this is for WynterRavenheart, because I read your post about Thor's electricity and wanted to write something real fast but that didn't work. Also, I mashed it up with my head canon about Asgard's super techy tech and this ended up being nothing like I imagined but now there's nothing I can do xD.
Um... I'm just sorry about my half-baked explanation of stuff, it's really late and honestly I don't know where this came from, but enjoy all the same!
This is so unbetaed is not even funny, so all the mistakes are my own.
You can also read this on AO3.
"You have...electricity?" said Tony looking around Loki's chambers "Huh, I never thought you would, I'm not sure why at the moment" he sat on a chair-thing that was covered in... yep, that was fur (the softest Tony had ever laid his hands on, he wondered what kind of animal it was), his head was still spinning after being beamed up by the glowy eyed, big, scary dude with the golden sword.
Not to be confused with your regular Asgardian... Aesir... whatever. Apparently everyone in this realm is big and scary, and they have glowy eyes, and own weaponry made of gold; but back to the point, now that he thinks about it, it makes sense that a super advanced, god-like race of warriors had discovered electricity, it's just that, up to this point it had never occurred to him.
Loki gave him a look and Tony knew he was thinking 'how stupid can you be Anthony?' he just knew it.
In hindsight, Thor had been confused by many things, like the TV and the computers, but electricity wasn't in the list, also, and judging for what he's seen so far in terms of Asgard's tech, he's beginning to think his confusion wasn't about the appliances themselves, but more about how outdated they were, now that he thinks about it... no, wait, better not think about it, his ego will not be able to handle that, he wants to weep at the thought that everything in his topnotch, super techy tower is so outdated that it was probably something Thor's great great great great great grandfather used to play with. And they live like a million years! or whatever.
He's going to faint.
"So you have electricity" he said after he reigned over his urge to black out, "I don't see any switches, or cables, or heard the faint hum of it when we were outside, how does it work in here?" he asked, come on, Loki had to have seen this coming, he's a nerd too, and knows how it feels to need knowledge; there is no way Tony's going to pass up this opportunity to learn about new tech, and Loki would never deny himself the satisfaction of holding something over his head (which, to be completely honest, wasn't so difficult considering how tall the bastard was, and how... not so tall Tony was).
"Well" Loki started, a smirk planted on his face "it works a lot better now that Thor has... mellowed, took a bit of trial and error from all of us, but thanks to that, Mother, Father, and myself are a lot more resistant to it, we count it as a blessing, there were some that weren't so lucky" he said with an odd expression on his face.
"What does Thor have to do with anything?" Tony asked.
Loki gave him 'the look' again.
"Thor is the god of thunder, not to say that without him there wouldn't be any, but he's a sort of… keeper, I guess, of it, he can generate it but with a thought, doesn't pollute, and there is no need for cables as it's the case in Midgard. There are some of us that have more kinship to certain elements, and can control them for the benefit of the realm, or to gain the upper hand in battle." Loki explained "Thor was… a rambunctious child; he would throw tantrums whenever he didn't get his way, and everything would go haywire for a while, that is one of the reasons Father gave him Mjölnir in the first place, it helps him control his powers, if not his temper."
Wow. Just wow.
"So, what? Thor makes an electric storm every once in a while, and that's it? Where does all that energy go? What do you do with it? How do you use it?"
"The energy is stored in the buildings and the earth, and it's used automatically when needed, Anthony, you have to understand that there are centuries of alchemy involved, it is impossible for me to explain it to you fully." Tony knew that meant his mortal mind was too weak to grasp the full concept and that he would probably be dead before they got anywhere. He did feel a bit lightheaded, so he nodded.
"But do you have TV's? Computers? Toasters?" he couldn't resist asking.
"We prefer live performances, to be quite honest, storytelling, sung stories, that kind of thing, so while we have something like your televisions and computers, we don't have such an extensive content for entertainment purposes, it's mostly used for security, vigilance and communication" Loki explained and waved his hand over the table that was between the chair-things.
A hologram(?) appeared, except this one wasn't like the ones in his tower, while his holograms are impressive (in terms of Midgardian technology anyway), they look like just that, holograms. This one though, it looks as if there was a real tiny person walking around the table. The day wouldn't end without him fainting, he was sure of that.
Loki tapped the head of the person; Tony noticed it was a tiny Thor walking around his own room (he supposed).
He saw tiny Thor stop as soon as Loki tapped him and a tiny Loki appeared next to tiny Thor, the small blond figure waved a hand just as Loki had done, and suddenly Thor was in the room, if it wasn't for the table cutting across Thor's legs, he'd think it was the real him.
"Brother!" hologram Thor greets Loki with his usual enthusiasm and godly smile on his face. Loki just rolls his eyes.
"I was only illustrating my point oaf, bye now" he said and waved his hand again. Hologram Thor and tiny Thor were gone immediately. "So you see, this, of course doesn't work just anywhere, this method is quite dated now, it's mostly used inside the palace if you want the full size, the guards sometimes use the small version to keep an eye on the city, but with Heimdall it gets redundant. The healing circles work in the same fashion as well, the energy Thor creates is used to power the healing abilities of the spells needed to mend even the worst of injuries."
"Wait, so… you have all this, and you don't use it? Just like that? It's dated…Jesus, it's like you're talking about an iPhone 4 instead of the most advanced and impressive piece of technology I've ever seen…"
"Tony, I can teleport anywhere I want, if I want to talk to Thor –and I don't- I can just do that, there are security breaches with this method, you can see the person you are talking to, but there is no way to know if there is someone else in the room listening unless they touch the image as well, too many unknown variants." Tony could see the point, but still, if he could get his hands on this and understand it, he's sure he'd be able to maybe solve that privacy problem, man; if he could take it to earth he'd be considered a god himself.
"This is crazy" he said, because it was.
"We've spent long enough talking about this Anthony, we should eat now, the feast won't commence until the moons are high on the sky." He said pointing to a bowl of fruit that he was sure wasn't there a second ago.
"Yeah" he relented and grabbed a big, shiny, and -of course- golden apple, everything here was so golden, even the fruit! Or well, the apples, since all the other fruit seemed pretty normal, well, the ones he could recognize.
He relaxed in his chair-thing, taking bite after bite of the admittedly delicious fruit, though he noticed it didn't taste like an apple at all; he looked through the window and saw the sun (one of them; two suns, that's crazy!) reflected on one of the golden pillars and wondered if the weapons, and buildings, and armors, and all the other stuff was actually made of gold, or if it was only dipped in it. But why would you dip an apple in gold though, that made no sense.
Wait a minute.
Golden apples, he's read about that.
Golden apples.
Golden. Apples…
Golden apples!
He turned his head so fast his neck almost snapped.
"Did you just do what I think you just did?" he asked Loki, but it was mostly rhetorical, since the ear to ear smile Loki had was very telling.
"I can't let my husband die before he can understand how Asgard's electricity and technology works" he said with a shrug, as if it was nothing… wait, did that mean he was going to explain fully how it worked?!
Score!
Wait, husband?
"Wait, husband?" he was starting to see black around the edges, oh god, did the apple got them married? That wasn't in the book he read…
"Why do you think the feast is for?" Loki said.
Tony fainted. Called it!
The last thing he saw was Loki's shit eating grin.
The last thing he thought was:
Loki, you little shit.