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(no subject)

Who: Loki
Broadcast: Everyone
Action: Paisley
When: Right now!

[Action]

[Guess who just shows up to breakfast one... afternoon? Loki emerges from his office, looking for all the world like a man who has just woken up from an extended nap, barely open eyes, trying to stretch his back and shoulders, the whole nine. He wanders into the kitchen, fumbles around until he makes himself something hot and dark enough that he can pretend it's coffee, and stares suspiciously into the cup before drinking.

Ugh, his mouth tastes like someone glued one of Thor's feet to it. Ugh. What possessed him to sleep like this...

(Guess who has no idea he's been missing for weeks~)]

[A bit later: Broadcast]

[Awake now, and... well, he looks amused. Which is to say as if he's planning on flaying someone alive.]

Why yes, I have returned. Hide all of the party favors, lock up your sons and daughters, cancel the pedestrian fireworks displays.

A funny thing, missing time. You'd never know it was gone until someone tells you. Has anyone else fallen victim to such thievery?

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It feels a little strange she almost said. She might still say it. But first there was one thing between them that was never strange, and one thing between them which she hadn't yet indulged in since his return.

Rogue simply leaned forward to claim his lips with hers, a kiss she meant to be brief and punctuating, but at the touch of his lips turned into something a little more desperate, a little more driven by concern. She'd been so worried about him.

Loki was more than happy to lose himself in that kiss, his hands coming up to comb lightly through her hair, caress her cheeks. He hadn't yet been the one who waited, who was left behind; he didn't know what it was like in that sense. (And time was also such a relative thing; he could lose a month and not even notice, caught up by something.) But the comfort of Rogue was in assuaging some of the complete paranoia he'd begun to feel at the revelation of his missing time.

Rogue kissed him maybe a little longer than comfort required, a still-gloved hand going up to place cautious fingertips on his cheek. When she needed to pull back to do that silly mortal breathing thing, she did with a gasp, moving to lean her forehead against his. "I looked for you," she breathed a confession against his lips, her voice burdened with the pain and the stress, the frustration and the agony of loss, no matter how she would have tried to keep it from him, it was there in the weight of her vowels, the sharper edges of her consonants. "I tried everythin'."

She shuddered, a subconscious reaction to remembering the coldness of space, the way that 'coldness' didn't even begin to describe the feeling of the void.

"It didn't work. All I could do was wait." I'm sorry. She shut her eyes against the feeling of heat. I came for you and I couldn't get to you and-- "I'm sorry."

"I wish you had found me," he said quietly. I am sorry. He's not good at sorry. He's never been good at worry. "I... do not think there is anything you could have done. For you would have, if you had been able."

But it felt good, to know she had tried.

"I tried everything," she repeated, even stupid things that he'd probably frown at her about if he knew. I wish you had found me.

She wished she had too.

"I'm sorry," it was worth saying again. He'd told her, once, about how he had fallen. No one had come for him. He'd gone through years of hell and torture and madness on his own, and no one had looked for him. She had. She always had. And each time, it hadn't been enough.

Some hero she was.

"You tried," he said quietly. He could hold on to that knowledge. No one had ever really tried to look for him before. "You tried." Even if she hadn't succeeded, she had tried. She'd done her best. He could believe she had done that.

His fingers found the hem of her shirt, curling into the fabric.

It wasn't enough.

'Ultimate power', Mystique had called her, and even with all the feeble controlled she possessed, the powers she could beckon forth with a little concentration, she hadn't been able to breach the Marsiva. She couldn't even ram a ship into it. Nothing had worked.

She couldn't apologize again. Apologies were worthless. And it meant something that he, that Loki, was willing to forgive, or overlook her failure to find him each time. She didn't want to downplay that, for his sake. So she said nothing, her hand dropping to his shoulder and curling into the fabric.

She'd hold onto him if she could.

Loki slid his arms around her and leaned into a much fuller embrace. There wasn't anything else he could say to the apology, to the unspoken words that hovered around them. But he could reassure himself that she had tried. No one else had tried for him, and that was what had to be more important. Whether she had failed or not, she had tried, and he had no doubt she had tried to the point of breaking herself.

After simply holding onto him for a long moment, Rogue realized that this was a rather uncomfortable way to embrace and she knew at least five better ones and he'd taught them all to her. So with very little ceremony, she shifted to slide up and sit sideways on his lap and curled against his chest. The hand which had been on his shoulder dropped down to his chest, caught at the material there as she held him.

She'd tell him, she thought, because it might help him to know. And because she'd feel better if she knew that he knew. She didn't want to keep secrets. She didn't want to make him a stranger. "I'm pretty sure ya were on the Marsiva. That's where the pendent pointed. I tried ta get on board..." she decided to leave off the details at the last minute. "It didn't work."

Loki was more than happy to help settle her into his lap, to wrap one arm around her shoulders and the other around her waist. He rested his head lightly against hers, chin just touching her shoulder.

He nodded slightly. It was good to know, that he hadn't been taken so far as that. "It seems they do not wish us to return after we have left that ship," he remarked. "Interesting, that."

"Heard about all kinds of weird things folks were seein' when we were on board the last time," she said, glad to divert attention away from her actions. "Get the feelin' they're not as on top of it as they'd like us ta believe."

"Mmm. Or it is just another means to manipulate us." His paranoia was in overdrive at this point. "I trust none of this."

"Hey," she gave him a small smile and reached up to trace her fingertips lightly over his features. "Ya don't need ta trust it, but that doesn't mean ya should stop considerin' all the data either."

Her fingers reached his hair, she tangled them in it and she tugged on them lightly. "But ya know some of it's real."

Like her, right there, sitting in your lap and pulling on your hair.

"That is true." The reality of Rogue was rather inescapable at the moment, unless he wanted to go full-blown maybe this is all in my mind paranoia--and that really was a path to madness. At some point, he had to believe what he saw and felt. He nuzzled into her shoulder.

Good. That sounded... better. And it was always a good sign when he touched her like that, so maybe he was coming out of being freaked out faster than she thought. She was glad.

"I can't wait ta show you around the space station later." She let her fingers trace lightly through his hair. "It's got the best library I've seen since we've been here, but they call it a 'datary.' I think you'll really like it."

"Oh, I'd very much like to see that." Genuine enthusiasm there. He's missed having access to a library, even if the one in Luceti wasn't at all good. Just having books of a sort around will make him much happier. "I ought to see if they've any book shops as well."

"There are a few, but they're harder ta find. This place seems ta value glowsticks a lot more'n nearly anythin' else," she smiled at him, loving to hear that enthusiasm in his tone. "We can go check them out. I've been earnin' enough money for you ta be able to get what ya want, as long as it's not emptyin' out the entire bookshelf and putting it in your pocket space."

And so she explained to him about the gumballs, their frozen assets, the odd jobs she's been working, and the people who've come and gone (Kitty, an alternate universe), and the garden. Oh yes, she'd like to take him to the garden as well.

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