Hello, dear readers. To assuage fears, NO, this story is not over, lol. I was taking a break after the Iron Man 1 period...which took a lot longer than I thought it would. I realized looking back at this chapter that it was like PARAGRAPHS upon PARAGRAPHS of just exposition, and I was like...Okay. Maybe need to fix some things here.
So yeah, after the long delay, here is the next chapter. We are now in IM2 era. I sincerely hope it was worth the wait!
Tony is a man of science and he always will be. Because of that, he was always quite familiar with laws.
That is, Archie's law, Bragg's law, Coulumb's law—laws created from the very purpose of science itself, to explain and understand. They provide a groundwork to build up from. Now that these discoveries are out of the way, we can work towards the next.
It always ticked him off when someone threw Murphy or Finagle in there. They are not laws, they are philosophies, and Tony keeps a line between philosophy and science. That said, he's been thinking very much about the things Murphy and Finagle were trying to "explain": fate.
He should stop, really, because there is no problem to solve there. It's a riddle that doesn't have an answer. What is happenstance, and what is sequential logic? What is luck, and what is choice?
The only thing he can settle is that choice does in fact play a large part in the course of time. Not always, of course. Does anyone choose for there to be earthquakes and tsunamis, do they choose when they lose their parents? No, but he did choose to let Mary Fitzpatrick enthrall him, and that gave him a son. He chose not to give his mother a proper goodbye, and that gave him a pain in his chest that hasn't gone away even years after the fact. Even in a roundabout way choice comes through—he chose to leave those jagged pieces on his bed, and that's why he has a scar on his palm now.
For a longest time, the length of which he cannot map, the course of Tony's life seemed to be orchestrated by nothing but his choices. His shitty, thoughtless choices. Choosing to keep Stane around despite the red flags that flashed before his eyes, choosing to create weapons that slaughtered innocents because he couldn't be bothered to break from routine, choosing to treat his son like a nuisance just for existing,
He's trying to remedy all of that by making better choices now: Stane's gone, Stark Industries has ceased all weapons manufacturing, and he is trying to fix what he broke with Peter. He has not succeeded, but he is trying, and not actively choosing to break it into any more pieces.
And why did he choose to let the world know he is Iron Man? Because he wanted the world to know he was making better choices. Perhaps it was self-congratulatory of him, but he had this unshakable notion that it was how he was going to move away from the Tony Stark that went into the cave.
Not that he's trying to erase all of his sins from existence, of course. He's trying to wash the stains out, not set fire to the cloth. The Iron Man is the greatest thing he's ever created, because its purpose is to protect. Not make money, not kill and destroy, not make him look new and shiny and impressive.
So Tony is sure that being the Iron Man is not fate, it was a choice with improvement in mind.
Now, though, he is reminded of another law: Hutber's.
"Improvement means deterioration."
Peter is improving.
He's fallen back into place at Queens, as easy as a piece in a puzzle. He's back at his old school, and making friends easily. The teachers brag on him for his intelligence, as they always have. His days are simple and easy. If he's not at school, then he's with the Parkers. There's an actual, decent Italian restaurant with properly-spelled menu items that they frequent often. Not too far from the Parkers' apartment, a park is being built. They take down the paper in Peter's room and paint the walls red. May tells Tony that sometimes he has entire conversations with R2D2 (who stays hidden in his room)—that is, Peter speaks, R2 says beep-bwa-ba-bweep, and Peter goes on. Apparently he once chided the robot with, "Whoa! Language!"
Tony sends over money each month: the exact thing that May had denied they were going to do. They talk about it during one of their phone calls. Sort of. May swears on the highest heavens that everything he sends is going to Peter and Peter only, and the last spare dime is going to go right back to him. "I can't believe we were going to let other people take care of him," she says, and Tony sounds like he's eavesdropping even though she's talking to him alone. "Just family friends that he met once or twice, because we were scared. How could we think that?"
Honestly, it's not that Tony doesn't care whether Peter is being fed and cared for or not, because he knew that would never be a problem being with the Parkers. He gobbles up each and every thing he hears about Peter being okay.
He has begun his therapy appointments. SHIELD ended up suggesting her, and Tony only initially hesitated out of fear that Peter was going to have to go down an alley, under a bridge, to an underground bunker just to talk to another Man in Black. Thankfully, Doctor Rittenburg is just a doctor. One who specifically treats patients recommended by the CIA on steroids, but a doctor, who has apparently specialized in each and every form of psychology there is. Peter does not fear going to her office. Under oath she can't report back every tiny thing Peter tells her, but apparently he's being honest, and not holding himself back.
Since he's left, the only threats he's had to deal with have been scraping his knees on the pavement and the occasional cold. Sometimes he has nightmares about Stane and the suit, but they have been fading out as time goes by. Since May hung up fairy lights in his room, he's sleep much more soundly.
Tony, meanwhile, is deteriorating. And he deserves it.
He knew how heartbroken he was going to be when Peter was gone, but he wasn't quite prepared for the emptiness of his house. Even if he has J.A.R.V.I.S. blast music to the point that the AI advises against possible ear damage, it is quiet. He hadn't realized how much space Peter had taken up—without sneakers kicked beneath the sofa, or a Dahl book left dog-eared on the table, the mansion feels sterile and barren.
He won't linger on it too long, because he made this bed. If he hadn't made a mess of things so badly, then he wouldn't have to realize how quiet things were. It's funny in a way that doesn't make him laugh, to think that not many months ago, he was starting to tire of his son's presence.
He keeps Peter's room cleaned, not in case he comes back, but because he'd feel even more like shit if he let everything collect dust. There are things Peter has left behind. Tony finds a copy of Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day near the end of the bed, some Nerf foam bullets fallen behind the nightstand. Little things that he wonders if he should send to Queens, or not for fear of pushing too soon.
The house is quiet because Peter is not there, and if he is not there, then he is safe. So really, nothing deteriorates.
Iron Man improves...
Well.
Everything.
Tony was prepared for some support. He already had a few, some random Malibu citizens who bore witness to his and Stane's battle, the family in the car he had saved.
The vast majority were either holding their breaths, or were vocally unconvinced. The glimpses he caught on TV screens and magazine covers were exactly as he imagined them. IRON MAN—DANGER OR PROTECTOR? they scream. Within the week, every single news channel debate has been about Iron Man, what he is or can be. They cry the same things Tony would be crying, too. "But how can we know? What if he just snaps one day, and he has that on him?"
He almost goes off the map for a while. The entire U.S. postal service seems to be packed with letters to him, begging for interviews, demanding answers. For over a week Tony does not step foot outside the mansion. With his security system, no one can come in within a mile of it, but reporters still prowl undeterred at the perimeter. He avoids looking out the front windows, afraid that just a tiny shadow of him will send them into a frenzy.
Then, at long last—and as he goes to bed that night, Tony actually wonders why it didn't happen sooner—his Gulmira debut makes it out into the world.
Within an hour of uploading, footage of Iron Man laying waste to the Ten Rings becomes the most popular videos on every platform—Facebook, Twitter, YouTube. There only seem to be two variants, and neither are exactly HD. The people recording have shaky hands, and the wind makes the audio snap and crackle. Regardless, the video is clear enough to show him, glinting gold and crimson under the blazing sun, the suit's face as stoic as ever as he sends Ten Rings gunmen flying through the air, crashing into the sides of buildings in sprays of dust. The more popular version shows him being told to stand down, barrels pointing at him in every direction. Iron Man lowers his hands...and with a quick flicker (because the video is just too grainy to really show what happened) all the visible Ten Rings members collapse to the floor, leaving the innocent survivors standing with mouths agape and eyes disbelieving. It ends just two seconds after he takes off in a blaze.
Who took the videos? Who uploaded them? It doesn't matter. What matters is the shockwave that follows.
As soon as J.A.R.V.I.S. informed him of them, Tony thought, Uh-oh, here we go. Because surely this was just going to be fuel to the fire. Former War Monger Tony Stark Lethally Deploys New Death Machine: The Sequel.
No.
Everyone...loves it?
Really, really loves it.
Tony almost feels physical whiplash at how quickly things change. Magazines now call him, The Vigilante We Need(?) Random passerby grabbed for an interview just gush about him. A weathered gentleman says that he's been waiting for someone like Iron Man to take initiative. A little boy chirps and squeals about how cool! Iron Man is, and pew-pews his hands in his dramatic reenactment—Tony would have watched it longer, but the boy bears an unnerving resemblance to Peter, so it turns it off after that. The CNN crew who were once debating if the entire U.S. Army should have him under lockdown, now defend him, praise him.
Thank him.
Tony knows that he should feel nothing but relief flooding through his bones, but he's cautious. He thinks this has to be some kind of dream, because on his list of Things That Are Probably Going to Happen When You Tell People You're Iron Man, glowing praise was not on it. That's why he continues to decline interviews and TV segments even when they're posed in good faith, because there has to be some kind of...catch.
It's not unanimous, though, which proves to him this is a little too good. Some journalists—including an anonymous one who may...or may not... be Christine Everhart, point to the fact that Tony has a personal history with the Ten Rings. This wasn't just a random attack from a "good Samaritan," this was an act of revenge. Those articles, though, were buried under a resounding chorus of Who cares?
Tony hides because he knows that once he comes out, he's going to have to give answers that he does not have. The world wants to know what Iron Man is. A vigilante, inspired by his time in the cave to right the wrongs of the world? An outlet for the bloodlust brewing under his skin? Or nothing more than a past time? Tony Stark's "thing" now that he's no longer producing weapons for the military?
For a time, Tony himself doesn't know. He works on the suit, tweaks it, betters it. But what for?
He gets his answer when he begins to fill a thrum in his bones, like when his body aches to move after being stationary for so long—but it is never satiated. The closer he is to the suit, the more it intensifies. He catches his fingers twitching.
It scares him: that this sudden ache in his joints may be bloodlust. He thought he'd answered the call when he went to Gulmira. For months he dreamed of that same rush when he came out of the cave, the ecstasy that pumped with his blood as he finally struck back not just as the men who took him hostage, but the men who killed Yinsen, Yinsen's family, with his the weapons branded with his name. He recalls the disappointment he'd felt when he'd returned home, the armor chipped with gunfire, and could not remember the details.
He knows it's a slippery slope, but he indulges in the thought, if only to test a hypothesis. It turns a negative. The thought of crushing Ten Rings cronies with his hands, filling them with bullets, watching blood gush from torn flesh. It makes him sick. Unclean. That's not what he wants. When he thought of them just being taken away, erased, unable to hurt anyone again, that set him at ease.
The Ten Rings wasn't just his fight. On top of that, Tony doubted he'd be able to do much of anything to them ever again, not unless he was going to join with the Department of Defense—which he was not going to do. So he had this ache to do something more, and no way to actually follow through with it.
He should have let it go, he knew. Let it rest. Move on with his life—it wasn't as though he didn't have a million other things to fix.
Tony couldn't ignore it, though, anymore than a starving man could ignore his stomach. He could not sit nice and pretty in his lavish mansion and all its toys when there were still people being killed in their homes. Parents never seeing their children again. Boys and girls, forever small.
The Ten Rings were untouchable.
But there were...other targets.
Just—to be clear, Tony didn't have vigilantism in mind. Being some kind of bounty hunter, a neighborhood hero, that just wasn't him. He wasn't about to start prowling the streets for any sign of trouble.
That didn't mean he couldn't...indulge a little, though.
His first indulgence came not a month after Iron Man's debut. Two girls were out and about in Malibu, teenagers, vacationing in California in the middle of winter because of the teenage drive of 'why not?' They'd been waiting for an Uber, standing on the curb, when a car pulled up and claimed to be their ride. Yet the driver would not give his name, would not confirm it on the app, would not answer any questions. By the time the girls realized something was horribly, dreadfully wrong, it was too late. As one of them was leaning towards the open passenger window to squabble with the driver, a man who had been leaning against a wall suddenly sprinted forward and pushed her inside. He wrangled with the other girl, but she went feral, clawing and screaming at him, so the driver took off with the one they had, and his tag-team buddy scurried away.
Instantly everyone was alerted to watch for the car, to call if they saw anything. Tony saw it as he was working on the suit. As he sat there, unmoving but wanting, a child unsure of stepping off the diving board, at last it was announced the car was spotted not far from his very mansion.
So, Tony had responded, and yes, he wants to say that it was because how could he just turn a blind eye to doing something to help the poor girl, when he himself was a parent, one who had had his own child taken in a similar way? But he knows, unspoken forever, that he was almost glad to see it. Glad for the opportunity.
It was easy, and his disappointment, too, went unvoiced. With the radioed updates in his ear, it took no time at all to locate the vehicle, to verify the heat signatures inside, to scan and confirm that the driver had no weapon, just an iron grip on the girl's arm as she batted and screamed at the window. All Tony had to do was wrench open the door and pull her out. The driver spiraled out of control, shocked out of his mind, just the same as the girl: even after Tony had set her back down on her feet and the police cars drifted to them, she'd just stood still, unmoving.
Tony had flown out of there before reporters could swarm the place. He wasn't about to do the kiss and cry. That didn't stop another round of media gushing, though. The dissenting went quieter still. This wasn't personal. This wasn't a story of revenge.
Even after that, even after stopping a gang of thieves from making away with museum pieces, even after flying out to a sinking sailing boat to fly its crew to safety, it all hits Tony like a truck.
Because suddenly, Iron Man is. Everywhere.
Street vendors sell sweatshirts emblazoned with him, red-and-gold baseball caps, keychains, lanyards, mugs. Children walk the streets with miniature masks, tiny gloves with LED lights. The Arc Reactor itself becomes a symbol. T-shirts with nothing more than a bright blue circle on the chest sell for twenty dollars a pop on the boardwalks. In the thickest tourist traps, actors in dedicated plastic recreations of the suit snap photos. Ice cream trucks sell little Iron Man pops with candies for eyes. Toys, plushies and dolls and action figures, line up in children's stores. Iron Man appears in chalk and graffiti. Balloons on corner carts.
There are whole news segments dedicated to him now. International news segments. Hombre de Acero. Jernmand. Uomo di ferro. Tetsujin. Zheleznyy chelovek. Newspapers and magazines dedicate entire spreads to him. Shelves gleam red and gold. Journalists have dedicated their careers to watching him now. The interview requests keep pouring in, but so do others, people begging him to show up not just at birthday parties and banquets and galas, but just in the street, just to do a quick fly over Malibu to satiate the masses. To endorse charities. To help with their essays about him. A school in Pennsylvania has "Dress as Your Hero Day," and miniature Iron Men roam the halls with their little backpacks and lunchboxes. Tourists going through Stark Industries complain when they don't see the suit in action. People scream, people cheer, people cry.
He gets letters from people thanking him for what he does. Giving their condolences for what happened in the cave. And condolences for Stane, lost to a "plane crash," but he burns those. Sending him good wishes. Crayola-drawn invites to children's birthday parties. He gets paintings and drawings of Iron Man to hang on the walls. Just a request for a signature.
Tony is used to applause. He's used to standing under the spotlight and waving to a wild crowd. This is new. This is alien.
Something else fills his bloodstreams. It's bright and electric. Addicting. He gets a hit every time he opens an envelope, or turns on the news, or sees the red and gold in the streets.
He didn't do this for praise. He didn't set out for a comeback story. He just wanted everyone to know that he got better.
They do.
And they love him for it.
Then things deteriorate when the hunger leads to more hunger.
He never had a taste for it before. Oh, he drank it all in. He let the masses drool over him, let them cheer as he walked across a stage—let them titter behind their hands if he so much as walked across their paths.
But there was always a disconnect. He didn't care that the why was because he was the Modern Day Da Vinci. The Prodigal Son. And really, did many of them care, either? How many people would lose their minds over a celebrity, with no care to their work or accomplishments, just that they are famous, and there, standing before them? Making weapons was so easy to Tony, he never gave it a thought. It was like scribbling a paper with Crayola, turning it into his professor, and being praised and acclaimed for such a revolutionary thesis.
All that mattered was that everyone loved him, and not long ago, he'd have said How couldn't they?
This is not the same. He cares about what he's doing and why. It isn't easy.
And people now care about the why's. Once there was Tony Stark, the guy on TV, the guy in the news. Now there is Iron Man, the hero who confronted the Ten Rings, the Samaritan who protects the little people.
So when he opens a letter, or turns on a news, Tony feels like he's taking a drink of tonic. Like whiskey, it warms him from the inside out. Like vodka, it makes everything unwind and come undone.
He's addicted to the stardom. He is high on fame. He'd been so scared of what would happen, and now he is consumed by knowing the world loves, loves, loves him.
Then there are the withdrawals.
Sometimes Tony does not realize how intoxicated he is by the uproar until he's in the quiet solitude of his bedroom, with nothing but his own thoughts. When he's staring up at the dark ceiling, he can no longer procure the images of talkshow hosts raving about him with their guests, little children proclaiming him as their "hero." Tony can only think of the empty bedroom down the hall. He preens when he sees how badly Stane failed to ruin him, but then he thinks about all the time wasted with Obie. He wishes that his mother was here to see him. He realizes that the strangers who wear Arc Reactor T-shirts and red-and-gold lanyards love him more than his father ever did.
Someone had said you don't realize how addicted you are until you're without your poison. He doesn't know who, but they were right. Tony is used to sleepless nights, but he is tired of being tired.
Thus, the bar in the mansion is consistently stocked. He doesn't chug down bottle after bottle—remembering all the times Richard had to come and take care of him when Tony was supposed to be taking care of Peter has forever soured the idea of getting hammered. He just...takes what he needs to make his thoughts go quiet. Sometimes it's just a shot or two. Sometimes it's more.
Sometimes he mixes things together—makes specialty drinks to distract his hands more. One night he makes a rum and coke, takes a drink, and realizes he added too much Coke. He almost laughs.
In the months that follow, Tony gets an improvement he hadn't even realized he needed: a new friend.
He had always like Ben. He was thoroughly convinced the guy had never done a bad thing in his entire life, and for added measure he loved Peter and Peter loved him. Tony appreciated his role as peacekeeper—back when they were talking arguing about Peter coming with him, Ben had not raged NO at him, but neither had he blindly taken Tony's side. He also had a sort of quiet strength to him. He did everything he did even with his job, a child, and the loss of a dear friend.
They do not see each other very often at all now, living on opposite sides of the country. At first their talks were always about Peter, or maybe they started about Peter and then evolved from there. Then, eventually, they talk just to talk.
Tony hadn't even realized how much he needed someone to talk to about absolutely nothing. Sports teams. Car problems. Which restaurant chain had the best burger.
("Five Guys," Ben insists.
"Burger King."
"Five Guys."
"He's the King of burgers, Benjamin. I don't need to go anywhere else."
"When's the last time you went to Five Guys?"
"Never. That's my point."
Ben doesn't answer his calls for three days after.)
Workout routines. The absolutely insane people of New York. Cooking. Books. Saturday Night Live. Tarantino movies. The Olympics.
He knows that this is strange, at least a bit. If Tony had never met Mary, it's unlikely he would have ever met Ben Parker in the first place. Now they are two guys who live on opposite sides of the country who kinda-sorta have the same kid.
He's no replacement for Peter, but Ben helps things get a little louder. Sometimes a phone call with him cuts the silent midnight hours in half—helps tune out the sound of his own blood rushing in his ears.
As an added bonus, they never talk about anything deeper than Peter's wellbeing. They don't talk about Stane, Mary, SHIELD, the cave, the Ten Rings, nothing. It might be pathetic, but in these phone calls Tony can just pretend for a second that he is just a guy living the same ordinary life that Ben does.
Well. It might not be accurate to say that they never, ever talk about serious things.
Case en point, January, two weeks after the new year.
"Ben, no."
"Hey, hey, no. It's not like we're going to go to opposite sides of the globe to get away from each other." Despite his attempt to keep his voice light, the heaviness drips through. Tony doesn't wax poetry, but he thinks it's the voice of a breaking heart. "This isn't even final, for now. It's just…a break."
Sitting in the fluorescent light of the lab, Tony leans back in his chair and presses his palms into his eyes. He hadn't realized until now how much he'd made Ben and May into a package deal, that one was a given for the other. Even when they fought, they seemed unbreakable.
Turns out they are. It isn't even happening to him, but Tony can't help but feel gutted. Because he can't help but have the thought: Did I do this?
"What…" Tony knows the answer, but he has to hear Ben say it. He thinks back to them at the hospital, standing outside Peter's room, standing side-by-side and sticking together but…weary. "Can I ask what happened, or am I just pouring lemon juice in the wound?"
"Before you get it into your head, it's not all of…this." Tony is almost reeling by how quickly Ben saw right through him. Even across the country. "Even a long, long time ago, we were having some problems. Even before Mary…Anyway. Our jobs, and money, and decisions we were trying to figure out. May was thinking about going back to school, but it was right after I started at the academy. And neither of us were helping by just being us."
"Being 'us'? What do you mean?"
"Well, May doesn't censor herself, you know. If she wants to say something, she does. But sometimes, when she's really stressed, she says stuff she doesn't want to say. She says that it's like she just keeps finding things to be angry about. And I'm not always great at talking, because I don't like to fight or anything, so I can bottle stuff up and let it go sour, and…Well, we've been making strides. Making things better. But it just…wasn't enough, I guess."
Tony rubs at the back of his neck, sticky with sweat from a night of hard work. "And…Pete? Are you guys still going to be okay with him around?"
"Oh, yeah, absolutely. We're not going to take a break from him."
"Right, but if you two are separating, how…?"
"We actually got it pretty good. I'm going to move into an apartment in the same building. Owner's a longtime friend, giving me a bit of a discount on rent. So Peter doesn't have to worry about bouncing all over Queens just to see us; all he has to do is walk down the stairs."
For a long minute, Tony doesn't say anything, which in and of itself is saying something. He's not sure what to tell Ben. He doesn't think he wants to hear him chipperly assure him that it's going to be just fine, man, you two will get back together in no time! But neither does he want to just moan and groan about how bad he has it right now—that would just be rubbing it in, wouldn't it?
Maybe a good, old-fashioned 'you can talk to me' will do, Tony thinks. That seems a good an idea as any—
"So! We're just going to take it day-by-day and see where it goes. Anyway…You see that, uh…That thing Apple's going to start making? The iPad?"
Tony's mouth snaps shut even though he hadn't spoken a syllable. It could not have been more blatant how Ben had swerved into a new topic like a driver avoiding a deer. But what is he supposed to do, call him out on it? Insist that they keep talking about this?
Of course he doesn't want to talk about it. Just humor the poor guy.
"Yeah, it's hit my radar. What about it?"
"Is it actually impressive? Because I thought the 3G was impressive until you said kindergarten macaroni necklaces were built better."
So the rest of the conversation is spent talking about Apple products and the upcoming iPad—Tony trying to be at least a little forgiving, because he's aware that any technology he doesn't make himself looks as advanced as an Atari to him. Ben doesn't bring up May again, and neither does Tony. He's not upset, because it would make no sense to be—he just hopes that Ben is getting to talk about this to someone.
With that thought, Tony wonders if Ben wanted to talk about it at all. Whenever they talk, they always ignore the elephants in the room. So why would do differently now?
Everything with Rhodey deteriorates.
Almost instantly.
What multiplies the force of its hit is that Tony had never even thought about it happening. And he feels like an idiot for it.
No, scratch that, he feels like an idiot for thinking things had ever improved between them. For so long he'd made Rhodey out to be this uncaring bastard who couldn't give less of a shit what Tony wanted so long as he kept making pretty little weapons for him. So many people had turned against him when he came back, and Rhodey had just disappeared into the crowd.
It took forever and a half for Tony to come around and realize it wasn't just about winning for Rhodey—the man didn't look at war like it was just a game of Risk. What Tony went through in the cave was probably just a little snippet of things Rhodey had seen time and time again. He flew out to Gulmira fueled by a white-hot rage that Rhodey knew like an old friend. Then Tony took away Rhodey's greatest chance of enacting that rage. He could not believe he'd never realized before just how much Rhodey depended on him to make things easier for him.
He'd felt like shit for turning Rhodey into a shadow. Swatting him away like an annoying bug. So when they had their talk in the beige hospital, he thought he'd put broken pieces back together. Tony apologized for not giving him a heads-up. Rhodey apologized for acting like Tony broke a promise to him.
He had said: "If you don't want anything to do with all of this anymore, I'm not going to judge. I just ask you to do the same thing, because I'm staying."
Which Tony had thought was the best possible way for it all to end. He'd made up his mind to make things right with Rhodey, but that didn't mean going right back to producing bullets for him. They had agreed to disagree. They both saw the world was in need of saving, but had different ideas of how to do so. And that was that.
Or so Tony thought.
"This is the most extreme case of déjà vu I have ever felt in my life. I swear to you, we have had this exact conversation before."
Rhodey's lips purse into a thin, hard line, but Tony can't feel bothered by it. He can't feel anything but calm, because otherwise he's going to unleash the torrent of outrage that's bubbling under his skin. He had an inkling that they were going to discuss something about Iron Man when they came for dinner tonight. He didn't think it was going to be this.
"Things have changed, Tones. This isn't the 'exact same conversation.'"
"No, no, it really is." Tony looks down at his plate, pokes at the leftover bits of sushi rice with his chopsticks. Not ten minutes ago he was mocking Rhodey for still not being able to use a pair. "I said I wasn't making weapons anymore, you said 'no, you have to,' I said 'no' again, you said 'fine,' and that was that."
"Well, I guess I got naïve." Rhodey takes his napkin and wipes down the sides of his mouth, looking away from Tony. The new-age Japanese restaurant looks ridiculous because of this conversation now. With the neon cherry blossom trees and the little rivers that run between the tables, they might as well be having this talk at a Chuck E. Cheese. "I thought all we'd have to do is let you keep the Iron Man suit and just keep an eye on you and that would be that."
One of Tony's incisors cuts into his lip. He takes a sip of sake. "Despite what you hear on the Today Show, I'm not crazy."
"I don't think you are, but we at least have to keep up appearances. We have to at least let people know we haven't slapped you on the back and told you to go nuts."
That had been their compromise thus far. The settlement was that the Iron Man was good…for now. They would let him keep saving the world…for now. There were always some that awaited with bated breath for him to lose it. One day he was foiling robbers' escape plans, and the next, he was decimating a guy who bumped into him on the were building, like water boiling closer to the edge of a pot. Tony knew that many, most of all Senator Stern, were just dying for the evidence and the chance to prove that Tony was insane, just like Stane wanted them to believe.
Hm. Stane and Stern. They even sounded similar.
Rhodey continues, "For years and years now, people have tried to recreate your stuff. No matter what your intentions, you gave them ideas."
"And they're just so spectacular at copycatting, aren't they? Remember when that town got hit with three missiles, but they were Stark Industries Lite, and it took three days just to find out where they landed because they didn't so much as peep? I remember that. Had a lot of laughs."
"This isn't the same. That suit is the best thing you've ever made, Tones, and they know that. So they're going to work a million times harder to recreate it." Rhodey lowers his voice, casts a dark look around the neon restaurant. Only a single waitress walks by, her heels clacking on the tile floors. "We're already getting reports, Tony. People walking around in recreations like kids in Halloween costumes."
"Aw."
"Yeah, it's cute when it's pathetic, isn't it?" Rhodey isn't smiling. Far from it. Tony knows that he's pushing him closer and closer to losing his composure, sitting here completely nonplussed and unmoved. "Then one of those Halloween costumes destroys an entire neighborhood. Is that going to be cute?"
"No, because that's not going to happen. You want to know how I got the upper hand on Stane?" Tony tapped a finger against his temple. "Originality. Stane couldn't get creative for the life of him. They all think the same. Give 'em some crayons and they think they can copy the Mona Lisa. Show them a tank, they'll recreate it with Legos. They only know the outs, not the ins."
"They don't need to get the fine details right, it just has to be enough. They may not have the firepower, but they may be durable enough that they can't get taken down. Or maybe they have no durability at all, but we only find out when one malfunctions and blows the entire city off the map."
"Here's where I'm confused, James. The words you're saying imply that you want me to just go cold turkey on the Iron Man, but that's not what you want. You want me to give you more. And how does that solve any of the problems you just listed?"
"Give us an upper hand. Give us something to knock 'em out cold before they can start on their rough drafts."
"Let me posit a hypothetical." Rhodey looks off to nothing in particular, thrumming with annoyance, but hell, so is Tony. "One of your tin soldiers gets taken down in enemy territory. They get a nice Christmas present right on their doorstep. Then what?"
"Yeah. Then what? It's not like they're going to know how to pilot it."
"Oh, they will dedicate time to finding it out."
"So they do. We'll still have an army against their one." Rhodey holds out a hand towards him and curls in his fingers, like he almost wants to grab Tony to shake him. "You said it yourself, Tony, they'll never know how to actually get it to work, make their own copies, not without you."
"That is true. But as a counterpoint, let's take a trip back on memory lane." Tony tosses back the rest of his sake—how much did he drink?—and levels Rhodey with an unblinking gaze. "I said I was done."
"And I said I wasn't." Rhodey's eyes are just as icy, just as unbreaking. The look of disdain is not one Tony likes to see on his best friend's face. Yet he's seeing it quite often as of late. "The Iron Man is going to cause problems, Tony. The least you could do is help us with them."
"Yeah, see, right there is another point. Us. Who is 'us'? All your Air Force friends, or the entire Armed Forces? Or do you mean 'us' as in 'U.S.'?" Tony's voice only gets harder as Rhodey starts to imperceptibly shake his head, the exact same way he did when he visited him at the base. He's in disbelief at Tony's ineptitude, his insanity. "You think that every soldier should have a suit just because they're a soldier? Not every one of our star-spangled troops is a good person. You always tell me about the freaks who got it into their heads that every non-American creature is a devil. Imagine what happens when he decides to go vigilante on a village."
Even from across the table, Tony can see how Rhodey is biting into his cheek. "Vigilante. You say that like it's not exactly what you're doing."
"Goddamn. I'm convinced. You got me there, Colonel, I'll have a whole box of Iron Men shipped to you by morning." Tony slaps down on the cherrywood table. The waitress across the way startles, but he can't think to feel guilty. "Okanjou wo onegai shimasu."
"I have been doing nothing but cover your ass ever since this all started. The only way people like Stern are going to get off your case is if you make Iron Men suits for the military."
"Tell me something I don't know."
The check is slipped over to him. Rhodey moves to take it. Tony is quicker.
"Look, I told you, I got why you didn't want to make any more weapons for us. Even when I thought, wow, that would really be something for us to have, I let it go. I knew you were done and I wasn't going to drag you back in. Things. Are. Different." Once his card is returned, Tony stands to his feet, and Rhodey follows suit. He moves like he's boxing Tony in, but Tony isn't even looking at him anymore. "There's a lot of trouble headed our way and you've got to help."
"All my points still stand. The answer is no."
He can feel Rhodey's glare stabbing into his back like blades as he turns away. Rhodey calls out to him still, his voice sounding whiplike in the silence. "So that's it? You're just going to turn your back on us when we need you?"
"No, that's just what you've decided I'm doing. You can keep going. Don't attach my name to it."
"It already is."
No, not yet. For now, Iron Man is me, and I am him. Once 'Iron Man' become synonymous with 'war,' then it's all over for me.
I'm not going back.
Tony doesn't say this to Rhodey. He keeps walking, past the neon pink cherry blossoms and over the little rivers. Rhodey is calling out to him. He's furious. And scared. But Tony can't be bothered to listen to his words, and just keeps walking, first out into the night and into the silence of his home.
Rhodey's gone now. He only wishes he hadn't gotten it into his head that he was ever going to stay.
The future of Stark Industries improves—though anything would have been a relief, considering how certain its demise seemed to be.
For one thing, stock skyrockets up through the ceiling, but that is more forboding than it is exciting. Clearly people think that the Iron Man is just the first taste of what's to come, no matter how much Tony insists that it is not. Even the board—which is a bit smaller now that Stane's "loyalists" have been culled—hints and pushes for it. They just want him to "consider" it. Tony does not.
With weapons now forever on the shelf, attention is shifted to other Stark Industries creations, everything from wristwatches to toasters to security systems to fire alarms to pacemakers. Most importantly, research on the Arc Reactor finally comes to the forefront, which Tony hopes makes Stane roll in his grave. There is much work to do, but already there is extreme interest in it. If household wares aren't going to cover the loss of weapons, then this sure will.
However, Stark Industries has become another thing that has just fundamentally changed ever since Iron Man emerged. It's not as though Tony can just drop everything like it's all just been a hobby that he's finally tired of.
He'd been more than used to the mundane torture of being a CEO. Long business meetings. Signing papers until his wrist was sore. Just like the fanfare, Tony just took it without caring, because he was good at it and people liked it and that was that.
Now, it's just...excruciating. Time after time Tony sits at the head of the conference table, listening to someone or another talk about projections and invoices and estimations, and he wants to just...rip his skin off. Just walking into and out of work, his fingers twitch and his limbs spasm. Any second away from the lab, away from Iron Man, is pure torture.
And again, Tony knows he should suck it up, because he is Stark Industries. Yet he knows that if this keeps going, he's going to screw something up. If he can't force himself to care, or even just pay attention, then there will be consequences. Like when he singes his fingertips in the lab when he spaces out.
The most logical solution would be for someone else to take up the mantle of CEO. Someone who was trustworthy, knew what they were doing, and—unlike Stane—was real.
And how perfect, that he already has just the person in mind?
Tony deliberates for a while. He thinks of it especially as Pepper gives him his agenda for the day, or even just as she does something as mundane as deliver him a cup of espresso espresso espresso—even at the cost of her scolding him for not paying attention.
Would she appreciate it, or would she be offended?
On the one hand, Pepper has more than earned herself a paid permanent vacation. Good god, she comforted his crying son in the middle of the night because he had no idea how to. She almost lost her life saving him from Stane's machinations. Even after that, after all of that, now she has to clean up his messes.
She has to shoo away the journalists who won't take no for an answer. She has to sift through his mail to find the fan letters and the requests and the children's pictures. It's all bled over into her daily life, too—no everyday person will point at her across the way, crying, "Look! It's Iron Man's secretary!" But the people who really, really want answers and inside secrets flag her down in cafes, grind her schedule to a halt when they come to SI not because they want to speak to Tony Stark, ma'am, no, I would like to talk to you. Once someone shows up on her doorstep for an impromptu interview. Thankfully it was just a twenty-something journalist major too blinded by the stars in her eyes to realize she'd crossed a line. Even so, Tony insists that Happy take her to and from work every day, and Pepper insists that if he keeps insisting that she's going to pour salt, not sugar, into his coffee.
On the other hand, if it weren't for the big, glaring issue of Tony, then probably she'd have smooth sailing. If he stepped away from Stark Industries, then they'd no longer have that connection, and not only would people stop seeking her out in his name, she wouldn't have to beat off his pursuers anymore. There would probably be some outcry, because what is Stark Industries without the Stark, but she could teach a class in How to Calm People Down 101. Besides, Tony would be absolutely willing to help her with whatever she needed, whenever she needed it. Pepper glows with the pride of what she does.
He remembers, once, when he was sitting down for a meeting, and Pepper lingered to inform him of a change in their schedule. Someone on the board—was it Jameson? Tony can't recall. He turned out to be a follower of Stane, so he doesn't think of him much—flicked a hand at her, said, "Why don't you ask your secretary to bring us another round of coffee, huh?" Someone else—not a Stane follower, but that's not why Tony feels guilty for not remembering who it was—quickly scolded him: "Watch your tone. Miss Potts doesn't just bring coffee and answer phone calls. She probably does more work here than you ever have." Pepper had been professional, of course, accepting the grumbled apology, but she was shining as she left.
She'd be more than deserving of it. And probably better than he ever was.
Not to mention, she'd be able to worry about him a little less.
She assures him that she doesn't. That she's asking if he wants something to eat just because she's on her way to lunch anyway, not because she's wary of him skipping a meal. That when the day is so packed that they must begin to snip, she always offers the earliest events, for varying reasons that are never because she's worried that he's not getting enough sleep. Tony shows her some mercy by not saying anything when he catches her staring at him from the side of her eye. Especially when he fumbles a pen in his grip, or runs a hand down his face.
It makes him happy. Actually, more than that, it's a balm to a scorch Stane had left. Pepper is real. Pepper doesn't pretend to care, she just does. At the same time, it's just not fair to her. Hardly anything she does for his sake is, but when she's juggling the day's plans, she shouldn't have to account for if her boss is going to finally collapse.
Also...For just a minute—just a minute!—Tony entertains the intrusive idea that maybe this would finally let them be whatever it was they kinda-maybe-sorta wanted to be.
Then he stuffs the thought away just as fast. Pepper becoming CEO won't just put a nice little Hello Kitty Band-Aid on the issue. People are still going to whisper and throw all her years of hard work down the drain. Of course Tony Stark made her CEO.
He also knows that—even if he can't look at her for too long lest he go blind, even if the sound of her laughter hits him like a comet, even if he sometimes hovers over her number in the dead of night just because he wants to hear a human voice—Pepper deserves better than him. As if she didn't feel an unfair responsibility for him before...
Anyway, it's just a thought. And Tony is a grown man, not a tween with their first puppy love. It probably won't be soon, what with the everything going on, but he imagines that he can find someone to settle down with. That time will come. After he stops seeing Pepper's face every time he so much as glances at another woman.
Stark Industries is going to go into good hands. Its future will be brighter than the Arc Reactor.
He just isn't going to be able to see it.
Not thirty seconds after he realizes this, the monitor above his workbench lets out a ring. Peter is calling. Peter wants to see him.
Tony throws his shirt back down in a hurry, shuts down all the screens with the results and the scans and whatever else. He knows Peter won't be able to see it, but he wipes the pearling blood off his fingertip anyway.
"Send him through," Tony tells J.A.R.V.I.S. He hopes his voice doesn't sound as unsteady as it feels.
Peter's face appears instantly, jolting and jumping around as he fumbles to steady his camera on his desk. He is getting taller, very slowly. Tony doesn't think he's going to be able to carry him around for much longer. His limbs are stretching out and he's starting to put on some of those youngling muscles from running around at recess. If Tony didn't know any better, he'd say that Peter's eyes are picking up just the tiniest bit of his mother's green.
Beyond Peter's face is his Queens bedroom, and Tony's fingers curl on his lap. He remembers when the bedroom down the hall had its walls covered in robots and rocket ships, monsters and animals. Now it's almost solely Iron Man. Each one is just a little different, obvious signs of an artist perfecting his craft. Iron Man flying. Iron Man punching a bad guy. Iron Man surrounded by stars and fireworks. The only paper not covered in Crayola is the front cover of the TIME magazine naming Iron Man Person of the Year. Among Peter's star-studded bedspread, a pillow shaped like the helmet lies front and center. A bust balloon is tapered to one of his bedposts-not quite new, the string loose, swaying and bobbing about. On his nightstand is the cast that's finally been sawed away—tilted just so Tony can see the 'T'.
Everyone loves Iron Man. But Peter loves him the most.
The first time Peter had presented a picture, Tony had been shocked. He praised it, declared it better than Leonardo, but he was still shocked. He was certain that Peter could only be...okay with Iron Man. Because really, isn't he just a walking, talking reminder of what happened? Can Peter really look at it and not see the icy glow of Stane's eyes, staring down at him, I found you.
The answer is a resounding YES, apparently.
"I don't know how much longer this secret is going to be a secret," Ben tells him during one of their face-to-face calls, after Peter has zipped out of sight to grab another piece from his portfolio. "Any time someone mentions Iron Man, he's two seconds away from screaming, 'THAT'S MY DAD!'"
It's impossible to have a talk without him now. Tony has had to tell him to slow down, tell him about his day, don't rush through just so he can answer more of Peter's questions. Peter does not run out of questions. How fast can he fly? How do his blasters work? What does the inside look like? Is it comfortable? Is it heavy? How high can he go? How many pounds can he lift? It's all top-secret, but despite Ben's warnings, he thinks Peter likes it like that. He's like a spy. Knowing things that no one else can know.
He asks Dr. Rittenburg about it, if only because it's too good to be true. She tells him it's fine—laughing, because Peter rambles to her just as much as he does to his father. After all, wouldn't Tony be bouncing off the walls if he was related to one of the most famous people on the planet? Moreso than that, though, she tells him this is a good thing. Not only does Peter talk less and less of Stane, but remembering what happened may be easier for him now. He may be looking back on the terror and "realizing" that he was never in trouble in the first place, because Iron Man was around. He would have never let Peter die.
It's almost too much for Tony to take. He doesn't deserve this. He's supposed to be trying to mend things over time, keeping his distance so that Peter can heal properly. Peter isn't supposed to be starry-eyed for him. Peter isn't supposed to be asking when he can come stay with him again.
Tony needs more time. He needs to wait and see if this is going to fade. Surely one day Peter will "snap out of it," right? Remember that he just forgot about everything Tony did because oooh, look, Iron Man!
Still, as he keeps his distance, Tony allows himself to indulge a little. If only in the moment, he pretends that this is normal and okay. Just a son excited over what his father does.
"Hi, Dad!" Peter exclaims as soon as the camera steadies. Leaning back in his seat, he almost knocks over a cup of pencils.
"Pete," Tony exclaims back. He presses his thumb to his forefinger to stop any more blood from oozing. "How was—How was school today?"
"It's Saturday."
"Trick question. I almost had you." Tony narrows his eyes and points a finger at him, and Peter laughs. It's gotten a bit deeper—boyish. "Really, though, what's happening? How did that science project turn out?"
Peter disappears for a moment, and returns with a yellow orb in his hands. It had taken him a fine time to not just form the papier-mâché sphere, but then paint it, and plaster tiny ruffles of yellow, orange, and red tissue paper to its outside until it looked to be engulfed in flames. Peter flicks a switch on its base, and it glows from within.
"Look at that, look at that," Tony crows. "What did that get?"
"An A-plus," Peter affirms, but then adds, "Luke's got an A-plus-plus."
"What, did he actually light his on fire?"
"He did the Earth. It was..." Peter's hands move about in front of him, struggling. "It was a plastic bowl with the—land painted on it, and he filled it with blue water. Like, water dyed blue."
"Hm. I still say that's too safe."
"Maybe I can light mine on fire next time."
"See?" Tony taps a finger on his temple. "Great minds think alike."
Peter giggles, and sets his sun aside, flicking off the light again. "We have another project to do in History. Can you help me with it?"
"I sure can, but Pete, it's Saturday. Don't you want to forget about school? Go outside and smell the daisies?"
"I'm excited about this one," Peter protests. "I want to do mine on Iron Man."
Something keeps Tony from answering at once, although he smiles. His heart swells. His heart constricts. "Yeah?"
"Yeah. We have to do a poster about someone really important—a hero." Peter reaches under the desk and pulls out a blank white canvas that fwubba-wubbs as he shakes it. "And if I did mine on Iron Man, it would be the best one, because you can tell me anything about Iron Man." His voice suddenly bitters. "Sidney keeps asking why you don't rust if you're made of iron, and I keep trying to tell him that the suit's made outta titanium alloy, but he won't listen to me."
Tony lets the vision appear in front of his eyes. Peter, standing in front of his class, bouncing animatedly around as he presents his poster, spitting out facts about Iron Man at a mile a minute. Tony imagines that, like all his crafts, Peter will go above and beyond in his design. Maybe he'll draw all the pictures himself, or cover the poster in red and gold foil to look like the armor. Or attach a blue LED Arc Reactor to it.
"Can we?" Peter bounces in his seat. "I have to tell Mrs. Matilda who I'm going to do mine on this Monday. Can we?"
The image dissipates. Before it does, Tony sees Peter say something just a little too specific, and an unseen child call out, 'How do you know that?' After that, best case scenario is Peter is penalized for "lying." Worst case, the secret is out.
"Listen, Pete." Tony leans back in his seat. He folds his arms, wary of his still-throbbing fingertip. Wary of what the screens behind him would show if they were on, and wary of what he's just learned throbbing in the back of his head like a tumor. "Hand to God, I want to. And we both know that it would be the best one. But, I can't tell you anything secret. If you say something only Iron Man knows, then people will know that you know Iron Man, and then you're going to have to start lying."
Peter's face has been falling all the time he's spoken, but now it scrunches together. "Haven't I been lying this whole time?"
"...Okay, touché. Still." Peter sighs, sets the poster down. "We can still do it if you want, I just can't tell any secrets. Do you still want to?"
"No, it's okay." Peter switches the button and makes his sun die and live again, over and over. "Everyone's probably going to do Iron Man, anyway. I just thought maybe mine would be the best, just because."
"Well, I will still be more than happy to help. I'm sure there are a ton of 'heroes' you could do. Now, granted, none of them will be as great as me—" Tony preens and presses his hands to his chest, which succeeds in a chuckle from Peter. "—but you can try to come close, right?"
Peter presses his hands to his desk and leans forward. "Oh! What about Captain America? We watched a video about him last month. He's just like Iron Man! He was super strong and was always helping people, and he wore a really cool costume—his wasn't like yours, it wasn't just a-a suit made from clothes, not titanium, but it still looked really cool, and he had his shield. I could make a shield if I did him! It would be really easy."
As sourness floods Tony's mouth as though he'd just bitten into an overripe lemon, he wonders if he should backtrack. Go for possibly spilling his secrets again.
Tony can't believe it had never occurred to him that Peter would find out about Captain America. Of course he would. He's one of the most in-your-face symbols of American patriotism, it's like if he expected Peter to never find out who George Washington was. Children, especially at Peter's age, still eat him up. Every historical museum in the States still sells star-branded backpacks and plastic shields and bicycle helmets with those little stupid wings on the sides. Now Tony gets another vision, Peter's gaping face in a dark classroom, illuminated only by the glow of a projector, playing grainy black-and-white footage of the Star-Spangled Man with a Plan slumming it in Nazi territory.
What kid at that age wouldn't love Captain America?
Answer: Tony. Tony at that age hated Captain America.
Hated that all the Stark family photos were grim and unsmiling, like morose Victorian portraits, but Howard beamed on a stage with Cap and his backup dancers. Hated how every history book just had to have a section dedicated to him, and hated how he had to carefully wade through the paragraphs until he finally got away from him, like a car coming out of fog. Hated how Howard never had a good word to say about him but wouldn't shut the hell up about the guy prancing around in felt stripes.
'Course, Peter doesn't know that, and Tony isn't going to tell him that.
He is going to be a little...selfish, though.
"Yeah, yeah, that would be a good one. Just, uh...Why don't you ask Mrs. Matilda what everyone else is doing? Who knows, everyone might do Captain America, too."
Peter nods, but looks crestfallen again. It's the face of a kid who just saw the newest, coolest toys on sale, but was then told that they could only pick out a tiny little thing from the checkout line. Who else is going to be just as cool as Captain America or Iron Man?
Tony opens his mouth again, unsure if he's going go tell him to do Iron Man, or spit out some lackluster suggestion—kids still think Neil Armstrong is cool, right?—but Peter beats him to the chase, suddenly perking up. "Can I show you something?"
Tony's teeth click as he stops himself. "Yeah, yeah. Lay it on me."
Peter pulls his desk drawer out with such force that the pens and paper in the cup rattle. He pulls out a handful of papers haphazardly stocked together, and rifles through them one-by-one, as expertly as an archivist. Finally he flourishes to Tony one of his latest masterpieces, so close that Tony has to tell him to back it up. It's a side-view of Iron Man (a pretty decent side-view, for just a child, though Peter did just about everything well for "just a child") with a chunky, geometric backpack. Or rather, because it has no straps, a kind of turtle shell. There are many notes and sidebars to it, but all in such hurried chicken scratch that Tony can't even begin to decipher it.
"What if," Peter says, "You had a backpack so you could carry stuff around? Like when you stop a bunch of bad guys from stealing and you take back what they stole but you still have to use your hands to fly?"
Tony pinches his chin in his fingers, humming contemplatively. It was one in a long series of Peter's suggestions, including but not limited to: a sword (in case he runs out of the...pew pew stuff), a water fountain (in case he gets thirsty in the middle of flying but can't take his helmet off) and a mechanism to instantly change the color of the suit (in case he ever, you know, gets tired of being red or if he needs to camouflage and he's too bright or something like that you know?)
"I will contemplate over this," he tells Peter, as he always does. "I need to run it by I first, I'm going to need myself to sign off on the paperwork, so you should be hearing back from Tony in about...four to five business days."
Peter rolls his eyes at him, but does not protest. Tony likes to joke that he and Iron Man are two different people. He realizes that this is very much a "dad joke."
"Do you think..." Peter flicks the sun's light on and off again. "Do you think maybe you could take me flying one day?"
Tony thinks about it. More specifically, about dropping his son mid-flight and having to find the splat that used to be him.
"If I recall correctly, you have quite a fear of heights."
Peter shrugs, embarrassed, and Tony feels a touch guilty. Peter and Ben had not too long ago ventured out to an amusement park for a nephew-honorary-uncle day. They had waited in line for the spinning swings for upwards of a half-hour, but when he was finally about to be strapped into his chair, Peter lost it and refused to go. Ben had assured him a hundred times over that he hadn't "ruined the trip," but Peter was unconvinced.
"It'll be different," his son protests. "You won't drop me. I know you won't. Please?"
Tony doesn't even pretend to think it over this time. "Sorry, sport. Maybe when you're just a little older, okay?"
Peter deflates like a balloon. He's hearing it more and more, and Tony remembers how frustrating it is, but sometimes he has to be the "bad guy." He isn't going to risk Peter turning into a smear on the Earth just to keep from hurting his feelings.
"What if I got my own suit?" This time Peter's hands drift toward the pull-out shelf under his desk, but stops. There's nothing down there Tony hasn't seen before. Peter is dead-set on the idea of being Iron Man's "sidekick." Maybe he'd be called "Iron Kid," he would say, and then he'd show Tony his ideas for his suit, still gold and red but just a touch different, to make it his. "Then we could fly together."
Tony's lips purse again, and Peter already deflates a little more. "When you're much older. Being in the suit isn't like the kiddie Ferris wheel at the park, okay? It's dangerous. I got banged up pretty bad my first few times with it." Peter doesn't say anything. "Hey, Pete, come on. I know Iron Man is cool. And very handsome. But you're just—" Tony pinches his forefinger and thumb together. "—too little. And I'm not doing this to mean 'too much,' I mean you're actually this small. You're tiny."
His jokes only get him a little, obligatory pull in the corner of Peter's mouth. "I..."
Tony taps his fingertips on his knee, waiting patiently. "You..."
"I miss hanging out in the lab," mumbles Peter. He looks down at his backpack blueprints again, and numbly stuffs them away, down into the rolling drawer. "I miss being at the mansion and building it together. Now we just..." Peter shrugs. "We just talk about it."
It takes a lot of effort to practice his self-control. It would bring such a smile to both of their faces if Tony just said, 'Alrighty then, you can come back home first thing in the morning! We'll get you settled and eat pizza and have a party, won't that be fun?'
He can't. At least not until he's absolutely certain Peter isn't being blinded by stardom, and even then, not until he's certain that the mansion is 100%, faultlessly safe for Peter, and he doesn't think that's ever going to happen.
"You said I could come back when I wanted to," says Peter. "But every time I do, you say 'no.'"
"That's not really what I said, Pete. I know you want to come back, but we still don't know if it's safe yet. I can't let you come back if I know you could get hurt."
Peter again says nothing, and it makes Tony wonder if he's shouting hypocrisy.
"Look, I'll broker with you here. We'll wait until the summer to talk about it." The light that sparks in Peter's eyes has Tony sticking up a finger. "Talk about it. No promises. And until then, maybe you can come for a visit. That's two maybe's, alright?"
Peter nods. Tony could almost laugh at how obviously he's reining in his excitement. He's trying to be more mature, Tony knows. He's trying to break out of the mold as the precious baby Peter that everyone takes care of. And adults don't say "yay!"
"Until then, we can try to set something up." Tony claps his hands together. "You know what? We've done a million and one things in Malibu; it's high time I come over there and see what's so great about Queens."
Peter holds up his chin. "I'm what's so great about Queens."
"Whoa, whoa!" Tony pretends to fall back in his chair, inching away from the monitor as he tries to push back against an unseen force. "Your ego! It's so big it's pushing through the screen! Someone help!"
Peter laughs again. It's so nice to hear him laugh, to think back on how quiet and small he was in his hospital bed. Peter is bright, and colorful, and right now he's just a fraction of everything to come. He's gonna lead the world one day.
Watching him, Tony tries to imagine him older. Taller. Eyes not so big and round, hands not so small. Tony wonders if he'll start taking on traits of him, or if he will continue in his mother's image. He hopes it's the latter.
"Dad?"
Tony blinks. "Son?"
"I said Aunt May's calling me. Can we talk later?"
"We sure can. It's going to be hard to fit it in my schedule, though. I mean, me and the President are having lunch at five, the Rock and I are going bowling, I just can't cancel on ACDC again…"
Peter hops off his chair with sass. "Well, I'm about to go hang out with the Power Rangers. So."
"Wh—Hey. That's not fair."
Peter smiles one last time, and his hands reaches out to Tony. "Bye, Dad."
"See you, kid."
Then Peter goes dark, and Tony is alone again, sitting among wires and steel. He looks at the blood smeared dry across his fingertip. He wonders if there truly is a hint of toxic purple in it, or if he's just seeing things.
Things are improving. Stark Industries is looking towards a golden age. The Iron Man has created a shockwave of hope. Peter will grow into something amazing.
He's going to miss it.