Chapter Text
“I can’t keep doing this, Lokes.”
Loki looked up, lifting his gaze from his hands. For too long he’d just been staring at his fingers, shifting and intertwining them in silence. “Doing what?” “Don’t you play that game with me. You know exactly what.”
“No, Anthony, I don’t. What is it that I do that irks you so much?” Loki’s gaze felt like an assault, designed to push him back, wear him down, and force him to surrender. Tony looked away. “It’s not so much you do, it’s more…”
“Isn’t it?” Loki interrupted. “Then what is the problem? If you don’t care what I do, why do you feel the need to chastise me?”
“I do care! I do care, but it’s the… chastisement itself I’m through with. Since the beginning it’s just been argument after argument with you. Everything is a battle. I can’t live with you at my throat!”
“Why?” Loki sneered. “Are you afraid I’ll slit it?” His eyes were narrowed, and he pulled his lips back in a snarl, showing rows of sharp, white, teeth. Yet his eyes proclaimed a different story, as did the single tear falling down his cheek.
It was a trick Tony had come to know all too well. “Cut the waterworks, sunshine. I’d appreciate it if you’d stop trying to manipulate me for five seconds so that we can actually talk this through. You can’t just avoid the issue forever, and it’s certainly not going away of its own accord.”
Loki’s face straightened, all distress gone in seconds. “Can’t I?” He asked coolly. “I seem to have done a pretty good job at avoiding it thus far. Why not continue?”
It was like trying to push over a stone wall with your bare hands. “Loki, come on, can’t we just talk…”
“I don’t want to talk, Anthony!” He sounded every bit the spoilt child at that moment, just a pampered prince throwing his toys out of the cradle. “If you don’t like me as I am, why don’t I just go?”
“Go where, Loki? Last time I checked, you want all that welcome on Asgard. I’m just trying to help you, you’re a mess…”
“I’m a mess?” Loki snapped, raising his voice for the first time. “I’m a mess? Anthony Edward Stark, perhaps you should examine your own life before making such accusations of me.”
“Yeah, I know. I know I’m a mess, and that’s the point. Someone tells me I’m a mess, I wholeheartedly agree. I don’t start screaming at them about what they’re doing wrong. And I fix it. I am fixing it.” Only now was Tony able to look Loki in the eye again. “You? You don’t do shit. You just mope around, wallowing in your own misery. You’re… you’re useless.”
Loki fell silent. His gaze dropped – now it was him that couldn’t meet Tony’s gaze. “If I don’t serve your purpose, if you have no use for me, then why don’t I just go?”
“Loki… you think I’m just using you? No, that’s not what I meant…” Suddenly the implications of his word, spoken in anger, became apparent. “Loki, I’m worried about you. I hate seeing you like this. I mean, I think I preferred it when you were a cocky, murderous megalomaniac. At least that’s not, well, this.”
“Would you? Why? To a put a little excitement in your life again? A little danger?”
“Loki, no…”
“And I can’t do that anymore, can I? All I do is mope and moan – is that why you want me to leave?”
“I never said I wanted you to leave! Never!”
“Oh, but you implied it…”
“No! Because I don’t want you to leave. I want to help you. Is that really such a strange concept to you?”
“Oh no, it makes perfect sense. You want to fix me like one of your machines, so that I can serve your purpose. That’s right, isn’t it?”
Tony stopped. There was no arguing with Loki when he was so latched onto an idea. Every word Tony spoke would be weaponized, and he wasn’t about to supply Loki with more ammunition. “I… I don’t know what you want me to say, Loki. Tell me what you want me to say.”
Loki paused, considering the request. Then his eyes softened, his insecurities again revealed. “I want you to tell me to stay, Tony.”
“I have been.”
“Convince me.”
There was no doubting what Loki meant. Tony opened his arms, and Loki shuffled across the room into his embrace. He held the god tightly against his chest, before pulling his chin up so that he could see Loki’s face. Then he reached up and kissed the trickster, delicately, soothingly, trying to placate him. Loki moaned, accepting the kiss more than willingly. They kept their position for moments, before Loki finally made a move. Slowly he reached down and tucked his fingers into Tony’s boxers. The inventor sighed, bucking his hips into Loki’s touch, moaning into his mouth as Loki’s fingers worked across the sensitive skin of his dick. All previous thoughts were overwritten with need, the argument was out of mind…
“Stop!” Suddenly Tony was pushing Loki off him, back into the room. The god was dazed for a moment, not yet registering what had happened. Then his eyes narrowed.
“Changed your mind, Anthony? Decided you want rid of me after all?”
“You just… you just used sex as a weapon.” There was something about it that made Tony feel violated, though his need was still apparent enough in his pants.
Loki… Loki just looked angry. “No, Tony, I wanted you. Because I love you.” It was horrifying how easily Loki turned those few sacred words into something so twisted. “I wanted you, not the argument.”
“And you always get what you want, don’t you?”
“I thought you said you wanted to help me. You know how insecure I can be…”
“Yes, I do want to help you. But I’m not willing to sacrifice myself entirely to help you.”
“All I wanted was reassurance…”
“No, all you wanted was to get out of that argument, nothing more.”
Loki fell silent.
“Well? Are you even going to say anything?”
“What is there to say, Stark? What do you want me to say? Am I to take this that you want me to leave?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“What?”
“If you want to leave, go! I’m not going to stop you! I have no idea what to do anymore. I’m out of ideas.”
And Loki just smiled sadly, and began to back away. “If you wanted me to leave, you should have just said so.” Then he turned his back on Tony and disappeared into the bedroom.
Tony waited a while – an hour or so – before following after Loki. He found the bedroom empty, save for the t-shirt and jeans lying discarded on the bed. A quick check of the wardrobe showed that Loki’s armour was gone. Wherever Loki had gone, he was a long way away now. Tony sunk down onto the bed, still holding Loki’s clothes. He didn’t bother to change, despite Jarvis’ requests. He didn’t move a muscle until the morning came.