Plagued

Tony decided there was really only one logical way to get what he needed, but that Bruce was too smart for him to actually just flat out lie. It had to be clever and witty and provocative, all things he prided himself on being and still his mind was drawing blanks around the entire situation. After a few seconds, he decided to hell with all this cartoon evil genius scheming and called Bruce like a normal person.

"Uh, hey, Tony. How's it going?" Bruce's voice filtered into the lab, sounding somewhat wary and strained.

"Great. Fantastic. Never been better."

"That's good to hear. So what can I do for you?" he asked, his tone lightening just a little.

"So I had a question about, you know, all this biology mumbo-jumbo you seem to be all hung up on." He paused for a second; licking his lips and preparing them both for the absurdity of what he was about to unload. “So say a friend of mine was having some sort of allergic-type reaction to his own body and consequently happens to be throwing up black sludge? That's gotta be bad right? Definitely not normal."

Bruce sighed into the receiver and Tony winced. "It sounds like your friend either has some sort of autoimmune deficiency causing internal organ damage or severe alcoholism," he answered with a stern tone. "Tony if you're killing yourself, you know you shouldn't have called me. Go to a hospital and seek real professional help. I know rehab isn't glamorous, especially for someone in your position, but dying in a pool of your own blood and vomit-"

"Cool it Seventh Heaven, I'm not drinking myself into an early grave anymore, okay? I legitimately have a friend with this issue who is not a raging alcoholic. Now, let's back up to the autoimmune and internal organs? What exactly could be going on there?"

"Tony..."

"Bruce, please. I can't take him to a hospital, there'd be too many complications with that."

"And why is that?” he asked reflexively before pausing to sigh heavily into the receiver again. “You know what. Never mind, I don't want to know. The less involved I am with any of this, the better for us all," he groaned and Tony could almost hear him taking off his glasses and rubbing up over the bridge of his nose. "Black vomit can be an ulcer, tear in the esophagus, internal bleeding, kidney failure, a tumor maybe, heck, it could be yellow fever for all I know. Is that the only symptom?"

"Well...uh…no. But this is going to come out really weird, so bear with me. So every time my friend, uh, exerts himself in a habitual sort of way he kind of starts dying."

The line went quiet for a long time; so long Tony started bracing himself for a loud crash and mindless roaring on the other end. He exhaled softly when he was met with yet another exasperated sigh. "Tony...you're killing me here. Look, I can't really tell you without knowing all the facts. All I can give you is my previous theories. If your friend suffered any blunt force trauma recently or has any other pain internally, it'd be safer to go with an ulcer or bleeding, but I honestly have no clue."

"Would you considering taking a gander at a few scans I have in my possession?" Tony asked with an edge of hopefulness seeping into his voice.

"Send them over and I'll get back to you with a report of everything that I can conclusively prove. I can't promise you anymore than skeptical theories seeing as you won't go to a hospital, but I'll help however I can."

"Thanks, Brucie. It means the world to me, big guy."

"Yeah, yeah. You're welcome, Tony," Bruce answered before hanging up and leaving Tony in the silence of his lab.

"Jarvis," he called out, already secure in the fact that the A.I. unit had sent the scans.

"Yes sir?"

"How's Loki?"

"He has managed to recuperate somewhat, sir and has gotten himself into the guest bed."

"Sleeping?"

"Quite soundly. His vitals have also returned to normal and it has been an hour since he was last vomiting."

Tony groaned softly and grimaced. He had never really been around sick people so he didn't really know how to handle the situation well. What did you do for someone who had some kind of malignant disease and was spewing their guts? Chicken soup? He rubbed his eyes and huffed with a knot of aggravation tightening between his shoulder blades.

"Why am I stuck with this again, Jarv?" he sighed and shook his head.

"Because Loki saved you from the wormhole, Sir."

"Rhetorical, smart ass. I'm well aware of my sense of obligation. A life for a life and all that." He scowled darkly down at the steel beneath his palms that he was currently trying to press his fingers through with enough force to make his wrists start to ache. He was beginning to feel trapped in a situation that was built around him. Maybe there was more than just the incident in New York, maybe that was only part of something more that he wasn't quite seeing. Then again, maybe he was starting to get paranoid the older he got, but he knew something just wasn't right. His lips twisted in another unhappy grimace as he replayed the events leading up to his current situation and analyzed every moment he'd spent with Loki in that time frame. His brow furrowed as he realized the subtle changes in behavior and the strange familiarity he had allowed to settle between him that could almost be considered a friendship when you looked at his very short history of friends. Hell, he hadn't even stumbled over the word when talking to Bruce when he should have at least made a face at himself. And not to mention the fact that he was becoming borderline compassionate over this. Definitely not even going to touch that right now.

After a few more moments of staring at the empty space between his two spread-out palms, he decided it was best for him to leave the workshop and try to clear his head. Maybe he’d go for a drive, get away from the house for awhile, but then what if Loki woke up and decided to tear the house down looking for him. So no, leaving was definitely out, even if the walls were slowly encasing him like a coffin. He stayed and wandered aimlessly from room to room, from floor to floor, looking for anything to draw his attention out of his own head and into solving some meaningless problem. His hands flexed at his sides reflexively as he found nothing that needed his attention. It was maddening to the point where Tony started contemplating blasting through a wall with his repulsors and taking the time to rebuild it himself.

“Sir?”

“Go ahead Jarvis.”

“The report you asked for has been received from Doctor Banner, would you like it read to you?”

“No, just send it through to my tablet, I’ll take a look in a sec,” he answered with a soft sigh. It wasn’t the best option, but it was something to do that could help him claw his way out of this faster. He sat down on the couch in the empty loft and opened the document, attempting to read it. He hadn’t gotten very far when he was interrupted by a silken voice.

“When the angels fell from the celestial plane, they became demons, preying on the vices of man in hopes to gain their souls and drag them down to the depths of hell with them. They held power over men. They bred fear in their hearts and shook the earth. And they fell with Lucifer, the jeweled minstrel of Heaven, the beautiful bringer of light. And he became their ruler, the Prince of Darkness, plaguing humanity and bending them to his will with the lightest of persuasion. Even when he fell from grace he still held power, great power. And he was loved so by the demons that they left the presence of God to follow him down to wretched Earth and entwine their fate with his. They gave up the eternity men strive for, all of them for a chance to be loved as The Most High. ”

Tony looked up to see Loki leaning in the doorway, looking sallow and weak. He raised his brow, feeling his gut twist at the sight of him looking so tortured and sickly. “You getting to a point?”

“The point is Stark,” his voice spat out cold and venomous. “That I am a god among you mortals, born with power and cast from the graces of my overlord and yet I am not granted the same mercies. Where are my legions of darkness? Where is my power over your race? My own magic has turned against me to destroy me from my core. I have bartered my body and soul away for a fleeting chance to conquer man and what have I accomplished? Millennia have passed before my eyes and I have squandered it all in the hopes of being something greater, of being truly hailed as a god in showers of glory, of being loved. The inevitability of my demise drawing closer has made it very clear that I am crowned the lord of lies for the irony that the entirety of my life has been a quite elaborate fabrication. I have tried to obtain something that does not exist on the sole premise of telling myself that it does. The trickster fooling himself…it is tragically comical.”

“You’re monologuing and it’s getting really painfully cliché in more ways than one here,” Tony sighed and rolled his eyes. Loki’s gaze turned cold as he stalked towards him, wrapping icy slender fingers around his throat.

“Even weak I can still shred you apart and unravel your fragile mind, with or without a foothold on your soul. You have been of little help and if I must die, you will certainly precede me,” he growled, tossing him away like a ragdoll. Tony coughed harshly, gasping for each breath.

“Oh ye of little faith,” he finally managed to wheeze out and look up. Loki glanced down over his shoulder ready to snarl. “You seem to be recovering rather well for a terminal patient, I don’t think things are really all that bad yet. From what I’ve been able to see, which wasn’t very much given your interrupting sermon, you’re not retaining any of the previous damages.”

“Clarify, quickly.”

“Going into cardiac arrest should have permanently weakened your heart and made you susceptible to heart failure, but it didn’t. Jarvis ran other scans and there’s no damage anywhere else in your body. Not to mention being legally dead and not actually being dead is a huge indication that you’re still healing yourself at the normal rate.”

“So there is hope that I will not perish in the near future?”

“Unfortunately. So all that interweaving of Christianity and Norse mythology was pointless as well as boring and melodramatic, Lucifer, ” Tony quipped and got up. He dismissed the heated glare poised on him as he dusted off his pants. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to finish reading. Wouldn’t want to outlive my usefulness.”

“I should have thrown you into the wall in the same way your beast planted me into the floor,” Loki growled sinisterly and folded his arms over his chest. “Though perhaps it’s to my advantage you feel more chipper.”

“Chipper? That’s a stretch,” he smirked and turned back to his tablet, scrolling through Bruce’s notes and the list of articles he’d attached to the file. He had to admire the thoroughness of Bruce’s research in so short a time, but he was certain the doctor was concerned that Tony himself was in serious danger of dying.

“What is it you’re reading so attentively?” Loki asked after a few minutes of watching the inventor. Tony looked up with an almost devious smirk and rolled his eyes.

“Oh wouldn’t you just love to know.”

“Do not play cute, Anthony, it does not suit you at all,” he said snarkily and sat down in an armchair beside the sofa Tony was lounging on.

“I don’t play, I am cute,” he answered haughtily and continued to ignore him.

“Yes of course,” he sighed and rolled his eyes dramatically. “So am I to sit here in silence while you pretend I am not here?”

“A little testy aren’t we. I’m reading Bruce’s report on your condition in an effort to help you, but you keep interrupting. Why don’t you think up a few theories of why this is happening to you instead of whining like a bored brat?”

Loki sucked on his tooth, making an angry popping noise as he tipped his head back. He closed his eyes and sighed, releasing his frustration with Tony in a breath as he tried to clear his mind and think. The inventor had a point after all, he shouldn’t be sitting around waiting for whatever thing was going to hit him next and leave his fate entirely in the mortal’s hands. He rubbed his head and squeezed his eyes shut, feeling a headache come on slow and throbbing at the front of his skull as if the answer was trying to push its way out of the god’s forehead. “Perhaps it’s a curse,” he mumbled softly, looking up to the ceiling.

“Go on,” Tony pressed and sat up fully.

“Whatever malignant force that is in play only attacks my magical energy as if something has been tied to it. There are quite a few spells that can attach to another sorcerer’s magic in this way, but I’ve never known of any to be like this, many of them are spells to be cast upon a lover to be able to sense if they are weak or in trouble. Yet, I’m sure one of this caliber exists.”

“And you think someone may have done a little hocus pocus on you when you weren’t looking?”

“It could have been at any time when I was stripped of my powers and I wouldn’t have been able to tell,” Loki reasoned and rolled his head to the side to glance at Tony.

“Do you think I’d be able to see anything on the scans if you had a magical tag on you?”

“I’m uncertain. You’d have to have a scan of me before the spell was cast for comparison I suppose, but that may not be conclusive either.”

“We’ll try it anyways, make me feel better about it. Do you have any ideas of who you pissed off enough to do this?”

“There are a few angry enough, but fewer are skilled enough to actually do this…unless…”

“Unless?”

“Unless they’ve banded together against me,” he mused and rubbed over his face. It was a difficult situation; he was going to die one way or the other it was just a matter of what he chose. “All those I have angered in the nine realms could be joining together in an effort to bring about my demise in whatever way they can.”

“Let’s back up slightly before you start the wallowing,” Tony sighed and leaned forward on his knees. “Who would be at the forefront with the power to curse you?”

“Amora.”

“Alright, getting somewhere. Why would she attack you? What did you do?”

“She is a spurned ex-lover of sorts. What you refer to as a woman scorned, but it’s been hundreds of years and she’s never acted out so maliciously against me before.”

“So you believe she may have thrown an ‘I hate Loki’ party and linked up with someone weaker who hates you more?”

“It is the only explanation that I can divine from the situation,” Loki answered somberly, twisting his face into a hard scowl.

“Sir, the scans have been reexamined and the comparisons made. There does appear to be slight inconsistencies between the scans taken during the attack and now. I am projecting them for you now,” Jarvis cut in and Tony looked over the hologram projections.

“There’s a greater energy spike at the beginning of every spell after the attack. I say that probably confirms your theory. Who wants you hurt but not exactly dead?”

“Honestly? It could be just about everyone I’ve ever met. I am a wanted man by all counts and more than one would want to see me tortured to the point of near death and weakened to a defenseless plaything they can enact revenge and ire upon. Even you want me hurt if not completely removed from the face of existence.”

“Do us both a favor and tone down the theatrics for the sake of getting something productive done. We don’t know who she’s linked up with, so we focus on finding her and figuring the rest out later. Any ideas?”

“None.”

“Fabulous. Well I’m going to go down to the lab for a bit and see if I can cook up something while you do nothing,” he sighed and got up from the couch exasperated. “Jarv, let’s try isolating the spikes and see if we can get a unique energy signature from them at all.” Loki watched him go with a sullen expression painted across his face. He couldn’t track Amora without magic, which effectively made him useless or at least that’s how he felt. He could follow Tony down to his lab and attempt to be of some assistance, but he had no will to put up with the other’s running diatribe. God, his head was starting to get worse. He winced as he stood and trudged back down the hallway to his room, settling back down onto the bed. He groaned in pain and squeezed his eyes shut, feeling like his skull would split. The sound of his blood pumping thudded louder in his ears until he felt like he might scream in agony and agitation before his eyes shot open with a thought. He knew this pain. He knew from where in his skull it ached and the thought had him up on his feet too quickly. He swayed with slight dizziness in the doorway before calling out to Jarvis to direct him to the lab. He clutched the side of his head and made his way down, nearly falling twice before he reached the door.

“Stark!” he shouted hoarsely, pushing the door roughly open. Tony turned, his face screwed up in mild alarm.

“What the hell, longhorn?”

“Stark…it’s Thanos…,” he panted and collapsed to the ground for the second time.