The Rise to Heroism {Loki Laufeyson} Book One

Chapter Fourteen

The next few days drag on. Loki's taken to avoiding me. But it's not like I care! Frankly, I couldn't care less about what he does. Only, the anger is starting to get to me. As a little girl, I always felt invisible until I met that man in the park on my way to school.

"Your soul is so quiet, yet so loud. What troubles you young one?" He had asked and I explained to him my situation. My father was an alcoholic and beat my mother. Everyday, he'd go to work, leave, go to a bar, come home completely smashed and beat the hell out of mom. Everyday, I'd hide in a small panel behind the TV, watching it happen. I never understood why he did it, or why mom hadn't left him - growing up like that, you just assume that it's the norm. I've always figured that those beatings were where I gained my temper - my growing obsession of hurting those who hurt me first. But now, looking back on it, I think that it's just the internal scar my father left on me when I was born. The need to punish those who've done me wrong. Only, my mother never wronged him, neither did I. He was a sick old man who had no respect for anyone but his stupid-ass self.

He died around this time - the time in which I found the old man. My mother was always sad and scared and refused to leave the house. I couldn't understand why she mourned him. He was such a bad man. Why would she miss him?

I know why now - it's because she loved him dearly, and the thought of never seeing his face again stung her. I can't say that I felt the same way, because I didn't. He was a sick bastard who deserved what he got. Serves him right for trying to pick a fight in a bar. Goddamn idiot brought a knife to a gun fight.

I still don't miss him. I never have and never will. If anything, I'm glad. He'd given me more scars than I had asked for - lord knows he gave more than enough to mom, who had never gotten over it up until the day she died. The day she forgave everything and let go...

The old man gestured around us. "Ah, but look around you, child," I searched through the crowd of faces rushing off to work that morning. Nobody stopped to ask if I was lost, hell, no one even acknowledged me.

"I don't understand..." I shook my head, my long blonde ringlets swaying with the small movement. The old mans face softened, like he found my confusion adorable. His blue-green eyes held so much wisdom that soon enough, he bestowed unto me.

"Each person here has a story, each one better or worse than the other. Do not put blame on the ones who are trying to deal with their own problems. For their minds are also clouded by worry and lonesomeness." The man had said, ruffling my hair. I hadn't told him about my father, but something deep inside me told me that he just knew. Those few words alone helped me to understand why he did what he did and for a short time, I was sympathetic toward him. From that day on, I saw the world differently, trying to find the light in everyone, like I never tried to with my father.

Usually, I can. But after meeting Loki, I realized that it was far more difficult than I had previously assumed.

I thought that I had found that dull light in Loki's soul, but what remained of it had burned out. I feel that dark loneliness growing in the pit of my stomach, affecting the way I see things. The bright colours of the world are becoming duller and duller by the second and it's irritating me to no end.

But today, he's acting especially strange, refusing to be in the same room with me. Any bit of eye contact and he's off again, walking the other way. I want nothing more than to just talk to him - try to change his mind about leaving, but he's not having it. Any attempt at a conversation and he pulls farther away from me.

Finally, I become infuriated and decide to follow every move he makes. I make sure to steer clear of him, conceal myself behind corners of the tower, statues, furniture. Every footstep - I'm right behind him.

At the end of the day, I follow him outside. Rounding to the back, he looks around nervously, pulling out a set of keys that belong to a rather large transport truck behind the tower. He boards the truck, ignorant of the fact that I'm right there alongside him. Once I feel the truck stop after a few hours, I pry open the doors and hop out.

Peering around the corner of the truck, I see an Asgardian guard screaming at the sky. "Heimdall! I order entrance to Jotunheim!"

A huge beam of light comes down and strikes the guard. I fling myself inside of it with him, intending to save him but instead, I find myself latched onto Loki's waist. He looks down at me, eyes wild.

"Rebecca!?" He yells, his arms wrapping around my shoulders.

"It's Becca!"

Ignoring my correction, he growls. "You stupid bi-" His voice drowns in the noise from the light as we're taken away by it.