Final steps

[st_ratagem]

Loki had spent the last hour or two before sunset preparing, and the first hour afterward. He’d taken ruthless advantage of the fact that the Inn staff was desperate to give people towels and had carefully interwoven the. On the floor such that there was no chance of getting at the actual carpet below without effort. He’d selected a dagger from his collection - a very old one that he hadn’t actively used since childhood, one of a pair given to him by his mother - and sharpened it to an almost perfect edge. He’d opened up the balcony door to let the early-winter night chill in. He’d even out together a little aid kit (disinfectant, pads, bandages, needle and thread) for afterward.

In many ways, the hardest part was settling on the towels with the in-etched staff resting in front of him and forcing Odin’s enchantment away, knowing that he wouldn’t be allowing himself to go back to normal possibly for hours. And that, as soon as Thor arrived with a bowl and his hands, it would all have a witness.

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[st_ormbreaker]

Thor looks at Loki, befuddled, lips slightly parted while he tries to dig into the recesses of his memory for anything remotely resembling this tale. It sounds like something he'd do for the reasons he claimed to do it, but...

He knew some or part of it had to be a lie and he couldn't figure out which bits were true and which weren't, so he chose not to believe any of it. Still, there's one thing he's certain is a lie:

"For the record, I think you would fancy being stabbed by her."

[st_ratagem]

“Probably yes, now. Then, no. I was worried about lethal stabbing.” Sif probably would be more inclined to lethal stabbing, still, but Loki cared less. “But here’s the thing, brother. Any human, or the Jane here, would believe that story. It sounds exactly like something I’d both do and brag about. Even you sort of believe it, and you know better! So just... make something up. It's practice, I don’t have to believe you.”

[st_ormbreaker]

After another half-minute of frowning, Thor settles on a lie.

"Sakaar was a literal trash heap. Trash literally fell out of these portals in the skies. The only thing that was well-kept in that place was the Grandmaster's palace and his various belongings, the people he favored, and the stadium he had his people fight in. The place the fighters were kept before fights was pretty awful. You refused to be there physically, by the way."

All true so far.

"We had to escape Sakaar on one of the Grandmaster's ships, which were the only ships capable of leaving the planet." Or so Thor believed, anyway. Probably one of the Grandmaster's ways of keeping anyone from leaving. He's sure more people would evacuate the planet if given the opportunity. Who wanted to be on a planet with a psycho like the Grandmaster ruling, anyway? Or on a planet with the Grandmaster, period?

"You had the access codes to one of his ships. The orgy one and you had it because you were an active participant. Knew how to set off the fireworks for the ship and everything. Which helped us to stop the Grandmaster's right-hand woman when we were chased, by the way."

[st_ratagem]

“Good!” Loki nodded, even applauded a little. “It all hangs together nicely and sounds believable, even if the percentage of truth is a little high for me. Tell that story to anyone who doesn’t know better and some who do, and it would work.” In fact, the only reason that Loki knew which pars were lies was the number of times Thor had mentioned his Statesman and how he’d come by it.

[st_ormbreaker]

"It's not hard when you have something believable to work with," Thor says. All that? Believable. "What should I lie to Valkyrie about?"

[st_ratagem]

“Anything! Yourself, me, Midgard. Insist you’re a vegetarian.” Loki waved his bandaged hand. “Try to have fun with it.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"No one's going to believe that," he says. He doubts even Loki would be capable of selling that idea to anybody save maybe someone they just met.

And even then, he doesn't think he has the look of someone who spends a lot of time munching on carrots and cabbages.

"I'll try lying to Valkyrie and report back." What about? He's not sure. He'll figure that out when the opportunity arises.

[st_ratagem]

“Most animals are actually vegetables. Scientifically speaking.” Purest bullshit that no one would believe, but fun. “I look forward to hearing your results, brother.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"I'm sure it's not going to work, but I'll try it anyway." Thor's usually confident in himself and in his abilities, but he's more confident in Valkyrie's ability to see through bullshit than he is in his own ability to lie convincingly to her.

Thor nods at Loki's staff. "When's your stick going to be ready? I want to see you use it."

[st_ratagem]

Loki looked over at the staff as well. “The runes were the last thing. It’s as personal and cold as I can make it, so if it doesn’t work it’s not because I cut a corner anywhere.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"So you could try using it now?"

[st_ratagem]

“I could. I don’t want to freeze my room, though, on the off chance that it actually helps.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor nods a head towards the balcony. "Why not go outside?"

[st_ratagem]

Loki sighed. “Is it really that important to you? Watching me fail?”

[st_ormbreaker]

"Why are you so convinced that you'll fail?" It's obvious from his tone of voice that Thor isn't here to see Loki fail.

[st_ratagem]

“Because I’ve failed consistently until now, and I don’t know what I’m doing. I’ll fail until I succeed once, and then I’ll go back to failing because I won’t know what I accidentally did right.” Loki flexed his bandaged hand, letting the sting from the healing cuts scour some frustration away. “Healing all over again, except I actually know how healing should work. It just doesn’t.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"For all your ridiculous schemes, you'd think you'd have more confident in your ability to pull something off." Thor is in utter belief of the lack of Loki's confidence in himself sometimes, in part because Loki didn't seem to have any doubts in himself when it came down to things like usurping the throne or conquering Earth, but also in part because Thor had astonishingly few self-doubts.

[st_ratagem]

Loki’s mouth tightened. It would likely be read, if Thor noticed at all, as annoyance at the phrasing ‘ridiculous schemes,’ which was fine. That was a little annoying, and much better than the truth: it hurt, having a deeply uncomfortable and this-far insoluble problem dismissed like that.

But of course Thor didn’t know any better. He’d never really failed at anything before. Not anything important. None of his battles were ever uphill in bad weather. “I’m sure.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"I'm sure," Thor says, clapping a hand on Loki's shoulder. "So let's go make some ice and snow." Truthfully, Thor has no idea what Loki's powers are capable of, but ice and snow seemed like it'd fall under the umbrella of "things an ice giant can do".

[st_ratagem]

Loki jerked away from the hand on his shoulder, even though it hadn’t lingered. “You’re always sure. But - and I can’t believe I have to keep reminding you of this - I’m not you, the universe doesn’t fall at my feet just because I exist. I don’t want to spend however-long being a freakish blue failure for an audience who thinks it’s great fun.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor blinks.

"The universe doesn't fall at my feet just because I exist," Thor argues, and he knows as soon as the words leave his mouth that he should just stop and let it sit there, but he doesn't. "I don't think you're a freakish blue failure, either. If you don't want to do it in front of me, then just say so."

[st_ratagem]

“I meant that nothing’s ever difficult for you. Failure isn’t a thing for you, so it can’t possibly be a thing for anyone else. If something’s difficult for me or I fail, it’s just me being ridiculous because of course it’s not actually difficult.” Loki clenched his bandaged hand again, but the sting wasn’t enough to smooth anything out. “If I have to fail, and I always do, I prefer to do it without being an object of fun, so yes: I would rather not do it in front of you.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor starts to open his mouth to protest again, but shuts it before he can say something else. They'd already barely avoided one of those I'm not talking to you for a few days fights today already. He doesn't want to have another.

"Okay," he says instead. "Just tell me when you're ready to show me."

[st_ratagem]

“I wish it was as easy as you think it should be,” Loki offered after a moment. “I think I’d mind the whole Jotunn thing less if I could manage some bare minimum of competence. I know you don’t understand. It’s a series of problems you don’t have.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"Most things generally aren't easy." Thor was willing to concede that most things requiring sheer willpower or brute force came way more easily to him than most people, but learning how to use his powers to their full potential after Hela broke Mjolnir, well...

That had proven difficult. More quickly resolved than it might have been for other people, but still difficult.

"I have lost before, you know," he says. "You just haven't been around to ever see it."