A young girl in the palace of Asgard sat by herself on the steps, playing with her figurines.

"The dragon swoops towards the palace, the Valkyrie flies over, defeats the dragon, and saves Asgard." She played.

A Time Door opened behind her. Three figures emerged, TVA Minutemen. The Hunter at the lead, a dark-skinned woman with curly hair, pulled out a Tempad.

"There's our Variant." She said. The other Minutemen immediately moved into action to sieze her. "On the authority of the Time Keepers, I hereby arrest you for crimes against the Sacred Timeline. Reset it."

"Wait!" The girl screamed as the lead Minuteman pulled her through the Time Door. The other Minutemen bent down to the toy boat and other figurines and set the Reset Charges, demolishing any trace of them existing.

The young girl emerged through the Time Door with the Hunter. She was walked down to a service desk. To the side, a man was brought in as well. Grunting in pain as he was being strong armed and battered by the TVA soldiers.

"HELP HIM!" The girl screamed.

The Hunter ignored her cries and dragged her off to the TVA screening rooms. After a series of proceedings she was escorted by the Hunter into the courtroom.

"Next case." The judge announced.

The young girl bit the Hunter in the arm, then proceeded to step on her foot. The Hunter cried in pain. Taking advantage of the distraction she escaped from the Hunter's grasp.

"Next case!" The judge demanded.

"Right here!" The Hunter exclaimed but it was too late.

The Hunter looked down at her waist to realize something was missing. She looked up to see that the young girl had taken her Tempad and was already pressing buttons on it. A Time Door emerged. The girl looked back defiantly at the Hunter before eventually running through it.

***

Judge Renslayer took a deep breath in then out as she rode the elevator up as if to calm her nerves. As she entered the room her breath was reduced to a tremble. There they were. Sitting in front of her on their thrones. The Timekeepers.

***

Mobius paced outside of the elevator. Mobius ran to it in a haste as the doors opened.

"What'd they say?" He asked Ravonna immediately as she exited. "Are you okay?"

"No, no, Mobius. I'm not." Ravonna said frantically. "Under the best of circumstances, it's jarring to stand before the Time Keepers. And this is not the best of circumstances."

"Yeah, but they can't blame you." Mobius said.

"They can and do." Ravonna iterated. "The Variant was right here. What if she got to the Time Keepers?"

"I know, but she didn't." Mobius said.

"No, but she got away." Renslayer said. "Along with the Variant that I gave you permission to bring in here."

Mobius averted his eyes.

"Do you have any idea how impossible it is to keep the timeline stable?" Renslayer said. "The Time Keepers are all that stand between us and full-scale calamity."

"And I'm glad they're on our side." Mobius said. "But if they want me to find Loki and the Variant I need access to Hunter C-20."

"I'm sorry, but that's impossible."

"Look, when we found her she kept saying "It's real. It's real." over and over. I need to find out what that meant and what else she saw when she was with the Variant." Mobius said. "Look I know there's protocol but she could have information-"

"She's dead, Mobius!" Ravonna whispered firmly.

"What? How?" Mobius asked, puzzled.

"The Variant, she enchanted C-20, scrambled her mind." Ravonna said, averting her eyes.

"I don't get it. She seemed okay, she seemed fine." Mobius said.

"At first, yes." Ravonna said. "But by the time she got in here she could barely speak. The decline was steeper after that."

"I didn't know. What..."

"Nobody does." Ravonna said. "We don't want people to panic. Can I trust you to keep that between us?"

"Of course. Yes." Mobius affirmed. "I'm sorry."

"Every moment those Variants are out there, we're all in danger." Renslayer said then added. "Find them."

Judge Renslayer departed, leaving Mobius to his thoughts.

***

The destruction continued on Lamentis.

Loki followed Sylvie back to a pair of boulders sitting next to a lake. Loki approached her with a gloomful look, as if ashamed to face her.

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He took a seat on the rock next to her. "I'm sorry."

She turned to him, producing a ginger nod with her head before speaking. "I remember Asgard. Not much but I remember. My home, my people, my life." She said. "The universe breaks free, so it manifests chaos. Like me being born the Goddess of Mischief. And as soon as that created a big enough detour from the Sacred Timeline. The TVA showed up, erased my reality, and took me prisoner. I was just a child. I escaped. Stole a Tempad and I ran for a long, long, time. Which really sucked. Everywhere and every-when I went, caused a Nexus event. Sent up a smoke flare. Because I'm not supposed to exist. Until eventually, I figured out where to hide. And so that's where I grew up, the ends of a thousand worlds. Now...that's where I'll die."

A silence fell on the two of them as they looked out beyond the lake.

***

"There's nothing sir." The analyst said.

"Even with the magnified nexus threshold?" Mobius inquired. "That one should be setting off alarms if somebody steps on the wrong leaf."

"Wherever they are, I'm not sure anything survives." The analyst responded.

"Yeah, don't underestimate them. You see anything down at Roxxcart?" Mobius asked.

"They're gone." B-15 responded. "Leaping across time, plotting their next massacre. Any news on C-20?"

Mobius swallowed. "No."

B-15 shook her head in disbelief. "We need to find them."

"We will." Mobius reassured.

***

The meteors really began to increase in size as they hit down on Lamentis. The moon was on it's last legs.

"Not long now." Sylvie said, all hope gone in her voice. "Do you think what makes a Loki a Loki is the fact that we're destined to lose?"

"No." Loki said. "We may lose. Sometimes painfully. But we don't die. We survive. I mean you did. You were just a child when the TVA took you, but you nearly took down the organization that claims to govern the order of time. You did it on your own. You ran rings around them. You're amazing."

Through the sorrow a smile slowly bloomed on Sylvie's face. Loki looked down to realize that she had taken his hand.

The meteors began to fall in their vicinity. An enormous eruption was headed their way.

The two Loki's turned to face each other and braced for the end.

***

"We've got something." One of the analyst said. "Temporal lock."

Mobius leaned in to observe the monitors. On the screen a massive branch was starting to form, traveling directly upwards almost in a straight vertical line. "Okay that's not someone stepping on the wrong leaf. You ever seen a branch like that?"

"No." B-15 stared at the screen in amazement.

***

Back on Lamentis, two Time Doors suddenly opened in front of the two Lokis. Within moments they were back at the TVA, Time Collars engaged as they wrestled against the grips of their guards. The two Lokis looked back at each other as the Minutemen seperated between two groups. Mobius looked back in confusion as they carried Loki into the Time Theater.

"Well?" Mobius said.

"Well what?" Loki said.

"I know you got some quip you're dying to say." Mobius said.

"Oh I don't have a quip." Loki said bitterly. "I've got nothing to say."

"Come on." Mobius taunted.

"By the way I should have an equal amount of security." Loki uttered. "This is insulting."

"You just can't help yourself." Mobius said.

"You betrayed me!"

"You betrayed me." Mobius shot back.

"Oh, grow up." Loki said.

"You grow up." Mobius said. "You know it occured to me that you're not really the God of Mischief."

"Oh, here it comes." Loki said, practically rolling his eyes. "The folksy, dopey insult from the folksy dope. What am I the God of Self-Sabotage, yeah? The God of Back-Stabbing?"

"Just kind of an asshole." Mobius said. "And a bad friend. Yeah, chew on that for a little bit. All right, it's ready."

A glowing red door appeared. It's form looked similar to that of a Time Door.

Loki looked in horror. "What is this?"

"You'll see." Mobius said with a smile.

"MOBIUS!" Loki cried as the guards prepared to throw him in.

"No, no, no." Mobius told the guards. "Let him, one last desperate trick from the desperate trickster. Go ahead."

Loki looked into Mobius's eyes. "The TVA is lying to you."

Mobius put on an amused smile. "Put him in."

***

Loki emerged from the red Time Door in a dining hall in Asgard.

"What?" He questioned as he looked around. Then chuckled in amusement. "Seriously?"

A figure entered the room. A woman carrying a large piece of hair missing from one side of her head. "You." She said with seething contempt.

Loki turned. "Sif!" He said with excitement.

"You conniving, craven, pathetic worm. You did this." She said, making rapid strides towards him.

"What?"

As she approached she slugged him in the face. He winced in pain.

"I hope you know you deserve to be alone and you always will be." Sif said.

"All right." Loki said, bending to look past her. "A bad memory prison? How quaint."

Sif immediately thrusted her knee into his groin and punched him in the face, sending him spiraling to the ground before exiting the hall from the other side.

Loki groaned in pain as he slowly got to his feet. "Some punishment. I remember exactly what I did after that. I went and had a nice long bath and a glass of wine. And never thought about it again, because it was just a bit of fun."

"You." Sif emerged again. "You conniving, craven, pathetic worm. You did this."

"Hang on..." Loki began.

Sif hit him in the face. "I hope you know you deserve to be alone and you always will be."

"Just..." Loki said again before getting interrupted with another groin hit and a punch to the face.

He groaned loudly as he hit the floor. "Time loops how lovely."

"You." Sif emerged...again. "You conniving, craven, pathetic worm..."

"Okay, okay, Sif. Hang on." Loki said.

Sif punched him again. "No, you hear this. You deserve to be alone-"

"And I always will be." Loki snapped impatiently. "All right, I get it. Listen. You are a reconstruction of a past event created by an organization that controls all of time. So you need to trust me and you need to help me escape. Yeah?"

Sif let out a ragged sigh and gingerly nodded then placed both hands on Loki's shoulders.

"Okay, good." Loki confirmed.

Sif abruptly thrusted her knee into Loki's groin again then proceeded to punch him in the face before walking past him. "Pathetic."