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If anything, the invasion was easy to pull off. This was a primitive planet, after all, and whatever fondness he might have held for it once, (it was His home, after all) had died long ago. That one mourning boy that once smiled at him was gone and Loki had lost anything he cared for. So what was the point anymore?
He didn’t love you! Who could love a monster like you?
Revenge for being played, the Mad One suggested, is worth considering. Loki agrees. This is what this is. Revenge for being played. Revenge for being robbed if the world took him away.
The invasion is successful, and the laughable force formed to counter him is defeated. The only thing left is find the treasure the Mad One desires. Although, to give credit where credit is due, he wouldn’t have achieved it as easily if that one human pair hadn’t come his way. They had promised to help him if he, in exchange, helped them find their missing friend or, if he had died (had been killed), at least recover his body.
Tracking spells are easy, all you usually need is a personal item that belongs to whoever you’re tracking down (the more important the better) and concentration. When he tells them, they bring him to their friend’s Workshop , and he stares around in awe. They’ve asked him to track a mage, one that he does not know the powers of. Maybe the mage in question doesn’t even realise what they do, but Loki can feel the endless energies tied to creation float all over the place. They feel stale, unused, perhaps from how long the master of this workshop has been gone.
“Can you find him?” the woman (Pepper, she had introduced herself as) asked and he nods. “Just for curiosity’s sake, who am I looking for?” he asks. He doesn’t need a name, but approaching someone with their name, rather than a “hey, you” is easier to establish communication.
“His full name is Antony Edward Stark” the man (who introduced himself as James, but the Pepper lady called him Rhodey) replies. “But he prefers to be called Tony.”
Just call me Tony, okay? Antony is too long and boring.
He doesn’t dare get his hopes up. After all, he could be dead, and his friends are only holding on their fragile hope because “he came back before”. He wants to share that hope, too but he knows. If he hopes, he’ll only be more hurt in the end.
Again.
-//-
This part of land is cold, but not unbearably to the skin. The endless white, however, is a wound to his soul, a remembrance of things he’d wish he could forget. But he gave a promise he didn’t dare betray, not because it was in his nature, but because he wanted to know. It’s a selfish secret, he thinks, but he’s been called selfish all his life, enough to embrace it this time.
There’s an underground building of some kind, and he’s drawn there. Something familiar beckons him in. And so he enters, unseen, covered by a thin veil of magic. He could fight, sure, humans were too weak to put up a good fight against him, their mortal constitution too frail in comparison to that of an Asgardian (or Jotun). Then, he reaches the deepest part of this strange construction. He can only sense one person there, alive, but also unmoving.
It’s him, it has to be him. Magic doesn’t lie, and he’s the one he’s been looking for. He’s not sure if it’s him , though. He looks much different than he remembered, not just older. He’s covered in injuries, most of them old enough to be healed, albeit leaving scars behind. His hair is messily cut, as if done in a hurry. He looks like a prisoner not fed for months, which is not surprising, the whole structure looks like a heavily guarded prison that would put one of Asgard’s to shame. And lastly, most horrifyingly, there’s a hole in the middle of his chest, a weak, blue shine emitting from it. It hums with magic, of ancient and long forgotten civilizations, of power inconceivable, and then Loki just knows what that glow is. It’s what he was sent to retrieve. The space stone. And it’s only one person he knows foolish and daring enough to do this thing to themselves.
“Dearest” he finds himself whispering, as he sits by his side, as close as he thinks won’t startle him. “What have you done to yourself?”
Tony opens his eyes, slowly, and turns his head to his direction, but it feels like he’s not seen. There’s a weak shimmer coming from them and, he thinks they look blue, like the Stone. “Hey, it’s Loki.” he mutters. “I missed you. Even if you’re an illusion. It’s nice to have company. Pepper and Rhodey drop by sometimes.” Loki feels his heart break at that. He feels angry at himself too; how could he even doubt that he would be forgotten, when the thought of him kept Tony hope and company.
“We’re getting home, Tony. Your friends miss you.” he finds himself blurting, while carefully working on releasing Tony from his bounds. “Besides, you have yet to introduce me to them.”
“That’s new. You never ask about them. Just listen. You’re being a weird illusion today, Loki.”
“That’s because I’m not an illusion, you idiot! You’re being worse than Thor, you know that?”
“That’s a thing an illusion would say.” Tony counters. Loki rolls his eyes and places a quick kiss over his lips to shut him up. Tony blinks. “You’re not an illusion.”
“Took you some time to realise.” Loki replies. “So, how about going home?”
-//-
“And that’s all, I guess.” Loki concludes his tale to Tony and his friends. They all look deep in thought, another surprising reaction after their return. They cried both when they saw Tony, thanked him in a way nobody seemed to have done before.
“Well, I’m not giving you back, and I’m certainly not handing out this.” Tony points out to the Stone. “It kinda keeps me alive, you know?”
“Because having your life tied to an ancient artefact is much better than being poisoned to death.” James (call me Rhodey) comments with a roll of his eyes.
“Boys, before we start screaming at Tony for being an idiot,” Pepper intervenes, “why don’t we finish what Loki started?”
Tony perks up at that. “You mean take over the world? That’s a childhood fantasy of mine! Let’s do it.”
“Yes, because if we tell others aliens are coming, we’ll be taken oh so seriously, Tones.”
“Careful Rhodes, that sounds awfully close to treason” Tony mocks and the both of them laugh. Loki can’t help but turn to Pepper. “Are they always like that?”
She nods. “You’ll have to learn to appreciate and accept them as they are.”
“I hope you two accept me as I am. I don’t think I’m good enough for Tony.”
Pepper smiles. “You’ve gone to great lengths for him. Avenge his death, was it? Then you searched for him across the planet. You’re alright. Just don’t break his heart, okay?”
“Don’t worry, I won’t.”