Written to: The Bird and the Worm - Owl City
Yuanfen (缘分）： A relationship by fate or destiny; the binding force between two people.
"This is a complete crock of shit," Loki protests even as he allows Thor to drag him into the fortune teller's booth. "You don't even believe in this sort of stuff. I remember when we were children, Mother predicted you'd grow into a hard-headed stubborn man, and you told her that you'd never be like Father. And look where that's gotten you."
Thor is blissfully oblivious to Loki's ranting, and only sweetly tells him that, unlike the All-Father, Thor is still possessed of both eyes and has not yet adopted a jötunn babe for Modi's brother. Loki rolls his eyes, and mutters under his breath that that can certainly be arranged.
The fortune teller comes bustling in, redolent with the scent of cloves and a bittersweet scent that Loki is well aware is of an illegal nature. Not that he would know, surely not, it was an illegal substance, and Loki certainly wouldn't be knowing anything about that.
"Lady Darcy tells me that that is pot," Thor says, smiling sweetly at Loki, and Loki just gapes at him while the fortune teller stares at them with narrowed eyes, wondering if they seemed like the type to report her to the nearest authorities. "It makes me very hungry," Thor continues, and the fortune teller sits down and begins to deal out a deck of cards, obviously considering them unthreatening. "I remember she gave me some once, and I almost demolished a shoppe where they sell the most delightful sandwiches made of cow," Thor says, smiling fondly at the memory, and Loki decides not to tell him about the first time he himself partook of marijuana. Thor didn't quite need to know who exactly destroyed three cupcake shoppes in Manhattan. The Avengers were still looking for the culprit.
They sit down across the fortune-teller, who sniffs a few times (Loki wonders if it were possible she were under the influence of some other illegal substance that he most certainly didn't know about), and asks them to show her their palms. He resists the urge to giggle as she traces the lines on his right palm with a long, red talon of a nail, bites his lip to keep from laughing as she leans back, sniffs again, once twice thrice, before telling him that his future holds certain doom.
Thor is understandably concerned, a feeling which only grows when the fortune teller tells him that he, too, is about to experience a catastrophic change.
"Don't worry about it," Loki tells him after they leave the booth. He has almost forgotten the joy of breathing untainted air. "They all say that."
And perhaps it is all the smoke he's been inhaling, or because the sun is shining directly into his eyes, but Loki takes a deep breath, turns his head to the side, and in the most refined way one can do this, retches into the bushes next to them. And this would be cause for concern, but it was only made worse by the fact that Loki appears to be spewing fire from his mouth, setting the grass aflame. As he wipes his mouth with his sleeve, Thor reaches out to steady him and pinch out a budding flame on his sleeve.
"What was that?" Thor asks in alarm, stamping out the budding blaze. "That's certainly not normal. Perhaps it is a harbinger of this impending doom."
Loki scoffs, rolls his eyes, and tells Thor that it was probably the Mexican food they had last night.
Thor is absolutely not convinced, and only takes consolation in the fact that Loki seems fine (other than the occasional blowing sparks fits he has on their walk back to the Tower), and that at least they will be together for this incoming catastrophe.