Work Text:
Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
“Not the stapler, please.”
Nimble fingers drop plastic and metal back down on the table, threatening to topple over the messy pile of files between Loki and Mobius. As if more research is the key to finding a god (lesser than Loki themselves, this Loki, of course) with both time and space as their playground. It’s insufferably naive.
The assortment of pens labeled TVA property next to Loki has been dwindling for the better half of an hour, with indentations and blotches of blue ink on the floor to match.
“Next time you attempt to betray someone on the field you might want to think about the consequences, if paperwork makes you throw such a tantrum.” Mobius says, flipping through a file with practiced precision, eyes scanning the text, and it makes Loki feel too small in the cramped space.
“I am not throwing a tantrum.” Loki insists, eyes substituting their stolen daggers.
“Practicing some backstabbing, then?” Loki is too well acquainted with the smile on Mobius’ face that means the analyst thinks he’s clever.
“I’m bored.” And honestly, Loki’s unsure of why they dignify Mobius with an answer. Maybe it’s because Mobius so rarely listens. “You cannot put a god in a cage.” They continue, ignoring the sharp laughter across the table.
“Or a library, apparently.”
“Is this funny to you?”
Mobius sighs, putting yet another file in the dead-end pile. “No, being stuck in here while I could do my job out there is not funny to me.”
Frustration claws its way up Loki’s being, clogs up their throat. The last pen snaps under the pressure of their fist, ink bleeding over reddened knuckles.
“Alright, how about a walk.” Mobius suggests, standing up without waiting for an answer. He absently rubs his own hand like he wants to wipe away ink that isn’t there.
“I don’t need you to-“ Loki starts, sharp.
“I think you do.”
Loki pushes themself and the heavy chair back with a grating noise, following Mobius out through dizzying corridors. They walk slowly, Mobius’ hands occasionally tracing the walls they walk along, while Loki’s stay rigid by their side.
“Do you want to talk about it?” Mobius starts, choppy, like he’s tasting the words in his mouth. Loki scoffs. “You look…wound up, do I need to worry about someone’s safety?”
“You’d hardly understand.”
“Like it or not Loki, I know you.”
“You don’t, analyst. You may know my life because you’ve got it all there on your big screen like it matters, but you do not know me.” Loki can taste the venom dripping from their own words.
“Let me try, then.” Mobius insists, and Loki hates how much they want him to.
“Yet I’m not allowed to know a single thing about you, how lovely.” They deflect, stopping in their tracks.
“We can get to that later.” Mobius’ breathes.
Loki turns their gaze on him, cold and calculating. This creature, mortal is not the right word for anyone in the TVA, this stranger. Loki doesn’t know how they got here, idly toying with the idea of confiding in Mobius, of sharing a sliver of unremarkable truth.
“I’m…wrong, in this place. I don’t belong here.” They start, suddenly, pointing out the obvious. A sharp intake of breath. “This place narrows down my existence to everything it’s not, and it’s suffocating.” Loki’s hand moves on its own accord, touching their throat. “All I am here is a variant, one of so many Loki’s. That makes you used to me.”
“You think it makes you more human.” Mobius replies, soft and unassuming and infuriatingly right.
“I think it tethers me to your perception of the variant you caught.” Loki says, grinding sharp teeth together.
“I can see how different that must be for you, Loki.”
“Different? I’ve been reduced to this” Loki claws at the tie wrapped around their neck “man. A pet.”
“You’d rather keep your illusions, your tricks? I know what you are, with or without them. Even if I wanted you all magicked up again, you can’t pick and choose what works here.”
“You want me controlled.” Loki cuts in, fingers tingling with the long gone whispers of their magic.
“Come on, we’re cooperating, aren’t we? Listen, we’ll be back out in the field again soon enough, thanks to my groveling in there with Renslayer. You’ll get a second to breathe some life into yourself, I promise.” Mobius’ starts again, the quirk of his brow and lips always oh-so-superior.
“Now you’re promising things? You trust me, all of a sudden?” Loki answers, mimicking the tone Mobius’ puts on when he’s negotiating.
“No.” He says it easily. “But you can't cage a god, after all. I just think you’ll stay because you want to.” Mobius’ has the nerve to smile.
“How can I want anything without such a thing as free will?” Loki says, throwing their hands up, nose scrunched up in a frown.
“Oh, you’ve got more of that than you think. Even here.” It feels contradictory to everything that's been thrown at Loki so far, but Mobius says it with such conviction Loki almost tastes what he means. They take a step closer, head angled to the side, contemplating.
“Speaking from experience?” Their voice turns hushed, a little lilting.
“Always am.” Mobius replies easily.
“And what do you want?” Loki asks with a smile, like a shark smelling blood.
“Let’s save that for later, Loki.”
They’re standing close, off to the side in a corridor that stretches on too far behind and ahead.
“You know, the way you say my name is the only thing that's felt right since I got here.” Loki murmurs, taking a step closer still. It’s a line more than a confession, but the way Mobius twists his lips and rolls his eyes melts some of the ice encasing Loki’s insides.
Loki leans down, feeling the heady rush of doing something unexpected in the place where all is known, pressing his lips to the upper corner of Mobius’. It’s chaste, a ghost of a kiss. Mobius breathes in deeply, turning his head just an inch, leaving that inch as space between them.
“I said we’d save that for later.” Mobius mutters, stepping back, running a hand across his face. He can’t quite wipe away the beginnings of a smile.
Loki reminds themself to breathe, hot needlepoints of a blush pricking his skin.
“You feelin’ better, for now?” Mobius’ asks after a stretch of silence, eyes light and crinkled.
And strangely, they do. When the TVA seems so far away from Loki and Mobius sphere of existence, when Loki’s being stared down by someone who looks like he sees a mystery and might be fine with keeping it that way. “I suppose.”
“How about you get some actual work done then, I’m getting a snack. I’ll see you when you’re done, alright?” Mobius says, louder, shaking his head gently like he’d been startled awake.
“Mind numbing paperwork awaits!” Loki exclaims, turning on their heels, a bit too eager, to walk back to the pen-ink crime scene they left behind.
Mobius calls out his name one more time and Loki smiles in triumph.
“It might not be what you want, but the color made me think of you.” Mobius continues, throwing a small, glimmering object up for Loki to catch before leaving, turning a corner that might not have been there when they arrived.
The object lands heavier than expected in their palm. Loki turns the gold cylindrical tube until they can read the flowery engraving on the cap of the lipstick. Bloodshed.