The minutes that passed felt like hours, and Tony was eventually convinced that Loki would be dead by the time Bruce arrived at the Tower. Jarvis continued to give him status updates, the God of Chaos seemed to be getting by, but Jarvis also kept pointing out why medical attention was highly recommended.
The ticking of the clock was like an assault for Tony's ears. And suddenly, in the silence that followed Jarvis' latest status update – a soft ding interrupted Tony's panic.
He jumped up, not dropping the bloody cloth, and ran straight from the room to the elevator.
"Bruce!" He heard his own voice, but he hadn't even realized that he had uttered a single word.
The startled scientist looked Tony up and down, and the worried frown hadn't left his face for a second when his eyes turned down to see the blood soaked cloth in Tony's hand and the frown returned with full force.
"Tony, what happened?!" His voice was very quiet, an indicator for how tense he was, he did not want to snap, but seeing the bloodied cloth had startled him.
"Okay, so, I would totally tell you the whole story right now, buuut there's a tiny problem, and it's currently under shock and slowly bleeding out in one of the bedrooms, so it'd be lovely if we could discuss all that later?" Tony spoke so fast that he almost stumbled over his words, something that - given his erratic speak pattern - was concerning.
"What?! Where is the person?! What happened?"
While Tony dragged Bruce to the guestroom where Loki was still lying unconsciously in the bed, he gave him a short summary of what had happened earlier this morning, promising he would fill in all the blanks later, and warning Bruce, that he please – please! – should not get upset, even though it was Loki (at that point Bruce had stopped and just blinked – once, twice, then it seemed he had decided that he wanted to hear the full story before he Hulked out – but then followed after Tony).
When Bruce saw Loki's beaten body the scientist sharply drew in a breath, then looked over to Tony, who already had told Jarvis to give Bruce the details about the Trickster's condition. When the A.I.'s voice had gotten quiet again Bruce turned to Tony.
"I am not that kind of doctor." He gave Tony a skeptical look when he saw Tony's raised eyebrow, Tony knew that Bruce had been medically trained, for example in Calcutta. "He should go to a proper hospital."
"Bruce, you know what'll happen! S.H.I.E.L.D. will find him, and I reckon they're keen to get their hands on him! If they find out that he's here, they'll flip!" Not even Tony could honestly say that he would wish that upon Loki.
Bruce seemed to be in deep thought. "I will need some supplies."
Tony nodded. "The infirmary should have everything."
Bruce got paper and pen and wrote down a list of supplies that he would need, then he threw Tony out of the room. Apparently he thought Tony couldn't be as helpful as Tony thought he could be.
Getting the supplies didn't take Tony half as long as deciphering Bruce's chicken scratch did. Well, he didn't really get the stuff, he told Jarvis to make someone from the Infirmary bring the stuff up to his floor. The young man that was standing inside of the elevator a few minutes later gave Tony a confused look but obviously didn't dare to ask what the scientist was up to. Usually people from the lower floors couldn't even go to this floor, he was quite happy to see it so he didn't dare ruining his chances of seeing this floor again.
When the man was gone again Tony delivered several cardboard boxes to the guestroom. He couldn't even name half of the stuff he saw in there.
As soon as Tony had set the boxes down, Bruce very politely – much to his chagrin – made him leave again.
After waiting for about two minutes (patience wasn't Tony's strung suit) Tony decided that just waiting here wouldn't make Bruce work faster, so he made his way to his lab to busy himself.
Two hours of tinkering with a new blaster for a new prototype of his suit and quite a bit of thinking "what to do with the crazy lunatic that Bruce is currently stitching up?" without coming to a conclusion Jarvis told him that Bruce was asking for him.
Tony rubbed his forehead, he really, really wanted a drink. But Bruce might just kill him if he found him with any alcoholic beverage now, and he'd rather not risk his friend being charged with murder.
He stepped into the corridor, walked up to the elevator and pressed the button for his floor. When the doors opened again Bruce was already waiting for him.
"Tony…" Bruce trailed off.
"Come on, Jarvis will show you what happened." Tony led Bruce into the living room. When both men had sat down Tony handed Bruce a Stark tablet. "There you go."
After that Bruce was mostly quiet while he watched the security feed from the early morning. He rolled his eyes at Tony's attitude (not that he could blame him, Tony knew he had behaved ridiculously), and started to tense when the Wardrobes had led Tony outside.
"He was out there the whole time? In that state?!" Bruce was obviously agitated.
"I didn't know that!" Tony tried to defend himself, but before he could continue, Bruce interrupted him.
"I know, Tony." Then he went back to watching the video. He flinched when Tony carried Loki inside, and when Tony tried to do some good when checking Loki's injuries.
After some time he sighed.
"I thought…" He trailed off, but Tony picked the sentence up. "… that he would maybe be thrown into prison for the rest of his days, and kept there to rot? Yeah, me too."
"I never expected…"
"… that they'd torture him and then dump him on my balcony? Yeah, me neither."
Bruce shot Tony an annoyed look.
"How is he?" The humor was gone from Tony's voice. He had hoped that he'd never have to see the crazy demigod again, but he did not wish torture upon anyone, it simply hit too close to home for him to even think about the possibility of it happening.
"He's not doing too well, but he will live. Jarvis gave you a pretty good summary of how severe his injuries are, and he's not healing on his own. I am no expert on Aesir, but that's what usually happens with Thor. I suspect they did what they once did to Thor." A permanent frown seemed to be etched into Bruce's face at this point.
"You mean they took his powers? I thought as much." It wasn't a lie, he had suspected it when Loki didn't wake up.
"It will take some time until all his injuries are healed. I can't tell you yet how long it'll take." Bruce tried to explain Tony how to proceed with the injuries, Tony just nodded, Jarvis could always fill in the blanks after all.
"So you have not told S.H.I.E.L.D. yet? Or Fury?" That's why Tony liked Bruce so much. He was visibly shocked by seeing Loki, and he had more than just a bit of disliking for said demigod, but he had first done all he could have done to help and only after that he asked about things like S.H.I.E.L.D. or the angry Director.
"No. And I don't think it'd be a good idea to involve them right now. I want to ask Thor what all this is about first." He had after all spent some thought on what to do next while Bruce was still with Loki, and he was sure that notifying Fury would lead to Loki being thrown in a cell somewhere, or worse, punished to Fury's liking. Tony was sure that Loki was still dangerous, but he was also sure that what had been done to him (he didn't even think of Loki's lack of powers) had been punishment enough.
Bruce slowly nodded. "Yes, I don't think him being a lab rat would be a good idea right now." The scientist tried not to even think of what else they could do. Then he continued. "I can't stay here, Tony. I think you're doing the right thing, but I can't stay."
It was unnecessary to ask why. Bruce wanted to help, but being confronted with Loki over a long period of time would be tough on him, and no one wanted Bruce to lose his temper.
After a few moments Tony asked "Will you be nearby?" Bruce nodded.
"I'll stop by tomorrow, after my appointment in the lab."
Bruce and Tony stood up. "Tony, you'll need to check the bandages, I will change them tomorrow, but you have to make sure..." He was interrupted by Jarvis.
"Sir, Mr. Laufeyson seems to be waking up."
Both men turned to the bedroom Loki was in, Tony reached the door first and opened it. The beaten man's hands twitched, just looking at him seemed painful. At least there was no feeding tube down his throat (Bruce had been sure that Loki would wake up sooner rather than later), and he was able to breath on his own. But he was still quite the sight. Bandaged from head to toe, one arm in a sling (it was the arm that had been dislocated), and even though the thread going through his lips was gone, the skin around his mouth looked like horrifying Halloween make-up.
And then Tony's eyes wandered to the place where Loki's eyes were supposed to be, was covered in antiseptic gauze.
"What happened to his eyes?" Tony whispered in the direction of Bruce, who was more or less hiding behind the half-opened door.
"I am not completely sure, but I think something like acid seems to have been dripped onto his eyes. I don't know how bad the damage is, but the skin of the eyes itself need to heal properly, and him opening and closing his eyes won't be helping."
And then Loki Laufeyson, God of Chaos and Trickery, prince of Asgard, woke up and Anthony Stark, genius and scientist, thought hell was about to break loose.