Tony crouched down in front of the couch and put his face right next to Loki's. "Hey!" he yelled.
Loki immediately sat up and poorly shot Tony away from him - only sending him flying back onto the floor. "What was that for?!" Tony yelled.
"What was 'hey' for?!" Loki growled.
"I needed to wake you up!"
"Is there something wrong with saying 'hello, wake up?'"
"Yes," Tony nodded, "that's not as much fun."
Growling, Loki stood up and walked straight into Tony's room. He stumbled over to Tony's bed and collapsed onto it, curling himself up in the blankets.
"What are you doing?" Tony asked in the doorway, watching Loki.
"Sleep," Loki grumbled. "Leave."
Tony obliged, and headed downstairs. He snuck past Clint and Steve and grabbed the coffee pot, two mugs, the bowl of sugar and the carton of milk, then snuck back upstairs. He set everything down on his coffee table, and slid that into his room. "I got something for you."
"What?" Loki groaned.
"It's coffee."
"I do not know or care what that is."
"It's... a, uh, Earthling morning tradition?"
Loki sat up and looked at Tony, raising an eyebrow. "Earthling morning tradition?"
"Just trust me, you'll love it," Tony grinned as he poured some coffee in one of the mugs.
Loki yawned and slowly made his way over to Tony, grabbing the coffee filled mug, and drank it. He immediately spat it out, all over Tony. "I should kill you for tricking me into that," Loki growled, giving Tony a terrifying death stare.
"Wait - wait, wait, wait!" Tony grabbed some sugar and milk and put an average amount into the coffee. "Here. Some people like it better like this."
Loki gave Tony another look before another sip from the mug. Without a word, Loki turned around and sat back down on Tony's bed, covering himself with the blankets, keeping the coffee in his hands.
A small but genuine smile crept up on Tony's lips. Loki liked the coffee. Tony did something that a God liked... If only humans were that easy to work with.
"So?" Tony asked, sitting down at the foot of the bed.
"Do you have any books?" Loki asked, not interested in conversing about anything else.
"Um, yeah, I think so, why?"
"I would like one. Go get me one."
"I... um, alright. About what?"
Loki shook his head, "I don't care."
Tony nodded and left the room. "Jarvis? Do we have any books?"
"Yes, sir. Miss Potts has a short selection of books sitting on a small bookshelf in the corner of the living room."
"The... My living room?"
"Yes, sir."
Confused, Tony made his way to the living room and looked at the corners. Sure enough, there were a few books on a bookshelf. "How long has that been there for?"
"About six months."
"Oh, wow." Tony grabbed as many books as he could carry, and brought them back to Loki, dropping them all on the bed beside him. "Here."
Without a word, Loki picked up a few books and skimmed through the summaries at the back until the found one that looked the least boring, and he began reading.
"So," Tony began again. "I have to work. I have a, uh, mission."
Loki slowly nodded, hardly listening.
"Come with me."
"Why?" Loki made a disgusted look, not looking up from his book.
"Because... keep me company."
"I'm sure you can find another. I am busy."
"I want your company," Tony lied. He just needed to keep an eye on Loki, and honestly, he might be useful for where he was going. "Come on. Spend time with me."
Loki sighed, "you are annoying. Leave me be."
"Loooki," Tony groaned, drooping his head downwards. "Please? For me? You can bring your book."
Loki stayed silent; ignoring Tony.
"I'll buy you a new book when you finish that one. A better one. A library - I'll buy you an entire library. And - and I'll put it in this building. I... I-I'll kneel for you."
Loki raised an eyebrow at Tony's last suggestion; a small smile tugging at the corner of his lips. "You sound truly desperate."
"I just want you around. Please?"
"I sense that you are not going to give up?"
"Nope."
"Fine," Loki finally agreed, slamming his book shut. "I expect a library when we get back."
Tony nodded, "deal. Come on," he called out as he ran out to get dressed into his armour. By the time Loki had followed him into the room, Tony was already suited up. "How do you want me to carry you?"
"What?"
"We have to fly there, we're going down to Washington."
"How far is that? Can we not walk?"
"Walk? That would take like, a month. We have to fly, we'll be there in - well, I've never flown so far with someone else, before..." Tony trailed off, not sure how fast he should fly.
Loki stared at Tony, "turn around."
"... Why?"
"Turn around."
Tony slowly and cautiously turned around, putting his back to Loki.
Loki ran and jumped onto Tony's back, wrapping his arms and legs around Tony, keeping his book in hand.
Unprepared for that, Tony stumbled over, catching himself on the wall, "what are you doing?!"
"Just fly."
Tony redeemed his balance, then jumped out of the window and started flying off to Washington. Loki sat himself upright so he was sitting on Tony's back as if were Tony were a horse.
Loki opened his book to continue reading, but the wind shot it out of his hands. "Stark!" Loki yelled, as if he were to blame.
"I got it. Hold on," Tony muttered. Loki leaned forwards, wrapping his arms around Tony, and Tony began flying downwards to grab Loki's book. He caught it before it hit the top of a building, and gave it back to Loki, "you know, you really can't fly and read. Wait until we land."
Loki grimaced, highly displeased with the entire situation, but held onto the book, and waited.
A matter of minutes later, Tony told Loki to "hold onto me again, I'm gonna land." Loki held onto Tony again, and Tony landed in front of a rather massive building.
Loki jumped off of Tony's back and stared at the building. "Where are we?"
"NASA headquarters."
"That means nothing to me."
"It's the National Aeronautics and Space Administration."
"Why are we here?"
"I need to try to build a communicator between here and Asgard."
Loki laughed, "you brought me here to waste my time. Thank you, Stark."
"It'll work. Come on," Tony led the way to front doors. "I need to talk to whoever has the most power, here," he told one of the workers.
"You're joking, right?" the worker questioned, as if Tony were stupid.
"No," Tony shook his head and began explaining what he needed to do and why he had to get it.
After an hour and a lot of complications, Tony was able to talk to the NASA Administrator, Charles Bolden.
Loki sat at the back corner of the room on a counter, reading his book while Tony met with the Administrator and did things Loki found to be rather stupid.
"Mr. Stark," Charles held his hand out.
Tony took his hand, shaking it, "Mr. Bolden. It's nice to meet 'ya."
"The honour is all mine. I understand that you need a satellite?"
Tony nodded, "yes."
"May I inquire as to why you're making such a request?"
"You know of the Avengers, right?"
Charles nodded.
"Great. Well, I need to be able to reach Thor."
"You want to reach another planet? Do you know how long we have tried -"
"Yeah, well, you didn't have me. I can make it work."
"How do you purpose you do that?"
"I'll modify the satellite to only work with the communicators - that way there's no interruptions and the signal will be a bit stronger. I'll of course have to boost the signal... I don't know, a billion percent? I'll point it in the exact right position; it'll take a some tinkering, but I can do it. I won't be able to tell if it works or not until Thor comes back and can take it to Asgard, though."
"How do you intend on boosting the signal and getting that much power?"
"I'm Tony Stark. Look at what I'm wearing," he stood back so Charles could see his Iron Man suit. "I can do anything."
In the corner of the room, Loki had looked up from his book to observe Tony, almost amused.
"That does not answer my question, Mr. Stark. How will you expect to get that much power? We would have to drain the city - or the country, if not world."
"An arc reactor. I'll build a big one - bigger than big. It'll be huge and powerful enough."
"How do you know that will work?"
"I'm alive, aren't I?"
Charles pondered that for a moment. "Where do you intend on keeping it?"
"I don't know. Build me a place to keep it." Tony turned and headed over to Loki. "Would you be able to magically seal it in to protect it?" he asked in a hushed voice, so no one would know of Loki's true identity.
"Why would I want to do that?"
"I'm giving you a place to stay, keeping you hidden in the Avenger's Tower, you have your own closet, I bought you clothes, I feed you and I'm getting you a library. The least you could do is seal something for me."
"You're doing that because you love me," Loki smiled.
"You don't want to do this from the goodness of your heart?"
Loki grinned and shook his head, "I haven't got one."
Tony sighed, and headed back to Charles. "I'll pay for everything if you can get a really big room built for it, as soon as possible."
"How big, how soon?"
"Yesterday Thor said he'd be back soon. I don't have a time. The sooner the better. I'd say... make it... one hundred or one fifty feet tall and wide. I don't know, just make it big. I'll get working on the arc reactor. Come on Lo - Laurence?"
Loki gave Tony a weird look, but closed his book and got up, following Tony out the door and into the hallway. "You could not have chosen a better name?"
"Was else was I supposed to say? Loki isn't exactly a common name, especially around me. Leonard is not a bad name to have; you're lucky I didn't call you Lana or some other girl name or something."
"Anything would be better, Star - Was it not Laurence?"
"Same thing."
"I do not wish to be known as Laurence, or Leonard. You could have called me Tony and that would have been bett- ... well, no, that would be much worse."
Tony stopped walking and stared at Loki. "That's my name!"
"Oh, so it is," Loki grinned as he kept walking.
Tony huffed as he began walking again, "you aren't going to get to me that easily."
"I've no idea what you are talking about."
"Hold on," Tony warned.
Loki stopped in front of the exit, about to turn around to ask what Tony was talking about, but before he could, Tony had picked him up and flew out of the door, heading off to return to New York.
"Stark!" Loki hissed.
"What?!"
"Put me down. Now."
Tony stopped flying and hovered in the sky, "you want me to let you go?"
Loki looked downwards and sighed, "from a survivable height, perhaps?"
"We have to get back somehow, how else do you want to go?"
"On your back."
"Just relax, I can go faster with you in my arms - I don't have to worry about you falling off. Just hold on," Tony began flying again - faster than before, and ended up back at the Avengers Tower in less than half the time it took to get to Washington.
When they were back inside on Tony's floor, Tony set Loki down and began pacing around, listing what he would need and where he would get it, and Jarvis took note.
Loki crossed his arms over his chest and growled. "Forgetting something?"
Tony thought about it for a second before snapping his fingers as if he had just gotten a lightbulb idea, "how am I going to get all of this down to Washington? I can't possibly build it here and try to get it there, but I don't have what I need to build it there..."
"You imbecile, you owe me a library."
"Yes, I know that, and I'll get you one - but first I have to do this. Besides, I didn't say when."
"So, that's how you work?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," Tony muttered, stepping out of his Iron Man suit.
"You made a promise so you get what it is that you wanted, but made sure not to specify when you would do so, so that you can fulfill that promise when it is at your earliest convenience?"
"I'm still working, I don't have time for this. It's not my fault you want the damn thing right now. Go read your other books, I'm busy trying to do some important things."
"Well, excuse me for being born," Loki muttered, leaving into the elevator before Tony could respond in any way.
Tony stared at the elevator doors and frowned. "I don't feel bad," he told himself. "I didn't do anything wrong. I have to get this done." He went down to his workshop in one of his basements and started creating plans on how to sort everything out, then he started working on the arc reactor. Once he had a major part of it built, he dragged it up the elevator, got back in his suit and flew it down to Washington, then flew back to the tower at the speed of sound to repeat the process several times over.
All the while, about seventy odd workers were working on Tony's requested custom built room for the arc reactor. As Tony brought more pieces to Washington, he set them inside the boarder of the room and joined the pieces together, building the reactor as the room itself was built.
Eventually, some odd hours later when Tony was finally finished, he put his suit away and went to go to bed, but he found that his bedroom door had been magically sealed shut, just as the closet door was.
Tony sighed, "Jarvis? Show me the live recordings from my room."
"Yes, sir," Jarvis obeyed, projecting the live footage onto the wall.
In Tony's bed, Loki was sleeping soundly, curled up in a ball in Tony's blankets.
"Great," Tony nodded. "He stole my room." He sighed again and curled himself up on the couch, too exhausted to do anything else.
- . X . -
Loki flicked a small spark of magic at Tony, shocking him awake. "What was that?!" Tony yelled, rubbing his arm, completely awake.
"I had to wake you somehow," Loki rolled his eyes.
"So I get hurt by your magic when I wake you and when you wake me?"
"It's your fault for not avoiding the circumstances of getting hurt."
"And what circumstances are those?"
"Wake up before me and wake me up pleasantly - preferably with some of that hot drink you supplied three days ago."
"Coffee?" Tony raised an eyebrow.
"Yes. That."
"I have worked my ass off, and I finally get to sleep and you wake me up after... Jarvis, how many hours of sleep did I get?"
"Three, sir," Jarvis answered.
"After three hours of sleep... to get coffee?"
"Yes," Loki nodded.
"Go back to sleep," Tony groaned and fell back onto the couch.
"It is your own fault that you have been so occupied by such an absurd mission to get sleep."
"Well, you could have helped instead of overreacting and leaving."
"Go get the coffee, Stark."
"No."
"Is coffee just as unreasonable as the library you offered? Forgive me for my selfishness. I will just go search until I find it, myself," Loki stood up from his chair, "perhaps your teammates will be better mannered than you."
Tony groaned and got up off the couch, "sit down," he ordered Loki as he dragged himself out to the elevator. "I'll be back."
Tony slowly managed to get himself off of the elevator and down to the kitchen to get the coffee.
"Tony, gross, put some pants on," Clint muttered as he walked past Tony, who was only wearing boxers.
"I own the place, Barton. Close your eyes."
"Since when do you take milk and sugar in your coffee?" Steve questioned suddenly, watching as Tony screwed up his usual coffee.
"Since I wanted to, why's it concern you?"
"I was just asking."
"Whatever woke up this morning is an idiot," Clint muttered.
Tony stared at Clint and in the most serious, hateful tone he could manage, he growled "I know." He then made his way back to the elevator to give Loki his coffee, ignoring Steve mutter something about Tony being weirder and more moody than normal.
When Tony walked back onto his floor, Loki immediately jumped up from his chair as his eyes lit up. He ran over to Tony and gently grabbed the mug with both hands, sipping the coffee.
"You're welcome," Tony muttered.
"I know," Loki retorted, unwilling to thank Tony.
Tony groaned and slowly headed to his bedroom, "I'm going back to bed - thanks for stealing that, by the way."
"I did not steal it. It was not taken."
"I own it."
"Well, then occupy it."
"I was -"
"Busy," Loki finished. "I know."
Tony shut his mouth and left into his bedroom, kicking the door shut behind him.
Loki immediately followed, opening the door again to stand in the doorway. "You know," Loki said, sipping on his coffee, "in a situation like this, Thor's idea of 'soon' usually consists of three days."
"So?" Tony questioned, climbing under his blankets.
Loki frowned at Tony, "do you not know how long you have been working?"
"No, not really."
"It has been almost three days."
"Sixty four hours, to be exact," Jarvis announced.
"Thor... might be here today?"
Loki nodded.
Tony groaned and threw the blankets off of himself, "great." He grabbed Loki's coffee and swallowed it all in a couple of gulps, ignoring Loki's insults and the burn in his throat. Then he quickly ran down to get his suit, and flew off to Washington.
Tony immediately began configuring everything to work right. He needed to wirelessly connect the arc reactor to the satellite, configure the satellite to work only with his communicators, and try to figure out which direction to point it in - which is when he needed help.
Who could help him? Loki obviously wouldn't. Who else knew anything about Asgard?
Having the perfect answer, he took off again without a second thought.
With the help of Jarvis, Tony managed to track down Jane Foster.
He landed in front of what he hoped to be Jane's front door, and knocked.
Shortly after, a girl opened the door. Judging by what Thor had said about Jane, it looked like Tony had found the girl he needed.
Before Jane could question if Iron Man/Tony Stark was really at her doorstep - and why - Tony picked her up and began flying. "I need your help."
"Oh my god, we're flying," Jane shouted, squirming around out of both excitement, fear and surprise.
"You are Jane, right? Thor's Jane?"
"Did you just kidnap me without knowing who I am?"
"I'm not kidnapping you, I'm borrowing you."
"Without knowing who I am."
"I need your help," Tony changed the subject. "I'm trying to build a communicator between here and Asgard -"
"Can I have one?"
"What? You - No? No, you can't. This is just for Thor and I, so I can contact him when I need to."
"What about me? What if I need to talk to Thor?"
"I'll give you my number, you can call me and if it's important, I'll tell Thor."
"What do you call important?"
"Something that doesn't involve 'ooh, Thor, I miss you, I'm so sad and lonely without my godly boyfriend.'"
"I don't talk -"
"Yeah, yeah, so, you've been to Asgard, right?"
"Um, yeah."
"Where is it?"
"What do you mean where is it? It's in outer space."
"Yeah, where? What direction?"
"Up."
Tony let out a frustrated groan. "Up where? North? North-East? North-West? I need an exact position."
"I don't have one! Thor just flew us up in a bunch of light. Do you really think calculating every direction we went in to track down where exactly Asgard was, was the most important thing on my mind?"
"Let me guess, you were too busy thinking 'oh my god!'" Tony let out a squeal, imitating what could only be defined as a fangirl squeal from a teenage girl.
"I didn't do that!"
Tony stopped flying and hovered in the air with Jane in his arms, "you don't know where Asgard is?"
"No -"
"At all? You can't give me any indication what direction you went it?"
"No, I'm sorry, we just went up somewhere."
Tony groaned, "alright. Fine," he turned around and began flying back to take Jane home.
"Holy shit, is that Iron Man?!" a female voice nearly yelled when Tony had set Jane back at her doorstep.
"Sometimes," Tony answered by reflex.
"You are right now!"
"Oh, look at that, I guess I am."
"This has got to go on facebook, come here," the girl jumped beside Tony and held her phone out to take a picture of them.
"Darcy..." Jane groaned. "He's busy."
"Yeah, taking a photo with me."
Tony popped open his faceplate and forced out a quick smile for the camera, as the girl - Darcey - smiled and took the photo.
"Thank you!" she grinned.
"Don't mention it."
"I am," she nearly sang, holding up her phone as faecbook was loading.
"Okay, well, I'm off," Tony said, turning to take off again.
"Wait," Jane protested, grabbing Tony's arm.
"What?!"
"I need your number."
"Why? You have Thor."
Jane rolled her eyes, "only through you. You just said I could have -"
"Right, okay." Tony put his hand out and, with the repulsors in his hand, he wrote his number into the ground. "Fill that in when you're done," he muttered, taking off at the speed of sound.
"Sir," Jarvis suddenly said, "you have drained your power significantly. Might I suggest allowing the suit to charge, or perhaps using a different one?"
"Might as well," Tony replied, changing his direction towards New York.
When he got back to his tower, he allowed his suit to charge for a while. He needed a break, anyways. He had been working for three days and had only gotten three hours of sleep. He definitely needed a break.
"What happened during those three days, anyways?" Tony muttered, heading over to his computer. "Jarvis, start from when I started working, and show me all the recordings all at once? Fast forward through them, too."
On Tony's computer screen appeared a lot of small boxes, each containing the recordings from a different camera throughout the tower. Completing the request, Jarvis sped the recordings up, allowing Tony to view them quickly.
It wasn't until he saw Loki leaning against the doorway in the recording of Tony's workshop that Tony asked Jarvis to "play that at normal speed,"and leaned closer to the computer, observing the small box.
Jarvis obeyed and played the recording at a normal speed, "would you like me to enlarge and unmute it as well, sir?"
"Sure," Tony nodded. Jarvis did so immediately after.
While Tony was working away, Loki leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed, watching him.
When Tony burnt himself and cursed, a small smirk appeared on Loki's face. It took Tony a few minutes to recover before continuing to work away. After a more minutes, Tony stepped into his suit and took off to Washington with his tools in hand, and Loki disappeared around the corner.
Tony fast forwarded through the recording again, and Loki came down to watch Tony several more times.
"Are you still on that?" Loki asked from his spot at the doorway.
Tony either ignored or didn't hear Loki - whichever the reason, he didn't reply. Instead, he was mumbling things to himself as he ran around the room, picking things up, setting things down, moving things, losing things, tripping over things...
Loki shook his head and disappeared around the corner again. He returned only once more, not saying anything again; just watching.
When Loki left, Tony watched the other recordings, following him. Loki only went upstairs and into Tony's room, sealing the door shut. He went into Tony's bed and got himself comfy under the blankets, falling asleep. Some time later, he woke up and turned to the camera in Tony's room and pointed at it with his hand, and the signal was lost.
Tony sighed, leaning back in his chair, "thanks." He got up and headed up to his floor to visit Loki. He should probably take Loki out to get some food or something - he had been kept in the tower for three days without any clue what anything was, where to go or any help. For that, Tony felt bad.
"I feel bad," Tony announced rather loudly as he walked out of the elevator and onto his floor. He walked around searching for Loki before he continued.
"You are capable of such emotions?" a voice replied from behind.
Tony jumped, not expecting Loki to be right behind him. "Surprising, isn't it? Look, I didn't mean to work for so long; I didn't think it had been three days. I feel terrible."
Loki stared at Tony, not saying anything.
"Come on," Tony nodded towards the door, "let's get lunch."
"You wish to feed me, merely to recompense your own feelings?"
"Don't turn this into something selfish, Loki. Just come out with me."
Loki narrowed his eyes at Tony, but nodded, "fine - but I am continuing to refuse travel via your ways of transportation."
"Great! That's no big deal; we can walk. I know a great place we can go -" Tony paused, looking over Loki's outfit. It was different. Instead of seeing himself on the shirt, he saw Batman's logo. "What's with the shirt?"
"Oh, do you like it? I had your voice tell me where to get new clothing that was not so... obnoxious."
"Obnoxious? Really? Thank you. Whatever, I need to buy you a suit anyways, come on."
"What happened to lunch?" Loki protested.
"We can't go out with you looking like that. The restaurant in fairly high class. They won't serve you like that."
Loki growled, "then I refuse."
"They have cherries."
"What are 'cherries?'"
Tony gave Loki a weird look, "um... they're those red things you were eating... rather interestingly."
"Oh, yes. I am quite fond of those."
"I can tell," Tony nodded. "Come on out, it'll be fun."
Loki sighed in defeat, "fine."
Tony grinned, "great, give me thirty seconds!" he quickly ran into his closet and changed into a pair of his own dress pants and a dress shirt, grabbing his jacket and tie to put on later. "Alright, come on," Tony repeated as he walked back into the main room, pressing the button for the elevator.
The next two hours were agonizing for Loki as he was sized and forced to try on countless things. Tony, on the other hand, was having lots of fun. It was beyond obvious how much Loki hated being touched, sized, having to undress, redress and repeat the process several times, yet the only argument he gave was shooting Tony the occasional death look - which was somewhat worse than any other Tony had received.
When Loki was finished and was dressed in a nice suit, Tony handed the man a fifty dollar tip. "Send me the bill," he requested as he left. He then began walking with Loki down to one of his favourite places.
When they got to the restaurant - about half an hour later - it was clear that a few of the workers were rather surprised when Tony was walking - and with another man. Tony never didn't drive... and his business dates never arrived with him, either. The men quickly shrugged it off since it was none of their business, and they had to continue with their jobs, however they kept a curious eye on the pair.
Tony ignored the stares and the few whispers as he led Loki into the restaurant. Upon utterance, they were immediately seated in Tony's usual spot by the waiter Tony usually got served by. "Can I get you anything to start with?" the waiter asked, handing Loki a menu, setting Tony's down in front of him.
"We'll have water, for now," Tony requested, trying to keep everything as casual as possible.
The waiter nodded, and left to get the water.
Tony observed Loki as he observed the menu. For the most part, Loki looked lost as to what everything was. "In all fairness, I don't know what most of the things are either," Tony stated.
Loki looked up at Tony with a blank face, before observing the menu again, "where are the cherries?"
Tony chuckled, amused at Loki's love for cherries. "Here," Tony opened his menu to the page showing a fruit salad, and showed Loki, "it's a fruit salad. It's got a bunch of different fruits, cherries included. I think you'd like it."
Loki nodded, "I will take it."
The waiter then came back, setting two glasses half filled with ice on the table, and filled them with water, setting the pitcher of water on the table, as well. "Have you decided on anything, yet, or would you like more time?"
"Yeah, he'll have a fruit salad," Tony answered the waiter for Loki, "and I'll... uh... make that two, I guess. Can 'ya give him some extra cherries?"
The waiter nodded, took the menus and left.
Tony and Loki then sat in silence, staring at each other as they waited. Neither had anything to say.
It was about ten minutes later that their food arrived, and Loki didn't waste one second to pick up a cherry and put it in his mouth, biting off the stem.
"Don't do that," Tony muttered, stabbing his fruit with his fork.
"Do what?"
"That."
"What?!"
"You know damn well what."
"I really don't, Stark."
"That... seductive way you eat cherries. Don't do that here."
"I am not seductively doing anything. It is your own fault if you find it appealing," Loki muttered. Without breaking eye contact, he picked up another cherry, bringing it up to his mouth. He slowly parted his lips and carefully set the cherry on his tongue, pulling it into his mouth. He wrapped his lips around the cherry and bit down on the very end of it, causing the stem to fall to the table.
Tony watched as the stem fell, and stared at it. Loki couldn't help but smirk at the effect he seemed to have on Tony; it was quite amusing.
Snapping out of it, Tony leaned across the table and grabbed Loki's fork, putting in his hand, "use that."
Loki frowned at Tony, but mimicked Tony's previous actions; stabbing the fork into the fruit. Smirking, he slipped his tongue out of his mouth and guided the cherry in. He wrapped his lips around the fork, and gently slid it out of his mouth, without the cherry. He moaned lightly, "mmm, that's a good cherry." Seconds later, he spat the cherry stem out into the center of the table; tied in a knot.
By now, Tony was on the edge of his seat, glaring at Loki. "I swear to god, if you don't start eating normally -"
"What? Will we leave? I am sure the current observers would not think innocently of that."
Tony immediately began looking around. Loki was right, people were looking at them. He sighed. He could see headlines now; Has playboy Tony Stark no limits? Miss Potts has been unseen for weeks, Tony is suddenly spotted with strange man who tongue ties cherry stems.
Tony turned his attention towards eating his own food, and finished in a few minutes.
Loki, however, continued to take his sweet time, seductively eating his fruit.
"Are you done now?" Tony asked when Loki ate the last piece.
Loki licked his lips as he swallowed his last piece of fruit, "mmm."
Tony rolled his eyes and called out for the tab.
"How was everything on your date, this fine afternoon?" the waiter casually asked.
Tony raised an eyebrow at the man as he said date, and Loki simply grinned, highly amused. Noticing Loki's grin from the corner of his eyes, Tony looked at Loki with great curiosity in his own. Was he testing Tony? Loki's grin turned from amused to daring. What was more important to Tony than image? Not much.
Tony swallowed his pride, and smiled at the waiter, "yes, it was phenomenal. I especially loved the cherries," he winked at Loki.
"I... I-I'm happy to hear that!" the man smiled and set the bill down in front of Tony, along with a couple of mints, then left to carry on with other customers.
Tony looked up at Loki who looked... almost surprised, and a bit impressed. He quickly turned his attention to the tab. Without looking at the amount due, he pulled out a fifty and a twenty dollar bill, and stood up. "Ready?" he asked Loki.
Loki nodded and stood, as well.
Might as well go all out now. Tony held his arm out for Loki to take so that he could escort him out, and Loki immediately and ever so willingly put his arm through Tony's, accepting his escort offer.
They left the place with countless looks being thrown their way, and Tony had never felt more self conscious, judged or worried in his life. There were definitely going to be headlines.
"That was delicious," Loki opinionated when they had wondered onto a new street.
"I can tell you liked it."
"I can tell you liked it, as well," Loki smiled rather smugly. "That is almost worth doing again."
"Yeah, maybe not with cherries next time," Tony replied, ignoring the first part of what Loki said.
"But cherries are good," Loki protested, licking his lips. "You must get more."
"I'll get you as many cherries as you want if you promise not to do that in public again."
"Oh, where's the fun in that?"
"You have a really deranged version of fun, y'know that?"
"I have been informed," Loki grinned rather proudly.
Tony rolled his eyes, ending the conversation.
A/N: Loki likes his cherries... ehe.
I'm really sorry about the ending. It's definitely not one of my better ones. - What I had written was so long and had so much stuff in it, I had to chop it into two different chapters, and this was the best place to separate it.
The next chapter will definitely be exciting! c:
In the meantime... review? [: x