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Howard watched the whole conversation from his apartment, fuming and cursing under his breath the entire time, Maria grim-faced beside him. He had trusted Fury, to an extent, even liked him a bit, but right now he would cheerfully sock him in the jaw if he thought he could actually manage to land a punch (though the guy had gotten old, he could probably still wipe the floor with untrained old Howard). That Fury could sit there and pretty much admit to throwing Tony under the bus for his own reasons while asking for his help made Howard see red. Tony should tell the asshole to go fuck himself. At least he wasn’t defending Steve. If he’d done that, Howard wouldn’t have been able to control himself. The mere suggestion that Steve could go anywhere other than prison infuriated him. He wasn’t that great anyway. Maybe back in World War II, but now? What had he done during the first invasion? Killed a few aliens on the ground, big deal. A well-equipped regular soldier could have done the same. It was Tony who’d saved the world that day. Well, and the Hulk, who had single-handedly destroyed two of those ships. The rest of the Avengers hadn’t done anything that couldn’t have been done by other people if they’d known and prepared for it. Bunch of assholes.
There was nothing he could do about them just yet, but Fury was right there, and Howard wasn’t going to let it slide. He took his phone and sent a message to Tony that he wanted to talk to Fury.
“What are you doing?” Maria asked.
“I’m gonna go talk to that bastard.”
When Fury had arrived, they had all discussed whether to reveal Howard and Maria’s resurrection to him. Tony had been against it, worried about what Fury would do with the information, and the others had agreed that they weren’t sure the man was trustworthy. Now that they knew what he wanted, though, and that was the Avengers’ help, there was less chance of him fucking them over. Fury had to know that, whatever cooperation he was proposing, Tony didn’t actually need him for any of it (and if he didn’t know that, he hadn’t learned anything from his mistakes). It was therefore in his best interest to stay on Tony’s good side, so Howard was going to take the opportunity to get some things off his chest. He was sick and tired of seeing his boy screwed over by people Howard had thought he could trust. He was sick and tired of all the fucking traitors who thought they could get away with this crap.
On screen, Tony looked at his phone. Are you sure? he replied.
Yes. Keep him there, I’m on my way. Howard typed. The strategizing seemed to be over, now it was time for Fury to answer for his actions. He turned to his wife. “You coming?”
“Oh, yes.”
*****
The door was open. Howard could see Banner leaning against it talking quietly to Vision, who saw them and inclined his head slightly in acknowledgement. Howard took a deep breath, squared his shoulders and walked in, Maria right behind him.
“Well well, Nick Fury. Long time no see.”
Fury whirled around in his direction, hand going for the gun at his side, though he didn’t draw it. His eyes widened when he saw who had spoken and he looked around quickly, as if confirming he wasn’t hallucinating.
“If you shoot my parents I’ll have to kill you and that will mean we’ve just wasted an hour for nothing.” Howard had to give it to Tony, the kid could bullshit with the best of them. His casual nonchalant attitude was probably infuriating for the people he was riling (it had certainly annoyed him plenty back in the day, and the kid had only gotten better at it).
“What the… Howard!? What the fuck?” Fury turned to Tony and the others, who all looked as if nothing out of the ordinary was going on. It was a little bit funny.
“Oh, I’m sorry, did we forget to give you some important piece of information? How thoughtless of us.” Tony’s smirk had Fury narrowing his eyes.
“What the fuck is this, Stark?”
Tony ignored Fury, taking out his phone and fiddling with it, the picture of boredom. He looked up. “Oh, sorry, did you mean me? You’ll have to be more specific, there are lots of us now,” he said, smirk firmly in place as he gestured between himself, Howard and Maria.
“Cut the crap, Stark.”
“Don’t talk to my son like that, Nick,” Howard said, coming closer to stand toe to toe with Fury, letting his anger show while Maria narrowed her eyes. “You ought to be thanking him on bended knee for fixing up the mess your so-called Avengers made. Not to mention saving the fucking world.” And all the tech Tony had most likely built for SHIELD.
“You’re supposed to be dead.”
“So are you, the way I hear it.”
Fury sighed, taking a step back. “I was at the funeral. I saw your body. You were dead.” His posture was still tense, as if expecting an attack. Good.
“And now I’m not.” Even though it had been a little over a month, Howard still had nightmares of dying, seeing the bike coming closer, the man – Bucky – looking at him coldly, no recognition at all. He remembered pain, fear and regret – helplessness. And whenever he thought that Steve had known and said nothing, had protected the man who’d murdered him in cold blood without a single thought to either Howard himself or Tony, the feeling of betrayal threatened to suffocate him.
“And how did that happen?”
“Well, it’s been lovely, but we should get going.” Rhodes gave Fury on last pointed look and left the room with Vision and Banner. Tony waved goodbye to his friends and took a seat in one of the chairs, putting his feet up on the table.
“Probably shouldn’t tell him too much, dad, don’t trust him not to fuck us over if it helps him somehow.”
Fury sat as well, glaring at Tony and giving Howard and Maria a suspicious look. “I already told you, Stark, I’m on your side.”
“Well, excuse me if I don’t believe you. I seem to have a bad habit of trusting the wrong people. You know, like a certain spy that said she was on my side only to switch over when the other side was more convenient. And a few other examples I could mention.”
There was no answer Fury could give to that, so he said nothing. “It’s really you.” He eventually said, turning to Howard.
“You have aliens dropping from the sky, Nick, is a little resurrection so hard to believe?”
Fury snorted. “It isn’t, actually. Fucking crazy shit keeps happening. The world has gone to hell.” He became serious. “How did it happen?”
“Accident with an alien artifact,” Tony answered. “And before you start getting ideas, it’s very unlikely to happen again, so don’t even try. Also, you’ll get blown up if you try to get your grabby hands on it. And wouldn’t that just be a crying shame?”
“Now,” Howard said, getting Fury’s attention, “what I want to know is: did you forget the part where I told you to keep my kid out of SHIELD? And to protect him?” He tried to reign in his anger, not entirely successfully.
“I see you guys have made up.” Fury looked from one to the other, assessing them. It pissed Howard off – not that he wasn’t already pissed enough to begin with.
“Don’t bullshit me, Nick. I thought I could trust you not to throw my son under the bus, but I guess I was wrong.” Son of a bitch.
“I wasn’t trying to do that, as you no doubt heard. Things got more complicated than I anticipated, and I overestimated some people’s ability to fucking think.”
“You mean like that asshole Rogers? Who almost killed my son with the weapon I made him?” He leaned over, doing his best to loom over Fury, who was admittedly bigger and more intimidating than Howard.
It was nearly imperceptible, but Howard saw Fury flinch at that. Good. “That never should have happened. I swear I didn’t think the guy was that far gone, that it’d ever come to that.”
Howard wasn’t appeased. “Really? Because it seemed to me that Steve disliked Tony from the start and you encouraged it.”
“No, I didn’t.” He paused, leaning back in his chair and putting his hands on his lap, putting some distance between them. “Okay, that report wasn’t great, but I honestly didn’t think Rogers would put much stock into it once the battle was over. He was friends with you, after all, and your kid here,” he waved in Tony’s direction, who was watching them intently “is a chip off the old block. I figured they’d hit it off eventually.” He grimaced. “I guess I figured wrong.”
“Yeah, no shit,” Tony said, a hand on his chest where the shield had hit him. Howard was going to destroy that thing one of these days. Or maybe he’d use it to bash Steve’s face in, then destroy it. It would be incredibly satisfying.
“And you sent some fucking back-stabbing woman to spy on my son,” Howard hissed, leaning over Fury again. “You put him in danger, and you deliberately sabotaged him.”
“Again, I wasn’t trying to do that, not really. And he put himself in danger long before SHIELD got involved. I tried to keep him out of the spotlight, but he decided to go and announce he was Iron Man to the whole fucking world. That wasn’t my idea.”
Howard had seen that press conference – he’d seen a lot of footage of Tony since he’d been given a tablet and figured out how to use the Internet. It was amazing how much stuff was out there about Tony, not all of it flattering – and Howard thought Tony had done the right thing with that announcement. He could have handled it better, maybe, but it showed he wasn’t going to hide behind lies and subterfuge – which had no doubt thrown a wrench in Fury’s (and Hydra’s) secretive agenda. He’d set himself up for accountability from day one, and ensured he had control of the suit and its use. God only knew what would have happened if someone like Ross or Hydra had gotten a hold of that technology. Hell, even Fury himself.
“You took advantage of the fact that he was sick” he didn’t want to say dying, even if he knew the problem had been fixed, because the thought was deeply disturbing “to send in your little spy. Instead of helping him, you jerked him around.” Tony had told them about the palladium poisoning, about how he’d spent months thinking he was dying (and with every new piece of information, Howard had wanted to tear his hair out and kill someone – Jesus, Tony’d had a lot of shit happen to him, it was enough to drive a parent up the wall), desperate to find a solution and Fury had known and done nothing.
Fury shook his head. “If I had a cure, I would have given it to him. I didn’t. I had people keeping an eye on him, yes, but again it wasn’t to screw him over.”
“Well, if that was you trying to be friendly I’d hate to see what you do to your enemies.”
“If I wanted him dead, he’d be dead. I was trying to keep him alive, goddammit! It’s not my fault he’s a reckless fool.”
“And did it ever occur to you to, oh, I don’t know… talk to me? Tell me that?” Tony interjected. “Instead of sending Romanoff to mess with me? Contrary to popular belief, I do listen when people tell me stuff. Well, important stuff at least. How not to die would have been fucking important.”
Fury stood up. “Okay. You want me to admit I fucked up? All right, I admit it. I fucked up. Sending Romanoff was a mistake, making Rogers leader was a huge mistake. All right? What more do you want?”
Tony seemed surprised that Fury had admitted to being wrong, but Howard wasn’t, not entirely. Fury had never been so full of himself that he couldn’t recognize a mistake. It didn’t really make him feel better considering what his mistakes had cost Tony, but it was something.
“What I want,” Howard said with arms crossed, looking coldly at Fury, “is your assurance that Rogers and his buddies will go to prison where they belong. None of this ‘we need them’ shit. We don’t need them. They are short-sighted, stupid, insubordinate and dangerous. I want consequences for their actions – no sweeping it under the rug, no making concessions or excuses. I want them found, and brought to justice. And it’s not for vengeance, though I’ll admit I do want some revenge, but because it’s what they deserve. You, Nick, helped create this mess, so now you’re gonna help clean it up. You admit you made a mistake? Good. Now you fix it. And if you ever mess with my son again, I promise you, there will be hell to pay.”
For a while no one said anything, and Howard kept his eyes on Fury, wanting the other man to know he was absolutely serious. He might not have his name and power anymore, but he had all of Tony’s (considerable) assets and resources at his disposal. Howard hadn’t gone from poor nobody to one of the richest man in the country by being an idiot or a push-over. When he wanted something done, he got it done, and Fury should know better than to underestimate him, especially when it was this important. This personal.
Fury nodded.
“Wow, dad, that was pretty badass, I’m impressed.” Tony looked stunned, which deflated Howard a bit. His son should know he’d always fight for him, it shouldn’t be such a fucking surprise. Well, time to show him then.
“Are we understood?” Howard asked.
Fury nodded again. “Loud and clear. You know,” he continued, “I kinda pity Rogers now.” He smiled. “Glad to have you back, Howard.” He offered his hand and Howard shook it, still a bit wary. “With the two of you working together, Rogers is gonna regret ever hearing the name Stark. And those fucking aliens are gonna regret ever coming to this planet.”
Howard nodded and smiled back. When Fury turned to look at Tony, Howard decided to take a chance and punched the fucker as hard as he could, surprised that it connected. Fury staggered a little but quickly gathered himself.
“Shit, dad!” Tony’s eyes widened and he activated his wrist device, getting the repulsor ready and pointing it at Fury, in case the man decided to retaliate, probably. Howard shook his hand – fuck that hurt, but damn it felt good.
Fury actually laughed, the bastard. “Fuck, Howard.” He rubbed his jaw. “You pack a hell of a punch for an old man.”
“You deserved it.” Goddammit, his hand was on fire, but he gritted his teeth – he’d be dammed if he let it show.
“Yeah, I guess I did.” Turning to Tony and taking a step back to be out of Howard’s reach he added. “Could you not point that thing at me?”
Tony lowered his arm but didn’t deactivate the device. Smart kid. He was smiling too. “Also pretty badass, dad. But please don’t try to do that to Rogers, you’ll break your hand on his super chin.”
“Maybe I’ll borrow one of your gloves.” Or maybe the whole suit. He’d been meaning to ask Tony if he could go for a ride in it, it was probably even better than flying a plane.
Maria, who had been silent up until now, finally came closer to glare at Fury. “I don’t care who you are or what your plans are from now on. But let me be clear: you will treat my son with the respect he deserves and you will never betray, lie or use him for your own gain ever again. You do not want to see what will happen to you if you hurt him again.” She stood tall and proud, eyes blazing and hands clenched at her side. “You have to idea what a mother is capable of to protect her child.”
Howard saw Tony’s eyes widen at this side of his mother he had probably never really known. Howard had seen her facing down swarmy politicians and businessmen enough times to know she could be pretty damn fierce when she wanted to.
Fury watched her and nodded. “Message received, ma’am.” He started to walk towards the door. “Yeah, Rogers is in for a surprise all right.” Fury said, smile back in place, the asshole, but Howard felt better now, even if his hand was still smarting like crazy.
One down.