InsaneJournal

Who: Darcy and Jane
What: just bff things
Where: Norway
When: sometime this month
Warnings: does Darcy count?
Status: complete


It was not cool at all that Jane and the Asgardians were exiled to New Asgard for the foreseeable future. Sure, Darcy understood why, kind of, though she thought that it would have made more sense if they only penalized Thor for the storm. Not like Jane, or anyone else, could have stopped him.

The feds had seized all of Jane’s stuff by the time Darcy made it to New Mexico and she hated having to give her friend that news. Unfortunately, Darcy was not quite as together as the FBI.

She’d been making it a point to use the portal that Strange established between Manhattan and New Asgard at least once a week to spend time with her friend. Ever since ending up in this weird universe so much had happened that they never seemed to have a chance to just hang out. Darcy was making an effort to change that.

Today, she popped through with takeout from one of Jane’s favorite NYC eateries. “Knock knock,” she called. “Anyone home?”

"Nobody here but us exiles!" Jane called up the stairs. She was down in the living room, curled up in a corner of the couch with her laptop and a cold cup of coffee. Her funding was gone, she couldn't consult or lecture but she still had her work. There was always the work.

She smiled at Darcy and waved from behind her screen as her friend came down the stairs. She was glad Darcy had been coming by. Jane had been feeling disconnected from everything lately. Plus ever since she was sick, she and Darcy hadn't been often in the same place at the same time.

"Mmm, I smell curry. I'm starving. Thank you."

“I’m pretty sure I’m going to give Rhodey a heart attack,” Darcy joked. “He is really worried that I’m going to get caught making these little visits.” She understood his concern, but she also didn’t see how it was possible that anyone would find out since she was using Strange’s portal and not, like, flying on a plane or flashing her identification or anything.

It really sucked that she was suddenly a Stark heir and had access to all sorts of money and couldn’t do a damn thing to help her best friend. “Whatever though. You’re worth it.”

"Don't get caught," Jane said, getting up and going to get forks. "I really don't want to see Tony lose his mind." She passed Darcy a fork and went to sit back down, clearing her laptop away to make room. "But you're always welcome here."

Darcy certainly had no intention of getting caught. Orange was not her color. “Don’t worry, Jane,” she said, accepting her fork with a grin. “I’ve gotten away with so many other things in my life. I have no doubt I can pull off this one too.”

Then again, maybe she had used up all of her luck. Nah. She was good.

“So, how’s Thor?” she asked. “No more temper tantrums?”

"You scare me sometimes. I want you to k ow that," Jane said before digging into her curry. She took time to eat a few bites before continuing.

"It's stopped raining." It was closest to diplomatic she could manage. "He's struggling. He blames himself, doesn't feel like a hero." She lowered her voice. "He won't talk to me, won't come downstairs and eat with me. I can barely get him out of bed. I'm trying to find the balance between being supportive and not killing him." Jane shrugged, which was about how well that was going.

If she scared Jane, maybe she could scare Thor into getting his shit together. Darcy considered offering to talk to him, but decided against it, at least for the moment. She didn’t want to overstep. For now, she’d offer her best friend the support she could.

“How could he blame himself for Loki and Peter being dumbasses?” she asked. The fact that either of them thought it was a good idea to break into the building was beyond her. Peter was a teenager, so she supposed he could be given a little bit of a pass, but Loki was definitely old enough to know better.

"For the storm," Jane clarified. "I'm not downplaying that. He was responsible and it was awful. He has to own that. But he refuses to work on why he lost control and what he can do to keep it from happening again."

“Oh.” That made a lot more sense given that it was his fault. Somehow, it didn’t surprise Darcy at all that Thor wasn’t keen on doing the introspective thing. She understood why that made it harder on Jane though. “I guess therapy isn’t really a thing on Asgard, huh?”

Jane shook her head. "No they're more of a 'keep everything bad inside and let it eat away at you for a thousand years' kind of people."

Darcy sighed. “And of course we can’t just get him drunk and make him talk about his feelings.” Unless they got some of the really strong Asgardian stuff, but she had a feeling that would end up backfiring.

“Can we get Sif or Valkyrie to kick his ass into submission?”

Jane raised her eyebrows and inclined her head at her friend. “I asked Sif to drag him out of bed and knock him around. Hopefully that will happen soon. He needs to know he can fight back without losing control. Maybe then he’ll want to work on what went wrong.”

That sounded like a good idea to Darcy and she nodded her approval. “Could also probably get Bruce to help out,” she suggested. “Unleash Hulk on him or something.” Though that would require him taking the risk of coming to Norway and she wasn’t sure how that would go down with basically anyone.

“Or I could bring you some lingerie and a crate full of sex toys,” she said, waggling her eyebrows. “You could sex him into submission.”

"Darcy!" Jane chided, pressing her palm against her eyes for a moment. "Pepper said the same thing but not everything can be solved that way, you know. I'm trying to help him but he doesn't want to spend much time with me. The more he expects me to wait on him the crazier he makes me, the more I spend time in my lab. Relationships are more complicated than that."

And that was precisely why Darcy had no interest in having a relationship. She enjoyed having fun. Dealing with all that drama was decidedly not fun. “Well, I guess it stands to reason that if it works with Tony, it would be something I’d suggest,” she said. More of that nature versus nurture thing, though her parents had never been uptight about sex.

"Darcy!" Jane said again. She didn't want to consider whether a sex drive was an inheritable trait. Besides, while Darcy didn't seem to have much interest in settling down, Tony and Pepper had been together for many years now. "I'll let Sif and Valkyrie knock som sense into him. I'm not sure if he'll come down but I can try and talk him into it if you want to say hi."

“If not, it’s fine,” Darcy said. “As long as I get to spend time with you.” She was worried about Jane, even if she was trying to mostly cover up her concern with jokes.

"Don't worry," Jane said with a sardonic grin. "I'm not going anywhere."