They somehow ended up at Loki's penthouse. Loki had brought Thor a change of clothes, as they were dripping wet from staying outside in the rain so long.

"You change, too, "Thor interrupted Loki as he walked towards the kitchen, "I don't want you catching a cold."

Loki grimaced. Thor was being over-protective as usual, and an unwanted sense of nostalgia washed over him briefly. "I'm just putting the kettle on."

Thor only stared, and Loki felt as if his not-brother's blue eyes were trying to see into his soul. He disappeared into the kitchen. The blonde man sighed and began peeling off his sopping clothes, wiping himself dry with a towel and putting Loki's clothes on. They were a bit too small, as he had expected, but he appreciated them no less. Loki emerged from the kitchen again.

"I'll," he started shakily, taking a deep breath before trying again, "I'll go hang those up to dry."

Thor nodded, feeling the familiar awkwardness set in over him and his brother again. He took to looking around his brother's home, noting the high-class paintings and expensive furnishings. The high keening of the boiling kettle called him from his wandering, and he moved back towards the kitchen. Loki was already inside, taking the pot from the stove and pouring the steaming water into two ornate teacups.

"Still two sugars, no milk?" Loki spoke softly.

"No, I'll have it straight," Thor replied.

"Ah." Loki remarked. So his not-brother has changed in his absence, though tea preferences weren't really that important in relation to what could really be different. He brought the platter over to the small table but did not sit down, merely taking his own cup and stepping back so Thor could take his. They drank in silence for the next few minutes.

"So...we are the only two left?" Loki asked.

"Yes." Thor gazed at him, trying to observe his reactions.

"Hmm." Loki was unreadable as always, bringing his cup to his lips again. "Anyways, how is life in New York treating you-"

"Loki," Thor derailed his brother's attempt at small-talk, "For three years, you let us think you dead." Loki was stone-faced, appearing to be more interested in something on the wall than what Thor had to say. "Three years you were alive, yet we had no word of you. No letters, no telegrams, nothing. How could you? Why did you not-"

"Because, Thor, Odin had made it perfectly clear the day I was-no, even when you were shipped off I wasn't a part of your family. Did you think your safe job at the shipyards was a stroke of luck? Odin had allies in the army, he pulled strings to get you there, and he pulled those same strings again to make sure I would end up in the damnedest, most hellish trench on the Western front. He wanted me gone, Thor, can't you see? Dead!" He slammed his teacup into the ground a few feet away, shattering it, "How could I have come back to that sort of family? But at the time, the more important question was 'how could I survive?' So I ran, Thor, I turned tail and I ran, fast as my legs could carry me and farther than my body could allow. I ran-" a sob cut him off as he braced himself against the side of the counter, "I ran across a whole ocean, Thor, and even that wasn't far enough, because the damned bastard still found me here. Through you." He drew one hand to his face, trying to wipe away the stinging tears.

"Oh, brother..." Thor tried to move closer, to comfort his weeping brother as before.

"I told you not to call me that!"

"What should I call you, then?" Thor's voice rose, "For I still love you like one-"

"No, don't love me!" Loki cried, doubling over the counter again, "Stop loving me while you still can Thor, for nothing good ever comes of loving me," sobs over took him again, and he let Thor near him, finally, "My real parents, dead, Mother, dead, and you..." his voice became soft and hoarse with crying again, "As you said, lost three years of your life to mourning for me. Only despair follows me and the ones that I love, Thor."

Thor embraced him, holding him impossibly tightly in his tanned arms, "No, brother, it is not your fault. It's not your fault." he breathed in, a shuddering thing, steeped in sadness, "Say it."

"It's not my fault." Loki repeated, barely above a whisper.

"It's not your fault."


Within a fortnight, Thor had bid his old flat goodbye and moved in with Loki. Darcy seemed distraught, and Jane voiced her doubts as well, but when he explained that Loki was his brother, who he had thought dead, they all fell silent. Dr. Selvig nodded solemnly, and Thor knew he truly understood.

"It's not as if I'm leaving forever," Thor rationalized to them, "It's just a quick subway ride into Manhattan."

"Oh, but the subway is so frightening," Jane fretted.

"You'll still visit us all the time, right?" Darcy interjected.

"Not literally all the time, but enough, I suppose," Thor said. Darcy stopped talking, but her protests were still written all over her face.

"Be safe," Selvig clapped him on the shoulder, and that was it.

All of Thor's things occupied a previously empty room in Loki's penthouse, and he took up a part-time job building sets for some of the theaters on Broadway. He didn't need to, as his brother's not-so-honest income could have supported them both easily, but his brother's secretive nocturnal schedule didn't leave them much time together, and Thor decided it was best to keep busy. His brother's job with the mob was a constant, nagging presence in the back of his mind, always. When he was not working, not distracted, free to let his mind wander, his imagination ran wild. Loki never told him what he specifically did late at night, waking up for dinner and coming home just before lunch, always tired-looking and skittery, avoiding Thor's questions. Thor always feared the worst, that he was going to just stop coming home, and no one would know to tell him what happened. He'd go "missing, presumed deceased" again, and Thor wouldn't be able to take it.

His nightmares about Loki's demise returned, but the backdrop of a trench war was replaced with New York scenery, soldiers morphed into trench-coated gangsters, mortar shells turned into car bombs, landmines turned to distillery explosions, mustard gas reformed into assassination mickeys.

He couldn't lose his lost brother again.


Late one evening, when Thor was still sleepless, perusing Loki's small library in the sitting room, he heard a strange noise at the front door. There was a peculiar bit of thumping, and a lot of scritching sounds of metal against metal. He thought it was a burglar, and moved to find a particularly heavy statuette of Hermes Loki had on a side table before creeping into the front entryway. The door finally swung open, and Thor, about to swing the figurine down, stopped short. It was his brother, doubled over, hair and clothes disheveled and blood dripping thick down his left arm. Thor let the statuette clamor to the floor, surely leaving a dent in the hardwood, before rushing to his brother's side.

"Loki! What happened?"

"Forget about me for a second," Loki hissed, "Wipe the blood off the door before it dries, quickly!"

Thor did as he was told, and as he mopped up the last of it and closed the door, he heard Loki's strained voice from the kitchen, telling him to bolt it and turn off the lights.

"What happened?" Thor repeated again as he stepped into the kitchen. Loki was leaning against the table, trying to remove his clothes. On autopilot, Thor ripped the sleeves off his shirt, jacket, and coat in one fell movement.

"I've been shot-you oaf," Loki said through gritted teeth, "Those were expensive,"

"And I'm sure they weren't already ruined with your blood," Thor retorted mechanically, moving to get some dishtowels.

"Mn, get the first aid kit. Bathroom-" Loki cut off as he tried to touch his wound, reeling back at the sensation, "S-second shelf."

Thor ran, bumping into doorways and knocking things over as he went. When he returned to the kitchen, Loki was lying back on the table, chest heaving and face pale.

"Good," Loki breathed as Thor reappeared, face relaxing visibly, "Now, there should be a-" Another sharp intake of breath as he removed the blood-soaked rag from his arm, "A syringe of morphine-Ah!" He pressed a clean towel to his injury as Thor rummaged through the small white briefcase, finding a plastic case with a needle and a vial labeled "morphine" inside. "Yes, give it to me," a bead of sweat rolled down the black-haired man's face as he extended his hand. Thor clumsily put the two parts together and handed it over. Pushing the plunger slightly to expel any air bubbles, Loki proceeded to jam the needle into his left forearm, vein already protruding, and empty the drug into his bloodstream. His muscles all immediately relaxed, and he took a shuddering breath.

"Alright, Thor, now I need you to take the bullet out."

"What?"

"Well, we can't leave it in, can we, now? Don't worry, I'll help you."

"Can't we just go to a hospital?"

"No, Thor, we have to do it here. You have to. Help me." Loki pulled himself up on his good arm, leaning up against the wall and motioning Thor to come around to his left side. After rooting around in the first aid kit, he pulled out a pair of forceps and a long metal rod. Thor nearly gagged.

"Oh, I really don't think I can-" Thor lurched away, before coming back again, "I have a friend who's a nurse, she can-"

"Thor, I've lost too much blood already. We need to get it out immediately." Thor looked away again, then glanced back at his brother's pale eyes, screwed nearly shut in pain. "Please, I need you."

Grabbing the forceps, he took a deep breath and set his face. "Okay, tell me what to do."

Loki resituated his arm to give him a better angle, "Can you see the bullet?"

"Yes-" Thor finally looked clearly and directly at the mangled, bleeding wound and nearly threw up, "Yes, I can."

"You're going to need to get the forceps around it," Loki breathed, color still slowly draining from his face, "Securely, and just pull it out."

"That's it?"

"That's it. On my mark." Loki grabbed his bloodied, torn shirtsleeves from the counter and stuffed them into his mouth, using his fingers and mumbling a countdown from three. Thor took a few deep, noisy breathes and jabbed the instrument in. Loki's entire body shivered, and a loud grunt escaped from the pit of his chest. The blonde man looked into the other's eyes, wondering if he was meant to stop. Opening his eyes a fraction, Loki nodded him on and Thor continued, ignoring his brothers noises of pain until he felt the metal was finally around the bullet. Gently, gently, he pulled it out, praying his hands not to shake too badly, until the it was completely out.

Throwing them haphazardly aside, he reached across to pull out antiseptic and some gauze and bandages. He dumped the foul liquid over the wound and the gauze, bring one to the other and keeping pressure, despite his brother's hissing protests. Until he was doubly sure the bleeding had stopped, he wrapped the white bandage around his brother's bicep meticulously. As Thor stepped away, Loki threw his head back and sighed, then burst into high laughter.

"You did it, Thor." he smiled, raising his good hand to beckon his brother closer, "I knew you could,"

Thor began laughing as well, nerves coming down from their heightened alert as his brother wrapped an arm around him. The blonde man was about to pull away from the strange embrace when there was a loud pounding at the door. Loki stiffened, locking his brother to him.

"Keep absolutely quiet," he barely whispered, voice as tense as his tendons, "You did turn the lights out, didn't you?"

Thor nodded, and gulped in fear as they heard angry voices at the door, mixed with more violent knocking. They stayed rigid in silence until well after the knocking subsided. Loki sighed again, pulling his right arm away, but Thor still stayed close.

"What was that?" he implored, searching his brother's eyes for an explanation. Loki turned away, pretending to be more interested in divesting the scraps of his bloodied clothing,

"There are..." he paused, "many things I haven't told you about."

"Like what?" Thor drew back, trying to look his brother in the eyes again.

"Tell me, Thor," Loki finally turned towards him, "Do you love me?"

Taken aback by the abruptness of it, Thor didn't have an immediate answer.

"When I walked in here, when you saw the blood, what was the first thing you thought?"

Thor drew a measured breath, "Please, God, do not let my brother die. Not after I have gotten him back. I can't lose him again." Loki had stood, shakily and walked closer to his brother, faces only a few small inches apart.

"Then tell me, Thor, if I had died," he inhaled quickly, "What would you have wished you'd have told me while I was still alive?"

"I..." Thor didn't want to re-imagine a world where his brother was dead, but memories would not be stopped because of mere wants, "I would tell you- no, I would show you how much you meant to me," at this, he wrapped his small arms around his smaller brother, "I would hold onto you and never let you go again. I would go back, to the day I left for the war, and just hold you and not let you leave me ever again."

"I was thinking the exact same thing, when I was trying to get back here," Loki shuddered, holding back a sob, "That I didn't want to lose you again, and all the things I still had to say to you..." he trailed off, tears slowly sliding over his cheeks, "So, I'll ask again," pausing once more for breath, "do you love me?"

"Yes!" Thor said, sounding slightly startled, "I love you more than anyone or anything else in the world. You are my brother."

Having started to return the embrace, Loki tried to pull away. "But I am not your brother."

"It doesn't matter. I love you like one. I love you more than any other brother in the whole world."

"But-" Loki started, voice shaky with tears, "But I love you differently, Thor."

"Does it matter?"

"Yes. Oh, yes, it does," Loki was quieter now, and the sound of shame had crept into his tone.

"Then I will change my love, if it matters so much," Thor chuckled, "What does it need to become?"

Loki pulled back from Thor's now slack arms, looking straight into his bright blue eyes, before lids slid shut over his green ones and his face moved forward and up. Their lips pressed together, and Thor stiffened, eyes wide. Loki did not stir, and Thor relaxed slowly, moving one hand to cup the back of his not-brother's head through black, sweat-slicked hair. It felt like an eternity before they had to break for breath. The smaller man avoided the others eyes, until he finally willed up the courage to speak again.

"It must become that," Loki breathed, the truth of what he'd just done dawning on him. Be it the shock of getting shot, the loss of blood making him lightheaded, the relief at being alive, he didn't know what spurned his actions. He finally forced himself to look at his not-brother.

"Loki..." Thor's face softened, brushing his fingers along the smaller man's face, "It already has."