Tony peaked around the corner; the hallway was empty. He tiptoed, in a rather comical fashion, to the first door. After a short pause he quickly opened it and burst through. The room was empty. Damn. He checked the other 4 rooms of the hall, the next hallway and the kitchen, he'd pretty much given up on scarring Loki.
Ever since the God of Mischief had moved into his tower Tony had tried and failed many times to surprise his the new resident. Today was yet another failure, however, and Loki was nowhere to be found. Not that it affected Tony too much. He sauntered into the kitchen, sulking, and got himself a coffee. He wondered where Loki might be.
As if reading his mind Jarvis piped up, "Sir, Loki is in the dining room on the ground floor, he appears to be practicing magic."
Tony let our a groan, couldn't his AI have told him before he spent an hour searching his whole tower?
"Thanks for finally having some input Jarv'" he replied sarcastically, putting his now-empty mug down and heading toward the lift. He pressed the button for the ground floor a little too hard, his restlessness a result of caffeine and excitement. He all but ran through the hall as soon as the doors opened enough for him to fit through, heading straight for the dining room.
He opened the door and looked through, his toothy grin making his demeanour even more juvenile than his behaviour already was. The door squeaked a little as he opened it wider. He paused, a grimace spread across his face as he waited for the God to move. Loki was sitting on the floor cross-legged with his back to the door. A faint blue glow emitted from an unknown source and tendrils of thick blue smoke swirled around on the floor before dissolving into the air.
When nothing happened Tony opened it fully in one swift motion and yelled as loud as he could, 'BLAAARR,' limbs flailed wildly. Even Tony himself didn't know what the loud sound was meant to be. He came to an abrupt stop when there was still no response from the God. Damn. Didn't scare him this time either.
He sighed and walked over to see what Loki was doing. He stood behind him but couldn't see more than blue smoke and a pulsing ball of energy that Loki was mustering between his hands. From where he was, he couldn't see that Loki had his eyes closed and was in deep concentration, almost in a trance-like state.
"Hey why're you putting smoke all over my carpet? It better not stain," Tony complained, putting his hand on Loki's shoulder to support his weight as he leaned forward to see better.
"AHH!" Loki yelped and jumped away from the touch on his shoulder, finally noticing Tony was in the room. The energy ball flickered like a light bulb might, before disappearing altogether. The smoke turned from blue into a darker grey and began swirling around where Loki sat facing his intruder.
"Uhhh...is that meant to happen?" Tony questioned, sounding more curious than nervous.
Little zaps of electricity began shooting haphazardly around in the smoke making it appear more like a heap of billowing, miniature storm clouds.
"Yes of course, it was fully my intention to have you barge in here and disrupt me while I'm performing a specialised spell that is now malfunctioning," Loki said sarcastically, "it better not backfire," he mumbled to himself more than to Tony. He stood up, "I told you not to come in here, I left a note and everything."
"Not my fault you lost control of your fairy magic." Tony shot back in an attempt to defend himself.
"Actually, it is." Loki said in his no-nonsense tone. Tony shifted his weight, uncomfortable with upsetting the God.
Deciding it was probably best to get out of the small storm, seeing as how it didn't get smaller and started swirling faster, he stood up and began to drag Tony out of the room with him. Tony protested at first but was no match for a pissed off God. They got halfway across the room before the storm started rumbling.
"Is that thunder?" Tony asked, his face incredulous as he looked over Loki's shoulder with wide eyes.
"Crap." Loki said, before a searing white light filled the room. Loki threw himself in front of Tony to protect him from the shock wave that erupted, shattering windows and knocking them both over, a surge of power and magic swept through the room.
They both woke up rather dazed. Loki lifted himself up on his arms and looked down at Tony, whom he was still half lying on top of. Tony just smiled and started laughing, not the reaction Loki expected.
"What? Do you know how badly that could've ended? We're lucky it's only smashed windows and broken furniture!" Loki's words were harsh but Tony didn't seem to acknowledge the tone.
"Umm…" he said, still laughing, "I don't think that's the only thing…"
"What? What else? Why are you laughing?" Loki said, all malice forgotten and replaced with confusion. He rolled off and sat up, turning his head and looking around the room to find what Tony found so funny. Tony laughed harder, clutching his stomach, and rolled on his side as tears formed in his eyes. "What is it?"
Tony stood up, laughing less as he wiped his face on his sleeve, recovering his composure. "You- you have ears!" Tony lost all sense of self-control he'd regained since standing up and began laughing again.
Loki was getting sick of this, he wanted a straight answer and he wanted it soon. For a man who claims to be so adult Tony was rather childish sometimes. Of course he had ears, he's always had ears, what was he on about now? He sighed, forcing himself to be patient while Tony collected himself. "Yes, I have ears, what of it?"
"No, you have ears Loki," Tony clarified, as though putting more emphasis on the word 'ears' was meant to help.
"Uhh I still do not know what you're going on about,"
"Ooh you always go into 'professional mode' when you're angry," Tony said, as though the whole ear-problem had been sorted.
"Tony! What's wrong with my ears?!" Loki urged him to shed light on the situation. He reached up to feel the sides of his head, making sure that he still had ears and that they were alright, but he couldn't find them. His eyes grew wide. Tony said he did have ears, right?
Tony crouched down and gently grabbed Loki's hands, moving them up to the top of his head and placing each one on something soft. Tony stepped back with a huge smile on his face, as though he was proud to help, which only served to make Loki frown more. It took a while for it to click in Loki's mind, possibly because he didn't really want to believe it, but as he felt around he found he did indeed have some new ears. Giant, floppy, soft ears.
"Are you a cat?" Tony said, once again his curious mind was at work, studying Loki for any animalistic behaviour, "or a mouse? Or some kind of cow?"
Loki sighed. Cow? "You don't get out much do you? Cats have pointed ears and mice have round, thin ears that stick up." Deciding not to even grace the cow suggestion with acknowledgment, unsure whether Tony really thought he was now part-cow or if it was a roundabout jab at his helmet again.
Tony helped him up. "Sorry I don't take notice of the ears of wildlife."
"It's considered common knowledge Tony, and they're not 'wildlife' either," Loki ground out, quickly growing annoyed at Tony again for not being concerned enough about him or educated enough about the world in general. Tony rolled his eyes. He brushed himself off and looked at Tony, only instead of seeing his face; he was met with the bright glow of his Arc Reactor glowing through the black fabric of his shirt. He looked up, "am I shorter than you now?!"
They both stood staring at each other with wide eyes, Tony's jaw slightly agape, Loki grinding his teeth, one could almost see the steam coming out of his ears. As always Tony broke the silence first.
"Awww you're adorable when you're grumpy!" the man practically squealed.
"Shut it Stark, I am not in a gaming mood," Loki snapped before storming off to find a mirror to further inspect his ears. He hated being short, he hated having weird animal ears, he hated being mad at Tony, this all sucked. Tony chuckled and trailed behind at a safe distance. Was the guy ever fazed by anything? Loki wondered momentarily.
After dodging a toothbrush and a bottle of shampoo thrown by a remarkably peeved God, who followed up his efforts with slamming the door so hard Tony was sure he'd have to replace the hinges, he waited outside the bathroom impatiently tapping his foot. When Loki finally emerged again it took all of Tony's self control to not burst out laughing again. He looked at Loki expectantly.
He'd simmered down a fair bit while in the confined space, and after examining his ears; Loki had come to a conclusion…
"I'm a puppy, Tony."
A/N: Please give me your feedback, suggestions, criticism, corrections, anything, I would love to hear what you have to say! If anyone likes this story, I'll post more chapters for you! Just review or something and I'll be happy to.