Sentinel

Tony makes an effort to find Bucky the next day so he could apologize. Usually Xanax, so Tony has heard, made you forget things that happened after you take it. He found that that only happened sometimes with him and depended somewhat on dosage. The higher to dosage the more he forgot but he also thinks that’s because of his resistance to the substance too.

When he finds Bucky he looks weary, like he isn’t sure how to handle the situation and Tony figured if someone threatened to wipe his mind he’d be pretty worried about being around them too. “I am so sorry,” he blurts out as soon as he gets close enough that only Bucky would hear him.

“For?” Bucky prompts.

Okay fair enough. “Threatening to use compulsion on you to wipe your mind of me being weird. I wouldn’t actually do it, and I’m shit at doing it on Xanax anyways so it wouldn’t have even worked so there was really nothing for you to worry about I was just-” he probably would have continued but Bucky cuts him off.

“You were on Xanax? Let me guess, you don’t have a prescription for that,” he states more than asks.

Tony looks at the ground, “no. It’s not a big deal though, I have it under-”

“Control,” Bucky finishes in an almost annoyed tone, “no you don’t, that’s what addicts say. Look, I don’t really have much of a choice but to report this,” Bucky tells him. He goes to try and step around Tony but Tony jumps in his way, surprised that he managed to rival the guardian in regards to reflexes. He’s seen how fast Rhodey can move and he wasn’t even done his training yet, the fact that he managed to get the jump on Bucky was more than a little impressive.

“Can I just explain?” he asks quickly.

“Do you really think that’ll help this situation? Because I probably should have reported this some time ago,” Bucky points out.

“Then why didn’t you?” Tony asks, always pushing his limits as far as they could go. There was a reason and he was going to exploit it. If he could, anyways.

His statement causes Bucky to pause for a moment though, thankfully, and he considers Tony’s question. “Because,” he says eventually, “you can’t force people to do things just because you think it’s good for them.”

“And realistically what has changed between when that first occurred and now to you? Because I can tell you that I won’t do anything I don’t want to and you’d know how good I am at hiding things considering Rhodey doesn’t know about most of this, even with the bond, which is honestly a miracle,” he says, babbling on without realizing what he just said until it was too late. Shit.

“You and Rhodey have a bond, that’s why he’s so in tune with you! I knew you two didn’t have a normal friendship,” Bucky says, excited that he figured it out. Well, Tony told him so he shouldn’t be so excited. He didn’t even do any sleuthing or whatever, Tony just gave the information up like a god damn idiot and Rhodey was going to skin him for this.

“Yeah, yeah, everyone already knows that,” Tony says flippantly, trying to play it off like that information wasn’t important. It was, bonds between guardians and Moroi were literally only ever found in stories. Until he and Rhodey figured out that they had a bond they both thought they were fictional like everyone else did. It had taken them an embarrassingly long time to piece everything together.

“Bullshit,” Bucky says, calling Tony’s bluff immediately, “a lot more people would be interested in you and Rhodey if they knew that. But Peggy suspects as much.”

True, at least Tony thought, but Rhodey never let anything slip and she was mostly on a mission to avoid Tony. Why she didn’t also avoid his mom he had no idea, but they had been good friends before. Maybe he was missing something that kept them from drifting apart after she technically killed Maria’s husband. “It’s old news,” Tony says, shrugging like this was meaningless. It’s a tactic he knew wasn’t working but he had to try something for Rhodey’s sake. He didn’t want people poking and prodding at Rhodey like he was some kind of science experiment. They’d all ask what he can do and to be honest even he and Tony didn’t know the extent of their bond or even why it formed to begin with.

“No, it isn’t, or Peggy wouldn’t be watching Rhodey like she was trying to figure out what kind of connection he had to you. Unless you used compulsion on her to get her to forget and she’s trying to get her memories back…” Bucky murmurs, clearly thinking he was onto something with that.

“Jesus Christ, I didn’t use compulsion on Peggy to make her forget anything, what the hell kind of person do you think I am? People don’t know.” Rhodey was going to kick his ass for telling someone about this… hell, if he didn’t already know Tony would be shocked. Half the time he knew about the things Tony did before Tony and the other half of the time he knew something happened but he didn’t know what.

“You outright admitted to using compulsion on the entire school to get them to stop talking about Howard and you threatened to use it on me, forgive me for thinking you used compulsion on Peggy,” Bucky says sarcastically.

“Of course I used compulsion on the whole school to get them to shut up about Howard! I’ve spent my entire life in that piece of shit’s shadow, always having to live up to the ridiculous expectations everyone put on me because they all think that I’m just like him! Well I’m not, and I wasn’t going to live in his shadow with his whole new set of expectations either. He’s dead and I am tired of being Howard Stark’s son instead of Tony Stark. I just wanted to live a life where people judged me based on my actions, not anyone else’s. Is that so much to ask?” he asks softly, looking away and blinking away the unexpected tears in his eyes angrily.

Besides, it was hardly like people didn’t have reasons to hate him for being him. They did given that he got rather uh… snappy sometimes for no real reason and even he knew it. There were lots of reasons people could hate him that had nothing to do with Howard, and there were probably a couple reasons that people would like him that weren’t his family or money too. So he was tired of living in Howard’s shadow, who wouldn’t be? And then the asshole went and had to kill someone to turn Strigoi and ruin Tony’s life further. As if he hadn’t done enough to him already.

Bucky sighs, “I guess we all have things we’d rather people forgot about. Doesn’t mean you should have actually made them all forget though,” he says, trying to find some kind of middle ground here.

“I didn’t make them outright forget, I just made them leave me alone and stop trying to spread stupid rumors about me being Strigoi because I hate church. I’m an atheist.” And everyone knew that long before his father off and ruined Tony’s life more.

Unexpectedly the comment makes Bucky laugh, throwing Tony off because he still thought he was trying to battle it out with Bucky for his rights to privacy. “Sorry, that’s not funny… actually that’s hilarious but I can see why you don’t think it’s funny,” he says, snickering at Tony.

He relaxes a little and laughs, “I’d laugh if it wasn’t me,” he admits. It was kind of funny if he thought about it objectively.

They sort of sit there in silence while Tony tries to think up ways to get Bucky from telling some kind of authority figure about his problems when Bucky breaks the silence.

“Look, I know better than most how stubborn people can be when they have problems. But you need to talk to someone about what’s going on with you, whatever that something is. So if you talk to someone I won’t say anything. Deal?” he asks.

Tony considers it for a long moment before he decides that Bucky didn’t tell him to talk to a teacher, she said to talk to someone. Which meant he was talking to Rhodey, obviously. “Yeah, alright,” he agrees and Bucky looks relieved.

“Good, because you really do need the help, you know that right?” he asks, looking genuinely concerned.

“Why do you even care?” Tony asks. It wasn’t like he needed to.

“Because you’re smart, and funny, and passionate, and a half a dozen other things that shouldn’t go to waste because you’re too pigheaded to deal with your problems. So please talk to someone, ease my mind a little,” Bucky tells him, offering him a small smile.

Tony smiles back just a little because it was nice to feel like someone cared about him. Usually he felt rather alone even if he knew he wasn’t. If no one else was there Rhodey always would be and Tony knew he’d never give up on him, even if he probably should. He just had a hard time convincing himself that was really true.

*

Rhodey knew something was off with Tony, of course he did, the bond let him know how Tony felt pretty much all the time. But Tony liked his privacy and Rhodey didn’t like to pry to be truthful. He knew if Tony needed him he’d come to him, or at least that’s what he thought until Tony did come to him.

“You do what?” Rhodey asks, shocked when Tony drops several large pieces of information on him at once.

Tony shifts uncomfortably, “I um, don’t really sleep much,” he starts and Rhodey rolls his eyes.

“I knew that Tones, sometimes you wake me up if you’re doing something particularly stupid and you get stressed out. I meant the rest of what you just said.” He’s always known Tony was resourceful, sneaky. He used to get into all kinds of shenanigans with Tony that he probably shouldn’t have been in and they rarely got caught for it. He just never expected that Tony would use that against him for some reason even though it should have occurred to him.

He lets Tony have a moment to himself, knowing that he needed it because apparently he wasn’t high at the moment. Or maybe he could feel Tony’s emotions through the bond anyways, who even knew at this point? “I.. I just don’t want to bother you with my shit Rhodey. So sometimes I drink a little, or take something. It’s fine, really,” Tony says, trying to act like it actually was fine.

Apparently he forgot that unlike everyone else Rhodey could actually feel what was happening in his mind. “One, you aren’t bothering me. At all. And two, this is not fine Tony, this is a big deal and you need to talk to someone who is a trained professional. I’m qualified to kill stuff, not to be a mental health provider,” he points out. And even then his qualifications on killing Strigoi was questionable. He still remembered Howard, maybe a little too vividly and Tony’s own nightmares didn’t help, and it made him feel far less confident in his abilities. What if the next Strigoi he had to deal with batted him away just as easily? Older Strigoi, especially those that drank a lot of Moroi blood, were far stronger than Howard had been and probably more gifted at fighting too. If that were the case he’d kill Tony with his incompetence… He drops the thought because right now it wasn’t necessary, right now he needed to deal with Tony.

“Could we not?” Tony all but whines. “I told you so I didn’t have to do that,” he mumbles.

Rhodey sighs and sits back in his seat, contemplating for a moment. “I know you don’t want to talk to someone but come on Tony, you know this isn’t good for you and there’s only so much I can do.” Especially if Tony was purposefully going out of his ways to make sure Rhodey didn’t notice his moods were off but he doesn’t say that quite yet.

“Can’t I just… I don’t know, not do that? I’ll talk to you,” he says.

“Will you?” he asks seriously, “because you went out and found a bunch of different ways to keep me out to specifically avoid that. What about Pepper? Does she know about any of this?” he asks. It’s selfish, he knows, to hope the answer is ‘no’ because Tony needs to be talking about things to someone but he also wanted to be the first someone he talked to. He dismisses the selfish thoughts and focuses on Tony, who looked intent on not looking at him.

“No,” he mumbles, “Pepper doesn’t know. I didn’t say anything to you because I’m already in your head and stuff, that’s got to be annoying enough to deal with so I didn’t want to add to it.”

That wasn’t an admission that he’d talk to Rhodey, he notices. “Tony, look at me,” he tells him. Tony doesn’t comply right away but eventually he does and Rhodey kicks himself in the ass for not noticing how tired Tony looks. But, if he felt like cutting himself slack, he probably thought Tony needed to see a feeder. Sleep deprivation and needing blood looked about the same on Moroi features. It was Dhampirs that were easier to read that way considering they didn’t need blood so sleep deprived it was.

“Listen carefully- you aren’t bothering me in any way if you talk to me. Yes, sometimes the bond is annoying when I slip into your head but I don’t want you doing drugs to keep me out, Tony, Jesus. To be honest I get more annoyed at your mental commentary at my classmates’ fighting techniques than I do when I accidentally fall into your head. Neither one of us can help me ending up in your head but you could at least keep your snarky feelings to yourself and I know you’re projecting them.” It was probably one of the only times he projected his feelings at Rhodey and it was simultaneously amusing and annoying.

“Hey, I’m just trying to keep you entertained,” Tony says in his own defense.

“Well you do give me a good lesson in fighting while distracted. Might come in handy one day,” he says honestly. He used to be bad at it, back when the bond was first forming. Tony’s feelings were all over the place and they were so intense and he had no clue how to deal with them. Now he was pretty good at keeping an eye on Tony’s feelings and the situation that was happening in front of him. Or at least he thought he was but now he wasn’t so sure anymore.

Tony snorts, “always guardian business with you. Don’t you ever get… I don’t know, resentful of me? I kind of ruined your life,” Tony says softly.

He’s looking away again and Rhodey frowns, “how the hell did you even get to that conclusion? And no, I don’t resent you. Pepper might though, she actually has to work for her good grades.” It always annoyed her that Tony never had to try to get the grades he did but she had to work pretty hard for her grades. To add insult to injury she was usually behind Tony for highest grades too even if it wasn’t by much.

The comment does it’s job and Tony laughs a little, relaxing just enough both physically and mentally. “Yeah, she kind of does but she’s a good sport about it. But with you though, you had a life before Howard and all of that mess, you were carefree and so much less… serious and focused all the time. Don’t you ever miss that? It’s only gone because of me.”

Rhodey rolls his eyes, “I was childish and stupid, I needed to grow up and it wasn’t you who took that away that was Howard. And… and to be honest I’m grateful to him for it. Not that I’d ever wish for that to happen again, for your sake, but I needed to let go of all that childishness if I was ever going to be a decent guardian. I needed to learn to protect you and not just from getting into trouble for doing stupid things I half encouraged you into. And no, I don’t miss that. I don’t miss it because I know that in the end the changes I’ve made will better protect you later and that’s all that matters to me,” he says honestly.

From birth he’d had it drilled into his head that Moroi come first- and Dhampirs kind of depended on them to continue existing. And then he met Tony in kindergarten and Justin Hammer stole some of his crackers and Tony waged a war that Rhodey somehow got caught up in and they were best friends ever since. Especially after Tony called their first grade teacher a Nazi for giving Rhodey trouble for not doing his homework. That’s when he knew he was in it for the long haul. Tony always covered for him if they were into trouble, always taking the heat even if it was Rhodey who did whatever Tony was getting into trouble for. Like the time he broke that million dollar vase that apparently belonged to some idiot Royal who was at the school to visit. Tony took the blame, leaving Rhodey out of his story entirely.

Tony might think that Rhodey was giving him too much but he gave Rhodey a lot too. There were plenty of things Rhodey would have never been able to do without Tony, and he probably would have been kicked out of school ten times over if Tony didn’t always cover for him. So it was only fair that he gave Tony something back for all of that.

“I don’t know why you care about me so much,” Tony mumbles.

“Because you’re my best friend,” Rhodey says, “and because you’ve always been there for me. Always.”

Tony snorts, “name one time,” he says.

“That time I stole a stake from the guardian training room and would have been expelled on the spot immediately for it and you took the blame,” Rhodey says without hesitating. Tony had sweetened the deal but playing with it too and Rhodey hadn’t had to fake looking terrified that Tony would stab himself with the damn thing, making him look innocent and Tony guilty. Tony was good at that, making it look like he did whatever it was that Rhodey should have been getting in trouble for. Never once has a teacher questioned whether or not Rhodey was really to blame even if he sometimes got in trouble along side Tony for being semi involved in his shenanigans.

“That was one time,” Tony argues.

“Okay fine, there was that vase incident, all those cool ski trips we went on over Christmas breaks, that time you punched Ivan Vankov for calling my mom a blood whore even though he tried to kill you afterwards and I had to save your ass. Also there was that time I stayed up all night on a Sunday to get drunk instead of studying and you gave me the answers our math test Monday. I could go on for awhile actually, do you really want a list?” he asks. Because he’d give Tony one if it made him feel better.

Tony smiles a little, “do you really feel like I actually do stuff for you? Because I always feel like you’re doing all the giving and I’m doing all the taking.”

“Of course I do, and you aren’t doing all the taking. You do stuff for Pepper and I all the time,” Rhodey says.

“Name one thing I’ve ever done to Pepper aside from annoy her?” Tony says.

“You gave her study tips that actually improved her grades quite a bit. She’ll be thankful to you forever for that,” Rhodey points out. Tony looks annoyed that he had an example that fast but sighs, “okay fine, maybe I do some things for you.”

But it isn’t enough hangs heavily in the air but Tony only thinks it- Rhodey can feel it.

“Promise me you’ll talk to me, alright?” Rhodey asks. If he did then maybe he could talk Tony into getting some actual help.

Tony heaves a heavy sigh, purposefully being dramatic, but he agrees. It was a relief to Rhodey because Tony was all kinds of sneaky and if he agreed to talk to him that was at least a step forward in not having him use that sneakiness to his advantage to purposefully hide things from him. He does walk over to Tony and hug him though, tightly, because he needed Tony to know that he cared about him and not just because he was supposed to care about Moroi as a species. Tony hugs him back, burying his face in Rhodey’s chest. He can feel Tony taking actual comfort in the touch and he’s happy for it. Maybe it would teach Tony that Rhodey really did care about him even if he didn’t know it.