Tony bid George good night and started walking back to his flat in London. They had been living in London full time for almost a year. And what a year it had been. Married life was everything he had hoped it would be, and he was pretty sure he had never been happier. The only way he could possibly be happier would be if he suddenly developed magic and was suddenly a wizard. But Hermione and George kept telling him it didn't work like that.
Now that he and Hermione were married they didn't have to be as secretive about him being involved in the shop. Since he was married to a witch, the statute of secrecy didn't apply to him anymore, and he was able to officially become a partner in the shop. He turned working with the shop into a full time job, and he could feel the stress that had seemed to permanently take up shop in his shoulders immediately slip away. He was more relaxed than he had ever been.
From what he has heard from Steve, the training of the new Avengers seemed to be going well. And there seemed to be a little bit of a romance blooming between Wanda and Vision, which was just weird to think about. He still thought of Vision as J.A.R.V.I.S. Steve kept telling him the door was open for him to join back in whenever he wanted, and Tony kept thanking him and they had basically stayed in London full time.
Which was nice. To be in a new city, and be far away from his obligations. However, Pepper was bugging him. He and George had been splitting their time between muggle and magical technology and inventions. They had developed a Virtual Reality program which would project people's memories so they could experience them in 3D. As soon as George had introduced him to a Pensieve, the idea had taken root and run away with him. They were able to patent it for Muggles and Wizards alike. And now Pepper wanted him to go to speaking engagements and promote it. He was in the process of negotiating George into the deal. Going on a tour of sorts with his best friend and business partner would be ideal. Bringing Hermione along for the ride would definitely be a bonus. He would need to see if she would be able to travel.
Now that they were in London full time, she was brewing potions for more and more of the Wizarding World both here and back in the states. It made him so happy to see her so successful with her little business venture. And on top of brewing normal wizarding potions, they had finally perfected the muggle version of a wizarding contraceptive and non-addictive pain medicine. Patented through Stark Industries of course, and Hermione was able to write it up for some medical journals and potions journals alike, and now her name was becoming familiar again, just not for being a war hero, but for being bloody brilliant. Things were definitely looking up.
Now, he just needed to suck it up and do what Pepper told him to do. It was his company after all.
TSHG
Tony stood and stared at the elevator door as it closed on the woman who just confronted him. Her son was dead. And it was his fault. The Avengers fucked up, and an innocent boy was dead because of it. And there was nothing that he could do about it.
"Tony, don't listen to her," George was saying from next to him. He had, of course been there the whole time. Heard the whole confrontation. "There's no avoiding casualties where there is a big battle."
"But there was no reason for us to do that there. In the city. We could have tried to move the fight outside the city and away from Civilians."
"That's not how it works. That's not how bad guys work, Tony. They don't care about civilians, so they will choose a populated area. It's what they do. You beat the bad guy, and you prevented many more deaths from happening."
Tony shook his head. He couldn't get the image of that boy out of his head. The one the mother showed him. He had heard of the damage caused in New York after the battle. The many lives forever changed because of it. But he shrugged it off. They had prevented the city from being nuked, people should be thankful. But now. The cost of their fight had a face. And it was something that he would not be able to get out of his mind.
"C'mon," George said, grabbing Tony by the arm, and dragging him into the elevator, and pressing the button for their floor. "You need to see Hermione, she can fix this.
The entire ride up to their floor, Tony couldn't stop thinking about how many more people must have lost their lives duirng their many battles. Not just Hydra agents, but innocent people. How many died in Sokovia? Probably not as many as could have if they didn't intervene. But would Ultron have done what he did if the Avengers hadn't been pursuing him? How responsible was The Avengers in all of this?
The elevator dinged, and the doors opened. George resumed his grip on Tony's arm, and dragged him to his room and pounded on the door with his fist. The door to the room swung open revealing Hermione.
"What's wrong?" Hermione asked, opening the door wider to let Tony and George into the room.
"We were waiting for the elevator when the presentation ended, and we were confronted by a mom who lost her son in Sokovia."
"No," Hermione gasped, shutting the door behind them.
"Yes," George said, leading Tony to the couch, and forcing him to sit down. "And she basically told Tony it was his fault that her son was killed."
"No!" Hermione exclaimed, looking over at Tony, who was sitting basically catatonic on the couch.
"Yes," George said. "Pretty sure it's fucked with Tony's head. I'm going to leave you two here, and I'll be back later. Let me know if you need anything, if he gets worse, or better."
"Thank you, George," Hermione said as George left the room.
He raised his hand and opened and closed the door to the room.
Hermione turned toward Tony and walked over to where he was sitting before she sat down next to him.
"Love, talk to me," she said, laying her hand on his shoulder.
Tony didn't say anything, he just laid his head on her shoulder. She moved so that she could wrap an arm around him and moved her hand up to stroke his hair. They sat in silence for quite a while. Hermione comforting, and Tony receiving.
"Even when we think we're doing something good, it's not," Tony finally spoke up, not removing his head from Hermione's shoulder.
Hermione didn't say anything. She just continued to sit there and comfort him. She knew he didn't need her to say anything yet.
"People call us heroes, but we're not. Yes, we've stopped alien invasions, but where does that leave us? Pretty sure we've either directly or indirectly caused the problems we were stopping anyway."
"I'll give you Ultron, but not the Chintauri," Hermione said. "How were you remotely responsible for them?"
"Loki is Thor's brother, if he didn't have his connections to earth, Loki would never have chosen to release his wrath and alien allies on it. And New York wouldn't have been targeted. I've heard about what's been going on in Hell's Kitchen in response to the attack. Crime syndicates have risen up and taken advantage of people who have lost everything because of the attack. And vigilantes like the Devil of Hell's Kitchen have risen up to try and take care of the problems we've created. So are we really heroes if we've created this new wave of criminals who bank on the disaster we've created and these new people have to resort to vigilantism to make up for it?"
"Weren't you technically a vigilante before you SHIELD recruited you?" Hermione pointed out.
"Not the point," Tony said. "The point is, maybe we should have let the government take care of the alien invasion. And Ultron. Because we're very obviously not heroes."
"I've seen the footage, you're a hero"
"I'm not a hero."
"You are. You've saved countless people as Iron Man."
"But what about the people I, we've, killed in the process? Where's their justice?"
"If you didn't do something to stop the alien invasion or Ultron, or any of those other crazy bastards, how many more innocent people would have been lost?"
Tony sighed. "But there has to be a better way to do this. One where less people get hurt."
"I'm sure there is. But I'm sure we've had this conversation before. There are some evil people in the world. In the Universe. And they're going to target the most populated area in order to do the most damage, because that's what they are trying to do. Make a big impact so that people will listen to them. The Avengers are here to minimize that impact. And the fact that most of you have some kind of super power, that gives you an advantage that a regular military doesn't. That boy was in the wrong place at the wrong time. And it's unfair for his mother to place so much blame on you. When you tried. You tried so hard.
"If you don't like how things are, maybe there's a solution that will make everyone happy. The Avengers can still do what they're doing, but maybe there can be more government oversight? SHIELD is gone. But maybe you can be used in some other way."
"I never thought about that. More government oversight. We could be used almost like a military or something. Report to someone higher than us. I'm going to need to contact General Ross."
"See, that's more like it. Come up with a plan. And now I don't want to hear you say that you're not a hero anymore. Because you're absolutely a hero. At least you're my hero," Hermione paused. "And I'm sure this baby will think you're their hero, as well."
Silence fell across the room as Hermione waited for it to click in Tony's head what she just said. After a minute Tony flew up from her lap and stared at her. "What?"
Hermione took his hand and placed it on her womb. "This baby is going to absolutely think you're their hero. Whether you're flying around in an Iron Man suit, or if you're sneaking them home products from the joke shop."
Tony closed his eyes and swallowed the lump in his throat before leaning over and giving Hermione a kiss. He then shifted so that he could lay his head in Hermione's lap, pressing his cheek where the baby would be. "Hello, little one. I'm your daddy."
