Chapter One

When Thor had vanished away to Asgard with Loki and Tesseract in tow, none of them had expected to hear from the thunder god for a good long while. Besides, they were all too busy with aiding the repair effort and with their own responsibilities for it to be of any real concern. Days became weeks became months with scarcely time for more than a passing thought as to how their Norse friends were getting on. So it was a surprise to all involved when during one of Fury's weekly 'will you assholes seriously just do what I ask you to do just this once or I swear I will throw all of you off the top of this tower yes I am looking directly at you Stark' meetings, there was a crash of thunder followed by a spray of glass as a beaming Asgardian came barrelling through the window to land triumphantly on the table.

Fury's carefully stacked papers went flying, his coffee mug hit the floor with a heart-breaking smash, and the holographic display that he'd been gesturing angrily at crackled and fizzled away into nothingness. Tony, sitting at the furthest end of the table and thus commanding the best view of the whole event, made a mental note to review the logs from the display to find out just what Thor had done to turn his lovely blue displays such a charming shade of magenta before they gave out.

The bigger surprise was that Thor wasn't alone. Though Mjolnir flashed and crackled in one hand the other was clasped tightly around a sullen-looking god of mischief. Said god, despite the death rays that would surely have been beaming from his eyes had he been capable of such a thing, was looking a hell of a lot better than the last time any of them had seen him. On a scale from ‘about to stab the next person who breathed wrong and then cackle’ to ‘forced to swallow a live scorpion’, Loki was nearer the scorpion end of the scale. And maybe he had, Tony thought. Who knew how Asgardian justice worked?

Thor was in full Asgardian regalia, helmet and all. He cut an imposing figure atop the table, with the sun at his back and his cloak somehow still billowing a little. Loki was less impressively dressed, but no less imposing. He held himself stiffly in his brother’s grip, trying to be as far away from him as was possible while gripped by an arm with biceps the literal size of Tony’s entire thigh. Thor was far more at ease than his wayward sibling, uncaring of how ridiculous it was to stay standing on the table, his god-sized feet crushing the insignificant mortal papers into the glass surface. Glass crunched beneath his boots. He beamed down at his friends.

"It is good to see you all-" he started, but was cut off by Fury's voice.

"Thor." The director stood, holding a half of his broken coffee mug in each hand. "Kindly explain to me why in the hell you're standing on my table in the middle of my meeting."

"Technically it's my table," Tony interjected. Fury gave him a glare that made the effects of the Arc of the Covenant look like mild sunburn. Tony raised his palms in submission, and leaned back in his chair.

"Why are you standing on my table with the guy who fairly recently tried to kill all of us, destroy the city and enslave the human race in the process?"

It didn't seem physically possibly, but Thor smiled even wider.

"I come with wondrous news!" He gave Loki a squeeze. "My father has agreed to grant my brother a pardon."

"A what?" if Fury's voice had been any flatter it would have been road kill. Thor seemed not to notice the murderous tone. "Are you saying that-"

"Loki will be forgiven for the harm which he has caused and, once he has made sufficient reparations, will be allowed to return to Asgard as my brother and my equal once more."

Thor smiled broadly at everyone, and the sun reflected off his helmet in just the right spots to make golden light flare in the faces of everyone he aimed his head at. Loki looked like he might actually be sick. The others were all carefully watching Fury, Clint poised on the edge of his seat ready to run for the hills at any moment if things started to go south. Tony was pretty sure Natasha was about point-five seconds away from drawing a weapon on the whole lot of them.

"He nearly levelled New York!" Fury protested, gripping the remains of his coffee cup even tighter.

"You know, technically that wasn't all him, it was mostly the Chita-whatever and their Intergalactic Space Whales," Tony cut in again. This time everyone glared at him. Some people just can't appreciate perfect wit when it walks among them. He spread his hands and shrugged in a 'what?' gesture. Natasha rolled her eyes and flicked him on the ear.

"Shut up, Stark."

"Lighten up." Out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw Loki's mouth twitch into a brief smirk, but when he turned his head to look, his expression was as sour as ever.

"Anyway," Fury said fiercely, desperate to gain some control over the situation again. "What in the hell happened on Asgard for you to come to this decision?"

At this Thor shifted a little, making the table creak ominously under his weight and sending more papers fluttering to the floor.

"Ah, well…" he rubbed the back of his neck with Mjolnir, "There were certain…terms to my brother's forgiveness…" He at least had the decency to look embarrassed about it. Loki sighed and slipped out from under Thor's arm, stepping lightly off the table and perching on the edge. He examined the backs of his hands as he spoke, as if what he was saying couldn't possibly be more uninteresting.

"What my idiot sibling is trying to say is that, among other things which need not concern you, I must play nice and make amends for the harm I have caused. This, it seems, must take the form of aiding your little 'team'." Loki was far too mature to actually make the air quotes, but they were clearly audible. "Once I have been judged to have done the appropriate amount of good deeds, I will be permitted to return to Asgard, and soon after, to do as I please." His voice dripped with such acidic disgust that even Steve seemed impressed by it. "It is presumed that by the time I have fulfilled this inane task I will have learned the error of my ways or some such nonsense." He shrugged, armour glinting. "Such is the will of Odin."

"So what, we're just going to babysit him and let him play Junior Hero until daddy tells him he's been a good boy, he can have his TV privileges back?" Clint finally joined the discussion, shaking his head, "He'll probably turn us all into frogs while we're asleep."

Loki chuckled darkly, then drawled, "Have no fear of that, Barton. One of the terms of my…redemption, is that my powers have been limited. Significantly."

"So a Junior Hero who can't do jack shit in a fight." If anything, Loki's addition had pissed Clint off even more. He snorted and fell back in his chair, "Perfect."

"I am not as helpless as you presume," Loki looked as though he wanted to say more but Thor had by now climbed down from the table as well and put a hand on his brothers' shoulder, silencing him.

"I would ask that you at the least give my brother lodgings here while you talk and make your plans. I give you my word that he will cause no trouble." His enthusiastic smile was gone, his face now grave and honest.

Fury ground his jaw, thinking. The coffee cup was in serious danger of turning into so much ceramic dust when Tony waggled his fingers in the air for attention.

"Uh, if I could have some input for a minute, given that, you know, this is technically my building that you're planning on renting out to the green eyed monster over there?" Nobody made any kind of effort to shut him up, so he figured he was good to carry on. "As much as I fear for the continued lifespan of myself and my beautiful, long-suffering windows -"

Loki smirked; quickly hiding it with a turn of his head, but Tony saw it. If the villain was laughing, he was definitely on the right track.

"I trust Thor on this one. If he says Loki won't make trouble and Loki admits to being about as powerful right now as a sidewalk entertainer, then I can't see his staying here resulting in extensive property damage. And if it does then you'll have me to answer to." Another smirk, this one saying volumes about what Loki thought about Tony's threat-potential. "At the very least we can keep an eye on him here. High security. Round the clock surveillance. And if the thought of the intel isn't giving you a security hard-on, Fury, then consider the alternative – an irritable neutered deity bumming around New York for months on end."

"Somehow I can't see him working at Starbucks," Bruce spoke up at last, quiet but measured, mouth twitching briefly in a smile, "If this is going to go to a vote, I'm for letting him stay – under SHIELD guard."

"This is not a democracy, Banner."

"And it's not a Fury-ocracy either." Tony quipped back, "or a dictatorship." He looked around at the others. "You all live here as much as I do. What do you say?"

"I'd rather have him where I can see him," from Natasha, with a confirming nod and a mutter about wasps from Clint.

"We can control the situation here. And I don't like the idea of putting people in more danger by letting him wander homeless," was Steve's contribution.

"So that's a yes from everyone," Tony grinned, and happened to meet Loki's eyes from across the table. They glinted with wicked amusement in the sunlight. "Looks like you just got yourself a room, freeloader. Keep your hands off my windows and we're golden.

"Quite," Loki muttered, and then winced when Thor nudged him in the ribs with his boot, along with a meaningful look that was probably intended to be surreptitious. Thor's face was far too expressive for that kind of subtlety. Loki cleared his throat and ground out, "I thank you for your hospitality. It is…most appreciated."

"I also thank you, my friends," Thor smiled winningly, and, jeez, was disgustingly handsome an Asgardian trait or what? "My gratitude to you Tony Stark, for championing it. Your generosity will not be forgotten."

Tony held up his hands.

"Woah, hold on there, I didn’t champion anythin-" Natasha stamped hard on his foot, which usually wouldn't shut him up, but he'd been tag-teamed by Clint, who had stomped on the other one. He didn't know which one to glare at, so he settled for fuming in Loki's general direction instead. Natasha smiled winningly back at Thor.

"Shall we get our guest a room then?" she said sweetly, grinding her heel harder into Tony's foot when it looked like he was about to comment.

And so it was that, not twenty minutes later, Tony found himself assigning rooms to the god of mischief (and alien invasions of major cities) inside the only newly christened Avengers Tower. Despite his planning and room-assignments for each of his teammates, there had still been plenty of rooms left over, so they had no trouble finding a spot for their newest 'member'. Unfortunately, that spot happened to be on the floor directly below Tony's own penthouse. In an unsurprising turn of events, Fury had already summoned a team of SHIELD agents, serious faced and armed to the teeth.

The guy who looked like he had the biggest stick shoved up his ass hurried up to Fury as they approached.

"The rooms are fully secure sir, and ready for the priso—the tenant, sir." The agents' eyes jumped nervously to Loki, standing with vicious eyes and folded arms next to a glowering and resplendent Thor. He swallowed.

"Uh…whenever you're ready. Sir."

"Dismissed, agent. Assign a guard rota amongst your team for the next week – round the clock surveillance. Beyond that…we'll see." The agent nodded and hurried away back to his team.

Thor was frowning at all the agents swarming about, and Tony found himself frowning too.

"Is all this really necessary?" he asked Fury, "I already have my own security set up."

"We just like to be thorough, Mr. Stark," Fury folded his arms, watching as the agents filed away into the elevator, leaving behind just four of their number. Two of them set up folding chairs outside the door, while the other two were poking at a computer monitoring station that took up half the corridor. Tony scowled – sloppy construction. He could have done better – would have done better – if they’d just asked.

"Complain, and I'll kick you off the top of the building myself, Stark," Fury said softly. Tony shrugged.

"Hey, it's your funding you're wasting. Go hog wild." He turned to Thor and Loki. "Well. There you go. Hope you don't have any problems with your privacy being invaded twenty-four seven."

Loki ignored him and strolled towards the room. He clasped his hands behind his back and turned slowly, taking in his new surroundings.

"It will suffice," he said dryly. "My thanks, Stark. You are truly an impeccable host."

Thor slipped past Tony and into the room. He smiled.

"This is good. Cozy. You will be happy here, brother."

"If you say so," Loki muttered. "I would have some privacy, such as it is in this place. I wish to rest. I'm certain you can keep a close eye on me to make certain I am…behaving." His eyes darted around the room and it didn't take much of Tony's considerable genius to work out that he was locating the cameras in the room, both Tony's own and the SHIELD Special Editions.

Thor nodded and clapped Tony on the shoulder.

"Come, Tony Stark, let us return to the others. I have much to tell you all of my time in Asgard, for not all of it was spent in discussion about my brother..." Tony allowed himself to be half-dragged along by the thunder god, who continued booming about whatever the hell it was he'd gotten up to back home. His mind was only half on the words though.

Loki was inside the Avengers Tower. In his tower, no matter how Fury thought of it. Loki. The one and only god of mischief, lies, and ridiculously over-compensatory helmets. It would have been surreal if he hadn't already filled the tower with an eclectic mix of superheroes. Actually, no, it was still surreal as hell. He shook his head as he followed Thor into the elevator. He hit the button for the recreation floor, where he was pretty sure the others had already fled to.

Loki, in his tower, for who knew how long. He sighed, and went to join Natasha and Steve at the pool table, snagging himself a cue.

This was going to be a weird ride.

---

Chapter Two

"You know, I would have expected a god of mischief to be way more fun to be around," Tony complained over the comms. He ducked a chunk of flying debris and grinned as he practically heard Steve rolling his eyes. They were fighting some amateur who'd seen one too many monster movies and who somehow had access to the right equipment to make a passable imitation of Godzilla; an imitation both fully-sized and fully-pissed-off at its own existence. Tony hadn't yet managed to get close enough to see if the replica was mechanical or organic or some unholy fusion of the two. Whatever it was, it wasn't doing much other than blunder about, whaling on anything that blocked its path and taking out huge chunks of road with its tail.

The monster let out a bellowing roar that even had Tony wincing inside his suit.

And that. It also did that. At regular intervals.

"At least he's here and helping," Steve replied once the echo of the roar had faded away. "Sort of."

"He's standing there nodding approvingly at the damn monster!" Clint growled. "Got a shield up to keep his precious little ass safe and nothing else."

"I also have my own communications device and can thus hear every word you say," Loki's smooth voice cut into Hawkeye's furious rant. "And I shall help as I see fit. You seem to be doing just fine on your own for the moment."

Tony found himself grinning at Hawkeye's stunned silence. It was at times like these he really wished he had a way to see his teammate's faces as well as hearing their voices. He made a mental note to find out if there was any security footage of wherever Clint was holed up.

"Alright, that's enough." Captain America, diplomatic as always. "Tony, get in closer on the flank, see if you can find a weak spot that'll bring it down clean."

"Yes, sir!" Tony snapped a (not melodramatic at all, thank you very much) salute and zoomed off. He banked left to swing up around the monsters’ side, taking advantage of its momentary distraction with a building covered in mirrored windows. Yeah, definitely organic, he thought, his assessment confirmed when he finally got close enough to see the rivers of greenish-black fluid oozing out of the few injuries the team had managed to inflict. Not to mention the data the HUD suddenly flashed up, registering high levels of sulfur in the air.

"Damn, this lizard has gotta smell foul," he muttered, swooping past the creatures back, scanning between the thick black spikes that jutted there for anything remotely resembling a weak point.

"Tell me about it," Natasha's voice in his ear this time, her voice thick with disgust. "Not all of us have fancy masks to cut out the smell. Tell me we can take this thing down already?"

"Gimme a second, I don't have a—"

"Under the jaw," Loki's voice cut in, sounding bored. "There's a black marking, triangular in shape. Hit that with any weapon you like and you will destroy the majority of its brain. Control the fall and you have your clean kill."

There was a long moment of incredibly dead air before Steve coughed.

"Ah, yeah, um, thanks...Loki. Uh, you heard him. Any of you got a shot at that area?"

"I do," Tony said. He swooped around, looping over the monsters’ neck to hover under its chin. He could feel the vibrations of its rumbling growl right through his body.

"See you later alligator."

He aimed, fired and then it was over. He could see blue sky through the new, fleshy tunnel he'd just made. Ropy strings of something foul were already dripping down across the circumference. The monster made a choked sound and started to topple over, tail spasming in its death throes. Chunks of concrete flew up as it mashed the street into dust.

"Thor! Hulk! Get close and catch this thing!" Steve snapped out orders, calm and quick. "Iron Man, hold it there as long as you can, we do not want this thing taking out another block when it comes down."

"You got it," Tony darted out from under the creature - as if he had any plans to stay where he was with several thousand tons of bad-smelling monster coming down on him - and flew to the back of its neck. He grabbed one of the spines and pushed on the power. The suit screamed and bleeped in protest at the effort to keep the monster from moving.

"Thor and Hulk are in position. Lower it slow as you can."

"Took you long enough," Tony muttered. He began to haltingly lower the monster to where Thor and Hulk stood waiting to take its weight onto their hands. By some miracle they managed to get Godzilla lying on the road without taking out any buildings - well, one hotdog stand didn't survive but Tony consoled himself with the fact that they probably weren’t good hotdogs anyway.

Tony cut his jets and dropped to the ground, miming dusting his hands off. They were smeared all over with the foul blood the creature had been oozing. Hell, his whole suit was probably drenched in the stuff from where he'd blasted it. The question was would it be better to clean the thing up or to just make a whole new one. He'd been working on a few things he could incorporate into a new one anyway, and he could always auction this one off to charity or something – Pepper would approve of that - and anyway….

"Well that went well."

He looked up as Steve approached, looking with satisfaction at the big dead pile of ugly lying in the street. "Hey, Loki, thanks for the tip--"

"Save your gratitude." Loki snapped, harsh enough to make everyone wince in unison. He hadn't come to see the fallen beast, and Tony had no idea where the god was. "Have you finished with the creature?"

"Yeah, I guess--" Loki didn't wait for Steve to finish.

"Good."

There was a hissing crackle that shot a spike of sound straight through Tony's head, like a millisecond of migraine, and then the connection fell silent.

"Sir, it appears that Loki has destroyed the communications device," JARVIS reported calmly in his ear.

"Eh, we've got loads of the damn things. I'm sure his babysitters can keep an eye on him until he gets back to the tower. He won't try anything. Probably."

Thor came striding down across the monsters back to join them. He tracked smears of green-black blood across the broken pavement, and his armour had lost a lot of its shine to sprays of the stuff. He didn't look that bothered by the gore or the smell though, if anything he looked…invigorated.

"I am glad my brother could aid us in this fight," he said, "It reminds me of better times. I believe this bodes well for us all."

"Yeah, I guess you could call it helping," Clint muttered over the comms. "Not like we could have figured out anything he said by ourselves anyway."

"Ignore him, Thor," Steve clapped the thunder god on the shoulder. "He helped. The bastard didn't enjoy it, but he did help. We appreciate it."

Thor beamed like someone had just handed him a puppy.

"This is good! We shall feast tonight in celebration of this victory!"

"Does he ever not want to feast after we fight something?" Clint called, appearing from the doorway of a nearby building. Tony updated his mental note about security footage. He clapped the archer on the shoulder, grinning at the wince and dirty look he got.

"Lighten up, Katniss. Who doesn't enjoy a good feast?"

And that was how it was. Some minor-league menace would threaten the city, the Avengers would respond and Loki would tag reluctantly along. He would stay out of the fight, shields up, and just watch. Tony had to bite his tongue to avoid making out-loud comparisons about bratty teenagers. He liked his internal organs arranged the way they were meant to be, and Loki's face was perpetually etched into the kind of scowl that suggested commenting on it would end in some impromptu surgery.

Occasionally Loki would offer advice like he had for Godzilla, or he'd flick his hand and chunks of debris would fly in a direction that wouldn't take one of their heads off. On a few memorable occasions Thor had made him use some kind of healing spell, most recently on the Hulk, when his hand had been almost severed at the wrist by the flock of angry metal birds they'd been fighting.

Outside of the battlefield Loki largely stayed holed up in his rooms. Tony and the others had started out eagerly checking through the surveillance footage for anything interesting. Initially they were rewarded with a curious few seconds of Loki in furious concentration followed by him collapsing to the floor with a bloody nose. He got up after a while, and after that there was just…nothing. They all lost interest when it became clear that apart from that one incident, Loki wasn't going to perform for the cameras he knew were watching him. He simply sat on the bed, or at the small desk, reading something he'd scrounged up, or scratching out illegible marks onto papers already crammed full of more illegible marks.

Tony being Tony, he'd tried to enhance and examine the marks, but he couldn't get them to match up to any pre-existing languages or letterforms, so he gave up and went back to tinkering with his suits. Still the markings – and the initial incident with the collapsing and the bloody nose for that matter – stayed ticking away in the back of his mind. Problem-solving was his default state, and Loki was without a doubt one of the more interesting problems he’d encountered.

Loki didn't even venture out to eat – at least nobody ever saw him in the kitchen or the pantry, and he wasn't hard to miss when he did decide to explore, since the various SHIELD agents set to guard his room stuck to him like glue wherever he went. It would have been funny if Loki's expression had ever been anything other than cold, restrained fury.

Nobody went into his room either, except for Thor. It wasn't forbidden but none of them really felt like voluntarily walking into the lion's den. Thor would take trays of food in to his brother and emerge hours later carrying the same tray of food made only a few spoonful’s lighter. Unless, Tony soon discovered, there was something sweet on the tray. Any time Thor took in a bowl of ice-cream, or slices of cake, or an enormous portion of Steve's own home baked apple pie – and really, Tony would have made fun of him for making it if it hadn't tasted so damn good – the tray would come back without a crumb of said sweet thing on it.

Tony filed that one away, though what it had potential for he couldn't say. He put it down to being happy about knowing something about the trickster god that the man himself hadn't told him.

At any rate, Thor never shared with the others what the two of them talked about in Loki's rooms, and Tony found that he felt bad when he started to load up the surveillance footage, and closed it as soon as it started playing. He figured that if it was relevant then Thor would tell them about it himself, and if it was dangerous the SHIELD groupies would pass it on.

Still, the lack of information didn't stop him wondering what Loki was up to, since every time he did glance over the footage, the pile of papers Loki was amassing seemed to get larger. None of the books Loki read were from Earth either, so they were no help. Thor was eager to cheer his sulky brother, and happily brought them to and fro from Asgard for him. Much as he tried not to dwell on them, the thoughts were distracting Tony while he tried to work on taking apart one of the metal birds they'd fought. He'd finally managed to convince SHIELD – well, Fury mostly – to let him have one for himself, and he'd been gleefully dissecting it over the past few hours. He figured to himself that he was about two, maybe three days away from his curiosity winning out, and sending him barging into Loki's rooms to see what was going on up close. He wondered if he should wear the suit when he did it, just for safety's sake - Loki's rooms did have windows just about big enough to throw him out of.

"Really, Stark, are you always going to dwell on that?" Tony jumped and his fingers slipped inside the bird. One of the loose wires caught his bare finger and he yelped at the tiny shock, shoving the burnt digit into his mouth. He glared at Loki, who was leaning in the doorway, for once without his usual hangers on. He smirked and folded his arms, casual as anything.

"Careful now."

"-uck –ou," Tony said around his finger. He removed it, shaking away the last tingles of pain. "How did you get in here and what do you want? And since when are you allowed to wander around without someone with a very expensive gun holding your hand to make sure you don't touch anything?"

"I have my ways. I am not entirely powerless. As for my entourage…they are otherwise engaged at this moment." Loki examined his fingernails, a partial smile on his lips. Was it just Tony's imagination, or were there bags under the gods’ eyes? Then Loki flicked his gaze up and Tony snapped his eyes away. It wasn't him that Loki was interested in though.

"That is one of the creatures that nearly removed your Hulk's hand, correct?"

"Yeah, I'm—wait just a minute," Loki's initial words finally caught up to him. "Did you read my mind just now?" He tried very hard not to think about all the things he was suddenly starting to think about. Pink elephants, pink elephants, pink elephants, no important schematics, pink elephants, very definitely not what happened with the marketing exec last week.

"If you think any harder you'll surely catch fire," Loki pushed off from the wall and sauntered over. How he managed to look so intimidating and elegant in civilian clothes god only knew. And had he picked out his own wardrobe or did Tony have some savvy SHIELD flunky to thank for the holy crap those are well fitted black denim and the why are you even noticing this Tony, down, boy, tight green shirt? At any rate, Loki had now crossed the workshop and was still talking, seemingly oblivious to Tony's sudden appreciation for well-chosen attire.

"What with my powers limited as they are, your mind is quite safe. I can only catch the faintest glimmer of your staggeringly uninteresting and disgustingly predictable thoughts, and then only when you are unaware of my intentions to do so. You are safe for the time being."

"I'm cock-blocking your mental mojo. Awesome."

Loki ignored him and peered down at the half-dissected mechanical bird on the table, its guts spilling out in a tangle of wires and tiny components.

"This is impressive engineering, by Midgardian standards."

"Eh, I could do better. Whoever did this had no sense of design. The wiring's a complete mess," Tony yanked a handful of wires out of the things stomach with a hissing snap. "Totally inefficient. I've got no idea how they actually managed to make these things work."

"It is obvious, is it not?" Loki said. He raised an eyebrow. "Then again, I suppose you do only have the limited capacity of a mortal. Perhaps you cannot comprehend its workings."

"You want me get your babysitters?" Tony shot back. "Don't patronise me."

"Very well. In terms even you could understand, there is magic in this…creature. That is how it works. The wiring is merely a crude attempt to harness the power in a more specific direction." Loki stepped in closer, delicately lifting up a loose panel. He ran his finger across the grooves on the inside. "As I suspected. These engravings here, they act as a catalyst for the spell. It is odd though, that I am not familiar with them…" he frowned. "I know most languages related to this kind of endeavour."

Tony snorted, absently stripping the wires of their casings.

"Yeah, right. You speak machine, of course you do. It's not magic, it's just science.”

Loki opened his mouth to expand, his eyes already narrowing, but he was cut off by a furious Clint Barton screaming over the intercom.

"Stark you are a dead man! You hear me! Dead!"

Tony's face split in a huge grin

"Loud and clear, Barton, loud and clear." He leaned back in his chair, unable to stop the laughter.

"I can hear you laughing, Tin Man, and you better enjoy it while you can because you are a dead man walking! You hear this sound? This is me carving your name into an arrow. Special delivery, addressed to your ass!"

"Can't kill what you can't catch, Barton, and last I checked you couldn't fly," Tony managed to pull himself together long enough to gasp out. He shook his head. "Didn't you enjoy the joke? Surely you've got a sense of humour stowed somewhere in that quiver of yours."

"It doesn't involve a damn metric ton of breadcrumbs! You'll pay for this one, Stark. Watch your back." The intercom snapped off, leaving nothing but Tony's wheezing laughter.

"Oh man, I have been waiting for that call all day."

"What exactly did you do to him?" Tony finally got his laughter under enough control to notice that Loki had his head tilted slightly to one side and was eyeing him with interest. He swallowed, cleared his throat, and attempted to compose himself.

"I, ah, I filled his room with breadcrumbs."

Loki was silent for a moment, then,

"My only queries are why and how?"

"Why is because pranking Hawkeye is hilarious. He's the only person I can prank safely without risking my life or feeling like I kicked a puppy.” He started counting off on his fingers. "Natasha would just get me back worse – and probably something sharp of hers against something squishy of mine would be involved; I can't claim on the insurance for Hulk-related damages anymore; and Steve is the aforementioned kicked puppy. And Thor…usually isn't here, so I don't have anything immediately on hand to work with." Tony began running his fingers through the wiring spilling out onto the table. He wondered if there was anything useful he could salvage from the birds. They'd seemed to be using some kind of collective consciousness when they'd been attacking – that could prove useful….

Loki interrupted his thoughts, sounding impatient.

"How, Stark? You have no magic. How did you accomplish such a feat being as mundane as you are?

"I'll ignore that obvious insult for now, and let you know that science can, in point of fact, do many wonderful and interesting things. Anyway, I don't need magic when I've got a pump, some tubing, the complete schematics of the building, access to the right ventilation ducts and a couple of…of…" he snapped his fingers, "JARVIS, what'd I call those new drones again?"

"Lab Rats, Sir, as I recall. You were quite pleased with your inventiveness regarding said name."

"Right, Lab Rats," he rubbed his forehead. "And once again in the cold, sober light of day I find myself questioning my own genius. It's there, it exists, I have proof of it, but its whims are unknowable." He whistled, which was followed by a whirring noise from across the workshop and a bright silver something zipped across the floor to stop right at Loki's feel. He looked down in mild disgust.

"What is that thing?"

"Tiny robot. Limited intelligence, fast, mobile and useful for making small repairs and also for pulling several hundred feet of tubing through ventilation ducts to deliver a metric ton of breadcrumbs to the room of one Agent Barton," Tony grinned. "But, if I can figure it out – which, by the way, I almost certainly can – I'm going to make them able to ferret out landmines, like real rats. That way they might be actually useful."

"Most intriguing," Loki stooped to pick up the Lab Rat, long fingers wrapping delicately around the slim metal body. He held it up to examine it, tilting it this way and that.

Truth be told, Tony was kind of fond of the little things. They were teardrop shaped, with a rounded head and pointed tail, fitted out with both caterpillar treads and retractable legs for versatility of movement. They had a set of four-pronged, extending claws, high-definition cameras for eyes and a small laser cutter set in the front of their 'heads', around which Tony, on a whim, had painted a crude grinning mouth. He had built them with a rudimentary AI, capable of following pre-programmed sets of instructions and making a few self-initiated decisions. Nowhere near as smart as, say, JARVIS, but competent enough. And if he really needed them to do something specific, he could take manual control himself.

Loki had apparently finished his examination, and set the creature back down on the floor, where it made a noise suspiciously like a squeak before scurrying away.

"Of course, you could have accomplished your little trick much more simply with the use of magic."

"Not all of us can wave our fingers and bend the universe to our whim, Magic Mike.”

"Yes, well, that doesn't mean that your methods aren't extraordinarily inefficient."

"You think you could pull off pranks like that better with magic? Prove it."

Loki leaned back against the table and looked down at Tony, his grin far too full of teeth for Tony's liking, and his eyes lit up with a dark form of amusement. He suppressed the urge to flinch away, meeting the gods gaze head on.

"Really, Stark, you think it wise to engage me on my own field of battle? You have not forgotten who I am, have you?"

Tony shrugged.

"Yeah, yeah, I know, god of mischief, trickster extraordinaire. Whatever. You in or are you scared you'll lose to my superior technology?"

Loki's grin twisted into a confident smirk.

"You have no idea what you're getting yourself into."

"Like I said: prove it."

"Oh, I intend to," he seemed like he intended to say more, when they heard a thunder of running feet and a trio of angry and confused looking SHIELD agents barged into the workshop, making a beeline for Loki.

"It seems my parole is up," he sighed. The SHIELD agents grabbed his arms and started frogmarching him out of the workshop. Loki allowed himself to be pulled away, glancing back over his shoulder at Tony to deliver another toothy grin.

"I look forward to our next encounter, Stark."

Then he was gone. Tony leant back against the table, his breath heavy and his heart pounding like he'd just run a mile. He gripped the edge of the table tightly, ignoring the slight tremor in his hands. He slowly shook his head, marvelling at himself. A prank war with a trickster god.

What the hell had he gotten himself into?

---

Chapter Three

This little competition had been Tony's bad idea and there was no way he was going to sit around and wait for Loki to strike first. Less than an hour after the god had been escorted from his workshop he got down to business. Something relatively simple to start off with, he thought. Nothing that could warrant violent retaliation. A cold shoulder and dirty looks from Clint were one thing, but an angry Norse god was not something Tony wanted to see up close and personal.

So. Something small. Easy. He whistled for one of the Lab Rats, and it scurried over with an eager squeak.

"I know I didn't program you with that, so cut it out," he told it, setting it on the table. "Now, I've got a little job for you. I only have one thing on Loki, so that's where we're going to start. "

The Lab Rat squeaked again, got halfway through the noise then aborted it to a tentative beep of confirmation. Tony grinned wryly. "Good enough. Now hold still.”

The Lab Rat froze in place as Tony set to work on a slight modification to its laser cutter attachment. The Rat would be almost useless for anything else afterwards, but sacrifices had to be made. He soon finished up, and the Lab Rat bleeped back into life. Tony set his hands on his hips and eyed it.

"I set some instructions in with that little upgrade. You got them?"

Squea- beep!

"Good. Now get lost." Tony set the Lab Rat on the floor and watched it zoom off. A warm curl of satisfaction accompanied by a twinge of excitement flushed through him. A simple, sweet little prank to get the ball rolling. Maybe this whole thing wouldn't turn out so bad after all.

One obnoxiously large order of donut holes and a few hours later, Tony received word that his prank had worked. Well, received was the nice way of putting it. He was sitting with his feet up on the table, the mechanical bird abandoned for now in favour of a sugary reward for his own genius. He plucked another donut hole from the bag in his lap, licking the sugar from the previous one from his lips. Just as he closed his mouth over it there was a vengeful shriek of static from the speakers and he toppled his chair over backwards, almost choking on his mouthful.

"Stark!"

How Loki could manage a shout that was also a hiss he had no idea, but manage it he did. Tony scrambled to right himself in the chair, clutching at the bag of donut holes in his lap. He just about managed to save it.

"Mm. Yes?"

"That was not science – that was baked trickery."

"Ah, so you got my present then?" Tony licked sugar from his fingers and pulled up the camera feed from Loki's room. He started when he saw that the other man was staring directly up at one of the camera's, eyes seeming to glow a little brighter than was altogether natural.

"Your present and your infernal rat," Loki held up the remains of the Lab Rat Tony had sent off. A broken injector tube dangled out of its crumpled head. The video feed was hi-res enough for Tony to see that the tube was empty of all the salt he'd filled it with. Mission accomplished, then.

"Looks like the ball’s in your court, Sulky the Green Eyed Reindeer. I look forward to seeing what you come up with."

"I can assure you it will be infinitely better than sugar switched for salt. And speaking of salt..." Loki's fingers twitched and Tony immediately spat out the donut hole he'd just put into his mouth.

"No-one likes a copy-cat."

"That wasn't my trick - that was just a little payback. Watch yourself, Stark. Closely."

"There's nothing I like doing more," Tony shot back, then shut off the video feed. How Loki had seen him, he didn't know – the feed was only one way. Stupid gods. I thought his powers were supposed to be limited.

---

Loki's retaliation didn't come until almost a week after they'd struck their initial ill-advised deal. Tony had been on edge the entire time, but the others had put his excessive jumpiness down to not enough sleep and too much caffeine, so he was in the clear as far as that was concerned. The last thing he needed was Fury riding his ass about making childish bets with resident supervillains.

He was woken at some ungodly hour of the morning on a Saturday of all days by an alarm screaming through the entire tower. His first thought was that it had to be Loki, but then JARVIS was patching Fury through on visual almost immediately, accompanied by some shaky camera footage of downtown.

"Ladies and gentlemen, our giant monster boy is back. It's ugly as sin and it's headed for right for the Avengers Tower. Mobilise yourselves. SHIELD has air support inbound.”

Not my damn tower. Tony rolled out of bed, instantly awake and moving fast. The lights flickered on above him as he ran but he barely noticed a thing - he was suited up and in the air before he realised something was off. At first he wasn’t sure what it was, but he knew there was something – he never used the oven and so had never wondered if he’d left it on, but he imagined the sensation to be much like this. He didn't have time to dwell on the feeling. As soon as he was airborne he could see the monster; a towering beast with misshapen limbs, a lumpy head and multiple jaws full of teeth, each of which looked as big as Tony himself.

"Big, ugly, dumb and mad," he announced himself over the comms. "Who does that remind you of? Answers will reflect on your next performance review."

"Well, gee, boss, and there I was counting on that Christmas bonus," Natasha quipped, "But if you want us to be honest…"

Tony grinned, "Good morning, Widow. Seen anything useful yet?"

"Not yet. Keep it distracted for a couple of minutes and I'll find something."

"Can do."

Tony aimed himself at the monster, swooping as close to its malformed head as he dared. It was clearly enraged, lashing out at anything that moved and everything that didn't. He got its attention with a quick burst from his palm repulsors, and the resulting screech had his ears ringing.

"I'm sorry, but you just haven't impressed me with that performance," he darted out of the way of one flailing claw. "Is everyone's favourite mischief maker around yet to do that thing where he knows exactly where to shoot something?"

"Haven't seen him, but that doesn't mean anything," Steve said. He paused for a beat, and then, "Is it the light, or did you change your colour scheme?"

If Tony hadn't been held aloft by many thousands of dollars' worth of expensive, custom-built, incredibly well-put together technology, he would have plummeted fifty stories.

"What?"

"Well, I mean, I'm not saying you can't change your mind about your own suit, but I didn't think green was really your colour."

"I…" Tony looked down at himself. The suit, as Cap had said, was green. Bright emerald with dark, mossy-green accents and swirls of brighter lime tracing up over his forearms and calves. The only thing that wasn't green was the arc reactor, and even the light from that seemed slightly tinted.

If Tony had been a more considerate man, he would have made some attempt to mute his mic before the stream of profanities started.

"I happen to know a woman with a pretty tough line in industrial soap," Natasha commented once he'd finished. "You seem like you could use some. I'll put you in touch."

"So why is your suit green?" Clint asked, sweet as sugar. Tony didn't need to see him to see the expression on his face. He ground his teeth.

"Shouldn't we be focusing on the monster, not me?"

Said monster roared again, and punched a building. Debris rained down and somewhere below a shrill car-alarm started screaming.

"Funny, isn't your opinion usually the other way around?" a silky, arrogant, god-damn snake of a voice said. "And if you haven't spotted the weak spots on this thing yet then my word, what are you doing with your time?"

"Loki," Tony growled. "How nice of you to show up." He scanned the ground below, searching for the trickster. He finally spotted him, and his HUD zoomed his vision in for a clearer view. He was leaning against the wall of a building as-yet untouched by the Cloverfield rip-off. There was a pair of SHIELD agents standing beside him, and even at this distance Tony could see the unease they felt at being so close to the giant monster wrecking the city. Then, as if he could tell Tony was looking at him, Loki raised a hand and gave a little wave. It was an arrogant little wave, Tony decided, all cocky fingers and self-assuredness and now Tony was getting angry at Loki's damn fingers in the middle of a fight.

The monster, sensing it was losing attention, punched a different building, and glass exploded to Tony's left. He was almost distracted enough by it to miss Loki's next words, but not quite.

"Left side of the head, the curved in spot below the uppermost eye; right side of the chest between two of those – are they still ribs if they're on the outside? – and the direct centre of the forehead, the only part not covered in oozing sores."

Without waiting for any of the others to comment, Tony kicked up the power and shot around to the creature’s left hand side. He fired off a quick burst at the spot below the eye, twisted in mid-air seconds after the beam had cleared his palms and zoomed around behind it. He levelled a blast at the back side of its head as he passed, ignored the ear-shattering roar of pain it let out. It reared around to face him, showing that it had even more of those huge teeth than previously thought and that they continued, impractically but terrifyingly, all the way down its throat.

Fear of being mashed into cat food was a secondary priority at that moment. Tony blasted around to the front of the beast, its jaws snapping and throwing slimy splatters of drool through the air. Both of the buildings it had punched were still standing, but they wouldn't be for long if the monster were allowed to continue its pained thrashing. Tony aimed with both hands at the bare patch between the bloated red sores and fired. The creature screamed, loud enough to shatter the glass in every window for two blocks, and toppled over backwards.

It was only then that Tony registered his teammates yelling at him.

"Dammit, Stark, give us time to control this thing!" Steve's voice cut through the clamour loudest. "This is supposed to be a team, not a one-man army!"

He blinked. Oh. Right. Teamwork.

"What the hell was that?" Barton came in. "Do you have something against anyone but you getting any action?"

This was followed by a sound that could only have been Hulk growling something next to Barton's ear to get his opinion across.

"I don't need to be present to stop you getting action," Tony quipped on autopilot. He was more concerned with scanning the broken up ground below again for one asshole of a trickster god. Alright, so the prank was as harmless as his with the salt-in-the-donut-holes had been, but he had messed with the suit. Harmless was a relative term. He finally spotted Loki, just a short way from where he'd originally been and apparently heading towards the fallen monster. His SHIELD escort was tagging along behind him, looking like they'd rather be anywhere else.

Tony plummeted, landing deliberately hard on the street two feet in front of Loki. The bastard didn't even blink.

"Shall we call this an even match, so far?" Loki said and yeah, there was that self-assured smirk. Tony flipped his faceplate up so as to better fix him with a furious glare. Loki blinked slowly, enjoying the moment.

"You messed with my suit."

Loki tsk'd and gave the suit an approving up-and-down look.

"I'd call it an improvement – you look very fetching."

Tony's brain was at war. One faction wanted very much to punch Loki right in his stupid, smirking, well-proportioned face. Another – sounding like a chorus of tiny Peppers' and Rhodeys' and maybe even a Steve or two – was telling him to walk away, just walk away. He ground his teeth and glared harder at Loki, who had moved past him now to get a closer look at the monster he'd just felled. It was at this point, watching him pass, that another faction took up inside Tony's head – a very small one, which wanted to quietly and calmly point out how well-fitted the trickster gods’ jeans were. The tiny Peppers', Rhodeys' and Steve's quickly jumped on it, smothering it out of existence. Tony shook his head. God, it really was too early for this.

"And since the threat of the day is dealt with, and I have done my good deed for the morning, I think I am finished here," Loki had finished looking at the monster, and was heading back to his SHIELD buddies. He was still talking? Right. Dead monster. Green armour. Gods in tight pants. Prioritise, Stark.

"Change it back," he snapped at Loki. Loki folded his arms.

"Oh, but it suits you so much better this way.”

"If you don't change it back, you'll be admiring the new colours I can make your face turn. I'm sure a few nice shades of blue and purple would look very fetching on you. Really bring out your eyes."

"My word, Stark, I didn't know you cared."

Tony rolled his eyes.

"Just change it back."

Loki sighed heavily, as though Tony were asking him to move the earth and stars. He flicked his fingers and the air around Tony seemed to shimmer for a moment. When he looked down his armour was once again gleaming red and gold.

"Thank yo-" he started, not without the bite of sarcasm, but Loki was already stalking away, closely flanked by the SHIELD agents. Even with them trailing along behind him like well-armed, muscular puppies, he still managed to look impressive. Tony shook his head, and then turned back to the monster. Its dead bulk shifted, deflating slightly. A foul smell wafted towards him and he quickly slammed the faceplate back down. He could worry about getting Loki back later – for now there was Big Ugly to deal with.

"Mr. Stark," Nick Fury's voice came in over the comms, "I believe we need to have a talk about mission appropriate behaviour."

Tony sighed. It was going to be a long day.

---

After the suit incident the pranks continued in a similar fashion for the next week or so. Tony messed with the shampoo in Loki's bathroom – not that he was even sure if the god used it or if he just magicked himself flawlessly clean – and was rewarded with a blonde-haired god of mischief for all of the five minutes it took for Loki to notice that something was wrong. Tony saved that little surveillance clip away for a rainy day. Loki, on the other hand, seemed to have enjoyed changing the Iron Man suit to green so much that he did it twice more, each time in a different shade of green. Boy, did the gossip blogs have a field day when fluorescent green Iron Man took to the sky.

And Pepper was not happy with the amount of messages she was getting concerning matching the Iron Man colour scheme to every brand, charity and sports team under the sun.

“I agreed to help run this company, Tony, not just to do endless PR fielding for you,” she told him one night, over the phone. She was away, negotiating an important deal of some kind, that inevitably Tony would have to sign paperwork for.

“Don’t blame me, blame Thor’s brother,” Tony said, and she sighed.

“Why do you always attract the melodramatic ones?”

“Hey! What’s that supposed to mean?”

She chuckled, and he smiled at the image of her shaking her head and grinning to herself.

“Just be careful Tony. And also aware that you might have to concede to at least one of these charities, or it’ll be bad for your brand.”

“Superheroes don’t need brands.” Pepper sniggered.

“I know. Look, I have to go. Be careful, alright? And get that signing hand warmed up – there’s a lot to go through when I get back.”

She hung up and Tony leaned back in his chair, thinking about suit colours. Maybe it would be nice to change it up a little sometimes. He jotted a note on his phone to get a rainbow-coloured suit sprayed up for the next Pride parade he could attend; that was a cause he had no problem lending Iron Man’s significant weight to.

Loki, it seemed, had a thing for the colour green though. After getting bored with changing the colour of just Tony’s armour, he expanded his repertoire to Tony’s entire wardrobe, right down to boxers and socks. On one memorable occasion, he’d changed all of the furniture in the penthouse as well. It got to the point where Tony was starting to think that, limited in power as he was, colour-changing was about all Loki could do until – after Tony had set every speaker in Loki’s room to play Thunderstruck on repeat at high volume – he got back after patrol one night to find Loki's name etched in letter six feet high across his windows. That had not been an easy one to explain to either Pepper, the insurance company, or the repair guys. The only upside was that somehow it didn’t make it onto the internet.

Pranks aside, the Avengers had been having a pretty easy time of it. A few more mega-monsters had appeared to smash some things up, but they were by now experts at dealing them, with or without Loki's uncanny eye for weak spots. Apart from the monsters, though, they kept being pestered with those damn mechanical birds again and again. The one Tony had dissected hadn't given him anything useful, and though they were easy to beat off, the fact that they kept coming back – and coming back bigger and less-birdlike each time – was concerning.

Fury wanted answers – they all did – but for all his poking and prodding and analysing, Tony just couldn't get a fix on where the birds were coming from, or who was making them.

"Except for the fact that they are awful with wiring," he complained to anyone who would listen, "I can't figure out a damn thing about them. Frankly, I'm insulted at myself."

The only thing they could find was that every time the birds appeared, soon after there would be a random energy spike out in the city. But whenever they went to check it out, by the time they got near to it, it would simply vanish before they could pinpoint the source. Tony kept on grumbling about it but since there was nothing he could actively do, he found other things to focus on.

Like continually getting one up on Loki.

With the pranks shooting back and forth, not really escalating but most definitely not stopping – the amount of security footage Tony now had saved of Loki with various colours of paint sprayed across his face was taking up some serious hard-drive space – time just kind of slipped on by. Soon enough it was November and the trickster god had been taking up residence in Stark tower for almost three months, and he wasn't the angry, sulky brat he had been when he'd first arrived.

Though, Tony made sure to never even think those descriptions when Loki was around. As far as reformation was concerned, Loki was at the least helping with, well, maybe not enthusiasm but at least a little less disdain. A lot more sarcasm, but as far as Tony was concerned it just meant he had to step up his comeback game. Loki was certainly more entertaining to backchat than Clint. And apparently his help had been noticed, since after one brief but very messy encounter with a group of idiots who'd somehow managed to irradiate themselves some highly unstable superpowers, Loki was surrounded by a brief glow of gold and green light. Once it had faded he had blinked, looked at his hands uncertainly, and then vanished.

Everyone had freaked out and Fury had almost gone into cardiac arrest when Loki reappeared later that evening back in Stark tower, looking a little paler than normal.

"So, you got some mojo back, huh," said Tony.

"If you don't mind, I'm rather tired," Loki replied shortly, striding out of the room he'd appeared in. Tony followed after him, as did a trio of very relieved SHIELD agents.

"Can you go anywhere now? Is that your 'repentance' all done with?"

"Stark, you are by far the most irritating creature in this tower," Loki sighed. "But since I'm certain you will pester me for untold hours unless I answer you – no, I am not finished here. I have had a certain level of my powers restored to me, I assume as reward for my good behaviour," he sneered at the words. "But I am still limited. I cannot leave the boundaries of this wretched city."

"Well, if nothing else this'll make our little," he eyed the trio of SHIELD agents cautiously, "Engagement a sight more interesting. Just don't do anything perverted."

A sly grin appeared on Loki's face,

"Please, Stark," he drawled, "If I were out to visit perversion on you, I assure you our relationship would be very different."

Tony very impressively repressed the shiver that tried to run through him. The SHIELD agents tried very hard to look as if they weren’t hearing any of this conversation.

"Well, have fun teleporting around the city," he said. "I'm sure you can startle some old ladies into heart attacks. Get some of your villain points back."

He turned on his heel and strode away; sure that Loki was smirking at his back.

The pranks after that did get a little more interesting. Loki might still have been trapped in the city limits, but he could certainly move around the Avengers Tower at will now, and he took full advantage. Mostly he seemed to use it to avoid having to talk to anyone – disappearing from his room whenever anyone came knocking, or vanishing away from the end of what were starting to become loud 'discussions' with Thor. Why he did that, Tony could only guess at, since from the audio he had it seemed that Thor was just trying to express pride in his brother, give him words of encouragement to continue on his 'path to redemption'.

Maybe Loki just couldn't take a compliment.

Either way Tony decided to step up his own game a little. He could afford to be a little more daring now, especially since Loki could immediately teleport away from whatever danger Tony tried to inflict on him. So, he waited until Loki was comfortably in his room, scratching away at the papers on his desk, before tapping into the environmental controls and dropping them right down to below freezing. To Tony's annoyance, Loki didn't seem to notice that anything was wrong. He ignored JARVIS's warnings and pushed the temperature lower and lower. Still Loki didn't so much as twitch, just kept scribbling away.

Then, as the temperature slid through double-digit negatives, Loki glanced to the side, to the glass of water that was starting to freeze over. On the screen he was watching, Tony couldn't see Loki's face, but his entire body suddenly went rigid. He snapped his head around, eyes fixing straight on the camera. Tony couldn't help but flinch away from the intensity of the glare coming from his monitor. Seconds later that same glare and the incredibly pissed off god it was coming from were less than two inches from Tony's face.

Loki's face was a twisted mask of rage, his eyes boring into Tony like they could burn out his brain and – wait, was that fear buried in there? Tony didn't get a chance to examine the details of Loki's emotions just then, because by that point Loki had grabbed the front of his shirt and hauled him off the ground.

"What do you think you're doing, Stark?" he snarled, and for the first time in a while Tony could see him as the powerful creature he was, despite whatever limitations he’d had put on him. He was stronger than any human, he could quite easily snap Tony's neck like this. Tony stayed very, very still and tried not to let his sheer terror show through. He managed an awkward shrug.

"Just checking the temperature controls are all functioning – ah, ow, no, okay, that was a lie, it was a prank, you seem fine though, do you wanna put me down anytime soon because you're damaging my shirt," his mouth just kept on running. The chorus of tiny Peppers', Rhodey’s and Steves' – that could collectively be called a voice of reason, he supposed – were having a nervous breakdown and filing for emotional abuse. Loki's grip tightened and he lifted Tony a few inches higher.

"Look, I really don't see what the problem is, it's not like you're going to get a cold or something, and you didn't turn into a lime flavored Popsicle so it looks like we're all good, right? One more prank point to me, you can get me back later. I'm kind of getting to like the green."

"You are very, very wrong," Loki snarled through clenched teeth. His eyes were wide, practically glowing green now. Tony felt static in the air, all the hairs on his arms rising up. Then something seemed to flip a switch in Loki's head, the static dissipated and in a blink Loki was gone. Tony dropped to the ground, trying and failing to keep his balance. He landed on his ass in a heap.

"Fuck."

After that little incident, Loki didn't emerge from his room for a solid two weeks. No one could open the door, no matter what they tried, and when Tony checked his cameras all they showed was static. So much for 'redemption'.

---

Chapter Four

If he were being truly honest with himself, Loki could say that things were going better than expected since he'd been taken back to Asgard. He had been fully expecting to be in chains for the rest of his life, tossed in the darkest pit Odin could find and left there to rot. He let none of his inner fears show, bearing Odin's recriminations and Frigga's disappointment in stony silence, letting his barbed tongue dull the sting of their words. So, it was surprising when Odin made the decision to not only not lock him up for all eternity, but to allow him back to the very world he'd tried to conquer.

The knowledge that he would retain his physical freedom was not so sweet when he was brought to his knees as Odin stripped his powers from him, taking all but the basest of magics. Loki bit his tongue and swallowed blood as the Allfather tore his magic away. Imprisonment, death – either would have been better than this. Any punishment would have been better than what life held for him now that he was stripped bare, trembling and raw in front of the universe.

Gasping for air before Odin, furious and humiliated, somehow Loki found himself swearing to 'make amends' and to 'do good henceforth'. A part of him wasn't entirely sure he was lying, but the loss of his magic has his head spinning and he wasn’t entirely sure which was up either, so even in the aftermath he couldn’t have said if he had meant a single word.

And then that was that. Thor clapped him on the back and embraced him, declared a feast to honour his brave decision. Loki declined and slipped away. The ever-cautious Odin would not allow him to be alone, however, and he was followed by palace guards to his quarters. Loki scarcely cared. Even after seeing him broken before them, none of them dare to come in after him when he slammed the door and locked it.

So, while his brother and family celebrated his ‘reformation’, Loki hid himself away. He would not, could not, allow anyone to see him this way. To see him disgraced, neutered, weak – more of an embarrassment than ever before in his life. Even when, in the small hours of the night, Frigga came knocking at the door. He screwed his eyes shut against her pleading words, though his hand hovered above the door handle.

He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t open the door. Not even Frigga would he let see him this way.

Yet when he heard her footsteps fading down the corridor it took every ounce of self-control left to him not to cry out after her.

He returned to Earth with Thor, disgusted with having to negotiate with the fools his brother counted as his friends, and then Loki was stuck there. Stuck on Midgard, trapped in a tiny set of rooms in a tower, kept under surveillance and under guard every second of the day. It almost made him laugh, the extent of their paranoia toward him. Did they not understand that he had nothing? He was less of a threat than he had ever been and yet he felt sure that the one-eyed man, their Fury, would have him in chains at the bottom of the ocean if he could.

And if he had, Loki would have drowned. The very second he'd been alone he'd tried to transport himself out of the building, just to the street below if he could. He would be damned if he'd be held in a cage as flimsy as the one he’d been assigned.

The effort had left him unconscious for three hours, and when he woke it was to a pounding head and dried blood crusted around his mouth and nose. With the cameras spying on his every movement he wasn't so foolish as to try that trick again. He might have been weakened but he was damned if he would offer proof of it to the mortals holding him captive. It did not take him long to determine what he could still do. Weak illusions were still within his grasp, as were flimsy shielding spells and the barest minimum of healing powers. He could also just about manage to move objects with his will, but that was harder, and left him feeling ill.

And of course, he still looked Asgardian. Small mercy that was.

He tried to avoid using his powers as much as possible, reasoning that if he refused to help the others when they asked, he would not have to humiliate himself further. Thor tried to persuade him otherwise, but apart from taking the food he offered, Loki would not speak to him. He had nothing to say to his idiot sibling. Still, he could not remain in hiding forever it seemed. Staying inside the tower began to itch at his brain – he could not bear such captivity. So, just for the sake of getting outside, he finally agreed to 'help'.

He could not do much, but those he was helping didn't need to know the true reasons behind it. He hid the nausea that conjuring a shield caused with harsh words, disguised the ache in his head at deflecting debris with biting sarcasm. It was at the least enjoyable to rile up the heroes, though he did not doubt that soon they would all become far too predictable to be even remotely entertaining.

The one thing he could do that didn't cause him any more physical discomfort was to spot the flaws in the enemies the Avengers insisted on fighting. Why any human would continually create such pitiful monstrosities, Loki could not fathom. Still, it seemed to impress them somewhat, and Thor was certainly happy that he was helping.

"You see, brother, redemption can be had," he said earnestly through the door to Loki's room. "I know that you are not so hard of heart as you pretend to be. Hide away all you like – I know you too well."

"You don't know me at all," Loki sneered back at him. Thor chuckled.

"We shall see."

Time dragged by. The walls pressed in on him, his body its own prison. He would surely lose his mind before regaining so much as a sliver of his power back. He would die here on this wretched world, alone and useless.

And then Tony Stark happened.

It had been no small feat to cloud the minds of the guards on his door that day. He felt certain he had hidden his fatigue well when he had approached the man in the workshop, but he had born the head-pounding repercussions of his 'escape' for the next week. Of all the pitiful heroes he was forced to bear the company of, Stark had piqued his interest the most. He had a tongue almost as sharp as Loki's own, and he was clever. Many of them were, but Stark was the only one who had built his own armour – had given himself power where there was none to be had otherwise.

Stark's proposal had interested him, certainly. It appealed to his nature, such as it had been before all that had happened. He had gone gladly back to his cage that day, pleased at the knowledge that at least he would not die quite so bored. It had been more than entertaining to perform the little tricks that seemed to so rile Stark. None were much more than illusion, and even then Loki found he had to work hard to conceal the drain even such small acts had on him. It was worth it, though, for the amusement Stark's reactions – and retaliations – provided.

Then, without him noticing it, he had been there for three months. And he discovered, upon looking back, that in the last one and a half, he had been actively helping the Avengers. Oh, not without protest, certainly, and not in any way that could be considered polite. But he had helped. He dreaded to think that Thor of all people had been right, but there it was.

And the confirmation of his help was received with that sudden blast of magic around him, the swirl of gold and green light, pouring into him. It had been like fire blazing through him, flooding through his veins. Is this it? he wondered, watching as the power twined around his hands and spread through his body. Am I forgiven?

He gently tested the power, found that he could once again step sideways through the universe, move as he pleased and –

He hit a wall.

His body fell back into reality, unable to move any further. He gritted his teeth and moved again, slower, taking it steady – he was a little out of practice that was all, he could do this-

He hit the wall again.

He stood still this time, hands clenched into fists and glowering. Limited. Still limited. He could move more freely now, but the city limits were his limits – and what arbitrary limits they were. The location of a sign. The wall of a building. He ground his teeth and tried not to lash out with his newly regained power. He was still a prisoner. Loki sighed and forced the anger down, compressing it for later. Then he stepped sideways and moved back to the tower, resigning himself to the inevitable panic that would await him after his disappearing act.

But whatever constraints still applied to his magic, it was good to be able to wield some power again without the constant drain of his energy. The illusions he used to plague Stark no longer set his head to pounding, and the shields he protected himself with in skirmishes did not cause his hands to shake and his knees to tremble as he held them. In short, he felt more like himself than he had since his punishment began.

And then Tony Stark happened. Again.

He hadn't noticed the temperature drop at first. He had been so caught up in his notes, writing and rewriting them, scrawling down every last scrap of magic and knowledge he could remember. If he could not earn his powers back – and he doubted he could ever earn anyone's forgiveness really, least of all Odin's – then he would simply learn them all over again. So long as he was not killed, he could do it. He was sure of it. He had reached for the water glass, hardly looking at it. The cold of it sent a thrill up his arm, and he stared at it, at the frost on the rim. It took every ounce of self-control not to crush it to dust in his hand.

He knew at once what had happened – that it had been a trick and that Stark was responsible – but some tiny part of his brain flooded with blue, with white, with ice. For one brief moment he was sure that he had frozen the glass, that he had chilled the room to such coldness. The tips of his fingers faded to blue, as though dipped in ink.

No.

His eyes found one of the spying cameras, and he slid sideways to the source of it, rage and ice before the insignificant human who had dared to do such a thing as this. He grabbed him by the collar and hoisted him into the air.

"What do you think you're doing, Stark," he snarled. He was surprised to hear a tremble in his voice, and glared harder at the human – with any luck he would take it for anger, not fear. He did, standing still as a rabbit before a wolf and failing to hide his own fear. He shrugged, feigning nonchalance.

"Just checking the temperature controls are all functioning," Loki tightened his grip, pulling Stark's collar tight around his throat, “– ah, ow, no, okay, that was a lie, it was a prank, you seem fine though, do you wanna put me down anytime soon because you're damaging my shirt." This one truly had no sense of self-preservation. Even like this, helpless as a child and utterly at Loki's mercy, he spoke with so little care. It was almost insulting. Loki tightened his grip and lifted Stark higher.

"Look, I really don't see what the problem is, it's not like you're going to get a cold or something, and you didn't turn into a lime flavored Popsicle so it looks like we're all good, right? One more prank point to me, you can get me back later. I'm kind of getting to like the green."

"You are very, very wrong," Loki snarled through clenched teeth. He could feel his magic snapping beneath the surface, knew just how he looked and revelled in it. Let Stark see him as he was, let the mortal know who and what he was dealing with, however limited that might be. The power rose, the air becoming heavy with it, sick with it – already his head was throbbing, his stomach churning. If he unleashed what was building he would feel the repercussions for days.

Stark was not worth that kind of weakness.

Loki stepped sideways, dropping the mortal, dropping the magic. He was back in his room before Stark could blink, and in less than a second had cursed every camera in the room. He had consented to their prying for long enough.

---

It took two weeks, but Loki did finally emerge from his room. He told himself that he simply couldn't take another minute of Thor sitting outside his door, talking to him of second chances and heroism, but he wasn't entirely certain that was true. It was dull, staying away from any kind of contact. Oh, he'd slipped away of course. He’d visited every inch of the city he was trapped in, watching and lamenting the fact that he was still stuck living among these miserable creatures, but even that had grown tiresome. For someone so used to having multiple worlds at their fingertips, and powers beyond what even many Asgardians could dream of, one small city and its self-absorbed inhabitants was not exactly riveting stuff.

So he re-joined the Avengers, taking his place as far away from actual work as possible, and occasionally chipping in with some useful titbit of information. Just to keep them from getting too irritated with him. At any rate, involving himself in their little missions certainly did provide entertainment. The strange spikes of energy that they had been trying to track were growing more frequent. Loki couldn't help the curiosity they raised in him and more than once he loomed over the shoulders of Stark and Banner as they studied what little readings they had.

He could see at least part of what was causing the spikes as clear as day. He'd felt the small tug of magic every time they'd registered one but had said nothing. For one he felt certain they would be disinclined to consider magic as a possible cause, and for another he had no reason to help them in such a way. They had intelligence to a degree; they could likely solve the mystery without his input. Besides, the magic felt oddly familiar, though he couldn't place it.

With the spikes increasing in frequency, and still no-one able to get a fix on a location or establish any kind of real pattern, he decided that he could speed up the tedious process of finding whoever it was if he did reveal what he knew.

He was lurking about in Stark's workshop when he came to his decision. Now that he was able to travel at will through the tower, the SHIELD agents had stopped attempting to accompany him every step he took. They begrudgingly 'allowed' him freedom of movement, so long as Stark 'allowed' them access to all of his security footage. It didn't bother Loki. He had just enough power now to manipulate the cameras as and when he needed to. They saw what he wanted them to see and no more.

"Stark," he said, just as Tony threw a stylus through a hologram. Loki, who happened to be standing on the other side of the hologram, neatly dodged the projectile.

"Surely I have not irked you so with just one word," he said, raising an eyebrow. "Usually your name seems a source of great satisfaction to you."

"Cram it," Tony muttered, hunting for another stylus. "Bruce, have you seen- oh. Thanks." Banner handed him another with a long suffering smile.

"Well, if that is to be your attitude, I shan't share my information with you," Loki turned, making as if to leave. He saw Stark straighten up out of the corner of his eye. He hid his own smile – the mortal was so easy to predict.

"What information?"

"It pertains to those energy spikes you have been fruitlessly trying to trace," Loki wandered back towards the table, every movement carefully casual, as if what he had to say really couldn't be of much importance. He saw Stark's jaw twitch, knew that he would grind his teeth to powder if Loki kept on this way. Oh, this was why the man was such fun.

"Tony, don't give yourself an aneurysm, you'll give me one," Banner said. "What do you know, Loki?"

Banner, now, he was no fun. For a supposed 'rage monster', he was frustratingly calm, and nothing Loki had said or done in all the time he'd had contact with him since the invasion had seemed to have any effect.

"I know that it is partly magical in nature," Loki thrust a curious finger into the hologram, amused at the way it sparked green at his touch, then reformed. "And I know that I have…felt this magic somewhere before – do not ask me where, I have already driven myself to insanity trying to recall it."

"Stop messing with that," Tony flapped his hand at Loki's curious fingers, pushing him away from the hologram. He darted his stylus through it a few times, then closed the whole thing down. Without its light, the room was much darker. Loki found his eyes drawn, as they often were, to the blue glow beneath Stark's shirt. He had not yet determined the reason for the glow, or the device it came from, but he had already vowed to find out. He did not enjoy not knowing things.

"Tell me everything you know," Stark said.

"Unless you wish me to explain the complexities of my powers and of all magic to you, there is little else I can tell you," Loki came around the table now, and leaned on it next to Stark. He lifted his hand, allowing a few sparks of magic to dance between his fingers. "I can only say that it is an old power, else I would not have forgotten its origins. It is not of Asgard, either, nor any of the realms I have frequented in my life."

"So it's alien, then – like the Chitauri? From their corner of the universe?"

Loki shook his head.

"No. Nothing like them. Older than them, darker than them...I recall that it is stronger than they were, but in what way I could not say for certain. Now you know all I know."

"Not about magic I don't." Stark had sidled closer to him, and was trying to surreptitiously examine the sparks still idly dancing about Loki's fingertips. For once in a good humour, Loki brightened the sparks and made their dance more complex. It cost nothing to perform such tricks, and a part of him enjoyed seeing someone actually intrigued by his gift. It had been a long while since anyone had expressed that form of interest.

"Stark, to even begin to explain this kind of power would take your lifetime," Loki said. "I am sure you have had your machines recording all that I do. Examine that and draw your own conclusions. I am no teacher."

"Your readings are definitely interesting," said Banner. "They don't exactly match any known sources, but they're not wildly different to a lot of things either. Your magic, from what we've got, shares some readings in common with a few kinds of radiation and several other things." He gave Loki an odd look, one the god couldn't quite place. "You know, if you were willing, we'd love to examine you more. Take proper readings. Maybe teach ourselves a few tricks."

Loki chuckled.

"As if your kind could learn even a fraction of what I can do. Besides, I would never allow you to gather such information on me. I am not so foolish as to think you wouldn't use such a thing against me."

"Well, you're no fun at all." Loki had to admit to being surprised when Stark poked him in the arm with his stylus. "Denying the world of valuable scientific data and us of some fun research. God of mischief my ass – god of boredom and secrecy more like."

"Stark, you are fortunate that you amuse me," Loki said casually. "Else I would tear your head from your body."

"Baby, you wound me," Stark made a show of being mortally offended, a hand on his chest and his head thrown back. "Really you do." He spun the stylus in his fingers, then called his hologram back up. "Now both of you get lost, I've got real work to do."

"Don't stay up too many days in a row," Banner said, taking his leave, "You know how Pepper worries."

"So do you and Steve. You should form a support group. Talk it out." Stark waved at him without looking away from the glowing blue of the hologram. "I'll be fine."

Banner bid him goodnight, and once the door had clicked shut, there was nothing but silence in the workshop. It took Stark a few minutes to realise that Loki still hadn't left.

"Didn't I tell you to get lost?"

"I don't follow orders, least of all from you," Loki retorted. He had sparks and trails of green light playing over both of his hands now, teasing abstract patterns from them for brief moments then letting them twist away. Stark shrugged, though Loki could tell from the way he kept glancing over that the magic still intrigued him.

"Whatever. Do what you like. Don't expect me to entertain you though. I really do have work to do."

"Yes, those little metal birds," Loki watched as Stark rotated the hologram, which was indeed a replica of one of the most recent 'birds' they had encountered. They were looking less and less like birds with each meeting, and the one Stark was currently dissecting electronically had more in common with a gargoyle than any bird.

"Yeah, those," Stark frowned, and scribbled a note with the stylus. It was fascinating to see the letters form themselves out of light within the projection – it closely resembled some of Loki's own magic. "You got any insights on those that you haven't cared to share with us yet?"

"No."

"Well, let me know when you do. Cause I'm stumped." The hologram vanished again, leaving the room in darkness again. There was a little light from the far end of the workshop, where one overhead light was still switched on, but the only other light now came from Loki’s hands and Stark’s chest. The human sighed and lifted himself up to sit on the table, rubbing a hand over his forehead.

"This isn't like me," he muttered, half to himself. "I can figure anything out. Anything. But this…"

"It is magic," Loki said, finally dropping his magic and darkening the room further. "Do not berate yourself for being unable to comprehend it. Your mortal mind was not built for such complexity, as competent as it is in other areas."

"That was definitely a compliment. You hid it, but it was there. Thor's right, you are improving," Stark leaned back on his hands, turning his head to look directly at Loki. "What are you on now? Step five of the Asgardian Redemption Program? Go you."

"As I said, Stark, you are lucky you amuse me."

"Yeah, yeah, head from body, all that fun stuff." A pause. "Do you think anyone could understand your magic?"

Loki remained silent, letting Stark draw his own conclusions.

"Like, I know from Thor that his scientist lady and her friends kinda sorta understand some of your tech, but your magic seems like it's different. It's not a transport-y thing, and it's a not a physical weapon like the hammer. Why is that?"

"Stark-"

"Yeah, I know, a lifetime for the basics, but humour me. What makes you different? And how come you don’t even notice it’s cold until you’re well below freezing but Thor needs a blanket if the aircon’s turned up too high?"

For a moment, just a split second, Loki wondered what would happen if he told Stark the truth. If he let everything out to this human in the name of explanation. What havoc would such a secret wreak? He shook his head slightly, his jaw tight. No. Mortals were too small to comprehend what he knew, and Stark could not be trusted with that particular secret.

"There is far too much of that for you to know, Stark."

"Jeez, are you ever going to call anyone by their first name?" Stark poked him in the shoulder with the stylus again and Loki's hand snapped up to grab it. He caught most of Stark's hand too, his grip like a vice. The human didn't pull away.

"I shall call you any name I like," Loki said stiffly. "Be glad I at least choose one that is already a part of you. There are worse things I could name you."

"You could try – I've been called most things under the sun."

"That," Loki said, the corner of his mouth tilting up, "Does not surprise me."

Stark finally pulled away from his grip, taking the stylus with him.

"Well, you don't have to," he said awkwardly. "You’ve been living under my roof long enough, I think you can call me Tony."

"Perhaps I will," Loki straightened up. "Goodnight, Stark." He was about to step sideways, aiming for his room, when a hand caught his shoulder.

"Wait."

"What?"

"You don't...I mean…you should really stop, ah, hell," Stark scratched at his beard. "Stop hiding in your room when you're not 'helping' on mission. Thor keeps pining after hanging out with you – sounds like you two had a real fun childhood. Super violent. And you know, it might help with your…redemption thing. Maybe."

"Let no-one say you do not have a way with words," Loki held up a hand to forestall Stark's next words. "But…I will consider it."

Stark grinned.

"Great! Because we're having a movie night tomorrow, and you should definitely come if only to see what happens when literally no-one can agree on what to watch. It's exactly your kind of chaos. Hell, come and do your," he waggled his fingers, "Your mojo thing. Change the reel every five minutes. It'll be hilarious."

"As I said, I will consider it," Loki had to hide a smile at Starks strange enthusiasm. "Now, goodnight."

"Ciao."

Loki stepped sideways into his room, and as the magic fell away around him, and he made his way to bed, he found that he had not lied to Stark. He was considering joining them in their 'movie night'. He had not thought he could tire of his own company, but perhaps even he had his limits. He smirked to himself – after all, how could he resist an open invitation to cause a little chaos?

---

Chapter Five

"Barton, where do you find these things?" Tony held the DVD – an actual, physical DVD, who knew they even still made those? – as if it were some kind of dead rodent.

"I'll have you know it's considered a cult classic. Well, considered that it will be a cult classic. It has a cult following!"

“Good thing we’re not a cult then!” Tony tossed the DVD over his shoulder and man, oh, man, he didn’t think he’d ever seen Clint move so fast.

"I think you broke a land speed record there, Tweety Bird."

Clint hugged the DVD to his chest and glared.”

"It's not like your choices are any better."

"My taste is immaculate."

On the couch, Natasha tried to smother her face with a pillow.

"I wish Thor was here," she groaned. "Neither of you ever argue with him."

"It's like arguing with a golden retriever. A highly intelligent, extremely reasonable, genetically engineered super adorable golden retriever."

Natasha peeked out around the cushion, grinning.

"Crush, Stark?"

"Nah, big, blonde and able to crush my head with one elbow flex isn't really my type." Tony flopped down on the one remaining couch, swinging his legs up to claim the entire thing for himself. Clint gave him a pointed look, which he studiously ignored, instead bringing up the menu of his own movie collection. He flicked his fingers, cycling through the titles.

"Since none of us fickle men can agree," he said. Steve opened his mouth to argue, then thought better of it, "You pick, Tasha."

The evil smirk he got from that almost made him reconsider. Then she made him pull up Total Recall and all was forgiven.

"JARVIS, get the lights."

The lights went down; Clint glowered at him in the dark for a moment, before huffing and going over to join Steve, Natasha and their head-sized bowl of popcorn on the other couch. Tony settled more comfortably into his cushion. It was a shame that Thor and Bruce weren't there, but then, if they had been then two of the others wouldn't have. They'd been running regular patrols every night to keep an eye out for the energy-slash-magic spikes, and although they'd had no luck so far, they kept at it anyway. Just in case.

Old Arnie had just gone on the run when Loki joined them. His attempt at a causal slink in to the room was ruined by the pair of SHIELD agents lurking at his shoulders. Tony deliberately didn’t look as Loki perched himself at the end of the sofa in the small strip of space that Tony’s legs didn’t reach. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the other three most definitely noticing the new addition.

“Uh, Tony?” Steve said, “Are you aware that we have a... visitor?” he spoke slowly, as if trying not to startle a predator. Tony bent his knees a little.

“Yup. And now he even has a whole couch cushion to himself. Witness my benevolence.”

“I…don’t entirely think that’s the right context for that word but…” Tony looked over at him properly. He didn’t look exactly unhappy, but he certainly wasn’t thrilled either.

Natasha was pretending to be thoroughly engrossed in the movie but Tony knew her well enough by now to know that she was taking everything in through her peripheral vision, and despite the way her legs tangled with Clint’s across Steve’s lap she would be up and lethal at a moment’s notice.

“What the hell is he doing here?” Clint, tactful as always, cut through the bullshit in the air. Loki glanced coolly at him.

“I believe I am joining you in watching this recreation of fictional events.”

Clint rolled his eyes.

“Yeah, sure you are. You barely enjoy coming on missions with us, now you want to hang out?”

“I assure you, Agent Barton, that I have no ulterior motives.”

“Oh, fine then, I completely trust you and take everything you say at face value.” If he scowled any harder, Tony thought, he was going to give himself an aneurism. Tony held up a hand.

“Barton. Guys. Girls. People. Just chill – I invited him, alright?”

Three separate mouths fell open in a comical line. And then they all piled in at once.

“Are you serious?”

“How high were you?”

“Tony, I’m sure you meant well, which for you is a first, but-”

Loki stood up. The SHIELD agents tensed, JARVIS paused the film, and Tony grabbed Loki’s wrist. He tried and failed to stare down each of his teammates, and settled for staring ferociously at a spot just above them.

“Loki, sit. Avengers, stand the hell down, because if you don’t chill right now I swear to Fury I will call Thor and tell him you’re being mean to his brother.”

As threats went, it was somewhere on par with ‘I’m telling mom!’ but it was as effective as it needed to be. None of them wanted Thor angry at them – for a variety of very good reasons. Loki snatched his hand away. He didn’t sit back down.

“I can see I have made an error in joining you,” he said stiffly. Tony felt a prickle on the back of his neck and was suddenly certain Loki was about to vanish. He grabbed his wrist again and yanked. With a highly-undignified yelp of surprise, Loki fell back onto the couch. Tony heard both SHIELD agents draw their weapons and turned to glare at them now.

“You two, either pull up a beanbag or get lost. You are not helping me de-escalate this situation right now.”

The two glanced nervously at each other, and slowly replaced their guns in their holsters. Tony guessed their mission briefings had never covered Avengers Movie Night Protocol. He checked back on Clint, Natasha and Steve. All three were still staring at him in varying degrees of amusement, irritation and disbelief.

“Go on, go,” he said, without looking back at the agents. “We can handle him, I promise. You can come running back if you hear screaming but otherwise take a night off. Have a bubble bath. Listen to some smooth jazz.”

The agents finally decided that none of what was happening was in their job descriptions and left in a hurry. Tony flounced back into position on the sofa.

“JARVIS, start it up again.”

The movie started to play again. There were no further comments from the peanut gallery and after a few minutes Tony poked Loki with a toe. Loki’s sharp, green eyes snapped to him.

“Would you relax, you’re making me twitchy,” Tony muttered. Loki’s jaw tensed a little but he leant back into the sofa and seemed to relax a little. Baby steps.

It was difficult to let himself get involved in the movie with Loki sitting right there. Tony shifted and shuffled, got up on the pretext of getting more popcorn, wandered back with it, stood behind the sofa for an awkward amount of time, before finally managing to sit down next to Loki. He set the bowl of popcorn between them, as feeble a barrier as it was, and through a mouthful said quietly,

"So, how do you like our taste in entertainment?"

"It leaves much to be desired," Loki spoke without looking at him, and with only the barest movement of his lips. Tony smirked.

"Not a Schwarzenegger fan, then."

Loki smiled faintly, but didn't reply. Emboldened, Tony stretched his arms out along the top of the couch.

"It's better than whatever it was Clint wanted. Not that I've seen it, but I can tell. I have a sixth sense about these things."

Loki finally relaxed properly into the couch, but kept his arms folded. Tony had a sudden, almost overpowering urge to toss popcorn at that stoic face until he got a reaction. He fought that one down and settled for cramming another handful into his own mouth to suffocate any more potentially suicidal urges he might have. Loki’s eyes flicked to him suddenly, sharply, and Tony checked himself, frantically trying to think of nothing.

"Relax, Stark," Loki murmured. "I still cannot read your thoughts at will. Your body, however..."

Was Tony imagining it, or did the god of mischief just give him an appreciative once over?

"Is easy to read," Loki finished, turning his attention back to the screen. "As is the size of your entertainment system. Are you, as they say in Midgard, overcompensating?"

Tony decided not to grace that one with a response but clearly Loki hadn’t spoken as quietly as he’d intended because Tony heard Clint snort with amusement and Arnie hadn’t done anything particularly amusing. He grabbed a handful of popcorn and flung it over their way.

“Ass,” Clint snapped.

“Poor aim,” Natasha commented, throwing the popcorn back and smacking Tony dead centre of the forehead. He grimaced, and wiped away grease with the back of his hand. Good old Arnold ignored them all and continued emoting gruffly all the way to Mars.

"He is very enthusiastic about all this," Loki commented after a few more minutes. "Does Thor hold a fondness for him, by any chance?"

"You know, I don't think he's seen a Schwarzenegger movie." Tony frowned, "Damn. That's an oversight on my part. I’ll have to correct that."

Loki chuckled, and Tony got the feeling that he'd been set up somehow.

"Now, Stark, how about that chaos you implied I would so enjoy?" Loki said. Tony blinked. Oh. Right. That.

“Well, you missed the pre-show entertainment of Clint choosing terrible movies, and I haven’t prepped anything, honestly. I, uh,” he lowered his voice even more, “I didn’t think you’d actually show, to be honest.”

Loki pressed his lips together and said nothing. Tony cleared his throat.

“Field’s all yours, I guess, if you’ve got anything. Or, you know, we could just have a nice, relaxing evening…”

And, wow, Loki sure wasn’t hiding that smirk, huh? Now the god was definitely relaxed, legs stretched out and – how were they that long, exactly? – and crossing them at the ankles. Tony found himself very carefully not noticing how well the other man’s jeans hugged the shape of his calves. Somewhere in the deep recesses of his brain, the tiny chorus line of Steve-Pepper-Rhodey buried its collective face in its collective hands.

“No chance of that then. Just don’t injure anyone. Minor mischief only.”

“Or what? You’ll toss me out of the window this time?” Tony tensed. “I shall abide, Stark. I believe I have caused enough aggravation so far. Minor mischief only.”

So saying, Loki finally uncrossed his arms, and with the flick of a finger, a shimmer of green light had zapped across the room and splashed up against the screen. It vanished so fast if Tony hadn't been sitting next to Loki, he'd have thought he'd imagined it. Even so, it took them all a good five minutes to realise what he'd done.

Clint sat upright with a spray of laughter, spilling the bowl of popcorn all over the three of them.

“What the hell!”

It was impossible for any of them to keep a straight face. There was no way to be serious when you were watching perfect replicas of the two not present Avengers up on the screen, as if they’d been filmed for the original. And when the Thor-replica spoke with Schwarzenegger’s voice…

“JARVIS tell me I can save a copy of this. Please.

"I took the liberty of storing a copy of the altered recording from the moment of its inception, sir," JARVIS said smoothly.

"I knew I loved you for a reason."

"Get me a copy, or I'm telling Banner and Thor about it," Barton threatened, pointing a finger at him. He moved the finger to Loki, “And you. Don’t do that to me or you’re a dead man.”

"A disproportionate threat, Barton, to a little harmless magic. Although I believe you once made that promise to Mr. Stark, and as far as I can tell, he still breathes," Loki shot back smoothly. He put a hand on Tony's neck, feigning a search for a pulse. "Alas, I am correct. Perhaps you should work on your aim, Agent Barton."

Natasha covered her face with her cushion again, shaking silently. Steve was just slowly shaking his head, but smiling all the same. Tony's little rush of pride at his successful bonding exercise was soon chased away by the fact that Loki's fingers were still at his neck, cold and delicate. He swallowed and Loki met his eyes.

"I'm definitely alive," he muttered, surprised at how dry his mouth was. He swallowed, and wet his lips, not missing the brief flicker of Loki's eyes that followed that action. "Yup. Still breathing."

Loki withdrew his hand, unnecessarily slowly in Tony's opinion. He examined his fingers, as if searching for something.

"So you are," he murmured. It was too dark to properly read the expression on his face as he leant back against the couch. His fingers flickered, green light washed over the screen and the actors shimmered back to normal. As the movie ran on, Tony found himself becoming hyper-aware of the narrow space between him and Loki. One plastic bowl of width between himself and a fickle god, in however good a mood he appeared to be in? Close enough that Loki had put a hand on his throat, for god’s sake. It suddenly seemed like a terrible idea.

He kept very still, certain that moving would arouse more suspicion than not moving, and that if Loki knew he felt uncomfortable he'd find a way to make Tony feel even worse.

"Stark, stop thinking," Loki murmured. "It's distracting."

Tony made a noise intended to sound like he was insulted but that came out more like he was choking on a hairball. He stared resolutely at the film and it was a credit to his own stubbornness that he didn't look away from it again until the credits started rolling. JARVIS brought the lights up and lowered the volume – the world's most considerate home theatre – and Tony stood up, stretching.

"I guess that wasn't so bad," Clint said, disentangling his legs from Natasha's. "But I still get to actually pick what we watch next time. And that next time we get a pre-show warning about extra guests.” He shot a pointed look at Tony.

"Nah, I vote Natasha picks every time," said Steve. "It's way less stressful. And she has better taste than either of you."

Natasha didn't hide her smirk very well.

“And Loki,” Steve continued, “It’s…good, I guess, of you to come. Thor would appreciate it.”

Loki’s mouth curled in distaste.

“I do not make decisions based on my brother’s appreciation.”

“I’m just trying to thank you,” Steve’s eyes narrowed. Tony quickly stepped between the two.

“Calm down, girls, you’re both pretty,” he said. “And as fun a bonding experience as that was, I have stuff to do, so let’s break this party up. Alright?”

The situation seemed to diffuse, and they all managed to bid each other varying levels of goodnight without any incident. Once he was out in the corridor, alone, Tony felt a little more relaxed. For all of five seconds.

"You have an interesting definition of fun, Stark."

"If you don't start making some kind of noise when you move I swear to god I will not be held responsible for shooting you some day."

Loki slid up into step with him, hands clasped behind his back.

"You have my word that I would not hold that against you," he said. "Although my original point still stands."

"I don't have a retort prepared for you, so just act like I offended you or something. Make me feel better."

"Your ego is truly the stuff of legend," said Loki dryly.

"Hey, if there weren't at least a dozen legends about my ego, my ego would have something to say about it." They reached an elevator and Tony called it. "I guess I'd better 'escort' you back to your quarters. Or I might be getting a tetchy phone call about security from Fury. Again."

They stepped into the elevator and for a moment Tony thought it was going to be thirty whole seconds of horrifyingly awkward silence. Then Loki spoke,

"You intrigue me, Stark."

"Oh? Should I be flattered?"

"Most certainly," Loki leaned back against the wall of the elevator, his posture so casual it belied the sharp seriousness of his expression. "There are not all that many who do."

"I take it that means you're not going to murder me in my sleep any time soon. Because then you'd lose our little war by default."

Loki laughed at that.

"You are safe for the time being. As I said, you intrigue me. I should like to indulge my curiosity where you are concerned."

"Okay, now I am worried."

The elevator dinged, the doors sliding smoothly open. But for a moment, neither of them moved. Tony had made the mistake of meeting Loki's gaze, and now he found that he couldn't – or didn't want to – relinquish it. Those sharp green eyes were a puzzle, a challenge he should really, really not engage with.

The elevator doors decided that since no-one was going to go through them, they'd close themselves again. Loki's hand shot out and halted their progress, and that was enough to shatter the tension. Tony cleared his throat, and ducked under Loki’s arm out of the elevator.

"I guess you can indulge away," he said, deliberately not looking as Loki easily kept pace with him.

"Oh, I intend to. But you may regret allowing me the freedom for said indulgence," Loki was really far too close but damned if Tony was going to move away. "I have a tendency towards tenacious obsession.”

"I don't doubt that."

They reached the corridor that ended in Loki's quarters. The SHIELD agents Tony had dismissed earlier were nowhere to be seen. Guess they really did take the night off. He didn't have to, but Tony walked with Loki right up to his door. The god put a hand on it, but didn't push it open right away.

"I don't believe I thanked you for your invitation," he said.

"You didn't."

"Then, thank you, Stark."

"JARVIS, tell me you have that saved for posterity, otherwise no-one's ever going to believe me."

Loki glared at him.

"Have a care, Stark."

Tony grinned at him. Loki rolled his eyes, and pushed the door open. Tony tried not to make it obvious that he was straining for a peek into the room that he still couldn't get a camera feed back into, but subtlety had never been his strong suit.

"I will remove the curse from your cameras, if you would like," Loki said, blocking most of the view into his room with his body. Tony had almost gotten a good look at the desk, had caught sight of yet more piles of papers, but now all he could look at was Norse chest. Well-dressed Norse chest, and a decent looking Norse chest, if he was really being honest about it and-

"Yeah, that'd be good. Get Fury off my back at any rate." He took a step back, looking at the floor, the ceiling, the door.

"Work on your bluffing, Stark, and remember who it is you're trying to fool." He finally looked back at Loki, and saw something unreadable in his eyes.

"What are you-" he started, but Loki cut him off.

"Goodnight, Stark." The door clicked shut and Tony stared at it. Then he groaned, and rubbed a hand over his face.

"Why am I like this?" he lamented. "This is terrible. This is so terrible."

"Sir? Would you like me to run a full bio-scan?"

Tony laughed, and began the walk away from Loki's rooms back to his workshop.

"No, JARVIS, not unless you can burn thoughts out of my brain."

"I do not yet have that capacity; however, I am certain with enough time that-" Tony waved a hand.

"Don't even start. Just. Don't."

He could just chalk it down to a personality flaw, he mused as he went. He liked puzzles, he liked a challenge. He liked beautiful things, beautiful people. And a beautiful puzzle? Well, it was only natural that he'd be…interested. Yeah, let's call it that, he decided as he reached the workshop. Interest. He queued up some music and let the riffs and the work block any untoward thoughts his brain might try to entertain.

Just interest.

---

Chapter Six

Tony was having an issue with elevators.

It had started two mornings after Loki had shown up at the movie night. He’d called the elevator as usual, not really paying attention because after said movie night he hadn’t been able to sleep anyway so he’d just stayed up working and then the next day had sort of come and gone and then somehow it was morning again and Bruce was in the lab standing above him and when did he get on the floor and-

To cut a long story short, Bruce had taken one look at that whole situation and told him to go to bed, so he’d gone and called an elevator, and had been staring somewhere into the middle distance with his brain just barely engaged, so at first, he didn’t really notice the green light spilling out from between the elevator doors. Then the doors opened and the light was so bright that even his exhausted mind couldn’t help but realise that something was wrong.

Before more than a single syllable of surprise could escape his lips, the green light had collapsed in on itself and an avalanche of white was crashing towards him, over him, burying him in some sort of alien material that was trying to suffocate him. He cried out in alarm but the wave of white had already knocked him to the ground, covering his face. It was crushing on top of him, pressing him to the floor, oh god, it was in his mouth…

It took far too long for his sleep deprived brain to register what it was he was struggling in a pile of. His fingers squeezed around a handful of the packing peanuts and squashed them into the shape of his palm. The endless avalanche ended, and Tony sat up, styrofoam pieces cascading off him in a squeaky rustle. He spat one out of his mouth. The green light had faded from the elevator and there was no sign of Loki anywhere in the corridor. He settled for glaring up at a security camera, sure that somehow, someway, the god would see it.

“Stark, what the hell are you doing?”

Oh, great. Tony looked up at Fury, making no attempt to extricate himself from the pile of styrofoam he sat in.

“Director. Good morning. Just. You know. Installing new panels and they came with all the…packaging…still. Forgot to take it out before…uh…”

Fury was shaking his head and walking away.

“Forget it, I’ll take the stairs.”

---

After a good ten hours of sleep, Tony was feeling much better and had already started thinking about ways to get Loki back for the elevator trick. He was doodling around on his tablet as he headed to the elevator. He was pretty sure he had all the parts he’d need lying around in the workshop somewhere.

This time he noticed the green glow before the doors opened and managed to dive out of the way just before an elevator’s worth of tiny black, green and gold spheres came tumbling out. They hit the floor and bounced off in every direction. Tony – though he later denied it – shrieked in alarm and pressed himself against the wall, covering his head with his tablet against the onslaught of impossibly bouncy rubber balls that were flinging themselves with reckless abandon across the corridor.

“Holy mother of – Tony what the hell did you do!”

He looked up from underneath the shelter of his tablet to see Steve, in full uniform, attempting to fend off the balls with his shield. They were still going, clearly powered by forces beyond the natural laws of physics.

“Why do you assume I did this?” Tony shot back, deflecting a volley with the tablet. In response Steve angled the shield to send a barrage back at him. Before they could hit, whatever was powering them cut out and regular physics reasserted themselves. The balls dropped to the ground, thumping gently and rolling to cover the floor of the corridor. Tony lowered the tablet. Steve shook his head in disappointment.

“I think I’ll take the stairs this time.”

Tony sighed, shoulders slumping as he watched him leave. He took a step forwards, thinking that he could at least use the elevator now since it wasn’t full of magical rubber balls. His foot slipped on the ball covered floor and he landed on his ass with a hard thud.

Oh, he was going to get Loki back for this. Big time.

---

He would, he mused, be closer to a retaliation if he could spend less time being assaulted by elevators. He’d tried to avoid them but there were a lot of floors in the Avengers tower and unlike certain super soldiers, he couldn’t cheerfully jog up ten flights of stairs without breaking a sweat. But despite his careful examination prior to calling or entering one, Loki always seemed to have a trap ready to spring. Nothing lethal, oh no, that would have called far too much attention to itself. Just things that were inconvenient, annoying and embarrassing.

Aside from packing peanuts and homicidal bouncy balls, he’d been assaulted by self-activating party poppers; self-guided nerf darts; a whirlwind of iridescent butterflies that tangled in his hair and then vanished, leaving him hopping frantically, flapping his hands at himself, while Natasha watched in amusement; and an elevator’s worth of shaving foam. That one had not been fun to clean up.

But the worst one, in Tony’s opinion, was what he referred to afterwards as The Incident. It was the last elevator trick Loki ever pulled and it led to a broken elevator, a defenestration, a serious dent in two king-sized ego’s, and a significant amount of yelling and paperwork in the aftermath.

But before The Incident and in between elevator assaults there were still monsters to fight and amateur-hour supervillains to take care of. And to everyone’s surprise, a reasonable amount of help in fighting them came from Loki. Whether because he was starting to take an interest in his own redemption, curious about the strange energy they kept encountering, or simply bored, no-one was certain. Whatever his reasons, he was on the Avengers good side and seemed to be staying there.

One notable occasion of his involvement came when they were up against an overambitious engineer with a not-so-secret tentacle fetish, who had unleashed a gigantic, multi-limbed, mechanical Lovecraftian horror on the city.

"I have spent enough time on the internet," Tony muttered, dodging yet another shiny metal limb, "To not want to know where this is going to end up."

"Tony, do you have a lock on a power source yet?" Steve came on over the comms.

"Not yet. There's too much…flailing…for me to get close enough to lock onto anything. Can someone get Hulk in a hugging mood?"

"Stark, the power in those limbs would rend your Hulk apart," Loki cut in. "And loathe as I am to pretend to care about his well-being, I believe I have an easier solution if you would be kind enough to aid me in getting closer to this monstrosity."

Tony swooped away from the monster for a moment, searching for Loki. He found him and dove down to hover just above him.

"Taxi for Odinson?"

Loki scowled at him, but reached up and let Tony lift him into the air anyway. With his arms under the gods own, Tony flew them back towards the tentacle beast. He could faintly hear Loki muttering to himself and sparks of green kept shooting across his HUD.

"What's the plan, then?"

"The power source is somewhat magical in nature, if you hadn't already picked that up," Loki said, sounding a little strained. "It is similar to the energy you have been tracking. This being so, I can focus on a power source more easily with my own powers than you will be able to with your machines, and thus destroy this abomination. But distance is still…. difficult to overcome with much of my powers still limited. Hence this rather undignified form of transportation."

"What, you didn't want to teleport yourself directly onto a giant metal octopus? I'm shocked at your self-preservation."

"Shut up and keep still. This requires concentration."

"Sure thing."

It was easy enough to hang there, with the tentacle robot distracted momentarily by the other Avengers. With nothing to do but keep Loki from falling to a splattery doom, Tony amused himself by watching his teammates.

Widow was a study in sleek motion, dodging the smaller tentacles that lashed close to the ground in ways that would make an Olympic gymnast green with envy. Every shot she fired hit home, chipping away at the monstrosity’s armoured exterior. Hulk was grappling with two larger tentacles, further away from the main mass. Tony couldn’t quite hear the angry roars from where he was but he was sure they were ear-shatteringly terrifying. Hawkeye he couldn’t see in person – only the results of every explosive bullseye. Joint after joint along the tentacle limbs shattered in a bloom of fire. He couldn’t see Thor either, as the thunder god was somewhere on the ground on the opposite side of the monster. Tony could tell because he could not only hear the echoing clang of Mjolnir on metal, but see the bright flashes each hammer blow sent up.

He had just moved his attention to Steve, charging forwards with his head tucked behind his shield, when Loki announced that he was finished.

"Done. We should leave. Swiftly."

Tony didn't bother waiting around to argue. His sensors were already picking up increased levels of magical energy, and there was a sickly green glow coming from deep within the central mass of the tentacled beast.

"Loki says to clear the area," he announced over the comms. "I'd take that under serious consideration, I think things are about to get messy."

Tony didn't have the time to track whether the others had gotten clear or not before an explosion roared behind him. The shockwave knocked him a few feet lower in the air and he could practically feel the smugness radiating from Loki’s body at the effect he’d had. He risked a glance backwards to see that all that was left of the tentacled machine was a twisted hunk of metal with the stumps of a dozen multi-jointed limbs sticking out of it, twitching pitifully and occasionally shooting out green sparks.

"Your help is appreciated, Stark," Loki said. "Drop me by the remains of that…thing, would you? I want to take a closer look at whatever warped and poorly planned magic was used to create it."

Tony aimed for a patch of unbroken ground near to the melted mass and let Loki drop before landing himself. He stood back, letting Loki do his thing, while the sensors in the suit scooped up as much information as they could. He'd go over it later with Bruce, see if they couldn't get anything useful out of it. Though if it was anything like the other readings they’d gotten lately it would be maddeningly close to useful without actually giving them anything new. He sighed.

"You done yet?"

Loki waved a hand at him. His arms were glowing with magic, and he had them both plunged into the solid metal of the monsters remains. He was frowning in concentration and Tony couldn't help but see a little bit of himself in that expression. Loki's fascination, his obsession with magic, was as deep as any Tony had for technology. If Loki had been a little less adamant about avoiding anything resembling friendship with him – or anyone else for that matter – he might have liked to talk to him about it some time. Thor had made enough off-hand comments about Asgardian magic being a higher form of science that figuring out how it worked was a permanent addition to Tony’s to-do list.

Finally, Loki pulled his arms out. He muttered something about it being ‘intriguing’ but that was all he would say. He was less sour-faced than usual though as they headed back to the tower. That was another thing that he was starting to do. Despite having his teleportation powers back, he wasn't using them as much as he had been to start off with. For whatever reason, he was spending time in the company of the other Avengers, and even though said time was usually only the minutes between getting to and from the latest problem it was a significant change.

Thor was certainly happy about it, and Thor's happiness meant copious food for everyone, courtesy of the surprising culinary talents of the god of thunder, so really it was a win-win for everyone. In fact, in the past week even Fury hadn't had a thing to complain about. The only time his hackles did go up was when Loki got powered up again. Whatever it was he was doing that determined how much and how frequently his powers got restored, he was apparently doing enough of it because he went green and glowy for a second time in the middle of the street just after he’d helped them bring down another mutant monster. It was only by a miracle of SHIELD efficiency that no trace of it made its way online.

Still, he wasn't out murdering random people, or trying to take over anything, so Fury settled for keeping his agents in the tower, his eye on the security footage and staying as calm as the situation allowed him to.

Until, of course, The Incident.

---

It was entirely possible that Tony had overcomplicated his revenge. He struggled to keep a hold on the various components he held in his arms as he left the workshop and made his way through the tower. Still, if anyone deserved an overcomplicated revenge prank it was Loki. Tony still had bruises from the nerf darts.

He approached the elevator with caution. There was no sign of any green light. He called it and sprang back a few feet down the corridor, nearly dropping his armful of equipment as he did so. The doors chimed softly open and nothing came flying out at him. That was good – and hopefully it meant Loki wasn’t paying much attention to him today. Tony stepped into the elevator and headed up to Loki’s floor.

The plan he had devised had a few steps to it that all had the potential to fail and end with him on the receiving end of another humiliating strike from Loki’s side of the court. He chewed on his lower lip and ran through it all one last time. First, get to Loki’s room without incident – so far, so good on that front. Step two was to get the SHIELD babysitters out of the way without raising suspicion. He had a cover story prepared, and was sure that his usual charm and winning personality would cover any issues there. Then came the tricky part of setting up all the equipment without alerting Loki to his presence, which would have been simple if it were any ordinary person, but Loki had senses beyond the ordinary and so Tony figured he had only a very limited amount of time in which to act. Then, with everything set up he had only to activate the devices and if everything went like he hoped it would, Loki would be paying in full for his tricks.

The elevator stopped and Tony hurried out, still sure that at any moment it would flood with green light and he’d be assaulted by some new magical menace. Thankfully, he remained unmolested by the arcane, and hurried towards Loki’s room. There were two agents on duty and neither of them looked particularly happy to be there, much to Tony’s delight. One of them looked up as he approached. She raised an eyebrow.

“Mr Stark. What are you doing here?”

Tony hefted the gear in his arms.

“Got some work to do in this corridor.”

She frowned.

“Work? Director Fury didn’t say anything about-”

“That’s because he doesn’t need to know about every bit of maintenance I do in my own building.,” Tony interrupted. “Now, the panels I need to get to are, unfortunately, behind your station. Could you pretty please move?” He gave her a winning smile.

The agent rolled her eyes and nudged her partner with an elbow.

“We’re due a break anyway. If you keep an eye on the monitors, then I won’t tell Fury you’re making modifications without telling him.”

“Like I said, I don’t need to tell him anything,” Tony said as the two of them got up. “But sure. I won’t tell if you won’t. This won’t take long.”

He waited until they were out of sight before getting to work. He set down his pile of electronics and quickly found the wall panel he needed. A tug and it was away and then it was the work of a few deft movements to connect the small holo-projector he’d constructed. If all worked as it should, it would be able to create a full, three-dimensional image as well as use JARVIS’ speakers in the hallway to play the pre-made audio Tony had set up.

With a quick glance at the monitors assuring him that Loki was still in his room and absorbed with his strange papers as usual, Tony got up and began assembling his second piece of equipment. Poles extended, containers attached, sensors switched on – yes, his measurements had been accurate and the thing fit perfectly around Loki’s door. He stopped for a moment to admire his handiwork.

Then he hurried away back down the corridor, fishing a pair of heavy bracelets out of his pocket and snapping them onto his wrists. He didn’t think he’d really need Iron Man’s gauntlets for this but it paid to be prepared where Loki was concerned. Tony took a deep breath and, with a swipe on his phone, activated the holo-projector.

A full-sized Hulk bellowed into holographic life in the corridor, its bulk filling the small space. The pre-made audio track kicked in and Tony listened to the sounds of running feet, shouting voices and miscellaneous crashing noises.

Tony wasn’t sure they directly corresponded to any of the other noises but he wasn’t an audio engineer and besides, he didn’t think Loki would care. He shouted out into the corridor.

“Oh shit! Not that way!” the audio played the sound of his palm repulsors and the holo-Hulk flailed its limbs, roaring. “No, that’s Loki’s room, Hulk, stop!”

Tony grinned as he watched Loki’s door fly open. The god stood there, tall and imposing as always, glaring out at the holo-Hulk. His eyes glowed green but before he could so much as summon a shield, Tony’s trap sprang. The contraption he’d erected around the door smoothly executed the simple function Tony had built into it. Motors whirred silently and the containers tipped up. The first splashed its contents over Loki’s head, the sticky, syrup-like substance drenching him in seconds. Loki’s eyes blazed with fury at the realisation of what was going on and as he started to move, the second container deposited its load as well.

Feathers of every colour swirled about him, sticking fast wherever they touched the syrup that Tony had concocted specifically for this purpose. Loki finally saw Tony where he was hiding at the other end of the corridor and started towards him, striding through the holo-Hulk. It flickered around him but didn’t deactivate, and the audio was still running.

“Stark!” Loki snarled. Feathers fluttered in the air behind him and Tony couldn’t stop his laughter at the sight of the furious god, now head to toe in rainbow coloured feathers. Then his survival instinct kicked in as Loki got closer and he turned to run for the elevator. It opened as he reached it and in that moment, he forgot about the previous elevator incidents altogether and kept running.

Green light blazed in front of him.

“Oh, shit!”

He was going too fast to avoid it. The light burned, grew solid, and then they were on him.

Eggs. Dozens and dozens of eggs of every kind. He was almost knocked to the ground by the sheer force of the first barrage hitting him head on. Yolk and egg white and shell coated his face, his chest, his legs. Tony staggered backwards and still the eggs kept coming. He flung up a hand and the bracelet activated, trapping his sticky hand inside a gauntlet. His other hand trying to fend off the eggs that still came at him, Tony only realised he’d fired a shot when there was an explosion in the elevator and he found himself blinking away smoke as well as egg yolk.

He spun around to see Loki with his arms folded, managing to look smug under all the goo and feathers he was still covered in. Tony glared, about to snap a comment at him, when his foot slipped on the slimy floor and he went over backwards. The palm repulsor went off again and as Tony landed he saw that he’d hit Loki. He stared in horror as the god flew backwards – and smashed through the window behind him.

The holo-Hulk roared, the projection sparking and glitching, seemingly not recovered from Loki passing through it. The onslaught of eggs finally stopped and Tony managed to sit up. Behind him there was another explosion from the elevator and more smoke filled the corridor.

He heard running feet and only when the SHIELD agents appeared through the smoke did he realise it wasn’t coming from the audio he’d set up. They stared in horror at the inexplicable scene before them.

“Uh, I can explain,” Tony started.

“You’d better be able to,” said Steve from behind him. Tony winced and looked around. Well, wasn’t that just great. The gang was all there.

Steve had his arms folded, lips pressed together. Natasha had a gun in each hand but they hung at her sides as she stared around at the chaos in the corridor, a faint smirk on her lips. Clint was doubled up in laughter, and Bruce was looking at the holo-Hulk, still twitching in electric spasms, in confusion. Thor pointed his hammer at Tony and boomed,

“Where is my brother, Tony Stark?”

Tony closed his eyes and sighed.

He had one mother of a headache coming on.

---

He felt like a kid in detention. He hadn’t even been able to mouth off to Fury when he’d shown up in the infirmary to scream at him and Loki for a full thirty minutes. And when Tony thought he was done and he’d be able to slink away and nurse his aching body in peace, Fury had started in on the utter perils of dismissing SHIELD escorts to resident supervillains and watching eighties action movies with them. By the time he’d left Tony’s headache was worse than ever and he was on the point of wishing he’d never been born.

The only upside was that Loki was feeling at least as bad as he was. The two of them were sat in chairs by the window of the infirmary, which was where Fury had ‘politely insisted’ that they stay for the next few hours. For medical reasons, of course. They’d managed to get reasonably cleaned up, though Tony was sure he still smelt faintly of raw eggs. Loki had actual bandages on his arms where the window had smashed around him, and strips of gauze on his forehead. When he’d fallen from the window, Tony found out later, he’d saved himself by teleporting away. He’d managed to aim himself at the infirmary but had still been falling when he appeared and had smashed his head on a counter.

Tony wished he could have seen the look on the face of whoever had been in there at the time. He sighed and adjusted the ice pack on his neck. Next to him, Loki was picking at the gauze on his head.

“You’ve still got feathers in your hair,” Tony said. Loki glared at him, then winced. He ran his fingers through his hair, dislodging the few colourful quills that had clung there. They floated to the floor, clumped and matted with goo and water. The two men stared at them for a long moment.

“I feel,” Loki started, his words slow and careful, “That things may have, perhaps, gotten a shade out of hand this afternoon.”

Tony nodded.

“Can’t say I disagree with you there. What do you say we call a truce for now?”

Loki chuckled.

“Oh, no, you won’t win that easily, Stark.”

“This afternoon proves that there are no winners in this contest. Just sticky, humiliated losers.”

Loki tilted his head in a motion that might have been agreement.

“A fair point. But I shall be exceedingly bored without something to entertain me, Stark.”

It was Tony’s turn to laugh.

“God forbid you get bored, obviously.”

“Obviously.”

“Well, what do you want? Because I get the sense that if we keep escalating, I won’t have a tower left - or any friends to keep in it.”

Loki thought for a moment, running his forefinger across his lips in thought. Tony caught himself staring at them motion and snapped his eyes away, praying Loki hadn’t noticed.

“Perhaps we need not escalate,” Loki said at last, “Perhaps we need only…expand our horizons a little more.”

“I don’t know if I like where this is going.”

Loki grinned, catlike, his eyes brightening. Tony ignored the tiny jump in his chest at the sight of it, at the way Loki’s eyes shone into his.

“You have demonstrated some ingenuity in laying me low this afternoon. Your talents will never be enough to outdo me, so I suggest we combine our resources instead. The whole is greater than its parts, after all.”

“I’ll ignore that blatant insult for now. But a team-up? And prank who, the city of New York?”

“A little large a dream for one so small,” Loki said. “No, I was thinking of something closer to home. You have five other Avengers in this tower, each presenting a unique opportunity. And of course, in engaging with me you have neglected your efforts against Agent Barton.”

“He has gone un-pranked for far too long,” Tony agreed. This was a bad idea, he knew. A terrible idea. The chorus of Steve-Pepper-Rhodey’s was kicking up one hell of a fuss in the back of his head but he didn’t have the time to listen to a conscience when the other parts of his brain were already spinning through the possibilities.

“With my magic, and your knowledge of the Avengers, as well as your…entertaining little inventions-“

“Patronise me again and I’ll knock you out of another window.”

“Oh, do try, I should love to see it,” Loki leaned closer to him, that smile still glittering. Tony swallowed. “What do you say Stark? Do you feel like causing a little more mischief?”

Tony returned the smile, schemes and blueprints dancing through his head.

“You know what, Loki? I absolutely do.”

---

Chapter Seven

After such an explosive end to their original arrangement, they laid low for the next few days. Just to let things die down a little. Although Tony suspected that the egg-related puns at his expense would continue until the day he died. When they judged it had been long enough for at least Fury’s blood to have settled below the boiling point, they plunged right in with their first victim.

And of course, it was Clint, who in Tony's view had gone for far too long un-pranked. The idea was simple enough, and once Tony had whipped up a ‘new’ batch of arrows for Barton to test, they were off and running. Well, technically they were new – cosmetically.

Barton felt them over, eyes narrowed. Tony watched him expectantly, knowing that he wouldn’t find anything wrong.

"Why do you want to watch?" he said, as Tony followed him down to the training rooms. “Normally you don’t give a crap.”

"I just want to see how my gift works out for you. Subtle changes for big results, hopefully, but you never know. They might just explode in your face. Primary data is always useful."

"Then get the recordings from JARVIS," Barton grumbled as they stepped through the door. While he was setting up his bow, Tony glanced around for Loki. There was a flicker of green at the far end of the room. Luckily the shooting range part of the training floor had enough targets for Loki to easily hide behind one that wasn’t currently in use. And, doubly fortuitous, they were the only ones there that day. Not hugely surprising, given Barton’s monopoly on ranged weaponry, but good all the same.

Clint drew back and Tony held his breath as the arrow shot through the air. For a moment, he thought it would fly too fast for Loki perform his part of the trick. Then the arrow thudded into its target in a shower of green sparks and a beautiful, flawlessly white dove fluttered up from the bullseye to perch on top of the target.

"What the-" Clint started. He already had another arrow lined up, but now he was eyeing it with suspicion. Tony shrugged, his expression as innocent as he could make it.

"I'm good with tech, but I'm not a wizard. Don't look at me. Maybe it was just a fluke – try another one."

Barton fired again, and this time an inky black raven joined the dove on top of the target. Clint looked like he was about to attempt to shove his bow somewhere painful on Tony, when Loki stepped out of hiding.

"I applaud your accuracy, Agent Barton," he said smoothly, voice cutting clearly across the room. Clint's head snapped around and he was notching another arrow before Loki had taken three steps. Loki raised his hands, surrendering. "Shoot me if you wish, but as I am not allergic to birds, I doubt you will have much effect. Stark – you should really be more careful which compounds you mix together."

"I'll take that under advisement," Tony shot back, fighting the urge to grin. Loki's expression was so serious that if it hadn't been blatantly obvious that it was magic, Tony might have believed he really did have nothing to do with what had happened. God of Lies was a well-deserved title.

"I'll get you back for this, Stark," Clint thrust his bow at Tony. "You watch your back. And yours too," he shook an arrow at Loki. "I don't know how, or when, but you'll get yours. Just wait."

And with that somewhat nebulous threat, he left. Tony watched him leave, and managed to not look at Loki for ten whole seconds. At first glance, Loki's face was impassive, as if he had zero interest in what had just transpired. But there was a little twitch at the corner of his mouth, and a slight crinkling of his eyes, and as soon as he met Tony's look a full-blown grin took over. Tony ignored the somersault his stomach decided to do at having that smile aimed his way.

"You were right," he said, "This is far more fun. And I don't have to be the only one looking like an idiot."

"It is not as if you need my help to appear such, Stark," Loki said, but he was still grinning, so Tony didn't take it too hard. He clapped his hands together.

"So, who's next?"

---

Everyone was, as it turned out. Far too excited about having magic on his side, Tony had gone from the range to the workshop and spent far too many hours fiddling with his Lab Rats. In between pretending to analyse the re-arranged data from the magical energy readings, he soldered and screwed and cursed his way to a collection of odd-looking little robots.

Sometimes Loki would join him in the workshop, appearing out of nowhere and perching on a workbench or just leaning against the wall to stare as Tony worked. Several times Tony was sure the god was staring at him rather than the objects he was working on, but every time he tried to turn fast enough to catch him, Loki’s eyes were always somewhere else. He was imagining it. He had to be.

The modified Lab Rats lined up one after the other along the floor, each with its own little quirk. One had a series of nozzles on the front of its head, another had sprouted speakers like strange growths over its back, and yet another had some kind of catapult device that folded down into its sleek silver back. These and several others sat patiently waiting for orders from their creator.

“What do you intend to do with these creatures, Stark?” Loki asked, when Tony finally seemed to be finished. At the very least there were no more pre-existing robots left to modify.

“Easy – send these little pre-made prank packages into everyone’s rooms, where they will hopefully annoy the shit out of some Avengers and possibly other assorted Stark and SHIELD personnel. Then you’ll poof them away,” Tony waggled his fingers to indicate the use of magic. “Teamwork.”

Loki lifted an eyebrow.

“Hardly. I prefer to be a little more than a getaway driver for your party favours.”

“This is just a little smattering of entertainment,” Tony ran a hand over the back of the last Lab Rat he’d finished with. Its motors whirred under his touch. “You know. Like snack food, but for pranks. Just to keep people occupied while we work on something bigger. It can’t all be arrows into birds and elevators full of eggs.”

“Alright, Stark, as you wish – on one condition.”

“Which is?”

Loki smiled.

“That my brother be first.”

---

The two of them were hunched over a tablet in Tony’s workshop, watching through the eyes of the Lab Rat as it navigated around Thor’s rooms. Loki had kindly transported it into there, saving Tony the trouble of steering it through the building, and now they were searching for the best place for it to hide in wait. They only had about five minutes to settle on a location, since, according to the schedule Tony had gotten JARVIS to access from SHIELD, Thor should have just finished his meeting with Fury.

“Which one did you have me send?” Loki murmured. He was far too close for comfort, his arm pressed up against Tony’s. Tony was eighty percent sure he could smell Loki’s hair, and ninety percent sure that he liked it. He stared resolutely at the tablet screen.

“Silly string,” he said.

“Which is?” Loki asked, but before Tony could answer they heard a door open through the Lab Rat’s transmission. Tony tapped on the screen and the robot zoomed its way to the nearest cover – which happened to be under Thor’s bed. Tony held his breath, even though there was no way for Thor to hear them. This Lab Rat didn’t have speakers attached.

The video feed showed a pair of booted feet walking towards it. Then there was a creak, and they were looking at the feet from behind. Thor, it seemed, was now sitting right above the Lab Rat. Large hands reached down to begin undoing the boots in front of them and Loki pointed.

“Once he removes his boots, use it then. His feet are particularly vulnerable.”

“Your brother has ticklish feet? That’s adorable,” Tony said. He tapped a few icons on the tablet and in Thor’s room the Lab Rat readied its nozzles. Thor’s boots came off and, chance of all chances, he pulled off his socks as well. Somehow feeling Loki’s smirk next to him, Tony sent the command.

The Lab Rat opened fire and a long burst of silly string erupted from the front of it, hitting its target dead on. They heard Thor yelp in a much higher pitch than Tony had ever heard from him in person as the sticky mess sprayed over his feet, coating them in a multi-coloured mess. Thor leapt away from the bed, kicking at what covered his feet.

Loki was laughing beside him.

“I wish that I could see his face!”

He got his wish – Thor had knelt and was staring under the bed, directly at the Lab Rat. He scowled at it and Tony’s laughter faded at the sight of the hand growing larger and larger on the tablet screen.

“Loki, save my robot!” he cried, frantically reversing the Lab Rat away from Thor’s approaching hand. Loki’s fingers waved and in a burst of green light the Lab Rat appeared on the table, still reversing. It shot off and zoomed across the floor until Tony hit the brakes. He carefully drove the little creature back towards them, picked it up and set it on the table.

“Good job, buddy,” he said, tapping a couple of fingers on its head.

“Squeak!” said the Lab Rat.

Tony sighed.

“I specifically programmed all of you not to do that.”

“Beep!”

“Better.”

He felt a hand on his shoulder. Loki was grinning at him, eyes bright.

“Another!”

---

They spent the rest of the day teleporting Lab Rats around the Avengers tower, spraying silly string, catapulting magical orbs of goo, and startling people with sudden noises. It was mundane entertainment by most standards, and despite the technology powering it, it was really very juvenile. Still, it kept them amused and nobody got traumatically injured by anything, so they saw no reason to stop. Not until towards the end of the day, when they encountered Natasha.

Tony was surprised that they’d managed to sneak a Lab Rat up on her in the first place. Even with Loki’s magical transportation of the robots, he’d always assumed that Natasha had at least twelve additional senses that ordinary humans didn’t have, and would have been immediately aware of its presence by ESP or something. But she didn’t so much as twitch when the Lab Rat materialised behind her in the kitchen.

The Lab Rat they’d used this time was the one with the bulging speakers along its back. They’d had great success already blasting unexpected noises at people and vanishing away. Tony scrolled through his list of audio files.

“What do you think?” he asked Loki, without looking up. “Obnoxious siren? Piercing scream? Sudden explosion?”

Loki reached over and pushed the nearest icon.

“Sometimes you think too much, Stark,” he said.

The audio was muffled somewhat, coming back through the Lab Rats audio feed, but it was still loud and distorted enough to make them wince. The cacophonous elephant trumpeting had an immediate effect on the Black Widow. She spun around, knife in hand, caught sight of the Lab Rat on the floor behind her, and threw. Tony instinctively pushed away from the screen, almost knocking Loki out of his chair, as the knife flew at the Lab Rat. It embedded itself in the floor millimetres from the Lab Rat’s camera, the blurry edge vibrating with force.

Then the view spun as Natasha picked up the robot. Her face appeared in the camera, her gaze like cold steel.

“Watch your back, Stark,” she said. “Unlike Barton, I’m not too lazy to follow through on revenge.”

Then the camera went static.

“Don’t bother bringing that one back,” Tony said dully. “It’ll be scrap metal by now.”

“I like her,” Loki drummed his fingertips together, “What do you think she’ll do?”

“Trust me when I say I don’t think either of us want to know.”

---

They retired the Lab Rats, at least temporarily, after that. It would be too obvious to keep using the same tricks over and over again. And while Tony went back to the drawing board for the tech side of things, Loki took it upon himself to entertain them both by putting the rest of the Avengers through the Colour Change Challenge. And while all of them gave both Loki and Tony suspicious looks every time it happened, no-one could exactly prove anything. When questioned, Tony swore blind that it was something to do with the magical radiation.

The news footage from the incidents was well worth the week of bio-scans he had to run on the Hulk as a result.

And then it was Steve’s turn. Tony had finished his latest bit of technological fiddling, and while the modifications he’d made to his repulsors were purely cosmetic, it was the perfect cover for Loki to use his magic to mess with the Captain.

He was suspicious from the outset of course. Tony played truant to the training sessions he was supposed to attend, and wasn’t exactly known for actively requesting sparring time. But Steve gave him the benefit of the doubt and showed up as Tony had requested, in full gear with shield in hand.

“What did you say you did to your suit?” he asked as he entered, his eyes darting around every corner of the room. Tony gave him a smile, and beckoned him to come closer. He’d made a point to move – well, to get Loki to move – most of the training equipment off to the sides, as if he really had made something new to test.

“I modified the repulsors,” Tony said. “The configuration of the energy beam is gravimetrically balanced now, and I increased the power outage by thirty percent to start with, as well as switching the polarity on-”

Steve raised a hand.

“Stop trying to blind me with science. You made them stronger and you want to see if it worked.”

Tony shrugged.

“Pretty much. And I want to make sure they won’t destroy your shield if they hit it. Not something I want to test in the middle of a fight.”

“You’ve made your point.” Steve lifted the shield. “Hit me with your best shot.”

Tony pretended to fiddle with his gauntlets for a few seconds, glancing out the corner of his eye at Loki, who was leaning up against the far wall, tucked away in the shadowy corner. Loki gave him a small nod and flashed a grin. Tony raised his gauntlets and aimed at the shield.

“Brace yourself.”

The repulsors fired and a blast of energy that was, functionally, the same as it always had been, shot out at the shield. But instead of the usual bright blue-white this blast was a shimmering rainbow of colours that lit up the room. Tony saw Steve’s eyes widen in surprise behind the shield in the split second before it hit. The beam rebounded off the shield in the usual way, and Steve quickly aimed it down to explode against the floor.

Apart from a few scorch marks, there was very little damage. The room had, after all, been designed to let even the Hulk spar in it without being destroyed. Tony lowered his hands.

“Well, that seemed to work as expected,” he said.

Steve was staring at his shield.

“Oh,” Tony feigned surprise. “That didn’t come up in the simulations.”

Steve’s shield was flopping over his arm. The colours had run into each other and were somehow dripping from the lower rim, leaving splashes of red, white and blue on the floor. He moved his arm and the shield wobbled.

“Huh,” he said. He shook his arm up and down. The now jelly-like shield waggled back and forth. More splashes of colour dripped to the floor.

“Well. That’s gonna be a tough one to fix.” He carefully slid his arm free and dropped the shield. It landed with a wet splat.

“I’ll leave it in your capable hands,” he said. “You can drop it off at the armoury when it’s fixed.”

Then, without so much as a hint of a frown, Steve turned on his heel and strolled out of the training hall. When he was gone, Loki peeled out of the shadows and the two of them looked at each other, neither of them with any idea how to respond to Steve’s…lack of response.

“He’s been hanging out with Bruce too much,” Tony said finally. Then he looked at the shield, which was starting to spread like melting butter. “You…uh…you can fix that, right?”

Loki snapped his fingers and with a gong! the shield was back to its usual indestructible self. He walked over and as he bent to pick it up, Tony found himself averting his eyes from tightly-clad, mischief god ass.

“Back to the drawing board,” he said. Loki tossed him the shield and he staggered back a little as he caught it. Damn, the thing was heavy – and Steve flung this around like it was a Frisbee? “Luckily for us, I have just the thing.”

Which was how he ended up pacing the floor of the workshop, watching a video feed of Steve’s room while Loki put together the contraption he’d dreamed up.

“No, other way up,” he muttered as he stared at the tablet screen. God, he hated watching other people put things together. Loki’s hands were deft, certainly (and with such long, delicate fingers, a little voice whispered before it was quickly squashed by the Steve-Pepper-Rhodey voice of reason), but they weren’t used to the kind of machines that Tony’s were. Good for magic, not quite as good for electronics.

Tony switched to the camera in the hall. Still no sign of Steve. He’d be back soon, Tony was certain. He gnawed on his lower lip so furiously it was a miracle he didn’t chew right through it.

“Come on, come on,” he whispered. Finally, the Loki on the screen straightened up and then vanished.

“You enjoy making things complicated, don’t you?” he said, suddenly behind Tony. Even though he’d been expecting it, Tony still jumped.

“Can’t you appear in front of me? Does magic not work if I’m looking at the place you materialise, you walking heart attack?”

“You are still breathing. Calm yourself. How long until the Captain returns?” Loki plucked the tablet from Tony’s hands and hopped up onto a workbench. He leaned back on one arm, the tablet held low in his lap. His hair fell across his face as he stared down and Tony found himself swallowing an oddly dry throat as he watched him absently tuck it back behind his ear. Had his neck always been that long? Had his skin always looked so smooth?

“Ah, he is back,” Loki said, breaking into Tony’s confused reverie. “Come, watch your mischief play out.”

Tony pulled up a chair and slid up in front of Loki, who held the screen out so that they could both see.

“He was in the corridor a moment ago,” Loki murmured. They watched the door to Steve’s room open, and Tony realised he was holding his breath. The door swung in, touched the contact that would set the mechanism off and then-

Air horns blared and a huge bang almost shorted out the tablets speakers. The confetti cannon exploded just as it was supposed to and Tony yelled in delight at the whirl of colourful paper that enveloped Steve.

There was a shout and then a thudding crash. The smoke of the cannon slowly cleared and Tony’s mouth hung open.

“I don’t believe him.”

Steve’s fight or flight reflex had kicked in and selected fight, apparently, and he had punched out at the noise. Somehow, he had hit the confetti cannon and punched it clean through the wall into the corridor. He stood there, staring at the destruction. Then, to Loki and Tony’s supreme frustration, he gave a sigh, shrugged his shoulders, and flopped himself down on the bed. They stared at him as he picked up his laptop and tapped away.

“Is he…watching Netflix?” Tony said brokenly.

"Your Captain is remarkably stoic," Loki said, setting the tablet down. "It is most unamusing."

"Oh, it’s all an act,” Tony grumbled. “Has to be. He knows I’m behind these, and he’d hate to give me the satisfaction of responding to them. But we can get him to crack. We’ve just gotta keep trying." Tony kicked off from the workbench, sending his chair wheeling across the room. He hit a different workbench, span around and sent himself spinning back. He had just shoved himself off again when an idea came to him. He spun the chair mid-slide, and slammed his feet down, stopping himself, then with one push slid back up to Loki, coming to a halt with his hands on the gods’ knees. Loki didn't exactly look impressed, but he made no move to push Tony’s hands away. He filed that one away for later.

"How well can you cook?" he asked .

And once he’d explained his plan, Loki’s grin could have put the Cheshire Cat to shame.

---

Chapter Eight

As it turned out, Loki's many centuries of life had not been entirely wasted on being a tricky little shit, and he had picked up skills other than magic and violence. Still, Thor was the only one who wasn't astonished to walk into the shared kitchen to find the resident ex-supervillain whirling from counter to stove to oven to fridge like a menacing culinary tornado. Equally, no-one was surprised when said ex-supervillain snarled at them to get out of the way when they tried to get any food for themselves. The only one who managed to get anywhere near him was Tony, and even he was chased away when Loki caught him trying to steal a handful of cherry tomatoes.

Tony nearly lost a finger to Loki's very accurate, very fast knife, and decided that he’d just wait for the plan to unfold in the common area with everyone else. Once there he found that the team had decided to do some rearranging. Natasha was supervising, sat on the back of one of the sofa’s that was now pushed to the far window side, watching with a critical eye as Steve and Bruce attempted to put together some sort of enormous table. Tony had no idea where it had come from and made a mental note to get someone to do a tower-wide inventory.

“What’s going on?” he asked, popping the singly tomato he’d managed to steal into his mouth.

Natasha jerked a thumb at the doorway, where Thor and two harassed looking SHIELD agents were bringing chairs into the room. Thor had two chairs in each hand, the agents held one each and looked as if they’d rather be anywhere else.

“As soon as he found out Loki was cooking, he decided we should honour his efforts with a ‘proper feast’,” She rolled her eyes, but she was smiling a little.

"My brothers cooking demands respect!" Thor set down his chairs and set his hands on his hips. “It is a poor substitute for a true Asgardian feasting hall, but it is a good effort.”

“I’m glad you appreciate our work,” Tony looked down to see Clint crawling out from under the table. He tossed a screwdriver at Natasha without looking, and she caught it with one blink-and-you’ll-miss-it flash of a hand. Clint, Steve and Bruce stood back, eyeing the table with a mix of suspicion and satisfaction. Nothing like a proud DIY father, Tony thought.

“It is vastly appreciated,” Thor clapped Clint on the shoulder. “And it will be well worth the effort. I have not tasted of my brothers cooking in many years, though I doubt he has lost his touch. You are in for a great treat tonight!”

"I'm sure we are," Tony muttered. His phone buzzed in his pocket. There was no message, just a green starburst in the centre of the screen that exploded three times then vanished. Clearly it was time for him to supply his ingredient for dinner.

"Anyone want a beer?"

This question was met with a resounding yes, including the SHIELD agents, and Tony slipped back into the kitchen. It was hotter than it had been before, much more so than the common area. Loki was still darting around it like a whirling dervish.

"Asgardian cooking is really something, huh?" Tony remarked. Loki shot him a look that was too concentrated on other things to be a proper glare. He’d tied his hair back while he worked, but a section had escaped on the right side, and he kept absently trying to make it stay behind his ear.

"Just do your part Stark,” he said, giving something incredible-smelling a brief stir, “I will not make such an effort again if your creation fails."

"Oh, relax, Swedish Chef. I got this."

The small vial he drew out of his pocket was about forty-percent science, fifty-percent magic, and ten-percent luck and guesswork. He was pretty sure it would work – he hadn’t stayed up for three days straight learning biochemistry for it not too. But for all the effort that had gone into making it, adding their little concoction to the food was the work of about thirty seconds. It turned the steam a disquieting shade of green for a moment, fizzed in the various pans, then dissolved to hopefully undetectable nothing. The only way they’d know if it had worked would be when the intended effects kicked in.

Tony crossed to the fridge to get the beers he’d come for, then managed to trip over Loki as he headed back towards the common room. His ankle tangled with Loki’s and he nearly went face first against the counter. A strong hand grabbed the back of his shirt and hauled him up.

"Do be careful, Stark. If you injure yourself while in here, I shall be blamed and I won't have your SHIELD cronies poking their noses closer at me again for your sake."

He let go and Tony took a step back – then found he was up against the counter and couldn’t retreat. He managed a smirk in the face of those intensely glittering eyes.

“You say the sweetest things.”

Loki’s mouth twitched a little, and then he was back to his preparations.

Tony re-joined the others in the common room and distributed beers. The SHIELD agents took theirs and practically ran from the room. Tony was pretty sure that SHIELD was having to write a whole new rulebook on Avengers protocol at this point. After all, what does a reasonably trained secret agent do when faced with a motley collection of superheroes building furniture and having dinner together?

Soon enough they were all sat around the table, and a few minutes later the food just kind of…appeared in front of them. Clint almost spilled the last of his beer in shock. Loki came strolling out of the kitchen, looking distinctly unflustered now, as neat and well-dressed as ever. He spread his hands, a small smirk on his face.

“Enjoy,”

No further prompting was needed. The vast array of dishes, none of which Tony had any hope of naming, all smelt too divine to be real, and all of them heaped their plates high. Loki, taking the only empty seat left – next to Tony, because of course it was – did more than a little basking in the compliments that came flying his way. In the commotion, Tony managed to swig down the other flask he’d had stashed away. This one contained a counter-measure to the original concoction, and should keep him free of its effects. He didn’t know if Loki had taken his own one, or if he’d be able to avoid everything with his magic.

And, he thought, the effects should be starting to kick in any minute now. He focused on his plate, kept eating, and waited.

It hit Bruce first. He was asking Tony if there were any beers left and by the end of the sentence his voice had gone up an entire octave. He blinked as everyone stopped eating to stare at him.

"What the-?" his voice squeaked even higher. Tony and Loki placidly ate on, pretending not to notice.

"Yeah, there should be some more left. Clint, be a babe and go check, would you?"

"Go check your…self…" Clint's anger devolved into confusion as his voice plummeted into the lowest of registers. He coughed, and thumped his chest. "What did you do, Stark?"

"Me? Nothing!" Tony pointed at himself with his fork. "I can't believe you'd accuse me of-"

He was interrupted by a belch from Natasha, who quickly covered her mouth when it escaped her lips in the form of a shimmering blue bubble. Silence fell momentarily as it floated across the table. It hovered for a second right in front of Steve’s face. Then it popped with chiming sound, and dropped glittering sparks all over his plate. Steve stared at the place where it had been, a slight frown of confusion on his face.

“Seriously, Tony, what did you do?” his voice had dropped into the deepest of bass registers and Tony stared and stared, sure that there was the hint of a smile twitching at the corner of his lips.

"Loki, it has been a long time since you behaved this childishly," Thor tried to admonish his brother from the opposite end of the table. The sting was taken out of it as his voice shot up to match Bruce's. He belched as well, a mouse-like squeak that released a pink-hued bubble from his lips. It burst in the middle of the table in a shower of golden sparks. Thor pointed a finger at his brother. “Loki…” he started in as menacing a tone as he could manage while sounding like he’d inhaled a full canister of helium.

And then his hair turned green. He seemed to feel the change somehow – could he feel the magic? Tony wondered – and ran his hand through it, liftin the strands in front of his eyes in dismay. Loki sat back in his chair, smirking.

Before Thor could chide him again, a ripple of magic seemed to run around the table, leaping from person to person as the changes brought on by Tony and Loki’s ‘seasoning’ kicked in. Natasha gasped as spotted yellow and black fur appeared on the back of her hands and raced up her arms. Colourful belch bubbles floated from mouth after mouth, showering clouds of glimmering sparks across the table. Clint grabbed at his ears, feeling the new, furry, rounded shapes with a look of horror on his face.

Bruce started to say something, managed a few syllables of almost bat-pitched squeaks, and then gave up in helpless giggles at the sound of his own voice. And, Tony assumed, at the rainbow coloured hue Steve’s hair had taken on. Tony watched Steve intently.

Come on, this has to do it. This is the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever seen, Capsicle. It has to be.

Steve looked down at his hands, which were changing colour every few seconds. He looked around at the table. At Bruce in high-pitched fits of laughter. At Clint pawing at his ears and glaring at Loki, as he hiccupped out bubble after bubble. At a green-haired Thor, trying and failing to glare angrily at Loki while metallic scales raced up and down his biceps. At Natasha, booming laughter, sounding uncannily like Jabba the Hutt, and tormenting Clint with her furry hands.

He finally met Tony’s eyes. Tony lifted an eyebrow. Steve raised one of his own and it turned shocking pink. He blinked. Sighed. Bit his lip.

Thor belched, long and loud, releasing a hot-dog shaped balloon that floated down the table, slowly rotating. It passed between Tony and Steve, a blue filter hovering between them. It burst with the sound of dozens of tiny, tinkling bells.

“Excuse me,” Thor said quietly in his helium squeak.

And that did it. Steve’s mouth twitched, grinned, and he finally rolled his eyes, threw back his head and laughed.

“Alright, Tony, you win. You win!” his extremely bass voice reverberated around the room, only making everyone else’s giggles worse. Steve shook his head. “You win.”

Tony punched the air.

“Yes! I am the greatest!”

“Loki, you ought to be ashamed, behaving this way,” Thor squeaked out. He coughed, and a collection of tiny multi-coloured bubbles floated up to the ceiling.

"Oh, come now Thor, would I really be so petty?" Loki said, eyes as wide and innocent as he could make them. “I assure you, Mr Stark is entirely responsible for this incident.” He glanced at Tony, who glared at his stupid, handsome, smirking face.

If I go down, you're coming down with me, Tony thought.

"Well, you know what they say, Loki, it takes two to tango. My genius can only go so far." Loki’s smirk vanished and it was Tony’s turn to grin.

Steve sighed and picked up his fork.

"At least our embarrassment tasted delicious."

"To the asshole chef," Clint rumbled, lifting his beer. "And his shit-eating accomplice."

"Sous-chef, surely," said Tony, knocking his can against Clint's.

"Hardly," Loki muttered.

The effects wore off slowly as they finished up the meal. Thor’s green hair was the last to go, and he ran his fingers through the blonde-again strands with a sigh of relief. Still, everyone’s paranoia radar pinged off the scale when Loki disappeared the dinner dishes and raised his hands, ready to replace them with deseert.

"Are we all gonna start speaking in tongues when this arrives?” Bruce asked, eyeing Loki suspiciously.

"I can promise you, the dessert is untouched," Tony said, "Scout's honour."

Natasha snorted.

"You were never a scout."

"Hey, I could have been! It's not like it would have been hard to get all those badges."

"Yeah, yeah."

Their bickering was cut short as Loki dropped his hands and a wash of green magic passed over the table. Every single Avenger immediately reverted to a five-year-old at a birthday party when the dessert appeared. Ice cream, chocolate, brownie, caramel – and that was just the surface layer of the incredible looking sundaes that stood in elegant glass dishes along the table.

"I can feel my arteries clogging just looking at this," Clint said, plunging his spoon deep into the layers of sugary goodness. "I'm not gonna move for a week."

"I am pleased you have learned of human desserts," Thor said, digging into his own, which Tony was sure had tiny pop tarts scattered on the top of it. "I had thought you might frighten us with your favoured dish from home."

"None of your palates are nearly refined enough for that," Loki said, elegantly scooping up cream from the top of his own dessert. "And Midgardian sweets have a certain allure."

Tony was too busy excavating his way down his own sundae to pay much attention to the conversation. Truth be told, when he'd planned this with Loki, they'd only ever discussed making the dinner and spiking it. The only reason Loki had taken on the cooking task was because Tony had zero culinary knowledge beyond packets, tins and toast. He watched the mischief god out of the corner of his eye, remembering how, back when he'd first arrived, the sweet foods were the ones that he seemed to eat the most of.

Thinking of that made him remember the first prank he'd pulled in their little war. And didn't that seem like an age ago, he mused, licking chocolate sauce from the back of his spoon. Had it really been only a few months?

"Is there something on my face, Stark?" Loki murmured. Tony blinked, and realised that he'd been staring. Never one to let himself be caught in an awkward situation, he simply reached out one finger, and swiped at the corner of Loki's mouth.

"Yup. Chocolate right there." Before Loki could realise there had been nothing there at all, Tony pretended to lick his finger clean, and grinned. Loki's head tilted slightly to the side, and he brushed his own fingers over his mouth.

"Thank you," he murmured, then stood abruptly. "As the creator of this meal, I thus have the right to pass the duty of cleaning up its remnants on to you all. Thor knows his way around dishes well enough. I bid you goodnight."

"Brother!" Thor protested, but Loki had already vanished. Thor scowled. “He has never cleaned a plate in his life.”

“Weren’t you both princes?” Natasha asked.

“Father called it character building,” Thor muttered, poking at the remains of his ice-cream. “Loki soon found ways around it.”

"Ah, let's just do it," Steve stood, clapping Thor on the shoulder. "You can teach me some more of that battle hymn you were telling me about yesterday."

Tony sat back in his chair and watched as the others cleared the table, cleaned it up and began figuring out how to dismantle it. He stretched, yawning a little, then excused himself to his rooms. Things had gone better than expected. They’d gotten to Steve, nobody had tried to murder either of them in retaliation, and Loki had certainly seemed pleased with the praise he’d gotten before the trick was revealed. All in all, a good night’s work.

Then again, if someone had told Tony four months ago that he'd be sharing dinner and dessert with the guy who led the invasion of New York, he'd have laughed in their face. So much had changed since then, himself included. Funny how things go, he thought. But it wasn't funny things he was thinking of as he stripped and slid into bed. It was the look Loki had gotten just after he'd faked swiping chocolate sauce from his lips. Even turning it over in his mind he couldn't quite decipher it.

He shoved an arm under his pillow, closed his eyes tightly and decided Loki’s face was a problem for another day. His subconscious didn't quite agree, and his dreams that night had more Loki in them than he was entirely comfortable with.

---

After that, of course, it was only a matter of time before inevitable retribution came from one source or another. Tony was expecting it, and spent more time than he liked to admit checking rooms for possible tricks and traps. He kept a particular eye out for Clint and Natasha. He was sure that if anyone was going to retaliate, it would be one of them. Clint he was sure he could fend off without too much trouble. Natasha, on the other hand…he didn’t think he’d see her coming until it was too late and she’d emptied all his bank accounts.

Sure enough, before two weeks had passed, the first attempt at retaliation came.

“Don’t look, but I believe our retribution is at hand,” Loki murmured to him. Tony glanced up and Loki motioned with a flick of the eyes and an almost imperceptible nod at something behind him. They were in the workshop, Loki having popped into existence for the sole purpose of making Tony scheme tricks with him, instead of actually working. Tony was more than willing to be distracted – Fury wanted a source on the energy spikes and Tony was about a million miles from anything resembling one.

Tony nodded, and tapped at his tablet screen.

“So if we execute the mechanism in this way,” he said, loudly. The screen switched to the workshop camera’s, and it didn’t take long to see a familiar figure lurking outside the glass doors. Clint was leaning up against the wall with all the subtlety of a SHIELD agent on their first intel mission. He rolled his eyes.

“I thought you were a super spy,” Tony called without looking round. On the screen, Clint jumped. Tony spun his chair around and folded his arms. “Not your best work, Barton.”

“If I wanted to sneak up on you, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” Clint said as he too-carefully stepped into the workshop. Tony quietly noted that he lifted his feet just a little higher than was normal as he crossed the threshold. Loki must have noticed it too, as there was a small ripple of green magic that ran along in a line behind Clint’s feet. A tripwire. Tony almost laughed – back to basics? Really?

“I just thought I’d come and see what you were up to,” Clint continued, shrugging. “You know. Get a little intel on the enemy.” He gave Loki a pointed look.

“Well, you’re out of luck. No intel to be had here. In fact, we were about to go get lunch,” Tony stood up and headed for the door. “You want to come with?”

Barton’s eyes shot to the door for a split second. He smiled.

“Nah, I already ate.”

“Suit yourself.”

Tony strolled casually towards the door. He didn’t bother to lift his feet over the trip wire, not after Loki had done whatever he’d done to it. He was reasonably certain he wasn’t going to be the one falling for this trap. And, hypothesis confirmed, he made it through unscathed. Whatever trap Clint had hooked up, Loki had successfully neutralised it. He paused and glanced back into the workshop.

“Loki?”

“I’ll see myself out,” the trickster said with a wicked grin. There was a flicker of green at Tony’s feet, and then Loki was gone. Clint seemed to be fighting off some sort of facial seizure.

“C’mon, Robin Hood, I need to lock this place up. Move,” Tony made a ‘hurry up’ motion. Clint hurried out towards him and as he stepped through the door there was a soft click and he stumbled, the tripwire now back in existence apparently.

“Oh, fu-“ he started. A deluge of water and ice tipped down from where he’d rigged up his bucket above the door, dousing him in freezing liquid. Clint gave a shriek of frustration.

“I swear to god, Tony, I am going to murder you in your sleep!”

Tony was already hurrying away.

“Next time try to be a little more subtle!” he called over his shoulder. “You gotta step your game up if you want to play with the pros!”

He turned the corner and fled to the nearest elevator before the angry, damp Barton could catch up to him. Now, he thought as the doors closed, things were going to get a little more interesting.

---

The world outside of the Avengers tower continued to move on. The next few weeks saw an increase in the spikes of magical energy and Tony had to put staying out of Barton’s way on the backburner as there was suddenly an influx of new data to go through. No-one, not even SHIELDs tech-heads, could figure out what exactly was causing the spikes, but the sheer number meant that they did manage to make it to the sources of a few of them. The things they found only served to deepen the mystery. Scorch marks in perfect concentric circles. Twisted chunks of metal, blackened like they’d been melted. Old papers charred into illegibility. Tony found himself gathering a small collection of the strange objects in a corner of the workshop, and the collection drew Loki down there more and more. What he was doing as he turned the various bits of ephemera over in his hands Tony had no idea, but he was there often enough for him to start to get accustomed to Loki's presence. Strange, what you could get used to.

With the increase in energy readings, Tony had expected a surge of appearances from the mechanical not-quite-birds, but none came. Their absence gave him no comfort. He would rather have been fighting them, able to see what changes there had been to them this time – and at least then there’d be something for them to go up against. All this mystery with no tangible answer made him antsy. And an antsy Tony Stark was a Tony Stark who irritated his teammates faster than usual. The only thing that did come up was a spate of reports of smash and grab robberies at several antique bookstores. It wasn't usually something the Avengers would take an interest in, but when it was discovered that the books taken were all occult books, it wasn't hard to conceive of there being a possible connection.

Possible connections didn't need Iron Man to smack them in the face though, and SHIELD was handling it the bureaucratic way, which still left Tony with nothing to do. So when the storm warning came, he jumped on the chance to at least flex his engineering muscles, if nothing else. Reinforcing the tower against every possible storm-related phenomenon was easy enough, and testing the lightning resistance with Thor was legitimately fun.

Trying to subtly ask Loki if he could reproduce any different kinds of weather effects was fun too, in a way, but Loki's expression when he saw through the paper thin excuses made Tony abandon all hope of getting any other tests done. He turned his attention instead to trying to determine, along with the rest of the meteorological community, where in the heck the storm had come from. There had been no hint of it before the warning suddenly came in, as if it had just spontaneously appeared over the ocean and decided to come barrelling towards them.

"Maybe I should just punch Thor," Tony muttered to himself, tossing his tablet down on the table. Loki glanced over from his corner, interested.

"Oh?"

"It's the closest I can get to punching the storm," Tony elaborated. "Which is interesting, but not very physical. Neither are scorch marks or missing books or fading patches of magical energy which, really, why is that even a thing? How is it even anything?"

"It only sounds ridiculous because of your primitive conceptions of what magic is," Loki unfolded himself from the corner, tall and lean and striding over. He picked up the discarded tablet and flicked his fingers across the screen. "Though I must say I would not prevent your engaging in combat with my brother."

"Please, be a more perfect, protective sibling." Tony sighed, running a hand through his hair. "It's just so frustrating. Something's going on. I can feel it. But everything's so…intangible. It's like having the pieces to three separate puzzles and none of the pictures."

Loki set the tablet down and leaned his elbows on the table, meeting Tony's gaze with unusual seriousness.

"Stark, believe me when I say that you may not wish to see any of the pictures."

Tony stared back at him, realisation dawning.

"You know something. Something we haven't picked up on."

Loki stayed silent.

"It's in the magic, isn't it? We can't comprehend it, we can't analyse it, but you can – you have. Loki, what do you know?"

Loki blinked slowly, considering, then shook his head.

"As you say, things are too intangible. I would not concern you unduly with things that may not even be relevant."

"Loki."

"And besides, it is far more fun to watch you twist and stretch your little human mind to try to find the answer. Perhaps you will expand your thinking in the process."

Before Tony could come up with an appropriate insult to retaliate with, Loki had vanished. He swore, and snatched up his tablet. If there was an answer, he'd just find it himself, and damn the god of lies, mischief and being a dick.

No matter how much Tony pestered him over the next couple of days, Loki still refused to say anything. Tony tried picking through old footage of his room, looking again at the papers Loki constantly scribbled at. No joy. Then he made a rapidly aborted attempt to sneak into Loki’s room while he was out, that only ended in him losing half an eyebrow and a good chunk of dignity. To Loki’s credit and Tony’s surprise, Loki fixed the eyebrow afterwards. The loss of dignity Tony would have to live with. All the while the storm simmered away, crawling nearer, and just before it was due to hit they got a call from Fury.

"We've picked up a pair of the book thieves," he told them, having summoned them all at the ungodly hour of 11am. "And they're a damn sight more interesting than regular old smash-and-grab guys. They're almost certainly related to the energy spikes we’ve been looking into."

He tapped at the tablet he was holding, and a moment later a video feed had been transferred onto the conference rooms’ main screen. It showed an interview chamber, with a scrawny guy sitting handcuffed across from an impassive SHIELD agent. His eyes were wide and darkly shadowed, his skin a sickly yellow shade, with a cluster of sores at the corners of his mouth. He was babbling so fast that it was hard to keep up.

"-here soon, they promised us, she promised it to us. You'll hear them too, and you'll know what it's like! Please, you have to believe me, I'm not –we're not bad guys! We're not criminals, we're just doing what we're told, see! Just like you! Your boss tells you to grab a guy, shoot a guy," he made a pistol gesture with his hand. "Pow! You do it! And we did it, just like she said, and you'll meet her soon, oh, man, she's the most incredible – you've never met anyone like her!" He slapped his palms on the table. "You'll love her like I do! Man, you should just join us, join us and join her and you can have power just like we're going to. We'll be stronger than anyone, than...than an Avenger, even! You've seen those guys on the news, right? With their flying," he made a swooshing noise and swept his hands through the air, "And shooting and stuff. We'll be better than them. She promised, she promised, she-"

Fury cut off the feed.

"You get the general idea."

"Do we have any idea who this 'she' is?" Steve asked. "All that talk about power – Asgardian, maybe?"

Thor shook his head.

"If I have read the reports of Director Fury correctly, nothing they have taken links in any way to Asgard, or any of the other realms of which I know."

"Well, it looks like we can cross you and your brother off the list. Who does that leave us with? Anyone got a phonebook full of otherworldly supervillains they feel like sharing?" Tony asked.

Fury ignored him.

"We've got plenty of people working on it. If there's an answer, we'll find it. In the meantime, keep running patrols and be on-call for when the storm hits. It's getting bigger by the second, and if there's an accident we could use a couple of Avengers on stand-by."

"We're here whenever you need, us, Director," Steve said. With that, the meeting was over, but as they were leaving the room, Tony caught Fury's arm.

"Thor said the reports on the books didn't mention anything to do with Asgard. I haven't had time to read them through – what do they mention?"

"If I hadn't written them, I wouldn't believe them," Fury replied. "But since you asked, you better stow your one-liners."

Tony raised a hand.

"Scouts honour."

"You were never a- you know what, I don't care." Fury massaged his forehead and it was only then that Tony realised how exhausted the Director was looking.

"No jokes," Tony said. "Tell me, Nick."

Fury met his eyes and said flatly,

"Demons, Stark. All the books that have been taken have something to do with demons."

---

Chapter Nine

Tony Stark was not the kind of man who believed in demons. Then again, not too long ago he'd been the kind of man who hadn't believed in gods of any kind, and now he had two of them living with him. Still, until he saw one in the flesh, he was keeping demons firmly on the 'not real' list. And right now, there were bigger, realer problems to worry about.

The storm that had been approaching had finally hit, and with force. The Avengers, on standby since the first dark clouds had swarmed overhead, were now out and offering assistance to the overworked emergency services.

Wind howled outside Tony’s helmet, audible even through the dampeners, and he fought with his repulsors just to keep himself in the air.

"Thor, how the hell do you fly in a straight line in this kind of weather?" he had to shout to be heard over the comms. The electrical static in the air was messing with transmissions, and what made it through was random in volume, and interspersed with bursts of sharp static.

"Years of practice, man of iron," Thor shouted back. "I would be more than willing to teach you the basics."

Tony rolled his eyes, and kept on compensating for crosswinds.

The rain came down in sheets, a constant barrage of water that did nothing to help visibility. Luckily Tony had cameras more capable than the human eye to help him out. He blasted across the city, darting from an idiot who thought they could totally drive in this weather; to a struggling worker whose boss hadn’t let them leave early; to a girl who’d gotten trapped on her roof, going after her cat. Humans battling the weather across the city, struggling through misfortune, stupidity or some combination of the two.

After three hours, he was bone-tired and ready to collapse. The storm, on the other hand, had only just gotten started. Somehow the rain was getting heavier, a physical force combining with the furious wind to force him out of the sky. The suit beeped warning after warning at him as he kept on trying to compensate, shunting power from system to system. It was no use.

"I'm not gonna be able to stay airborne much longer," he called out, hoping at least one of the others would hear him on comms. "Who's nearest to my position?"

"That would be me," said Natasha. "I could use a hand, if you're coming down."

Tony ran a lightning fast diagnostic, and was about to tell her that he could last maybe another ten minutes when it started to hail.

"I'll be right with you, Widow."

He plummeted to the ground, hailstones pinging off the suit. Even with his cameras it was hard to see the road he landed on, and the wind seemed determined to blow him off his feet. He managed to locate Natasha and began heading towards her, splashing through the miniature river the road had become.

"This is no natural storm," Loki's voice came in suddenly over the comms, clearer than anyone's had been all night. "There is magic at the heart of it. A great deal of magic."

Tony hadn't had the time to check for the energy readings before now, but a quick scan confirmed what Loki was saying. The readings in his HUD shot up off the scale – they were stronger than they’d ever been before. He chewed on his lip, thinking.

"Can you counter it?" he asked. He had no idea where Loki was, if he'd even come out with them. There was a shimmer in the wall of water to his left, and then Loki was standing there. The rain didn’t touch him – it was hitting some kind of invisible barrier and running off, leaving him in a sphere of dry air. He was frowning, his fingers dancing with green sparks.

"No," he said, and despite him not raising his voice, Tony could hear him with crystal clarity, as if there were no storm between them. "It's a warped kind of power. If I knew exactly the cause of it, if I knew the caster…."

"Loki, I know you know something. If you can do anything about this-"

"There is nothing I can do, Stark," Loki shot him a glare, but his eyes were worried. "Loathe as I am to admit that."

"Well, if it makes you feel any better, I can't do shit about it either," he said with a shrug. Loki's lips twitched in what might have been the start of a smile. It was cut short by a crack of thunder and a streak of lightning splitting the night sky apart.

Tony swore a convoluted streak in three different languages as another bolt of lightning followed the first, then a third, and a fourth. He took a break to breathe, and then a fifth bolt cut through the darkness – this one blood red. He stared up at the sky, watching the heavy black clouds roil in the air. There seemed to be a gap forming in them, a small patch of open sky with a scattering of stars. He squinted.

"Is it actually easing up?"

Loki stared up too, frozen in place beside Tony save for his twitching fingers. Spark after glittering spark formed, fell, and dissolved in the rainwater as they hit the ground. Another flash of red lightning crackled across the sky. Loki frowned,

"Actually, I think it just got worse."

A boom of thunder - which later would be recorded as the loudest thunderclap ever experienced in recorded history – rocked the world. Tony winced inside the suit at the echo of it. As he watched, the patch of sky that had cleared expanded, and as it did, a line of red light appeared at its centre. The line stretched, spread out cracks like a smashed window in slow motion. The cracks reached the border of clouds and then tore itself open into a swirling portal of crimson light.

"Tony! Can you get airborne again? We need to find out what that thing is and close it!" Steve was barely audible in his ear, but Tony was hardly listening to him anyway. He was too busy trying to identify the new noise that had filled the void left after the thunderclap.

"So much for my list," he muttered, as a screeching, squalling, raging horde of creatures that could only come under one heading spilled out of the portal. "I hate it when Fury gets to be right."

The demons barrelled out of the portal, thousands of leathery wings beating the air, screaming a challenge at the city below. Tony didn't even think, just fired up his jets and blazed into the sky. He faintly heard Loki shout something after him but there was no time to find out what it was. The monsters were filling the air, falling in a screaming rain towards the earth. Tony fired at one of them and was satisfied to see the repulsor blast tear it to shreds.

"Numerous but easy to splat," he announced to the others. "Hit them hard and fast.” A demon screeched towards him and he barely swung out of the way in time to avoid it. "Make that really fast."

Aiming towards the heart of the portal and the thickest concentration of demons, Tony ran a quick scan to confirm his thoughts. The demons were leaking the same magical energy that they’d been tracking like nobody's business, and the portal seemed to be entirely made of it. Not quite radioactive, not quite anything else, growing and swirling in the heart of the storm. The suit sucked up data as Tony flew, readings screaming at him. It was a good thing none of it was radioactive, or he’d have been screwed.

Tony opened up with his repulsors and demon after demon was blasted to pieces. Now that he was up with them, he realised that there weren't as many of them as he had thought from the ground. They just moved around a lot, like a swarm of very loud, very angry bats.

He got a close-up look at one of them when it hit him from the side, screeching and clawing at his armour. A squashed in face, with a gaping mouth crammed full of teeth and eyes of pure, dead black. He wrapped a gauntleted fist around one of the horns curling from its head and tore it from him, holding its flailing body at arms-length while he blasted a hole through its chest.

"How's everything on the ground?" he shouted, not even sure the comms were still working. He got three responses at once, containing varying amounts of swearing, anger and coherence. "All good, then. Right. I'll try and stay up here.” He saw a familiar explosion of light to his right. “Thor, how're you holding up?"

"They are like winged cats," Thor replied. "But they are no trouble. Watch out for their magic, though, it is most unpleasant."

Tony was about to ask, ‘what magic?’, when he got a first-hand taste of it. A ball of red and black energy hit him square in the face and he was halfway to the ground before he remembered which way was up. He struggled to right himself – whatever it was, it had scrambled his systems. While he was preoccupied, the demon had swept down towards him, taloned hands extended. Tony had barely gotten his hands up in front of him, ready to fire, when a bolt of green hit the demon from below, turning it into so much ash.

"You're welcome," Loki’s smooth voice murmured in his ear.

"Cut the attitude and shoot some more of them, Gandalf the Green. This rain doesn't agree with me."

In response, the five demons nearest to Tony were immediately incinerated with green fire. He grinned. Then another demon flew at him, and it was back into battle mode.

The rain and hail kept on pouring down. Chunks of ice pinged off the armour, some of them so big Tony was sure he’d be hammering out dings for weeks. What with the rain and blood spattering his faceplate, the howling wind and demons tearing at him from all sides, it was a wonder he managed to stay in the air, let alone keep fighting.

But stay up he did, and by the time Clint put an arrow through the last demons head, he had racked up an impressive kill count of his own.

"JARVIS, any energy spikes consistent with the readings we have from those ugly bastards?"

"Negative, sir. The only current source of the energy is the vortex."

Tony looked up, but the vortex was already starting to close in on itself. The clouds around it seemed to be being drawn into it, and most miraculous of all, the hail had stopped and the rain was beginning to lighten. Watching the last of the red light fade into ordinary darkness, Tony felt a wave of exhaustion flow over him. At this point the suit was the only thing keeping him upright. He stifled a yawn.

"Good work, everyone," Steve said, sounding tired but solid. "Looks like we got 'em all. SHIELD will want a debriefing, but they can wait. I don't know about all of you, but I'm beat. Let's head home."

"Copy that, Cap," Tony just about managed, then he turned his jets to the tower and managed to land without crashing. He just about had the energy to note that there were a couple of dead, mangled demon corpses to the side of the landing strip, and then he was out of the suit and stumbling in the general direction of a bed. Just before he passed out completely, he mumbled a command to JARVIS to block any and all incoming calls until at least mid-afternoon tomorrow. Then he was out.

Blissfully, he didn't dream about anything.

---

The debriefing couldn't be avoided forever, and by late afternoon Tony found himself dragged to the conference room and let himself be talked at by everyone else. He muttered a couple of observations about energy readings and combat abilities when prompted, but his mind wasn't fully firing until well after the debrief was over. By then he was awake enough to remember what he’d seen by the landing strip. He caught Bruce's arm as they were leaving the conference room.

"I think I've got a couple of bodies fresh for an autopsy, if you're feeling up to it."

Bruce frowned.

"Not really my expertise, but alright. Where are they?"

"Oh, it isn’t mine either, I’m just an enthusiastic amateur. I want to get my hands in one before SHIELD does – I don’t like it when Fury has more intel than me. And they’re up on the roof, by the way. Let's bring them in."

Tony had expected the corpses to be heavy, and so he'd badgered Thor and Steve into coming up to the roof with them, to help carry the bodies down. But when he experimentally lifted the hand of one, he found that the whole thing was paper light, and he could probably have carried both by himself. He let Steve and Thor do it anyway – didn't want to make them look bad, after all.

He initially wanted to take them to the workshop, since that was where he took everything apart, but Bruce quietly noted that perhaps the medical bay would be a better option since, you know, medical bay. Tony agreed, and about fifteen minutes later he and Bruce were standing over a pair of twisted demonic corpses on a set of metal tables. Steve and Bruce had insisted that anyone present in the room for the autopsy wear full coverings – gloves, mask, goggles; the whole shebang.

"We don't know what kind of stuff these things are made of. They might poison you the second you stick your hand in one," Steve said. Not that he was sticking around for the whole gory ordeal anyway. Tony grumbled, but acquiesced.

Loki, on the other hand, didn't. He had slipped into the room almost without anyone noticing until he leaned over Tony's shoulder to get a better look at the first demon they were about to cut into. Tony stiffened at his presence, then relaxed a little when he realised who it was. Then he did an internal double take that relaxing was the instinctive option when Loki was standing inches from his back. How times have changed.

"One comment about resemblance, and I'll autopsy you," he threatened. Loki merely looked amused at the scalpel being thrust in his general direction, and took a half step away from Tony.

"I can assure you, such comments were far from my mind."

"Well, shall we get started?" Bruce said. Tony turned back to the demon.

"No time like the present."

But the moment his scalpel pressed into the demon’s chest, there was a soft wheezing noise and the corpse, for lack of a better word, deflated in on itself. Tony held his hands away from it.

"I barely touched it, I swear."

The corpse gave a soft sigh, and then collapsed into dust. Next to him, he saw Loki frown and lean ever so slightly closer.

"What is it?"

"Magic. A small flare, when it crumbled." Loki seemed about to stretch out a hand to touch the ash-like remains, then thought better of it.

"Well, we still have one more," Tony forced cheerfulness, and joined Bruce by the second demon. It was almost identical to the first, save for the fact that its horns were larger. Its eyes had also remained open, and the dead black stare gave Tony a shudder of revulsion. He let Bruce do the honours for this one, but the same thing happened. The scalpel touched leathery flesh, the corpse collapsed in on itself and then crumbled into dust. And, presumably, another flicker of magic. Tony turned to ask their only resident expert on magic what he thought, but Loki was already gone.

"Come on, let's get this cleaned up," Bruce sighed, lifting his goggles. "And we'd better let Fury know what happens when you try to dissect these things. I'm sure he's managed to scrounge up a few corpses of his own."

---

As Tony was heading back, his mind mostly on getting to a shower as soon as humanly possible, he paid little attention to the figures of Steve and Thor hurrying down the corridor in the other direction. He gave an absent nod as they passed him and thought nothing more of it. The moment he opened the door to his room, he realised why they’d been hurrying and spun on his heel to go after them. Every item in his beautiful, luxurious, expensive room had been flipped upside down. The bed was stuck to the ceiling, the blankets and pillows somehow glued to it. His TV was upside down in its wall bracket. The ceiling lights had been removed and laid out on the floor in the same pattern as they had been in the ceiling – a ceiling which was now beautifully carpeted.

He caught up with them around a corner. They were wheezing with laughter, Steve clutching Thor’s shoulder for balance, Thor’s face steadily getting redder. They looked up as he came over, tried for one valiant moment to school their expressions into something resembling innocence, then cracked up again. Tony folded his arms.

“You know, a part of me is really impressed with your dedication,” he said. “How did you get everything to stay up there?”

Steve started trying to explain, but kept giggling every other word, and eventually gave up, shaking his head.

“Well, I hope you’re happy, because if it isn’t back to normal by the time I actually want to sleep, you can both kiss your hot water privileges goodbye.”

Thor’s face suddenly gained a look of horror.

“You would not do such a thing.”

“Don’t try me, Goldilocks.”

Before they could reply, he turned away and this time decided to head down to the workshop. He’d have to find something to occupy his time while the two stooges put his room back together. When he got there, he was surprised to find that it was already occupied – Loki was standing in the middle of the room in the dark, surrounded by holographic displays. He had his hands clasped behind his back, and was staring up as figures, data and video danced through the air.

He was facing away from the doors, and Tony paused for a moment, just watching him. Loki either hadn’t noticed or was ignoring his arrival. Either way, Tony had a few moments to pretend he wasn’t indulging in appreciation of the shadows the light from the displays cast on Loki’s face – the arc of his cheekbone, the curve of his neck as it turned slightly each time he moved his attention from one item of information to another.

“I suppose the appropriate thing to do is apologise for using your resources without permission,” Loki spoke without turning around. Tony would have been lying if he said he didn’t jump a little at the sudden sound of his voice. He cleared his throat.

“I never got the impression that apologising was a part of your shtick.”

Loki let out a soft chuckle.

“Is that what I have? A ‘shtick’?”

“Well, yeah,” Tony started forwards, joining Loki amid the displays. One screen played three silent videos simultaneously – all different angles of phone footage from the demon attack. Dark, grainy, shaky – about one step north of useless, and a million miles from usable data. The others had data readouts scattered over them, algorithms running energy comparisons, trying to make sense out of chaos. “Of course you have a shtick. Everyone does. Mine, of course, is being incredibly handsome, mind-blowingly talented, and basically a genius.” He saw Loki smirk out of the corner of his eye, and continued. “Yours is…hmm…” he rubbed at his chin, pretending to think. “Being annoyingly mysterious, a snarky little shit, and somehow being a real live actual magician. Oh, and you have a fetish for green.”

“Is that so? If I were a lesser god I might feel insulted, and be tempted to smite you on principle.”

“Good thing you’re just a puny one then,” Tony said, and ducked away. His instincts were good – Loki’s shower of sparks flew about a millimetre over his head. He could smell singed hair, and made a face. Loki was glaring at him, his eyes icy slivers of green. Tony wasn’t sure if it was the light from the holograms making them glow like that, or something else.

“You ought to add another few items to your shtick,” Loki said, “A distinct lack of self-preservation and an inability to keep your mouth shut.”

“It’s part of my lovable charm.”

Loki made a small scoffing noise, and started to close the displays he’d been examining. Tony held up a hand and made a motion, freezing the screens. Loki scowled.

“There is nothing you can gain from these, Stark. Believe me.”

“See, I wish I could,” Tony said. “But I have this theory that I’d like to test out.”

Loki folded his arms, head leaning slightly to the side.

“Oh, this will be fascinating.”

“There you go, snarky little shit. Told you so. No, my theory is that you have gained something from these, because you do know something about what’s going on. I saw the look on your face when we were out in the storm. You have some idea what’s happening, and you’re not sharing.” Tony pointed a finger at him. “So, give me a reason not to tell Fury you’re holding out on us.”

Loki’s jaw tensed, and his eyes grew somehow colder.

“Stark…”

“Don’t ‘Stark’ me, you can’t intimidate me with my own surname, my brand identity is too powerful. I don’t care if all you have is half a sentence you read a million years ago when you were in diapers about something remotely like what’s going on. At this point any intel is good intel. Share.”

“You severely misunderstand Asgardian lifespans,” Loki said. Tony tried to make his finger point more intimidating. The upwards quirk of Loki’s lip told him it wasn’t exactly working, but then the god sighed and rolled his eyes.

“Alright! Alright. I don’t believe that anything I say will satisfy you, but here is what I can say – this is not some supervillain of the sort you are used to. This is something that comes from magic. Powerful magic. And,” he paused, only briefly, but enough for Tony to notice it, “And that is all I can tell you.”

He wasn’t telling him everything. Tony was sure of it. But that was the odd thing – Tony knew he wasn’t telling him everything. Tony knew he was lying, and if Loki wanted him to believe what he was saying, then Tony was sure he’d believe it. Loki was a good liar. Hell, if the mythology was even partly on the mark, then that was basically his raison d’etre. So, if Loki was telling a lie, and Tony could tell it was a lie, then Loki couldn’t really want Tony to believe said lie, and-

“Stark? Are you…well?” Loki sounded a shade closer to concerned than Tony was used to hearing from him. He blinked back to reality with a start.

“Oh. Yeah. Sure. I’m good. So, what you’re saying is…demons are attacking us because of magic, and it’s probably a powerful wizard.”

“An imprecise and useless term, but if you insist on layman’s parlance, then yes. That is…essentially the situation.”

Tony threw up his hands, and dismissed all the screens, leaving them in darkness. Outside the windows the city was beginning to glow with light as the sun fell below the horizon. No raging storm disturbed the night this time.

“Great. Thanks, oh mighty and powerful one. ‘A wizard did it and now there’s demons’. We had that one pretty much figured out.” He sighed and ran a hand over his face. “You know, I was hoping you’d have some long, detailed explanation of how this was all happening for me. Explain the secrets of the universe while you were at it.”

“I cannot create an explanation where there is not one to be had.” Loki thought for a moment. “Well, not if you want a true explanation. I could create fictions for you until your planet turned to dust.”

“Please do tell me a bedtime story,” Tony quipped, finding a chair and sitting in it backwards, balancing his elbows on the backrest to sit his chin in his hands. “I need the distraction. Not least because I’m stuck down here until your brother and the poor, innocent super-soldier he’s corrupted put my room back together.”

Loki made a face like Tony had told him time was running backwards.

“My brother did what? In your room? With the-” his expression couldn’t decide if it wanted to be concerned or amused. “Are implying what I believe you are implying?”

Tony blinked. Then realised.

“Oh! Oh, no, no, nothing so scandalous. No, they just flipped my entire room upside down and glued pretty much everything to the ceiling. Bed included. Not sure how, really, but they did. If they listened to me, they’re fixing it. If not, I guess I’m sleeping here tonight and neither of them will ever know the joy of hot water ever again as long as they live in this building.”

“You certainly have a knack for cruel and unusual threats.” Loki smiled, “I have to say I approve.”

Tony wasn’t certain it was a good thing that Loki was approving of something he’d done, but he was a fan of that smile, as much of it as he could see in the gloom. He should turn the lights on or something because it was probably weird to be sitting in the dark trading barbs with Loki. You never knew, someone might come by and get totally the wrong idea.

“J, lights,” he said. Immediately the room was flooded with light, though for some reason not as much as Tony had thought. He looked up at the ceiling. The lights had a strange, orange cast to them, and almost seemed to be flickering.

“Must be something wrong with the system,” Tony said, to Loki’s quizzical look. He got about two steps out of the chair when the sound system started up. It was then that he realised what the flickering light system was meant to be emulating.

And as the intro of Careless Whisper filled the room, Tony turned slowly on his heel to face the door. Sure enough, standing there with a shit-eating grin on his face and giving him a shit-eating little wave, was one Agent Clint Barton.

“Thought I’d give you a little mood music, for your tryst!” he called, motioning between Tony and Loki. “Set you up with a nice atmosphere!”

Tony managed not to run over to the door and immediately strangle him, but instead to walk over calmly, and yank it open to request, politely, that he put the room back to normal. Or at least, he would have done, if the door had opened. Tony pulled. Pulled harder. Reasoned that maybe he’d made it a push door instead and somehow forgotten, and tried that. The door stayed firmly closed.

“Barton,” he said, absolutely not snarling in the slightest, and definitely not flushing at all. “Let me out.”

“But I went to all this trouble!” Clint said, affecting a pout. “Sorry I couldn’t rig up rose petals to fall from the ceiling – I’m not the engineering genius you are.”

“JARVIS!” Tony called, looking up at the ceiling in a desperate appeal to his AI. “Fix this!”

“My apologies, sir, but it appears Agent Barton has locked me out of the lighting and sound systems for the workshop. I am endeavouring to counter his lock-out.”

“What did I even program you for?” Tony looked back to Barton, and yanked on the door again, as if it might have magically been unlocked since the last time he tried. George Michael crooned away in the background, and the flickering ceiling lights cast their pseudo-candlelit glow throughout the room.

“Barton. I get it. You got me. You got me good. Put it on the internet, get ten billion hits. Please let me out. End my suffering.”

“Well, since you asked so nicely,” Clint started to reach into his pocket – for a key-card, Tony prayed fervently – then he paused. “Actually, you know, I went to all this trouble for you two and you don’t really seem that grateful! I chose this beautiful music, this wonderful lighting, and not so much as a peck on the cheek.”

Tony ignored the growing heat in his face.

“Barton. I will give Natasha all your PIN numbers.”

“She already has them. I use hers to buy her Christmas presents. Try again.”

“Twenty-four hours from now, Fury will have convincingly doctored footage of you eating burritos while the rest of the Avengers fight valiantly behind you. Prepare your ass for at least two straight hours of lecturing about mission appropriate behaviour and the values of teamwork.”

“Pssh, that’s basically my weekly SHIELD briefing. Really, Tony, I thought you were better at threats than this.”

Tony opened his mouth to try a third threat, when he heard footsteps behind him. He tensed as he felt Loki’s hand grip his shoulder.

“It’s alright, Stark, I believe I know what Agent Barton is angling for.”

Then, before Tony knew what was happening, Loki’s other hand had grabbed his chin and turned his head, and Loki’s eyes were bright and staring into his and Loki’s breath was on his lips and Loki’s lips were on his lips. He went statue-still, not daring to so much as blink. His heart was thudding so hard it felt like his ribs would crack. There was a flash of light, Loki pulled away, and Barton gave an ugly screech of laughter.

“Yes! My payback is complete! Live this one down, Stark.” Clint held out his phone to the door so Tony could see the screen. For a moment Tony stared at the photo, slightly blurry, of him and Loki. One of Loki’s hands was on his shoulder, pale fingers curled almost possessively over it. The other held Tony’s chin, holding his head while Loki’ lips pressed against his own. Tony was staring at Loki’s closed eyes like a rabbit in headlights, and his entire face had flushed red. Then, just as he’d managed to take the whole thing in, Clint’s phone glowed bright green and began showering sparks.

Barton yelped and leapt backwards, the phone tumbling from his hand. It lay on the floor, spitting green sparks. Loki snapped his fingers and the sparks stopped. Barton scrambled to pick up the phone, and a look of dismay crossed his face.

“That’s cheating!” he said, pointing an accusatory finger at Loki. “I won that round, fair and square.”

“It’s not winning if nobody knows you succeeded,” Loki said smoothly. “Now, I believe you should quit while you’re ahead, as the saying goes on Midgard, and release us.” There was a dangerous edge to his voice that Clint didn’t miss.

Grumbling, he pulled the key-card out of his pocket and unlocked the door with a beep. Then he fled down the corridor before Tony could open it and chase after him. By the time he was gone, the lights had gone back to normal, and the music shut off with a snap.

“Oh, thank god,” Tony breathed out, letting his eyes close.

Loki’s hand was still on his shoulder. Tony felt a sudden, inexplicable urge to reach up and touch it. He swallowed.

“That was certainly more inventive than his last attempt,” Loki said. “We shall have to be more vigilant.”

And then he was gone. Tony opened his eyes and stood there in the empty workshop, fighting the urge to run his fingers over the lips Loki had kissed and wondering how his life had gone so wrong.

---

Chapter Ten

The entire world was talking about the attacks. Every news site had coverage, and even the mainstream media wasn’t shying away from calling the monsters ‘demons’. There weren’t many other words to describe them, and images of them were plastered over every screen. There wasn’t so much as a single message board that didn’t have a discussion raging about what the beings were and where they’d come from.

Even the Avengers tower wasn’t free from speculation. SHIELD had gone into identification overdrive, and Fury had taken over two entire floors to run his operation. Tony was too busy debating with anyone who got close about the origins of the creatures to bother getting annoyed at the Director for it. He and Bruce had several lengthy conversations about why the creatures gave off the energy readings they did, and what caused them. There was one memorable three-day conversation he had with Thor about whether the demons were alien or from a different dimension, and what the specific differences between those things were. At one point Thor had made Tony call up Jane to get her opinion, only to have Darcy join in, and the four of them had ended up spending the next three hours trying to pin down the definition of ‘alien’.

Thor’s input was valuable, given that he was the only ‘real’ alien Tony had access too – apart from Loki. And usually – strange as it was to call anything related to Loki usual – he would have been pestering the trickster to get his thoughts. Loki, with as much knowledge as he hinted at having, would certainly have helped matters if he could have been persuaded to share any of it. But after Clint’s prank in the workshop, Loki had hidden himself away in his rooms again. The surveillance in there was back up – much to SHIELD’s collective relief – but all it showed was him scribbling more notes to himself in that spidery, unreadable language, and spending an inordinate amount of time lying on his bed staring at the ceiling.

Tony pulled up the camera feed more often than he liked to admit to himself. Before Clint’s little trick, he would have thought nothing of marching up to the greasy hermits’ door, shoulder barging it open and annoying some answers out of him. But every time he tried to get up the nerve to do it, his traitorous brain flashed back to the workshop. To Loki’s hand on his shoulder, the press of Loki’s lips to his own. Get it together, Stark, it was just a prank, he told himself. It was no use. It was like a song stuck in his head, except the song was handsome, and tall, and kissing him.

So he stayed away from Loki’s rooms, Loki stayed locked inside them, and Tony spent more time picking up things he’d thrown in frustration than actually using them.

Then a perfect distraction arrived in the form of another storm blowing up out of nowhere. It had all the same features as the previous one, and this time they picked up traces of the magical energy brewing inside it. The Avengers went straight to red alert and were rewarded with another batch of shrieking demons to fight. The second storm was bad, though nowhere near as catastrophic as the first one had been, and there were less demons too – which they treated with a mix of relief and suspicion. Tony tried everything he could to get his hands on a live one to examine back at the tower but met with no success.

He settled for dragging another few dead ones back inside, and recruited the resident medical staff, and SHIELDS medical examiner to help with the examination this time. Maybe he and Bruce had made a novice error the last time, and the experts would do a better job. They had no such luck. Despite taking every precaution, the corpses crumbled away to nothing the moment the scalpel touched them. Tony spent the clean-up grumbling to himself about inconsiderate, ugly aliens, and wondered if he’d have the time to develop a working stasis field before the next attack came.

But before that Pepper returned from her meetings abroad and cornered him with the months of paperwork that had piled up, along with dire warnings about attending scheduled conferences and mixers on threat of physical harm against his person. She’d also somehow found out about the pranks he’d been pulling while she’d been away – and Tony was inclined to blame Natasha, because those two had shared looks that were downright frightening – and boy, on that front she was worse than Fury. Thoughts of stasis field were far from his mind for the rest of the month as he was swept up in whirlwind of all the work he should have been doing to run his own company. He didn’t even have time to plan his revenge on Clint.

He was even busy enough to not think about Loki for several days at a time. Inevitably, though, someone would mention him in passing, or he’d see a brief clip of him fighting the demons on some show or other. Then he’d spend the next few hours telling himself he wasn’t going to waste time thinking about Loki for no reason, and the few hours after that berating himself for wasting time thinking about not thinking about Loki. Then he usually gave up and went to do paperwork because anything was better than listening to his traitor brain play Careless Whisper on repeat.

Another storm hit at the start of February, this one milder again than the previous two. A pitifully small batch of demons fell through the hole in the sky this time, and were quickly despatched by the Avengers. Tony didn’t bother trying to find a corpse to drag in when it was all over. He just helped with the clean up and started thinking about stasis fields again.

The rest of the month was relatively quiet. Not even a hint of demonic weather on the horizon. Tony finally battled his way through a Pepper-Approved amount of paperwork and schmoozing, and found some time to himself to work on both the stasis field idea, and his payback for Clint. He was in the middle of preliminary schematics and a deep dive of internet prank video research when the alarm started blaring. He glanced out of the window but the sky was clear and blue, the sun bright. There wasn’t so much as a cloud visible.

He ran for the suit anyway. He was in the air and searching for the source of the alarm before any of the others had made it out of the building. His sensors shrieked at him as he spun in mid-air, and he stared up, ignoring them. There wasn’t a storm-cloud in sight, but the sky was being torn apart by a giant red and black vortex, just the same as the ones that had appeared with each of the unnatural storms. The magical energy pouring off it was insane.

"Holy shit," Tony breathed. He brought comms online. "Tell me the rest of you can see this.”

Everyone called back in the affirmative as he angled up towards the vortex. It hung there, like an evil, sightless eye above the city. No demons came pouring out of it yet though, so maybe he’d have a chance to figure out how to close it himself this time.

"Don't get near that thing, Stark," he was surprised to hear Loki’s sharp voice over the comms. It was the first time he’d had spoken to him since the workshop incident. Tony ignored the brief flicker in his stomach at the sound. Now was not the time. “This is larger than before. Something big is about to come through – I would recommend you stay away from it.”

"Thanks for the concern, but I think I can handle my- woah!"

Out from the glowing centre of the vortex came a howling mass of wings and claws and teeth. The swarm of demons was several orders of magnitude larger than the first attack had been, and as they came through they spread out, darkening the sky with their numbers. They were fast, and loud and they just kept coming, more and more and more of them pouring from the vortex. The cloud of monsters descended on the city as the Avengers, so very small in comparison, raced up to meet them.

Tony didn’t have the time to aim at the demons. He just avoided head on collisions and fired wildly into the heaving mass. There were enough of them that most shots hit, but the portal kept on spewing them out. He caught glimpses of Thor twisting and turning in the air, heard the clang of his hammer carving a bloody swathe through the screaming horrors.

"Is it me, or are they getting bigger?"

He was sure that some of the demons were larger than the ones they’d encountered before. Not that there was time to run any kind of comparative scan – they all swirled around him at such speed that he couldn’t get a clear view of an individual. Just impressions from the mass, in all its roiling, shrieking, clawing force.

He heard an explosion close to his right and a cluster of demons scattered as they fell, plummeting in lifeless pieces to the ground.

"Nice shot," he commented.

"Thank me later,” Clint replied, “Watch your six."

Tony span in time to punch a demon right in the mouth. It bit down around his armoured fist, teeth grinding against the metal. Tony flared his hand inside the demons’ mouth and let loose a repulsor blast. The monsters head exploded in a gory mass and its suddenly limp body dropped like a stone

"Tony!" Steve's voice cut in over the radio. "Can you get to my position? I've got civilians here and I'm pinned down. I could use a little extra firepower."

"On my way."

He quickly located Steve’s position, and wove his way at high speed through the demons towards him. Clawed hands grabbed at him but none caught purchase, though he wasted valuable seconds blasting especially persistent demons out of his path. He drew in a sharp breath at the sight that greeted him when he arrived.

A bus had been flipped over, and Steve was crouched on top of it, fending off demon after demon while the passengers inside screamed. The rear window of the bus was smashed open, and the doors at the front jerked spasmodically. But the demons weren’t clawing their way past the broken glass or the glitching door – instead those that landed were stalking towards it, heads lowered, hissing and flapping their wings.

The behaviour was curious enough to give Tony pause. The only opponent there was Steve, and he was just one man. The ones on the ground should have been swarming him, instead of leaving it to the ones still in the air. Then the bus gave a shuddering rumble and belched smoke from its exhaust, causing the passengers inside to shout louder. The demons joined their own high-pitched chittering to the noise, and the few that had gotten closest to the broken window jumped backwards. One of them swiped a hand towards the bus, as though fending it off.

Tony stared at them in amazement. They were afraid of the bus. They were almost acting as if…

“They think it’s alive,” he breathed to himself. Then he grinned, and aimed his palms at an abandoned car lying on its side, not far from the bus and the demons crowding around it. He fired, and the car exploded. Only two or three demons were caught in the blast, but the rest took to the air instantly, like frightened pigeons. They shrieked and lashed their long, spiky tails as they circled above Steve and the bus. Tony aimed at another overturned vehicle, a van this time, lying crosswise by the broken front end of the bus. Another blast, another explosion, and the other demons had taken to the air, snarling and spitting at the fiery creatures below them.

"Get your skates on Cap, I don't know how long they'll keep thinking the cars are a threat," he said. He saw Steve give him a nod, then jump down off the bus and begin hurrying the passengers out and over the now clear road. Tony hung around a few minutes longer, taking pot shots at any demon that dared to brave the still burning vehicles and come a little lower.

"Okay, update on the demons everyone," he announced over the comms, once Steve had gotten all the civilians out of the road and into the relative safety of a nearby store. "There might be a lot of them, but they're not tech-smart. I'm pretty sure they think our vehicles are alive and dangerous. Blow up a few cars and you should be able to get them to scatter if they're crowding you too much. How long they'll think like that, I don't know, but take advantage."

He took to the skies again, this time seeking out Thor. When he eventually found him, battling high above the city, he couldn't help but wince. The thunder god was dripping with blood, and it had to have been just as much his own as his enemies. There was a nasty gash across the side of his face, his leg armour had been all but ripped away and his bracers weren't faring much better.

"Need a hand?" Tony shouted to him, fighting to be heard above the unceasing scream of the demons. They were still pouring from the vortex in the sky, but the flow might have lessened a little now. Maybe. Thor gave him a bloody grin and smashed a demon’s skull in.

"Gladly!"

He hadn't trained with Thor nearly as much as he would have liked, but they still easily slipped into a rhythm together. Fighting in the air was far different to fighting on the ground with someone like Steve. There were so many extra factors to consider, so many more directions from which an attack could come. He and Thor moved around each other in a bloody aerial ballet, Thor smashing in heads with his hammer, and tearing the demons’ wings from their backs, while Tony blasted shot after shot, disintegrating them in the air. The demons retaliated with their own energy blasts, the balls of black and glowing red bouncing off the armour but sending all his instruments crazy. He disabled them after a while – the constant bleeping and shrieking of alarms and alerts too distracting.

For all their confusion over vehicles, the demons weren't at all bothered by Tony's metal suit. They kept on flinging themselves at it, screaming in his face and clawing at the armour over and over and over. It wasn't until one of them managed to force its claws through the back plate of his armour and gouge a set of lines into his back that he really started to worry.

"JARVIS, make a note to work on force-fields as well as stasis fields," he muttered, reaching over his shoulder to pull the demon away from him. His back burned in agony but he pushed the pain away. He could luxuriate in it later, when he was surrounded by people to whine at. The demons’ head fell away under a close-range repulsor blast and he grunted in satisfaction as he shook the gore from his hand.

Looking up then, he found that the air around him was suspiciously free of demons. There were still hundreds of them covering the sky, and Thor was entangled with a whole group of them, but for a few hundred square feet around Tony, the air was clear. He took the opportunity to check back on the vortex, and run a brief scan. He had been right earlier in thinking that the flood of demons had been lessening. They were only coming out of the deep black heart of the portal in dribs and drabs now, nothing like the monstrous horde they had been when this started.

Despite the hundreds of monsters still swarming in the air and on the ground, Tony began to feel a little more confident. They could control this. They would control this and they'd kick these things back to wherever the hell – and he excused himself the pun – they had come from. He searched for the thickest throng of demons and started towards them, blazing a streak through the air.

A few seconds later he was yanked back through the air, something gripping his ankle like a vice. He didn’t even have enough time to draw a breath before a clawed hand was digging into his shoulder, squeezing and crushing the metal in against his body. Tony gave a cry of pain and anger, aiming a hand behind him and blindly firing off a volley. There was a sickening hiss by his ear and then another clawed hand was covering his faceplate. The claws screeched across the metal as they dug in, found purchase, and then started to pull. He struggled, pouring power into his boots but somehow the demon held him in place with the powerful beating of its enormous wings. Tony’s feet were suddenly slammed together as a barbed tail wrapped around his ankles, restraining him.

His mind raced. There had to be a way out. If he’d been facing the demon he would have been free by now – one repulsor shot to the face and goodbye, Satan. But it had him from behind and he couldn’t get his arms up to get a good shot and he couldn’t fly away from it and metal was screaming and breaking and it had torn the faceplate off and oh god those were its claws reaching for his face.

A flash of light blasted the demons hand and it roared, yanking it away and pulling free of Tony all in one motion. Tony plummeted, frantically trying to get his fall under control. His right boot jet sputtered and died and he was left weaving uncontrollably and aiming himself at the softest bit of concrete he could see. A roar from above him made him waste a few of the precious seconds he had left looking up to see the demon racing down towards him. It was missing a hand and its wings were in tatters, so it probably had about as much control over its descent as Tony did, yet somehow it was gaining on him.

"Tell Pepper to delete my internet history, J," he muttered, then flipped over so he was falling backwards and head first, covered his exposed face with his arms, and kicked the failing thruster up over every parameter ever installed and plunged downwards. Predictably, the enraged demon followed suit and caught up enough that the two of them crashed into the ground within seconds of each other, the demon on top of Tony. Tony immediately thrust a palm up, and fired.

The blast was weak, the demon taking it without even flinching. The suit was almost dead around him – any more overexertion and he’d be trapped inside it. The demon bared its teeth, thick drool dripping onto Tony's exposed face. It met his gaze with pitch black eyes and unlike all the others he'd stared into these held more than the just the basest glimmer of intelligence. It was hard to say why, just something in the set of them, the cast of the light, but this demon was staring at him with conscious malevolence.

He was so screwed.

So of course, he punched the demon in the face and screamed obscenities at it, hoping and praying that the comm was still active despite the damage to his helmet, that one of the others would be nearby, would be able to do something, anything-

The demon grabbed his fist with its remaining hand and started to squeeze. Tony fought against its grip even as the monster opened its mouth wide and leaned down towards him, ready to tear out his throat. Somewhere to his side there was a hiss, a whine and then a blast of emerald green fire engulfed the demon, the force of it sending it screaming backwards away from Tony. It writhed on the ground as the flickering tongues of flame seared its flesh away. It was several long minutes before it finally lay still, and once it did Tony just lay there, breathing hard and trying to figure out what the hell just happened.

"I do hope you're alive, Stark – I would hate to have made such an effort for nothing."

Loki stepped into view over him, a smirk on his lips and his hands still wreathed in green fire. He was in full Asgardian armour, helmet gleaming but splattered with blood, and his eyes bright with magic. He held a hand out, the fire fading, and Tony took it, glad of the gods unnatural strength to haul both him and the dying armour upright. Loki flicked his eyes over the damaged armour, taking in the places where demonic claws had punched through metal, and the twisted edges of the helmet where the faceplate had been ripped away.

"Man, I'm gonna be feeling all this tomorrow," Tony said, wincing as shifted his shoulders, trying to ease the sting in his back from where the demon had gouged him. The suit whined in protest at his movements, about as done with the whole day as he was. He tried hard to ignore the fact that Loki was still staring at him, and harder still not to think about the fact that this was the first time they’d been face to face since that night in the workshop.

"You are injured?" Loki asked, and Tony couldn’t ignore him anymore. He met the gods eyes, and was he imagining it or was there genuine concern in them? Loki tilted his head slightly, thinking. Then he reached out towards Tony’s face and for just a moment, Tony flinched away from his hand. Loki froze.

“I’m sorry. May I…?”

Tony swallowed.

“Sure. You probably can’t make it worse – unless you do it intentionally, and then we'd all just murder you anyway and I've be avenged so it wouldn't matter. Well, I guess a few people might be a bit upset, and Pepper sure as hell wouldn’t appreciate the paperwork, but mmmf!"

Loki had had put one hand on Tony's shoulder, where he could see it glowing green out of the corner of his eye, and the other had just come up to cover his mouth. Loki met his gaze, amused and serious at the same time.

"Stark," he said softly, "You talk too much."

Tony could feel his own breath caught against Loki’s palm, and was glad he was too beaten up for the heat in his face to be immediately obvious. The green glow at his shoulder intensified, and Tony felt something like fire burning through his body. He started to cry out, eyes going wide and why was he trusting Loki, this was such a bad idea and –

"Oh."

Loki let his hands drop away.

"Better?"

Tony moved his shoulders tentatively. Not so much as a twinge.

"Actually, yes. Much better. Didn't know you did healing voodoo."

"Please don't misuse terminology like that," Loki said, as if it pained him to hear it. "And yes, I do, when the mood takes me. Magic is not all trickery and destruction, you know."

“I guess it’s closer to our technology than I thought,” Tony said. It was such an inane thing to say, but Loki was still staring at him, and his eyes were still bright from the magic, glowing like fire. Was he imagining it, or was Loki’s face a little flushed too? From the fighting and all the magic, of course, he’d been working as hard as any of them today.

"Far more similar," Loki's voice was soft, and there was the hint of a smile at his mouth. Around them, the sounds of battle were dying away and when Tony looked up he saw to his relief that the vortex was finally collapsing in on itself. The mass of demons in the sky was diminishing at last, and somewhere in the distance he heard the familiar roar of the Hulk, closely followed by three different, equally piercing car alarms.

He grinned and looked back at Loki.

"Guess we won," he said.

"It appears so."

And maybe Tony was imagining things but it seemed that Loki had taken a step closer to him whilst he’d been looking at the sky. He swallowed, feeling a dry click in his throat. His traitorous brain was throwing up a handy dandy flashback to the last time Loki had been this close to him. He coughed, and hoped Loki hadn’t gained any mind-reading powers back yet.

"Thanks for the save," he managed to blurt out. "It's, uh, appreciated."

"Yes, well, if you'd died I'm sure someone would have found a way to blame me for it," Loki shot back, but there was no acid in his tone, only good old sarcasm.

"Maybe," Tony said. "Maybe not. As far as the list of evil-doer’s goes, I don’t think you’re exactly topping it anymore.”

Loki chuckled softly shaking his head.

"Stark," he began, and was cut off as a blazing beam of green light suddenly surrounded him. Tony took a step back, staring as the light – which seemed to be emanating from Loki’s own body – intensified, flickering with gold flashes and darker emerald flares. He could see Loki inside of it, his eyes wide and blazing with light. It was a beautiful, terrifying sight.

Then, as suddenly as it had arrived, the light faded. First to a glow, then to a faint green hue, then to nothing at all. Loki was left standing there, his irises still blazing with green energy, shock written clearly across his face. He looked down at his hands, gazing at them as if he could see something incredible in them.

"Guess you did another good deed, huh?" Tony murmured. Loki looked back up at him, still amazed, and shook his head, lost for words.

"Can you freak out over your reward later? I think we need to help with clean up."

Loki had never stuck around for clean up before, not once, but this time he just nodded a little numbly, and followed Tony as he set about finding the others to help take out the last of the demons, and give the public services some aid in putting the poor battered city back together.

Loki's eyes glowed green the whole time.

---

After they had helped as much as they could, the Avengers plus a still faintly glowing Loki made their way back to the tower. They were herded to the medical bay where a horde of SHIELD medics swarmed them to check over their injuries. By luck or by skill or some impossible combination of the two, none of them had been seriously hurt. Natasha had a few cracked ribs and a mild concussion, and Clint had to have several nasty chunks of glass pulled out of his shoulder, but they were the most serious of the injuries. Thor, though he’d been bloody and beaten the last time Tony had seen him, was already starting to heal – Asgardian health benefits were one hell of a trip. He sat patiently while the medics frantically checked him over, though, assuring them that a few days of rest would see him just fine.

Steve had also gotten away with only a few cuts and bruises – he didn’t have so much as a sprained ankle. He downed a few painkillers, got the worst of it bandaged up and snuck out of the med-bay as soon as he could to head back out and help with more of the clean-up and recovery effort. Bruce – once he’d de-Hulked – turned out totally fine, if more than a little exhausted, and Tony…well, the armour had taken most of the beatings for him and thanks to Loki he was doing the best out of everyone.

Except, of course, for Loki, whose eyes had finally stopped glowing and who didn’t have so much as a scratch on him. His glittering Asgardian armour had vanished back to whatever pocket dimension he stored it in, and he loitered at the door to the med-bay, seemingly unsure whether he should stay or not. Tony, dodging questions from the medics about where his injuries actually were, managed with heroic effort to pretend not to notice the way Loki’s serious gaze kept darting back to him. Something altogether tingly seemed to happen at the base of his spine whenever his eyes caught Loki’s, and he didn’t want to be dwelling on that – not when he was still in a skin-tight bodysuit.

A bodysuit that would have to be replaced, he realised, given that it was slashed to ribbons in the back. Add that to the endless list of things he had to fix thanks to this fight. He eventually managed to slip away from the medics and head back to his room, intent on changing and throwing out the trashed suit before anyone else could draw attention to it. He didn’t need a barrage of questions about why it and his armour were trashed and he didn’t have a scratch on him.

He was halfway out of the bodysuit when he realised he was being stupid.

“What the hell does it matter if anyone knows he fixed me?”

He shook his head as he stripped the rest of the suit off and tugged on a clean shirt. It wasn’t like anyone was going to be mad that Loki had healed him, he thought, wriggling his way into new jeans. Heck, Thor would probably throw a party for Loki’s increased good behaviour. And it wasn’t like Loki fixing an Avenger was an unprecedented scenario – with varying degrees of enthusiasm he’d patched up the others before now. It had been one of the only useful things he’d been able to do when he got here. So why, Tony asked himself, was he so paranoid about anyone finding out about this instance?

There was a fairly obvious reason, and a part of Tony knew it was all tied up with what had happened in the workshop, but no way was his conscious mind letting itself admit that, so it settled for deciding that he didn’t want his teammates to know how destructible he was, even with the armour.

He made his way to the bathroom to splash cold water on his face in an attempt to shut his brain up, and had mostly convinced himself that he’d succeeded when a voice from behind him made him crack his head on the faucet in surprise.

“I’m certain they’re already more than aware of that fact.”

Loki, leaning against the doorframe, watching him with a cool expression. Tony opened his mouth to speak but Loki lifted a hand.

“I know. You would prefer it if I left your mind alone. The return of my powers has made them a little more…sensitive than usual. I will maintain a stricter control on them, you have my word. My apologies for the intrusion.”

Tony grabbed a towel and rubbed at his face.

"Whatever, Megamind. Do you like trying to give me a heart attack, or something? Is it some kind of Asgardian-next-level pranking technique that I haven't got a hope of countering? I thought we had a truce."

"Perhaps you should be more aware of your surroundings," Loki suggested, twisting out of the way as Tony pushed past him into the bedroom. "It would certainly aid you in combat. Unless you're counting on my being there again to save your life."

Tony stopped, no longer sure where he was even trying to go. He closed his eyes.

“Thanks for that, and everything, but this is the first time you’ve spoken to me without demons trying to kill us since…since…” he couldn’t make himself say the words. Since you kissed me. Could Loki hear the thought in his mind? Despite what he’d said, was he listening to Tony’s thoughts right now, getting the same repeating mental image of Loki kissing him in the workshop? When he spoke, Loki’s voice was stiff.

“I have been busy. I have other things on my mind than collaborating with you on tricks.”

Tony opened his eyes, stared across the room. He could feel Loki’s gaze burning into his back but he refused to turn around. He couldn’t bring himself to look at him.

“Is that why, up until Barton’s attempt at payback, you kept bothering me to come up with new ones constantly? Why you kept giving SHIELD a collective aneurism by sneaking off all the time?”

Why you seemed to occasionally enjoy spending time with me? Why I kept catching you staring at me?

“If you’re trying to make a point, Stark, I am afraid it is eluding me.” He felt a hand on his shoulder and then suddenly he was facing Loki. “If you are upset with me that is your own business. Your feelings are no concern of mine.”

Tony managed a laugh, but it didn’t quite sound right.

“Me, eluding you? My feelings? Sure, that’s why you’re the one who kissed me for a prank, then hid in his room for weeks at a time, only to save my life and heal me with magic. Sure, Loki, I’m no concern of yours.”

“I should have let the demon kill you,” Loki snapped. His fingers dug in tighter on Tony’s shoulder, a painful parody of the workshop incident.

Tony rolled his eyes.

“Please. You clearly care too much about my life to do that.”

“And if I do? If I have the infinitesimal urge to ensure you are not torn to pieces?” Loki gave a short laugh. “Is that a concern of yours? That I might be the slightest bit invested in your continued existence?”

“What are you talking about?”

Loki stepped in closer, and Tony instinctively backed off. His calves hit the bed and he was forced to stop, staring up as defiantly as he could into Loki’s face.

“Look, you’re mad at me, I get it. I don’t know why – though realistically there are probably an infinite number of reasons for you to be – but if you could go back to just staring at me and saving my life on occasion that would be great. Loki, stop looking at me like you want to stab me-”

He was cut off by Loki’s mouth crashing into his, and Loki’s hands grabbing his shoulders. For a moment, he was too stunned to do anything. Then he found that he’d closed his eyes, that his hands were clutching at Loki’s shirt, pulling him closer. But just as he was really getting into it, Loki pulled away.

"As I told you earlier," he said, a little breathless. "You talk too much."

Tony made a noise that was mostly a growl, and pulled on Loki’s shirt, dragging him back to his lips. Part of his mind was yelling that this was a really terrible idea stop this right now, but a larger, louder part had gotten a taste for that mouth and it wanted more. Loki, it quickly became apparent, was more than happy to oblige. His teeth grazed Tony’s lower lip, then bit hard after the first brush had Tony gasping into his mouth. Tony pulled Loki closer, and managed to bring the both of them toppling backwards onto the bed.

“Eager,” Loki murmured, bracing himself above Tony with a hand either side of his shoulders. Tony reached up and slid his hands into Loki’s hair, pulling him back down. He spread his legs apart as he did so and Loki insinuated himself between his thighs like he belonged there, practically purring as Tony pushed his hips up against him. He hooked his legs around Loki’s hips, pulling harder on his hair and grinning into their kiss when Loki drew in a sharp breath.

“Have a care, Stark,” his voice rumbled deep in his throat. He ground down against Tony, eliciting a moan from the smaller man – the look on his face at that sound was the definition of sinful.

“I do care – about how many clothes you’re wearing.” Tony let one hand trail down Loki’s neck, and over the front of his shirt. “Because right now there’s too many. Way, way too many.”

Loki leaned down and kissed him again, his own hand sliding under Tony’s shirt now, over his stomach, his chest, then back down to the waistband of his jeans. His fingertips brushed over Tony’s hips and he pushed up into the touch, letting out a small sigh, his hands now finding their way under Loki’s shirt, sliding up the taut muscles of his back. Loki took the opportunity to kiss him deeper, sliding his tongue into Tony’s mouth in a hot, gasping mess, trying to taste every inch of it. When he finally drew back, it was to draw a shaky breath and say;

“For a mortal, you are intoxicating, Stark.”

Tony managed a mock-offended face.

“For a mortal, what are you talking about ‘for a mortal’?” hard and deliberate, he ground his hips up against Loki’s, raking his nails down the gods back. Loki’s eyes went wide. “I’ll show you for a mortal.”

"I'll be glad to see it." Loki's voice had gone deep and rough, and then he was pulling Tony's shirt up, following it with his mouth. The kisses he left up Tony's chest were hot and wet, and good god damn, his jeans were far too tight right about now. Loki seemed to realise this at about the same time Tony did, and once he'd gotten Tony's shirt off, his hands were reaching for the zipper when there was a sharp knock at the door.

They both froze. Tony frantically hoped they’d both imagined the noise, but a few seconds later the knock repeated.

"Mr Stark?"

Tony recognised the voice as one of the SHIELD agents who'd been assigned to Loki-watching-duty since the very beginning. He swore.

"Yes?"

"Your AI informs us that Loki is in this room. Director Fury has requested that he be brought back to his quarters and placed back under surveillance due to recent…uh…events."

"Sure thing. I'll tell him when he, uh," Loki had started to do something distracting with his mouth along Tony's hip. He swallowed. "When he gets out of the bathroom." Between his legs, looking up from lowered eyelids, Loki gave him a wicked grin. In that moment Tony very much wished the SHIELD agent would kindly evaporate.

"Thank you, Mr Stark."

Tony waited for the sound of retreating footsteps, but there were none. Apparently, the agent wanted to escort Loki away herself. Damn. With a soft sigh, Loki extricated himself from between Tony’s legs and straightened up. Tony found his shirt and tugged it back on, conscious the whole time of Loki's eyes on him. By the time he was re-dressed, all trace of lust was gone from Loki's face – no sign of a flush, his gaze calm, his hair back to its usual immaculate state.

"So, uh, what now?" Tony said.

"Now?"

"You know, what do we do after…that?"

Loki raised an eyebrow.

"Well, Stark, if you can get me away from those ever-watchful SHIELD agents of yours, I'd put in a strong vote for going to bed, together, sans clothing."

"Ah." Tony swallowed. "Right. Cool."

He felt a burning desire to tell the SHIELD agent that Loki had teleported away, why not go and search for him somewhere else. Despite his promises to the contrary, Loki plucked the thought from his mind and laughed, leaning down to press one last, burning kiss with just a little too much tongue to be fair against Tony's lips. The look he gave him as he headed for the door was dark with lust.

"Think on what I said, Stark," he said. "I intend to."

Then he was gone, nothing but retreating footsteps followed by an anxious SHIELD agent. Tony stared at the open door for a long minute, still feeling the press of Loki's lips on his. Then all at once he stood, shut the door, about faced and went into the bathroom to take a very long, very cold shower.

---

Chapter Eleven

After his literal glow up, SHIELD clamped back down on Loki almost as hard as they had when he’d first arrived. After all, he’d gotten his ability to teleport back from one of his magical rewards, who knew what powers he’d gained this time? But after a week of relatively good behaviour and the imminent possibility of another demonic attack coming without warning, eventually Fury relented and allowed the security to relax a little. Though it was Thor who managed to be the most persuasive in getting him to ease up.

“I have told you time and again, Director, that my brother is repentant,” he had said. “He lost his way all those months ago, and how he has found it again. It has even been an entire two days since he insulted me, which I believe is the longest he has gone without doing so in an entire century.”

In the interest of maintaining intergalactic relations, Fury conceded and Tony had never wanted to hug the thunder god more. With all the eyes on Loki, he’d hardly dared to even think about what had happened between them for fear of SHIELD somehow picking up on it. Still, he resisted the urge to go running to find Loki the moment he was allowed out and around the tower again without an armed escort – mostly because he wasn’t entirely sure what he’d do when he did set eyes on him again. Impulse control had never exactly been his strong suit.

So it happened that the next time he did see him again was in the middle of a fight. Now that they weren’t getting any handy storms to warn of demonic incursions, it was a nasty surprise every time another vortex opened up. Demons swarmed around them, darkening the otherwise clear sky, sending blasts of red and black magical energy back and forth through the air. Apart from having a nasty sting to it, the magic really messed with Tony’s sensors, making combat more difficult than it needed to be. He could aim by eye, but having a computer to do it was just so much easier.

He blasted another demons head off, the body falling to the ground to join a dozen of its brethren. A flash of movement shot past him, inches from his faceplate, and he ducked backwards. The movement turned out to be a knife, which seconds later embedded itself in a demons’ throat. Tony turned, tracing the knifes trajectory back to it thrower. Loki, looking directly at him, breathing a little hard, blood on his face, eyes shining. Their eyes met across the distance and Tony tried to process the thousand thoughts racing through his mind, not least of which was where the hell did he get those knives from?

Loki’s mouth quirked in a brief grin and then he was gone in a shimmer of green light. Demonic screeching sounded behind him and Tony spun, throwing himself back into the fight. He could be distracted by pretty smiles later – right now there were demons to deal with.

And oh, the demons. Tony was as frustrated with their continual attacks as anyone else, if not more. They hadn’t come through in anything like their previous numbers again, just small handfuls - enough to fill an afternoon with a bloody skirmish, but nothing apocalyptic. What was possibly worse than the demons were the frequent strategy and intel meetings Fury kept holding in the tower. He and the rest of the world wanted an update, an explanation, but so far all they had was a whole lot of nothing.

“It’s like they’re probing us. Testing us,” Steve had said during one such meeting. He punched his palm, shaking his head. “It doesn’t make any sense. They clearly have the advantage on us in numbers – why not bring the whole army through and take over?”

“Maybe they’re not an invasion force,” Natasha mused, “Maybe they’re just scouts. Gathering intel, figuring out what defences we have.”

“But why send scouts in after two larger invasion forces already failed?” Clint asked.

“It’s possible they thought they’d take us out with the earlier forces,” Natasha span a pen between her fingers, fast enough to blur. “If they haven’t been to this planet before then they were operating without enough information. They might have assumed we were more defenceless than we were – now they know we’re not. The smaller groups are trying to get a better handle on what we can do ready for the next wave.”

“If we could get more data on them, learn something more than just what it takes to blow their ugly heads off,” Tony dug his fingers into his palms. “If we could even get more from their portal I could maybe figure something out. A way to at least track or predict if, even if I can’t close it. Everything about them is just so…slippery. And not in a good way.”

"For now, we keep doing what we’re doing. Keep beating them back.” Fury said, “Maybe we’ll get lucky and they’ll decide we’re more trouble than we’re worth.”

"I doubt that very much, Director," Loki drawled, sounding as bored as Tony felt. Either Thor had worked a miracle or he’d gotten fed up scribbling in his room, because he’d started attending the strategy meetings with them. He was leaning back in his chair, boots up on the desk, his fingertips drumming together above his chest. Fury kept glaring at him, Loki kept ignoring it, and Tony tried very hard to ignore the shapely thighs stretched out in front of him. “The creatures you are fighting are obviously mere foot soldiers for a more intelligent leader. Slay as many as you wish, but their commander will not give up so easily.”

Fury leaned forward, resting his chin on his fist. His eye was cold, his face carefully blank.

"Care to explain how you know that?"

Loki shrugged.

"Mere logic. Any fool could come to such a conclusion with just a little intelligent thought."

He was hiding something. Tony could see it. All of them could see it, and that meant Loki was letting them see it, which was more worrying than anything else. Whatever it was, Loki wasn’t telling and no amount of subtle threats or overt whining seemed to persuade him, and so they were left to talk themselves in yet more circles, wishing for a solid corpse to dissect, meaningful readings to decipher.

The best they could manage was another interview with one of the idiots who'd been caught stealing books about demons, and all she would say was more babble about 'greater powers' and 'other worlds of endless darkness'. Tony was starting to wish Satan himself would come crawling up out of the ground and announce his plans to bring about hell on earth, if only so they’d have an answer.

He distracted himself by working on an improved suit, losing his days to schematics and prototypes, a comforting monotony broken only by the occasional demonic incursion and pleasantly intrusive thoughts of how Loki had felt pressed on top of him.

But much as he wanted a repeat performance, he refrained from seeking out the god himself. SHIELD had eased up somewhat on the obsessive monitoring per Thor’s request, but there were cameras everywhere in the tower, Loki’s rooms in particular, and he didn’t want to take a chance. The last thing he needed was Fury throwing him in lock-up for fraternising with the frenemy. Besides, there was a strong possibility of Loki just showing up in his room or the workshop at some point – which, as it turned out, didn’t take all that long.

He was in the middle of working on the same data they’d had on the demons from day one, hoping that maybe it would make more sense if he looked at it upside down, when Loki appeared. As usual he popped into existence without warning, so suddenly that Tony instinctively panicked and threw his pen at him. Loki blinked and the pen vanished in mid-air, reappearing a moment later embedded in the floor by Tony’s head.

“What do you want?” Tony asked, sitting up and trying to pull the pen out of the floor and failing. Stupid gods and their stupid magic. One of these days he was going to figure out how that shit worked and then Loki would really have something to worry about. He stared up as Loki sauntered over, glancing over the holographic screens floating above him. Tony waved a hand and they vanished.

“Why, nothing but your company, Stark,” Loki said. He crouched down and plucked the pen easily from the floor, twirling it through his fingers a few times before it vanished.

“Bring that back from the shadow realm, I need that,” Tony complained. Loki’s fingers flashed and the pen reappeared. “How do you even do that?”

“That would be telling,” Loki settled into a cross-legged position on the floor, hands on his knees.

“Come on, as if you don’t love talking about how great you are. I’ll show you mine if you show me yours,” Tony grinned. Loki rolled his eyes.

“Your seduction techniques could use a little refinement. However, there is something about you that intrigues me,” he lifted a hand and tapped one long finger against Tony’s chest, right in the centre of the arc reactor. Tony tensed. “This little device. Explain it to me.”

“That’s…something of a long story,” Tony said. He brought his own hand up, covering the faint light of the reactor where it glowed through his shirt. He also caught Loki’s hand under his own, pressing it to his chest.

“I do enjoy a good tale,” Loki murmured. “Indulge me.”

Tony stared into his eyes, wondering if he could just kiss Loki right then and avoid the direction this conversation was going in. He drew in a breath, started to lean forwards, and found the words spilling out of him. The desert, the cave, the betrayal – the total upheaval of his entire life, all tumbling out in a jumbled mess of a narrative. And all the while Loki sat there, perfectly still, his hand on Tony’s chest and watching his face like he could read in it all the details Tony forgot or couldn’t bring himself to say.

He wasn’t sure how long he talked for but when he was done, the interior lights had come on, the windows darkening as the sun began to lower.

“So, yeah,” he finished up awkwardly. “That’s the story. Feeling indulged yet?”

“I believe so,” Loki said. “You are quite the intriguing creature, Stark. I had not expected to hear such a tale from your lips.”

Tony coughed, suddenly embarrassed. He got to his feet and stretched, wincing at the cracking sound his back made. The workshop floor wasn’t the most ergonomic of seats.

“I should get back to work. See if I can drag anything else out of these readings.” A flick of his hand and the screens popped back up, flooding the room with a blue glow. He went to grab a chair, and saw Loki straighten up from the floor, stretching his arms above his head. He dragged his attention from the sliver of flesh between shirt and pants to the screens as the data finished organising itself.

“But, Stark,” Loki said before he could sit down to get to work, “I have not yet held up my end of the bargain.”

Tony looked up at him, his grip on the chair back tightening as Loki moved towards him, a sly smirk on his lips.

“What bargain?”

Loki stopped, and lifted a hand to Tony’s face, tracing his fingers along his jaw, down his neck.

“I do believe you said that you would show me yours if I showed you mine,” he murmured, hand trailing down Tony’s chest. “You have told me your tale, which means I ought to show you,” he slipped two fingers into Tony’s belt loop, yanking him closer, “A little magic.”

Tony’s legs very suddenly decided they weren’t going to hold him up anymore and he sat down hard in the chair – which immediately collapsed under him. He grabbed out for something to keep himself from falling, but the only thing available was Loki’s arm and the two of them went crashing to the ground in a clumsy heap.

“There are easier ways to have me on top of you,” Loki growled, extricating himself as elegantly as he could from the tangle of limbs and chair parts. Tony ignored him, grabbed a handful of screws from the floor next to him and flung them through a holographic screen in the direction of the door. He was rewarded with a cry of pain and a,

“Screw you, Stark!”

“Leave the puns to the professionals!” Tony shouted, getting to his feet with a wince. He dismissed the screens and was rewarded with a sour looking Clint Barton, who had a hand pressed over one eye.

“This is gonna bruise,” he complained.

“Shouldn’t have messed with my chair then, should you?” Tony snapped. Clint flipped him off, and stomped away, still clutching his eye. Tony sighed, and turned back to find that Loki had already vanished. His shoulders drooped and he resigned himself to rebuilding a chair and plotting gruesome vengeance on Barton.

--

Two days later he was still plotting his revenge. Barton had at least received the appropriate level of mockery from his teammates for failing to get one up on Tony and ending up with a pretty nasty black eye as a result, but Tony wanted real payback. He was fooling around with ideas in the workshop that afternoon when Loki showed up again. This time Tony managed to not be quite so surprised when he appeared – he at least didn’t throw anything this time.

“Slipping your leash again?” he asked, leaning back in his chair. Loki shrugged.

“Our last meeting was interrupted. I merely thought it would be rude of me to not allow it a satisfying conclusion.”

“Really?” Tony couldn’t look away as Loki moved towards him, slow and deliberate, his fingers trailing over the edge of the workbench. He managed a mostly confident smirk. “And what conclusion were we aiming for? Because if I remember rightly, you were going to show me a…little…magic.”

Loki had straddled him, trapping him in the chair, their legs pressed tightly together. He slid his hands up Tony’s arms, traced across his shoulders, trailed his fingers lightly up his neck, nails just barely scraping against his skin. Tony swallowed.

“Um,” he managed. Loki chuckled.

"Truly, you have the voice of a poet, Stark,” he murmured, leaning in closer and taking Tony’s chin in his hand. Tony felt warm breath on his neck, and Loki’s lips brushed against his ear, "But I suspect you can find a better use for your mouth."

Tony wasn't sure whether he was hearing a sudden internal rendition of the Hallelujah chorus or the Jaws theme, but either way he couldn’t help himself. He turned his head, grabbing onto Loki’s shirt and pulling him round into a vicious kiss, and it was only when their mouths met that he realised he’d forgotten just how good the last time had felt. His memory hadn’t fully preserved the sensation that was Loki. A soft sigh escaped him as Loki’s lips moved against his own, tongue pressing into Tony’s mouth.

He pulled away for a moment to draw breath, staring into Loki’s too-bright eyes as his hands slid under Tony’s shirt, tracing the edges of the arc reactor with his fingertips. Tony had to smirk at the slight flush on Loki’s face, and the god returned him a wicked grin before dipping his head to bite a kiss onto Tony’s neck. Tony groaned and let his head fall back while Loki kissed his way up to his jaw, tongue flicking over his pulse as he went, which was racing far too quickly. Distracted as he was, Tony’s own hands did not remain idle – they roamed up Loki’s back, dragging his shirt with them.

“You promised a lack of clothing the next time this happened,” he said, more than a little breathless as Loki’s tongue traced a line up his jaw to his ear. “Come on. Get naked.”

“Mortals,” Loki sighed in mock irritation, “Always so impatient.” But he obliged in sliding out of his shirt anyway and Tony gazed up at him, his hands tracing the path his eyes took over the gods smooth, sculpted chest. The came to rest at the back of Loki’s neck, and Tony pulled him down close again for another kiss.

“Now that’s a look I approve of,” Loki whispered into his mouth. “So very worshipful.”

He nipped on Tony’s earlobe, and as he was ravaging the other side of his neck, there was a shimmer of green light and Tony’s shirt suddenly disappeared.

“That better still exist on some level of reality,” Tony started to complain. Then he shut up, because Loki was sliding off his lap, pushing his knees apart while trailing hot, wet kisses down his chest and was just starting to unbuckle his belt when the alarm started to blare.

Tony closed his eyes and swore as he heard Fury’s voice over the comms, announcing another demonic party raid. He looked down but Loki was already gone, not so much as a green spark left. He swore again, and ran for the suit. He was up in the air in minutes, pushing thoughts of Loki to the back of his mind as fast as possible.

Frustratingly enough, the scouting party was small, the property damage minimal and the non-demonic body count was a grand total of zero. Overall, the rush to deal with it seemed a little excessive. Tony had started in on a good old commiseration of annoyance with Natasha over the comms when he caught sight of Loki approaching one of the demonic corpses. He was glad of the helmet covering his face from view, so he could indulge in a little admiration of assets in privacy. Loki tilted his head for a moment, staring at the corpse. Then he raised his hands over it and green light began to twine around them, flowing downwards to wrap around the corpse.

Tony dropped down, landing a careful distance in front of Loki so as not to startle him – he had no desire for a faceful of magic. He approached slowly, flipping the faceplate up as he did so since the proximity to the magic was making the sensors in the HUD spin a little too fast to be totally comfortable right then. It definitely wasn’t so he could see Loki a little clearer, that was for certain. The god in question was frowning as the magic twisted around the corpse, covering it in a fine mesh of glowing green lines. He glanced up briefly as Tony approached.

“You wished to examine one of these, yes?” his voice was strained, and was Tony imagining things or had a blood vessel popped in one of his eyes?

“Yes,” he said.

“Good. I would hate to have made such an effort for no reason.”

The mesh of light sank into the corpse, infusing it with an emerald glow. Loki’s hands dropped, and Tony decided not to comment on the way they were held in trembling fists at the gods sides.

“The spell should hold for a full day – more than enough time, I hope, for you to go digging around inside it.”

“I…thanks,” said Tony. Then, on a whim, “You wanna join in?”

The look of surprise on Loki’s face was almost comical.

"You would not object?"

Tony very carefully made sure his comms were turned all the way off before he replied.

"I didn't object to you shoving your tongue down my throat an hour and a half ago, why would I object to anything else now?"

Loki blinked, bared his teeth in a cat-like grin, and then immediately transported himself, Tony, and the corpse straight to the medical bay back at the tower.

Thirty minutes later, after calming down the panicked medical staff and getting the corpse set up on a gurney, Tony managed to smooth talk Loki into holding off on the examination until at least Bruce got there. He did at least ask the medical staff that hadn’t immediately left if they wanted to help, being as they were a little more expert in the field than he was. None of them were overly impressed with Tony’s plan to cut the thing up and see what made it tick, but seeing as none of them felt they were being paid nearly enough to start dissecting demonic corpses, none of them made any real moves to stop him. So by the time Bruce arrived and Tony had set up some equipment to record as much as possible – given that a second chance at this wasn’t likely – all of the actual medical professionals had left.

He also had JARVIS in charge of running analysis from every sensor it was humanly possible to get analysis from. He wanted to know every detail of every atom of this thing. And later, he’d go through all the data and if he was very lucky there might even be something useful in there somewhere. Then, finally, they got down the actual gory business of getting inside the demons’ body. Even in death it was intimidating, its face frozen in a hideous snarl.

Tony held his breath behind his protective mask as Bruce made the first careful incision into the demons’ chest. The blade sliced through the grey skin so easily it was hard to believe that only a few hours ago this thing had been a monster capable of incredible violence. Loki stood at the end of the table, staring at the demon as they opened it up, his face utterly blank.

“So far no crumbling to dust. Nice job,” Tony said as the ribcage came into view. It looked disturbingly human. “Loki, will your magic affect the readings we get from this thing?”

Loki shook his head once, sharply.

"I doubt it. And if they do, I will be able to show you which readings are my own."

Tony nodded and motioned at Bruce.

“Let’s…uh…rummage.”

It was a good thing all the medical staff had decided they wanted no part of this, or they would have had a collective aneurism. Yet somehow between them they managed to extricate the demons internal organs without damaging any of them, and blood only got mostly everywhere. The ribcage might have looked human but that was about it. Loki identified a heart and lungs from the creature – the rest they grouped under ‘internal organs: pending classification.’ While Tony and Bruce poked around, getting blood so dark it was almost black all over their hands, Loki did some examination of his own. A lack of a scalpel was no hindrance to the trickster - small, dancing lights darted from his fingertips to weave in and out of the gaping chest cavity. All the while his frown grew deeper and deeper.

JARVIS quietly recorded the whole thing, while Tony set aside two dozen blood samples for analysis later – assuming, of course, it didn’t turn to dust when Loki’s spell wore off. Bruce, meanwhile, had moved on to open up the demons’ head to get a look at its brain. Inside the skull, surrounded by a layer of dull violet goop, was a smooth greyish lump criss-crossed with shallow lines that glowed faintly red, and pulsed at the touch of Tony’s gloved fingers.

“I’m no expert, but doesn’t a smooth brain equal a lack of intelligent thought?” he said. No-one contradicted him so he assumed he must have been right. “Looks like you were right about them being foot-soldiers, Loki. With this useless lump in their heads they can’t be intelligent on their own at all. A creature like this couldn’t possibly have masterminded any kind of invasion.”

"There are times when I wish I were not so astute," Loki said, and the lights he was examining the body with snapped out. “I suggest you make the most of the time you have left of the spell."

He vanished without another word and Tony cursed internally, then externally as he gripped an 'internal organ; pending classification' a little too hard and unidentifiable demon juice squirted out onto his face. He shook his head – he'd go after Loki later. For now, though;

"JARVIS, talk to me about what you're getting. There has to be some logic to all this mess."

---

Chapter Twelve

Loki lay on his back on the small bed that he had the dubious fortune to call his own here in the tower. He stared up at the ceiling with his arms folded behind his head, trying with mixed success to quiet his mind. The demons, their magic…they stirred something deep in his mind, a place he had no desire to go. He did not doubt that if he wanted to, he could pull up whatever his mind was whispering about, and it would cease to dance at the edges of his thoughts. On the whole, he would rather it stay there. Let it linger at the edges of recollection. Whatever it was could stay a ghost of a memory and he could let himself believe that for once his suspicions would be groundless.

He closed his eyes, drawing in a slow breath. There were downsides to being a god. Thousands of years of memories being one of them.

There was a knock at the door and his eyes shot open.

“You can see into my quarters with your infernal cameras,” he called, letting his frustration bleed into his voice. “You need not intrude on my privacy any further, Ms Irena.”

“First name terms with the jailer – and I thought I was smooth.”

It was Starks voice, sounding amused. Loki ignored the jolt in his chest at hearing it, and schooled his expression into a scowl as he rose and went to the door, trying not to jump to conclusions as to why Stark was at his door in the middle of the night. He pulled the door open the barest crack and glared out of it.

“Don’t you mortals ever have to sleep?”

“I try not to – gets in the way of more interesting things,” Loki found himself pushed aside as Tony barged into the room, either oblivious to or ignoring his frosty look. He made a show of looking around, nodding approvingly at the room that had remained mostly unchanged since the day Loki had moved in. Loki caught his breath as Tony’s gaze slid over the books on the desk, and the stacks of papers next to them, all covered in his spidery notes. Aside from his clothes, they were the only personal items Loki had acquired in the months he had been at the tower – he had no intention of making this place homely in the least. Loki cleared his throat, drawing Tony’s attention away from the desk.

“Stark, it is entirely the wrong time of day for your attempts at humour.”

Tony grinned at him, holding his arms out as though indicating himself.

“Oh, come on, don’t say you’re not even a little bit happy to see me.”

Loki swallowed, keeping his gaze on Tony’s face.

“I was busy.”

“With all of this?” before Loki could stop him, Tony had sat in the chair at the desk and started rifling through the papers. His jaw tightened and he pressed his hand, suddenly in an almost painful fist, hard against his side to stop himself from grabbing the impudent human and throwing him from the room. Instead, he pushed the door shut with a soft click and watched as Tony flipped through the papers. He didn’t need to worry, he knew, as there was no chance of him understanding any of it. Loki was not so foolish as to write in English, or what Midgardians called Norse for that matter – even Thor would not have been able to read the language he made his notes in. He knew how to keep his own secrets.

At last, Tony dropped the papers and looked back at Loki.

“What is it you know?” he asked. His tone was blunt, but his eyes were begging for answers, and though a part of Loki knew he deserved them, he held his gaze and kept his face a mask.

“Nothing.”

Tony made a scoffing noise and rolled his eyes.

“Come on, you’re supposed to be the god of lies. Do better than that.”

As happened so frequently when dealing with Stark, Loki didn’t know whether to laugh or to scream. The man had so little regard for the power of the person standing before him it verged on sheer idiocy. He knew what Loki was capable of, even with his powers still limited, and yet Loki knew that he would keep making his smart comments until someone physically stopped him. It was a wonder he was still alive.

“God of mischief, mostly,” he replied. He waved a hand and the papers and books on the desk vanished in a ripple of green light. “Though regarding your current demon problem, there would be no answers in my papers regardless.”

“How come?” Tony swung himself around so he was straddling the chair, and leaned his arms on the backrest. He had tilted his head a little to the side, staring up at him, and Loki quickly shifted his gaze. He was the manipulator here, not this human with the curious eyes. “I have literally nothing else to do tonight. I’m not leaving until you talk about something.”

Loki gave a small sigh and shook his head – the man was as tenacious as ever. He raised a hand and one of the sheaves of paper reappeared in it. He let his eyes run over them, over the harsh pen strokes of his writing, the dark black ink thick in unreadable tangles across the page. He spoke without looking up, his voice quiet.

“When I first came here, Odin had taken everything from me. Everything. All he left me was what was wrapped into my bones so tightly that to remove it would be a fate worse than death – as it turns out, even he would not be that cruel.” He ran a finger over a phrase, curls of golden magic rising from it like smoke. “Had any of you taken it into your heads to kill me when I first arrived, you would have permanently removed a problem from your lives.”

He let the papers vanish, gazing at the green light that engulfed them, then danced around his hand. It still gave him a thrill of relief to be able to perform even that simple trick again. Without his magic, the world had been reduced, dulled – getting his powers back had given him colour and sound again, and he dared not think what he would do if it was taken away again.

“I’m surprised you’d admit to something like that,” Tony said softly, breaking his reverie. Loki let the light fade from his hand and curled his fingers into his palm, still gazing at it.

“I only say it now because it is no longer true,” he replied. “It would take a great deal of effort for you to end my life now. That and I do not…” he hesitated, at last raising his eyes to Tony’s. “I do not believe you would actively try to do that now.”

“Not actively, no.” Tony laughed softly, “Though it depends on what you try to pull next. You never know, I might be one green suit away from homicide.”

“Perhaps the time for games is over now, given the circumstances,” Loki said. Tony shot him a grin and Loki couldn’t help but feel himself smiling in return.

“Funny things are still funny, demonic apocalypses notwithstanding,” he said. “Speaking of which, I do have one other burning question for you.”

Loki raised an eyebrow.

“Oh?”

“Why did you agree to stark pulling pranks on me in the first place?”

Loki chuckled, and moved over to lean on the desk next to Tony, sensing his slight tensing as he came nearer. He was reasonably certain at this point that the reaction didn’t come from fear, and that knowledge brought a smirk to his face.

“Boredom, mostly,” he said. He let one hand trail out over Tony’s shoulders, a movement that was deliberately casual, almost absent. He watched Stark only from his peripheral vision, drinking in the slightly open-mouthed glance Tony shot at him, and slight wetting of his lips. “Although I suppose a part of me did wonder, briefly, if I couldn’t accidentally cause your death somehow.”

Tony snorted.

“Sure, right. Didn’t we just establish that back then you couldn’t kill a cold virus, let alone a fully sized human?”

Loki drew his hand back towards him, this time dragging his nails over Tony’s exposed neck, delighting in the shiver it caused. Stark was so deliciously responsive.

“As I said, it was largely boredom. You at least proposed an entertaining way to pass the time.”

“You know we have the internet in here, right?”

He chuckled, and trailed his hand down Tony’s spine. Stark sat just a little too still, and Loki could see his pulse fluttering in his throat – he could almost hear the blood rushing through his veins.

“I always find reality more interesting.”

A faint flush of red had graced Stark’s cheeks, though he was determinedly not looking at Loki as his hand stroked up and down his back, fingers dancing over his spine up to his neck again. Loki bit back a sigh of want. Better to tread carefully here, in this room with its many prying eyes.

Tony cleared his throat.

“Uh, so, where did you get those knives from, huh?”

Loki blinked, his hand halting in its movements.

“My…knives?”

“Mm-hmm,” Stark had, of all things, pulled his phone from his pocket and was tapping away at it as if it, and not Loki, were the most interesting thing in the room. “You had them in the fight earlier. Haven’t seen them before.” Loki watched his tapping fingers, fighting back irritation. What game was the mortal playing now?

“In terms even you would understand – a pocket dimension,” Loki raised the hand that wasn’t on Starks back and with a twist and a pull, the knife materialised in his hand. He squeezed the hilt, the weight of it a comfort as always, and span it dextrously. Tony glanced up at it, then back to his phone screen.

“That’s pretty neat.”

Loki scowled, and with a flick the knifepoint was under Tony’s chin, tilting his head up.

“What are you doing, Stark? You come here and interrogate me, then ignore me? There are penalties for such behaviour, you should know.”

Tony winked at him, apparently not the slightest bit concerned about the literal knife to his throat, and held up the phone.

“Just giving us a little privacy.”

Loki examined the screen, staring at the tiny lines of flickering numbers and small boxes of video. He withdrew the knife.

“What?”

“Oh, you know,” Tony tossed the phone onto the desk and finally turned to face him properly. He was smiling in a way that sent a shiver down Loki’s spine. It had been some time since anyone had been able to affect him in such a way, and he wasn’t yet certain if he liked it.

“You were letting your fingers do some pretty specific talking,” Stark continued, one hand now sliding slowly up Loki’s thigh. “And I figured that if I was interpreting them right, then SHIELD probably doesn’t want to see it.”

Loki stared at him for a moment before letting his head fall back in an unrestrained laugh. Tony’s hand paused in its journey up his leg.

“What? What did I say? I mean, I know I’m hysterical but I wasn’t trying to be, I was trying to seduce you.”

Restraining his laughter but unable to push away the smile, Loki shook his head. He twisted the knife back into the ether with a soft shimmer of power, and took Stark’s face in his hands.

“You continue to surprise me,” he said, “and I am trying to decide whether I find it endearing or irritating.”

“How about arousing?” Tony raised an eyebrow. Loki let his hands slip down his face, trailing his finger down the sides of Tony’s neck.

“You have proven such,” he murmured, enjoying the way Stark’s breathing sped up and the deepening flush on his face. “And since you have so kindly arranged a little privacy, and given the lateness of the hour, perhaps this time we shall not be rudely interrupted.”

He watched Tony swallow, wet his lips, and now he did allow himself to want.

“I do have one more question,” Stark said, his voice heavy and low.

“Make it your last,” Loki whispered.

Tony drew away from him and in a moment was out of the chair and on the floor, on his knees with his hands on the inside of Loki’s thighs. Loki stared down at him, his own breath coming faster now, as Stark slowly pushed his legs apart, not looking away for even a second, and Loki had watched other people fall into a spell under his gaze and thought that perhaps now he was experiencing what it was like to be on the receiving end of a pair of spellbinding eyes.

“Back in the workshop,” he said, hands slowly moving higher, with just enough pressure to tease, “you kept promising to show me a little magic.” His hands stopped, thumbs on the highest point of Loki’s thighs, a breath away from his groin. Loki held himself very still and said nothing. “So, my question is – when exactly are you going to get around to that?”

Loki let out a noise that he would later deny having been a growl and slid his hands into Tony’s hair, pulling him closer. He could feel the heat of Stark’s breath on his thigh and had a sudden, desperate urge to rid them both of clothing with a wave of magic. He restrained it. There was a time and a place for haste, and right now, with the promise of a distraction-free night ahead, he wanted to savour this. He rose from the table, standing straight, and with a gentle yet insisted tug, pulled Stark to his feet.

“You want me to show you magic?” he said, keeping his voice low and as even as he could, pulling Tony flush against him. He slid a hand up under Tony’s shirt, savouring the feeling of warm skin beneath his palm. “You’re certain you wouldn’t rather I show you something else?”

He rocked his hips against Tony’s, letting out a satisfied hum as Tony flung his arms around Loki’s neck and stretched up for his mouth. Loki dipped his head, closing his eyes and allowing himself to fall into the sensation, content to simply kiss him for a long, long minute. Then the heat growing in his belly grew more and more insistent until finally he span them, pinning a breathless Stark against the desk. Much as he had adored Stark on his knees, he was going to be the one seducing him, not the other way around. And, skilled as he claimed to be in the art, Loki knew that Tony was no match for him in that respect. He was going to enjoy this.

Tony stared up at him, his eyes wide, lips wet. Loki caressed his face with the back of his hand, the tender movement lasting only a moment until he pushed himself between Tony’s legs and leaned down for another long, hungry kiss.

“Forget the magic, I like where this is going,” Tony gasped when Loki finally came up for air. He slid his hands into Loki’s hair, tangling his fingers in it to hold Loki’s face close to his own. Loki could feel Tony’s breath on his lips and for a moment felt an almost intoxicating dizziness clouding his mind. He blinked, trying to clear his thoughts. Such an interesting mortal, to have this effect on him.

“Good,” he growled when he had his mind under control again, “Because I have been waiting for far too long.” He lowered his mouth to Tony’s neck, sucking at the tender flesh where jawline met neck.

“Tell me about it,” Tony managed to groan. He had released one hand from Loki’s hair and slid it down between them, reaching for the fastening on Loki’s pants. Loki rolled his hips down into the touch and continued his way down Tony’s neck, leaving a trail of red marks between his jaw and his shoulder. He reached Tony’s shirt, growled in irritation, and sent out a flare of magic. The shirt vanished in a ripple of green light and Loki was granted access to the entirety of Tony’s chest, the arc reactor casting it in a pleasing blue glow.

“You already did that trick,” Tony gasped. “Still a good one though. Does it work on pants, too?”

“Patience,” Loki murmured against his throat, rocking his hips down again into Tony’s hand. “We have all night, do we not?”

Which was, of course, when there was a soft knock at the door. Loki gave another growl, this time born of frustration, and called out,

“Ms Irena, I have told you several times-”

“Loki, may we speak?” Thor’s voice. Loki closed his eyes and breathed out a slow, controlled breath. Of all the times…

“No,” he shot at the door. Stark’s hand had unfastened his pants and his hand was sliding inside and if there was ever a time for Thor to listen when he told him to leave it was now.

“Loki, I know you are keeping something from the team,” Thor was not so easily discouraged and really, what else had Loki expected? “From me. They all know it, and I know that you know that, which means you wanted them to know you were keeping something.”

Loki fought to keep his voice steady as Tony’s hand started to stroke, a wicked grin on his face and a challenge in his eyes.

“Brother, I am not in the least interested in discussing your paranoia about my intentions right now.”

He stared down at Stark’s flushed face, so close to his own, and was about to devour his lips in a kiss he would not soon forget, when,

“I am worried,” Thor said. There was a soft thump, and Loki guessed that Thor had sat himself down against the door, a sure sign that he wasn’t about to leave any time soon. Stark’s hand was becoming insistent and Loki at last dipped his head to take that kiss, sliding his tongue into the other man’s mouth and drawing out of him a quickly smothered moan.

“You are always worried,” Loki said when he finally pulled away. He caught Stark’s wrist, halting his movements, and shook his head slightly. “Patience,” he murmured, soft enough that only Tony could hear. Tony withdrew his hand, affecting a pout that Loki found oddly charming. Loki let his other hand curl around his jaw, letting his thumb run back and forth across Tony’s lips. “I will soon see him away. And then…”

“I’ll hold you to that,” Tony whispered back.

“That’s not true,” Thor was saying, blissfully oblivious to the scene he was interrupting. “But I have good reason to be concerned this time. These demons…it unsettles me that I have no idea what they are. More so that I think you…you do know what they are.”

“Go back to bed, brother,” Loki said, letting his voice take on a more soothing tone. He was still very conscious of Stark beneath him, a distraction even without his hands on him. “You are overthinking things as usual.”

“Please, Loki, if you know something, tell someone – even if it is not me,” Thor said. “I have a bad feeling about all of this. I fear it will end in disaster.”

Loki let out a slightly bitter laugh and glanced towards the door.

“Premonitions now, brother? I thought sorcery was beneath you.”

“Loki! I have never thought that!” Loki heard him get to his feet, heard the door handle begin to turn. A brief flare of magic shot from him, almost before he realised he was doing it, and Thor yelped. “That was unfair.”

“What was unfair was you interrupting my evening with your ridiculous theories,” Loki snapped, stepping away from Tony now. Try as he might to cling to it, the desire of the evening was starting to fade, and Loki knew that whatever the night had promised to be it now never would. Frustration and anger took over instead, sliding neatly into their customary places in his heart. “If I had something of interest to tell you, I might tell you. I might not. You and the rest are capable of solving your own problems without my help. Even I know that much.”

Loki glared at the door and didn’t let himself react to the wince he saw from Tony out of the corner of his eye.

“I am just concerned,” Thor said, and Loki knew he would be reaching for the handle again. Always the foolish hope in that one.

“You need not be. I do not need your sympathy – you ought to have learned that by now.”

“When will you stop acting like every sign of affection is an attack?” Thor said, his voice low now, with a dejected edge that only made Loki grind his teeth and fight to stay his hand from sending out another flare of magic.

“When will you realise that affection is a weakness you possess and I do not?” the moment the words were out of his mouth, Loki wanted to cram them back in, to grab time by its coattails and force it to reverse itself. He didn’t dare to look at Stark. He stood there, aware that his hands were shaking, his eyes burning into the door. He was painfully aware that Thor was staring at him from the other side of it, that Stark was staring at him from where he stood by the desk. He set his jaw and waited. After a long silence, Thor sighed.

“As you wish, brother. Sleep well.”

His footsteps retreated down the corridor, but Loki didn’t move until almost a full minute had passed since the last of them had faded away.

“I’ll see myself out,” Tony broke the silence at last, a harsh edge to his voice that Loki hadn’t heard before. All he could give was a slight nod and a twitch of his index finger. In a swirl of green Stark’s shirt was back on his body. Loki didn’t move after that as he left, didn’t even meet his eyes when Tony glanced over his shoulder before letting the door fall shut behind him.

He only realised he was digging his nails into his palm when he felt a trickle of blood between his fingers. He stared down at it, watched as green light erupted along the wound, sealing it shut with a line of fire that burned emerald, then gold, and then faded. He closed his fingers over his palm and commanded the artificial mind that controlled the building to turn off the lights. It complied, leaving him in darkness.

“Well done, Loki,” he murmured bitterly into the empty room. After a moment, he moved to the window to gaze out at the lights of the city below. “Very well done indeed.”

---

Chapter Thirteen

How many other people on the planet could say they had made a so-called deity look the way Loki looked right now? With a flush on his cheeks and his eyes glittering with lust – the full, dark intensity of them fixed solely on the focus of his desire. Tony sighed as Loki dipped his head to press a line of burning kisses along his neck, running his hands down Loki’s back as he did so, feeling the firm curve and flex of muscle beneath his palms. His legs were around Loki’s waist, gripping him between them as he thrust down again and again in a smooth, deep rhythm. He gave a satisfied moan of pleasure and dug his nails into Loki’s back, eliciting a deep throated chuckle.

Tony wasn’t entirely sure how they’d ended up like this – tangled together at last on his bed, in darkness save for the faint glow of the TV from the far corner. But no, that couldn’t be right, because the TV was on the wall opposite the bed and it was far bigger than that glow. Tony opened his eyes and tried to see over Loki’s shoulder to figure out where the light was coming from, but he couldn’t seem to angle his neck right to see into that corner. Well, it didn’t matter anyway. What mattered was how good Loki felt on top of him, inside of him…

His head fell back against the pillow again, and he let himself be lost in Loki’s hands on his skin, the scrape of his nails, his mouth over his pulse, sucking and biting and sure to leave a mark and in that moment Tony couldn’t care less and-

“Ow!” his eyes shot open. Loki’s scratching nails had dug a little too deep, and when he looked there was blood running down his arm. He followed it up to his shoulder where it now gushed from a gaping wound of three jagged lines like claw marks. “Loki, what-”

But when he turned his face to Loki’s, it wasn’t the tricksters’ familiar green eyes he stared into. He was gazing at bottomless, mindless black pits. Tony’s eyes went wide as he realised he was staring into the warped, monstrous face of a demon, and that he was no longer naked – he was in the armour, battered and broken. The demon was squatting over his chest with claws raised, dripping with blood, with his blood-

He sat up in bed with a gasp, back tingling with the cold sweat trickling down his spine.

“JARVIS, lights.”

He ran a hand over his face, wincing in the sudden brightness but grateful for the painful reality of it.

“That certainly seemed like an interesting dream.”

Tony whipped his head around, his hands grabbing at the sheets for lack of anything better to cling to. Loki was leaning against the wall, one leg crossed at the ankle over the other and his arms folded loosely across his chest. The corner of his mouth twitched in a smile.

“And what the hell are you doing here?” Tony said, still clinging onto the sheets, holding them to his chest like a B-movie heroine. “Don’t you have a brother to antagonise?” It had been a couple of days since that night in Loki’s rooms, but he still winced internally every time he thought back on Loki’s words. They hadn’t spoken since, and he’d started thinking that whatever this thing was that they had, had been over before it really started. Loki’s being there, though, said that maybe he’d been wrong about that.

“I heard you call out,” Loki said with a shrug. “I came to make sure you were not being brutally murdered in your bedchambers – as it turns out, there were far more interesting things going on. But the part at the end where you grabbed your shoulder and screamed doesn’t seem to match up with the rest of it. What was that about?”

Tony glowered at him and flopped back onto the bed.

“Bad dream,” he muttered. “And since when do you have super hearing that you can hear my sex dreams from a floor below me?” And since when are you concerned enough about me to come running at the slightest sound of potential danger?

“I thought that was what it was.” Next thing he knew, Loki had one knee on the edge of the bed next to him with a disconcertingly hungry look in his eyes. “Please, do share.”

“Nope. No. No way. It’s,” he groped for his phone, saw the time and shut his eyes with a groan, “God, too-fucking-early-am for you to be asking that. Go away.”

Loki chuckled and Tony felt cool fingers tracing down his neck. He opened his eyes and found Loki’s green ones gazing down into them. For real, this time, no demonic vision popping up to replace them.

“Are you certain?” Loki murmured, letting his hand slide over Tony’s shoulder and down his bare arm. “It didn’t seem like your dream lover left you very satisfied.”

“Are you sure you want to take his place?” Tony caught Loki’s hand under his own, and sat up to face him properly. “Given your opinions of affection?”

Loki’s jaw went tense.

“What I said to my brother has no bearing on what I wish to do to you,” he said, trying to lean in for a kiss. Much as a large and vocal part of him wanted to drop the subject, Tony held himself back, putting a finger against Loki’s lips. Loki’s eyes narrowed.

“Stark,” he said in a warning tone, “I can leave if you wish, but do not try to play games with me. We both know how poorly that ends for you.”

“Last time we played games, you ended up tarred and feathered, so I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Tony said. “But Loki, you can’t say shit like you did and then just…just blank me for two days straight, then show up in the middle of the night because you were eavesdropping on my dreams.”

Loki sighed, and pushed Tony’s hand from his mouth.

“Alright. I will admit I spoke in…irritation, the other night. I did not mean to imply anything insulting towards you.”

“You really hate admitting you fucked up, don’t you?” Tony said. Loki gave him a sour look, and he breathed a laugh. “All right. I get it. Thor pushes your buttons and I was just in the way. We’ll talk about your family issues later.”

“You cannot solve the issues between my brother and I with a well-constructed quip,” Loki leaned in to kiss him again, and this time Tony didn’t stop him. He’d played about as much therapist as he reasonably could. Usually he was the one on the receiving end of advice about fixing fuck-ups, not the other way around. And right now, it was the middle of the night, in the privacy of his own room, and maybe he’d get lucky this time.

“JARVIS, lights,” he said, pulling away. The lights shut off, leaving nothing but the blue glow of the arc reactor and the faint city light trickling its way around the blinds. Loki’s mouth curved into a smile. “Don’t get too excited,” Tony said, “We don’t exactly have a good track record with this stuff. I fully expect the Hulk to come rampaging in any second. Or demons to come crashing through the window. Or the building to collapse around us.”

Loki let out a soft laugh.

"I am hoping that tonight our luck will hold,” he said, and leaned forwards to kiss him again. All thoughts of the bitter way their last encounter had ended faded into the back of Tony’s mind as Loki’s hands gripped his shoulders, pulling him closer. Tony broke away briefly to gasp,

“You are way too not naked for this,” then went back to devouring Loki’s mouth. Loki rumbled a laugh against his lips and even from behind closed eyes Tony could see the ripple of green. His hands found bare skin at last and he slid his palms down Loki’s sides, falling back onto the bed under a gently insistent push from the man on top of him. Loki’s tongue was doing downright sinful things to his own, and Tony groaned when he pulled away. He looked up into the gods eyes, opening his mouth to a complaint that died on his lips at the look on Loki’s face, so dark and desperate that it sent a shiver through his whole body. The dream hadn’t even come close to comparing to the reality of what lust really looked like on Loki.

Loki slid himself between Tony’s legs, and Tony gladly let them fall apart to accommodate him. He trailed his hands down Tony’s sides, nails lightly dragging down his ribs. His mouth followed soon after, hot and wet, teeth nipping as he went, and Tony figured he better not walk around shirtless for a little while. He let his eyes close as Loki continued his descent, drinking in the sound of lips on his skin and the rough syncopation of their increasingly heavy breathing.

“God,” he groaned out as Loki’s tongue left hot, wet trails over his hips, his thumbs tracing the line of his hip bones. Loki chuckled, the low laugh vibrating against Tony’s skin.

“Indeed,” he murmured. His hands slid to Tony’s thighs, fingers pressing down with just a hint of pressure, the faint promise of a more-than-human strength. Tony could feel Loki’s breath on his groin, his erection twitching in response. He bit his lip. He wouldn’t beg, he wouldn’t beg, not yet, not this early-

“Sweet merciful Christ, Loki, will you just-”

And that was when Loki took him in his mouth. Tony let out a full voiced moan, secure in the knowledge that JARVIS was the only other one that could possibly hear it. The chorus of sensibility in his head, the one that sounded like a collection of Pepper-Steve-and-Rhodey’s, the one that had been slowly falling into despair ever since he’d agreed to play pranks with a trickster god, finally threw up its collective hands and quit the premises. Tony didn’t have it in him to even remotely give a shit, what with Loki’s tongue doing something incredibly complicated and very, very nice between his legs. His hips jerked upwards into the gods mouth, but Loki’s hands on his thighs gripped harder, holding him down. Tony clenched his hands against the bed – this should have felt dangerous, that amount of coiled strength on top of him, but all he could think in that moment was that he wanted Loki to hold him tighter.

He looked down, and Loki drew his mouth away for a moment, holding Tony’s eyes with his own and grinning a wicked grin that had Tony grabbing his hair and pulling him up, desperate to kiss him again. Loki obliged and as he pressed himself against him, Tony rocked his hips up and was pleased to finally hear a soft moan escape Loki’s lips. It was only a small sound, quickly swallowed in the hot press of tongue and lips, but the fact that he’d heard it meant that now he was going to be spending his time looking for a way to hear it again. It was just a matter of experimenting.

Which was, after all, one of Tony's many and varied areas of expertise.

He thrust his hips upwards again, then again, splaying his hands over Loki’s back to pull him closer, feeling his breath hot and heavy against his cheek.

“You are most enticing,” Loki breathed into his ear, punctuating his words with a drag of teeth over Tony’s earlobe, “For a mortal, of course.”

God, Tony could hear him smirking.

He wasn’t sure, afterwards, how he managed to flip them over – though he was pretty certain Loki let him do it – but but flip them he did, rolling Loki beneath him. And now he found himself sitting astride a flushed, smirking god of mischief, somehow with his hands gripping Loki’s and pinning them up over his head. He bit his lip as he looked down at him, at Loki’s glittering eyes and at his face cast in strange shadows by the blue glow of the arc reactor, his hair in gorgeous disarray around his head.

"For a mortal," he growled. Loki bucked his hips up and Tony groaned.

"Go on then, Stark, show me for a mortal."

Loki's voice was low, breathless, heavy – Tony thought he could listen to that sound for hours. He let go of Loki’s hands, slid backwards down the bed and took the god in his mouth in one smooth movement, a perfect mirror of their previous position. Loki let out a sound suspiciously like a purr and Tony felt long fingers tangling themselves in his hair. There was no push or pull, just a firm, encouraging pressure. Not that Tony needed any encouragement, no, he was out to enjoy himself and, if possible, wipe that smirk off Loki's face for a change.

That and pull more of those moans from him, as loud as he could manage.

It had been a while since he’d been with anyone, so he blamed rusty technique for it taking longer than he wanted to get Loki right to that beautiful edge, his body tense with pleasure under Tony’s ministrations. He drew his tongue up in a long slide and pulled away, watching Loki’s eyes open and glare down at him as he realised that Tony had stopped. His eyes were dark with desire as he tightened his grip on Tony’s hair.

“Stark,” he breathed in that heavy voice again, turned rough at the edges from the delicious moans he had been trying but not entirely succeeding at suppressing. “Do not test me. I will crush your skull if you don’t continue.”

Tony grinned up at him, stroking Loki’s inner thighs with teasing fingers.

“No, you won’t, you like me too much.”

Loki growled and pushed his head down. Tony laughed and obliged, continuing to glide his fingers in circles as he finished the job. Loki’s grip tightened further as his hips jerked in short, sharp movements, his breath coming faster and faster. Finally, he gasped out,

“Stark-!” as he came, and Tony didn’t think he’d ever heard his own surname sound so erotic before. Then he realised that Loki was on the verge of pulling his hair out, and he reached up to gently pry the gods fingers away from his head – Loki’s hand went limp at his touch, falling away to the bed. Tony swallowed, wiped his lips with the back of his hand, and sat up. Loki lay with his eyes closed and lips slightly parted, catching his breath. A lazy smile spread across his face and he looked up at Tony, pushing himself up and catching Tony’s mouth in a kiss in one fluid movement.

It was a softer one than any they had shared before, almost tender – although it rapidly deepened when Loki’s hand slid between Tony’s legs. He was almost embarrassed at how quickly he came undone to the gods’ fingers, with a gasp and a moan and half of Loki's name. He leaned his forehead against Loki’s and they sat like that for a while, each listening to the slowing of the others breath.

Finally, Tony opened his eyes. Loki’s were still closed and Tony had a few moments to indulge in his face up close – to take in the faint veins on his eyelids, the delicate blackness of lashes lightly fluttering above his cheek, the curve of his lip. He swallowed quietly, not entirely sure what to do with this sudden rush of vulnerability washing over him. Watching Loki like this had made something decidedly too warm and squishy start uncurling in his chest. He quickly shoved it down and pulled away – he didn’t want to deal with whatever that was right now.

Loki’s eyes opened slowly and he ran a hand through his hair, smoothing the tangles back.

“You know, we can literally never let Thor find out about this,” Tony said. “Or Fury. Or Pepper. Or Steve. Or – well, pretty much anyone, honestly.”

Loki raised an eyebrow and, in an absent sort of way, traced his fingers in slow circles around the arc reactor.

“Ashamed of me, Stark?”

"I make a point to never be actively ashamed of anyone I sleep with. I have impeccable taste." He laughed to himself as Loki rolled his eyes. "No, I just fear for my life if your super powered lightning storm of a brother or the most aptly named SHIELD agent in history find out I just slept with someone who was once our enemy. And you don’t even want to know what Pepper would do."

"Was? Then I am no longer considered such?"

Tony scratched at his beard.

"Not really. You haven't murdered nearly enough innocent people recently. I wouldn't exactly start calling you a hero yet but you're at the very least a grey area." He yawned. "But let's save the discussions of morality for when I'm not about to pass out."

“As you wish,” Loki’s hand slid away and he started to climb out of the bed. Tony caught his wrist.

"I know I have a reputation of sorts when it comes to this kind of thing, but you don't have to think of me that way, if you don't want to," he said. He cleared his throat and managed to hold Loki’s gaze, “I want you to stay.”

He couldn’t quite read the look on Loki’s face, but eventually he gave a soft smile, and slid back into bed. Tony rolled onto his side and tried not to think about the gentle, warm tingling feeling that started uncoiling in his chest again as Loki’s arm slid over his waist and the god curled around him, pressing close. Tony closed his eyes and as he slid into the deep sleep of the thoroughly satisfied, he could have sworn he felt the faint brush of lips against his hair, the almost inaudible murmur of words in his ear.

---

He was more surprised than he’d thought he’d be when he woke the next morning with the solid weight of Loki’s arm still over his waist. More surprised still to feel Loki’s legs tangled with his own, Loki’s other arm snaked under him with his hand curled against Tony’s chest, and Loki’s face pressed into his neck. He lay for a moment, indulging in the feeling of Loki’s skin against his. Then he began the process of trying to untangle himself from the attractive octopus he’d apparently invited into his bed.

Loki stirred as he extricated himself, blinking awake with an adorably incoherent mumble.

“Good morning to you to,” Tony said, prising Loki’s arm away from him. “Anyone ever tell you you’re a clingy goddamn deity?”

“Usually they like it,” Loki muttered, relinquishing him at last and pushing himself upright. He yawned in an all too human way, running a hand through his dishevelled hair, and in that moment Tony made the executive decision that the warm, uncurling feelings in his chest were a mutant form of lust, and that he could deal with them in the usual way. He leaned in to kiss Loki, who seemed happy enough to obliged, rumbling a pleased hum into the kiss and sliding his hands around Tony’s hips.

“I certainly am glad I stayed, now,” he said, pulling away. “This is a most enjoyable way to wake up.”

“Yes, and you get to examine your handiwork,” Tony said, running a hand over his chest. Loki had left a scattering of reddish marks all down it, though – small mercies – they were all well below the collar line.

“Sometimes I impress myself,” Loki said with an amused smile, and was leaning back in for another kiss when a low growl broke the mornings silence. They both froze.

“That wasn’t me, was that you?” Tony asked. Loki shook his head. There was another growl, and now Tony realised it was coming from behind the door that lead out into the penthouse. Then the distinctive sound of something unidentifiable but almost certainly expensive breaking. Tony scrambled out of bed, grabbing the first clothes his hands found, and then the nearest heavy object. The latter ended up being his hairdryer, but he’d done more with less in the past so it would have to do. Improvised weapon in hand, he crept to the door and cautiously drew it open just enough to peer into the next room.

“Oh, my fucking god, Loki tell me you still have those knives.”

No sooner had he spoken than he felt Loki pressed up against his back. He was shirtless but had pants on at least, and he held up a hand wrapped around the hilt of a dagger.

“What is it? A demon?”

Tony just motioned with his chin into the penthouse, where a tiger stood in the middle of the room. The breaking sound had apparently been the lamp it had just knocked over, although it didn’t appear much interested in it, and was instead pacing unconcernedly around the room, tail swishing back and forth.

“Interesting choice of pet,” Loki said. “But if you wish it gone, I will deal with it for you.”

Tony quickly shoved the door shut, pressing his back against it, and caught Loki’s knife-hand by the wrist.

“No, no, no, no, forget what I said, you are not knife-fighting a tiger – not least because this almost definitely a prank and I don’t need Barton catching you shirtless in my room.”

Loki shrugged and the knife vanished.

“Tony?”

There was a knock at the other door following Natasha’s voice, and Tony had a moment of dawning realisation.

“You up yet? I left something in the penthouse.” There was an amused edge to her voice, and damned if he couldn’t picture the smirk on her face. Before his logical brain could catch up to him, he’d already stormed across the room, yanked open the door and shouted –

“NATASHA ROMANOV A LIVE TIGER DOES NOT COUNT AS A FUN PRANK!”

- before he remembered that Loki was still standing shirtless in the room behind him, and before he realised that the clothes he’d so quickly grabbed earlier were not, in fact, his. He stood in the doorway, in an emerald green shit clearly cut for someone much taller, pointing his hairdryer at her in as threatening a manner as he could manage.

“I did warn you, Stark,” she said, raising an eyebrow and pushing the hairdryer out of her face with one finger. She eyed his choice of clothes with amused interest. “I’m not like Barton. I actually get my revenge.”

Her eyes drifted over Tony’s shoulder to take in the rumpled bed and the shirtless, and thankfully now knife-less, Loki standing across the room. Tony couldn’t bring himself to turn his head to see what Loki’s expression was. Natasha nodded slowly.

“Alright. I’m going to assume this was a retaliation attempt aimed at Barton, and I’m going to leave now.” She started to turn to go, and Tony grabbed her arm.

“You’re not going anywhere! You’re getting this tiger out of my penthouse!” She laughed, and easily prised his fingers away.

“Yeah, no,” she said. “You have fun with it instead. I’m told it’s perfectly tame.”

“How did you even get it in here?”

She waggled her fingers at him over her shoulder as she strolled off down the corridor.

“A magician never reveals her secrets!”

Tony shut the door and thumped his head against it a few times.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to…?” Loki said behind him, and when Tony looked he had a dagger in each hand again. Tony groaned and wished very strongly that he’d never woken up. In the penthouse, the tiger growled and broke something else.

This was not shaping up to be a very good morning.

---

Chapter Fourteen

It took some doing, but Tony finally managed to persuade Loki that no, knives were not the answer in this scenario, and that yes, he should go back to his own room before anyone else showed up and caught them in a compromising situation. With a huff and an eyeroll, Loki had done just that, leaving Tony to the task of organising a group of highly confused SHIELD agents to come and get the tiger out of his penthouse. With their help, and that of an overeager Thor who spent more time playing with the big cat than helping remove it, they eventually got it out of the building.

Tony had no idea where Natasha had got the thing from and he didn’t want to know. SHIELD assured him that they’d see it was returned to a suitable place, which Tony hoped like hell wasn’t code for taking it out back and shooting it. He made a mental note to donate to a few tiger-related non-profits later just in case. The mornings drama then over with, he tried to use the rest of the day to actually get some work done.

After a good hour of staring at the data from the autopsy and having his brain do nothing but fail to achieve more than the mental equivalent of start-up noises, he gave up and decided to tinker with a new suit design instead. He didn’t fare much better there – his head was too full of other things to focus. Those things were mostly thoughts of the previous night, flashes of memories of hands and mouths and smooth, naked skin. Great to spend minutes at a time staring into space thinking about but not so great for a productive work day.

More than once he found himself pressing his fingers to the marks Loki had left on him, those small red reminders that the memories were real, that last night had really happened. And could happen again, he tried not to think, because it could very easily never happen again and he’d regret all the time he wasted on imagining that it might.

Loki-based distractions aside, the rest of his day was also tinged with a constant level of paranoia that Natasha had left another surprise animal somewhere for him to encounter. Because either she had, and the tiger was the beginning of a deadly barrage of animal related pranks – or she hadn’t, and was relying on the paranoia to slowly drive him insane. Tony thought the latter was probably more likely, but that didn’t stop him from exercising extreme caution anytime he opened a drawer, a cupboard, or a door.

Adding to his list of issues was the fact that his sensible internal chorus hadn’t returned from the night before. He thought they’d likely quit for good now, which left him to navigate this potentially dangerous situation alone without any kind of moral guidance, and also with the realisation that he’d taken to referring to his inner voice of common sense as a separate entity. He spent a good hour in the shower trying to untangle that wormhole of mental weirdness before giving up and deciding that he’d made his own stupid decisions so far in life and things hadn’t turned out so badly.

There were many people in his life that would disagree vehemently with that thought, but Tony was nothing if not someone who habitually disregarded other people’s opinions about his life choices.

But as the days passed, he began to realise just how deep of a rabbit-hole he might be falling down. Now that the proverbial dam had broken between them, pretty much any encounter he and Loki had that was free of prying eyes ended with one or both of them flustered, debauched, naked or a combination of all three. Tony found he was more worried about potential heart attacks from the high concentration of stress and arousal he was being subjected to than any demonic incursions.

“You’re going to be the death of me,” he gasped out during one of Loki’s frequent visits to the workshop. Luckily for Tony, everyone was used to him spending long hours in there without wanting to be disturbed and they hadn’t had any near misses so far. This was also partly because he had a long suffering yet endlessly considerate AI running his building who consented to act as an early warning system just in case.

“Oh, surely we’re past that,” Loki purred, fingers digging into the back of Tony’s thighs. He smirked up at him. “I threw you from a window – you kindly returned the favour. I would call that even.”

“Are you ever gonna let that go?” Tony rolled his eyes. “You didn’t die.”

“And neither shall you,” Loki said matter-of-factly, and returned his attention to raising Tony’s blood pressure by way of obscenely good oral sex. Tony groaned and gripped the workbench tighter, thinking that if his heart did give out, then at least he was dying on-brand.

In the process of having copious secret sex with their resident ex-villain and trying simultaneously to pretend that he wasn’t having copious secret sex with their resident ex-villain, Tony discovered that Loki had a far better poker face than he did. Whenever they were around each other in view of the rest of the team, he tried to stick to the usual banter, tried to keep up appearances. But now that the two of them had well and truly broken the ice, he couldn’t help that he wanted to keep looking at Loki. He wasn’t actively fighting denial of the gods obvious charms any more, and if there was one thing Tony didn’t exactly have in abundance, it was self-control. When he wanted to indulge, he usually did.

When he was in the armour, it was easy enough to hide it. No-one could tell what exactly he was looking at from behind the faceplate, and if anyone picked up on how frequently he was facing Loki’s general direction, they didn’t say anything. Outside of the armour was a different story, and despite his enormous collection of expensive sunglasses, outright ogling such as Loki tended to inspire in him lately was difficult to hide. He played it off as best he could – he had mastered the ‘who, me?’ look long ago, and for the most part deploying that seemed to work. A just messing with you, smirk and a don’t imagine things shrug went a long way.

It didn’t help that he was having to fake a lot of comms glitches when incriminating things kept slipping out of his mouth with alarming frequency.

Loki, on the other hand, had no trouble at all pretending that nothing was going on. He was always the one who caught Tony staring, and apart from flashing the occasional quick wink of acknowledgement, tended not to react at all. The few times Tony did catch him staring, his face was perfectly composed – inquisitive, or amused, maybe, but not obviously appreciative. He might have been insulted by it, if he didn’t have a whole cache of extremely appreciative Loki expressions stored in his brain. And if a sizeable portion of those looks tended to be given from somewhere below Tony’s waist, well, it wasn’t like anyone apart from Loki himself was reading his thoughts now, were they?

Still, by luck or by skill or an unholy combination of the two, he had so far successfully managed to keep up the appearance of not being in a friends-with-exceptionally-great-benefits relationship with the god of mischief. However, there was one spanner in the proverbial works that he was waiting to screw things up.

“And I mean, there’s no way she really bought that whole ‘it’s a prank!’ line, because, it’s Natasha,” Tony complained, for possibly the hundredth time. “She can spot a lie on the other side of the planet. No way she bought it. She’s just waiting to bring it up, and you can bet she’s probably already told Fury and it’s only a matter of time until-”

Loki made a frustrated noise.

“Stark, one would almost think you didn’t want me on my knees betwixt your thighs.”

Tony looked down at Loki’s raised eyebrow and irritated expression. Both were somewhat mitigated by the spit-slick erection next to his face, but the point was made.

“Who the fuck says betwixt?” he said.

“I do, when you’re being obnoxious,” Loki countered. Tony had never had anyone passive-aggressively deep throat him before, but there was a first time for everything. “Do you want me to continue, or not?”

“…Yes, please.”

---

Aside from keeping his entanglement with Loki a secret, life was reasonably peaceful. There hadn’t been another demonic incursion for over two weeks now, and no other small-time villain had stepped up to fill the gap. They should have been grateful for the rest, making the most of the respite their enemy had afforded them. Instead, they remained on edge, watching the sky every second, waiting for the vortex to rear its ugly head again, for more demons to come screaming through. But February came and went, and nothing more menacing than ordinary storm clouds appeared in the sky.

It was still no less a shock to the system when they were all woken at some ungodly hour of the morning by what sounded like a news announcement intro blasting from every speaker in the tower. Tony groaned into his pillow, not knowing which network had dragged him from sleep, but swearing that he'd buy them out and liquidate all their assets. Possibly with a repulsor blast.

"JARVIS!" he shouted over the ongoing intro theme. "What the hell is this?"

"My apologies, sir, and all others present," JARVIS said, as polite and even toned as ever, just louder, "But I currently have no control over the broadcast being made. All audio and visual systems are under external control. I am attempting to rectify the situation."

Tony sat up and glared at the TV screen, which was playing the final parts of the unknown news theme. Come to think of it, he was pretty sure he'd never heard that intro before, and there was no title sequence playing on the screen, just a dancing mess of static. The intro cut out and the screen went black for three seconds of blissful silence, then;

"Greetings, people of the earth, I do hope I didn't wake all of you." Tony stared at the woman on the screen, his heart in his mouth. A pale face – not just pale but white, dead white – with pitch black eyes glaring out at them. Beneath them a smiling mouth, opened just wide enough to show off the too-many too-sharp teeth that filled it. "I know you have such strange little time zones – and such an odd concept of time itself, really, but we won't go into all your inadequacies right now. There are more important things to discuss."

Her voice doubled and tripled as she spoke, edged itself with a cadence no human could hope to replicate. There was a slight hiss to her words; a dangerous, serpentine edge that promised nothing but malevolence. She moved back from the camera, enough to show the base of two huge horns curving out of her head.

"As you may have noticed, we now have complete control over all your communications devices and displays. There is no place on your tiny world that cannot hear my voice. There is nowhere you can hide,” her smile widened. “So I expect that you will pay close attention to the most important message you will ever hear in your insignificant little lives.” She leaned forwards and Tony suddenly regretted every inch of high definition his TV provided him with. He could have counted her pores – if she’d had any.

"The planet known as Earth is hereby claimed for my empire. In one day, daemonic law will be in full effect and you will bow to my will or face the consequences of resistance.” She let out a small laugh that wouldn’t have sounded out of place in a nightmare. “I do hope you use your time wisely, little ones.”

The screen went black. There was a hiss of static, followed by a silence so deafening that Tony could have sworn every living thing in the city had collectively stopped breathing. And then everything went to hell. Fury was on the comms instantly, demanding everyone’s presence ASAP or so help him god. He was followed by Avengers, SHIELD agents and everyone else in the tower shouting over each other as they tried to figure out what in the fuck had just happened and what they were going to do about it.

What felt like seconds later, Tony found himself lodged in a tactical meeting with Fury and the rest of the stressed-out Avengers.

“We’re in communication with the usual forces,” Fury said, “And thanks to the pre-shows our new friends provided, they aren’t wasting any time insisting that this is just hallucinogens in the water supply.” He cast his gaze around the table. “I want ideas, people. Stark, Banner – what do you have so far?”

“A whole lot of fuck-all,” said Tony, “We can fight them off and that’s about it. They’re vulnerable to all conventional weapons and the bodies turn to husks when the portal closes. But this new one, the one that actually spoke – I get the feeling she might be a little different.”

Fury nodded.

“For once I agree with you. This portal, can you close it?”

“Not with what we have at the moment, but maybe the application of a well-placed missile would help?”

Fury shifted his jaw, drumming his fingers on the desk. He stared round at them all, and settled his gaze on Thor.

“Any advice from Asgard? This is alien, and you’re the closest thing we have to an expert.”

Thor made a face.

“So far my inquiries have turned up nothing. No-one knows of these creatures. I have people digging through our archives as we speak, though I fear that they may not find anything useful in time.”

“What about Loki?”

Tony tried not to tense up at the mention of his name. The trickster was conspicuously absent from the meeting, a fact the others hadn’t failed to pick up on. Thor shook his head.

“If he does know something he hasn’t told me. I am beginning to doubt that he is withholding knowledge – even he can see now that the situation is too desperate for tricks.”

Fury sat back in his chair.

“Fine. We’ll work with what we’ve got. It’ll have to be enough.” He turned to Natasha and Steve, “You two, I want you to work with our allies and formulate a battleplan. Barton, work with the SHIELD agents in the tower to plan a defence out of here.” He passed a grim look around the table. “I don’t care what some jumped up she-demon says on TV. This world is not going down without a fight.”

---

It was late by the time Tony finally gave up. He dismissed the hologram he’d been staring at for the past few hours, and stretched in the chair. His neck and back clicked unsettlingly and he grimaced, massaging at his shoulder. No revelations had come to him. No last-minute solution to the problem that would keep the demons and their broadcast-hijacking leader away from the earth. He got up, deciding that if he was going to be fighting off a demonic apocalypse in the next few hours, he might as well try and get some sleep in first. Got to be fresh and in prime demon-punching condition, after all.

“Stark,” Loki’s voice came from the shadows, making him jump and stub his toe on the chair. He scowled as Loki stepped forwards into the moonlight – it was almost full that night, clear and bright. The perfect prelude to the end of the world.

“Where’ve you been hiding all day?” he demanded. “Did you miss the announcement for the demonic apocalypse?”

“I did not,” Loki moved towards him, reaching out a hand to trail down Tony’s bare arm. The touch made him shiver.

“We could’ve used your advice today,” Tony said, softer this time. Loki’s hand curled around his bicep, pulling him closer.

“Nothing I could say will change anything.” Loki bent his head and kissed him, slow and deep, his other arm twining around Tony’s back, holding him close. When they broke apart Loki was staring at him with burning eyes. A moment later he found himself pushed to the floor with Loki straddling him.

“Not that I mind the attention,” he said, trying very hard to stay focused while Loki kissed at his lips, his chin, his neck, and his hands took a leisurely wander down Tony’s chest. “But are you okay?”

Loki paused, looking up from where he was busy unfastening Tony’s belt.

“I am perfectly fine,” he said. He squeezed a hand and Tony groaned. “As are you, it seems.”

Tony wriggled free of his shirt and ignored the hardness of the floor in favour of the pleasant weight of Loki on top of him. Loki had managed to get him almost out of his jeans and apparently that was enough for him right then, because he was already stripping out of his own clothes, tossing them aside as he re-settled himself over Tony’s lap.

“If I seem eager,” Loki said, kissing down his chest and doing something rather insistent and extremely nice with his hand at Tony’s crotch, “It is only because this may be the last chance I get to indulge myself with you.”

Tony’s heart nearly stopped in his chest.

“And why’s that?”

Loki glanced up, raising an eyebrow.

“Why, because the world may end in fire and brimstone tomorrow. I imagine it would be rather difficult to partake in,” his hand squeezed a little and Tony made a slightly choked noise, “This, when everyone is dead.”

“Don’t you think you’re being a little pessimistic there?”

“You’ll forgive me if I don’t share your optimism,” Loki went back to kissing his chest, apparently trying to taste every inch of it. Tony put a hand on his shoulder and he glanced up again, looking annoyed.

“If you want me to stop, then say so.”

“No, it’s not that,” Tony said, and rolled his hips up into Loki’s hand. “Just – if you wanna fuck like it’s your last night on earth, can we at least do it in a bed?”

Loki’s face split in a smile that managed to be at once predatory and charming.

“Your wish is my command,” he purred. A swirl of green and gold surrounded them, shimmering ribbons of light that blocked out all else. It was there for mere moments, and once it faded Tony found that they were in the far more comfortable surroundings of his bedroom. Loki had also taken the liberty of vanishing the rest of his clothes – Tony sincerely hoped they still existed somewhere. He’d liked that belt.

Loki, magic trick completed, had returned with all enthusiasm to devouring his way down Tony’s body. While he was occupied, Tony reached a hand out and managed to fumble a small bottle out of the nightstand. He sat up and pulled Loki close, keeping him in his lap as he slid a hand down his back, over the curve of his ass. Loki kissed him hard, humming with pleasure as Tony’s slick fingers pressed into him, and he angled his hips to let him push deeper.

Tony buried his face in Loki’s neck, kissing at the long expanse of pale skin. Loki’s hand took hold of him again and he groaned into his shoulder, working his fingers faster. They broke apart for a moment, both breathing hard. Tony slowed his hand for a moment.

“This is what you want?” he breathed roughly. Loki gave a lazy smile.

“Why, would you prefer to be on the receiving end?”

“I’m not complaining, you’re just…usually the demanding one,” Tony sped his fingers up again, curling them a little inside. Loki sighed a moan, letting his head fall back.

“Believe me, Stark, I am still all kinds of demanding, regardless of my choice of positions,” he pushed Tony down onto the bed, and removed his fingers. “Were the world not ending tomorrow, you would have ample opportunity to discover that fact.”

Before Tony could reply, Loki – in a move that had to have been possible only because he was made of fucking god magic – slid down onto him so hard and so fast that Tony was pretty sure he saw stars. He certainly moaned loud enough to imply it, and Loki chuckled.

“It is most fortunate your rooms are at the top of this tower,” he said as he began to move. His hands settled on Tony’s chest, either side of the arc reactor.

“Why, because of how loud you’re gonna be screaming my name?” Tony grinned, bucking his hips up, his own hands finding a firm grip on Loki’s waist. Loki gave a little gasp, then smirked.

“Oh no, my dear mortal,” he purred, and dragged his nails down Tony’s chest. “Because of how loudly you’ll be worshipping mine.”

---

Later, as they lay together still catching their breath and with specks of magic darting about them in the easiest clean up Tony had ever experienced, Loki said,

“I will miss this.”

Tony rolled his eyes.

“Not this again. You remember that we have a line of Avengers, featuring two whole gods, standing between the end of the world and a bunch of ugly ass demons?”

Loki sighed and sat up. His hair fell messily about his face, just brushing the tops of his shoulders. Tony put a hand on his and said softly,

“What makes you think we’re all going to die?”

Loki met his eyes.

“Because you are human,” he said. “It’s what you tend to do.”

Tony swallowed.

“Yeah, well, we’ve gotten out of bad situations before. We kicked your ass, remember?”

“Vividly,” Loki said, the corner of his mouth twitching. “And you have but one god on your side – I still have not regained all my powers, and even if I had…” he trailed off and there was silence for a moment. Then, “Would you come with me?”

Tony blinked.

“Where?”

“To Asgard. To anywhere – I may be limited, but I still know ways around the universe that others do not. And you are reasonably intelligent for a mortal. I’m sure between us we can find a way to-”

Tony squeezed his hand.

“I can’t just leave, Loki. You know that.”

Loki sighed and drew his hand away, brushing his hair behind his ear.

“I do. It was worth a try, though. It would be far more pleasant to take my leave of this wretched planet tonight with you than to stay and watch…watch it be destroyed. And likely die in the process.”

Tony didn’t miss the hitch in his words, and swallowed, deciding not to mention it.

“It would,” he agreed instead. “And maybe when this is over, and we kick these demons straight back to whatever space hell they came from, you can take me on a whirlwind sex tour of the universe, how ‘bout that?”

Loki finally smiled, but shook his head.

“You never fail to amuse me, Stark,” he said, leaning in to kiss him. Tony met his lips and drew him back down to the bed – after all, the apocalypse wasn’t due until tomorrow.

---

The blare of alarms woke him the next morning, yanking him painfully into consciousness. His eyes snapped open, his brain trying to get in gear and process both the screaming alarms and the fact that he was alone in the bed at the same time. Fury’s voice came over the comms.

“Battle stations, everyone – it’s starting.”

Tony scrambled out of bed, pushing away thoughts of where Loki had gone. There was no time for that now. He hurried into his clothes, hands already shaking with the flood of adrenaline.

“Two minutes ETA for me, Fury,” he called as he ran from the room. He hoped the Director could hear him over all the alarms. He sprinted across the penthouse towards the roof, and impatiently waited as the armour clicked into place piece by piece. The few seconds it took to encase him felt like an age. His estimate to Fury had been excessive – he was in the air in a minute and a half.

The sky was clear, but he knew better than to trust that. A rumble of thunder echoed through the air, followed by a flash of lightning. Then another, and another, and Tony hung in the air, watching as the sky tore itself in half. His stomach churned with sudden overlapping memories of all the other vortexes they’d seen, and of the first tear in reality he'd encountered. The one with nothing but empty space and terrible alien creatures on the other side of it. He swallowed hard and brought the comms online.

"Good morning, everyone, and how are we all feeling this fine apocalyptic morning?” He managed to make himself sound at least vaguely chipper.

He got a chorus of acknowledgments and a subdued rumble from Hulk. The vortex was a bloody crimson, its jagged edges stretching outwards until it seemed to cover the whole sky, as if someone had gutted the heavens. For an awful moment, there was nothing but silence. Tony listened to his own breath inside the suit, waiting.

A demonic howl tore through the quiet, and from the city below there rose a cacophony of shouts and shrill alarms as the biggest swarm of demons they’d ever encountered came tearing out through the portal.

“Avengers, we have a job to do,” Steve said over the comms. “So let’s go do it.”

Tony shot towards the oncoming demons, and soon noticed a swirl of green light keeping pace on the ground below him. Loki. Well, at least he hadn’t run like he’d sort-of threatened to do last night. That was good, because from the looks of it they were going to need every advantage they could get. Tony angled upwards into the mass of demons, not daring to slow down for even a moment as hundreds of the screaming horrors streaked past him.

He fired into the horde and demon after demon fell to his repulsors but it hardly made a dent. This was no advance force, this was the full-on invasion and the previous incursions had been slap fights compared to this. There had to be hundreds of thousands of them around him and still they kept on coming.

He made it through to slightly clearer air with only a few scratches, and swung around, ready to go through in another pass. A demon shrieked up from below him and he burned its face off with a boot jet before angling higher up into the sky. All around him the monsters continued to fall, a hellish rain of claws and teeth and red-black magic.

"I need a proximity alarm in this thing," he muttered to himself, dodging away from another demon that had snuck up behind him. It twisted in the air and angled back at him – Tony blasted it into dust. He dared to take a moment to scan the area to check on the other Avengers positions, and caught sight of Hulk being swarmed by what had to be a hundred or more demons on the ground. They were crawling over him like ants, and for every armful that he flung away, another dozen clawed their way onto him.

“I got you, buddy.” Tony plummeted, sending blasts of blue-white energy hurtling into the mass. Hulk bellowed as demonic bodies exploded around him, punching at the ones that kept on coming. Tony hit the ground and fought his way to Hulk’s side.

"You doing okay there, big fella?" he shouted up. Hulk looked down at him and grinned his toothy, slightly scary grin, before picking up a pair of demons by their necks, and using them to beat away the rest that kept on coming.

"I'll take that as a yes then." Tony launched himself back into the air, firing again into the screaming mass of demons that were still pouring from the vortex.

"Fighting them like this will do little good," Loki spoke over the comms, a rare enough occurrence to make Tony falter in mid-air. "Find the leader. The woman who took over the broadcasts. Cut off the head and the body will die."

“Now he gives advice,” Hawkeye said sourly.

“Berate me later,” Loki snapped. “Just trust me. Kill her and you may have a chance.”

“So it’s a Chitauri scenario,” Widow said. “Anyone got eyes on her yet?”

No-one had. Not that it would have been easy to spot one demon out of the torrent that continued to pour from the vortex. Black lightning crackled across its surface, arcing down towards the earth and sending up explosions of crimson smoke where it hit.

“Stark?” Loki came in again, interrupting Tony’s frantic scan for any sign of a white-faced female demon.

“Go ahead,” he said.

"I believe I can trace her. In a manner of speaking. She's very, very good at hiding herself but I'm better. You seem to be closest to where I can sense her."

Tony swallowed. Loki had claimed to know nothing about what they were facing – now he knew how to track their leader? He shook his head. There’d be time to grill him on his lack of information-sharing later. If he could find her, and they could take her out, this whole thing could be over by lunchtime and Tony was down for that. He cleared his throat.

“Stark? Did you hear me?”

"Just point me and shoot me."

He couldn't see Loki's face, but he was at least ninety-percent sure the god smirked at that. He caught a flare of green in his peripheral vision, down to his left.

"You see where I am?"

"Yup."

There was another flare of green.

“She’s somewhere within two hundred feet of that second point. On the ground, I think. That’s as specific as I can get.”

"Much obliged."

Tony rocketed towards the spot Loki had indicated and landed hard enough to crack the sidewalk.

“If you all heard that, which I hope you did, converge on me because we might be about to end this,” he said, hoping that he wasn’t about to go toe-to-toe with the leader of this army on his own.

He scanned the area, seeing nothing, his sensors less than useless with all the energy the vortex above him was spitting out. There was a scuffle from behind him and he turned in time to see a bloodied cop crash to the ground out of an alley and begin scrambling backwards over the road. The cop raised his gun and fired off rapid shots, squeezing the trigger until it did nothing but click uselessly.

He tossed the weapon aside, and started to run. Before he got more than two steps, a tendril of darkness, like living shadow, shot out from the alley. It wrapped tight around the cops’ neck, jerking him to halt. Before Tony could do anything, the tendril jerked violently and there was a sickening crunch as the cops’ neck snapped. Tony stared at the body as it hung there, the eyes staring lifelessly out of a face frozen in terror.

There was a thudding of feet from behind him.

"Tony! I came as fast as I could, but I-" Steve came to a halt as the tendril retreated and the cops body dropped to the ground. The two of them looked to the alley as its creator emerged, and it would have been impossible to mistake this demon for any of the others.

She stood at least eight feet tall from horns to hooves, with a long, barbed tail brushing against the ground. She wore no armour, and though her torso was bared there was nothing remotely sexual in her nakedness. Muscle rippled beneath her dead white skin, which was splattered with blood all the way to where it faded into coal black at her hips. Her powerful legs were entirely pitch black, looked strong enough to have crushed Tony’s head, helmet and all, and ended in large, obsidian cloven hoofs.

“Well, well,” she said, halting in front of them. Her voice was just as unsettling in person as it had been over her broadcast, rippling with power and vibrating with unsettling frequencies. She settled her hands on her hips, long claws tapping against the blood on her stomach. "You must be the heroes my scouts have told me so much about.” She looked them up and down, red light from the vortex above flashing in the black pits of her eyes.

“You’re much smaller than I imagined you to be, given the amount of trouble you’ve caused.”

"I've got a clean shot," Hawkeye murmured over the comms. Tony opened his mouth to tell him take it, take it now and end this right here and he’d blast her to pieces at the same time, just to be sure-

"Wait," Widow spoke up. “She wants to talk, let her talk. She’ll give something away.”

The demoness sauntered forwards, tail swishing behind her. Her hooves left smoking black imprints in the ground below her as she moved. She slid her pitch-black eyes over the two of them, mouth curling in a smile.

"The one they call 'Captain'," she drawled, "And of a whole country, too – what an achievement for you. And the so called 'Iron Man'," she sniffed, "Though your suit smells not of iron, its construction is impressive. I suppose you would not consider aiding me?"

Tony lifted a hand and flared a repulsor at her in response. She laughed, showing off her pointed teeth.

"I thought not. Though I must say, your progress so far has been admirable. Well done on capturing most of my little pets, by the way.”

"That was you?" Steve said.

"Oh yes,” she tossed her head proudly, “Strong as I am, I needed someone here to help open a gateway for me and my kin. What did you think of the toys they managed to build? A little crude, I suppose, but they kept you busy."

"They were amateurish and pointless. Kinda like you," Tony shot at her, and she threw back her head and laughed. He’d never heard a sound so awful.

"If you say so ‘Iron Man'. Just remember how pathetic you mortals are – doing anything for the merest brush of power in your meaningless little lives. It must be a relief to you to know that soon you won't have to worry about your insignificance any longer.”

"Okay, that's it, I'm taking the shot," Hawkeye growled over the comms, but before he could do anything there was shimmer of green and Loki appeared in front of the demoness. His armour was covered in blood and he clutched two equally gory daggers in his hands. He gave the demoness a twisted smile which she returned in kind.

"Why, hello again Trickster," she said. Loki glared at her, hands tightening on the hilts of his daggers.

“Leave,” he spat out.

Just kill her now, thought Tony. Just shove one of those blades right down her stupid throat and end it, never mind what Natasha thinks. Fuck strategy – just kill the bitch.

“Someone get him out of the way or I’m shooting right through him,” Hawkeye said warningly.

"You two know each other?" Steve said, taking a step forward. “Loki? You feel like explaining?”

Tony stomach churned. His entire body felt like it was prickling with heat as he stared at the demoness, at Loki. What was going on here?

The demoness crossed her arms, wicked smile widening.

“Oh, I should say we do, little Captain,” she said. “Isn’t that so, sweetling?” She reached out and brushed the tips of her claws down the side of Loki’s face. He stepped quickly away from her, an expression of angry disgust on his face, and said nothing. Tony watched him with growing dread, wishing Loki would glance his way, do anything other than stand there as the demoness smiled, eyes glittering like she knew everything about him. She lowered her claws and directed her gaze at Tony, seeming to stare right past the faceplate and into his soul.

Her words sent the bottom crashing out of his world.

"Why, the little godling here is the one who showed us the way in!"

---

Chapter Fifteen

Everything happened very fast after she’d spoken. Loki’s head snapped around to stare at Tony, his eyes wide, mouth opening as if he was starting to say something but Steve flung his shield at him, cutting off anything he might have said. Hawkeye and Black Widow opened fire simultaneously, each hitting their target dead on. The demonesses head snapped as the arrows hit her in the dead centre of her forehead. Then she jerked twice more as two shots hit her one after the other – left eye, right eye, both exploding in a shower of blood. She let out a piercing scream and in the time it took to blink she had vanished. Above them the army of demons swarming in the sky echoed her scream in unison, before the whole great mass of them fled as one back through the portal.

Tony barely registered any of it. All he could do was stare at Loki.

He had made no move to block or avoid Steve’s shield. He had thrown up no defence, hadn’t vanished out of its way in a shimmer of magic – he hadn’t even stepped to the side to avoid it. He’d just stood there and let it collide with his chest, sending him sprawling on his back. He slowly pushed himself up on his elbows.

"I-" he started, but Steve was already on him, snatching up the shield and planting one foot firmly on Loki's chest, pinning him.

"Save it," he growled. Tony hadn’t seen him that pissed in a long while.

But why, he thought, was Loki even still there? SHIELD was descending on the scene like a swarm of angry, professional black hornets, locking it down with brutal efficiency, and Loki just lay there with Steve’s boot on his chest. He could teleport now – within city limits, granted, but he could. He could have gotten himself out of this in seconds. Tony knew that, Steve knew that, SHIELD knew that. So why the hell was Loki still anywhere near them?

Tony couldn’t get close enough to even think about asking him. SHIELD agents had surrounded him now and were in the process of restraining him - cuffs clicked into place, a gag locked around his head, even a black strip of a blindfold over his eyes. Then he was bundled into the back of a black armoured car, out of sight. As they drove away, Tony realised that Loki had dropped his daggers. They lay where he’d fallen when the shield had knocked him down. Almost in a daze, he went over and gathered them up. The blood on the blades was still wet.

“Portal’s still open,” he heard Steve say, both on the comms and right next to him. He flipped open the faceplate, suddenly feeling the urge for real air on his face, and looked up. Sure enough the portal still hung there, a gaping red-black rip in the sky, lightning crackling intermittently across its surface.

"Which means she's not dead," Tony murmured.

"What?"

"If she was dead, that thing would have closed. I know it. It's still open, and the army retreated rather than immediately going for blood vengeance after we triple head-shot their general – she’s not dead.”

"I'd like to know how she survived a hit like that," Natasha was striding up to them, her black suit splattered with gore and a nasty-looking scratch down one side of her face.

"She's some kind of alien creature, who knows what she can take," said Steve. "Thor and….and Loki and their kind can take hits that would destroy one of us. For all we know she’s immortal.”

"Whatever she is, as long as she's alive, she's a threat," Tony said, flipping the faceplate back down. "I'll see you back at the tower. We've got a lot of work to do."

He powered up and shot into the sky before any of them could reply. He tried very hard not to think about the look Loki had given him and gripped the daggers tighter. Despite the extra strength of his armoured fists, the hilts didn’t so much as dent in his hands.

There were two options here. Either the demoness was lying, or Loki was, and of the two, Loki was the one with the reputation. Tony shook his head, shoving the thoughts aside. He’d figure that out later – right now he had to try and find a way to close that portal before the demoness recovered and came back through looking for revenge.

He landed back at the tower, mind already racing a thousand miles a minute as the armour was stripped away piece by piece. He stashed Loki’s knives in the safe below the bar, then went straight down to the workshop. The moment he stepped inside time ceased to have meaning. Minutes and seconds were replaced with schematics, theories, data points. Numbers and letters written in light hung in the air and they were all very pretty, very clever, and very useless. He chewed the inside of his lip and dug in harder. There were answers here. He had all the pieces, he just had to figure out how to put them together to get the picture he wanted. He’d done it before and he’d do it again.

He jumped about half a mile when someone tapped his shoulder, bringing him back to reality. He whirled around, thrusting the stylus he was holding forwards in as threatening a manner as was possible with a few inches of blunt plastic.

"Oh. Bruce. Hi. Sorry." He shoved the stylus in his pocket, hooked his thumbs into his belt loops. "What's up?"

Bruce held up two grease-darkened paper bags.

"You've been down here a while. Figured you might need to eat, whether you knew it or not."

Tony glanced at the time display on one of the screens. Ah.

"Thanks.” He took one of the bags and crammed a fistful of fries into his mouth. His stomach came rumbling back to life and as he inhaled the food, Bruce took a slow walk around the workshop, glancing over everything Tony had been working on. The main display still hung in the air, but there was work scattered across the various computer displays and tablet screens in the room, as well as on scraps of paper and scrawled in thick pen across the length of one of the workbenches. Bruce raised an eye at the latter and Tony shrugged – what could he say? He’d been in the zone. Nobody complained when artists got paint places other than the canvas.

"Figuring out how to close it?" he asked when he’d completed his survey of the room. Tony nodded, slurping down soda.

"Not that I'm getting anywhere. None of this stuff conforms to any standard laws of physics. I think I invented a new model for gravitational simulations, though. Know anyone who could use that?”

“Send it to Jane,” Bruce flashed a brief smile, “At the very least she’ll tell you thirty different ways it’s wrong.”

Tony finished off his drink and sighed.

“Speaking of Jane, how’s her boyfriend doing? Has Thor come up with anything new yet? Maybe he and his people can understand this thing a little more. Just because he likes to call it magic, doesn't mean it-"

"He's been arguing with Fury," Bruce cut him off. He found a stylus and started poking at a few of the glowing diagrams. "Who has, you should know, taken it upon himself to use one of the rooms here as a holding cell."

"Has he?" Tony said flatly. Loki’s face flickered through his mind, that look he’d given him before Steve had knocked him down. His eyes wide and desperate and…Tony crushed the empty soda cup and threw it at the trash. It missed, skittering across the floor into the darkness. "I think Fury and I need to have a talk about boundaries."

"Thor wants them to let Loki go," Bruce said, turning away from the hologram. "He doesn't think Loki had anything to do with this, but Fury heard what the demoness said, and he's not budging. He’s got Steve backing him up for the time being, but that’s Steve. He’ll come around to whatever side is right once he has all the information."

"He probably does have the right side. Loki's a liar, he could have been lying to us this whole-"

"You don't think that, and neither do I," the sharpness of his tone made Tony start. "Tony, he has a good chunk of his power back. He could have blocked Clint and Natasha’s shots, and danced off with her through the portal. He didn’t do either – he let Steve knock him down and he let SHIELD take him prisoner.”

"He's let them do that before. He knows how to play the long game."

"That's exactly what Fury's thinking. They've got plans to interrogate him to hell and back to find out what he knows. And I think they've upgraded their kit since the last time they took him in, if you catch my drift.”

"What do you want me to do about it, Bruce?" Tony rubbed his forehead. The hours of work were starting to condense into one motherfucker of a headache. "Out of all of us, I'm the one Fury's least likely to listen to. If Thor isn't having any luck, I've got no chance."

"I don't want you to talk to Fury, I think you should talk to Loki. He seems to hate you the least.”

Tony snorted and hoped his dismissal sounded more legitimate to Bruce than it did to him.

"That's a stretch. But okay. For the record, I do think you’re right on this. I’m not convinced Loki’s playing a long con this time. Not after he-” he cut himself off, “Not after all the effort he’s gone to for his redemption thing. Do you know he conjured up a Band-Aid for a little girl two weeks ago? He thought no-one saw that, but I did. It had kittens on it."

Bruce cracked a smile.

"Sure, Tony."

"Thanks for the food," Tony said. "I'll go see about getting through Fury and talking to our resident mischief god."

"I know I probably didn't have to ask you to, you would have anyway," Bruce said, making to leave. "But I wanted to be sure. I can't say I have much love for Loki, really, but I…I know what it's like to be accused because of who you are."

"I think most of us do, at this point.”

Once Bruce had gone, the workshop felt oddly empty. Tony sighed and dropped into a chair, dismissing the holograms. He closed his eyes, rubbing his temples. He’d go up against Fury tomorrow once he’d had some sleep and some heavy-duty pain meds. And if Fury wouldn’t let him in, well…he smiled to himself in the dark. No matter how much the Director liked to think otherwise, this was his tower.

---

In an entirely predictable turn of events, no one would let him in. Fury himself wasn’t around – though that wasn’t exactly surprising either, since he likely had approximately seventeen thousand other more important things to deal with – but the agents he’d left behind were sticking to his orders. Nothing in, nothing out. No amount of bribery, threats or outright whining could get them to budge.

“Dammit, this is my tower,” he shouted over his shoulder at them, stomping away to regroup. “And it's not like any of you even asked if you could use one of my safe-rooms as a holding cell!”

He slunk off back to his workshop to sulk, pouting in a chair and spinning a stylus around his fingers. The only support he had for sure on this was Bruce, and Tony didn’t think that Hulk-ing his way into Loki’s cell would win him many points for Team ‘Let’s Trust Loki’. And sure, Loki had been helpful recently, had maybe been letting them in a little. At the very least letting Tony in, in a variety of interesting ways. But none of that would be enough to persuade the whole team to go against Fury just to ask Loki what his thoughts were on the off-chance that he might be innocent this time. And if it turned out he was responsible for this new threat, if he’d led the demoness to Earth…

Tony span the stylus faster.

Loki’s expression after the demoness had spoken. The way he’d looked straight to Tony, had done nothing but stare at him with wide eyes, like he was trying to tell him something. Trying to beg for faith in him despite her words. Maybe he was reading too much into it, putting meaning into a glance that meant nothing. But all the other expressions Tony had had the opportunity to see on Loki’s face when they were alone had carried weight. He’d had the rare privilege of seeing the trickster without all his masks, and despite Loki’s reputation for lies and deception, Tony had never seen anyone fake an orgasm quite that thoroughly before.

He sighed and set the stylus down, ran a hand through his hair. What he wanted was proof. Something tangible to tie Loki to this one way or the other. Once he had the facts, then he could start making decisions like whether he’d be the one holding Loki down while everyone else shot him. But he wasn't going to get anything stuck outside of Loki’s cell, and twiddling his thumbs in the workshop was only going to drive him up the wall.

“If I can’t get into one of my own safe-rooms, SHIELD or no SHIELD, I’m going to throw myself through a window this time,” he muttered. He kicked away from the desk, and as the chair rolled slowly across the floor, the wheels of it bumped up against something that let out a small, 'squeak'. A slow smile spread across Tony's face as he reached down and picked up the Lab Rat. The painted grin had mostly worn off by now, though somehow it still managed to emote nervousness at him.

“Squeak?”

“Exactly.”

---

Despite how badly he wanted to talk to Loki, he held off on his plan until later that evening to give himself chance to double and triple-check the building schematics and to finalise the Lab Rat’s setup. Satisfied that he was as ready as he’d ever be, he snuck himself into a room adjacent to the safe-room that had been converted into Loki’s cell. He settled himself on the floor with his back to the wall and a tablet in his hands, watching through the robots’ video feed as it manoeuvred itself through the vents. The video feed shut off as it began to cut through into the separate air vents that supplied the safe room, and Tony drummed his fingers on his thigh while he waited.

It took less time than it felt like, and soon enough the Rat was in the safe-room. The video feed was mostly clear as the Lab Rat scurried across the floor, squeaking quietly every so often until Tony sent it a firmly worded command-line to shut the hell up. It was strange, seeing the room from such a low angle. Then a pair of booted feet came into sight, and Tony directed the Rat's camera up until Loki’s face came into view.

He was no longer blindfolded, but he was still firmly gagged – and now the whole lower half of his face was covered by something that was all metal and glass and clamps for god’s sake. Tony tightened his grip on the tablet. Loki had been fastened to the wall by wrist and ankle on short chains that just about let his hands hang at his sides, and those were definitely a SHIELD addition because Tony had not intended the safe-room for that kind of use.

He swallowed, and held a small mic up to his mouth, hesitating for only a moment before whispering into it.

“Hey tall, dark, and evil, do you hear me? Blink once for yes and twice for no.”

Loki managed to turn his face down towards the sound, and gave one slow blink.

“Okay, now do that again if you can actually hear me, and aren't just incredibly confused by what's going on.”

Loki rolled his eyes, then blinked again.

“Right. I'll cut to the chase – SHIELD won't let me in to talk to you, and I want answers. Are you letting us keep you here?”

One blink. One hypothesis confirmed.

“Did you show that demoness how to get here?”

Loki's expression looked pained as he blinked a slow yes, and then a fast no.

“Did you show her how to get here?” Tony pressed. Loki's shoulders sagged as much as they could in his restraints, but he blinked yes again.

Tony felt his heart sink. Loki had been involved. But his reactions were…

“Did you show her here...recently?”

Loki rapidly blinked a no, paused, then again, another pause, and a third time. His eyes had brightened, his eyebrows raised, he strained forwards against the restraints, putting every possible emphasis on answering in the negative. A flush of hope and then a wave of confusion flowed through Tony. What was it Loki had said about the magic involved in all of this? Something about it being old. So old he couldn't remember where it was from. And old for someone like Loki didn't exactly mean a decade or two – more like a couple millennia. Tony drummed his fingers against his leg, tapping out a staccato rhythm. What was going on here?

“Do you think she said what she did to deliberately implicate you?”

One blink. Yes.

“Right. Then you two know each other?”

One blink.

“And she doesn't like you?”

One blink. Then two. Then an eye roll.

“Okay, I get it, it’s complicated. We need to talk about this in full sentences. I'm getting in there tonight or so help me I will strangle someone. Just hang in there, and try not to murder anyone with your brain. I'll get you out and then we can punch this demoness in the face together, alright?”

Loki blinked once, and his eyes seemed to smile a little. Tony wanted to reach through the camera to touch him, at least brush the hair back from his face. He stared at the video feed a moment longer, and then began to recall the Lab Rat. As it was heading back towards the wall, he heard the door open.

“What the hell?” someone said, and suddenly the video feed was a scrambled, tumbling mess as the Lab Rat was picked up. Tony swore, and started for the door but he’d barely gotten to his feet before it opened for him. He was greeted by an agent holding the Lab Rat, another one with the audacity to point a gun at him, and behind them both a glowering Nick Fury. Tony gave them a strained smile.

“Director. Just the man I wanted to see - we need to talk.”

Fury dismissed the two agents – and Tony sure didn't miss that the one holding the Lab Rat walked off with it – and turned to him.

“Mr Stark, you'd better have a good explanation for this.”

Tony almost laughed.

“For once, Director, I do. You and I both know that Loki is only in that room because he chooses to be. We have nothing that can really hold him, not with as much power as he has now and that's him at half-mast. If he wanted out, he'd be out. There's something bigger going on here.”

“Yeah, like he's playing the long game, and probably acting as a homing beacon for the whole damn army. He’s done it before, Stark. I won’t be caught out the same way twice.”

Tony shook his head.

“This is different. He's not on her side. I know it.”

Fury sighed and rubbed at his forehead.

“Look, Stark, if you think you know something – if you think he knows something – then I'm giving you one shot to get it out of him. You have until dawn, because tomorrow morning Thor is contacting Asgard and we can all wave a cheerful goodbye to our little friend in there, whether he had anything to do with it or not. I’m not keeping that big of a liability around any longer than I have to.”

Somehow Tony managed to keep his face neutral enough that Fury didn’t pick up on the wave of fear that washed over him. If Loki went back to Asgard, accused of the same crimes again, who knew what they’d decide to do to him this time? But Fury had given him time – not much, but some – and that was all he needed. Fury walked him to the door of the safe-room, nodded to the SHIELD guards to unlock it. They covered Tony with their weapons as he walked in, as if that would do any good if Loki really was turning on them. Behind him the door thumped shut and the room was suddenly far too quiet. He’d built this place. He knew where his own cameras were, knew that SHIELD would have their own on top of that. They were watching and that was the only thing that kept him from running over and tearing at Loki’s chains.

Instead he strolled over and cast his eyes over Loki, as if examining him for the first time. The chains, the cuffs and the skin rubbed raw around them. The gag around the lower half of his face that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a Clive Barker movie. Loki watched him with wary eyes as Tony carefully undid the clasps and released the gag. There was a soft click as it came free and Loki drew in a deep, ragged breath. Below it his lips were chapped and raw, and there were pinpricks of blood around his mouth. Tony wished he’d thought to ask for some water to bring with him or something. Loki swallowed a few times, working his jaw with a painful clicking sound.

“You took your time,” he said. Flickers of green light sparked around his mouth, leaving healed skin their wake. Tony dropped the gag to the ground without looking at the side of it that had been pressed into Loki’s skin. He managed an unamused raised eyebrow.

“Yeah, well, everyone thinks you're a gigantic traitor so they were reluctant to let me come see you,” Tony folded his arms. “I have half a mind to believe them, given your track record. So. Prove me wrong.”

“You're a terrible liar, Stark, but I won't hold it against you. You are, after all, far outclassed in present company.”

“Don't stall. Explain.”

“You really don't want to know.”

Tony could have punched him right in his pretty face.

“Trust me, I do. And so do SHIELD, and everyone else. You'll be staying here a while if you don't talk, and when you do get bored and,” Tony waggled his fingers, “Magic your way out, you'll still be stuck in the city, only this time with a horde of angry SHIELD agents and superheroes trying to find you. You're not that good.”

Loki smirked as if to say 'Oh, but I am that good'. Then he sighed and let his head loll back, exposing his throat. Tony coughed, and shifted his weight a little – with Loki there was no way the movement was accidental. Then Loki looked up again, and there was nothing close to mischief in his eyes. At that moment, he was every inch as old as Tony knew he was, despite the youth of his skin.

“It was a long time ago, when I first met her,” he began. “Before I or any other from Asgard had even thought to visit Midgard. The universe was very much different then, and for someone like me, the perfect playground. I was much younger then, so consider that when condemning me. I had never even seen your realm before.”

“Who did you meet? The demons? Their leader?”

“A single demon, at first. You have seen how I can move freely through the universe if I so wish? Well, I was – how shall I put this? Exploring. I found a shortcut, as you might call it, and found myself at the far reaches of a distant galaxy, on a world where the sky was black and the earth blood red.” His eyes had glazed over, no longer seeing Tony but the far-off alien world he’d found so long ago. “Where on other worlds there would be deep oceans, here there were endless fires a thousand fathoms deep, filled with strange creatures who swam among the flames. It was like nothing else I’d ever seen. It was incredible.”

“And there were demons there,” Tony said. Loki nodded.

“I was so entranced by this strange place that I’d found myself in that one of them crept up on me. Before I knew what was happening I’d been knocked unconscious, and when I awoke I was in her palace.” He closed his eyes, remembering. “You’ve never seen the like, Stark. Ceilings high and dark and full of stars like burning eyes; walls carved from some pale stone like marble but stronger, colder, the twisting patterns in it like exposed muscle. And all of it lit by a dying sun, through windows of crimson glass that drenched the rooms in blood.”

Loki shook his head.

“It has been a long time since I thought of it, but it all comes back so clearly. She sat on a throne of bleached white bones, torn from no creature I could imagine. And she looked then exactly as she does now – she has not changed one iota in all these centuries.”

“She's immortal. Great.”

“She has a name in her tongue that even I cannot pronounce. There are a myriad of translations and all are as you might imagine for someone like her. Queen of a Thousand Torments. Blood Mother. She Who Death Forgot. Daughter of a Hundred Hells.” Tony shuddered. It was all as melodramatic as the demoness had been. Loki continued, “And she seemed intrigued by me. Nothing like me had ever managed to find its way to her world before, and so out of curiosity she didn’t slaughter me on the spot. Instead we got to talking and, well, that's where anyone loses to me.”

Loki grinned at him, and Tony struggled not to return it. Then the tricksters smile faded.

“At any rate, I escaped with my life on that occasion, but every so often I returned to that world. You might think it foolish but she intrigued me. She was different. Powerful. Clever. Far more so than anyone else I knew on Asgard, and far more so than the creatures she commanded. As you might imagine those traits endeared her to me. You of all should understand why that would be so.”

His tone turned bitter, and Tony wished the cameras were gone. He shoved his hands into his pockets to stop them from reaching out.

“When I discovered Midgard for myself, and the ways here beyond the crude drama of Heimdall and the bridge, I showed her the trick of it. At that time, I found you mortals interesting, and guessed she would feel much the same way.”

“Did she?”

“For the most part. We both found you amusing, but she decided that you were ultimately of no concern to her, being so far beneath her. You must understand, Stark, even then she was ancient. She had conquered worlds and slaughtered billions before I was even born. You were as insignificant as amoeba to her.”

“But you didn't think she'd want to crush us, the way you did?”

“Don't try to guess at my intentions for that incident, Stark. But no, I didn't think she would have any interest in conquering you.” He smiled wryly. “Otherwise you can be certain I would have enlisted her aid rather than the Chitauri’s. Well, I would have had I been given a choice in the matter. At any rate, I was certain she cared so little about you, and you were so far away, that she would soon forget all about you. After all, there are far more interesting things in the universe than the human race.”

Loki closed his eyes again - in that moment he looked very tired, and more human than he ever had. Tony’s chest felt tight. Loki shifted slightly and the chains clinked against each other, the cuffs at his wrist sliding around the chafed skin. Finally, after a long silence, Loki opened his eyes. They were flat, cold. He wasn’t expecting Tony or any of their watchers to believe a single word he’d said – and who, Tony thought, could blame him?

“Well, Stark. That is all I have to say. I did show the demoness how to get here, a long time ago. She did like me, once, and perhaps still does. Why she has chosen to come here now, I couldn't say. But know that killing her and stopping her army will be no easy task, and tell your SHIELD friends that without me and my brother you haven’t the faintest hope of achieving it.”

“Oh, I think they already know that,” Tony said coldly. Then, raising his voice, “Director? You get all that? Cause I think we could use a set of keys down here.”

There was a moment of silence before the door swung open, and Fury came to join him. He folded his arms, eyeing Loki up. The trickster gave him a mock submissive smile but to Tony’s relief he didn’t say anything.

“You believe what he says?” Fury finally asked.

“I do. And I also think he has no incentive to be lying at this point. We’re not keeping him here – you know that, I know that, he knows that.” Surely even Fury couldn't ignore the logic in that.

“He stays under guard.” Fury turned away at last, glowering at Tony. “And constant surveillance. Until this demon shit is dealt with, he doesn't go anywhere in this tower or out of it without an escort.”

“That will make me disgustingly ineffective on the battlefield,” Loki snapped out. “And you don't want me hindered out there. You might have Thor on your side but he alone will not be enough. You need me.”

“You don't know how many times I've heard that one,” Fury said with a laugh. “And I never said your escort had to be one of my people. I'm sure Stark here would be happy to babysit you, and shut you down if necessary.”

Tony almost lost his poker face then and there. He managed to turn his laugh into a cough as three SHIELD agents strode into the room and set about freeing Loki from his restraints. He rubbed at his wrists, trails of green racing around over the injured skin and returning it to its usual smooth, pale state. He flexed his shoulders and his eyes glowed faintly, sparks of magic dancing at their corners. Tony gave him a warning look.

“Don't do anything stupid.”

“Relax, Stark.” The glow faded, and Tony thought Loki looked far too relaxed as he was escorted from the room by the agents. “I can play this game well enough. Worry about yourself, and inform the rest of your team about the demoness.” He paused, stopping just long enough for one of the agents to grab at his arm to try and move him. He shook them off with a glare. “And Stark…send Thor to my rooms as soon as he is available. There are things we must discuss.”

Then he was gone, four more SHIELD agents attaching themselves to him as they headed out into the corridor. Tony watched them go, then glanced at Fury. The Director was already tapping at his phone, co-ordinating and updating the rest of his organisation. He slipped out of the room and went to find the rest of the Avengers.

As luck would have it, they were all in the same room for once, the four of them clustered in the kitchen holding drinks of varying levels of alcohol content. Bruce raised his eyebrows when Tony walked in, and Tony nodded back. A relieved smile spread across his face.

“So, I’ve got…news,” Tony said, and then launched into the whole unbelievable tale Loki had told him. They were sceptical, he could see it on their faces. Even Bruce, who had encouraged him in the first place. The only one who believed him from the outset was Thor, who had started frowning the moment he’d mentioned Loki’s travels away from Asgard, and who had looked downright worried by the time he was finished. It was the thunder god’s concern that convinced him once and for all that what Loki had said was true. And if Thor was worried…

He didn’t want to say out loud that they might be totally and utterly screwed, but since Loki wasn’t around to read his mind, he could think it as much as he wanted.

The second Tony said that Loki had asked for him, Thor ran from the room and it was only the fact that the rest of the Avengers pounced on him with a million and one questions that stopped Tony from tapping into the security feeds to watch that conversation.

In the end, what it came down to was that they had no choice but to believe him. However far-fetched the tale, the rest of the facts added up to it being true. Loki hadn’t protected the demoness from the head-shots, he hadn’t fled the tower in a bloody swathe of bodies, and the demoness had known him. And they had no idea when she might be back.

“If Loki is the key to stopping her, then we use him,” Steve said. His voice was steady but he’d peeled the labels off half a dozen beers already and was working on a seventh. “That’s the end of it. I just hope you can put him down if you have to, Tony.”

Tony was about to ask just what Steve was implying by that, but then he continued with;

“He’s a lot stronger now than he was. And he might do more this time than toss you out of a window.”

“I think I can handle him,” Tony said. Natasha was giving him a look which he pointedly ignored. “But just in case, I’m going to go and give myself a few upgrades. If you need me, I’ll be busy.”

He turned on his heel and left before any of them could ask any more questions. Halfway down the corridor he felt the beginnings of an honest-to-god sulk starting to take root as the reality of it all sank in. Loki was under heavy surveillance again. SHIELD would have twice as many guards on his room, tighter security measures on their cameras. There was no way he could risk trying to mess with them, and there was no way he’d be able to get Loki somewhere private. Not in the tower, and no way in hell could he get Loki out of the tower – there were no secret erotic hotel-room trysts in Tony’s future right now. His relationship, if you could call it that, with Loki should have been the least of his worries with everything that was going on, yet he couldn’t help but pout about his newest toy being locked away.

Still, once all this ended – and it would end, one way or another – they could pick up where they left off. Because Tony had every intention of finding out just how demanding Loki could really be.

---

Chapter Sixteen

He had known this was coming ever since Stark had brought the first corpses inside the tower. He’d had his suspicions when he’d first seen the magic inscribed on the inside of the mechanical birds, but when he saw the demon lying on the table, twisted and ugly even in death…all of it had begun to come back. First a trickle, then a flood – things he hadn’t known he still remembered. After all, it had been so long ago, and he’d been so young…

Seeing it had been a punch to the gut as he recalled what it meant for one of them to be here.

He didn’t say a word. Not to Stark and not to the others, not even after the repeated incursions, when he was more certain than ever that he knew what was coming. What use would it have done, even if they had believed him? They would only, he knew, have found some way to blame him. He might have been able to talk Stark round to his side, but even that was far from a certainty. So, he kept his mouth shut and went back to his notes, digging deep into his own mind to claw out every scrap of arcane knowledge buried there, in the hopes that he might find something useful.

Stark knew something was up. The others did too, Loki was certain – particularly Thor – but none of them dared to question him about it. Stark was the only one with the temerity to come out and ask him what he knew, and as of late he was easier and easier to distract away from questions Loki didn’t want to answer.

And there was the real problem. There was the reason behind the cruel twist in his chest when he thought about revealing his connection to the demons. If Stark knew he was involved, however tangentially, if he believed Loki to be an accomplice… He refused to follow that train of thought to its conclusion because he hadn’t the time or the inclination for such self-reflection. If he were to make it out his exile, his punishment, and the inevitable battle with the demons alive, then he had to maintain a…professional distance. Yes, that was exactly it. So long as things between Stark and himself remained as they were – an admittedly delicious physical attraction – he’d get out of this intact and, with any luck, all his powers back. Any thoughts that tried to run contrary to this plan were quickly and firmly squashed – he had a lifetime’s experience with denial in such matters and it would be a shame to let such talent go to waste.

Then she’d been there, on the screen, looking the same as she had a millennium or more ago. The Blood Mother, The Queen of a Thousand Hells. The demoness. The sight of her brought back every one of her names that he knew, and the tales behind them. Her entire blood-drenched history clicked into place as though he’d never forgotten it. He hadn’t expected to see her so soon, had dreaded seeing her at all. From all the tales of carnage she had so delighted in recounting to him, he had been under the impression she saved herself for last. That she watched as worlds fell before her endless hordes, then showed up to complete the slaughter and claim the planet for her own vast empire. Something was different this time, and here she was, announcing herself. Giving them time. Playing with her food.

His blood had run Jotun-cold when she spoke. He couldn’t tear himself away from her eyes, even glaring out from a screen. It was like staring into two slivers of starless space, into the bottomless pit of nothingness at the end of the universe.

He never knew, even afterwards, if Stark had been able to tell something was wrong when he had gone to him that night. Whether the human played along to comfort him, or if he had truly lied so well that he half convinced himself he was fine. But he’d had to go to him. Had to keep himself away from his own thoughts, which had eaten away at him all the hours of the day. He’d wanted one last night where someone believed in him. Because once the demoness showed up, everything would change.

And oh, how cruelly she’d changed it! He’d known what she would say even before she spoke. He’d never been able to penetrate her mind but he knew how this went, and he read it in her face. There was no defence he could offer, no gilded words that could undo her accusations. After all, she was telling the truth. He had time to look at Stark, with a prayer that he would see the reality in his eyes, and see through the demoness’s ploy.

He let himself be knocked down, lay still beneath the Captain’s boot, fought down every instinct insisting that he get out of there, that he flee the scene and damn the consequences – who cared what these humans thought of him? He stayed. He let them bind him and take him away. Because, if he could bear the brief moment of honesty with himself, he did care what they thought of him. Or at least, he didn’t want them believing a manipulated truth that wasn’t one he had made.

The more he thought about it, the more it galled him. How dare that little cloven-hoofed witch manipulate his Avengers in such a way? If they were going to fall for anyone's lies and misdirected truths, they would fall for his because at least he was good at it. She had never had the gift like he did, even for all her aeons of existence; she was a hammer and he a scalpel. How dare she?

More than that, he realised as they were chaining him to the wall, he wanted them to know that he hadn’t done this. To know that he had no hand in the death and destruction she brought, and to know it not from some convincing lie but from the truth. The real truth. He hadn’t wanted anyone to believe that about him for a long while and the feeling was so strange that he was almost glad he was chained to the wall – it stopped any embarrassing episodes of collapsing in shock.

Perhaps it wasn’t so surprising though. He’d been helping them long before the demoness had showed up. It had almost been like it had been before, with Thor and the Warriors Three. Fighting alongside people who, even if they didn’t exactly like you, at least put up with you. He wondered if Odin was watching any of this, and if he enjoyed the fact that the penance he had imposed appeared to be working at last.

Then he remembered the look on Stark’s face. The hurt, the shock, the betrayal in his eyes, the anger underneath it all. It made his insides twist, an unfamiliar sensation he had no intention of putting up with, but which showed no signs of leaving. Then, of course, Stark had come to his rescue with his electronic rodents and his questions, and Loki had been sure he’d take everything as a lie. Face to face, he was still no more certain that Stark believed a word of what he was saying.

But then that agent had walked in on the lab rat, and suddenly there was Stark, and the gag was gone and he could at last speak the truth. He didn’t expect anyone to believe him even so. When he'd finished telling Stark of his encounters with the demoness he had fully expected scoffing, maybe a quip or two, and then to be left to rot in this cell. Stark had been right about there being no point in fleeing with his powers as they were. He could evade SHIELD and the others for as long as he lived but to be trapped in the city, in hiding forever, was unthinkably torturous.

And then the strangest thing – Stark believed him.

He was free again. Free to be spied on, followed, guarded at every turn, but free nonetheless. Fury’s suggestion that Stark be the one to supervise him had been amusing, though the spark of gladness that jumped in his chest surprised him. One more thing to avoid for the time being. For now, there was the demoness and her kin to deal with.

Dealing with them, though, meant that they had to be around to deal with. After Barton and Romanov had shot her and caused the retreat of the entire army, there had been nothing but silence. The rift remained open, a gaping red and black wound torn in the sky. When he saw it, Loki felt that they were lying on the executioners’ block, just waiting for the blade to fall on their necks. He forced himself to stare at it while he waited for his SHIELD escort to satisfy themselves that nothing suspicious or dangerous was in his rooms, not daring to so much as raise an unamused eyebrow. As Stark had said, he was on thin ice, and he had no desire to be imprisoned again any time soon.

They left him alone again once they were satisfied, and he had a few good long minutes in which to try and decide what exactly he was going to say to Thor when he showed up – assuming he even did. He should have known better than to doubt his eternally optimistic brothers’ loyalty, as he was at the door scant minutes after the SHIELD agents had left.

“Loki?”

“Come in,” Loki tried to drape himself casually in his chair, tossing a ball of light between his hands as if he couldn’t care less. Thor came straight over and pulled him up into a hug. The ball of light dropped to the ground, fizzling out. Loki stood stiffly in the embrace until Thor released him, grasping his shoulders.

“I knew,” he said. “I knew this was not your doing.”

“You trusted me?”

He nodded.

“You are many things, Loki, one of which is my brother. You may be able to fool me most of the time, but when it matters, I know. I always do.”

Loki, thinking of the many times Thor had definitely not known, kept his mouth shut for once. Thor smiled and gave a nod.

“So. What is it we must discuss? Do you have a plan for defeating this demon?”

“I…not as such…” Loki said, and Thor frowned. “Stark has told you what I told him, no doubt?”

“Yes.”

“Then you remember what I told you about her, all those years ago.”

Thor’s brow furrowed.

“I remember bits and pieces of that time,” he said. “I remember you disappearing for days at a time, always off on some adventure somewhere I could never figure out how to follow you. And I remember you returning once, when we still shared quarters, covered in blood and trembling head to toe.”

Loki swallowed thickly. Thor continued.

“You told me you’d found something, a place that was…what did you call it?”

“Exhilarating and terrifying in equal measure,” Loki murmured.

“That was it. You were obsessive about it, but you never did tell me where it was you kept going. Then one day you just…stopped going. I asked about it, and you told me you were never going back, not ever again. Then I think you learned how to turn into animals and you started stabbing me for fun, so I kind of stopped thinking about the other thing.”

Loki barked out a laugh, surprising them both. He sat back down in the chair, and rubbed a hand over his face.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Not for the stabbing, that’s still funny.”

“In your opinion.”

“Which is, as we both know, the only one that matters. Thor,” he looked up, throat going tight, “I’m sorry I didn’t say anything sooner. If I had, if I’d reminded you of those days, perhaps we could have…perhaps she would not have…” he trailed off, closing his eyes against the sting of tears that had suddenly sprung up. This was not how he had intended this conversation to go. Thor crouched in front of him and took his hands. Loki looked at him, at his too-serious, too-trusting face. “I don’t know how to stop her,” he whispered.

Thor squeezed his hands.

“Neither do I,” he said. “But you don’t have to, and I don’t either. Not alone. It’s not just you, me and the Warriors Three against the universe anymore. We have allies – strong, clever, wonderful allies, who for some reason have decided to start trusting you.”

“Thanks,” Loki said sarcastically. Thor ignored him.

“Between us we’ll find a way to stop her,” he insisted. “You’ll think of some clever magic to close her portal and send her running for cover.” A sly grin, one Loki had never seen before, crossed his face. “I believe that Tony Stark would be more than willing to assist you with his technological prowess.”

Loki felt his blood run cold for a brief moment.

“What are you talking about?” Thor stood and, of all things, winked at him.

“You’ll figure it out,” he said. “You always do.”

Loki stared after him as he left, wondering if his brother had just implied what he thought he’d implied, and if he knew he’d done it.

---

Although he was ‘free’, he kept to himself and to his rooms. Even isolating himself again it was easy to see how tense everyone was. The whole city – the whole country, judging by the news reports – was on high alert. There was mention of curfews, whispered debate over martial law. Whatever they did, Loki doubted they would prove to be anything more than a brief distraction when the demons returned. After all, they’d struggled with the Chitauri he’d brought and those had been little more than battle drones.

The demons, while similar in some respects, had the advantage of a far superior core to their hive-mind. Their queen was far older and far more experienced than the Chitauri had been, and now that she had decided to get personally involved, the fighting was going to get a lot harder. Well, it would if they ever returned.

He knew it was a vain hope that they wouldn’t. That it was a childish fantasy to pray that the demoness recalled how boring she found this entire galaxy, closed her portal and left. She wouldn’t. With little else to do but think on his old encounters with her, he found he could recall the tales she had told him perfectly clearly. The stories of other worlds she had conquered and ravaged, stripping them down to dead husks before moving on. Her fury and determination, her unrelenting power. When she decided on a world, nothing could change her mind. Loki had thought then that her single-mindedness would be a weakness to exploit. Now he knew better. It was only one more of her strengths, and it would see them all dead.

He knew he should tell someone more of what he knew of her. At the very least he should talk to Stark. But alone as he was, he wasn’t ignorant of the tense atmosphere at the tower. It was a very fragile truce that left him with his life at present, and he didn’t even dare to leave his room, magically or otherwise. He barely dared to move around inside of it, lest some too-sharp movement lead a watching eye to get twitchy fingers. It would take more than a few gunshots to put him down in his current state, but the recovery would be decidedly unpleasant.

So instead he thought about the demoness, and how hopeless the whole thing was, and when that got far too depressing to be any fun, he thought about Stark instead. To talk to him would be a blessed relief from Loki's own thoughts, but he didn't think it wise to issue a summons. As Stark had said, they were on thin ice. He had to wait for Stark to come to him.

And when he did, it was not exactly in the way Loki had expected. A couple of tense days after he had been allowed to return to his quarters, one of the SHIELD guards delivered a gift to him.

“From Mr Stark,” they said, dropping the box on the desk and trying very hard to shuffle away in a brave-looking way when Loki reached for it. “He said to tell you, uh,” they made a face, coughed. “To tell you ‘if I’m going to be a babysitter, then the baby is going to get an upgrade so I can location track him’. His words.”

Loki didn’t doubt that. After staring at the agent until they made an official sounding excuse and left, he turned his attention to the box. Small and rectangular, white with a black Stark Industries logo in the centre. He opened it with no small amount of caution – they might have agreed to hold off on the tricks, but he was no fool. Nothing exploded and he was not covered in any unpleasant substances, so he supposed this was a real gift. Inside was a sleek black rectangle, shiny and smooth. A phone of some kind, Loki surmised. He turned it over in his hands, finding a small place at the bottom to connect it to power, but nothing else.

His fingers slid around the sides until he felt the slightest indentation at the top. He pressed down with a nail and the screen lit up in his palm. The Stark Industries logo flared blue, and then settled down into a clean, crisp display. He was playing around with it, pretending he wasn’t the slightest bit impressed with Stark’s sense of design aesthetics, when it vibrated in his hand.

He answered with more than a little apprehension. Stark’s voice was so clear he might have been standing right next to him.

“Awesome! I was half worried SHIELD might have blocked transmissions into your rooms.”

“Why have you given me a phone, Stark?”

“Like I hope the agent told you – I want to location track my pet project. Fury wants me to keep an eye on you? I’ll keep a tracker on you. No escaping for you.”

“Is that wise?”

“It is when I have you on a secure line not even SHIELD can get into. Well, not yet anyway. JARVIS is working on keeping them out permanently. But at the moment they just hear us talking about how amazing I am.”

Loki raised an eyebrow.

“Is that so? And why, pray tell, have you done this? Fury wants you to keep an eye on me, as you said – you could speak to me in person.”

“And have to constantly restrain myself from jumping your bones in front of god and Nick Fury? Nah, this way I can do things like…this…” his voice grew muffled for a moment, and the phone chimed softly in Loki’s ear. He lowered it, and opened the notification it had delivered to him. His eyes widened a little and he quickly closed the highly compromising but very pleasing photo Stark had just sent him. It took all his self-control not to glance around at the cameras in the room, hoping they hadn’t just seen what he had. He swallowed.

“Well, well, you certainly have made such advances in technology,” he said. Tony laughed.

“You see what I mean? Can’t do that in your rooms, too many prying eyes. But I can indulge myself way up here in my penthouse…”

“And leave me to suffer alone. You realise that the infernal cameras in these rooms are everywhere?” Loki leaned back in his chair with a sigh.

“Not in your en-suit,” Tony said in a sing-song voice. “I had JARVIS check. Even SHIELD isn’t that creepy, it turns out. They can watch you go in, they can see if you go out the window, and I think they can tell if your life-signs stop while you’re inside, but they can’t see anything you do in there.”

“I suspect they will grow suspicious, though, if I enter with your gift in my hand, and remain in there however long you deign to torment me.”

“You keep reminding me how smart you are, you figure out the best solution. Make an illusion, or something. Meanwhile,” there was a shuffling sound, “I’m just gonna be up here. In my king size bed. Naked, as you know.”

“Indeed. Stark, you are aware that magic requires a level of concentration? Something a little difficult to maintain if I’m distracted listening to you pleasure yourself?”

“Mm-hmm,” Stark sounded distracted himself, “That sounds like a you problem.”

Loki closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Stark…”

“Oh, right, not fair to leave you with just audio.” Loki didn’t dare to lower the phone from his ear, for fear of flashing something compromising to the cameras. “C’mon, Loki, you’re hot but you’re not so hot I can get off to a close up of the side of your head.”

Loki moved the phone enough to be able to see the screen. He very quickly slapped it back against his ear, and shifted in his chair.

“Don’t tell me you’re shy,” Stark’s voice held a teasing edge. He was breathing heavier now, and that sound against Loki’s ear was almost too much. He ought to transport himself to the mortals’ rooms right that moment and show him the consequences of teasing a god. He drew a deep breath.

“Give me…a moment.”

Before Stark could reply, he ended the call without looking at the screen, and shoved the phone into his pocket. He stayed sitting for a moment. Ran a hand over his face, breathed in deep. Then, as casually as he could manage, stood and went into the bathroom. The door shut behind him and he leaned against it, already pulling out the phone, calling and waiting, waiting, waiting…

This time Stark appeared on the screen immediately, the camera held unsteadily in front of his face. He grinned, and he was a little flushed.

“This is a much better view,” he said. “Shame I can’t be there in person, but, you know,” he shrugged, and let the camera pan down. “Gotta at least try and keep up appearances.”

Loki wanted to shove his face into the bed and make him beg forgiveness for the torments he was inflicting. Instead he found himself biting his lip with a hand slowly stealing to his groin as he watched Tony’s own hand doing much the same. He could hear the soft groans and quick moans – almost comically exaggerated to begin with, growing more real as Stark forgot the tease and fell into the pleasure – and soon enough was responding with his own. He had no idea if he was pointing the camera on the phone anywhere that Stark would enjoy, but judging by the way his hand sped up, he was enjoying it nevertheless.

“This is turning out…” Stark gasped out, bringing the view back to his face. Loki liked the way desire looked on him – the flush on his cheeks and his parted lips, the way his tongue darted across the lower and the way his throat moved when he swallowed. “…better than I anticipated,” he finished.

“Better if I could touch you,” Loki purred. “Better for you to feel my hands on you, for my fingers to be the ones tracing your skin.”

Tony grinned.

“I love it when you talk.”

“Most people do.”

“Don’t bring most people into this, I want to enjoy you all to myself.”

Loki swallowed a shiver at the sound of that. Strange to be on the other end of the possessive talk, but not altogether unpleasant. Yet another aspect of Stark he would find time to enjoy, should the world not end.

“I can talk all night,” Loki said, though judging by the feeling in his groin, that timespan might have been a little generous. “Give or take a few minutes.”

“Please do,” the video of Stark turned jumbled and blurry for a moment, and then Loki was treated to an almost full-body view of him as he lay on his side in the bed, staring directly into the camera as if he was looking into Loki’s eyes. “Tell me everything you’d want to do if you were here.”

Loki slowed his own hand a little, the better to concentrate fully on Stark.

“If I were to tell you everything I wanted to do to you, we might be here until the end of the universe.”

“Which might be next Tuesday for all you know, so cut to the chase.”

“So impatient, my little mortal.” Loki wanted to kiss that impertinent mouth, to taste the grin on Stark’s face, devour every laugh and sarcastic comment that issued from it, and told him as much. The resulting expression was worth it, so he continued. “I want to bite your neck until it’s marked, and trace your throat with my tongue, so that I might feel the way you moan when I do – and you do moan, Stark, and such a pretty sound it is.”

One such moan escaped him then, as pleasing a sound as ever a mortal made.

“I want to take you in my hand and have you push your hips to me, in that impatient manner of yours,” Tony’s hips arched into his own hand in just the same way, and Loki swallowed, stroking himself slowly as he watched and continued to talk. “I want to take you inside of me, slowly, since you would wish it otherwise. I want to feel you like that, and hold you still beneath me until you beg me to move.”

“God, Loki,” Tony’s voice was rough, and he had closed his eyes, his head tilted back. Loki’s eyes devoured the line of his throat, the curve of his side, the flex of his wrist as he stroked and squeezed and stroked. His own erection was hot in his hand, desperate for more attention of its own but he wasn’t about to let himself get distracted. Not yet.

“And I want to let you beg,” he kept his voice low now, not quite a whisper but close, “And when I hear enough, I want to reward you for at least pretending to be patient.”

He could hear Stark’s breath faster and faster now, knew he was close.

“I want to fuck you like that, slowly. I want you to clutch at my skin, I want you to moan against my mouth, and when you come I want it to be with my name on your lips.”

“Loki!”

As he wanted, so he got. And it was to such a sight that he finally acceded to the demands of his own body, and was more than aware of Stark’s eyes on him as he brought himself to the same state as he had brought the mortal. When he had recovered his wits, and looked back to the screen, he caught an odd expression on Tony’s face, one that quickly vanished under a cocky grin.

“Am I the best, or am I the best?” he said. “Don’t answer that, we both know the answer.”

Loki chuckled.

“I will conceded that you are at least a creative thinker. And I will not deny that this little encounter was…enjoyable.”

“I’ll bet,” a pause. “I’m glad she lied.”

Loki’s breath caught.

“I...I am glad you believed that I didn’t.”

Another pause, Tony’s eyes darting away for a moment.

“I’d better go,” he said at last. “Not sure how long I can keep this line open without someone at SHIELD noticing. Better safe than sorry.”

“Of course.”

“I’ll call you tomorrow. Can’t let a good gift go to waste, right?”

Loki laughed, and Stark ended the call. He stared at the empty screen until it went dark, then quickly turned his eyes from his own reflection. He sighed, and straightened himself up with a quick wave of magic. He’d better go back to the main room before SHIELD decided he was acting suspiciously and chained him to the wall again.

---

Despite the pleasing distraction Stark had brought him, Loki still lay awake most of that night, staring at the darkness of the ceiling. The Avengers had hope. Humanity had hope. They had fought monsters before and beaten back terrors; how could they not have hope that this would end the same way – with them standing victorious as the enemy fled or died before them? Loki, falling deeper into memories that had stayed buried deep for good reason, could not help feeling that hope to be false.

And for all he had spoken of conquest, he did not want this realm turned to the barren husk the demoness would leave it. Humanity, for all its many, many flaws, was interesting. Well, amusing at least, which mostly amounted to the same thing. He sighed, closing his eyes. Eventually, his bluff would be called. The Avengers would ask him to defeat the demoness, as he insisted they needed him to do, and when they did, he had to have something – anything – up his sleeve.

---

Chapter Seventeen

The only light in the workshop was the glow of screens and holographic displays. Tony had switched off the overheads and drawn the blinds hours ago, cocooning himself in shadows and the endless play of letters and figures that danced in front of him. He moved from one screen to another, jumping from problem to problem, switching between dilemmas like he was channel surfing. Papers littered the floor where, too impatient to find the right computer to input them to, he’d scrawled notes and then discarded them when they proved worthless.

It wasn’t killing the demons that was the problem, not anymore. Killing them was far too easy. The vast number of them, while intimidating, wasn’t really the problem either. He was about eighty-five percent sure that the Avengers – with a little help – could beat back the hordes. No, the demons weren’t the problem. He flicked away a simulation that told him nothing new and pulled up, for about the fiftieth time that day, the footage of the last fight. What with cell phones, news cameras, amateur filmmakers and copious surveillance cameras, they had plenty of it, from every angle you could dream of.

Enough to, say, build a three-dimensional holographic replica of the real problem they were facing. Lights danced and knitted together, and Tony stepped back, staring up at pupil-less eyes that were no less intimidating for being made of intangible light. Thanks to Loki, they had a dozen or more names now that she’d gone by, half of them in unpronounceable alien tongues. The Blood Mother, the Queen of a Thousand Hells. Whatever she wanted to call herself, she was in charge of the invasion and somehow, she was the power behind both the portal and the demons that spewed from it.

And he was no closer to knowing how to kill her after nearly thirty-six straight hours staring at holograms than he had been when he started. Tony ground his teeth and shoved her smirking, inhuman face away. She was the key to all of this, the lynchpin behind stopping the invasion. If he could just solve her then everything else would come crashing into place and they could end this damn fight. Because when Clint and Natasha had shot her, the entire force had reeled and gone into instant retreat, and if they could kill her for real, maybe then they wouldn’t come back.

She wasn’t dead, despite the double headshot. That he was convinced of, and Loki’s stories had seemed to back that instinct up. She’d vanished and the army had run, but the portal was still open, just waiting to rain hell down on them again. Three headshots and she hadn’t died and he had no idea why. They had to find some way to put her down. She had to have a weakness – nothing was completely invulnerable, nothing was invincible. There had to be something that could hurt her.

Tony just wished he knew what it was.

He found his thoughts drawn inevitably to the few seconds before she’d vanished, when she’d told them Loki had shown her the way to Earth. The few seconds before Loki had looked at him and he’d known something wasn’t right, the few seconds when the cold sting of betrayal had raced through him, hollowed him out. He tightened his grip on the stylus and tried to focus, plugging in parameters for a new simulation, inventing data to fill in the gaps…

The look on Loki’s face, the desperate determination in his eyes. In that split second, Tony had known something else was going on and that he had to get to the bottom of it. And how had he known? How had he been able to tell from just one glance that something was up? When had he gotten to know the trickster god well enough to see that?

It wasn’t a line of thought he wanted to go down. Not right then anyway. But, once Loki was in his thoughts it was always a tricky business getting him out again these days, so instead of trying to ignore all thought of the trickster, Tony took the path of least resistance and diverted instead. He had an easy enough place to divert too – he had the god on speed dial now, and boy-oh-boy was that a novelty that wasn’t soon going to wear off.

He hadn’t entirely intended to go down the rabbit hole of straight up phone sex. Originally he’d meant what he told the SHIELD agent that passed his gift along – if he was going to be in charge of Loki, he wanted to know where he was. Especially if he took to disappearing again. But then he’d started thinking about how trapped Loki must feel, back to square negative one and locked in a room, and how he could easily cheer him up, and how, though it would be easier to do that in person he could just as easily do it over the phone…

He’d basically spiralled back into prank-thinking, only the end result was far more sexually charged than any of the pranks he’d ever pulled had ended up being. He found himself with his phone in his hand almost without realising it, and he bit his lip. His thumb hovered over the screen, wondering if calling every day since he’d given Loki the phone was too much, when the dull thunk of knuckles on glass made him jump.

Tony glanced at the door, hoping his face didn’t look weirdly guilty. Natasha was already halfway into the room, holding up a bottle of something with no label. He shoved his phone back in his pocket.

“Figured I’d come and make sure you hadn’t died,” she said, grabbing a chair, spinning it across the floor towards him and straddling it to a stop in front of him. She twisted the lid from the bottle and took a swig before offering it to Tony. He took it.

“Is this going to kill me?”

“I sincerely hope not, otherwise this conversation is going to get very boring very quickly.”

“Fair point.” Tony took a swig and closed his eyes as something that tasted maybe like vodka, maybe like paint thinner, maybe like the spit of a vengeful god, burned its way into his stomach. He smacked his lips and passed it back. “You agents don't skimp on the good stuff, huh.”

“Call it a perk of the job. It used to belong to a petty little dictator, but he didn’t need it anymore. I hate to see good drink go to waste.” She took a generous swig and raised an eyebrow. “So. How long have you been hooking up with our resident villain?”

“What? Who told you that? Was it Barton? It was Barton, wasn’t it? I swear to god, if this is another attempt at payback-”

“Stark. Please. Remember who you're talking to,” Natasha pointed to herself, swigged again, and passed the bottle over. “Don't insult me by accusing me of blindly believing gossip from Barton. I do my own research.” She smirked.

Tony sighed.

“Fine. As if I can even try to lie to you of all people. Yes, we’re ‘hooking up’.” He drank deeply this time, and the heat spreading through his chest was certainly making the conversation a lot easier. Which, of course, was exactly what Natasha had planned on. Stupid super-spy. He took another swig and returned it to her, rubbing at his temples.

“Why are you asking about it? I assume if you were going to snitch on me to Fury we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

“I was going to,” she said. “But then I decided that rocking the boat right now was maybe not the greatest idea. You’re both assets and we need all the help we can get the way things are going. That and…” she hesitated, tapping a nail against the rim of the bottle. Then she met his eyes. “I trust you, Stark. Most of the time. And as long as the two of you are shooting from our side rather than at it, I don’t think anyone needs to know what weird naked shit you decide to get up to in your spare time.”

Tony blinked.

“Wow. I…uh…I gotta say I wasn’t expecting, well, any of this. Least of all you being on Team Tony Sleeping with the Enemy.”

“Oh, trust me, Stark – when all this is over, Loki still deserves to get his ass beaten from here to Asgard and back. I’ll buy his whole ‘redemption’ deal when he saves the world instead of trying to conquer it. But like I said, he’s an asset right now and that’s all that matters.” She took one last, long swallow from the bottle, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and passed it off to Tony. She stood.

“Good talk, Stark. I hope you know what you're getting yourself into.”

“Not entirely, no, but I'm certainly enjoying it.”

“Oh, I gathered that,” her smirk made him frown.

“What's that supposed to mean?”

“Oh nothing,” her tone was all innocence, but he didn’t like the look in her eyes. “But you may want to rethink how secure your secure line is.”

She walked out of the room with far too much swish in her step, with Tony shouting after her.

“Natasha, what does that even mean? Natasha! If you've got- oh my god you have footage don't you? Natasha!”

He heard her laugh echo down the corridor as he sagged against a workbench. He lifted the bottle, eyed the amount that was left, shrugged, and downed the lot. He could deal with the repercussions in the morning.

---

After a week Tony couldn’t take it anymore. The portal was still open, the demons still absent, his theories were still abstract and his only contact with Loki was through a few square inches of screen. Something had to give, and since he couldn’t do anything about the demons, he set his mind on actually touching Loki again. And maybe while he was at it he’d get something useful out of him about fighting the demoness when she bothered to show up again. He spent an hour pacing around his room, figuring out what to say to the SHIELD guards, what to say to Loki, how to touch him without losing all self-control and giving the cameras an eyeful of X-rated, Iron Man on Trickster God action.

When he’d finished pacing himself into an anxious frenzy, he remembered that A) he still had Loki’s knives and B) he was Loki’s designated babysitter and SHIELD would have to let him in. He went to the safe where he’d stashed the blades and took them out. They were a solid weight in his hands, the hilts smooth against his palms. He wrapped his fingers around them, thinking of Loki wielding them with such grace – he fought as naturally as he breathed, as brutal as the hulk and as graceful as a dancer. He bit his lip, staring at his reflection in the metal. Then he sighed, steeled himself, and went to find a bag.

Five minutes later Tony was at Loki’s door, a satchel hanging from one shoulder, arguing with five SHIELD agents.

“He wasn’t actually under suspicion of anything last time I checked, I can speak to him if I want,” he said.

“It’s not safe, Stark. Not if you’re unarmed.”

“What’s he gonna do to me? Bore me to death? From all reports he’s been sitting quietly in there ever since you took him out of those chains – which, by the way, I’ll be having words about with…with one of you.”

He shifted the weight of the bag on his shoulder, thought about taking one of the daggers out and jamming it into an agents’ chest, then sighed.

“Look, at least one of you must know that Fury assigned me to him when we let him go. If I’m allowed to keep an eye on him when we go back out to fight again, I’m definitely allowed to speak to him before we do. Tactics, you know?”

The five of them looked at each other, uncertain. Tony kept pushing.

“Call the Director if you don’t believe me. I’m sure he’d love to be bothered by the five of you making poor decisions while he’s trying to save the world. Again.”

“Fine,” said one of them, rolling her eyes. She herded the others aside so Tony could get to the door. “If you start screaming for us to come save you, you’ll have a long time to wait.”

“Thanks, I’m touched by your concern.”

Tony knocked on the door.

“Loki?”

A pause in which he could hear his own heartbeat, then the door clicked open.

“Come in.”

He stepped through, closing the door behind him. There would still be a multitude of cameras watching their every move of course, but it made him feel better. Loki hadn’t gotten up to let him in – he must have done his hand-wavy, lazy-god magic to open it, because he was still sat at his desk, scribbling away.

“Hey,” Tony said quietly. Loki didn’t look up. “Loki, come on.”

The god stopped writing, huffed, and looked over his shoulder.

“What is it, Stark? For once in my life I’m trying to help, so I could do without your puerile distractions.”

Ouch. Tony knew he had to maintain his distance, what with the extra eyes on them, but would it kill him to be civil?

“Come up with anything yet?”

Loki shrugged.

“This and that. Possibilities, but no plans. If you came to demand answers, I’m afraid I can give you none. You may tell your Director as such, if he refuses to believe what I have to say.”

“That’s not why I came,” Tony swung the bag off of his shoulder. “I just came to return a couple things.” He drew the knives out, hearing Loki draw a sharp breath at the sight of them.

“Where did you get those?”

“Picked them up off the battlefield while they were carting you away,” Tony held them out, hilt first. Loki got up slowly. He stared from the blades, to Tony, and back again. “Figured you might want them back.”

At last he took them, his fingers wrapping around the hilts far more naturally than Tony’s had. He gazed at them, as if he couldn’t believe they were back in his hands. Then there was a shimmer of green, a twist of almost golden light, and the pair of them vanished. Loki lowered his hands, tilting his head as he looked at Tony. Something almost as warm as Natasha’s vodka flared in his chest at that look. It was his curious look, his ‘I’m slightly confused by your Midgardian behaviour’ look.

“Why?”

“Huh?”

“Why, Stark? Why return them?”

“Because they’re yours, idiot. I don’t know the first thing about how to use them, there’s no way I was gonna let SHIELD have them, and I’m pretty sure Natasha has more knives of her own than is really necessary.”

Loki took a step closer, and Tony suddenly didn’t care about the hidden cameras or the agents just outside the door. They hadn’t been in a room together since their conversation in Loki’s cell. They hadn’t been close since the night before the demoness attacked. Loki’s eyes were so bright, his lips were just slightly parted, and Tony’s hands ached to reach up right then and grab him by the hair and kiss him and fuck Fury and his cameras-

“Stark, you think too much,” Loki said softly. His hand made it halfway to Tony’s face, then abruptly changed course to brush his own hair behind his ear. Seemed like Tony wasn’t the only one with surveillance cameras on his mind. “You’re apt to give me a headache.”

Right. Loki could sense his thoughts, after a fashion.

“Sorry.”

Loki swallowed, not breaking eye contact. Tony couldn’t help watching the movement of his throat, and from there it was far too easy to start thinking about other things. Loki cleared his throat.

“If that is all you came for, you may leave,” he said, turning back to his desk. Tony didn’t miss the sudden tensing of his shoulders, and fought to keep a grin off his face. “I’m sure you have your own work to return to. I imagine our time is rather short.”

“Always is,” Tony said. Then, just as an experiment, cast his thoughts back to their last phone call, a memory which involved him biting a pillow, Loki biting his fist, and two rather messy orgasms. Loki froze, a hand gripping the back of the chair so tightly Tony heard the wood crack. He breathed out a laugh and shook his head without looking round.

“You do amuse me, Stark.”

“I’m quite entertaining, for a mortal,” he replied, and thought about a time when Loki had been on his knees, looking up at him with a wet, red mouth and Tony’s hand in his hair.

Loki sat down a little too hard in his chair, and picked up his pen.

“I’m sure I shall see you on the battlefield again,” he said, and was Tony imagining it or did he sound a little breathless? “Try not to get in my way too much.”

“I’ll do my best.”

Tony picked up his bag, and started to leave. Before he did, he sent one last, extravagantly explicit thought Loki’s way: the two them in his bed, Loki pinned under him with his head thrown back, eyes closed and gasping, his hands clutching at Tony’s back. He heard Loki drop his pen and before he could respond, Tony fled the room, calling over his shoulder;

“Call me!”

He was grinning like an idiot as he hurried past the SHIELD agents, and he didn’t give half a fuck what they thought about it.

---

Chapter Eighteen

Exactly two weeks after they’d shot her in the head the demoness was back. Her transmission took over in the middle of the afternoon, just as it had before, a scream and hiss of static covering every screen before her face appeared.

“I must congratulate you,” she snarled, the voids of her eyes seeming to swirl with rage. There was no sign of injury to either of them, no scars at all on her face. “That really stung. But I sincerely hope that wasn’t the best you can offer – as I told you this planet is under daemonic law and you will pay for your resistance.”

The broadcast ended, leaving every screen showing nothing but crimson static. Over the city the portal began to churn and roil, lightning crackling across its surface. The screaming began faintly, growing louder as the bloody gash in the sky writhed and rippled until the shrieking horde burst forth from its hideous depths, a heaving black mass so large that it blocked out the sun as it spread across the sky.

The Avengers were ready for them, and so was the rest of the city. Huge swarms of people had fled after the demoness’s first broadcast, and the military had rolled in to take their place. The city was far from empty, though, and the people still there had panicked at the new broadcast. Civilians ran in droves through the streets, screams of panic echoing up and down every block. Frantic drivers collided with one another, with buildings, with demons that dropped from the sky like murderous hail.

In the air and on the ground, the Avengers tried to beat back the never-ending tide, even as still more demons plunged to earth. Tony’s world had become a mess of screams and alarms, explosions and howls, and he knew – as they all did – that no matter how hard they tried, there was no way they were getting through this without casualties. All they could do was try and mitigate the damage.

“They’re still coming,” Natasha’s voice over comms was calm and measured, belying the horror of her words. “According to SHIELD, they passed the estimated number of Chitauri we faced about ten minutes ago, and there’s no sign of them stopping.”

Tony blasted a trio of demons out of the air and had enough time to watch them fall before having to swoop out of the way of another dozen converging on him.

“Just so long as you guys are keeping count. There will be prizes at the end,” he said. “Any sign of the scream queen yet?”

“Nothing so far,” Steve said, and the others had similar answers. “Stark, tell me you have something to take her down when we do find her.”

“I’ve got a couple maybe’s and one possibly.”

“Well, keep looking for her anyway. We’ll take her out somehow and finish this.”

“Killing her is only part of the solution,” Loki’s voice came over the comms, surprising Tony – and probably everyone else. “Even if she dies, the rift will remain open and she will simply return, angrier than before, and all this will be as a pleasant dream in comparison. You must close the portal and cut off her connection to the source of her power.”

Tony had to blast half a dozen demons to ash, and duck out of the way of one of the larger ones wielding two fistfuls of sparking red magic before he had a chance to reply. The big demon was following him, but it was slower and less manoeuvrable than the suit, so he figured he had a few seconds to discuss tactics before it became a problem.

“That’s wonderful news – you got any ideas on how to do it?”

“I…may have something...” Loki sounded reluctant. Tony rolled his eyes, looped under and behind the big demon and sent a repulsor blast through the back of its head.

“Come on then, share with the class,” he said.

But before Loki could continue there was a deafening crack of thunder and black clouds began spreading out from the rim of the portal, darkening the day even further. Huge forks of lightning split the sky and in response the demons raised a dissonant chorus of screeches, their fighting growing more frenzied. They squabbled with each other as much as they did with the city they were attacking, and still their numbers only seemed to grow.

Tony found himself the target of a sudden barrage of magic from a cluster of about thirty demons that descended on him. Claws raked down the side of his armour as he twisted out of the way, firing indiscriminately until the monsters were gone. He flung himself behind a building, breathing hard.

“Loki, whatever you have, let’s hear it and fast.”

“I was able to recall some of the demoness’s magic,” Loki said. Demonic screeching and a series of explosions came through over his comm line, along with a selection of curses in at least three different languages, none of which Tony recognised. “I am reasonably certain I could close the vortex.”

“Then do it already so we can all go for cocktails!” Clint shouted. Tony heard an explosion of glass and saw that half the windows on one side of a skyscraper had been smashed inwards and demons were swarming into the building. He looked away, hoping there was no-one left inside.

“I can’t,” Loki growled over the comms, frustration clear in his voice. “I know how but without all my own powers I cannot create enough energy to cast the spell that will seal the rift. There needs to be a burst of power of a larger magnitude than I can currently create. That will, essentially, slam the gate shut and after that I can seal it.”

“How much energy are we talking?” Tony couldn’t help but smirk a little. He let loose a barrage of rockets, each one locking onto a demon’s head. The gory fireworks drew more attention back to him but it was worth it.

“If I understand your armour correctly, the amount needed would drain it completely, Stark,” Loki said. “I think…perhaps…”

“Brother, I would be glad to aid you!” Thor boomed. “I will be with you in-” his words were cut off by a loud roar. “It may take me a few minutes,” he amended. Tony could see the lightning crackling several blocks away, and not for the first time was glad the thunder god was on their side.

“We don’t have time to wait,” he said, making a snap decision. “Loki, you’re with me. We’ll find the demoness and track her position, then find somewhere for you to do your mojo on the portal. If you’re right and that cuts her off, it won’t matter if my suit runs out of power.”

He shot through the air, scanning the ground, searching for a tell-tale flash of green.

“Thor, if you can get to us, then do it. If not, we’ll manage. Loki, what’s your positi- oh, okay, there you are. Cool.”

In a shimmer of light, Loki had blinked into existence on the street directly below him. Tony landed next to him, pausing on the way down to blast a handful of demons to dust, and send a volley of rockets into the teeming mass above them. There was no need to aim anymore – anything fired in the general direction of ‘up’ was guaranteed to hit. It was just a matter of hoping you hit big.

“Bridal of fireman?” Tony asked, grinning at Loki from behind the faceplate. He was ninety percent sure Loki could see through it if he wanted anyway. Loki scowled, and Tony saw that his eyes were glowing. Underpowered or not, he still looked intimidating. He shrugged. “Worth a shot.” Then before Loki could complain, he stepped behind him and wrapped his arms around Loki’s chest, gripping him tightly before blasting upwards.

“I can’t fight like this,” he warned. “So you’d better be ready to-”

Six bolts of vivid green lanced from Loki's hands and incinerated all twelve demons that had been flying towards them.

“I think I can take care of the defence, Stark.”

“Man, am I ever glad you're on our side this time,” Tony muttered. Then louder, “You tracked down the demoness yet?”

Loki was silent for a moment, thinking.

“Yes. Not accurately, but close enough. Though from what I recall of her she’ll likely be somewhere high – she enjoys watching over her troops as they slaughter the population.”

“That's good to know. Direct me, then Mr Magical GPS, my arms are getting tired.”

Tony didn't need to be able to see Loki's face to know he was rolling his eyes. He directed them anyway, and Tony soared across the city, cutting between buildings and trying not to look at the devastation the demons were causing. And despite the added encumbrance of carrying Loki, he was still able to outmanoeuvre most of the demons in the air, twisting and dodging through the endless ranks. He did his best to avoid the heavier areas of fighting, but where it was unavoidable Loki’s magic was quick to carve them a path. When all this was over, Tony thought, he had to find a way to get data on Loki’s magic – he needed to know how that stuff worked.

They passed over the Hulk, who at that moment was using the mangled remains of a bus to batter away wave after wave of demons as they descended on him. He looked up as they flew overhead, and bellowed.

“Keep up the good work, buddy!” Tony called down to him. The Hulk slammed the bus down on top of a group of larger demons who had tried a ground assault. The demons were flattened, and the bus finally smashed into pieces, leaving Hulk holding two twisted spikes of metal. He swept his fists through the air, now using the spikes to skewer demons as they descended, and then using the bodies of those to beat away the others. He seemed to have things pretty well in hand, so Tony kept going.

“Head north,” Loki said, and when Tony looked down he could see a glow of green magic on Loki’s hands where they were gripping his armoured wrists.

Tony adjusted his flight path, swooped around the side of a building and came face to face with a crawling wall of demons. He flung himself backwards but it was too late. The demons shrieked and peeled away from the side of the building they’d been clinging too, heading straight for them.

“Fuck!”

Tony shot upwards, hoping to crest the approaching tide and get over it before it enveloped them, but It was quickly apparent that he wasn’t going to make it.

“Loki, work your magic,” he said, trying to keep the panic from his voice. His eyes darted from side to side as he turned in the air, watching every escape route collapse. Demons surrounded them on every side, tails lashing, clawed hands reaching for them.

“Drop me,” Loki said.

“What?”

“Just do it, Stark, and try to catch me before I’m flattened.”

“Loki-”

“Do it now!”

Tony swallowed and let go. Loki fell from his arms, falling to meet the rising tide of demons. Arms free, Tony aimed up, one anxious eyes on the suits power levels as he shot blast after blast into the screaming cloud of monsters. He let himself fall as he fired, hoping he was headed in the same direction as Loki. From below him, he caught sight of an emerald glow, rapidly brightening and shooting towards him. He stared down into it, the suits visor dulling the glare so he could just about see into the centre of the light.

Loki, falling with his arms outstretched, light pouring off him in waves. Every demon it touched screamed and turned to ashes. The light poured over Tony and the suit groaned around him, his HUD glitching out crazily. He angled himself to fly face first into it, stretching his arms out towards the silhouetted form that was Loki. Dark ashes fluttered around him as the ground rushed up towards them.

“Come on,” he muttered, straining the boot jets. Seventy feet. Thirty. Ten.

He could see Loki clearly now, and could see the ground below him, could tell the make and model of the half-destroyed cars he was falling towards. Tony stretched out his hands,

“Loki!”

The trickster looked up, eyes bright with magic and grinning manically as his hair whipped around his face. He reached up and the second his hand was in Tony’s gauntlet, Tony yanked him upwards and wrenched his body around to shoot back into the sky. The boot jets scorched the concrete, leaving two rough black marks beneath them as they soared away.

The cloud of demons was gone. The monsters were dead or had scattered, fleeing from the blaze of magic. Tony had an open sky to arc up into. He let out a breath, that became a shaky laugh.

“You’re a reckless idiot,” he said. He hauled Loki up into his arms, wrapping them around his chest again. He couldn’t feel it through the armour, but he saw Loki squeeze his forearms.

“I could say the same of you,” Loki said. His tone was cocky, but Tony could hear the roughness of his breathing, and he didn’t think it was entirely from exertion. They flew on in silence for a minute or so, until Loki called for him to stop.

“Here,” he said. “At the top of this building, most likely. Can you see the roof without taking us up there?”

“Gimme a minute.” Tony focused on the top of the building, waiting for the helmet camera to focus as it zoomed in. A bright spot lit up, the outline one he’d gotten very familiar with in the past couple weeks. “Oh yeah, it’s her. Cap?” he queried over the comms.

“Little busy, but go ahead,” said Steve, sounding strained.

“I have the demoness’s location. She's on top of an office block, pretty much directly below the centre of the portal. Can you see me from where you are?”

A pause, then,

“How could I miss you? Has anyone ever told you that armour's a little ostentatious?”

“I take it as a compliment every time. This building, right here.” He pointed a leg and flared a boot jet in a way he hoped was helpful. “You got it?”

Steve confirmed that he had.

“Mark it, and let the others know. Loki and I are going to head up to the portal and try to close it. As soon as it's shut, we gotta take her down before she can try to re-open it.”

“While the portal is closed, she should be cut off from the source of her powers,” Loki added. “She will be as close to mortal as she can get.”

“Copy that,” Steve said, “Everyone else got it?”

Once everyone else had come back affirmative over the comms, Tony nodded to himself

“Good,” he said. “Wish me luck everybody.”

He jetted away from the demoness’s building with Loki, and once he judged they were a good distance away from her, angled upwards towards the rift.

“Stark, find a place to set me down,” Loki shouted up to him. This close the roar of the portal and the shrieking of the demons was almost loud enough to drown out the sounds of death and destruction coming from below them. Almost. “I cannot do this while you restrain me.”

“There's nowhere to put you down, this thing is in the middle of the sky!” Tony shot back.

“If you don't find a place to put me down and I do this hanging from you like some ragdoll, the whole spell could backfire and level this entire city.”

Tony fought the urge to drop the asshole again, and instead aimed for the top of the tallest building he could see. He set Loki down, then thumped onto the roof beside him. If he looked to his left, he could easily find the demoness where she stood, her building being higher than theirs. She was stalking back and forth across the roof, wings raised, tail lashing.

“We're completely exposed up here,” he said, looking back to Loki. “If she turns around, or one of her minions sees us and decides that we’re more interesting than the people on the ground…”

“I am aware of the risk, Stark,” Loki snapped. He’d stripped off his armour and was removing his long, leather jacket, giving himself more freedom of movement. He rolled his shoulders and shook his hands, sparks of magic dripping from his fingertips. He pushed his hair away from his face and looked up to the portal, eyes beginning to glow.

“Thor, if you can get to us, we need you now,” Tony called over the comms. “Tell me you're not in the middle of anything.”

There was silence for far too long, and then;

“Stark, I... ah.... I’m afraid I will not be joining you.” Through his earpiece Tony could hear the creak of straining metal and the smash of breaking glass.

“Thor, what's going on?”

“Several of the demons flung themselves into an already damaged building,” Thor spoke quickly, his breathing heavy. “I am currently the only thing between it and the several hundred people trying to get out from underneath it.”

Tony swallowed.

“Okay, Thor. We'll handle this one on our own. Is anyone on their way to you?”

“I am,” Natasha and Steve said in unison.

“Good. Next time we talk, there'll be no more portal. Iron Man out.”

Just him and Loki then. Alright. Tony switched off the comm, wanting no chance of distraction.

“JARVIS, systems report.”

“You are currently operating at ninety-one percent power, sir. Minimal surface damage, eighty percent of total munitions remaining.”

Better than he’d expected.

“Estimated power drain for blasting that portal?”

“That is too nebulous a question for estimates, sir.”

Tony swallowed.

“Right. So. A lot then.”

“Stark.”

Loki's voice drew his attention. He sounded almost as strained as Thor had, and when Tony looked at him his eyes went wide. Loki was glowing with power, even more so than he had when he'd been all powered up from saving Tony's life. His eyes were nothing but pure emerald light, and strange symbols danced in white afterimages all over his body. Tony had never seen him look more unsettling – or so breath-taking.

“Let's do this.” Tony said. He raised his palms and aimed at the heart of the portal. “JARVIS, no safeties. I want everything. Let her rip.”

“Inadvisable, sir, but done.”

“Thanks, buddy.”

Tony locked the suit in position against the recoil that was surely to come, and glanced at Loki. He nodded, leaving a trail of swirling green drifting through the air.

“Firing in three...two...one...now!”

He let loose and if he hadn't been locked in, he would have gone straight down through every floor of the building below them. The energy blast shot up into the portal, where it seemed to disappear into the blackness. The demons still pouring through it howled as they were incinerated, and those hovering nearby scattered in all directions. The beam did nothing to the portal, just fell away into its endless depths, and Tony could do nothing but keep it up, watching as the power level in his suit ticked down and down and down.

From the corner of his eye he saw Loki step up beside him. He lifted his hands, palms aimed up at the portal, fingers splayed. He took a breath, then – and Tony had no other way to describe it – he unleashed hell.

Emerald green magic, sparking and forking like lightning, burst from Loki’s hands. It twined itself around Tony’s energy blast like a vine, racing up at breakneck speed towards the portal. As it went, the beam turned from blue-white light to burning, blazing green. As it raced higher it stretched the energy beam out, still crackling with lightning, pulling it out to fill the entire portal with light. Red lightning sizzled at its expanding edges, burned away by the force of Loki’s magic.

Their light filled the rift and for a moment there was silence.

The pause was shattered by ear-splitting explosion and a wave of concussive force rocketed down from the portal. Loki went crashing to the ground, and Tony frantically released the lock on the suit so it didn’t bend him in half backwards and break his spine. He skidded across the roof, head spinning, alarms blaring in his ears and the HUD completely scrambled. He skidded to a halt, groaning.

For a long moment Tony just lay there, blinking up at dust and green light and white afterimages of abstract shapes. His ears were ringing and it took a while before he could hear Loki coughing next to him. With a grunt of effort, he pushed himself up.

“You are currently at 5% power, sir,” JARVIS spoke calmly into his ear. “I would not recommend a repeat attempt.”

“You're not gonna get one,” Tony muttered. He pushed up the dust-covered faceplate and looked over to where Loki was on his hands and knees. He wasn't just coughing but retching into the dust. His hands sparked like bad wiring, and his skin seemed to be sort of...flickering.

“You okay?” Tony managed. Loki looked up, wiping the back of his hand across his mouth. Tony pretended very hard that he didn't see the dark smear of blood that came away on it.

“I will be fine. I just need to...rest...” Loki managed half a smile. Then he looked to the sky, and the smile widened. “Stark. Look.”

“What?” Tony followed his gaze and found a smile of his own forming. The sky was clear, not a cloud or a bird or a vortex to hell in sight. They’d done it. They’d closed the portal.

“Not bad for a pair of reckless idiots,” Loki said.

Tony gave a croaky laugh, shaking his head. He started to say something, when there was a thump behind them. His heart froze as he turned as fast as the drained suit would let him.

“Well, well, well, my little trickster,” said the demoness. “It seems I underestimated you. Rest assured, that will not happen again.”

And she raised her clawed hands and began to stalk towards Loki.

---

Chapter Nineteen

Tony raised his palm and managed a weak blast that the demoness batted away with the back of one clawed hand, not even glancing his way.

“If you value what remains of your life, little human, you’ll stay out of this,” she growled.

Loki was getting to his feet, hands and bare arms sparking with magic, his eyes glowing and fading, glowing and fading.

“It’s over,” he said, “Try and at least take your loss with some dignity.” He bared his teeth in a bloody grin that wasn’t far from a grimace. His fingers flexed and with a shimmer his daggers were gleaming in the newly restored sunlight. He cocked an eyebrow.

“Well?”

The demoness let out an inarticulate roar and launched herself at the trickster. Loki span to the side, trailing magic like an afterimage, then darted in behind her, blades flashing. Neither one connected. The demoness twisted too fast, and her tail lashed out as she turned, slicing Loki across the arm. Magic sizzled around the gash, already trying to stem the flow of blood. Loki ignored it and dove back at the demoness. She bared her fangs and roared again. Claws swept through the air, a blur knocking first one, then the other dagger from Loki’s hands. They clattered for a moment on the ground before vanishing but she gave him no chance to summon them again.

As her onslaught continued, Tony wrestled with the suit, frantically re-assigning priorities until he could at least move again. His weaponry was useless now, and he only had the barest minimum of power to the boot jets. He figured he could get maybe thirty minutes of movement out of the armour before it died around him and left him trapped in a tin can. Luckily, he was no stranger to punching his way out of things.

He heaved himself to his feet and ran towards the battling duo. Loki had caught one of the demoness’s hands on its way to slice off his face, and was struggling to hold it at bay. She had brought the other hand up, ready to gut him, when Tony slammed into her from the side. She was shoved away from Loki with a howl of frustration and before she could regain her balance, Tony punched his armoured fist into her temple and she staggered backwards. She was only a few feet from the edge of the roof now, hissing and lashing her tail as she fought to steady herself.

Loki didn’t miss the opportunity. He hit her with a blast of magic – not large, but enough.

The demoness toppled backwards. Her bellow of rage echoed up as she plummeted towards the ground. The two of them shared a glance, then leapt after her. Tony grabbed Loki as they fell, and managed to swing him onto his back – Loki’s arms locked around his neck, his knees around Tony’s chest. Warnings flashed at the edges of Tony’s vision as the HUD tried desperately to tell him not to do what he was currently doing.

Below them, the demoness howled and fought the air, beating her wings in a frantic struggle to right herself. She managed it less than halfway to the ground and came screaming up towards them, claws outstretched and the promise of a violent death burning in her eyes. Forcing the suit to co-operate, Tony banked right and narrowly avoided a head on collision with claws and teeth. He vaguely heard Loki mutter something, and then a volley of green arrows of light shot off after the demoness.

“Get us on the ground, Stark!” he was shouting in Tony’s ear, through the wind and the metal, “We’re too vulnerable up here!”

“Tell me about it!”

Tony aimed himself down, blocking out the unearthly screams of the demoness not far behind him. He slammed into the concrete, knees protesting at the shock that ran through them. Loki immediately dropped off his back, daggers reappearing in his hands. He stood back to back with Tony as Tony straightened up and switched his comms back on.

“Avengers, converge on my position,” he barked out, “ASAP. We have the demoness on the ground. Come and get it while it’s hot.”

As he spoke the demoness crashed down in front of him. Tony had thought he’d left a dent with his landing, but she almost had to crawl out of the crater she formed. Her teeth were bared as she stalked towards them, tail snapping from side to side. Her wings were held up, the wickedly hooked tips hanging over her horns, and Tony could see ragged holes in the coal black membrane, sizzling with green light. Loki’s arrows had hit their mark.

“Oh, yes,” she hissed, “Bring your friends. You can watch while I tear them apart!”

She gave another roar, one that shattered the windows up and down the entire street. Tony flinched, but held his ground. Loki had his back, the rest of the Avengers were on their way, and SHIELD would be sending everything they could spare. But until they made it through the rest of the demonic army it was just him and the trickster god. Not a duo he would have put money on, a year ago. Yet now, with Loki moving to stand beside him, glowing with magic…he’d lay down a sizeable chunk of stocks on it.

Not all of it though. Demoness or not, he wasn’t about to piss off Pepper.

So, for the moment, they were on their own. The man of iron in a dying suit, and the trickster god on community service, sparking like a live wire. Tony curled his hands into fists and raised them to meet the oncoming monster.

The demoness had been holding back before, he soon realised. If she hadn’t been trying to kill them, he would’ve been impressed. She hurled wrecked cars at Loki, tore up chunks of the road to send flying at Tony’s head, all the while never letting up an endless litany of screamed curses in languages that made Tony’s ears ache and his brain vibrate. Again, and again she flung herself at them, her body a living weapon as she tore and ripped and sliced their defences down.

And her magic…Tony had almost forgotten about it from their first meeting, when she’d murdered that cop, but he sure as hell remembered it now. It was like living shadow, thick and dark and just as malicious as its wielder. Loki threw up shields of his own magic as best he could, blocking her attacks while Tony used the rapidly draining energy that remained in the suit to throw punches at her. She only laughed and flexed her hands, sprouting a tendril of darkness from the cracked ground beneath Tony’s feet, where it wrapped around his leg before he could so much as shout, and started to pull him over.

Loki dropped the shield and slammed a blast of emerald down on it, golden light searing it to ashes.

“Keep it up, trickster,” the demoness taunted, shaking dark magic from her claws. “I must confess, I haven’t had this much fun in centuries.”

Tony hadn’t had any reply over the comms yet, and there was no sign of any kind of backup. The only small miracle was that they also hadn’t come across any civilians during their fight with her. By this point, somehow, they’d battled and run their way close to the Avengers tower. Tony could see the huge letters on the side still lit, the building standing undamaged in all of this. That settled it for him. She was going no further. His building was not getting wrecked, not again. Either she died here, or they did.

That and the suit was protesting very loudly that if he tried to run much further it would lock him in place like a street mime mid-step. He had to get out of the armour in the next few minutes, or he’d be in trouble. But he couldn’t abandon Loki. He wouldn’t do that.

The trouble was, the demoness never tired. Even after fighting her this hard and this long she kept coming screaming back. The holes Loki had blasted in her wings had stitched themselves back together, the crunch of bone Tony had heard whenever he’d managed to land a hit did nothing to slow her down. She was covered in blood and stone dust and the glittering of glass shards, but she smiled as if she’d only just arrived on the battlefield.

Then, because of course, a wave of her hellspawn came screeching out of the sky. Loki barely had the chance to shout before they were on him. Tony watched in horror as Loki vanished under a pile of lashing tails, rending claws, and swirling magic.

He was on his own.

The demoness glanced at the pile of screeching minions, then turned a fanged smirk to Tony.

“You mortals. Always so foolish. You didn’t really think you could win, did you?”

Tony threw a car door at her. She let it bounce off, an imprint of the side of her head next to the handle. Blood sheeted down her cheek but even as he watched the blood slowed, stopped. She twitched a claw and the wet redness began to steam, evaporating away to clear her vision. She blinked once, and smiled.

Tony managed to duck when she leapt at him, her claws dragging over the top of his helmet with a skreetch! He turned, keeping her in front of him. She landed easily, bounding up like a gymnast and shaking metal shavings from her claws.

“Just how long do you think you can keep this up?” she said, at least having the courtesy to wait until he was looking directly at her before hurling the entire car whose door he’d thrown at him. He ducked again, wincing as he heard it smash into a building. “I’ve fought in battles that lasted months at a time,” the demoness continued. “You can’t outlast me.”

“Your portal’s closed,” Tony said. “It’s over. You’re done. Why not just surrender now and avoid all this senseless and expensive property damage – which, by the way, I’ll probably end up footing the bill for.”

She chuckled.

“I can see why the trickster likes you. You are very amusing.” She cocked her head to the side. “But not enough to let you live.”

He couldn’t get out of the way this time. The suit had nothing left. The demoness slammed into him with her shoulder and he went down hard. Alarms howled at him, the suit flashing one percent power remaining across his field of vision. He couldn’t even move his arms to push himself back up, but maybe if he locked himself in he could get off a close range repulsor blast directly to her face-

The demoness put her hoof on his chest.

Thor had never followed up on any of his threats to put Mjolnir on Tony and leave it there when he was being irritating, but Tony imagined now that it would have felt something like this. All the air left his lungs in a rush and he felt the suit compressing inwards under her impossible strength. Metal creaked, the warnings gave up trying, and still the pressure increased.

“Someone really likes leg day,” he croaked out. She bared her teeth in that awful smile.

As her claws reached towards his face, Tony’s mind raced, looking for something, anything that would get him out of this. Comms gave him nothing but static now. Loki was buried under a pile of demons and the suit was one finger twitch away from shutting down and locking him inside it. C’mon, Stark, think, he told himself. Her claws drew closer. Behind her head he could just see the A of the Avengers tower. All that work going to waste because of one cloven-hoofed asshole.

She ripped away the faceplate, tossing it up into the air, where one of her demons swooped down and snatched it, gibbering manically.

“Truce?” Tony tried. The demoness lifted her hoof and he gasped for air, though the dented armour still pressed in on his ribs. He was pretty sure at least one of them was broken. Possibly three. Come on! There’s gotta be something! In your stupid brain, in the suit, in the tower….

“I shall enjoy tearing your world into pieces,” said the demoness. She reached down with both hands this time and dug her claws into the chest panel. With a squeal of metal and protesting mechanisms, the front of the suit was torn away, and she tossed it aside. Tony sucked in a grateful gasp of air as the pressure was lifted from his ribs. His relief was short lived, as the demoness stared at the glow of the arc reactor in his chest, head cocked to one side. She gave a disturbingly human shrug and slid the tips of her claws around it, ready to rip it free.

There was a sudden blast of green light from behind her. With a growl she snapped her head around, and despite everything Tony couldn’t help but grin at the sight of Loki standing behind her, dripping in demon blood. He looked terrible, of course – claw marks sliced across his face, two of them distressingly close to his eyes, blood running from his mouth, his nose, his head. His arms were scratched to something approaching the appearance of raw meat, and his clothes, also torn up badly, were more blood and gore than fabric.

“You didn’t forget about me, did you?” he said sweetly, affecting a pout with eyes wide and eyebrows raised. The demoness snarled and flung herself away from Tony towards the trickster. He shimmered as she swiped at him, passing right through the illusion. Another Loki appeared behind her, laughing.

“Oh, don’t tell me you really fell for that one? I told you about all my tricks, didn’t I?”

“You try my patience, trickster,” she snapped, “I’ll have your tongue for a necklace when this is done.”

The demoness bent, dug her hands somehow into the road and pulled up a chunk of it roughly the size of a minivan, and hurled it at Loki. Laughter echoed down the street and he shimmered out of existence again. The rubble crashed and skidded down the now empty road, smashing into an abandoned bus. The demoness’s hands curled into fists, her own claws digging into her palms and drawing blood.

“I can smell your magic, godling,” she said in a low voice, thick with menace. Her eyes closed and a smile turned the corner of her mouth. “It is not so sweet as mine!” Her hand shot out and there was Loki, throat caught in her grip. No smile now, no laughter; now he was choking and grabbing at her hand as she lifted him off the ground, his feet kicking wildly. The dark shadows of her magic began to gather around her claws.

“Try and get away,” she purred, lifting him higher, “And you’ll leave your clever little head behind.” Loki’s mouth moved silently, eyes glowing, green light sputtering and sparking at his hands. The demoness ignored this, running her other hand up Loki’s stomach, claws dancing over his torn shirt. She glanced down at Tony.

“Shall I gut you like a fish in sight of one of your mortal pets?” she mused, “What a wonderful sight to behold – a god laid low like nothing more than a hanging pig.” She dug one claw into Loki’s stomach, pressing deep so that dark blood began to flow. Loki didn’t make a sound, pressing his lips into a thin, pale line. The demoness brought her head close to his.

“Any last words from that silver tongue of yours, trickster? I-”

Squeak!

She snapped her head round at the sudden, unexpected noise. Her eyes darted down, drawn to the silver gleam of metal at her feet.

“What in the-?”

“Surprise, bitch,” Tony croaked out, and issued the command. The Lab Rat raised the nozzle in its head and blasted a high-pressure stream of silly string directly into her face. The demoness bellowed and brought a hoof down on top of the small robot, obliterating it. She tore the sticky strands from her face, her features twisted in disgusted rage.

“A nice effort, human, but I think-gah!”

Tony’s few seconds of distraction had been enough. Loki had raised his glowing hands and summoned back his daggers then in one swift movement, sliced through her wrist. He dropped, wincing as he landed, and tearing her severed hand from his throat. The shadows that had gathered around it vanished like so much mist and he tossed the rapidly decaying lump of flesh to the side.

The demoness hunched before him, clutching the bloody stump of her wrist. Blood so dark it was almost black dripped sluggishly from the wound. Shadowy tendrils of magic were already starting to ripple around it, beginning to knit into the shape of a new hand.

“You’ll pay for that,” she hissed.

“No, I don’t believe I will,” Loki said. She slashed her remaining hand at him and he ducked under it, stepped forwards, daggers vanishing to be replaced by a bright glow of magic. His hands flew up and threw a glowing loop of emerald light around her neck. She glared at him, but before she could say anything more Loki pulled the thread tight and severed her head from her neck. For a moment it remained in place, then with an awful, sticky sound it toppled to the ground.

Tony gaped at it as it rolled, somehow moving under its own power, the mouth still working around deafening screams, black eyes rolling manically. Loki stopped the head under one bloody boot, and with his other hand grabbed the shoulder of the demoness’s body. The green still swirling around his hands changed to flames that quickly engulfed the headless body. It jerked and flailed, dropping to its knees. Shadowy magic tried to repair the damage but it wasn’t fast enough to counter Loki’s emerald flames. The head beneath his boot shrieked, spitting rage in languages no human had ever heard nor would again.

“I will find you, trickster! I will claw my way back across the void and end you! You and this wretched planet will feed my empire! I will-”

“Oh, do shut up,” Loki said, a look of extreme distaste on his face. He kicked the head up into his hands and hurled it skyward where it tumbled over and over, hair trailing, dripping blood. At the apex of its upward arc he flung the green fire that still wreathed his hands up towards it. The flames caught the head, incinerating it in a burst of fire and the demoness’s body finally collapsed, crumbling to foul-smelling ashes as Loki’s flames began to fade.

Only when she was gone did he drop to his knees. All trace of magic faded from him in an instant, leaving him nothing but a bloodied figure in torn clothes, kneeling on a broken street and gasping for breath. Tony hit the release on the suit, and with a whine it released his arms and legs. All light and power faded from it as he scrambled free. He staggered to his feet, legs trembling, every part of him aching. He winced as he took a step towards Loki, certain now that, yep, at least three of his ribs were broken. He rubbed the back of his head and glanced down at the remains of the armour.

“Well, that’s as good an excuse as any to build a new one, I guess,” he said. He turned back to Loki, only to find the trickster’s face about six inches from his own.

“Jeez! Give a guy some warning, would you? I nearly had a heart atta-”

Loki cut him off by grabbing his shoulders and crashing their mouths together. Tony made a muffled sound of surprised, then closed his eyes and leaned into the clumsy, desperate kiss. One of his hands went to the back of Loki’s head, clutching his tangled hair, even as Loki’s own arms slid around him to hold him in a crushing embrace. His ribs screamed at him and he told them to go fuck themselves, drinking in the taste of Loki on his lips.

Loki pulled away, just barely, to whisper,

“If she had killed you I would have burned her empire to ashes.”

Tony had about half a second to think about how hot he definitely shouldn’t have found that before Loki was kissing him again, so hard it was like he was trying to devour him. One of Loki’s hands splayed out over Tony’s cheek, mapping his brow, his nose, his cheekbones with his fingertips, then trailing them spiderlike down his neck. Tony gasped into Loki’s mouth, gripping his hair tighter, biting at his lip and not caring about the blood he could taste there. Loki’s nails scraped lightly back up towards his ear and Tony was pretty sure his entire spine liquefied in that moment.

He could and would have gone on like that all afternoon, injuries be damned, but they were interrupted by arrival of the rest of the Avengers. His eyes opened at the signature crash-thud-roar arrival of the Hulk, only a few feet away. Loki’s eyes opened at the rumble of a motorbike announcing Natasha and Steve, and the crash of thunder that brought Thor and – surprisingly – an uncomfortably carried Clint. There was a moment of silence where Tony tried to believe that if he didn’t look at his teammates, they would cease to exist.

Then he heard Thor and Natasha say in somewhat haunting unison,

“Barton, you owe me fifty dollars.”

---

Chapter Twenty

Tony pulled away, trying his best to look cool, calm and composed. The attempt was a complete failure, of course, but that didn’t stop him from trying. Loki let his hands drop from Tony’s neck and stepped back, his poker face far better than Tony’s under the stares of the various Avengers now gathered around them. Natasha and Thor were busy high-fiving, both with smug looks on their faces, while Clint buried his face in his hands and muttered something unintelligible but clearly despair-filled to himself.

Steve sat back on his hands on the bike, the corner of his mouth twitched up in amusement and one eyebrow slightly cocked in way that distinctly said ‘really, Tony?’. Hulk grinned a big, toothy grin made somewhat disconcerting by the traces of blood in his mouth.

“Puny god kill angry horn-lady?” he rumbled. Loki’s mouth twitched in something that was almost a smile.

“Indeed I did. She won’t be troubling us any longer.”

And then Steve surprised them all by stepping off the bike and holding out a hand to Loki.

“I never thought I’d be saying this, but thank you, Loki,” he said. “Looks like you saved our asses today.”

Loki stared down at the offered hand, blinked a couple times, then shook it. Steve grinned and slapped his shoulder.

“If anything makes you officially an Avenger, I’d say this’d be it.”

Loki’s eyes went wide and Steve laughed, dropping the handshake. Out in the city there were still alarms blaring, people shouting, the sound of expensive to repair things breaking. Tony clapped his hands together.

“Party’s over, kids, time to clean our room.”

But before any of them could start complaining, there was a gasp from Loki. Tony’s eyes shot to him, worry darting through him, a thousand terrible scenarios flashing through his mind. Loki was glowing. Green light surrounded him, the way it had before when he’d had his powers restored, only this time it was far stronger. Almost too bright to look at, pouring from Loki’s skin, golden beads of it dripping from his eyes and open lips. Tony squinted into the glare, and for a moment he could have sworn he heard singing.

“What the hell…?” he heard Natasha murmur behind him, accompanied by the Hulk rumbling in confusion. Then, just as suddenly as it had appeared, the light was gone. Tony blinked, spots of white dancing in front of his eyes. He rubbed frantically at them, trying to clear his vision.

Loki stood tall, and it was as if the battle had never happened. All trace of blood was gone. Every gash and bruise and scrape had vanished, and he was clad in full armour again, gold gleaming, silver shining, leathers bright. He stared down at his hands, at the tendrils of magic still swirling around his fingers like living light. He was overflowing with magic now, Tony could feel it, was sure they could all feel the power radiating from him. When he lifted his eyes to Tony’s they were glowing brighter than they had when he’d sealed the portal.

A slow smile spread across his face.

“I am…whole again,” he said. Tony started towards him, grin already forming, but he’d taken only half a step when Loki vanished in a ripple of green-gold light. Tony froze, staring at the place where he’d been, waiting for him to re-appear.

He didn’t.

Oh, thought Tony. Well. Okay.

“We’d better get started fixing this city – don’t want to be accused of slacking off,” he said brightly, turning back to the others. They glanced at each other, and even Hulk’s face had an awkwardly apologetic look on it. Thor clapped a hand on Tony’s shoulder, ignoring the wince it elicited.

“Do not worry, my friend,” he said. “He has accomplished all father intended him to, that is all. This is a good thing!”

Tony made an indistinct noise of mostly agreement, not bringing up the fact that Thor hadn’t said anything about where Loki might have gone. There wasn’t the time to dwell on it though – a SHIELD armoured car had pulled up and Fury was spilling out of it along with a cadre of operatives, and thus began the whirlwind of post-alien-invasion clean-up. Without the suit he wasn’t much use, but he threw himself into the work anyway. He didn’t want to think about Loki. He didn’t want to think about the death toll that he’d eventually have to find out and obsess over. He didn’t want to think.

But as battered and useless as he was, it wasn’t long before a combination of Steve, Nick and Natasha had ordered, convinced and bullied him into going back to headquarters to rest. He gave up trying to argue with them – he was too tired to keep it up for more than a few showy quips anyway – and let himself be herded into the back of a SHIELD van along with a handful of other agents. He sat a few seats away from them, where they cradled broken limbs and nursed bloody faces, and stared out the window without seeing as they rattled the short distance back to the Avengers tower.

There was a very nice medical team waiting when they arrived, ready to herd them all up into the med bay, but Tony gave them the slip and took the elevator up to his penthouse. He wasn’t in the mood to sit there and be poked and prodded and stitched back together while people worried over him and spewed thanks for all the people that were still alive thanks to the Avengers.

Thanks to Loki, he thought as the elevator doors slid open. Not, of course, that anyone would be admitting that any time soon. Steve and the others might be ready to accept him onto the team but Tony doubted the rest of the world was quite ready to embrace him as one of its saviours just yet. He limped his way into the bathroom and with much cursing and struggling managed to extricate himself from the bodysuit. Like the armour it was mostly wrecked, and not the kind of thing that lent itself well to patching up. It didn’t matter. He had plenty of others.

He stifled a cry as hot water stung against his back, finding every cut and bruise and graze. Blood streaked the water with pale red, swirling round his aching feet. He’d go to medical tomorrow. He’d slept with worse than broken ribs before now, and maybe tomorrow he wouldn’t be so damn distracted thinking about…about…

I am whole again, Loki had said. Tony snorted to himself. More like I am an asshole again.

He cut off the water with a snap and stood for a moment, watching swirls of steamy vapour rising from his skin. Then he stepped out, dried and slid straight into bed. He’d had a vague plan of pouring himself a drink or several to send himself off, but the second his back touched the mattress he was out. He was berated the next morning by his own body and by the medical team for sleeping on his injuries, although by then he was refreshed enough to deflect with his usual dry wit, and no-one seemed that bothered. Tony Stark being a brat wasn’t the biggest issue on anyone’s plate right now.

Once he was all patched up and dosed to the eyeballs on pain medication, he spent the rest of the day wandering up and down the tower, not entirely surprised that the none of the others were around. Steve and Hulk would probably be helping with clean up still; Thor was either with them, with Loki – wherever the hell he’d vanished to – or sleeping off the fight in Asgard were Fury couldn’t bother him. With Natasha and Clint it was a toss-up depending on how charitable they were feeling. They might be helping. They might be in an obscure bar in South America with fake ID’s and an infinite tab.

Or they were all avoiding him and the potential awkward conversation hanging in the air. His ego liked that option but his emotional wellbeing was already on the fainting couch clutching at its chest. The broken ribs that prevented him from venting his frustrations in any meaningful way didn’t exactly help either.

After a week he finally decided that mooning around sulking was for losers, and that broken ribs couldn’t stop him working on a replacement for the suit he’d trashed. Once he was healed he’d only be dragged into working on projects for SHIELD or something equally boring, but while he was injured no-one could yell at him for spending time and resources on his own projects.

As soon as he was back in the workshop, pulling together blueprints new and old, digging up scribbled notes of half-formed ideas and starting to stitch them together, he felt much better. He barely even realised he’d missed his afternoon dose of painkillers until he floated back down to reality with his body screaming at him. Still, it was good to get back into something productive. Something that absolutely kept his mind occupied and most definitely didn’t result in him staring into space for long minutes at a time, stylus half raised, thinking about how Loki had felt pressed up against him, humming with magic, his desperate breath in Tony’s mouth.

If she had killed you I would have burned her empire to ashes.

It hadn’t sounded like a lie. Not in that moment. Not with Loki clutching at him like that, kissing him like that. Of course, that had been before he’d gotten his mojo back.

Tony clenched his fist and threw aside the current blueprint, chewing his lip as the hologram restructured into a blank grid. He wasn’t thinking big enough. That was the problem. This was a new suit – time for a new start, for new tech. Something really interesting that’d get people talking again. The stylus hovered, darted through the light, pulling shapes together. His frown slowly morphed into a smile. That was more like it.

Three days later he realised all he’d eaten was coffee and the occasional pill, that his ribs were throbbing and his back was aching. He blinked and stretched, wincing as he did so, then rubbed at his eyes. They felt like they hadn’t closed in hours. Maybe they hadn’t. But now he had a working blueprint and had started on a preliminary build so everything else was secondary. Sure, some of the details were up in the air but half the fun of making something new was finding the problems when they slammed you into the ceiling and told they needed recalibrating.

He yawned, scratched at the stubble on his jaw, and started looking to see if he had any pain meds still kicking around the workshop anywhere. He found a bottle with two rattling in the bottom, tipped them into his hand and realised they were ball bearings. He tossed them at the desk with a grimace and flopped into a chair.

“JARVIS? Order me something – I don’t care what, just a lot of calories. Like, an obscene amount. Just the fattiest, sugariest thing that won’t directly kill me.”

“On its way, sir. Might I make a recommendation?”

“You might.”

“A shower may be in order, as well as some fresh air. You have been in this sealed environment for several days, now. Additionally, painkillers would be medically advisable for your injuries.”

“Believe me, I’m aware. Once I can find some damn pills I’ll take them – let me know if you pick any up on internal cameras, yeah?”

“Of course, sir.”

Was the AI sassing him? He thought the AI was sassing him, but that was what he got, he supposed, for talking to the thing so much. Imitation and flattery and all that.

Still, he made the effort and took the shower, wincing the whole time and striving not to look at all the pretty colours his bruises were turning. He went right back to the workshop afterwards, found that someone had delivered his food in the interim, and inhaled the lot faster than should have been possible. He was going to take a nap after that, he swore he was, but another connection made itself and then he had to pull that last diagnostic back up, and oh of course that was the problem! He got up to go find a screwdriver, and was bent under a desk when someone spoke to him.

“And here I thought I was the one prone to melodrama.”

He dropped the screwdriver he’d just picked up and smacked his head against the desk with a clang. He scrambled out from under it, rubbing the back of his head and swearing and looking up and-

And there was Loki. No armour, no glow of magic, just stood there with his arms folded, one eyebrow raised and the beginnings of a smirk on his lips. Tony just stared at him. All the things he’d wanted to say rose up in a rush, collided with each other and blue-screened his speech centres. Loki let out a sigh and rolled his eyes, walking towards him slowly as if worried he was going to startle the human.

“No, I didn’t leave you, you idiot, and no, I wasn’t running off to wreak havoc on some unsuspecting planet.” He cocked his head, “Also no, I did not go ‘super Saiyan’.”

“You vanished,” Tony managed, wondering frantically what else Loki had scooped out of his thoughts. He swallowed, still struggling to find the right words. System rebooting, please ignore Loki’s exposed collarbones and tight pants. He shook his head. “You kissed me like…like…like that, then you went supernova and you vanished. What was I supposed to think?”

“I had to return to Asgard,” Loki held out his hands. “To see my father. It was a part of the deal that Thor made with him.”

“I thought you hated him.”

“I do. But only in equal part to how much I…” Loki made a face. “He…is still my father. Let us leave it at that.”

Tony didn’t back away as the trickster closed in, reaching a hand up to his face. Loki didn’t touch him, not quite, and the air between his palm and Tony’s cheek seemed to hum with electricity. Tony felt his breath starting to quicken, and tried to remember that he was meant to be mad at Loki right now. Runaway boyfriend. Abandonment issues. Stay focused, Stark. He gently pushed Loki’s hand down.

“You could’ve said something first. ‘Hey Tony, I gotta go check in with the divine probation officer, back in a few’. You could’ve texted me – I gave you a phone!”

Loki’s eyes slid to the side.

“The distance would be too great for the device to function. And when I say I had to return, I mean I had to return.”

“Oh,” said Tony. He shifted his weight. “Well, what did daddy dearest say? Are you off the naughty list?”

Loki chuckled.

“I am forgiven, so much as I can be. My powers are my own – I may do as I wish once more.”

And his eyes might not have been glowing with magic this time but still they held Tony’s captive. He was almost falling into that gaze, and this time it was his hand that reached out to Loki’s face. Loki didn’t stop him, pressing his cheek into Tony’s palm, biting his lower lip just enough to send a flush of warmth through Tony.

“And…and what do you wish to do now? Any urge to conquer and destroy rising again? Feel like heading up another invasion?”

Loki shook his head, and slid his fingers up Tony’s neck, into his hair. His other arm snaked its way around Tony’s waist and yanked him closer. Tony gasped, as much from enjoyment as from his broken ribs.

“Right at this moment?” Loki murmured, leaning in close and laying a barely-there kiss just below Tony’s ear. Tony didn’t whimper, he definitely didn’t whimper, he-

“I have to say what I wish to do now is ride you until you scream,” Loki whispered into his ear. Tony’s insides spontaneously turned to jelly, and his knees buckled. He fell against the trickster and then Loki’s mouth was on his again, and it was just as good as the battlefield, it was better than that, better than every other kiss before that. Loki growled and pulled him closer, gripping Tony’s hair tight enough to make him gasp into Loki’s mouth. Loki was holding him too tightly, too close. His ribcage was on fire, every bruise on his chest singing a discordant complaint, but he wasn’t about to say anything, wasn’t about to do anything that would make this stop, not now.

Loki pulled away.

“You are still hurt?” he said with a frown.

“I’m fine,” Tony grabbed his arms, tried to pull him back. Loki held himself at a distance, frowning.

“I would not harm you further. Show me where.”

Tony sighed and ran a hand over his ribs.

“Bitch broke three of them. Could’ve been a lot worse – she could’ve ripped them out and used me as a xylophone.”

For a moment Loki’s frowned deepened. Then he lifted glowing fingers and trailed them down Tony’s chest. There was a brief flare of heat and then the pain was just…gone. Tony drew a deep breath, enjoying the feeling of it not hurting to do so. Loki grinned at him and god, Tony loved that look.

“Better?” Loki asked.

“Much,” said Tony. He grabbed at Loki again and this time he obliged. Loki’s mouth was soft and pliant against his own, tongue sliding between Tony’s open lips. Though he gave as good as he got – and Tony was narcissistically aware of how good he gave – there was no denying Loki’s sheer talent in that area. Tony clutched at Loki’s back, his neck, tangled his fingers in Loki’s hair, wanting him closer and closer and it still wasn’t enough. One of Loki’s hands slid beneath his shirt, cool fingers trailing over his stomach, up his chest. Tony pressed into the touch, fisting his hand so tightly in Loki’s hair that the god groaned sinfully into his mouth.

Loki’s fingers moved down, dextrously unbuttoning Tony’s jeans, sliding in tips first, palm pressing not quite firm enough against his groin. Tony bit at Loki’s lip, pressing his hips up.

“Stop teasing,” he managed to get out, the words rough and low, “And get us out of this workshop. For the love of god.”

“As you wish,” Loki gasped back, kissing his way along Tony’s jaw to first nip at his earlobe, teeth dragging over the skin, then sucking down his neck. The air shimmered around them as Loki fixed his mouth on the juncture between neck and shoulder, teeth pressing just so and sucking hard enough to draw a moan. Reality faded back in and then they were on a bed and whether it was his or Loki’s or fucking Steve’s he had no idea and he didn’t care because along with teleporting them, Loki had also removed their clothes and he was flat on his back with a lapful of trickster god.

Loki pulled away, now straddling Tony’s hips, gazing down at him. Tony couldn’t tear his eyes away from Loki’s, could hardly think over the pounding of his heart. That warm, squishy, unsettlingly good feeling was uncurling in his chest again and he wanted to cry and laugh and kiss Loki until they both forgot how to breathe. He swallowed.

“I enjoy you here,” Loki murmured, leaning forwards, rocking his hips against Tony’s as he trailed a hand down his chest, circling the arc reactor, moving down. Tony groaned, reaching up to slide his hands down Loki’s arms, over firm muscle and smooth skin. He trailed a hand down Loki’s side, along his thigh, reaching in between them to-

Fffrrrttt

Both of them froze. Loki looked like he’d jumped straight into the fight part of fight or flight. Tony started to sit up, internal alarm bells ringing.

Ffffrrrttppphh

Loki rolled off him and Tony sat up fully now, a suspicion already starting to form. As he moved he felt something shift under the sheets below him and groaned, suspicions confirmed. Loki cocked his head and was eyeing him a combination of confusion and amusement as Tony reached beneath the blankets – which, as it turned out, were his, thank god – and pulled out a deflated whoopee cushion. A brief rummage turned up three more still buried under the blankets. Before he had a chance to even start explaining to Loki what had just happened, the intercom crackled on and they were treated to Clint’s ugly shout of laughter.

“Ha! I told you, Stark! I told you! It was worth the eye trauma you just inflicted on me!”

“Clint, I swear to god I’m going to murder you. Straight up. No frills, just flat out murder. With a knife. Loki, get me a knife.”

Clint continued laughing.

“Constant vigilance, Stark! You’ll never be safe again – this war will never be over! I-” he suddenly cut off in a shriek and Tony realised that Loki was twirling his fingers, a swirl of green dancing around them. The intercom snapped off and Loki just grinned, dismissing the magic with a shake of his hand. He touched a finger to Tony’s chest, pushing him back onto the bed, and crawled back on top of him.

“Now then Stark,” he purred, sliding his hand up Tony’s leg, “Where were we?”

The End