I am genuinely amazed that none of you have tracked me down and killed me yet. I am so sorry for the wait.
If you're still following this, you are lovely and I thank you. c:
Loki awoke a few days later with Stark's offer still on his mind. One more look around his room and his decision was practically made for him. He couldn't sit here any longer. There were only so many books he could read before he simply went mad. He needed something else to distract him from the void in his head. Tentatively, Loki asked the ceiling where he could find Tony and J.A.R.V.I.S. explained how to get downstairs.
Soon after, Loki found himself standing outside the glass wall entrance of Tony's workshop, unsure of how to proceed. He didn't see the scientist, but it was a large room and countless machines blocked his view. After a moment, J.A.R.V.I.S. unlocked the door and gave Loki permission to enter. As soon as Loki pulled open the door, he was hit with a wall of sound. Music blasted throughout the room. Suddenly, a blur of red and gold washed across his memory.
His memory? A large square in front of a marble building formed a blurry image in his head. He stepped further into the workshop, hoping to coax out more of the memory. Feeling helpless as nothing else came, he turned abruptly and nearly fell into a partially complete suit of metal. He stared, wide-eyed, at the same red and gold that had graced his mind a moment ago. Still utterly confused, he reached a hand toward it.
"Thought about my offer, have you?" Stark's voice seemed to come out of nowhere. Loki spun and found Tony standing with a rough, metal contraption on one hand and screwdriver in the other. No doubt, he had just been working. "Are you ever going to not jump when I talk to you?"
"I—well, you…You sneak up a lot." Loki admitted. Tony looked toward the open workshop door.
"So do you, evidently."
"Oh," Loki noticed his gaze. "You're, um, ceiling let me in."
"Mmm." Tony raised an eyebrow at his ceiling skeptically. "His name is J.A.R.V.I.S. So, are you here about my offer then?"
Loki gave a small nod.
"Well!" Stark attempted to clap his hands together and was promptly jabbed by the gauntlet he had been working on. Wincing, he flexed his fingers. "Oops. Let's get started, shall we?"
An hour later, Loki was almost beginning to regret his decision to help out. Tony had wanted to begin small, and so Loki had conjured the mysterious green light for Stark to measure. And then he did so again. And again. And again still. As Loki sat and questioned Stark's music choice, his wrist ached from the weight of the numerous wires taped to his arm and hand. He tried to be thankful that at least he was no longer stuck in his room; he hated the smothered feeling it still gave him.
Tony's mood appeared to reflect Loki's. He had started the project with excitement and enthusiasm, but now he seemed unsure of how to proceed. He sat, glaring at his notes in front of him. Frustrated, he sighed and he ran a hand through his hair, causing it to stick up strangely. Loki smirked and took Tony's notes in his hand. He glanced over them, genuinely interested.
"I think you're going about this the wrong way." He finally said. Stark looked at him, surprised.
"You can understand that?" he asked. Loki nodded and pointed to a section of letters and numbers on the page.
"Right here," he explained. "You're trying to treat what I can manipulate as a variable when you should be using it as a constant–" He stopped when he noticed Tony staring at him instead of the equation he was attempting to clarify. "What do you think I did for the last month? You're library is significantly lacking in some decent literature, by the way."
"I don't have time for novels. I hardly sleep as it is." Tony defended. "Now, go back to what you were saying about this theory."
"Well," Loki continued. "The best way I can think to explain it is that it's similar to an electromagnetic wave – most like a radio wave probably – and I'm the antennae as well as the tuner. It's always present; I just tune in and influence it." Tony stared at his notes in amazement as Loki spoke.
"I could kiss you, you crazy psychopath!" Stark exclaimed as he began writing frantically. Loki laughed nervously, unsure of how to respond. His eyes wandered to another table covered in notes and blueprints. Intrigued, he moved closer.
They didn't seem to be in any sort of order. Not that that surprised Loki; Stark's workplace was as haphazard as his mind. He rifled through them, interested in the mechanics behind some of Stark's inventions. There was one for some sort of gauntlet; it looked similar to what Tony had been working on that morning. Another depicted some strange glowing staff. One page, half buried under twelve others, had a chaotic diagram slashed across it. Words like Tesseract and Chitauri stood to him; and one at the top, Loki.
Quickly, Loki glanced up at Stark. He was still filling up his papers with nearly illegible scribbling. Loki swiftly folded the paper and slid it into his pocket. As he turned back to help Tony more, a paper drifted off the table. Loki reached down to retrieve it and was greeted with a miniature sketch of the suit he had almost knocked over earlier. He stared at the design again, perplexed by its familiarity.
"Like it?" Tony was suddenly right next to him. Startled, Loki nodded. "A lot of power goes into it. Not too much stands a chance against me when I'm in that suit." Loki offered the drawing to Stark, whose eyes remained on the Asgardian. Tony took the paper silently, his fingers accidentally brushing the other's.
Loki's eyes wandered toward the real suit, the red and gold filling his mind with confusion again.
"Like a boot to an ant." Loki said, unsure of where the words came from.
I can't science. I don't know if you noticed.