost Giants comforted one another, and he didn't think Loki wanted his embrace or his kisses. "Loki," he said, "your life is yours. But if you will have me, I wish to stand beside you. And you owe me naught."
Loki's lips trembled. "I am my own Loki."
"Yes. Forever."
And Loki laid his own hand over Thor's, and they fell asleep like that, with Loki on his back, and Thor on his side, curled next to him.
Pairing: Thor/Loki
Warnings/Ratings: See Part I.
Summary: Our heroes arrive on Earth and meet Jane, Darcy, and Erik. Pop tarts are consumed and secrets are shared.
The blinding power of the storm spat them out, Thor hitting the ground first with a solid whump, making a Thor-shaped impact crater in the sand. He sat up, blinking as his vision struggled to clear, grabbing handful of sand. The wind lashed at him, tearing at his clothes and hair like an angry lover.
Seconds later, Loki appeared, tossed facedown between Thor's legs. "Arrgh," Loki moaned as he gathered his limbs under him. "Where are we?" Slowly he lifted his head, first to the level of Thor's crotch, and then another moan later, higher to look Thor himself in the eye. "Hel," Loki answered his own question. "We've been banished to Hel."
Sand streaming through his fingers, Thor said, "This is Earth, isn't it?"
Bright white lights appeared from the gloom. "A metal dragon!" Loki screamed, leaping to his feet. "It's coming right for y--"
The metal dragon honked a challenge. It's glowing white eyes left Thor frozen in shock. Before Thor could stand and fight, Loki iced his arm into a spiked club and swung out at the monster, caving in its skull. Screeching in its death throes, its eyes dimming, the metal dragon shuddered to a stop. Smoke billowed from its cracked skull.
"You," Thor stammered as he stumbled to his feet, "you saved me."
Loki's icy arm returned to normal. "Yes, well, don't get used to it," Loki sniffed.
The metal dragon's side split open and three small human forms tumbled out, coughing and shaking. One, a tiny and beautiful woman, stared in shock at Loki and Thor, then regarded the sad remains of her dragon. "You destroyed my van," she said wonderingly. "Why did you -- what are you doing here, anyway? There was no one here before."
Thor put on his most winning smile and swaggered towards her. "I am Thor Odinsson, heir to Asgard," he said. "Did this beast belong to you? It attempted to maul us, but nevertheless, when I am king I will have you sent a chest of rubies to compensate you for the loss of your dragon."
"My dragon?" The woman gawked at him. "Who did you say you were again?"
Her male companion pried open the beast's metal skull. "Oh, no," he said. "They smashed the head gasket."
"Is that bad? That's bad, isn't it?" asked their third companion, a dark-haired girl. She too was staring in wonder at Thor and Loki. "You," she said, pointing at Loki. "I saw you punch the van! Your arm, it was all -- blue-y and stuff."
Loki drew himself up to his full height and pulled his cloak tight around him. "You imagined that, mortal!" he declared.
"Okay, whoever you two are," said the other woman, "my name is Dr. Jane Foster, and you just turned my research van into a big paperweight. So since we're all stuck here in the desert until the tow truck gets here, how about explaining how you appeared out of thin air?"
In the hour it took for the tow truck to arrive, Thor had given the three humans a crash course in Asgard, the Nine Worlds, Yggdrasil, and of course, his many adventures and exploits. Loki sat off to the side, arms crossed, trying in vain to ignore the humans very existence.
"Oookay," Jane said, cutting in before Thor could launch into another tale about defeating fire-demons, "um, Thor, assuming this -- incredible story is true, what are you going to do now?"
"I'll fetch my hammer and return to Asgard," Thor said blithely, as though nothing had ever been more obvious.
"Odin banished us from Asgard," Loki grumbled from his seat a few feet away. "Why should it be so simple to return?"
Darcy plucked at Thor's sleeve. "What's with Bela Lugosi over there?" she whispered, pointing to Loki.
"Ah, that is Loki Laufeyson, Loki Giant's Child, my consort!"
"Is he from another world, too?" Darcy giggled. "Transsexual, Transylvaniaaah-uh-huh-huh!"
Loki, utterly failing to understand the pop culture reference, drew himself up. "Are you insulting my parentage, mortal?" he asked indignantly.
"Oh thank god, the tow truck's coming," Jane said, standing up and dusting off her pants.
After the van was secured, everyone squeezed into the tow truck, which proved difficult with the addition of the two newcomers, who seemed to take up the entire back seat of the extended cab with their elbows, knees, and broad shoulders. Finally, Erik rode shotgun with Jane perched on his knee, Darcy sitting between them and the driver with the stick between her legs.
"All right back there?" called the tow truck driver to the two in the back.
"Never. Better," Loki gritted out through his teeth. He was wedged against Thor, and with every bump in the road Thor's knee rubbed against a very intimate place.
Darcy wiggled around and stuck something into his hand. In the dim light given off by the dashboard, Loki could make out a tiny box connected to two bits of string, with small buds dangling from either end. "Here ya go," she said. "Listen to this while we ride."
"What am I meant to do with this--" Loki began to say, but Darcy mimed sticking the little buds in her ears. Doing that, he pushed a button and discovered that the tiny contraption emitted music.
"So you boys don't have anywhere to go until you find your, er, your hammer, correct?" Erik asked Thor as they bounced along. "We can lend you sleeping bags for tonight, and tomorrow you can head into town and find out if anyone's seen your hammer."
"Excellent!" Thor said, his face lighting up. "I will remember your generosity when I come into my kingdom, this I vow."
***
The tow truck squeaked to a halt, and after the van was unhitched, it was time for the five passengers to climb out. Jane, Erik, and Darcy popped out of the front seat, followed by a grinning Thor, and then finally Loki, who was walking oddly for some reason.
As Jane and Erik talked to the tow truck driver, Loki accosted Darcy. "This town we are going to tomorrow," he said. "There will I find this Evanescence?" He held up her iPod, the front screen displaying Evanescence: Bring Me to Life. "For they alone speak to the pain in my soul."
Darcy stared at him with her big eyes. "Wow, you really are from another planet."
Thor approached them, holding sleeping bags tucked under one arm and an entire box of Pop-Tarts in the other. "Come, Loki!" he said. "Our hosts have supplied us with bedding and with these edible confections. Humans are generous indeed."
Loki ran after him as Thor went to spread their sleeping bags out on the ground. "You should not have revealed our origins to them," he hissed. "Humans cannot be trusted. They are vicious and cowardly creatures."
"Who told you that?" Thor scoffed. "Your father? He only wanted to turn their world into a frozen wasteland. So thoughtless of humans to be in his way."
Loki's mouth twisted. "Very well then!" he said petulantly. "Trust them with your life. You are powerless and lost among them, and when they turn on you, do not expect me to save you." He flopped down atop the larger of the sleeping bags. "And I claim this bedding for my own."
Thor sighed. He sat on the other sleeping bag, pulled off his boots, then reached across and lay his hand over Loki's. Loki froze, then looked down at their hands, then up at Thor, his mouth open a little. "Listen," said Thor. "I know that I have caused you much misery, and my rashness has gotten us banished from Asgard. I would move the Nine Worlds and the nine skies above them and the nine hells below them to make right these wrongs. Believe this, Loki."
Loki swallowed. "I-I would like some of those treats the humans gave us," he said at last.
Thor smiled, then removed his hand to pick up the box. Soon enough they had a little pile of foil and an empty box, and bellies filled with Pop-Tarts. "The humans aren't so terrible," Loki said after some minutes. "They did give us food and bedding even after I killed their dragon. If it had been my father's dragon, he would've turned us into toothpicks."
Thor coughed softly. "About that... is Laufey your father or your mother?"
Loki blinked rapidly at that. "We jotnar have not the same words for parents as your kind. We count only the parent that births us, not the other who begets us. So Laufey bore me, if that answers your question."
Thor gazed up at the strange constellations in the sky. "Your entire race is fatherless?"
"Jotnar do not mate for life." Loki sighed. "We mate to create strong offspring. He who begets the youngling takes no interest in it. As I told you, we are not a sentimental race."
Thor turned to him once again, rubbing a little at the scratchy stubble on his chin. "So it is foreign to you to be married at all, much less to an Asgardian like myself."
"It is not our way," Loki said, and he took a deep breath. "But you've never asked me so many questions before. Why do you wish to know?" He looked sideways at Thor, his brows furrowed. Guarded, always so guarded.
Thor pondered this a moment. He had spent the last few weeks thinking only of himself -- it is unfair that I must marry this creature, he does not talk to me, he does not touch me, he does not lay with me, he does not kiss me -- but now, banished to Earth, he had a taste of what Loki himself must've felt, tossed into a foreign world alone and friendless. But I'm not alone, Thor thought. I have Loki with me. "I'm learning not to think of myself so much," he replied.
Loki and Thor burrowed into their sleeping bags, both of which were about a foot too small for them. They bundled their shirts into pillows for their heads and lay sprawled on their backs, staring at the cloudless night's sky.
"Can Heimdall hear us?" Loki asked.
"Heimdall hears and sees everything. But he is loyal to the king, and he will not disobey him. I must find Mjolnir, and then we may return to Asgard."
Loki seemed to consider this for some minutes. His breathing grew so slow and so even that Thor at first thought he had fallen asleep, only to hear Loki softly say, "Thor?"
"Mmmm?"
"Do you know that the only reason I am alive is because of you?"
Startled, Thor rolled over on his side to look at Loki, who remained on his back, arms splayed above his head, staring at the stars. "No," Thor admitted. "That I did not know. What do you mean by that?"
Loki's eyes slowly slid shut. "When I was born," he said, "I was so small and frail that it was thought best to leave me to die. It was thought a mercy."
"Laufey thought it a mercy," Thor growled. He could imagine King Laufey holding tiny Loki, Laufey frowning at his stick-thin arms and legs, imagine Laufey tossing Loki outside and leaving him to die.
"But Odin came, and said a boy-child had been born to him, and he wished for an alliance." Loki's eyes opened again, and they glistened. "It was decided that I might prove useful yet. That being so small, I would grow to an Asgardian's size and with magicks I could appear to be one. For that and that alone, I was allowed to live. As a youngling I was told many times that I owed every breath to you. So you see, Thor, you have only had to live with me a few weeks. I have lived with you all my life."
Thor clasped Loki's shoulder in his hand, wanting to pull Loki closer to him, to console him, and not knowing how. He had resented Loki, yes, and then desired his attention, his admiration. But he knew not how Frost Giants comforted one another, and he didn't think Loki wanted his embrace or his kisses. "Loki," he said, "your life is yours. But if you will have me, I wish to stand beside you. And you owe me naught."
Loki's lips trembled. "I am my own Loki."
"Yes. Forever."
And Loki laid his own hand over Thor's, and they fell asleep like that, with Loki on his back, and Thor on his side, curled next to him.