Sorry for the delay! There are many sob stories I could tell, but at the end of the day I just can't write when there's lots on my plate – sorry

On the plus side, it's now the summer holidays so I have much more time for writing! YAY!

"We lost. Alfheim has been destroyed."

They waited for Bruce to join them again before Loki explained himself more clearly. Jarvis had been left to keep an eye on Thor's condition but with the thunder God stable there was little more to do but monitor him, which left everyone else clear to hear what the hell had happened.

The story wasn't terribly complicated, which made it worse in the way; no great tales of betrayal or fights against desperate odds. They had simply been overwhelmed.

"They are not a foe I, nor anyone else, have ever seen before." Loki explained carefully. "The Elves of Alfheim are considered some of the best warriors in the realms, bettered only by Asgard, but…"

"But even the both combined couldn't win." Clint supplied for him, and the trickster nodded.

"Indeed. We were obliterated. Asgard lost a significant proportion of their army, and the Elves were decimated." He shook his head, lost and bewildered. "I watched the city burn. The creatures ransacked it, then razed it to the ground. We were being forced back towards the Bifrost site; there was no way any of us could have got to the populace in time."

Loki's tone of voice held something to it that most of the Avenger's couldn't pin-point. Some unusual quality that hadn't been heard before.

Survivors guilt.

"The city burnt, the civilians were massacred, and we couldn't do anything to stop it. I have never seen the like; at least not when fighting with such seemingly indestructible armies as the Aesir and Elves." The trickster leant his elbows on his knees and hung his head with a heavy sigh. "I have witnessed horror in battle before – I fought in World War One to say the least – but this was something else. To go into a battle assuming that we will be there for a couple of days at the most and simply sweep the foe aside and to then be slaughtered. It is…it breaks you."

"Will you be alright?" Steve's well-meaning question seemed to take Loki by surprise as he glanced up at the super-soldier.

"Me? I shall be fine, it is Thor I worry for. He has not lost in battle for a good few thousand years." A bitter smile crossed the trickster's face. "As you will recall I know what it is like to lose a battle."

"Yeah, but you weren't emotionally invested in that fight; you didn't give a damn about the chitauri. I guess you gave a damn about the Aesir fighting alongside you this time, though."

"Can we not go into the ins and outs of my mental state right now; I do not have the patience to deal with it, however well-meaning your intentions may be." If the words didn't get his point across, his tone of voice certainly did, silencing any other questions.

"Alright, you're wound up and have PTSD coming out of your ears, calm down and stop being an asshole." Loki glared murder as his husband slumped down beside him, but Tony didn't seem to care. "Calm down, deep breath and just…chill. Yeah?"

"And how, exactly, am I meant to do that?"

And then Tony's hand was on the God's back, a light pressure that was reassuring without being soppy, and there was a subtle change to Loki's posture as the stiffness left his spine a little.

"I worry for Thor." He admitted quietly.

"He'll be fine. I've got him on a fluid drip and he was already looking better when I left." Bruce said helpfully.

"It is not the physical aspect that is a problem. As I said; it has been many millennia since Thor was on the losing side of a battle and this time he lost friends. The Elves of Alfheim may have hated me and with good reason, but Thor had good friends amongst them and...It did not end so well for them."

"I'm sorry to hear that."

Loki shrugged listlessly. "People die in war – Thor had simply forgotten that it can be his friends as well as the enemy."

"Do you even know who the enemy were? What they wanted?" Tony asked quietly.

"No idea." The trickster glanced over at where Sleipnir had curled up on the floor, Evie slumped against the horse's warm side. "But they were taking no prisoners. It is hard to say what their motives were; from what we saw it was wholesale destruction. The city was razed to the ground and maybe they were looking for something or someone, or maybe they just wanted to kill everything in sight. I couldn't say."

"What were they? Chitauri?"

"Again, I couldn't say, although they bore little to no resemblance to the chitauri."

"They looked more like trolls." Sleipnir added helpfully, which drew strange looks. "You know? The mountain trolls and such like? They were huge – and bulky, as if their armour was part of them. No-one had ever seen the like. None of our weapons could bring them down – it was insane."

"There was no clue as to where in the realms they came from, if indeed they were from these realms. I would almost go as far as to say they were not a natural race at all but some sort of construct." Loki rubbed away a smudge of blood on his cheek with a tired hand. "I don't know. It was all such a blur; there was no moment to comprehend what it was we were actually dealing with."

Tony still had his hand on the God's back and he could feel the sudden shiver running through Loki as he spoke and the man leant in to knock his forehead on his husband's shoulder.

"Hey, did you even sleep at all? You said it's been two weeks for you; how much sleep have you had?"

"I couldn't say. A few hours here and there."

"Liar." Sleipnir rose to his feet, dislodging Evie, and limped over. "You barely closed your eyes in all the time we were there, Möðir." He nudged his nose into Loki's chest, knocking the trickster into Tony. "You didn't sleep. At the best you barely dozed for a couple of hours, and God or not that is not enough."

Loki batted his son on the nose, pushing him away. "Bully." But he certainly sounded half-hearted.

"Well, that sorts that then!" Tony slapped his hand against his husband's back. "You need to go to bed and sleep for a week and by then maybe Thor will be better and we'll be able to get a bit more sense out of you."

"I am fine-"

"Yeah, you're really really not." Tony smirked at the glare levelled on him. "Seriously. Sleep, eat and then we can do a proper debrief." He flicked a lock of his husband's filthy hair. "And let's add a shower into that list, because you smell like a slaughter-house."

"Au-de-battle-field." Loki said, and the smile playing around his lips showed that he agreed with Tony's description. "I must admit that my nose shut down some time ago."

"Lucky you." Stark grinned up at Sleipnir. "You too – food, bed and bath. Although the bath may have to be Jarvis hosing you down on the balcony."

"As long as the water is warm I will be happy with that. Am I sleeping on the balcony too? I recognise that this place is a bit suburban and is unlikely to have stable facilities."

"Well, since you apparently aren't very good with heights I'm gonna be nice and say that you can stay in here if you like." Tony waved a hand towards the deep-pile rug. "Make yourself comfortable and if this is going to be a regular thing I'll put some proper facilities in place for you."

Sleipnir glanced at the cream rug then down at his blood stained coat and nodded. "Thank you. I'll clean off first though."

Jarvis led the horse back towards the balcony in search of a hose – and the AI would certainly be able to reconfigure the plumbing for there to be some hot water for Sleipnir. Loki watched them go with tired eyes but he managed another smile when his son glanced back at him for a moment.

"Come on, you too." Tony looped an arm around his partner's shoulders and encouraged Loki up to his feet. "Shower, food and bed."

"I should-"

"You should listen to me. Come on."

The trickster shrugged the arm off. He would normally have given Evie a hug before disappearing for the evening, but given how filthy he was that wasn't really an option so he simply pressed a kiss to his daughter's forehead instead. Tony followed him from the room, rather feeling as if he was a lap-dog the way he was trailing behind the God.

"You know, now that we're out of sight you don't need to hide how crap you're feeling. Not that you were hiding it too well, but, y'know."

"Who said I feel unwell? I am simply weary."

"Bullshit." Tony almost found himself jogging to keep up with the long strides his husband was taking. "You haven't teleported to our room, hence you feel like crap." He walked straight into Loki's back as the trickster stopped dead infront of him. "Ow, watch it!"

"No. You need to watch it, Stark. I am fine. I just want to sleep."

"Do you Aesir even have a term for PTSD?"

"I will happily introduce you to another window if you do not shut your mouth in the next moment." Loki stalked off again. Tony rolled his eyes and glanced up at the ceiling.

"Jarv, could you set the shower running for him?"

"Of course, sir."

"Am I being too obnoxious?"

"I think you are simply experiencing what most of your friends have gone through with you throughout your life. Really, you could not have found someone so well suited to you if you had created them yourself."

"If you value your circuits you will never let Loki hear you say that."

Jarvis didn't reply, but Tony fancied he could hear the AI chuckle. He made his own way back to his rooms, slow enough that Loki could have had a chance to lock himself in the bathroom if he wanted solitude that much.

As it was when Tony quietly entered their bedroom the trickster had left the bathroom door open, a trail of strewn clothing scattered across the floor from the main room to the ensuite. The man sat down on the bed and reached down to pick up the discarded undertunic. It was covered in blood and muck – just like everything else – but there were tears in the fine material. Rips and slashes that suggested Loki must have healed himself after receiving the injuries, and had fixed his top clothes of the damage but didn't bother with anything that wouldn't show.

The man bunched the filthy tunic up into a ball with an angry sigh. Loki's definition of 'just fine' was about as accurate as his own when it came to injuries. He pulled himself up from the bed and gathered up the rest of the battle-stained clothing, sorting through what was beyond salvaging and dropping the ruined portion into the bin. The possible-to-clean bunch was thrown into the laundry basket to be sorted out at another time.

With as much procrastination out of the way as possible Tony gingerly knocked on the open bathroom door.

"Hey, want some company in there?" He called softly.

There was no verbal reply, but the curling steam that had been emanating out of the doorway suddenly wrapped around the man's waist as a physical force, gently pulling him into the room.

Loki was in the shower as expected, turned towards the wall and leaning his forehead against the cool tiles. He didn't react to Tony's presence in the room, despite the invitation, simply letting the water drum across his shoulders sluicing away the grime and filth.

Tony left his own clothes in a more orderly pile before stepping into the shower to join his husband. He didn't say anything, just pressed up against Loki's back and let his head fall forwards to rest between the trickster's shoulder blades.

"I'm sorry…" Loki turned his head just enough to be able to see the man over his shoulder.

"Nah, you needed me to shut up, not keep harping on at you."

"You were worried."

"I missed you."

"I did not intend for it to take so long."

Tony shrugged lightly, picking up the washcloth from the rack and beginning to wipe away the blood on Loki's shoulder's that the water alone wasn't quite clearing. "We were prepared for it to take some time. Birdy missed you too of course. You saw what she managed to do to her arm; she's too much like us – takes stupid risks when she's stressed."

"Who said I take risks?"

The washcloth paused for a moment and Tony laughed. "Uh, the chitauri? Having Evie? Marrying me? What do you call those if not stupid risks?"

Loki simply shrugged in reply.

"But yeah, we all missed you. Even Clint. And I kept Merlin in the loop too – he's a bit of a dick, but he really does give a damn about you."

"I have never doubted that he cares. Is he well?"

"I think so – it's not like he tells me much. Mentioned something about going to Italy on holiday so will be out of contact for a week or two."

The trickster chuckled softly. "Yes, he does like Italy. Spent a few decades there during the Renaissance."

"Oh? Let me guess; he was an influential part of the whole movement." Tony said with a grin. "A member of the Medici's? A Borgia?"

"Hardly. He went by the name of Da Vinci back then."

Tony paused, then laughed. "Of course he bloody did. I thought you said he hadn't left the UK much."

"A few decades out of millennia is not much. Merlin has been many people in his long life. A sorcerer can take many forms and he can fake the aging process well enough."

"Must be lonely; it can't be easy to continuously out-live everyone you know. I still can't believe you two don't spend more time together given the circumstances." The man pressed his forehead against his husband's back again. "It frightens me to think that that was so nearly going to be Evie's fate too; outliving everyone she has ever known or loved, over and over again. Just you by her side as one single constant."

"And you wonder why Merlin and I do not get along. I am an endless reminder for him that as much as he loves this world and its people he will never truly be part of it. He is not human and he hates me for that just as much as he loves me for being his parent." Loki turned around at last, forcing Tony to step back. "He pretends aging, cycling from youth to old master over and over – although his mind never changes, just his face."

"That's horrible."

"Life is never gentle, Tony."

"You really should bring him here, you know. We're all part of the immortality plan now – he won't be alone."

Loki smiled slightly. "He would never agree to that now. Maybe one day in the future, but not now. For the mean time the best we can do is keep in contact and let him know we are here if he wants us."

"We need to put him on the Christmas card list."

"You want to send the son of a Pagan God a celebration of the birth of Christ?"

"Well when you put it like that…" Tony smiled and brushed Loki's wet hair back from the trickster's face. "Maybe a Yule card then."

"Maybe." Loki leant in to press a kiss against Stark's forehead. "Now, I believe you mentioned sleep."

"You don't want to eat something first?"

"Not now, no. Food was less of a problem than sleep. One can eat standing up or on horseback."

The two men left the shower to find Jarvis had heated up the towel rail for them and the fluffy towels were just the right temperature. Normally Loki would have used magic, but this time he let Tony fuss over him instead – allowing that the man was not-so-subtly checking for hidden injuries. As it was, all wounds he'd sustained in the battle had healed up and the worst left were a few thin scars here and there that would no doubt be gone by the morning.

"Oh, by the way, I did manage to scoop up a birthday present for Evie."

"What? In the middle of an active war zone? Please tell me you didn't get our baby girl a severed head!"

Loki looked disgusted. "What could she possibly want with a severed head? No I picked something up during the war council on Asgard before we left for Alfheim."

"Weren't you meant to be in the war council?"

"It's called a clone, Tony. How else would I get anything done?"

It was a fair point.

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Whilst Tony slept better than he had done in the past two months, Loki did not find rest so easy. For most of the night he slipped in and out of fragmented nightmares, struggling to keep his mind from wandering back to the scene of battle. Eventually he gave up altogether and, as tired as he was, left his husband sleeping soundly.

It was only when he saw the door infront of him that he realised his feet had led him to the medical bay. It was possible his half-asleep brain had been subconsciously trying to bring him to Thor, since he had certainly been consciously worrying about him. The trickster slowly pushed the door open only to come up short when he saw Bruce by Thor's bed, taking some readings off one of the machines the blond was hooked up to.

"Oh. My apologies, I will go…"

"You don't need to. Here." Bruce motioned awkwardly. "He's doing much better. You didn't need to worry."

"I was not-" The clipped answer was almost instinctual on Loki's tongue, but he silenced the lie before he could finish it. "You are right. I believe I was worrying. How healed is he?"

"Getting there. I've got him on some fluid drips to replenish what he lost in blood and the wounds have sealed." Bruce moved away from the Thunder God's side. "Here, you can sit with him, if you like. You look like death yourself, to be honest."

"I am-"

"You are exhausted and have barely slept, despite everything. Sit down before you fall down and I'll get you a cup of tea." The doctor gestured at the chair by Thor's bed. It didn't escape his notice that Loki looked decidedly wary as Bruce pushed past him to replace the chart on the end of the bed. "You know, we may not talk to each other all that much but there's no need to tip-toe around like I'm a primed bomb."

"You will forgive me if our first meeting left a lasting impression on me."

"Of course, and on the floor. But I've not smashed your face in during all the years since, so please stop treating me like a skittish horse."

Loki had the grace to at least look slightly abashed as he moved up to his brother's bedside. Thor was looking so much better than when Loki had last seen him; although the thick wad of bandages were an unusual sight on the blond God.

"Is he unconscious or asleep?"

"Asleep. I did try knock him out earlier but none of the drugs worked."

"He and I have a different physiology to you humans – of course your drugs will not work."

"Surprisingly, I had come to that conclusion myself."

Loki reached out and – almost without realising – smoothed Thor's hair back out of the thunderer's face. "This is an unusual situation – it is usually me in the infirmary at the end of a battle."

"Thor doesn't normally get injured?"

"I didn't say that. No, normally I have healed everyone else and run out of energy for myself by the end."

"And this time you just ran out full stop."

"Something like that."

Bruce eyed Loki whilst the trickster stared down at Thor. Whilst Loki may have been quite a pale individual at the best of times the dark circles under his eyes and stoop to his shoulders said a lot even to someone who wasn't that familiar with him. Bruce still couldn't say he was exactly Loki's biggest fan, but the Hulk in the back of his mind no longer seemed to prickle at the trickster's presence and his empathy was much larger than any old grudges.

"Look. If you aren't going to sit down here, then let's at least get some food into you. Thor isn't going anywhere and I make a mean bowl of muesli. And I did offer tea."

Loki smiled slightly and dipped his head in a nod. "I must admit, food does sound good." He flicked his finger at Thor's nose, so that the minor cuts and scrapes healed up. "You are sure he will be alright?"

"He'll be fine. Although his ego may be terminally bruised."

"Well, somethings cannot be helped I suppose."

The two of them left the hospital bay with Jarvis softly agreeing to tell them of any changes to Thor's condition and made their way up to the main living areas. Through unspoken agreement they took the stairs – neither particularly wanted to be in the confined space of an elevator together.

Bruce started bustling around the kitchen, and waved off any offers of help. After all, it was hardly difficult to put together two bowls of cereal – although he had no idea what Loki considered normal breakfast fare. Wild boar probably.

"What type of tea? And how do you take it?"

The trickster cast his eyes over the selection in the cupboard then pulled out a box. "I grew fond of this the last time I was in England. It is best when strong, but with a good splash of milk." He waited for Bruce's nod then threw a teabag into each mug.

"You were in England much?"

"Enough. I prefer Scandinavia."

Banner grinned. "And that has absolutely nothing to do with the way they used to worship you, I imagine?"

"They feared me. Thor was the one they loved, and worshiped in their thousands."

"Bet that went down well."

Loki shrugged, pouring boiling water into the two mugs. "I backed the winning army, so it is not such a sore spot."

"Yeah, but still, you must…" Bruce trailed off, glancing towards the doorway at the sudden sound of piano notes. "Evie's up early."

"I didn't know she played."

"She's very good-" The Doctor winced at a sudden crashing chord and smiled wryly. "-usually." He waved a hand at the doorway. "Go on, I'll bring your breakfast in; you two need more time together than you've had."

The trickster looked taken aback for a moment, then inclined his head. "Thank you."

"Go on, I won't be a moment."

The piano music was fractured and when Loki followed the sound into the main living room he found his daughter attempting to play with an angry scowl on her face. Whilst her left hand was quite happy following the bass line it was obvious she shouldn't even be attempting to use her right, given that it was still in plaster and had to be extremely sore.

"I am sure Bach didn't score that for a broken wrist."

Evie jumped, then turned with a smile. "Möðhy, I didn't think we'd see you until the afternoon!"

"I was unable to sleep." Loki tapped the lid of the piano. "You never told me you could play."

The girl's smile turned self-deprecating. "Well, I'm hardly any good right now, am I?"

"Give me your arm."

"I thought you were out of magic."

The trickster's expression grew fond. "Not so much that I cannot now fix a broken arm. Hold still; this will feel odd."

"I know; you've done this before, remember?" She still winced at the feeling of her bones reknitting, though. "I don't suppose you've got enough in you for the ribs too, have you?"

Loki's sigh was that shared by world-weary parents across the nine realms. "Which side?" His daughter's grin was worth effort.

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Thor woke later that day – woozy and pained, but lucid enough for conversation. He was also more downcast than the Avengers had seen him – Loki's fears about his spirit being broken may not have been unfounded. Despite Bruce and Jarvis trying to say otherwise he insisted he was well enough to sit in on the debriefing that was called.

The story was the same they had heard the night before and Thor could add little more to it.

Asgard had received a frantic call for aid from Alfheim – all the more shocking in its urgency given the military might of the Elves – and mobilised their own army to come to their aid. Given the known strength of the Elves it shocked the Aesir to the core to be called upon for help, but that was nothing compared to their reactions when they arrived and found what had already become of Alfheim.

The villages and farms had already been sacked, any survivors fleeing to the citadel which in turn was burning.

The attacking hordes were stronger, faster, better. Their weapons were capable of more fire power and greater range, their armour repelled all but the strongest of strikes. They were the nearest thing to invincible anyone had yet seen. The Aesir army were as easily beaten back as the Elves were beaten down, and eventually the battle became a simple slaughter of all those who couldn't make it back to the Bifrost site in time.

"But why?" Steve asked for at least the fourth time. "There had to be a motive; were they after something, were they taking prisoners, were they after territory?"

Thor shook his head tiredly. "If we knew we would have said." He was propped up against a pile of cushions on the sofa – pale and quiet, and for once had let Loki do the talking.

"Didn't any of these things say anything? I thought the Allspeak let you understand any language."

The thunder God shrugged with one shoulder. "Not that I heard. Loki?"

"I never heard them say anything. But then again, I was hardly trying to He Hnin

make conversation."

"But, battle cries, calls for help, swearing or praying – that always happens at some point in a battle." Steve spoke from experience, both Rhodey and Sam nodding in agreement with him.

"I…" Loki started to say something, then stopped and frowned. "No, nothing." He glanced at his brother. "You?"

"No…That is strange, now that I come to think on it." Thor tried to straighten up then groaned, but carried on regardless. "I did not hear any of them say a word I understood."

"Allspeak not working?" Tony asked flippantly.

"It works on all languages."

Stark glanced over at Sleipnir, where the horse was tucking into a huge bowl of premium porridge oats. "Well, you said it didn't work on animals right, Sleipnir's a special case."

"Yes, so?"

Loki slammed his hand down on the table, making them all jump and drawing a concerned whinny from his son. "Enough! What is the point of all this? A realm has been destroyed, a peoples driven to the point of extinction and we are sitting around discussing this like…like a war-council!"

"Totally thought you were going to say committee right there." Evie called over.

"Do you think this is a joke, Evelyn?! People died! Good people! And there was absolutely nothing we could do and you are making jokes about it!"

The girl's eyes went wide and she gaped at the trickster. For a moment it could have gone either way; freak out and run off crying or freak out and scream back at him. Apparently screaming back was her favourite option – she was never one to really cry anyway.

"Well if you're gonna fuck off for months on end then roll up injured, Uncle Thor unconscious and telling us an entire Realm just got destroyed. Forgive me if my coping mechanism is to find a bit of fucking humour in this situation! War sucks, who knew?!" She gestured at the other stunned Avengers in the room. "And don't act like you are the only one to discover that! Dad went through hell in Afghanistan, Uncle Bruce has worked as a doctor in war-zones, Uncle Clint and Aunty Tasha have been through any number of conflicts, and Uncle Steve? World War fucking Two! And don't think that frost thing you're doing right now frightens me, because it really really doesn't, and is a bit of a dick move, to be honest."

It was entirely possible that Evie had never spoken to her mother like that. In fact, they both knew for certain that she hadn't. Sure her arguments with Tony could be the stuff of legend, but this was a whole new ball-park.

Loki stared at her open-mouthed, before slowly following her gaze down to the table.

His hands were blue and the work-top under them sparkled with frost. Tiny spikes of ice were just beginning to grow up and out of the surface.

"Oh…"

The heavy silence that followed was broken by Sleipnir making a noise that was his equivalent of clearing his throat.

"Umm, is it normally like this here?" He looked between his mother and sister in surprise.

"Define normal." Evie answered mulishly. "My normal consists of living with super-heroes, an absent Mom and a terminally ill Dad. I'm still getting used to my new normal of two healthy parents. The last thing I fucking need is for one of them to get himself killed in somebody-else's war." She jumped when Sleipnir suddenly dropped his heavy head onto her shoulder, but reached up to rest her hand on the horse's nose. "Sometimes I hate this life-style."

Steve glanced between the parents and child. "Do you guys want us to leave you sort this out? This sounds like you three – four, sorry Sleipnir – need to talk."

Tony looked ready to agree, and Evie merely shrugged. However, Loki pulled his hands away from the table with a loud cracking sound as he snapped the icicles.

"No. We need to sort out this situation with Alfheim."

"Way to prioritise, Möðhy."

"What do you want me to do here, Evelyn?! We lost hundreds of Aesir, and there isn't even a final count of the thousands of Elves who died. Yes we have problems here, but we have the time to sort them out. There are families back in Asgard that need answers right now. Thor and I shouldn't even be here right now; we're needed at home to sort out the mass funerals, re-structure what's left of our army, try to put together a coherent plan should these things attack somewhere else and simply trying to find somewhere to put the few hundred refugees we now have. But we're here on Earth because all of you were our priority. Not our country-men, not our brothers-in-arms, you were our priority. What more do you want from me?!"

Evie had taken an involuntary step back into Sleipnir's chest, shock written across her face. She and Loki didn't argue. They had never had a reason to argue. And now both tempers were riled and it was lucky the girl didn't have magic too, otherwise fire-balls would have been flying.

"Okay, I think we all need to calm down and just breathe for a moment." Tony said carefully. "We don't want anyone being thrown out of windows here."

"You needn't fear, Stark: that's a privilege reserved for you alone."

The man nodded curtly. "Well, let's not go there again." He had his StarkPad in hand, and with a flick of his fingers the image onscreen appeared up on the large wall-mounted TV. "Right, these are the notes I've been taking; let's look through them and if there's nothing else for God's sake let's call this a day."

Loki gave the screen a cursory glance. Stark had been typing out in text-speak to keep up with the back-and-forth conversation, but the notes were easy enough to understand.

Alfheim attckd who did it?

New bad guys why? No motive

? who? Is Earth in trbl?

All dead = rlly not gud Asgard lost most army

Like all dead. Rlly bad

1000000's who were ths guys?

Or whtevr didn't spk? Cant spk? No Allspk?

"Apart from your appalling grammar and spelling that sums up the main points. Thor?"

"It has the key issues." Thor was looking exhausted but his grim expression made it clear he was looking at this from the same view-point as his brother; this was a problem that needed to be solved here and now. "This still leaves us with a great many unanswered questions."

"And they can wait."

"But-"

"They can wait." Steve's tone of voice made it very final. "You need rest. Loki's going to blow up the tower if we're not careful and there's still a horse in the living room. Shit needs to be sorted, sure, but we can't do that with everyone in the state that they're in." He had that military snap that usually commanded attention, but even so Clint sniggered, which took the edge off.

"Heh, well done guys, you've reduced the mighty Captain America to swearing." He kicked his legs off the table and stretched them out. "But he's also right. We've been chasing our tails with what you've told us. These bad-ass aliens destroyed Alfheim, but we don't know who they are, what they are, why they are or anything. And actually there's no way we can sort that out here. I get that you guys went through hell and are freaked out by what happened; but realistically we can't help. We know nothing about other races, we can't find out about them and couldn't get there if we wanted to. Not really sure what help we can be here."

There were some token protests and further comments, but Steve and Clint rather had the measure of the situation. Until they either had more information, or there was another incident, there was nothing the Earth-bound Avengers could do.

Thor made his way back to the med-bay with Bruce's help, and his lack of complaint made it clear that he was still feeling extremely unwell. The others followed suit and quietly left, mostly seeking out something to help clear their minds of the thoughts of what had happened to Alfheim. Evie drifted over to the piano, studiously ignoring her parents and brother.

Sleipnir's ears pricked at the first few notes and he wandered over to watch what she was doing.

"How do you know what to do?"

"I read the music."

The black blobs and squiggles and didn't make so much sense to the horse as he tried to see what the music said versus what Evie was playing.

Behind them Tony nudged his husband. "You need to talk to her."

"Not right now."

"Loki-"

"No. Not right now." The trickster glanced at Stark quickly, his gaze unhappy to say the least. He had definitely reached his emotional saturation point. Any more and he would either blow something up or – worse in a way – cry.

"Don't leave it too long, then."

Loki dipped his head once then turned on his heel and left the room.

MWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMW

The next few days seemed a bit of a mess. Thor healed quickly enough, although was very subdued, and Loki had recovered and made a very quick trip off-planet to send Sleipnir home to Asgard. The argument with Evie hadn't really been cleared from the air – they had sort of brushed it under the rug and left it lie. Tony hadn't raised the subject with either of them again.

The Avengers has been out again on a few sorties against suspected Hydra bases, but hadn't found anything new or useful. Stark and Banner were still playing around with the liberated chitauri pieces but the rate of research had dramatically slowed given that they now didn't want to turn anything on and start the distress signals again.

And the mystery organisation was still taking out larger Hydra bases with extreme prejudice. The Avengers had been called out on clean-up a few times now and there was never any sign of who had swept through the place and destroyed it so thoroughly. The group evidently held a severe grudge, that much was clear, but beyond that there was no clue as to who or what they were.

Loki went along for a few of the expeditions, but quite often was found ensconced in his and Tony's bed-room, scrying for any sign possible of Alfheim's attackers. So far he had found nothing.

It was after another long session – that had begun to creep into the small hours of the morning - that Tony quietly knocked on the door, bearing a large glass of red wine. He had very quickly learnt not to interrupt his husband in the middle of the spell, so waited for Loki to either let him in or ignore him.

"I'm done."

Tony placed the glass down on the bedside table and sat down on the bed next to the trickster. Loki passed him the dish of ink he'd been using for the scrying, and that was deposited on the desk.

"Any luck?"

"Nothing." Loki rubbed a hand across his eyes and smiled grimly. "Absolutely nothing." He glanced at the wine. "I do hope that's for me, because I am going to drink it anyway."

Tony laughed and passed it over. "Yeah it's all yours – red's not exactly my choice of beverage." He ineffectually tried to mop up some spilt ink with the edge of his t-shirt. "So, other than no results, how're things?"

Loki had taken a sip of wine, and watched his husband suspiciously over the rim of the glass. "Alcohol…questions about how I am feeling…I do believe you are trying to get me into bed."

"Later, Romeo. I just want to make sure you're okay; I hardly seem to see you at the moment."

"I am fine."

"You did remember it's Birdy's birthday tomorrow, right?"

"I am hardly going to forget."

Tony laughed. "Sure. You still haven't told me what the mystery gift is. I've pulled some strings and got her a copy of Half-Life Three – it doesn't technically even have a public release date yet. Oh, and some tickets to her show of choice on Broadway. And some ear-rings, nothing too glitzy, just diamond studs."

Loki watched his husband in amusement over the rim of his wineglass. "Only diamond? Why not black diamonds?"

"No sense in being ostentatious, she's only fifteen."

"Personally I am surprised you did not get her a car."

"That's next years present. I've already got a Maserati ready to soup up for her." He grinned as the trickster shook his head. "Well? What have you got to add to the pot anyway? You promised it wasn't a severed head."

"It is not." Loki put his glass down on the bedside table. "Has she ever had a pet before?"

"Not really. Why?"

The explanation had Tony genuinely face-palming – forehead smacked hard against the heel of his hand. He had to admit that Loki's plan was brilliant, and certainly something Evie would love, but it wasn't exactly something he'd ever have considered himself. Their first time celebrating their daughter's birthday as a proper couple and they hadn't even bought the presents as a couple. Of course, everything would be tagged as from both of them, but that wasn't really the point.

"So, it's nearly two AM; it was about this time all those years ago that you suddenly turned up in here looking like someone had kicked seven types of crap out of you."

"Mmm, so it was. I believe that was the first time we had seen each other for nine months as well."

"I really didn't think I was actually going to see you again. I assumed you'd found a better lay somewhere else."

Loki leant back against the headboard of the bed, stretching out his cramped legs. "Out of interest, had you wanted to see me again? Other than missing out on all the late-night activities, of course."

"Sure; the sex was great, but I was beginning to realise that I actually enjoyed talking to you as a person." Stark shifted across the bed and plopped his head down in his husband's lap. "You'd become a fixture in my life; I don't like change, and you'd just upped and vanished. To be honest I was pretty annoyed about it."

"I should have come to you sooner and told you about Evelyn." He trickster ran his fingers through the man's short hair. "I was running from the inevitable by trying to ignore what was happening."

"Maybe, but had you told me you would have given me the chance to panic and run. As it was I didn't have a chance to back out of being a father."

"Would you have wanted to back out?"

Tony laughed. "Are you kidding?! Evelyn's my everything; I can't imagine my life without her!"

"You never regret tying yourself down?"

"Hell no!" The man twisted to look up at his husband. "What are you angling at here? Do you regret having Birdy? Or letting me keep her?"

"Not at all." Loki's tone of voice wasn't very convincing, but he smiled reassuringly when his husband frowned up at him. "No, I really don't regret those decisions at all. I feared them at the time, but I knew I made the right choice."

"She was so tiny…" Stark's voice trailed off in a drawl of nostalgia.

"Tiny but perfect."

"And now she's big and perfect."

Loki laughed quietly. "Actually, she's smaller than before I left for Alfhiem. That training regime must be going well; she's lost weight. Not that she needed to lose anything, but still."

"She's lost the puppy fat. Our little girl is becoming a woman." Tony ran a hand over his eyes with a chuckle. "She's already had to drag Pepper out shopping for new bras – apparently she lost some weight in other places too."

"Poor thing." Loki wriggled down a little so that he wasn't sitting up quite as straight and folded his arms across his husband's chest. "She didn't drag you out on those shopping trips?"

"Nah, I just supply the endless amounts of money. And what do I know about buying bras anyway?" Tony waved a hand lazily. "I can provide hot water bottles as and when needed but other than that Birdy tends to deal with stuff on her own or goes to Pep. She's an independent kid."

"She's had an unconventional upbringing; she's going to be independent. Sleipnir was terribly clingy and it didn't serve him well when he grew older. Admittedly I over-indulged him; but I was young and new to the parenting thing. You've done a stupendous job raising our little Bird."

"Well, let's make the most of her first birthday as a full family."

"And that would probably involve us attempting to sleep at some point."

Tony groaned and shook his head. "I can't be arsed to move." He felt his husband shift under him and looked up to see Loki wave a hand in a lazy circle. "What are you…oh." He chuckled as his jeans and shirt melted away leaving him just in boxers. "Okay, that works."

"Magic, it's a wonderful thing."

"I have noticed that."

MWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMW

The morning dawned bright and unusually cold for September. Despite being back in one piece Evie had decided that her birthday warranted a lie-in, her training be damned. When she finally surfaced it was gone mid-day and the rest of the Stark-Tower inhabitants were no-where to be seen. She wandered through the kitchen and dining area to grab some food and rather hoping to bump into someone.

As it was the place seemed to be empty – no people, no presents, no sign that anyone had remembered what day it was. That didn't particularly worry her since she couldn't believe her parents had forgotten her birthday but it was certainly annoying.

"Jarvis? Where is everyone?" There was no reply and she scowled up at the ceiling. "Oi, answer me you bucket of bolts!"

"Routine-maintenance in progress, access to basic severs only."

"What?! Oh come on!" The girl pulled her phone out her pocket instead and opened the app to track everyone else's where-abouts.

Absolutely nothing.

"The hell?" She clicked the phone off and stood with it in her hand for a moment. So; everyone was apparently missing. On her birthday. And her mother just so happened to be one of the most powerful and talented magic-users in the realms.

Yeah, links could be drawn between those facts.

The teen spun on her heel, looking around the large open-plan living space. So…this was obviously her family – extended and otherwise – taking the piss, and knowing her parents they weren't going to just pop out and yell 'boo', she was going to have to find them.

How does one find a group of invisible people?

She cast her gaze around again and then grinned.

"You're all on the sofas, right?"

Tony's voice came out of thin air sounding rather disgruntled. "How the hell did she guess that so quickly?"

"She is a genius."

"Actually, Mjölnir leaves a sizable imprint on the cushions." Evie pointed at the small but obvious dent in one of the cushions where the invisible hammer was sat. She grinned smugly when her family and friends faded into view on the sofas.

"I told you to put that wretched thing on the floor." Tony smacked Thor round the head. "There goes the surprise!"

Loki ignored the other two and wrapped Evelyn up in a tight hug. "Happy birthday, dearest." He looked down at his daughter with a fond smile. "Fifteen years – where have they all gone?"

"I know, right?" The girl hugged her arms around his waist tightly. "I feel like I've waited fifteen years for this birthday – you're here. Like, actually here, not just for a couple of hours in the evening! I've got my Mum home for my birthday!"

"Hey, hey little bird, you aren't crying are you?"

"Just a tiny bit. I'm happy – it's happy crying."

Loki pressed a kiss into her hair. "I'm glad I'm finally here too. This was always the aim, from the very beginning. Get rid of the monsters; be a family."

"And you did it. Took your bloody time, but you did it."

"I did it." Loki glanced at Tony and gestured him over. "Well, I may have had a little help. It was a family effort." He reached an arm out to pull his husband into the hug.

"Hey, that's what I'm here for." Tony tickled Evie under her arm, making her squeal. "Happy birthday munchkin!"

"Dad! Don't call me that!"

"I don't care how old you think you are madam, you are always going to be my baby girl!"

Loki disentangled himself from his husband and daughter and took a step back. The rest of the group were still giving them a little bit of space before offering their own birthday greetings but grinned when they realised what the trickster was up to. With an elegant gesture he unwound the rest of the spell around the room.

Evie looked around then clapped her hands over her mouth with a surprised laugh.

Whilst they had never stinted for her birthday before, there had never been much by the way of decoration for the occasion. A banner or two when she was younger but after Loki had been taken her birthday had always become something of a subdued affair on the girl's own insistence.

Now there were gold and silver balloons hanging from the walls, glitter appearing from nowhere in the ceiling and vanishing into sparkles whenever it landed on anything. A huge pile of presents sat on the coffee table by the sofas, a kaleidoscope of butterflies fluttering around it. Down the walls banners had been hung depicting various things the girl was interested. Four had the Hogwarts houses, there was one with a Tardis, some StarWars screen-shots, a 1967 Chevrolet Impala, a huge printout of a piece of piano music, dinosaurs, anything and everything Evie had loved over the years. There was even one for Disney with the lanterns she still set off every year framing it.

"Oh my God..."

"Like it?"

"Oh my God!"

Fifteen years old or not, Evie had stars in her eyes as she spun around trying to take in the whole room at once. She had stopped enjoying her birthdays after losing her Mother, refusing to make a big deal out of them. Sure, kids loved their birthdays, but to Evelyn the main enjoyment had been seeing Loki for that brief amount of time. When she lost that the rest of the day lost meaning as well.

And now Loki was back and she had a reason to celebrate again.

They went through the usual routines of present giving, and presents from super-heroes are guaranteed to be awesome. Steve especially was excellent at picking out something extra special.

Evie was giddy with joy and excitement, although ninety percent of that was simply the fact that she finally had both parents with her. Being now fifteen years old the presents were more refined than she was used to – an antique watch, a collection of nineteenth century piano pieces, a spa session – they were very definitely 'you are nearly a woman' gifts. Well, other than Half Life 3, which was always going to be appreciated.

The day was spent exactly as it should be – vegging out eating cake and junk food whilst watching bad movies. Evie had already decided that she was going to use her show tickets for the Lion King and was happily half-way through a new book from Bruce. She was lying lengthways across the sofa, her feet comfortably propped up on Loki's lap and bowl of toffee popcorn balanced on her stomach with the book propped against it. The sparkles were still falling from the ceiling, vanishing just before hitting anything and getting mildly annoying when they got in the way of the TV and the balloons were still bobbing around the place.

Tony sat down on the arm of the sofa beside his husband and nudged the trickster with his elbow. When he had Loki's attention he nodded towards their daughter with a querying expression. Loki glanced at the girl as well then nodded with a smile.

"Hey Birdy, we've got one more present for you." Stark picked a piece of popcorn out of the bowl and threw it at Evie where it hit her on the nose.

"Huh?" The girl raised her gaze from her new book with a small frown. "What? Another present? But you've got me loads already!"

"Nice to know you appreciate it." Loki said with a smile. "But your father is near enough the richest man on the planet, and I am a Prince of one of the most influential Realms; we are allowed to spoil you rotten if we feel like it."

"Well I'm hardly going to complain, am I?" Evie sat up properly, putting the book and bowl down on the floor.

"Eyes closed, arms out." Loki ordered with a smile.

"I'm fifteen, not five." But said fifteen year old did what she was told, sitting like a little ballet doll with her arms in first position. She tried to guess what her parents had planned, but they hadn't exactly given her any clues, and as she'd already said she hadn't been expecting anything else.

For that reason she really wasn't anticipating the warm heavy weight that suddenly materialised on her lap, fur tickling her arms.

"What the-?" She opened her eyes and let out a small squeal of delight. "Oh my God! Möðhy, you didn't!"

The fluffy animal in her arms looked up at her with a startled expression.

"A Münchrat! You got me a Münchrat!"

The mini-mammoth tried to stand up on her lap and failed beautifully, over-sized feet flailing around before it gave up and curled up instead. Its trunk wrapped around Evie's wrist in a plea for security and she hugged the little creature.

"It's so cute!"

Tony leant over her shoulder to admire the Münchrat. Loki had let him meet the animal briefly so that he would know what he was getting into letting Evie have it, but he was always going to take the chance to observe an alien up close. The thing was certainly adorable. Just like the last time Evie had been introduced to the species it looked like a mini woolly mammoth. The trunk was longer, in comparison to the body, and the feet were oversized in the way that a puppy's might be, but other than that it was the extinct ice-age animal in miniature.

"What is it?" Clint was the first over, looking absolutely fascinated as he reached a hand out to the little thing. "It's like someone shrunk Jurassic Park!"

"It's a Münchrat!" Evie couldn't have looked more delighted. "Oh my God! I said I wanted one but I didn't think you guys would actually get me one!"

"Neither did I until yesterday." Tony tickled the little thing under the trunk and it made a snuffling noise at him.

"Yeah, but what is it?" Steve echoed Clint's earlier question, but he had the sense to look at Thor for an answer.

"It is one of our native species. They are generally considered to be a bit of a pest, but the children like them." Thor sounded like someone talking about their town's hamster problem. "They are low maintenance and the tame ones like nothing more than to sleep on people's laps.

Case in point, Evie's one was already looking drowsy, it's trunk still refusing to let go of her.

"They are a popular pet for children, as I say, but mostly seen in the same light as you Midgardian's see rabbits."

"And you consistently had at least three or four up until only two hundred years ago when Father told you to be rid of them." Loki said with a sweet smile.

"What does it eat?" Bruce didn't crowd round like everyone else did, but remained sat on the other sofa peering over the top of his glasses. "Does it need to be inoculated?"

"It is an omnivore, and will eat anything it can get hold of. To stay healthy it mostly needs vegetation, but a little bit of bacon now and then or some chicken will be appreciated." Loki scratched the little creature's head gently. "And it has one of the best immune systems known." He glanced up at the scientist. "Infact I'm sure Evie will let you take a small blood sample since you may wish to have a look at said immune system."

Evie frowned slightly at Bruce then nodded. "It may be able to cure cancer, so I guess so." She hugged her new pet. "But not yet, I want it to like us all before you stick a needle in it!" She glanced up at Loki's huff of laughter and watched as her mother placed a finger gently on the Münchrat's head. In his other hand a test tube materialised that quickly filled with blood.

"There we go; one painlessly acquired blood-sample." He capped it and threw it over at Bruce who almost fumbled the catch and had to juggle it slightly.

"Uh, thanks." The scientist placed it down carefully on the coffee table. "So, Evie, what are you going to call your new friend?"

"I don't know…" Evie looked down at the creature and – sensing her attention – it made a snuffling noise and booped her on the nose with it's trunk. "Is it a boy or a girl?"

Loki looked slightly taken-aback. "It has tusks; can you not tell that it is male?"

"Well, it's an alien; it's hard to tell." The girl picked it up so that it's legs dangled comically as she made eye-contact with it. "So, you're a boy. What's your name little guy? Huh?"

"Micky the Mammoth." Clint supplied instantly.

"No." Evie rubbed noses with the Münchrat. "His name is Arthur."

"That's…possibly the most random name you could have thought of." Tony said.

"And I don't give a damn." Evie went off into a babble of baby talk to her pet, which seemed to bask in the attention.

Tony nudged his husband gently in the side. "Is that thing going to grow much?"

"No, it's fully grown. Although it could always grow fatter, I suppose." Loki folded his arms, watching his daughter and the Münchrat getting to know each other. Evie looked up at her parents and although she was smiling happily her eyes were full of tears.

"Seriously guys, thank you. This has been, like, the best birthday I've ever had!" She pushed away Arthur's trunk as he inquisitively tried to find out what was in her ear. "Thank you."

MWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMWMW

The party went on early into the morning, with more junk food, more films and quite a bit of alcohol. Loki didn't entirely understand Earth's – or rather, America's – drinking laws so Evie was allowed rather more beer than she should have had.

In the end Loki had to get her safely to bed – given that Tony had deemed it was his fault their daughter was inebriated – and Arthur had claimed the bottom of the girl's bed as his own, curled up like a puppy. Evie was asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow, although Loki didn't envy her the hangover she was likely to have the next morning. In the end, as a loving parent he decided to cure it for her, but sometime soon she was going to learn the horror that is a fully fledged hangover.

Loki himself hadn't really taken part in the drinking, and Tony had a legendary alcohol-tolerance so neither were that worse for wear when they finished clearing away the party debris (like anyone else would help) and managed to get to bed themselves.

"That mammoth thing was such a good idea; she adored it."

"It was only by luck I thought to pick it up when I was in Asgard." Loki could only just see Stark in the faint light of the arc reactor, but could make out the smile on the man's face. "This was…" He shook his head slightly. "I never dreamt I was going to be able to spend a proper birthday with her. I always assumed it would be secret evenings, and then that I would simply never see her again."

"Well, now you've experienced the awesomeness of her birthday. Just wait until Christmas; it's going to be insane since it'll be the first one since I've been allowed to drink again. And I'm sure we can let Birdy have a drink or two as well."

"She had more than one or two this evening; infact she's lucky to have me at hand to stop the inevitable hangover."

"Ah, you should have let her suffer; you never forget your first hangover."

Loki laughed quietly. "No, that's true."

Tony waited expectantly for a moment then prodded his husband in the arm. "Come on, where's the follow-up? Don't leave me hanging here!"

"What? Oh, it is not much more than I drank too much and had a terrible headache the next day. Not exactly the best story ever."

"You seem a little distracted. You okay?"

The question seemed to be amusing to Loki as he chuckled, rolling onto his side to face his partner. "I am sorry; I suppose even now I am still worrying about Alfheim."

It was a legitimate concern, and Loki had hardly been off the subject so it wasn't surprising he couldn't let go of the problem. It was just depressing that even on his daughter's birthday he was still worrying away about it.

"Come on, Capricorn, can't we just have one night where you can turn off and not freak out over it? We've had a lovely day, can we just make it last until morning please?"

Loki huffed in exasperation. "I want to go back to Alfheim. There are certain things I want to determine now that it is not a battle-field."

"Fucking hell Loki!" Tony sat up, the bed-covers falling down to his lap. "One night! Just one fucking night without you banging on about it!"

"A whole realm was destroyed, Tony!"

"Yeah, and that's horrible, but you've barely slept since it happened! I'm worried about you!" Stark pinched the bridge of his nose. "I get that you feel like you have to do something, but you can't take all of this on yourself!"

"Someone has to."

"It's been a week; do you really think it's even remotely safe?!"

"Of course it isn't safe, but it will be a damn sight safer for someone with magic than for anyone else." Loki snapped. "And I am the only one who knows what to look for."

Tony drew his knees up to his chest and rested his forehead on them with a heavy sigh. It meant that the room was plunged into complete darkness as the arc reactor was obscured.

"This was meant to be our night. We had a great day with Birdy celebrating all things Evie, and tonight was meant to be us celebrating that you successfully expelled a human being from your uterus."

Loki choked. "What?"

"It was meant to sound more romantic than that. But the point stands; I wanted this to be a special night for us and you can't get your head out of the war-zone to even realise that. You just want to jump straight back into the battle-field!"

"Tony, I cannot help -"

"So if you want to go back there don't think for one minute I'll let you go alone!"

"I…what?"

Loki wasn't often on the receiving end of his husband's death-glare (he was usually the one doling them out) and this one caught him unawares.

"Look, if you're set on waltzing off into an alien no-mans-land I'm coming with you! You could come up against anything there!"

"But-"

"So we are either doing this together or I'm making Thor stick Mjölnir on your chest!"

The trickster looked completely dumbfounded at his husband's suggestion. It didn't seem like the idea had even occurred to him.

"Tony, it will be obscenely dangerous!"

"So? I'll have the suit, you've got your magic, and why the hell did we get married if not to zoom off to other planets for intergalactic wars?!"

Loki shook his head with a disbelieving laugh. "By the Norns…I do love you, you stupid mortal. I am half a million years old and yet someone like you can still surprise me."

"Is that a yes? I believe you did promise to take me to Alfheim at some point."

"Yes, as a honeymoon. We've been married for months, and a warzone is hardly a romantic setting."

"But it's so reminiscent of how we met!" Tony gave up on normal conversation and moved over to flop on top of his husband. "Seriously though, when are you intending to go?"

"You are heavy. And I don't know. Sooner rather than later – we don't know what is happening there and I don't want us to risk losing vital evidence."

"So, we talking about tomorrow? I'd better warn you here and now; if we tell the others they'll insist on coming too, especially your lumbering brother."

Loki sighed – which was difficult with Stark lying on top of him – and shook his head. "I know, I know. Thor will never let us go alone."

"Covert ops it is then." Tony kissed his husband's nose. "Will we need to use the Bifrost?"

"No; I can get us both there and back. And anything we might find."

"No severed heads."

That made Loki laugh. "No, no severed heads, I promise." He reached up and flicked Tony's ear. "We could go now."

"What? Seriously?!"

"It's two in the morning, near enough, people will not be arising early given the amount of alcohol consumed so we have maybe five hours, six at a push and everyone else assuming we've slept in."

Tony sat up, looking down on the trickster. "Wait, seriously? You want to go storming into enemy territory at two in the morning on – can I remind you here – our daughter's birthday."

"You were the one who wanted to spend the night together."

"Well, yeah, but not like that."

Loki pushed the man back so that he was able to sit up as well. "You want me to stop worrying about it all; this is how I stop worrying. The sooner the better."

"What are you even looking for? What do you expect to find?"

"I will not know until I find it! There are certain artefacts that I want to know the fate of."

Tony knew nothing about what sort of artefacts Alfheim could be hiding, and it was debatable if Loki wanted to save them from destruction or was simply using the opportunity to get his hands on some powerful objects. However, it was true they could do with any intel they could get since the realm was no longer in Heimdall's view. Stark couldn't deny that it had been niggling away at the back of his own mind that there was a chance an attack could occur on another realm, that it could occur on Earth.

They had fought off the chitauri and Loki as a team, but Loki's heart hadn't really been in that fight and the fact that all the chitauri had dropped dead the instant their nerve-station had been nuked had been the winning move. If the might of the Aesir and Elven armies had fallen to these strange invaders, Earth really didn't have a chance.

"Yeah. Yeah okay. I don't like it, really don't like it but it would be nice to get the elephant out of the room."

"I hardly like it either." Loki leant in and pressed a quick kiss to his husband's lips. "But it's necessary."

It wasn't technically necessary to go then and there, but Tony felt that he'd already made (and lost) that argument. And arguing with Loki never usually ended well anyway – the God was the most single-minded person Stark had ever met and that was saying a lot.

Jarvis was less than pleased with the idea, but was forbidden from alerting anyone else to the foolish venture so responded in sulky silence as he delivered the Ironman suit to the room. Not knowing anything about Alfheim, and even less about the state it was now in, Tony put on some running skins; even if the suit was temperature controlled it never hurt to be comfortable. He also ensured the faceplate on the suit was down since God knows what crap had been stirred up in that battle.

"Are you ready?" Loki waited for his partner to nod before resting his hand on the metal arm of the suit. The contact wasn't technically necessary for the spell to work, but it made the landing cleaner and meant that the trickster didn't have to concentrate so much.

Tony still wasn't used to the sudden swirling black that he was pulled into, and although it didn't cause any nausea he never felt entirely comfortable during a teleportation. He appreciated that it was a better way to travel than the Bifrost though. For a start he barely felt the landing, just a sudden change in texture under his metal boots.

However, if the landing wasn't a big deal the way every warning light lit his vision certainly caught his attention.

Whatever his expectations of Alfheim were – battlefield or not – he first impressions were of such thick dust clouds that beyond his own warning lights he couldn't see more than two feet infront of his face. However, that was more than enough to see Loki suddenly gasp, wide-eyed and clutching at his throat. He went down to one knee, doubled over.

"Loki! You okay?!" Tony went to help him but the trickster had already waved a hand and something began materialising over his face. "I thought you could breathe any atmosphere with oxygen!"

"There's no oxygen here." Loki sounded horrified at the discovery. "The atmosphere has been stripped!"

"How is that possible?"

"I don't know." The trickster slowly stood up again, adjusting the mask he had conjured over his face. It was horribly reminiscent of a world war one trenches gas mask, although given an Asgardian twist. The two glass eyes stared blankly at Tony.

"That thing's hideous."

"It saved me from mustard gas more than once." Loki looked around, then spread his hands out. With the gesture the heavy clouds of dust blew away, revealing nothing more than burnt rock and grey ash.

"You could have landed us somewhere closer to a city or something."

"This was the main gateway to the capital."

"Jesus." There was absolutely nothing to give that away – the ground had been razed. Tony had seen photos of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and even they had had some structures left standing. This was total obliteration. Loki must have been feeling the same horror since he didn't even comment on the use of another deity's name. "I'm reading extraordinary levels of radiation. I mean, my suit's good, but I've got about two hours before I'm flirting with serious health risks."

"I am sensing the same. And the toxicity in the atmosphere…I've never seen the like. This realm's air should have the same basic elemental make-up as Earth; nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide…"

"Yeah. I've got gaseous hydrofluoric acid, chlorine, gaseous formaldehyde…these shouldn't even be able to exist together. What the fuck happened here?"

Loki swept more of the choking clouds away, still not revealing anything more than blasted rock. "I do not know…"

"What do you know of that has this sort of fire power? I mean; even a nuke wouldn't do this."

"Besides perhaps myself there is nothing I know of. And I could level a city, at a push, but this…this is realm-wide." Loki's voice echoed oddly within his gas-mask, giving the silent landscape an even eerier feel. "Come, let us see if anything remains."

It was slow going, picking their way across the terrain. Occasionally the suit would spike a radiation warning as they passed certain areas and Loki had to periodically wave the smog away so that they could see where they were going. There was a suspicious lack of evidence that a battle had taken place there. True, there was no evidence that anything had ever been there, but knowing a horrendous battle had gone down it was frightening that there were no bodies, no discarded weapons, no broken armour. It was as if someone – something – had gone through and swept the whole realm clear.

"There! Two o'clock!" Loki suddenly pointed off to their right. He had already made more concessions to the toxic atmosphere and now his hands were encased in heavy leather gloves.

Something was rising up out of the smog and as they neared it resolved into the shattered remains of a wall, maybe two or three feet high. Behind it other scraps of rubble denoted where other foundations may have been.

"Well, it's something…" Tony kicked over a brick to reveal a blacked, burnt side. "This must have been a big-ass building if any of it is still standing."

"It was the temple. This whole area was the temple district. Hospital, research areas, school, the library. Oh they had such a library here." Loki stepped over a pile of bricks scanning the ground. "This was the nerve centre of the city – the Elves put such store by their learning that they placed all things associated with it around their temple to the Norns."

"What did it look like here? Asgard?"

"No, infact it bore more similarities to Midgardian cities. London maybe. Many older areas, architecture across the time periods and some superstructures, but not as many as in a place like New York. This was a marvellous city."

"I thought you weren't allowed here."

"That was only a recent thing after I stole a certain artefact they held here."

Tony picked up a piece of tile – roof or floor he couldn't tell – and tried to see what the pattern was on it. "Why steal it?"

"To prove that I could and therefore it was safer in Asgard. There were other things I meant to take too, for the same reason, but the guards were alerted after the first one and I didn't get a chance."

"Looks like you were right then." He threw the tile back down and looked around. "So; I guess it's these other things we're here for now. What are they and where would they be?"

Loki shook his head. "They aren't here. From a distance and with all the radiation I could not be certain, but this is where they should be, and they aren't." He kicked at a stone. "Shit!"

Tony watched his husband stalk off further into the ruins of the building, the suit keeping track of Loki's life-signs when the fog swallowed him up. As a place, Alfhiem meant little to nothing to him. He didn't know the people and had never seen what it looked like before, but this desolate wasteland was frightening. Loki's description of a grand city, and now all that was left was this, it was a horrible thought. Earth had nothing that could wipe nearly all trace of civilisation away. Even an atomic bomb left debris and other than the foundations of the largest structure in Alfhiem there was no debris to be seen.

If these creatures turned such a power on Earth humanity would fall.

Earth would fall. He could already see it now; the oceans flash-drying, forests and jungles burning to ash in moments, all organic matter combusted, all the grand buildings of the world smashed to dust…

For a moment it was horribly easy to imagine it.

"Tony, there's nothing here." Loki reappeared, the glass disks of his gas-mask gleaming red from the dull sky. "We should go." His face was obscured but the defeated slump to his shoulders spoke volumes.

"Should we go via Asgard? Let them know what it's like here now?"

"I've already spoken to Heimdall and told him the state of play here."

"Right." It was pretty obvious there was something Loki wasn't saying; and Tony was willing to bet Stark Industries that the trickster hadn't told Heimdall either. He didn't comment though – it wasn't a conversation/argument he wanted to have in a place like this. Instead he simply let Loki grab his arm again and pull him back into the spinning darkness of the teleport.

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If Evie noticed that her parents seemed more tired than usual she didn't comment. Having unknowingly escaped her own hangover thanks to Loki's magic she simply assumed that they were both suffering their own aftereffects of her birthday. And given that others among the Tower's inhabitants were certainly wearing sunglasses inside it was a reasonable assumption.

And besides, with a new pet to acquaint herself with it wasn't like the girl was going to have her mind on anything else.

Coulson called in again – looking once again worse for wear – to complain about a large power plant that Hydra had been in command of being blown to smithereens losing all personnel and any intel the place might have had. It was becoming a familiar story and all the Avengers could tell him was that it wasn't them.

It was Steve who took the call, and who had to spread the bad news to the others, less than impressed that Coulson was still trying to blame them for it.

"Can't we just tell him it's the Russian's and be done?" Evie asked cheerfully. She was sat on the floor, Arthur playing with her shoelaces.

"Not really acceptable in this day and age. Fifty years ago that would have been the ideal answer."

"Middle East?"

Steve cast an annoyed glance at the girl. "Really? Or are you just throwing names out in the air now?"

"Of course I'm throwing names out in the air. You think I know anything about this shit?"

"Don't swear." Tony flicked her ponytail. "And stop pissing about; none of us have a clue what's going on." He glanced over at Loki, who was brooding silently on one of the sofas. "And right now I think there are bigger fish to fry than some rouge terrorist group."

"In what way?"

"We went to Alfheim last night." Loki said softly.

Of the six of them – Loki, Tony, Evie, Steve, Thor and Pepper – in the room only Pepper didn't voice her horror at this latest piece of news. Thor was on his feet, Evie was complaining loudly and Arthur was trying to hide his head up the girl's jumper to get away from the noise.

"I am not going to say a thing more until you all stop shouting." The trickster sounded uncomfortably like a school teacher with the way he said it, but gradually the protests died down. Steve ran a tired hand down his face.

"Seriously. You two seriously went back to a place that as far as we know could have been crawling in enemy fighters. Was it?"

"Hardly."

Tony gave the description of what they had done and what had happened since Loki tended to get slightly too poetic when explaining things. That didn't mean the man skimped on the details though. On the contrary, he made it very clear what state they had found the realm in and the lack of absolutely everything. The suit had recorded it all – as usual – and he had Jarvis (who was still peeved with him) put up some stills on the TV.

If the others were shocked by what they saw, Thor was devastated. However, he wasn't given a chance to express this dismay because Loki took over from his husband.

"The lack of structure left standing is indeed a frightening prospect, but it was another conspicuous absence that should really be concerning us at this moment."

Tony glanced at him sharply. So far the Prince still hadn't told him of his deductions. Thor's brow had furrowed at the statement too, but evidently for different reasons.

"What did Alfheim have? You already secured the Gauntlet in Asgard's vaults, what was left?"

"There was a diadem set with precious stones."

"I recall it, what of it?"

Loki rolled his eyes at his brother's lack of thought. "The central stone was known as a power gem, it was a highly magical item, hence why it was stored in the centre of their temple for safe-keeping."

"So? You said all was destroyed, could this gem not have been destroyed also?"

"No. It was a misnomer. That was no mere gem of power and nothing could have destroyed it." Loki looked down at his hands briefly, a quick but obvious show of fear. "It was one of the Infinity Stones, Thor, and there was no trace of it left on Alfheim. Whoever those attackers were, whoever sent them, they have one of the Infinity Stones."

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