Gods Do Get Sleepy
Loki
There had to be something wrong with Peter Parker, the Spiderling. This was all most suspicious. There was no other explanation for him willingly inviting Loki to a cafe, all cheerful and strange like that. It was almost disturbing, really. Off-putting. He hadn’t the faintest clue how to react to it.
Loki took a bite of his sub-sandwich, packed full of turkey, provolone cheese, lettuce, and tomatoes. It was surprisingly good, despite the shop’s run-down, rather abandoned look. They were seated at a small booth, the only customers, stashed away in the corner, with faint music playing in the background. The Spiderling was munching on a handful of what he called “French Fries,” with his brown eyes ever blinking, ever innocently. Underneath the table, Loki could feel Peter’s legs swinging back and forth, rocking the table at the same pace, in the same rhythm, over and over and over…
“Mr Loki, you’re falling asleep again.”
Loki jerked himself upright, shaking his head rapidly and dropping his sandwich back onto its paper wrapping. Without bothering to reply, he wiped his fingertips on his napkin, cleaning away where the mustard and mayonnaise had begun to drip out again, as the sandwich tipped in his dozing hands. He crumpled up the napkin and flicked it across the table, huffing and slouching back in his seat.
The Spiderling mimicked his posture, and he too crossed his arms and slid down the booth, grinning at him some more even as his red hoodie bunched up behind his head, exposing more of his bright yellow t-shirt from behind the open zipper. “Why do you keep doing that?”
“Doing what?” Loki answered.
He slid his sandwich aside, playing dumb whilst he absentmindedly thought about his clone, far away in Asgard. He’d checked in on his magic, and thankfully the clone was still dutifully disguising itself as Odin- and thankfully still doing it well enough that no one had noticed anything amiss.
Yet.
“Falling asleep.” Peter grabbed his soda cup and took a long gulp through his straw. “What are you so tired for? Do gods even get tired? Mr Thor says they don’t.”
He sniffed. “Yes. We do. He’s a liar.”
“Oh. So, why are you tired?”
“I’m not.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No, I’m not.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
Loki sighed, long and exaggerated. “Alright, fine. Yes. I am tired. Very tired, as a matter of fact. Are you yet satisfied?”
“Nope.” The Spiderling shook his head and pushed the steaming chai tea latte towards him. “There’s lots of stuff I wanna talk about, but you’re way too sleepy for it. Drink this, it’ll help.”
Loki gave in to that, too, and took the warm cup into his hands, sipping the drink down cautiously. The hot, spiced creaminess hit the back of his throat and ran down, immensely satisfying. He closed his eyes, taking it all in. It felt so nice to enjoy what he liked again, rather than what he had to pretend to like because it was what Odin liked. He took another sip, eyes still closed as he relaxed into the gentle lulling of flavours and comfort. Peter wasn’t too much of a threat- besides with his uncanny insight, it would seem- so Loki was fine with taking a moment to have his eyes shut, blocking out everything else in a fleeting moment of peace.
He opened his eyes again, then fixed them on the mini-Avenger. “Thank you.”
Peter sat back up all the way, squinting at Loki. “Are you sure you’re okay? It doesn’t seem healthy for you to be this tired.”
He hesitated. “It… isn’t. But I’ve been doing this for three years, so I’m sure I can handle more.”
The Spiderling, who had just taken another drink of his soda, choked on it, and almost sprayed it all over Loki’s suit. He flinched backwards, but thankfully, Peter swallowed, and just ended up coughing and gasping for a few moments. When he looked back up, his eyes were two massive orbs.
“You’ve been this tired for three whole years?!”
Loki crinkled his nose, scoffing. “Heavens, no. It’s just been getting progressively worse the longer I’ve dragged this whole charade on.”
The moment he said it, his mouth snapped shut, and he understood very quickly that he’d likely made a mistake. Peter was talkative, intuitive, and worst of all, he appeared to be very, very curious. Loki got the distinct feeling that the child wanted something from him. He didn’t know why, just as he didn’t know why Peter was willing to buy him a sandwich and a chai latte, but he was beginning to piece together at least what the Spiderling wanted to get out of him.
Peter spoke right on cue.
“Charade?” He tilted his head to one side, his fluffy, light brown hair flopping over with it. “You mean acting like you’re dead? Which you still haven’t explained, by the way.”
Loki rolled his eyes to the ceiling, digging his hands into his long hair, (ruining the already ruined, curly, frizzy mess that it was) and burying his head into his arms. He let out a long groan. “It’s not acting dead, it’s letting Thor continue to believe that I’m dead.”
A beat.
“I don’t really see the difference…?”
He lifted his head to roll his eyes again at Peter, though his hands were still tangled into his hair and he only managed to raise his head a few inches off the table. “You wouldn’t.”
“I might,” Peter said, optimistic as ever. “Just explain it to me.”
Loki coughed, harshly, the rawness of his own throat burning him. Unfortunately, however, he couldn’t use his seidr to heal himself; his magic was too weak and any attempts at self-restoration seriously risked his clone vanishing into thin air. At the very least, it would result in a mass panic when the Allfather just vanished in the middle of a council meeting, if not entirely expose himself to Asgard, and thereby, his older brother. Loki determinedly ignored the Spiderling’s earlier statement, that maybe he wanted to get caught because then he could tell Thor he was alive and be back with him… without actually having to tell him anything at all.
He eyed the Spiderling up and down, considering whether or not to open his mouth. He ended up deciding to speak, anyway, as he did so, Loki shoved down Peter’s voice, which reminded him that he would also open up to the child because he had no one else to talk to. He firmly disagreed with this, even as his lips parted to fulfil the prophecy made by this ridiculous Midgardian child, and Loki opened up.
“I thought I was going to die, around three years ago. Thor saw me fall. He thought I was dead. I thought I was dead- and I nearly was. My heart had stopped, the process of death had already begun to take place, but… somehow, at the last second… my seidr revived me.”
Peter lifted a finger to speak, but Loki cut him off, already anticipating the question.
“My seidr is my magic. It regenerates my health, allows me to change shape, cast enchantments, it makes clones, draws my daggers, conceals my pocket dimensions… essentially, any magic that I do apart from the natural strength and power of an Asgardian, is my seidr.”
Peter’s face screwed up for a moment, evidently thinking hard. “So, you’re all tired because you’ve… is your-?”
“Yes, my energy is directly linked to my use of magic.” Loki cut the Spiderling off again. “Not enough energy and my seidr is weakened. And on the other hand, if I use too much seidr without allowing myself to recharge, then I am weakened- body and mind.”
Peter pushed aside his food, also leaning in on his elbows. Loki met his eyes, and in them, those brown, shining depths, he could see earnestness. Imploration. Kindness. He was caught between looking away and staring longer, entranced by this strange purity. “Why doesn’t your brother know? Why are you hiding out, just wasting away and draining all of your own magic- all of your own life, even?”
Loki licked his chapped, dry lips. His voice came out barely above a whisper. “It’s complicated.”
“What are you so scared of, Mr Loki?” Peter’s voice had gone soft, too. “You know he loves you, right? He loves you a lot.”
“He shouldn’t.” He snapped back, and sneered, feeling his fear flaring angrily again.
The Spiderling pursed his mouth and made a thoughtful little noise, one that only put Loki more on edge. Peter seemed to have understood something, but Loki hadn’t. Whatever it was, he’d missed it, and that was even more worrisome. But it wouldn’t do him any good to bother asking. He wasn’t sure he even wanted to know.
Loki stared outside, to his left, where there was a window right against the wall to their booth. The sun was beginning to go down, and the burning orange light was penetrating the glass, casting its vivid rays as coloured beams that illuminated the sad little cafe. The light was blinding, and he had to wince and look away to avoid it. He turned away, sighing, resting his head fully in his arms and giving up on trying to prove himself to a strange Midgardian child who made no sense, and yet, perfect sense all at once. What was it about Peter Parker that was so…?
He’d lost the word. And the thought. Loki had lost the word because he could feel Peter’s legs swinging underneath the table again, his movements gently rocking the table back and forth again, and Loki buried his face into the crook of his elbow, closing his eyes to focus better- to perhaps find that lost thought- but it just sent him down a wormhole of entirely different thoughts. And rapidly, with the warm glow of the sunset behind his lids, with the aroma of chai tea perfuming his breaths, and with that ever rocking motion of the table, Loki succumbed to the void.