Science And Magic Miracles
Summary: Oneshots about Stephen and Toni's relationship that led to their happy ending in (Not so) Little Miracles, featuring all their friends and family!
From the moment Rhodey walked into her lab that day, after 'welcoming' the Rogues back, Toni could tell that Rhodey had finally figured out she and Strange were engaged. How he found or figured it out wasn't as important as capturing every awkward second of him congratulating her and begrudgingly accepting that he is not to hunt down the Sorcerer Supreme for daring to go behind his back to propose to her. He was elated to be allowed to give him a shovel talk, though, so she had wondered where she should be worried or amused.
From the moment she saw Stephen's reaction to finding out they would be becoming parents, Toni could tell that this was practically a start of a fairytale type of ending and she knew, no matter how much she hated that knowledge, that it won't last for long. And for the first time in, line, years, it won't be because of the Rogues. She still had a good month without any problems or disturbances aside from Rogers constantly trying to talk to her - he apparently wanted them to get back together, despite being perfectly well aware that she'll be marrying Strange soon and was more than content with that fact. She was happy, damn it! Happy, truly and deeply happy for the first time in so, so long. And she wanted Rogers to have nothing to do with anything that caused that happiness - or smaller instances where one of the old Avengers would try to talk to her when she would really rather not interact with them at all. Wanda would try and get back with Vision, who would in turn do his best to avoid her, Sam was trying to make it up to Rhodey but Carol stood in his way, Barton was trying to get Toni to arrange him a meeting with his wife, Romanoff had tried to guilt trip her into getting her in contact with Fury but at least Hope had Lang perfectly under control and the only mishap on his part was playing with his ants. Then there was Wanda aggravating Stephen about lessons and training and Wilson constantly asking when he can have Red Wing back and Rogers getting into arguments with Ross, but, thankfully, that was the gist of it.
Ignoring their overreaction when they learned that Peter and Harley were underage despite them both being perfectly capable of taking care of themselves and having their parent's/guardian's permission to be back up. Harley had put them down quite spectacularly and Deadpool had made the Black Widow red with anger and embarrassment when he got a chance to talk with the Rogues.
Then, when one peaceful day, while she was jogging in the park with Pepper and discussing wedding plans and the baby's room arrangements when, suddenly, a sparking portal opened in the middle of Central Park. Now, usually, this wasn't a cause of concern except the grim look on Stephen's face told her everything she needed to know about how the rest of her day was going to go. Pepper practically begged her not to go - "Think about the baby!" - but Bruce's appearance and the name on his lips froze Toni's blood in her veins and she was left with no choice as she stepped through the portal into her own world of nightmares. From the moment Bruce explained what happened with the Asgardians - and the story of what happened to the Hulk after Sokovia and what Bruce went through with Thor and Loki was a story in for itself - to the moment when Stephen and Peter were beamed up into the alien warship, to meeting the Guardians of the Galaxy and to the fight with Thanos, all of it was just the prologue to her greatest nightmare.
Then she was fighting Thanos on her own and actually managing to do some damage before the tyrant attempted to stab her with her own blade but she and FRIDAY were quicker, dispersing the blade before it made contact and making it retreat into the armor. The sudden move made the Titan stumble but was far from enough to distract him and he curled his giant hand around Toni's midsection. Had it not been for Extremis, Toni wouldn't have survived long enough for Peter to slam into Thanos hard enough to make the purple behemoth let go of her. Toni and Peter were on him instantly, soon joined by the dizzy Stephen and Levi, then assisted by Peter Quill, AKA Starlord. It was their combined effort that, in the end, did indeed weaken and distract Thanos enough for Nebula, the blue alien cyborg that had arrived some time after Thanos threw a moon at Toni, to sneak up on her 'adoptive father' and cut his fucking head off. Toni all but collapsed with relief when Thanos' head rolled in front of her feet, only to kick it away when its eyes suddenly snapped open, the world bleeding red as the Reality Stone made their efforts futile.
She wasn't sure what possessed her to do it, but she activated the unibeam and charged at Thanos at full thrusters. Adding Extremis into her punch knocked the purple alien over and she came to straddle his chest, one hand pinning the Gauntlet open, the other around his neck as she let the Starkenium release almost all of its power until only twelve percent was left in the suit. As with the Mind Stone when Loki had tried to use it to control her mind back in the Battle of New York, the other Infinity Stones were ineffective when faced with the raw energy from the Starkenium core of her Arc Reactor and Thanos was left with half his face burned off but somehow still alive and well enough to throw Toni off of him. But Levi had caught her and Peter had been ready to web the Gauntlet and keep it open, Drax now awake and helping him pull and Stephen was ready, conjuring up some amplifying spell and he, Toni and Quill fired all they had left through it, the Arc Reactor's energy breaking through the Power Stone's influence and the attack landed true, right through Thanos' head and upper torso. The suit retreated back into the Arc Reactor housing due to only 2% of power being left, but they had a secured way back home with the Guardians.
Only Toni insisted on a few pit stops along the way, first being Vormir.
It took her laughingly little to convince Stephen to forget about that natural law bullshit and just reverse time. In a localized manner, of course. They didn't need to undo their efforts in killing Thanos. It was a surprise when they met Red Skull as the guardian of the Soul Stone and it was even more surprising when he told them how Thanos got his hands on the Stone in the first place - even though he kind of had to - but with that understanding, Stephen simply reversed time on the Gauntlet and the green alien woman that had been sacrificed - Gamora, the love of Quill's life, apparently - to reverse the exchange. The touching reunion between the Guardians had Toni kind of emotional, but she had blamed it on the pregnancy hormones, even if her fiancé and her pseudo son didn't believe her. In retaliation, she took Levi and didn't give him back, much to the Cloak's pleasure and Stephen's exasperated, fond amusement. The poor thing will need some stitching. Thanos had done quite a number on it, as he had on all of them.
Their second stop was also Toni's insistence. The ship full of Asgardians that Thanos had attacked in order to get the Tesseract and the Space Stone within hadn't changed much since the Guardians last saw it, but once Stephen got to work, the Space Stone was back in the Cube and there were plenty of confused Asgardians trying to figure out just what the Hel had happened. Loki seemed to understand, bowed to Toni in thanks and then glared in distaste at Strange. Toni had learned of their interaction and found it funny but didn't antagonize Loki about it. In the end, they had Heimdall transport them all with the Bifrost back to Earth, where they were almost shot out of the sky by Carol before she realized they were not enemies. Thor nearly did it anyway when he recognized the ship and all but barreled into Loki, Heimdall and the warrior woman simply calling herself Valkyrie. Bruce looked rather relieved to see them, too, so that was nice, as was seeing that Vision, Rhodey, Harley, Hope, Carol and everyone else had survived. They had apparently taken the fight to Wakanda and had nearly decimated the attacking aliens until they had all but fell dead, probably with the deaths of the Black Order and Thanos.
The last three trips Strange made before they could curl up together and just sleep for a century was to Knowhere, Xander and to Nivadellir, to return the Reality and Power Stones and the Infinity Gauntlet. Stephen grumbled about the natural laws, only half heartedly, and restored the three worlds back to life before he finally came home and the New Avengers all collapsed into a big group cuddle on a pile of pillows the kids prepared while the sorcerer was busy. The former Rogues only stared, feeling awkward, especially when Pepper, Happy, May, MJ, Ned, Wade and Hank appeared with Wong and they all joined in, along with a few ants who pushed Scott over to Hope and Shuri, who all but dragged T'Challa into it. Toni only remembered asking FRIDAY to do a group health scan before falling asleep, not even hearing the results. When she woke up, it was to Loki and Stephen glaring at each other from where Thor had apparently dragged the 'Revengers' and the Guardians into the pile and no one had minded. Much. Apparently Stephen and Loki had some things to discuss, but it was a pleasant surprise to learn that Loki won't be going for his knives. Yet. But for now ...
He was welcomed.
The Rogues, though, were not, much to her pleasure.
With some rest and food, everyone was back to mostly an operational state. Wakanda had lost quite a few warriors but the loss wasn't nearly as devastating as it could have been - like, say, half of the life in the entire universe - and the injured were getting treated. When everyone was ready for it, Toni called up Fury and had Stephen portal him, Maria and Coulson in, surprising everyone from the original Avengers, especially with Coulson's alive status. A short debate started and was swiftly ended by Fury before they started a status report, including medical health of all participants. Everyone from Titan sighed in relief when FRIDAY informed them that the baby was perfectly fine. Stephen might have cried a little but Toni had stayed perfectly dry-eyed ... Yeah, right. She had just hid it better when Peter and Harley hugged her in relief while those who hadn't known she was pregnant - the Revengers, half of the Guardians and the Wakandans; of course she had told Fury about his honorary grandnephew or grandniece. She and Carol had ribbed him mercilessly after he had plucked Toni out of her chair and hugged her with a few stray tears of happiness rolled from his good eye - congratulated her, although they kind of didn't understand the amount of relief everyone was showing.
It was probably for the best that they never learn she had been practically sterile until this not so little miracle had happened. The Hulk can rage about it later, when Toni was back in New York and eating a greasy cheeseburger.
The world - the entire universe - recovered quite well after the almost tragedy that could have shaken them was so narrowly avoided. The Guardians left Earth after the wedding - the Wedding of the Millennium, apparently, and it was, it had to be, with what Kamar-Taj, the Asgardians, the Wakandans, the Guardians, Hope, Pepper and Toni did with it; Fury, Carol, Maria and Natasha, surprisingly enough, were a great help - the Asgardians had by then already somewhat settled in Norway - they were practically their national treasures now - the Wakandans went back to their own business and Toni and Stephen had a nice honeymoon that lasted all of two whole days before they were needed to save someone else's ass. Again. Not that they needed much longer, as both were workaholics and a bit of control freaks, after the types of lives they've led so far.
Time passed, villains got bold enough again to attack and the Avengers took care of them with ease. Scott and Hope got together again, Happy proposed to Pepper and Carol proposed to Rhodey, as was both the Kree and the Skrull way. Her honey-bear sure did get a surprise with that one and she had laughed at him while he gawked at his proposing girlfriend. All in all, life was good, especially as Rogers had finally gotten the message and left her alone. Thank the Vishanty or the Allfather or whoever else was listening up there. He was becoming quite bothersome.
By her fourth month of pregnancy, Toni stopped piloting the Iron Maiden, not willing to let the risk of losing her baby due to stress take away what might very well be her last opportunity to have a child of her own. Well, of her own flesh and blood, anyway. She already had her bots, FRIDAY, Vision, Harley and Peter. Stephen approved of this move, as did almost everyone else. Hell, almost the entire world supported her temporary leave, all happy for her for once. That was quite a new experience for Toni Stark, or rather, Toni Stark-Strange. Yeah, she never got rid of her name. The kid will never get rid of the Stark name.
Starks created the future, after all.
Speaking of her sorcerer husband, the further along in her pregnancy that she got, the more doting he became. If anyone had doubted that he was whipped before for Toni, they wouldn't now, as he catered to her every whim and need. Then again, the entirety of Kamar-Taj and the New Avengers did pretty much the same, even Wong and Hank ran around to make sure she was comfortable. As her belly grew and the child remained healthy, Toni started getting a little impatient, barely being able to wait to hold her child for the first time. Unlike some mothers, she never complained about being pregnant. Then again, those mothers probably had those pregnancy pains, like a stiff back or swollen feet, neither of which Toni had to deal with because of the lovely invention that was the Extremis. And, seeing as the likelihood of her ever having a repeat experience, she treasured every moment of it.
Her cravings, though, were as strange as her last name was, but easily satisfied, seeing as she had a bunch of portal-making friends that could go all around the world to fulfill said cravings. She even got Carol addicted to some of the toppings she had put on her pizza once. And let's not even get her on the topic of all the experiments with toppings she had with Thor and his favorite meal of all, pop-tarts. Stephen, Christine and Bruce nearly had a heart attack for her when they saw the amount of sugar and cholesterol she had inhaled that day. Not that Extremis hadn't burned through it almost instantly. Seriously, Extremis was one of the best things that had happened to her, where this pregnancy was concerned.
Especially when her water broke and the contractions and pains of labor began. She'd heard of women screaming their throats raw or accidentally breaking their husband's hand during the labor while screaming profanities and threats of castration or the labor lasting for hours, where, in comparison hers lasted no longer than half an hour altogether and was relatively painless and almost effortless on her part. Good thing, too, for Stephen's hands' sake.
Waiting to hold her baby for the first time was way more nerve wrecking.
"Congratulations, it's a healthy, little boy!" Christine beamed as she entered the room where the proud parents were waiting, holding close and securely a little bundle in her arms. She gave the new Stark-Strange a little smile before handing him over to his awaiting mother, who all but melted when she saw him up close for the first time and held him in her arms. Somehow, all of her difficulties in life, all of her troubles and problems seemed worth it if she had come to this moment in time.
He was a handsome baby, and not just because he was hers. He already had a tuft of hair at the top of his head that seemed somewhere between her and Stephen's in color and he had her nose and Stephen's high cheek bones under all that baby fat. He won't be opening his eyes for another couple of hours and she couldn't wait to see what color they will be. Stephen had that heterochromia iridium thing that she found really awesome and hoped their son will develop. It's quite beautiful, although she kind of wanted him to have her eye color, too. All Starks had a rich brow for their eye color and this boy was going to be one hell of a Stark, growing up with Iron Maiden and the Sorcerer Supreme as his parents and all his superpowered aunts and uncles. Toni couldn't help but wonder whether he'll take up science or magic. Or maybe he'll go a la Asgardian and learn that point where magic and science are one and the same. He'll certainly be smart enough to do that if he inherits half of his parents' intelligence and memory. And he'll certainly have teachers in all aspects that might interest him.
"Hello, my little bambino," she cooed to him as she nestled him against her chest, Stephen moving to be her support and pillow as they gazed down at their child. "Welcome to the world. We've been waiting for you."
"Your mom nearly lost patience with how excited she was," the man chuckled, extending a shaking finger to their son. The little boy wrapped a tight fist around Stephen's offered finger and Toni saw Stephen melt. "I'm so glad that we can finally meet you, little one. You are not even aware of how loved you already are. Mommy and daddy fought a giant alien tyrant to make sure you can come to this world." Toni couldn't help but snort. That will be quite a story to tell in school when her son grows up. When he started making a fuss, Toni arranged him so he would have access to her breast so he can suckle. She winced a little at how strongly he pulled. She couldn't help but wonder if Extremis had any side effects. "What should we call him?"
Toni didn't even need much time to think about it before replying. "Miracolo. It's Italian for miracle. I thought it fitting, ever since I learned I was pregnant. We can call him Colo for short. Or Raco. Or little Mira."
Stephen just grinned and kissed her forehead. "Sounds good to me." She just leaned against him and watched as Christine walked back in, this time trailed by all their friends and family. Even Laura was there. Toni smiled at them with a little wave, suddenly feeling just how tired the labor had left her, releasing a yawn.
Pepper walked over and she gave her her goddaughter and she, Happy, Rhodey and Carol all made goofy faces at the baby, already wrapped around little Miracolo's fingers. Hope and Scott were staring at the godparents and the baby with something akin to awe, Peter and Harley flitting about, trying to get a better look at their pseudo baby brother. Hank and Nick were holding back a little, but both smiled at her when they met her eyes. Thor was openly bawling from the other end of the room in happiness while Loki awkwardly pat his back. It was weird how quickly Loki got integrated into the New Avengers. Shuri was practically vibrating out of her skin, only held back by T'Challa to let the family have a first look before she could start talking the baby's ear off about all the things that she'll teach him. Deadpool was being awfully quiet where he was standing, in full uniform, with Hill, Coulson and Ross. May was with Ned and MJ, also waiting for their turn while Laura and Wong had made their way to the proud parents. Vision was also hovering uncertainly around her until Toni grabbed his hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. Billy, Stephen's old nurse, and Bruce were discussing some medical thing or the other that Toni was really too tired to listen to and were trying to keep the overly excited Guardians - who had come as soon as they learned she was in her final weeks of labor - in control and stop Valkyrie from breaking out the booze. The littler Bartons were outside, for now, glaring the ex-Rogues into submission so they won't crowd the room much. Or upset the mother. They may or may not have been helped by the ants Hank stationed out there.
New Asgard was waiting to hear about the baby. Nivadellir and Xandar, too. She had little doubt that someone at Kamar-Taj was somehow watching them - she believed Wong had called it scrying - and were celebrating already. Maria must have told everyone at SI already, and if not, FRIDAY had, because Toni had connected to the server with Extremis and saw a celebration in progress. Peter and Shuri had probably already informed the world.
Toni sighed in content, closing her eyes. Her son was here, in the hands of the people she trusted, she and her little family were surrounded by their bigger family. She was safe. They were safe. The biggest source of her nightmares was gone. She was held by the love of her life and surrounded by friends so dear they were family.
Stephen kissed her cheek and tightened his hold on her, reclining a little more so she would be more comfortable. Toni just sighed happily again as Levi wrapped around them both, the chaotic harmony of her family's voices lulling her to the best sleep since she was four.
For once, life was good for Toni Stark(Strange).
THE END
