In Aporia

"The body inside the body astounds, confesses sins of the funhouse." - In Aporia, Akilah Oliver

Genuinely asking: if you knew your brother was into snakes, and stupid besides, how could you not use that to your advantage?

#

The problem with Thor is that he can't be killed. Even something as fatal as getting stabbed has barely any effect on him - sure, he cries out, bleeds, sometimes thrashes on the floor in agony…but then he still gets up, lightning crackling through him, to deliver a rousing blow. It could be the god thing or it could be the muscles of steel thing, the water in Asgard, good genes.

It makes trying to kill Thor not that fun anymore, honestly.

But can Loki help himself? No. The desire to hurt his brother flares up in him like a rash, and he learned long ago that quelling it only made it worse. So when that whisper thrums inside him: just do it, it'll be a bit of fun - some muscles complain from memory, thinking of chains, being slammed into the floor, his brother's eyes going wobbly-watery when he does a "mean" thing yet again. But that's only for a fleeting moment. He always caves. It's in his nature.

#

Loki doesn't handle grief well. Family trait, he'd like to think. Losing his mother cut so deep he let himself get all unkempt, facing the endless walls of an underground prison, his own blunt errors. (If you had not listened, just this once - her smile, her fingers on your face, the warmth of her lap when you crawled into it after being ground into the harsh marble of the staircase, her easy laughter as she said you two were fighting again, weren't you? Are you ever not fighting?) Leave Loki alone too long and even he starts to get sick of himself, and worse, earnest with it. That's not a good look for any god with chaotic tendencies.

So when Odin dies on that beautiful hill overlooking a gorgeous sea, gold glinting away into nothing, Loki cracks a little inside. Then a bit more when Thor says: this is your fault.

He's almost grateful when big sister comes and immediately starts her Destroy-Asgard-Kill-My-Brothers rampage. Nothing scoops away sadness faster than a need to survive, which is another layer under fear, the same kind that blooms in his stomach as she watches Hela crush Mjolnir to pieces with her fist. Loki has a weird relationship with death: he craves the taste of it, is amused by the look of it on others' faces, and likes dancing in and out of its line of sight, safe with the knowledge that it's not quite his time yet. His real fear is humiliation: dying like a dog under someone's heel, unable to keep from begging, possibly with sincerity. No. That would be unacceptable.

That doesn't mean he meant to rip a wormhole in the rainbow bridge to Asgard, and drop into Sakaar, right into the Grandmaster's lap. But this environment: gaudy decor, free-flowing liquor, people who never say what they mean, lies rolling off every tongue and enough well-practiced laughter to cover it up - this, Loki feels at home in. Besides, there's so much going on, so many useless conversations to have, so many new beings to seduce, so much to despise, that Loki doesn't need to think about Odin dying. Hela ripping Asgard apart, blades shooting from each fingertip. Thor's hammer breaking - Thor will be fine, but his hammer; that has to hurt. Odin's trembling voice as he says: "My sons." Odin fading into the light.

#

It happened like this: Thor beat him at another sparring round, and laughed about it.

Thor was bright like the sun and was going to be king and everyone liked Thor better, and no one knew this more than Loki. The creeping feeling of being unwanted tore little pieces into Loki's already tattered pride. All that, even before he finds out about the Frost Giant stuff - it was this sense of not-belonging, how frail he felt when they wrestled in the courtyard, how his voice tended to fade out while Thor's swelled. I just want to be your equal. This thought, driven into him repeatedly, so that many years later it's still what he's striving for, against every instinct.

"I don't think that's what you really want," Frigga tells him once. Afternoon sunlight hits a vase of flowers by the window; Loki is skulking in the kitchen. He's bruised against the ribs were Thor (unintentionally?) elbowed him into a stone column.

"Did I say that aloud, mother? I didn't mean to."

"Loki." Frigga is kneading dough. Loki has never understood his mother's love of baking when there are others to do the work for her. "Your brother loves you very much. You know that, right?" and, when he doesn't reply, "You only want to make sure he doesn't lose sight of you."

That's too much to bear, that's not it at all, so Loki leaves the kitchen to throw knives in the armory, imagining his brother's face on every ripped canvas. Leaning out of the practice room window, he sees Thor in the grass of the yard below, holding onto a - something - and laughing. Closer inspection proves that something to be a snake. Thor laughs about everything, but his delight is particularly stupid this time. Loki grins.

He practices that night - a careful illusion (and yes, he gets pushed into stone pillars more often than he'd like to admit, but Thor is shit at illusions, at least): green scales over his fingertips, a flickering tongue, precisely beady eyes. It's a work of art. He casts it three days later, tucking a knife into his sleeve. Thor, who keeps to predictable schedules and tends to amble in the same places, finds a gorgeous emerald snake sliding along the weeds outside one of their many sparring locations.

He says "Oooh!," bends down, picks him up.

Loki will always remember the look on Thor's face, his strangled yelp when he transformed, how his knife went into Thor's stomach, smooth as butter.

#

"That was cruel," Frigga says.

"It was just a joke," Loki answers (sullen on the outside, smirking to himself in the inside).

That's the first time someone ever calls him cruel (yes, you already know it's not the last), and something in her gaze changes when she says that. Something that unsettles Loki. He actually, well, feels a bit hurt. That's not even counting the smarting in his jaw every time he moves it, because Thor got a great punch in, all that shock reflexively channeling into his arm.

Still: worth it.

#

The vessel they've stolen from Grandmaster is an interesting place to house an entire population in. Loki governed the people of Asgard for a couple of years, while Thor was away making out with human girls and hunting for pretty rocks, but truthfully: the populace annoy him. He doesn't think much of them. (Can't shake the feeling that they've always preferred Thor, and that's why he couldn't rule them as himself, could he? Had to dress up as his father, had to write plays and spread propaganda to regain even a shred of respect. They bent, at least; they swayed. People are easy like that. Manipulable.) The problem with the ship is that these common folk are everywhere, swarming, and (of course) Thor turns out to be fine with this, mingling with the hoi polloi. It must be all those Midgard fans, with their Instagrams and Snapchats, who taught Thor to coexist so gamely with the masses. His brother was always a ham, but he used to be a ham with some dignity.

Thus, the liquor cabinet. Loki likes to spend time there sampling the Grandmaster's once-private collection. Besides, if there's one thing all Asgardians have in common, it's a love of good wine.

Not that he's always welcome. He's enjoying a fascinating coffee-like substance called Kahlua when a muscle twinges in his back. He dodges, feels air whistle against his ear as a dinner knife shoots past. It embeds himself into the wall behind him with a foreboding thok.

"That's mine," Valkyrie snarls. She is always snarling or sneering. It's very tiring.

"It's not yours," Loki says. "This ship is property of Asgard now. Besides, I first commandeered it."

Valkyrie rolls her eyes. "Only because the inmates let you. And that one really is mine. I won it from a bet back on Sakaar. It's very rare." She purses her lips and holds out her hand. Loki, not terribly in the mood for a deathmatch at the moment, sighs and passes it back to her. After a moment, she adds, as if with great magnanimity, "You can keep your glass."

"Much appreciated, O Great One," Loki drawls.

Valkyrie, as usual, is too drunk to pay attention. She busies herself emptying several liquids into a goblet, sniffing it, then adding some more. That can't possibly taste good. Loki frowns at how some of the liquid is congealing rather than mixing, but he suspects she hardly tastes what she drinks anyway. When she's finished, she raises the goblet and starts chugging it down. aLoki thinks about the memory he took from her: the way her steed's wings beat frantically, the slow-motion slide of the blade entering the other shieldmaiden's chest, eyes going dull as stones. How she fell onto a mass of comrade's bodies, tears and blood streaming down her face, unable to move any further.

She burps, loudly, disrupting his reverie. Squints at him, as if she has forgotten he was ever there at all.

"You might want to take up some other coping mechanisms," Loki advises. "Practice your knife-throwing or something." He can never resist a good jab.

Valkyrie glares. "Don't talk to me about grief. You know nothing of it."

That isn't true. Loki has spent his whole life soaking in grief. It's like when he's not drowning in grief he finds some new ways to turn the taps on and let grief gush over him again. If he's not doing something to shoot himself in the foot or ruck up hell, there's a problem.

He drinks up the last of this magical Kahlua, offers her a smile. "You think you have me figured out, but you don't. No one does." Not even myself, he thinks, treacherously, as he strides out.

#

This is very, very slightly fucked up, but: Loki is surprised Hela didn't ask him to join her. Loki is not as surprised that he isn't sure if he would have said yes.

On the one hand: the instinct to protect Asgard is deep, innate. It's his home, it's his people, and even if they will never accept Loki as their ruler or his father's heir, it's where he learned to live, where he feels most himself.

On the other hand: chaos and power and anarchy are things he loves, and in that moment when Hela stepped out of her portal, he saw those all radiating out of her in glorious waves. She was also hated, deemed unworthy. She, unlike Thor, knew it was like to be despised.

It's much more likely she would have sliced his head clean off, rather than starting friendly dialogue, But he knows this for sure: he and Hela are much more alike than him and Thor, and a very, very slightly fucked-up part of him thinks maybe childhood (and everything that followed) would've been different, had their older sister been around.

#

Midgard's got some funny literature on Asgard. Loki knows this partially because of Wikipedia (what, no, he never Googled himself, what are you suggesting?), and partially because he went to a bookstore on Broadway street to buy some gifts for Odin before leaving him entirely alone on earth. His father had always complained about wanting more time to read, after all.

The tomes they have on "Norse Mythology" are mostly inaccurate, but some of it rings true, which is alarming and terrible. These scholars, they think they have it all figured out. Ragnarok: The Destruction of the Gods. Resulting in the death of many important figures: Loki, Odin, Thor included. It's very descriptive too. Loki getting stabbed by Heimdall. (?) Thor killing Jormangundr and taking nine steps, very specifically, before he collapses. (?!) Then all that eyeroll-inducing stuff about the earth flowering and a single man and woman enjoying the green, green earth, etc. Consuming morning dew for sustenance. It's so poetic, and silly. Besides, Loki hates how he looks in most versions. They haven't got his nose right. He decides to get Odin Tuesdays with Morrie, The Tao of Warren Buffet, and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.

Earth's got some funny literature. (Excluding, even, the insidious thing called fan fiction that includes endless webpages of depraved stories about Thor and every single one of his 'coworkers,' none of which Loki has read, of course.) The Norse books don't capture things correctly. How he misses his mother, how he has given up on the respect of his father, how tired he is of chasing after Thor. How unable he is to stop.

#

Thor comes into Loki's room without asking, as always, efficiently dodging the two knives that drop from the little trap he set (one from the top, one from the left. Thor's gotten better at agility, Loki will give him that). Of course, he laughs when they stick into the floor and the wall, respectively. There was a time when Thor was not laughing much, but - the absolute madness of the last few events notwithstanding - he seems especially chipper now. Despite his missing an eye, blowing up Asgard, being dumped by his girlfriend, Odin gone. Thor is disgustingly graceful about grief, which Loki finds a tad infuriating.

"What is it now, brother?"

"I'm checking on you," Thor says, and flops down onto his bed like he owns it. This ship is now property of Asgard, and by extension, Thor's. Thor always owns everything and doesn't realize it. "When we get back to earth, you'll obviously have to lay low for a bit. Have you got some disguises ready?"

It always comes back to this, doesn't it? They're terrible for each other, but they're brothers, and there is some thread between them that drags them back together again, ad infinitum. Each other's shadow, the reverse side of the mirror. Thor lounging all up in Loki's space, ignoring the pained expression his brother shoots him, talking as if Loki didn't try to destroy Midgard or stab him in the back yet again a few days ago, like he's figured things out and has come to terms with it. Loki, despite himself, going along with the situation for a bit, if only so that his brother can pick his brains or ask for his help, guilelessly.

Loki, I thought the world of you. I thought we would fight side by side forever.

It's what you always wanted, isn't it?

Loki had often dreamt of being rid of Thor forever, but it's not fair if Thor agrees with him. That takes all the goddamned fun out of it.

You only want to make sure he doesn't lose sight of you.

Mother never understood him, even less than father did. Loki hates how good his family is. He's tired of not deserving them.

So he sits on the bed next to his brother, says he's got a few ideas, including maybe trying out Tony Stark for a day or two, wouldn't that be hilarious. Thor laughs, eyes crinkling, and Loki thinks: stop. Looking. At me. Like I matter to you. It drives me crazy.

Thor is King of Asgard at last, and Loki is by his side (for now, the serpent inside Loki whispers. He's still got a secret or two tucked under his tongue. It's in his nature). It's a lull in the story, the blank space between chapters, but this is fine until the next trick. He knows by now that Thor can stand a joke or two.

A/N: Hi. I haven't written fanfic in four years, so I'm rusty, but hopefully you all enjoyed the idea of Loki encountering MCU fanfic as much as I did. You should all read the poem In Aporia ( poetsorg/poem/aporia), and any other poem on that has the word Trickster in it, seriously.

Feedback is always much appreciated.