Chapter Text
2017—1 week after Ragnarok
Loki didn’t do friends.
He tried to chase away his first friend 6 years ago, when he first betrayed Thor and almost got him killed.
Oh right, he destroyed and murdered a lot of things too.
And even if he’s now mostly reformed, and maybe wants to make friends, the entirety of Asgard (and Midgard, he supposed) will probably never stop being wary of him.
After all, immortal beings can hold long grudges.
Loki let the thought stew in his mind as he walked through the main corridor to the deck of the spaceship, which thankfully, looks empty. He isn’t oblivious to the glares, although subtle, the other Asgardians sends his way as he passes by.
This is fine. He’s Loki, the god of mischief, the bad guy in every myth, and a destined loner.
He doesn’t need friends. He isn’t meant to have any. Thor’s the only exception. And he’d already chased him away one time.
But Loki feels his heart weirdly sink at the conclusion, and his hands gripped the handrail tighter, stopping at the deck’s entrance.
For some unknown reason, after finally breaking the shaky bond he had with his family, the only real bond he had with other people, what he was sure was his source of constant pain, he felt a hole form deep inside his soul, growing bigger with every decision to veer closer to the point of no return.
Still, after everything he’s done, Thor always welcomes him back with slightly open arms.
Loki shakes his head.
That thought trip is way too deep for his liking. Loki took a deep breath, and was about to enter the deck to get a view of the stars to clear his head before his loudmouth of a brother came in, when he hears the telltale swish of a cape behind him, and immediately twisted into a backflip, dagger materialising in his hand, already pointing at the direction of his attacker as he lands behind them, only to dematerialise it right after when he saw shaved off blond hair and an eyepatch that reminds him uncomfortably of Odin.
Speak of the devil. ‘Brother.‘
Thor turns around and grins in that loud way of his, hand putting down his axe that was surely being aimed at Loki’s chest just a moment earlier.
‘What, no stabbing this time, brother?’
‘Sorry, not in the mood for it,’ Loki finds himself answering honestly, ‘Perhaps I will return the favour when you’re making one of your famous speeches, no?’
Thor laughed loudly. ‘There’s no need for that. Walk with me, won’t you?’
Loki scoffs and drawls out, ‘As you wish, my king.’ The insult was half hearted, and he’s going to follow Thor anyway. He just can’t resist the opportunity. Bad habits, he supposes.
They walk for quite a while in silence, weaving through countless narrow corridors, the only sound being Thor greeting the occasional group of Asgardians.
Honestly, Loki was kind of impressed that Thor hasn’t tried to start a conversation yet.
‘So…’
He spoke too fast.
Loki meets Thor’s gaze and sighed for the second time today, a total of two times more than he usually did. ‘Yes, my king?’
Thor finally frowned. ‘Stop that.’
‘Then tell me, what is it that you want from me?’
Thor’s blue eye twinkle at the question, frown disappearing immediately.
Oh no.
‘It’s been a long time since we are on such amicable terms, brother. Don’t you think it’s long overdue for a spar?’
Thor turns to face Loki completely, revealing the room behind him to be a room Thor converted into his personal training room, equipped with an Thor-made obstacle course and reinforced with state of the art made from the same material as his axe, therefore mostly damage-proof. Because of course, who even is Thor without a space to really move and fight something?
Thor smiles again, this time sickly sweet, and put out his puppy dog eyes, well, eye that charmed dozens of stuck up upper class Asgardians back when they were children.
‘Come on brother. I’m bored! Just one little spar?’
Loki isn’t buying it. ‘Can’t you find other people to beat up. Like, say, that stray Valkyrie you found?’
‘That stray Valkyrie has a name and is your elder, you know? Show some respect.’ Said Valkyrie replies as she comes out of the training room from some hidden corner, startling Loki.
Loki sneers, he’s not about to be belittled by some—
‘Besides, I’m tired of always winning. Time to see Thor’s stupid ass get beaten by the better brother.’
His withering insult is immediately forgotten on his tongue. Someone insulting Thor and saying he’s the better brother? Loki feels a deliciously horrifying fire of kinship licking his stomach.
Loki meets Valkyrie’s teasing gaze. An unknown understanding passes between them, and he is finding it harder to resist the temptation of proving the Valkyrie right.
Sandwiched between the two of them, Thor’s eye bounces from one to another, sweat brewing on his brow, probably coming to the conclusion that putting his greatest haters together probably isn’t the best idea.
Thor is the one to break first, frozen smile wavering as he said, ‘You know what? I don’t—‘
Loki couldn’t anymore.
‘No no, brother, I accept. But of course, even if I truly am the better brother, your tremendous yet undeserved power can only be combatted by,‘
Valkyrie breaks their eye contact.
‘This legendary team up.’ She finishes, smug smile forming on her lips.
Loki also surprisingly has to hold back his own smile, and deliberately flattened his lips and tilted his chin up, turning Thor’s previous challenge back to sender.
Thor, the combat lover he is, fell into the temptation of a good adrenaline pumping spar, glaring playfully back at Loki before also tilting his head back and hitting his own chest with a fist.
‘It’s on, brother.’
And spar they did.
In the next few hours, every single inch of the training room is either hit by one of Loki’s knifes or one of Valkyrie and Thor’s superhuman punches.
Loki supposed that should be expected, with three gods fighting it out in one tiny room. However, the most unexpected thing is that, well, Loki’s actually having fun.
He and Valkyrie are a great match, her brute strength complimenting Loki’s more evasive style of fighting. She and Loki even cooperated seamlessly, bonded by their mutual dislike of Thor, and took turns distracting Thor while the other prepped a sneak attack, making them ten times more unpredictable than if it were him fighting alone.
‘Loki, stop hiding and help me with this giant oaf!’
‘Well, I’m trying to find a time to slip in! Plus, I wasn’t the one hiding in the middle of nowhere for hundreds of years!’
‘Yeah? Well, I’m not hiding anymore, yet I still can’t see your sorry ass! Aren’t you supposed to be the better brother?’
And Odin, they even have something strikingly similar to the banter Thor’s merry band of gods used to have.
Honestly, this might be the best time Loki’s had in a thousand years. Not that he will admit it.
Sadly, as Loki learnt, all good things had to end, when the three of them slumped to the ground in bone deep exhaustion five hours later, fully spent and ready to crawl to dinner.
He gazed at the other two tiredly chatting at his small, increasingly miserable corner. It really is a shame. He kind of likes Valkyrie. Now she’ll never acknowledge him again. She was probably put up to this by Thor anyway.
As Loki collects himself in an attempt to at least appear dignified at dinner with a sudden weird, heavy feeling in his chest, a pair of slender and strong legs stepped into his vision, and a tanned hand is shoved in his face.
Loki takes it and is promptly pulled up, and is met face to face with Valkyrie.
He must’ve looked upset, as Valkyrie raises a dark eyebrow, but doesn’t comment on his admittedly confusing sour mood.
She then thrusts another hand in his face.
‘I don’t think we’re properly introduced. Hey, my name’s Brunnhilde, but I prefer Valkyrie.’
‘I know. We’ve met back on Nowhere.’
The Valkyrie raises another eyebrow at his grumpy attitude.
‘Well, was just being polite. Thought you’d appreciate that.’
Loki doesn’t bother to dignify that with a response. What is she getting at?
Valkyrie sighed. ‘Thor didn’t put me up to this. Personally, I think you’re pretty cool to hang with after reforming or whatever. So, S’ tomorrow ok?’
It’s Loki’s turn to raise his eyebrows. How did she read him like that? ‘What?’
Valkyrie sighs again. ‘Do you want to hang out or not?’
No one’s ever liked him more than Thor. Loki, for the first time in his life, scrambles to answer.
‘I, of course, sure.’
Valkyrie kept her word and found Loki the next day. And next week. And the week after. And so on and so forth.
Over the course of two months, they established a routine of meeting up once a week at the three bars on the spaceship, sharing Thor’s stupid moments and drinking away their problems, or, as Valkyrie put it, “bitching bout’ their shitty lives”.
Between the bar visits, he starts to help Thor with his kingly duties, and slowly but surely, didn’t feel so bad about it. Even if he had to suffer through Thor constantly implying that Loki and Valkyrie are the “F” word. They’re the only members of the Thor Hate Club, it doesn’t go much deeper.
She just wants someone to hate Thor with her, nothing else. No one except Thor wants that with Loki.
Still, the company was kind of nice, finally giving Loki someone besides Thor The Loudmouth to talk to. Really, it’s amazing how no one had died of embarrassment talking to him, with how he basically shouts out the conversations he’s having for everyone to hear.
Like now, where he’s sitting in Bar 3 and complaining about Thor with Valkyrie, finishing his second glass of wine while he watches her down her fifth glass of rum.
‘Seriously, he can’t be this brainless! At this rate, the rock pile might even be smarter than him!’ Loki gestures wildly. Oh, the wine’s definitely getting to him.
Brunnhilde drunkenly slaps his shoulder. ‘Come on, Krog’s not so bad,’ she slurred out.
Loki grunted in response and mumbled, ‘Thor’s lucky the people like so much.’
Right after his mumble, Valkyrie suddenly sobers up and sit straight, eyes narrowing at him as she asked, ’Why did you dislike him that much?’
Loki tries to plop face down on the table and pretend that he is absolutely wasted and very much not able to spout anything other than gibberish.
Unfortunately, the weeks of camaraderie has only improved upon Valkyrie’s ability to read him as she holds his head by his collar, an unimpressed look on her face. And fine, the isn’t exactly the brightest idea to avoid confrontation. Loki blames the wine.
Valkyrie’s eyes softens just a bit and she starts to prod his head with her finger.
‘Hey, I bitched about my regrets with the Valkyries with you last month, no? It’s ok if you don’t want to talk about it, but I promise, it feels so much better when talk about it with a friend. Gets the pressure off one’s chest, you know?’
Loki raises his head so fast that he gives himself a headache. He must’ve heard that wrong, but between the desperation crawling his throat and the hopeful pang of his heart, he asked anyway.
‘We’re friends?’
Loki winces at the break in his voice, cheeks burning both in embarrassment and the extra glass of wine he downed.
It’s over. Valkyrie is going to reject him publicly, loudly in front of the entire bar. He will have to live with the mistake for eternity. After all, no one wants to be friends with—
‘Loki, of course we’re friends.’
And just like that, Loki breaks. Glassy eyes finally gives way to tears and suddenly, he found himself spilling the story of his life, of how he was lied to by his so called parents, how he regretted letting them die, how he never meant to hurt so many people, how he only ever wanted to be seen as great and as important as Thor and spiralled down because of that.
And Valkyrie sits next to him the whole time, wiping his tears and patting his back when he gets too choked up to continue, never once having a negative comment to his actions.
On that Thursday midnight in bar 3, Loki has never felt closer to a feather, floating unburdened under the infinite starry sky.
The next morning, when Loki is having a meeting with Thor, handling the complaints of cannibalism the crustaceans have towards a new seafood restaurant, all while nursing a stupidly huge hangover, Valkyrie waltz into the deck, holding a paper box that wafted a heavenly delicious smell of bacon.
‘Here, for your hangover.’
Without warning, she tosses the box towards him, causing him to fumble the surprisingly hot box and almost dropping the contents.
When Loki gets hold of the box at last, he opened to find the age old hangover meal of bacon and eggs, and a small cup of water to wash it all down. Maybe because of last night or his hangover, for once, Loki stopped resisting, letting his lips turn upwards to an almost smile at Valkyrie’s direction.
‘Thank you.’
Valkyrie nodded back. She doesn’t say anything about last night.
And as always, Thor ruins the moment.
‘Hey, what about me, Val?!’
This time, Valkyrie turns to Thor, a tilted smile of mirth forming on her lips, eyes sparking with an unspoken challenge as she shoots back, ‘Order a servant to do that, my king.’
While Thor sputtered indignantly at the answer, Valkyrie left as fast as she came, leaving a wink at the both of them, and the hole in Loki’s soul shrunk just a little.
When Loki tries to continue working, he felt Thor’s stare burning the back of his head.
‘So…’
Sure enough, the short-found peace is broken again.
Loki sighs again. He seems to sigh a lot when facing Thor these days.
‘Yes, brother?’
‘Are you guys friends now?’
When Loki turns towards him without answering, Thor cringed, probably thinking that he said the wrong thing.
‘Sorry, sorry, I shouldn’t have probed. I—‘
But the thing is, Loki liked to mess with Thor, including seeing him in unneeded distress. And seeing Thor’s face at the moment, Loki cackles out loud before collecting himself and smiled, chest somehow, against all odds, filled with bright, beautiful hope for the future.
‘Yeah. I think, I finally have another friend.’