Chapter Text
"I need you now but I don't know you yet"
-Alexander 23 "IDK you yet"
Introductions
The first time he had seen her was at Stark’s tower, after the battle against the Titan. It was the calm that came after the storm. Peaceful. Stark and the Captain were in medical, recovering. The former’s arm was beyond saving, Loki thought; he would live, but the arm would never feel again. If he got to keep it at all, that was. So, he was still unconscious and would be for a while.
The other—the Captain—was mainly suffering from ‘blunt force trauma’ as the mortals called it, though, he did have a healing factor with which to speed along his progress.
Of the remaining Avengers, Romanoff was no longer with them; Loki had not seen the red-haired assassin anywhere during the battle or afterwards. The Hawk—Barton—was with his family two floors below. And Banner was mostly all right, except for the arm which held the Infinity Stones for a time. According to the Midgardians, that would leave lasting damage.
Finally, there was his brother, who was sitting at Loki’s left on the narrow and stiff chairs of the waiting room. His head was leaned over onto Loki’s shoulder in a somewhat awkward position, fast asleep after the adrenaline rush of fighting. Loki was silently grateful for that; Thor’s leaning on him was likely the only thing keeping him from implanting a dagger in someone’s eye.
More specifically, Nebula’s eye.
The Guardians of the Galaxy (honestly, could the titles get any worse?) were one floor above them on the balcony. Nebula had come down for something (to check on Stark’s progress, Loki thought), and it was all he could do not to lurch upwards and murder her.
She looked different. Since the last time he had seen her, she had gained a few new mechanical parts and replaced a few others. It didn’t matter, his mind told him. Nebula was a threat.
Only… she wasn’t.
Thor leaning on him was the only thing that prevented the instinctual reaction. Deduction for more information was what kept him firmly planted in his seat. See, the Avengers had just defeated the Mad Titan—at great cost, and with great difficulty, but they had defeated him. So, if a daughter of Thanos was in their midst, why were they not more focused on apprehending her?
Because they were not concerned with her.
Whether that was because she had switched sides or was a completely different version of herself from one of those alternate timelines— whatever the reason—it didn’t matter. Because if Earth’s mightiest heroes (mightiest was not saying all too much. Again, titles) did not concern themselves with her, why should Loki?
It did not stop him from eyeing her warily as she made her way across the room to confront the Doctor, asking after Stark. She received the same answer as everyone else: “He’ll live, but we’re not out of the deep end yet.” Or different versions of Midgardian idioms that meant something similar (honestly, all of their conversations were encoded with hints of pop culture and reference. To what, Loki discovered, even many humans did not know).
In any case, that was when Nebula spun on her heel and stalked out of the room to rejoin the Guardians. She did not notice Loki, as far as he knew. If she did, she did not act on the observation. So, she left, and Loki felt the tension bleed out of his body. First, all at once, then in small increments as he forced himself to relax.
Naturally, just as his eyes fluttered close, that was when a small voice perked up from his other side. Two seats away, sat Stark’s Spider-child, wearing a grey hoodie that was far too large for him and sweatpants that had to be borrowed from someone else.
“Mr. Loki?” asked the Spider cautiously. He was leaning over the armrests with wide eyes.
“Just Loki,” he mumbled, only half-certain that the words were coherent. That was a concern.
“Aren’t you—like—a bad guy?” he asked, voice full of only curiosity, as far as Loki could tell.
His first thought was, yes.
His second thought was, no.
His third thought was, sometimes?
There was no clear answer. New York… wasn’t him, but that did not mean he was not at least partly responsible for the death and destruction that resulted from it. Still, he fought the Titan where it most counted, so he would take that as a point away from ‘bad guy’ status.
Then there was Jotunheim, which was… complicated. Not that everything else wasn’t complicated, just that the near elimination of his own species was more so because it was him. In his right mind, not Thanos’ tampering or persuasions. No, that was him.
What was also him, was his last desperate attempt to save Thor’s life on the Statesman. It had gotten him killed, and now, he was back. Again.
So, there was no single answer.
“It varies from moment to moment,” Loki answered honestly, prying his eyes open after they threatened to fall close.
“But on a scale of one to ten, where are you at right now?”
Loki thought about it. Moments prior, it likely would have been a six, maybe a seven. Now, with Nebula gone and the Spider-child offering sufficient distraction, that number was significantly lower. “Maybe a three?” he offered with a slight tilt of his head.
The Spider-child nodded. “Cool,” he replied lightly, smiling a little. “Let me know if it gets above a six. I’m Peter, by the way,” he added abruptly, extending his hand.
Loki limply shook it with his right. His whole arm felt like slush. Both of them did, really. “Nice to meet you,” he said, voice slurring sluggishly. Sleep sounded absolutely wonderful right about now, despite him still wearing his dirtied armour.
Eyelids heavy, his last thought before drifting off was, I like him.
Six
The second time he saw her was also at Stark’s tower, about a week after everything had settled down somewhat. The Avengers were still recovering in the Tower. Stark had yet to wake, and when that would eventually happen, he would still be confined to a wheelchair for another couple of weeks. The Captain was attempting to hobble around, supported strongly by his friend with the metal arm. After a few steps, he had been banished to the dubbed ‘Sofa of Shame’. Banner was also on the Sofa of Shame, after attempting unconsciously to open a door with his ruined arm, breaking the sling and setting his progress back by days—maybe a week.
The Guardians were there as well, their ship parked on the helicopter pad of the Tower. One of their members preferred to always remain with the ship, but the rest enjoyed wandering around the Tower until they got bored and started wandering around the city. According to Thor, after having been banned from twelve bars, seven restaurants, and four theatres, the Guardians had decided to expand their radius to the rest of the country and then to the rest of the world. Things only escalated from there. Banned from thirty states, seven European countries, and all of Asia (and counting), they had confined themselves to the Tower. Which was probably a good idea because it had only been one week.
Unfortunately for Loki, all of this meant that the Luphomoid was in his vicinity far more than he was comfortable with. And, being banned (though not officially) from… most of Earth… he was lacking options on where to go when she was around.
The Guardians trusted her. The Avengers trusted her. Hel, his brother trusted her, if only because the raccoon did. There was no sensible reason for his urge to flee, just… she was there. Her very presence brought up unpleasant memories of a time he would not talk about for any reason. Not even so that he could remain on Earth. That part of his life was…
That was his business to tell.
So, he avoided her like the plague, hiding in Thor's room (Loki didn’t have one) until he was sure she was gone, and sticking to his brother when he could not. Eventually, there did come a time when he could no longer avoid the problem, and that was right now.
Thor was in the training room, sparring with the Captain's metal-armed friend. Bucky, he thought his name was. The fight was evenly matched. Somewhat. Loki could tell when his brother was holding back, and this was one such occasion. No weapons were involved; Stormbreaker was off to the side leaning against the wall, and… Loki wasn’t sure if the metal arm counted as a weapon.
That was when the Guardians entered, all at once in a big group that stampeded over anything that got in their way (if their little adventure in Disneyland was any indication. Loki didn’t know what “Disneyland” was, but he could make a decent guess). The raccoon was at the forefront of the group, yelling something to Thor that distracted him for a moment long enough for Bucky to get him in the stomach.
But Loki wasn’t really paying attention anymore. No, his eyes were fixed solely on the woman hovering by the doorway, blocking his exit. He shuffled closer to the bench on the opposite wall. Thor had asked him to stay—they were supposed to spar together later on. He couldn’t just leave without an explanation.
So, Loki sat there and waited. And waited. And the sparring continued and the Luphomoid did not move. The guardians took up a spot on the other end of the bench, chattering away and making commentary on the fight. But all of that was background noise—just a mix of jumbled sounds—because she was right there. By the door. Too close.
Too. Damn. Close.
That was when another entered the room, pushing past Nebula and squeezing around the huddled Guardians to take up a seat two to the right of Loki, putting himself between him and Nebula.
“Hi, Mr. Loki!” said Stark’s Spider-child with an enthusiastic wave. His lips were tilted up into a bright smile, which was odd. Why would anyone—never mind.
“Just Loki,” he replied through half-gritted teeth. It wasn’t the child. It wasn’t the incorrect form of address, just—
Nebula was right there.
“Oh,” said the human quietly, crossing his legs. He almost looked apologetic. “Sorry about that. Where are you at right now?”
Loki gave him a puzzled look, eyebrows lowered, and replied: “Right beside you?”
“No, no, no, no, no,” the Spider said frantically, the words slurred together. Under his breath, he muttered, “I forget you guys aren’t from Earth.” Aloud; “It’s just an expression—means how are you doing. Like, between one and ten.”
Recalling their earlier conversation, Loki looked between the Spider-child and the Luphomoid, watching her with wary eyes as she leaned against the wall by the door. No, she was getting closer now, joining the conversation of the rest of the Guardians.
Thor was still there, in the training ring. He wouldn’t let her attack him and the Avengers trusted her, but…
“Six,” Loki replied, swallowing. “It’s hovering around a six right now.”
Surprisingly, the child neither asked why nor pressed for any details. He only responded with a question: “Have you ever been to a museum?”
In hindsight, this was probably one of his bad decisions. Yeah, he was making a lot of those recently—taking on the Vulture alone, hitchhiking on an alien spaceship, and most of all, dying. Aunt May was never going to let him hear the end of it for those last two. (Even though, in Peter’s opinion, they were not mutually related. In his defence, the Snap would have taken him whether or not he was on an alien planet). Despite all of that, this somehow still managed to take the cake.
What was he thinking inviting the God of Mischief to a museum?
First, Tony was going to kill him. Then Aunt May. Then Pepper (Oh boy, did Pepper scare him). Of course, all of this was given that Loki didn’t kill him before any of them got the chance. Which was—
What was he thinking?
Was he thinking?
I think you know the answer to that, Parker.
No. The answer is no.
To make things worse, instead of backing out slowly like a sensible person, Peter decided to actually go through with it. So now, he and Loki were walking down the windy streets of New York—dressed in normal clothes (kind of. A suit was normal, right?), which he had to admit looked a little strange on the Asgardian—in the direction of Central Park. Well, more specifically, towards the Met Museum.
Funny, Peter thought. Only a week (five years) ago he was on a bus headed towards MoMA. Now he was walking towards a different museum with an actual Norse god. Maybe he didn’t think that one through.
No, he definitely didn't think that one through.
Actually, would the museum even be open? It had only been a week since Bruce snapped everyone back into existence. Honestly, he wouldn’t blame the museum-folk if they didn’t have everything together just yet. And Loki was, like, a thousand years old. He’d probably lived through more than half the stuff there. Just—this was a terrible, terrible idea.
It was sunny outside, not a hint of bad weather in the air, but it was chillingly cold with the wind and the skyscrapers of downtown casting long shadows on the pavement. Peter read an article about that once—street canyons or something, it was called. They caused the wind to be stronger because of the air pressure when the streets narrowed and opened. Like the breaststroke. Open, closed, moving forwards.
And that was not at all relevant.
He had a coat on anyway, so the wind wasn’t so bad, and even though the air was smoggy (typical New York) it was marvellously familiar.
Peter kept walking, occasionally glancing at Loki nervously. The supervillain just kept walking beside him, looking around at the city. Nobody else on the crowded streets of New York seemed to recognize him, which was a good thing. He did not need to deal with that right now because Mr. Stark would ground him for twice his lifetime if any villainy occurred.
But there was no turning back now.
To Loki’s visible disappointment, the museum was not open. The door was blocked with yellow tape and a sign that declared their opening date to be a few weeks from today. The exterior of the building looked different from how Peter remembered. It looked worn, dirty—like someone had not taken care of the architecture for the full five years that he was dead. Which was probably true.
“We could break in,” the god suggested, waving a hand at the door. His fingers shimmered green for a moment, and Peter felt his heart skip a beat.
He’s going to break down the door!
“Um, no,” Peter quickly objected, shaking his head vehemently. “We are not breaking into anywhere. We have to do something legal.” Emphasis on the legal part.
Loki took a deep breath and slumped forward slightly, looking disappointed, but the light on his hands faded.
Oh, good.
No B&E today.
After a tense moment of silence, the god asked, “Then what do you suggest we do?”
Peter shrugged, thinking of options. Most of—well— everything was closed. Central Park was an option, but he honestly didn’t know if Loki would want to go there. There wasn’t much to do in the park save for walking around and talking. Holding an extended conversation with the god didn’t really seem… doable. Besides, the park was littered with trash; Peter had been earlier in the week and seen it for himself. So no, not a good choice.
“Have you ever had a hot dog?”
A hot dog. Really, Parker?
Loki’s lips thinned. “I can’t say that I have.” He probably didn’t even know what it was. It was not like the name was very descriptive.
“Let’s go find a hot dog stand. There’s gotta be something around here.” Peter skipped down the steps, nearly tripping on the last one, which was embarrassing, but oh well. His sticky feet caught him at the last possible second, so he didn’t fall flat on his face in front of the God of Mischief. That would have been bad. Not that this situation wasn’t already bad. He was looking for hot dogs with Loki.
Turning his attention back to the street, and quickly making sure that Loki was still behind him, Peter looked for any sign of a nearby hot dog stand.
Spoiler alert: there was nothing. Peter was sure—absolutely one-hundred percent sure—that there was a hot dog stand outside the Met Museum. It was not there. He could have sworn… Never mind. They would have to find something else.
‘Something else’ turned out to be bagels, huge fluffy bagels with cream cheese and smoked salmon and capers. The bagel place was quaint, nestled in between Avengers Tower and Central Park, which was good because they wouldn’t have too far to walk once this was over. It smelled like fish and bread and lemons, for some reason. In all honesty, though, Peter was just grateful that something was open.
There were a few others in the shop, the tables were mostly empty, and the majority of the people inside looked to be waiting for take-out. So, they had found a seat pretty quickly by the window, watching the people as they walked by as they waited for their bagels in dim lighting and awkward silence.
When they arrived, Loki loved them, and once again, Peter was astounded at how much Asgardians could eat. “Dude,” said Peter— and did he really just call Loki ‘dude’? “You ate, like, four of those. How are you not full?”
Loki put down the fourth bagel, and replied after swallowing, “Humans are different from others, but for most creatures in the Nine, the longer you are away from your realm of birth, the less energy you can take from it.”
“So, you need more food to make up the difference?” Peter filled in, curiosity growing. What? Space aliens were interesting. They were aliens. How could he not ask a few questions? He leaned forward with his elbows on the table and chin resting in his palms.
Loki tilted his head side to side, then vanished most of the wrapping paper with a wave of his hand. Peter looked around the shop anxiously to see if anybody noticed, but they didn’t even bat an eye at the… magic? Or was magic preventing them from seeing it too?
“Somewhat,” he averred with a nod. “More so for beings with seiðr—you would call it magic—such as myself and Thor. Less so for those without.”
“Thor can do magic?” asked Peter, eyes widening. He had seen the lightning, but magic? Never anything like what Loki did, vanishing things just by pointing at them.
“What did you think the lightning was?”
Oh.
Right.
Obviously.
“I don’t know,” he replied sheepishly, wiping his fingers on the napkin on his lap. “Powers? Didn’t think it was magic.”
“The forms of magic are different, but it is still seiðr.”
“What else can you do with magic?” Peter asked, returning to his horrible table manners. “I mean, the lightning is cool and everything, but I’ve never seen anything more than that. So. Magic is real. That is too cool. What can you do?”
Loki blinked at him once, face lighting up into a cheerful grin. Then he answered with a question of his own: “What do you want to know?”
“Everything,” he said animatedly. But for now, only; “Can you conjure objects?”
“In what way?”
“Like, make them come out of nowhere,” Peter elaborated, tossing his crumpled napkin into a garbage can in the corner. He only narrowly got it in.
“Depends,” answered Loki with a careful smile, leaning back in his chair and gesturing somewhat randomly with his right hand. “I can make objects appear—” he summoned a pen (for a moment, Peter thought it was a knife and felt his heart skip a beat) “—and disappear.” The pen vanished in a ripple of air.
“Cool.” He smiled, watching it, and ignoring how his brain screamed that magic defied every known law of science. “But can you make things?”
Loki’s brows narrowed and his light smirk disappeared. “Why?” he asked, suspicious.
“Because I forgot my wallet, and we haven’t paid yet.”
His head fell forward, and Peter could tell he was trying not to laugh with the way his shoulder shook, though his face gave none of that away.
“What?” Peter cried indignantly. “Those bagels are twelve dollars each. I don’t carry that much cash in my pockets.”
“You said,” recalled Loki, chuckling, “that we would only do legal activities.”
“That was before I owed sixty dollars in bagels.”
Loki sighed, still smiling. “I suppose I could make a passable imitation if I knew what your currency looked like.”
“I only have fives,” Peter said slowly, taking the crumpled bills out of his back pocket. He was not about to hand the cashier twelve five-dollar bills—because that would be weird.
“Fantastic,” Loki muttered dryly. “Are you sure we may not simply leave?”
“No.”
Loki huffed, “Fine. I’m calling my brother.”
Wonderful. Because another Norse god at a bagel shop who couldn’t understand the first thing about how money worked was exactly what they needed right now.
Loki pulled out a phone from… nowhere… and brought it to his ear after a few taps.
“I thought you guys couldn’t use cell phones,” Peter noted, squinting.
“They’re relatively simple devices,” Loki replied, shrugging as the line rang on the other end. “Thor has only never bothered to learn.”
Ah. Well, that explained it. Thor couldn’t use the toaster in Avengers Tower. That was common knowledge because the last time he had tried, the kitchen caught on fire. The sprinklers put it out, thankfully, but nobody knew how it had happened in the first place. Peter just assumed it was an Asgardian thing. Guess not. Thor was just bad with toasters.
“Brother,” Loki said into the phone, not missing a beat. “I need—” he looked at Peter and mouthed, 'how much?’
Peter did the math in his head in less than a second: “Sixty-two dollars and seventy cents.”
Loki repeated the number into the phone, and Peter thought he heard, “What for?”
“Bagels,” the god replied, tone completely flat, but he was smirking as if he could already guess Thor’s reactions.
“Bagels?”
“Yes.”
“Bagels?”
“Are you going deaf? Yes, bagels.”
Peter stifled a laugh.
“Brother, why?”
Loki replied without answering the question: “I am with Stark’s Spider-child.”
Why does everyone think that?
“You know,” said Peter matter-of-factly, raising a pointed finger. “I’m not actually his—”
“Yes, Tony was looking for him earlier.”
Mr. Stark was looking for him? Wait. That meant—
That meant Tony was awake. Tony was awake. They had to get back to the Tower!
“Mr. Stark’s awake?” he asked, leaning forward half over the table. His voice was loud enough to carry through, though not loud enough for the other customers scattered around the shop to hear.
“Yes.”
“We have to go—”
Loki raised his other arm—the one that wasn’t holding the phone—above his head and snapped once. A moment later, Peter was standing in the common room of the Tower, rubbing his forehead with his fingers. That was… nauseating. The floor felt like it was moving beneath his feet and the whole room was swirling. That wasn’t good.
His spider-sense was all over the place, yelling at shadows that weren’t even there and insisting vehemently that there was a threat right on top of him. There wasn’t. It was just being annoying.
He fell backwards onto the ‘Sofa of Shame’, as had been dubbed by the Avengers. Everything was still spinning. “What—” he half-slurred incoherently. “Where are we?”
Peter thought he saw Loki walk towards the elevator on the other side of the room, but everything was still blurry, whirling. He couldn’t make out shapes, but the sound of his voice from over there helped in pinpointing his general location.
“The Tower,” Loki replied, unmoving. “Stark is two floors up.”
Peter pulled himself from the couch. The room was no longer spinning quite as severely, but it still was not comfortable. He made his way on shaky legs to the elevator, where Loki was waiting for him. Where had everybody gone? This room was packed when they left. A light ding sounded as the doors opened down the middle, and the two entered wordlessly.
It was a short ride, no more than seven seconds, but the silence was terse and awkward.
Another chime dinged as the doors parted for them a second time, revealing the waiting room and all the Avengers plus a few others.
Clint was sitting on the counter, talking to Wanda who was right beside him, though standing. Captain Rogers was sitting with Falcon and the Winter Soldier in the middle of the room. They were quietly laughing about something. Bruce, Thor, and the Guardians were by the floor-to-ceiling window on the opposite side of the room, being their usual rowdy selves.
Peter was so focused on the chaotic scene that he almost didn’t notice Pepper coming up beside him. “Tony’s awake,” she said, smiling at him, and Peter could see the welling tears in her eyes. “He’s asking for you.”
He just nodded and let Pepper pull him towards a door on the right, vaguely aware of Thor calling after Loki, asking about the bagels.
Crap!
The bagels!
They didn’t pay for the bagels.
Peter’s dead. He’s dead. He did a dine ‘n dash over sixty dollars’ worth of bagels.
May’s going to kill him.
Then Tony, probably.
If he’s awake enough for that.
The door swung open, and Peter shuffled through awkwardly. Colonel Rhodes was already inside, standing beside the hospital bed where Tony lay. He was wearing a T-shirt—probably one of Tony’s by the band logo on the front—and dark blue jeans under the leg brace.
Mr. Stark looked terrible, and that was an understatement. The bed was bent slightly so that he could sit up, and Peter saw the full damage the Stones had done on him. His arm was wrapped entirely in bandages, and he could still see the burn marks trailing over his shoulder. There was wrapping around his torso too—his ribs. Beyond that, there were dozens of small scratches and bruises that had yet to completely heal.
His lower body was completely covered by a blanket, but he wasn’t wearing a shirt, exposing the large misshapen scar from the arc reactor.
“Hey, kid,” said Mr. Stark, though it was more like a whisper and hardly audible. His eyes were still closed, so Peter couldn’t tell how he had known it was him.
“Mr. Stark,” Peter breathed in relief. His vision was blurring, but the dizziness of Loki’s teleportation spell—or whatever it was—was wearing gone. He stepped closer to the bed until he was right next to it, debating whether or not to sit. Probably not. His voice caught in his throat as he tried: “I’m sorry. I—”
“You ‘ave n’thin to ‘pologise for,” he slurred, wincing slightly. Should he even be awake? He should be resting, right? “‘N it’s Tony. We’ve been o’er this.”
“Right. Sor—” he caught himself at the last second.
Nothing to apologise for.
Yeah, right.
Tony nearly died.
“You ‘kay?” asked Tony, eyelids cracking open, only to shut closed again.
The light, some part of his brain reminded him. It’s the light. The room was already dim, but after no exposure to any light for a week, Peter guessed even the low glow of the overheads was too much.
“I’m fine.” That was mostly true. He’d had a few injuries after the battle outside the Compound, but his healing factor had taken care of them pretty quickly. “How are you feeling?”
Tony tried to shrug, then made a noise between a grunt and a wince as his shoulder jostled. “I’ll live,” he said through clenched teeth.
Well, that was not saying much.
“My arm’s toast, but ‘m gonna make a new one. Or s’mthing. Dunno yet.”
Pepper swung around to the other side of the bed and rested a hand on his good shoulder. “You can worry about building prosthetics later,” she said softly. “Just rest, for now.”
Tony gave something that resembled a nod and hummed wearily.
Colonel Rhodes briefly left the room to inform the others about Tony’s status, then returned immediately after. Pepper didn’t leave Tony’s side, holding his hand and occasionally offering a comforting glance in Peter’s direction.
Peter pulled up an armchair from the corner of the sparsely decorated room, curled up, and fell asleep to the sound of Tony’s and Pepper’s breathing.