There is a specific sort of discomfort to being in a hospital bed. It is so specific that Tony doesn't even have to open his eyes. He's surrounded by cheap cotton and cheap springs and the too-sterile air is making his skin crawl.
He hardly even wants to open his eyes
When he cracks open his eyelids its just enough to make out a bleary humanoid shape in the corner, as he knows he's going to have to face the blinding white in stages.
"Loki?" He croaks and automatically reaches out the hand with the IV in it. Tony has to force himself not to pull against what feels like a shackle, and rip his vein to shreds.
"No, Tony." Says a deeper, and altogether more tired and disappointed voice. Tony knows that voice. It doctored, nurtured, and guided him on his father's behalf for eighteen years. Howard was absent, and his mother only had eyes for Howard, and nannies came and went, but Obadiah Stane was the closest thing to 'being there' that Tony had ever had, before Pepper.
Tony had planned on never seeing either of his parents again, but Obie was more collateral damage on that front.
Tony'd figured that he'd see him again at some point.
He hadn't wanted it to be like this.
"Your...friend is on his way to Texas."
"No!" Cries Tony before he can bite it back. He's shaking.
"Tony, Loki Lauff is a musician under contract to complete a tour. That is what he's here for-"
"Loki wouldn't-"
"Tony, listen-"
"He wouldn't just leave-"
"He is contractually obligated to-"
"Shut the fuck up Obadiah!"
Tony still can't really see, and the tears he can't hold back any longer aren't helping matters. The room is swimming but he'd know that voice anywhere.
"Obie, you have to listen to me! You don't know Loki like I-"
"I get it, Tony. I really do. You're young. Your father pissed you off. He made you feel unappreciated, so you figured you'd make him sorry. I love Howard more than any of his various...ladyfriends probably ever will, but even I can admit he can be an asshole when he puts his mind to it. There's also some good-"
"No. There really isn't."
"The man's a genius-"
"And what good is that if he treats everyone around him like a piece of furniture in his own personal fucking funeral home!?"
Obadiah's silence is like a physical slap across the face.
"Look, I know that what I did was shitty and-"
"It's been forgotten."
"Obie, there's no way that everyone-"
"Everyone does stupid things when they're a kid, Tony. That's what youth is for!"
"Youth is about scraping your knees and falling in and out of love every week. It's got nothing to do with..."
"With what, Tony?"
Tony's got a million nouns swimming through his head and he doesn't want to pin a voice on any of them. He'd literally done every shitty thing he could possibly think of in the years leading up to his excommunication from the Technological Church of his holiness Howard Stark.
"He disowned me. Told me if I so much as set foot on company grounds ever again he'd have me shot. Haven't heard from him since. Haven't heard from you either, Obie."
That fact is what hurts most of all.
"I've slept in cellars and cars and mansions and homeless shelters, I've been in an out of jail cells and whorehouses and cities and states and gig after gig after gig. I've been hurt and sick and nearly dead and I heard nothing from any of you fucking people. For over a year."
This time Obadiah's silence feels like a personal victory.
"What's changed, Obie?"
When Obadiah throws a manilla folder onto Tony's lap Tony doesn't even have to open it to know what's in it.
Tony does it anyway.
The person in those pictures is not him.
Wanton and waspish and androgynous, a starving boygirl attached to the hip of an alien predator in lipstick with a handful of thick black claws.
Kissing, touching, stroking, strung out, oblivious.
Transcendent.
Photograph after photograph after photograph.
"It's becoming almost impossible to hide." Says Obadiah and Tony doesn't understand.
"HIde?"
"I didn't think you were this naive."
Tony's got a photo in his hands of him and Loki, holding hands in some hotel or other.
He can suddenly hear Peters in his head.
Loki looks at you like you're the only thing that matters..
Tony can see it in Loki's face and it makes his heart physically twinge.
"Stop that!" The picture is snatched out of Tony's hands before he can blink and he feels like a piece of him has been taken away. "Our people are good, but not that good! You've been recognized and you are one minor mistake away from being a goddamn laughingstock! We miss one single picture and you can't show your face in public! One fucking slip up, Tony Stark, and you won't ever be able to come home!"
There are pictures of him and Loki all over the floor and Tony feels like Obadiah has singlehandedly debased something sacred and profound
"I didn't know that coming home was an option."
"Look, you wanted your father's attention, and you have it Tony. You've got what you wanted right in the palm of your hand. You've succeeded. You don't have to do this anymore. You are so young and such a brilliant brilliant mind, Tony. Don't waste it over some faggot that whores you out and jitterbugs off the second it's time for him to bat his eyelashes in the direction of a new crowd of faggots."
Tony feels the tears dripping down his chin before he can stop himself and in that moment he hates himself more than he ever has.
"I know that Howard isn't perfect. I will be the first person to admit it. I'm not going to look you in the eye and insult your intelligence by promising you that if you come back the Stark family is going to become the Brady Bunch. But, after what you did, he's willing to let you back into any one of his houses, and take care of you, and leave you his legacy."
Tony hasn't built, designed, or fixed anything beyond the completely mundane in eons. He hasn't been in the proper circles. A robot that does your laundry, jerks you off, and can predict the stock market with damn near perfect accuracy might have been invented in his absence and the circuitry of it might be a complete fucking mystery to Tony Stark, previous technological boy wonder, current coked-up wind-up toy of London's most notorious rock-n-roll prostitute.
"And you and I both know that that's more than you deserve, Tony."
Tony knows that this is true.
"You humiliated him, your mother, and yourself. Then after you left you pursued this particular course with a vengeance. If I were you I'd crawl back to him on your hands and knees and accept whatever abuse he wants to give you."
Tony knows that this is true also.
"You've fucked up Tony Stark."
Tony's got a brick in his throat and a turbulent ocean of bile and anger and despair churning in his gut.
"I'll be back for you in the morning. I'll help you fix this. Like I've always done."
When Obadiah leaves Tony's got nothing to say. He shakes and he sobs and he shakes, alone in the dark, straight into unconsciousness.
FGS: Thank you man. And I'm really hoping I can. My dad just lost his house and he and my sister were basically homeless and cashing in on favors for a month, so now that my sister is in a legit place I don't feel that bad about fucking off for a month. I also hope that all the scholarship places feel bad enough for me to help a brother out, you know man. I mean also, rock & roll is my literal life. Like I write this shit, I play in the only band of people I have met under fifty that play Led Zeppelin for fun. Like fuck. If there is anyone that should go on a music based program to the place where everything I love came from, it's me. For the love of fuck.
Stormy: Your reviews always make me so happy.
Loki88: MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH AHA
Kaja: I can dig that, and that is a killer tattoo. I'm jelly. And yeah man. I was actually writing novels before I did fic, so like I am probably better at creating characters than taking other people's and beating them into submission. I am actually writing a novel right now that I'm gonna self publish. Right now it's called 'If Stephanie Meyer Can Be That Self-indugleant and Make Ten Million Dollars Than I Can Too, Fuck All Y'all' but I probably need a better title before I do that haha.
Jenamy: Dude, Tommy Chong is like one of my spirit animals. You probably couldn't tell, but weed is pretty much 70% of what I do. Like The other thirty is wine, beer, writing, music, and dying my hair unnatural colors. And hey man, I kind of hate to tell you this, but shit isn't even as bad as it's gonna get. Like holy shit. Torturing characters is kind of the crust on that pie chart which is my life. If you're feeling down and think that Tony should get away from Loki I am doing it right and you are getting it right. Like shipping isn't shipping unless your ship is so destructive to one or both people that you feel bad about it. What are fluff ships? What is happiness? Fuck man, I don't even know anymore.