AN: This is a chapter that is from the pets' point of view, but still fits into this story, so rather than make it a separate story (which I considered doing) I decided to add it to this one. I really am sorry about the lack of updates, but things are getting better with the family, so hopefully it won't be long before I can commit more time to writing.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOO

"Where are you going?"

Nutmeg couldn't scowl, but he did lay his ears back – a little – at the sudden question coming from the corridor he'd just walked by. He stopped and turned around, giving Ironpig a chance to walk over. The piglet was wearing an Avenger sweater that Nutmeg knew had been knitted especially for him by one of the Wakandans who lived in the village where Ironpig had been born.

"No where."

The piglet looked pointedly at the Ironman doll that was hanging from the Flerkin's mouth.

"Are you taking that to Peter's room?" he asked, knowing that that was where the Flerkin had come from.

He just liked to annoy the kitten by calling him out for doing things that he knew he wasn't supposed to be doing.

"No."

He started to turn back to continue his trip, but Ironpig was in a bit of a mood, and a little grumpy. And not just because Steve and Peter were both gone so he had to share Tony with Jack and Nutmeg both. Which cut down on his own cuddle time, considerably. Which wasn't how the piglet liked things.

"Why do you keep stealing that thing? You know Peter cares about it. It isn't even that interesting."

"It's amazing," Nutmeg disagreed. "And Peter loves it."

"Then why do you continually hide it from him?"

"Because he's jealous," a new 'voice' said, as Jack walked into the middle of the corridor. The chocolate lab was damp but looked pleased with himself – although his mouth was oddly clamped shut. "He doesn't like to share Peter with it so he hides it."

Ironpig snorted his amusement – and agreement – but Nutmeg shook his head, dropping the stuffed doll to the floor and setting one paw on it – as if to keep it from escaping him..

"Of course I'm not jealous. Peter doesn't love a stuffed bag of cloth more than he loves me, no matter who it looks like. I hide it to make sure he doesn't lose his edge."

"What edge?"

"You wouldn't understand," he told the piglet. Clearly ready to change the subject, he turned to Jack. "What's in your mouth?"

"What? Nothing."

Ironpig turned his attention from the doll to take a closer look at the young lab. Especially his mouth.

"You have a tail hanging from your mouth," he said. "What is it?"

"Nothing."

The long, thin, tail twitched, slightly.

"It moved," Nutmeg pointed out, now interested – and not just to change the subject from the doll. "What do you have?"

"I don't know what you're talking about…"

"You are a terrible liar," Ironpig told him. "What did you catch?"

"I might have been out in the field just now and caught a mouse."

"You caught a mouse?" Nutmeg asked, grudgingly impressed.

"It ran right in front of me," Jack said. "It was just a reaction to grab it."

"Are you going to eat it?"

"No. Don't be gross."

The piglet snorted.

"You've eaten far worse."

"I know you've eaten deer shit out in the field," Nutmeg agreed. "And rolled in it."

"That isn't alive."

"What are you going to do with it?" the young Flerkin asked.

"It's a gift."

"Steve is gone."

"I know."

His jowls were now drenched with drool and it was beginning to form a slimy film hanging from his mouth.

"Then who-"

"Gotta go."

The lab turned and left without a word, heading back down the corridor and the other two watched for a moment, and then Ironpig turned back to Nutmeg.

"How do you keep getting the doll out of the vibranium cage it is in?"

Nutmeg didn't smirk, but he did look smug.

"That would be telling." He picked up the doll, once more. "Gotta go."

The piglet watched as Nutmeg left, too, heading the opposite direction that Jack had gone. Clearing debating who was the most interesting, just then, and who to follow. Since Nutmeg was stealthy and Jack had long legs and was probably long gone by then, Ironpig decided to not bother with either. Instead he turned and headed for lounge to see if Tony was there.

If he was, he'd mooch a snack if he managed to look hungry enough. If he wasn't, then it was a sure bet that he could look cute and beg a snack from whoever was behind the bar, just then.

OOOOOOOO

"How are they doing?"

"Everything seems to be doing fine. They'll be back, tomorrow."

Tony settled next to Pepper on the sofa, enjoying her company and taking solace in the fact that Peter would be home the next day and would have a ton of stories to tell.

"Did they go to Arlington, yet?" Pepper asked, reaching for her laptop and opening it, ready to settle in and enjoy his company as well.

"That's where they're going, next." He picked up his tablet to bring up a new schematic for his suit. "Steve will have Peter call us to check in when…" he trailed off, frowning when he heard an odd noise at the door of their suite. "What was that?"

"Jack is outside the door," Friday said, helpfully.

There was another scratch on the door, and Pepper smiled.

"Poor baby. He probably misses Steve."

"Yes." Tony got up and walked over to the door, opening it and smiling when jack trotted in, tail wagging, cheerfully. "Hey, big guy. What are you up to, huh?"

The lab trotted over to the sofa and put his head in Pepper's lap, and she moved her laptop so she could rub his ears.

"Poor baby. Do you miss your daddy?"

"What does he have in his-"

Even as Tony was asking the question, wondering why there was so much drool trailing down Jack's mouth, the young lab opened his mouth, spitting a very drooled on blob onto Pepper lap. Both Tony and Pepper froze, and for a moment there was absolutely no sound in the room aside from Jack's wagging tail thumping against the leg of the coffee table. Then the blob twitched, and a pair of beady eyes suddenly looked up at Pepper – who gasped. Tony was much less calm. With a shriek that he'd later deny, he reached out and swatted at the hapless mouse, knocking it from Pepper's lap and onto the floor, away from Pepper.

The mouse scurried away, immediately going under the sofa and out of sight – and then out of the room and into the corridor – and Tony fussed over Pepper, who had gotten over her moment of shock, easily. She was a farmgirl, after all, and a mouse wasn't the fearsome creature that Tony obviously thought it to be – even a slimy one. Holding her side as she laughed, she caught Jack's nose, rubbing it to keep him from being scared by Tony's actions.

"What the hell…"

Pepper shook her head, still amused.

"He brought me a present, obviously."

"Obviously." Tony scowled, looking around. "Where did it go?"

OOOOOOOOOO

Twenty minutes later, Tony Stark walked into the men's room near the control room of the compound. He looked around and then rolled his eyes. Nutmeg was under a urinal, playing with a white pawn from the chess set that Tony knew was in Peter's room, and guarding the Ironman doll that Peter was so fond of.

"What are you doing?" he asked, kneeling down and picking up the doll, the pawn, and then the kitten. The doll went into one pocket and the pawn into another. "Do you realize I have to wash that stuff, now?"

The kitten didn't answer, of course, and Tony didn't notice the sigh as he walked out of the bathroom.

"Did you find him?"

Natasha Romanoff was smirking – and had been since Pepper had told her what had happened – and how Tony had reacted.

"Of course. No video in the bathroom, obviously, but Friday saw him go in, so there wasn't a problem."

Natasha had Jack with her, and the lab looked up at the kitten.

"Pepper liked the mouse," he reported.

"Why do I doubt that?" was the response.

"Hey, kid," Tony said, catching Nutmeg's attention from the silent conversation he didn't know was happening, and rubbing the furry belly to make him purr. "I have a job for you…"

Romanoff snorted.

"He's not going to go catch that mouse for you, Tony. You might as well give the thing a name and make him a little mouse hole in a wall somewhere."

A scowl from the billionaire.

"I'm not going to have a mouse running around the compound, freely. Not when we have a cat."

"He isn't a cat," she reminded him. "Do you really think you can just set him loose and expect him to catch it on command? Maybe Flerkin aren't natural hunters, or something…"

"We're hunters," Nutmeg assured Jack. "But I'm not catching your slobbery mouse."

Jack couldn't shrug, but he didn't seem too perturbed.

"Come on, kitty," Tony crooned to Nutmeg. "Let's go find this mouse before Peter comes home."

Natasha laughed.

"I can't wait to tell Peter… Especially the scream."

Tony rolled his eyes.