I'm Bound to Ramble
Tony thought it was deeply unfair that of the two parents his daughter started out with, she was left with the broken one. Tony made messes of things—of himself, of the relationships around him, of the world. Every tragedy, every ounce of pain and suffering experienced by the few people who surrounded him, was a direct result of Tony's ego and selfishness. The fact that someone as perfect as Pepper Potts, that someone as selfless as James Rhodes, that someone as loyal as Harold Hogan stuck around was not something Tony had taken lightly—at least, not in the end. And then Morgan came. Beautiful Morgan, with sparkly eyes and quick wit and an infectious personality, and Tony realized that he would burn the whole world down just to keep her safe. For a brief time, he was content.
Of course, that's when everything would go to shit. And his perfect, amazing, wonderful child would find herself without a perfect, amazing, wonderful mother. And the worst part? Tony couldn't even tell you how it happened.
They say trauma is like that. If it is heavy enough, thick enough, suffocating enough, it will literally erase memories. It seeps into the brain and short-circuits it. It rewires and cuts off and connects wrongly. As an engineer and mechanic, this phenomenon is nothing short of maddening and terrifying.
Suddenly, Tony found himself widowed with a 7 year-old and gaps in his mind that had never been there before. Tony spent many sleepless nights wondering how he could remember things like wormholes and snaps and aliens and kidnappings and torture with frightening accuracy and vivid flashbacks, but his wife's death eluded him. And not just him. Rhodey, Happy, heck, even Natasha and Bruce, could only recall the broad strokes.
And then, when Tony did sleep, there were the dreams. Dreams that shook him to his core. When Morgan told him over breakfast one morning, six months after the event, that she was seeing her mom, and her mom was telling her about a brother, and that they needed to find him, daddy, please, he's all alone and he's going to hurt himself, Tony freaked. Because his dreams were eerily similar and having good mental health has never been a Stark strength and could family members really hallucinate the same things in the wake of shared trauma? So Tony paid a very nice lady a very hefty sum to fix it, which backfired spectacularly, and ended up almost giving his daughter cavities from all the hot fudge sundaes he bought her afterwards.
After the funeral, Tony threw himself into trying to fill in the gaps. He kept coming up empty, but he felt so close. Even his AI couldn't help him with the timeline. Friday's files were corrupted, and to this day, he couldn't figure out how to recover them. She was very apologetic every time they tried, but the only clue she could give him was a time stamp. That, and the location of a whole other AI system connected to her programming that was unreachable.
He knew it all had something to do with Spider-Man, but that ended up being a dead end because Spider-Man disappeared the night Pepper died. And wasn't that the kicker? He just disappeared. Almost like he had been snapped again, except this time, Tony wasn't by his side holding his hand. Tony had never known Spider-Man, had never felt the need to figure out who was behind the mask, but desperately wished he had. Because then he'd be able to use all his considerable resources to track him down and figure out what happened. The man was hurt that night--he could remember that much. Gravely hurt. He was with Pep when she died, he knew this because even if Morgan's dreams were just manifestations of grief, her description of swinging from a spider web rang so true. Tony didn't know who Spider-Man was, but knew Spider-Man's courage and heart (how could he not, they fought together enough times), so when the man never showed up in Queens again, Tony knew he had probably died along with his wife. He funded a city-wide memorial for the lost hero, and commissioned a mural in his honor. It was the least he could do for the man who he was pretty sure saved his daughter.
What was the point of being a genius or billionaire if the most important problem in his life couldn't be fixed? Rhodey told him that he needed to take a break and think about something else. Happy was dealing with his own grief after his fiancée died (on the same night, coincidentally, like a fucking tragedy the likes of a Shakespeare play), so Tony decided to turn his attention to SI. Losing his wife was devastating. Losing the CEO of his company barely registered to him, but his board was insistent and Natasha offered to help out as he got his footing. You don't say no to a super-spy. He tried it once. It did not go well.
When Dr. Albert Prentiss called him, it was 2 AM and Tony was at his desk trying to figure out how to cobble together a somewhat happy Christmas for a somewhat sad 8 year-old.
'Anthony, I thought I'd get your voicemail, honestly. Do you know what time it is there, son?'
'No rest for the wicked, Al. It's good hearing from you. Busy corrupting the youth of today? There's still an offer for you to come work at SI, you know. Senior department head. Of course, it'd be very senior. Since you're old and all.'
'Oh stop it. You know I'm happy here.'
'How anyone can be happy at that dump, I don't know...'
'Hush, Anthony. I'm calling to see if you and James would be willing to come over here and consult on a project I'm working on with one of my undergrad students.'
'You work with undergrads, now? Last I heard you were teaching adults—not children.'
'Well, this is a special case. He reminds me of you, honestly. Nineteen years old, sophomore but on his way to graduating early. He came to me with a proposal for an affordable medical device that would neutralize mutations on someone's DNA without exposing them to radiation. It's a brilliant piece of tech with amazing implications for cancer patients and even enhanced children. We ran a lot of the coding and equations, but need access to vibranium. Obviously, my department is strapped for cash. My student guarantees me he can get it, but I'm not sure he realizes it will be in the millions of dollars. I'm not asking you for a grant, Anthony. I just want you to see it and tell us what you think.'
'Well, I have many things to do and don't want to do them, so I think Rhodes and I can stand the stink of Caltech for a few days.'
'Thank you so much Tony. Just one more thing. This student reminds me of you in all the ways. He is a genius, but he is leaning hard into college life if you know what I mean. I don't expect you to mentor him, but for the love of God, be kind. He's a master at getting under one's skin but has the greatest mind I've seen since another mess I taught at MIT.'
So Tony gathered up Rhodey, packed up Morgan (because, to be honest, he didn't want to sleep away from her either), and flew out to the far-from-superior technology institute ten days before Christmas and 310 days after the worst day of his life.
I don't expect you to mentor him, my foot. Tony didn't want to mentor the punk--he wanted to fire a repulsor beam at his smug, inflated head. The tech was genius. That much was certain. But listening to that little shit drunkenly insult him and mock his professor was enough to make Tony want to destroy his research, do it better, and then keep the kid from ever getting a job anywhere ever after graduation. Benjamin Fitzpatrick wouldn't exist by the time he was done with him. Rhodey had the audacity to laugh in his face when he said this. ("Really, Tony? Welcome to my life forty years ago." "Eww. You're old, Dad." "Hey!" "She's got a point, Boss. They both do." "C'monHogan!")
Tony finished answering some emails, tucked Morgan into bed, and hopped in the shower. He lingered for awhile, content to let the hot water roll off his back as he thought of better times with better-than-him people. It wasn't until 45 minutes later, when he heard a chime on his phone, that he got out.
"What's up, Fri?"
Sir, the "Snitches Get Stitches" protocol has been activated. Little Boss is off premises and I am unable to find her presently. Would you like me to enable, "Dad Knows Best"?
"What the absolute FUCK?"