Author's notes: And here's the rest for today! :D Happy holidays to all you, my dears!
llvi.
"Wow." Darcy took a moment to whistle, her eyebrows fully lifted as she turned. "Tony's got this place 500% decked out for the holidays."
"He's like that," Loki and someone else said. The prince turned and stared at Clint Barton, standing right at his shoulder. The Hawkeye smiled, eyes crinkling in a vaguely menacing fashion. Then he relaxed, swapping out the wicked expression with a deep chuckle.
He walked past Loki and approached Darcy, giving her a peck on the cheek. "Merry Christmas, beautiful."
"Merry Christmas, weirdo," Darcy replied, kissing him back. Mirroring smiles appeared on their faces, while Loki and the rest of the Asgardians blinked in mute surprise. The cat had ascended to Loki's shoulder, and now he rested his chin on top of the sorcerer's head as he stared at Darcy and Clint.
"You know, it makes an awful lot of sense," he remarked. Jazz meowed from over where he was toying with ornaments hanging from the Christmas tree, probably agreeing with his littermate.
"Pizza and cheesy horror movies," Loki recalled. He shook his head as he smiled, feeling a little irritated with himself for not putting together such obvious connections. "Of course it's you two."
"They're so much on the same wavelength, it's freaky," Tony said as he joined them. He responded to the mandatory fistbump with Darcy, much to Loki and the cat's amusement. "Don't know whose idea it was to let them date."
"Not mine, that's for sure," Eric grunted.
Everyone laughed, and soon after Loki lost track of things as a crush of hellos ensued, multiple reunions and a few introductions—Loki managed to catch the names of Pepper Potts and James Rho—oh, just call him Rhodey —and before the Asgardian knew it they were all out in the main room of the floor by a truly colossal Christmas tree.
"I shot the star up there," Clint said proudly. Darcy patted his shoulder to congratulate him.
Eric, Bruce, and Jane were eagerly talking astrophysics and radiation with each other while Thor listened patiently. Loki was impressed by the fact that he was willing to stay around a conversation he could barely follow. Before meeting Jane, it certainly wouldn't have happened.
Rhodey, Hogun, and Natasha Romanoff seemed to have struck up some sort of camaraderie, and were engaged in intent conversation. Pepper and Steve were watching Tony bounce from one group to the next. Apparently Coulson had been unable to come, having previous engagements. Darcy and Clint were having a very good time swapping absurd stories with Volstagg and Fandral.
The cat hopped down from Loki's shoulder and crept up behind its brother. Jazz was oblivious, wriggling his stocky body between presents beneath the tree and playing with ornaments. The cat waited for the perfect opportunity, then with a cackle sprang upon his littermate.
Loki was on his own for only a moment. Tony came popping up from who knew where and eyed the taller man suspiciously. "So," the billionaire said. "I hear that you've managed to make Christmas happen twice."
"I know what you're going to ask, Stark," Loki said, not giving him the chance to continue. The Trickster smirked. "A sorcerer never reveals the secrets of his trade."
Tony pouted. Loki was unrepentant.
"Come, everybody," Volstagg called as Darcy lifted her wrapped platters up into the air. "You must try some of the Lady Darcy's brownies!"
lvii.
Loki had to stop and take a moment to smile at the Tesseract-styled box with his name written on it. It glowed when he touched it, humming quietly. Definitely the work of Tony Stark.
"Oh. My. God."
"Yes?" Loki quipped as he turned. The occupants of the room laughed, and for a second Loki was startled. His quips usually weren't well-received.
Darcy was once again at the center of the throng, smiling proudly. Clint was the one who had exclaimed, and Loki wasn't surprised to see brownie crumbs ringing the man's lips. "Darcy, why didn't you tell me about this?!"
"Good things to those who wait," Darcy replied, patting his cheek.
Clint cocked an eyebrow. "Your favorite movie series is The Fast and the Furious."
Darcy put a finger on her boyfriend's lips. "Shhhh."
lviii.
Ah. Now this was familiar. Loki sat against the far wall, sipping hot cider he had de-spiked. Socializing was all well and good, and Loki certainly had a knack for it, but after a while it just wore him out. So he had filled a mug, de-spiked it, and sat down to watch everyone else enjoy themselves. Not that he wasn't enjoying himself. Just more quietly.
"Yeah, I get stressed out around large groups, too," Clint confessed as he sat down beside Loki, a full mug of hot chocolate in his hand. Loki frowned. He hadn't known there was hot chocolate. Clint chuckled before taking another sip of his drink, watching the festive group spread throughout the family room. "Something about the overwhelming needs to grab everyone's attention, and to be as inconspicuous as possible. That's what I get for joining SHIELD after growing up in the circus."
"I cannot claim to have the same problem as you," Loki admitted. He breathed in deeply as apple-and-cinnamon scented steam wafted up his nostrils. "But after a certain length of social exposure, it tends to exhaust me."
"Same." Clint nodded and offered his mug for a toast of agreement.
The two cups clinked against each other, cocoa and cider. Loki brought his mug back in, then blinked as he realized something strange was in his drink. A small, rubbery object bobbed up to the surface, black with green eyes and stylized fangs.
"It's an eel," Clint explained when Loki glared over at him. The archer snickered. "Darcy said you would appreciate it."
"Indeed," Loki replied, his voice laden with sarcasm. He picked the eel out of his cider and dried it. Since there was no garbage can nearby, he put it into his pocket.
"FRIENDS!" Thor roared. "IT IS TIME FOR SPOONS!"
llix.
"Spoons" was a very violent game, it turned out. Especially when Asgardians and Earth's Mightiest were involved. Jane and Pepper were wise enough to stay out of it, but Darcy came blasting in with enthusiasm. She held up rather well.
Loki, on the other hand, was pretty sure he still had a black eye, and it took him three times to properly reset Fandral's shoulder. Steve had a shockingly strong sense of competition, apparently. Fandral dismissed his profuse apologies, declaring that they were brothers from this day forward. It wasn't exactly the sort of reaction Steve had been expecting.
After several hours (and five fires in the kitchen), it was finally time for dinner. Loki took care of his black eye at last and gave up on fixing his hair. Clint had taped his nose, and Volstagg was proud to be missing another tooth. It would grow back over the next year or so, or within a day, depending on whether he went to visit the healers or not.
Dinner was a manic event, filled with bizarre storytelling, various dinner duels, and everyone talking over each other in a mood of general gaiety. Loki had to keep turning his head this way and that as he tried to track the conversations, laughing with a frequency that surprised those who had known him for a long time. He interjected with witty comments as he so desired, although half the time the cat beat him to it, and Loki was obliged to audibly translate.
Jazz was very popular with the group, naturally, but the cat didn't seem terribly bothered. He tended to stay closer to Loki, Darcy, or Clint, occasionally wandering over to Steve and giving Loki suggestive looks. The Trickster only snorted.
At one point Clint initiated some form of Monkey in the Middle, in which he launched food items from one end of the tables to Volstagg's mouth, and the cat jumping in an attempt to intercept. Steve was responsible for scorekeeping. So far the teams of Clint and Volstagg vs. the cat were relatively even.
Clint made the final score, ending the tie between his team and the cat at last. The table erupted in cheers. Tony jumped up on top of the table. Loki hadn't realized the little man was so agile.
"Everybody grab your drinks!" he hollered, and grinned broadly. "Who's ready for presents?!"
llx.
It was a good thing they had decided on a limit of three gifts per person, otherwise both Asgardians and Midgardians would have been buried underneath heaps of wrapping paper. As it was, there was still plenty to go around. Perhaps wanting to make things more interesting, Clint disappeared for a few moments before returning with a guitar. He tuned up and soon they were all singing Christmas carols as they continued to unwrap.
The hours continued to pass in a colorful, jovial blur. Loki was free to relax this time around, since he didn't have to worry about resetting the day at midnight. They were nearly two hours into the AM now.
JARVIS spoke up again. As well as monitoring the kitchen and acting as the DJ, the supercomputer was in charge of keeping track of whose gift was where. "According to my calculations, one gift remains," JARVIS informed them. "Loki to the cat."
"I don't see anything under the tree," Clint remarked. His teammates took his word for it. The archer leaned back as he swept his eyes around the room, his fingers curling around the hand of the arm Darcy had slung across his shoulders. "Where is Loki, anyway?"
"Catnapping," Darcy replied.
"He's asleep? Now?" Tony huffed, not noticing the amused chuckle Pepper had to stifle. "Rude."
"Catnapping," Loki said flatly, flickering back into view. He cracked an eye open to stare balefully across at Tony as he pointed to the cat curled up on his lap. "As in, the cat is napping on me."
"Oh, I'm not the only one here taking a snoozle, Frost Midget," the cat retorted, not bothering to open his eyes. Then his ears pricked up and he did. "Wait, did the JARVIS say you had something for me?"
"According to his calculations, yes."
"That's hardly an answer, Frost Midget."
"Yeah, Loki," Darcy added. "Where's your gift for Danny?"
Loki cleared his throat, tilting his head back to gaze up at the ceiling. "Perhaps I forgot it," he suggested. "Or perhaps I didn't get one at all."
"Loki, please." Darcy wasn't buying it for a second. Soon the entire group in the family room was pressuring him (even Jazz!), while the cat purred in amusement.
Finally Loki shoved the cat off his lap and rose up to his full height, glaring down at him. Nobody was alarmed by the apparent hostility of the action—by now they knew the cat was in no danger, and that he and Loki had become friends of a sort. The stare down continued, Loki scowling and the cat smirking.
Then Loki's expression, even his stature changed. He had taken on an air of solemnity, and all fell silent as they caught it. The cat's smirk shifted into a look of expectancy. Was this what he thought it was?
"Ég veit hvað þú heitir, og ég segi það satt." Loki's voice had taken on a cadence no one had ever heard before. It was fair and strong, and it seemed to reverberate deep within. Thor could not stop thinking of Odin. Loki knelt and gently pressed two fingers against the cat's chest. "Your name is Vit."
The air was hushed. Even the Christmas music in the background had been silenced. Loki withdrew his hand and it seemed for a moment that it left a little sphere of light behind, green and sinking into the cat's fur.
They stared at each other for a moment, pale blue eyes up into deep green ones. Then Vit purred, closing his eyes as he smiled. "Wit, sense. Well done, Loki," he said, and he sounded happier than Loki had ever heard him. "You know my name."
Loki smiled back. Merry Christmas, he said, just for the two of them to hear. Vit purred again. Loki gestured to his shoulder and Vit immediately sprang aboard, and Loki rose back up to his feet. They exchanged bemused looks as everyone applauded.
"There's no competing with you in the area of gifts, Loki," Thor remarked, shaking his head. "You always come up with the best ones."
"I can hardly take all the credit," Loki replied. He wiggled his fingers, tendrils of loose magic swirling around them. It was hard to believe the prince had been so formal just a moment ago. Even harder since there was a green cat sitting on his shoulder. "Magic, you know. But thank you for the compliment, brother."
"You know what I think?" said Tony. He looked over at Clint, who was already following the inventor's line of thought and reaching for his guitar. "I think it's time for more carols."
"We've already sung all the ones we know, Tony," Pepper reminded him.
"Then we'll make up new ones!" Tony declared, gesturing enthusiastically with his glass as he pondered. "Like, uh, Asgardian versions or something!"
"Happy to oblige," Loki said, prompting a delighted grin from Stark. "Barton, if you would accompany me? I apologize if the lyrics are rough. Try to keep up, everyone."
With cat on shoulder and unlikely friends gathered all around, the Trickster of Asgard launched into an impromptu re-writing of a Christmas ditty. He watched as the snow began to drift down outside. How nice. It didn't even need his prompting this year.
.
Jingle bells, jingle bells
Jingle all the way!
Oh, what fun it is to ride
In a two-goat open sleigh, hey!
.
Jingle bells, jingle bells
Jingle all the way!
Oh, what fun it is to ride
In a two-goat open sleigh
.
Dashing through the stars
In a two-goat open sleigh
O'er the realms we go
Fighting all the way!
.
Battle cries in ears ring
Making spirits bright
It's such fun to ride and sing
A sleighing song tonight
.
Oh, jingle bells, jingle bells
Jingle all the way!
Oh, what fun it is to ride
In a two-goat open sleigh, hey!
.
Jingle bells, jingle bells
Jingle all the way!
Oh, what fun it is to ride
In a two-goat open sleigh
.
A day or two ago
I thought I'd take a ride
And soon this pesky Vit
Was seated by my side
.
The goats had fire for breath
This wasn't too thought through
Why are our animals so weird?
At least I made it to you
.
Oh, jingle bells, jingle bells
Jingle all the way!
Oh, what fun it is to ride
In a two-goat open sleigh, hey!
.
Jingle bells, jingle bells
Jingle all the way!
Oh, what fun it is to ride
In a two-goat open sleigh…
(extra note: the language Loki speaks is Icelandic ((didn't have the time to figure out how it would work in Old Norse)). In theory, he is saying I know your name, and I speak it true. If any of you actually are Icelandic/know Icelandic, I apologize for any sloppiness.)
(also, the cat's name is wit/wits in Old Norse, and sense in Icelandic. Hey ho, now you know! And now there's only one more Aggravation to go.)