Ƈ O Ɲ S U M Ɛ Ɗ

If people want to know, they can approach me off of anon but I'm not gonna be talking about this publicly anymore. Both of us did wrong, I've taken responsibility for my part and apologised but a year later and I'm still suffering from the fallout and so far talking about it has only made it worse. So if you want to know, ask me off anon but otherwise I won't say anything else that they can use against me

Thor had tried to explain to the team that Loki hadn’t been, well, himself when he’d attacked New York. That he’d always been prone to mischief, never exactly trustworthy, but that he wasn’t generally evil. Believe it or not, Tony was trying to believe that, trying to look past the memory of Loki’s hand on his throat and remember instead how it had felt when he’d had his brain played with. It sufficed to say he hadn’t liked it much. Tony also knew a thing or two about the endless struggle for redemption and how it felt to change absolutely everything about yourself, try and do good, and have it not mean a damn thing to half the world. He’d been lucky enough that the other half had given him a second chance–one he knew he didn’t deserve. But he’d also never tried to take over all of New York City with a rabid alien army. 

No, said a little voice in his head. You just let innocent cities across the world get bombed with your weapons. Your death count is much higher. 

“I don’t think you’re contagious. I think you’re an anomaly,” Tony explained, already rolling his chair away to one of the many machines on his desk. “Your brand of science leaves traces. Let’s call them…blips in the natural order of things. This realm–this planet–this reality, operates on a finite amount of matter–nothing created, nothing destroyed. You wave your hands and do some abracadabra, and you offset the balance. I can trace the energy.” Tony didn’t look up, continuing to speak as he analyzed the ‘sample.’ So far, Loki was right–as much as he hated to admit it: there was nothing to see, nothing to find, nothing lingering. But just because he didn’t see it, didn’t mean it wasn’t there. “Magic is a system, right? It has to have coding. And I’m good at code.”

“Okay, fine, it’s ‘real’.” He put air quotes around the last word, finally looking up to see that Loki had not, despite his threats, actually left. He hated to admit that he was glad–he shouldn’t be–but it had been a while since Tony had had a real challenge, and alien ‘magic’ was the ultimate test. “Now that–” He said, pointing the pen at Loki. “Makes sense.” He didn’t–couldn’t–believe that magic was random, that was as simple as snapping your fingers and making a wish come true. There had to be a logic behind it, a theory as strange as gravity must have seemed to the ancients, that he could, piece by piece, begin to decode.

Tony tried his best not to look impressed. The last thing he needed was Loki getting a big head or, worse, thinking Tony was actually interested in anything he had to say. But the truth was, well, he was. The man just turned his pen into a snake. That shouldn’t have been possible. It wasn’t the weirdest thing Tony had seen, not by a long shot, but there was something different about seeing it up-close when no one was trying to kill him and no alien army was knocking on his door, ready to take his head off with a magical guillotine. With no immediate threat, no lives currently in danger, no “heroing” he had to do, there was nothing but pure, unadultured, scientific inquiry. And he loved it. 

“And this Seidr–it understands the oath?” he asked, eyebrows raised and leaning back so far in his seat, he’d have fallen over long ago if he hadn’t designed it for that very instinct. He put his legs up onto the desk, crossing at the ankle, and folded his hands behind his head–the picture perfect image of casual indifference, but inside he was buzzing. “You’re trying to tell me you’re in contact with all the atoms of the universe? That you’re having ‘magical’–” Again, he made air quotes around the word “Conversations on a cellular level?” He sat up. “I know I’m going to regret this, but fine. Let’s…oath it out. What do we shake hands or something? Blood pact? Do I need a lock of your hair? A small doll I poke with pins when you annoy me?”

Loki wasn’t sure whether being an anomaly was much better than being seen as a monster or contagious. He was...Loki wasn’t sure what word to use, but it was rare anyone showed this much interest in his seidr, so it was a welcome change  that Stark was and wanted to learn more. However, he didn’t like feeling like a science experiment, nor did he like the idea that he was only worth having around so long as he could be poked and prodded at. He was grateful that his back was turned to Stark, he would have been humiliated if the mortal saw how his usual stoic mask crumbled from the onslaught of memories assaulting him. 

One in particular was causing him the most pain. He was suspended in the air, his skin being peeled off by the Chitauri to test his healing abilities, his defenses and his pain threshold. If he could have passed out from the agonizing torture he was being put through, he would have, but Ebony Maw’s intrusive microsurgery needles kept him awake throughout it all. Loki was allowed no rest from the many ways they had tried to break him. they’d just kept pushing his body and mind till it could take no more, and once they had broken it, they had been able to rebuild it however they wanted. They’d indoctrinated and radicalized him into their way of thinking, turning him into the villain Stark still saw him as.

He took a moment to recompose himself before he turned back to Stark, plastering a smile on his face. “I suppose Thor’s told you all about how unusual I am.” Better to pass him being an anomaly off as a joke than to admit that it had touched a sore spot. Loki’d been seen as unusual and as an outsider all his life, it was something he was used to so it was second nature for him to act unbothered when someone else pointed it out to him. “I wish I could confirm your theory, but there’s no coding to what I can do. There are things about the universe that are mystical in nature, however much you want to deny it, it doesn’t make that any less true.” He admired Stark’s intelligence, but this was one area the mortal fell short. His ignorance and refusal to accept what his science couldn’t explain made him narrowminded, and ultimately would get in the way of understanding the universe on a deeper level.

Loki wanted to explain seidr to Stark, to help him understand and learn. It had been centuries since Loki’d taught anyone and he wasn’t ashamed to admit he missed passing his knowledge onto someone else. However, teaching was a two way street, the potential student had to be willing to learn, and open to possibilities that contradicted what they already knew. There was no problem having questions, Loki welcomed them, but outright denial wasn’t welcome in a place of learning. “There is a system of sorts, there’s a sort of give and take when using a spell. It takes energy to wield seidr, if you don’t have enough of it, or are inexperienced the spell will either fail, or hit back at you.” It wasn’t unknown for overenthusiastic beginners to die from trying a spell well beyond their ability. “It’s a living force, it should be respected, those that abuse it aren’t just scum, they’re a danger to themselves and everyone around them.”

The pen turned snake continued to slither up his arm till it reached his shoulder and hung around his neck. It brought a smile to Loki’s lips and he gently stroked his fingers along its scales. He’d always had an affinity to snakes, they were wonderful creatures, often misunderstood like he was and far more intelligent than humans gave them credit for. They were also survivors, using that little they had to find a way to come out on top, it was a trait Loki respected. “You can take it if you want.” Loki offered. “It’s perfectly safe.” Loki could be cruel, but he wasn’t about to turn a pen into a snake that was venomous, not when he wanted to earn Stark’s trust. “See for yourself how real it is.”

Loki wasn’t expecting to make a believer out of Stark overnight. He knew it would take time, if it happened at all. Annoying as it was to be doubted and to have Stark resort to childish air quotes, he could understand Stark’s skepticism. He was being asked to believe in something that he couldn’t prove with his machines or any other scientific means that were available to him. If Loki had been in Stark’s position, he would be just as reluctant, so he could hardly fault the mortal for how he was acting. “It’s not so much a conversation, think of it like how you might combine elements together. You’re not talking with them, you’re just putting pieces together that already exist.” Stark was making it more complicated than he needed to.