AN: I really do want to apologize for being so quiet. Family has had a lot of turmoil and while it hasn't been me with the issues, it has been stressful for me so I haven't been able to focus as much as I would want to in order to write anything quality. I'm still around, though!

OOOOOOOOOOOO

Peter was driving the car when it pulled into the garage at the compound the next day. He smiled when he saw that Tony was waiting for them, leaning against the Pontiac with Ironpig in his arms. The piglet was wearing a purple sweater and was clearly enjoying the way Tony was scratching under his collar.

When Peter turned the engine off, Tony walked over to the driver's side and opened the door.

"They let you drive?"

Steve smiled, getting out of the passenger side while Bucky got out the back, stretching to relieve muscles stiff from being on the road.

"No sense in us driving when he was willing," Barnes pointed out.

"Besides," Steve added. "He needs practice driving in new locations, right? This way he gets some."

"Like when you took me to Seattle to learn to drive on hills," Peter reminded Tony.

"You took him to Seattle just to teach him to drive on hills?" Bucky asked, surprised.

It was Peter who nodded.

"Yeah. When I was learning to drive."

"Because the hills here aren't steep enough?"

The question made Tony roll his eyes and Peter and Steve both smile.

"They were all going to Seattle anyway," Tony told him, not defensive at all, and relaxed enough with Barnes, by then, that he wasn't at all offended or annoyed. "It was a good experience. Like Steve says, a good chance to drive somewhere new."

Bucky smirked.

"They told me you spoil him, but I told them it was their imagination…"

"I don't spoil him, Barnes." Tony pretended to be annoyed, but he saw Peter's grin and couldn't be mad even if he wanted to be – which he didn't. Not for something like that. "Peter's a good kid. He gets rewarded for that by having opportunities."

"Uh huh." Barnes went to the back of the car, opening the trunk and pulling his overnight bag from it. "I'm going to go find something to eat. Thanks for coming, Peter."

The boy nodded, catching his bag when Bucky threw it to him.

"It was great," he assured him. "Thanks for taking me with you guys."

"We'll see you, later," Steve said.

"You're not debriefing," Stark told him, well aware that Steve was often the recipient of some good-natured teasing for the way he liked to discuss everything happening around him – even for the most mundane things or events. "We have things to do, now that you're home."

Rogers smirked, too, looking cheerful and not at all annoyed at the teasing. He'd had a good time with Bucky, and Peter had made it even more fun.

"We'll see."

He and Barnes walked off, and Peter turned to Tony.

"Where's Pepper?"

"She went into the city for a party."

"Without you?"

Tony shrugged, turning and heading for the corridor that led to Peter's quarters.

"It's a birthday party for one of her PAs – Johnathon. You've met him."

"Yeah."

"Well, she needs to be there, and I don't want to be there, so Happy drove her in and when she's finished, she'll go to the sanctum and Stephen will bring her home the easy way."

"Oh."

He knew Tony liked to be the center of attention at times (maybe a lot of times) but knew that if it was someone else's party, then Tony didn't want to be there and be on display or have to sign needless autographs or take a million selfies.

"Did you have a good time?"

He hadn't been able to do more than send a quick text to check on things the night before. It had been one of those very rare times when he'd been stuck in a meeting – this one a seemingly endless conference call that had him and Pepper and a couple of the SI VPs talking to a group of Japanese businessmen. It was a meeting that he couldn't get out of – and the main reason that he hadn't invited himself along with Peter and the others on their road trip. Peter had assured him that he was doing fine and having fun, and Steve had confirmed it in the reply to the text that Tony had sent him, as well.

He'd have called before they got on the road the next morning, only he'd slept in and by the time he'd roused out of bed, they were already on the road and Pepper had reminded him that their son was in perfectly capable hands and that she'd like to spend some time with him before she had to leave for the city.

Not to mention Nutmeg had destroyed their living room while they'd slept and she would appreciate some help getting it all put back together.

He'd grumbled, but hadn't been too serious.

"I thought we weren't going to debrief," Peter told him, making Tony roll his eyes and pretend to take a swipe at him with the arm that wasn't holding Ironpig.

"We're not debriefing," he told his son, cheerfully. "I just want to make sure it was worth leaving me and your mom alone with your crazy cat…"

"It was really neat," Peter replied, amused that he'd made Tony smile. "I saw my grandpa and grandma's graves and put a penny on them – and about a million other ones when we went looking around Arlington."

Tony nodded.

"Did people recognize Steve?"

"A lot of people did," Peter confirmed. "Not so much at the Smithsonian since he hid pretty well out in the open, but when we were at Arlington we went to this retreat ceremony thing where the military group lowers the flag every night and fold it up and the woman who was in charge noticed him and asked him to join so he did. When they were done all the tourists and the visitors left but we were invited to stay over at their base."

"Which you did."

That much Tony knew, since Steve had let him know when the offer had been made. He and Pepper had been fine with that since they preferred their son to be surrounded by an entire Army base overnight.

"Yeah." They'd reached Peter's quarters and he opened the door for Tony. "It was pretty cool."

He'd been to military bases before, after all, but it was always fun to watch the people interact with Steve Rogers. It was also a reminder that even though Tony was Ironman and was amazing and popular with the general public, Steve was even more recognizable and was even more popular, because he was more relatable to the common man. Which made sense, since there weren't a lot of billionaires on the planet but there were a lot of people who were in or had been in the military.

"You're just glad that you had a break from your cat."

The boy stopped and looked at his living room. Everything that belonged on his shelves were now on the floor and scattered about – except for his Ironman doll which was securely locked in its little vibranium cage and clamped to the shelf. The controllers to his video games and even the transportation rock were also on the floor. Peter rolled his eyes, dropping his backpack near the door.

"Yeah."

Tony snorted, amused to see that Peter's cat was an equal opportunity destroyer. He slapped him on the shoulder.

"Clean this up and come have lunch with me."

"Okay."