Chapter 28 - Epilogue: Part One

Note: The epilogue is split into three parts ;p

Trigger warning: mention of self harm.

The first few months were the worst. Tony struggled with looking after Jareth and even had a few breakdowns when he got too frustrated about doing something wrong. He had no clue how to take care of a baby, and had to rely on the help of mainly Pepper and the other Avengers, who had been a little angry at first when learning that it was also Loki's, but then very understanding and helpful. Though it was a little rocky to start with, Tony soon learnt the roles of how to care for his child properly, and was coping. Just.

Within the first year or so, there were times where he'd pretend he was alright during the day for Jareth and the other's sakes, then as soon as he'd tucked him into bed and waved the others off, he'd sneak off and hide somewhere as he cried, letting out all the pent up emotions he'd schooled so he wouldn't worry anyone.

He missed Loki more than anything, and found it difficult to be a first time father alone.

Eventually though, he had stopped the secret crying. It was on one occasion where Bruce had found him in an unstable condition, bleeding while holding the culprit knife in his own hands, that he'd been referred to a therapist. That had helped. Quite a bit actually. He was put on medication for a small while and Jareth stayed with his family in Asgard, but over time he gradually got better. He was only taken away for a few months, as Tony was determined to make a speedy recovery so he could see his son again. When Jareth was two, he was back living permanently with Tony again. By the time Jareth was four, Tony was completely fine.

While recovering though, Tony had found visiting Loki had helped tremendously.
Mostly on his visits after the rough patch, they would just sit and talk about Jareth and his life, with Loki listening intently and trying to imagine what the tales had looked like to live them. They also had their fair share of make-out sessions, but hadn't gone much further due to the glass windows surrounding the cell, and the fact Loki's magic had been sealed so he couldn't hide them from view while they did more. He missed the both of them too, and had apologised a lot when he'd heard of Tony's condition during the earlier years.

Tony had never found anyone else. He couldn't. He knew Loki would return to him one day, and he prayed that it wouldn't be too long. He wished that Odin had sentenced him to an exact amount of time, instead of being kept in the dark, never knowing which days he'd wake up alone, or whether Loki would be in his arms once more.

As Tony had aged yearly, but not physically, he found it more and more difficult to hide his immortality, and was forced to announce it to this world. This also caused him to say about his relationship with Loki, and their son Jareth. Needless to say, quite a lot of the press and his fans were outraged by these facts, but over time they had settled down and were eventually just accepted.

Jareth had gone to school just as a normal Midgardian would have. He grew at the normal rate one would too, so Tony knew he'd have to ask Thor for an apple someday. He'd asked on one occasion when this issue had become clear around his tenth birthday, but Thor had shaken his head and told him the youngest age someone could take the apple was in their twenty first year alive, or it could be harmful. Tony didn't want to cause his son pain, so had agreed that an apple would be granted on his twenty-first birthday.

After the announcement about their situation and Tony's immortality, they'd had a surprisingly little amount of trouble caused by it. There had been one occasion where a kidnapping had occurred, but Jareth was quickly rescued back, and there thankfully hadn't been another incident like it.

Natasha and Clint had taught him to fight, as had Tony too. Self defence, what to do in certain situations, things that would come in handy if he ever had to use it against someone or something. Bruce had also started doing yoga with him too, as Jareth had expressed an interest in it. Unfortunately for the poor doctor, that was not the only interest that the boy had taken with him, as he'd also inherited Tony's natural curiosity and stupidity, which was shown by the various times he'd tried to provoke the Other Guy into making an appearance. Tony laughed when he'd heard what Jareth had tried to do, and was secretly proud of him for following in his footsteps, even if he did have to outwardly scold him for appearances sake. It was around that time that Natasha had become pregnant with Clint's child, and had given birth to a boy called Orland.

Growing up, Jareth and Orland had stayed close to one another, and by the time they looked nearer the same age, the two had become best friends. Practically inseparable. By this point, the Avengers had long since moved into the tower, each owning their own floors as if it were an apartment block with one or two communal floors build in. Somehow, they always ended up congregating on Tony's floor though. They didn't know why, it just happened.

Steve had adopted a daughter from a German orphanage after he'd been there on a solo mission, and had worked with and saved the girl who'd rubbed off on him. Her name was Claire and she was an age in-between of Jareth and Orland. The three were close, and had even started up a band when they had all left school. It was pretty popular, most probably because they were the children of the Avengers, but nonetheless, they had their small time in the spotlight before they gave up. Orland and Claire were only human after all, and they wanted to do all the normal human things: university, earn a stable income, find love, and settle down. They'd always had the offers of joining the Avengers, but only Jareth accepted.

He'd always missed his mother, though not as much as Tony did. He loved visiting him and hearing tales from his past. When he was younger, he'd always ask when Loki was getting out and returning to him and dad, but Loki would always smile sadly and shake his head, saying soon. As he grew older, Jareth knew this had been a lie, and when he was old enough, Tony told him the story of how he and Loki first met, along with the tale of Loki's 'crimes'. Jareth was surprised and had gotten annoyed at his grandfather for putting Loki in there, but Tony managed to calm him down and he eventually and begrudgingly accepted it. Just as Tony had done.

Until his teens, Tony assumed that Jareth would maintain a human form, despite the fact that his eyes often shifted quite a bit from red to green and back again. Then there was an incident. It was a cold winters day, and Jareth had been out with Tony, Orland and Clint, playing in an ice hockey match with the three cheering him on from the side. He liked the sport a lot, and had gotten into the regional team. At the end off the match, some kid had pushed Jareth onto the ice when he'd taken his gloves off, which caused his hands to turn blue from the direct contact. As this was the first time it had happened he'd freaked out, but Tony was quick to console him. He'd eventually calmed him down a bit after Tony had explained out him that this was normal and was completely fine. The blue had spread all over his body by the time they'd quickly returned home, and when they were alone in their apartment, Tony had told him about Loki's true heritage.

He'd read up on Jötunns in the years before, so if something like this ever happened, he could be prepared. He didn't want the same thing to happen that happened to Loki: being led to believe Jötunns were evil monsters that scared little children like the bogeyman. Jareth took some time getting used to it, but he eventually accepted it and even began to test out and use his powers to help his father in the Avengers.

As Jareth grew up like a human, going to schools, learning to fight, making friendships, falling in and out of love, Tony's life had a new purpose: to make the Arc Reactor the world's main source of clean, efficient energy. By the time Jareth had taken the apple, Tony had managed to succeed, and only then did he sign his company over to Pepper completely. Seeing as he now had an extended lifetime, he didn't want to be tied down to his company forever, and the Avengers missions and tasks had almost completely taken over his time, along with looking after Jareth and visiting his lover on Asgard, he had seen no point in keeping it after this point. He'd managed to complete his main objective, and he knew Pepper was more than capable enough to maintain the company and manage it. She had eventually found love in form of his former driver Happy, and the two had started a family of their own. Tony had no doubt that Stark Industries would one day be passed on through her family, and he couldn't be happier for it. He knew Jareth was never interested in it, and that Pepper was ecstatic when she learned Tony was giving this to her.

A few years before this had happened, Tony had a brief encounter with a man called Aldrich Killian, who had apparently worked with Pepper before she worked for Tony. The man had used the image of a terrorist called the Mandarin to scare the world while he conducted experiments on people's brain to make them superhuman and re-grow limbs. Only problem was that was the test subjects tended to explode more often than not. Jareth had been taken from Tony and injected with the Extremis, but because of his Jötunn heritage, he was able to calm the fire within him and harness the powers as new abilities. It was quite an achievement, and strange thing to happen. He was the first Jötunn to be able to harness both ice and fire as his personal elements. Loki used magic, but Jareth used his body and mind.

Jareth had also inherited Loki's knack for magic, and after lessons from his grandmother, and theory from his mother in the cell, he was able to harness new powers for himself. Tony had also tried to learn a bit of magic himself after learning that it wasn't completely impossible for him. He wasn't a natural like Jareth and Loki, but he could master a few spells and was slowly learning. He'd made Jareth a suit, or several as he improved the designs, after feeling a little annoyed he was getting all of Loki's powers. Jareth loved the suits, and over time had found a way to incorporate all four powers into his fighting style. A fire-powered Jötunn with magic and a suit of armour that flew and gave him a bit of extra power. With this and Tony in his own suit with the little amount of magic he had, the two were virtually unstoppable.

The next few years beyond that were quite quiet compared to the time before and after them. Jareth had taken off for a few years to travel and experience the world. He'd even joined the military for a bit, which had worried Tony to no end, but he trusted his abilities and had been safe. He was half Jötunn after all. He was discharged with second and third degree burns up his left leg and arm, after being caught too close to an unemployed bomb while scouting a town, but had managed to take most of the manage and contain it to save his teammates. Thankfully though, he had healed and recovered fast due to his heritage. He was left with scars though, but he wore them proudly as a reminder of the good he'd done.

During this, Tony had devoted his time to researching and memorising Asgard's laws and history. There was a lot to cover, but it kept him occupied and stopped him from worrying about his son too much. He also taught himself Elfish, with a little help from Loki and an Elf from Álfheimr called Rispan, who Loki had befriended centuries ago and referred him to for lessons. Loki had told him that the Elves were a race more focused on crafts and skill, which had sparked Tony's interest. He was even considering going there one day to learn some skills first hand and try his own.

The depression he'd felt for the first few years of Jareth's life had returned to him around this time too, although he didn't attempt to hurt himself. He managed to console himself by keeping himself busy and sociable with the others.

Twelve years after Jareth was old enough for the apple, Hydra was exposed with S.H.I.E. ranks, having been growing in secret since it was founded after the second world war. After Natasha and Fury unlocked the S.H.I.E.L.D database and leaked classified information about the Hydra agents, the Avengers had become separate from the organisation and began fighting against the soldiers. Unfortunately in doing that, that had leaked every single secret S.H.I.E.L.D to the world, including Natasha's past. It had taken several years for the public to completely put their faith back in the Avengers after that, but after defending them from various Hydra, Doom and various other villain's attacks, they had gained that trust back.

By this point, half the Avengers had aged considerably. Natasha had managed to take on the Hydra mission at 62 years old, which was pretty amazing. Clint had also aged but hadn't been a part of this mission in the end of it. And in fact, that was the mission that caused his downfall. He'd been sent off with a team of what he thought was S.H.I.E.L.D, but had turned out to be Hydra. The team had grieved their loss but regardless, had carried on and fought in his name.

As he got older, Bruce found it more and more difficult to recover after the Hulk transformations, so had gained a purpose in creating something to cure him. It had taken a few years, but he finally managed to create something which had cured him. He'd regretfully retired from the Avengers then, moving to South America with his old girlfriend Betty, whom he later married.

With the loss of both Clint and Bruce from the Avengers team, they had felt a little lost with the smaller ranks, and the team felt unbalanced. Tony and Steve were the only two really actively fighting, with Jareth helping when he could, and the same with Orland and Claire. Natasha tried her best to help out, but she wasn't the same woman she once was, so had to be more careful the older she got.

A few years after Hydra, Jareth had gone back to university. As a teenager, he'd followed in his fathers footsteps and managed to get into MIT at the age of 14, which was a year earlier than Tony had done as a child. Tony had been extremely proud when this happened, and even more so when he came out of it at 19 with two masters degrees in electrical engineering. Because the Mandarin incident had occurred in the middle of his studied, he finished a year later than he would've originally, after having to recuperate and harness his powers so he wasn't as threat to his coursemates.

With the universities later on, he went twice over the course of eight years, studying Music and language. He mostly went to the human universities to learn more and expand his knowledge. He had made vague plans to try and learn as much as he could from this world, before exploring and learning from others.

Loki had told him tales of the Nine Realms, telling him about the worlds and creatures that inhabited them. Jareth had made Tony promise that when Loki was freed from his Asgardian cell, the three of them would travel throughout the universe together. Tony had thought this a good idea, and after talking about it with Loki on one visits, they had agreed in was one thing to do once he was freed.

Over fifty years had passed in total, and in all that time, Loki still had yet to be released. Tony knew that his sentence was more likely than not going to be a very long time. Or at least until he was dead, which had thrown Odin a little when he'd learnt of Tony's immortality. As it was a done deed, and there was no reversal, he'd let it slide. What was perhaps a little worrying though was that for the past few years, he had not heard from Thor nor been to Asgard himself. He was worried, but in his current position stuck on Earth, there was not much he could do to find it out.

Natasha was an elderly woman, and as much as it pained her to admit it, she could not longer fight with them. She helped Steve with training possible new recruits to help Tony, Jareth, Thor and Steve when she was gone. By this point, the serum had worn off a little more, causing Steve to now look a similar age to Tony. His strength had stayed and his muscle definition, but now his age and alcohol tolerance were catching up with him, and slowly turning him to just an average guy. That didn't discourage him, as he'd vowed to always help out as long as he could.

Their children, Orland and Claire, had ended up together and had even begun a family of their own. They'd named Jareth godfather as he was still their best friend, which had please him greatly. They didn't deny how weird it felt that he still seemed to be 21 and they now looking over double his age, but none of them cared. Orland and Claire still looked up to the half Jötunn as if he were their older brother, and Jareth feared the day where their mortality would run out. He knew it was inevitable, but he tried his best not to dwell on it, knowing that it wouldn't do any good.

During the episode with Hydra, Steve had been reunited with his friend from the last, Bucky Barnes, or the Winter Soldier as he was also called. The man had been brainwashed into forgetting Steve and being made into Hydra's puppet, but with the help of his best friend and time, he'd slowly begun remembering the truth and adjusting to the world he was now living in. Steve had helped him a lot with that, and as he'd been injected with a serum similar to his own, he was also the same age, albeit slightly younger, than Steve. The soldier had developed a crush on his old friend as he helped him, and had turned to Tony for help on how to handle it, as he wasn't aware he was gay before this and didn't know what to do. Tony had helped him with the situation, and had even helped set the two up. They now worked together with Natasha and the recruits. Bucky was also an Avenger.

This brings us to the now present, and focusing on Tony and Jareth at this point in their lives. Tony, being 95 years old but still looking the same as he'd done 55 years ago, was currently lay on a sofa in his living room reading a book on Jötunns. It had become one of his favourites, seeing as both his lover and his son were Jötunn. The race had always intrigued him, and he still found it strange how Loki never accepted the beauty in his true form. He hoped his time in the cell might change his opinion of this, but he guessed if not then he'd just have to convince him otherwise.

Jareth was currently living with him again, taking a break from his travel and studies to spend some time with his father. Well, not that he was doing that at this moment. It seemed the boy had inherited his father's (and probably mother's too) playboy ways. He was a handsome young man, and like his parents, had the pick of both boys and girls when it came to games and activities in the bedroom. This day was no different, except that Jareth had found a young girl which he had been seeing for a fair few months. Tony had met her once and had found her to be charming and funny, so all in all, a good match for his son. He didn't say anything like that pout loud to her though, and had merely thrown in some of the old Stark charm to show them both that he approved.

The two were meeting for a date today, so Tony had been left alone to entertain himself. This book in particular was one he'd read often when he missed Loki and Jareth wasn't around. Jareth looked more like Loki now he'd grown; same eyes, same facial structure and the same mischievous smirk on his face when causing trouble, although he had certain features like his nose and chin which were clearly inherited from Tony. Annoyingly, he'd gotten his tallness from Loki too, and towered over Tony slightly.

His hair was still the same colour as Tony's, although the style was nothing like either of theirs. It hung down over his face hiding one eye, and came down to the middle of his neck. He had always had the ability to willingly change eye colour, but favoured his red eyes over the green ones. This was because of how openly he accepted his Jötunn heritage. Tony had often found him over the years wandering the house fully or partially blue, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. Which for them, it was.

It was the early hours of the afternoon when Tony heard the elevator ding open and someone entered. He assumed it was Jareth returning from his date at first, but then frowned to himself as he realised he'd only been gone an hour. So unless something hadn't gone as planned, then it must be one of the others. He couldn't be bothered to lean up and look over the sofa back, so just tried his luck to see if he could guess who it was.

"You're back earlier than expected, Jare? Everything go alright with Sarah?" He called out, returning to his book but keeping an ear out for a response. He was surprised when he was met with a silence instead of an answer. "Hello?" He tried again, but still gained no answer. He heard the faint rustling of clothing though, so he knew someone was in here with him.

He tensed slightly, his mind now racing to think of who it would be. He shut his book and sat up quickly, placing it down on the glass coffee table next to him before standing and turning. He turned with a frown, but when he saw who it was standing there, his eyebrows softened their glare and his mouth dropped open in surprise.

The man standing in front of him offered a kind smile in return, his eyes lighting up the moment their gazes met, and Tony could feel his heart explode with both relief and happiness. He stared to tear up, unable to stop himself as he looked at the man standing in front of him, looking perhaps a little beaten up and worn out with longer hair, but otherwise no different to the last time he'd seen him in his armour 55 years ago.

"Loki..."