A/N: Never in my life have I ever heard a song that so perfectly describes Loki's situation, after everything went down. This fic is based off of Mumford and Sons' song "Broken Crown." Go and listen to the song, seriously, but especially all the way through. It gets super emotional and it fits Loki amazingly well.

This scene takes place (in my mind) right after Thor and Loki return to Asgard, after the events in The Avengers.

Update 11/13/13 - Found some spelling errors, my OCD side had to fix it.

"Away from me!" His voice reverberated in the vast hall, clanging and echoing in the expanse of the chambers. It was a bitter sound, bursting with hatred and anger at a million different things. Thor only stared as his brother stumbled away from him, gasping, wiping his mouth on the back of his arm. The gag Thor had just removed dangled limply from his fingers, and he let it drop to the floor with a quiet clang. Loki eyed the thing with disgust before turning back to his brother, practically screaming. "I said away from me, Odinson, before I turn you to stone!" The desperation was visible and Thor's heart dropped sickeningly inside of him.

"I will not leave you yet," he said with just a trace of hesitation, to which Loki latched on with vengeance.

"Have you not committed your duty piously, oh great one?" he mocked, standing shakily to his feet to face him. "You, crown prince, have fetched the wayward monster and have taken him prisoner to face Asgardian justice. Are you not ready to feast and dance into the late hours of the night, boasting of your triumph against the Jotun filth you have quelched?!" He sounded utterly mad, and whether he knew it or not, he did not seem to care. Loki had always been so poised and calm - his raging and screaming was nothing short of frightening.

"I wish to talk to you brother," Thor said quietly, "before the others arrive."

"I am not. Your. Brother," he spat, clenching his hands by his side. "You know that I never was."

Touch my mouth, and hold my tongue,

I'll never be your chosen one.

"I care not for your repeated arguments," Thor said, still quiet and subdued. "I have but one question for you."

"Then please, out with it," Loki said wildly. "We musn't waste time in ridding this place of me."

"Why Loki?" Thor whispered, and his quiet tone seemed to pierce the air stronger than the yelling had. Loki was shaking, breathing heavily, eyes darting back and forth at unseen things.

I'll be home, safe and tucked away.

Well you can't tempt me if I don't see the day.

"Your stupidity shows itself yet again," Loki snarled and backed away when Thor took a step towards him. He was not acting normal. He seemed panicked, antsy, almost...frightened. He wiped his mouth again and gasped, falling to his knees. Thor wished to aid him, but somehow felt he should stay put, watching his brother suffer. Loki smashed the floor with his fists, then his palms, shaking almost uncontrollably. Thor held his breath, waiting for it to pass, wondering what magic was yet being pulled from his body by the spell cast in the room. "You are doing this to me!" he shrieked in Thor's direction and his body convulsed once more. Thor could not help then but close his eyes. This was necessary, he knew. But the pain still crept into his heart like drops of poison, burning him from the inside out.

"I could have helped you," he said, unaware that Loki had heard and was staring at him incredulously from the floor.

"You are a fool," he croaked and Thor turned to him again. "You know not of what you speak. You were not the one cast into the abyss and left to die at the hands of a being more powerful than the strongest found in all the nine realms. Your sympathy is wasted on what you will never understand." He tried pushing himself to his knees, only to collapse back to the floor, his eyes huge.

The pull on my flesh was just too strong.

Stifled the choice and the air in my lungs.

Better not to breathe than to breathe a lie.

"You are mad," Thor said, fear creeping into his voice.

"You know I am not," Loki struggled, "and that is why you fear me."

'cause when I open my body, I breathe a lie.

"I do not fear you, Loki," Thor said, coming to stand before his brother's prone form on the floor. Loki attempted to push himself away, but Thor grabbed him roughly by the chin and forced him to look up at him, arms dangling limply by his side. "But I will admit to not understanding you."

"You never will," he whispered in response, his voice cracking through the sudden quiet. His eyes had lost their glimmer and Thor was well aware of the magic still seeping from his body as the spell Odin had cast worked its doings on Loki. He could do nothing to fight it. It was a sorry sight.

I will not speak of your sin.

There was a way out for him.

"Cast your sympathies elsewhere, Odinson," Loki continued, refusing to call him by name. "Lest you stoop to my own level and breathe a lie of fellowship."

"Loki stop this," Thor cried out, shoving his brother to the floor. Loki landed on waiting hands, rolling to his side to sit up, slightly woozy, hatred coursing through his veins. Thor then grabbed him roughly by the collar and pulled him to his face, voice heavy and desperate. "Answer me brother, why did you do this? After all that came to pass, why did you choose this path?"

Loki's head lolled back, then snapped to attention in a vicious stare. His anger was returning, but his strength was not. "Curse you!" he screamed, struggling uselessly against Thor's hold.

"Where is my brother?" Thor began to yell, shaking him wildly until Loki thought his neck would snap.

"Stop calling me that!" he boomed, shoving against Thor's arms. Thor refused to let go and blinked away the tears that came unbidden to his eyes.

"Answer me. I know the real you is still there, Loki, please."

"This is me, you idiot," he snapped in response, but his voice cracked.

The mirror shows not

Your values are all shot.

"Let me go, unleash me, you pitiful oaf -"

"I will not leave without an answer!" Thor bellowed and before he knew what he was doing he had reared back and struck him across the face. The blow sent him skidding across the floor, but Thor followed with angered steps, fists raised, grabbing his brother once more, shouting into his face. "Tell me! Tell me what I could have done to prevent this!"

Loki smiled - a chilling, condescending leer.

Thor roared and hit him again, tears streaming down his face at the sight of his brother's blood by his own hand. Loki began to laugh, even as his fist made a crushing blow to his nose. The laughter was a sickening sound, full of misplaced mirth and he looked positively terrifying as his own blood seeped into his mouth and turned his teeth scarlet. Thor let him drop to the ground, crying out at the blood, all the blood, until Loki made it to his knees and stared him in the face. "I know you want me to say that I loved you once," he said, voice husky, slowly making it to his feet. "And maybe I did. It feels as if it were a dream. You must accept, dearest brother, that this is the new reality. You must face the fact that you were raised with the very being you had been taught to hate and kill. It should not be any different now, though my skin is as white as yours. I am not your own, and I never was."

But oh, my heart was flawed

I knew my weakness

"You spent your entire life as a son of Odin," Thor sobbed, staring his brother down, "and then upon finding out this secret, you decide to kill and destroy and cast away all who loved you, despite their knowledge of what was kept from you?" Loki faltered then, opening his mouth and closing it again, his face stained with crimson.

So hold my hand, consign me not to darkness.

"You are aware of the consequences," he spoke evenly in reply finally, his eyes glittering with an emotion Thor could not describe. "Do not act as if this can be made better, or that anything can change."

"There is always hope, Loki," Thor said brokenly, watching as his brother swallowed and closed his eyes.

So crawl on my belly til the sun goes down

I'll never wear your broken crown

"Get away from me," Loki murmured, swaying dangerously. He leaned heavily against a pillar and the eyes he shot in Thor's direction were full of terrifying malice.

"Loki -"

"Get out!" he screamed, voice raw with passion.

I took the road

and I fucked it all away.

"I want to offer you a chance at redeeming yourself!" Thor bellowed back, but he had lost him, he could see it. Loki had resigned himself back to the madness and was suddenly hitting him back, striking his face with the little strength he had gained back.

"There is no redemption!" he screamed and hit his eye. "There are no second chances, there is no freedom, there is only pain and weakness and death." Thor easily blocked his next blow and shoved him back into the wall, pinning him there by the throat.

"There could have been," Thor hissed, "had you let it."

Now in this twilight, how dare you speak of grace.

"You no longer believe that," Loki spoke in a vicious whisper. "This was always my destiny. And there is not a damned thing you can do to change it." The light seemed to change the color of Loki's eyes - blue to green, blue to green. More magic? he thought, but he could no longer contemplate these things.

"You were my brother once," Thor choked, releasing his grip slightly on Loki's throat. "And you know it."

"And you know it is no longer," Loki swallowed against his fingers and it was then the pounding of footsteps boomed around them, coming closer, ever closer, ready to barge in and take him to the dungeon.

"It did not have to be this way," Thor whispered and pulled back, sudden anger pushing at his lungs and heart and mind. "It did not have to be this way. You made your choice. You made it then, and you are making it now. You can never say I did not try, Loki. You are lost to me." The doors flew open and guards poured in, armor clanking, brows furrowed, determined. Thor stepped back as they swarmed in around his brother, grabbing him roughly by the arms and yanking him to his feet, smashing chains about his wrists, slapping the gag back on with gleeful force. They pulled him by the hair, the arms, anything they could grab and shoved him to the door, to the exit, to the end. But before his foot crossed the threshold, Loki suddenly turned and eyed his brother, his eyes green once more, soft and sad like the child he used to be. Time froze. Thor's breath caught in his throat and he tried to understand, but the moment passed too quickly and he was shoved from the room, out of sight.

Gone.

But in this twilight, our choices

seal

our

fate.

My apologies if either of them were out of character. I would imagine it a highly emotional exchange right afterwards, but what do I know. The lyrics to the song are popped in there so you can either view it as a song-fic or rambling thoughts in the minds of both the brothers. Please leave a review and let me know what you think!