Work Text:
Behind the door a secret place
A hidden house you see
A place where you imagine
Just how life could be
In your head you've made your bed
You sleep alone you see
The person in the mirror can't be me
~ Hidden Houses, Dave Gahan
Tony knew that he wasn't normal from the moment the usual soulmate mark vanished from his wrist and he acquired two sets of voices in his head at the age of 6. "Hide!" became his new motto from that day on, his fear of discovery the driving force behind a lot of his actions.
He wasn't normal and the second voice was the further proof he didn't actually need. Hiding, especially form his father, became a new sport and he excelled at it for most of the time. It was disturbingly easy to hide his bare wrist since his father didn't pay that much attention to him and he was fiercely independent even before it happened. He needed to be, considering what was in his future:
"Don't touch me, I have pepper spray!" in a female voice and a deep baritone that told him "Tony Stark, I'm..." and then nothing because he didn't deserve a name he could avoid his whole life.
His soulmates where assholes and apparently at least one liked to threaten him. Great. In his better moments he imagined one of them to be like Mr. Spock and the other as Dr. McCoy, making himself Captain Kirk in the process. He could live with that. Friends who showed their affection through banter.
But then his father belittled or threatened him once again while his mother tried to intervene but ultimately didn't succeed and he realized that he would get what he deserved. Times two, because he deserved double the punishment or something. His mother knew that there were two people out there, waiting for him, and told him over and over again that it would be okay, that they would be beautiful and brilliant.
Tony tried, he really did, but he couldn't believe.
Having not only one but two soulmates should have been exciting but Tony dreaded the day he would meet them. His joy at hearing the first words out of his new best friends' mouth - "Hey, I'm James, your new roommate."- couldn't be captured with words.
The way he clung to Rhodey in the following years would have been embarrassing but Tony had stopped caring at this point. Rhodey knew and understood his fears and did his best to screen new people before they could enter his life. A lot of people never met their soulmates and Tony had no problem with being one of those. He perfected the mask he hid behind to the point he almost forgot that it was a mask himself.
Until the day a beautiful, strawberry blonde woman stormed into his office, trailed by his new bodyguard, Happy.
"What the fuck," he started to say only to be confronted with a stack of paper being slammed onto his desk. "Don't touch me, I have pepper spray," the woman hissed into Happy's direction before she turned to Tony. "Hi, I'm Virginia Potts. From accounting? You have probably never heard of me before but there is something I have to show you..."
It was her. His soulmate. The one that had been born when he'd been three and barely able to understand the words she would say to him one gloomy day. She was beautiful. She was fierce. She was intelligent.
Pepper, as he called her right there and then, was perfect. He could see the moment she realized what his first words to her had been and he would never forget the gorgeous blush on her face. Happy somehow disappeared, taking every other person in the office with him.
Only Pepper remained.
They smiled at each other, charmed and insecure and both so relieved that their first meeting turned out to be so much better than they both had feared.
He stopped hiding that day, at least in private. He had been so stupid and the universe had proven him wrong and gifted him with the most amazing woman to ever walk the Earth. The first time their fingers touched he swore he could feel the stars realign.
Now they only had to wait for their third. Maybe they would get lucky once again. They had to. Their third had to be amazing to be worthy of them.
Pepper had the same words as he did, so they would meet him together. Perfect. They could barely wait.
They had to wait for an eternity.
As Tony was preparing to have the arc reactor removed from his chest Pepper searched for the best surgeons available in all fields and stumbled over one Dr. Stephen Strange but learned that he's suffered an almost fatal and career-ending car crash only a couple of weeks before. She shrugged, barely sparing a thought, and continued her search.
When Tony fired Quentin Beck from the BARF project and searched for a replacement he stumbled over the name Dr. Stephen Strange but had to discover that the good doctor had retired and vanished into obscurity after having lost the use of his hands. He shrugged, briefly mourning the chance of meeting a man who was apparently almost his intellectual equal, and decided to do it himself in the end.
"Tony Stark, I'm Doctor Stephen Strange. I need you to come with me. Oh, uh, congratulations on the wedding, by the way."
The words came out of Stephen's mouth on autopilot, he was too busy making plans and trying not to panic at the world-ending threat approaching to be nervous at addressing the perfect couple.
Tony Stark's "I'm sorry, you giving out tickets or something?" followed by his fiancée's soft "Hi" directed at Bruce Banner shook him to the core and he could only stare and watch as the same realization appeared on the other two faces.
Ever since the day he'd been born there had been two voices in his head. One mocking but not unkind, one soft and lovely with even one word. He'd hid them from the world, never telling anybody about the fact that he had two soulmates out there waiting for him. It was his little secret, precious knowledge for him and him alone.
Their voices comforted him his whole life; hell after his accident the vague hope of meeting the two - two, how could he get so lucky?! - people made for him was all that kept him going on the really bad days. Even after having discovered magic and gaining custody of the time stone he refused to look for them. He would find them when the time was right.
His soulmates where Tony Stark and Pepper Potts.
Thanos was approaching and they were out of time.
He got the luxury of feeling Tony's hands on his body for a few short moments while the man checked him for injuries before carefully helping him stand up. They managed to steal one hasty kiss and a short caress from an uncaring universe but he never got to touch Pepper or hear more of her wonderful voice than that soft "hi" that hadn't even been directed at him.
He died on Titan in the knowledge that all his hoping had been in vain and that he'd been alone until the very end. It had all been for nothing.
*
When he woke up again he was in his own bedroom in the Sanctum, memories hazy and indistinct. There was a moment of panic but then there where hands on his arms, gently restraining him and telling him to please calm down.
Two voices. Male and female, talking over each other, each trying to reach him. He opened his eyes and looked into the happy faces of Tony Stark and Pepper Potts.
"Hey there, sleepyhead, nice to see your gorgeous eyes again. I've been telling Pep all about them but I don't think she believed me."
"Now I do," she said and put a hand on Stephen's cheek. "Hello, Stephen. Nice to finally meet you for real. Welcome back." She kissed him gently.
"Mommy? Daddy? Can I meet him? Please?"
More laughter and Stephen watched in confusion as Tony vanished for a moment - only to come back with a little girl in his arms.
"Stephen? Meet Morgan, our daughter. Morgan? That's Stephen. I've been telling you about him."
The little girl who looked exactly like he imagined the child of Pepper and Tony to look like, shyly waved at him before the Cloak grabbed her attention. But she sneaked a glance at him every few moments or so and smiled at him. "Mommy and Daddy have been waiting for you for a long time," she informed him seriously and then giggled when the Cloak tickled her under the chin.
"Sorry we started without you," Pepper whispered into his ear as she helped him sit up. "But things happened. But I promise, we never forgot about you. We never gave up hope that we'll get you back."
No, they hadn't. The way they looked at him despite barely knowing him - full of love, understanding and acceptance - made that clear.
He had never been more grateful for his enormous bed then right now, with two fully grown adults and one little girl on it, all trying to hug him at the same time.
"You got to kiss him first this time! Now it's my turn!"
Pepper held his shaking hands while a fascinated Morgan got further acquainted with the Cloak of Levitation. Stephen watched the spectacle for a moment or two before Tony gently turned his head around. "Let's do this right this time. Hello, Stephen." Tony bent forwards and Stephen melted into their first real kiss. One of Pepper's hands found its way into his hair and began to gently stroke through it.
Silence replaced the voices in their heads, thanks to having the real thing in their lives, and all the hiding was a thing of the past.