Ch2. Prologue 2

Tony's lips twitched as he remembered those happier times.

He was hopeful. Since the Avengers ceased to exist, the number of villains decreased and he had his quiet and peace. Being the Iron Man was thrilling but he missed the carefree life. He missed being his own boss. He missed not being worried about this or that bad guy.

Oh, Tony was aware they just were not discovered because nobody was even trying to discover or fight them but he was also aware the bad guys existed before the Avengers became a thing too and the world still spun.

Tony was making the world a better place in his own way. Through making new technology.

So, when Bruce and that... sorcerer, because apparently, that was a thing in their world too, appeared in front of him, Tony instantly knew his quiet life was totally screwed.

He often thought he would have this incessant itch to suit up and go being the Iron Man again once he got a justified cause for it. But... that itch simply wasn't there. All Tony felt at that moment was a deep sense of sinking exasperation as if he knew he was making the greatest mistake in his life but he also couldn't just refuse to participate in the ensuing shit-show.

His ego wouldn't let him stay on the sidelines now that he knew about it.

And even then, if this Thanos aimed to kill half of the universe, what real choice did he have? Putting his own fate in the hands of others was never Tony's style. Just the thought of having his survival in the hands of Rogers made him scared witless for his continuous healthy life.

When he found himself in the alien spaceship because Strange's hocus pocus didn't work as intended, Tony did not just idle around, waiting for his chance. He was looking around, trying to understand what he was seeing.

The little raccoon shit once told Tony that he was genius only according to the Earth standards. Tony begged to differ.

No matter how smart one was, he can not come up with ideas he has no references for.

His stroll through the spaceship? That was his fill of references.

Tony had so many ideas on how to improve his tech and how to make new things after that. It was a real eye-opener and a great shot of inspiration. Human technology had no more than a few short decades of development which was seriously limiting him. These aliens, on the other hand, developed their spaceships for centuries if not millennia. They would naturally be more advanced than whatever humans had. It would be a mighty embarrassment if that was not the case.

What happened next is not even worth pondering over. Simply put, Thanos kicked everyone's ass so thoroughly it was not even funny and all because the Star-Lord decided the best way to punish the Purple Face for killing his girlfriend was to set him free.

Smart lad, that one...

In the end, Thanos got the time stone... and Tony only in this strange orange realm really understood it was Strange's plan all along for him to sacrifice himself. And then Thanos managed to snap half the universe out of existence whereas Tony was trapped on a broken spaceship in the middle of nowhere.

Only the encounter with Danvers saved his life and... it opened his eyes for the second time. Strange did not exactly showcase what abracadabra could do. Danvers, however...

She was a normal human female. No half-breed alien. No someone born special. She was just a... human. Yet, the level of power she reached...

She could fly and live in space. She could carry the entire spaceship with no problem. She could do simply so many things it was mind-boggling.

Granted, the acquittal of her powers was an accident at best but it was undeniable direct proof humans had the potential to reach that kind of level.

For the first time in his life, Tony started to think he was using the wrong method to solve his problems. That he was researching in the wrong direction altogether.

But that was only a stray thought at that moment. After Thanos kicked his butt and dropped a moon at him, Tony was mentally, physically, and spiritually drained. He didn't see any way out so he gave up.

Yes, admitting it was a hard blow for his ego when he was reviewing this part of his life but... it had to be said no matter how embarrassing it was.

Tony was too tired when he finally came back to Earth. Inventing and research were far from his priority. His drive was lost.

Seeing Rogers' face and hearing him so optimistically ask if Tony had a lead, clue, or direction for him...

Tony just blew up. He didn't understand how could the stripped dipshit ask that? Just like that? As if Tony was some kind of magical wish-granting and money-printing fairy that can just pull solutions out of his ass whenever necessary, whenever the great Captain America didn't have an answer because his straightforward way of thinking could not handle the intensity of the problem.

Tony was just so exhausted and fed up with it all.

He said it years ago. The Earth needed an army. They needed something to protect them from alien threats. And while his original idea was really bad, the problem would not just disappear because Captain America did not like technology. Aliens would not stop breathing because Captain America is protecting Earth. They could care less who the bastard in spandex is.

Tony knew they would eventually come and invade but seeing the other Avengers so eager to follow Rogers' lead, it was not worth it to argue. Tony messed up with Ultron and he knew it but...

It was at that moment when he was looking into Steve's eyes after he blew up at him before falling to his knees due to fatigue that Tony realized why exactly did he fit in with the Avengers so much. It was because they were all arrogant assholes just like him. They just had a different way of showing it.

After all, what else than arrogant was the thought that the Avengers, a group not even reaching ten individuals, could protect Earth from aliens? Especially after knowing what kind of power Thor wielded?

It was ridiculous, really.

Yet, at least they lost together.

And that was the end of their interaction. Tony retreated back to Malibu, to his basement laboratory, and just like that, five years passed and Tony had his hands full with trying to pull the world back on its feet.

Stark Industries was at the forefront of restoration projects all over the world and Tony's technology helped keep agriculture, important factories, power plants, and other necessary fields from crumbling on themselves due to the shortage of workers. Tony had to invent a massive amount of tech to keep the world spinning and stop regression.

So much so he was overworked more often than not during the first two years.

One would think that now when they didn't need to play hide and seek with the government that had much more important things to deal with than catching a few insignificant criminals, the former Avengers would at least come and visit...

Oh, Tony didn't expect Steve to show up. He was not sure he would even open the doors for him.

But Clint and Natasha? Or Bruce? Even Sam...

Tony missed them just a teensy bit for the first three years before he realized neither was really interested in paying him a visit and his interest slowly shifted to indifference.

Nothing has really changed...

When they finally showed up, asking for a time travel machine, Tony lost it. He hysterically laughed in their faces at the very thought.

Part of him was bitter that now when he is again useful, they come crawling back and part of him was just barely able to stop itself from rolling on the ground from the stupidity of their solution.

Time travel... really now.

That's why it was a shock even for him when he really cracked it and found out how to actually manage such a feat.

What could he say? He was a bigger genius than he thought!

Only by Earth standards, his ass...

One of these days he was going to procure himself a stuffed raccoon alien wannabe.

There was nothing much to say about what happened next. They got stones, Natasha sacrificed herself, the Avengers got hyped up, and Steve showed himself badass by being able to use Thor's hammer which for some reason made him some kind of righteous person despite the fact the hammer first belonged to Hela and she slaughtered entire planets with it, and then to an arrogant asshole that was Thor before his little outing to Mexico.

Worthy... pfft.

Okay, Tony might have had a bit of inferiority complex fixated on Captain America. Who wouldn't with a father like Howard Stark who was obsessed with the guy? It was completely normal! No homo.

The final battle, in Tony's opinion, was kinda pathetic up until Thanos ordered the bombardment. Frankly, he sometimes wondered what was in the guy's head. If he started the bombardment from the start before the armies engaged, he would have gained an overwhelming advantage.

His army was supposed to be the strongest in the known universe, at least according to Thor, but they had no technological advantage on the land. It was quite underwhelming.

And then Danvers showed her prowess, decimating Thanos's warship, and Tony was left bewildered again.

Like... couldn't she have done that sooner? Like, way sooner?

During his retrospective session in the orange realm, Tony also had to wonder... why did she not use the stones? She was one of the very few entities present on the battlefield that could most likely use them without dying.

Yet, when Tony saw Strange looking at him and showing him one finger, he instantly understood what the magic prick wanted from him and how the encounter would end for him.

When he got the stones, Tony hesitated. He didn't have a family to give him motivation and harden his resolve to sacrifice himself. His only friends were Rhodey, Happy, and Pepper and even then they slightly drifted apart because they all had too much work, their own families, or something else to focus on in the past five years. He also didn't think he owed the world anything. He did his best to make Earth a better place and then, he also had to give his own life?

It was unfair. So very, very unfair...

Yet, in the end, as he looked through the battlefield, Tony knew what he had to do and he snapped his fingers anyway, filled not with resolve but deep regret.