A Brief History of Tony Stark

Tony Stark had been a great many things in his life.

He'd been a genius, pretty much always.

The earlier half, he'd been adorable.

Well, he was still adorable(if he did say so himself), so add that to the list of things he always was.

He'd had his jackass moments, well, all the time.

And then there were his equally frequent sexual flings.

Did he mention that he was a born alcoholic?

Of all the things Tony had been, he'd never really been anything half-way.

In the light of this observation, he'd always had a deeply integrated fear that if he didn't so something perfectly awesome such as the way he invented or calculated algorithms, then whatever he was doing was doomed to be a horrible failure.

Tony knew upon joining the Avengers, that it was all or nothing.

So far he'd done pretty well about it, likely because although he worked alongside these people, he was not required to form friendships.

A friendship was something that the man was capable of, if not by the mere skin of his teeth, and honestly he'd been putting all that effort to good use on his lifelong companion, Rhodey.

Relationships however, highlighting his relationship with Pepper Potts, usually fell on the short end of the stick no matter how hard Tony tried.

Honestly, he did try.

Tony Stark had been a great many things in his life; Billionaire, playboy, philanthropist, etc etc.

A respectable boyfriend was not one of them.

Maybe it had something to do with the 'playboy' nonsense or the alcoholism, because the last time he checked, philanthropy was a good thing, no matter what kind of sneer the Captain gave him upon bragging about it.

Perhaps he did spend too much time locked away in his workshop and maybe it could be understandable for his partner to be sick of worrying over him whenever Iron Man was needed.

Which seemed like always... just like everything else.

So Tony, being Tony and all, had come to accept the fact that relationships beyond necessary acquaintance just weren't his thing.

So when Steve Rogers, Captain-Profanity-Withheld-America, asked him on a date, he might have panicked. Not many could say that they turned down the icon of the nation, he-who-was-everything-that-stood-for-America, even less could say that they turned him down four times.

Let's face it, the goody-two-shoed prick was stubborn.

It's not that Tony didn't want to go out with him the first time he asked. He could picture it clearly; a movie, a stroll in the park or by a pond, throwing bread at ducks and sharing an ice cream cone and it

was all so 1940's.

Not that there was anything wrong with the 1940's, in fact, it was probably the basis of what is considered a dream date to this day.

Which is why Tony said no.

He took one look at that perfect man and his perfect plan (star-spangled-man-with-a-you-get-the-picture) and all he saw was a big something for him to royally screw up.

After flat-out rejecting Steve Rogers and let's face it, condemning himself to hell for knocking poor Mr.

America down a few steps, Tony had made a comment. He couldn't remember exactly what the comment was but it had something to do with skipping the 'wine and dine' and just jumping into bed.

He'd said it because he knew Steve, and he knew that Steve would be put off by the offer.

He was half wrong.

He got his usual scolding for his sexual prowess behavior and the Captain stormed off to likely sulk at his proposal getting stepped on by Tony's $2200 sneakers.

Maybe Tony had shut himself up in his shop for thirty-nine hours afterward with no food and little water, but he wasn't moping over Captain America; he just had a lot of work to be done.

Right.

When he finally did rise out from what the other Avengers had begun to refer to as his 'bat cave', he was over it.

Until Steve asked him again.

This time had been a bit more subtle, something Tony was promptly not having and retorted with;

"My bedroom is closer."

The third time he responded with;

"Is that some new sex position?"

And the fourth went something like;

"Sounds like an unnecessary amount of foreplay."

Each time Tony had been attempting to shake him although if the Captain had ever decided that Tony had a good suggestion (which would never happen, if their history was anything to go by) and did jump into bed with him... well, Tony wasn't going to complain.

Jumping into bed was something he could do. It made sense for people to have sex and then find other people to have sex with and so on and so forth.

All this 'date' nonsense just made him dizzy.

All four times Steve had flushed, but he only retorted sharply the first time. The other times he just shook his head a bit and walked off, possibly leaving Tony feeling far worse than if he had called him out for being a dick.

So why did Steve keep asking?

The fifth time was different.

Tony wasn't sure if he should be endeared or concerned at the dim lighting, soft music and candlelit dinner he found waiting for him when the tower was supposed to be empty.

Not to mention the pretty blonde that rung his hands together nervously.

Tony panicked, as he was near guaranteed to.

"My bedroom is like, an elevator ride away."

"That's enough, Tony."

His tone caught the Iron Man off guard. He was used to Steve's embarrassed but confident attempts at wooing him but the voice of his commander snapping startled him into silence.

A silence that lasted long enough for Tony to look at the wonderful meal (likely homemade) and the ambiance and the man that stood and watched and waited for Tony to say something not fucking stupid, and decide that yep, he was going to fuck all of this up.

"I have work to do."

He muttered weakly, turning and trying to accept that fact that this was likely the final rejection, that Steve would realize that Tony had no romantic interest in him and give up on his pursuit.

It was almost sad.

Tony got nowhere, a strong hand gripping his upper arm had locked him in place and forced him to turn back and look at the Captain's beautiful blue eyes.

"Why won't you have dinner with me?"

Tony wished Steve had been violent about it, at least then he could accuse him of pushing him around and storm off, but there was never anything violent about Steve.

"Newsflash, Capsicle, I don't have dinner with anyone."

"You have dinner with Dr. Banner."

"Fries and a shake while we compare thesis' is not going out to dinner. Bruce doesn't get down on one bloody knee to ask me."

It was an exaggeration of course, but Tony felt that Steve may as well be with how sincere and headstrong he looked every time he asked, as if every time he was certain that Tony would say yes.

"Then I won't ask. Have dinner with me."

That strict, you-will-do-what-I-say-because-I'm-America's-sweet heart voice was riveting and Tony should have gotten a fucking medal for how well he held up against it.

"Well, why won't you just have sex with me?" He whined, because he was good at that.

"Because, Tony..." The way the Captain spoke his name sent tremors through Tony's body. "This thing that we have, one of us has to do it right."

Tony was never sure if it was because Steve pointed out the obvious sparks between them that he had tried so devotedly to ignore or the fact that someone, for the first time in his life, was honestly trying to do right by him, but he knew when he had lost.

He let Steve guide him to the table and was ashamed as how weak he went in the man's grip.

So Tony had never been boyfriend material, especially not in the long-term, but it seemed that Captain America was all of that (no surprise there) and was able to compensate for his blatant lack.

Once Pepper had bought herself birthday gifts using Tony's bank account, something he entirely approved of seeing as he wouldn't know what to get her anyway.

He'd amused the thought of buying her a country at some point.

This time it was Tony getting the gifts. Everyone knows that any Stark could dish out any amount of money for anything they wanted, so the small bouquets of flowers and homemade cakes that Steve presented every so often were accompanied by a shy look and a bit of hope.

Tony guessed it was hope that although the gifts were in no way expensive, he would like them all the same.

And he did like them, very much.

Maybe because Steve would hide his smile behind each set of flowers or because he would write on the cakes 'eat something' in near-perfect cursive frosting letters.

Either way, Tony was successfully wooed.

So even though Tony was shit at the whole boyfriend thing, Steve didn't mind, and suddenly the word long-term didn't leave so many vomit-knots in Tony's stomach.

He really liked Steve, always had.

(That was another thing that consisted of his entire life, although he'd never confess out loud about his immense crush on Captain America from childhood until his late-teens, consisting of comics, posters, costumes, and printed underwear over the decade or so.)

Another thing that Tony Stark wasn't so hot at was abstaining from sex.

Sex was, well, he was Tony Stark, the words 'sexual deviant' were probably in his job description.

The first time Steve saw Tony to his room for the night, he'd taken the man's wrist and kissed it with affection in his eyes.

"That's all?" Tony had griped, heart hammering from the unfaltering happiness on Steve's expression.

"Goodnight, Tony."

The second time, at least he got a kiss.

Tony got lots of kisses in fact, Steve seemed to love kissing more than anything else and hey, that was not something that Tony was about to complain about. Sometimes the Captain was unbearably sweet about the whole thing. His lips would pressed innocently to the corner of Tony's mouth and that would be it. Other times proved that Steve was capable of being lust-driven, just that he was much better at controlling it than Tony. This pissed Tony off to no end, he would grab Steve's shirt and drag him close and their mouths would get unbearably hot against each other. Tongues would tease and dance and there was so much sucking involved that Tony had to pat himself on the back for not coming in his pants.

Tony wasn't good at abstaining from sex, but he was good at having sex. Very good, in fact.

After months of parading around with Captain-Damn-America to movies and dinners and parks and all those other lovely 1940's things Tony knew were in store, Tony Stark finally got some, for lack of better term.

Steve had always been adamant in his argument that sex was something that came later on in a relationship as opposed to being what started one. As cute and boy-scout as that was, Tony wasn't buying it, which is why he teased the man endlessly when he'd discovered that Steve was still a virgin.

Teased but dropped the matter of actually having sex like a brick.

Deflowering Captain America seemed like too much damn pressure, even if he was Tony Stark, genius, playboy, philanthropist, yadda yadda...

Tony decided that he had been waiting for so long already, it wouldn't kill him to give the Cap time to be ready.

Imagine Tony's surprise when three days later a very needy Capsicle was knocking on his door and accusing Tony of not being attracted to him anymore.

"What?"

Tony had gaped at the six feet of blonde, blue-eyed, deliciousness and repeated himself.

"What?"

If Tony had known that all it took to get Steve into his bed was to stop trying to get him into his bed, well, he would have done so a long time ago.

So from then on Tony added 'lover' to the list of things that he was. At least that was something he was familiar with.

With Steve being the amazing boyfriend he is and Tony being he amazing lover he always bragged about being, things were going pretty smoothly between what everyone referred to as the Super Couple.

And then Steve asked Tony to marry him.

It went how one might imagine; flowers, lights, music, down on one knee and a ring that probably cost SHEILD a fortune.

Tony said no (of course) because he knew for certain that he would be a dreadful husband.

Unlike in his attempts to make Tony go to dinner with him, Steve didn't wait very long to ask again.

In fact, it went something along the lines of:

"Will you Marry me Tony?"

"Uh... No."

"Marry me, Tony."

"How about let's not."

"Tony."

"Steve, Stop it."

It went on for a while before the Captain pulled his ace.

"Tony, this is either where we're going or we're going nowhere."

"Steve... are you breaking up with me?"

"God Tony, I'm trying to marry you!"

The banter continued for near half an hour, Tony being difficult and Steve being long-suffering.

Finally the good Captain took Tony's hands in his and the genius shut-up promptly.

"Tony... for the sake of America... Marry me."

"Oh ha ha, I see what you did there, stars and stripes, and you know what I have to say about that?"

They got married on top of Avengers tower. Everyone showed up.

Nick Fury and Agent Hill. Phil Coulson and his cellist. Thor and Natasha and Clint and Bruce and Pepper and Happy... They all sat in first-class folding chairs as Tony was reluctantly walked down the isle by Rhodey, bitching the whole time about how he may as well have been wearing a Vera Wang gown.

Oh yeah, when it was mentioned that everybody showed up, everybody showed up.

It felt like all of upstate New York gathered at the base of the Avengers tower, with signs and fireworks they watched the ceremony broadcast on the side of the tower (it was not difficult for JARVIS to make that arrangement)

So yeah, New York watched America and Philanthropy get hitched, there were doves and birdseed and a heli-carrier with a banner reading 'just hitched' in lovely print and scribbled beside it in red sharpie 'gonna go get laid now'.

So the Super Couple became Super Husbands. They climbed aboard and flew away, waving at the millions of people that cheered at their departure.

"It feels like the whole world wanted us together, Tony." Steve joked, adjusting his tie.

"I don't care about the world, Steve, I wanted us together."

Their honeymoon was scheduled for two weeks.

No one heard from the pair for three months, but Natasha made sure to give it to Fury hard when he attempted to track them down and give them work.

As frightened as Tony had been about the whole 'marriage' thing, life in the tower didn't change much.

Steve finally admitted that he had moved into Tony's room (He had been sleeping there for months but claimed it wasn't right to move in before they were married) and Tony had a wedding band to ogle in disbelief.

The lease didn't even change, at some point Steve's name had ended up on it (along with everyone else) when he'd donated the tower to the team.

Steve however, did convince JARVIS to give him full access to any part of the building (damn traitor) and now was able to let himself into Tony's lab with food whenever he pleased.

Tony wasn't really complaining about it, the food was welcome and in times of stress the blonde would rub the kinks from his shoulders.

He wouldn't admit it to many, but Tony enjoyed being married.

Four years of domestic bliss and the occasional world-saving shenanigans, and Tony was introduced to another something he wasn't ready to be a part of.

Parenthood.

If Tony's father was any indication of what he would be like around children, he wanted nothing to do with it.

As usual though, Steve managed to push Tony right into those situations he never felt qualified for.

"Steve, no."

"Tony."

"No, not happening, I wont."

"Please, Tony!"

"Uh uh, I went to dinner with you, I refrained from having sex, I even married you... you cannot do this to me. Steve."

That's how Tony and Steve, Iron Man and Captain America, adopted a five year old boy named Peter Parker.

So the Super Husbands became the Super Family.

Peter was a good child, loud, rambunctious, opinionated, but very intelligent and very well behaved.

Except for the times he would crawl across the ceiling and leave Steve gasping for air from a near panic attack while Tony chased him with a ladder.

Tony made a point to always tell Peter how handsome, intellectual, and brave he is. Basically, everything Howard Stark had never said to him.

When Peter wanted something, Tony made sure he got it. Steve would always accuse him of spoiling the boy, but let's face it, if Peter ever so much as threw the word 'hate' at Tony, well, Tony wouldn't be able to handle it.

So when Tony was in charge of mealtime, Peter never ate his carrots. When it was Tony's turn to put Peter to bed, he'd read as many bedtime stories as the boy asked for until sleep took him in it's own time. So on carrot nights, Steve fed Peter, and when Tony took more than thirty minutes putting Peter to bed, Steve would knock and steal his husband away with a stern glance at their adopted child.

As much as Tony spoiled him, the boy never argued with Steve, or either of them really.

"You're a good man and a great father, Tony. You don't have to keep trying to buy his affection."

Steve told him one night, his arms wrapped lazily around Tony's waist.

"You thought my father was a good man also."

"That's different, Tony."

"Would you have slept with my dad, if you had the chance?"

"God Tony, if I thought of Howard that way at all, I would not have asked you to dinner. It would have been too weird."

Tony grumbled and buried his face in his pillow.

"Stop calling him Howard."

He didn't see Steve roll his eyes.

When Peter was ten years old, he asked Natasha why his dad never got yelled at him when he broke into his lab and exploded things, despite the obvious anger in his expression.

The woman didn't think to sugar-coat the concept for him.

"Your Dad is afraid you wont love him."

"Why would he think I wouldn't?"

"I think it was around your age when he stopped loving his own father."

Tony never asked why Peter started eating his carrots around him without being told, he didn't ask about Peter being satisfied after one bedtime story as opposed to four. Tony just thought it was part of growing up.

When Peter told him one day for no reason whatsoever, "I'll always love you, Dad." Tony was a bit more curious.

"Is there something you need, Pete?" He asked slowly, as if tip-toeing on ice.

"Yeah, I needed you to know that."

Tony may or may not have cried that night, but if he did, Steve kept it to himself.

So Tony stopped worrying somewhat.

He'd take the chastisement of Steve any day.

He took it when he bought Peter, well, GameStop.

When at eleven he dropped Peter off on his first day of Middle School... in the Iron Man Suit.

Steve yelled especially loudly when Tony made him a dirt bike... he said that thirteen year-old boys should not be racing around Manhattan on a dirt bike.

It's a good thing that Peter asked Steve and Tony for permission to go anywhere or Tony would be shipping him off to whatever party he wanted.

Hell, he'd provide the helicopter.

At least one of them was sensible.

At Sixteen, Peter got a car.

Thankfully this time Steve was in on it, even helped pick the model.

Tony figured he was doing pretty good, so when Peter was seventeen, he helped him design a suit and web-shooters.

Steve was not happy about that one.

Steve was so 'not happy' that Tony slept in the common room for two weeks.

"Thanks, Dad."

It was worth it.

It took a while for Steve to adjust to the fact that his baby was now a superhero. Six months to be exact, six months in which Tony secretly had JARVIS keep tabs on Peter every time he put on the suit.

When Steve found out about the extra feature he had forgiven Tony wholeheartedly, then demanded that JARVIS keep him updated as well.

All in all, Tony was doing the whole 'Cool Dad' routine spot on.

Until Wade showed up.

In Texas, they have shot guns, in Marvel New York, they had repulsors.

One could imagine Peter Stark-Rogers' reaction when for the first time in his life, not only did Tony flat out object to something Peter wanted, but had that something tossed from a 99th story window.

"Dad! Why would you do that!?" Peter had yelled, almost concerned for his boyfriend's safety if only out of habit.

"It won't kill him." Tony grumbled, raising the security by two hundred percent.

"Peter, if he's really that serious about you... he'll climb back up." Steve teased, wrapped an arm around Tony.

"How do you know, Pop?"

"Let's just say I've been there before. He'll try again."

Tony positively glowered at his husband.

"JARVIS, up security to three hundred percent and train the machine guns on Pete's window."

"Dad!"

That night Steve laughed at Tony's inability to sleep, for once understanding it.

"You picked a hell of a time to be responsible."

"Wilson has grabbed my butt on the occasions we've run into him. There is no way Peter's butt is safe."

Steve laughed and tried to keep away the mental image.

He wouldn't trade witnessing Tony being over-protective for the world.

Over his laughter, the sound of machine guns went off, ruining the moment for the both of them.

They looked at each other, listening to the firing and shouts of curse words as clear as day.

"Put on the suit." Steve growled.

"Yeah." Tony responded.

Wade Wilson wasn't prepared for the guns, and he most certainly wasn't prepared for the two uniform-clad Super Husbands careening toward him.

Peter just covered his eyes.

The End