The next day, Loki seemed overly content with himself. He displayed a smug little grin while sitting at the breakfast table with Bruce and Tony, and after some minutes, the engineer couldn't stand it anymore.

"Would you care to explain me what makes you that happy?", he asked. "It's too early to be in such a good mood."

"Oh, you should know in about, I guess, a minute", the god answered, grinning.

"Now you're scaring me. Does it have to do with Bruce?" The doctor stared at his tea with a dreamy expression and smiled. "Because he looks creepy." Bruce raised his head and smiled at Tony while he took a sip out of his mug. Tony noticed his dilated pupils. "Loki, what did you do to him?"

Loki didn't get to respond because a voice from the hallway stopped every conversation.

"Who the fuck has the goddamn balls to pull off this shit?!" The next second, Clint stormed into the kitchen with a bundle of arrows in his hand. He growled as he spotted Loki and pointed at him with one of the arrows: "You!"

Only now Tony realized his problem: The arrowtips were heart-shaped and pink, and he was pretty sure there was something written across them although he could not read it.

Bruce ignored the yelling and smiled at his tea.

Tony didn't have the time to read the small, curved engravements on the arrows before Natasha entered the room, a gun in her hand. With a murderous expression she walked over to Loki and yanked his head back by his hair, causing the god to gasp.

"Tasha, what the hell are you –", Tony began, trying to reach out and stop her in time, but he didn't even get to finish his sentence before the Widow pressed the weapon at Loki's temple and pulled the trigger.

The whole kitchen froze for a moment, not even a breath was to be heard (aside from Bruce, who had started to hum a tune quietly), until they realized there had only been a soft plop and Loki was covered in confetti.

"Explain. This", Natasha hissed and let the god's hair go. He grinned, rubbing his scalp, and replied sweetly: "Oh, I am not sure. It appears you have not loaded it the right way, have you?" The spy's expression turned even more murderous.

"This is the point where you should run", Tony whispered, but Loki's grin only widened.

"Oh, but I am still far from finished!", he responded. "You might want to check your suit over."

The engineer gasped. "You—you didn't break anything, did you?", he demanded and received a small chuckle as answer.

"I can promise it will work just fine." Oh, because Loki seemed so reliable at the moment. And that sounded so trustworthy just now.

"I'm gonna try that now", he muttered and hurried towards the elevator that would bring him to the penthouse and the landing pod. He was having a really, really bad feeling about this. "JARVIS, how's my suit? Did anything bad happen to my baby?"

"The suit appears to be fully functional, sir", the AI replied, and did he only imagine that or did JARVIS sound amused?

Slowly, Tony made his way over the landing pod, piece for piece coming into place without any alarming sounds or events (like explosions or confetti showers). Eventually, he stood there fully armoured and nothing had happened.

So the trickster had decided to spare him – how kind.

Grinning and still armoured he made his way back to the kitchen, already hearing the yelling when the elevator opened. Judging by the deep, vibrating voice, Thor had arrived.

He heard Natasha, too: "You put what into Bruce's tea?!"

"Well, I did not want to make him angry", Loki replied. "To me, he looks very comfortable."

"That's because he's about as high as Stark Tower!", Clint shot back.

"I think he looks... happy."

The millionaire chose that moment to step into the doorway and the first thing he saw was Steve, dressed in his suit – or what had used to be his suit: Now it was made of skin-tight, shining black leather and had clips and chains everywhere.

Steve did not look happy. Hot, yes, but not happy at all.

He was scolding Loki, who seemed not really affected by his threats but more content with his work as he let his eyes wander down the well-trained body in front of him. Tony understood him. Some people would kill for that sight.

Next to the captain, Thor was complaining and Tony just had to laugh as he saw him; his blonde hair was made up in two thick braids with big red ribbons at the ends that apparently wouldn't come off. He looked like a school girl with a beard.

His laugh made the others notice him: Clint, who had been rampaging about the god writing "Phil Coulson" on the heart shaped arrowheads, looked up and his jaw dropped while Natasha, who had been busy with doing something about the confetti in her gun, burst into laughter.

"Holy shit, Tony", Clint laughed, "you should really wear that more often!"

"What?", the millionaire asked, confused, as the whole kitchen started to chuckle. "In case you didn't notice, I'm wearing it all the time when we're out on the field."

"Look, it's the iron fairy!", the archer exclaimed and eventually Tony lifted a hand in front of his face to stare at it.

At his hand.

Down at his suit.

Back at his hand.

Back down at his suit.

His pink suit.

"Mischief managed", Loki announced, beaming widely.

Then he spun on his heel and ran for his life.