Jazz about had it with Thor and his curiosity as to why she could use his hammer. His friends were far less subtle about their interest.
Loki was just about as peeved about it as she was, likely because he was worried she might start to show interest in his more annoying older brother.
Finally she had enough...that and someone finally clued her in to the fact Loki had been flirting with her for months.
The blush on her face when she found that out was rather spectacular, though not as much as the one she had when she shocked Loki by pulling him in for a very firm kiss in front of multiple witnesses.
The god of tricks was stunned silent by the display, though once he snapped out of it he looked decidedly smug about the whole thing and kissed her back.
He seemed to take the fact that he would have to court her properly before she even thought of letting him near her in the bedroom rather well.
Then again, Prince of Asgard. She should have expected him to be rather old fashioned in the first place.
Loki looked at the helmet that went to her suit with curiosity.
"What sort of realm still uses this technology?" he asked, tossing it up and down a bit.
"Midgard," she replied, not really thinking about it as she was still finishing up her work for the day.
Loki stopped what he was doing to stare at her, and Jazz started kicking herself for letting it slip where she was from.
"You're from Midgard," he said in surprise.
"I had a minor mishap involving some rather dark magic and an energy conduit that lead to me crash landing in the forest on Asgard. I almost thought about seeing if I could become a Valkyrie when I realized it would put me too close to Thor for my tastes. Instead I decided to put my mind to better use," she admitted.
Valkyries were a thing, but it took a lot of training and effort to become one. Easier to become an engineer and learn how to get back to Earth that way.
And again, it put her far too close to Thor and his stupidity.
Loki looked at the helmet in his hand, then at her.
"This power source you're having so much difficulty with. It's on Midgard isn't it?" he asked casually.
"Yes, and I don't really want to explain to Odin why we need to make a day trip out of it just to use the Bifrost. Never mind the fact I would have to deal with a lot of paperwork explaining the light show it makes," she replied.
Loki smirked at her.
"Who said we would need to use the Bifrost? I know a lot of the old paths, and we could easily traverse them to visit Midgard. Though where it would come out is anyone's guess."
"...So long as it's not underwater or too far up in the atmosphere, Nyx can tell us where we are. Though odds are my father will drop everything to come find me the second he finds out I'm back on Earth," Jazz replied.
Loki paused at that.
"Your...father?"
Jazz winced.
"It's a complicated story, best told with more than a few drinks," she said quickly.
"I can get the mead and a quiet room where we won't be bothered," he offered. He wanted to know more about her.
Jazz took the offer.
Once she had a few drinks of the rather strong mead, she told him a rather startling tale that sounded like it was right out of one of the old tales about heroes.
From her parents (her mother and adopted father) dying when she was very young, to an aunt that was less than pleased to have her around, to the trials set up by the people she should have been able to trust, to finally having enough and seeking her last remaining blood family. The fear of how her father would react to the fact she was a mage, to finally defeating the very man who left her orphaned for sixteen years in the first place.
Loki had to admit, it was a fantastic tale...and he would have had serious trouble believing it if the woman before him wasn't just as fantastic in her own right.
How else could one explain why she could use Mjolnir, which was so picky about who was allowed to wield it, unless there were mitigating circumstances in their past?
The girl was much like Thor in many respects, except she was less inclined to brag and far more noble than his brother. She actually saw the lower classes, rather than pay lip service to helping them.
It only solidified Loki's desire to see Midgard for himself. And if anyone asked, he could claim he wished to court Jasmine properly as befitting the noble of another realm, which meant meeting her father and asking permission first.
Even if according to Jazz, her father was less than responsible and often needed a "babysitter" to keep his head on straight.
It took all of two hours of them being on "Midgard" before Tony cottoned on to the fact his daughter was back on Earth.
It took them three hours before Tony was hugging his daughter rather tightly in relief.
"So who's this?" asked Tony, finally noticing Loki.
"This is Loki of Asgard. He's the one who showed me how to get back home," said Jazz. She looked hard at Tony. "Now, would you mind explaining why I found news articles of you snapping at your party?"
Tony winced.
"I can explain."
"I know for a fact Rhodey can brew the Dreamless Sleep potion I've been giving you. And while Pepper wouldn't know how to understand what you went through, she is surprisingly competent at keeping you in line. So explain to me in great detail exactly why you trashed the house," she asked sweetly, in a tone that implied he had better start talking or else.
Even Loki cringed at the tone.
In New York
Loki wasn't overly impressed with the level of technology that was on Earth.
Then Jazz introduced him to the internet, musicals, and all the entertainment Earth had to offer. Never mind the fun of mixing drinks.
He was hooked instantly, and that was long before she introduced him to the twins.
Much to Loki's amusement, the second they found out who Jazz brought back with her, they started bowing and saying they weren't worthy. Never mind the amusing spit take Remus did when introduced to him.
Jazz happily pleaded ignorance when she saw them conspiring.
Needless to say Loki got permission from Tony to 'court' Jazz when he successfully diverted the girl from giving her father a tongue lashing.
After being there for a week or two, Jazz turned to Loki.
"So do you feel like returning Asgard, or would you rather make day trips between the two realms and stay here?"
Loki paused at that. To be honest, he was far more at ease on Midgard...Earth... than he was on Asgard. Here he didn't have to deal with being "Thor's brother", and there was so much more to offer. Even if Earth was tragically out of date in several areas, it had quite a bit more to do. He had become fascinated with "broadway" and the classic literature that Jazz had introduced him to.
(Mostly because rather than explain what she meant when she said that Mjolnir would be good for producing storms to recreate Frankenstien, she had given him the book instead. One chapter in and he was hooked.)
Jazz looked at Loki dead in the eye.
"It's up to you. If you want to return back to Asgard, I'm fine with that. But if you want to stay here and just tell Frigga and Odin that you're courting me while getting to know me better, I can show you around Earth properly. Besides... you're the only one who knows how to traverse the old paths and actually reach Asgard," she told him.
Loki looked outside to 'New York', then thought of the sheer boredom he had dealt with back on Asgard where everyone kissed Thor's ass and only considered him an afterthought.
"I'll explain to mother and Odin that I'm going to be busy courting you properly and therefor unavailable," said Loki after a moment.
It wasn't that hard of a decision to make.
In Asgard...
Frigga had smiled knowingly at her son.
"I am glad for you, Loki. You have been quite unhappy of late until found a woman to properly match you," said Frigga.
Odin was a bit busy with matters of the court, which was why Loki was telling Frigga his decision.
"For someone so young, she is rather wise for her years. I think you would like her, mother," said Loki.
"It is good to see you smile again, Loki," said Frigga. "Just be sure to bring her here to meet us if you decide to move forward with your courtship of the young mage."
Loki made sure to grab a few things that he knew Jazz had left behind, such as her tool kit and a few books from the library he knew she had been interested in. It wasn't like he couldn't swap them out later.
In a completely unrelated series of events, Loki took a better look at the 'arc reactor' that powered Jazz and Tony's suits, as well as their buildings...and almost starts swearing.
"Do you have any idea what this energy is?" he asked.
"...Not really, just that Howard found it shortly before the end of World War II and never really explained where he came up with it," said Jazz confused. "Does this have anything to do with why I landed on Asgard after being hit with an obscure spell that dates back to the Viking era?"
Loki had to mentally count to ten.
"This energy," he said slowly, "Is almost identical to the energy signature given off by the Bifrost."
"What?" said Jazz startled.
"What's the Bifrost?" asked Tony.
"It's how the Asgardians, particularly Thor, get around. We took some of the older paths that aren't really well mapped to get between the two realms, but only Loki has bothered to familiarize himself with where they actually go and how to use them," said Jazz. She looked at Loki. "Isn't the Bifrost powered by the remnants of the Tesseract?"
"Yes, and it has been lost for centuries," said Loki. "Which is why it's highly suspicious that your technology would have an identical energy signature and that your grandfather was able to find how to reproduce it."
"Unless it was lost on Earth. Considering Odin hasn't exactly permitted travel between Asgard and Midgard for several centuries, it's entirely possible that it's been here the whole time and no one would be aware of what it was," said Jazz.
"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" asked Tony.
"Let me put it this way dad," said Jazz, pausing a moment for Tony to beam at her for calling him that, finally. They still had a bit to go before she was comfortable calling him that. "Imagine putting something like a nuke in the hands of the colonials or the British during the Revolutionary war without telling them the dangers of using it and letting them play around with it...never mind trying to take it apart unaware of how bad radiation is."
Tony cringed at the thought.
"The Tesseract is a source of almost unlimited energy, except messing around with it would be as dangerous as playing around with high-grade radioactive materials without the proper equipment or knowledge to use it. Just touching it with your bare hands could kill you," said Jazz slowly. "Humanity simply hasn't caught up enough to safely use the real thing. Fractions of it like our arc reactors are fine, and a step in the right direction, but we're not quite there yet."
"Never mind the fact that if you start trying to build weapons for it, it will signal to the other realms and several rather unpleasant races that humanity is ready for a higher form of warfare that they are ill-equipped to deal with. You barely have space travel to your moon... you'd never be able to handle fighting some of the species out there," added Loki.
He had been rather dismayed that Earth was that far behind when it came to space flight. Even Asgard had ships, though they weren't used much and were mostly considered relics at this point.
"I get it, I get it. We're not ready to play with the 'big boys' outside Earth. What about shields and the like?" he asked.
"That would be acceptable," said Loki. "Creating shields wouldn't be nearly as bad as trying to make weapons with this sort of energy, and could help spark others like yourselves into updating what's available now. This reliance on fossils is holding you back."
Tony looked at the arc reactor thoughtfully and an idea occurred to him. He had accidentally discovered how to make the current one by finding that old copy of the Stark Expo map and noticing something off about it.
"I know that look dad. You're up to something."
"Just thinking...what if we used your current line of defensive tech and used it to inspire other inventors to find new ways to upgrade what we have now, with a bonus to anyone who can successfully find applications for purely energy based technology without having to rely on fossil fuels? Or plans for electric plants that don't need steam, nuclear energy or water to run?" he replied. "We haven't held a Stark Expo in years, and this would generate a ton of notice."
"And if I was the one holding it, then no one would question why we're promoting something other than weapons," said Jazz dryly. "Everyone still associates you with weaponry and more recently Iron Man. However my image is completely different and no one would bat an eye to this sort of thing."
Loki found it all very interesting. Jazz just found it to be a monumental headache. Because they were using it as a way to promote something other than weapons, she was stuck doing the bulk of the organizing.
She eventually caved on the second day when Pepper tried to shove more of it on her and practically begged Loki for some help. He was much better at multitasking.
Pepper just seemed to find this the perfect opportunity to take out the fact she had landed on Asgard for almost seven months out on Jazz. Apparently she didn't like the fact she had been delegated as Tony's sole "babysitter" after getting used to Jazz keeping him in line again.
Especially after the birthday fiasco. The less said about that mess the better.