Work Text
Loki blinked himself to wakefulness and raised his head. He’d fallen asleep at the desk, piles of files surrounding where his head had been pillowed on his crossed arms. His shoulders were sore, and in a moment of bewilderment he realized he hadn’t slept properly for quite a long time.
He judged himself somewhat harshly for the fact that the first real rest he’d gotten had been in an office archive, and then decided to smother the knowledge that sleep was only possible where there was safety.
A new warmth registered, and he sat up, rolling his shoulders back, before twisting to grab the brown jacket that had been draped over him. It wasn’t the dreary greenish-tan of his own jacket, and when he held it up, it was clear that the sleeves would be too short if he put it on.
Mobius.
The analyst in question was absent from the chair across from him. Loki wondered where he’d gone, but in the back of his mind he was reeling, because the fact that Mobius had left him alone,
asleep,
at this table meant that not only did he trust his coworkers not to bother Loki, but he also trusted
Loki
not to get up and walk away.
Why had he given Loki his jacket? It wasn’t particularly cold in the TVA. It wasn’t particularly warm, either. Loki frowned at the sudden awareness of the lack of temperature—the blazers were never smothering, but removing them never caused a chill. He supposed temperature control was just another delight inherent to the all-around delightful Time Variance Authority.
He lowered Mobius’ jacket and allowed a secret smile down to where it rumpled in his lap. He could admit, even if only to himself, that perhaps there was
one
delightful thing about the Time Variance Authority, and that sole delightful thing had shown him more kindness in a silent act of trust than anyone in Asgard had ever managed with all of their words.
Perhaps kindness was real, and perhaps Loki deserved it.
Perhaps kindness took the form of a dork with a mustache who didn’t seem to realize that Loki had his own jacket hanging over the back of his chair.
He rubbed his thumb absently over the fabric. Gods didn’t pray, and even if they did, Loki certainly wouldn’t, but he found himself knee-deep in a sudden elevated hope that could only be described as akin to, if not wholly, prayer; hope that may have been more similar to dread, had there been anyone else around. Loki was, for once, glad to be alone, as he prayed that he
wasn’t
imagining the extra warmth in Mobius’ jacket.
Because if he
had
been imagining it, it would imply a level of closeness to Mobius that he wasn’t willing to entertain. It would suggest an
attachment
to the man, a tangible association of warmth with Mobius’ entire self. Loki was stronger than this. He wasn’t about to become emotional over a jacket.
His thumb skated over it once more, and he recalled how it folded and creased at the elbows when Mobius put his hands on his hips. The fabric was worn there on the outside more than anywhere else, physical evidence of a meaningless habit that suddenly meant more than it should have to Loki. Mobius was a
person,
regardless of his nonsensical job at this nonsensical institution—a person who put his hands on his hips so frequently, his jacket remembered that small strain, like a desire path, even when he wasn’t wearing it.
Loki found himself choking back the desire to learn all of the desire paths in Mobius’ life, from the tired threads on the elbows of his jacket to the way his feet angled themselves as he walked down stairs. Because
Mobius was a person,
and he’d draped his jacket over Loki’s shoulders while he slept, and that spoke to a softness Loki had never been brave enough to touch. He’d called it weak, before. He’d looked at Thor and mocked him for taking a chance on his love.
Now, however, Loki was fighting back the realization that taking a chance on anything, especially something as risky and selfish as love, was probably the bravest thing someone could do.
Mobius didn’t feel risky, though, and spending time with him didn’t feel selfish. Loki bunched the jacket in his hands and frowned at it, now seriously considering why the analyst would do something like this. Sure, covering a sleeping person with a blanket or other similar item was a fairly universal standard, but Loki saw Mobius as more practical than that, so there must’ve been another reason. Maybe he wanted assurance that Loki would come find him once he’d woken up.
Or maybe he’d left it to show Loki, definitively, that he hadn’t abandoned him. He’d studied Loki’s entire life, after all. He must’ve come to the conclusion that Loki would wake up, see the empty desk, and assume Mobius had ditched him without a second thought.
Something warm and foreign bubbled to life in Loki’s body. He wanted to be irritated by it, but it spread from the insides of his ribs to the tips of his fingers and filled him with a feeling so new and so wonderful, he barely managed to tuck his smile down against his chest.
Loki had been important. He’d been admired, respected, feared. But he didn’t think he’d ever been so quietly
valued,
and he wanted to hate how easily Mobius seemed to be proving all the claims of his past wrong.
But evidently he didn’t want to hate it that much, because he was really quite happy with the development. Not that he would admit this to anyone, of course, but the happiness was there nonetheless, and Loki, selfishly, wanted to get used to it.
He stood, shrugged his own jacket on, and tucked Mobius’ jacket over his arm before setting off toward the monitor room.
He paused in the doorway, watching the analysts type and sort papers and push buttons. Casey was squinting at a file at his desk in the corner. Mobius stood in the center of the room, talking to one of the armored minutemen, his shoulders relaxed despite the obvious dress code violation. Loki watched the minuteman’s curious gesture, then watched Mobius wave it off. He had no idea what excuse he’d given, but the hunter nodded and continued down the hall, and Mobius sighed before glancing in Loki’s direction.
The change on his face was instantaneous. His whole body, really. His posture straightened and his tiredness seemed to vanish. He waved from the middle of the room, and several analysts glanced up at the movement. When they saw who he was waving to, they returned to their work as though Loki’s presence and Mobius’ resulting delight was just another workplace constant.
Loki wasn’t wholly oblivious, and he certainly wasn’t blind. He knew Mobius
liked
him—in fact, he was fairly sure
everyone
knew that—but he was having a hard time accepting the fact that Mobius was perfectly content with broadcasting how much he liked Loki to any room he entered, even in a way as casual as this one.
Loki had never had someone who actually enjoyed liking him. Even with his family, their respect and esteem was often in spite of who he was. The Asgardian people liked that he was a prince. Humans often liked that he was, by their standards, attractive. Mobius had every right to behave as though he was just keeping Loki around for help on the mission, but for some reason, he’d decided instead to
light up
whenever he saw Loki, just short of having real sunlight pouring from his skin.
Some cruel trickery must be at work here,
Loki concluded, after seeing Mobius smile at him enough that his own heart began to skip around without permission whenever it happened again. If his heart had ever paid any mind to his head, it probably would’ve reminded him that it was better to ask for forgiveness than permission, but to be quite candid, Loki wasn’t very inclined to fault his heart for this joyful disobedience.
Very simply, it was
nice
to be smiled at. It was nice to be
liked.
It was nice to have a friend—and that was exactly what Mobius was, despite Loki’s better judgment.
And looking at Mobius now, at his unapologetic delight, despite his better judgment, Loki smiled back.
“Hello, Sleeping Beauty,” Mobius said as Loki neared. He snorted and held out his arm, offering the jacket back.
“I can’t believe you left me to my own devices in the archives,” he replied, the teasing tone coming far too easily. “What if I’d returned to my mischievous ways? Wouldn’t you be in trouble with your boss?”
The skin around Mobius’ eyes and mouth crinkled as his smile turned equally teasing. “Your
sleeping
devices?” he clarified. “Yeah, call me a fool, but—”
“Oh, I will,” Loki interrupted. “I have. And I will again.”
“—But,”
Mobius continued, undeterred, “I was confident enough that you wouldn’t be getting up to get a drink of water, let alone anything chaotic enough to write home about. You looked exhausted.”
“Rude.”
“You didn’t even notice me leaving,” Mobius added. “I hit my foot on the chair leg and knocked over a lamp when I caught myself on the table.”
“I definitely would’ve noticed,” Loki said, crossing his arms. “There’s no way you did that.”
“I did.”
“You did
not.”
“Well, you didn’t notice me leaving my jacket,” Mobius acquiesced, holding up the garment with a shrug. “I hope you slept well.”
“I did,” Loki admitted haltingly, and swallowed. “Thank you.”
Mobius just patted him on the shoulder, then shrugged his jacket on and adjusted the lapels. The slightly worn threads at the elbows drew Loki’s eyes in a gentle way nothing else ever did.
As he followed a now-rambling Mobius down another boring TVA hallway, he did his best to skirt around the blaring, unignorable knowledge that he was completely, utterly, and absolutely
smitten
with this man.
Mobius continued to talk—probably logistics about whatever they had to work on next—but Loki couldn’t find it in him to pay attention.
If he spun a wheel of people from his life, including his past self, and informed whoever it landed on that he was developing a rather debilitating fondness for a dorky office worker with a mustache, he was
certain
they wouldn’t believe him. He barely believed it himself, even while he stared like an
idiot
at Mobius’ face, as though expecting it to divulge the secrets of the universe when he next looked at Loki.
It wasn’t long before he did turn his head to look at Loki, and while his smile didn’t seem to be divulging any secrets, of the universe or otherwise, Loki found that he preferred it this way. There were no secrets in Mobius’ smile because he had nothing to hide, and the more time Loki spent with him, the more he realized he had very little to hide as well. Perhaps secrets weren’t all they were cracked up to be—not when being known, openly and happily, was an option.
Perhaps love was real.
And perhaps Loki deserved it.