Loki -2021-2021 -

December 31, 2021. Midnight. Loki sat alone on the roof of the apartment building in the dying branch. Fireworks erupted across a dozen timelines at once, visible only to him. He raised a glass of champagne that didn’t exist—a phantom glass, a trick of light.

In May, he saved a child from a burning building in a timeline where fire obeyed different laws. The child’s name was Anders. He was six. He had green eyes and a stubborn chin. Loki told himself it was a strategic anomaly—a variable worth preserving. He did not admit that Anders reminded him of a younger, crueler version of himself, before the fall, before the void, before his mother’s gentle hands. Loki -2021-2021

When Loki stepped out again, the year on a Midgardian calendar was 2021. December 31, 2021

Thor shrugged. “I’ve seen worse. I’ve seen 2021.” Fireworks erupted across a dozen timelines at once,

He was Loki. God of Stories. And he had lived an entire lifetime in twelve months.