A few days later, the Avengers were once again tested, but this time by their very won Director Nick Fury.

Fury came into the tower with five other humans. There were two men and three teenagers, two boys and one girl. The teenagers all looked nervous. The men looked like they were handling their nerves well.

"Are we running a home for strays?" Tony asked.

"Looks like it," Clint muttered.

"Play nice children," Loki murmured.

He swept over to the newcomers. Behind him, Tony surreptitiously fled the room. He hated being handed things and being metaphorically handed new recruits by Fury was just as bad.

"Welcome to Stark Tower," he said graciously. "I'm Loki."

"We know who you are," one of the teenagers stammered.

"This is Spiderman," Fury explained.

Spiderman was a teenager of no older than fifteen. Loki understood how he felt. He had been barely fifteen when he arrived on Earth, after all.

Spiderman suddenly reddened, as if he'd just realised what he'd said.

"Sorry... Your Majesty."

He bowed. Loki waved his hand.

"We don't do that here," he said with a small smile. "It's a pleasure to meet you..."

"Peter. Peter Parker."

"Peter. And you are?" Loki asked, looking at the others.

"Doctor Strange."

"Oh, we're using our made-up names?" Loki heard Peter mutter, dejected.

"Sam Wilson."

"Pietro and Wanda Maximoff."

"It's wonderful to meet all of you. I'll just go and find Tony."

He entered the lift to Tony's workshop, leaving Peter practically vibrating with excitement.

"Tony!" He called. "You have a new fan!"

"Not another one surely!"

"There's a teenage recruit with spiderlike abilities who is obsessed with you."

"Brilliant," Tony responded, coming into view as he stood up from where he was tinkering away at one of his cars. "I'm not becoming a dad to two children."

In the time since Loki's real identity had been discovered, Tony and Pepper had produced a little bundle of joy called Morgan. Morgan was a clever and rather mischievous toddler, and Loki enjoyed helping Morgan pull pranks on Tony.

"I never said you would," Loki said drily. "There will, however, be a bet on it."

"Fine," Tony sighed. "Let's meet these recruits."

*

Despite Tony's apprehension, he and Peter immediately got on like a house on fire. They started by talking about mechanical engineering and then Peter met Morgan. Peter was her new best friend in under a minute.

Rhodey laughed quietly.

"Tony can never get Morgan to keep quiet. Ten bucks says Parker stays."

"Make that twenty."

"Done."

"I'll bet that he won't stay, just to make it interesting," Clint said, walking over to them.

"So, if Parker stays, as he undoubtedly will, you owe both Rhodey and I twenty dollars, Clint," Loki pointed out.

"Fine. Remind me to remind Fury to actually pay our wages this month."

Rhodey looked surprised.

"I got mine."

"Fury refuses to pay billionaires," Loki shrugged.

"Absolutely typical," Clint complained. "I'm going to get Nat to intimidate Fury the next time we see him."

There were interrupted by a sudden shout of glee from Tony as Peter answered a difficult question about physics. Tony rushed over to Loki and gave him a look.

"Okay, the kid's staying."

*

Twenty bucks better off, Loki sought Tony in his workshop once again where he was showing Peter around.

"It's dinnertime," he announced as he entered the room.

He smiled as Tony completely ignored him, engrossed in explaining the function of DUM-E to the teenager. Peter, however, spun round, aghast.

"I promised Aunt May I would be back ages ago!"

"Leave it to me," Loki promised. "What's your address?"

Bewildered, Peter gave it. Loki instantly teleported and emerged in a small flat. A woman shrieked at his appearance. However, to his amazement, she immediately calmed down.

"You're Loki, aren't you? The Asgardian prince? Tony Stark's business partner?"

"One of the Asgardian princes," Loki corrected. "Why weren't you shocked?"

She shrugged.

"Peter has done some strange things since being bitten by that spider. These sorts of things don't scare me anymore. As much, anyway. I'm his aunt, May."

"Pleasure to meet you. Peter got waylaid tinkering in the lab with Tony."

May chuckled fondly.

"That boy, always making things. I wondered why he was late."

"Would you like to come to dinner at Stark Tower? I imagine Tony and Peter will be quite a while."

May looked shocked, but she wasn't one to ignore opportunities.

"Oh, I would love to!"

"If you would like to take my arm?"

May took it and he instantly teleported them away.

"Oh!"

*

Loki had managed to recruit everyone in the tower to dinner and so it was that Aunt May, Peter and the other new recruits found themselves having dinner with all of the Avengers. Fury had declined Loki's invitation of dinner, and Rhodey had been called out to a job by the military but everyone else was there.

While Loki could have conjured up a feast, Steve wanted to make it 'homemade', as he called it. Steve set to work preparing the meat as Bucky cut potatoes and Pepper made a salad. Even Dr Strange ended up helping, although it seemed surprising that he even volunteered.

The man mostly kept to himself and alternated between being acerbic and hilariously sarcastic. He and Tony didn't get on overly well but the man was a surgeon and so he and Loki had a long conversation about hospitals while Strange set the table and Loki made a salad dressing. Loki had continued to help Daniel at his hospital until Daniel's unexpected death, performing difficult surgeries when he had a break in his schedule. After that, it had been too much for Loki to return to the place where Daniel had died so he resorted to paying the hospital  an extortionate amount of money annually instead. Loki did sometimes miss the hospital, and the friends he had made during that period of his life, as well as Daniel of course, but he tried to remain optimistic when speaking to Dr Strange.

Some time later, dinner was ready and they all sat down to enjoy the food. Chat at first was a little stilted, with the Avengers keeping to themselves and the newcomers staying silent but, as everyone saw Tony and Peter nattering at a hundred miles an hour and Loki engaging with Strange and Sam, soon Natasha and Pepper began talking to Wanda, and Clint to Pietro.

It was all going well...

Until the call to assemble blared.

*****

A.N. Morgan, Peter, Sam, Strange, Wanda and Pietro are all now present!

Thanks for reading and please comment!!!