lt_safe_house | A night at the bar

Entry tags:

A night at the bar

Date: April 2, 2003, evening
Status: Public (Complete)
Setting: The Manor Bar
Summary: Loki invited me for a drink, so here I am... Let's see who else is coming.

Staying in one place for a while had its advantages. Loki was in a surprisingly good mood. Whistling a tune he had heard at sometime during the past few weeks and that had stuck in his head, he walked into the manor bar. he was hoping his other self would make good on the promise that they'd have a drink or two together. He most definitely wanted to find out a bit more about him. As important it was to know both your friends and enemies inside out - it was certainly even more important to know yourself, if you were planning to end the world.

In the door that lead to the bar, he stopped to see who else was present, if anyone.

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Loki joined in with the other's laughter. "I can't blame you," he said. "Neither would I."

Then he grew serious again. "Why not go back, then? I assume you could go back? Do you think Asgard would be different for us if each of us returned there?" He reached out for the cards, wondering if his other self would stop him from taking them.

Loki thought about that. "At least the welcome we'd receive probably would be. And what'd be the use returning without Odin? The rest barely tolerate us at all." He wasn't entirely sure Heimdall would even let him pass.

The cards were marked, of course, but not his only or even best pack. No reason to keep them from himself unless he feared being exposed as a cheater which wasn't too big a risk, he decided. Who'd turn himself in like that? Besides, he'd only been doing card tricks and could always claim that he used a different pack when playing with others.

"Who needs Odin?" Loki asked with some distaste in his voice.

He gestured to the bartender to refill his cup, then started shuffling the cards, alternately using one hand or two and showing off different shuffling techniques. "What are we playing?" he asked.

"Well, the rest probably won't want to hang out with me, so it'd be pretty boring in Asgard without him. Might as well stay here and make some new acquaintances. Seems this place attracts gods of all kind which makes it rather interesting."

He watched himself shuffle with rising mistrust.

"Nothing we bet over. I'm not playing against myself with a pack of ... trick cards."

"They'd have my head for good this time, if I showed up there again," Loki muttered. "Have there ever been any... incidents here?"

At some point of time, the cards had changed into a deck with cups, coins, swords and rods in his hands. The one he had taken from his other self was securely tucked away. He'd examine it later. It wasn't stealing if you took something from yourself. Not really. He dealt each of them five cards, tossed the eleventh down on the counter between them, and put the stack face-down, waiting to see what the other Loki would do now.

Loki picked up the cards, gave himself a mildly reproachful look before arranging him in an order that appeared to please him.

"Incidents of what sort?" he asked casually.

"Someone not complying with the rules. Trying to kill or harm or whatever a citizen of the village or one of the people here. Anything. I jsut want to know if there's a precendent for what might happen."

He waited to see if the other Loki would start playing a card, then added:

"I'd feel safer if I knew how safe I was from retaliation for escaping," although he was pretty sure that the other one would know it for a half-truth at best.

Loki casually threw out a card as if at random. This was the first time, he realised, that he didn't know his own hand.

"Upper Tadfield's fair game, we think," he remarked. "So if you're afraid," a smirk "You'd better not leave Lower Tadfield."

Maybe one shouldn't accuse oneself of cowardice, but on the other hand, Odin certainly would have.

"You need to draw a new one", Loki reminded his other self as he chose a card and casually flipped it on top of the other two.

"You think. So you're not sure? Has anyone ever tried?"

If that one didn't know himself well enough to know he wasn't a coward, then that was his problem. Let them think him weak. That way some of the things he intended to say would appear much less threatening.

"We did," Loki said deliberately vaguely. "But Adam wasn't here at the time, so ..." He shrugged. "We're pretty sure, anyway."

Loki took up a new card and waited for the other one to make his choice.

"How often is he gone? And for how long?"

Loki shrugged. "He was gone when I arrived and didn't show up until this morning. If he has regular traveling habits, I haven't had the chance to figure them out."

He casually threw down another card this time picking up a replacement, but not even looking at it.

"But he's here now?" Loki asked, carefully selecting a card, putting it down on the stack and looking at his other self. "Swords," he said as he took a new card and squinted at it as if he didn't like what he saw and hoped that he would be able to change the card if only he concentrated on it hard enough.

"He's here," Loki confirmed. "Or was, I don't think he lives in the manor, probably has his own place somewhere in town. Nobody really seemed to know when I asked."

This was bad. He had one swords card, but no more. Reducing his hand had been a bad idea while he had no matching pack on him. He had to palm some cards soon, but it was too early in the game. His other self was bound to notice, if some of the fallen cards disappeared.

"Do me a favor and point him out to me when we see him, will you?" Loki asked.

"Are you going to play a card or not?"

"Of course," Loki promised and looked around for Adam, even though he knew he'd left the bar a while before his other self had arrived.

"What? Oh, sorry, almost forgot," he threw down his only swords card and picked up two new ones without looking at them.

"I have a strange way of counting," Loki remarked, putting down a card of Cups that matched the number of the other Sword's, thereby indicating that he had not needed the swords at all, but only requested them on a whim.

I took a new card, wondering if they were playing the same game at all. If so, an additional card on your hand could mean you were going to lose.

"How so?" Loki asked. Neither of the cards he'd drawn was much use, but one of them was cups, so he threw that down and slipped the other into his sleeve.

"Because I just took two cards," Loki said drily, putting down another one.

"Your turn."

"Well, I guess in that case I should better throw down two as well," Loki said dropping two random cards onto the table and taking one.

"So, I take it you haven't met any of the others in your travels lately?"

"No, I haven't," Loki confirmed. "I only met mortals who didn't even recgnize our name."

He took a card from the stack, glanced at it and tossed it onto the heap.

"Honestly, I have no idea where they are."

"Well, I have a very vague idea where my versions of hem are," Loki said with a shrug. "And you can't have met a lot of humans, if none of them knew our name. Most have heard of us, though they're not too clear about the details."

He threw the next card out of his wrist in an almost horizontal line and it slid in under the rest of the stack. "Aw, missed."

"I met a few, but most of them were completely blank where we were concerned," Loki retorted.

"That was a four of coins, wasn't it?" He grinned and put down a seven of coins on top of the stack, drew a fresh card and shoved it at his other self. "You forgot to draw again, you know."

"Actually," Loki claimed. "I'm pretty sure it was swords. And you said I drew too many earlier, remember?"

At least his two of coins fit nicely on top of his seven.

Putting down another card, loki indicated to the barman to refill his cup.

"You're sure you don't want any mead?" he asked hies other self, still barely able to believe.

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