Author's Notes: Yes, I am aware of the irony of naming the second chapter "Three." Roll with it.

Phil recommended Stark for inclusion in the Avengers Initiative. He did not mention he was still sending daily emails to Pepper. He did not mention she was texting him pictures all the time now. Tony, the robots, Stark Industries.

He definitely did not mention that sometimes, Stark was smiling at the camera in these pictures. Stark knew Pepper was in contact with him. And he was encouraging it.

Phil didn't know what to do with that, so he did what he always did: buried himself in work. He pushed through the mountain of paperwork that was the investigation of Stark Industries, made the necessary arrests, sent five people to Gitmo, filed all the files, and moved on to his next assignment. He and Pepper stayed in touch, and Stark still knew about it, but he was busy. They were busy. Stark Industries had started gearing up for some high tech CONFAB in the next year or so, which looked like a massive ego project. Phil didn't say anything about it. Pepper said something about it every other day.

It was months later when Phil got an email from an address he didn't recognize. And it was sent to his personal account, not his SHIELD one. Which was odd.

There were no attachments, so he opened it up.

"Agent," was the salutation, and instantly Phil knew. Tony had sent him this email. Why on earth would Stark be contacting him?

As it turned out, the message was a long, rambling monster that mostly seemed to be explaining why Stark had decided to blow off the cover story and come forward as Iron Man. With the occasional digression into particle physics, advanced computer science, linear algebra, or all three. But the bits he could follow were the explanation.

"It all comes down to this: Pepper told me I should apologize, because I made more work for you, but I can't because I'm not sorry. Rhodey is my best friend and he's a good man. He has a family, and a kid, and a job. Pepper is a good woman. Hell, I only met you once, but I knew right off that you were a good man. And you saved Pepper's life, which makes you an incredibly good one in my book. You probably have a family, too. You're lucky. They're lucky. And I…am not a good person. At all. I'm not a serial killer or anything. But I'm a drunk who occasionally invents things that either revolutionize technology or blow up and I never know beforehand which is which. But I made this suit. And I used it to help people. And I'm not a good man but I did something good. So I was standing there thinking that I could keep everything secret and never have a chance to do something as good as that again. Or I could change everything. My whole life. People wouldn't just know what I did, they'd start expecting things. Good things. Things I'd have to live up to, or at least try. And maybe I'm still a drunk who invents things that sometimes blow up, but that isn't all anymore. And that's all I would have been if I had stuck to the cover story. And the only thing I had to do to change was to say four words.

"If you could fix your whole life in four words, wouldn't you do it?

"But I'll pay you some kind of comp if you feel like you deserve it."

Phil stared at this email for a long time. It was raw and rambling and Stark had probably been drunk when he wrote it. But it was also sincere and probably really hard to write for someone who seemed to live nearly exclusively in his own head.

So he wrote a brief reply.

"Stark,

"One, do not offer to pay any government employee any sort of compensation for doing or failing to do their job. This is known as a bribe and is generally frowned upon by most law enforcement organizations, including SHIELD.

"Two, Pepper once informed me, and I quote, 'Tony is worth every second of trouble he puts you through.' I admit the amount of paperwork you added to my workload was considerable. However, Pepper strikes me as intelligent, so I think her judgment there is probably sound.

"Three, I'm an only child and all my parents have died. I have no family."

He sent the email quickly, before he could talk himself into deleting the third point.

Things went back to normal. Except that now Stark texted him almost as often as Pepper did. Stark always called him "Agent." He didn't know if that meant Stark didn't know his name, didn't care, or if this was his way of teasing. So Phil didn't say anything about it and he went back to work.

Phil kept seeing things everywhere that he wanted to take pictures of and send to them. The construction helicarrier (classified), the planning work going into the Avengers Initiative (very classified), potential uses for arc reactor technology (Stark already knew about that). For the first time in a long time, he was frustrated that his job required him to keep so many secrets. Tony and Pepper were letting him look into their lives. He wanted to be able to do the same thing in return.

He definitely did not report any of this to SHIELD, and he didn't mention it at work. Pepper and Stark, whatever they were to him, belonged to him. Professionally speaking, Tony was something of a risk. He did not follow the rules. But he listened, sometimes, to the people he trusted, and it seemed like Phil was becoming one of those people. Phil didn't tell anyone because something in him rebelled at the idea of putting his SHIELD manipulation tactics to work on Stark. And SHIELD would want him to do that, here and there. Just gentle nudges, they would say. And it would be true. They would never ask him for anything that big or that awful. That wasn't their way. If you demanded more than what an asset could give, you would loose that asset. So they would not ask for anything unthinkable. But they would ask him. And he would do it because he was a good agent. He didn't want to put that possibility on the table.

So he kept quiet. He had already given SHIELD every other piece of his life. This part was his. Maybe they knew anyway. But he didn't think so, and he certainly wasn't going to just give them information. Let them get it the hard way, spying on him the way they did all their employees. He and Stark and Pepper had a weird balance, but it was working and that was good enough for now. So Phil kept working and sent messages about what he could tell them (anything that wasn't work-related, mostly).

After 9/11, SHIELD had abandoned the idea of a stationary headquarters. It had taken many years to get Congress to release any kind of funding for it, but they had finally gotten their plans for a helicarrier approved. It was a totally new concept, and Fury was flogging the contractors through building it. In the meantime, they were in an awkward transition. Coulson worked out of an office that was half-underground (literally—the bottom of his one window lined right up with the grass) at the Pentagon. And it was actually cherry blossom season, of all the incredible clichés, when he heard Tony Stark's voice coming down the hallway towards his office.

He was making a lot of noise, the way he always did, so Phil poked his head out of his office, noting the other SHIELD agents doing the same thing from their offices all up and down the hall.

Only Stark seemed to see him right away. "Agent!"

Since every single person now looking into the hallway had responded to that address at some point within the last 24 hours, everyone looked at him curiously.

Stark rolled his eyes. "You may be agents, but his name is Agent." He leveled one finger right at Phil's face. "All the rest of you government minions can return to whatever boring thing you were doing."

There were eyerolls all up and down the hall, but no one seemed overly upset. Possibly because after you'd spoken to the sorts of people SHIELD arrested, "government minion" did not rate as an insult.

"Him. This man is the liason."

Stark's escort, a probationary agent who was fantastically beautiful and had probably only escaped Stark's blandishments by being morning moiety, gave Phil an apologetic look and explained, "Though Stark Industries no longer makes weapons, they have begun producing armor, vests, boots, and various other support equipment for use by soldiers and agents in the field. SHIELD has several contracts with them. Mr. Stark has apparently grown tired of dealing with our requests separately and feels that things would be streamlined if SHIELD assigned a dedicated liaison with their company. He is specifically requesting you."

Phil thought back to the case currently on his desk. Children, all younger than nine, being kidnapped from all over the US. Evidence suggested a trafficking ring. The methods being used suggested perpetrators with superpowers of some kind. The FBI had been very reluctant to turn the case over, but SHIELD had finally wrangled it away from them.

"No thank you, Stark," Phil said quietly.

And, was it his imagination, or did Stark look hurt at that reply? "Come on now, Agent. I promise it's a great perk package."

Phil wasn't sure how to phrase this next bit without giving their…whatever it was away. "I'm sure that both the work and the people I'd work with are wonderful," he answered, still with a bland tone, "but I don't want to leave the job I have."

Because he didn't, dammit. He was good at it, and he saved people and he dealt with the crazy that nobody else knew about. Tony actually looked like he understood that. The hurt expression came back, but it was lessened and layered under sadness and resignation. Phil almost changed his mind, but Stark stuck a hand out and said, "Ah well. It was a nice idea anyway."

That sounded like goodbye. Phil didn't want that at all. He took Stark's hand, but he held it, firm and certain in his grip. "Of course, if you or Miss Potts encounter any situations that require SHIELD involvement, you are expected to contact me. I am the official case agent for all matters involving Stark Industries, Tony Stark, and the Iron Man project." And then he let go of Stark's hand.

That got him that brilliant smile. "I'll keep it in mind, Agent." He and his handler swept out.

Phil was troubled by this strange encounter the rest of the day. While it had been undeniably good to see Stark, the whole scenario had been strange. Something was wrong, and Phil didn't know how to pin down what it was. But, since he was the official case agent for all matters involving Tony Stark, it was easy enough to order some extra surveillance.

He was pleased to note that his communications with Pepper and Tony were not revealed by the department snooping. He wasn't sure how those two hid his texts, but whatever they did with them, it was good. Their whatever-it-was was still his secret.

As for what was wrong with Stark, that was—unfortunately—easy to work out. The arc reactor in his chest was powered by palladium, to which long-term exposure was highly toxic and quickly fatal. While his blood was, at present, 97.6% healthy, and while Stark had taken on a rather ingenious diet to counteract the effects of the palladium poisoning, this was a temporary solution. His blood would become more and more toxic, and would do so faster and faster over time. Until, finally, it would overwhelm him.

Tony Stark was dying.

Phil appended this information to his file and flagged Director Fury on it. He debated, for a long time, telling Pepper about it, but finally chose not to. Tony should tell her. It wasn't his business.

But now he was keeping a secret from Pepper (or at least, keeping a secret from her that was relevant to her) and he realized that he didn't like it.