Affection 2

Part 16

The realm was a barren and desolate wasteland when Loki and friends got there. The hot sun bore down on them from a sickly pale orange colored sky

Loki looked up with a chuckle, one of his hands over his face to shield his eyes from the hot sun.

"Wow, well you look at that? He basically lied about everything...well mostly everything." Loki looked to the tiny little oasis far away in front of them. A little bit beyond it lied a light silver tip at the - what it looked to be - the center of the trees.

Without even thinking about anything, his feet started to move. Fandral walked up to him and tried to keep his pace.

"Um, Loki, don't you think we should survey the area for anything?"

Loki thought about it for a moment. "Hm, nope."

"Wh-what? Dreco is a powerful magician just like you! He could conjure up enemies for us any moment!"

The dark-haired prince stopped and turned to Fandral. "We only have job. One mission and tha-"

Loki was interrupted by the faint cry of something.

Someone…

He turned to the castle, the source of the noise. It was silent around the group, nothing but the wildlife in the tiny oasis nearby, until he heard it again.

His eyes opened wide.

"Luna!"

Loki took off running, his heartbeat rising and rising with each step. His green eyes got wilder and wilder with fear and danger coursing through his veins. The only thing that kept him from having tear stained cheeks was the wind against his face.

He was running so fast that he didn't see the think branch in front of him. Loki hit the ground with a 'thunk'. As he blinked, he could he could hear his brother's gruff voice behind him and footsteps that rustled against the dead leaves on the ground.

"Are you okay, Loki?" Thor said, his eyes clouded with concern.

The young prince sat up with a nod. "Yeah, I'm fine. We just need to get to the castle quick before something extremely bad happens."

Just as Loki got up and said that, the sky grew dark and thick, gray, and opaque clouds escaped from the ground like a pipe leak.

Fandral let out a grunt and looked towards Loki.

"Yeah, yeah, Fandral, I know."

The group quickly got into their fighting stances, their senses on high alert, ready for anything at a moment's notice.

When the thick smoke, it took the shape of soldiers, each one facing a warrior, their eyes glowered dark and ominous. The dark gray uniforms had the outlines of the light elves' usual military uniform.

Loki laughed inwardly. He had to applaud Dreco for this moment.

It was ingenious.

The light elves' soldiers were smoke, pure gaseous substance. The perfect soldiers; they could kill enemies and never die; or maybe they could, but it would take a hell of a long time for a person to defeat them.

It was all silence as the soldiers and the group looked at each other, sizing one another up. Loki opened his mouth to give a command, but Thor yelled a battle cry and threw his hammer down on one soldier, the smoky entity dodging the hammer easily with a blank face.

Loki snarled as his soldier attacked him and the others, like a domino falling down on one another, blocking the entity hit. He took a look at everybody's soldier: Thor's had a sword and shield, Fandral's has a spear, Sif's had a javelin, Volstagg's had a combat staff, Hogun's had a battle axe, and his own had nothing but its own bare hands.