Unbroken (Loki x Reader)

Chapter 11 - Confrontation

"He watched someone he loved age and die without him," you shoot back. "That's exactly what's going to happen here!"

"No, not quite," Frigga counters. "Bragi's mortal...they were connected in a way that's difficult to explain. Their severance was a crime against the very fibers that weave the tapestry of life. It was a violation of nature."

Doubt gnaws at your resolve. While you don't quite understand what Frigga means, it's clear that there's more behind Bragi's lost love than you know.

Maybe she's right.

Maybe Loki can survive watching you age and wither.

But can you?

"Even if you're right," you whisper, lip trembling. "I'm just a mortal. I...I don't think I can-," a sob cuts off your protest as Frigga stands and places a calming hand on your shoulder. You throw your head in your hands. Confused, angry, stricken by grief.

Frigga remains silent as she stands and paces before you.

"Odin may yet change his mind," Frigga says. "There is no reason to take such drastic action. I myself am puzzled at his recent behaviors."

Frigga trails off, lost in deep thought. A look of concern and suspicion on her face. But she doesn't elaborate.

"Has he ever changed his mind on anything?" you implore, causing her expression to shift from one of intrinsic conjecture and speculation to one of empathy.

"You may yet earn your immortality," Frigga offers.

"How?" you snap through tears. "How?" you ask again in Frigga's silence. "I'm already in Asgard! There aren't any big wars or battles where I can fight amongst Gods and achieve victory, Your Highness," you say, exasperated. "I mean, that's what it takes, doesn't it? Heroic valor? How am I supposed to achieve that already surrounded by gods?!"

Frigga regards you with empathy, her silence speaking volumes.

"I can't," you answer for her. "Not here. But if I leave, then...then maybe somewhere down there on earth I can try to, I don't know, earn my way back? A-and if I never do, then-."

"Then what?" Frigga interrupts gently. "You'll have walked away from a lifetime of love and happiness?"

"I'll have saved us both from a lot of pain," you say in little more than a whisper. "I know what it's like, Frigga. To know death is coming for you. And not be able to do anything but wait for it," you say, flashes of a dark cell and dripping water flashing through your mind.

Frigga shakes her head, placing her fingers lightly against her temple. "My dear, Loki would rather escort you to Midgard than lose you entirely. Of that I am quite certain," she finally says.

"No," you say back in certainty. "The King's terms were clear. If Loki leaves Asgard, he loses his magic. His immortality. I would be asking him to trade who he is for a death sentence in a realm he detests. I couldn't do that to him. I won't." you say defiantly.

Frigga smiles down at you, sadly shaking her head. "Odin thinks you unworthy of immortality. Yet here you are, ready to give up a life among the Gods to once more benefit my son."

"I love him, Frigga," you say, your eyes pleading with her. "You have to understand...it's like nothing I've ever felt before. It-it-it makes it hard to breathe when I'm with him," you stammer, desperately trying to explain. "Because every time he looks at me I feel like he steals the breath from my lungs. It makes it hard to think clearly, because my thoughts are always of him."

Frigga sits beside you, pulling out a delicate lace handkerchief and dabbing gently at the tears on your cheek.

"You're right," you say weakly. "Loki would survive losing me," you say weakly. "But I don't think I can...I'm not strong enough to watch him go through that pain. Not when I'm the one causing it. And there would be nothing I could do."