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It’s quiet, in the aftermath.
In the darkest and deepest recesses of space, there’s the sound of rubble shifting, settling— an audible signal of the end. The sky is red and full of smoke, particles of metal and rock floating aimlessly through the air as if they’re afraid to land.
On the ground, there is ash.
All Tony can think is seventeen.
That’s how old Peter is. Was.
That’s how old Peter was.
When Tony was seventeen, his parents broke like porcelain on a backwoods road, leaving behind broken bones and bloody steering wheels.
When Peter was seventeen, he shook, shivered, crumbled as the universe turned him to dust from the inside out.
None of it’s fair.
He’s aware of a presence at his back, the blue woman he saw earlier. She had been looking for someone— Gamora? But she hadn’t been with the others. Tony wonders absently if she’d turned to dust like the rest or if she had met a more gruesome fate. He supposes it doesn't matter now. What's done is done.
Nothing but past tense.
“There should be a ship a few miles from our location. The Guardians had to get here somehow.”
Her voice sounds like gears grinding against each other and it grates on Tony’s ears. He feels numb, like he’s floating above Titan, weightless. Some far off part of his mind wonders how gravity works on planets apart from Earth while the rest buzzes with numbness. In the back of his mouth, he tastes iron and copper colliding.
His lungs feel like they’re filled with water.
The sensation is familiar in its brutality.
Tony doesn’t realize he’s shaking his head until he feels the snap of a metal hand across his face.
“You will not stay here,” the woman says. She’s standing, towering over him now, looking like some sort of divine being, the apocalypse in full swing behind her. The cool feeling of her fingers bites into his jaw as she grabs his face, forcing him to look into the black orbs Tony guesses are her eyes. If he could register anything beyond the feeling of ash (of Peter) beneath his nail beds, he’d almost say she was being gentle.
“The wizard believed you to be valuable. You will fix this.” And with that, she’s yanking Tony to his feet. He can’t feel the ground beneath him, can’t help the way he fights against her, but he does because no, she can’t, she’s taking him away from Peter, he can’t just leave Peter—
She’s yelling at him, he can tell. He sees her mouth, blue and so strange moving at a rapid pace, teeth bared and furious. There’s grief plain and simple painted across her features, but he can’t bring himself to care.
Not now.
He wishes Strange had let him die.
It would’ve been a mercy.
Suddenly, the blue lady’s mouth snaps shut with a mechanical click, her features smoothing out. She places a hand on his chest and he can feel it, in the recesses of his mind— can feel the way her fingers probe what’s left of his armor, can feel when she finds the cauterized edge of the stab wound Thanos had placed there only minutes before.
Or perhaps it’s been hours. Maybe years. It’s all the same to Tony.
There’s a searing burst of pressure in his side and then it’s only pain and thoughts of Peter before it all fades to black.
+
It takes them nearly a week to get back to Earth.
Or really, what’s left of it.
He doesn’t say a word to the blue woman, to Nebula, during the entire trip. She doesn’t sleep, doesn’t seem to need to as she keeps the Milano at what Tony would call warp speed if the phrase didn’t sound so fantastical.
The pop-culture reference makes his chest ache in a way he didn’t think was possible anymore.
The rest of him remains numb. He thinks the last living parts of himself were left on Titan.
Not that there were many.
Distantly, Tony understands that his stab wound is infected. He’ll probably become septic soon, if he hasn’t already. He doesn’t tell Nebula, doubts that she’ll understand anyway with her mechanical parts and lack of an immune system.
If he’s being honest with himself, Tony is just hoping he dies before he gets back to Earth.
It’s a selfish wish, he knows. Strange saved him for a reason, said it was the only way, but Tony has been trying to make his life count since the day Yinsen died for him in that cave, and no matter what he’s done, no matter what he’s accomplished, it’s all been for nothing.
He couldn’t stop it. The world turned to ash, and he couldn’t stop it.
Six years of panic and tentative planning and he couldn’t stop it. Six years of trying to keep himself, the team, the universe together and he couldn’t stop it and now Peter is dead, the closest thing he had to a son is—
No. Rewind. Reverse.
Focus on the pain.
If he’s lucky, it’ll be over soon.
But when has the universe ever been kind to him.
“We will land shortly. I’m tracking the location of Rocket,” says Nebula, barely turning her head in his direction. Her posture is stiff, tense in anticipation. And grief, Tony supposes. It has a way of sticking in a person’s bones, regardless of whether they’re made of steel or not.
“He must have survived. His tracker is still active.”
Tony feels himself nod but the motion feels detached, like his head is full of cotton, Nebula’s voice sounding far away and more artificial than usual. With his right hand, he fumbles for his stab wound, squeezing until he feels blood start to coat the pads of his fingers.
He lets the pain flow through him like some kind of penance, but it’s not enough. It will never be enough.
His vision whites out, fades into nothing as he feels the ship break the atmosphere.
+
Steve thought he knew the meaning of loss.
He was wrong.
Over seventy years ago, he crashed a plane into the ocean to stop a bomb that would’ve killed millions. Only five years ago, he defeated an insane robot that destroyed a country from the bottom up. Two years ago, he nearly traded Tony’s life for Bucky’s.
It was all for nothing.
This was the endgame, and now Bucky was ash at his feet and Wakanda was kingless.
None of it makes sense.
He's trying, he really is, to wrap his head around it but there's just no understanding. Half of the universe is gone, over half the team is gone, Bucky's gone and Tony is—
He never got to apologize.
For lying, for Siberia, for abandoning the team. He never got to say sorry.
Steve had known guilt was heavy, but this is suffocating.
They’d tried to save Vision, they’d refused to remove the stone by citing contingency, and it had cost them half the universe. One man’s life for billions of others. And Vision died with them, anyway.
So many mistakes. They’d made so many mistakes, and this was the price.
“Captain.” God, and that makes his shoulders tense. He turns his head, meeting eyes with one of the Dora, her gaze unflinching but weighted. Not for the first time, Steve wonders how these people can have so much strength in the aftermath.
“A ship has broken through the atmosphere. There's no telling if it’s friend or foe. The team calls for you.”
She looks vaguely disgusted as she says the word “team” and Steve can’t blame her. He’s barely seen Natasha or Bruce or, hell, even Rhodey since everything ended. He has no idea if Thor is even on Earth anymore.
But he isn’t a Captain, really. Not after everything. Not since Siberia, and sure as hell not after this.
In lieu of speaking, Steve just nods, getting to his feet with military precision. He feels like he’s made of glass, like he’s glued together— more fragile than he’s ever been.
He didn’t know he could feel this way.
He follows the Dora, her pace fast and tense as they reach the doors, stepping through the threshold and out into the clearing where they had fought. There are still bodies lying in the grass, casualties from the battle that weren’t the result of Thanos’s finale, and it makes something sharp and acidic rise in the back of Steve’s throat.
Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Natasha and Bruce making their way towards him, adjusting their pace to keep up. A beat, and then Thor and the racoon-thing he’d shown up with step into his line of sight, silent and solemn.
Rhodey’s already in the armor, faceplate down, but Steve knows the expression he’s hiding all too well. It’s a reflection of Steve’s own, after all.
Exhausted. Ill. Grieving.
A loud whir echoes its way across the field, intrusive and sharp in the careful silence that's settled across Wakanda. One minute there’s nothing, and in the next, a dark mass is lowering itself to the ground, unsteady but purposeful.
“It’s the Milano. Holy shit,” and if Steve could feel anything at all, he'd be surprised that it’s the racoon who's speaking. Instead, he shakes his head and starts jogging, heading towards the ship with single minded determination.
If this is an enemy, if this is some kind of final blow from Thanos, then dammit, he's going out swinging. He has nothing and no one to be careful for anymore.
He feels the rest of the team moving behind him, shifting forward together like a pack of wolves, starving and desperate in their attack. The viciousness of it all is disconcerting, and Steve wonders if this is really what they were meant to become. Lone survivors in the wake of such chaos.
Chaos they'd inadvertently caused.
They reach the doors of the ship right as they open with a gust of air and a bang. The racoon keeps moving even after Steve draws himself and the others to a halt, holding his ground. The creature scrambles up towards where a drawbridge is lowering towards the clearing, creaking and groaning from the weight, making contact with the earth with a low thud.
“Quill! Drax! Where are you assholes?” The racoon is...yelling. Which, again, Steve would’ve questioned if this was before, but now they’re in the after, so he keeps his gaze focused on where a blue woman is stepping forwards, out of the shadows, mechanical and otherworldly.
“They’re dead. It’s just me and the metal man.” Her voice is artificial, robotic and so strange but yet familiar in a way that makes Steve’s insides twist.
That is, until her words sink in.
Something bright and sharp flares in his chest, right behind his ribcage.
He’d never known hope could be so painful.
Steve’s moving before he even registers what he’s doing. Natasha calls for him a few feet away, but he ignores her in favor of walking towards the opening.
He keeps his steps even and measured even as he feels himself falling apart.
“You must fix him. He’s our last chance,” and it’s the blue woman speaking again. Steve pauses in his march towards the ship, stopping right at it’s maw, watching with rapt attention as she turns away, fading back into the dark. He can hear his blood pounding in his ears, his heart beating so fast it feels like it might crash right through his ribcage.
There’s no way.
It can't be him.
Not after everything, not now.
The universe wouldn’t grant him that much kindness.
Steve is still in the pits of denial even as the blue woman returns, this time carrying something, someone, only slightly smaller than her in her arms.
It’s Tony.
Oh god, it’s Tony.
Every one of Steve’s senses goes silent as he bursts into a run, practically ripping Tony from the woman’s grasp, red immediately staining the palms of his hands. Tony’s skin is practically burning his skin with fever, but it’s him, breathing and beaten and broken but alive alive alive.
Just barely.
He feels rather than hears Bruce say his name, the pressure from his grip sinking through the shoulder of his uniform as he finally tears his eyes away from Tony’s face.
Steve can’t say how long he’s been sitting there or how long Bruce has been trying to get his attention, but how could anyone expect anything of him when Tony is right there, cradled in the safety of his arms.
“Steve…Steve. You need to run back to base. He’s barely breathing. He needs— he needs a hospital,” and those final words bolt through him, a shock to his system.
Before anyone can say another word, Steve has Tony clutched to his chest, sprinting at full speed. It takes a moment to recognize the sensation he’s feeling, only to realize it’s the wind on his face, whipping at his cheekbones. All around him is the smell of earth and blood and the scent of ozone. Suddenly, it’s like everything has been thrown back into vivid technicolor, abrupt and jarring in contrast to the constant black and white of the after.
Right now, in his arms, is a chance.
Right here, in his arms, is Tony.
Bloody and with one foot in the grave, but he's here and Steve has never seen anyone so beautiful.
Tony will live. He has to. If he hasn’t died yet, that means he’s not meant to, and while Steve has always had a hard time accepting fate as law, he’s praying it’s at work now.
Steve runs and he runs and he runs— feels the shift of dirt beneath the soles of his feet, the pitter-patter of Tony’s tooquicktooweaktoofaint heartbeat beneath his fingers.
He keeps his eyes fixed on the palace and lets himself hope.
+
There’s the taste of gauze and antiseptic— linoleum and fluorescent lighting. The sheets beneath his body feel blue and grey but god, his side, it’s all red red red pain pain pain but then there’s blue, sky blue, staring at him and through him and something inside of Tony settles, shudders, stops.
“Tony,” and it’s a voice that makes him shiver, a timbre that reaches down down down, all the way into his sternum, and it pulls pulls pulls until there's nothing left.
“Tony,” it says again, and—
“Stay with me. Tony, you’ve gotta stay.”
He sleeps.
+
He wakes to breathing. The inhales are deep, steady, and metronomic while the exhales are gusts— strong and forceful.
Sleep, Tony’s mind supplies. Someone is sleeping.
The lights are bright even behind his eyelids, sharp and sterile. Tony screws his eyes further shut, scrunching his face and trying to shift in what he assumes is a hospital bed. He braces himself, takes stock of his body.
Legs. Feet. Arms.
Hands. Chest. Neck.
Head. Hands. Heart.
Then he moves.
Immediately, his nerves set fire. A gasp gets stuck in his throat as he arches off the bed and then he’s choking, sobbing for oxygen that just isn’t there. All of a sudden, Tony becomes aware of the tube in his throat, of the heat in his side, and the world tilts on its axis.
He opens his eyes.
Above him, there’s blue.
“Tony? Tony, listen to my voice. Listen to me, Tony, you’re safe. You’re in Wakanda, you— Bruce!”
The voice is breathless, panting and frantic like whoever’s speaking just ran a mile or five. There are hands on him, then— searching and insistent. They’re on his wrist, pressing against the skin of his side and ow ow ow, no please no—
“Tony,” and oh.
He relaxes, all of the fight gone out of him.
That’s Steve, isn't it?
That’s Steve above him.
That’s Steve’s hand in his hair, stroking his greasy curls back with a delicate sort of pressure, a gentle sort of strength, the feeling of fingertips against his hairline soothing the tension that’s crawled into his frame.
Tony squeezes his eyes shut again, opens them against the harsh brightness that surrounds his bubble of awareness, and then it’s Steve Rogers standing over him in all his brutal, beautiful glory.
It’s not at all what he expected.
He’d thought that seeing Steve again would be painful. That it’d hurt. They hadn’t said a word to each other after Siberia, not really— only sending the odd text every now and again, usually while drunk or exhausted or lonely beyond measure.
At least, on Tony’s part.
He’d thought it’d sting, that it’d burn, that it’d tear him apart from the inside out.
God, he'd never been more wrong.
Looking at Steve now, seeing his face bruised and gaunt and tired, a full beard where smooth skin once was—
It’s like coming home.
He breathes once, twice, a shifttugpull sensation ripping through his throat and the world goes dark again.
Steve, Tony thinks, right as his last bits of his consciousness float away.
Steve.
+
Steve watches as Bruce takes out Tony’s tracheal tube, his own breath caught somewhere between his third and fourth rib.
Tony’s always had a long history of taking his breath away.
It was naive to assume anything had changed.
Gently, oh so gently, Steve takes Tony’s right hand in his, marveling at his warmth, his callouses, his nails, his skin. Tony’s always been bronzed, his natural olive undertone making him look golden in the sunlight. Steve, on the other hand, has always been well aware of his own Irish complexion. Tony had teased him about it when they’d all first moved into the Tower, throwing good natured jibes in Steve’s direction about speedos and sunscreen.
God.
It'd been so easy, before.
They’d been so easy.
There’s the barest of shifts, the slightest sound of linen against linen and Steve is holding his breath again, staring at Tony for any signs of him resurfacing once more. A moment, then another, and he lets the tension drain out of his body.
Not conscious, then.
Not yet.
But he’d wake up and he’d be fine. Bruce said so.
“Sometimes, I wonder how you do it,” Steve says to the empty air. His voice sounds like it’s been dragged over coals, like he’s been screaming for hours and hours. There’s no response, and Steve wasn’t expecting one, but the silence still rings loudly against the linoleum tile.
“I wonder how you’re human. You’re like a goddamn cockroach, Tony,” he laughs, half hearted and weak. “Nothing can kill you.”
Steve chuckles again but it’s sharp and not at all what he’s feeling but the alternative to laughing is crying and he can’t afford that right now.
“And I’m thankful,” Steve croaks, continuing even as he tangles his fingers with Tony’s lax ones.
“I’m so thankful that you keep coming back. Even if it’s not to me. You could take one look at me when you wake up and tell me to get out, to go to hell, and I’ll leave, I swear. All I need is for you to wake up, to be fine, to— to keep moving. Because we need you.” Steve swallows, his voice growing weaker.
There’s only so much more he can take.
“The world needs you,” but it’s not the whole truth, and it feels like he can't breathe. His eyes are burning, bright and stinging against his eyelids while his throat burns. The pressure rises and rises and rises until he snaps in the silence.
It feels like a revelation.
“Goddammit, Tony, I need you more than anything.”
It comes out as a sob.
He sits there for an hour, two, the sun slowly setting beyond the glass of the window. His breath shudders and his face is wet, but all the while, he holds Tony’s hand.
Tomorrow, the sun will come up and there will still be bodies laying out in the field. Tomorrow, a new day will start and half the world will still be dust.
Tomorrow, Tony will wake up. Maybe he’ll scream, maybe he’ll cry, maybe he’ll tell Steve to get out of his sight. Whatever happens, it won’t matter. As long as he’s alive.
As long as the world has Tony Stark in it, there's a chance.
That’s all Steve needs to keep going.