They're about to confront Odin, and TVA Loki is nervous.

He's nervous because he knows that Odin knows this conversation is coming, and he's had time to prepare whatever it is that he's going to say or do.

He's nervous because Thor's already talked to him, and it's only made his brother more angry.

He's nervous because Mobius isn't coming with them, and everything is more nerve-racking without Mobius.

And, perhaps most of all, he's nervous because he's going to be talking to the Allfather about unpleasant things, and that has a history of ending poorly.

He has Thor by his side, and he takes comfort in that. He has Sylvie, too; they're going into this journey together. But there's no company in the world that would make a confrontation with the Allfather, likely the most powerful man in the Nine Realms, any less daunting. A part of him wonders if it wouldn't have been better to not speak of this at all. Sometimes, maintaining the peace is the best option.

But as they approach the doors to the throne room, it's too late to change his mind – and with Sylvie here, he wouldn't be able to. She wants to talk to Odin, and he would never send her into a situation alone that he himself wouldn't want to be in.

So the two share a wary look, and they open the doors.

Odin is perched atop his throne, seemingly unguarded in a way he very rarely is. Why, he wants to ask? He's not afraid that his youngest son will lash out the way he's done before? He's not afraid that his life will be at risk without somebody to protect him? Does he trust Thor, perhaps, to save him in spite of his anger? Or is it that he trusts Loki? He trusts that his son has grown in the time they've been apart? That even after everything, he would never hurt his father?

"My children," Odin says, and he stands up from his throne – a sign of respect, maybe? In another situation, it might have felt intimidating, but not right now. Right now, he seems... sincere. It's comforting, a little bit. It doesn't feel as though their lives are on the line right now.

"Father," Loki greets him with a nod. This is the first real conversation they've had since he was welcomed back into Asgard. This isn't quite how he'd anticipated it happening.

Odin begins to descend the stairs to the throne, and he gestures for them to join him. "Come."

Loki and Sylvie share a glance, and then they approach. Thor stays back, he notices; back at least a half-dozen steps, as though trying to remove himself from the situation. It's strange to see. He and Odin have always been so close. He wonders if that will ever come back.

Odin puts one hand on Loki's shoulder, and the other on Sylvie's. When he looks at them, his eyes are full of love, and... regret. It's an unusual thing to see from him. He always seems so sure of himself, of his actions, his words. But this is different.

"Loki," he begins, "Sylvie..."

The corners of her lips quirk upwards at the sound of her name, at the way he looks at her. This is nice, for her. Just talking to Odin, just being in his presence, in his mind, is nice. She's not used to it the way that Loki is. She hasn't seen his shortcomings the way that he has. She hasn't seen him at his worst the way that Loki has.

"I see Mobius isn't with you," Odin remarks.

Loki grimaces at the reminder. "No, he had... other... things... to attend to." Those 'other things,' of course, being his desire to be literally anywhere else except here.

Loki had dismissed the notion at first, but given that it was Odin's first remark, maybe he was right. Maybe Odin is upset with him. If that really is the case, then Mobius probably should have come with them. It would have been easier to get that out of the way now – and, more importantly, to get that out of the way together.

But that's okay. If Odin wants to talk to Mobius, Loki and Sylvie will simply go with him. They'll confront Odin again – or Odin will confront them again, as the case may be. It doesn't matter. Either way, it will be fine.

Odin nods solemnly. "I understand," he says. "Heimdall told me what you learned. I suspect you have questions; things you would like to say to me."

Loki looks over at Sylvie, giving her the floor. She looks back at him. Clearly, this isn't working out very well.

Finally, Loki just asks, "Why didn't you tell us?" That's perhaps what bothers him the most. Their father banished their sister, knowing she would one day return, and did nothing to prepare them for it. How did he think that was okay?

Odin sighs. "The truth?"

Loki nods. No more secrets. No more lies. He wants the truth.

"I was ashamed," Odin admits. "I was ashamed of what I'd done and the child I'd ruined, sculpting into an image of my worst self, so I hid her from you – from everyone."

Loki nods slowly. That's... understandable. Wrong, of course, but understandable – a reminder that he's imperfect; that he has flaws and moments of weakness, too. "Were you ever going to tell us?"

"I was," Odin says, "someday. When I felt you were ready to hear it, and when I felt I was ready to tell you."

Again, Loki just nods, giving himself some time to process that. He didn't intend to keep the secret forever. He didn't try to leave them to their own devices. He did, it seems, in the Sacred Timeline, but it wasn't planned. He simply couldn't bring himself to talk about what he'd done or why he did it. That's something Loki can relate to.

It's Sylvie who speaks next, and she's focused not on the past, but on the future. "How do we stop it?" she asks. "How do we keep her from destroying Asgard?"

Odin shakes his head helplessly. "I don't know."

Loki stares at him.

He doesn't know.

He does not know.

Odin, the Allfather, the King of Asgard, ruler of the Nine Realms, does not know.

This is unheard of. More than that, even, this is terrifying. Odin always has a solution for everything. It's not always one Loki agrees with, but he always has one. The fact that he doesn't now, that Hela is too formidable a force to plan her defeat...

It's scary.

"There must be something we can do," Sylvie says with a frown. "We have a warning now. We know what to expect. We can plan around that!"

Odin's gaze shifts. "Thor."

Loki glances back at his brother. He stands tall, even taller than usual. His jaw is clenched. His hands are balled into fists by his side. He's not himself; that much is obvious.

"How was she defeated in the other world?" Odin asks him. "Do you know?"

Thor looks straight past him as he answers. "We had to bring about Ragnarok," he says monotonously. "We gathered our remaining people, and we set Surtur upon our homeworld, and upon Hela within it."

Loki raises his brows and turns back to Odin. They defeated her only by destroying the entirety of Asgard. That doesn't bode well for them.

Odin presses his lips into a firm line as he thinks; then, "I will work on this. We should have many years until we must face this problem."

Thor speaks up again. "Until we must face it." He emphasizes the word strongly.

Odin's head cocks ever-so-slightly to the side.

"We will have to find a way to defeat her," Thor repeats. "Not you. You left this problem for your descendants. It will never be one that you have to face."

Loki looks at him, and then at Odin, and then back at his brother. This is so unlike him. He's never this cold, this harsh, and certainly not to their father. And he's right, which is the strangest part. He's right to be upset. A part of Loki feels he should be more upset, too – and maybe if his relationship with his family, with his father, hadn't been so fragile right now, maybe he would be. But he just got him back. He just got them all back. He can't let anything tear them apart.

Odin takes a deep breath, and he answers evenly, "Hela is a threat to everything we hold dear. Though I will not be here to face her with you, she is as much my problem as she is yours – more, even, than she is yours." He shakes his head. "Do not think I take this lightly, my son. I assure you, I do not."

Thor clenches his jaw, but he doesn't speak again, and, for a few moments, it's silent.

Sylvie cuts in, almost hesitantly, with, "We shouldn't have to worry about Hela for a long time. Mobius says the next big threat is the Dark Elves. We should focus on that."

Odin looks to Thor, who remains silent, unmoving, not a crack to his cold exterior. So Odin looks back to Sylvie, and he nods once. "Very well," he says. "What of the Dark Elves? What must we prepare for?"

This is an easier conversation to have; a less tense one. The Dark Elves are a long-time enemy of their people. Though the fact that they live is a surprise, there's nothing inherently wrong with this. There's no inherent darkness to the situation looming overhead as there was when they spoke of Hela.

Ultimately, it's decided that they will stop the remaining Dark Elves long before the Convergence, but, Odin decides, this is something to deal with in the future. There are things he needs to sort out, he says, and there is enough chaos that's brewed within the year the Bifrost was lost to them that their priorities, at least for this moment, must lie elsewhere.

And that's the end.

They've begun making their plan. They've begun strategizing. They're going to find a way to solve this, and nobody has to get hurt. Frigga doesn't have to get hurt. They're going to keep her and all of Asgard safe. They just... haven't quite figured out how to do it yet.

It seems they're all going to bid each other farewell and part ways, but then Thor speaks.

"There's one more issue we haven't discussed," Thor says.

Loki furrows his brows, and he glances at Sylvie uncertainly. She seems just as confused as he feels. What else is there they have to talk about? Everything Thor told them, they've now talked to their father about. He doesn't plan to talk about Ultron, does he? That's not a problem he ever suspects they'll have to face. Hell, they brought the scepter back to Asgard when they retired the Tesseract. They can't build Ultron now.

Odin's gaze flickers to Loki and Sylvie, and then he asks his eldest son, "And what is that?"

"The Mad Titan."

Loki grimaces.

Shit.

Odin only seems intrigued. "Who is this Mad Titan?" he asks. "What does he want?"

Thor doesn't answer at first. Maybe he's expecting Loki to. He doesn't know. His gaze is glued firmly to the floor, his hands clasped together in front of him. This is not a conversation he wants to have right now (or ever).

Finally, Thor answers, "He wants the Infinity Stones. He wants to use them to wipe out half of all life throughout the universe."

"What?" Odin's voice is low, almost a growl. It would have scared him, once a upon a time, but Loki's seen much scarier things since then.

"He will come for the scepter and he will come for the Tesseract," Thor says. "He's strong. He has an army that will bend to his whim. Even as he stands now, he's near-impossible to stop. Once he begins collecting the Infinity Stones, we won't stand a chance."

It's quiet after that.

He wonders if there's something – or someone – he should be looking at. He can't bring himself to do it.

There's a hand on his shoulder, and he knows that gentle touch must belong to Sylvie. Still, he can't force himself to look at her.

"You know him," she says quietly.

Loki just nods. He knows him all too well.

"It's Thanos, isn't it?"

Loki doesn't answer, but he's sure his grimace speaks for itself. A part of him feels his time with Thanos was a lifetime ago. A part of him still feels as though it was yesterday; as though Thanos is looming over him everywhere he goes, just waiting for a chance to strike. (And he isn't. At least on the Sacred Timeline, there are years before he has to face Thanos again. But it doesn't make that feeling go away.)

"Loki?" Odin says cautiously. "What do you know of this Thanos?"

Though he doesn't want to, Loki forces himself to raise his gaze to meet his father's. There's a look of intrigue on his face, but, more than that, there's a look of concern. If he knew who Thanos was, if he knew that Thanos had done, he would know just how warranted that is.

"I know that he's more powerful than the entirety of Asgard," Loki says. "I know that we can't defeat him, and I know that I don't want to be anywhere near it when you try to do it anyway."

Sylvie's hand leaves his shoulder, only for a few seconds before he finds it in his own hand. She gives it a gentle squeeze. He wonders if that's because she expects him to say more; if she thinks he's going to need that reassurance when he continues talking. If it is, she's going to be disappointed.

Thor scoffs. "Then what do you want to do, Loki? Just let him destroy half the universe and do nothing to stop it?"

"That's all we can do," Loki snaps. "You can't kill Thanos. There is nobody in the Nine Realms who can match his power."

"You don't know that."

"And you don't know him."

Thor narrows his eyes, and Loki does the same, clenching his jaw. He doesn't know what he's about to get into. None of them do. Nobody could possibly understand because they haven't been where he's been; they haven't seen what he's seen.

... Well, there's one person who has, he supposes. He's sure the other Loki would back him up if he was here.

Finally, Loki turns away. "I'm not having this conversation." And he heads for the door. (Sylvie, of course, comes with him. He loosens his grip on her hand in case she doesn't want to, in case she wants to drop it, but she doesn't. He appreciates that.)

Thor scowls. "Loki–"

"Let him go, Thor," Odin says. "We will worry about Thanos when the time comes, but for now, our priorities must lie elsewhere."

At least Odin has some sense.

Loki doesn't wait to hear Thor's response. He has to assume he disagrees, and he's not fighting about this. He knows it won't work. And, perhaps more importantly, he just got his family back. He's not ready to lose them – not over this.

When they're outside the throne room, Sylvie takes her hand back, only to put it on his shoulder once more. "Loki?" she says cautiously. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," he says tersely. He is absolutely, totally fine.

"Uh-huh," Sylvie says skeptically.

"I think I'm ready to go to bed."

Sylvie nods sympathetically. "Yeah, that might be a good idea."