Chapter Three

Pepper was a great babysitter.

Loki… not so much. As it turns out, all Asgardian lullabies were about murderous beasts and beheaded peasants.

"Are you sure there's no twinkle twinkle little star or some crap that you know?" Tony asked as he wrestled with a squirming baby Clint.

"Clearly you've never met my father," Loki responded, holding Thor out in front of him as if the infant Asgardian carried a disease.

"No wonder you turned out the way you did," Tony muttered, having finally calmed Clint down by giving him a random Nerf dart he found under the coffee table (probably from Peter, he thought, remembering the day the kid had roped him into an epic Nerf fight).

As Clint gnawed happily on the foam cylinder, Tony turned his attention to Bucky, who had somehow gotten his metal arm stuck between two couch cushions. Steve sat next to his wailing friend, giggling and clapping happily at his struggle.

In between fighting with the bawling Bucky, ignoring the ringing in his ears from Steve's delighted shrieks, and his fiancée's yelling at Natasha to stop bugging Sam, Tony heard the distinct klaxon-like ring of the compound's doorbell. "Pep, you free to get that?"

"Are you kidding me Tony, she's going to kill him if I don't hold her bac- Natalia Alionova Romanov, get his wings out of your d*mn mouth!"

The doorbell rang again.

"That's on you, Tolstoy," Tony said.

"I'm a bit busy at the moment," Loki wheezed, trapped under the weight of Thor's shrunken Mijölnir.

Tony cursed loudly (and he would've sworn he saw baby Steve give him a disapproving look). "F.R.I.D.A.Y, check the front door cameras, will you?"

"Sure thing boss." The AI's systems hummed for a moment before she spoke again. "Peter Parker's at the door, sir. You want me to let him in?"

"Yes!" Tony said loudly, both answering F.R.I.D.A.Y's question and crying out triumphantly as he successfully disentangled Bucky's mechanical limb from the couch springs.

"Hey, Mr. Stark?" Peter's voice came from the foyer. "Anyone home?"

"In the living room, kid!" Tony called back, desperately pulling at the miniaturized Mijölnir that Thor had stuck on his now-older brother's chest. As the sound of footsteps grew closer, Tony abandoned his efforts and looked at Thor, who was sitting on the ground looking quite pleased with himself. "You know," he told the shrunken prince, "that was a really sucky thing for you to do."

Thor just grinned a toothless smile and clapped in amusement.

"Mr. Stark?" Peter's voice came from the adjoining hallway this time. "Mr. Stark, what's going on? My Spider Sense is going crazy! Are you guys okay?" The frantic teenager pushed open the door, whipping his Spiderman mask off his head, and his eyes immediately going wide as saucers. "I- is that a… baby flying right there?"

"Don't start asking questions now, kid, your head'll explode." Tony reached up and grabbed little Sam by the leg to stop him from flying away on his miniature Falcon wings.

"But- but… Mr. Stark-" Peter's voice got quiet as he looked over at Loki, still trapped by Thor- "isn't that… the bad dude?"

Tony nodded, taking his wallet out of his back pocket. "Yup. Sure is."

"Why is he… Oh my God, are those Mr. Wilson's wings?" Peter stood in the doorway, his mouth hanging loosely open as he surveyed the room. His red Spiderman suit looked as if he'd hastily put it on while web-slinging over to the house, the fabric of his normal tee-shirt sticking out of the collar. "What…?"

"I said no questions, kid. Here, just, take my card… There should be a store or something near here. Get as much baby stuff as you can. Got it?"

"Uh…" Peter's eyes darted around the room wildly. "O- okay. Yeah Mr. Stark. Yeah, I'll be- I'll be back soon."

Tony clapped him on the shoulder and forcefully led him out of the lounge. "Thanks, kid."

Poor Peter was too flabbergasted at the situation to argue. He grabbed the credit card Tony offered him and backed out of the room, into the hallway. "Hey Pete, you might want to take the suit off before you go!"

Peter said nothing, flashing a thumbs-up at Tony as he made his way back out onto the streets of New York, hastily stuffing his unneeded Spiderman suit back into his bag.

With Peter out gathering their supplies, Tony could go back to focusing on making sure the baby superhumans didn't kill each other… or Loki.

"Thor," he sighed, tossing Sam's wings onto the coffee table and picking up the tiny blond Asgardian, "I can't believe I'm saying this, but please don't kill your brother. I need an extra set of eyes."

Loki squirmed uncomfortably.

Thor looked at Tony and blinked. "Myuhnuh."

Tony turned to Loki. "What's he saying?"

"How the h*ll should I know?" Thor's brother snapped. "I don't give a d*mn what he's saying, just get him to get this thing off me!"

Tony hoisted Thor higher into his arms. "You heard the man, Point Break. Get the hammer and go destroy a city of something."

"Myuhnuh!" Thor giggled, grabbing his shrunken weapon off his brother's chest.

"Oh thank Odin," Loki sighed.

"Good, you're back in action, you can take him now." Tony deposited Thor, who was happily cuddling with Mijölnir, into Loki's arms, to which the Rightful King of Jotunheim scrunched his nose.

"How exactly do I go about holding this- this thing?"

"First of all, that thing is your brother. Congrats, you can now hold it over his head for the rest of your life that you're older than him."

Loki's pale face grew a shade lighter. "You mean to say you can't reverse this!?" He gestured to Thor.

"I'm trying to think of what I could do to reverse it, but these idiots are gonna kill themselves and someone has to make sure they don't. Seven babies is already too much. Seven baby superhumans…" Tony exhaled slowly.

"Well don't expect me to help you babysit for the next 1500 years until this one gets back to his normal age."

"I'm going to fix it!" Tony demanded, trying to convince both Loki and himself. "I just need some time to work on it without these things-" he shook his left leg, where Clint had snuck up and hugged his ankle- "interrupting me!"

"Well, then, what's stopping you?" Loki snapped, prying Thor's hand away from his long black hair. "Get to work!"

"And leave you- the guy who tried to kill more than half the people in this room- with a bunch of defenseless Avengers? Not a chance, Reindeer Games. Even with Pepper here."

"You think I want to be an Avengers nanny?" Loki growled. "All I want to do is get off this cursed planet. And seeing as Heimdall-" he jabbed a finger at the sky in annoyance- "isn't exactly buddy-buddy with me at the moment, Thor is my only chance to leave, and a bloody two-year-old can't exactly summon the Bifrost. So, yes, Stark, I want this to be over just as much as you. And if that means watching the infant forms of the people who beat the Chitauri, then so be it!"

Hearing his brother's angry tone made Thor burst into tears. The moment his first wail hit their eardrums, the other six were bawling too.

Tony anxiously rubbed his forehead. He looked over at Loki, who stood with one hand holding Thor and the other on his hip. Tony looked back down at where Clint was still trying to hug his ankle. Then back at Loki. That at Natasha on Pepper's lap, chewing on the corner of a pillow as she cried. Then back up at Loki. Then to the corner of the room where Steve blubbered about Bucky and Sam playing tug-of-war with his shield. Then back at Loki. Then at Bruce, who was curled in a very tiny ball, trying to hide under the coffee table. Then back at Loki once more.

Then, with a very audible curse, Tony Stark made what he believed to be the most risky decision of his entire life.

"I'll go get my stuff from the lab and bring it in here. All twenty-eight arms and legs must be present and accounted for when I get back. Metal or otherwise," he added, pointing at Bucky, who was now lying face-down on the carpet, wailing as Sam tossed Steve's shield at him over and over again. "Keep an eye on him for me, will ya?" he asked Pepper pointedly.

Loki rolled his eyes and shooed Stark out of the room before Pepper could respond. "Yes, yes. Now get to work!"

Tony ran from the living room, down the stairs, to his and Banner's lab, and came to a halt in front of his cluttered desk. "Alright, help me out here, F.R.I.D.A.Y. Remember that compound holoscreen I had? Where'd I put the controls?"

"Top left desk drawer, sir," the AI responded. "I'd recommend bringing the laptop, though, boss, because the holoscreen only has a few of the downloaded schematics you used for the serum."

"Thanks F, you're the best."

Tony grabbed the needed supplies, gathering more than was probably necessary. Once he had collected everything he could've possibly needed, the stressed genius began to carefully make his way back to the room he'd left his comrades in. Before he reached the adjoining hallway, however, a loud shout and crash made him drop everything and make a mad dash to the room.

"STARK!" Loki's panicked voice rang through the house once more.

Swearing and tripping over his computer cord, Tony managed to stumble his way into the lounge, where he broke out into a cold sweat upon seeing what caused Loki's panic.

Bruce, still lying halfway under the now-overturned coffee table, was crying loudly along with the other six babies. That wasn't the concern, though. What was concerning was the slight greenish tinge that was making its way up Bruce's neck and face.