Long may you run (part 5)

The next day is an emergency.

As soon as Tony wakes up, JARVIS informs him that he's just become aware of a huge amount of SI-made weapons in Pakistan; it was hidden so far, but due to some escalating conflicts in the area whoever has the arms decided to make use of them.

Tony drinks a smoothie, he doesn't think he could swallow anything else, and then talks to Happy who already knows everything, thanks to JARVIS. After Tony's in the suit and already over the ocean, he has JARVIS send a message regarding Iron Man's activity for today to Fury.

The flight is long and boring more than anything; Tony sleeps through some of it, letting JARVIS pilot the suit and trusting him completely, and when he's awake they talk about Ijon and Steve and Pepper, and a little bit about Tony's plans of upgrading Howard's big arc reactor.

Sometime before Tony lands he gets the thumbs up from S.H.I.E.L.D.; they informed the local authorities of what is going to happen and why. The whole world knows Iron Man very well now, thanks to the nuke story, and they knows he's a hero, so at least Tony doesn't have to run away from local law enforcement after he's done his job. That's a nice change from what happened too many times at the beginning of Iron Man's activity.

The whole op is easy: Tony incapacitates the dozen or so terrorists with tranq darts, transports them away to a police station, goes back to the mountains where the weapons are, and makes them blow up and turn into unusable pieces and dust in a completely controlled way.

Before he leaves the country, he gives a statement to policemen to make it easier for S.H.I.E.L.D. to sort out, and then he flies back, enjoying chasing sunset. He can feel the adrenaline flowing through his body and doesn't manage to keep a smile off his face; it feels so good. Being needed, doing the right things. It's what makes him feel so alive.

Since Tony is already in the mood, he decides that it's the right time to fulfill his promise to Fury. He comes home for an hour after he's flown across the ocean, takes a shower, eats some leftover lunch stuff, and takes off again.

JARVIS did a perfect job at hacking all the info Tony needed, and with the A.I.'s abilities in addition to S.H.I.E.L.D.'s, finding the pair that stole the Chitauri gun is really easy. Tony's had a week to monitor them and their newly established routines, so he knows they will be having breakfast in one of the boring Florida bars by the beach.

Tony hovers over the area in his invisible suit, waiting for the couple to leave the café and go back home so that he can confront them. He sits on one of the terrace's steps leading straight onto a beach, disengages the reflection panels – there isn't anyone but the couple in the vicinity – and waits.

It isn't long before they step out of the house, holding hands and laughing and looking sickeningly sweet together, and pretty innocent for a pair of thieves. Tony is sure it's them, he had JARVIS scan the house and J detected the alien weapon, but it's hard to believe it in the strong southern sun.

They must have even harder time believing that Iron Man is sitting casually in their backyard, judging by their faces.

'Before you do anything hasty, let me know you that I'm authorized to tranq you and bring you in by force,' Tony says before they can take a step. They wisely don't move.

'Is this –' the woman asks, glancing at her boyfriend and frowning disbelievingly.

'Iron Man on our terrace? I think it is,' the man admits and moves his hand to grab something from under his shirt, Tony can guess he had a gun behind the belt. He stands up abruptly and the man freezes in mid-movement.

'I wouldn't do that if I were you,' he states, taking a few steps ahead until he's right in front of them. 'Are you enjoying Florida?'

'Yeah, we are.'

'Apart from the mosquitos –' the woman starts, but Tony cuts in.

'You haven't unpacked your bags. You don't even own swimwear. You have pictures of your old home everywhere. You don't enjoy Florida. Now, do you miss New York?'

'How do you –'

'Don't tell him anything!' the man exclaims, not letting her finish. 'We don't have to say anything –'

'I know everything I need to know about you already,' Tony states, tilting his head slightly. 'But I come with an offer –'

'We're not going to prison!'

'No, please,' she adds, holding the man's hand tightly. 'See us? We can't go to prison, we –'

'You might be going to prison if you don't agree to my offer,' Tony informs them easily. 'You wanted to be this century's Bonny and Clyde and that's okay, I can understand that, it's romantic – but I have a good offer for you, I think. No talking about prison. You're good at hiding and good at engineering – don't interrupt,' Tony says when the woman opens her mouth. 'As you surely know I work with S.H.I.E.L.D. and I am fairly sure you know a thing or two about them. They want you in.'

'S.H.I.E.L.D. –'

'They want us –' she looks at her boyfriend with a frown.

'Both of you. Working for them. You'll give back what you stole and come to work for S.H.I.E.L.D. They pay really well, in case you're wondering.'

'And if not –'

'I take you to the police with the evidence of your crimes.'

'We'll work for S.H.I.E.L.D.,' the woman quickly says, glancing at the man who nods sharply. 'Thank god I'll be freed from the mosquitos,' she murmurs as Iron Man shows them to go inside and collect their things. JARVIS sent a message to S.H.I.E.L.D. as soon as they said yes.

Tony has a feeling that they'll enjoy their new lives very much.

August 1st, there is a team meeting. They discuss all July's missions and activities and decide that now that they have their own HQ, they can have meetings whenever it works for the whole team, without asking S.H.I.E.L.D. for space for training. Just another day or two and the building will be ready and everyone who is still working will be gone. They praise Nate for Ijon, who is exactly what they wanted, according to Steve's words. Tony is secretly beaming, knowing that JARVIS can hear every single word the team says.

The next day Tony has to deal with overprotective Pepper who has just come back from a trip to China and feels like shouting at him for what he did in Pakistan.

'It was different watching Iron Man doing all those things when I didn't know it was you inside,' she explains, half-scared and half-angry. 'Why does it always have to be you?'

'I ask myself he same question,' Tony replies before he can process the words.

'Tony,' Pepper whispers and hugs him tightly. 'You're fine,' she adds and it ends up with Pepper nestled into his thin body sobbing for the rest of the evening. Tony stays strong for her, even though it's damn hard. He's done his fair share of crying back in December, when he learned about the prognosis, and Happy was there to help him. Now he has to help Pepper with accepting the inevitable; he just hates seeing her hurt.

On August 5th, with everyone present, the Avengers have their usual monthly training. First Sunday is still a standing fixed date. It's the first time they're using the Avengers HQ's training room and it's as perfect as possible.

The session goes well, Tony is taking advantage of still feeling as good as possible – he starts the next radiation cycle tomorrow – and doesn't pull his punches at all. He doesn't hurt anyone, of course, it's pretty hard to do that with his teammates, but it feels good, to let go of the tension.

When everyone is cleaned up afterwards, they have a celebratory dinner: the teams working on the swimming pool and Quinjet landing pad left the place yesterday, so the renovation is officially done.

'To Iron Man, because none of this would be so great without him,' Steve says before they drink a toast. Tony frowns behind the faceplate, wondering what exactly Cap has in mind. 'I've been living here for some time now, you know that,' Steve adds sheepishly, looking around the room and smiling at everyone. 'I've had a lot of arguments with the renovating teams that you probably don't know about – I had to make sure everything was done exactly as we wanted. You know how it is when you leave people without supervision, especially people who answer to Director Fury,' he adds and everyone chuckles. 'Iron Man made sure I didn't die of starvation and always kept me on my toes. Even if he's not living here, I'm sure you'll experience that sometime.'

Tony nods to that; he's visited Steve a few times at night, when he was pretty sure Steve couldn't fall asleep, and they talked for hours. Tony is definitely not planning on stopping the visits now that everyone has moved in. The will just have to take them somewhere more private. Ijon can help with that.

The next morning Tony spends a few hours in the clinic, first receiving his usual radiation and then a blood transfusion – Levy wants to make sure he's fine, as his RBC count was exactly on the lower limit and likely to drop during the two week cycle. Tony promises her he'll look out for fever or any other side effects and when he's home, he swallows an antiemetic and goes to sleep. He didn't realize he was that tired; the training and party yesterday wore him out.

On Tuesday Tony feels much better and it's a lucky coincidence, because Fury ask Iron Man to come over to the upstate research facility and get to know the newest member of R&D team, Agent Benjamin Pollack, who keeps thanking Iron Man for bringing him and his girlfriend in.

Tony ends up spending all the week's evenings cycling and all the afternoons doing science.

The man turns out to be funny and clever and it's as nice to work with him as it was to talk with Marcel; they are the same kind of person, even if there's such a big age difference.

Bruce comes by a few times and they exchange some words about Marcel and Bruce's gamma radiation research. Tony feels like flinching every time he hears the word, radiation, but he manages not to.

Nate comes by to check on Ijon and the whole installation on Thursday morning, straight after he leaves the hospital since he's feeling fine. There are only three people inside; Phil with his physiotherapist are at the swimming pool are and Clint is at the door as soon as Nate approaches the building, certainly informed by Ijon that someone is coming.

'Good to see you finally,' Clint signs wide a wide grin. They don't have the occasion to talk too often, true, and most of the time since the attack Clint was preoccupied with his boyfriend's wellbeing. 'You look like you haven't slept much recently,' he adds and Tony rolls his eyes, thank you, he knows how he looks. The blood transfusion helped with headaches and dizziness, but the feeling of exhaustion creeping up Tony's bones is ever-present

'Thanks for the compliment,' Tony signs back, making a face at Clint. 'You, on the contrary, look better. Good to see that.'

'Having Phil here is everything I need,' Clint admits and Tony smiles at that. Clint doesn't care at all if someone calls him sentimental or cheesy, he's never been afraid of admitting his feeling towards Phil. 'Wanted to thank you for you know what,' Clint signs before leading Nate into the HQ's control room.

Tony knows perfectly well what: he's made sure Ijon recognizes ASL so that Clint can go around sans hearing aids without a problem. It was a bit tricky, there wasn't much time to figure it out or teach the A.I. manually as Tony did with JARVIS, but everything is apparently working like it should.

After he's made sure everything is fine with Ijon and the whole security system – he didn't really need to since JARVIS has control over everything, but no one can know about that, so Tony has to pretend – Clint asks Nate to go out for ice cream with him.

'Phil will be with Aiden for another hour,' Clint explains with a hopeful look on his face. 'And I don't fancy meeting new people. I thought it would be nice, since it's so hot today. We all need some time to relax.'

'Why not,' Tony signs and that's how he and Clint end up in a nearby park, eating Italian gelato and discussing S.H.I.E.L.D. gossip. Tony has to admit it's a nice change from his usual activities, even if it ends up with him agreeing to something before he can think more about it.

'Code red, Happy,' Tony rasps out as soon as the door close behind him.

'What the hell, boss?'

'We've got an emergency,' Tony explains, looking around the room with an analyzing eye. It looks kind of expensive and big for one person, but it should pass as a normal thing. 'Clint insisted on coming over and Bruce texted me he will, too, if he can, so what was I supposed to say? They're coming to Nate, in case you're wondering,' Tony clarifies, bringing his hand up to his head to ruffle the hair that is not there. Even after all those months he still does that.

'So what's the problem? I disappear, of course, none of them can see you with me and so on, but –'

'I don't know what to do when people visit. Or Nate doesn't know –'

'Don't make it more confusing than it already is, Tony –'

'No, I'm being serious here,' Tony cuts in and Happy looks at him with a frown. 'I know what Tony Stark would do perfectly, I know what Iron Man could do, if people came to his house, but that's easy, he's the kind of a mysterious fella that keeps silent and has this faceplate – but Nate? He's supposed to be normal. I can chat with people in corridor and during coffee runs but –'

'You are being silly now,' Happy cuts in, looking at Tony with slight annoyance from across the room. 'You talk about them the way people talk about friends, I know you didn't go to kindergarten but maybe you can grasp the idea? Buy mini candy bars and let them get high on sugar, offer them coffee, let them stare at the interior of your flat. Show them your computer room, you're supposed to be an IT guy, or the screen we've turned the wall in the living room into, I'm sure they'll want to come for movies again. That kind of thing.'

'It's really just that? They won't… require something?'

'Pinky swear, boss – gosh, you're dumb when you're nervous –'

'You know I didn't plan for Nate to have friends. Nothing more than neighbors and a few more people to exchange greetings with. And this – ugh. But okay. Mini candy bars, that's the idea of the day.'

'I try,' Happy laughs and disappears into the kitchen area. It means Tony needs to make a salad and some tea – and the dinner will be ready soon.

Clint and Bruce come over the next evening and Tony has everything under control; the apartment is cleaned from anything suspicious and Tony makes sure no one will enter the workshop area. Happy is out for the evening, meeting up with one of his friends, and Nate greets his friends with homemade mac&cheese and root beer; all of the Avengers like root beer. That's good, it just makes things easier.

Tony decides to entertain Clint and Bruce with JARVIS. Well, not exactly JARVIS, not in the whole, but after a long discussion with the A.I. Nate pretends to be working on a system that would perfect translating ASL into written sentences and then voice them in a way that would be smooth and natural. JARVIS can already do that and Tony figures it could be a great thing, to have something like that on the market. It would help so many people with everyday life.

Hmm. He has to tell Pepper all about that.

'The program,' JARVIS says what Tony signs; he used the word program on purpose, not letting anyone know that he has the most amazing A.I. of the whole planet in his little Manhattan apartment, 'can also translate ASL into other sign languages. So far, we've perfected BSL and French sign language.'

'It feels so strange to talk to you like that,' Bruce comments, gesturing at Tony who stands in front of one of JARVIS' cameras. 'Different. But interesting – and if you could make this commercially available, it would be a breakthrough.'

'Always happy to give you science feels, Bruce,' JARVIS comments for Nate in his British voice and Tony turns around. 'How about the dessert?'

'With pleasure,' Clint signs back and they sit on the sofa. There is a peach pie and mini candy bars, just like Happy said, and they have a good time watching a movie.

It's so comfortable that it's scary; when Clint and Bruce leave, Tony swears to himself that he's not going to agree to a meeting like that again. Even if they insist. He really can't let himself mix Nate into Iron Man's life and vice versa. Some things are more important than fake friendships.

Tony takes a step back from all the social activities that include the Avengers and decided to spend the second week of radiation resting and working on his personal projects; he informs Fury that Iron Man can't come over to play with R&D and only appears on one training session the Avengers have. Luckily no one needs Nate Rives at the moment.

Pepper comes over a few times, she's in New York for the rest of the month, finally done with all the business trips. She makes Tony eat and goes with him to the big workshop. Tony shows her all the suits he has.

'I'm glad you have all this backup, Tony,' she says when they are done with the sightseeing and Tony pours them both some coke over ice.

'I need to figure out what to do with it – later,' Tony replies, trying out how much he can say. Pepper smiles sadly and gives him an almost too long hug, but she doesn't cry. That's good. Tony is happy to see her dealing with the mess he created.

Next Monday Tony is in the clinic for another blood transfusion and Levy asks if he bought the bike. The subject simply didn't come up earlier.

'I went to Randy's like you told me to and I got myself a midnight blue Cervélo,' he says enthusiastically. 'Cycling is more fun than I expected.'

'I knew you'd like it,' Levy smiles and closes her file. 'How about we go for a ride? I heard you visited some of the Brooklyn's finest. I'm sure there are some interesting places I can show you.'

'Sound good,' Tony agrees. 'Which day works for you?'

'Saturday would be the best.'

'Sure thing. Text me with time and place,' Tony says and gets up. 'See you then,' he says and leaves. It's a good thing that he's meeting with Annik in the afternoon and they're going to a park with the usual three toddlers; the rest of the kids are at summer school on weekday mornings.

Nate meets with Annik one more time that week and says he's sorry he can't come on Saturday. It's not a problem, he knows, but he always feels a bit guilty.

Levy really knows some strange places that Tony didn't know about. They eat knedlíky and then visit some weird thrift stores where Tony buys a few little trinkets for Pepper and a vintage radio for Steve; he knows Cap surrounds himself with rather modern things, for someone born in twenties, but he has a feeling that Cap will love the radio.

On their way back, there is a stop for Persian sharbat and enjoy the cool drink in the shade of one of Brooklyn's small parks.

Tony could get used to this.

When he comes back home, JARVIS tells him that Steve left a message.

'Play it for me, J,' Tony says, leaving the bike in its usual place by the door, next to Happy's Cannondale. He puts away the things he bought carefully and takes the clothes off, listening to Cap's worried voice. Maybe it was little unfair to Iron Man's only friend, disappearing like that; they've seen each other only once within the last two weeks.

Steve says he's like to just talk, if it's possible. He mentions Tony's right to have his private life hidden a few times, but it just makes Tony feel more guilty.

'Send Cap a message for me, J,' Tony asks he A.I. as he steps into the shower. 'Tonight, roof of the HQ, midnight.'

'Done, sir – I will order pizza.'

'You read my mind,' Tony sighs, gesturing at JARVIS to start the water.

'A word from you saying that you're fine would be enough, Iron Man,' Steve greets Tony with a mixture of amusement and worry in his voice. 'We didn't really have to meet, I mean, I appreciate this, but I don't want to distract you from –'

'It's fine,' Tony cuts in before Steve starts a spiral of endless apologies, like he does sometimes. 'I wanted the meeting. I've been a terrible friend recently. I apologize for that – I missed meeting with you, too. Unique perspective,' Tony adds and Steve's frown is replaced with a knowing smirk.

'I'm starting to get used to things how they are nowadays.'

'You'll always look at everything differently, Steve. An old-time artist's eye. Don't sell yourself short,' Tony says and just then Steve's phone buzzes faintly.

'Excuse me,' he says and takes out the cell, only to look back at Iron Man's face again. 'Midnight pizza?'

'I know you,' Tony laughs and JARVIS makes it sound soft. Steve rolls his eyes and disappears downstairs; he's back five minutes later with a steaming paper box in his arms. 'Chicken BBQ. Though you might feel like it.'

'It's perfect,' Steve declares and stuffs a piece into his mouth. Tony watches him eat and wonders for a fraction of second how it would be if he didn't have to hide – but then he shakes his head and pushes the thoughts out of his head.

'What do you want to ask?' Tony questions a few moments later because Steve is staring at him. Not ostentatiously, but he is staring.

'Are you okay?'

'I am fine,' Tony replies quickly, then closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. 'Why?'

'That time with Bruce – when he told you to take a day off – and then you told Director you won't be around for some time and I only say you for the training. I was worried. But you know that already,' Tony nods. 'Are you really okay?'

'I am, Cap,' Tony assures Steve, feeling only slightly guilty for the lie. He can't share the truth with anyone. He wouldn't want to, either – too many people are concerned with him as it is. He's a problem for too many people already. 'Just busy with work. You know. Real life.'

'I'm sorry for being selfish like this, but – I still wish I knew your real life,' Steve confesses, keeping his voice quiet and playing with the piece of pizza rust in his hands. 'I'm sorry. But it's difficult not to think about things I shouldn't think about. Since you're my best friend in these times,' he adds, looking away.

'I should be the one apologizing for keeping up my act. But I have to. For now.'

'For now?' Steve repeats neutrally. 'What does that mean?'

'I don't know,' Tony replies truthfully. There's a long pause when Steve and Iron Man stare at each other, and the Cap starts laughing.

'I can live with that,' he declares finally. Tony exhales with relief.

He's really receiving more understanding than he deserves.

The next Thursday Fury calls and tells Iron Man that there is terrorist activity in an area a few dozen kilometers away from where he destroyed the Stark Industries weapons a month ago. It appears that there are more SI arms in the region. Iron Man promises to take care of that.

Tony spends the weekend – minus Riverside time, the last weekend of summer holidays – going through all the info he can access about the region and old SI weapons trade data. JARVIS keeps close watch via Stark Satellites and at the end of the three days of scarce sleep and lots of coffee and organic takeouts, they pinpoint three places where SI weapons have been used.

JARVIS tells Happy, Pepper and Fury about Tony's plans when Tony is flying over the ocean again. Fury clears him for the op quickly; that possibly means there's more to the story than just a few stray weapons, but Tony can think about it when he's done with his job.

It takes him over a day and a half to neutralize all the people he finds in the three places, their numbers it the biggest issue. There is a total of seventy-right unconscious bodies he needs to relocate before he can blow up the remaining weapons; he doesn't trust anyone with doing that for him, and he definitely doesn't want to hurt anyone, even if it is a bunch of terrorists.

Tony comes back home after spending another day making sure there weren't any more potential hideouts in the area and that he won't have to come back for another op anytime soon. He says hello to Happy and assures the man that he's alright. Happy asks JARVIS to scan Tony just in case and Tony doesn't even feel annoyed with that; he's hungry and tired. More tired than hungry, though, so he crawls straight into his bed after a quick shower and sleeps for twelve hours straight.

When he wakes up, his heart almost stops when he notices someone in his room, staring at him, but it takes him only a fraction of second to realize that it's just Happy, reading some magazine with a worried frown line between his eyebrows.

'Why are you here?' he asks, sitting up slowly, so that he won't feel dizzy. Sleeping too long does that to him sometimes. It's difficult to go back to keeping his body vertical.

'JARVIS asked me to. You were having nightmares.'

'I don't remember,' Tony says; it's his turn to frown. He really doesn't.

'You were tossing around and J wanted to make sure you wouldn't hurt yourself,' Happy explains and puts the magazine away, meeting Tony's eyes. He's worried.

'So you sat with me the whole night?'

'Half of the night. And I wouldn't fall asleep anyway –'

'Why?'

Happy sighs and stands up. He takes a deep breath before speaking up.

'JARVIS didn't brief you with breaking news when you were away, huh? I know he didn't, boss –'

'Happy, what happened?' Tony asks, now starting to get worried, and sits at the edge of the bed. Small steps.

'Nothing bad, don't worry – you'll know soon enough,' Happy pauses and glances at his watch.

'You have a call from Miss Potts,' JARVIS announces. Happy offers Tony a small smile, murmurs something that sounds like right on time, and leaves the room.

'Pepper?' Tony asks, biting his lip, and waits for her melodic voice to speak.

'I know this is unexpected and happened a few months earlier than we all expected,' Pepper says and Tony starts to get an idea what she's talking about. 'Stane's trial is done. We didn't expect it at all, after all this time, but he confessed – he's officially convicted of everything we accused him of. And,' she pauses, takes a deep breath and then another. 'Anthony Stark's name has been officially cleared of all alleged offenses.'

'Oh,' Tony breaths weakly, suddenly feeling very blank and very out of place.

'What are you going to do now, Tony?' she asks, keeping her voice in check. Tony knows she's torn between being happy and concerned, even more than usually. That's how Pepper is.

'I don't know, I – I need to think, Pepper. I need to think,' he replies and gestures at JARVIS to end the call.

A/N: Beta by dri-dri93, thank you very much for that!

Thanks for all your amazing comments, favs & follows :) It's so great to know you're all out there reading my story and it really makes me so, so happy! I hope you enjoyed this part and I should probably say I'm sorry for the slight cliffhanger but I'm not really ;p

I made a simulation of The New York Times from the day after this chapter ends, if you'd like to see my handiwork on my tumblr. Since this website doesn't let me just post you a link, my username is concreteandsun then tumblr then com then (slash) post (slash) 54605854947, I hope you can figure it out? :) Please have a look, I think/hope that you'll enjoy the little details.