1227/The Troubled Trickster

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The Troubled Trickster
Date of Scene: 30 June 2017
Location: Mercy's Garage - West Harlem
Synopsis: Summary needed
Cast of Characters: Mercy Thompson, Loki, Claire Temple, Winter Soldier




Mercy Thompson has posed:
The world in this existence is in flux. For everyone.

Even the son of two kings.

Within the astral plane, truly the Coyote's psyche, the four were scattered, sequestered off from each other. Split apart to make it easier for this fledgling god to deal with each individual nuisance.

Mercy alone, Claire alone, Bucky alone and Loki, as well.

For Loki, however, it's a little different. His knowledge, his abilities and skill, afford him some control of what's going around. At least in the very beginning. As such, when the Tricksters arrives he'll find himself in a place that can only be described as a point of crossroads. Roads comprised of dirt, cobblestone, asphalt and more can be seen stretching off into the void, the ends of each road disappearing within the ethereal haze. If one can sense it further away three pinpricks of light can be felt; Mercy, Claire and Bucky. Their minds a bright spark against the harshness of this particular beast; corruption, madness and an intractable will to live, to survive this experience and to become something MORE.

And then, like a silent warning, the three luminous minds are neatly snuffed out.

Claire first.

Bucky next.

Mercy last.

Whether cloaked or something more is hard to say, especially as the shadows around Loki begin to stir, the attention of The Coyote focused completely on the Trickster.

Loki has posed:
The rule of all roads, pick the most interesting one to follow. The potholed backroad or the rutted dirt track worn by hundreds of youths over the years might lead to an outstanding beauty site. It could also go to a derelict bridge haunted by ghosts, but life exists in flux to be //interesting//.

Loki finds himself inexplicably looking for glass as a surface rather than mossy stones, mud, or even wooden planks. His self manifested here needs to worry less about the texture, given all hints of his fine suit are banished.

The tall man is shorn of less of his Asgardian heritage. Height for one, and the golden circlet spanning his brow serves mostly to keep back his wild black hair. A loose poet's shirt and black pants with those high leather boots make for a slightly piratical appearance. Let that be a starting point as he stands at the crossroads and //laughs//.

"Really? I give you points for being traditional." A shrug of his broad shoulder then; he's close to seven feet tall with proportions to match.

The start of any journey begins somewhere. For him, it's laying down a handful of chocolate cake crumbs and blowing them in a direction. They fan across the air and ground. Where the largest number clumps, he turns three ticks and takes the nearest path.

After exactly twenty-five-and-a-quarter paces, he crouches down and takes a running leap for the next road. Powerful leg muscles contract and bunch, thrusting him into the air. Both boots come down in a strong thud, pushing him low to the ground. He runs backwards down the path before turning and doing an aerial spring.

Let the coyote make any sense whatsoever out of that. He'll take a handful of leaves from the nearest bush and spend a good portion of his walk stripping off bits of bark and trimming down the foliage to no apparent pattern. There is no magical value in a handful of leaves, and no advantage in meandering as he does, short strides matched to broad ones.

But then, there never was any cause for telling Frigga //no// to the safety of mistletoe, either, was there?

He can, and he does. Weaving himself a snare for future use to capture a thought and stories, that's not important right now as it is to sing.

"Nid wy'n gofyn bywyd moethus
Aur y byd na'i berlau man,
Gofyn wyf am gallon hapus;
Calon onest, calon lan."

Mercy Thompson has posed:
A snarl lights the area around Loki.

Traditional.

And while his words are /truth/, it still rankles The Coyote. It thrusts back in his face how new he is to all of this. Not that his anger will stop him. Instead, it just helps fuel the rage within young man's mind.

Before the shadows strike, however, they watch. Wariness shivering throughout them. They watch the Trickster drop those 'bread crumbs', pick a road, then another and take apprehend those handful of leaves. It's only when he speaks that the shadows move again. To strike.

Perhaps the coyote thought Loki enunciating a spell, versus spoken word, or spoken song. Whatever the underlying thought might have been, the time for action has come, and The Coyote sends out those tendrils of darkness. They'll spring like arrows, aiming for the large target that Loki now represents and while some might be avoided, all cannot be. There's simply too man.

As soon as one hits, another does as well, then a third, a fourth and more. The world around Loki will shift, falling abruptly to darkness. The light around leaching quickly away and the cloak of blackness taking all vision from those vibrant green eyes. With a stomach-lurch, Loki will fall. A downward spiral, a sharp drop into the vastness of space. That feeling stretches for several minutes, perhaps possibly an infinite time, until finally like a rubber-band, the world snaps back into place.

When awareness returns Loki will find himself in a known place; Asgard. He's within a familiar room, with familiar people. A great hall stretches outward with a throne upon raised dais. Upon the throne sits Odin and beside him, in his customary place next to the King, is Thor. The brother. Emotion lines the expression of both men; one with worry, the other with frustration and consternation and both with expectation. A question was asked, but that question is lost to Loki. The vision starting after whatever was said had been spoken.

"Brother." Comes Thor's deep baritone, that singular word of his laced with an unspoken question.

That single word striving to be a 'helpful' prompt for a brother caught so 'unaware'.

And should Loki reach for his magics he'll find them repressed. His power flitting away with each grasp, each reach.

Elsewhere a smaller coyote raises her muzzle; that sensitive nose picking up the faintest hint of chocolate upon the web of red the trio navigates upon. It's enough to cause the four-footed coyote to veer to the left; direction altered slightly. Her steps become more sure as the faintest of words drift to sensitive ears; a familiar voice. A welcomed voice.

Loki has posed:
What would be the point of dodging the arrows? Nay, the whole point is giving ample opportunity to strike. Sweet pain, the lesson of Thor Odinson and his trusted band of warriors.

Loki makes the pretense of dodging one or two merely to show he can be foiled like everyone else. /Just like everyone else./ The oldest conceit, the truest lie. He grunts when one of those black bolts plunges through his side past the filmy linen shirt to an unscarred stretch of pale flesh that so briefly goes blue.

Fall into the darkness. This, too, has disturbing familiarity with the transit of realms on the Bifrost bridge. Second rule from Heimdall the watcher, how to brace his knees and stay loose for the inevitable rainbow colliding to a halt with a solid surface. He jolts into place, his senses following his feet a microsecond later. Remember to favour that side, even put a hand over where a wound could be.

/Remember/. The self from the future tells the past incarnation.
In Asgard.

How many times he's stood before that great golden barque representing the might of Asgard over the other nine realms. Authority in a great, ancient chair occupied by his forefathers for three generations give or take, being warmed by the steely, unhappy gaze of his father. Odin on the throne is never a warm sight. He's not a warm man nor ever has been to his children, but something about the high seat always cools his affection further and enflamed Odin's wrath.

"Forgive me," he says under the golden one's expectant pause. "I was considering the necessity of obtaining Mother's birthday present. And suitable tithing to appease Vanaheim after that little adventure."

Loki is the diplomat. He smooths over the wrinkles in political affairs with the other places, including the realm of his own mother, Heimdall, even Sif of the... Well. Her hair is better dark. He remembers himself now. "Naturally those weighty topics need their own due time. Again, brother? Forgive me, Father. Mother's happiness..."

He trails off. Whatever else they say about the Trickster in the court, no one can doubt the filial devotion from the younger prince. He briefly smiles at Thor, then turns to the rest of those assembled at the steps.

Mercy Thompson has posed:
Perhaps in the actual court of Asgard, Loki is known as Silvertongue, but within this one it's different. His words are met with a one-eyed stare both arctic and irritated. It was the wrong thing to say. The wrong thing to do. Which is likely a familiar feeling to Loki, but when his eyes turn to Thor, the expression upon the Thunder God's is worse.

It's a mixture of pain and pity. The slightest tilt of his head in the negative; trying to warn a brother away from what he says.

"Truly, this is what you have to say, Loki. Fripperies about presents and tithes." The All-Father states, his voice laden with a deep growl, a heavy note of disgust heard. "I know not how Thor continues to convince me to expect more of you. It is a waste." Rising in a creak of leather, armor and a swirl of cloak, Odin turns to Thor; Loki dismissed in the All-Father's mind. "You shall deal with this."

Then he leaves.

Thor, dressed in his resplendent armor, watches Odin leave. When the room is only the two of them, Thor will step down from the dais. His heavy steps will bring him closer to the much slender and dark Prince. "Loki." Begins the large man, his words gentle, as one might speak to a child, or someone who doesn't always comprehend things. "Did we not speak this morn? This meeting was to be important for you. To impress upon Father that you were serious. That you understood what was needed of you."

And as Thor approaches the shadows reach out again, wrapping briefly around Loki, to afford him a sense of the Thunderer. There is the inherit magicalness of the Asgardian, yes, but now, there's more. An aura of a sorcerer encircles the lighter of the brothers; denoting his education with the magical arts.

A reflection of Loki's own mystical abilities placed upon his brother.

Loki has posed:
Old rules of the game: don't talk to the All-father. Do not argue. Thor never gets that point, and he will thunder on with drawn brows in front of the throne. It didn't take long for the younger boy to figure that one out.

Now, being chastised, Loki bows his head. He clasps his hands behind himself, and gives the proper genuflection in presence of his king, not his father. Another distinction not lost.

One part of him rankles at the reminder, curling lips and snarling. Old gifts, //familiar// gifts, shown to a buffoon who doesn't know how to use them? Oh, that's rich. And in that moment, things change. He changes.

But he doesn't change because how can he ever change when he was always that way?

The young man tilts his head. Dark hair falls over his brow and he stares up at Thor with a crooked smile. "But we both know it doesn't matter //what// I say. You're going to be sent out to be the great conquering hero. I'm going to stay here to study, aren't I?"

Because he's fourteen, if a day. He shrugs his shoulders. "I was never going to convince him to let me out, but that's the fun of trying. If I didn't say what I said, then he wouldn't have his role. How many times do... No, you know, and you don't know. You get to be the adult this time."

He makes a shooting gesture with his thumb and forefinger at one of the doors. "Mighty you, off to throw your weight around and remind us all of your power. That's why //you// get called to war. But you know my burden."

He grins. Teeth show, pristine and white. "We're ever our fathers' disappointment." A dramatic sigh from him as he walks out for another of the entrances, leading away. Crumbs on the road, a handful of leaves thrown over the swept floors. "You're never, ever good enough no matter how hard you struggle. No matter how much power and prestige you acquire. All those people roar your name, and you're //still// not the favourite. Hard breaks, brother. You're young enough to still believe it's possible to change the old man's mind, aren't you?"

He ducks behind a pillar and turns around and around. "One day! Maybe today will be the day. Maybe this will smash the way it's always been and we can rise victorious. Or maybe you'll have to try to figure out why your dear old dad is //still// not happy with what you've done. Even if he even notices we're here. He might. Maybe he will."

Then he's cavorting through the door to not be late for his interminable charting of paperwork. Because fourteen, or precisely six-hundred-thirty-one, is a time when you really, really prefer to be elsewhere. Maybe Loki will swipe a pastry from the kitchen before creeping off around the palace. He knows all the back ways.

Mercy Thompson has posed:
The dynamic in this particular dream between brothers is that older looking out for the younger. Always there to protect, but also in some ways to hold back; unaware how their shining moments eclipse all that the youngest might, or could do.

"If you had but tried, brother." Are Thor's initial pained words to all of what Loki says. "Whatever you may really thing, or truly feel, surely even you know you must say what's needed. The game must be played. You must /try/."

Thor speaking of actual politics and advising Loki on how to navigate the system.

Truly the day is odd, isn't it.

"I will go speak with Father -" Again is implied. "- We shall speak later."

And with Loki's step out of that door the scene shifts, changes again, to a library. Something he likely knows well. There are few within the hushed room and it won't be until Loki turns a corner that a familiar figure will be seen.

Frigga.

Dressed as she always is, a book held in her hand, her expression thoughtful. A strand of power from her tells the story of Loki's arrival and when he chances upon her, she'll turn. Her gaze is familiar, the notes of a mother's love held within, as well as happiness upon seeing her child. But there are other things too; worry, concern and disappointment.

The great hall rarely holds its secrets close and clearly word has filtered down to the Queen on just how this morning went.

That doesn't stop her from folding the book closed and placing it upon the table, her greeting warm. "Loki."

She holds both hands out to him.

Loki has posed:
The teenager doesn't slouch in to the library. Oh no. The world dissolves around him and reforms into a shelter of books and soaring columns, grumpy librarians who argue the finite details for best binding techniques to keep space worms at bay. An imperative when the space-faring race usually comes back infested, like the time the Warriors Three got clapping fleas.

He stands up a little straighter. His clothes are mostly straight and tidy. Nothing out of the ordinary there except his circlet keeps slipping down.

He shoves it up with a finger. It stays for now. Only for now.

Frigga is present, a warm beacon of radiance and welcome as anyone could expect. Glorious in that pleated gown, she is in every way what Odin is not. Maternal and soft-spoken, accepting and welcoming to the guests and allies of the world. Too good, really, for what he' about to do.

"Hello, fairest lady." He blows her a kiss, leaning up against a pillar. "I've decided that the traditions today aren't /really/ for me. So dull. It's all the same old, same old. We've done this before, haven't we?" He isn't complaining so much as reflective.

"I want my pure, honest, and happy heart. Do you see any of that around here?" He waves his hand a little. "I mean, maybe two out of three. Not much to do here with that." He then clasps then and gives her a slanting look through the corner of his dark lashes. "I'm /bored/, Mother, horribly and utterly bored. Big brother is trying to think and while it's so funny he uses words he probably doesn't know the meaning of, I've got better things to do. This is like a bad children's story. Like one a particularly slow oaf in London would tell to his other milquetoast friends too slow and dull to know there should be twists and turns. Excitement. Real stakes. You're a horrible storyteller. Must be where /he/ gets it from. But you were always were second-rate, a copy of the superior original. Me."

His breath puffs out, and the boy on the cusp of manhood laughs. So bright, it's more of a chuckle than anything else. His magic may be repressed, but then there is what he is.

Chaos incarnate. Chaos the life bringer, chaos the toll taker, written into every ephemeral note of his being.

He did this one. He does it again.

There is a balcony. A balcony over a garden, and he takes the route at a sprint to the perpetually open windows. All the better to get the greenery, see. Once he filched a grimoire of dark elven magic and jumped over the edge. He'll do it here, again, leaving a bit of space to land in a crouch on the grass. A nice clearing with natural plants all around. His memories supply the colour and scents of crushed lemon balm. But there's a hole in the being. A place in the real place where a certain object lies buried, a hummingbird feeder now. Just, you know, the devourer of bad things.

Mercy Thompson has posed:
Oh tricky Loki.

Not playing by the rules.

Which should be expected. Would be if The Coyote understood who he was dealing with. He has an inkling of /some/ of what and who he deals with, but the broader sense of it all is lost.

The vision would have continued. It should have, but those words addressed to Frigga so are heard by The Coyote. And he understands /just/ what's being said there.

The vision stutters to a stop, the walls of the library, the length of the balcony collapsing into itself before all that's left are shadows.

Deep dark things and upon the edges of those shadows a blurred shape of a coyote can be seen. Fur black, eyes yellow, it's massive form merges with the darkness around it. Only sharp movements give away point of ear, flick of tail, edge of claw. While it might feel like minutes it will only be seconds for the darkness to rear up once again. Then with a single lance the blackness descends -

- The pain of these psychic wounds will be worse. A fire within the veins, an echo of teeth crunching bone, claws piercing skin and a body being mauled. And while The Coyote wishes to cause Loki to feel this pain, it's only a byproduct of what's about to happen -

A happy byproduct, or so it is in Coyote's mind, but a secondary sensation to the primary.

When the visions return it'll be completely in Loki's own mind's eye, instead of represented within the 'physicality' of the astral plane.

Those held most dear to Loki will be brought forth now; Frigga.

Killed. In front of Loki. Her dying body held within his arms. A last rattling breath before her eyes lose that familiar weight, that familiar shine.

Next is Thor; perhaps not loved in the same sense of Frigga, but an unspoken bond there. Dead upon a fruitless battlefield, sent by the All-Father.

Even the Warriors Three; wiped out, much like Thor, gone from this world.

All that's left is Loki and Odin. A relationship that at the best of times was quite strained and at the worse, terrible.

And even as those images are dropped within Loki's mind, the shadows reach out for more. Greedy fingers of emotion trying to burrow through his mind and find those emotions that will help feed what The Coyote is trying to do; self-hatred, loathing, loneliness, loss.

And there will be one more, envy, but that roll of shadows has yet to grasp at the Trickster god.

Loki has posed:
Frigga, dead. Hurts, doesn't it, to see that beloved face slack and the animation in her vibrant eyes gone? The glassy sky of Asgard reflected in their dull sheen has no comparison to the gems that beckoned children to her side and shone with such pride at the small victories her husband and other sons could not share.

Pain.

The severed, bloody limbs of the only man who ever presented a /challenge/ is an old future and memory. He sees those hewn arms gone slack and the empty grip devoid of a stout handle, the hammer imploded or off to another contender. They might wear the helm. They can claim to be worthy. They are not Thor, the Thunderer, bellowing voice forever silenced.

Regret.

Facing his father, Odin, is easy. The stern face, the bloody glare burning like a balefire with that one patch blanking the orb he gave on Yggdrasil. Their stance in the silent world, facing one another, two poised juggernauts about to collide. If he were that kind of man. His innards harden and his stomach rebels, the taste of acid on the back of his tongue sizzling away.

Contempt.

The coyote is there. The //thing// is behind the shadow, in it, and there are no lights burning in the dark to call for home. He has been on the back foot this whole time, bruised and beaten by those psychic blows. Not unlike the blows of Volstagg the lion, Fandral the fop, Hogun the guy no one remembers. He won't really regret the loss of the great porker with his bushy red beard.

A younger man would take them proudly. Protect the vital spots and make no sound, then strike out at them later. The teenager grins, bloody, full of a storm of dark emotions that might be worth feasting on.

"You forget," he spits out the words. The astral realm is about will and purpose and clarity. They are out there. "I don't define myself by my father. I'll never be enough for the blind old bastard. But me? I'm enough for /me/." Another gob of bloody ice hits the ground. "He wouldn't do this. I did."

Overweening pride, yes, and burning confidence. The sacrifice he's made, over and over, to try to give them space and a chance to flee may not have worked. The magic might not be there. But then... Then?

He shifts out of human skin altogether, fluid as living fire, every spark in this place something of a misnomer. He's not aflame: it's his thoughts and his identity, merging again into a terribly unlikely combination that makes him dark, dark, dark, and potentially very furry. The Coyote. The //same// coyote. Every feature, every facet, every element identical. Point of ear to curve of back to tip of the tail. Except an inch taller, just because, need to rub that in. "I'm going to steal your story, brother," calls that yip. "And on these shores, my story is the only one to be remembered. We is me is I, and there /is no you/."

And this is the story of how a nascent Coyote got drunk and got stupid thanks to leaves and chocolate cake. He's making it up as he goes along. And it will be /better/.

Mercy Thompson has posed:
With each word of Loki's the darkness reacts. Like a snake, coiling tight, tighter, readying itself.
However, that strike doesn't occur until Loki recreates himself into a familiar image. Almost a true reflection; albeit larger. Just by a touch.

That's enough to cause The Coyote to howl in fury, anger, seething anger. That anger only increases at the speak of stealing stories.

Loki will not still this coup. Will. Not.

Another angry howl is heard, the underlying words within that noise a simple shout of, "NEVER."

And this is likely the outcome Loki anticipated, wanted really. The sounds of fury roll forth between around the two and as one howl echoes into another the Coyote strikes. Whether here or on the physical plane both beasts are faster than anything nature ever created. And they'll both need it.

Coyote's movements are like quicksilver, a shadowed step here, then a pivot, and the smaller of the two coyotes draws close. Noot quite a pounce, but he's definitely upon Loki. Teeth are flashed, used to grasp upon whatever flesh that's near; yes, he'd move for a clamp on Loki's furred throat, but likely that is closely guarded. Much as his own is.

Even with the Coyote's movements the shadows continue to cling to fur, tip of ear, and when close enough they lance out, trying to burrow into the other Coyote. Small nips and bites to hurt, to distract, to find an opening to be used in their favor.

Loki has posed:
One of them fights with shadows. They bite at the laughter and the delight, the trickery and the benevolence. They'll taste pain and regret. Suffering is a flavour too, somewhere between walnuts and bitter acorns that no one ought to be eating. Iron wrath. Regret.

The Elder Coyote fights with ideas. Are they real memories, are thet tales?

A broad, sweeping landscape awakens. Red arches of sandstone loom against the burning sun, and the tourmaline walls descend to a river of pounded glacial rocks and turquoise. Among the grasses are two figures made from the clay and fire, dark and curiously formed. But before they even open their eyes or pretend at living, there is Ma'ii; the grinning young man melting into a coyote's shape. He dances around the unmoving body on the ground, a person misshapen and yet perfect. Stars are upon him, the First Man, and the dust staining his hands and feet brick red. Ma'ii lifts his head and howls, the howl bringing the first rains upon that dry landscape. In his delighted stirring is the breath of life, as he dances about in the greenery exploding with flowers and growth as a desert awakens in the rain.

The First Man awakens with it.

Loki laughs in a yip. "Did you think you were the first?"

A tribe stand in the great golden seas of the middle places. The children are gaunt with hunger, their eyes glassy and emaciated bodies listless. Huge bloated stomachs under weathered wraps give little hope. Parents cluster together, the warriors sick. Flies foam around their mouths and zip through empty cook fires that burn the grass, but show emptiness all around. Mouse and a bird creep around the camp, and the Great Ones sit in counsel.

The buffalo are gone, and the emptiness of the plains a sense of grave sorrow. But one scruffy, dirty creature lolls its tongue out and laughs. Ke-ke-ke. A whuffle as it trots off, leaving the mighty animal spirits frightened by some unseen horror.

A great beast of shadow looms in a cavern deep and thick. Malice floods out, a promise of danger. Bleached bones and stinking rot greets the sensitive nose but he presses on. Ghosts cry, mourning: "Why didn't you save me? You let me die! This is your fault!" The shambling four-footed beast skitters past, swaying and falling among the packed in buffalo. He must be drunk or have eaten the cactus reserved for shamans. Fool. Every hit upsets the great, shaggy animals and they press away to the entrance of the cave.

Soon there is only the grinning desert dog, one ear pricked, the other askew. It stares into the dark and thumps its tail. The nightfall, inchoate and wrathful and hungry, roars out. "Who brings this mangy cur to my house? Begone!"

In a wave of movement, the coyote flees from its presence. The silly gamboling of its uncoordinated paws sends forth the herd, crackling out into the world where the hungry tribes seize their weapons to bring a feast to an end. And so the healers bring their nourishment again.

"Did you really believe you were unique?"

Mercy Thompson has posed:
Shadows and stories.

When Loki evokes those images in the much younger Coyote, there's a pause. The shadows still, the Coyote holds his breath; his eyes take in what he sees, what he smells, hears, feels.

The story is listened to, watched; the cant of the Coyote's head taking on that listening pose that many youngsters often adopt around Elders. It's a subconscious move on the Coyote's part, something he doesn't realize he's even doing. Something that shows just how naive and untrained he is.

That, however, doesn't mean the game is over. Not quite yet.

It's with Loki's last words that the younger Coyote realizes the error of what he just did. He left himself exposed, open, and it's causes the beast to snarl. Words trip out of the muzzle of the creature, as it turns a furious look upon Loki. "Do not! Those are not your stories!" Even if in some regards they are, after all Loki is God of Trickery, Lies and Stories.

Another snarl leaves the beasts mouth and with a flash of shadows, the Coyote dissolves into a flurry of shadows; putting space between the two. When he reforms the Coyote will bark and yip four notes of power. It's not an attack, however, instead, that spell reaches outward into the astral plane. A spell of search and find and when it finds what it seeks it rips it away and to the Coyote.

Winter Soldier and Claire Temple now find themselves alone on the red web.

And Mercy Thompson finds her much smaller, much more delicate coyote form beneath a large paw. Against such two beasts the smaller coyote looks frail. Very much so. Something that could be so easily crushed.

The Coyote places a paw upon the tender belly of Mercy, and with a crinkle of muzzle, the male Coyote yips. "I may not be unique, but I will be the only one with the power upon Earth. There will be no others."

A promise, for any future skinwalkers born and with that threat, the Coyote drops muzzle and teeth to Mercy's belly, and while the smaller coyote struggles, she can't quite wriggle free from that weight. The speed of his attack is quick enough that the Coyote rips open the belly of the smaller coyote, a long terrible slash of red, spilling forth blood and organs.

And while this would is wholly psychic within the real world Mercy's body convulses; the shock of that wound great enough to effect a reaction upon the mortal plane.

Loki has posed:
He /could/ sing the four yips right back. They are clear enough in cadence. And would that have any impact on the woman under paw suddenly revealed?

"They /are/ mine. Who do you think the Star People are but I?" Laughter from the second coyote, the tinge taller. His body wriggles with fascination in the tumult of activity. "I first danced and stole the fire, sang the secrets to ride the horse and shoot the wiliest prey. I stood in these lands first. My story is the story of the continent."

Dark laughing eyes full of gold sparks stare back onto the skinwalker hungry for a bigger share of the coyote pie. There is just one aspect even worse the Dine and the Blackfoot and Arapahoe remember, and that shadow is already flooding through aspects of selves whirling around in the astral.

Because the fool beast ranting at a father reaches for the thing he should not take. The sister is not for him to try his wrath upon. Fang and hide gather. Fur flashes. Elder Coyote remembers that crushing touch, the attempts to break through his tougher hide. Iron floods through the construction of it.

A drink won't numb that sensation flooding through the Asgardian, who has had quite enough. He hauls himself up a little taller, and the cracking bones and the wide, white smile are inhumanly bright.

Then there are four. The teenaged boy with the crooked circlet, the tall prince in proper Asgardian regalia, the capering crumb-scatterer dressed a bit like a pirate to ignorant eyes.

The coyote gambols in a loping dance. The three move independently of one another.

The teen hurls the green vines and leaves from the garden to set the snare around the skin walker atop the bright mechanic. Whispered to grow, they have the teenager's affliction for getting totally hung up and fixated on everything. The best binding force: they can't be distracted. It's in their make up.

The one in the loose shirt vanishes and reforms, a wisp of thought and will driven by the speed of a tale. It's the person you forget that is dangerous. And Coyote is easy to forget. So is shard of glass he jams between the ribs, preferably. A conduit to rip out the divine, call it back, blood to blood.

The elder prince, the peacemaker, steps in front to attract attention that way to him. "In this story, the bad little boy caught red-handed gets sent to the warrior to learn what is right."

Three quick yips and then a fourth, that changes the beat. Four yips of power from the coyote. Three to call and fourth names him mortal. If he has his way, Loki just punted the skinwalker alone to Bucky and Claire... Simply missing the immortal shape-shifting part stuck in glass, where it can slough right off back into Mercy like water.

Mercy Thompson has posed:
The Star People.

While there is likely so much truth there the young Coyote doesn't wish to believe, to hear, or to see the legitimacy of Loki's words - so he doesn't. Common sense has no place in this particular picture. Just madness laced hysterics. A half-mortal mind was never intended to hold that much divinity within itself.

When the terrible wound is given to the smaller coyote the cry it evokes is something more human sounding than canine.

The younger Coyote raises his bloody muzzle and the power that was so rudely usurped from Mercy Thompson is added to his own. It allows the dark coyote to add the faintest height and bulk to itself, though still falling short of Loki's form. A harsh slash of anger radiates from the younger Coyote and with an inarticulate snarl the creature refocuses. Only to find the target has no morphed into four; three shades and the original. No one can have four of themselves in one single moment ... can they. So the Coyote assumes which is a grave error upon his part.

Still, nothing can be done at this point except for the Coyote to react. When those leaves and vines are thrown at him the Coyote automatically pulls forth shadows. They blanket his form and with a sidestep the creature pivots; intending to dart away, but already he's too slow. The first creeping vine wraps around a paw, then up a leg, until the beast struggles against the embrace of those immobilizing vines. Short harsh sounds erupt from the muzzle of the beast, but even that doesn't last long. Not when the diplomat enters the Coyote's field of vision. That movement calls forth the Coyote's yellowed gaze and just as their eyes meet that jagged piece of glass is neatly slide between ribs. If the Coyote could shout, it would, but he only offers a grunted sound of surprise and pain.

Then what was stolen from the father and the sister is finally retrieved. The shard of glass and the song of the coyote, sung just so by Loki, pulls forth the drops of the celestial and to a lesser extent the coyote's spirit - which is what allows a skinwalker to change shape.

Elsewhere in a field of red Claire Temple and the Winter Soldier find themselves alone. Their guide abruptly taken from them. Whether they moved or stayed in place they'll soon find themselves no longer alone. There's a shift around the two and between one blink and the next a coyote appears. Though hardly Mercy. And the coyote form doesn't stay long. As soon as the beast lands upon the ground the fur, claws and tail begin to melt away. What's left is a young man, twenties possibly, with high cheekbones, copper skin and light brown eyes, a familiarity there only stamped heavily with the masculine. His eyes, so like Mercy's and so not, are wild when he realizes what just happened and they turn toward the assassin and healer.

Bucky might see something familiar there. A madness created by the breaking of a mind and with a lurch the man rises to his feet.

And back with Mercy and Loki, a new presence is added to the mix. Old Coyote. For this moment he's taken the form of a forty-something rodeo worker; dressed in cowboy boots, heavily worn jeans, plaid shirt and cowboy hat. With a sweep his light brown eyes take everything in with that glance, even Loki and all his forms. While others might feel something like awe upon seeing Loki, Old Coyote doesn't. He may be younger than the Prince of Asgard, but he has just as much ego to be completely at ease with the other god's presence.

The man extends a hand outward and the few drops of blood that belonged to Old Coyote glow briefly, before disappearing. Subsumed back into the whole.

Claire Temple has posed:
Still they exist in an unnatural world swathed in a million shades of red -- that shifting, breathing, living red that surrounds them at all sides.

It is signal enough for Claire to keep her hands on the Soldier's -- on James Barnes's face -- holding him like an anchor point by the sigil glowing on the back of her hand.

"Keep touching me," is all her warning, delivered without explanation because she has none. "Don't let go, or I'll lose you. You gotta stay with me." She knows not the why, but now trusts in whatever has imbued her with this temporary power. A means to reach through the caging dark and confusing shadow; a means to keep his mind from being lost back into the nightmarish prison of --

His memory, Claire assumes, with a nauseated turn of her stomach. When your own /memory/ is turned into a torture --

Her marked hand walks itself down from his face in a constant brush of her fingertips and curl of her thumb, until it reaches the terminus point of his right hand, and she emphatically threads their fingers. Claire Temple has been many things for many people, but never let someone's literal ground wire --

-- and she adapts readily to this too, because she has to, slipping him one last look that pinches the corners of her eyes -- we got this, promise, says that look -- before her attention strays to a rivet of movement at their shared periphery.

That flash of ruddy fur opens Claire up with immediate relief, because what she thinks is: Mercy! She's found them again, she will guide them true as she's done this entire way, and she --

Is not this. This coyote is different, larger, and it half-steps Claire closer to Bucky's side, the movement as guarded as it is preparing for the worst. Her hand squeezes his, first in warning, and then in... shock as that animal begins to shed its shape, losing its animal features and melting away into -- a man.

He looks so much like Mercy Thompson. Yet his eyes do not have her center -- her wholeness.

"Who the hell are you?!" Claire demands angrily. "What is this?!"

Winter Soldier has posed:
Claire continues to hold him. And the Winter Soldier-- no, Bucky Barnes by now, in some way, shape, or form-- does not object. He has recognized, by now, that her touch makes the nightmares go away and restores him to his own mind.

Such as it is.

"Why am I seeing this," he asks her in a whisper. "What is this--"

He is distracted from his own confusion, however, when a sudden flicker of movement at their periphery catches his eye. He turns warily, still holding onto Claire with one hand, but his other transparently itches for a weapon. Especially when he sees the look in that young shapechanger's eyes.

Who are you? Claire demands.

"Someone who is going to start giving answers," the Soldier muses, the cold finality of an encroaching winter storm in his voice, as he turns towards the man.

Loki has posed:
Four of them occupy one space, such as a mental plane has 'space.'

The yellow-eyed coyote whuffles its discontent at a soft vibrato growl. Roughshod noises kip over teeth and tongue, soaring in a grating hum at the end.

Source of its discontent is the teenaged Loki bending over, facing away, hand clapped over his mouth. His shock of raven hair sways and the coronet threatens to come right off. Abjectly miserable sounds of biology in full rebellion make the queasiest of liquid choruses.

The one slightly older and far more capersome puts a hand on the kid's back, in part to keep him doubled up. "You act like you've never seen entrails before. Loki, gatherer of stories and sower of discord -- and chocolate crumbs -- sighs. "Come now, isn't this a bit melodramatic even for //us//?"

The prince is the one down on one knee, the circlet marked by curling gilded horns. Not an obscene length, to be sure, and the affectation is one perhaps the modern and the teen wish he'd do away with. He touches the brutal wounds carved into the smallest skinwalker, his fingers trailing across the torn edges of the skin. Blood and bile, living organs receive the same impersonal caress. It's he who slants a look to Old Coyote, younger and yet older, full of ego and his fair share of burgeoning malice in a common grain as his. None of them present like boredom. He can smell the similarities between fallen woman and taller, copper-skinned man in a cowboy hat.

The Elder Coyote bristles slightly and then gives himself a good shake. Fur flips inside, turning round on a thinner, taller human form in a good suit complete with damn chocolate cake, half-used. Crumbs came from a source, after all. Liam Serrure, for all intents and purposes, though his face is contorted by some curious, cold blend of emotions that leak out despite himself. Flares from a troubled star erupt around him, painting gossamer swirls of clouded jade and clotted gold.

He's beside Mercy's fragile form, scooping her up in his arms. Old Coyote and his other incarnations can go fuck themselves with a spork if they dare to interfere. Fingers brush her hair from her brow and he whispers urgently into her ear. "It's /not/ real." Oh, how it seems. "Mercedes Thompson, I tell you the story. A brave woman guided her friends through a deep, dark night. When they stumbled, she went back to them to show them the clear path. She could see where they were blind. They followed her until they could go no further." The low, rolling anger stipples his words, an orator's voice marked by a brimming frustration. Oh, the easy path isn't for him, not tonight, though he might knit the psychological damage together. It won't be the same. And damn Old Coyote there to pieces. "And she went into the night, where the scents were familiar and wrong. She felt afraid. The doubt hurt her. The fear cut her. They //lied// to her and told her she was hurt beyond repair."

He'd pray this works, but prayer is for supplicants. Loki bows to none, in spirit, not even the Odinforce he //might// petition. For a stranger on Midgard, some small creature attended by her own powers. He nuzzles into the space above her temple. The hint of danger is harder to detect, the pool of ice flaring behind him and the Prince flexing his hand like a sword is about to come to it. Liam Serrure, then, whispers, "But she was fine and whole. Come back, Mercy, and see for yourself. Your skin is as lovely as the moment I first set eyes on it in that ombre dress. Come back."

"Or he'll tear that boy apart. And possibly you." Poetic Trickster Loki smirks. Teenaged Loki looks patently alarmed. The prince raises an eyebrow at the Coyote.

Mercy Thompson has posed:
Old Coyote looks amused at the young teenager prince.

There's a note of agreement in his eyes in regards to the one that remarks about melodrama.

Then it's back to Mercy and Liam - Loki - the man, person, god, that Mercy's knows the most.

He gathers her in his arms, offering comfort through touch and word, but it's what Loki says that evokes the most reaction. His voice rolls over her form, reaching inward to the part that's still aware, that can still hear. The part that knows logically these wounds aren't real, even as the heart and mind dictates they are. The story and her name becomes anchor points for the coyote, or rather human woman, as she walks back from a brink that could have been deadly. The wounds upon abdomen begin to knit and heal, miraculously if this were the real world, less so upon this particular plane of existence. And as he offers that nuzzle against temple, Mercy will finally shift. An indrawn breath, a slight bit of movement, and then her hand will reach up to touch his face. "Loki." Comes his name, her voice rough, scratchy, but not in of itself broken.

Pushed perhaps beyond its limit, but not broken.

"I knew you'd find us." Is what's said next, implicit trust in those words, and then, "Why ... Why are there four of you." She asks, her eyes closing for a minute, uncertainty there, a question about what she's seeing, even as she tries to recall all that's happened.

Old Coyote watches. His gaze opaque with whatever thoughts and amusement are held within. Then with a click of tongue, the man speaks when it's clear Mercy shall live, "I suppose there's still hope to be had, isn't there. Good." And just like that Old Coyote is gone, a faint echo of a coyote's call echoing throughout the astral plane.

Young Coyote, or rather the young man, stares hard at both Claire and Bucky, and while he offers a haughty look at both, fear can be seen within his brown eyes. "I am Coyote! You cannot harm me!" And while that's no longer true and Bucky could easily hurt the young man before them, Old Coyote appears next to him. A heavy hand will be placed upon the young Coyote's shoulder, "No. You are not." And with a look that holds both mockery and sadness, Old Coyote vanishes, as does the son.

The web around Claire and Bucky offers a burst of brightness before it too disappears and all -Mercy, Loki(s), Claire and Bucky, will find themselves back at the beginning.

A point of crossroads; showing every road imaginable. Every opportunity that has, could have and might have been taken.

Winter Soldier has posed:
There is half a glance spared for the rest of the scene around them-- their unnatural environs-- but most of the Winter Soldier's attention is fixed on the broken-minded, defiant young man before them. The man who moments ago was a coyote, much like Mercy.

It's not hard to put together the puzzle pieces there. Especially not when the young man begins to speak. His words are brave, his stance haughty and self-assured, but the Winter Soldier knows the look and stink of fear, and both are heavy on this man who claims to be Coyote.

Claims that he cannot be harmed.

The sound of a gunshot rings out almost before the eye can register that the Soldier has moved. His .45 is aimed very precisely, the bullet intended for a major nerve cluster in the shoulder to induce as much pain as possible. In the Winter Soldier's eyes is furious, dead-eyed retribution for what he was just PUT through--

"Looks like I can," he observes.

And he looks like he might shoot to kill, in the next few moments, if not for the intercession of the Old Coyote.

The Soldier's head droops. So does his gun arm. The anger goes out of him as quickly as it appeared. Shell-shocked as he is by all he has just seen, he isn't in much condition to parse their new location.

Loki has posed:
The Lokis: look fast, they might be visible.

The teenager wrinkles his nose as the Trickster shoves him back out of the way, and the boy vanishes in a glint of slanting green fire.

The prince doesn't even bow, the cold-hearted smirk and the mere dip of his chin to Old Coyote's vanished presence signalling nothing and everything.

Liam Serrure will carry the burden of that woman skinchanger unless she fusses too greatly. For someone so relatively lean, without the impressive broad physique of a certain Russian-enhanced soldier, he isn't perturbed by her weight one bit.

His arm cradles the back of her head. Another hooks under her legs. Any hint of bruises or failing organs that insist they were just eaten by another hungry desert wolf are his business to worry after.

Her dark hair is comfort enough. The scent dispels some of the lingering rage prowling around in those green eyes. It does not dispel the sharp, self-satisfied grin of the magnificent bastard. The prince is the last to go, simply marching off down a road untaken in the dream realm.

"I suppose none of you had cake." They've moved past lattes. "We should."

Claire Temple has posed:
Those whispered questions from Bucky Barnes squeeze Claire's heart. There's a helplessness in ignorance, and she wishes she knew enough to give him an answer.

All her honest heart can do is soothe. "I don't know," she answers him, light and wan. "But it's safe now." Her hand tightens down in wordless vow.

Then, confronted with the younger Coyote, who proclaims his name and so much more, and --

-- a single bullet from Bucky's gun proves even psalms of the divine dead wrong. The sound of it widens her eyes and stops Claire silent.

She's still not sure what happened. She's still not sure what she's been through, what she's seen. She's still not sure this is even real.

But she's pretty fucking sure that makes her smile. Just a bit.

Then the elder man, just as unknown, takes the wounded son out of existence, and their entire world seems to distort and change.

Her daddy used to play a lot of Robert Johnson, and he sang about devils in crossroads, and Claire's not sure if that's what's happening here. She catches hints and glimpses of images that burn like afterimages behind her eyes: a future where she is a surgeon, a future where she accepts a Nobel Peace Prize, a future where she has her foot anchored onto a screaming someone's shoulder as she points a gun between his eyes, a future where her mother pulls weeds from her overgrown tombstone.

The life seems to ghost out of Bucky; Claire sensitizes to that, drawing close, her free hand lifted to touch questioningly to his face. She's so afraid to lose him again, lose him to those images, those tortures --

Here still in the astral realm, suddenly they are not alone. Four Lokis, and an unconscious Mercy Thompson among them. One by one, those strange, nuanced copies seem to disappear, as if any of this could make /less/ sense, and all that is left...

Claire stares through mention of cake. Her hand tightens around Bucky's. "Is she OK?"

Mercy Thompson has posed:
An odd glint enters Old Coyote's eyes, just before the two disappear, a look at Bucky that says 'I'll remember you'.

A promise, a curse, some type of promise held within the god's eyes.

As for Mercy, there isn't much protest when Loki picks her up; which might be quite telling to her state of mind. All of that is pushed aside, however, when Claire's voice is heard. That brings it really all back for the coyote, as her eyes open again. "Claire!" That name is said in both relief and surprise, her name possibly answering the question of whether Mercy Thompson is okay, even as surprise registers at the sight of Bucky.

It seems all the big guns were drawn out for this.

And while more could be said the world shifts again. The crossroads and all that could have, would have, might have been, fades, as the more mundane world beckons the four back. The web of power beneath the four, once vibrant and full of power, slowly fades, dying, as its creator's mind finds itself fractured.

The clearing will never be the same, as too much blood magic has tainted the ground, and as for those four sentinels, crow, snake, coyote and fox, all that's left of them now are the animals they were created from. Crow with broken neck while snake, fox and coyote can be found quite alive and darting this way and that, before managing to push the door open enough to escape.

Now comes the time of sorting things out; turning over all that happened, figuring out just how to parse it, and perhaps finding some passable explanations that don't many too many people twitch.

Cake surely wouldn't be such a bad idea here. And for some alcohol might be better.