2 hours later, when Pepper came to check on Tony, and more specifically on the poor infant she'd left in his care while she had to fix many of Tony's problems, deal some annoying buyers, all while tracking down Benjamin Parker, trying to return the infant to the man. She instead discovered Tony sitting in a chair near the wall, holding the sleeping infant. Only then did she notice that the lab wasn't playing loud AC/DC like normal, instead it was playing quiet nursery music. "Tony." Pepper called, snapping the engineer's attention from the baby on his shoulder to his assistant. A small, tired smile formed on his face from watching the small child.
Pepper walked closer to the man, who was oddly relaxed for someone who was utterly uncomfortable being in the same room as the child until she left him alone with it. Maybe that was one of her worse decisions she'd made in the last week or so but it seemed to have forcibly bonded the two together, now to ruin Tony's day. "Tony I have some bad news." Pepper started, hoping for once to get the mans attention for the really important news.
Tony's tired smile slowly faded from his face and a scowl replaced it soon after. "Pep? What is it? Is it about Peter?" Tony asked quickly. Tony stood from his chair and place the sleeping child into the carrier.
Pepper was confused how Tony had learned that the child's name was Peter. "How did you? Never mind. I have some unfortunate news about Peter. His parents, Mary and Richard, along with his Aunt May, were in a plan that crashed approximately three hours ago." Pepper explained. Tony looked heartbroken, glancing back at the little 3 week old baby, who'd just became an orphan 3 hours ago. "And, there's another thing, Benjamin Parker, the man who dropped Peter off, was fatally hit by a car shortly after leaving him. Tony, I've checked his records, Peter doesn't have anyone else to go to. He has no living relatives Tony." Pepper finished.
Tony picked Peter up again, the young boy slowly waking up again after his at least second nap of the day. "We're keeping him." Tony declared.
Pepper's shock was to be expected. "Tony, are you sure? This isn't like getting a fish, and it really isn't a fast process either. It's a lot of responsibilities, less sleep, less time, and absolutely no drinking." Pepper tried, trying to get the idea of repercussions affecting Tony for once of his actions.
Tony carried Peter closer to Pepper, trying to get her to look at the little baby. "Pepper, I get this will make things a lot different around here, and there's the matter of getting him back out to Malibu once I get back from Afghanistan in a week, then we can be a happy little family." Tony declared.
Pepper took a sigh and carefully pulled the baby from Tony's arms. "Alright, if you plan on keeping him, you'll need to baby-proof everything and you'll need to buy furniture, clothes, diapers, food, everything that this kid will need. Now, while you start doing that, I'm going to go start getting the adoption papers and everything set up." Pepper said, carrying Peter into the elevator, after grabbing the carrier and heading up to her office.
Tony simply shook his head and began planning the changes to be made to one of the extra bedrooms in his Malibu house to be Peter's room, more specifically the one closest to the master bedroom. He also ordered red and blue furniture for Peter's nursery and just about ordered every color, style and size from newborn to 6 months. Then he moved onto ordering food and diapers to Stark Tower for about 3 weeks even though they should be moving within 2 weeks.
When Tony finished, he had the shipments for Stark Tower inbound to arrive in less than an hour, Pepper had also notified him that a CSS agent and two of his lawyers were on their way right now to start the adoption, but wouldn't be there for about two hours. But just as he reached the main office floor, with his and Pepper's offices, he could hear Peter starting to cry. Tony quickly left the elevator once in reached the floor and tried not to run over to where Peter was, he didn't do as well as he'd've liked to. "What's wrong?" Tony asked.
Pepper laughed as she picked Peter up out of his carrier, tiredly blinking his eyes. "Nice to see you too Tony." Pepper scoffed, "He just woke up, I'm wondering if he's hungry or if he needs to be changed." Pepper tried to feel around Peter's diaper, it felt light and dry. "I think he's just hungry Tony." Pepper handed Peter off to a very eager Tony.
Tony pulled Peter onto his shoulder and his crying softened, slowly stopping entirely. The infant looked up at Tony and gave a bubbly giggle after a moment of silence. The silence didn't last long before Peter started crying again, trying to convey something with his, well, no vocabulary. "I'll go take him down to the kitchen to try and find something for him. The formula should be here soon." Tony said, walking toward the elevator.