By that point, Tony had forgotten all about having called his suit.
Neither Tony nor Loki saw it coming, when the suit rushed out of the lift and crushed right into Loki's side. He was slammed against Tony's waterfall wall on the other side of the room. Tony took the chance to hold out his arms for the armour to attach itself onto him and immediately addressed Jarvis when his faceplate locked with his helmet. "Hell, what took you so long?"
"I am very sorry, Sir," Jarvis said. "There have been complications with the setup process."
"Guess that needs to be refined."
Tony knew he was still in no position to fight Loki off, but at least he couldn't try to slit his throat any more. He felt a thin trail of blood trickle down his chin, where Loki's dagger had cut into his skin.
"Sir. The cut at your throat should be treated to avoid infection,"Jarvis advised.
"Yeah, little time for that now."
Tony watched Loki pick himself up from the floor. He looked royally pissed, like a cat thrown into the bathtub, dripping wet with his hair sticking to his head. Just when he had managed to straighten himself up, the window behind him burst. Tony blinked and then Thor was pinning Loki to the wall by the throat.
"Hey, hands off, he's mine!" Tony called, despite being glad that Thor had shown up. He hadn't been sure how to go on from this point. Escaping would likely have been the only option. And so not like Tony.
"What do you think you're doing, Loki?" Thor growled and loosened his grip from Loki's throat to let him speak.
"Can't you see?" Loki mocked, huffing out a short laugh. "I am freeing mankind from the shackles freedom puts them in."
"This is deranged! Do you not see this? It can't escape you that your goals are hollow."
"Are they now?" Loki laughed again. "I haven't been asking you."
"You should've," Tony chimed in, "instead of trusting some guy in space who promises you the world."
Thor kept his grip firm around Loki's neck, but turned to face Tony. "What are you talking about, Stark?"
"Well, while you were flying around with your magic hammer, I had a look into your brother's neat mind. Not that he digged it," Tony said, as Loki gritted his teeth.
"But the point is, I think Mr. Almighty here has fallen victim to some guy he has turned to makes my skin crawl." Tony wasn't exaggerating either. The thought of the memory made the hair on his skin turn upright.
Thor turned to Loki again. "Who are you working with, brother? Who is constraining you?"
Thor loosened his grip, so Loki could speak. "No one! Why would I let anyone force my hand after all these years of suppression you made me undergo?"
"Did you look yourself in the eye? You have succumbed to madness, brother. You do not see what you are getting yourself into…,"
Tony didn't know what to do. He felt vain just being spectator to the scene that unfolded, but this was a moment only between Thor and Loki, nothing for him to meddle with. Yet he couldn't help but recall Loki's memory of how Thor pushing Loki off that tree. He didn't know anything about these guys' backstory, but what he had seen in Loki's head made him wonder.
"... I beg you," Thor whispered. "Come back home with me."
"Why? So you and Odin can leave me to rot in chains?"
"No." Thor shook his head. "It'´s not too late to turn back now. But it will soon be. If you do not stop now, you won't be permitted to make amends anymore."
At that, Loki shoved his hand against Thor's chest and sent him flying backwards with a burst of magic. "I DO NOT WANT TO MAKE AMENDS!"
Tony tried to shoot him with his repulsor, but Loki saw it coming and sidestepped it. "Why, to return to that sorry state of being overshadowed ?! How would you understand, 'Brother?'"
Thor managed to land on his feet. Tony could see the gears in his head turning, trying to come up with the right thing to say. Finally, he drew a deep breath and spoke.
"We are family."
"No," Loki hissed. " We are not. We never were."
"Sorry to interrupt Family Matters," Tony said, addressing Thor. "But I think Loki is just stalling for time until the portal opens."
"Precisely," Loki said, raising his gaze. "But there is nothing you can do to stop it either way."
Thor bit his lip, then took a few huge steps towards Loki, who stiffened but didn't move. "We can't!" he said. "No, you are right, we can not thwart your plans. But you can! Loki, you are not thinking are hurt, I can see that, but I also know my brother! He would have never come up with something so imprudent!"
Loki swallowed and blinked rapidly. Like someone who wanted to keep his eyes from watering up. "The person you speak of no longer exists. Since that day in Jotunheim he is gone. He will never come back."
"Loki…" Thor's voice broke off and Tony found there was something heartbreaking about seeing a massive guy like him on the verge of tears.
"... Loki," he repeated. He reached for Loki's shoulder, maybe hoping to get to him through touch. But then, Loki vanished in a flash of green light, leaving Thor standing in Tony's living room. His hand still hung mid-air, lost.
Tony let out a breath he hadn't noticed he was holding. "You alright?"
Thor shook his head. "Why won't he give in?" He raised his gaze to meet Tony's. "He is going to ruin everything, for everyone and himself, just because he is too thick-headed."
Tony shrugged."Yeah, but you reap what you sow."
"I was once like this as well. I cannot let my brother walk that path."
Tony wasn't convinced that Loki had a good core, after he had tried to slit his throat a few minutes before. But if Thor was right, it was only in their best interest if the guy came back to his senses and dropped his schemes. "There is one more thing you haven't tried,"
Thor looked at him and waited.
"You know, we had that weird connection, never mind now. But he does appear pretty attached to your mother," Tony said, walking over to his bar.
"He is." Thor nodded. "But father didn't find it appropriate to send the queen away from Asgard."
"Well, do you think she could persuade him?" Tony asked, while picking up a new glass of scotch. The old one had shattered on the floor and its content was spilled all over the floor.
Thor nodded. "Yes, if someone is capable of getting to him now, it can only be Mother."
"Easy thing to do then." Tony sipped his drink. "Get her down here."
It hadn't been as easy as it sounded, when Tony suggested it. Odin wasn't jubilant about the idea but he couldn't withstand his wife's persistence in the matter. Until the last second Frigga had hoped Thor alone would be persuasive enough, but as soon as she heard she was now the only hope left for her son's fate, there was no holding her back.
And that was how she came to appear in Tony's tower. Compared to Loki's memory, she was even more beautiful in person. Tony just hoped that Pepper wouldn't show up now, because every woman in the world would grow jealous of such beauty.
They didn't waste time with introductions.
Frigga asked right away, "Where is he?"
"We do not know," Thor admitted. "When we tried to get to him before, he vanished."
"I always hoped it wouldn't end anywhere near this," Frigga said, addressing Thor. "I hoped he would be a light to shine on his own."
"He mentioned that," Thor said. His ever so proud and upright posture sunk down. "Being overshadowed."
"Your father and you cast large shadows. But you mustn't blame yourself for that, my son. It is me and your father who should have conducted differently."
Tony coughed. Discussing those matters was without doubt pivotal, but this was not the time for it. Maybe they didn't feel the weight of the threat hanging over his home-planet, but he did. They had tried to shut down the portal by themselves but apparently they needed Loki's sceptre for that.
Frigga noticed. "I apologize," she said. "I am locating Loki all at once."
She closed her eyes and her lips moved, as if she was mumbling something. So, magicians needed incantations after all. Tony had wondered about that.
"I know where he is." Frigga opened her eyes again. "Let us hope for the best," she told Thor, then dissolved in an all too similar fashion to Loki's.
Hope was a neat thing, but Loki lately had taken a liking to destroy neat things. So as Frigga returned, her shoulders were hunched forward and the white of her eyes had a tint of red in them. She just shook her head and no one dared to ask how it had gone. Tony handed her a glass of water and she took it, nodding in gratitude.
"Guess we'll have to kick his butt." Tony said.
Once more, Frigga shook her head. "He hasn't made up his mind yet."
"Then why do you look so downcast mother?" Thor asked.
Frigga pressed her lips together, then took a step forward and locked her hands with Thor's. She took a deep shaky breath. "The queen of Asgard should be wise, and yet it has taken me until now to realize that Loki is never going to be the same he was."
A sob escaped her lips. "He is broken, I have lost him."
She leaned her face into Thor's chest and cried. Thor wrapped his arms around her. "He is not lost," he assured. "I know it."
Tony was more on Frigga's side in that, but he wouldn't say anything. If it had been hard to watch Thor bite back his tears before, it was horrible to watch a mother's pain at the loss of a son. Even if he was -as Tony had heard Thor say- not her own flesh and blood.
Loki and Selvig were gone. As was the portal. Loki probably found it too dicey leaving it so close too Tony,him being a genius and all that. And as nothing else was happening either at the moment, Tony offered Thor and his mother a place for staying the night. She thanked him with a little bow and they retired for the night.
As Tony stood in the lift riding back up to his living room, he shot Pepper a text.
Tony-08:23 PM-
Sorry, you can't come back yet. It's not safe. I'll get back to you tomorrow. Love you 3
Pepper responded right away and Tony figured she had her phone with her.
-Pep-08:23 PM-
I'm worried, Tony. Promise me that you will watch out for yourself.
Tony-08:24 PM-
Promise.
Tony couldn't help but wonder. His father had cast a large shadow too, but Tony had never felt compelled to react to that with villainous actions. Then again, he had been a bit of an asshole before the incident in Afghanistan. Egoistic-if he wasn't still-, irresponsible, reckless, inconsiderate, yes all that, but never that messed up.
"Sir, you have a intruder." Jarvis said.
"What? Where?"
"It appears he is in your living room at the moment. I am sorry, the sensors in the area were damaged by Thor earlier today."
The doors of the lift slid open and Tony stepped outside. He could tell something was askew, even if it was all silent in the room. There was this sensation again that made the hairs on his neck stand up.
"Some light, Jarvis."
The contrast of white marble tiles against the deep red of blood was mesmerizing. A trail of blood led around the corner towards his bar. Tony swallowed. The sight screamed cold blooded murder, as seen in TV-crime scenes. He rounded the corner and froze at the sight.
Loki stood in front of his bar, downing one of Tony's most delicate bottles of Whisky like it was ice tea. At his approach, Loki glanced at him out of the corner of his eye before he went on drinking.
The bobbing of his Adam's Apple distracted Tony for moment from what a bloody mess the guy was. His clothing was torn and his breastplate had been pierced.
"Sure, make yourself comfy," Tony said, after he had overcome a moment of surprise. "Oh, the blood? Don't worry, Dumm-E can clean it up later."
Loki just snorted and that didn't clear up for Tony whether he was merely in too bad of a shape to laugh or if he still tried to sell to Tony that he found his jokes irritating rather than funny. Which was a ludicrous thing. Tony was freaking hilarious.
Upon a closer inspection, Tony noticed the glowing cube that Loki had clutched in his left hand. "Is that the Tesseract? Why, I'm flattered you're trying to lure me in with presents, but I'll have to decline. I am not too much into the sadistic stuff."
"You mustn't touch it," Loki said. "Your skin wouldn't react well to that."
"Yeah, thank you for not making me burn until my skin peels off."
"Pleasure," Loki croaked. He placed the bottle of whisky on the counter to grab hold of the tables edge with his free hand and doubled over until his face was no longer visible to Tony. He coughed and made a sickening sound that reminded Tony of many hangover nights he had spent bent over a toilet bowl.
However, it was no bile that trickled down Loki's chin down to the floor. It was thick and deep red blood. Even standing that far away, Tony could hear his strained breathing. It occurred to him that this was the perfect moment to call SHIELD to take him prisoner again, or to take revenge on him for the murder attempt earlier. It was a great opportunity to humiliate him.
He found himself intrigued by the idea, but also by the fact that the one who Loki sought out when he was throwing up blood, was him.
And he had yet to find out who could beat Loki up like this.
"So, you needed a drink, big fella?"
"Just a little something against the pain."
"Yeah, I wonder about that. Who managed to work you up like that? Cause I´m considering recruiting him for the team."
Loki snorted. "The Chitauri weren't overly fond of my decision."
Tony raised his eyebrow in suspicion and took a few steps towards the god. "You're telling me you gave up, is that it? Mommy sweet talked you into submission. And you're here. My place. Not seeking out Thor or SHIELD."
Once more, Loki coughed and Tony caught himself staring at his thin lips as he wiped away the trail of blood that ran out of them in a swift uncaring motion. "Impressive deduction, so what?"
"So, I guess you're here because I owed you a drink. "
Loki smirked. "What other reason would there be?"
"Honestly though. An 80 year old Bartonshire Irish Whisky, and you down it just like that? You got nerves."
"I've had worse," said Loki. He could still stand without staggering, which was noteworthy considering that the bottle standing in front of him was empty and Loki had finished it in less than two minutes. With Loki's high tolerance, buying Loki drinks for one evening would be tough, even with Tony's wealth.
Tony''d end up rolling around on the floor, before you could even accuse Loki of being tipsy.
His phone buzzed. He was about to glance at the screen when Jarvis diverted his attention. "Sir, we have a situation outside."
He had to reprogram Jarvis to get straight to the point. Tony placed the phone on the counter and shared a short look with Loki. His expression was arcane. "Fill me in," Tony said.
"Unspecified life forms are currently attacking the city, Sir."
Loki coughed again, and droplets of blood covered the counter."Ah, yes, something you ought to know."