The Variant's Shadow - LokixOC - ONGOING

* Centuries Later *

400 years were never going to be enough. 

Ophelia kept staring at the Throughput Multiplier, tears already falling down her cheeks. She hadn’t been able to move ever since she’d entered the room. She’d seen it immediately, all shiny and complete, and reality hit her harder than ever before. Time had caught up with her and after 400 years, it was time for her to go back. 

She should’ve known when she’d heard Loki’s excited voice telling her to meet him there. The same as the day he’d left them all. He’d been talking about this for weeks. How the Multiplier was almost done, and how they’d finally be able to go home, to their friends. 

And here she was, standing in front of the very thing that would fail its purpose but eventually allow the TVA to follow its new path. Images of the things she’d once forced herself to do flashed in front of her eyes. Still, Ophelia only wished for them both to go back 400 years before and not to their friends. 

“What do you think ?” Loki asked behind her. 

She turned to tell him that it looked great, that they’d finally leave the past, but the words were stuck in her throat. For an instant, she even thought that she was about to pass out. 

After four centuries, Loki had taken his old TVA clothes back. The ones he was wearing when he’d gone back to learn about things she’d never tried to understand. The ones he was wearing when she’d watched him save the TVA so long ago. He now looked the same as he had back then, and Ophelia was starting to feel sick. She wanted to pinch herself, hoping that it was only a nightmare, one that she’d had many times over the years. She didn’t need to. It was all real.

“What’s wrong ?” he asked, brushing the back of her neck. 

Ophelia cleared her throat and shook her head. “It’s going to be awkward,” she scoffed. “Coming back after so long, explaining everything.”

He simply smiled at her. “Are you coming with me ?”

“I can’t,” she sighed. “Because you made it a surprise, I have things I need to take care of before I join you.” Loki arched a brow at her. She’d become an expert in the art of lying, but not to him. “Things don’t just to themselves, you know. I have to clean up our place, empty my office, unlock the door for Mobius, move everything back, and…”

“OB,” he finished in a whisper. He sat next to his creation and sighed. “Can’t we take him with us ? Switch them ?”

“Switch them,” she repeated, sitting next to him. “That sounds awful. I’ll just need to enter Miss Minutes’ program and do it.” Before he could object, she took his hand and smiled. “I can do it without anyone finding out. And it’s only temporary,” she added, wishing that her lies became true. 

“It won’t be the same. It never was for you, and you’ve had so many years to try,” Loki replied. 

“It’s because of the damage to my brain, it’ll be fine for him,” she kept lying. “Besides, I’m fine not remembering everything. I know what matters.”

He nodded quietly. “As soon as it’s done, I’ll send her here so you can come back. See ?” he added with a smile. “That’s switching. We can do the same with OB. He wouldn’t mind.”

“It’s only–”

“Temporary,” he said. He tightened his grip on her hand and added : “It’s going to be different without you.”

“I’ll be there.”

“Not to see it.”

“I already have.” She swallowed back her tears and forced herself to keep smiling. “But if it makes you feel better, I’ll be behind the door if you need me.”