Disclaimer: Marvel is the boss. Of everything. And the owner of a lot of universes. I wish I owned Stony. I would spend all day just watching them be cute.

A/N: Here is the explanation that you all probably need. I've tried to cover everything, but if something doesn't make sense, comment, and I'll try to explain it in the next chapter. Also, the timing may be a little off, so if you do a little math and it doesn't make sense, then just roll with it, please.

Chapter 11

Bruce liked to think that he was a fairly intelligent person. He certainly wasn't as smart as Tony, but really, no one was, so it wasn't a big disappointment for him. But he had a couple doctorates, and he had more than a couple papers published in respected magazines. So he was pretty smart.

That being said, he still had no idea what was going on right now.

Sadly, this was a feeling he was rather accustom to, what with living with the Avengers.

But he had thought that he knew a lot about this particular situation. He and the rest of the Avengers had smirked and rolled their eyes many a times at the obliviousness of the Steve and Tony situation. They were so obviously in love with each other that it was sickening.

"I can't believe I forgot you," Steve whispered, resting his forehead against Tony's. Both of the men's faces were wet with tears and Bruce could see that their shoulders were shaking slightly from emotion.

"Um, what?" Clint asked. Tony and Steve looked up at the same time, and then at each other, communicating something between their eyes.

"I have something I need to tell everyone," Tony said, getting off of Steve's lap and taking Steve's hands between his, pulling him up.

Bruce followed after them, wondering what exactly Tony could think that he needed to divulge. The man had many different armors that protected his true self from the outside people, but living with the man told you many of his secrets.

Tony and Steve stopped abruptly in front of him and Bruce stopped before he could run into them.

"Oops?" Tony offered weakly. Bruce glanced around Steve to see the broken table that they all usually sat at to eat breakfast.

"We'll have to talk in the living room," Steve sighed. Tony made a face. "You guys ruined the living room too?"

"It was Bucky's fault." Tony accused, pointing at the offending man.

"It was not," Bucky scoffed. Steve waved a hand at them and they quieted.

"We can go to the kitchen on the twelfth floor," Tony suggested. They all filed into the elevator and Bruce tried to keep his eyes anywhere besides where Steve and Tony's mouths were moving together.

"Knock it off," Bucky told them. Tony leaned around Steve and grinned, though they didn't begin to kiss again. Finally they were all seated at the table of the twelfth floor and Bruce watched them curiously. The scientist inside of him was burning with curiosity.

"So, in nineteen twenty two, a boy was born to Cassandra Stark and Gerald Stark." Tony began from where he was sitting in Steve's lap. His voice was almost clinical, it was so detached. "They didn't want the child, and they made sure that the child knew it." Here Steve wrapped his arms around Tony, resting his chin gently against his shoulder. Tony's face twitched into a smile. "The boy ran away from home by the time he was fifteen. He was doing okay, really, as well as anybody could during the great depression. And then, one day, he awoke in an alley to find a fight was going on. The fighter was a small blond that had absolutely no chance of winning. So, because the boy had absolutely no sense of self preservation, he joined the fight. The two probably had less than two hundred pounds between them, and they most likely would have been killed if it weren't for the blonde's much taller and muscled friend, who saved them. Later, the blond introduced himself." Tony's fingers thread through Steve's, which were resting against his stomach. Bruce suddenly understood, though it made no sense to him. "The blonde's name was Steve Rogers. The boy's was Anthony Edward Stark."

"That makes no sense," Natasha said coolly, her voice completely devoid of shock, because that simply could not be a true story.

"We're not done," Steve said. "The blond invited the boy to come and live with them, as even though he denied it at the time he thought that the boy was incredibly cute. The boy agreed, and though he didn't pay rent, he found plenty of ways to earn his keep. He fixed all broken things in the house and the blond and his friend soon realized that the boy was a genius."

"Not true, I still maintain that he's an idiot," Bucky said. Steve rolled his eyes and continued.

"There was an undeniable attraction between the two of them, and though it was outlawed, they started to see each other romantically. They were utterly in love and luckily the blonde's friend supported them enough to hide their secret." He said.

"And everyone knows the story of how Steve became Captain America and the Howling Commandos," Tony interrupted. "Though the stories rarely tell of the one Howling Commando that the Captain was in love with. But then, on one mission, there was a blast, and the Howling Commando really had no choice but to put himself in between Steve and the danger."

"So he fell," Steve said roughly. "And the blond was inconsolable."

"Could barely get out of bed except to go on missions, which he would carry out so numbly that it was amazing he didn't die," Bucky added.

"Anyway, when he had fallen, the boy was only twenty years old. He expected it to be the end, so he was surprised to find that nearly sixty years later he woke up." Tony said. "The person who woke him, and told him about how he had been frozen, was named Howard Stark. And he was in a bit of a predicament. That was how he described it. A bit of a predicament. His son had died, and he needed someone to inherit his company. He had known of the boy, had met him while working with Captain America, and knew of his genius. He decided to switch the boy's identity with his own son's. It was appallingly simple. No one noticed that Anthony Stark's original middle name was Phillip and that Tony Stark's face had changed amazingly within two weeks."

"The boy was suddenly in a life of leisure. But it was incredibly hard. For one, the real Tony Stark had been born in the sixties. The boy was about twenty years younger. And then there was Afghanistan. And then he learned that all the money had been putting into finding Steve had paid off. The blond was found. He was overjoyed." Tony swallowed. "You can imagine my confusion when Steve didn't recognize me at all."