Work Text:
The thought had burdened him those very moments he had gazed through those 14 million futures back on Titan. To the others, his scrying was but a few minutes at most. To Stephen, it felt like years. Reliving every single outcome of battle, over and over again, with just a few changes every time, only to be met with one singular chance at victory.
The victory in which Tony Stark dies saving the universe.
If you asked him, he'd tell you what he told Tony just after the Snap: "There was no other way." But even then, Stephen himself couldn't believe it. The chance of Thanos sealing a permanent win was so inevitable, of course it had to take the life of someone important to defeat him once and for all. Someone important to the world, to the Avengers, and to him.
"Doctor Strange?"
Stephen glanced up from the cup of tea he was currently trying to enjoy, meeting the gaze of Peter Parker from across the room. The kid had swung by the Sanctum unannounced to focus on finishing the many years' worth of homework he had to catch up on.
"What is it, Peter?"
"Just making sure you're still awake. You look like you fell asleep with your eyes open."
Stephen managed to smile. Despite everything, Peter still could find ways to lighten the mood. That became apparent during their time in the Soul Realm, where five of the longest hours of Stephen's life were only made more bearable by Peter's company.
"I'm just thinking to myself is all."
Peter quietly nodded, though it was obvious that he was debating on that answer. Considering everything that happened, he could probably tell what Stephen was thinking about. He just wasn't sure if he should bring it up.
"Wanna talk about it?"
The question made Stephen slightly raise one eyebrow. "Is this an excuse to procrastinate?"
"No!" Peter responded almost incredulously, as if the mere thought of procrastinating was the worst crime in the universe. "I'm almost done with today's lesson anyway. And I'm pretty sure whatever's bugging you is bugging all of us."
Stephen gazed back into the cup of tea he was holding. It was beginning to go cold, the steam no longer rising from the surface in wisps. The light tremor in his hands caused the liquid to vibrate unsteadily in the cup, more so than normal, forcing him to set it down without having taken a single sip. With a lot on his mind, though, he wasn't very thirsty anyway.
The kid had a point. No matter how many times he, or Stephen, or any superhero covered it up with other emotions, they were all thinking the same thing.
Why Tony?
Why Tony, who battled tooth and nail out of that cave in Afghanistan and became Iron Man, Tony who launched that nuke into the wormhole with no promise of return, Tony who had to shoulder the thoughts of Ultron and the Civil War and almost dying nearly alone in space trying to get home — why him?
That, even Stephen didn't know. He didn't know why fate chose Tony to be the one to snap Thanos away and to give his life to the universe in order for it to live on. He didn't know, and the feeling of not knowing ate him alive every night.
"There really was no other way, was there, Doctor Strange?"
Stephen looked up once again at Peter and shook his head. Out of those closest to Tony, he felt for the kid most of all. To turn to dust in his mentor's arms, only to have the roles reverse in the end, Stephen wondered just how Peter was holding up to all of that.
"You knew from the very beginning."
"I did." Stephen stood up from the armchair with a sigh, leaving his cold cup of tea beside it. The Cloak detached itself from him and flew over to Peter, hanging itself onto the spiderling's shoulders instead. A small act of comfort.
Peter didn't mind, instead grateful for the degree of warmth the Cloak provided in the chilly air of the Sanctum. He focused on his pencil tapping lightly on the textbook opened up in front of him."Do you feel bad?"
"For the universe being saved? No." The doctor pulled up a chair by the table, sitting adjacent to where Peter was. "For knowing the entire time that Tony was going to be the one to die out of all of it? Sometimes."
Peter only nodded again. The tip of his pencil moved to lightly doodle spider webs in the corners of his worksheets. "I don't blame you." The kid's words were quiet, but sincere.
Stephen clasped his hands together on the table, watching himself twiddle his thumbs. Even if Peter didn't blame him, he felt guilty anyway. He had directed the timeline into the only victorious solution he could see. It was either the universe, or Tony Stark.
Silently he thought back to that battle on Titan. When he met Tony, it was very clear neither of them would get along. But on that planet far from home, despite his promise to put the Time Stone before either Tony or Peter, he had traded the gem knowing full well that he was saving a man who would only meet his end five years in the future.
"Why'd you do that?" Tony had said to him after Thanos had disappeared. Stephen responded cryptically, as he could not find any other phrase that wouldn't give away the inevitable future. After the Snap, with tears in his eyes, he watched the world turn to dust before dying himself.
And at Tony's funeral, with Wong beside him as they saw off that metaphorical heart on the lake, the sadness in the air weighed heavily on him. He had known it would end this way. In that moment, he stood stoically among the ranks of other heroes, who were oblivious to the storm that raged in his soul. Stephen could only hope that, wherever Tony was then, he was finally at peace from the terrors that plagued him at night.
Stephen continued to supervise Peter as the young high schooler returned to studying. They sat there in comfortable silence, other than Peter's pencil scratching numbers and formulas on paper. Both knew what the other was thinking, who they were grieving, that they too could rest because the universe would be safe.
They may not have Tony Stark anymore. But at least they have each other.