Chapter Text
The drive to wherever Stephen was taking them was...interesting. Loki’s never ridden a motorcycle before but he could tell that the way Stephen was driving was a bit reckless. Turning corners without slowing down, running the occasional red light. (“We’re cops it’s allowed,” Stephen had said before Loki could comment on it.) And don’t get Loki started on how...uncomfortable it was. Having to hang on the Stephen so he wouldn’t fly off, plus the uncomfortable heat coming from the seat wasn’t helping.
Neither did being stuck in a traffic jam.
“Dammit, I hate living in New York,” Stephen said, sighing. Leaning forward so that his head was resting on the speed meter.
“Then just move, it’s as simple as that,”
Stephen cast a glance back at him.
“Yeah, like it’s that simple to pick up your life and move to a completely different state,” Stephen snorted and Loki forced down a frown that was threatening to come up, instead he let his face rest in the most neutral position it could. Because he had been forced to pack his life away, as a prince, as a god. All because of one fucking thing that he could’ve prevented.
Instead of voicing his demons out loud he just said. “Well, I think you’ve done that before. No offense but you seem somewhat kinder than the normal New Yorker. Plus the accent is a bit off,”
Stephen laughed at that, a warm chuckle that made something in Loki’s chest spark. He decided to put that spark in a little box and set it on fire. He would think about what it meant later.
Probably.
Yeah, he won’t.
“You’re right on that one, not many people notice though. So, good on you I guess.”
“It’s why Stark hired me, I guess,”
For a few moments, neither of them said anything else as Stephen moved the motorcycle forward for what only seemed like a fucking inch. Norns, why did the Avengers have to make their home in New York? Why couldn’t be someplace without so many people in it? Like Kansas. Which he only knew about from watching The Wizard of Oz. That movie was a guilty pleasure of his and he would admit to no one that he watched it.
“Where did you grow up?” Loki asked after what seemed like an eternity.
“Sorry?”
“Where did you grow up, Strange?” He asked once again, annoyed that he had to repeat himself.
Stephen shifted a bit around Loki’s arms before realizing that yes, Loki was in fact still hanging onto him even though they were practically parked. In Loki’s defense, he didn’t know when they would be taking off again and he’d rather not completely fall off into the tires of cars thank you very much.
“You’ve read my file, and I haven’t read yours so it only fair that you tell me where you grew up at the very least.”
“Yeah, Uhm,” Stephen paused and took a deep breath like he was trying to settle his nerves. “I grew up in Nebraska, not as interesting as Norway though,”
Loki hummed and nodded, trying to seem like he knew what this ‘Nebraska’ was. He really should’ve paid attention when the little spider was trying to teach them about all the states in America. He’ll look it up when he gets home.
“Couldn’t have been that boring, every place has something charming about it,” That charming thing to Loki usually had been magic cults. People out in the countryside had nothing to do really.
Stephen made a non-committal noise and Loki knew that it was the end of the conversation.
Loki sighed and settled back a bit as Stephen started to move forward at a slow, but steady pace.
All Loki managed to get from that conversation was the fact that Stephen was a heavily guarded person. Which, he already assumed, but it was the fact that he was so smart about it was what caught Loki off guard. Most people with secrets to hide would talk so much just to make you not think about it, but Stephen didn’t. Stephen stayed silent and choose his words with care. Despite himself, Loki did have to admit that he was impressed. Not all Midgardians were as calculating as Stephen was. Though, he did have the advantage of knowing that Loki could spot lies, so that dialed it back a little.
As Loki felt the wind in his hair getting faster and faster as they finally picked up some speed, he decided that he definitely wanted to know what the hell Stephen was hiding. No matter the cost. He could afford to lose this job anyways, it wasn’t like he was getting paid.
Ten minutes and three stoplights driven through Stephen finally parked in front of a rundown bar connected to the other buildings on the street. A glowing neon sign at the top indicated it as ‘The Wandering Glass’ though, the last part in ‘Glass’ was out, making it look like ‘The Wandering Gl’. Policemen surrounded the bar, making sure anyone who walked by couldn’t stay there for too long.
As soon as the motor of the motorcycle turned off Loki had his arms off of Stephen and was standing up, brushing his suit off.
“Took long enough to get here,” Loki murmured to no one in particular as he straightened his tie. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his reflection on one of the rearview mirrors and scowled at himself.
His hair, which he prided himself in taking expert care of, was messed up worse than Hel itself.
“This stupid ride ruined my hair,” He said, glancing up a directing his scowl towards Stephen who glared back at him.
“Sorry, princess, I’ll bring a helmet next time if that’ll make you happy,”
At those words, something in Loki’s mind clicked and he felt like such a dumbass for not realizing it as soon as he got on the damn thing.
Stephen wasn’t wearing a helmet.
When Stark told him the basics of cars, which he once again didn’t pay much attention too but he at least caught the part where Stark talked about motorcycles for exactly ten seconds. He remembers Stark saying that it was highly unsafe to not wear a helmet, that it was basically guaranteed death if they got in an accident.
“Why don’t you have one now?” Loki asked, more forcefully than what’s normally socially appropriate on Earth. He set his jaw and stared at Stephen.
Stephen didn’t point out his tone of voice and instead just shrugged. “I don’t need it,”
Loki stared at Stephen like he was an idiot. Because he was. What amazed him was that Stephen seemed to believe that he didn’t need one and that he wasn’t just covering up something.
“You’re kidding me,” Loki said. Stephen, the bastard, just shrugged again as he started to walk towards the line of tape the police had set up. Loki quickly fell into step with him.
“I’ve been driving for a while, I know when to be careful.”
“How long is a while?”
Loki couldn’t help but grin like a cat when Stephen steps faltered, even if it was for just a split second. Even though Stephen was smart, Loki had been alive for a thousand years. He knew how to get under people’s skin. Stephen slowly turned to look at him, clenching his jaw.
“Long enough,” Was all he said before shoving his hands in his pockets and heading directly for the police tape. Not caring that he was leaving Loki behind.
Loki didn’t stop smiling as he ducked under the police tape and made his way inside behind Stephen. He only stopped smiling when he saw the crime scene, instead, that smile was replaced by a feeling of being sick as the scent of murder filled his nose. A scent he was all too familiar with.
The place was littered with policemen, running around the place doing who knows what. But through all that Loki managed to notice two things at once. The wall behind the bar was streaked with dark red blood, whoever did this clearly didn’t care to clean up after themselves. And at the same time, he saw a young man with fluffy brown hair frowning down at the floor where the body most likely was.
Peter Parker. Peter Parker was here and Loki couldn’t help but feel anger boiling in his chest. He knew that Peter wanted to be a forensic scientist for them all, that he wanted that to be his cover story. But he still felt angry that people allowed Peter too, he was only nineteen. He was still a kid in Loki’s eyes and he already had enough on his table between collage and being Spider-Man.
Loki knew all too well what it was like to grow up too fast.
Loki pushed his anger down hoping that it wouldn’t boil up here. A crime scene wasn’t a good place to be angry, even he knew that.
He walked towards the bar as fast as he could, faster than pissed of Stephen could at least. He slipped behind the bar, just as Peter glanced up, meeting his gaze with his mouth open.
“Oh shit, uh hi Mr. Loki, and you too Detective Strange,” Peter waved to Stephen who came to rest at his side. Stephen gave a small, but polite smile to Peter.
“Hey, Parker,”
Peter nodded then looked back to Loki. “How’s your first day going?”
“As well as it could, though I do not think it’s respectful to the dead to have small talk in front of their bodies,” Loki smiled softly, hoping that Peter knew he was joking, but did want to move everything along.
Peter nodded a few times, rubbing his hands along his jacket.
“Right, right, well uh I've been here for like, five minutes but this,” He gestured to the body laying on the floor. The body was of a woman with red hair which was sprawled on the ground around her. She was wearing a white dress shirt that was now smeared with blood from where the cuts on her chest had seeped into it. She had three long cuts across the entirety of her chest that looked blacked around the edges.
Almost as if they had burned. Loki realized distantly.
“-Is Laila Wood, she was thirty years old and worked as the bartender for this bar, we have two witnesses in the back room, I haven’t taken statements from them since, y’know, that’s not my job. But I’ve heard that they only heard what happened. Anyways, go ahead and take a look,”
Loki stared at the body, before kneeling next to her, looking closely at the wounds, at the blacked edging around them. Definitely burns, but from what?
Stephen seemed to be on the same page, but instead of kneeling like Loki had he just stared down at her before turning to Peter.
“Any clue what the weapon could’ve been?” He asked, crossing his arms. Peter sighed, and ran a hand through his hair.
“Of course that’s the first question you ask, well short answer, no,” Peter said as he kneeled beside Loki. He reached out and touched one of the cuts gently with his gloved hand. Loki grimaced a bit as he did, just because he’s killed things before doesn’t mean that he liked to look at the bodies afterward.
“Long answer: It looks like a simple knife or something of that caliber but as I’m sure you’ve both noticed, there are signs of burning on the wounds. Which I’m pretty sure weren’t post mortem, don’t quote me on that though. Anyways, the point is, the burns weren’t enough to cauterize the wounds, so yeah,” Peter finished and he looked at Loki for a split second, as if trying to search for something, but quickly looked back down to the body. Loki raised an eyebrow at him, wondering what the fuck that was about. Before looking back at Stephen, asking him if he’s ever seen anything like this but stops in his tracks when he sees the look on his face.
He looked...distant like he was thinking about something Loki couldn't comprehend. Which was absurd Loki could understand everything Earth had to offer if he actually cared too.
Loki snapped in front of Stephen’s face. “Strange, are you there?”
Stephen jumped as soon as he snapped, coming back from wherever his mind had been in a split moment. He frowned at Loki and slapped his hand away before turning on his heel.
“I’m...going to talk to the witnesses, you got everything here? Good,” He didn’t even wait for a reply before he turned and walked away.
Loki watched him go with a raised eyebrow until Stephen disappeared behind a door that a policewoman had directed him towards. He turned back to Peter.
“That was weird,”
“Eh, not really for him,” Peter said. “Strange is like that sometimes, he gets in his own head and kinda stares for a bit, but he usually comes out of it with something figured out,” Peter shrugged and turned to look at a little case that he carried with him. All Loki really knew was that it was for lab stuff.
“He’s probably a little mad about having a partner so having you snap at him probably pissed him off a bit,”
Loki snorted and shook his head. “A little is an understatement Spider,”
Peter rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, just give him a chance Mr. Loki,” There was a heavy pause as Peter took some kind of vial with a cotton swab on the end of it out of the box.
“I’m really happy that you're out of your house,” Peter said softly.
The silence returned heavy and thick as Peter took the swab and opened the victim’s mouth and swabbed the inside of it.
Loki didn’t know how to respond to that. So, he didn’t. Peter shouldn’t be happy about this, this was stupid and only something that he was doing to make his brother happy...right?
Loki shook his head. He was at a crime scene where someone had been brutally murdered, no time to think about that.
“You looked at me oddly when you were explaining the wounds, why?” He asked bluntly, hoping to whoever was listening that Peter would move on from that last topic.
“Oh, well, “ Peter screwed the cotton swab lid back on the vial and moved to put it in the case.
“They’re not completely cauterized but I’m ninety-five percent sure it didn’t happen post mortem right?”
Loki nodded as Peter turned to look at him, a deadly serious look on his face.
“Well, my first thought was Star Wars but that led me to my second thought which was,” Peter took a second and looked around before leaning into him, whispering so low that only those with super hearing could hear him.
“What if this has something to do with our…..other gig? Specifically your uh, specialty”
Loki immediately understood what Peter was getting at.
Magic.
Peter wanted to know if something magic-related was going on here.
Loki turned his head back towards the wounds. He considered it for a moment trying to think of wounds like this that he could’ve seen over countless battles. But, he ended up shaking his head.
“No, none that I can think of, most abilities of that sort tend to either not cauterize at all or cauterize completely. Unless it was a type of magic I haven’t seen, which is pretty much impossible,” He whispered back. It was true, he’s been to most of the realms and has seen magic of all types. It would be hard to find one he hasn’t discovered.
Peter frowned a bit and nodded. “Yeah, It was kind of a big push honestly,”
Loki smiled a bit and reached over to lay a hand on Peter’s shoulder. “It’s was a good thought though, really Spider.”
Peter smiled at that. “Thanks, Mr. Loki, but, shouldn’t you be with Stephen right now? I mean it is your job to take the statements. Plus, the whole human lie detector thing you have going on would be pretty helpful,”
Loki rolled his eyes at that. “Yeah, yeah, good luck with, whatever science stuff you do,” Peter laughed lightly as Loki got up, brushed himself off. He made his way to the door he saw Stephen go through, not particularly excited to see him again.
He would much rather have Peter as his partner.