#also for ur mental picture loki is wearing a green shirt with the suit

[martianbugsbunny]

That's How He Knows He's Yours (A Lokius Fic)

Would you like a little bit of self-indulgent Lokius to heal from the finale? You would?!?! Good!! Because I just so happen to have some! *opens green coat to reveal a fic* All the context you need, which is little to none, is in the fic, so just read on and enjoy and patch up your little broken heart!!!

The TVA was having a party.

That wasn’t really the important thing, but it was interesting anyway. Mobius couldn’t remember the last time they’d had a party—but they needed to keep their spirits up after finding out that their entire lives were, in fact, lies, so a party it was. Every sector was having its own shindig, because the TVA was immense, and all of the employees couldn’t have fit in a single room if they’d been threatened with death to do it.

Well, anyway, the important thing was that Mobius wasn’t going alone. He’d convinced Loki that it would be more fun to go together than to go separately, or not to go at all.

The other important thing was that Mobius had offered to braid Loki’s hair, which had grown considerably longer than it had been the first time they’d met, and that Loki had taken him up on it.

He’d spent hours studying both Jotun and Aesir braiding styles—not just the actual construction, but also the meaning behind them. In the end he’d picked the Jotun style that signaled “I’m taken” because it was beautiful, and because he was pretty sure Loki didn’t know enough about his own culture to know what it meant himself, so Mobius could convince himself it wasn’t that much of a presumption.

“I’m not so sure about this suit,” Loki said, patiently waiting as Mobius brushed his hair before twisting it together. “The gold stripes are a bit much, don’t you think?” “What happened to the guy who used to strut around wearing gold armor and a cape?” Mobius teased, beginning the first braid. Left under the middle, right under the middle, he muttered to himself.

“I’ve been wearing your boring TVA clothes for months,” Loki said. “The drab must’ve rubbed off on me.”

Mobius rolled his eyes. The truth was, he was outside his own comfort zone in a fancy suit. His didn’t have metallic pin-striping on it like Loki’s did (because it was a bit much, although Loki wore it well) but it was black, and a much sharper cut and a much more dashing style than he was used to wearing. He’d been just an analyst in a plain brown suit for centuries, and now here he was all dressed up like he thought he was Prince Charming or something.

He tried to focus more on the different strands of dark hair in his hands than on the way his fingertips brushed against Loki’s temples as he gathered new locks to add to a braid.

He failed.

As he began to pin the completed braids up using glittering golden hair pins, he tried to focus more on not stabbing Loki’s  scalp than on the brush of his hands against the nape of Loki’s neck.

He failed.

Loki was built like a prince, Mobius sometimes caught himself thinking. It didn’t matter if it was princedom of Asgard or of Jotunheim. There was an elegance in the set of his shoulders, in the movements of his hands as he wielded his magic, and a determination in the curve of his back and the way he stepped, that was just plain regal. Gold, like the simple rings he was wearing that night and the hair pins Mobius had found for him and the single slim chain around his neck, seemed to have been built into the cosmos for no reason other than to have Loki wear it.

That was waxing poetic. Mobius didn’t do that often—only for Loki and Jet Skis. What could he say, they were both remarkable singularities in the universe.

He finished setting the last braid into place, nestled among the others like a crown across the top of Loki’s head. “All done, puss,” he said, patting Loki on the shoulder.

Loki’s head turned slightly to the side at the use of the nickname, and Mobius could just see a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “Do I dare look?” he asked.

“I didn’t mess it up that bad,” Mobius said. Loki chuckled and got up from the floor in front of Mobius’s couch to go check his appearance in the mirror on the other side of the room.

Mobius could see the reflected green eyes widening as he caught sight of himself. For some reason Mobius’s heart was in his throat.

“I didn’t know you knew how to do this,” Loki said.

“What, braids?” Mobius managed to speak past his racing pulse. “It’s not that hard.” (It was, actually, quite hard, but learning it for Loki had made it seem easier.)

“No. The Jotun style.” That quick pulse stopped altogether. Mobius sat there, stock still, feeling very much like he was going to throw up if Loki didn’t break the sudden silence.

He turned from the mirror to look Mobius in the eyes properly. He was smiling, his eyes glittering beneath the faint liner he’d applied earlier that evening and a light dusting of shimmery white eyeshadow. “Seems the pussycat has caught himself a guilty little mouse,” he said, his voice sultry and honey-smooth, dripping into Mobius’s soul. “You didn’t realize I knew what these braids meant,” he stated. There wasn’t a hint of doubt on his face.

“You caught me,” Mobius said. He was impressed with himself for being able to get any words out at all, with Loki’s gaze focused on him like that.

“I’m taken, am I?”

Now Mobius found himself entirely unable to speak. What could he say, after all, other than "we’ve been spending a lot of time together and you don’t mind when I call you ‘puss’ and I catch you staring at me sometimes in a way nobody ever has"? It seemed stupid even in his brain. None of that meant he and Loki were…whatever he’d been subconsciously thinking they could be when he’d picked the style.

Loki walked back across the room, a new sway in his hips that Mobius was positive hadn’t been there before, and sat down on the couch to lean directly into Mobius’s personal space. For a long moment, far too long, far too breathless, he simply studied Mobius’s face, as though he could see everything single thought that had ever crossed his mind.

“We’ll see about that when we get back from the party,” he said finally, gaze flicking briefly down to Mobius’s lips. “Maybe you’re the one who’s going to be…taken.”

He crossed into that last bit of personal space and pressed their lips together, his touch surprisingly light, stunningly tender, as one arm came up to drape across Mobius’s shoulders and draw him even closer.

“Don’t be so sure of yourself, puss.” Mobius finally found his tongue again after the kiss (although in a few moments, he was sure the cat would have it) and flirted back, laying a hand on Loki’s thigh. “You’re the one with the fancy hairstyle to prove it.”

As Loki laughed, Mobius captured his lips in another kiss, just as soft as before but oh-so-many leagues more passionate, and he thanked his lucky stars he’d been fool enough to pick a Jotun way to call Loki his.