Chapter Text
Tony was a bad sleeper by nature, let alone habit, and it wasn’t unusual for him to spend days in his workshop before crashing hard. Pepper endured it with her trademark good grace, and Tony went out of his way not to disturb her with his nocturnal tinkering. Still, even if he’d been a world napping champ, he was pretty sure he would have been woken up by the frantic pounding on the front door.
“Jarv?” he frowned, pushing his stool back from the workbench.
There was no response. No one should have been able to make it onto the property without the AI raising the alarm, let alone all the way to his doorstep. Tony grabbed an automatic pistol and held out his other arm, pieces of the suit flying to cover the outstretched limb and the front of his torso as he hurried out of the workspace.
The house was silent, the lights on Jarvis’ cameras winking steadily in the dark despite his lack of response. Tony reached the entrance hall, gun at the ready. He could make out a human-shaped shadow through the frosted glass, tall and broad-shouldered with longish hair by the looks of it.
“Tony?” a voice whispered behind him.
He glanced over his shoulder at Pepper, peeking around the top of the stairs.
“Get back, babe.”
She pressed her lips together unhappily but obeyed, ducking out of sight. Tony sidled along the wall next to the door so he wouldn’t present a target, and yanked it open with his weapon aimed right at their visitor’s nose.
Bucky Barnes, ex-Winter Soldier, stood on the stoop with a terrified look on his face and a sleeping child in each arm.
“Help me,” he begged, “I didn’t know where else to go.”
“What the actual fuck?”