Tony is eight years old. Based off of a picture on tumblr by ironfries.
Despite his (and his nannies') best efforts, Tony didn't have many friends. That was a fact. He just didn't do well with real people. Tony spoke his mind more often than not and that got him into trouble with the other kids at school and the teachers. It didn't help that he was just plain smarter than them.
Jarvis could almost be considered a friend, but he was first and foremost employed by Tony's dad to take care of the household, so he didn't always have time to play with Tony.
Which was…fine. Tony understood, even if he didn't like it. He didn't need a friend his own age. He had his projects, books, and the few toys his dad hadn't cared about enough to throw away.
Most of the time, he could convince himself that he was okay, that he wasn't lonely, but when he's sitting on the playground at recess, alone, reading a book and watching all the other kids play with each other, he can't help but wonder.
He had a friend once, long ago. Her name was Sophie and they met in Kindergarten. At first, they hated each other, but a bully had started to pick on her during the second week of class. Tony remembered the stories his Aunt Peggy told him about Captain America and how he hated bullies. So Tony marched right up to the bully and told him off. Even if Sophie was annoying, she didn't deserve being bullied. He got a call home and the nanny of the month banned him from the workshop for a week, but the next day at school Sophie shared her cookies with him, and they were inseparable. At least until her family moved to Chicago for her dad's job. They kept touch for a couple months, but the letters and phone calls became further and further apart until they stopped altogether.
Now, at eight years old he didn't have any people he could claim as friends. Sure there were a couple kids who sometimes hung out with him, but he knew it wasn't because they wanted to actually play with him. He learned that lesson the hard way in first grade.
Instead of trying to make new friends at school (which never ended well), Tony worked on an original robot design that he would build himself without help from his dad. It would recognize his face and say a sentence back at him.
It took him weeks of refitting parts so he could build the body. All the parts that were premade weren't right for this. For once, Tony was glad his dad was away on business because the nannies that watched him in the workshop didn't know what he making, so he could make anything he wanted instead of looking at the engines and circuit boards his dad left.
The major set-back was that he needed Jarvis to be in the room with him if he was going to use any of the power tools or welding materials, and for some unknown reason, he was busier than normal when Tony was trying to build his small robot.
The voice box he needed was also hard to get because Tony had to take it from one of the guidance systems Stark Industries makes. After a month of not working on his little buddy, Tony asked Jarvis if he could get him one to look at, playing the card that his dad wanted him to improve it but he didn't leave one for him to examine. Tony was sure that Jarvis didn't believe him, but went along with him anyway.
While Jarvis was well known at the factories, he could only get his hands on a first generation voice box. His robot wouldn't sound as human as he'd like, but that's ok.
Tony plugged in the box and reprogrammed the voice to sound as human as he could get it without remaking the entire thing. He thinks he even did a better job than the current voice box the army has for their equipment. It also could've been that he only needed it to say one phrase and not many.
One night working late in his room had him programming the facial recognition and coding for the words. He had a bruise on his arm from being pushed at school that day, and even though he was the one bleeding, the teachers punished him, while the other kid got off scot-free. Tony had to sit by the teachers for the rest of recess. No one stood up for him or even asked if he was alright. That stung more than the scrapes on his hands.
By the end of the week, his robot, which he named Buddy, was built and the circuit boards and battery were inside him. Everything was programmed and was hopefully working. This would be the first time he put everything together and turned him on.
Tony tightened the last screw in Buddy's silver, blocky body and pushed the On button on his back. He set him on the table, legs straight out in front and sitting up, arms bent at the elbow joints at his sides. The antenna lit up, changing from red to green signaling a full charge in the battery. The eyes lit up next with a bright glowing blue and scanned the small face of the child sitting in front of him.
The screwdriver was gripped tight in Tony's fist as he waited for the little robot to speak its first words. The words that Tony had programmed into it in a fit of loneliness last week.
"You're my best friend, Tony," Buddy said, his tiny mechanical voice coming from the speaker mouth. Tony let out the breath he was holding and loosened his death grip on the screwdriver. "and I will never leave you."
A tear slipped down Tony's smiling face. It worked on his first try, and he didn't even have to take him apart and mess with the coding. It really worked. Tony wanted to scream in joy and show his dad that he could make amazing things, but he knew he would just get a scoff and a broken robot for his efforts. Another couple tears slipped down his cheeks; he didn't bother wiping them away.
"I won't leave you either, Buddy, you're my best friend, too," Tony whispered back, sniffling between the words. Buddy didn't respond. He spoke the words with a combination touch and face recognition, and so Tony poked his chest to make him speak again.