And that's a wrap! Thank you for reading, favouriting, and alerting. :) This is the final update. Within a few days I've got a one shot to post, and then hopefully within the next week or two editing will be complete and I can start posting my next story.

As for this one, I will eventually write a prequel to it, so you can all find out the details of Loki pre-Natasha and how they met, since I've gotten quite a few question about it. I was planning on doing it any way, but now that I know people want to know, I'm even more inclined to do so. We're looking at probably 2 longform stories between then and now.

Trigger Warnings: Past abuse, drug use

I do not own the Avengers or anyone therein.

Chapter 9
Things in the proposal are going well. The client seems interested in Tony's work, everyone is smiling and nodding in the short little break they're taking, and some pretty blonde that about two months ago Tony would have taken out and then to his bed is chatting him up when his phone starts to buzz inside his coat pocket. He flicks a smile her way, holding a finger up, pulling the phone out.

Steve.

He can feel Odin's one good eye on him across the room as he excuses himself and steps towards a quiet corner of the room by the window.

"Is everything okay?" he asks first.

"You need to be here."

"Really? I'm in the middle of a proposal. Are you sure that it can't wait?"

"He's leaving, Tony. Or trying to. Are you going to let him? After all of this?"

Tony feels like he's standing on air and in a minute gravity's going to catch up and he'll come crashing down. His stomach sinks like lead. He wants to tell Steve he can't do it, that he can't come, that he's needed here. That his job rides on this, even though he knows it doesn't, not really. He's only here because they need someone to answer the really technical questions—if they even come up. He just wants something else to blame when he can't stop Loki from leaving him.

"I'll see what I can do," Tony murmurs into the phone and hangs up before Steve can reply. He takes a deep breath to steel himself, turns around, and Odin's already there.

"Emergency, Stark?"

"Uh, yes sir." He swallows; it's scary how that bear of a man can move around the room so silently. "I need to go. Someone needs me." As he says it, he realizes it's true. Loki does need him, as much as Tony needs Loki to stay around. No one's ever really needed Tony before, just wanted. He lifts his chin up some, ready to fight Odin over his leaving if he has to.

"I expect he's very important to you."

"Uh. Sir?" Tony blinks, suddenly confused. How much exactly does Odin know about what's going on?

"Get out of here, Stark." Odin goes to looking out the window.

"Will do, Sir." He walks out of the room. As the boardroom door shuts behind him, he pauses.

Loki Odinson.

Oh.

He shakes it off and sprints down the hallway to the elevator.

XXXXXX

"—I just didn't know what was so interesting about the show. Natasha! So good to see you!" Steve is talking fast and brightly and grinning his forced grin that says 'oh God, please guide me through this, I do not know what I'm doing.'

"Steve," she says, stepping inside and they hug briefly.

"Tony?" She whispers.

"En route," he replies, equally quiet, and they pull away.

Loki's looking absolutely stricken in the hallway, a bag Natasha had loaned him stuffed full of clothes by his feet, and he looks at her desperately, hopefully, before Natasha gets tackled in a flying hug and she just holds him for a few minutes. He's all bone underneath his clothing that hangs too loosely, and she smooths his hair down gently with one hand.

"Hot chocolate?" Steve asks, that bright desperation back in his voice but it's eased off a little. He knows Natasha's going to help him keep Loki here.

"That sounds lovely," she says as Loki steps back to stay 'no.' He gives her this look like she's betrayed him and she smiles at him reassuringly. "Especially if you have mini marshmallows."

"Let's go find out." Steve goes into the kitchen, leaving them alone in the foyer for a moment.

"Natasha?" Loki's voice is a half-broken question hanging in the air.

"Just a little while longer," she replies and heads for the kitchen, not waiting on him to say anything else. Tony has done something she knows she never could; she will give the man a chance to fight.

In the kitchen, Natasha and Steve talk and Loki just sits there, slumped in a chair at the table. She notes how he fidgets, how his eyes dart around, and he's wringing his hands. His eyes, though, are the clearest that she's ever seen them, even if he does occasionally tremble a little. Loki, clean. It's a novel concept and one she wants to get used to.

The hot chocolate gives them something to do with their hands. Steve is nervous and preparing something for an early lunch; he would move like that when the rush got heavier when they worked together. He always did make the best staff meals when he was freaking out about a large party coming in.

The front door opens. Loki starts up like he's been shocked, looks at Natasha pleadingly. Natasha doesn't look at him, sips her hot chocolate serenely and notes the way Steve's knife cuts down a little harder.

Tony's home.

XXXXXX

It dawns on him, when Natasha doesn't even jump up or act surprised about the door opening and Tony rushing into the kitchen, that this was planned. That Natasha has planned this and somehow Steve figured out he called her and they're all conspiring and insane. He starts to push himself up, planning on walking back to the apartment across town if he has to; Natasha puts a hand on his wrist, runs her thumb along it.

"Sit down, Loki." She looks at him, eyes soft. She hasn't betrayed him; she thinks this is what's best. He doesn't know what to do, but he trusts her because Natasha had helped save him before. He can sit through this… this fiasco if she thinks it's best. She doesn't ask him to do things that will hurt him, not knowingly.

XXXXXX

Tony looks at all of them, feeling breathless. The red-head at the table, with her hand on Loki's wrist, he doesn't know but he can guess it's Natasha, Pepper's other half. Steve's cooking, but he feels a fond rush for the man anyway because Steve cooks when he's nervous but he's managed to keep Loki here. The resolve he'd felt in the board room, talking to Odin, is suddenly a heavy weight on his chest and making it hard to breathe.

"Tony," Steve sighs, brightly. "This is Natasha. Natasha, Tony."

"Pleasure," Natasha offers, and they shake hands before Tony sits down at the table, across from Loki. Loki isn't looking up at him, body totally rigid.

Tony doesn't know what to say. Tony usually is full of words, words come to him and tumble out and he throws them about like a shield. His entire way home he has thought of words he will say, but now, here, Loki across from him, they are gone, deserters every last one. He has never done this before, tried to convince someone they should stay.

The silence stretches out like a too-thin wire about to snap and take everything with it.

Tony puts his hands on the table together and looks down at the wood grain. He needs to speak. Now. Say something, anything. All of his arguments and pleas that he had come up with are too empty.

"Loki, do you want to leave?" He looks up to watch Loki.

Loki doesn't answer, just sinks a little more into his chair and curls a little more around his mug of hot chocolate.

"Because," Tony pauses, licks his lips, grasps for something eloquent. "Because I would like it if you didn't. Because I…" the words stumble a little and his chest is too tight "I would like you to stay. I…" He grips his hands together to stop them from shaking and closes his eyes for a moment. Fuck it.

"I love you, Loki. I think you're amazing and wonderful, I think you're brilliant. You're smart and sharp and know things that I don't know and don't think I'll ever grasp. I don't want to get up and deal with a day where you aren't around. I like seeing your smile, when it's small and private and you don't think I notice. Your laughter, all of it. It's beautiful. You're beautiful. This sounds so stupid, and I know you're scared. I'm scared. I'm terrified. I'm terrified I'm going to blink and you'll be gone, I'm terrified you'll disappear again and I won't be able to find you again. I told you I want to know everything and that hasn't changed; I still do, I haven't even learned an iota of an iota of what it is you love and what you like because you don't tell me, but that's okay too because I'm willing to wait because that means you'll stay that much longer, that means there'll be that much more for me discover as we go. Steve's right, I do do terrible things, a lot, all the time, but you are not one of them—Loki, you're one of the best things that has ever walked into my life and I don't want you to walk out because you're scared and you think you don't deserve something good for once, because if anyone deserves something good it's you. You've changed me or I wouldn't be here right now, and I'm begging. Loki, please. Please don't go. I can't stop you, I can't make you; just, just there's a place for you here, with me, and I don't want to lose you again. I want to try, I want this to work, and I've never felt that way about anything in my life." His hands are shaking and his voice is thick with unshed tears. "I love you, Loki. Stay, here. With me."

His eyes have gone to the table, because if Loki is going to reject him, he doesn't want to see it. His heart aches; he never knew words could hurt so much when torn out this way. He takes in a ragged breath as he hears clothes rustling and closes his eyes. A tear slips out and splashes on his hands.

Soft, thin fingers brush it away and rest on them, gently. Tony looks up, and meets green eyes that are deep as the universe, reflecting the same terror Tony feels.

"I'll try," Loki whispers.

Tony catches Loki's hand between his own, and kisses it softly.

"That's all I ask."

XXXXXX

There's a photo on a mantle piece from New Years—they are all there in this big group hug, Loki in the center smiling, a sort of confused smile that suggests he's still not certain how this has happened. Tony has an arm around his waist, and is leaned in to whisper something into his ear with a sly smile. Steve looks harried, like he's just stopped cooking for a second because they want the photo; Pepper and Natasha are both clearly already drunk. Next to it is a diploma, awarded to one Loki Odinson in music education. And next to it, another picture. This one is a small, private moment; two silhouettes framed by the sunset, watching it. Content.

On the fridge hangs a calendar, a date circled at the end of the month in red; Tony's handwriting is cramped into the little space: 12 mth clean. 11 mth sober. Dinner 6.