Archive of Our Own ^beta

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Steve and Sam’s first stop before they set off to find Bucky is Manhattan, and as this is the first time he’s seen Tony in person since the invasion, Steve is understandably shocked when he sees Tony clad in dark pants and a white muscle shirt that revealed his chest’s lack of an arc reactor.

“Cap,” Tony greets as they enter his workshop, his attention focused on whatever project he had going on. “Saw the mess you and Red left in Washington. Did they screw up her wardrobe or something?”

“He’s the one who wanted SHIELD gone actually, so,” Sam answers, jerking a thumb at Steve.

The billionaire looks up and blinks at him. “I may not be laughing,” he says slowly, “but that is the funniest thing I’ve heard today.” For a moment, he pins Steve with a stare that is clearly designed to remind him that he’s the one who chose to stay with SHIELD instead of taking Tony up on his offer to move into the tower after it was reconstructed. And then he turns his eyes to Sam with an expectant look. “Please tell me that Captain America got himself a black driver.”

Sam, bless him, does not take offense, but the tactless remark effectively snaps Steve out of his stunned trance.

“Tony Stark, Sam Wilson,” Steve says, finally gathering back the wits that had scattered at the sight of Tony’s lightless chest. “Sam’s ex-air force pararescue, and I don’t think you need to be introduced,” he adds with a glance at Sam to confirm.

The eyebrow Sam pointedly raises answers the silent question succinctly.

“I wasn’t being offensive,” Tony says unprovoked. “My best friend is black. And he serves as a lieutenant colonel in the Air Force. So I have a pretty healthy respect for black men in the Air Force.”

It had felt so rude to ask Sam to wait for him outside at the time, but now Steve’s kind of wishing he’d asked anyway.

And then Tony’s eyes narrow. “You’re the guy with the wings,” he guesses intuitively, and Sam shrugs and falls into parade rest. Steve doesn’t think he’s met a more modest man in the twenty-first century. He also thinks he would’ve continued to be impressed with Sam’s ability to go with the flow had Tony not added, “Did you want new ones? Is that what you came here for too? ‘Cause I can whip a pair up in a jiffy, but the jiff’ll take a day at most, ‘cause I have to flesh out the design and then get it fabricated—”

His mouth falling open, Sam’s eyes keep growing wider as Tony pushes aside one of the holograms in front of him and pull out a new schematic—shaped unmistakably the EXO-7 FALCON—with just one gesture.

“Oh god, what?” Tony bemoans, expanding the hologram with his hands and tapping the mechanism where the wings were stored. “No, no, no, this is— I can’t— JARVIS! JARVIS, who designed this piece of shit?”

“That would be you, sir,” a voice says dryly, coming from nowhere and everywhere at once. Steve has read about JARVIS before, and remembers hearing it speak during the Chitauri invasion, though it had only ever directly spoken and was spoken to by Tony.

“What? No!” Tony gasps, looking shocked.

“I’m afraid so, sir.”

“What? I didn’t—” Sam looks to him for help and gestures abstractly at Tony. “Stop him,” he says, looking ready to beg.

Steve smiles. “We can wait a day,” he tells Tony agreeably, who stops arguing with JARVIS and beams.

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She doesn't expect to be recognized as soon as she steps into the room. Jane, maybe, because she’s a famous (or was that infamous?) astrophysicist, and Erik, yeah, he mentioned meeting the Avengers during the alien invasion in 2012, and Thor, well, he doesn't need to be recognized so much as remembered, but Darcy?  Yeah, right. 

“You!” comes the shout from across the room as she looks around the gorgeous penthouse. “Taser girl!” Darcy’s gaze snaps straight to the man speaking, which, surprise!, was Tony Stark. “Yeah, you,” he says when she lays eyes on him. “Come over here!”

“Tony,” Pepper Potts—oh Jane’s Thor, she’s in a room with Pepper Potts!—snaps, “you could ask nicely!”

“Indeed, Lord Stark,” Thor says while Darcy thinks Lord Stark? Oh jeez, because Tony Stark did not need to get his ego stroked every time Thor addressed him. “The Lady Darcy should be addressed with respect, not with impatience.”

“No time for that,” Stark says dismissively, already leaning over the table in front of him. “I've only been waiting for you guys to arrive since forever, okay? I need to get this tested out—”

Darcy had been about to snap back with a bad word and a witty way to say no, but her brain immediately recognizes the things lying on the table and she’s suddenly standing beside the table right across him before it can even tell her what she’s looking at.

“Ooh, so shiny!” comes out of her mouth, unbidden, as she hovers a hand over the one that attracts her eye the most.

“Pick one,” Stark says, “and go wild. But not on me. I’m squishy. And taken.”

Darcy hears none of his blabbing, too busy squee!-ing shamelessly as she snaps up The Shiny One. “Thor,” she calls out excitedly, turning to face the blond hunk of god who’d been right behind her. “Thor, can I—? What? Thor? Jane, where’d he go!”

“Darcy, no!” Jane says, looping her arm through Darcy’s to keep her in place. “It wasn't even funny the first time.”

“How would you know?” Darcy replies. “There has only ever been one time, you have nothing to compare it to yet!”

“Oh my god, I love this kid,” Stark says from behind her. “Pepper! Pep, I want her, can we keep her?”

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It takes three visits from Thor’s friends before Jane finally noticed it.

“Fare thee well, Lady Darcy, Jane Foster,” Sif says warmly before passing through the door.

“Indeed! Until next time, Lady Darcy, Jane Foster,” Volstagg says, bowing to Darcy and then smiling jubilantly at Jane as he follows after Sif.

“Lady Darcy,” Hogun bows to Darcy before turning to Jane and nodding briefly, “Jane Foster.”

“Lady Darcy!” Fandral practically sings, ever flamboyant as he leans down to kiss Darcy’s knuckles before turning to Jane and raising her own hand to his lips. “Jane Foster.”

She doesn't think anything of it at first, but when she hears Thor thanking “Lady Darcy” after she flipped some (read: the whole pan of) bacon onto his plate the next day, Jane finally starts taking a tally.

Over the course of the next week, Thor attaches the title ‘Lady’ to Darcy’s name every single time Jane hears him say it, even when it’s not Darcy he’s speaking to, whereas he never addresses her with anything but her own name. This wouldn't have been a problem, really, because he says her name with ‘my beloved’ or ‘my lovely’ or something similar and that’s just so much better to Jane than being called a lady. It doesn't even bother her when she hears him call Pepper and Natasha ladies as well, mostly because he doesn't call Betty a lady either, so it's not like he's calling every woman but her a lady.

However, it does become a problem when she finally overhears him say ‘my dearest’ and thinks he’s about to add ‘Jane’ but instead what comes out is ‘Lady Darcy’, and if Jane is particularly cool to both him and Darcy for the rest of that week, well, she’s busy with Project Bifrost and she’s so close to a breakthrough, she doesn't have time to socialize right now, okay?

This, however, earns her the attention of Pepper, who confronts her at Thor’s request because he believes that she, as a female, might understand what Jane's going through better than his other friends. Pepper’s nice about it too—takes Jane out for drinks at a classy lounge, shoves a mimosa in her hand, and only starts prodding once their food arrives. Jane, already more than a little frazzled at the puzzle she couldn't solve and a lot jealous of Darcy for something that probably wasn't even her fault, spills the beans with minimal prodding.

“It’s like Darcy’s some noblewoman they have to bow to or whose hand they have to kiss every time they see or leave her and I’m just some peasant standing in the same room as her,” Jane vents, tears creeping up her neck to sting her eyes. “And I know it’s shallow, I know Darcy’s better than what I think of her right now and she doesn't deserve it from me because she’s my friend, but why is she Lady Darcy and I’m just  Jane Foster? I have two  PhDs and she hasn't even graduated college and— God! I just… I’m just so confused, and hurt,” she admits, wiping the tears that had escaped her eyes.

“I’m so sorry, Jane,” Pepper says, placing a warm hand over hers and squeezing comfortingly. She tells Jane it’s okay to be shallow sometimes, and even shares several occasions in which Pepper had indulged in the vice herself. “And I’ll help you with the whole lady thing, okay? I’ll ask someone about it. You don’t have to go at this alone.”

“Please don’t tell him that this is what I’m being crazy about,” Jane begs, thinking that she was talking about Thor.

“That won’t be a problem,” Pepper assures her, patting her hand. “I can be very discreet—Tony’s playboy years gave me a lot of practice.”

Pepper works fast, it seems, because the very next day, she calls Jane up (well, down, technically) to her office for lunch (sushi, yay!) and tells her what she’s gleaned off of Sif, whom Jane hadn't even realized had come by.

“At first, I though it wasn't really helpful information,” Pepper admits. “Sif’s description of ladyships could mean anything from being proficient with weaponry to being a skilled sorcerer to being born to a wealthy family. So,” she smiles sheepishly, “I got more specific and asked why you and Betty weren't called ladies like Natasha, Darcy and me.”

Jane winces. “Did she guess that it was me asking?”

“I don’t think so,” Pepper shakes her head. “I made sure to insinuate that I was the one asking while pretending not to insinuate that it was me asking.” Pepper pauses, and so does Jane. “Tony must be rubbing off on me,” she murmurs, shaking her head. “Never mind what I just said. I’m sure she thinks it’s just me asking.”

Blowing out a breath, Jane nods. “Okay, lay it on me.”

Pepper obliges. “So it’s obvious that while some aspects of our culture mirror Asgard’s in some ways, most of our ethos is the opposite of theirs,” she says introductorily. “On both Earth and Asgard, the more popular someone is the more their name is known, and the more clients or privileges or currency they get, depending on their profession. The difference between here and there is how you know that person as. Take you, for example,” Pepper gestures to her. “Here you’re known as Astrophysicist Doctor Jane Foster, and that’s the short version. On Asgard, you’re known as Jane Foster. That’s it. And maybe,” Pepper stresses, “that sounds a little insulting, particularly to someone who spent nearly ten years getting her degree—” Jane flushes, Pepper having hit the nail on the head with unerring precision, “—but according to Sif, having the name Jane Foster talked about by regular Asgardian citizens in their homes is like talking about Michael Jackson in our own living rooms.”

Jane’s mouth falls open, a little stunned. Okay, maybe plenty stunned.

“So you see,” Pepper says, “calling you Jane Foster isn't because your degrees aren't recognized in Asgard or they think you’re a peasant. It’s because simply knowing the name Jane Foster is enough.”

Groaning, Jane buries her face in her hands, completely mortified. “Oh god, I’m such a shallow bitch.”

“I told you,” Pepper raps her playfully on the knuckles, “it’s okay to be shallow sometimes. Though you may have to apologize for the cold shoulder you've been giving them,” she muses.

Jane takes the advice and peppers—heh—Darcy with chocolates and sweets and several movie nights, and as for Thor, well, he was helluva lot easier to apologize to.

(“What are the things in your ears, Lady Darcy?” Thor asks her one morning.

Darcy either ignored him or couldn't hear him through the earplugs, though she wore them and glared at Jane every morning for the rest of the week.)

Chapter Text

“So it’s true,” Steve speaks up when Stark’s monologue hits a pause.

“What?” The billionaire asks, blinking like an owl peeking out of its hole in a tree. Steve gestures to Stark’s chest, and the man gets a clue. “Oh yeah,” he nods, tapping his chest. “Got rid of it. Well, not rid , rid. Specs are still up here,” he taps his temple. “And, you know,” he adds, gesturing to the building.

“But the shrapnel?” Steve asks, a worried frown crossing his face.

“With Pep,” Stark says. “Made it a nice necklace for her to wear. Wanna see? J, show the man a picture.”

“As you wish, sir,” Stark’s artificial intelligence system replies, and a new hologram pops up, showing Pepper Potts looking gorgeous in a strapless blue gown that showed off the bling hanging around her throat.

Sam whistles. “Man,” he says, “talk about giving your heart away.”

Tony beams. “Right? Okay for that, I’m throwing in some other goodies. Whaddaya want? Ooh, I can give you some boots! Y’know, to boost yourself up when you need to fly. But then you’ll need stabilizers, so gloves too—”

“Hey man, no,” Sam protests. “I don’t even—”

“That’s very generous of you, Tony,” Steve says shamelessly.

“Right?” Tony asks rhetorically.

“I hate you,” Sam hisses. “Remind me why I’m helping you again.”

“Because you’re a good friend,” Steve tells him solemnly, “and retirement is boring.”

Sam stares at him. “Captain America is sassing me,” he says to Tony.

“He does that sometimes,” Tony agrees. “Or, you know, a lot , if you spend too much time with him.”

Chapter Text

Tony’s head snaps up, ears perking up. “JARVIS, turn the volume down.”

“Certainly, sir,” JARVIS says, and as the music loses its loud quality, Tony squints his eyes, tongue peeking slightly from the corner of his lips as he focuses for several long moments.

And then he relaxes. “Huh,” he says, looking back at the d—

His head snaps up again, hands releasing the tools he was holding as he hurries to the door. “JARVIS…” he says warningly as he walks quickly down the hall, peering into the rooms.

“Apologies, sir,” JARVIS replies, though he doesn't sound apologetic, “but there seems to be a situation in Doctor Foster’s laboratory.”

He says this as Tony reaches the room, and he comes to a full stop just by the doorway, his eyes growing wide as he takes in the scene in front of him. “No.”

Thor turns around with a smile that greatly contrasts against the ripped shirt hanging from his shoulders, and his smile only widens upon seeing Tony. “Anthony!” he greets loudly, standing tall and proud, one of the fists on his hips moving up to beckon him over. “Come! I must introduce you!”

Darcy Lewis is on her knees in front of Thor, and she offers Tony a wide, wide grin. “His name is Little Thor,” she says shamelessly, rocking back to sit on her legs. She doesn't even have the decency to stop stroking the now-named Little Thor, who, judging by the slick sheen he can see glinting off the bright lights, has thoroughly slobbered all over her hand.

Foster sniffles, glaring at them furiously from across the room. “How could you two do this to me?” she asks irately, swiping a Kleenex from the table beside her to blow her nose, which was almost loud enough to cover the panting going on between Thor and Lewis.

“I—” Tony shakes his head, feeling stunned for the first time since… well, since yesterday morning, when Lewis twirled into the kitchen wearing what Tony recognized as Barnes’s shirt and Rogers’s pants and the slippers he once saw on Romanoff's feet. “What…?”

“Come, Anthony!” Thor says again when Tony still doesn't move, “Come join us and meet Little Thor for yourself.”

That? That was just too much, and Tony slaps his mouth over a giggle. Little Thor, jeezus—

“What’s wrong, Anthony?” Lewis asks, smirking at him, her hand smoothing over the length of (Tony giggles again) Little Thor. “Cat got your tongue?”

“Little Thor,” bursts out of him with a barely contained, nearly hysterical laugh, “doesn't look so little!”

“Stark, no!” Foster wails as Lewis tosses her head back and cackles.

Little Thor shoots Tony a little smile and says, “WOOF!”