Tony's slumber was disturbed by a buzzing sound somewhere in the room. He tried to ignore it, snuggling closer into Steve, hand wrapped around his waist, cheek pressing up against the top of his head. The buzzing got more prominent, and he grumbled in response, turning away from Steve ever so slightly, opening his eyes just enough to form a glare. The source of the irritable buzzing sound that rudely woke him up from his peaceful slumber next to his super soldier, came in the form of none other than his Stark phone. He ever so gently, ever so quietly as to not wake up Steve, moved off of the bed and trekked over towards his pants, fishing out his phone from his pocket.

"Hello?" He said softly, putting his clothes on in the process.

"Mr. Stark, we need you to come down to S.H.I.E.L.D. HQ right away." Fury's voice boomed. He looked behind him and saw Steve stir slightly.

"Hang on," he whispered, grabbing his shirt and quietly exiting the room. "Alright, continue. What's the issue?"

"We've apprehended one of those things that were responsible for the capture of Captain Rogers, so I thought you'd wanna ask some questions." A strange feeling washed over Tony; it pooled and swirled inside his chest first, making its way to his fingertips as they tingled, his hands clenched into fists. It was a weird feeling of anger festering inside of him, but in the mix he could feel something along the lines of revenge. Was that the feeling? It felt like it, he was going to march down there and let every ounce of hatred drip off of him in the form of either words, or maybe fists. He was hoping for the latter.

"I'll be there as soon as possible." He ended the call without waiting to hear anymore of what Fury had to say. His mind was only focused on one thing, and that was getting down to S.H.I.E.L.D. and hopefully getting answers, as well as teaching certain alien assholes not to fuck with the people Tony cares about.

When he arrived, Natasha was already waiting for him outside of HQ. No words were exchanged between them as she led them to the interrogation room. He felt ansty when they stepped into the elevator, and as they were getting closer, he was biting the inside of his cheek to try and calm his nerves. Once the elevator doors opened, he saw Fury waiting for him.

"I'm glad you could make it, Mr. Stark. I'm certain you're in the right state of mind before I let you in?" Fury spoke calmly.

"Oh, of course. Why wouldn't I be? It's not like the asshole behind the door kidnapped my boyfriend or anything." Tony sassed. Fury raised an eyebrow at him, causing the genius to roll his eyes. "Long story, can you just let me in?" Fury looked at him for a few more minutes before he turned around, inputted the pin on the lock pad, and opened the door, holding it open for Tony.

As the brunette walked through the door, he wouldn't be lying if he said he was a bit overwhelmed. The room itself was dark, even with the blue lights surrounding them it was still significantly hard to see, but just lit barely enough for him to see the creature shackled to the table. He slowly inched his way forward, the sound of a door closing followed by footsteps close behind him as he sat down.

He made eye contact with the creature, and he could feel all the emotions he was trying to suppress early come crawling back in a tidal wave, and before he knew it, he reached across the table and punched the alien in the face. He felt hands grab his arms, leading him gently back into the chair as they remained on him, firmly holding back.

"That's for Steve." He spat. The creature simply chuckled darkly and smirked, looking Tony dead in the eye.

"Ah yes, your poor, precious, boy toy. How could we forget, his screams of pain are still engraved in my mind. What I wouldn't give to hear them again." He tried getting up again to punch the creature in its face once more, but Natasha's firm grip held him in place.

"Mr. Stark." Fury's voice boomed, a hint of warning laced within his words. "Need I remind you why you are here?" Tony scoffed in response.

"I understand you're frustrated, believe me I am too, but save the punching for later and just get through this first." Natasha whispered to him. He sighed heavily and nodded his head, her hands leaving his arms shortly after. He clicked his teeth with his tongue, glaring at this disgusting thing across from him.

"So why did you do it?" He suddenly asked.

"For a genius, you certainly made sure to ask a stupid question." It replied. However, it shook its head and chuckled. "I'm sure one of us already told you, if you hadn't figured it out by now, but we wanted to break up the Avengers in our own way, make sure there aren't any threats for other races who want to invade earth."

"Ya see," Tony said, leaning forward, a smug look on his face, "that's what I thought at first too, but that's not exactly accurate is it? You tried to kill me, but instead here I am looking at your disgusting ass face. Then you try to get my boyfriend to kill himself; which I'm sure you thought if he did it'd be easier to get to me since I'd be so busy with my self destructive tendencies, and yet you failed."

"You assume we failed?" It raised its eyebrows in response. "Who's to say we didn't want him to escape? Who's to say we didn't want your little spy buddies to escape too, and have them lead you on this wild goose chase. What if those closest to you aren't what they seem to be? Maybe we're destroying you from the inside, and you're too blind to see it."

"Well that would be a pretty decent plan, if it wasn't for the fact we have a mind manipulating witch, who, by the way, is on our side and would tell us if you shit bags are still messing around with us." He could see the creature's expression sour, and he knew he was getting somewhere. "Your plan was to have Wanda take us out one by one, wasn't it?"

"That little witch had one job, and it was to make sure the Captain died before we made her work her way into your little crime fighting group. Instead, she saved him and got away."

"So then, that should be the end of the story. Except it's not, because you're just the pawn in all of this. You're not the ring leader, the one behind all of these evil schemes, you're just carrying them out. So, where's your leader?"

"Heh," it chuckled, smirking at him, "I think you'd be more worried about your property back home?" Tony's narrowed his eyes, suspicion with a hint of confusion etched into his face.

"Why would I need to worry about Capsicle? He's safe at home with Wanda." The way the smirk never faltered from the creature unnerved Tony, and he could see the other knew it was too as its smirk grew.

"Are you sure about that?" Suddenly it felt too hot for Tony in the interrogation room. He could hear Natasha speaking into his ear, he could see her trying to get his attention, but nothing was registering as the fear took control of his body. He abruptly got out of his seat, exiting the room and making his way towards the elevator. The entire ride up until the main entrance of S.H.I.E.L.D. HQ was filled with nothing but terror gripping his heart. He took off back towards the tower in his Iron Man suit, getting there as quick as he could.

He wasted no time entering the tower, wishing the damn elevator would hurry the fuck up and just get him to his room. Eventually the doors opened to his floor, and he was already running to his room. His footsteps slowed until he came to a complete stop. He was frozen in place, his eyes noticing how the door to his room was cracked and bent in half in front of where it used to be on its hinges. He dared to step closer, wanting to see what the inside was like. His breath hitched and he swallowed the lump in his throat as he looked at the mess around him. Glass was shattered on the floor, curtains ripped, the bed flipped over and resting halfway inside of his closet, the drawer broken, wood mixing with the glass and the contents of the drawer laying on the floor. Holes tattered the walls, some mere dents and the other's actual gaping holes. It was a sight for sore eyes to say the least. But there was no Steve anywhere to be seen. He started to panic, slowly exiting the room.

"Where's Wanda?" He thought as he made his way back to the elevator. Once the doors opened again to his desired destination, he hurried over towards the spare guest room where Wanda has been staying until Tony can get around to making her her own room. To his surprise, the room was completely untouched, everything perfectly in the same place as it should be. "What the…?"

A small click was heard behind him and he turned around. His eyes widened as he saw Steve, standing there with his shield, and a gun pointed at him, lip split, scratches on his throat, clothes ripped, and his bandages bleeding. He raised his hands slowly, an instant reaction from having someone hold a gun at you, his mind bringing back the image of the fake Fury threatening to kill him.

"Steve? Please put the gun down." He said slowly and calmly.

"Shut up!" The soldier yelled, his voice a little shaky.

"Steve, it's me, Tony."

"How do I know that!? How do I know you're not one of things that just attacked me not too long ago pretending to be him again?"

He was speechless. Steve was right, how exactly can he prove that he's not one of them? How can he exactly trust that Tony was real to him, when there's a possibility that he could be a fake in the eyes of the soldier. The truth was, there is no way for him to get Steve to believe him, because he was so far gone that there was no way to make him see real from fake. So, Tony just accepted his fate.

"You're right," he said sadly, watching as the soldiers expression hardened, grip on his gun tightening, "you can't exactly tell if I'm the real Tony, or just one of those fake ones running around trying to hurt you, because truth is, even the real me can hurt you." He felt tears start to form, and he made no attempt to wipe them away as he kept talking. "The real me can hurt you far worse than any fake me could; I could break your heart with insecurities alone, I could lock myself in a lab and shut you out, hell, I can even hurt you by trying to keep you safe. The real me would feel guilty thinking that I could keep you safe from the rest of the world, or whatever threatens the safety of our home, but the truth is I can't. I can't protect you from everything, because danger will always find us, and that's what I'm scared of every single time I look into your eyes. I'm scared that if I shelter you I'm just hurting you, if I let you fend for yourself I risk the danger of hurting you by trusting myself that I think you're ok. I can't prove to you that I'm the real Tony Stark. So, if you want to, then by all means pull the trigger."

He watched Steve hesitate, the gun in his hand shaking just a little bit. He watched Steve's face, the serious expression crumbling into one full of relief, the gun and his shield dropping onto the floor as he moved towards Tony, picking him up and wrapping his arms around him, resting his head into his chest as he sobbed.

"I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry, Tony." Steve cried. The genius placed soft kisses on his forehead, wrapping his arms around the blonde's neck, whispering sweet things into his ear to calm him down.

"It's ok babe, I'm right here. I'm right here with you, you're gonna be ok." The soldier held him tighter, but not too tight so that he might hurt Tony, but just tight enough so that he could hold Tony closer to his body. "Shh, it's ok. What happened? Where's Wanda?"

"I took her to the gym after that creature came in here pretending to be you. And I… Oh God, Tony I shot you. I mean, I shot a fake version of you but… I don't ever wanna be in a situation like that. It hurt so much." Tony felt his heart break for the soldier emotionally. This man has been through so much, and there's just more salt being added to his wounds by the minute. He couldn't even begin to imagine how he would feel if he were in Steve's shoes, but God does he wish he could be. All this pain, all this agonizing, unnecessary, twisted pain that Steve's been through, he doesn't deserve this.

Steve continued to apologize, and Tony continued to assure him that it was ok, that he's here for him, and that he's sorry for leaving him this vulnerable. They held each other; Steve staining Tony's shirt with his tears, and Tony placing soft kisses on Steve's face and whispering sweet words into his ear to calm him down.

Tony knew that the only way to make the situation better was to put an end to this whole nightmare. He knew that the team was going to have to figure out where these things' final target was, and they would have to put a stop to it. Tony swears that he'll do whatever it takes to not only ensure that this whole fiasco is over, but he'll also ensure that after this is all over, he'll make sure that Steve is finally happy, no matter what.