Chapter Text
Loki almost wanted to laugh. Almost. Thor had just handed everything over to him. The throne, their people, and now and infinity stone. He had to agree with Thor's reasoning- the stone was much safer here than with the Collector, and it wasn't like Thanos wouldn't come either way. He had to be ready for that, and the extra infinity stone would only make the defense easier. Especially with him wielding it.
After getting confirmation with Thor that the Collector wouldn't come seeking out the stone, Loki went down to visit it in the vaults. He had to admit, this one intrigued him, and had since Jane Foster had been taken as its host body. Reality. The Aether, in this form, but Loki knew it could be just as solid as the others, if it wished to. Or was forced to.
But Loki had no interest in forcing it into any form but the one it was already in.
This might be a mistake, but Loki was known for those.
He opened the container and reached out a hand.
Stupid Thor. Stupid Odin. Stupid circular portal thing.
Loki hit the ground. "I have been falling for thirty minutes."
The other man in the room besides his brother, presumably the sorcerer who was responsible for all this, turned to Thor. "You can handle him from here."
Now that was just insulting. "Handle me? Who do you think you are? Did you seriously think I would just let that go-"
"Did you seriously get yourself possessed by an infinity stone?"
Oh. The sorcerer was actually good. And had the time stone, according to the entity in Loki's body, which wanted to prod curiously at the other being. Loki held it back. Careful, he reminded it.
"I don't know what you're talking about," Loki told the sorcerer.
"Brother..." Thor sighed. He clearly didn't believe Loki- which, fair enough, Loki had already expressed interest in this situation, good for Thor for noticing- so there was no point in attempting to hide it any longer.
Loki rolled his eyes. "I am not possessed by it, I mean really."
"Brother..."
"You're right. Poor wording choice," the sorcerer conceded. Not bad. He knew when not to pick a verbal fight when he was wrong. "You'd call it... hosting it, then?"
"That's better, yes."
"Loki!"
"Yes, Thor?"
"Did you actually put the Aether in the vault?"
"It's the reality stone, Thor, and yes, I did, actually, but I figured it could be more useful with me than sitting down there waiting for someone to steal it-"
"Who would steal-"
"It's an infinity stone. I believe your answer is half the fucking universe!"
"Right. Right. So your solution was to... host it."
"Yes, actually, it was. Very hard for anyone to take it from us right now."
"Malekith took it out of Jane."
"Malekith was also an ancient being who had already attempted to use it to destroy the universe."
"Your point?"
"I don't need a point, Thor, you do. Because you can't exactly take it out of me, if I'm not mistaken."
"Shut up."
"Gladly. I believe we've gotten distracted."
"About that," the sorcerer interjected. "I believe it's best if I come with you. I'd prefer not having an enemy of this planet walk around with something that powerful unsupervised."
"I thought Thor was my supervision."
"And now I'm adding myself in as well."
"Wonderful."
Loki didn't actually want to see Odin. Loki actually felt better seeing Odin with the sorcerer hovering awkwardly in the background. That was strange.
Strange was also apparently the sorcerer's name. Loki was going to call him Stephen, just to annoy him, because it was very clearly not what Stephen wanted to be referred to as by either of them.
Thor had told him to stop antagonizing the sorcerer. Loki didn't want to. Stephen had started it.
Then Odin was dead, and Loki felt like he was in shock. He'd often thought of Odin dying, of course- either in battle or later by Loki's own hand- but he'd never thought the Allfather would just... die. One moment he was there, the next he wasn't. It was kind of terrifying.
None of them said anything for a moment, but then the portal opened.
That would be Hela, for all the good Odin's last minute warning had done.
Loki grabbed a dagger, and both he and Thor returned to their Asgardian outfits. Stephen, beside them- why was he still here, again? Did he consider Hela a threat to his planet too?- summoned twin shields. Not bad. Loki had always been more for illusions, pocket dimensions, shapeshifting, and the like, but that was definitely useful. Still, there was nothing wrong with just using normal weaponry, for all that Asgard had ridiculed him for not being a warrior. Really, the only thing the shields were was showy, and probably not going to do much against the goddess of death.
What was he planning on doing against the goddess of death, again? Right, leave that to Thor.
Honestly, Hela looked more like him than Thor did, which... said a lot about Odin, maybe, since he'd chosen Loki's Asgardian form, but Loki didn't want to think about that right now, and Odin was dead, anyway, so it didn't really matter.
Hela commented that Thor didn't look a lot like Odin, which Loki thought was just ridiculous. "More than either of the other two of you," Stephen commented.
"Do shut up," Loki told the sorcerer.
Hela raised a brow. "And you?"
"He's from Midgard," Loki informed her. "I don't know why he's still here. Please leave." He glanced at Hela. "Not you. Although, actually, yes, you too."
Thor rolled his eyes.
And then Hela spouted off a bunch of nonsense about her being queen, and Thor protested, and Loki pointed out that he was more king than either of them given that he'd been pretending to be Odin for years at this point and was already doing the job, but only got a 'shut up Loki' for his troubles. He was helping, actually, Thor, if he was king than Hela couldn't be.
Thor got to the point where he was throwing mjolnir at their sister, who proceeded to completely destroy it, at which point Loki decided it was time to go.
"Bring us back!" he called to whoever was manning the Bifrost at this point, and they responded. He barely heard Thor's 'Loki no!' before the three of them were picked up.
Apparently the sorcerer was coming to Asgard now. Wonderful.
At Thor's shout, Loki looked back from where he was glaring at Stephen. He had just enough time to watch Hela throw Thor out of the Bifrost- and that was concerning, since when was that possible?- before speeding toward them. Loki's plan was mainly faster faster faster, but that wasn't enough. He grabbed onto Stephen as Hela reached him, because if he was going down he was taking the sorcerer down with him.
He had, until this moment, had his mind on other things, and therefore forgotten about the infinity stone. His, not Stephen's, although either was fine, but his was more useful at the moment.
Hela grabbed him, and the Aether reacted, throwing Hela and Loki in opposite directions out of the Bifrost, Loki taking Stephen with him.
Loki hated space.
They somehow landed on a trash planet.
It was nicer than Thanos, at least.
Stephen struggled to his feet at Loki's side. There was no sign of Hela or Thor.
Loki groaned. "Wonderful."