DAY 13: 0704 HOURS

"Stop staring at me."

"We could always talk about your anguished soul," he gave her a cutting glare over the breakfast table, "here," she handed him the morning paper; "I've done the hard parts of the crossword for you."

"Thanks," he took it off her, "of course, you have to remember that we do not have the same definition of 'hard'."

She shrugged, "whatever."

He glared down at the clues for a long time. A nine letter word for house; he wrote Jotunheim, only because it would fit.

She cleared his bowl away, "residence," she corrected him, "residence goes in that space, not Joelheim, whatever that word is. Schlaigelhauffen."

"Jotunheim," he corrected her, "it is where I am from, originally."

"So I've heard," she said, "I have also heard that you tried to blast it a while ago. It's pretty clear to me that you have no strong ties to it."

"What are you doing? Searching for clues to my mental state in the cryptic crossword?" he bit at her.

"Its New York state," his glare cut into her, "Okay, Icicles," she held up her hands defensively, "didn't mean to piss you off, but hey, it's an occupational hazard," she smiled, "is J . . . J-Heim pretty?"

He looked up at her with almost a look of shock on his face, "if you think that it is a word of ice palaces and elves as in your myth of Santa Claus, you are much mistaken."

She sat back down opposite him, "I believe I am having flashbacks to Arctic survival drills," she sipped her juice, "other planets and stuff, they interest me," he cocked his head at her; "you don't think I have a telescope on my roof just to spy on the neighbors, do you?"

"Do you wish to know about the other realms?"

"A little, yeah. And to know whether dragons really exist," she crossed her arms over the table, "Asgard first."

"Why Asgard?"

"Because I can pronounce it," Bella answered back simply. Loki smiled at her with a tiny laugh, "all I know about it is what's written down in Sophie's books."

"The palace looks like a pipe organ," Loki replied, "and the city is like New York, only bigger, more sprawling, more advanced, and with less gas fumes."

She arched an eyebrow, "not much to write home about then?"

"Not really," he replied, "and we would kill for some good leadership."

"I knew Odin was a douchebag, but this is ridiculous," she shook her head and smiled, bemused.

"We could do with a leader that is stupid and harmless rather than, as Sophia puts it, alien Pol Pot," Loki told her.

"He's that mercenary?" Bella gasped, "I may be working for Thor, but where does he get his commands?"

"Despite grandiose postulating that he is king of Asgard and the protector of the nine realms, he protects himself, first, last, always," Bella's eyes widened, "there is a method to his madness, unfortunately. There have always been, and he has always used me. Sometimes I feel like a stolen relic."

"You don't look like the Arc of the Covenant," she grinned, "we all feel like pawns in the cosmic guessing game, believe me, I know," she squeezed his hand, "some people believe in a god, some believe in Karma, and I even know one guy that swears by the big purple spaghetti monster. Sometimes we feel like someone has orchestrated our entire lives in come sick game, and I know that I feel although I am stuck in ten rounds of D and D, and when that happens, do you wanna know what I say to the big man?"

"What?"

"'Fuck you'," she said simply, "I am sick of his sadistic ant-farm power game down here, and I'm not playing it anymore," Loki began to grin at her, "If God, Odin, Allah, Yaweh or whoever the fuck he is wants to watch people squirm, he can make more epileptics, 'cuz I'm not gonna writhe for his amusement," she grinned slightly herself, "and if your Not-Pa wants to watch you stew before he kills you, the worst punishment you can give him is that he has to watch you get better and change the world in a positive way. It hurts because he could have done the same thing."

He slouched a little lower, "they lied to me, they all lied to me . . ."

"Loki, it doesn't matter now," she told him gently, "it doesn't matter that they lied to you before, Honey, all that matters is the present now. What are you gonna do next? Are you gonna fall down and die or are you gonna crusade for the truth. Once you know the truth, you find peace," He sort of grunted at her, and still looked incredibly depressed. According to Thor, he had been this way since his mom died, and he had only gotten worse after being busted for impersonating his old man that had actually been in Odin Sleep for his second stint as king. The fact that Loki did not kill Odin proved to his brother that there was still a scrap of the old Loki in there, and Thor would be glad that she was starting to reveal it.

"And besides," she started, "if I found an adorable blue baby abandoned on a rock or something, I think I would keep him too."

"Abandoned in a temple," Loki corrected her.

Bella's brow furrowed, "isn't that a weird place to abandon a baby? I mean, what self-respecting tyrant like Laufey would leave a kid to die in a place where a priest or nun or something can pick him up and look after him?"

"What do you mean adorable?" he changed out one awkward subject for another.

She grinned, "When look at you, I don't see a killer," she explained, "I'm a Marine, despite the brotherhood of us all, I am a highly trained killing machine, which is something that you are not," after a confused glance with Loki, she decided to give him an ultimatum, "I'll show you mine if you show me yours."