A/N:
1) Sorry for the long wait!, and as usual, please let me know if I mess this up.
2)Sincere thanks for reviews and encouragement goes to: Lancaeriel Peredhil, cara-tanaka, Basia Orci, peppymint, 3rdbase101, HKay, Beloved Daughter, sekmarkspn, Miravisu, and WynterRavenheart. As usual, I'll respond via PM to anyone I can.
Also, thanks for all the faves, alerts, etc, it is most encouraging.
3) To 3rdbase101 and the individual who PM'ed me about it, thanks a million for pointing out the lack-of-contractions error in the previous chapter, which I am fixing with this posting!
4) As I usually forget to mention, I own nothing!
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Rhodey ends up staying for the night in one of the guest rooms, but awakens very early, having to, as he explains to JARVIS, perform damage control, and make sure his cover story is intact. He does commit to returning the next morning to assist his friend with repairs to his shop where he knows Tony will not let anyone else assist him, insisting that with Tony injured - largely because of his decisions - he owes his friend this much.
Though he is no longer planning revenge on the mortal, Loki still feels the need to express his disapproval of the man's actions, so as Rhodey turns to leave, he finds Loki sitting regally (as regally as a cat can, complete with a slowly flicking tail showing his disapproval) blocking his path.
Even in this form, it is apparent that Loki still can appear imperious and condescending, because Rhodey stops momentarily considering him, adding casually after a moment of silence:
"You are terribly opinioned, for a cat."
Loki hisses in response to his, irritated by what sounds like an offhand dismissal of his rightful criticism, but he falls silent as Rhodey drops to one knee, saying wearily as he reaches out to pet Loki:
"It's true though… I screwed up…. and I'm not sure I deserve Tony's friendship anymore."
It is the sheer emotional pain in those words that stops Loki from clawing at the hand that runs a single stroke across his side before the mortal straightens up and exits the house, muttering to himself:
"Great, now I've started talking to the cat."
Rather than dwelling on either those words, or the troublesome questions about his past and the failed relations in it which have been rising up in hi mind unbidden all night, Loki returns to where Tony is sleeping and curls up by the his side, letting the steady beating of Tony's heart soothe him to sleep.
When Tony finally awakens, it is hours later than his usual, but not surprising considering how much rest his body needs after all the damage that has been done to it.
After feeding himself and Loki, Tony begins to bring some order to the chaos that fills his shop, apparently choosing to leave the heaviest of the work for when he will have help – a simple action that tells Loki beyond any doubt that the physical battering of two nights prior has left him in more pain than he has admitted to … anyone.
Naturally JARVIS knows the extent of Tony's injuries, but just as Loki does, he also knows by now that getting the mortal to actually give his body all the rest it needs is a lost cause.
Despite this fact though, Loki feels relief as he watches the energy and enthusiasm that had once filled Tony Stark come back, and he feels a comforting warmth fill him as in the middle of cleaning up, Tony stops to tell JARVIS - at his usual rapid-fire pace - the specifications for a new enhancement to his flight stabilizers.
He seems like he intends to design the parts immediately using his holographic design software, but he stops abruptly when Pepper arrives and enters the shop, looking significantly more weary than she had the previous evening when after finishing up at Stark Industries the damage control for the day, Tony had sent her home to get some much needed rest.
Instantly he is crossing the room, asking gently:
"Pepper, are you ok?"
Despite the hope Loki had clung to, it is the fears of two nights prior that tear at him as he watches this unfold, and perhaps Tony feels the same because there is an uncharacteristic hesitance in the soft tone he has spoken with, an unspoken and almost perfectly hidden fear of loosing the one thing he needs the most…. and in the unbearably long seconds that Pepper takes to answer, all Loki can think of is how he dreads Pepper telling Tony that their kiss had been a mistake, and that a relationship between them can never work.
In the six months that he has lived with Tony, Loki has learned to read even the best concealed of the mortal's emotions from his expression and body language alone, and he knows that even as he asks, Tony dreads the next words out of Pepper's mouth.
Unexpectedly, Pepper breaks eye-contact, turning and walking past Tony as she sets a hesitant hand on a now-inert pipe of the accelerator, saying in a voice choked by regret:
"You were dying….. and I didn't even know."
Confused and cautious, Tony moves to her side, offering in a firm but gentle tone:
"You couldn't have known."
When Pepper turns to face him, she gives him a bitter smile that has absolutely nothing happy in it as she says angrily:
"Yes, I could have – I should have…. you were giving me all these signs….. the donations, the Expo, making me CEO, racing in Monaco….. your birthday….. what you told me on the plane…."
She takes a deep breath in a futile effort to calm herself, before finishing explosively:
"You gave the entire god-damned world all these signs and after all these years of knowing you….I still didn't see any of them!"
She lurches away from Tony in anger just as he reaches out to comfort her, but then just as abruptly comes to a stop as her shoulders shake violently with the force of a sob, and she whispers:
"You were hurting… and I didn't know."
This time she does not pull away when Tony pulls her into his embrace, whispering to her: "It's okay, Pepper…It's okay."
She pulls out of his embrace replying sadly:
"No it's not."
And in an almost predictable fashion they fall into an argument from there, but there is more at stake this time, and though Loki is certain from watching this exchange that Pepper does indeed reciprocate Tony's feelings, it is a far cry from an assurance that they indeed have a chance at being together.
Tony insists gently, sadly even:
"I didn't want you to know…. I didn't want to watch you mourn for me…. and even if I'd told you, it wouldn't have made a difference."
This time when Pepper smiles at Tony, the expression is one of pure sadness, and her voice breaks with tears as she says:
"If I'd known…. I would have done everything in my power to make the last…. days of your life … as happy as they could have been."
Tony replies quickly but in a tone that lacks all his usual assuredness: "I know."
Still it is enough to shock Loki, and Pepper as well, if he is to judge from her incredulous:
"You know?"
It is Tony who sighs, before admitting quietly, a strange sense of resignation in his tone:
"Well, I knew it would be either that or you would leave me… and I didn't want to spent what was left of my life without you."
For a second Pepper seems like she is about to argue, but the defiance on her features melts away as fast as it had appeared, and she only sighs, knowing - just as Loki does - that Tony's concern was justified, knowing that she has threatened to leave him before, telling him she was unwilling to watch him kill himself, and though Tony had been doomed to a certain death by the very device that was keeping him alive, he had also known that by continuing his duties as Ironman, Tony was bringing about his own death exponentially faster – a truth which would have inevitably come up sooner or later.
When Tony speaks again, the grief and uncertainty that weighs upon him leaks into his voice:
"…. But most of all, I didn't want you to feel pressured into doing anything you would regret."
This time, Pepper shakes her head and is about to argue, but Tony presses on, the insistence in his quiet tone despite the fact that it is breaking with sorrow silencing any reply she may have had, as he says:
"I've cared for you for a long time, but the first time I realized how much you meant to me… was in Afghanistan… when I thought I was going to die, and it was your voice I heard calling my name.
You were the reason I kept going then … just as you have always been my reason to keep fighting each time I have faced death."
Tony swallows hard, struggling to keep his voice level while he reaches for Pepper's hands, taking them gently in his own even as Loki sees from Tony's expression that he is bracing for rejection:
"I love you Pepper – I always will, but I understand if you do not feel the same…. you have more than enough good reasons not to…. and I didn't want you to feel like…."
Finally Pepper cuts him off, moving a hand to rest against his cheek as she says gently, smiling through the tears that fall:
"But that's where you are wrong, Tony…the only difference it would have made is that I wouldn't have kept telling myself that it would make things weird…. or that it wasn't the right time to tell you…. I would have told you the truth: that I love you…. and the hell with the consequences."
Finally Tony smiles, hope burning bright within him as he asks:
"So can we see where this goes?"
Pepper's answer though silent is definitive: She kisses him.
This kiss is just as desperate as the one on that rooftop had been, fueled by the knowledge of how close they had come to loosing each other, but when it ends, this time, they stay locked in an embrace for what feels like an eternity, foreheads touching and eyes closed – a simple gesture that somehow reassures Loki that Tony does after all have a chance at finding happiness with the woman he loves, and though Loki is probably forgotten in this moment, it does nothing to taint the flood of genuine pure happiness filling him.
When night falls, Tony and Pepper make themselves comfortable cuddled under blankets on some of the less damaged pieces of furniture left in the living room, 'stargazing' as they say - though that in reality translates to a lot of conversational bonding and gazing at each-other.
Pepper drifts off to sleep first, and as Tony cradles her closer, looking down at her sleeping features that are lit by the bluish glow of his arc-reactor, even though his shirt, he smiles in a rare expression of true contentment before letting sleep overtake him as well.
Loki stands sentinel over the pair, finally turning his gaze to the stars, and for the first time he thinks of his former home, practically invisible from Midgard but ever-present. He thinks of his brother – correction: not-brother – who, Loki realizes in light of all he has learned here in this world, had actually loved Loki, despite his numerous failures to perceive what Loki had really needed from him so many times.
Like Pepper, Thor had missed out on Loki's subtle signs of despair, not noticed as Loki had slipped further and further into loneliness and depression – but it had never been out of malice.
That is enough for Loki, and though he is certain that what he had once is lost forever, the fact that he had indeed been loved does matter, enough that he wants to have another chance with Thor, enough that he wants to apologize for his actions against him when they had last been together – and even though he cannot escape the well-justified fear that once Thor knows the truth about Loki's identity, the Thunderer will hate him ... even though aside from their truly different heritage he knows that his actions have forfeited him the title 'brother' more so than perhaps blood ever could … for the first time since falling to this realm, he wishes to be called 'brother' once again.
He wishes to regain the love that he had for so long not recognized, and very likely destroyed, and even though he reminds himself it is a futile hope, in this moment the fact that he wishes for it is enough.
Loki curls up on the back of the couch and drifts off to sleep, feeling more at peace than he has in centuries.
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