Warnings: Slash, sex, extreme prejudice, self-harm, suicidal ideation. Rated for angst.
Reassurances: Despite being alpha/omega dynamics stuff, everything is totally 100% consensual. This is also not actually porn. So far.
Tony laughed his head off the first time he caught Thor watching a porno about omegas. Thor was deeply confused.
"Is the purpose of this film to elicit laughter? I was under the impression it was for something quite different."
Clint appeared before Tony could answer. "What's so funny?" the ever-curious archer wanted to know.
"Thor's watching one of those horrible pornos where the omega's so horny he needs it," said Tony, emphasizing the point with his hands.
Clint facepalmed and started laughing too, but then abruptly stopped. "What the hell does it say about our culture that those myths are so widespread that an alien visitor could read and watch all the media he wants and he'd probably never learn that it's all totally bogus until he talked to a real omega about it?" he asked quietly.
Tony stopped laughing too. "I try not to think about it," he answered in the same tone. "Some days I wonder if coming out publicly, throwing my support behind the omega equality campaigns, would actually move anything forward, and then I remember I'm a cynic."
"And it isn't worth it to risk getting your company taken away," Clint finished for him. "I don't blame you."
"You are an omega, Man of Iron?" asked Thor curiously. "I cannot tell the difference. Is this one of the falsehoods present in the film?"
"The pheromones thing? Yeah, total bullshit," said Tony, settling himself on one of the chairs in front of the TV. Clint followed suit.
"Man, it would suck if it weren't," Clint said. "We'd all be outed by force, and most of us would have to find an alpha for life and live off them."
"I do not understand," said Thor.
"There's an ancient law on the books saying if the owner or CEO of a company, anybody too high up to get properly fired by the usual means, turns out to be an omega, the rest of the company can legally oust him on grounds of emotional instability," said Tony. "And obviously any normal employee can get fired for being an omega. It's legally a mental illness."
"It is not a physical condition?" asked Thor.
"Well, there're a lot of problems defining these things. It's not as easy as saying, these cars are blue, these cars are red, et cetera. Where's the line between a physical condition of the brain and a mental illness? Humans created these words a long time ago before they really understood stuff, and when they realized it was more complicated than that, it was almost impossible to get people to let go of their concept that omegas are all crazy bastards. And they don't like the truth, so we're crazy horny bastards and everyone gets to laugh at us on TV and movies and shit." Tony exhaled loudly and grinned without humor.
"This is a grave prejudice," declared Thor. "I see that it would be less than advantageous to have your status widely known."
"Though, it would be nice if we could find out about omega kids and fucking warn them," said Clint, frowning.
"Yeah, imagine, mandatory school testing. 'You're good, you're good, you're an omega, listen, life at some point is going to become absolute shit really suddenly, here's what you do to prepare for it.' Yeah, especially if it was confidential," Tony agreed.
"A lot of omega kids kill themselves on first heat because they don't know what's going on and they can't rationalize their way through it," Clint added to Thor.
"Is it truly that dreadful?" Thor looked scandalized.
"Kinda dreadful. Let's see, my first time…"
He woke up with it. He hadn't noticed the sensations other omegas would tell him about in the years to come, because being alone was a fact of Tony Stark's life. But he noticed the heaviness in his chest, the difficulty in convincing himself that he really ought to get out of bed and go to school. Really, he wouldn't have bothered, except that he couldn't afford to skip school if he wanted to graduate early, and the prospect of getting to leave the empty Stark mansion with the small handful of servants who were his legal guardians by now, the prospect of going to college and finally having challenging classes and getting to build things all he wanted had been his unwavering goal since his parents and Jarvis had died.
He dragged himself down the stairs. It had taken him an extra ten minutes to get out of bed, the idea of food was actually repulsive, and he was moving slowly enough to know he couldn't make up the time by hurrying. So he skipped both breakfast—and Tony had Nutella for breakfast-and his shower and only just got to school on time.
He needn't have bothered. He could only concentrate for about ten seconds at a time before his mind wandered back to…nothingness. The feeling that happiness was an illusion. The inability to care about anything. After school, he dragged himself home again, forced down a piece of cheese for dinner, and went to bed, where he stared at the ceiling until he fell asleep.
The next morning was worse. He didn't even bother to get out of bed when he woke up with the insane desire to rake some kind of knife down his arms. It was like an itch, on the inside of his skin, except more a mental itch than physical.
What the hell is wrong with you, he asked himself. He'd had the occasional desire to see if self-harm was all it was cracked up to be, if it really did release mental pain, but the thought of being Tony Stark, orphan genius billionaire and cutter always shut that thought process down before he got really curious. He'd spent so long convincing government and administration he could manage on his own, that he didn't need to go into foster care (where they wouldn't understand him, where they would tell him he needed to slow down, talk out his feelings instead of build, where they wouldn't want him to graduate early) that the staff at Stark Mansion were practically family (true, but only when Jarvis was alive) anyway. Giving in to this soul-cloying depression would prove them right. Even if he was careful where he put the cuts, even if no one found out, he would know.
He didn't care anymore. He thought it was probably a good thing the nearest knife was an elevator ride and half a floor away. The lack of desire to get up and find it was probably the only thing keeping him from doing it now.
Instead, he ran the palms of his hands over his arms, pretending someone was there. Once, he thought he would be embarrassed to say he missed being touched, missed the way his mother would sometimes place a hand on his shoulder and plant a kiss on his forehead, miss the way Jarvis's hands would check for fever when he was sick, carry him upstairs when he was exhausted, expertly wrap bandages when he was hurt. Now, any embarrassment was covered by the desire to have someone there. Someone to touch him, yes, to hold him tightly, he felt like his skin didn't belong to him anymore and if someone would only hold him he felt sure it would remember that it was his. More than that, though. Someone to care. Someone to care that, fuck the fact he wasn't actually sick or hurt, it hurt just to live right now and Tony had no idea why. Why didn't anybody care?
The voice Tony usually quashed ruthlessly came rising out of the back of his mind. No one at school likes you. You're too smart for them, so they're mean, so you rub how smart you are in their faces and ruin any chance of making friends. Your parents didn't like you either. You were never as interesting as your father's toys. And your mother just didn't know what to do with you. You were too smart for the schoolkids and your mother, not smart enough, or creative enough, or something enough for your father. You just can't please anyone. Worthless. Useless.
I'm graduating high school earlier than Father, Tony told himself. I'm going to take over SI when I'm eighteen, and by then I'll have graduated MIT or be close to it, and I can just build, and I'll build better things than Father. I can make better weapons than he ever did. And I'll make other things. Whatever I want. No one telling me I'm not good enough.
The words sounded empty. Tony mustered the energy to wrap himself more tightly in his blanket. It wasn't a human presence, but it helped minutely.
The pain only grew, and by dinnertime, Tony was in mental agony. All he could concentrate on, all he could think about, was that nobody cared about him, he was worth nothing, and that, quite honestly, death sounded better than this.
Finally, he gave in, got out of bed, and took the elevator down to the kitchen. There would be sleeping pills there. He would take enough to end this. He knew a regular dosage wouldn't put him out in this state—they never worked when he was both reasonably rested and really worked up about something, and he'd fallen asleep so early the night before. The difference between an overdose just high enough to forcibly put him to sleep and an overdose high enough to kill him wasn't something he knew exact dosages for. He didn't care. As he got into the elevator and pressed the button, though, dizziness overcame him and his vision blacked out.
He woke up in a hospital bed, an IV stuck in his arm and his favorite living staff member, Josie, who cooked, sitting next to him.
"Oh, good, you're awake!" she said, standing up and pressing his nurse call button. "I found you passed out half lying out of the elevator in the kitchen and had to call 911. Looks like you're taking after your father and working so hard you forget to eat and drink!"
The doctor came in moments later and explained to Tony that he'd been found severely dehydrated and with dangerously low blood sugar levels.
"Your mom tells me you're an intellectual and things like food and water just don't seem important sometimes," said the doctor, smiling at him in a fatherly way. "Let this be a lesson to the contrary, eh?"
Tony registered that having nothing but a piece of cheese for two days when his body was used to regular meals and a reasonable intake of water probably hadn't done him any good. He was, however, rather glad he had passed out, because the overwhelming desire to die had simply…gone.