Chapter Text
"God I hate politics," groans Clint from the couch. "This is what, the fifth Republican debate? And the presidential election isn't for another ten months."
"You know, you could just not watch cable news," Tony points out the obvious from the kitchen table where he and Bruce are science jamming; he's supposed to be at a company board meeting this afternoon but science jamming is just so much more fun and Pepper so much better at talking down stuffy corporate suit types. "Like, until November's over. It'll do wonders for your sanity, trust me."
"Seriously can you believe this lot?" Clint expansively sweeps a hand at Tony's giant flat-screen television. "Old white guy senator one, old white guy senator two, slightly less old smarmy white mayor guy three, middle aged white guy four who can't even string a sentence together—"
"You mean Texas Governor Samson? Guy verbal-trips over his own teeth but he plays a mean game of golf and keeps a good whiskey cabinet."
"—crazy congress lady, token black guy on a glorified book tour—"
"Actually, you know what, if you don't go cold turkey on the cable news for your own sanity, why not do it for ours? At least limit yourself to Daily Show episodes or something. Or hey, here's an idea, get off the couch and go spar with Natasha some more—"
There's a dull popping sound from outside, like a distant explosion. A minute later the door bursts open and Steve Rogers runs in shield already in hand. "We have a situation," he says, straight to the point. "Central Park area, apparently a battalion of robots came up from the sewer system. Thor's already there and Ms. Romanoff messaged to say she's on her way."
This gets everybody's attention, including Clint's. Tony feels like he can kiss the robots for their timing. "Sounds like fun," he says while Bruce unbuttons his shirt with a sigh. "Hear that Barton? Mommy says you have to turn off the TV and go play outside now. Be a good boy and tie your own shoelaces, ‘kay?"
Clint pretends to aim an arrow at his head as he leaves to get his stuff. Tony laughs it off and tells JARVIS to get a suit ready. Time to fly.
* * *
Attack du jour turns out to be a wimpy disappointment. Granted, compared to Loki most stuff thrown at the Avengers is wimpy but steampunk robots against Tony's genius so-ahead-of-the-curve-I-touch-the-X-axis tech is just lame. This battle? More like a walk in the park, at least for the Avengers. The people who ran screaming out of Central Park just before it turned into a greener lunar surface, not so much, but at least it means the area is clear of civilians.
Of course, Tony's life being what it is, the moment his mind forms the words walk in the park everything changes.
Heavy black clouds quickly gather overhead low enough to brush Stark Tower. There is wind. Tony's first thought as he hovers thirty feet above street-level is that Thor is about to do his thunder thing which although very impressive and sometimes shit-freezingly "oh god an actual god" scary is really overkill in this situation. His second and very understandable thought as the clouds rapidly twist into a funnel down to the torn-up ground is something's coming. Already he can hear Steve shouting at Natasha and Clint to drop what they're killing to get over here, down below Thor is looking up from the remains of the giant moving Etsy piece he's just smashed into cogs, and Hulk will be bounding in any moment now making them ready for whatever is going to be appearing. Very ready. Abso-bloody-lutely rea—
The funnel cloud pulls away. The sky goes back to being calm overcast. There is a very familiar figure in green and black curled on the ground. Tony groans because there is only so far people can be ready against the unpredictable God of Mischief and speaks for all of them. "Ah, crap."
Or almost all of them. "Brother!" shouts Thor, as if the more he throws the word at Loki's head the more it will sink in and change Loki's mind about taking his family issues out on Earth. The rest of the Avengers are gathering into their anti-Loki stances: Captain America raising his shield, Hawkeye with an arrow cocked and scanning the area for Loki's latest minions or tricks Black Widow beside him, the Hulk lumbering in from what had been an alleyway fists bulging. Thor is approaching his brother Mjölnir in hand, which is a really good idea since Thor is best to handle whatever initial attack Loki throws out, and also a really bad idea since seeing Thor is a great way to crank Loki's kill instinct from 'when I feel like it' to 'deadly serious'. Luckily Tony has an idea to counter that. He turns on his suit's sound system and calls up a track. A pulsing bass beat booms across Central Park with a snarky comment about a couple of trailer park girls. On cue Tony starts singing along – loudly.
"Guess who's back. Back again. Asshole's back. Warn your friends. Guess who's back, guess who's back, guess who's back ..."
He leaves off when the song goes too low even for his voice. There is a pause over the comms for about three seconds. "Is that … music?" asks the Cap doubtfully.
"Really, Stark?" That's Clint. "My respect for your music collection just dropped into the subway."
"Hey, there's some damn good buskers in the subway. Besides, nothing like bad music to ruin a dramatic entrance and we all know this diva just loves his dramatic entrances." Tony turns Eminem a little louder and grins behind the armoured face plate.
"I'm not sure you had much of an entrance to ruin," says Natasha, her voice clipped. "Look."
Tony does look. Hard.
Loki isn't moving. More than that, not only does he not have his ridiculous helmet, he isn't even standing up instead just … lying there. With clothes torn and bloody like he's just escaped something with claws. Zooming in visuals, Tony can see Loki is breathing with eyes closed and more blood around his mouth and throat. A lot of blood. Thor reacts predictably.
"Brother!" Whump goes Mjölnir to the ground never to be moved until Thor calls it, and there goes Thor rushing to Loki's side. He's the only one – the rest of the Avengers hang back expecting a trick and who can blame them – though Tony does hover a little closer which gives him a better angle to see what's happening. That and watch Thor's back. It's less out of concern for Loki hitting the big guy than it is for what Loki might say to him …
"Brother. Loki." Thor lifts Loki and lays him across his knee. The trickster god's skin is much paler than usual, especially in contrast with his black hair and Thor's fingers which are – oh Jesus – brushing over his brow like a caress. "Loki, what has happened? Why do you not wake?"
"What's going on?" asks Steve quietly over the comm's rapping background music.
"Loki's hurt and not saying anything. Not even moving. I'd give some analogy about a squashed bug but since Loki doesn't have his golden stag beetle helmet I'll save it for some other time."
"Is he alive?" asks Natasha.
"Yeah."
"Pity," Clint mutters.
"Better not say that around Thor, he's doing a pretty good impression of Romeo over Juliet in the final act right now." Tony ignores the ugh did not need that image cough from Clint and powers down his repulsors (along with the sound system, probably to the team's relief). "Gimme a sec, I'll enter stage left."
He lands on the ground near Thor. Thor doesn't look up at him, instead moving from trying to touch his brother awake to gently shaking him with the same lack of result. "Hey, big guy, nice work with the walking clocks, what's up with your bratty brother, huh?" Tony asks brightly.
Thor doesn't look up from Loki's unconscious form. "My brother is badly hurt!"
"Yeah, well, can't help with that." Or care. "So this would be the point we call up Fury and tell him to ready the SHIELD containment cells again but since Loki's swooning like a Southern belle in a wasp corset maybe you could call your all seeing space viking buddy to take your brother back and put him in the Asgard cell where he's supposed to be?"
"He is hurt!" shouts Thor, complete with a rumble of thunder overhead.
"Okay, okay!" Tony reassures hurriedly, hands out and reminding himself once more that angry god does not equal good idea. "Loki's hurt, you're concerned, we get that, but what are we supposed to do about it?"
Thor's eyes harden and fix on him with a flash that isn't metaphorical. Tony gets a sinking feeling. "We must help him—"
There's a gurgled gasp as thin white fingers jerk up to grab Thor's arm. Immediately Tony drops into an attack stance ready to fire those nice little surgical strike missiles he installed last week. Thor starts and looks back down to find Loki staring up eyes wide in a way that is either terrified or furious or both, but definitely unseeing. Thick, choked sounds come from the trickster's mouth as he coughs out blood which falls into the soil like heavy rain— "Loki!" Thor shouts, still supporting his brother's shoulders. "Loki, what has happened to you? Are you all right?"
Of course I'm not all right, you thundering oaf let go of me I hate you! is what Tony expects Loki to say or something to that effect, except Loki doesn't. Instead Loki is making those awful sounds as he spits out blood looking really worse for wear, but he's pulled too many tricks before so Tony keeps weapons up. Behind them the rest of the team are shouting things and the Hulk is sounding dangerously close to coming over. "It's all right I think," Tony calls over his shoulder. "Mangled God of Mischief having a panic attack, totally okay in the sense that he's only digging fingers into Thor's bicep, not magicking the city into melted chocolate or anything. Totally under control—"
Which of course is the point that the rest of the steampunk robots still functioning decide to crash the party. It's a pretty pathetic crash for the reasons described before Loki entered the picture, so Tony doesn't bother to do much other than shoot his missiles into the three metre tall rusting clunker clanking towards him. It falls down with an undignified thud but Thor doesn't even look up and clutches his choking brother. Tony rightly assumes that the rest of the team will take care of the party crashers and goes back to the alien Norse god problem. "We are not helping him," he tells Thor firmly. "Setting aside the little issue of your brother being a supervillain who tried to take over Earth and did some 160 billion dollars worth of to damage to New York we have no idea how to deal with Asgardian physiology—" Loki gives a particularly guttural sound that makes Thor's face twist helplessly and Tony feel like he's a heartless supervillain instead of Iron Man. It's not a feeling he likes, so he blusters through it. "Oh come on, Loki, we've seen you get up from worse, you're a god for chrissakes. Just stand up and insult us for a bit like you always do, it's not like the cat got your tongue and it'll make you feel bett—"
He breaks off looking down at Loki's contorted face. Specifically, at his throat and mouth. Loki's bloody, empty throat and mouth.
Oh. Oh.
Iron Man definitely feels like a heartless supervillain now.
A roar and a smash lets him know that the Hulk is taking care of the remaining robot problem. Loki has stopped hacking up blood but is now shivering in Thor's arms. Thor himself is looking desperate as he covers his vagrant little brother in his red cape. Tony has no idea if gods go into shock like humans do but what the hell, executive decision time. "Fine. Pick him up, we'll get him some medical attention, but if this turns out to be some overly elaborate plot of his to get us to lower our guard god or no god you are cleaning the windows of the tower every day for a month. Make that three months. Six, even. And the bathrooms as well."
Thor is already standing with a red-wrapped Loki burrito in his arms. "That is acceptable. Let us go quickly."
"Iron Man, what's going on?" asks the Cap urgently over the comms.
"We're taking Loki somewhere safe."
"Taking Loki somewhere safe?!"
"Hey, I'm not happy about it either but if you want to argue with an upset thunder god, be my guest," Tony replies shortly, already lifting off. There's a whoosh as Mjölnir is called to Thor's hand. Thor's other hand is holding the Loki burrito slung over his shoulder as he spins Mjölnir to take flight. "Have fun with the clockwork tin cans, we'll see you back home."
"Stark!"
Tony really hopes he isn't going to regret this.
* * *
'Taking Loki somewhere safe' turns out to be 'taking Loki into Stark Tower'. JARVIS kindly reminds Tony that Pepper figuratively arm-wrestled the insurance company to cover Acts of God(s) when he fixed it up after the Loki/Chitauri incident to include suites for his teammates, training areas, state of the art medical facilities and more, but it doesn't make anyone feel any happier about the situation.
"So what's wrong with him?" asks Natasha warily. She and Clint are seated with weapons nearby watching Thor and a de-Hulked, re-dressed, and now in doctor mode Bruce Banner hover over Loki through the medical room's industrial-strength glass window. Steve and Tony stand on either side of the window so as to not block their view.
"Has to be pretty bad to take down a Norse god," Clint replies, morbidly fascinated by the scene.
They all fall silent as they imagine how powerful something would have to be to hurt someone like Loki to this extent. Inside the room Bruce is gingerly poking and scanning bits of Loki while Thor stands by with one hand cupping Loki's head. Over the months everyone has repeatedly tried to tell Thor that tender isn't the way to treat a supervillain but when said supervillain is Thor's little brother exceptions have to be accepted. That doesn't mean anyone has to like it, but under current circumstance nobody is going to tell Thor to stop.
Eventually Thor and Bruce come out of the medical room. Thor looks grim, Bruce slightly green and not in the Hulk sense in the glow of the tablet computer he's holding. "Uh, okay. Setting aside the fact that I've only treated human patients, although Asgardian biological processes—"
"I thought Loki was Jotunn?" cuts in Tony. "Giant frosty the snowman people?"
Bruce shrugs. "I'm not sure about that, but Thor did explain that while they're not brothers by birth Loki was raised as one of Asgard and is a talented shapeshifter …"
Tony lets it go and waves at Bruce to continue. He clears his throat. "As I was saying, although Asgardian biological processes are literally out of this world in terms of strength, efficiency and speed, the overall structure of their bodies is essentially human so I'm working from that basis. Loki's injuries ..."
Bruce clinically reads out a list. Joints pulled out of their sockets. Bones smashed, several times over. Chest hacked open, ribs pulled apart like wings before being shoved back into place. Evidence of massive internal trauma as if something long, barbed and heated was plunged in and twisted. Throat cut from jaw to clavicle. And the list goes on. By the end of it Steve and Tony are feeling ill. Natasha and Clint are studiously expressionless. Thor's face is thundercloud black.
"If Loki were human he'd be certainly dead," Bruce finishes. "Since he's not he's already healed some and going by observation of our resident Asgardian in time he'll recover completely with one exception."
"Which is?" Steve asks.
Bruce bites the inside of his cheek for a moment. "Do you know what a Columbian necktie is?"
Tony knows, it was the first thing that came to mind when he saw Loki's condition in full. The two assassins definitely know. Steve and Thor blink. "What is this thing of which you speak?" Thor demands.
"It's an execution method that was used extensively during the Columbian civil war in the fifties," Natasha explains. "You make a vertical slash in the victim's throat and pull the tongue out so that it hangs over the chest hence the name, after which you count down until the victim asphyxiates or dies of blood loss."
"Exactly," Bruce says, looking relieved that he didn't have to do the gory explanation. "Except in this case the victim couldn't die and the tie was yanked out completely."
There's a moment as that image sinks into everyone. "So Loki God of Lies Silvertongue has had his tongue cut out," Clint sums up at last.
"Yes. And unless Asgardians have the ability to regrow lost limbs and organs, that isn't going to heal."
A dark smile spreads across the archer-assassin's face. "I fail to see how this is a bad thing."
"Uh, Barton?" Tony nods at Thor who looks to be two breaths away from divine wrath. Clint drops the smile, if not the sentiment which to be perfectly honest is probably shared by everyone in the room with the exception of Thor. Certainly Tony feels it.
Thor, thankfully, accepts the disappearing smile for what it is and calms down. Sort of. "I know my brother's speech is poisonous and all of you have been harmed by it. I myself have felt its sting many a time, but be that as it may I cannot find any joy in his suffering." Thor draws himself up to meet all their eyes with an indomitable gaze that reminds Tony that not only is their teammate more than human, he's also a prince. "Loki is my brother. For me to turn my back on him this day would ignoble and unworthy."
With that Thor goes back into the medical room. The rest of the Avengers watch as he takes a chair, places it by Loki's side, and sits down obviously resolved to stay there until Loki wakes up. After a moment's hesitation Bruce follows him in. Natasha's lips thin. "All right," she says to no one in particular. "Now what?"
Tony has an answer for everything. "Drink. And then pizza and ice-cream not necessarily in that order. I don't know about you, but as far as I'm concerned we did our work, saved the day again, and since both Snow White and the Huntsman are down for the count they can wait until morning. Right guys?"
The others are already heading for the lounge.
* * *
In remote outback Australia, a shooting star falls to earth. It's a small one, the sound of its impact barely heard by the tiny town fifty kilometres away, but very bright. When the light and dust clears there's a perfectly formed crater left behind maybe six metres in diameter. There's something shining in its centre.
Something silver.