This was written as a response as a prompt challenge, Iron Dad 1000 Feelings from tumblr.
Prompt: 100: The felicity of the first touch.
It had not been that big of a deal, he had hugs before (it made him think about Jarvis and his mother). Had fist-pumped with fans and friends alike. He had never been a stranger to someone caressed his cheeks when he remembered how Pepper did it, always so gentle, always attentive.
It had never been an alien concept. Tony had been well versed about it. Had harmless memories of it.
Yet.
When Peter came into his world it got harder to confront some of his emotions. The kid was just so reckless. So, spirited with innocence that few had these days. He made him want to protect him. Pepper saw it when he worked long hours with him, when he repaired and upgraded the suit. Happy did too when he picked up and dropped off the kid many times and listened to the many stories Peter had to share. Rhodey didn't miss the train when he came over and shared very embarrassing stories from their youth when Peter asked about them.
It all had turned his life into a mushy mess with him picking up signals that he was getting very parental. Tony Stark had never called a family man, had never had the chance to explore it either. And when he gotten to meet Peter Parker, it still hadn't fully clicked until it all winded out with the whole before and after the homecoming disaster. But it should have. It should have! There had been signs everywhere. All the makings of Tony seeing that the kid was more than a teen superhero that he was mentoring.
He was his kid. They may have not shared the same blood or were relatives, but Peter had become the son he never dared to imagine before he could have. He was the very light that he needed when all else turned into hell. He offered Tony a way to keep his life moderately safe. To have Pepper, Happy and Rhodey relieved that Tony could go a day with eating at a normal schedule if he had the kid nearby. To sleep better when Peter noticed the dark circles.
Peter had practically became the source of guilt trip if someone needed him to act like a normal functioning human being; and he couldn't fault them for doing that. Nobody would want to disappoint the kid. Not when his brown eyes were the equivalent of puppies and kittens that stared at someone's soul.
All those hours when they had laughed, when he accidentally parented his spider kid Tony felt like that there was this crawling sensation was coming in waves. As if, Peter's continuous exposure into Tony's life was spreading him into thinner layers. He needed to always have some way to communicate with him, to know if there were any new villains popping up. Tony really didn't want to watch or have the experience of Peter's form ever crumble. Because, it had been scary when the plane had crashed, and he later learned about certain pieces of what happened that night.
He hadn't been stupid; he knew that Peter didn't tell him everything.
But he allowed him time to go over his own triumphs and to hopefully find peace to ever confide with him.
.
It still struck him with awe that Tony had a teenager in the facility. Yes, it had been awhile since they established a routine for Peter coming and going to the facility while juggling being Spider-Man and being Tony Stark's personal intern. The kid had a lot going for him, and Tony had been growing restless with how consistent he was getting paranoid from his nightmares.
It just felt like madness that his life really changed. And it all had been thanks for the positive effects from Peter and from his own life experiences of working on damage control when his mind went out of control. An unlucky perk of being a superhero.
He didn't know why he had his dreams so often. Or why he kept them when he worked inside his lab. Tony just knew that some way or another he needed to have the perfect defenses for his family. For everyone that placed trust into him.
It had felt like it had been so long since he found a moment for himself.
To be only Tony. Not Tony Stark. Nor Iron Man.
Just Tony. The person that hardly ate right when Peter, Pepper or Rhodey were there to threaten him to act human. The same one that kept on working and working as seconds passed and multiplied as hours used for his eyes to look at screens or his hands padding through updates or calls. It all been a cycle. Watching, reacting and adapting. The only difference was that his close-knit family had grown from his mother and Jarvis.
It went through tragedies, triumphs and all in between.
Years, decades (if he wanted to be accurate) had brushed on his skin, he was no longer as youthful like before. The reflections that he saw had explored that reality. He had a kid. He had a fiancée and he was a superhero billionaire. That had been his life.
Was how it still ran when he woke up to that dream.
It felt so real. So warm. Tony had wanted it badly. He told Pepper so when they had been jogging by the park. And of course, she had her side, while he had his. Yet, he knew that they could work it out. It was them; it was all the years since they first met. He could see how much she wanted it too when he told her.
There had been a hesitation in her part; gods know he had those same feelings before when he had been going through endless bottles when he had been far younger. Sinking further from those ideas when he first didn't know how to cope by been left alone. He had the stories to prove when he looked back. The dream though, had been what helped him see how much he wanted and needed another chapter in his life. Pepper and Tony deserved that kind of ending.
Didn't they?
He had seen everyone else finding their own conclusions, and with Peter...Tony had seen a part of it. A bright kind of stepping stone where his heart could relax. He had wanted the world to finally let him rest so he could see the end of the tunnel.
Was that too much to ask?
.
Apparently, Tony still had a lot to learn from May. He always had known that mothers were strong figures, and he never doubted it when he remembered how strong his own had been with the kind of life they shared. When May Parker entered into his life, it had shown him how protective, caring and utterly lively she could be when she saw the whole picture. She became fast friends with Pepper, (not that it had been shocking, they both had a lot of common when it came to taking care of reckless people like Tony and Peter respectively) had wrangled a modest schedule to help him deal with parenting a kid that wormed into his world. She didn't have to, but that had been the point. The Parkers were honest people.
Such a rare aunt-nephew duo when Tony had mostly known dysfunctional families and strangers in his life. It had reminded him of how wonderful Rhodey's family was. A touch of normality that Tony could never achieved or been allowed since Howard had been his father.
He had wanted to protect them. Wanted them to know how grateful he truly been when she didn't stop Peter's internship and Spider-Man time. She and Pepper had become the very people that made it all possible when he couldn't separate the paternal instincts he got when Peter came into his life. It all had been altered into something else that he couldn't recognize. He was not the same person when he was 19—25—30. They all had different outlooks.
All different phases really, when he remembered how the world looked to a child, a rebellious teen, to a reckless twenty something years old self went through. It had a way to circle and morph into the one he had now. It proved that Tony was not a man that wanted to go back to the very beginning. He was a futurist. Someone that would and hall the essential makings to keep progress going. Having a kid had only amplified his desire to better the world. If only to pass on a worthy legacy he never had.
It had been why when Peter made his debut at the ship that made it all go to hell.
He could already sense how his heart wanted to explode. How his anger at the universe at large gave him this kind of obstacle. He didn't—Tony couldn't afford any more mistakes. Not when Peter with his large brown eyes were staring at him. With his go happy smiles at his movie references was still inherently a part of his charm as he worked alongside him.
When they crashed into a planet, when he had seen who exactly he had to work with to beat Thanos he desperately wished that the tag team that they formed wouldn't cost them greatly. Strange, the wizard that had looped him inside the whole parade didn't give him much to work on either when he told them their chances. But he was Tony Stark. A man that worked with impossible factors.
He would make it work. (Because, there was no other option; he couldn't lose any more of his heart here.)
.
"Mr. Stark. I don't feel so good."
.
He woke up to the sound of his heart racing. Never a good sign. His skin had been burning hotter as his throat clogged with the puffs of air that he could barely keep; Tony had desperately wanted to go back to sleep. To go about the hours when his body was shut down and he drifted off. It had been so long since he had been able to find a moment for himself.
His lungs demanded for him to detach himself from his own bed, to free his limbs from the blanket that had once promised a luxury he didn't have for some time. It felt so raw, the boiling emotions of before reawakening his fears. To find himself so small again, powerless from being so broken and human. Pepper had been there for him, like always, trying to calm him. In the back of his head he knew that she had been doing her best to stay stronger for each other. And Tony—he, he had been waking up every day and night wondering why it had been him. Why did it choose Peter?
He had remembered how Peter clung to him. How desperately scared he had been. It all happened so suddenly, too quickly for them as Tony watched in horror as his kid turn into dust in his arms.
It had been a sight that never dulled since he had been left in space with Nebula. Or when he had finally been rescued. But the world after that, he couldn't really call it one. The amount of people that died from the aftershock had said it all. More than half the population of the world felt it all. The repercussions of it all and the leftovers that made of the Avengers hadn't helped Tony either.
He didn't stay there for long.
Rhodey, Happy and Pepper were left. Not even May survived it. He lost both Parkers. In many ways, she had been lucky because of it. She didn't have to see her nephew's name engraved alongside the rest that perished or vanished from that day. They both had been marked together, and Tony, he had been left on Earth to trace the names he both knew and couldn't help. He felt all the weight of the world's tears when he went there and each time he woke up.
He knew that he had been 'lucky' considering that he still had Pepper. That Rhodey was still doing his best as colonial, and Happy driving him when they both knew he needed to talk in the cemetery. But Tony literally lost his kid.
The same one he vowed that he would have protected when he first met him.
The coldness of the cement stone burned him, but he still traced his name. No matter the weather, no matter if he had business, he made sure to go there. That had been his new routine. Pepper understood when she went with him with flowers, when Rhodey tagged along when Tony needed another hand to tell him that he was still there, and Happy to drive him to the deli store that Peter loved so much.
Every day it would still hurt, and everyday Tony would notice that the grass had always been cut clean and sharp. And he knew why it had always been so pristine. So many visited, so many made sure to maintain the space. Because they all knew.
The world was so much colder and dead since that day.
.
Morgan had been his joy. Both Pepper and Tony knew that. And nothing could dispute that.
But. When he remembered the small wedding, when Morgan had been born, they both had known that everything had not been as perfect as it could had been. It hadn't been like when he lost his mom or Jarvis. Something that he could fully put away into a box because when all was said and done, Tony knew deep down that he could have prevented it.
Ultron had been a terrible loss, the Sokovia Accords had been a very demanding ending to an era. But when Thanos happened, Tony knew that the moment had been when Tony knew how much the world could grow so much weaker and stronger. It all depended on the individuals themselves and how they carried the survivor's guilt since then.
.
Life went on.
As much as it had to.
Tony learned how to smile at his daughter, to his wife, to—he eventually learned that sometimes, people couldn't always move on that quickly. And that had been fine. Because, he knew everyone coped differently.
When he heard from them again...when he had found a way to bring Peter back, all Tony could see was how the world could be shaped if they could achieve the impossible. How much he still needed to do. And so, Tony Stark went back to work.
.
It didn't matter that all around them had been a big battle, where the screaming never stopped, and where his blood was running high as he memorized the absolute truth that he had his kid back. Peter was alive and right in front of him.
He was there with his hands wrapped around his son, they were both alive and Tony almost felt like he was delirious or in some strange bittersweet dream. Tightly, his heart squeezed as he heard Peter's voice since a five-year silence. He listened to the choppy, so innocent chatter that Peter had always been known for. It held the same lightness he saw in Morgan when she first started talking; and like that, Tony felt so at peace, so relieved to have his kid back. The hug itself rallied his resolve to ending Thanos.
When the fight was over, when the nightmare would fully end, Tony Stark would make sure that his family would all be reunited under one roof.
.
"We won. We won Mr. Stark."
.
It had been a sight Tony always wanted but had brushed it off as a dream.
After half a decade later and his body screaming in protest as he lifted his head, he saw it: Peter, Morgan and Harley in the same room. The beeping of the heart monitor however, had not been in the picture. Neither when the three heads snapped to attention when they heard the rustle of his blanket. His daughter had been the first to speak, to reach out for him. He had indulged her with a kiss on her forehead, and Peter and Harley both had sat on both sides of his bed.
He never had been fond of hospital beds, and the white walls, but when he saw his kids, all alive and relatively healthy, he couldn't help but feel so grateful.
Tony Stark may have not been brought up to have such affectionate dealings from his father, but he did have memories of Jarvis and his mother. He had Rhodey watching out for him since MIT, gave Happy a work for his job when he hired him and Pepper since she first became his assistant to now loving wife.
It once may have been a thoughtless concept; but now, after all the tribulations that Tony had faced, he could say that now he was happy at where he stood. Since the first touch of meeting them all, Tony Stark finally felt at peace. Pepper came into the room and chuckled at bit at seeing a dog pile on Tony's bed.
When she kissed his cheek, softly she said: "You can rest now, Tony."
And he believed it. Because his whole family was there, safe and alive back in earth. Where they all belonged.