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“Where’s Tony?” Asked Natasha as she walked through the kitchen and into the living room with her freshly made cup of coffee.
Steve looked up from the kitchen table where he’d been thumbing through SHIELD reports. “Huh? He’s playing on the rug.” He pointed a thumb over his shoulder toward the living room rug. Natasha stared down at her feet and saw nothing but a mountain of toys and Clint. She looked over to the couch and saw Thor asleep and snoring loudly, how had she not noticed that? She also saw the coloured marker scribbled all across his face and raised an accusing eyebrow.
“Clint, what happened to Thor?” Clint looked up from the toys and over at the Asgardian sprawled across the couch.
"Oh, funny story, Tash. He couldn’t handle the pace of us badasses and fell asleep so we punished him with the power of markers.” Clint grasped for the markers and raised them in the air proudly.
“The badasses being?” Interjected Steve, now sat backwards straddling his chair, facing everyone in the living room.
“Me and Tony!” Clint exclaimed.
“So where is Tony, Clint? Weren’t you watching him?” Chided Natasha as her foot tapped impatiently. Her hands on her hips, leaning forward and towering over Clint intimidatingly.
“No, Steve and Thor were watching him! I was just chilling with him. We’re buddies.” Clint grinned.
“You can’t just be buddies, he’s five. You’re suppose to be responsible for him, Clint!” She pinched her nose frustrated.
“Hey!” Cried Steve, offended. “We were all watching him but you were the last one interacting with him, Clint! You lost him!”
‘Men’ thought Natasha. “Well he can’t have gone far. When did you guys last see him?”
Steve thought hard for a moment. “Oh, I saw him walk past me.”
“That’s right!” Added Clint. “He went to the bathroom.”
“When?” She urged.
“Um, about twenty minutes ago, I guess?”
“And you didn’t think to check on him when he didn’t come back?” Natasha was becoming infuriated with the guys' lax babysitting skills. “What if he’s lost or hurt?”
“Natasha, calm down. If he was lost or hurt JARVIS would have alerted us and if I’m being frank: this Avengers Lego is really quite distracting.” Clint lifted the Lego Quinjet and ‘flew’ it past Natasha’s nose with his hand, as if to demonstrate it’s awesomeness and powers of distraction...
“That’s a great idea, Clint. JARVIS where is Tony? Is he still in the building?” Steve requested. “Is he with Bruce?”
“Dr. Banner is currently in his laboratory and young Master Stark is not with him, Captain Rogers. While he abides by your request to remain on the premise unless escorted by one of the Avengers, he has requested his location to be kept a secret.” Informed JARVIS.
“Why the hell would he do that?” Barked Natasha.
“He said it would break the rules of Hide and Seek, Ms. Romanov.”
Clint leapt to his feet, accepting the challenge. “It’s on!” He went running out and down the hallway. With all the commotion, Thor rose from the couch rubbing his eyes. Steve tried to hide a giggle as he caught a glimpse of Clint and Tony’s graffiti.
“What have I missed during my slumber, friends?” Boomed Thor as he yawned and stretched, “where is the Tiny Man of Iron?” Natasha let out a long sigh and stormed out after Clint. Thor, confused, looked over to the super soldier for answers.
“Come on.” Steve got up from his chair and headed to the doorway, “we lost Tony and he’s hiding somewhere in the building.” Thor nodded, accepting the quest as the two chased after the assassins.
After fifteen minutes searching the whole tower, the four Avengers were no closer to finding Tony.
“Is it time to ask Bruce for help?” Asked Steve as he ran a hand up the back of his head. Natasha shot him an angry look. Before she could respond, they heard a loud bang from the door behind them.
“What the hell was that?” Sputtered Clint as he leapt behind Thor for cover.
“It came from inside the closet. Did anyone check--” Steve was cut short as a muscular arm reached across Steve’s chest to hold him back.
“Fear not, I, Thor, shall venture into said closet!” With that, the mighty Asgardian grabbed the handle and ripped the door open and almost off it’s hinges.
“Tony!” They all cried.
Tony was sat on the floor of the dark closet covered in dust. He was surrounded by plastic tools, that had come from one of the many visits to the toy shop, and a bunch of screws and other parts that had come from the vacuum cleaner and other domestic appliances that had been stored in there. Tony coughed and stood up brushing the dust off him.
“I forgot to empty the bag.” Mumbled Tony to himself. It’s as if he hadn’t even noticed the Avengers’ presence.
“Tony?” Called Steve, “are you okay? We were worried sick.” Natasha just tutted.
“Hmm? Yes, I got bored. I saw this closet and decided to go play Hide and Seek but I got tired of waiting for you to find me so I started playing around with these machines and then after I took them apart and put them back together a couple of times I decided to make a vacuum cleaner robot that would vacuum all by itself!” Tiny Tony took a deep breath and continued. “But then I didn’t have all the parts and I didn’t want to come out of the closet and get them in case you found me so I decided to experiment and then a fuse blew and this happened.” He folded his arms stubbornly and kicked at the broken vacuum cleaner remains.
“But, little warrior, how did you work in this darkness?” questioned Thor, looking at the light switch dangling from the high ceiling and back at Tony, who could not have been more than four feet tall in his current condition.
Tony looked confused for a second. Then he looked down at his arc reactor and pointed. “With this. It’s a great flashlight! I think you should all get one! Can you? That would be so cool! I bet I could make one, if I could just take this one apart for a minute-” Clint crouched down next to Tony and put his hand on his shoulder.
“That’s awesome, little buddy but we didn’t know you had gone to play Hide and Seek, otherwise, I totally would have found you already!” Declared Clint sticking out his tongue playfully and ruffling Tony’s hair.
“We thought you had told us you were going to the bathroom.” Added Steve. Tony’s eyes went wide as he suddenly remembered and ran off down the hallway towards the bathroom. Steve chuckled, “I guess Tony has always been easily distracted by his passion for building and losing his train of thought. Although now I’m even more worried about him when he’s in his workshop for days.” He rubbed his chin with a worried look.
“I think you guys should take him out. Give him something new to do, he’s clearly bored of being stuck in here. We can’t keep letting him take stuff apart like this.” Said Natasha.
“Great! We can go to the toy shop again!”
“No, Clint! He has enough toys. Besides you play with them more than he does.” She groaned. “Take him somewhere new.”
“I’ve got just the place!” Cried Clint. “Thor, buddy. You’re gonna love this!” Clint set off running down the hallway again. Thor shrugged and followed him.
Natasha turned to Steve. “Aren’t you going?”
“Umm, no. I, er, have paperwork to do.” Steve said stumbling over his words as he edged back towards the kitchen.
“You know, you can’t keep avoiding him, Steve. He adores you. You can’t keep pushing him away.”
“I know, I know. It’s just...he was my boyfriend and now he’s a kid and it’s weird, you know? I’m not sure where the boundaries are...” Steve trailed off.
“Is that what’s been bugging you?” The assassin laughed. “He’s a kid, treat him like you would a nephew or something. All he wants to do is cling to you 24/7, let him. I know you want him to. Hell, your face lights up every time he comes close.” She lowered her voice, the tone more serious. Her hands fell heavily on his shoulders and she looked him dead in the eye. “I know this is hard for you Steve, but Bruce is down in his lab working his hardest to figure this thing out. You know he won’t quit. Just stay strong, for Tony.”
Steve broke free from her grasp and put his hand up to his arm in an uncomfortable gesture. “I guess. I think I’m still gonna sit this one out. Besides, I have all that paperwork to go through.” The super soldier quickly turned and hurried off towards the kitchen before Natasha could say anything else. ‘I miss him so much.’
The limo turned into a parking lot.
“You’re gonna love this, guys!” Exclaimed Clint excitedly, rubbing his hands together.
“I still don’t understand why Steve couldn’t come.” Whined Tony. “Doesn’t he like me anymore? Did I do something wrong? I didn’t mean to, tell him I didn’t mean to!” Tony pleaded, his big brown eyes beginning to fill with tears. He pulled at Thor's shirt. Thor rested a giant hand on Tiny Tony’s head.
“Fear not, little one. Steve loves you greatly.”
“Yeah, he’s just got a lot of homework from Fury. I bet he’s devastated he couldn’t come.” Added Clint. “Now let’s begin the awesomeness!” Rubbing his hands together, he flung open the door to reveal their location. Tony let go of Thor’s shirt and looked on in amazement, his mouth wide open.
“An ice cream parlor! Can we go in, can we go in?”
“Sure, little buddy.”
Tony ran up to the door, energetically jumping up and down and impatiently waiting for Clint and Thor to catch up. Thor pushed open the glass door and Tony ran in and straight up to the counter. He placed his fingertips on the top of the counter and raised himself up on his toes, barely tall enough to see over the top. Thor came up behind him and lifted him onto one of the bar stools.
“What do you want? You can have anything.” Said Clint. “Since Tony’s footing the bill.” He mumbled aside to Thor, with a grin.
“I want one of everything!” Tony shouted spinning around on the stool.
“Well, maybe you should pace yourself--”
“That sounds like an exquisite feast, young sir!” Boomed Thor. “One of everything my good man! We shall await your service over there.” Thor told the worker behind the counter motioning to the large table in the corner. Thor raised Tony to his shoulders and galloped him over to the corner booth in a haze of excitement. Clint handed the guy Tony’s credit card and joined his friends.
“Ugh! I couldn’t eat another bite.” Said Clint as he fell back in his chair, defeated.
“‘Twas a marvellous feast!” Shouted Thor, slamming his spoon down on the table and sitting back. Between them they had demolished over fifty different ice cream dishes, sundaes, snowcones, sorbets, frozen yogurts and more in just about every conceivable flavour. With Thor obviously consuming the lion’s share. “What fun awaits us next?”
“Um, well this was kind of it, to be honest.” Said Clint, poking half-heartedly at his half eaten sundae. As he leaned forward, something out of the window caught his eye. “But then again...Look!” He pointed across the street. Thor and Tony followed his gaze.
“Can we, Clint?” Asked Tony with the biggest grin.
As they exited the ice cream parlour, Tiny Tony was tugging at Clint’s sleeve, urging him to move faster. Clint put his other arm in front of the child to stop him. “Steady there, little buddy. Watch the road.” ‘And Tash thought I was an incompetent babysitter. If only she could see me now.’ he thought proudly to himself, as he exercised perfect road safety.
Once they were safely across the street, Tony ran through the gate and into the playground. He ran up the steps to the slide and waved from the top enthusiastically. “Look, look! Come on!” Tony demanded playfully. He slid down the slide and ran back to Thor, pushing the Thunder God to the base of the steps. Thor carefully climbed up the small apparatus and squeezed himself into a sitting position at the top, it was a tight fit. He slid down and laughed wholeheartedly as he hit the wood chip at the bottom with Tiny Tony sliding down after him and leaping on his back.
“‘Twas tremendous fun. Again! Come, join us, archer, and show us your feats of dexterity!” Declared the God as he climbed up for another turn, with the child still clinging to his back.
Clint couldn’t restrain himself any longer and ran over to the jungle gym. He dove through the bars and effortlessly grabbed one of the metal supports, catapulting himself to the top of the structure with such grace that Thor and Tony just stared in amazement from the base of the slide.
“The mighty Hawk shows his prowess at last!” Boomed Thor as he went bounding over to Clint, closely followed by Tony.
After almost an hour at play, the three heroes were still highly energised from their earlier ice cream fueled sugar rush. They’d ran around playing tag, tried to see who could launch off of the swing set the furthest, failed to catch Clint climbing around the park’s equipment and nearby trees. They’d pretty much conquered everything the park had to offer, except for the merry go round...
“Hey, Tony you wanna go faster?” Called Clint as he and Thor spun the merry go round.
“Faster, faster!” Cried Tony as he raised one arm in the air.
“A brave choice, little one.” Boomed Thor as he used his Asgardian strength to accelerate the speed. After a few seconds Tony’s arm went back down and his expression changed from pure joy to something else.
“Hold up, big guy. I think something’s wrong.” Said Clint concerned. Thor slowly brought the merry go round to a stop. His first instinct was to halt it immediately after sensing the grave tone in Clint’s voice, but the god thought better of it, as this Tony would have been catapulted far without the safety of his suit of iron. Thor did not want to explain that to Steve or Natasha...
As Tony slowly came around to meet Clint, Clint was met with a still, quiet Tony looking off into nothing. “Hey, little buddy. What’s wro--”
Tony suddenly erupted multi coloured vomit in Clint’s direction. Clint felt the warm, wetness hit the front of his shirt and cling to his skin. The sweet smell only sickening him further. “Oh, ew, gross, Tony!”
Tony looked up at him with tears in his eyes. “I’m sorry, Clint.” He sniffed. “I didn’t mean it. Please don’t be mad.” Thor came and scooped him up from the merry go round.
“Clint is not mad, child.” Thor grinned like a cheshire cat. “He is what you Midgard’s call a wimp!” Thor threw his head back and laughed. Tony couldn’t help but smile.
“I’ve called the car around. Let’s go get in.” Said Clint through gritted teeth.
On the way home Tony and Thor had sat at the opposite end of the limo to Clint to avoid the smell from his shirt. He was afraid to take it off as the material had soaked through. He was hoping Natasha would give him a hand when they returned to the tower.
“Steve, Steve!” Tony leapt out of the limo and ran up to the door where Steve and Natasha were waiting to welcome the three Avengers home. Before Steve could prepare himself, Tiny Tony had latched himself onto Steve’s leg and was gripping it tight with no sign of letting go. “I’ve missed you so much! Why didn’t you come with us?” Natasha smiled at Steve as he blushed slightly.
“Did you have fun, Tony?” Asked Steve as he glanced across at Clint’s shirt and foul expression. Thor followed behind, still grinning.
“Yeah! We went for ice cream! You should have come. We went in the limo, it was huge and it has all buttons and lights and stuff and the ice cream parlour smelt great. It had a big glass doors and spinning seats! We had all the ice cream flavours! Thor ate most of it and we went to the park and Clint was awesome! There were trees. I fell out of one but Thor threw me back up so I didn’t have to start from the bottom again.”
“Wait, what! Slow down, Tony!” Exclaimed Steve as he tried to take in all the information Tony was firing at him. Tony stopped speaking and yawned. He sat down sleepily on Steve’s foot, still clinging to his leg. “What happened to you Clint?” Steve said as he looked down at the man's shirt and back to his face.
“Well.” Started Clint.
“Looks like someone had too much ice cream to me.” Chuckled Natasha.
“No.” Said Clint dryly. “This isn’t mine, it’s Tony’s.”
“Damnit, Clint. What did you do?” Barked Natasha. Thor stepped forward.
“‘Twas not Clint’s fault, Lady Natasha. ‘Twas mine.” He sighed. “I spun him too fast on the circular metal frame and the result... was not expected.”
“Is that why you took him for ice cream? You can’t just try to bribe him after you guys screw up.” Argued Natasha. Steve just looked down at the small child falling asleep on his leg, letting Natasha rip into Clint and Thor.
“No!” Clint shouted back “We went for ice cream before the park, actually!”
“We had a mighty feast!”
“Shh, Thor. You’re making it worse.” Mumbled Clint.
“Oh! So you filled a small child with ice cream and then spun him around? What the hell did you think would happen, Clint!”
“He was fine for ages! He’s freaking Iron Man! I’ve seen him do more than ten consecutive barrel rolls at Mach 3! How was I to know he couldn’t handle a rusty old merry go round!”
“He. Is. Five! You suck at babysitting.” Natasha stormed off with a huff down the corridor.
“Wait, Natasha. You need to help me outta this shirt!” Called Clint as he chased after her waving his arms.
Steve looked up from Tony. “Looks like someone’s sugar rush has ended.” Thor smiled and helped Steve pick up the child from his feet. Steve hoisted the small boy onto his chest, Tony’s head rested on the super soldier’s broad shoulder. “I guess I should go put him to bed.” Steve said to Thor in a hushed voice, as not to wake Tony.
"That would be a good idea." Thor agreed, his tone deep but hushed.
Tony stirred slightly in Steve’s arms. Steve raised his hand and placed it on Tiny Tony’s back to soothe him. Steve turned and headed off to Tony’s room. He couldn’t help but smile the whole way there. ‘Natasha was right’ he thought. ‘He’s still my adorable little Tony. Only now he’s even smaller.’