With an ear splitting shriek of metal on metal, the elevator ground to a halt.

“Curse this elevator!” snarled Aku, eyebrows blazing and green face contorting into rage. Loki rolled his luminescent green eyes at the gaudy being of evil. He raised an eyebrow in mild interest when the another man in the elevator, apparently mortal, spoke up.

“Oh, it’s not the elevator’s fault!” he reprimanded, his bright eyes burning with an inhuman intensity. Loki was intrigued. He would guess that any Midgardian would shrink in terror from the might of Aku, not rise to the defense of those he was persecuting. The fact that the object of abuse was an elevator didn’t change things that much. “Could just be faulty engineering. Or the cable’s rusted. Or something’s stuck in it, which would be really exciting!”
“Exciting!?” demanded an obnoxiously cheery voice. A pink pony, mane and tail curlier than one would think physically possible, bounced up in the man’s face from out of nowhere. The man recoiled backwards, before pulling a pair of glasses out of his trenchcoat pocket and donning them.
“Yes, but not nearly as exciting as you,” he marveled, as if observing a new species of jungle animal. The pony continued bouncing in place, as if she and gravity were having an eternal tug-of-war and she refused to give in. “Look at your color scheme! You’re standing out more than the Shogun of Sorrow back there.”
“None shall upstand the Almighty Aku!” roared the shapeshifter, springing out of the earth between the pony and the man. He grew larger than the elevator’s size warranted, causing everyone to press back against the walls. The lights seemed to dim in comparison to his blazing eyebrows.
“In anything?” Loki asked mildly, as if confirming. The Doctor eyed him suspiciously. Though the raven-haired man looked human, he obviously wasn’t, by his outlandish garb and manner. Last he’d checked, he’d landed in 2013 Manhattan, not 5,000 B.C. Norway.
Norway…
“Everything, foolish mortal!” retorted Aku, whirling on Loki for no reason than to vent his anger.
“I suppose that means you take the cake for being tactless,” replied Loki softly, his eyes narrowing.
“CAKE!? Can I have some?” asked Pinkie, getting in Loki’s face. Scowling, the Asgardian merely pushed her aside while he and Aku had their debate.
“You dare insult the Master of Masters, the Deliverer of Darkness, the--”
“Spare me the lecture, Niflheim Horror,” drawled Loki, unfazed by Aku’s ridiculous volume. “If you’re going to battle the God of Mischief with words, you might as well use titles that mean anything, rather than self-proclaimed propaganda. You’re all over the place, honestly. I don’t know if this is just a bad day for you, but you certainly haven’t impressed me. Or anyone in this elevator--” noticing the pink pony, Loki hastily corrected himself. “--except maybe her.”
Aku opened his mouth, closed it again, then shrunk to the size of a normal man. Swiftly advancing up to Loki, he jabbed a finger up at him, the unnatural point causing Loki to lift his chin to avoid its sharpness.
“Who do you think you are, pitiful whelp?” snarled Aku. That’s when the man with the spiffy hairdo and the brown trenchcoat stepped between them, separating them by pushing them away by the shoulders.
“The Nordic God Loki, that’s who,” identified the Doctor, fearlessly looking Loki in the eye. “Although in reality, not a God, but a highly evolved alien species. Gotta love Asgardians. Thor’s a bit trigger-happy, though. Last time we met we kinda broke Vanirheim.”
“Thor’s never been to Vanirheim.” said Loki, his brow furrowing. The Doctor winced slightly, as if he said something he shouldn’t have.
“Last time I met him, more accurately said,” apologized the Doctor. “It’s...complicated. Wouldn’t believe me if I told you. But you,” here he whirled on Aku, pointing an odd sonic device at him and activating it with an irritating whir. “are not of Earth, despite the fact that you have been on Earth for ooh, let’s see here, eons! Wow!” He held up his screwdriver to his face and inspected it, much to the bewilderment of Loki and Aku. Pinkie Pie didn’t seem to care, and bounced across from the Doctor with that same goofy smile.
“Does that mean that you’re old?” she asked innocently.
“Yes, it does.” answered Aku simply, his eyelids lowering in exasperation.
“I think we all are,” mused the Doctor, shrugging awkwardly. Pinkie frowned in confusion.
“But you don’t look old,” she insisted. “How old are you, then? If you don’t mind me asking, that is.”
“Nine hundred and three,” replied the Doctor. Loki recoiled slightly.
“Really? You don’t look a day over twenty!” observed Loki. “I had a feeling you weren’t human.”
“An accurate assumption,” admitted the Doctor. “but you look thirty. And you are..?”
“Just turned one million,” announced Loki. “Guess I’m still a lot older than--”
“Now hold your horses!” interrupted Pinkie, popping up in front of Loki and pushing him to the elevator wall with a hoof on his chest. She had a rather serious expression on, much unlike her. Loki was slightly intimidated, until she spoke again.
“It’s your birthday?” she clarified, eyes narrowing in disbelief. Loki nodded. He was actually pleasantly surprised that somebody cared. Just because that somebody was a pink pony didn’t demean the fact. Her eyes immediately widened, and her face broke into a mile-wide grin. She practically exploded into the air like a pinata hit by a nuclear missile.
“It’s your BIRTHDAY!?” she echoed ecstatically, her voice raising an octave. Everyone jumped back at the suddenness of her outburst. “Why didn’t you tell me? Birthdays are important! They’re the most super-duper funtastic days of the year!”
“Well, it’s not like anybody was celebrating, so I guess I sort of--”
“Say no more!” ordered Pinkie, her face becoming serious again as she clamped Loki’s mouth shut with a hoof. “This is sacrilege! Nopony should have to go a birthday without a party. I must remedy this! Don’t you worry, Mr. Loki! Your millionth birthday party is going to have so much funtasticalness, they’ll be talkin’ about it all the way to Appaloosa and back!”

~~~~~

“And I’ll invite Derpyhooves and Fluttershy--I think you’d like her! And Twilight and Rainbow Dash and Rarity and Applejack and Lyra and Bon Bon and Vinyl Scratch and Octavia and Carrot Top and Starry Night--Oh! We should invite Princess Luna! Aren’t you friends?”
“I’d like that,” said Loki simply, smiling fondly. The elevator had started moving about five minutes ago, helping to lighten everybody’s mood. Pinkie’s endless rambling about the party and how amazing it would be helped as well. Pinkie whirled on Aku, completely unafraid of him.
“Are you gonna come?” she asked. In reply, Aku frowned and melted into a black puddle on the floor.
“That’s okay!” smiled Pinkie, instead turning to the Doctor. “But you’ll come, right?” The Doctor looked slightly uncomfortable at rejecting the offer, running his hand through his styled hair.
“Well, actually, I’ve got a rather important...thing to be attending to,” he excused himself, watching Pinkie warily as if she would explode if he hurt her feelings. “I’ve got lives to save, places to be--”
The elevator doors slid open, gaping out onto the barren top of the building. The wind was much harder up here, ruffling Pinkie’s mane and Loki’s hair.
“Not anymore you don’t!” Pinkie seized the Doctor’s hand with both hooves, walking backwards on her hind legs. “C’mon, it’ll be fun! The world isn’t gonna end if you miss this one thing!” she pointed out, rolling her blue eyes.
“Well, it just might, but a little party never killed nobody,” mumbled the Doctor to himself, smiling at Pinkie’s endearingness despite himself. “Double negative intended.”
“Has anybody noticed that there doesn’t seem to be a way down?” observed Loki, peeking over the edge of the building at the staggering drop. He wisely backed away from it before fate pushed him. Knowing his luck, it was about to. Pinkie, however, bounced right up to the very precipice of the edge, looking back at them as if nothing was wrong.
“Don’t worry, everypony! I’ve got it covered!” she assured. Taking a deep breath and raising a hoof, she sang out a syllable that neither Loki nor the Doctor quite caught. Long and loud and clear, it rang out throughout the city, causing the other two to cover their ears and grimace at the volume. Finally ending the note, Pinkie waited expectantly. There was a lengthy moment of awkward silence, and her smile faded.
“Falkor didn’t hear me,” she said sadly. Even the two ancient aliens dimmed slightly at the pink pony’s displeasure. “But that was as loud as I could go.”
“Why don’t you try again?” asked the Doctor, pulling out his sonic screwdriver again. Loki prepared for another vocal onslaught. Pinkie brightened, though she didn’t look back at them.
“Good idea!”
Again with the glass-shattering, opera-quality singing. Doubling over in agony, Loki could’ve sworn his ears were bleeding. The Doctor raised his odd sonic device, activating it in a way that amplified Pinkie’s voice. He didn’t even notice right away when the noise stopped--his ears rang fit to drown out any sound or lack thereof.
But what he did notice was the doglike face that appeared over the roof of the building. White and furry, it framed warm brown eyes that were good for the heart to look into. Stepping onto the roof and crouching so as to be easier to mount, it was revealed to have a wingless, equally furry body about four yards long. Loki and the Doctors’ jaws dropped.
“Is that--?” clarified Loki.
“Yes, it is,” replied Pinkie nonchalantly. She bounced up to Falkor, giving him a hug around the neck. “Thanks for the ride, buddy!”
“It’s the least I could do,” he responded kindly. He looked up at the other two, completely unsuspicious. “Friends of yours?”
“Yup! It’s Loki’s birthday. We’re throwing him a party at Sugarcube Corner. Wanna come?”
“I’d love to. Hop on, you two, don’t be shy. I haven’t bitten in centuries.”
Getting on the back of the luck dragon, Loki, the Doctor, and Pinkie Pie flew away.