Tony is trying to write a coming out scene that isn't fucking cliché and it’s harder than he thought. Its not like he doesn’t have models for it in real life, this isn’t something he needed to research, but putting it down on paper is harder. Maybe because he knows how it feels, he guesses, to have to spend so much time determining who he could come out to, when, and how to do it. And despite coming out to Rhodey ages ago he’s learned that it’s not a one-time thing. Its something he needs to do every time he meets someone new. Or he did, back before his writing left him famous. Now he doesn’t really need to explain himself to anyone because he’s well known enough that people know he’s bisexual.
He gets a lot of accolades for diversity, which was half of what put him on the map, but frankly he doesn’t do it purposefully. Well, okay, he does and any writer who pretends their shit is just coincidentally all straight white guys with lackluster white lady love interests is a fucking liar- they designed it that way. But he doesn’t write diversity for the sake of it, he writes the way he does partially because that’s what real life looks like and also there’s a shit ton more drama in a kid in a wheelchair surviving the zombie apocalypse than a kid with working legs. That’s a totally new set of challenges, world building, and solutions he needs to think up to make a story work. It’s more interesting that way.
Also, when he started writing he’d already noticed that there were more unicorns on TV than bisexuals. And Rhodey has always lamented that black men were always the villains and he never could relate to them. Probably because he’s soft and empathetic and men in general don’t get the luxury of softness let alone black men. And Pepper has always hated that she’s only ever shown as the love interest with no purpose to the plot and sometimes gets stuck in the role of Dead For Man Pain as she called it. And Peter, when he came out, pointed out that there were no stories about trans kids, and beyond that there are barely any stories about trans men. Just trans women because people find that change more titillating, Tony guesses, and even then the stories are rare or transphobic.
So he wrote a story with a trans kid as the protagonist mostly for Peter, and yeah sure everyone else was technically diverse but the story was set in New York so it sort of had to be. It was an alright story, not his best, and he had found that he didn’t care much for writing things that weren’t more... flashy, he supposed, so he set about writing sci-fi. It’s always been his favorite genre anyway and yeah, the lead character happened to be bisexual and yes she also happened to be a woman and a badass but that’s because limp characters are boring. So when he’d been accused of ‘forced diversity’ when his third book came out, zombies are fun and yeah the lead was in a wheelchair but he had some pretty cool ways of getting around the zombie problem that other characters didn’t, he was confused.
Rhodey thought his response to the accusation, that the problem wasn't forced diversity, it was forced sameness, was hilarious. So did Peter. Maybe because he was so baffled by the accusation to begin with. Tony mostly found the entire argument stupid because it wouldn’t exist if his characters fit the status quo. Still, that’s hardly going to stop him from writing characters that more than likely reflect someone’s reality in some way, hence attempting to write a coming out scene that isn’t garbage. And a gay black man has to be more relatable than James Bond as a character.
He’s decided those criticisms were garbage and instead focused on the ones that rightly pointed out that he spends too much time on science. Not everyone finds the science of the zombie apocalypse interesting, and it is kind of weird that a character that isn't an engineer and doesn’t seem to have a tech background knows a lot about androids. Those criticisms make sense. So he tends to relegate bits and pieces of information to characters that would have it for a reason now. Its difficult, especially when he knows so much more about his worlds than anyone else, but he manages.
This though, writing a coming out scene that’s not hell on wheels to put on paper- or screen given that he types on a computer- is awful. He just needs something that’s true to Sam’s character and he’s written something out like five times but nothing quite feels right. He’s considering putting it in another part of the story if for no other reason than to put it off when there’s a knock on the door. “Thank fuck,” he mumbles to himself, pulling himself from his chair and going to the door.
He opens it to find an attractive guy in the other end glaring at him. “Why the hell did you kill Riley?” he asks and Tony sighs.
“Well, originally I was going to kill Sam but then Rhodey informed me that killing a black guy to further a white guy’s story is kind of a shitty thing to do and I agree. Plus there was something missing in the story, something that wasn’t quite adding up right so when I chose to kill Riley and make Sam the main character instead I realized what it was. Turns out Sam was the main character the whole time but I didn’t realize that because I had been trying to jam someone else in the role.” Happens to him frequently, and a lot of other writers from what he’s gathered.
In the zombie story the kid with ADHD was supposed to be the lead, but then the kid in the wheelchair turned out to be a better story telling vehicle. And originally his bisexual lady character was her girlfriend’s love interest, but when he started writing she was more interesting so he made her the lead instead. And there was one occasion where the rich kid was supposed to be the vampire’s best friend but in a freak twist of events he ended up being more interesting than the vampire so.
“You killed Riley because you were worried about being racist and you wanted to give me man pain? Fuck you man, you could have done better than that,” the guy says and Tony frowns, realizing super belatedly that that story isn’t even published.
“How the hell do you know all this? And also no I couldn’t have done better- Sam needed a call to action that would result in him leaving his current life. Nothing less than Riley dying would have done that, I didn’t just decide to kill him because I was going to kill Sam first than flipped it. Sam’s character required the dude to die if I wanted him to leave base. Riley never would have agreed to come with him to work on Project Insight. Shit, Sam never would have agreed to work on Project Insight if he knew what it actually was,” Tony says, shaking his head. Poor bastard, accidentally working for a fucked up Nazi offshoot that managed to survive to the distant future. Post-apocalyptic is new for him, but he thinks he’s doing okay. His editor likes his stuff anyway and Natasha is not easy to please.
“Wait, what do you mean I never would have agreed to work for Project Insight if I knew what it was?” the guy asks and Tony frowns.
“Who’d you say you were?” he asks.
“Sam Wilson, you wrote me, some shit happened- it’s not important-”
“Oh I think it’s very important,” Tony interrupts.
“No it isn’t. What are you talking about?” Sam- he does fit Tony’s description of him well though he’s a lot more attractive than Tony imagined him. Is that weird? That’s weird. This guy can’t be for real though, there’s no way but also how the hell does he know anything about Sam? Even Peter doesn’t know Sam’s last name and he’s the one who knows the most about the character.
“Surprise, they’re Nazis?” Tony asks more than states and Sam’s eyebrows fly up.
“You didn't want to be racist and you have a black man working for Nazis?” he asks and wow okay, the voice is definitely right for how he imagined Sam but what the fuck? Characters don’t come to life. He needs some damn sleep.
“I’ve been awake too long, I think I should maybe pass out for awhile,” he says and he goes so close the door but Sam sticks his foot in the way.
“Don’t you close the door on me you pasty fucker! Explain yourself!”
“I’m not even that pale. You should see Loki if you think this is pale. Guy’s skin tone is fucking paper,” he mumbles.
“Yeah, I don’t know if you know this but my skin tone is a beautiful rich shade of brown so anything lighter than this is pale. Open the door and explain the Nazis,” Sam tells him.
“Is this in the story?” Tony asks. Because writing himself into a story would be super douchey. Also, he likes only being on the back of book covers. Living like a hermit is nice after that whole disaster that he can call his childhood and early adulthood. Thank fuck for Peter, really, because without him Tony’s not sure he ever would have gotten his shit together. But he had a kid, and that kid needed support so he needed to do something and May was right to think he wasn’t fit to be a parent. So he went to rehab, cleaned up his act, raised his kid, found out someone made a mistake along the way and it turns out Peter was a surprise boy, little late in the game there but Tony kind of wanted a son so it wasn’t a big deal, and then came the writing.
Sam, or whoever this guy is, squints at him. “What? I don’t fucking know, is it? You’re the writer,” he points out.
“Well obviously not because I’d straight up never write myself into a story. Which begs the question of how this happened. Wait. Am I a character?” he asks, frowning to himself. Is someone writing him? Oh that would be some story-ception and he doesn’t like it on account of he likes his independence and he knows how writers are dicks to their characters. Is he about to be killed off to give Sam more man pain? He shakes his head because its too early for this.
“Oh my god, shut up with your existential crisis and deal with this. What is up with the Nazis?” Sam asks.
“Doesn’t concern me right now, you’re trying to come out to a coworker,” Tony says. If he’s a character who’s writing him? And how the hell did all this happen? And for what reason? Because this is not helping with his scene.
“My coworkers are Nazis, they kill gay men! And black men, what is up with the damn Nazis?” Sam says again.
“Oh yeah, actually Jane’s not a Nazi. She’s a lesbian and she’s an astrophysicist!” he says excitedly.
Sam rolls his eyes, “I know that. Get. To. The. Nazis,” Sam tells him.
“Oh, right. Yeah, they claim it’s not a race thing- I’m sure you’ve met white supremacists like that- actually no you haven’t whatever, they claim they don’t have a problem with race but won’t let black people join their creepy club. Or they’ll be all ‘we’re fine with you but stay in Africa’ or whatever. That’s them. So they’re all ‘yeah he’s black and we hate it but he’s also smart. Not smarter than us because we’re white but also he can conveniently figure out problems we can’t not because he’s smarter but because he’s smarter. But not smarter than us.’ They’re Nazis, their logic makes no sense. But they do need you because master race or not you are actually smarter than them. So’s Jane but they’re only slightly pissed off about that because she’s a woman, but at least she’s white.” Jane’s not going to be happy when she finds out either, then its her and Sam teaming up to fuck up the Nazis and also ensure escape from the dying earth.
“You know what, fuck you for all this but at least the planet isn’t dead here. Kind nice, the trees,” Sam says.
Tony sighs, “oh yeah, that’s only because we’re in the pre stages of where your earth ends up. No one’s doing anything about the climate change thing though,” Tony says.
Sam’s eyes bug out of his head, “someone call Congress!”
*
Peter stares at Sam and then turns to Tony. “Look, sounds crazy but he knows his whole backstory and a bunch of stuff about Jane that I haven’t even written yet so like. I don’t know what this is but its happening,” Tony says, shrugging.
“Someone needs to do something about the environment, I’ve seen what happens and that shit is not pretty!” Sam tells them.
“I know, I wrote it,” Tony points out.
“This is cool!” Peter says, jumping right into it he guesses. He’s always been a lot more fine with these things than Tony.
“No, it isn’t. How do we send you back?” Tony asks.
Sam raises an eyebrow, “oh you think I’m going back to Nazis and a world that shit itself after climate change finally broke the planet? Oh hell no, I am staying right here and you killed my best friend so you’re obligated to host me,” Sam tells him. Tony sighs. How does this shit always happen to him?
*
Tony’s watching a documentary on oceans- research partially and also because he thinks corals are pretty- with Sam when Sam decides to break the long silence. “What made you make me the protagonist? Jane’s interesting,” he says and yeah, Tony knows.
“She’s been working somewhat closely with people from Project Insight for years. She wouldn’t have been a good lead into the story like you were given that all your knowledge was fresh. Jane wouldn’t have a reason to ask your questions,” he murmurs, taking a note on ocean currents.
“Okay. But why not change Riley’s character to keep him alive? Or mine,” Sam asks.
“In the midst of trying to avoid killing people of color to help white men out I discovered Riley is actually boring and I didn’t want to write him so I killed him. Helps that it doubled as your call to action,” he says. Sam wasn’t going to take up the offer to work with officials on Project Insight until Riley died. By then his family, what was left of it, was estranged, his best friend was gone, and the only thing keeping him there was his love for his job. Which was a job that now reminded him of Riley. So Sam took up the offer to escape the pain.
“You killed Riley because you didn’t like him,” Sam states more than asks.
Tony shrugs. “Sorry, not my fault he was bland,” Tony says, shrugging.
“You’re the writer, it was literally your fault he was bland. Go back and rewrite it,” Sam tells him.
“I’m not unwilling Riley, it’d ruin the story and Natasha liked that he died. I think that’s only because she likes when characters die though. She keeps trying to get me to kill off Thor too and I can’t kill Thor off, he’s sunshine in a bleak world. The whole book would be emotional baggage without his optimism holding it up.” Natasha thinks it’d be better that way but Tony’s seen DC movies- making everything dark and gritty does nothing but emotionally exhaust your audience. So Thor stays.
“Do I escape the Nazis?” Sam asks and Tony nods.
“You leave them on earth to die too. You don’t save everyone, but that was never possible to begin with,” he says.
“You should leave a way for people to find out how I did it so they can save themselves. But not the Nazis, fuck those guys,” Sam says. “Unless they stop being Nazis then you know, maybe.”
Tony laughs, “I thought about doing that. Depends on what kind of solution I might find to that, and if I want any of what happens in this story to carry on to the next book.”
Sam raises an eyebrow, “you’re going to write more?” he asks and Tony nods.
“Trilogy. Not sure what’s in store for book three yet, but the second book is about the people that left. It won’t be your generation, but the next one. Space travel takes time, but they aren’t going to reach the planet you set course to in their lifetime. Their job is basically to reproduce so the next generation can make it to that planet,” he says.
Sam winces. “That’s bleak.”
He nods. “They think so too. Suicide becomes epidemic because people have no meaning, or hope. Depression permeates the ship. The protag is a young boy, one who loves space and doesn’t really mind being lost in it at all. The adults assume his wonder and curiosity are symptoms of his being a child but they aren’t. He just doesn’t derive meaning in life the way they do, or want to. They’ve all grown up hearing about your heroics and they want to live adventures like that. This kid knows he can’t do that, so he makes his own destiny, his own hope. Eventually he figures out how to make the ship move faster. Doesn’t get anyone in that generation there in their lifetimes, but it does begin to alter the way people around him think. They all thought they were meaningless, just a means to an end and yet this kid did something new, something no one had seen until that point. Story’s about hope, and how to maintain it even when you’re in a world- or in this case a ship- that doesn’t look so good.”
Sam considers that for a long moment. “That’s kind of beautiful. How’s it end? For that generation?”
Tony smiles, “they start studying the planet they’re going to from afar, trying to figure out as much as they can for the people who are going to arrive there. They start studying other planets too, finding out new things about where they are. Basically, they take an interest in the world again.”
“They make their own hope,” Sam says and Tony nods.
“Yeah. Bit optimistic but,” he shrugs. Sam shakes his head though.
“No, I like it. I mean, feels pretty true to human nature anyway. Seems like every time we back ourselves into something we find a way out of it and there’s always someone that breaks the mold. Makes sense that it would be a kid- adults aren’t as open minded.” So Tony knows. He’d considered making an adult the protag but it just didn’t feel natural to him that someone who’d spent so much time steeping with a bunch of people with depression would find hope like that, meaning. A kid though, they won’t have gotten used to the way things work just yet, they’re still learning how the world works. Its just that this kid in particular changes how the world works. Kind of in a mundane way, but still.
“I guess. And fuck knows where things are going from there,” he says, shaking his head. It’ll be hard enough to change characters every book- people get attached to them and want to see more of their stories, understandably, so doing three separate stories with whole new characters that are in the same world is a bit of a risk. But by now he has a good reader base so he thinks he’ll be okay.
“Give them a creepy demon to fight,” Sam says and that’s exactly the kind of dumb shit Tony would write Sam saying. He’s not serious, obviously, even if Sam would genuinely be amused to read something like that.
Tony sighs. “I think I might make the planet already populated. So they get there and the locals are like ‘hey we don’t need you guys’ and they have to deal with that.” The planet is livable, so it stands to reason that intelligent life exists on it. “Or maybe I’ll make it a kind of attempt to tame a new environment that does a lot of weird shit. Rebuild civilization. Depends on what kind of conflict and adventure I want, I guess.”
“If you go with locals you could do a Romeo and Juliette thing,” Sam says and Tony gives him a look. He made sure Sam was educated; there is no excuse for his brainy ass to have come up with such a shit storyline.
“That story ended up with several people dead, Sam. Fuck no. Also alien sex is not to be taken lightly; you don’t know what their anatomy does and how it reacts to humans. Or if they have weird mating rituals in which they eat your head like a praying mantis. Bad idea,” Tony tells him.
Sam decides that’s the funniest shit he’s ever heard, he guesses, because he starts laughing ridiculously hard.
*
Sam didn’t expect to like his creator- he killed Riley. And it turns out he did it for man pain and because he thinks Riley is boring. Rude! But he’s actually really sweet, and imaginative, and Sam’s always been a sucker for someone who helps kids with homework. Peter and Tony are puzzling over his English homework now and neither of them knows what the fuck they’re talking about so Sam sighs and walks over.
“The green light is a metaphor,” he tells them and Tony squints.
“Why’s he staring at a metaphor?” he asks, squinting at the book like F. Scott Fitzgerald is about to pop out of there any moment to explain himself.
“Do you two not know how to look shit up?” he asks, then pauses. “Oh my god you have the internet!” he says and fuck helping the kid with his homework, he’s looking for the worst internet comments have to offer. He’s heard stories and he wants to know.
When Tony finds him twenty minutes later he glares up at the man because he said the comments were shitty, not that people are out there defending people who think genocide is a valid political opinion. Or that stealing people’s pets is somehow freeing them from ‘slavery.’ Or half the other crap he’s found on here. “This planet has always been the worst and I think we should just let this species die,” Sam tells him.
Tony laughs, “internet comment sections were literally the reason I didn’t have the internet survive the Climate Crisis. I knew you’d read people’s most fucked up thoughts and just fuck off on your own,” he says and Sam laughs.
“Seriously?” he asks. That can’t possibly be right but Tony laughs and nods.
“Kind of, yeah. I mean ultimately you’d get over it, but I thought it’d be a hindrance in your path so I took down the internet,” Tony tells him.
Sam looks back at the computer sitting in front of him. “Yeah, I mean. Humanity is a cesspool,” he says eventually. He doesn’t want to admit Tony is right but also he’s lost faith in his species. Time to send the cats into space, they’re alright. Or maybe some dogs. Actually, both. Unless they do some weird interbreeding shit Sam doesn’t want to see how that goes. It probably wouldn’t go anywhere but still, no.
“We aren’t that bad,” Tony says and Sam gives him a look. “Okay we are but we could be worse.”
“Saying that steaming turd on your plate could be a whole pile of steaming turds is not an improvement, Tony,” Sam tells him.
Tony laughs and sits down beside him. “Here,” he says, pulling the computer from Sam’s grasp and trying something in. When he goes to lean over Tony sticks his hand on his face and pushes him back. Rude.
*
Turns out Sam’s a bird person, which Tony didn’t anticipate, and now has a special fondness for falcons. Which are extinct on his earth not that Tony wrote that down. Or even thought about which birds were no longer around but whatever. “Can you own one of these?” Sam asks.
Tony shrugs, “I mean. Probably but I don’t know what proper care for one would look like.” Falcons aren’t like... exotic, are they? They’d probably be okay to own if they had the right cage space, right? They’d probably need a lot though, they’re large birds.
Sam turns back to the computer screen and then to Tony. “You killed me best friend because you found him boring,” Sam says like this is a reason for Tony to get him a bird.
*
Sam pets the falcon’s head gently. He’s read up on bird care and Peter loves the bird so there’s that. “Her name is Redwing, here, pet her,” Sam says, extending his arm to Peter. Peter walks over and carefully pets the bird’s head.
“I can’t believe I now own a fucking bird,” Tony mumbles.
“Uh, this is my bird. Get your own bird,” Sam tells him. Tony rolls his eyes fondly and leaves Sam with his bird that he’s officially over attached to.
*
Peter finds him trying to write that scene, the damn coming out scene, and perches on his desk with little care that his ass is crinkling Tony’s notes. “Is this supposed to happen? In the story? You know, with Sam,” he clarifies.
Tony shakes his head, “writing yourself into stuff is douchey. Also I didn’t anticipate Sam being obsessed with falcons.” There aren’t falcons around in his universe, or that many birds minus seagulls because those are the cockroaches of birds, so he had no opportunity to see what kind of birds Sam would like. And he doesn’t like pigeons or seagulls.
“Well, I think Sam is cool,” Peter says, looking at his computer screen. “Isn’t this chapter supposed to be due last week?” he asks and yeah, it is. Natasha has been riding his ass for days now but its just not coming out right. No pun intended.
“Yeah, well if Sam would fucking cooperate on paper that would be nice. And in person, we didn’t need a falcon.” If they were to get any pets Tony would have preferred a cat- low maintenance and soft. Everything he wants out of a pet.
“I like the falcon, I think she’s pretty,” Peter says and he would. He’s not discriminatory in what pets he likes. Tony continues to stare at the screen, trying to come up with something useful for long enough that he doesn’t notice when Peter slips off and he definitely doesn’t notice when Sam creeps up.
“Peter says you’re having trouble with a scene,” he says, making Tony jump.
He looks over to find Sam leaning against his desk and sighs. “Yeah. Its supposed to be a coming out scene but its not… going well,” he says.
Sam glances at the computer for a few moments, “Jane is the person I’m talking to, I assume,” he says and Tony nods.
“Don’t know how you know that but yeah.”
Sam snorts, “because I don’t like anyone else that I work with, something about them feels off. Didn’t anticipate Nazisbut thanks for that. Jane’s the only one I’d ever confide in.”
Which is why he put the scene here, at this moment, to Jane in particular. “Good point, I guess. Its still a pain in the ass to not make this sound like every other god damn coming out scene ever though,” he says, shaking his head. He wants it to feel natural, true to character and not like this was a convenient time to mention Sam’s sexuality. It is, a convenient time he means, but that’s not why it’s relevant. That comes later with the Nazi thing and also Jane’s sexuality and how that plays a role in them forming a stronger bond as they begin working against their adversaries.
For a long moment Sam says nothing. “What’s my motivation?” he asks and Tony sits back in his seat.
“You don’t necessarily have one, not related to sexuality anyway. You’re talking about you got to Project Insight to begin with, which obviously includes mentions of Riley, former love of your life before he died.” It’s a natural segue, one he’s unlikely to find again which is why it has to happen nowand he’s also still in the tail end of the set up for the story. He needs Jane and Sam to find common ground and bond over it before they discover what Project Insight actually is and who runs it. Without that bonding there’s no real reason aside from his design for them to stick together, which just makes the rest of the story a mess given that Jane’s expertise is necessary for Sam’s work and vice versa.
Sam looks surprised and Tony frowns, “don’t look at me like that. You didn’t know I liked birds, why would I think you’d know about Riley. I know where you started the story and it was after anything referencing our relationship,” he points out.
Yeah, okay. So he’s not wrong. “Are you going to give me advice or what?” he asks and Sam sighs.
“I don’t know why you’re so stuck on it, you told me Jane’s a lesbian and she’s not a stupid woman. Have her connect the dots, probably mention something about her sexuality, and then whatever it is you need out of the scene happens,” Sam says.
The fact that he’s right really pisses Tony off. All this time he’s spent on it and out of nowhere Sam gives him good advice? Asshole. “Well, thanks for solving that,” Tony mumbles, giving his screen an irritated glare. He’s prepared to ignore Sam and go back to writing so Natasha will stop hounding him when Sam speaks again.
“Do you really think Riley is boring?” Sam asks, sounding hurt.
Tony sighs and sits back in his seat. “Sam. Riley is resistant to change, rigid in his morals, and doesn’t like changing his routine. In a story that requires rule breaking, investigating higher ups, and a vast change in literally everything from setting, to routine, to topic of study Riley is the wrongguy for that. It was always meant to be you, but with Riley you’re just as resistant to those things as he was because you want to keep him happy. Ultimately he hadto die for you to move forward.” He pauses, considering if he wants to continue, and then decides fuck it. Might as well. “And he wasn’t good for you anyway. Your love for each other held you both back- Riley needed to learn to adapt to new things and you hated being trapped by Riley’s resistance to your natural curiosity. Love doesn’t change incompatibility.”
But Sam doesn’t realize that at the part of the story he’s in, doesn’t until he meets his love interest later in the story. They have a lot more common ground and Sam resists it at first because of Riley until he eventually realizes that his relationship with Riley kind of sucked not that either of them meant for it to. It’s just that they weren’t really meant to be together is all, and they were forcing a relationship out of nothing but stubborn feeling rather than genuine compassion and care for each other.
Sam squints at him, “you actually think that? That Riley wasn’t good for me?”
Tony laughs, “Sam I literally designed it that way. Realizing this is part of your grieving process so you can move past Riley’s loss.”
“Well I think you’re wrong,” Sam says, undercurrent of anger in his voice and Tony sighs.
“Sam, just because you sucked together didn’t mean you didn’t love each other. People love people they aren’t compatible with all the time, that doesn’t make their feelings less real. But it does make for a bad base for a romantic relationship,” he points out.
“So I guess I get a new romantic interest then,” Sam states more than asks.
Tony nods. “Guy named Peter Quill. Total asshole, you kind of hate him at first but you also need his skillset. Jane might know everything there is to know about space but she doesn’t know how to get there, and you know everything there is to know about agriculture and chemistry, but you don’t know how to fly a space ship. So dealing with Peter it is.”
“You named a character after your kid?” Sam asks and Tony rolls his eyes.
“No. Peter is more of a coincidence anything. And he had like five other names first, that one just happened to be the best one.”
Sam sighs. “So what makes me realize this Peter guy is a good choice for me, hmm?” he asks.
A bunch of stuff but Tony will make it simple. “You come to the realization that, as much as he annoys you sometimes, he challenges you in a way Riley never had. He doesn’t try and stifle your curiosity, or tell you to keep your nose out of things he doesn’t think you should look into, and he sticks neck out for you despite your differences because he believes what you’re saying. Riley would never do any of those things,” Tony says. It’s a sad moment for Sam, actually, realizing that Riley was never the love of his life. It’s never easy to realize someone you loved wasn’t good for you, but its important for Sam to learn. Of course now he’s somehow alive and also here in the real world and Tony doesn’t know how that happened but he guesses he’s never going to make that realization now except in Tony’s mind’s eye.
*
Sam watches Tony attempt to bond with Peter over some weird meme but he doesn’t seem to get it and neither does Sam. Peter, however, is amused as hell and keeps interrupting himself with laughter. “These memes are getting advanced and increasingly hard to understand. Good for the kids I guess. You guys basically invented a new language,” Tony says, shaking his head.
“I’m sad you’re missing out,” Peter says, still giggling.
“What, no ‘kids these days?’” Sam asks, grinning.
Tony, of all things, looks confused at this. “The only reason people say that is because they don’t understand what kids these days are up to and think that lack of understanding makes the kids bad instead of accepting their unawareness of memes or whatever is the problem,” he says. “Also I used to be‘kids these days’ and the rhetoric is exactly the same.”
Well there’s a take Sam isn’t used to. Peter looks pleased with this turn of events; clearly happy his father isn’t a jackass who has decided his entire generation is the worst thing ever. “Weird how that same sentiment happens in my time too,” Sam says, shaking his head.
“I mean, it’s been around forever,” Tony points out. “Makes sense that it’d follow you into the future.”
“Future sucks,” Peter says and Sam snorts.
“Kid you have no idea. Indoor plumbing is a luxury, that’s the only reason I even joined the military. Shitting in a hole wasn’t cutting it for me,” he says, shaking his head.
Peter snorts and starts laughing before he seems to realize Sam is serious and then he frowns, turning to Tony. “What did you do to him?” he asks and Tony sighs.
“Well the earth has basically gone to shit except small pockets of the population left to forage over basically nothing. Toilets that work clearly aren’t going to be a thing and no one is planting their ass on an old ass toilet with questionable origins,” he points out.
“Um, clean the toilet,” Peter says but Sam shakes his head.
“Cleaning supplies are too rare for that. I fought a woman for a lemon once and then I ran out of food so I ate it instead.” It was horrible, he hates lemons. They’re too sour and that one was small but he had to do somethingand technically lemons are food too.
Peter stares at him for a moment and shakes his head, “I’m glad I’ll be dead by the time dad’s generation is done fucking the planet up in an irreversible way,” he mumbles, walking off.
Tony frowns, “kid, how young do you plan on dying we’ve got twelve years and you’re fifteen,” he calls after him. “Peter? Peter you better plan on living for more than twelve years!” he yells.
“Oh my god dad it was an exaggeration relax about it!” Peter calls back and the tension leaves Tony’s body.
“They’ve got a lot of depression humor, his generation, and its sometimes hard to tell what I should be worried about,” he explains like Sam needs the explanation.
“You could have made it anything but a lemon,” he tells Tony, who rolls his eyes.
“Lemons double as cleaning products, it couldn’t have been a banana. And also bananas are dead. Deal with it,” he mumbles.
That’s rude, Sam resents that. “I think you could have killed lemons and given me a banana instead. I don’t know what that is, but its probably better than lemons.”
Tony turns, frowning. “You’ve never eaten a banana?” he asks and hello, they’re extinct where he’s from so no. Tony turns and grabs one of those long yellow things off the counter and throws it at him.
He catches it and stares at it for a moment. “You guys eat these things? They don’t look like they’d taste pleasant,” he says and Tony sighs.
“Well you have to peel it first,” he says, taking the banana back and peeling it before handing it to him again.
Sam shrugs and bites into it, finding that it doesn’t taste that bad. Definitely better than lemons, that’s for sure. The peel is annoying though. “These aren’t that bad. Kind make my mouth feel tingly,” he says and Tony’s eyes go wide.
“Oh my god that’s not normal, you’re allergic to bananas,” he says and oh come on. Of course he is.
*
Tony, maybe because Sam feels more real than made up, totally forgot about all the luxuries Sam doesn’t have in his normal timeline. So as a rectification for his suffering Tony orders pizza, a lot of it, and makes sure Sam gets the pre-world shitting itself experience. “I can’t believe you don’t even need to talk to people to get food. Sometimes I have to literally fight people for it. You assholes are squanderingthis,” Sam tells him and Peter, stuffing another bite of pizza into his mouth.
Peter gives Tony a horrified look. “What did you doto him?” he asks, not for the first time.
Tony sighs, “what? There’s not a lot of food and its not like Sam’s violent by nature, most of his fighting over it is trying to keep what he already had, not stealing it from other people.” Sam did a lot of sharing the wealth, actually, because he has luck finding food and medical supplies partially because he knows a lot about how to grow food and he also happens to know a lot about chemistry. It’s a good combination in his world though its little more than luck that Sam happens to be a genius.
“I am here to defend myself, thank you,” Sam says to him. “But yeah basically what he said. I can’t believe you deprived me of pizza. You’re an asshole, man,” Sam tells him and that’s rude.
“Why would pizza survive an environmental apocalypse? That makes no sense you guys can barely make bread.”
Sam shakes his head, “excuses,” he mumbles and Tony gives Peter a look but instead of helping him his kid betrays him.
“Yeah, that’s rude. Maybe the government figured out how to make pizza,” he says.
Tony lets out a long sigh. “Government barely exists, its literally people who happen to have a wealth of resources and refuse to share while condemning the rest of the population for not having resources they need,” he says. “So even if they didfigure out pizza they’d hoard it to themselves.”
Peter squints, “so the same thing as politics today?” he asks and… well, he’s not wrong.
“On a much smaller scale and mostly only around Mexico and a few other pockets of people throughout South America, yeah. Technically there’s people in Africa and Asia too but there’s no reason for you to know that so you uh… don’t,” Tony says to Sam, who looks shocked.
“How the hell did they survive all that?” he asks and Tony shrugs.
“Same way you guys did. Humans as a species are hard to kill. And Africa has the benefit of Wakanda. Didn’t help North Africa much but the southern half of the continent has some people. Australia was fucked though, but that’s technically true even before all the weather changes screwed the earth over. Have you seen the spiders they have? Shit is the size of your face and people willinglylive there.” He shakes his head. Beautiful country, he’s been, but to live there at the cost of big ass spiders and dingos that are vicious but look exactly like a dog you’d one hundred percent pet? No fucking thanks.
“Wait, none of those places are fucked. We should go to Canada!” Sam says excitedly and Peter frowns.
“Why would you choose the most boring country to visit? We should go to Korea!” he says, more pleased with his choice.
“Compromise, I have business in London, we can go there,” Tony tells them.
*
Sam looks amazed but he’s pretty much amazed by everything and Peter thinks that whatever worldbuilding Tony did it must have been mean to poor Sam. Pizza surprises him and pizza isn’t even special. Right now though Sam is surprised by the simple presence of Britain and he knows a weird amount about the country even if only half of it is right. Peter assumes the other half picks up once the world goes to shit but he leaves Tony to correct the misinformation while he and Ned go do a Harry Potter tour.
Initially he wasn’t going to take Ned but when he said he was going to a Harry Potter tour Ned told him he’d never speak to him again if he didn’t bring him along and Ned is the best. Peter couldn’t leave him behind so he brought him along.
*
Sam grins, looking pleased with himself and Tony has to admit he does look nice sitting on an porch overlooking Italy. “Best countries so far: Japan, because that was fun. Britain, mostly because I actually know stuff about that country even if half of it was shit you made up. South Africa was beautiful. Italy is great. I liked Ecuador. Cuba was awesome but I should probably avoid ever drinking that much again. Worst countries so far. Fuck France, they have good bread but- unpopular opinion I guess- the Eifel Tower is ugly as fuck. You led me to believe it was some beautiful monument and its just a big ugly A shape. Fuck Canada even more, shit is coldand the only interesting thing I saw was a homeless man with no pants yelling ‘pants!’ in a mall. I know I live in the US but I’ll say it, Texas sucks. Alabama is worse. And New York, beautiful but there are rats the size of cats and also the people are pretentious. We should move to California or Hawaii. Preferably Hawaii. Also, was not fond of Egypt. Too much sand,” he says and Tony snorts.
“But you liked sandy beaches in California?” he asks.
Sam thinks on that for a second before shrugging. “I’ve made peace with my hypocrisy.”
Tony shakes his head. “Uh huh. And leave the Eifel Tower alone, its important even if it is a big A shape.”
“Nope, its ugly. So’s the Statue of Liberty. There, I said that too. So, where to next?” he asks and Tony shrugs.
“Pick a place, you always end up picking something better than me,” he says. Sam always ends up in some type of trouble too, though not usually on the scale Tony is used to. Its just that Sam is a curious bastard and thinks ‘no trespassing’ signs are more for show than not and Tony has to go along with him to make sure he’s fine, obviously. This must be how Rhodey feels following him around whenever hedoes dumb shit.
Sam looks out over the buildings and considers his options, tea in his hand for a long few moments before he speaks. “I didn’t expect to like you but you’re actually pretty awesome.”
That’s not what he expected but okay. “Thanks, I think.”
Sam lapses back into silence and Tony starts to comb over some of the notes Natasha sent about his chapters. “Do you think you made me up?” Sam asks, surprising him again and Tony looks up, finding Sam looking back, conflicted.
Good question but Tony has already thought of the answers. “Sure I did, but you’re more than what I created.” There’s things about Sam that he never anticipated, like him being some type of freak who’s a bird person and also he hatesmangos. Those were things Tony didn’t know about him until he showed up and claimed mangos taste the way old basements smell.
“Yeah, okay. Its just weird, hanging out with someone that created you,” Sam murmurs.
As if the reverse isn’t ten times weirder. “Sam, what I put on paper barely even resembles you anymore. I mean, in essence the guy I’m writingisyou, but people are always more complicated than writers can write. Doesn’t matter how much effort I put into my writing capturing the subtle pieces of who you are is beyond the words I can use to describe you.”
Sam’s lips tip up into a smile. “Guess I know why people read your writing. That’s probably the most beautiful declaration of love I’ve ever heard without using the word ‘love.’”
Tony feels a whole lot of things at that but what he says is a loud, “whomst?”
Sam throws his head back and laughs. “You know you have the emotional awareness of a walnut, right?”
“I do not! And I don’t, we I do, but you’re a character I created so-” he sighs, not able to put what he feels into words.
“Tony. According to everyone you know you barely leave your computer, always writing something new. Only thing that draws you away is your kid and now, apparently, me. Even your basic needs can’t manage to pull you away but I did. That’s a pretty clear statement,” Sam says, raising an eyebrow.
Yeah, because a characterfrom his bookshowed up on his doorstep. “I think if you had someone show up from yourstory complaining about killing his best friend and lover you’d also be occupied,” he says, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Yeah, except you didn’t stop writing so clearly I wasn’t thatmuch of a distraction to you. Face it Tony, you’re in love with me and I can’t blame you, I’m a good catch. Good looking, intelligent, probably the funniest person on this planet- I’m irresistible,” he says and Tony snorts, throwing a napkin at him.
“Well don’t get a big head about it,” he says and Sam laughs.
“So you agree?”
“That’s not what I said,” Tony mumbles.
“Yeah, we both know what isn’t said can be just as important,” Sam points out and yeah okay. Rude.
*
Ned frowns, toying with the Death Star he just finished building. “Let me get this straight- Sam is a character Tony made up and he showed up somehow in the real world and was mad that Tony killed off his best friend and lover and now they’re… dating?” he asks.
“Tentatively seeing if they’re compatible,” Peter corrects.
“So yes,” Ned says. “How is it that all the interesting stuff happens to you?” he asks and yeah he has no idea.
“Remember when you told me going on a date with Harry was a bad idea? Well turns out his company is into some shady things and I don’t know whatthey did to that spider but I think it did some stuff to me when it bit me,” he says and Ned frowns.
“Go to the hospital if you have a weird bite,” he says and Peter’s not sure that’ll work.
He stands up on the desk in his room and jumps, holding out his hand and allowing himself to hang from the ceiling from it. “I don’t think there’s a cure for being able to stick to walls,” he says.
Ned drops the Death Star he was holding, mouth hanging open. “You need to become a superhero now. Sticky Boy!” he says and Peter wrinkles his nose.
“Sticky Boy?”
“Yeah, your super hero name. Because you stick to things,” he says like Peter isn’t aware of that.
“That’s terrible Ned, no.”
Ned nods, “yeah, we can do better. What bug sticks to walls and stuff? Praying Mantis Man!” he says excitedly.
“Okay, you’re fired from naming,” Peter tells him.
*
“Hey guys, if there was a super hero who could like… see really well, and hear things, and kind of sense danger a little, and could stick to walls what would you name them?” Peter asks. One quarter of the people in this room are writers, he figures Tony or Sam will come up with something better than what Nedhad.
Sam looks away from the movie- Rocky Horror since he’s way behind on movies. “Spider Man, obviously.”