Coming Home Again
Summary: Tony Stark is 15 years old and lives in a shitty apartment with a father she hates and a mother who is hardly ever coherent. When her genius gets her into trouble with the CEO of Hammer Industries she's offered a chance to make enough money to possible get away.
I DO NOT OWN THE AVENGERS, OR MARVEL, OR IRONMAN OR ANY OTHER MOVIE REFERENCES IN THIS STORY!
This story Coming Home Again belongs to somanyfeels on AO3 and is also on her account on under the name whothefrickleisbucky!
Yes, I got whothefrickleisbucky to give me their permission to rewrite their story, but with a TWIST!
Coulson had left to go file paperwork so Toni was alone in the elevator with Natasha Romanov, the Black Fucking Widow. She knew it was impolite to stare but it was also impolite to lie about your identity to gain information on someone so she figured she would do it anyway.
"You're the Black Widow." Toni said in disbelief. "I'm meeting the Avengers."
"I noticed. Now, you'll be meeting with us every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless we're out on a mission. We'll discuss with you the details later on how you'll help us apprehend Hammer." Natasha said as the elevator doors opened.
The first thing to catch Toni's eye was the very large hole in the wall just across the room. The next was microwave that was smashed and left abandoned on the floor in the common room. Natasha just looked at it and sighed. They were just outside the kitchen and Toni stopped to enjoy the delicious smells coming from the room while Natasha leaned forward slightly to listen.
"-hacked into my computer. Now we're having a team bonding dinner! Bruce, streaming shows online is a sacred event that has been tainted. We shouldn't be making him curry, we should de-pants him and throw him in a lake in his underwear. Then give him curry."
"If they hired anyone else they would have deleted the files entirely, but he made sure we still had them in a place he knew we would look. Be nice, Clint."
"No, Cap! There's a storm coming for this kid. Maybe I'll finally get to use that bucket of rubber spiders." There was a rather exaggerated evil laugh in the kitchen while Natasha shook her head. When Toni glanced up at her she grabbed her by the wrist and dragged her into the kitchen.
"Gentleman, this is Tony." Natasha pushed her towards the island in the center of the kitchen as all its occupants began to stare at her. She recognized Thor immediately because what kid didn't know about the Martian who joined Earth's Mightiest Heroes, he was more muscular in person than on tv. Dr. Bruce Banner, the physicist Toni recognized from all the science journals she used to read at the library was standing over by the stove in a ridiculous apron that had an arrow pointing up that said, "I'm with a genius." Steve Rogers she recognized from the black and white photographs they looked at in her old history class, he sat at the kitchen island and read the paper and smiled at her. The last man she didn't recognize, he sat on the counter and glared at her. Since Toni could name everyone else he assumed this to be Hawkeye.
"You're younger than I thought you'd be." Hawkeye jumped off and was immediately in front of her, staring her down. "You started a war little man. Orange is the New Black is a one of the best shows I've ever seen and you replaced my Netflix app. I love that show and I love Netflix so you better hide everything you love because I will find where you live."
Toni looked away. The last thing she wanted was anyone of these guys to be in her apartment. The wallpaper was peeling off and the carpets were stained, but worst of all that would mean they would meet her parents or find out she's a girl and she would rather just pack up all of her beloved books and the little gadgets she made in her free time and bring them to this man.
"Clint, stop. You're scaring the boy." Steve Rogers walked over to him and smacked Clint on his back before holding out his hand. "Steve Rogers. Nice to meet you. I'm very glad you decided to join us in finding out what Hammer is up to. We promise to keep you safe."
"Yadda yadda truth, justice, and protecting the innocent." Clint the turned to return to his seat on the counter to reveal a note taped to his back that read, "Second-Class Archer". Steve snickered with a wink to Natasha as he gestured for Toni to sit down. Clint looked back at them. "What? God, it's another note on my back isn't it? This one better not say 'Robin Hood' again Ste- I am greatly offended at this."
Clint crumpled up the note and threw it at a laughing Steve when Bruce started setting plates of curry at each place while everyone took their seats. Toni had never had curry before and she glanced up at the others who were eating it quickly. She was hungry, hadn't had anything to eat all day so she took a large bite.
"God, Dr. Banner this is delicious. Is there anything you do that isn't absolutely incredible!?" Toni took another bite as Bruce looked up at her and smiled.
"I can think of a few things. So tell us about yourself Tony. We should know the man who will help us uncover the truth behind Justin Hammer."
"Ah, well. I'm fifteen. I'm a Gemini. My favorite color is red. I got my GED last year so I'm done with school."
"A young scholar! No doubt you will be vital to our guest to defeating Hammer, but tell young one, what is a Gemini?" Thor said with a mouth full of food.
"It's a zodiac sign. People like to take the day they were born and see what the positions of the stars say about it." Natasha Leaned across the table towards him.
"What else? What's your family like?" Steve said as he grabbed for the bowl to get more rice.
"They're lovely, especially my mother." Toni said but made sure to keep her voice even. "So what do you guys think of Hammer Industries? What do you need me for?" They glanced up at the change in conversation.
"You were able to get into SHIELDS most secure files. We were wondering if you could get yourself into Hammer's servers." Bruce said.
"Oh, I can do that. I've done it before." The group fell silent as Toni went back to eating his curry. Thor glanced at the others.
"Is this an impressive feat?" The god asked.
"According to our techies it is. It's a wonder you ever got caught, Stark." Natasha shook her head at her.
"Not a lot of time and I was a bit distracted by the thought of money and prison. The other time I got caught was because I used my phone. I guess that's how Hammer found me to get me to hack in here." Toni said as she finished her meal and put her plate away. He glanced at the clock. Shit. "I, uh, I have to head home now."
"I'll drive you back." Natasha stood and grabbed her keys.
"See you Monday kid!" Natasha told her as she climbed out of the car.
Toni glared up at the sky as she walked towards her building. It was too dark. She kept going over in her head how she shouldn't have been so stupid as to get arrested. She prayed that since it was by SHIELD and she now had a super-secret SHIELD mission with the Avengers her parents wouldn't know. She stopped outside her door and waited.
She stared at it as if she was waiting for it to disappear. In fact, she was. She didn't believe in magic, but now was its chance. She leaned in and rested her head on the door and breathed deeply before entering.
Toni held back her sigh of relief when she saw her dad passed out in her chair with the tv still on. Her mom had long since gone into their room to go to sleep. Toni took a few cautious steps forward as she tiptoed around the empty bottles. They were haphazardly scattered around the area surrounding Howard's chair, which included the tv and his bedroom door. Toni made it to the television and turned it off, having it on all night would not do them any favors for their electric bill. Toni took an unfortunate step backwards that knocked over two bottles that had a domino effect on the rest and they clattered to the ground loudly.
"Shit." Toni whispered as she heard Howard stir in his chair and sit up. She turned and stood up straight as his father took several steps over to him.
"Damn Bitch, you know what time it is?" Howard said to her as he grabbed onto Toni's shirt.
"No, sir."
"Tried calling you, but you're too good to answer the damn phone."
"Shit, no I-I went out today and forgot my phone." Toni shook her head at the lie and didn't notice the fist until it collided with her cheek with a force that would have sent her to the ground if not for the strong grip on her shirt.
"You don't talk back to me, slut." Toni reached up to touch her cheek but a firm hand ripped her arm away. "Where did you go?"
"Nowhere! I went to see Happy, he needed help with his math." Toni knew it made sense. Most of her friends were still in High School and she regularly tutored them to get out of the house. Howard let go of her shirt and instead grabbed onto Toni's jaw with a firm grip.
"You have no respect." He said with a punch to the teen's ribs. "You should learn it."
"I'll respect you when you earn it, asshole." Toni regretted it immediately. She knew her bigmouth would kill her eventually and feared that that day had come. She took a shaky breath as she saw her dad's eyes widen in shock and anger. Toni held back a yelp as Howard threw her to the ground and gave two harsh kicks to her stomach.
"Little girls should not try to talk so grown up." Her dad said as he stumbled to the kitchen and grabbed a beer. Tony sat up and leaned against the side of the couch. She tensed when her dad crouched down beside her and took a large gulp of the beer. "Tell daddy you're sorry."
"Sorry, sir." Toni said and took a sharp breath as the rest of her dad's beer was poured over her head. Howard laughed as he walked into his room and closed the door.
Toni sat there for several minutes trying to catch her breath. She quickly wiped away whatever beer tried to drip its way into her eyes and then stood to walk to the bathroom. The teen locked the door behind her and took off her sweater and shirt. She splashed water in her face and hair and wiped herself down with a wet towel before poking at the dark bruise appearing on her left cheek and the light finger mark around her jaw with a frown. Great, how was she going to cover these up?
With a sigh she went to her room and crawled into her bed still wearing her jeans. She laid on her back and stared up at her glow in the dark stars that she made sure to be as astronomically correct as possible when she put them up. After several minutes she closed her eyes and just spun the metal SHIELD bracelet around her wrist. Trying to ignore the pain in her jaw and the cramping of her stomach.