Chapter Text
***
...down and out, when you're on the street...
Tony woke up slowly, to the sound of soft music. He knew this song. It was Bridge Over Troubled Water. Obviously, everyone knew this song, but it was a great song. He hadn't heard it for ages, years, and he suddenly wondered why. It was a classic song. It was calming, and sort of like a river in and of itself. He could so easily let himself drift away on it, back to sleep, but something in him said no.
He opened his eyes. He was lying on the longest couch in his lounge, and on the smaller one, a book in hand, was Steve. He noticed Tony was awake.
'Hi,' he said.
'Hi,' Tony croaked, and, slowly sat up. The movement made his head spin.
'Easy,' Steve said, getting up and coming to sit beside him. 'You okay?'
Tony considered this. He felt weird, lighter, somehow, but bereft. Unsure what to say, he hugged his arms over his chest and realised what he had subconsciously already known: that his flight suit was gone, that Venom was gone.
I'll take your part, when darkness comes...
He found tears were in his eyes and blinked them away, embarrassed. ' ...'s a good song,' he sniffed, trying to cover.
'Yeah,' Steve agreed. 'Well, it is, until you've heard it a thousand times.'
'Huh?'
'It's Peter's playlist. The same thirty-four songs have been on a continous loop for the last two weeks, he insisted.'
'Two weeks?! I was out for two weeks?!'
'Easy,' Steve said, and apparently without thinking, rubbed Tony's back as if he was Peter. 'You've woken up a few times, but you weren't really making sense. You don't remember?'
Tony shook his head, feeling sick, but even as he did so vague, confused memories were coming back to him. Steve trying to explain where he was and what was happening. Tony demanding to have Venom back, screaming and crying, and behaving like a child having a tantrum. He closed his eyes. 'Shit,' he said.
'You'll be alright,' Steve said. 'The Shield medics said you just need to adjust. That thing was in your system for a long time. It could be a while before you're completely yourself again.'
Yourself. The word sent Tony's pulse racing. He didn't know how to be himself, not on his own, not as a singular. He couldn't, he couldn't do this alone, he didn't know how to be on his own, Venom had made his life ordered, controlled, without him it would all be chaos, he couldn't deal with that, he didn't know how to deal with that - But at the same time, the memories of the last few years were coming back. The paranoia, the hatred, the people he had killed, murdered on the slightest pretext. Pepper's face when he fired her. Jarvis' pleas, telling him the truth, telling him that he needed help, before Tony turned off everything that made him him. He'd used a dying child, used highly experimental, untested medicine on a child who was four just to get to Steve, he'd planned to kill Steve, to do unspeakable things to him.
No, no, no-
Steve hauled him upright, putting Tony's arm round his neck and holding him round the waist, moving fast. They made it to the bathroom just in time for Tony to puke like he hadn't since freshman year. Damn. So much for dignity. But the gentle, firm hand on the back of his neck, keeping him in position over the toilet, was sort of nice in a weird way. And at least Steve kept his gaze firmly fixed on the ceiling until it was all out and the two of them sat together on the bathroom floor.
'And this is why you're on the couch,' Steve said, smiling gently. 'Closer proximity when you wake up and that happens.'
Tony groaned. Then he knew it was time to ask the question he did not want to ask, but had to know.
'Okay, I'm lucid. What happened? Tell me all of it.'
'What's the last thing you remember?'
'Osborn's scientist. The EMP.'
Steve frowned. 'This can wait, Stark, you aren't well.'
'No. Tell me now.'
So Steve did, gently but factually, a soldier giving a report. How Tony had killed Osborn, attacked Shield, trashed the city to lure Steve here, and how they had eventually gotten Venom off him. Tony closed his eyes, trying to fight off the nausea, trying to ignore the prickling of his arms, objecting to being exposed to air for the first time in years.
'Your AI activated a defence mechanism that ejected what was left of Venom out of the vents and straight into Shield custody. They're studying it in the lab, but they'll probably want to talk to you eventually.' Steve hesitated, then continued, 'They've found enough to know that it would have been influencing, probably even making, your decisions for you. None of this was your fault, Stark.'
Tony couldn't answer that. 'And Peter's okay?' If Peter was hurt, he didn't know what he was going to do.
'Fine. He's been staying in a Shield safe house with Harry. He'll be glad to know you're awake.'
'Harry?'
For a moment, pity flickered over Steve's face. 'Osborn's son.'
Tony wished he hadn't asked, and closed his eyes again, taking a deep breath. His guilt wouldn't bring back the dead.
'Wait,' he said, when he had mastered himself. 'Have you been here the whole time?'
'Shield assignment,' Steve said. 'They needed someone to keep an eye on you. Make sure you're alright. And... Captain America was seen on the streets of New York. I wanted to lie low a little.'
Tony nodded. So Steve was working, here to guard him. Of course it wouldn't be anything else. So there was only one more thing he needed to know, and he wasn't sure what he wanted the answer to be.
'So...' He said, slowly, trying to stop the break in his voice. 'I'm not getting Venom back, ever, am I?'
'No,' Steve said, simply. For a long moment, there was silence, in which Tony fought the urge to vomit, or to cry. Then Steve added, 'It's nice to meet you, Tony.'
Tony nodded, and they went back to the lounge. Once he was sitting back on the couch – and damn, he was tired – he asked, 'Hey, Steve, could you give me a minute?'
Steve looked concerned. 'Are you okay?'
'Yeah, fine, I just...' Tony swallowed. 'I need to start making this right. Starting with Jarvis.'
Looking uncertain, but nodding anyway, Steve retreated to one of the guest bedrooms. Tony took a deep, wobbling breath, kneading his eyes. He had to do this. He needed a friend right now, if he had any left.
'Jarvis, open a programming terminal,' he said, and in front of him a holographic screen opened up, showing the complex matrix of code that made up Jarvis, along with a complete set of keyboard and input options, ghostly blue in the half-dark of the room. He had no idea what time of day it was, what the date was, he wasn't even sure of the year. He didn't know how long he had been Venom. But he did know that Jarvis had tried to warn him, and that, even when he had been lobotomised, he had found ways to resist, to stretch the strict boundaries of his programming right to the limit, to get Peter inside, to help him get the music going, to help Tony.
Tony didn't deserve it, and Jarvis deserved so much better. There was nothing Tony could do to make it up to him, but there was at least one thing he could put right.
Some part of him, some part that hadn't been totally overwhelmed by Venom, must have known it was wrong to turn Jarvis' personality off in the first place, because he hadn't deleted it or removed it altogether. It was still there, just waiting to be turned back on. Tony did so. Silence reigned.
'Hey, buddy,' he said, quietly, ashamed. 'How you feeling?'
'Mr Stark,' Jarvis said, and he sounded peeved. 'I assume from this I can say 'Welcome back, sir'?'
'Ha. Something like that.'
'I'm scanning you for any remaining traces of the symbiote,' Jarvis said, fussily.
'I'm pretty sure they got it all, J- ow!' One of the robots that usually cleaned the place had crept up beside him and pricked his arm with a needle, in a way that Tony felt was unnecessarily hard.
'I require a blood sample,' Jarvis said, nonchalantly.
'Fine, I deserved that.'
'Yes, sir.'
'I'm sorry, Jarvis.'
'From the changes in your behaviour and personality, sir, I can safely say your actions were from the Venom symbiote, not you.'
'Still, I get it if you're pissed-'
And then the sprinklers opened, and everything was drenched. Tony spluttered, and then laughed. Jarvis was undoubtedly back, and his relief was immense. Even as Steve came out, looking alarmed, to see what was going, Tony began to feel better. It was almost as if the water was waking him up after a long, long sleep, washing all of it away. He wasn't sure what the world was going to be like, without Venom. He wasn't sure what sort of man he would be.
But Tony Stark had never backed down from a challenge. He'd never left a puzzle unsolved. Somehow, he would figure it out.
***
'Are you sure about this?'
Tony nodded. 'Completely.'
It wasn't even a lie. He stepped forward towards the doors, but Steve caught his arm.
'Stark. Tony. What Venom did wasn't your fault. You don't have to do this.'
'You'd do exactly the same, Cap.'
He saw Steve's expression shift to one of reluctant acceptance and pulled his arm free. Then Steve's face changed again, softening as it always did when he thought about his son, and Tony held up a hand to stop him.
'I know, I know. You couldn't do it. You have Peter to think of.'
'So do you,' Steve said, quietly.
And it was true. Two days after he had woken up, when Steve had been sure Tony was stable, Peter had come to see him. It had been amazing, wonderful, and unbearable. Peter had been so pleased to see him, so convinced Tony was still a hero, a hero who had saved his life, given him superpowers, fought off a monster. No-one had ever been as happy to see Tony as Peter had that day. He didn't understand what had really happened, what Tony had done. Just thinking about Peter's unconditional affection made it hard to stop Tony's resolution from crumbling. What was this going to do to the poor kid?
Steve must have sensed weakness, because he added, 'He idolises you. You're his hero.'
There it was. All Tony needed to get him through this.
'I know. I think it's time I did something to earn it, don't you?'
Steve hesitated, then nodded, short and curt, a soldier accepting orders. 'I'll be here when you're done,' he said.
'Great.'
There could be no more delays. Tony pushed through the door onto the stage and was immediately assaulted by the flashes of cameras as he came and stood before the assembled press. There had been a time when he would have been introduced by a member of staff, or the head of the organisation. Now he stood there alone, waiting for the clamour to die down.
'Thank you for coming,' he said, keeping it to the point, because showboating, being charming, was so not the point of this; and because he was exhausted. 'I know there's been a lot of talk about me the last few weeks. I guess getting absorbed by a monster and rampaging through the streets will do that. I know Shield's being giving you a lot of info about Venom, what it is, what it made me do over the years, but...' he swallowed. Big announcement time. No problem, he'd done big announcements before. 'It's impossible, without a full investigation, to determine how much the Venom symbiote was responsible for, and how much was me. That's why, at the end of this statement, I will be handing myself over to the authorities.'
He'd sort of expected a big, noisy reaction, but instead everyone seemed to be slightly stunned. Tony knew it wouldn't last, and continued quickly.
'But before I do, there's some apologies I need to make. First, to the employees of Stark Industries and their families, who were out of a job overnight through no fault of their own, I'm sorry. Anyone who is still out of work, or is employed in a position that pays less than their final salary at SI, can write to me for financial compensation. And Pepper, if you're watching, I... what can I say?' He shrugged, coughed a few times to clear his throat, and continued.
'And to the families of those that Venom, Iron Man, that I hurt or killed, often on little to no pretext: they deserved better, and so do you. My apologies are meaningless, they aren't going to undo anything, but... what I, what Iron Man did, was not justice. It wasn't fair or right, and I know nothing I can do will make that better. I just hope that my, uh, momentary arrest will offer some small comfort.'
The cops were here, assembled at the side of the stage, looking like they weren't quite sure what to do. It was time to wrap up.
'I will be submitting to the authorities for arrest and trial. A trial which I am fully aware is a damn sight more than my victims got. No-one deserved to die over a stolen packet of cigarettes.' His voice cracked, and he swallowed, determined to get to the end. 'I will not be employing a lawyer unless the state insists on appointing one for me. If this is the case, I will cover the bill myself to avoid placing any more monetary burden on our legal aid system. Iron Man did not give people the opportunity to defend themselves. There will be no tricks, no bribery, just an honest investigation into what I did. Thank you.'
He was down the steps and in front of the dumbfounded cops before anyone in the audience realised that he was done. One of them finally stepped forward, cuffed him, probably read him his rights, but the room was too loud with shouted questions and excited reactions for Tony to hear. It was a relief when they shoved him through the backstage door, into the relative quiet.
Another step later, the hand disappeared from his shoulder and Tony looked back to see Steve, in Shield uniform today, pushing the cop's arm down.
'No need to push, officer,' he said. 'He's going willingly. I'm Mr Stark's Shield liaison, I'll be accompanying you while you take him in.'
With that, Steve fell silently into step beside him, a solid and reassuring presence. Tony found himself blinking back tears again – an annoying habit he'd developed since losing Venom – because he didn't deserve this. He didn't deserve to have anyone beside him, and yet, Steve stayed, sitting beside him in the back of the cop car, staying in the room while he was processed, and walking with him all the way to the holding cell. The pity in his face when the door was about to shut nearly broke Tony's heart.
'Don't worry, Cap,' Tony said, managing a smile that was almost convincing. 'It's the right thing to do.'
Steve nodded, biting his lip. He seemed unsure what to say.
'Stand back from the door, please,' the officer said. Tony stepped away.
'I'm proud of you,' Steve blurted, and Tony just had time to see his face flush with embarrassment before the door was shut between them.
Steve was embarrassed, but Tony couldn't work out what he felt. There was some awkwardness, sure, because Steve wasn't his dad, wasn't really anyone except his Shield-appointed guard, but... no-one had ever said that to Tony before. Ever. He'd done precious little for anyone to be proud of, but now Captain America was proud of him. Steve was proud of him. A small, warm feeling spread inside him. The situation suddenly didn't seem so bad.
Tony looked around the cell. As it was used for those awaiting trial, not those already convicted, it wasn't as bad as it could have been. He had a bed, a chair, even a desk. And absolutely no tech, and nothing to do but think.
Hell. This was going to be boring.
***
They rushed the trial because of the press interest, but it still took more than three months to get to the end.
Tony had a state-appointed lawyer, a capable middle-aged woman, who he met with every day. He liked her. She understood his desire not to 'get off', but to get to the truth. She also liked puzzles, and brought him a new one every day to try and keep him occupied. True, he solved most of them in less than five seconds, but it was a kind thought.
He had a crap ton of therapy. It turned out he was a bag full of issues, some of which had nothing to do with Venom at all.
Time seemed to stretch. He even started doing press ups and sit ups, trying to burn off some of the feeling of being cooped up. He missed Jarvis, and kept finding himself talking aloud to him before remembering even Jarvis couldn't hear him here.
Every other week, when he was allowed visitors, Steve came. Eleven AM on the dot, he would be sitting and waiting, and ask the same question: 'So, how are you doing?'. He was the one that persuaded Tony to use the therapy. They both agreed Peter should not come visit, but the little boy wrote to Tony every day without fail. Sometimes the letters were about science, or about something interesting he'd found out, or what he and Steve had been doing. Once it was the entire script of Cars 2 laboriously written out by hand, with different coloured felt tips used for the speech of different characters, because Peter thought he was probably bored. Tony read the whole thing.
Pepper wrote to him too, and then came to visit. She had another job, and was doing well. She was glad to see him back.
Rhodes also came once or twice, even though Tony hadn't apologised to him in his speech, and spent the whole hour of his visit telling Tony what an idiot he was. Tony knew he was forgiven.
Sometimes Tony had to go to the court, or to a tribunal, and answer question after question about what Venom was, what he had done while it was on him, why he had done it. Mostly, the legal system got on with it without him. His lawyer would bring him the newspapers so he could read the updates.
Shield scientists and researchers came and explained the Venom symbiote and the effect they believed it would have on someone. Tony wondered why they were being so unusually forthcoming, but the only person he could ask was Steve, who didn't understand the question, quite happy to believe that Shield had no ulterior motive other than helping. Tony, however, knew this was valuable intel, and that normally they would have been quite happy to leave him in a deep dark pit in order to keep their secrets. Unfortunately, there was no way to know what they were up to, so he filed the question in the back of his mind and tried to just focus on what was going on in the trial.
Pepper got up one day and testified fiercely about the changes in Tony's character after he got infected, and wouldn't give the prosecution any ground when they tried to imply it was hardly a change at all. And then Steve got up there, in full Captain America uniform, in front of the eyes of the world, to testify about what he had seen, and about the fight.
Naturally, this caused a huge delay and a major shift in national attention as, in order to make Steve's testimony credible, he and Shield had to prove that yes, it was really him, yes, he was the original and yes, he had really been frozen for 70 years (but no, he had sadly not punched the real Hitler), by which time hardly anyone could remember what he had been supposed to have been testifying about in the first place. But Steve pulled them back on track, and told them everything that had happened from the day they had met (deftly avoiding the fact a four year old had super powers now), and when Tony read the transcript he was surprised, because there was so much he didn't know Steve had noticed. Every time he had had a moment of doubt, every time his better self had fought against the nature exaggerated by Venom, Steve seemed to have noticed it.
With so much time to think, Tony was uncomfortably aware that while the Venom-inspired impulse to kill Steve had completely vanished, the rest of his feelings had not. If anything, they had grown. With Venom, he had just wanted to get Steve to bed. Now he pretty much just wanted to get into Steve's bed, stay there, wake up there every morning for the rest of his life. These were feelings that, given the circumstances, kind of sucked.
In the end, the charge was seventy-two counts of causing grievous injury and eleven counts manslaughter; because while the court accepted that the murders had been greatly influenced by the symbiote Venom, there was insufficient scientific proof to completely absolve Tony of any responsibility. It was pretty much what Tony had expected, but when they met in the briefing room to wait for the sentence to be decided, Steve couldn't hold still.
'Aren't you supposed to be professional, Mr Shield Liaison Officer?' Tony asked, watching Steve pace back and forth. 'Steve. Come on, it's a fair verdict.'
'No it isn't!' Steve snarled. 'It wasn't you! You don't even remember what happened!'
'I don't remember that last afternoon,' Tony said. 'I remember the rest. I will always remember the rest.'
That, at last, stopped Steve in his tracks. 'Tony...'
'Don't. I'm okay. I have a lot of therapy.' Then he frowned. 'Wait, do I still get therapy when I'm in proper jail? I don't know how jail works. Do I have to join a prison gang? I mean, that's assuming I can find one that will take me, goodness knows I will probably be the only rich white guy in there. This country is seriously broken, I mean have you seen-'
Steve was shaking his head vigorously. 'You aren't going to jail. You can't. It's not fair.'
'Steve, they just convicted me of killing eleven people, and we both know that's probably a low estimate.'
'It wasn't your fault! This isn't right!'
Tony wasn't sure what else he could say. It wasn't that he wanted to go to jail. Actually, he felt quite sick at the prospect. What was he going to do with himself? He couldn't fight, defend himself, without Venom or the armour. He was pretty sure there were no labs in jail. And how long would he be there? Ten, twenty years? Peter would be an adult when he got out. If he got out. They could give him life. It would only be fair, the amount of lives he had taken.
But he really didn't want to go to jail. Tony took deep breaths, seriously worried he might puke again.
His lawyer came back into the room. 'The judge is ready to deliver his sentence,' she said. 'Come on, let's hear it.'
Tony nodded and followed her, Steve beside him as far as he was allowed to go, before he returned to the viewing gallery. Tony just hoped his knees would keep holding him up all the way to the end.
'This has been a complex case,' the judge said when they were all in position, 'With many people speaking passionately on your behalf. It was further confused by the Venom symbiote, which is scientifically unprecedented. Currently, although much of the jury and I myself believe it is likely you had little to no control over your actions, there is not enough legal proof to declare you innocent, and I must base my ruling on proof. However, I believe there is sufficient evidence to state that your actions were without deliberate malice, and that by submitting to the authorities before any case was made against you, you have a genuine desire to make amends.'
The judge paused for breath. Tony gripped the wooden rail of the dock, suddenly completely unsure what to expect.
'With all this in mind, I believe significant leniency in your case is justified, with a view to overturning the verdict in future should more research enlighten us about the nature and reach of Venom. Your considerable talents also shouldn't be overlooked. If you wish to contribute to society, there are better ways for a man of your skills to do so than in stamping number plates.'
Another eternal pause. How long did it take to breathe? Tony hadn't breathed at all for at least five minutes.
'I am therefore assigning you 45,000 hours – that's just over five years, for those of you not as quick at calculating as Mr Stark – of community service, to be served under the authority and supervision of the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division. You will serve them in whatever capacity they see fit, and to the best of your abilities, on penalty of a maximum term of imprisonment of 25 years. Your hours may be extended if, on completion of the 45,000 hours Shield or this court deems your contribution insufficient. You will, during this time, submit to regular physical and psychological testing to check for any remaining effects from the symbiote, and you will keep Shield informed of your movements at all times. You will be considered to be in their custody. In other words, you go where they tell you to go, do as they tell you, live where they tell you to live, and don't so much as pop out for a carton of milk without their approval. Understood?'
Even Tony wasn't able to process this. On the one hand, it wasn't prison. On the other hand, Shield could do much worse to him. Clearly they had made the Venom intel public for this purpose. He glanced up into the gallery, looking for Steve, but it didn't give him any answers. From the mixed expression on Steve's face, Tony guessed his reaction was much the same as his own.
'Yes, your honour.' He managed to get out.
'Good.' The gavel was tapped smartly on the bench. 'Court dismissed.'
***
Tony was back home, in Stark Tower, 48 hours after the trial had ended. He still didn't know what Shield was going to do with him.
Steve had caught up with him shortly after the court broke up, and told him he'd received orders to continue as Tony's 'handler' and await further instructions. And as Steve's place was tiny – if Peter grew any taller they wouldn't both have fitted – all three of them had moved to the tower. Since then, there had been nothing from Shield.
Tony had had plenty to keep him occupied, however. Just having a small child in the building seemed to take up a great deal of his time. Within six hours of Peter's arrival, where the kid had been following him around like a duckling, he'd realised that Peter's curious little eyes and hands were going to want to be in the lab, and the choice was to either ban him completely (aka the Howard Stark Approach), or introduce some safety measures. His lab floor was now covered in sprayed yellow lines marking a safe distance away from anything electrical, hot, sparky or explosive, and he'd invested in some child-size googles and protective clothing.
They spent a lot of time in the lab. Not sure what else to do with himself, Tony had gone down there to tinker, to build, to try not to think about what Shield might have him do, and Peter always came too, asking so many questions that it usually turned into a teaching session. Where Peter came, Steve came, sometimes watching the two of them, sometimes dropping into one of the chairs with a book and leaving them to it. Tony really liked those times. Peter was charming and smart and fascinated by everything, and Steve was a solid and reassuring presence that would stop anything too bad from happening. Venom wouldn't be able to get to him again, even at those times, slowly growing less frequent, when Tony wanted it to.
It would have been a different story if he had been there alone, Tony knew. With Steve and Peter there, there was no chance to feel the solitude. It was almost like his fantasy, waking up with a family there every day, except that Steve was in the spare room, in a separate bed, and motivated by orders rather than any feelings.
Still, he made pancakes for breakfast, and that was good enough for Tony.
On the morning of the third day, they were sitting at the table eating said pancakes, and Tony was trying to mentally map out the limits of Peter's powers – he could stick to stuff and clearly had some sort of super strength. Tony was less sure about Peter's insistence that he now had super speed or 'the power to jump really far' – when Jarvis announced Director Fury was coming to see them.
'Ask Peter to stay in his room, please, Jarvis,' Steve said, and Tony sort of loved that Steve was comfortable enough in his house to do that, and because he was thinking that, he didn't have any time to mentally prepare for Fury sweeping his way into the room.
'Well, isn't this cosy?' Fury said, eyeing the pancakes. He came and put a brown folder down in front of each of them. 'Orders, boys.'
Steve opened his immediately and began to read, his brow furrowing in concern. Tony drummed his fingers on the front cover of his. It was time to state his conditions.
'I'm not making weapons for you, Fury,' he said. 'I don't do that any more. And I'm not doing any studies with Venom that involve re-infecting me or anyone else. If you try to make me I'm going back to the cops and doing the twenty-five years.'
He didn't look at Steve. He couldn't. Fury snorted.
'We aren't letting you and Venom within two hundred feet of each other,' He said. 'And we're not asking for weapons. My psychologists were annoyingly insistent on that; they think you're 'unstable' and could 'kill us all' if I leave you in a room full of sabotage-able weapons. Open your file.'
Tony did. It was a contract for how his hours of service were to be completed and the conditions of his custody. These conditions basically boiled down to Steve being his live-in babysitter and having to approve all his comings and goings. Embarrassing, but it could definitely be worse. And it meant Steve and Peter would stay. Tony allowed himself a moment of happiness, before reading on to see what they actually wanted him to do.
At first it talked about 'scientific consultancy', dealing with transports, computer systems, tracking devices, threat detection, communications, and all other non-weapon aspects of a shady intelligence organisation. But then he turned the page and saw a single paragraph that, he suspected, was the real reason they had set this up.
-
Mr Stark will utilise his armour system known as IRON MAN as a full participant of THE AVENGERS INITATIVE, including all training, briefings, and active missions as required.
'You want Iron Man,' he said, 'As, what, a field agent?'
'Sir,' Steve said, putting his file down, and Tony could see his own picture there along with several others. 'What is this?'
'That, Captain,' Fury replied, 'Is the Avengers Initiative.' He turned to Tony, and actually cracked a smile. 'Welcome to Shield.'