Iron Titan

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

Absolute devastation. That was the only way to describe it.

It was utterly senseless, yet coldly methodical. The Madonna Inn, the inescapable steadfast, had become utterly trifling in how easily it was torn asunder. The barrier separating it from each residents' home had been obliterated. A gauntletted hand through tissue.

The bitterly cruel irony was that few residents still lived to witness this come to pass.

"Your kingdom, Odinson. Your people." The Titan wrenched Thor up from the ground, fingers circling his skull. "False idols. Comfortable lies for an uneasy head."

Comments

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

"Make this easy for yourself." Tony didn't avert his gaze the way he did when he finished off all the others. He met Thor's desperate stare head-on, watching the life in them waver and fight--the feeble kicking of a frightened animal. "You'll return. All this--just a fading memory."

He withdrew his blade with a sickening gnashing of flesh and bone.

"A bad dream. That's all."

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor tries to remain steady on his feet, but as Tony withdraws the blade, his legs buckle from beneath him. Thor's knees strike the ground painfully, but it barely registers. All he can feel is the pain of his chest and all it feels he can hear is the beating of his heart. Blood is coursing out of him, and though he presses his palm against it in a desperate attempt to ebb the flow, it does nothing. He knows his body isn't healing fast enough. He knows that no matter what he does, he's still going to die.

If he can't save Tony, can anyone?

Thor takes a breath and attempts to pull himself back up to his feet.

He didn't want to do this. Thor truly wanted to believe that it wouldn't come to this.

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

Having turned the moment Thor hit the ground, Tony didn't need to linger to see what happened next. The way home--the moment he had waited so long for--it was within arms reach. He wouldn't apologize for the bodies he had to climb over to get there.

Until Thanos was defeated, his will had to be of iron.

And then, the telltale scraping of dirt and harsh breaths. Tony turned. And he took aim.

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor holds out his hand and Stormbreaker finds its place into his palm. Breath haggard, he uses what remains of his strength to swing the blade forward -- to give Tony and swift the merciful death he deserved --

-- only to discover that his blade failed to strike true.

It's lodged in his chest, in the same place where Stormbreaker had struck Thanos in Wakanda. He feels something roll over his entire body. It feels like static electricity, except it's not. Thor isn't sure what it is.

"I'm sorry," he tells, Tony, and he pulls his left hand away from his own chest and onto Stormbreaker's handle so he can use the full weight of it to press Stormbreaker's blade deeper into his body.

He doesn't want Tony to suffer.

Not any more or any longer than he has already.

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

For the final time that night, Tony hesitated, and that one moment was all it took. The impact of something within his body spread like a violent ripple, and there was Thor's weapon lodged in his chest. The air was pushed out of his lungs in a silent gasp.

As Thor closed in, they were once again face-to-face. His armored hands went to Thor's arms, clinging to him as the strength left his legs. He didn't even feel his knees hit the ground.

He braced his palm against Thor's chest. There was no fight, no last stand. The only thing Tony offered up was his wide-eyed look of shock and a murmur of the man's name.

[st_ormbreaker]

What had he done?

Thor places his hand against Tony's back and he rips Stormbreaker out of his body and drops it at his side. He pulls Tony into his arms and allows his chin to rest on Tony's shoulder, the way he often did in those moments where they were alone and he felt comfortable and happy.

But he's not now. Thor buries his face in Tony's shoulder and he desperately clutches Tony's body the same way he clutched Loki's in those final moments aboard the Asgardian arc. His breaths are coming out in shuddering sobs.

All of this had been meaningless.

But at least soon the two of them would be dead.

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

There was no pain, not even the pain of regret. After all, he would simply return to the day he departed, without knowing or understanding a thing.

His dark eyes softened in acceptance as he gazed above at the wormhole still lingering on high. Not all was lost.

Numbly, his knuckles found the warm wound on Thor's chest. Forming two small funnels, the nanites exited them in a foam-like spray, mending Thor's wounds at a rapid pace.

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor's gaze turns skyward at the same time as Tony's does, and in his foggy-headiness, he doesn't realize what Tony is doing until the seal is nearly finished.

He looks at Tony uncomprehendingly, a single hand groping blindly where the gaping hole should be, but isn't.

"Tony -- what?"

He looks down at Tony, at the wound still in his chest. In an instant, Thor's hands are upon it; he presses his hands against the wound, trying to stem the tide. He'd been prepared to see Tony die moments before, but now --

"Do it," he snaps at him. "Do whatever you did to me to yourself!"

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

Tony tasted blood and dirt and he turned his head to purge it. "R'lieved...honestly. You had it in you."

[st_ormbreaker]

Though his wound has been sealed completely, Thor's breaths are still as labored as they were when he was bleeding out. He continues pressing his hands against Tony's chest, blood still pushing past the gaps in his fingers.

"What are you talking about?"

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

Nodding weakly up at the portal home, Tony returned his eyes to Thor. Gone was the malice. All that remained was exhaustion.

"Doing what needs to be done...Prove it to me." He knocked his knuckles against Thor's sealed wound. The small, repetitive gesture was all he could manage. "C'mon...go. We'll see each...again."

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor doesn't go.

He just grows more frantic. "Do it!" he pleads. "You did it before, do it again!"

Thor tugs his right hand away from Tony's chest to grab his hand. Thor nearly loses his hold on it, their hands so slick with blood.

He clumsily attempts to fold Tony's hand into a fist, just as he remembered it when he had done whatever he had to heal his wound.

Thor holds it against Tony's chest and attempts to catch Tony's eyes.

"Tony..."

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

Tony let his head rest back onto the scorched earth, closing his eyes as if he was simply lying down for sleep.

"It's all...just a dream."

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor looks down at Tony, his brows furrowed. His mind is desperately groping for some explanation of what's happening.

"What?" he asks.

And then Thor wakes up.

Thor throws the covers off of him as he jolts upright. His head spins to look down at the Tony-less space next to him and finds a note sitting there.

Thor's hand immediately darts for the paper.

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

The note was written down in decent print--almost illegible at the beginning with his researchers' slashmask script, though immediately an effort was made for it to be presentable.

"Good morning/afternoon/whenever Big Guy,

Sorry to doze and dash. I got a good five hours this time. 26% up from the average.

I had a breakthrough in between sleep cycles. Gonna find Rocket. Gotta see this through. I'm really close, I can feel it, y'know?

I want to wake up with you every morning. There'll be more of that once the suit stops the rinky-dink show.

-Tony

PS. I kissed the paper. You can kiss it back."

[st_ormbreaker]

For a half-minute after he's finished reading it, Thor looks down at the page he clutches tightly in his hand and says and does nothing.

Then abruptly he sets it down on the bed and pushes off the mattress and onto his feet.



When Thor finally leaves, he leaves a note behind as well.

Going out for a bit. Taking the tent.

Good luck with the suit. Speak with you in a few days.

xoxo
Thor