Author's Note: OKAY that was never supposed to take that long. As you may have noticed, I have been posting other things not this for the last while - this was for gifts for the holidays, and having been concluded, I should now be back on my regular schedule. SO THAT'S COOL.

Continued gratitude to zaataronpita, beta and best friend, and to everyone who's been sticking with this and telling me they're enjoying it! You keep my honest. (Or something, anyway.)

Cheers!

Loki had not intended to linger once their backup arrived and began cleaning up the mess –and, Loki thought, undoubtedly disseminating misinformation. He had every intention of slipping away unnoticed, and then Romanov appeared out of nowhere and caught his arm.

"You're taking me to dinner," she said. Loki just managed not to jerk his arm away out of reflex, and blinked at her.

"It seems a bit late for that," he said, rather than commenting on the brusqueness of her invitation. Her eyes flicked past him like she was looking for someone.

"You offered to defend my honor. It would be much appreciated if you did so by keeping me from having to deal with the asshole who's in charge of PR."

Loki settled back on his heels. "You're lying," he informed her, declining to play along. "There is no such motivation, nor would you request my help if there were. Do me the courtesy of not assuming I am utterly without a brain."

Romanov's expression flickered between irritated and amused. "Fine. I want to talk to you in private. And I am hungry. They hardly serve any food at these things."

Loki considered her for a long moment, and then inclined his head. He could feel his own hunger pangs, however well he managed to ignore them. "I appreciate your honesty. Have you a place in mind?"

"Actually," she said, after a moment, "I think there's a place on Market that's open late."

"I'm afraid I don't know this city well enough for my usual means of transportation," Loki said with a thin smile. "Have you other means?"

"Car," Romanov said, and indicated one of the nondescript black vehicles. "Or I will in a moment. Wait here." Loki settled back on his heels and watched her stride over to a SHIELD agent looking both conspicuously unoccupied and slightly distracted. He straightened up at once when he saw Romanov approaching, however.

Loki tried not to let his thoughts wander. He did not much care for the directions in which they strayed.

She returned moments later and waved the set of car keys at him. "Get in the car, Silver. And try to relax. I promise I'm not taking you somewhere to kill you." Her smile was quick, sharp, and a little bit deadly, enough to possibly belie the promise. Loki could not help a soft laugh.

"Relaxation is as much my strong point as I suspect it is yours, Agent Romanov." But he slid into the passenger seat of the vehicle, adjusted the seat so he could stretch out his legs, and leaned back. "And am I to call you that all through dinner, or have I earned the honor of your first name?"

She started the car. "Maybe later."

"You have mine."

"I have a name you gave yourself. Probably recently." She glanced sideways at him. "Which is fine. But don't try to pull that argument with me."

Loki flashed his teeth at her. "It was worth a try." She didn't react in the least. He leaned back as much as he could against the seat at his back, smoothing his features back to regally composed. "So, did you find your observation of me edifying?"

"Less than I would have liked," she said, not even bothering to attempt to deny it. A part of Loki had to be amused at her nonchalance.

"I wouldn't be much good at this if I did not know how to hide my mind."

"But not nothing." She didn't so much as glance at him. "You told Coulson that you had some training in negotiation. I'd narrow that down to diplomacy. Am I wrong?"

"If I confirmed your suppositions that would take all the fun out of your guessing," Loki said chidingly. Romanov seemed less than amused.

"So, diplomacy. But not strictly a diplomat, given how quickly you turned to killing even when there might have been other options. You've got a way of looking at people that makes me think you were born with money or power – or maybe both. But that sort of performance irks you – the playing nice to people you don't like thing. So wherever you're from, jockeying for status wasn't part of it."

Loki felt a faint prickle down his spine. "Is there an aim to this exercise?"

"I don't know yet," Romanov said, voice still perfectly calm, almost detached. "You seemed curious, so I'm telling you what I noticed." More than he'd expected. But she hadn't asked about Asgard. He prayed that was a good sign, and not a bad one. She glanced at him, sidelong. "But if you want to change the subject…"

"May I ask what it is you wish to speak of that couldn't wait?"

"You can ask," she said mildly, "Or you can wait and find out in about ten minutes. You hadn't met Stark before, had you?"

"I had not," Loki said, keeping his voice carefully neutral. Romanov smirked.

"He has that effect on most people." Loki angled his gaze sideways, trying to read the shadows of her face.

"You were an assassin," he said suddenly, "Not a spy, I think, before your current employment…and I would guess, now as well. If it is necessary." She tensed, very slightly, and he watched her push it away, submerge whatever threatened to surface once more.

"In my line of work, you don't stay alive very long if you don't learn how to kill." Her eyes were still forward on the road, not deviating even an iota in his direction. "I think you know that."

Loki didn't answer. His thoughts kept trying to twist in strange directions, and he focused on keeping them on a tight leash.

They drove the rest of the short way in silence until Romanov pulled off the road and into a parking lot. "Nothing fancy," she said, opening the door and sliding out of the car. "I hope you don't mind."

"I can manage," Loki murmured, unfolding from his seat, and didn't wait for her to stride toward the front door, the garish open sign leaving an afterimage on his eyelids. She caught up to him in a few steps, but it gave him a petty kind of satisfaction. "Though I fear we're rather overdressed."

Romanov shrugged. "I doubt anyone's going to comment. Table for two," she said, to the host before Loki could. The man looked more bored than surprised, although Loki caught the slight twitch of his gaze in Romanov's direction before he pulled it away. He picked up two menus and turned with an only slightly surly, "This way."

Loki arched an eyebrow in Romanov's direciton, and she gave him an almost suspiciously sweet smile. "The lasagna's good. I had a craving for Italian."

The restaurant was nearly empty, but the surly young man took them near to the back anyway, dropped the menus on the table, and departed with almost unseemly haste. Loki watched him hurry away before sitting down, pushing the chair back from the table so he could stretch his legs, the picture of casual relaxation he did not truly feel. "You've been here before, then?"

"Once or twice. It's close to a neighborhood of influential people but not out of my price range."

Loki twitched his head in the direction the fleeing young man had gone. "And do you know him, by any chance?"

Romanov smiled, very slightly. "I don't know why you'd think that." Loki felt his lips twitch, and smoothed them out as another server brought them two glasses of water. Romanov sipped at hers. Loki left his where it was.

"You wanted to speak to me," he prompted after a moment's silence. Romanov nodded, very slightly.

"I did."

"About?"

Romanov sat back and examined him with that weighing, assessing gaze. Loki wondered briefly what she was looking for, and kept his expression blank just in case. "You know, for all Agent Barton told me, you're not so bad."

Loki let his eyebrows rise. "High praise."

One corner of Romanov's mouth ticked up. "I wouldn't take it personally. We're both used to a little more…mundane, even if that's starting to change. With a little time…I'd guess he'll come around."

"I shall breathe a sigh of immense relief and stop fretting over that, then," Loki drawled. Romanov gave him a slight sidelong look. "If you thought that was a concern of mine…"

"Oh no," said Romanov, "I'm sure you're not in the least concerned about anyone else's opinion of you. You're independent. Self-reliant. Damn all the rest of them." She took a sip of her water. "Right?"

Loki let his eyes narrow just a fraction. "Not quite how I would put it, but near enough," he said, as though he hadn't heard the sarcasm underneath. She looked at him a long moment, and then nodded.

"Mmhm." She set her glass down and folded her hands on the table, her tone changing slightly. "You noticed I was observing you. Phil asked me to, and to report what I saw."

Loki was momentarily surprised by the frankness of that admission. He tried not to let it show on his face. "I wouldn't expect you to inform me of this."

"He didn't ask me to evaluate you," Romanov said, her eyes curiously intent, "Or assess a threat. It wasn't an official request. I owe him a favor, professionally, and it was in that spirit he asked me for my…expertise."

"Your expertise," Loki echoed. He could feel himself coiling tight and did his best to mask it. A waiter came by and Romanov glanced at him.

"Ready to order?"

Loki glanced at the menu he'd barely looked at since sitting down. "Not really."

"Mm. Too bad." Romanov flipped her menu closed. "The lasagna, house salad with thousand island on the side. Just water is fine." The waiter's gaze turned to Loki and he offered a thin smile.

"I'll just share hers," he said, pleasantly. She gave him a hard look that he ignored.

"You aren't getting any of my lasagna," she informed him. Loki smiled at her, too, the expression no more genuine. The waiter glanced between them and then vacated the premises.

"I shall keep that in mind."

Her eyes narrowed and then relaxed. She sat forward, elbows leaning on the table. "Yeah, my expertise. He thought I might be helpful in…your particular situation."

"Why you," Loki asked, steepling his fingers under his chin. "Out of everyone he might have chosen…why you?"

Her eyes on him were perfectly opaque, nearly impossible to read. After a few moments, she dropped them to flick to her glass of water and picked it up to sip at it. "I didn't integrate well," she said, finally. "When I was first hired. I wasn't great at cooperation and it was starting to look like the wrong call had been made bringing me in." She shrugged one shoulder. "I had someone who got me back in line, made sure I stayed clean. SHIELD – particularly Coulson - knows an asset when it sees one. He thinks you're floundering. Are you?"

Floundering? Loki felt a hot flare of anger and answered nearly automatically, snapping, "No."

Romanov set down her water glass. "Not necessarily professionally. Personally."

"Meaning?" Loki said, voice tight. Romanov just looked at him, levelly, but Loki had taken much sterner looks from much more intimidating opponents.

"I think you're smart enough to work that one out," she said finally. Loki propped his chin on his hands and threw her an amiable smile.

"Why don't I ask you what you think? You are the one doing the assessment, after all."

"Most people don't like being told what they're feeling by someone else."

"I'm curious what it is you think you've worked out."

Romanov leaned back again. "I've done my homework after Coulson mentioned the idea to me. Talked to both Agents Barton and Ford. Gotten an impression of your mission performance, read your formal reports, and now observation of my own. And you want to know what I think?"

Loki leaned in, ever so slightly. An almost sick feeling throbbed in his chest. "I believe I do." I don't.

Romanov's voice changed slightly again, became cool and clinical. "You're impatient, borderline reckless. You have a sharp mind – a very sharp mind, but when you get emotionally involved you lose it. You've got good focus but you're easily bored. You've got a ruthless streak but that's emotional too. I don't think I've seen you drop your guard once, but you're good at pretending you have. Most people you find dull. The few you don't make you nervous; like me. I also make you nervous because I'm as good a liar as you are, and you're not used to that. Should I keep going?"

Loki's stomach was in his throat. It was like being naked, worse than naked, like being flayed bare of skin and laid out for all to see, to stare, to gawk at. That he could be reduced to so very little…and she wasn't wrong. About any of it. When was the last time, he wondered, when someone had looked at him and seen… (cared to see, he thought sometimes, or even bothered to try, not too dazzled by Thor, perfect Thor-)

He cut off that thought, quickly. He wanted to lash out, or possibly run, or something – something. But he had…asked. Out of some morbid curiosity, he'd asked. And she hasn't condemned you yet, murmured a quiet voice at the back of his mind, but that was a dangerous thought. "You're not unskilled at this."

"One of the best." Romanov's eyes were intent, but one corner of her mouth flickered up. "Huh. I was expecting you to react worse to that."

"Were you?"

"No one likes to be told the truth about themselves." Romanov's smile was faintly sardonic. "Can I ask you again?"

Loki kept his voice deliberately casual. "Ask what?"

"If you're floundering." Her eyes were cool, calm, but not, he thought, expressionless. He was beginning to think anything but.

"Adjusting," Loki said, after a long moment. "I would say. Becoming acclimated."

"Mmm." Romanov simply looked at him for another moment, and then nodded. "Fair enough. It takes some getting used to." She stretched out her legs, and fell silent. Loki shifted, almost but not quite uncertain. "It's interesting, you know. I have a feeling you could charm just about anyone if you felt like it. You've got the charisma and the personality for it. I'm curious why you don't put in the effort."

Loki blinked. He hadn't thought of it that way, as charm or charisma. It was just another way to lie. "Perhaps I don't feel most people are worth the effort."

"'Perhaps?' I'd think you'd know." Romanov hummed under her breath. "You were keeping at least as much of an eye on me as anything else at that party," Romanov said, leaning forward with her elbows on the table. "Ford said you acted like you were working alone, and Clint commented that your first thought when things went wrong was that SHIELD had set you up."

"Are you going to tell me I'm wrong to be wary?" Loki said, letting his mouth curve, wry, amused. Something was humming in his chest or stomach, a strange feeling he couldn't quite pin down. Romanov snorted.

"Hardly. I'd be a hypocrite. I am saying - you'll halve your effectiveness that way. Tire faster, react slower, catch less. It's no way to work. So go ahead. Be wary. I'm not saying you need to make friends. Just…" she shrugged. "It's advice. Paranoia can keep you alive. Too much can kill you just as well."

"Are you suggesting I trust you?" Loki said, letting his tone communicate his incredulity. Romanov looked amused.

"I'm not suggesting you should trust anyone. That's not how it works. I don't trust easily, and I've been working with these people for years. But I trust someone."

Loki raised his eyebrows at her. "Someone." Barton, he guessed. Given how she talked about him, the use of his first name, he was almost certain of it. That's who it is for you, isn't it, and he could have said it. Part of him wanted to, to needle her into a response, throw her out of that carefully held balance.

Her eyes locked on his, calm and nearly expressionless. "Yeah. One person I know I can have at my back and not need to look over my shoulder." She looked up, and smiled pleasantly. "Ah, there's my lasagna. About time."

Loki sat back as the waiter set down her food. He felt strange, anxious, uncomfortable, and wasn't sure why any of it. But the urge to lash out hadn't returned. He waited until the waiter left to speak again. "You said Coulson asked you for your…professional opinion."

"Mmm." Romanov took a large bite of her lasagna, and looked briefly nearly blissful.

"And what are you going to tell him?" Loki asked. She glanced up at him, and he thought he caught a glimpse of something in her eyes. Maybe sympathy.

"What I told you. And that you're adjusting, and I don't think he needs to worry." She smiled, fractionally, and he thought this one had a little more of truth in it, and a little less of a weapon. "You seemed to enjoy the chess."

"It was not…a bad game," Loki said. He felt uneasy, disquieted, the urge in him tugging back and forth in myriad directions. To lash out, to run or close off or – pathetic, he chided himself, fiercely. Hold your ground.

"Come by sometime," she said. "I've got a place. Little bit of work and you might not make a bad player."

Loki's eyes narrowed. "I shall have it mastered in the space of another afternoon." At her smile, he knew he had been baited into it.

He found he couldn't quite mind.

She paused, and looked up, fork poised above her dish. "By the way," she said, "It's Natasha. Natasha Romanov."

Interlude (X)

He was hired.

Despite himself, Loki was a little surprised. "Welcome to the team," Megan said when he turned up on his first day, nearly painfully cheerful. "And by that I mean me and Ron, but – hey. And now you."

"So it would seem," Loki said, trying not to stare at her.

"Ron's out today," Megan said, hopping off her stool behind the counter. "Just you and me, sugar. So I'm supposed to teach you the ropes. It's not too hard – mostly you'll be shelving things, unpacking orders in the back, and taking the register while I'm off." Once again, Loki was struck by a strong sense of surreality. Menial labor. You would have scoffed at this, such a short time ago.

He pushed the thought away. "That all seems simple enough."

"Yeah, should be. Okay, let's start with the back room." She gestured him around the corner, and Loki followed her into a crowded, somewhat musty room stuffed with boxes. Loki wasn't sure what his expression looked like, but it seemed to amuse Megan. "Yeah, we're not great at the organization thing. Deep breath, it'll pass. So, what were you studying?"

"Physics," Loki said, easily. Megan's expression was faintly startled.

"Really? Cause I was expecting – I dunno, lit or history or something."

"I like to know how things work." It was still laughably primitive, but the field mortals called physics did seem to be the closest thing they had to an understanding of what he called magic and they had any number of more complicated names for. His guide made a face.

"Physics never got me. Too much math. But I was never much of any kind of academic, really. So – boxes come in through that door, there," she pointed, "Deliveries, when we get them. You'll have to sign for them, and then go through and make sure the orders match – sometimes they fuck it up – and yeah, that's it, basically. Where are you from?"

Loki blinked a little, slightly taken off guard by the question slipped into the midst of a deluge of instructions that did not, to him, seem very clear. He filed the words away and hoped it would be intuitive enough. "England," he said, and then added, "Though only originally, I've been here for some time." Vague, difficult to disprove. When he wasn't thinking, apparently his voice had an accent to it that sounded familiar to Midgardians, and the little searching he'd done had not found the location objectionable.

"Huh," Megan said, sounding more interested rather than less. "Okay, just curious. Any questions so far?"

"No," Loki said, which was the answer that he would have given if he had had questions. Megan seemed to think as much too, given her skeptical eyebrow.

"Really? Cause you've got a little bit of the 'dazed and confused' going on-"

Music abruptly began to play, loudly and jauntily, and Loki nearly jumped. He was almost immediately ashamed when Megan grimaced and pulled her phone from her pocket. He'd seen enough people using them to know what they were, and yet it seemed every time-

She glanced at the screen, and made a face. "I've gotta take this," she said, sounding unhappy about it. "Be right back, okay? You can poke around."

Loki looked in a few of the boxes as Megan walked a few feet away and answered the call, but mostly he watched her. She didn't look happy. Whoever she was speaking with, she had little fondness for them, and she paced back and forth a few times, agitated. Loki caught himself frowning and tilted his head to listen, but could only catch fragments of words and a sharp tone of voice.

She hung up a few moments later and returned, expression soured. Loki tried not to look curious, and apparently failed. She sighed and waved a hand vaguely. "Not a big deal," she said. "Just a…thing. My biological dad – wants to get in touch with me. Ha, cause that's going to happen."

Loki frowned. "Biological as opposed to…"

She gave him an odd, sidelong look. "They don't have adoption in England?"

Loki felt as though he'd been slapped in the face. Out of surprise more than anything, and a moment later he felt foolish (of course, what else would it be) and then simply…unsteadied. It's not the same. He forced a laugh. "Of course. Silly me."

The odd look only intensified, and Loki tensed. Had he already misstepped in some vital way, idiot, what were you thinking- then, abruptly, understanding seemed to dawn on her face. "Oh!" she said. "Yeah, I'm adopted. You could just ask, I mean, it's not a big deal and I'm a nosy bitch who likes to overshare, so…yeah." Loki had the distinct feeling that he had just missed something, some assumption she had just made, but wasn't certain what it was.

"Yeah," Megan went on, puttering back toward the main section of the store. "Ron's my dad. Figure it's the only reason he hired a total deadbeat, heh. I'm not sensitive about it or anything." She glanced over her shoulder as Loki trailed after her, and finally paused. "…did I say something?"

"No," said Loki, after a moment. "Not…no. You did not." Ron's my dad, she said, like it was that simple, like this other man she clearly didn't care for mattered not at all.

Megan was still giving him an odd look.

"Okay," she said, after a moment, and turned back around. "Well, let me know. I put my foot in my mouth sometimes and I won't notice if you don't say anything, chances are. So, shelving…"

Norns, he thought, still pulling my strings, am I supposed to think something, learn something, are you still-

He pushed that thought aside. Coincidence. Strange coincidence, and he would think on it no further.

I was never his son. And now I never will be.

No further.