Hello there,
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Do you like Loki's creations, dangerous experiments, and willingness to challenge enemies that appear above his league? Then you will definitely like Thairon, the protagonist of my original story, Arrival : Ruptures. Comments, likes and reviews are appreciated. Here are the links for : AO3, Spacebattles, Royal Road and Webnovel.
—
He bit the back of the brush, squinting one eye. He gently dabbed it in the sunset orange color on his palette, dragging the brush across the clouds.
Sometimes, it felt great to be so far away from everything.
Now if only that persistent laugh from the woods would stop.
His hand twitched at one last guffaw, splattering paint on the landscape. He could have rewound it and fixed his mistake, but the process itself mattered more to him.
Setting the painting tools on the table next to him, he walked to find the source in the sole patch of green on this waste of a planet that had mysteriously appeared while he was painting.
Whoever did it was about to have problems.
"Excuse me, could you be quiet, please? I understand you are celebrating something, but I am trying to work here," he implored, silencing the laughter for a second.
The buffoon in gold finery laughed louder at his words. The masked individuals, or whatever they were, joined him.
"Who even are you, boy?" the entity before him asked. Loki could see that he was composed of energy, a god, so to speak.
"Someone trying to finish a painting," he retorted with a dry voice.
"Would you look at that? We have an artisan here. Here, paint this," he laughed, throwing a melon at his face.
Loki's left eye twitched as the fruit turned to dust in midair. He flicked his hand, and the fool's left arm exploded in a shower of golden gore, covering the followers behind him. He screamed, clutching the bleeding stump.
He opened his palm, and the writhing entity flew to him. His hand wrapped around the throat, squeezing.
"How about I paint this landscape with your blood?" he hissed, and the other arm exploded as well. The god before him lost his voice, simply thrashing, trying to kick him. The golden ichor sullied the water while the followers screamed and ran.
He did not give them the chance. The flowery wisps withered, and the masked ones decayed into dust as time took its toll on them.
The god, or rather the parasite in his palm, accelerated towards his throne. It's struggles ended as Loki's seidr slammed him to him like a meteor. It burst like a rotten fruit, painting a patch of grass and trees golden.
He took a deep breath to calm his raging mind.
"You killed Rapu," the sole living sapient in this sanctuary aside from him said, his voice empty of anything.
He regarded the mortal for a moment. The races of the galaxy looked very similar for the most part. There were dozens he knew with appearances that could pass as an Aesir, and the bald Aesiroid before him was just another to the list.
"Was that his name? Rapu?" A foolish name for a foolish god.
"Yes, he was our lord."
He raised an eyebrow. It must have been shocking for a mortal to see his god die before his eyes. "Is this going to be a problem?"
Apparently not because the mortal threw his head back, laughing, though there was no mirth in it. "He said we deserved to die in his name. All our worship, all our prayers for him to grant this barren land sustenance—none of it meant anything."
"Entities like him are parasites, leaching off your worship." Which he found insulting, to be honest. If you are going to call yourself a god, do it without the need for worship.
"If only we had known."
The words made him consider something.
"Would you have worshiped him then? Or any other god? Or would you take your destiny into your own hands?"
The tattooed mortal's eyes snapped at him, eyes ablaze. "He, and all his kind, are unworthy of my worship. They are no gods."
He considered the mortal's words while peering into his past. Surviving in a desert where food was scarce and water even more so, his people had died one by one, leaving only Gorr and his daughter.
Who had recently perished.
He could leave the mortal to his fate, but the energy Rapu had was still present in his remains. It could be put to good use with a bit of work. He had toyed with the Infinity Stones enough but had no reason to use them.
This could be it.
"Well then, Gorr, I believe it is only fair what you have given Rapu be returned to you and your people."
"What?"
Loki snapped his fingers, and Gorr's vision swarmed with light before darkness took him.
—
He could not say how long he was floating in a sea of comfort, away from all his troubles. His mind was blank with a peace he had never known before.
"Father, Father, wake up."
Gorr's eyelids fluttered, feeling sunlight, not harsh and scorching, but gentle and tempered by the shadows, warming his face.
"Astrid?" his voice rasped at the blurry person before him. He blinked to clear his vision, his hand reaching out to cup her face.
"I am here."
"How?"
"I dunno. I just found myself here. But look, it's all green now, and there is so much food."
"Ada," he said, holding out his other hand to his wife, who knelt next to him.
"Dear."
"How is this possible?"
"It must be Rapu's eternal reward."
"Rapu is dead. I saw it with my own eyes. He mocked our suffering, our worship. There was no eternal reward."
"Husband, what are you saying?"
Gorr rose, walking to stand atop a rock, gazing down at his people. "I say no more worship of the false gods. We take our destiny into our own hands."
"Blasphemy," someone screamed, receiving approval from a part of the crowd.
"Hear me, my people. The gods do not care for us. Rapu has never answered our prayers. We are nothing to him. And now, he is dead."
A young woman threw a pebble at him but missed. "How can you say that?"
As if his cries were heard, a light flashed overhead. Rapu's body, which he had seen being destroyed with a mere flicker of the stranger's hand, fell to the ground, lifeless.
"I thought a little assistance would be necessary to prove your words," the smooth voice whispered to his ear. He looked around, seeing the stranger nowhere.
His people backed away from the corpse, some falling on their knees.
"No more worship of the false gods. No more groveling for sustenance. What Rapu has taken from us has returned with his death. From now on we live for ourselves, not for the gods," he beseeched as the whisper supplied him with an excuse.
The first one to support him was his wife, and his daughter followed. As Rapu's body disintegrated into nothing, his people began to rise in defiance.
—
He rewrote the reality of the planet.
The sandy, dry surface turned to fertile soil, perfectly conducive for the growth of flora. Lifeforms were the next. Microscopic creatures are necessary for driving the ecosystem, bugs for pollination, and birds to carry the seeds and livestock.
Rivers, seas, and an ocean teeming with life came into existence, while the planet itself was moved to a more habitable zone in the star system.
The constant earthquakes and volcanic fumes died in an instant when the crust was fused into a single piece.
The ash and toxic gasses in the atmosphere were repurposed. He changed the atomic structures, leaving only water behind.
He didn't simply create a temporary patch of green that would be unsustainable without him but had made it so the planet would thrive on its own.
He was about to leave the planet as the inhabitants celebrated their newfound fortune when an idea struck him. While the desert planet has been remade into a lush paradise, it wasn't enough for them to create a society.
He decided to leave a gift, this one from himself, behind.
—
Asgard
He inspected the sword he had taken from the planet.
All-Black, the Necrosword, forged at the dawn of time, was made to kill the gods. It tried to bind his lifeforce to it and corrupt him. He rebuked the efforts, which were cute in their insignificance. His seidr spread over the sword, breaking it down to more energy for him, putting an end to it, permanently.
The screams were music to his ears.
Since his itch for art was gone, with the landscape painting left unfinished, he sought other amusements for the day.
—
Knowhere
It came in the form of an offer. He had left nodes across some of the planets he had visited. One was on Knowhere should the Collector ever wish to contact him.
His message was simple. Some individuals of great reach wished to offer him a rare artifact in return for a rather loaded order of Anulax batteries. The details on the artifact were sparse. Either they did not want word of it going out, or it was a trap.
It excited him.
"Taneleer, to what do I owe this pleasure?" he asked, coming out of the gate in his usual spot. The Collector smiled at him, silent.
A golden field, a shade he had seen long ago, rose like a cage around him.
"Sorry, they just offered a lot for you," he shrugged.
He did not look sorry at all.
"You are the one who stole our batteries. The mysterious traveler," a woman, all blinding gold from head to toe, said.
Loki was already amused by the trap. A gravitational disturbance field meant to stop him from leaving the barrier.
The accusation of the high priestess made him lose control. His free, unburdened laughter echoed in
"Can you cover yourself? Your hideous sense of fashion makes me want to tear my eyes out."
She blinked owlishly.
"And stole your batteries? Please be reasonable." He raised a palm, creating a battery, followed by another and another. It turned into a stream of metal hitting metal as a small pile of Anulax batteries gathered near his feet.
"They were so easy to replicate; I still find it amusing to this day. It took me thirty minutes of studying to figure out their little secrets."
"So much for your self-proclaimed superiority."
"That should not be possible," the High Priestess, Ayesha, if he remembered correctly, denied, eyes wide.
Loki's lips quirked. He disappeared from the dome and appeared behind her. Her soldiers fell flat on their faces, stuck to the floor.
A plasma blade sprung from his wrist. He wrapped his arm around her neck, the blade at the edge of her necklace.
"You made a mistake, one that you are going to pay for dearly."
"We can come to an agreement," she said, raising her hands, palms flat.
"Oh," he smirked, "what do you think you have to offer me?"
"Anything you want."
He chuckled. The blade detached from his wrist, still pointing at her throat. He created three more, each one ready to decapitate her from one end.
"Any artifacts or technology on spacetime manipulation, exotic energy sources, matter reconfiguration, or forbidden knowledge?"
"No."
He tilted his head to the left. "No? Pity. Then you have nothing I want."
"The Power Stone," she screamed, thrashing. "We know where it is."
His arm wavered for a second. "Now you have my attention, though how?"
Her tale became more entertaining each second. When they sought an energy source for their planet, the Sovereign came across the mentions of the Power Stone. They had sent drone fleets all the way to the Andromeda Galaxy, only to discover the stone was hidden in a temple submerged deep beneath the ocean.
They could not afford to wait for the tides to recede, and with the creation of the Anulax Batteries, it had become a moot point.
He felt like laughing.
He never sought the stones, yet found them one way or another.
"Very well. I will not gut you like a fish and let you die in the filth of your own intestines in return for the location."
"Such a pleasure." He winked and flicked his hand, banishing the High Priestess and her soldiers back to Sovereign.
He turned to the collector, all humor gone. "As for you."
"I knew you were greedy, but I did not believe you were a fool either."
The Collector raised his hands in submission, backing away from him. "I am sure we too can reach an agreement. You wanted to know about Odin's past, yes? I can tell you all about it."
"No need; I learned everything from my sister, Hela."
"Sister?" He stumbled, eyes widening in terror. "You are an Odinson."
"Correct."
"Then my collection, you can take any piece you want."
He hummed, appearing to consider it. Taneleer smiled in relief. It did not last long when a hand went through his chest.
"I'll just take everything," he whispered. The Collector did not even have the time to react before he began to assimilate his memories while breaking his body into more seidr.
He did not tolerate treachery.
—
Once he had put the new memories in order, he was free to peruse his newly acquired collection.
The most interesting addition was a Dokkalfar.
"Hello there," he greeted, pulling the Dark Elf out of stasis.
He fell flat on his face, looking around wildly.
"Who are you?!"
"Loki Odinson, a Prince of Asgard
"An Aesir?!" The elf growled, pulling out a blade.
"Before you attack me, know that the war is long over and your people are extinct. You are the last one. Unless you wish for it all to die with you, stand down."
He lowered his blade. "We lost?"
"Yes. My grandfather, King Bor, put an end to Malekith's plan to plunge the Nine Realms into darkness, as evident by the fact I am here."
He growled, raising his blade. "Then it does not matter. I too shall die and join my kin."
"Sure," Loki shrugged, annihilating the Dark Elf with a thought.
Each organic specimen was cataloged with their planet of origin. Slaves for display as they were, he sent them home one by one, ensuring their existence would not cause disruptions.
Except one.
"Hi there," he greeted the warm brown furred dog in a spacesuit, kneeling to give her scratches.
The energy she was emitting caught his interest, and the telepathy collar around her neck wasn't there for decoration.
She leaned up to sniff at his fingers. Deciding he was safe, she allowed it. "Hi. Who are you?"
"Loki of Asgard. You are from Earth, correct? The Soviets, I believe?"
"Yes. You know Earth?"
"It is under Asgard's protection, though we don't intervene much."
Cosmo, she revealed, was sent to space by the Soviets on a one-way trip. Exposed to exotic radiation, she had gained telekinesis. Upon discovering her, the collector just added her to his collection.
He vaguely remembered something about the Soviets and a dog in the space program from his past life, but the name did not click.
"He is gone; I suppose I am the new owner. Would you like to come with me to Asgard?" It would be a pity to let such an intelligent creature be locked up in Knowhere.
"Anywhere is better than here," she said, wagging her tail.
"You," he called to the pink female dancing around. "Would you be interested in a job?"
—
In the next chapter:
"Brother, feeling ready?" Loki asked, watching as the attendants fussed over Thor.
"I was born ready; you, however, look freshly out of bed." Thor winked, smug while attendants fixed his armor.
Loki rolled his eyes, and with a mere thought, he was washed, changed out of his clothes into something more ceremonial, and looked perfectly ready for the coronation.
Thor's face soured, as he was spending hours to look excellent, only for Loki to do it with a thought: "Unfair."
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