Chapter Text
The worst part isn’t being abandoned by an Asgardian space beam in the middle of the New Mexico desert.
The worst part isn’t having to walk across said desert for six hours before finally making it out of the Bifrost’s extensive residual magic radius.
The worst part isn’t the nauseating, whole-body-enveloping feeling of general awfulness that comes with Loki’s teleportation once you’re out of that no-fly zone.
The worst part isn’t even being exhausted and cold and filthy and thirsty beyond belief and actually feeling like you’re teetering on the brink of insanity in your desperate need to have a hot shower and gulp down approximately thirty gallons of water.
No, the worst part – the worst part – is surviving all that and finally getting home and finally trudging up the driveway and finally standing on your front doorstep... only to realize that not only are your keys not in your pants, but you have no idea which pants they might be in. Or which planet those pants might currently be on.
“Is something wrong?” Loki’s voice floats up from behind as Tony stands with his forehead against the door and his finger pressing the intercom buzzer.
“Nope,” Tony replies in his raspy, dehydrated voice. “Just, um... I think the house keys might be on Jotunheim? Because I’m pretty sure I put them in my pocket when we were about to go through the portal, and then, you know, all that stuff happened...”
“I thought you pressed numbers to open the door.”
Straightening up and turning around, Tony looks back at Loki. “Not on this door. This isn’t some average suburban house in Phoenix. This is my top secret lair where I do all my plotting and inventing and other very important superhero stuff. And because I apparently like outsmarting myself with my own security system, it needs a number code and a computerized key.”
“Oh,” says Loki, and he glances away, in one of those gestures of his that Tony’s come to read as ‘I don’t know what human nonsense you’re talking about, but I have no intention of admitting that’. “In Asgard, doors are locked and opened by specific touch. If someone has permission to open the door, it will open for them, reading their energy.”
“Yeah, we have something similar on Earth, too, only ours read fingerprints or eyeballs. You might remember a little incident you were involved in with that poor bastard in Germany. And the thing is, I’d really rather just have somebody steal my keys than try to remove important parts of my body if they’re that determined to break in. There are a couple biometric security systems inside the house, but outside? No. Thanks to you and Dan Brown.”
Loki nods. “That’s probably wise. Are there any large pieces of furniture or architectural impediments directly on the other side of the door I should know about that would interfere with shifting inside?”
“Uh.” Leaning back against the door again, Tony gives the buzzer one more long push, hoping like hell that Bruce is home and is about to appear at any second to let them in. “Okay, yes, that would be a logical solution to the problem. There should be nothing in our way. However,” he quickly adds when Loki makes a move forward, “can you just... Let’s wait a sec. My bones are still wiggling from our last jaunt. Lemme have a minute for all my molecules to reassemble before you force them through another quantum rift in the fabric of reality.”
That very reasonable request doesn’t stop Loki from continuing to walk right up to the door with a look on his face like ‘suck it up, you pathetic mortal; it’s only magical teleportation.’ So Tony squeezes his eyes shut and takes in a deep breath to brace himself against the impending discomfort. Maybe it’s better this way? Maybe it’s better to get everything over with all at once instead of drawing out unpleasant feelings and the nagging worry that some of his innards didn’t settle back into the right place?
But seconds pass and nothing happens. Tony opens his eyes to the sight of no Loki, and the sound of the deadbolt turning in the door at his back. He moves out of the way as the door swings open, and there’s Loki, showing off an annoying little smirk.
“Or, yeah,” Tony says, “you could shift without me and unlock the door from the inside. That would, in hindsight, be the more sensible plan of action.”
The lights snap on in the front foyer all the way into the living room when Tony steps inside, illuminating the greatest sight he’s seen in months. That floor, those walls, those windows... He’s home. And he’d fall down to his hands and knees to hug the house right then and there if not for the very real possibility that his sunburned, dust-caked, and completely exhausted body would refuse to get back up again.
“Jarvis, I’m home.”
“Welcome back, sir,” Jarvis’ voice echoes through the hallway. “I would have opened the door for you, but seeing as you deactivated the necessary security settings...”
“You kept letting in S.H.I.E.L.D. agents,” Tony mutters as he resets the lock. “We’ll talk about reinstating your door privileges once you learn to tell the difference between people who are allowed in – namely me – and people who aren’t allowed in. Namely everybody who isn’t me. Especially Fury and Coulson, no matter what programming they override.”
“Duly noted.”
“Oh, and this is Loki,” he says. Heading in towards the living room, he gestures for Loki to follow. “Let’s add Loki to the list of people who are allowed inside.”
“Welcome, Mr. Loki.”
“Loki, this is... uh...” Pausing, he racks his brain for a simple and concise explanation for a disembodied butler voice, and comes up empty-handed. “Yeah, I’ll explain tomorrow when we’re not tired and filthy. I think tonight all I want to do is have a shower and then collapse into bed. Sound okay to you?”
“Very much so,” Loki replies, eyes scanning the surroundings as he follows behind Tony. His movements are slow, bordering on cautious. Like a cat surveying its way through a foreign space. Which, Tony has to remind himself, is more or less the truth. Weird as it seems to think about, Loki must be feeling as alone and out of place here as Tony felt on Asgard. A place he’s never seen before, a place where he doesn’t know what to expect or how he’ll fit in, and yet it’s his home now. He’s just expected to deal with all that uncertainty. Deal with it, accept it, and live with it.
Tony reaches out to place a reassuring hand on Loki’s back, in case that helps. “Come on. I’ll give you a full tour in the morning, but right now, let’s have a good, close look at the master en suite. I think you’ll enjoy its top-of-the-line shower feature.”
He leads the way through the house to the bedroom with cat-like Loki at his side, seeming maybe a little more at ease, but not much. Well, that’ll take time. Something to work on. “Hey, J?” he asks as he walks. “Is Bruce still here?”
“I’m sorry, sir. Dr. Banner is away for the weekend and will be back on Monday.”
Is it selfish to be happy Bruce isn’t around? No, Tony quickly decides. After everything he and Loki have been through, they have to deserve a bit of time to themselves. “Thanks. And, um... what day is it today?”
“Friday.”
“Spectacular.” He and Loki have three nights to themselves. So he won’t feel so bad about wasting tonight if he passes out in the next fifteen minutes.
“You do have several thousand accumulated emails and voicemails that Dr. Banner did not feel comfortable reading or listening to on your behalf. Would you like to-”
“Nope,” says Tony. “Delete everything more than one day old.”
“You have seventeen remaining emails and one voicemail.”
“Great. Now delete those too and we’ll be all caught up. Night, J. I’m on Do Not Disturb until morning. And by morning I mean noon.” He shuts the bedroom door and looks over at Loki. “Shower?”
“Is that a... ghost?” Loki asks.
“Funny you should ask, but no,” says Tony. “To way oversimplify, he’s a computer. I’ll get you all caught up once I can think straight. I need some water. Do you need water? My mouth is so dry I’ve forgotten the taste of saliva. Everything tastes like dirt right now. I’m going to turn on the shower and stick my head under the spray for several minutes.”
He flicks on the bathroom light, but stops right there in the doorway once he catches sight of himself in the bank of mirrors. He might as well be staring at some stereotype of a Great Depression hobo: about two weeks’ worth of overgrown beard, hair so stiff with sweat and dirt it sticks straight up from his forehead where he kept raking it back, skin on his nose and cheeks reddened by the sun, and a considerable coating of gray-brown dust like a mask on his face, concentrated in all the fine lines around his eyes to accentuate every crease. And that’s without taking into account the absurd Asgardian clothes.
“What?” Loki asks, prodding him in the back as a gesture of non-verbal shorthand for ‘stop standing in the doorway and blocking the way to the shower’.
He leans back to let his body rest against Loki’s. “I look incredibly sexy right now, don’t I?”
“Always,” Loki answers with a smirk.
“Okay good,” says Tony. “Because you’re the one who has to deal with me looking like this. I, on the other hand, get to look at you. And you look suspiciously like you used a magic forcefield to ward off any sun, dirt, or wind damage.”
“Ridiculous,” Loki says, running a hand over his perfectly smooth and shining hair as he slides past Tony into the bathroom and over to the shower door. “That would be a highly impractical use of magical energy.” He turns on the taps. “Now come over here so I can wash you.”
“You totally used magic, you vain fucker,” Tony mutters. But he mutters it as he goes, because only an idiot would turn down a Loki-assisted washing.
He peels off his clothes, kicking them over against the wall for Future Tony to deal with in the morning or in a few days or maybe never. The hot water, when it hits his skin, feels just as good as he’d been anticipating. It’s impossible to hold back a moan of pure contentment. He stands directly under the shower’s spray with his face upturned, letting it wash away all the collected grime, then opens his mouth to rinse out the coating of grit.
“Aw shit, I forgot how awful tap water tastes,” he says between mouthfuls, half of which he spits out. “Like dogs have been swimming in a chlorine-treated lake with undertones of isopropanol.”
Behind him, the shower door clicks shut, and then the very welcome presence of Loki’s naked body presses up against his back. “Then why do you keep drinking it?”
“Because I’m way too lazy and wet to get a cup of filtered stuff from the sink.” Again, he opens his mouth, drinking as much as he can bear. “Oh, this is the worst. This is the worst thing that has ever happened to me. Community tap water. I’m probably going to get some kind of deadly water parasite.”
“Oh, probably,” Loki agrees. “Now close your mouth for a moment so I can wash your face.”
Tony takes one last gulp before complying, closing both eyes and mouth and letting the water rain down on his skin. At his back, he can feel Loki’s movement, reaching down to grab a bottle from the tiled shelf. Seconds later, hands are on his face, smoothing something slippery and floral-scented in circular motions over his cheeks and up to the bridge of his nose.
“Uh. Is that...?” Conditioner. It’s hair conditioner.
“Is it what?” asks Loki.
“Nothing,” Tony says, letting himself sag backwards against Loki for support. Loki’s fingers gently rub at his eyelids. Why ruin a perfectly good moment by pointing out something as insignificant as correct Earth shower product usage? “Everything’s fine. Actually, everything’s great. Really great. Isn’t it?”
“I think so,” Loki murmurs close to his ear.
Yeah. It’s pretty great. He’s home. He’s home with Loki. He’s in the shower, with Loki, and Loki’s hands are moving from his face to his ears to his neck to his shoulders to his chest, skillfully caressing away all the dirt and sweat and aches and pains left behind from their long walk across the desert from the Bifrost site. What could be better than this? Nothing.
Okay, maybe if the tap water didn’t taste like dogs.
“Turn around,” Loki instructs, and Tony does.
Actually, this might be better, because now Tony can drop his forehead down onto Loki’s shoulder and wrap his arms around Loki’s waist. And Loki’s hands can travel up and down his back in stripes and swirls, then up to his hair to massage his scalp with a soothing scratch of fingernails and another dollop of floral scent. He keeps his eyes closed, savoring the sensation of Loki’s touch skirting down to his hips. And the tingle of magic soaking through his skin to infiltrate the layer of muscle below.
“Why are you not grabbing my butt?” he mumbles into Loki’s collar bone.
Loki’s hands quickly move into position with a gentle squeeze. “Better?”
“Yes. Though now I’m wondering why I’m not grabbing your butt. Obviously I’m too tired to think clearly.” He releases his hold on Loki’s waist to go for the ass. “There we go.”
“And now we stand here like this until you fall asleep leaning against me?”
“There are worse ways to spend a Friday night.”
“I can think of better ways as well,” Loki says. “However, on account of how you are still recovering from your Jotun transformation and a very long walk across the desert...”
Tony groans as Loki turns off the shower spray. “I’m up for anything that doesn’t involve moving or having to make decisions.”
“You’re up for sleeping,” Loki tells him.
Okay then. “I’ll still fall asleep holding onto your butt, though,” Tony says as Loki herds him out of the shower and wraps him in a towel.
He’d forgotten how comfortable his bed is. The plush mattress. The down pillows. The six hundred thread count bamboo rayon sheets he spite-bought from Amazon because Pepper, with her inexplicable and illogical bias towards Egyptian cotton, refused to buy them at the bedding store. And now the addition of a nice Loki tucking him under the duvet really ties the whole scene together with a big, pleasant bow. “C’mere,” he mutters, rolling onto his back and holding out his arm in an invitation to cuddle. He’s rewarded with Loki’s head on his shoulder, in exactly the right position for a damp hairline kiss that lets him inhale the scent of generic flowers. He tightens his hold around Loki’s back as a welcome arm slithers around his middle.
“But what if...” he says, though a wide yawn cuts him off. “What if I just lie here and let you do all the work?”
“What if you went to sleep and woke up rested and refreshed in the morning, and we could do whatever we wanted then?”
“That sounds like quitter talk.”
Loki shifts to make some small measure of eye contact. “I can’t tell if you’re serious or joking.”
“I’m joking.” He yawns again. “Sort of. But I wouldn’t say no if you, uh, wanted to thank me for rescuing you from Asgard in some kind of... manual manner.”
“That has to be another joke.”
“It was slightly less of a joke than the first suggestion.”
Luck is not on Tony’s side. “We’re finally free of Asgard,” Loki says, “and are together, at last, after all that time spent celibate on Jotunheim. And you want to spoil what could be a very nice reunion with a quick hand job in the dark? During which I’m sure you’d fall asleep?”
“Well, um...” Loki may have a point. It may not be a point that Tony likes, but it’s probably right. “So we go back to Plan A, with me lying here and you doing all the work?”
Slowly but precisely, with all his snake-like elegance, Loki lifts his head and slides up alongside Tony’s body. Until his face hovers over Tony’s, blurred by the night’s shadows, and he exhales a low, thoughtful hum. “Tony Stark,” he whispers, leaning in close so the name on his lips brushes Tony’s ear, “I have very specific plans for you tomorrow. Plans that will require every last bit of your mortal stamina. Therefore, I suggest you rest well now so as not to disappoint me later.”
Tony can’t stop the shiver that ripples through his body from his spine to his toes with a very prominent stop in between. Not that he’d want to stop it. After, as Loki put it, all that time spent celibate on Jotunheim, it’s starting to stir up a very welcome spark of all the desirous feelings he’s been missing out on.
“Okay I’m suddenly much more awake now,” he murmurs.
“No, you’re not,” Loki replies. “Go to sleep.”
Settling back down, Loki pulls the duvet around them like a cocoon and returns to his space curled up in the crook of Tony’s arm. So that’s that, then. It’s not a bad ending to the evening, per se. Actually, comparatively speaking after all the crap they had to deal with in recent memory, it’s a pretty damn good ending. If only patience were one of Tony’s strong suits and he could convince himself that it’s only a short, overnight, eight-hour-or-so wait before he can let everything go and plow Loki’s ass into the mattress.
Until then? Some innocent and sexually frustrating snuggling. Closing his eyes, he inhales one deep breath and slowly sighs it out again, letting the weight of it flow through his limbs and remind him of just how exhausted he is. His back aches and his legs ache and after a minute of lying there he feels so heavy the thought of never getting out of bed again sounds incredibly appealing. Already, his mind is growing foggy as it drifts towards sleep.
ooo
Whatever Tony was dreaming about was probably nice. Not that he’d remember or anything, because he’s shaken awake in the middle of the goddamn night by a hand on his shoulder and hissing words in his ear.
“Tony. Tony, wake up.”
It takes a second to pull together enough coherence to realize that’s it’s Loki’s hand and Loki’s voice. Because, yes, he’s home, in his own bed. With Loki. Who is, for some dumb reason, disturbing a perfectly good night’s sleep and the replenishment of stamina that goes with it.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m awake,” he says through a yawn, pushing Loki’s hand away. “What’s going on? If you woke me up for anything less than the outbreak of nuclear war...”
“Somebody’s here.”
And just like that, Tony’s brain jumps from still groggily half asleep to wide awake in the span of half a breath. He snaps up into a sitting position. “What do you mean, ‘somebody’s here’?! Jarvis? Did Bruce come back?”
“No, sir,” Jarvis replies. “Director Fury arrived approximately five minutes ago.”
“Director Ffff...” Tony says, and almost swears, but in all honesty ‘Fury’ would be worse than any other four-letter word in his vocabulary. “Why?!” he demands instead. “How did he even get in?!”
“He has a key.”
Of course. That’s probably Bruce’s fault, in conjunction with the situation of S.H.I.E.L.D. inserting themselves into the portal business. “And why didn’t you tell me he was here?!”
“You gave specific instruction not to disturb you.”
“I meant for unimportant crap like phone calls or Coulson ringing the doorbell! Uninvited intruders? I need to know about that!” Throwing back the covers, Tony tries to slide out of bed, only to be stopped by Loki’s arm wrapping protectively around his ribcage and keeping him in place.
“No, don’t go,” Loki whispers to him. “It could be a trap.”
Fair enough. Tony nods. “Jarvis, what’s Fury doing, exactly?”
“Director Fury is standing at your kitchen island, and appears to be eating one of Doctor Banner’s yogurt cups.”
“That doesn’t rule out a trap,” Tony growls. “Anybody else in the house or on the property?”
“No, sir.”
He looks to Loki for confirmation, and Loki shakes his head in the negative.
That still doesn’t rule out a trap. “J, is he armed?”
“I’ve scanned two small handguns.”
“Has he said anything to you?”
“No.”
“I better go see about this,” he says to Loki, moving the restraining-bar arm aside. “You stay in here. If everything goes south? You shift away and get yourself out. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. If Fury’s after anybody, it’ll be you, so...”
“Tony,” Loki murmurs.
“I’ll deal with this. Just stay in here.”
In the dark of the room, he somehow manages to find a pair of sweatpants and a house robe to throw on. He closes the bedroom door behind him before setting out for the kitchen. There, as promised, Fury stands at the island. One empty yogurt cup, the green kind that Pepper always used to buy, lies on its side. Fury’s spoon scrapes in a spiral motion to finish off a second one as Tony stops in the archway to watch.
“Wow. Nick Fury. What brings you here at...” He glances over at the clock on the microwave. “...3:52 in the morning?”
Without even looking up, Fury finishes off his last spoonful of yogurt. “I was in the neighborhood.”
“I hope S.H.I.E.L.D.’s paying you a shift premium for having to work so early.”
“I’m always on the clock.”
“I figured,” says Tony. “Do you ever sleep? I’m kind of having a hard time imagining you wearing pajamas or lying down in a bed. Are you like one of those hardened assassins that only ever takes light naps while fully dressed and sitting in an armchair?”
“I’m sure I get less sleep than you do,” Fury says, looking up and giving Tony’s bedroom attire the once-over.
“I need my beauty rest. It’s one of the drawbacks to being so terribly handsome.”
Fury wiggles his empty yogurt cup as Tony takes a seat on the other side of the island. “Want me to get you one?”
“No thanks,” says Tony. “I, uh...” He pauses. But he might as well let the massive, elephant-sized cat out of the bag and start steering the conversation over in the direction he knows Fury wants to go. Casually drop the name everybody’s waiting to hear. “Loki’s mom gave us some magical elvish lembas bread that we ate earlier. I’m still not hungry.”
“Hm.” Fury nods like that was a normal thing that could’ve come up in any conversation. And he says, just as casually, “Would Loki like a yogurt?”
“Nah. He’s pretty picky about food. Only eats raw meat and mushrooms and that kind of thing.”
Again: “Hm.”
Fury sure milks that yogurt cup for all he can get out of it, scraping his spoon around the inside for the final dregs before moving over to the sink and very thoroughly washing it out. Then he washes the other one. Then he places them both in the recycling bin. Then he stretches his arms above his head and from side to side while making a rhythmic hissing noise between his teeth, and if his goal is to annoy Tony by wasting all this time that could better be spent asleep, he’s succeeding.
“Okay, I give up,” Tony says, rubbing his eyes. “In the interest of getting back to bed as soon as possible, I’m going to ask you outright. Why are you here? I assume it’s because of Loki, but I’d really like to know specifically what you hope to accomplish right now.”
Returning to his place at the island, Fury gives Tony one of those crooked half-smiles. “That’s very astute of you. I am here because of Loki.”
“Shocker. Never would have guessed. But I’ll tell you now, if you’re expecting me to hand him over so you can take him back to S.H.I.E.L.D. headquarters for alien autopsy the sequel, we’re going to have a problem. A problem that will not resolve in your favor. I’ve just spent the last couple months dealing with all kinds of obstacles from Asgard and Jotunheim, and no offense, but you’re child’s play in comparison.”
“It’s nothing like that,” says Fury. “Loki’s free to stay with you for now. On one small condition.”
“The condition better be something along the lines of me giving you a dollar or a friendly handshake.”
“You’ve just returned from an alien planet. Since nobody knows what you may have been exposed to, I think it’s wise to keep you under quarantine for the next few days. At least until Banner returns and has a chance to give you a full examination.”
Tony blinks. “Wait, so my punishment is not having to leave the house or do anything?”
“It’s not a punishment. But yes. I’m asking you and Loki both to stay here. That’s all. I’ll send Romanov over around noon or so to-”
“Uh, hang on, Romanov? That’s starting to sound like a new condition I don’t like as much.”
“-to brief you on a few important developments that’ve come up in your absence, and to help you arrange any food or supplies you might need for the next few days.”
Well, as far as interactions with Natasha Romanov go, that doesn’t sound too unbearable. But still. “Can’t you send somebody better? Like, I don’t know, generic button-pusher number six? Somebody who doesn’t actively hate both me and my boyfriend?”
“I’ll see what I can do. Until then? And until further notice? You stay in this house. As long as you play nice, you get to keep custody of your weird-ass, Shelley Duvall-looking alien boyfriend.”
“He does not look like Shelley Duvall,” Tony growls.
With that same crooked smile, Fury saunters away to show himself out. “I’ll be in touch.”
“Yay, can’t wait,” Tony says to Fury’s back. He covers up a yawn with both hands before rubbing his face and standing up from the stool. “Jarvis?”
“Yes, sir?”
“As soon as that front door hits Fury’s ass on the way out, this house is on full lockdown. Key or not, nobody comes in without my approval. Anybody that shows up effective this second onward can wait for me to get out of bed and personally unlock the door.”
“Acknowledged. Are you still not to be disturbed until ten?”
“I thought I said noon.”
“Noon it is.”
“Super. Night, J. And if anybody else mysteriously appears in the kitchen? Or in any other room? Tell me. Or I’ll replace you with the voice of Stephen Hawking.”
“Of course, sir.”
As expected, Loki isn’t sleeping when Tony climbs back into bed. Also as expected, he asks, “What was that?”
“Ugh, the usual,” Tony growls as he tries to return to his previous and very comfortable sleeping position. “Actually, wait,” he corrects himself. “Not the usual. I was expecting some ridiculous demands, probably something to do with us having to go to a S.H.I.E.L.D. facility and them putting a tracking tag on you and installing permanent surveillance in the house.”
“But?”
“But all Fury wanted was to tell me I have to stay inside until Bruce gets back, and that Natasha or somebody is coming over at some point to... uh... something. Tell me about all the fun times I missed while we were out being frost giants, I guess. Anyway, bottom line is, they’re not interfering with anything and we can allegedly go about our daily lives. For now.”
“For now,” Loki repeats. The words sound significantly more ominous when he says them.
“Yeah. This is probably a false peace offering to let us get comfortable before they jump in with their usual shenanigans, but I’ll take whatever I can get right now. I’m too tired to haggle.” Swallowing a yawn, he turns to bury his face in Loki’s hair as the familiar feeling of sleep-deprived dizziness washes through his brain.
“I’ll stay up the rest of the night to keep watch in case one of them reappears,” Loki says, his voice quiet but colored with an undertone of menace. “I don’t trust them.”
“Nobody trusts them,” says Tony. “I’m pretty sure the L in S.H.I.E.L.D. stands for Lying. But Jarvis has it covered. So you can go back to sleep.”
“I’d rather stay awake.”
“I’d rather you sleep.”
“Why?”
Tony smiles. “Uh, something about specific plans? Terrible, filthy, degenerate, obscene plans? I hope? And stamina needed to go with them?”
Loki holds his breath for a minute, then exhales with a hum. “I suppose that is a good argument, yes.”
“Of course it is,” Tony mumbles. “Now go to sleep, because I really want to have my evil way with you in a few hours. At least five times. Probably more. All day. Got it?”
Loki replies with a feathery kiss landing somewhere in the vicinity of Tony’s ear. Which Tony will happily accept as a wordless agreement. Settling down into the mattress, he wraps both arms around Loki as best he can and closes his eyes.
S.H.I.E.L.D. is already starting to feel like a distant, unimportant memory as the hazy waves of sleep float back in.
“Hey, Loki?” he whispers while he still has the capacity for speech.
“Hm?” Loki grunts.
“Welcome home.”