Chapter Text
Thor’s awful, irritating, sexy brother is attacking New York again.
Loki may be smart, funny, stylish, and the best-looking super villain Tony’s ever had the pleasure to blast in the face, but he’s also wickedly sadistic and clearly out of his gourd. Tony has fantasized about what the guy might be like in bed, but he suspects if they ever did tumble under the sheets together, Loki might decapitate him and stuff the corpse with alien eggs or something the morning after. So yeah, Tony’s not going there. He’ll appreciate the pretty, sure—but he’ll do it from a safe distance.
It’s winter in New York, just another day, just another god of mischief attack. Loki’s conjured up a giant herd of sticky green goo monsters that are wreaking havoc and chasing screaming pedestrians around, all as a distraction so he can put up illustrated billboards of Asgard, Odin, and Thor in over-the-top war propaganda style, emphasizing the imperialism and depicting humans as tiny pathetic caricatures fawning over their gods from below. It’s hilariously tongue-in-cheek.
“Hey, Pointbreak,” Tony grins over the comms as he explodes another goo monster. “Loving these big red thunderbolts coming out of the looming black castle in the sky. Is this an accurate depiction of the old homestead, or are we seeing Loki’s creative license here?”
He flies past another billboard of a giant eyeball watching humans 1984-style, with text that reads, “Heimdall sees all! A patriot never criticizes the King!”
“No, our city gleams gold, not black. But my concern lies rather with these villainous gelatins,” Thor responds. He swings his hammer into a goo monster, but it just sinks right in and sticks, requiring messy extrication by hand.
“I want some of these posters for my rec room,” Tony says. “The snark just oozes out of them. Loki could make a career in political humor if he talks to the right people.”
“Enough chatter!” Cap barks. “Iron Man, get your head in the game! We have civilians to protect!”
“Uh, yeah, what do you think I’ve been doing, Cap? Those goos in Times Square didn’t explode themselves.”
“He means, get your ass in gear, Stark! You look like you’re taking a scenic tour over there, while the rest of us are covered in green muck!” snaps Clint, running up to another blob and tossing an exploding arrowhead in by hand. They’d quickly discovered that actually shooting his arrows gave them too much velocity; they cut straight through the gelatinous monsters and out the other side. Clint switched to melee work, but he’s been cranky ever since.
“Hey, don’t hate me ‘cause I’m better at dodging,” Tony smirks.
“The Iron Man is correct,” Loki chimes in, suddenly revealing himself from invisibility on a nearby billboard ledge. “Despite your world’s plethora of devices capable of flight, he is the only one of you pathetic imbeciles to adapt even a little to your current opponents. Perhaps you should take lessons from him.”
He nods to Tony, singling him out for approval, and Tony thinks firmly to himself that he doesn’t find that attractive, not at all. He grins behind his face plate.
“I hate to say it, but he’s right,” Cap sighs, knocking back a Jello from an escaping courier with his shield. “Where is SHIELD at with getting a Quinjet over here and targeting these blobs from the sky?”
“Not an option. Too wide for city streets,” Nat says, half-attentive as she tosses an improvised explosive and ducks behind a parked car for cover. She’s not looking all that muck-covered either, to be honest, but Tony knows better than to point that out. “If we can herd them all into Central Park, we might save ourselves some time that way.”
Thor lands on a car roof below Loki’s billboard, denting the metal with his weight and dripping green sludge everywhere. He is immediately pursued by a particularly large blob, which bounces up off the pavement behind him.
“Brother—” he begins, only to be muffled a second later by the blob landing on him and engulfing his entire body with a weird sizzling noise. He struggles valiantly until he has at least his face and one arm free.
“Why, Thor, I do believe you found the only blob acidic enough to eat through living flesh,” Loki smiles beneficently.
“Brother!” Thor gasps again in righteous indignation, half-stuck in the giant goo. His face is red and blotchy, and his dissolving armor is giving off an unpleasant burnt stench. “Cease this mockery and call off your constructs! Your quarrel is with Asgard, not Midgard’s humble citizenry! They have no place in our conflict!”
Piqued, Loki crosses his arms. “Have no place? Is Midgard not one of the Nine? If anything, the Allfather has been neglectful to its stupidest realm, claiming dominion without caring to inform the populace he so subjugates! I’m doing them a favor by addressing that ignorance.”
“Stupidest realm? Did he just say stupidest realm? I take exception to that,” Tony says, dropping down onto a rooftop. “J, gimme the feed for that billboard behind him.”
While Loki and Thor continue to loudly bicker, Tony takes thirty seconds to mock up a little mischief of his own and tosses the details to JARVIS for implementation.
The electric billboard behind Loki flashes and changes to an unflattering screenshot of Loki mid-blink, taken from Tony’s suit footage in the latest fight, with a giant cartoon talk-y bubble saying, “I am sooooooo smart! You’re not my REAL dad! Waaaagh!”
Whirling around to stare at the new billboard, Loki cuts his eyes unerringly back to Tony’s position on the roof, clearly pissed.
Tony gives a cheeky little wave. “Hi, therRAAGH!”
Teleporting directly in front of Tony, Loki lifts him off the roof by the throat, face twisted in a snarl. Tony grabs his wrist, feet dangling off the edge of the building, and reflexively attempts to blast him pointblank in the face. His gauntlet clicks, and nothing happens.
Alarmed, he looks at the repulsor on his palm only to find that same green goo suddenly covering it. Triggering his boots reveals a similar situation—all four flight stabilizers have been magically jammed.
“Oh, fuck.”
The armor creaks under Loki’s fingers—and holy fuck, the dude is strong—and Loki’s lip curls up in that creepy I’m-about-to-eat-you way. The sidewalk below is a sheer eight stories down. If Loki drops him now, Tony’s gonna end up a crunchy metal splatter on the pavement. From far down the street, worried Avengers shout his name in dismay.
“Let’s see that charming face of yours, hmm?” Loki smiles threateningly and touches a finger under the chin of Tony’s helmet, popping the faceplate off like it was nothing in a demonstration of raw power that Tony finds simultaneously arousing and disturbing.
Tony meets his gaze with an anxious grin. “Can’t take a little joke, Reindeer Games? I thought you were all about the silly pranks.”
“Your taste in humor lacks refinement, Stark,” Loki purrs ominously. “Allow me to instruct you better.”
“I’m sure you’re a hell of a teacher, but I’m not into roleplay. How about some bondage instead? I’ve got a very sexy set of handcuffs that I’m sure you’d look great in.”
Loki’s fingers loosen ever so slightly, dropping him nearly an inch, and Tony tightens his own grip in response.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa! Safeword! Safeword!”
“Once again, you spout semi-flirtatious innuendo that hardly passes for a threat, while I hold your very life in my hands. It’s an impressively idiotic reflex, even for a human. Unless perhaps… you are attracted to mortal danger?”
Loki raises an eyebrow, and Tony fights a heated flush. The supposition is not completely inaccurate. It’s common knowledge that Tony’s a bit of an adrenaline junky, and Loki’s unpredictability is a temptation he can’t ignore. Tony can’t do much but hang there, clinging to Loki’s outstretched arm where it holds him by the neck, heart pounding and yet still somehow incapable of keeping his mouth shut.
“I honestly don’t mind a little high altitude experimentation, but you know what they say, no glove, no love; no net, no… dangling over eight-story drops?”
Loki’s mouth curves into a predatory smile, and Tony’s heart does a double-beat. Admittedly, it’s been a while since Loki’s actually killed anyone, not since the invasion, in fact, but the wild sprees of destruction and public menacing don’t exactly speak of a stable mind. Tony doesn’t think Loki will kill him, but…
“Cards on the table, what can I say that’ll get me back on the roof?”
To Tony’s relief, Loki considers this, apparently willing to engage in debate. “I don’t suppose swearing allegiance to me and handing over the reins to your world governments is on offer.”
“No, but you know I’m worth keeping around for all the other benefits. I’m clever. I’m entertaining. You can’t deny I’m kinda cute.”
Loki gives him a once over, still at arm’s length. “I’ve seen cuter.”
Tony perks up. “That’s not a denial!”
Astonishingly, Loki’s gonna-eat-you face relaxes into exasperated amusement, which is a major step up from homicidal rage.
Tony talks faster, optimism buoyed by the rush of adrenaline, and pushes his luck. “I have a counter-offer to the whole world domination thing. You switch sides to Earth defense duty, and I’ll go on a date with you.”
“You are appallingly impertinent. I should kill you and be done with it.”
“Nah, you don’t wanna do that. I’m too good a lay to waste, promise.”
“Keep him talking, Tony,” says Nat in his ear piece. “Steve’s almost at your position, and the rest of us are less than a minute behind him.”
Loki’s eyes drift to Tony’s ear—because of course his hearing is good enough to pick up comm chatter from two feet away—and he plucks out the ear piece to speak directly into it.
“I don’t know what you expect to accomplish, other than goading me to kill him faster,” he says to the listening gang. “Of the two who could possibly catch him, Thor is still entangled in slime, and the beast is nowhere to be seen.”
“If you drop him, that’ll be the end for you,” Cap warns over the comm. He sounds like he’s jogging up a stairwell. “Thor’s brother or not, the kid gloves come off.”
Loki’s looking peevish again, and Tony doesn’t want to die just ‘cause Loki decided to spite Captain Spangles.
“Hush, you guys,” he tries to defuse. “Me and Loki are trying to work out when we’re gonna go parking.”
Thankfully, Clint picks up the lighter tone and scoffs over the comm. “Parking? What are you, fifteen?”
“You’re never too old to park, Barton.”
“I tire of this nonsense,” Loki says, and makes as if to throw Tony down. Tony clings tighter to his arm, pulling up his legs to wrap around Loki’s torso and nearly overbalancing them both.
“Nooo! I’m only 47, I’m too young to die!”
Loki freezes, face blank. Tony didn’t expect that to actually work.
“…I beg your pardon,” Loki says carefully. “How old are you?”
“47?”
“47 what?”
“…years?” Tony makes a face.
“And how many Midgardian days are in a year?” Loki asks.
“365,” Nat answers over the comm, apparently catching the scent of a strategy she likes. “He’s really not that old. It’s hardly a fair fight.”
“A fair fight is the least of my worries,” Loki mutters, and without further ceremony, dumps Tony back on the roof. “Thor! Are you aware of the age of your so-called shield brothers? This one is only 47 years!”
Finally extricating his feet from the goo on the car, Thor falls off onto the sidewalk and picks himself up with a grimace.
“They are young indeed, but mortal lives are short,” he says, distractedly wiping gunk off his face with a slimy forearm. “You know this, Loki.”
“A year is a solar rotation around this sun, you idiot, not their cyclical connection to Yggdrasil. A mere 365 days! Your Jane is—” And here Loki says a series of words that are definitely not English, but must have some meaning to Thor because he pales, white as a sheet.
“No!”
“Can you not do basic mathematics?” Loki teleports down off the roof to the street in front of Thor, and begins hissing angrily at him in this other language again. Thor replies back, shaking his head and looking more distressed. Loki gestures emphatically and jabs him in the chest with a finger to punctuate some kind of argument, and Thor turns beet red, cringing in embarrassment.
Tony and the gang watch in baffled fascination. Then Thor turns and walks shamefaced several paces away from them all in the middle of the abandoned street, raises his hammer and calls for Heimdall.
The light blasts down, making them all wince from the brightness, and then he’s gone.
They all stare at Loki still standing there like none of them are at all a threat to him. Awkwardly, Cap adjusts his shield.
Loki turns back to them with a firm, no-nonsense expression.
“Go back to your tower. This game is over for today.”
And then he vanishes.
They’re all left wondering what the hell is going on.
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Thor has been AWOL for three weeks, not responding to texts, phone calls, or even hails to Heimdall. Steve’s still holding out hope, but Tony’s ghosted enough people himself to recognize it. Thor has totally dumped the Earth. He won’t be coming back.
Tony’s in his workshop, with engine grease smeared on forearms and face, when JARVIS shuts off the music without warning.
He looks up and around for the cause of the interruption.
“…J? You there, buddy?”
There’s no response.
Tony stands and cautiously picks up a heavy wrench, mentally sorting out where he left his closest repulsor. He creeps around the machinery and chest-high tool drawers to get a better view of the room, and nearly jumps out of his skin when he hears a velvet voice behind him:
“How adorable.”
“Shit!” He whirls and throws the wrench, but Loki easily catches it out of the air without even looking at it.
“Now, that isn’t very nice,” Loki says, smiling as he sets the tool aside and prowls slowly closer. “Is that how we greet a guest?”
“Yeah, uh, I’m not exactly up for guests right now, and how the hell did you get in here, anyway?” Scrambling backward, Tony trips over a chair and gets immediately back to his feet. “Thought the arc reactor field kept you out?”
“I’ve always been able to teleport into your tower. I’ve simply never had reason to before now.”
“JARVIS?! Suit?!” Tony calls, still backing up without taking his eyes off Loki. He doesn’t hold out any real hope JARVIS will hear him, instead continuing to inch his way back towards his wall display of older models. Anything to put some armor between him and Allstate Mayhem over here.
“I’m not here to hurt you,” Loki assures him all too smoothly, palms out but still advancing. “I simply want to talk.”
Tony doesn’t really think he is going to hurt him, but the dude’s unpredictable at the best of times, and he’s never gone after any of them at home like this. This is already way outside Loki’s M.O., and that worries him.
“Excuse me if I don’t exactly take your word for it right now,” Tony parries, risking a quick glance to the side for the manual switches to open the nearest suit.
There’s a flicker in the corner of his eye, and Loki teleports behind him, between him and the suits. Tony flinches and stumbles back the other direction.
“Whoa—uh, ok, you wanna talk? Let’s talk. What’d you do to JARVIS?”
“Nothing at all. The room’s cameras and audio sensors, on the other hand—those I cast illusion spells on. Your servant is perfectly fine, albeit oblivious for the moment.” Loki’s still walking toward him, unhurried.
Tony barks a nervous laugh, backing away. “So no one else knows you’re here! Lovely. I don’t suppose you’ve come to take me up on that invitation to change sides? ‘Cause I’m afraid it was a one-time offer. I’m not available anymore. It’s not you, it’s me.”
Loki smiles indulgently. “No, thank you. I’ve been doing some research into mortal lives—research that, in retrospect, was long past due. It occurred to me during our last skirmish that I did not have the full picture of human limitations. I did not understand your situation, or your decisions. I made assumptions that have since turned out to be false.”
“Annnnd you realize now that we’re awesome, and you shouldn’t be messing with us?” Tony asks hopefully.
“I realized that my contempt for you was unfair, in context. You deserve pity and protection, not taunting destruction. You are not ants. You are infants, doing the best you can, gamely trying to care for yourselves with no proper minding.”
This is condescending as hell, which is par for course with Loki, but at least it sounds more playful than threatening. Tony relaxes slightly, back on familiar ground.
“Infants, huh? Guess that’s a step up, at least. Though this particular infant kicked your ass in Central Park the other day, so that doesn’t say much for your badass level. Just sayin’.”
Loki’s eyes light up with encouragement, and fuck if that isn’t weird. “You did. You, Stark, in particular performed amazingly well. I thought you just another fool at the time, but now? With the knowledge that you are not even a century old? You are phenomenally precocious for a child of your age. It is almost inconceivable that you’ve invented these devices and made these discoveries on your own. To come so far in so little time, especially compared to your peers, when you’ve had no protection, no resources, no guidance... My understanding is that you’ve never even been off the planet!”
Tony narrows his eyes. “I can’t tell if that’s supposed to be a compliment or an insult.”
Still smiling, Loki stalks closer; Tony keeps backing up until his ass hits a table, and suddenly he’s pinned there, Loki looming over him all sexy and intimidating. Tension builds in his shoulders and neck. He looks down at Loki’s gold-trimmed collar, confusingly divided between wariness and a suicidally stupid amount of attraction. Loki’s close enough to breathe on. Tony swallows hard.
“You’re a talented young thing, with so much potential,” Loki murmurs approvingly. Their position’s almost intimate, practically pre-kissing distance, and Tony can feel his body heat for chrissakes. “It would be intolerable to leave you here to languish and struggle, without even the barest of adult support. I’ve raised many children over the centuries, and while I can’t stretch my resources enough to foster the entire planet on a one-to-one level, I’ve decided I will be looking after you, Stark, as your adult guardian. I will make you my ward.”
Tony’s heart is beating hard. Half of him is still worriedly thinking, what if Loki kisses him? Then the last sentence registers.
“Wait, wait. What?”
Loki’s gaze softens, and he summons a damp washcloth out of thin air. Tony barely has time to recognize what’s happening before Loki grabs Tony’s head and starts vigorously scrubbing his face. Tony flails and struggles, sputtering, “Wha—What the fu—! Lo—!!”
Releasing him almost as quickly as he began, Loki glances at the engine grease on the washcloth with a satisfied look.
“There, now. You must remember to wear appropriate safety gear when you play in your workshop, my darling. I know you’re having fun with your experiments, but we wouldn’t want you to lose an eye.”
“My darl—what?” Tony wipes his damp face on his forearm, baffled. “Is this—are you threatening me, or just being really, really patronizing?”
“Honestly,” Loki shakes his head fondly. “It’s like watching a baby teethe on a cursed knife.”
“Ah. Patronizing it is, then.” Tony grimaces.
“Be a good boy, now.”
Arms raised, Loki casts some kind of spell, and a green light shoots out from his hands to shimmer over Tony’s body. Tony blanches and panics, patting all over his chest and looking for the damage, but nothing is immediately visible or bloody.
Loki teleports away.
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After 4 hours of panic and fretting with the other Avengers over what the spell might have done to Tony, they finally get a call back from Strange, who arrives shortly afterward via portal.
He strides up to the exam table where Tony’s sitting anxiously, Bruce manning the scanners nearby. Steve and Nat hover pensively by the door, and Clint tosses a ballpoint pen to himself, already fully kitted out in weaponry and itching to go.
Strange gives Tony a perfunctory glance up and down.
“It’s protective,” he announces in a bored voice. “You called me away from the Actiniaria Dimension over a protection spell.”
Everyone immediately expresses their disbelief and confusion. Clint additionally expresses doubt that Strange is really competent in his assessment.
“It’s not like it’s hard to identify,” Strange insists, irritated. “It’s extraordinarily well-made and obviously powerful—Loki really is in a different league when it comes to power, which is… somewhat irksome, I’ll admit—but the spell he chose for this is fundamentally simple, pointed, and direct. It blocks physical and magical damage, with special added cushion space here,” he points to Tony’s head, “and here.” He points to Tony’s elbows and knees.
They all stare at him, until Bruce finally points out, “So… you’re saying Loki gave Tony the magical equivalent of a helmet and kneepads.”
Strange shrugs. “Sure, if that’s how you want to look it.”
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Tony starts keeping his repulsor gauntlet by his bedside, on his wrist, or otherwise within arm’s reach at all times now that he knows Loki can come and go as he pleases from the tower. The fact that Loki’s announced some kind of intent to mess with Tony in particular (whatever this guardianship ruse is) only adds to the Avengers’ worries, and they spend more time hovering around Tony as well.
Maybe that’s why it’s a full two weeks before anyone sees Loki again, just as the team is finally starting to let their guard down.
Tony is hurriedly changing clothes in the penthouse living room, stumbling as he hops into a pair of decent slacks and tosses his sweaty undersuit over the back of the couch. Doom’s attack downtown was poor timing, as usual, but the Avengers are getting faster at handling it; he still has time to make it to the investors meeting at S.I. if he hurries. Quickly fixing his hair in front of the mirror behind the bar, he grins as it occurs to him that at least this time, his face looks great—no bruises, no cuts, no bandaging at all. The protection spell still hasn’t worn off yet.
“JARVIS, send the car around and tell ‘em I’ll be down in a second.”
“Might I recommend you grab something from the kitchen on your way, sir?” JARVIS replies. “You have not eaten since last night.”
“No time. I gotta video-call the Prime Minister of Belgium on the drive. Can’t have my mouth full. You got those files ready on the Brussels plant?”
He turns around for the elevators and nearly has a heart attack.
“OH, MY GOD!”
Loki stands before him in casual Asgardian leathers, arms out like he’s about to hug him or cast magic on him. Tony dives back behind the bar by reflex, opening his wristwatch gauntlet over his hand and charging it for a blast, only for Loki to wave a hand and depower the thing in one motion.
Tony stares in horror at the disarmed gauntlet, heart pounding and forehead breaking into a cold sweat. Has Loki been able to do that the whole time? He’s abruptly hyperaware that the arc reactor is just under his shirt, keeping his heart going, and if Loki decides to turn that off too, there’s nothing Tony can do to stop him.
“Are you finished?” Loki asks, unimpressed. “Because your breakfast is getting cold.”
With Tony still frozen in horror, Loki glides up and pops a warm spinach bagel in his mouth.
Tony spits it out.
“What the fuck!” he exclaims, regaining his ability to speak. “Have you always been able to do that? Why haven’t you done that before?”
“Eat your bagel,” Loki calmly replies.
“No! I’m not eating my damn bagel!” From that brief taste, it is a good bagel, though. It sucks that he can’t rule out the possibility of it being poisoned. On the other hand, the last spell Loki cast on him turned out to be protective, not hostile.
“Why are you doing this?” he asks with narrowed eyes, warily rising to his feet and edging away from Loki, back around the other side of the bar. “What was with that spell last time? Do you regularly cast protections on your nemeses, and, and, and feed them bagels?”
Loki settles back against the cupboards, unfazed. “Don’t be silly, pet. You were never powerful enough to be my nemesis.”
“Either you just came into new abilities, or you’ve been toying with us this entire time. You’d be gloating more if it were former, which means you’ve been yanking our chain and playing down your magic ability from the beginning. But why? Just to piss off Thor?” Tony rambles, mind racing. “No. That tracks to begin with, but he ditched us weeks ago. Why keep showing up? What have you possibly got to gain?”
Loki’s smile broadens wickedly. He couldn’t look more nefarious if he tried, which is probably the point. He’s fucking with him again, and enjoying it. It’s never been about winning. It’s about the attention, and the theatrics. It’s about the challenge of the game.
Damn, Tony’s tempted to play.
“You are a child under my protection, and I won’t have you going hungry. You need proper nutrition to grow healthy and strong,” Loki chides, grinning ominously. “Now eat your bagel.”
“Uh-uh. I’m not buying it. This is some kind of double bluff. You want to lure me in with curiosity. Well, bad news for you, Rudolph, because I don’t have time for reindeer games today. I’ve got a meeting to go to.”
Loki exaggerates a sigh. “Very well. But you will at least drink this.” He pulls out a juice box and sets it on the counter.
“Yeah, no. You’re having too much fun for that to be safe. Your favorite gullible rube’s gone home where you don’t wanna follow, and you think I’m the next best thing. But your fight’s gonna have to wait, because I promised to be a responsible majority shareholder today.”
He tries to head for the elevators, but Loki intercepts him and teleports them both faster than Tony can blink, pinning him against the wall of windows on the other side of the room.
“Shit!” he exclaims. His heart rate rockets upward. This is a familiar position for him, and not in a good way. Cold glass presses against his back, and below him, out of the corner of his eye, he can see the midday traffic drifting slowly a thousand feet down.
Loki brings his arm up and Tony flinches, but it’s only the juice box again. Loki presses into Tony’s sternum. He leans in close to Tony’s ear.
“Drink your juice, and you can go.”
Ok. So he’s sticking to non-violence for now. This whole ‘child-ward’ ruse must be important enough to his plans that he isn’t willing to give up the pretense. Well, Tony can play this game, too. A frisson of rebellion runs up his spine, and his lifts his jaw.
“No. I don’t wanna.”
Inches away, Loki’s face acquires a mean smirk. He pulls an empty baby bottle out of thin air and waggles it at Tony.
“Would you prefer this method? I can always swaddle you and feed you myself.”
That is… not the threat Tony was expecting. His eyes narrow.
“Is this some kind of kink for you?”
Loki remains unmoved. “You have until the count of three to decide.”
Tony eyes the bottle, reconsidering. Loki’s definitely strong enough to physically overpower him without the suit, and he really isn’t ready to face the god’s not-so-new repulsor-killing powers. He’s got to get back in the lab and work out an actual anti-magic repellant before their next encounter.
“One,” Loki says.
After a second’s hesitation, Tony takes the juice box and eyes it carefully. It’s a recognizable label, regular 100% apple juice, no sugar added. It seems to still be factory sealed, not that that’s any indication of a lack of tampering, given what Loki can do. Glaring suspiciously, he unwraps the attached straw and jams it through the foil opening. He hopes this doesn’t turn him into a toad or something.
Loki waits patiently until Tony finally screws up his face and puts the straw in his mouth.
Fuck it. Loki didn’t hurt him last time.
“Two.”
Closing his eyes, he rolls the dice and drinks. It tastes like regular apple juice. It takes him less than a minute to suck the whole thing down, Loki’s gaze intense on his face the whole time.
“Ok,” Tony says, pulling off and crumpling the empty box. “I drank your damn juice, and that isn’t even a euphemism for once. Can I go now?”
Loki steps back, apparently satisfied, and Tony inches around him to leave. He’s almost at the elevator, trying not to look like he’s hurrying, when Loki stops him again.
“Oh, and Stark?”
Tony freezes, wariness rising. He’s played the stupid humiliation game with the children’s juice box already, and now Loki’s changing the rules. Figures.
“What?” he asks over his shoulder.
“Do you need to go potty before you leave?”
Dumbstruck, Tony turns and stares at Loki, whose face practically bleeds faux seriousness.
“What. The. Fuck is wrong with you!?” Tony bursts out, and Loki dissolves into gales of cackling laughter like it’s the most hilarious thing he’s ever seen. “You think this is funny? You think—you think you wanna get into a war of ridicule with me? Huh? You wanna see how that goes? I will decimate you, Vaudeville! I will roast you to the entire internet! I have an army of meme-sters just waiting for—”
Wiping tears of laughter from his eyes, Loki waves goodbye and disapparates. Tony knows when he’s being mocked. He knows when a gauntlet’s been thrown. And Tony never backs down from a challenge.
This means war.