Lucy Ward.
Seeing her had infinitely multiplied all of Gwen's suppressed feelings towards her daughter. Love and loss, all bundled up and strong enough to burst out of her ribcage, made it difficult to think about anything else. But you couldn't survive on the streets if you were a lovestruck fool. Gwen held thoughts of her daughter back, only allowing them to come forward in the small hours of the night when there was nothing else to trouble her, and meanwhile carried on with the job at hand.
Miraculously, her chef friend had managed to get her an interview to work in the Avengers Tower as a maid. Posh boy's gonna think this is hilarious, she thought gloomily, as she removed her piercings one morning while dressed in the smartest clothes she had ever worn.
The problem was that she actually had a bit of a soft spot for the Norse god. She had been a drug dealer for a solid six years, after all, she was hardly in a position to maintain a moral high ground over him, and that wasn't even counting the couple of people who had been on the receiving end of her switchblade. Loki was arrogant and privileged, yes, but he also had wit to match her own and, she was forced to admit, wasn't too unattractive when he wasn't wearing the wan face of an ordinary man. And he had shown her Lucy, which not only meant she was forever in his debt, but also hinted at a nicer side he probably wouldn't willingly admit to.
On the other hand, he could be- and often was- infuriatingly up himself. It wasn't just that she was tired of hearing how tiny her Midgardian brain was, it was that he thought he was better than everyone else in the world, just because he was a king- and not even a proper one! He was just pretending to be someone else!
Gwen blinked, and realised that while she had been thinking her legs had carried her all the way through New York to the lobby of the Tower without her noticing. She had had to leave Algernon behind, which meant this was the first time she had gone somewhere without him, but he was hardly going to endear her to her maybe-employers.
A little nervously, she walked up to the desk and coughed. A smiling woman with a headset looked up at her.
"Can I help you?"
"Annie, um, Smith for a job interview?"
The woman nodded. "Miss Potts will be with you shortly."
Potts?! That wasn't part of the plan.
"Miss Smith! Lovely to meet you, Mrs Pleasant's told me so much about you."
Gwen jumped and spun round to see a slim strawberry blonde woman offering her hand to her, a tablet tucked into the nook of her other arm. She shook it and followed Potts into an elevator, which took them up several floors to an office with one wall made up entirely of glass windows that looked out onto the Manhattan skyline. Gwen, who was mortally afraid of heights, quickly turned her back to it and took the seat Potts offered her.
"So Annie," she smiled, "any particular reason you want to work in the Avengers tower?"
Gwen suspected this was a trick question. "Uh," she said eloquently, "to be honest, ma'am, I don't really care that I'll be working for a bunch of superheroes, I've never really been bothered about that stuff. I just want to work for a company that has an excellent reputation outside of its high-profile owner." Oh, I'm good.
Pepper looked very relieved. "Right answer," she said, "between you and me, I do not want to admit the amount of restraining orders I've had to issue to people who've applied to work here."
"Miss Potts," a smooth disembodied voice said, and for the second time in ten minutes Gwen jumped. "Mr Stark would like to speak to you."
Pepper closed her eyes for a moment. "Tell him I'm busy, Jarvis."
"Of course."
The CEO looked back at Gwen. "Sorry about that," she said, "now, about your qualifications-"
"PEPPER!"
"I am sorry Miss Potts," said Jarvis the omnipresent voice, "I did try to tell him."
A short man with an intensely trimmed beard had emerged from the lift and strolled into Pepper's office. "You're making a staffing decision without me?" he asked, hand on his chest to display how insulted he felt.
"Tony," said Pepper wearily, "it's just a maid."
"Yeah," Stark replied, "my maid."
"With your track record, darling, all your maids are men."
"I'm offended you would even think me capable of this," said Stark, walking round and leaning on the back of her chair. "I'm in a committed monogamous relationship," he informed Gwen.
She nodded, while trying not to panic. There was no way they would know why she was really here, right? Right?!
"Tony," said Pepper, "go play in the lab with Bruce."
"Fine," huffed the trillionaire, and swanned off back into the lift.
"Again," said Pepper, straightening the files on her desk, "sorry about… him. So, Annie, why do you want to work as one of our service staff?"
I actually resent the concept of me being subservient to all of you purely on the basis that you are more affluent than me, she thought, but obviously didn't say it aloud. She gave suitably shoe-licking answers to all of the questions and made it through the interview without incident.
"Now," said Potts, "do you have any questions about your wages or anything like that?"
Gwen suddenly realised that she hadn't even thought about getting paid for working at the Tower. "Uh," she said, "… no…"
"Excellent! We'll email you in the next couple of days, but I think I can say I'll be very glad to have you on our team!" Potts trilled, and Gwen nodded.
%
"I'm gonna get paid Algernon! For a job which I hate on principle, but still. That's an extra wage, on top of what the posh boy gives me. I might actually be able to afford to buy stuff for myself."
"What are you prattling on about now?" said a smooth voice, and Gwen turned to glare at Loki as he sauntered into the room.
"I got a job in the Avengers Tower as their maid, thought it might make sneaking about there easier."
Loki raised an eyebrow. "I somehow cannot imagine you mastering the concept of being seen and not heard in order to be a serving girl, mouse."
"Believe it or not," she said coolly, "I'm not thick enough to rant at my employers." She shuddered a little at the last word, hating that it meant she was tied down. It felt different with Loki; he needed her as much as she needed him, whereas she would just be another termite in the anthill of Stark Industries.
"I shall try to," he said with a crooked smile, "any news on my brother?"
"Somewhere in Brazil, I think." She yawned, and started unbuttoning her blouse. "Turn around while I get changed."
"Must I?"
"Oi. We've talked about this."
Loki obediently turned to face the wall. "Do they suspect anything?"
"Why would they? Everyone thinks you're dead," she reminded him, pulling on her jeans. "How's Asgard?"
"Asgardian."
"Thank you for sharing such an important piece of information with me," she said scathingly, and he chuckled. "Okay, you can turn back around now. Does Asgard have mice?"
"Yes," he said, "they're generally considered to be pests."
She gave him a sunny smile. "Well, we are."
He laughed properly. "At least you're self-aware."
"You could learn a thing or two from me, posh boy." She shrugged on her jacket and sat down to lace up her boots.
"Where are you going?"
"Out to get drunk," she lied smoothly, "I think I'm allowed to celebrate, don't you?"
He shrugged. "So long as it doesn't affect your tailing ability."
"It won't, Loki, don't worry. Don't wait up for me," she added, fishing Algernon out of his cage.
"I wasn't planning to."
%
Gwen had never been able to afford admission to the Cloisters before, a museum in north Manhattan that had been built to look like old European castles, but she had often camped out in the park it was situated in and had spent hours staring hungrily at the old stone walls, wondering what was inside.
"I am such a nerd," she murmured to Algernon in her pocket, "for the sake of my dignity, he must never know this is how I spend my free time." The museum had everything; art and gardens and ancient things that glittered lazily in their glass cases. A few elderly couples gave the pink-haired girl with threatening clothes and countless piercings slightly suspicious looks, but she paid them no heed with her nose pressed against the screens shielding the exhibits, eyes poring over them and the placards that explained what they were.
She was so absorbed she didn't notice the god disguised as a man watching her from shadowy corners, a funny expression on his face.
A/N aye look another character from the MCU actually turned up. AMAZING