And this is four glorious days with four freaking posts. I am having so much fun with this! hopefully I don't forget my laptop over the weekend XD

Thank you aa826 for reviewing. *Hands over a Loki shaped chocolate*

This was not good. Loki tried to take a deep breath but found it hard to do. The air seemed so thick and hot in the bathroom. The shower water that was running was supposedly set on cold but it felt warm to him.

Loki gripped the shower wall with his right hand, his left arm left dangling at his side. The less he used it, the quicker it would heal. He looked down and inspected his body for even the slightest tint of blue. He had changed into that creature when he had held the casket and when 'they' had touched him. But he feared that in his weakened state he may start to revert back. He tried to tell himself that he wouldn't, that he was jumping to conclusions but the water felt nearly blistering to him. I need sleep.

Loki had learned how to change form when he was a child. Making his nose larger or smaller and then gradually to where he looked like a different person. But he was able to switch back to his normal form with ease. It was his natural state.

Loki's nails dug into the wall as he thought of his truly natural state. He had no idea what kept him in his Asgardian form. He never would have known that it wasn't his original form if that damned frost giant hadn't grabbed him. Maybe because my magic is weakened. Loki sighed. He could feel his spine starting to fix itself which was painful, but needed. This was taking even more of his magic leaving him with very little left over. Or I'm dying.

Loki shut off the shower and stepped out onto the rug. He carefully patted the water off of him so not to aggravate his wounds. Upon inspection in the mirror, Loki found himself to look paler but definitely not blue. He looked down at his clothes which were smelly from sweat and blood. He tied the towel around his waist and headed out into the room Pepper had designated as his.

The room held a bed facing a 'TV' which Loki was somewhat excited about. He had only briefly noticed TVs when he was on Midgard before and had no time to toy with them. On a desk near the curtained window was some cloth. Loki made his way over to it and noted that it was pants of some black material. He pulled them on to find that they were loose in his midsection. He pulled the strings and the waistband tightened.

Next to the clothing was bandages which Loki applied onto his wounds, using some of his magic. He laid back on the bed, contemplating staying there for the rest of the day. Loki knew that if he did then Thor would randomly burst into the room and do something stupid. Like hug him.


Loki was happy to find his way so quickly back into the penthouse. He didn't really feel like wandering around continuously. He noticed that Tony and Pepper were in the kitchen.

Pepper glanced his way, "Clint's gone to find you a shirt."

Loki nodded.

"I thought you were supposed to be scrawny," Natasha's voice came from behind him.

Loki turned to look at her, "compared to Thor, most things are."

Natasha nodded, "true." She held out some sort of brown circle. "Reese's?"

Loki raised a brow. He was honestly hungry as hell. Their breakfast was measly by Asgardian standards. He took the food and popped it into his mouth. Immediately he reached up and grabbed whatever was sailing at his head.

"You shouldn't take things from Nat. Might be poisoned," Clint smirked.

Loki looked down at what Clint had thrown at his head and found more cloth, presumably a tunic. "You can't poison me."

"I'll take that as a challenge." Clint grinned.

Loki smirked, "try it."

"Asgardians can't be poisoned?" Natasha asked.

Loki frowned as he noticed a design on the tunic: a hammer with lightning coming out of it.

"Some can, some cannot," Loki said simply.

"If you don't like that shirt," Clint grinned. "I have a 'Hulk Smash' one too."

"You make tunics of your heroes?" Loki commented. "I'd love to have one of you."

Clint's smile vanished, "let's see how you fair against arsenic." He plopped down onto a chair.

"No poison," Natasha called after him.

"Nat?" Loki tried.

Natasha jerked her head around, "Natasha," she corrected.

"Tasha," Loki smirked. "Is there more nourishment around?" He pulled the shirt over his head with a little difficulty.

"Natasha," Natasha repeated. She raised a brow at Loki's t-shirt which now had a giant green 'X' over 'Thor's hammer'. "There's cookies in that cabinet." She noted how Loki seemed to perk up at cookies. "You have a sweet tooth, don't you?"

Loki shrugged and immediately went after the cookies. He took the container over to the couch and began looking around. Loki had noticed when he had undressed for the shower that he was missing his bag and all of his knives. He could easily replace knives but that bag….

Loki began checking all the creases in the couch that he had been laying on. He moved the fur but nothing. Eventually he got down on his knees and began feeling around underneath the couch.

Natasha watched uneasily. Unsure of where to put Loki's knives she had just stored them underneath the couch. She assumed the small curse Loki just let out meant that his hand had just found them.

Loki pulled the cloth out from underneath the couch and wiped his bloody finger on his pants. On the cloth with all of his knives was the bag which Loki immediately stuck into his pants pocket. He wrapped the knives back up and then pushed them back under the couch.

"What's in the bag?" Clint asked.

"Tricks," Loki smirked. His usual answer when asked that question.

"So, that's the legendary 'bag of tricks'." Natasha sat down on the couch.

Loki eyed her, curious to how she knew of it. He wondered if Thor had mentioned it. He shrugged it off and headed to his room to put the bag away.

Loki had almost made it to the hall leading to the stairs when the elevator dinged. Almost immediately the room was filled with his brother's thunderous voice, "I wish to try it!"

"Slow down there cowboy," the dark haired female told him. "Disney World is not ready for…this." She gestured at Thor.

Loki had stopped dead and waited. He could run. He seriously thought about it. But that might lead to a tackling hug that Thor was wont to do whenever he ran. The brunette went to the cabinets by the bar immediately. Selvig put down some suitcases by the elevator and popped his back. Jane was holding a suitcase in one hand and a rectangular device in her other hand which she was staring at.

"Lady Natasha!" Thor went over to give her a hug, much to the woman's dismay.

Jane set down the suitcase and then put the rectangle in her pocket. She glanced up at Loki and then stopped. Loki immediately regretted not running. But she had seen him so he just stared her down.

The amount of colors her face was changing was actually pretty funny. The Midgardian apparently couldn't stay focused on any one emotion long enough to create words. Loki wondered how long it might last.

"You son of a bitch!"

Apparently not that long.

Jane stomped her way to the god, "you died! I swear to god, you died! You let us believe you were dead! How could you? Have you even a single shred of …of…decency in your thick skull. You made Thor cry! You made me cry! Why?!"

Loki opened his mouth to make a comment on Thor crying but was cut off with Jane's slap. He chuckled and grinned, "I missed you too, Jane."

Jane looked about ready to slap him a second time.

"Brother?" Loki looked up to see Thor staring at him in shock.

"Thor," Loki said evenly. If he had the magical capability at that particular moment, Loki would have made a double and ran like hell. But sadly that required more magic than he was willing to spare at the moment.

"Brother!" Thor came forward and Loki tensed. Immediately Loki felt the tree trunks that were his brother's arms encircle him. He frowned and look past the arms to see Jane's death glare. Loki was suddenly pushed back and Thor held his upper arms making Loki wince. "I thought you dead!"

"Is that why you chose to leave me on some deserted planet?" Loki growled.

Thor stared at him, "you were not breathing brother. You had gotten cold and….discolored."

Loki looked at him confused. After a moment in dawned on him: frost giants. He had been gravely injured on that damned planet and had thought himself dead when he had passed out. Maybe he did revert back to his 'natural state' whenever he was gravely wounded. "Cold as ice?" Loki asked and then stared down the brute.

Thor looked at him confused. It was pitiful to Loki, watching the man have a thought. "I did not realize…" Thor shook his head. "But you are alright!" He gripped Loki by the head and pulled them together so their foreheads touched. "You are alright!"

"More or less," Loki muttered. Thor chuckled and pulled him into another hug. A much tighter hug which made several of Loki's bones pop. Loki grunted with pain and Thor released him.

"Brother, you are hurt," Thor steadied the slightly wobbly Loki.

"I am fine," Loki grimaced. "Just stop touching me."

"Why do you not use your magic to heal yourself?" Thor began to look Loki over. "Has father taken it away?"

"Odin-"
"Father"

"-has not." Loki ground out.

"Then why?" Thor frowned. Loki glared at him. "Are you that gravely injured?"

"I will heal in a few days, no need to-" Loki was cut off as Thor pushed him to the couch.

"You need rest. You are weak," Thor darted off and returned with bread.

Loki pushed it away, "I am perfectly capable-"
"Then, why not use your magic?" Thor asked more forcibly.

Loki looked up at him and stared into the idiot's eyes.

"You are low on magic," Thor frowned.

Loki pushed Thor out of the way and stood, "it will return quickly. Until then we have bigger issues to discuss."
"What had led to this?" Thor asked.

"There was an attack on Asgard yesterday," Loki told him. "Do you remember Thanos?"

"A child's story mother told us so we'd stop sneaking out at night," Thor frowned.

"It comes from a real prophecy, one in which Thanos comes back from Hell to devour all 9 realms," Loki crossed his arms. "He led the attack on Asgard."
"How do you know? Father told you?" Thor demanded.

"Actually I told him," Loki frowned. While he was sleeping.

"Father made no mention of this last time I visited," Thor frowned.

Loki gave a half smile, "That's probably because you didn't speak to him."

"What do you-" Thor stared at him, "what did you do?"

"He fell into the great Odin sleep, what was I supposed to do?"

"Not RULE ASGARD!"

"You didn't want it!"

"That-that's not the point!"

"You left!" Loki ground out. "Mother is dead and by all accounts I was dead too."

Thor looked murderous.

"If it became known that Father had fallen ill as well then Asgard would have been attacked by more than just Chitauri," Loki told him.

"Father?" Thor honed in on Loki's slip. He frowned when Loki gave no answer and then asked, "Chitauri?"

"Chitauri is Thanos' army," Loki explained.

"I thought it was your army," Thor frowned.

"Did you ever stop to think where I went to when I was gone?" Loki asked angrily. "Heimdall couldn't find me, if he even bothered to look."

"He looked, we all did." Thor told him.

"Thanos is real," Loki said. "And it was through him that I was able to escape that Hell."

Thor fell silent. He had never thought that Loki was living in a Hell dimension. "He helped you escape?"

Loki nodded, "with my powers and his combined I was able to jump out of Hell itself."

"Why would he help you?" Thor asked.

"Because I was helping him," Loki replied. "I was to remove any obstacle of his coming to Midgard. Kill them, weaken them, rule them-it didn't matter."

"You put Earth into chaos to save your sorry ass?" Clint asked.

"One does tire of getting to see their spine from the gaping hole in their front," Loki bit out. "Yes, I let the creature 'help' me. A spell that made our powers one temporarily while controlling me." Loki pointed to his temple. "I don't like being controlled that much, which he found out once I had escaped."

"Why not use this spell on himself?" Natasha asked.

"He's cursed to stay and I wasn't," Loki said simply.

"So," Clint spoke, "exactly what prevents you from betraying all of us and running back to your master?"

Loki grimaced at 'master,' "If you will recall, I failed that particular mission. And I am now to 'long for something so sweet as pain.'"

"You will help us?" Thor asked.

"Looks like," Loki sighed. "My knife will find my own throat before I am forced to live in Thanos' nine realms."

Can you sense the brotherly love between them. Imagine being brothers for 1000 years. Ooh this is going to be fun to write.