Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Prologue

Molly Hooper was fuming mad.

It was apparent who was responsible, as only one person in existence made her feel this kind of anger.
Said person had become high, fake proposed to someone, got shot, underwent another heart failure, all for one case—and now to top it all off, he was a murderer AND another previously-thought-to-be-dead-too mass murderer slash psychopath was supposedly on the loose again.
So needless to say she couldn't wait to get home. and pester Lo-Tom, maybe even adventure somewhere. Anything, anywhere really, she wasn't picky, because it would distract her and what she needed was a huge distraction.
Oh wait she was no longer engaged to 'Tom'. Not that it mattered, they are still good friends after all, so the option remains.
Molly Hooper would be going on adventure.

Chapter Text

-London, 3 years earlier-

After the whole aether, & Nine realm fiasco, Thor chose to remain on earth with Jane.
Loki ruled under an alias; meanwhile he kept Odin protected in his deep Odinsleep.
His brother had gone to America-no doubt to join up with the precious Avengers, as well as to be with Jane.
Since his brother had gone to America, he had to find a different country. He rather liked England, nice and dreary with a stiff elegant attitude, but also an older charming, and charismatic culture. He liked it. so he chose to explore it.

Of course there were a few who actually remembered the whole New York incident- which is why he did what he's good at—taking disguises.
He became a bit skinnier, with short curly brown hair. changing some features too. This appearance seemingly was significantly a lot duller-which generally meant he even had to act a lot dumber.

He had been strolling down a footpath when he saw a young woman struggling with her bags. She looked like the epitome of innocence, but yet had some kind of incredible strength within her. Remembering that he was now a banal decent human being right now so he should try to help, he offered his assistance to help her carry them home by taking almost all of them from her-taking some perverse pleasure in ignoring her protests—which to be honest, just really amused him.
He could have already figured her all out, but in this mortal form, he decided to do it their way. So he complimented her, began asking questions about her, until he saw her stiffen and a wary look crossed her eyes.

Now this was interesting—this told him many things—she had a bad experience with a man, or perhaps men, or both, who were either inquisitive or just found out a lot about her. they may have used or even abused her, and probably bore some kind of resemblance to him. immediately he apologized to her for prying and begged for her forgiveness, he didn't realize.
That stopped her again, “realize what?” By Frigga, he was really out of it today wasn't he, so much for the silver tongue
“Are you sure you want to know?”
“knowing, would have spared me all sorts of heartbreak in the past , so yes.” she remarked, somewhat shortly
And so he regaled her with explanations of himself; his nature- to be as observant as he can. To make deductions. He saw her subtly startle at the words 'observe' or 'deductions' in particular, this further peaked his interest. He proceeded to tell her how he realized she must have has bad experiences with inquisitive or knowledge empowered men; how she only stiffened up and grew wary once she had gone over or come to some sort of a realization about what she was doing, and reminded herself what must have happened last time. Then there was her other physical reaction; she had brightened up and then stiffened and then somewhat relaxed in consecutive split seconds when she saw him approach-so he resembled either a good friend or someone she fancied in the past, but then remembered what they put her through, and then realized that he wasn't them.
While she was impressed, it really didn't help strengthen any resolve of hers to trust him, and she told him as much, to which he laughed and nodded, and simply said in a more subdued and grave tone of voice, “trust your instincts.”

They remained silent for the rest of walk until they reached her residence.
“So, my instincts are saying to invite you in for tea, so come on, in you get,” she declared, somewhat forcefully.
Surprised, and curious about this very complex creature before him; here was a woman who had suffered at the antics of those- who he sort of reminded her of, and yet here she was inviting him in. Were humans just naturally masochistic?
“are you quite sure about this?”
“would it help make you feel better if I said that I can kick you out if need be?” she responded humorously, but also somewhat sarcastically
“should such a regrettable moment ever come, I promise I shall respect your decision and show myself out” he said, hoping to reassure her he wouldn't try anything, but also to try to gauge her reactions to get a fuller scale.
“well then, nothing to fear then eh?” she shot back cheerily, and then fully entered, leading him in.

After boiling a kettle and sitting down for tea, the real questions started coming.
Well, for him.
She asked where he was from. And who he was.
Before they had started, he told her he will try to answer anything she asks as truthfully as possible, which could mean he may become vague since his story tends to seem a bit far fetched.

So this question...

“Well, I can assure you, I'm not from around here.” he began. She arched an eyebrow and gave him a sarcastic stare as if to say 'no kidding'
“I'm quite far from home actually,” he said thoughtfully, pondering as to how he should broach the topic. “how much are you into astronomy?” he finally settled on asking.
“I'm pretty well versed in it” she replied, 
“do you believe in more dimensions, galaxies, realms? whatever you wish to call them? do you believe there could be more life out there?” 
“Oh yes,” she said, features lighting up “yes! most definitely”
“okay, we'll come back to that later but for now, well, short version, I am a wanted criminal and the only way to get a new start was to fake my death.”
“Oh! you too?” she giggled
“I'm sorry?” he was confused,
“you faked your death as well!” she exclaimed, excitedly,

He just told her he was a wanted criminal, and not only does she focus mainly on the 'undead' part, but indicate it's happened before? 
Seeming to read the confusion on his face, she explained, “you said short version-which means there's a whole lot more behind the fact that you are a wanted criminal, so I can't judge you for that just yet, and second,you're probably the third person I've met who hasn't properly died. I helped the last one fake his, god knows what he's up to now.”
He stared at her in slight awe. There was so much more behind her appearance of merely a small, fragile, youthful, and innocent looking woman.
Most would already harbor resentment once they heard that he was a wanted criminal, yet she had barely blinked an eye.
He was feeling uneasy and unsettled. He needed to regain control. Fast.

“You love him.” he stated, startling her out of her reverie. “this person you helped to kill, is he the same one who caused you pain, and resembles me?”
“He's married to his work. But yes.” she defended.
“That doesn't change facts,” He persisted. Why was he doing this? Oh yes,
“Its a pain isn't it. To love someone who you know would never look your way. and in fact, only will, when they need something.”
He sighed. “yes. yes it is. But how could you tell?”
“You had the same look when you said the word love.”
“She loves my brother, who in turn loves another. Not to mention she had threatened to kill me on numerous occasions, and would do so with no hesitation. It would never work out.” he thought ruefully. Why was he telling all this to some stupid mortal? He was getting furious with his silver tongue.
“Well, you're here now, aren't you?” She asked, shaking him out of his thoughts.
“I'm sorry? Yes, I don't follow” he frowned
“You said you're here for a second chance. Make the best of it, become a man who would earn her love and respect. Unless of course she just has bad taste.”

He looked at her questioningly
“You can't have love without respect,” she shrugged. “that's kind of how it happened for me, in the first place, but I also have bad taste so who knows”
“Not to be vain, but from what I gather, he resembles me, so how could that be bad taste?” he smirked
“oh no, not as far as looks go, great taste, however I just seem to gravitate towards sociopaths. And occasionally psychopaths”
“Ah, well, I really wish I could say you're wrong, or not all, but I'm afraid I'm in no position to speak.” there was no point denying it. She could already read him so well, what was left to lose?

She looked at him. Understanding suddenly dawned on her. “Oh. OH. Not you too!” she almost pleaded and half begged. “why does this always happen to me?!!” and she buried her face into the crook of her elbow face down on the table.
After a few seconds of drama she snapped back up suddenly, “Anyway, back to the point”.
He nodded. “I do respect her very much. She has done great things to prove the strength and magnificence of the female gender.” he smiled at her. “as have you”
She blushed “me? what have I done?”
“So much. You can't begin to even comprehend how much.” it was true, she had surprised him so many times in just one conversation.
“if you say so” she smiled. “then glad I could help”. She grinned, her whole face alighting.

And then a thought came to her, and she started laughing so hard .
He, yet again, remained perplexed and looked on.
Once she had calmed down, she explained “here we have been, talking for what, an hour , I invite you into my house, we're drinking tea and we still don't know each others names?”
He started chuckling at that too, which then led to full blown out laughter. Something which neither had done in a very long time .
“I'm Molly” she said holding out her hand. “Molly Hooper.”
“Really now Molly, you introduce yourself first to a potentially extremely dangerous man who's a wanted criminal?”
“You said trust your instincts.” she shrugged “so I am.”
“I don't know what I should tell you. Should I give you a harmless name to call this face, then I suppose it would be fine for you. But then if I give you my real name I may never be allowed back in here.”
“Is it really that bad?”
“Quite. Did you ever hear about new York?”
“Oh you mean the messy business with the Avengers?”
“yes”
“Of course, we scientists had a field day.” of course they would
“What did you think about the perpetrator?" he needed to know now. He desperately wanted to know what she thought of him.
“He clearly had family issues. He clearly wanted to prove himself, whether to his family or just to himself. Frankly, we still don't even know if it was really him! I mean he had a mind changing staff thingy but who's to say something similar hadn't already been done to him? Or wherever he got it from-how do we knew they didn't do something worst to him? He clearly--ohhh”
“What is it?” he asked getting even more panicky
“sorry, nothing, just coming to my own realizations here. I'll let you know in a moment if they are pertinent.
Anyway, i feel bad for Loki, son of Odin, brother of Thor, son of Frigga, that's a lot to live up to. If I had to contend with favoritism every day, I'd probably go insane or do something drastic too. But don't worry, I'm jot judging you, as long as your reasons weren't as psychotic as the last criminal mastermind who's mess I had to deal with, I'll leave you in peace.”
Her words stunned him.
A mortal.
How.
this usually works
“performance issues? not uncommon you know.” she smirked at him
oh. he said that out loud?
“no, but I can hear it in here” she said, tapping the side of her head.
WHAT
“ow, hey no need to shout, or I'll kick you out remember? you promised,”
"but I don't understand," he said, "I was in disguise,"
“yea, to others I guess, but once I started talking to you I noticed, especially after we passed all the reflective surfaces and your appearance was always different in them. It took a while, but it finally sort of dissolved”
"you are an extraordinary human being Molly Hooper. it is my honour to have met you."
“the pleasure is all mine, Loki, god of mischief” she winked.
"really, I do not understand how you don't already have a lover"
“I could say the same about you”
he gave her a pointed stare as if to ask 'seriously?'
“okay maybe being the baddie in a huge intergalactic war isn't exactly a huge turn on, but several girls do have a thing for bad boys!” he rolled his eyes
“you already know I have a strange taste in smart, handsome sociopaths or psychopaths both who end up doing me some sort of harm. So how are things in Asgard? I mean after that whole evil plan to destroy the universe thing”
“you know about that?” he asked surprised, “No, actually I just guessed from observations, it didn't exactly look like friendly stuff, and unlike your little stint, no one was gloating about supremacy or sovereignty so I assumed they just wanted mass destruction”.
“very good,” he was once again genuinely impressed. She was rather smart. “There is a dark anti matter which possessed Jane Foster, and she was burning up, when Malakith extracted from her and reabsorbed it into himself, he began channeling to go through all nine realms, because they were in alignment so the effects would be amplified, and this would effectively destroy them all. Thor was able to stop him while I usurped the throne, so that been dealt with.”
“you usurped the throne and no one noticed?”she asked incredulously
“well first of all I'm supposed to be dead, second, I pretended to be Odin”
“is he dead?” she asked, a bit concerned
“of course not, I'm not stupid”
“just checking”
“so is the real him ruling right now? Since you're here?”
“no but its mirror image of him, like a hologram”
“cool! well I'm sure you're doing a good job”.
“how can you he so sure?”
“because I haven’t kicked you out yet.”
“ah...okay.”
“so about this lady lover enemy of yours?”
“Lady Sif.”
“what's she like?”
“Nothing like me. She's a strong warrior, with the bravest, purest, and the most loyal heart I know amongst the Asgardians”
“And she loves Thor.”
“yes”
“but Thor loves Jane”
“correct.”
“well I don't know what you're like but I guess we could figure it out.”
“eventually.”
“yea, well you guys are gods, so you have enough time to work it out.”
“give or take 5000 years”
“really?”
“yes. anyway what about the subject of your fancy?”
“oh” she blushed. “he's brilliant. he's the smartest man I have ever met, but he's married to his work and he's so rude but confident, and he's tall and has this dark hair and...... eyes...and he has this voice- he's a lot more like you come to think of it....”
“and I suspect he faked his death”
“yea, he's off somewhere taking down a criminal network.”
“perhaps I could help him?”
“I don't see how but you're certainly welcome to try.”
“Well, if I can help this realm in any way after the havoc I caused, it would help my conscience greatly 
“the name is Moriarty”
“who?”
“he's off fighting Moriarty's network, and his name is Sherlock Holmes.”
“thank you Molly Hooper, you can expect me again, another day,”
“be careful though, sometimes Sherlock drops by when he needs something”
“I will bear that in mind. Now I believe I have things to get back to back in Asgard, think of a suitable name for me in the meantime, you can't go around calling myself Loki, people would talk”
“people do little else” she smiled 
“that is true.  goodbye Molly Hooper” he said bowing
“and good bye lord Loki she curtseyed “
“oh now, saying such things to a power hungry god? you are devious”
And she giggled and walked him out goodbye
"Farewell" and he gracefully strolled away.