cape_kore | 001 Δ Loki Laufeyson Δ [Video]

[There is nothing recognisable, at first, at waking up alone in a room entirely unlike that in which he recalls himself prior, his sense of space twisted about him like a Klein bottle, strange smells and tastes on the air and a fog in his head. Not waking up -- being caught at such a disadvantage puts Loki immediately on edge, and he wracks his mind as he pushes himself up from his sprawl, up through his stupor, to find the thread of memory which will lead effect back to cause. Spacetime does not unravel; he cannot see where its pieces become contiguous. There is only then, now, the smell and weight of metal, and the little device on the surface of the table, clumsy and ancient. Quaint. The word sparks off a familiar taste at the back of his tongue as he reaches for the device.

Rust. Concrete dust. And then the message plays.

The corners of his mouth quirk faintly up and he closes his eyes. Oh, oh; now arises a dilemma.

Loki sits for a time in his room, device in hand, looking down at it with worlds of possibilities swimming through his cloudy head, and finally, finally he switches the video on, little smile -- a veil -- firmly in place.]

Given how well the last attempt to keep me here went I could see why one might be keen to try again.

[Perhaps this time I will not play as nicely.]

But whatever has become of all my old friends?

[It isn't a manifesto. It isn't even quite a threat, save on its underbelly, but there is no mistaking the subtle signs of anger, and those who remember him -- if any -- may recall that in Loki, a quiet anger is if anything more dangerous than a noisy one.]

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[New faces make Meja uneasy. In other prisons, it would mean some sort of activity outside it. Military action, or something equally stirring. Here? She's not really sure what to think of more people joining their not-so-little group.

People coming back?

Somehow, that makes her even more on-edge. But she offers a faint quirk of her lips.]

What are their names?

[Might as well assist, if she can.]

Anthony Stark. Clint Barton. Dr. Bruce Banner. I recall a small, brash young woman who was not overly fond of me and a cabal of her associates.

[The names are delivered in the sort of half-confessional worry one saves for discussing people about whom one cares. It is not difficult to imitate; Loki has seen men at prayer and it is much the same, a whispered litany of wishing without any genuine hope. It is, he believes, a good act, all the more so as it is not entirely insincere.]

[Those names were before Meja's arrival, and she shakes her head slightly, with an apologetic shift in expression.]

I think they were taken home, though I'm not positive. [One person had died because of the sea monster, and she hadn't really asked for a name. Not exactly news she wants to just pop out of the blue with, anyway.] Though a large number of people have come back, like yourself. Perhaps they will, as well.

Taken home.

[Loki can't say he believes there's any truth to the phrasing, but the intention behind it he cannot wholly question. Taken home; had he not been? But he hadn't remembered this place; something about it remains unsettlingly peculiar.]

If that is where they are, then hope for their own sakes they remain there.

[Meja really isn't sure that everyone is taken home. That's the problem with memory tampering, and the general lack of information in this place. But she hopes that's what it is.

Because the alternative — being experiment on, perhaps — is unpleasant, to say the least.]

Yes. Though who knows, with the recent amount of people who have come back after a long absence. They might return, like you did.

Perhaps. I only hope that if they do arrive they bring with them the certainty that I have not gone mad.

[He offers a smile, humourless, injected with something almost sad. A lie, and perhaps an obvious one.]

Perhaps I ought to speak to the others you say have returned. Might you have any names to offer me?

[Names she's slightly short on.]

I know Sam Winchester is back. And a young woman named Charlie. And a man with dark hair and glasses, but I'm afraid I don't know his name.

My own is Meja, by the way.

[The hesitation between her statement and his answer is conspicuous. He weighs his options. Some pseudonym, or that which may already bear thorns and hooks: the true name. But it is likely known, at least to someone. He was, after all, here before.]

I am called Loki, and I thank you for your assistance.

[If his hesitation is conspicuous, then Meja's own silence is downright suspicious. But she can't help the icy clinch that runs through her, at that name. It's a reaction born of a being that has taken everything away from her. Including, in a way, her own life.

But she takes a deep breath, because the eyes of this Loki don't glow blue like the wane of a winter moon, and the voice is wrong. It doesn't echo and twist like she can still hear if her thoughts are lost in a daydream.]

Well met, Loki. It's no trouble.

[The pause has Loki leaning forward just slightly, just enough to betray a sharpening of focus, the piquing of his interest, whether for good or ill. When he speaks, his voice is low, almost a murmur, tone nearly confiding, sympathetic.]

Was it reputation or experience which caught hold of your tongue just now?

Both.

[Meja offers a wry smile. That sympathetic tone sets off more alarm bells than the name does, but they're much smaller bells. Another Loki? She can handle that. A different Loki.

Please, she thinks. Please.

None of them need to be trapped in here with that sing-songing madman.]

But you're not the Loki I know. He wouldn't have been this... polite.

[Or focused.]

001 Δ Loki Laufeyson Δ [Video]

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