This chapter describes a suicide attempt and a very depressed Loki. If this might trigger you, please don`t read it.Take care of yourself, please.

"Sir?"

Loki cringed. He remembered the strange thing that spoke out of nowhere. Stark called it an Artificial Intelligence and Clint had explained to him what it`s capable of.

"What?" His voice was cold.

"Please put that back and return to bed."

He more or less fell to the floor, placing himself with his back leaning against the bed. He couldn`t stand any longer. His body was weak and it made him curse. "Why should I?" It was hard to breath, his chest was hurting with every breath like the rest of his body and he was trembling.

"Because if you didn`t intend to use the scalpel to create arts or crafts I couldn`t think of any use of it that wouldn`t force me to alarm Mr. Stark. I assume what you are about to do will harm you. Especially considering how you arrived here and aren`t cured nowhere near enough. And it will hurt. Again."

"I hope so."

"I`m afraid I don`t understand, Sir."

Loki sighed impatiently. "It don`t matter. Everything`s fine. What was your name again?"

"JARVIS."

"So, JARVIS, please stop bothering me."

"I`m instructed to keep an eye on you. So this is your last warning before I call Mr. Stark or organize medical treatment."

"No! What I want you to do is, to shut the fuck up and leave me alone!" Loki thought for a moment if he had heard this words from Barton or from Stark. His voice was calmer when he added: "Please, leave me alone. And no Stark! There`s no need to call him. You don`t understand this. I`m a god. This is necessary. It`s fine. Just leave me alone. You don`t understand."

"As you wish, Sir." And the AI went silent.


In his workshop Tony was working on his suit and was deep in thoughts when JARVIS approached him."Sir, Mr. Loki told me to shut the fuck up." Tony laughed given the diction. "But he is about to get injured again. By himself, I should add. I`m afraid he will try to commit suicide."

"What the fuck? Show me the camera footage of the room."

"Yes, Sir." The design drawings and calculations in front of Tony changed instantly to the picture of a more than ever pale Loki. He still sat on the floor in the long-sleeved hospital gown. His whole body looked tense and was trembling at the same time. In the short meantime between his conversation with JARVIS and now he had managed to sink the scalpel into the flesh at the inside of his left forearm and struggled to cut through it with an unsteady trembling hand. His body was shaking even more as blood started to drip to the floor.

"Fuck!" Tony jumped to his feet and started to run. It seemed to take an eternity for the elevator to reach the right floor and to run to the room.


Alarmed by the noise Loki cursed in a foreign tongue, jumped up and turned his back on the man that rushed through the door into the room. He tried to calm himself down, while he let the sleeve slide over his arm and hid the scalpel under some medical supplies with a precise and surprisingly fast movement. The fight-or-flight response seemed to work for gods, too. He took a few unsteady steps away from the door.

"What`s now, Stark?" He tried to speak calmly but his voice was betraying him, shaking and revealing how much strength it took him to speak through the pain.

"You tell me, Loki!" Tony screamed.

"Nothing. Oh, and you mustn`t forget to remember me to disassemble your damn JARVIS. Everything`s fine. So go back to work, I don“t wish to talk to you at the moment."

"And I don`t give a shit. You will talk to me."

Tony had stepped behind Loki, grasped him at the shoulders and turned Loki to face him. The god gave a wince of pain at the sudden movement. He looked worse than before. Bloodshot eyes and gritting his teeth. His eyes wandered around nervous and restless. Tony grasped his wrist firmly and managed to roll up the sleeve despite the miserable attempt of resistance. There were cuts of various depths. Irregular, conducted with shaking hands but nevertheless badly bleeding. It was only Loki`s current weakness that had prevented substantial or fatal damage. And it was luck, that his right arm still healed from an open fracture and wasn`t fit for use. Tony could feel that his stomach seemed to knot itself and a lump formed in his throat. This shouldn`t have happened. I shouldn't have left him alone like that. Stark was angry about himself and about the trembling god equally.

Loki looked embarrassed, shame, fear and growing anger alternating his facial features. "That`s nothing, you pesky mortal." he hissed. "Go away. Leave me alone." And let me end what I started. He tried to turn and free himself of the grip on his arm but he was too weak to succeed.

"No. That`s the one thing I will not do - leave you alone. I`m here and I will not go away before you tell me what the fuck is wrong with you! I saved you from dying, so I won`t watch you cutting yourself into ribbons now. Tell me, what the fuck is wrong with you?"

Loki screamed and took a fast step forward, pushing Tony out of his way. A laughable push compared to the strength he once had. But Tony took two steps back to leave him some space. "It doesn`t concern you. Go away! You can`t help me and even more important, you shouldn`t. Oh and before I forget, this pain and blood is by far better than this agonizing burning in my chest and in my head, that breaks me from the inside out in thousand pieces. And better than everything waiting for me if Odin or S.H.I.E.L.D. or whoever gets me." His voice has gotten louder with every word, that the yelled at Tony."I would prefer to ram a blade in my heart and feel all blood draining out of my body. I just don`t have the strength now to cut through my stupid ribcage or I would just do it. Everything repeats itself over and over again. I`m done with failing and getting punished for it. Yes, there is nothing that makes up for the horrors, they are a part of me and they will never go away. Never. So if you`re not going to kill me, there`s nothing you can do. I am a monster. I should have never lived. I was meant to die. He should have left me there. It would have been better for everybody. I would have never felt that pain. I am a burden and should be dead. I should have had the dignity to die instead of fighting for my life. But I did it nevertheless again and again and it brought nothing but pain and destruction. Especially to me. I can take no more. I`m a monster. I don`t deserve to be alive. I understand it now, took me long enough.

The magic she taught me was the last good thing I had left. And it`s gone. Like everything else. I`m useless and at latest now I`m worthless. All that is left is the monster. I can`t change that. Everything broke and this is all that`s left. I am not willing to suffer any more without cause and I can`t deny that I`m a failure. So kill me or let me do it, at least, Stark." His words sound harsh but even more than that exhausted and plain desperate. Loki painstakingly breathed and sank to his knees, he wasn`t able to stand any longer. There was no power left. He tried to steady himself by resting his weight on his hands but he trembled like a leaf. Pathetic. He felt like drowning in the tidal wave of desperation and embarrassment.

He looked a lot like he did, when Tony found him. Bleeding and barely breathing. Wounded. Broken. He looked like he was going to fall apart.

Tony knew this feeling. To some extent at least. His life wasn`t just unicorns and rainbows, not by a long shot. As long as he remembered, he always felt alone. Dominated by his cold, calculating and violent drunken father. When his parents were killed in a car accident just Obadiah Stane was left. But still nothing a bottle of whiskey, scotch or vodka or some companion in the bedroom couldn`t cure, huh? Afghanistan might have been something worse. After being wounded and kidnapped he underwent surgery without proper anesthesia, got tortured and there are the other things, that happened there, that he never told anyone about. Like losing Yinsen. Obadiah had betrayed him. He had to kill him to survive. Others followed, trying to finish him off. He fell out of the sky, escaping death by an atomic bomb or by hitting the ground by the skin of one`s teeth. The darkness up there followed him sometimes into his dreams adding a new chapter to his nightmares. But after all he was still standing. While Loki seemed to fall right now here in front of him, getting shattered by the impact. Tony felt for the underdog, empathy for the god that radiated desperation. He knew this feeling. Regrettably. So Tony sighed and decided to try and help.

"Listen, Loki. You found your way here, I don`t know how. You were so badly injured that it was just your stubborn will that kept your body alive. You were shattered to pieces and nearly drowning in a pool of your own blood. But you fought. With a strength I`ve never saw before. You`re now here. Still breathing. Hell, you even managed to get out of bed and cut yourself despite the fact you shouldn`t have the strength to do so. Everybody else in your condition, even Thor I assume, would be dead." Loki cringed as he heard the familiar name."Yes, you`ve done horrible things. I can`t deny it and I won`t. And I`m sure I don`t even know half of this things. You`ve done mean things to me, like throwing me out of my own window. And we`ll talk about this, believe me, because this sucked. But I choose to not take vengeance for it when I found you lying in pieces in your blood. You survived and it is a mystery to me how, but you survived. I, too, shouldn`t be alive unless it was for a reason. Find your fucking reason. Just don`t give up now. That`s not your style. You fought until now, you can keep on doing it. Don`t give up."

Tony wasn`t sure if Loki was still listening. He was silent. But he lifted his head and looked at Tony and for a moment Tony thought he could see a small spark between all these pain in his eyes. Then Loki lost his conscience and collapsed to the floor.

"JARVIS, when for fucks sake did I volunteered to be the shrink of a Norse god? I will quit if I get thrown out of a fucking window again, I swear! What did I do to deserve this anyway?"

"I have a few suggestions of an answer, Sir."

"Save it!"


When Loki woke up, he was lying in the hospital bed again. A big bandage covering his forearm. "Good Morning, Sir. Mr. Stark instructed me to tell you, in case you`re searching the scalpel you`ve used, it`s gone and he will be back in a few minutes. He advised, you should do nothing he wouldn`t do." JARVIS` voice told him. Loki just lay there and waited, his eyes closed.

Perhaps five minutes later he heard steps and then Tony Stark`s voice.

"Life sucks sometimes. Often. Yes, life can suck for long stretches of time. Life can kick you in the nuts. Again and again. But there are things that are just marvelous and gorgeous, too. I think I understand your pain to some extent but you will not kill yourself in my house. It`s a rule that is not up for negotiation. You're worth more. I can give you shelter but you won`t kill yourself or me or anyone else while I do so. You`ll help me understand what happened in New York, I will keep you alive and safe. That`s the deal. Think about if you can accept it. I`ll be back in an hour to hear your choice." And the footsteps went away.

An hour later Loki agreed to the deal.