fossilised | Jotunheimr

Loki had made sure that their time in this miniature waterfall included intimacy, reminders of why Thor should desire her and why she would be the best choice for All-Mother, though of course she said all of these things with action and not word. It was important that Thor not know that he was being manipulated into this. When he did finally emerge from the shower, it would be in male form again to look at the traps that Stark proposed to take them to.

"I have told you time and again why we are here, and it is not for jollity."

Honestly, do Midgardians have such a faulty memory?

"Perhaps if this goes well and we cause no incidents, the ways may be opened for more pleasurable visits to your realms, but we must fulfil only the orders of the All-Father this first time. The seidr I felt was here."

He pointed at a section on the map fairly near New York, where Tony might know that SHIELD had a base, or he might not if he hadn't been listening to Coulson that much.

Tony looked annoyed, especially when Thor leaned right through his line of sight to examine the map on the wall. He found the tapestry, made of light, to be truly remarkable, a feat he had not expected from Midgard and one not often used by Asgard simply because their preferences often allied to the tactile rather than the visual. And that was why, in the personal bathing waterfall, Thor had been unable to do much but think of Loki, of their time in the waters just prior to his celebration, and of how nice it was to be touched by him.

“I thought we could have some fun before we decided to raid a government agency,” he muttered. In Tony’s defense, he tended to shirk duty for anything not duty related. He liked to work, but only on his own terms.

And that was a SHIELD branch. He knew it the same way he had known where Banner was the last two years (in Mumbai, in case anyone was looking for him). Tony made it his business to know these things. And business was good.

“But I guess bothering SHIELD can be considered fun, too. I’m going with you. And just you,” he pointed at Loki. “Everyone else can stay in my Tower.”

"How is it that you can bother a shield?"

Shields were inanimate and rarely held any magic of worth, they tended to be limited to basic defensive spells if they were even ensorcelled at all. No, what he had sensed and what the All-Father had sent them here for was something far greater, something that had the echoes of the Casket about it.

"We will not stay behind," that was Sif, finally speaking up with annoyance at the small and confusing mortal that the Jotnar had introduced to them. "Thor is the leader of this mission; if anything, Prince Loki should remain behind now that his work in finding the artefact is done."

She wanted to get Thor away from that Jotnar and speak to him about propriety, about keeping the Giants at a distance.

Tony stepped back, letting Thor stay where he was as he attempted to keep his own eyerolling to a minimum. “SHIELD stands for a bunch of words that are too long to remember. It’s just the name of a group of idiots doing potentially illegal things to keep the country safe from….well… From stuff like you guys. Which is why Paint Chips here isn’t going to come with. And neither are any of you unless you know how to disguise yourself and not stick out like a huge, pulsing thumb. No? None of you? Great. So you’re staying behind. I’m not helping you hurt humanity because you might like a shiny object or a patch of moon dust that SHIELD might be protecting.”

And Tony thought he might be able to handle one person….but all six? No, Tony couldn’t hold his own against all six and he doubted SHIELD would have the know how either.

“This isn’t even going to be about retrieval. You want to do this the right way? We go in. I annoy Cyclops until the only guy – why can’t you be a woman again? That was much better – who can negotiate without looking like a bunch of backwater vikings can maybe talk SHIELD out of whatever it is you guys want.”

He didn’t want to help anyone infilrate and take here, but Tony really would help them figure out the next step. It didn’t have to be smash and grab.

Perhaps some residual part of Stark remembered that the Aesir were conquerors and that was why he was so reluctant to allow them to be part of this, or perhaps it really was because Thor and his friends seemed less diplomats and more warriors. But Stark would be shown a fool if he thought that he was a match for any one of them, even a Jotnar runt far from his home.

"Thor?"

Loki was unsure if this plan would work, but it certainly appealed to his ego to want to be the one to find and claim whatever it was they came for. But Thor was, supposedly, in charge of this mission and he would need to give his blessing for this plan to go ahead.

"Our guide has offered the advice he feels fits Midgard, but the decision is ultimately yours."

Tony knew better than to retort about his recommendation, though he did add: “You guys could have ran in there and did what you had to do. But you didn’t. You came to me for help and I’m telling you that it will be seen as an act of aggression if you just decide to fight your way through a bunch of people who are only protecting what’s theirs. You need to talk this out first.”

Thor glanced at Tony, but his attention was mostly on Loki. He couldn’t help but trust him. When he was weak and powerless, when he was ignorant and foolish, Loki had been there to guide him. “I do not wish for you to go alone. And I would like to engage in this discussion as well.”

Tony couldn’t help but try to analyze the two. It was easy to see that Thor was more or less smitten with Loki. And that Loki probably was playing the same long con that Tony knew many, many women did when it came to him. They wanted pieces of his power and Tony had sometimes enjoyed their chase and sometimes shut them down, but he had always been aware of it. Whatever Loki’s motivations were, though, he couldn’t tell.

“How about this. Your good pal, Loki, and I do a prelim meet and greet. You take it easy in my Tower. And then we’ll set up some sort of formal meeting if the whole thing doesn’t go south?”

Thor blinked, opened his mouth, and then shut it again before he drew Loki back towards the others. “I still do not understand what he says,” he complained. “But I am agreeable to this.”

Loki still did not truly understand the language of the Midgardians either, it was rapid and confusing with many shifts where words that meant one thing were apparently being used to mean something else. But it hardly mattered, he understood the basic plan and it was enough for him to reassure Thor.

"Even if our guide is strange, if he can lead me to the source of this magic then we can move much more clearly. Stay for now, relax and drink with your friends, I will return successful."

He turned back to where Stark stood and held out his hand again.

"We should away, then, as swift as we can."

Which meant going via the shadowed edges of the realm once more, near instant transportation to anywhere else on the planet.

This time, Tony was much less willing to take that hand. “When in Midgard, let’s do things the Midgardian way,” he said. He was not about to leave five heavy drinkers in a place he could not control or monitor. This suite in London would be trashed if he left them here and he had a reputation as a philanthropist and not a hotel room wrecker to uphold. “J, how far away in the jet?”

It would not move as fast as the armor, and no where near as fast as a quinjet but thankfully, with Pepper in Germany, the plane was close by. And JARVIS had been on it as a method of extraction since Tony appeared in the alley a few hours ago. “I have it at Heathrow. Ms. Potts has been furnished with access to a rented private jet should she require it before we can return yours, sir.”

It was the first time that JARVIS had spoken around the others and all save for Loki looked immediately on edge. That umbrella in Thor’s hand looked much less like an umbrella now and Tony immediately explained what was going on and let Loki assure the Aesir and Vanir that it was all right. JARVIS was not innocuous. He could and did assist Tony in all sorts of battle operations, but for the moment, he was just acting like transportation dispatch.

“Let’s take the plane home. It will give us more time to talk so you can get in good with the Agents we’re about to meet. Sound good? I can keep your friends at my place and we’ll be close by in case you need them….?”

Thor frowned. “Your nonsense is urking. Do you have a piece of shifting ground that acts as a transportation device? Loki’s magic is far more precises.”

“No… It’s… It’s a vehile. That flies.”

“Ah. Aye, I would like to see your flying vehicles,” Thor agreed, winking at Loki. He was doing so well, right!

Many of the realms had flying vehicles, the skiffs of Asgard were swift and required very little training to use, so why was Thor seeming to laugh at the idea that Midgard could have such a thing? Was not the weird advances they had seen already proof that more could be done by mortals in such a short time, than could be accomplished anywhere else? Perhaps that was the reason, their short lifespans forcing them to work swiftly if they wished to make any progress at all.

"It is not necessary, I am capable of taking us all through the ways to your abode now that I have been there once. There is no reason for us to take such time in one of your vehicles."

He itched to get at this object, this thing that pulsed with seidr, and taking unnecessary time travelling would only be an irritant.

"If you insist then we may travel such a way, I suppose."

Thor had no doubt at Midgard’s abilities at all. He’d been hit with one of their massive ground vehicles already and he simply was enjoying himself. More time with the journey was not time wasted. It would be a learning experience. Once they found the power source, the centre of Midgardian magic, and retrieved it, this journey and this ability to learn more of this Realm would end for some time. And that meant that he and Loki could again spend years apart. Why rush? A slower moving vehicle would give them the time Thor craved, even if Loki himself did not.

“Good, it is decided. We will continue our lesson of this wayward Realm!”

“Wayward— You know what? Never mind. J, have a car brought around. Stretch.” Not usually his bag, really, he preferred sports cars, but it was either that or take the tube and… No. He could not imagine any of these people on public transportation. He could barely imagine himself on it.

Four Aesir, one Vanir, one Jotun and one human being climbed into a white stretch SUV with blacked out windows and by the time they made it to the airport, the inside was utterly trashed as four of them decided not to hold back their strength on the various features. Tony was unamused as he glanced at his ever increasing credit card bill.

“It is strangely like a home and vehicle,” Thor said once they arrived on the plane, and he nodded for Loki to follow him back to explore ahead of the others. “There is a bed in this compartment and yet many more seats than Midgardians could fit upon the furs. Ah! There is a waterfall here as well!”

Even though Loki did not partake in trashing the inside of the vehicle, he saw no issues with it. Many warriors sought to test their strength on anything around them and it was the Midgardians who ought to have crafted sterner and stronger materials if they wanted to keep them in tact.

Sif followed Thor to look at the miniature waterfall so that she could enclose them together, squashed uncomfortably in the small shower area of the private jet, her voice low and her eyes intense.

"We have a need to talk. You know that you're one of my oldest friends, and so this comes from a place of affection, but you must distance yourself from that Jotnar. A distant respect for potential new vassals would be well, but you give him--her-- too much and hang off his every word as though he were your master and you a hound."

Thor looked confused as Sif entered the tiny glass room within a room with him. He had been expecting another, after all. Her words were more alarming than her presence, though, and it left him with his lips tight and his heart aching as he did his best to chew on what she said and give it the weight that it deserved. “I feel very close to Loki. He assisted me with very tough lessons and I want very much to help his people. If it seems I hang upon his words, it is not because I am his hound, but perhaps in a way his student. I wish to build my throne upon unification and that includes bringing Jotunheim back into the fold. My friendship with one who will likely become king of his Realm is vitally important to me, Sif. Our time together is brief and I must do all I can to ensure the friendship of our Realms while we are together.”

His frown turned into a grin.

“Why must you all think that I have been enchanted?” He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and lightly (for him) butted his head to hers. “What is it you fear from his company? Hogun is unlike us and yet he is our friend, is he not?”

“He wears in his hair the jewel of the Valkeries,” Sif finally said, cutting right to the heart of it, only to have Thor laugh.

“Ah, that. Do not be as his kin are. It is believed that I had given him the stone as a courtship gift, though I had not meant it to be as such. Jotnar take one spouse and have one love with whom which they bear children. It is a bit of a joke between us. He will wish to take a Jotun bride to keep his bloodlines clean and I will have many children, perhaps even before I wed. We are not compatible in that way. But he is a true friend, Sif. Give him a chance to be one to you as well.”

And yet, though Thor said these things, he could not help but feel smitten with Loki. It could not, however, be something to truly pursue. Their peoples would not allow it and Loki did not agree with Asgardian openness besides.

Sif wanted to believe that it was just a joke between them, but something about this twisted her up inside. She did not think that the Jotnar court would let go so easily if they really believed that the Tear had been a gift of courtship, and she could see the way that Thor looked at Loki. If this was allowed to develop then he would no longer care to share himself with others.

It was a bitter thing to realise, but it made her jealous. She had always hoped, and her family had even sort of assumed, that perhaps one day she would be the chosen one of Thor. But he had never shown an interest in her as a maiden, only as a fellow warrior, which was good-- it was.

"I hope that you know what you are doing," she murmured, accidentally setting the small waterfall going above them and ignoring the way she was becoming wetted. "I think that he would wish for it to be beyond a joke. You ought to distance yourself before it goes too far."

Why had Thor given away the jewel? It was not a gift that a friend would give another, it was so valuable, and now Loki wore it openly as if as a taunt.

“The moment he chooses his consort, he will break it off and I will accept it. It will give Jotunheim a bit more face to think that their future King did the rejection. He has little interest in me, Sif, and I have utterly no interest in searching for an All-Mother when my father is strong and I am so young. It will be many, many years before I even wish to beget children, let alone find a queen.”

Thor used his elbow to cease the waterfall, shaking the hair from his eyes the best he could. It was not easy in these tight quarters.

“This conversation has grown too serious. I will distance myself from no one and you must let this matter drop. This is an adventure, Sif, and romance has no place here!” Oh, simple Thor. Perhaps she really should not worry if Thor still was young enough not to even realise that romances and adventures often went hand in hand. He obviously skipped all of those parts of the poems in favour of the battles and heroic clashes.

There was a sudden knock at the door, a thump, really, and their new Guide’s voice reached them. “Please do not make me have to burn this whole ship. Pants must be worn at all times,” Tony complained, and that only made Thor laugh.

“Midgardians have odd rules, friend Stark, but I shall abide!”

Damn.

There would be no point pursuing this further, Thor had got it firmly into his head what would be happening and she knew from experience that he was too stubborn to change his mind. He'd insist that he had no interest, and that Loki was not for him, right up until the moment that he realised that he was madly in love and nobody else would do.

Well, she'd just have to make sure to keep them separate to keep that from happening, then, that would become her mission.

She stalked out of the shower, dripping everywhere, and glared at the small Midgardian. "Why do you have such odd rules? I am wet, I wish to change, and yet your rule that I must remain clothed at all times keeps me from doing so."

No way in hell could Tony take this long term. He stared at Sif as if she had two heads and then shook his head as he left the hallway. Thor tromped after him, puddling water, but it was more important for Stark to have his authority known than to have his carpets clean. What was another few hundred dollars after today?

Thor did not make the beeline for Loki as Sif might have feared. The prince was poking respectfully around the main cabin and Thor decided to sit beside Hogun while Volstagg ate from a bag of chips Tony had given to him to see if that might shut him up.

It didn’t. It just got potato in his beard and gave a new dimension to his spittle.

Tony decided to be proactive in this situation though.

He went back to his office to give Coulson a call. Not Pepper, though he ought to have, he knew that.

“So do you want to meet some aliens? Shut up. No. Did I really use that line a few weeks ago? Well whatever. I want you to be at Stark Tower in about three hours. Alone.”

Coulson liked his job, he liked knowing he was doing something to save the world and keep it safe for future generations. But sometimes, just sometimes, he wondered if it was worth it when he had to deal with Tony Stark. He hadn't signed up to be a billionaire's babysitter, and it was just bad luck that the man had managed to make himself into a superhero with his knowledge of technology.

He sounded even more annoyed when he answered the phone this time, because Stark was pulling him away from their newest discovery. Steve Rogers!!!! Actual unfrozen Steve Rogers, and he'd been watching the man train in the gym trying to get up the courage to introduce himself and ask for his signature.

"If this is another excuse to have me bring over pizza, then I'm going to introduce you to my newest gun."

He'd be there, though, three hours.

Tony might have his finger on the pulse of SHIELD’s basic ins and outs but no one had bothered to inform him yet of the person his father had been so obsessed with his entire life that he had patented him was walking around New York as if he owned the place. Or. You know. Like he had just discovered that the world had shifted drastically since he’d put his plane down in the water to keep HYDRA from recovering the tesseract. He had no idea of what exactly SHIELD did on the daily and he was sure it had to do with mostly keeping him in check anyway so he ignored it.

And that was why, after he’d gotten his rag tag group of alien visitors corralled first in the plane and then in another car (also destroyed upon arrival) and then passed a very badge happy Happy his penthouse, he almost regretted calling Coulson in.

It would just make things messier for him and his life had suddenly become very, very messy. He almost told Happy to show Agent Coulson right to the super special back door (AKA, the service alley entry) but then he would have to be involved in potentially helping out an invading body and he couldn’t have that on his record again.

“I need you to keep an open mind,” Tony told Coulson as he met him at the elevator and led him towards the sound of ruckus and commotion.

There was no way that Tony actually had aliens in his tower. Oh, they existed, SHIELD had records of unexplained visitors for some time, but it very rarely investigated as long as they showed no signs of hostility. They had no clue that there were such powerful races out there.

"Uh huh."

He was met by a black haired woman when the doors opened, willowy and green eyed in a tailored suit that seemed to have a more masculine cut. She smiled welcomingly and offered her hand for the shake that she had seen Stark do.

"You must be the keeper of the relic we have come to see. I am Loki-Fyri of Jotunheim. Please, do not be frightened, I assure you that the Jotnar are not here as conquerors or savages."

Behind Coulson, Tony gave Loki a big double thumbs up for taking his advice about presenting himself as that pretty woman version. He understood the concept of Loki being single gendered but he couldn’t help but really enjoy this person. He had a type. She wasn’t entirely his type but just having boobs pushed her up a notch.

Coulson, for his part, glanced briefly over his shoulder at Tony, had enough personal discipline not to roll his eyes, and took the woman’s hand.

What she said, however, about Jotunheim? That bothered him. Had Stark hacked them? Again?

“Well that’s good to know, Ms. Fyri....”

Tony didn’t have any qualms about eye rolling though.

“Just do the thing— you shouldn’t touch her while she does it though, Coulson.”

"Fyri is my title, son of Coul."

Why had he not given a name beyond his family one? It was unusual, but she could be formal using just the name of his father. She glared over at Stark briefly, and folded her arms under her breasts in mild irritation.

"I am no performing feastday entertainer to change my form at will, but I suppose if it will make this go more swiftly then I can appease you this once."

There was a ripple in the air as Loki changed back to her natural form, which brought with it a return to the more masculine body as all Jotnar looked male on the surface. He was immediately too warm, but he also felt more comfortable, more at home. This body was his natural shape.

"Now, we must discuss the object that you currently hold."

“It’s Phil, actually. Phil Coulson,” the polite Agent said, mostly because he enjoyed the look on Stark’s face out of the corner of his eye. He’d heard this one before. No, his first name is Agent. Sometimes Tony recycled his material, not because he wanted to continuously get praise for amusing lines, but because it seemed that he honestly didn’t remember using them.

The guy couldn’t remember his social security number, after all. Somethings had to get moved aside for all of that genius. Right?

He watched Loki ‘transform’ with a very schooled face. “Another version of your life model decoy, Stark?” He asked, not really giving Loki a once over. “I’m impressed. And a little scared. Does Pepper know you’re spending your time doing this?”

Tony crossed his arms over his chest. “So that is a real person. Loki. Son of Laufey, King of Jotunheim. Just like Norse Mythology. Got Thor in there too. And a bunch of other people who probably don’t matter as much. Someone call the ancient aliens guy for an interview.”

Mortals had such odd names. At least most of the other Nine Realms understood what proper naming conventions were, even if they changed the honorific after the name of the dam or the sire. But these names seemed to hold no rhyme or reason, and he had no idea what the name Phil might even mean.

Crimson eyes watched Coulson carefully, but Loki made no move to reach out to the man lest he burn him severely just by proximity. Instead, he did as all Jotnar could innately do, and summoned ice to wrap around his arms and spread across the floor to create a chill that even the mortals should be able to feel.

"Do not dismiss me as false, Phil Coulson. I will forgive much to keep the peace, but my patience is far from limitless. Nor are my companions false; they are Thor Odinson, Volstagg, Sif, and Fandral of Asgard, and Hogun of Vanaheim."

The older man rubbed a hand at the back of his neck, smile on his face even as he tried to figure out the right course of action. He’d thought he’d come here for something very different, despite what Tony had claimed, and he was still not very apt to believe a word out of Stark’s mouth. Then again, they’d been recording strange occurrences for a long time now, they’d been recovering evidence that might reach science fiction like proportions. So was it so odd that he was standing here with someone that was a mix between Avatar and Elsa?

“This might be a little above my pay grade, but... if you haven’t already decided to destroy the world after meeting Tony Stark, we might be able to salvage this. I don’t know what he’s told you, but I’d really like to have a formal meeting here between our people and yours.”

“Boring,” Tony said. “Loki says you have something that probably doesn’t belong here and is pretty dangerous. What have you fished up lately, Coulson?”

Apparently it was that all mortals were bad at listening or remembering and not just Stark, for he had already said at least once that they were here about a source of seidr that they had felt and needed to retrieve. He schooled his patience as Stark explained it to Phil Coulson, which oddly made the man look a little nervous.

His initial thought was for Steve Rogers, of course. That was the last thing they fished up, but-- but he was meant to be here, and he wasn't magical at all. Maybe the serum? No, that didn't make sense.

"Could you be more specific?" He asked, keeping himself as calm as possible on the outside.

"No, only that I felt the seidr pulse and connect from a great distance."

Wait-- pulse. Could this have anything to do with the day the Tesseract suddenly surged with energy and then went dormant again? This could be bad.

"Is that so?"

"--yes, that is so. Our guide informs us that your artefacts are kept in a building that we require permission to enter. Therefore we seek your permission to retrieve what we have come to seek."

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