Thor Odinson, God of Thunder, King of Asgard (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pirateangelbaby) wrote2020-03-24 07:23 pm
pirateangelbaby) wrote2020-03-24 07:23 pm
Step One
Trigger warnings: Alcohol abuse, PTSD.
Keeping up with four children is exhausting.
Thor had known it would be a challenge when he agreed to shelter his nieces and nephews in Loki's absence, and to some extent, they certainly keep him busy enough he rarely works himself into a fit - they have a schedule to keep, lessons to learn, baths to take and meals to eat, and bedtime stories to read. And then there are the unscheduled moments that demand his attention, as mundane as skinned knees or broken crockery, or as serious as a meltdown after a traumatic trigger that Thor had not known to prevent, or hours spent trying to soothe an inconsolable Eindrid whose distress seems only that Loki is not here and Thor is not him. It seems the only times he is truly left alone to his own thoughts is after the children have gone to bed, assuming none of them has a nightmare that needs chased away with a hug and a warm glass of milk.
They're not entirely comfortable with him either, he can tell. He is now their uncle, but he is also their king, and though they have seen him broken and beaten, in many ways he is still a stranger to them. Nothing will cure this but more time, getting familiar with one another. Despite himself, Thor hopes that he has that sort of time with them, that his brother's children might grow to see him as more than just the Allfather, damaged though he is.
At the same time, he prays that Loki is not gone so long that he achieves this all at once.
With the children safely tucked in their beds, Thor retreats to the living room to return the storybook to the shelf there, tucked among similarly brightly-colored volumes that are slowly taking over the unused space. He leaves the lights off, the room faintly illuminated by the green glow of the aurora outside the windows, the color of Loki's magic drifting across the walls and glinting off the curved edge of Stormbreaker's blade above the mantel. For a moment, the tint of the light shifts and fades, casting a purple shadow on the head of the axe, and Thor shivers and tears his gaze away as he reaches up to touch the fulgurite pendant around his neck.
The waiting is the worst part, eating away at him in the empty silent spaces.
Moving quietly so as to not disturb the children as they drift to sleep, Thor moves to the kitchen and rummages in the cupboard for a glass, intent on making himself a drink to soothe his own dread so that he can sleep. But with children in the house, he has gone through his clean dishes much faster than he's accustomed to, and washing up is going to make too much noise. Perhaps a bowl? He can't just drink it right out of the keg. Or... can he? There's no one here to see. And it's not like he's going to drink the entire thing, he just needs a little, enough that he can sleep without worrying where Loki is and whether he's safe. Enough that he forgets.
It's in the middle of his darkened kitchen that Thor has an ugly epiphany. Something is wrong.
Since when does he need alcohol just to sleep at night? Since when does it seem normal or reasonable to resort to drinking out of saucepans and serving bowls, or cupping it in his bare hands? Eir's potion has made a world of difference, slowly easing him back toward the ability to function at all, to feel happiness and hope again and giving him the energy he needs to push back against the heaviness that still tries to weigh him down. But it's done so little to lessen this craving, this need, so powerful that it hasn't even occurred to him to deny its call until this very moment. Asgardians drink with every meal, it's true, but this... this is so far from mealtime that he cannot excuse the habit.
But why? Isn't he getting better?
A spark of his old stubbornness ignites in Thor's chest, and he firmly turns away from the kitchen altogether, even as his fingers itch for the cool weight of a bottle in his hand. Instead he brushes his teeth, and changes into his pajamas, and slides beneath the covers of his bed. He does not need the alcohol. He is Thor, king and Allfather, and he will not be beholden to a beverage's will above his own. He will be fine. It's fine.
Anxiety twists in the pit of his belly in the dark of his room, and he curls up on his side, spare pillow clutched tightly to his chest as a child would with a favorite stuffed animal. It feels like hours before he finally drifts to sleep, silently slipping below the surface of the vast ocean of dreams.
He wakes all too soon with a cry caught in his throat, reaching out with ghostly metal fingers for a specter that isn't there, his heart thundering in his chest. The roars of war and slaughter echo in his ears, afterimages of Loki's throat clutched in cruel purple hands burned into the back of Thor's eyelid, and before he knows it he is in the kitchen with the taste of mead on his tongue, seated on the cold floor with his back against a cabinet door which rattles as he trembles, pressing the cool metal of his fist against his forehead. Even once the shaking eases, he does not relax his grip on the dirty glass in his hand, not until it's empty and the haziness of alcohol has wrapped his mind in soft wool.
He does need it. By the Norns, does he ever need it.
But he shouldn't.
And he has no idea how to stop.
Keeping up with four children is exhausting.
Thor had known it would be a challenge when he agreed to shelter his nieces and nephews in Loki's absence, and to some extent, they certainly keep him busy enough he rarely works himself into a fit - they have a schedule to keep, lessons to learn, baths to take and meals to eat, and bedtime stories to read. And then there are the unscheduled moments that demand his attention, as mundane as skinned knees or broken crockery, or as serious as a meltdown after a traumatic trigger that Thor had not known to prevent, or hours spent trying to soothe an inconsolable Eindrid whose distress seems only that Loki is not here and Thor is not him. It seems the only times he is truly left alone to his own thoughts is after the children have gone to bed, assuming none of them has a nightmare that needs chased away with a hug and a warm glass of milk.
They're not entirely comfortable with him either, he can tell. He is now their uncle, but he is also their king, and though they have seen him broken and beaten, in many ways he is still a stranger to them. Nothing will cure this but more time, getting familiar with one another. Despite himself, Thor hopes that he has that sort of time with them, that his brother's children might grow to see him as more than just the Allfather, damaged though he is.
At the same time, he prays that Loki is not gone so long that he achieves this all at once.
With the children safely tucked in their beds, Thor retreats to the living room to return the storybook to the shelf there, tucked among similarly brightly-colored volumes that are slowly taking over the unused space. He leaves the lights off, the room faintly illuminated by the green glow of the aurora outside the windows, the color of Loki's magic drifting across the walls and glinting off the curved edge of Stormbreaker's blade above the mantel. For a moment, the tint of the light shifts and fades, casting a purple shadow on the head of the axe, and Thor shivers and tears his gaze away as he reaches up to touch the fulgurite pendant around his neck.
The waiting is the worst part, eating away at him in the empty silent spaces.
Moving quietly so as to not disturb the children as they drift to sleep, Thor moves to the kitchen and rummages in the cupboard for a glass, intent on making himself a drink to soothe his own dread so that he can sleep. But with children in the house, he has gone through his clean dishes much faster than he's accustomed to, and washing up is going to make too much noise. Perhaps a bowl? He can't just drink it right out of the keg. Or... can he? There's no one here to see. And it's not like he's going to drink the entire thing, he just needs a little, enough that he can sleep without worrying where Loki is and whether he's safe. Enough that he forgets.
It's in the middle of his darkened kitchen that Thor has an ugly epiphany. Something is wrong.
Since when does he need alcohol just to sleep at night? Since when does it seem normal or reasonable to resort to drinking out of saucepans and serving bowls, or cupping it in his bare hands? Eir's potion has made a world of difference, slowly easing him back toward the ability to function at all, to feel happiness and hope again and giving him the energy he needs to push back against the heaviness that still tries to weigh him down. But it's done so little to lessen this craving, this need, so powerful that it hasn't even occurred to him to deny its call until this very moment. Asgardians drink with every meal, it's true, but this... this is so far from mealtime that he cannot excuse the habit.
But why? Isn't he getting better?
A spark of his old stubbornness ignites in Thor's chest, and he firmly turns away from the kitchen altogether, even as his fingers itch for the cool weight of a bottle in his hand. Instead he brushes his teeth, and changes into his pajamas, and slides beneath the covers of his bed. He does not need the alcohol. He is Thor, king and Allfather, and he will not be beholden to a beverage's will above his own. He will be fine. It's fine.
Anxiety twists in the pit of his belly in the dark of his room, and he curls up on his side, spare pillow clutched tightly to his chest as a child would with a favorite stuffed animal. It feels like hours before he finally drifts to sleep, silently slipping below the surface of the vast ocean of dreams.
He wakes all too soon with a cry caught in his throat, reaching out with ghostly metal fingers for a specter that isn't there, his heart thundering in his chest. The roars of war and slaughter echo in his ears, afterimages of Loki's throat clutched in cruel purple hands burned into the back of Thor's eyelid, and before he knows it he is in the kitchen with the taste of mead on his tongue, seated on the cold floor with his back against a cabinet door which rattles as he trembles, pressing the cool metal of his fist against his forehead. Even once the shaking eases, he does not relax his grip on the dirty glass in his hand, not until it's empty and the haziness of alcohol has wrapped his mind in soft wool.
He does need it. By the Norns, does he ever need it.
But he shouldn't.
And he has no idea how to stop.