For the First Time (Again)
{ @starkreactorr -- plotted starter }
♔—- Almost six months passed since Loptr and his twin brother, Loki, stepped foot inside of a Jaeger. For more than four years, they’d been drift compatible and they’d been two of the best Jaeger pilots in the business of defending the world from the massive monsters known as Kaiju. Everyone within the industry knew of the twins and because they often made appearances in their sky-scraper sized mech suit to defend the civilians of Earth from invading aliens, they were pretty well known to people around the world too.
But their last mission left them both injured. Loki, fortunately, suffered very minor injury. He spent about a week in recovery, patching up what were mostly surface wounds, but Loptr? Loptr nearly died that night. A massive piece of shrapnel tore through his abdomen as a category IV Kaiju threw their Jaeger to shore, where it landed on its back. The sea monster climbed atop it, and shredded the suit’s chest plate in order to get to the pilots inside. The only saving grace had been the fact that the mission hadn’t been a solo one. Category IV’s were rare and it was rarer still for one Jaeger to go head-to-head with one alone.
Cherno Alpha, a Mark-1 Jaeger from Russia, piloted by two of the most experienced pilots in the business, managed to pull the Kaiju off of Loki and Loptr before the beast to get to the tiny humans inside, but the damage had been done. Loki disengaged while Loptr slowly bled out, unconscious and hardly able to be moved. It was a miracle that Loki could even pull his brother from the wreckage.
And their drift caused him to feel every ounce of pain that his brother endured while being nearly ripped in two.
The injuries resulted in Loptr falling into a coma for almost six weeks. Their Jaeger, Rogue Viper, was destroyed beyond repair and harvested for parts. And Loki? Gods, Loki spent every single day at his brother’s bedside, praying and wishing beyond a shred of a doubt that his twin would wake up. Loptr did eventually wake up, but the lasting damage of the attack meant he would never step foot into a Jaeger again, leaving Loki co-pilotless.
For a while, that was all right. The shared trauma the brothers endured made the idea of climbing back into a mech suit a bit too traumatizing to think of, but as the weeks turned to months and Loptr turned to engineering so he could help build more Jaegers, Loki was left with an empty, burning hole in his chest. The one thing he was good at, above all other things, also happened to be one of the most valuable resources the planet currently needed, to protect and defend those who couldn’t protect themselves.
It killed Loptr to watch his brother go through such a disconnect. Loptr always enjoyed being a pilot, but it wasn’t his true passion. Loki, on the other hand, lived and breathed the need to be front and center for the action and his brother seemed lost without that purpose. Loptr found joy in building and maintaining Jaegers, but Loki only kept himself busy. No one aside from his twin was drift compatible with him. They were both far too complex and too difficult to fully understand for an outsider to share a neural link with. At least, that’s what Loptr thought until he spent a few months working with Tony Stark. The shorter man was beyond intelligent, sassy, witty, creative, cynical in the best ways possible, and Loptr found himself thinking that he could very easily drift with his colleague. And if he could drift with Tony, surely Loki would be able to as well?
Loptr planted the idea in Tony’s mind after a while. The other engineer seemed a bit resistant at first, but the more they spoke about it, the more Tony came around to the idea. It was a slow process. One didn’t just decide to jump into a Jaeger and head off to fight Kaiju in the blink of an eye, after all, but the more he spoke with his friend about it, the more he thought there might be a legitimate chance of working.
And what better way to test it out than to have Loki meet his engineering partner?
Loki stepped into their workshop with two cardboard lunchboxes and slowly made his way over to where Loptr sat. The most distinguishable difference between the brothers was definitely their hair. Loptr kept his hair short and highly styled while Loki’s hair hit the middle of his back in an intricate braid. Loptr also sometimes sported facial hair, usually a goatee, but Loki was always cleanly shaven. Out of the pair, Loki looked almost androgynous while Loptr only gave off the air of being a rather beautiful man. But they had the same facial features, the same alluring emerald eyes, and the same lithe build.
Loptr smiled as Loki came over and handed him one of the boxes. “How did you know I was hungry?”
“We’re twins, remember? I always know when you’re in need of something,” Loki pointed out. “Plus, you didn’t show up for lunch, so I figured you were engrossed in your latest project.” Loki looked over the table at the endless blueprints. A new Jaeger design, it seemed.
“Sorry, guess I lost track of time,” Loptr muttered as he opened his box and took out half of a toasted turkey sandwich. “I’m actually glad you’re here. There’s someone I want you to meet.”
“Oh?” Loki asked, arching a brow at his brother. Loptr looked... far too excited about his turkey sandwich. “You aren’t trying to set me up on another date, are you? The last one was absolutely awful.”
“No, no, nothing like that. Well...”
“It’s not a date! But it’s kind of just as intimate as one, really. Even more so...” Loptr stared down at the sandwich so he could avoid his brother’s intense gaze. “I think I might have found someone who could be drift compatible with you. He works here, with me. His name’s Tony. He’s a brilliant engineer, but I think, more than anything, he wants to get back into a Jaeger.”
All Loki could do was blink at his brother, his mouth slightly ajar in shock. He’d almost given up hope that he could ever find another co-pilot. “Really...?”
Loptr nodded and set the sandwich back into the box. He took a black and gold cane from the side of his desk and used it to push himself up to his feet. He could walk just fine, but not without a little bit of support from the cane. At least Loki had carved it to be a beautiful piece of functional art.
He hobbled over to where Tony sat and Loki was quick to stand and follow after him. “Hey,” Loptr said, a soft smile tugging at his lips as he looked down at his friend. “I thought you might like to meet my brother. Loki, this is Tony Stark, Tony, this is my brother, Loki.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Tony,” Loki said, flashing one of those highly recognizable, charming smiles. Loptr possessed the exact same one.
