Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Ethan’s

“So you’re still not talking to Angel?” Willow asked as they checked out the costumes.

Buffy snorted and mock-parroted something he apparently said to her earlier, “‘I don’t know why you’re so upset, Buffy. Cordelia’s not a bad person. You just need to give her a chance.’ Yeah, right,” she snarled. “It’s like he has a blind spot when it comes to seeing how she acts around us.”

Willow gasped and pointed to the corner. “Maybe seeing you in that would make him forget about Cordelia!”

Turning to look, Buffy saw a gown straight out of a Disney movie. It was beautiful, perfect and she’d look amazing in it…and she wasn’t going to buy it. This time, Angel had to be the one to make an effort. She moved to the fantasy section and grabbed a leather armor outfit, complete with a cape. Not the most feminine, sure, but it could still turn a few heads if it fit as well as she hoped. Unfortunately, the tag identifying it was missing, but what did that matter?

Halloween evening…

Feeling the wave of magic pulsing over him, Loki cracked his neck and took in his surroundings. This wasn’t Asgard or any of the upper realms. Based on the blandness of it, he’d guess it was Midgard. Knowing his luck, Thor would find him here and assume he was trying to subjugate them.

“Buffy…Buffy!” a young girl in a flattering, yet very revealing outfit yelled as she ran up to him.

“Pardon?” he inquired. His all-speak wasn’t translating the word into something he understood.

“She’s not Buffy,” the girl murmured, either to herself or the man behind her holding a weapon.

Loki was about to correct her on his gender, when he looked down at himself and saw that he actually was in a female form. Perhaps ‘Buffy’ was a person’s name? He had an epiphany and realized that the magic he felt earlier must have been somehow responsible for this turn of events.

“What do we do?” the girl pleaded as a couple monsters approached them from across the street.

He concentrated on the spell and waved his hands outward, turning the creatures back into their human forms.

Children.

Someone cast a spell on children.

He felt rage and protectiveness boil up inside him. How dare this amateur use magic in such a hideous way?!

Reversing the spell on the pair next to him. The girl disappeared, but the boy’s gun turned back into a toy. He ordered, “Find your friend and then get to a safe place and stay there. I will deal with this!”

“You got it, Buff,” the boy agreed. “We’ll go to the library and find Giles.”

The stench of foul magic led him to a costume store, where he found a man standing over a statue of Janus…the poser god.

“Ah, Slayer…where’s your Watcher?” the man asked. “I was really hoping to see Ripper.” When Loki didn’t answer him right away, he smirked. “You don’t know who you are, do you?”

Loki grabbed him by the throat and lifted him up, then replied, “I am Loki, the true god of mischief, and I am most unhappy with your trifling.” His eyes flashed green as he started his punishment.

The screams could be heard for blocks.

Chapter Text

Outside Ethan’s

Once he had destroyed the sorcerer who inflicted that spell on helpless children, Loki could feel the body’s owner – and something else – attempting to seize back control. He had a few options here; first, he could make an effort to fight back, but that something else was so primal and looming that he wasn’t entirely certain he could overpower it.

Second, he could sever the spell holding him here on his own and return to his own dimension. He really didn’t want to do that since all he had to look forward to there was spending the rest of his life in the dungeons of Asgard.

That left option three – try to persuade the girl, Buffy, and her other self to allow him to share her body.

Before he could consider his choices in depth, a coven of vampires came up to him. The blond male leading them seemed to want to kill him based on his expression, but the brunette female at his side gazed wistfully at him, as if he held the answers to all her desires. Maybe jealousy was the male’s issue?

“Mischief man from beyond the stars,” the woman sing-songed as she circled him, running her fingers along his chin and through his hair. “You can make our family whole again. Give me daddy back,” she pleaded.

Now the male really looked unhappy.

“Dru, pet, is that really a good idea?” he murmured resentfully.

In reply, she hissed and scratched at the blond.

Loki took a moment to delve into the male vampire’s mind and learn what Dru was asking for. He could have tried her mind, but she radiated madness, so he’d prefer to avoid it for the moment. ‘Daddy’ was a vampire named Angel (or Angelus) who was cursed with a soul and either left his coven or was driven away when he wouldn’t feed on humans anymore. The irony was that he was in town, presumably to help the vampire Slayer – whom Loki was currently possessing – to fight his own kind.

Normally, he wouldn’t care about Midgardians, but between the earlier spell and Buffy’s determination to protect them, he knew that he couldn’t do what this vampiress wanted…at least not in the way she was asking. She would never agree to his request if he unleashed the cursed vampire onto humanity again…especially if Spike was correct and they had feelings for each other.

That notion caused him to roll his eyes metaphorically. Some higher power enjoyed the star-crossed lovers story a little too much.

But because of his nature towards mischief, he would still grant her wish.

To do so, he needed to dive into the sea of insanity that was her mind. What he found caused him to reel back in horror. The torture she endured at the hands of Angelus caused a flashback to his time with The Other while he was in the Void. Between that and Buffy’s revulsion at learning what ‘her vampire’ was capable of, he felt the strong urge to track that beast down and remove him from existence.

Truly, it would be a mercy to release Drusilla from her torture-induced psychosis.

When he attempted to sever them from the world, he felt a protection surrounding the souled vampire. Why would he warrant such protection from the Norns when Loki was left to suffer for his relatively minor infractions? If he had caused more suffering, would he be worthy of a second chance like this monster?

If he couldn’t undo the suffering that way, he’d do it another way. He reached out and ran his hands along the sides of her face gently. “I’ll ease your suffering, dóttir,” he promised. He wouldn’t take the memories of her suffering, but he would disassociate her from them. Then he bound their souls to their bodies and to each other. They would be a family until they were killed permanently.

It would be good for Angel/us to take responsibility for his actions in a tangible way instead of just brooding about them.

Even Buffy seemed to agree with his decision.