Rhodey's not sure exactly what has changed, but on his return to the compound things are… different. It's like a breath they've all been holding has finally been released, and while he wouldn't call the situation relaxed exactly, the atmosphere has definitely improved.

The afternoon he gets back he finds everyone in the kitchen. Tony pokes distractedly at a tub of takeout as he manipulates a circuitry blueprint on the display in front of him. Vision is at the sink washing dishes and is the only one to offer Rhodey a hello.

It's the third person in the room who stops him in his tracks as his is hand halfway to opening the refrigerator door.

Loki sits at the breakfast bar entirely unconcerned by Rhodey's entrance. As if that wasn't unusual enough in itself, his attention is focused with single-minded ferocity on the sub in his hands. The almost indecent efficiency with which he's devouring it is a sight to behold.

Rhodey looks meaningfully at Tony across the room, who without meeting his eyes simply shrugs. When Rhodey then turns to Vision he receives a pleased smile that borders on smug.

Okaay, Rhodey thinks, and without further comment fetches himself the soda he's been craving all day. He leans back against the counter and tries to hide his fascination behind an appreciative first pull at the bottle.

"Was your trip productive?" Vision enquires politely, and Rhodey has to tear his eyes away from the spectacle of Loki neatly unwrapping a second footlong.

"Um, sure," he manages intelligently. "It went great."

Vision doesn't push for more, well aware that the debrief will have to wait for now. They're playing safe, keeping Loki out of earshot. If they're right it's probably unnecessary, but if they're not… doesn't hurt to be cautious.

Rhodey's pretty confident he's nudged the right people in the right direction, although he's going to have to be careful about how he confirms the desired effect. Something he intends to get Tony to look into, provided he can tear his friend away from whatever this shiny new project is that has caught his attention.

What they really need is intel. They need connections, funding streams, affiliated groups. They need to know what (if anything) has been achieved by their friends out east, what's been shared, and what's been done with whatever's been learned. And they need to know how to stop any of it going further.

Rhodey has pointed good people at the problem, but what comes back might be out of their hands. If that's the case he wants to make sure he, Tony and Vision are in a position to act on it first.

"Hey, Loki," Tony calls over his shoulder, breaking Rhodey's reverie. "C'mere a minute."

Loki rolls his eyes with a long-suffering air that suggests this isn't the first time he's been asked to inconvenience himself recently, but to Rhodey's surprise he sets his meal down and approaches Tony at the table. Tony points at something on the glowing screen, and the two of them move closer together to study it.

Rhodey leans in discreetly to Vision as this happens. "So…" he says, gesturing vaguely towards the pair at the table. "This is… new."

Vision dries his hands off on a towel. "I understand our guest and Mr Stark are collaborating on a project of some kind. They appear to have had a 'heart to heart'."

It's still weird to hear Vision use idioms like this, especially when the way he pronounces them gives them obvious air quotes. Rhodey frowns. "Should we be worried?" he asks. The question is at least half serious.

He watches as Tony produces a pair of shades and thwaps Loki in the chest with them. "Here," Tony says, barely paying attention. "Try these on for size."

Loki stares at the man without moving to take them. "You have got to be joking."

The bickering that ensues ends with Loki crossing his arms and Tony looking sullen, but to Rhodey's increasing wonder no blood is spilt. Tony agrees to work on something else, clearly aggrieved at having to do so. He mutters something about entitled higher beings and punctuates this by invading Loki's personal space, crudely measuring the side of Loki's head with the span of his fingers. Loki endures this for a moment before irritably swatting the offending hand away.

Rhodey watches this open-mouthed.

Vision rests a hand on his shoulder. "Welcome back, Colonel Rhodes," he smiles.

o0o

The room Tony has commandeered for this little experiment is large, mostly empty and located in one of the unused wings of the facility. Judging by the set up it was last employed as an assembly area of some kind, a screen and projector still awaiting use and gathering dust on the far side of several rows of seating. Between them, Rhodey and Vision push stacks of chairs against the walls to create a space big enough for the visual tech to work unhindered. Something to do with providing a blank canvas, Tony had said. Less for the brain to seize on and try to populate with matching scenery. Rhodey's not entirely clear on the specifics, but he gets the gist.

If he's honest, Rhodey's still not entirely sure about this. He gets what Tony's trying to do, he does, and God knows having something to concentrate on has done wonders for Tony and Loki both, but there's a niggling unease there that won't go away.

Of course Tony is keen to push ahead. He's invested now. It's his idea and his design. He doesn't want to back down from a challenge and he wants to prove his theory could work. Rhodey's seen him like this many times before.

Tony tells him he should live a little. And Vision just seems to want everyone to get along so badly he'll go along with anything. But Rhodey… Rhodey's never been one to rush into anything without a damn good reason and a back up plan to boot.

Tony is putting the finishing touches to the improved tech he's worked up for Loki. The guinea pig himself looms at Tony's back, his gaze intense.

As Rhodey approaches, Tony leans in close to solder the last connector in place and sighs. "Would you stop doing that?" he says without looking up.

Loki ignores this and continues to scrutinise the work, prompting Tony finally to straighten and look at him. When he registers just how close Loki is to him he jerks back slightly.

"You are next level creepy, you know that?"

The smile Loki returns is almost predatory. Yeah, Rhodey thinks. He knows.

"Is there anything else you require?" Vision interrupts, and Tony casts a speculative look over the room.

"I think we're good," he declares. "Time to road test this baby."

The device he hands to Loki is small and compact, no bigger than a large coin. Loki inspects it carefully, apparently finds nothing too concerning, then raises an eyebrow at Tony.

"Really jam it on in there, right here," Tony instructs, tapping a spot just behind his ear. "Once the spike's in it's not so bad."

The look Loki returns is flat.

"He's kidding," Rhodey hurries to explain, sliding Tony a warning look. He takes a moment to think about it, then double checks. "You are kidding, right?"

The grin Tony produces isn't exactly an answer. "Just press it lightly and relax. The tech'll do the rest."

"Hmm," Loki says, doubtfully. "And what are we to expect? A charming scene from early childhood, perhaps?"

"Well that's kinda up to you, or your brain at least. This thing roots out the meaty stuff, the memories with meaning. Anything with enough neural pathways to suggest it's important and revisited often. Usually I'm able to direct things with enough concentration, but as you don't have anything, ah, in mind I guess you might say, we'll have to just spin the wheel and take our chances."

"And if we don't like what we find?"

"Just remember none of it is real. This will all be, quite literally, a figment of your imagination."

Tony claps what Rhodey is sure he thinks is a reassuring hand on Loki's shoulder and gives him a little push.

"Go ahead. Just like we practiced."

Loki purses his lips at this but doesn't say anything more. He moves off slowly to the centre of the room.

"I hope you know what you're doing," Rhodey murmurs to Tony from the corner of his mouth.

Tony flaps a hand at him but doesn't answer.

It takes a minute or two for Loki to finish steeling himself, but when he's ready he turns to face his audience and places the tech to his skin as instructed. Rhodey can just make out the liquid movement of nano tech as it expands outwards from the disc and sends a probing arm into Loki's hairline.

All four of them glance about the room, but nothing seems to be happening. Rhodey realises he's been holding his breath.

Tony peers at a handheld display glowing softly in his hands and frowns at what he sees.

"What is it?" Rhodey asks, although he's almost afraid to.

"Nothing," Tony assures him. "Just some interference. Lemme just… there." He stabs a finger at a couple of readouts and the air around them crackles soundlessly. It doesn't flicker so much as fizz, staticky and pixelated like bad dial up. The kind that asks to have a fist banged against it a couple of times. As though thinking the exact same thing, Tony slaps the flat of his hand against the tablet twice.

That seems to do the trick. Translucent lines coalesce and begin to slide into place, gradually building and connecting around them. Vision's eyes track the slowly resolving shapes with the crease of a small frown between his brows, and Tony scowls down at the readouts. Rhodey fixes his eyes on Loki at the centre of it all and feels a cold finger of suspicion trail down his back.

The guy looks nervous. He stands as though prepared to fight, or run, or maybe both. Although he holds still his eyes flick around the room, cataloguing every change and movement.

The walls smooth out flat and then crowd closer, the size of the space narrowing to one much smaller than the real space behind. A table appears, then a chair, then a number of screens, trays and consoles. The shining metallic surfaces reflect harsh overhead lighting. The sound of approaching footsteps echoes from beyond an unseen door.

The walls and floor are white. Loki's breathing is loud.

"Oh shit," Tony murmurs a fraction of a second before Rhodey can.

"Tony," Rhodey warns instead.

"I know, I know, turning it off-" Tony's fingers fly across the readouts, but before he can power the thing down Loki takes matters into his own hands. Literally.

He rips the device from his skin like it's a poisonous animal and winds his arm back to throw it.

"No no no, wait!" Tony pleads, but he's too late. As the pictures snap out of existence, the tech is already shattering into tiny fragments against the far wall.

"Aw man," Tony mutters regretfully.

Loki's shoulders are heaving, and when he whirls back around from the destruction he's just wrought the look he turns on Tony is murderous.

"Okay," Tony hedges, his hands held up. "I should've seen that coming. I miscalculated. You're right to be pissed. But let's just keep things constructive here."

Loki stalks towards them both with dark purpose and Tony backs up, pushing Rhodey with him. Rhodey's groping blindly behind him for something, anything, to defend himself with when the backs of his legs bump into a stack of chairs, bringing him and Tony up short.

"Get out of my way," Loki growls as he passes them, and the force with which he pushes through the doors they've just cleared leaves one of them swinging precariously on damaged hinges.

"Wow," Tony breathes after a moment of stunned silence. "I think a little bit of pee came out."

Rhodey takes a deep breath and just shakes his head. How Tony can makes jokes about this sort of shit, he'll never understand.

Vision approaches them, calm as you like, and gestures towards the route Loki has just taken. "Perhaps I should…"

"Let him go," Rhodey says. "Maybe just… keep an eye on him."

o0o

When Loki finds them again, he is stiffly formal.

"I apologise for my behaviour," he tells them, and the room goes so still Rhodey thinks he could hear a pin drop. "I should not have destroyed your equipment, and I am sorry to have alarmed you."

It's an awkward second or two before anyone speaks, and it takes an elbow to the ribs for Rhodey to persuade Tony it should be him who does.

"Er," Tony stutters, "sure. Don't sweat it."

"I wish to try again," Loki continues, then pauses. He lowers his eyes. "If you are amenable."

Rhodey exchanges a look with Tony, and to his credit the self-professed philanthropist seems to pull himself together.

"I can rig some replacement tech easy enough," Tony says. "Shouldn't take long. I think we just need to make some adjustments."

The breath Rhodey releases eases a knot of tension he's been carrying since this whole thing blew up. He closes his eyes for just a moment and fortifies himself for the objection he knows he has to make.

"Hold up," he eventually says. "I've gotta ask. Are we sure this is a good idea? I mean, what's to stop the same thing happening again? We're not going to learn anything we don't already know and I'm pretty sure none of us want to revisit that little scene again."

Loki winces and turns to brood at the windows.

"It won't happen again," Tony insists, becoming animated as he thinks. When he sees the dubious look Rhodey's giving him he railroads it with a slew of chatter. "I'm serious. I don't usually say this, so enjoy hearing it while you can, but I was going about it all wrong. I ran diagnostics on what data Friday managed to assimilate before the headpiece went to pieces - which, fine, my bad - and of course that was the memory it hijacked. It zeroed in on the heavy stuff just like it was programmed to do. I just need to recalibrate so we're looking at older neural pathways, not just the recent heavy traffic."

Rhodey steps closer to Tony and lowers his voice, mindful of the vibes Loki's giving off from the corner of the room.

"And if the rest of the shit he's got tucked away in there is no better?" he asks pointedly.

Tony puts his back to Loki and matches Rhodey's soft tone. "Come on," he wheedles. "This could really work. And anyway, we've still got Friday. We were never in any real danger back there."

Rhodey snorts. "Yeah. You were the picture of cool." Tony pretends like he hasn't heard, and Rhodey sobers. "I can't believe I'm the one telling you this, but you're playing with fire. Not to mention the guy's head."

That's when Tony cracks a crooked smile. "Then I guess we're breaking even."

Rhodey's pretty sure he doesn't mean it.

When they come to try again, it's with a solemn promise from Loki that he will conduct himself with decorum. His words, of course. Tony labours the point and declares he'll not build more tech if this one goes the same way as the first, and Loki accedes to this with a slight bow of his head as he takes the proffered device.

He doesn't hesitate at all this time as he presses the metal to his skin, a look of cool determination on his face.

The shapes that begin to form are entirely different this time. Gone are the geometric lines and clearly defined colours. There are no bright whites, edges or sharp outlines.

Instead there is a strobing, pulsing nebula swirling overhead, a meeting of thunder clouds and galaxies in pale hues of light. Snatches of images materialise within the maelstrom, fleeting pictures that hint at more beneath these vague outlines.

Most of it is incomprehensible, but there are impressions Rhodey thinks he recognises, or at least can extrapolate from.

A woman's face, her smile soft and gentle. Sweeping vistas the likes of which could not occur on Earth. Vast chambers, libraries and armories that have no equivalent in Rhodey's own experience. Glimpses of battles, disagreements and tender moments that leave him feeling like an eavesdropper, his ears heating as he looks on. And peppered throughout, impressions of what can only be Thor, his beaming face shining with the light of a thousand suns, or else darkened with disapproval, scorn or disappointment.

None of these images last for more than a fraction of a second, and the speed with which they flicker past is enough to make Rhodey feel nauseous.

Rhodey reminds himself that Tony's tech, as powerful as it is, has a job on its hands it wasn't designed for. Alien physiology aside, what they're looking at here is a snapshot of hundreds, if not thousands of years of memory, all of it clamouring for attention. That's a lot of information to assimilate and parse, some of it well beyond the realms of human experience. It is beautiful for all that, and even if it's not exactly what they were looking to recreate, it's a least a testament to the wealth of memory that lays beneath whatever barrier separates it from Loki's conscious mind.

"Oh cool," Tony breathes as he takes it all in, and Rhodey agrees. Vision is similarly entranced, reaching out a hand to pass through the projection above him. "Loki, are you getting this?"

Loki does not reply. Rhodey glances to him and sees why - his eyes are shut, a grimace of pain on his face that he seems to be trying hard to contain. He raises a hand slowly to the side of his head and simply stands there, caught up in something he seems unable to stop.

"Tony-"

"On it."

Tony pulls the plug much faster this time, and almost instantly the room is back in its original state. If anything Loki only grits his teeth harder, bending slightly at the waist as though being assaulted by something unseen.

Vision approaches him cautiously, a hand outstretched behind him to warn his onlookers back. All three of them zero in on the faint aura of weirdness floating just at the edge of their senses, like a creeping shadow that disappears when it's looked at directly. It's a heat haze, a shimmering layer of colour that the eye cannot discern. It defies definition, whatever it is, but it's clear that Loki feels it, and it's not pleasant.

Rhodey looks on as Vision murmurs something reassuring to Loki where he stands trembling as though enduring something he'd rather not.

Very gently, carefully, Vision moves Loki's hand over the device at his temple, coaxing him to unpeel the thing from his skin. He does so slowly, eyes still closed, and when the metal comes away he releases a sharp sound of pain.

Vision waits patiently until Loki opens his eyes and lets out a shaky breath, then with trembling fingers drops the device with deliberate care into Vision's waiting palm.

"Um, all okay over there?" Tony asks a little warily, but doesn't move to approach.

Rhodey can see what's about to happen before it does. Loki gulps in two breaths of air, turns abruptly and staggers forward. His outstretched hand hits the wall just in time to catch himself as he retches.

"Oh boy," Tony says next to Rhodey with a wince.

"Still think this was a good idea?" Rhodey can't resist saying.

It's a while before Loki speaks, but when he does it's with more conviction than his stumbling words would suggest. "There is something… something is wrong."

"Well yeah, I think we all guessed as much." Tony's sarcasm covers a nervousness Rhodey knows he feels. "I'm sorry it didn't work."

Loki is emphatic despite his obvious distress. "No, you don't understand. It's there. I can feel it all there, but I can't- Something is stopping me."

Rhodey and Tony exchange a brief glance that conveys a myriad of sentiment, none of it necessarily positive.

They're out of their depth. That much is painfully obvious. But if the gleam in Loki's eyes is anything to go by, this fact alone is not going to be enough to warrant throwing in the towel.

"I have an idea," Vision interjects before either Rhodey or Tony can form the right words. He looks Tony square in the face for a long moment, his eyes full of apology, and when Tony returns his gaze his face softens. "You're not going to like it," Vision admits, and Rhodey can only pinch the bridge of his nose against the oncoming headache.