"So… what do we do, now?"
Tony shrugged, watching as Peter tried to ignore the long, velvet-covered nose and the soft lips that were nibbling on the back of his hair while he sat with Shuri, Rocket and Groot at one of the tables.
"Beats me. Stephen?"
"Oh, no…" the magician said, smiling his amusement as Peter pushed the Pegasus's nose away from his hair with a gentle admonishment that did nothing to make the magical creature stop what it was doing. "This is not a sorcerer supreme problem – and that creature didn't come from the sanctum. This is an Avenger problem."
Peter's flight with the Pegasus had been smooth, despite the slight mishap that it began with. It had been a little longer than the other two had been, but the landing had been flawless and the boy had looked properly excited by the ride. Certainly, he looked as if making the promise to never ask for anything else as long as he lived had been worth it.
Then, though, rather than move away from the group of humans and graze while waiting for the afternoon to finish, the winged creature had sidled up to Peter once he'd seated himself at the table, and had hovered over the boy, alternating between lipping his hair, playfully, and spreading a wing over him and sheltering him from the view of the others. Or maybe just making a point of telling the rest of them who Peter belonged to, now. Either way, it was amusing to Strange, but not so much to Tony, who was concerned that Peter really might want to keep the thing, and Valkyrie didn't seem to approve so much, either.
"I don't want to have a long talk with it," Stark said, watching as Shuri reached up and patted the horse's side, saying something to Peter as she did, which made the boy smile and shake his head. "Is it in love with him, or just infatuated with him?"
"How should I know?"
"It's magical, right? You deal with magic. It's not the whole in love with a virgin thing, is it?"
Wong snorted.
"You're thinking of unicorns."
Pepper smiled, although she had her concerns, as well.
"It isn't harassing Shuri quite as much as it is Peter," she pointed out. "So we can assume it's because of the magic thing."
"We don't have a barn," Natasha said. "And it's a little big to sleep in his bed."
Besides, she might want to cuddle with him, herself, sometime, and something that big would definitely be in the way.
"He's allergic to horses."
"The Pegasus isn't exactly a horse," Wong told them before Strange could. "It's probably allergen free."
"That should be a relief," Tony replied rolling his eyes. "But it isn't."
"At least I won't need to give him a shot, or anything," Strange replied.
"He'll be fine," Thor said, shaking his head. "The creature is from legend and will return to Asgard when I return. It will not leave Valkyrie for Peter. And I assure you, she isn't a virg-"
"We don't need to discuss that," Pepper interrupted.
Tony nodded his agreement. At the moment, the table held Wong, Stephen, Natasha – and himself and Pepper, of course. T'Challa was talking to Sirah, Gamora, Mantis and Ramonda (who was holding Ironpig) – and was almost certainly offering the former slave girl the choice of what she wanted to do in Wakanda – while the others were intermingled with their visitors. Even Bruce was at the barbeque – although the man had been holed up in his lab in the tower for almost a week, now, and had been running all kinds of tests on himself to try and confirm that the ability to change himself at will wasn't just a temporary thing.
At the moment, he was playing volleyball with a small group of people – including Quill, Drax, Rogers, Danvers and Clint – as well as Azoru and a couple other Wakandans. Stark liked seeing them enjoying themselves.
"We do need to discuss the space stone, however," he added.
"I assume you are not intending to keep it for yourself?" Thor asked.
"Not on your life," Tony assured him. "The last thing we want are all of those things here at the compound. Bad enough trying to figure out what to do with the ones we're not completely sure how to return."
"Such as?"
"The power stone doesn't have a guardian, any longer," Stephen said.
"And while we know where Peter found the soul stone – at least, he knows where he found it – it is uncertain how to return it to that place. Or, more specifically, to the guardian who holds it."
Tony's expression was serious.
"We need to learn a bit more about that," he agreed. "Peter says a sacrifice was needed to get it – and that May had been the sacrifice – but does that mean another one has to be made to return it? Or, even more worrisome, does the sacrifice return with the return of the stone?"
They all (except Thor) understood that Tony wasn't concerned that May would return because he was worried about losing Peter to her, but was worried that it wouldn't exactly be May. Maybe a spirit of May, like Alec, or something, stuck in Peter's head. The boy had enough stressed, Tony didn't want that to be added to them.
"I'm afraid I can't help you with that," Thor admitted. "But I will take the space stone back to Asgard when we leave. If it is ever needed, again, it will be where Peter found it; in the vault dedicated to my father."
"A safe place for it," Wong replied.
"You didn't find anything in your library about the soul stone and how to return it?" the god of Thunder asked.
"There is very little known about the soul stone. Of all the stones of power, it is the most mysterious."
"What will you do with the power stone?" Thor asked.
"Find a place for it."
"On Earth?"
"Not if we can avoid it."
Time enough to worry about that later, though. Thor taking the Space stone would clear another one of the infinity stones off the planet – and the guardians were going to be leaving within a week, or so, he knew. That would take care of another. He wouldn't send two of them to the collector, and he wouldn't send two with Thor to Asgard; Strange had suggested that both would be a bad idea, and despite his desire to get them off the planet, Tony had agreed.
Two in the same place would be a tempting target, after all. And they knew it, of course.
The conversation changed, then, as the tables that were set up for the food were suddenly beginning to become loaded as the kitchen staff and the conscripted helpers started bringing out the barbeque staples: potato salad, salad, pasta salad, chips, deviled eggs, roasted ears of corn on the cob and a myriad of other fare that was designed to feed a diverse crowd of guests all joined the meat that was being pulled off the grills and the drinks that had long been set into the mammoth ice coolers at the end of every table.
Stephen offered to go get Natasha something to eat, and she thanked him with a smile as she almost automatically looked to see how Peter was doing with the Pegasus. The boy was still being subjected to sloppy caresses – and she smirked, because she was sure the cloak wasn't too happy about being forced to share Peter any more than it already was.
"You know what would be fun?" Wong asked, also looking at the table where Peter was sitting – just in time to see a glistening white wing block their view of the boy, once more. "Peter riding that thing, with Mjolnir in his hand and the Cloak of Levitation flaring out behind him with the infinity stones in the glove on his other hand."
Tony rolled his eyes, and Thor scowled at the reminder that Tony's adopted son could wield his hammer. It was Pepper who spoke up, though.
"He'd fall on his head," she said, shaking her own. "And knowing our luck, the hammer would land on him and no one would be able to lift it off of him until we found Thor and brought him to help."
Tony nodded his agreement.
That sounded about right, really.