So, this pretty much just came to me. I have been reading a lot of Thorki lately, that might have prompted this, although there is nothing but brotherly love in this story. I shall try my hand at Thorki another time :)

Remembrance

They are between battles, each resting in their own way.

Thor sits uncharacteristically quiet, deep in Tony's lab, watching as the dark-haired man tinkers with tiny things too complicated and delicate and precise for him to understand. It reminds him of Loki, many decades past, bent over his runes and old parchments as if they were made of gold and the most delicious of meads.

Thor doesn't try to touch anything. He learned his lesson a long time ago, after being burnt and cut and thrown against the wall one time too many –the magic is unstable still, Thor, you oaf, do not touch that!- and worst of all, after being ordered out from the seiðr chambers by his brother. Thor hated being banished the most.

His form is perfectly still against the cream-coloured couch –stained with grease and oil and whisky, for it has been part of the lab for long enough to get sucked into the whirlwind that is Tony when he is creating- but his mind never quiets. He should be sleeping, he knows, to restore his strength and his energy, but a part of him rebels at that, because he is a god, he is the Mighty Thor, the Thunderer, the Odinson, and he does not need rest against such frail foes as he now faces.

He knows the true reason he will not go to sleep tonight, or the night after or the next, until he has no other choice than to give in to exhaustion and welcome oblivion with open arms. It is Loki that is the Liesmith, not him, and so he does not attempt to lie even to himself.

He misses Loki. Before the fall, before he lost his brother –perhaps forever, and doesn't that thought bring a painful clench to his heart- he would keep company with him in nights like these, in the too-short nights before battle. Thor would pretend nothing ailed him, and his bother would pretend to believe him –and perhaps to be at ease himself, because Thor has never been able to see past the mask Loki uses sometimes, though not for lack of trying. They would simply sit together, sometimes speaking of deeds long past, sometimes just listening to the other's breath and the crackling of the fire, and without fail when Thor felt most agitated, the night would pass carried on his brother's voice, which would weave the most enthralling tales until the sky turned pink and the sun rose. Those nights were as much part of his armour as the breastplates and the chainmail, perhaps even more so.

Tony swears, breaking the god out of his melancholic thoughts, suckling in a finger he has singed in his carelessness. For a moment Thor can imagine longer hair on him, and in the dim light of the lab he can almost convince himself he sits besides his brother once again. The Allfather knows Loki too had often harmed himself in his blind pursuit of seiðr.

Tony realizes, then, that Thor remains in the room with him, the sudden pain waking him from his absorption. The god appears carved in marble, but Tony has known hurt and brokenness and loneliness for longer than he wants to acknowledge and even in an asgardian it is a sight he recognizes. He speaks without hesitation, just as he had spoken insults and teasing and admiration earlier, because if there is one thing Tony knows of life is that it's better to throw yourself into the deep end feet first.

'Trouble sleeping?' The tone is almost mocking, but then again, Thor is not the only one that remains awake at five in the morning.

'Just remembering, my friend. It is all well, for all that tomorrow we shall go into battle once again.'

Thor's voice always makes Tony want to smile, even when it's contorted like this, trying to appear lighter than it is. It's loud, and happy, and eager, and it suits Thor. Tony likes that, likes the god in spite of his sometimes condescending attitude, because if anyone can understand a god complex it's Tony fucking Stark, and, in any case, Thor is a god.

'And yet here you are, watching me work in the dark like the little creepy stalkers I always end up gathering. Are you a stalker, Thor?'

'Ah, my friend, it is far too late for jesting. Perhaps I should retire now and be done with it. Tomorrow shall be harsh on us, and no wise warrior faces the battlefield weary if he can help it.'

Tomorrow. Tony doesn't want to think about tomorrow. He doesn't want to think about how Loki is stretching the whole thing out, the destruction of the earth imminent -but it has been so for weeks, and imminent does not mean that, damnit- he just wants the whole thing over so he can get on with his life, away from Cap's disappointed eyes when Tony is less than generous and moral and good, away from Natasha's pointed smiles, from Clint's quiet camaraderie, from Thor's puppy-like excitement at everything, even from Bruce's awesome science powers. Because if the crazy Norse god drags this out much longer, he is going to get attached, and Tony does not share. He is possessive, sometimes oppressively so, and if the Avengers stay much longer then Tony won't be able to let them leave. And that might end up badly for Tony, because he may be Ironman but he's pretty sure that if they gang up on him he will lose. Tony doesn't lose. Much like Loki, he has a salted-earth policy.

'What is it? You seem a bit… downcast. I thought battle was like a party for you Norse gods.' And the words have just left his mouth when Tony realizes. Thor can't disguise the flinch that goes through him, and Tony feels nothing but admiration when he thinks that despite everything the golden god will fight tomorrow, against the brother he had long thought dead.

'It is nothing, son of Stark.'

It is, though. Thor loves his brother still, but everyone he knows wants only to tear him apart. Perhaps his mother cares for Loki, for Tony knows that Odin cares even less than Howard ever did for him, and when you do not measure up to a Stark as a parent, well, it is a new low.

'You miss him, don't you?' The words slip before he can stop them, because Tony doesn't know how to keep his mouth shut, and also because maybe he can help, can do something for the big god after all.

Thor looks away, but still rumbles in the affirmative. Tony walks to the couch and sprawls all over it, getting comfortable, and Thor sits back down when he sees Tony has no intention of dropping the conversation.

'How is he? Underneath all that crazy, I mean.'

'I do not wish to trouble you with recollections of the man that tries to destruct your planet, man of iron.'

'I ask. You answer. I'm pretty sure even asgardian gods know how conversations work.'

Thor smiles at that, and his head falls back as he remembers.

'He's always been studious. I know no other capable of such concentration when he is working on his seiðr.' Thor's lip stretch into a smile. 'He used to play pranks on everything and everyone. Not even the Allfather could avoid his mischievousness.' Tony wonders when that mischief turned to mayhem, wonders why. Thor has sought that answer for a long time, but remains empty-handed. "As a brother, he was always there when everyone else had left. Not always with sweet words, for Loki's tongue has always been sharp, but still there. He would weave a braid into my hair, for courage and luck, before every trial I faced to become a warrior. Before battle, on nights such as these, he would invent tales the likes of which I have never heard anywhere else.' Some of those long-forgotten heroes and realms and colours return to him, and Thor hugs the memories to his chest as one would a baby. 'He was always quick to strike back when affronted. His enemies might not have known it was his vengeance they suffered, but they never went unpunished.' Father never sought retribution for Loki, not as he did for Thor, and the god understands how that would make his brother seek vengeance –always vengeance with him, never justice, for Loki has not known justice in all his years and he is not likely to learn it now.

They remain quiet for a while, Tony watching the ceiling and trying to imagine a Loki that was less crazy, less twisted, tries to picture the hurt little boy that never knew his father's love, that remained always in the shadows of another's achievements, and the jotun god takes shape in his mind as a long lost twin to the defiant, lonely boy he once was. He does not fight it. There are still more than enough differences between them.

Thor thinks of his brother, of their childhood in the hallowed halls of Asgard, of his fall into the abyss, of the cold desperation in his eyes when he rejects his brother once more, even if he is in another realm now. He thinks of Loki's words, most of all, because for all that Loki is a great seiðmann his silver tongue is still his greatest weapon.

I remember a shadow, living in the shade of your greatness.

'He was always lonely. Alone. Both, even when with others. Sometimes I could make that go away, but not always. He learned to live in isolation even if surrounded by people, ignored, unwanted. Mother and I cared for him, but it was never enough. And I was foolish and young, and often forgot about him to go on adventures and fight and play with the other children.' He quiets, because he had meant to chase Loki's words away with his own but it is not working. 'I let him fall. Not to the abyss, I would have held onto his hand for all eternity if that could have stopped him from falling, but I let him fall into the shadows. I let him be forgotten.' The confession almost crushes him, the words he knows true finally out, formed, real.

It hurts Tony to hear Thor speak like that, but by the sound of it the words need to be said, need to be drained out from a man who has had to hold it all in for centuries. No matter what you did, he would have turned out the same, he wants to say, but doesn't. Because for all that Tony is brash he is also a genius, and he knows there is no way he can predict what a thousand years of neglect can do to a person. Maybe it would have helped. He doesn't think so, looking at Loki now, but perhaps that is not entirely fair. Perhaps the child he was could have been saved.

'It does not matter what he has done, what he will do. I will not fail him again. Whatever his punishment is at our return to Asgard, I will join him. I will fix what is broken in him, as much as it can be fixed.' He whispers, and his words are laden with a promise he intends to keep, even if the Allfather and Ragnarok itself try to stand in his way. 'I won't let him fall again.'

Thor clasps a hand to his shoulder and Tony starts, because the movement is sudden and he didn't expect the god to be quite done yet. But Thor has used up in a night a great many words, and he doesn't quite need to speak more. He will retire to bed now, before dawn rises.

'Thank you, my friend, for listening to me even if you despise Loki. You have been of great help in this dark night.'

And before Tony can think about it the words are spilling from his lips, because the god deserves to have someone he can talk to, even if that someone is Tony.

'Thor.' He doesn't wait for the god to turn around. 'If you ever want to talk about your brother again… It doesn't bother me, not like it would the others. I know Clint is upset about the whole mind-control thing, and Natasha about Clint being taken away from her, and Bruce really doesn't need the stress and he kind of got dragged back into things because of this, and Steve is a bit too good to understand that people are always a little bit evil so you probably shouldn't try to talk to him about Loki.' Or me, he thinks, but he doesn't say. 'But for me it's cool, I don't particularly hate him or anything. And I'm stealing his catchphrase, anyways, so I might as well help his brother, right?'

Thor smiles. He is glad there is someone he can talk to when it comes to his brother. The Warriors Three and Lady Sif and Father could not bear to speak of him without murder in their eyes and their tongue, and he had thought the Avengers would be the same.

'What is this "catchphrase" you speak of, son of Stark?'

Tony stretches in the couch, happy to see the god is almost back to his usual self.

'I do what I want!'

Thor's laugh, loud and booming, resonates in Stark Tower.