driftfleet | [ they bid me to take my place among them ]

Entry tags:

loki,
thor odinson

[ they bid me to take my place among them ]

Who: Loki + Thor
Broadcast: N/A
Action: Planetside
When: Right here, right now.

[ Despite everything, Loki at the very least, does a good job. He manages to salvage enough wood (keeping in mind Thor’s pathetic moral considerations). Crafting was one of his unused skills, though he never lost his touch. He never struggled putting the boat together with magic and skill, having it rest silently on the crest of the hill. Loki fills it to the brim with flowers; probably unlike the kind found on the planet and unlikely to be found anywhere else. Their sweet fragrance drifts into the air.

And just like that, in a matter of hours, it was ready. Loki tosses the bauble of light casually, as he waits. There is a black feeling bubbling up in his heart. ]

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[Thor hadn't left all the work to Loki. He had made his own scavenging trips through the week, hauling off wooden planks and suitable fabrics to the distant hill they had picked for the ceremony. There are some tasks though that Loki is undeniably more suited to. Thor has little skill in the magic arts, or conjuring ability. So he had allowed Loki to make his preparations in peace, and had only joined him in the last few minutes as they waited for the sun to properly set.

It strikes him how surreal this is, looking at the newly completed boat sitting upon the desert brush. Preparing rites on an alien world, far removed from hearth and home. Of course neither of those existed anymore. That was why this was necessary. He stirs after a moment and looks over to Loki, who had been standing there in silence.]

Is there anything else that needs to be added?

[ Loki makes the ball of light disappear briefly as he dusts his clothes off. ]

No. The fire will come at my command. Or you can hit it with a lightning bolt. Your choice.

I'll do that part then.

[He knows Loki has already done much of the work here. Thor won't drop his end of the load just out of convenience.

Casting his gaze over the boat again, he's silent for a long moment. Every other funeral he's attended, the dead have been sent on their way with their earthly possessions. Their swords, their shields, their treasured heirlooms. In the immense loss of Asgard and their separation from even the remaining people, there's almost nothing they can add to the boat beyond their words. Most barely escaped with the clothes on their backs.

Thor exhales and reaches around behind his belt, unhooking the end of his cape. He then unsnaps the remaining fastener on his left shoulder.]

[ Loki merely watches with bright eyes. He has little to add and . . . he probably wouldn't. Asgard has robbed plenty from him as it is. Still, there is a hollow pang in performing this ceremony. A ceremony he never got. And one that is useless to him. There's no Valhalla at the end of Loki's journey. And he doesn't want to know where Frost Giants go. Better to live in ignorance.

Once the cape has been settled, Loki's palms glow and the boat starts to rise steadily from the ground. ]

[Thor had stepped back from the boat as soon as he had set his cape in the prow, and stood alongside Loki once more. The boat begins to rise. For a paralysing moment, Thor finds himself stuck, unable to say the words. The enormity of it is always there, but in having to recite the prayer he settles over him again like a smothering shroud. He had said the words for Odin. Now he needs to say it for all of Asgard's dead.

He takes a deep breath and begins.]

Lo, there do you see your father. Lo, there do you see your mother, and your sisters, and your brothers.

[There are too many names he knows and doesn't know. Some come more quickly, painfully to mind. Sif. Fandral. Volstagg. Hogun.

Leif the stablehand. Sigurd the captain of the palace guard. Gudrun the healer. Countless more.

He shuts his eye momentarily against the sting before raising his voice once more.]

Lo, there do you see the line of our people, back to the beginning. Lo, they do call to you. Asgard, I bid you take your place among them, in the halls of Valhalla.

Where the brave may live forever.

[ Loki lets the ball of light reappear. There is a smug, sick kind of satisfaction in him, twisted and thorny. Isn't it fitting, Asgard, Loki thinks to himself, that you denied me this at every corner and now your rites come from my hand and my benevolence?

But he merely lets the glowing orb lift off into the sky. The ship continues to sail onward. ]

[It's a stark contrast to the funeral held for Frigga and those who fell to the Dark Elves' blades only four years earlier. Then, the sky had been filled with lights, and the waters crowded with boats. Now it's just the one of each. Thor tips his head back and watches the progress of Loki's orb, and chooses to imagine the stars beyond are the others they can't create themselves.

Thor lifts his fist towards the ascending boat. It's not the fury of a storm he calls down from above this time, an act too violent for this. Instead he coils up the lightning inside himself and opens his hand, sending a bolt straight into the base of the vessel. It crackles all over the small ship, sparking swift flames among the flowers and the dried wood.]

[ Weaving his magic through the ascent, Loki lets the sparks and the fire spread before it turns golden bright, drifting upwards as if called by a higher power. This was harder than it looks. Odin would use Gungnir for such a task, but Gungnir was gone — lost to Surtur. And Loki was the last mage of Asgard, the last beholden to the secrets. The rites. The texts he would pour over, year after year, thirsty for knowledge.

For worth.

The ship slowly vanishes, each piece turning into stardust, soft into the expanse. ]

It is done.

[So it is. Thor watches the last lingering traces of the ship dissolve into light and then into nothing, feeling like some kind of last breath is leaving him. Some last vestige of what was lost. That weight will continue forever, but at least now they've sent those souls on their way.

He thought it might have felt better than this. It feels right, yet rings a bit hollow.

When a few moments pass, Thor turns to Loki and nods. Despite the tiredness that settles in his heart and his eye, he remains grateful that Loki agreed to do this with him.]

Thank you.

Don't.

[ It comes out as a hiss. ]

I didn't do it for you and I certainly didn't do it for them. But I am still of Asgard.

[ And it's all he's got, whether he likes it or not. ]

[Thor's lips press into a thin line, but he's not much cowed by the reaction. Loki's suppressed tension has been evident in fits and starts ever since he came back to the Fleet.]

Was it for Asgard then?

[Or for Loki's own sake?]

[ Flatly. ]

There is no Asgard. If there were, I doubt they'd let me stand here.

[ But something in his expression loosens all the same. ]

I never had my chance.

[Thor's about to retort that Loki stood with Asgard not that long ago, and still does. That it's only by his efforts that any of Asgard remains standing at all. It's impossible to deny that--

But his mouth snaps shut abruptly, because in a heartbeat he knows what Loki's talking about. Thor remembers the last time these rites were done, and the gap carved in the middle of them. Silence descends. Thor folds his arms over his chest and stares at the sandy earth, letting a breath out through his nose.]

Ah.

[ His lips are pressed so tightly, it seems it could vanish, leaving Loki without a mouth to speak from. Anger rises up in his throat like bile, but there is no target. There's no absent father to rail again, no ignorant group of people standing in the sidelines. No faceless targets.

So the tone of his voice surprises him when he speaks, cracking. ]

Why didn't you let me say goodbye?

[Thor stiffens involuntarily. That day is thrown into stark relief in his mind, when so much of it he's tried to move on from, or simply doesn't recall. A blur exists in places where nothing was relevant except the grief of it all. An outline where his mother used to be.

He remembers enough, though. Certainly he remembers the look on Odin's face. A few heartbeats pass and he raises his head, looking at Loki. He shakes his head once, abrupt.]

That was not my decision to make.

[ His answering chuckle is bitter. ]

No. You were a good son, those days.

[Thor huffs in return, with a more emphatic headshake this time.]

For those few hours.

[It hadn't taken long after Frigga's funeral for Thor to clash with Odin, and come to the sinking realisation that treason was the only way to do the right thing. Maybe their mother had been the first unravelled thread in the childhood tapestry he'd made of Odin's unchallenged wisdom. Hela had taken a sword to the rest.]

I did ask. [As an admittance it's small, not deserving of much more considering the circumstances.] I won't pretend I fought for it.

[ Loki loosely shrugs, feigning nonchalance. ]

It hardly matters at this point. I can't follow her and I've long lost that right anyway. It's just . . . childish nonsense.

I would really prefer you not follow anyone into death again, Loki.

[He doesn't even want to consider it. Two 'deaths' are too many.]

It matters to you. And it matters to me too.

[ Loki glances at Thor. ]

I just — I wish I knew. Where Frost Giants go.

But I rather keep pretending otherwise.

[Thor stares at his brother for a long moment, at a loss. Loki rarely talks of his heritage this blatantly. He's perfectly willing to use his adopted nature as a knife to drive home whenever he wants, and has done many times. But this isn't at all the same thing.

'Where Frost Giants go' - Thor has no idea. He'd rarely thought about Frost Giants outside of battles, much less what happens to their spirits afterwards. It was only in the aftermath of his attack on Jotunheim and Loki's fall that Thor really gave their kind any consideration at all.

Watching Loki now, he doesn't have answers for him. Thor reaches out and puts his hand on the back of Loki's neck.]

I don't know either. But we have time enough to live first.

[He doesn't intend for either Loki or himself to go knocking on Valhalla's doors just yet.]

[ It doesn't quite reassure his own doubts but Loki knows Thor lacks the same answers he does. Perhaps in a way, he was hoping for something sickening sentimental. Of course we'll go the same. We'll be together And Loki would scoff, but hold onto it all the same. Because Thor said so.

Instead he merely gives a mute nod. ]

As I said. Childish nonsense.

Besides, I don't think it matters where all the others go. What matters is where you go. And if you go somewhere stupid, I'll just have to drag you back again.

[ . . . His lips curl, slight, slowly but very apparent to Thor. ]

Then I had best not wander off.

[Thor shakes Loki a bit by the shoulder. For emphasis.]

I'll remember you said that.

[It's not entirely a joke.]

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