You both terrified the nice waitresses and managers at the pancake house. You hadn't meant to, of course, but they were already suspicious when the well-dressed skinny young couple came in and ordered the unlimited pancakes. Supers have stupidly high metabolisms, Loki wasn't human (you weren't entirely sure you were anymore either), and the last real meal you'd had, besides last night, was two weeks ago. Those pancakes were doomed. The staff became even more suspicious after our third reorder of pancakes. By our fifth reorder of pancakes, the chef himself came out to see who was eating all of his pancakes. He glared at you both. You figured he recognized you and had a feeling that supers weren't going to be allowed to have unlimited pancakes anymore as soon as he could get it past corporate.

"Tom, Kelly, are you in town to film the new Avengers movie?" one of the paparazzi asked while you were inhaling pancakes. It was really quite rude of them, you were busy scaring the poor staff of the pancake house. You didn't want to deal with the press, but they always followed you around.

You grinned at them, though, amused they'd gotten you mistaken for the actors. "Sorry, wrong celebrities," you told them with a too-innocent smile. Loki tried to hide his smirk and failed. Miserably.

"Wait? What? You're-?" she spluttered, surprised that you weren't Tom and Kelly.

"Not Tom and Kelly," you replied still too innocently. innocently. She tried to get an interview from you instead, but she had ruined her chance by not knowing who she was talking to. She finally left you alone, looking defeated.

You and Loki enjoyed your breakfast; you spent most of the meal telling him stories about your super friends. You had gotten some new recruits, who had the misfortune of training with you whenever Fury could get you to act as 'helpless victim' during training sessions. You'd had too much fun over the years messing up their plans that you had gotten quite good at it. Now the new kids all saw you as Sigyn, a role model in the super community and one of the strongest, if not the strongest super in the city. They didn't expect you to mess with their carefully made plans during training sessions. They all got incredibly flustered when you jumped in to help them, or sat on the ground crying and tripping everyone, or all sorts of other things that just messed with their plans. It was one of their important lessons when they started their training, that victims would never do what you expect them to. you did the role so well, that Fury always got you to do the training class whenever he could.

"Oh, I forgot to tell you, but don't you dare tell Uncle Tony I told," you started. Loki perked up, extremely interested in a story that he couldn't tell Tony. "Tony finally proposed to Pepper," you told him with a grin. "They're trying to keep it secret, but they suck at it. The entire compound knows, but somehow they haven't figured it out that we all know,"

"Which one is Pepper, again?" he asked, he had spent as little time with Tony as possible, so of course he hadn't met Pepper except in passing.

"She's the extremely formidable woman who runs Tony's company. She isn't around the tower often," Loki roared in laughter, once he could visualize the woman ordering Tony around.

"You can't tell Uncle Tony!" you replied firmly, but you were laughing too. Those two were adorable and Tony was totally whipped by Pepper. Loki promised he wouldn't tell...yet. You laughed harder, imagining how that was going to go when it happened. "Try to be nice, Lo. This is his first real relationship and we don't want him to think we're unsupportive,"

"Two questions," he started. You grinned at him, but nodded. "Firstly, Lo? Where did Lo? come from?"

You looked away, Loki was weird about nicknames. "Sorry," you murmured, assuming he was offended.

"There is no reason to be sorry, darling. It was just a question. I was simply surprised." His voice was gentle and reassuring.

"Everyone else has nicknames..." you mumbled defensively. Loki deserved one as well.

He pressed on, leaving that subject for another time, probably when you were less defensive. You knew you was being a bit extra defensive right now, and it wasn't entirely fair, but you were hindered by your lack of powers. You hated feeling helpless. "Secondly, what do you mean by unsupportive?"

"Uncle Tony is still known as a womanizer from his life before the Avengers. He's afraid of going public with Pepper and thinks people will be mean to her, will claim she's just another woman in a long line of forgetable faces," you explained. "I don't want Uncle Tony to feel that way when he finally gets up the courage to tell me."

He thought about that, but nodded. "Earth is strange sometimes," he finally replied. You could tell that he didn't understand why people would be against someone loving someone else, or would dare say anything against Pepper. "But with that being the case, I promise to be nice when he tells us. After that he is fair game for teasing, just like everyone else," he added with a grin.

"Naturally," you replied dryly as Loki caught the waitress' attention to order another round of pancakes. She looked visibly scared by that. You sighed and reached in to your purse. "Candice," you told her, reading her name badge. "I promise we're not trying to get you in to trouble. We're just trying to have a nice breakfast. If we're causing you or the chef trouble, I'm sorry. Look, here's your tip in advance," you told her and handed her a hundred dollar bill. It was going to be her tip regardless. you were rich and could afford to tip crazily. "Can you send the chef out to talk to us? We'll explain it to him," you added. The chef came out and was much happier with you once he had gotten your autographs and you gushed about how delicious his pancakes were. He also got a tip and promised you as many pancakes as you could eat anytime you came in. Once that was settled, you got back to your conversations about your friends.

Your breakfast date was going wonderfully until there was a giant crunching crash of metal outside the restaurant. You whirled instinctively to see what it was to find a huge car crash right outside the window. Both cars looked instantly totaled and one was on fire. You looked over at Loki, who had already shifted into his black and green battle armor. "Loki," you said softly, holding out your wrist to him. You figured he had been lying earlier when he said he couldn't remove it.

He hesitated, until you heard the child crying, screaming in pain and terror. "Do not tell your uncle," he told you firmly. You nodded you agreement. He removed the bangle from your arm. You dropped a wad of cash on the table to cover your bill, vanished your purse, and shifted to your own battle armor in a moment. You ran from the pancake house to help. The crash was huge. Five cars were involved. Loki pointed to one. "The child is in that one," he called. You nodded and rushed over. Of course it was the car that was on fire.

You grabbed the fire with your power and snuffed it almost immediately. Fire was yours to control. You tried to pull the car doors open, but they were locked. You cursed and used telekinesis to force them open, ripping them from the hinges. You got the child out first and was already healing him while you worked to get his mom out of the front of the car. She was somehow mostly uninjured. It took only a moment and a small bit of power to heal her. Her son... You set him on the ground so you could place both hands on him to heal him.

They were healed quickly. You handed the son to the woman and sent her in the direction of the pancake house. As you did, you noted the sound of sirens. Help was coming soon. "Sig!" Loki called. You looked over and saw the victim he was helping. The guy had been nearly decapitated. You ran over and slid to your knees, kneeling next to him. Loki had been dumping healing magic into the man, but he didn't have enough, not for how fast this healing needed to be done. You placed both of your glowing hands on the poor man's neck, telling him gently to be silent and calm. He didn't listen, but it had been worth a try. You dumped healing magic into him and knit his throat back together as fast as you could.

"Is everyone else clear of the cars?" you asked Loki while you worked.

"I will check. Be safe," he told you firmly and overprotectively. You nodded absently, focused on your work. You got the guy healed enough that he wasn't bleeding, his muscles were knit back together. He could move. He would need more healing, but he'd live for now. You sent him on his way towards the pancake house, where all of the victims were gathering.

Loki had pulled all of the victims from the cars and everyone who was capable of moving was heading to the gathering spot. You went to him to help with those who were too injured to move. You were healing another child when one of the cars exploded behind you. You threw a shield up around the people you were healing, and incidentally, Loki, but healers are not great at self preservation and you realized too late that your shield didn't actually cover you. It covered your charges instead.

You realized this as you were flying through the air from the explosion. Loki and Tony were both going to kill you.

Repeatedly.

You landed hard on the concrete in front of the pancake house and shakily got back to your feet, examining your injuries. Cut on your head. You were scraped up all to hell. Bruised if not broken ribs. You didn't even want to think about the arm you had landed on.

Loki and Tony were so going to kill you.

And still, you rushed back to the victims. You couldn't heal myself, only others, so you threw all of your healing magic into healing the car crash victims. The police had finally arrived, so you had to finish this quickly. "Loki, drop your magic," you told him. He did instantly, trusting your plans, trusting you. You were grateful for it, grateful for his trust.

You closed your eyes and raised your hands, concentrating. You let the healing power flow from you to all five of the gravely injured in front of you, plus Loki who had gotten cut by something while he was rescuing people. It took more magic to do it that way, but you were grounded for the next week regardless, and these people needed help now. So you let the power flow, fixing bones, muscles, tissues, stopping bleeding. It only took a minute, but it was the longest minute you'd experienced in a long time. You needed Loki's help to stand again when you had finished, drained from the power use. "Don't tell Tony," you told Loki as he got to work healing you before you had to go give police statements.

"Only if I am allowed yell at you myself for forgetting to include yourself in the shield," Loki growled at you. Yep, he was pissed.

"That's fair," you replied easily. "At least I only get the lecture once that way,"

It took forever to give your statements and get everything settled with the cops. After that, you and Loki trudged your way back into the pancake house. You had intended to make sure everyone was ok in there. Instead, you were greeted with cheers from all of the waitstaff instead and thanks from the people you had helped. There were also fresh stacks of pancakes waiting on your table for you.

"Tony is going to kill us," you told Loki a few minutes later when you had sat down to eat in a post battle stupor, still in costume and covered in battle grime and the minor cuts and scrapes that didn't get healed by the quick battle healings.

"Why do you say that?" he asked with his mouth full of pancake, so very unlike him that you knew he was exhausted from the battle. You pointed to the TV on the wall. It was showing a news report of the crash. You and Loki were featured, rushing in to save the victims of the crash.

"Tony is going to kill us," Loki agreed sourly.

"Well, he's just going to have to wait until after I finish my pancakes," you replied tiredly. You were getting really tired of constant emergencies and really hoped things would calm down soon. "We should go find out what Tom and Kelly want before Tony gets ahold of us," you suggested after you had finished your pancakes and were walking back to your car, still in costume. Loki grinned at you and nodded.

"That does sound much more agreeable than a lecture from your uncle. But first," he held out his hand. "Wrist," he ordered gently. You glared at him, but he didn't give in. "Darling, you have already stopped resting because it was absolutely necessary. Those people would have died, and I admit that I could not have saved them all on my own. But you have got to rest, love, preferably before you drop from exhaustion. You are not going to do that if the healers at the compound can call on you for help," he reminded you firmly, despite his gentle tone.

You sighed. "I know. I just hate being helpless. It sucked the years I lived with them without powers. It's even worse now that I've gotten used to being the strongest super among them."

"I know, love. Believe me, I know. I'm sorry you have had to face all of this alone. I'm sorry that they took advantage of your kindness so badly. I'm here for you now. Please, trust me to take care of you so you can heal yourself. Please, my darling, please let me help you," his voice was too close to begging. You heard the pleading and desperation in his voice.

"If anything bad happens, I am going to be quite cross with you," you finally told him, stealing one of his lines as you held out your wrist for him. That earned you a tiny smile.

He fastened the bangle back around your wrist. "I would expect nothing less." He leaned down and kissed you gently.