Caffeine Rush (Avengers Fanfic)

Chapter 8: Homesick

After Loki had transfigured himself into a cat a few times, he had discovered that he actually enjoyed being a cat. The Avengers liked him more, he got to trip them and get away with it, cuddle and chalk it up to cat instincts, sleep whenever the mood struck, and get excellent barista service from yours truly whenever he called for it. He had liked it so much that he spent over half his time as a cat, that may have had something to do with a certain speedster's encouragement. He seemed to sense that he was playing right into whatever I had set up for him, but also didn't seem to mind all that much.

Loki spent a lot of his time as a cat with me. When I asked, he insisted it was because he wanted to be present for every conversation I had to pick up on more clues. I think he just likes cuddling and doesn't want to admit it. When Thor needed to find his brother, he went searching for me, because Loki always seemed to be near wherever I was even without being in cat form and I was a lot easier to find than the silly little trickster . . . most of the time.

There were times that when anyone tried to find me, they couldn't, and that's because I was out for a run. Usually I returned rather quickly so I wasn't missed for too long, but there had been a time or two where I had to be alerted from my bellhop app that I was gone for too long. The couple times that had happened had started a rumor that I was dating a SHIELD agent, which had been hell to deal with before the rumor was put out once and for all. The constant questioning from Tony, Loki's sulking, and Thor's boisterous laughter had been too much for me so I had loudly declared in front of all the Avengers and a large portion of SHIELD agents that my only love in this world was coffee and cats. Lord Mischief had seemed quite smug after that, sitting next to me in a royal manner befitting such a prince as he.

Following that incident, Loki and I came to start a weird sort of ritual. I would set up a cushion for his royal highness on the couch and make his tea exactly the way he liked it and he would wait patiently in cat form, levitating his book and tea saucer for his convenience, until I had a break or was off duty. Then he would abandon both and hop on my lap, biting at my fingers until I started petting him, looking royally smug the whole while. He was literally the cat that got the cream.

I knew he enjoyed it because anyone with his amount of touch starvation definitely would, but there would always come a point that he became self conscious of the petting and batted at my hand without warning, sometimes with claws, sometimes without, it depended on his mood. When that happened, I switched to whatever struck my fancy at the moment, whether that be watching a movie, reading a book—either his or mine—or researching on my laptop. Luckily, Loki didn't understand how it worked or what I was doing when I was on my laptop, I tried explaining once but he quickly grew bored and dismissed the question. Apparently he wasn't interested in my research into this world or he didn't realize the significance of it.

I was trying so hard to distinguish all the differences between this world and mine but they just kept getting bungled up, I had almost called Natasha Nathan to her face, which would have seriously screwed things up for me. I had had a complicated relationship with Widowmaker, on a good day we'd be best of friends, on a bad day he tried shooting me. I was faster than a bullet but if I wasn't ready for it, it still had the opportunity to hit me. Nathan never felt bad if he successfully shot me, his reasoning was that I would have a couple hours of pain and be right back to normal. I got him back by leaving him stranded in the middle of nowhere with nothing but a vitals tracker, and I do mean nothing. If I ever needed help from someone who wasn't my dad or Uncle T, I went to Nathan. It was weird that I couldn't just show up at his place for a movie night, that that version of him wasn't in this universe. Nat was great, but she wasn't Nathan.

Melancholic longing hit me in the face when I thought of the people I missed from my world. Uncle T and my dad, the versions of them that I knew and loved, were gone. I was in an entirely new universe with places and people that were similar but not the same. I was homesick. But even if I went back, there wouldn't be anything to go back to. My parents were gone, my house was razed, Uncle T was dead, my only friends were afraid of me, and I was a worldwide pariah. That's what happens when someone with dangerous abilities is driven to the brink of insanity, goes on a rampage, nearly destroys the world and is recognized as weapon of mass destruction by world governments with no way to imprison or control you. Thank you, instant deceleration at Mach 7, for leveling an uninhabited mountain instead of a city highrise.

I had no way of knowing what had happened after I left, if they had even realized I was gone. I had left without saying a word to anyone, disappearing like I never existed in the first place. I had needed a fresh start somewhere that I didn't have to hide my speed if I chose to but wasn't obligated to use it either. Somewhere that already had their heroes, heroes that were capable and walked the path without being distracted by fame, fortune, or national allegiance—that would help simply because they could. I found what I was looking for, bonus that it had an invention as delectable as coffee. I hadn't ever known if this universe would be a temporary waypoint or something more. I hoped it was more, I wanted it to be more, but if it was going to be my home then it needed to know the real me. I came out as Rush when I decided that I wanted to go all the way, I wanted them to know I was Rush, I just didn't want them to hate me for it. Was it wrong of me to make them figure it out instead of just coming out and telling them?

My brain may have been as fast as a super computer but I was still human at heart. Loki's little mrow helped pull me from my thoughts, he must have noticed that I wasn't all present. I wanted this to be my home, for him, Tony, Natasha, and all the others that had been so good to me in my short time as their barista. I wanted to be part of the team. Maybe it was about time that I moved up my timeline. I was going to do something wild and unpredictable and impulsive, whatever it was would definitely make headlines as Rush.