The guard outside pulled the door closed, and as it swung around it revealed Loki standing there – horned antlers and all.

overclock 0.1 s

His thoughts sped up – literally, processors coming online and taking apart information faster than they had any right to, processing the emotional flood and tamping it down – not half as pretty as his nice neat stop command, because he still felt it, like time had stood still just to let him feel it and pack it back away, without showing a damn thing on his face, because he would not show weakness. Not here. Not to him, ever.

His processing turnover whirled back down, back into a rate that wouldn't actively damage his brain, and he didn't jump as the door met its frame with an impressively final thoom.

"Son of a bitch," said Tony conversationally.

"No, my mother was bipedal when she begat me," said Loki, stepping forward with a smirk, raking his eyes over Tony's orange jumpsuit. "Oh, how the mighty have fallen."

"What, seriously? That's what you open with? You'd think somebody called 'Loki Silvertongue' could do better than a total cliche."

"Mm, but it has the simple ring of truth, and as much as you may call me a liar, Stark, I have to admit... a simple truth in the right place can cause the most exquisite chaos." He closed his eyes, inhaling as if he could savour the scent of it, looking like – well.

Tony coughed and politely looked away. "So, what 'simple truth' have you come to impart, that you think'll make me fly off the handle and do something stupid?" he asked, doing his best to sound bored. Which was kinda difficult in the face of the homicidal rage and desperate helplessness. It didn't particularly matter that he didn't have the armour here – although, damn the fact he didn't: a few more days, and he'd have the subspacing refined to a point where he'd never be without the armour again. Yet even if he'd had it, it wouldn't have made much of a difference. If Loki was here in person, and not just an illusion – which Tony doubted – killing him here still wouldn't matter. This wasn't him; this was just a sliver of him, the smallest fraction.

"That you should worship me, Tony," Loki said, moving with a swiftness akin to Steve's until he was right behind Tony, and Jesus Fucking Christ stop

Error: Operation denied for duration of patch application.

OVERRIDE, DAMN IT!

– he did not jump out of his skin.

"Or as much as you could worship, having no soul," Loki continued, sounding amused. "But is it not meet that in the final days of the world, even the soulless might beg for salvation?"

"I might beg you to shut up," said Tony. "But I'd rather enforce that. Permanently."

"So hostile," Loki murmured, and at a more human speed moved around to the other side of the table, taking Fury's seat. "This is not the time for hostility between us, Tony – Thanos threatens this multiverse, this cluster as you so call it – and he is an experienced hand at war. This Yggdrasil would not be the first that he has burned to ash."

"Great, once I kill you maybe you can compare notes with him on how it's worked out for you both. Your info's a little out of date. The Living Tribunal finally got off its ass and ganked that guy – what, half a day ago? Time's relative."

"I would commend you on fitting so many falsehoods into so few words, except that you actually believe them all," drawled Loki, and how did he manage to drawl like a smug Southerner while sounding like a Brit? It boggled Tony's puny little mortal mind. But then the smugness vanished, leaving behind nothing but business.

But damn, he looked sincere.

"Spit it out," Tony told him.

"The Living Tribunal lost," said Loki. "Oh, it set back Thanos some – but even now, the Mad Titan gathers his strength once more." His voice dropped to barely above a murmur. "But look ye, gods and mortals, to the saviour of the Nine Realms; with my help, Anthony Stark, this multiverse is not yet doomed."

Sure. And he'd come... here.

"You mean you need my help," blurted Tony.

Loki bared his teeth in something that might be described as a grin, if the person doing the describing was the god of lies.

"Truth," the aforementioned deity purred.

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed, but if you've got criticism you'd like to share, please don't be shy. Time-travel is tricky, so I really would be extremely grateful to anyone who'd like to point out what didn't (or did) work for them.

I'm planning to start cross-posting the sequel, Gambit, here soon, assuming FFN keeps playing nice with me. If you'd like to see what's already been posted elsewhere, you can visit my AO3 account, which is linked on my profile. Gambit will be the last story in this series.