A/N: After a too-long hiatus (blame college), I am back with more! Seeing as Iron Man 3 will be out in a month or so, I need to get this done and set up for Phase 2! Hope everyone's ready for the ride!

6: The Trickster and the Shadow

"Of all the people who could have come, I did not expect you."

I frowned darkly through the glass barrier that separated me and Loki. He was firmly locked in a cell that, originally, had been designed as containment for the Hulk, in case he got too dangerous. I doubted it would have held Hulk for long, much less led to his death by thirty thousand feet, but for Loki it was good enough for me. I crossed my arms and regarded him as coolly as possible, even though his back was to me.

"And considering you were going 'kneel bitches' back in Germany, you really don't look like someone holding all the cards right now," I replied in just as deadpan a tone. Loki turned to glance at me with a smirk, but I held my ground.

"And why should I?" he asked, gesturing around his cell amiably. "After all, I am so thoroughly contained in this…prison."

"'Cause you don't look like the guy to make things up as you go. Unless, y'know, all the planning and deliberation flew out the window when I punched you."

Loki chuckled at my sarcasm, and I dared to play along with a little smirk of my own. Of course Loki was dangerous. Of course he could probably freak me out. But I wasn't going to let him beat me in a game that was going to have everything I cared about put on the line. And then some. I wasn't going to let him catch onto that, though. He surveyed me quietly with his sharply-blue eyes that didn't seem quite right.

"You would like that, wouldn't you," he noted softly.

"Now why would I? Seeing as you have all the answers. Enlighten me."

I sat down in a chair, turning it around backwards before settling to watch him. Loki was watching me as he sat on his cot on the far side of the cell, surveying me like a sculptor would a block of stone. Or a crazy brain surgeon keen to look inside my skull.

"It would be a quick victory, to be sure," was his opening comment.

"No it wouldn't."

My insistence surprised him, and I kept my smirk in check. I could play this game.

"And what makes you believe that?"

"No plan makes you unpredictable," I elaborated carefully. If I was going to get a plan out of him he couldn't necessarily be suspecting of it. I learned this technique from one of the best. "If we can't predict what you're gonna do, you get the advantage. We respond without knowing the full board of the game."

Loki seemed slightly stunned by that, so I leaned forward in my chair and added, "And not even a comment on the fact we're really face-to-face for the first time."

He made one single chuckle, transforming his face into a glowing, confident smile. So he had a move to make.

"You are unlike what I expected," Loki complimented me, that smile never quite leaving his face. I frowned a little at that.

"And what did you expect?"

"…the same baseless arrogance as your brother," he replied, and my frown darkened. So that was what he was up to.

"You figured I was his clone, well, that shows what you know about me."

"What else is one to expect?" Loki argued. "When for all your life you've been compared to him, forced to put him on a pedestal for all your life as your model of what it is to be a Stark. Because you were never worthy to be accepted as your father's own child!"

My chest clenched at his words, even though I was trying not to let them reach me. I wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of knowing he'd gotten to me.

"I don't care if I'm worthy," I retorted as briskly as I could. "As a matter of fact, I couldn't care less what you think of me."

"But there is someone who did."

"And he's dead."

"Yet it haunts you still," Loki hissed. "You have let it consume and destroy you."

"Funny you say that while I'm standing right here."

"Yet that wound lingers, doesn't it? Festering."

"Let's stop playing 'get in Andy's head' for thirty seconds," I snarled, my grip on my chair tight. I wasn't going to let him get to me, come on, Stark, you can get this. "Where. Is. The Cube?"

Loki replied with an innocent shrug and hands spread from his sides, palms up, in a classic 'I don't know'. I didn't believe it for a second.

"I don't have it."

"That's obvious. I'm not that stupid."

"And yet you've no idea how simple, how stupid, your minds can be!" Loki laughed derisively, and I clenched my jaw. This guy was seriously starting to damage my calm.

"You seem to like insulting my mind."

"Only because it is worth the insult."

"Or maybe it's the only one willing to go toe-to-toe with yours."

"Willing? Or foolish?"

"Maybe a bit of both, I can't tell."

Loki snorted softly, definitely a contained laugh, as his smile reappeared on his face. Okay, this could be going better, but not bad. Yet.

"No, I find it is a mind smothered by the greatness of another," he spat slowly, his gaze locked on me, keen and vicious. "Why should the glory all be his, if you are so worthy as to receive the same favor, and did as much to win it? Instead, you were rejected…found wanting."

For a moment I wondered if he was talking about me or himself. I had a scary feeling that it was a close toss-up as to who his subject really was. Loki himself stood up and breezed towards the window slowly.

"…I don't think there is much difference between you and I," Loki said as he approached the glass that kept us scant inches apart. "None at all, in fact. You merely pretend we are so."

"And yet I'm not the one in a cage," I retorted, getting to my feet to meet his gaze. "Not to mention I think we're different on a much more basic level. Maybe my father didn't like me. But at least I know who I am and what made me that way. Can you say the same?"

"Oh, I can," Loki replied, but there was a coldness in his reply that made me think otherwise. I dared a smirk of my own.

"I think not. That's why you're gonna fail. You're building yourself up on hate and confusion and all because of that you'll end up in a deep, dark hole."

"…are all mortals so arrogant?" Loki asked, his brows folding in mock confusion. "Or is it only magnified in your family?"

Okay, good, he was losing steam, if he could only think of insults to throw at me in hopes of a response. I straightened myself up, ready to finish this once and for all.

"As greatly as I enjoy debating with you, there's still only one thing I wanna know," I sighed, brandishing one finger to make my point clear. "So either you can tell me, or we keep going in circles until we get our own answer."

"If I tell you, it only accelerates the inevitable."

"Yeah, well, inevitable isn't always carved in stone. Something will slip through your fingers and there won't be a thing you can do to stop it."

"Oh, I'm so terrified."

"It'll happen," I assured him with a shrug, stuffing my hands comfortably into my pockets. "That's all there is to it."

"…your overconfidence will destroy you," Loki hissed, is gaze losing all appearance of calm. "It is only a mask. Do you really think I have no idea who you are? That your flagrant profanities threaten me? All they are is a crutch with which you bolster your failed courage."

"Oh, I'm so scared," I mocked. Bad idea. He leaned closer, every part of his face seething with hatred and malice.

"Maybe not now, but soon you will, when I bring you the empty corpses of all those you held dear."

I stiffened with cold at the bare image of Tony dead in my arms. No. Loki's face twisted into a vicious grin as he came up to the glass.

"Yes, that thought haunts you…ever since you saw the poison in his flesh. Do you think I will be more generous than that? Far from it. Everyone you have come to love will die under my hand, languishing, while you watch. And when the last of them is nothing more than mutilated flesh, I will come for your precious brother."

A fist met the window between us, making me jump, heart starting to race. No. No, I wasn't going to let him get to me…but Loki's vicious eyes fixed my gaze as images of Rhodes, Pepper, Steve, even Moreau and Hogan, wasted and destroyed, flashed in my mind's eye. Loki's look never wavered as my horrified imagination found Tony.

"You will watch as he destroys himself, slowly, thoughtlessly," Loki spat, his voice low and grating, "in every way I know you fear. I won't even have to lay a hand on him because he'll do it all himself! And when he lies dead in your arms, you mewling quim, you will see that you let it happen in your vanity!"

I had to turn away from that gaze, shaking in horror and struggling to breathe. No. It wasn't going to happen. Not while I was still alive. I'd made a promise, and if Tony ever went down the road that he'd found while he was palladium-sick I'd drag him back even if it took me with him. I closed my eyes and forced myself to focus.

"…even if you do it, I'll never give you the satisfaction of seeing my pain, you soulless monster," I managed to spit. All it got was a scathing chuckle from Loki.

"Monster?" He laughed softly. "I am not the monster here. You brought it with you."

I turned to fix him a hard glare. Maybe we were the same person under different circumstances. But there was one thing I knew I wasn't.

"I'm not you."

I left at that, shaking as I reclaimed my Bluetooth. And I still didn't have any clue about what Loki's next move was; he had to have one, if he was in a cage that was practically indestructible –

I was nearly to my dorm to get more sleep when I finally got it. I had brought the monster with me. And what Loki had said when Fury went to talk to him, at the mention of Bruce, a beast making play at being a man…

"Mina, get Nat and Thor, Loki's going to try and wake up the Hulk and smash us right out of the sky!" I barked into my earpiece as I turned right around to rush for the lab.

"I alerted Natashalie, but there's more to worry about!" Mina reported as I jumped stairs and pushed through hallways. Why did the dorms have to be so damn far from my crazy brother? "Tony had Jarvis get through the SHIELD firewall and he's found Phase 2, Fury's en route and a lot closer than you are!"

"And you couldn't block Jarvis why?!"

"He was introduced as hard code and not a remote access, he was already in the system and just needed a way in!"

I swore before breaking into a real run to the lab. I managed to get there alongside Nat and Thor, but Fury was already there, as was Steve. It didn't take long for me to take stock of the situation: everyone already in was trying to find out why SHIELD had designs for WMDs based on the Tesseract, and Fury was, of course, trying to cover his ass.

"If everyone could shut up for five minutes?!" I barked before turning to Bruce. "Think you might wanna step out of the room, Doc, keep your cool."

"I was in Calcutta, if you recall, I can handle a bit of stress," he retorted politely, but briskly. I was able to glance at the nearest computer screen and noted a telltale flicker of Mina at work.

"Loki's manipulating you, has been since I turned up at your doorstep," I insisted. His dark gaze flickered warningly and I shifted my weight back uneasily. I didn't have my backpack why, again...

"And what do you call this?" Bruce asked sharply, motioning to the nearest screen. "I want to know why SHIELD is using the Tesseract to make weapons of mass destruction."

All eyes turned to Fury at that, and I couldn't help but wince inside. Thankfully I'd kept my signature off those designs, otherwise I knew I'd be getting a roasting, too. To be fair, Fury had gone through enough after the Avengers Initiative had gotten scrapped; it had been his baby, and I knew he wished that Phase 2 hadn't been selected. That was why he had tapped every single individual here for retrieving the Cube; it was a chance to get what he'd been denied through normal SHIELD channels. But at least he answered honestly. The problem with that was everyone first turned on him, then each other. Thankfully I was only affixed to watching and listening, managing to just barely keep my tongue in my head.

"Andy!" Mina piped up in my ear, and I was able to stop watching the chaos to focus on her. At least no one had tried to attack me yet. "Signals from the scepter, one wavelength focused here, and something close is tracking it, headed our way!"

"Dammit!" I spat, shaking my head as if that would stop Loki's manipulations. But by the time I looked back up, Bruce suddenly had the scepter in his hand and looked right on the verge of letting Hulk out on purpose.

"…Doctor Banner," Steve noted slowly, momentarily forgetting about arguing with Tony, "put down the scepter."

It seemed to make Bruce double-take in confusion, and he looked down at his hand to see it, obviously shaken. I exhaled slowly as the aura of the room definitely got less tense.

"…now maybe we should get out of here before bad things happen," I noted, but it was obvious Loki's manipulation was still on most everyone else when a large Stark console – obviously something Tony had had delivered – beeped successfully. We had a fix on the Cube.

"Looks like you don't get to see my party trick after all," Bruce muttered as he set down the spear and headed for the computer. I moved after him as everyone spoke up about who was best to go after the Cube – and Tony spoiling for a fight with Steve, dear God – and my eyes widened to see where the signal was. I glanced at Bruce, who was looking right back at me.

"That no-good son of a –"

"Andy!" Mina shouted right before a ball of flame burst up through the floor. I instinctively grabbed onto Bruce as the two of us were blown back into the airshaft on the other side of the windows backing the lab. I let go of Bruce just before we hit the grating on the bottom, debris raining down on us. I managed a few shaky breaths before pushing myself up a bit, enough to make sure my earpiece was still in place.

"Mina…what was that…"

"External explosion, took out one of the engines," Mina reported. "I think Loki's comrades turned up to get their boss out, and that was them ringing the doorbell."

"Mina, stop using bad metaphors," I grumbled, trying to pull my legs free of a pipe that was pinning my knees. I gritted my teeth as I tried to pull myself free, but an uncomfortable gasp made me pause and look over at Bruce. He was hunched over, fists clenched against the grate as he rocked back and forth, moaning in pain. Oh, hell no…

"…Bruce…Bruce, come on, don't let him out," I pleaded, still focusing my energy in getting my legs free. If Hulk came out I was as good as dead if I couldn't run. "You said you had him, please, Bruce…"

He managed to shake his head, and I could see a faint swath of green appearing on his neck. Dammit, no…. I dragged one leg free of the pipe, using my other foot to start levering myself out. I spared him another glance, and he shoved himself back onto the floor near the pipes. I was able to hear a bunch of mechanics on approach, but I waved them off as fast as I could. Okay, Stark, think, get him to not go into rage…

"Bruce, listen," I said, still trying to pull my other leg free, "I swear, you'll get out of this, just don't let him out…"

All I got in reply was a look back from him. Already his shoulders and chest had expanded, muscles rippling as his shirt ripped apart, and the fear in those dark brown eyes made me shiver. He knew, but at this point there was nothing that could stop the Hulk. I just barely managed to rip my other leg out from under that damned pipe as Bruce howled, the sound turning into an enraged roar as the Hulk staggered up, fists clenched and back arched, ready to attack the first thing he saw. I managed to stagger to my feet, but I knew there was only one thing I could do at this point.

"…hey, Mina, help me get away," I murmured into my ear. The micro screen deployed as Hulk turned slowly, growling, and as soon as I saw my first direction up the stairs behind me I turned and bolted. It was half a second before Hulk charged me with a bellow, and I managed to get out of his grasp and running hard through the bowels of the helicarrier as he smashed and crashed after me.

My day could not get any worse.