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Tony is sprinting through the dense, snowy forest in stolen shoes that flop against his bare feet and a torn tank top and jeans that held up surprisingly well to electroshock torture. He's running for his life. At least running generates some semblance of warmth, gives him fragile hope that he won't be recaptured and killed, and demands all of his focus—preventing him from thinking about how he hasn't eaten in days, or drunk anything but the handful of snow he snatched up when he cleared the tree line from the creepy, abandoned-looking house complete with murder basement for storing rich young men whose parents might pay a ransom or hand over a Jericho missile.
This set of kidnappers clearly didn't know Howard Stark.
Or like him after they spoke, if the abrupt shift in Tony's treatment is any indication.
If they'd done their homework, they'd've asked Tony to build the missile; he designed it years ago, after all—his final contribution to Stark Industries' weapons division. But only a few key people in SI know about that. The public thinks Howard is the Stark who designed all Stark Industries' revolutionary weapons, and that Tony's just his hard-partying playboy son who's never done anything useful with his life.
Ignorance of his techspertese worked in Tony's favor, because these idiots left him handcuffed to a radiator in an unlocked room, and didn't check the lining of his jeans before leaving him unsupervised. Tony's had wires and a lock pick sewn into his seams since Ana got the idea when he was seven, and once he pulled the stitches, out they came, and then out he went into the freezing cold of the dead of winter while the world turned dark around him. He hasn't heard yelling or sounds of pursuit yet, but when they discover he's escaped they'll probably search for him and have useful things like flashlights, because no one saw their phone and fucking stole it from their pocket while they were handcuffed to a radiator and covered in fresh electrical burns.
He's got limited light and limited time, he's ill-equipped for the cold, he's been starved for three days, and he has no idea where he is, just that he randomly picked this direction and he's heading west-ish through a forest toward the rapidly setting sun.
Tony runs.
And runs.
And stumbles.
And falls.
And that's when he hears it: a familiar melody sounding in his head.
He's just a kid when he first hears the music. He's human, no one knows werewolves exist yet, and there's no sexy beefcake couple Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes coming out as werewolves and giving interviews to the press to explain the melody Tony heard sporadically during childhood is what werewolves hear when their soulmate is within a few miles of them. There's no one to explain that humans who hear a melody are soulmated to a werewolf, nor to tell him when you touch your soulmate for the first time, your melodies form a harmony that lets you know how important that person is to you.
No, there's no explanation for why Tony hears strains of melody when he's out in the city with Mom, usually around Brooklyn, and there's no indication anyone he knows hears music sometimes too. Tony is smart. He chalks it up to auditory hallucinations, or maybe an affinity for composition, and plays the melody on the piano sometimes, hums pieces of it to himself when he's not paying attention while building himself a pet dog, but otherwise the intermittent melody doesn't affect him. And anyway, he doesn't hear it at boarding school, or much even when he returns to his parents' house in New York, so by the time he leaves for MIT, he's dismissed it as some piece of early childhood he's left behind—his version of an imaginary friend, perhaps, because he's never been good at conforming to what's normal.
He'd all but forgotten the melody when, two years ago, husbands Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes came out as werewolves because Rogers's testimony was needed to convict a serial killer, but without the werewolf factor, no one would believe he'd tracked the man five miles by scent. The press exploded when he shifted in the courtroom, and the two became the emerging face of werewolves all over the world. They gave interviews, fielded questions, and explained how they met: they'd followed one another's melodies.
And Tony remembered being a child walking through Brooklyn with his mom and hearing a song sometimes in his head, one he hadn't heard in years, and realized what it meant.
It would be wonderful to have a soulmate, someone to look at him the way Rogers and Barnes look at each other. No one has ever looked at him like that, with a love so unconditional, intimate, filled with joy, a love given because he exists. Knowing someone out there will look at him like that has given him hope on so many desperate, lonely days.
That's why a selfish part of him was terrified when one of his seed bombs—which should've only been sold to the U.S. military—was used in a domestic anti-werewolf hate crime; he hadn't heard his melody in years, and it would serve him right for building weapons if they killed the one person he could count on to love him. He stopped making weapons. He came out as having heard a melody when he was a kid. He and his mother are outspoken proponents of werewolf rights now, and Maria Stark's opinion has clout.
But still, Tony hasn't heard his melody again.
Until now.
The sound—the pull—is coming from the west-ish direction he thought he'd picked at random. But maybe it was fate, and he's finally going to meet the person who'll love him just because he exists, no matter what. Since he can hear it, his soulmate's got to be within about five miles of him. He can follow the pull—he thinks, he hopes—and whoever's at the other end will have to take him in, they'll have to.
Tony braces against a tree that scrapes his arm and claws his way to his feet. He gets a head rush for his pains, but he quickly tries to listen past the sound of his own harsh breaths and the aches in his arms and torso and legs, and follow the melody.
His lips are so cold he can't feel where they're split anymore. His nose, too, is cold. He can't feel his fingers. Or toes. His ears are burning with cold, and his legs feel like rigor mortis is trying to set in, and he's slowed from an attempted sprint to a jog to a slog, stumbling like a drunk through the trees, ever more grateful that the pull gets stronger the farther he goes; ever more comforted that the melody that will harmonize with his own gets louder and more intense, somehow, in his head.
But he's too slow.
Of course he's too slow.
He only distantly registers the boots clomping through the snow behind him, hears the angry shouts for him to come quietly, recognizes the sound of safeties switching off and guns cocking. He stumbles to a stop because he wants to live. He can't drag his hands up from hugging his chest to conserve warmth, though his sweat has leached what feels like all warmth from his skin and just makes the cold sharper, but he at least tries to turn around and face the inevitable like a man, like he's made of iron, the way he knows a Stark should be. At least if they take him back he might live. He's getting hypothermia, definitely has frostbite, might be losing some extremities as a mercy instead of a torture device pretty soon.
He trips sideways in his too-large shoes, ankle not where it needs to be to bear his weight—he can't turn and can't move, not with any coordination, not anymore—and falls into the snow. His head cracks on a tree on the way down, and the music thunders in his ears like his slowing, straining heart.
He starts hallucinating, because that's what your mind does when it needs to leave the body it's trapped inside: it gives you a better place to hide than the real world you're running from. He imagines a gigantic jet black direwolf leaps over him, the sounds of fighting and men screaming and growls of rage before the din trickles to silence. Imagines a second wolf with a tawny muzzle nosing at his body, licking the warm spot on his head that must be bleeding, and the way the melodies leap and twine in his head when they touch. He imagines Bucky Barnes leaning over him, and wonders why Steve Rogers isn't here since this is Tony's better place dream.
Bucky's eyes are wide as they take Tony in. "You're Tony Stark," he says. He looks at the tawny wolf. "It's actually Tony Stark." He takes Tony's hand and the music swells, and the wolf noses his temple and what was loud harmony becomes sweeping and orchestral. Tony can't help smiling, because this is a good way to die, imagining two such perfect people would want to love him, would find and fight for him when hiding would be safer.
"C'mon, Tony, stay with me," Bucky croons, lifting him onto the giant tawny wolf that looks, honestly, as big as a horse, or at least a large pony. The wolf stands from its crouch when Bucky's firmly seated behind him, and Tony's hands are pressed firmly against the wolf's warm, furry back underneath him. Bucky pushes him practically flat and presses close, and then there's amazing warmth above and beneath him, and everything begins to slip away.
Someone's saying something above him, insistent, worried maybe, or even angry, but sounds don't have meaning anymore.
Because Tony's done. He found the harmonies to his lonely melody, if only in a final, beautiful dream. He can rest now.
He wakes up. Somehow, he wakes up. He's lying on his back. In a bed, he thinks, wearing soft, dry clothes that aren't his. And sunlight is streaming into the unfamiliar room from a tall, wide window. Almost nothing hurts. He can wiggle his fingers and toes and ears, and all are accounted for—though he's constricted and can't move much else. Oh, and he's warm. There are arms around him, moist breaths stirring his hair from both sides. He's being…cuddled. By two people. In a bed that smells like home—but not his home, exactly. More like, these are the scents that make home worth coming home to—these scents intrinsic to the men beside him.
The join of his neck and shoulder throbs, but it's a dull ache, like an old wound, hot and itchy with healing. He can smell blood that he knows is the scent of his blood concentrated in that spot, but his blood scent isn't just coming from him, there are traces of it next to him, and he follows his own scent to the mouth of Steve Rogers—actual Steve Rogers, which means the other set of arms around Tony must belong to Bucky Barnes.
Tony's had very pornographic fantasies about waking up like this, with these two men, but now that he's here he's at a loss. What should he do? Why isn't he dead? The thing that steadies him now is the music he hears, their three melodies harmonizing. This close, he can tease out whose is which, and realizes what he thought growing up was a single song was in fact the joining of two; Steve and Bucky must've been inseparable.
"I'm not dead," he says at last. His voice isn't sore from screaming anymore, which is a relief. But precious little about this situation makes sense. "'M not hurt. 'Cept my neck. How'd I hurt that?"
Steve noses Tony's temple, and Tony hears him sniffing—scenting, werewolves call it scenting, Tony remembers hearing that in one of his and Bucky's interviews. He carefully traces over the wound on Tony's neck. "You're not dead," he confirms. "You're healing really well."
"Born to be a wolf," Bucky mutters into Tony's hair, and tugs his waist a little closer with arms Tony has fantasized about holding him down several times just this month.
Tony is a genius. He's not firing on all cylinders yet, doesn't have all the necessary information, but he's seen werewolf movies and TV shows, and while they're probably ninety percent bullshit, Bucky and Steve's comments and the way he's realized he can hear three heartbeats, and smell his own blood, and the throb on his neck keep adding up to the same conclusion: "Am I a werewolf now?"
"Yeah," Steve says through a heavy sigh.
He smells…not happy? But also happy. If happiness is even a smell. Tony's getting a lot more sensory input than he's used to and doesn't know how to interpret most of it. He tries not to follow the trail of 'Steve regrets that I am a werewolf and that I am here,' but it's hard to break a habit of insecurity and self-loathing that's so deeply ingrained and has been reinforced for two decades. He sucks in a sharp breath and tries to let it out slowly. "Did someone bite me? Is, uh… Is biting people to turn them into werewolves actually a thing?"
Bucky and Steve snicker, but not meanly, more like they're charmed, and the hands on his body start moving—not to let go, but to caress with thumbs and warm palms, to grip tighter, hold closer.
"It is a thing, in fact," Bucky says, "but only alphas can do it, and we have to mean to—no one gets turned by accident."
"I gave the bite," Steve says. "Bucky's teeth were too human when you… When we, uh…"
Bucky is blunt. "You died on the way here, doll. We got his teeth into you fast, but it was a toss up whether it'd take since your heart had stopped beating." Bucky's leg curls over Tony's thigh and hooks his ankle, tugs a few inches, protective or even possessive—neither of which Tony expects, even from people whose melodies were born to join with his.
"Oh," he says, noting now that Steve's pressing closer, gripping him a little harder, nuzzling his hair. "It does that. Thanks." It comes out a little more vulnerable than he'd like, makes him feel too exposed, so he adds, blasé, "Not my first resurrection, but definitely the best one so far."
Steve and Bucky make worried rumbling growls in their chests that Tony knows are below normal human auditory range. "Better be the last time you need one," Bucky grumbles. "Least now you're harder to kill."
"That's probably gonna come in handy again pretty soon." At their questioning hums, Tony explains, "I get kidnapped a lot."
"I wish I didn't believe that," Steve says, which makes Tony feel better about not introducing himself. His memories at the end of things before he passed out (died!) are hazy, so maybe he introduced himself then, or they know his face from the tabloids that love to rag on him.
"So the guys in the woods," Bucky says. "Kidnappers? Were they catching or retrieving when we got there?
"Retrieving."
"Bastards."
"They really were. Uh, hey, so, I think I need to tell my PA I'm alive, at least, and Mom's probably freaking out since I've been missing for three or four days. How long was I out?"
"Just the night," Steve assures him. "We weren't sure how to reach the right people at Stark Industries about you, and we needed to make sure you transitioned in a safe place, so we haven't called the police yet either. You can do that now, if you want. I should get breakfast started anyway."
Still, the arms around Tony don't move, and he's content that no attempts were made to release him whatsoever. "So you know who I am," he says.
Steve tenses and starts to sit up. "Oh! We didn't introduce—"
"I know who you are, Steve," Tony says.
"Oh." Steve looks quietly pleased from his vantage point, leaning on his elbow and staring down at Tony.
"You're the asshole who's supposed to be my Mr. Right Furnace, but you moved and now I'm cold."
Steve's eyes narrow, but he smells warm and isn't making any unhappy noises that Tony can hear, sub-vocal or otherwise, so he thinks he's in the clear. He hopes he didn't mortally offend his actual soulmate. One of them, anyway.
The other one's snickering, so Bucky's clearly fine with Tony's sense of humor.
"I see we got another wiseass." Steve huffs. "Shoulda seen it coming."
Bucky snorts. "Quit complainin'—you're the worst one."
Steve flicks him in the forehead and slumps back against Tony's side. Tony chuckles because they're even more adorable in person than in their interviews.
And it feels so easy, being here with them, like they're all familiar strangers who really are made to be joined in three-part harmony. Tony isn't anxious, or compelled to cram their quiet lazing together with words spun into a fortified defense around his heart, or afraid they're secretly unhappy with him. He's not afraid at all. He knows he's safe here, with them and their combined scent of home that's seeping into his skin and making him feel more comfortable within it. Their music is faint, a background companion like the AC or the rain or the refrigerator hum, but he knows it's there, weaving in and out and creating something beautiful he was always meant to be part of—a place he was destined to be, where he'll be wanted and cherished and loved, and never abandoned.
With Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes, no less, who saved his life and pretty much handed him superpowers he fully intends to go wild testing the limits of whenever he gets back to his workshop.
He swallows. He'll have to go back to New York and SI eventually. But maybe he can wait a few days. Tell his mom and Pepper he's okay, so they can tell Rhodey and Happy they can stop looking for him and worrying—because that's what they do every time Tony's snatched, reliable and comforting as clockwork.
And Tony can stay here with Bucky and Steve, his soulmates who don't want to let him go. He can stay here, being cared for by two men who risked their lives to find and protect him without hesitation, who fought and won against wildly unfavorable odds even though all they knew about him was his song. He can stay here, with men who already value him more than any ransom, because they know instinctively Tony is worth far more than the world cares to believe.