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“Thanks for your help out there,” Tony says and wags his eyebrows. He cuts his eyes to the left and then to the right and crouches lower, like he’s telling a secret, “Bruce Wayne.”
The man in question sighs and looks to the ground, not dignifying him with a response. He’s becoming increasingly aware that his identity is the worst kept secret in the superhero community and he’s not shocked that Tony Stark, of all people, knows.
Behind Bruce is the rest of his team. Superman is scouring the skies above and Diana and Aquaman are using their strength to clear the rubble out of the road. To the side of him is the Flash talking fast and loud about the battle to a less than impressed Cyborg- looking on ahead, unmoved with his hood up.
Tony could wait longer for a response, could probably needle the man some more because, honestly, the guy looks like a grumpy cat who could do with some pushing, but he takes his cue to leave with some grace this time around. Something about seeing their team work cohesively and amiably together stings- that they should prosper where he had tried so desperately, over and over again, and failed anyways. No, he can’t stay any longer. He can already tell that he’s a little much for them, and what’s new? That’s true for everybody he meets.
He does a two finger salute before the face plate closes back on him, “Well, it was nice talking to you guys. See you when the next big bad tries to kill us all again.”
*
So, it’s not that long until the next big bad tries to kill them all. Actually, it’s only a week- which, lately, is their average lag time between villains cropping up. You could say that they’re on a roll.
This time it’s god-knows-the-fuck-what (slime maybe? All they’ve got is that it’s gross and poisonous) spilling up out of the sewers in Gotham. It’d be a simple plug the leak and cleanup job if not for the fact it erodes anything that comes in contact with it.
Tony sees this on the news with that one Daily Planet reporter (Lois something?) after an alert from F.R.I.D.A.Y. along with “Our very own Justice League, already on the scene-” and he’s already running calculations using the composite data available on the substance because oh, god if they’re anything like the Avengers, then they’re going to try to punch their way through the fucking slime, and that won’t end well.
It takes about ten minutes for him to come to the solution but after running everything through F.R.I.D.A.Y. for double checking, he’s suited up and ready to go. A simple combination of tomato juice, water, and vinegar should render whatever it is harmless. It’ll be kind of like giving the entire place a skunk bath, but at least nobody will die.
--
By the time he gets there, the streets have been evacuated and the entire Justice League is bent over the Batmobile having a hushed discussion about how to handle the situation, as opposed to just jumping into it.
He lands right beside them (greeted by a cheerful “Iron Man!” from the Flash) and explains his findings before anybody can ask him why he’s here. Bruce looks skeptical, but does a small test on a piece of slime inching dangerously close to his shoe and is reasonably convinced after that.
“Barry, you’ll be the fastest, can you go get some more,” Bruce squints down at the paper where Tony haphazardly wrote all his math down earlier, “Tomato juice, vinegar, and water so we can clean this thing up.”
The kid practically jumps at the chance and Tony is reminded of his own fondness and constant worry for the spiderling.
“Sure thing boss. Anybody need anything?,” he emphasizes this by doing a circle around all of them in a millisecond, “Water, Soda, Candy…”
Bruce gives him a look, translatable even from behind his mask as Just go already, and the kid raises his hands in surrender and leaves, while Bruce smiles after him.
The scene is so warm and touching, and it’s never what Tony’s had with his own team. Every conversation between him and the Avengers is forced and stilted. There’s no friendship there and certainly no trust, at least not for him. They work like a well oiled machine on the field, but after? After he’s still just their consultant, just their pet kept on a very tight leash, only doled out when it becomes convenient to the rest of them, when they need somebody to die for the cause because they have Captain America to live for it.
Tony sighs to himself and gets ready to leave. He figures his work is done here. They probably won’t want him to stick around and step on their toes.
“Hey, Iron Man, thanks for your help today. We really appreciate it. This is some brilliant stuff you came up with.”
Bruce holds out his hand for him to shake, and Tony takes it, mostly because he’s kind of stunned, and slightly because he doesn’t really know how to respond to genuine praise these days.
Wonder Woman steps forward and puts her hand on Bruce’s arm, “Listen, we’re sure you’re busy, but after we do things like this, we all like to have dinner together and talk. You’re welcome to join us.”
The rest of their team nods along and Tony agrees to join because he can’t bring himself to turn down their kindness.
--
After clean up, they all head in the Batmobile (which Tony is solidly impressed by the sleekness and design of. It takes all of his self control not to openly praise it to Bruce on the way over.) to Wayne Manor where a slick butler by the name of Alfred Pennyworth has been waiting patiently for them.
He greets them all at the door where Bruce dropped them while he brings his car around, and while Tony has long since sent the armor off, the man seems to know exactly who he is anyways.
“Ah, Mr. Stark. Jarvis used to speak very highly of you,” he says while leading them all down the hall to the dining room. And, okay, that’s not what Tony had expected. Is there like a secret butler meeting club that he missed or something? If anything he expected Alfred to bring up the Avengers, or S.I.- Not Jarvis who’s died twice over now, which somehow hurt just as much each time.
He’s so caught up in thoughts about Jarvis that eh never actually responds and then Alfred has already pulled a chair out for him at the table. Tony nods his thanks to him, and it’s minutes later when Bruce rejoins them, freshened and changed into a nice three piece suit.
Bruce pours each of them a little white wine, which Tony doesn’t outrightly decline, but doesn’t touch it either because he’s sober, okay? And conversation flows freely after that. They all talk easily about their day outside of superheroing. Clark (not Superman- Clark) is in the middle of wedding planning with his girlfriend and it’s so frustrating that they’re very close to just eloping. Bruce and Diana have been visiting different museums recently and are in talks to renovate a European art exhibit. The kid, Barry, still doesn’t have a job, much to everyone's chagrin, but he’s trying his best. The only one not participating is Victor who sits with his hood still up right next to Tony.
“So, Tony, what are your plans for-,” somebody starts to say but that’s the exact moment that Tony notices that the hole in Cyborg’s sweatshirt is growing larger.
“Can I see your arm?,” he asks, turning directly to face him.
The other look confused by the request but the kid hands his arm over, and Tony rolls up his sweatshirt, takes what’s left of his solution from earlier,and dabs it on using a napkin. Bruce stands and crosses over to hover at Cyborg’s other side.
“Vic, you should’ve told us you got hit,” he says, and puts a comforting hand on Victor’s shoulder.
Thankfully, the damage is superficial, and only slightly rusted the cybernetics of his arm, but Tony knows that it could have been much worse. The guy is called Cyborg for a reason and Tony has worked on Barnes’ arm enough to take a guess as to why Victor wears this hoodie all the time, and why he didn’t tell anybody that he was injured. He works quickly on the arm to make the boy more comfortable, and when he’s finished, Tony makes a joke about the vinegar smell to divert attention away from them and the night continues peacefully.
*
He should stop thinking about it, but he can’t. He’s not a member of the Justice League, and it’s not his responsibility, but he wants to reach out to and make sure the kid, Victor, is okay.
It’s not Tony’s place, and he knows that, but he knows a little about Victor’s past now, and if he can help-
It’s not that they’re alike, because they are very much not but he had to put the giant glowing glorified car battery back in his chest, and people stare, so he sort of gets it. The Arc Reactor is nowhere near on the same scale as what Victor went through, but they both struggle with the same issue- and, okay, Tony can’t walk away without knowing that Victor is going to be okay. Sue him. It looks like a trip to Gotham is in order.
*
He took the jet out instead of the suit to show that he’s not coming down for business. Besides- New York to New Jersey is a short flight, and he needed time to think.
Victor is staying in Wayne Manor, for the time being and it feels a bit odd to be standing at Bruce Wayne’s front door ringing the bell like he’s an everyday acquaintance come down to catch up over tea or something.
Jesus, his hands are sweating by the time Alfred answers the door.
“Mr. Stark, it’s nice to see you. Master Wayne is working on a project right now, but he’ll be up in a few moments, if you’d like to wait for him.”
Tony stops to lean against the doorway and rubs his palms together, “Actually, is Victor here?”
Alfred raises his eyebrow, but says, “Yes, follow me,” and leads him to what appears to be a study, just off the main entrance. Victor is sat at the desk inside pouring over textbooks, all of which are stamped on the side Property of Gotham City University Library.
Tony walks over and lifts the cover of one up- Principles of Biology. Ah, a science kid, after his own heart then.
Victor glances over and tries quickly to tidy the area a bit.
“I haven’t been back to school since the accident. Bruce thinks I should enroll again.”
“I can help you, if you want. This stuff is like the alphabet to me.”
That at least gets a smile out of the kid.
“Thanks, Mr. Stark, but I don’t even know if I want to go back.”
Tony sits himself on the edge of the desk and drums his fingers against the wood.
“And why’s that?”
Victor huffs seat and angrily tosses another book onto the pile on the desk, before putting his head in his hands.
“Kid, I’m going to say this once, and only once. Who gives a fuck what they think?”
Cyborg bangs his fist against the desk and jumps up.
“What would you know?!,” he yells, and Tony pulls the hem of his tee shirt down to reveal the Arc Reactor in it’s full glory. Victor deflates, and sits down again.
“It’s not the same.”
Tony puts a hand on his shoulder.
“No, but it’s as close to the same as either of us is going to get.”
*
It gets easier, after that. Slowly, he encourages Victor to go back to school, to show himself off more, to be the cocky confident kid he was before the accident.
He ends up spending a lot of time at Wayne Manor, days, sometimes weeks, at a time. He has friendly arguments with Bruce about the Batsuit vs. the Iron Man armor. Him and Barry play video games in the living room until 3 am. Diana guides him through classical art in a way that reminds him of Pepper. Him and Arthur make terrible, stupid bets against each other that neither of them win until somebody else has to declare it over. He pokes fun at Clark for being a farm-boy and Clark pokes fun right back at him by publishing fluff bait articles about Iron Man in the Daily Planet. And, well, if he’s around and the Justice League need help then he has no reason not to lend a hand. He doesn’t realize that he’s getting attached to all of them until he already is. Damn.
*
The second he realizes it, he tries to distance himself. He takes the jet back to New York before anybody wakes up and the second he lands he’s greeted by Natasha on the platform.
“Stark. You’ve been gone awhile.”
She’s sizing him up, again. Always.
“So I have.”
She confused, he can tell. He just doesn’t have the energy to feed into her game anymore. She’s a spy and she doesn’t know how to be anything different. He understands that much, but some information isn’t hers to have.
She hands him a file and turns on her heel to leave.
“Suit up. We’re assembling.”
*
He knows now why F.R.I.D.A.Y. didn’t alert him to the call to assemble. There’s not even a big bad here. It’s just another ex-Hydra base raid- the purpose of which damn sure wasn’t in that file, and has yet to be uncovered.
It’s not that bad, really. It’s a fast job and if he focuses and tunes out the comms then he can pretend that he doesn't hear anybody hounding him to be careful with the practically ancient technology he’s hacking. In fact, he’d almost call it boring, and he’s relieved when F.R.I.D.A.Y. sounds with an alert through the suit’s speakers.
“Boss, The Justice League is under heavy attack by an unidentified group in downtown Metropolis. They have requested your assistance.”
He hears a curt, “Stark-” through the comms before he flies out of signal.
*
The Injustice Gang? Really? It takes them two hours to fight these guys off only to find out that they call themselves the Injustice Gang. What a rip off.
There city seems mostly intact, at least. They fled after being defeated, but whoever these villains were they either have really good aim or a personal vendetta against the Justice League, and Tony says as much to Bruce.
“They wouldn’t be the first,” he says before pausing, “There a reason you ran off so early this morning?”
Tony doesn’t know how to explain it to them. That they’re the Justice League, and he’s him, and that they have a good thing that he’ll just taint and ruin if he sticks around. He doesn’t know how to tell them that he left because it’s easier than waiting for them to inevitably get tired of him.
He opens his mouth to respond but thankfully he’s saved by the quinjet, landing smack dab in the middle of the road.
The whole team steps out, to stand opposite the Justice League. Steve immediately greets them all by name and asks what happened here, only to have it explained by Barry in the most erratic form of storytelling possible.
At the end of it Clint shrugs, and resheathes his bow, “See, told you they didn’t need Stark.”
Steve pinches the bridge of his nose and waves Clint off.
“Tony, we’ve talked about this. The team comes first,” he says, and Tony’s glad he has his faceplate up because the only thing he can think is how the team didn’t come first when he was lied to for years about his parents and left to die in Siberia.
it’s Victor who comes to his save in the end.
“Well then it’s a good thing that we’re his team, huh?”
Tony wishes he could take a picture of the Avenger’s faces right now, but he settles for speaking instead, and looks to where he’s surrounded on either side by his team.
“Yeah, it is.”