Disarm • Stark

After Pepper grabbed Mazzy by the hand and started leading her out of the building, they were each swooped up off of the ground by Tony and Rhodey. After that, Mazzy watched with a disgusted expression plastered on her face as Tony and Pepper proceeded to make out in front of her and Rhodey. 

Luckily, after that, Pepper and Tony apologized and Mazzy got to go back home and have a bowl of chocolate ice cream with whipped cream and sprinkles on top. 

Tony sat across from her, and Pepper next to him, each of them having a bowl of vanilla ice cream with Hershey's syrup on top. 

Now, Mazzy thought, was her chance to learn the truth. What was wrong with her and why was she on the news?

"Dad," Mazzy said with more seriousness than a six-year-old should ever have to convey. Tony looked up from his ice cream bowl and, seeing the look on her face, let his shoulders slump a little lower. He had hoped she would forget about it. "I want to know," Mazzy told him. 

"I told you, Maz. There's nothing wrong. You're fine," Tony lied easily, dipping his spoon back into his ice cream. 

"Tony..." Pepper said, turning her head to look at him. Tony looked at her right back, exchanging words through the looks on their faces. 

Tony's face was desperate, his heart aching and his stomach churning. Don't make me tell her. Please, please. Just let her be a kid. Just a normal, everyday kid. 

Pepper's face was sympathetic to both parties. She understood that Mazzy knew more than she was supposed to and she wanted all the blanks filled in. But she also understood just how adamant Tony was on allowing Mazzy to live a happy, innocent childhood. She didn't need to know what she had done or where she had been. She just needed to be ok. 

"Dad," Mazzy said again. Tony met her eyes. Her wide, pleading eyes. "I deserve to know. It's about me. I should know who I am."

"You do know who you are," Tony argued, scoffing away her reasoning. Mazzy wanted to interject, but didn't get the chance before Tony continued. "You are who you are now. That's who you are, that's who you've always been. I mean, you're not making sense, kid," he said. 

With determination and frustration fueling her inner fire, Mazzy pushed her chair out from under the table, the legs squeaking against the floors. With furrowed eyebrows of confusion, Tony and Pepper watched Mazzy hop off of her chair, walk around the table, into the kitchen, and climb up onto the counter. 

They didn't get the chance to run over to her before she pulled the large chef's knife from the knife stand and swiped the blade across her forearm, leaving a deep, clean cut. 

"Oh, my God!" Pepper exclaimed. 

She and Tony jumped out of their seats, rushing over to Mazzy and snatching the knife away from her. Tony grabbed at her arm, inspecting the wound like he would if she were a normal girl. Pepper tore a paper towel from the roll and pressed it against her arm as blood seeped from the wound. 

"No! Get off," Mazzy grumbled, shoving the paper towel away from her skin. 

The bleeding had already come to a stop. In mere seconds, the cut began to heal. Mazzy watched intently as her skin bound itself back together, like nothing had ever happened. No scab, no scar, no bandaids needed. 

As soon as the cut was healed, Mazzy looked back up at her father's stunned face. She glared, trying her best to express just how tired she was of not knowing. 

"Why can I do that?" she asked with desperation. "Why do you still have cuts and bruises from the fight, but my cuts and bruises go away in minutes?"

"Mazzy, you never ever do something like that again," Tony warned, grabbing her face by the jaw. She glared harder, angrier. "Do you understand me?"

"Why did the lady say I wasn't normal?" Mazzy asked, insistent on getting her answer. 

"I said, do you understand me?" Tony asked her again, his tone tense and warning. 

Fury in her veins, Mazzy's arm lashed out to her left, reaching for another knife from the stand. 

"Hey! Hey, hey, hey, hey!" Pepper shouted at her as Tony scooped her up off the counter in one quick motion, pulling her away from the knives. 

"No! You aren't listening!" Mazzy yelled, thrashing in his arms. She slammed her fists against his chest and kicked her legs against his abdomen. It hurt more than Tony would ever admit. She was stronger than most little girls for the same reason she could slice her arms with kitchen knives and be just fine thirty seconds later. "Let go of me! You need to listen to me!"

"No! I am your father! You listen to me," Tony scolded, holding her firmly despite how badly it hurt when she dug her nails into his skin. Pepper watched from the kitchen with a hand over her open mouth as Tony began marching Mazzy up the stairs. "You're going to your room!"

"You can't make me!" Mazzy argued. She'd never been sent to her room before. Tony had never had any reason to ground her or punish her. Not until that damned woman on the news started blabbing her mouth on live television. 

"Yes, I can! You know why?" Tony asked, swinging open her bedroom door with more force than he intended. He placed her down on the ground. "Because you're a normal little girl and normal little girls get punished when they don't behave," he spat before slamming the door shut. "Lock the door," he muttered. 

"Locking the door, sir," Jarvis's voice replied with the type of nervousness in his voice that most AIs aren't able to possess. 

Mazzy slammed herself against the door, tears streaming from her eyes. "You have to tell me! You have to! It's not fair!" she shouted through the door. 

Tony let out a heavy breath, rubbing his eyes as he leaned his back up against Mazzy's bedroom door. He didn't need this stress added on top of every other thing in his life. Mazzy didn't need this stress, either, but there wasn't anything he could do about it now. 

If only he could go back in time. Maybe he would have known better. Maybe he would have caught onto his then-girlfriend's odd behavior in time to stop her before she could run away with Mazzy in the middle of the night. 

It was late 2008, just a few months away from the New Year. Mazzy was three, almost four. She would start preschool in the fall of next year. Tony wasn't looking forward to it. He was worried about her going to any school, no matter if it was private or public. No matter what, he wasn't sure if she was safe. Most kids aren't the children of celebrities. How would that play out in Mazzy's school life?

Evelyn Nelson wasn't so worried about that, though. 

Only she knew that Mazzy wouldn't be in preschool in the fall. Mazzy wouldn't be anywhere near any preschools for a long time. She'd be out of the United States, out of North America, and across the ocean. 

But that was a secret. 

As Tony and Evelyn tucked Mazzy into bed, Tony was none the wiser about the plan Evelyn had laid out in her head. 

Tony would go to sleep that night with Evelyn by his side. When Tony fell asleep, Evelyn would slip out of bed and change into dark clothing. Then she would creep down the hall and into Mazzy's bedroom. She would stick a syringe into Mazzy's skin and fill her blood with a drug that would keep her asleep for hours on end. She would pick Mazzy up and carry her out of the house, to a car, then to a plane. That plane would fly across the world, and when Mazzy would wake up, she would have a handcuff around her wrist, linking her to a bedframe. 

The next morning, Tony would wake up to see that his girlfriend was missing. And when he'd go to get Mazzy out of bed, he'd see that she was gone, too. But it would be too late. Mazzy would be gone. 

"Dad! Let me out! Please, please, Daddy! Just tell me!" Mazzy screamed, kicking at the door with all the force she could muster up. 

Tony wasn't sure how much longer he could sit there and do nothing. He was hoping she would have calmed down already, but she hadn't. Mazzy just kept screaming and crying and kicking. 

With nothing else to do, Tony got up off of the floor and walked back downstairs. He couldn't bear hearing her cry like that anymore. It made guilt build up inside his stomach and he didn't need that. He needed her to stop asking questions. His lies had worked for months and now it was all crumbling just because of that stupid woman on the news who couldn't mind her own business. 

The woman had been paid off to keep quiet about the whole thing. She was reluctant, at first. Tony had told the woman that, when Mazzy got sick, the only cure they had was an unofficial, experimental drug for healing, and with no other options, that was what they tried. And it had worked. It was total bullshit, but the woman bought it. Plus, she got 100k in her bank account to keep it to herself. 

If only Tony had been able to pay her off sooner. Then all of this could have been avoided. 

When Tony got back downstairs, he watched as Pepper wiped the droplets of Mazzy's blood off of the countertop. He hated that Mazzy had done that. It made his stomach churn and his heart race. He was overwhelmed with guilt. 

He cleared his throat, announcing his presence to Pepper. 

Pepper turned to look at him with that same wide-eyed look she always got when he did something stupid and dangerous, like when she first caught him building the Iron Man suit in the lab. "What are you going to do?" she asked him. 

At first, Tony didn't give any answer. He just walked to the counter and opened up one of the higher-up cabinets. He picked up the knife stand and put it up, out of Mazzy's reach. "Jarvis."

"Sir."

"Remind me to install child locks," he muttered exhaustedly.

"Would you like me to order some, Mr. Stark?"

"Yeah. Sure."

"Ordering now."

"Great," Tony huffed, leaning his back against the counter and rubbing his face. 

"Tony," Pepper said, standing across from him with her back against the kitchen island. She crossed her arms over her chest, giving him a serious but sympathetic look. "What are you going to do?" she asked for a second time. 

"I don't know, Pepper. How about not tell her?" Tony suggested, his tone tense and annoyed.

Pepper's mouth dropped slightly open with disbelief. Sometimes she couldn't believe Tony. He never seemed to deal with things in the most responsible way. "You can't be serious," she said, shaking her head. 

"I am serious. I'm not telling her. She can scream and cry and throw as many fits as she wants. I'm not gonna tell her, Pepper," Tony said without making eye contact. He understood why it was frustrating for Mazzy to not know, but he didn't care. It didn't weigh out evenly in the end. If he told her, he could ruin her sweet, sweet personality forever, and he wasn't taking that risk. 

That was his baby. 

His baby who Hydra had ruined. His baby who was lucky to be unable to remember what she did before the age of six. His baby who had killed people without meaning it. His baby. 

It would kill her to know what she had done. 

"You don't have to tell her everything. She just deserves to know why she can do what she can do," Pepper tried to reason with him. She could hear Mazzy crying in her bedroom upstairs and the sound of it twisted around in her brain, pulling at her amygdala and forcing emotional reactions out of her. 

But Tony wasn't budging. It pulled at his emotions, too, but those emotions only made him more and more insistent on keeping Mazzy out of the loop. "The more I tell her, the more questions she'll have. It's better if she doesn't know any of it," he insisted.

"The older she gets, the more questions she'll ask. It's inevitable, Tony. You're going to have to tell her sooner or later, or she'll just find out by herself," Pepper said. 

And Tony knew that. Mazzy was a smart girl. She had his genes, after all. She would figure out the secret eventually. But not yet. And the longer he could go without her knowing, the better. She was six years old. Six years old. It didn't make sense for her to know. She didn't have to. She shouldn't have even been worrying about it at all.

"If you don't tell her, she'll hate you. She'll just keep acting like this. She could do something worse than what she just did. You don't want to take that risk," Pepper went on. 

"Whatever she does, I'll deal with it," Tony said. He pushed his hands off the counter and began walking away again, but Pepper followed after him.

"You need to give her some sort of answer," Pepper insisted. Mazzy would never settle for simply not knowing. 

"I don't need to give her any answer. She's my kid. I get to make these decisions. Not you. I'm not asking for your input," Tony snapped at her. Pepper paused, giving Tony a stern, warning look that made him rethink his words. He sighed, rubbed his hand across his face, and took a breath. "Pepper, look. We're going in circles here. I'm sorry if it bothers you, but I'm not telling her the truth. She doesn't need to know it. So I'm not going to tell her," he said more calmly this time. 

"Well, you have to tell her something," Pepper said. 

And just like that, Tony had an idea. He would tell Mazzy something. It didn't have to be the truth. It wasn't the truth with the woman on the news, so it didn't have to be the truth with Mazzy, either. What she didn't know couldn't hurt her, right?

"What? What are you thinking?" Pepper asked, her eyebrows furrowed. Usually, when Tony got that thinking look on his face, she never liked the idea that came after.

"I'm thinking I'll tell her what I told that lady," Tony answered.

Pepper pressed her lips together, frowning slightly. She sighed. There really was no good way to deal with this situation. The only options Tony had were to tell his daughter that she had killed countless innocent people without knowing it or just lying right to her face. Neither option was necessarily good for Mazzy, but only one of them would give her answers without tearing her apart. So lying was the only good choice. 

Tony made his way up the stairs, leaving Pepper alone to wonder whether or not this was a good idea. 

When Tony got to Mazzy's bedroom door, all he could hear was her crying on the other side of it. She wasn't screaming or kicking anymore. She was just crying. And it made Tony's throat tie itself into a knot. He swallowed, took a breath, and knocked on the door. 

"Go away," Mazzy sobbed from the other side of the door. 

"I want to talk to you," Tony told her. 

"I don't care," Mazzy spat, giving the door one more weak, little kick. 

Jarvis unlocked the door and Tony pulled it open, frowning at the sight of Mazzy on the floor with her head hidden in her arms. He knelt down beside her, putting a hand on her back. "How about you hop up off the floor and we talk like civilized human beings," he said. 

Mazzy unhid her face, glaring up at him. "Why? For all I know, I'm not even a human being," she grumbled.

Tony rolled his eyes, blowing air out of the side of his mouth. "I thought you wanted answers. I don't have to tell you, if that's what you'd prefer," he said, shrugging his shoulders. He stood up again, walking back toward the door. 

"No!" Mazzy shouted, shooting up off of the floor. She grabbed him by the hand, not letting him leave the room. "You have to tell me."

"Alright," Tony said, putting his hand on her back again. He began leading her to the bed. "Come sit. And stop freaking out."

"You made me," Mazzy murmured, narrowing her teary eyes at him. 

Again, Tony rolled his eyes. He wiped the tears from her cheeks with his hands as they sat down on the bed. "You wanna know why your body heals so quickly, or do you wanna pout some more?" he asked. 

"Tell me, please," Mazzy said, her eyes wide and glossy.

"You know how I told you that you got sick when you were littler?"

"Yeah," Mazzy answered, nodding her head. 

"Well, the only way the doctors could make you healthy again was by giving you a special medicine that made your body heal faster," Tony explained to her. Part of him didn't like lying to her face like that, but ultimately, he didn't care. He'd hide the truth from her for as long as he could, no matter what it took. "That medicine stayed in you. And it always will."

"How come you wouldn't tell me?" Mazzy asked, pinching her eyebrows together. 

"Uh..." Tony murmured, fidgeting with the bear stuffed animals on Mazzy's bed. "Most people can't, uh, get that medicine. It was just a prototype. So we have to keep it a secret, alright? You think you can do that?" he asked. 

Mazzy nodded enthusiastically, sniffing away the urge to cry some more. "I'm good at keeping secrets," she said, wiping her face with her shoulder.

"Oh, yeah?" Tony asked, a small smile finding its way onto his face. He was glad she didn't ask any other questions. She probably would in the future, but he didn't have to worry about that just yet.  

"Yeah. I kept Natasha's secret real, real well. I didn't even tell Pepper," Mazzy said proudly. 

"Wow," Tony said, his voice soft and quiet. He smiled, tucking Mazzy's hair behind her ear. She was still his sweet girl and she would be for as long he could help it. Maybe someday he would have to worry about Mazzy figuring out the truth, but he didn't now. Now all he had to do was keep her happy.

All he had to do was keep lying.