Hell's Book of Random One-shots

Loki and the Spirit Squad - Part Three

Peter suppressed a shudder as a cold breeze ran through the room, the broken windows and caved in ceiling offering no shelter from the outside.

Ned shone his light around, mouth still agape as he took in the rotting wood beams and the mould covered walls.

"This is so creepy," he said, voice echoing back off the walls.

"Yeah," Peter nodded, his own light shining over a portrait that was too warped to make out clearly. "You really get what you come here for."

"You think the stories are real?"

"Maybe," he shrugged, pulling a face of disgust, "but I hope not."

"Same."

They continued to look around the room, which mostly consisted of dust covered debris and broken furniture that could have been chairs but equally could have been tables at one point in time before being broken by falling pieces of an otherwise beautiful manor.

The only thing that remained intact, looking disturbingly close to untouched by time, was a piano and its bench.

"Oh, that's weird," Ned said, taking a step back closer to Peter who was stood in one of the clear spots on the floor in the middle of the room.

"Way creepy," Peter agreed, "but maybe it's a trick?"

"You think Loki might have put it there to freak us out?"

"Well...yeah, sure...he's cool but he is known for these kinds of things...right?"

"Yeah," Ned nodded, "yeah, totally, it's a prank."

Peter shone his light towards the ceiling, trailing the line of splintered wood that had once made up the floor of the hallway above, the walls of said hallway and its withering wallpaper visible through the long gap.

"He's been quiet up there too, this place creaks when you breathe so that's pretty weird."

Lowering the light, he pointed the beam at Ned.

"We should go and check on him."

Ned stared back, his eyes wider than even he realised.

"Yeah, let's do that."

---

"Well," Loki said, the door falling closed behind him as he continued to stare down the doppelganger, "this is quite the development."

"A disturbing one, if I may say so," the man said, lifting his chin. "Who are you?"

"You are the one mimicking my face and yet you have the audacity to ask such things?"

"I am mimicking no one, you are the one trespassing in my home."

"Some home it is given the state of it."

The imposter bristled, his hands clenching at his sides.

"I shan't bear your rudeness for a moment longer, your forcing your way in is quite an issue enough, I have no need for your added insults to my family manor."

"Then tell me how to leave and I shall insult you no further."

"I cannot tell you how to leave if I do not know how you arrived."

"Of course not," Loki sighed.

A faint sound caught his attention and he stopped to listen, straining to hear anything more clearly but all he could make out were two voices that sounded too far away to distinguish beyond whispered garbles.

He didn't need to be the genius that he was to figure out that it was likely Peter and Ned, doing their own investigation of the upstairs having likely not found much of interest to them on the lower level.

A look over to his Victorian twin, who was watching him as intently and insulted as he had been just a minute ago, proved that only Loki could hear the boys as they, hopefully, approached.

"Interesting," he mumbled, looking back towards the door. "I'm going to assume that me leaving the way I came will return me back to my own realm."

"Realm?" The other frowned.

"Yeah," Loki glanced over with a dismissive wave of his hand. "I'm bit of a realm hopper, think nothing of it."

He turned fully towards the door as the voices grew closer, still echoey but more distinct.

"That's my cue to leave, so if you will," Loki said, dipping his head before stepping towards the door.

He had barely reached out to grab the handle, his fingertips hardly grazing the metal before it twisted and the door started to creak open on worn hinges.

Stood behind the door was not the two teenagers Loki had brought along, as he had expected.

Instead stood a dark hair, regal looking woman with a pinched face and a tray of fine china, crockery that was a little too pristine for Loki's liking when compared to the otherwise dreary place.

There was a lingering moment where they merely stared at one another, the newcomer's face unreadable in a way that sent an unpleasant shiver down Loki's spine.

He wouldn't describe it as fear, it was more akin to the uncomfortable tenseness brought on by an unpredictable foe on the battlefield, a stark difference to the man stood behind him.

Her eyes eventually broke from Loki's to look over his shoulder, her mouth twisting unpleasantly into something close to a sneer.

"Thomas, who is this?" She asked, her voice cold and unwelcoming.

"I truthfully cannot say, Lucille."

Lucille gave the briefest of twitches of her nose, a flashing expression of displeasure before her eyes met Loki's once again.

"Then I guess he shall be joining us for tea."