Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Terran,” says a voice, and it sounds muted to Tony, as if he’s underwater. As if he’s drowning, and someone is calling from above.

“Hey, Terran. Stark.”

It comes again. The blue woman, he thinks, recognizing the coldness in her tone and the metallic whir of an arm. Daughter of Thanos. Another half-machine. He doesn’t move.

She sits down next to him with a couple soft clicks of her joints. Tony makes no sign to acknowledge her presence. He doesn’t know what she wants from him, why she has not just left him here to die. For a long moment, an hour, three hours, they sit in silence— a tired, wounded man with his hands curled against his lips, crushing the last of a boy’s ashes in his fist, and a woman, back straight, eyes dark and pensive, watching the setting sun.

The sun takes forever to set on Titan, the day longer than one of Earth’s. But set it does, and finally Tony moves. Looks down at his feet. Up at the now midnight sky. Then finally to his right, at his sole remaining companion, a woman he’s only known for the duration of a single battle that feels like eons ago already.

“Remind me your name,” he asks. It comes out as barely more than a hoarse croak. For a beat or two, the cyborg does not respond.

“Nebula,” she eventually concedes.

“Right.”

There is not much else to say.

Tony.

There was no other way.

Doctor Strange’s last words to him sear through his brain. Echoing, desolate, desperate. The doctor’s eyes had been full of too much knowledge, an aching pain of millions of possibilities, millions of outcomes that Tony does not know and will never know.

There had been one win, Strange had said. He’d promised. But they’d lost. They’d failed.

There was no other way.

Bullshit, Tony thinks. He almost wants to laugh. He thinks he might have finally gone insane. He thinks he might be crying, but he’s not sure. He can’t feel anything.

Losing everyone, losing Pete— it doesn’t count as a win.

It doesn’t and if the doctor thought it did, then— no. No.

He thinks instead of the fragile openness of Strange’s last gaze, his last words, and wants desperately to believe them. That somehow they can still save it all, can somehow fucking just reverse time and deaths and just—

(he wants Peter back in his arms and warm and safe and not crumbling to dust—)

He needs a time stone for that, Tony thinks wryly. A time stone and a certain fucking wizard that crumbled with the rest of them.

Angry tears are rolling down his cheeks, and he lets them fall, down his face and dripping on to his arms as he squeezes his eyes shut and curls in on himself, in and in and in as if he could just become small enough maybe he could crumble too. He knows that he should’ve died instead, knows that this is some cruel trick of fate to leave Tony fucking Stark, Merchant of Death, alive once again as the ones he tried so hard to protect fucking turned to dust around him, and he hates Strange even more for asking Thanos to spare him. For leaving him helpless to watch them fall.

Tony Stark, forever cursed to watch the world end, without being allowed to end with it.

There was no other way.

Tony.

Mr. Stark, I don’t feel so good—

“This was inevitable, you know.” Nebula says abruptly, cutting through his thoughts and his tears. The bitterness in her tone slices through the night air like a knife. “Thanos has been planning this for as long as I knew him.”

“And all that time you didn’t think to put a stop to it, huh.” He can’t help it, knows that she tried and couldn’t, knows from her brief introduction before the fight that she has as much reason to hate Thanos as much as he, if not more, and yet. And yet.

Nebula turns her dark eyes toward him, the sorrow for her sister and for the life of suffering she carries with each breath she takes reflected in her stare and Tony grimaces.

“You know the answer to that already,” She says simply, her voice cold as ever, and Tony nods. He knows. Of course he knows.

He’s been seeing the images for years, every night, every day, haunting his every step, and he still couldn’t stop Thanos. He thinks of the scratch he left on Thanos’ cheek and the way Thanos had held his head, gently, as he pushed Tony’s own weapon deeper into his gut. This whole time, Tony had been a joke. A failure. A plaything for Thanos, something for the Titan to humor himself with before he had gotten bored.

You shouldn’t have given him the stone, Strange. I wasn’t worth it.

And suddenly, he feels angry. The hurt and humiliation burns through him and he feels himself shaking with pure, unadulterated rage. It’s freeing, it’s all-encompassing, and Tony revels in it, the fury that begins to course through his veins. Fuck Thanos, fuck this cruel world that has hated him from day one, fuck fate for giving him hope, giving him love, then taking it away at every turn and laughing in his face as he failed to stop it. Fuck the Infinity Stones, fuck the Avengers, fuck the better world he had been trying desperately to build, fuck everyone who said he could do it and fuck everyone who said he couldn't. And fuck Doctor Stephen fucking Strange for giving him one last fucking shred of hope and then crumbling to dust along with the rest of them, taking Peter with him and leaving Tony with absolutely fucking nothing.

There was no other way.

Just as he curses the doctor’s name to hell, he sees a flash of movement to his left. Tony whips his head around and he’s so angry that he’s ready to fight, broken suit or not, wants to punch something, anything— but what he sees instead stops him dead in his tracks.

Tony.

It’s that god-forsaken cloak of Strange’s, its two ends flipped up in a gesture that could almost be interpreted as a “hands-up-don’t-shoot” kind-of motion.

Tony stares, still seething. Tears still streaming down his face.

We’re in the endgame now, says Strange’s voice in his head.

“Did he leave you here for me?” He asks. It sounds stupid to say out loud but oh god, he wants it to be true. The cloak give a slight shrug and waves its collar a bit. It could be a yes.

Tony wants it so badly to be a yes.

Tony reaches a shaking hand, the last of Peter’s ashes slipping through his fingers, toward the red cloak hovering just out of reach, and it responds immediately to the movement as if it had been waiting the whole time for his signal, flying forward and sliding around Tony’s shoulders. The gold fastens come to a rest securely with a light tap on each side of his chest.

It feels like a hug, almost. It feels like a here I am. I’m not going anywhere.

And then Tony starts to cry for real, a mixture of grief and relief and desperation and hope all mixed into one.

The cloak wraps him up tighter, folding over him like a warm blanket, and it’s a comfort he didn’t realize he needed until he had it, a comfort that he clings to like a lifeline. It feels like hope. Desperate, weak, and flickering, but hope nonetheless. It seems like a reminder from the doctor. That there is still a way. That there was one way, and this must be it.

He would get Peter back. He didn’t care that it was impossible.

He’s done the impossible before.

He pulls the edges of the cloak tighter around himself and stands.

Chapter Text

“We need a plan,” he says, addressing Nebula.

“What do you mean, ‘we’?” she shoots back, squinting an eye in distaste. Her voice however, surprisingly lacks the vitriol Tony might’ve expected, and even as he starts limping away she gets up to follow him.

“Well, we—” he re-emphasizes, “have a giant wrinkled purple douche to kill. Now, doesn’t that sound like a mission you might like backup for, hm?”

Tony grimaces as each step pulls at his side, but he stubbornly continues his slow hobble toward the abandoned spaceship off to the distance. The cloak helps a bit, holding much of his weight and catching him before each potential stumble. He keeps a firm hold on the edges of the red fabric, hugging it tight to his frame.

Nebula makes a whirring noise that sounds vaguely irritated, but falls into step by his side. “Your complexion suggests that you might not be in the best condition to kill even a small rodent at this point, Terran. You are weak, you need…” she trails off, as if surprised by her utterance of a statement that may have passed as concern for his well-being. Tony snorts.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart, I’ll continue to pretend you’re a completely heartless assassin as long as you pretend to believe that I’m capable of getting us out of here.”

Nebula scowls at him. “Call me that again and you’ll find just how heartless I can be,” she mutters, and ah, there’s the venom he had been expecting. “And I don’t need the help of a Terran on his first trip from home to navigate the solar system I grew up in.”

Tony rolls his eyes. “Yeah, okay, sure. Whatever. And what’s this Terra-whatsit you keep calling me? Is that alien speak for ‘dumb human’ or what, ‘cause I’ll have you know that as far as humans go, I’m actually one of the more passably intelligent ones.” He laughs bitterly. “Not that that does me much good, of course, but you know how it is. Or maybe you don’t, I don’t know.”

Nebula gives him a look. “Are all Terrans this talkative? Or do you and Quill just happen to share a common annoying character flaw?”

“Rude, I would like to point out that I am infinitely more nuanced than he is,” Tony quips back, but then falls silent as he remembers that Quill is. Not here.

Is? Was.

Silence begins to stretch between them again, abrupt, unwanted, and Tony starts to feel nauseous. He buries the feeling with a rough shake of his shoulders and swipes a palm angrily across his face. Pulling subconsciously on one pointed end of the cloak’s collar, he nods, more to himself than to Nebula.

The cloak responds by gently covering his shaking hand.

“Right.”

Tony swallows the bile rising in his throat and, determinedly not thinking of people to ashes to dust, he strides forward, approaching the ship that had belonged to the Guardians. It looks mostly functional from the outside, covered in a little bit of debris from the battle but otherwise unharmed. He pauses at its base, evaluating its build and locating its entrance, but before he can do much more than that, Nebula slips past him and crawls under the ship’s belly to unlock a hatch. It pops open with a quick code and she disappears inside faster than Tony can blink in indignation.

“You’re slow,” he hears her now disembodied voice call from inside.

Tony pulls a face and mocks her words silently to the sky, before lowering himself to the ground to crawl under as well. “I think I get a pass because I have a mildly concerning gash in my side and a rather inconveniently injured leg, but by all means, continue to lord your superior alien knowledge over me, why not? Tony Stark doesn’t have feelings, it’s fine.”

He pops his head through the latch and gives Nebula an obnoxiously bright, beaming smile, before bracing his elbows to pull himself up. It takes him a couple of failed tries (he feels weaker than he wants to admit), but the cloak soon takes pity on him and levitates him up into the ship, placing him down a short ways away from his new companion.

Tony gives the cloak a high-five. “Nice,” he says. “Do that more often.”

Nebula looks unimpressed by the entire event. “It’s my sister’s ship, of course I know it.”

“Wonderful, wanna give me a welcome tour?”

The cyborg scowls and stomps off, Tony quick on her heels. She starts throwing open doors haphazardly, making sure each makes a loud clang as she goes.

“Bunker 1, Bunker 2,” she points him to two small rooms on the left side of the ship, each with multiple sleeping rolls in various disarray— “water closet on the end, communal kitchen here, there’s a storage area next to it where I was lovingly housed for a short while. Cockpit up front, and it looks like the escape pod is missing…” She pauses to study said absence of escape-pod idly, then shrugs and stalks off to the front of the ship.

“There. Tour done. Welcome aboard.”

She sinks in to one of the pilot seats and begins fiddling with some of the buttons on the control panel.

“Great. Awesome. Any alcohol?”

Nebula ignores him.

“Excellent.”

With a shrug that is as much the cloak’s as it is Tony’s, he gingerly limps away to the helpfully-identified communal kitchen. It’s a mess, bowls and utensils everywhere and various snack boxes (most seem to be unknown space food Tony has never heard of) littering the counter, a tiny sink filled with dirty plates.

It looks like a well-used kitchen. A complete mess, perhaps, but signs of its previous occupants are everywhere. Tony thinks of Quill and Mantis and Drax and something pulls at his heart desperately.

He forces it back down and does not think of Peter. Damn, he really needs a fucking drink.

There’s a cabinet, top-right, helpfully labeled “Booze” in chicken-scratch handwriting that’s probably Quill’s, and Tony lets out a relieved breath of air and grasps at the handle. Inside is a mess of odd colored bottles labeled with more mysterious brands. Tony grabs one with clear liquid inside and prays that it’s space vodka.

Tony takes a swig directly from the bottle and winces as it goes down.

It’s definitely not vodka, but it sure burns like it.

“God, that’s fucking nasty,” he tells his new best friend, and the heavy red fabric flutters around him in agreement.

Tony takes another gulp, then another, and he spills a bit down his shirt but whatever, it’s not like his clothes aren’t already completely destroyed, and the last bits of his nano-tech are 100% non-functional. His eyes and throat are stinging, and even the inside of his ears starts to throb. It’s blissfully awful.

The cloak’s tall collar kind of half-pats the side of Tony’s head in what seems like a gesture of comfort, and one of the ends comes up to carefully pry Tony’s fingers from the counter top. Tony hadn’t even realized that he’d gripped the edge of the counter in the first place, shaking fingers clenched so tight his knuckles are turning white with the pressure. With an uneven exhale, Tony releases his grip and allows the cloak to slowly peel his fingers from the edge. The soft, worn fabric remains wrapped around his hand, and Tony has never been more grateful to have a sentient piece of outerwear. Tony takes another gulp from the bottle and sets it down, then awkwardly reaches up to pat the cloak’s collar, trying to return the calming gesture.

“You know, I have— had this AI, a good friend of mine, who usually is there in my suit with me,” he tells the cloak. “Of course, in my current state she’s gone, but. I have a backup back on Earth.” He doesn’t really know why he’s telling the cloak this, but the cloak gives a slight ruffle in response, as if to tell Tony it heard and understood whatever he thinks he was trying to say.

Tony sighs heavily and closes his eyes. God, he misses Friday. He misses JARVIS.

He misses Pepper.

Is she alive? Is she gone with the rest of them? Is she—

His brain supplies the awful imagery of Pepper disintegrating in his arms, and then her face is morphing into Peter’s and all he can see is the fear in Peter’s eyes as he’d clung desperately to Tony’s shoulders, Mr. Stark, I don’t wanna go—

Tony gasps and wrenches his eyes open. Stop it, stop it stop it stop it, he tells himself, as if maybe, just maybe, if he refuses to think about it then maybe all of this isn’t true. Maybe this has all been one horrible dream, just like all the other nightmares he’s had— except he knows its not. He knows it’s real.

And he knows what he has to do.

He shakes himself and gives the still half-full bottle now sitting innocently on the counter an accusing stare. Not even alcohol can save him from reality, he thinks. Not that it ever has, of course.

With a shrug, Tony grabs the bottle and meanders back toward the cockpit. Nebula is still there; in his absence she’s powered up the ship, and the control panels glimmer with various colored lights and flashing buttons.

Tony grabs the seat next to Nebula and turns toward her.

“So,” he starts, then pauses to take another drink. How much has he had now? Not too much, right? Whatever. He continues. “Earth. Can you take us there?”

Nebula doesn’t even look over at him. “We aren’t going to Earth,” she says shortly, still fiddling with a dial.

“Excuse me? Yes we are, my entire life’s work is on Earth, I need to do damage control and my workshop—” he leans forward. “Look. I’ve built shit in worse circumstances but that doesn’t mean I want to, if we go back to Earth I’m going to be about two thousand times more helpful than I will be here, and besides that I don’t know who the fuck is left but it’s fifty-fifty right? And I’ll take all the manpower I can get—”

“I don’t care about whatever little ragtag gaggle of humans you’ve got left on your shitty planet.” Nebula finally spins around to look at him. “I don’t need your primitive Terran technology, and I don’t need this teamwork crap, either. It’s hopeless, it’s done. Thanos already won. I don’t know what kind of cute little plan you’re trying to come up with, but it’s futile.”

She eyes the liquor bottle in his hand distastefully before turning back to the control panel. “There is only one thing that has kept me going all this time,” she says, reaching up to flip a switch on the cockpit’s ceiling. “My only purpose and mission for the past several years has been to see Thanos dead. He may have won, but I will not rest until his corpse lies bloodied and broken on the ground before me. Do you understand?”

She flips another switch, follows it with an eight button sequence, then whips around to glare at Tony’s lack of a response. “Do you understand, Stark.”

Tony frowns. “Loud and clear. Listen, of course I want him dead. But, I think we are on two different pages here. I want him dead, but I want everyone else alive. And we’re going to do it. But to do that, we need Earth, and I need your help.”

“How in the universe do you think we can accomplish that? We can’t turn back time, they’re already dead, we have no room for sentiment.”

“Really, I have a plan. You have to trust me here.”

Nebula snorts. “Trust,” she whispers scathingly, almost to herself. “No room for that either. And, even if you do it, what’s the point?” She throws him a rueful smile. “My sister will be gone either way.”

“You don’t know that,” Tony says, almost softly. “Perhaps that’s true, but. If there’s even the slightest chance that we can do it, that we can reverse all the shit Thanos has pulled, and then kill him— if there is even the smallest possibility that we can do it, even if it’s one in over fourteen million, then we have to try.”

Nebula stares at him pensively. Tony gives her a rueful, sad smile of his own.

“Do it for her,” he says. “For your sister.”

We’re in the endgame now.

Nebula grimaces and she closes her eyes, looking pained. Tony waits. Wonders idly if she is still able to cry, part-machine as she is.

There’s a long moment, and then she opens her eyes, calm and controlled, and tilts her head thoughtfully at him.

“All right, Stark,” she decides eventually, though sounding a bit put-off, as if each word is a small jab at her pride. “All right. We’ll do it your way. But Thanos’ blood will be on my hands, if its the last thing I do.”

Tony lets out a whoop of success. “That’s the spirit! Let’s go fuck some shit up, Neb.” The cloak flares around him in agreement. Nebula rolls her eyes at the nickname, but surprisingly doesn’t protest. With a quirk of her lips that might’ve been amusement, she turns back around and pulls up a digital screen.

“Destination search: Terra. Requesting coordinates.” She presses and holds for voice recognition.

The software whirs softly and the screen blurs through numbers, exhausting its database. A few seconds later a blinking alert Match Found flashes red across the screen, followed by a long string of coordinates. Nebula grins.

“Seatbelt on,” She announces, and Tony barely has time to grab one of the buckles before she’s got them shooting off into the nighttime sky, leaving Titan and its ruined landscape behind.

Chapter Text

He’s not sure what to expect as Earth eventually looms toward them, a small speck quickly growing in size as Nebula bullets forward with a burst of speed, destination in sight. The Milano (as he had been informed that the ship did indeed have a name), was rickety and obviously past its prime, but flew quick, and luckily they hadn’t needed to stop and refuel at any point in the journey, which was more than fine by Tony because he wanted to minimize his space travel as much as possible, thank you very much. Alien planets were not exactly his cup of tea, although he thinks he’s doing pretty well, really— he has yet to devolve into a full blown panic attack, at the very least.

Though, that could just be thanks to the alcohol buzzing in his veins, keeping his anxiety muted enough to control.

The trip home had seemed much longer than the trip out had, but that could’ve been for a couple reasons, Tony muses. For one, he’s not as hyped up on adrenaline as he had been while hurtling through space the first time, in a giant donut with Peter and the doctor. The journey to Titan had been more than enough action-packed to keep him occupied. For another, time sometimes has a strange way of slowing down after traumatic situations, and he thinks the past recent major events in his life definitely qualify as such. He snorts quietly to himself at that thought. Let’s add them to the fun-sized list of Tony Stark’s life-altering experiences, shall we?

Nebula slows down the ship as they break through the first layer of the atmosphere.

“Where are we landing, Stark?”

He frowns. “Uhm…”

He’s torn; on one hand, he’d like to head straight toward Stark Tower, because his workshop is there right now and Pepper— well. He needs to know; he’s also not sure he can handle the truth.

He’s already lost Peter and if Pepper is gone with the rest of them he’ll—he’ll—

Tony doesn’t know what he’ll do.

He doesn’t know if he’ll be able to do anything.

There was no other way, Tony. Strange’s voice reminds him, and he wants to curse the doctor again. Wants to scream at him for leaving this burden on his shoulders, wants to pummel the other man to the ground and ask why? Why does it have to be like this? Why does this have to be the only way?

Why did you take Peter from me?

But the doctor is not here, and there is no one left to ask.

“Stark?”

Tony shakes himself and squares his shoulders, absentmindedly touching one gold fastening of the cloak to affirm its continued presence. “Sorry, yes. We need to make a beeline toward New York… I can probably give a rough estimate of its coordinates but we’ll probably have to—”

A loud crackling noise over the comm interrupts him mid-sentence. Nebula jolts at the sudden noise and leans forward toward the vocoder, holding down two buttons beside it. The crackling slowly fizzes into muted static, and the faint sounds of what seems like voices arguing in the background.

Nebula glances over her shoulder at Tony and they share a look; Nebula’s face pinched and uncertain, Tony’s with a tense downward pull of the corners of his mouth, brows furrowed.

The voices die down and then one speaks up, louder, clear enough for them to hear, though it still buzzes around the edges. It’s a feminine-sounding voice that Tony does not recognize.

“You are an unauthorized spacecraft entering the Earth’s atmosphere; Identify yourselves immediately or you will be classified as a threat to our planet and dealt with accordingly.”

Nebula opens her mouth to respond but Tony leans over her and grabs the vocoder before she can say anything.

“Hi, this is Tony Stark,” he says, “requesting a safe location to land. Although, I’m going to do it anyways, whether you’ve decided I’m a threat or not. I don’t know who you are or what you want, but I’ll be damned if you try and stop me from coming home.”

The person on the other line falls dead silent, and the static fills the cockpit of the ship unpleasantly.

Nebula elbows him in the ribs and he grimaces. “I’m wounded there,” he hisses at her. She narrows her eyes unappreciatively.

“Stop antagonizing them,” she hisses back, “we need to not get blown out of the sky—”

“Tony?”

Tony’s heart stops. He knows that voice, knows it too well.

But it’s a voice he thought he’d never have to hear again, a voice that’s become the narrator of his nightmares, a voice he’s tried to forget over and over again— and at once, everything is too raw, too soon, and the walls that had been holding back his panic crumble to pieces and it all comes flooding in, his chest feels tight and he can’t breathe—

“Tony? Tony, answer me. Are you all right? What happened? Where did you—”

Tony grits his teeth and squeezes his eyes shut and he’s trying so hard to calm the rising flood of anxiety threatening to spill out. He knows he needs to respond but he can’t, he doesn’t want to speak that name out loud—

Nebula’s face flickers with concern, and the cloak pulls in tight around him, giving a supportive squeeze. Tony takes a deep shaky breath and forces himself to speak.

“...Rogers. Could you. Just. Put someone else on the line, please.”

“What, why—”

“Just do it. Please. I’ll. Explain later.” Every word feels like a knife in his chest.

“But—”

“Steve, I am fucking serious right now.”

There’s a buzz of silence on the end, and Tony swears he can almost hear Roger’s silent fuming coming through the line. He grips the edge of his chair and forces himself to breathe, does not dare open his eyes.

Eventually, there’s soft mumbling from the other side of the connection, and then a softer, but almost just as familiar voice filters through.

“Tony?”

Tony lets out a sigh of relief and feels the tension in his body unravel a little. He takes a huge breath and gasps, suddenly able to fill his lungs again.

“Bruce, thank God.”

“Yeah, hey, it’s me. Listen, we need to land you safely but things have kind of gone to shit here while you were gone. We’re all in Wakanda right now—”

“Who? Everyone? Is—”

“No.” Bruce sounds pained. “I’ll explain more when you get here.”

Tony leans back in his chair and looks up at the ceiling. “Let me guess— a fifty-fifty situation?”

“Yeah.”

Of course.

There was no other way.

“... All right. Can you give me coordinates for getting to you and clearance to land without getting blown to pieces?”

“Already on it.”

Tony takes another deep breath and scrubs a hand across his eyes. Bruce reads out coordinates and gives him detailed instructions on how to safely enter Wakanda; Nebula looks skeptical at the idea of flying right into a cliff but tilts the ship down and starboard nonetheless, starting their descent.

“Thanks Bruce,” Tony says, quietly. “See you soon.”

“I’m holding you to that,” his friend responds, and there’s a quiet pause before the line clicks and falls dead.

Tony sighs and watches the world fly by them as they break through the clouds, hurtling toward the African continent.

Nebula gives a small gasp beside him, looking on in awe. “Your planet is beautiful,” she murmurs softly.

“Thanks,” he says, “I’m happy to take partial credit considering my breakthroughs in environmentally conscious energy-saving technology. Not to be an arrogant prick but I’m kind of a big name around here, and an arrogant prick to boot, so—”

“Shut up, don’t ruin this,” she mutters under her breath, but Tony thinks she might be smiling.

They’re fast approaching land, and soon they’re zooming over unknown rural landscape, the sun beating down on tall grass, beautiful rocky outcrops, and high trees reaching elegantly toward the sky.

“Incoming,” Nebula says sharply, pushing forward toward a large, looming cliff face. “Your friend better be right.”

“I trust him,” Tony says, but his voice sounds tight and he can’t help but grip his armrests and brace for an impact that never happens— in a blink of an eye they’re through the cliff and there, before Tony, is a city he knew of but could never have imagined. Wakanda stands tall and beautiful against the sky, shimmering in defiance to all that has happened. Tony can see the remnants of a battle still fresh, in the scarred gouges cut along the ground and stains of what might be blood littering the earth, scorch marks from burning corpses and general destruction of the landscape. With his heart sinking low in his chest, he forces himself to look, unwilling but needing to see what his failure on Titan had meant for his home.

I’m so sorry, Peter.

I’m so sorry, everyone.

There was no other way.

And he clings to the hope that that must be true, his last shreds of sanity desperately depending on Strange’s last words; but he feels the guilt all the same, covering him, suffocating him, lingering in his veins and his lungs with each breath he takes, each breath that is his and not Peter’s, that is his and not the doctor’s, that is his and not the rest of all living things, as it should’ve been.

As it will be, he reminds himself firmly.

We’re in the endgame now.

Nebula slows the ship as they approach the gleaming city of Wakanda, looking tall and strong despite the war it had seen and survived, and soon they approach what looks like a landing pad, and can see small figures waving flags, gesturing for them to land. Nebula pulls the ship to a standstill and then slowly lowers them to the ground.

They touch Earth with a soft jolt, and Tony can’t quite believe it.

He’s home. He’s finally home.

He’s not sure he’s ready to find out what’s happened to it, though. He supposes he doesn’t get much of a choice.

“Come on Stark. Let’s go.” Nebula stands up from her chair and stretches one mechanical joint, flexing her fingers. Her shoulder pops out somewhat grotesquely and she rotates it around before popping it back in with a sharp click. She then throws a look at him, as if daring him to say something. “Ready? I need you to make sure your friends don’t decide they’d rather you be the sole survivor of this fun trip— that wouldn’t bode well for them.”

She grins, all teeth and no kindness, and Tony laughs.

“Ah, I’m really starting to like you, Neb. Let’s go broaden your cultural knowledge.” He stands up and stretches as well, silently thankful as the cloak once again comes to his aid and keeps him secure and stable on his feet.

Tony exits the spacecraft with Nebula hot on his heels. Instantly, they are surrounded by a guard of women warriors, all dressed in deep gold and red, spears up and pointed in warning.

“Speak. You are Tony Stark?” asks the woman directly before him. She seems to be the leader, and her eyes are fierce and burn with a wildness that Stark recognizes all too well.

He holds his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “Yes, I am.”

He gestures with with his chin toward Nebula. “This is Nebula, she is not from around here. But, she fought by my side against Thanos on Titan, and I can assure you she will not be a threat to you here in Wakanda. She goes where I go.”

Nebula looks mildly insulted over being identified as ‘not a threat’, but smartly keeps her silence. She settles for merely a sharp glare in his direction, biting back whatever retort might’ve been on the tip of her tongue.

“I come in peace, and by Stark’s side,” she says curtly.

The woman does not seem entirely placated by this response, but after a pause nods and stands straight, hitting her spear against the ground. The others surrounding them repeat the motion in unison, standing tall with one sharp echoing clack of their spears.

“I am Okoye,” the woman before them says. “We are the Dora Milaje. I will escort you to the princess.”

“T’Challa—?” Tony starts to ask before he can stop himself, and the wildness in Okoye’s eyes flares with grief and it’s the only answer he needs. He feels the guilt rising again like bile in his throat.

“I would be honored to greet the princess,” he says instead, and Okoye nods. The Dora Milaje fall into step on either side of Nebula and Tony, and they follow Okoye into what Tony assumes must be the Wakandan royal palace. He wants to appreciate the interior, the spralling halls and beautiful, modernness of it all, but he just can’t. He can’t focus at all, really, because all he can think of is how Peter is gone, and now T’Challa is dead and who knows how many more, how many more had been condemned to die. He holds his head high and limps his way after Okoye, the cloak flaring behind him, but inside he’s crumbling, spiraling, fighting a losing battle against the guilt once more.

They turn a corner and go up a short flight of steps, and then the hallway widens out into a huge room with floor to ceiling windows, beautiful and metallic in all of Wakanda’s classic glory. It’s set up conference room-style, but that’s all he gets to see before he hears a sharp cry.

“Tony! Oh my god, Tony—”

“Pep—,” he manages to breathe out a single syllable and then Pepper’s there, alive and breathing and warm, flung into his arms and he wraps her up on instinct, bringing her close to him, as close as he can, even closer. She’s alive, she’s whole, she’s—

Tony feels tears clawing at his eyes and he breaks down a little, quietly this time. He lets out a faint noise of relief and buries his head into her shoulder, clinging to Pepper like a lifeline, memorizing again the familiar feeling of her warm, small hands pressed against his back, holding him together as she’s done so many times.

“I’m so sorry,” he whispers against her neck.

“I know,” she says. “I know.”

Chapter Text

He hears someone clearing their throat and his short reprieve from horror is splintered apart. Still holding onto both of Pepper’s shoulders, he stares upward and speaks to the cold, high ceiling, already one-hundred percent clear on exactly who it is.

“Going to take this moment away from me too, Rogers? Really? Can’t even let me have this one. Then again, it always was about you, wasn’t it?” Tony knows it’s the last they need, more fighting, more hate. But he’s tired, he’s exhausted and filled with more grief he can bear and he hasn’t even seen Roger’s face but knows, knows that he might break down if he has to even look the other man in the eye. So he keeps his gaze firmly fixed to the ceiling, his hands on Pepper’s shoulders.

“Tony, you know that’s not true,” Rogers says from behind him, his voice filled with that familiar strong-willed self-assurance that makes Tony want to scream.

And it’s not fucking fair, because hasn’t Rogers always been the one to be calm and strong and right, while Tony stands in the shadows, shouldering the burden of all the worry and doubt for all of them?

“Not true? Oh but of course, my mistake, I mean how bold of me to assume that our star-spangled goodie boy could do any wrong—”

He’s shaking, he’s livid, and Pepper grabs onto his hands that are still gripping her shoulders, folds them into her own in an attempt to calm him down.

“Enough, Tony, don’t, not right now,” She says pleadingly. “This is not the time. Don’t.”

“No, but you know what? I think I will,” and he forces himself out of Pepper’s grasp and whips around to face Rogers, “Please, let’s discuss this right now, shall we? After the world has ended and everything is gone, but of course not even that could…”

He falters.

Rogers stands before him, barely more than a meter away, but it’s what’s past him that stops Tony in his tracks. His blood runs cold as he takes in the others standing behind the other man. Or rather— his brain starts doing quick calculations.

Natasha is there, and Bruce. And a young teenage girl that he can only assume is the late King’s younger sister.

And no one else.

“Is this everyone,” he asks hollowly.

Rogers shakes his head. “Thor lives, too. But he— he comes and goes.”

“And Rhodes,” Bruce says in the background, approaching. “He’s off on a control mission, right now. Should be back soon.”

Tony’s head swims with a bit of relief at the news that his closest friend lives, but it’s not enough to fill the growing hole of emptiness in his chest.

“Barton?”

“Still MIA, along with some others. The only person we’ve been able to get successfully in contact with since the battle was Pepper. Doesn’t mean we aren’t still searching, though.”

“Of course.”

The conference room is huge, and the absence of the people he’s failed rings through the room like a loud, endless, clanging echo that only Tony can hear. Rogers clears his throat again, running a hand through his hair and pulling that pinched expression he always makes when he wants to say something, and Tony just. Can’t do it anymore. All the vitriol, the anger, the tumultuous sadness, rage, hurt, whatever it is that he feels toward Steve just seeps out of him, and then he just feels empty. Irrelevant. Miniscule.

The tired man before him with a scruffy beard and the outline of a star on his chest is someone he doesn’t know (and doesn’t trust, not one bit), but Pepper is right. This is not the time, and her warm hand is pressed gently to his shoulder now and he takes a deep breath and reminds himself that Peter needs him. There is no room, no time for anything else.

We’re in the endgame now.

“Okay,” he whispers to himself. “Okay.”

With a shake of his shoulders he looks toward Nebula and motions to her to come stand at his side. Nebula, for her part, has been standing quietly beside Okoye and the other guards, looking supremely uncomfortable but otherwise completely composed. With a tense nod she complies and takes two stiff steps toward him and the others gathered.

“Nebula, Pepper. Pepper, Nebula. And this is Rogers. Agent Romanoff. Bruce.”

“A pleasure,” says Nebula, sounding like it’s anything but. Bruce gives an awkward wave and Rogers extends a hand, ever the gentleman.

Nebula stares at it like it’s a personal offense. Tony takes this as a small victory.

Natasha gives Nebula a small nod, then raises one thin, dubious eyebrow at Tony. “Seems like you’ve been making some new friends, Stark. Over your space-phobia yet?” It’s a jab, but Tony thinks it might actually be her poor attempt at an olive branch.

“I like to think of it more of an aversion rather than a phobia these days, thanks for asking. Nothing quite like extreme immersion therapy, it really does wonders for mental health.”

She gives him a small smile at that, and it’s almost an apology.

It’s at this moment that the princess steps forward and Tony suddenly remembers that he’s in the presence of Wakandan royalty. He wonders if he’s made some sort of major slight by not immediately introducing himself. Hopefully not, though he’s not sure how much that would matter at this point anyways.

“Mr. Stark,” she says, and he recognizes her voice as the first one he had heard over the comm on the spaceship.

“You are the princess?” He inquires, extending a hand. She nods and returns the gesture, giving him a brief handshake. She’s dressed in a neon orange something or other that seems right out of a Vogue magazine, but there’s hurt and grief in her eyes that she’s clearly trying to hide and all Tony can think is oh God, she’s so young. She looks the same age as Peter. Maybe a year or two older, but not more.

“Yes. Please, you may call me Shuri, Mr. Stark. I’ve heard a great many things about you.”

Tony winces. “I’m sure.”

After the fall-out the rogue Avengers had taken refuge under the Wakandan King; Tony had known the whole time, but had been more than happy to leave it be and let T’Challa deal with them. He’d had enough trouble doing damage control after Serbia that it had been a relief to know they were out of his hair, at least for a little while.

He wonders, though, how much they slandered his name, what whispers this girl has had to hear of him.

You deserve it, says a voice in his head. Is her brother’s death not on your hands?

He swallows heavily. “I am sorry for your loss, Shuri. I plan to make things right. I only ask that you allow me the resources to do so.”

She could say a great many things, Tony thinks. She has every right to distrust him, every right to question his competency, every right to deny him. He braces himself for an outburst, but it doesn’t come. Shuri instead tilts her head thoughtfully, pensive and anguished and intelligent way beyond her years.

“My mother disintegrated to dust before me, Mr. Stark,” she says, looking him dead on. “And my brother is dead.”

She folds her arms tight across her chest— there’s a burning fire in her eyes as they stare into Tony’s and it’s then that he knows that she gets it. She’s there with him, feeling too much, knowing too much. She’s another who carries that burden, another that lies awake knowing they could’ve done more.

“My brother is dead, Mr. Stark,” she repeats. Her voice is harsh and rusted. “The ashes left behind have scattered to the wind. It was not his time to go.”

It’s a statement, but it’s more than that. It’s a challenge. It’s a what do you plan to do about it? and a what can I do to help?

“We’re in the endgame now,” he tells her.

Her eyes flash with wild fire and determination.

“Then we play to win.”