It took the better part of the morning to restore order to the students, better being a relative word with Loki as he sat in Ororo's office waiting for her to return and talk to him. He felt sick, angry, ashamed. Thor's accusations had likely cut through the threads of any trust or empathy that he had received upon his arrival. Kurt had walked him to the office where he had pulled out a set of beads with a gold cross on the end of it, murmuring something in a language he could not understand. Kurt had seen Loki watching him,
"It is a prayer for you, Loki. Perhaps it vill help."
He'd left Loki sitting alone in the office then, and an hour had passed before he heard the handle turn and the door behind him open.
He let them walk around in front of him to stand. Despite his pride, he couldn't bring his eyes up to meet theirs. He kept his gaze at their feet for the time being.
"You want to stay here, right?" Ororo began.
Loki nodded, a quick sad smile passing over his countenance.
"Alright then you can start by being honest with us. Where are you from?"
Loki looked up at Logan and Ororo, "I am from Asgard. I was born Jotun, adopted by Odin and raised as brother to Thor."
"So what, he's a god?" Logan glanced at Ororo.
"Is what Fury told me true?"
Loki shrugged, "I cannot tell you if I do not know what he said to you."
"Are you responsible for the attack on New York last summer?"
Loki closed his eyes, knowing any explanation would be useless. He swallowed, gave an imperceptible nod, waited in the tense silence that followed.
"Who is Sarah?"
"She is an agent with S.H.I.E.L.D." He had balled his hands into fists in his lap.
"How is she associated with you?" Ororo had begun to pace back and forth in front of him.
"We became lovers during her employment when I was placed in her care. Fury refused to let us see one another and so sent her on a different assignment. I followed her, was captured, brought to Asgard and punished. From there, she brought me back to Earth where we tried to hide from detection at a friend's house, Mister Stewart's in Maine. When we found we could not, we left. From there we stopped at a truck stop, I managed to get a ride from a trucker because I did not want her in harms way any longer and so left her there. That is everything in its entirety."
He couldn't bear to talk about the pregnancy, the thought of her alone without him there to help her making him half mad. He looked up at Ororo and Logan who now had their heads together talking to each other and all at once he was on his feet.
"I wish to redeem myself."
Ororo stopped talking to Logan and stared at Loki, "How do you expect to accomplish that?"
"With guidance, time?" he had his hands atop his head now, and he bent at the waist, suddenly overwhelmed, "I will do what you wish, I am weary to death trying to resolve such a jaded past. I must find a way to be with Sarah and if I am to be remanded to your care, I will use the opportunity to show myself worthy of her."
Logan stared hard at him, "We none of us here are exempt from damn foolish things we've done in our past but you seem to have a laundry list of trouble. I say it's just about impossible for you to wipe away that much ink."
Ororo held up a hand, "I can't say that I don't take stock in Logan's assessment, however, even the most misled of us has found a way back from darkness. A lot of people, teachers, saw what happened today, there will be that mountain to climb. You have expressed a desire to make yourself useful here, you'll have that chance too, but I expect respect and compliance with our rules. The students will learn as much from your actions as you will learn from theirs. As I told you yesterday, the students and my friends are my biggest concern. I'm going to call Fury again to speak to him about the intrusion today and explain what I consider hostile intent, Logan will you see him out. He's supposed to be shown around by Gracie...damnit...Grace, today."
Logan smiled broadly, "See, it's hard not to call her Gracie, told ya." He waved a hand in the direction of the door, "Come on, we'll see if Gracie is in any state to show you around."
They found Grace in the courtyard with a tall muscular young man, light brown hair in a short buzz, dressed in jogging pants and a v-neck t-shirt that looked about to burst. Beside him was a young woman with long brown hair in a similar set of clothes. They were all standing around the gaping crack in the pavement.
"So the guy just up and slammed the big hammer on the ground? It figures I miss all the fun."
Grace was writing something on her ever present clipboard, "Kitty it wasn't fun, trust me. That guy was scary. Hot but scary.."
"See," Kitty frowned, "I do miss all the fun."
Logan walked up behind Grace and whispered in her ear, "Oh Gracie."
She started forward, losing her grip on the clipboard as it clattered to the ground and Loki bent to retrieve it. As he handed it back to her, he watched her eyes cloud over when they met his own.
"Maybe I didn't miss it entirely." Kitty whispered to Piotr.
"Ororo has returned the new guy to you, Gracie."
"Why me? If anyone should take care of him, it's you right now." She kept Logan's gaze, refusing to meet Loki's again.
"You're the house mother and I've got a class to teach don't I?" As Logan turned and trotted back towards the mansion, she heard a snort of laughter.
"That was the whole point,"She squeezed her eyes shut, opened them and turned to Kitty and Piotr, "I've got to get going." Then to Loki, "Come on, we're going to be late for the self defense class. That is still the plan right? Ororo didn't mention any changes?"
Loki shook his head, "She said nothing to me."
Grace grunted, "Follow me then."
They arrived at the gymnasium a few minutes after the Self Defense as an Option class had started and Loki was surprised to see Logan standing at the front facing a large group of students and a few adults dressed in gis on a large matted square in the middle of the floor.
"What are the three A's of self defense?" Logan called out to the group, waiting for a response, winking at Grace as he saw them settle in the bleachers.
He pointed at one small blond girl in the front row. "Allison, three A's."
She looked up at the ceiling and down at the floor, "Attitude...Awareness?" She hesitated longer then. Logan pointed to another student, a boy with black hair and black eyes. "Jonah?"
"Action."
Logan nodded, "The correct attitude is the single biggest attribute you must possess in order to keep yourself out of needless trouble. In other words, don't go looking for trouble because you might find it." He noticed students in the middle and towards the back rows pointing and whispering and he rolled his eyes.
"Okay guys, I don't think we're going to get any learning done today until I introduce you to my newest assistant." Logan motioned at Loki and at first he kept his seat mouthing the word "No".
Logan glared at him and pointed to the spot on the mat beside him.
Loki heard Grace next to him, "He can't make that decision on his own." gasping as Loki stood and trotted down the stairs to the mat.
Thirty pairs of eyes returned his stare. In the rear of the group he noticed the two girls who had first led him to Ororo's office, Shayna and Marly. Shayna had Marly's arm in a death grip, her mouth open in a silent scream. Loki caught her eyes and smiled, trying not to laugh as she started to shake poor Marly like a rag doll. He looked over his shoulder at Grace with that same smile but immediately dialed it down when he saw her glaring at him.
"This is Loki, he's going to be my whipping boy." Logan laughed along with the students, and clapped Loki hard on the back, "No, really he's going to be my assistant. It might take a little while to get him into a routine so you more experienced members take it easy, wouldn't want to break him." He nudged Loki, "We were working on how to escape an attacker from the rear, ya think you could pair off with someone and practice a little?"
Loki looked down at his pants and button down shirt, "I am poorly dressed for it."
"Just unbutton your shirt a bit and roll up your sleeves, I'm not asking you to do a whole routine." Logan turned and waved at Grace who by now was writing on her clipboard at a furious pace, looking up, writing again.
"Okay, class, Loki is going to come at me from behind and put his arms around my waist and I'm going to show you two options again. Does anyone remember what they were?"
Hands rose in the group and Logan put up a hand, "Okay, alright, you'll get a chance to prove it." He nodded to Loki who sighed and walked up behind Logan, wrapping his arms around his waist, noticing that the difference in their height was less extreme than he'd thought.
"Okay, the bad guy has got his arms around you, got some nice heels on?" He lifted his left foot and put it against Loki's shin, sliding it down his leg to rest on his foot. "You drag that shoe down hard and plant that spike heel in the top of his foot, and there's a real good chance he's going to loosen his grip unless he's got steel toed boots on. In that case." Logan twisted around in Loki's arms, bending his elbow and bringing it around to rest at Loki's jawline. "You'd do it a whole lot faster than I did but we don't want to have to get a new instructor on the first day."
He broke away from Loki and came up behind him. "I'm going to do the same thing to you, let's see if you know what you're doing. Don't forget to pull punches, we don't want a fatality."
Loki mimicked Logan's actions, his only mistake being bringing his foot down harder on top of Logan's as he began to lose his balance.
"Let's hope you're a better dancer or your partner is going to have sore feet." Logan waved to the students, "Okay let's pair off and try those moves half a dozen times. Whoever doesn't have a partner come up here to me."
He glanced up into the bleachers at Grace and grinned to himself, "Grace, come down here and be Loki's dance partner will you?"
He chuckled as Grace's head shot up with a dazed expression on her face.
"Come on, we're uneven." He turned back to Loki who was staring at him. "I'm the instructor, I gotta make sure everyone is doing it right."
Logan realized that Grace hadn't moved from the bleachers and he made for her, she rising before he got halfway there and coming down the stairs to stand next to Loki.
"I'm too short." She crossed her arms, the clipboard absent from her hands for only the second time since Loki had met her.
"Nonsense, class, what do I always say?"
In unison the class shouted, "Size doesn't matter!" Logan observed a couple of the adults in the class giggling and he waggled his finger at them.
In truth, she was only a head shorter than Loki but the difference was enough to make her uncomfortable. She gingerly brought her hands around his waist, her hands had begun to sweat in her gloves. She leaned as far from him as she could without pulling him backwards, catching the scent of his body, feeling him tense beneath her arms.
"Okay class, all together, Awwww!" The group erupted into gales of laughter and Grace made a mental note to herself, the next time she encountered Logan alone, to kick him square in the balls, rules be damned.
"So go ahead and try the moves, or are you quite comfortable?" He watched the students as they practiced and brought his attention back to Loki and Grace who had parted and were now watching the students. He made a twirling motion with his finger, "The woman is usually the victim, put your arms around her waist. Gracie..you try to break out of the hold."
"GRACE!" She shouted, her voice echoing across the gymnasium, bringing her elbow around as she'd seen Loki do but not quite able to stop herself, knocking him in the jaw before she dropped her arm down and winced.
"I'm sorry, I didn't really mean to hurt you." She cried, spinning around.
"No harm done." Loki wiggled his jaw with his hand and she noticed the split at his lip that Thor had given him had started to bleed again.
"Come on, let's get that taken care of." Grace walked away from him to fetch her clipboard.
"Well, do you think you could do this every other day?" Logan poked his arm.
"I could, perhaps I might teach you something as well."
Logan nodded, "We'll see won't we."
Grace handed him a washcloth from the large linen cabinet down the hall from his room and stood in the bedroom waiting for him as he cleaned the cut in the bathroom, the silence irritating to her ears. She sighed, sat on the bed,
"Is it true?"
Loki walked back into the bedroom, buttoning his sleeves, "Is what true?"
Grace looked up at him, "All of it, Asgard? The gods, you being a wanted man?"
Loki said nothing, tucked the tail of his shirt into his pants.
"And this woman, Sarah? Thor said you could be with her if you returned.."
"Do not speak of her." He growled, shook his head, frustrated, his hand at his forehead, "it pains me greatly."
Grace sat there, a stunned look on her face until he groaned and sat down in one of the easy chairs, "I have made many poor decisions in my time here on Midgard,"
"Midgard."
"Earth if you will, I fell in love with a Midgardian, I thought that we could be together in peace but Fury would not have it, even underneath his all seeing gaze. I have ruined two lives, hers and mine in my impulses, my confounding need for affection, my short sightedness."
Grace wanted to go to him, touch his shoulder and reassure him but she forced herself to stay seated on the bed. "Love will find a way, it always does."
Loki stared into the empty fireplace, "Forgive me if I do not share your optimism. I have seen many winters, many cold lonely nights with nothing save the braziers for warmth. Never had I had anything close approximating companionship like I had with Sarah. I belong nowhere now, with no one."
"You can belong here if you try." Grace stood from the bed suddenly ill at ease, her heart starting to pound.
"If nothing else, I feel as if I am at the very least, among my own kind here. We shall see."
He heard the click of the door as it shut, slow. His heart had started to pound in unison with hers and he'd only felt the thoughts closest to the surface of her mind. He would have to endeavor never again to try and read her, it was as if a connection was being forged each time he had done so. He stood from the easy chair, straightened his clothes and decided to head to the hall for lunch, he found he was actually hungry.