Jane woke up to light filtering through the window and sat straight up. It was gorgeous out, with blue skies and a gentle frost glittering everywhere, from the window to the tips of the grass. She wiped her hand across her face; it came away smeared in her make up. She internally groaned; she probably had her make up all over her pillow.

Stretching out, she was up and nipped into the bathroom, pulling a towel along with her. It didn't take long to remove the make up and take a shower; it probably took longer trying to decide what to wear; not the blue dress, that was too fancy, but not her jeans, she wanted to look nice, not scruffy. She hesitated over the green dress; it was perfect, but... she remembered the green of Loki's outfit the last time he had visited her and mentally shook her head. His colour...

"Well, thanks for ruining the colour green for me, Loki." She muttered as she pulled a purple dress from her closet. She didn't like it much; Darcy had brought it for her last Christmas and as was usual with Darcy, it was a little tight and showed too much cleavage for her tastes. Still, it would have to do.

She dressed quickly and tiptoed down. Thor might still be asleep and Darcy was almost certainly dead to the world. Jane knew from experience that waking up Darcy too early wasn't the thing she wanted to do on a Tuesday morning. Or any morning.

She grabbed her keys and purse and pulling on a coat, scribbled a note to Thor and set it down on the table. Now that her theories were finally being accepted by scientific communities, she had a lot more work to do, especially since she had missed a day yesterday. But she would still be seeing a lot of Thor today. She wasn't going to miss out on that. She grinned as she glanced at the note. It read:

Dear Thor,
I've got to go back to work, but when you've woken up and gotten ready, can you come and join me? I have a lot of work that could benefit from some gaps being filled in and I think you could help with that.
Love you,
Jane.

She briefly hesitated at the 'I love you' but let it pass. Thor had saved her life when she had been... possessed by the Aether, he deserved more then an 'I love you.' She bit her lip. But would it seem to forward? Nah, I'm sure it'll be fine, she reassured herself. And anyway, they'd been (technically) dating for over two years. It was just long distance. With no contact. But it's fine, she reassured herself. He was back and that was what really mattered. Right?

Sighing and drawing away from these unwanted thoughts, she walked straight out the kitchen and towards the door. Slipping on a pair of flats, she took one more look towards the kitchen and opened the door and stepped out, closing it softly behind her. She had a long day ahead of her, it wouldn't do to ruin it by waking Darcy now.

Thor arrived at midday, when she was taking a quick break to gulp something down (and get some more coffee). He beamed at her as he walked through the door of her laboratory. He wasn't dressed in Asgardian clothes, she noticed, rushing up to greet him. Thor had, in fact, traded his normal armour like clothing for something less... noticeable and significantly more easy to cuddle with. Not that it made much of a difference, Jane smirked, casting an eye over Thor's... stupidly incredibly muscular body. It was quite a sight, Jane thought, pulling away from the hug and showing Thor over to her calculations. She didn't think she knew anybody else with a body that muscular. But that wasn't the point. She needed to stop being such a ditz and get on with her work.

A thought of Loki's long, lean body as he sat on her counter flashed through her eyes and she shut them, shaking her head. Loki was totally not her type. He wasn't even cute, just annoying. And she was being stupid again.

"Jane?" She looked over at Thor and he smiled again. She couldn't help but smile back; his smiles and laughter were contagious.

"You've been distracted lately. Is anything troubling you?" Jane shook her head. She couldn't exactly tell him that his brother had visited her twice and now she couldn't get him out of her head, could she? That would make very interesting ground for a break-up.

"In that case, shall we begin?" Thor inclined his head towards the desk and she, smiled, jogging over and gathering up her papers, showing them to Thor.

"So, NASA has this probe up in space and lately it's been getting these weird signals, ever since the battle with Malekith and there is a theory that an Einstein-Rosen Bridge has opened up somewhere in the depths of space... a wormhole, Thor! One close enough to pick up with our signals! Who knows what could be on the other side, discoveries of every kind, civilizations..." Jane talked rapidly, barely even allowing herself to breath in her excitement. Thor, however, didn't share in it; in fact he just looked graver and graver the more she talked. Faced with this surprising lack of enthusiasm, she found herself trailing off and finally finished with an awkward silence.

It stretched on for log minute, while Jane watched Thor in anxious appeal. But he seemed barely to notice her, consumed in his own thoughts, the look of silent worry still etched into his features. Jane's confusion began to turn to anger; she hadn't expected him to hump up and down for joy and be as excited as she was about it, but she had expected a little more then this... silence!

As she watched him, a memory began forming in her head: Loki, sitting next to her, watching the star filled sky... in silence. But not a silence like this, an awkward, irritating silence where she had thought there would be explanations for her questions, where she could talk about her theories to her heart's content. Loki would know what to say here, she inexplicably mused to herself; he always did. Damn it, why couldn't she get him out her head?! He was a slimy creep, all he ever did was lie and cause misery, why wouldn't he just leave her alone!? He was not exactly attractive or sweet! Sure, he was clever, but she wasn't attracted to psychopaths. She was attracted to nice, normal(ish) people. Like Thor. She looked up at him, a sudden wave of sympathy for his predicament washing over her. He had to live with Loki as a brother! At that moment in time, she couldn't think of anything worse.

"Is.. is there anything wrong?" Thor looked up at her, a frown crossing his features and stared at her a long moment.

"Jane..." He pronounced carefully, "I don't want you to have anything to do with this wormhole any longer. Please, Jane, it... it may be dangerous. I don't wish for you to get harmed. Jane?"

Jane stared at him in complete surprise. Why... this was her job to investigate stuff! And who was he to tell her what she could and couldn't do! She wasn't some kind of doll to keep safe, she was her own person and she was allowed to choose what she wanted to do!

"What?!" Thor reached out to her, concerned, but she pushed him away.

"This my job! My... my life's work! This.. You broke into SHIELD to get it back once! Why... what..." To Jane's utter chagrin, a hot angry tear spilled down her face. She was fed up with people telling her what she could or couldn't do!

"Jane... I'm sorry... please." Thor looked so chastened that Jane couldn't stay angry at him. Not for long. He was just trying to keep her safe, that was all. The problem with that, though, as Jane knew deep down, where she refused to admit it, that was why she was so angry. She loved Thor, he was sweet and kind and noble. But with every passing day, he became more and more unreachable. He wasn't the cocky guy she first met, nor the charming man she fell in love with; he was increasingly not Thor, but Prince Thor, of Asgard. Utterly unreachable for a little scientist like her. But Jane refused to admit it, he was still the same guy he'd always been, she was just imaging things.

"Jane..." Thor never managed to finished his sentence, for that matter, because at that moment somebody rapped on the door. Jane hastily wiped away her tears and opened it. A man in Asgardian armour stood there, a guard of some kind. He looked at her a brief second, bowed his head to her and then walked past her to where Thor was, where he knelt quickly and then stood again.

"My Liege, Asgard requires your assistance. There has been fighting in the north and The Allfather requests that you cut short your visit and come back." The guard spoke quietly, but clearly.

Thor looked helplessly over at Jane, but she didn't catch it, too busy trying to process the information she had just heard. But... he'd only been there a day, less, even! That wasn't fair...

"Jane?" Jane slowly inclined her head to look at him, she finally caught the helpless look on his face and her anger faded a little.

"Jane, I'm sorry... The Allfather has requested my presence. I cannot stay. I... I promise I will come back as soon as I can, once the conflict is finished. I am truly sorry, Jane."

Jan nodded her head, barely able to speak for the lump sticking in her throat. Catching sight of Thor's expression again, though, she forced a few words out through gritted teeth.

"Sure... I mean... It's okay. Go. Just-just go." Thor nodded slowly and walked from the room, an apologetic look on her face. For a second, Jane wildly wished for Thor to turn around and run back to her, declaring that she meant more to him then Asgard ever had and that he would stay with her forever. But alas for her, that didn't happen. In stead, Thor left the room, walking quickly down the hallway until she could no longer hear his footsteps.

She breathed out, a rush of air she hadn't known she'd been holding and laughed bitterly to herself. Of course. It was stupid to even imagine Thor would stay with her. However much he loved her, he was a prince of Asgard first and foremost.

And she realized, for the very first time, that Thor would never be truly hers. She would always have to share him with Asgard. I guess that's the price for loving a prince, Jane thought, wiping the tears that had started running down her face again. Her hand came back covered in mascara; she was always messing up her make-up these days, Jane mused sardonically. Maybe she should invest in some waterproof stuff.

She went back to her desk and stared at her research uncomprehendingly for a couple of seconds, before she decided that, damn it all, she was going for a walk. Besides, there wasn't much point in working with her research, since her only source of information had walked out on her.

She turned away and practically ran out the room, speeding through hallways and finally out the building, into fresh air. She took a second to gulp some of it down, before she took off again, running to... somewhere. Anywhere. Preferably private.

Somehow she ended up in a little park she had known from her childhood, a couple of miles from her workplace. Nobody ever went there now, it was the most private place she could get at the that moment.

She spied a little bench, paint peeling, and collapsed onto it, exhausted. She had ran (or speed-walked) the best of two miles and that, along with her recent fight with Thor, had exhausted her.

"Miss Foster." a familiar voice broke the silence. She stood up suddenly and whirled around; Loki looked almost startled at the make-up smeared all down her face, which she hadn't bothered to take off. It barely took a second to compose himself, however, and he looked at her with a his usual ever so slightly amused face, eyebrows raised in question.

"I take it my brother's visit didn't go down too well." He said, sarcasm coloring his voice. Jane glared at him just long enough to gather her thoughts and struck.

"You... You snake!" She screamed at him. He merely raised his eyebrows even higher and smirked down at her.

"My, my brother must have told you something truly terrible about me if this is the way you react at me. I wouldn't believe everything he says; he has been known to exaggerate." He informed her, a smug smile still pulling at his features.

This is his element, Jane realized. He knew best what to do when he was being insulted. And deep in her heart, she almost felt sorry for him. What terrible treatment had he received for this to become the norm? Still, if he wasn't such a asshole, he probably wouldn't have been insulted in the first place.

"How dare you?!" She screamed at him. He opened his mouth, probably to bite out some other snarky comment, but Jane didn't let him.

"How dare you come here and insult Thor, when you're the one who's been lying the whole damn time! He actually cares about you, but you repay him by messing about with his head, and mine too! You... you can just go to hell!"

"...What?" Loki looked perplexed, but Jane was on fire, she wasn't going to stop now.

"And I bet you didn't even care about Frigga! You were just using her as an excuse to hurt him even more!"

As soon as she said it, she knew it had been a bad idea. Loki's head snapped up, he glared at her with such force that if looks could kill, she would have died in a horrible way by now. His eyes, usually big and blue and somehow soft, sharpened until she felt like she was being eyed down by a predator and about to be eaten. She shrank away from him; but he wasn't going to give any mercy. He loomed over her, seemingly taller then he had ever been before and smiled, a furious grin that rooted her to the spot in fear.

"Stupid little mortals, always assuming things that aren't true, just to make themselves feel the slightest part more clever. You really think that I am the one who been lying to you? Thor doesn't love you, you're just a toy to him, a pretty little mortal girl who caught his fancy. It won't make a single difference to him if he has a relationship with you, anything long term for you is barely anything in our lifespan. You could spend your whole life with him and it would barely be anything to him. Do you truly believe that, once you're dead, he won't immediately replace you?"

"No.. please..."

"If you do, than you're more stupid than I thought you were. But what else could somebody expect from a little mortal like you?" He finished, quieter. Jane flinched back; a tiny movement, but being Loki, he caught it. Suddenly, the anger swept out of him, his shoulders moved forwards a little and his eyes grew softer. But there was a shard of ice in them that hadn't been there before.

"Goodbye, Miss Foster." He spoke, icily and before she could reply (not that she would want to) he disappeared.

Jane sat down slowly on the bench and let the burning tears run down her face and the choking sobs envelope her. She knew she shouldn't have been so upset about it, that it wasn't true. But Jane feared, in the center of her heart, that it really was.

It dawned on her this was the man who had killed dozens and dozens of people; and she wrapped her arms around her legs and came undone with sobs. She knew, finally, that while Thor might exceed Loki in brawn and power, Loki was far more dangerous in ways she didn't even know. And hoped she would never find out.

Also known as Jane having the absolute worst day in history. I'm really sorry, Jane, I promise the next chapter will be happier. For me and for you. And the readers, obviously.
Please review! Your reviews give my muse energy to write the next chapter faster. Also, have a cookie after that traumatic event that just happened. (::)
Now excuse me while I go and worry about how to reconcile them again, if it can be done. (It probably can be, wouldn't be much of a Lokane story otherwise. A couple of visits and a fight do not equal a relationship).