I'll Follow You To...

Not Alone

After pulling Loki into hell with her, the demon carried him, held under his arms, as she flew across the varied landscape.

He didn't take in much of his surroundings as he drifted in and out of consciousness, still exhausted from the overuse of magic and the blood loss.

There was no sun to be seen. Instead, the sky glowed brightly as if it was the source of light itself. It was coloured in various shades of yellow to deep orange and dark reds and every so often a crack of green or blue would streak across it like a lightning bolt. Loki thought it seemed as if the sky itself was on fire.

They crossed lakes of burning lava and cool meadows. Flew over empty wastelands scattered with the bones of vast creatures, and twisting jungles with plants that moved and grabbed at their feet, trying to pluck them from the air.

Other creatures that crawled below or flew above either ignored them or stayed fearfully away from his winged protector.

At some point he passed out completely and only woke as he felt clawed hands peeling off his tattered clothes and lowering him slowly into a cool bath.

He did nothing to protest. The red streaks that floated through the water as he was lowered in gave him a hint at the severity of his condition.

Afterwards, they carried him to a small room within the cave complex, laid him on his stomach on a bed of wool, then started tending to his wounds. As with the first time a demon had scratched his skin he wasn't healing as fast as he should have, and now he was an absolute mess.

Long strips of dark sticky vegetable matter were stretched over the wounds to hold them closed and soothe the pain.

They left him to sleep for what seemed like days, only waking him every so often to feed him a spoonful of sour tasting broth.

Sometimes he thought he felt gentle fingers stroking his hair, but whoever it was didn't speak, just sat by him quietly.

Eventually, he woke up and realized the pain was gone. He decided it was time to get up and figure out where he was.

He threw off the small pelt they had laid over him, looked around the dimly lit room and found his TVA uniform hanging on a hook in the rock wall. Expecting it to be full of holes and soaked with blood, he was surprised to find it clean and whole.

He then heard quiet footsteps, almost imperceptible, approaching the room. He cast an illusion to make himself blend into the surroundings and backed up against the wall.

When he saw Sylvie's small form enter he dropped his illusion before she could wonder where he was.

"Sylvie, is it finally you?"

He hoped he hadn't just found yet another Loki that looked like her.

"Loki!... you're awake! Good." She responded a bit startled, looking up and over and then glancing down, then quickly up again. "I fixed your clothes." She pointed to the clothes hanging on the wall.

"You know...if you want to get dressed?" She fidgeted, "Not that anyone around here will mind." She nodded but kept her eyes fixed on the ceiling.

Loki looked down, "Oh".

He dressed as quickly as possible, moving swiftly to grab his clothes. He remembered to use magic after almost putting them on backwards in his haste.

Now dressed Sylvie looked at him with a mixture of relief and disappointment, but it was definitely much less awkward.

"How are you feeling?" She pursed her lips and didn't look him in the eye as she asked.