550 words of Stephen Strange pining for a future he never got. Implied IronStrange.
Written for my 2019 Summer Prompt Challenge on Ao3.
Pining
Stepping into Avengers tower was fairly impressive on it's own, but it wasn't until he was stepping out of the elevator that Stephen felt truly overwhelmed. Not because of the architecture or the luxury or even the fact that he was in Tony Stark's living quarters.
No. It was the teenagers. Two of them. They were playing what appeared to be an Avengers video game - Iron Man vs Iron Patriot. He recognized the one playing Iron Patriot as Peter Parker. The other he'd seen pictures of.
Harley hit pause, earning an annoyed grumble from Peter. He was staring directly at Stephen with a grim set to his lips and narrowed eyes. The teen jumped the back of the couch to walk closer, eyes looking him up and down in a decent impersonation of Pepper Potts.
"Who are you?" Harley demanded, chin up, eyes still narrowed.
"Dr. Stephen Strange." Stephen offered the young man in front of him his hand, which he blessedly didn't take.
Peter had moved behind him and was making various faces and hand gestures. Stephen was fairly positive one of those had been a 'don't shake' but he was far from an expert on decoding teenage hand signals.
Harley suddenly grinned, "How do you spell that?"
"With a ph." Stephen shrugged. He'd gotten the question a lot growing up, more since meeting the Avengers. He raised a brow when the boy snorted.
Peter stepped up beside Harley. "Don't you mean a…ph.d?" Peter quipped. They high-five before they descended into a fit of giggling. Stephen had never seen someone actually roll on the floor while laughing.
Stephen turned to face the bar. Tony stood there with his face in his hands. "Your sons are broken."
"No…" Tony sighed, straightening up, "They're just dorks."
The memory faded as Tony started walking towards him. Stephen Strange awoke in his bed, glaring at the ceiling.
It wasn't even HIS memory - not really - it was merely one of the many futures he had seen. A failed one at that. But still, his stomach churned.
He walked down the stairs, greeted Wong with a vague nod and a wave. Coffee. He required coffee.
"Still reliving those futures?" Wong followed him into the kitchen. He leaned, unhelpfully, against the counter - directly in front of the coffee maker. Stephen stood in front of him, coffee pot full of water floating in front of him.
His hands ached and he found himself absently rubbing his left ring finger. Wong eyed the gesture.
"Ah, Stark again." Wong scooted away from the machine to let Stephen make his coffee. "Those futures seem to have had the most impact on you, I've noticed."
"Tony Stark did just die." Stephen reasoned as he watched the coffe begin to percolate.
Wong patted his shoulder. "In this reality, you'd just met him, but I think his wife would understand if you wanted to talk to here."
Stephen shrugged the hand and the suggestion off. In this reality Tony had married Pepper, he'd had a daughter. Harley and Peter didn't appear to have met either.
Wong sighed, his hands flew up, "Fine! Just pine away in your room for a version of Tony Stark that never existed."
Stephen took his coffee back to his room to do just that.
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