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Loki hadn’t slept in over 72 hours. Granted, as a god, he didn’t need as much sleep as the average mortal. But even gods have their limits.
Him and Mobius had been researching non-stop for a case, peeling through books and past reports until their eyes were burning.
Luckily for Mobius, he had been in the TVA for so long that time didn’t pass the same way. He only needed to sleep once a week now, the time passing for him in what equates to an average day on earth.
Unlucky for Loki, time did not pass the same way for him. He jolted upright for probably the tenth time in the past hour, having almost drifted asleep again.
Mobius gave him a look, raising his eyebrows.
“What.” Loki snapped, his sleep deprivation making him irritable.
Mobius raised his hands in mock surrender.
“Hey, I didn’t say anything.” he replied, blinking innocently.
Loki huffed and crossed his arms in response, before turning his attention back to the report.
If Mobius didn’t need to sleep, then neither did he.
But this report was dreadfully boring. He struggled to focus on the words, feeling as if they were moving about the page. Or was his vision just getting blurry? At this point, he honestly wasn’t sure.
He felt his eyes dropping shut and shook himself awake, using his magic to send a jolt of pain into his thigh. He sighed, focusing on the sting to stay present.
He wouldn’t give up and look weak. He couldn’t be the first one to walk away.
More importantly, he couldn’t fall asleep here. He wasn’t alone, he had no weapons, and there was no lock on the door. He wasn’t safe.
“Loki,” a voice suddenly said, making him jump.
Loki looked up, breathing heavy, and realized it was just Mobius.
“W-what?” he asked in response.
Mobius drew his eyebrows together in concern.
“You were falling asleep again,” Mobius responded, like it was obvious.
“Oh. I’m sorry,” Loki responded, his cheeks flushing.
He avoided eye contact with Mobius, and sent an even sharper jolt of pain into his thigh this time, gritting his teeth against the pain.
“Wait,” Mobius said, “What was that?” he asked, something odd in his voice.
Loki met his eyes and didn’t recognize the emotion he saw there.
“What?” he responded hesitantly, afraid he had done something unconsciously.
“You lit up like you do when you use magic, and then looked like you were in pain and rubbed your thigh,” Mobius explained, gesturing as he spoke.
Loki cleared his throat, guilty. He hadn’t realized he had been rubbing his thigh.
“It’s nothing,” Loki responded, his tone saying there was nothing left to be said.
“No, no, were you using magic to…shock yourself?” Mobius said, his voice growing in volume as he figured it out.
“That’s nonsense,” Loki responded, but he couldn’t meet the other man’s eyes.
Mobius’s expression went from amusement to something sadder that Loki couldn’t quite place. His prior volume in discovery was quickly met with reflective silence as Mobius processed what this meant.
“You know, you can take a nap if you want to,” Mobius said, attempting to subtly encourage the man towards taking care of himself.
“Ridiculous. I’m not tired,” Loki denied immediately, though they both knew the statement held no real truth to it.
Thankfully, Mobius let him have the denial, simply nodding thoughtfully.
“Of course. I was just suggesting it because I’m tired. I thought maybe we could take shifts, so the other could keep researching while one sleeps,”
Loki blinked, taken aback.
“But I want you to take first shift asleep,” Mobius quickly amended before the other man could suggest otherwise.
“That is…if you agree to the plan?” Mobius nudged.
Loki swallowed, considering how weak it would make him look if he agreed.
Mobius seemed to be able to tell he was still hesitant.
“This is simply for the sake of the mission,” he stated. “If i’m exhausted I’m not going to retain any of this information, so really you’d be doing me a favor.”
At this, Loki nodded
“Yes… it seems it would be a sensible plan,” he finally responded. “And since it is a favor to you it only seems fair I take the first shift asleep,” he finished.
“Exactly,” Mobius said, smiling and pointing at Loki.
Loki nodded, and then couldn’t seem to stop nodding as he considered all that this plan entailed.
“Loki?” Mobius questioned hesitantly, as if he was afraid Loki would back out of the plan if he spoke too loud.
Loki slowly looked back at Mobius, his breathing slightly uneven.
“Could you just…” Loki started before his voice died out.
Mobius simply nodded, and motioned with his hand for Loki to go on.
“Wake me up if anything happens, or anyone else enters the room, or if i’m…saying things,” Loki said in a rush.
“I will not let anything happen to you while you’re asleep, I promise,” Mobius replied, a weight in his voice that hadn’t been there before. Loki wanted to believe him.
Loki opened his mouth to voice one more request, but snapped it shut.
“Please tell me Loki or you’re never going to be able to fall asleep,” Mobius said, slightly exasperated.
Guilt lined the edges of Lokis stomach. He knew he had been asking for too much, being too much. Everyone else had always told him as much. And now, Mobius was annoyed.
The other man seemed to read his mind as realization dawned on his face.
“I didn’t mean it like that Loki and you know it,” Mobius pressed. “I just want to know what you’re thinking,” he said, letting the words hang between them.
Loki relaxed slightly. “Just… please don’t let anyone…” He couldn’t seem to finish his sentence, but Mobius got the message.
“Nobody will even come near you while you’re asleep, let alone touch or hurt you,” he replied, honesty in his tone.
Loki’s head snapped up, meeting the other man’s eyes. He swallowed, and nodded. Understanding was a powerful thing.
Mobius nodded too, smiling and clapping his hands together.
“Alright, I’ll dim the lights and have first watch,” he said, moving across the room to do such.
Loki quietly arranged his desk so he could lay down his head in his arms.
Mobius sat back down casually and continued reading his report.
Loki was relaxed by his presence, the sound of pages turning and the scent of the black coffee Mobius always drank thick in the air. Within minutes, he was asleep.
———————————————————
Mobius sighed in satisfaction at the sight of Loki asleep on the desk across from him.
He had wondered for months how long it would take the god to finally sleep in his presence. At first, he had thought it typical arrogance that the other man wouldn’t, but as he got to know him better it became apparent that the real reason was a serious case of trust issues.
As he watched the rise and fall of Loki’s back, the thought made him sad. He had struggled to keep his mouth shut, forced to see the other man fight off sleep for the better part of an hour before he had finally interjected.
When he had realized Loki was harming himself to stay awake his heart had nearly dropped out of his stomach. But that was a can of worms to open and dissect and hopefully rectify another day. For now, he was just happy to see him getting sleep, even if it would likely only be a few hours of it.
He knew Loki didn’t need as much sleep as humans, but he knew he definintely needed it more than every 72 hours. He hadn’t realized how deeply rooted this issue was until he saw the complete and utter panic in the other man’s face at the prospect of sleeping in an unfamiliar position.
He could practically see the gears turning in his head, adding together the lack of protection and locks and presence of another person into how safe he would be if he decided to let his guard down.
His heart clenched at the sight, at how deeply unsafe you would have had to be to have so much fear instilled so deeply inside of you.
And the implications that arose considering his comments on not letting anyone near him while he’s asleep… Mobius shuddered at the thought.
Loki had been treated poorly his entire life. Mobius intended to change this. While the only efforts he had succeeded in so far were getting Loki to take a nap infront of him, for Loki, it felt like a big step.
———————————————————-
After another few hours, consisting of Mobius having to ban an intern from entering the room to grab a stapler (Mobius didn’t break his promises), Loki suddenly began to speak in his sleep.
At first, Mobius smiled, thinking the muttering was cute. Until he realized what the other man was saying.
“No..I-I don’t want to..please I-“ Loki was begging.
Mobius felt sick to his stomach. He needed to wake Loki up.
“Please don’t touch me…I didn’t want to…” Loki continued, freezing Mobius temporarily.
“S-stop,” Loki breathed out, his voice trembling. And then he whimpered. The sound broke Mobius out of his trance, immediately reaching over to shake Loki awake.
The other man immediately shot up, his magic filling the room, forming a shield around himself. If Mobius noticed the shield was thicker around Loki’s lower half, he wasn’t going to point it out.
Loki was breathing heavily, his eyes moving around the room in a rapid motion, his fear palpable.
“Woah, woah, Loki, It’s just me,” Mobius quickly cut in, backing up to give the man space.
Loki was still shaking hard, backing another few steps towards the wall.
“Loki,” Mobius cut in, voice louder. “You’re safe, nothing happened, it’s just me, you’re safe,” Mobius said, making his voice as clear as possible. “Please breathe, Loki.”
Loki seemed to come back to himself, his breaths coming in a little slower. He released the tension in his body slightly, seemingly realizing what had happened.
He suddenly flushed, dropping his shield completely and walking back towards their desks.
“I’m sorry,” he choked out, “Just a bad dream, it was nothing. I can take my watch shift now if you want,” he said, his breaths still not coming in right.
Mobius sighed, upset that Loki was already deflecting.
“It’s nothing to be sorry about Loki,” he responded in what he hoped was a reassuring voice. “But it’s also not “nothing”” he said in air quotes.
“I think we should talk about it,” Mobius urged.
“There’s nothing to talk about. I made a mistake. I shouldn’t have agreed to this deal knowing this was a possibility. I will distract you from your reports no further and get back to reading my own,” Loki responded, voice flat.
Mobius wanted to grab the other man and shake him, but he knew he was only being so deflective because he was powerless within the situation.
“Loki, you’re still shaking,” Mobius pointed out, and indeed, when Loki looked down he saw the paper in his hand was shaking like a leaf.
Loki quickly set the paper down and ran his shaking hands through his hair.
“It’s fine Mobius, really,” Loki pushed back, but now his leg was bouncing up and down at rapid speed. He was on track to having another panic attack altogether.
Loki shook his hands out infront of him, trying to expel the nervous energy, but this action being so obvious to Mobius only seemed to make the man freak out more.
Loki suddenly stood up, pacing the room and clutching his chest.
“I have,” a rapid breath, “to go,” Loki breathed out, stumbling towards the door.
Mobius was losing control of the situation. He quickly rose from his chair, meeting Loki in the middle of the room.
He put his hand on the other man’s chest.
“Feel that?” he asked Loki. “Don’t go. Just breathe with me, match my breaths.” “Please,” Mobius said.
Loki listened, helpless to do much else but tether himself to the man infront of him.
After a few minutes of this, he was able to calm himself down enough to sit down again.
“You still want to tell me you’re fine?” Mobius asked him. He knew he was being an asshole, but sue him. He deserved this one.
Loki just shook his head, knowing he couldn’t deny it anymore.
“I’m sorry. It’s… hard for me to trust people,” Loki admitted, avoiding Mobius’s eyes.
Mobius had already known this, but hearing from Loki was a rare thing. Instead, he just nodded in response.
“When you looked through my history, do you remember seeing me meet someone named “The Grandmaster”?” Loki said, his voicing shaking on the name.
Mobius searched his memory. They had only covered that part of Loki’s history briefly, deeming the important part to be the battle with Hela and its affects on Asgard.
“Briefly,” Mobius admitted. “He was there with you and Thor on Sakar?” Mobius questioned, looking at Loki for confirmation.
Loki nodded, and Mobius felt his stomach drop as he watched Loki begin to wrap his arms around himself protectively.
“He took my magic. He had a contraption that would shock me everytime he pressed a button. So if I tried to fight back…” Loki started.
Mobius didn’t like where this was going but nodded supportively.
“The first time he saw me, he grabbed my chin and called me “pretty”” Loki said, fingers twitching.
“He wanted things from me that I didn’t want to give. But I pretended that I did to gain his favor,” Loki continued, now seemingly numb to the words exiting his mouth.
“Sometimes he would corner me. Sometimes he ordered me to be brought to his room, chains already around my wrists and ankles. Sometimes, he gave me a drink and I woke up to find him already-“ he cut off with a choking noise.
“This went on for weeks before Thor finally arrived, and eventually we made our escape,” he finished, clearing his throat.
Mobius felt like he was going to throw up. No wonder he had trust issues around sleeping, he couldn’t even imagine-
“Loki… I-“ Mobius started, and Loki just sadly shook his head.
“You don’t have to say anything Mobius,” Loki said, looking away “I never should have let it happen,” he finished.
“Loki,” Mobius said, shocked, and Loki looked up in surprise. “That is not your fault. I am so sorry that happened to you, but I need you to understand that was on him, not you,” Mobius said, voice earnest.
Loki nodded after a pause.
“It’s just hard to remember sometimes,” he admitted.
“I’ll have them install extra locks on your door for you, and I promise you I will never let anything like that happen to you here,” Mobius breathed out, meaning this more than anything else he had said.
Loki searched Mobius’s face for deception, and his eyes grew misty when he couldn’t find any.
“Thank you,” he said quietly.
“Thank you for telling me,” Mobius responded, a slight sad smile on his face.
If Loki allowed himself to sleep around Mobius more often after this day, he didn’t say anything.
And if Mobius went into Loki’s version of the timeline and “removed” the grandmaster, nobody had anything to say about that either.