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Tony didn’t think he’d had that much to drink. Maybe if he had a bit more this would all go away? Yeah, no that’s the kind of thinking that got him here in the first place, which…where was he exactly?
He’d been in his workshop, steadily making his way through the remainder of his liquor cabinet – he recalled that much. The tower was just too fucking empty these days. It was as if the past few years with the Avengers had never happened. The halls were quiet, the cabinet to the left of the kitchen sink wasn’t overflowing with pop tarts, JARVIS couldn’t find any more stashes of energy bars and Cheetos in the air ducts, the sink was free of coffee grounds.
He’d found the stub of a prismacolor pencil in Electric Blue behind one the couch cushions a few days ago. He remembered buying that set for…
Tony hadn’t scrubbed a single charcoal smear off the tv remote in months.
So what if everyone had left him? He’d been expecting it. It was bound to happen.
But that didn’t change the fact that he missed the team. And Steve – Steve had gone after Bucky, then left with Bucky, and Tony was just sitting here, blinking through a hangover.
Why hadn’t he told Steve how he felt when he had the chance?
Would it have made a difference? he thought. Probably not. He could picture it: Steve would awkwardly wring his hands and apologize and try to make him feel better while simultaneously edging toward the door. It was fine though. It wasn’t Steve’s fault that he didn’t love Tony like that. Tony got that, he did. But it just…
At least he had kept his mouth shut. Small mercies, he thought.
He made to rub his eyes, but his hands were tied behind his back.
“Oh, shit,” he said. Captured again. Who was it this time? What did they want?
“I think he’s awake!”
A crash.
“Mr. Stark! Mr. Stark? Mr. Stark, are you okay?”
“Can I poke him?”
“No, you can’t poke him. He’s hung over.”
“Fine. Spoilsport. I’ll get him some water then.”
“And ibuprofen. Get the ibuprofen! Perfect, here, give me the glass -- DON’T POUR IT ON HIM WHAT ARE YOU DOING.”
“I’m awake! I’m awake! What the hell…” Tony stared through the dripping curtain of his hair at his two captors.
“Hi, Mr. Stark,” said a sheepish voice. Peter Parker, Tony thought absently as he shook water out of his face.
“Hi, Tin Can.”
“Not now, Wade.”
And Parker’s mercenary boyfriend, apparently.
Tony swallowed. Okay, so not kidnapped exactly. “Is this an intervention?”
Tony would later say he had made the decision under duress. He would deny any agency in the whole matter. It was not his doing. Blame the webslinging menace and his masked mercenary. It’s their fault. All their fault. Completely.
Even though they got on his last nerve and the kitchen smelled entirely too often of Mexican food now – and his records on Mario Kart were left in the dust and there were a lot of random bullet holes in the walls and one room needed a complete renovation because an experimental web fluid exploded and one time there was a severed limb on the stairs – what was he saying again?
Well, he hadn’t picked up a bottle since they’d moved in. That’s the moral of the story, Tony thinks.
He still misses his old team, but he thinks he might have something like a family now.
And then Loki showed up on his doorstep with a duffle bag and a chagrined look on his face.
“Fine. Come in.”