Loki felt like a prick.

He walked back into his room and fell backwards onto his bed, staring up at the ceiling. He thought he should start working on the outline for his French Lit term paper, but he completely lacked the energy to do so at the moment. How could one concentrate on Balzac, Dumas and Hugo after one had just broken the heart of a sweet, lovely girl?

Okay, so maybe "broken" wasn't the right word. Fractured didn't even work. More like...scratched. In fact, it was probably the least dramatic breakup Loki had ever been through. There was a bit of crying, yes, but both he and Maria realized there would never be anything between them but a caring, even loving, friendship. Their short hardly-lasted-three-weeks coupling simply lacked any sort of passion. Still, she had left his room with tears in her eyes and a promise on her lips that she would see him at the next study group, with no hard feelings. It was those damn tears that had him feeling like a little shit at the moment. He did not enjoy it when anyone hurt or cried because of him.

Most of the time.

Depending on the person.

Knowing he really shouldn't procrastinate any longer, and that it would serve to take his mind off the image of Maria's big blue eyes filled with tears, Loki sat up and swung his legs over the bed onto the floor and resolved to write his paper. He clicked on his iPod and selected his 'Study Session' playlist and took a seat at his desk. Chopin soared through the speakers of the player on which his iPod was docked as he worked on the outline then immersed himself in The Count of Monte Cristo, taking notes as he read. He had read it before, of course—several times, in fact, because it was one of his favorite novels. And it never bothered him to read it again, especially in its original French text.

Loki tore his eyes from a particularly engrossing swordfight at what sounded like a knock on the outside door. He laid the book on the desk, pressed the pause button, interrupting "Moonlight Sonata," and got to his feet, listening for another. When he heard another, more impatient knock, he ran to the door and swung it open.

And froze.

"Hello, Loki."

Loki's hand tightened around the doorknob and he forced himself not to glare. "Father," he ground out between his teeth. "What are you doing here?"

Odin inclined his head. "That's no way to greet me. Am I not welcome to come in?"

Loki seemed to debate with himself for a brief moment before stepping back and gesturing for Odin to enter the dorm. He closed the door and took two deep, calming breaths before facing Odin again. The older man had his hands clasped behind his back as he roamed around the room, no doubt finding it inadequate in some way. Everything in regards to Loki was inadequate; including Loki himself.

"I take it this room was to your satisfaction?" He glanced at Loki as he moved to check the view from the window.

"Yes. Well…everything but the neighbors. Particularly the one across the hall." Loki's stomach muscles clenched when Odin's sharp blue eye flashed to him. Odin seemed to take a deep breath too, before moving away from the window. He smiled as he approached the table that Loki stood by, but it looked forced, uneasy.

"How are your courses faring so far?"

Loki lowered his chin after an awkward chuckle slipped past his lips. Small talk? He thought, contemptuously. He had to swallow the words before meeting Odin's one-eyed gaze again. "Faring well, actually—was there something you needed?" The way Odin's mouth fell open gave Loki some sadistic pleasure. "Or are you just killing time before you go on to visit Thor? Was he not in?"

"Loki…" Odin took a step forward, stopping short when Loki stormed away toward his bedroom.

"I don't have much free time at the moment, I'm afraid. I've papers to write, books to read." He felt his chest rising far too quickly with his quickened breaths, a rush of heat making him nearly pant in built-up anger. He stopped in front of his open door.

"Loki."

He snapped. "What do you want, Odin?"

"Enough! Now, I've just had about enough of you and your sharp tongue."

Loki cursed under his breath when the one-word shout made his entire body jolt in a silly childlike fear. He pressed his lips together tightly, hoping it would keep him from saying anything more. He was no longer comfortable in Odin's presence; he was a stranger to him now. A deceiver, a user…the true father of a man he would never, could never live up to. Yet he still found himself apologizing and, somehow, seeking his approval.

Odin scrubbed a hand over his face and removed his long black coat, tossing it over a nearby chair. "I don't understand you anymore, Loki," he started. "I don't know where this…animosity has come from."

Loki kept his eyes on the floor, his lips a thin pale pink line. He alternately fisted his hands and uncurled them at his sides in an effort to not laugh contemptuously in Odin's face or unleash the rage he felt bubbling underneath his cool, calm, and collected surface.

"But I don't like it," Odin declared, his tone gone harsh, drawing Loki's gaze briefly. "And I won't have it, not anymore. It has come to my attention that your behavior has been less than congenial toward your brother." Loki's eyes grew wide for a second before he lifted his eyes to Odin again. "That ends now."

Cool jade suddenly darkened to sharp emerald, narrowed. "What?"

"You and Thor are no ordinary students on this campus, you know this. You have a reputation, a legacy, to not only live up to, but to strive for, to protect. And, damn it, Loki, I will not have your childish and deviant behavior putting a stain on this family!"

"Whose family?"

Odin reared back at Loki's snarl before he seemed to gather himself. "Mind your tone, Loki."

"What for?" he spat back like the petulant child his would-be father often accused him of being.

"You forget yourself, son." Odin's voice rose to match the volume of Loki's. He continued, appearing not to have noticed the way Loki's green eyes flashed and his lips curled ever so slightly over his teeth. "You will show me the respect I deserve as your father—"

"You! Are not! My father!" Loki gasped at his own outburst, breathing heavily, glaring at Odin through suddenly damp eyes.

Odin's mouth snapped close, his jaw clenched; a hand flew out to grip the back of the nearest chair. "Is that the thanks I am to receive?" he said through a cracking voice that grew with every word until he was shouting. "After all I've given you? After I took you in, clothed you, fed you, gave you the finest education money could buy? This is how you repay me, you spoiled, selfish little boy!"

Surprising them both, Loki laughed once, humorlessly. "Oh, spare me the theatrics, you old fool. I meant nothing to you!" A tear rolled down a pale cheek but was ignored as Loki closed the distance between them. "I was a burden that you chose to take in…"

Loki moved his face inches from Odin's so he could look the old man straight in the eye as he spoke his next words, paying no mind to the tears that filled his own eyes and continued to roll down his sharp angled cheekbones. His voice lowered to a venomous, deadly whisper. "…to pay for your own sins."

Odin went still and visibly swallowed. His Adam's apple bobbed up and down with the movement, not unnoticed by Loki. "No, Loki…"

"I was a pawn, a tool. A stolen relic…put on display when you needed to further your precious political career, then stashed away—far away—until you might have use of me again."

Odin frantically shook his head. "Loki. That is not what—"

"I don't want to hear your excuses!" He shouted in Odin's face, making the older man flinch, before turning away, stomping around the room, feeling his blood and his adrenaline surging through his veins, forcing his heart to pump rapidly. "Your intentions mean nothing to me now. If it wasn't for the simple fact that I need my education to make something of myself away from you and the rest of the damned Odinsons I would have disappeared years ago. From this day forward, I want nothing, nothing, to do with you—any of you!"

Odin felt disoriented. The blood was rushing to his head making him feel a little light-headed. How had this happened? How had Loki learned of his deepest, darkest secret? Did he know the whole story?

I was a burden you chose to pay for your own sins.

How true the statement was.

In the years after Thor's birth, Odin had struggled to balance his family life and his work. Being a senator in Washington D.C. was no easy task and a twenty-four hour a day job. The pressure had gotten to him, admittedly, and he had made a terrible mistake. He couldn't even remember her name now—that's how much she had meant to him. Though, she had meant enough to Frigga to pack up hers and Thor's things and leave him for three months. And in the middle of an election year.

It had taken a lot of begging and groveling and promises to win Frigga back. She was a proud woman and she had already suffered enough, unable to provide him—or herself—with any more children. And he had known this was the one thing she had wanted most: to give Thor a sibling. The subject of adoption had come up. And his campaign team had jumped on it.

It'll make up for the affair, they had said. It'll emphasize your family platform, they had said. And so, he had done it.

When they had entered the orphanage, up in the northeastern part of the United States, Odin had had no preference: boy, girl, dark-haired, blonde, white, black, Asian, Hispanic. Frankly, he hadn't cared. He had only been doing it for Frigga. So when she had come out and presented him with an extremely pale boy of eight with hair as black as ink and eyes the color of Frigga's birthstone, he had been surprised. He had started to protest but then he looked down at the young boy, staring up at him with wide, innocent eyes that showed only a tiny hint of fear—and caught sight of the way he clutched onto Frigga's hand. And he had known right then and there. This was his new son.

Looking at the boy—no, he was a man now—Odin wondered where he had gone wrong?

No. No, he had done no wrong. Yes, his reasons for stepping foot in that orphanage that day were not the most honorable, but that did not change the fact that he cared for and loved Loki as equally as he had cared for and loved Thor. From his point of view, he had played no favorites. And how dare Loki so much as accuse him of such a monstrous act?

Odin was fueled on now by his own righteous—in his mind—anger. The purpose of his visit was not to have his own son berate and judge him for his actions. He had business to take care of and he would now do it.

"Stop with this damn foolishness, Loki! It's done!"

The younger man halted his angry pacing and faced Odin with a surprised look on his face. "N-no, it is not! You don't get to order me around anymore! You are not my father!"

"Oh, yes I am!" Odin shot back. "Despite your opinion on the subject, I have, in fact, been your father for the past decade, Loki Odinson! I grow tired of this juvenile behavior and I command it to stop."

"Command—"

"I am not finished!" He roared at Loki's interruption. He had the satisfaction of seeing Loki shrink back. "Furthermore," he lowered his voice, no longer shouting, but still imposing, as he continued forward, forcing Loki to retreat. "From this day forward, you will treat me, your mother and your brother with the respect befitting a senator's son. Oh, yes. And you will no longer be keeping male company in your bed."

Odin watched the color drain from Loki's face as his back reached the wall. Emerald eyes darkened and narrowed to slits, but something—Odin suspected fear—made the taller man's breath quicken. "Won't I?" he challenged quietly.

"No," Odin said with authoritative finality.

Loki smirked, but the slight curve of his lips lacked confidence. "You cannot control my actions, Odin. You are not with me at every moment of the day—" Loki let out a pained groan when Odin's old, tired hands curled into his sweater, gripped tightly, and roughly shoved him into the wall.

"You will stop this, Loki! I have no more patience for you and your antics!"

"And what are you going to do about it?" Loki's shout was answered with an unintelligible growl as his body was pulled from the wall only to be slammed back into it again. "Ah! So that's it, is it?" he stuttered, his back muscles spasming in pain. "Are you going to beat obedience into me? Go on," he dared, glaring down his nose at Odin, "go on and beat me like the child you never wanted!"

Before Odin could stop himself, his arm reared up and the back of his hand connected with Loki's face. The tall, suddenly frail-looking body collapsed to the floor with the force of Odin's blow, the air knocked out of him in one sweeping whoosh, and he blinked repeatedly as if he saw stars. Odin was shocked at his own strength yet he moved forward, running on pure adrenaline now, as he jerked Loki to his feet, again shoving him against the wall.

"This is not what I wanted, Loki," Odin started. He was cut off when Loki shoved him away. Odin staggered backward, falling unceremoniously onto the loveseat.

"It may not be what you wanted, Father, but it is what you created!" Loki shouted at him as he moved toward him.

Odin was stricken with a sense of fear as Loki approached him and mimicked his own actions by curling his fingers into his black suit jacket. Automatically, his fingers wrapped around Loki's thin wrists, trying unsuccessfully to remove his hands, as Loki continued to scream at him, hot tears spilling from his eyes. At a loss, Odin blindly threw out his hand once again striking Loki in the face.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, he swore he heard voices that were neither his nor Loki's, but in his rage, he pulled himself to his feet and launched himself at his most defiant son, his hands outstretched, his fingers bowed into claws, a feral howl coming from his throat.

But he never touched him. From out of nowhere, two arms had managed to wrap around him from behind and prevented his assault.

Then everything went black.

Loki didn't even know what he was saying, screaming, at Odin. Two years of pent-up emotions—despair, pain, disbelief, grief, anger, sorrow, hatred, deception, defiance, fear—everything had just begun to spew from his lips. His vision was going red with it all, which is probably why he didn't see Odin's hand come flying at his face again. And again, Loki awkwardly faltered backwards. His heart leapt into his throat and he braced himself for another hard fall to the floor. But this time his crash was cushioned by a pair of arms.

Loki! Are you okay?

The blood rushing in his ears made everything hard to make sense of. Voices, noises were muffled; images, faces were blurry. His legs gave way beneath him, his fingers clutched into a cotton t-shirt as whoever held him cautiously lowered him to the ground. He heard his name again but he couldn't seem to focus. He shut his eyes, squeezing them tight, and when he opened them again two of the deepest, darkest brown eyes he had ever seen were boring down on him. He felt the muscles of his face crease into a confused frown.

"Stark?"

"Hey…look who's coming around again."

A warm palm pressed and patted at Loki's clammy cheek and he finally felt himself begin to calm down, his heart begin to slow its racing rhythm.

"Tony!"

He looked away, toward whoever called for him, and carefully, but quickly, removed himself from Loki. Loki managed to get himself into a sitting position and saw Tony and a silver-haired man crouched over Odin. "Odin?"

"He's fine. He just passed out," Tony tossed over his shoulder.

Remembering himself, Loki dismissed the concern he momentarily felt and crawled to knees, pushed himself up to stand, pressing his hands to the aches in his back and chest. He dreaded the next time he looked at himself in the mirror, already knowing his alabaster-like skin would be marred with black, blue and purple bruises. He nearly crumbled to the floor again but an arm wrapped around his waist, a hand gripped his forearm.

"Whoa, easy there, little Loki."

Loki huffed out an offended breath. "Remove yourself from me, Stark."

Tony scoffed. "Hey, look, I don't if you've been keeping tabs here, Hamlet, but I just kind of rescued you from doing something you would really regret later."

Loki's lips parted, ready with a sarcastic quip, but his vision began to swim and, once more, he was falling into Tony Stark's arms.

Tony sat by his bedside for hours. When his body began to shiver and he curled himself into a ball, Tony pulled the blankets over him. When tracks of salty dampness began to escape from between his closed eyelids and his chin trembled in silent, broken sobs, Tony grabbed the tissues and wiped away his tears. When he called for Bucky in his sleep, then cried for Thor, and pawed at the air in the darkened room, Tony sat beside him and held him, rocked him, until he calmed down again and fell back into unconsciousness.

He was dozing off himself in Loki's desk chair when sleeping beauty finally started coming to. Tony watched him silently, unmoving so as not to startle him, as he blinked the sleep from his eyes and stretched like a cat in the bed before he remembered his aching muscles and sore joints and hissed in pain. He waited patiently for Loki's groggy head to clear, to remember where he was. Finally, clear jade eyes landed on him.

Tony grinned. "Evening," he greeted. And just like that the serene peace that had enveloped the room was gone. The desk chair rolled backwards on the carpet, propelled by his quick feet, when Loki flung back the covers and jolted to his own feet. He looked toward his open bedroom door, as if expecting someone to come waltzing in. "He's gone." Those jade eyes that were suddenly emerald again—how did he do that?—shot to him.

Loki started to speak, but sleep and the screeching from his fight with Odin only resulted in a soft croak, and the cut on his lip from one of Odin's hits smarted with a quick burst of pain that had his hand flying up to cover it. Tony scooted forward and offered him a fresh bottle of water from his nightstand, going so far as to unscrew the cap before handing it over with a tissue. Loki took both, eyeing him like a threatened animal on alert, and swallowed down the entire bottle before pressing the tissue to his mouth. He suddenly realized, as the room temperature liquid created a cool trail down his throat to his stomach, that he was starving. Food later, he thought to himself.

"Did he say where he was going?"

"Ye—actually, no, but I know where he went."

Loki waited expectantly, but Tony did not continue. "Are you going to tell me or do I have to guess?" He pulled the tissue away, folded the bloody part in, and pressed a cleaner part back to his lip.

"Oh. Yeah, uh, he went to dinner with Howie—my dad," he amended at Loki's confused expression. "It wasn't too hard to convince the old man to leave with your old man. Don't read anything into it. It was just a much more attractive offer than serving his 'quality time'"—he added finger quotes and a mocking face—"sentence with me. Odin arrived safely home a couple of hours ago. No doubt my dad didn't waste an opportunity like dinner with a US senator to kiss some ass and rub some elbows. It's definitely a relationship to fear, personality-wise, but other than that, it's really pretty harmless and I don't really think—"

"By the gods, do you ever stop talking?!"

Tony's lips came together and he blinked once before frowning in Loki's general direction.

"I don't need your life's history, Stark. I asked a simple question, which you answered, in the first sentence. It was quiet sufficient. Now if you don't mind."

"Hey, wait a minute!" Tony jumped up and followed Loki into the communal area. "I just sat by your bed for the past four hours." Loki tossed the dirty tissue into the trash then faced Tony. By his body language, Tony could tell that the guy was not impressed. "I think the least you can do is tell me what the hell happened here today?"

Loki's swollen lips pursed in thought and he shrugged his shoulders. "It was merely a family squabble."

Tony dropped his chin in disbelief. "Are you freaking kidding me right now? Family squabbles don't involve people throwing each other across the room or-or passing out because they were screaming so loud at the top of their lungs that I could hear you clear across the hall through not only your closed door, but my closed door, too! What the fuck, Loki? My father had to physically hold yours back to keep him from pounding on you!"

"Stark!" Loki waited a beat to make sure Tony would stay quiet. "I think you've made your point." Tony crossed his arms over his chest, cocked an eyebrow, and waited. Loki let out a long breath, his tongue poking out slightly in the corner of his mouth that still stung. "I appreciate your concern. And I thank you for your help and your…" his eyes traveled toward his open bedroom door and back, "…bedside vigil, shall we say? Please pass my thanks on to your father."

"That's it?" Tony followed Loki as he turned and walked toward the kitchen. "That's all I get? Jesus, Loki, that guy could've killed you."

"I am aware!" Loki slapped his hands down on the kitchen counter next to the stove, hanging his head, trying to regain the last bits of his composure. "I said I was grateful." As he spoke, Loki's eyes slowly met Tony's. "But I have no intention of sharing the details of my life with the likes of you, Anthony Stark."

Before Tony had the chance to respond, the door to Loki's dorm flew open and Thor burst in. He was breathing heavy, like he had just run a marathon to get there, his blue eyes flying frantically between his brother and Tony.

"Brother…," he panted, his eyes pleading for something Loki couldn't be bothered to read, much less give. He was too exhausted to even glare back. He gave a shake of his head and his lips curled into themselves. He mumbled something in a language that Tony didn't understand and swept past Thor, snatching his keys hanging from a hook below Clint's bull's-eye corkboard, slamming the door behind him.

Whatever Loki had said left Thor as still as a statue in his position near the door, staring at the carpet at his feet. It grew uncomfortably quiet and Tony thought he saw something damp in the corner of Thor's eye.

"What language was that?" Tony asked because he was actually very curious. He had never heard anything like it and, despite the fact that he had no idea what was said and that it was said with such venom, it still sounded quite beautiful. Or maybe it was just the voice that spoke it he liked.

"Norwegian," Thor answered gruffly, "The language of our..." He hesitated briefly, unsure. "Our ancestors."

"Oh." Tony's hands dipped into the pockets of his jeans and puffed out his cheeks. He filed that away for later. "What, uh, what did he say?"

Thor swallowed the lump in his throat and finally met Tony's eyes. "'Go to hell, brother.'"