This is an unbeta'd chapter, since my beta is very busy and I didn't want to make you wait any longer. So please, forgive me for the mistakes; I hope it's still readable.

Margaret: You'll see what Loki is actually doing. And no, he's not a straight up antagonist, he is just in his own team. About the spell having much more dire consenquences than Loki intended, you're not wrong. In fact, that will be showed in the next chapter. Thank you for your comment!

Thank you so much for the comments and the favs, they brightened my days! And special thanks go to cara-tanaka for her help. Enjoy your reading!

Chapter 25: Burning rage

Tony woke up panting.

As soon as he opened his eyes, he found himself in Loki's bedroom, which was familiar by now. There weren't any children, nor was there Pepper, or Rhodey or the Avengers. There was only Loki but the memories still hadn't left his conscience.

Inside his head, he was still fighting against them, against the ghosts he had fought day after day in the solitude of his dark cell, where Schmidt had been holding him.

At that time, the oppressive silence had worsened his desperation, because there hadn't been any distractions and all he had been able to do was think about his horrifying guilt. He hadn't had any alcohol to alleviate his anguish with, to muffle his senses and his thoughts with. But he had craved it more than death, more than a rescue, more than a night without nightmares. Even now, he felt too sober to bear his memories.

The awareness of what he had done – the children's blood on his hands and their screams and Schmidt's laughter and his never ending horror – was so vivid it seemed like someone was putting a burning brand in the open wound in his chest. He needed some alcohol, some way to lose himself, to forget.

He stared at the god without moving or speaking. It took him a couple of seconds to realize that Loki was real and wasn't the ghost inside his mind who was about to rip his Arc Reactor out from his chest. The god wasn't even reaching for it, since he had both of his arms alongside his body. He was still taller, more dangerous and more concrete than he had ever been.

"What... what the hell did you do to me?" he asked Loki with a rough voice, like he had been screaming for hours, and maybe he had, deep inside his mind.

He was still tasting sand and blood inside his mouth, choking with the memories from Afghanistan and from his fight against Schmidt.

"You did not obey, so I took the information that I wanted in the most suitable and effective way".

Loki's voice was angered, like he were accusing him. If Tony had been more in control of himself, he would have caught the warning in his words and the way the god was panting. But he wasn't in control, he was furious and desperate and in pain, and all he could think was that Loki was the one who had made him feel so awfully bad.

He stood up with trembling legs, hating the god more than the day Loki had tried to invade the Earth.

He was still weak because of the torture and the malnutrition, but his anger was burning his muscles and his chest and it granted him the strength to move faster than Loki or himself had anticipated.

"You, son of a bitch!".

He was on him in the blink of an eye, tackling him with such violence he managed to make the god falter. He had already lifted his right arm to punch him – I'll kill you, you fucking bastard, I'll kill you! – when Loki recovered from his surprise and threw him against the wall.

While Tony was struggling to breathe after the violent impact, Loki lifted his fingers and two dark chains appeared from nowhere, binding him to the wall with each arm on one side of his head.

"Remember your place, mortal".

It was a warning and a threat, spoken with a low, dangerous voice that meant death wasn't so far away, but Tony didn't care. Not when every fiber of himself was screaming and burning with self-hatred after Loki had woken his worst memories.

"Fuck you!" His back hurt, his throat hurt, his whole body hurt and what he wanted the most was to be free so that he could rip the god's heart to shreds barehanded. "You're a damn coward!"

He was so furious he couldn't even find proper insults anymore. His wrath was burning his lungs at every breath, he was struggling against the chains without caring about the pain. He just wanted to feel the god's blood on his hands and to hush the accusing voices in his mind with Loki's screams of pain.

How dare Loki violate his mind? To dig into his soul and to relive what he had tried so desperately to forget?

While he was tensing in vain against the chains, shouting insults he didn't even understand, the god took a step forward, coming so close, Tony could see his furious, upset reflection into Loki's green eyes.

"Be silent, Stark, or I will silence you forever".

Like he could care about the crazy god's threats, after what Loki had done to him.

"Fuck. You".

He barely realized that Loki wasn't looking at him with his usual pleased detachment.

There was the dangerous rage of a wounded animal inside his eyes and even his hectic movements were a sign that Loki didn't have his usual self control. Even through his own hatred, Tony could see an inexplicable resentment from the god.

And that only served to make him angrier.

He was the one hurt, the one who had been violated. Not Loki.

"You didn't have the right to fucking rape my mind, you bastard! You're just a sad, little shit who is jealous of his good broth-".

Loki's hand was suddenly on his throat in a bruising grip, muffling the end of his sentence. Tony could feel every finger pressing so hard on his skin that he knew he would show its mark for days. That is, if the god didn't kill him sooner.

He fought against his grasp, but he was livid, not scared.

Then, Loki strengthened his grip until he couldn't breathe anymore, and Tony found himself slowly losing consciousness.

But he didn't care.

At this point, he cared about nothing.

He didn't think he would ever want to kill someone with such intensity, in his all life. Maybe his tormentors in Afghanistan, maybe Vanko, maybe Hammer, that idiot that had put Pepper in danger with his silly jealousy and his absurd attempts at being better than him.

But now, he felt he needed to kill the god more than he needed to breathe.

To dig his nails, his whole fingers into Loki's flesh, to tear him apart, to leave him lifeless on the floor. So that he could erase all of the memories that Loki's violation had awoken in his mind.

Even Loki's hand on his throat hadn't any relevance compared to his own hatred.

He struggled once more, while his lungs burned and his sight was slowly becoming unfocused. He didn't care to die if he could hit the god just one time.

Guided by his instinct, he tried to knee him in his groin but Loki shifted to absorb the impact with his thigh and, to Tony, it seemed like he had hit a brick of marble.

Then, he didn't have the strength to fight anymore. Without the suit, he wasn't strong enough to break the chains and felt like he was a ruffled, growling heap of an empty shell that once had been Tony Stark.

Finally the grip on his throat became an insuperable obstacle for his will of remaining conscious to rebel again, and everything disappeared into the darkness.

I know it was short, but next chapter will be a lot longer than that and I'll try to update in a week or two at most. Thank you for reading, I hope it wasn't a disappointing chapter.