“Loki, have you seen… oh my God,” Tony exclaimed upon seeing his daughter riding a giant wolf.
The youngest Stark was laughing joyfully, pulling the animal’s fur, while her father almost had an heart attack.
“Loki!’
“What’s wrong?” The god emerged from the corridor, still closing his bathrobe since he was enjoying some quiet time in the bathtub up to a few moments before.
“What’s wrong?” Tony’s voice was almost unrecognisable, stress making it high-pitched, “Our daughter is about to be eaten by a wolf!”
Loki raised an eyebrow.
Little Helga was smiling from ear to ear on top of her new steed.
“You dragged me out of my bathtub for this?”
“Do something!” He would’ve jumped to save his daughter in a heartbeat, but his left arm was going numb.
“I’ll throw you again out of that window, maybe,” he growled.
“Loki, there’s a wolf here and our daughter is… is…” Tony would’ve fallen on the floor had’t Loki stepped in to keep him upright.
“Okay, no defenestration for you today. Come sit down for a moment.”
“Dad?” Helga directed the wolf toward the sofa where her father was trying to avoid a stoke.
“Darling, get away from that thing,” he panted.
“Don’t call Fenrir a thing,” Loki scolded him as the wolf put his huge snout on his knees.
“That… that’s Fenrir?”
“Yes,” Loki lifted their daughter from her step-brother’s back and lowered her on Tony’s lap, “I think siblings should develop a good relationship as soon as possible.”
“Loki?”
“Yes?”
“Do you want to see me dead?’
“Why are you asking again?”
“You planned this… playing date?”
“Of course I did. How do you think Fenrir would’ve managed to get here on his own?” he scratched his son’s ears.
“And did it ever occur to your mind, maybe just once, that informing me a giant wolf was supposed to come here to play with our little, fangless daughter would’ve been better?” He was starting to feel again his fingers so he had the strength to hold the child to his chest.
Loki stared at him.
Now that Tony pointed that out it would’ve probably been a good idea to inform him, but he had no intention whatsoever to admit he was wrong.
“Fenrir means no harm to his sister.”
“And how was I to know this is Fenrir?”
“How many giant wolves do you think could come here?”
Now it was Tony’s time to try defend his position since he wouldn’t have admitted he was wrong either.
“I don’t know, the list of your enemies is quite long.”
Good point.
“And you think one of my enemies would’ve let our two-year-old daughter ride them instead of instantly devouring her?”
1-1.
“Maybe he wanted to use her to get to you.”
“Why not just try to devour me?”
“You tell me. You’re the mad one here.”
“Oh right, you’re the epitome of mental sanity.”
“I almost had an heart attack because of you!”
“Only because you continue to refuse my help. How many times have I offered to get you rid of that blue thing?”
“There’s no link between the two things. How many more times do I have to explain how the Arc Reactor works?”
They were so focused on arguing that neither of them had noticed Helga sneaking out of Tony’s arms to return to her new friend.
In the precise moment in which Fenrir was gently lifting his half sister by grabbing the hem of her shirt with his teeth Tony came back to reality.
“Hey!” He snatched the child from the wolf’s fangs.
“Fenrir, don’t steal your sister without permission. We already discussed this.”
The wolf growled something, then he huffed and crouched in front of the sofa.
“Fenfif!” Helga called, reaching out her hands toward her new puppy.
“Helga, quiet, please.”
“Fenfif!”
“Helga, love, just stay here with your old dad and out of he wolf’s fangs.”
“Fenfif!” The little girl turned to Loki for help, and her father agreed on getting her out of Tony’s hold to put her on the floor.
“Fenfif!” She chortled crawling toward the wolf who started wagging his tail.
Tony checked on her for a few seconds, trying to understand whether his intervention was necessary or not, then he turned toward Loki.
“Are you alright?”
“Why?” That was the last question Loki expected.
“I don’t know, I guessed you’d slipped in the bathtub and hit your head since you seem not to remember a single thing of our parenting discussion,” nearing to the end of the sentence his voice had grown louder.
“Pardon?” He quirked an eyebrow.
“First: we don’t contradict each other in front of the child. Second, but this was implicit: any play date with new friends who could possibly eat our daughter or me are to be discussed first.”
“Fenrir won’t eat neither of you,” Loki scoffed.
“You can’t be sure of that,” Tony protested.
“Tony, just look at them.”
The human reluctantly did as he was told and was a little taken aback in his rant by the sight in front of him: Helga was resting her back against Fenrir’s side, holding his silver tail between her hands, while the wolf was quietly licking her cheek.
“I don’t know, Loki, can’t we just buy her a kitten?”
“He’s not a pet, he’s her brother.”
“Okay, but her brother’s a wolf.”
“My son.”
“Still a wolf. A giant wolf. With giant fangs.”
“Dad, can we keep him? Pretty please,” Helga’s tinkling voice interrupted his attempt at trying to be right just as a matter of principle.
There was nothing Tony could do.
Helga had Loki’s eyes, there was no way he would’ve managed to deny her something.
Loki had won.
Again.