The Ragnarok Trials

Day Thirteen: Called Out In The Dark

Day Thirteen
         Called Out In The Dark
Focus Word: Time
Word Count: 2832

Athena wasn't at the library, nor was she at the Courthouse. So I trekked to the other side of town, crossed the boundary of God Town and entered a plain, but serviceable development called Kensington Place. It seemed that Athena was another of those unfussy types, though I suppose that was to be expected from the Virgin Goddess. Building 2A was actually the third building in, but the number was big enough that it would take an absolute moron to miss it (a test, perhaps?), so of course I had no issue finding it.

Up two flights of stairs to the third floor, I knocked on the first apartment I came to.

"Who is it?" called a voice, crisp and clear, through the door. "Ah, Loki, come in."

I stared at the door for a moment, chagrined. How had she known who was there? The voice sounded like it had come from the back of the apartment, and no shadow had indicated someone behind the door.

"Well don't just stand there like an idiot, open the door and come in. You do know how to use a doorknob, do you not, Lie-smith?" It didn't sound as bad as it looks. Really, it sounded as if the goddess were laughing, amused at my reaction. It sounded like something she had expected and in which I hadn't let her down. This was not a sound I was used to from Athena.

"I know how to use a doorknob, Athena, thank you." To prove that I wasn't lying, I reached out and opened the door, letting myself into Athena's abode.

The strangest of feelings rushed over me then, as if a bunch of spiders or perhaps the fluttering of owl wings had brushed up against me, gone before I had taken a second step into Athena's apartment. If I hadn't known better, I would have thought that it was a manifestation of the goddess' power, guarding and protecting her abode. But that power was denied us now, so I was undoubtedly mistaken. She must have had an item of power in her possession, the lucky bitch.

See, items that were imbued with our power before we fell did not lose their power when we did. It's why Odin's curse had remained on me even though Odin no longer had the power to curse anyone. As I said before, chains once forged do not fall apart because the one who forged them no longer can. And so our items of power.

Now, that's not to say that we have direct control over the power within these objects. No, we cannot shape it or twist it in whichever shape we want. We can, however, use its power--its intended purpose--for our own ends. Athena probably had an item meant for defense, protection, or warding, and had rigged it to guard her apartment. Just like the Norse had pooled their own power into an object of home and hearth--probably something of Frygg's--and then allowed it to shape their world to their liking.

It was rather like torture, in my mind, to use these things. A small taste of the sweet addiction that was our power, a narrow sliver of the most delicious feeling we fallen ones can ever know, tempting us, oh how tempting it is, to be so much more, to reach so much farther into ourselves. To once again be what we were. It is torture, indeed, to be reminded of what we once were, to be what time now denies us, memories encroaching so close, too close, setting fire to our desires like nothing else.

They are a drug, these items. A dangerous and wonderful drug that all too many of us are addicted to because we cannot but want a taste of ourselves once more. To be what we were when we ruled the world. It's like we can't help ourselves, 'cause we don't know how to back down, we don't know how to accept that things have changed and we can no longer be what we were.

I can't help but wish I had access to one of these items. I yearn for one, in fact. Oh, for all of Gabriel's claims of my impending humanity, my solidity and my steadfastness growing daily, I would trade all of these feelings of stalwart stability for the chance to once again be as the smoke. To feel the twisting, eddying whims of chaos and to be as the wind, free and formless.

I would be lying if I said I would not give up Gabriel himself to be who I once was. And it is this more than anything that belies my impending humanity. Though I do admit to feeling a certain sadness every time I realize this truth about myself

Athena was smiling, hands on her hips, grey eyes twinkling. They looked a lot like Gabriel's eyes. So much so, in fact, that I started upon seeing them. "Uh, hey lady..."

"Hello, Loki." Athena was a beautiful woman. Stunningly so, in fact. Enough to tease poor Paris greatly, she and Hera and Aphrodite. In fact, she might have won if not for Helen. Dark hair, a shining coal, was bound up against her head in a messy bun, several tendrils of which twirled about her perfectly symmetrical face. Her lips were not quite as full as I liked, but when they parted in a smile, they seemed two perfect slices of red apple, teeth white and perfect. Bosom full and hips round, but graceful, she was absolutely breathtaking in every way.

I might have to mend my list. Aphrodite still remains number one, but Athena has just replaced Freya as number two. Maybe it's the fact that she tried to kill me earlier, but Freya was no longer particularly attractive to me these days. This is not to diminish Athena's beauty.

Man do I have a thing for Greek goddesses, yeah? I mean, I've never seen a female Angel, so I don't know, but the Greeks might be the most beautiful pantheon ever. Seriously.

"You are looking lovely, Athena," I ventured, smiling and sweeping my eyes along the length of her. She was wearing jeans and a t-shirt, but the simplicity of the outfit only enhanced how beautiful she was. "Men must have a hard time with the virginity clause..."

Athena laughed and waved me away. "Oh, that. I dispensed with that some time ago, Loki. One of the benefits of no longer being bound to some ridiculous belief system. I found me a man and got down a long time ago. Sex is a regular thing for me these days."

I blinked. And then I blinked again, this time accompanied by a coughing laugh that did little to hide my aroused discomfort. Hot damn, was what she just said hot. "Uh...great!"

"You'll have to work harder than that if you want to go any further with this, Loki," she teased, hand on her hip as she stood in the middle of her living room. It was a regular IKEA theme park in here, or perhaps a temple, given the power I'd felt on my way in. I scanned the room, but I couldn't see anything even remotely interesting or likely as the culprit. Mostly, I saw tasteful art and lots of law books. The room was painted a lovely powder blue, the furniture plush and luxurious, but not gaudy in any way. It was really, really organized though.

The bachelorette pad incarnate. Oh my God, Athena had turned into the female Hermes...

"Your place is lovely, Athena. You must be doing very well for yourself these days."

Athena closed the book she'd obviously been reading when I arrived, and tucked it into a shelf before gesturing toward the couch. "I suppose that's a start, Lie-smith. Now, you must be here about Baldur. I can tell you that Ares has no alibi. He left Aphrodite's side at midnight, a full three hours before Baldur was killed. I am not, however, sure that it was him. He is a stupid man, but the stint as Mars was really good for him."

I sat next to her and sighed. "I am getting really tired of everyone knowing what I'm going to ask before I ask it. I'm used to being the smart one, damn it."

"Aww, sweety, I'm a wisdom goddess. You never stood a chance with me." Athena's nose crinkled in the most becoming way when she laughed, and I found my heart pounding quite unexpectedly. Well, I did say that faithfulness was not quite within me yet, didn't I? And she was quite beautiful, was Athena. "You want to know where I was the night Baldur was murdered, I presume?"

"Of course, Athena." I leaned back against the arm of the couch, facing the goddess, who sat cross-legged next to me.

"At the law library. I am spending the next few decades as a lawyer. I'll have to appear to age, of course, but it'll give me something to do for now. There was a big case, so my colleagues and I were up all night researching and writing depositions. I can provide witnesses, of course, and camera footage. I never once left the building that night." Athena smiled. "You, of course, have already figured out who it was, so this is all a charade, you silly man, you."

I chuckled. "Had to come to see you, Athena. Any excuse to see a beautiful woman."

"Ooo, you charmer. Now you're getting somewhere." Athena sipped at a glass of wine that she'd had from before I arrived. "If you would like one, I can get one for you. It's Italian, of course."

"Sounds lovely."

The glass appeared on the table in front of me.

"What the fuck? How did you do that, Athena?! What kind of item of power do you have?" I jumped, my body feeling as if it would tear its way out of my skin and jolt back into Asgard. Not that it could, of course. Or could it?

Athena sighed. "Keep this a secret, please. I can keep Bacchus out, and I mask it as an item of power, but I would rather not have the entire world knowing I've managed to keep my power." She took a sip of wine and smiled. "Time is an illusion, Loki. Have you managed to learn this lesson in all your years here?"

"I thought I had. Clearly not..."

The goddess nodded. "I tell you this because you work for the Angels. I am a goddess of justice and law and wisdom, and so I admire them greatly, particularly Michael. I would not want them to believe I use this power to subvert their wishes, nor do I seek to reassert myself as a power within the world. It is merely a discovery I made some months ago."

"What?"

"That we never fell." At my look of confusion, Athena chuckled. "Time is an illusion. It is not linear, it does not happen and simply disappear into nothing. It does not come, looming big and bright, only to exist for a moment and then die. All times are now, all times are one. It is how God is able to be everywhere all at once. God is forever in the present, completely aware of that moment and every other moment because all of those moments are right now. I came to this conclusion, and my power returned to me. I never fell because, at this moment, I am soaring high on Olympus. I am springing from my father's head. I am claiming Athens for myself. And I am sitting here with you, sipping wine and giving away the great secret of my existence."

"I don't understand...God can exist in all times, but surely we can't..."

Athena snorted. "Of course we can. We are, at our core, made up of the same stuff as He. He is larger, yes, encompassing more. He is every one of us in a singular, ever changing form. So much like you, actually, but with complete control over the forms he takes and by no means at the whim of chaos. But we are, on a smaller scale, made up of the same stuff. I am all that I was, all that I am, all that I will be, and so I have full access to my power. Without all the sticky rules that come with having human belief determine me. I do wish I had discovered this earlier. I might have mated much sooner..."

"So...Medusa, then."

Athena frowned. "I am sorry for that. Even when it happened, I could feel the injustice in it. But I was bound to do what I did because my world was a world of male domination. If I could undo my choice, I would. But even now, I choose it. I always choose it. Time would change too much if I didn't. I have released her soul, of course, and destroyed the Aegis."

"I am sorry I asked, then."

"Don't be." The frown turned into a smile and Athena leaned forward. "I am free now. Because I have made this discovery. I would have been always free had I known, but I was not as wise as I thought. Do you want to learn how to do this? Do you want to be as you once were? Feel the tingling of your power in your fingers and along the tracings of your spine? I can teach you, if you want."

A shiver went down my spine, as much because of the feel of her breath on my skin as anything else, but also because the offer she made was damned tempting. To be as I once was. Powerful, silver-tongued in the extreme, smarter than all, without this prison of flesh always encasing me. I yearned to feel myself again, to be free, to lose the conscience I had begun building. I wanted to be cruel and to be kind all at once, to follow the patterns of chaos, to choose to float or to change direction for the hell of it.

I wanted to be powerful again. To be free.

And yet. And yet, was I not free now? Was I not free to choose myself?

But Athena was free, too. She was free to be herself, to use her power as she saw fit. And she chose to be wise with it. To guard it. To keep it a secret. Why, then did she offer it to me?

Was it the wiser course to say no? Could I be trusted with this power, as she could be, or would I become a threat to everyone I loved? Was my own power worth it? To betray Gabriel's trust and destroy our friendship, our relationship, and what it might become? Was it worth it to prove everyone right, that I would always choose the path that benefited me first and foremost?

Could I hold this power and not seek revenge on those that had punished me? Would I not break Christ's law and bring destruction upon myself?

Was it not better to exist, mostly whole and almost happy, than to not exist, powerful and complete? I didn't know. But I did know what Athena wanted my answer to be. And if she wanted it, it was probably the right answer. If I could not be trusted to do the right thing, she surely could. And so I answered.

"No. No, I could not trust myself with such power, even if I wanted it. I am trying to learn...humanity, Athena. Do not tempt me with myself when I am seeking to reforge myself as something new. Please." I shook my head, looking away, eyes closed tight against the feeling of loss that traced its way through my veins. Part of me, a larger part than I had ever realized, had wanted to say yes and to accept this power, and this part now raged within me, demanding me to change my answer and take the power I deserved.

I quashed it. I had to if I wanted to keep going. And I needed to keep going, for myself and for everyone who believed in me.

"Right answer, Lie-smith. You are learning well. And for your efforts, I will give you assistance in your case. You might not realize what it is, but it is exactly what you need." Leaning back, Athena reached up and pulled her t-shirt off, revealing the sumptuous mounds of her breasts, trapped within the encasing fabric of a bra, but beautiful nonetheless. "And now, if we've had enough of the talking, I think I'd like to take you to my bed now."

There weren't too many more words that evening, and those that were spoken you probably don't want to hear. Hey, if Athena wanted it, it had to be the wisest course of action. And that's the answer I'm sticking with, damnit.