Work Text:
“I adore your hands.”
“You what?” Mobius asked distractedly. He poked at the half-cooked batter in the hot pan in front of him with a silicone turner, before glancing at Loki with a frown. “My hands?”
“Mm,” Loki hummed languidly, chin propped on his fist as he leaned on the counter, eyes growing slumberous in the late hour. “So… capable.”
“Are you drunk?”
“No,” he snorted, pushing himself to sit straighter, though his smile was bashful. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I must be tired, after all.”
“Told you,” Mobius replied triumphantly, after earlier arguing such. “But I’ve committed to making pancakes now, so you have to stay awake and eat them.”
“I’m sure I’ll cope.”
“So… I have ‘capable’ hands?” he prodded casually, deftly flipping the pancake and conveniently avoiding Loki’s gaze. “Kinda like to think so, after being alive for centuries.”
“You know what I mean,” Loki muttered. “Strong… dextrous. And- and yet sort of gentle and elegant as well– look, just forget I said anything,” he finished in a rush, reddened face dropping into the nest of his folded arms.
“Right. I’ll chalk it up to delirium, that okay?” Mobius teased, even as he felt his face warming too.
“Please,” came the muffled supplication.
“What toppings can these capable hands very capably fetch for you?”
Raising his head just enough to issue a glare that was all furrowed brow and ice-blue indignation, any intended effect fell in a heap when Mobius found himself charmed at how inadvertently adorable it was.
“Syrup… with a side of due discretion,” Loki muttered dangerously.
Grinning in amusement, Mobius extracted the requested bottle from the fridge, placing it beside the two plates that each already had a couple of pancakes layered upon them. He flipped the one in the pan again, finding it pretty much done, and slid it onto Loki’s plate, pushing it towards him.
“Here, start before they get cold,” he urged. “I’m gonna be busy with the rest for a little while.”
Turning back to the stove to pour the next one, he glanced at Loki as he uncapped the syrup bottle and tipped an obscene amount over the stack, garnering an exasperated response.
“Do I again have to remind you of the ‘too much sugar equals bad’ thing?”
Loki grunted noncommittally, wasting no time getting stuck into his midnight snack.
“Far be it from me to lecture on the subject,” Mobius continued wryly, lifting the edges of the next pancake, “But it’d be pretty negligent if the person charged with handling your care and maintenance didn’t speak up, when you consume half a bottle of maple syrup in the middle of the night.”
“It can’t be that bad for you, if it comes from a tree,” Loki mumbled around a mouthful.
“Well. You’d know, wouldn’t you Sprout.”
It only took a moment or two for a spear of ice to pass through him as he realised what he’d said, and out of the corner of his eye, he could sense that Loki had gone quite still.
Eyes closing momentarily, Mobius steeled himself with a breath, lips biting together grimly in contrition. He took his time in flipping the pancake, then braved a glance towards the slightly ashen-looking face on the other side of the kitchen counter.
“I’m sorry, Loki. I wasn’t thinking.”
A brief pause, then–
“Neither was I,” Loki admitted, subdued. “Which is… new.”
Resting the turner on the edge of the pan, Mobius leaned on the counter as well, facing him properly.
“That’s a good thing though, right?”
Meeting his gaze, Loki nodded faintly.
“It’s a development. I suppose.”
Averting his eyes again quickly, he forked up another bite from his plate, though this time it was almost certainly in aid of projecting nonchalance than satiating any craving.
Hesitant, Mobius was unable to help feeling that he should say something more, but instead turned his attention back to the pan, leaving Loki to sort through his thoughts.
Surprisingly, the subsequent silence that stretched between them wasn’t particularly uncomfortable or tense, filled as it was with the sound of gentle sizzling, and the clinking of Loki’s cutlery. The unintentional reminder of everything they’d lost apparently hadn’t deterred him from finishing his stack, and Mobius chanced a smile at him, fondness surging as the knife and fork were placed daintily onto his place with all the courtly manners one would expect from royalty.
“There’s gonna be a couple more, in a few minutes,” he told him, “If you’re interested.”
“Mm… tea first, I think,” Loki said, sliding off the stool he was perched on and heading over to fill the electric kettle at the sink, before setting it to boil.
Watching him closely all the while, in a futile attempt to glean where his head might be at, Mobius abruptly came back to himself at registering the faint but distinguishable smell of burning.
“Ah, crap,” he grumbled, hastily flipping over the slightly charred mess before him. “So much for my capable hands…”
Loki’s faint chuckle as he deposited a couple of mugs onto the counter was comforting to hear, but what was far less expected was the sudden warmth at his back as he came up behind him, gentle fingers latching onto his arms as his chin rested lightly on Mobius’ shoulder.
“Not everyone has hands that are capable of holding together the entirety of existence,” he murmured lightly, so close by his ear that a prickling of goosebumps spread down his left side. “But personally, I’d argue that far more significant is the capability of holding together the broken ex-god who once did.”
Leaving this assertion hanging, Loki nudged him pointedly as he gave an affectionate squeeze, releasing him with discernible reluctance in order to locate the teabags and coffee.
Taming the wild butterflies evoked by the fleeting intimacy, Mobius stared down at the tragically imperfect pancake before him — a sorry representation of the last of the batter — and was promptly overtaken by the compulsion to slip it onto his plate, instead of into the trash as originally intended.
A soft spot for broken things, Ravonna had once accused him of possessing. And although she may have had a point, it wasn’t the weakness she’d branded it.
Possibly, it was even his greatest strength.