#that way the show would cover Loki returning the stones and the TVA trying to get him to help get back the rogue 2012 Loki or something | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

fatefulfaerie · 3 years

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Abnormality

Zelink Week 2021 prompt #6/7 @zelinkweek2021

Word Count: 2,225

Incarnation: Age of Calamity

Additional Prompts Followed: Timeline Alteration

“UTA” inspired by the “TVA” of the Disney+ series “Loki”

Trigger Warnings: abduction, brainwashing

Before Link knew it, he was being pushed along a dark hallway, hands tied and feet tripping on each other when he was pushed too abruptly.

“Faster.”

He could barely see, but long, blinking blue lights told him it was a narrow space, and his boots sounded as if they were walking on steel. He walked faster nonetheless. His own iron armor made even more of a ruckus.

“Where are you taking me?” He asked over his shoulder to the man who was pushing him. “What’s going on?”

He was in Hyrule Field last he remembered, returning to the castle after battling a Moblin. He saw an odd, egg-shaped robot and the next thing he knew he was pushed to the ground, landing in the steel trappings of wherever he was now. He was brought to his feet and pushed whenever his captor thought his pacing was too slow.

The man never answered. Link was blasted with light when a door opened as if automatically with the same noise as a sword slinking into a sheath. Link, who marvelled at such unprecedented technology, was pushed in before he could remark at it. The man behind him was gone when those same doors closed behind him.

Link looked behind him and there were no longer doors, just a wall. So he looked in front of him.

The room was clad with a silver material unlike stone. Angles jutted out at odd places and Link had never before seen architecture like this as he slowly paced forward towards the table.

Someone cleared their throat, a woman. Link’s head popped directly forward.

“Name?” She asked.

“What’s going on?”

“Name?” She repeated. It seemed Link found another person who would not humor his questions.

“Link,” he answered.

The receptionist seemed annoyed, eyes rolling to the back of her head and her eyelids fluttering. Link wondered what he did to upset her, but she scribbled something down on a piece of paper nonetheless.

“Birthdate?”

“August 16th,” Link replied. “But--”

“You have been charged with the crime of temporal misdemeanors,” she interrupted. “How do you plead?”

Link’s mouth moved but no sound came out.

“T-temp…” he tried, but failed. “What even is that? What did I do?”

“How do you plead?” She asked. There seemed to be no negotiation.

“G-guilty,” Link stammered. “I guess.”

She pointed her pen to the left, where there was now an opening, a doorless entrance.

“Step onto the platform for processing please.”

Link hesitated.

“Now,” she said without even looking up, and so Link did as he was asked, stepping onto the platform with oddly textured lines. With a jolt, it moved him along, Link’s arms drifting from his sides and knees bending as if bracing for danger. But before he could even get a sight of what was in this next room, his vision was clouded by white mist, a substance that shot a tingling feeling throughout his entire body until he couldn’t even feel his body. He was paralyzed completely and before he could fall, mechanized hands clutched his limbs, his arms, his legs. He felt his armor being stripped off but he didn’t have the control over his eyes to see who was doing it or where it was going, to object to showing this much skin and feeling this vulnerable in a strange place. Neither could he employ his vocal nodes to object to the last bit of clothing being removed until he was left only with a blue Sheikah-grade undergarment covering his most private area.

He could still see though, still tell he was being moved along into the futuristic building with no discernible connection to anything he had ever seen in Hyrule.

When he finally stopped, he stopped in front of a man behind a podium. Around Link were burn marks and the foul smell of burning flesh. His heart began to race.

“Link 816-D, you have been--”

But the echoey voice of doom was stopped when someone came racing through a now opened door, a woman in a blue dress with jagged and yet structured patterned white lines. The dress was far too tight and far too short for anything fashionable in Hyrule, but the dark-haired woman looked professional and put-together nonetheless. The fact that her dress almost exposed her knees was the least of Link’s concerns, it was just odd.

He definitely was not in Hyrule.

“He is to be questioned,” the woman said. Link couldn’t deny she was beautiful. He tried not to think about it. “Concerning the matter of the leading variant at large.”

“Very well.”

Link felt the greatest sense of relief when he was able to move again, permitted to step off the platform, and given garments to clothe himself in. They actually quite resembled the white and blue that everyone in this place wore, Link given white pants, a blue shirt, and a jacket that said “variant” on the back.

He stayed silent until the woman sat him down in a room, sitting across from him with a welcoming smile.

“Sorry about all that,” she said with her hands clasped into each other and her elbows on the table. “We don’t have the best reception here at the UTA. Let’s just say you are very lucky to be with me right now.”

Link didn’t quite know what to say.

“I-I’m sorry but…” Link stammered. “What is the UTA? Why...w-why am I here and...who are you?”

She pursed her lips.

“Somehow I always forget you guys come in here with no context,” she said, almost apologetically. “Allow me to explain. My name is Whitney and I am an employee of the UTA, which stands for the Unified Timeline Authority. We are in charge of making sure that the timeline is pure of contamination such as unauthorized time travel, timeline splits, and nexus events that cause timeline splits. We have worked long and hard to turn a chaotic and temporally lawless timeline of Hyrule into a unified and cohesive timeline. We work tirelessly to make sure the timeline stays straight, and doesn’t veer off from the set path.”

It sounded rehearsed to Link, but more than that, it sounded confusing. He got bits of it but he still stared, overwhelmed beyond belief.

“Okay, okay,” Whitney said, pulling out a piece of paper and a pencil. She started drawing a straight line on the page.

“Here is your timeline. You pull the sword at thirteen but you put it back, right? You didn’t tell anyone?”

Link nodded.

“Okay so time moves along and you age, as you know.”

She started drawing another line, exactly parallel to the first.

“Meanwhile, there is an alternate universe where you do keep the sword. Believe it or not, these both are heading towards the same destination until BAM!”

She stopped drawing the first line abruptly and let the second keep going straight. She continued the first with a line askew, making an angle.

“You encounter the little robot and everything changes. The destination is put in jeopardy at a rate we’ve never seen before. So we step in.”

“You have seen the robot so we took you. We also took the robot so he can do no further damage. We then go to where the robot came from in the first place and make sure he doesn’t come again. Thus, we have two robots. Both are now destroyed. Now I know what you’re thinking. Two robots but one of you, how does that fix it? Eliminating the second robot made it so that it never contaminated your timeline, and so there is now another Link that made it to the destination, the event where all alternate timelines become one. Thus you are the extra Link, a variant.”

She erased some of both lines and made it so that the two lines converged into one, drawing a dot at the exact place where they did and labeling it “the destination”.

“So I’m here because I saw the robot?”

“Not quite. You see, we could have wiped your memories or even wiped you but we took the opportunity to gain some…intel…about another variant.”

“Who?” Link asked.

“You,” she answered simply.

“What?”

She almost laughed.

From below the desk she pulled out a clipboard, the exact one that Link saw that first woman with. She handed it over to Link, who took it and knitted his brow at what he saw.

At least half of the names on each and every of the many pages were either Link, Zelda, or Ganon, each name accompanied by two to four numbers and a single capital letter.

In the middle of the last page was what the judge called him, Link 816-D.

“Yeah sorry about that,” she said. Of all the things she could apologize for, she sounded too casual to be apologizing for any of them, for kidnapping him, for stealing the armor he earned, for uprooting his life. “You are actually the fourth Link to come in with that birthday, thus Link 816-D.”

Link put the clipboard down slowly, and returned his gaze back to the diagram.

“The destination,” he said, before looking up. “What is it? Why is it so important that you can’t have it not happen?”

The destination is the singular moment where we were finally able to unify the timeline into one. We refer to it as the calamity.”

The word struck fear into Link’s heart.

“C-calamity…” he began, attempting to fight his shock at how cheery she said that word, how casually she referred to something that could kill thousands of people. “As in Calamity Ganon? Are you serious? You...y-you want that to happen? Do you realize what that means?”

Whitney nodded.

“It’s unfortunate,” she said. “But it was necessary that we let it happen. The near destruction of Hyrule was the only way to unify the parallel timelines. It isn’t the first time we took advantage of a disaster to slowly work towards unification. There used to be three separate timelines that were nowhere near parallel, mind you.”

Link went pale, cold. His eyes stung and his lungs paused. Not only did they permit the calamity but they let entire kingdoms be destroyed for their order.

For some reason Whitney assumed that Link was just as comfortable as her with the situation.

“The variant we are concerned with exists in the single timeline beyond the destination but the variant is trying to undo the calamity, and we need to know why. Activating that robot and sending him across parallel timelines was his first attempt. He is, of course, only a variant of you, but we feel that questioning you will lead to a bit of clarity as far as his motives. If you submit to questioning right here and now, we can offer you a job, you won’t have to worry about being destroyed or anything. I used to be a variant, too, you know. All of us were variants once. We’d love to have you join us.”

Link wondered how long this woman had been here for her words to sound so fake, so insincere, so rehearsed. Perhaps she was kidnapped as a child, perhaps she was raised by other people like her, who lost themselves gradually.

Thus Link most assuredly did not want the job, did not want to be a part of something that trades apocalypses for senseless organization, that trades lives for convenience.

The kingdom of Hyrule he once served not ten minutes ago was so much more…

It was...

Well he supposed they were no better, doing those same things, just on a smaller scale.

So he could either work for the UTA or be destroyed like the variants who did not comply. He could die for his morals or he could sacrifice them.

But perhaps there was a third option, one where he fought for his morals, destroyed the UTA from the inside.

“I’ll take the job,” he finally said, Whitney smiled. “But I have to ask...you said you were a variant...who were you?”

It didn’t seem like a question that was commonly asked, and she hesitated. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to answer, it was more like she genuinely forgot. Link narrowed his eyes.

“I was a variant of Princess Zelda,” she said. “I used to go by Hilda but when I got here they labeled me as Zelda 108-A. I was taken the moment Lorule got it’s own Triforce. Lorule was destroyed by the UTA, but...it was already a mess.” Whitney shrugged. “It was probably for the best.”

Her entire kingdom was destroyed and she showed so little empathy. Link could hardly believe it. She was so casual about it, like she was talking about what she had for lunch.

“A friend got taken alongside me but,” she laughed. “You know it’s funny I don’t remember their name.” She shrugged again. “Must not have been a very good friend. I’m sure you’ll be a better one.”

Link pitied that poor friend. He could very well have been her best friend, could have refused to comply and could have been erased from her memory so that she would comply, would slowly lose herself and become another drone of the UTA.

Link inwardly refused to resign to the same fate, to maybe, if possible, save her too.

“What is your first question for me?”

#zelink #I guess #the concept kind of took over #zelink week 2021 #zelinkweek2021

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chipper9906 · 3 years

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Heal The Cracks Within My Heart - Chapter 8: Homesick

< - - - Previous Chapter

WARNING: SPOILERS FOR LOKI SEASON 1 EPISODE 6 ‘FOR ALL TIME. ALWAYS.’

Pairings: Loki/Sylvie

Rating: General Audiences

Chapter Word Count: 7,142

Overall Word Count: 72,547

Status: Multi Chapter Fic - In Progress (8/?)

Chapter Preview:

“Is it because you don’t want to hit me?” It takes everything Sylvie has not to physically laugh in his face. “I know we’ve grown a fair bit closer since then, but you seemed to have no trouble doing it in the past. You slammed my face into that… stool thing, remember? Just… think about how annoying you found me then, or… or think about when I accidentally destroyed the TemPad, or -- Oh! How angry you were when I tried to stop you from killing He Who Remains, that was -- Oh wait! A little bit earlier, when I said about falling in love with this other version of you! What would you do if you saw me after catching me flirting with—”

CRACK

Link To Fic

Click Below To Keep Reading

* * *

The morning after was never usually so comfortable for Sylvie.

That was because most of the time… there was no morning after. It didn’t matter how kindly her partner for the evening has treated her, or how clingy they became — whether they knew the Apocalypse was upon them or not. She would never, ever, let herself fall asleep in a strangers bed, or… or couch, or… well, sometimes in an Apocalypse, it’s more of a ‘hook up in this dark alley’ kind of moment, so it wasn’t like she would be getting any sleep there, either.

It was a new experience for her. For a moment, she wasn’t sure why she had awoken with a smile on her face, given that there isn’t usually anything good happening in her life to warrant its presence. But then her sleep-addled mind registered the sensation of arms securely wrapped around her, of warm, bare skin pressed against her own, and the memories of last night came flooding back: clothes haphazardly tossed to the side, slick mouths sliding together, hands exploring toned muscles that danced under each others touch, fingers tangling into long locks as breathy moans are panted against each other's lips, the feel of sweat covered skin as they moved against one another.

She hadn’t realized just how much she wanted this, how much she had been missing. She had only really known the physical side of sex, because… it is a very physical act. But now she knows how different it is when she’s not letting some random stranger be the one to explore her body, but someone she cares for, and someone she knows cares for her in return. No, not just cares for her, but loves her.

She still couldn’t quite believe it, even though Loki had repeated the confession a few times at her request. She had never really considered the possibility of love — both loving someone, and having someone love her back. There had been no room for it in her life, living the way that she did, and she could never look past the mission. It hadn’t seemed to matter what became of her life once she took down the TVA; revenge had been all she knew, and all she ever wanted.

It was strange that now, that want had transitioned from one singular mission to… a person. Actually, when she thought about it… that was greatly oversimplifying things. She wanted more than just Loki, she wanted… a life with him, some sense of normalcy — as normal as normal can be in their life, anyway. Something other than being on the run constantly, or being hunted down, or being the one doing the hunting.

Even now, living in this small slice of domesticity with Loki, she still struggled to see that future. Not just because she’s never lived that kind of life, but because… she couldn’t see an end to this. It had taken all this time to kill one man, and now… they have to kill endless amounts of that same man?

They still had so much to learn about the Multiverse. Even if she could wrap her head around the number of timelines that now exist, and even if they could kill every version of He Who Remains in those timelines… wouldn’t there always be timelines popping up into existence with every small alteration? From one singular timeline, there had been an eruption of other timelines, to which those timelines bred their own timelines, and so on and so on. Killing every version of He Who Remains — or at least, the bad versions — didn’t seem like a job they could just… wrap up and then carry on with their lives. It wasn’t even a job that seemed achievable in their lifetimes. They would have to pass it on to someone else — which then brought up the question of who they would pass such a burden onto, especially when… when all this was on her.

Or… or they’d have to find a way to run things from outside the limits of time. Set up shop in the citadel at the end of time, keeping them from aging so they can do this… endlessly. Never growing old, never able to find a moment of peace. It would make these little moments they found within Apocalypses seem like dream vacations in comparison…

“Should I be worried over whatever you’re worrying about?”

Sylvie startles at the sound of Loki’s voice, shuffling around and glancing up to see him peering down at her with groggy eyes.

The clarity slowly comes back into Loki’s eyes as he wakes up. It was surprisingly easy for Sylvie to lose track of her thoughts when his eyes met hers, still able to picture the way they had looked last night: the blue of his irises all but disappearing as his pupils took over; darkened eyes hungrily taking her in, drinking in every detail and preserving it to memory like he may never get the chance to see her like this again—

“Sylvie?”

“Uh…” Sylvie snaps herself back to the present. “…What makes you think I’m worrying over anything?”

Sylvie feels Loki’s arms shrug around her. “Call it a hunch. Or… call it the fact that you feel so tense, I was wondering if you were about to bolt from the bed.”

Loki’s tone was a joking one, but Sylvie could hear that little tidbit of anxiety hidden in there, too. He genuinely thought that the last part was a possibility, and whilst she knew that wasn’t going to happen, she couldn’t blame Loki for thinking so.

“Nothing, just… overthinking, as usual.” She gives him a small smile, one that he mirrors back at her.

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m… just getting used to the feeling of all this, I suppose.”

Loki chuckles in agreement, glancing around at the cozy wooden and stone walls of the Inn that sheltered them from the elements. The single window situated in the wall to the left of them showed views of the snow-covered forest they had come from, the few snowflakes they could see lazily drifting to the ground in no way an indicator of the deathly snowstorm that was supposed to befall this picturesque little village.

Sylvie turns herself around in Loki’s arms until they were face to face. “Aren’t we supposed to be out there saving all the universes?” she asks teasingly, playfully nudging her knee against his.

Loki lets out an odd mixture between a hum and a groan. “We probably should be, yes. Doesn’t mean I want to right this minute, though.”

Loki was much too comfortable right now to do much of anything. He didn’t want this small bubble of peace they were engulfed in to be burst — which it would be. It always is. But if he could just get a few extra minutes of this, then… He’d do whatever good deed the universe… universes —plural — was now apparently expecting of him.

Sylvie apparently agreed with him, seeming in no hurry to escape the comfort of the bed’s plush blankets — or his arms, for that matter.

“How did you end up being the big spoon?” Sylvie asks him, referring to the sleeping position she had woken up in.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Loki was getting strangely offended at the challenge to his role in spooning. “I am the taller one; it makes more sense for me to be the big spoon.”

“Hmm… you didn’t exactly have that kind of mentality last night,” Sylvie’s words land exactly the way she intended, grinning at the flush that steadily made its way across Loki’s face. “The man who clamors for control… actually prefers being dominated.”

“When it’s you,” Loki grumbled.

“Oh? So you’re more… ‘in control’ with other partners?”

“Yes,” Loki asserts, trying to claw back some of his pride. “I usually prefer being the one who dictates the flow of things… leaving my partner at my mercy — and my mercy alone.”

“Mm-Hmm,” Sylvie hums thoughtfully, peering up at Loki through squinted eyes. “So… why did you leave all that to me last night?”

“Because, when I typically take control, I intend for my partner to thoroughly enjoy it,” Loki answers. “With you… I didn’t think you’d like that all that much; losing control, especially when in... in such a vulnerable state. I…”

Loki paused for a moment, frowning in concentration as he tried to find the right words. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but… I think we both know that all of your previous partners have been one-time affairs, have they not? With this, I…”

“Were you… worried you wouldn’t compare?” Sylvie asks.

“What? No—” It was kind of that, but it wasn’t the main point Loki was trying to get across. “—No, it’s…” Loki sighed harshly. “Call me sappy if you’d like, but… I guess a part of me was scared you might see this as another one of those one-time things. I… I didn’t want to do anything that you’re not comfortable with, so I just let you take the reins, because… the last thing I wanted to do was scare you off. I wanted to ensure that this, that our first time with each other, would be one to deposit into your good memories. Because, whilst it might be our first time, I was rather quite hoping that it would be the first of many.”

Oh…

Loki’s eyes dropped down and away from her, and just like that, any pretensions of teasing him any further had flown right out the window. Sylvie lifted up her hand from where it rested against the bed, placing it tenderly across his cheek. Her thumb slowly drifted up and down across the sharp edge of his jaw, drawing his line of sight back to hers.

“First of all? You don’t need to worry about comparing yourself to the others. Not one bit,” Sylvie assures him. “In fact, it doesn’t even compare. None of them do.”

Her words at least seem to be reaching Loki as the truth she intended them to be, the corner of his lips curling up by just the slightest. A part of her wondered if he was playing this as a whole ‘self-conscious lover’ kind of thing so she’d sit here and boost his ego. Then again, she’d probably do the same thing…

“Secondly, I fully intend for this to be a regular occurrence,” Sylvie states like it’s a matter of fact. Loki raises an eyebrow in surprise at the confidence in her voice — but naturally, he doesn’t question it. He’d have to be crazy to question such a thing. “And… okay, so you might have been right—”

“I’m sorry, what was that?” Loki asks in disbelief, untangling one of his arms to cup his hand around his ear. “My, my… hearing that might just have felt better than—”

Sylvie shut him up with a swift punch to the arm, glaring at his ear-to-ear grin. “Egotistical bastard…”

“Sorry, sorry -- you were saying?”

Sylvie kept up the glare for a good few seconds more before she continued. “I was just going to say… thank you. Letting me… be the one in charge, it… it helped keep me at ease. And I know you wouldn’t do anything to me, but… bad habits die hard, I guess.”

“It’s okay,” Loki reassured her, lazily drifting his knuckles across the soft skin of her chin. “Having this… it’s already more than I ever thought I’d have. One step at a time, right? These are big changes; I wouldn’t just expect you to jump between them like it they’re no problem.”

“No -- but I’ll still give it my all.” Sylvie surges up to plant a soft kiss on his lips, pulling away before she lets it lead into a repeat of last night that they, unfortunately, didn’t have time for.

Ironic, considering they had two devices in their possession capable of transporting them through time and space.

“But that means you’ve got to start pushing me a little, too. Sometimes I’m going to need some help, someone to nudge me out of my comfort zones, okay? I want to start meeting this other Loki your other partners have had the privilege to meet.”

Loki grins unabashedly at her, raising a hand to his head in a mock salute. “Yes, Ma’am.”

“Good. Now, come on—” Sylvie makes a start to get up, pulling herself out of Loki’s grip. “We should really start getting ready—”

Loki’s arms almost immediately snake back around her, dragging her back towards the warmth of the bed. Loki’s smile was nearly bright enough to match the pure white of the snow-blanketed on the windowsill, placed there not because of his actions, but because of hers. He knew that, if she really didn’t want to be pulled back into the bed, she would have stopped him. The fact that he was able to pull her back into his arms was because she was letting him.

Because she didn’t fancy leaving the bed as much as he didn’t

“Five more minutes?” he offers when she falls back into his chest. He uses his free hand to pull the blankets back around them before she even has a chance to respond to his offer.

“Fine.” Sylvie sounded annoyed, but Loki could hear the pleased undercurrents to her tone. “Just five more minutes.”

Two hours later, Sylvie was perched on the edge of the bed, finishing up tying the laces on her boots. She watched Loki out of the corner of her eye as he crouched by the fireplace, extinguishing the last few stubborn embers that continued to burn despite most of the fire having burnt out during the night.

Sylvie shrugged on the fur coat Loki had created for her — and then later discarded to the ground in his haste last night — reaching into its pockets and pulling out the TemPad. She slides it over her hand, squeezing her hand into a fist as she stares down at the TemPad.

“Would be nice to stay here forever, wouldn’t it?” Loki says wistfully, leaning back from the now-empty fireplace with a bitter-sounding sigh.

Sylvie barely hears him, too preoccupied with running a finger down the singular timeline that glowed up at her. Loki looks over at her silence, standing up from the fireplace and making his way over to her. He shoves his hands into the pockets of his trousers, cocking his head at Sylvie as he comes to a stop in front of her.

“Is it whispering secrets to you that I can’t hear?” he asks teasingly, leaning forward as if trying to listen in closer.

“Oh, definitely.” Sylvie looks up from the TemPad with a sly smile. “It’s telling me every little dirty secret you’ve been trying to hide from me.”

“Ah… I’m afraid I don’t have any,” Loki counters. “At least, none that I’m aware I’m keeping from you.”

“Well, that’s not ominous…” Sylvie returns her gaze to the TemPad, tapping her finger against its surface. Not to input or choose anything, from what Loki could see.

“Are you keeping secrets?” Loki jokes… for the most part.

“None worth telling.”

Now that was ominous, Loki thought.

Loki takes a seat on the edge of the bed next to her, sighing softly as he runs a hand across the top of his head to push his hair back and out of the way. “You going to tell me what you’re thinking about? Is it… something to do with what you were worrying about earlier?”

“No,” Sylvie answers, and it’s the truth. She wasn’t thinking about that — not right now, anyway. “I was… thinking of doing something selfish.”

A beat of tense silence passes between them. Sylvie glances up to see Loki looking rather concerned, his eyes darting between her and the TemPad she held. It was only natural that he was thinking back to the time she last used the TemPad doing something ‘selfish’, resulting in him tumbling back through a Time-Door and nearly ending up imprisoned and potentially reset.

“...And… what exactly is that?” Loki finally gathers up the courage to ask.

“I… I know that we should really get a start on this whole… saving everyone thing…” Sylvie begins, her choice of words getting a hushed snort of laughter from Loki. “But… ever since what Mobius told us, I… I haven’t been able to get them out of my head.”

“Get… who out of your head?”

Sylvie taps at the TemPad, the patterns of squiggly lines atop its surface shifting around until one lone timeline shone up at them. “My family. I know they’re out there now; my past life -- the life I could have lived.”

“You want to see them.” Loki didn’t phrase it as a question.

“I know I probably shouldn’t. I know it… it won’t do me much good, to see everything I missed out on. But… it’s…”

“It’s home,” Loki uttered softly.

“Is it selfish?” she asks him, dropping her hand back down to her lap.

Loki takes in a deep breath through his nose, rocking back slightly. “If it is… I think you’re permitted to be, after everything that’s happened; everything that was taken from you. And besides—” Loki gestures to the TemPad. “—Maybe after we regale them with stories of the terrifying dictator we are courageously facing, we might just sway them into giving us a helping hand. The soldiers of Asgard would certainly be a good acquisition in the coming fight. We’ll need all the help we can get…”

“Kind of sounds like we’re building our own army…” Sylvie notes.

“I suppose… we are,” Loki realizes. “But… not in the traditional way. There’s a difference, fighting using those under your command, than with… fighting alongside allies.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Sylvie says with an awkward shrug of her shoulders. “The only other person I’ve had fight by my side is… you.”

“Well... it won’t be long before we have more allies for you to compare.” Loki stands from the bed, nodding his head towards the TemPad on Sylvie’s hand. “And family is as good a place to start as any.”

A grateful smile hitches at the corner of Sylvie’s lips. She looks down to the TemPad, letting her finger hover over it for a moment before she pressed down on her timeline. The lights of the TemPad pulse with her touch, fading away as the Time Door materializes into existence in front of them.

“Do you… want me to come with you?”

Sylvie whips her head around at his offer, confused as to why it was even a question of whether he was coming with her. She had thought it would be a given by this point.

“I understand if you’d rather not have me there for something like this. That’s not to say I feel particularly comfortable with the thought of you being quite so far out of reach, but… if that’s something you want, then I can stay here with the other TemPad and meet up with you on a different—”

“Loki?”

Loki stops in his ramblings when she says his name, mouth snapping shut at the part-adoration-part-exasperation on her face.

“...Yes?”

“Are you always this much of an idiot the morning after, or is this just a rare occurrence?”

Loki shoots her quite the impressive bitch-face.

“You’re coming with.” Sylvie reinforces this by grabbing hold of his hand, giving it a squeeze as they move towards the shimmering time-door. “Let’s go home.”

“Wait, wait, wait—” Loki splutters urgently, digging his heels into the ground to bring Sylvie to a stop. She does so, looking back at him expectantly. “Just thought I’d check… you did enter a time before the events of Ragnarok, right? Just… you know, to make sure there’s actually a home to go back to…”

* * *

They hadn’t moved an inch since stepping through the Time-Door.

It was quite the juxtaposition: them, stood hidden within the shadows of the forest that sat on the outskirts of the city, whilst the streets of the city itself were bustling with life, crowded with people as they went about their lives.

It was both overwhelming and not enough at the same time. Neither one of them had said a word, greedily taking in every sight of the place they both once called home.

The palace stood proud and tall as always, golden and gleaming in the afternoon’s sun, casting an impressive shadow across the city it sat within. Loki wasn’t too sure if it was just nostalgic memories taking effect, but even the bridge itself seemed to be sparkling just that little bit more than what he remembers.

“Does it live up to your memories?” Loki breaks the silence, somehow finding a way to tear his gaze away to look down to Sylvie.

“I don’t know yet.” Sylvie’s eyes dance across the sights of the city, repeatedly landing back on the palace. “It… it doesn’t feel like I’m home. If anything, it’s more like… this weird sense of Deja-Vu. It feels familiar, and yet… like it’s the first time I’ve stepped foot in this place.

“Well… maybe your memory will be jogged as we take a closer look,” Loki offers, gesturing towards the city. “…That is why we’re here, isn’t it? To see home, see our -- your -- family?”

Sylvie nods, unable to hide the nerves that were on full display. Loki steps in front of her, blocking her view of Asgard as he wraps his hands around the top of her arms. “I won't pretend to know how you’re feeling right now. Our memories of home are different; the way we see our home is different. But I know you want to do this.”

“I do,” Sylvie agrees, a glint of determination in her eyes. “I’m just… I never thought I’d get this, you know? Returning home was never something I thought I could do, because… because there wasn’t a home to return to. And now… I don’t know. I guess I’m worried it won't be the way I’m thinking it’ll be.”

“It probably won't be.” Loki surprises Sylvie with his answer — not at all the reassurance she thought she’d hear from him. “Expectations are almost always impossible to reach. But whatever home ends up being for you… surely it’ll be better than never knowing?”

Sylvie’s eyes drift to the small sliver of the palace she can see past Loki. Somewhere in there, is her family. Her mother, her father, her sister… even herself. She can’t walk away from them. She can’t just… leave them again.

“Okay…” Sylvie modifies her fur coat with a burst of magic, forming a hood that she flips over her head. Loki raises an eyebrow as she hides her face within the shadows of the hood, reminded just a bit too much of the mysterious figure of her that he face to face with back in the RoxxCart. “You should be fine to walk the streets, but I’d rather not risk our people catching sight of two of me if my other self is out there somewhere.”

“Right…” Loki steps back to her side, joining her as they take one last look at the city from this distance. “Do we… do we want to meet the other you?”

“Could be fun,” Sylvie says with the beginnings of a smile. “It’d be interesting to see the type of person I became if… you know — the TVA had never decided to ruin my life.”

“Aren’t you worried?”

Sylvie frowns. “Worried about what?”

“Another version of you out there…” Sylvie could hear the smile in his voice before she saw it on his face, knowing right away he’s about to say something stupid as a joke. “Better hope I don’t go and fall in love with her, too…”

Sylvie slowly turns her head to face him, sporting a bitch-face that looked almost identical to Loki's. She steps up in front of him, wiping the joking smile off his face as she grabs hold of the neckline of his coat, tugging his face closer to hers. Loki swallows nervously, eyes flickering from the eerily calm look in hers to her lips oh so close to his. He wasn’t too sure whether she was trying to terrify him, or turn him on. Either way… both were working.

“I suppose I’d have to get rid of my competition.” Sylvie’s other hand brushes agonizingly slowly up his chest, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake despite the thick clothing he wore. Loki finds himself leaning towards her, eager to close the minuscule gap between their lips. Sylvie jerks her head back before he gets what he wants, forcing him away with a firm push of her hand against his chest and a teasing smile on her face. “Or I suppose I could call you out for the idiot you’re being and leave your dumb-ass behind.”

Sylvie turns around and walks away from him, heading in the direction of the city and leaving a rather stunned-looking Loki behind. Loki stands there watching her retreating form for a moment until coming back to himself, shaking his head as he hurries after her.

“So, just to be clear—” Loki starts as they approach the beginning of the city, emerging from the cover of the trees. “—Making jokes about myself and the other you are strictly off the table?”

“That depends.”

“On?”

“On whether you value your jokes over my affection.”

“Consider them off the table,” Loki asserts with a wave of his hand. “In fact, they’re more than just off the table; they’re no longer on this plane of existence, reduced to nothing more than a wisp of a former construct developed from—”

The first impression of the two Loki’s this universe is not entirely familiar with is seen through the eyes of a young Asgardian child, who watched as Sylvie unceremoniously shoved Loki into a stall to shut him up.

“My deepest apologies, I must have tripped over my own feet.” Sylvie bit back a smirk as she continued walking, waiting for Loki to catch up with her after apologizing to the bewildered-looking owner of the stall.

“Sorry, that was a tad bit harsh of me.” Sylvie has the decency to apologize to Loki as he reaches her side with a huff.

“I think I might have landed on a wedge of cheese…” Loki wonders out loud, getting a snort of laughter from Sylvie. “If that man chases us down and demands payment for damages, I’ll pass the bill along to you…”

The people of Asgard were all wrapped up in their personal lives, some making their way through the busy streets as they make their way home, others congregated in small groups that added to the bustling crowds within the center of the city. All around them was the buzz of multiple conversations all occurring at once, muted laughter from their people as they went about their day, all sounds of… life.

Sylvie had lost count of the number of people who had bumped her shoulder as they passed by each other in the crowded streets, tensing up at every touch as she waited for the inevitable moment they would recognize the Princess of Asgard mingling among the common people. Every time, she would pull her hood just that little more over her head, turning her entire body towards Loki as they walked.

Yet… no one seemed to notice. She was just another name-less and face-less person to these people, going about her business the same as they were. Loki’s towering presence next to her was comforting, his hand wrapped securely around hers, appearing as just another couple walking the streets of Asgard.

“They look happy,” Loki points out, referring to the swaths of people they had walked through. “It’s… good. Nice.”

“I’m just glad to see that me not being pruned doesn’t result in the destruction of our home…” Sylvie murmurs quietly, still not wanting to attract too much attention to herself.

Sylvie went to continue forward, only to find herself being pulled to a stop. She glances behind her shoulder, confused to see Loki frozen in place, staring at something to their right. She slowly turns towards the direction he was looking to, immediately laying eyes on what had brought him to a standstill.

It was… her. Not the actual her, but a statue. Its well-polished bronze surface shone brightly as the sun beat down on it, displaying her in a rather impressive looking set of Asgardian Armor. Her metal figure stood proudly, wielding a familiar-looking sword in her hand that she held pointed to the ground, looking out towards the city and its inhabitants.

“Huh.” Is all Loki can think to say. “That’s, um… that’s something.”

“I don’t know whether to take this as a good sign, or… a very bad sign.”

“...Bad as in…?”

“As in, this version of me had a similar hunger for ruling that you did.” Sylvie glowers up at the bronze cast version of herself. She shifts her gaze from the statue to the palace, the golden spires now looming over them, having inched closer and closer to home.

“We don’t know for sure yet,” Loki says. “We can't be sure of anything until we get in there, and… see exactly who it is that sits on the throne.”

* * *

The Palace was as beautiful as she remembered.

She would have dreams of walking these halls, albeit from a much shorter height perspective. Everything was as pristine as usual, still clearly well looked after by those that serve her family. Sylvie was only really able to get a few moments to reminisce before yet another patrol of Einherjar would appear, this now being the fourth time she and Loki have had to duck and hide from their watchful eyes.

“You know, Thor and I did something similar when we snuck out one night.” Loki’s breath tickles the side of her face as he whispers, the two of them hiding behind a marble pillar after waiting for the next set of patrols to pass.

“What for?”

“We were young, and decided that the fading of the sunlight shouldn’t dictate when the fun was to come to an end.”

Sylvie quickly checks to make sure the coast was clear before tugging at Loki’s sleeve to signal for him to move with her. Their footsteps are near-silent as they make their way down the hall, each step careful and deliberate to reduce the amount of noise they make.

“Were you caught?” Sylvie whispers in asking.

“Of course we were caught,” Loki answers. “Two foolish children stood no chance hiding from father's guards. I had only just started learning magic from mother, and to say I wasn’t particularly well-rehearsed in the art of deception and mischief at the time would be an understatement.”

“They realized you had snuck out, then?”

“Realized? They saw us making our escape attempt from a balcony. We weren’t terribly subtle with the way we went about it…”

"I can believe that." Sylvie holds out a hand to stop Loki as they approach a corner. They stand flush against the wall, Loki waiting just behind Sylvie as she cranes her head around the corner, taking a peek at what lies ahead. Or, more in particular, to see just who stood in the way between them and the throne room.

Between her, and..her family.

Or... Her and whatever this other version of herself had become...

"Two guards stationed outside the door," Sylvie whispers over her shoulder to Loki. "We could enchant them, but... I don't see a way we could get close enough to do it before they spot us."

"Hmm... If we can't rely on the element of surprise, then..."

Sylvie glances back over her shoulder, waiting for Loki to finish his sentence. She nearly has a heart attack when, instead of Loki, she comes face to face with one of the Einherjar. Her hand twitches, reaching for her sword, when something in the man's eyes brings her to a stop. There was something... Familiar shining in them. An odd sort of... Glee...

Oh, right, of course... Illusion Casting. What else did she expect from the God of Mischief…?

"Bit of warning next time, Loki," Sylvie grumbles under her breath.

“I did,” Loki counters. “I said ‘we can’t rely on the element of surprise.’ That was my warning I was about to do something.”

Sylvie rolls her eyes with a barely audible sigh, leaning back around the corner to check on the guards. They were still stood ramrod straight in position, attentive eyes staring dead-ahead, as they usually were.

“I could pretend to be escorting you, like I did on Lamentis,” Loki suggests.

“Except the guards would probably be wondering why you’re escorting their Princess,” Sylvie shoots down his idea. “Also, there’s every chance you might be escorting me into the throne room, and in front of… me.”

“Right…” Loki mumbled in defeat. “Um… Illusion Casting requires a little bit more tutoring than a basic crash course, so… unless you suddenly become a master at that, too… we’re running out of options.”

Sylvie sighs from frustration, chewing absentmindedly on her bottom lip as she thinks. She takes another glance at the still stoic guards, quickly ducking back behind the corner to avoid being spotted.

“Wait -- I think have a plan!” Loki whispers excitedly, bringing Sylvie’s attention back to him. “You need to punch me in the face.”

Sylvie was sure she hadn’t heard that right. “You… you want me to punch you in the face?”

“Need, not want; big difference between the two.” Loki lets the illusion of the spear in his hand fade away. He grabs Sylvie by the shoulders, maneuvering them around until he was the one standing by the corner, his back to the edge as he places Sylvie directly in front of him. “You need to get me right in the nose -- make me bleed.”

“You still haven’t explained to me what for?”

“To make it believable, of course!” Loki states like that helped explain his plan any further. “You’re going to hit me as hard as you can, and I’m going to be sent flying backward. The guards are going to rush to help me, and that’s when you step in and enchant one of them.”

“And what about the other one? I can’t enchant both at the same time.”

“I’ll enchant him from the ground,” Loki answered with a grin full of confidence. “Then we can just… put them to sleep and store them somewhere for the time being, steal their armor, and waltz right into that throne room.”

“I don’t know…” Sylvie didn’t hold quite the same confidence in Loki’s plan that he did, given that his last few plans have been less than stellar in both execution and their outcomes…

“You have any better ideas?” Loki asked, and he had her there. “Look, I have complete faith that the both of us could… go rush them and subdue them ourselves. But could we do it quietly enough that no one hears us on the other side of the door? This way, we bring the guards to us, and take care of them before anyone knows what’s going on. It’s perfect!”

“I think ‘feasible’ would be a better word than ‘perfect…’”

CRACK

Sylvie’s knuckles land squarely in the center of Loki’s nose, the force of the impact sending Loki crashing into the wall opposite. She winced, both from not meaning to hit him that hard, and because the punch was forceful enough that it had ripped open the skin above her knuckles. Loki’s nose was — as expected — bleeding quite profusely from the hit, made all the worse by the edge of the TemPad on her hand catching him right across the bridge of the nose.

Loki groaned from where he had crumpled down to the ground, and Sylvie had to remind herself to stick to where she was and keep to the plan than go over and help him. She wasn’t too sure whether he was struggling so much to push himself up because it was all part of the act, or… if she had perhaps gone a bit overboard with her punch.

Either way, what mattered was that the plan, miraculously, was working. The guards had sprung into action the second they heard the crash of metal from Loki’s fake armor smashing into the wall, their weapons held tightly in their hands as they marched over to him.

Sylvie waited until their echoing footsteps were upon her before darting out from her hiding spot, grasping onto the closest guard's arm whilst yanking the spear out from his other hand. The man underneath the armor didn’t even get a chance to voice his protests before her magic was flowing into his mind, his face going slack as his eyes pulse with a burst of green light.

Thankfully, Loki was not concussed from the hit, and still had the mental capacity to carry out his part of the plan. His hand had shot out towards the other guard who had come to his aid, wrapping it around his ankle and hoping more than anything that his first time using enchantment on his own on someone that wasn’t Sylvie would work. He squeezes his eyes shut tightly, focusing every little drop of concentration he has towards the task at hand.

Loki’s eyes pop open in surprise when he feels the man’s foot shift under his hold, greeted by the sight of the guard going slack and collapsing to the ground next to him, landing in a less than graceful heap. Seconds later, the guard is joined by his friend as Sylvie releases her hold on the other guard's arm — although Sylvie does at least do the man a kindness and slowly releases her hold so he drops down gently.

“Ow…” Loki groans from the ground, letting his hand flop down the ground as he rolls over onto his back. He raises his hand to his nose, wiping away the excess blood that had congealed around his face, wincing as he brushes across the tenderized skin.

“Gods -- are you okay?” Sylvie hurriedly steps over the unconscious guards, rushing to get to Loki’s side. “I probably shouldn’t have hit you that hard…”

“I said to make me bleed and to hit me as hard as you can…” Loki says, his voice nasally due to the blood blocking his sinuses. “You certainly did as I asked.”

Sylvie grabs hold of one of his arms, helping him get back to his feet. Loki groans as he gets upright, pinching up and down his nose to check for any breakages.

“In my defense, you were doing everything you could to rile me up,” Sylvie says, gently knocking his hands away to check his injury for herself. Loki lets her examine him, surprised by the gentleness of her hands as they brush across his skin, feather-light and delicate as they pass by the area of his nose where the skin had been broken. “And for the record? That wasn’t me hitting you as hard as I could.”

It probably shouldn’t make her feel proud of herself that Loki looked genuinely afraid of her. And… a little bit awed by her. “It wasn’t?”

“Not even close.”

Loki’s nose had long since stopped bleeding by the time they had stealthily moved the guards to an unused room nearby. Whilst he didn’t need to steal the guard's armor given his abilities to cast Illusions, it was much easier to do so than use up most of his focus on keeping the Illusion up and —more importantly — believable.

Sylvie finished up the last of her temporary golden armor, securing the helmet over her head and making sure it fits snugly. It was a little loose given that the man she had taken it from was slightly taller than her, but not so much that anyone would question it. She looked over to Loki as he scooped up the guard's weapons and shields, nodding in appreciation as he passes one of each to her.

“Wait—” Sylvie stops him just as they reach the doors to the throne room. Loki looks to her with a questioning frown, to which she gestures to her own face with a twirl of her hand. “You’ve still got blood all over your face.”

“Oh.” It only takes a small wave of magic washing over him for the blood to be wiped clean like chalk off a chalkboard. Sylvie nods her approval when he looks back to her, turning back with a shaky breath to the door that, just beyond it, held the answers to what was supposed to become of her family.

What was supposed to become of her.

Loki didn’t say a word next to her, which she was infinitely grateful for. He was doing all that she wanted from him, which was… just to be there, standing by her side. He knew how important this was for her. He knew that now, more than ever, she just needed to know he was there for her if she needed him.

And it was rather terrifying just how much she did need him.

“Okay…” Sylvie breathes out, steeling herself for whatever is about to come their way. She just about catches sight of a flicker of a proud smile from Loki out of the corner of her eye as she nods to herself, raising a hand up and placing her palm against the intricately engraved golden doors. Loki’s hand joins her seconds later, her eyes trained on the door under her hand whilst his were focused solely on her, waiting for her to make the first move. Sylvie pushes hard against the solid metal, Loki following suit and joining her as they push against the heavy weight of the doors.

Slowly… the doors open.

Next Chapter - - - >

#sylki #sylki fanfiction #sylki fanfic #pro sylki #loki/sylvie #lovedagger #enchantricks

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