2013.07.29 - Uncomfortable Questions

What a lovely Monday afternoon. The sun is shiny, the birds are chirping, and Loki, God of Tricks, is wearing Midgardian clothing (blue t-shirt, over grey long sleeved, black pants) while making his way from a local coffee shop. He's taking a tentative sip from his coffee cup, Mjolnir clipped to his right hip, as his green eyes appear thoughtful.
In his hand is a newspaper, flipped to the obit section, and Loki seems to be reading through it slowly.
Honestly, this has been a rotten few days for Jocelyn. She'd just gotten done hanging with a couple friends though, and that made the teenager feel better. She decided to strike off on her own for awhile, after taking one of her friends back, and found herself wandering through Metropolis. She was dressed casually in a pair of shorts and a plain green t-shirt. Jocelyn was not exactly the height of summer fashion. Fortunately, she had today off, so she didn't have to work.
She rounds a corner and spots Loki walking down the street, still carrying Mjolnir. Jocelyn raises her eyebrow. She hadn't actually had a chance to talk to Loki, and given he'd helped them at the battle, she wanted to confirm a few things. Or discover some. She wasn't sure. Regardless, the teenager quickens her pace, though when she's fifteen or so feet away, she speaks up.
"Afternoon there," Jocelyn says. "Mind if I join you?" the teen questions.
Green eyes lift from the obit, a pictured column of a handsome middle aged man, smiling brightly, sitting with a beautiful wife and three happy looking children. There's an immediate smile on the Trickster's face, warm and open and friendly.
"Yes, of course," Loki agrees, using the paper to motion to a table near by. 
"How are you?" he asks in his light tenor.
"I am well," Jocelyn says to Loki. At least physically. There weren't any scars or obvious signs of injury from the fight with the frost giants they had all partaken in. "Keeping busy. How about yourself?" Jocelyn asks. She's speaking casually, but she is trying to get a read on the man, and trying to figure out the best way to bring a certain topic up. Though when in doubt, Jocelyn figured it was best to ask directly. "I know who Loki is from news reports and from what others have said. I was wondering, however, how you know who I am, as I do not believe we have met, yet you addressed me by a specific name that most don't know".
Stepping toward the table, Loki sets his paper down, obit side up, and reaches for a chair near Jocelyn. He pulls it out for her, and will move to scoot it in as she sits down. Impeccible manners. 
"Much the same. I am tasked with ....things from both Midgard and Asgard and my ...Goddess, so this brief moment will no doubt be short lived," says the Trickster as he helps Jocelyn into her seat. His green eyes are clear of malice for the moment. When she mentions knowing who he is from news reports, the Trickster pauses, looking somewhere between fearful and relieved. 
"ah... Thor has spoken of you," the Liesmith tries while he moves to sit in his chair. 
"It was, afterall, partially by your efforts at Baldur's Gate that we were able to get a hold of one of the shards," he continues much more comfortably.
Mondays are always hectic. Things people put off over the weekend being done last-minute, plans changing as fast as they're made, and ... JARVIS interrupting everything to tell Pepper that a particular green-clad Aesir is out and about and requested a moment of her time. Great. Wonderful. Just what she needed, MORE things to worry about. But, she's not about to refuse the request. 
Walking briskly along with her teal bag on her shoulder, Pepper is looking for a particular pale-skinned and dark-haired form since JARVIS's directions were only as precise as what he was given to relay.
Something in Jocelyn's mind is ringing false here. Years of living in Detroit as a street rat has honed what she calls her BS Detector to a fine degree. "But that does not explain how you recognized me," Jocelyn points out. "As while Thor may have spoken of me, we have not met. Also, you carry Thor's hammer, yet you have claimed it as your own. Also, you fight as though you do not quite know what to do with your body, but the world has seen video of how you fight, and it is with more grace than what you showed". It isn't judgemental, but purely factual how she speaks.
The woman focuses a little bit on Loki now, really looking at him through her energy sight now. Maybe this was that rogue dark elf leader who needed to be dealt with. "So while I appreciate that Thor speaks well of my work at Baldur's Gate, I cannot believe it is how you know me". Again, no judgement. Simply factual. Pepper is noted, but as she isn't that close, Jocelyn doesn't pay her too much mind yet.
Loki quirks a brow at Jocelyn's scurtiny of him. His body is laced through with Loki's chaos, with nothing really available to peg him as THOR in his aura. WIth Mjolnir inactive and sitting quietly, patiently waiting to be of use, there is no Storm Powers in the area. And still, the scrutiny has Loki ill at ease, and so his eyes narrow and his shoulder squares in the longsleeve grey shirt under a drak blue tee he's wearing with his black jeans. 
"No. I suppose it doesn't," loki finally settles on saying.
Well, no frigging wonder Pepper doesn't spot Odinson right off, he's wearing normal (aka Midgardian) clothing. Once she does spot the Aesir, though, she promptly detours and walks straight toward his table and the pair currently sitting there. She doesn't call out or wave to him, though, as that's not something she's in the habit of doing. However, her brisk and seemingly silent approach might come across as grumpy, like the impending arrival of disapproval.
Jocelyn is perceptive enough to read that body language. She was just trying to filter out all the other energy. Shockingly, she sees a whole lot of it when she's hanging around a god. It can make focusing something that requires actual work instead of the natural bit she normally does.
Jocelyn is about to say something when Pepper arrives, the woman picking up on Pepper's arrival fairly quickly. "Ahh. Expecting someone I see. Well, I'll leave the two of you then". The woman's words are polite and formal. Jocelyn could tell she was being deceived, somehow, and while normally she'd stay and try to figure it out, her tolerance for deception at the current time was low. Comes from having her closest friend on the X-Men up and leave.
"If... you feel you must," Loki says to Jocelyn, looking confused and over his shoulder and...
"Lady Pepper," exclaims the Liesmith, quickly getting to his feet. He spills a bit of his coffee onto the obit column of hte newspaper he was reading. And then Loki glances between the two, looking a bit lost.
"Odinson." Pepper looks at the taller man with an expression like one might give to a particularly naughty child. "Sit. You had better have a VERY good reason for requiring me to drop everything and come running out here." She glances at the young lady that had been speaking with him, her stern expression catching Jocelyn as if expecting an explanation from her as well.
For her part, Jocelyn doesn't look that phased by Pepper's stare. Of course, Jocelyn hasn't really seen Pepper outside of cape (or, way back when, in disguise), so it wasn't like the woman would have cause to recognize her. Which Jocelyn was perfectly fine with. "Just having a conversation with Loki," Jocelyn tells Pepper with a casual shrug. Though the confusion and tentativeness in Loki's voice does give Jocelyn pause. There was definitely something off here, and while she was annoyed, she wanted answers more than anything. The woman does reach over and grab a chair, setting it down so Pepper has somewhere to sit. It only seemed polite.
It really is remarkable how 'cowed' the God is before Pepper. Loki drops to the chair, green eyes about as contrite as a child with his hands in the cookie jar could be. He presses his lips together and then pushes the newspaper at Pepper, as if the obit explains it all.
"Who is he?" Loki asks, voice shaking faintly. 
"Tell me he was some terrible. The picture... he looks so loved," the Trickster requests humbly, sounding as if he hasn't read the column - which would indeed describe a loved family man.
Pepper Potts nods her thanks to Jocelyn for the extra chair and sits down, her bag going into her lap intead of onto the ground next to her. She tilts her head a bit to look at the newspaper, her eyes flicking back and forth quickly as she reads the obituary column entry... oh HELL. She looks at Loki again, her eyebrows drawing together. "He was not. He was a supervisor in our accounting department and actually a very nice man... Odinson, PLEASE don't tell me you have something to do with this. It says he fell off of a balcony."
It seems strange to Jocelyn. Something isn't adding up here. She might have it worked out. Maybe. She had the vaguest ideas of what might be going on, but the woman, for the most part, remains silent. This was something for the god and the woman to discuss. An interuption here would not be appropriate.
Loki's eyes go wide, horror playing on his thin face. 
"But... the Visions... he was to bring about... did I-?" Loki stammers, frame shaking as his gaze falls down to the photo again. 
"I knew he had a family, but.. if he didn't then..." Loki lifts his gaze to Pepper again, and his pale cheeks some how grow paler. He's jaw works and his lips press into a thin unhappy line. His brows knit together in a pang of guilt that is more than awkward on the Trickster's face.
"Then why? That's what I want to know also!" Yeah, Pepper is clearly angry. But, even as her words sound angrier, her voice is still the same quiet volume. "I mean, does this have to do with those nightmares? When was the last time you even had any proper sleep? Why didn't you tell me immediately?"
Loki's frown grows darker and he shoves himself away from the table.
"His death prevented Ragnaro-" The words aren't even out of the Trickster's mouth when his hand comes up to his forehead again, fingertips pressing into a temple. He shoves the table aside, grabbing Mjolnir from his belt.
"I have to- There's another... If I hurry... maybe I won't have to..." Loki sputters then gives Mjolnir one very familiat spin. A tornado swirls over head, then reaches down and plucks the Trickster from the street. The dark patch of sky smooths away into nothing as the Asgardian vanishes into the summer sky.
There's a brief turn over to look at Pepper, a look of confusion on Jocelyn's face.
"He is acting decidedly un-Loki-ish," Jocelyn observes. At least from everything Jocelyn knew about Loki. "If I can ask, what's going on?" Jocelyn is feeling rather confused, kind of like she'd just been caught up in a tornado like the one that just picked Loki up.
Pepper Potts opens her mouth to say something more to Loki, but then he's gone with a whoosh. Huffing out an aggravated sigh, she then looks at Jocelyn and sits back in her chair. "Sorry. He /has/ been acting strangely. And I feel like I'm the one having to clean up after him." Honestly, though, the Aesir's comment about the visions has her more worried than anything else.
"Something about him makes no sense. He claims to have recognized me, but I've never had a conversation with him. He also just doesn't move or act like he knows what he's doing with his body," Jocelyn offers. "And there's the thing with him having Thor's hammer. Something is wrong," Jocelyn observes.
There's a pause. "Forgive me. I never introduced myself properly. I'm Jocelyn". Pepper may recognize her voice from the times they have spoken on comms when she was acting as Channel. It depended on how good Pepper's memory for that sort of thing was.
"Can't say I envy you the task of cleaning up after him though," she says. "He seems like quite a handful right now, which is odd in and of itself".
Pepper Potts reaches a hand across the table for Jocelyn to shake. "Hello. Call me Pepper... I get the feeling we've met before." She dismisses that thought as soon as it's spoken, though. "Things are ... complicated right now. I never thought I'd find myself having to babysit an Odinson, but," she pauses, then smiles faintly. "it's really not that different from what I usually do."
The hand taken, Jocelyn nods and shakes it. "Good to meet you, Pepper. It's possible, if you're watching an Odinson, that we saw each other at one of the events Thor puts on". The wedding or the feast, or something like that. "Though you'll have to forgive me. I've actually got an appointment I need to not be late for. Good luck," the woman says. And with that, Joce will head off.
Category:Log