planning stages!

[st_ratagem]

Loki had decided to solve a problem. It wasn't an active problem yet, but with Thor and Valkyrie both in residence, it was entirely possible that at some point alcohol would end up in short supply. Thor alone had managed to drink most of the alcohol in the Inn, and Loki thought that Valkyrie's tolerance was probably somewhat higher. That being the case, it seemed like a good long-term idea to start making booze. Specifically, Asgardian spirits strong enough to ensure that the king and his lieutenant had more efficient options than 'drink two whole bars'.

The only problem was that Loki didn't exactly know how the brewing and distillation process had worked. He'd never paid much attention to distilleries back home. Stills themselves were simple enough, according to a few books he'd collected from the library, but how the versions on Asgard differed... was it a matter of material? Ingredients? Something else?

It was almost certainly an area where Thor knew more than he did, so Loki sent a message inviting his brother to come up and help with a project. He made no particular effort to sound like he wasn't up to something, because it would be fun to see what conclusions Thor jumped to regarding the invitation.

Comments

[st_ratagem]

“Almost that entire year is a mess.” And it was annoying. Loki was used to knowing exactly what he was about, even if it was just a random whim, but so much of his time with Thanos and the finale on Earth was an incoherent mess now. One he still owned, of course, but.... “A sentence of solitary confinement for eternity at least meant an eternity to tidy up a bit.” Nothing else about it was good, but he’d felt nearly like himself by the time Thor needed a favor and let him out.

[st_ormbreaker]

"Why?"

Thor remembered Loki having a good memory -- far better than his, and Thor wasn't one prone to forgetting, either.

"Was it the fall?"

It seemed like the most natural conclusion.

[st_ratagem]

“I don’t know, but I doubt it. I remember all that clearly enough.” Loki frowned, then forced a close approximation of an uncaring shrug. Thanos had been literal torture in many ways, and certainly he didn’t care to remember most of it, but the haze hadn’t started until later than a lot of that. “It doesn’t matter, I think. I’m willing to answer for my words if I can get a reminder of which ones.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor's frown deepens.

"You told me you remembered me tossing you into an abyss."

[st_ratagem]

“A lie.” Asked and answered, but Loki said it anyway. “And not a very good one, since I don’t imagine it mattered how I came to fall.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor's eyes are trained on Loki's face.

"It sounded like you believed it when you said it."

[st_ratagem]

Loki shook his head. "I don't now, I didn't before that." He didn't, in fact, remember saying specifically that, but... he'd been angry enough, ready to say anything he thought might hurt Thor. An obvious lie about facts Thor knew was an odd choice, but.... "Lies only work if they're committed to. You didn't have hold of me. I let go."

[st_ormbreaker]

"It's not the account I'm disputing." Thor knew what had happened. He couldn't forget it if he wanted to.

[st_ratagem]

"Then I'm not sure what you are asking." After a moment of thought, Loki offered, "The mess might be a side effect of the scepter. Magic has a price as I've mentioned, and it was a significant boost."

[st_ormbreaker]

"So you said things you didn't remember saying."

[st_ratagem]

“Broadly, yes.” That might not have been the limit of the effects, but at this point sorting things out would be akin to putting together a jigsaw with no edges and no reference image: not really worth it to Loki.

[st_ormbreaker]

The idea is unsettling. If the Mind Stone had influenced Loki the way it had influenced them, then...

Thor temporarily pushes the thought aside as he wraps an arm around Loki and pulls him closer towards him.

"So long as you know it now," he says, and he claps his hand on Loki's shoulder a few times for good measure.

[st_ratagem]

“Yes, yes.” The side-hug and shoulder thumps were all Thor, though either the man had gotten better at judging force or Loki had gotten better at taking it. He didn’t care which. “You wouldn’t help me with that no matter how much I goad you, I know.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"You're right," he says. That he's utterly confident of. There were plenty of times where Loki was utterly infuriating, but nothing Loki had done would ever be enough for him to cast him into an abyss. "If I thought there was even the slightest possibility you were still alive, I would have gone to find you."

Thor believed he was dead, and Odin, pragmatic as he was, gave him no reason to believe his brother may have survived it.

[st_ratagem]

“Why do you count that as me faking my death?” Loki couldn’t resist the question, even though he probably should have. “I assure you I intended to die. That I didn’t wasn’t exactly my choice.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"I thought you were dead," Thor says, looking down at the books splayed out in front of them. He touches his hand to one of their covers and picks it up. "You didn't give me any reason to think that you weren't. Not until you attacked Midgard."

Explaining it now, it doesn't feel like it really makes much sense. Thor turns around the book in his hands.

"It was like you wanted me to believe you dead until you didn't."

[st_ratagem]

"I honestly didn't think it would matter much to you either way, beyond the initial shock." They'd already had this part of the conversation, at least, and Thor knew that Loki understood how wrong that assumption had been. And still was. "An initial shock, and then your friends would remind you how unnecessary and awful I was and all would be well for you."

[st_ormbreaker]

"There was no one in the universe that I loved more than you, Loki," he says, looking up from the book. "There still isn't. Your death off the edge of the Bifrost mattered as much to me then as your death on The Statesman matters to me now."

[st_ratagem]

"Yes. Well." Loki shrugged. "You'll have to forgive my lack of realization until recently. You did spend a significant amount of time exposing me to your friends' torments and laughing about them. Or mocking me yourself, though I'll admit that's different."

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor says nothing to that. He didn't think it was exposing his brother to torments at the time, but now...

He could definitely see where Loki was coming from.

"Did you really think I didn't love you?"

[st_ratagem]

"I thought I was... scenery, more or less. Part of the chorus, maybe: one more follower to show off the glory that was Thor, and thoroughly unimportant otherwise." Loki spoke slowly, weighing words before he actually let them out. It was difficult to describe this. "You loved playing 'big brother' and the respect and affection it got you from your audience - such a good brother to such a poisonous creature and so on. You loved your role, which translated at least to loving my presence in a way, but I didn't really exist to you. Without me, you'd just have to get respect and affection some other way, which would take, oh, six seconds at most."

[st_ormbreaker]

"I am your big brother and I like being it," Thor says, his brows furrowed. "There was never any playing at it."

[st_ratagem]

Loki waved a hand. “You asked if I thought you didn’t love me, the answer is both yes and no. I believed you thought you loved me, at the very least. I also knew you were only interested in things that were about you or when you were in charge. I loved you enough to be a bit player in your life, but in my life I was on my own. The mighty Thor was no one’s supporting cast, so to speak.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"Do you still feel like that now?" Thor asks quietly.

[st_ratagem]

“Yes and no. I grant your sincerity of feeling, but I also find that the mighty Thor isn’t one for supporting cast.” Loki smiled slightly. “It’s no trouble here, this need of yours to be in charge of everything. Virtually nothing here is important enough that I mind letting go, and when I do mind I dig in and you eventually get angry enough to drop it. You don’t outnumber me as substantially as you used to.” No Lady Sif, no Warriors Three, Stark and Rogers tended to stay out of the brothers’ spats, and Valkyrie... depending on the situation she might take Loki’s side. She was no blind supporter.