Chapter Text
Tony can’t sleep.
He doesn’t even know why he can’t sleep. Is it the excitement of his new engagement? Nerves about the future? The general feeling of dread that’s followed him every day for weeks? It’s hard to tell.
Pepper, of course, falls asleep without an issue. It feels like she’s passed out in his arms within minutes of her head hitting the pillow (after, of course, some post-engagement activities in bed). Tony doesn’t have such luck. He never has such luck.
He might drift off for a few minutes here and there. It’s difficult to tell when he can’t see the clock. It’s probably for the best that he can’t, though; time would only move more slowly if he could watch it with every agonizing second.
Maybe “agonizing” is the wrong word. It’s not agony. Lying in bed with his soon-to-be wife will never be agony. It’s just… boring. There’s nothing going on. There’s nothing to do. He can’t even stare lovingly at Pepper’s face because she’s decided to be the little spoon tonight and now his sight is full of strawberry blonde hair. He’s just bored.
He doesn’t know how long he lies in bed – because, again, he can’t see the freaking clock – but he does know that he’s starting to get antsy, so, finally, he makes the executive decision to get up for a while. He slips out of bed, careful not to disturb his sleeping beauty, and tip-toes out of the room, closing the door as silently as possible behind him.
“Hey, FRIDAY,” Tony whispers as he makes his way down the hall, “if Pepper wakes up and asks for me, tell her I just stepped out for some water.”
“Of course, boss,” FRIDAY replies.
Content with that, Tony continues on his journey. He only makes it a dozen steps or so before he has another thought: “And let me know if she wakes up.” Just so he can head back. Just so she doesn’t think she has to worry about him. With how his life has been going lately, he wouldn’t be shocked if she woke up to an empty bed and her first thought was that he’s drinking himself to death.
He is not, in fact, getting up to grab a quick cup of water, but he would like some water, so he makes his way to the kitchen. Maybe he’ll get a snack while he’s here, too. Do they have any fruit in the tower? Has anybody been grocery shopping since he went back to Malibu? He has no idea what to expect.
Although, he realizes in hindsight, one thing he probably should have expected was the possibility that Loki would already be there. It’s become a fairly common occurrence over the last few years, running into the local traumatized terrorist in the middle of the night when any self-respecting person would be asleep.
Loki’s back in his usual male form, complete with his fancy schmancy Asgardian armor that would make him look very dramatic if he looked any more lively. He’s seated at the table with his head propped up on his hand, a book laid out in front of him and the Captain America mug resting beside it. He doesn’t even look up at Tony in the doorway. He’s a bit offended, if he’s being honest.
Tony pauses in the doorway, debating his options. He hasn’t talked to the guy in a week. He hasn’t had a real conversation with him in even longer. The last time they even interacted prior to Tony and Pepper’s impromptu Malibu field trip was the two seconds of death-glaring Tony sent his way when he was eavesdropping on his conversation with Steve.
He’s obviously still upset with Bucky for murdering his parents and with Steve for keeping that from him, but Loki just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. There’s no real ill will there, at least on his end. Really, the question is whether he has to apologize for being short with him, or if he can just assume that things are fine between them and move on like nothing happened.
… The fact that Loki’s ignoring him makes him think he should probably apologize.
But, ultimately, he decides not to, because that’s a stupid thing to apologize for and he doesn’t owe anybody anything.
So he steps into the kitchen, putting on as much of his usual confident, cocky facade as he can manage when he’s so fucking tired, and greets the god with a casual, “Good book?”
Loki looks up at him, which does make him question his ‘the guy’s ignoring him’ theory, and he shrugs one shoulder lazily. “It’s alright.”
“What is it?” He’s sure it’s something he knows. Everything Loki reads is something that Steve’s already read, and everything Steve reads is something that everybody else in the world has also read before.
“It’s a strange story,” Loki says. “Of Mice and Men, it’s called.”
“Ah.” Tony nods slowly. That is, in fact, one that he’s read, but it was about a million years ago. “That’s the one with the big…” He gestures vaguely as he tries to think. What’s the socially acceptable word for this? “The mentally challenged guy?”
“Mm,” Loki hums. “Lenny. He’s really the only interesting part of the story. I don’t know that I’d still be reading it if he weren’t in it.”
Tony chuckles awkwardly. “Yeah, he’s… He’s great.” He will admit that he doesn’t remember all too much of this book, but he sure does remember the ending. That’s… unfortunate.
Loki slips a folded up strip of paper into the book to mark his page before he closes it, giving Tony his attention. “Why are you awake at this hour?”
Tony huffs. A stupid question, he’d say, given how many times they’ve run into each other in the dead of the night, but he’ll play ball. “Couldn’t sleep. You?”
“Bad dream.”
Tony nods. He’d just about assumed as much. “Is whatever was bugging you earlier done bugging you?” It must be, if he’s able to sit still.
“Fortunately,” Loki replies, then swiftly changes the subject before Tony can decide whether he’d want to ask any follow-up questions. “I suppose congratulations are in order for the future groom.”
Tony cracks a smile. It’s hard not to. The future groom. He’s still having a hard time wrapping his head around that. He’d obviously known Pepper would accept his proposal – she already had in private – but it feels so much more real now that it’s official.
Tony steps into the kitchen finally – no point in having this whole conversation from the doorway – and fills up a glass with some fresh water. He sits down at the table across from the god and takes a sip. This is nice. This is refreshing. He should drink water more often. (He will not drink water more often. That’s what diet Coke is for.)
“How does a Midgardian wedding work?” Loki asks. With a lighthearted smile, he adds, “I imagine it comes as no shock to you that I’ve never seen one.”
“Honestly, I kinda am shocked,” Tony remarks. “You’re a bazillion years old, and you’ve never crashed an Earth wedding?”
“No, I try only to invite myself to the weddings of people who actively dislike me,” Loki quips. “I haven’t known enough humans for it to be worth my while.”
Tony huffs a laugh. “Well, there’s a lot of different kinds of human weddings, so even if you’d seen one, you definitely haven’t seen them all.” As someone with acquaintances from all over the world, he’s pleased to say that he’s been to – and picked up ladies at – all kinds of weddings from all kinds of cultures. “At least in the US, it’s usually a big fancy ceremony and then a big party after.”
“Hmm.” Loki nods thoughtfully. “It doesn’t sound all too different from a wedding in Asgard. Is the entire celebration in one day, or is it spread out over the course of a week or so?”
“The main thing’s just the one day,” he says. “But then there’s the bridal shower and the bachelor’s and bachlorette’s parties and the rehearsal dinner where you make sure you’re not going to fuck the everything up. It’s a whole thing.”
“How long does that last?” Loki asks. “The ‘whole thing’?”
Tony shrugs. “I think you just throw it all in somewhere during the wedding planning phase.”
Loki cocks his head to the side. “How long does it take to plan a wedding?”
“Honestly, I have no fucking idea,” Tony says. “A long time.”
“Oh.” Loki thinks about that for a few moments. “Why would it take a long time to plan a wedding between two people who are in love? I assume there is no bartering involved between the parents; no careful discussions of alliances.”
Tony blinks at that.
Well, that’s one way to view wedding planning.
“I think it’s mostly because it’s a pain in the ass to book a venue,” Tony says. “Fortunately, what I lack in patience, I make up for in money, so if I have to bribe my way into an earlier wedding, I’m not afraid to do that.”
Loki nods understandingly. “Because what is the point of having both money and power if you do not use it to get what you want?”
Tony gestures to him. “I'm glad someone gets it.” Probably because he's a prince, now that he thinks about it. He's as much of a spoiled prick as Tony is.
“What sort of venue are you looking for?” Loki asks. “Where does a Midgardian wedding take place?”
“Now that is something I'll have to talk to Pepper about,” Tony says. “Our conversation didn't make it very far past ‘we should get married.’” He'll probably let her choose the venue, unless she chooses something completely outrageous and they have to compromise. He has no idea what he wants in a wedding. He spent most of his life thinking marriage was never something he'd have to worry about. He has absolutely no wedding-related hopes and dreams beyond the beautiful bride named Virginia “Pepper” Potts.
“You'll have to show me pictures,” Loki says. “I imagine it will be quite a sight to behold, regardless of where you decide upon.”
Tony scoffs. “What, you're not gonna go?”
“I can't leave the compound,” Loki reminds him.
Tony rolls his eyes. “Yeah, and that's never stopped you from following us around before.”
Loki ponders that. “I suppose I could sneak in,” he says. “I don't trust myself in a crowded building to pretend I have a physical form when the risk that somebody could walk through it is so high, but I could provide unnecessary commentary, if nothing else.”
Tony waves that off. “Don't be so paranoid,” he says. “Sylvie’s more than welcome to make an appearance. It’ll be fine.”
Loki smiles at that, a soft smile, a genuine smile. “I appreciate that.”
“Hey, we've been living together for almost three years now,” Tony reminds him. “I think a wedding invitation is kind of the bare minimum.” It’s funny, in a way, because even two years ago, he would have laughed at the idea of allowing Loki to go to his wedding. Now, he can’t imagine him not being there. He’s part of the team now. He’s part of their messy little Avengers family.
That seems to be the end of that conversation, so, once Tony's finished his glass of water, he gets up for another one. Now he really can't go to sleep. He'll be peeing all night.
While he's on his feet, he opts to look for a snack. He's not hungry. God knows he had enough food at that party to last a week. But he likes snacking on things, and if there's something snackable in the room, he's going to take it.
He settles on a bag of Doritos, which he brings back to the table with him. He grabs a few chips from the bag, then spins it toward Loki. “You want some?”
Loki waves it off. “No, thank you. I don’t like the texture.”
Tony snorts. “You don’t like the texture of chips?” Chips are, like, the fundamental snack of all time. How is it possible not to like chips?
“They’re very dry,” Loki says. “I feel as though I would need to drink an entire glass of water just to eat one.”
Tony shakes his head to himself. “It’s like the Cheez-Its all over again.”
Loki rolls his eyes goodnaturedly. “Cheez-Its are inedible. They are not food.”
Tony cracks a smile. At least some things never change.
“How long do you plan to be awake?” Loki asks.
“At the rate tonight’s going? A long time.” Though certainly not by choice.
“Did the chess board come with us to the compound?” Loki asks. “We could play a round – for old time’s sake.”
Tony shrugs. “We could,” he agrees. “For old time’s sake.” It’ll be nice; a reminder of simpler times, when his biggest problem was the god he was forced to babysit and his entire world wasn’t crumbling around him. “You’re not planning to go back to bed any time soon, I’m assuming.” He eyes the half-empty mug of coffee beside Loki’s book. That is not the beverage of choice for somebody who plans to go back to sleep tonight.
Loki huffs and shakes his head. “Not unless Rogers stops taking up every inch of it.”
Tony stares at him.
What.
The fuck.
Loki cocks his head to the side, confused, but he cannot be nearly as confused as Tony is right now.
“Rogers is in your bed?” How is he just going to drop that piece of information and move on like it’s the most normal thing in the world?
Loki shakes his head, brushing that off. “It’s a long story.”
“And we have plenty of time,” Tony says. He’s not letting the guy brush this off that easily. “Why is Rogers in your bed?”
Loki rolls his eyes. “It is a complicated story.”
“I’m sure I can keep up,” Tony says. He’s a genius, after all. “Why is Rogers in your bed?”
Loki’s head falls backward with an exasperated groan. “Rogers is in my bed because I wasn’t feeling well, he agreed to stay until I fell asleep, and then he fell asleep first. Can we move on?”
Tony just continues to stare at him.
Are they…?
No, that would be ridiculous.
Although…
Okay, he has to ask, just to be sure.
“Are you guys hooking up?”
“I do not know what that means,” Loki says, “but I assume the answer is ‘no.’”
Of course he doesn’t know what ‘hooking up’ means. The guy’s adapted so well to living on Earth, sometimes Tony forgets that he’s an alien whose only experience with slang comes from the people he lives with and what he sees on TV.
“Sleeping together,” Tony substitutes. “Having sex.”
Loki balks at him, making a noise that sounds like some bizarre cross between a laugh and a scoff that sends him into a coughing fit. Tony fights the urge to laugh. He has a feeling he can figure out the answer from that reaction alone – but he still wants to hear him say it, just to be sure, because sometimes it really seems like…
“No, the Captain and I are not having sex,” Loki says with breathless indignance as he struggles to regain his composure. “I am fairly certain the Captain does not even like men in that way.”
Tony shrugs. “Well, you’re not always a man.” And they do tend to get much more snuggly when Loki’s not a man, he’s noticed. He’d always assumed it was just because that was the bond that Steve and “Sylvie” used to share that’s carried over despite the identity reveal, but now…
Loki pinches the bridge of his nose, exasperated. “I am not having sex with the Captain – not in this form or any other.”
Tony studies him closely, looking for some sign that he might be lying – not that it matters, but if they are sleeping together, this would be so fucking funny to hold over their heads – but, unfortunately, it seems like he’s telling the truth. It’s probably for the best. Things are already so goddamn weird around here without throwing in a pair of fuckbuddies to the mix.
So Tony narrows his eyes, making a show of his suspicion more as a joke than anything, and says, “Good.”
Loki just shakes his head to himself, his amusement shining through.
“Chess board’s in the common room,” Tony tells him. “Field trip?”
Loki gives him a weird look. “What field?”
Tony gives him a weird look right back. “No, field trip,” he repeats, as if that’s going to clear anything up. “What, you guys don’t do field trips in Asgard?”
“We take trips to fields,” Loki says uncertainly. “Usually for battle or relaxation or hiding from your brother when you’ve tricked him and you know he wants you dead. I don’t understand what field is involved when walking to the common room, though.”
“No, it’s not–” Tony cuts himself off, pursing his lips. “Never mind. We’re going to the common room.”
Loki cocks his head to the side, looking at him curiously, but when Tony starts walking away, his glass of water in hand, the god follows him without further questioning.
The first minute or so is quiet as they walk. It feels kind of weird. It also feels weirdly not weird. He wouldn’t usually picture Loki as being on the “we can hang out together in silence without things being weird” level of friendship. (He’s not even sure he’d call him a friend at all. He likes the guy, much more than he'd ever admit aloud, but that feels like a gross oversimplification of whatever the hell their relationship is.) But, at least for right now, the silence is weirdly not weird.
It’s Loki who breaks it, with perhaps the words Tony would least like him to break it with: “While we are on the topic of Captain Rogers–”
“Nope,” Tony interrupts.
“I haven’t said anything yet.”
“And yet you have already said more than enough,” Tony says. They’re not even on the topic of Steve anymore. That was, like, two topics ago. If they’re on the topic of anything, it would be field trips, and even that was too long ago to claim they’re still on that topic.
Loki sighs. “Stark–”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Tony says. Loki’s not even supposed to know any of this shit to begin with. He sure as hell shouldn’t be the one bringing it up.
“Then don’t,” Loki says. “I will do the talking.”
Tony rolls his eyes and looks over at him, donning the most unamused expression known to man or god. “This has nothing to do with you,” he says. “Stay out of it, will you?”
“Except it has very much to do with me,” Loki says, “because I am one of the many people subjected to the immense discomfort that comes with existing in the same building as the both of you – the three of you, I should say, including Bucky.”
“Okay, and we have to deal with the ‘immense discomfort’ of you giving Rogers heart eyes every time I throw a party,” Tony deadpans. “What’s your point?”
“Yes, but giving Rogers ‘heart eyes’ every time you throw a party brings me immense joy,” Loki says, “whereas this is simply uncomfortable for everybody.”
Tony shakes his head to himself. “Look, there’s nothing you can say that’s going to fix anything, so don’t even waste your time, okay?”
“Maybe you’re right,” Loki says, “but I could possibly provide some much-needed perspective.”
“Oh, bullshit,” Tony says, rolling his eyes. “I don’t need perspective. I have perspective.”
Loki ignores that, just as he ignores every attempt Tony’s made to shut him up, and he keeps talking. “You understand that there’s nothing Bucky’s done that’s worse than what I’ve done.”
Tony clenches his jaw. “Bullshit.” That's all he says. That's all he allows himself to say.
“It’s not.”
“He killed my parents.”
“And how many people have I killed?” Loki counters. “Hundreds, if I had to guess? And that’s in your realm alone.”
“That’s different.” That whole situation was different. The shit Loki pulled has nothing to do with this.
“It is different,” Loki says, “but not in the way you think. I killed more people. I did it recklessly. I did it purposely and in cold blood.”
“That’s not the point,” Tony says irritably.
“It is not your point,” Loki says. “But it is a part of mine. Because, for whatever reason, you have decided that the atrocities I’ve committed are not a problem anymore – atrocities that are, objectively speaking, far worse than anything Bucky’s done. Why is that different? Why have I been absolved of my crimes, but Bucky cannot be?”
Because you didn’t want to commit them, he wants to say. Because somebody made you do it.
That, really, was when Tony forgave him for everything. They’d been friendly enough before then – Loki had saved enough lives on the team by then to at least earn some sort of lighhearted neutrality – but he didn’t truly forgive him until he learned the truth; until Loki unwittingly revealed that he there was somebody else pulling the strings, and he was merely the face of the horrors somebody else had concocted.
But that doesn’t help right now. That doesn’t make it different. Hell, if he really thinks about it, that’s just another similarity between the two. Bucky didn’t want to do what he did any more than Loki did. But he still did it. He still murdered Tony’s parents. He’s still the one who pulled the trigger – literally, metaphorically, he can’t say, but it doesn’t change anything. He still killed Howard and Maria Stark, whether he wanted to or not.
… Although, really, it’s hard to be mad at a guy for what he did when his mind was completely taken over by Nazis and he had no awareness of his own actions.
“The real difference, I would say,” Loki continues, “is that Bucky never had a choice. He did not know what he was doing. He was nothing but a weapon in someone else’s crime, and he is as horrified by the things he was made to do as you are.”
That’s not a difference, Tony wants to say, that’s another similarity. But Loki doesn’t know that he knows that, so he keeps his mouth shut.
They reach the common room just as Tony’s patience is about to run out, and he couldn’t be more grateful for a distraction. He doesn’t have the remaining brain cells to have this conversation right now. He barely has enough brain cells left to attempt to play late-night chess.
He heads over to the game closer and pulls out the chess board. “You want to just play on the floor?” It seems like the easiest way to play without rearranging furniture to be able to use the coffee table.
“I don’t see why not,” Loki says.
So Tony plops down on the floor, dumps all the chess pieces next to the board, and gets to work setting them up. Loki sits down on the other side of the board and joins him. They don’t talk as they set it up. There’s no more arguing. There’s no more trying to reason with someone who can’t be reasoned with – and, truly, that goes for the both of them. They both believe what they’re saying, and neither of them are going to change their minds.
Although, the more Tony thinks about it…
He sighs. He’s not done with this conversation, after all.
“I know it’s not Bucky’s fault,” he says. He’s known it since the moment Bucky told him. He’s known even before then that he can’t hold the crimes he committed under HYDRA’s control against him, against the real person who was buried in there through it all. “It’s not him that I have a problem with.”
“No?”
Tony shakes his head. “No, it’s Steve.” Which sounds kind of stupid to say out loud, but it’s true. It’s Steve that he’s mad at. It’s Steve who stabbed him in the back. “He knew what his buddy did – or he knew he might have done it; he knew enough – and he didn’t say anything.”
“Can you fault him for that?” Loki asks. “When this is how you’ve reacted, are you shocked that he didn’t say anything sooner?”
“Maybe I would have reacted differently if I’d been told sooner.”
Loki raises a brow. “The day Bucky came to the compound, you left the moment you touched the ground. Do you think that would have been a good time to tell you?”
Tony juts his jaw out, annoyed, but he doesn’t answer. To answer that, he’d have to admit that Loki’s right, and that is one thing he very much does not want to do.
“There has never been a good time to tell you,” Loki says. “There has not been a single moment since Bucky came to the compound where you have seemed as though you were ready for such an important but painful piece of information. I don’t know that Bucky was right to tell you even when he did. I would have waited longer, even, in his place.”
Tony narrows his eyes.
Wait.
“Did you know?” he asks cautiously. Has he been ranting to someone who’s guilty of the same thing he’s ranting about? It would make sense. He and Bucky have apparently been all buddy-buddy for years. Of course it’s come up. Of course Loki already knew. Of-fucking-course. He should have figured that out earlier.
But Loki shakes his head. “The first I heard of it was when you confronted the Captain,” Loki says. “I would like to say that I know Bucky Barnes fairly well, but I knew very little of the Winter Soldier.”
Tony eyes him carefully, looking for any sign that he’s lying, that he knows something he’s not saying, but he really sounds like he’s telling the truth. (Honestly, that doesn’t mean much. He is a notorious liar. He’s got to be pretty damn good at it.)
“And they are two different people,” Loki adds. “I don’t think it’s fair to blame one for the actions of the other, and I’m sure that Rogers feels the same way. I imagine that, in part, is why he never told you: because, really, it was never Bucky who did it; it was simply HYDRA. What good would it do to tell you that HYDRA was behind your parents’ deaths when you already rightfully despised the organization to begin with?”
Tony takes a moment to let that sit with him, to let it sink in, to really ruminate on it. Maybe Loki is right. Maybe he’s just a master manipulator. It’s hard to tell. But, regardless, this conversation has given him a hell of a lot to think about, and this is something that he definitely cannot think about as he’s trying to play chess.
“You go first?” he asks. He does have the white pieces, after all. He’s pretty sure that’s supposed to be the starting side.
Loki cracks a smile. “Gladly.”
And with that, the game is on.