|
   |
Loki is seated at the restaurant on the far side of Central Park. He looks a little younger than his old self, and a LOT more content and relaxed. He has a mug of hot cocoa and he brushes his long fingers along the metal of the table he's sitting at.
*
Finally — all done with checking every little population of the supernatural within the Park, as well as the status of the ley lines and the tensile strength of the Hellmouth's veil sewn tightly shut. Everything seems to be in order and it brings the good Doctor out along the edge of the park rather than meandering through its innards.
The walk has done him some good. His cheeks carry a flush from exertion and brisk wind alike and he strides along with a sense of ease to his composure, hands gloved in black rather than stuffed away. The crimson scarf about his neck hangs lazily, content as a housecat to bask around his neck.
An errant glance sets it all in motion.
A double-take follows and the air around Strange visibly encircles him before dropping away. Like a predator noting a possible threat, he does his best not to stare, but damn if that doesn't look very much like the younger Prince of Asgard. Paused a good distance down the sidewalk still, he takes a moment to watch the young man's mannerisms. Uncanny! He doesn't want to make an assumption, not with royalty from another dimension.
*
Its hard not to make assumptions, though, this fellow IS dressed rather less cool than the previous version. He notices Strange with a flick of green eyes in his direction and he smiles faintly, politely, without recognition. Then a moment later, he seems…charmed by some thought. He smiles a little broader and aims his gaze at his chocolate.
*
Tyger, tyger, burning bright / in the forests of the night…
She prowls the skein of streets and paths fringing Central Park, a lone young woman bereft of her lunar twin. Her map lies in the discordant murmurs responding her proximity, the compass cupped in a gloved hand. It might be easier to shut her eyes and listen to sighs raised by the dormant land vexed from stony sleep, nudged out of its uneasy slumber after a short-lived, deserved rest. Still, traffic runs parallel to the silent verdant heart of the city. Electricity races along the wires. Water runs at geometric angles to the natural flow seeking paths of least resistance.
What immortal hand or eye / could frame thy fearful symmetry?
Disquiet is hard to hear in the white noise raging in her ears, throbbing in the pulse of her heartbeat timed to someone else's. The witch finally crosses from sidewalk to rough earth starting to thaw, sucking at the heels of her boots, giving her a taste for the trouble vexing those natural reveries. Trees brush over Wanda's coat and she ducks under a worn limb, passing her hand along it, following the seemingly pointless route, a bit of careless thread cast liberally by fortune onto the wind.
Love-lies-bleeding tethers her to the spot, and her mouth parts, shaping the very taste of the cloud trailing past. Grass brushes against her toes. Hand on the trunk, she turns a little after the scarf. A mote of invisible energy to a finger she flicks its way. Interception is probably assured, a glimmering hello.
*
Having been caught staring (well, more like observing intensely), it seems beholden to Strange to at least ask the young man's name. After all, a name — or a Name — can hold power, be it over memories or even over the being itself. Chewing at the inside of his cheek for a second, he hesitates.
The familiar flirt of energy draws his attention away as unerringly as the sunflower tracks the sun. How could he ignore it anyways? It's not like the scarf was going to — it riffles its fringes towards the presence cloaked in amaranthine. The Sorcerer seeks and finds the caster by sight and his lips rise in a knowing smile.
"«Beloved,»" he murmurs, his eyes gaining a mild twinkle. "And here I was just going to send you a missive. I believe I have someone that I feel you should meet. If you aren't too busy, by all means, join me." His glance slides back to the lone chocolate-drinker at the table not more than thirty feet down the sidewalk. "I'll preface this introduction with a warning: he is not to be trusted, even if he presents with amnesia as his brother does." Perhaps an annoyingly vague warning, but the Sorcerer isn't sure how much more he can divulge in the immediate vicinity to the young man, no matter how quietly he speaks Wanda.
*
Loki really seems to be going about his business, drinking the hot cocoa, and continuing to have bouts of looking a little 'dreamy' about it. Maybe he really likes chocolate. As the two near him though, he does stiffen up some, aware than maybe he looks ridiculous sitting there grinning. Glance. Cocoa. Glance. Cocoa. Finally he turns his verdant gaze upon Strange and Wanda and asks in a voice as smooth as his molten drink, "Can I….help you?"
*
Many a good reason to loiter in the park after dark, none quite make sense for an unescorted woman. Least of all one beckoned by the likes of a perfectly respectable neurosurgeon who took early retirement rather than attaining the Nobel Prize or something equally fruitful in his career track. Pulling her coat closer to her body, the brunette stepping out carries all the memory of summer in the warm tone of her skin. Complexion alone says she should suffer in winter, and direly requires something warm to assure her continued commitment to remain this far north.
The flick of her gaze alights upon the man drinking on his own, and then back towards Strange, whom she falls into orbit around within a few footfalls. A nod answers him; she nonetheless schools her features to something peculiarly bland, vaguely suspicious and entirely in keeping with every Central and Eastern European setting foot on American shores. Easy to play foreign, for she is. "I see. You will please say hello for me and give greetings?"
*
Well, cover of nonchalance well and truly blown now, having been addressed by the young man. Strange glances back to Wanda and nods silently. He then leads the way those last critical two dozen feet or so, never dropping the green eyes that observe them in turn.
Pausing at a polite distance from the table, his expression is professional and friendly with the small smile he offers up. "Excuse me, but do we know each? I could have sworn that we've met before, though it was some time ago — maybe even worlds apart." The Sorcerer's eyes gain a glint as he tilts his head minutely. One might be hard-pressed to decide if he were simply injecting a swirl of personable charm into the interaction for the sake of drawing out information or daring the young man to deny that the insinuation of separate worlds means so very much more.
*
The man knits his brows and looks at the man, since he is closer. He glances back towards Wanda, then to Strange again. Thin lips press into a line and he sucks his cheeks in, a tight expression. "I do not know you, or her. You have either mistaken me for someone else, or this is a line." He arches his brows up, slowly, putting a question mark on the end. "In which case…it seems rather tasteless to do it in front of your girlfriend….or sister."
*
English is not the native tongue to the young woman in the distinguished gentleman's company, and she allows that constant battle to master her translations to slip a little further into the red. Slain are proper adjectives and order of object and subject, fitting less neatly into the nature of a fluent speaker. All the more when her guardedly curious gaze falls upon the perfectly nice young man seated at the table sampling his cocoa. At least she knows what that is.
"I do not see a lion," she murmurs in a confounded aside to Strange, turning her head slightly to avoid being entirely mistaken in public. "Mistakes are so bad in public? I do not understand you Americans."
*
The laugh that was slain behind his lips actually emerges as a quiet huff before Strange catches himself. Regardless of whether or not something was misheard or the Witch plays the same cat's-paw game he does, he's guilty of being amused by it. It softens the guarded expression around him, but only slightly and only for her presence beside him.
"A line, darling," he repeats, though his accent does trend heavily Mid-Western, putting another spin of pronunciation again. "We're all mistaken here, perhaps." Obvious, the insertion of his gloved fingers between hers at their sides, and he gives them a gentle squeeze. His gaze slides from Wanda back to the young man, narrowing slightly as he places the subtle emphasis on the pronoun."Are you absolutely certain though? I could have sworn we've met before. Doctor Strange, in case you need your memory jogged." He gestures to himself with his free hand, even giving a minor nod of his head, a minuscule bow. Sometimes the body language tells more than the tongue does.
*
Loki looks the fellow over again, up and down. "I recall you not. However." Here the man draws in a reluctant breath. "You are not the first to say you know me. I really do need to get home, now. "
*
"You could look like someone else." Wanda is willing to allow for a correction, though her good grace counts as a corrective look to Strange and her fingers squeezing around his in a most unfamilial gesture, one better defined by affection of another kind. Slim digits press into his, the high pitch of heat shared through skin to skin contact possible even through gloves or sleeves. The pressure alone is welcome while the thorny young man shows his spines to them, and runs for his hole in the hedge.
Not 'ere she gets a word in edgewise, however, conjecture offered in a ploy of honey. "You have no twin girlfriend or sister? Maybe they see you and think of her."
*
A quick rise of brows signals Strange's surprised amusement, though he mutes it quickly enough and, when it seems like there's no immediate retaliation through anything remotely what he knew of the younger Prince, it seems confirmed…at least in this moment…that the young man remains a mystery. Something unsolved. A suture without a knot. How annoying.
He considers utilizing the Sight to get more information and suddenly remembers a very recent reminder given to him from on high. Or maybe it was the needling gust of chill wind ruffling his hair. Either way, he decides again it with a mild feeling of disappointment.
"Maybe he does look like someone familiar. Still — my mistake." Mind you, he says it with not a trace of apology in his tone. "Should we see each other again, I owe you the story of how I came to be so…mistaken." With a smirk for the young man and another squeeze of hands for Wanda, he gives a final small nod before turning and departing, his Consort at his side.
*