How characteristic of a Loki to manipulate a relationship in the hopes of getting what they wanted. All his life he had played and tested, desperate for attention, for a confirmation of his worth that he would believe, for declarations of bonds he could trust. In the end, he had known it wasn't other people who were broken, but he himself. Forever seeking answers beyond the ones he had been given. Those he had come to love since leaving the timeline were only in his orbit because he himself and his circumstances had made it so. His grasping need not to be alone had ended with him becoming the loneliest creature in existence.
Until he learned to walk the timelines.
For centuries it was only as an incorporeal duplicate, practically a ghost, seeing, watching, stealing conversations. His old tricks had never left him. Many a time he planted whispers to see what would happen. Some good, some bad. He toyed with the multiverse, a bored but caring God. When at last he felt a change in the Tree, felt it root and self-sustain, he started to venture out. Short bursts, building up until he could become an occasional tender.
There were people he cared for, some he checked in on, others he had not yet dared to see, but now he wanted to make a connection, however fleeting. Amid the many recurring characters he had pored over, one in particular of late had fascinated him. Another somewhat tragic figure, different from him in many ways, perhaps even incompatible, and yet curiosity got the better of Loki. A human who had survived time and time again things he should not, who had chosen violence over peace, who did not know how to rest or be anything but a warrior.
Loki slid into the barstool alongside Frank Castle, shapeshifted into one of her female guises, long black hair down to her waist, thigh-high boots, clad in a dark green sweetheart dress. "Bourbon, please," she asked the bartender. "Neat." Kohl-lined eyes flicked idly to the man beside her, ignoring how many other men's eyes ogled her from the tables. "Have you ever had a drink that feels like the first in a million years?"
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