Disclaimer: I only own the plot and my OCs. Anything you recognize as not mine belongs to Marvel Studios, Disney, Warner Bros. Entertainment, and/or their otherwise respective owners.

Author's Notes: Happy (late) Thanksgiving! I meant to get this out sooner but this Thanksgiving and the preparations for it were just so fucking busy this year. Helping cook for Thanksgiving, finding out at the last minute I had to attend another dinner, etc. My festivities aren't over yet either but at least I get today as a break lol.

Anyways, the chapter title comes from It's My Life by No Doubt. I know the original version is by Talk Talk, but Tony was a '90s teen in this lmao, it makes more sense with this version.

As always, I hope you enjoy. Until next chapter,

~TGWSI/Selene Borealis

~the black and gold 'verse~

~black and gold~

~chapter 15: it's my life~

He and Rebecca wound up working for the entire night, only occasionally taking breaks. It was a good thing that the Beach House's walls were so soundproofed and that the lab was nowhere near any of the bedrooms, otherwise he didn't think they would've been able to get away with it as much as they did.

That being said, Rhodey and Alfred did come to bug them a bit, Rhodey once and Alfred twice. His best friend was the one who came to the lab first, looking about ready to call it a night – and get Tony to do the same. "Look, Tones, I know what SHIELD told you, but – " he began, only to stop in his tracks as he took the destruction of the lab all in. "Whoa."

Tony glanced up, taking the opportunity to also wipe the sweat from his forehead. "You need something, platypus?"

Rhodey was gobsmacked. "What the hell are you two doing?"

"We figured it out," Tony said. "The element that will be able to replace the palladium so I'm not getting poisoned anymore, I mean. Now we just have to make it."

"He figured it out," Rebecca corrected him mildly.

"Nonsense," he said. "You provided help."

"I provided moral support."

"That's still helping."

"Okay, okay," Rhodey cut in. "Am I to trust that this is not something you're going to give up until it's finished."

"...Probably."

"Fine. "Rhodey turned on his heel and walked out the lab; even he knew that there were a limited number of people that would be able to get Tony away from this project of his right now, and that he wasn't one of them. He waved his hand as he left. "'Night, Tony. 'Night, Rebecca."

"Goodnight, James."

Alfred's reasoning for coming into the lab the two times after this was somewhat similar: he did not try to dissuade Tony or Rebecca from what they were doing, just gave them refreshments (and, by extension, forced them to take breaks) to keep on going. He knew the routine of a late night, whether it be because of Bruce or Tony. He also assured Tony that the kids were alright, that they were all asleep in their beds and safe. This, too, allowed him to keep on going.

They didn't finish the remodeling until the early hours of the morning, as dawn began to seep in through the windows. When they finally had almost everything put in place for the synthesizing of the element, it was well over two hours after that.

Coincidentally, this was additionally the moment that Phil Coulson decided to enter the lab, making him the third person since the night before to do so. "Well, it seems like you've been busy," he said, looking around.

"Yeah, been at it for a while now," Tony griped. "And where the hell have you been?"

"I was doing some stuff," Coulson answered evasively.

"Yeah, well, us too, and it worked," Tony said. "Hey, I'm playing for the home team Coulson, you and all of your Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers. Now, are you gonna let us work, or are you here to break my ovaries?"

It spoke to how hard he and Rebecca had been working that she didn't even snort at his jokes.

"You know what this is?" Coulson asked, picking up a familiar-looking shield. It was a prototype of Captain America's shield, built long after Steve Rogers had plunged himself into the ice. Howard had wanted to see if he could replicate the vibranium that he'd made the original with, to no avail. The element that he had allowed Tony to discover/rediscover was a different one than vibranium.

Rebecca's breath had hitched when she'd first seen the prototype shield, hours ago. She still sent a longing, bittersweet gaze its way, but said nothing.

Tony made grabby motions with his hands. "That's it, I need that," he said. "Bring it to me." He explained as Coulson handed it over to him, "It's exactly what I need to make this work. Rebecca, can you come over here and lift the coil for me? Yeah...that's it." He put the shield underneath the coil and she let go of the former. The coil was now straight; that had been a problem before. Not anymore. "Perfectly level."

He focused back on Coulson. "We're busy. What do you want?"

"Nothing. Goodbye. Since you seem to be well on your way to getting your health back in shape, Director Fury has decided you don't need my supervision anymore. He's reassigning me," Coulson informed him. "I'm going to New Mexico."

Tony blinked. He wasn't going to comment on Fury changing his mind about Coulson supervising him, the man just seemed to be neurotic like that, but: "Like...permanently reassigning you?"

He didn't miss how Coulson looked over at Rebecca briefly. "Something like that."

...Huh. Besides back in 2001 and 2002, he'd never really interacted with Coulson up until this year. Even then, those occurrences had been just as brief as the ones before them.

Still...maybe he'd kind of miss Phil. The guy was an ass, but it seemed like everybody working with SHIELD was. That did not make him special.

...Or maybe, that was just the pregnancy hormones talking.

Probably, that was just his pregnancy hormones talking.

"Right. Well," Tony said, before clearing his throat. "New Mexico. That's the Land of Enchantment, right there."

"So I'm told," Coulson said.

"Secret stuff?"

"Of a sort." Coulson nodded at him, and then at Rebecca. "Good luck."

"Bye," Tony said. He held out his hand, and the beta shook it. "And thanks, by the way."

"We need you," Coulson told him.

Tony grinned and winked. "More than you know."

The SHIELD agent grimaced. "Yeah, not that much."

And then he was gone.

"Congratulations, sir," JARVIS announced. "You have created a new element."

Tony and Rebecca both stared at the small, triangle-shaped bar in question. It was glowing a soft blue, just like the palladium in his current arc reactor was, but with none of the danger involved. Hopefully.

It was beautiful.

Tony used a pair of metal tongs to take it out from where it had been synthesized. Carefully, he walked over to where the new, modified arc reactor he'd had JARVIS make while he and Rebecca had been busy messing up the lab all night and deposited it inside. The transparent aluminum – Star Trek IV: The Journey Home had made him wonder if it was possible for that specific material to exist. As it turned out, it was, and he'd developed it himself, although it was still too costly to use in large quantities – closed around the element, forming a protective barrier.

There were a few seconds of silence.

But then...

"Sir, the arc reactor has accepted the modified core. I will begin running diagnostics."

Tony let out a breath, one that he didn't know he had been holding for months now. Similarly, Rebecca laughed.

It took JARVIS another thirty minutes to announce that the diagnostics were completed and he thought that the arc reactor could be inserted safely without causing harm to either Tony or his baby. As soon as he did, Tony and Rebecca got back to work. She helped him replace the arc reactor just as she had that night back in Gotham, albeit it went better this time, now that she knew what to do without causing him to go into cardiac arrest.

Like with the lithium dioxide, Tony felt better pretty much immediately. His veins were still dark, so maybe that was just a pseudo-placebo from knowing that the new arc reactor would work. But still, he was already feeling like the weight of the world was coming off his shoulders.

Just like how he'd said he wanted Bruce to feel, once he got back from whatever business he was attending to. Ideally.

Rebecca watched him after he'd gotten his shirt back on properly, her grey eyes sharp. "Since you 'discovered' the element, you should be able to name it, right?"

"Once the teams from the IUPAC and the IUPAP – the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry and the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics," he translated for her, "verify that it is a new element, I'll get to propose a new name, yeah."

"Got any ideas?"

"Badassium?" Tony suggested. He nearly lost it at the look on her face. "Kidding, kidding. But, you know what...how about adamantium?"

She made an incredulous noise. "Where the hell did you get that from?"

"Greek class at the boarding school Howard put me into before I presented," he explained. He scratched at the back of his neck absentmindedly. "We were reading some selections from Hesiod's Theogony – a poem about the origins of the Greek gods. Adamant was an archaic form of diamond that could hurt even the gods. Kronos used an adamant sickle that was given to him by Gaia to castrate his father, Ouranos."

The memory had come to him quite suddenly, almost like it was even a case of his precognition at work. Like he'd received the barest trace of a hint that adamantium was what he would have called this new element, no matter what.

But, in his defense, the name just seemed right. He wouldn't have it any other way.

Rebecca wrinkled her nose. "That's...kind of gross."

"It's mythology: half the shit that goes on in those stories is going to be seen as gross by a modern person. Besides, it's not like Ouranos didn't deserve it. Now, come on," he said, hopping down from the table. There was so much energy coursing through his body now, he almost felt jittery from it. "I want to go see my kids."

They exited the lab and walked down the hallway, to the main part of the house. All of his kids, from Dick to Edward and Gemma, were in the living room, surprisingly enough, having already finished breakfast. It looked like the elder six were taking the opportunity to watch morning cartoons, something that would usually be reserved for a Saturday or Sunday morning during the school year, while Edward and Gemma were sitting in their play pen in the middle of the room, playing together with what looked like their favorite set of blocks. Natalie – Natasha was in the background, watching them. She didn't quite have the stereotypical demeanor of a nanny anymore, as she was leaning against the wall, her arms crossed.

His eyes locked with the delta that was disguising herself as a beta. She didn't need words to communicate what she wanted to tell him: a simple nod worked out just fine.

He nodded back. Then Tony let himself feel all of the happiness that was in him with abandon, even with it being slightly tinged with sadness at how Dick glanced over at him, then back at the TV, the eighteen-year-old omega's lips thinning. He would have to talk with him later, but now was not the time.

These were his children. He was going to get to watch them and the baby currently within him grow up. There was no more palladium that could poison his body for the remaining duration that it took until he could get his arc reactor removed.

Tony went over to the playpen first. As soon as he got close enough, Gemma was looking up at him. She outstretched her arms, clearly wanting to be picked up just as much as he wanted to hold her. "Omi! Omi!"

He pressed a kiss to her curls as he twirled her around, which made her shriek with laughter. "Good morning, Gemma." Then he set her down, which she didn't really mind all that much, before doing the same with his youngest son. "And Edward."

Tony greeted them all in that order and fashion, though without the twirling around for all of the older kids because it felt like his back might actually give out on him if he tried that. "And Bea, and Peter, and Harley, and Lili, and Jason," he singsonged. Jason playfully tried to bat him away, but allowed himself to be coddled nonetheless. Last but not least was Dick, who, although he was still mad at Tony, nonetheless let his adoptive omither kiss him on the head just as he had all the others. "And Dick."

"Why are you in such a good mood, Omi?" Harley asked curiously.

"Do I need a reason to be in a good mood?" Tony retorted cheekily. Of course, he thought about telling them the reason why he was, and he knew that he would have to eventually, but for now he was going to keep the information to himself. Just in case, for some unfathomable reason, the adamantium wound up not working and he would have to go back to the palladium. "I just love you all so, so much. Isn't that reason enough?"

Bea giggled as she and Peter nodded in agreement.

Tony glanced at the TV, then at Natasha, then back at the kids. "Well, I'll leave you to your morning cartoons," he said. "I need to get some breakfast and have a talk with Natalie. If you need either one of us, we'll be in the sitting room, okay?"

When he received the kids' various assents, he went into the kitchen. He got out the ingredients to make one of those damned smoothies, because even though the palladium arc reactor was gone from his chest, the radioactive isotope was still probably in his bloodstream. It would need time to be filtered out.

Natasha followed him into the kitchen. She waited until he had finished making the smoothie (and washing out the blender) to speak. "Everything's fixed?"

He chose to take a page out of Coulson's book. "Something like that." He could tell that she wanted to ask him what he meant by that, however he was aware of the potential for listeners who shouldn't be hearing this. His kids could be mischievous like that, albeit a quick look as he exited the kitchen and went into the hallway told him they were all still in the living room. He tossed his head towards the direction of where they needed to go. "Let's go talk more in the sitting room."

They walked into the room and sat down at the same places they had when he'd hired her. Tony noticed that she must've expected that they would be talking here, because there was a SHIELD briefcase right next to her seat. He didn't comment on it.

The delta began without much preamble. "Now that you've completed the plans for the arc reactor, Fury has said that you can know more about what we need you for." She grabbed the briefcase and opened it up, before she pulled out some files and handed them over to him. He started to skim his way through them. "We actually do know who broke Ivan Vanko out of jail: it was Justin Hammer."

Tony lifted his eyes up from the files. "Justin Hammer?"

He was not surprised by this information. As he'd said before, the alpha man was a sleaze.

"Yes," Natasha said. "We think that he wants Vanko to make multiple versions of your suit so that he can use them to elevate his company's position as a military contract."

Tony's jaw locked. God, the suit was not something that could ever end up in the hands of the military without explicit say-so about what they could with it – explicit say-so from him specifically. He didn't even want to think about all of the devastation that they would cause otherwise, all of the children that would be harmed just like the Ten Rings had been harming children in Gulmira, except it would be over a thousandfold times worse.

"Unfortunately for him," Natasha prattled on, not oblivious to his change of emotion, rather simply not wanting to waste time on it, "Vanko is not going to give him wheat he wants. He wants revenge against you first and foremost. Nothing else."

"Because of what my – " he had to stop himself. Why did he have the instinctive urge to call Howard his "father," now that he knew that he wasn't, when he'd never had the urge before? Was he getting stupidly sentimental or something? " – of what Howard did to his father?"

"Yes."

"Really a believer in ancestral sin, isn't he?"

He thought that he might've seen the left corner of Natasha's mouth twice. Aha, finally, he got one of the SHIELD agents to show their amusement at one of his jokes. "I guess so. Now, onto what we want you to do: we suspect that, based off of preliminary chatter, Vanko will be making his move either on July 31st or August 1st. We're not quite sure of where he will be debuting his plans at, but it will most likely be somewhere here on the West Coast, since this is where Hammer Industries' main factory in the United States is. We expect that there will not be just suits involved, but drones, if he is able to manufacture them."

"Wait," Tony interjected, "if you guys know that Hammer is the one that broke Vanko out of prison and where his factory here is, why aren't you trying to stop him already?" That just didn't sit right with him.

Natasha gave him the look of the long-suffering. "I've been told to debrief you on what you will be doing, not everything that is going on behind the scenes. There are things that you don't have clearance to know about. But," she said right as he opened his mouth, "I can tell you two of the reasons why: one, the suits and drones are not being built at Hammer's factory, and the supplies that he is getting are most likely not in his name, off the record, and not being sent to the factory itself, but to an undisclosed location that is also not in his name. We are using his main factory as an indication of his base of operations. Two, the more crimes that we can link with Hammer and Vanko, the higher the amount of years that they will be sent to prison for."

Okay, now that really didn't sit right with him.

"Even if that ends up causing more casualties?"

The thinning of her lips startled him some. She didn't seem as enthused about that either, unlike what she was trying to portray. "Yes."

Tony thought about what he wanted to say next. "Will you answer me honestly if I ask you something, Natashalie?"

"It depends on what you ask."

Not very encouraging of a response. He decided to take what he could get. "What did you do before this? No offense – you just seem a little too young for an experienced SHIELD agent."

She didn't blink as she answered him, just stared him directly in the eye. "Up until two years ago, I was an agent for the KGB, specializing in assassination. But I was killing people long before that. I was raised in a similar situation to your son Jason's, but he was lucky that your husband was able to get him and Barnes out of it; I was not. I went rogue once when I was around seventeen; I wasn't even trying to get out of the situation, even with how the opportunity was presented to me. For that, the people that trained me not only removed my uterus, as is typical procedure for anyone who possesses one in their care, but also the rest of my reproductive organs as a theta. I am not always a fan of what SHIELD does, the extra casualties that they allow to happen, but their methods are worlds better than those of my previous handlers. Does that answer your question?"

Tony's mouth ran dry. He knew that deltas only happened for certain reasons: genetic complications, other medical reasons such as cancer treatments before the age of presentation, or complete removal of sex organs after presentation also because of cancer or war crimes (but both of those had to be severe enough to make the already presented body think that it hadn't), but what she had just told him...

Christ.

He cleared his throat again. "I'm sorry."

Tony thought that her eyes might've softened at this. Her overall expression was blank, but the eyes were always the window to the soul. "Don't be. I've had a long time to deal with it. But, since I've debriefed you in everything that you need to know, I think I will be getting back to your children now," she said. She nodded at the files that he was still holding. "You can keep those for now. But we will be taking them back when all of this over."

The remaining time of the month of July, Tony spent with his family.

He waited until a few days later to sit down with Dick, so that they could both approach the conversation that they needed to have with more levelheaded attitudes. During that time, he had another last-minute appointment with Dr. Thompkins. He explained to her what was going on, and while she was worried at first about him basically treating himself with an undiscovered element, she was much more relieved once she got the blood tests that she'd ordered back.

"Your palladium toxicity levels are going down and there's no indications of any other type of radiation poisoning," she informed him. "I'm not saying just yet that this is cause for celebration, especially since you did this without even asking me on whether or not I would've recommended this treatment option – "

"You wouldn't have," he cut in. "Liability and all that. Trust me, I get it."

She ignored him. "But...this is good news, Dr. Stark. Very good news. And it's not the only good news that I have for you."

He perked up. "Oh?"

"I took this opportunity to test your blood for your baby's gender, since we haven't done that before now." She gauged his reaction before she said anything else. "Would you like me to tell you it?"

Tony...would've really rather preferred that Bruce would've been here for this. Biological or not, the baby in his womb was going to be his husband's daughter, too. And Bruce had been there for every other major scan with their other kids, if not every scan for a specific pregnancy. That was including all of the gender scans – the ones for Lili, Harley, Peter, Bea, and Edward and Gemma. It didn't seem right to find out when he wasn't here.

He knew what Bruce would say if he was to call him up right now and miraculously get an answer, though. Bruce would be fine with him finding out without him. It wasn't like the baby's other biological parent was here to find out either, after all.

He pretended that he was alright with it more than he really was. "Sure. Why not?"

Dr. Thompkins smiled at him. "You're having a girl."

A girl.

Wow.

He remembered with a jolt that he'd used she/her pronouns for the baby the other day, when he'd been thinking about the government trying to take her from him. It made sense now. He – he and Bruce were having a girl.

He grinned at Dr. Thompkins as he wrapped an arm around his stomach. "Well, that'll make baby names a bit easier, at least," he joked, like he hadn't already decided that, regardless of their gender, his ninth child was going to have a Desi or Persian name – preferably Persian. It was the culture that Anahita had adopted for thousands of years, it only made sense that he honor her at least in that way, if not others.

But there would be others, rest assured.

Anyways, after Dr. Thompkins gave him this bill of health and whatnot, he said to Dick after lunch, just as the younger omega was about to leave the kitchen, "Hey, bambino, can we talk after I get this mess cleaned up?"

Dick paused in his step. He turned around, his eyes narrowed and suspicious in that way only a teenager's could be. Jason, who had been about to leave with him, stopped as well. He eyed his older brother curiously.

"Fine," Dick decided after a moment. He wilted under the harshness of his own tone. "I'll help you clean up," he offered.

Tony took the proffered olive branch. "I'd very much like that. Thank you."

Neither of them spoke beyond what was necessary while they were cleaning up the mess. It was only afterwards, once they were sitting at the breakfast table, two iced coffees between them (yes, each of them had already had their traditionally advised one cup of coffee for the day, but he knew that Dick didn't actually drink coffee too much and they both deserved a treat in preparation for the conversation they were about to have), that one of them did. Tony ghosted his fingers along his glass, reminding himself of what he wanted to say. "Well, first thing's first," he said. "I'm – "

"I'm sorry," Dick blurted out.

Tony felt that space between his eyebrows crinkle. "Huh?" he said. "Bambino, what do you have to apologize for?"

Dick's face was cherry red. "I shouldn't have argued with you the other night. I know..." He tapped the surface of the table nervously with his right hand. "I know you weren't trying to start an argument with me. I knew you weren't then, too. But I started that argument, and that's on me. I'm sorry."

"Mm, you might've started the argument, but I had an equal part in ending it," Tony pointed out. "Don't worry, Dick. You're forgiven. And...I'm sorry, too. I don't...I don't like this decision that you're making, and you know Bruce doesn't either. Nah-ah, let me finish." Dick looked primed to get upset again, but if he was going to become upset, Tony wanted to say his piece first. "You are right about one thing: it's not our decision to make. But I think we're both worried that you're decision to not tell Zatanna about your pregnancy is going to backfire on you in the end. We'll be here for you, no matter what, we'll always support you, but what happens if there's something that you need her for, like her medical history, and she's not here to give it to you? You're not going to be able to go to her for help without revealing the truth. Or if she finds out on her own one day that you had her child and then you hid your daughter from her for all of this time? Are you ready to deal with the consequences of either of those problems?"

"Ye – " Dick started to say.

Tony shook his head. "No, I want you to think about it. Seriously think about it. Be honest with yourself. One parent is enough, a single parent can always be enough, but I want you to be honest if that is what you truly want for your baby, and that you haven't decided to not tell Zatanna out of fear. That if she were to find out later for whatever reason, that you wouldn't regret not telling her because you made this decision for you only, and not also for your daughter. That's part of being a parent, Dick: looking out for your child's best interests, even when you feel they might conflict with your own." He said the last part softly, so softly that it could barely be heard.

(Mainly because he knew he was a hypocrite in saying it.)

Dick stared down at the table. He didn't say anything for a good minute or two, pondering over what Tony had just said. Tony kind of hated himself for it: he didn't like causing duress in his kids, even though part of being a parent was sometimes giving them a dose of reality such as this one. He wanted them to feel like they could do anything, be anything.

But it wasn't just Dick that he had to consider in this equation anymore. And he needed Dick to see that he couldn't consider just his own wants and needs anymore either, if he was serious about being an omither.

Which he was. When the time was up, his eldest son, one of the two children that weren't of his blood and he hadn't given birth to but were still his children nonetheless, who he loved and cherished with all of his heart, looked up with a determined gaze in his eyes. "I'm not just doing it for me," he said. "I'm doing it for her, too. For Mari."

Everything that Tony had been planning to say stuttered to a halt. "For who?"

Dick grinned. He splayed out a hand on his stomach. "I, um...I decided on a name. Mari Antonia Grayson. The middle name is for you, of course, but Mari...it's meant to honor my biological amither, Marenda, but also Nonna Maria. Your mom."

"Oh," Tony breathed. "Oh, bambino..."

Then he was launching himself off of his chair, as much as he was able to. He pulled Dick into a hug. Because of their damned pregnancy hormones, they quickly became blubbering messes, sobbing and crying and whatnot. "I'm...I am soproud of you, Dick, and I love you. You've been the most incredible kid, ever since Bruce first brought you home with him," he sniffled at one point. "Don't you ever forget that."

"I know," Dick mumbled, his voice muffled by Tony's shirt. "I love you too, Omi."

Tony couldn't tell you how long they sat there like that. What he could tell you was that, sometime later, they were interrupted by Jason scoffing as he came into the kitchen. "Seriously?" he complained. "Why do you guys have to have a crying fest in the kitchen? I just wanted to get some orange juice!"

Dick pulled away from Tony to wipe at his eyes with one of the napkins on the table. "Just – just you wait," he threatened. "One day, years from now 'cause you better not be like me, this is going to be you."

Jason shuddered. "No way. I'm never going to be pregnant. No offense, but you two are a better lesson for birth control than health class ever will be."

Tony made a sound that was almost like a laugh. The phrase "no offense" was doing a lot of heavy lifting in that statement. "You know, I thought the same thing when I was your age."

"Yeah, well, I'm gonna stay thinking this way when I'm yours."

Harley's birthday was on the 23rd, just under two weeks after his conversation with Dick, so of course they had a birthday party for him. It was on the smaller scale, since although he had made sure to invite his children's friends and classmates to birthday parties in years past if they wanted it (and Harley often did, because he had a lot of friends at St. Philomena's), this year with them all the way in Malibu, it was just their (relatively speaking) immediate family. Not even Selina and Felix were there, although she made sure to call them to wish her honorary nephew a happy birthday and make sure that the present she had sent had arrived in time, and Dinah, to Tony's surprise, did the same – not that he was going to complain about it. It seemed like she was finally warming up to them.

They crowded around the breakfast table in the kitchen. Harley grinned as he stood in front of his birthday cake, a chocolate cake with caramel cheese frosting homemade by Tony; it was his favorite flavor. It had nine candles on top, and even with how it made sense that those number of years had passed since he'd given birth to Harley, Tony could still hardly believe it. It felt just like yesterday that he'd been in labor with him in his and Bruce's bedroom back home in the Glass House, that his mother had been giving him words of encouragement as he'd cussed out both Dr. Maxwell and his husband.

"Happy birthday, to you," they all sang. "Happy birthday, to you. Happy birthday, dear Harley..." Jason purposefully strung out the second part of Harley's name into multiple syllables, causing Edward, Gemma, and Riri all to shriek with laughter. They weren't really singing, so maybe he shouldn't have said "all," but they were following along as best as they could with wide eyes. "Happy birthday, to you!"

"And many more!" Dick, Jason, Lili, Peter, and Bea all sang in unison. Off-tune, in the case of Dick and Jason. This was also on purpose.

Harley blew out his candles, all in one go. They cheered. Tony swooped in behind his son, pulling him into a hug. Harley let out a squawk, but he otherwise allowed it. "Nine years old," Tony sighed, but not in a bad way. "My mimmo is nine years old."

"I want to eat my cake, Omi!"

"Alright, alright." Tony let go of him. "Where's the cake slicer?"

He cut the cake, making sure everybody got a piece, even Natasha, before he gave one to himself. He had to hand it to himself: the cake was good. Even his youngest daughter seemed to agree, if the way that she started kicking inside him was any indication. Or maybe that was just coincidence: it seemed kind of early for her to already be tasting what he was eating.

That was food for later thought – pun intended.

As he ate his cake, Harley started to open his presents. There were a fair number of them: an Nintendo DSi despite how the handheld game console wasn't supposed to be released until November (Tony had pulled some strings there), various LEGO sets, the necessary materials to make a potato gun (Harley had been begging him to let him make one for months now, or in his words, "forever." Tony had finally decided to just let him go ahead and do it because of all of the complaining, however it was coming with many stipulations, such as how they would have to build it together in the lab and that Harley could only use it when he was supervised by one of the adults in the household), and etcetera.

With him opening more and more gifts, though, there was one thing that became increasingly apparent. Tony watched as Harley bit at his bottom lip, taking a bit longer to open each gift. His blue eyes darted over to the landline phone that was in the kitchen. He was waiting.

Waiting for the call from the one person who hadn't already done it, nor had he since the last time they'd talked, when Tony had been on bedrest: his father. Bruce.

Tony was waiting for it, too. They all were, really, but him especially, right up there with Harley. The omega wouldn't necessarily blame Bruce if he wasn't able to call – he understood that Bruce might be out in the middle of nowhere without cell service, or that he'd maybe even lost his phones entirely and didn't want to risk placing a call on an unprotected line, or that something even...worse might have been going on. Like him being held captive or something like that.

Yet Harley was only nine years old now: he didn't have the full understanding of an adult. And Tony was worried that, if that call didn't come, he would end up viewing this birthday in a negative light. Not just now, but years afterwards. And his relationship with Bruce...Harley looked up to his father, he adored his father. All of their kids did. He didn't want Bruce's failure to call, if that wound up being the case, to negatively impact their relationship for years after now, as he had a feeling it would...

He wound up hovering over Harley, placing a hand on his shoulder and squeezing it. Harley looked up at him with a smile; it wasn't one that reached his eyes.

Finally, there was only one gift left, one from Alfred. Harley sucked in a breath as he started to open it.

Then...

The ringing of the landline caught them all off-guard. Tony practically jumped out of his skin. Everybody looked over at the phone, though nobody said anything.

"I'll get it," he said.

The phone number wasn't one that he recognized. That didn't necessarily mean anything.

He pressed the "accept" button and held the phone up against his ear. The silence in the room was practically deafening. "Hello?"

"Hi, Tony."

The grin that spread across his lips felt like it could've split his face in half. What a miserable existence he would've had, if that would've been the case. "Hi, Bruce," he said exaggeratedly.

He heard and saw all of his kids gaps.

"Is Harley there?"

"You mean the birthday boy?" He made the "come hither" motion to Harley. The nine-year-old launched himself out of his seat so quickly that, if not for Rebecca stopping it at the last second, it would've gone crashing to the ground. "Yes. You want to talk to him?"

"You know I do."

"Alright. Well, here he is."

He gave the phone to Harley. His son's face was as bright as the sun as he exclaimed, "Hi, Dad!"

Now naturally, Tony spent more time with his kids beyond just these two examples. He watched more movies with them, cuddled with them, cooked food with them, played outside with them, swam in the pool and the ocean with them, and more. It was perhaps the most amount of time that he had spent with them without interruption since February, and Godhe felt guilty about that. He looked into the eyes of his kids, particularly the middle ones, and wondered how they were going to think about this span of months when they got older. He tried not to think about it too much outside of his promises to not let this chaos happen again, since he couldn't change the past, only the future. Still, those thoughts were present in his mind.

They weren't the only ones, either. After Harley's birthday, the date for when SHIELD thought Vanko was going to attack was right around the corner. He needed a plan, one better than the simple vis-à-vis that SHIELD was intending. A plan that would make sure that neither Vanko or Hammer ever tried to harm him or his family for something that Howard had done (in the former's case) or try to replicate the arc reactor technology ever again (in both of their cases). A plan that made sure that they would both go to jail.

A plan that ensured that he wasn't going to do this alone, because he couldn't afford to do this alone. Too much was at stake, between his life, his baby's life, and the overall wellbeing of his family.

It was a good thing that he'd sort-of-unintentionally come up with the first part of "not doing it alone," then.

"I should have seen this coming," Rhodey bemoaned when Tony told him just what he was intending to do. "Tones, I haven't even put on that suit yet! I don't know the first thing about it!"

"You think I was much better when I fought in Gulmira, or with Stane?" Tony countered. He was quite literally pushing his best friend towards the suit he had made for him. "You just need to get in it and give it a whirl. It'll be just as easy as flying a plane."

"You say that like learning to fly a plane didn't take months! You're asking me to do this in days!"

"Yeah, well, you actually know how to fly a plane. I don't. So, if anything – " He stopped short as he heard a sound akin to laughter behind him. He whirled around. "Are you laughing at me, Natashalie?"

Natasha had already schooled her features. "Of course not, Dr. Stark."

He sniffed haughtily. "Good. Because, you know, I'm going to need your help too in all of this."

She kept her expression closely guarded, but he thought he might've seen her right eye twitch. "I am only supposed to do what Director Fury instructs me to."

"Nah-ah," Tony singsonged. "You're on my payroll. Technically, you're one of my employees, too."

"My cover is. I am not."

"Same difference. Besides, unlike platypus here – " he slapped Rhodey lightly on the arm, making his best friend roll his eyes. Honestly, Tony was kind of impressed that he was putting up with this as much as he was even with his complaints. He hadn't run away screaming yet, at least " – I'm not going to be asking you to do much, just some everyday hacking. And I know you have to know how to hack, before you try to talk your way out of that. You'll have JARVIS helping you, too, so it will be easy-peasy."

Before Natasha could even reply, JARVIS was beating her to it. "Thank you for the praise, sir."

"'Course, JAR. You deserve it."

Word Count: 6,897

Next Chapter Title: TBA