I didn't touch this story for three weeks and then wrote this whole chapter yesterday evening and this morning. I hope you enjoy!
"Do you have more money than my first James dad did?" Harry asks Tony out of nowhere, still poring over the album.
"You bet," Tony says, without a hint of modesty. He's sure there are some rich wizards and witches out there, but highly doubts their wealth competes with his, even with the absurd currency system they apparently use over in Britain. Seriously, 29 Knuts in a Sickle, and 17 Sickles in a Galleon? Why make coins divisible by prime numbers? And why skip several along the way?
"I'll let you in on a secret, Harry. I've got more money than, well, pretty much everyone."
James and Steve share a look. Right, living through the Great Depression, they probably hadn't thought they'd ever associate with someone as rich as Tony, or even imagine anyone could have his level of wealth. Neither of them say anything, and they don't seem to judge him at all. Then again, Tony's not sure how much James actually remembers about the Depression.
Harry, completely oblivious to that silent exchange, turns the page of his photo album. Tony's going to have to pick Loki's brain about the magically moving pictures, since they aren't digital in any way and it shouldn't be possible. Tony's had to accept a lot of impossible things are, in fact, possible, but his brain still needs to work out how.
As if summoned, Loki appears and puffs out his chest with a pompousness that only seems partially faked. "You may be wealthy for Midgard, but our wealth on Asgard is far greater."
"Yeah, yeah, we were your safety planet," Tony rolls his eyes. "You applied to Asgard and got rejected. You know, MIT pretty much begged me to come there, and I joined early."
James stares at Tony, which Tony realizes he'd grown unaccustomed to over the past week. Sure, Tony's used to all sorts of stares- admiring, shock, bafflement when he runs mental circles around people- but the way James stares is its one caliber. He's somehow combined a thousand-yard stare with the impression he's staring into someone's soul.
Tony doesn't know if James views Loki as a ticking bomb (James certainly views himself as one) but Steve seems exasperated by Loki and Tony's constant competition.
Okay, so Tony and Loki might already have a reputation around the mansion for getting on like a house on fire and having spirited discussions about magic and science. But hey, what can Tony say? He's always been one to build reputations quickly.
"You think that's too much?" Steve sighs from where he stands with Thor. "You should've been here all week,"
"It appears the good Soldier's sojourn with our shield brother did him well," Thor says, not shying away from Steve's heartfelt sentiment that James should have stayed. Thor and Steve have grown quite close after the past week, probably bonding over their broody brothers who are a far cry from how they used to be. Or, maybe not brother for Steve, but Steve still won't reveal if his relationship with James had ever gone past platonic, despite Tony casually mentioning his own various male conquests.
Thor continues. "As did my stay on Midgard. Perhaps you should travel, brother,"
"Let's go to London!" Harry jumps. "The Olympics are there! Jarvis showed me videos of the Olympics in Bei-jing when I was a baby."
"Way to make me feel old, kid." Tony clutches his chest, over his arc reactor.
Loki scoffs. "You're an infant in our lifespan, Stark."
Harry snickers at that, but starts to speak to the photos in his album again. "Did we watch the Olympics in Beijing?"
"You were all in hiding," Moody scowls, clearly thinking about how that hadn't worked out just over a year after.
"We're hiding now, and we still watch telly," Harry's picking up on some of Tony's snarky tones, and Tony couldn't be prouder.
"Speaking of which, how do these move?" Tony gestures at the photos in Harry's album. Loki starts to explain exactly how magical pictures move, and Harry interrupts.
"Can you make Dad's pictures move?"
"That's what the video function is for," Tony knows James had figured that feature out. "And we've got these beat, because our videos have sound,"
All the photos in Harry's album are silent. While they're a tad more interactive than a recorded video, they're not nearly as interactive as a video call. So ignoring the whole moving on paper with no power source bit, technology wins this round against magic.
"I can operate a video camera," James confirms, but it's not as robotic as before. He seems proud of all the pictures and videos he took of Harry and doesn't intend to stop.
Harry once again addresses the photos, but it strikes Tony as how a child might address an imaginary friend. He's struck with not only how young Harry was when his parents passed, but how young Lily and James Potter were. They look to be barely legal drinking age over here (not that it would apply in Britain, or that Tony ever followed that law).
He almost feels lucky, compared to Harry. Out of the blue, as if to drive the point home, Harry tells his dead parents "Mr. Stark has more money than you,"
"They left you a decent inheritance at Gringotts," Moody grunts. "Though it's not to be used until you're at school."
Harry gazes pointedly around Xavier's Institute, and Moody amends it to when Harry turns eleven.
"I'm not going to school until I'm eleven?" Harry asks, shocked. "But Lila and Cooper went, and I couldn't go. Why can't I go?!"
"Hogwarts starts at eleven," Moody grunts.
"I'm not going there!" Harry suddenly shouts, stomping his foot. "I hate that smelly ol' castle. And I hate its smelly old people."
"Dumbledore had a lot of those photos. He cares about you, laddie." Moody nods at the photos. "Your parents, Lily and James, looked up to him."
"The giant was bigger," Harry huffs.
"Dumbledore wants to apologize," Moody stares at Harry while his magical eye rolls around in his head.
"The tower's going to have preschool and daycare soon, for employee's kids." Tony switches the topic without warning. He would have mentioned it earlier, except they'd barely been in the tower before an alien invasion.
"Can I go?" Harry asks, clearly bored with staying home all day and all to knowledge that Xavier Institute's preschool program consists of James tutoring him with plans from Jarvis. Harry gives Tony a pleading look.
"That's up to James," Tony shrugs. "Speaking of which, Judge Jarvis made your adoption official. You're now officially a Barnes, Oliver. I didn't actually charge your name to Oliver or anything, you're still Harry. You can keep Potter, be a Potter-Barnes, but that sounds way too much like Pottery Barn."
"I'm not Harry Pottery," Harry says slowly, as if Tony's confused or dumb. Of course he's never heard of Pottery Barn. Neither have most other members of this conversation, two being out of time and the other two being from another world.
"Or you could just be Harry Barnes," Tony shrugs. Apparently Harry Potter is a name that's as famous in the magical world as Tony Stark is in the non-magical world. And now that everyone knows about magic, it won't be long before everyone knows Harry's name, magic or not. He wonders if fans will decide Harry's an honorary Avenger for defeating Voldemort three years ago, even though Tony's willing to bet it was really something Lily or James did before being murdered.
Harry glances between his album and James, who ruffles Harry's long hair and says "I won't be hurt if you choose to keep Potter. You're my son no matter what name you have."
Tony hears Steve take a choked breath. Whether it's at the sappy scene playing out in front of him or some vain hope that James is still Bucky regardless of his name choice is anyone's guess. Steve's been coming to accept that James will never be the Bucky he knew, but maybe he's still hoping he'll use that nickname someday.
James looks up to stare at Tony again. "Thank you," he says, voice too heartfelt for Tony's comfort. He almost misses the flat, expressionless tone. "I'll never be able to repay you for this. For everything."
"Hey, we already established that I'm one of the richest people ever." Tony waves a hand, hoping this won't turn out like those videos where parents and children cry happy tears during an adoption. Tony wouldn't know how to handle that. Then again, Steve's return hadn't exactly been like those tear-filled soldier homecomings, so maybe he's in the clear.
Tony's eyes definitely aren't stinging. Nope. He blinks.
Thor claps his hands, loud as thunder, and proclaims "Let us celebrate this joyous occasion!"
Tony grins. Thor certainly knows how to party, though Xavier's Institute isn't nearly as well-stocked as any of Tony's residences.
Once they're all holding cups, Thor raises his in a toast, and whether that's a thing on Asgard or something he picked up here is anyone's guess.
"The addition of a child to a family is always cause for celebration, but choosing to take in a child is even more so," Thor gives Loki a heavy, pointed look before turning back to Harry and James. "You may not be related by blood, but that matters not. You are family- a fearsome, protective warrior, and a young mage."
Thor beams at James. "I can see how proud you are to call him your son."
"Called him that before," James says. They'd accepted each other as family under the guises of Batman and Robin, but it probably feels nice to do it as James and Harry. To know they're legally family, though Harry clearly has no idea what that means.
"It means nobody can separate you and your dad," Tony tells him.
"You're not going to die," Harry practically orders James, who thankfully no longer views Harry as his handler. James nods his acceptance, but he's frowning. Harry frowns too, and flings his arms around James's stomach.
"You're not leaving are you?"
James keeps frowning with that stare of his, clearly thinking he might have to.
"You already found Steve!" Harry exclaims. "You can't go."
"Jarvis and my legal team are working overtime," Tony says. "HYDRA's the guilty party here. Besides, it looks like brainwashing will now be an actual defense, which means everyone's going to try using it, it's like the insanity plea without admitting you're insane. But hey, it actually applies in your case, and Clint's and Loki's. The brainwashing part, not the insanity part."
"That applies too," James' tone is a tad sardonic.
"Point is, you two aren't getting separated, and you aren't going to prison if I have anything to say about it."
"Because you're a good guy," Harry gives James an extra squeeze, then tries to shimmy up his legs until James picks him up.
"Dumbledore isn't going to separate you," Moody says suddenly. "He put you with muggles in the first place. Bad muggles. He was misinformed when he ran into you before. Thought you were a madman who kidnapped Harry."
"Says the guy who literally goes by Mad-Eye." Tony says. Moody ignores him.
"I did kidnap Harry." James almost sounds like the Soldier again, except his flat tone is more deadpan than dead inside.
Moody stares back, and Tony's about to start placing bets on who will win the staring contest when Moody's eye flicks to Harry. "Your godfather's rotting in Azkaban for betraying your parents to Voldemort, so you don't have to worry about him taking custody."
"Wow, you're real fun at parties," Tony mutters. He and Harry already had similar sob stories, and then they both have betrayal on top of it? Godfather… geez. Tony's thinking about Stane and no, he's not going down that path right now.
Tony breathes sharply from his nose, ignoring the sharp looks from James, Loki, even Steve and Thor.
Harry reaches for Tony, and James starts to pull him back, but Tony reaches out to grab Harry's hand. Harry's hand is tiny, seems so delicate, but it's grounding, pulling Tony out of his spiral about Stane.
"Can we put more pictures in my book?" Harry asks. Jarvis hooks himself up to one of the printers in the X-Institute and prints several pictures of Harry with James, Tony, various mutants and Avengers. Harry flips to the blank pages in his book and pastes in pictures.
Tony wonders when Harry will learn that digital files are far superior to paper ones.
"Is Harry Potter-Barnes taking your name as well?" Thor asks Tony. Tony, for once, is at a loss for words.
Tony had never considered himself father material. He's not Harry's father or anything, no matter what Harry said about Tony being his other, other dad. For one, Tony's not in a relationship with James, and two, well, he's more of the awesome, fun uncle who buys the kid presents but passes over the parenting responsibilities to the kid's actual dad.
Tony conveniently ignores when he'd been the sensible one, saying that Harry shouldn't play with knives, that Harry should have a childhood that wasn't constantly spent training and wary of attacks. Pepper had shaken her head at the irony despite her agreement; Tony's built suit after suit to improve Iron Man against any new possible threats.
So, yeah, Tony's not Harry's dad. Nope, no siree. But he did find himself missing Harry's blunt observations, his exuberance that, quite frankly, matched Tony's more than most people's.
Still, it's clear the Barton farm had done some good, showing Harry what a normal Muggle family is like so he doesn't think they're all like his horrid relatives. Plus it got him and James away from the craziness and media attention that they'd somehow avoided despite living with Tony, who was one of the most famous people in the world before saving New York by sending a nuke through a space portal.
"What about you, Captain?" Thor asks. "Are you to be Harry's father as well?"
Steve smiles tightly. Tony's sure that Bucky and Steve didn't have quite the platonic relationship that the history books portray, but James hasn't yet shown any attraction to anyone. Which makes sense, he's even more emotionally stunted than Pepper claims Tony is.
Looking at the photos, Harry would have the longest name ever if he included everyone in his adoptive family. That'd be a pain to fill out on forms, but then again, Jarvis could do it for him.
Harry turns to Loki, holding up a still picture of him and James. "Make it move, please."
Loki takes the picture and waves his hand in a grandiose fashion. He hands it back to Harry with a slight bow, and Harry beams at it before flipping it around to show everyone. In the photo, Harry and James sit watching television, but every so often glance at the viewer or shift position. Photo Harry gets up and leaves the photo, and Harry gasps "He's gone."
"You don't sit around all day," Loki points out.
Harry hands every photo to Loki to animate, and Loki finally gets around to explaining it. Some of the animated photos turn out ridiculous. Tony picks his nose in one, which he definitely doesn't do in real life, and James makes cross-eyed goofy faces that Tony's definitely never seen the real James make. Loki grins mischievously and Harry laughs in delight, then flips back to the photos of his former family.
He traces the edge of the ripped one. "Can you fix it?"
"I can't sense what he looked like," Loki says, clearly having put together the same pieces Tony had as to who was ripped out of the photo.
"Are you sure you want a photo of your godfather?" Steve frowns. "Did he not pass the mind control plea?"
Steve seems torn- one one hand, James, Clint would seem equally guilty of treason if tried without a mind control plea; one the other hand, SHIELD agents have been found to have been HYDRA traitors all along. Not that Steve really knew any of them, but the idea clearly bothers him.
Tony knows he wouldn't be able to be a jury over the godfather's case because it hits too close to home (as well as being held in magical Britain).
"He never got a trial," Moody says.
There's a shocked silence, and then Steve exclaims "What?!"