Hostages to Fortune 6/7

[seanchai.livejournal.com]

Title: Hostages to Fortune 6/7
Authors: seanchai and elspethdixon
Rated: PG-13
Pairings: Steve/Tony, Hank/Jan.
Warnings: No much, really. Some swearing and violence.
Disclaimer: The characters and situations depicted herein belong to Stan Lee and Marvel comics. No profit is being made off of this derivative work. We're paid in love, people.
Summary: The sequel to Readjustment. Things are finally settling down, and the Avengers are settling in. It's time for disaster to strike again.
X-posted to Marvel Slash.

And again, our thanks to tavella for the great beta job.


Hostages to Fortune





When Rhodey had announced that Hank had an antidote, Steve had naively expected it to be instantaneous, or at least, hadn't expected it to take this long. Shortly after Rhodey's announcement, a nurse had come in and given Tony a shot. That had been twelve hours, and eleven more injections of the antidote ago, and aside from the fact that Tony was now asleep, nothing had happened.

Visiting hours were long over, and the hospital was filled with an early morning quiet; most of the other Avengers had long since gone home, leaving Steve and Hank to keep watch. A few hours ago, a young, black doctor with a USMC tattoo on his forearm had come in to look Tony over, and had suggested that Steve, might also wish to leave. Steve had folded his arms and looked at the man for a long moment, at which he had rolled his eyes, and shook his head, but had left without further protest, and had not returned.

Sam and Clint had been coming by in alternating shifts, probably, Steve acknowledged, as much to keep an eye on himself and Hank as anything else.

Hank had assured them all that this was supposed to happen, that the antidote took time to work, but after twelve hours of watching Tony sleep, Steve wasn't finding that particularly comforting. But then, Hank had less reason to worry.

Jan, now half again as tall, had woken up several times, slightly more lucid each time. The last time, she'd pulled out her various IV and monitor lines, walked out into the hallway where Hank had been pacing nervously back and forth, and hauled him into her room, where she'd then apparently collapsed on him. The hospital staff hadn't been pleased with Jan being ten feet tall in the first place, and had unsurprisingly liked this even less. Steve had come out of Tony's room long enough to tell them to leave Hank and Jan alone, which they then had. He had a feeling the blonde nurse from earlier wouldn't have been so easily cowed, but this was a new shift.

Steve shifted his weight in the now-familiar plastic chair, which hadn't gotten any more comfortable. He'd been briefly dragged away by Sam and Clint in order to eat dinner, but otherwise he hadn't left Tony's side. And Tony hadn't woken up once.

Tony was probably exhausted from his week in DC, Steve told himself. Left to his own devices, he probably hadn't been getting enough sleep. Steve could sympathize; he hadn't slept in over twenty-four hours now, and his eyes felt gritty and tired. He'd expected to be sleeping with Tony again last night.

Steve let his head drop to the side of the bed, onto his folded arms, and let his eyes slide shut. Tony was going to be okay. Tony had to be okay. He just had to keep telling himself that.

Someone was petting his hair, Steve realized muzzily, an indeterminate amount of time later. Sam would mock him if he ever saw this, Clint too, but Steve found that he didn't really care. Tony stroking his hair was inexplicably soothing.

The touch on his hair stopped just as Steve woke up enough to remember where he was and why.

He lifted his head and opened his eyes to find Tony staring at him with wide-eyed trepidation.

"Tony?" Steve said tentatively, already halfway to his feet and reaching for him. And then Tony was grabbing him and pulling him close, back down and halfway onto the bed, clinging to him silently. Which was good, because it gave Steve an excuse to cling back.


***


Steve was big and warm and oh, thank God, alive. Tony's face was buried in his shoulder, the edges of Steve's scale-mail digging into his cheek. He was alive, and whatever it felt like, none of it had been real.

He'd thought Steve was dead, known Steve was dead. Known if he tried to touch Steve, he wouldn't be able to. It wasn't that he hadn't known he was hallucinating -- he'd known that. But as surely as he'd known he couldn't trust his own perceptions, he'd known Steve was dead, dead because of him, at his hands. And even if Steve was just another hallucination, that had been better than losing him entirely.

Steve was holding him so tightly that it almost hurt, repeating his name over and over. Tony let himself go limp, sagging against Steve and closing his eyes. What ever had happened, there were almost certainly things that needed to be dealt with, but they could wait; for now Tony couldn’t process anything beyond the fact that Steve was alive, was here, was all right.

"It's all right," Steve was saying, "I've got you." And then, a long moment later, "I was worried you wouldn't wake up."

Steve sounded upset. Tony reached up absently to stroke his hair, and hesitated as he felt a sharp tug on the inside of his arm. He looked down to find an IV line attached to the inside of his elbow.

He was in a hospital, he realized. That made sense. And it would explain why he felt strangely weak and uncoordinated.

He and Jan had been in a restaurant. There had been poison, and a riot.

"How did you get me out of my armor?" he mumbled into Steve's neck.

"I used my old override code." There was a strange note in Steve's voice.

"Oh," Tony said, without much curiosity. He'd been asking more for form's sake than anything else. At the moment, it was hard to care about anything but the fact that Steve was here. He wasn't sure he had the energy for more. Except...

"Is Jan all right?"

"She woke up a little while ago. You're the one that had us worried." Steve's arms tightened slightly around Tony's shoulders. His grip was painfully tight now, but there was no way Tony was going to object.

"Good," he said. "That's good." One of the many fears that had paralyzed him in the restaurant had been the worry that Jan would be killed or hurt. She hadn't had the protection that the armor had afforded him. He frowned into Steve's shoulder, eyes still closed. "There was a reporter..."

"Jan took care of him."

Good. That was good. It was fortunate that Jan had been there; he had been next to useless. "Was anyone else hurt?" he asked, finding that he did, in fact have the energy to worry about things beyond Steve's presence. "Did I-"

"No," Steve voice was firm enough to quell all doubt. "You kept several people from stabbing each other and stopped a few more from jumping out the window. And if you hadn't shut down the ventilation system, things would have been much worse."

Tony didn't answer, just kept his face buried in the crook of Steve's neck and breathed in the scent of leather and heat and sweat.

Some time later, he wasn't sure how long, Steve said, quietly, "I don't know what I would have done if your armor hadn't come off."

"I didn't have a choice," Tony said, feeling mildly defensive. "They were going to hurt each other. Someone had to do something."

"You could have been hurt." Steve let go of Tony, pulling away, and Tony opened his eyes to find Steve watching him seriously. "And we wouldn't have been able to help you. I can't believe I never asked for your new override codes."

"I couldn't leave Jan to handle everything alone," Tony said, trying to smile. Not that there'd been much he could do. The armor was a weapon; it wasn't designed for crowd control. He'd barely been able to use it for fear of hurting the people he was trying to protect. "But hey, you got everyone out, so I guess it doesn't matter."

Steve blinked. "Doesn't matter? Tony, what if you hadn't woken up?"

"What else was I supposed to do?" Tony looked away, inspecting the IV line in his elbow. He tugged at it absently, adding, "I couldn't just let them attack each other. More people would have gotten hurt." Standing by and watching when he could have intervened would have made anything that happened to those people his fault.

Steve grabbed Tony's right hand, fingers firm around his wrist, forcing him to let go of the IV line. "They only let me stay in here because I swore I could make you stop doing that."

"Doing what?" Tony asked, looking back up at Steve.

"Did you even think about the risks?" Steve was asking. "You should have told us you were compromised right away."

He'd been very aware of the risks of donning the armor in a crowded room when he'd already been exposed, but it hadn't occurred to him to say anything to the others -- for one thing, part of him had already been worried that they were dead, but even if that hadn't been the case, he wasn't sure he'd have thought to say anything; after keeping his heart problem a secret for so long, concealing his physical condition was second nature.

Tony shrugged, the IV line tugging at his arm again. What was in it, anyway? "It didn't seem important." In the midst of all the chaos, there hadn't exactly been time to have discussions about his physical or mental condition. It wasn't as if there was anything anyone could have done at that point. The hallucinations hadn't been fun, but the entire time at the restaurant, he'd at least known that they were hallucinations. It wasn't until later, until he'd woken up in the hospital, that he'd lost the ability to sort them out from reality.

"Didn't seem important," Steve repeatedly, slowly, his voice very calm. His jaw tightened. "What if you'd panicked and hurt someone? What if that gas had been poisonous, and there'd only been a limited amount of time to give you an antidote? You passed out inside the armor." His voice increased in volume as he spoke, the facade of calm crumbling until the least few words were almost a shout.

Tony managed to keep from flinching at Steve's anger, but only just. He took a deep breath, eyes focusing on the needle in his elbow, the green lines of the EKG monitor, the fuzzy hospital blanket that was covering his legs -- anywhere but Steve's face. "You had an access code," he pointed out, doing his best to sound reasonable. "And don't tell me you wouldn't have done the exact same thing! You would never sit out a fight, and you know it." People had been going out of their minds; he hadn't had a choice. And it wasn't as if Steve was any better at sitting on the sidelines.

"That's not the point!" Steve snapped. "You-" he broke off, maybe at the look on Tony's face; he had flinched this time.

He was too tired for this right now, shaky, disconnected, still feeling like he’d been put together wrong. Tony flexed his fingers, trying to collect himself. He hated being this weak in front of Steve; everything else aside, Steve didn't like being reminded that he was damaged goods.

Steve drew a deep breath. "I'm not going to argue with you while you're in a hospital bed. We can talk about this later." He stood up, glanced around the room. "I wonder where the doctors are. I would have thought they'd be in here by now."

Tony shrugged, grateful for the change of subject. "I cut the connections to the monitors and inserted an artificial looped datafeed in their place. They think I'm still asleep."

Steve stared at him, looking bemused.

"I didn't want the doctors coming in yet," Tony said, not quite defensively. When he'd first woken up, and stretched out a tentative hand to touch Steve's hair to determine whether he was real, he'd sensed the signals from the monitors and reached out with the Extremis to block them, half-afraid that people were spying on him. He hadn't really registered that they were hospital equipment until Steve had woken up and proven himself very real indeed, and Tony had belatedly noticed the IV in his arm.

Steve shook his head, but Tony thought he saw his lips twitch, just for a second. "I'll go tell them you're awake," he said.

"Get me some clothes, too, would you?"

Steve nodded, but made no move to leave, standing beside Tony's bed, one hand grasping the metal railing that ran along the edge of it, staring down at Tony, something strange and intense in his face.

Tony looked up at him silently. Steve looked tired, with red-rimmed eyes, and unshaven, though the stubble was so blonde that it was barely noticeable. As soon as Tony got dressed and checked himself out, they could both go home and go to sleep.

He'd spent a lot of time recently staring at Steve, drinking in the sight of him. After knowing for so long that he was never going to see Steve again, it was a little bit like coming into the light, every time Tony saw him. Steve alive and breathing wasn't something he was ever going to get tired of looking at.


***


Jan knew it was psychosomatic, but being out of a hospital room and back in Avengers Tower made her feel immeasurably better. Wearing real clothes helped, too.

The hospital staff had make token protests when Jan and Tony had checked themselves out several hours after Tony had rejoined the land of the living, but it really had only been a token protest. Jan had a feeling that they'd been happy to see them go, as much because of herself as because of Tony. The nurses hadn't reacted well when Carol had gotten her to increase her size; apparently it had done some very strange things to all of the monitors they had had hooked up to her.

She'd been so irrationally terrified... It had gotten better once she was larger, but it hadn't gone away until several hours after they'd started dosing her with Hank's antidote. After she'd cried all over Clint and thrown a screaming fit at the sight of Hank.

It was horrible of her to think, but she couldn't help but be almost grateful that Tony had been affected too, because the only way that this could be more humiliating than it already was would have been if she were the only one who'd collapsed on one of her teammates crying -- in public, no less.

Jan sighed, tucking her feet up under herself, and let her head drop back against the smooth leather arm of the couch in the Avengers' living room; even though the toxin’s effects had worn off hours ago, she still felt shaky and feverish. She also felt a strange sense of distance from the hysterical woman who had wanted to hide under a table in the Meridian, almost as if it had been someone else stepping in and making a fool of herself.

Once the drug had worn off, her reactions just seemed disproportionate and silly. She couldn't imagine herself overreacting like that, even back when she'd been a twenty-two year old socialite playing at being a superhero.

Hank hadn't met her eyes since she'd come back to her senses and found him lurking in the hallway; he'd barely even looked her in the face. And that made Jan feel even worse than the shakiness in her muscles and the lingering feeling of illness that Hank had guiltily confessed was probably due as much to the antidote as to the toxin.

She knew perfectly well that she had no reason to feel guilty over her drug-induced fear of Hank, because Hank actually had given her a reason to be scared of him. But that had been a long time ago, and she wanted to think that they'd gotten over it, moved past it, and knew that for the most part, she had. At least, when she wasn't being drugged out of her mind.

How could she expect Hank to keep trying when around every turn, there was something to remind him of the mistakes he'd made? The mistakes they'd both made.

Jan pulled the wool afghan Jarvis always left hanging over the back of the couch up higher over her shoulders. It was crocheted from red and blue wool, and was one of the few things that had survived the destruction of the Avengers mansion -- somehow, its presence made the living room feel familiar and lived-in, despite the lack of decoration on the walls.

They had all been staying here for a month, but so far no one had suggested putting new pictures up. They all knew exactly what had once hung all over the walls of Tony's apartment, and they knew why they'd been taken down.

There was a slight noise from the doorway; Jan looked up from the book she wasn't reading to see Hank slink into the room. Not looking at her, he crossed to the chair farthest away from Jan's couch and sat down, burying his nose what Jan assumed were the reports from the hospital.

She knew her reaction to him in the hospital had hurt him, but she didn't know how to apologize for that without hurting him more in the process.

Five minutes later, Hank was still hiding on the other side of the giant living room, and Jan had decided that this was getting ridiculous. "Hank," she said abruptly, "would you mind bringing that pillow over here?" She waved a hand, indicating the throw pillow that was lying on the seat of the empty armchair next to Hank.

"I, um, sure," Hank said, snatching up the deep green pillow and carrying it over to her. He held it out toward her like an offering.

Jan took it from him and stuck it behind her back, snuggling into it, and the tense set of Hank's shoulders eased slightly.

Jan rubbed the corner of the pillow between her fingers thoughtfully. That had worked better than she had expected. Not only was Hank on her side of the room now, it had somehow gotten him to relax. He still wasn't looking at her, but he was no longer holding himself as if braced for rejection, as if he expected at any moment for her to demand that he leave the room.

What else could she make him bring her?

"While you're up, would you mind getting me a glass of water?"

Hank deflated slightly, and Jan realized that he might have interpreted that as an attempt to get rid of him. "And get yourself some ice cream," she added quickly.

Hank gave her a tentative nod, and turned away, starting for the door.

"With two spoons," Jan called after him. "And bring your ice cream back here."

Hank stopped in his tracks and turned to look back at her, a smile slowly dawning on his face. "You know, my ice cream has calories, too," he said, an uncertain note in his voice in spite of the smile he still wore.

"Other people's desserts never have calories," Jan said, cheerfully, "it's a rule."

The uncertainty had fallen away from Hank's expression, leaving just the shy smile behind. Hank was cute when he smiled like that; it was a shame he didn't do it more often. Jan found herself smiling back.

"What kind of ice cream will I be eating?"

Jan made a great show of thinking carefully about it . "The pint of Häagen-Dazs in the freezer door. The caramelized pear and toasted pecan flavor."

Hank wrinkled his nose ever so slightly -- he was of the opinion that all ice cream ought to be either chocolate or vanilla.

"Every time you buy a carton of it, Häagen-Dazs donates money to help preserve honey bee populations."

"All right," he said, smiling again. "Pear ice cream it is."


***


Steve unbuttoned his shirt and shrugged out it, tossing it over the back of a chair, and rolled his neck. It had been a long two days.

Tony was sitting on the side of the bed, facing away from him. He was already undressed, wearing boxers and one of Steve's t-shirts. Somehow, without either of them mentioning it, Tony wearing his shirts to sleep in had become something of a habit; Steve probably should have protested this theft of clothing, since it meant that he ran through clean shirts noticeably faster than he ought to have, but he'd never quite gotten around to it. He had to admit that there was something oddly satisfying about the sight of Tony wearing his clothing.

Steve folded his jeans in half and laid them over the back of the chair, on top of the shirt, then sat down on his own side of the bed, stretching his arms over his head; his shoulders ached from wearing his shield for too long, and that half-hour of sleep he'd snatched in Tony's hospital room last night hadn't been nearly enough.

He knew Tony was even more exhausted. Jan had dozed on the couch for most of the day, recovering from the fear toxin and its antidote. Tony, on the other hand, had refused to go and lie down; instead, he had listlessly followed Steve from room to room around the Avengers' living quarters.

"You were right," Tony said quietly.

Steve blinked, turning to look over his shoulder at Tony; Tony would fall over where he stood before he'd admit that other people's suggestions that he might need sleep had any merit, so he wasn't talking about Steve's not-so-subtle suggestion that it was time they went to bed. Which only left the conversation that they had had right after he had woken up in the hospital.

Was Tony actually admitting that he needed to pay more attention to his own physical well-being? That seemed almost too good to be true, especially since Steve, given some time to think, had realized over the course of the day that Tony had had a valid point earlier; people had been in danger, and Tony had been one of the only two people there who could do anything control the situation. With a little distance between himself and the reality of Tony semi-conscious with monitors attached to him, Steve could admit that he had been reacting purely on emotion, rather than logic.

"You saved some of those people's lives," Steve said, equally quietly. Tony's shoulders were slumped; staring at his back, Steve could see the hard angles of his shoulder blades through the thin shirt.

"No," Tony said, shaking his head, "I was compromised. I could have lost control and hurt someone."

Apparently it had been too good to be true. "I would have done the same thing," Steve said, rising and walking around to Tony's side of the bed, wanting to look him in the eye. "You were right about that." Maybe if he turned the situation around, Tony would realize that the issue at hand was that Steve had been worried not about the risk he had put other people at, but the risk he had exposed himself to apparently without even noticing it.

"It's not the same," Tony's voice was still low, tired. "You don't have repulsor beams in your gloves." He half-raised one hand, palm facing out, and Steve could see the small bruise on the inside of his elbow, where the IV needle had been. "You have no idea how easy it would be to... I blew a man's head off with them."

Maya's first test subject for the Extremis, Steve guessed. His skull had been completely vaporized when SHIELD had finally gotten there; the media had been very fond of reminding people of that particular gory detail. Tony wouldn't have resorted to that level of lethal force unless he'd had no other options. While the Avengers very rarely killed, at one point or another, they all knew that the possibility was a potential last resort. It still wasn't an option any of them would exercise lightly.

It wasn't the time to debate this; not now, not while they were both exhausted. "You could have hurt someone," Steve admitted, hating to give Tony's guilt more fuel but unwilling to lie, "but you didn't. You saved people's lives," he repeated, letting some of his frustration leak through. "You know you did."

"But I could have-" Tony started.

"It's late," Steve interrupted, laying a hand on Tony's shoulder. "We can talk about this in the morning."

Tony nodded, his eyes closing for a second, and Steve moved his hand up a little higher, sliding it over the rough edge of his t-shirt until his fingers were resting against Tony's bare skin. Underneath his palm, the tendons in Tony's neck were rigid with tension.

Steve sighed, and let his hand fall back to his side. Tony needed sleep. They both needed sleep.

Steve walked back around to his side of the bed and lay down. After a moment, Tony joined him under the covers, where he lay staring up at the ceiling with as much space between them as the size of the bed allowed.

It had only been a week since the last time the two of them had shared a bed, but it felt like much longer; Steve closed his eyes, and thought about rolling over so that he was closer to Tony, close enough to wrap an arm around him and lay his head on Tony's chest. Lying like that, he could hear Tony's heartbeat, and Tony would lay a warm hand on the middle of his back, between his shoulder-blades, and run his fingers through Steve’s hair. It was the one thing Steve had found that always kept away nightmares, and even though he hadn't had any lately, he just... slept better that way.

The gap between him and Tony felt much wider than the bare few inches of mattress between them counted for. The memory of Tony flinching away from his touch was all too clear; Steve rolled over onto his side, facing away from Tony. Sleep was a long time in coming.

He wasn't entirely sure what woke him; maybe Tony had moved slightly, or made some noise. Whatever it was, it jolted Steve out of a sound sleep. He blinked, trying to wake himself up enough to figure out what was happening. Beside him, Tony made a small, distressed sound.

Steve rolled over, propping himself up on his elbow, and looked at Tony. It was the middle of the night, and not much light filtered in through the bedroom window, but there was sufficient illumination for Steve to make out the way Tony's eyebrows were drawn together into a thin, unhappy line.

It looked like tonight was Tony's turn to have nightmares.

Steve sat up, leaning over Tony, and gave his shoulder a gentle shake.

The result was immediate and explosive. Tony's eyes snapped open, and he came up swinging, fist catching Steve in the face hard enough that he saw stars for a moment.

Steve lurched back, pressing the back of his hand to his mouth, tasting blood. "Sonuvabitch," he spat, "I knew you were holding out on me. Why don't you hit like that when we're sparring?"

Tony stared at him, eyes wide, his expression shifting from confusion to a sort of frozen horror. "Oh God," he gasped hoarsely, pushing himself up and away from Steve. "I'm sorry. I'm sor-"

Steve reached a hand out instinctively, wanting to erase that look from Tony's face.

Tony recoiled, throwing himself backwards out of the bed so that he was standing several feet away, leaving Steve crouched in a tangle of sheets, one hand still outstretched. "You're bleeding," Tony whispered.

He had said the same thing in the Meridian. "It's okay," Steve said, his throat tight. "It was a dream, remember?"

Tony shook his head mutely, taking a step backward. Then he turned on his heel abruptly and left the room, back stiff.

The cat, who had been crouched unhappily in Steve's upturned shield, clearly woken by the noise, got to his feet and dashed through the door after him, body low to the ground.

"Damn it," Steve swore, his hand dropping back to the bed. He grabbed a fistful of the sheets, crumpling them between his fingers. He had no idea what he was supposed to do.

After a moment, he disentangled himself from the bedding and went after Tony.

The hallway proved to already be empty of Tony. It did, however, contain Sam, who was standing in the open door of his room, a paperback book in one hand. "First Tony, now you," he said, shaking his head slightly. "What are you doing up? You looked pretty beat before, and you just went to bed a couple hours ago."

Before Steve could answer, Sam's gaze fixed on his face, and he raised his eyebrows, adding, "Don't tell me; you finally tripped over your shield. That's what you get for keeping it on the floor next to your bed."

Sam was smirking at him. "I did not trip over my shield. I have never tripped over my shield." That one time back when he'd been staying in Sam's apartment didn't count; he'd only stumbled slightly, not actually tripped. Unfortunately, Sam had been there to see it.

Sam's smirk widened; he was obviously remembering the same incident, but mercifully, he didn't bring it up. "Then what happened to your face?" he asked, instead.

"Have you seen Tony?" Steve's split lip was immaterial; he needed to find Tony, to deal with this, whatever it was, before it got any worse. "I need to talk to him."

Sam's eyes narrowed, all signs of levity vanishing instantly. "Did Stark do that?"

He didn't have time to rehash the "Tony isn't good enough for you" argument right now. Not when Tony was this upset. Tony had a bad habit of doing stupid things when he was upset. "Yes, Sam," Steve snapped, "I'm a battered wife." Sam's expression shifted from concerned to annoyed, and Steve immediately felt bad; Sam had done nothing to merit being snarled at. "I asked for it," he elaborated. "I know better than to shake people awake from nightmares." Sam would understand that; Steve knew he'd accidentally clocked his friend at least once, when his own nightmares periodically resurfaced.

Sam tilted his head to one side, considering that. It was a gesture Steve had seen Redwing make any number of times. "Hey, it could be worse," Sam offered, after a moment. "Last time he hit you, he broke your jaw."

"He only fractured it," Steve said defensively. "He could have caved my skull in if he'd wanted to." Unarmored, Steve could mop the floor with Tony, but in the armor, Tony could go toe-to-toe with just about anyone short of the Hulk. And that wasn't even counting the repulsor gauntlets, which, as Tony had pointed out, could be deadly weapons.

He'd been too angry to notice it at the time, the hurt from Tony's betrayal still too raw, but Tony had been seriously holding back during that first big fight over Registration. Steve should not have been able to get into a fistfight with an armored-up Iron Man and walk away with nothing but some bruises and a couple of cracked bones.

Tony had been pulling his punches. And he'd never changed the armor's override codes. Whether consciously or not, Tony's heart hadn't been in that fight. There were times when Steve wondered if he'd ever stop kicking himself for not sitting down to a reasonable discussion with Tony sooner; it would have spared all of them so much misery.

Sam blinked, shaking his head slowly. "Right. I think he's in the living room. But you might want to wash your face off, first."

Steve touched the end of his tongue to his torn lip; it was still bleeding sluggishly. He scrubbed the back of his hand across his mouth, trying to wipe the blood away.

"Yeah, that's gonna help," Sam snorted. "Now you've got blood smeared all over your chin."

"Thanks," Steve said. "Sorry we woke you up."

Sam shrugged, hefting the paperback in his right hand. "I was awake anyway. Go clean yourself up and make nice with your boyfriend."

Steve smiled, ignoring the sting as it pulled at his lip. The term 'boyfriend' sounded silly as a description, as least when it came to himself and Tony, but there wasn't really a term that properly defined what they were to each other. 'Lover' implied that their whole relationship was about sex, and 'partner'... Bucky had been Steve's partner, and Sam. "I'll do that," Steve said.

He didn't like the extra delay, but he ducked into the bathroom to throw a few handfuls of water on his face and rinse out his mouth. As soon as he saw himself in the mirror, he realized that Sam had been right; there was a wide smear of blood across his chin and the right side of his face, and his teeth were red.

It was the sight of his blood that had upset Tony so much in the first place. Walking up to him looking like he'd just been in a fistfight probably wouldn't have been a good idea.

The living room was dark, lit only by the light from the windows and the faint glow of the digital clock on the DVD player. Tony was a dark shape on the couch, face buried in his hands. As Steve stepped into the room, he heard Tony sigh; he obviously knew Steve was there, even if he wasn't looking up.

From somewhere in one of the room's darker corners, Steve could hear the quiet squeaking sound the cat made when it was bored and looking for something to destroy. Aside from that, the room was almost oppressively quiet.

"Okay," Steve said into the silence, "we've established that you are pulling your punches, and that I need to work on ducking."

"I'm so sorry," Tony said, the words muffled by his hands. "I don't mean to hurt you, but I keep doing it anyway."

Steve shook his head, even though he knew Tony wouldn't see the gesture. "You didn't hurt me," he said, going to stand in front of Tony. "You woke up from a nightmare and socked me in the face by accident. It's nothing Bucky and I didn't do to each other a few times during the war. I should have been more careful." He knelt, needing to be able to look Tony in the eye. He'd never admitted to anyone else that the occasional nightmares he had about the war had started before he'd been trapped in the ice. After a while, they'd all learned to be careful waking each other up, and that rule applied just as much to superheroes as it did to soldiers.

"I could have hurt you." Tony lifted his head from his hands; even this close, Steve could still barely make out his expression in the dim light. "When that poison was affecting me... it's a miracle I didn't hurt anyone. Next time something like this happens, I might."

Steve didn't like the way Tony's voice sounded, didn't like that he couldn't see his face. "You don't know that."

"It's happened before. Right after I got the Extremis, and then before that, with Kang." Tony shook his head, looking away. "In the hospital, earlier... I thought that you were still dead, and that I'd killed you."

"Oh," Steve said, softly, hands twitching uselessly at his sides. He'd been almost certain something like that had been going through Tony's mind, but hearing Tony actually say it made Steve ache all over again, for how badly he had been hurting yesterday. He laid a hand on Tony's shoulder, just the way he had before they'd gone to bed, and brushed his thumb gently over the bare skin of Tony's neck. "I'm right here. None of that was real."

"It could have been." Tony's voice was low, but the words were surprisingly forceful. "I might not always be safe to be around."

"Tony," Steve said slowly, the worry that had been filling him joined by a sudden urge to grind his teeth, "are you actually suggesting that I should reconsider our relationship because someday you might end up being mind-controlled?" If he let that possibility keep him from getting close to people, he wouldn't have any friends left. If he'd been able to forgive Sharon for shooting him, forgive Bucky for trying to assassinate him as the Winter Soldier, what made Tony think Steve would be willing to give him up over something that hadn't even happened. "Should I get rid of Sharon and Bucky, too? And Sam, just to be safe?"

"No," Tony mumbled, face turned away, "that would be unfair."

"Yes," Steve said, slowly and clearly. "It would be. And not just to them."

Tony looked up, the faint light from the window making his face appear washed out, his hair and goatee even darker than normal.

"Everyone I love has been manipulated like that at some point," Steve went on. Tony, Bucky, Sharon, Sam, most of the other Avengers, with the possible exception of Clint and Jan. "And every time, I've hated that I couldn't protect them, or prevent it." Bucky had spent years as the Soviet Union's tool, and Steve hadn't even known. Tony had nearly died right after gaining the Extremis, when that hacker had mind-controlled him. Sharon still could barely look him in the eyes. "But I refuse to lose someone because of it." He flexed his fingers, tightening his grip on Tony's shoulder. "I love you, and I'm not going to lose you over this. I-"

Steve broke off, his next words vanishing on his tongue as he realized exactly what he had just said. He had never said "I love you" to Tony, never been sure how to say it, and for a few hours yesterday, he been afraid that he would never get the chance to. The words were out there now, hanging in the air between them.

"I'm being stupid, aren't I?" Tony said ruefully, and Steve could hear the smile in his voice.

Steve blinked. He'd expected more of a reaction when he finally worked up the courage to say the words. Maybe Tony hadn't noticed. "Yes," he agreed. "You are being stupid." He let go of Tony, standing, the memory of those hours spent watching Tony lie there motionless suddenly crashing down on him. "You- I was afraid you weren't coming back."

"Steve." Tony stood, taking a step toward him, but Steve was on a roll now.

"You wouldn't talk to me, and you wouldn't let me touch you, and you promised I wouldn't have to do this by myself." He hadn't meant to say that last bit; the words had just burst out on their own.

"I'm sorry." Tony had a hand on his arm now, just above his elbow, and was squeezing gently.

Steve shook his head, laughing a little. It sounded slightly hysterical even to him. "If you apologize again for something that isn't your fault, I'm going to have to hit you, and then Sam really will think our relationship is abusive."

Tony let go of him abruptly. "What?"

"I don't know if that's better or worse than thinking I tripped over my own shield," Steve went on, belatedly realizing that after Kathy Dare, the ex-girlfriend who had shot him in the spine and then tried to avoid attempted murder charges by claiming that he'd abused her, Tony might not find that kind of joke funny.

"Well," Tony said, shifting towards him, so that their arms were just brushing. "if you didn't keep it right next to the bed..."

"I didn't trip over my shield," Steve protested. "I've never tripped over my shield."

Tony shook his head. "You know," he said softly, leaning his weight against Steve for a moment, "if you hung it on the wall, the cat wouldn't be able to chew on it."

"Can we go back to bed?" Steve asked, not at all plaintively. "It's three am." Actually, it was probably closer to one, but he was tired. Also, Tony was about two minutes away from putting his head on Steve's shoulder and falling asleep standing up.

Tony nodded, and the two of them returned to the bedroom, Steve ushering Tony along with a hand on the small of his back.

Steve stepped carefully around his upturned shield, then stopped, an idea striking him, and bent down to flip it over, so that it was convex, the smooth surface dully reflecting the faint light from the window.

Tony had come to a halt in the middle of the room, and was now blinking slowly at the boxes; he was starting to look slightly dazed with exhaustion. "Are you ever planning to unpack those?" he asked, frowning.

"I was going to wait until we moved back into the mansion." Until they were really back home. "I thought maybe you could help me unpack them then, if you don't mind."

"That will be nice," Tony said vaguely. Steve wasn't entirely sure if that was a real answer, or if Tony had just hit that point of exhaustion where he would agree with whatever you said because processing human speech had become too difficult.

Over the past month, Steve had guiltily found himself somewhat enjoying Tony in this particular stage of sleep-deprived fatigue; Tony tended to start using Steve as furniture when he was tired. Steve shook his head, and gave Tony a gentle shove in the direction of the bed.

This time, there wasn't any empty space between them. Steve slid over until he was lying half on top of Tony, wrapping an arm around his waist and burying his face in Tony's neck. There would have been interesting possibilities inherent in this position, especially after a week spent apart, but right now, they were both too tired to do anything more than just lie there.

Yesterday, he'd been afraid that he would never be able to do this again. That Tony had gone beyond his reach forever. Steve's arm tightened reflexively, and he closed his eyes, breathing in the faint scent of metal that always seemed to cling to Tony's skin.

He'd come so close to losing this.

Tony had spent over a month thinking he was dead. Steve didn't even want to think about what he would have done if it had been him in that position. He'd barely been able to hold it together through a single afternoon.

At least he knew now that he could still function in a combat or rescue situation even when Tony was involved; he hadn't fallen apart until after they'd gotten to the hospital.

After a moment, Tony said, quietly, "I know you're back. I know it's okay." He wrapped an arm over Steve's shoulders, his hand resting on Steve's back, as if to hold him in place. "I am getting better, I swear."

There was something almost sad, Steve reflected, about the fact that Tony felt the need to apologize for his own pain, as if he didn't have the right to be damaged by everything that had happened to them in the past year.

"When I'm not under the influence of mind-altering drugs, I'm mostly better."

"I know," Steve said. It was true, more or less. He hoped it was true.

There were a few moments of silence while Steve listened to Tony breathe. Then, from beside the bed, there came a sort of scrabbling noise, the kind of sound that might be produced by claws on metal. It was followed by the very faint thud of a small, furry body sliding off Steve's shield and onto the floor, then by an even fainter hiss.

Steve grinned against Tony's neck.

"Congratulations, Captain America." Tony spoke in solemn tones, but Steve could hear the amusement underneath. "You've defeated a five pound kitten."

Steve kept on grinning, feeling faintly smug. "I know."

Tony made the soft sighing sound that he only made when he was starting to fall asleep. "I do too, you know," he mumbled.

"What?" Steve asked. He was the only one who got to hear that little contented sound these days, he reflected, with sleepy satisfaction.

"Love you," Tony sighed, and then he was asleep.



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Chapter One Chapter Two Chapter Three Chapter Four Chapter Five Chapter Six Chapter Seven