Things were going wrong in the universe but everything was kind of perfect for Tony. It had been twenty-three months since Steve had left him in a dead suit. It had been twenty-three months since meeting Peter. It was twenty-two months since he moved home. It had been twenty-one months since May had found out the truth and Peter had quit and life had gotten better for the kid. Strange had been insufferable, but it had been twenty months since Rhodey had used the exoskeleton.
Things had changed a lot. Tony was healthier. He was more assured in his own skin. The Avengers were a team. Patsy Walker and Jessica Jones had signed the Accords. Carol Danvers was delightful. Namor was great. So with them, Nova, Vis and Rhodey, he was pretty happy with the current Avengers. Only Vision and Rhodey lived with him, he'd never open himself to the brutal pain of losing another family. He had a family in the form of Vis, Rhodey, Peter, May, Pepper, Happy and Phillip.
It was thirteen months since the biggest change in Tony's life. Bubbly, giggly, amazing Phillip had changed Tony's whole world. He looked into his son's big green eyes and it was impossible to be anything but happy. The process of adoption had taken a lot of money and a lot of time but when he looked at Phillip the past vanished and all he saw was the future.
Phillip had been ten months when he'd come home with Tony. His birth certificate had just "baby boy" in the place of a name. He had been dropped at a fire station within hours of being born by a teenage girl who wouldn't tell them her name and wouldn't let them call a doctor even though she was pale and limping. She'd fled and left Tony's baby in the hands of people who would make sure he was safe. Needing a name, Tony thought of his friend, of a man who he'd liked, a good man who had believed in Tony, and he'd had an easy time filling in the blank space. And when he saw his son sitting on Peter's lap in the lab, playing with Vision with stuffed animals on the floor or sitting on Pepper's hip as she cooked, he felt perfectly content with his lot.
On the anniversary of the adoption, Tony threw a big party with all the Avengers, and Matt Murdock, and Foggy, and Karen, and Peter and his friends. There was a big cake and it said, "One Year at Home!" Laura Barton brought the kids, Luke and Jessica brought Danielle and the children had a fun time playing.
Peter and Liz were still together, shockingly. Mrs. Allan had moved away, to avoid being in New York for the trial. Liz hadn't wanted to move during her senior year and had stayed with an aunt. She'd had a hard time, her perfect reputation was tarnished, but she stayed. Now, she was a freshman in college but that hadn't broken her and Peter up. He went over to Columbia so frequently that he knew lots of the students but he was still best friends with Ned and MJ. And now, instead of being Tony's intern, he was officially Tony's junior research assistant. His September Foundation grant was ongoing because the results of his glue experiments were going well. His end goal was an adhesive for NASA to use.
All the love Tony had felt for Steve, all of the fun he had had with Clint and Natasha, was pale and distant and it didn't have a patch on his life now. For Phillip's birthday they had a quiet family dinner. It was surprising that the meal had had eight people. He hadn't expected to have a family again. But watching Phillip playing with DUPLO blocks while Peter rhapsodized about all the fun they would have together with LEGO once Phillip was older made for a perfect night.
When he'd been on his back on the ground stuck like a turtle, he hadn't expected fun again. He couldn't have imagined a baby climbing into his bed and cuddling him awake every day, or the rough nights when Phillip wouldn't sleep, or tears over carrots being cut into the wrong shape, or the horror of his kid's diapers after certain foods, or the joy of Phillip's ever-growing vocabulary.
Tony had started dating, sort of, well, he'd started sleeping around again. And that was actually good for him, it got him a little breathing room. It disconnected love from sex and made him feel safer even though Pepper said it was unhealthy. But, honestly, what did the most stable and well-adjusted person in his life know about his emotional health? Sex was fun when it was meaningless. But that was at charity events, parties, functions. Nine nights out of ten he was at home in sweats with Phillip wiping something on him. There was finger-painting on half the table surfaces in the house, there was playdough accidentally stamped into the rug in Phillip's bedroom and the playroom and Tony was happy.
Then the talks began, things were definitely wrong in the universe. Planets were missing from distant systems. All the astronomers were scared. Then Thor and Bruce appeared after Asgard exploded. Thor had brought all the Asgardians with him. They had landed in Norway and Thor wanted to build a homestead for them there.
Thor and Bruce sought Tony out in New York. He was sitting at a Starbucks. He had been taking an hour of quiet time after a morning of meetings. Rhodey had Phillip with him and had told Tony to take a breather. Sipping a super sweet candy caffeine thing he was reading about Beyonce's newest album. It was enjoyable. Then a voice said, "How much junk pop culture are you going to make me catch up on?"
Tony looked up and there was Bruce. "I've had algorithms running for three years, searching for you." He saw Thor standing behind him. "Three years you have both been gone, and you turn up at a Starbucks?"
"You weren't at the Tower," said Bruce. "So we hit up places with coffee."
Tony smiled, "I don't live there anymore. God, I missed your faces. Where have you been?"
Their story spilled out about the Hulk and a fighting world and Thor finding all nine realms out of order. They both got coffees and just kept talking. Thor spoke of Thanos, of his father's death, of his sister who made his brother seem sane, of an eye lost to a sibling. And Bruce talked about being trapped as Hulk for two years straight. Tony squeezed his hand, "I'm sorry, my algorithms couldn't find you. Strange said the universe wanted you where you were and that you were perfectly content. I didn't push, let it go. I thought you were where you wanted to be."
"I wasn't in danger," said Banner. "Hulk was a king there, beloved by the public and pampered by the despot in charge." Tony squeezed his hand again.
"I really missed you. I missed both of you but my lab was quiet for so long, Bruce."
Thor said it was urgent that he make a safe place for his people in Norway and Tony said, "Okay, you need to talk to the government first, because this could cause problems and for god's sake, watch your brother." He caught them up on the UN's Accords and said, "You have to sign, retire or be a criminal."
"I don't know what I'm doing. I have been in space, hulked out," said Bruce. "I don't know if I'm retiring but I know I'm not going to be a criminal. Can I sign it with the caveat that I might be retired?"
"Yes, absolutely. Clint said he was retired, didn't sign, then he did some stuff and now… I don't know where most of the Avengers are. They either refused to sign it and kept going or signed it and then broke it. They fled the country."
"So who is here? Just you and Steve?" asked Bruce.
"No, Steve isn't here. Of the original gang, it's just Vision and Rhodey."
"Steve's not here?" asked Bruce. "He's not with you?"
Tony took a deep breath, "No. No, we broke up. He… he didn't believe in the Accords, he didn't want the oversight. Bucky turned up and it got… it just got complicated."
"Tell me he didn't cheat on you with his ex," said Bruce with genuine horror.
That warmed Tony, his friend instant anger on his behalf. "No, turned out he'd been lying to me about Bucky murdering my parents for a couple of years and I freaked out and attacked Bucky because he was right there and… and it was all a lot." He shrugged, "And, if Steve steps foot on US soil, he will be arrested for attempted murder."
Bruce blinked, "There must be a mistake. He wouldn't do that."
"The doctors said that, if it weren't for the compression suit, I would have bled out. They tag teamed beating the shit out of me… I wasn't innocent in it, I wasn't. But he crushed the arc reactor with the shield and I was on my back so I couldn't stand up because I couldn't get up in the three hundred pound suit while that injured — I had internal and external bleeding. I couldn't breathe because I have a hard time breathing when I'm on my back. The doctors and the lawyers reviewed it all and agreed with each other and… he knew that; he knew my limits. So, yeah, he'll be arrested for attempted murder. Bucky will be arrested for aggravated assault. They haven't made a mistake, I was pretty close to dying. I mean, there's two sides to every story so, if you want to hear his side, you'll have to find him. The Wikipedia page only talks about my side because he fled and never said a damn word."
Bruce thought and Tony could see his mind racing then Bruce said, "I don't need his side: you tell me that that's your side and you tell me that the Wikipedia page is right, good enough for me. You were always going to get me in the case of a breakup. Even if you had cheated on him, you still would have gotten me in the breakup. That's how friends work."
Tony felt something uncoil within him that he hadn't realized had been wound so tight. To Thor he said, "Thor, I won't be offended if you want to speak to Steve before making decisions. But, you should know, Norway supported the Accords so you will face a friendlier government if you sign. If you're going to talk to Steve, do so before you sign the Accords. I won't be angry if you want to talk to him."
"As the king of Asgard, I must do what is best for my people and I must do so now. I told my people I would be gone for no more than two days. Where is this UN and may I read these Accords?" asked Thor.
"Yes, I can take you and walk you through the Accords myself but we need to stop in at home first. My kid has been with Rhodey all morning."
"Kid?" said Bruce, smile blooming on his face, "kid?"
"Phillip, I adopted him a little over a year ago. He turned two a couple of weeks ago. He knows all about you guys. He'll be excited to meet you. So, we'll swing by home, grab Phillip and go to the UN. They have good snacks so he's happy there."
"You have a kid," said Bruce. "That's great. How is Natasha?" he asked.
Tony shrugged, "She's under whatever rock Steve is under. I haven't seen her in two years. She was fine when I last saw her. She's with Clint, Steve, Sam and Wanda."
"So she and Clint picked the guy who left you for dead?" asked Bruce.
"There're two sides to every story," Tony said.
"Yes, and one of them is that Steve is wanted for your attempted murder," said Bruce. "He was always going to get Sam in the breakup. I don't know Wanda, but Clint and Natasha should be here."
"I agree, but there you go," Tony shrugged. "Let's walk, we're not far from home."
"Where is home?" asked Thor.
"My parents' mansion," said Tony.
They talked about the new Avengers team and Bruce said, "So, how big is this mansion? That's a lot of people."
Tony told them about his fear of people liking him for his money. "In retrospect… I know that Natasha and I were friends. But Sam, Wanda and Clint?" They couldn't answer and Tony just said, "My mansion is for family, not the team. Vision and Rhodey are there. And you two are so very welcome to pick bedrooms. They have their own bathrooms and are big rooms but it's not like the Tower, no separate floors."
"I would love a room," said Bruce, "yes, please. After the last two years — having been surrounded by people who worshipped the Hulk — it would be like coming home to play in a lab with you. Accidentally taking sips of each other's drinks, laughing over stupid things, working on side projects together — that was my home. The building was just a building. All we really need is some lab space and each other's company."
Tony could have cried hearing that and he said, "Good, come home. Thor?"
"I would gladly join you to eat Pop-Tarts early in the morning, and reminisce: you have always been such a wonderful storyteller. For me, the draw of the Tower was the companionship of shared meals and experiences. Playing the video games: such sport! The Tower was my home on Earth because of the people. But, as the king of the Asgardian people, I cannot make my home with you. I must stay with my people. At this moment we are on a very large ship, very far from society but that cannot last. I would like a few pairs of socks in a drawer at your house for visits."
"Sounds great," agreed Tony. "You'll like the AI in the house," he said, smiling at the thought. They reached the gate and he keyed in the code, rattling it off for them.
"Did you make FRIDAY better?" asked Bruce as they walked up the drive.
"She got more human over time but this one is marvelous."
"I'm sorry about JARVIS," said Bruce. "We needed Vision, and I'm glad to hear that you think of him as family, but I'm sorry about JARVIS. He was a friend."
"I grieved for JARVIS for a long time, until I came here," he opened the front door and said, "I'm home, and look what I dragged in."
"Dr. Banner, Son of Odin, it is lovely to have you back," said JARVIS.
"JARVIS?" said Bruce. "My God. How are you here?"
"The house was off the network. When Sir moved home, he realized that I had been waiting here the whole time."
"It is wonderful to hear your voice, my friend," said Thor. "Of course, Vision has your voice but he isn't you."
"No, he isn't but I do find Vision to be quite interesting, he can give me a lot of insight. He is a step between alive and AI so he has perspective and can explain things. But when I speak to FRIDAY I realize just how much I have developed over the years."
"JARVIS, it is so good to hear you," said Bruce. "I'm moving in and knowing that you're here with us? That makes it even more like coming home."
"I have missed our talks at two in the morning," said JARVIS.
"You had two AM chats?" asked Tony. "I didn't know that."
"They were philosophical," said JARVIS.
"They were the idle, quite conversations fueled by insomnia," said Bruce. "But they were comforting."
"Daddy," said Phillip, running in. He was stained and smiling and he said, "Daddy, Peter and me dough."
"You and Peter are making new playdough?" asked Tony, looking at his purple hands realizing he'd been kneading food color into flour. Phillip grinned at him and Tony said, "That's great, honey. I want you to meet my friends. You know how you hear stories about Thor and Bruce?"
"Thor has hammer. Bruce's fun," agreed Phillip.
"Yeah, these are Thor and Bruce. Bruce is going to move in with us 'cause he is so much fun and nice."
"Yay!" said Phillip. "I tell Peter!"
He ran off and Tony said, "Peter is my lab assistant. He's great, amazing really, he started as my intern last year. He's sixteen and he has the coolest aunt. I kind of want to be his step-uncle."
Before he reached the kitchen he heard Phillip babbling. "Thor and Bruce?" Peter repeated. He looked up and said, "Wow, Thor and Bruce. Um, hi, I'm Peter. I'm friends with Tony, well, he's my boss, well, sorta."
"I'm legit your boss," said Tony.
"You eat dinner at my house once a week, I have the top score on your Xbox, we bake together, I have seen you shirtless and I'm currently in my socks in your kitchen. I know I get a salary but are you really my boss? Y'gonna fire me if I cause an explosion?"
"Nah, if I were your real boss the amount I make fun of your love life would be sexual harassment."
"Liz," said Phillip before he started making kissing noises.
Tony smiled at him and said, "The fact that I taught my kid to make fun of your love life would make it doubly bad."
Peter laughed and said, "I actually came over to work in the lab but Rhodey had to go to a sudden meeting about the stars missing from the sky. Something is really, really wrong out there so I took over watching Phillip. I have some stuff to do to show the September Foundation that I should get money for next month. Wasn't the point of the September Foundation to make it so scientists didn't need to apply for grants?"
"Oh I'm sorry," said Tony, sarcastically, "is the thing that gives you unlimited funds in return for a two page form once a month where you say how you spent your money and say what your next step is — without having to prove you're making headway — too onerous for you? In the last two years, what has been your result?"
"I've made glue ever so slightly stickier and stronger than Gorilla Glue," said Peter. "It's going to be amazing once it's done."
"Yeah, and that's why the foundation has handed a sixteen-year-old over a hundred thousand dollars in the last two years — and included your Subway fare and snack budget — in exchange for receipts and a note saying, 'Still doing my best!' once a month."
"The September Foundation is really, really awesome," said Peter to Thor and Bruce. "Tony founded it to make it so that young scientists could work without being scared of running out of money all the time. You can just focus on work. The chemicals I can buy now — it's totally mind-blowing. They buy me rare earth elements that cost tens of thousands of dollars per ounce and say, 'If you think you're gonna need a lot, we'll buy it in bulk.' It's totally crazy."
"I will clean up my kid and we'll get out of your hair, Peter," said Tony. "We need to go to the UN to teach Thor and Bruce about the Accords."
"Are you signing them?" asked Peter. "That's great. It would be so nice to have some new friendly faces. Captain Homewrecker didn't sign, Black Widow did and then flouted them and Barton said he didn't need to sign and then shredded his family to pieces. So it would be really cool to have more of the OG Avengers on the not-scary-actually-listen-to-the-will-of-the-people side."
"I'm moving in," said Bruce. "Get used to me being here; you're going to have to share your lab space."
"Awesome," said Peter with a grin. "Wipe down the workbench before touching it. Sometimes I accidentally miss a spot and my work is really sticky."
"Thanks for the warning," said Bruce.
"Thor, are you staying? Because it would be really fun to be able to say, 'Yeah, I was hanging out with my good buddy, the god of thunder, he can't beat me at Mario Cart.'"
Thor chuckled, "Nay, I must return to my people; my home was destroyed. They wait for me in Norway. But perhaps I could visit to beat you mercilessly at the video games."
"I'm sorry about your home," said Peter, somberly.
"My people escaped and in the end, Asgard was where we lived, not who we were."
Peter nodded and said, "Well, if there is anything a nerdy guy from Queens can do to help refugees, just let Tony know."
"Thank you," said Thor, "that is very kind."
Tony took Phillip to get him changed from his art shirt and to get his hands clean. On the stairs, he heard Peter clear his throat and it gave him pause. Speaking softly to Phillip, he said, "Go wash your hands, buddy." The little boy continued up the stairs.
Peter spoke in a serious voice, "Look, it's really nice to meet you. And I'm glad you're here. If you're here because you're coming home and Tony is your friend, great. But, if you're here because you landed on Earth and you're broke we have a very large problem. Tony paid for the lavish lifestyle of the Avengers for years and he didn't care because he's rich and he thought that you were his friends. He will happily foot the bill again without blinking. If you're here because home is where your friends are, awesome. Tony is a social person and the more he is surrounded by love the better. Money is no object to him and if you're family it makes no difference. But it has taken him years to get over what the others did. He still won't date because of what that bastard did. I haven't spent two years putting my friend back together to have you break him.
"There is a secret very, very few people know. I am trusting you with it because you need to know for this threat to carry weight. If you watch the footage from Germany of when things got bad, you will see Captain Cruel go toe to toe with a little-known street hero called Spider-Man. You will see that they are pretty evenly matched but that the bastard wins. Spider-Man pulled his punches because he thought he was fighting a good man. I will not make the same mistake again.
"If you hurt him you will not walk away from a fight with me: you will crawl, with broken bones and bloodied heads. I have seen the output of data from what your hammer and the Hulk can do. You might win that fight but you will be badly damaged by it and you better kill me because if not, there will a round two. If you are here just for free food and new clothes and awesome phones, what you're going to do is simple: sign the Accords and then say, 'Tony, I have to sort some stuff out.' You're going to go away and call occasionally until the relationship peters out. If you're here because this was coming home, because his was a face you wanted to see, his was a voice you wanted to hear, then welcome home. I'm making carbonara tonight and you're so welcome to share that meal. My aunt will be here, Phillip will sing his ABCs, we'll have a great time. The choice is yours and I hope you come to dinner. We'll never talk about this again. But you can't mess up my friend." There was a ding and Peter said, more brightly, "My glue is done mixing. There is ice tea in the fridge if you want some. I made too much by mistake." Peter walked out of the kitchen and Tony was still frozen on the stairs. He heard Peter walking through the dining room and sitting room but he couldn't move. Peter saw him on the stairs and said nothing.
The boy made a heart with his thumbs and index fingers over his heart and then pointed at Tony. He mouthed, "I had to."
Tony smiled and returned the gesture.
The UN took three hours, reviewing all of the Sokovia Accords, reviewing how they got to that point. Thor and Bruce signed everything and Bruce said, "So we have grownups backing us now?"
"Yeah, it makes more sense," said Tony. "It doesn't solve all our problems. We've had some major incidents and some civilians have died, some infrastructure got damaged and then we had a full panel review, all sorts of experts breaking it down to say that — as horrible as it was — that was the best we could hope for. Having that backing, the legitimacy means that countries accept that we really have done our best; it's always safest outcome and we are a help."
Bruce and Thor nodded, thinking about it. Bruce sighed, "They say you should use a strong password. But, honestly, if my pin was hard I wouldn't be able to get into my bank account after two years away. Want to go get Chinese to celebrate us signing?"
Tony smiled, "Pete usually cooks dinner if he ends up at the house on Friday. And that kid can cook; I think it's 'cause his aunt can't."
"He's making peas pasta," offered Phillip.
"That's called carbonara," Tony told him.
"Like it," said Phillip.
"I haven't had a home-cooked meal in two years," said Bruce.
Thor said, "Midgard has such comforting foods. I must return to my people soon, but a night spent with your company would be most welcome."
"Well, then, let's go home," he said.
As he opened the app for a black car Uber, Bruce said, "Do you have any of my clothes? These are your pants. I cannot believe you wear pants so tight. They're what I could get on Skaara. I lost your Duran Duran shirt when I hulked out on Asgard, sorry. This shirt was given to me by a nice farmer in Norway."
"You lost my Duran Duran shirt?" asked Tony.
"Technically you lost it two years ago," countered Bruce.
"Technically you stole it along with the quinjet," Tony replied.
"Sorry, I'll find you a replacement on eBay," offered Bruce.
"Don't steal," said Phillip in his imitation of Tony's stern voice.
"Not a big deal, I thought I lost it in the laundry," Tony shrugged. "When I left the Tower, I shipped everyone's stuff upstate, I figured they could go collect their damn selves. But I have your stuff and Thor's at the house. It will be a bit musty but it's there."
"Great," said Bruce. "It's really good to be home."