The Light To His Lies (Loki)

F O U R T E E N

As the crowd scurries away from Loki frantically, I stand in the center, holding my ground, looking at him in confusion. He has yet to notice me, somehow, and I decided to keep myself that way. Maybe I could figure out exactly what the hell he was doing. "Hello, Lady Cassidy? What was the name of the man with the Tesseract?" I say into the com. Her voice buzzes back into my ear. "I think it was Loki. Why?"

"Well, for starters, he's standing right in front of me." I say, turning and starting to walk with the crowd as Loki creates clones to herd us out. "I'll call the other agents immediately! Do not loose that target!" I hear in my ear. "Got bigger problems than that, my Lady." I reply, eyeing the stone in his scepter with wary eyes. The Mind Stone.

He herded, standing before Loki and his clones. His garb transforms into his Asgardian armor, his staff into his septor. He takes a moment to revel in his garb, eyeing the crowd before him, before he curls his lips and says, "Kneel," He orders, my heart stops dead in my chest. The sheer glee in his eyes at this moment haunted and I couldn't force a rational thought through my head. Nobody listens at first, as would be anyone's natural inclination, until he yells it again. "I said, KNEEL!" I jumped, not expecting that out of him. People start to kneel, and not wanting to stand out, I do the same. This is not my Loki, this is someone else entirely, this-this was a monster. I wanted to stand demand he explain himself, possibly drag him back to Asgard by the ear, no longer so keen on the idea of throwing my arms around him, but I remained with my head down so he did not notice me. I reframed from conjuring Dygö and watched with analytical eyes, bowing so my hair covers my face. He grins in success and starts walking amongst the crowd, watching everyone's expressions. His blue eyes seemed to glow in the dim lighting of the night, and it was impossible not to notice it. "Now, is this not easier? This is your natural state. You see, you yearn to be ruled, you crave subnagation. You were made," He pauses, a slight curl bringing up his top lip, before banging his septor on the ground, his lips curling in pure delight. "to kneel." He says.

An elderly man close to he center of the crowd stands up slowly, shaking a little as if it hurt him to do so, a daring gaze meeting Loki's. "Not to men like you." He says. Loki glares down at him, a snarl appearing where his menacing smile once was.

"There are no men like me." He barks, his smile fleeting.
"There are always men like you." The man replies, challenging him with his gaze. I smiled, not bad, mortal, I thought. I conjure my armor onto my body, Dygö materializes in my scabbard. "People, look to your elder! Let him be an example." Loki says slowly, before gradually holding his scepter forward, I leapt into action when a bright, orange beam launched at the elder. I dove in front of the man, shielding him with my body and holding my forearm in front of me, the blast hitting my armor as screams fill the air. My armor heats up and warms my skin underneath slightly, but I barely flinched at it. I shoved my grief and shock deep inside me and forced myself to delve inside my instincts and training. This was not Loki- and I couldn't see it as him. "Hello, love." I say, forcing myself to grin tauntingly. I look at him and rose to my feet slowly from my kneeling position, allowing him only two seconds to take in my presence"Did you miss me?" Loki stares at me in shock, too stunned to move. "Lyra," He mutters. My eyebrow twitched with aggravation. "Oh, don't you Lyra me-"

I charge at him, teleporting above him so I fall onto his shoulders, twisting my hips so he lands on the ground with me on top of him, my knees on each side of his body, I grab his throat, I forced myself to replace my emotions with training instinct, looking at Loki not like he was my lover although it pained me, and he grins. "Indeed I have." He dissipates, and my hand smacks into concrete as I begrudgingly realized that it was merely a clone. I stood up slowly, turning toward the real man who watched me with a calculating look. Steve lands next to me suddenly, I barely flinched, I saw him coming way before he actually came, in his Captain of America suit. "You know, the last time a man stood above everyone else, we ended up disagreeing." He says. The real Loki's lips curl. "The man out of time, how peculiar."