A/N: Again, thank you so much for all the reviews. Here is the next chapter. Future chapters will come slower, but I seem to be on a roll and vacation is a wonderful thing :)
Chapter 3: Arrivederci
"DUM-E, put that computer over… No, not there! I will not hesitate to donate you to a community college if you keep this up, and I don't care if they don't exist around here, I'll find a way. U, clean up that mess! Why am I putting up with you?"
Tony sighed even though they all knew the answer. DUM-E approached him with a chirping sound, asking him whether he was feeling okay. Fondly, he caressed DUM-E's pressure sensors.
He lived in the outskirts of Bern and had more than just a small variety of customers, but he had not really made any friends here. He did not need friends. The last time he had tried to make some outside of Pepper and Rhodey, it had majorly blown up in his face. He was practically a hermit these days, and he preferred it this way. He really did.
He finished up the security system he had created for a rather exclusive jewelry store and sent a message to his initial contractor that it was ready for installment, while he simultaneously repaired Mrs. Bucher's old TV and Mr. Aeberhard's computer (both with upgrades and, in case of the computer, additional firewalls and a filter for any kind of malware).
Life was easy. Life was quiet. Life was repetitive.
Tony sighed.
Two more years.
He hoped that this easy life would not bore him to death prematurely until then. His hands twitched when he put the TV aside. He wanted to build things, he wanted to hear the buzzing of life, he… would not focus on building things more complex than a microwave.
JARVIS seemed to sense how dark his thoughts were becoming and told his next moves on the six virtual keyboards.
"Checkmate in two for Boards 1, 2, 4 and 5. Checkmate in three for 3. Move the Queen to C5 on 6, which results in checkmate," Tony smiled. "Really, JARVIS? I expected better after all these years." He was just messing with his AI and JARVIS knew it. They had been playing for over an hour, which was longer than almost all people on Earth had ever been able to keep his attention on the board. God, he missed Bruce.
"I'm sorry, sir, but your approach to chess still manages to confuse me."
"Too illogical for you, Mr. Spock?" Tony grinned.
"Indeed, sir."
Tony sent U, Butterfingers and DUM-E to recharge as this would allow him some privacy to talk to his friend; or rather, to continue their everlasting study sessions. He did not want to frustrate his other AIs with this. They were unique creations with a whole range of emotion from love to jealousy, but only JARVIS was this differentiated in terms of human emotion, and was able to properly analyze them.
"Revenge."
JARVIS had given up a long time ago to simply repeat the definition of revenge ("the action of inflicting hurt or harm on someone for an injury or wrong suffered at their hands"), but immediately went to the heart of the matter.
"Not yet, Sir."
"Because you didn't want to?"
"Because you would not have liked it."
That was not surprising. JARVIS could autonomously create absolute havoc if he so wished, and these past two years had not been easy for either of them.
"Do you plan to?"
"Not without your permission, Sir."
"Good enough for me, J. I trust you."
There was a moment of silence.
"What about you, Sir?"
"Not really. Whom would I unleash my revenge on, JARVIS? They are my friends."
"I do not particularly agree with your definition of friends, Sir. If you go by the classic definition, Colonel Rhodes and Ms. Potts are your friends, but none of the Avengers are. They have shown very little sign of affection on their part."
Tony touched his arc reactor with a soft smile, but his chest clenched painfully, "Well, that's because it's always more complicated than a mere definition. They are…" His voice failed him, simply because he had no idea how to explain his feelings to his AI.
"I'm sorry, Sir," JARVIS sounded truly apologetic. "Of course. However, I do reserve myself the right to be angry at your behalf. They had no right to take as much as they did. Their actions were successful, Sir, as successful as cutting off the hands of a thief, but that does not make the punishment any less unethical. Vision should have objected."
"Again, I told him not to," Tony repeated for the 35th time, "I didn't want the others to know about that. They knew far too much already. If Steve had known, he would have objected, I'm sure of it." Almost sure, he was almost positively sure that Steve's sense for justice would have been strong enough to overcome his disappointment in Tony.
Thankfully, a soft bell that announced Mr. Aeberhard's arrival interrupted his dark thoughts.
"Guete Abed, Herr Stark. We gaht's Eu hüt? Ech ha e Nachricht übercho, dass mine Computer gflickt isch worde," the tall man said cautiously as he entered Tony's workshop announcing that he had received the message he had left on the man's cell phone.
"Grüezi, Herr Aeberhard. Ihrä Compi isch gflickt und ich ha all Datä chönne rette," Tony replied, while he turned on the computer. He had never tried to adopt the Bernese Swiss German accent. He liked hearing it, but he had first learned the Zurich accent due to multiple connections to the ETH and several businesses located in that city. Once he had an accent in any language, he did not randomly change it. He explained to the man what he had done, what the original problem was and how he resolved it. He further gave some instructions on how to avoid similar issues in the future and how to keep his computer for the next ten years on upgrades only. All tech companies seemed to count on 'use it, toss it' mentality these days, upgrading the software and making it incompatible with the older hardware forcing people to buy the latest models on an almost yearly basis. It was not necessary, though, Tony had his tricks, and people, especially small businesses, were grateful as it lowered their IT costs immensely.
Mr. Aeberhard paid him immediately in cash, thanked him profusely, and left the workshop within minutes.
"Sir, are you sure you do not want me installed into your surveillance system?" JARVIS asked again. This was an ongoing request since Tony's arrival in Switzerland, but the contract he had signed, prohibited him from using any technology more sophisticated than a surveillance system of a regular small business of the same size. JARVIS was here as his company, not his bodyguard, but the lack of protection he could offer, stressed the AI immensely.
"We are good, JARVIS, why…?" The bell rang and Tony glimpsed at the camera feed. His heart started to pound painfully against the arc reactor. "JARVIS, is that…?"
"Yes, Sir, it looks like Captain Rogers, Sergeant Barnes and Dr. Banner have entered the premises. Do you wish me to…"
"No, JARVIS, I'll handle it," Tony said as he heard the soft knock. "It's open!"
While his right hand was covering his chest, he hoped the arc reactor was strong enough. He felt like his heart would come to a stop any minute, which he would actually prefer to the present situation.
They entered and, on top of JARVIS' barely concealed fury, DUM-E, Butterfingers and U practically pulsed with a confusing mix of emotion ranging from happiness, to 'I missed you!' to 'Go away and never return!' and 'Why have you stopped coming by?'
This painful onslaught of emotion on top of his own caused his muscles to tense up. It did not help that Bucher TV continued to ask Bern Workshop Microwave what was happening, and Bern Workshop Coffee Machine was asking for beans to prepare the coffee, while Bern Workshop Teapot demanded to be noted, and snarled at Coffee Machine that she was Tony's favorite.
"I care about you both. I adore your tea," he said firmly but quietly hoping to end that daily argument while praying to a God he definitely did not believe in that Steve's ears did not catch his reassuring words.
Steve's confused and worried expression told him that all was for naught.
"Welcome!" said Tony spreading his arms before quickly covering his chest again, hoping to distract them, while simultaneously reprimanding himself for his indisputably odd behavior. "Mi casa es su casa and so on and so forth! Come on in!"
Steve, Barnes and Bruce entered and stepped down the few steps that led to his workshop (Organized chaos, as he liked to call it), slowly approaching him.
Bruce is here, yay! Why are they here? Is everything okay? Bruce looks tired (most probable cause: sleep deprivation, which does not affect him until sleeping less than two hours a night over a period of seven days. Why is he pushing himself so hard? Has he already found another Science Buddy?). Cap is unsure. Why? Barnes looks like he wants to murder me in my sleep. It's not like he would have to wait until then. I'm not a threat. They all could kill me with their little finger. They always could without the Armor. No Armor (don't want to die - Liar!). The Hulk would never hurt me, but Cap might, Barnes will. They took Armor apart with their bare hands (Pain). How's Armor? Is Arno taking care of it? He goes into action with it, but does he upgrade it? Does he remind it that it's there to help not to hurt?). Barnes ripped out the arc reactor (Defenseless. Let me die! I won't build any weapons for you! Just let me die!). He would come alone if he wanted to end me. God, his arm still screams in pain. How can Barnes ignore this? Why hasn't Arno taken care of that? Is Arno hurt? Nobody was injured on the last mission and Pepper didn't say anything. But what if Arno is hurt? There is no heir. Pepper might inherit. She should.
"Hi Tony, how are you?" Steve asked cautiously, barely interrupting Tony's thought process.
"Good, perfect, absolutely fabulous," Tony responded promptly, retreating further back until he bumped against the large table, which covered with various tools from a toolkit fit to fiddle with micro-electronics to wrenches intended for cars. "How are you? Is everything alright?"
"Are you afraid of us, Stark?" Barnes asked bluntly. His cold eyes followed Tony's every move. He had not forgiven how Tony's actions and manipulations had hurt, and almost killed, Steve.
"Nope, why would I be?" Sarcasm was back with brutal force as if it wanted to catch up after two years. "I'm just in a room with three superheroes who have more or less reason to hold a grudge against me. I don't see why I should be worried."
"We wouldn't harm you, Tony," Bruce lifted both of his hands in a heartbreakingly fragile gesture, which caused Tony to feel like a monster.
"Oh God, Bruce, I know you wouldn't," said the engineer, not trying to hide his pain. He stepped towards the physicist with his arms wide. "I..." 'missed you' would the understatement of the century, so he was at a loss for words.
Bruce, who usually avoided openly displaying his emotions, emitted a pained, little sound and crossed the last steps that separated them to pull Tony into a hug. It was tight and safe, and the engineer never wanted to let go. However, it soon became a little too tight.
"Whoa there, Big Guy!" he gasped. "Remember, I have a huge metal thing in my chest, could you…"
Bruce immediately released him and Tony almost whimpered at the loss of contact. The last time he had touched a human being was when Rhodey had visited two months ago, if you ignored casual business handshakes. The colonel was now on a secret mission in the Middle East (and yes, for once, he did not know more, because he could not risk breeching his contract). As he looked at his Science Buddy, he saw familiar green eyes scrutinizing him.
"I'm good, Big Guy," he repeated, making sure the Hulk knew that he not only addressed Bruce.
Without giving any warning, DUM-E shot forward and slammed into Steve, who was so surprised by the assault, he stumbled a little.
"DUM-E, stop it!" Tony shouted, quickly inserting himself between his AI and the leader of the Avengers, terrified of what the latter might do to the robot. "Sorry, Rogers!" said he, while doing his best to tune out Butterfinger's and U's 'Must not go against primary directives, but DUM-E follows his prime directive, will not interfere' and DUM-E's 'Left us! Never said goodbye! Tony Stark miserable without Avengers, but also sad around Avengers. Alone, always alone. Steve Rogers stood against Tony Stark. Friend but also adversary. Steve Rogers let him go away and left Tony Stark all alone. Now Steve Rogers must go away!' "They've not seen you guys in a while. It's hard to explain the shifts in our relation…fr…shifts of feelings towards each other. Give me a minute, boys!" he addressed the robots. "Go and recharge!"
The first command he ever programmed worked like a charm, but their feelings were still a jumbled mess. He had no idea how to sort out something he did not quite make sense of himself. Years of practice, years of appearing completely indifferent towards anybody he met, allowed him to rid his face off any emotion.
"What can I do for you?"
What do you think? Want me to continue? And I apologize for yet another cliffhanger.
Second A/N: For all the (approximately 0.5) people from Bern or Zurich: No, I am not from either of these cantons as you can probably tell, so feel free to correct me if I did not get the accent right.