A/N: I'm sure you don't care for my excuses, so I won't give them. But I'll admit: this one is pretty much a little self-indulgent piece born out of lots of good (and bad) HP fanfiction I've read lately. It picks up from the first Hogwarts AU chapter, but is set in HP-canon 1996 (both Bruce and Tony are about to start their 6th year), only with some Avengers characters substituting for the HP ones (Steve is the Boy Who Lived, Starks substitute Malfoys, Bruce sorta substitutes Neville etc.).

Would've Done Anything

"You what?!"

"I did what I had to."

"No, no, I'm pretty sure you didn't have to, why would you have to…"

"It… needed to be done, alright? I-I didn't really have a choice…"

"Of course you did! It's your life, damn it, it's…"

"I took the Dark Mark, Bruce. Deal with it."

Bruce was really thankful for the silencing charm Tony has put on their compartment before the start of this conversation, because screaming his lungs out seemed like a neat idea right about now.

Tony looked tired, and like he lost some weight. His hands were firmly clasped on his knees, back ramrod straight, face calm and a bit haughty.

When the boy sought Bruce out in his compartment on the Hogwarts Express and proceeded to proof it, claiming that they had to 'talk', Bruce knew it was going to be bad. Tony was angry, Tony was probably livid and hated Bruce, and who can blame him, really, when it was basically Bruce's fault that Howard Stark was shipped off to Azkaban little less than three months ago, after the dreadful battle in the Ministry. They did exchange some letters during the summer, of course, and Tony repeatedly assured Bruce that no-one was to blame there but Howard himself, and he would have hardly wanted his father to actually succeed in his mission, but Bruce was still weary. Family was family. Mr. Stark was harsh, and exacting, and distant, but Tony still loved him. And now Tony would hate Bruce.

It would be hard, and painful, but Bruce has managed to prepare himself for that.

He was not prepared for what Tony has actually said.

"W-when?" he managed to get out, still trying to wrap his head around the news.

"July," Tony replied quietly.

"You really… did you really want to…"

"Yes, Bruce. I really did."

"Is it… is it because…" Bruce tried, but the expression on his face was telling enough that Tony did not make him finish the sentence.

"It had nothing to do with you. It was my own choice."

"No, it, y-you couldn't, I know that!" Bruce cried out, leaping to his feet, raking both hands through his hair. "There had to be something else."

"Why the hell?" Tony asked, wrapping his hands around himself and falling back on the cushions of his seat. Bruce could be mistaken, but his expression in that moment looked a bit pained rather than pissed off. "Is it not enough that I agreed with the Dark Lord's ideals and wanted to join the ranks of his followers?"

"You don't agree with it, you can't…" Bruce shook his head in confusion.

"Are you really so sure of that?"

"Yes, otherwise we wouldn't be having this conversation! Is it… is it because of your father? I know he was pushing you, but…"

"No-one's pushed me anywhere."

"…but he can't force you. Can he?"

"He didn't need to force me. He's my father. I ought to obey him."

"It never stopped you before."

"Not in a matter as important as this."

Bruce fell on his seat once again, with a dry chuckle. "He never approved of me though, did he?" he said, looking pointedly out of the compartment window. "And after… after I've been bitten, he forbade you to even talk to me, didn't he? 'Do not associate yourself with that animal, Antonius' I believe were his words." Without him fully realizing it, Bruce's hand was now squeezing his left shoulder, where jagged purple scars still marred his skin under the layers of clothing. "You never saw fit to obey him on that account, and I thought it was… for me it was… But I guess it wasn't all that important to you. Not as this is."

"It's not… the same," Tony murmured.

"How, pray tell, this isn't the exact same thing?"

"It just isn't!" Tony leapt to his feet, his arms still circled protectively around him. "Hell, I don't have to explain myself to you! I made my decision, and I went through with it, and if you don't like it you can just sod right off!"

Bruce was shaking his head absentmindedly and wringing his hands, scraping them hard with his nails. "All right… all right, I'll try to understand…"

"No you won't, you can't understand, you fucking moron!" Tony lashed out, his angry voice now tinted heavily with desperation. "Y-you don't know, you don't know what it's like, to have this constantly on your shoulders! To have all this honour, all this responsibility before your blood, your name, your family…"

"Yes, of course, how would I ever know anything about having a family, right?" Bruce sneered, and moved to stand face to face with the other boy.

"I did not mean it that way…" Tony sighed, and took a small step back, all anger suddenly gone from his face.

"Yeah? What other way did you mean it then, Tony? Really now, I guess I do have it easy! And even if my parents were still around, they were only Muggles, and that's barely even human these days, isn't it?"

"Bruce…"

"I am barely human, am I not? Maybe I really am no longer able to comprehend the intricacies of human reasoning…"

"No, just… I mean, yes, shit, I mean, shut up! I'm not trying to…"

"That's just it, you're not trying at all! Just go with the flow, do whatever Daddy tells you!"

"Don't you dare…" Tony whispered.

"Or what? You'll kill me? Like your pals did with Buchanan Barnes in our fourth year?"

"Don't be ridiculous!"

"I'm not going to let you succumb to whatever bizarre delusions of grandeur those monsters have been feeding you!"

"And I'm not going to stand here and be judged by a filthy fucking mudblood!"

Bruce's face went rigid at that, but an ugly twist of his lips distorted its careful blankness mere moments later. "Yeah," he rasped, taking his glasses off with slightly trembling hands, and started to slowly clean them with a hem of his sweater. "Yeah, you're… you're right, Tony. Or is it Antonius now?" His voice was calm, low, and almost sickeningly sweet. "I'm sorry. Wouldn't want to address you improperly."

"Shit, Bruce that's not what I…"

"It's okay."

"Look, Bruce…"

"So, how was the initiation for you?" Bruce's eyes focused sharply on Tony's now, and the other boy was rather shocked to see that the predominant emotion in them was fear. Slightly hysterical, barely controlled fear was something Tony Stark has least expected from his friend after the kind of news he'd dumped on him. Anger, blind hatred, certainly. Not… not this. "I mean, I bet there were black robes and ugly masks and branding and stuff, but what else?" Bruce went on, that sneering curve still on his lips. "You had to torture a Muggle? Kill them? Or is that too low-grade, and you needed a mudblood for that?"

Tony wanted to reach out to Bruce, but thought better of that. "Bruce, please…"

"How was it? Got your kick?" the other boy pressed, once again quickly working himself up into a state.

"What? Hell no, listen…"

"Do you need some more, to, I don't know, practice or something? Accepting volunteers?"

"Bruce, stop!"

"Are you going to…" his voice hitched, as his eyes fell to the floor. He heaved a shuddering breath before putting his glasses back on his nose. "You know, I can go to Headmaster with this when we arrive, are you going to stop me?"

"I'll ask you not to," Tony said quietly, calmly. This question he was expecting.

"And if I… I can't simply… let you, Tony, I really can't. And if, i-if I have t-to fight you…" Bruce stammered rapidly, right before taking his wand out of his pocket and pointing it at Tony. His face was resolute and rigid, but the tip of the wand was shaking, even caught in white-knuckled grip of his hand.

Tony threw his hands up in the air. "Merlin, Bruce, put that down, I am not going to fight you!" He was a bit frightened himself now. Bruce never lifted a wand if he was not intent on using it.

"Why not?" the boy cried out, voice tinged strongly with pain.

Tony looked away, blinking rapidly. "Look, Bruce, I'm sorry. For calling you… that word."

There was a long, anxious moment of silence before Bruce's face seemed to sag in resignation, and his hand has finally lowered. He shook his head, pocketed the wand and got to his seat again, shrinking into a corner, bringing his knees close to him.

"No, you were… right. In the beginning," he murmured softly, pain and confusion still clear in his features. "I don't understand at all. I've been in this world for more than five years now, and I still understand no more than on the day we met on this very train for the first time. You said we were gonna be pals," he added, barely above a whisper.

He looks just like on that day too, Tony thought with a start. Small, haggard and lost.

"You're my best friend, Bruce," Tony pleaded, his voice inexplicably hoarse and unsteady.

"You're a Death Eater, Tony," came a dull reply from the corner.

Tony remained silent. He tried to remind himself that that was what he expected. That it was inevitable, really. That, all things considered, it was probably for the best, and the whole thing could have gone much, much worse.

Still, as he sat on his side of the compartment, alternating between watching the passing Scottish scenery and stealing glances of his former friend, he felt as if the tense quiet between them singed at his throat like smoke. A little longer, and he'd start to choke.

"Are you going to go to Headmaster?" he asked at last, if only to say something, to spare himself the painful suffocation.

Bruce flinched, and clenched his eyes tightly shut. Tony could hear the other boy breathing deeply, in and out, in an even, careful way of someone desperately trying to stay in control. In and out, in and out, and for a moment there Tony got so caught up in that oh-so familiar rhythm that he had barely managed to catch the quiet, impassionate words over it.

"They attacked us, Tony," Bruce whispered, looking straight ahead but seeing nothing. "In our own home. My Aunt's a cripple, it's sheer dumb luck that she's even alive at all, and I am… what I am now." His voice went even quieter. "And you've joined them."

Tony thought of playing the 'arrogant and unapologetic' card again, but knew that he had no strength anymore to pull it off. Couldn't look Bruce in the eye and say "deal with it". Couldn't look Bruce in the eye at all.

He didn't blame the other boy, of course. He could never. Hell, he still remembered picking up the Daily Prophet that one day, summer after the Tri-Wizard Tournament, a familiar name catching his eye in the article about a Death Eater raid on a Muggle neighborhood, foiled by the Aurors, who have managed to arrive just in time. 'Just in time'. As if.

So no, of course he didn't even hope for Bruce to forgive, or to accept. But he also found, to his shame, that the thought of losing Bruce's friendship, his trust, his respect and his company filled Tony with cold, nagging sort of pain that threatened to blow into an outright panic at the slightest provocation.

Maybe that was the reason he found himself blurting out quite unexpectedly, "They were going to kill Mum if I didn't."

"What?"

"Or Father. Or me," Tony went on, failure to censor himself evident in his wide open eyes. "Or they would've done… something. I don't know what, something horrible."

What was he saying? He didn't plan on saying this. It was most certainly not a part of his plan on what exactly to share with Bruce regarding his change of status. A plan on how to push Bruce away from him for the boy's own good.

"How do you know?"

"Profe… Another Death Eater told me. A friend of the family," Tony answered with some reluctance.

"Maybe they were just… just bluffing? He was just pushing you to join?" Bruce's voice was still small and dull, but he was speaking.

"No, he… I got a feeling that he actually wanted me to refuse to join, come what may. But I can't," Tony sighed, rubbing at the bridge of his nose. In for a penny… "Father's fucked up. Big time. Like, 'he's probably better off in Azkaban now than not' big. But the thing is, someone had to take his place in the inner circle." He grimaced, "I had. The D-dark Lord wants to… I've been given an assignment, a mission I better not bloody fail, or else…"

"Else what?"

"Else it's going to get even worse."

Bruce frowned. Tony didn't know whether it was a good sign or bad, since Bruce didn't frown when he was confused. He frowned when he was thinking hard about creating a concentration level in a Draught of Peace that would be strong enough to serve its purpose while also diluted enough to not cause rapid addiction with regular use. He frowned when he searched for a way to make things work.

"What is that mission?" the boy finally asked.

"I don't really… want to talk about it right now," Tony replied, hiding his eyes. "Not right now."

Preferably not ever. The mere thought still sent his head reeling.

Bruce was shaking his head again. "Shit, Tony…" he said under his breath, raking a hand through his hair. If possible, he looked even smaller now. But he also looked Tony right in the eye, firm and steady, and there was still pain there, but no more fear. And that was what did it.

"I can't… you know I can't really say I was never… prejudiced against Muggles and Muggleborn, Bruce," Tony was talking all of a sudden, trying to hold Bruce's gaze, words coming out quick and a bit jumbled, "but you must also know that I would never…" He winced, and wanted to stop, and found that he couldn't. "I just don't know what to do. I want to get out, you know, I want to get the fuck out of this mess, of this war, but I don't know how, or if I can, or if I have a right to, and I just…"

"I know."

"Sometimes I just…"

Tony wanted to find the strength to say it, to push the words out of his mouth, to make Bruce understand just how tired and anxious and scared he felt, trapped in his duties and his lies, but one look at the other boy made him realize that Bruce did. And also that Tony did not want to push him away, however selfish that made him.

"We'll get through this," Bruce said suddenly, visibly uncomfortable with saying something he barely believed in.

"Don't."

"Don't what?"

"Don't try to sound optimistic," Tony smirked. "It weirds me out."

"Would you rather I said we're all doomed and there's no hope?" Bruce said dryly.

"Well, that'd certainly be more in character for you."

Tony regretted the comment. It clearly made Bruce think of other things that were in character for him, and there was one of the most distinct…

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry I yelled at you, that I said those things."

…his tendency to apologize whether it was called for or not.

"You kidding? I was seriously expecting you to jinx me to death the second you heard the words 'Dark Mark' leave my mouth."

"Why did you tell me then?" Bruce asked, confused.

Tony shrugged. He wasn't quite sure how to truthfully answer that question without coming off as some sort of needy child, so he settled on a safe response. "You would've found out eventually."

Bruce nodded absentmindedly. He was still huddled in his corner, looking out the window, arms clasped around his knees. He may not lash out at Tony anymore, may not be afraid of him, but it would be a long time before he would actually be more or less all right with the situation. Time spent in curled up like that, away from people, one on one with his thoughts, like Bruce is used to dealing with most of his problems.

Tony wanted to distract his friend (were they still friends?) from his gloom, and so decided to adopt a method tested by time and practice. Putting a hand in his pocket, he took out a small silvery package out of it, ripped it open and reached it out to Bruce.

"Want some?" he smiled, waiting patiently for Bruce to make up his mind and finally pick a lone jelly bean out of the pack. That was good. That was a good sign.

"Are you… Are you okay?" Tony asked sometime later, when it became obvious that Bruce was not going to initiate any kind of contact between them, seemingly content to just watch the green hills of Scotland pass them by without a single word. Also, he really needed to know the answer to that question.

"My best friend is a Death Eater," Bruce said quietly, eyes never leaving the window.

"But I'm still your best friend, right?" Tony tried to smirk, more than a little bit of nervousness in his voice.

There was a pause, and then Bruce was speaking again, even quieter.

"I would've done anything to protect my Mum."

The rest of the ride was spent in silence.

It was the beginning of their sixth year at Hogwarts. As far as beginnings went, it was all right.

A/N: so there it is. I hope you have enjoyed this feat of blatant cheating on my part, and please leave a review if you're so inclined.

Next time in Kaleidoscope: Fairy Tales!