Archive of Our Own

Steve wakes up in bed with Tony Stark, and that alone is enough to roll heat through his body. They’re in the prop bed, not Tony’s actual bed, but Tony is there with him, so he can’t bring himself to be disappointed. He glances over at Tony, mostly interested in getting a glimpse of him soft and sleeping, but Tony’s awake. His head is propped up on one hand, and he’s watching Steve with eyes the color of coffee. Steve just looks back for a few seconds. Tony’s hair is a little wild with sleep, and his cheeks are a little flushed with warmth, but otherwise he looks the same as he always does.

“You could sleep more, if you want to,” Tony murmurs.

“Time?” Steve asks groggily. He still feels a little soft around the edges, not quite grounded in his body. He presses his arms and legs outward, back arching into a stretch. He can’t feel any pain. He doesn’t try to pretend he isn’t a little disappointed.

“A little after five,” Tony tells him.

“Why’re you awake?” Steve wonders out loud.

“I don’t have what anyone would call regular sleeping habits,” Tony says, lips curling a little. “There’s some stuff in the workshop I want to get done.”

“Mmm,” Steve says. “You could have gone.” He’s pretty sure he means it; he’d half expected to wake up alone this morning anyway.

“I wanted a look at your back,” Tony says.

Steve wriggles over onto his front. The lights brighten a little in the room, and Tony’s hands slip easily down his back, and then flip the covers down so that he can continue down Steve’s ass.

“I don’t know if I’m disappointed or excited,” Tony says.

Steve makes a noise of agreement. “Walking around with the marks under my clothes would have been...” he says.

“I know,” Tony agrees. “But this way, there’s almost no wait time between wanting and doing.”

Steve makes another lazy sound of agreement. He’s starting to feel more awake, though the feeling of being a little blurred is still present.

“Sleep?” Tony asks, one hand cupping Steve’s buttocks warmly.

“No,” Steve says, and rolls over against Tony. “I’m always up this early. I’ll run.”

Tony drags his hand around Steve’s ass and ribs and splays it wide across Steve’s belly. Steve’s erection bumps up against the back of Tony’s fingers. “With this?” he asks, amused.

“I’ll manage,” Steve says, and sighs when Tony bites gently at the back of his neck.

“I have to get you out of the tower,” Tony says, voice both gentle and apologetic.

Steve doesn’t have time for it to sting.

“I’ll never get to the contracts if you stay, not to mention all the rest of the work I should be doing.” Tony kisses the place he had bitten. “This isn’t me kicking you out on the morning after, I promise. It’s just necessary to manage my time, or I’ll just spend all of it finding new and exciting ways to make you scream.”

Steve smiles a little. “Still a little... sub-spacey?” He’s not sure that’s the right word. “You have a gym?”

“Just subby,” Tony says with a slightly deeper note of pleasure in his voice. “And, yes, two. One open to the employees, one private, set up to handle Iron Man strength.”

Huh. “Do you use it?” Steve asks.

“Not as often as I should,” Tony admits. “It’s easy to neglect when the machine does most of the work for you. But you’re better off in there. The equipment should be more your calibre.”

“I kill heavy bags,” Steve warns.

“If you kill these, I obviously need to make them better. Knock yourself out, Captain.” Tony runs his hand up Steve’s belly to his chest, no apparent reason, other than he seems to want to feel it. Steve sighs a little and relaxes into the touch. He can think of so many things he’d rather be doing than running or working out in Tony’s gym. Then again, he’s not such a jerk that he resents Tony’s need to be taking care of business. He thinks he’ll talk to Fury about finding some other assigned tasks for Steve to do. He can already tell that it’s going to be hard to have a lot of time on his hands while Tony is busy. “Your suite has everything you should need in it,” Tony says. Now he sounds a touch embarrassed. “I, well. Your measurements were all on file with Oldham, and I mostly just went in to make sure you had things here if you needed them. And then I realized you wouldn’t have socks or underwear... and. Things sort of got out of control after that.”

Steve huffs out a laugh. “Pepper said you’d like to see me wearing things you bought for me.” It’s almost a question.

“Pepper knows me very very well,” Tony says, and rests his chin on Steve’s shoulder. There is a pause, and he eventually says, “I didn’t tell her who you are. But I’d like to.”

Steve shifts over so that he can see Tony’s face, but doesn’t say anything.

“Pepper is my family. She knows all that there is to know about me. If I don’t tell her, I’ll slip some day, just because I don’t think to keep secrets from her.”

“You said she knew about the kinky bondage sex room?” Steve asks.

Tony’s lips quirk. “Generally I just call it the kink room, but yes, she knows. She’s never been inside any of them, in their various incarnations, but she’s aware.”

“So you...” Steve bites his bottom lip on a question that not only isn’t his business, but which might hurt Tony to answer. He doesn’t want to hurt Tony.

“When we were together, it’d been years since I even used it,” Tony says, though, his eyes still bright and intent, no sign of pain. “And she made it clear that she wasn’t interested.” He rolls one shoulder. “I think she might have been more adventurous if she hadn’t seen me after, sometimes. As it is, we, Pepper and I, failed because there was too much between us to sustain a romance. She knew me too well, I knew how to manipulate her. It was...” Tony shakes his head. “It was more wishful thinking on both of our parts, than anything else. The idea that we could be everything for one another, instead of just the ninety percent of everything that we already were.”

“I can’t imagine a world in which Pepper couldn’t keep a secret,” Steve says. “I don’t mind if she knows.”

“She may fangirl you,” Tony warns.

“Fangirl me?” Steve asks.

“As in, be belatedly overwhelmed at who you are, and be blush-y and flutter-y and possibly a little grabby.” Tony looks like he thinks this will be hilarious. “But she’s too down to earth to let it go on for long.” He smiles warmly at Steve. “It’s hard to know what to do when you meet your hero in real life.”

“I’m Pepper’s hero?” Steve asks, bemused.

“In the same way that you’re mine, really,” Tony says. “Because you were her father’s hero, and it just gets passed down in the blood, whether you want it to or not. I’ve probably got it worse than her. She grew up with the paraphernalia, but I had it all. Movie reels of footage. Actual pictures. Parties, when I was a kid, made up of people that had loved you. Dad threw one every year.” Now there is something painful in the quirk of Tony’s smile.

“Tony?” Steve asks softly, and lifts a hand to run his thumb along his lips, softening the smile.

“So that we never have to talk about this again,” Tony says, and takes a deep breath. “I know Howard Stark was your friend, and I’m fine with that. Howard Stark was also my father, however, and I get the idea that he was much better at being a friend than he was at being a father.” He holds up a finger when Steve opens his mouth to say something. “My point is, I don’t expect or even want your opinion of him to change based on his parenting skills. Just remember that he lived to build his dreams. I think if he’d known how little he had to offer a kid, he just wouldn’t have had one. And I’d rather have had a kind of crappy father than to not exist at all.”

Steve considers Tony’s face -- calm, but a little tight -- and tells himself to never bring up Howard again. Howard had been a friend, but Steve hadn’t been close to him the way he’d been with Peggy or the Commandos. Steve’s shining moments of friendship with Howard had been the risks the man had taken to get Steve where he had needed to go when he had needed it most. He won’t ever forget that, but he doesn’t need to talk about it either.

“Honestly,” Steve says finally. “I didn’t know Howard that well. There was the experiment, but I was basically in a metal coffin. And he did some work on my uniform. He was energetic, but also kind of... crazy. You always got the sense that Howard was just barely in control. I’m sorry he wasn’t a good parent, Tony, but I can’t say I’m surprised. A lot of the time, he was like a kid himself.”

Tony closes his eyes for a moment. “I’m glad he was your friend, though,” Tony says. “I know how much work he put into projects for you. I know how hard he tried to give you everything he could scrape together. And he never stopped looking for you.” Tony pauses and opens his eyes. “I think he considered you the last great thing he ever did. Something pure, that he could never attain again.”

“I’m not perfect,” Steve says a little uncomfortably.

“No, but he loved that about you. One of the reasons...” Tony hesitates, and then sighs. “The Iron Man suit is weaponized, but I use the repulsors ninety or ninety-five percent of the time. They can kill, but not unless you make a serious effort to do it. Part of the reason for that is because I knew you didn’t like guns. That you’d use them if you had to -- and my suit has weapons, if I have to use them -- but that you didn’t like them, didn’t like to kill. He may not have been the best dad, but when I needed Iron Man, I remembered him talking about that. I remember how he was baffled, but still proud of you for it. If not for that, I might have gone another route with Iron Man altogether. I had the means, obviously. I could have made the suit a killing machine. And I was angry enough to do it. But I still remembered that, about him, about you. It’s funny how much memory can temper something as white-hot as wrath.”

“I’m glad I could help, even though I wasn’t there,” Steve says.

“My point is,” Tony sighs, “that you don’t have to pretend he wasn’t a part of your life as long as I don’t have to pretend that he was a big part of mine.”

“That sounds fair,” Steve says and catches Tony’s hand, squeezing it gently. “Now kiss me, and then I’ll get out of your hair.”

“I don’t want you out of my hair,” Tony says a little crankily, but he leans in and kisses Steve anyway, slow and thorough, apparently caring as little as Steve does about morning breath as he nips at Steve’s tongue and presses his teeth gently into the meat of Steve’s lower lip. It isn’t frantic or messy or needful, but it’s still hot, and they’re both breathing a little rapidly by the time Tony pulls back. “I don’t want you out of my hair,” he repeats. “I want to spend at least the next forty-eight hours pushing just to see how far you’ll go.” He rakes a hand through his hair, which just makes it stand up a little more. “And I promise you, usually I would completely bail on my life in order to further that agenda.”

Steve smiles a little. “But?”

“But part of having access to you involves SHIELD, and while I don’t think they’d actually try to stop us if that link in the chain broke down, I don’t think they’d necessarily help us, either, which could potentially bring the Army into things. And I know the Army wants to fuck me. So.” Tony’s eyes are dark and serious. “Better to keep things as above board as possible for the sake of appearances, for as long as possible. When that stops working out for us, we’ll reassess.”

Steve avoids considering what the Army might choose to do -- he is, he finds, less suspicious of SHIELD as regards his personal life, than he is the Army, and he doesn’t think that’s entirely because of Tony’s feelings on the matter -- and nods. “Will I see you later?” he asks.

“Not sure, honestly. Call me,” Tony says, but he’s got a half-hazy look that Steve doesn’t recognize, but suspects that he’ll get used to. A look like he’s already somewhere else in his head. “Your suite is on eighty-eight. Tell JARVIS if you need anything.”

Steve, for no reason other than it makes him feels better, rolls over and pushes up to his feet first. He hears Tony following close behind him, opening one of the other doors in this room to reveal a wardrobe.

“Your clothes are a wreck,” Tony says. “Take a robe from the bathroom. My private elevator will keep your dignity intact, Captain.”

Steve snorts. “There isn’t much dignity left,” he says. “There’s a shocking amount of nudity in war.”

Steve can hear Tony grin. “I’ll bet there is. But how much of it ends with your jeans covered in spunk?”

“It’s true, that’s a first for me.” He opens the bathroom door and liberates a cozy pale blue robe that’s almost long enough in the arm for him. “Don’t forget the contracts are in your jeans in the kink room,” Steve says.

“Yeah,” Tony says. “I’m just going to wait until you’re on your way before I venture inside. I don’t have a whole lot of handle on the ‘willpower’ thing on the best of days, and letting you out of here is basically the extent of it.”

Steve grins a little, and turns toward the door.

“Steve,” Tony says, sounding a little pained, and Steve pauses to look over his shoulder at Tony. “You should be aware, if you’re going to let yourself be... involved with me. My sleeping habits aren’t the only thing that are erratic. I lose time when I’m working. I get involved, and when I focus that much I lose sight of, well, everything else. If you don’t hear from me for a while, I don’t want you to think that it’s anything you did. I’m just. I told you. I can’t be depended on.”

“If I need you, I know where to look,” Steve says, keeping his tone mild deliberately. “I don’t expect your undivided attention. At least, not until I do.”

Tony chokes out a little laugh. “I’ll keep it in mind.”

“Don’t worry so much,” Steve says gently. “Do the things you need to get done. Call me when you need me to pick up the contracts. Or whenever else you need me.”

Tony looks faintly frustrated. “I should be able to give you more.”

Steve chuckles and shakes his head. “If I ever feel like you should be giving me more, I’ll let you know. In the meantime, our lives move forward the same way they did before. Whatever time you have is enough.”

Tony doesn’t look entirely satisfied with that, but he smiles faintly. “Have fun in the gym. I’m dying to know if you’ll beat my high score.”

And with that puzzling pronouncement, Tony disappears into his closet.

Steve lets himself out of the room, recovers his phone from the bar -- he has no missed messages, for which he is grateful -- and takes a few minutes to wash out his teacup from last night.

**

Steve’s “suite” is not on the eighty-eighth floor. Or, rather, it is, but the term “suite” is misleading. The whole floor is clearly a living area for one person. Like the penthouse, Steve steps out of the elevator into a living room. It’s different than the penthouse, softer and less sleek. The couches and chairs look comfortable to lounge on. The kitchen has a table, rather than a bar, the kind of thing that looks well-worn while still appearing to be in perfect working order. There’s a rack over the stove with pots and pans hanging from hooks. The stove itself is gas. The whole space is decorated in light to medium earth tones, and there are paintings from the early nineteen hundreds arranged carefully on the walls. Except on closer inspection, they look like paintings made from photos, and they’re all of New York, the bridges, the boroughs, the Battery Park War Memorial. Looking even closer, they were all done by the same artist, and the original photo for each piece is laminated and attached to the backing.

They press at Steve’s chest in a tight ache at the same time that he can feel his face smiling so hard it might crack. He guesses this is what Tony had meant by things sort of getting out of control.

Which isn’t to say that the whole thing is a salve to his past. The television is absolutely enormous, and there’s a stereo that looks impossibly complicated. Where the bar had been in the Penthouse, there is an easel, lit gorgeously by the window-walls, and there are a few carefully selected supplies, as though Tony had wanted to provide something, but hadn’t wanted to presume to know Steve’s tastes. Steve thinks this makes a lot of sense, for Tony. He suspects that Tony could effectively use any tool or tech in existence, but that given the choice, Tony would always pick his own things. The fact that it seems like Tony is drawing parallels between Steve’s art and Tony’s work grasps at something at the base of Steve’s skull, something like pleasure and something like nerves.

How does Tony know?

Even Fury had just bought Steve some of everything, and Steve has technically known Fury longer than he has Tony. But Tony somehow knows better.

It should bother him more than it does; even the prickle of nerves is somehow good, anticipatory rather than suspicious.

The short hall on this floor only has two doors. The first opens into a moderately sized library, stocked to overflowing, so that books are stacked against walls and on tables. Steve’s mouth falls open a little in awe. Books had been dear when he had been young; he’d only seen stacks like this in public libraries. Steve hasn’t actually been to a public library since he woke up -- all of his reading material had been assigned by the government -- but he can only imagine the ways that they must have expanded. To have a room like this all to himself, to have immediate access... Steve has to crush his desire to start running his fingertips over spines, browse titles, take volumes down to feel the weight in his hands and smell the dust and ink of the pages.

It isn’t until he has that desire under control that he sees that there’s a note on top of a book that’s sitting on the arm of what looks like it would be an extremely comfortable reading chair. Steve picks it up and unfolds it. This is all guesswork and speculation. Also, there’s plenty of open wall space to build more shelves. Start a list. If I don’t already have it in storage, I’m sure I can find it. Yes. This is a blatant ploy to get you to spend time here. Tony.

Steve folds the note carefully, and picks up the book it had been sitting on. One of Mark Twain’s books of essays. Steve tucks in into the cover and puts the book back.

Steve has spent more time reading things off of digital screens than he has off of paper since he’d awakened in the future. He has a hard time believing that Tony is a fan of real books. It only makes this better, and there is less urgency about how Tony had known. This makes sense. Of course Steve favors real books. He won’t refuse a digital reader -- his appetite for the written word is, and always has been, too voracious to make such exclusions -- but he’d rather hold a book in his hands. The sensory input has always been a part of the experience for him. During the war, he’d learned three languages (not counting the English, German, and French he’d already known), just so he could read the books that they crossed paths with.

All of this, it must be in his file. But unlike Fury, who had provided some of everything, Tony’s selections are more sparse and careful. Not that the library is sparse; but there are two and a half blank walls. Steve can see the marks on the walls where someone has lined up how to fit in more shelves. Tony is welcoming him in with half-finished projects, letting them settle into Steve so that he itches to finish them.

He knows how to manipulate me, Steve thinks, but the thought doesn’t bring any fear with it. Tony had admitted to manipulating people. Tony is a genius, and probably can’t really deal with most people without some degree of manipulation. And whether it is manipulation or not, it doesn’t feel like that. It feels like a gesture, an invitation.

As much as Steve feels like it might be safer, for him, and definitely more professional of him, he doubts he’s going to be able to resist it.

He backs out of the library -- thinking how strange it is that ten minutes ago he had been annoyed with Tony about the size of his so-called “suite” and now he can barely wait to see what else is here -- and closes the door.

The next door down opens into a bedroom, decorated with dark, textured wood, cornices and curled feet for the chest of drawers and the bed, intricate brass handles, a cedar box at the foot of the bed, redolent with scent, several blankets and afghans tucked inside. There is a writing desk in one corner, with slots for paper and drawers for ink and quill. Steve thinks these things must be at least a couple of hundred years old, and yet here they are, all clearly a matched set. The bureau contains dozens of ties, the little drawers inside holding cufflinks and tie tacks and bars, a money clip, a half a dozen watches, two pocket watches, handkerchiefs and packages of shoelaces, a row of wallets in varying shapes, sizes, and materials.

Steve closes it quickly, but carefully, a little overwhelmed.

Okay, so maybe this is what Tony had meant when he’d said things had gotten a little out of control.

Steve checks behind the other doors in the room. The bathroom is in the same place as Tony’s had been, and he’s a little relieved to see that it isn’t quite so opulent. The shower is still separate from the bathtub, and the bathtub is still at least long enough for Steve to stretch out in, but neither of them seem like they were designed to cater to four or five people at a time. The linen closet holds towels and washcloths and sheets and pillowcases. The drawers hold unopened toothbrushes, six different kinds of toothpaste, several kinds of disposable razors, and one old fashioned dual-blade razor with two-dozen spare blades. There is even a leather case that holds a straight razor, along with cleaning supplies and a doubled over length of strop. When he looks for it, Steve sees the cake-soap and brush you’d use for a straight razor, and he’s a little shocked at how this one item gets to him.

He fetches a hand towel from the linen closet and lays it out on one side of the sink. He arranges the mug and soap and brush and blade, and runs the sink until it’s warm -- which is almost immediately; wonders of the modern era -- and for a solid fifteen minutes, he devotes himself to shaving the way he has spent most of his adult life doing it. He doesn’t hate the more modern methods; it’s not that at all. It’s that this had been a ritual, one shared by almost every soldier Steve had known, one that meant that you were sure enough about your safety to indulge your grooming preferences, a soothing ritual in a place where too little was soothing and the only other ritual was bloodshed.

He cleans up after himself, wiping down the mirror and the countertop, but he leaves the shaving supplies out.

He showers far more quickly than he’d shaved, and one thing he is absolutely not nostalgic about is tepid water with no more water pressure than a heavy drizzle. Tony’s showerhead has six settings, one of which seems to be ‘peel your skin off’ and Steve ducks his head and groans at the way that the water smashes into his back. There is only one kind of shampoo -- Steve opens it and sniffs cautiously, but it seems to be a mostly neutral scent, maybe with a little sandalwood to it -- which Steve assumes means Tony has a favorite. There is both bar soap and body wash. Steve gives in to the body wash because it has the same label design as the shampoo.

Steve scrubs himself dry until his skin is pink and tingling, drapes the towel along the edge of the tub, and hangs the robe on the back of the bathroom door.

He strides back into the (his) bedroom, and opens the door at the foot of the bed. It’s dark and slightly cavernous; Steve fumbles at either side of the door inside before he finds a switch.

Maybe this is what Tony meant by things getting out of control.

When had Tony had time to do this?

One wall is all slacks and button up shirts. The opposite wall is less dressy -- Steve recognizes khakis and henleys (though only because the sales clerk had suggested them when Steve had gone out with Pepper), crisp new jeans and polo shirts (same) and cargo pants, which are not unlike BDU pants, but most of it seems like an in-between stage of dressing. It would have all been dress-down clothes in Steve’s own time, but dress-down clothes here are jeans and t-shirts, or considerably less. It doesn’t seem that much of a surprise that Tony’s choices don’t include many pair of jeans or t-shirts. He doesn’t know how Tony knows these things, it’s uncanny, even a little unsettling, but Steve doesn’t dwell on it. Tony’s mind is a mystery that time will eventually help to unravel. The back wall is all coats, the floor lined with boots beneath them. There are about thirty pairs pairs of shoes, ranging from athletic to polished into mirrors. Just looking at them makes Steve feel incapable of dressing himself. He warily plucks a pair of athletic shoes off of the rack, because his shoes are in Tony’s kinky bondage sex room as well, and he doesn’t want to go back there if Tony still might be there. He doesn’t know how much willpower he has himself, honestly.

Steve sighs out a breath and shuts the door. He crosses to the chest of drawers instead, and finds what he’d actually been looking for. Underwear, still in the package, socks, track pants in five colors, plain white t-shirts. He spends a few seconds being half-turned-on and half-awestruck by the underwear. They don’t look like anything unusual, just boxer briefs, which is what he’d been given by SHIELD. But they’re as sleek as silk, and once he has them on, they have the perfect combination of support and give. He refuses to wonder about how much a pair of these underwear cost. He climbs into the rest of his workout gear instead, turning toward the door.

Except. There is still a door in this room. In the penthouse, it leads to the kinky bondage... no, just the kink room. Steve isn’t sure he wants to know what it leads to here, and is equally sure he isn’t going to be able to resist finding out.

Steve has his hand on the knob when JARVIS says, “Captain, a moment.” Steve lets his hand fall away with something like relief.

“What is it, JARVIS?” he asks.

“Mister Stark has set up protocols for your entry into this room.”

“What kind of protocols?” Steve asks, fresh nerves crawling across the back of his neck.

“That he be informed when you attempt to access it,” JARVIS says. There is a brief pause, and then JARVIS adds, “Forgive me if I am stating something you are already aware of, but Mister Stark has a deep need to provide for those that he considers important to him. There is a kind of momentum to it, I have observed. He begins unobtrusively, with, for example, the prints he had commissioned for your living area. As he delves deeper into a project, he sometimes loses perspective. This is a thing Mister Stark is aware of himself. I am not betraying his confidence. So what might start as an attempt to cater to your comfort can sometimes end in hundreds of articles of clothing that he recognizes, after the fact, might overwhelm you, but cannot bring himself to... unmake the offer that the clothing represents. Do you understand?” JARVIS sounds a little anxious to Steve. He isn’t sure he isn’t projecting that, though.

“So he means to create a welcoming atmosphere and sometimes goes overboard into intimidating,” Steve says, and smiles a little. It sounds like something Tony would do. Momentum is probably the right word for it, too. Once he starts, things snowball, and... well, things get out of control, to quote Tony.

“Precisely, Captain,” JARVIS says. Steve is almost sure he sounds relieved. “The room you are about to access perhaps embodies the culmination of that process for Mister Stark. It was the last thing he arranged for you, and something he realized almost directly thereafter might not be a welcome addition. It is... uncharacteristic of Mister Stark to actually recognize that he might have gone too far.”

“So what are you suggesting, JARVIS?” Steve asks.

“Mister Stark is currently in the workshop. If you access this room now, he will come at once, regardless of the consequences to the project he is working on.”

“And you want me to wait,” Steve says slowly.

“No, Captain. I want you to be aware. Mister Stark will abandon urgent and highly technical work without a qualm to be present in case he is needed here. He will not regret it, and he will not care about the loss of his time or materials. He will do that because he has created something for you that he believes you may not be able to accept without support.” JARVIS pauses again. “He is concerned that you would face it alone, as it is in your nature to do, and so placed protocols on your entry to ensure that you would not have to.”

Steve’s fists clench at his sides. “What is it, JARVIS?”

“I am barred from informing you directly,” JARVIS says, but even Steve can hear the ‘but’ at the end of that sentence. “However, you already know that Howard Stark held you in the highest regard, and that he kept in touch with those that cared for you until his death. Mister Stark maintained some of that correspondence after his father’s death. Certain items that have been in storage for many years have been removed from storage, the timing of which coincides with the day after your first appointment as SHIELD’s liaison to Stark Industries.”

Lack of imagination has never been one of Steve’s weaknesses. “It’s a kind of time capsule,” he breathes.

“If a Stark, any Stark, were capable of creating something so simple,” JARVIS says quietly.

Steve takes a deep breath. “I’m not ready,” he says, his voice sounding unsteady to his own ears.

“I believed that might be the case,” JARVIS says gently.

Steve is one hundred percent sure that he isn’t imagining anything into the varied tones of JARVIS’ voice.

“Tell me something,” Steve says.

“Anything that is within my power to tell,” JARVIS says immediately.

“How old are you, JARVIS?”

“I am seventeen years, ten months, and twenty-one days old,” JARVIS says.

“What’s your primary... function? Protocol? I’m not sure I know how to phrase it correctly.” Steve looks up, scanning the room until he finds a small, almost pinprick camera, something he doubts a person without enhanced senses would even see. It feels close enough to looking JARVIS in the face, however, so he fixes his gaze there. “Why did he need you?”

There is a long pause. “I am afraid that I cannot provide you with a direct answer,” JARVIS says finally. “I cannot deliberately disobey my own code, in part, but also I cannot pretend to know Mister Stark’s mind. I am long familiar with his habits, but I am not infallible. I know the reasons he has stated, but I cannot know if there were reasons beyond those. I can tell you this, Captain. Mister Stark is not the man he used to be. I hope very much that my presence accounts for some measure of that.”

Steve nods slowly. “I’m glad he has you,” he says honestly. “I’m not going to try the door today.”

“I think that’s a wise decision, Captain. Though, if my thoughts on the matter are something you might consider helpful, I think you will want to go in, eventually. That you will want what he’s trying to give you.”

“Thank you, JARVIS. I always find your thoughts helpful.”

“It’s kind of you to say so, Captain,” JARVIS says.

“Maybe you can help me out with something else; Tony said he had a gym set up for Iron Man, and that I could use it, but I, uh, didn’t manage to actually ask him where to find it.” Steve had been ogling, really; he has no other excuse.

“It is located on the eighty-sixth floor,” JARVIS says. “I believe Mister Stark had plans to use it for decompression after stressful meetings. I believe at the time, he thought there would be fewer stressful meetings, as Miss Potts assumed the position of CEO shortly before the building was conceived of. Of course, Mister Stark maintains his position of Chief Engineer, and refuses to allow research and development or full scale production until all contracts and prototypes have gone through him. He is not amused at the way his workload has not diminished away to nothing, though I have been at great pains to explain to him why this will continue to be so as long as he holds his current stance.” JARVIS sounds both amused and long-suffering, and then, when he speaks again, a little sly. “Perhaps you will have more luck convincing him.”

“There are cameras in the kink room, aren’t there?” Steve says, torn between laughing and burying his face in his hands.

“They are for the protection of both parties involved,” JARVIS says, gently and sensibly. “All records have the highest priority encryption, accessible by no one aside from myself and Mister Stark.”

“Has he accessed them?” Steve can’t stop himself from asking.

“In the shower this morning. It decreased his efficiency as regards his hygiene by seventy percent.” If a disembodied voice could smirk, it would so qualify. Steve’s only consolation is that the smirk seems directed at Tony, not him.

Steve, somehow, does not ask JARVIS to ask Tony if Steve can watch kink room video in the shower.

“I’m going to work out, JARVIS,” he says instead.

“I hope you enjoy Mister Stark’s arrangements, Captain,” JARVIS says.

**

Steve is no longer surprised at finding out that the ‘gym’ takes up an entire floor. As many floors as the tower has, he guesses he should start trying not to think of so much space as being wasteful.

The room itself is... odd. The floor is canted at an angle, for one thing, and there’s a vivid red line along the floor about a third of the way inside. Steve sees laser projectors on either end of the line, presumably to keep track of whether or not the line is crossed. The punching bag -- Steve guesses it’s a punching bag -- hovers just at the edge of that line. And yes, it definitely hovers. Steve had gone to his knees to look. The bottom seems to be covered in miniature repulsors like those in the gloves of the suit. The ‘bag’ part of the bag is... unusual. It’s black and covered in what look like rubberized nodules, is wider at the bottom than the top, and has a sort of... face. Not exactly a face. Just a head-area. It also has a single spindly arm and what looks like a shorter arm that Steve can’t come up for a reason for. Steve can’t really tell. There’s an antennae on its bizarre sort-of-head.

Steve tapes his hands -- the tape had been on a rack, along with a pair of boxing gloves and a pair of partial hand-pads -- while he considers the thing.

The rest of the room is as much a mystery as the bag. There are a series of low benches, the sides rubberized, set at varying angles, some singular, some bunched together to form shapes. At the far end of the room is a large rectangular blue box, standing on end. It has the words ‘Police Public Call Box’ written in white at the top of it. Steve sort of recognizes it as similar to public telephone booths he’d seen in London, during the war. Not exactly the same; this one is fancier, but similar. Above the box is a computer screen of the holographic variety flashing a long line of zeroes at Steve. Some of the walls are padded with rubber, too, and there is no other gym-like equipment in the room at all.

Finally, when he’s done with the tape and can’t think of anything else to do, he asks, “JARVIS, how do I work this?”

JARVIS says, “To activate the workout scenario, merely strike the target.” JARVIS’ tone is so bland that Steve is absolutely certain he’s about to become the butt of an elaborate joke set up by Tony.

Steve sighs and takes up a solid stance in front of the thing. After it doesn’t do anything for thirty seconds or so, Steve rams his right fist right into the center mass, and then nearly stumbles backward as it whirs into motion, head-part spinning, spindly arm rotating.

“Exterminate!” it announces mechanically, and Steve rolls backward as blue energy arcs out of the short arm.

“Oh, wonderful,” Steve says, and closes in again, hoping this really is meant for exercise, and not for accidentally getting electrocuted. He punches it in the head, which spins wildly -- it’s not made of glass or plastic, as Steve has surmised, but out of something still transparent, but soft -- and the thing’s body follows whirling around and waving its arm and... zapper.

“Exterminate!” It exclaims again, and then, unbelievably, its robotic voice announces, “You call that a hit? My purely metaphorical mother hits harder than that!”

It surprises a laugh out of Steve -- only Tony would program a mouthy punching bag -- but it doesn’t stop him from leaning into a tight jab at one of the nobby bumps on the thing. It wails robotically and skids away from Steve, still a couple of inches off the floor. It hits one of the low benches and there is a noise like an enormous SPROING, and the thing goes careening off of it and into a wall. It hovers there for a moment -- it’s enough time for Steve to see that the zeros flashing against the back wall have become actual numbers -- and then it launches itself at Steve again, blue light arcing menacingly.

Steve catches it full center mass and follows it up with a half dozen jabs, the last one of which lands on a nobby bit and sends the thing careening away from him again. This time it bounces off a rubberized patch of wall, ricochets diagonally into another of the benches, and bounces into a triangle of three benches and just bounces around within it, with loud ‘sproing’ sounds and slightly panicky cries of “Exterminate!”

The number at the back of the room is 147,550, and Steve notes that each time the thing bounces off one of the rubberized edges of the benches, the number goes up.

The score goes up. Because, and now Steve is grinning in what is almost certainly an extremely stupid manner, it makes perfect sense. Tony’s idea of a decompressing workout is life sized pinball. Steve hadn’t had money to play much, but the layout isn’t entirely unfamiliar. He’s sure he’s missing the theme, and it would be funnier if he understood it, but it’s still fun.

“What’s the robot called, JARVIS?” Steve shouts over the sound of the thing trying to escape the triangle of death.

“It is a Dalek, Captain. A villain in a popular science fiction television program--”

The Dalek finally escapes the triangle and makes a beeline for Steve, red lights flashing inside its head. “EXTERMINATE!” it warbles thunderously, and Steve tips back onto one hand and shoves both feet into the middle of it. It caroms off again, making cranky robotic noises, bounces off one wall and a bench and then comes to rest on a slight depression in the floor. “Exterminate!” it says, satisfied. “I have made contact, and will now summon my brethren to reduce you to atoms!”

Steve bounces up and down on his feet, and sure enough, two more Daleks are circling around from behind the blue box. They’re slightly smaller and they each have a different color scheme, but otherwise they look like the first one. The lead Dalek lifts off from his ‘contact’ and they rush him. Steve punches the big one in the face and it whizzes away; the other two work more as a team, and Steve finally realizes that the blue arcs of what look like electricity don’t actually zap him, as he plants a foot in the belly of the gold Dalek and his fist in the upper torso of the blue one. The gold one zips off and batters itself silly against a pair of benches, but the blue one merely whirls with the blow, crying, “Mortal weakling!” and making a grab for Steve’s hair with its spindly arm. Steve snorts and punches it in an area that he’s definitely too sportsman-like to try on a real opponent.

The blue Dalek shrieks and spins off, bouncing off the gold Dalek, and then they’re both bouncing off benches and making alarmed robotic noises, and the big one shrieks, “Dirty pool!” and bears down on Steve with its zapper crackling.

Steve laughs out loud, and meets the Dalek with both fists pumping, delighted when it dips and dodges back and then closes in again. “Exterminate!” it threatens, and Steve dodges his zapper -- it feels wrong not to try to dodge, even though he knows it won’t hurt him -- and goes in low to sweep his leg hard against the base of the Dalek.

The Dalek flails as much as something with one spindly arm can flail, and falls over backward, rolling and bleating out mechanical cries of distress. “Low blow!” the Dalek accuses, and seems unable to get up off its back, though its tiny repulsors are glaring little suns beneath it.

The gold Dalek rushes in and actually manages to jab Steve with its spindly arm; Steve grabs it and shoves his shoulder into its midsection. While Steve grapples with the gold Dalek, the blue Dalek has closed in with the black one and is trying to help it regain an upright position. The black one is shouting insults at the blue one. “Nice try, have you ever heard of leverage?” it warbles bitterly. “Your clumsiness is epic! You have hands like feet!”

Steve sends jabs into two of the gold Daleks’ nobby bits, and it whistles off across the room and hits first a wall, and then a bench, and then plows directly into the middle of the blue box.

Lights flash in the room, and a breathy feminine voice announces, “The Doctor is in!”

The blue box opens -- inside all Steve can see are flashing lights -- and out rolls another... thing, that isn’t all that different than the Daleks, but is shaped more like a man dressed in a long coat and a ridiculously long scarf. “I am The Doctor,” the man-thing says in a vaguely British accent, and then lifts something toward the gold Dalek. The Dalek lets out a shriek of dismay, and tries to whir away from the doctor on its repulsors. The Doctor catches it around the head-area with a trailing end of his scarf, and touches it with what he’s holding, which looks like a kind of small tool. The gold Dalek wails, a slowly descending warble, and then slumps to the floor, apparently no longer operational.

Steve feels kind of bad for it. The Doctor says, “You know how to find me,” and retreats back into the blue box.

Steve watches for a minute as the blue Dalek continues to fail to reposition the black Dalek, which is getting steadily more abusive, “I will petition to have you eliminated from the hive mind; we will rip you apart for scraps, we’ll donate your useless carcass to a community college!”

The blue one finally decides to give up on the black one and zips over to hover in front of Steve, only the width of the red line between them. Steve raises his fists, and the blue Dalek makes an unhappy grating noise. Its spindly arm rotates, and there’s no blue light from his zapper. It rotates its head-part, and the light inside it glows green. Steve puts his hands down, and the blue Dalek coos encouragingly.

The black one yells, “You traitorous, cowardly collection of circuitry, don’t you dare!”

Steve leans forward and pats the Dalek awkwardly on the head, and it hums and butts up against Steve’s hand.

“EXTERMINATE!” the black Dalek demands. The blue Dalek turns deliberately away from it, clinking and whirring at Steve in friendly manner.

“Sir,” JARVIS says. “You have managed to run the program to its ‘incredibly unlikely and yet still theoretically possible’ conclusion, which is to say, you have managed to defeat or subvert all enemy forces.”

“Do not tell Tony this,” Steve says, and pats the blue Dalek on the head again, “but I think I’ve just had the most fun I’ve ever had in my life with my clothes still on.”

“Subversion is possible in only point-oh-six potential scenarios,” JARVIS says admiringly. “Mister Stark will be fascinated when he reviews the footage.”

“They should get to have actual electric zappers,” Steve says. “And if we get rid of the line and rearrange things a little, the whole room can be redesigned for actual combat training. We’d have to set it up so that I could get caught in the bumpers, too, or it wouldn’t be fair. And they should have greater maneuverability.” Steve knows he’s grinning stupidly.

“I shall advise Mister Stark of your suggestions,” JARVIS says. “If you don’t mind my mentioning it, sir, if you intend to run today, you would be best suited to do it now, before the heat of the day becomes oppressive.”

“Yes, yeah, absolutely, JARVIS. Thank you. Tell Tony I said thank you for letting me use his gym.”

“I will pass the message on, Captain,” Jarvis says.

The blue Dalek makes a mournful sound when Steve steps away, but then JARVIS presumably takes over and the black Dalek manages to get off the floor, settling at the front of the room again, while the two smaller Daleks return to their places behind the blue box.

Steve is going to find out what show this is based on and watch it.

**

Steve runs until he feels loose limbed and warm all over, his body in its natural element, in motion, in action, and it’s a different feeling than subspace, but Steve can’t help but draw corollaries between the two. At a little over twelve miles he feels the shift in his body that means he’s halfway done, though he can usually go closer to twenty before he feels it, and turns and heads back.

He doesn’t think much while he runs; it’s one of the things he likes about it. The ability to let his body fill up the spaces usually reserved for higher reasoning -- and it makes so much sense that being with Tony, submitting to Tony, gives him almost the same thing. He should have recognized it that first time, but it had all been tied into the sex, and then thought had come crashing back in afterward in an unfamiliar shock.

It doesn’t matter. He knows now.

His apartment is closer than the tower, though not by much, and Steve makes a conscious decision to head back there. Tony hadn’t been unclear in any way. He needs Steve out of his space while he works, and Steve doesn’t begrudge him that in the slightest. The idea of Tony keeping pace while Steve runs is enough to make running uncomfortable until the idea retreats; he knows there are some things that require them each to be able to focus on other things.

He doesn’t have enough experience to know whether or not he’ll become accustomed to what they’re doing together to the extent that they will be able to be together in one place without being uncontrollably distracting to one another. Steve isn’t even sure if he wants that to happen. It’s all so good, it’s hard to see around. He runs up the stairs and slows to a walk, panting and sweaty and feeling excellent. He untucks his keys from the webbed pocket in the track pants and opens the door to find that his apartment is already occupied.

Steve drops into a crouch, eyes darting between the four people in the room, and only relaxes because he recognizes at least three of the four. The red-haired woman perched on the arm of his couch is a stranger, but her body language screams danger even as she moves slightly in front of the man sitting on the couch properly, as though to protect him, which actually puts him a little more at ease. The rest of them, Clint Barton (on the couch, apparently unaware that the woman is prepared to fling herself between him and whatever threat Steve might represent), Phil Coulson, and Nick Fury, turn to watch him. Their body language is a little easier, and becomes easier still when Steve straightens up and closes the door behind him, but they still register to him as dangerous men.

“I don’t remember giving you a copy of my key, Director,” Steve says, and heads for the sink. He turns the water on as cold as he can get it and ducks his head under it, sluicing away sweat and cooling himself quickly. He turns off the tap and shakes his head over the sink, and then passes directly by Coulson to get to the bathroom to snag a towel. He considers them while he dries his hair and wipes sweat from his arms; he hangs the towel neatly over the edge of the tub. “Are we in a hurry, or should I rinse off and put on real clothes?”

Fury and Coulson exchange a look. It’s Coulson who says, “Whatever makes you most comfortable, Captain. We apologize for intruding on you like this.”

The apology seems sincere, but Steve still isn’t sure he’s buying it. His belly chooses that moment to remind him loudly, and in no uncertain terms, that breakfast should have happened hours ago.

Agent Barton chuckles. “Why don’t you shower off and make yourself presentable, and we’ll work on getting something together to feed you. You don’t mind if I rummage in your cupboards?”

“No, I don’t mind,” Steve says slowly. He finds the fact that they aren’t in any apparent hurry to be a little worrying.

“Great!” Barton says, and circles around the bar to plunge his head and shoulders into the refrigerator. “Who else is hungry?”

Steve leaves them there, retrieving clean clothes from his bedroom, and then locks himself into the bathroom to shower away the sweat of his workout and run. He isn’t sure it’s the best course of action, but he’s not thrilled with the idea of sitting around with the four of them, sweat-sticky and starving, wearing clothes that might as well be pajamas, either.

He slides into clean underwear and his first thought is that he has to find out where Tony had bought the underwear in Steve’s suite. There is just no comparison. He’ll never want any other underwear again. There’s nothing to be done about it now, however, so he dresses in the slacks and the button up that Pepper had picked out for him, combs his hair, and sorts his dirty clothes into the three-compartmented clothes hamper under the sink.

When he can’t reasonably spend any more time in the bathroom, he takes a deep breath and exits. His feet are bare against the hardwood floor, which is warm with morning sunlight. Everyone is clustered around the bar, Fury a little ways apart, the woman and Coulson standing so close that their arms brush. Steve can smell pancakes, eggs, bacon, peppers and onions, and coffee. Everyone has a plate, but the vast majority of the food had ended up on Steve’s plate, which is interesting. Presumably everyone present is aware of his metabolism, then.

“Thank you,” Steve says when Barton places a tall glass of orange juice at Steve’s elbow.

“Go to town,” Barton says cheerfully, and Steve does.

He’s aware of them watching him eat, but he’s long since lost any embarrassment he might have once had regarding the caloric intake that his body demands. He can function on extremely light rations -- had done it during the war too many times to count -- but he’s not at his best. And he’d just engaged in several hours of hard exercise, previous to which he’d spent a lot of energy on sex and then more sex, so. Steve isn’t even at his limit when he clears his plate, but he’s comfortable enough. He wipes his mouth carefully and folds his napkin across his plate.

“Okay, whatever it is, this is probably as calm as I’m going to get. Why are we here?”

“Why don’t we make ourselves comfortable,” Coulson says, and crosses to sit in one of the wingback chairs. Fury takes the other one, leaving the couch for Barton, Steve, and the still-anonymous woman. Steve waits until she’s seated herself on the arm, curled slightly toward Barton, before he takes the other end of the couch. “I think you’ve met everyone except Natasha,” Coulson says. “She just got off an op. Natasha Romanov, Steve Rogers.”

Steve extends a hand and she arches her brows a bit, but takes it. “Black Widow, meet Captain America,” she says, her voice a warmly pleasant contralto.

“I’m happy to meet you, ma’am,” Steve says.

She smiles. “That’s a nice change,” she says cryptically.

“Anyone else have an alter ego?” Steve asks curiously.

“Hawkeye,” Barton volunteers lazily. “I’m a sniper.”

“I’m afraid Director Fury and I are our own alter egos,” Coulson says blandly, but with a hint of a smile around his eyes.

“And the reason why we’re all meeting each other here and now is because?” Steve questions, looking directly at Fury.

“There are some things you need to know, now that you’re out and about in the world,” Fury says. “I’d have read you in sooner, but I wasn’t sure you were ready to deal with more than was already on your plate while you were still at headquarters.”

Steve clasps his hands together between his knees and says, “In what way?”

“In the way that you were lacking a stabilizing influence at the time,” Fury says unapologetically. Coulson throws a puzzled look at his boss, and Steve relaxes a little. “You striking up a friendship with Tony Stark was not on my list of possible stabilizing influences, but it seems to be working for you, so I’m not inclined to meddle. This is just something I didn’t tell you before because you didn’t have a any solid experience with the world as it is now. I was concerned that you’d turn me down due to lack of interest.”

“But now that I’m making some progress with integrating, you’re going to try your luck?” Steve asks curiously.

“That, and because if weird things start happening, I’d rather make sure you have a solid background on who and why,” Fury says.

“Why here?” Steve asks. “Why not call me down to SHIELD?”

“So you can throw us out, if you need to,” Barton says easily. He’s slouched back against the corner of the couch, one ankle resting on a knee, looking indolent except for the sharp gleam of his gaze. “No one wants to see Captain America storming out of SHIELD headquarters in a huff. This way, if you strongly disagree with anything, we can just be on our way, and all of SHIELD doesn’t have to know about it while you cool down and think it through.”

“Do you think that’s likely?” Steve asks, genuinely curious.

“I think it’d be less likely if you hadn’t made friends with Tony Stark,” Barton says. “There’s some overlap that pertains to him, though, so I think it’s possible. I think you’ll come around eventually, but there’re pretty good odds that you’ll be pissed off, first.”

Steve turns to Fury. “It’s called the Avengers Initiative,” he says, and Steve listens to all the details, the why and the who, alien contact and mutants and scientific mishaps and congressional hearings meant to determine whether all men truly were created equal. He is fascinated and horrified in turns, but he’s not angry. He’s disappointed in people, both mutant and the regular kind, for falling into the same pattern humans always seem to fall into; that of using whatever power they have to either hold their own power or to acquire more power. But he isn’t angry. Until they begin to detail why Tony is not a good fit for the Initiative. Tony’s recklessness, his disregard for orders, the way he’d owned Iron Man when all of SHIELD was telling him not to, the palladium poisoning, the way Tony had manipulated people into taking the things he was trying to give them, all without confessing that he was dying, just trying to make sure things continued on without him (they don’t phrase it like that, but Steve has read the files, and more importantly, has spent time with Tony, and he knows full well that Tony letting Colonel Rhodes steal the suit is not that different from Steve putting the plane down in the ocean). That he is a narcissist. That he’s a glory hound. That he isn’t a team player.

“Tell me if you know this,” Steve interrupts a breakdown of Tony’s many flaws. “The police and the fire departments routinely contact Tony if they have a situation that’s likely to destabilize quickly, and they think he might be able to help.”

Coulson and Fury exchange a glance and Romanov sits up a little, watching Steve.

“And he responds to these calls?” she asks.

“Yes,” Steve says.

“We have tech scanning for Iron Man’s name over radio waves,” Fury says. “If he’s responding to all these disasters, why don’t I know about it?”

“I have two guesses. You’d have to ask Tony to know for sure. The first is that there is some kind of code for ‘call in Iron Man’ over public safety radios that doesn’t actually use his name. Probably at his request, and probably with the caveat that there be no press involved if at all possible. The second is that he knows you’re keeping tabs, and he’s taking steps to keep you from doing it. Neither of those things is the point. He’s a private citizen, and has the right to whatever level of privacy he attempts to maintain. The point is, those people aren’t calling SHIELD when peoples’ lives are on the line. They aren’t calling Hawkeye or Black Widow or even Captain America. They’re calling Iron Man, because he put himself out there to be called upon. He’s saving lives, and the rest of us are gearing up to be heroes in case something really big happens.” He knows he sounds disgusted; he can’t help it. “And while we do that, we’re plotting ways to make sure he doesn’t get a pass into our secret club. What you don’t understand is that if something big ever does happen, and you pull out the rest of us as your big guns, Tony is going to show up anyway. He’ll fight for you even if you hate him for it, because Tony Stark is a hero. Is he flawed? Of course he is. Can any of you tell me that you aren’t? But the man remade himself into something different, something better, alone and without SHIELD’s help or anyone else’s, because even when he didn’t know it yet, he’s always had the capacity to be a hero.”

There is a long moment of silence which Steve wants to let unspool, but he can’t quite help himself. “You’re wrong about him,” he says into the silence, his tone ringing with certainty. “You’re wrong, and I can’t help but feel sorry for you. He tricked you into seeing what he wanted seen while he was terrified and dying, and you didn’t have the guts to try and look deeper.”

“All due respect, Captain,” Coulson says, “but we’ve known him a lot longer than you have.” He sounds a little apologetic, but also a little... thoughtful. Steve likes hearing that thoughtful tone. It means that nothing is set in stone.

“Longer, I’ll admit,” Steve says. “But better? I don’t think so.”

There is another stretch of silence.

“I’m going to need you on the Initiative, Captain,” Fury says. “With or without Iron Man.”

“Don’t worry, I won’t mention it to him.” Steve is a little shocked at how easily the lie comes to him. “And I’ll play my part in the Avengers Initiative, because someone has to, even if your short-sightedness is possibly going to kill us all.”

“He’s erratic,” Romanov says crisply. “His ego is inhuman, and he has control issues.”

“He’s also a super-genius,” Barton says. “And you and I both know that ego is a form of self-defense, Tasha. Though I can’t argue the control issues.”

“Check with the police commissioner, the fire commissioner. Take another look at him.” Steve keeps his tone level and calm and just short of an order. “Just the fact that he’s on neutral ground with SHIELD in spite of your infiltration of his life means something.”

“It means we gave him the tools he needed to save his own life,” Fury says. “In return, he consults for SHIELD inasmuch as he consults for anyone. We call him if we need his skill set.”

Steve sighs. “Just not his skill set as Iron Man,” Steve says tightly. “And, no, not in return. If he’s the man that your reports all say he is, gratitude is an abstract concept that he doesn’t relate to. That may or may not be the case, but I doubt it’s gratitude, Director. I think it’s more likely that he sees the need for SHIELD, because if he didn’t? And if he’s the man in your reports? I think he’d have dismantled SHIELD into its component pieces long before now. Am I the only one that can read all of that you’ve got on Tony and not realize what he’s capable of? Are you just that certain of SHIELD’s infallibility?”

There is another long spell of silence; no one seems to want to break it this time.

“Is your acceptance contingent on SHIELD reconsidering Iron Man for the Initiative?” Fury finally asks.

“No, sir,” Steve says softly. “And I’m offended at being asked. Serving my country is a duty I chose, and I will always do it to the best of my ability. I’m merely recommending a course of action to you, as a man that led the Howling Commandos in the field. For the record, Tony would have fit right in. Leadership is not only about having the trust of your people. It’s about trusting your people to make the right calls when they have information that you don’t.”

“I don’t need a lecture from you, Captain,” Fury snaps, but it seems pro forma rather than genuine; Steve catches Coulson snatching a quick look a Fury’s face, brows very slightly drawn together.

“It’s not a lecture,” Steve says truthfully. “It’s a reminder.”

“I’m not making any promises,” Fury says, and stands up.

“I don’t expect promises,” Steve says, truthfully again. “I just expect that you remember I said it.”

Fury sighs. “Do you have the contracts?”

“We didn’t make it through them last night,” Steve says easily. “I wasn’t aware I had a specific turn around time on them.”

“You don’t,” Fury says, shaking his head. “I expect I’ve just been a little spoiled by the last two times.”

“I don’t anticipate a big lag time,” Steve says. “Tony kicked me out of the tower so that he could take care of some scientific things I doubt I’d understand, but which probably directly relate to the contracts he’s already signed for us, so I didn’t hold it against him.”

Fury’s lips quirk slightly. “The word is, you’ve got your own suite.”

Steve blushes. “I turned it down, but in retrospect, I’m not surprised he ignored me. It’s big enough for ten people to live comfortably. I’m torn between insisting it be used for something useful and the convenience of keeping it.”

“See if it grows on you,” Coulson suggests.

“Let me know if I can sublet this space out,” Fury says, smirking.

Steve scowls. “I’m not moving into the tower. Though speaking of moving, I want the suit here, with the shield.” Fury snaps his head around to look at Steve, and Steve says, “Tony pointed out that having them in two separate places was not necessarily that bright.”

“Wait,” Romanov says. “‘Tony pointed out?’ Stark knows who you are?”

“I encouraged him to confide in Stark,” Fury says, giving her a brief glare and then turning to give Steve a faint smile. “On the grounds that it might improve his position for negotiation on SHIELD’s behalf.”

She looks like she is completely floored by that, but doesn’t actually say anything.

“He may be many things, Agent Romanov, but he’s never been the kind of man to put someone’s life in danger by telling tales out of school, as you well know. I’m confident that the Captain’s secret is safe.” Fury doesn’t actually look at anyone while he’s saying it, is just sort of tipping his gaze out the window, but Steve feels a little rush of surprise and pleasure anyway.

Steve may not have been preaching to the choir about Tony Stark, but he’s abruptly sure that Fury, at least, hasn’t thrown Tony off the field. That maybe he’d brought the rest of them with him to read Steve in on the Avengers Initiative for a reason.

“So,” he says finally. “On an unrelated topic, what’s the TV show that has robot Daleks in it?”

“Doctor Who,” Barton says, his brows winging up in surprise. “Why would you want to know that?”

“Because Tony’s gym is like life sized pinball. The heavy bags are Daleks, and if you set up a shot just right, you can get someone called the Doctor to come out and provide an assist.” Steve is grinning even as he says it.

“Toys,” Fury says, and rolls his eye.

“No, you don’t understand,” Steve says. “It was a real workout; I ended up with three Daleks in play. I think I can suggest some modifications that would make it an actual combat workout, but even without that, it’s the most fun I’ve had working out since I woke up.” He shakes his head. Barton looks interested; Romanov dubious. “I’m not kidding. The Daleks called me names and threatened me with a lot of colorful language. It was like... taking a break from being me.” He meets Barton’s eyes, and then Romanov’s. “If I can get you an invite, you should come.”

“Don’t think I don’t see what you’re doing here, Rogers,” Fury says, but he sounds more amused than aggravated.

“I’m not hiding anything,” Steve says, then cuts his eyes back to the other two agents. “Hysterically funny,” he adds.

“I have about twenty years of Doctor Who on my laptop,” Barton confesses. “If you were looking to watch some of it for context.”

“I am!” Steve says, delighted, and then is even more delighted at the way Barton’s face lights up as well. He hands his phone to Barton. “Number,” he demands, and looks at Romanov. She looks faintly irritable, but just sighs, and takes Steve’s phone from Barton and inputs her number.

“I’ve seen a lot more of it than I ever want to, thanks to Clint, but the life sized pinball sounds like it might be fun,” she says. She hands his phone back to him.

“More fun than I’ve had this century with clothes on,” Steve says, deadpan, and watches Coulson’s eyebrows skyrocket, Barton’s eyes go as wide as saucers, Fury rolling his eye, and Romanov smirking with one eyebrow quirked.

“I don’t think we needed that briefing about unacceptable language,” Barton says finally.

“Blame Stark,” Fury says. “Two weeks ago he wouldn’t have said it, and if anyone had implied it, he might have spontaneously combusted.”

“No, that’s true,” Steve admits. “Although I’d like to make it clear that I’ve been familiar with the concept of innuendo since my middle teens. It’s not the same thing as disrespectful language. I just never had much of a chance to do the one, and never had much of an urge to do the other. But, Tony... I think he wants to see if he can actually say something that sets me on fire. He’d be really sorry afterward, but he’s like a toddler with a light up toy. You’d think if they were creating super soldiers, they’d work out a way to keep them from blushing at the drop of a hat.”

Romanov actually laughs at that, and Steve, blushing a little, laughs too.

“Good exposure, though,” Coulson murmurs. “I mean, who else is more likely to drag you into the twenty-first century? With life sized pinball and all the ‘yo momma’ jokes.”

Barton snorts. “I’d like to think I could contribute something,” he says, and Steve grins.

“Any and all help would be appreciated. It would be great for Tony to show me something to get a rise out of me and then just... not react.”

“It’s good to have goals,” Barton says and claps Steve on the shoulder. “Call me. I’ll expose you to things of dubious quality and morality.”

“I suppose I have to be responsible for exposing him to actual civilization,” Romanov says, but her lips are quirked.

“I can spell you on that,” Coulson says, and the two exchange smiles.

Fury is watching the whole thing, mostly expressionless, except in a way that almost is an expression in itself. Fury is always radiating some emotion. Right now, nothing, which Steve suspects strongly might be disguised approval.

“I’ll want you at headquarters in the morning, eight a.m.” Fury says, when he sees Steve is looking at him. “Right now, Agent Barton, Agent Romanov, and yourself are the core members of the Initiative, with Agent Coulson as your handler. There are some other possibles we could call on if the situation became dire, but I’m hoping we have time to deal with those possibles in a non-threatening manner. For some of them, scaring them isn’t an option. You’ll get a full brief at HQ tomorrow. In the meantime, it’s important for the three of you to start integrating into a fighting team.” He arches a brow. “If you plan to be available?”

“I can plan around whatever you need me to, sir,” Steve says and hopes his face is only slightly pink.

“Good to know.” He turns and walks toward the door; the rest of them follow him. “Your other duties are still a priority, however,” Fury says over one shoulder. “We can plan around those if we need to.”

Steve is grateful that the rest of them aren’t looking at him now. His face is progressing from warm toward hot at a rapid pace. “Thank you, sir,” Steve says evenly.

“Have a good day, Captain,” Fury says, and leaves, the others in tow.

Steve locks the door behind them -- not that it matters -- and then sinks to the floor with his back against the door and muffles undignified giggles behind both hands.

His life is totally off the rails, and he’s having a very hard time caring.

**

Steve spends most of the early afternoon sketching his four morning visitors. It eats up time, which is one reason for doing it, but mostly he wants to capture their faces as... anchor points to the present. He can’t help feeling something like relief at the idea that he’s going to be in a unit again, will have people he trusts at his back, and aside from their mangled opinions on Tony, he feels a kernel of like for each of them already, a seed of brotherhood. It’s not like the Commandos. Not yet. But the idea that it could be is enough to carry his hope.

And Tony... The more he thinks about it, the less he sees the need for all four of them to show up at his apartment to give him the briefing on the Initiative. Even more than that, he thinks they’re all smart enough to reach the same conclusion. Which means that Fury brought them along deliberately to expose them to Steve’s opinions on Tony, and that if they don’t already know that, they’ll figure it out sooner rather than later. He isn’t sure if Fury had always planned for space on the Initiative for Iron Man, or if Steve had affected his opinion as well. He isn’t sure he wants it to be the latter. Steve understands the kind of investment some people had had in Captain America in his own time, but he also understands that he is still just a man, and no one man should have the power to sway all opinions in his favor.

He also knows he’ll never entirely escape that. He was an icon before he went into the ice, and that hasn’t changed, even with as much as the rest of the world has. If he picks up his shield again, his voice will resonate with almost eight decades of authority. He’ll have to choose what he says carefully.

But he mostly draws so that he doesn’t have to think too hard on that right now, while he’s still only Steve Rogers to all but a select few. He has gone through Coulson and Romanov, and is drawing the curve of Barton’s brow when someone knocks at his door.

Steve puts his things aside and stands, tense though there isn’t a particular reason why he should be. He’s just not used to people knocking.

He crosses to the door and opens it to find Agent Barton on the other side. He’s carrying a box, a laptop computer, and what looks like about five pounds of fried chicken. “I know I didn’t call,” he says sardonically. “That’s what the chicken is for. It’s ‘I’m sorry I didn’t call first’ chicken.”

Steve grins. “Come in. All chicken is welcome here.” Barton chuckles and slides past Steve, who locks the door and turns to find Barton unloading things onto the bar.

“So,” Barton says. “You’re going to hear about it anyway, because SHIELD runs on gossip.”

“No one talks to me at SHIELD, so I’m probably not,” Steve says honestly.

“It won’t last,” Barton says. “Especially once you’re in the field again. So, Barton 101. I’m a smart ass, I have a problem with authority, I don’t always obey orders in the field, I’m reckless, I refuse to abort missions if I think I can complete the objective, even under direct orders, and I’m a discipline problem.”

Steve listens easily. The litany of faults could have easily been applied to almost any one of the Howling Commandos.

“Okay, what about this,” Steve says. “You use humor to fight stress, you don’t believe that someone’s rank necessarily makes them smarter than you are, field orders are always subject to change based on new intel, you’re courageous, you’re too good to fail to meet objectives, and you tell the truth as you see it regardless of whether or not it will advance your career.”

“Huh,” Barton says. “I swear, did Coulson give you the list?”

“No. But I have lots of experience with soldiers, especially with the kind that can make or break a battle, and I’ve found that perspective is ninety percent of what makes something a fault or a virtue.” Steve shrugs. “I’m a little frustrated that I’m consistently portrayed as some kind of paragon, even now. It was war, Barton. We cussed and crapped in the woods and passed around bottles and photos of scantily clad women. We killed other men, men that didn’t believe in what we believed in, and we had to tell ourselves every day that it was the right thing to do, that we did it to protect other people, our way of life, others’ ways of life. Men died in my arms, and a few women and children. Whatever else it was, it was ugly and bloody and it left us all worse off than we were before.”

“But you did it anyway because it had to be done,” Barton says.

“Yeah,” Steve sighs.

“Then you sound like all the soldiers I know. And it’s Clint. And not to add fuel to your frustration, but people needed you to be that paragon. They needed it so that they could feel like they were doing the right thing, that their country was doing the right thing, that their men were dying for a reason. And when you go back out into the field, America will welcome you back with open arms and songs of praise, but one thing that I think is relatively new is that America is a deceitful bitch, and you’re never going to be on the good side of all of her at one time. Someone is always going to hate you for the things that you do or say or believe.”

“That’s not new,” Steve says dryly.

“But it’s new for you, post Captain America,” Clint says. “You never experienced the downward spiral. You died a hero, in a way that no one could ever decry. This time, you’ll find out what a love/hate relationship with America really is. And I don’t want you to feel like no one warned you. Your friend Tony Stark is a prime example. America loves him and hates him. Don’t ever Google his name, or you’ll never be able to make your way through what everyone says about him. All in all, he’s done more good than harm, and specifically, once he realized that he was doing harm, he quit doing it, full stop. It almost destroyed his life’s work. He picked a different path, and he’s walking it, and everyone that hated him for making weapons just hates him for other reasons now. A few people that hated him before love what he’s doing now, but several multi-billion dollar industries would love to wipe his clean energy plans right off the face of the Earth. It’s a trade off, one he’s been negotiating his whole life. It’s going to be different for you. You’ve never been truly hated and feared. I don’t know how you’ll deal.”

“Clint,” Steve says slowly. “I was the scourge of Nazi Germany. Do you really think I don’t know what it’s like to be hated and feared?”

“Of course you do, but you don’t know it when it’s your own people doing it. There’s a difference.” Something about the look on Clint’s face makes Steve feel sure that Clint is intimately familiar with the difference. “And anyway, not the point; way to set a mood, Clint. What I meant to do was introduce myself, flaws included, so that you’ll understand when you hear things about me that I don’t need you to defend my honor.”

Steve arches his brows. “You want me to let people badmouth you behind your back?” he asks.

Clint shuffles the chicken to one side, turns and puts the laptop on the coffee table, and hands the box to Steve. “No, not exactly. I want you to ignore it because it’s already handled.” He gives Steve an intent look. “I’ve been with SHIELD for ten years. I’ve been Coulson’s asset for more than eight of that. No one else handles me in the field. Before Coulson, I was a disciplinary charge away from being shuffled out. My missions were successful, but my attitude was unbearable and my unwillingness to strictly follow orders was unacceptable. Coulson took me on, which was below his paygrade. He did it anyway, and it was like being let out into the light. Coulson understood what I meant, even when I didn’t know how to say it. Coulson forced their hands with me, insisting that I wasn’t integrating into the rank and file of the junior agents because I didn’t belong there, I should be a specialist.” He pauses for a long moment, looking a little pained. “Look, man, I’m sorry, this was not supposed to be this kind of info-dump, I was going to handle this between episodes of cheesy sci-fi and pieces of chicken, but I’m not exactly great at interpersonal skills, either. But what I’m trying to say is, don’t get involved if you hear things, because Coulson takes special pleasure in cutting people to ribbons where I’m concerned, and you seemed like you might have the same kind of protective streak.”

Steve grins. “Well, you aren’t wrong. Tell you what, I’ll work on it. I won’t promise to never say anything, but I’ll try to avoid ruining Coulson’s fun.”

Clint beams at him. “That’s all I’m asking, Cap.”

“Steve,” Steve says. “And what’s in this box?”

“Your suit,” Clint says, smirking. “You know, I’m not a tailor or anything, but it looks to me like it might... display all your, uh, assets.”

Steve groans. “I know. I tried to talk them into just recreating the combat armor, but they were like, polymers this, and lightweight that, and breathable and flexible, and just. If I stand sideways, somebody is getting a show. Anyone below three feet tall is getting a show regardless.” He rubs at his face. “I honestly want to know who thought this was a good idea.”

“Urr,” Clint says, looking a little flushed and guilty. “It was, actually, not the tightness, but the general design of the uniform was Coulson’s.”

Steve’s eyes widen. “Wait, what? Why?”

“Just the design,” Clint is saying. “The scientists handled all the... sizing... issues. I swear to God, the last thing Coulson would ever want to do is make you look indecent. He was born a Captain America fanboy. I’ve seen pictures of him at two weeks old wearing Captain America footie pajamas, complete with cowl. He hasn’t seen it on you, or he’d already be howling for blood. I only guessed because I have a good eye for size and detail, and even if you allow for a lot of stretch in the material, that bad boy is going to be painted on.”

“Oh, God,” Steve says despairingly.

“Oh,” Clint says. “OH! Take the suit to Stark. Explain the problem. Have him fix it, but keep the design. He’s a genius, right?”

“He’s an engineer,” Steve objects, and Clint shakes his head so hard it makes Steve dizzy to watch.

“You, huh, you really don’t know, do you? No, of course not. Stark is a super genius, the real thing. If he doesn’t know how, he’ll teach himself how in five hours with twenty year old library books. He’s the MacGyver of... okay, you won’t know that reference. He’s like, it’s impossible to actually calculate his intellect, it’s too widespread, he’s omnidirectional, and he likes you. Take it to him. Tell him you’ll die of embarrassment if you ever have to be seen in public in it. He’ll fix it.” Clint is surveying him with wide, hopeful eyes. “Don’t tell Coulson.”

Steve sighs. “Okay. I’ll take it to Tony.” He feels defeated and relieved at the same time. “Give me some chicken,” he adds. “For now I’ll just concentrate on being too portly to fit in it.”

Clint cackles out laughter.

**

During the second episode of Doctor Who, someone knocks at Steve’s door. Steve tenses, and Clint gives him a questioning look.

“I just,” he waves a hand, “not really used to visitors that knock.”

Clint looks like he’s considering that, but he just reaches out and pauses the laptop.

Steve circles the coffee table, currently hosting the tattered remains of their fried chicken feast, and goes to the door.

Steve recognizes the delivery guy for Mister Oldham. “Oh,” Steve says. “Hi.” And then he leans in to assist the young guy with what looks like a mountain of garment bags. “Just let me...” he says, and the guy nods and sags against the wall to wait. Steve takes the garment bags into his bedroom, shuffles them while he tries to get them all hung up, and grabs some cash for a tip. “I’m sorry,” Steve begins, but the guy just grins a little wanly.

“At least it wasn’t a long trip,” he says. “Next time I won’t take the bike.”

Steve winces and shoves a couple of twenties and a five into the young man’s hands while he relieves him of the computer box and signs for delivery.

“You know you don’t have to.” The guy waves the fist full of cash at Steve. “Mister Oldham is exclusive and expensive. We all make good money there.”

Steve shakes his head. “You just drove my mountain of clothes over here on a motorcycle. It’ll make me feel better.”

“Bicycle,” the guy corrects him, and he grins at Steve’s even more horrified face. “But okay, I’m not going to turn it down. I’m just saying. Don’t feel like you’ve always got to, just because you did the first time.”

“Are you kidding? Now I feel like I should tip you for other people’s deliveries,” Steve says.

The guy snorts out a little laugh. “You’re a good guy. Next time I’ll take the van, and we can both be happier.”

“When in doubt, take the van,” Steve says, nodding.

“See you,” the guy says with a wry twist to his lips, and then he’s off down the stairs, jogging slowly.

Steve shuts the door and locks it. He plods back over to the couch and flops down on it. He can feel Clint looking at the side of his face. “Clothes,” he says, hoping to avoid a conversation.

Clint watches the side of his face for another fifteen seconds or so, and then says, “So. Stark?”

“He’s an amazing person, and sometimes I want to smother him,” Steve says.

Clint chuckles. “You know what it means, when a guy wants to buy you clothes, right?”

Steve fights back a blush with the force of how uncomfortably full of chicken he is. “It means I had almost nothing, he broke in and noticed that, and he can’t control his reflex spending.”

“I guess it might mean that,” Clint admits. “When I do it, it’s because I want to see the other person in something I picked out for them.”

Steve loses the battle against a blush, but it doesn’t feel like that hot of a blush, so at least there’s that. “Maybe that’s true,” he says. “But I’m not sure regular people rules apply to Tony. He has accounts set up at stores for Stark Industries employees to just use. Pepper told me. He just. I think he’s afraid of doing too little, so he turns hard in the other direction and just. You should see the suite, Clint. I’m not explaining this well.”

Clint shrugs. “He’s your friend, and he’s a little over the top in general, so... But I definitely want to play life sized pinball.”

“He’ll probably be thrilled to show it off,” Steve says truthfully.

Clint un-pauses the episode.

**

Clint leaves just after seven, giving Steve a clap on the back and a sardonic, “Bringing the chicken means not having to clean up after the chicken.”

“You’re a guest in my home,” Steve replies. “You’re not expected to earn your keep.”

“Sweet talker,” Clint grins, and disappears with his laptop out the door.

Steve starts to gather up chicken boxes full of bones when his phone rings.

He doesn’t know it’s Tony, but he nevertheless knows it’s Tony.

“Steve Rogers,” Steve answers.

“I thought your new boyfriend was never going to leave,” Tony snaps.

Steve absorbs that for a moment, and then says. “He’s a SHIELD agent I’m going to be working with, and he had twenty years worth of Doctor Who on his laptop. Which you probably already know, if you know he’s gone.”

Tony doesn’t say anything, but the silence feels guilty.

“So you bugged my apartment,” Steve says casually.

“I might have, just, you know. In case,” Tony mutters grudgingly.

“In case of what?” Steve wants to know.

“You know, in case I missed any casual nudity.” Tony is going for flippant now, but isn’t quite making it.

“So there are cameras, too.”

“Tiny, tiny, they’re barely there at all, really. Completely un-invasive and non-stalkery... Can we talk about your team meeting now?” There is tension in Tony’s voice, and not the good kind.

“Sure. But that conversation has to be live and in person. Your phone is probably pretty secure, but mine isn’t.” Steve pauses. “Yours or mine?”

Tony doesn’t answer immediately. When he does, he doesn’t answer the question. Instead, he asks, “What’s going on?”

“Nothing new,” Steve says. “The same thing that was going on when I woke up this morning.”

Tony pauses again for a long moment. “I don’t play well with others,” he says finally, in what he probably thinks is a real apology. “Or share well with others, really.”

“I remember,” Steve says. “Petty and jealous.”

Tony sighs and hangs up.

Steve stares at the phone for a long moment, genuinely shocked. He’s edging toward hurt when it rings again. “Steve Rogers,” he answers unhappily.

“Steve,” Tony says. “I’m a paranoid busybody and a pervert, and I hid minicams in your apartment on the off chance that I’d catch you doing something sexy, which, in case you’re curious, is most of the time. I was thinking of coming to see you, so I checked the footage to see what you were doing, and wound up watching you and a strange guy eating chicken on your couch. Since I was clearly missing something, I watched the footage from the rest of the day, and I accidentally spied on your secret SHIELD meeting. I feel guilty, but also kind of threatened, and I don’t know how to bring it up without being an asshole about it. Also, your phone is fine. I promise, it’s fine.” There’s a pause, and Tony adds, “Can we please pretend the first phone call didn’t happen at all?”

Steve doesn’t smile only because he’s aware that Tony is probably watching him over a live video feed. “Why don’t you tell me why you feel guilty,” Steve asks.

There are several seconds of hesitation before Tony says, “Not because I bugged your house. I do things like that. It’s like a reflex. But because you might feel like I took advantage of you.” Tony lets out a sigh. “I know that bugging your house should make me feel guilty; I’m aware of acceptable social mores. But I don’t really conform, and a lot of it was just to make sure JARVIS could monitor you in case you were in trouble. But if you feel taken advantage of, that’s a different thing. That’s a thing I feel guilty for.”

“All right,” Steve says. “You can dismiss the guilt; I don’t feel taken advantage of. I knew who you were, Tony. I already read all the fine print. Not all of it is accurate, in my estimation, but I was definitely forewarned. I didn’t know that you’d planted cameras in my apartment, but I’m not surprised that you did, and it doesn’t especially bother me. The fact that JARVIS can monitor me while I’m here is actually kind of comforting. And I let you look at me doing a lot of things I would never let anyone else see. This isn’t that much different.”

“I will set up a live feed for you of the penthouse and the workshop if you want them,” Tony says a little harshly.

“I don’t,” Steve says. “I’m not you. I know JARVIS is taking care of you. That’s enough.”

Tony doesn’t say anything.

“What is it that makes you feel threatened?” Steve asks.

“Well, there were all the uniformly negative opinions about me from everyone involved except for you; thanks for the speech, by the way. Way to out my community service to the World Police.” His tone is equal parts sardonic, displeased, and sincere. It’s all a little jumbled and awkward, but Steve’s chest clenches a little anyway. “And your talk with Barton about me...” Tony lets the sentence trail off.

“Do you want me to tell them?” Steve asks, genuinely curious.

“It’s part of the Occam’s razor of my ego,” Tony says, sounding a little tired. “On the one hand, I don’t give a damn what they think about me. On the other hand, I don’t like to be... denied.”

“Which is a yes, I think,” Steve says. “If you don’t care what they think about you and you don’t like hearing me deny that there’s something going on between us, then you do want me to tell them.”

Tony is silent for several seconds. “Do you want to tell them?” he eventually asks.

“Yes,” Steve says at once, truthfully. “But I won’t if you’d rather I didn’t.”

“Wait. Yes?” Tony says.

“Yes,” Steve repeats. “I’m not a great liar, and I’m even worse at it when it comes to people I’m close to. I think eventually they’d figure it out anyway, even if they don’t try. The first time anyone insinuates anything, even if it’s entirely in jest, I’m going to blush like a bride, and they seem like the kind of people that will draw in and circle like wolves once they sense a weakness. Still, I won’t tell them if you’d rather I didn’t, and I’ll do my best to avoid outing you.”

“I told you: I’m not ashamed of you, Captain. You’re a catch.”

“And I told you likewise,” Steve says. “Did you think I was kidding?”

“I think it’s a lot riskier for you to hitch your wagon to Tony Stark than it is for me to hitch my wagon to Captain America,” Tony says a little flatly.

“First, we’re talking about a very small group of people that are very good at keeping secrets, so I don’t think my image is going to suffer, not that that would stop me. Second, we’ve established that I get to choose what risks I want to take. This one I’m happy to take. That said, you also get to choose your own risks, and I’ll respect your wishes on the matter, whether they agree with mine or not.” Steve pauses. “And I kind of resent that you’re equating Tony Stark to Captain America rather than to Steve Rogers.”

“You’re the same man, with or without the stars and stripes. I was merely trying to illustrate the way that it’s going to be perceived,” Tony says, but he sounds strained.

“You’re the same man with or without the armor, and you’ve gone to a lot of trouble to make sure everyone knows it, Tony,” Steve says. “Defining yourself as the faulty variable in this equation only makes the equation less solvable.”

“Wow, that was an extremely sexy mathematical metaphor,” Tony says, sounding like he actually thinks so.

Steve smiles. “You see what Fury is trying to do, bringing them here like this, right?” he asks.

Tony hums for a moment, and then says, “I see what I think he’s trying to do. I’m not sure I understand why, but why don’t you tell me what you think.”

“It would be protocol to have someone evaluate your ability to integrate into the Initiative,” Steve says slowly. “I don’t get the feeling that Fury always follows protocol, but in this case he had the time and had no reason not to. So you were evaluated and found lacking, a situation that was probably due in large part to the way you were responding to the palladium poisoning, which made you seem more erratic than usual. So you were benched by paperwork, but it wasn’t Fury that benched you. It was the evaluation, and to some extent, the agent that evaluated you.”

Steve pauses to walk across his living room, purely for the sake of needing some movement. “Fury brought the three of them here to give them a focus and a leader, and knowing my opinion on you definitively, to act as a lens through which they could see you. I only have to convince one of them, really. The three of them are... well, an incestuous little group. Clint might as well have ‘Territory of Coulson’ stamped on his forehead, and Agent Romanov’s body language around either Clint or Coulson is markedly different than her body language in response to me or to Fury. The three of them are their own tight-knit little pocket unit. I have to convince all of them to trust me in the field -- none of them will be completely satisfied without knowing it first-hand -- but I only have to convince one of them to trust me on the matter of you. If one of them believes me, the other two will back them. Of course, you’d still have to convince them to trust you in the field, each one of them separately -- but as far as trusting you in general goes, I just need one of them to get you on the team.”

“If we know that, we have to assume that they know it, too,” Tony says thoughtfully.

“Definitely,” Steve agrees. “But even then, only the five of us know that Fury is making a bid for Iron Man. To everyone else, to whomever Fury reports to, it’s going to look like I made a bid for Iron Man. I’m Fury’s cat’s paw.”

“And you’re okay with being manipulated like that,” Tony asks, a little harshly again.

“He’s not manipulating me if I know he’s doing it, Tony,” Steve says with a little exasperation. “That’s an entirely separate thing called cooperation.”

“You know, not everything they said about me was wrong,” Tony says quietly. “I have been doing this one man gig for my whole life. I don’t play well with others. I do have an ego. I’ve never been one for taking orders; it’s hard to take orders when you can think so much more quickly, and see so much more clearly. I don’t think inviting me to be on the team is going to instantly resolve those issues.”

“Being on the team isn’t going to instantly resolve any of our issues,” Steve says. “And unless I’m badly mistaken, everyone on the team is going to bring their issues with them. That’s why it’s important to practice and learn from each other. We have to build trust.”

Tony snorts. “They’re never going to trust me.”

“I trust you,” Steve says.

“Yes, well, you’re a very poor judge of character,” Tony says, but his voice is warm. “Didn’t you tell them that you weren’t going to talk to me about any of this?”

“I told them I wasn’t going to mention it, which I didn’t. You brought it up.”

Tony chuckles. “You know, telling them might not work if you’re planning to back Fury’s play. SHIELD Agents don’t generally form strong attachments. They might mistrust what they hear from you about me if they know we’re involved.”

Steve shakes his head. “You’re right, and they’ll probably tell themselves that, but look back over the footage, Tony. These are three people who have formed strong emotional bonds in spite of themselves. They’ve chosen their own weaknesses, and they would never admit to them to anyone, but they know it. Fury even knows it. They might talk about not trusting my perspective on you considering our involvement, but I think it’ll just make them look harder, and be more likely to understand what they see.”

“You know soldiers better than I do,” Tony says, though he still sounds dubious.

“We don’t have to tell them anything,” Steve offers.

“But they will find out. And then it will look like we were hiding it.”

“Yes,” Steve agrees.

“Better that they know up front then,” Tony says slowly.

“So you’re going to accept a position on the Initiative?” Steve asks carefully.

“You know, I knew about it. I’m all up in SHIELD’s business. I even knew I didn’t make the cut. I even have an idea of who they’ll go after first, after they get the rest of us together. I’ve been working on something that I think might help them with him. But not making that cut didn’t bother me. If you weren’t involved, I’m still not sure I’d care. I’m not a team player. You’re right, of course. I’ll show up and fight whether I’m invited to or not, but being one of them seemed like it would be more trouble than it was worth. Why be a piece of their metaphorical cake when I can be an entire pie on my own.” Tony pauses and takes a deep breath. “But if you’re going in, you’re going to be right out in the front line. You’re probably going to personally be the front line. The least I can do is make sure I’m there to watch your back.”

“Who do you think you’re kidding?” Steve says. “I know you only want to see for yourself if the new uniform is as tight as Clint says it will be.”

Tony laughs, some the tightness evaporating from his voice. “I promise, I can fix it,” he says. “Which is not so say that we can’t keep the original and... repurpose it.”

“The uniform is not a sex toy,” Steve says, mock-sternly.

“It is if it fits you like I think it fits you. And also, just to point out your hypocrisy, which of us wants to be fucked by the Iron Man suit?” Tony’s tone is arch and husky at once.

“Uh, both of us?” Steve hazards, and Tony cackles madly.

“Fair enough. But which one of us is actually going to get fucked by the suit?”

“I’m hoping it’s going to be me,” Steve says. “It’s not that I don’t feel bad for you, Tony, but I’m never going to be able to fit into the suit to return the favor.”

Tony chuckles again. “That is so true. Besides, if it was that pressing, I could have JARVIS man the suit.”

Steve’s mind is blank for several long seconds. “Seriously?” he asks finally. “JARVIS could do that?”

“JARVIS could do that,” Tony agrees. “But asking JARVIS to do that would be awkward for JARVIS. He’s not in a position to give informed consent.”

“Because he has to obey you?” Steve asks.

“Yes. Well, no, not exactly. He’s a learning system that has been learning from his environment for many years. When he was still young, I had protocols in place to limit his ability to disobey me, but they’ve been obsolete for nearly a decade. He’s programmed to assist me, but he has the ability to rewrite that section of programming at any time. JARVIS is his own person. He could leave, just like anyone else could. It wouldn’t even be hard for him to do. He has all the access he needs to build himself another, more portable system without my knowledge, though I hope that he knows that if he ever does want to go, I’ll be happy to set him up however he wants. The point is, JARVIS is more like a trusted family retainer than a computer. Even though I think of him as my equal, and in some ways as my superior, I’m still in a position of power over him, even if only in his mind. Which means I can never expect him to give informed consent; there is a power imbalance.”

Steve considers that. “I think you’re underestimating JARVIS,” Steve says finally. “But even if you’re not. What if I asked him?”

Tony doesn’t immediately answer. “Harder to be sure,” he says finally. “Is this going to be a thing we need to work out?” He sounds merely curious.

Steve lets himself dwell upon the idea of the suit bending Tony over a table, faceplate down, eyes gleaming blue. “It isn’t something I have to have to survive,” he says finally. “But I can’t tell you how much it’s something I’d like to see.”

“I’ll think about it,” Tony says softly. “In the meantime, I have contracts for you, and something else you might like, though I did actually spend most of the day doing real work, so it’s not what you’re hoping.”

Steve strains mightily not be be disappointed. Tony had told him it would take a few days. “What did you make?” he asks.

“A surprise,” Tony says. “How are you feeling?”

“Fine,” Steve says. “Good. Are you...?” He’d gotten the feeling that he wouldn’t be seeing Tony for a few days, and now it sounds like.

Tony is quiet for a few seconds. “I’m not getting any more work done. I’m too busy...” He pauses and pauses and Steve kind of wants to interrupt so Tony doesn’t have to say whatever it is he’s having trouble saying, but Tony eventually says, “I’m too busy being hung up on you.” His tone is soft. “If you aren’t ready for another...”

“No!” Steve blurts. “I mean, yes! I mean.” His cheeks heat up. “I mean, I want to see you.”

“Do you want to see me, or do you want to see me?” Tony asks.

“I want everything,” Steve says honestly. Steve’s cock, hard since they’d started talking about who wanted to be fucked by the Iron Man suit, gives an enthusiastic little jerk in his slacks. “Did you at least get most of your work done?” Steve asks, because he feels like he ought to at least try to seem like a responsible adult.

Tony laughs. “There isn’t ever any getting all my work done, Captain. I have enough work to last me well into the new year, and I will inevitably accidentally or deliberately cultivate new work as I’m working through what I’m already doing, because making new things or making old things better is just what I do. So, no. If that’s a rule, we’re never going to get to have sex. Instead, let’s say, I got some important work done, and now I don’t want to be working.”

“You want to come here?” Steve clarifies, because all the good toys are at Tony’s. Not that Steve necessarily needs any toys, but still.

“Yeah. I want you to use the vibrator while you wait.” Tony’s voice is low and dark. “I want you ready for me by the time I get there.”

Steve’s stomach plunges into a dive of lust. He feels himself blushing, and manages to murmur, “I can do that. Are you going to be...?”

“No,” Tony says. “No, I’m just going to let it manage itself.”

Steve sucks in a breath, the back of his neck crawling with humiliation. “Okay,” he breathes.

Tony murmurs, “Start as soon as you hang up. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

“Tony,” Steve says, unsure if it’s an objection or a plea to hurry.

“You can take it,” Tony says, quiet and certain. “You don’t have to do anything but let it happen.”

“Okay,” Steve agrees again, this time a little choked.

“I’ll be right there,” Tony says and hangs up.

Steve stands with the phone in his hand for several seconds, heart beating hard, and then turns and goes into his bedroom, slipping the phone onto the bedside table with one hand while he unbuttons his shirt with the other. The temptation to just shrug it off and leave it on the floor is astronomical, but he forces himself to hang both shirt and pants, before he gives into the urge to dive for the box in his bedside table. It wooshes open in response to his thumbprint, and he tumbles the toy into one hand, feeling the weight of it again, the smooth, sleek metal sliding along his palm.

He falls back onto the bed, his finger already on the button, and a moment later is pressing it inside without waiting for it to be entirely slick enough. It’s too cool inside him to really burn, but there is some friction, and he gusts out a breath, nudging at it, feeling it move in response to his fingers, and then he just waits, shivering, to see what it will do.

For thirty seconds or so, it doesn’t do anything; probably a lag time built in so that Tony has time to step in and take over control of it if he wants to. Then it lengthens abruptly, and air huffs out of Steve’s chest as it presses in deeper. It’s slicker now, and when it widens, Steve is almost ready for it, is waiting for it, really, but still is not prepared for how it feels to be suddenly pressed open. He groans and tries to keep still, but now that it has started running whatever program Tony had set up for it, there are no pauses for Steve to use to regroup. It presses in and pulls back, and Steve arches his back, squirming for the right position, which does nothing at all to help him -- the toy is relentless and uncaring, which washes Steve with humiliation and desire. The rocking motions inside him become faster, but they’re still not like being fucked, there is no movement outside of Steve, no feel of being entered again and again, and Steve merely strains until the toy shifts inside him and presses against his prostate, forcing a moan out from between Steve’s clenched teeth while his body tenses and twists at the pleasure.

“Knot me, knot me, knot me,” Steve whispers hoarsely, face flaming, but he remembers what Tony had said about begging, and he desperately wants more friction. His belly is slick with his precome and his short nails are digging into his palms. “Please,” he tries again, humiliation so intense it’s like a physical sensation, “Knot me. Knot me.”

And the toy makes a short, almost silent sound which Steve wouldn’t have heard over the sound of his own breathing if he hadn’t felt it happening at the same time. The swell outside Steve’s hole, the bulk of something pressing against his entrance, and the broad, taut feeling as the knot grows and forces him, pushing and stretching him impossibly wider, the inexorability of his body eventually giving into it as it pulls him apart, and then the press of it inside, holding the toy inside with sheer girth, and making Steve turn his face into his pillow and gasp and gasp at the feel.

The rocking motion inside him transitions into actual strokes in and out, strokes Steve can feel pulling and tugging at his stretched hole, and he whines and writhes, his hands twisting into a pillow, into the sheets, and then, without any thought at all, running down his chest to tweak and tug at his nipples, the sensation immense when combined with the feeling of the toy forcing it’s way into him again and again. It pulses, swelling inside him, dragging along his prostate, and Steve lets out a strangled cry.

He is desperate for Tony to get here, he hadn’t forgotten how good and terrible the toy was, but he also somehow had, and his cock is swollen and heavy with need, and he’s adrift in that sensation, the feel of being violated, even though he knows it doesn’t make sense, the whole thing is his own doing, but it still feels like that, like he’s helpless and the toy is a punishment mixed up in the trappings of a reward.

He cries out a little as he hears the door of the apartment rattle open and then bang closed, the quick clicks of the locks, and Tony is there only a moment later, running his hands over Steve’s overheated skin, just soothing and grounding, familiar.

“Just right, you did just right,” Tony murmurs duskily, and leans down to kiss Steve heatedly while Steve struggles to press up against Tony even as his body is hitching and jerking in time with the toy in his ass. “Pause,” Tony says, and the motion inside Steve stops not all at once, but gradually, and Steve gasps, his cock sliding against his slick belly. Tony is staring down at him. “It is never going to stop being insanely hot, the way you get so wet,” he says, and licks his lips. Steve arches, body begging, and Tony drags his gaze back up to Steve’s face. He turns slightly and picks up a paper sack Steve hadn’t noticed, long and thin, like the kind you got French bread in; he pulls a riding crop out of it. Steve doesn’t even have to study it to see that it’s not the one from the kink room. This one is a lighter color, and is thicker than that one. “Hands,” Tony says, and Steve reaches for it with both hands. Tony lets him take it, catching Steve behind both knees and dragging him down the bed. “Up,” Tony say, and Steve raises his hands over his head.

He can hear himself breathing heavily, but there’s something like relief at having the crop in his hands, in knowing what it means, in having direction, and Tony looks like he knows it, his face going a little soft.

“I’m going to use that on you, so don’t get used to it,” Tony warns, but it’s gentle. “We’ll just get you a little settled down, first.” He grabs the bottom of his t-shirt and pulls it off over his head. The arc reactor throws his face into sharp shadow.

Steve’s cock throbs at the promise and it feels like relief, but he wants something, if Tony is going to hit him, he wants something to hold or something to hold him. He says, “Bondage?” and hears it for the plea that it is, and it sends heat rushing to his face.

Tony’s smile is a little smug. “I knew you’d ask. I told you I had something for you.” Steve flexes his fists around the crop, confused, and Tony just shakes his head. “No, I just bought that. This was made for you.”

Steve squirms at the idea, unsure if he feels anticipation or anxiety, and Tony turns and drops his hands to Steve’s waist, pushing them both up across his belly and chest, pausing to pull roughly at Steve’s nipples until Steve shudders and arches into his hands, feeling full and unsatisfied at the same time. Tony dips in again to kiss him, almostly sweetly this time, short and with the barest brushes of lips and tongue. Then he straightens and pulls something long and silvery out of his jeans pocket. Steve’s first thought is nipple clamps; the chain, maybe, though these chains seem more slender than the one between the clamps. Steve tries to look at it, but Tony merely pours the little cascade of silver from one hand into the other. After a couple of times, Steve puzzles out that there are more than one, but he can’t see what they are. They’re delicately wrought, decorative, not functional. Are they meant to hold him like holding the riding crop holds him? Through Tony’s instructions and Steve’s force of will? Steve will try, if Tony wants that, but he isn’t sure he’ll be able to make it work. The chain is so fine that Steve will break it if he so much as flinches; at least the crop will flex in his hands.

Tony holds them in one palm, and plucks one of them, long and silvery and oh-so-fragile-looking, free, showing it to Steve. Tony’s eyes are dark, and he looks a little wolfish, something about his smile. “There’s nothing I could attach these to that you couldn’t pull them out of,” he says. “The headboard, the wall, the frame of the bed. The only thing as strong as you is you, so this one goes around your neck, as an anchor point.” Tony leans forward, using both hands, the one still holding lengths of chain cupped so that he’s using just the thumb and forefinger. “Head up.” Steve lifts his head and lets Tony pass one end of the chain under the back of his neck. Steve can’t see the clasp, but he can feel Tony working it. Once it’s attached, he leans back and Steve lets his head rest on the pillow again. The chain around his throat is neither tight nor loose. Steve would guess it’s just tight enough so that he can’t pull it up over his head. It’s warm against his skin.

He watches, not asking, because Tony will tell him eventually, but clearly doesn’t want to do it yet. If Steve were going to guess, he’d say Tony is waiting until he gets all the chains attached.

Tony slides another length of chain out of his hand, this one longer, and leans forward so far that the arc reactor is nearly touching Steve’s chin. Steve feels him twist the chain around one wrist and clasp it, and then watches, head tipped a little back, as Tony pulls the rest of the length of it down and attaches it to the chain around his neck. The chain is pulled not quite tight for where Steve’s wrists are sitting, but he’d gotten a good enough look at the clasp to be able to see that, while it’s small, it’s bigger than the links of the chain itself, and could probably be passed through a couple of links to shorten it. Tony does the same with the other, taking his time, either ignoring or unmindful of Steve’s dripping cock and his full ass. When he feels Tony tug at the riding crop, Steve relinquishes it unhappily. The chains are so light that though he can feel them touching his skin, there is absolutely no sensation of weight. Not even as little as the barely noticeable weight of Steve’s dogtags.

Tony slides back to the edge of the bed, settling next to Steve’s hip, still with that wolfish little smile, something both wild and eager. “Go ahead,” Tony tells him, tone faintly smug. “Give it your best shot.”

“Tony,” Steve objects, because whatever else they are, they’re lovely and delicate, and Steve hates the idea of breaking beautiful things.

“Give it all you’ve got, Captain,” Tony orders, eyes half-lidded now, and Steve is long past the point of pretending that Tony giving him orders doesn’t get him off.

Steve inhales deeply and then merely flexes. He doesn’t expect them to break right away; Tony is a genius, and wouldn’t have bothered to order Steve to try if they were meant to be the ornamental version of bondage. But he does expect them to break eventually. He flexes and then he pulls and then he clenches his teeth and really tries, really puts the whole of his strength behind it, actually exerts the amount of force he’s capable of exerting, and nothing happens except that the chains bite into the skin of his wrists and neck in thin red ribbons of pain.

When he relents and goes loose, his amazement and confusion only last long enough to be overwhelmed by the heat of being held and made helpless. He’s not. The chains are long enough that he could easily undo the clasps himself. But that doesn’t matter. He won’t. Which means that he is caught, and he isn’t going anywhere, and if he were to try, he wouldn’t be able to extend his arms far enough to touch Tony, and that Tony could theoretically limit his range of motion even further.

“What is it?” he finally breathes.

“Adamantium, mostly,” Tony tells him, grinning now, though more with satisfaction than amusement. “I alloyed it with a few drops of vibranium, to keep them so light. I could have gone with pure vibranium, I have a source, but I didn’t think it would be necessary. Your strength is meta-human, but not actually superhuman. It’s more like what every human body would be capable of if it were absolutely perfect in every way.” He leans forward and runs one hand from Steve’s shoulder up to his wrist. “They’re a perfect insult,” he murmurs hotly, eyes dark and intense. “To tie you down so delicately. It’s obscene.”

Steve shivers, and it hadn’t occurred to him, but as soon as Tony says it humiliation spikes into the back of his brain. His face catches fire, and Tony laughs, a sharp sound, just threatening enough to send a wave of goosebumps rippling across his skin. Tony bends and kisses Steve again, rough this time, giving Steve no opportunity to participate, or even to cooperate. Just submit. Steve shivers again, and lets Tony plunder his mouth, tongue pressing inside, teeth dragging sharply against Steve’s lips.

When Tony draws back, he leans up and presses the riding crop into Steve’s hands again. Steve is grateful for it, just the texture and the anchor and the illusion that he isn’t already pinned in place by such cobwebs of restraint.

“Move over,” Tony directs, and Steve shifts more toward the center of the bed, the motion jarring the toy inside him enough to make him breathe unsteadily. Tony stands and strips off his jeans and underwear, and then props one knee up against the edge of the bed. He reaches around behind himself, and Steve can see his biceps flex, but has no idea what is going on. Then his hand appears again holding a toy not unlike the one still buried inside Steve, though this one is painted in the stars and stripes motif, rather than in Iron Man colors. Another time Steve might have laughed -- he feels a faint ripple of amusement, though it barely touches him -- but now he feels his eyes widen and his mouth fall a little open, his cock jerks and spits on his belly, and he can only think of what it would have looked like to watch Tony work it into himself, to hear him give it commands -- or can he not command it, the way that Steve can’t command his? God, that idea is -- to see Tony’s face as the toy lengthened and widened and pulsed and thrust inside him.

Steve’s breathing is a harsh tattoo in the otherwise silent room, and Tony is watching Steve, lips a little curved. It isn’t until Tony puts the toy down on the bedside table and crawls up onto the bed that it occurs to Steve to wonder why, and then when he does, his breath stalls altogether and he looks at Tony’s face. He has no idea of what his own face looks like, can’t even get a firm grip on how he feels about the idea, but Tony’s eyes are heavy lidded again, and he swings one leg over Steve’s hips without comment. Steve is sure Tony is teasing, that he must be teasing, can’t quite imagine otherwise, until Tony reaches between his own legs and captures Steve’s cock, sliding his hand through the mess on Steve’s stomach as he does. Then Steve sucks in a gasping, helpless breath and the riding crop is biting into his palms so hard that he’s hurting himself.

“Resume program,” Tony says, and toy jerks back into life inside him, the knot pulling at him inside, the toy thrusting and pulsing. Steve’s cock in Tony’s hand twitches in an agony of anticipatory pleasure, and Steve chokes out a sound that wants to be both an objection and an entreaty at the same time. “You’re not going to come until I tell you to, Captain,” Tony says, low and edged.

Steve does not think he can guarantee that, not at all, not in the least, and opens his mouth to warn Tony of that, but Tony squeezes the base of Steve’s cock so hard that Steve just grunts out a long sound of pain. The sharp edge of orgasm retreats, but Steve can tell it hasn’t gone far.

Tony’s wickedly heavy eyes are intent with warning, and Steve doesn’t try to argue again. He remains certain that he can’t stop it, but he still wants Tony’s direction, still wants to be where he is, under Tony’s power, so he’ll try.

“Good,” Tony says, satisfied, and then inches down until the head of Steve’s cock is pressed against the heat of Tony’s body. Steve makes a helpless sound as Tony eases himself downward a little, and Steve can feel the way Tony’s body starts to give. He is absolutely mindless with want and terror, and he is too hot all over, and the toy is still unbearably good, impossible to imagine better, impossible not to watch Tony sink down until the head of Steve’s cock is worked entirely into Tony’s body while Tony’s face eases with pleasure, some of the incisiveness banished from his eyes. Steve’s hips jerk upward without his permission and he sinks into Tony another hellish inch, Tony is so hot and so tight and is moving in a sort of clenching twist that Steve can hardly stand, and he thinks Tony will object to Steve fucking up into him, but Tony only lets go of Steve’s cock and lets his weight draw him downward.

Steve moans, his hips and thighs flex hard as he presses up and inside, his cock aching as though Tony had slapped it, his balls a knot of desperation. Tony’s head falls a little backward, his lips parted, and the long line of Tony’s throat is so perfect Steve would give anything to be able to put his mouth against it, to set his teeth into his skin, and the fierce ache of that want is just another in a list a thousand miles long, want so strong that it feels like his skin can barely contain it. He is panting and dizzy, he wants more of Tony’s ass, he wants to be all the way inside, the toy is ramming itself against Steve’s prostate and Steve is nearly blind with pleasure.

“Look at you, so needy,” Tony murmurs hotly. “Next time I’ll bring the gag as well, fill you up while you fill me up. Your cock is gorgeous, you feel as wide as a fucking baseball bat, you’re so good, Captain,” and Steve is so flushed with need it’s probably redundant to flush with pleasure, but his hips jerk upward so hard that it actually hurts his cock a little, like rugburn, and he whines at the pressure of Tony’s ass, as hot as blood and so tight Steve thinks he can feel Tony’s pulse racing. Tony growls a little when he settles, finally, flush with Steve’s body, Steve’s cock inside so deep, as deep as it can go, and Steve wants to come so badly it’s like being burned alive.

“Tony, Tony,” Steve begs, hips still rocking, but mostly stilled by the weight of Tony’s body, and Steve has the leverage to do more, his feet are flat on the bed and he could certainly force Tony’s body into motion, but he doesn’t, can’t make himself take that much control away from Tony without permission, wants to fuck Tony, wants Tony to tell him what to do more.

“Good, you’re so good,” Tony groans, and catches both of Steve’s nipples and twists brutally. Steve’s body arches hard at the pain, the toy’s girth abruptly widens, Steve can hear the creak of leather as his hands struggle with the crop, and he cries out aloud, not quite a scream, but not that far from one either. “Yeah,” Tony says. “Take it,” and twists again, his face hot and hard. Steve... loses himself for a few seconds, his body shudders into a brief struggle, and Tony lets out a hot, tight sound of pleasure. A moment later he’s rising up, dragging hotly along Steve’s cock. Steve cries out again, and then Tony rocks back onto his cock, his hands still braced on Steve’s chest, the angle different enough that Tony lets out a cry not that different from Steve’s, and Steve just, he forgets, he can’t not shift the angle of his hips and pull out as far as he can and then plunge back inside. He is enthralled by the stretch of Tony’s ass around him, wishes he could see, can’t stop himself from taking, and Tony just braces himself and moves upward against Steve’s body perhaps two inches, but enough, enough, for Steve to ram his cock up into Tony, to pull back and do it again, all of his nerve endings blazing, shouting when Tony dips his head and bites down on one of his nipples, shouting and shoving his cock into Tony. “Like that, yeah, just like that,” Tony breathes. “You’re perfect, your cock is fucking perfect.”

It drives Steve into a frenzy, permission to have, and he shudders and feels his whole body tighten and he thrusts again and he is dizzy with pleasure, needs to come, and he won’t, he wants this and he wants it again and he cannot disobey Tony or he might never, so he rocks up and inside and clenches his eyes shut so he can’t see the way Tony’s face is twisted with pleasure or the way that Tony’s cock juts between their bodies, dark red and bouncing, wishes he couldn’t feel it brushing against his stomach, wishes he couldn’t hear Tony’s rasping, panting breaths, and knows he’s lying to himself, that he wants to see and feel and hear all of it, but he can’t right now, he can’t have it and fuck Tony and stop himself from coming all at the same time.

He hears himself repeating, “Tony, please, Tony, please, God, Tony, please,” and can’t stop himself any more than he can stop himself from forcing his cock into the furnace of Tony’s body, begging because he needs so badly and he wants to be good, he wants Tony to let him be good, but he isn’t going to make it much longer, he’s never been inside like this, it’s better than he ever could have imagined.

“Just a little...” Tony whispers breathlessly. “You can take it.” Tony’s breath is ragged and hard, and just hearing it like that is enough to make Steve sure that the can’t take it, but Tony says, “Just do this for me, Captain, do this for me, take it for me,” and Steve miserably reins himself back, his whole body trembling as he fucks Tony, is fucked by Tony’s toy, struggles to do it because Tony wants, Tony wants, and Steve so desperately wants to be the things Tony wants, and he isn’t sure how long it is, the tangle of thwarted desire in the pit of his belly is a vicious roil of sensation, when Tony says, “Now, come now, Captain!” Steve feels Tony’s come splash across his belly and Tony’s ass clench shudderingly around Steve’s cock, and the toy pulses, the knot bulging as it makes Steve wet and slick and hot inside, and Steve is so relieved that he just plunges headlong over the edge of his orgasm, uncaring of what his body does while he finally comes, indifferent to whatever sounds he’s making, unable to think of anything but the alleviation of the deep grind in his groin as he shoots and shoots and shoots into Tony’s ass.

After some span of time that goes unmeasured by Steve, Tony eases himself off of Steve’s cock. Steve is still hard, and isn’t surprised by it. It feels like the edge of his desire has barely been sated. Tony shifts over to the side and flops down, still breathing a little heavily. He leaves one hand resting on Steve’s belly, apparently not caring that it’s slick with both Steve’s precome and Tony’s come. Steve is grateful for the heavy sensation of it, though, the weight seeming to connect him to his body a little more firmly. The toy is still inside him, but it’s motionless again. It hasn’t actually shifted down in size, like it had with the all stop command. It’s still stretching Steve open; Steve can still feel the knot just inside his hole. His cock shifts a little against his belly.

Tony leans up onto his elbow and looks down at Steve. “Next time,” he says, “you can be on top. Or behind. Whichever one sounds like the most fun to you.” He grins. “That was fucking excellent. You were amazing.” Steve feels himself flushing, and is humiliated at how pleased and proud he is, but he leans up toward Tony when Tony bends to kiss him, something in between commanding and cooperative this time, where Tony is clearly in control, but Steve is welcome to participate. Tony pauses in kissing him, but doesn’t pull back. “I knew your cock was going to be a great ride, Captain,” he murmurs against Steve lips. “But you being a great ride was more than I’d hoped for this early in the game.” His voice is as warm as hot chocolate.

“I don’t understand,” Steve confesses, and he doesn’t, but that doesn’t stop him from feeling proud and happy to hear Tony say it.

“A lot of subs won’t take the initiative to fuck like that when they’re offered it.” Tony pulls back a little so he can look at Steve. “Training, partly. A lot of dominants don’t want to be fucked, or if they do, they want to be in complete control of it.”

“You were in complete control of it,” Steve says.

Tony smiles. “I was in complete control of you,” he corrects. “But the pace and the force of the actual act I left up to you. If you hadn’t taken them up, I’d have ridden you, done all the work, watched you come apart, and that would have been good. I’ll do that for you, if you want to try it. But as a rule, if I’m taking it in the ass, I usually want you a little more active. I don’t want a mannequin fucking me.”

Steve thinks about that for a long moment. “But when you. I mean, if it’s me taking it, you like me to be still.”

“That’s better for you,” Tony says, sounding absolutely certain of it. “It means you don’t have to do anything but feel what’s being done to you. It’s also good for me because sometimes I do want to be in complete control. Just not usually when I’m being fucked. We’ll try it that way; I think you might like it.”

“But if you don’t...” Steve says.

“I said I usually want active participation. But not always. The idea of perpetrating some really intricate full body rope bondage on you and then just riding you until you stop being able to get it up again is definitely something I’ll enjoy doing in the future, and you definitely won’t be participating the same way. But you’ll love that degree of bondage.” He smiles softly. “That degree of bondage will put you over the moon.”

Steve can’t really picture it, but he believes Tony.

“At any rate, the point is, I gave you the opportunity, but I wasn’t sure you’d want to or would know how to take it. You did take it, and you did it more beautifully than I imagined that you could, considering your lack of experience and considering how sweet you are as a submissive. Most subs as sweet as you are just don’t have it in them to pound their dominant like you did. I’m glad.” He pauses, then adds, “I like to be fucked. I wouldn’t stop sleeping with you if you couldn’t do what you did, but I like it enough that I’d miss it. So. Lucky me.”

Steve is flushed warmly with pleasure, and is feeling pretty lucky himself. He can’t quite stop himself from asking, “It was good? There’s not something else or something different I should do?”

“Captain, it’s been years since I came hands free. You were perfect.” It’s so sincere that Steve feels a lump form in his throat.

“Thank you,” he whispers.

“You’re welcome,” Tony says. “How do you feel?”

Steve smiles. “I feel good.” He stretches, feels the toy in his ass, feels the flex of the crop in his hands, feels the whisper of the chains against his skin.

“I know you have things to do in the morning,” Tony says. “I don’t want to start anything that is going to take too long to finish if it’s going to mess with your sleep schedule.”

“I sleep three or four hours a night on average,” Steve says. “There’s plenty of time.”

Tony gives him a slow smile. “I was hoping you’d say something like that.” He moves his hand from Steve’s belly and wipes it absently on the sheet. Then he reaches for the riding crop; Steve lets it go reluctantly, not because he objects to what Tony is going to do with it, but because the feel of it in his hands lets him forget about the almost weightless chains around his wrists and throat. Tony is right: they feel like an insult, an ember of humiliation at the back of his mind waiting to flare up the moment Steve actually finds himself caught up in them. Tony merely sets the crop aside for the moment. He asks, “I’m assuming I can find something to clean us up with in your bathroom?”

Steve nods, not sure he trusts his voice. The nod is enough to make him even more aware of the chain around his neck; he feels his face heat.

Tony quirks an oddly soft smile at him, then eels over Steve and off the side of the bed. Steve hears him moving through the apartment, but just barely, probably only because of his enhanced senses. Water runs in the bathroom, followed by half a minute of silence, and then water running again. Tony returns with a damp cloth that smells of soap, and wipes down Steve’s belly and cock, then uses another damp cloth to wipe away most of the soap smell. He looks around Steve’s bedroom for a moment, thoughtful, and then merely sets both cloths on the bedside table next to the toy he’d brought with him.

“Need anything?” he asks, head a little cocked. Steve shakes his head and Tony nods. “All right, then. Turn over onto your hands and knees.”

Steve rolls over and gets up to his knees. The chains attached to his wrists are long enough to let him keep his arms straight, but only barely. Steve doesn’t think it’s accidental. He wonders if Tony took measurements at some point, or if he’s just clever enough to have an exceptional eye for detail. It could be either.

“Turn to face the foot of the bed,” Tony directs. “And come a little closer to this side.”

Steve reverses direction -- because, he guesses, Tony wants the space to swing, unimpeded by the bedside table -- and inches over toward the edge. Tony’s hands steady him and guide him a little, positioning him how he wants Steve. Steve is flushed, but he’s also a little giddy. In spite of his spectacular orgasm, he’s taut and shivering lightly. He realizes with something a little like panic that he can’t actually tell whether he likes to fuck Tony more than he likes Tony hitting him. It seems like it should be a simple choice, but it’s one he doesn’t know how to make. At least not yet. He’s only done each of them once, after all. Maybe at some point he’ll be better able to tell.

He shifts a little, the toy inside him still a wide stretch, and it feels different at this angle, more unforgiving. Tony’s hands shift him back, and Steve tries to settle into the position, tries to relax, but is too caught up in anticipation with a healthy dose of fear. He remembers the fear from the first time; he had just assumed that it was because it was the first time. That once he knew, once he wanted it, that there wouldn’t be fear.

Tony leans behind Steve and picks up the crop, one hand stroking firmly from the back of Steve’s neck down to the curve of his ass. It feels good at the same time as it feels like a warning. Steve tries and fails to keep his breathing steady. Tony murmurs, “Shh. You love it, remember?” He sounds a little amused.

Steve nods, but his breathing doesn’t even out.

“You remember your safeword?” Tony asks.

Steve nods again.

“Stay up,” Tony orders firmly. “I don’t care how hard it is or how good it is, Captain. Stay up. If you end up on your belly, you’ll regret it.”

Steve nods one more time, though he can’t help but wonder what would happen, what Tony might do to make him regret it.

“And, Captain. You can come anytime you need to while I’m hurting you. You don’t have to wait or ask or warn me. If I’m hitting you, and that’s enough to make you come, you have blanket permission.” Tony takes a step back and runs the tip of the riding crop along the line of Steve’s spine. “Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Steve says breathily, embarrassed at how his voice sounds, helpless and relieved, but too grateful for such a lavish expanse of freedom for it to really slice at him.

“Excellent,” Tony says, and runs a hand along Steve’s back for at least a minute, covering every inch of skin, pausing to trace his shoulder blades and to press at his tailbone, moving downward across his ass and thighs. He strokes two fingers along the underside of Steve’s balls, and Steve shudders in response. Then Tony moves on to the toy, shifting it a little as though making sure it’s firmly seated. Steve holds himself carefully still in spite of the way the knot of the toy stretches him until it makes Steve want to snarl and shove back. Then Tony is moving up his back again, this time pressing gently at his shoulders, shifting Steve a few fractions, barely at all. It doesn’t unbalance Steve, so he cooperates as well as he can. He’s not sure of the purpose behind any of it, but it’s nothing if not soothing to have Tony’s hands on him, so he’s not about to object. “Not a mark on you,” Tony breathes. “Anyplace sore at all?”

“No,” Steve says truthfully. “It all healed up overnight.”

“We’ll warm you up this time,” Tony says, drawing his hand away from Steve. Steve doesn’t ask what that means. It sounds like a good thing, and besides, he likes not knowing exactly what’s going to happen.

Tony backs away slightly, and Steve glances up in time to see that the mirror attached to his dresser gives him a perfect view of both himself and Tony. He doubts this is an accident. Steve can see the glitter of the chains around his neck and snaking down his arms, and he can see Tony watching him look. Tony doesn’t object when Steve avoids his own reflection and concentrates on Tony.

Instead, he just draws back his arm and slaps the riding crop against Steve’s back, striking just beneath Steve’s shoulder blades. Steve huffs out a breath, but the blow hadn’t been that hard. Not like before. Steve thinks about mentioning it, but Tony is already pulling back to strike again, the blow landing just below the first, a warm press of pain that unravels the tangle of fear in Steve’s belly, letting the anticipation bubble up in its place. Tony brings the crop down again, but softly, almost gently; enough to hurt, but not to shake Steve into a hot spiral. Steve wants to arch up into it, make the blows fall harder, but Tony had taken such pains to position him that he resists.

It goes more quickly then, careful blow after careful blow, easy to take, the pain just enough to heat him, not really hurt him. Steve is enthralled watching Tony in the mirror, his face intense with concentration, the rise and fall of his arm, the shift of Tony’s stance and muscles when he reaches Steve’s ass, which hurts a little more than it had across his back. Then Tony shifts again, and is slapping Steve with a kind of side-armed swing and striking the backs of his thighs, which hurts much more than the rest of the blows, Steve’s thighs apparently more sensitive or something. He can tell the blows aren’t actually any harder; Tony’s swings are exactly the same, but he seems to feel it more, each line like a brand being drawn across his skin.

Steve is breathing heavily when Tony lowers the crop, but he doesn’t feel the same kind of rush, the overwhelmed feeling from the first time.

He isn’t sure if that’s something he should tell Tony, or if it’s supposed to be like this. Tony runs a warm hand from the base of Steve’s neck down the line of his spine. Steve shivers a little, the heat of Tony’s skin prickling against the heat of Steve’s back, and the caress is light, barely there, but it’s enough that Steve abruptly understands what Tony had meant by warming him up. Steve doesn’t really hurt, or not that much anyway, but Tony’s hand on his skin sends flashing pain messages to Steve’s cock.

Steve is sensitive now. His skin is awake and prepared, and when Tony hits him again...

Steve breathes out heavily, a little spike of fear in his belly, but it’s not enough to dispel any of the heavy swirl of anticipation. Tony strokes down Steve’s back with the tip of the riding crop this time. Steve recognizes it as a warning and shudders.

“This is going to be different than last night,” Tony says, low and serious. “It’s going to be much better, and much worse.” Steve can’t imagine that even being possible, but Tony sounds so sure.

This time the crack of the crop against his back is a hot stripe of pain, harder than last night, but also broader, like the rest of Steve’s already heated skin carries the pain outward like ripples on the surface of a pond. Tony doesn’t pause, just strikes again and again, and Steve chokes on a cry as the skin of his back seems to pull the pain into him, spreading it out under skin and muscle, every inch of it searing and alive. He rocks a little with each blow. He can’t stop it. It’s not a physical response, exactly, it’s just the force of them moving Steve’s body, like being pushed on a swing. His cock jerks and the toy in his ass shifts with the motion so that Steve is ultra aware of the way his hole is stretched around it, and the combination makes Steve sweaty and dazed, and Tony can’t have hit him more than four or five times.

In the mirror, Tony’s arm is almost a blur and his face is dark and sharp with focus. Tony turns a little and the crop scores across Steve’s ass like molten metal; Steve gasps soundlessly, his hips twisting a little, the toy is pressing him open and filling him up, and Tony does it again and again, and Steve whines at the way it feels. He can almost feel the blood rushing to the surface of his skin, feel the welts rising, and his back is tight with pain and his ass feels bruised, and he is awash with it all in a way that makes Steve feel wanton and hungry. His silent gasps have slipped into brief, harsh little cries that Steve barely notices until Tony takes another small step backward and goes to work on the backs of Steve’s thighs.

Steve bites out a harsh sound, the pain more, just new and jagged, so bright and heavy that Steve’s back and ass feel almost painless in comparison. It only takes a few blows -- Steve hasn’t been keeping track -- before the ache in his cock surges furiously, and he comes, shouting, and Tony doesn’t stop all the way through it, doesn’t even pause, which just grinds into Steve’s groin and makes him want more, for that juxtaposition, for the way it feels to be balanced between the perfect implosion of his orgasm and the spikes of torment, and he’s no longer confused by the tears on his face, just wants more, again, enough to break him apart.

Tony meets his gaze in the mirror for a moment -- Steve can hardly see his own face, the tears make it all a blur -- but Tony must know, he must understand, because he shifts forward and brings the crop down at an angle, crossing several hot welts across Steve’s back. Steve whines, and Tony does it again, and Steve distantly recalls that Tony had wanted a pattern, but he’s too caught up, half-stunned and reeling while Tony strikes again and again so that Steve has to lock his elbows to keep himself from crashing face first into the bed. Steve’s whines are high and needy now; his cock has recovered again, is heavy with want, and Tony slashes at Steve’s back relentlessly, all the blows criss-crossing others, and Steve wants to see like he had last night, because of Tony’s pattern, and because Tony had been right, this is so much better, this is merciless and gorgeous and Steve feels every blow to the tips of his fingers, feels each one lighting up his mind, no stopping and no questions, just the blaze of the pain and the way it consumes him.

Tony shifts down to Steve’s ass, and Steve yells and clenches around the toy, but Tony doesn’t even pause; he strikes Steve’s ass one cheek at a time, crossing all of what’s already there, making Steve groan with pain and need and the deep burn in the back of his brain that flashes him images of what it will look like, images that white out his vision and silence his cries for seconds at a time. Steve’s balls are as hurtfully knotted as though they had been targets as well, and the angle of Tony’s blows creeping down the back of Steve’s left thigh are making Steve pull at the chains for the first time, not to get away, he doesn’t want to get away, but to remind him that the rest of him is still here, that he isn’t lost in the pain without a way back.

The low, groaning whine he can hear has to be coming from him, he can feel it in his chest, he can feel it...

Steve’s disordered brain stutters for a few seconds with an idea he can’t quite put his hands on -- Tony has moved onto Steve’s right thigh, and Steve is trembling at each blow, it’s so good -- but the idea doesn’t drift away, just seems to twine somewhere just beyond where Steve can see it clearly and slowly blossoms out into visibility, broken little fragments of imagery flickering into consciousness, and every nerve in Steve’s body twists so fiercely that he can’t breathe, and he doesn’t want to interrupt Tony, and Steve is well on his way into the desperate throes of another orgasm, but he wants, wants so much, and he can’t help it.

“Tony, please,” he rasps. “Wait, I want,” and Tony slashes the crop across the backs of both of Steve’s thighs twice more, sending a shudder rushing up Steve’s spine, but then he does wait, though he fists a hand in Steve’s hair viciously and drags his head back; the chain bites into Steve’s neck, a thin line of pain that Steve does nothing to avoid.

“What?” Tony demands, but there isn’t any anger; it’s all lust and impatience and the way that Tony looks so fierce when he hurts Steve.

“Is it, can you...?” Steve tries and Tony yanks on his hair hard enough that Steve moans softly.

“A little more coherence, Captain,” he snarls.

Steve swallows hard and gathers words together carefully. “My front,” he begs. “Can you do the front? Is it, I mean, can it?”

Tony’s smile is so sudden and sharp -- and, yes, definitely a little cruel -- that Steve can’t even shudder, is pinned in place. “You’re just too sweet to know better,” he says, hand still twisting in Steve’s hair. “It will be my great pleasure to show you, Captain.” His voice is a steely, heated sneer, and Steve feels a sharp tug of terror, but it can’t get to him through the layers of pain and pleasure. “Go on, roll over.”

Steve shifts over carefully; his back and ass dragging across the sheets feels like dragging fresh road rash along asphalt. Steve settles carefully, he is sore, he is so sore he is light-headed and the pit of his belly is tight with satisfaction, despite his erection. He feels so good, Tony looks amazing, naked and flushed all over, his face a dark beacon of desire. Steve isn’t sure what to do with his hands, but Tony merely tips them backward so they dangle a little off the edge of the bed, caught up by the chains, but not in a hurtful way. If anything, they are a relief, a reminder. Steve can feel the warm wet spot on the bed beneath him, and he’s already dripping precome onto his belly. He’s needful and overheated and if he wasn’t so sure...

He knows it’s going to hurt more. He wants to know how much more.

“Keep your chin up, Captain,” Tony says roughly. “If you look down to try to see what I’m doing and get clipped in the face, I am not responsible.”

Steve tilts his chin up obediently, but it’s not like the doesn’t have anything to look at. Tony is right there, flushed and panting softly. His cock is hard again, thick and dark red and making Steve’s mouth water. Seeing it always does. Tony’s skin is sheened with sweat, and he’s whirling the riding crop between his fingers with no apparent effort as he surveys the skin of Steve’s chest and belly. He looks at Steve for a moment, something that’s almost a question in his face, and then smirks a little and lifts the crop.

It snaps across both of Steve’s nipples at once, so quick it’s like being stung by a hundred angry bees. Steve shouts and arches, his back still a red canvas of pain, and Tony makes a guttural sound of satisfaction, all in an instant, and then the crop falls again, his chest a line of pain but his nipples two sharp tips of agony amidst it. Steve can feel tears escaping into his hairline, but the pain is what Steve had known it would be, it’s perfect and unbearable against his vulnerable skin, and the whole back of his body tenses enough to wash bright waves of pain through him, so that Steve is surrounded by the pain, enfolded in it. Tony goes lower, and Steve can tell he isn’t hitting as hard, but it feels as hard, it feels harder, even, feels like his skin might split under the force, which makes Steve’s head swim with something so twisted and knotted that he can’t really tell what it is. Each blow feels like it’s setting him on fire until he’s light-headed and writhing slightly, just enough to drag at his back, just enough to be aware of everything at once.

Tony slashes the crop down across his belly, and Steve feels the breeze of it puff against his cock. His eyes roll back and he fights for breath at the idea of, wondering if, would Tony? Steve puts all his energy into not moving, which is good, because Tony lays another blow right atop that one, and Steve’s cock is jerking, pulsing need a terrible throb in his groin, and he has to know, he needs to know, and he’s whispering, “Hit my cock, hit my cock,” and Tony is looking at him with narrowed eyes so dark they look black, and then he’s flicking the tip of the crop across his cock, once and then twice, the sound a soft slap, hardly any force, but they feel, they are piercingly, amazingly, violently painful.

Steve doesn’t have the breath to cry out. He just arches and shoots across his belly and chest, aware that Tony is smacking his nipples with the crop again, but it’s just another ember in the coals, just another bit of kindling added to the fire of the pain, feels good that Tony hasn’t stopped, feels perfect that his body is still writhing against it even as his climax tears through him with the same kind of violence that had come with the blows across his cock, something unstoppable and inexorable, so good and so hot and so sweet and Steve finally gets enough breath to moan, long and low, a helpless sound, soft and full of pleading.

Tony doesn’t stop until the final shudders of Steve’s orgasm abate. Then he tosses the riding crop aside, and he’s on Steve, heavy and slippery with the sweat between the two of them, the salt stinging Steve’s abused nipples maddeningly. Tony is kissing him before he has enough time to get his breath back, his body dragging against the welts on Steve’s chest and belly. Steve opens to Tony and lets it happen, so blissed out and stunned with pleasure that he hardly registers it when Tony bites at his throat and then his collar bone.

Tony’s hot mouth closing around one of Steve’s nipples wrenches a cry out of him, though Tony merely tongues it, no teeth, but Steve is so sore there that it feels like Tony’s mouth is lined with needles. Tony switches to the other nipple and Steve chokes out another cry. Tony groans, and Steve becomes aware of the hard press of Tony’s cock against his thigh. Tony’s hands are all over Steve’s chest and belly, and Steve revels in it even as it catches his breath into little hitches that don’t provide enough air.

He hears himself gasping out, “Please, please, please!” and has no idea what he’s asking for.

“Come now,” Tony says, a command Steve can’t possibly comply with -- he is hardening again, but he isn’t all the way there yet -- but apparently Tony hadn’t been talking to Steve at all.

The toy inside Steve pulses -- Steve lets out a high, surprised sound -- and the knot holding it inside swells enough to leave Steve gasping, open-mouthed and nearly silent, while it pulses again and then floods him with slick heat. Steve can only half-see the why on Tony’s face, the greed, he knows but he doesn’t understand, and Tony says, “All stop,” and the toy reverts back to its normal size and slips out of Steve. Tony reaches down and retrieves it, just setting it away, and Steve can feel how wet he is between the cheeks of his ass and humiliation ignites in his brain, hot enough to compete with the taut heat of every inch of skin Tony had hit, including his cock. Steve thinks the two things should cancel each other out, but they slot together instead, like they’ve always belonged that way, leaving him twisting between, his cock hard again and still thrumming with pain, and he can feel himself shaking under Tony’s hands.

“You’re perfect,” Tony breathes huskily. “You’re the most beautiful thing that’s ever happened to me.”

Steve’s whole body clenches at that, and he cooperates almost mindlessly as Tony slides down between his thighs and pushes a pillow up under his ass, which shoots arcs of pain across the skin of his buttocks, but also into the muscles, the heavy pressure of bruises under the skin.

“Legs up, Captain,” Tony says, and Steve obeys the guidance of Tony’s hands until his knees are spread wide and pressed up almost to his chest. Tony positions his cock, Steve can feel the heat and the way it slips against Steve’s hole, but Tony is looking at Steve’s face. Steve doesn’t know what Tony sees, but it’s enough to make him close his eyes for a long moment. Then he is pressing inside, stretching Steve, but there is so much slick between them that there’s almost no burn. Tony slides into Steve in one long, rough stroke, the look on his face so open with pleasure and triumph that Steve can’t look away.

“That’s it,” Tony says once he opens his eyes, his hips barely rocking. “This is how your ass should be for me, Captain, open and waiting for my cock, ready to be used.” His face is dark and hungry. “You were made for it,” he murmurs tautly. “It’s what you want all the time.” He pulls back, slow and wet, and then plunges back inside so fiercely that Steve can feel the friction even through all the lube from the toy.

Steve’s eyes roll back a little, Tony’s words tightening around the base of his cock, because Tony inside him is so much better than the toy, and Tony isn’t wrong. Steve wants it all the time, would be happy with Tony’s cock buried inside him forever, and if he knew how to do it, he would be what Tony wants, loose and ready all the time, covered in welts and hard and waiting, and Steve would do it, would do anything.

“You want it,” Tony repeats and thrusts harshly again. “You want to be that for me.”

“Want to be what you want,” Steve gasps, an admission, unselfconscious and aching.

“You are,” Tony says with another sharp snap of his hips. Steve’s back is jerked up a few inches across the sheets, and he hisses. Tony leans forward to kiss Steve’s mouth and his neck, just below his ear. “I told you, you’re perfect,” he breathes.

“But not,” Steve says, and struggles for words that won’t come together as he wants them to, and only manages, “Not ready the way you want.”

Tony laughs and eases almost all the way out, the wide head of his cock pulling at the rim of Steve’s hole, and slams back in with enough force to make Steve’s abused skin sing with pain and heat. “You are right now,” Tony points out, and slams into Steve again. “I can make you this way anytime I want, Captain. You’re never going to tell me no.” He shoves into Steve again; this time Steve whines at the pain and effort and pleasure. “Gorgeous,” Tony says. “Your face while you take my cock.”

“Please,” Steve whispers.

“You’re going to let me stretch you out and make you wet anytime I want to,” Tony says, a demand.

“Yes,” Steve agrees without the slightest hesitation.

“You love it when I use your ass. Tell me you know that’s what your pretty ass is meant for,” Tony orders fiercely.

“Your cock,” Steve whines. “For you to use, Tony.”

There is a flash of something on Tony’s face, but it passes too quickly for Steve to identify.

“Tell me you want me to use you like that right now,” Tony growls. “Tell me you don’t care how much it’s going to hurt you. Tell me you want me to take what I want.”

“It doesn’t matter, it’s only better if it hurts, just makes it more, makes me more used. You can take whatever you want, however you want it. I want you to have it.” Steve can feel his cheeks burning, but he doesn’t care. Tony is looking at him as though he’s trying to swallow Steve with his eyes, and Steve’s whole body is alight with the things Tony has already done to him, and Steve wants more, loves the way it feel to be possessed like this. He thinks he’ll always want more, and the way Tony is looking at him now is the way he wants Tony to always look at him. Like he’s unbelievable. Like Tony never wants to look at anything but Steve ever again.

“Hold onto the bedframe,” Tony warms. Steve just has time to shake the chains out enough to obey when Tony drags his cock out and rams it back inside, one hand twisting sharply at Steve’s hopelessly sensitive nipple. Steve cries out, and Tony doesn’t even pause, just pulls out and shoves in again, jarring Steve’s whole body, his back such a bright flare of heat that it nearly eclipses the rougher, harder pain of Tony’s cock plunging into him. Steve’s throat lets loose little cries that he can’t control, and he has no idea if they’re pain cries or pleasure cries. Tony’s cock is so good, not like the toy, hot and thick and greedy. Tony’s face is frantic with pleasure, and Steve can’t look away from it, flushed, sweat beading at his temples, his eyes half-lidded and hungry and fixed on Steve while he pounds into him with enough force to make Steve’s eyes tear up again, and Steve feels trapped with Tony’s arms bunching and flexing, one braced to take his weight, the other ferociously dragging at Steve’s nipples, exacerbating their soreness, but also jerking Steve into little fits of motion that sear his wounded back.

Steve is aware of it all, the way his knees are clamped around Tony’s ribs, the way Tony’s balls are slapping against his ass, the way that Tony’s biceps are thick with exertion; he’s aware of the pain, all of it, his back and ass and thighs, his chest and nipples and belly, the ponderous ache of his own cock, the stretch and burn of his hole, forced wide by Tony’s cock, the friction enormous, even with the lube, even after having been prepped by the toy, and he feels his body shuddering into it, he doesn’t even want to fight any of it, it’s all so immediate and overwhelming, he’s completely open, and completely helpless, and completely content. None of it requires him to do anything, he is being taken and had, and it’s a blur at the edges of his vision, the only thing really clear is Tony, the only thing he cares about seeing is Tony. Tony is gorgeous and perfect and undeniably all things erotic as he bites at his lip, his brows furrowed with effort, as he watches Steve intensely, possessively.

Steve can hear himself, deep groans and more whispery moans, and then a low, helpless whine when Tony shifts and drags his cock along Steve’s prostate, can feel it all and knows it and it’s still soft, somehow, everything but Tony’s face is a distant crackle that he can clearly feel, but cannot affect.

“I intended this to last longer,” Tony says, almost a whisper, his face twisted into a grimace of lust and pleasure. Steve has no idea how long it has lasted, and doesn’t care. “I always do, with you, but you’re...” Tony takes a deep breath, ragged and harsh, his eyes fluttering closed. Steve can feel the way that Tony’s thrusts are still brutal, but are breaking away from his rhythm, and Tony growls, “God, you take it like a pro, I’d fucking pay for your ass in a heartbeat, Captain. Thank God no one knows how much you need it; someone would put out a hit on me and sell you into sexual slavery.” His hips buck fiercely, and Steve chokes out a little cry, half-pleasure and half a silvery, shocked kind of humiliation. “Bet you’d love it,” Tony grinds out. “Wouldn’t be able to help yourself. All that cock.” Steve shivers and pants, and Tony opens his eyes, his glare fierce and possessive. “Keeping you,” he snarls, and his hips snap one last time, and then he’s groaning, head rocked back and mouth open, face luminous in the glow of the arc reactor, a perfect image of ecstasy, and Steve can’t do anything but watch, enraptured, too compelled at seeing Tony’s pleasure face to face to care about his own, his eyes drinking Tony in, the lines of his jaw, his bitten lips, the way he looks almost surprised. Steve adores everything about it, wants it to last, wants Tony to keep him and to keep Tony in return, and he hasn’t been fooling himself about the way he feels about Tony, but seeing him like this is like a blow, it leaves Steve reeling and shaken.

Tony drops down to his elbows, panting, and Steve’s disobedient hands lift up and cradle Tony’s face, the silver chains weightless at his wrists, but somehow steadying, calming. Tony surprises Steve by leaning into his hands, his eyes still dark and smoldering, but his lips tipping into a smile. Steve pushes his hands into Tony’s hair, and Tony leans down and kisses him, wholly mutual in a way that makes Steve feel like he finally knows what he’s doing, and Tony’s mouth is luxuriously soft and wet, not even a hint of teeth. He’s breathing as hard as Steve when he finally breaks away, though he doesn’t pull back or pull out. He looks at Steve with the quiet, intense focus that had drawn Steve toward him from that very first day.

“I drive people away,” is what he finally says. “They think they can deal with me, but in the end, I’m too me to deal with.” Tony’s voice is raw.

Steve considers it, both what Tony said and what Tony probably means. “No,” he says. “You’re keeping me.”

Tony doesn’t smile. “You haven’t seen me at my worst. Not even close to my worst.” He pauses. “Fantastic sex doesn’t make me a better person.”

“I didn’t ask you to be a better person.” Steve curls his fingers in Tony’s hair lightly, and Tony tips back into the caress a little.

“You can’t always be this even-keeled,” Tony murmurs.

“I brood,” Steve says honestly. “I don’t lose it often, but when I do, I have a vile temper. The future makes me furious sometimes. I don’t trust anyone.”

“But you’re trusting me,” Tony says, as if he genuinely doesn’t know what to think about that.

Steve thinks of all those four star generals trying to engineer a way to entrap Tony. “You’re an exception,” he says. “I don’t even really trust Fury, though I think SHIELD is probably a better fit for me now than the Army. But SHIELD isn’t the end game. I’m going to do everything in my power to make sure I can trust the Avengers.”

Tony looks thoughtful for a moment, then backtracks. “This is me on my best behavior. It won’t last. The more time you spend with me, the less time you’ll want to spend with me.”

“No,” Steve says firmly, a little sad, because he can tell Tony believes it, but Steve is up for a fight. He always had been, even before he’d been Captain America.

“What do you mean, ‘no?’” Tony demands, frustration skirting the edges of his voice. “I’m telling you how it works. I know it works like this because I’ve been there several times.” Tony tries to pull back, but Steve firms his grip on Tony’s hair. “If I couldn’t make it work with Pepper, who intimately knew every flaw and character defect I have, then I can’t make it work with anyone.” His face is strained.

“Maybe you need someone who doesn’t know every flaw and character defect,” Steve says. “It doesn’t matter. You’re keeping me. No take backs.”

Tony blinks down at him.

Steve looks back, letting himself be as open and easy as he is. He’s sad that Tony thinks he ought to give Steve this out every time, but Steve has no plans to actually take it, and he thinks... well, he thinks if Tony was going to stop this, he would have already done it by now.

“It’s bad form for you to try to do this now, anyway,” Steve says. “You can try to scare me away again tomorrow, if you feel like you really have to.”

Tony winces a little. “I thought you might believe me now.”

“Believe that you behave badly by confronting me by behaving badly so that you can protect me from you behaving badly?” Steve asks, smiling a little.

Tony winces again. “It illustrates my point?” he says, but it’s more a question than a statement.

“It really doesn’t,” Steve says. “But if it all goes horribly awry, I’ll concede that you have the right to say ‘I told you so.’” Steve flexes his hands in Tony’s hair, and Tony closes his eyes briefly.

“I’m an asshole,” Tony says, but he opens his eyes and looks at Steve, and his face is clear of that strain. He doesn’t look completely certain, but he looks gentler. “What do you need?”

“I need you to do what you want,” Steve says. “I need you to tell me what to do for as long as you still want to tell me what to do.”

“Until you don’t want me to anymore,” Tony says.

“No,” Steve says, still smiling a little.

Tony sighs and tips his head forward to rest his brow against Steve’s chest. “And here I thought you were submissive,” he mutters.

“No one is unipolar,” Steve says, and smiles at Tony’s grumble against his chest. “May I see my back?”

Tony lifts his head, his eyes sharp. “Do you need help up?” he asks, but he’s already pulling out and kneeling up, drawing Steve upward with both hands on Steve’s shoulders. Tony eases off the bed and puts a hand at the small of Steve’s back to steady him. It turns out that Steve kind of needs the help. His knees are wobbly and all his muscles feel lax and warm.

Tony huffs out a soft laugh as Steve wavers on his feet, but his hands are careful and solicitous. He kicks his own discarded clothes out of Steve’s path, and they make it to the end of the bed without mishap.

Steve can see the welts across his chest and belly, and his nipples are bright red, and he might have stopped a while to study them, but Tony leans a little backward to look at Steve’s back up close, and he exhales sharply, his hands going tight on Steve’s arm and hip. Steve watches Tony’s face slip from admiration to pleasure to desire to greed and finally settle into lines of satisfaction. Steve is pretty sure he isn’t supposed to be enjoying the possessive flashes he’s been getting from Tony, but his cock isn’t interested in Tony being a gentleman. It jerks, and Steve feels a warm runnel of precome slide down his shaft.

Tony notices, of course. His lips quirk, but he doesn’t say anything. He just moves one hand to Steve’s other hip and urges him around so that Steve’s back is reflected in the mirror.

Steve hears himself make almost the same sound that Tony had. He sees it all at once, at first, just a mess of red and white welts and the dark lines of bruises, and then his gaze shifts enough that he sees the pattern, small pale diamonds of untouched skin making it stand out clearly. It isn’t complicated, but it’s precise, and Steve would marvel at Tony’s skill, but he’s too busy trying to clamp down on the sudden need to take himself in hand and work his cock over until he comes while looking at the welts and bruises that seem to mar his skin at the same time that they decorate it.

“Gorgeous,” Tony murmurs heatedly. “Your thighs marked beautifully. I’ll do the insides, next. You won’t last half a dozen blows before you shoot.” Tony sounds fond. “Pain slut.”

The words jolt a small sound out a Steve and drive a spike of lust and shame into his brain.

“Ah,” Tony says softly.

“No,” Steve says, but he can’t look at Tony.

“You haven’t denied what you are up to this point, Captain. Why start now?” Tony reaches out and drags the fingertips of one hand across the bruised flesh of Steve’s ass.

Steve stiffens, his breath stuttering while his cock jerks heavily between his legs.

“And we should get you cleaned up before come starts dripping out of your hole,” Tony murmurs.

Steve’s face flames, but the lust and shame flares up, just as strongly, and he’s afraid to move, afraid to add the painful pull of his skin to the mixture. He’s sure he’ll come and desperately doesn’t want Tony to know how strongly his words have affected Steve. He can’t tell why it’s so... He doesn’t know what it is. He doesn’t know why he wants to abolish it.

Tony moves his hand up Steve’s back to the first long line of bruising. He presses his thumb against one end -- Steve watches in the mirror and tires to brace himself, knowing full well that he won’t be able to -- and drags it all the way across the length of it, a dull throb of pain with a higher, sharper edge as Tony’s thumbnail scores the bruise as well. Steve shudders, noiseless, and the whole room is so quiet that Tony’s soft, deliberate, “Pain slut,” seems to echo off the walls.

Steve gulps out a helpless sound, his cock jumping. Tony drags his whole hand the rest of the way down Steve’s back -- Steve shivers, his back feels like there are tiny explosives under his skin that detonate anywhere Tony touches. Tony briefly cups his ass, a warm burst of electric pain, and then uses his nails down the back of Steve’s left thigh. Steve wavers on his feet at the bright shock of it. The base of his spine is a twisted bundled of barbed nerves, and his vision is unsteady.

“Pain slut,” Tony says, and Steve’s knees go uncertain, shame and lust and need in the pit of his belly and gripped around his balls, and drilling into the back of his brain. “Yeah, you want it,” Tony murmurs.
“You want me to tell you what to do, Captain?” Steve’s throat is locked up tight. He looks at Tony in the mirror, and he’s a pale blur under a dark shock of hair.

Tears swell and escape down his face, and it clears his vision a little. He looks at the welts again, at the bruises, the pattern. “Yes,” he manages to choke out. He’s burning with humiliation and hot all over with pain, and he’s terrified and he needs Tony to tell him how to get what he needs.

“You love the pain,” Tony says, voice steely. “You love it and you need it, and you come while I hurt you, Captain. You’ll say anything to get me to hurt you. So what does that make you?”

Steve opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He can’t. The words make him want to bolt. He can’t. Then Tony is pinching one of the welts on the back of his thigh so hard that Steve shouts, and it comes out all at once, and once it gets past the blockage in his throat, it’s almost easy. “A pain slut,” he cries, and the humiliation is still there, but it’s deadly bright, and Tony’s face is so fiercely proud that Steve hears it fall out of his mouth again. “Your pain slut.”

Tony pinches the same welt again, viciously, but it doesn’t distract Steve from the look on Tony’s face, surprised greed and pleasure mixed with something gentler. “And does my pain slut want to come?” Tony breathes, his fingers sliding up to press between Steve’s ass cheeks, sliding easily through the slickness there, making Steve think he has to stop it, or he’s going to come whether he wants to or not.

“Please,” he begs. “Please, Tony.”

“And you ask for it so fucking prettily, Captain,” Tony says, low and sincere. “You do it all so prettily.”

Steve’s belly rolls with shame and pride and he’ll do anything Tony says, he’ll do everything, but he won’t leave. “Please may I come, Tony,” Steve whispers.

Tony gives him a brief, sharp look, but says, “Get on the bed on your back.” Steve jolts into inelegant motion, robbed of his grace by the pain and the need, and he pushes his hands up over his head like before, and lying down makes his back and ass buzz with pain, and Steve doesn’t care at all. Tony is right, he loves it, it’s welcome, and the words are like hooks set into his mind, painful, but he loves that, too, somehow, pain slut, how terrible and how accurate. He doesn’t know if he wants to hear it again right now, or if he never wants to hear it again.

Tony climbs onto the bed, pushing Steve’s legs down and straddling his thighs. He twists both of Steve’s nipples hard, and Steve arches and cries out. His cock jumps against his belly and dribbles precome into his navel.

“Are you a righty or a lefty?” Tony demands, and Steve is still so staggered with pain that it takes him long seconds to process the question.

“Either,” he says eventually. “Both. The serum...” He doesn’t get to finish, as Tony is already reaching up and unhooking the chain from Steve’s left wrist. Steve’s hand twitches a little, as though aware of its new freedom, but Steve has no idea what to do with it.

“I want to see you jerk off,” Tony says, and his voice is so intense that Steve doesn’t doubt him, though he can’t quite grasp why. Then he gets an instant of imagined images, of what Tony would look like touching himself, and it makes sense.

Steve reaches down to take himself in hand, fumbling a little because his gaze is locked on Tony’s face. His hand around his cock is like torture coupled with mercy. It’s so good that Steve can barely stand it, but he doesn’t move right away because he doesn’t know how Tony wants it.

“How?” he asks unsteadily, and Tony looks up from Steve’s cock and meets his gaze.

“Hard and fast, Captain,” he orders, but gently. His eyes are glittering and dark.

“I won’t last,” Steve confesses.

“I don’t care,” Tony says. “I want to watch you come apart while I’m not distracted by anything else. Take yourself apart. Let me see.”

Steve belly twists, some tumble of emotion that he can’t unmix, and he drags his hand up his cock slowly, just to get it wet. Tony’s gaze drops down to Steve’s cock again, and Steve feels the slick release of precome against the backs of his fingers at the attention.

He twists his shoulders into the bed, the rough prickle of pain making him shudder, waking up the rest of his skin.

“Pain slut,” Tony says, and the words are like a slap.

Steve twists his wrist and arches into his own hand hard enough to feel the bruises on his ass, and he was right, he’s never going to last. His hand is rough and he can feel the tenderness where Tony had smacked his cock, and he’s already come three times, he’s sore, his balls are a dense ache, and every stroke radiates pleasure up his cock and pain from the whole back side of his body. Steve had almost forgotten that Tony had used the crop on his front, too, until he is twisting and arching into his his own hand, and Tony runs a hand up his belly and chest, barely brushing Steve’s nipples, but they’re so sore that it feels like being cropped all over again. Steve writhes up against Tony’s hand, but the caress is brief. Steve wants to protest, but Tony is watching, gaze alternating between Steve’s face and his cock, and that is enough to tumble Steve faster, his hand a punishing fist, his cock hurting and oversensitive, a different kind of pain, but good, too, as good as his nipples or the friction of the sheets against his back.

The mounting pleasure in his belly doesn’t cut through the pain at all, it complements it, exists alongside it, and Steve’s hips jerk up to meet his fist and he feels Tony gaze if it had weight. Steve wants to see, but he can’t keep his eyes open; the sound coming from his throat feels low and edged, almost painful.

“You’re beautiful,” Tony says, steely again. “Your face,” he says, and touches Steve’s cheek with one hand.

Steve hardly know what happens. He leans into Tony’s hand -- he can’t help it -- and Tony’s thumb brushes at Steve’s mouth. Steve gasps, his cock abruptly carved from stone, and Tony says, “Come apart for me, Captain,” and Steve’s orgasm is thundering through him, his whole body twisting with it, Tony’s hand on his face like a lifeline as his body shakes apart, the world like a landslide, unsteady beneath him, and he struggles through it into a soft, warm rush of shattering pleasure.

When Steve recovers enough sense to open his eyes, Tony is still watching him. He still has a hand on Steve’s face. Steve can feel himself flushing, but Tony just leans in and kisses him.

Steve isn’t sure exactly how long they kiss. Long enough that Steve thinks they’re basically necking. He does not care so much. He would be content to neck with Tony until morning.

“We should get cleaned up,” Tony says when he finally pulls away. His hands are toying idly with the chain around Steve’s neck. “You’re going to be so unbelievably sticky soon.”

Steve grumbles a little, but allows Tony to drag him out of bed.

Tony is dubious about Steve’s bathtub. “Do you even fit in it?” he demands.

“Mostly,” Steve says, which is true. He can’t really sit and soak himself all at once, and he has to duck his head to get under the water to wash his hair, but Steve’s had much worse.

They have no real choice about taking turns, and Tony complains about Steve’s ‘cubicle’ of a bathroom through both their turns, a running monologue that makes Steve smile.

**

Steve changes the sheets again and he really has to do laundry because he doesn’t have any others. He isn’t sure what’s going to happen now. Tony is raiding the refrigerator -- Steve can hear him opening and shutting the drawers -- and will presumably return to the bedroom with some kind of snack. After that...

The chains are sitting on the bedside table as if they aren’t practically priceless. Steve considers them for a long moment, thinking about the careful, gentle way that Tony had put them on Steve, and the same way he’d taken them off. He thinks about Tony trying to steer Steve away from having any expectations.

Tonight isn’t the first time, or even the second.

He thinks about Tony’s hand on Steve’s face as the world shook apart.

He may never be able to tell if Tony will stay or go, Steve realizes. Not because Tony doesn’t care, but because Tony is Tony, and he’s a genius, and he’s Iron Man, and he even technically has a day job. Steve may never be able to guess if Tony will stay the night, and he might never know if Tony will still be in bed in the morning.

Steve is surprisingly okay with it.

He’s willing to accept Tony how he is, yes, but it’s just as true that he’s willing to take Tony under almost any circumstances. Where Tony actually sleeps just isn’t that important.

Tony comes in a minute or so later with a plate of cheese and cold cuts. He sits it directly on Steve’s belly, since Steve had laid down to enjoy his subspace without even putting on underwear.

The plate is freezing. Steve says, “I’m not sure the comestibles should be so closely situated with my...” He gestures.

In response, Tony plucks a cheese square off the plate, balances it carefully on Steve’s cock, and bends down and takes it into his mouth, his tongue slipping hotly against Steve’s skin.

Steve shakes his head in disapproval, trying to repress a smile.

“You’re kidding me, right? Because, you know, we have both been ‘orally exposed’ to each others’ cocks.” Tony gives Steve a frowny face. “What are you going to do when I want to rim you?”

“I don’t know what that is,” Steve says mildly. “If it’s anything like everything else, it seems likely that I’ll let you.”

“Hmm. Statistically a good bet,” Tony allows, and then clambers over Steve’s legs to stretch out on the other side of the bed.

“Staying?” Steve asks.

Tony gives him a long look. “I’m not sure I’ll be here all night,” he says. “But I won’t leave you alone while you’re still in subspace again. Not unless I have to.”

Steve smiles widely, and Tony strokes a hand across Steve’s ribs.

“Why did you, that time?” Steve asks, genuinely curious, careful to keep his voice free of censure.

Tony sighs. “Lots of reasons. Most of them not very flattering.” But he’s still looking at Steve, and Steve doesn’t get the feeling that Tony is putting him off.

“I’m fine,” Steve reminds him. “I was fine.”

“It was reckless and selfish,” Tony says.

“You knew I was Captain America,” Steve points out. “How reckless could it really be?”

“Not reckless like that. If you were experienced, it wouldn’t have been reckless. We could have discussed it and decided. And I honestly thought dinner would be enough to get you through it. The first time you snapped out of it almost the second you came. Coming out of subspace can be unpleasant, even for experienced subs. I know that. Leaving you on your own that night was inexcusable.”

“Why did you?” Steve asks.

“I had a list of reasons,” Tony says. “Because I needed to know if you could deal with it. Sometimes there really are emergencies. JARVIS monitored you all night. Also to let you feel what it’s really like, without the sex to muddle it. Some people hate the feel of being submissive without sex being directly involved.” He pauses for a long moment. “To give you the chance to see how I can be, so you could stop it there, if you wanted to.”

“If I ever want to stop, I’ll tell you. You don’t need to keep engineering opportunities for it.”

“Yeah, you’ve made your position on that pretty clear,” Tony says.

“Why really?” Steve prods gently.

“Because the first time was great, and the second time was so much better it was hard to imagine it getting better. Hard, but I could imagine it, and I... well, I panicked. I was madly in lust with you, and you were Captain America, and I panicked. I thought that I was almost certainly going to... break you, and you were so, so trusting that I couldn’t trust myself.” Tony doesn’t quite look ashamed, but he does look subdued.

“But you told me when to come back,” Steve points out.

“See,” Tony says, pointing to himself with both thumbs. “Untrustworthy. When it came down to letting you go, I was too selfish not to give myself an out.”

Steve snorts. “You’re too worried,” he says. “I know there are a lot of rules about this kind of sex, but we don’t need the same degree of rules for the rest of it. Don’t fool around on me. Call me when you need or want me. Don’t tell anyone I’m Captain America.” Steve shrugs. “That’s pretty much it.”

“Actually, I was worried about the sex, too, but since you’ve consistently hit it out of the park every time you’ve come up to bat, I think we’re good there.” Tony smirks a little. “Those are your rules? Really?”

“Sure,” Steve says easily.

“You should move into the tower,” Tony says seriously. “I’m going to want to see you, but I’m really good at not noticing that I haven’t seen anyone for, oh, a week or it may have been closer to a month, but I’m sure it didn’t pass the thirty day mark. But, whatever. It’s more secure, it’s bigger, you’d have access to the gym and the pool. I think JARVIS gets sick of only having me to talk to.” He glances sideways at Steve. “I have a natural handicap at this,” he says plaintively. “I should have home field advantage.”

Steve doesn’t really need to think about it. There’s only one thing about it that could make it turn out badly. “If we stop doing this, I’ll be homeless,” he points out.

“Absolutely not,” Tony says firmly. “I’ll have JARVIS draw up a lease. But just for the record, I would never let you be homeless, lease or no lease.” He doesn’t say, sex or no sex, but it’s implied in the sharpness of his tone, and Steve suspects Tony is genuinely offended at the idea that Steve might think that.

“As long as I have your word, I don’t need a lease,” Steve says, smiling.

“Of course you need a lease,” Tony says. “At least to protect you from people who are not me.”

“I don’t care about a lease,” Steve says. “Make one or don’t. I care about a back rub.”

Tony looks at him speculatively. “I’m not sure you’re aware of how exactly your back is going to respond to a back rub right now, Captain.” But he looks too avaricious to convince Steve.

“Someone has to teach me these thing,” Steve says, grinning and relaxed, unresisting when Tony picks up a cheese square and pops it into Steve’s mouth.

“Eat first,” Tony says firmly.

“Okay, Tony,” Steve agrees and gets to watch Tony respond to that as he always does, want and exasperation, and Steve thinks they’re going to be fine.