Hi THERE and welcome to this fic! This is technically a crossover of both Thor and Doctor Who, but really, it's more of a story about Loki and the Doctor, i.e., two mad men in a box.

Or rather, without a box, as it will soon become apparent, when it will also turn into quite a problem.

But yeah, anyway, happy to have you here along for the ride. For Loki, this li'l madcap ride kicks off right after the first Thor movie, and for the Doctor right after Voyage of the Damned. I wanted to put this in the crossover section, but fanficnet was a bit on the...uncooperative side today, so I'll have to fix that when I'm online again. Until then, enjoy!

Time and Relative Mischief in Space

by Taranea

Chapter 1: Catch Him If You Can

"No, Loki."

Loki was still falling. Had been falling. Would be falling forever.

And he didn't even care.

"No, Loki."

Odin hadn't roared the words. He had spoken so quietly. And just like that, so softly, so irreparably, Loki's last, desperate appeal had been crushed.

There was no hope for him now, no chance to ever repair what he had done.

And, realizing that, he had finally let go.

Falling...

It hadn't even felt like falling, at first - it had felt like weightless drifting, like lightly floating, and only Thor's anguished face, his uselessly outstretched hand and the shattered edge of the Bifrost receding into the vast distance gave him any real feeling of motion. It was surprisingly gentle, or would have been, if he hadn't felt like someone had taken his own spear and thrust it straight through his insides.

And then the tendrils of the universe had wrapped around him and oh, Loki fell.

The void was tearing at him, fierce winds howling in absolute, surreal silence, enough to drive anyone mad who wasn't already. He was cold, oh so cold, his blood perhaps already frozen, and he thought it was bitter irony that his very nature as a Jotun that had caused him to lose everything was perhaps the one thing now that prevented him from losing his life, too.

Was this to be his punishment, then? Falling, plummeting, rushing downwards in endless space forever, through the empty and senseless void until his mind would simply give up and break?

Fitting. Let him who is nothing rejoin the nothing in its most pure and absolute form, an icy voice in his head supplied.

Nothing.

Nothing forever...

...wait.

Loki's shut eyes had blinked open again. Had there just been a noise?

A...strange noise...

Loki's face creased into the tiniest frown, his lips trying to recreate the sound he had just heard...

"Vworp Vworp?"

And that was as far as he came, because then his own remaining breath was suddenly knocked out of his lungs as his back collided with something hard. And whatever it was, it then seemed to break underneath him, because he could feel it give and then himself tumble through it, into it, and the next thing he knew everything around him had just exploded into existence.

Colours and sound were suddenly there again, assaulting his numbed senses after the void like a kaleidoscope gone mad, but his lungs immediately seemed to realize there was now air and sucked it in greedily with a gasp. Loki still had no idea where he was, flailing wildly as his movement seemed to just have become suddenly a lot more painful as he was knocked against something and then fell through something else, and just when his brain had registered that in between the air and the pain and the things surrounding him, that yes, he was undeniably alive, before he could actually do something about it there was a splash!

...and Loki Odinsson, Trickster, Liesmith, God of Mischief and the Prince of Asgard had landed head-first in a swimming pool.

xxx

The Doctor, on the other hand, had ben having a boring day. It had been a while since Martha had left and even though he was already beginning to wish there was somebody around to talk to and be clever at, he hadn't yet really found it in himself to go and find somebody to travel with. Thinking of Astrid also always sharply reminded him that his companions did not always meet with the kindest fates, which...left him a bit reluctant to take anybody in at the moment.

But without company, the TARDIS was...empty.

And, even if you could go anywhere and to any place in the universe, sometimes, the Doctor thought, a day could still be simply...boring.

Fortunately, it took a turn for the interesting after approximately five seconds when a man (or at least, a man-shaped being – this was the TARDIS and one could never be sure) crashed through his space ship's doors.

The Doctor's eyes grew wide. "What!"

Before he could do anything, his involuntary visitor had whirled through the control room in a tangle of limbs, wide eyes and an utter disrespect for gravity, and then proceeded to bounce off the console in a way that would have looked rather comical if it hadn't also looked rather painful.

The Doctor stumbled backwards. "What?!"

Next, the TARDIS apparently decided to be helpful, because she abruptly shook like a rodeo bull and as a result the alien then crashed straight through the other door, until a loud splashing noise indicated where precisely his journey had ended.

Not even bothering with a third customary 'What!' the Doctor had already taken off running.

xxx

Loki gasped, and struggled, and would have screamed if water hadn't rushed into his mouth the moment he tried.

If this is the afterlife, it is missing a certain amount of dignity, shot through Loki's head, and for a moment he wondered whether he should transform into a salmon (or maybe simply let himself drown, an option that seemed increasingly more attractive by the minute), but then his head already broke the surface, and, indeed, his feet came to stand on solid ground.

He then noticed that the water was approximately four feet deep and came up to a point slightly higher than his navel.

Right. So drowning here would have looked potentially rather undignified.

Well. Not that standing like a drenched poodle in full battle armour in what was apparently some sort of extravagant bathtub had ever had the potential for a lot of gravitas in the first place.

Loki looked around, blinking water out of his eyes and absent-mindedly picking his helmet out of the water before it could sink.

Where was this? A bath of some sort? Was this a joke by the universe?

The room he found himself in was wide and circular, the floor, ceiling and walls seeming to be covered in the same golden-hued tiles. The hexagon-shaped bath he was standing in measured perhaps sixty feet across, the water looking deeper at the other end. The entire architecture certainly looked different than anything Loki had ever seen in any realm.

...well, I don't think there's any realm with such a lack of style, anyway, Loki thought. Hel, where am I?

His eyes fell upon a ladder at the side of the bath and, after a few shaky attempts, he even managed to marshal his bruised, tired and cramping body into obedience to take a few swaying steps toward it and climb out of the pool. Up here he could see the door he had to have come flying through and wondered whether he should try and hide somewhere until he knew where he was or wait a bit to see whether he could get some of his strength back first. Next, however, that decision was already taken from his hands, as then running footsteps were starting to be heard and they seemed to be headed right for him. Loki instinctively tensed and felt himself shifting into a more battle-ready stance, internally cursing himself that he had let go of his spear now. He felt too weak to trust in his magic and that meant he was reduced to the few throwing daggers concealed beneath his clothing.

But then again, now that he was listening more closely, the footsteps only sounded like one pair of legs and those not even like heavy boots or armoured footwear, rather more...

"Oy! Who are you and how did you get in here?"

Loki stared. The...man who had just burst through the door did not look like a soldier or a guard.

But he also hadn't expected someone who looked like an accountant in a tizzy.

Before Loki could say anything, the new arrival had already stopped himself a few feet from the other, and then for some reason donned a pair of glasses and waved a...rather pitiful wand? a voice in Loki's head supplied.

He instinctively stepped backwards, wanting to bring a spell up in defence, but then also realized that the thing glowing a light blue at him was not magical in nature, but it did seem to tell the other something, because his eyes immediately widened even more, and his face split into a (from Loki's perspective) rather worrying grin.

"A frost giant!" he exclaimed.

"...excuse me?" Loki croaked, mostly because he a) was currently reeling, since he had never expected anyone to see through his disguise and b) had never expected anyone to react to this realization with quite that much enthusiasm.

"That's what you are, a genuine frost giant!" The other was carrying on, seemingly completely ignoring Loki but still grinning like a lunatic, "Coldest creatures in the universe, you lot are, not particularly known for your warm welcomes either, but biggest ice palaces this side of the Medusa Cascade. Oh, you're beautiful..." but then he he trailed off and his grin started to actually transform into a frown. "...though you don't actually look like a frost giant. Why don't you look like a frost giant?" He cocked his head and sniffed. "You're supposed to be blue." His tone actually wasn't unlike a school teacher's in art class who was asking Loki why he hadn't gotten the colour right in a painting of a giraffe.

Loki stared. For all he knew, he was in a strange place he did not recognize, his magic was not functioning properly, everything hurt, he was soaking wet, and the presumed ruler of his unknown surroundings seemed to be stark raving mad.

And he was also someone who knew too much. Loki didn't know whether this man had any ties to Asgard or Jotunheim, didn't know why he was so pleased to have found him and didn't know what he planned to do with that knowledge or him. But then, the other seemed to sense his unease, because the scrutinizing expression dropped away with some of the manic energy, both to be replaced with a more relaxed expression and a friendly smile.

"Oh. Sorry. I think I'm being rude. You're completely soaked and I haven't offered you a towel, even. And I of all people should know one can't always choose their appearance, I suppose," he said, the last as a muttered aside, before he offered his guest an apologetic shrug. "Always wanted to be ginger, myself, you know?"

Again, Loki blinked, a bit more slowly this time, the drenched god appearing as if hoping that things would make sense again when he opened his eyes once more. They didn't.

"But yeah, anyway, I'm the Doctor, we're in my...home, I suppose, so I should probably offer you a cup of tea. You're not going to melt, are you? Sorry, bit of a badly timed joke. Bad habit," he grimaced, before perking up again, "But you might want a change of clothes, can't imagine anyone wants to stand around being soaked. And what you're wearing doesn't look very comfortable. Especially that helmet," the man who had called himself the Doctor gave the headwear Loki was still clutching by one of its horns a quizzical look.

He frowned. "Don't you bonk it in door frames a lot?"

"...no," Loki managed his first active contribution to the bizarre conversation. If all of this had turned out to be one single, insane prank at this point he would not have been surprised, if only for the fact that he couldn't think of anyone beside himself who would actually be able to come up with such a ridiculous scenario.

"Right," the other said, as if he hadn't even heard the reply, and cocked his head. "But yeah, your get-up all seems rather..." - his mouth twisted a bit, as if something tasted bad - "...martial. Who are you?"

Loki took a breath. "Loki," he began, then paused for barely a second, before he caught himself again. "...I am Loki."

"Loki?" A spark of recognition seemed to flash through the eyes of the man calling himself the Doctor, and his eye brows rose a little. "Loki as in, Loki the god?"

The prince of Asgard drew himself up instinctively, feeling some semblance of poise returning and taking to it like Hannibal Lector to an Overeaters Anonymous convention. "The very same."

The Doctor grinned brightly. "The one who gave birth to a horse, right?"

The temperature in the pool room seemed to immediately drop just a few degrees.

xxx

"Hey, nothing wrong with horses, honest," the Doctor added quickly, trying to defuse the situation as glibly as he could, "I, uh, almost married one. Once." He rubbed his chin. "But yeah, not one of my better ideas..."

"Are you from Midgard?" Loki interrupted him, now seeming more irritated than angry, which was a start, the Doctor supposed.

"Midgard...?" The Doctor blinked for a moment, before realizing what the other meant, "...oh. Oh, I see. No. I'm from...somewhere else entirely. I visit that place a lot, though. That where I could take you?" Meant to visit that place anyway, the Doctor thought, that strange weight loss company basically reeks of someone tampering with that planet again...

"…"

The Doctor interrupted his train of thought when he realized his guest hadn't replied. Instead, the dark-haired man who had just claimed to be Loki, the God of Mischief, just seemed to be tired and wet and slightly lost for a moment, before he noticed the Doctor's gaze on him and immediately it was as if a mask slid over his features again, obscuring any trace of emotion the Doctor thought he had just glimpsed.

Well. If that isn't not suspicious at all.

In fact, the Doctor had felt slightly uneasy around Loki from the start, but without being able to pinpoint exactly why. The armour, the guarded expression, the concealed knives he had been able to spot, even the, well, honestly slightly silly helmet, all suggested that this was an individual who had scarce reason to trust others and probably rarely found himself in peaceful circumstances.

But because he was the Doctor, he still saw all this and said,

"...or how about a cup of tea and that towel first?"

To be continued...

Right then! Hope you liked, and if you read, please review! :D (Or just visit my profile for more DW crossover nonsense ;) )