Though Tony doesn't know it yet, Loki couldn't agree more about the man. He sees the way Rumlow's face changes ever so slightly when Steve turns away from him, like his agreeable disposition masks some kind of resentment to the Captain in particular. With Loki as the main focus of everyone's observations, he doubts even Natasha sees she change.
Interesting. Perhaps they will dig into that later.
For now they have a task and one highly trained agent who really wants to kill him and an assassins who's still thinking about it. Not the worst conditions he's worked under.
"Captian, would you hand me that broken power unit?" He gestures to what appears to be a broken blue glass crystal. Steve makes to move to do so, but is cut off by Rumlow stepping in front of him to grab the crystal first. For a moment Loki wonders is the man is going to withhold it from him, but then he steps over and drops it on the table by Loki.
"...My thanks."
The agent stays uncomfortably close to Loki as he examines it, scratching the occasional string of runes in his notebook. Loki, well use to Thor trying to bug him during his studies, dutifully ignores the man.
"This would be the unit that supplied power to the blasters the Chitahuri wielded. I assume you were unable to collect any still in one piece?"
Natasha shakes her head. "Not a lot made it through the portal and most of them dropped from the sky when it closed."
"Pity. They draw their power from the flagship of their fleet. Had we a whole one, we may be able to trace the connection back and get a vague idea of where they are now."
“What if we back trace it?” Tony asks, running short fingernails over the smooth pieces of debris to find a slotted opening or some way to get at the inner workings of the weapon. He’s genuinely surprised to find a push plate, considering it somewhat low tech for the rest of what he’s seen, but the wiring is utterly foreign.
He’s immediately excited, the hair on the back of his neck raised in genuine pleasure.
“I’m going to need a stand,” he says, pulling his phone out of his pocket so JARVIS can emit a 3D Projection around the room for him to manipulate. “Unless one of you wants to hold this for me the entire time? No? And I need the room cleared. And I need it electronic free. You’ll have to watch through the door. Anything else will interfere with frequencies and ruin what I’m doing.”
No one really seems that apt to want to leave them to it, so Tony gives Steve a little glance and the blond is left sighing and acting like a cattle herder.
Tony owes him and he knows it. He’ll make good with Cap one day.
Sensing the tension in the room, Natasha asks Rumlow to go get a suitable stand from R&D. The agent gives her a scornful look, but finally moves out of Loki's space in order to complete the request.
Loki helps clear things away as delicately as possible while they wait, chattering the whole time. "If we can get more pieces, I may be able to mend it back together, but we would still need to give it some sort of jumpstart to trace it's signal back to the fleet. It would broadcast location to them as well, but-"
"They already know where Earth is," Natasha finishes his sentence as she packs up the last of the cables in the corner.
"Precisely." Loki watches as Rumlow comes back in with a stand to set the weapon on. "Stark, do you require my assistance, or should I go into the hall with the others?"
“No. I need you,” Tony says quickly, drawing more pointed attention than he had meant to. “Your expertise. No one else knows what they’re looking at.” He makes sure not to look directly at Loki after than.
The truth is that he probably does need the other. His presence is chaotic and soothing, a juxtaposition that only makes sense in physics. Their irregularities fit together like puzzle pieces, anticipating each sharp line and curve to hug one another.
Tony appreciates the stability that Loki’s crazy brings to his own.
When they’re alone, Tony tenses slightly. He can only play act so much around the others.
He shifts his speech to Asgardian, his words measured but clunky. “Did it, tried to kill me, they.” He needs help on the syntax. “It all matches. Come. Close to me. Watching are they. Embrace me for snow.“
Let SHIELD think Tony is being smitten. And let Loki think Tony is doing it all for show. It works out both ways.
I need you. Three simple words send a zip of electricity down his spine. Loki knows the other doesn't mean it in the grand sense, but just hearing those words is enough to make his heart flutter just a bit.
Rumlow and Steve give Tony a look, Steve's persisting just a bit after his quick correction, but Natasha looks straight at Loki, He hopes he's able to cover his reaction well enough.
"I am by no means an 'expert' in these weapons," he says, packing the last of the excess scraps in the trunk they were delivered in, "but the components are similar to some of the weaponry used in Asgardian ships."
Loki chuckles at Tony's words.
"Your grammar needs work." Despite his teasing, Loki complies with the request, pulling Tony in for an embrace. He lets the human decide the duration, only speaking again when they pull apart.
That punch of emotion tells Tony that his attempt to cover up his slip of the tongue had not been entirely taken as a slip. It’s worrying, how quickly he has changed to fit the role of someone bonded to another, and how good it makes him feel to make someone else feel good too. That’s a foreign subject matter.
So when Loki embraces him, a way to play off Tony’s use of Asgardian as if he had been speaking endearments, Tony presses his face against Loki’s shoulder and stays in his arms for quite a long while.
He doesn’t even bother to mention that he only started learning the language less than three weeks before and that the human tongue could not actually make some of the sounds required.
Instead, he holds onto Loki until the warmth coursing through him becomes too hard to ignore.
“First we need to hook everything up to JARVIS.” It takes the better part of the morning, while Fury has linguists and code breakers trying to solve the language riddle. In the end, they do find a way to trace back the weapon’s signature to the mothership. A little science, a little magic, and it will tell them about how far away the marauders are.
The results will take weeks to analyze but at least they should be able to work on the next problem. SHIELD itself.
Despite the fact that Loki has only minimal exposure to Earth technology, he picks up the basics of hooking JARVIS in rather quickly. It helps that the system Tony built is closer to some of those on more advanced planet.
They don't have the exact analysis yet, but the instant they get the ping back from the mothership, Loki breaths a sigh of relief.
"The fleet is still a great distance away from the Nine," he says, loud enough to be heard by Steve and Natasha through the door. Rumlow had fucked off left some time ago when it was clear there wouldn't actually be a fight. "We won't know more than that without further analysis."
"That why they needed the portal?" Steve calls in.
Loki nods. "The Titan's desire to target Midgard was rather sudden. While the Chitahuri is the most mobile of his two forces, they were still a great distance away."
He lays a hand on Tony's shoulder. "If we are able to continue this analysis at the Tower, our progress may be expedited." In truth, he just really wants to leave the SHIELD HQ. They need to discuss what both have seen today away from prying eyes.
“We still don’t know why?” Steve frowns, arms crossed over his chest. The blond shared a look with Natasha, though NER response is an almost blank look, the sort she gets when she’s really thinking.
Honestly, Tony had been wondering the same. Earth isn’t anything special. Asgard would be the better target but it’s Earth they’re after, Earth they sent Loki to... Looking up at Loki, Tony nods. “Maybe they really are after our water,” he muses, before stretching his back. “Anyway. Been great. Appreciate the near death experience on the way. But we have to be going.” Tony grabs his phone and slips it into his pocket.
He needs to rebuild his armor. He needs to get JARVIS working in earnest on this data.
But most of all? He needs to figure out why half of SHIELD is homicidal before Thanos shows up to an already destroyed world.
For a moment Loki is worried that when Tony reaches for the door handle that it won't open. His worry is in vain, as they are able to easily leave the room with the data Tony has gathered, leaving a copy behind for SHIELD, of course. Natasha offers to them a ride back to the tower, seeing as they their other option would be a commercial flight.
Fury meets them on the landing pad before they board.
"Let us know if you work through that data before we do," he says.
"Of course. The sooner we can start planning, the better," Loki replies.
Fury nods, then says something that...well, it was probably suppose to be something in Asgardian. Loki can't help but let out a snicker.
"You know, Director, the All Speak I am gifted with understands all spoken languages in the Universe, and I have no idea what you were trying to say just now."
“There are fifteen genders. That’s the hardest part to remember,” Tony says as he passes by, giving Fury a tap to the chest with the back of his hand in the most flippant of manners. He strolls up the gangplank last and then leans down before the ramp is pulled up and the doors shut to wave at the people left standing there.
“Sometimes I hate that mother—“ The door shuts before Fury finishes his sentence.
Back at the Tower, the rooms dark and only the lab a bright beacon above the living space to signify that Banner is hard at work on something or other, Tony takes Loki to one of the other open spaces, originally designed for parties, and asks him for the items he’d found over Baltimore as he has JARVIS install a clean sweep protocol to make sure nothing but the AI can listen in to their conversation.
“I don’t know if I feel better that Fury isn’t trying to kill me...”. Tony frowns at the scraps of his armor and the bits of missile that Loki had stowed away. “But someone in SHIELD is.”
"As much as it pains me to say it, SHIELD may be Midgard's best chance as large-scale defenses in the event of an attack." Loki takes out the pieces one by one, each shimmering into existence in his hand before he lays them carefully on the large banquet table. "Whatever corruption that has found itself into their ranks must be rooted out quickly."
Unfortunately Loki also knows that hearing something like that from either himself or Tony would seem more like they were trying to destabilize the organization than an actual warning.
"Were you able to find anything in their systems?"
Tony exhales through his nose and pulls out a tiny matchbook sized data stick from his back pocket. It catches the light differently from the Chitauri technology, but somehow it seems so much more ominous.
“It’s encrypted. Should take J three, maybe four hours. But we’ll have to wait until Banner turns in for the night.” This has to be something his new found friends aren’t culpable to. Tony can not risk pulling them into something so destabilizing until he has proof. “Want to go out for pizza? They probably won’t try to kill me in public.”
Loki wishes they could simply decrypt the data and give it to Fury and be done with it, but it won't be that simple. Luckily he is use to people not trusting him, even when he is working in their best interest. He didn't get the moniker 'God of Lies' in the past few weeks, after all.
But it has been a long day, and the problem won't be solved this evening no matter how hard they work. An evening out sounds like just the thing he needs.
"That sounds lovely. JARVIS? You will tell us when Dr. Banner turns in for the night?"
"Of course, Mr. Odinson."
Loki frowns a bit. "Just Loki is fine, no family name."
"I will update your preferences," the AI says. "Is there a prefix you would prefer?"
Loki thinks for a moment. "What are the options?"
JARVIS runs through the common English prefixes, with a brief explaination for each. Loki raises an eyebrow at Tony.
"There are three for women determined on their marital status, but no genderless options?"
“Honestly, don’t try to figure English out. It doesn’t make sense to anyone and that’s how we like it,” Tony grins.
It’s not too far into the first pizza that Loki will begin to feel...different. Tony doesn’t notice, but having never grown up with an innate connection to magic and the very force of it stemming from his natural being, he wouldn’t. Sitting back in front of a red plastic cup of soda he has not and will not, thank you, touch, Tony cleans his fingers of the grease and looks up only when he notices Loki’s strange facial expressions.
“Okay, not a fan of pizza,” he says, slowly, knowing something else is wrong.
Loki would continue to poke and prod about cultural things while the two of them worked during the next few weeks. Battle plans with the other Avengers during the day (or whoever could stand to be near Loki, at least), sifting through the data JARVIS decrypted by night. There is a lot, and Loki has that uncomfortable feeling that they're only scratching the surface.
A call for help takes them away from the tower that day. Only Tony and Loki went, as the only other Avenger even in the building was Bruce who did not want to risk the Hulk for a small threat. It is relatively easy for the two of them to deal with--just a low-level thug who somehow got his hands on modified Chitauri tech. They were back within a few hours, pizza in hand from the shop owner grateful to them for stopping the robbery of his store.
The feeling starts just as he's starting his second whole pizza. At first it feels like a pressure on his chest, then the pressure becomes a sort of tingling that spreads through to his extremities. He sets down the slice and looks at his hand, but nothing appears wrong.
"It's not that, it..." a sudden dizzy spell has him gripping his head with one hand and the arm of the couch with the other in an effort to not teeter over. The tingling becomes a numbness, but not of his sense of touch. He can still feel the fabric of the couch beneath his fingertips. No, this is deeper.
Then it clicks.
He flicks a hand out, trying to summon a tome from his collection. Nothing happens
Loki doesn't say anything, but his wide, panicked mean he doesn't really have to.
The dizziness doesn’t hit him the same way, having come to know at that point when the feeling is his own or Loki’s. The process has just taken some time and more understanding of their situation, and Tony’s innate ability to pack away thoughts and ideas into neat compartments when he doesn’t have the brain space for them has helped him ignore a lot of feedback from their bond.
Loki’s strange, empty gestures do give him pause and Tony slowly opens the valve into his more conscious mind. The influx of panic is the first thing that hits him and Tony pushes through it to see what else there is.
A pull, followed by a lack of response causes dread to cloud his lungs before he understands the issue.
Loki and he are still fine, the bond is still there, but Loki’s tether to the universe feels as if it’s dissolved. Tony is on his feet, looking around as if expecting that horrible woman from the feast to suddenly appear, laughing like a cartoon villain.
She doesn’t.
“Time to fill me in,” Tony says, swallowing worry.
Loki tries a few more hand gestures, attempting to draw the runes in the air as Tony had watched him do for more complicated spells. Nothing. No sparks of green or magical letters appear in the air.
His chest tightens even as his breathing starts to quicken.
"My magic. I can't feel it, it's gone. How-" He holds his hand out, trying the most rudimentary light spell. Still nothing.
“How is that possible?” Tony can feel the panic slide towards the more noticeable areas of their bond and he swallows back any he might have to match. Feedback loops aren’t fun, not even when he think they might be. Laughing uncontrollably is just as bad as being exponentially more and more afraid.
Standing up and looking around, not that there’s anyone to help them, Tony puts his hand over Loki’s.
“Can your mom help?” Does his mom even know? Can Loki call Heimdall if there’s no magic?
Tony's voice is muffled by the ringing in his ears as he frantically tries to cast something, anything, even the simplest of spells. Panic grips him more with each failed cast. He feels like he's falling and floating and sinking all at the same time.
Then his bonded puts a gentle hand on his and reality comes back into focus. His fingers curl around the man's hand, holding on to it like a lifeline.
"I-I don't know." He closes his eyes and tries to focus on the warmth from Tony's hand. "Roof. If we call Heimdall we should go to the roof." No sense tearing up the living room.
A few minutes later, Tony still looking with worry at Loki. They’re at least on the roof, but nothing seems to be happening. Tony slips his hands into his pockets and buffets the heavy, cold winds. Whatever is wrong with Loki seems to also be wrong with the proverbial watcher god. His mind is going a mile a minute but on the off chance that Loki begins to throw a fit, Tony’s keeping close.
“I don’t think it’s you,” Tony says, eyes leaving the sky to touch his bonded. “It’s like something has been blocked.”
He nearly said “severed” but that wouldn’t have gone over well.
“Even if you lost your magic, Golden Eye would still find us.”
Loki's thoughts race, thinking of every possible reason why Heimdall wouldn't answer their call. Sure, he and the Gatekeeper never saw eye-to-eye, and had tried to kill each other in recent memory, but he would never shirk his duties by flat-out ignoring a call for aid. Which means something must be preventing him from answering.
Perhaps the same thing preventing Loki's magic from reaching him.
He shivers despite the fact that the cold on the roof shouldn't bother him. With Tony's hand in his, he realizes the chill is his bonded's rather than his.
"Come, let's get you warmed up," Loki says, suddenly feeling guilty for all the unfettered panic he must have been pushing through the bond. Tony seemed to handle it well, but that doesn't mean it wasn't there. He takes a deep breath and focuses once more on the warm hand in his as a way of clearing his thoughts.
Once inside, Loki gives Tony's hand a squeeze. "I have a theory, but we will need to contact Thor to confirm it."
“Do we have to...?” Though Banner has stuck around, and Thor comes and goes, it’s been nice to mostly just work with Loki. Tony has always been a loner, and while Pepper and Happy had been by his side from time to time, they’d known to let him be. Dragging more people into the ring seems like an undo hardship.
Still, this isn’t his area of expertise. Technically, it’s not Thor’s either, but with an eye roll, Tony agrees. “Where’d he get to?”
Probably with that astrophysicist. She seems... boring. Which means of course that she’ll come along too. Tony rolls his eyes again and has JARVIS find Jane Foster.
Loki snickered at Tony's reluctance to invite Thor and his human into their his space. It's unclear to him whether the human had always been this private, or if it is the subtle influence of the bond. Either way, it benefitted Loki.
"I simply need to ask him a few questions about his powers. If I am correct, he will be feeling something of an effect as well. You furnished him with one of these 'smartphones', yes?"
“Then he doesn’t have to come here?” Tony fishes the phone from his pocket and hands it to Loki. “Knock your socks off.”
He’s going to busy himself analyzing atmospheric differences just in case it’s some sort of natural phenomenon interrupting Loki and his magic.
Thor, at least, is pleased to have his brother call him and he sounds honestly excited to hear his voice. “Brother! Jane Foster and I were just speaking of you. Heimdall seems angry with me. Did you or I say anything when last we were in Asgard?”
"So you have been in contact?" Loki breathed a sigh of relief. At least that means Asgard is safe.
"Something is interfering with my magic, and I fear it may have something to do with his silence. How fare your powers?" If he's right, Thor will notice some difficulty, but will retain most of his abilities as they are mostly innate rather than learned.
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cuttingremark) wrote2021-11-10 05:17 pm
no subject
Interesting. Perhaps they will dig into that later.
For now they have a task and one highly trained agent who really wants to kill him and an assassins who's still thinking about it. Not the worst conditions he's worked under.
"Captian, would you hand me that broken power unit?" He gestures to what appears to be a broken blue glass crystal. Steve makes to move to do so, but is cut off by Rumlow stepping in front of him to grab the crystal first. For a moment Loki wonders is the man is going to withhold it from him, but then he steps over and drops it on the table by Loki.
"...My thanks."
The agent stays uncomfortably close to Loki as he examines it, scratching the occasional string of runes in his notebook. Loki, well use to Thor trying to bug him during his studies, dutifully ignores the man.
"This would be the unit that supplied power to the blasters the Chitahuri wielded. I assume you were unable to collect any still in one piece?"
Natasha shakes her head. "Not a lot made it through the portal and most of them dropped from the sky when it closed."
"Pity. They draw their power from the flagship of their fleet. Had we a whole one, we may be able to trace the connection back and get a vague idea of where they are now."
no subject
He’s immediately excited, the hair on the back of his neck raised in genuine pleasure.
“I’m going to need a stand,” he says, pulling his phone out of his pocket so JARVIS can emit a 3D Projection around the room for him to manipulate. “Unless one of you wants to hold this for me the entire time? No? And I need the room cleared. And I need it electronic free. You’ll have to watch through the door. Anything else will interfere with frequencies and ruin what I’m doing.”
No one really seems that apt to want to leave them to it, so Tony gives Steve a little glance and the blond is left sighing and acting like a cattle herder.
Tony owes him and he knows it. He’ll make good with Cap one day.
no subject
Loki helps clear things away as delicately as possible while they wait, chattering the whole time. "If we can get more pieces, I may be able to mend it back together, but we would still need to give it some sort of jumpstart to trace it's signal back to the fleet. It would broadcast location to them as well, but-"
"They already know where Earth is," Natasha finishes his sentence as she packs up the last of the cables in the corner.
"Precisely." Loki watches as Rumlow comes back in with a stand to set the weapon on. "Stark, do you require my assistance, or should I go into the hall with the others?"
no subject
The truth is that he probably does need the other. His presence is chaotic and soothing, a juxtaposition that only makes sense in physics. Their irregularities fit together like puzzle pieces, anticipating each sharp line and curve to hug one another.
Tony appreciates the stability that Loki’s crazy brings to his own.
When they’re alone, Tony tenses slightly. He can only play act so much around the others.
He shifts his speech to Asgardian, his words measured but clunky. “Did it, tried to kill me, they.” He needs help on the syntax. “It all matches. Come. Close to me. Watching are they. Embrace me for snow.“
Let SHIELD think Tony is being smitten. And let Loki think Tony is doing it all for show. It works out both ways.
no subject
Rumlow and Steve give Tony a look, Steve's persisting just a bit after his quick correction, but Natasha looks straight at Loki, He hopes he's able to cover his reaction well enough.
"I am by no means an 'expert' in these weapons," he says, packing the last of the excess scraps in the trunk they were delivered in, "but the components are similar to some of the weaponry used in Asgardian ships."
Loki chuckles at Tony's words.
"Your grammar needs work." Despite his teasing, Loki complies with the request, pulling Tony in for an embrace. He lets the human decide the duration, only speaking again when they pull apart.
"Alright, show us what you had in mind."
no subject
So when Loki embraces him, a way to play off Tony’s use of Asgardian as if he had been speaking endearments, Tony presses his face against Loki’s shoulder and stays in his arms for quite a long while.
He doesn’t even bother to mention that he only started learning the language less than three weeks before and that the human tongue could not actually make some of the sounds required.
Instead, he holds onto Loki until the warmth coursing through him becomes too hard to ignore.
“First we need to hook everything up to JARVIS.” It takes the better part of the morning, while Fury has linguists and code breakers trying to solve the language riddle. In the end, they do find a way to trace back the weapon’s signature to the mothership. A little science, a little magic, and it will tell them about how far away the marauders are.
The results will take weeks to analyze but at least they should be able to work on the next problem. SHIELD itself.
no subject
They don't have the exact analysis yet, but the instant they get the ping back from the mothership, Loki breaths a sigh of relief.
"The fleet is still a great distance away from the Nine," he says, loud enough to be heard by Steve and Natasha through the door. Rumlow had
fucked offleft some time ago when it was clear there wouldn't actually be a fight. "We won't know more than that without further analysis.""That why they needed the portal?" Steve calls in.
Loki nods. "The Titan's desire to target Midgard was rather sudden. While the Chitahuri is the most mobile of his two forces, they were still a great distance away."
He lays a hand on Tony's shoulder. "If we are able to continue this analysis at the Tower, our progress may be expedited." In truth, he just really wants to leave the SHIELD HQ. They need to discuss what both have seen today away from prying eyes.
no subject
Honestly, Tony had been wondering the same. Earth isn’t anything special. Asgard would be the better target but it’s Earth they’re after, Earth they sent Loki to... Looking up at Loki, Tony nods. “Maybe they really are after our water,” he muses, before stretching his back. “Anyway. Been great. Appreciate the near death experience on the way. But we have to be going.” Tony grabs his phone and slips it into his pocket.
He needs to rebuild his armor. He needs to get JARVIS working in earnest on this data.
But most of all? He needs to figure out why half of SHIELD is homicidal before Thanos shows up to an already destroyed world.
no subject
Fury meets them on the landing pad before they board.
"Let us know if you work through that data before we do," he says.
"Of course. The sooner we can start planning, the better," Loki replies.
Fury nods, then says something that...well, it was probably suppose to be something in Asgardian. Loki can't help but let out a snicker.
"You know, Director, the All Speak I am gifted with understands all spoken languages in the Universe, and I have no idea what you were trying to say just now."
no subject
“Sometimes I hate that mother—“ The door shuts before Fury finishes his sentence.
Back at the Tower, the rooms dark and only the lab a bright beacon above the living space to signify that Banner is hard at work on something or other, Tony takes Loki to one of the other open spaces, originally designed for parties, and asks him for the items he’d found over Baltimore as he has JARVIS install a clean sweep protocol to make sure nothing but the AI can listen in to their conversation.
“I don’t know if I feel better that Fury isn’t trying to kill me...”. Tony frowns at the scraps of his armor and the bits of missile that Loki had stowed away. “But someone in SHIELD is.”
no subject
Unfortunately Loki also knows that hearing something like that from either himself or Tony would seem more like they were trying to destabilize the organization than an actual warning.
"Were you able to find anything in their systems?"
no subject
“It’s encrypted. Should take J three, maybe four hours. But we’ll have to wait until Banner turns in for the night.” This has to be something his new found friends aren’t culpable to. Tony can not risk pulling them into something so destabilizing until he has proof. “Want to go out for pizza? They probably won’t try to kill me in public.”
no subject
But it has been a long day, and the problem won't be solved this evening no matter how hard they work. An evening out sounds like just the thing he needs.
"That sounds lovely. JARVIS? You will tell us when Dr. Banner turns in for the night?"
"Of course, Mr. Odinson."
Loki frowns a bit. "Just Loki is fine, no family name."
"I will update your preferences," the AI says. "Is there a prefix you would prefer?"
Loki thinks for a moment. "What are the options?"
JARVIS runs through the common English prefixes, with a brief explaination for each. Loki raises an eyebrow at Tony.
"There are three for women determined on their marital status, but no genderless options?"
no subject
It’s not too far into the first pizza that Loki will begin to feel...different. Tony doesn’t notice, but having never grown up with an innate connection to magic and the very force of it stemming from his natural being, he wouldn’t. Sitting back in front of a red plastic cup of soda he has not and will not, thank you, touch, Tony cleans his fingers of the grease and looks up only when he notices Loki’s strange facial expressions.
“Okay, not a fan of pizza,” he says, slowly, knowing something else is wrong.
no subject
A call for help takes them away from the tower that day. Only Tony and Loki went, as the only other Avenger even in the building was Bruce who did not want to risk the Hulk for a small threat. It is relatively easy for the two of them to deal with--just a low-level thug who somehow got his hands on modified Chitauri tech. They were back within a few hours, pizza in hand from the shop owner grateful to them for stopping the robbery of his store.
The feeling starts just as he's starting his second whole pizza. At first it feels like a pressure on his chest, then the pressure becomes a sort of tingling that spreads through to his extremities. He sets down the slice and looks at his hand, but nothing appears wrong.
"It's not that, it..." a sudden dizzy spell has him gripping his head with one hand and the arm of the couch with the other in an effort to not teeter over. The tingling becomes a numbness, but not of his sense of touch. He can still feel the fabric of the couch beneath his fingertips. No, this is deeper.
Then it clicks.
He flicks a hand out, trying to summon a tome from his collection. Nothing happens
Loki doesn't say anything, but his wide, panicked mean he doesn't really have to.
no subject
Loki’s strange, empty gestures do give him pause and Tony slowly opens the valve into his more conscious mind. The influx of panic is the first thing that hits him and Tony pushes through it to see what else there is.
A pull, followed by a lack of response causes dread to cloud his lungs before he understands the issue.
Loki and he are still fine, the bond is still there, but Loki’s tether to the universe feels as if it’s dissolved. Tony is on his feet, looking around as if expecting that horrible woman from the feast to suddenly appear, laughing like a cartoon villain.
She doesn’t.
“Time to fill me in,” Tony says, swallowing worry.
no subject
His chest tightens even as his breathing starts to quicken.
"My magic. I can't feel it, it's gone. How-" He holds his hand out, trying the most rudimentary light spell. Still nothing.
no subject
Standing up and looking around, not that there’s anyone to help them, Tony puts his hand over Loki’s.
“Can your mom help?” Does his mom even know? Can Loki call Heimdall if there’s no magic?
no subject
Then his bonded puts a gentle hand on his and reality comes back into focus. His fingers curl around the man's hand, holding on to it like a lifeline.
"I-I don't know." He closes his eyes and tries to focus on the warmth from Tony's hand.
"Roof. If we call Heimdall we should go to the roof." No sense tearing up the living room.
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“I don’t think it’s you,” Tony says, eyes leaving the sky to touch his bonded. “It’s like something has been blocked.”
He nearly said “severed” but that wouldn’t have gone over well.
“Even if you lost your magic, Golden Eye would still find us.”
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Perhaps the same thing preventing Loki's magic from reaching him.
He shivers despite the fact that the cold on the roof shouldn't bother him. With Tony's hand in his, he realizes the chill is his bonded's rather than his.
"Come, let's get you warmed up," Loki says, suddenly feeling guilty for all the unfettered panic he must have been pushing through the bond. Tony seemed to handle it well, but that doesn't mean it wasn't there. He takes a deep breath and focuses once more on the warm hand in his as a way of clearing his thoughts.
Once inside, Loki gives Tony's hand a squeeze. "I have a theory, but we will need to contact Thor to confirm it."
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Still, this isn’t his area of expertise. Technically, it’s not Thor’s either, but with an eye roll, Tony agrees. “Where’d he get to?”
Probably with that astrophysicist. She seems... boring. Which means of course that she’ll come along too. Tony rolls his eyes again and has JARVIS find Jane Foster.
At least his hands few warmer now.
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theirhis space. It's unclear to him whether the human had always been this private, or if it is the subtle influence of the bond. Either way, it benefitted Loki."I simply need to ask him a few questions about his powers. If I am correct, he will be feeling something of an effect as well. You furnished him with one of these 'smartphones', yes?"
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He’s going to busy himself analyzing atmospheric differences just in case it’s some sort of natural phenomenon interrupting Loki and his magic.
Thor, at least, is pleased to have his brother call him and he sounds honestly excited to hear his voice. “Brother! Jane Foster and I were just speaking of you. Heimdall seems angry with me. Did you or I say anything when last we were in Asgard?”
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"Something is interfering with my magic, and I fear it may have something to do with his silence. How fare your powers?" If he's right, Thor will notice some difficulty, but will retain most of his abilities as they are mostly innate rather than learned.
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