Guilt For Dreaming

Chapter 7: Because You’re Young

Tony sighed angrily as he glared at his red-rimmed eyes in the mirror; he revised his previous thought about the worst thing about being back in time. His pop culture references were all 40 years out of date – in the wrong direction! Everyone else was catching up with him! (As usual.) He should not be the one bending over backwards here. Everyone else was just slow. He wasn’t the problem. He wasn’t.

 Star Wars hadn’t even happened yet. Kirk and McCoy were Star Trek, not Picard and Riker, or Sisko and Bashir, or even dare he say it Archer and T’Pol.  (Or Taggart and Lazarus.) Not to mention that revealing his appreciation for the “geeky” sci-fi show had earned him both derision from the non-nerds, whilst his apparent lack of knowledge about the show had earned him scorn from the geeks.

He’d gotten blank looks for just about every reference he’d brought up, Blade Runner, and Stargate, Breaking Bad, Back to the Future, Bronies. Hell, even good old Dungeons and Dragons was still too obscure for most of the dweebs let alone the rest of his so-called schoolmates. His magic missile joke had sailed right over the collective heads of the Krelboynes, though that was probably a good thing in hindsight. (The joke had been the exact kind of rude that would make Cap’s all too familiar glare make an appearance.)

It wasn’t just the cultural references, his entire vernacular was off, and he was using slang that didn’t exist yet. Phrases and colloquialisms, syntax and jargon. Tony hadn’t noticed the problem at the mansion, the Jarvises were both too polite (or should that be too out of touch with pop culture) to say anything about it and they were the only real company he’d had there.

Ben was trying his best to subtly coach him, but… Tony felt like tearing his hair out, every attempt he’d made to connect with his classmates was rebuffed with puzzled, confused and worst of all disdainful looks. He’d dealt with worse; he’d been swimming with corporate sharks for most of his life. He’d had the press sharks eating out of the palm of his hand long before he’d hit adulthood. He could deal with a bunch of school children, for chrisakes he was a 40-something year old man, he was above all of this.

Somehow his only friends at the whole damned school were Justin of all people, Mr Reid and Ben. Tony and Reid spent more time sharing silences than anything else, and as for Ben. Well, Tony only saw the older (younger? Somehow Tony didn’t think the other man was younger than him, even taking into account his own true age) man twice a week. Ben’s vernacular and frames of reference were as bizarre as his own, only the older man did a far better job of hiding it - Ben only seemed to let the phrases slip in Tony’s company. Tony was clever enough to spot that the older man was still trying to teach him how to blend in as he did.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t working quickly enough, kid-him hadn’t exactly had much exposure to pop-culture the first time around, not at this age.

The only kid who ever attempted to stick up for him was Justin, and whilst Tony was more than grateful, Justin wasn’t exactly winning any popularity contests either. Tony almost wished that Justin would stop, the poor kid was just painting a target on his own back, and Tony still hadn’t quite managed to get over the old irrational hatred, he knew he wasn’t being much of a friend in return. However, the other boy was so affection starved that he didn’t seem to notice, Tony was feeling a building sense of guilt there, he owed the other boy far more than what he felt able to give him. Tony knew he wasn’t giving enough back. And yet somehow H-Justin seemed content to take what he could give. The situation had left him feeling distinctly uncomfortable.

Painfully, and several years too late Tony was finally empathetic of just what Carol had been going through, when that damned implant of hers had been interacting in strange and unpleasant ways with the Kree DNA running through her blood; he felt strangely detached from everything and everyone. His attempts at meaningful interaction with other people never quite connecting, like two different operating systems trying and failing to communicate.

Of course, Tiberius Fucking Stone hadn’t helped at all, he’d started the whole thing by patronisingly sneering at Tony in a voice perfectly pitched to carry across the entire canteen. Soon they’d gained a jostling crowd of snotty jeering schoolboys all of them asking Tony if he’d ever seen or heard this film or that artist.

Tony had tried not to rise to the bait of course, insofar as that was possible as the central focus of a baying group of vindictive boys. He’d squared his shoulders, straightened his spine and flashed his very best press grin.

Unfortunately, there was no intimidating this crowd into backing down. Not with Ty there, goading things on from the background. Tiberius had encouraged the mob, riling them up into a blood hungry frenzy without once lifting a finger and implicating himself. He’d always been good at that. Tony had just never spotted it until it was too late.

Tony hadn’t thrown the first punch, Ben and Ana had taught him better than that, he’d learnt the value of discretion. Besides even with his zappy-eveners he’d still felt hesitant to act against children as young as this prepubescent lot were. Tony had plenty of ways to defend himself from a mob that damn near filled the entire canteen, but nothing he felt happy to use against children that were as determined as this group without resorting to moves that were designed to maim. This was no test-the-new-boy initiation like the half-hearted mob he’d fended off on his first day.

Tony had once encouraged Bruce Banner to strut. He appreciated the irony now, a terrible privilege indeed.

Unfortunately, Justin had provided the spark that set the whole stinking tinder keg ablaze, the smaller boy had pushed his way through the jeering crowd of children and tried to protect Tony.

Tony had been so caught up in the feelings of guilt and shame that he hadn’t even seen who’d hit Justin, only that the younger boy was suddenly falling into a limp sprawl at his feet blood streaming from his nose.

Tony had seen red at that, the sight of the small child lying so still triggering his protective streak. He’d lashed out at the next person who raised their fists to him, the Wushu instinctive and automatic in a way he hadn’t managed since he’d reverted to pipsqueak proportions.

Despite the fact that he’d apparently taken out five of the mob in that first moment he’d been overwhelmed by the sheer number of children and the fact that he was trying not to hurt anyone too seriously. It was only D’Eath’s timely arrival that saved him from a prolonged beating, as it was Tony’s right eye was already swollen and beginning to purple impressively.

The war veteran had taken one icy look at the mob and in a no-nonsense manner hauled the scrum of children away from the pair at the epicentre of the chaos with no apparent effort. Tony had stared up at the man’s expression of cool anger from his prone position on the floor heart sinking as potential repercussions started whizzing through his head.

If Howard found out about this he was done for.

D’Eath had hauled both Justin and Tony off towards Mrs Kowalski’s office, icy silence echoing chilly behind him as he frogmarched the pair of them through the corridors of the school.

To Tony’s surprise Leekie had intervened on his behalf intercepting D’Eath’s march through the corridors with a gentle reprimand to the taciturn man. Tony hadn’t remembered the school taking such an understanding stance on bullying before, but well, he supposed there had to be some benefits to being a veritable teacher’s pet even if said teacher was herself subject to malicious gossip from her own so-called peers.

Leekie had insisted upon ushering Justin off to the nurse’s office and Tony couldn’t help the feeling of surprised relief that had shot through him. Tony had honestly thought that both he and Justin were about to be punished severely for an incident that they hadn’t even started, however Leekie had pleasantly surprised him by rescuing the only innocent in the whole stinking affair.

Leekie had deposited Tony with Mrs Kowalski before continuing on his way with Justin, the younger boy had shot Tony a commiserating look before allowing himself to be towed away. Tony had been worried about Justin, the sight of the younger boy on the floor with blood streaming from his nose still at the forefront of his mind despite the way that the other boy was obviously ok enough to shoot Tony a look of mute, if bloody, camaraderie.

Leaving the relative privacy of the bathroom next to Kowalski’s office, grateful beyond measure for that small act of humanity, Tony squared his shoulders and went to face the music. Mrs Kowalski looked down at Tony with an unconvincing mix of sternness and nervousness. It left Tony wondering how on earth she’d ever managed anything disciplinary when he could see straight through her masks.

Then again, he supposed she’d had the advantage of childhood on her side, Tony remembered not quite realising that the teachers weren’t infallible superhumans until he was in his last year at the school.

“Antho-“

Just as she cut across his reminiscence Tony mulishly interrupted her misuse of his name, 

“It’s Tony.”

“Tony dear.” Mrs Kowalski’s tone was alarmingly firm, she sighed wearily, “What are we going to do with you?”

Tony gaped at her, what? How was this in any way his fault?

“Mr Leekie and I have been worried about your lack of interaction with the other students for a while now, and now we find out that you’ve been fighting with your roommate? How long has this been going on for?”

Tony opened his mouth to correct her but she kept going,

“Honestly Tony, what are we going to do with you?” Her tired repetition alarmed him, “I mean, your grades are excellent, but that still doesn’t excus-“

Fortunately for Tony’s sanity Leekie chose that moment to poke his head around the door,

“Is young Mr Stark alright?”

“Wha-?”

“That was quite a nasty situation Mr D’Eath broke up.” Leekie bulldozed his way into the conversation completely oblivious to the thick atmosphere that had been building in his absence, “The poor man was furious enough with the situation that he had to take himself away from the students before he did something unforgivable to them.”

“I’m sorry – wha?”

With an annoyed flick of his comb over out of his eyes, Leekie blinked.

“Did no one tell you?”

At Mrs Kowalski’s confused look, Leekie frowned at both her and Tony in consternation, for once completely ignoring the long strands of hair that escaped down into his eyes. Eyes searching, Leekie began his explanation,

“Mr D’Eath rescued young Messrs Stark and Hammer from a nasty situation in the canteen. It seems their age-mates haven’t taken too kindly to this pair outshining them academically. I left Mr Smythe and Ms Ramesh in charge of the perpetrators given that they mostly appeared to come from their classes.”

Leekie sighed wholeheartedly,

“It’s a mess Evelyn, most of our youngest students were involved, including the majority of the gifted class. I’m afraid I don’t know what disciplinary measures we’ll need to suitably punish them.”

Mrs Kowalski visibly re-evaluated Tony,

“Tony…” she looked down at her paperwork, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have assumed.”

Leekie shot Mrs Kowalski a sharp look at that admission, eyes darting between the two of them, the considering expression looked strange on the normally affable man’s face.

“Evie – you know we shouldn’t judge the students by their parents’ actions…” Leekie trailed off, giving Tony the side-eye before continuing in his too pleasant speaking-to-children-tone, “Tony why don’t you wait outside for a moment? I’ll just be a minute.”

Mrs Kowalski passed Tony off onto Weepy Leekie with visible relief, Leekie looked concerned in a way that had Tony struggling not to squirm. Even Leekie’s comb-over of unconvincing floppiness contrived to look apprehensive.

Tony caught a brief snippet of, “Evie I know how you feel about Howard Stark but that warmonger is not to blame for Pete D’Eath’s shellshock and you know -” before the door was gently closed in his face.

Tony glared up at the sign proclaiming the room the Principal’s Office, annoyance at this whole wretched situation peaking now that the building storm of panic had abated, Tony ended up childishly kicking out at one of the chairs in the corridor that served as a mini-waiting room of sorts. He stubbed his toe, and ended up quietly hugging his sore foot. Whatever Leekie and Evie Kowalski were talking about in there it was obviously taking some time, and Tony was in no mood to attempt to snoop despite the fact that he’d obviously gain some useful leverage if he did.

Despite the logical, rational side of himself pointing out that the reason the other children had taken against him so strongly was almost certainly a seething mixture of jealousy and fear of difference, Tony couldn’t help but wonder just what it was that the other children found so hateful about him.

The hissed taunts of “Tiny Tony” in both the corridors and his classes wasn’t helping matters. As insults went he’d had worse, far worse. The childish attempt at a derisive nickname probably not even breaching the Top 100 list of bad things he’d been called in the press, and by his friends, over the years. But still. It hurt somewhere deep inside, where the iron hadn’t yet managed to seep in and harden - the knowledge that even here in this brave new world, that he was forever destined to be a social pariah. Somehow the other children could sense the corrupted taint of a murderer, and traitor, that hung around him like a pall. A miasma of all of the worst things he’d ever done, subtly warning them off.

After what felt like an absolute lifetime, but was probably no longer than 20 minutes of sitting stewing in his own company Leekie emerged from Mrs Kowalski’s office looking unaccountably weary for reasons that Tony couldn’t be bothered trying to fathom. Not after the utter shite his day so far had been.

“Tony, my dear boy” Tony internally bristled, the phrase bringing up unwanted memories of Obie and all that that entailed, “I… I wanted to apologise for any confusion that occurred earlier. …And, I, that is to say…” Leekie paused uncomfortably as if marshalling his thoughts, “Myself and several other members of staff have noticed.” Leekie squatted down at Tony’s level, shooting him a caring expression before all too casually examining Tony’s hands, “You often have bruised and torn knuckles. As if you’ve been fighting. Now I’ve cautioned them to leave you be, we’ve had no complaints of fighting, and nothing from other students to imply that you’re the instigator here. But well. We’re all worried about you.”

Tony internally scoffed, who had noticed? Who had betrayed him? Certainly, Mrs Kowalski hadn’t found anything alarming about the situation.

It was typical, people seeking to help well after the damage had already been done. If anything, Ty had unwittingly done Tony a massive favour. Tony had honestly thought that he and Ben were being discrete enough. Apparently not. Now at least Tony had an all too believable explanation for whatever accidents occurred in his classes with Ben, hopefully Tony would be able to persuade the older man to stop holding back. Apart from one memorable incident that had resulted in a split lip Tony knew that Ben had been careful to limit his hits to areas that wouldn’t easily show.

Up until the past couple of weeks the scuffed knuckles would have been genuinely difficult to explain away. How on earth was he supposed to say that he’d earnt them by viciously sparring with a fully-grown man who was only supposed to be teaching him the basics of how to elbow a groin and run?

Still, the renewed need to be careful was annoying, and all Ty’s fault. This whole situation was ridiculous, and had given the irritating comb-overed man an excuse to intervene, the idiot man had obviously been waiting for a reason. Tony’s defensive scowl hardened, making Leekie lean back in consternation, his independently aware hair yet again flopping into his face.

Tony was dreading the conversation he’d have to have with Ben, he hoped that it wouldn’t mean that the other man would insist on holding back on him even more… But…

Tony glared up at Leekie as the man wisely backed off, allowing his annoyance to leech into his expression. He didn’t quite realise it, but the expression combined with his round cherubic face made him look like a toddler on the verge of a tantrum.

Leekie visibly steeled himself for the upcoming confrontation and Tony made a concerted effort to reign his glare back in, he didn’t want to start this difficult topic of conversation off on even more of a back foot than he already had.

Tony wasn’t 100% sure if he managed to pull-off the calm expression he was aiming for, but the attempt obviously assured Leekie that he wasn’t about to start something in the corridor,

“I’d rather not talk about it.”

Tony deflated immediately. That wasn’t the sentence he’d been planning, and it came out a lot more sulkily than he’d intended, but if anything, Leekie seemed to find this reassuring. Tony genuinely didn’t want to know what the other man had been assuming about his home life if he found Tony’s rather idiosyncratic responses to people caring about him as a positive sign. Tony was well aware that he wasn’t the best judge of people that claimed to care; he’d never been able to reliably parse what the actual motive behind the offer was supposed to be.

Leekie sighed and rubbed at his eyes, for once nothing of the annoying over-earnestness showing in his actions.

“Well, you know we’re all here for you if you want to talk. Right Tony?”

Tony leaned back, glaring up at Leekie suspiciously, Leekie huffed out another sigh, looking far older than his years in that moment,

“You do know we’ll believe whatever it is you have to tell us, don’t you?”

Puzzled, Tony’s response was an automatic,

“Ye-es?”

Leekie looked sad, the fine lines around his eyes harsh in that moment. He surprised Tony in that moment by seemingly deciding to drop it.

“We’re all here for you Tony, whenever you decide you want to talk…”

Sighing yet again, Leekie began to walk towards his office, looking back over his shoulder to make sure that Tony was following him.

“You’ll be pleased to know that young Mister Hammer is fine, his nose was badly bruised but nothing that the nurse couldn’t fix-up.”

Tone suddenly too bright, in a way that instantly made Tony suspicious Leekie continued,

“Let’s get you something fun to play with before I walk you to your next class, ey?”

Tony thanked his not so lucky stars for this blessing in disguise, if Leekie was willing to take Tony’s awkwardness in his own skin at face-value, attributing his slightly off reactions to everything around him to nearly non-existent bullying, well, Tony wasn’t about to disabuse him of that notion any time soon. Tony was having a difficult time of it attempting to blend in, he might as well take advantage of every bit of help he could get – even if it was from as unlikely a source as Ty fucking Stone. Tony had a feeling that Ben would approve of such underhanded tactics. He felt a sudden icy burst of homesickness for a moment -  FRIDAY would have been the first to sassily point out that Tony needed to rely on them.

~~~~~~~

Edwin hurried towards the phone in the hallway, he’d been carrying out some belated housekeeping in a bid to keep his mind off of Ana’s latest round of exploratory surgery. Maria, and even Howard had insisted that he take all the time he needed, but he needed to keep himself busy. Left to the quiet of the empty home he’d made with Ana he was liable to drive himself mad. Indeed, Ana, who knew him best had insisted that he do something with his time other than fretting over her.

Whilst he knew the doctors were medical professionals who were far more likely to have an idea of what was wrong than he did, Edwin was becoming more and more tempted to use the ghastly list of possible illnesses that young Tony had so naively put together for Ana. Edwin hadn’t shown the rather grim list to Ana, the horribly relevant thing far too morbid for his tastes, the note had… angered him, much to his shame, despite the fact that young Tony had obviously had the best of intentions when he’d put the rather disturbing worse-case-scenario thing together.

If his charge wasn’t so very young Edwin had to admit that he would have been liable to do something rash about the contents of the letter. The hateful thing read like a ghoulish wish list of possible diagnoses. Edwin couldn’t possibly judge whether young Tony’s arguments were valid or not, even after he’d calmed down the roiling storm of emotions that the poor child’s well-intentioned missive had awakened. Edwin was too close to events to have any sort of perspective on them, and there was no way that he’d risk Ana’s health by putting the doctors under the impression that he was a hypochondriac making a big fuss over nothing.

However, for all of Edwin’s misdirected anger at the note, he dearly wished that the numerous medical professionals had something more to say to Ana and himself than the numerous pretty but altogether useless methods of dressing up “We don’t know what’s wrong” that they’d received so far.

The Starks had been very kind about everything, even Howard had been very good about the whole painful situation - especially once Ana had decided that she didn’t want Edwin there with her whilst Edwin had been too exhausted to argue the point with her. He’d dragged himself back to the cottage just off the mansion grounds, the guilt for allowing his darling wife to see just how much this situation was affecting him was nearly crippling. Howard had found him then, the other man just coming back from an appointment of his own. Edwin had caught a rare flash of the man Howard had once been, the man that had earnt his loyalty all those decades ago. Howard had dragged him back to the rarely used games room, and they’d gotten through a bottle of good brandy together that evening (Howard well aware of Edwin’s aversion to whisky no matter how smooth), as Edwin unloaded all of his frustrations.

Howard had merely sat back in the leather armchair and listened. Edwin had forgotten how good a listener the man could be when he wanted to. (There was a reason Howard had been such a prodigious lover, much to Edwin’s chagrin.) The next day, feeling surprisingly chipper despite the amount of alcohol he had consumed, with Howard’s reassurances that his place at Howard’s side was assured ringing in his ears, Edwin had soldiered on - it wouldn’t do to let things slide here too.

Edwin shook himself out of his reverie. A vaguely familiar but unknown female simper sounded on the other end of the line interrupting the somewhat dark turn his thoughts had taken, he’d been half expecting some bad news from the hospital,

“Hello? Is Mr Stark there please?”

Edwin answered cautiously, unsure what the mystery caller wanted,

“May I ask who’s calling?”

“Oh, yes sorry. It’s Mrs Kowalski, Principal of Westchester Academy for Privileged Boys, it’s about one of our students.” The simper got firmer, “Is Mr Stark there please?”

Relief that it wasn’t the hospital and guilt sung through his veins. Beyond trying desperately not to ruminate on the inadvertent hurt that Tony had caused with that awful letter Edwin honestly hadn’t given the dear boy a second thought in the wake of Ana’s problems. Realising that he’d been silent for just a fraction too long Edwin hastily replied,

“Oh. I’m afraid Mr Stark is in New York on business at the moment. May I take a message? It’s Edwin Jarvis - I assure you that I’ve heard it all before if you’re worried about revealing things to someone who isn’t a parent.”

Mrs Kowalski’s voice on the other end of the line was hesitant,

“Mr …Jarvis, is it?”

Edwin did his utmost to sound both competent and confident,

“Yes, that’s me.”

“The gentleman who dropped Anth- Tony off at the school?”

“Yes, still me.”

“Ah, perhaps it is better that I tell you than Mr Stark after all. I remember you dropping his son off with us.” A momentary pause before the woman muttered, seemingly to herself, “If the man couldn’t even find it in himself to drop off his own son, I very much doubt he’d care enough to do anything about this situation.”

Edwin wryly wondered if Mrs Kowalski had forgotten just who was on the other end of the line before dismissing the notion of pointing out that he was under Mr Stark’s employ. It wouldn’t be helpful to remind the woman of his position and make her clam up on him. Though he had to wonder just what Howard had done to the woman that she sounded so very angry at the man, as far as Edwin was aware she wasn’t amongst his employer’s many conquests. He didn’t think he remembered handing over a silver bracelet in exchange for a slap from her, besides she really wasn’t Howard’s usual type.

Dragging his thoughts back onto the matter at hand for what felt like the umpteenth time that day Edwin decided that he should forestall this rant about his employer’s virtues or lack thereof before it gained a momentum of its own,

“Was there anything in particular that you wanted to talk about?”

His gentle interruption seemed to embarrass the speaker on the other end of the line, there was a loud shaky hiss of an indrawn breath, making Edwin’s heart sink, before,

“My - my apologies Mr Jarvis. Um, young Tony was involved in an incident at lunchtime today and well, it’s standard policy to infor-“

“What!?” the panic was immediate and strong, “What happened? What kind of incident, is Tony alright? Why wasn’t I informed earlier?”

“Mr Jarvis. Mr Jarvis! Please, calm down. Tony is, well, he’s alright – physically at least.”

Taking a calming breath Edwin managed to repeat in what he thought was a passably calm tone,

“What happened Mrs Kowalski?”

“There was an attempt at bullying in the canteen Mr Jarvis, Tony and one of our other boys were the intended victims. One of our teachers Mr D’Eath managed to break it up before anything happened to Tony at least.” In an undertone, Mrs Kowalski muttered to herself, “I’m dreading the phone call I need to make to young Justin’s parents.”

Edwin sighed heavily into the receiver,

“I see.”

“I’m very sorry to have to inform you about this Mr Jarvis.”

In the privacy of his own head Edwin thought to himself, ‘I bet you are.’ Before shaking himself and getting back down to the business of caring for his young charge.

“Am I to understand that this is the first incident of this type that I should be aware of?”

“Uh – yes. That is to say we were beginning to worry that Tony was fighting with his roommate, several members of staff had noticed that he seems to have scuffed knuckles rather a lot. But… Well, sadly this incident provides ample explanation for what’s been happening.”

Edwin felt as though his heart were in his throat, he’d been so wrapped up in his own not inconsiderable problems that he’d utterly failed in his promise to keep a careful eye out for his charge, for Tony. Ana would have his hide if she found out how lax he’d been in his duty of care.

He wrapped the conversation up quickly after that, unwilling to show this woman just how rattled the news had him, allowing her to hang-up with the impression that his shortness with her was due to anger rather than his burning desire to drive to the school at full speed to embrace Tony in a hug whilst muttering apologies in his ear.

No doubt such actions would embarrass the dear boy enormously, especially the newly reticent version of his charge that Edwin had been slowly getting to know the previous summer.

Edwin busied himself by re-educating the frankly incompetent staff that Howard insisted on employing about the proper upkeep of a large household. He didn’t fail to notice the relieved looks on several faces by the time his lecture wound down, the fools deserved it, they still hadn’t mastered the proper discretion required in a household of this type.

About an hour after the frankly alarming phone call came through Edwin realised that he’d been directing his anger at the wrong people. Ben had promised to keep Edwin informed of anything and everything that he thought Edwin would want to know about the goings-on at the school.

Ben’s biweekly phone calls had been cheery and, in hindsight, all too brief. Edwin wondered why on earth the other man hadn’t deemed fit to inform him that his charge was being bullied at this place that was supposed to be a haven for children like young Tony; bright, precocious and the unfortunate offspring of parents who made remarkably lucrative targets to extortionists the world over.

Whilst this wasn’t quite at the terrifying level of unpleasant incident that Edwin had specifically asked Ben to keep an eye out for Edwin was nonetheless angry at his old friend. Ben should have known better than to keep something like this from him dammit. Had his trust in the man been misplaced?

~~~~~~~

Justin pranced into their shared room that evening with a huge grin on his bruised face, Tony was relieved. He’d missed the boy at dinner that evening and had been semi-convinced that Justin had been hurt badly enough to have to go to an actual doctor’s despite what Leekie had said to him earlier.

“Tony! Guess what?”

Tony dropped the poorly disguised IQ test gratefully. Whatever ‘what’ was it had the other boy excited enough that he’d forgotten his usual caution when it came to their carefully friendly interactions, in a dry tone Tony asked the question that H-Justin was practically demanding of him,

“What?”

“Everyone.”

Tony repeated the question, this time in genuine puzzlement,

“What?”

“All of the Krelboynes who were ganging up on us? They all got the paddle!”

“Oh.”

Tony didn’t really know what to say to that, but he had to admit that the mental image was a pleasing one. Whilst he didn’t quite share Ha-Justin’s gleeful malice over the situation he could well imagine that there’d been more than a few reddened cheeks in their afternoon class that day and he didn’t just mean on their scowling faces.

Justin’s vivacious mood suddenly darkened,

“Ty didn’t get in trouble though… He kept looking at me all the rest of the day.”

Tony’s heart sank, he’d been right, Justin had made himself a target. Dammit. The other boy didn’t deserve to go through this shit on his behalf.

Especially not this version of Hammer. Well, perhaps Hammer as Tony had eventually known him would have deserved it. Malicious, jealous, murderous fool that he was.

But Justin?

No, he didn’t deserve anything of the sort.

And whilst Tony was mature enough to admit that even Hammer hadn’t necessarily deserved all of the enmity that he’d received from Tony over the years, he had no idea how to fix this situation.

Struggling to keep up the cheery conversation with this new pall of guilt hanging over him, Tony’s replies devolved into the monosyllables that had typified their early interactions.

Eyes creasing with hurt H-Justin stuttered himself to a standstill, the sudden silence breaking Tony from his reverie. He hurried to fix the situation he had created,

“H-Justin?”

“Yes?”

Came the sulky reply,

“I’m… I’m sorry. I was distracted.”

Tony cringed internally at the pitiful explanation. It seemed even H-Justin picked up on it,

“By what?” Came the response, still in the same low sulky tone. Relieved as Tony was that H-Justin was finally feeling secure enough to take that tone with him, it still set alarm bells ringing,

“I –“ Tony cut himself off, before deciding to go for it, “I was worried about what Ty would do.” He couldn’t help himself after all of that disgusting emotional truth, and added his own sulky riposte to the end of the sentence, “Okay?!”

Justin sniffed, seemingly mollified.

“Fine.”

“What do you mean, fine?!” Tony took a deep breath, and stopped himself before he could dig any deeper, “Sorry.”

“That’s okay.”

Came Justin’s quiet, if still sulky response.

Tony extended a shaky olive branch,

“Want to listen to a record?”

“Okay.”

Justin’s response was still flat, but at least it had lost that angry edge. Tony added a sweetener to the deal,

“You get to pick.”

Somehow even the headache inducing evening of nothing but Jobriath on a loop was worth it to see H-Justin happy with him again. Tony wondered when on earth that had happened. The stupid borrowed ‘puzzle’ lay ignored in the corner of the room for the rest of the evening.

~~~~~~

“Yello?”

The other man picked up after what felt like an interminable number of rings, Edwin got down to business immediately, seeing no need to beat about the bush.

“Ben. Why haven’t you kept me informed about the situation at the school?”

Edwin tried to keep the anger out of his voice, he must have failed, since Ben’s reply was immediate and wry,

“And what situation would that be Ed?”

“What? You mean to say that you don’t know about the bullying?!?”

“Ed.”

“Ben…”

Edwin’s tone was a warning in itself. There was a gush of static that Edwin took to mean Ben had sighed gustily into the receiver,

“Ed, do you honestly think I wouldn’t be able to spot it if my charge was being bullied?”

Edwin paused at the tone in Ben’s voice, the world-weary tiredness, so similar to the flat, dead tone the man had taken in Ettersberg when they’d found him. Pushing the horrific images from the war to the back of his mind Edwin focussed instead on what Ben was pushing at, whilst Edwin didn’t know Ben anywhere near well-enough for his own sense of duty he at least knew the man well enough for this. Swallowing, Edwin reflected that anyone who refused to leave his people behind, thus subjecting himself to conditions at Buchenwald? Well.

Purposefully avoiding the harsh words that wanted to spew from his mouth Edwin instead asked the rather mild question,

“Are you sure you haven’t missed anything?”

“Ed…”

Now Ben’s tone was a flat warning, even over the static of the phone line.

Edwin took a different tack,

“Just as you had a duty of care to those people, doctor, I have a duty to Tony.”

“Do you think I don’t know that?”

Ben’s response was an annoyed hiss of exclamation, insulted outrage palpable in every clearly enunciated syllable.

“Look, Ed, I… I care for the brat alright? I thought I’d do my job here and be done with it. But, the kid’s grown on me, like a fungus. I’d have told you if there was anything going on here that he couldn’t handle. Trust me.”

 Edwin read between the lines with a dawning sense of alarm,

“What’s been going on that he can handle?”

The silence on the line was answer enough.

“Ben…”

Edwin’s tone gained the sharp edge that he’d been fighting so hard to conceal.

“Tony has dealt with the situation with a remarkable deal of… panache.”

“…Panache…”

“Yes, panache!”

Ben’s voice had gone high pitched and defensive.

“Look, the kid doesn’t suffer fools. He’ll be done with this jumped-up school for rich twits by the end of the year, tops.”

“Ben. Just what has Tony been getting up to under your not so watchful eye?”

Ben snorted in inappropriate amusement at something in that sentence, before seeming to sense Edwin’s continuing building annoyance.

“Look. The kid, Tony, will be done with the high school theatrics come summer.”

“What? Is that why he’s being bullied?”

“Haven’t you been reading any of my letters?”

Ben’s tone was accusing,

“Yes! Yes of course I have.”

Edwin teetered off into uncertainty as he heard himself. Edwin felt his self-righteous anger draining away from him, even as he uttered the not-quite-an-untruth. In reality he’d skimmed the things, they were longwinded and often full of the kind of disturbing detail that Ben seemed to delight in – such as the information that the supply teacher was definitely having it on with three of the more permanent members of staff, and none of the other members of this entirely male love-square were aware of the situation. 

After one, or rather several dozen, too many observations of this type about the goings on in the private-lives of the staff at the school, Edwin had given up on reading the rambling missives thoroughly. Especially once Ana had fallen ill.

In hindsight that was a mistake. Ben’s knowing tone showed that the often-infuriating man was aware of it too,

“Look, I told you in the first week that I got here that Tony had been bumped out of the grade system. What did you think that meant?”

“I… I, honestly it slipped my mind.”

Ben’s tone softened maddeningly, sympathy pouring out in his voice.

“I know Ed. Believe me I understand, I do.”

“How?”

“What?”

All of the anger, resentment and fear exploded out of him in an outpouring of grief.

“How could you possibly understand? You? So fickle, you’ve never had a meaningful relationship in all the decades that I’ve known you? What could you possibly know about loss?”

 “Ed…”

Ben’s tone was a warning, but Edwin continued his rant, knowing all the while that the harsh words were ill-advised but unable to stop his tirade now that the dam had burst,

“How could you possibly understand anything about responsibility? Caring for another?”

Even as he continued his hurtful rant Edwin knew that every word was a mistake, yet he could do nothing to stop himself,

“I shouldn’t have entrusted Tony to your care. Not a man with a history such as yours.”

Ben’s sound of inarticulate sympathy finally undid him, none of the cutting anger Edwin had been expecting, hoping for present in that noise of commiseration. Edwin found himself sobbing down the line, clutching the handset of the corded phone as though it were a lifeline,

“I’m losing her Ben! I’m losing her and I don’t know what to do.”

If anyone had been around to see his breakdown in that moment Edwin would have been scarlet with embarrassment, as the situation was, his face was red with emotion and the long-suppressed need to vent to someone. Anyone.

A truly mortifying length of time later, with much shushing and many soothing noises coming from Ben on the other end of the line Edwin felt calm enough to get back on to the matter at hand.

“God, I’m sorry Ben.”

“No problem. It happens to all of us.”

“I… I just don’t know what I’ll do if I lose her. Ana, she’s my - my everything.”

“Really Ed, it’s fine. I, well I know you hate to hear this, but I understand. Really.”

Ben sounded hesitant, awkward. The irascible man never cared what other people thought about him, that alone clued Edwin into the fact that he must have crossed a line, though of course Ben would never mention it again.

“I’m sorry Ben, truly.”

“Pshaw – make it up to me by listening to my advice about your Tony okay?”

“My Tony? He’s not my anythi-“

“You and I both know that isn’t true.”

Ben’s tone brooked no argument, and for once Edwin wasn’t inclined to put up even a cursory fight, not after the show he’d just made of himself. Ben continued talking, as though he was unaware of Edwin’s reason for pause,

“Look, he’s going to want to go to university this year.”

“So soon? But he’s so young.”

“There’s something else there isn’t there? You’re not usually one to put age” Ben’s voice turned wry, “or gender before ability Ed.”

Edwin smiled to himself as he remembered that meeting with Peggy, it was his turn to sigh this time. Rubbing at his already sore eyes as he spoke,

“It’s Howard.”

“Ah.”

“Indeed. When is it ever anything else?”

“Ha! So, what has the old bastard done this time?”

Ben’s implicit trust warmed Edwin’s heart, it went without saying that they were both well aware of Howard’s worst tendencies.

“I’m afraid that Howard has convinced himself that Tony is one of those mutant ‘freaks’ as he so charmingly put it.”

“Ah, I see. And you’re afraid of the consequences if Tony starts to exert some independence?”

“Frankly I want the dear boy to have a childhood. And I believe that spending some time amongst children his own age can only be doing him good.”

This time the inarticulate noise from the other end of the line was one of frustration, after a lengthy pause Ben hesitantly put forth,

“Look Ed, do you want the kid to hate you?”

“What?! No! Of course not.”

Ben made a noise as if what he was about to say was incredibly self-explanatory,

“Then let the kid do what he wants.”

Edwin’s temper flared at Ben’s disregard to the welfare of his, well charge.

“And how exactly is wanting Tony to make some friends his own age not acting in his best interests?”

There was a significant pause on the other end of the line before Ben drawled out,

“Well put it this way. His only friends in this dump are one of the security guards, myself – if you can even count me given that I’m his teacher – and his roommate. And I’m nearly convinced that as soon as the kid is able to he’s going to dump the roommate.” In afterthought, “Half the time he acts as if he can’t stand the brat, the rest of the time it’s as if Tony killed the kid’s puppy or something.”

Edwin wasn’t sure what to make of that information.

“You mean, he hasn’t made any friends?”

To his own ears, Edwin’s voice sounded small and shocked.

“Well, no. Like I said, there’s the roommate. But, well. No. Not really.”

“But, how?”

“He doesn’t seem to like kids very much Ed.” A pause, “I can’t say I blame him. Snotty nuisances the lot of them. Even in this role I’ve had to clean up far too many bodily fluids.” Ben sounded vaguely horrified “It’s ridiculous, for people so small; I don’t know how they aren’t dried out husks.”

“Is he at least trying to make friends?”

“What am I? His watc-keeper?”

“Well. …Yes.”

Another burst of static as the receiver struggled to translate a sigh.

“Fine. He’s made some half-hearted attempts. But that’s precisely what they were half-hearted. The kid really doesn’t care much about other kids, beyond avoiding them.”

“But-“

“Ed, he’s chafing at the bit here. I can tell he’s finding the atmosphere stifling, you’d be able to see it too if you were here. It’s why he’s gotten so into our lessons.”

Speaking of which,

“Yes, how is that going by the way?”

“Oh, fine, fine.”

Ben’s tone was too airy, too laidback.

“Ben?”

“He’s very determined to learn.”

Edwin spotted the evasion, if Ben thought that kind of prevarication was going to pull the wool over his eyes he had another thing coming,

“And?” Edwin could hear the edge in his voice, “Ben? What have you been teaching him?”

“Nothing he hasn’t wanted to learn!”

“Yes, that’s reassuring.”

“Don’t push this one Ed.”

“What, just as I shouldn’t push Tony to spend some time amongst other children?” Edwin scoffed to show the other man just what he thought of that idea. “Ben, tell me just what you’ve been up to whilst my back’s been turned.”

Sounding not the least bit chagrined Ben rattled off an infuriating list,

“Teaching your boy the basics of self-defence, as you requested, reporting on his actions at the school. In essence spying on him. Oh, and having all of my perfectly good advice ignored.”

The last was said in a sing-song voice that Edwin just knew Ben knew was perfectly pitched to annoy. He really hated the other man sometimes. Though Edwin had to admit, perhaps he had a point.

Tone wry, Edwin asked the question he just knew Ben was waiting for him to utter,

“What do you suggest?”

“Beyond heeding my advice, you mean?”

Ben’s tone was unutterably smug.

“Ben…”

“Ed…”

Edwin rolled his eyes at Ben’s mocking repetition of his name.

“Very well.”

Edwin’s spine straightened as he recognised the tone in Ben’s voice, ah, good the other man had finally gotten down to business.

“Back Tony up when he makes his decision about uni, Ed. From what the boy has, or should I say, hasn’t said I get the impression that he isn’t expecting any back up from his father. So, shouldn’t his actual dad be supportive?”

“Ben…” Edwin hastened when he realised he was inviting the other man to start his game of silly buggers again, he sighed, “You know it isn’t that simple.”

“It really is Ed. Trust me. I know.”

From anyone else that phrase would have been trite and irritating. Lord, even coming from Ben it was trite and irritating. And yet, Ben had seen him through the belated aftermath of Finow, with a seemingly supernatural ability to discern just when to ask questions and when to offer silent companionship.

Well, Edwin admitted, at the time he’d found Ben incredibly irritating – it had only been the other man’s visible emaciation that had staid his hand on a couple of memorable occasions when he’d come very close to laying hands on his fellow Brit.

“Essentially, you want me to let Tony make his own mistakes.”

“Ye-“

Edwin rapidly cut the other man off before he could get too smug,

“And, to turn a blind eye to those lessons you’re teaching him.”

“The lessons you instigated I point out.”

Ed sighed, knowing full well that he’d walked into that one.

“Very well Ben, I’ll consider your advice.”

“And if you have any sense you’ll heed it.”

“What about the Howard situation?”

“From what you’ve told me about that incident last summer it sounds like he has it well in hand Ed.”

“Incident?” Realisation dawned, “No! Surely not, that was an unfortunate accident!”

“Fine! Sure it was.”

Edwin grimaced at the too bright all too false acceptance in Ben’s voice

Ben grudgingly responded to the original question,

“Listen, you and I both know that short of taking Tony into child protective services there isn’t much to be done. And we both know that even with the current downturn in SI’s profits that Howie darling has enough power, influence and money that nothing would happen. Well, nothing beyond taking away one of the few barriers between Tony and his father having carte blanche to do whatever his diseased alcohol pickled brain comes up with.”

“Ben!”

“What?” Ben’s defensive tone for once was free of the other man’s usual infuriating amused knowingness, “We both know it’s true Ed. And I think we both need to let the Kid deal with it. Believe it or not the brat knows what he’s doing.”

“Tony is not a brat.”

“No, he’s your brat. And that’s why I like him so much.”

With that rejoinder Ben hung up, Edwin had a feeling that he deserved it, he’d been snappish throughout their little talk even ignoring his sudden fit of tears. Edwin had some serious thinking to do, he’d been concentrating far too much on being maudlin as Ana would put it.

~~~~~~~

Ben tutted at him when Tony slunk into their next session.

“What have I told you about laying low?”

“Wha-? Wait you can’t be implying that what happened in the canteen was my fault?”

The arch look Ben replied with was answer enough.

The session that followed that snappish introduction was a harsh one, though as if reading Tony’s mind Ben took care to never once come into contact with Tony with anything approaching bruising force – as if making a point that he was skilled enough to avoid such things if he so wished, unlike a certain student of his.

Tony ended up flat on his back on the mats an embarrassing number of times that session. Though honestly that wasn’t what had him so worked up, the pointed lack of a certain kind of challenge that lesson left Tony in a foul temper for the rest of the evening. Oh, the lesson had been difficult all right, Ben calling on skills that Tony wasn’t sure he’d ever possess. But that was the problem, the whole thing had been too cerebral – forcing Tony to think, plan and strategize, when all he’d wanted to do was lose himself in the repetitive violence that he’d come to crave.

Tony desperately wanted a drink.

But of course, that was the problem, one drink was never enough. Sighing he resigned himself to a frustrated evening of tossing and turning, the insomnia that had helped trigger his descent into alcohol dependency rearing its ugly head again now that there was no chemical solution to keep it in check.

 Tony was aware that he needed to find something to drown out the voices and the guilt, but, well. With the benefit of hindsight, he really didn’t want to restart himself down the slippery slope into alcohol dependency. Besides, whilst it had been easy enough to get a hold of booze at MIT, even as a 12-year-old freshmen, he doubted anyone would sell booze to a 6-year-old.

He needed to find a distraction of some sort. Something harmless, innocuous even. But what?

~~~~~~~

If Tony had thought that Ben’s response to the canteen incident had been surprising, and unfair. Well, it was nothing in comparison to the weight of the sheer, outright disappointment Mr La Guerta immediately turned on the class the moment they’d all managed to line up as usual on one side of the small gym that doubled as the fencing salle, sleep deprived and shivering, that cold February morning.

Tony had to admit he was impressed, the man had shown no sign whatsoever that he was upset with them, calmly allowing them all to file in, as he took down the attendance register as usual.

Then came the explosion.

“I heard all about what happened in the canteen earlier this week.” La Guerta’s tone was low and casual, and completely belied the scowl he aimed at the children in the class, making many of the brats shrink where they stood.

Tony looked around blank-faced, feeling no sympathy for the little shits at all. These were the future senators and CEOs of America, somehow it was slowly beginning to dawn on Tony that his own appalling attitude towards his own company hadn’t been entirely his own fault. He’d been just as much a product of his upbringing as these snivelling idiots who couldn’t even take responsibility for their own acti- Tony’s thoughts stuttered to a halt as the realisation struck, not for the first time, that he’d literally been no better than these children, he’d more than earnt himself the title The Merchant of Death.

“I am very disappointed in all of you class.”

The collective shrinking was a sight to behold,

All of the strength, and force and anger that the man’s sheer towering all-American bulk had implied, all of it shone out of the man at once in one low military growl. And it was definitely military, the war-veteran was looking out from behind those blue eyes of his, glowering disdainfully down at the terrified group of children ranged before him, as though they were his troop and they’d just failed inspection miserably.

“I thought I taught you better than that.”

The group were very carefully not meeting each other’s eyes, the shared embarrassment reaching over 9000 levels.

“The discipline of fencing is all about mutual and self-respect.”

The children were exchanging embarrassed glowers, that said, ‘Right, this never gets out of this room okay? You ever tell anyone else about this and you are dead.’

No one was quite managing to meet anyone else’s eyes, there was much shuffling of feet.

“What I heard from Mr D’Eath, shows me that you cannot be trusted with your swords this week.”

There was a collective groan.

“Instead we shall be relearning the basic principles of respect, and how to obey the basic forms of a fair match. Since that is all you can be trusted with.”

La Guerta didn’t shout, he didn’t need to. Tony waited for it,

“I’m very very disappointed in all of you.”

As one the class shrunk in on themselves, even Ty was gazing mournfully at his own feet.

In the small analytical corner of his mind that was always paying attention to these things, Tony noted with no small amount of vicious pleasure that La Guerta made a point of not singling either Ty or Tony out for special attention – though La Guerta’s expression may have softened just a fraction when his gaze was pointed in Tony’s direction.

The red-head was doubly terrifying in his anger, since he didn’t live up to the stereotypes about temper that were so often attributed to people with his complexion. Instead the entire class was spent with the man reiterating with embarrassing frequency how disappointed he was in all of them, and wouldn’t they try to be better people next time? If not for him, then for themselves?

As a self-diagnosed maladjusted asshole, and a self-assured one at that, even Tony had to admit that something about the man’s upset and saddened expression triggered, the long-thought dead, melted in acid, and buried in a cesspit, then dug up and burned for good measure shame in Tony. Even though Tony was almost convinced, like 99% sure, well alright 80% sure that he wasn’t the target of this little lecture. Okay – 60-40. But still, the odds were in his favour.

~~~~~~~

Tony came awake with a start, shuddering as he shook off the remnants of the dream – no, nightmare. Not, sadly a nightmare of his subconscious’ making and his imagination but rather remembered horrors.

He lay there in his sweaty bedclothes staring blankly up into the darkness trying desperately not to remember the horrors wrought by Corvus Glaive first amongst the leaders of Thanos’ cruel armies, and his aptly vicious weapon.

Danny had fallen to that blade. Even the Iron Fist’s legendary chi and purpose no match against a cosmological reign of terror that had been wrought for thousands of years by a madman who was on a level playing field with the very demigods who had shaped much of Earth’s civilisation.

Tony was only grateful that he hadn’t woken Justin for once, the other boy was deeply exhausted after their taxing day, and Tony envied him his apparently restful slumber. If anything in the wee long dark hours he found he rather resented the other boy’s relatively easy existence, H-Justin, only had to worry about his school-life. The other boy had loving, if somewhat distant parents, who were willing to give their young son anything that his heart desired. Tony side eyed the vague shape dimly silhouetted in by the reedy moonlight filtering through their curtains – and abruptly let out an explosive gust of air as he realised just how irrational his thoughts had become.

Jesus, he was being jealous of a sad and lonely six-year-old who was in dire peril of becoming the school’s resident punching bag. Christ on a bike. What the hell was he thinking?

Collapsing back onto the mattress at that ashamed thought Tony vaguely hoped that Ben would help him pummel the thoughts away the next day. Their sparring sessions were always good for working out aggression, even if letting himself get hit wasn’t exactly the healthiest coping method in the world.

He desperately needed to find something to help him shut up the night terrors.

~~~~~~~~~~

Instead of following his usual fruitless routine of attempting to meditate by the lake Tony spent the freedom afforded by the weekend rummaging through his trunk for something, anything, to do that wouldn’t affect the timeline.

Ben seemed to have definitely cottoned on to Tony’s ulterior motive during their sessions, and was having none of it. Their latest lesson had been another slow painful walkthrough of a set of katas. These ones from a martial art that vaguely resembled Krav Maga whilst never fully resolving itself into that particular military discipline.

Tony was painfully aware that he couldn’t even let his mind run away whilst he did some engineering. At least, not until Tony had earned himself some genuine privacy.

No.

Tony couldn’t fall back on that old coping method, much as he missed it, and it was closest thing to healthy that he’d ever developed.

Pity.

Habitually avoiding the socks, and the Wand of Watoomb, Tony spent a fair stretch of the time half-listening to, and wiping, the tapes that his little computer had made searching for any clues about Hydra’s current plans.

If the task weren’t so thankless he’d have been tempted to take the spying up a notch. But no, Tony was self-aware enough to know that the boredom of the job would mean he’d let something slip that he shouldn’t. Tony really couldn’t afford to spend the next thirty years locked up in some SHIELD holding cell because of his big mouth.

The chore completed Tony flicked through his small LP-collection, before selecting Paranoid to give the disc a second chance. Dammit, Tony liked Black Sabbath. He wasn’t going to give up on them just because of his freak outs as Harley had put it.

This time Tony managed to more or less take the music at face value, so long as he didn’t allow himself to think too much about the lyrics he was fine.

Tony cast about for something to do, eyes falling on the much more sparse contents of his trunk, with most of it spread out around him in the room. In the corner lay Fury’s present, ignored as it had been since he’d received it, and mistrustfully buried the thing alongside the Wand of Watoomb in the sock corner.

Thus, it was with LPs and other ephemera laid out around him in their shared room, a thought jumping up and down in the back of his subconscious, that Tony looked up with some surprise when the door opened unexpectedly. The interruption came just as Ozzy was getting to the part about the realities of a sincere drug addiction. Tony had to admit that there were some uncomfortable truths in that song.

“Hi Ton- What’s this? “

“What’s what?”

“Our room. Why’s it such a mess?” Justin’s already high voice rose in pitch, “What’s all of this stuff?”

The other boy was nearly shouting by the end of the question, irritatingly high voice raised to alarmingly loud volumes.

“None of your business.”

Tony snapped out automatically, defensive hackles raised.

“Why is everything all over the place??” Just- no Hammer’s face was reddening in familiar indignation. The little brat pumping up in a way that would probably have been amusing if it weren’t so horribly familiar.

Tony found himself becoming genuinely annoyed in the face of Justin’s irrational fury. The other boy’s body language was aggressive and confrontational, and bringing back nasty memories. What was the big deal? It wasn’t as if he’d touched Hammer’s half of the room, much.

Well, okay. The oversized tape reels had ended up on Justin’s side of the room when he’d started rooting out his LPs. Tony had needed the space, Okay?

Surely it wasn’t that big a deal?

It wasn’t as if he’d touched anything on Hammer’s idiosyncratically arranged shelves. What was the big deal?

Still more puzzled than annoyed Tony found himself responding to the other’s rising flustered anger with near-automatic scorn, the old paths well-worn and comfortingly familiar in the face of this bizarre overreaction to a few things being a little out of place.

“What’s wrong Hammer?” The verbal attack a habitual routine in the face of this horribly recognisable version of his old rival, “Worried about your subpar toys?” Tony felt his tone turn biting and harsh, “Relax, I wouldn’t stoop so low as to touch anything a Hammer had anything to do with.”

Hammer’s face turned red and ugly as the other boy stormed over to loom above Tony, but not before he’d roughly kicked over the small mountain of clothes that had been encroaching on his half of the shared space. Tony scowled in indignation at Hammer’s rough treatment of his belongings, his hackles rising further as Hammer inadvertently continued to loom, like so many of the business partners, military generals, and well, men in general, that he’d had to deal with in the past. Tony opened his mouth to angrily call Hammer out on his hypocrisy, but was unable to get a word in edgewise over the sudden shouting.

“You’re being mean!”

The other boy was towering over Tony, fists clenched angrily at his sides.

“And?”

Tony drawled, in a tone that perfectly told Hammer just how little he cared about that.

“You’re just like everyone else!”

Hammer’s foot was perilously close to crushing Tony’s fingers, the other boy was still looming over him. Tony wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of showing him how much that bothered him, he purposefully leaned back with practiced insouciance, as if he hadn’t a care in the world channelling Howard’s sneer when dealing with rivals that he knew were below him for all he was worth.

“No. No I’m not. But if you’re going to be such a ridiculous Sheldon Cooper” Tony spotted his mistake as soon as Hammer blinked in confusion, and just steamrolled over the error, “about a little mess, maybe I’m beginning to see why everyone else avoids you.”

Tony felt a grim sense of satisfaction when the look of hurt flashed across Justin’s face. Perhaps he was being a little harsh with Justin about the interruption, but well, it had just gotten to the good bit, and besides, he’d been sure he was on the verge of something!

“I wish we weren’t roomies!”

Hammer ran out.

Good.

The little shit deserved it.

Who did he think he was, to push like that?

To niggle and push and threaten to break his stuff?

Tony went through the rest of the day in a haze of self-satisfied righteous anger.

Eventually the idea that had been jumping up and down and making rude gestures from the back of his brain resurfaced. After a dissatisfying lunch, Tony sat down and continued his thorough mistrustful inspection of the cassette player that Fury had given him.

Tony even went so far as to deconstruct the thing down to its base components examining every one for bugs before eventually deeming the device clean and reassembling it all grudgingly. Perhaps old one-eye had meant the thing genuinely after all.

It was through a haze of anger that he put together his first mix-tape of this strange new life, which was perhaps reflected by his song choices. Using a cassette that he’d scrounged from the school stores Tony made a point to thoroughly raid Hammer’s LP collection for music, as well as his own far smaller selection of records. Tony even forgot to be annoyed that the dip-vat was still no more likely to happen in the face of his annoyance with Hammer.

Tony had just begun to fiddle again with the cassette player Fury had given him with no small amount of suspicion – checking the thing automatically for tracking devices and bugs even though he knew that there weren’t any there – when the cresting wave he’d been avoiding all day hit.

Tony realised that Justin hadn’t reappeared in their shared room that evening, and the feeling that he’d been deftly not-thinking-about struck. Tony realised that some of the emotion that had been bubbling under his skin for hours was guilt.

Tony felt awful about how he’d lashed out.

Justin had behaved in such a Hammer-like fashion that he hadn’t been able to see past his memories to the upset child standing in front of him.

~~~~~~~

After two hours of frantic searching Tony eventually located Hamm- Justin holed up in the first place he should have looked. The other boy had hidden himself away in the glorified cubbyhole above the senior’s lounge. Although it was pretty difficult to make out details in the dim light, Tony was pretty sure he had a good idea of what Justin had been doing in there.

Avoiding meeting the other boy’s eyes Tony looked down guiltily, and awkwardly extended a hand with his peace offering – the second mixtape. The tracklist wasn’t quite as soppy as the stuff that became a cliché in 80s romcoms, but it was pretty close.

“What’s this?”

Ha-Justin’s voice was sullen, and small. Tony winced internally, he’d done this.

Dammit, Tony man-up. You’re a Stark, and Starks own their mistakes.

“An apology.”

There he said it.

Justin peered up at him suspiciously. He tentatively reached for the tape. Tony swallowed and passed over the second half of his gift,

“Here you’ll need to use this to play it.”

Justin hesitantly grabbed the proto-Walkman, or whatever it was that Fury had dug up for him. There was no obvious branding on the machine’s steel case, the thing could record and playback, and Tony knew it was far bulkier than even the earliest Sony models had been.

In Tony’s avoidance motivated distraction, he’d failed to notice that Justin had cautiously donned the headphones and was listening to the tape. The other boy was gently smiling, as he recognised the first song Tony had chosen for his apology tape, a Jobriath track, naturally, Good Times, a song that Tony personally detested, but Ham-Justin adored.  

Tony hesitantly sat down near H-Justin, and when the other boy didn’t flinch at his presence carefully started unpacking the small pack he’d had brought with him. Inside the knapsack was the small treasure trove of candy that Tony had hastily crammed inside, he felt a little guilty that he didn’t have any real food to offer Justin. Tony was no fan of overly sugary crap, and he had a feeling that Justin hadn’t eaten anything decent all day.

Tony needn’t have worried how his little gesture would be received, Justin fell on the pack with a soft cry of joy. For Tony’s own sanity the second track on his ‘I’m sorry!’ mixtape was a T.Rex number, though admittedly it was the disgustingly upbeat song Get It On.  

Tony had been a little worried that Justin would read something into the message behind the song, but to his relief all of the references flew right over the kid’s head.

The pair ended the evening by sneaking back to their dorm – Justin on a sugar high that made keeping him quiet nearly impossible, though somehow Tony managed it.

It was with a feeling of relief, and surprising lightness that Tony lay down to sleep that evening. Justin’s happiness infectious, even though Tony wasn’t sure that he deserved his forgiveness.

Tony didn’t dream that night.

~~~~~~~

Ms Ramesh beamed down at Tony’s miniaturised water filtration device. Tony pulled off the headphones and stared back at her nonplussed, he really wasn’t sure what she was making all of that fuss about. Tony had been damned careful to make sure that all of the technology featured in the clunky thing was available today – today being 1977, but today.

At first, he’d thought that she was peering at him because of the addition of the headphones, Tony had started to sheepishly put them away when Ms Ramesh impatiently tutted at him and asked for a quick sitrep about the project he was working on.

The design didn’t even approach the level of complexity that he’d carefully drip-fed into the coffee filtration design that the lawyers were carefully patenting and pushing towards manufacture.

There was nothing novel in the thing whatsoever. He hadn’t even had to miniaturise very much of it either. Tony had to admit that he missed being able to just let his mind wander whilst his hands did all of the engineering, but Tony had produced far too many insane items of domestic destruction with access to only a toaster and a screwdriver whilst distracted, and had no intention of unleashing that sort of thinking on the world just yet.

Tony would wait until the 80s at least before letting that sort of thinking get out there, it would fit right in with the tech-boom that spawned the Sinclair-ZX Spectrum and later the batshit, and much maligned C5 that the founder of the company would be infamous for forevermore, rather than his pioneering work in the fields of computing and general human decency at the corporate level.

Blinking as he came back to the present Tony recommitted himself to the promise that he’d only release technology that would at the very least make people’s lives easier, and at a rate that the market was willing to accept, in order to further his aim of pushing humanity towards a more humane future.   

Of course, even the best laid of plans never survives contact with the real world. Tony had been privy to enough disasters in his lifetime that he really should have realised that by now.

~~~~~~~

“Tony Stark – A Chip Off the Old Block?”

The Stark heir at the tender age of six has just revolutionised the world of water filtration with a revolutionary new design for…

Tony threw down the copy of the New York Times in disgust, he’d made it into the business columns. Tony hadn’t wanted any of this to happen, but in the past month events had flown by at such a pace that it was all he could do to stay afloat.

Fortunately for him the Lawyers at Landman and Zach were well worth whatever the school was paying them on his behalf, so the leaked design had been retroactively patented and bullet-proofed before the press managed to spew them to the general public, but still.

Tony had never liked that damned lab-tech – the idiot hadn’t even covered his tracks, the man had been fired as soon as the administration had discovered what he’d done, Leekie showing a sadistic streak that Tony would never have attributed to the man.

Still the damage was done, Leekie’s intercession on his behalf meant that the tech-prodigy angle that Tony had been purposefully avoiding was back on track, more strongly than it had been the first time around too.

However, there was a silver lining to the latest incident, as Ben had so bluntly pointed out during their last brutal sparring match, it had lit a fire under Landman and Zach’s collective asses. Hopefully it would get the ball rolling on Tony’s little nest-egg.

~~~~~~~

Tony was shocked when he recognised the handwriting on the envelope that had been handed to him by Smythe that morning. Tony completely missed the flash of an emotion akin to sympathy on the ascetic man’s face, too caught up in the impossible handwriting carelessly scrawling his name.

Spying Ty staring maliciously at him out of the corner of his eye Tony casually pocketed the envelope hoping against hope that the other boy hadn’t seen what had happened.

Sure enough, despite the care Tony had taken to pay attention to his surroundings that day – he’d even walked around with his headphones off, a real rarity ever since Tony had rediscovered the joys of portable music. Well, despite all of that care Ty cornered him in the narrow corridor near the senior’s lounge.

Tony was only grateful that Ty hadn’t spotted the door Tony had been heading for, it would have been the end of an era if the little evil little shit discovered his and Justin’s hidey hole.

“Look guys, Tiny Tony thinks he can hang out with the seniors.” Ty grinned maliciously at the small crowd of followers and hangers on that seemed to dog the boy’s footsteps wherever he went, “Stupid little baby. Don’t you know that the senior lounge is for the big boys?”

Tony’s brow furrowed as he processed the implications there, had someone scolded Ty for getting into something he shouldn’t?

Affecting his best political sneer Tony did his best not to let his puzzlement show on his face,

“What’s the matter, Cae-uh– Ty” Tony remembered just in time not to use the old nickname, that had never happened, not here, “Forget the fact that unlike you I have every right to be here?”

Okay, so it wasn’t his best attempt at being a wit, but Tony was still feeling rattled that Ty had come this close to inadvertently discovering his and H-Justin’s supply cupboard.

Tony swaggered past Ty, shouldering the bulkier boy aside when he belligerently moved to block the corridor and slipped inside the senior lounge, where sure enough Ty did not have any permission to be.

Unfortunately, in his flustered urge to act superior to Ty’s ridiculous pissing contest Tony had forgotten one small fact.

Most of the seniors hated him.

Tony was met with cold looks, oh there were a few neutrally indifferent gazes mixed in there, but they were far outnumbered by the faces showing scorn.

Edwin Cord spoke up,

“What are you doing in here Stark?”

“Wha-?”

Tony was still feeling rattled from the Ty thing, he missed the opportunity to shrug off his scorn by a mile. Edwin Cord grinned down at Tony, the self-confident swagger the taller teen had lacked ever since his encounter with Tony’s by-now infamous watch back in full force, now that the other boy was on his home turf.

“What’s the matter ickle Krelboyne – get lost?”

The mocking cry-baby tone in the other boy’s voice snapped Tony out of it, he regained the cold bluster of a CEO and shot out a verbal blow in the only language this fool was likely to understand. Money.

“Just because the only paycheque you’re likely to see in the next couple of decades is Daddy’s trust-fund Cord… Don’t tar us all with your brush.”

The bulkier teen stepped forward angrily, the shape of his perpetual shadow Jack Taggart looming threateningly behind him.

“Now, now Cord. You don’t want to start a scene, do you?” Tony made sure to pause, “Not here in front of all of your…” He sniffed for effect, “Peers. You do remember what happened last time?”

Taggart spoke up for the first time,

“Yeah, well we all know about your stupid watch now Stark!”

“If you think that’s the only trick up my sleeve. Well, you’re even stupider than I thought.”

Tony made sure to maintain eye contact with Cord the whole while, grinning his death’s head grin that showed far too many teeth in the process. Cord visibly paled, to mocking titters from his peers.

Flushing angrily Cord and Taggart stormed out of the lounge, leaving Tony to awkwardly try to look casual amongst people who, whilst not enemies really weren’t peers either.

~~~~~~~

Tony crashed down on the bed and finally, finally, tore open the letter. Sure enough it was from Howard. Howard who’d never bothered to so much as turn up to a graduation ceremony, let alone sit down and write his only child a letter.

Tony,

Well done on the free publicity, that hippy crap is excellent for keeping the environmentalist’s off our backs. We’ll make a business man of you yet.

Howard.

Tony stared down at the scrap of paper unseeing, even, even something as good as this – the old man had taken it and twisted it into something hateful. It was all coming back, Howard’s insistence that he take business. Something useful.

In the end after many years of arguing, and Obie’s intervention on his behalf they’d compromised on engineering with a computing minor.

Not quite the course Tony had wanted to do – computing, and certainly not the business route Howard had wanted. But a solution that was partially acceptable to both of them, the plan had been for Tony to spend a few years in R&D learning the ropes of the business behind the scenes; working on his “little projects” whilst being coached on the finer points of sharkdom by his father.

Of course, that had all gone out of the window with the old bastard’s untimely death during Tony’s placement PhD year at Zurich on loan from Cambridge. The months and years following that horror had passed in a whirl of parties, alcoholism and extreme sports. Tony doing everything he could to avoid taking on the mantel that brought so many memories with it, and Obie doing everything he could to aid and abet his every narcissistic whim as Tony systematically worked his way through every kind of time-wasting high he could find in a bid to stay away from America and the responsibilities waiting there.

Of course, in hindsight, his oh-so-kind ersatz father figure Obie helping Tony fulfil his childish dreams had probably all been part of the backstabber’s plan to drive a further wedge between Tony and his father. Thus, ensuring that he’d have his way with S.I. when the time came.

~~~~~~~

The remainder of spring term passed in a relatively peaceful whirl of schoolwork and exam preparation. Despite the glares, and hisses of ‘Tiny Tony’ that were often shot his way (seriously could no one in this place come up with a decent insult?), neither Cord or Stone dared to do anything with the aftermath of their latest humiliation, and the incident in the canteen so fresh in people’s minds (and on sore buttocks), especially given the seniors sudden inexplicable apathy with respect to their campaign against Tony. It probably helped that even Mrs Kowalski had been looking on Tony fondly lately with all of the publicity he was earning the school.

Justin had proven more than willing to abuse his parents’ generosity with the cash, the other boy had a sizeable stack of LPs of his own now, and despite his touchiness about his side of the room he was still happy to share them in exchange for free use of Tony’s record deck.

For his part, Tony was growing increasingly frustrated with the incredibly slow pace of the schoolwork that the senior year, even the advanced gifted class, were taking. Tony hadn’t remembered everything being so slow.

Then again, Tony supposed that it didn’t help that the teachers (even the otherwise affable Ms Ramesh) were suddenly insisting that he go at the same pace as everyone else rather than allowing him to skip ahead. It was irritating and annoying and – Urgh he’d proven that he knew this stuff dammit, Tony was aware that he’d passed out of high school education in that whirlwind of a first month.

But for some reason he wasn’t being allowed to progress at his own pace. Something that Tony was definitely not used to. He didn’t like it, this artificial hampering – and worse still, Tony had no idea what had caused it, or even how to make it go away.

Somehow Justin had been unusually perceptive at lunchtime, accepting Tony’s foul mood with a grace that Tony wouldn’t have attributed to adult Hammer let alone this strange new kid-version of the man. And yet that seemed par for the course these days, Tony’s life was full of strange and unwanted surprises from even more surprising sources.

Tony was almost entirely convinced that by the time he worked out just whose fault it was that he was being made to take even the science classes at the same pace as the rest of the seniors that he wasn’t going to be surprised by the source, only saddened.

That evening in shared commiseration the pair of boys worked their way through all of the acts that Justin could get his hands on that were in any way related to David Bowie and Glam Rock. Accompanied by an indoor picnic consisting almost entirely of sugar of course. In that month’s care package, received earlier in the week, Justin had received a selection of European candies from his jet-setting parents.

Whilst Tony had immediately gravitated towards the salty/sour candies that came from the Scandinavian countries, Justin had taken one taste of the chewy slightly salty gummies, pulled a face and dumped the entire overlarge bag in Tony’s lap. Thankfully there was also a copious amount of chocolate in the package, which Tony was happy to let the younger boy keep to himself.

Tony had to admit he thought that Justin was getting a little too fond of Marc Bolan, he was contemplating introducing H-Justin to something loud and brash, like The Clash, to mitigate the damage but he was afraid that it was already far too late.  The pair were lounging on the floor listening to T.Rex’s Electric Warrior in a sleepy, slightly sticky, malaise.

It had turned out that Justin adored Glam Rock, and with its peppy message of hope and how it was Okay^TM to be different, Tony could see why. Much as from his adult perspective he didn’t quite see why Justin was quite so infatuated, Tony was of the opinion that there was an awful lot of dross to sift through before they got to the gems. And unfortunately for Tony’s continued sanity Justin had a tendency to drift towards the teenybopper stuff that targeted the kids still reliant on an allowance to afford their music.

Tony had to concede that the song Cosmic Dancer at least had a certain relaxed charm about it, if he hadn’t known better he’d have probably assumed the thing came out of the whole 60’s psychedelia acid-wave. The song certainly had a trippy laidback and lackadaisical style that spoke to him of lying back on one of the lawns at MIT and sharing a spliff with the other more party-inclined undergrads of his acquaintance during the 80s.

Still Justin’s record buying mania meant that in the space of just over half a term Tony and Justin’s room was a veritable hoard of records, Justin had managed to gather everything from the lighter end of the now defunct glam rock movement, acts like Marc Bolan, Lou Reed, and Roxy Music, to acts like Sweet, Mud, Slade, and even another album by that poor bastard who’d died in his strange glass pyramid cum mausoleum, Jobriath.

Justin’s half of their shared room was beginning to resemble a record shop, the young boy was getting records delivered so regularly. Much to Tony’s chagrin Justin’s record organising system proved to be just as idiosyncratic as every other organisational system the other had ever come up with. Though Tony had to admit that the style was rubbing off on him, much to his chagrin.

Ben had looked at him askance the other day when he’d casually mentioned that he rather liked cataloguing Suzy Quatro next to Iggy Pop in conversation.

Justin claimed that the order was autobiographical by way of an explanation, which Tony had understood all too easily. Tony had to wonder ruefully just why Hammer’s security programming was so pitiably easy to hack into, when his programming layouts had always been as erratically ordered as everything else about him.

Tony caught himself planning to teach the Hammer-scion to do better this time around and was horrified with himself. So what if he was a sweet kid now? The little shit had grown to be a thorn in Tony’s side, long before he’d become Iron Man and an almost legitimate target. He pushed the thought back and down with an effort, no, it wasn’t fair to Justin, just as it hadn’t been fair the first time around.

With the benefit of little Justin’s… and Tony had to admit this to himself, welcome company for the past month, and nearly a decade’s worth of distance from the events at the Expo Tony had to wonder just how much of Hammer’s treachery he’d brought upon himself. 

 Tony hastily smiled back across the table at Ha- Justin, as soon as he noticed the other boy’s face falling from his lack of response to whatever the other boy had been chattering about. With a sinking feeling he suspected that Justin was rapidly becoming a not just a schoolmate, but an actual friend.

~~~~~~~

The minor public debacle caused by the leaked filtration design kept Tony busier than ever.

Tony and Ben had been forced to sit in on a whole slew of impromptu lawyery meetings during the Easter break, as the law firm of Landman and Zach proved that they were well worth the promised percentage of profits that had been required to gain the promise that they would continue to act in Tony’s best interests long after the fees paid by the school dried up. In the end, Tony had ended up with the first roster of patents to his name; and a deal that sold the filtration units at cost to a non-profit organisation with ties to several dozen NGOs all working in the turmoil going on in the Gulf, large swathes of Africa and several other countries that the UN was keeping an eye on due to ongoing humanitarian crises. (Though sadly there was nothing in the turmoil ridden stretch of countries sandwiched in the region between India and China, the poor souls stuck there left to rot by even the aid charities.)

Much to Tony’s chagrin, of the file of patents and proprietary ideas that he’d given the firm nearly full reign over, the scheme most likely to get off the ground any time soon was the Starkbucks idea. Helped along by the revolutionary coffee filtration machine, that was going to be produced by the same company manufacturing the humanitarian units. The only roadblock there was a tiny micro chain in Detroit, who were resisting all attempts to buy up the brand-name.

Tony’s school-funded sessions would only stretch so far (and being honest Tony had been bitterly surprised to find just how all-encompassing the school’s contract on behalf of its students with the law firm was; given the struggles to survive that he remembered enduring as a student at MIT. Tony wasn’t sure what changed between his childhood and early teens, but that sort of aid had never been offered the so readily before, and had been all been long-gone by the time he’d reached MIT. Perhaps the disparity was related to the school-fees for this place come to think of it), and understandably given that the firm were already effectively putting in pro-bono time on his behalf when compared to the usual hourly rates they commanded, despite raiding said fund slightly illicitly for their fees they weren’t willing to plug the sizeable disparity in the amount available to them, and the amount Starbucks were optimistically demanding.

For a company that wasn’t actually anywhere close to being in profit they were a tenacious bunch. Especially when the fact that their business model was only superficially similar to Tony’s plan was taken into account. Really, the only real grounds they had for complaint was the name, and even then, Tony could argue that Stark was a family name with a straight face, even if the damned thing was an Americanism of a far older, Germanic-Jewish surname.

Still, if negotiations held out for just four months the water-filtration scheme was due to be handed over to both the Red Cross & Red Crescent, and Médicins Sans Frontières, at which point, purely down the necessity of keeping the manufacturing plants open, the Starkbucks branded coffee machines and filters would come onto the market buoyed up by the humanitarian publicity, earning a projected profit of 25% - 70% of which would be plugged straight back into expanding the reach of the aid given with the water filters.

The 70% value still irked at Tony who wanted 100% of the money to go into the network of charities that his accidental breach of his wall of silence was aiding, however he’d had to concede that he was working within a largely capitalist system, and as such he needed to play within it.

If the four-month target was reached the slice of the profits from the scheme would enable Tony to buy out all of the current Starbucks branches, and all rights to the business scheme, and more importantly the trademarks, that they were using.

Of course, Tony had no intention of following their methods, he wanted to jump-start the trend of paying a living-wage for farmed produce that had begun to take off at the turn of the 21^st century. If the practice was further ingrained in the collective consciousness perhaps it would survive the recession that was due to hit come the end of the 00s. However, in order to make his firm bullet-proof he needed to protect himself from the swathe of litigation, suing and counter-suing that would likely ensue if he opened his chain up right this instant.

Tony internally cursed. If he’d arrived just two years earlier he could have started this scheme uncontested. Though of course he’d have been four when he woke up rather than six. He swallowed the fit of pique down, Tony was struggling enough as it was, he dreaded to think what would have happened if he’d found himself in the body of a kid that had barely just outgrown being a toddler.

He refocussed on the meeting – ironically the one aspect of the entire plot that had gotten through the lengthy lawyery sessions uncontested had been Tony’s logo ideas for the Starkbucks brand. It helped that the Starbucks firm were still using their old-fashioned rather detailed mermaid logo rather than the stylised one that, Tony had to admit, had inspired him to use his beard as a basis for the undefinable shape that he’d doodled.

~~~~~~~

Tony was hunched down in his usual spot by the lake morosely glowering out over the deceptively attractive looking water. Despite the fact that it was only mid-March it felt fairly warm in the shade, or at least it did when compared to the freezing temperatures they’d been enduring just last week.

Tony hated the winters on the east coast, the longer this one lasted the more Tony longed for the warmth of Malibu.

As always Mr Reid quietly made his way over and offered Tony the customary mug of cocoa, Tony gratefully accepted the offer and the mismatched pair trudged up to his little raised guardhouse, looking forlorn, a cold nearly skeletal structure of spindly wood looming in the melting slush like a beaconless lighthouse that would never shine.

By the time the pair had both settled down on the slim entryway that served as their balcony, overlooking the lake from their elevated position Tony had become aware of just how cold a day it really was – temperatures entering the 50s or not.

“So, what’s got you looking like a smacked ass? I heard you hit on some big fancy design that was worth a fortune, or going to save the world or some shi- uh, something like that”

Tony sighed expansively

“Lawyers.”

“Oh.”

Reid’s tone was accepting, as if with that one simple word Tony had explained everything. In a way, Tony supposed he had.

Carefully keeping his gaze on the distant shoreline Tony continued his explanation,

“And the stuff that Ty – um that is Tiberius Stone started. Poor H-Justin is so scared, and he’s all alone with the Krelboynes and…”

Tony dared a quick glance up at Reid, and was surprised to see that the scrawny perpetually bestubbled man was glowering harshly out at the distant horizon. It was the same look he’d seen on Mr D’Eath’s face in the canteen nearly a two months ago. Tony swallowed and stared down into the opaque depths of his cheap cocoa, suddenly ashamed without knowing the reason why.

Reid was looking unusually perturbed, the expression on his face so unlike the man’s more familiar laidback gaze of relaxed melancholy that Tony usually envied.

Not knowing how to broach the subject Tony decided to approach it from a tangent, hoping vainly to ease his way onto the thin ice rather than crash right through it, as was his usual response to matters like this.

“Uh-“ Tony paused, already hesitating. Biting his tongue, Tony stared again out at the placid lake before trying again, “Uh, Mr Reid?”

“Yeah?”

“Uh, if you don’t mind me asking, is something bothering you?”

Tony could have smacked himself in the face, so much for gently skirting the topic. He was useless at this kind of mushy shite, he knew it. There was a reason why he always communicated in backhanded gestures.

Fortunately, Tony still had the cute factor going for him, Reid grimaced, before seeming to catch himself. The skinny line of the other man’s jaw twisted, before his face settled into a fonder, more tolerant expression.

“Lord, you’re a perceptive one kiddo.” Reid’s voice was wry, Tony risked a fleeting glance up at the man, afraid that he’d ruined their quiet companionship forever with his direct question.

Reid looked down at Tony with a sad grin, an expression that Tony recognised from his own face, having seen it reflected in Par-Peter’s goggles once too often.

“Nah, don’t worry about it Tony, it ain’t nothing you could do anything about.”  In that moment Reid frowned, Tony gulped worriedly, “And it’s definitely nothing that you should be blaming yourself for. D’you hear me?”

Reid’s usually laid back southern drawl sharpened as he reiterated that point,

“Really kiddo, you think I didn’t notice the way you shoulder blame?”

Tony stared down at his mug again, unable to meet the other man’s eyes. Since when had everyone around him suddenly turned so ridiculously perceptive?

“Listen alright? Me and La Guerta, we’re worried about your teacher Mister D’Eath is all.”

“Oh.” Tony flinched when he realised how tiny his voice had become, Tiny Tony indeed.

“And it’s nothing you need bother yourself about, we’ve got a plan.”

“Oh?”

Tony glanced up again, this time seeing the warmth in the other man’s eyes that had been the very thing that made him tentatively trust him.

“Yeah, we’re just waiting on the weather to turn. Me, and La Guerta, and Dawson” at Tony’s puzzled look Reid added, “You don’t know him. We’re gonna bring D’Eath back to the real world, whether he likes it or not.”

The new determination sparking in Reid’s eyes made Tony believe it. He turned back to his hot chocolate in quiet relief, the genteel balance of their usually non-verbal companionship restored.

~~~~~~~

Despite Tony’s overabundance of schoolwork, Tony and Justin took to spending more time in the library as a way of relieving their shared frustrations with their academic situations. Well, in Tony’s case it was more a resumption of previous habits, only this time with company. The library had the clear advantage of permanent adult supervision, even when Ty and his cronies followed Tony and H-Justin inside they couldn’t do anything. Not with a member of staff as a witness.

Mostly though, it gave Tony a break from the whispers of the older students. Cord and Taggart had once again stepped up their campaign to isolate Tony from the seniors, not that they needed to put much effort in, given the age-gap. Somehow the fact that Tony looked as though he was going to be the first of them to own a successful business rankled amongst the nearly-but-not-quite-adults of the seniors more than anything else had. Especially after he’d so cuttingly pointed that fact out, loudly in the middle of the lounge no less.

Whilst nothing serious had happened since the drum contamination – and thinking about it Tony admitted that the drum’s loss was serious enough. Ms Ramesh had contacted every supplier that she had contracts with, and a few that she didn’t, and none of them had been able to provide them with a replacement that matched the specs they needed.

At least, not for a price that the school was willing to pay.

Hence, the overabundance of schoolwork – as Tony rushed to catch-up on a project that he’d already started nearly two months later than everyone else. Fortunately for him, Tony had a built-in replacement ready and waiting, one that would impress the exam-boards far more than the purely scientific research he had been planning on writing-up.

And as an added bonus, Tony was sure that Cord (if not the rather slow Taggart) was aware that it was their little act of sabotage that had forced Tony’s hand, and all but dropped a golden-goose of a project into Tony’s lap.

Tony’s scientific coursework was, of course, the write-up about the water filtration device, complete with the preliminary tests that he’d daydreamed his way through in class as proof that Tony could carry out the scientific process with no supervision. All backed-up by the rather more impressive R&D that Tony’s, fledgling coffee-chain and humanitarian aid organisation Arc-Tech could produce.

Tony suppressed a smile when – speak of the devil – he spotted Taggart and Cord enter the space, immediately spotting Tony and H-Justin at their usual table, turn tail and leave.

For the most part the boys studied in companionable silence, both ensconced in their own private worlds afforded by the mixtapes they’d both become mildly obsessed with - Tony occasionally helping Justin when he saw that the younger boy needed the assistance.

Tony’s first attempt at offering a helping hand had been awkward and clumsy, but once Justin realised that Tony’s motive wasn’t a prelude to some unpleasant trick the younger boy seemed to revel in the opportunity to bounce ideas back against someone who was smarter than him. Tony was secretly pleased that he’d been able to help. His own struggles to find someone on anything approaching his level leant Tony a level of empathy that he’d never have credited himself with.

For Tony’s part, he spent most of the time that wasn’t spent on his ‘Project’ alternating between the dull but necessary task of memorising interminable list of “facts” & literature for the SATs and other more international qualifications that he was planning on sitting for later that year, and his more… esoteric reading.

Ms Ramesh and Mr Leekie had both been a huge help in that regard, for Ms Ramesh’s part unlike Mr D’Eath she actively encouraged her students to think beyond the curriculum, and encouraged extracurricular learning. (Despite the incontrovertible fact that she refused to let Tony speed ahead of his classmates, Tony refused to think of them as peers – they weren’t)

Leekie had proven an invaluable source of specific information about precisely what the differences in requirements were for the numerous international qualifications that Tony was planning to put himself through. As well as the standard High School Diploma, Tony was working his way towards earning GCEs, and A-levels, and was seriously contemplating the Baccalaureate qualification that was recognised across the Commonwealth nations.

The additional work wasn’t actually that strenuous, though of course the fact that he often sat in the back of Ms Ramesh’s classes doing something different to everyone else didn’t pass unremarked.

As well as the previous attempts to mock him for his age and swottiness, he was now deemed a snob for not deigning to carry out the same good old fashioned American style education as everyone else. Though again, Tony had to concede that his ill-judged put down of Cord in front of nearly everyone really, really hadn’t helped matters.

Privately Tony thought that it was probably a good thing that he’d decided to wait a few years before officially reconfirming his fluency in Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien, Japanese, Korean, French, Italian, Arabic, Berber, Pashto, Wakandan, Sokovian, Romanian, Latverian, and several Thai languages. (To his everlasting shame, Tony had learnt the majority of said languages during the course of his playboy “career” – finding it far easier to have a good time when everyone understood each other than forcing others to speak hesitant English for his benefit. The remainder had been gained as a direct result of the superhero lifestyle, another life-choice that was simultaneously unhealthy and frowned-on by governments and the general populace)

Whilst Tony found navigating the different scholastic approaches a more interesting challenge than the actual work, he had to admit that it was still an unpleasantly boring task. He’d actually sat most of the CE’s at the turn of the month, spending several lonely weekends alternating between the hated but necessary meetings with the bloodsuckers at Landman and Zach, and hours under the watchful eye of the external adjudicators and Leekie. Tony was beginning to loathe Leekie’s office, with its cheerful blocks and bright colours and air of quiet despair. Between the lawyers and the tests, he was probably spending more time in there than any other room in the school.

Still, Tony was aware that he should be grateful to the man, he’d actually fought tooth and nail to let Tony take even those pitiful exams. In a bid to stave off the impending insanity that this enforced bout of solitary activity of dubious scholarly value had nearly induced, Tony had ended up falling back into the magic research with a depressing degree of enthusiasm.

Unfortunately, the mythology research hadn’t flagged up much of use, though Tony had found a thick tome about Norse Mythology that he hadn’t encountered back when he’d been looking up Thor and Loki’s backgrounds to try and figure out why the sack full of cats hated his brother so much. The tome took an interesting new spin on the mythology – Tony was beginning to realise that the level of information remaining about the Norse Pantheon was the equivalent of only the tales of Heracles surviving from Ancient Greece. It was incredibly frustrating, and rather tragic. With the 20/20 that hindsight provided Tony wished that he’d spent more time attempting to draw blood from the stone that Thor had proven to be, despite the usually affable demigod’s cheerful ignorance of his own cultural heritage, Tony knew that he should have tried harder to glean what he could from the prince.

Beyond the fascinating new information about Einharger Tony had to admit that the book didn’t provide much more information than that he was already aware of, it just presented it from a slightly different perspective. Depressingly unlike the rote repetition the qualifications required, which, unfortunately all seemed to be lacking something by way of common sense, or rather common humanism to his jaded eyes.

During their current study-session, Tony ended up meandering down an unexpected path during his perusal of Tibetan Buddhist mythology, it hadn’t occurred to him before, but the description of meditation espoused in the volumes that he’d found was utterly unlike the approach that he’d been taking with Bruce. Tony thought that this needed some more consideration.

Maybe he needed to focus inwards after all?

But on what?

Even when Bruce had been encouraging him to get to know his own mind more he’d been annoyingly unclear on just what he thought Tony should be looking for. Tony had to admit that the reason for that irritation may just have been irrational, due to his own scientific bent he’d been disappointed by Brucie-bear’s vague and wishy washy reasoning when he’d espoused the benefits of meditation.

Tony preferred clear, accurate and precise instructions.

This was why he was so bad at cooking.

Tony was an engineer and a scientist dammit, he could follow instructions that were ten times more complicated, and several orders of magnitude more sensitive than any damned recipe.

And yet that was precisely the problem.

Cookery books tended to be vague and wishy washy… Just like Brucie-bear’s instructions had been.

Vague and irritating instructions like… Finely dice, slice thickly, cook until golden brown, simmer until thickened. How the hell was Tony supposed to know what a “pinch” of salt was or a “splash” of oil?

Tony harrumphed quietly to himself, earning an annoyed glance from H-Justin that reminded Tony uncomfortably of the looks that Hammer had used to shoot him. He knew he was getting irrationally annoyed, was aware in that distant part of himself that was always watching the rest of him, that he was trying to avoid the real reason he was so upset with Bruce. But it was satisfying to be able to pinpoint why he found cooking such a struggle when he was so skilled at achieving the delicate mixes, temperature adjustments and annealing regimes needed for precise metallurgy as well as the more esoteric polymer processes.

If only he’d been able to persuade Pepper that it was the recipe’s fault rather than his own – maybe he’d have been able to convince her that he cared enough, that maybe she’d have stayed… On the same level that was always watching, Tony was aware that this was precisely the reason why he tried not to think about Bruce unless he could absolutely help it… The other man had left him too, left him to the wolves.

Sighing loudly enough that Justin looked up at him in concern this time, Tony settled on his other major project this term. (As if he didn’t already have enough things to focus on.) Tony had decided to bite the bullet and start reading about modern swordsmanship technique. Whatever Ben was teaching him was so far removed from the stuff La Guerta was using in class that any overlap between the styles was few and far between and usually purely coincidental.

Unfortunately, just as with cooking, Tony found the language in the few vaguely helpful tomes incredibly flowery and vague.

It was yet another source of frustration.

However, Tony did think the current huge book spread out before him would help a little with his footwork. There were clear diagrams, like the ones found in dancing manuals (Tony shuddered at the comparison, but well, as a member of Society he’d had to learn) so at least he thought he could see what he was supposed to be doing – even if Tony wasn’t exactly sure how some of the contortions between the steps were supposed to be possible.

Gods, whatever Ben was teaching him was so far removed from this… technical work, the latest sword that the infuriatingly secretive man had added to their ever-growing sparring repertoire had been a Greek Kopis of all things.

Ben had been pleased that Tony recognised it, Tony hadn’t had the heart to tell him that he only recognised the thing because he’d been forced to sit through The 300 dozens of times. Not that The 300 even existed yet. A certain blond teammate of his from years gone by had been far too enamoured of the film’s warrior code, and Tony had not-so-privately thought, homoeroticism, all so helpfully encouraged by Clint of course.

They’d all gotten into serious trouble when Clint had encouraged (and filmed) Thor kicking a nameless Hydra goon off of a cliff, shouting,

“This. Is. MIDGARD!!!”

Before posting it on Youtube – within hours the video had over 12 million views. Tony had only found out about it after the fact when Fury – vein throbbing at his temple in the way that it only did when he was desperately trying not to murder his idiot insubordinates - had called them all into his office and shouted at them for hours over that one.

Somehow Tony, being the designated adult for that little excursion had gotten a particularly long shouting at. He still felt more than a little miffed about that one. Sure, it had just been the three of them there, but he’d been busy securing the perimeter from the air when the incident had happened, and besides since when was he the responsible adult in any party?

That had been the incident that had started Tony on cataloguing Fury’s tells in detail. The seething resentment that he of all people had gotten the blame for the incident triggering a near manic desire to find the spying spyer’s weaknesses.

~~~~~~~

Though still somehow terrifying in his sheer distance from everyone else, members of staff included, Justin reported that Mr Smythe had inexplicably started to be nicer to him in class.

Tony wondered what the trigger to that change of behaviour could have been, Tony had been trying his damndest not to fall back into his bad-habits of snarkily criticising every little thing that H-Justin did wrong in their social interactions. Well, alright, every perceived thing that Justin did wrong. However, paradoxically, now that Tony was actively trying to maintain a friendship with the other boy, the urge to cajole him, for his own good (and wasn’t that nastily reminiscent of a certain judgemental boyscout), was nearly overwhelming.

Justin was happily chattering away about his latest musical idol (Meatloaf for reasons that Tony just couldn’t fathom, especially since the infamous album that had made the man famous didn’t appear to exist yet) over their evening meal of coincidentally enough, suspicious school meatloaf, when Tony spotted his first hint that something other than the slightly warmer climate might be making Mr Smythe more amicable these days.

As a kid, Tony wouldn’t have spotted it, hell, being honest with himself for the majority of his adult life Tony would have remained cheerfully oblivious too. However, in the aftermath of being de facto leader of the Avengers, when no one, least of all he, wanted him in the position? Yeah – Tony had learnt some people skills as a matter of self-defence.

Smythe was making googly eyes at Ms Ramesh along the length of the staff table.

And worst of all, Ramesh was clearly happy with the attention.

Eeesh – when the hell had that happened?

Tony was horrified by what he’d seen, surely not? Not… Not Ms Ramesh? Why on earth would she want to go out with the rude and misanthropic Smythe of all people? What the hell could his favoured teacher possibly see in his least favourite staff member?

If Justin noticed that Tony barely touched his meatloaf that evening the other boy wisely held his tongue, instead putting on an LP (sure enough, the strange looking Victoriana covered number called Stoney & Meatloaf) at a volume that might have made Tony wince about annoying their dorm mates, if he actually cared about such things.

~~~~~~~

Tony was beginning to regret agreeing to these one on one classes with Ben, whilst he was probably getting better at self-defence, nearly two terms in Ben’s attitude was beginning to grate nearly as much as the other teachers’ more familiar simultaneously awestruck, wary and slightly condescending attitude.

The only adult Tony had regular contact with who’s behaviour wasn’t rubbing Tony up the wrong way was Ms Ramesh, and he wasn’t at all sure why. Though he had a feeling it might be linked to her no-nonsense attitude with everyone, she treated everyone like an equal. Of course, that had been spoilt lately by the not-so-small revelation about her social life.

Ben on the other hand condescended to him on a regular basis, though Tony supposed he had more right to than everyone else. If anything, Tony welcomed the too-familiar feeling of being talked down to. It wasn’t a nice feeling, but it was comfortable.

Tony was really beginning to feel his age again now that the distractions of finding himself in the fucking 1970s had settled into a routine. He was finding it harder and harder to play the part of the innocent six-year-old, not that Tony had ever managed it satisfactorily if Ben’s hints were anything to go by.

At least the schoolwork had become slightly more engaging, or rather Ms Ramesh’s classes were – otherwise it was the usual routine of re-memorising a load of information with too little background behind it to be anything like the kind of depth or understanding that Tony was used to working with.

It didn’t help that Tony was finding it increasingly difficult to toe the line in D’Eath’s history classes, to his twenty-first century outlook on the world the incredibly America-centric viewpoint his textbooks were pushing seemed childish and dangerous to him. The point of view favoured in the Commonwealth biased GCE’s hadn’t been much better, though at least at this point the Brits at the Cambridge University Press were beginning to admit that perhaps the attitude of we white people are automatically everybody else’s superiors had something off about it, if the leading question in the essay assignment about Lord Mountbatten’s role in Partition was anything to go by. At least Tony hoped that he’d judged the gist of the question correctly.

He still felt uncomfortable when he remembered the automatic response to D’Eath’s question, ‘What is communism?” Tony had answered factually, outlining the underlying belief system in equality, Marxism and equal share of the state amongst the people, bringing up the foundations of Socialism as a point of interest. D’Eath, and the majority of the class had given him appalled and shocked looks, D’Eath had awkwardly stuttered out that, ‘No, no that wasn’t quite what I meant – Mr Cord?’ And Cord had smugly rattled off a response about Stalin, repression, Mao and genocide. Internally Tony had been seething, not at the people around him, but at himself.

Of course, the question hadn’t actually been ‘What is communism?’ of course the whole thing had been framed under the automatic assumption that capitalism was the only right and proper system of state. And yet, mind wandering, Tony’s brain had supplied the textbook response. Just the 21^st century textbook, rather than the 1970s barely past McCarthyism edition.

Tony found the incredibly western, white-centric viewpoint shocking, he’d been horrified when he realised that the Trail of Tears and the so-called “Battle” of Wounded Knee were still being taught as if it they were a positive thing. In order to pass his upcoming exams, he might have to espouse a viewpoint that he found morally repugnant. From his time as CEO of SI it was a position Tony was used to, but he still didn’t like it.

Of course, Ben took advantage of Tony’s distraction with ruthless efficiency, by the end of the hand-to-hand session Tony had been flat on his back often enough that he’d resorted to the Turtle of Fury out of sheer exasperation.

Tony had very nearly managed to trip Ben up with Jarvis’s signature move, Ben managed to leap out of the way, but it had been close. Tony tried one of the other signature moves from the technique, this time succeeding in knocking Ben’s left foot out from underneath the taller man, and earning himself a look of surprised appraisal that made him bristle. Ben’s lips had thinned as he very pointedly did not chastise Tony for his lack of attention, rather, Ben upped the intensity of the session to a nastily exhausting level.

Tony who’d already been finding their current pace difficult to keep up with, distracted or not, immediately regretted the rash decision to let that little trump card out of the bag. It seemed he’d earned himself a little bit of respect there – respect that he wasn’t sure he actually deserved if the way the muscles in his legs were trembling from exertion was any indication.

During the warm-down Ben too casually asked,

“What was that move?”

“The Turtle of Fury?”

Ben shot Tony a puzzled look,

“It’s Jarvis’s signature. You should get him to teach it to you.”

“Hrmm.”

Ben looked vaguely disturbed, as if he hadn’t expected something so effective to come from the dithering butler, then expression softening Ben turned to Tony and said,

“You really should tell him you know.”

Tony jolted in unpleasant surprise. He’d thought that Ben had dropped this topic. He certainly hadn’t brought it up for months. Side eyeing the older man Tony cautiously replied,

“I won’t. I can’t.” He huffed out a resigned sigh, “Besides, what would you have me tell him? Anything resembling the truth would have me committed.”

“I’d say true, but then I’d have to point out Edwin Jarvis’ heavy involvement in the affairs of your father.”

Tony gave Ben a look of undisguised horror,

“Brain bleach – brain bleach! Urgh! No! I thought I’d long since corrupted myself to the point where nothing could horrify me, and then you had to go and prove me wrong. Urgh, nonononono.”

Ben snorted in genuine amusement – the snigger turning into an out and out fit of laughter at Tony’s continued horror.

Once they’d both managed to calm down enough to continue the conversation, one bout of laughter-induced cramps for Ben later, Ben continued to pry.

“You know that isn’t what I meant.” Tony just glared at Ben suspiciously, “Okay – no you didn’t. But that really isn’t what I meant. I meant your knowledge of Ed’s involvement with a certain organisation that you really shouldn’t have any inkling about. Capiche?” 

Tony briefly tried the innocent act,

“What organisation?”

“Oh, cut the crap Kid. You and I both know that Edwin Jarvis has been highly trained in martial arts.” Ben shot Tony a significant look, “And we both know why.”

Tony stared at Ben’s toes rather than the other man’s changeable and all too perceptive eyes.

“What? Did you really think I’d gone senile in the past couple of months? I do remember you telling me all about those interesting individuals who taught you your subpar survival skills, remember?” Ben gasped dramatically, “Don’t tell me, you’ve got dementia?” He clutched at his chest, as if deeply wounded, “And in one so young!” 

This time Tony thumped Ben on the upper arm as hard as he could manage, the other man allowed it. Tony thought ruefully about this casual reliance on violence, it probably said something unpleasant about both of them. Tony didn’t want to think about what it said about how seriously the other man was taking this discussion.

 Glaring half-heartedly Tony instead answered Ben’s non-question with one of his own,

“You know, don’t you? What are you – fried chicken?”

“Wha-?” Ben’s look of puzzlement was genuine enough for once.

Tony mentally recalled his last sentence,

“Chopped liver!”

Ben’s smiled was crooked,

“I meant chopped liver!”

“Well at least that was a genuine mistake this time rather than a ‘wrong’ one. Perhaps we are making progress after all Kid.”

Grateful that Ben had dropped the subject Tony fell back into their old routine,

“Sure thing Old Ben, next you’ll be telling me how to use the force.”

Used to the Old Ben comments as he was Ben didn’t deign to comment – merely casually brought up that he’d be teaching Tony yet another style that was possible with the three types of sword they were currently practicing with. Three! At the beginning of the school year Tony had barely contemplated weaponry more basic than a gun and bullet beyond a materials perspective.

Now – he was learning how to use five, well six if you counted the epee, types of edged weapon and Ben was already heavily dropping hints about beginning on another type soon.

~~~~~~~

Tony was sat on the damp grass staring unseeing, as always, over the boating lake. He’d been there long enough that both the seat of his pants and his underwear had been soaked through by the cloying wetness of the rain that had fallen earlier that morning, but he didn’t much care.

He’d grown to enjoy spending time out here for its own sake, rather than the necessity of trying to get in contact with his chi, or whatever mystical bullcrap it was that he was trying to cram into his head. Whilst the task no longer carried the desperation he’d felt all those months ago when he’d first arrived here in this strange ersatz world it still irked Tony that he was making little to no progress on a task that Doom of all people had strongly implied he should put his mind to sooner rather than later.

A part of him had noted, but not thought much about the fact that Reid hadn’t shown up with his usual offer of a drink and quiet companionship. Tony had a feeling that the skinny, perpetually in need of a shave, security guard thought that he had no friends.

Well, he wasn’t far off.

Tony spotted movement on the far-curve of the lake shore, and turned his attention to it – the lack of Reid’s presence unnerving him more than he cared to admit.

There were three men, wrestling on the ground. One of them was probably Reid from his build. Tony furtively made his way over, his sense of self-preservation taking a backburner to his worry for his friend.

As he got closer Tony gradually realised that he recognised all three of the men, and he relaxed, giving up all thoughts about stealth when the familiar bulky form of Mr La Guerta, and the slighter form of Mr D’Eath emerged from the distance.

He crept closer, this time out of a desire to see what they were up to before they spotted him, rather than any real fear for what would happen if he were spotted. As Tony drew nearer he could hear that all three men were laughing, phew – that ruled out the all too probable idea that Mr D’Eath was having a flashback.

Tony eventually worked out what the three of them were doing to each other, a split second before he was spotted. It was his own fault, he’d completely forgone any attempt at being sneaky, being too busy chuckling to himself.

All three of the men were trying to stuff cold and sticky mud into each other’s shirts and pants. Tony had no idea what had triggered their messy little game, but he was glad it was something so innocent – rather than the first thought that had flashed to his mind.

As is always the way in incidents like these, Tony was not allowed to be a neutral bystander for very long. Mr La Guerta spotted Tony and cheerfully greeted him – at which point Reid threw the clod of mud he’d been about to stuff into the seat of the other man’s pants at Tony.

It smacked him in the arm messily.

Tony had to admit, he’d never expected to carry out this sort of extracurricular activity with the teachers, but it was fun. And to top it all off, D’Eath was grinning ear to ear through a thick coating of mud that made him look like a prehistoric monster that had crawled out of the primordial ooze.

The four of them caused quite a stir as they trudged muddily through the school grounds towards their respective washrooms to clean off. 

Tony even managed to ‘accidentally’ smear mud all over Ty’s t-shirt when the other boy had automatically moved to try and push him once he’d realised who it was underneath all of the filth,

“Oh look, did Tiny Tony have an accident?”

Ty had once again attempted to block the corridor, when would the other boy learn? Tony had casually brushed the other boy aside, he may have been scrawny, but all that exercise – running around the school grounds, Ben’s sparring and even the damned epee classes was beginning to pay off.

Tony had been wiping off the worst of the mud in the seniors’ bathroom, deciding, perhaps childishly, to spread the love around when he overheard the interaction that confirmed all of his worst fears about Ramesh and Smythe.

Tony was in the shower section of the room, the water not yet turned on - since he wasn’t a complete savage Tony had decided to scrape the worst of the mud into the trash rather than attempt to wash it down the shower drains.

As such Ramesh and Smythe must have assumed that the room was empty.

When Tony overheard the pair whispering he hadn’t been worried, merely continued to scrape the rapidly caking mud into the trashcan. However, as he turned to leave, urgh. Tony was not a child. He wasn’t.

And yet there was something about catching two of your teachers kissing that never ceased to be disturbing. The pair were so caught up in their oh-so-adolescent make out session that they hadn’t even noticed that Tony had been there.

~~~~~~~

Ana tried not to glare at the nurses as they brought in her evening meal, it wasn’t their fault that the repast was less than appetising, or the doctors less than helpful.                                                                                                                                                                                                      

This was her sixth diagnostic session, if Howard weren’t being so generous with his money she dreaded to think how they’d pay for all of this, even the generous health insurance she had with SHIELD only extended so far. And Ana somehow doubted that a woman insisting on a diagnosis for an illness that half of the medical professionals she’d seen were convinced was ‘psychosomatic’ would be covered by even the most generous of insurance firms.

Still, despite her own situation Ana couldn’t help but worry about her boys. Edwin obviously wasn’t taking care of himself, oh her darling tried so hard to hide it, but she was his wife, and an Agent of SHIELD to boot. She could spot a man exhausted from stress and lack of sleep a mile off. Ana had made sure to smile gently at her darling husband when he’d tiredly brought her an apple torte, the neat lines of the apple slices perfectly arranged in a spiralling pattern on the tart’s surface.

Despite her lack of appetite and the roiling unease fuelled nausea that threatened her dignity Ana made a point of eating a large slice as he’d worriedly sat by her bedside. She’d carefully watched the tension in his shoulders ease at her false display of hunger, and felt herself relax a tad.

To her shame, Ana still hadn’t shared her worries about Tony with Edwin, her darling already had so much on his plate. She couldn’t bear to add to his load, even as she mentally braced herself to prepare for the worst. Ana had already updated her will, leaving everything to her two boys using the facilities SHIELD provided to do so discretely.

Tony’s sudden and striking shift in personality had niggled at Ana’s sense of foreboding for months now. Whilst she was almost certain that Tony was still Tony, a DNA test, and the boy’s knowledge of events that he couldn’t possibly have known of otherwise reassuring her… Ana was concerned.

Ana had even contacted Peggy about her worries, knowing that the other woman knew well enough when to keep things to herself. The near break in Ana’s and her darling Edwin’s relationship when he finally broke down and revealed the secret he’d kept from her ever since that awful madwoman Frost had attacked her, had more than proved that.

Despite the fact that Ana and Edwin had reconciled, their relationship growing more depth as they both learnt to confide their hopes and fears in each other… Well, Ana had remained angry at Edwin for months after that little revelation, her career at SHIELD had been an almost direct result of that argument.

Ana had felt stifled and betrayed, and couldn’t face her husband. She’d fled into the SSR’s patient clutches instead, immersing herself in the culture of training and espionage that Edwin had tried so hard to protect her from.

It had taken six long months before they’d broken down and shouted all of the anger and hurt out at each other. And in the meantime, Ana had proved her point, communicating the betrayal that still burned through her veins by trouncing Agent Carter on the training grounds, snubbing the other woman’s gestures of apology at every turn.

Until, a month after her reconciliation with Edwin, the Agent’s awful disgusting attempt at cooking Hortobágyi palacsinta, a strange post-war invention that Ana had never even heard of before… Well, the resulting mess had made both of them break down into near hysterical giggles in the break room.

Their high-pitched laughter had attracted the scorn of a few of their fellow agents, specifically the more hidebound male members of the SSR who still felt that women should go back to the kitchen now that the war was over.

The pair had proven their point on the sparring mats, teaming up for the first time since Ana had officially become a member of the SSR.

No, Peggy had long since proven that she knew how to be discrete, even perhaps when she shouldn’t be. Ana trusted the other woman to keep her confidences.

Ana attempted to settle down for the evening, the near constant ache in her belly as ever a maddening backdrop to her life. Almost as maddening as the doctors’ patronising insistence that there was nothing wrong. The dark fear gnawed at her guts, the fear and rage and anger at her situation turned to a physical ache. The rage and helplessness of it all, forcibly reminding Ana of her flight from her home country, dredging up dark memories from the recesses of her mind. Images that Ana would much rather remain buried, in Hungary where they belonged.

And yet, despite all of this, Ana found her thoughts returning to Tony. What had the boy gotten involved in? And how would the dear cope without her there to shield him from the worst of his parent’s excesses?

Ana eventually drifted into a fitful sleep, filled with disturbing memories from Hungary, and Edwin’s run-in with the Black Widow all those years ago. The dreams merging her fear for her husband with her own terror when the madwoman Whitney Frost had attacked her and the darker overarching madness that had engulfed much of the world in the thirties, forcing their emigration to America amongst thousands of others.

In the strange logic that comes with dreams Ana found herself staging a rescue mission, nothing was going right, the layout of the building they were in kept changing. Razor wire lined every surface, chambers kept opening up on all sides. The walls of the place itself glistening ominously with the black malice of Zero Matter. At the end of the hall, a shower room loomed ominously out of the black rushing suddenly towards Ana’s small squad of agents.

Outside of her room a sudden alarm preceded a rush of noise, as nurses, doctors and even other patients rushed towards the source of the panicked mechanical whining. Ana frowned in her sleep as the noises of frantic medical intervention quite seamlessly became part of the nightmare.

Ana didn’t bother to hold back the glare the next day when after a morning that seemed to stretch on forever, the matronly nurse bustled in at mid-afternoon, and matter-of-factly informed her that they had found nothing wrong. Of course, they hadn’t. As she packed away the belongings she’d brought with her Ana wondered how much more of this she could take.

~~~~~~~

It had been a fairly mundane April weekend, nothing about it had been particularly special, yesterday’s mud wrestling match aside. Even the latest in a long line of swordsmanship styles that Ben was rapidly taking him through had faded into the dull routine of work that was all somehow beneath Tony’s interest.

Tony felt that that in itself should have set alarm bells ringing in his head. Since when had he ever managed to have enough peace at any time in his life, that he of all people could afford to experience such an inventive emotion as boredom?

Tony stared in horror at the trashed contents of his and Justin’s shared room. It seemed the reduction in bullying attempts had all been a ploy. He could have kicked himself; Tony had known that it was too good to be true.

Dozens of Justin’s LPs lay in sad black shards scattered all over the floor, the cardboard sleeves ripped and crumpled. The VCR was in so many pieces, the delicate film of the few tapes they’d bothered to acquire strewn laid out all over the room like the guts on some mechanical battlefield.

The devastation wasn’t limited to the records, Tony’s half of the room hadn’t escaped the wanton carnage. It was only his habit of locking most of his belongings inside his trunk that had saved him there.

With his paranoid inclusion of his LP-deck amongst the habitual contents of his trunk, unfortunately many of Tony’s clothes were targeted instead - torn and dirtied cloth mixed in with the broken miscellanea of belongings that were strewn around the room. The one genuinely valuable item that Tony had lost was the computer – the nixie tubes were noticeable in their absence, tiny shards of glass mixed in with the overall carnage. The computer rendered useless, the circuitry completely fried.

Tony sighed, dragging his hand over his face in annoyance. Well at least that was one less problem to worry about he supposed. Tony was only grateful that the idiots hadn’t gone so far as to smash the cathode ray tube.

Ha- Justin looked utterly shell-shocked, Tony couldn’t blame the other boy. He shuddered as he remembered the overreaction a few weeks back, when Tony had gotten a little messy. Tony supposed, if he didn’t have so much experience with all of his shit getting fucked up, well, he supposed he’d be pretty upset too. Tony winced when he remembered the total remodel he’d been forced to carry out on the Malibu mansion after the absolute disaster of his “last” birthday party.

His workshop had never quite been the same after that.

Compared to H-Justin Tony had gotten off lightly too, all he’d really lost was some clothes, and… okay, all of his textbooks. But still, Ha- Justin had left all of his belongings out in the open, so nothing apart from his clothes had escaped the carnage.

Oh, Tony could see that whoever had done this had made a good attempt to get into both of their trunks. Tony’s especially; there were deep gouges all along the seam between the lid and the actual body of the trunk, concentrated around the lock. But. Well, Tony had made a point of buying a military-grade piece of kit there despite the strange looks that Jarvis had given him when he’d insisted upon it during their shopping trip.

Tony was only grateful that the idiots hadn’t gotten far enough into their attempt to trigger any of the self-defence mechanisms that he’d taken some pains to install. Tony honestly couldn’t imagine how he’d explain one of his fellow students somehow being unfortunate enough to find the equivalent of a bear-trap clamped around their arm.

He supposed he should have expected it. After all, Tony’s continued lack of a shit to give every time Ty or one of his cronies hissed “Tiny Tony” at him in the school corridors as he pushed his way past them had probably grated on them enough that they’d decided to up the ante.

Tony should have seen it coming.

Stupid, foolish, idiotic, useless, ass that he was he’d gotten Justin caught up in all of his crap. Tony could only thank the gods that he knew existed that H-Justin was too upset to even cry. The other boy was still staring in mute horror at the destruction, his already pale skin milk white.

~~~~~~~

Yelena Belova waited crouched at the feet of her master. Hardly daring to breathe, lest she call his wrath down upon herself. She was waiting for his judgement to fall. She’d failed in her mission to take the potential asset, one Anthony Edward Stark from the mansion in New York.

She knew that she was going to be punished for her failure.

“Black Widow. You have failed Madame F, as she has failed us, given that it was her lax training that caused this. Roxxon Industries will be very disappointed in the services of the Red Room.”

Yelena kept her face impassive, she knew she was going to be punished for this, she could only keep her silence and hope that her otherwise exemplary record, and docile behaviour was polite enough to earn her some small mercy.

“As such you will be sent back to the main house for further re-education.”

Yelena dampened down the instant urge to struggle, to get out before it was too late. She was a Black Widow, one of a long line of assassins who had served the Red Room and Mother Russia proudly and efficiently. The pain that was in store for her would help her regain the focus she had lost in the wake of the strange incident at the Stark mansion in New York and her subsequent months spent evading capture in the prison state of North Korea.

As a beefy hand clamped itself inexorably around her scarred wrist, Yelena allowed all resistance to drain from her body.

~~~~~~~

In the wake of Ty stepping up his bullying campaign Tony and Justin moved several of Justin’s more precious surviving LPs into the little hidey-hole above the senior’s lounge. Whilst a lot of superficial destruction had taken place that irritating afternoon, the bullies hadn’t been particularly thorough with their malicious self-appointed task. Since Justin had very nearly lost his wardrobe to the destruction, the lock of his expansive trunk barely holding against whatever tool the bullies had used Tony had offered the use of his more secure trunk. However, to his secret relief Justin had declined.

Tony was mildly annoyed by the loss of the computer and its Hydra chasing properties but perhaps it was for the best. He hadn’t been sure what he’d do if the software actually did flag something up. And as it was Tony really wasn’t sure how on earth he should attempt to deal with the hornet’s nest that was SHIELD cum Hydra, let alone the particularly deadly problem that the Winter Soldier program presented.

However, to his surprise that was the least his problems for the time being, he wasn’t anywhere near as upset about the situation as Ty probably wanted him to be. He had to admit to himself that he was furious that the little bastard had gotten away with what he’d done, but in the scheme of things as far as victimising attempts went. …Well, this one was pretty pathetic really. Almost laughable.

The only thing that raised Tony’s resigned almost amusement above anything more than mild irritation was the fact that little H-Justin had gotten caught up in the crossfire. Tony had only been able to watch in mute sympathy as Justin tried, and failed, to piece back together the shattered remains of some of his most prized LPs. Even if the small boy were to successfully work out which black shard matched which, well, there was no fixing that kind of damage.

Something inside Tony hardened at Justin’s crestfallen expression when the boy realised that his treasured Jobriath discs were amongst the casualties of the destruction. If the album artwork wasn’t so painfully familiar Tony doubted he’d have been able to identify it from the small shreds of card that were left; much to Tony’s chagrin that particular artist had remained Justin’s favourite. Tony had suspected that the not so subtly gay themes on open display on the albums’ covers had been the source of the attention. No doubt they were probably the reason that the discs had been one of the primary targets.

Tony had no proof that it was Ty, and it might not have been. Though from the suddenly smug expression that seemed to grace his features whenever he caught Tony’s eye Tony felt he had all the confirmation that he felt he needed. Still, nothing important of Tony’s had been out in the open. Hell, if Tony was being honest with himself, he didn’t really have anything important. Not anymore. Well, maybe the sword.  But that was stored with Ben’s things anyway. Even Ben hadn’t wanted to try and talk his way out of why a six (nearly seven) year old was in possession of a large edged weapon.

But that wasn’t the point.

Ty had hurt Justin.

Tony was fair game.

But Justin?

Justin was an innocent in all of this.

~~~~~~~

Howard sighed when he read the latest report from the fruitless search in the Arctic Circle. Nothing. He’d been at this for over thirty years. And still. Absolutely nothing.

Summer was nearing, he’d soon be able to go back out onto the ice and continue the hunt. He had to bring Steve home, despite the fact that even with the glimmer of hope that the serum’s newly discovered cryogenic properties brought it was highly likely that Steve would be returning on his shield rather than with it.

Gulping down the whiskey in one swallow, savouring the nearly acidic burn, Howard turned to the tottering pile of paperwork in his in tray.

Howard accidentally sent a whole sheathe of papers sprawling with his elbow as he leaned over to place the glass on a reasonably stable surface that wasn’t completely covered in reams and reams of paper.

Sighing he angrily plunked the glass down on the nearest flat-ish surface, uncaring of the condensation seeping into the documents below.

The typeface on the letter that had been unearthed in the lower strata of paperwork by the landslide caught Howard’s eye, an overly decorative cursive that most reputable businesses wouldn’t dream of using these days. It was vaguely familiar; the font dredging up memories of a grovelling apologetic letter about leaked designs…

Howard cursorily reached over and tore the envelope open, only realising once he’d done so that it was a status report on Tony’s progress from that damnably expensive school that he’d shipped the idiot boy off to. Ah, that’s why it had caught his eye. It was about that hippy crap his idiot boy had gotten so enthralled with lately, Howard would have to do something about that sooner rather than later. Though for now it was a useful source of publicity.

Apparently, his useless spawn had skipped ahead to the senior year already, at least partially living up to the gushing missive that the Mensa idiots had sent him earlier in the year. Alright, Howard conceded as a glimmer of something warm flickered in his chest briefly dispelling the constant cold heavy weight of the guilt he’d carried around since Finow, perhaps the boy wasn’t quite as useless as he’d thought.

Howard went rummaging for more similar looking envelopes, ignoring the fact that the mountains on his desk became a sea of paperwork on the floor in the process, and eventually he unearthed another, more recent letter begging for more money.

At first Howard had been angry when he realised that it was a scrounging request. When he realised what it was for, he was infuriated.

It seemed the oh-so-exclusive school that he was paying a five-figure sum for every term had managed to allow most if not all of his son’s possessions to be destroyed, oh and apparently, this was the fifth request for a replacement Czochralski Dip Vat of all things. For a moment, Howard wondered why on earth they thought he would accede to such a spurious request, before dismissing it.

No son of his was going to be wandering around in public in rags. Howard perfunctorily rattled off a cheque for Edwin, scrawled out a quick note of explanation for the boy, and sealed the envelope. 

~~~~~~~

To Tony’s shock his strongest ally on the staff in this campaign of wits against the paired dangers of both Edwin Cord + Jack Taggart and Ty Stone turned out to be Mr D’Eath, perhaps the very last person (well, alright Smythe was the last person but D’Eath was a close second) on the staff that he’d have given credit to on that particular front.

D’Eath seemed to have firmly taken Tony’s side in this whole affair, a fact that up until that point had escaped him. Tony wondered when the turning point had been, when had D’Eath decided that Tony was worth the time and effort?

The man’s empty gaze, so often trapped in the jungles of Vietnam, seemed to burn with a napalm fuelled heat whenever Tony caught the man’s eye. He’d (mostly) kept his head down in the man’s classes, uncomfortably aware of the heat of the man’s gaze.

Had he misjudged the other man so badly?

~~~~~~~

Tony had been pleasantly surprised when in the aftermath of the destruction of his room another hastily scrawled note from Howard turned up giving him the rare permission to replace the things that he’d lost. The note was perfunctory, quite literally demanding that Tony not shame the Stark name by walking around like a pauper.

The very first thing Tony had done with the money was order several dozen records to replace the ones that H-Justin had lost, alongside several new acquisitions.

The other boy had been nearly star struck at the gift – which had left Tony feeling awkward. He had no idea why H-Justin was so grateful, he’d only replaced what had been destroyed because of him anyway.

Still, to Tony’s relief Justin had finally moved on from Jobriath, though perhaps the boy’s favour of the artist was tainted by the memory of the thoroughly destroyed album sleeve. Justin was now spending his time alternating between Here Come the Warm Jets by Brian Eno, and Tapestry by Carole King. Tony wasn’t sure which of the two albums he found more irritating – though Eno probably edged King, with his enthusiastic use of irritating sound effects and analogue synths that Justin seemed to adore, of course.

Carole King came a very close second, quite apart from Tony’s (justified, of course it’s perfectly justified the song’s crap okay?) hatred of You’ve Got A Friend – with its twee, utterly untrue message about twu-fwiendship. Urgh Tony wanted to make exaggerated barfing mimes every time the song came on, Justin played the twee acoustic album often enough that Tony was beginning to hate the rest of the LP too.

To Tony’s complete lack of surprise Justin had taken to playing You Make Me Feel on a loop, singing along with the song with gleeful abandon. Whilst the sight never failed to make Tony smile, he now knew most of the album by heart, and had even caught himself singing along to the chorus once or twice. It was a good thing that he’d never been tempted to sing along with the proto-walkman in the school hallways, too aware of the unfriendly eyes just waiting for him to stop paying attention to his surroundings. Tony could only imagine the aftermath of singing the eponymous line in that song in front of a group of hormonal schoolboys.

That task dealt with Tony had hastily replaced all of his textbooks, mourning the loss of the computer all the while. There was no feasible way he could replace the thing, nowhere unsupervised to carry out the necessary delicate soldering. Despite his earlier hopes the self-directed experimental labs were carefully supervised at all times.

Apparently one of the year groups that had come before Tony’s time had delighted in converting red phosphorous to white phosphorous and using the volatile stuff all over the school to create little explosions. Resulting in one boy nearly losing an eye, when a small chunk of the reactive allotrope had been hidden in his lunch tray.

Suffice it to say Tony was chafing at the (even he had to admit, understandable) restrictions placed on his access. 

Tony had considered the textbook acquisition the end of the affair, until Ms Ramesh hesitantly commented that Tony’s outfits were looking a little threadbare - after the room destruction incident he’d been alternating between his two surviving sets of clothes – resulting in nasty titters from the entire senior college prep class. Tony had reluctantly delved into the mysterious realm of clothes shopping, dipping further into the surprising well of money that Howard had seen fit to gift him.

Tony was painfully self-aware that his own tastes in clothes were lacking, Pepper had told him so often enough. And unlike Ty she’d never belittled him for no reason. It didn’t help that to Tony’s eye the height of 1970s fashion was damned near the ugliest style he’d ever seen.

Jarvis had sealed the urgency of the situation by sending him a note pointedly enquiring about when he’d be receiving the wardrobe requests given that both Tony’s ‘academic and leisure’ pursuits had already been covered. Tony had been a little hurt by the lack of personal content in the missive, until he realised the probable reason for that lack. The guilt that replaced the petty feelings of hurt had weighed heavy on him for the whole week that he’d spent picking things out.

In the end, he’d compromised between things that he’d have chosen for himself, and things that Tony thought Pepper would have liked him to wear, with more than a little influence from a certain musical idol who he’d gained a taste for in recent months. He’d rattled off a sheepish note to Jarvis with the list of clothes that he wanted, all taken from the department store catalogue that Jarvis had not-so-subtly included with the letter. Tony had to admit that that scornful instruction from Howard may have been part of the reason why he’d avoided the chore for so long.

Of course, the other reason for the head-in-the-sand tactics was exposed when he’d started flicking through the damned catalogue. Whilst Tony had never much cared for high fashion, he had been unpleasantly reminded of how strange this era that he was trapped in was. There was no Alexander McQueen, or Paul Smith included in the long list of designers that supplied the store, no Vivienne Westwood, or even Jimmy Choos - a brand name that Tony was only aware of because the brand was Pepper’s other favoured choice when she wasn’t in the mood for the towering red-lacquered Laboutins that she loved so much. (Of course, Tony had delighted in pointing out that Danny Choo had created his own brand of creepy dead-eyed dolls in a fit of annoyed pique when Pepper had commented on Tony’s ‘childish’ taste in sneakers.)

The backwards fashions in this era were yet another unsettling reminder that he was almost literally on another planet – and that it would be a hell of a long time before Tony managed to make his way back to what he thought of as anything resembling the ‘real world’.

Tony hadn’t much thought about his wardrobe, until he had to. After all, kids’ clothes were kids’ clothes, right?

Well, apparently not.

Whilst he wasn’t a complete novice at this, Tony had to admit that he found it difficult to judge which clothes were ‘cool’ in this horrible decade, and which clothes were the type that parents forced their children into. Dooming their unfortunate offspring to the march of shame through the school hallways. It was with that thought in mind that Tony had made his careful selection, for once grateful that the choice was his own.

Despite the unexpected hurdle, Tony had made do. He’d honestly been surprised when Jarvis hadn’t objected to his choices, but shrugged it off, since it was Howard’s money being wasted.

Tony’s new wardrobe was a mixture of well-tailored suits, and the more familiar band t-shirts and jeans that he’d always favoured. The suits were a very different cut to the style he usually favoured, hugging in at the waist, flaring at his ankles, and generally highlighting his slight figure rather than the usual boxey cut that was designed to enhance his bulk and intimidate. Whilst Tony would have loved access to his favoured tailor, Tony figured that the CEO Special would look ridiculous on his tiny kid-frame, besides, he should probably play up the cute child genius angle whilst he still could. Tony had taken care to avoid the casual blousy shirts that were horribly popular in this era, instead opting for a simultaneously far plainer, and more visually striking style that was all sharp collars and well-turned cuffs. Tony had found that he couldn’t quite give up the minimalist aesthetic with a twist that had typified the designs he favoured in the 21^st century.

Whilst he certainly didn’t care what the other kids thought of him, Tony was painfully aware that a misstep here could make his remaining months at the school hellish.  Unworried as he was for his own wellbeing, Tony was more concerned with maintaining his nearly untouchable image for Justin’s sake.

He’d been unpleasantly surprised when the large-package showed up – revealing that even the sensible pairs of jeans that he’d chosen had ridiculous flares that had a tendency to get wrapped up around his ankles during his attempts to spar with Ben.

Fortunately, no one seemed to notice his discomfort, not even Ty had anything to say about the new wardrobe – well, aside from a snide remark about how he finally looked like a member of respectable society again, rather than a street urchin (apart from the fact that he was too short to believably be someone worth talking to). Tony had merely rolled his eyes at the comment, too relieved that he didn’t stick out like a sore thumb to bother thinking up a retort.

~~~~~~~

Xavier had been surprised by how long it had taken the guardians of the newest lauded super-genii to reply to his offer of mentoring. Usually the parents jumped on the chance to help their child in any way that they could. Charles had to admit, he was even more surprised by the contents of the letter and the person who’d sent it, the note was written by one Edwin Jarvis, who claimed to be a family friend, and begged for his discretion.

Once Charles had quickly verified the information with some judicious use of Cerebro – to Charles’ surprise the man was much more than a family friend, and more of an ersatz father figure to the young man in question carrying a depth of love for the boy that was normally only shared in biological families. That fact had both reassured him about the rather odd request and completely saddened him when he realised why the other man thought such discretion so necessary.

The whole situation was uncomfortably similar to the delicate balance Charles was trying, and to his shame, failing to strike with young Jason. The boy’s innocent mismatched eyes were already haunted by some of the things his own father had done.

As such Charles had discretely made enquiries with the bureaucratic staff at the school, unfortunately even with the liberal application of his …gifts the process to provide an external visitor access to the place had taken months of bypassing red tape. Still, Charles supposed that the delay was at least partly worth it, he now had a perfectly legitimate reason to visit the institution again should the need arise. He was visiting under the guise of encouraging inter-school relationships, as far as everyone else was concerned Charles was merely there to encourage a private school little league. Charles had to admit that he wasn’t looking forward to the false speech he was going to have to give to the assembled students. However, the ability to make unfettered contact with potential future students for perfectly innocent reasons was utterly invaluable.

Charles had no concrete plan about how he’d gain access to chat with young Tony Stark, but he was confident that he’d be able to wing it.

He had to admit that he found the ball of neuroses and nervousness that personified the Principal’s post a surprising fit for the role. Mrs Kowalski was an inherently honest soul, constantly feeling guilty about some minor imagined infarction or other – usually involving the occasional unkind thought about her charges’ parents. (Charles personally thought that said thoughts were well deserved if the woman’s memories were accurate.)

Eventually after spending the entirety of the morning giving speech after speech to each successive group of children that were herded in before himself and Hank, Charles struck the jackpot with the first of the senior classes that reluctantly filed into the small hall.

The repast in the canteen had been an interesting experience, reminding Charles far too much of the unpleasant slop served up in Baliol College’s Hall, a side effect he ruefully supposed of over a decade of rationing. The morning speeches had all been short perfunctory affairs, targeted at young children and uninterested teens. The afternoon speeches were all targeted at high school aged kids, attempting to encourage the older children to bolster their CVs by volunteering to help actually run the thing. Though illogically to Charles’ mind, he’d been given the brightest and oldest of the kids to talk at to first, Charles grudgingly admitted that the idea was probably that they would be fresh faced and chipper after lunch.

Charles noticed his target’s presence before he actually entered the room, giving a small jolt of surprise, which made Hank look down at him in concern. Charles sat up straighter in his chair and gave Hank a subtle nod, the other man would have to take this one. Charles was going to be busy. Aware of hostile and bored eyes on him as the teenagers filed in and lounged around on the uncomfortable looking chairs laid out, Charles somewhat self-consciously stroked at his receding hairline - cleverly concealed by his fashionably floppy haircut.

The mind in question was abuzz, once again Charles got the distinct impression that he wasn’t being consciously repelled from the other, but nevertheless he faced an impenetrable staticky barrier that promised pain. Charles wasn’t sure why, but the sensation put him in mind of being forced to watch several thousand televisions simultaneously, here in this realm of metaphor with no physical equivalent.

Taking a more delicate tack to that of his last unfortunate encounter with this fascinating mind Charles allowed himself to sink still further into his gifts, only leaving enough of himself behind to save embarrassment should anyone ask him a direct question.

Finally, finally, the boy in question snuck into the room – one of the very last students to do so. Compared to his fellows the child really was incredibly young, the age gap profound and ridiculous. Charles felt a great swell of pity for the boy, for compared to the young men who were supposed to be his peers he was a boy, attempting to get on in a world of testosterone and hormones that he could know nothing about.

Still, the part of Charles that had grudgingly learnt to read body language (for what use was body language to a telepath?) when his gift had been supressed by the nerve serum noted that the child, this Tony, didn’t shy away from his fellows. If anything, the boy moved like a shark, a self-confidence evident in his every action. Charles would have to ask Hank what he thought about all of this later, he had no doubt that the incredibly intelligent man had noticed, and it never hurt to have a second opinion.

Charles would have asked him then and there, but the other was midway into the delicate opening segue of their little presentation and Charles was still trying to oh-so-gently worm his way past formidable subconscious mental defences.

~~~~~~~~~

Ben had been keeping an eye on their guests all day, he didn’t trust these two schoolteachers despite Edwin’s missive. The pair were from a school with a spotty record of student intake to say the very least. He’d been careful, oh so careful, to keep everything he did well within the Ben Adams persona that he’d built for himself, doing nothing to attract attention. As far as they were aware he merely happened to be the member of staff that happened to have a free day today, an open schedule and an insouciant air.

“Please, call me Hank”, had actually been the harder of the slightly mismatched pair to get a read on, all careful control, and nervousness about secrets. Ben had been incredibly careful to keep his body language open and laidback around the other man – paradoxically reminded of the utter fear of an atrocity survivor and the extreme overconfidence of the younger idiots just after their first death.

For a long horrible moment, he thought that he’d been made when Hank had snorted explosively just as they went to shake hands, something about the skinny boffin reminding him of a certain giant of his unwilling acquaintance in that moment, before the bespectacled mutant settled back down into his self-protective stance and smiled nervously at him.

The near miss reminded him why as a rule Ben avoided mutants – just as he’d carefully avoided every potential source of conflict in the second half of the twentieth century thus far. Ben had learnt that lesson (again) when he’d gotten caught up in the camps at Ettersburg. He’d promised himself never again. Of course, Ben was painfully aware that he’d inevitably find himself in that far too familiar situation again sooner or later, but he was determined to put it off for as long as possible. Hence avoiding mutants.

Ben was even more careful to keep his thoughts precisely within the bounds of what Ben Adams, ex-SAS commando, and disenfranchised soldier’s soldier would think. No leaving the carefully worn-out groove today. No.

If you knew the right people, and Ben, unfortunately was intimately acquainted with scores of the wrong people, well… If you knew the right people Charles Xavier and his little group were infamous.

A powerful and far too likely to stick his nose into other people’s business telepath, and a genius (and mutant to boot) who was prone to experimenting on himself. Both sharing an unfortunate habit of hanging around violent extremists. Just the sort of individuals that Ben habitually moved to other continents to avoid, and here he was interacting closely with the pair as a favour to a friend. Not that Edwin would have appreciated it as such, the silly man, far too caught up in petty concerns to even think about recognising the bigger picture for what it was.

Still, though he didn’t like to think about it, Tony was rapidly turning from a charge of circumstance into a Student. And the boy deserved the capitalisation, for all that there was no tell-tale buzz, Ben could have sworn from his mannerisms that he was dealing with a young one who’s first death had been later in life. Only it was impossible, especially given the child’s age.

Ben had done his research thoroughly, and whilst there was definitely some question about his parentage… Well, Ben had found the birth records. No changeling here.

Ben narrowed his eyes when Xavier stiffened in his chair, a clunky oversized thing that had been hell to navigate around the gothic revival architecture of the school, Ben hadn’t seen anything about the students filing in that would warrant that sort of reaction. He carefully observed the silent communication between the pair before focussing his attention back on less obvious people watching. They hadn’t noticed his notice, but it didn’t hurt to be cautious.

Tony trudged in looking just as unhappy to be there as the hormone driven teens. Despite Ben’s best efforts, the boy’s gait was still an awkward combination of a child’s natural exuberance and curiosity paired with something far more self-assured, notably wary and weary. Ben was happy to observe that Tony had wholeheartedly embraced the decision to play-up the child genius card for all that he was worth – the boys replacement wardrobe after the destructive incident in the dorms played up to that expectation perfectly, pairing t-shirts emblazoned with strange slogans and references with outdatedly flared trousers, awkward gawky oversized barely tinted sunglasses and overlarge sneakers.

Ben wasn’t sure where Tony’s newfound lack of style came from, or how on earth the brat had persuaded Edwin to buy it for him, but he had to admit that it provided an effective and admirable smokescreen to the awkward juxtapositions going on right underneath everybody’s noses. He only hoped that his continuing educational efforts would mean that Tony could drop the ridiculous charade long before he hit his teens, Ben would be ashamed if any student of his had to go around dressed like that for any length of time.

Ben stared out at Xavier from behind the mask of the Ben Adams persona. Analysing the powerful telepath with distrust, he’d met his fair share of telepaths, and he knew how to deal with them. But Ben did not want to draw that kind of attention, even if it would bring a sense of malicious glee to dump the arrogant man on his ass. Ben had felt Xavier summing him up and dismissing him, and he hadn’t like the sensation, useful though it was.

Settling down to watch from behind the mask he’d erected for himself, Ben prepared to protect his student.

~~~~~~~

Tony was vaguely aware of a twinge, a headache building up behind his eyes. Looking around surreptitiously he could see that he was about as willing to be there as the rest of the honours students, well except perhaps Baines, who looked thrilled at the idea of more sport, and he didn’t count, that kid was disgustingly good at everything he tried his hand at. Managing to be well-liked amongst both the nerds and the jocks, even Taggart didn’t seem to resent him.

Resisting the urge to sigh loudly Tony tried to at least look like he was paying attention to the nervous young man at the front of the room, the guy looked like the kind of nerdy stereotype that Taggart and his cohorts loved to bully. Side-eyeing the aforementioned group Tony could see that they were definitely planning something from the nasty grins and chatter.

Another sharp twinge of pain had Tony drawing himself up and trying not to look like he had a migraine, decades of attending board meetings with the worst kind of three-day hangover had acquitted him well there at least, Tony was well-used to working through the kind of pain that would paralyze most people. His mind skittered away from the real reasons for such immunity, flashes of hands holding him down, and a cutting tearing sensation in his chest as Yinsen pulled out a large chunk of his ribca- Tony came back to himself with a start looking around surreptitiously so see if he’d done anything stupid.

No one seemed to have noticed, well the balding guy in the wheelchair looked a bit green, but since no one else was looking worried Tony chalked it up to the dude being a bit spaced. Everything about the man screamed the very worst sort of seventies fashion-sense, it wouldn’t surprise Tony, if alongside that ill-advised large collared floral shirt, leather jacket and flares combo that the dude was into pot. He certainly dressed the part. Tony completely failed to recognise the irony of that thought given his current wardrobe choices, but the sudden relief from the build-up of pressure behind his eyes was a compelling reason to relax.

The inexplicable headache gone Tony decided he’d actually listen to the spiel, though he very much doubted it Tony thought it might be worth paying attention – especially if the way Ben was meaningfully eyeing him was any indication.

~~~~~~~

Charles slammed back into his own head with a jolt. Just as he’d been making progress, this time avoiding any attempt to sync with the impossibly fast mind in question, and getting through the outer defences by sheer slipperiness, he’d been hit with a flash of something sickening and hot. It had been like a mental brand tearing through his own mind with remembered heat and pain.

No, not heat. Just pain. The self-defence mechanism had been violent and alarming, but effective.

Nursing the telepathically induced headache Charles tried not to look as though he was about to be violently ill, though of course he needn’t have bothered, Hank was already shooting him concerned looks. One of these days Charles was going to work out how to keep things from the other man again, though they’d been living in each other’s pockets for so long now that he knew that was a forlorn wish.

Deciding it was silly to try and hide the headache any longer Charles reached up and rubbed at his temples in a bid to soothe the building pressure, he didn’t notice, too caught up in his own discomfort, but his actions made a certain Ben Adams straighten up in alarm before the man just as suddenly slumped back into his more usual casual slouch.

Charles tried to work out just what he’d done wrong, he’d eased his way past the first layer of defences successfully he was sure of it. To a less accomplished telepath Charles was sure they would have been fooled into thinking that layer was the only layer – there were several sets of memories stored in this outer region ready for his exploration, and he’d been about to do so when that jolt of emotion had lashed out at him.

He heaved out a frustrated breath, Charles was so sure that he’d managed to avoid the issue he’d encountered last time, he hadn’t even attempted the impossible task of keeping up with the flashes of current thought and gotten straight to targeting the boy’s long-term memories. And yet, despite that avoidance tactic seeming to work, Charles had been repelled as soon as it seemed that he was getting anywhere.

Where on earth would a child learn to use such tools, and how? Unless this confirmed his possible theory that young Tony Stark was no child. However, up close and personal like this, Charles could tell that this boy didn’t have the same disturbing double-echo that Logan had carried three years ago. And there was certainly no tenuous yet strangely immutable thread to follow, echoing through the impossible.

It was a puzzle and no mistake.

Unfortunately, one that would have to remain unsolved. With no access to the boy’s memories, and no feasible way to sync his own mind up with the impossibly scattered thoughts of the child that sat so disinterestedly in front of him. Well, Charles honestly hadn’t a clue how to go about teasing this little mystery open.

Charles started carefully probing his own memory of that mental defence, realising with an internal jolt that it hadn’t been a defence mechanism. Charles hadn’t triggered anything, he’d been through the first layer, nowhere near touching anything in that mental space, and nowhere near the secondary layer of defences surrounding the deeper memories.

As Hank droned on about the possibility of setting up a sports league between the two high-school aged groups of students that both schools shared, stuttering his way nervously through the spiel that Charles had found so effortless, Charles got to pondering about that incident three years ago.

What on earth had made him trust Logan in the end? When Charles had been so very cynical about the world and his place in it?

Being honest about it Charles knew that he’d only been playing along for the majority of that awful escapade, but by the end of that tumultuous week he’d trusted Logan completely.

What had made him follow the other man down through that impossible maelstrom of time?

Thoughts of Logan’s sudden, and appalling attack of PTSD gave Charles a sudden jolt of realisation. A sensation of ice trickled down his spine, and Charles barely resisted the urge to stare at the boy in question in concern.

What Charles had taken as a defence mechanism had actually been a projection of memory, loud, sudden and vicious. Even if he’d been safely ensconced within his own skull Charles would have felt it. The sensation had been wrenching and awful and painful as anything Charles had ever come across, and it had been a memory. A flashback – ruthlessly quashed, but a memory nonetheless.

Charles needed privacy, and possibly the help of Cerebro to try and work out what he’d seen. Like everything else related to this impossible, ridiculous mind that shone so tantalisingly close, well the memory was overwhelming with an overabundance of information.

He rapidly forgot all of his promises to one Mr Edwin Jarvis as this new puzzle swept aside all other concerns. If he could prise the memory open, unlock its secrets, perhaps Charles would be able to work out just what it was that was so intriguingly different about this impenetrable maelstrom of thought that lay before him.

Whilst Charles wasn’t convinced that this boy would prove to possess the X-gene when the time came, he would nevertheless extend an invite to attend his school during the summer months. Charles wanted to get a better idea of the young man’s personality, mutant or not, a certified genius who was intelligent enough to immediately be flagged for several government watch lists bore keeping an eye on by someone friendlier.

Besides it would be useful to instil the moral compass required to view mutants as people from a young age, and interacting with other genii as well as children his own age, who were similarly excluded from their peers could only do the boy some good.

Fortunately, Hank was around to quietly cajole him into remembering their reason for coming here - It took most of the rest of the day, but eventually, after dozens more interminable speeches about this, as yet entirely fictional little league, Charles managed to manufacture the ‘coincidence’ required to allow him to meet Tony in relative privacy.

Charles and Hank were forced to take part in the evening meal at the school before they finally had the time to go and ‘examine’ the small training gym that would be ‘perfect’ for their needs, sat with the rest of the staff at the raised platform that elevated them ever so slightly above their students. The difference was little over half a foot’s worth of height, yet psychologically it was a world away.

Charles had been shoehorned in between a bear of a man with bright flaming hair, and a jittery individual with a thousand-yard stare that he could have spotted a mile away after his experiences with Erik. Hank was seated opposite, and a little way down the table from him next to a charming young Indian woman, who in turn was sat next to the young balding (in an utterly undignified manner) man who’d arranged this small gesture of interschool friendship – the trio seemed to be getting along swimmingly, a fact that made the thin ascetic fellow on Hank’s other side glare furiously.

Charles was working hard on his over-reliance on his gift, he was purposefully trying to avoid falling back into the old habit of gently skimming minds instead of observing simple human interaction. The man sat directly opposite him, the fellow with the big-nose who’d been their escort all day smirked at him,

“I see you’ve noticed our burgeoning love triangle. Care to place a bet?”

Charles frowned at the other man, trying to convey his disapproval as mildly as he could. Whilst he didn’t want to upset one of his hosts he couldn’t say he liked the man’s apparent attitude towards his coworkers, treating them as if they were sideshow attractions merely there for his amusement.

Giving in to the urge Charles decided that a quick skim of the other man’s mind couldn’t do any harm, it wouldn’t do to have any charge of his being corrupted by inappropriate company – he knew too well where that road lead.

He reached out mentally sending out a quick probe before diving in… Odd, he hadn’t noticed before, hadn’t been paying enough attention to the man to notice, as supercilious as the man was Charles hadn’t deemed him worth considering more closely. Where everyone else in the room pinged to his senses, the minds around him buzzing with a quiet susurration of thoughts, and yet from young Mr Adams’ direction – silence.

Charles gently synced with the surfaces of the minds around him, skimming surface thoughts as easily as a dolphin playing in the waves before focusing his attention on Adams and just what it was that had caught his attention.   

Oh superficially at least Adamson’s mind was like everyone else’s, a smattering of noisy surface thoughts jostling for his attention amongst a great sea of noise, but the deeper ping and response.

He pinged.

And there was no response.

Charles waited with a sense of baited breath, but again nothing but that eerie silence came. 

Curious.

If he hadn’t looked closer he wouldn’t have noticed. Tentatively he reached out to Hank and tersely let the other man know what he was about to get up to. Aside from a quick sharp glance in his direction Hank made no show that anything was amiss.

Allowing himself to briefly refocus on the conversation at hand, the convenient excuse of eating not holding much more than a candle of an excuse for being rude Charles concentrated again on examining this strange mind.

The surface chatter so easy to skim from, that was but a shell, a front, a disguise – the exact thing that a telepath carrying out a cursory inspection would expect to see.

He glanced sharply at Adams, the other man clearly misinterpreting the reason for the look gave him what he probably thought was a roguish grin. Charles extended another cautious mental probe, mindful of the possibility that the other would notice his presence and dove deeper.

Immediately he found himself lost in a miasma of noise, nonsense thoughts, and lude sexual observations about staff members of both genders drowning out all other thought. Everywhere he turned Charles was faced with an overload of information, a constant bombardment of the man’s thoughts on the events of the day, in minute, distressingly lewd detail. On top of all of it, making everything even more difficult to comprehend was the sensation of being zapped by 10,000 volts.

Charles wasn’t sure which way was up or which was down.

He was lost in the other’s mind – with none of the usual clues about which way would lead him deeper into the psyche or which would let him resurface in the real world.

The sensation was similar to, yet utterly unlike the painful overload that he’d received during that first foolhardy attempt to touch young Mr Stark’s mind. Through the haze of pain, Charles hoped he wasn’t bleeding again, that would be difficult to explain away at dinner. No, Charles could tell that this response was unnatural, targeted, an attack rather than the seemingly natural overwhelming flow of thought that Mr Stark’s brain seemed to produce.

Still reeling from the painful electrical jolts Charles focused on trying to spot any kind of pattern to the information he was being purposefully overwhelmed with. There was none, no source, no linking thought, no pattern.

He gritted his mental teeth and tried to regain any sense of focus, unlike the pure overwhelming noise he’d felt the other day this effect was predictable, Charles could almost taste it. Mentally spinning around Charles tried to work out what his subconscious was trying to tell him.

There! – There was a gap in the information, it was tiny. A few years ago, before he’d come into contact with quite so many people Charles was sure that he’d have missed it. Charles blindly struck out in the random direction trying to ignore the overabundance of information and failing. It was overwhelming, the sheer number of sights, sounds, smells, tactile information – heat, pressure, up, down.

Charles felt as though he were in Cerebro again, that hideous time when he’d lost control of his gift – being electrocuted by the very machine that had been designed to help him, reeling from the pain of it all, and unable to tell where he ended and everyone else began.

How was this even possible?

A sudden sense of gaping empty space made him halt. And just in time.

The informational overload ended as abruptly as it had begun, Charles was left reeling from the suddenness of it. He took the time to catch his metaphorical breath, before trying to comprehend what lay before him.

A vast empty blackness, that stretched out and down. So far down. Charles had the impression of impossible depth. Charles had a feeling that he’d breached whatever that defence had been.

And yet what was this?

Another defence?

Somehow Charles didn’t think so, it was unlike anything he’d come across in a mind before. Then again, that overload of sights sounds and feelings was unlike anything he’d come across in a single mind before.

Cautiously, hesitantly, Charles sent out another ping. There was nothing, no echo, no response, nothing. The effect was even more striking without the veil of surface thoughts there to distract him. The uncaring silence completely unnerving.

Charles got the distinct impression that if he just reached a little further he’d find something. It was incredibly tempting to just let go, and drop down into that nothingness. The urge to jump so strong he could almost feel it like a physical hand pressing on his back.

Charles stumbled back from the edge.

Somehow, he didn’t think he’d make his way out again, despite the nagging feeling that the bright core that must be at the centre of the mind he was searching for was just out of sight, just a little further, that all he had to do was lean over the edge and...

Ignoring the fleeting and all too tempting impression of lights just beyond his range of view Charles backed up further, feeling the overwhelming informational overload brushing uncomfortably against his mind again.

He took a deep metaphorical breath and steeled himself for the journey back to the surface. This was one mystery of the mind that Charles was content to leave be.

Steeling himself Charles turned to face the barrier that he’d fought his way through to reach this space… Whatever it was.

Gulping at the angry looking lightning that seemed to form the bulk of the structure Charles decided that he couldn’t afford to waste any more time in here. Intriguing mystery or not Charles still hadn’t actually sensed any ill-will, it had been his own damned foolish curiosity that brought him here.

The unsettling sense of down down down echoed up emptily and eerily behind him as he plunged back through the chaos.

The journey out seemed easier somehow, as if the mind was expelling an unwanted guest.

With a jolt, Charles found himself back in the here and now, breathing heavily. He blinked and looked around himself, surreptitiously checking that he wasn’t having another nosebleed. He wasn’t - thank goodness, though Charles had to admit, after fighting his way out of that maelstrom of chaotic thought he was surprised. No one else seemed to have noticed his short absence, not even the man who’s mind he’d been drowning in. Though Hank was peering at him with poorly disguised concern.

Charles shot his friend what he hoped was a reassuring look, before he got on with the business of working his way through his disappointing evening meal, the memory of the unsettling darkness lingering uncomfortably at the back of his mind all the while.