"This is growing tedious," Loki said, and waved his hand.
The assassin, who had proven vexingly difficult to stab over the last several minutes, completed his latest lunge...but as something much smaller and a great deal less lethal than before. When Loki reached down to de-attach him from his pantsleg, he bared teeth, but made no sound, and lashed out at Loki's hand, a motion that drew more blood than Loki had managed to draw from him with half a dozen daggers.
He grabbed the assassin-turned-kitten by the scruff of the neck, hauled him up to eye level. The kitten continued to show its teeth, still making no sound; but the strangest thing about him--including his front left foreleg, which was formed of metal and perfectly shaped--was the limp way he hung there, even as he so clearly continued to plan Loki's death. Even his tail failed to lash, as any other cat's tail would have, no matter what species the soul inside belonged to. He was stillness itself, other than his eyes, which tracked Loki's every motion.
"What are you?" Loki asked.
He expected no answer, and received none; and when he tried to force answers from the kitten's mind, he received more claws marks for his trouble, and discovered nothing more than a blank grayness where there should have been the usual cacophony of memory.
He'd planned to leave the kitten on Midgard, of course. That had been the entire purpose of using the transformation spell. Now, though...
Well, he was just too fascinating to leave behind.
With the hand that wasn't holding the kitten, Loki withdrew the Tesseract from his pocket dimension, and off they went.
*
Twelve hours later, they were tucked away in the storage bay of an undermanned freighter, headed somewhere that was neither the small moon the portal had dropped them out on, nor any realm Loki had become disenchanted with recently.
By now, the assassin had come to a conclusion that should have been obvious from its first moments of its kitten existence: That its claws were unlikely to finish the job it had started. Of course, it had taken several hours of Loki explaining it, while wondering what they did to mercenaries on Midgard to ensure such dedication to their work that this one had yet to decide that Loki was too much trouble for his bounty. But whatever the cause, he was now able to put the kitten down without immediately being scored by its claws for his trouble.
The kitten still did not seem inclined to let him out of its sight. When Loki lay down for the evening, in the corner of the room that was farthest from the door, and the most shielded from anyone who might chance to come in, the kitten followed, planting itself atop his abdomen as if, through doing so, it could prevent his escape.
What happened next was inevitable, at least on Loki's part. He'd always liked cats, largely because they'd often preferred him to loud, boisterous Thor. He'd spent many long days reading in bed or some other nook, with a cat on his lap for company. Even if the person he'd been in those days seemed not a little contemptible to him now, the sense memory was strong: He didn't realize what he'd done until the kitten itself tensed beneath his hand.
It hadn't scratched him, however. Progress. Loki continued to stroke it, uncertain whether it was more satisfying when the kitten coiled itself even more tensely--still making no sound, nor baring its teeth, though it did lay back its ears--or when it finally began to loosen, nearly half an hour later.
The most satisfying thing, however, was when it rumbled. Briefly, so low as to be unheard, but instantly recognizable to Loki's fingers, which were currently scratching behind its ears. It happened for an instant--and then the kitten jumped a foot into the air. When it landed, its tail was three times the size it had been before, and the hair along its back was raised. Most telling, however, were its eyes, which had widened in a way that could only be described as human.
Most cats, given a fright, would have fled. This one stayed, and stared at Loki with those wide eyes, as if awaiting an explanation.
"You purred," Loki said. "Cats do, when they're pleased."
The kitten continued to look at him, though by now its fur had begun to lower.
"I'm surprised you're having trouble with this. Truly. Don't you have cats on Midgard?"
The kitten rolled its right shoulder in a seeming shrug.
Strange. If Loki remembered correctly, Midgard was where cats had originated. He was almost certain he'd caught sight of a few while he'd been there, though not up close. But perhaps he was wrong.
After a while, the kitten settled on his stomach again, though much more cautiously this time. Loki did not concern himself with being more cautious, and resumed in stroking it.
The next time such an event emerged from its chest, the kitten startled slightly, but remained where it was. After a while, its eyelids began to droop. By then, so had Loki's.
*
There was no telling, later, which of them had succumbed to sleep first. When Loki woke, the kitten still slumbered, not moving until Loki laid a finger upon its fragile skull. One only, the slightest tap, but the kitten came to life immediately. It didn't jump quite as high as it had before, and when it came down, it hissed, silent still, crouched down so low it might have been cringing if there hadn't been such clear murder in its eyes.
Loki laughed. The kitten's hiss faded away, replaced by something else. Not fear. Perplexion, perhaps.
"I'd planned to let you go, once I'd tired of you. Perhaps I'll keep you, instead," Loki said, more provocation than anything else; he was rarely decided on a course of action until he took it, and already had several dozen idle ideas of where he might turn next.
Instead of growing fearful, or angry, the kitten sat motionless, looking at him.
"Would you like that? To stay with me? I can't imagine you would. Perhaps I ought to throw you out the airlock after all."
The kitten sat, staring, as expressionless as it was unmoving. Was that blankness intentional? Loki would have assumed it must be, if not for the grayness of its mind the day before. Fascinating, indeed.
He would take it with him, Loki decided. Until he got to the bottom of the mystery, or it became a liability.
Yes. That was almost certainly what he would do.
When the ship arrived at its destination, a shadow departed it, a scrap of fluff and metal following dutifully at its heels.