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"Hey."
Startled out of his reverie, Loki blinked owlishly at the Analyst crouching in front of him.
Loki stared at the proffered cup.
He must have stared at it too long for the next thing he knew, Mobius was physically grabbing Loki's hand and wrapping Loki's fingers around the cup.
It's just tea," Mobius cajoled him into taking a sip. "It'll help."
Loki obliged. The tannic tea scorched the back of his throat and burned his empty stomach. He did not remember the last time he ate anything.
"Loki didn't you say your name was?" Mobius asked gently.
"One of them, yeah," Loki said in a voice so soft Mobius must have thought he had misheard and then naturally felt the need to ask,
"How many names do you have?"
Loki did not immediately answer. Any version of Mobius was bound to be just as inquisitive.
"You used to know all of them," he finally whispered.
Trickster God.
God of Mischief.
God of Lies.
(Mischievous Scamp)
"You really don't remember?" Loki asked.
"Remember what?"
Who, Loki corrected silently.
"Me," he mouthed.
A silence followed, thick and uncomfortable.
"I think I'd remember having met someone like you," Mobius said dryly. A smile, soft and crooked, tugged on his moustached lips.
It offered no comfort, the smile, seizing Loki's heart instead like a clamp made of ice.
It was the same smile Mobius had given him when they said their goodbye up on that little hill in the Void.
"I don't want to forget you," Mobius had said.
Loki should have known better than making promises on someone else's behalf but he couldn't help it, "You won't."
"However this is gonna end, good or bad…"
Mobius had touched his cheek like he was the most precious thing, had looked at him like they were never going to see each other again. "I really don't see an outcome where I don't forget you."
Stupid Mobius. The Norns had the tendency to grant wishes made without thinking, fears spoken out loud, curses cast in the heat of the moment...they were cruel like that.
Loki closed his eyes tightly. It would not do for this Mobius to see his tears, they were not meant for him.
"Hey, hey," Loki heard and felt the man abandon his crouching position to sit right next to Loki, even lean back against the same filing cabinet -
"Are you okay?" The concern in the agent's voice made the tears flow even faster, and Loki almost choked trying to stop them and breathe at the same time.
The weight of the hand on Loki's back was cruelly familiar. "Are you hurt anywhere?"
"No," Loki croaked.
Why did this Mobius have to be just as caring? Loki did not deserve it, not then, and certainly not now. His mistake was too great, his failure too fatal.
"I don't know how to fix this, Mobius," he confessed. He was aware just how much his voice trembled but he could not, for the life of him, quell the terror inside.
"What have we done?" he whispered in agony. "Sylvie…"
"Is that who you've lost? Sylvie?" Mobius probed. "Who is that, your partner? Friend?"
Loki's eyes filled again. "Everyone." I've lost everyone.
His Mother. Sylvie. Classic Loki, who had survived for so long only to die in vain, sacrificing his life for a false cause.
"Mobius."
At the spilling of his name, the agent straightened in renewed interest. "Yes?"
"Not you," Loki murmured. "The other you."
"Right," the doppelganger said quietly. "Your Mobius."
Loki stiffened.
The man shrugged.
"You...have this look on your face." A hesitant pause of a breath. "Is there something I can do?"
Loki let out a sob. If he had been uncertain before, that one simple question clinched it.
This was not his Mobius.
His Mobius would have gathered Loki in his arms, and pressed his lips to a spot just above Loki's ear where his moustache tickled the least.
His Mobius would have run his hand up and down the outer of Loki's arm to ward off the chill he could feel settling in his bones, something he had brought back with him from the Void.
His Mobius would say his name, very, very gently, "Loki."
Loki shuddered. He was hearing things. He must be losing it.
"Loki, it's okay," the man said soothingly, this man who wore Mobius' face, emanated Mobius' scent, radiated Mobius' heat - "We'll figure things out."
"I don't know how, but we'll get there." The hand on Loki's back lifted, only to be replaced by someone's arm tentatively encircling his shoulders. "We'll get you home."
I don't have it, Loki almost said. But that was a lie, wasn't it?
Somewhere out there, there must be someone waiting for him.
A surge of unbearable longing stirred in the pit of Loki's stomach, and unthinkingly, he leaned into the embrace.
It shamed him to the core to admit it, but maybe this alternate universe he had been thrown into was not so bad after all.
And maybe, just maybe...for this very, very brief moment in time, whatever 'time' meant anymore, he could pretend that Mobius had returned to him just as he promised.
"Thank you."