Tony's Epilogue

(author's note: The story comes to a conclusion with the return of the Stones and Tony beginning to digest what they went though, told from Tony's POV.)

Tony would have been fine if he never had to see that damn platform ever again. Or the stones. Or any of that magical mambo jumbo, really. It had been four days. 96 hours, give or take. He still hadn't managed to shake the weirdness of it all, getting credit for something another dimensional him had done. Or figured out how to function in this new role—not the protector anymore, but the protected. He wasn't to be risked again. They had made that quite clear. Pepper and Peter. Happy and Rhodey. Not even for this last challenge, returning the Stones. Hell, even May told him she'd tie up him in the damn basement before she'd see him jump through that portal again and it wasn't easy to keep the inappropriate jokes that hit him at the thought of that to himself. This wasn't a joking matter, he knew that. And he was pretty sure, that her concern lay mostly with Peter, not with him. He saw their point, but sitting this one out wouldn't have been his first choice. It was a part of bringing this quest to an end and by right he should be at the center of making it happen. Bur nobody had stood for the mere discussion to include him on that particular mission. And... well, thank goodness. Instead, he had spent every second since his arrival with his family and the kid. Nothing else mattered in the end. Only they mattered.

His former self's death had left them broken, frayed and wounded. Pepper. Morgan. Peter, too. Coming back for their sake had been the right thing to do. He knew that now. Happy broke down in tears when he turned up at the house; Rhodey outright fainted at the sight of him. Who could blame them? All of this was just as surreal to all of them as it was to him. Their gazes often lingered on him for a fraction too long, their touches lasted a few more seconds than he was accustomed to, their hugs were closer, deeper. They all were still reassuring themselves that he was indeed back. None of them had really processed what had happened yet. Nor had he. The consequence was clear. He would not, could not, go and jump in front of the canons again. Not for a long time. Maybe not ever again.

For the first time in more than a decade, he wouldn't be in the front line, wouldn't spearhead the mission to save the planet. However, that didn't mean he wouldn't support the team. That part was non-negotiable. He'd do what he can. Research the Stones, their history, their basic makeup. He'd help protect the Universe, stand by the team. Strange's whole thing had been that the Universe still needed him. Well, he didn't know about that, but he'd do what he could. So, there he was, right next to that damn Quantum Realm tunnel. At least he wasn't alone.

The team should stand united for this one last step and all of them had turned up. The first thing he did was to stride up to Natasha, pull her into a hug, and hold her close for a solid minute.

"Had to steal my thunder with the Stones, didn't you," she said when he let go of her.

"Shut up, Nat. I'm really happy you're not dead."

She shrugged. "Well, technically I am, right? Or at least that other me is." She shook her head. "This is all really messed up."

He snorted. "Tell me about it. How close did Clint come to putting an arrow through his other-dimensional self?"

She sighed deeply. "You have no idea."

"Well, I don't blame him. I thought I was going to have a heart attack on the spot myself."

"That would have kind of defeated the original purpose of the trip, so I'm glad you pulled through." Her eyes wandered past him to where Peter was hovering close to Pepper and Morgan. "Who'd have thought the kid had it in him."

"I did." He said it without hesitation, without a shred of doubt, eyes prickling with pride. Nat nodded, her smile deepening, and he gave her another quick hug before walking over to Bruce.

After everything that had happened, there was still a fair amount of splintering going on. While Bruce worked at the platform's control panel, Rhodey and Happy sat in the shade on a picnic blanket May had brought along with snacks and some shockingly tasty cake. He wouldn't be surprised if that was an attempt to make the team forget about the kid's kamikaze quest. In fact, he was pretty sure it was exactly that, however unnecessary. Strange had been right. Nat's rescue had taken an enormous amount of heat off the situation. He tried not to have his feelings hurt by that. It wasn't personal. He knew that. At least, it meant that the team had been ready to listen. So, they had talked. They had explained. Peter and Strange mostly. It had somehow felt wrong that he would argue his own case of... well... coming back to life. Maybe that was part of his problem, but whatcha gonna do...

So, the kid and the wizard had explained how they had picked him up and then turned back time and how things were fine and how there was nothing to worry about. It seemed like an easy fix, a loophole and it was. In a way. It was also a highly complex tangle of cosmic rules that requiring an extremely specific set of magic super skills to pull off. But it was what it was and the team had... Well, after Bruce had spent 2 days straight reading Strange's books and running simulations on Tony's model, they had come around, accepted Peter and Strange's reasoning. And while that didn't magically turn them all into a happy family, all that was left was for them to heal now. The trust would grow back. With time.

Lang had turned up as well, standing a bit too plainly at a distance. He had introduced Tony to Hope. They had decided to stick around for this last part of the quest but there was an undeniable restlessness in both of them, a need to get back home to the West Coast. They weren't the only ones itching to leave. Nebula hadn't officially shown her face, but she was hovering somewhere among the trees. Peter had pointed her out to him, but try as he might he couldn't see her. Must be the kid's ridiculously enhanced senses and hopefully not just Tony's eyesight bidding him goodbye.

Of his band of merry conspirators that had given him this second shot, only Strange was missing. The wizard apparently had other things to do. Some other chores, consequential to the fate of the Universe for sure. Tony gnawed on his lip and rolled his eyes at himself. Actually, that was probably exactly what the Sorcerer Supreme was doing. No reason for Super Hero Envy, Stark.

He stepped up close to Bruce, still at a safe distance from the platform. Somewhere along the line, it had been decided that Rogers would return the Stones. On his own. Well. Of course, that seemed a little— He gave his head a little shake. He wasn't going to get in the middle of that. The team had made that decision so that was that. He was close enough to look over Banner's shoulder, to check the progress. Nope. He wouldn't do that. He would not check the variables on the display. He was here for emotional support only. For the team. For whoever would need it.

Bruce mumbled to himself, the string of vocalized thoughts interrupted by the clattering of keyboard keys and beeps from the platform's control panel. On the platform, Rogers talked to Wilson and Barnes. Maximoff was sat in the grass close by with Clint walking back and forth right next to her mimicking what looked like archery maneuvers. Well, of course, he would be. The air held the familiar vibe of pre-mission tension, this odd mix of anticipation, fear, and determination. Sure, it was different. Not the same weight of desperation and despair. The stakes were different. And yet, there seemed to be more. Maybe it was just his half relaxed, half exhausted state, now that the euphoria of seeing Nat simmered down. Maybe it was something else, something he couldn't quite put his finger on, but the longer he stood there, the clearer it became. Something wasn't quite right...

Rogers had finished hugging his friends and paced the circle nervously. Wilson and Barnes descended, hurling their usual snark at each other and Nat jumped up onto the platform instead. He gathered her into a particularly lingering embrace, lingering even for the whole coming-back-to-life business. When she finally joined the others on the sidelines, Tony's eyes stayed on the Captain. He seemed suddenly distant and withdrawn as if he was a mere observer of the group. Wilson, unaware of Cap's mood, dashed out some friendly insults at him. Cap didn't engage but the faintest smile tugged at his lips.

Tony frowned. When Rogers turned to look towards Bruce, his eyes found Tony instead. The small smile froze for a moment before disappearing altogether. Instead, Cap pursed his lips, the corner of his mouth curled up into a smirk, that seemed almost resigned before he nodded curtly at him. His eyes stayed with Tony for only a moment, then slid away again and back over to his friends.

A split-second eye contact instead of the lingering gaze he was now accustomed to. Fine, it was Cap. Cap liked to hold onto his... Yeah, no. Something was definitely off.

"Banner, I'll need a second. Hold off on that power button a bit longer, would you?" He didn't wait for an answer. He ignored the flustered gazes of Wilson and Barnes and Natasha's call too. When he jumped up onto the platform, Rogers turned to him.

"Tony?" he asked, a slight frown on his face.

Tony scanned the group waiting below. The kid, surprised by his sudden jump into action, had taken a couple of nervous steps towards them but Pepper and May were having none of it. They called Peter back and when Tony shot him a smile and a quick wave, he went back to sit in the grass next to Pepper and Morgan. Everyone else was well out of earshot, too. Tony still stepped a little closer to Rogers.

"What's going on, Cap?"

"I...I don't know what you mean." Cap shook his head, blinking at him.

Pathetic pokerface. But then again, Rogers had never been a good liar.

Tony raised his eyebrows. "Yeah, something is up. You can tell me now or—," he looked over to Wilson and Barnes, "we'll discuss this in a larger group?"

"No! Wait!"

Cap looked right at him, grating his teeth. Whatever was up, he had not planned on telling anyone, least of all Tony. He might have gotten away with it if he hadn't hugged Nat for so long…

"I... it might be some time before we see each other," Cap said, his voice still hardly above a whisper.

Some time? Tony shook his head. "It takes 10 seconds, Cap. Even if things weren't to run quite as smoothly as is to be expected. It doesn't matter on our end. Here, it's still the same—oh." He narrowed his eyes on Rogers. "Wait, what the fuck are you saying?"

Cap's eyes slipped from his again and fixed on something invisible in mid-air. He sighed. "Loki once called me a man out of time. He was right. I don't belong here. I never did. Now, I get a shot at fixing that… make it right."

"Yeah, you stop right there and get Reindeer Games out of your head. You hear me, Cap?"

Roger's looked right at him, eyes steady and determined now. Damn! He was serious!

Tony grabbed his arm as if close contact would lend his words more weight. "Listen, Steve, I don't know what's going on in that head of yours—I rarely do—but this is lunacy. What do you wanna do? Go back to the 40s and pop up, pretending you got out of the ice on your own? Leave the other you as an eternal Capsicle while you sit by the fire site 'til Peggy gets home from work? That isn't you."

He could feel Cap's muscles flex in his grip. The man bit his lip and closed his eyes, eyelids fluttering. "I saw her. In the Shield facility in 1970. I... I was so close." He opened his eyes, breathing heavily and were those tears in his eyes? "Hydra... Red Skull... they stole the future we had together. I don't care, even if I have to live in hiding, I'd still have her." He drew a sharp breath. "If it were Pepper you'd do the same thing, Tony! You did the same thing!"

"I've had Pepper in my life for 20 years. She's my wife. We have a daughter! You've seen Peggy from time to time on a few missions stretched out over a couple of years about eight decades ago. Come on, Cap. It's not the same thing. You liked her. You had a crush on her, but—"

"I loved her! I still do!" Rogers stepped closer to him, urgency in his low voice now. "I can help us, help them. I know what is supposed to happen. I could do so much good. Stop Hydra from infiltrating SHIELD. Save Bucky from what they did to him and..." He looked away for a moment. "and from what they made him do. Keep Nat out of the Red Room. Even Thanos! I know what he'll do." His gaze fully focused on Tony now. "I... I could prevent all that chaos. Peggy will help me. We could make a better world."

Tony stared at him. He opened his mouth but found no words. This was insane. He would have never expected that much bullshit from anyone on the team, least of all Rogers. He swallowed and stepped even closer to him, his hand still on the other man's arm. Careful and with as much emphasis as possible, he said, "That's not how it works, Steve. I know it. You know it. Please don't insult either of us by pretending otherwise. If you do that, there's no telling what that shift causes. There's no telling if things happen in any way like they did for this dimension. Hydra. Thanos. Peggy. Barnes." He clenched his fists to keep himself focussed. "All of it. Hell, you show up and marry her, my always-a-bachelor single-focus son-of-a-bitch father might think his mission's complete decades earlier and just marries someone else. What the hell is the world gonna do if I'm never born?"

Tony arched his brows at him, his lips tilting up in a suggestive smirk. He wasn't really kidding though. There was no telling what a 2023 Rogers living in the 1940s or 50s would do to that timeline. How could they even begin to speculate what would happen after that? Chances were things would turn out disastrous as he would try to meddle. Rogers shook his head, not appreciating the comment at all. He turned to look away. A quick glance confirmed that Cap's eyes were resting on Tony's wife and kids.

Then Rogers turned back to him, his face struck with anger and frustration that pierced Tony with a shocking familiarity. A jolt went through him, the sudden feeling of nakedness without the suit as a buffer between them. He had to force himself not to try and put some distance between himself and the Captain. "You're one to talk. You're here, are you not? What about that timeline you messed up?"

He looked at Rogers, eyes wide, trying to remember how to breathe. "There is no rogue timeline for me, Cap. Strange used the Time Stone to reverse time back to before anything could have changed anyone's actions in that particular timeline. They... The kid found a loophole. And I'm grateful to him because I wasn't done. I have so much more life left to live right here. But I wouldn't have done it without the reassurance that my actions wouldn't affect a whole dimension in a way I couldn't even begin to know." He shook his head, fixing him with a stare. "You are a different man now, Steve. You belong here. You'd be out of time over there just as much as you felt the first day here. You've lived here in this time, with these people most of your adult life!"

Rogers shook his head again. He shuffled from one foot to the other, eyes avoiding Tony's, but Tony wasn't done. He reached for the man's arm almost as if he could hold him in their time, in this reality, all on his own. "Steve, listen to me. You have a life here. You have friends here and maybe if you finally accept that you belong here, you can have all that what you think you could have had with Peggy. Peggy already has a husband she is meant to be with. Children. A life."

Tony tightened his grip on Rogers' arm, pulled at it to force the other man to look at him.

"I know... I know it's easy for me to talk, being here after I chose to die. I got lucky. But at the end of the day, I'm not here for me. I'm here for them. They need me and I'd do anything for them."

Steve still avoided his gaze, hands balled up into fists. The mood around them was growing restless. A quick scan of the people around the platform revealed many narrowed eyes and crossed arms. Cap's friends now actively looked to catch the man's attention, seeking permission to intervene and break up whatever their argument was. Tony was almost out of time with this. "Steve, what you want to do, going back to the past to fix things... that's not you. You're the guy who stands by his dumb-ass choices. The guy who persists. Who keeps at it, till things turn out alright." Tony bit his lip, as he searched Rogers face for a reaction. "Peggy has a family. Bucky is right here. Nat is right here. Sam and... and Wanda, they—" He cleared his throat. "This dimension right here needs you, too. There's so much left to fix. Leaving to potentially fix things in another dimension means abandoning this one. And that's not you, Cap."

"Hey Steve, you alright, man?" Wilson had stepped up to the very edge of the platform.

Tony dropped his hold of the Captain's arm. He took a step back, his eyes still intently on the man in front of him. There was no telling. Maybe, maybe he should stop this. Stop him from making this big of a mistake. This impactful of a mistake. His eyes flickered over to Wilson, then to his own feet. Steve was his own man. He had the right to make his own choices and to live with the consequences, just as Tony had done.

Rogers pursed his lips and nodded without another look at him, before he gave a quick wave in Wilson's direction.

"Tony, you done?" Bruce looked up at the two of them expectantly, distinct wariness swinging in this voice.

Tony simply jumped off the other side of the platform and headed straight for his family. 10 seconds. That's all the time this journey would take on their end. He quickly kissed his wife and picked up their little girl. He held Morgan close while they watched on. Peter had gotten to his feet during Tony's squabble with Steve but with Tony back by his side, he sat down again. Their eyes met as Tony bent down and ruffled his hand through the boy's hair.

"You think he'll do it?" Peter whispered.

Tony shrugged. Those damn enhanced senses. "It's not up to us, kid." He turned back, eyes on the Captain up on that platform about 30 yards away from them. "Pep, darling, remind me that we need to reinforce the soundproofing in the walls of our house, especially the rooms upstairs before Peter is allowed to stay overnight again."

Pepper only rolled her eyes but Tony jerked as Peter lightly slap his leg. "Ew! Gross, Mr. Stark!"

He chuckled and Morgan squirmed a bit in the tight hold of his arms. "Why does the house need soundproofing, daddy?"

He looked at her, his face a mask of innocence. "Peter's hearing is really good and your Mommy likes to swear a lot when she thinks people aren't listening. Especially when she's alone with Daddy."

He got slapped from both his wife and his Spider-Kid for that one.

"Seriously, Tony..."

"Mr. Stark..!"

Tony giggled and his girl followed suit. God, he loved that girl. He buried his face in Morgan's locks, kissed the top of her head. On the other side of the clearing, Banner had just handed the Stones to Rogers and made the last adjustments. It was time.

"Maybe you could reinforce the walls of our apartment as well, Mr. Stark..."

Tony's mind was torn away from the platform and he frowned down at Peter before he followed the boys glance over to May and Happy.

Morgan had apparently done the same. "Does May swear a lot as well?"

Tony bit his lip but couldn't suppress a snort. Peter threw his hands up and covered the red flush on his face. "I really don't want to find out!"

Morgan looked at him then at Tony, trying to make sense of what they were talking about.

"Seriously, boys." Pepper glared at both of them. "Is this really the time and place?"

Tony set Morgan down. No sooner had he let go of her that she crawled over to Peter and onto his lab. The boy's arms wrapped around her small frame with a naturalness like he hadn't missed the first 4 years of her life. Like it wasn't a miracle that Tony got to see them like this, like family. Pepper's hand found his and it was almost painful to look away from the two kids. His two kids. The content twinkle in his wife's eyes was soothing enough though. His hands went up to cup her face and he pulled her close, kissing her deeply. He really had expected her to push him off. Pepper had never been in favor of public displays of affection, but she only pulled him closer, her body solidly pressed against his and when they broke away from each other he rested his forehead against her's.

"No time like the present, Mrs. Stark."

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. For a moment he was afraid that he'd made her cry again. But Pepper grabbed hold of his shirt and pulled flush against herself, kissing him as if it would be the last time she would have the chance to hold him. His heart dropped to his stomach like a heavy stone as the reality of the situation rolled over him. She had been there. She had kissed him for the last time, had held him for the last time. He had been lost to her forever. No hypotheticals about it. Even though he had no memory of it, because it wasn't him who'd done this to her. He'd still done this to her.

God, that n-dimensional mindfuck of a multiverse would take a while to work through. Not just for them. Their whole universe was reeling under the un-snapping. The sudden increase in the population. Over 3,5 billion people added with the snap of Bruce's finger. 5 years they had made due and now that the battle was won, they still had a hell of a lot to fix. He might never put on the suit again to fight some evil monsters but there was still a whole lot for him to help with.

He deepened the kiss, made himself feel as alive to her as possible. He'd make this up to her. To his family. Both him and Pepper were slightly panting when they broke apart. Tony's hand ran through her strawberry blond hair, before he hugged her close to his side, arms entangled around each other. Her hands softly squeezed his arms while her head rested on his collarbone. As they both looked back over to the platform, Captain America disappeared with the flip of a switch.

10

9

8

Tony's eyes wandered down to Peter, Morgan still in his lap, leaning against his chest. He met Tony's eyes, his face tense in anticipation.

5

4

3

Tony shrugged, nodding his head at him. "We'll be alright, kid."

As Morgan struggled to get up and pointed at the platform, both their heads shot around to look.

"There he is again!"

He could feel Pepper's hand squeeze his arms and felt a load taken off his soul.

They watched as Wilson and Barnes jumped up onto the platform, clapping Rogers' shoulder, joking around about how much he'd aged.

Tony took a deep breath and called out to him. "Good to have you back, Cap!"

Rogers turned, looking straight at him. He gave a curt nod before calling back. "Til the end of the line, Tony!"

(author's note: Guys, let me just say thank you for reading and commenting and favoriting the story. I had a great time figuring out how this would go.

If you liked this story and are in need of more Peter/Tony centric stuff to read, I do have a story that is my main focus again from now on, an AU tale of Tony and Peter's lives, set post-Ultron, heavy on IronDad/SpiderSon, called If They Knew All About Me. You can find it on my profile.

Thank you all again.)