Steve wheeled Tony carefully into his penthouse, easily navigating the hall with the gurney they had Tony strapped to. "I really don't think this is necessary. I could sit up. I could be in a wheelchair…" Tony frowned even deeper at the concept of a wheelchair.
"It's not getting up sitting up that would be the problem, it's getting you laying back down." Steve told him easily, putting on the brakes so that the gurney wouldn't move. Thor came in carrying Steve's bag from the hospital, dropping it near the door in favour of helping the supersoldier move his boyfriend.
"I don't think I fully believe you that you'll stay in bed." Jane told him worriedly, taking Thor's hand as Tony breathed through the pain of being moved and Steve tried to soothe him vainly.
"So little faith in me! First Steve, then Bruce, now Jane-what's next, Loki comes down from on high and nags me about sitting still, too?"
"No, next I'm going to order JARVIS to tell me the millisecond you move. Blaringly."
"It shall sound like a bomb raid in London if he so much as wriggles, sir." The AI supplied, and Captain America smiled.
"Traitor!"
"I am here for the good of yourself and mankind, sir. Captain Rogers has your best interests at heart."
"And don't you forget it." Steve threatened, shooting Tony a meaningful look.
Tony wrapped his fingers around Steve's, tugging just slightly-a tug to him, more of a flinch to anyone else-and Steve knelt down beside the bed, almost at eye-level with Tony, "You need to go and get ready for bed. You look worse than I feel." Tony smiled at him cheekily, and Steve rolled his eyes at the dig.
"You're comfortable? You don't need anything?"
"I don't think I'll be comfortable for a while, but given the circumstances, I'm good. And all I need is for you to not look like the leading zombie in an undead romantic comedy."
Banner smiled, "That may be the painkillers talking now."
"NO, THE CAPTAIN IS PHYSICALLY PLEASING TO THE EYE, YET WITH HIS FATIGUE, HE ALSO APPEARS DEAD ON HIS FEET." Thor boomed, smiling at Tony even as he winced from caffeine-deprived hangover. Jane sent him an apologetic look, squeezing Thor's hand. "IS THAT NOT WHAT A ZOMBIE IS?"
"That is exactly what a zombie is, big guy." Tony told him indulgently, yawning, "And it's the drugs talking that I'm not making a crack about Steve being physically pleasing to the eye."
Steve chuckled, leaning down to kiss Tony again, "Get some rest."
Tony obediently closed his eyes, relaxing as much as he could and trying to sleep when he couldn't roll onto his side. It didn't take long before Tony was gone to the world, snoring softly through his nose and his mouth gently open.
"Aw, ain't 'e sweet?" Clint mocked acerbically, and everyone from Steve by Tony's bed to Natasha down the hall gave him the deadliest of disapproving looks.
"I can't believe we're all moving in together. Is Tony really okay with this?" Bruce asked as Steve led them away from Tony's room.
"It was his idea, Bruce. He wanted to make sure we all stayed safe." Steve muttered, glancing from his watch to a digital readout of the time three times over the course of a minute.
"Steve, relax. I've had JARVIS upload a reminder to sound when it's time for Tony to take his pills and to get more pain meds." Natasha told him almost-gently, placing her hands over his arms, "We're here to help you and Tony just as much as we are to keep each other safe.
Steve mustered up a smile, shaking his head, "He's out of commission and I feel like I'm going to lose my mind…" Steve breathed.
Natasha's demeanour shifted fluidly, her voice calming and reassuring, as if she were talking someone off a ledge, "He's strong, and he's determined. He'll pull through this; you just need to have faith." Steve nodded slowly, and Natasha nodded back with more conviction than he had. "Go clean yourself up and get some rest. You deserve it." Steve nodded again, shuffling off as if he didn't quite know which way he was going.
"Scale of one to Loki-invasion, how worried should we be?" Clint asked Natasha as she rejoined the others.
"Very."
Agent Phil Coulson was waiting for Clint as he came down from Stark Tower, standing in the lobby of the sky-scraper in jeans and a polo Clint himself had bought him. "He's stable, and he's got Steve taking care of him, and Bruce and Natasha taking care of Steve," Clint told him, his expression breaking into a smirk, "But you're not here to talk about Tony."
"No, and I'd rather not talk about what I have to talk about now." Clint shot him a confused look, one eyebrow raised, "The...thing that attacked Steve and Tony is a bio-mechanical monster with a very clear signature."
"We've got a new big-bad, and Iron Man is down for the count, and Captain America is too distracted to be of much use. Fuck."
Coulson nodded darkly, Clint and he falling into step as they exited the building and climbed into Coulson's black SUV with tinted windows. "You know, I haven't seen you in anything besides the suit in two years." Coulson shot him a look, sliding his glasses up to rest on his head. Clint laughed, shaking his head, "Besides...that."
Coulson shook his head at the special agent, pulling away from Stark Tower, "So, feel like indulging me with golf, or will you try to kill me with the nine-iron again?"
"You really wanna risk that?"
Pepper watched Clint and Coulson go, sitting in the lobby, happy that she didn't have to try to hide right now.
"You know, they're not completely disgusting the entire time that they're together. Steve would probably confine himself to the other side of the room with you there, actually." Bruce Banner was a sneaky bastard for the completely unsubtle Hulk lurking within. "Sorry." Bruce smiled, and Pepper forced herself to relax.
"I-it's not that. I'm just...the way I ended it with Tony, I just don't want to...I don't want to taint what they have right now."
Bruce looked at her oddly, "You wouldn't taint it." Bruce told her, rolling his shoulders, "Pepper, you're the one that knows him best."
Pepper hung her head, her red hair falling down over her shoulders, "I don't, though, Bruce…I don't really know him. I thought I did...maybe I did, back when he was Tony Stark, playboy and arms dealing bastard, but...after Tony turned into Iron Man, it just...he wasn't the Tony I stuck around for. He was fulfilling all this potential that I'd seen in him, but it's all so dangerous, and he just...I think I liked it more when it was just potential. It was safer when I knew that he'd never do something like this. Steve...he never got to see Tony without the smirk and the supersuit and the bravado. All Steve's ever known is Tony with the superman underneath...not Tony the man-It doesn't even make sense, does it?"
Bruce's kind eyes looked at the strawberry blond for a long time, a small smile tugging at his lips, "You worry about him. You're probably one of the only people ever to have worried about him before. Like this, at least. Steve...understands the man that Tony sees himself to be. He gets that Tony wasn't always like this, and he gets that the lesser of the two is what Tony thinks he still is."
"Tony will always feel that way, though. No one will tell him or treat him any differently, and he's too arrogant to stop treating himself like the enemy, too."
Bruce placed a hand over Pepper's, looking her in the eye, "I know what it is to have this...monster in you, that you and everyone else hates. But...what Tony brought out from the monster; what he did with the others...it's made me wonder if, maybe, it's not a matter of the monster overruling the man. Maybe the monster is a man, always has been, and he just needs the right people to bring that out in him." Bruce shrugged, taking Pepper's hand and helping her up, offering her his arm as he walked her to the elevator. "It's not coincidence that I'm down here, either. JARVIS probably would have been singing for joy at your arrival if Tony wouldn't've reprogrammed him for it."
Pepper stepped out into the Stark-Rogers level of the Avengers sections, smiling as they caught the back end of Steve getting browbeaten by Natasha into using Tony's room with him. Steve smiled appreciatively before he caught sight of the pair stepping out of the elevator, and Pepper acutely regretted letting Bruce bring her up, if only for the fact that Captain Steve Rogers had never looked more like the living dead in his life, and now he was trying to rally himself because he'd seen her.
"Hello, Ms. Potts." Steve said, nervous and kind and unerringly polite.
"Please; Pepper. Good to see you, Cap."
Pepper flashed a winning smile, shaking Captain America's hand and nodding at him respectfully, "And you. Um...Tony's asleep right now, I'm afraid, but-"
"That's alright, Cap. And, if I may? You should get some rest as well. Bruce and Natasha will take care of me, or I can come back later."
"I look that bad, huh?" Steve asked, the façade of unshakable politeness giving a little with a grin, "Alright, I'm won over. Of course, feel free to...whatever it is that you guys would do...yeah, bye." Steve blushed, flustered.
"Sleep well, Cap."
Pepper had to admit, that smile was every bit as wonderful as Tony's: angelic in Steve where the devil ruled Tony's, but perfect nonetheless, "Thanks, Pepper."
Natasha smiled slightly, coming around Bruce, "Good to see you again, Agent Romanoff."
"I'm still Natasha, Pepper." Pepper mustered a smile, trailing Bruce and Natasha into the apartment.
"Looks good…" Pepper's voice was tinged with just a little wonder at the slight vintage twist Tony had taken in the interior decorating.
"He wanted it to feel like home for him." Bruce told her gently, and Pepper felt her throat constrict just a little. "Tony's been educating Steve on the merits of mullet rock, and Steve's learned how to use the microwave and the water filtration system attached to the fridge. They work well together."
Pepper smiled, feeling awkward and out of place. "Excuse me." Natasha murmured, nodding to them both. Pepper listened carefully as Natasha walked down the hall, "Steve Rogers, get in Tony's room. He needs you just as much as you need him."
"But P-"
"Go."
Pepper dropped her gaze to the floor, her lower lip disappearing between her teeth, "Bruce-"
"Do you still love him?" Bruce tilted his head just slightly, and Pepper had never found an expression like that quite so disarming.
"N-No...No, I don't." Pepper looked down, but she still couldn't stop telling him the truth.
Bruce nodded once, "Well, c'mon, we both need to get through some nasty break-ups."
"I'll get the tequila." Natasha said, making Pepper leap out of her skin in shock at how close she'd come so silently.
"Truth or dare, or watching horrible, artsy movies?"
Natasha made a gagging sound, shuddering. "Truth or dare."
"Well, this'll be fun."
"Nothing illegal."
"And no waking up the boys. They deserve a sleep."
Bruce smiled at Pepper, leading her into the living room. "JARVIS, sound-proof Tony's room."
"Yes, sir."
"And keep the black-out blinds closed until Steve wakes up." Natasha muttered, setting them up with shots, salt, and lime wedges. "Truth."
"Last person who broke your heart?"
"Mmm, you'd have to love for your heart to get broken."
"You can't tell me you haven't loved!" Bruce insisted, "I refuse to believe that you haven't loved."
"There was a guy...once...in Budapest. He ended up being gay."
Pepper shook her head, taking her second shot, "I know that hurt."
Natasha grunted, and they clinked shots in cheers, "Alright, Bruce, truth or dare?"
"Truth."
"What's one thing that makes you angry?"
"Needless stupidity." Bruce said easily, taking another shot.
"Dare." Pepper said, shrugging when Natasha shot her a look. "What? You two are boring. You're forgetting I've done this with Tony."
Steve was walking backwards as Tony slowly hobbled forwards on the physio-therapy support beams. "This is amazing. Thank you, Doctor." Steve smiled brightly at Dr. Strange, reaching out to take Tony's hands.
"He's healing quite well." The sorcerer remarked, nodding at Steve.
"St-Steve!" Tony wobbled on the support bars, and Steve caught him quickly before he could fully fall, levering him back up, "This is...so embarrassing. I can't even walk without my boy-" Tony cut off as Steve looked at him sharply.
"We've talked about this, Stark." The Captain growled, eyes narrowing, "You're not weak because you need help; you're strong for accepting it."
Tony's mouth twisted, and Steve huffed a sigh, rolling his eyes.
"The voice in your head that's Howard? He needs to eat his words." Steve told Tony in a gentle voice, helping him to sit down and handing him a water bottle, kneeling down in front of him to work on Tony's leg, his hands firm and sure over the shaking muscles. "How's your chest feeling?"
"I think I'm babying it still, but it's all healed up."
Steve nodded, one hand resting against Tony's lower ribs anyway. "Thank you, Strange. You're a miracle worker."
Steve took his hand away from Tony's chest, moving it back to working Tony's leg and making sure that his muscles were okay with the advanced healing they'd gone through. Tony watched Steve as he got completely lost in working Tony's leg and massaging the aches out of him, a furrow between his brows that Tony finally allowed himself to smooth out with the tip of his finger, "Hey, Cap, you should try to relax. I'm not the only one that needs you." Tony told him softly, trying to make the situation a little bit lighter, even if it'd cost him.
Steve leaned up, kissing Tony's lips softly and resting their foreheads together, "Right now, you're my priorities list. Nothing else there."
Tony shook his head slightly, "I don't want to be your only concern, Steve. There's a whole world out there that needs you, that deserve you, and it'll make me feel even more like I don't deserve you if you stay here with me and I'm selfish with you. Which is why I'm sending you out tonight. Pepper has some Stark Industries stuff for me to look over anyway, and it'll be boring as hell for me, so I don't even wanna think about what it'd be like for you. You should go out tonight, you're a superhero: you need to run and jump and be free."
Steve sighed, looking into Tony's eyes, "What if I don't want to?"
Tony rubbed his thumb over Steve's jaw, "I won't force you. But I think that there are other people that need your attention more than I do right now. As hard as that is to believe."
Steve smiled at Tony's grin, shaking his head, "There's no one out there that needs me like you do, Tony. There's no one that loves me like you do." Steve pressed a firm kiss to Tony's mouth, "And I need you, too. I love you, too."
A/N: Once again, thank you all so much for all the wonderful reviews and stuff. I'm sorry this wasn't as fast as the last few updates, I'm on a vacation right now and had a sudden influx of shit to do. Hope you all enjoyed, and I hope to be getting out updates a little faster, but no promises.
TTFN