Chapter Text
Steve and Bucky knew each other from a young age. That was unusual in and of itself, but then the world worked in odd ways where the two of them were concerned. Steve grew up with Leave him alone on his right forearm and Fuck you and everything you’ve done on his left. Bucky grew up with I’m sorry on his left and Thank you on the other. They grew up with one string of letters the pale gray of the dead and one the stark black of thrumming life. They grew up with a soulmate by their sides and a gravestone across their skin.
When Bucky went off to war Steve tried to follow. He didn’t think he could handle two dead, didn’t think he could handle losing the only one he had left. He made it, eventually. Made it in spite of his sickness—his weakness. Steve made it because he had to. He wouldn’t let Bucky go down alone, wouldn’t live with lonely gray arms and a bleeding heart. If Bucky died then he would too. Until the end of the line.
—————
Steve hadn’t expected the serum. Hadn’t expected to ever grow strong or healthy or important. He was glad. The better to protect Bucky, the better to protect everyone whose soul mark was still black. Steve had decided he would do something the day he saw a soldier staring at the gray letters on his left arm in broken despair, the day he realized that Bucky’s death would rip him open and shred his insides like tissue paper.
Steve did something the day Bucky went missing and he felt the tingling in his arm that meant he might not have a soulmate for much longer. It was no surprise, really, that Steve fought like a caged beast. In some dark, feral way he was.
From there everyone knew the story. Everyone knew they formed the Howling Commandos, fought and fought and fought, Bucky fell to his death in the ghostly alps and Steve followed not long after to save the world.
—————
This is what Tony grows up with: a father obsessed with finding a relic from long ago, two arms branded with the promise that he will always be alone, bruises from a man who cannot bring back the stuff of legends. Tony grows up with hatred.
He learns that he is cursed for being abandoned since birth, unnatural for carrying death wherever he goes, a tool because pain is written across his very soul. Tony starts wearing exclusively long sleeves in public when he is eleven, though whether that is because of his father or his marks he is unsure.
—————
When his parents die Tony remembers how Steve had Bucky and vice versa, despite his attempts to drive the two from his mind. They haunt him as laughing specters, the soulmates who had everything Tony never will, the ones his father cared for more than his own son. That’s when he begins to build U and Butterfingers and creates the blueprints for JARVIS, when he recreates DUMM-E from what he remembers before Howard threw him at a wall in a fit of rage. Captain America, Tony thinks savagely. Soon the A.I. are the closest he’s ever had to a family.
The first human friend Tony makes is Rhodey. Tony thinks they became friends because Rhodey needed help passing a course and Tony wouldn’t let him leave afterwards. Stockholm Syndrome or whatever. Rhodey says it’s because Tony is funny and sweet and caring, or some sort of shit like that. Tony knows it isn’t true, but it still makes him smile.
He meets Pepper next, then Happy. Every time he drags them into his orbit and won’t let them leave, until eventually they don’t want to. Tony knows the friendships are probably the best thing that will ever happen to him, and hearing that people love and care for him gives a high he could never get from sex.
Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. Tony works and works, builds his empire (not Howard’s, his), makes weapons Howard never could have, reaches newer heights, becomes more.
—————
Then Afghanistan happens.
Tony goes in as the Merchant of Death, whole and proud and clean. He comes out with a gaping hole in his chest and ribs filled with shrapnel and the arc reactor, new scars, hands more bloodstained than he would have thought possible. He comes out hating himself more than ever.
He comes out as Iron Man.
After that it’s a whirlwind. He nearly dies, stops Obadiah (Stane, he reminds himself. Stane), and nearly dies again. He builds more suits, rediscovers an element, stops some bad guys. He has his heart ripped out and mangled and broken. He lives.
—————
He is there when Captain America is pulled from the ice. Watches him defrost and sleep in a time not his own. Memories he did his best to suppress come flooding back, so much pain and hurt and resentment.
And there, standing at a dismantled once-grave with a dead man breathing, Tony speaks. It all spills out once he starts—the hatred he fostered once he realized he would never (could never) be as good as Captain America; the resentment that Steve Rogers had what he never would; the stupid, childish awe that this war hero from so long ago is here and breathing. It tumbles from his mouth in a broken, vicious stream. Starts with the stilted “Fuck you and everything you've done,” ends with the raw “I’m sorry, you deserve more than me.”
Because Tony saw. Halfway through a rant about Howard and how different everything could have been, he saw the twin streaks of text, the grayed out Leave him alone and the deep black Fuck you and everything you've done. And right then, right there, he knows his life is a joke. A huge, cosmic joke for someone like Tony—someone so broken—to be the great Captain America’s soulmate.
Tony knows he can never tell him. Deeper than the arc reactor, deeper than his frail heart, Tony knows that he cannot saddle the hero with the screw up that is Tony Stark. He can’t do that to Steve Rogers, can't do it to himself. He is not foolish enough to offer himself hope only to let it be torn away.
But just before he leaves, as he stands in the doorway, Tony looks back. Just this once, he looks back.
—————
Tony doesn't leave his lab for eight days. Eats only when the world starts to sway, sleeps only when he passes out, drinks himself stupid.
Eventually he gets dragged out by Rhodey. Rhodey who has been with him always, Rhodey who saw his bruises and scars and stayed with him anyway. Rhodey, who never judged him for being marked with death.
He stomps in on the morning of the ninth day, takes one look at Tony, and picks him up bridal style. They end up in the kitchen, Tony sitting sleepily at the island, Rhodey cooking pancakes. They don't say anything, but when he is done Rhodey walks over and gives Tony a hug. It’s warm and accepting, and everything Tony has always needed.
When he lets go Tony smiles.
—————
When the call comes Tony considers, for one brief, vengeful second, not going. He considers letting other people—people who are actually heros—do the job. They don’t need him. But that thought gets shot down immediately. His hands are already bloodstained, he already has more death on his ledger than anyone he can think of. He may never be able to repent, but at the very least he should try. Try and fix everything he has ruined.
Tony flies to the helicarrier, meets Fury’s group, meets Steve Rogers. Steve says Mr. Stark and Tony feels his arm burn in recognition, but everything is fine. Then nothing is, someone hijacks the tesseract, the helicarrier blows apart. It’s a shame, really, but Tony paints on his masks, fights, dies again, gets shawarma.
They all go their separate ways and Tony moves back to California alone. That’s okay though, because he’s okay. Even when he isn’t, Tony is fine. He shoves Steve from his mind, ignores the nightmares new and old, builds and builds and builds. And if sometimes he feels phantom hands and hears cold laughter and shouts then what of it?
The Mandarin comes. Tony almost loses Pepper and Happy, meets a kid who doesn’t judge him in a way no one else could, comes back broken and whole at the same time. Tony nearly loses everything and he can’t help but wonder if it would be easier with a soulmate, if it would be easier with Steve, but then he remembers all the reasons he didn’t want to tell him and they’ve only been confirmed now.
Then Steve comes back. Comes back and apologizes, and Tony feels years of hatred melt away because it was never Captain America but Howard. So he smiles and says that it’s okay, because it is okay, and offers the tower. It’s been repaired and Tony moved back in and it’s just...so empty. Even with the floors full of workers and shops and jabber, Tony is still so alone.
Steve agrees with a smile, moves in that first week. Then comes Bruce and Tony can’t help but grin because this is someone who understands. Someone who lost their marks when they became someone new and is willing to accept that Tony never had any at all. Bruce never pries at the paint Tony wears constantly now, never asks about the occasional shadows of letters.
Tony is disgustingly grateful.
Clint and Natasha appear together a month later, silently, with only a change of clothes and enough weapons to fill an armory. They aren't there one day and then they’re drinking coffee at the breakfast bar and everything is fine. Better than fine. Tony is happy.
—————
Slowly the Avengers become friends. Tony learns Clint likes small, confined spaces where no one can sneak up on him. That Natasha won’t let anyone else touch anything she consumes and that she has to buy it all herself. That Bruce hides from himself when he’s afraid—covers himself head to toe, avoids mirrors, makes his skin not his own. And Steve. Tony learns about Steve too. He learns that Steve takes out his emotions on a punching bag because men weren’t allowed to be weak. He learns that Steve likes to draw people, likes to be in the thick of things and capture moments. Steve uses drawing to photograph the world in a way he was never able to before. Tony learns just how lonely Steve is, learns the grief of losing your best friend, learns about the isolation of being a hero lost in time.
And he learns other things too. That Steve pours his milk before his cereal (Tony will never look at him the same), that he always puts on his left sock first and ties his right shoe last. That he likes the morning because of the quiet, with just the birds and the exhausted people heading to work, right when those who partied all night are finally slinking off to bed and the traffic is subdued and quiet. That Steve treats Tony’s robots like people and JARVIS like a friend and Tony like a friend too. And that-and that Tony loves Steve.
The realisation isn’t sudden, like being hit by a car. It’s a slow quicksand that creeps up on Tony until suddenly he’s surrounded. It’s that one day Tony sits up in bed and his first thought is I wonder what Steve’s doing today. And as slow as the realisation is, suddenly it follows Tony everywhere. He can’t look Steve in the eyes anymore without remembering that he loves a man who will never love him back, and he can’t talk with Steve about the past without hating himself for wanting something that isn’t his and will never be his because Steve is Bucky’s and Bucky is Steve’s and Tony has no part in that. And Steve still comes down to the lab almost every day, still smiles at Tony’s disjointed and overly-technical rambling in that quiet way of his that means I wasn’t really listening to what you were saying but I’d really like to draw you right now, still laughs at Tony and his bots’ antics, and grins at Tony’s dumb jokes, and makes sure he eats more than coffee and the occasional energy bar, but everything seems so much more now.
All the things that made Tony love Steve in the first place are highlighted in hot-rod red with a blinking neon sign that says Stop in great angry letters, and every time Tony sees Steve and thinks Wow he feels that sudden jolt in his heart (both of them) that’s like someone is sitting on his chest, and like he just flipped upside down and then right side up again, and like he’s falling, and like he’s crying at the same time. Tony doesn’t think there’s a specific word for that feeling, just an ache that catches him blind and off guard and dizzy in simultaneously the best and worst way possible.
And just as he’s coming to terms with this new level of patheticness, just as he accepts that yes, he’s the man who has everything, just not this, Steve leaves.
Natasha and Steve go off on a mission. Tony is drowning his usual worries in work, locked in the workshop, fiddling with fragments of code and upgrading his suit when JARVIS interrupts with multiple news feeds overrun with chaos. Tony doesn’t know where they are, he can’t contact either of them, Clint has no idea.
There is nothing he can do and it turns his blood to ice. Tony doesn’t know if either of them are okay. All he knows is the ensuing chaos that every single news station seems to be covering.
—————
They expose Hydra, bring SHIELD crashing down, come limping back with a new guy named Sam behind them.
—————
Steve is quiet and so cold. Tony doesn’t know what happened, because he thought they had been close.
Natasha is the one to tell Tony what happened. That Bucky is alive, that he was tortured and brainwashed by Hydra, that he’s the Winter Soldier and they don’t know where he’s gone.
Steve comes to Tony for help eventually, a week later when he has processed everything that’s happened. Tony feels a twinge of something, but he shoves it down and helps. Because Steve deserves his soulmate back, and because Bucky deserves to be helped and possibly healed. Steve tells him about his parents, because of course he does, and after an hour alternating between anger and aching sadness Tony nods and gets back to work. Bucky was brainwashed. It wasn’t his fault.
Eventually he returns too, and Tony sees with pity and disgusting relief that one of his arms is gone. The one that might have had Tony’s words on it is gone. Though Steve sticks by Bucky’s side he immediately begins speaking to Natasha. Tony hurries to speak to Bucky softly, terrified that Steve will hear. “I’m sorry,” spills from his lips before he can help it but Bucky just stares on in confusion. First words out of the way with seemingly no epiphanies or recognition , Tony doesn’t worry about what he says to Bucky, smiles gently and tells him he is welcome here and that he is always there if Bucky needs anything at all and that it isn’t his fault. Bucky doesn’t say anything, just pushes more into Steve, large body shrinking into his soulmate’s shadow.
Tony pretends the harsh glare Steve sends him doesn’t hurt and leads the Winter Soldier to his room. After so much, Bucky deserves something his own.
—————
The nightmares come back in full force that night, (fists and cruel words and icy smirks, the lonly darkness of space and knives scraping against bone, water that is unforgiving and pillowing at the same time, electricity coursing through his veins) and Tony wakes up shaking and sweaty. The dark is the restricting rot of the cave, and his chest burns like it did when the arc reactor was first shoved in, all those years ago.
Five minutes later he is sitting on the kitchen island, clutching a great mug of coffee to hide the trembling in his hands. It is still dark out, the moon high. A rainbow of lights shine all across the city and Tony takes a moment to just absorb it all. To remember that he is in New York, not Afganistan. That the sky is solid and his feet are on the ground. He stays there for another hour before wandering down to his workshop where DUMM-E greets him happily. Butterfingers offers him a wrench. Tony beams and takes it, twining the metal between his fingers before moving over to his latest project.
—————
He gets lost in the work and next time he looks up it is bright and the projected time reads 10:47 a.m. His stomach growls, and for a moment he considers emerging to grab something to eat. Just something quick, get me through the day, but when he asks JARVIS who is in the kitchen the idea is immediately shot down.
“Mr. Rogers, Mr. Barnes, and Ms. Romanoff. Sir, are you alright?” Tony is staring at his forearm in desperation, licking at his finger and trying to rub off the bright letters. He wants them gone, wants to be able to let Steve and Bucky live happily, wants to be less of a fuck up. “Sir!” He looks up at JARVIS’ voice, startled by the intensity, concerned for a moment that something is happening.
He hadn’t realized that his skin had gone red and scratched in some places, nor just how hard his heart is pounding. Tony looks away and grabs the sweater he always keeps hidden in a closet for when he feels sick. The rasp of fabric against his suddenly sensitive arm is odd and grounding, sending a shiver down his spine.
There is a beep and Tony looks down to see his bots crowded around him, sensors all pointing up. “Hey, kids.” Another affirming beep. He moves towards his work table and looks down at whatever the fuck he was working on. “JARVIS? What is this?” Schematics flicker up in front of him and once again Tony sinks into his work.
—————
A day later and Tony pauses for a moment to remember that normally Steve never would have let him work this long without leaving the lab. But Bucky is back now, and nothing is normal anymore. Tony decides it doesn’t bother him.
—————
A week later and Tony finally emerges, hair oil greased and sweater stained. He wanders toward the coffee machine with a single-minded focus, staring at it numbly as is turns on and begins to grind the beans. A heavy hand on his shoulder makes him jump and he stares up at Steve in confusion. The larger man looks concerned, but Tony isn’t sure why. It’s only been seven days. Tony even ate! He’s pretty sure he slept at some point too, but a lot of it is blurry. Pepper will appreciate it at least.
“Tony, are you alright?” Tony doesn’t know. Physically he is perfect, if a little tired. Mentally everything seems confused and undefined.
“‘Course I am, Cap. Why’d’ou ask?” So maybe he’s more than a little tired, but that’s what coffee is for.
Coffee.
Tony turns back to the machine hopefully, but liquid is only just starting to trickle into the pot.
“You should sleep.” Tony can hear the frown in his voice, and he doesn’t like it. Cap has his soulmate back. He has Bucky. Steve should be happy. He’s earned that much.
“Sleep’s for th’ weak,” Tony slurs, pouring steaming coffee into his mug and taking a gulp. “‘M Iron Man.” And that’s that.
—————
Tony hadn’t meant to upset Steve. He’d just wanted coffee and to get out. He spends the rest of the day curled up in one of the chairs in the living room with a tablet, nursing his coffee and burned mouth, trying to pretend that Steve’s apparent disregard for his existence since Bucky returned doesn't hurt. It shouldn't. Tony doesn't have any soulmates and he should be glad Steve is with his.
He’s glad. He is.
Tony is still brooding in a chair when the rest of the team piles in for a movie night, as proclaimed cheerfully by Clint. Usually when they have these Tony sits between Steve and Bruce, leaning into one or the other. Usually, he ends up falling asleep against them and has to be woken up or carried to his room. Bruce wakes him up, Steve carries him.
Tonight Bucky sits at the end of the couch with Steve huddled close, Steve’s entire right side and Bucky’s entire left pressed together. Natasha sits at the other end and quickly pulls Tony in when the genius looks around helplessly. He doesn't know where to sit without Steve. The assassin cuddles him immediately, wrapping arms around him and tucking her legs up beneath her. Tony melts against her side and pretends he doesn’t notice the space in the middle of the couch left by Steve, who is as close to Bucky as he can get. Bruce, Clint, and Sam sprawl across the floor, Bruce sitting between Tony’s legs.
They put on some senseless comedy Tony doesn't care about, and he and Clint spend most of it making fun of the movie and each other. Sam jumps in occasionally and Natasha never hesitates to drag Clint. Tony stays curled against her, safe in her arms and secure in the knowledge that Bruce is right near him. He pretends he doesn't notice Steve or Bucky.
Tony falls asleep halfway through the third movie and wakes sometime later with Natasha carding gentle fingers through his hair and murmuring quiet phrases in russian under her breath. Tony decides then and there that Natasha is the fourth best thing to happen to him, right behind Rhodey, Pepper, Happy, and JARVIS and his bots, on par with Harley and Bruce. (He stubbornly reminds himself that Steve doesn't even make top five because that fifth spot is taken by the formation of both the Avengers and Iron Man. Iron Man would be higher, but...Afghanistan).
He falls asleep again and opens his eyes to the brilliant light of morning, snuggled beneath mounds of blankets. Natasha is curled in an armchair to the side of the great mattress, tapping away on a tablet. She smiles when he looks at her, and Tony is sure that she knows the exact moment he woke up and opened his eyes. This has happened before, her in his room. She’ll never admit it, but Tony knows it’s because sometimes she can’t sleep and they’ve grown close in the past months.
Natasha is who Tony goes to when he doesn’t know what to do, or when the day has reminded him of everything he has done. Natasha is the only one of them who has seen his unedited file. She comes to him when something has happened. When she’s killed someone else and can’t quite remember that she’s not the Black Widow anymore, or when dreams stalk her and Clint is too associated with her past to be sufficient comfort. They make an odd pair; the assassin and the mechanic, the billionaire who never cared and the spy who ended up caring too much. Tony is one of three Natasha trusts and he thinks that means more than any compliment.
—————
Eventually they wander from Tony’s room to the kitchen, Tony because he is in dire need of coffee and Natasha because she tends to be clingy after an especially bad dream. It is blessedly empty, and Tony immediately perches on the kitchen island as the coffee brews. Today will be another busy day. The Board wants a new prototype for a starkpad and Tony has plenty of half-finished projects he needs to work on. The week long work marathon was only made less productive by Steve and Bucky, and Tony needs to catch up. Plus there is a benefit ball Pepper wants him to attend tonight and it’s already almost noon.
Tony retreats to his lab, but only after promising Natasha he won’t stay in for a ridiculously long time again. He needs to look presentable for the ball, anyway.
—————
It goes fine. People cozy up to Tony either for the money or the reputation, girls and men alike eye him constantly, plenty of people call him Mr. Stark and mean Merchant of Death, even more call him Iron Man. He wants to say that he is Tony Stark. He is both those things and so many more, that he is not a hero. He wants to say that no matter what he has told the press, Iron Man is the suit and JARVIS and so many factors that yes, he contributed to, but that he is not necessary for. He is not necessary.
Tony stays late, drinks less than normal, throws smiles at the press and everyone in the room, ignores his roiling stomach.
He returns home wide awake and filled with an adrenaline he can’t explain. It’s nearly two, he should sleep, but his mind is racing through equations and hypotheses and schematics. Tony settles for sitting at the kitchen island, sipping coffee, swinging his legs off the edge as he looks out into the city.
It’s a testament to just how distracted he is that Tony doesn’t notice Bucky until he’s right beside him. “Nice night,” Bucky says. Tony flinches, and his head whips around quickly enough to hurt. His arm is burning in recognition, and for a second the words choke in Tony’s throat. Nice night. So innocuous, such a common phrase. He had given up hope in finding his soulmate even after the words somehow turned back to black.
“Yeah, I guess it is.” They don’t say anything for a while after that. Tony looks back out the window.
“Listen, I’ve been talkin’ with Stevie, and he thinks it’s a good idea for you to look at my arm.” Tony ignores that strange ache in his heart he always gets when he thinks of Steve, and instead turns a curious gaze to Bucky.
“Really? I don’t want to do anything unless you’re sure.” A few beats of silence, and then-
“Yeah. I dunno what’s in there and I’d rather not have Hydra wherever I go.”
Tony feels a smile bloom across his face, the first one since that morning with Natasha. “Well then. Follow me!”
—————
Dawn finds Tony and Bucky in Tony’s workshop, the former bent over the latter’s arm. The vague schematics JARVIS managed to pull from the nether hang off to the side, and a bizarre assortment of tools arc around them. It’s taken Tony nearly all night to figure out just how the arm worked—the wiring was far more complicated than necessary.
Probably, Bucky had said, to make it difficult for anyone to tamper with. They don’t like their belongings messed up. It sends a shiver down Tony’s spine, the way Bucky speaks of his past. It is so emotionless, so programmed, that sometimes it’s hard to remember that he is a person now, instead of a robot given human flesh. Steve comes down at ten to drag them both up to breakfast, but the engineer can’t shake the idea that he came for Bucky, not him. Afterall, Steve may be Tony’s soulmate, but Tony isn’t Steve’s.
—————
The problem is that Tony still loves Steve. Even after Bucky’s return and Steve’s absence, Tony still loves him. Sometimes it feels like he’s finally gotten over it, but then he’ll sit by Natasha and Clint instead of Steve, or walk in on Steve sketching, or see him pull off his cowl after a battle and it leaves him breathless. It only gets worse as time goes on and he’ll catch Steve and Bucky curled up together, or kissing, or holding hands. And the thing is that Tony can’t even be hurt. Not when Bucky will spend every waking hour in his workshop asking him about his projects, or when he plays fetch with the bots, and especially not when Bucky will call him some stupid old-timey name like Doll.
Looking back on it Tony would say that he began to fall in love with Bucky that very first night in the workshop. As it is, he only really discovered it when they all returned from a mission only to find Bucky looking frantic. “What’s wrong, Love?” Steve had asked when Bucky was finished fussing (Mother hen, Sam had muttered).
“Your communication cut out. I didn’t know if anything had happened, or if you were okay, or if-” he cut himself off, perhaps unsure what he was going to say, perhaps afraid to go down that road of thought again. None of them had said anything, just offered weary smiles as Steve pulled his soulmate close.
It had hit Tony as he downed nearly half a pizza in record time: Isn’t Bucky wonderful. It was a one-off thought, nothing surprising. Bucky was, afterall, wonderful. It wasn’t until that thought turned into I could kiss him for it, that Tony realized something was wrong. You weren’t supposed to want to kiss your friend, and you certainly weren’t supposed to want to kiss your friend’s boyfriend. Bucky was firmly off the table, and Tony felt disgusting even thinking of it. What sort of betrayal to Steve...but it was fine. Because Tony wouldn’t do anything. He would shove these stupid new feelings in a box to be examined at a later date. Maybe never. Never sounded good.
He had considered avoiding both Steve and Bucky, the better to avoid emotions and all the baggage that followed, but somehow he knew that would only invite Steve’s pathetic kicked puppy look and Bucky’s furrowed brow, and a dozen questions of are you alright, and have we done something, and what’s wrong. Tony didn’t want to do that. He already felt bad enough. Which meant the only other option was to stick it out. They’d go away eventually—either everyone would leave, like they always did; or the feelings would melt away, or wither up and die, or whatever it was neglected emotions did. And Tony would be fine. He had always been a good actor.
—————
Months later and the three of them are best friends. Joined at the hip, laughing, perfect best friends. If you didn’t count the fact that two of them were dating and one of them had a crush on the other two and all of them had decided to ignore whatever it was their arms said. Tony had learned to simply look the other way when they kissed, laugh at their love eyes, make fun of their stupid sappiness. If he’d had a soul it would probably be ruined and broken, but he didn’t, so it was fine.
Tony still curled up with Natasha and Bruce at movie nights, still sat wherever there was an empty seat at breakfast, still pulled stunts where he hid in his lab whenever anything got too much, still got dragged out by one or both of the super soldiers.
Everything would have been fine if not for those stupid alien...whatevers.
—————
The battle is meant to be easy. Another few aliens intent on conquering the world or something, another few bruises, another few cuts. Run of the mill procedure. Except that the call comes at four in the morning, right when Tony is about to sleep after a three day lab binge. There is no time to chug coffee, no time for anything except to call the suit and rush out the door. Somewhere is the back of his brain, Tony remembers a time when Steve would have dragged him from the lab by the morning of the second day, but that time has long since passed, and though Bucky and Steve still drag him away they sometimes forget. Now Tony is, for the most part, in charge of his own health, just like it used to be. Maybe if he had cared nothing would have happened.
But Tony had never been the type to put his health before anything, and so it was that he entered a battle that was far more difficult than it had any right to be sleep deprived and slow.
It isn’t until the end that things begin to go south. Sure, his suit is a bit dented, yes, JARVIS’s voice cuts out every so often, maybe he is bleeding a bit, but it had all been going fine. And then, just as they are dealing with the last of the aliens (it had been a small scouting party), one of them saw fit to launch a fucking subway car at Tony’s fucking head. Now to be fair it is unlikely that Tony could have dodged completely had he been alert and at his prime. As he is neither of those things, the car manages to clip him head on, sending him and his flickering repulsors spiraling away.
It all seems a bit hazy after that, lots of sunspots and what appear to be lens flares peppering his vision, a bunch of voices that all seem absurdly concerned for him, of all people, some screaming and crashing of rock, hands fumbling at the catch of his armor and then against skin.