multiversallogs | [open] If thou wouldst drink of my life

Who: Loki and YOU???
What: So, Loki kills the guy who comes to release him from the room and he immediately gets branded and black bagged. Dragged back to The Spire, he's shoved in a sensory deprivation chamber of some sort for possibly a week or maybe two.
Where: The Arena; Griss Twist
When: Weeks after his arrival
Notes: Nothing yet.
Warnings: Possible violence / terribleness; who knows!

He did not know how long he had been there. A familiar feeling, truth be told, that after the panic and anger subsided and the bruised ego finally came to terms with itself, recovered, Loki had come to find a sense of peace there. In the darkness. Where nothing and nowhere enveloped you to it's breast and you say nothing, hear nothing, feet nothing, smell nothing, and taste nothing. Was he still alive? Was he still breathing, was he still here, was he still functioning?

He was nothing. This was going to be his home until death: nowhere. Not here, not there, everywhere and nowhere. Of no home; of no family; of no name but Loki.

Upon his release, terms read -- You have been branded as a violent criminal. To release the brand from your flesh you must work for it in bloodsport. -- his mind flitted to the question, 'what would happen to Thor if these mortals (or otherwise) are so strict' He had little care. He did not anticipate turning a new leaf, it was not in his nature, it benefited him none, and most importantly it was not exciting, expanding, or fun.

So here he was.

Something more at work here indeed. Those men who came for him, scarred him with something so searing hot he couldn't breathe and put him in this blackness were a power beyond what he'd known and he knew to fear. Though he'd meet it snake-grinning and proud-chested, he knew to fear. Loki was beyond that, now. Beyond the aching pain of sight again, the pasting need for hydration, the agonizing hunger, the ringing of his ears to once again hear. From nothing to everything. All at once it surrounds him. Footsteps, chatter, bells ringing, doors slamming, food cooking, dogs barking -- and the stigma one would expect.

Made him smirk. Monster. A criminal. Yes, he was, wasn't he? The thing that people feared.

He looked unwell; but his dress was clean and unique compared to the others about, alien, and something that stood out clear from those surrounding him. He cared none, basked in the difference if anything because he was different, and moved forward. Curiosity managed to grab his attention at the 'blood money' he was to pay -- this gladiator fighting, and this was where he would be. At the top edge of that Colosseum.

A green serpent knot glowed right through the layers, right through the armor on his chest. Runes were worked in to it for those who read it. Simply it read, 'violent'. Shame, truly. To get off on such a poor start.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

As if this world weren't surreal enough, some number of hours after Loki's release a mechanical buzzing-ring sound abruptly begins to emanate from somewhere about his person. That sound is coming from what turns out to be the little object that was in the arrival room with him, the one that the idiotic propaganda-steeped pamphlet identified as a CiD.

Someone's getting a call.

Displayed on the video screen is a young woman seated at a table or desk of some kind, pale-skinned and dark featured, pretty, in an angry sort of way, smoking a cigarette and staring, unimpressed, directly at him. How exactly she got his contact information is anybody's guess.

"Where the fuck have you been," she deadpans, and flicks her cigarette ash in the only thing (besides, presumably, her own CiD) on the desk, a black enameled ashtray. The rest of the environment around her is too dark to be visible, but she's definitely indoors. Not many clues to her identity for someone who'd just arrived and gone straight to the Arena-- but anyone else would've seen at least one of her billboards by now. Meet Penelope Lane: She's Kind Of A Big Deal.

If it was another place at another time, he'd take to a library first (and he would most likely later on) or wander endlessly to understand his whereabouts. Watch this network upon that device he were given. Asgard was not one place to use such things but they were not oblivious to the technologies on Earth they were, rather, more advanced - aided with what might widely be known as magic to most.

It appears, rather, in his hands. To save the effort of rummaging through plentiful layers. He'd looked it over in the arrival room, gathered it's basic functions enough to know how to turn it on, answer, make 'calls', and so forth. Thus the answer comes back in the same form of a video.

He were not hiding precisely where he was nor how roughened he looked; but it was very interesting that she was or seemed to be. Whomever she were. She knew him. He did not know her. How interesting. "Had been sidetracked, shall we say? I do apologize."

But he'll play along for now. He's made a woman angry.

To be fair, it's not so much that he's made her angry, just that he's given her yet another excuse to sharpen her proverbial claws on the face of someone of arguably male persuasion. Just another day in Baedal.

"Apologize to this," she immediately replies, and holds up what appears to be her wallet, purely for emphasis. "You didn't want my money, fine, but you let me fucking know you're not going to fucking show up, it's called common fucking courtesy."

There's a pause, and she blinks, narrows her eyes, and leans closer in towards her CiD. "You look like shit," she says, delicately as usual. "If you were going to turn up looking like that, maybe it's for the best, because that shit is not what I hired you for."

This is what passes for 'friendly concern' in Penelopeland.

Well then, it's not as if he's never met a woman who was very woman and very ready to split the skull of any man daring to cross her womaness. The thought might have tickled him a bit if he knew it but alas. Now what to do about this, precisely. Also, what in the nine would he need her money for? A moment's thought.

"And I had," it's sweet (with an undercurrent of sly), motion of his hand to his heart where that marking laid. Oh. So. Clear. Perhaps he had gone mad, and truly been here before -- he knew of those with powers strong enough to erase thoughts and previous memories. Once ago he would not have believed anyone but the All-Father yet he were not so naive now.

"Side-tracked, I mind again. How would you have I make up for this shameful lack of courtesy?"

Do tell.

"Yeah, 'getting sidetracked' is when you get a phonecall from your boss and can't finish dinner for an hour while he talks your ear off. 'Getting sidetracked' is when you get too absorbed in what's on TV to finish paying your bills right away. It is not fucking disappearing for months at a time with no explanation."

She doesn't sound especially worried about any of this, mind-- more inconvenienced than anything. Still, it doesn't appear to be the sort of thing that goes without comment from her. She leans back in her chair and folds her arms across her chest, glaring at her CiD, thinking. It's not a matter of thinking of something she wants from him, it's what she could conceivably get that concerns her, and for good reason.

"You owe me," she finally concludes. "Someday I'll call in my favor, and you'll give it, no whining. And definitely no disappearing act when I do. We square?"

Really? He happened to have disappeared for a few years before his presence was made known to the All-Father once again upon entering Midgard but she needn't know that. He just purses his lips with the tail of a smirk at their corners.

"Oh do I?" He sees that, and not that it would be hard to miss. His aptly shaped little brand. A horrible experience predating worse days, but he'd not show it anywhere save for the mess on his face. Exhaustion, to be sure. Those green eyes still poisonously alive, mind.

"Had I gotten something from this deal? As the way I see it, neither of us benefited from my untimely disappearance." Months at a time. What was he doing a few months ago? Midgard, this wasn't adding up. "And thus to owe you it would be you also owing me. Should we discuss this somewhere more," a brief pause, "solitary, perhaps?"

A moment passes where she stares, blinking rapidly.

"No, I'm fine where I am, thanks. Look, you made a promise to me, and then you backed out of that promise. Therefore, you owe me. That's business." She's not exactly speaking slowly, like you'd explain something to a child, but she sure is enunciating carefully. "What I would have owed you, had you actually come through on your side of the deal, was a fuckload of cash, which I was both ready and willing to part with, as was previously established. Instead, you balked. Therefore, I don't owe you squat, but you owe me damages. I'm not running a charity. Businesses don't operate themselves. You cost me time and prestige, and short of doing some very shady deals in very bad parts of this city, you can't get that shit back. I'm asking for a future favor in return, rather than suing the shit out of you for breach of contract. Call that the favor I'm doing you."

Well then. He does like how you do said business, truth to say. How unfortunate he cannot quite say he remembers any of this -- which leads to more interesting theories. More on that thought later. He just takes a moment to look upward.

She does realize anyone surrounding, close enough, could possibly hear -- actually that might be a mutual disadvantage, let's fix that shall we? The arena is loud indeed, but nevertheless if he was here than there might be the possibility of others not mortal here as well. He doubts she is one, he would not likely do dealings with a mortal.

More on 'if he was here' and the theories of that later as well.

Now, back to business. "Very well," it's calm and accepting. "Then I shall await your call."

"Cool. Nice to be on the same page."

She picks her cigarette from its ashtray and leans back in her chair, taking a lazy drag.

"You'll hear from me."

And she ends the call.

Right. Well.

He rose a hand to his head as the vocal cloaking spell was finally released. What a headache. A small exhale, device sliding away again with the twist of his palm.

This is already interesting.

[open] If thou wouldst drink of my life

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