Coffee and Books 3

Chapter 15

Early in the morning the elevator takes us up to the penthouse of Stark Tower, where Tony Stark has agreed to see us. Across from me are Thor and Loki, both standing at ease with their backs to the wall of the elevator. Loki's eyes are fixed on me, in anticipation of what is to come. He's a little tense, though it's a somewhat happy tension. This is his plan and it looks like it's gonna work.
Thor could have been standing in line at the grocery store, you wouldn't know the difference; except for the occasional glances from me to Loki, a small smile playing on his lips. Heimdall had a similar reaction when Loki told him what he wanted to do. Both Thor and Heimdall didn't need much persuasion, they just wanted to know if I was okay with it all. Now we only need Stark to cooperate, however, that's why Thor is coming along.

Friday opens the door for us, her intercom voice chiming a welcome. The spacious penthouse is empty, no sign of Stark, except for the faint bass sound we can hear coming from another room. It turns out to be coming from another floor: Stark's personal lab takes up the entire floor below the penthouse. A glass-walled staircase takes us down to the lab, which reminds me of a garage, if mechanics had robots and other high-tech gadgets to fix cars.
In the middle of his workshop is Stark, seemingly engaged in conversation with one of the construction robots. The thing actually nods his 'head' in agreement when Stark gives him an order.

"Good morning, Stark!" Thor booms, announcing our presence over the rock music blasting from the speakers. Loki takes my hand, presenting us as an united front.

Stark swivels his stool around, sliding it across the floor in our direction. "Is it morning already?" He gets up and kicks his stool under a workbench. "I guess it is. Now, tell me, why do I get a three man - sorry, two man, one woman - strong delegation to visit when all I have to do is fix a problem with Loki's favourite fashion accessories?" Stark looks each of us in the eye, making a point of doing so. You wouldn't know he pulled an allnighter. "Good morning, Ylva, nice to see you here. You're not gonna ask me to make you some restraints too, are you?"

As always, Stark's word vomit is layered with sarcasm and playful insults. When I first met him, I didn't like him at all. Yet I guess he kinda grew on me, especially after helping me out on more than one occasion. And over time, he has eased up a little on Loki too, agreeing to lower the settings on his restraints. "Nah, I'm good, Tony. Thanks for the offer."

"Friday, turn the music down, please." Stark crosses his arms in front of his chest. "Well? I still haven't heard why all three of you are here."

"I need you to take my restraints off," Loki says.

"No," Stark answers immediately, at the same time as Thor says: "Temporarily."

"I need you to temporarily take my restraints off," Loki rephrases slowly, "so I can bind Ylva to me."

"Excuse me?" Stark raises his eyebrows. "I'm not gonna help you with whatever it is you two are up to in the bedroom." He shifts his gaze to me. "Really, Ylva? I wouldn't have thought it of you."

Loki and I sigh in unison: dealing with Stark can be very tiresome. "A mental bond," Loki explains curtly. "I wouldn't expect you to understand. I just need you to give me access to my full powers."

Stark scoffs. "If you want that, you better give me a real good reason to do that."

I can almost hear Loki count to ten in his head before he speaks again. "If I bind Ylva to me, I would know when she's in danger and where to find her. It's a pretty simple procedure, but I need my full powers to do it right."

"And I suppose you would like to keep those powers after creating that bond." Again with the sarcasm, yet Stark makes a valid point.

"That's not entirely necessary," Loki admits grudgingly, knowing Stark would not agree otherwise. "Once the bond is created, only a low level of magic is needed to maintain it."