"Oh, hey guys," Tony greeted casually, propping his head up on his hand. "How's it going?"

"Better now, after having seen this," Clint grinned, tipping his head to the side. "Cap, I love your outfit."

"I knew you were lying about this thing!" Steve hissed, pulling the fabric away from his neck. "I'm going to change." Steve got up and stomped away toward his bedroom.

"Way to ruin the mood," Tony scoffed, rolling to his feet and dusting off his pants.

"You called us here, remember? Something about having to save our captain from himself?"

"Yeah, and the first part of that is making Steve happy and keeping him that way. So don't mess it up."

"And the onesie was a part of making him happy?" Bruce challenged, raising an eyebrow in disbelief.

"Okay, that was for me. But come on, you saw how adorable he looked!" Tony said defensively. If he was in a good mood, it would be easier to keep Steve in a good mood, right?

"What's this all about anyway? You were very vague in your explanation."

"It's a long story which I will explain later, with the aid of a lot of alcohol," Tony replied. He couldn't go through everything now, then act normally in front of Steve. Not when the thought of all of his injuries still made him want to throw up. "For now, we're just hanging out."

"You called us in from Shield missions to hang out?" Natasha asked, raising an eyebrow. Tony couldn't stop his expression from darkening at the mention of Shield. They were the cause of all of this mess.

"What's that face mean?" Clint wondered.

"Shield and I aren't on the best terms at the moment," Tony muttered.

"On a scale from harassing you to fill out paperwork to you having to fly their nuke into space, where are you right now?"

"The nuke would be a breath of fresh air," Tony growled.

"Yikes. Okay," Clint mumbled, glancing over at Natasha. "You hear anything and not tell me?"

"All the time."

"Wow."

"But not about whatever is going on with these two."

"See, that's how I know all this was bullshit!" Tony hissed, getting worked up. "They kept everything quiet because they knew what they were doing was wrong."

"Tony, what happened?" Bruce asked. Tony sighed, glancing back toward the bedrooms. It wasn't really fair to keep the others in the dark. And maybe knowing at least some of the details would make them take everything more seriously.

"Jarvis, warn me when Steve is on the way back," Tony requested, waiting until he got confirmation from his computer to continue. "Steve was going on missions for Shield."

"Okay? What's the problem? There had been some talk about putting us on the same strike team, but plans changed," Natasha said, looking unbothered so far.

"Plans changed alright. They ended up having Steve work alone."

"I'm still not hearing an issue. They send me out solo all the time."

"On back to back missions for over a month without a break? With barely enough time to sleep, even when you're injured?" Tony snapped. He knew it wasn't fair, since Natasha didn't have the details, but he couldn't stand hearing anyone defend Shield right now. "I doubt that's the standard."

"Shit," Clint muttered. "That's definitely not good."

"How did he end up back here?" Bruce asked.

"Oh well, he asked Shield politely for a vacation and they sent him back with their well wishes," Tony replied sarcastically.

"And the real answer?"

"Steve almost died and I made the decision for him. Shield left him out there broken and bloody, like he didn't even matter," Tony hissed, raking a hand through his hair. "I had to save Steve from himself, since he sure as hell wasn't going to do it."

"How did you two become friends anyway?" Bruce asked curiously. "Not that I'm complaining, but you didn't exactly get along very well on the helicarrier."

"We ran into each other right before he got sent out and just decided to give it a chance. He's not so bad once you get to know him. Stubborn as hell and no self-preservation skills, but a good guy."

"So, how bad was it when you finally stepped in?" Natasha asked. This was the question he'd been dreading. The fact that Steve had looked so utterly terrible, and that was after the hospital had cleaned him up, made him want to throw on an Iron Man suit and wreak havoc on anyone in Shield he could find.

"It's a miracle he survived," Tony said quietly. If they wanted the details, they were going to have to ask Steve. Jarvis let out a soft tone, alerting the group that Steve was on his way back. Tony tried to fix his face into something more casual, but he could tell he wasn't doing the best job. Natasha was as collected as usual, but Tony could see the concern on the faces of the other two. This was why he didn't want to talk about all this now.

"Hey guys, sorry about that," Steve said as he walked back up to the group. "How have you been?"

"No complaints," Natasha replied.

"Worked on a few interesting projects," Bruce added.

"Great," Steve said politely, before turning toward Clint. Clint had been silently looking Steve over, but snapped his eyes back up to his face once the attention was on him. "Everything alright, Clint?"

"Of course. Everything is the same as it's always been," Clint said quickly, plastering on a fake smile. How was this guy a spy? He was terrible. Tony glared at him, willing him to act natural.

"Right," Steve mumbled, squinting his eyes at him. Clint withered a little under his gaze. Natasha and Bruce stayed silent, which just made everything worse. It was obvious that something had changed and Steve was no idiot. "Tony."

"Steve, I-"

"You told them, didn't you?"

"I had to, it-"

"You promised me!" Steve shouted, whirling around to face him. "You said you wouldn't say anything!"

"But-"

"It doesn't matter how old I am! It wasn't your information to tell!" Tony couldn't do more than stare at Steve in shock. This was bad.

"I, um," Tony mumbled, clearing his throat. "I didn't say anything about your age."

"What?"

"I told them about what happened with Shield." Tony could tell the moment it sunk into Steve's brain what he'd done. He'd outed himself. Tony had to do damage control. "Uh, what Steve meant to say was-"

"How old are you?" Natasha asked.

"Um-"

"We were discussing if it would be morally right for him to sign up for an AARP card. I told him to go for it, get those benefits," Tony joked.

"How old are you?" Natasha repeated.

"My math might be off, but I think he was hovering somewhere around the 90s. Respect your elders, Romanoff."

"Steve?" Natasha pressed. Steve looked every bit like the kid he was at the moment, wilting under the pressure of his flub.

"I just misspoke. Can we leave it?" Steve asked quietly.

"It can't be that bad, right? It's not like you're secretly super old or something. Or a teenager," Clint chuckled, shaking his head. Steve's face immediately drained of color. "Shit. Don't tell me you're jailbait."

"What?"

"Don't use that term. It's disgusting," Natasha admonished.

"Are you old enough to drive?"

"Of course," Steve replied in exasperation.

"How about vote?"

"Yes."

"At least you're legal," Clint mumbled.

"What is this, 20 questions?" Tony interrupted. He knew the question that would naturally come next and it was one that Steve would either have to lie about or finally admit to.

"Are you old enough to drink?"

"The drinking age is as low as 16 in some places in Europe, so yeah," Tony butted in. Even though he'd been the one pushing Steve for information about his age not too long ago, it felt wrong seeing someone else do it too. He kind of wished he'd never found out at all.

"I meant in America."

"Canada is in North America and theirs is 18, so-"

"I'm nineteen!" Steve exclaimed, tipping his head back to stare at the ceiling. Hearing that out loud never got easier.

"He'll be twenty soon," Tony added feebly.

"Holy shit. Holy shit!"

"Clint, calm down," Natasha chastised.

"I am calm. I'm just having a mini existential crisis because somehow Captain America is young enough to be my son, but also old enough to be my grandpa."

"How is this possible, Steve?" Bruce asked kindly. That was the kind of energy they needed right now. The guy who turned into a big, green monster was the most level-headed of the bunch.

"It's complicated. I don't want to talk about it," Steve mumbled.

"Who else knows about this?" Natasha asked.

"No one. And it needs to stay that way."

"If Shield finds out-"

"They won't," Steve insisted. "It doesn't matter either way. My age hasn't prevented me from doing my job."

"Well, according to Tony, you almost died," Clint added unhelpfully.

"Tony overexaggerates," Steve replied tightly, glaring over at him. There went all that bonding they'd done. "And that had nothing to do with my age. I led us in battle, didn't I? Even if you decide you can't respect me in my role anymore, that doesn't mean I can't fulfill my duties as Captain America. I did it at sixteen and I can do it now."

"Sixteen? This keeps getting worse."

"No one is saying they don't respect you anymore. It's just a lot to take in at the moment," Bruce said placatingly.

"Shit, it might make me respect you more. I was a complete dumbass at sixteen," Clint snorted.

"Some things never change," Natasha smirked.

"Rude."

"Can we all just pretend that nothing's different? It isn't really, since I'm the same person I was a few minutes ago, just with a smaller number on my license."

"Oh God, we're gonna have to get you a fake ID. You can't even get into bars!" Clint moaned, smacking his forehead.

"Could you stop making jokes for a second?" Tony snapped. "No one thinks you're funny right now."

"I'm just trying to wrap my head around this," Clint shot back defensively.

"And you think this is the best way to do it? Is anyone laughing?"

"Let's all just calm down," Bruce said.

"I called you all here for help and you're making things worse."

"You didn't even tell us the real reason why you wanted us back. Maybe if you weren't so vague, we'd know what we were walking into. Oh, and maybe if you'd mentioned to Steve we were coming in the first place," Clint pointed out.

"I didn't want it to be a big deal. We were supposed to talk things out in a calm manner, after getting reacquainted with each other." Tony honestly hadn't had a real plan. He thought everything would fall into place with everyone around, but maybe that was ignorant. Maybe he was expecting too much. They hadn't done anything else all together besides the Battle of New York and that only worked because they were fighting against a common threat. This was about working out an internal issue, which was always trickier.

"Is it really getting reacquainted when we barely even know each other as it is?" Clint questioned.

"Where's Steve?" Natasha asked suddenly. Tony whirled around, finding the spot that he'd last seen Steve in empty. He'd turned all of his attention to Clint during their argument.

"Shit. Where is he, Jarvis?"

"Mr. Rogers has left the building."

"And you didn't tell me?" Tony hissed.

"How did he move so fast? And when did he get so sneaky?" Clint wondered.

"I need to find him," Tony muttered. Steve was healed enough to be safe, but that didn't mean Tony wanted him out there alone. Not after his big secret came out.

"Do you want help?" Bruce offered.

"No, just stay here," Tony sighed, walking toward the elevator. Hopefully Jarvis had a direction he could go in. "It'll be better if I do this alone."

"You know I didn't mean to upset him," Clint said guiltily.

"You can tell him that once I bring him back." Tony climbed onto the elevator, trying to figure out how they'd gone from putting together a jigsaw puzzle to this. So much for their carefree day.