A/N: Welcome back. Updates won't always come this quickly, but I'm writing and it's been months since I've written anything longer than a text message, so I am gonna go with it while it lasts.

Thanks for the reviews and alerts/favorites. I'm excited that you want to come on this journey with me!

Disclaimer: Not mine. Never will be. But I like playing with them.

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Awkward was the best word Jane could come up with to describe the interaction between Loki and herself in the fifteen minutes following Thor's departure.

Thor, being Thor, hadn't stayed long. She'd expected that, really; he did have soon-to-be-King'ly things to do in all parts of the universe, not just earth. But she had expected him to stay longer than seven minutes and forty-three seconds.

"I really must depart," he'd said. Seven minutes and forty-five seconds, was that really all the time she was worth? "Repairs have only just begun on the palace – "

"Of course," she'd interrupted, feeling horribly selfish considering all the destruction Asgard had recently suffered. Greenwich was all but smashed, she didn't say aloud. "Go. We'll be..." Fine, she'd wanted to say, but frowned instead, lowering her voice to a whisper. "Is he really?"

"Human?" Thor had finished with a nod. "Aye. As much as any of us can be, that is." He'd laid a heavy arm around her shoulders, and the weight felt solid and real. Secure. "Father stripped him of all his magic. He's harmless."

Jane doubted that, her eyes having strayed warily to where she could just make out the silhouette of Loki in her living room window. Her life was so surreal, now, it seemed. Why had she agreed to this again?

"More or less," Thor added after seeing her expression. "I will be back," he'd vowed, grasping her shoulders and turning her to face him. "This, I promise."

And, as she'd met his stormy eyes, she knew it to be truth. If not for Jane, some small part of her mind whispered, then Thor would return for his brother. She'd given him a chaste, albeit breath-stealing, kiss goodbye, ignoring the fact that she could feel Loki watching them, and then, finally, returned to her trailer.

She did linger on the porch for a moment or three or ten, until she couldn't delay greeting her guest any longer. With a deep breath and a final tug on the hem of her t-shirt, she'd stepped inside.

The screen door had creaked open, the hydraulics making it slam shut behind her. Loki had been facing away from her and he'd stiffened immediately. He didn't make a move to turn, so she froze too, willing him to face her. To speak. She'd had no clue what to say.

Hello, welcome to earth, the planet you attempted to crush less than a year ago. How'd that go over for ya?

Like she'd said; awkward.

She cleared her throat and headed for her tiny kitchen. "You hungry?" she asked out of habitual courtesy. "Cuz I'm starving. I don't know about you, but waking up at five in the morning because your..." well, she couldn't exactly call Thor a boyfriend, now could she? "Anyway, it's early and I'm hungry, and I don't have much but I could make waffles."

And now she was rambling, so Jane squeezed her lips together as she pulled the box of Eggo's out of the freezer, grabbing the butter and syrup from the fridge. She tossed the whole lot on the counter. Loki said nothing behind her, but she could hear him moving around, touching things. Her things. She tried not to ponder what he must think of her meager furnishings. She popped two waffles into the toaster and pushed down the lever before turning to face her guest.

"You eating or not?"

"Decidedly not," he replied, holding a snow globe of Lady Liberty between two long fingers. He sniffed it, then shook it, sneering as white flakes swirled inside. He set it back down on her heavily weighed down bookshelf and took one step backward, clasping his hands behind his back.

"Suit yourself," Jane said with a shrug, pouring her second cup of coffee. "That's your room over there," she pointed to her left, indicating Darcy's old room. Now that her (sometimes) intern had moved in with intern numero dos, what's his face, she had the spare room. "It's not much, but..." she waved a hand, "you can put your stuff in there."

He raised an eyebrow at her, then looked down at himself, leaving it up to her to put two and two together.

"You're kidding me." Thor hadn't mentioned she needed to provide clothes for his wayward, trouble-making brother.

"I've no need for... stuff."

"It's mid-July."

"Hooray."

And their conversations were oh, so engaging.

She made a face and waved her hands, indicating the... costume he was wearing. (Because what else could she call it?) Oh, sure, he'd foregone the armor this time, but the leathers and cape, complete with over-the-knee boots were perfectly in place. "You are aware that this is the desert, right?"

"I am."

Jane snorted. "And you're just going to wear that the whole time?" He shrugged and turned his back on her as she started dressing her waffles. "It's, like, a hundred degrees out there on a cool day."

"This body is not as temperamental or as weak as yours." Boy, that face. Smug and supremely arrogant in its certainty.

"Except," Jane felt only a little pleasure (okay, a lot) in reminding, "you're just as weak and temperamental as I am right now, aren't you." Perhaps even more so. Well, the temperamental part, at least.

"Hardly," he half growled.

"Still," she pressed, not really wanting to argue that point. Even stripped of his magic as he was, his essential and elemental makeup was probably different, at least somewhat, than hers. She would never make the mistake of thinking Loki weak. "Aren't you really from Jötunheim? The realm of ice and giants? I imagine the New Mexican desert feels a bit like Hel to you."

Since she'd practically been shoveling waffles into her face, even while talking, Jane hadn't noticed the expression on Loki's face growing colder and harder. As she lifted her eyes to meet his, expecting an answer to her truly logical line of questioning, she took and involuntary step back, bumping into her kitchen counter.

Oh, goody. She'd managed to piss off the hair-trigger god in record time.

To Be Continued...