Tony was always the Avenger who seemed to get the least sleep. The team doesn't think anything of it, really. Then again, none of the Avengers knew about the suits Tony constantly had on guard during the times he did sleep. None of the Avengers knew about the times Tony would wake up, panic flowing through him. None one knew, and Tony didn't bother to tell them. He didn't see the point.
So far, he was doing a pretty good job of keeping the truth from them.
Usually, Tony was one of the first of the Avengers who were awake. This time, no one saw him until ten in the morning, which was odd for the billionaire. Most of the time, he was up by six and already ready to start the day. So when Tony finally did wake up, he looked pretty shaken and tired.
"Welcome back to the world of the living," Clint said sarcastically. "Where've you been, your lab?"
It took Tony a few moments to respond. "Yeah," he said finally. "Yeah, let's go with that." He looked away from the group and put some toast in the toaster. Clint and Natasha exchanged a look, clearly knowing something was up. But, they didn't say anything else about it.
Tony had never been a big toast person, so they wondered what was up. Usually, he settled for some coffee. Sometimes he stole a pop tart from Thor, but that was only sometimes. He had coffee every day. Maybe he had gotten it before everyone else woke up.
After he got his toast, he began to leave again.
"Are you going back to your lab?" Bruce asked him. Tony stopped and turned around.
"Uh, yeah. I've got some work I need to finish," he said quickly and took a bite of toast. "It's pretty important and stuff, so I gotta get g-"
Natasha raised an eyebrow. "Important like you're just going to keep working on your suits?" She asked. He didn't say anything for a few seconds.
"Yeah, that's the plan. You got a problem with it, Romanoff?" He challenged, his voice having an edge to it. When she didn't answer, he turned his back on them and left. It left the other Avengers feeling uneasy. Sure, Tony could be difficult and arrogant, but he was never snappy like that. Now they definitely knew that something was bothering him. They just had to figure out what. How they would do that however, was something they had not yet figured out.
"Has Tony said anything that would give us any hints over the past few days?" Steve asked, determined to get to the bottom of this.
Bruce shook his head. "Not really, no. Tony's just been being Tony."
Natasha thought for a few moments before agreeing. "I can't think of anything else either. So whatever this is, it must've happened last night."
Clint snorted. "He probably just had a falling out with Pepper or something," he said. Natasha tilted her head, acknowledging the possibility. Although, no matter how many times those two disagreed, they still came back to each other, so it couldn't be that.
"And if it's not?" Bruce countered. Clint didn't answer. No one else said a word.
It's now late at night, late enough for a normal person to be asleep. But Clint is still awake. He's practicing firing his new arrows that Tony had made for him a few weeks ago. The simple trick to hitting his target was to imagine that it was Loki's face, which just made it even more fun to do.
The arrow he fired was suppose to electric the target when hit, but it wasn't really doing anything. He waited a few more seconds and still, nothing happened. With a sigh, he walked over and cautiously tugged the arrow off, silently willing that when he touched it the arrow wouldn't shock him instead. When nothing happened, he let out a breath of relief he didn't even know he had been holding in. If the arrow wasn't working, then he had to bring it to Tony to fix. After all, he was the one who had made it.
Yawning, he made his way to Tony's door and knocked on it, loud enough to wake Tony but quiet enough to not wake anyone else. The mechanic normally didn't mind being woken up in the middle of the night, and sometimes he was already awake doing who knows what. When the door didn't open, Clint knocked again. "Hey, Tony, you in there?" He called out. This time, the door did open but instead of seeing Tony, Clint was met with an Iron Man suit, palms raised and facing him, repulsor blasters ready to fire.
"Whoa, whoa!" He shouted. "Tony, what the hell are you doing?!" He exclaimed. But, then he realized that Tony seemed to still asleep in his bed, thrashing from side to side, his face twisted in a panic. So, what he was facing now was just another one of his suits. "Tony, wake up!"
Clint's panicked cries finally woke Tony up. He blinks furiously, looking around at his surroundings trying to understand what was going on. When he spotted the suit about to possibly kill Clint, he immediately reacted. "Power down!" He shouted. The life from the armor faded and fell to the ground with a clank, leaving Tony looking at, trying to gasp in ragged breaths.
The shouts had been enough to wake the other Avengers, who came racing from their rooms, ready for anything.
"What happened?" Steve demands. His shield is in his hand, but he's dressed in pajamas, much like the other Avengers.
"Why don't you ask Mr. Iron Man, over there?" Clint hissed. Tony was sitting on the side of his bed, clutching his arc reactor, still trying to breathe. He was drenched in sweat, his eyes filled with fear and uncertainty. That definitely wasn't normal for him.
Bruce was the first one to ask. "Tony, are you okay?"
Tony's head snapped towards their direction, startling him out of whatever state he was in. "Yeah, yeah. I'm fine. The suit was just responding to me, everything's fine, it was protecting me," he insists.
"Protecting you from what?" Steve asks, raising an eyebrow.
Tony shakes his head. "Nothing really, it was just a dream, that's it."
"Well, getting my face almost blown off doesn't feel like just a dream," Clint retorted, crossing his arms.
Tony bit the inside of his cheek and let out a sigh. "Is this something that we can wait until tomorrow to talk about?" He asked a little too hopefully.
"This doesn't really seem like a thing that can wait until tomorrow," Natasha pointed out.
Bruce nodded in agreement. "She's right, Tony."
Tony buried his face in his hands, keeping it there for a few moments longer before he finally stands. "Well, I guess it's time for the grand reveal, huh?" He said, half to them and half to himself. "It's kind of been happening for a while now, ever since the attack on New York. Anyways, I've kind of been having these dreams, more like crazy nightmare-flashbacks-"
"Tony, that sounds a lot like PTSD!" Steve cries. "Why didn't you tell any of us?"
He hesitated for a split second. "I kind of did," he said, but did not elaborate on who it was. "And even after that, it didn't help. So, I wasn't sure what to do. I can't sleep without a suit on guard. I still don't know what to do." He doesn't say anything else after that.
"Well, telling all of us is a good step forward," Steve told him. "We're always here for you, Tony, you know that, right? We're a team."
The saying took a few moments to process inside Tony's mind before he nodded. "Yeah, yeah. We're a team. We're the Avengers."