Hi! o/ It's the plural Tony fic!
I've had this in my drafts for quite a while, actually—since December 2022! (God, has it seriously been that long?)—but I haven't done much work on it since last year. I got to about where it is right now, realised I hadn't plotted an ending, and ran out of steam. I still want to share what I've got—hey, who knows; maybe someone will be inspired! Maybe this will mean something to someone, somewhere!—but I did just want to give a heads-up about that, so as to pre-empt any disappointment.
That said, though, if anyone has any thoughts about where this story could go, I'd love to hear them! (Or if anyone wants to have a crack at writing their own follow-up/ending, I'd love to see that, too!) Maybe one of you clever folks will be able to help me out of my rut with this piece. Regardless, I figured that you lot out there in internet land would get more enjoyment out of this being posted unfinished than I'd get out of having it sit around :)
Now, with all that out of the way... enjoy :D
There are things I’m not supposed to remember
Locked up in my mouth, a single canary dies and is revived
over and over and over
‘till the only sound that poor bird can make is a whisper
that sends thrills through the greedy ears of the Big Boss
who rubs his soft pink hands with glee and uncorks a joyous
keg of oil to pour down a baby bird’s throat.
My tongue grows too big for its confines
there next to the canary and the cyanide pill tucked behind my molar
so it tries to loll out, dazed and dumb, but I swallow around it
and some sopping yellow feathers settle beside the dissolving drugs that keep me sane
There are things I’m not supposed to remember
and I know this to be true when I am on the verge of voicing some memory that never occurred, staring down from the precipice of a rash few words
I am not me I am not me I am not me
There is a canary in my mouth trapped in stasis,
driven mad by the makeshift cage
but Baby I am trying to keep you safe.poem by me, December 2022
Tony gets kidnapped.
It’s not the best turn of events for what was meant to be a simple, in-and-out, weapon-demo-then-copious-drinking trip. He’s not actually sure that he’s had worse. (Of course, he may simply not remember whatever other less-than-ideal situations he’s gotten himself into; that’s entirely possible. He’s no stranger to the kind of amnesia that meets anyone fool enough to look for answers in the bottom of a bottle.)
As much as one can, though, he’s making it work. He’s got a plan, and he intends to carry it out, and he’s doing pretty damn well so far.
He’s half-sunk into the familiar dance of welding machinery, grease staining the front of his wrecked shirt and grit settled deep under his fingernails, and—
Well.
You see, the thing about Tony Stark is that he never shuts up. This has gotten him into a fair amount of trouble.
It has, however, done him some good, too.
He’s babbling to himself as he works, staving off the sense memory of being dunked in cold water, when his verbal train of thought gains an unfamiliar lilt.
“—and weld this panel, hang on, I’ve got this, give me a moment, take a break,” he hears from his own mouth, which is weird, but he’s running on the tail end of an adrenaline rush, so he doesn’t question it too much until it feels like he’s stepping back inside his own head. Huh.
Words stop falling hurriedly from his mouth. There’s a soft, warm sensation, like he’s being draped in a woollen blanket, and Tony… sleeps.
Except he doesn’t, apparently, because he wakes up to find a mostly-completed gauntlet. Well, ‘wakes up’ in a generously loose sense: he doesn’t recall putting his head down (or picking it up). Then again, he also doesn’t recall constructing the makeshift armour in his hand.
He’s not quite sure what to draw from that.
The next odd lapse finds him being scooped up from the desert by Rhodey—shit, Rhodey! He’s too dizzy from dehydration and the metal in his chest and the relief of being rescued to notice that everything past Yinsen grabbing the gun is a blank space.
It gets a little more worrying when he’s back home.
He’s (mostly) fully fed, and drinking enough water for his vision to stay steady when he stands up. Yet he feels something warm when he’s plummeting through the air in the Mark II, and before he knows it he’s sighing in the wreckage of the Cobra. It doesn’t feel normal, but, hey! When has Tony’s brain ever worked normally?
He ignores it.
Then he’s scrambling at the Mark I reactor while Obie’s last traitorous steps away are still echoing in his ears, and someone is murmuring to him, hold on there, I’ve got this, and a peculiar calm overtakes him and he’s drifting….
They’re falling. They’re falling and Iron Monger—Tony spares half a thought for how much he dislikes the moniker—is gathering frost and they’re falling, plummeting back to the ground and JARVIS is in his ear but it feels like someone else is moving his limbs—
“I am Iron Man,” he says, and the reporters rise as one, and Tony should be used to the stage, has spent all his life in the spotlight, but he can’t help the prickling on the back of his neck that makes him want to turn around.
Don’t worry, I’ve got your six, says a voice behind him, but it’s also in his head, insubstantial as a wisp of dandelion fluff on the wind. Tony realises that however much he wants to look, there will be nothing to see.
He faces the crowd resolutely, standing just as unwavering as his freshly-minted title demands. That indeterminate presence hovers behind him.
Tony stalks into his empty workshop.
“Okay, what’s the deal?”
There is nothing but dead air in response.
He sighs, then picks up some gauntlet scraps to start fiddling with them. He’s been making adjustments to the palm repulsors; maybe they’ll actually do what he wants them to this time.
“Don’t think I haven’t noticed,” he says idly, flipping open a panel to fiddle with the internal structure. The insulation is all wrong, and the whole metal-to-skin idea is out, so he’s experimenting with more comfortable padding.
He mutters this all to himself, then follows it up with a bitter-sounding but really just confused, “If you’re, like, mind-controlling me or something, just a heads-up would be nice. Y’know.”
Because, you see, the thing is: Tony Stark talks a lot. Regardless of whether it’s a press conference, or a midnight fridge run, or a muted running commentary while he’s in the suit that he barely even registers as more than brainwaves. It is such a natural extension of his thoughts—such a natural response to isolation—that it’s barely conscious.
That lets all kinds of things slip through.
Because when Tony Stark talks, he’s used to knowing when someone is listening. More often than not, he’s alone—but, as he finds, sometimes the loneliness talks back.
“I’m not possessing you,” says Tony, but it isn’t really Tony at all, is it? The sounds are all wrong, taking on that weird lilt again. There’s a soft haze pressing up in the back of his skull but it’s not suffocating. It makes itself known, that’s all, doesn’t reel Tony back like an unsatisfying catch. Not this time.
Tony’s hands are still on autopilot with the gauntlet before they fizzle and twitch in such a manner that he thinks he’s accidentally electrocuted himself.
He hasn’t, of course; he’s far too smart for that. He drops the metal on instinct anyway, which seems to be the goal of the woollen presence hovering just over his shoulder. Movement that is not his own seeps through the limbs, folding them neatly over his thighs. Tony blinks down at them, startled for their having moved of their own accord.
“Focus on me, how about?” says Tony’s mouth. “The suit can wait.”
“Not like you’re giving me much choice.” Tony is privately relieved that he can still use his face.
The relief drifts over like so much radio static, and he gets the distinct sense that the other entity knows the gist of his emotions.
He sighs. “I wouldn’t just kick you out permanently.”
Tony frowns, then gets whiplash from the way he and this—this—well, he’s sorely tempted to say person—are swapping control of his mouth.
Sorry, says the person, without moving Tony’s lips. It’s harder to ignore me when I’m making noise.
“What the hell…?” Tony mutters. “Are you just thinking at me?”
Yes.
“Huh.”
I’ve done it before.
“When?”
A wince that is not quite his own flickers across Tony’s face. It is quickly smothered.
If you don’t know, then I won’t tell you.
Tony makes a disgruntled sound. He’s already cooking up a plan to try to get the person to think about it, because then he can tap into their thoughts, but he is swiftly struck by a realisation.
He is talking to a voice in his head.
The thing is, though—it doesn’t feel fake. Tony would know if he were faking. He is making no conscious effort to hear these things being said, they’re just happening. He’s not saying them.
It doesn’t feel like just a voice in his head, either. Tony knows his brain; he knows his body. He would know if he was having a stroke and that’s why his hands were spasming earlier; he would know if he was imagining soft, fuzzy presences behind him at inopportune moments just like he would know if he was talking to himself.
Because as much as he is talking to himself—insomuch as there is nobody else in the room… Nobody doesn’t mean no-one.
Huh.
“Care to explain what’s happening, mystery man?” he says aloud, then snaps his fingers. Nickname. “You need a nickname, you need—wait.”
The person-presence-not-a-voice has a strangely amused air. Slow down.
“Nah,” Tony says, thoughts churning a mile a minute. God, it’s like a thousand gears in tandem. “How the hell are you in my brain?”
One thing at a time, think-says the person. You’re not making me up.
“Oookay?” Tony furrows his brows at a vague spot on the ceiling. “Nice to know. But I could think that at myself.”
Try it.
It’s a weird challenge, but Tony has never been one to back down from one, so—you’re not making me up. He determinedly thinks it as hard as he can, but it’s not the same. It just feels like his voice echoing back, not the distinct voice that Mystery Person has.
“Huh,” he says aloud. “You’re not making me up. You’re not—hm.”
Sounds wrong, doesn’t it?
“Yeah,” Tony admits.
His inner eye hosts the briefest flash of someone grinning. It’s not quite an image; more like the concept of a grin. The muscle memory of one. A flash of teeth and a brief crinkle to the eyes.
“How are you doing that?” Tony asks, raising a hand to his temple. “My head hurts.”
Sorry, says Mystery Person, sounding properly apologetic. It’s been a while since we’ve done this.
“Oh yeah?” Tony says, not meaning it to come out quite as it does. After a brief moment of consideration, he leans into it. Why not? “You might have to jog my memory, baby.”
Don’t… don’t do that.
“Do what?” Tony feigns innocence, plastering on that perfect golden-boy grin that makes journalists swoon too much to get out a straight question about SI’s involvement in Afghanistan.
Don’t flirt with me.
Tony huffs out a frustrated breath through his nose, but switches it off. “Maybe it would help if I had any frame of reference for who the hell you are.”
I haven’t really thought about it.
Tony raises his palms. “How is that helpful?”
Sorry.
“Asshole.”
Huh.
“Huh, what?”
I don’t think you knew how to swear last time.
“Once again, gonna need a refresher,” Tony says, biting back a screech of exasperation. “Or is your memory just as bad as mine apparently is?”
No, I remember it. I’m just trying to figure out the best way to… hm. Do you remember making that computer, as a kid?
Tony makes a derisive sound. “Gotta get more specific, man. I did that a lot.”
Right. Um. Now that’s weird; Tony doesn’t think he’s heard Mystery Person stammer before, or sound anything but confident …And when, exactly, did he start keeping tabs on this person?
Since they showed up randomly and started talking, says an internal voice that sounds a lot more like his own. Tony sighs, fighting the urge to fiddle with the gauntlet. He got his hands back ages ago—Mystery Person only had them for a couple seconds—but he feels like he’s being scrutinised, and they did say the suit should wait. He picks at a hangnail instead.
The ghost of a hand brushes over his, batting his own away from their self-injurious fidgeting. It shouldn’t feel as normal as it does.
“So. Deets?” Tony says to the empty workshop, as if it’s a perfectly normal use of a Saturday morning.
The first one, Mystery Person says finally. It’s not just the words that do it, it’s the bleed of thoughts behind them.
“Ah,” Tony whispers.
He remembers being lonely.
He remembers being so crushingly, entirely lonely, soldering pins in a dark room all alone, that he started talking to himself.
And the loneliness talked back.
“…Owen,” Tony says finally. The word is reverent, laced with almost-buried recollection.
He had a friend! He made a friend for himself, and at some point he forgot—why did he forget? How?—but that doesn’t matter anymore, because he’s remembered.
“Owen,” Tony says again, with more certainty.
Hi.
“What the fuck.” He’s dizzy. He’s already sitting down. He sinks onto the floor.
“You’re my friend,” he says weakly. The floor is cool linoleum underneath him.
Yeah, Owen think-says apologetically.
“Okay,” Tony says, and tries to do the breathing thing. He already spends most of his time a little lightheaded from the reduced lung capacity—a necessary sacrifice to keep his heart, y’know, beating—and the panic isn’t really helping his case re oxygen intake.
Most fields of science come to Tony intuitively: he just—gets it, there’s no ‘aha’ moment, he just understands. Hell, most fields full stop come to Tony intuitively; he didn’t finish college at 17 for nothing.
Which is why it’s saying a lot that he doesn’t get why he hasn’t been able to remember Owen. It’s coming back now: the memories that he’d forgotten he was even lacking have returned in hazy, aged technicolour. It still feels as though he’s watching through the body of someone else, but now he can kind of parse the fuzzy-warm part of the mist to be Owen. He realises that the half-formed recollections are that way because someone else had the wheel, was letting him float far above his body in the empty spaces of his mind, letting him ignore the pain.
Some memories are clearer, though, and they seem to be Tony’s own—as opposed to his recollections of the times he was pressed up against the inside of his own skull while someone else did the person-ing. It’s like a barrier has crumbled down and, picking his way through the debris, he can revisit his expansive, impersonal childhood home where this kind half of his soul split away. And—he remembers.
He remembers being young—seven, maybe?—chattering quietly to himself in his room while he tried to get a chip seated on the circuit board, only half-noticing when he heard a voice speak back. He remembers thinking it was an imaginary friend.
He remembers glancing at his copy of some book that he can’t remember the specifics of, shining in mint condition on his desk. He remembers naming the kind fuzzy-warm man hovering in his brain after one of its characters—and he remembers the smile that his new not-so-imaginary-after-all friend granted him at that christening.
Like he’d done something right.
The amount of times that look had been directed at him in his tender single digits, was… alarmingly minuscule. It hasn’t climbed much since.
“Shit,” he says hoarsely, leaning back against the leg of a workbench. An unreal hand alights on his shoulder. It is certifiably strange: his skin feels as if it’s expecting real input and routing the appropriate sensation to his brain, then going wonky when it realises that nobody’s touching him. The void of touch is a restless itch but it still settles his nerves—as does the thought-murmured, Hey. Deep breath in, buddy.
Tony sucks in cool, motor oil-scented air, then starts to wheeze. He buries his face in his hands, grabbing at his hair to anchor himself. “Fuck, shit, fuck,” he says, in between delirious laughs.
Where Jarvis was polished, sharp edges to Tony’s younger self, caring for and about him in a distinctly measured, British way, Owen was the father that maybe—just maybe—Tony could have had in some other world where things weren’t so bad. Yet he was strangely somehow also a brother, and in a stranger way still a part of Tony. It was thoroughly odd and a little bit disarming.
As it still is, apparently.
“Shit,” he says again, finding his breath. He straightens a little, tipping his head back against the workbench, blinking at the bright light of the workshop. “Sorry I flirted with you,” he says to the empty air above him.
Owen winces, but says, Don’t worry about it. You didn’t remember me.
Latching onto that train of thought, Tony snaps his fingers. “About that. How the fuck?”
I don’t know.
Tony blinks. “But you… you remember everything, right?”
Yes.
“Then surely you remember how I forgot it?”
Owen places a hand on Tony’s shoulder. I’m sorry.
Tony frowns. The dearth of knowledge—especially about his own life—makes him itch. “No. Don’t be. I just. I don’t get it. How do I not know any of this?” he asks, frowning up at the still-hazy form of Owen that’s hovering in his perception. He’s not seeing Owen, but knows that’s where he’d be standing if given form. That’s where he is standing, in the safety of their mind.
But that’s not what’s grating on Tony.
“I just—man, this is weird,” he continues, massaging his temples in an effort to dull the pain. It recedes after a moment. “You’ve been here all this time?”
Yeah.
“But I never noticed you.” Tony feels a little petulant, but he forces himself not to budge on what is a pretty justified question. Owen seems to notice, because he lowers himself down to sit in front of Tony. The workshop is unchanged in Tony’s vision even as he’s getting an almost palpable sensation of calm eye contact.
You weren’t meant to. I’m here to keep us as safe as possible, and up until now, that has involved you being in the dark.
“Oh.” There isn’t really a good way to respond to that. Tony clenches and relaxes his hands where they lay in his lap. “Right.” He nods. “Why not?”
Owen tilts his head. Do you want me to lay it out for you? I think you know.
Tony pulls up his mental catalogue of the past few decades and sees them riddled with benders and dope and mindless sex with whoever he could get close to. He sees the death of Jarvis and his parents, and the months-long blur following them that only ended when he landed in the hospital—again—to get his stomach pumped. He sees the weight of being a CEO, he sees the way he drove everyone away from him, he sees the impromptu road trip in ’04 where he sat for a very long time at the top of a cliff somewhere in New England.
He wasn’t going to do it. He didn’t try. But if something were to startle him, and he were to fall—well.
He wouldn’t try that hard to hold on for dear life.
Tony blinks away the painful cavity in his chest. “Good point,” he admits. “But, um. I know now.”
That you do, Owen agrees.
“And I have my memories back,” Tony adds. Then he frowns. “They’re all… as they were, right?”
Yes, of course, Owen assures him in a rush. Your memories are real. Some are—were—just harder to get to than others. On Tony’s continued apprehension, he adds, It’s with our best interests in mind.
Tony breathes in, feeling the vacuum of his lungs fill and drain. Calm. He can do calm. “So it’s a safeguard, then?” he says after he’s slowed down his pulse.
Yes. Owen rubs Tony’s upper arm in an achingly paternal motion. Tony’s lungs drain again.
“Okay. I—yeah,” he says, trying to force some oxygen back into his brain. “I think I can deal with that.”
I’m glad, Owen says, smiling. Then he nods at Tony’s position, still half-slumped against the lab bench. It’s been a while since we’ve eaten.
“S’that a veiled way of telling me to get off my ass?” Tony asks, but he’s grinning.
I don’t know. Has it worked?
“Almost,” he grumbles, unfolding himself and grimacing as his hips click. “Heel, boy. Impatient. Also, ouch; I do not like the floor.”
Good thing you’re not sitting on it anymore, then.
Tony grunts, leaning against the top of the bench, which still holds the unfinished gauntlet. “By the way, since when do I have—” he starts, then flounders for a moment before cutting himself off. “Okay, what the hell are you?”
Elaborate?
“I don’t need to elaborate, man, you’re in my brain,” Tony says, trying not to sound too aggressive. He’s not entirely sure it works. “Which is the whole crux of my question, anyway. What are you?”
I don’t know.
Tony stares at the deserted landscape of his workshop. “Huh?”
Owen shrugs. I know as much as you know, Tony. I haven’t exactly had the chance to do any research on our state in the past few years. Not without tipping you off.
“Right,” Tony says slowly. “You’ve only been around when I’m like, about to die.” For a moment, he regrets how fine-tuned JARVIS is: any out-of-the-blue web searches would’ve certainly tripped the AI’s security measures. But for a lack of stringency, Tony wouldn’t be so entirely in the dark about the person in his head.
Precisely. Owen pauses, then follows that up with, If you’re curious—which I know you are—I would suggest doing some research. I’m sure the Web has what you’re looking for.
Tony is fishing a laptop from a cluttered drawer before Owen’s done with his sentence. “How do you know about the Web? You were last around in, like, the 70s.”
I have all the same memories as you, plus some of my own. …And you had a computer, then, too.
“Not Google, though. That’s weird.”
Sure, Owen says, in a tone that suggests he doesn’t agree but doesn’t want to push it. Tony boots up the laptop and disarms the security protocols, poking his tongue out at Owen as he goes. Then he hits an unexpected sticking point.
“Uh…” he says, hands hovering over the keyboard. “What the hell do I search for?”
The Internet is, unsurprisingly, divided on the subject of multiple personalities.
“I’m not crazy, though,” Tony says again, frowning. They’ve relocated to the lounge, where he’s kicking his feet up on the sofa and frowning at diagnoses. He’s glad that he ensured that all of his privacy settings were firmly on before this trawl; every opened page leads to more questions. One or two searches could be chalked up to curiosity, but he’s been at this for long enough that Owen has stopped him twice to refill his glass of water.
You’re not, no. I’m under the impression it’s a highly variable condition, Owen says, peering over Tony’s shoulder at the digital version of the DSM-IV-TR (it’s a mouthful of a title, even for Tony). Owen still feels only like a vague warmth, which Tony is mildly grateful for. He’s not sure he’s quite ready to deal with the visual form of a whole other person.
“What’s with the—that, then?” Tony says, clicking to the IMDb page for Psycho.
Owen sighs. It would seem that we are easy targets.
“You can say that again,” Tony mutters. On attempting to return to the DSM, he hits another IMDb page by accident, then scowls reflexively. “I can’t believe I missed a Sargent film. Jaws, Owen, Jaws!”
Once again, I have never seen it.
“Heretic.”
If you insist.
They do their best to be careful.
Owen agrees that it’s probably best to keep his existence under wraps for the time being. Tony is just relieved to not have to do any heart-to-hearts in the near future.
“Heart-to-arc reactor?” he muses. Owen exudes unamusement.
You do have a heart, he points out.
“We all have our flaws,” Tony acquiesces.
There are small communities online, clustered in forums and mailing boards, for people like him. Tony sets up several levels of security before he makes any accounts.
Never one for incomplete tasks, he spends several days poring over essays and comics and message boards. The consensus seems to be that, regardless of their personality or memories or age, ‘headmates’ are just as worthy of respect as the original identity.
A small, Owen-shaped part of him warmed by the reassurance, Tony leans back in his chair with a smile.
Water on his face. Water on his face. Water in his mouth, in his eyes, everywhere—he can’t breathe, he can’t breathe.
Lavender-scented Owen, soft wool blanket, soft towel. Stepping out of the shower. Hiccuping, wheezing.
Sitting on his bed. You’re not there, you’re safe, you’re okay.
Wet hair, damp, half-clothed. Shaky hands. I’ve got it from here. Go rest.
Falling asleep, and it’s finally an absence—even while his eyes go on blinking, his body piloted by someone else.
Tony comes to, midway through a sentence. His mouth goes slack. His brain whirs into motion, trying to figure out his situation. In his room.
Phone to his ear.
“Hello?” says the voice right in there, all tinny and Rhodey. Tony glances around the room. His eyes land on a clock; it’s pretty early, he was sleeping for an hour or two.
Well. Owen was sleeping, evidently, because Tony does feel a bit more rested but he doesn’t remember answering the phone, not even in the normal hazy half-asleep way that he’s familiar with. Thanks, Owen, he thinks, earning himself a faint responding warmth.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m—yeah, I’m fine,” he says, mostly caught up. “Sorry. Connection dropped for a sec.”
Rhodey pauses for a moment, then dubiously says, “If you say so.”
Tony frowns. “I do say so. …What was I saying?”
“…You were just saying hello, man. I only just called you.” There is a not-insignificant undercurrent of worry in his tone.
“Right. Well.”
Something shifts over the line—probably just the fabric of Rhodey’s clothes, or him moving his phone to his other hand. It makes Tony flinch. He feels wrung-out, even with the power nap.
“What’s wrong, dude? You sound spooked.”
Tony shakes his head even though it makes no difference. He doesn’t actually feel real, he belatedly notices. It’s like he’s floating way above the world.
“Nah, I’m fine,” he hears himself say distantly.
Another few seconds of dead air, then, “…You don’t sound it. D’you want me to come over or something, keep you company? You’ve had a stressful few months, I really wouldn’t mi—”
“I’m fine,” Tony says again, sharply, steamrollering his friend’s attempt to help. He should go back on it. He should go back on it. Yet as much as he thinks that to himself, as much as he knows that the company would be good, that he and Owen can’t function forever in their little bubble of barely-reciprocal support, he just—he can’t.
He can’t accept it, he can’t double back, he can’t tell anyone, because that’s permanent. It’s not an experiment he can rehash, it’s not a lab where he can just buy endless replacements for the materials he exhausts—this is real life.
He could say whatever he wanted right now, could announce that he’s becoming a supervillain or going vegan or that he’s got a person living inside his head, he could say anything, and he would have to deal with the fallout. He would have to risk the single friendship he has that isn’t several leaps over the line of normal.
That’s not a mistake he can come back from.
Owen whispers something in his ear. He’s not sure what, but it doesn’t help, because Tony is involuntarily bidding Rhodey a swift goodbye and hanging up and, in doing so, tossing away an offer for help that was extended to him.
God. He feels stupid.
Tony, formerly possessing the sole intent of getting some goddamn coffee in his face, stops short in the threshold of the kitchen. Pepper has beaten him to it.
He glances at his watch, suppressing a groan when he realises that what is, to him, ass o’clock in the morning—achievable only by way of increasingly distressing nightmares-slash-flasbacks that seem determined to follow him into the waking world—is a normal alarm time for Pepper. She glances up from her calm operation of the coffee machine.
“Mornin’,” he says casually, affecting normalcy. He tries to pretend that the clink of the disconnected arc reactor isn’t ringing in his ears, tries to pretend that he can’t smell booze on his father’s breath and hear the ting-ting-ting of a spoon going round and round a glass, stirring immoderate spirits in with just enough lemon to make shouting at an eight year-old a passable pastime.
Owen places a hand on his shoulder. Tony’s thoughts whirl back to reality like a tub draining.
Back in the cool, quiet kitchen that his feet are firmly planted in, Pepper raises an eyebrow. She’s smiling. “Morning,” she replies. “I’ve got to go on a work trip.”
Ignoring the words in his head that heard their last angry echo several decades ago, Tony makes a sour face. “Fun.”
“Sometimes.” Pepper pours steamed milk into her mug and thankfully doesn’t feel the need to stir it. “It’s mostly just busywork. D’you want a cup?”
“I can make it,” Tony says, only stammering a bit. Owen rubs a hand bracingly over his spine.
Pepper huffs slightly, amusement colouring her features. “You don’t have to, though,” she says, and starts another drink. Tony notes dazedly that—as always—she ground enough beans for the both of them. He’s been wondering if that was on purpose, but Pepper is usually never also in the kitchen when he stumbles in.
“You’re up early,” she comments, as if reading his mind. She glances over her shoulder. “Couldn’t sleep?”
Tony runs a hand over his goatee. “No,” he admits. “It’s been. Difficult.”
Further explanation sticks in his throat. Tony itches to feel bad about it, to find some kind of guilt for not being forthcoming about the kind of emotional divulgences that people seem to like, but Pepper doesn’t seem to mind.
There’s a certain peace in the guts of machinery.
That discovery, of course, requires one to become desensitised to the minor burns and electric shocks and the smell of melting rubber, but once that hurdle is cleared, it’s easy going. It’s just logic.
There’s nothing unexpected about machines. If it doesn’t work, there’s a reason. If it does—there’s still a reason.
Machines aren’t fickle. As much as people like to joke that Tony has a magic touch for tech, he really doesn’t. Nobody does. He just has a trained eye and a sharp mind and he understands what makes something work and, consequently, what could be going wrong.
Today’s project of choice is a broken Chevy Impala—’67, he vaguely recalls—from some guys on the road that didn’t seem to recognise him. Tony doesn’t make a habit of repairing cars, especially ones that don’t belong to him, but he can’t resist getting his hands dirty once in a while and getting properly acquainted with a machine.
Rhodey once compared Tony’s affinity for bots of all kinds with his own, closely guarded love for horse riding.
‘It’s like those teen movies,’ he’d said, tossing an unopened bag of popcorn at Tony and settling in for their third rewatch of Alien. ‘Y’know, where a girl finds this horse who hates everyone except her and she takes it to the national championships.’
‘I’m not a horse girl,’ Tony had protested, sitting down heavily at his friend’s side with a fresh six-pack of beers. ‘Want one?’
‘No thanks. And you kind of are, man.’
Tony had never quite understood that conversation till he’d gone horseback riding in—god, 2003, it must’ve been—on a whim. He was stoned enough that the memories are hazy, but remembers the singular feeling that he was sitting atop a creature that could literally kill him, yet would follow whatever directions he gave. The potential energy of the warm, short-furred body supporting his was lethal, but the horse just flicked its ears to ward off flies and harrumphed a little when Tony fumbled a piece of licorice.
Even now, considerably less doped up (read: none. Boo, Pepper and her household rules), he gets it. There’s enough heft to this car that, were its tires to move, it could turn Tony into no more than a human-shaped splatter on the ground. But they don’t. It remains stationary in his garage (at what point does it become more of a secondary workshop that just so happens to contain cars and a garage door?), engine purring underneath his hands as he performs (the machine equivalent of) open-heart surgery. Hey, twice in one year! That’s a personal record!
He pats the fender appreciatively, then stills at the sensation of being watched.
Sorry, says a voice in Tony’s head that is neither himself or Owen.
“Don’t sweat it,” he says. “Um, Tony.” He’s itching to stick out a hand to shake, but there’s no opposite pair of hands, no other goddamn person to touch. He settles for picking up a wrench and twirling it around in his hands.
Hi, Tony.
There is a pause. Tony expects a name, but his new arrival is not forthcoming with any such information.
I don’t have one, they explain. Simple as that.
“Oh.”
They hum an affirmative response.
You could name me.
Tony flushes for no good reason. “I dunno. Feels… weird.”
A glimpse of faded shaggy blue hair. A shrug. It is a little weird. I’d just go with it.
“Good idea,” Tony murmurs, eyes catching on a rainbow on the wall and staying there, his train of thought slowing to molasses. For an incredibly strange moment, he is nowhere; he is nothing. He is just refracted light. He is just the rhythmic toss and catch of a wrench, heavy metal taking on the warmth of hands he can barely feel.
He blinks rapidly and unintentionally, then refocuses his vision. “Woah.”
You good?
“No idea,” he says, dazed.
Fair enough. The new person doesn’t feel at all like Owen. They’re shorter, more disaffected. Younger.
“Are you, like, me?” Tony asks, the Impala all but forgotten. It’s a very stilted way of asking if they’re a younger version of himself, but their sharing a brain is helping the communication some. He’s seen lots of people talking about alters like this—there’s a name for them. Damn it; he’s too far into the molasses to remember.
Littles, the person supplies. And no. I’m. They pause, scrunching up Tony’s nose, which. Well. He should really be used to the whole ‘someone else moving his face’ thing by now, but it’s still a little disarming. I’m fifteen. I’m not you.
“You’re a part of me, though,” he says, just to make sure.
Sure. I’m not, like, a version of you, though. I’m my own person.
“Okay.” Tony tosses the wrench again, catching it with ease. The new person watches.
You gonna name me or not?
Tony frowns. He sets down the wrench again. “What makes you think I have names on-demand in my brain?”
Give me an acronym or something, man. Else I’ll just name myself, like. Tony Two.
Tony snorts despite himself. Well. Because of himself. Himselves? He shakes his head as if it’s an Etch-a-Sketch and confusing thoughts are little magnetic pieces of sand.
You’re weird, says Definitely-Not-Going-To-Be-Called–Tony Two. There’s no venom to it, it’s just an amused (and slightly detached) observation.
“I do try,” Tony says. He considers the presence in his head, trying to pull words to mind. His brain cycles through several before landing on one that piques the new person’s interest.
“I just need to figure out an acronym for it. Hang on.” Tony squints, preparing to do just that. He snaps his fingers. “Got it. Another Member of the Brain Everyone’s Riding in. First Owen, now you, it’s like a clown car in here,” he jokes.
That’s not how acronyms work, I think, Amber says, but he can tell that they like the name.
“Meh. Acronym, shmacronym.”
Weird, Amber reiterates.
Tony grins. “Sure. Now, how d’you feel about keeping me company while I work on this car?”
Cured of its hydraulic issues, the vintage Impala is returned to its owners. Tony watches the black glint as the guys drive off and wonders what his next project should be.
JARVIS puts through a call that has Tony sighing almost instantly.
“I told you, man. I’m not getting involved in this thing. It’s just gonna end up with a mess. And then you’re gonna put me on clean-up.” He nicks his finger on an unpolished edge of the new bot he’s constructing, earning him an automatically-opened first aid drawer. Fury makes a noise of discontent over the line. Owen frowns and says something indistinct about taking care of the wound. Tony rolls his eyes but puts down what he’s working on and walks over.
“If you’re gonna declare yourself as some kinda robot hero, you should have people in your corner,” Fury argues.
Tony rummages through the drawer for some Wet Wipes, antiseptic and Band-Aids. He cleans off the swelling bead of blood on his finger, then hisses as he sanitises it. “I’m not joining your little Powerpuff Girls. End of.”
There is a meaningful pause in the conversation. “You’ve watched Powerpuff Girls?” Fury says, sounding startled.
Tony blanches mid-application of an Iron Man Band-Aid. Goddamnit, Rhodey, thinking he’s all funny on his Walgreens runs. “What? No! It’s—it’s just a pop culture reference, man. Get with the times.”
“…Right.” Fury doesn’t exactly sound convinced.
Tony ignores the fact that it’s apparently plausible that he—of all people!—watches Powerpuff Girls in favour of getting the little sterile patch lined up properly on his fresh cut. “Look, dude. I’m busy right now.” Tiny Iron Man’s gauntlet disappears under the other end of the Band-Aid. “So if that’s all from you, I’d appreciate it if you’d hang up right now.”
“What, you don’t pay someone to hang up your phone calls for you?”
“Used to, but they got too annoyed by all of the lame people who call me all the time,” Tony snarks absentmindedly. “Now shoo.”
“You’re a real piece of work, Stark.”
“Oh, I know.”
The Mark IV stands ominously in the corner of Tony’s workshop. He sighs at it, clucking about its impatience, but breaks out the proper kit to keep making adjustments. The faceplate hasn’t been unlatching properly, lately, and he’s pretty sure it’s because it sustained a very minor bump during a test run. He’s already drawn up preliminary plans for the Mark V’s faceplates, accompanied by extensive notes on the IV’s shortcomings.
It’s coming along remarkably well. He spends the better part of a day knocking around in the ‘shop before Owen reminds him to drink some goddamn water.
Tony sighs and removes his welding goggles—worn at the behest of Owen and meeting indifference from Amber. “Fine. Asshole.”
I’m just looking out for you, Owen points out. He’s not angry, though. He’s never angry.
“Drinking water is for losers,” Tony says, even as he looks around for his bottle. There’s one somewhere around here; he’s sure of it.
On the far-left table.
So it is! “Thanks.” Tony takes a small, experimental swig, then tosses back a good half of the bottle when he realises how parched he is. “Jesus. Must’ve been working for a while. JARVIS, how long since I came in here?”
“Just over two hours, sir.”
Tony whistles. “Good thing you gave me a heads up, then, Owen.” He frowns. “You need a nickname.”
I most assuredly do not.
“Yeah, you do. You just haven’t accepted it yet.”
Tony. There is a small note of desperation in Owen’s thought-voice. Please.
“What?” Tony says, grinning.
Almost everybody that you talk to has a nickname of some sort. I don’t think I would know anyone’s actual, legal first name if I didn’t share your memories.
“Hm. I’m failing to see the problem, here.” Tony takes another sip of water, then gestures at the air before him that’s thick with an apparition of a man. “Nicknames: cool. Not nicknames: not cool. D’you wanna be not cool, Owen?”
Owen sighs. Do I have a choice?
“Nope,” Tony says cheerfully.
And that's about as much contiguous writing as I've got. The rest is all snippets and remakes of the same few scenes wherein I try to figure out exactly where to go, then realise I haven't seen a Marvel film and don't know the characters quite well enough. Of course I then don't want to go out and actually watch a relevant film, and the cycle continues, lol.
I hope that sparked some sort of feeling, even if it wasn't necessarily joy xD I'm sorry again about the (lack of) ending.
Comments are, as ever, the most wonderful thing in the world—this story has been 2 years in the making, almost all without outside input, and I'd love to hear back from you all <3 (Or, because you're reading on Neocities because you love me, you could shoot me a message on my blog, or suchlike!)
Thank you for reading! Have a good day; take care of yourself. o/