I decided to open an industrial looking metal door. Peeking through the door, I saw what looked like some sort of party going on. Feeling that was safe, I slipped through the doorway...
...and then my brain registered things at this party weren't right.
For starters, the party-goers didn't look particularly happy. It looked like the event had started as a high school prom, and then things had gone weird. Everyone had piercings and tattoos. All the guys were muscular-- in fact it looked like their muscles had burst the seams of their tuxedos. Everyone, except some goth-looking young people, had nice looking, deep tans. And everyone was looking toward a stage in the front of the auditorium. On the stage stood...
Oh, crap. THAT thread! It was Loki!
He seemed to have paused in mid-speech, and was looking around.
"What is this?" he said, looking around the edge of the crowd. "Someone's magic is meddling with my moment..."
His eyes turned in my direction, catching me in the attempt to re-open the door. (Why did magical doorways always have to shut behind you, anyway?!)
"I don't think so, interloper," Loki declared, and suddenly the door transformed into a painting of a door, sort of the reverse of a cartoon, painted doorway becoming real.
"Now where did you come from?" Loki mused, gesturing for me to come forward. Like a marionette, my body moved me forward. Trying to will myself awake, I figured out this wasn't a dream. "I sent all the chaperons away, and there already is a d.j. here, such as he is."
Loki glanced in the direction of the d.j.'s booth, and the d.j., cowering low in his booth, turned even paler. Luckily for him, Loki was more interested in where I had come from.
I found myself on the stage facing the deity.
"And you are most definitely too old to be in high school, so you aren't a late arrival," he further mused. He sniffed at me. "And your deodorant is not working."
There were some snickers out in the audience.
"Where are your shoes?" Loki asked, apparently actually surprised. He looked me up and down. "You came here by accident, didn't you?"
I tried to speak, but couldn't make anything come out, so I nodded instead.
"Let's see what you have in that poorly maintained head of yours," Loki continued, theatrically placing his hands on either side of my head. "Now hold still. This might not hurt."
Whatever he was doing didn't hurt, it just felt really, really weird. Images, smells, tastes, etc. flickered through me. As quickly as it started, the chaotic fragments of memory stopped. Blinking, I tried to gather my thoughts.
"You really don't know, do you?" once more Loki seemed surprised. "You were just sitting around, and then found yourself elsewhere, wandered around, and found yourself here."
It didn't seem to be a question, and I wasn't sure I could make my voice work, anyway. I was preoccupied with trying to figure out whether my heart could pound any harder. It felt like it might pound itself to jelly against my rib cage at any moment.
"Someone must be messing with the very laws of reality, or something equally as foolish," Loki mused, seeming to forget about me and the teenagers for the moment. Now would have been my chance, if I had the foggiest idea of a successful course of action-- which I did not.
"So far it hasn't bothered me, but I will need to monitor this meddling..."
His attention snapped back to the room. The moment of distraction was gone, and no hero had swung into action. I swallowed hard as the deity turned back to me.
"Still, I need to do something with you-- you don't fit into this occasion at all," he informed me. "I suppose you have done me a favor by bringing these cosmic events to my attention, however inadvertently. So I will offer you a choice: join the party, leave the party, stay but be inconsequential, cease to exist."
Oh crap. None of those sounded promising.