This fic is based off of Lei-sam's comics, 'Stranger in a Strange Land.' The comics are absolutely amazing - so well drawn with such an original and attention grabbing story-line, and I am so honoured to be able to write a fic about it.
As well as the plot, Lei-sam has helped with a bunch of parts in the story and the editing, so credit for this fic goes to her as well!

Her comics can be found on her tumblr, which is lei-sam dot tumblr dot com
If you haven't seen them before, I highly recommend doing so! ^-^

Low below the golden and magnificent palaces and galleries of Asgard, lay the dark and dismal dungeons, old and forbidding like Asgard itself, leaving all of its inhabitants stuck in an endless gloomy mood.

Through the hallways of the rows of cells containing the prisoners, a group of guards made their hourly rounds, checking up on all of the prisoners. As one guard came across Loki's cell, he stopped to stare in at the disgraced prince of Asgard. He turned to another guard and grinned, "is it not enthusing? We are more suited for the throne of Asgard than the son of Odin, himself."

The other guard tore his attention from other prisoners to walk over and stand beside the amused guard, equally enjoying the view of Loki locked up in a cell. "For an insane criminal, he sure does do a good job boosting the self-confidence."
A low growl escaped Loki's lips as he glared at the guards who dared to belittle him. He could feel his blood boiling in his veins as rage began furiously building up inside of him. He had been enduring endless taunting and insults from the guards since he had been tossed unceremoniously into his cell, and they certainly did not make that easy to do. He had finally had enough. "When I get out of here, you two pathetic beings will be the first I massacre on my relapse assassination spree." Loki laughed, "or maybe you're not even worth it. Look at you two. So worthless, that Asgard made you guards of all things. You'd have to be brain-dead to screw up a job like that."

The guards took a step back, fearing the blood-craved, insane look in Loki's eyes, and the merciless tone of his voice. Even from behind the barricaded window he was scary…it was just a window, after all. It wasn't impossible to break out of. It was only very, very unlikely to get out and be alive, but Loki hadn't been in the cell for very long at all - he was still fresh with rage, violence and he craved destruction. The guards knew better than to test their luck with someone such as Loki. They retreated, continuing with their rounds.

Loki began pacing around his cell, wishing he had something to destroy. He felt angry. Worse than he had before - and not just because he was still wearing off the Tesseract and whatever Thanos managed to do to his mind, but because Thanos managed to control him in such a way that he had done. Loki had been used, controlled, abused and manipulated... On top of which, he had been sentenced to four thousand years of solitary confinement, and for what? A few pesky mortals falling to their deaths? It could hardly count as anything compared to all the lives Odin had taken in all of the wars he had partaken in.

Suddenly, something flew through the wall of Loki's cell, and hit the floor. Loki cocked his head to the side, curiously observing the body on his floor. When the body groaned and looked upwards, Loki recognized him to be one of those 'Avengers' from Thor's special team from Midgard. In other words: a threat - especially considering Loki was locked up and more at a disadvantage. Loki wasted no time to lunge towards the mortal, ready to kill him.

"No! No, no, no!" Tony yelled, immediately trying to avoid Loki; protecting his face with his arms as he crawled backwards into the corner. "Fuck, Loki, wait! I come in peace; don't kill me - wait!"

Loki froze with his hands just mere centimeters away from the mortal's throat. Tony was obviously trying not to lose his cool, but was failing miserably. Loki would have questioned why he seemed so distressed, or why he was in his cell, of all the people and places, but no longer found it in himself to care. He finally had what he wanted. He could let out all of his frustrations while killing an enemy and a friend of Thor's. There was nothing better he could have possibly asked for.

He again reached for Tony's throat, ready to pull his head off. Strangely, however, Loki seemed to be doing no harm. He couldn't even affect Tony's breathing. Loki stared at Tony, and punched him in the face. Tony's head whipped to the side with the force of Loki's punch, throwing him to the floor with the momentum. He put his hand on his face, expecting to have a dislocated jaw, but found that that he wasn't injured, nor had he felt any pain. With a surprised and confused expression, he looked up at Loki, "I... didn't feel that. That didn't hurt."

Loki stared at the mortal, bewildered. Loki was a God - Tony was nothing but a mere defenseless mortal who ought to be bleeding on the floor hanging on to his life by a thread, not sitting there completely unharmed. "Why?!" Loki growled, punching Tony again.

"Would you stop that?!" Tony argued, trying to fight the urge to engage in a fight with Loki now that he couldn't get hurt by him. "I'm not here to fight you!"

"SHUT UP!" Loki yelled, punching Tony again. After Loki had hit Tony countless times without doing any harm, he gave up and sat on the ground in front of Tony with a long sigh. "Why are you here?"

"I don't know, I... Something happened that shouldn't have."

"What happened?! What were you doing before you came here?!"

"Well… we were fighting Doom," Tony began, only to be interrupted by the puzzled expression on Loki's face. "Dr. Victor Von Doom," Tony hurried to explain. "He's a crazy and evil dictator back on Earth; he favors the use of technology and magic. Anyways, after the whole New York incident, he became obsessed with you and your 'Godly' powers and magic . I started monitoring his every movement; he spent a good chunk of his time in Germany and, strangely, on my rooftop. I didn't know what his intentions were, I just assumed he had lost it, so I held my ground, waiting to see if he did anything more. Fury suspected that he was after the Tesseract or some of that alien tecnhology your arms left behind."

Loki huffed in annoyance, "technically, those were not my troops…"

"Anyway," Tony interrupted him "I think he was actually looking for something to do with you; with your energy, power, or magic…whatever that all is. It wasn't until he successfully stole all of Earth's power and caused the biggest blackout possible - and believe me, I'm pretty impressed that the guy managed to pull something like that off - that he caught anyone's attention. So the Avengers got together and sought him out. When we confronted him he said something about finding the "original source" and that he had managed to find a way to create a portal from Earth to that source…which means -"

"Me... he was referring to me and my magic," Loki growled in annoyance, finishing Tony's sentence. "But I do not understand. Why me?"

"Because you're a god. He said something about wanting to impress you enough that you'd consider him worthy of godly powers and grant it to him, keeping him as an ally. He can't go after Thor because, one: lightning is a little harder to track down, and two: Thor's a good guy, he wouldn't go grant some evil bastard godly powers."

"But how did you get here?"

"That portal. Doom was still in the middle of turning it on when we came and interrupted him. Steve and I started a fight with Doom while Natasha, Clint and Bruce tried to turn off the portal. They finally got it, but as it was closing Doom tried to slip into it. Steve and I tried to stop him at the same time and, well... Steve managed to immobilize Doom, but Doom pushed him and he was about to fall into the portal himself. I saved him, but in turn, I fell in, instead."

"And you came to the origin of my powers... to me," Loki finished.

Tony nodded, "yeah, I believe I came to you because Doom used your magic to target his destination, your powers where like a beacon that guided me here."

Loki looked perplexedly at Tony.

"So, is Thor around anywhere? I can't undo what happened without him. Also, it was really nice of him to miss that fight," Tony rolled his eyes. "He would've been really helpful. I'll need to build some sort of Earth-to-Asgard communicator... what kinda technology you guys got here?"

Loki growled at the mention of his brother's name, and squeezed his hands around Tony's throat again. "I cannot seem to harm your body, Stark, but mark my words; I can harm you in other ways."

"I-I'm sorry? Would you rather help?"

Loki frowned at Tony, slightly taken aback from Tony's offer. He seemed so... genuine; as though he wouldn't mind help from Loki. "No," he spoke, as if the answer were obvious.

"Great!" Tony got up from underneath Loki's grasp and jumped on the bed. Making himself comfortable, he leaned against the back wall with his hands behind his head and his ankles crossed. "So, how often does Thor visit you? Tell me he hasn't come by already today."

Loki gave Tony a look that Tony didn't quite understand. "I have not seen Thor since he brought me back here."

"What?" Tony asked, leaning forwards to sit upright."You're kidding, right?" Thor never gave up on Loki... why wouldn't he visit him now?

Loki crossed his arms over his chest, annoyed with Tony's existence. "GUARDS!" he yelled as loud as he could, making sure he would be heard.

"What are you doing?! Shh!" Tony desperately pleaded. He didn't know how else to get Thor to come down if he never visited, but he was certain that the guards wouldn't take well to a human being stuck in a cell - he was positive that would count as breaking in.

It took the guards a few seconds, but they came running over to Loki's cell. Loki didn't need to say anything as the situation was perfectly clear, however the guards stood staring in at Tony, wondering what to do. They couldn't risk opening up the cell to get him out in case it was a trick of some kind, but if it wasn't, they couldn't just leave the human in there with Loki.

"Oh, go get Thor," Loki spat out. "Make yourself at least some degree of useful."

"We can't disturb Thor unless it is important."

"I'm important!" Tony protested, offended.

Loki walked over to Tony and leaned down in front of him, "play along or when you get out of here I will kill you in ways you do not know exist for it is so horrendous," Loki warned in a very low voice. He picked Tony up off the bed and stood in front of the window, again. "This is Thor's companion; his teammate from Midgard that he loves dearly and speaks about often. I suggest you summon Thor now or I will kill this mortal."

The guards exchanged another look, positive that Loki was playing a trick - he probably just wanted to escape so bad that he was using an illusion of something he thought the guards wouldn't question. He wouldn't or couldn't hurt the being; it wasn't real.

Loki took their hesitation to throw the mortal body into the window. Tony felt some sort of electric, magical feeling run all throughout his body. He could feel it, yet it didn't hurt him. There was no damage to his body, either. Presuming that there should be, he acted severely hurt and didn't move a muscle.

The guards panicked. Someone was in there with Loki, and he may or may not be alive. The guards both shoved each other and tripped over their feet in attempts to hurry and get Thor as soon as possible.

"How did you know I could withstand that?" Tony asked, sitting up when the guards had left.

"I didn't," Loki answered, leaning against a wall, awaiting Thor's arrival.

"You... You could have - "

"I do not care for you or your existence. I want you gone, mortal. I do not care how it happens, but it will."

Tony sat in an upright position with a sigh. Looking around, he realized that Loki had furniture... but none of the other cells in view seemed to have any. "Why doesn't anyone else have a bed?"

"That is of too much luxury."

Tony stared at Loki in disbelief, "so... they... what? They all sleep on the floor? Every night?"

"Yes."

"But... why do you have -?"

"Because my," Loki paused, contemplating on which word to use next. "My... mother, would not have me be without it."

"Who's your mother?"

Before Loki could answer - not that he was going to - Thor was seen approaching their cell.

"Brother," Thor greeted bitterly.

"Thor," Loki spat.

Unresolved brother drama...that was just what Tony needed. He wasn't sure if he should interfere with the reason they were having a reunion, or if he should awkwardly try to stay unseen so they could try to talk it out.

"What is it like?" Loki asked, "roaming around free while your brother rots in the dungeon? I'd quite like to experience that joy for myself."

Alright, talking - probably not so good. Tony didn't really need his new roommate or his only hope to be stuck in a bad mood. "Hey, Thor!" Tony tried to lighten the mood, jumping up to stand in front of the barricaded window. "Good to see 'ya, again!"

"Man of Iron, why are you here? How did you get in there? What trickery is this?"

"Is it not possible for this not to be 'trickery,' Thor?" Loki questioned. "I am not to blame for everything."

Thor turned to the guards and pointed at Tony, "how did this man get in there?"

The guards looked at each other, trying to come up with an answer. "I-I don't know," one spoke up. "Loki was alone five minutes ago."

"Did you not say that he had hit the barrier and fallen?"

The guards nodded.

"Trickery," Thor concluded, turning back to Loki.

"Thor, Loki didn't do this," Tony jumped in. "It was Doom. I was on Earth -"

"Long story short," Loki interrupted with thin patience, "he fell through a portal that has been locked upon my magic."

Thor stared at the pair for a minute, trying to decide whether or not the story was of truth. "Open the door," Thor finally commanded to the guards.

"But, Sir -"

"Now."

The guards nodded and stumbled to open the door for Thor.

"If you try to escape, I will kill you," Thor warned Loki as the doors opened.

Loki shook his head at Thor's ignorance, and headed for the back of the room as if to show that he had no intentions of escaping.

Thor walked in, and grabbed Tony's arm, pulling him out, "Man of Iron, whether or not this be a trick, I cannot risk you being here with Loki, nor can I risk you being among Asgard. My people will not take well to that. I do not know why you are here, but you must leave. I will open a portal from my world to yours with Mjolnir. I can return you home and we shall sort this nonsense out there. I also intend to bring this Doom back to Asgard with me to hold prisoner."

Before Tony could reply, Thor had created a portal with his hammer. Tony barely had time to even look through the portal at Earth before he was dragged inside. He went through the portal, but appeared back at Loki's side, causing Loki to stumble backwards with surprise. He tried to grab onto something to keep his balance, but ended up touching the barrier, burning his hand. He cursed, waving his hand around.

"Stark, what the hellebróga?!" Loki yelled.

Tony stared at Loki's red hand. The window was enough to badly injure Loki... why didn't it affect him at all? Tony quickly made a mental note to have some fun with how pain tolerant he had suddenly gotten.

Loki growled at Tony, causing Tony to retreat in fear - not fear of getting physically hurt, but of what else Loki might be capable of.

Suddenly, Thor appeared between the pair. He stared at Tony.

"I don't know," Tony answered Thor's unasked questioned.

Thor shook his head and disappeared again.

Tony and Loki exchanged a confused look, but split up, staying at opposite ends of the cell. Tony sat down on Loki's bed and got comfortable; leaning against the wall with his arms behind his head and ankles crossed again.

Loki glared at Tony with deep hatred, "get off my bed."

"I'd like to see you make me," Tony grinned, challenging the god that was now physically harmless to him.

Loki narrowed his eyes, "you would not -"

Before Loki could finish his sentence, Thor appeared outside of the cell again.

Tony immediately jumped up to his feet and ran over to the window, curious to know what happened. "What'd you do? Did you find anything out?"

"Yes, I saw the Avengers," Thor nodded, and shared the information he had retrieved:

"But we have Tony," Clint argued, not believing or overly caring that there was another Tony out there. One was enough. He didn't want to risk anything to have two Tony's.

"Not all of him," Natasha protested. "If there's a part of Tony that got separated from himself, no matter how small, we have to go save him. Tony isn't Tony without all of himself."

"No matter how much Tony we think we have, that small piece of Tony out there with Loki is still Tony," Bruce agreed. "Hell, we don't even know what Tony is really Tony; which one is the original."

Thor nodded, "Banner is right. I cannot allow Loki to have such a shadow forever, nor would my people take well to that. The Man of Iron would be stuck with Loki in a small cage for the rest of his life. I cannot put a friend through that - even if there is another one of him," Thor paused. "I fear that if Loki does not convince the Man of Iron into becoming allies, then Loki would use Man of Iron's life to escape... however, it seems the Man of Iron has gained a great resistance beyond that of a mere human; he withstands that which even those of Asgard cannot. Loki had tossed him into the barricade that keeps all prisoners in their cells, and no harm was done to him, but we do not yet know how invincible he is, or if he can be defeated at all. I do not wish to allow my brother to test that out with his limitlessness, merciless wrath like that."

The group exchanged a few looks regarding Tony's sudden invincibility, agreeing with Thor. If it was possible, Loki would surely find a way to kill Tony if he wanted to.

"We need to get him out of there as soon as we can. He'd do the same for any of us," Steve agreed. After everyone exchanged a look, Steve added "I hope."

"How did this happen? How do we go fix it?" Thor asked. "Banner? Have you any ideas?"

Bruce clicked his pen as he leaned over the counter, staring at his papers on the counter. "Tony fell through while Doom's portal was closing, and it wasn't stable to begin with. As it was turning off, it was only half working, so, figuratively speaking, it tore Tony's soul in half, throwing him in some different state, or trapped in both dimensions."

"Simplify, son," Steve requested, trying to understand Tony's condition better.

"When Tony fell through the portal, it worked and didn't work at the same time. Its job was to teleport whatever went through it to Asgard. It did that and didn't do it. We saw him come right out the other end as if it hadn't worked, but he also got sent to Asgard. The machine malfunctioned. He's still one person, but existing in two places at once."

"If he came from battle, why has he no armour?" Thor questioned.

"I don't know. Tony is Iron Man, but the suit isn't part of his soul, so, I guess it was left on Earth, unable to go through the portal. Look, I'm really not the right guy to be answering this stuff... all I know is that we have to get him put together."

"How do we do it?" Thor questioned.

"I... I don't know. This is something I would need Tony for."

"We can't include him in this," Natasha forbade. "That's why Clint made sure he was busy in his workshop. You know what he's like. He'd try to spend time with his other self, and he'd end up being irresponsible and stupid."

"I know," Bruce confirmed, "that's why I'll need time. I'll need to talk to Doom and see if I can get anything out of him. Natasha, I'll need you to come with me. Thor, go back to Asgard and make sure they don't kill each other. Steve, Clint... look after our Tony."

Tony sighed, trying to process everything. "So, I'm... existing... in two places, at the same time? And I don't even get to enjoy it?"

Thor nodded, "so it seems. Banner will get you back as soon as he is able. In the mean time... it looks like your solitary confinement is not so solitary anymore, Loki."

Loki and Tony both looked at each other. They were going to be stuck together. It could be days - weeks even - until Bruce could fix the mess. There was no way Tony and Loki could put up with each other for so long without killing one another.

' "Stark, what the hellebróga?!" Loki yelled. '
Here, Loki uses the Old English language. 'Hellebróga' translates as 'terror of hell.'