A/N: Guys. My last two chapters have sucked ass. I'm sorry. Shit's been pretty fucked around here. But I'm hoping to grind out the rest of these chapters in a far more fabulous and brilliant manner than previously. So forgive me, and have patience, because it's gonna take a bit longer than normal for me to get these chapters out. Also, I'm eventually going to go back and rewrite the past two chapters. Key word: 'Eventually'. Especially chapter 15. (I'm well aware it suuuuucked ass.)

Also, you might want to go back to chapter 14 and read anything about Thanos. Or, you can not. I did, and I wrote it. xD.

Thanks for your continued support. I appreciate each and every one of you beautiful people.

xoxox

"Natasha!" Thor called out, seeing the fire-engine red head in front of him at the school library. A librarian glared at him, only to be ignored- Thor had bigger fish to fry.

The young Russian-American turned to face him, the smile on her face dimming to a pretty, but merely polite, ghost. "Hi, Thor." She waved, the man beside her turning. Clint. Thor barely hid his surprise. As far as he had known, Natasha hated the young, bubbly-but-melancholic archer. Not surprising, though, as he hardly kept up with who was with who these days.

"Have you heard from Loki?" Thor had been stonewalled by Loki for days. It wasn't like he could normally get ahold of him right away, but recently, the younger Odinson had at least been willing to answer his text messages- even if they were unsatisfactorily one-worded. At this point, Thor would take what he could get.

She shrugged. "Sure, but he hasn't been...around much." Clint snickered, only to cough uncomfortably when a pallid, pointy elbow rammed into his ribs. A satisfied smile played with Natasha's lips. Thor squirmed.

"Well, how is he?" He hated this. He hated not knowing exactly how is little brother is from his little brother's own mouth. Loki had always come to him when something went wrong, or- far more rarely- when something went right. Now, he prayed it was the latter, that he was...getting along with Tony- even if Thor wasn't particularly comfortable with the relationship.

She smiled reassuringly. "Thor, he's fine. You need to stop worrying. Give him some space. You know how he is." She patted his shoulder, her elfin hand landing a manly, resounding smack. It felt like something from one of his football buddies. He eyed her curiously.

"Thanks, Natasha." Thor smiled gratefully at her, glancing at a rather distracted Clint. They seemed like an odd couple in his opinion, but, then again, Natasha Romanoff had never been quite so calm and human. Not to mention, she wasn't glaring at him like she'd ram a pencil through his eyeball if he so much as looked at Loki wrong.

"Thor?" A deep, vaguely familiar voice boomed behind him.

He turned, still smiling, to greet whomever it was that recognized him.

His smile faded instantaneously.

A knock rapped at the door urgently. Tony looked up, covered in soot from a, er, explosiony-backired-plan-gone-wrong type of incident. Oopsies. The kitchen was as covered, as he was, in a thin film of black. Really, he was still trying to figure out what had gone wrong- other than having, y'know, adult ADHD that hadn't been curbed by medication in months- because, all the calculations had been right. Right-ish. It was really still in the hypothesis stage.

He grabbed a blackened rag off the engine suspended in the kitchen and ran for the door. A worried blond giant stood on the flip-side, looking a disheveled mess.

"Is Loki here?" His voice was strained, and blue eyes were wild.

Tony snapped to attention. "No. Whoa, buddy, why don't you come in for a minute." He grabbed the bicep of the tilting man- and really, Tony wasn't sure how he felt about the man having muscles bigger than his fucking head. What were they feeding this guy?- and led the man inside. Thor flopped heavily on a couch. Tony sat in the middle of his coffee table Indian-style, and wiped his hands clean- okay, less dirty; is there really a difference?- and studied Thor. "Loki's in class right now. You know that. So, what's up?"

Thor shot forward in his seat, nearly startling Tony into falling off his perch. "Thanos is here."

Now, Tony hadn't yet gotten the balls to ask about the mysterious Thanos. He was pretty sure that asking that question would either start a shit-storm the size of Hurricane Katrina, or, turn Loki into a depressed little ball of melancholy and kitten-fluffy bedhead. Neither was something he wanted to kickstart with Loki being so happy. It was even starting to rub off on Tony- ahem, not that he wasn't already happy with having Loki spending the night on the weekends and eating dinner with him and watching late night TV with him pretty much every day. They're both just enjoying each other and life and it was perfect enough and uneventful enough that Tony had fairly forgotten the whole Thanos enigma.

"Wait, what do you mean?" Nevertheless, despite his lack of information about the situation, red sirens were whirring in his head. Thanos was here, and this was bad. His hackles were rising.

"He..." Thor sighed, scrubbing his wary expression with two, big, quarterbacker hands. "He's enrolled here, Tony. He's going to be staying here. For three years." Blue eyes looked at him in despair.

Tony's mind was sprinting through ideas and possibilities and the conversations he'd had with Thor about this person before. It was fairly easy to assume that Thanos had hurt Loki. Pretty much everyone Loki had ever known had hurt him- or so it seemed, in recent years, anyhow. And, judging by the kicked-dog look on Thor's face and the watery blue eyes, Thor couldn't stop this from happening again. Or, if he could, he couldn't without Loki's permission.

Tony's brain was starting to hurt.

"Did this Thanos dude hurt Loki?" He rubbed his face, eyeing Thor through the cracks between his fingers. The smell of burnt something attacked his nose.

Thor sighed, slouching back into his seat. "Yes. Two years ago." Blue eyes studied Tony carefully. "Did you ask him about...that?" The caution mixed with danger in Thor's eyes was starting to alarm Tony- the man was twice his size. If he decided to go at Tony for some reason, well, then Loki'd need to start on Tony's eulogy.

"No. He's so...happy, Thor. I couldn't ruin that." Tony was fairly positive that Thor knew precisely what he meant. Loki's emotions were fragile, to say the least. The slightest thing could send the boy spiraling from cloud-nine high happy, to seventh-circle of hell misery. Tony preferred the first much more than the latter. He loved when Loki was light-hearted and happy and playfully bitchy all the time. He had gotten accustomed to tickling the boy awake and kissing him to sleep every night and having that pretty, tenuous laugh in his ears all day while Loki made fun of him in his lab.

Thor nodded understandingly. It was like, for once, there was some sort of arcane secret between them about Loki. Like, maybe Thor had gone through exactly what Tony was going through, and maybe it wasn't such a leap to find that one day- if Loki accepted the big brute who wanted so desperately to be his big brother- they could be friends. Maybe Tony didn't have as much to fear as he had once thought. Not that he'd forget what he had done to Loki- he still saw that replayed through his dreams- but maybe, he could learn to be cordial and kind.

"It was a bad time, Tony. Loki..." Thor looked down at his hands helplessly. Tony fidgeted anxiously. "Loki changed after that. He became unstable and unhappy." Thor sighed. "It was all my fault. I should have known that Thanos wasn't good for him. I knew who he was and how he treated the women he was with. But, like now, Loki seemed so happy. He seemed like their relationship was perfect, but it wasn't real. And I knew that. I could see it in his eyes when he was just being himself and not talking about...him." He shook his head. "But I didn't do anything. I just, sat by and let him get hurt." Tony felt his fingers clenching into a tight fist. "He never actually told me exactly what happened. I'm sure there's a lot I don't know about what happened. But, Thanos beat him. Loki was put in the hospital for three broken ribs and undernourishment." Tears were accumulating in Tony's eyes. "Thanos had been 'abusing' him for months. But I never saw a bruise on him. So, I'm not sure what he meant, and he looked so breakable, I was afraid to ask him to tell me anything more than what he wanted." Thor dropped his face into his hands. "Then I saw Thanos earlier today. He asked me where Loki was. He asked about you, although I have no idea how he found out about you two." Thor looked up, locking their eyes together fervently. "He's dangerous, Tony."

A shiver ran down Tony's spine. "I have to get Loki. Stay here." He ordered. "Don't move. He needs to hear this from you, Thor, his big brother." And then he was sprinting out the door and towards the campus.

Loki glared at his professor with disdain. If there was one thing he had intolerance for, it was arrogant men who thought they knew everything. Which, to be honest, he was a bit guilty of himself. Nevertheless, this man knew less than anything- in Loki's opinion- and he couldn't fathom how the man had gotten through college himself, let alone gotten a job as a professor. Giving up on trying to make the ignoramus' head ignite with his bare glare, he glanced down at his notebook. It almost made him cringe to see the blank page. In any other class, it would be filled to the brim with precise notes and diagrams and even a drawing or two. But here, the page was barren, like a desert. Cue an over-dramatic, diva sigh.

Gnawing on his pencil for a moment, he looked out across the campus. It was a beautiful day, really. He wished he had stayed at Anthony's apartment, skipped class for the day. His handsome beau had even mentioned driving to the beach. It was perfect weather for a walk across the sand, feeling the water lap at his toes and Stark's fingers between his. With a groan, he dropped his head into his hands. When had anything become better than learning?

Slowly, he started doodling on his cringe-worthy blank paper. Within a few minutes, he realized he was sketching Anthony. In cat form. A surprised giggle slipped past his lips, making a few surrounding classmates look at him in thinly veiled shock. Cue a very irascible, misanthropic glare for each and every one of those mewling quims he unfortunately had to spend time every day with. (Loki's a fun person, really, he just doesn't like humans. Put him in a room with a tiger, a boa constrictor, and a gator, and he'll have three new friends. Put him in a room with a bunch of people, and he's gonna run out screaming in .05 seconds flat.)

Fun Fact #15: Loki loves to draw. And he's extremely talented in it. Art was always one of his favorite classes- mostly because the instructor let him do whatever he wanted. And he received accolades from all his instructors through high school and in private classes Frigga got him when he graduated. It was a part of him that he had lost not long after the unspeakable happened with Thanos, and when he thought back, it was the part of him that he had truly missed most.

When Thanos walked out of that apartment, Loki realized he had allowed the man to take a big bunch of his most lovable traits out the door with him. Loki had lost his compassion, his empathy, his creativity, his humanity. He had lost his physical comfort with not only himself- although the man had already demolished that throughout their relationship- but with the rest of the surrounding world, as well. And until Stark had come into his life, there had been a wall between those pieces of himself that seemed to be missing, and he himself. It hadn't been until that screwed up, wrecked, completely intolerable human being walked into his life that he was able to slowly find himself again.

Loki looked down at Kitty-Tony and smiled gratefully. Yet another part of his soul had been restored by the man with a crooked grin and addictions out the ass and daddy-issues that even rivaled his own. Maybe they were finding themselves in the worst parts of each other. Maybe they were just so screwed up that they were both inspired by the worst in each other. Was that wrong? Was that unhealthy? Loki was pretty sure it was but he found that he really didn't care. He felt more alive than he had in two years and it was all because of Stark. It was all because of his Anthony. His boy. His love.

"Class dismissed." A dull, humdrum, everyday voice intoned through his flying thoughts. He looked up, a little startled by the buzz of leaving-class, lets-get-the-fuck-outta-here noise that accompanied the ending of class.

Belatedly, he grabbed his things, stuffing his notebook and pencil into his backpack and dodging through the crowd to slip out the door- just another tall, skinny, malnourished teen of the bunch. He was very unique, but he wasn't dissimilar to the rest. He felt like he was dull and unnoticeable and indiscernible Maybe Anthony was changing that view of himself, because now, when he looked in the mirror, he didn't see Loki Odinson- screwed up, scared, tiny- he saw Loki Laufeyson- Anthony's boyfriend, lover, smiling, happy. When had he ever seen such extraordinary things in his own reflection?

"Loki Odinson. Well, I'll be damned." A voice sounded behind him the moment he caught a glimpse of racing red and flying muddy brown. A chill ran up his back as his eyes locked on chocolate brown irises that were faintly frantic. Desperation coursed through him, because all he wanted- no, needed- was to run, to get caught by muscular arms that would save him from this. But he couldn't, because he had always vowed to himself that he wouldn't back down from him any longer.

He spun, fierce determination dwindling in his chest the moment brown hair and crystal blue eyes snapped into view. "Thanos." A curt nod jerked his neck. Ow. Emotional pain flared through him like arthritis in his joints on a cold day.

A warm being grabbed him from behind. Sharp fingers held him with tight compassion. "Loki?" A haggard, ragged voice breathed against his ear.

Anthony.

Warm, sweet, compassionate, adorable Anthony. An anchor, something to hold him tight, something to keep his feet on the ground and his heart beating. Anthony. He loved Anthony. He loved him with every cell of his body and every dying ounce of faith and hope in him. Anthony was his light at the end of the tunnel, but it was getting harder to see that light, even with his hands holding him and his warmth on his back-seeping through the jacket he had stolen from the inventor which smelled of him, his sweat and hard work and the motor oil that tainted his hands black and brown- and the smell of his spicy cologne permeating his senses.

"Hi." He murmured, leaning back into this suddenly phantasmagorical illusion of happiness all bundled into a tiny human in a red t-shirt and destroyed jeans and black stained face. "What happened to your face?" He smiled, a faltering attempt at adoration.

"I blew up the kitchen." Suddenly, the despair morphed into sheepishness and apology- because we all know Anthony won't be the one cleaning up that mess (especially not with Loki quickly turning into a fidgeting mass of anxiety with Thanos staring at his back like he can pierce through his skin and into his soul with that clear blue gaze).

"Good job, love." Loki smiled again, trying his hardest not to seem as wrecked as he was.

"Who're you?" Thanos' demanding voice made Loki jolt like he'd been hit by lightning.

Stark's fingers went rigid around Loki's hips. It was suddenly two years ago and Loki's looking into the eyes of a murderer who wants nothing more than to slowly but surely rip Thanos apart piece-by-piece until he's screaming for god to kill him. Who wants to tear him apart and feed him to the wolves. Who wants to flay his skin and burn him alive. Who wants to just rend apart this being who's tortured the one he loves. And Loki hates it. He hates seeing that look in first Thor's and now Anthony's eyes. Because it's his fault. Because he knew when he began seeing Thanos that, one day, it would come to this. And not for the first time, Loki realizes no man is an island, even when it comes to personal pain and anguish. And as much as he hates Thor, he wants to say he's sorry for turning him into a homicidal monster- because god knows, even he couldn't get the blond to leave Thanos be. He remembered seeing Thanos the day after he got out of the hospital, seeing the fear on the handsome face when blue eyes locked with Thor's and saw the promised retribution there.

"I'm Tony. Who the fuck are you?" The threat in Stark's voice wasn't wasted on Thanos.

"Thanos. Loki's ex." Nails were starting to pierce Loki's skin, but he didn't mind. He didn't mind this effigy of Stark's love. Loki was never as sure of love as he was when it was painted onto his skin by carmine colored lifeblood. Just as he was never as sure of hatred as he was when it was shown on his pallor in black and blue. Funny how red seemed to portray love, and black painted the picture of hate.

"I've heard about you." Anthony's voice was more a growl, and Loki was stricken by how he sounded like a wolf. Bloodthirsty and unquestionably alpha.

"All good, I hope." Thanos' eyes connected with Loki's, commination a promise, threat prominent. Loki's world started to shudder- or were his muscles now taken over by the fear and shock and inner death he was experiencing?- and everything seemed to shatter and blur. Stark's hands were the only thing keeping him upright.

"No." Anthony sounded ready to pounce on Thanos and rip his jugular out. Loki was physically shaking now, because if Stark got in one more fight with someone who had tortured him emotionally, he might just die of horror. He hated how Stark protected him, and loved it all the same.

Thanos' face hardened. "I don't know what you've heard, but I assure you, I've never harmed Loki." Oh, god, he's about to faint. Loki's whole world is shattering right now, because, dear god, what if Anthony believes him? What if that charisma that had once captured his heart, takes Anthony's by storm? What if Thanos takes away just one more irreplaceable piece of his soul- that magnetic piece that has attracted all those ripped shards that he had lost? What if Loki lost Anthony to Thanos?

What would he do?

How would he go on?

Would he even survive?

Loki had known if he saw Thanos again, he wouldn't get through it. And now, with Anthony by his side, he was beginning to realize just how accurate that idea had been.

A/N: Short, angsty, cliff-hanger. Just the way I like it.

Hopefully this is an improvement on the past two chapters.

Please let me know.

I really want this to be better.

And yeah, my life is...UGH. So, chapters might be a little longer coming these days. Anyways, I'm like in this twilight-zone of numbness between happy and spiraling into misery- so...yeah. Inspiration isn't easy to come by right now. Bear with me.

REVIEW. Tell me what's good. Tell me what's bad.

I need y'all beautiful people's input here. I'm lost. I NEED A LIGHT TO GUIDE ME.

Too dramatic? Yeah? Ok.

I LOVE YOU ALLLLLLL.

xoxox

Love, Rayn.