Thank you again for reviewing, Kiiriminna and Silvermane1!
It is so hard to keep from typing Thanatos (a relatively harmless Greek god of death) instead of Thanos (galaxy's largest ass-hole). I've combed through the story and I think I caught it all but please tell me if you've found that or any other mistakes.
"Omygosh, that's adorable." Tony laughed teasingly. He kept his voice just above a whisper. If Loki heard him and woke up, Bruce would kill him. Then the god would raise him from the dead and kill him. Then maybe he'd give Bruce another chance to kill him, as a honeymoon present.
Banner reluctantly tore his gaze from the still faintly glowing grass to glance at his patient. "That's not really what I meant when I told him to rest." The doctor said drily. "Sleeping like that is murder on your back."
Loki was deeply asleep in one of Tony's lab chairs, which had been specifically designed to keep the sitter uncomfortably awake during long, tedious nights. He was too tall, and his head was craned painfully over the back of the chair, exposing his bird-like neck. The young god was snoring slightly.
"Like a butterfly punching you in the face," Stark continued, his eyes shining with dramatic, and fake, tears. "Or the first bloody scratch from a kitten." He sniffed and drew one filthy hand across his cheek, leaving a black smudge. "That's the sort of face you'd let get away with genocide. Oh, wait."
Bruce opened his mouth to defend the sleeping Loki, and paused. Loki had committed genocide, one of the worst war crimes humans could dream up. Not only had Loki slaughtered an entire race, but he had tried to do so three times.
"Loki hasn't got away with it," He countered instead. "His father branded and whipped him, and who knows what else." The argument felt weak. Should he defend Loki, after everything he had done? Could he not defend Loki, after everything they had been through?
"And Hitler was bullied in first grade," Tony snarked, but he still looked faintly worried. He puttered about with a few more pointless tests, avoiding Banner's eyes. "You, ah, you don't think Thor's dad did any of that, you know, before?"
Yes, I do think that, the doctor thought. "We could ask Thor, but he might not tell us."
"Mmm." Tony labelled the magic grass samples and copied down the results of his last test before meticulously cleaning up. Bruce knew the inventor only tidied up when he was avoiding a particularly sticky thought, and remained silent. The room was quite save for the soft snuffling of Loki's gentle snores. "I, I looked up some legends after New York. Do you want to hear what Loki did to a goat?" Stark grinned mischievously, but it didn't hide the hollow worry in his expression.
"The thing with the goat's beard?" Bruce asked sarcastically. "Sure, let's just wake Loki up first and ask. Can you see him doing that?"
Tony winced. "Point taken."
The doctor let the tension build. He could tell his friend was trying to scrounge up the courage to speak some certain painful idea. Banner hoped dearly that Loki didn't somehow wake up at the wrong moment and break the fragile peace. Tony licked his lips nervously and gathered himself.
"What about his kids?" He mumbled in a small voice. "You think that's just myths and stuff?" They both glanced quickly at Loki, not daring to breath. The young god didn't stir.
"Mr. Thor is approaching the lab, sir." JARVIS whirred, interrupting the moment. Bruce noticed distantly that JARVIS reacted to Thor the same he had to Loki. No change in inflections, sentence structure or emotion.
"Tell him to be quite and let him in, Jarv." Bruce suggested. Thor wasn't allowed in the lab without permission anymore. He had tried to fix a laptop with Mjolnir.
The door slid open and Thor slunk in. He glanced about shortly before his eyes settled on the sleeping form of his little brother. He smiled and crossed the room silently.
"Hey, Zapdos." Tony greeted him. Bruce snorted and mouthed 'Pokemon?' "Shut up, Brucie, it's fitting."
Thor was used to having earth's many idioms and references fly over his head, and hardly noticed Stark's nicknames anymore. "I am surprised my brother would slumber in your presence, my friends." He commented in a less booming voice. The thunder god brushed away the wild black curls from Loki's blank face, a strangely timid expression on his face. "We were once great companions, and trusted one-another as we did no other. Perhaps we shall be again." He murmured hopefully.
The two mortals shared a look. Theoretically, they knew Loki and Thor had been inseparable brothers for thousands of years but seeing the affection in practice was baffling. Tony hesitantly cleared his throat.
"Thor?" The thunder god looked up. He knew Stark well enough to recognise using his real name was a bad sign. "Does, uh, Loki have any kids?"
The massive blonde froze, his wide blue eyes shooting towards Loki. The mischief maker snuffled in his sleep. Thor slowly moved away from the chair as though it was a proximity mine and gestured to Stark and Banner to follow. Once they were outside the sound-proofed lab, Thor resumed breathing.
"Anthony Edward Stark," He said severely with a face like a storm-cloud, "if my brother had heard you, the All-father himself could not spare you. I say this as your friend. Never mention Loki's children in his presence." Bruce watched Tony through the corner of his eye. The self-proclaimed genius had wilted anxiously. They had their answer, but Bruce needed to know more.
"What can you tell us?" He asked insistently. Thor's blazing gaze turned on him but Banner didn't quail. Loki's glare was far worse.
The Aesir deflated at Bruce's clinical tone and scratched his chin nervously. "If Loki hears-"
"He won't, and we can't help Loki until we know what he's been through." The doctor consciously slammed a lid on his emotions. He figured whatever he heard wasn't going to be pretty.
Thor was no story-teller. He told only the facts he knew, trimmed no thorny truth; Fenrir, imprisoned; Jörmungandr, exiled; Hel, exiled; Váli, (and here Thor choked slightly) dead; Sleipnir, enslaved. By the end of the list, his throat was tight and his eyes watered. They were his niece and nephews, though Thor had never thought of them as such before. It was starting to settle in how he had failed his little brother over the years. Of all Loki's children, Thor had only met Váli and Sleipnir. Váli had been a studious young boy, much like his father in looks, and Sleipnir was a very fine, er, horse. They hadn't deserved their fates.
Tony was looking up at the ceiling, blinking uncomfortably. Bruce had his hands clasped tightly over his lap and was thinking calming thoughts.
Stark cleared his throat. "Odin is an asshole," He croaked. Thor didn't have the strength to bridle against the comment and in any case, he privately agreed just a bit. "I thought- How the fuck did he get away with all that?!"
"There aren't human, Aesir, whatever." Bruce uttered expressionlessly. "A wolf, a snake, a horse- they only saw monsters, didn't they?" What could people do to Bruce, without so much as a flicker of guilt, if SHIELD wasn't protecting him? If the Hulk wasn't protecting him?
What they had done to Loki, he guessed.
"Dammit," Tony cursed under his breath, "I'm sympathising with the mass murderer." The three loitered sheepishly, trapped in their own thoughts and uncertainties. "Is Barton here yet?"
"Yes. He is with Lady Romanoff." Thor mumbled, looking lost. He wasn't used to the human tendency to 'change subjects' at the first heavy word. "She asked me to watch Loki."
There was a pause as, in a single shared move, they turned to face the closed door.
Stark giggled hysterically. "Whoops."
Loki was dreaming. It must be a dream, he thought, because he was free. There was wind buffeting his feathers as he skimmed over an endless golden field. The sky was clear and almost painfully blue. He could see figures moving below him, familiar and beloved shapes loping, galloping, slithering or running in the shielding shadow of his wings.
The wind grew fiercer and the blue dimmed into a purple-grey. Rain pelted Loki from every side, obscuring his view and thunder crashed around him, vibrating in his bones. He swooped desperately, lower and lower in search of the ground, but the field was gone. Empty blackness sucked at the edges of his vision, panic pooled in his chest and tore out a great piercing cry-
The door swung violently open, jerking Loki awake. Thor stood in the frame with Mjolnir raised in the air, ready for battle. He drew up short when he realised the young god was still sitting in the chair.
Loki, caught in the grips of a nameless terror, jumped to his feet. A thousand years of fighting along side Thor had ingrained in him the strong instinct to gravitate towards big blonde men wielding hammers and he flitted without thought to the thunder god's side. "What's happened?"
Thor looked down at his swaying, bleary-eyed, half-asleep little brother and flushed ashamedly.
"Nothing, minn smár bróðir," The thunder god said soothingly, taking Loki's elbow. The pale sorcerer was, fortunately, far too drowsy to fight back and allowed himself to be lead over to Tony's emergency cot and laid down. Loki had gone beyond merely tired and was in the realm of 'almost literally dead on his feet'. The godling closed his eyes and just barely kept his head above the tide of sleep.
Tony tip-toed quietly over with Bruce at his heels. Banner took Loki's abandoned chair and took off his glasses to rub the bridge of his nose while Stark drifted over to the pair. "I didn't know gods needed to sleep." He teased feebly.
"Not often, friend Anthony, but my brother is exhausted. Seiðr takes much from its wielder. My father sometimes spends weeks resting in the wake of some expensive magic. Loki will sleep for some time." Thor went to sit down on the cot and knelt down beside it instead after a moment's thought. The Aesir scratched his chin uncomfortably. "He was frightened," He murmured gently, "when I opened the door. Why?"
Tony rolled his eyes. "You charged in with a raised hammer and you wonder why he was surprised?"
Thor's face crumbled. "Loki was frightened of me?"
You stupid oaf, Loki thought dreamily, you couldn't scare a pheasant. He knew it wasn't strictly true, but few people had ever accused Loki of honesty.
Stark hurried to reassure the deflated thunder god. "Surprised by you, he's probably used to you waving Mew-Mew at him."
If anything, Thor fell apart even more. His lower lip quivered. "Yes, yes, he must be used to it. I have been careless with Mjolnir and Loki often suffered for it."
Where in the Nine Realms did that come from? Loki guessed they were continuing some previous conversation and felt a lick of anger. Some people made it so hard to spy on them.
"At least you know now," Bruce pitched in kindly. "And you won't do it again, will you?" The human doctor managed to inject as much warning and disappointment into that simple sentence as the All-mother herself. Warmth bloomed briefly in Loki's skinny chest.
To the magic-user's surprise, Thor nodded earnestly and swore, "Never again, my friend. Never."
Ever making promises he can't keep, Loki assured himself shakily.
Stark wandered back to his lab, struggling to keep the sound down and simultaneously offer Thor the privacy of loud noises. Loki felt a hot breath ghost over his ear and the tickle of the Aesir's hair over his cheek.
"Ek harmr minn mistaka," Thor rumbled, "I will not repeat them." He heaved a great sight and moved reluctantly away.
Loki's last thought, drifting down into the embrace of oblivion, was that he had to see his children before he faced the Mad Titan.
Just in case.
Loki also possible had a kid named Narfi or Nari or had twins, who knows. Váli himself is also referred to as a Son of Odin or brother to Loki in some texts. Basically, I have no clue how accurate I'm being but at least I know I'm wrong somewhere and that's the important thing.
minn smár bróðir- my small (little) brother
seiðr- spell or enchantment
Ek harmr minn mistaka-I grieve my mistakes
Please review! Kind words sustain my angsty soul!