Work Text
August 2012
But I can't move until I choose I need a crystal ball
Tony is in a board meeting when his timer suddenly tells him he has a few days left. He stares at it for a second, wondering if that feeling in his chest is hope that the timer will finally be right, or annoyance that it would do this to him. Either way, Tony discretely hides his wrist and pretends to pay attention again. It doesn't really matter. But by judging the look on Pepper's face, he can tell that she knows his timer has decreased again and that she knows that he isn't paying attention. He loves Pepper all the more for that knowing smile on her face as she rattles off a polished and prepared business plan to the board. If she didn't have her own timer, and he wasn't such a mess and a drain to her sanity, he would have asked Pepper out a long time ago. A long time ago. Nineteen days ago, his timer had told him he had three years to go. Eight days ago, it had told him that he had three months left. Five minutes ago, it had told him he had three weeks left. And now? Three days, one hour, twenty-nine minutes and forty-seven seconds. He wonders what it will say in the next few days, and he wonders what it'll jump to this time. Tony's timer has never decreased three times in a row like this, and he wonders what's going to happen next. Will it jump to three decades? Three years again? What now?He isn't listening, and almost misses the end of the board meeting, had it not been for his mind trying to find an out to this dreadful thing. Tony stands up in joy and practically dashes out the door as dignified as he can. He is completely aware of the fact that he probably doesn't have any, at least not to these people, who have seen all of his public ups and downs. And Pepper, well, she was there for the private ones too. So he doesn't expect Pepper walking out right behind him, matching his quick pace with her killer heels and trying to get a word with him. He expects her to command him to stop, or to talk business with him, or to scold him for his lack of attention. So when she doesn't do any of that, he's surprised."What is it now?" Pepper curiously asks, gesturing to her wrist with a discreet motion. Even though he had taken his cuff off during the meeting when he felt it change and then hidden his wrist so no one could see, he never hid it from Pepper or Rhodey, who knew. And even still, she never looked, never breached that trust, and never tried to glance at it, even though he had let her. And even though she could see it right now if she wanted to, she didn't. He looked at her with an amused expression. "Three days and an hour, more or less," Tony answers. "This hasn't happened to you before. It dropped three times in such a short period of time," Pepper remarks with a smile. She was of firm belief that Tony's timer would zero out one of these days, and that his timer would firmly work. He supposed that it was nice to have someone else believe in you for you. "It'll go up soon," Tony says. "Remember that time it said I had a day?"Pepper shook her head. "We'll see."
April 2014
Hoping for a miracle I'm not equipped for this
SHIELD. HYDRA. Steve. Super-Soldier Serum. Natasha. Falcon. Fugitives. Ex-fugitives. James Buchanan Barnes. The Winter Soldier. SHIELD Info Dump. Howard. Maria. Murdered. Fury. Hill. SHIELD. Disaster. Tony doesn't know what to make of it. In such a short span of time, too many things have happened, and too many secrets and blood have been spilled. He has JARVIS pull out everything he can about the Avengers and the Avengers-adjacent, knowing that this is what he can do to protect the team on his end. As soon as he realizes that all the information was on the internet—and what the hell was happening? How did the information get on there in the first place?—which was instantaneous, he immediately orders JARVIS to do that. And then he turns on the news and sees live footage of Steve's shield falling into the Potomac. Followed by Steve. He flies to D.C. immediately after that, and rushes into the hospital room where Steve is. Steve. Natasha's there, the new guy's there, and both of them look at Tony with equal expressions of worry on their faces. God, he doesn’t even know what’s worse: the heavy feeling in his chest at watching Steve fall off the helicarrier, or the blatantly unmasked expression of pain and sadness on Natasha’s face. He doesn't know what to make of it. So he leans against the door and listens to the story pour out of the two, and even they only know pieces of what happened. What truly happened on the Insight helicarrier is locked in Steve's brain. And Steve is unconscious with injuries that would have killed a normal person twice or thrice over. Tony can’t look at him without wanting to beat the shit out of HYDRA more, and it is at this point when he finally realizes what the hell it means to be an Avenger after Loki and the Chitauri. SHIELD is/was HYDRA. Pierce was their leader. HYDRA is/was everywhere, in governments all around the world. That was why the three of them were declared fugitives. The new guy is Steve’s running buddy, and a VA counselor with an impressive resumé as the Falcon. New guy was Air Force, trained by Rhodey. Fury was almost killed by an elusive decades-old assassin named the Winter Soldier. Fury is now, for all intents and purposes, dead. The Winter Soldier is not. He was James Buchanan Barnes, as in Steve’s best friend and Howling Commando and personally Tony’s favorite. He was sent to eliminate Steve as well, right before Project Insight was launched. Project Insight, something Tony had taken a look at and not paid attention to. There’s the shit with Arnim Zola, and Hill now working with Pepper, and Coulson being alive (with his own new team) and the Winter Soldier killing Howard and Maria (god, he almost wishes JARVIS hadn’t found the file and the video, and he almost wishes Natasha hadn’t mentioned noticing something for a second, a little too late) and Steve fighting the Winter Soldier and someone having dragged Steve out of the Potomac. God, what has happened? What will they do now? Sam—new guy, codename: Falcon, as in those wings he had designed years ago—finishes telling the story and Tony leans back on the door more, blown away in horror. It just doesn't make any sense, and yet it completely does. Vague bits and pieces, things that seemed off now had explanations. None of it was something Tony wanted to accept. He didn't know what to say. He couldn't say anything, not when Steve was there and so pale like a ghost and straddling the line of death and—"I'm going to go find his shield," Tony mumbles, needing an excuse to get out of there. He just couldn’t see Steve right now, couldn’t think about Steve right now, couldn’t do anything but shut out everything he had learned in the past eight hours. Denial, right?"Neither of them know, do they?" he hears Sam ask just as the door was closing. Tony didn't know what he was talking about, but it seemed like Natasha did, as she only sighs. And Tony leaves, silently promising to come back later at a better time for everyone, including himself, with the shield.
January 2013
Under the spy, there’s no escaping I'm a deer caught in headlights
He was alive. Pepper was alive. Rhodey was alive. Happy was alive. The Mandarin was not. His mansion was not. Okay, it was okay, he was okay, everything was okay, everyone was okay, okay? Words sounded fake to him, and maybe it was because he had repeated reassuring phrases over and over again until they had lost all value, but now they sounded fake. Empty and hollow, and of no use. But they were true, and everything had worked out just fine, and now Tony would learn from his mistakes again and live. He would live. It was going to be just fine. He absolutely was not panicking in his penthouse of Stark Tower at seven in the morning. No, he wasn't, what was anyone talking about? Shut up, JARVIS, he did not need this sass this early in the morning. "Sir, you have a call from Captain Rogers," JARVIS said, and Tony sighed. "Put it through, J," Tony said. "Hello? Steve?" "Tony. Wha–Tony, oh my god!" Steve's relieved yet panicked voice sighed—why did Steve sound like he was running a marathon in an asthmatic body?—on the other end of the call. "Tony, god, you're alive, the news said the mansion... and there was a bomb and you weren't found and the Mandarin was... oh my god, Tony, are you okay?"Steve's question set Tony off in laughter. Was he okay? Was he okay? "Steve. Just rethink your question for a second, okay?""Tony, someone blew you up. It's a very valid question," Steve petulantly said. Tony laughed again, not as broken and hollow as before. "Steve," Tony said. "I am so sorry I wasn't there," Steve cut him off, full of remorse and apology. "I should have been, for you, I should have been there to help somehow and oh god, please don't ever do something like this ever again without calling for help. I thought you were—the news said you were—no one knew what had—god, I’m just so glad you’re not dead. And I, uh, if you need something, or someone, I'll be there, okay? Just call? I'll be there, and—hey, Natasha!" The sound of a phone being snatched filled the air."Stark, I swear, if you do some dumbass thing like this again and give Steve a panic-induced ulcer or a heart attack again, I will kill you. You didn't land on this team just to be killed by a terrorist," Natasha's sharp voice scolded, but he could hear everything she wasn't saying and the relief in her voice. "Steve was this close to leaving our op, and hopping on a plane to Malibu by the way."Uh huh, like it was only Steve. Tony heard Steve call out Natasha's name defensively and let himself weakly smile.”We’re coming to the Tower in a few days. Don’t do anything stupid, don’t die, or I will personally find a way to deliver an Iron Man suit to Hammer. Steve wishes you a Happy New Year, by the way, and he apologizes for the bad start.” She hung up right as he heard the sound of bullets. He pointedly did not think about what they were doing and why Steve had called at such an awkward time if he thought Tony was dead, though it was hard to keep himself from laughing bitterly at how Steve had apologized like it was his fault any of this happened.Really, it was all Tony's, and just one more thing he had fucked up.
August 2012
I am hoping for a sign Something bring me right here
Loki was a son of a bitch, and it was a good thing he was adopted, since Thor’s mom sounded like she was the exact opposite of a petty bitch. The fight against him was easy (at least to Tony, even if Cap had been struggling) and subduing him was even easier. Of course, Thor had to come and put a dent in things, but it was still straightened out. Everything was okay. So Tony sheds off his armor, pulls off the undersuit he had actually managed to put on, and then prepares himself to meet Dr. Bruce Banner, world-renowned scientist who had dropped off the grid a few years ago, last known (at least as far as Tony had dug) as researching the supersoldier serum. Tony wanted to know why, and then pick the 7-PhD-holding scientist’s brain. He smelled the start of an amazing bromance. Tony was adjusting his shirt when he notices his cuff was facing the wrong way. He pulls it off, wondering what the number had jumped to. It had been a day since he checked it last—the time still hadn’t changed since then. Tony had rolled his eyes and pulled the cuff on yesterday. He had thought it was going to change sometime soon, and didn’t really bother to check it.Now, staring at the row of zeroes that was his timer, he wasn’t laughing anymore. He had met his soulmate. Somewhere, somehow, he had met his soulmate, and he didn’t even notice who it could have been. There had been hundreds of people at the Stuttgart Museum and the time would have corresponded to that and—he had a soulmate. He had someone out there who he had a... and Tony had played it off as a joke, and he hadn’t cared. He hadn’t believed in soulmates, because he thought he didn’t have one. And now it turned out he has one, he has one that he let slip through and he doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry or not feel anything at all. Lucky soulmate, for avoiding him and his mess, but he feels sorry for the person out there who’ll live with the knowledge that they have lost theirs. And really, he didn’t care and he doesn’t know why he’s caring right now, but he knew it was just going to have to pass. Tony calls Pepper, knowing that the footage of his conversation would be deleted in the very future. “Pepper?” Tony greets. “Tony?” Pepper confusedly asks, though she sounds worried. “Aren’t you—aren’t you at SHIELD?””Pepper,” Tony says, his traitorous voice breaking for some reason. “Pepper, my timer zeroed.””Oh,” her breath catches in surprise, “Oh, Tony, that’s delightful, I knew you had a soulmate, I can’t wai—””I don’t know who it is,” he cuts in between, before she can congratulate him and then rub it in. “Oh,” her voice stops in shock and pity and sadness and oh god, he does not deserve the saintly goddess that is Pepper Potts, “Tony. Are you okay? Do you want me to post a search on SoulFirst? I’m sure someone has posted a zeroing already that might match yours. Where were you?” SoulFirst. God, he had forgotten about that. Pepper hadn’t, this was why Pepper was CEO. She was good at thinking logically. And life. “Stuttgart, Germany, fancy place where a guy named Heinrich Schaefer’s guest speaking?” “Stuttgart Hall? Okay, it’s in, and I’ll have JARVIS update you? It’ll be alright, Tony. We’ll find them.” Pepper assuredly says. “But I—””And besides, I told you that you were good enough to have someone. You deserve it, Tony, don’t you dare turn this negative onto yourself,” Pepper warns, a fond tone in her voice. “Okay,” he says, and when Pepper makes a noise indicating she doesn’t quite believe him, he much more confidently repeats, “Okay. I have to—””Be safe,” she says, before he hangs up, still feeling completely numb.
February 2013
Please see me through metaphors in blue I'm holding on for dear life
Steve is the only one that doesn’t live at the Tower, to Tony’s chagrin. Even Natasha was finally persuaded, more by Clint than anything, but she did still say yes. He visits frequently, sometimes for Avengers business, sometimes for training, sometimes for the gym, sometimes for fun, sometimes for teal meals and bonding, and sometimes for movie night, but he never stays. Tony doesn’t know what to think of that. He tries persistently, to get Steve to move in with the rest of them, but Steve digs in his heels and constantly refuses in his polite, aw shucks manner that somehow completely softens the blow. Tony doesn’t know how Steve does it. He’s also managed to completely win over Pepper, and Tony’s fairly sure the two of them meet occasionally to talk about whatever they talk about. Tony still has not completely ruled out that they’re not meeting to either a) rule the world b) conspire against Tony into getting him well-hydrated and proper-rested and well-fed or c) become the world’s best power couple (semantics if they aren’t actually a couple). But as it stands, Steve’s even turned down Pepper’s offer to stay. Yeah, Tony went there. He’s tried everything he can think of to get Steve to stay, and nothing is just working. Tony can’t understand why on earth Steve would want to stay in his lonely, small, cramped, probably bugged, SHIELD-assigned apartment instead of Tony’s populous, large, sprawling, not bugged, SHIELD-free Tower. It doesn’t make any sense, and Tony knows that logically, there has to be something he isn’t hitting yet that he soon will. Steve likes it here, Tony knows that much. Right now, as he’s sitting right next to Steve and watching the Hunger Games so that Steve and Thor can understand Clint’s nickname, he can just tell that Steve like it here. He can at least tolerate being here. No one really thinks of Tony as a people-observant kind of person, and they’re probably right in doing so, but there are some things he pays attention to. Steve; Steve is just one of them, and Tony has known since Day Two or Three (hey, cut Tony some slack here; Day One was a mess involving aliens) that Steve wasn’t too comfortable or happy here. Tony really couldn’t blame him. But as time passed, and everyone made an effort to know Steve and Steve seemed to make so much of an effort to live here, in this century, Tony can say that Steve’s doing better. His smiles are more real, he’s less likely to hunch into himself, he’s less likely to tense and retreat. And as Katniss stabs the table and Haymitch makes a sassy comment about killing a placemat while Effie Trinket shouts something about mahogany, Tony can see Steve crack a small smile at the movie. It’s the smile that he rarely sees, the one that comes out when Tony thinks that Steve is most relaxed and accepting of his displacement and the one that comes out at the most randomest of things. This time, it’s accompanied by Steve relaxing into the sofa and leaning a little into Tony—and oh yeah, has Tony even mentioned yet that Steve has a habit of touching when he’s calm and a habit of pulling away when he isn’t? Tony doesn’t even care at this point, and he thinks, looking back, that he hasn’t ever cared. And then the revelation hits him harder than one of Steve’s punches. He likes Steve. A lot more than—oh holy mother of fuck he loves Steve, and that’s why he wants to see Steve smile, why he’s always paying attention to Steve, why he wants Steve living here so badly and not just because he wanted the full set, why Tony lets Steve lean into him and why Tony cares so much in a way that he’s only cared about three people and an AI before: Jarvis, Rhodey, Pepper, and JARVIS. He doesn’t even notice that the movie has paused, or that Steve is staring at him with those big, blue eyes and a look of concern that god, Tony thinks is endearing. He’s in love with Steve, a grown man built like a truck, enough to call him endearing and cute. “Tony?” Steve asks, and they’re both aware of everyone having taken notice of the pause. Steve did pause the movie, that always raises questions. “Are you okay?” “Yeah, yeah,” Tony waves off nonchalantly, “I just had an idea for... it’s not important, don’t worry.”Steve shoots him a questioning look. “Are you sure? Science is never not important, according to this really great guy I know.” ”It was for the suit, but I...” Tony trails off the sentence, letting Steve fill in the blanks that he blew them all up. Steve winces a little, like he didn’t want to bring it up and make Tony relive those memories on account of him. “Okay,” Steve just nods, restarting the movie. Tony pretends to not notice when Steve leans in imperceptibly closer, and he doesn’t complain either.
October 2012
I'm falling apart And I can't take anymore
Two months, and nothing. Not a single person has said anything, and Tony/JARVIS have checked everywhere. “You’ve checked every single person from that day?” Pepper asks one day, when the two of them are just lounging around in the mansion, a rarity thanks to both of their schedules. “Yeah,” Tony carefully, trying not to betray anything he’s feeling. Pepper knows him better than that though, and she cuts right through it. “This doesn’t change anything about you.” “I—””No, Tony, it doesn’t. I’ve always told you that you have a soulmate, and now we know that you do. I know we’ve lost them—” It's funny how Pepper seems to share responsibility for this, like she was the idiot with an ever-changing timer and absolutely no belief in their soulmate timer or the fact they had one. Like she was the idiot who didn’t bother to look at their timer and let her soulmate slip by. Like she was the idiot who then did all but cry about it, even though she still had no faith in it, “—but it isn’t your fault. You aren’t a bad person or an evil monster and you aren’t the Merchant of Death to deserve this.” Tony can feel his face crumple. He doesn’t cry. He doesn’t; Stark men do not cry. They are made of iron and steel will and they do not cry. “Pepper,” he finally asks, “What is wrong with me?””Nothing,” she firmly says.Two hours later, the story completely changes. Both of them are drunk, him more so than her only because she’s drunken what seems like two glasses and he’s drunken what seems like two bottles to a normal person. “Pepper,” and now he’s crying, damn it, “I don’t understand.””Oh Tony,” she comforts, “The world doesn’t deserve you, with all that it does to you.””I didn’t care about it, I didn’t care,” he says, slurring everywhere. Pepper’s running a hand through his hair. “Why does it hurt so much? I don’t care, and the stupid timer had to say zero and it hurts and I don’t want it to hurt. Why can’t it go back?”Pepper doesn’t answer with anything but consoling motions, and that’s pretty much how the rest of the night goes. The next morning, Pepper hugs him for a solid few minutes after he tells JARVIS to call off the search. They get drunk again, equally smashed and crying. That is how Rhodey finds them a little while later when he drops in for a surprise visit. The day ends with the three of them drunker than they really should be, teetering the line of alcohol poisoning, and no one blames them, really. Not even when the three of them wake up the next day in the same bed, fully clothed (thank god this wasn’t like Nice, or Milan in 2003 and 2005, or Jakarta, or Toronto, or even Detroit, where they didn’t even have sex that time but were still mostly naked) but also heavily cuddling, with Tony in the middle. No one cares; this doesn’t even rank on the scale of weirdness between the three of them.
April 2014
Dumbstruck, I'm falling for his act
Down a shame spiral, I am utter nerves
The next time Tony steps foot in Steve’s hospital room, Steve’s awake, propped up in his hospital bed, and staring at the ceiling like it has something written on it. He looks mostly healed, though his face still has a little bit of purpling and bruising that’s concerning, and his arms and everything else that’s visible out of the covers look a little beat up. Mostly healed. There are still some of Bruce’s elephant-rhinoceros-horse painkillers hooked up to Steve, but just enough that Tony wonders if they’re actually taking the edge off for Steve, or not even that. “Hey Tony,” Steve says with a soft smile, lighting up as he walks in. “Hey Steve,” Tony replies, swallowing back any memories about what Steve looked like last time. “Please don't ever do something like this ever again with calling for help.”Steve huffs a laugh, and then winces, and Tony instantly realizes that the painkillers are not high enough to do a single damn thing to Steve. He walks over and glares at Steve while pressing the button a few times. Before Steve can say something else, Tony glares again, and then leans against the door like he did last time. “Hey, I had help,” Steve tries to defend himself. “And remind me, did I end up in a hospital bed for this long? Did I end up in a hospital bed, period? No,” Tony says, earning himself a dirty look from Steve. “S’not my fault,” Steve mutters, and it is Tony who laughs this time. God, he’s in love with a self-sacrificing, reckless, stubborn idiot and that combination makes for some interesting, interesting decisions and experiences. This thing that Tony has, with the worrying about Steve and the wanting to do everything for him and the fishing his shield out of the bottom of the Potomac is like breathing to him, easy and natural. He doesn’t know what to think. “Apparently you voluntarily dropped your shield,” Tony points out. “Like it’s not your primary offensive weapon and a one-of-a-kind, valuable and finely crafted shield. Made of the rarest metal on earth.” Steve gives him an apologetic look that’s angelic enough that Tony throws up his hands. “You absolute troll.”He grins as Tony continues on and says, "It’s at the Tower, by the way. Found the damn thing, but I’m only giving it back if you come and get it.””Are you—are you trying to bribe me into healing?” “Depends. Is it working?” Steve laughs, loud and clear and winces again, but the blond doesn’t seem to care. Tony takes one look at him and wonders if this is what having a soulmate feels like. If this is the kind of love they feel, because he really can’t imagine anything else.
September 2012
No one's brain to pick
He wouldn’t say that Steve and him were best friends, but he would say that Steve has somehow worked himself into being one of Tony’s friends. Tony has no clue on how it happened, especially after the horrible scepter-influenced first start that they had, and all the bitter resentment Tony had built up over decades against Steve. Until he comes up with an explanation, he’s calling it the Steve Rogers phenomenon. Or something like that.Somehow, he had gotten Natasha to tolerate him and smile at him, Clint to easily trust him (despite the fucked-upness the mind control thing), Bruce to let go some of that tight control around him, and Thor to follow him during the battle. In the month and a half later, Steve already had won everyone over, whether they realized it or not, and whether they wanted to be won over or not. Tony belatedly realized that included him. Steve was kind and polite and so honest in a world where nothing was black and white that it was refreshing. He definitely had a few things he wasn't telling and like everyone, he did lie, but Tony didn't mean that kind of honest. Steve was a breath of fresh air and a light in all of their darkened lives, though he was stumbling through life himself. He was trying, trying, trying, and never giving up, but he was helping as he helped himself. He did not deserve the horrible time displacement deal he had gotten, even if everyone here now were all the better for it. He also did not deserve one of the most well-known facts about him. Steve Rogers was a blank, one of those few that weren't born with a timer. Every single history book and every single book on timers never failed to mention that tidbit. He was always used as a point to show everyone that people without timers could live happy lives and romantic ones too. Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter, of course, are one of history's famous couples, and the reason that much of the stigma behind the timerless and timer-ignoring romances was removed. Though she went on to marry another man, Daniel Sousa, who had lost his soulmate early on, that relationship as well proved that other love still existed. Tony groans. When did he become a news article or a book?Still, that didn't change how Cap was partially the reason that Tony didn't care about his stupidly changing timer. It also didn't change how Steve was still the reason that Tony was not losing his mind like he had his soulmate. He was just inspiring like that, and Tony marked it down as the Steve Rogers phenomenon again. "The Steve Rogers phenomenon?" Pepper repeats questioningly from the other end of the video call. Right, the video call with Pepper about how the Avengers thing was going, and how R&D was going. "How much of that internal monologue did you hear?" Tony asks."Just that," Pepper says. "Do I want to hear whatever preceded the... Steve Rogers phenomenon? What is it, by the way?""It's this..." Tony starts to explain, launching into a derailed explanation on how he's impacted everyone, including Hill and Fury.
March 2015
Ego, I am a slave to you You're running the show, my confidence is bruised
Apparently it’s three o’clock in the morning. Who knew? Tony blinks as his eyes drift away from the clock and towards his empty stashes of coffee and his empty pot of coffee. He frowns. Great, now he has to go to the communal floor and get some coffee... without getting caught by one of any of the frequent night-prowlers or someone passing through or leaving the Tower. Otherwise he knows he’ll just have to face the wrath, or in Steve’s case, puppy eyes, of someone and lose against them telling him to go get some sleep. The 'you're a hypocrite for being up too' card never works anymore either. So he pulls up the camera placed in the kitchen to see if anyone’s there, and groans when he sees Steve. Tony really cannot go up against Steve right now, especially when he’s caffeine deprived. He never even has a chance against one of Steve’s smiles, or Steve’s ‘I’m concerned for your health and you should be too’ face, or Steve’s “Please?’ face or even those eyebrows of disappointment. He would at least like to put up some kind of a resistance. Tony just stares at Steve in the kitchen, waiting for him to leave. So he watches Steve brew his tea with all the movements of a guy who has just come out of a nightmare. It must have been a devasting one, for Steve to look so far gone and retreated into himself that he’s a ghost working off of muscle memory. Shoulders hunched, eyes glazed, face dark, chest rising unevenly, and shaking arms, he doesn’t look at all like the Steve he’s come to be. Steve sits down on one of the stools at the kitchen counter the wrong way, so that his back is to the counter and he sips. Natasha walks in, ghosts of her own, and takes a look at the remaining tea left in the pot. She pours it all for herself. It’s apparent that Steve hasn’t noticed her yet, for all of his supersoldier hearing. She seems to come to the same conclusion Tony did and talks to him. Steve snaps out of it intensely enough to give someone else whiplash. Tony’s always known for being in his head, but no one seems to realize that Steve can pull that off like a champ, and in all the worst ways possible. As a result, it’s often best to pull him out slowly, and not like what Natasha did. Because Steve’s now dropped his tea—empty, how the hell did he sip so fast?—on the ground, and his cuff has fallen. No one knows why Steve wears a cuff since everyone knows he’s a blank, but Tony now knows. Too quick to be read, Tony catches a number at the far-most right of Steve’s wrist and stares in shock. Steve scrambles to get his cuff on, but Natasha’s noticed what he has. “You’re supposed to be a blank,” she says, with her eyes slightly widened.He pales slightly, and some of the coldness in his eyes comes back. “I was a blank.” His implied and then I woke up is understood by all. “You aren’t happy?” Natasha asks, concern in her voice. “Do you still—?”“No, I wasn’t um... Peggy had a timer,” he shakes his head, weakly trying to explain. “And Daniel was her soulmate. History liked its own story.””Oh,” Natasha’s voice catches, in an odd way that reminds him too much of Pepper. “Steve.”“I have a soulmate,” Steve says with a smile, only the smile is so wrong, so bitter, so sad that Tony wants to look away now from this extremely private moment but can’t. He stares at Natasha, before pulling off his cuff and showing it to Natasha in just an awkward angle that Tony can’t pick it up in all of the shadows and whatnot. Before Natasha can say something, and her face is in a carefully blank expression right now, Steve says, “They’re out there somewhere.” Something her face shifts, but Tony can't see the quick emotion that races across her face, disappearing just as quickly. Natasha carefully sets down her tea, picks up the cup he’s dropped, carefully places it next to hers, and then hugs him. Tony quits the video and just decides to go to sleep. He does not shed any tears, thank you very much.
July 2014
Standing at the crossroads There's no right answer
Steve takes a break from his HYDRA hunt on the first of July with Sam and without the Winter Soldier. Right in time for his birthday and the party that Tony’s throwing him. Really, Tony wishes he could have planned the timing this well. For someone whose birthday is in a few days, Tony notices that Steve doesn’t seem happy at all. He looks incredibly pained and miserable, and Tony wonders what that’s all about. When he asks Sam, he just shakes his head and says that Steve has been like this ever since they raided the last warehouse. Sam asks him to try and get it out of Steve before he wallows in misery. Tony likes Sam. It’s decided. It’s now the second of July and Tony finds Steve sketching in his book. “Hey Steve,” Tony says, plopping down on the chair next to Steve’s sofa and watching Steve close his book in a panic. And then Steve seems to register who he is. Instantly, Steve hardens and turns into a stoic shell of himself. “Hey Tony,” Steve says. “I have to—”“You look like someone kicked a patriotic puppy,” Tony says, internally wincing at what he just said. Steve doesn’t even seem to notice. “I have to tell you something,” he seriously says, “I should have told you of a suspicion from the beginning about HYDRA but I thought maybe it was paranoia and I didn’t realize just what or who had... and...””And?” Tony prompts, dreading what Steve was about to say. “At the most recent base, I found a few reports about the Winter Soldier’s missions from 1990-1995 and, Tony,” Steve’s face crumples at his name, “I'm so sorry but the Winter Soldier killed your parents and Jarvis.” Tony blinks. He hadn’t expected Steve to ever tell him about HYDRA killing his parents, let alone say it was the Winter Soldier’s doing. He hadn’t expected Steve to sound so apologetic, like it was him who did it. He hadn’t expected to Steve to include Jarvis in there either. “I know,” Tony says, trying to alleviate Steve’s guilt, and god, is this what’s eating at Steve? “I found a video when I was pulling files out about the Avengers. And a file.””You've known and you—you haven’t said anything and,” Steve tries to say. “Tony, you’ve been helping me find him and he—”This is a conversation Tony does not want to be having. This is a conversation Tony’s had with himself, with Pepper, and with his therapist several times over. He thought it wouldn’t hurt with the amount of times he’s said it and thought about it, but with Steve, it’s just... it still hurts. It does. “No less a victim than my parents and Jarvis,” Tony merely shrugs, trying to play it off, trying not to show anything, and Stark men are made of iron, they don’t cry, they don’t cry. “Are you... are you sure? I—I can’t ask you to help me find him and I can’t ask you to—””And I’m offering,” Tony says. “This is not an ultimatum for you to choose him or me. I don’t think either of us would like what that answer would have been, no matter which side you would have picked. I’ve had time to think this over, and I think I’d like to meet the guy who my dad either called a bastard or a good fucking man.” Steve looks at him like he hung the moon.
May 2015 (now; the night)
Spirit, Please don’t abandon me
“You have any secrets I should know about?” Tony quips, staring at the room in Clint’s house that he was to share with Steve. As if the world wasn’t fucked enough already for him, without this torturous situation. As if Clint wasn’t laughing his ass off about the one room, one bed situation that he had put them in. Steve shrugs vaguely. “Shouldn’t that be my line?””I’m serious. What is your dark side, Cap?” Tony asks, because he’s a bastard who can’t let go and because Steve can’t hate him any further than this. Also, since when he known to let things go? Steve’s piercing gaze suddenly turns on him, assessing him just like Natasha or Hill would. But unlike them, he isn’t cold or calculating and he isn’t trying to figure out how many ways Tony can be taken down. Steve’s looking for something deeper, and his look sets Tony on a fire that isn’t exactly bad. “Haven't you figured it out yet, Tony?” Steve asks, his dark, tired voice doing things to Tony that really shouldn’t be done. Not now, not now, world’s in danger, Ultron, world’s in danger, not now, not now, not now. “And here I—”He stops short of saying something and then drops a bag of clothes and supplies to the ground. Steve shakes his head, thinking better of it and then pulls off his shirt, tossing it in a little basket to the side. He grabs a cotton tee, underwear, a pair of old man plaid pajamas, then heads towards the shower in Romanoff and Bruce’s room. All the tenseness from his body leaves in a wave that leaves Tony reeling in how much has changed. Just as he is about to leave the room, Steve peeks back, having thought of something. Those eyes look at Tony again dead-on, really seeing Tony and leaving him bare open. Tony wonders why Steve never lets himself stop at the exterior, why Steve tries time and time again to see Tony as the broken monster he really is. Steve leaves.Tony stands, staring at Steve’s retreating figure and carefully avoiding watching Steve’s back muscles. “You love him,” Natasha’s voice says in front of him, forcing his eyes to snap to her. “Even if he isn’t your soulmate.” “I don’t have one,” he lies easily, and the words do come easy. “I don’t have to worry.” “What a funny family of soulmate issues we are,” Natasha says. “You don’t have one, Steve’s the poster boy for blanks, Bruce can’t be with his, Thor is Asgardian and their system is different, and I have three different timers. I don’t really remember one, one has happened, the last hasn’t. The two that have happened; I know they don’t remember either.”Tony wants to ask why Natasha’s sharing, and what that even means, before he remembers the Red Room and all the horrors of brainwashing. So he attempts for levity. “It’s a fucked up world when Clint’s the normal one.””I don’t know what the context is, but fuck you too,” Clint says from behind Natasha, seemingly looking for something. He’s staring intently at Tony’s lips and Tony sighs. Natasha doesn’t even have to turn around to figure it out. But since Clint is searching for his hearing aids, she’s forced to turn around and say, “Did you take them out again, you idiotic disaster?” while she signs the ASL translation of that. Tony catches her pinky entending near her forehead upwards in a motion he recognizes with the sheer frequency she uses it towards Clint. “Laura’s already chewed me out,” Clint mutters just as Natasha’s tearing him a new one in frantic hand gestures and glaring looks. Steve chooses that moment to step out of Bruce and Natasha’s room with his old man pajamas and thin shirt, Bruce bright pink behind him. That’s a story, Tony thinks. Steve’s also holding what seem to be Clint’s hearing aids. Steve tries to sign something, but horribly fails on account of Clint’s hearing aids still in his hand. Steve looks Clint in the eye—with nowhere near as intensity as he does Tony all the time—and clearly asks, “Did you take these out again?” Clint groans and signs something, before holding his hand out for the aids. As soon as he gets them, he bolts, with Natasha on his trail, determined to finish yelling at him. Bruce goes back into his room and suddenly, it’s the two of them alone again. “I don’t know why he does it when he knows Natasha’s going to yell at him. And Laura, I suppose,” Steve sighs, shaking his head. “The constant fear alone make up for how uncomfortable they can be sometimes. Then again, I don’t think he has much to fear this time around.””Barton didn’t get the vision,” Tony points out. “He out-visioned the vision.” “This again,” Steve sighs again, heading into the bedroom and plopping down on the one bed.“No, I’m really curious,” Tony says. Steve looks at him again briefly. ”You called it a vision,” Steve quietly says, standing up in realization slowly. “She showed Natasha, Bruce, Thor and I our worst nightmares, not our futures. Not visions. Which means... Tony—””No, don’t you dare—””—what did she show you back at the warehouse where we found the scepter?””—ask me because I’m not talking about this again.” “Again?” Steve asks, taking a step towards Tony. Tony backs by a step accordingly. “The—she showed me something that I wasn’t prepared to see,” Tony reveals reluctantly. “The end of the path that I set us on.” Those words to Fury were fitting, in what he had said. Steve takes another step, not too intimidatingly and then stops. He closes his eyes and visibly suppresses another comment. When he opens them, he says, “Ultron. Ending the fight. Going h-home.” It isn’t lost to Tony on how Steve stumbles over the word, and has a faroff look in his eye. It isn’t lost to Tony on how everyone else on the team has people and a place to go to, except for Steve minus the Tower. Even Natasha, and even Bruce, whether they’ve realized it or not. “You think I walked out of that alright,” Steve slowly says, a haunting expression coming over his face. “Because there wasn’t anything to bounce back from. Natasha saw remnants of a past that had been washed out of her by brainwashing and locked away in shackles, because that’s how she lives, by not thinking about it at all. Thor saw a future where he failed, but it hadn’t occurred to him before this, had it? And he saw something in there that’s going to distract him from his dream. Bruce saw a Harlem where he killed Betty. Do you know the last time Bruce worried about Harlem specifically? 2012. And then we helped him out of it. She spent minutes on them, reading their minds and pulling thoughts out.” He laughs. “She spent twenty four seconds on me, twenty seconds too many with the number of times I’ve seen that nightmare and the number of waking moments I think about it.“ Oh. Oh.“Steve, I—” Tony wants to backtrack fast enough to be just like the enhanced that beat them earlier. This is him being a peak asshole, and he was wrong before about Steve not being able to hate him any more, because this is that. This is bad memories, and worst nightmares and two am conversations when both of them are down. He doesn’t want to know, not at all, and he wishes he wasn’t such a bastard. “Camera flashes were gun shots and spilled wine was a body bleeding. People dancing were people fighting, lipstick was blood, and laughter was a foreign sound. I was in a dance hall after the war. Stork Club. Everyone’s dreams were what could have been or what could be, and maybe part of mine was like that but... my dream was about my reality. That I’ll never leave war and war’ll never leave me. It’s become the only thing in this life that I know and maybe I fight because I want to save lives, but evil megalomaniac robot with otherwise bad philosophy or not, he was right about me. I live pretending I can’t live without a war, because war is the only thing I have left. Peggy told me that everyone could go home, and to picture it, and the next thing I see is that I’m all alone in the dance hall, wearing my goddamn uniform. Isn’t that what happened? Isn't it? I walked away alright because it’s what I’ve been doing for the last three years. Want to know my dark side? I'm living it everyday."”Steve, I—” Tony shouldn’t have pushed and he doesn’t know why he keeps doing this to Steve, who despite his ghosts, is a good person and has his own battles to fight without Tony’s help.”No,” Steve cuts him off, “Don’t apologize. This is what you do. Push, prod, and poke, because you’re an engineer and someone who tinkers. That is who you are. Don’t apologize for being you.””Yeah, well, I’m an asshole who doesn’t—””And I’m the hypocrite who yelled at you for trying to come up with a solution for alleviating your goddamn nightmares! You think I don’t know what the end of the path means? We all die in your dream, don’t we? One final mission that ruins us and tears us apart because we weren’t enough? Don't apologize."Tony blinks at how Steve has his number almost perfectly. “Blanket around the world so that the fight can end, we can go home, and none of us do end up dying on that final mission. I should be apologizing right now for yelling at you like that without understanding why. I still wouldn’t have agreed, but some of the things I said would have never been thought of.”Almost perfectly on the nose, but Steve’s not getting why that made Tony so scared, and he doesn’t want him to. “I don’t know what to feel that you’ve read me this easy, glad or worried since I’m so open, apparently,” Tony tries for levity. Steve snorts, though he deflates, almost like he’s remembering that he thinks he isn’t angry at Tony. “You are not easy, Tony Stark.” Steve blinks, too, like he’s finally realized where they are, where Tony is leaning against the wall for having taken too many steps backwards, and where he is, away from the bed he was sitting on. “Gee, compliments like that and a guy might actually think that you don’t hate him,” Tony says. He frowns. “I don’t hate you,” he says with the most sincerity Tony’s heard all throughout today. It’s practically sickening at this point. “Are you sure?” Steve just gives him a sad look, before saying, “I could never hate you.” Before Tony can say anything, Steve walks dangerously close to Tony, brushes a hand out, looks at Tony meaningfully, and then turns off the light. So maybe Tony was projecting (and maybe he was down for some hate-sex). Steve climbs into bed, somehow taking up just a little less than half of the bed even given his considerable stature. It’s clear that Steve has already thought about the bed/floor argument, and came up with a better solution. Only not for Tony, because a night with Steve in the same bed sounds like torture since they aren’t sleeping together. Tony sighs.
May 2015 (now; the next morning)
I am dreaming, I’m in a drift
Tony wakes up to the strange feeling of sleeping without any covers. He’s also very warm, and there’s a very comfortable pillow right next to him. He opens his eyes and realizes he’s being aggressively cuddled by Steve, with their legs tangled together, Steve’s arms pulling him close to his body, and Tony’s arms hugging Steve’s back. Worse: he’s aggressively cuddling Steve and wishes he doesn’t have to move and get out of bed at all. There’s a strange feeling flooding Tony right now, and he can’t think about anything but this feeling of want and desire. And Steve looks so young and peaceful without the heavy weight of Captain America on him that Tony doesn’t want to move and wake him up. It’s at this exact time when Tony realizes that Steve isn’t even thirty yet, that Steve has had to soldier the mistakes of the world and every other person from such a young age that he probably doesn’t even know what it’s like to be a carefree twenty something. Steve, who is sunshine and quick sketches and witty remarks and from-scratch baked goods, probably hasn’t even dated anyone. “You think too loud,” Steve mutters, before comically opening his eyes and trying to untangle the two of them frantically. He ends up shoving himself off the bed in a hurry with a soft thump. “Oh god, I’m sorry, I must have suffocated you and I didn’t mean...”Tony plays it off with a shrug, trying not to laugh. “Now I know your secret in winter.” Steve rubs his face with a groan, looking apologetic and sheepish as he gets up. God, is this the same guy who served in a goddamn World War? His hand drops down from his face again when he says, “I didn’t mean for that to happen, I’ll take the floor next time if there is a next time and...”But Tony isn’t listening to Steve anymore; he’s staring at Steve’s uncuffed wrist with a growing sense of horror and shock. 00-000-00-00-00. Steve’s found his soulmate. Steve has a soulmate, and now is not the time to think about how it isn’t him or anything. “Tony?” Steve asks, before he catches Tony’s gaze to his wrist. He immediately turns away his wrist and tenses. “Tony.” “Congratulations,” Tony simply says, “To whoever it was and whenever it happened.” He doesn’t say anything else and doesn’t himself feel anything. Steve doesn’t take it. Instead, he just looks sad as he looks away. “I woke up from the ice with this.”Tony doesn’t say that he already knows this. “Thought that the universe was trying to make up for everything I lost by giving me this. And then I lost my soulmate, and thought that maybe not.” “What?” Tony asks in shock, blinking at Steve. “I don’t know who they are,” Steve says calmly, like he’s tried to accept it and move on. And for Steve, who thought he was a blank for all of his old life, maybe it was an easy thing to forget about it. “And there’s just five people alive who know that I have a timer. There’s only four people who know what the numbers are.””Steve, why are you telling me this?” Tony asks, still staring at Steve’s wrist. “Natasha and Sam are the others,” Steve continues, "but they doesn’t know where it zeroed. Happened just a short while after I woke up. During Loki.”Tony’s blood runs cold. This is eerily like his story, and it can’t be, it really can’t be. And yet, this makes so much sense on why he hadn’t found them, even after combing through all the lists and footage and people. This makes the love and the pining for Steve have context and meaning, and maybe he actually has a shot. Like breathing, he’s always called it, and that explains why he’s always wondered what soulmate love was like if it was supposed to be stronger than this and he thought nothing could be stronger. His heart speeds up. Goddamn, he has a heart condition and this is bad for him. Soulmates. He’s found his. Finally. And then he wonders what the hell to say next, because what if Steve isn’t gay, what if Steve hates Tony, what if Steve is disgusted and repulsed? Tony knows he has to try. “Stuttgart Hall,” he whispers. “Yeah,” Steve says, looking at Tony sharply. “How did you—”Tony takes off his cuff and holds up the line of zeroes to Steve. Steve’s eyes widen, and his breath catches as his face softens towards Tony. “Stuttgart Hall.””Oh,” Steve says lightly, like he can’t breathe. There's a smile growing on Steve's face, reverent in a way that's never associated with Tony.“I think we’re—””Soulmates,” Steve unironically finishes, like he can’t believe it. "You're my soulmate.””Yeah,” Tony breathes out. “Wha-what do we do?” ——————“Brush your teeth, shower, get dressed, and I think we need to have a talk.” Steve had said before he had dashed into the bathroom in their bedroom. So by the time Tony had done the same, Steve was already in the kitchen cooking breakfast, because apparently it was four thirty in the morning and no one else was up. “Tony,” Steve says as soon as he steps foot into the kitchen. His voice is lighter than Tony has ever heard it. “There’s coffee running.” “Can I kiss you?” Tony asks abruptly. He's already come this far with impulse decisions, and fuck, this must be what it feels like to be Steve. There's such an adrenaline rush that comes with impulses. Steve turns around in surprise and stares at Tony with hope in his eyes. A smile curves his pink lips. “I think that was the shortest talk we’ve had.” Tony grins as his mind is doing cartwheels and flips and playing fireworks in his mind, congratulating him for his soulmate. “As long as we’re in agreement.” And that is how the rest of the Avengers (and Laura) find them, kissing like their lives depended on it in the kitchen an hour later, after they’ve both eaten breakfast in the few minutes they weren’t kissing. Steve has his hands under Tony’s shirt and Tony has a hand down Steve’s pants as they’re tightly pressed together against the kitchen countertop, with Steve being the one who’s pinned. He seriously wants to know just how Steve can kiss like this, and what other party tricks he has. Tony realizes he will have the time to learn everything he wants about Steve if they defeat Ultron. “Not in my kitchen! Arm’s length for Jesus!” Clint yells. “Finally,” Bruce mutters as he looks much more awake, suddenly. “Told you one bed and one room was a good idea,” Laura says as she rolls her eyes affectionately towards Clint. Their soulmate status makes much more sense now. “Congratulations,” Natasha sincerely says, smiling at the two of them like a normal person. “It’s about time,” Fury comments, surfacing from behind Banner. They both quickly pull away from each other, hands retracting from where they were. It’s akin to teenagers being caught, though as Tony sneaks a glance towards Steve, he doesn't seem to be ashamed. Steve doesn’t even seem fazed. Tony really wants to know what Steve’s gotten up to now. “I’m telling Pepper and Sam,” Natasha merely smirks. Tony suddenly has a flashback to Pepper telling him that he has a soulmate. He groans; she’ll never let this go. Next to him, it seems that Steve is thinking of someone (Sam or Natasha) who’ll rag on him. Tony thinks that he has the shorter end of the stick though. Because Pepper will never let this go. He can already hear her in his mind.
“We’ll see,” the ghost of Pepper mocks.