Blood and Knifes

6

"Perhaps you should drive," Loki suggested.

"I- Well, I can, but, um, I think it would be a bit frowned upon," Megan tried to explain.

"You'll have to teach me," he said, opening the drivers door and sitting down. Megan rounded the car and sat in the passenger seat.

"Well, this is the steering wheel," they pointed. "It steers the car depending on which way you turn it. There's two pedals, one is the gas, the other is the brake. The gas makes the car go, the brake makes it stop. The speed depends on how hard you press down on the pedals. And this," they pointed at the stick. "Is especially important. You move the stick to the different letters for different types of movement. The P stands for parking. You have to make sure the stick is there if you don't want the car to drive away. The R stands for reverse; it makes the car back up. The N stands for Neutral. You use it when you're stopped at a street light or a stop sign. D stands for drive. Does that make sense?"

"Yes, I believe I understand."

"Um, before we go, could you, um, do something about the bugs? Maybe cast an illusion over them to make it appear like we're not doing anything in particular?" They paused. "There probably aren't any in the car, because you just made it, but I'm sure there are quite a few inside the house."

Loki looked perplexed, but he waved his hand anyways. Megan breathed a sigh of relief.

"Why are these 'bugs' so important?" He asked.

"They're watching and listening to us to make sure we fit in with society," Megan explained. "I've read enough to know how this goes. Although this is a bit more morbid than I expected. They're killing anyone that is different. It's like World War 2 all over again, except this time there's no one to help us. There's very little we can do right now. We just have to try to seem normal, and survive as long as possible." They crossed their legs and fidgeted with their ring, waiting for Loki to say something.

"Why tell me this?" Loki asked after a moment. "We barely know each other."

"Oh, um, I guess because you don't quite seem to fit in either?" They said hesitantly. "Sorry, that sounded rude. I just mean, like, you're from such a far away place, and, um, you don't know how to drive a car, and you have magic, I don't know..."

"You're very perceptive," Loki said. "I have never 'fit in' anywhere, except perhaps Sakkar. I am quite skilled in the act of blending in. You are from here, what types of things are prohibited?"

"Well, um, they want the human race to continue, and to do that they need the best people to, um, reproduce, and they don't want anyone to have any problems. So no physical or mental disabilities or disorders, and nothing they might consider a disorder. Basically no one with any mental illnesses, no one unintelligent, definitely no one LGBTQ+."

"LGBTQ plus?"

Megan glances at him with confusion. "You know, the acronym. Oh, do you not use a community acronym? I mean I prefer SAGA, but most people use LGBTQ+ so I try to use that one more often."

"No," Loki said. "I meant to ask what it stands for."

"Oh, um, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer or questioning, intersex, asexual, some people think the 'a' stands for allies but it doesn't, um, demisexual, and pansexual. And the romantic and gender versions of those too. It's a pretty long acronym, and it doesn't exactly cover everything, which is why I prefer SAGA -- sexuality and gender acceptance."

"Why would identifying as any of that be not allowed?"

"Well, um, America has never really liked anyone from, um-" They trailed off, uncertain of what to say.

"SAGA is fine."

"Yeah, um, it was just a few years ago that people of the same gender could get married. Being trans, asexual, non-binary, having dysphoria, those are all still classified as mental illnesses. And, um, discrimination based on sexual, romantic, or gender identity is still legal. Parents still disown their kids if they're from SAGA, we're still working on getting gender-neutral bathrooms, trans people can't use the bathroom of the gender they identify as and aren't legally recognized as trans, um, SAGA members are killed all the time," they listed. "There's a ton of problems. I mean, there's still a ton of people who think slavery should be legal, so, um, yeah. America's not very good at accepting things that are different."

Loki sat in silence for a few moments.

"I did not know about any of this. Asgard and Jotunheim are accepting of all peoples," He said. "Had I known this was a problem..."

"Well, um, we've kind of just learned to live with it. I mean, there's tons of activists on both sides, and most of the people in the government definitely don't want to do anything to help us, so, yeah. This got really political. Let's just go shopping. We can't really change anything if we're starving to death."