Faultlines

Agony

Agony

When Tony reached Stark Tower, the living room looked like a bomb had gone off. The windows were blown out. Furniture lay blown to pieces. And Loki stood in the middle of it all, that awful smirk on his face. Tony hadn't let him out of his sight during the time he had needed to take his badly demolished suit off. Now he stood in front of Loki in pants and a shirt. He felt oddly naked.

"What? Had a temper tantrum?"

Loki didn't answer, but his smile grew even wider. The uneasy feeling within Tony grew exponentially.

"No really, man, not only are you breaking in here, but you are also throwing a fit? Uncool.", Tony carefully made his way behind the bar, trying to look as natural and not threatening as possible as he did so. He really needed to get to the honing devices for the Mark VII or he'd be toast.

"This looks a little like the time my brother exploded our dad's lab. But he was eight. What's your excuse?"

"Your brother. The magical one?"

Tony's smile froze. How the hell did Loki know that? Barton couldn't have told him, could he? SHIELD wasn't supposed to even know about the wizarding world, let alone Harry.

"I wasn't aware you had met.", he slipped on the second honing device.

"I haven't yet had that honour.", Loki's smirk had developed into a full-blown smile.

Tony opened his mouth to answer, when his eyes fell onto a short, wooden stick lying forlornly on the floor next to one of the windows. No. All colour left his face. He knew that wand. In fact he had seen it many, many times.

"She was surprisingly apt at defending herself, but no match for a god."

Tony felt like all air was leaving his body. No. Just no. It was just not possible, why would... He had invited them. All of them. Harry, Ginny... the kids. A new, horrible idea formed in his mind, but he wouldn't, couldn't go there. It was nothing. It wasn't possible. They had apparated out and Ginny's wand had been left behind. That was it. It simply had to be.

All the things he had planned to tell Loki to distract him until the others arrived, seemed so trivial, so inadequate. Tony simply kept staring at the wand.

"She was funny, too, for a mortal. I almost contemplated letting her live. But then again: Why would I?", Loki had come steadily closer while talking and Tony finally left his spot behind the bar, carefully walking towards both the god and the most harrowing object in the world.

"I wonder, if you want me to kill you the same way. Do you? I could throw you out of the window. Or I could make you one of mine. Have you kill your little brother."

Then there was hope, Tony thought, there were spells she could have used to break her fall. Her wand was up here. Harry could have caught her. In mid-flight? And Harry wasn't here. Was he?

There had been a crowd at the foot of the tower. Tony had seen them. Tourists, he had thought. Or people staring at what was going on ahead. They weren't there because Ginny... no.

"What is your opinion on this, Man of Iron?"

When Tony finally looked into Loki's horribly smug face again, for a tiny second he forgot he wasn't even wearing a suit. He punched the god in the face. Loki took a step back, probably more from bewilderment than anything else. Tony meanwhile was pretty sure he had just broken his hand.

Whatever else Loki might have planned for him, the moment Tony struck him, it was all over. Loki grabbed Tony with an angry shout and threw him out the window.

Afterwards Tony didn't remember being scared. He didn't really remember the suit actually working and saving him. What he did remember was the realization that THIS was truly what had happened to Ginny. She had fallen this way and right now he was falling towards her.

When he felt the security of his armour and stopped falling, he softly landed on the ground, a few feet away from the panicked crowd at the tower's base, many of which either looked extremely ill or at him in horror.

He knew he should fly up there, towards Loki, but he just couldn't get himself to do it. Just as he couldn't walk over there, either. He knew deep down that Ginny was dead. She could not have survived this. But he just didn't know how to react, what to do about it.

"Tony!", the shout went right to Tony's bones. No, he thought, please don't be here. Not here.

"Tony! What is going on?! Ginny send the kids away and I can't apparate upstairs, what's even..."

Tony didn't even manage to open his helmet, when he turned towards his little brother. There was a voice inside his head shouting "No. No. No." over and over again.

"What's happening over there?", Harry asked, nodding towards the crowd, a note of worry in his voice that almost broke Tony's heart.

"Harry", he started, finally finding the strength to open his helmet and let his brother see his face, "Don't. Let's go somewhere..."

But before Tony could finish his sentence, a bright lightbeam shot upwards into the sky.

"What the...?!"

"The portal. We need to..."

But Harry wasn't listening to Tony anymore. His eyes were unmoving, fixated on a spot behind Tony's shoulder.

Tony realized in horror what must have happened. The beam from the top of the tower had made the crowd disperse. He tried to grab Harry's shoulder, but Harry was so much faster, sprinting past him and only stopping, when he fell to his knees in front of what Tony was finally able to admit was Ginny.

Meanwhile aliens were arriving overhead, an army ready to kill them all. Tony couldn't get himself to leave his brother, though, all he could do, was stare at his stony shoulders.

One of the aliens charged towards Harry on his glider. Tony shot him down on instinct, Harry didn't even react.

It was as if suddenly the world was coming back into focus. The screams. The bright light. The cotton candy that had engulfed Tony ever since he had noticed the wand, was gone in an instant.

He couldn't do this now. He didn't have the time. None of them did.

"Harry.", he carefully put his metal hand on his brother's shoulder, desperately avoiding the broken form of his beloved sister-in-law, "Harry. We need to go. We need to do something. Now." Harry still wasn't moving and there were more aliens attacking him now. Tony was momentarily swamped defending them both.

"Harry, don't do this to me, buddy! You are a fighter. You do not give up. You do not sit here and let them take over the world. I know you. We need you now, the world does. Come on!"

Harry was still staring at his wife, but just as Tony was ready to grab him and fly out, Harry's right arm shot forward, wand in hand. Green light shot out without Harry even really looking at his target. The alien fell dead to the floor.

Tony's breath hitched, as he watched Harry get up and turn around in one fluid, practiced motion. His wand flying, his face set in stoic silence and not a single word leaving his lips.

It was the first time Tony had ever seen Harry kill. The first time he ever really understood why some people were scared of his baby brother.