Loki sat up in bed with a jolt, squeezing the life out of his mattress. His right hand automatically moved to where his dagger usually hung, at his side, but it wasn't there. It took him a few moments to come to his senses, and he had to blink several times before his eyes adjusted to the dark. He could see the silhouette of his dagger, still pinned onto Sherlock's bedside table, and Sherlock himself, sitting up straight in his own bed across the room in what seemed like a meditating position.
"Nightmare?" Sherlock guessed without opening his eyes.
Loki nodded slowly. Slowly the memories came back to him in a haze — this random world, the stranger at his cell, and Sherlock. He remembered Sif ordering him to put on a green shirt and black pants which was apparently his 'pyjamas'. He really didn't see why he couldn't just sleep in his leather armour. He'd feel a lot safer, and probably sleep better. Chances were he wouldn't have any pesky nightmares either.
"Yes."
"If you want to talk about it, go ahead," Sherlock advised, "I probably won't hear a word you say, but Mycroft might."
Loki glanced sideways at the empty bed.
"Minecraft isn't here."
"Oh, but he's watching us all right. He probably has MI6 stuff planted all over this room."
At that moment a static crackle interrupted their conversation, and Sherlock grinned.
"Told you."
Loki sighed.
"I guess we'll have to do this the hard way."
-
"What just happened?" Mycroft demanded when Loki and Sherlock seemed to disappear into thin air.
"No idea, sir," one of the other relatively young assistants, Miss Smallwood, replied.
Mycroft stared at the screen in semi confusion. How could two boys just... disappear? Into thin air? Was is green-screening? Some optical illusion? A pre-recorded video that was hacking into their system?
"They've just..." she muttered, "it's like they turned invisible."
"Stick to the facts, Elizabeth," Mycroft ordered, "that's not possible."
"Nor is a giant green Gamma-radiation mutant," Miss Smallwood reasoned.
"The Hulk was a hoax, Elizabeth, nothing more," Mycroft claimed.
Miss Smallwood sighed.
"I suppose we'll have to report this?"
"Report this? And let those in charge know I've been using some of their equipment to keep an eye on my brothers? Hah, I'd rather die."
"You might die, if they find out," Elizabeth Smallwood pointed out, "after all, they can't exactly fire someone who knows so many British secrets already..."
"They won't fire me," Mycroft replied, sounding more confident than he felt.
"Just be careful," Miss Smallwood muttered under her breath, "I don't want to lose you."
Mycroft took one more look at the screen.
"Loki..." he muttered, "whatever trick this is, I know it's you."
He thought back to what he'd seen earlier that evening. He still didn't know how the boy (in his eyes, Loki was still no more than a boy) had done it, but there was no magic to it.
Magic is just science that hasn't been explained yet, right?
-
"What do you mean, 'the hard way?'" Sherlock enquired.
"Well, I can guarantee you that nobody can overhear us now," Loki replied.
"Whatever you say," Sherlock shrugged, "My concentration has already been interrupted, so I might as well listen, I suppose."
Sherlock changed his position slightly. He was wrapped in a white sheet, and for a moment Loki wondered where he'd gotten it from.
"...unless you don't want to talk about it," Sherlock went on, "in which case we'll leave Sif to her beauty sleep."
"She can't hear us," Loki replied, "nobody can. It's called an illusion, Sherlock. We can say whatever we want, but only the two of us can hear it. Or see each other, for that matter."
Sherlock raised an eyebrow.
"If you say so. Now, what did you nightmare about?"
Loki hesitated.
"Well, it started in Asgard. Where I live," he went on before Sherlock could interrupt, "I'm assuming you're from Midgard?"
"Midg... Earth, wasn't it?"
Loki nodded.
"Well there's Midgard, Asgard, and a few others. I'm from Asgard."
He hesitated, as if he knew that wasn't strictly true but didn't feel like elaborating, and Sherlock filed his hesitation away for later reference.
"Either way— my dream started in the dungeons, where I was in my cell."
"What were you imprisoned for?"
"It was a dream, how should I know?"
"But you've also been imprisoned there in real life," Sherlock pointed out, "probably for a considerable length of time, too, or otherwise multiple times."
Loki raised an eyebrow.
"Explain."
"It's simple actually," Sherlock smiled, clearly in his element, "you said my cell, whereas if it had simply been a figment of your imagination, or part of a dream, you wouldn't have used a possessive pronoun."
"What if I'd built it," Loki reasoned, "or it was built in my honour, or what if I've dreamt about it every night...?"
"All of those are considerably less likely," Sherlock shrugged, "and besides, your reaction was all the proof I needed. But do go on."
"I was in my cell," Loki continued, slightly more cautious with his choice of words, "when a figure walked up to it. The same as I saw before I came here — dark cloak, hood hiding his face, etcetera. All I could really recognise was his voice."
"Describe it."
Loki paused.
"Soft. Light. Playful, but in a 'I could end your life with the click of a button' kind of way."
He stopped again, and closed his eyes.
Sherlock waited patiently for him to continue.
"Something like this," Loki went on, and his next words were a near-perfect imitation of what he'd heard; "Even Sherlock's name is less weird than that."
Sherlock froze, all traces of a smile wiped off his face.
"Moriarty," he breathed.
"Mori-who?" Loki repeated in his own voice.
"Moriarty," Sherlock whispered, "my arch-enemy. There's only one person who says my name like that, and that's him."
"Shurl-lock," Loki repeated with a grin, and Sherlock rolled his eyes, but then they lapsed back into their serious attitudes.
"So in your dream he came to... Asgard," Sherlock mused, glancing at Loki to see if he was pronouncing it right, but Loki was already shaking his head.
"I don't think he came there. That part of the dream was an actual memory — the last I saw before coming here. And I remember him having distinctly two different voices. Somehow the intruder was using your Moriarty's voice."
"He's done it before," Sherlock whispered, and Loki raised an eyebrow in expectation.
"Moriarty has done the same before," Sherlock elaborated, "he used other people's voices so I wouldn't hear his own. It seems that whoever intruded here used that same technique. The question is — were they working together, or was either of them under force?"
"Does it really matter?" Loki enquired, "I'd rather we get out of here, and then we can track them down and get the truth out of them personally. I have a few... methods that haven't failed me before."
It was Sherlock's turn to raise an eyebrow.
"Don't you think we'll need to know how they did it before we can know how to undo it?"
"They probably used the Bifrost," Loki shrugged, "which doesn't make things easier, because Heimdall isn't responding, which means he's either in the plot or they've done something to him."
"Heimdall... is that why you were shouting at the sky earlier?"
Loki nodded.
Suddenly the door flung open, and in a haze of green Loki dropped the illusion that kept them invisible. Milliseconds later the light switched on, revealing Frigga Hudson standing in the doorway.
"Boys!" she scolded, "get to sleep! You have school tomorrow, you'll need a good night's rest."
She muttered something under her breath before switching the light off again, and Loki and Sherlock exchanged a look.
"I suppose she's right," Loki shrugged, "whatever this world is, I'll need all my energy to cope tomorrow."
Sherlock nodded as well, rearranging his sheets before throwing himself into a more comfortable position.
Loki opened his mouth to say something more, but Sherlock's even breathing stopped him. No point in waking him up if he'd already gone to sleep.
So he turned onto his side, and slept within moments.
-
As you may have noticed — I have developed a mild GIF obsession They are ideal for some things, it seems. Is it annoying? Because then I'll stop.
Thanks for reading!!! Keep up the voting and commenting, I love getting feedback, or even just people laughing at the jokes. It's really encouraging! If it's not too much trouble, please recommend my books to others. And feel free to let me know what you think! I don't get offended very easily, and sometimes criticism is for the best. ;-)
-Ev