The Ant and the Boot

Loki took me to bed more often and more savagely in the next few days. I was confused at first, but soon my confusion grew to fear: he began to verge on hostile, ignoring when I told him no or told him to stop. He simply pressed a finger to my lips to silence me and continued, lips pressing to the inside of my neck where my pulse hammered in terror. Why? Why was he suddenly doing this? I suppose I’ve been spoiled, being given the gentle side of Loki for so long that I had begun to forget the monster he could be.

“Loki, please,” I gasped, shuddering as he rolled me under him, running his fingers over my breasts. As always he touched a finger to my lips to silence me, regarding me with that cool, raw hunger in his eyes before gripping my waist and pulling me to him.

I turned my head away from him as he pressed his lips against my cheek, squeezing my eyes shut. I could feel tears forming there. What had changed?

“Loki, please, you’re scaring me!”

He stopped. His bare skin shifted against mine as he rolled off of me, his eyes clouded and distant as he stared at the ceiling. I could see frustration there. Impatience too, maybe. I pushed my hair out of my face, curling in on myself and swallowing.

His arms found me, drawing me to him as I trembled. His chin rested on my forehead, fingers gently stroking my hair. The gesture said I’m sorry, and more than that that he still cared and didn’t want me to be frightened.

“Then why are you doing this?” I asked, looking up at him. His green eyes turned away from me, again distant, lips pressed tightly together in a thin line.

Thor. Whatever he had said to Thor in those days before accounted for his sudden change in conduct. I had asked him over and over what had transpired between them, but each time I did his face became unreadable and he shut me out. That scared me because whatever Loki had said was the reason I was still here and I didn’t even know what it was. I had begun to feel more like a hostage than I had at any other time during my stay here and that disturbed me.

“Loki, please. I need to know,” I whispered, gripping one of his hands in mine. He looked at me for the first time, eyes calm and soft again, and kissed me lightly on the forehead. He then met my gaze again and pressed a hand to my abdomen, regarding me seriously.

As the pieces clicked together my heart began to hammer in my chest, panic creeping into my voice.

“No,” I yelped, pushing away from him, “Loki, no. I’m not ready – nowhere near ready – Gods, Loki, I can’t –“

His eyes remained calm as he drew me back to him, pressing a finger to my lips to silence me again.

I couldn’t believe it. I knew now why I hadn’t returned to Earth: Loki had told Thor I was pregnant. These past few days had been spent trying to make his lie a reality, all unbeknownst to me. With a pang of terror I wondered, could I really be? Could he have succeeded? Rising emotions swelled up in my chest, the desire for Loki mingling with my lasting repulsion towards his actions and simple, unadulterated, childlike fear.

Loki wiped the tears from my face as they started to fall, kissing me softly before I could say another word. He began to roll me again, pulling my body to his.

“Loki, no!” I snapped, kicking out and pushing him off me. He looked stunned as he fell away, regarding me with nothing less than surprise. I shut my eyes, shaking my head.

“Loki, we can’t. Hell, I can’t,” I stammered, sitting up, my hair falling wildly about my shoulders. I pushed Loki away as he reached up to press a finger to my lips again. No, this time I would not be soothed into submission.

“Loki, what do you think would happen to our child?” I pressed on, staring him dead in the face. “Do you think he’ll be treated like a king, or even treated like an equal, the child of a traitor and a mortal? Our child would be ostracized, Loki. I can’t do that. I’m not condemning my own baby to that kind of fate.”

He sat up, cupping my face between both hands. It will be okay, be calm.

“No, Loki, it won’t be okay. Mortals, we don’t…”

I cast around for the words to say. How did I explain it to a person who didn’t live as we did?

“Many mortals, like my family – we do not marry early. We do not have children early. We’re simply not ready yet.”

He cocked his head, looking over my body then raised an eyebrow. In his eyes I seemed very much ready.

“It’s not just a matter of if we physically can have children, Loki. It’s also a mental thing. Mortals are supposed to go out, finish school, get a job, fall in love, hopefully get married – then there will be time for children. I’ve only done the first of those.”

Loki gripped me and kissed me, tumbling back with me onto the bed. You are in love.

“No, Loki, you don’t understand,” I pressed, pushing his lips away from mine. “This is not love. We are lovers, but that is different from being in love. Loki, I’m too confused about you to know if I’m in love with you, and I know you’re not in love with me. Love and lust are very different, Loki. Can’t you see that?”

He couldn’t. Anger flashed in his eyes – more frustration, maybe – and he gripped me again, crashing onto me like a wave. He held tightly to me, trapping me in his arms. He reached past me to his bedside table where a half-depleted quill and ink rested. He dipped the quill in the ink, then stretched out my arm, pressing the tip against my flesh.

He quickly wrote on my skin, the ink cold and the point scratching against my inner arm. He held the black lettering up to the moonlight so I could read it, his face still bearing impatience. I had only a moment to read the word, written in a childlike English, before his lips found mine again, hands gripping my face.

Wife.



I’m perpetually late to every event, even if that event is, say, travelling to another dimension to save a young girl from bearing the child of a mass-murdering lunatic who happens to also be a demigod. I didn’t intend on being late, but when you’ve got a girl like Pepper keeping you in bed – well, you tend to stay.

I was still trying to get my tie on, stumbling around with my pants around my ankles, when I heard the sound of Point Break landing on the roof. He could have been a small jet with the way the tower shook.

“I’ll go let him in,” Pepper sighed. She was already, well, mostly dressed, an oversized shirt of mine covering her body. I liked the fact that I could still see her panties when she walked. They were black lace. Very sexy.

“Okay, be there in a minute,” I called to her, finally managing to pull my pants up to my waist and fasten them. I cursed at the tie, throwing it across the room and instead grabbing an AC/DC t-shirt from a drawer. I was going to be in my suit anyway, no one would give a damn what I wore underneath.

“Jarvis, get the Mark 9 ready to go,” I called up to the ceiling, hopping down the steps out of my bedroom as I tried to get on a shoe. I twirled gracefully, also grabbing my sunglasses from a nearby table.

“Yes, sir. Do you also want me to prepare the Mark 13?”

“I thought that was already in my suitcase. Is its paintjob done?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Good. Pack ‘em up, Jarvis.”

When I got to the roof Pepper and Thor were talking – or rather, Pepper was talking and Thor was trying not to look at her bare legs and lacy underthings. I smiled. I knew there was a reason I loved this woman.

“Hey Point Break, ready to go,” I said, putting on my sunglasses. It was a very bright morning. Thor smiled at me, looking relieved.

“Stark, I was beginning to wonder if you would arrive,” he greeted.

“And miss a chance to embarrass you in front of your daddy? Not a chance.”

Two suitcases, one red and gold and the other a sleek black thing of some expensive brand or another, came up a shoot to my left, raised on a platform that rose up into the floor.

“Your bags are packed, sir.”

“Thanks, Jarvis. Tell the kids that daddy will miss them while he’s away.” And by kids I meant my partially sentient robot creations that helped me out in the lab when I played with my science experiments.

“Be careful up there, Tony,” Pepper whispered, smiling. She gripped my shirt and I wrapped an arm around her waist, feeling her soft curves against my hand. There were definitely some things I was going to miss while I was away.

“Oh, you know I will,” I replied, winking. She laughed, her fingers moving down my chest in a way that made me think fondly of last night and many other nights before.

“Don’t cause Thor too much trouble,” she added.

“No promises.”

She smiled before kissing me softly. I held her there, feeling her warmth for a moment before letting her go. I just couldn’t get enough of that woman.

“See you soon, Tony,” she said, pulling away. I squeezed her hand before turning, pressing a button on the Mark 9 suitcase with my foot.

I’d smoothed out all the kinks in the suiting up process over the past month, and within seconds I was fully clad as Iron Man. Almost as an afterthought I grabbed my other suitcase, standing up by Point Break. Even with the suit on he was almost twice my size.

“Impressive,” he said, nodding. “Are you ready?”

“Of course I am,” I said, nose twitching. “I won’t get motion sickness on this ride, will I?”

He just laughed and grabbed my arm, lifting his hammer into the air.



I couldn’t believe that they would bring him here. Such a piggish mortal on our soil was a disgrace, no matter what “customs” we were supposedly following. It was, no doubt, an attempt to strike at me, or even to sever Dove from me. Given my ruse how could my brother even think that he could take her from me, even by bringing a mortal here? Asgardian custom was clear in that a woman, once carrying the child of a man – especially a man of noble birth – must remain with the man, now bound to him through blood.

But in mortal tradition this did not seem to be the case. Did Thor intend to say that, because she was a mortal, she should only have to observe her own customs? Such trickery was unexpected from my brother.

Still, he was here. The Iron Man. Tony Stark.

I ground my teeth the moment he walked through the golden gates of the throne room, so nonchalant and pompous. He smiled and waved at everyone as if he was some kind of celebrity.

I snorted. He would find no fame here.

Dove was by my side, exposed to the world only the day before. She was dressed like an Asgardian, a loose white dress adorning her body, tied around her neck and fastened about her waist with a silver chord. It was backless and, with her hair piled atop her head with only tendrils falling about her face, left little to the imagination. I hated the way that other men looked at her, desire filling their eyes. Could they not see that I had claimed her?

When Stark walked in, Dove’s face lit up with a warm glow. I hated the smile that broke across her features at the sight of him. When he met her gaze she impulsively tried to run to him, ready to fall into his open arms. I seized her wrist before she got more than two steps, pulling her harshly back to my side. I met Stark’s face coldly and saw the hate that he bore me.

I did not stay long enough to hear the words that Odin had to greet Stark with. I had paid my time in the Court, and now I would leave them to their own frivolities. I spun on my heel, my green cloak, now returned to me, fluttering in my wake. I pulled Dove away with me. Her footsteps faltered, but I refused to let her go back.

When I shut and locked my door I turned to her. She stood silently in the center of the room, looking small and delicate. She did not meet my gaze, her arms wrapped around her body. Even with her eyes averted I could see the pain in her eyes – the longing to return to be with Stark, even though I was here with her.

I crossed to her and pulled her to me roughly, my fingers wrapped around the back of her neck as I pressed my lips against hers. She whimpered, her hands still folded about herself instead of touching my body. Impatience and frustration coursed through my veins and I tore free the knot that held her dress about her neck, letting the bodice fall free to her waist. I cupped her breasts, pressed my hand to the small of her back, biting fervently at the nape of her neck, ignoring her yelps of distress. I loved her, and I would show the world that everything that I touched was mine.

Yes, Loki, god of Mischief, a voice whispered in my head, soft as a breath, let your hate grow strong. Only then will you find true power once more.



I circled around the city until I found them. I landed on someone’s balcony, watching from a distance. He sat in a large bed while she paced beside her own balcony, the dress she wore disheveled and her hair loose from the configuration it had been in earlier that day. They didn’t look at each other. Dove kept her head bowed, never meeting his gaze even when his eyes trailed her.

She’s afraid of him, I thought to myself, kneeling. That fucker has gone and scared her half insane.

And he’d knocked her up to boot. I ground my teeth as I imagined her terror as he raped her, maybe more than once, maybe over and over again. What kind of monster does this to innocent girls?

I got to find out just what kind of monster. As I watched he stopped her, reaching out his hand and gripping her arm across the bed. She turned to him, sitting down at the edge of the bed sheets. He ran his hand over her cheek in a gentle caress – then yanked free the top of her dress with one swift pull, the loose knot coming undone behind her neck.

I wanted to look away, but I couldn’t. She turned away as he pulled her to him in his arms. Even from here I could see the panic, the confusion, the doubt that marred her face. He turned her face to his, kissing her before rolling her under him and pulling up the skirt of her dress.

Revulsion rolled in my stomach and my lunch threatened to make a reappearance. My hands clenched into fists, metal grinding on metal as I fantasized about all the ways I could kill him. That bastard. That sick, twisted bastard.

And then his head turned to me as he lay on top of her his hands twined with hers and pressing her down. His eyes met mine and he smiled, daring me to do anything about it.

Dove’s eyes remained closed. She never saw me as I watched her pain, endured as much as I could while he devoured her before flying away into the darkness.