I DISDAIN ALL GLITTERING GOLD
OLIVIA IS LAYING ON THE COUCH, BECAUSE HER BEDROOM IS CURRENTLY BROKEN. No, really; some explosion blew out half of her bedroom wall. Most of her stuff should be salvageable, but she’d rather not sleep in there with the surprise renovations.
Tomorrow, she’ll be moving her stuff temporarily into Stark Tower. The Banner siblings have been gifted their own floor, and Tony said the two of them can stay there as long as they need, so Olivia figured she could stay until they finish fixing her apartment building.
For tonight, though, it’s the couch.
Olivia is almost dreading the sleep she’s going to get tonight; she’ll have to endure soul resonance with Loki. Given that her brother threw him around like a rag doll earlier, she’s sure it’ll be very fun.
When soulmates first meet, they forge a connection; from that connection is spawned their ability to see color. For about seven days, though, their souls will be synchronized and resonating as they get used to the new connection.
As such, every night when they sleep, that connection manifests itself in one way or another, depending on the two people’s current state of mind. It’s usually different every night, though they have been occasionally known to have repeats of the same format, given the right circumstances.
As Olivia’s eyes slide shut, she wonders what she’ll have to put up with tonight.
***
Olivia’s eyes flutter open to gaze at a familiar ceiling; it looks just like the one in her childhood home, painted black, with glow-in-the-dark stars pasted haphazardly all over it.
She sits up, realizing she was laying on a couch not dissimilar to her own; except this one looks like it’s new.
She looks to her left, finding the room to extend for about 30 feet. However, halfway through, the mahogany floorboards come to a sudden halt, replaced by something shiny and colored. The blue-painted walls also give way to intricately-carved ones, as though to divide the room into two. She’s never seen any color like it before, so she’s not sure what to call it.
Just as she notes that the other side is pretty, if a bit gaudy, she notices its occupant.
Loki is sitting in an uncomfortable-looking chair at the head of a long table, flipping through some book Olivia’s never seen before.
She decides not to make her presence known just yet, instead opting to look around her half of the room. On the far walls of both sides is located a door, set on the right. On Olivia’s side, there’s a bookshelf next to it, full of her favorite novels and movies.
Set against the wall on the left side of the door (which is Olivia’s right while looking at Loki) is a small TV, with the DVD player already hooked up. On the opposite wall is a desk, with a radio and a lot of papers set atop it. She already knows she’ll find all the pencils and pens she could need in the drawer under the desktop.
Wedged into the corner between the bookshelf and the desk is wedged a tall, nostalgic floor lamp, several lights branching off the central pole.
“Well, well— finally awake, are we?” A voice questions from the other side of the room. Olivia turns, seeing Loki standing next to his table, looking slightly down at her.
“Finally asleep, actually,” she corrects habitually. A lifetime of being a smartass has temporarily overtaken her better judgement. For some reason, confusion paints his face.
“What?” he wonders, seeming to have been taken off guard. She sighs.
“Well, technically, this is a dream; so what you meant was finally asleep,” she reminds him, a little surprised he didn’t get it. Her comment wasn’t really a thinker.
“I… can’t hear a word you’re saying,” he confesses, sounding a bit thrown off. She blinks.
Oh.
Well, that answers one question, but brings up about five more.
“What?” she wonders, bewildered. “I can hear you just fine. Hold on, maybe I need to—,” she cuts herself off as she slams into an invisible barrier between the two halves of the room. She takes a few steps back in shock.
Looking surprised himself at the unexpected turn of events, Loki approaches the barrier. He places a hand against it, and Olivia can see the skin on his hand flattening against the invisible wall. It’s a weird sight without any glass to interfere.
“A barrier,” he reflects thoughtfully. He considers it for a moment, and then turns a smirk onto Olivia. “Do you fear me so much, you even need to distance yourself from me in dreams?” She scowls.
“I don’t,” she denies, truthfully. “You’re not even on the same planet as me right now.” His smirk does not waver.
“I still can’t hear you,” he reminds her. “I’m sure you’re grateful for that; it means I can’t hear you plead for my mercy.” She crinkles her nose up in disgust.
“Me, pleading?” she scoffs, mostly for herself. “I’m not the one who got thrown around like a rag doll today.” His face falls into an angry scowl; maybe lip-reading isn’t his strongest skill, but her facial expressions are obvious enough to get the message across.
He slams his hand into the barrier; the action doesn’t make the loud noise he probably wanted, but he’s not deterred.
“When I get through this barrier— and I will—, I will peel the flesh off your bones one by one. I will turn every night of the next week into your own personal, intimate torture,” he spits furiously. Olivia walks over to her desk, pulling open the drawer to grab a blue sparkly gel pen.
Leaning over the desk, she can feel Loki’s gaze on her back as she writes on one of the sheets of paper. She holds it up so he can see, and his slightly confused expression immediately sours at the words she haphazardly scrawled.
‘You don’t even know my name’ is all it says.
He pushes his face into a strained smirk.
“Are you certain of that, Miss Banner?” he prompts, drawing himself up to stand straight. “Sister of the Hulk; tell me, is it a dreary life, constantly reining in that monster?” She narrows her eyes at him, but shrugs after a momentary pause.
“If you know my name, then why don’t you say it?” she prompts. He stands silently for a moment, and she recalls suddenly that he can’t hear her. With a slightly exasperated sigh, she gives up on speaking to him, instead turning on the radio atop the desk.
Strolling over to the bookshelf as she hums along to a catchy pop song that was popular in her teenage years, she ignores Loki’s vague threats from the other side of the room.
The books and movies on the shelf are the ones she has memorized the best.
After a moment of perusing and humming along to Since U Been Gone, she pulls her favorite book off the shelf. It’s a great mystery novel about a detective who has to hide the fact that the serial killer he’s hunting down is also his soulmate.
She settles on the couch, flipping open the book. Noticing the absence of Loki’s voice, she glances over to see him glowering down at his book.
Well, hey, that’s one less thing for her to deal with.