AUs are my thing. Like I can barely even write cannon; my story "Call Me Crazy, Call Me Yours" is the closest I've been to cannon in a while and that is just for this fandom. So, hopefully, I can manage an AU in this fandom as well? Maybe? I start too many stories for my own good, but Tasertricks. They're just so perfect that I can't stop writing for them (kind of like Jara when I first got sucked into the House of Anubis fandom).

(Also, as a side note, this story will have its own soundtrack by the time it's finished, with each chapter as a song to be added).

"So much hate for the ones we love; tell me, we both matter, don't we?" Running Up That Hill, Placebo version (original by Kate Bush).

Disclaimer: I don't own Thor.

Loki Odison is no stranger to getting what he wants.

Whether it be because he is powerful, or because he forces his way into getting whatever it is, he always gets it in the end. This time, however, he finds himself empty-handed when his parents inform him that Thor, his oaf of a brother, is the son who will be inheriting Asgard Industries. Thor. Not Loki.

The answer to this conflict is, of course, to get what he wants one way or another. Loki knows he will get the company sooner or later, seeing how uneducated Thor is when it comes to business. The man majored in kinesiology for God's sake. Loki was the one to major in business; if anyone should be running the family company, it's him.

But of course he doesn't mention so to his parents. Loki respects them, but he finds their judgment must have been lacking if they had chosen Thor as the son to take over the family buisness. No, the way Loki sees it, he's better off manipulating his brother to hand over the company instead.

So, for now, Loki decides to stay quiet about his plans and merely congratulates his brother at the party his mother organized, milling full of family and friends alike of the Odison family. He feels slightly out of place here, to be honest, but he endures it, thinking about how he's going to get what he wants as long as he is patient.

"Ah, Loki!"

Thor comes to Loki now, beaming at his brother and wearing a suit that appears too small for his built body. He is trailed by his four friends Fandral, Volstagg, Hogun, and Sif, all of whom Loki is familiar with and knows well himself.

"Thor," answers Loki coolly. "Congratulations on inheriting the company; I always knew you were the more suitable one to do so." All lies, of course, but Loki has never been partial to using the truth when it comes to getting what he wants.

"Thank you, brother," Thor replies, beaming. "I am most excited."

Loki nods. "Yes, I would believe so," he says, and he turns to Thor's friends, nodding at them each accordingly but not referring to them in particular.

"And now, it is time for celebration," Thor goes on fondly. "I shall call for champagne, my friends! Loki, do say you'll come and have a drink with us."

"As you wish, brother," Loki agrees, knowing the idiot will not give him peace until he does. "You know that I am always here to congratulate you." Still lies. How can such words have ever been truthful?

Thor, beaming in his way that shows he was not able to catch the lie, herds off his friends to get champagne, but as Loki moves slowly to follow, he finds that Sif lags slightly behind the others as to talk to him.

"You are taking this remarkably well," she remarks as she falls in step with him.

Loki looks at her, smirking slightly. "Well, he is my brother," he says in a surprisingly easy honest tone. "I could not be angry that he is the one inheriting the company, no matter how much of a bad decision."

"Surely you aren't just a little bit upset?" Sif presses slowly, and her tone is the slightest bit hesitant when she speaks, though Loki notes she is clearly trying to make him say something he ought not to.

Loki keeps smirking. "Why, Sif, you are baiting me," he chides playfully.

Sif rolls her eyes at his flirtatious tone. "Perhaps," she admits. "I merely need to know you aren't planning anything stupid, because I know you, Loki. And I know if you want something, you get it. So tell me, just how upset are you?" While her words are supposed to be intended well, her voice and demeanor are too stiff to be friendly.

"Sif, my dear, I know you equally as well as you know me," says Loki smugly. "And I know you are not worried I will do something stupid. You are worried I will do something to Thor, your unrequited love for, what, two years now?"

Sif falters in her step, but her face remains stiff. "I do not know what you mean."

"It's quite obvious," replies Loki teasingly, knowing he's caught her. In fact, he smirks harder when he realizes this. "You have been pining for my brother for quite some time now, and I believe everyone has noticed such, except for Thor himself. Then again, he wouldn't notice them even if your feelings hit him over the head with a hammer..."

Sif scowls. "I will not listen to you degrade your brother," she insists, her pretty features growing harsh. "And while he is my friend, you forget that I am your friend as well. Just don't do anything stupid, okay?" At this, her gaze softens.

"If it will ease your pain, then of course I will not," Loki says smoothly, not entirely sure to believe that Sif counts him as a friend. "In fact, you have my word."

Sif stops walking and stares at him honestly. "What good is your word, Loki?" she asks quietly, her eyes scanning his. "I have known you to be a liar and a cheat when it comes to business affairs. You are much too rash with your words and elaborate too much on action. You must let your brother have his chance."

Loki could sneer at her. He could insist that his idiot of a brother does not deserve to have a chance with such a great task. He could so easily spill his opinions and thoughts and would not regret a thing.

However, for now, all he does is grin and say, "You are too hasty to judge me, Sif. I assure you that I do not have any plans for Asgard Industries than to watch my brother take over it successfully."

Sif doesn't believe him. It's clear in her eyes.

"Very well," she says, finally. "So, champagne?"

"As you wish."

Champagne glasses are distributed, and Thor raises his own and begins a long speech to the people at the party of his general pride to be taking over Asgard Industries in his loud, powerful voice. As the workers and friends cheer and clap, Loki sips at his glass and watches the scene unfold quietly. He still feels out of place, and he still knows Thor is not the right man for the job.

A final rousing cheer jolts Loki from his thoughts, and he joins the masses of people raising their glasses to Thor in an absentminded gesture. The sound is deafening and most certainly not one Loki intended to hear on his Friday night.

But if it means getting what he wants...

"Loki." His father, Odin, comes up to him now, amid the swirling masses of people going about to congratulate Thor. "Care to step out onto the balcony with me?"

Loki takes a sip of his champagne before saying, "Of course, father." He says it respectively, but he is doubtful of what spending time alone with his father at a time like this could entail.

Loki follows his father out onto the balcony, watching carefully as the older man appears to have something troubling on his mind. As they reach their destination, Loki is greeted by a breath of fresh air, which he gratefully enjoys; the mess of bodies inside had made the room too warm for one's taste.

Odin leans over the side of the balcony, prompting Loki to do the same, and he follows his father's tired eyes to gaze down at the cars below, all of them small and honking and glowing in the darkening night air. Loki takes a sip of his champagne and awaits his father's words, knowing they must be serious.

"Loki, my son, I have something I need to tell you," says Odin finally.

Loki does not take this into mind; he is used to his father's talks. He actually is quite tired of his father's useless spouts of wisedom and random spurs of you-are-my-son moments, but he doesn't say so. What he does say is, "Go ahead, but will it be long? I believe I haven't congratulated Thor just enough yet."

Odin sighs, and he keeps his eyes trained on the cars below as he notes, "You are bitter about my decision, and you treat the manner with sarcasm." He looks at Loki after a few seconds and asks, "Is that not true?"

Loki looks away slightly. "Perhaps, but would you be surprised?"

"No, I am not surprised," Odin replies, though his voice is much more tired than Loki has known it to ever be. "You are my son, and I know how you are." He looks harder at Loki, practically begging for eye contact as he lays on thick the father/son bondage. When Loki doesn't give him the satisfaction, Odin finally asks, "Son, why do you think you did not inherit the company?"

There are many words on the tip of Loki's tongue. Because you are an idiot, perhaps, or because you've always favored Thor over me. What he settles on, however, is simply, "I do not know, father."

"It is not because of any matter relating to favor," says Odin quietly, as if to read Loki's mind. "Your brother is merely the right one for this job. He is the best suited for it."

Loki resists the urge to frown, having to mask the frown with a slight grimace as he curtly says, "I believe you displayed the belief when you appointed him the successor for the company, did you not? You don't have to rub in the fact to me."

Odin sighs once more, and he again looks down to the cars below before he says, "Loki, I am only saying this so you will not take what I will say next out of context."

"And what would that be?" Loki is not sympathetic to his father at this moment, and it is obvious by the way his lip curls in distaste. What he really needs right now is another glass of champagne, not another boring talk.

"You're adopted." The words fall from Odin's lips haphazardly. Once they are out of his mouth, Odin stiffly straightens out his body and looks towards Loki, expecting a response.

The words, however, do not register with Loki at first. How can they be true? He is Odin's son. His father would not hide such a big thing for twenty-seven years. There is no way those words are true. Still, that does not stop the champagne glass from slipping from Loki's fingers as he is caught off guard.

"Your mother did not want to tell you," Odin continues unabashedly. "I, however, knew we could not hide a secret like this forever. It would've been obvious, considering you are different in appearance-"

Loki cuts him off. "Mother told me dark hair was a common trait in this family," he fumes, his voice thick with anger. "You both led me to believe I was part of this family?"

"You are part of this family."

Loki, had he not dropped his glass, would have thrown it in anger right now. Instead, he angrily pushes over to the balcony edge, staring down at the masses of cars driving beneath the building with eyes that have gone unexplicably blurry.

"How old was I?" he demands, voice cracking slightly. "When I was adopted?"

Odin is not put off by Loki's tone. "But a few months," he replies.

"Why?" Loki snaps, turning away from the edge of the balcony, eyes now full off anger and all question of tears gone. "You had Thor. Why would you need me?"

Odin exhales. "It's not important, son," he says rather gruffly.

"Don't call me that." Loki's tone comes out harsh as the words fall from his lips. "How can I be your son when you have lied to me for twenty-seven years? How can you even be my father?"

"I am your father. Do not speak to me in such a way."

"Then answer the damn question," spits Loki through gritted teeth as he meets Odin's eye with unmistakable fury on his face. "Why. Did. You. Need. Me?"

Odin's face, once stiff and maybe somewhat rueful, grows hard at his son's anger. "If you must know, your parents were drug addicts who set their house on fire and left you to die," he says, his tone of voice just as harsh as Loki's. "I was walking past that very house, and I saved you. You were alone. I took you in."

"And for what?" interrupts Loki angrily. "You know there was a reason."

Odin looks away from Loki now and out at the night sky. "You're right," he admits. "Because I was starting off my career as a young business man at the time, taking in the orphaned child I had rescued would, undoubtedly, win over the public."

Loki has to run that through his head. His father never wanted him. No, what Odin wanted was success and the ability to have the public in the palm of his hand. Had Loki been a random orphan, Odin wouldn't have looked twice his way.

"So I was a ploy," fumes Loki, and he slams his fist down on the edge of the balcony in anger. "I was a fucking ploy. I was never going to inherit the company from you, yet when I was young you promised Thor and I had an equal chance."

"I told you not to take this out of context. Thor is the better suited for this company, and that is the reason he is the one to inherit it," Odin repeats stubbornly.

Loki laughs dryly. "Oh, and when did you decide that? When he was born, perhaps? No, don't tell me, I'll bet it was when I was adopted and you knew you couldn't pass on the family business to someone who didn't belong!"

"Lower your tone," reprimands Odin harshly as he turns to face Loki once more. "I am not going to quarrel with you about the past, nor the present. I, your mother, and Thor are your family. You are part of ours."

Loki balls both of his fists. "Is that so, Odin?" he sneers, pointedly avoiding to call Odin his father. "And are you sure you never regretted what you did? You obviously can't return an adopted child. Did you ever stop to think of what that would mean for you?"

"I do not regret it," Odin replies stiffly. "I am secure in who I am as a person."

"That is well for you and your company, isn't it? But you did not stop to think of me, who would not have anyone to truly be when this mess would be cleared. You have left me to be unsure as to who I am in a person. Who can I be? Who am I?"

Odin keeps a stoic manner as he replies, "You are my son."

Loki stares hard at his father. "Am I really?"

"Do not demean yourself and question me. You know that your mother and I love you as if you were our own," Odin says. "Now come, let us go back in to the party. Our family will be awaiting our presence."

That is how Odin finishes the conversation. He has just dropped the bomb that Loki is adopted and then treated it like it is a business matter. Like it has no importance. Like he doesn't even care what Loki has to make of this. Well, Loki won't let Odin have that satisfaction.

"You may go," Loki says coldly, "but I will not. I do not wish to be part of this family any longer. If it is any consolation, Odin, you no longer have to deal with a failure of a son." Now fully angry, Loki turns on his heel and leaves his father behind, entering the party once more only to find the exit.

The people milling about only make Loki angrier. They are the people he once saw as his family, or even his friends, but now he feels he is unworthy to ever welcome them as such again. Now he wants nothing to do with them ever again.

"Brother! Come celebrate with us!" comes the distinctive yell of Thor, who has noticed that his brother has come back into the room. Loki spares him one glance and sees that Thor's friends and Thor alike are all watching him a bit strangely.

Loki notes he must appear angry. Well, he is. There's no need to be surprised.

"Loki!" This is his mother's voice, and Loki spots her in the crowd. Her voice is as desperate as her face is; it appears as though she knows exactly what Odin had talked to Loki about. "Loki, wait!"

Loki turns and briskly walks to a nearby elevator, pointedly ignoring her. He owes her nothing. Not when she's been lying to him for twenty-seven years. Not when she's led Loki to believe he belonged. Not when she's gone out and let Odin say he didn't.

"Loki!"

Loki presses the elevator button for the lobby with finality. This is the last time, he swears, he'll ever be among those people. It won't, however, be the last time he comes to Asgard Industries. Loki, knowing he is no longer part of the Odison family, still knows exactly what he wants: their company.

And he's going to get it.

When he reaches the lobby, Loki stalks out of the elevator doors, pointedly ignoring any eye contact. When he's finally out of the building and out into the cold winter snow, he dully notes that he left his coat at the party, but he doesn't dwell on it; there are much more valuable things he has lost today.

The cold is certainly dangerous for thinking, for Loki finds his thoughts are racing and he can barely even feel the cold. Millions of thoughts, all of them racing through his head, make him numb to the outside world. Though, it isn't so much as his thoughts, but questions. The question is most often of why. Why his parents did not tell him he was adopted. Why they tried to mask the truth with lies.

Loki reaches his car and finds that he's ankle-deep in snow. The white, powdery substance is beginning to fall at an alarming rate. Normally Loki would not drive in such conditions, but he has to get away. There is nothing for him anymore.

Not his father.

Not his mother.

Not-

"Loki!" Thor, of course, comes trudging through the snow himself, looking winded from a run he must have made. "Why are you so hasty to leave? Do you not desire to stay?" While his words are meant to come off as nonchalant, Thor's acting has never been good.

Loki resists the urge to roll his eyes here. Thor knows. Of course he does.

"You know very well that I do not desire to stay," hisses Loki, knowing he will have to say all on his mind to get Thor to leave. "Do not act thick, either; I can read your emotions clearly. You know, don't you? That I am adopted?"

Thor doesn't even blink at the accusation, because as Loki suspected, it is true. "Father told me when you stormed out," he admits. "Loki, I did not know until today."

"Yes, neither did I," snips Loki. "Now if you excuse me-"

"No, brother." Thor steps closer to Loki, but does keep a sizable distance; while Loki is at the curb by his car, Thor is near the middle of the road. "You musn't go," adds Thor. "We must talk about this."

"And what is there to talk about, brother?" spits Loki in anger. "That is, if I can even call you that." Yanking out the keys to his car, Loki unlocks the door and turns to Thor and says, "Now goodbye."

"Brother, please. Think of what you are doing," Thor insists, still not moving forward, but looking as though he would not hesitate to get into Loki's way and psychically stop him. "You cannot leave now. Mother has gotten upset."

"She is no mother of mine." The words come out too easily out of Loki's mouth. Though he tells himself it is because they are true, he suspects he has gotten too good at lying.

"But she loves you," pleads Thor quietly.

Loki grips the keys tightly in his hand, leaving the imprint of the patterns on his fingers. "I don't love her," he says coldly. "Now leave me; I need to be alone."

Thor backs up slightly, but his eyes never break away from Loki.

"As you wish," he finally says. "But listen well, brother-"

Suddenly, there comes the sudden sound of screeching tires and a blaring horn. In a flash, a large van has jerked to a stop rather haphazardly, but not before bumping into Thor and knocking him down in the process.

"I'm listening," says Loki almost smugly as he watches his brother on the street, dusted over by icy white snow and most likely damaging his suit in the process.

The van's doors click open, and a woman hurries out, rushing to Thor's side. As Loki strays slightly closer to the two of them, he hears the woman's distinctive beg of "Do me a favor; please don't be dead."

Loki is about to laugh at his brother's most stupid actions when suddenly the other door of the van swings open, and out comes tumbling another woman. This time, however, this woman falls forward, and her body collides with Loki's, therefore bringing Loki down as well.

"What on Earth?" sputters Loki in indignation as he hits the snow, the woman's head crashing down on his chest and her wavy brown hair flying about.

"Shit! Dude, I'm so sorry," comes the panicked, not-too-apologetic voice of the woman atop of Loki. The woman then attempts to push herself upright, but in her haste, she merely digs her elbows right into Loki's ribs in an attempt to get off him.

Loki yelps at the feeling; he is not fond of the sensation it gives.

"Was that you? Damn, you have nice abs! You are, like, as hard as the street!"

Loki frowns, not happy at all to be pinned underneath such a foolish woman. Quickly, he grips the woman's arms and roughly shoves her off of him so he might he able to stand. Once he does so, he doesn't even look in the direction of the woman.

"Wow, thanks, asshole. You're such a gentleman," sounds the woman's sarcastic voice, and from Loki's peripheral vision, he can tell that the woman has gotten up on her own.

Loki ignores her then and directs his attention to Thor, who is staring in bewilderment at the woman who ran him down with her car. Loki, recognizing the look to be one of attraction, resists the urge to roll his eyes.

"Thor," he calls subtly, "you ought to get to a doctor." He says it not because he cares, but because he feels as though Thor should be diagnosed with something so he will not get the company just yet.

Thor looks to Loki as if barely remembering he is there. "Ah, Loki," he says. "Thank you for your concern, but I will be alright; the car came at a slow speed."

The woman who is fawning over Thor pipes in and says, "Are you sure? I am really so sorry. The street was icy, and my intern tried to move the wheel-"

"Your awesome intern," interjects the foolish woman Loki all-but-met.

Thor just smiles at the woman's worry. "I am fine," he assures her. "Though, I do believe since I have been acquainted with your car, I ought to know you as well. May I ask your name?"

The woman blushes. "Jane," she says softly. "What's yours?"

"Thor." Thor keeps smiling.

The woman Loki "met" coughs loudly to break the moment. "I do hate to ruin your moment," she says (though by the tone of her voice, Loki believes she doesn't), "but I believe your tuxedoed friend here is staring you down."

Loki notes himself as the "tuxedoed friend" but does not retort to it.

The Jane woman just blushes once more, though this time, it appears to be out of embarrassment. "Sorry," she apologizes to Loki for no aparent reason (because Loki is staring at Thor, not her). "Also, um, that's Darcy, my intern." She gestures to the foolish woman.

Loki then decides to look at this Darcy character. She is small in height, but it appears as though she is quite pretty; in the cold, her skin is a rosy pink that clearly defines her semi-proportional features. She also appears to have a good body, in retrospect, but Loki doesn't dwell on that; looks, he finds, can always be deceiving.

"And this is my brother, Loki," adds Thor, gesturing to Loki as if only introducing him for the sake of introducing someone just as Jane did (and he most likely did).

"Brother?" echoes the Darcy woman. "No way! But you're like some super sweet Prince Charming guy and your brother is, like, a total asshole!"

Loki frowns at this woman's words. Did she seriously just insult him?

"Darcy," hisses the Jane woman in warning.

Darcy just shrugs. "You were thinking it," she says, and she directs her attention to Loki. "Sorry, but you were kinda an ass. So let's start over, 'kay? Hi, I'm Darcy." She holds out her hand as if to shake, which Loki sneers at.

"I do not wish to associate myself with you," he replies. "In fact, the only affiliation I shall wish to have with you is this: you must pay for a new suit, seeing how you knocked me down and ruined this one." He draws out one of his business cards and hands her one, finding the shocked face Thor, Jane and Darcy each give him as satisfying.

"Whoa, major asshole alert," says Darcy in disbelief as she looks at the card and than at Loki. "Geez, man, what crawled up your ass? I was trying to be friendly. Y'know, that one thing that you should try sometime."

Loki just stares down at the woman, finding it particularly amusing how angry she gets. "I don't wish to," he says calmly. "Now if you excuse me, I need to be somewhere." Taking his keys, Loki makes his way to his car once more.

"Loki!" Thor's voice booms as he shakily stands from the street. "You cannot-"

Loki grits his teeth and whirls around to face his brother. "Oh, shut up, Thor," he snaps. "Go about and lower yourself as to talk to these women who are clearly not in your social class, but I will not, nor will I ever. Now, good day."

He enters his car and slams the door, but not before he hears Darcy's parting call to him to "go back to the Titanic era and sink with that ship." Gritting his teeth, Loki starts up his car and drives away as quickly as he can despite the weather, knowing he will likely get angry if he does not get out of that situation.

Sink with that ship indeed. How pathetic that Darcy was back there, calling him such names like she is better than he is. Obviously that could never be true; based on her apparel alone, Loki guesses she is poor. And to think he is the rich one! How can she simply insult him when he is so much higher in relevance to class than she is?

But like it or not, Loki has to admit Darcy doesn't leave his mind as he drives back home to his flat, and the drive takes a while. Whether it be because she is almost- perhaps even somewhat- beautiful, or because she infuriated him, he honestly can't tell. But, of course, it must be the latter.

Or so he tells himself it is. Really, he doesn't have time to be drawn to women right now; he has to form a plan to get what he wants, and any poor woman off the street with a quick wit and a sarcastic tongue is not going to get in the way of getting what he wants.

And Loki, no longer Loki Odison, is going to get what he wants.