#tarnishedson

“Yes, yes, no, only if I haven’t showered. Please. I don’t buy cheap booze.” 

Loki’s life had never been what anyone could call settled. 

Even before he left Asgard it had been fairly hectic, and afterward--well. A traveling circus set on Earth had been as settled as it got for several years, and even when that traveling circus became rather permanent, life hadn’t exactly slowed down for the Ringmaster. No...first there had been a wife and child, and then there had been a young woman and a much younger boy who had stumbled in--and then there had been Veles. 

Veles, who had settled Loki far more than the god had ever been. 

Right up until the day he left. 

And when he left, the mess that had remained had not been settled at all. 

It still wasn’t: no matter that the new host was safe within the boundaries of Loki’s now-compound, there was still an aftermath that had not been dealt with, and some of it would not be dealt with until Vala could finally remember having caused anything that needed to be dealt with; but there was another half, another part that only the Ringmaster could handle. 

There was a little boy who had accidentally fallen by the wayside in the midst of the storm that had overtaken Loki’s mind upon discovering his husband gone, and one way or another Loki meant to make it up to him--which was why, as his new baby slept curled safely up with his wife and their enormous felines, the Ringmaster now slipped into the little boy’s shared trailer, his expression uncharacteristically subdued. He was very good at some things, but he was very poor at others; apologies, he felt, tended to lay within the zone of very poor. 

Days where Percy felt good – felt healthy – were getting fewer and farther between the last few months.  Carrying a half-Jotun child had played havoc on her thyroid for one thing, plus all the other usual complaints of a body coming to the end of the time it could sustain the life growing inside of it.  But this morning she had woken feeling better than she had all week; it had been the final factor in a decision about an idea she'd been playing with for days.  Dressed for work, she sped along roads that were familiar enough to drive in her sleep, not bothering to slow when she hit the long gravel drive to the circus.  She was happy today, for no particular reason. So when she saw the lot was pretty much empty, she yanked the wheel and played the brake and spun her Audi into the kind of action movie stop that left her laughing out loud and would have given a whole list of people severe heart attacks if they'd been there to witness her doing it.

Her laughter still hadn't died down entirely when she stepped out of the car and walked through the settling cloud of dust toward one particular trailer she didn't often make for.  If it hadn't been on this side of seven-thirty she would have swung past to say hello, but she'd had enough experience with just how much of a morning person Viper wasn't to leave that one well enough alone thankyouverymuch.  Instead she rapped on the door stood back to lift her sunglasses up to rest on top of her head.