Andrew. The kid's name was Andrew. That's really all that Tony got out of teen after that mostly silent journey to Avenger's Tower. It was 2:58 AM. The members of the team residing there that night were asleep, and had thankfully already been asleep when Tony arrived about a half hour earlier with his "house guest". Tony wasn't planning on keeping the kid a secret exactly, but he was pretty sure avoiding perhaps the excitement and/or nervousness of meeting a house full of other heroes straightway was probably for the best with how the kid's current mental state was.
Tony was sat slouched on the modern gray sofa in the common room, uncharacteristically unplugged from technology. He could be doing something productive; like trying to track down any leaked research in the DNA altering serums or even attempting to run a facial recognition search to find out more to this kid's identity and background than just a first name. But no, Tony Stark remained still, just letting his mind whirl in a circle of guilt and worry as he waited for Andrew to finish cleaning himself up. Tony only snapped out of his trance when the kid finally made his appearance. Andrew quietly padded into the open room, stopping a few feet from where Tony sat, unsure. Bare feet and now dressed in a Stark Industries hoodie and sweatpants. The black clothes contrasted with how pale the boy still looked, though his appearance had greatly improved after a shower. His face clear of dirty smudges. His damp longish locks now clean and holding a slight messy curl to them. The only visible injuries seen now were the bruise under the kid's left eye and shallow cuts on his right cheek and bottom lip. Tony knew there were more hidden under the clothes, but at least in this moment the kid didn't look as heartbreakingly broken as he did earlier.
"Hey kid," Tony stayed seated, keeping the mood as casual as possible. Andrew still had to be reeling from everything that happened to him, and a transition to another unreal situation (even if it was nonviolent and not against his will) still had to be hard to process. "Don't look so nervous, hm. Safe space. How about you take a seat."
Andrew gave a little nod and made his way to the matching sofa across from Tony, a glass coffee table separating them. He sat right in the middle and pulled his feet up to sit cross-legged. He gave a quick glance at Tony, then looked down at his hands in his lap.
"Okay," Tony began, sitting up straight, "so I said I wasn't going to badger you about needing any check up or tests...within a reasonable time frame, until you're ready. And I didn't suddenly change my mind, so don't worry. But I'm thinking we should talk."
"About what?" Andrew deflected, keeping his gaze down as he spoke. His voice was a little scratchy but nowhere near as hoarse as it had been earlier that evening.
Tony mentally sighed. "Oh, I don't know, maybe about how I found you trapped in a mad scientist's evil lair with dozens of other people? Yeah, yeah that's it."
"What if I don't wanna talk about it?" Andrew looked at Tony then, tired eyes glossed over with anguish. It made Tony want to kick himself for being so blunt.
"Well I'm not going to make you, so you don't have to. But I hope you'll think about it. I brought you here to help you, kid. And I think it's going to be a lot easier to do that if you can help me out here first by letting me know what happened to you."
"Okay, I...I will. I just, don't wanna do this right now. I can't."
"Don't worry kid. You'll get there. We'll get there. And well, just so we're clear, you must know that a few important people live here, so you're not really going to be a secret from them. But I promise that's nothing to worry about. No one else is going to know about you being here or what happened to you as long as you don't want them to. But do you have some family you want to call, kid? Someone's got to be missing you. Wherever they're from; I can get them here to you if-"
Andrew snorted a short humorless laugh that cut Tony off. "No. There's nobody missing me."
Tony pressed his lips together at the depressing bit of shared information. He didn't know if he should press the kid more about it, or maybe just leave this to be shared on the kid's own time too.
"Um, Mr. Stark," Andrew began in a quieter tone, "I don't really want to bother you for anything else right now, like I mean just you bringing me here was...thank you. But um, actually I'm really hungry."
And Tony wanted to kick himself again. How could he not have thought about feeding the poor kid? One of the many reasons he would never have kids of his own —or even pets for that matter. Tony was quite happy with just robots. With a raid of the refrigerator, Tony hooked Andrew up with several cartons of somebody's leftover Chinese food. The kid ate at the coffee table while sitting on the floor. He devoured it all except for a half bag left of crispy chow mein noodles. And the kid probably downed at least a half gallon of water along with it. There had been no talking, just hurried eating; and Tony sadly wondered how long ago the kid had been allowed to eat by those bastards at the lab. It was only when the kid was done, chopsticks down, and his latest glass of water drained that the kid spoke.
"I couldn't get that stupid collar off." Andrew seemingly said out of the blue, his eyes on the empty food cartons. He was still sitting on the floor and leaned back heavily against the sofa, his arms hugged around his drawn up legs.
Tony just listened; he wasn't about to try to hurry up the kid to get to the point. The teen had decided to open up, and Tony would respect Andrew going at his own pace.
"I could tell it wasn't turned on," Andrew went on after a short pause. "Like there wasn't a hum to it like there always was, but I was afraid it could start up again any second, that one of those people could track me with it or just kill me. I was hiding in the back of some dude's pickup truck, like prying at it the whole time. I dunno how long it was. It was just suddenly dark out and the truck stopped at a 7-Eleven, and I snuck out and ran across the street to hide at that truck place. I didn't mean to break all that stuff. I..." Andrew's eyes met Tony's. "I just couldn't get the collar off. I was scared. I dunno, I was freaking out I guess. And then... I went all glowy. And like you said, 'bang boom'."
That bit of sharing was certainly a start, and did Tony ever appreciate it. He'd seen the tinier demonstration with his own eyes when the kid got angry and scared and started to glow, but what the kid described here definitely proved that the activation of the serum induced power was at least partly connected with how the boy's body reacted with certain emotions.
"Don't worry about Mr. Ray and his fine establishment. I'll make sure he's taken care of." Tony leaned forward and grabbed a crispy noodle from the table and popped it in his mouth. "And hey, I'm assuming that's what got the collar off, so at least it was a partial win situation." Tony remarked cheekily.
Andrew cracked a small smile for a brief moment. It slipped away to a concerned look. "I coulda hurt someone. I don't wanna hurt anybody."
"Of course you don't, and you won't. That's why you're here. I won't let you hurt anyone, and I won't let anyone hurt you. I realize this is a 'we just met' sort of situation, but I'm hoping we can have a level of trust here." The man scooted down to sit on the floor across from Andrew and held his hand out over the coffee table for the boy to shake. "So here we are... I'm Tony Stark and I'm going to do everything I can to help you, and I trust you won't blue bang boom my tower."
Andrew showed another tiny smile and bought his hand up to Tony's offered one. "I'm Andrew Hutton, sir, and if you say I'm safe here, I believe you. And I guess I'll try not to...explode or whatever." A half cheeky smile graced the kid's face.
Tony let out a silent huff of a laugh. At least the kid was becoming comfortable in his presence. "Well, that's a good place to start, kid."