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The invasion is a chaotic shit show of epic proportions. Alien forces led by an alien prince calling himself the “Rightful King of Asgard.”
S.H.I.E.L.D had originally pegged Thor as unhostile but as Tony bursts his way through another whale shaped spaceship, he doesn't think that initial assessment was entirely accurate.
'We've got trouble Stark.' Steve tells him over their comms system.
'Are you just now seeing the invasion, Rogers?' Tony tuts. 'We need to get your eyes checked old man'
Unsurprisingly, Steve ignores his joke. 'We’ve got another Asgardian on the field.'
'What?' Tony groans, he's so tired. 'Don't tell me. It's the God of war. No wait, God of death? God of fucking-up-Earth.'
'God of mischief, actually.' A new voice practically purrs through the comms. 'Greetings Avengers, I am Loki Odinson, Prince of Asgard. I'm here to collect my brother.'
'Jarvis?'
'Sorry sir- I don't-' Jarvis tries to report back but his voice is halted by static. ‘-the tower.'
Tony immediately heads back to Stark Tower where he finds a man with ridiculously oversized golden horns waiting for him. Tony lets the broken armour peel off him once he lands. He needs to grab a new suit so he nods his head to the new figure, gesturing for him to follow. 'I take it you're Loki? I'm-'
'Tony Stark. I know.' The man looks like he stepped straight out of a fairy tale. Lily white skin and hair as black as coal. An explosion in the distance reminds Tony that he doesn't have time to dwell on his budding bisexual awakening.
Loki is dressed similar to the viking armour Thor wears, but in emerald green and polished gold. He's unarmed but his confident stance implies that he doesn't need weapons to be a threat.
'My reputation precedes me.' Tony smirks, faking confidence. 'Drink?'
'Maybe later. I'd be more than happy to drink after my victory.'
Tony pours his drink, subtly placing his gauntlets on his wrists. 'Mmm, and just so we're all on the same page. What counts as a victory for you?'
'Stop the chitauri and find whoever it is that's enchanted my brother.'
That stops Tony in his tracks. '...Enchanted?’ He repeats.
Loki nods. 'This whole invasion. It's not Thor's style. Someone else is clearly pulling the strings.'
'Brainwashing agents and pulling out eyes not your brother's usual methods?'
'Not at all. He doesn't have the talent to hypnotise others. He's not terribly magically gifted other than his storms.' Loki clicks his tongue. 'If I can get close to him, I might be able to knock some sense into him.'
'Could you start with Selvig?'
'Who?'
'The man on my roof controlling the portal.'
Loki's eyes flick to the sky. He hums in thought. 'The chitauri make a deadly army but they have one fatal flaw. If their mothership is destroyed, they'll all be deactivated. The mothership is too big to fit through that portal, so if you have a weapon big enough to send it through, you could wipe out the whole army in one go.'
'We don't really have anything like that to hand. We'd need a-'
Jarvis chirps in his ear, telling him about the incoming nuke. 'Scratch that. I got it. You sort the portal, I'll sort the nuke.'
Loki nods, clasping Tony on the shoulder before storming towards Selvig.
Tony isn't entirely sure if he should be trusting the God of mischief, the brother of the god trying to take over earth, but Loki seems like his best bet right now.
Before Tony can overthink things, he finds himself in the endless void of space, facing an army bigger than earth could possibly handle, and then slowly the oxygen deprivation gets the better of him and Tony blacks out.
When Tony comes back to consciousness, he sees the worried face of a god looking down at him. Loki's green eyes sparkle with an ethereal glow.
'This heaven?' He mumbles, head pounding.
Loki chuckles, looking relieved. 'Afraid not, my friend.'
'Did anyone give me CPR?' Tony says as Steve helps him sit up. 'I swear to god if you kissed me Rogers.'
Steve finally laughs at one of his jokes, another victory for the day. Speaking of-
'Did we win?'
'Yes.' Loki nods. 'The army is deactivated and Thor has been... incapacitated.'
'Incapacitated?' Tony wheezes out.
'Your Hulk has knocked him around enough to knock him out of his enchantment. He's dazed but he should be alright.'
'Ah, great. Go team. Good job guys. Alright. Let's just not come in tomorrow. Let's just take a day. Have you ever tried shawarma? There's a shawarma joint about two blocks from here. I don't know what it is, but I wanna try.'
Loki laughs. It's a beautiful, musical sound.
'And you owe me a drink.’ Tony reminds the god.
'Well my work isn't entirely done. But I suppose I could squeeze in a meal.' Loki tells him with a smirk that slowly spreads into a genuine smile.
***
Once the unconscious Thor is secured in the Hulk-cage, Tony manages to coax Loki into coming to the shawarma place with him.
‘And who is this?’ Natasha asks, arching an eyebrow. Her eyes quickly scan the Asgardian, Tony can’t help but wonder what her assassin eyes see.
‘This is Loki. Thors brother.’
‘Another god?’ Clint moans, already reaching for his bow.
‘This ones on our side.’ Tony assures them quickly.
Steve nods. ‘I saw him catch Tony when he fell out of the sky.’
Tony's head whips around to look at Loki. ‘You caught me?’
‘Yes.’ Loki says with a casual shrug of his shoulder.
The math doesn’t check out on that. Tony frowns. ‘I was falling at terminal velocity. In a pretty damn heavy suit of armour.’
Loki laughs. ‘I’m stronger than I look.’
‘I bet you are.’ Tony grumbles as he takes his seat.
‘You don’t look much like Thor.’ Clint points out suspiciously.
‘I was adopted.’ Loki says it casually, but the quick twitch of his lips leads Tony to believe there's more to the story. ‘Are you the agent who was enchanted?’
Clint sinks down in his seat, shoulders hunched. Looking like he regrets talking at all.
‘If you’d like, I can make sure there’s no remnant of the magic?’ Loki offers. ‘Enchantment charms like this tend to linger.’
Clint stares at Loki for a long moment before glancing at Natasha. ‘You’ll shoot him if he tries anything?’
Natasha nods sharply, Tony suspects that she’s already holding her gun under the table.
Clint grumbles his consent and Loki moves to the empty chair next to him. ‘This won’t hurt, but it will feel a bit strange.’ He warns, his hands gently resting on either side of Clint's temples. His eyes flick closed and softly glowing tendrils of magic spread from Loki's fingers. Clint's eyes shine with a green glow and Natasha tenses.
‘A complicated charm.’ Loki confirms. ‘But whoever did this didn’t place the spell directly. They must have used that sceptre Thor has been carrying. That makes it easy to dispel.’ For a brief second, the glow around Clints head goes golden. The light fades away and Loki opens his eyes, lowering his hands. ‘Headache gone?’
Clint blinks. ‘Yeah…. They were still in there?’
Loki nods. ‘Their hold was weak, but they could have reactivated the curse if you touched the sceptre. You’re clear now though.’
‘Thanks… I owe you one I guess.’
Loki waves him off. ‘My brother did this. I’m simply cleaning up after him.’
Jarvis whispers something in Tony's earpiece and he pulls his phone out. ‘Speaking of your brother, what's this?’ Tony asks as he pulls up a video feed of the hulk cage. Thor is still unconscious in the centre of the room, but another Loki is standing at the entrance, watching him.
Loki leans over Tony's shoulder to see what he’s looking at. ‘Duplication spell.’ Loki explains. ‘I can make an exact facsimile of my body which I can see through. In this case, I’m using it to keep an eye on Thor. Plus it means that when my brother finally wakes up, he won't be alone.’
‘Huh… So you’re seeing two rooms at once?’
Loki nods.
‘Isn’t that distracting? Do we only have like… half your attention.’
Loki laughs. ‘I assure you Antony, you have my full attention.’
Tony adamantly does not blush. ‘Alright then.’ He says a bit too quickly, putting his phone away so they can continue their meal in peace.
They’re all exhausted, with the exception of Loki who looks like he could still run a marathon without breaking a sweat. Once they’ve all had their fill, they return to the Tower. Loki uses the tesseract to take his brother home and the rest of the Avengers crash in the towers' many guest rooms.
Tonys weirdly disappointed to see the god go. It seems like a wasted opportunity to learn more about the other life forms in the galaxy. But Loki does have his brother to prioritise, so Tony can only hope that the god decides to come back one day.
***
Tony should sleep.
Days of fighting aliens gods, unending armies and almost dying really should have totally knocked him out. But his brain just won't turn off. He can’t stop thinking about the actual reality of there being actual aliens with armies big enough to wipe them out without breaking a sweat.
Knowing that sleep is impossible, Tony heads to the liquor cabinet in the lounge. He pauses when he realises he’s not alone.
‘Desperate for that drink are you?’ He asks the god perusing his collection.
Loki exhales slowly. ‘Oh, you have no idea.’ He says as he turns to face Tony, the guy looks exhausted.
Instead of his armour, Loki is dressed in what Tony can only assume is casual clothing for a Viking prince. He’s wearing a dark green tunic lined with golden embroidery. The horns are gone, exposing impossibly soft black hair that has been partly braided to stop it falling into his face.
Despite the clear exhaustion, the man looks absolutely stunning. Meanwhile, Tony is dressed in sweatpants and an ACDC shirt which definitely has more than one hole in it. Even though he couldn’t have known the prince was coming, he feels massively overdressed.
‘Why’d you come back?’ Tony asks as he closes the distance between them. ‘Don’t you have very important royal duties to be attending to?’
‘Asgard is hectic and you promised me a drink.’ Loki shrugs in explanation. ‘I figured it was a good enough excuse to escape a while.’
Tony nods, heading to the bar. If anyone understands drinking to forget family problems it's him. ‘Alright then. Scotch okay?’ He says, reaching for the bottle when Loki nods ‘Hows Thor?’
‘Awake. He’s…’ Loki frowns. ‘His head is free of the enchantment but the effects of the torture still linger.’
‘Jesus…’ Tony frowns to himself. From what he saw, Thor is impossibly strong. He’d hate to come up against whatever is strong enough to trap and torture him. ‘You know who did it?’
‘Thor wasn’t able to tell me much. But I have a rough idea who I’m after.’ He says with a tone which implies he’s already planned his revenge.
‘How can we help?’
Loki raises an eyebrow.
‘What? We’re Avengers, that's what we do; Avenge.’
‘This isn’t your battle.’
‘Nah, you’re an Avenger too now. Part of the team. The welcome pack is already in the mail.’
‘Oh, please tell me we have matching shirts.’ Loki says sarcastically, but there’s a small smile at the edge of his lips.
Tony laughs. ‘I’ll get some designed for us.’ He says, pouring the scotch. ‘Ah, no ice…’
Loki picks up the glasses and blows on the bottom of them. Crystal ice shards start to form around the glass.
‘Handy party trick.’ Tony hums, reluctantly impressed.
‘A frozen heart comes in useful I suppose.’
‘What’s that mean?’ Tony frowns, not liking the derogatory tone in Loki's voice.
‘I’m not Asgardian, like Thor.’ Loki explains simply.
‘So you’re a different type of alien?’
‘It’s a long story.’
‘I have the time.’ Tony promises.
Loki looks him up and down for a moment before relenting. They move to the sofas as Loki begins to talk. ‘I only learned I was adopted recently. All my life Thor and I have been raised as supposed equals. We were always told that either one of us would inherit the throne, but I always knew it would be Thor.’ Loki huffs. ‘He fit into Asgard so easily, where I struggled at every turn. I don't exactly fit the warrior mould people expect from Asgardian men.’ He explains, rolling his eyes. ‘Thor's coronation was supposed to be last year but Thor wasn’t ready to be king. It would have plunged the Nine Realms into chaos. That includes you by the way.’
‘I’m in the Nine Realms?
Loki hums in confirmation as he sips his drink.
‘So you’re my prince?’
Loki smirks. ‘If you’d like.’
Tony adamantly does not have the time to psychoanalyse why that flusters him.
‘It was a simple prank designed to show how easily Thor's temper would flare.’ Loki continues to explain. ‘And it worked, but in the extreme. Thor went against our fathers express wishes and waged war on Jotunheim, home of the Frost Giants. Father was furious.’ He sighs, finishing his drink.
Tony quickly tops him up, it sounds like Loki needs the alcohol more than he does.
‘Thor was banished to Midgard but I…’ He shakes his head. ‘When we were on Jotunheim I was grabbed by one of the giants. I should have lost a limb to frost burn but instead… my skin just turned blue like theirs. Father has this relic from an ancient war with the Jotun, the Casket of Winters. I snuck into the treasury and held it. And… the Asgardian illusion around me dropped. My skin was blue and it felt like I could actually breathe for the first time.’
‘Can I see?’ Tony asks, curiosity getting the better of him.
Loki quirks an eyebrow. ‘I’d rather not. You’d suffer from the cold and I can’t stand the sight of my skin like that.’
‘Like what? Like it's supposed to be?’
Loki's fingers tap against the glass. Tony wonders if it's a nervous habit.
‘Jotuns are the enemy of Asgard. We’re taught as children that they’re nothing but brainless, savage monsters. The monster of every fairytale our parents would tell us.’
Tony frowns, starting to piece things together. ‘So your dad’s a class A dick then?’
Loki tilts his head, a questioning look on his face.
‘Your dad knew you were a frost giant and still told you they’re monsters? That's a dick move.’
Loki pauses, sipping his drink. ‘It is, isn’t it? I confronted him about it. He told me he took me in as a child to use me as a political tool. To strengthen relations with Jotunheim. I was never a son to him, I was a bargaining chip.’
‘Fuck.’ Tony exhales. ‘That’ll fuck you up.’
Loki raises his glass in a fake toast. ‘I didn’t even get to give Father a piece of my mind.’ He huffs. ‘He passed out half way through the argument and fell into the OdinSleep.’
‘The what?’
‘It’s like a coma.’ Loki explains. ‘And with Thor exiled, the burden of the throne fell to me.’ He finishes his drink, reaching for the bottle to fill his glass again. ‘I tried to speed up Thor's return by sending him an enemy to prove his worth, but he saw it as a threat. He thought I was trying to take the throne for my own. We fought when he returned. It was… quite the fight.’
‘Standard sibling stuff I assume?’ Tony says, trying to catch up with Loki's drink count.
Loki flashes him a weak smile. ‘There was an explosion and Thor… He fell from the bifrost, into the endless void of space. I couldn’t get to him in time…’ He swallows his drink and stares into the empty glass. ‘I’ve searched for a year. Until he finally showed his face on Midgard.’ He looks up at Tony. ‘And you know the rest.’
‘So I take it things are pretty tense in Asgard?’
Loki puts the glass on the table before falling back against the cushions of the sofa. ‘It’s all my fault. Even though I’m the one who found him and got him home. The blame lies with me.’
‘That's such bullshit!’ Tony says, maybe a touch too loud thanks to the alcohol.
Loki raises an eyebrow.
‘What? It is.’ Tony pouts. ‘They lie to you your whole life so you have a perfectly reasonable freak out when you find the truth. Then an accident happens to your brother, and the consequences are your fault? Nuh-uh.’
‘I’m afraid so. The monster prince of Asgard.’
‘Fuck them. You should stay here.’
Loki looks at him like he’s crazy.
‘I’m serious!’ Tony jumps to his feet. ‘You’re an Avenger. One of us! I was already planning on making floors for everyone else so they could stay here.’
‘I have duties on Asgard.’ Loki protests, but it sounds like even he thinks it's a weak argument.
‘You owe those fuckers nothing! Come hang out on Earth and be a superhero.’ He grins, covering one eye to mimic Fury. ‘Have you heard about the Avengers Initiative?’
Loki looks Tony up and down before chuckling. ‘Are we still getting t-shirts?’
‘“I saved NYC and all I got was this stupid t-shirt” designs have already been sent to the printers.’ Tony beams. ‘I’ll make you one in green.’
‘I’ll need to return to Asgard to check on Thor, but… I think I’d like that.’ Loki says, with an impossibly soft smile.
‘Then it's official!’ Tony beams. ‘Let’s celebrate!’ He cheers, pouring more scotch for the both of them.
***
Tony wakes up with an awful headache, but to the smell of pancakes. So it’s not all bad news.
He blearily opens up his eyes, the physical strain of the invasion catching up to him all at once.
He turns his head, spotting Natasha sitting on an armchair. She sips tea from a Stark Industries mug and watches him with a smug smile. ‘So I take it the god is staying?’
‘Huh?’ Tony puts a hand on the pillow under his head to help himself up, but finds that he’s been sleeping on someone's lap. ‘Oh no…’ Tony whispers before looking up. Thankfully, Loki is fast asleep, head tilted back against the curve of the sofa. Tony bitterly thinks how unfair it is that the god looks graceful even when he’s fast asleep.
Tony very carefully sits up without disrupting the sleeping man, and runs a hand through his hair.
‘Steve and Bruce are making breakfast.’ Natasha explains. ‘Clint’s not up yet, but that’s normal for him. We probably won’t see him till noon.’
‘Please tell me they’ve made coffee.’ Tony moans, adamantly ignoring the embarrassment of being caught passed out on top of someone else.
Natasha nods. ‘Go on, I’ll wake up our new friend.’ She says teasingly.
Tony yawns, taking one last peek at the sleeping god before shuffling to the kitchen.
***
‘Welcome to the team.’ Natasha says, knowing that Loki has been awake since Tony started to wake up.
Loki opens one eye, an amused smile on his face. ‘I think I’ll like it here.’ He hums happily, stretching his stiff arms.
Natasha considers herself an expert on body language. And she can only assume that knowledge is transferable to aliens until proven wrong. As she watches the man, she gets the sense that he’s relaxed for the first time in a long while, probably years. She can certainly relate to that feeling.
‘Come on, we’d better get in there before Tony drinks all the coffee.’ She says, offering a hand to help him up and leading him towards the kitchen where their new teammates are waiting for them.