The god is practically unconscious when someone finds him. He is battered and bruised, body and soul; simply exhausted, too world-weary to hold his eyes open anymore. So when Someone finds him, he doesn't protest when that Someone scoops him up in strong steady arms and holds him close against a warm solid body. He thinks he maybe slips into sleep for a little while.

The certain Someone carries his oh so precious delicate cargo to a bathroom. He works out how Loki's armour comes apart and relieves him of it, then strips the thin cloth of his undergarments away as well. Loki is too tired to care about modesty, too far gone to really care. He is too pale and too thin beneath his clothes, ribs pressing against his skin like they're trying to break out, ridges of his spine too easy to count as that Someone's warm careful hands lift him and lower him into warm softly scented water. Everything is warm, he's surrounded by steam, seeping into his skin, into his bones, into his tired tired aching muscles and drawing out the pain buried in them. The water takes the weight from his shoulders and carries it for him. He doesn't have to think.

Tony Stark sits on the closed lid of the toilet with his chin on his hands and wonders what could possibly push someone this far out of themselves.

Before the water can get cold Tony is hauling him out again, and Loki is practically a ragdoll, slick skin making him slippery and difficult to manage. He falls against Tony's chest and his hoisted up over Tony's shoulder, making the dark cotton of his t shirt damp. Then he is wrapped in such soft thick towels, and he sits huddled on the ground with his bird-boned arms wrapped around himself while Tony rubs another towel through his hair. When he's dry Tony takes the towels away and leaves him shivering despite the warmth of the room.

Loki is taller and so much thinner than this someone, but the god's own clothes are too dirty and tattered for him to wear again, and so Tony manages to manoeuvre Loki into a clean pair of boxer shorts and drag a faded old Metallica shirt over his head. It practically drowns him. He's still shaking. Tony sighs and scoops him up once more and bears him to a living room, wraps him up in several blankets and sits him on the sofa. He presses a mug of tea into the god's long icy fingers but Loki just sits and holds it, staring into the hot liquid.

Tony sits on the edge of the coffee table with his fingers steepled under his chin and watches him.

"You're supposed to drink it," he says finally, his voice ghosting into the silence of the room like a puff of smoke. Loki makes no move to put the mug to his lips, but starts shaking, harder, and Tony has to take the mug away from him before he drops it. Loki still shakes, and finally he shows that he might just be alive, as hot salt tears build in his glass green eyes. Once the first falls another chases close behind and they don't stop coming.

For a moment Tony hesitates, but only for a moment, and then he is leaning forwards and pulling Loki into his arms and holding him tight enough to stop his shaking, letting him soak the shoulder of his shirt with salt water. Loki cries silently, until he's exhausted himself and can do nothing more than sleep, so Tony carries him to bed and stays with him to keep him warm.