Plagued

Loki bided his time waiting for Tony to wake. The mortal looked like a haggard dog on the verge of keeling over into death and while that had its charms, Loki was in need of a live genius billionaire. He watched him from an orb he'd produced in his hotel room. This was the final piece of his plan and though he was loath to be so reliant on anything from Midgardian, he couldn't pull this off alone anymore. It pained him that the very source of his power was stifling and forcing him into this unusual and compromising position. He would never admit to being weakened but the truth was he was. Something in his magical composition was less than it should be and he himself was unable to identify what it was. Not only couldn't he sustain certain spells for long periods of time but he also felt physically drained after performing any sort of sorcery which was more than troubling. he vainly hoped that in allowing the only other person he deemed worthy enough in brain power to examine him under this pretense of needing specialized weaponry, he'd find some sort of answer. No mage could know his terrible secret without exploiting it and while if Tony ever found out he'd definitely use it to his advantage, Loki found him a worthy adversary, deserving of whatever physical expenditure it would cost the god. As Loki brooded over his situation further, a flicker in his orb called him from his thoughts. Tony was moving, waking from his spell-induced slumber and stretching.

The engineer sat up from his couch, rubbing his eyes and feeling a strange sense of vertigo. He waited for his eyes to adjust to the weak morning light. He raked his calloused fingers through his mussed hair and rose from the cushions to brew his customary cup of coffee in the kitchen when he was stopped short by incredibly long, black-clad legs and startling green eyes. Thing didn't take kindly to the second intrusion of his home, nor being messed with quite this early. He scowled darkly up at Loki, a scathing remark fighting to fall from his lips. He was like a grumpy kitten, all fluffed up and perturbed in the god's sight. "Now Stark," Loki began in a placating tone.

"So it's safe to assume that yesterday wasn't some sleep-deprived hallucination?" Tony sighed weakly. "I guess you want me to get started now." He was less than happy to be on Loki's leash, even less so than the fact that he was awake before seven.

"Don't tell me this was unexpected, Stark. Surely you of all people know I'm
quite diligent in acquiring things I need and want," the god purred dangerously.

"What about what I need and want?" Tony challenged in a growl.

Loki cocked his head to the side with one eyebrow shot up his pale brow, inspecting the mortal as if he were a strange insect. "What you require I have already freely offered and am here to supply. As to what you want," the weird came out bitterly venomous,"it is inconsequential and unprofitable to me to concern me with what you desire, therefore I don't care." His smooth voice showed no hint of emotion as he stared Tony down and straightened his stance. Defiantly, Tony glared up at the god, his jaw working in tensed anger. "Then I won't do it," he responded flatly.

Tony expected anger and yelling to follow. He expected Loki top turn red with rage and possibly do him physical bodily harm as well as tear into his already shredded psyche. What he got was a swelling, sonorous chuckle that echoed off the quiet walls and scared him half to death. "Oh brave Anthony Edward Stark, standing in the face of his destruction like a true hero. Arrogant and proud as ever. I applaud you, I really do," Loki laughed and clapped his hands together, adding to the reverberating sound of his laughter. Tony merely continued to glare. "Shall I tell you what I have done with your pathetic mortal soul? Hmmm? Because I've not removed it from your body yet, but I have suppressed it. Compressed it into a tiny, tiny fraction and locked it away inside your body so that you may remain alive for as long as I deem you useful to me. The very essence of your being, the personality of the man you once knew will never return, because it is non-essential to my purpose. You can still feel emotion and yes, you can still hate me all you want, but you will never be able to retaliate in the way you once could. The part of you that was foolhardy and reckless, the part of you that was rebellious and free, the part that was Iron Man; I have taken it from you and you will never get it back if you continue to defy me. Do you continue to refuse? If you do, know that I have the power to peel back the layers of your mind and completely unravel you until the only thing you understand is pain and then I will simply torment your body in every agonizing way possible until you are no more."

Tony swallowed thickly, a real sense of dread seeping into his bones, chilling him to the core. Had he been his normal self, he probably would have laughed in the face of such danger and made some snarky comment about villains and their monologues, but he couldn't even think beyond the intensity of Loki's threats. "No...I....I won't refuse," he said in a small voice that can hardly be characterized as his own.

"Then shall we proceed to your laboratory?"

Tony nodded and led him towards the elevator, feeling completely list within himself. He finally was the thing he had dreaded becoming, the thing he had changed his entire life to avoid; a soulless creation abetting evil for selfish gain. The god followed, his lithe body stalking the billionaire like a panther out for the hunt. Trapped in the elevator together, the two men stood in silence, both listening to the rapid rabbiting of tony's pulse as they descended into the bowels of the Tower.

When the doors opened to reveal the genius's workspace it was terrifying to see. Tools and blueprints were scattered on the floor. Forgotten holographic drafts spun and displayed haphazardly throughout the air at various odd points.There were half built and half torn apart machines and devices strewn across every surface and Dummy was whirling in circles off in the corner. It look like a mad scientist's demented lab, which honestly wasn't too far from the truth. Loki surveyed the mess around him, his face harden with the absence of emotion as he calculated how far into his own madness Tony had already fallen. He hadn't lied when he threatened to crush the inventor's soul, what he had neglected to mention that a highly-functioning individual without the presence of its eternal self would start destroying itself anyway. Of course had he known, Tony would have told Loki to go to hell and either let himself die or figure out how to rebuild a soul, he was just that insane.

Loki crossed to a table and picked up a green glowing rod that had several buttons on one end and what appeared to be attachments that fit over it. He picked it up and twirled through his fingers. Tony watched the blatant display of dexterity with a touch of concern. It was supposed to be a multi-functioning weaponized rod for Clint, It could be converted into any number of shapes and lengths, bent to an arc, and the attachments were various explosives and projectiles.

Watching his device in the god's hands, he began to realize that he had already begun to regress into an arms manufacturer and can't hold that against Loki entirely, or can he? He wants to, he wants to hold onto every last shred of anger against the man standing in his workshop and hate him until he finds a way to kill him. He wants nothing more than to rip this man apart, but he knows that he can't. Even if Loki did not have such a hold on his soul, he could not kill him just out of agitated spite and hatred because he was essentially still the good guy. Still the guy who could mitigate a world crisis and defend the planet. He was still a hero, it just happened to be buried, even more so now, under everything else.

Loki placed the rod down and cocked his head at Tony who hadn't moved at all and was staring blankly at the god. "Something troubling you Stark?" he asked, not sure that he actually cared. He needed Tony to start and stop all his nonsense that was taking away from the task at hand, he had very little patience left.

"No, no. Just step onto the pad there and Jarvis will scan you," Tony answered, shaking himself back into reality. He attempted to clear some space in from the largest monitor in the room as Loki stepped onto the pad before him. "Jarv, run a full body scan and highlight extraterrestrial energy signals and unidentified wavelengths. Save data in classified file on my private server under Project Green," he spoke to his AI. It was a weak title but he was literally incapable of doing better. When the screens lit up and data began running, but Jarvis made no reply, Tony got upset. "You could at least let him talk," he grumbled to the god. Loki's face took on an apprehensive look before he shrugged and the screens went wild. "You there, J?"

"Yes, glad to be back, sir," Jarvis answered. "The amount of data collected should take a few hours to properly sort now that Mr. Laufeyson's scan is completed." Loki hissed at the sound of the title the AI unit had given him.

"Your machine will address me solely by my name, not what your precious S.H.I.E.L.D. agents have christened me," he ordered.

"Yes, Loki," Jarvis responded while Tony glared at him through the lucite screens in front of him. Loki level his gaze with a sinister glare of his own before stepping from the platform and closing the distance between them. "I shall return when the sorting is done and you can be of further use to me."

"Why is this so important to you? Why can't you just use the magic anyway and find some spell to conserve your energy?" Tony asked, blurting out the words before he could weigh the consequences.

"Do you dare to question me?" Loki asked and Tony felt a squeezing in his chest. Pain coiled around agony clenching in his body and forcing him down to the ground. The metallic taste of blood stained his mouth as he crouched into a fetal position, gripping his stomach and trying to block out the pain. "Do not stand in a false place of power over me, Stark. It is to me you owe your very life!" Loki snarled and increased the pressure around Tony's soul. He vanished, leaving Tony sprawled on the ground panting for air as the pain started to dull and die away. He stayed down on the ground, unable to move for a small eternity, blood still seeping from between his lips onto the concrete. It's not until Jarvis alerts him that the data has been completely sorted and classified that he can actually will himself up off the floor and out of the spiral of confusion and anguish. He has to finish this thing, finish and finish Loki, before he loses himself entirely.