Chapter Text
Tony felt his breath quicken and traitorous tears shoot into his eyes, as his brain caught up with the mess in front of him. The mess he had caused. Shards of the destroyed glass were lying on the counter of the kitchen island as well as on the floor beneath it and the brownish liquid of his hot chocolate was quickly not only dripping down the island but also spreading in a river of dark fluid on the floor and had already seeped into the soft grey-ish carpet that separated the open kitchen area, with the island as a dividing element of the room, from the living area. Panic entered his young brain when he realised what he had done and no matter how harshly his dad screamed Stark men don’t cry in his head, the realisation that he had messed up badly broke the damn inside of him and tears started to stream relentlessly down his rosy cheeks. It soon became hard to breathe as well, sniffling sounds mixing up with the otherwise silent crying, and deep down the little boy knew exactly what choice words his Mamma or Dad would have to say to him if they could see him right now - or worse, knew that other people could see him like that. This thought only made him hiccup harder and cry snottier.
Had he been able to think straight, Tony could have probably come up with a plan to discard the evidence of this blatant fuck up, but the fear of the Avengers, of Captain America, scolding and punishing him was way too big, way too real and palpable for him not to give into panicked instincts. So little Tony did what he had learned to be best at: run and hide. He had learned to keep as silent as possible as to not draw his Dad’s attention or annoy the adults, he knew how to keep himself hidden so no one, not even drunk Howard, could find him to take their frustration out of him, and he knew how to run and keep away because he had been kidnapped before and he knew that Stark Industries had a no tolerance policy concerning ransom payment.
The hurried tap tap tap of barefooted feet on the floor could be heard loudly in the otherwise silent apartment, as Tony hurried his way down the dark and empty hallway, searching for an unused room with an inconspicuous cupboard to hide in. His panicked brain was working on autopilot and when it finally deemed one of the more seldomly used supply closets appropriate, Tony hurriedly got inside, closed the door behind him again and curled up on the cold floor, just letting the tears and snot run down his face, breathing unevenly and disrupted by frequent sobs. He knew he had been bad and he knew that Captain America hated bad boys and punished them - his Dad had always told him so after all. But it somehow had always seemed less real, less dangerous to him, when only the hurt of disappointing Captain Rogers had been on the table and his Dad had been the one doing the punishing than now, when the real Captain America lived on the same floor as him, was supposed to come home later that night from a mission and would find out just how big of a mess Tony had made and would definitely hurt him for it. Not that Tony didn’t deserve it, he knew he shouldn’t have done it. But he had seen how strong Captain Rogers was, how easily things could break in his superhuman hands, and Tony was so scared of being broken by those hands as well. He sure as hell would deserve it though.
Tony had known it was a bad idea, but at the time that hadn’t deterred him. Thoughts of punishment hadn’t been on his mind at all. Feeling smarter than everyone else, the small boy had naturally thought he would get away with it. When he had gotten it into his head that he wanted to drink this evening’s hot chocolate from one of the fancy glasses with the long handle and the golden rim all around on top, there had been no stopping him. When he had asked Mr. Bruce that evening to get one of them from the top shelf of the hanging cabinet that held all the glasses and cups, the scientist had just smiled gently and explained that those were the good wine glasses and they were saved for special occasions. Then he had proceeded to prepare Tony’s hot chocolate with extra whipped cream in an attempt to lighten his then subdued mood.
Tony had tried to get the fancy gold rim glasses out of his head, but somehow he couldn’t. He really wanted to try what it felt like to be a real adult and drink from a delicate glass like that. His mom always drank wine from them, so he bet the hot chocolate would just taste amazing!
He had not told Mr. Bruce that of course, but obediently prepared for bed afterwards, changing into his Pyjamas - the red ones with little Iron Man helmets all over them, that Mr. Rhodey had bought him shortly after he had woken up here (he was only wearing them because his favourite Captain America PJs were being washed right now, though) - brushing his teeth, playing a little with his robots until Mr. Bruce came to read him a bedtime story.
And hadn’t that been a weird change from living with his parents. Sure, Mr. Jarvis sometimes would try to find time and read to Tony, but here, without fault, no matter how many annoying questions he had posed throughout the day or how often he had interrupted the adults doing important adult things, the one who was assigned to tuck him in that night would always read him a story, sometimes even two. And being tucked in, yet another weird concept that Tony couldn’t really grasp, but surely wouldn’t complain about. Often, they would even brush through his hair or lay a warm hand on his cheek and he knew he shouldn’t crave those small touches so much, his dad always told him he shouldn’t be so needy, but it still felt good, almost like when on his birthday last year, his mamma had gently, yet absently, kissed his forehead or when Mr. Jarvis had hugged him tightly after he had come home with a scraped knee from when Timothy, who was way older and way bigger, had pushed Tony down the stairs after he had won the school’s science contest some months ago.
So yeah, Tony liked the new bedtime routine he had here and really hoped the adults wouldn’t find out any time soon that he didn’t actually need any supervision and could put himself to bed just fine.
After Mr. Bruce had left, Tony had waited in the dark for the steps to walk away, heard him rummaging in the kitchen and probably cleaning up, before finally the Ding! of the elevator announced his departure.
At the beginning, they had been hesitant to leave him alone. When he woke up here, they had set him up in a room on Captain Rogers’ floor of all people - and Tony had been really nervous about that, afraid that somehow he would manage to disappoint Captain America even in his sleep, so nervous in fact that he had ended up wetting the bed the very first night he had slept there and then crying himself into a hysteric fit because he had wet the bed and if dad found out, he would beat his ass for embarrassing the Stark name in front of the good Captain. But when Captain Rogers had hurried into his room (probably alerted by JARVIS, the traitor, about Tony’s mishap), he had looked so sad at Tony’s panicked attempts to tearfully apologise and just gently taken him to the bathroom, given him another bath, changed him into a new set of clothes, before taking him to his own bedroom and holding the sniffling boy close, soothingly caressing his hair until Tony had fallen asleep.
Since then, some time had passed and there had not been another accident. Tony had gotten used to sleeping in a room on Captain Rogers’ floor and while in the beginning, one of the Avengers had always stayed on the floor when he slept and Captain America wasn’t back yet so he wouldn’t be alone, between himself and JARVIS, he had been able to convince them they could leave for their own floors in the night instead of crashing on the couch. His parents’ mansion was just as vast and JARVIS would surely alert anyone, if he ever needed help. (And Tony sometimes liked to not sleep but read or build things and the telling Ding! of the elevator arriving on the floor would always inform him in time if someone was coming to check up on him in his room, so he could hurry back to bed, turn off the light and get under the covers, pretending to be asleep.)
So when Mr. Bruce had left, he had waited for another half hour to be sure he really was gone and also to make sure that Captain America wouldn’t be home yet, before he had gotten up on naked feet and silently had made his way into the kitchen, pushing a chair into position and placing the footstool on top of it to be high enough. Then he had climbed up to reach the top shelf of the cupboard to grab one of the sought-after glasses with the long handle and the golden rim. For a short moment, his climbing construction had swayed dangerously and for a second, the little boy had thought it would all come crashing down right then and there, with him on top of it, but to his great relief he had made it down safely, fancy wine glass in hand.
The next step had been heating some milk on the stove - back home, he had done so often with Jarvis or Ana, so he was a real pro at making hot chocolate! - and then letting the chocolate melt into it in the pot on the stove. When all was finally finished, it was time to pour it all in the beautiful glass, and hadn’t he been oh so excited at the prospect to drink something as yummy as the hot cocoa from a glass so fancy not even his parents had allowed him to touch them back at home (and normally, his parents made him use grown-up cutlery and utensils, unlike the Avengers who had gotten him extra kids plates and glasses, with cool drawings of the superheroes on them!).
So when he had slowly poured the steaming hot beverage into the thin-walled glass, all that had been on his mind had been excitement and joyful anticipation. Which made it all the worse when seemingly out of nowhere, already-half-full glass in hand, the glass suddenly and without any prior warning burst into three big shards that clattered loudly onto the floor, the brown liquid exploding all over his hand, and arm, and pyjama shirt and the floor, leaving the frozen boy with only the handle of the wine glass in his hand.
It had taken several seconds for his brain to catch up to what had just happened but when the reality finally had set in, the panic had struck him full blown. That was how the little boy found himself with quickening breath and tears stinging at his eyes, observing in horrid obsession the mess he had made.
He fought so hard to keep back tears, Stark men don’t cry, repeated over and over in his head in his Dad’s angry voice, but ultimately, he failed even that and once the first tear had spilled over, it was as if a dam had been broken. Hysteric sobs made their way up Tony’s throat and the terror of what he had done, how bad he had been, made it impossible for him to get any clear thought. Letting the rest of the broken glass fall to the floor and then running on naked feet to find a good hiding spot was no conscious decision.
It took Tony some long seconds to calm his breaths enough to be able to speak again. While the fear had never left his small body, he knew he needed to tie up all loose ends lest he risk one of the adults finding him and giving him to Cap for punishment.
“JARVIS?”, Tony whispered brokenly, scared to his bones.
“Yes, young Sir? Do you want me to contact one of your adult friends?”
“No, no please, please don’t tell any of them where I am, okay?”
“Young Sir, I don’t think that is a good idea, you appear to be in dire distress. Captain Rogers will be home soon, and Dr. Banner and Mr. Barton are both still up and about.”
“NO! No telling anyone where I am!”, came the panicked reply in a high pitched squeak. It was followed by several seconds of silence, probably JARVIS debating how deep his programming run, that forced him to ultimately obey his maker’s commands and whether the young Tony Stark still counted as said maker.
“Very well, young Sir. But allow me to say that I think this is a very bad idea and that none of the others would react in a way you currently seem to think they would. They all love you very much.”
More tears streamed down his face at that. Tony wished he could believe JARVIS, but he had heard the actual Mr. Jarvis say the same lie too many times before. (I’m sure your father loves you, Anthony. In his own way.)
Tony desperately wished to be able to turn the time back to before his nightly adventure. If he just hadn’t wanted to drink his stupid hot cocoa out of the stupid fancy glasses, none of this would have happened. Tony was just as dumb and useless and nothing more than a baby, as his Dad always told him. And now Mr. Bruce and Natasha and Clint and Captain America were finally gonna find out what a waste of time and space he really was and no one would ever read to him again or answer his many questions about space travel and dinosaurs and robots. Everything would go back to how it all had been back home, before he had woken up in the tower, and while Tony knew that he had lived like that and managed just fine until now, he also was so very afraid of losing what little of an openly affectionate family he had gained in the last weeks. Since arriving here he had been afraid of the adults suddenly realising how annoying he could be, and after seeing the mess he had made in Cap’s kitchen when he was supposed to be sleeping, nonetheless, he just knew they would finally give up on him and just hand him off to a nanny, so they wouldn’t have to bother with him anymore. Because Tony knew he was a bother. (Everyone always said so.)
Tony didn’t know how much time had passed. His little heart had long since stopped hammering wildly and slowed down to a somewhat normal pace again. The tears had also stopped flowing after what had felt like an eternity. His feet were so cold and he was really really tired by now, sitting in the dark in the chilly cupboard, no real space to move, but he didn’t dare move, lest anyone find him. So far, no one had come down to the floor so no one had found the mess he had made yet when the Ding! of the elevator cut through the complete silence, Tony’s breath hitched automatically. He strained his ear to listen in fearful anticipation and from the sound of the steps out of the elevator and onto the wooden flooring, he just knew it was Captain Rogers that had finally come back home from his mission.
Maybe he should have confessed to Mr. Bruce right away, Tony suddenly thought. When his Dad came back from meetings late at night he would always get so much more angry and so much rougher with Tony, so it probably would be the same with Cap, right?
Tears suddenly started to brim in his eyes once more. Maybe if he had just confessed to Mr. Bruce right away, he could have taken care of Tony’s punishment. And even if the Hulk would have made an appearance during it, it surely would have been preferable to angering an exhausted Captain Rogers who just came back home after a long day of working.
A small whimper of fear escaped Tony’s throat before he shoved one of his hands in his mouth, biting down harshly, to keep from making any further sounds.
Yet the noise had alerted the supersoldier, because Tony heard the steps coming to an abrupt halt when hearing the noise, before taking off in direction of his room.
He was really glad he hadn’t chosen the obvious hiding spot under the bed, because surely he would have been found there right away. And maybe if Captain America didn’t find him, they would just forget about him and then no one would shout at him and tell him how bad he was and hurt him.
He was deep in his scary thoughts when suddenly the Captain’s frantic voice made him come back to reality. “Tony? Tony! Where are you, buddy? Jarvis, lights!”
He had probably found his empty bed now and would any second start his search for the disobedient child.
And sure enough, some seconds after, Tony heard the steps walking through the apartment, looking first in the bathroom, then in the living room for him, before they started to make their way to the kitchen.
(Tony still remembered the last time he had made a big mess at home and Dad had been the one to catch him. If Mr. Jarvis caught him doing something bad, he always made Tony clean up after him and talked to him about dangers of certain situations and asked a lot of questions about his reasons, before scolding him. But Dad never asked questions or made time to understand what Tony had been trying to do. Dad just got angry and screamed at Tony and told him how useless he was. And if it was already late and Dad had maybe already drunk a glass or two of his grown-up-drink, or maybe if he had had a long day at work, then he would smack Tony around in anger first, before giving him a harsh spanking later.)
He knew Captain America would do the same, Dad had told him so time and time again. Especially if he found him crying like a baby, hiding in a cupboard (Dad always hated it when he was weak and tried to hide or cried.) But Tony really feared how much it would hurt when Cap would hit him. Surely a whole lot! (Surely a whole lot more than when Dad hit him, and that already hurt lots.)
He should just have listened to Mr. Bruce and accepted that he would not get to drink out of the fancy glasses. They weren’t for babies like Tony, who just made big messes whenever.
“Tony, are you okay? Jarvis, where is Tony? Is he okay? What happened?”
He only heard him muffled through the cupboard and on the other side of the apartment, but it was obvious Cap was distressed (and Tony had caused it).
There were steps and he heard the bathroom door open, and close again shortly after. Tony held his breath really long, until he couldn’t anymore, because he didn’t want to alert Captain Rogers to his presence. He knew he had super hearing, so even when he had to breathe again because his lungs burnt really badly, he tried to do it as silently as possible.
“JARVIS!”
Captain America’s voice sounded strained and angry.
“Yes, Captain Rogers?”
“Did you hear my question? Where is Tony? What happened?”
There was a short pause and Tony hoped against all odds, that JARVIS would do as he had bidded and not rat him out. Maybe if he could just manage to stay hidden until the morning, then maybe Captain America’s anger might have died down a little, and then he could just clean up his mess and apologize and maybe he would get off with a scolding and a spanking, but nothing more. (And maybe he would not be sent away.)
Relief flooded little Anthony’s body at the AI’s response. “I am really sorry, Captain Rogers, but young Sir has instructed me not to reveal his location.”
“What? JARVIS please, what is going on? What happened? Is Tony okay?”
“There was an incident. I can assure you, Sir is not bodily harmed, but he appeared to be in a lot of distress.”
Tony whimpered a little before he could repress the sound when the AI started to lay out more information. Incident was a word the adults always used to describe that something bad happened. It was for when everyone knew it was something bad, but no one wanted to say it. And now Captain America would be even angrier, for sure!
(Not even talking about the part of him being in a lot of distress. Stark men don’t cry, he knew that, Dad always sad so. The lessons just didn’t seem to translate into his brain and sometimes he just couldn’t stop the stupid tears from entering his eyes, no matter how hard he tried to push them down. He really didn’t want to have more lessons on this particular rule.)
JARVIS’ response only seemed to agitate Captain America further though, and Tony listened with rising dread how the supersoldier seemed to methodically opened door and cupboard, one after the other, in his search for him.
“Tony, please, are you alright? It’s Steve, I’m really worried about you, buddy.”
Captain America’s voice sounded so honest and Tony really, truly only wanted to jump out of his hiding space and run to the blond man as fast as his little legs would carry him. He really wanted to be held in a warm hug by his hero and be told that everything was fine.
But Tony knew that nothing would be fine. He had made a big mess. He had broken the rules. And when Mr. Bruce told the Captain that he had even told Tony not to use the glasses, the Captain would surely get even angrier at Tony.
He should have known it was not a good plan though, to try and hide it out. Tony was only ever able to delay the inevitable. (And Tony knew that adults always got even more angry, when you left them waiting.) After minutes and minutes of looking in every room, under every piece of furniture and in every cupboard on the floor, Captain America finally opened the wooden doors that led to his hiding place.
He couldn’t suppress a scared whimper when the menacing silhouette of Captain America’s broad shoulders appeared in his line of vision, still clad in his uniform, because apparently he had gone straight from returning form his mission to searching for Tony.
(This was right out of Tony’s nightmares. This was right what his dad had always said would happen, if he kept up being such a bad boy. Captain America would find him and teach him to behave.)
***
When Steve opened the cupboard door, several things happened at once. He felt such relief at finally having found the little boy, but at the same time, his heart started hammering in overdrive in concern. The little boy looked completely exhausted. His eyes were red rimmed and swollen from probably crying for hours and what was even worse, he looked completely afraid.
At realizing Steve had found him, he panickedly raised his arms in front of his head - Steve wasn’t sure if it was a defensive posture or a placating one. Either way, he felt like just crawling in there right with the boy and just curl up and cry with him, at how horrible everyone in his life had to have treated him. Oh, and maybe he wanted to punch Howard just a little bit as well.
“I’m r-really s-sorry Captain ‘merica, S-sir.”, the little boy then pitifully started to hiccup.
Scratch that prior thought, he wanted to punch Howard a lot.
“I-i made a r-real big m-mess even though I know bet-better…”
A sob started to ripple through the tiny body and Steve was absolutely aghast at how anyone could ever have hurt him.
“A-and I’m real s-sorry f-for hiding, I kn-know I'm not a baby a-anymore and should t-take my, my punish-ment like a man.”
More and more tears streamed down his face, snot covering his whole nose. Steve had to strain to understand him between his hiccuping and stuttering and sobbing.
“And I know I'm not spo-sup-supposed to st-stutter, Sir, pleasedon’tbeatme…”
Oh and didn't that just absolutely break Steve's heart.