Pearl's New Friend Is Definitely Not Evil At All, Okay

[foolyoutwice]

It takes a fair amount of open space to cut down one flying ship in order to repair another. In the end, Pearl and Loki had set up shop in the grass outside the garage. His skiff--scorched, dented from bullets, gashed along one side, crooked-winged--sits next to a larger Asgardian craft, one built on similar lines but considerably more ornate. Even by Asgardian standards. The hull is covered with inlaid twining patterns that work themselves out into serpents and wolves and falcons.

It's splendid. Beautiful craftsmanship in the style of two thousand years ago. And Loki is gleefully marking off portions of it to chop up. With a flaming torch thing that he certainly hopes is adequate to the task. Pearl had thought it might be.

"Do you think we'll need to replace the entire wing? Or just the damaged section?"

Comments

[ownerless]

"Oh! Garnet! Yes, well!" She looks momentarily flustered, but rallies quickly. "This is Loki! I'm helping repair his skiff!"

[a_conversation]

Garnet notes the flusteredness. Is that Pearl being Pearl, or...

"Loki. Your people are spacefaring, then. Are you human?" He looks it, more or less, but in Milliways that's unreliable."

[foolyoutwice]

"Yes we are, and no I'm not." He smiles an easy smile. "Well met, Garnet. I am Loki of Asgard."

Has she heard of him?

[ownerless]

Pearl hasn't gotten into a lot of detail about who she's met in Milliways. ...or how much time she's spent there.

"Garnet lives with me on earth," Pearl supplies.

[a_conversation]

"Asgard," Garnet repeats. "Where is your planet? And what species are you?"

"...we are gems," she adds. "As Pearl probably told you."

[foolyoutwice]

"I'm...Asgardian." From Asgard. "It's considered one of the Nine Realms, so it's...an easy matter to visit Earth from there. We call Earth Midgard. Used to visit regularly, in fact! It was quite a nice little planet a thousand years ago."

[ownerless]

"Asgard seems to exist in a parallel universe to ours," Pearl adds eagerly. "It doesn't seem possible we wouldn't have encountered them before, otherwise. Right?"

[a_conversation]

"Yes," Garnet says. "We could have crossed paths on Earth, otherwise."

Asgardian isn't much of an answer, to Garnet. "What brings you to Milliways?"

[foolyoutwice]

"Yes--and I think we would have heard of you. Or of the other gems. You inhabit several planets, I believe?" It's asked casually, interstellar traveler to interstellar traveler, like an Earth-bound acquaintance might ask another, I think you said your family were from the Midwest?

"--As for me, well." A little grimace. "A situation with a wormhole brought me here."

[ownerless]

Pearl sneaks a silent, guilty look at Garnet. Did she tell him too much? She probably told him too much.

[a_conversation]

Garnet is not at the point of blaming Pearl. But the studied casualness of Loki's question makes her go still. Several planets. Does he know about Homeworld?

"We're from Earth," she says, firmly. She scrutinizes him. He certainly looks human. "How did you survive the wormhole?" She's not sure even a gem would.

[foolyoutwice]

"I didn't think I had," he answers flatly, scrutinizing her in return. "I thought I was dead when I first came here. But Asgardians are very hard to kill." (As are Jotun, but that's really none of her business.) "Harder than we look, if you're used to humans. There's another Asgardian here: my brother Thor. Perhaps you've met him? Shiny armor, very...blond? Works for Security here?"

[ownerless]

"He's very nice, too," Pearl adds. "Oh, and Garnet! He has a wonderful hammer, you should see it!"

[a_conversation]

Ooh, a hammer! "I haven't met him. I met another Security person with Pearl. X, her name is."

[foolyoutwice]

"Another friend of mine." He's still perched up on the second craft; but now he hops down lightly. "She'll be disappointed to see that I've damaged the skiff, so..." A gesture. "Repairs."

[ownerless]

"Disappointed? Why?" Pearl looks suddenly suspicious: has she been pulled into something nefarious? Has there been troublemaking?

[foolyoutwice]

"Because she enjoyed a flight in it?" It's okay, Amusingly Flustered Pearl Woman, this specific element of the situation is not actually nefarious! "It will still fly, of course, but..." But not as nicely.

[ownerless]

Oh! Ha.

"Well of course it will!" Pearl declares. "We're going to fix it."

[a_conversation]

Oh. Pearl is fixing things again.

"For what purpose? Where do you fly, in this skiff?"

Just, you know, out of curiosity. Her tone is as casual as she can make it.

[foolyoutwice]

"Mostly the lake and mountains here." He smiles a bit. "It's not entirely unlike home, and not entirely unlike the better parts of Midgard. Except of course for the peculiar physics."

His smile brightens. "May I offer you both a tour, when the repairs are complete? We'll want to test it, naturally."

[ownerless]

"Ooh, yes, we'll certainly need to test it."

But she knows better than to speak for Garnet. "--right, Garnet?"

[a_conversation]

"...right," Garnet says. "A ride would be...nice."

It would be! If this human-looking nonhuman is okay and all.

[foolyoutwice]

He's totally okay! Garnet's future-vision probably turns up only a few very remote possible timelines in which Loki makes contact with the gem homeworld and sells out the Earth gems in exchange for great power. Or attempts to take over Milliways. Or becomes a multiversal threat to their particular Earth.

Really, they're very remote, these possible timelines.

And look, right now he's just grinning cheerfully at the two of them, full of childish enthusiasm for his little boat. "It really is an excellent craft, the Asgardian skiff. Wonderfully maneuverable. I promise you, you'll enjoy the flight."

once they fix up all these bullet holes and stuff

[ownerless]

"I do always like learning how to fly something new," Pearl says. "...or fix it."

[a_conversation]

(Garnet will be invoking her future vision very shortly, oh yes. But not just yet--she needs a moment to put her head in her hands and concentrate.)

"Yes," she says, instead. "What happened to it? Why does it need fixing?"