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For a moment, when he heard the sound of heavy boots on the cold ground, Tony panicked. He had heard Rogers and Barnes leave. Heard the sound of Prince T’Challa’s - who Tony had mistakenly thought had been there to back him up - jet flying off, possibly with Zemo.
After that there had been nothing but silence, nothing but the sound of his own breathing, the cold, and the pain in his chest for a couple of minutes. He had been planning on remaining where he was until the pain subsided and then try to find a way to get help or hope that FRIDAY had managed to send Vision his way before she had lost contact with him.
And then he heard the sound of boots and well, Vision did not wear boots. Vision did not even walk, if he could get away with it.
Which meant someone else was coming.
What if the base was not as deserted as they had been led to believe in the first place? Tony had followed after Rogers to help him out - oh, the irony - because he was not stupid enough to believe the ramblings of a recently triggered POW with scrambled brains as the gospel. Barnes (don’t think about him, don’t think about the metal arm, don’t think) could have been wrong, or he could have been misremembering; that was why Tony had come after Rogers.
To help someone who hadn’t been a close friend, but who he had still cared about. Someone part of him had truly thought was good, despite everything.
And instead - and if he could laugh bitterly without pain radiating from his shifted ribs, Tony would have - he had gotten slammed in the face and in the chest with the fact that Captain Righteous was nothing but a liar, cared about nothing but James Barnes and gotten left behind in enemy territory without a chance of getting out.
He wondered, how exactly would Rogers explain himself if Tony died out here or HYDRA kidnapped him?
Even if he tried to lie again, Pepper would not stand aside without an investigation being carried out. And if Prince T’Challa had not killed him, Zemo would talk. He wanted the Avengers dead and gone: he’d tell everyone anything they asked.
But then the sound of boots got closer, and Tony automatically closed his eyes in slight distress and euphoria as he recognised the familiar steps.
Always those emotions, whenever he was involved. Apprehension, dread, elation and pleasure. An intoxicating mix of all of them at once that spelled nothing but trouble, and that Tony was unable to get away from no matter how hard he tried.
The boots stopped directly beside him, and even with his eyes closed, Tony could feel the shadow towering over his body.
“See, now I’d say something witty and slightly hurtful, but you look hurt enough that I feel it might be mean,” drawled the man.
Tony’s eyes remained stubbornly closed. Maybe if he stayed still enough, someone else would arrive and-
“If you don’t open your eyes, sweetheart,” continued the voice, sickly sweet. “I will assume that you are heavily injured or worse, and act accordingly.”
Reluctantly, Tony opened his eyes.
Erik 'Killmonger' Stevens was smirking, and Tony had not noticed that he was now crouched beside him. He looked almost the same as the last time Tony had seen him, if only a little bit buffer. His hair was also styled a little differently.
But the aura of danger, the darkness in his eyes, the annoying little smirk on his lips? The same.
“You don’t look so good,” told him Erik, and Tony forced his face to remain calm as he spoke.
“How did you find me?”
He did not do a good job at it, wincing at the pain in his chest and definitely not missing the way Erik’s eyes darkened even further at that. He was smirking, and his tone was playful, but his eyes had promised nothing but pain since the second Tony had made eye contact with him (possibly since the moment he had stepped into the room and spotted him like this).
“What makes you think I have ever lost you?” he asked, and Tony’s eyes narrowed slightly as he pulled at parts of the armour he definitely should not know were there. Erik just smiled easily at Tony’s expression and, once the suit opened up, moved a hand to his face. Despite the cold of the bunker, Erik’s hands were warm, and felt like a balm as he traced his fingers over Tony’s cold cheeks and face. “You have a black eye.”
He said it as if he was making conversation.
Tony knew he was not making conversation.
But he did not reply, keeping his eyes on Erik's.
The man’s eyes narrowed slightly and then he sighed. “I will allow this for now. How injured are you? Can you move?”
Now that the suit was not weighing him down like a turtle, Tony tried to sit up.
Only to immediately gasp in pain at the feeling of his shifted ribs digging inside of him, and dropping right back on the ground. His eyes had gotten teary from the pain, but it did not stop him from seeing the way Erik’s expression further shifted into something even more furious.
Just for a split second, before it turned back to normal. “Okay. I’m going to have to carry you out.”
Tony had a really high tolerance for pain - ‘perks’ of his stay in Afghanistan - but that did not mean he enjoyed it. Especially anything that harmed his chest in any way. He turned into the biggest baby.
Rhodey said it was within reason ‘considering everything’.
The Avengers knew how protective and sensitive he was about everything related to his chest and arc reactor.
Rogers still had not cared.
“Sweetheart?” called Erik, and Tony blinked away the wetness, forcing himself to focus on him. Whether the tears were from the pain, or from a dream crashing and burning, or from hatred, he wouldn’t have been able to tell you. “You’re with me. It’s gonna hurt for a second, but I’ve got you.”
It was gonna hurt for more than a second, but Tony did not mention it.
He bit down his lower lip hard enough to draw blood when Erik closed the broken chest plate around his chest once more, and then started pulling him towards the exit. It did not hurt as much as lifting him up would have, but it wasn’t pleasant either.
Every shift was like his shifted sternum was digging into his lungs and heart and whatever else inside his body, and fuck, but it hurt.
He forced himself to not think about it, instead trying to focus on Erik’s words, the kind pet names falling from his lips - so different from how he usually was - the gentle tones he kept using. Tony wasn’t sure what the hell he was saying, if anything, but he had always liked Erik’s voice, so he focused on that, and not the cold, or how much his chest hurt or the memories of his-
He was pulled a little harder than before inside of a jet, and this time Tony was sure actually broke skin inside his mouth. Then Erik barely gave him time to scream again before he pulled him up and deposited him on a bed inside of the jet.
It burned.
“Shh, shh,” said Erik, pressing a finger on his lips and a kiss on his forehead, as Tony forcefully blinked back the tears of pain. The pain in his chest was atrocious, but he could breathe, and it technically could not get any worse than this. “You’re okay, darling. You’re okay now. I’m gonna be by your side this entire time, I just need to get some stuff-”
“No,” gasped Tony, grabbing his arm. The pain had started to subside, but still... “Please don’t go. Don’t-” leave me behind.
This time Erik’s lips pressed against his own and Tony should definitely push him away, definitely dissuade him, but he did not care. Erik’s lips were rough against his, maybe from the cold, but Tony did not care. So long as Erik was kissing him, he was not leaving and Tony did not want him to leave-
Erik’s lips left his. He kissed the corner of his mouth, and then his cheek, and then his hand. “No more than five minutes,” he promised.
Tony expression darkened. But he still forced himself to let go of Erik’s hand, turning his head towards the wall of the jet.
He felt Erik hesitate for a couple of seconds, beside him and then he heard the sound of the man jogging out of the jet and back inside the bunker.
Tony had always been the more co-dependent of the two of them.
His lips tingled a little from Erik’s kiss and he should not be doing this. This way laid only pain and destruction, because Erik was dangerous. Everyone Tony knew was a little or a lot dangerous, even his supposed friends, but Erik was even more so.
There were very few things the man cared about, top of which were: revenge, family and Tony himself.
It should be flattering.
But it was terrifying.
And Tony had, again and again, tried to separate himself from Erik, tried to stay away (been asked to by Rhodey, Stane, Pepper and Happy, not one but several times) but as creepy as it sounded, no matter how far Tony went, it was like Erik never lost sight of him. JARVIS swore he was not helping him, he knew his real friends would never tell him, and no one else knew of his link to Tony.
They had both been very careful on that part.
And yet, he was always there. At the wrong right place at the wrong right time.
With his stupid smirk on his handsome face, with a weapon or several on his body, and usually someone else’s blood on various parts of him.
Erik returned when Tony got to 176 seconds, way earlier than the five minutes he had promised, a dark expression on his face that turned into a smile when he saw that Tony had been watching out for his return.
Tony ignored the shield, arm, tape and weapons he dropped, keeping his eyes on him. “How did you find me?”
“Believe me or not, this time it was an accident... of sorts,” told him Erik, as the door closed. He was very careful as he shifted the bed Tony was laying on slightly, but Tony was not paying attention, eyes narrowed at him.
Accidents were not something Erik was famous for. Everything he did was premeditated and planned for in advance.
He snorted at Tony’s expression, before he moved towards the front of the jet. The way the bed was positioned meant Tony did not have to move, really, to see him, and Tony felt a little touched. He shouldn't. He couldn't help it. “I’m being forreal. I was monitoring Prince T’Challa and King T’Chaka, and then you stumbled on the scene. Was curious about what you could possibly be doing with either of them, so I kept my eyes open.”
Tony was not sure what Erik could possibly want with Wakandan Royalty, but the name dropping had him immediately on edge, even before Erik spoke.
“So,” he said, sounding cheerful. “Are you going to tell me what happened or will I have to guess?”
Tony’s heart hurt with how fast it was beating in his chest. Or maybe it was the jet taking off and the way it shifted him around? He had not even realised Erik had put a belt on him.
“Where are we going?” he tried, knowing in his heart it was futile.
Erik tutted. “Guessing it is, then. During that wack ass airport fight where for some reason you decided to pull your punches and that bitch spy attacked T’Challa, there were a couple of unknowns. All the unknowns except one were either injured or captured or tried to run.”
He felt a shiver down his back. “Tried?”
“I am not the one who should be watching her back,” he quoted, a slight amusement in his voice. “She should have. She’d have seen that knife coming, otherwise.”
Tony swallowed.
“She’s alive, if you’re worried,” continued Erik, unrepentant. “She did not technically harm you. Though I might have to fix that, considering her actions at the airport directly led to this.
“Anyway. One of the unknowns, the one who run off with Steve Rogers, his ass had that fancy smancy soviet metal arm. Pretty sure that was the Winter Soldier. Pretty sure that was the same dickhead who caused all that mess in Romania and then Berlin. You were only trying to capture him in Germany, but from the burn marks around the edges of the arm, you used your reactor to blast that thing off. Either he pissed you off a lot, or he tried to pull that thing out himself. Am I warm, yet?”
“Erik,” he tried, but the man continued. He had not turned around once since the jet had started moving.
“And then the shield. Which is made of Vibranium. Captain America’s shield, a very memorable shape. Indentations all over the bunker, as well as repulsor and laser marks. Again, could have killed him but did not, otherwise I’d have found his body there, not yours. And similar indentation marks on your reactor. Hence, the soldier on steroids tried to kill you.” He turned around finally, pinning Tony down with those knowing eyes of his.
Tony could not have lied if he tried.
Erik nodded to himself. “So I’m gonna have to kill him.”
“Erik, you can’t,” immediately said Tony, but it wasn’t normal fear he was feeling. A slight apprehension. Uncertainty.
Some vindication (because he knew it was futile arguing, that Erik had decided, and part of him... part of him did not even want to argue).
Erik seemed to put the thing on autopilot and he moved towards where Tony was laying. He moved like a panther, and Tony had always felt like prey when Erik was on the prowl. He put a loving a hand on his cheek, pushing back his hair from his face. “Unfortunately, I have to. Because he hurt you.”
“I threw the first punch.”
Erik blinked. “Do I look like I give a fuck about who started the fight?” he asked him, a raised eyebrow. “Or what caused it? All I care is that the little spy turned coat on you. The bird blamed you for Rhodey’s accident. The other bird sent you here to begin with,” Tony’s eyes widened, because he definitely should not know any of this. “The witch... well, I just don’t like her, and I let her go when you asked before and all she has done is cause more trouble. So she’s dying too. And those three left you for dead, so they will be dying too.”
“Erik, you can’t,” said Tony, and there was some fear, but part of him couldn’t help but wonder why didn’t he just let him? Erik just wanted to make sure he was protected, why should he stop him from doing that?
The man smiled at him, as if he was looking at a particularly naïve child. “And who’s going to stop me? Because you aren’t.”
Tony breathing stuttered slightly.
Because it was the truth.
He could stop Erik.
He could stop Erik very easily. Could turn him in somehow, or even take matters into his own hands. He knew that if his hands were bloody, Erik habitually swam in seas of blood.
The man was a mercenary with his own moral code and did not care about who he killed or why. He did not do it for the money, either. Tony had tried before to offer him a better paid job as his security detail, so that he did not have to continue doing what he was.
Erik had laughed and turned it down, telling him that he enjoyed doing what he did.
That day had ended up with another argument and Tony screaming at him to leave and that he never wanted to see him again.
He had seen him again about three months later at a weapons expo, and promptly ended up in bed with him again.
“We need them-”
“For the Invasion?” asked Erik, scoffing.
Not at the notion of the Invasion. Erik had never doubted any word that came out of Tony’s mouth except when Tony claimed to ‘hate him’ or that he ‘never wanted to see him again’. Those were the only things he never believed him on.
Which was valid since Tony never meant them.
But he had trusted Tony on the Invasion without even needing proof, something his supposed team mates had never even pretended to do.
“Half of them are as good as the weapons they hold. You want a spy? I have 100s. You want a Black Widow? Shit, I have several and some even have red hair. You want a marksman? Baby, everyone in my unit is ten times the shot tweety bird number one is, and most of them don’t stick to arrows that they can easily run out of during battles. You can train any of my gals and pals with those wings shit. And super soldiers?” He snorted. “What’s better, two super soldiers who cannot be controlled and trusted or several trained men who will swear their loyalty if they have to and know how to fight properly? Sure, they can run and heal fast, but I betcha one bullet to the brain and Captain Imperialism goes down.
“The witch I concede I do not have a replacement for, but I also really hate her. After what she did to you...”
And there it clicked. “You spoke to FRIDAY.”
He smirked. “You never told her to keep information from me. I called her up when your ass was done with Romanoff and you went after the idiots in the RAFT. She knew I care about you, so it was not hard to convince her to tell me what I needed and wanted to know.”
Tony’s eyes closed.
Unlike JARVIS, FRIDAY was still painfully young. And seeing how his team had basically been decimated and he was going after those two, of course she’d have seen no problem in telling Erik everything he wanted to know.
He couldn’t even be mad.
She had just wanted to protect him, and technically, sending Erik after him was a sure way of ensuring this.
Just not Tony’s preferred way.
“So what now?” asked Tony, turning to face Erik again. “You’re just what... going to kill the Avengers? Because they hurt and upset me?”
“Of course,” said Erik, as if this was completely normal and not the kind of stuff that could get him put away forever. “It’s what I do.”
It was.
Tony had killed many people in that cave when he escaped.
But he had not been unaware that even before Iron Man showed up on the scene to get his weapons back, several Ten Rings hideouts had been blowing up and getting destroyed.
And Vanko? The guy that had replaced him in prison was supposed to do just that: replace him. And yet, he had wound up dead.
Tony and Pepper had banded up together to stop Killian, and his suits had gotten to the majority of the Extremis soldiers.
Yet, all of them had died and AIM had burned to the ground before investigations into them could finish.
Tony had woken up the day after the event with a message on his phone saying, “I am so proud of your Pepper, and the guy who bombed your house is lucky he is already dead.”
Trevor Slattery had been found dead in his cell the next day.
The only reason SHIELD had remained standing for so long, was that everything they had done had been kept hush hush, and Erik had not heard anything about it until the Fall of SHIELD.
That had been the last time in a while they had seen each other.
When Erik had shown up after the fall of SHIELD with a video of a surprisingly alive Coulson being electrocuted almost to death - Tony said almost, but he had thrown up before he had seen the end of the video - he had screamed bloody murder and kicked him out of his Tower, refusing to hear anything else he said.
And yet when Tony had been in Sokovia, helping out with the destruction he had had a hand in creating, Erik had been there. Had not approached Tony, but had worked alongside him as a volunteer without bringing too much attention to himself.
“You can’t do this,” said Tony, knowing, in his heart, that his words were futile.
And part of him - the dark part of him, the part that had drawn him to Erik the first time they had met - wanted this. He wanted to see Erik burn down the world for what they did to him. He wanted to see him take revenge in Tony’s name.
He had tried being an Avenger, but he would like being the one avenged for once.
“I’ll let you pick three to save,” crooned Erik, finger playing with a strand of his hair. “I’ll let those walk. Come on,” he added. “You know you want it, my lovely Merchant of Death.”
Tony’s endeavour to look away from him was proving to be useless. “That’s not who I am anymore.”
Erik smiled, his free fingers tracing his lips. “Don’t lie to me. Pick three.”
Tony shook his head, careful to not dislodge his fingers. “You know I can’t do that.”
“Can’t or won’t?”
“Does it matter?” asked Tony, a flash of anger burning. His chest hurt when he pushed Erik’s hands from his face. “I’m not going to fucking pick which ones of my supposed team mates deserves to live or die, Jesus.”
Erik’s lips thinned. “Suit yourself. I’ll make the choice myself.”
“It’s not their fault,” tried Tony again. “Some of them were just in over their heads. You can’t just-”
“I can and I will,” said Erik, voice cold but not at all uncertain. “I am not sure about everyone else, but the Winter Soldier, the Witch, Captain America and T’Challa are dying. Nothing you can say to me can stop me.”
The Merchant of Death wanted to purr at the darkness in his eyes and voice. Wanted to curl himself around him, and kiss his fingers reverently, those fingers capable of so much death and destruction.
He wanted it.
But Iron Man could not want this. Because he was a hero, and heroes were not supposed to encourage the deaths of people who were supposed to be their team mates.
But Tony Stark was not a hero. Tony Stark was not recommended.
“At least leave Prince T’Challa out of it,” he tried, but Erik shook his head.
“Oh no, T’Challa gotta die too. His death is personal. You see,” and here he smiled, golden tooth shining. “His dad killed my dad. And since his daddy's dead, someone else gotta pay. A debt of blood is paid by blood.”
Tony laughed without really meaning it, shaking his head at the way Erik’s eyebrows rose.
“What’s funny,” he stated, and anyone else would have felt fear at his tone of voice.
But Tony shook his head, because as fucked up, as deranged and violent as he was, Erik had never put his hands on Tony or tried to hurt him. Not even when Tony begged for it he had given him anything stronger than a slap.
“Just seems to be a lot of that going around lately,” he said, ignoring the way the pain had tears falling down his eyes. It was the pain of course, nothing else. “King T’Chaka for some reason kills your father, T’Challa thinks Barnes killed his dad, but it was Zemo, and Zemo shows me Barnes killing my dad and mom which Rogers knew about for years and did not tell me about...” the tears kept falling, even as Tony tried to laugh again. “Crazy world we live in, uh?”
Erik’s smile had disappeared, replaced by a truly terrifying expression. This time he held Tony by the jaw as he pressed a bruising and fierce kiss against his lips, his teeth sharp against his lips.
When he pulled back, Tony’s tears had not stopped, and his chest just hurt more from the slight asphyxiation.
Erik’s eyes were dark as they bore into his. “I’m gonna kill them. For you,” he promised, voice a little reverent as he wiped his tears with a thumb.
Tony just nodded. “Okay.”
In another Universe, perhaps Steve Rogers would have been able to return to the RAFT a few days after Siberia and free his comrades. Perhaps they would have all run to Wakanda for a period of time, waiting with bated breaths for pardons that might never come.
But in this Universe, Steve Rogers never made it there.
He and the Winter Soldier were on a Quinjet, en route to Wakanda while the King went to drop off Zemo with the authorities.
It was incredibly easy for a certain vengeful AI to hack into said Quinjet and send it crashing on the coast of Egypt. It was also incredibly easy for a hardened mercenary like Killmonger to track them down once he had deposited a wounded Tony Stark in the same German facility his brother in arms was laying. It was hard to hide when you were branded terrorists by the UN itself and were on the run.
The bodies of Captain America and the Winter Soldier were found 5 days later in front of the White House, both of them showing clear trace of torture and mutilation, almost unrecognisable with several parts of their bodies missing.
The Captain had been cut in half across his chest and the Winter Soldier had a hole in his.
The Witch was found dead next. The RAFT had gone offline for several minutes the day after Captain America was found. When it went online again, the famed Scarlet Witch had found herself still in her straight jacket in the same holding cell the Abomination was in, the writing ‘Hulk was a nice guy’ on the wall of the cell.
By the time anyone had made it there, the witch was an unrecognisable smear on the ground and the Abomination was still hitting.
At the same time, Clint Barton was found with a broken back inside his own cell, crying in pain. Scott Lang and Sam Wilson were curiously left intact, as was Romanoff. Her injury could have been worse, but while she was bed bound for a while, she would live.
Rhodey was beside his hospital bed in his wheelchair as Tony was told all this from a UN official, and Vision had been in the room too.
Rhodey had looked pale beside him, Vision clearly shaken, but Tony’s entire attention had been on a bouquet of bird’s foot trefoils beside his bed. The normally yellow flowers were tinted red.
And inside them, a card.
Love you, sweetheart.
Tony found that he had never read a scarier threat in his life.
Or a better declaration of love.