Hiya there! First of all (this is getting to be a habit), I want to apologise for my long absence and thank all of you who bear with me – your comments and reviews keep me going, they always make my day ^.^

Secondly, well, there was a reason this took so long, and I'm afraid that no matter how much I kept twisting and turning the chapter, it wouldn't quite do what I wanted it to. I do hope I don't disappoint you, anyway.

That's it from me. Have fun!

"You are doing what?"

Tony looked up from the controls, eyebrows raised. He tried to not let Loki's look of utter incredulity (finally something other than that distant, cold mask) derail him as he replied: "Busting you out. Freeing you. Making a break for it. High-tail it the fuck out of here. Any of that ring any bells? Because I am not staying here one minute longer and trust me, neither are you."

Loki stared a second longer, then started to pace, running a hand through his matted hair. "But you – you don't understand," he said in a voice that was almost frantic, "you can't – Anthony, this is your world, these are your people. What do you think you're doing?"

Again, the inventor stopped in his doings and looked up, leaning against the control panel as he pointed at Loki. "See, that's exactly the thing. You're not making any sense. What kind of villain are you supposed to be, trying to stop people from helping you? You don't have to be here and we both know that." He gestured towards the door he had come through. "See, they don't trust me, and while it pisses me off, to some degree I do understand that. But what I don't understand is why are you here?"

There was just the briefest flicker of hesitation before Loki drew himself up and began: "I am going to claim this world as my own, as was my birth ri–"

"Oh, come on," Tony interrupted and didn't resist the urge to roll his eyes. "Nobody's watching us, so cut that bullshit. You know, they may not trust me up there, but I have eyes. I saw some of the footage the other agents had running while I did my reading on the team, and that stunt in Stuttgart? Really, Loki? I know you occasionally have a thing for drama, but if you really hadn't wanted people to find out what you were doing, nobody would've found out. You could've caught that guy in a quiet moment – by the way, an eyeball? Ew – somewhere else or just have shape-shifted and for all I know, that might've been enough for the retinal scanner to let you through, no fuss."

He raised a finger to stop anything that Loki might have wanted to remark from being said. "But," he continued, "and here's the thing, even if you weren't here on your own volition, assuming that you actually did get hit over the head really hard and all that wasn't intentional. You could have been out of here hours ago. You can teleport. Since you didn't do that, I'm assuming that there's a reason for it."

Loki sighed – honest to god stood there in his cell, sighing in something that seemed like frustrated annoyance. Then, he stood a bit taller, approaching the glass and putting a hand to it as he responded: "As a matter of fact, yes, there is an ulterior motive for this. There is a reason I am here and you, dear Anthony, are about to bloody ruin it!"

Tony couldn't help it. He laughed. Well, snickered, more like. "Pity, isn't it?" he asked gleefully. "But you know, you do have a point. This is my world, these are my people, and as much as I love –" He stumbled over the word and continued with only the slightest hitch in his sentence. "...having you back, I'm not about to sit by and watch this."

"But you don't understand!" Loki began again.

"Yes, you've said that already," the inventor nodded and with a final flick of the control panel, the door to the cell unlocked with a hiss. "Now, I think we have somewhere to be."

Just in that moment, a tremor ran through the whole room and Tony stumbled, struggling to stay on his feet. He saw Loki's disbelieving expression vanish as it was replaced by a wide, manic grin and suddenly, the blue eyes fixed on Tony seemed a lot more unsettling than just a moment before. Stepping out of the cell, Loki commented: "Ah, and that would be my ride. If you don't mind, Anthony, you were right, I have somewhere to be."

Tony hurried to stand in front of him, steadying himself on the railing beside him, and demanded: "Hold on a minute, what the hell is going on? Loki, what have you done?" He reached out with one hand and grabbed Loki's upper arm tightly so the god wouldn't be able to just teleport away.

Loki just gave him that same, unsettling, un-Loki-like smile again as he asked: "Wouldn't you like to know?"

The inventor gritted his teeth. It was really, really tiring that everybody kept treating him like he was either fragile, an idiot or a threat. From SHIELD, alright, but Loki? This was getting ridiculous. He tightened his grip on the god's leather-clad arm and replied with false calm: "Yes, yes I would."

For a moment, Loki looked at him with his head tilted contemplatively, then he nodded. With another smile that was definitely not soothing at all, he conceded: "Alright, then." Before Tony could react to that in any way, the prince's fingers were pressed against his temples and Tony felt his knees give out from under him before he lost consciousness.

He woke up later with no idea about how much time had passed. His head was pounding and he felt nauseous, like after a particularly rough teleportation (was that what had happened?), and the constant vibrations didn't help the matter either.

Tony put a conscious effort into not frowning as he tried to make sense of his surroundings without giving away that he was no longer sleeping. He could hear the low whir of engines and he seemed to be sitting up, strapped into a seat not unlike those on the quinjet before. And that would be my ride, Loki's voice echoed in his head. Had the prince gotten his hands on one of the 'jets?

To his left, he could make out the low murmur of voices too quiet for him to understand, but apart from that, nobody spoke. He'd have recognised Loki's voice immediately.

Since it was unlikely that Loki was going to murder him if he hadn't done it already (and when had Loki murdering him become a possible, not improbable outcome for any kind of scenario?), Tony slowly opened his eyes. He had been right, he was on the inside of a quinjet or something very similar – he had some serious catching up to do. Two years ago, he would have been able to tell the model and build year with a quick glance, and now... well, he was two years behind on everything. And for someone who had used to be two years ahead of everybody else, ten in Hammer's case (was Justin Hammer still – oh God, now that Stark Industries was no longer pushed by Tony's mind, had Hammer taken his place on the market? Surely some benevolent deity would have prevented that?), that was insanely frustrating.

He blinked a few times, zeroing in on Loki who sat opposite him with a sceptre draped over his lap, fingers curled around it tightly and eyes shut. Apparently, he hadn't taken notice of Tony waking up yet, and since the only other people on board were the two in the cockpit, neither had anyone else.

Not that that helped him much. It wasn't like he could jump off the 'jet, after all. Still, right in this moment, he wasn't being observed and that gave him the opportunity to sort his thoughts and try to figure out what to do next. What to do about Loki – Loki threatening his world, Loki kidnapping him, Loki and his eerie blue eyes.

One problem at a time, he reminded himself. Let's start with the whole kidnapping issue. While he had established that it wasn't going to be possible to leave just yet, he could at least do something for his level of comfort. With quick, nimble fingers, Tony unbuckled the belts holding him in place. The only way to look outside the quinjet was from the cockpit and telling the pilots he was up and about was probably not a good idea, but if he just got up and caught a glimpse...

Just when Tony had gingerly risen from his seat and was heading towards the cockpit with silent steps, a sound from behind him made him jump and whirl around in time to see Loki dropping the sceptre as though it had burned his fingers. He was looking around with wide eyes like after a bad dream and the blue colour in them was more eerie than ever, practically glowing until he squinted a few times, exhaling a harsh breath, and looked up at Tony.

The startled look on his face was the most vulnerable and the most sincere expression that Tony had seen on him since he had returned to Midgard, which was probably why he dared to turn fully and trace his steps back towards the prince, casually kicking the sceptre out of the way. Loki's eyes followed it with an unreadable expression and the cold mask that he had worn before slid back into place as he demanded sharply: "What do you think you are doing?"

Refusing to let that discourage him, the inventor flashed him a grin that was more confident than he felt. "That was my question to you, in case you don't remember it. You kidnapped me."

"You freed me!" Loki snapped back accusingly.

"Oh my god, I'm sorry!" Tony responded sarcastically, throwing his arms up. "So what? You attacked my planet!"

"Exactly!" the prince shot back. "This is not how you were supposed to behave!"

"How well do you know me, Loki?" Tony asked, bending down to be on eye-level with the still sitting Loki. "Did you actually expect me to do the sane thing and start working against you when there's even a sliver of hope that I'm getting you back? Did you?" He splayed a hand over Loki's chest, pushing until the prince was leaning back against the wall. "'cause if you did, that's seriously a little disappointing. I'd go so far as to call it insulting. You know me, Lokes, or at least you used to, I'm not so sure about it now. You know that fancy words and epic speeches are more your area of expertise than mine, but I'm smart and I'm stubborn and I'm not letting this go until I get what I want. You're stuck with me, buddy. You've been from the moment that you shoved that damn apple down my throat."

And for a second, a split-second, Tony swore that he could catch a flicker of green in Loki's wide eyes, gone as quickly as it had appeared. It didn't really matter that Loki shoved him back with a snarl afterwards – Tony was still grinning triumphantly as he stumbled back onto his seat while the prince unfastened his seatbelts with a vigour that would make anyone think he held a personal grudge against them. With a glare towards Tony, he picked up the sceptre and then made his way towards the cockpit.

The inventor crossed his arms, leaning back as he allowed himself to revel in the small victory. Not only had he left Loki without anything to say for once, no, he was absolutely sure now that his prince was still in there, underneath layers of leather armour and cold blue eyes.

There was some hope left and that was all he needed to go on right now.

Which left him with the question of how exactly he was supposed to go on now, but he was going to figure that out as he went. Loki was still up front, muttering with the pilots, and Tony craned his neck to see something through the window. It was still day (or again?) and they were above a city, but he'd be damned if he knew which one it was. Something large, full of skyscrapers and cramped streets – New York?

As if he had been reading his mind, Loki turned and gave him a confident smile. The fake, taunting kind that seemed to be default since he had come down here. Gesturing towards the hatch, the prince asked: "Would you like to see where we are going? I feel like it might interest you."

"Do you now?" Tony asked back warily. He tried to sound not as nervously eager and curious as he felt when he continued: "I suppose it would be rude to decline an offer like that, so go ahead."

Of course, Loki saw right through that, but aside from a raised eyebrow and a twitch of his smile, he didn't call him out on it. Instead, he opened the hatch and Tony got up from his seat, searching for a hold on the walls so the wind wouldn't make him lose his footing. When he was level with Loki, he blinked against the gust of air greeting him until he could make out the building beneath them.

"Son of a whore," he blurted out. "Fucking piece of shit, I can't believe it." From the corner of his eye, he caught the prince's expression; he seemed a little taken aback, so Tony added: "Not you. I'm getting to you later. I mean that pretentious son of a bitch." He put as much venom into his words as he could manage because he feared that if he didn't, he was going to cry, or throw up, or possibly both.

Beneath the quinjet, quickly growing closer, was a large, ugly grey skyscraper – which, in New York, wouldn't be that much of a problem if not for the four letters proudly flaunting themselves from the very top.

"It even sounds shitty," Tony said more faintly than he'd like. "I mean, who would want to work at a Stane Tower? That just... sounds wrong." Especially since he had been thinking about a Stark Tower, sometime in the future, maybe. He definitely liked the sound of that better. "How'd he even keep the company going without me? It sure wasn't his genius."

His hand was clenched hard around the handle he was clinging to and he feebly told himself that he was leaning against the wall because the wind was bad for his balance. That was all there was to it.

Of course he'd known that the world was going to keep turning without him and it was going to do so with Obadiah Stane in it, but up until now, the problem had been... distant. Not enough of a threat to unsettle Tony, not as long as he didn't actively think of the man or was waking up from a nightmare starring his former mentor. In this moment, Obie had become an all too real element again.

Tony wanted to be back on Asgard.

But that wasn't the way he did things, was it? He didn't get scared and turned to run. He would never have gotten where he was now, for better or for worse, had he not taken risks and faced challenges. Back then, when he had picked him from the cold planet full of alien Hobbits, Loki had started piecing him back together and although he hadn't been there all the way, Tony had grown better. He may not be who he had been before, wasn't ever going to be that man again, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Maybe a change had been in order anyway – he had, in the long weeks that he had spent in Afghanistan before Obie had had him dragged out of the cave, caught sight of his own weapons piled up in a terrorist camp. Obviously, something must have gone wrong there.

And oh god, Afghanistan. He had been gone from Earth for nearly two years; was Yinsen still there? Somewhere in a cave in the mountains?

There was too much that needed doing here. He couldn't freeze up or run away, he would just have to start somewhere.

Preferably by blowing up Stane Tower.

"So you felt like this might interest me, yeah?" he asked Loki, tearing his eyes away from the building below once again. "How's that, then?"

The question didn't seem to be what the prince expected – honestly, he used to know Tony so much better, this was getting ridiculous – and he cocked his head as he looked at Tony as if to try and figure him out somehow instead of just explaining, because that would have been too easy. No, he just stared at Tony with those creepy blue eyes of his as if the inventor had all the answers. He was the one who'd asked, dammit.

"Yes, how is that?" he repeated in a low murmur. After a few seconds, he just turned away again to stare down at the rapidly approaching roof of the ugly-as-hell-building.

Tony scoffed in disbelief. "Well, gee thanks. That was helpful." He watched Loki while the quinjet descended and spoke up after another few beats of silence: "Don't you think it would be a good idea to wait with this whole world domination business until you're making sense again? I mean, no offence, but you sort of look like you don't know what you're doing half of the time. Not exactly the perfect conditions for a ruler. Just saying."

Loki, who had apparently shaken himself out of whatever thoughts had caused the previous faraway look on his face, turned towards Tony with a raised eyebrow. Ah. The sass was back. "Is that the best you could come up with to keep me from subjugating this miserable race?" he asked, his voice practically dripping with sarcasm. "I'm afraid you will have to do better than that."

The inventor threw his arms up. "Oh, come on," he snapped. "Have you listened to yourself? I was watching your little speech to Fury before and now this. There was literally no subtlety or finesse in that. What happened, did you get hit over the head? How stupid do you think humans are? You're either acting like a complete dimwit on purpose or there's something behind this I don't understand yet, but either way, Lokes, whatever the hell you're trying to accomplish, it's not gonna work this way. You are severely underestimating us if you think this will work out for you. I mean, have you seen that team?" And okay, that was said with more confidence than he actually felt towards that ragtag team of spies and geniuses (read: Banner) that Fury seemed to have assembled there, but Loki didn't need to know that.

Anyway, the god didn't seem particularly fazed by Tony's little speech. He just hefted his sceptre more tightly and, after the 'jet settled on the ground with a thud, gestured for the engineer to walk down the opened hatch.

"Go on," he urged. "You'll understand soon."

"Well, thanks a lot, Captain Cryptic," Tony muttered under his breath. "Subjugating this miserable race, oh please. Should've recorded that so I can play it to you as soon as you're back in your right mind. You'll be embarrassed, just wait for it." He wasn't sure if Loki picked his murmurs up, but if he did, the god showed no reaction.

Tony firmly pushed the ever-present dread pooling in his stomach down; it had not been getting better since he had set foot on his own planet again and to be frank, it wasn't helpful in the least. He glanced around in the open space and resisted the childish urge to stamp his foot on the roof (because Stane Tower, really? That asshole) while he surveyed his surroundings.

There was something built up on the roof that looked like the bastard love child of technology and magic, with the glowy cube of science mumbo-jumbo right in the middle of the contraption, emanating a blue-ish glow that sent a shudder down Tony's spine as he got closer. The light had the same shade as Loki's eyes. And the sceptre, come to think of it. The inventor narrowed his eyes at the weapon suspiciously, then met the god's blue gaze.

Loki looked, in a strange way, expectant. Filled with trepidation, but apparently hoping for a special sort of reaction from Tony. Just out of spite, the engineer kept his features carefully blank, crossing his arms in front of his chest.

"So?" he asked challengingly. He tried not to let the thoughts racing each other in his mind sound in his voice, instead sounding cool and distant. "And now what? If you were waiting for a dramatic moment of revelation that involved me fainting like the heroine in some romance novel, sorry, buddy. Not quite in the mood."

While he let his mouth run, he tried to piece together what he was seeing. He knew that Loki was able to control people in some way or another, after all, he had managed to compromise Barton in some way; however, nobody had said that Loki was not acting under somebody else's thumb, either. Tony had no idea what had happened to the prince during the year he had been under the radar, but Loki didn't look good. Not at all. Even though he seemed to have recovered from when he'd first arrived, he was still pale with dark shadows under his eyes and his usually neat hair was still slicked back in greasy strands, not to mention its length.

If Loki was controlling people, who said that somebody wasn't maybe controlling Loki, too?

He watched the god's expression fall when Tony didn't react the way he had apparently expected, whatever that might have entailed. Loki's eyes flickered to the concrete surface of the roof for a moment, then came back up to meet Tony's and his grip on the sceptre tightened surreptitiously.

"Shame," murmured the prince. "Then I shall help you understand."

Determinedly, he raised the sceptre, which glowed a brighter colour than just moments before. Tony's eyes widened and he took a few hasty steps back, hands raised.

"Whoa there, tiger, no need to go straight to biting," he babbled while backing away. "I'm sure we can talk about this, I mean, I don't know how school works on Asgard, but down here, when we want someone to get something, we usually try explaining. With words. So put that thing down and we –"

Loki simply talked over him. "I know it can be hard to comprehend the right course," he said benevolently. "I struggled at first, too. But it will be so much easier to understand once you've seen, Anthony, let me help you see."

"Yeah, no, thanks," Tony declined with a grimace, casting a look over his shoulder to make sure he didn't tumble over the edge of the roof on accident. After all he'd lived through, that would be quite an embarrassing way to go. "Use your words."

The god, however, had used his brief moment of distraction and seized him by his tunic, yanking him forward. He pulled the other arm with the sceptre back and Tony's eyes widened, fixed on the sharp tip that was pointed toward him; for a moment, he expected the prince to simply plunge it through his chest like the medieval weapon it was. He tried to pull Loki's hand away with both of his own, but the prince's grip was relentless.

With a surprisingly anti-climatic clink, the terrifyingly pointy tip of the sceptre hit the cover glass of the arc reactor, covered only by the fabric of the green tunic. The gem in its middle glowed brightly and Loki frowned for a moment, opened his mouth like he wanted to say something.

He stopped, his eyes growing large, and Tony's brain had just managed to catch up far enough for him to try to ask what is it now? when a pulse of not-quite-pain shot through his chest and turned the words into a startled, mangled shout. The blue of the sceptre glowed more brightly, but the colour was subdued by the flash of green, wrapping around it like tendrils of smoke. Tony was not sure whether the prickling feeling he was experiencing could be described by a word as simple as pain; he stared down at his chest incredulously.

The distinct smell of burnt fabric filled the air, apparently emanating from his own tunic, which was curling and smoking like burning paper, starting at the arc reactor. That was enough to pull him out of his stunned paralysis; he staggered away from Loki, who had stopped holding on to him and was staring with similar disbelief.

Suddenly, he dropped the sceptre like it had scorched his fingers and staggered backwards as well, away from the weapon.

Tony was struggling out of his tunic, which was still smoking disturbingly, and gritted his teeth against the pain (yes, it was definitely pain now) that was caused by the reactor's rim having gone hot suddenly; mercifully, not hot enough to actually cause burns, but enough to be definitely unpleasant, especially since there was no way for him to get away from the feeling.

"What the fuck was that supposed to be?" he snapped as soon as he had thrown the garment to the ground. No-one but Loki and Selvig were there to see him anyway. "I'm no expert in creepy-ass-sceptre-science, but I'm pretty sure it's not supposed to do that. Then again, they do have studies down here about performance issues, nothing to be ashamed of. Actually, I've read that one out of five..."

He trailed off when Loki looked up at him, eyes wide and startled and impossibly green.

Tony stared, mutely, for a few seconds, before he managed to ask hoarsely: "Lokes?"

Carefully, as though his affirmation might reverse whatever had happened just now, Loki nodded. "I do think so, yes," he answered slowly.

Tony did not break eye contact while he gingerly approached, kicking the sceptre out of the way as he went. He stopped at a safe distance about two arm's lengths away from the god, staring up at him. It hadn't been a trick of the light like he had feared in the first few seconds; his eyes were really, honestly back to their strange shade of emerald, shifting and changing in tone with the light, but undoubtedly green.

Had Tony been more apt with words than he was, he would definitely have said something touching and moving right there, something to welcome Loki back to himself and express his will to forgive and help the god as long as he finally got to understand what had been going wrong in the first place.

As it was, though, he was simply quiet for some incredibly long seconds and then said firmly: "You bastard."

Loki beamed at him.

"Oh yes," he said, a slightly manic (but more familiar) glitter in his eyes. "I believe I have some things to sort out. Shall we?"

Incredulously, Tony gaped at him. "Seriously? After all this, you expect me to just go along with you and clean up your mess with you? Is that it?"

The prince paused, sheepishly. "It is rather urgent, I am afraid..." he said slowly, glancing over at Selvig, who was still working on the device without paying much attention to them. "But afterwards..."

"Oh, shut up," Tony waved him off. "Afterwards. Yeah, that's helpful." He gritted his teeth angrily. "I'm in. This is my home planet, of course I'm in. But I hope you're aware that you owe me a fucking bunch of explanations. We on the same page there?"

It was incredible, how Loki expected him to go on like nothing had changed. Tony wasn't quite sure he believed this yet; somehow, it had felt too easy. He was waiting for a catch, for the other shoe to drop. Loki couldn't simply be himself again, just like that, because what the hell had that even been? The rim of the reactor still felt unpleasantly warm, even with the cold wind on top of the building that made everything else freezing cold.

"We are," Loki agreed, but didn't move. He was staring at Tony (green eyes, Tony couldn't help but check again and again) with some measure of hesitance, fingers now empty of his spear and clasped in front of him, wringing together.

It was a tell of nervousness more obvious than Tony had ever seen on him, and alright, maybe he wasn't quite as back-to-normal as it seemed on first glance. But they had definitely taken a step into the right direction, unless he was falling for some trick here. Tony returned the look, rocking on the balls of his feet and shuddering in the cold wind. He glanced mournfully at the smouldering tunic behind him, then over at Selvig, still tinkering without paying attention to the two of them.

His eyes flickered back up to meet Loki's and the prince took a careful step closer. Tony exhaled shakily and closed the distance between them, throwing his arms around Loki's shoulders and burying his face in the crook of the god's neck. For this moment, he even managed to ignore the cold feeling of leather on his skin and the metal bits of the armour digging into his torso; it was all worth it for the feeling of Loki's arms wrapping tightly around him and the prince dropping his head to Tony's shoulder.

If this was a ploy, then he was walking right into it and as much as he hated to admit it, he really couldn't care less.

I'm going to kiss him, and then I'm going to punch him, Tony vowed silently to himself. For now, though, this was all he needed. After thinking Loki dead, lost forever, for so long, it had been hard to believe that he was still there; and even then, it had been in a distorted, power-hungry parody of the prince he had gotten to know.

Now it felt even harder to believe that, in some way that Loki would definitely need to explain to him (just not... just not right now), he had his Loki back, his very own god, and the almost painful tightness of their embrace seemed to be the only thing able to ground him to that fact and make him truly, really believe it.

Then, of course, Loki simply had to speak up.

"Anthony?" he murmured, not moving from his position.

"Mh-hm?" made Tony against his neck.

There was a sort of embarrassed pause. After a few beats, Loki muttered: "When I said I had an army? I wasn't lying. They really are on their way." Tony pulled back to stare at him, then at Selvig and the device, and the sceptre laying on the roof. Loki looked almost sheepish. "I'm afraid I truly cannot stop them now."

Of course, he told him that after he had gotten his hug. Tony pursed his lips and, not even really addressing Loki, but the world in general, proclaimed: "Son of a bitch."

This does not mean the two of them have sorted out all their issues. They still have a looong way to go. But I really didn't want to leave them without at least a hug.