Tony looks quite the angel, tangled up in expensive sheets, whuffling into his pillow like any child. He looks like neither Howard nor Maria, except, he does have some resemblance to a sketch Steve had done of a similarly supine Howard, in more innocent times.
He feels stretched, almost ancient, a feeling he knows will subside only when he returns to the addiction that he covets, the one that drives him to drink when he must be absented from its light. Yet, he can feel his humanity slip away, consumed by the exacting power of the Tessaract.
Perhaps Tony will never understand his father. Certainly, Howard hopes, prays despite living his whole life as an atheist, that Tony will never feed the hunger of the alien artefact which is turning Howard himself into some inhuman, impartial being.
Tony still loves him, but Howard fears, that too, will pass.
He can't pinpoint the exact moment Maria's love turned to loathing. Worse, Howard can't remember what is was like to be heart-on-his-sleeve adoring of his wife. Logically, he knows that she had once been the one to bring him to life, after Steve's death had ripped his right ventricle out, and maybe more. As much as he loved Maria, however, now he feels nothing for her, or anyone except...
Peggy, he obsessed over, some. She had been as devastated as he was after Steve died, so, of course, being the stronger, being a man, he had to take care of her. Tony, Tony was him, with no mistakes. Howard could recall being very similarly behaved, only, not as attention-seeking or bitter, but that wasn't exactly Tony's fault, now, was it?
"Because of me," he thought, with little more emotion than he would use to tell his people, "Keep looking." Howard oft fought with Maria these days. Somehow she could tell that her husband wasn't the same man she had married, and she resented it.
He did try. He ignored Maria's dalliances with other men. He pleased her as best as he could in bed. He even let her have the most say when it came to Tony, but all he did was never enough for her, because he couldn't give her his heart again.
It hurt, seeing the look on Tony's face, the love mingled with fearful resignation. Howard knew what he was like when he was drunk. But alcohol was the antithesis of the Tessaract, and could almost make him feel again.
In a way, Howard Stark was suicidal. Though terrified by the knowledge of what he'd become and would become, to the point where he was tempted to cause an accident that would destroy himself, there was always too many people nearby, near enough to stay his hand. Besides, he still had the one reason to live.
Tony was his legacy. All the good that was Howard Stark, unburdened by Howard Stark's mistakes. And, ever since the first time he'd spared some time from his insanely busy days to properly look at what Tony had become, he'd been awed. In fact, in many ways, Howard was his preteen son's biggest fan, though he couldn't ever bring himself to apologise for not recognising the star-bright brilliance belonging to his son. So instead Howard worked hard at ensuring that whatever he left to Tony, was the best possible future, a silent homage.
A loveless marriage, a business partner that would cheerfully rob him blind and hock his stuff in Moscow, and Howard Stark stayed to see his own brown eyes look at him with greater intelligence than he'd ever know.
Once he'd loved his wife; once he'd trusted Obadiah Stane. He trusted the Tessaract to tell him the truth, that what Obadiah Stane could and would do if, for any moment and any reason, he let down his guard. They'd been amiable once. Maria had introduced them and Howard Stark had felt a sense of kinship with the younger man; they shared tastes and opinions and policies. But one night while handling the self-perpetuating power, he'd idly considered letting Stane in on his research, and the Tessaract had flinched, and pulled on his own emotions to evoke its distress. Howard had grown cold to Obadiah then, and now, their behaviour regarding one another was strict professionalism as an art form.
Once a smile could have swayed Maria to any course of action, or made an infant Tony smile back. Once his emotions had been deeper than the sea, higher than the trees, and true.
Winning was not exiting life with the most toys. Winning was entering the afterlife, if there was one, to a crowd of friends who knew and loved and forgave. By that reckoning, Howard figured he had lost. Maybe Steve, if anyone. But maybe Steve knew, and couldn't love him after that, couldn't forgive the man who considered him a brother, a friend.
In a way, Tony was his redemption.
Sometimes Howard wondered if the only reason he existed at all was to father the child tangled beneath sheets of silk. Nothing, almost nothing, he'd ever done had any intrinsic value besides his boy. Steve, Steve had been a good thing, but that was less of Howard, and all Steve. Tony, his son was the most noble creation Howard had part in.
It was with genuine affection that Howard watched Tony.
His son still slept, even through the emotional confession that Howard would never make in daylight. It seemed he'd never know how deeply Howard loved him. After all, there were only two witnesses, and the moon kept secrets very well.
Howard could guess how his son remembered him: the villain of his childhood. Maria would be the saint, Jarvis, a beloved nanny who always listened, and Stane the favourite uncle. Already Tony had begun to call him by first name instead of more favourable appellations like "Dad," or even, "Father."
So be it. The more he could spare Tony from his own troubles, the safer Tony would be. Tony didn't need to be exposed to the turmoil and mess Howard's life had degenerated into, and if it meant that Tony'd never remember his father fondly, very well. Howard could live with that, as long as Tony never had to be hurt.
He ignored the cool logic that whispered in his mind that Howard couldn't protect Tony forever, that one day Tony would experience all the worst money had to offer. One day, it whispered, Tony would face his father's demons as well as some of his own. Yet Howard was resolute: as long as he could shield Tony from the world, he would.
How old was Tony? Eleven, already? Still? Tony was so very young, at the age where he'd barely realised there was wickedness in the world. Howard sighs as he stands up and exits the room. Jarvis gives him a knowing look as he walks away. Briefly, Howard reaffirms his willingness to do anything for Tony, as he enters the lab where he keeps the Tessaract.
A strange thing happened when Howard Stark died; his spirit did not follow the way of his flesh. Decades of experiments with the Tessaract had tethered him to it. He heard and felt snippets in time, and knew Tony was growing up. He felt flashes of pain from where SHIELD had imprisoned the Tessaract. Finally, Howard saw the tower Tony built, saw the battle below, saw Steve (!), and saw what Tony had made of himself. A brief regret, that Tony had to endure so much. An everlasting buoyancy of pride, that Tony had done so well. And Howard Stark was at peace.