(no subject)

[st_ratagem]

Loki glared at the journal, then shook his head. Asking Thor that particular what-if had been a mistake, and he'd realized it immediately after writing it. It was annoying, though, being asked the same question over and over again, as if the answer was going to change the twentieth-plus time. And it had never really stopped being concerning, verging on worrying, how clingy his brother tended to get, lately.

They'd been in battle before. Loki had even been injured before. It hadn't led to endless repetitions of ARE YOU OKAY before. One, maybe, immediately after the battle. But not... this.

A good indicator of how upset Thor really was: would he use the door or make a hole in the wall?

Either way, Loki wasn't actually in his room at all. He was on the roof above his room with his journal, a thoroughly non-magical blank book slowly filling up with astronomical observations and other thoughts, and a pen.

Comments

[st_ratagem]

“It took, oh, five minutes? Not longer. Silly overblown thing.” And commissioning someone else wouldn’t have kept the important details in without explanation. He’d put some random name on it so it would never be credited properly at least.

“And yes. Not as myself, but yes.” Thor would no doubt assume, correctly, that this had been a kitten adventure. “Another mortal Jane, you do seem to collect them.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"Yes, well, she isn't going to be a Jane if she really is Sif," he says.

Thor hopes she is.

"She has a friend that's helping her to regain her memories, but I know that's --" Thor gestures vaguely. "-- sort of your arena, too."

[st_ratagem]

“Try not to take this the wrong way,” not that there was going to be any other way to take it, “but I might be the last person who actually wants Lady Sif around. Between you and Stark, I’m outnumbered already.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"Outnumbered?"

[st_ratagem]

“Two of you, one of me. Have you forgotten how to count, brother?”

[st_ormbreaker]

"We're not outnumbering you," Thor protests, propping himself up with one arm. "Why do you think I'm outnumbering you? I'm not outnumbering you!"

[st_ratagem]

“Two of you, one of me,” Loki repeated. “It’s math, not opinion.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"You say that like I'm the enemy," Thor says, aggrieved. "We could be outnumbering other people."

Thor doesn't know who he'd want to outnumber at the inn (he liked them well enough), but he didn't very much like the idea of outnumbering his brother.

[st_ratagem]

“You can use the word ‘adversary’ instead if you prefer.” It was effectively the same, so Loki was sure Thor would not prefer. “How is this a surprise to you, brother? We have a truce, and I’m happy enough with it, but I’m still me.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor lays back down and sulks.

[st_ratagem]

“I’m serious. How is this news to you?” Loki stared at Thor. “To you, Thor.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"We're only adversaries because you choose to be."

[st_ratagem]

“I am not like you!” Loki snapped. “I never will be, and I won’t try. I’m always going to be me. I’m going to sneak, and lie, and have my own agenda and goals. If you think I’m ever signing on with the honest, noble, and forthright, you’re lying to yourself more effectively than I ever could.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor snaps upright.

"I'm not telling you to be like me," he snaps. "I'm telling you to make an effort for once! What kind of person argues with someone when all they want to do is be their friend?"

Thor suddenly feels like kicking something.

[st_ratagem]

“Clearly I do!” Prudently, Loki stashed his journal and notebook somewhere else. Just in case. “What I’m saying is that I am not....” He sighed suddenly. “I’m not doing it anymore, all right? 1500 years of trailing behind your friends was enough. I’m out.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor feels bad. He does, even though he always insisted that Loki be included, even when it was obvious that most of his friends weren't exactly chomping at the bit to have Thor drag his baby brother along.

"What does any of that have to do with now? Fandral, Hogun, Volstagg -- none of them are even here!"

He doesn't mean for his voice to rise there at the end there, but it just does.

[st_ratagem]

“It’s the pattern, Thor, not the specifics.” Exactly which friends of Thor’s were tagged along with was immaterial.

[st_ormbreaker]

"Are you jealous of Tony?"

Was that what all this was about?

"Because I've shown you as much attention as him, so don't act like I have somehow neglected you."

[st_ratagem]

“Try not to be an idiot, Thor. I don’t care who you bed and never have.” Almost never, but close enough. “Have I not been trying to get you to pay less attention to me?”

[st_ormbreaker]

"You don't think I know why you do it?" Thor has no idea why he's so angry; all he wants is for their relationship to be better. All he wants is for this Loki to know that he didn't mean it when he told him that he was the worst.

And yet here he was, fighting him every step of the way, as if they weren't brothers, if they hadn't been real, genuine, true friends until ten years before.

"It's because you're afraid. Afraid of anything that might make you care about someone else."

[st_ratagem]

Loki stilled for a moment; more common for him than it was for Thor, but still unusual. Most of Loki's stillness was holding himself back, watching, planning. This was closer to the freeze of a prey animal, not that he would have enjoyed the comparison.

It wasn't that Thor was angry, he'd been navigating his brother's temper their entire lives. He knew where his brother's on and off buttons were, when it was best to stand aside, when a silent shadow was more annoying than an outright challenge. No, it was more basic than that: Loki had never considered that Thor might actually know his buttons, too.

Or could aim close enough to them to make very little difference. If he was being honest with himself - which he tried to be, the better to lie to other people - fear was part of it. But only part, not the whole. "Wrong. But do you feel better for the outburst?"

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor doesn't say anything to that. He sits, sullen and angry and looks off the roof at the other building nearby and the pool right next to it.

[st_ratagem]

"Apparently not." Talking was soothing, but there didn't seem to be anything to say. "It's self-preservation, Thor. Any creature, if there's pain this way will go that way as efficiently as it can. I simply have... a lot of that way paths. It's just the way things work."

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor had spent so much time around Loki growing up. The last ten years were likely taxing on the both of him. He'd mourned his brother twice, and now was mourning him a third time. He'd believed each time that his brother was dead, but somehow this hurt more than anything. Because he had seen it with his own eyes, had heard the audible crack of his neck, had held him when Thanos dropped Loki's body right in front of him.

Loki had always been a prima donna, and it showed in those moments where he died and resurfaced later in good health. His death then had been so simple that he had no choice but to believe he was gone. To believe that his brother had made the unconscious choice, just as he had the first time, to die for some purpose he couldn't understand. He played his last words over and over in his head, hoping there was some reason hidden there, only to find there was nothing he understood.

Thor still says nothing, but this time it's not out of anger at all.

[st_ratagem]

More silence, not even a Look. He'd finally, it seemed, managed to lean on one of Thor's buttons hard enough to break the whole mechanism. That was good, wasn't it? Thor finally understood how things were. And all it had taken was a little truth at the right time.

"Right!" Loki practiced sounding cheerful at times, but it sounded brittle now, even to his own ears. He stood up, carefully due to the slope of the roof and spared a grateful thought for the fact that he'd already put his books elsewhere. He had nothing to gather up. "I'm off. I don't think there'll be any more stargazing tonight."