Chapter Text
When the alarm to Assemble goes off just under a week later, it comes as a distinct relief. It’s been a long time since Tony felt that way about going out as Iron Man; he’ll always answer the call, of course, has long since abandoned any notion of retirement from the role. But the heady sense of power and purpose that had drawn exhilarated laughter from his lungs during his early flights had largely been replaced by resigned acceptance, an understanding that Iron Man would always be who he was even with the arc reactor removed from his chest.
But conditions in the Tower had been…strained to say the least ever since the hand-feeding scene. In therapy and out of it Steve attempted to deny it, claiming that Tony’s attempt to press his Dominance had simply taken an unexpected form which required processing. Garcia had initially supported this, with the caveat that she expected Steve to share the results of his processing eventually. But as far as Tony was concerned, the evidence spoke for itself. Steve was jumpy and anxious, so over-eager to please Tony that it was like living with a Stepford version of his husband. He took in just enough at meals to avoid further accusations of under-eating but took no visible joy in it, nor in his frequent and picture-perfect displays of kneeling.
The worst part was that for just a moment, Tony had felt like he’d gotten it right. By the time the hand-feeding had finished Steve had been down deeper than Tony had ever seen him outside of particularly intense and lengthy scenes. He’d been clingy and sweet, peering up at Tony from behind slightly wet lashes periodically to grace him with wide, almost shy smiles. Tony’s Dominant hindbrain had practically been doing cartwheels of celebration with the combined relief of seeing Steve finally full and in subspace.
He’d woken the next morning to cold sheets whose devastating effect weren’t lessened at all by the note on Steve’s pillow indicating he’d gone for a run.
A hand waves in front of his face, fingers snapping near his nose and forcing him to go cross-eyed. He glares at Rhodey, who shrugs unapologetically.
“I called you like five times, man. Look, is War Machine finished being fitted with the upgrades we talked about? The military has given me the okay to go in with you all as long as you’re confirming the suit is ready to interface with the bracers.”
Instantly Steve is banished almost entirely from Tony’s mind, replaced with the choking grip of dread. He’d upgraded War Machine’s software the same day he’d finalized the design on the bracers, but he’d been deliberately vague about his process. He didn’t even have to close his eyes to see it again: Rhodey falling, his usual air of rigid control entirely absent. The realization that he wouldn’t make it in time to catch Rhodey—Rhodey, who had always been the one to drag Tony out of whatever mess he’d gotten himself into, and here Tony couldn’t even manage to return the favour when it had counted the very most. He’d long ago come to terms with the reality of what it might mean to have a friend in active service, but it was something else entirely to know that if he lost Rhodey on the field as an Avenger, it would be because Tony himself wasn’t fast enough, or clever enough, or strong enough, to save him.
“I have to—there’s a few tests that FRIDAY still needs to run. And I want to update the software on the bracers again, it’s still a little finnicky—”
“Tones.”
“And I still want to work on adjusting the sensors. Make ‘em less pressure and motion activated, so that if you lose feeling or the bracers crap out you’re not going to lose control. There’s a guy I’ve been talking to, he does similar work on car pedals for amputees, but he’s extremely pressed for time and he’s annoyingly resistant to my attempts to bring him on at SI—something about it being against his principles as the director of a nonprofit. It’s annoying. But maybe—”
Tony can’t be entirely sure, even in hindsight, at precisely what point during Tony’s monologue Rhodey decides to go around his best friend of twenty years. All he does know is that he looks over to find Rhodey’s back to him, and that when Rhodey speaks, it isn’t to Tony at all.
“FRIDAY, have the armour and the bracers both been cleared for active duty?”
When his AI responds, entirely correctly, in the affirmative, Tony learns that he is capable of hating his own creations.
****
Tony is so busy being consumed by his concern for Rhodey that it manages to surprise him when Steve’s voice is in his ear for the first time since before the Civil War. With his usual brisk, no-nonsense efficiency, Tony’s husband briefs them all on the newest threat to New York. Which turns out to not be entirely new.
“AIM? Seriously? I thought that the whole organization was dismantled after they, you know, abducted the President and nearly blew him up,” Sam complains to general agreement. Tony, who is already using the HUD to scan everything FRIDAY is pulling up about AIM’s apparent survival in real time, sighs. He knew he should have had Damage Control follow up about AIM and make sure everything Killian had built had been razed to the ground. How many times did Tony have to make the same mistakes?
“Once they had the big players and the big flashy flagship building, the government mostly stopped looking. From what I’m able to piece together, it looks like several of their major players have continued working together—not clear on what, though judging from those beekeeper looking getups, I’m guessing it isn’t a fashion line. My God that’s offensive. My eyes actually hurt.”
“I dunno, Tony, I once saw a picture of you in this baby blue and orange plaid suit. I think it might actually still be in one of the storage units under the Tower, actually, maybe when we’re done here—"
“Oh what was that, Widow? Your catsuit isn’t tight enough? I’ll remember that come upgrade day!”
Unlike Tony’s ill-fated suit (which was, to be fair, somewhat typical of the rather hit-and-miss fashions of the 90s), the beekeeper outfits turned out to have a function. Namely, to protect the wearer from the wide-ranging effects of the bio-weapons that AIM now apparently made its mission to produce and distribute. They had scattered agents in several population-dense spots throughout the city, armed with everything from what looked like plasma blasters to anti-charge bazookas, which they were directing indiscriminately into crowds. This would have been bad enough, but AIM was also using the same technology that ‘The Mandarin’ had once used to co-opt television signals in order to turn the whole damn thing into some kind of game. Every time the Avengers managed to subdue an AIM agent, nearby digital billboards, cell phones, and radio stations all promised surrounding civilians untold riches if they could make it to the end of the day with one of the weapons in their possession.
Not only was it a sickeningly effective bit of marketing, but it turned an already chaotic situation into an absurdity. Instead of accepting assistance from the team with anything resembling gratitude, or even just getting the hell out of the way, people were actively fighting them. One was so eager to get her hands on the alleged prize money that she actually took a swing at Steve. The fact that she immediately broke her hand was, Tony felt, an excellent lesson in both cause and effect and simple karma.
Really, the whole thing was a shitshow, but as far as first outings back for the reunited Avengers went, it was going shockingly well. Or at least it did until one of the cryo-cannons was picked up by an eager would-be contest winner and accidentally fired, missing Rhodey’s head by mere inches. Rhodey himself didn’t seem shaken by the entire thing. He barely even acknowledged it aside from thanking Barnes who had managed to divert the shot at the last second by tackling the civilian in question. Tony, though…
Tony was abruptly and completely fucking furious. Not just at the threat to Rhodey, although the near-miss was enough all on its own to make him want to rain fire and destruction down on anyone who had ever looked in Rhodey’s direction. It was the fucking pointlessness of it all that set his blood to boiling. Thanos was still out there. He’d been spending this entire time, since before New York, amassing an army. Gathering unfathomable power. And instead of focusing on surviving that very real, cosmic threat, here they were, fighting idiots in bee suits and their own citizens.
Filled with rage he’d felt only once before, the day he’d watched footage of James Barnes murdering his parents, Tony landed on the pavement with a heavy thud and none of his usual theatrics. He marched over to Barnes, who was gingerly removing the cannon from the hands of the person he’d tackled. The guy wasn’t putting up any resistance at all. He hadn’t even gotten up from the ground; he just lay there, shaking, crying, begging Barnes and anyone nearby to forgive him. He couldn’t have been older than 25, practically a kid.
And old enough to know better, Tony’s mind insists as he stands over a young man wearing a suit that could have crushed and eviscerated him five times over before he could draw his next breath.
“Iron Man. Stand down.”
Steve. Sweet, beautiful, perfect Steve, who had maybe understood the ugliness of people better than Tony himself when he’d insisted that the only proper hands for any of this were their own. Had he been right all this time? About all of it?
“Ohmygod are you really Tony Stark? Sir, you’re one of my heroes, I swear, I didn’t mean—it’s just they were promising a lot of money, and my little sister has been really sick and I just—please, Mr. Stark.”
“FRIDAY, mute comms and get us back to the Tower—but take the long route, would you?”
“Course, Boss.”
“And FRI? Get the asshole’s sister whatever health care it is she needs—but be smart about it. The last thing we need is people attacking us thinking it’ll mean we’ll solve all their problems. But. Ugh, fuck it. Do a background check on everyone who took AIM up on their offer. Get it to me preferably before they’re charged with anything.”
****
While it isn’t exactly a surprise that Steve turns up in the penthouse under two hours later, for once the anticipation of what would happen next has not left Tony feeling any more prepared for what to actually do. When his husband exits the elevator with Wilson in tow, Tony just stares at them both, as lost and directionless as he has perhaps ever been. To his surprise, it’s Sam who steps forward and into Tony’s space first.
“Have you eaten since you got back to the Tower?”
The question is so matter-of-fact that it’s surprisingly easy to answer.
“No.”
“Drank water?”
“No.”
“Alright. And I can tell you haven’t showered yet.” This is perhaps a more polite way to bring up the fact that Tony never bothered to change out of his sweaty flight suit than most people would have used, which is perhaps why Steve chose him for this particular conversation. “Steve, like we discussed, okay? Attend him in the shower. Don’t leave him alone, but don’t make any demands on him as your husband or your Dom. Let him talk if he wants to, but don’t ask any questions. Once he’s clean, both of you come back out here and I’ll have some food sorted out, alright?”
If Sam has already relayed these instructions to Steve, whose eidetic memory almost certainly means he could recite them verbatim, Tony suspects they’re being spoken aloud for his benefit. He manages a weak nod in the man’s general direction before Steve’s hand is on his lower back, guiding him to the bathroom.
It’s the first time they’ve showered together since before everything had fallen apart, and Tony wishes that he could more fully appreciate the site of Steve naked and glistening in the cavernous penthouse shower. As it is, he just stands there in a numb kind of haze as Steve smoothly shampoos and conditions his hair—careful to avoid any water or suds in his face—and runs a bar of lavender-scented soap over the length of Tony’s body. The soap had actually been Steve’s idea, way back when, an effort to con Tony’s mind and body into believing it required more than a handful of hours of sleep per night. Tony hasn’t used it since the Civil War, and it’s like the scent breaks whatever dam has been keeping him safely protected from the immensity of his feelings.
Anyone else might have mistaken Tony’s tears for drops from his hair or the showerhead. Steve has never been just anyone. But he stays true to Sam’s directions, not prompting Tony for an explanation or a discussion. The only concession he makes to his own impulses is to pull Tony into a crushingly tight hug.
“I could have killed that kid,” Tony confesses, the words echoing off the shower walls in an accusing symphony. “For a second I wanted to.” Steve nods. He doesn’t speak the pretty lies that he could have, assurances that Tony would never or could never be capable of such an act. But nor does he turn away or hide from Tony. He meets his gaze head-on and unblinking with the kind of bravery and commitment that belongs not to the stalwart Captain America, but solely to Steve Rogers.
****
Once they’ve showered, they eat the light but filling spread that Sam has prepared. It’s a change not to be scarfing down take-out post battle, but Tony is happily surprised to find that soup and sandwiches are significantly easier to stomach. He’s pleased to note that Steve, too, manages to put away six buns and several bowls of soup. He reaches out to brush his hand against Steve’s collar, then retracts it.
“I think,” Sam begins, eyes tracking Tony’s retreat, “that the two of you should scene if you both feel up to it. It doesn’t need to be anything overly complicated, but I think you would both really benefit from the connection right now.”
This sounds, quite simply, like a terrible idea to Tony, and he opens his mouth to say just this. He’d nearly harmed a fucking civilian, on what planet did that suggest a submissive would be save in his hands?
Even worse, Steve is nodding.
“I’d like that. I mean. If. We don’t have to, but. Yeah.”
Jesus. Steve only trips over his words like that when he wants something badly, and even if Tony’s mind cannot possibly fathom the concept of himself as someone worth wanting, especially in a Dominant capacity, his orientational hind-brain is entirely uninterested in deep contemplation. It responds to the clear sign of Steve’s need the way it always does: with answering, totalizing want. He looks at Wilson, frightened by the strength of his reaction, by the prospect of having Steve in his power when he had so nearly used it for unforgiveable violence.
“I’ll be here the entire time.”
****
Tony’s scenes are typically planned days, sometimes weeks, in advance. Of course he makes minor adjustments on the spot based on what he’s getting back from the submissive, but it’s been over twenty years since he’s gone into a scene essentially flying blind. Largely to allow himself time to think, he strips Steve and binds him to the bed with a pair of reinforced cuffs. They’re strong, but not powerful enough that Steve couldn’t break them if he truly desired. (Those cuffs, the adamantium and vibranium ones Tony had made specifically to answer Steve’s strength, have been hidden down in the workshop since Ultron.) Still, Steve seems pleased enough to be in any kind of bondage. He all but sinks into the bed, a hint of a smile playing across his pink lips. It’s all but impossible not to smile back at the sight.
“What’s got you so happy, Soldier Boy?”
Steve makes to shrug, meets the resistance of the cuffs, and smiles even more widely.
“Missed this. Missed you.”
“Then where the hell have you been all week?”
The question slips out without Tony ever even consciously thinking the words, let alone deciding to say them. And this, this is why he shouldn’t do unplanned scenes. He says and does stupid shit when left to his own worst impulses.
“I really was processing, like I said. I wasn’t expecting…not just what you did, but how I felt about it, I guess?”
“And how did you feel about it?” Tony asks. He reaches a hand down to brush a tendril of hair from away from Steve’s left eye, and feels it when his submissive tries and fails to reach up to prevent the loss of the touch.
“Like. Like it was all I could think about. Not—not in a way like I needed aftercare or something, I wasn’t upset, I just. No one’s ever…I’ve submitted a lot, but a lot of it has been practical. The handfeeding was like the complete opposite of that. It was so. Decadent, maybe? Having someone take that kind of time on me, just because I needed to eat, because you wanted to make sure I did. And I just, I wanted more of it so badly I couldn’t think anytime you were in the room. I thought about—I mean, I wanted to ask for more, but I didn’t. I couldn’t.”
Tony considers this as he trails touches too light to even be termed teasing across Steve’s chest. Steve had come into his own as submissive during wartime. He’d learned to shape himself and his needs into the spaces between battles, doing just enough to get himself and his soldiers by. Even their scenes before the Civil War had always had a certain kind of efficiency to them. In the worst of his anger, Tony had been inclined to read that as yet another sign that Steve already had one perfectly-shined boot out the door.
But what if it was something else entirely?
The possibilities are terrifying and elating. If Steve had never gotten to really know himself as a submissive, if what he wants more than anything else is someone’s time and attention, could Tony’s obsessiveness, his inability to let something go once he’s truly turned his mind to it, finally be a benefit rather than the death knell of his relationship?
“Well we can’t have that,” he finally murmurs, plucking at Steve’s left nipple. His husband groans, and the possibilities are still unfolding in front of Tony’s eyes almost faster than his mind can catalogue them. Steve’s nipples have always been sensitive, but he’s always seemed kind of self-conscious about it, and there’s always been so many other things to do… “I’m pretty sure Doc Garcia said you’re to be using your words, sweet boy, and for once I’m entirely in agreement with her.” He pinches at Steve’s right nipple, then bends down to give it a nip for good measure. “So tell me, sweetheart, how does that feel?”
Steve gives another quiet groan. Whether out of intentional defiance (unlikely) or an unconscious habit picked up decades prior, he’s biting his lip.
Tony bends down to kiss him, coaxing his mouth open in a dance of lips and tongue that goes on just slightly longer than the two of them normally bother with. By the time Tony finally pulls away, Steve is all but panting, his pupils blown wide. Tony’s Dominance, normally oh-so-carefully managed and contained whisper in the back of his mind, threatens to fucking roar. It feels like the second in between leaping off a building and the suit powering up to catch him in free fall.
“Tony. Please. I need—can we—”
“You still haven’t answered my question, darling.” He palms Steve’s chest again, and Christ his pecs are the most ridiculously, glorious handfuls, and he reacts to Tony fondling him this way like it’s his cock Tony’s gripping instead. “I’ll keep touching you like this, any way you want, but only if you ask for it.”
“It’s. I. It’s good, please, it’s good.” Tony rewards the admission with a thorough manhandling of Steve’s chest, to which he murmurs filthy appreciation until Steve’s face is just as red as his chest. Some of what he wants to say he manages to hold back, thank fuck, because it’s way too early to be asking his forties boy about covering his tits in silk and then taking a riding crop to them, but it’s still novelty enough to linger in such a way that it feels weirdly like their first time, like he’s learning his husband all over again.
Half to stop himself from considering the implications of this and half because he just really fucking wants his mouth on his submissive, Tony slides his way down his husband’s body and begins licking and nipping at his thighs and up to his groin. He avoids Steve’s cock for now, pressing lips and tongue and teeth to his balls and his perineum. Steve tries to beg for more and escape the touch all at once, like his mind can’t quite fathom the extent of his body’s want.
That’s when the memory strikes Tony from seemingly out of nowhere.
It had been relatively early days for their relationship. They’d enjoyed a few dates and a handful of scenes. A few of Steve’s toiletries were starting to have unofficial spots of their own in Tony’s bathroom. Steve had begun to recognize which of Tony’s music selections corresponded to specific moods.
Still, Tony had been nowhere near confident that he could go off-book with Steve yet. So when they’d wound up in bed that evening, Steve sprawled out across Tony’s maroon bedsheets not unlike he was now, a gleaming series of mathematically perfect angles more beautiful than any of the art he’d ever overpaid for.
“So your initial contract was a little vague regarding your feelings about toys. Vibrators, specifically.”
“They’re. I mean. I haven’t had much opportunity to use them, but when I have they’re um…they’re really strong, some of ‘em.”
In the course of his stuttering answer, some of the tension that had drained from Steve the moment he’d approached anything near subspace had started to reappear, turning the lines of his body just slightly harder. Tony had reached out, then, to soothe and pet, to ease Steve back into easy, familiar submission. And the next day Tony had shoved a box heaving with store-bought and custom-made toys to the back of his closet.
Before he can let the idea get tangled up in a web of his own anxiety and self-doubt, Tony lunges inelegantly for the drawer of his bedside table. He emerges with a familiar black prostate massager. It’s plain, not the kind of thing he would have chosen if he’d had time to map the scene out in advance. Certainly not as sophisticated as any of the ones that were probably still somewhere in the depths of Tony’s multiple closets. But it’s always gotten the job done for Tony himself, and even though he’s trying really hard not to get overly attached to the suspicion forming in his mind, he also finds himself liking the idea of getting Steve off with something Tony himself has used.
“Yea or nay?” he asks, twirling the toy between his fingers. Steve flushes, that same tension Tony had recognized before seeping into his frame.
“I…I told you, they’re really—”
“Strong, yeah, I remember. But the thing is, sweetcheeks, you’re usually pretty direct when there’s something you don’t like. Whatever our issues with communication, you’ve never seemed to have any problem telling me flat-out that you aren’t interested in something. And what I’m realizing is that you aren’t saying that. Telling me they’re strong is not telling me no. Is it, darling?”
For a few beats, Steve looks away. And even as Tony’s certainty that he’s right is growing, having Steve refuse to make eye contact is just…no. Some subs and Doms might use gaze-avoidance protocols, but that had never been them, and being cut off from Steve’s expressive baby-blues mid-scene is way worse than any withdrawal Tony’s ever had the displeasure of experiencing.
“Eyes on me, Rogers. And I’m going to need an answer.”
“…it’s not a no,” Steve mutters, his face awash in something like betrayal. And—maybe, oddly—something like hope.