Logan hated being useless. Of course, in his condition, there wasn't much he could actually do about… anything, lest he forget what he was doing in the middle of doing it, and be more of a hinderance to whoever had to come up behind him and fix it than a help. It didn't happen often, but the one time it had was so humiliating he never wished it to happen, again.
He'd been staying with Fafnir for almost a week, by then, and still sometimes forgot his host's name.
Still, there was nothing so loathed as a useless guest, one who merely showed up and did nothing but wolf down food and take up space. So, despite the threat of leaving a job half-finished, Logan had volunteered to tend to Fafnir's vegetables. Gardening had always come easy to him, and as he knelt in the soil, hands deep in the rich earth, he almost felt like he belonged. The plants would not judge him, and while he may forget their purpose, they'd never send him to the asylum.
"Hey, there." A woman's voice spoke up behind and above him, and Logan glanced to the side to see a pair of swede boots directly next to his left knee. They were connected to a woman, the one who had spoken, tall, with dark hair and skin, a ready smile, and glittering eyes that displayed intelligence and humor. She was the most beautiful woman he could remember. "Fafnir told me you'd be out here."
Was he supposed to know her?
Oh, not this, again… Perhaps they'd met recently, and she was someone important, and he was putting off a terrible impression by staring blankly up at her, slightly burnt and sweaty from the sun, his hands and face burnt from the sun. "Hello…?" He ventured, figuring that'd be safe as he scrambled to his feet, and wiped his hands on his jeans.
That was better. At least he was taller than her, now. "It's, uh… good to see you." That was it. Stay ambiguous. Elusive. She'd never know.
"I'm Sigyn." She grinned, raising her eyebrows at him. "Princess Sigyn of Vanaheim?"
The name rung a bell… as if he was supposed to know who was, but didn't. What a failure he was. "Well, I'm sure someone's told you my memory is… next to nonexistent." He admitted, smiling apologetically. "I'm afraid I've no idea."
Sigyn tilted her head in vague confusion, and took two steps to his left. "Sorry, the sun was in my…"
She trailed off, her wide, golden eyes staring up at him in shock. There was a heavy silence as neither of them were quite sure what to say.
"I'm sorry, have we met?" Logan finally blurted, unable to take her awestruck staring any longer.
With that, she shook herself, and glanced down at the soil beneath her feet. "My apologies." She laughed in disbelief. "It's just… you really do look like him. Loki, that is." She shook her head, making up for her previous silence by talking a mile a minute. "Right, of course, they told me about your… memory thing, I'm sorry, I wasn't thinking. Fafnir sent for me to see if I could pass any judgement as to whether or not you're the lost prince of Asgard, who was my betrothed, and… Bor's blood, you really look like him, it's giving me chills. In a good way. Do you think you might be…?"
Logan blinked in surprise, the vague concept of hope over the past week that he might actually have an identity flitting around his mind like a memory he couldn't quite put his finger on. "M-me? I… well.. If I'm as like him as you say…"
"You really are." She laughed in disbelief, and glanced away, patting at her face as if it was heating up. "I'm sorry I'm so flustered, it's just… I haven't seen you… him… in almost fifteen years, and I really, really missed you."
Already, she was speaking as he was actually Loki. It seemed too good to be true.
"Well, you're either him or Tom Hiddleston." She was saying. "So, I suppose I've got to quiz you to see if you're just a doppelgänger. What's your name?"
Logan blinked in surprise. He'd never seen anyone converse so quickly, at least, not that he remembered. It was a little overwhelming. "They call me Logan." He answered, leading her over to the bench at the end of the garden so they could sit.
"Logan." Her face fell a little. "You don't even claim to be Loki?"
"I can't claim to be someone I don't even remember." Logan quietly admitted.
"Fair." She sighed. "Then you don't remember anything?"
Silently, he shook his head. "You could try naming events, see if that jogs my memory. It's been known to have some effect, before, but I doubt it'll do much."
She pondered for a moment, before brightening. "You remember the coronation?"
"Whose coronation?"
"Thor's." She replied. "I was there. About fifteen minutes before the ceremony was the last time we kissed."
Nope.
Nothing.
"Sorry."
She glanced away, obviously more upset than she wanted to let on. "Quite alright… Do you remember Midgard? The invasion?"
"I remember Fafnir telling me it happened." He supplied. He also remembered crying himself to sleep that night after Googling the death count. Not that he'd say that to her face. "But… not the event."
"Hm." She acknowledged. "Of course, you don't remember me."
With a bit of a smile, he shrugged. "Not yet, but keep talking to me. Something might come back."
At that, she sent him a flat, unamused look, but a smile couldn't keep itself from pulling at her lips. "Okay, hot shot. I guess we can't test your conscious memory, but if you are Loki, something of you has got to be stuck in your subconscious."
"So you'll do what, exactly?" Logan questioned, a little nervously. He recalled Fafnir saying something about her being proficient in mind healing and magics, and he wasn't comfortable with the idea of her getting into his head to fish out the answers she was looking for.
"I'm going to investigate your character, instead. See if you're the man I fell in love with." She smirked. "Or if you just want to be."
"It's certainly one of the two." He chuckled. "Go on."
For a moment, she was quiet, thinking. Then, she cleared her throat, and flicked her wrist, summoning a notebook and pen to her hand. "Alright, first question. And these are going to be a little personal, so tell me if you get uncomfortable. What do you fear?"
"Right into the existential, hm?" He grinned. "Forgetting something life-threatening. Being forgotten. Asylums. Being choked. Being helpless in emergency situations, or any situations, really. Being a liability. Ice."
"Ice?" Sigyn echoed, an excellent poker face in place. "Why ice?"
He could only shrug. "I'm not sure."
She jotted this down in her notebook. "Don't mind me, I need this for research purposes. What do you want most in life?"
"A place I can belong." Well, that sounded sappy on multiple levels, but she only nodded, and hummed her assent. "Don't we all? What do you love?"
"Everything I can remember." He answered, almost wistfully. "Except tomatoes. I can't stand them."
She giggled in amusement, and waved a hand, gesturing for him to elaborate. "I mean, what stands out to you? What kind of things can you just not get enough of?"
"You." He winked, prompting an amused eye-roll. "Sunrises. Children. Cake. Recognizing someone as soon as I see them."
"Wait, what sort of cake?" She leaned forward eagerly. "It wouldn't happen to be apple spice?"
"As matter of fact, yes." He grinned. "That was Loki's favorite, too, I suppose."
She nodded, a nostalgic gleam in her eyes. "What do you think of spiders?"
"They're the vilest beings ever to walk on the face of the Earth." He immediately answered, as she leaned back, a very strange look in her eyes, as she vanished the notebook.
"Well." She stated.
"Did I pass the test?" He grinned hopefully.
She pursed her lips, and shook her head. "Listen, Lo… Logan. I really, really want you to be Loki. You were… I mean, he was the light of my life, and if you're him, I have my beloved back. Therefore, I'm biased. My heart tells me to believe Fafnir, but my head… my head's been given false hope one time too many. And while all the facts line up, and I want to say it's true, especially since Fafnir is the one who's putting you forward, and you're just as clueless as to whether you are or not as we are… You never really answered my question: do you think you're Loki?"
Logan cleared his throat awkwardly, carefully weighing the evidence. "I think…" He trailed off, and shook his head. "Norns only know. I certainly believe it's plausible. At this point, I wouldn't be surprised either way."
"Hm." Sigyn mused, leaning back in her seat, and regarding him with a critical air. "You said 'Norns'. Did you mean to say that?"
He shrugged, unsure. "Not exactly. What is a Norn?"
She didn't answer, but sat up, an intrigued expression in her eyes. "You look like him. You talk like him. You think like him. You act like him. You move like him." She took his hands in her own, and gently caressed his knuckles with her thumb. "And yet, our hearts are unsure. I'm sorry, Logan. I'm going to have to ask for a third opinion."
"Your Highness…" Logan pleaded, a flutter of panic welling up in his stomach.
"Sigyn." She corrected with a sad smile. "You can call me Sigyn."
"Sigyn, please." He begged. "I have nothing. I'm no one. I can't live like this any longer. If I'm not Prince Loki, can you at least tell me who I actually am?"
She glanced away, her large, soft eyes filling with tears. Of course, this would be painful for her, as well. "I'm sorry." It seemed the umpteenth apology spoken in the same conversation. "But if you're not Loki, I just met you half an hour past. I can't tell you anything."
A strangled gasp of despair wrenched itself from his throat, and he turned away, stricken with hopelessness.
"Look at me?" She softly spoke, and he turned back to her face. "Identity is not built on a name." She softly stated. "If you discover you're Marie Antoinette, that won't change who you are, yourself. You are a good man, whether you're Loki or not. A man is built upon his reputation, and your choices, not your name, define that."
He gave her a grateful smile, and glanced down at their clasped hands with a strange feeling of being out of place. "That ring." He stated, nodding to the thin band of gold inlaid with a tiny ruby around the first finger of her left hand. "I know it from somewhere."
"You like it?" She smiled holding it up so it caught the sunlight. "You gave it me. At least, Loki did. The day I came of age."
"I have very good taste." Logan teased, then became serious, once more. "Will you be going to back to your home planet, then?"
"I think I'll be around." She assured with a smile. "I have to give you something to remember, right?"
He snorted in amusement. "I'm glad to say you'll be one of the things that are extremely hard to forget."
"We'll see." She winked as she stood up. "But I've got to get to my hotel in Oslo before sundown, or they'll cancel my reservation. But I'll see if I can make it back here tomorrow."
Something prompted him to brush a kiss onto her knuckles before she disappeared in shimmer of yellow light, leaving him alone in the garden.
What had he been doing before she arrived? He couldn't recall. He ought to go ask Fafnir. It was as if the burden of being alive weighed far less heavily on his shoulders as he basically skipped into the house. Fafnir was sprawled on the couch, his nose in a book. "I take it you like her?"
"What's not to like?" He laughed, running a hand through his cropped hair. "She's… she's something else."
"That she is." Fafnir chuckled. "What's her final decision?"
"She can't be sure." He admitted, glancing away in an attempt to stop thinking of his still-suspended identity. "But she'll come back tomorrow." He knew he'd come in here to ask Fafnir something… what had it been?
Drat. He couldn't recall for the life of him.
No matter. Sigyn would return the next day, and he'd remember her. He wrote her name on his arm in sharpie to be sure of it.
TheOnlyHuman.