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“Do TVA agents usually partake in leisurely-getaways with their variants or are you just special?” Loki grins at Mobius from the palm tree patterned lawn chair that rests upon the slowly rotting deck. His long body lounges upon the faded outdoor furniture, knife in hand, sharpening one of his beloved daggers.
Mobius rolls his eyes, carefully stepping through the porch’s screen door with a smug look on his face. “I get special treatment.” Loki’s eyes brighten as he spots the 2 mugs of tea in the agent’s hands. He sits up in his seat to accept a mug.
“I put a little bit more sugar in it this time, hopefully you’ll like it.” Mobius places his mug down on the table that sits between the two chairs. “A bit less bitter this time.” He sends a wink in Loki’s direction, watching as the god takes his first sip. He pauses, taking in the hot drink.
“I hate it, it was better last time.”
Mobius smiles and Loki can’t help but reciprocate, hiding his smirk behind his mug.
“You’re so bad at lying to me,” Mobius chuckles, relaxing into his seat. He stares off into the scenery in front of them. Smile still on his face. He feels happy. He feels thankful. Finally he was able to get a well-long-deserved vacation from the TVA. He’d rather be anywhere but there, the lake front cottage was a bonus. The beautiful evening weather and sunset was also a bonus.
“Why here?” Loki’s blue eyes flick up to meet his own.
“Best place I could get in the time we had.” Mobius sips he’s tea, continuing to admire the dancing hues of the sunset shimmering on the soft waves.
“Sure.” He hums, watching Mobius as he drinks.
“What?”
“Oh come on, ‘best place I could get’, this place screams Mobius.” The god fans his arm out, gesturing towards the beautiful landscape of the greenery and lake. “This is quite literally your biggest fantasy come to life.”
“I guess I just got lucky then.” He continues to sip, clearly trying to hide himself in the drink.
“Why did you pick it.” Loki’s voice is serious, trading his tea for his freshly sharpenned dagger.
Mobius bites his lip, Loki watches the gears turning in his head. You could practically hear his thoughts. “I don’t know,” he pauses, thumbing the handle of his mug. “I feel some weird connection to it. Like- like it could have had something to do with my life before the TVA.” He shrugs his shoulders, now focusing on Loki’s hands- busy sharpening.
“I’m assuming you haven’t read your file?”
Mobius shakes his head. “I don’t want to, this is the closest I’ll ever get to my past life.”
“And you don’t even know if this place is even slightly related to your previous life.” Loki’s face is scrunched, not quite understanding Mobius at the momment. Nonetheless, he continues to pick at his dagger with a kitchen knife. “How are you not even remotely questioning who you used to be? You do still believe that you had one, yes?”
“Of course I do, but it’s not important to me. Why waste my life now wondering what I used to have?”
“Well you don’t have to waste time wondering.” Loki flicks a small light of magic, insinuating to Mobius that he can use his magic on him.
“Still no. I like what I have now.”
“Ugh, I don’t understand you.” Loki flops his head back, frustrated that they aren’t seeing eye-to-eye. Mobius chuckles, finishing off his tea.
“Okay,” he begins, placing the mug down, facing himself towards his partener. “You understand that I enjoy my life now, right?”
“Yes,” Loki peeps out, redirecting his attention away from his knives.
“The life I have now is the person I am now. I’m me, I’m the Mobius the TVA brain rotted and turned into an impeccable anylist.”
“Mediocre,” Loki mumbles.
“Okay smart ass, but do you get it? I just want to live the life I was given now, I could care less about what happened in the past. Why bother wasting my time worrying if I was an asshole or if I had a family, that’s not me. Even if you gave me my memories back and went back onto my original timeline, I’d then be leaving behind this life.”
“Hm,” Loki nods, thinking as he watches his partner’s face. “You would still want this life over anything else? Protecting the timeline? It hasn’t served you very well.” He swipes the blades against each other with more force, emitting a spark.
“Well, things have started to calm down, it’s been better after O.B was able to fix things up. We’ve been able to have more downtime. I don’t know about you, but I’ve been enjoying my time at the TVA. You and I, the gang, we’re able to actually live lives now.”
“I suppose. I don’t think I could agree about the TVA itself. It’s rather… bland.”
“That’s fair, it’s not built for royalty.” They grin at each other, the sunset glow brightening up their faces.
Mobius’ gaze casts down towards Loki’s arm, he points towards it. “How’s it feelin’?”
Loki gazes to his side, lifting up his sleeve to reveal a gash upon his forearm. “Sore, but I guess I could heal it now.” The god sits up in his seat, as he raises his left hand a green glow encases the wound.
“When you do that, does it take away the pain?” Mobius inspects, eyes lighting up with curiosity. He can’t help himself, it’s Loki.
“To some degree. It will still continue to feel sore. I could use more magic to take away pain if it does bother me, but it’s best not to waste energy. It’s fine right now since I’m not moving.” He finishes, rolling his sleeve back down his arm, going back to his knives.
They fall into a comfortable silence, basking in the cool evening air. All that is to be heard is the waves crashing against the grassy shoreline. While gazing out at the darkened sky, they both steal sneaky glances at each other, neither realizing. The quiet is new, but nice, their first time being away from the busy life of the TVA.
“Do people get in… relationships at the TVA? Is that a thing?” Loki breaks the quiet.
Mobius looks over at his partner, raising an eyebrow at the random question. Loki nonchalantly shrugs his shoulders, trying to prove that he hadn’t been pondering the topic for the past 10 minutes.
“Not really… I mean no one really has time for that when the TVA is their life-”
“Ironic,” Loki snickers.
“Yeah,” Mobius chuckles along, liking his lips. “I wonder with things becoming less hectic and people finding out more about themselves that people will start reaching out more. For any kind of companionship really, friendship or romantic. Even our relationship is… odd.”
“Our relationship?”
“Agent-variant, I was told I was crazy by many other agents and hunters.”
“So there’s really no hot-goss relationships?”
“Hot-goss?” Mobius laughs, head tilting back.
“I’m just poking for any information. I want to be in the loop of things. I suppose I should if this is truly my life now.” Loki sits up in his chair, scooting it so that he’s fully facing Mobius, just the small side table in between them, holding the empty mugs and sharpened daggers. “You’ve never been in a relationship?”
“Okay I never said that- You mean TVA life?”
“You have?” Loki’s eyes go wide, fixing his posture, eager to learn more. “And yes, obviously TVA life. Who, when?”
“Firstly, chill.” Mobius re-positions his chair, mirroring Loki who’s fully facing him. “Secondly, it was a hunter.” He picks at the armrest of the chair.
“Do I know them?”
“D-90…”
Loki squints his eyes at his partner, trying to recall. “D-90…wait, the hunter from your team that pruned you?!”
“Yes…”
“Ouch.” Loki leans back, taking it all in. Trying to remember any interaction between the two.
“Yeah, it was a while back, but there’s still bumpy roads with us. He wasn’t very happy with me and we… ended things.” Mobius scratches his jaw, slowly starting to reconsider opening up to Loki about his past love life.
“Rough, may I ask why he dumped you?”
Mobius bites his tongue. “I was… too… invested in my work, again, no time for relationships.”
The god nods his head. “Mhm, and that’s it? No one else?”
“Nope, even getting together with him was a surprise, I think we both did it just for some sort of escape from being alone, we both needed companionship.”
Loki hums, standing up from his seat, hands in his sweater pockets (that he had refused to wear, but Mobius convinced him). The god stands strong, gazing upon the scenery, the hung up lights around the porche’s roof present his focused complexion. Mobius admire’s from his chair, noticing the way Loki’s shoulders tense when a particularly strong gust of wind blows by.
The agent takes his shot and gets up to wrap his arms around Loki’s waist, leaning his head on the side of his partner’s arm. He looks out across the water, feeling at home in this moment.
“I know you were talking to D-90 the other day.” Mobius looks up, well aware of Loki’s sneaking around. Despite being confrontational, his voice remains soft.
“Guitly,” Loki sighs, turning around in his agent’s embrace to face him, surprised to see a non-upset Mobius looking at him. “He had mentioned something about the two of you and I couldn’t help myself from asking. He said you broke up because of me.”
“I-”
“I got in the way?”
“Well, the work got in the way. You didn’t do anything wrong, it was way before you even arrived at the TVA.” Mobius looks in his eyes, searching for something, he doesn’t know what. “I was given the Loki case, got too involved and he got upset with me.”
Loki nods, looking down. Mobius sense his guilt. “Don’t feel bad, please.” He leans in, resting his head on the taller man’s chest. “You have nothing to do with this, it was bound to happen anyways.” He squeezes his arms tighter around Loki, feeling the warmth of his hoodie on his bare hands.
“I understand, I’m just over thinking it,” Loki disregards, loosely wrapping his arms around the agent’s shoulders, secretly loving the warmth Mobius is adding.
Mobius lets out a short laugh. “Of course you are. C’mon,” he pats Loki’s back. “I’m gettin’ cold.” He smiles, turning around to head into the house. Loki stands and admires, thankful that he gets to live the life Mobius has given him. Even if they are just playing house at the moment, he’d rather do it with no one else but his partner.