Prompt Fill - Blackbird Dreaming - Incomplete (part 2/??)
2019-Jan-22, Tuesday 10:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
felicitygsContinuing from where we left off yesterday with some overlap.....
Steve's waiting in the hallway outside Loki's room, like Thor asked him to, and he can hear the two brother's arguing. Mostly, he can hear Thor, who keeps getting loud, then quiet, then loud again.
Loki, it seems, is more restrained about raising his voice.
Eventually, the door opens, and there is Thor.
"He said he'll talk to you. As a favour. That you'll owe him for." Thor sounds frustrated by this, but Steve isn't terribly surprised Loki wants something out of having to deal with one of his... jailers, Steve supposes, because that's pretty much what they are.
"Thanks," Steve says.
Thor just shakes his head and heads down the hallway, grumbling to himself the way storms do when they are on the move.
Steve knocks on the door frame before he steps inside, not entirely sure what to expect but...
It's normal. It really doesn't look too different from Steve's room, actually. The same floor to ceiling windows with a view, similar furniture, similar desk, a door that leads to a closet that's probably big enough to be it's own room.... The only real sign that it's not Steve's room is that the view is different and the bedding looks considerably furrier than anything Steve's ever owned in his life. Loki probably brought it with him.
Loki himself is sitting, arms crossed and face expresionless. He loooks... better, actually, than the few times Steve's seen him, but to be fair Steve's rarely had a reason to see him outside of fights. He looks considerably healthier, that's for sure, but he still has that same sharp line for a mouth that suggests he's merely waiting on Steve to speak to cut him open.
"I know you don't want to be talking to me, but your mother said you'd be the best person to help. So, well, thanks." That doesn't get a reaction, though Steve leaves enough of a pause for Loki to say something, so he keeps talking. "I've been having these weird dreams ever since--" I took your staff for safe-keeping--"you've been here and. Well, when I told her she said that you'd know. More."
"Yes, that is what Thor said," Loki says, crisp and voice deeper than Steve expected, but he doesn't say more, and soon the silence between them has stretched awkward.
"Well," Steve says, half-antsy and half-annoyed that despite knowing exactly why Steve's here, Loki's refusing to do more than the bare minimum of speaking. "What do you think?"
"Considering I know nothing of dreams nor dream magic, nor do I care about you, I fear I have nothing to say nor contribute, and my mother has redirected you for whatever reasons she has," Loki says, looking idly at the back of one hand before he looks up at Steve. Still expressionless, and yet still knife-sharp at all his edges. His eyes gleam blue and green and angry, so so angry, and it almost takes Steve aback.
"Really."
"Yes." Loki smiles wide; it feels like a threat with the just barely visible teeth, the edge of it.
He's playing with Steve.
"Well," Steve says, "that's a shame."
(Can he blame Loki?)
(Loki brought this on himself.)
"Indeed," Loki agrees, almost sing song.
"I guess I'll have to see if I can talk to her again. She seemed really sure you'd know about the blackbird and giant shadows and stars and stuff, but if you're sure--"
There, the smile falters, just a little. Just enough.
Steve heads for the door; he doesn't walk slower than usual, doesn't look back, does everything he can to make it clear that he's going to leave--
"Wait," Loki says when Steve's hand touches the door.
Steve pauses, turns to look at him. Loki's expression is different now--not all hard edges, but instead a little... thoughtful. Calculated.
"I might, perhaps, know something."
"Oh, well, I wouldn't want to--"
"Shut up. I won't offer again."
Steve grins, and lets go of the door.
***
"So you're saying the... giant shadow is a--"
"Titan named Thanos."
"--and your former employer."
"In a manner of speaking."
"And he's coming here to...?"
"Exact revenge for my failure, likely, and retrieve the mind gem."
Steve goes quiet, turning this all over. Loki as the blackbird--but Loki didn't recognize that it was Steve he was seeing while dreaming, which begs other questions. Do they all look different, warped, under someone else's gaze?
"How come I'm getting pulled into the dreams?" Steve finally asks.
(But he knows; it's the same reason Thanos is likely on his way here, isn't it?)
Loki is looking at him; that same uncomfortably piercing gaze that both Thor and Frigga have turned on him, and Steve wonders if they both learned it from her, or if it's simply a part of being Asgardian.
"That," Loki finally says, "I do not know. You shouldn't be there at all. You are, frankly put, just a Midgardian."
"Thanks," Steve says dryly. "So now what?"
"Now? Well, I suppose we see if we can interact the next time I go dream walking, and if so, then I suppose we might, just perhaps, manage to come up with a way to stall him." Loki pauses, eyes blue-green and sharp and focused much too much on Steve. "But short of finding the mind gem and destroying it, and any other of the infinity stones hidden here on Midgard, I doubt it would be a permanent solution."
"Okay," Steve says, ignoring the look.
(Loki isn't the right person; no one is. He's sure of that.)
"When are you planning to dream walk again?"
Loki shrugs. "I suppose you'll find out," and he grins, wide and sharp and mischievious. It startles Steve, how much it warms Loki's face when there's not the threat of violence between the smirk.
"Alright," Steve says. "I'll see you then."
Loki shrugs. "Or you won't. We will see."
Steve leaves, that smile still lodged in his mind. It was... something humanizing, as much as that word would disgust Loki, and Steve's not entirely sure what to do with that. That Loki might actually--well. Everyone is worth saving, aren't they?
He thinks of Red Skull, and this titan that Loki's voice shivered, just a little, when talking about.
Maybe not.
***
"Come on!" Natasha yells, and Steve is, he really really is, but at the same time he can't stop staring up at the sky and the impossibly large ship, the same ship he knows he saw from the inside, this giant torus floating verticle, impossible and wrong, and--
they're not just dreams, he knew that, he knew that from talking to Loki and still--
It hadn't sunk in, not yet.
Loki's the one talking, terse and serious, and Steve forces his head down to look at him, even as the words just wash over him, bits and pieces of vorpal and at least a few hundred and weak spots, but he can't quite focus.
They're not alone. There are other people coming, the military, they don't have to fight alone, but it doesn't change that the same ship that was in his (too real) dream (not a dream) is here now--
he didn't see the future, and he didn't cause this.
This was always going to happen.
Loki meets his gaze, and the smile he offers is grim and humourless and Steve realizes, just then, that unlike all the other fights, the other man is afraid.
He remembers that quiver in Loki's voice talking about Thanos.
"Alright," Steve says, puts on his leader voice and the mask and becomes Captain America, because that's what they need, right now, they need direction. "You heard him."
Steve might be freaking out, but for Captain America this is another Tuesday. They've already fought the Chitauri off before with less. They can do it again.
***
"You said," Steve says, when it's him and Loki in a brief moment after the fight, "that that we might be able to... delay them, at least?"
Loki looks at Steve. He's soot stained and sweaty and he looks unspeakably tired. "Yes."
"Then we have to try," Steve says instead of if more show up, we're fucked.
"Yes," Loki says, and turns away. He takes a step, two, then vanishes.
Tony lands behind Steve. "I wish I could do that," he says, clearly grumpy.
"You and me both."
Steve's waiting in the hallway outside Loki's room, like Thor asked him to, and he can hear the two brother's arguing. Mostly, he can hear Thor, who keeps getting loud, then quiet, then loud again.
Loki, it seems, is more restrained about raising his voice.
Eventually, the door opens, and there is Thor.
"He said he'll talk to you. As a favour. That you'll owe him for." Thor sounds frustrated by this, but Steve isn't terribly surprised Loki wants something out of having to deal with one of his... jailers, Steve supposes, because that's pretty much what they are.
"Thanks," Steve says.
Thor just shakes his head and heads down the hallway, grumbling to himself the way storms do when they are on the move.
Steve knocks on the door frame before he steps inside, not entirely sure what to expect but...
It's normal. It really doesn't look too different from Steve's room, actually. The same floor to ceiling windows with a view, similar furniture, similar desk, a door that leads to a closet that's probably big enough to be it's own room.... The only real sign that it's not Steve's room is that the view is different and the bedding looks considerably furrier than anything Steve's ever owned in his life. Loki probably brought it with him.
Loki himself is sitting, arms crossed and face expresionless. He loooks... better, actually, than the few times Steve's seen him, but to be fair Steve's rarely had a reason to see him outside of fights. He looks considerably healthier, that's for sure, but he still has that same sharp line for a mouth that suggests he's merely waiting on Steve to speak to cut him open.
"I know you don't want to be talking to me, but your mother said you'd be the best person to help. So, well, thanks." That doesn't get a reaction, though Steve leaves enough of a pause for Loki to say something, so he keeps talking. "I've been having these weird dreams ever since--" I took your staff for safe-keeping--"you've been here and. Well, when I told her she said that you'd know. More."
"Yes, that is what Thor said," Loki says, crisp and voice deeper than Steve expected, but he doesn't say more, and soon the silence between them has stretched awkward.
"Well," Steve says, half-antsy and half-annoyed that despite knowing exactly why Steve's here, Loki's refusing to do more than the bare minimum of speaking. "What do you think?"
"Considering I know nothing of dreams nor dream magic, nor do I care about you, I fear I have nothing to say nor contribute, and my mother has redirected you for whatever reasons she has," Loki says, looking idly at the back of one hand before he looks up at Steve. Still expressionless, and yet still knife-sharp at all his edges. His eyes gleam blue and green and angry, so so angry, and it almost takes Steve aback.
"Really."
"Yes." Loki smiles wide; it feels like a threat with the just barely visible teeth, the edge of it.
He's playing with Steve.
"Well," Steve says, "that's a shame."
(Can he blame Loki?)
(Loki brought this on himself.)
"Indeed," Loki agrees, almost sing song.
"I guess I'll have to see if I can talk to her again. She seemed really sure you'd know about the blackbird and giant shadows and stars and stuff, but if you're sure--"
There, the smile falters, just a little. Just enough.
Steve heads for the door; he doesn't walk slower than usual, doesn't look back, does everything he can to make it clear that he's going to leave--
"Wait," Loki says when Steve's hand touches the door.
Steve pauses, turns to look at him. Loki's expression is different now--not all hard edges, but instead a little... thoughtful. Calculated.
"I might, perhaps, know something."
"Oh, well, I wouldn't want to--"
"Shut up. I won't offer again."
Steve grins, and lets go of the door.
"So you're saying the... giant shadow is a--"
"Titan named Thanos."
"--and your former employer."
"In a manner of speaking."
"And he's coming here to...?"
"Exact revenge for my failure, likely, and retrieve the mind gem."
Steve goes quiet, turning this all over. Loki as the blackbird--but Loki didn't recognize that it was Steve he was seeing while dreaming, which begs other questions. Do they all look different, warped, under someone else's gaze?
"How come I'm getting pulled into the dreams?" Steve finally asks.
(But he knows; it's the same reason Thanos is likely on his way here, isn't it?)
Loki is looking at him; that same uncomfortably piercing gaze that both Thor and Frigga have turned on him, and Steve wonders if they both learned it from her, or if it's simply a part of being Asgardian.
"That," Loki finally says, "I do not know. You shouldn't be there at all. You are, frankly put, just a Midgardian."
"Thanks," Steve says dryly. "So now what?"
"Now? Well, I suppose we see if we can interact the next time I go dream walking, and if so, then I suppose we might, just perhaps, manage to come up with a way to stall him." Loki pauses, eyes blue-green and sharp and focused much too much on Steve. "But short of finding the mind gem and destroying it, and any other of the infinity stones hidden here on Midgard, I doubt it would be a permanent solution."
"Okay," Steve says, ignoring the look.
(Loki isn't the right person; no one is. He's sure of that.)
"When are you planning to dream walk again?"
Loki shrugs. "I suppose you'll find out," and he grins, wide and sharp and mischievious. It startles Steve, how much it warms Loki's face when there's not the threat of violence between the smirk.
"Alright," Steve says. "I'll see you then."
Loki shrugs. "Or you won't. We will see."
Steve leaves, that smile still lodged in his mind. It was... something humanizing, as much as that word would disgust Loki, and Steve's not entirely sure what to do with that. That Loki might actually--well. Everyone is worth saving, aren't they?
He thinks of Red Skull, and this titan that Loki's voice shivered, just a little, when talking about.
Maybe not.
"Come on!" Natasha yells, and Steve is, he really really is, but at the same time he can't stop staring up at the sky and the impossibly large ship, the same ship he knows he saw from the inside, this giant torus floating verticle, impossible and wrong, and--
they're not just dreams, he knew that, he knew that from talking to Loki and still--
It hadn't sunk in, not yet.
Loki's the one talking, terse and serious, and Steve forces his head down to look at him, even as the words just wash over him, bits and pieces of vorpal and at least a few hundred and weak spots, but he can't quite focus.
They're not alone. There are other people coming, the military, they don't have to fight alone, but it doesn't change that the same ship that was in his (too real) dream (not a dream) is here now--
he didn't see the future, and he didn't cause this.
This was always going to happen.
Loki meets his gaze, and the smile he offers is grim and humourless and Steve realizes, just then, that unlike all the other fights, the other man is afraid.
He remembers that quiver in Loki's voice talking about Thanos.
"Alright," Steve says, puts on his leader voice and the mask and becomes Captain America, because that's what they need, right now, they need direction. "You heard him."
Steve might be freaking out, but for Captain America this is another Tuesday. They've already fought the Chitauri off before with less. They can do it again.
"You said," Steve says, when it's him and Loki in a brief moment after the fight, "that that we might be able to... delay them, at least?"
Loki looks at Steve. He's soot stained and sweaty and he looks unspeakably tired. "Yes."
"Then we have to try," Steve says instead of if more show up, we're fucked.
"Yes," Loki says, and turns away. He takes a step, two, then vanishes.
Tony lands behind Steve. "I wish I could do that," he says, clearly grumpy.
"You and me both."