Tony was getting tired of the hospital bed he was confined to.
He had things to do, people to see, things to fix. He couldn’t just spend all his time in a fucking hospital bed.
Any other type of bed, yes, those had taken up a huge portion of his life for a long time, but a hospital bed was a huge no.
Unfortunately everyone else had a different opinion, and Tony was still confined to his bed.
He wasn’t left alone for long – actually there was someone sitting next to him most of the time – but now was one of those rare moments. No one was there, and he was alone with his thoughts.
Pepper, Rhodey, Natasha, Loki. None of them was there.
They were all somewhere else, and he was alone.
Not that he blamed them for that – Loki would have been there 24/7 hadn’t he been kicked out to have a decent night sleep on something that wasn’t an armchair – but those moments alone were the hardest for him.
Being alone meant that he had time to think, and thinking about himself had never been kind to him.
Now that the damage the Gems had left on his body had to be included into the picture, that time alone certainly didn’t look good for him.
So much had been lost, and even though Loki had promised to try and do something about it, Tony knew what he had lost.
Flying was gone.
His suit was gone.
His working in the lab, gone too.
Nothing of what had defined him in the last twenty years had remained.
His equilibrium was too feeble, his hands shook too much, his vision blurred too often. And if those inconveniences may have been solved by having Friday adapt to his new condition, he couldn’t work on his AI to do so; looking at the codes gave him a horrible headache that only went away after hours of sleep and Loki numbing the pain with his magic.
And all of that, without even mentioning the state of his body.
His right side was completely burnt.
The doctors had done their best to try and save the largest quantity of tissues possible, but all they had managed to come up with was partial mobility. Having his old skin back was out of question.
That wouldn’t have been so bad per se – saving the universe at the price of his looks was something he could tolerate – and even if Loki had shown no sign of caring about that, Morgan’s reaction had been enough to make him understand. Instead of launching herself in his arms as she was used to do, the little girl had hesitated, flinching at the sight of his burnt off skin showing through the bandages.
Pepper had tried to explain to her what had happened, but he would have never forgotten the look in his daughter’s eyes.
By God, he only wanted that to be over.
He wanted his old life back.
He wanted Morgan to jump in his arms at any given moment, he wanted Loki to run his nimble fingers over the muscles the training for the suit required, he even wanted paparazzi and their false compliments.
Now he was forced to stay in a hospital bed, with his whole world slipping away from his fingers.
Of course he knew he was lucky to still be alive – thank to the unlikely collaboration between Loki and Strange – but that didn’t make the situation any easier to digest; so much had been saved, but that was the common good, something that had little to do with Tony’s present, stuck in a hospital bed.
“You’re still awake?” Loki soft voice asked from the door, and Tony’s eyes quickly shot in his direction, making his head spin, “You know you shouldn’t do sudden movements.”
“It wasn’t a movement. I was turning my eyes.”
“Which is a movement,” Loki pointed out, reaching the side of the bed and sitting on it, “You should sleep, love.”
“I can’t.”
“Something hurts?”
Yes, there was always something hurting, but that wasn’t the point at the moment, “Where were you?”
“Pepper imposed a two hours stop at home.”
“And you listened to her?”
“Tony, what’s wrong?” Loki sighed.
“What’s wrong? Are you really asking?”
“Tony,” Loki sighed again, taking Tony’s uninjured hand in his own, “I apologise, I chose my words wrong.”
“You don’t apologise, never. Don’t start now.”
Loki stopped, his green eyes on their joint hands, “Then tell me what you want me to do.”
“Stop treating me as a charity case.”
“I’ve no idea of what that means.”
“But it’s what you’re doing.”
“You want me to cast a sleeping spell? You could use some rest.”
“I don’t want to sleep, Loki, for fuck’s sake!”
“Then what do you want, love?”
“I…” in front of Loki’s pained eyes, Tony deflated a little, “I don’t know. I want to go back. I want things to be normal again.”
“Tony, you saved us all.”
“That doesn’t really make a difference,” Tony tried to lift his right arm, but all he could do was raise it of a couple of centimetres from the bed.
“It doesn’t make a difference? We’d all be dead without you.”
“Yeah, tell Morgan that.”
“Morgan?”
“She’s afraid of me.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Pepper brought her here yesterday. When she saw me she-“ he stopped in the middle of the sentence, unable to go on any longer. The memory of his daughter flinching back was still too much.
“Tony, love, she’s 3 years old. She doesn’t understand,” Loki abandoned his position at the foot of the bed in order to get closer to Tony, and with all the due care he lowered himself beside the man in order to take him in his arms. That reversed their usual positions, but Tony needed all the comfort Loki could give, “Give her time.”
“Time? Really? You think it’ll get better?”
“She’ll understand what these scars mean.”
“She’ll understand her father is a monster.”
“Hero.”
“Hero,” Tony snorted, “As if she cares now.”
“Tony, please,” Loki murmured, “You’re alive. That’s all we care about.”
“Not Morgan.”
“Because we didn’t want to tell her the whole truth. Did you really want us to tell her she was lucky to still have a father because she may have not seen you ever again?”
Tony had to remain silent in front of that, leaning against Loki’s side as the god stroked his hand in his hair.
“Give her time, and she’ll understand too.”
“I…,” Tony started, but his voice died in his throat, “You…?”
“I?” Loki prompted him, his fingers carding Tony’s short hair where they weren’t flattened by the bandage that kept the protection the doctors had put on his ear in place.
“Will you…”
“Yes?”
“Now that I… I’d get it.”
“Are you asking me if I’m about to leave you?” Loki asked, his voice losing the warmth he had poured into it.
“I’d understand.”
“Anthony Edward Stark,” Loki sat straighter, so that now he could look Tony in the eyes, “I’ve had a long life, but I’ve never felt more insulted than in this moment.”
“What?”
“You think I’ll leave you only because you got injured?”
“Loki, look at me,” Tony sighed, “I’m a monster now.”
Loki rolled his eyes, “Oh, yes?” he asked, letting the blue of his natural form wash over his skin, “If this’s a contest, I’ve won.”
“That’s your natural you, this,” Tony waved with his uninjured hand, “This is not.”
“So? Your looks now are the reflection of the most selfless and brave act I’ve ever witnessed to, mine are just given by me happening to be born on a frozen realm.”
“But you didn’t expect this.”
“I didn’t expect to be here having the most stupid conversation ever with you, that’s true. And you know why? Because I thought I had lost you. I thought I would have never been able to see you again, to talk with you. I thought that was it. I thought that the love of my life – I’ll regret saying this, I know it – would have died in front of my eyes. And yet here you are. You’re here, talking with me, being your usual stupid self.”
Tony gave him a sad smile, “Loki…”
“No, I won’t listen when you’re just speaking nonsense.”
“I’m just being realistic. Giving you a way out.”
“No, you’re just being stupid. You think I love you only for your looks? You think I’m that shallow?”
“That’s not what I’ve said.”
“No, but that’s what you think,” Loki returned to his usual form in order to gently take Tony’s face in his hands, “I love you for who you are, for how you make me feel, and that’s not something a few scars can take away.”
“But I’m not even myself anymore…”
“What do you mean?”
“I can’t do anything, Lo. You’ve seen it. I can’t even look at the holograms Friday provides for more than ten minutes.”
“The point being?”
“I’m my work, Loki, I can’t access to it anymore, I…” once again Tony’s voice failed him, and Loki slid next to him again to wrap Tony in his arms.
“Tony, my stupid, adorable human, it’s been less than two weeks. Can you give yourself a bit of time?”
“I don’t know if I’ll ever recover.”
“As you don’t know what you have actually lost. You certainly didn’t lose me,” Loki kissed him on the nose, drawing him closer, “Listen, love, stop worrying. I know things have changed, that as of now everything is different for you, but what hasn’t changed is what I feel for you. You need my help now? Very well, I’m here for you. You want to be left alone for a while? I’ll sit in the corridor on one of those plastic chairs. You want someone to explain in more details what happened to Morgan? Tell me where’s the line I don’t have to cross, and I’ll tell her. You need someone to readjust Friday’s settings? Tell me what you think, and I swear I’ll learn how that damned thing works.”
Tony didn’t answer immediately, but the way he curled against Loki spoke volumes of how he had received Loki’s speech, “I don’t even know if that’ll be necessary. I’ve no idea of how my brain still works, if I can still do something with the projects I have initiated or if I’ll ever be able to create new ones. Thinking hurts,” he looked up at Loki, and the god placed a kiss on his forehead, lingering there for a couple of seconds.
“You know, I’ve decided that I had to get more information about humans healing factor. Your body suffered a shock that should have killed you, and right now it’s recovering from something that was about to overcome it. Since when I do things I decide to do them well, I’ve also looked up the historical cases of people who endured your same conditions, or at least something very close to it. The majority of them died, the ninety percent of those who survived remained in a coma. Those few who woke up couldn’t even speak. And here you are. Sounding as stupid as ever.”
“Are you really playing the part of the supportive boyfriend?”
“I’m not playing any part, Tony. I’m here, and you can push me away as much as you want, you won’t make me change my mind.”
“I just… I can only think of what I’ve lost.”
“I understand that that’s where your mind wants to focus, but try do the opposite? I know it’s strange for me to be the one pointing out the silver lining of a situation, but you’re forcing me to do so. You’re alive, in the right conditions to see your daughter grow up. You’ve got me here, and I’ve already told you that the moment my presence won’t be required here I’ll get more information about healing spells in order to reverse the damages left on your body. You have Pepper, who is single handedly fighting the press downstairs so they won’t get to you. Oh, and how can I forget? You have the gratitude of the entire population of Midgard and probably of the universe – I still have to contact a few people – for how you took down Thanos. Do I have to add something more or you think that’s enough to put your mind at ease?”
“Yeah, okay, but what about everything else? I planned to teach Morgan so many things, build a cleaner world for her, introduce her to what can be done in so many different fields-“
“You’re overthinking, Tony. That’s something you haven’t lost,” Loki interrupted him, “You’re still your annoying old self, and I can’t but love that. Now rest, my dear, I’ll be here when you wake up.”