The problem is it's very hard to tell when a superhero is recklessly endangering himself versus when he's accepting the very real dangers of the job. Tony, who is the embodiment of reckless on a good day, doesn't know if Captain America is throwing himself into his work because it's his work, or because secretly he wishes he were dead.

It scares him. And the fact that it scares him also scares him. Tony is used to being a shallow jerk; he's very good at it. Caring about Steve to the point that he worries if the guy goes off his own personal radar for more than an hour is seriously fucking with him.

There is a pattern. At twelve he surrounds himself with engine parts and tries not to think about the empty spaces. Fourteen and it's the first time he hears about molecular engineering, nanotech and how to bend the laws of physics as he knows them. He meets Rhodey and booze and the three become the kind of friends that don't need explanation.

Pepper and Steve totally ignore Tony as the agree on what to do with him. It's decided that the next day they'll pack up whatever crap Tony wants to bring with him (mostly research that will be carefully vetted before leaving the tower), and he and Pepper will move back into his Park Avenue house; Steve promises to visit a couple of days later. The way they're talking about it, it sounds like it's sort of a permanent thing. Tony decides that he doesn't want to be disabused of that idea, and lets them hash out the details as if he wasn't there.

[Sequel to Commitments by boombangbing]

The subject just says "Re: Today" and Steve clicks on it even before the little preview sentence is there.

"He doesn't know what to do about you. You might just have to let him buy you things for a while before he figures out that he doesn't have to try to buy your affections."

There's a brief "P." above a formal signature reading "Virginia Potts, CEO Stark Industries" above lines of incomprehensible ways to contact her.

"Blah blah civil rights liberty Nazis," Steve said, more or less, in a very serious voice. Tony yawned and pressed closer to his side. He'd had been taking call after call from various news organisations who were probably hoping for outraged comments about the sanctity of marriage and the general depravity of the modern age. Steve had the glitter in his eye that suggested he was enjoying disappointing scandal hunters, and Tony had tuned out the stream of platitudes an hour ago in favour of channel-surfing for reactions. Some sort of religious fundamentalist was predicting the downfall of society on Fox; Steve's eyes narrowed dangerously. "Blah blah *justice for all* God is love. Hitler." he said - or something like that - and slammed the phone shut. "Turn that off. Or over. Go back to the channel with all the dancing and cheering."

Steve hugged his knees to his chest gleefully. Any minute now, he'd get up and tell someone, and they'd be excited together, but right now it was just him and the TV, and he could privately glory in what America was becoming.

"What are we supposed to do? Put out an Amber Alert for Captain America?" Coulson demanded.

“Stark, did you just make Captain America come out?” Clint asked from the corner, one hand on his bow. “Christ, never mind the suit. It’s your mouth that’s the deadly weapon.”

“I know,” Tony said, happily, watching the way Steve’s neck was getting redder and redder. “It’s one of my best features.”

He can see the line of Steve's bare back, the breath that pushes into his body, too fast, uneven, and he wonders what Steve sees when he looks at the wall.

"What year is it?" Steve asks.

"Twenty-twelve," Tony replies, and he sits up slowly, lets the sheets slide loose, doesn't touch. He remembers this – how he felt sure he would shatter. There are grey spaces, empty time where he thinks perhaps he did.

I don't have a problem with opportunism. What I have a problem with is that we are asked to root for him as an agent of justice despite the fact that he is clearly impulsive, compulsive, and deeply narcissistic to the extent that he does not see how privileged he really is. The movies establish him as someone who does what he wants, when he wants, and because he wants to do it; and that the reason he does what he does is that he is so completely lacking in self esteem that merely doing these things makes him feel better, without any thought to the greater ramifications thereof.

"What happened to him before?" Steve interrupts. There's a growing feeling of unease in his stomach, and worse, he recognizes it. Ever since he walked away from Tony he's mentally been cataloging the way Tony hunched around his injured shoulder, favoring his arm, and the unsteadiness in his hands, and the way he swallowed like there was some sort of sour taste lingering in his mouth. He recognizes the symptoms—not precisely, but close enough.

Tony being insecure and Steve reassuring him. WITH HIS PENIS.

“It’s like living with a bunch of drunk, stoned, super powered, genius toddlers with ADHA,” Coulsen moaned, staring out the window as Thor, Banshee and Havok crouched behind a bush, stalking a duck on the other side (clearly, ducks had joined squirrels on their list of enemies). Acrid black smoke was billowing out of one of the labs where Hank and Bruce were working. Tony and Steve were sitting on the lawn (Fury had wondered about the picnic basket he’d seen Xavier pass Starke earlier), nibbling on bread, cheese and fruit, while Xavier and Lehnsherr were off somewhere, “playing chess”.

Everyone knew what that was code for.

Two events were a coincidence, three was a pattern, ten was time to sit up, take notice, and admit that yeah, maybe villains really were trying to rip Captain America's clothes off.

"The taller one. The other..." Charles frowns in concentration, eyes narrowing slightly. "Well, that's unexpected."

At that precise moment, the other agent turns and gives them both a hard, quick look. Nothing else changes in his placid demeanor. Charles blinks, and the man turns back to Hank's presentation.

"He suspects what we are," Charles says quietly. "And unlike his friends, he actually believes that our powers are real."

"Yup," says Bucky, a little proudly, "it might be seventy years in the damn future, but I can still get smashed right. Some things never change."

"Speaking of-" starts Steve, and Bucky fists a hand in Steve's t-shirt and pulls him down to eye-level, says, "Yeah, speaking of stuff I think I'm gonna do different this time-"

“Bad judge,” Tony says, gesturing at himself and spilling water all down his shirt, “of character. Like. Always. Thought Rhodey was a dick too, felt like an ass later--liked Pepper from the beginning, she was always good, she’s like. The exception. And fucking Obie, I always get it wrong. People’re hard.”

“So I should...take it as a compliment?” Steve says, sounding completely at sea. “That you thought I was a dick?”

“Smarter,” Tony says. “If I’d thought you were good you’d probably be like. Uh. Plotting...things, are you plotting things, no one has tried to kill me in awhile, but I don’t think you would. That’s a compliment, sorry I called you a dick. You’re not. A dick, I mean.”

Steve stares at him for a second, then sighs and shakes his head. “You’re a complicated guy, Tony, has anyone ever told you that?”

More than anything else, he just wanted Tony’s company. It was part of being together to share the same bed, or he’d always thought so, and, well, it was lonely and oddly disorienting, lying in Tony’s big bed by himself while Tony was working down here. Steve didn’t mind—well, not much—but he would have preferred Tony there with him. And it couldn’t be good for Tony to keep the hours he did, anyway.

“It’s me,” a voice replies, distinctly not Pepper. “You gave me an access code for your garage and I was told that you weren’t in your office, so…”

Steve's eyes flicker open. “What's wrong?” he says around a yawn.

She heaves a sigh, looking round at him. “Tony destroying the company yet again. Sex tape, you know, the usual.”

[Sequel to Magnetic by boombangbing]

From Steve’s perspective, a little more than a year ago, he lost one of the people he loved best in the world. Then, a little less than a year ago, he woke up and found that he had lost the other one in his sleep. But Tony wants him to celebrate.

Tony dragged his eyes off Thor's chest. Stupid sex spores, he thought, and stupid air filters in the armor. He was completely unaffected – well, unaffected by the spores, Thor was definitely starting to affect him, as was the sight of Steve's naked chest streaked with golden dust and the sounds Spiderwoman was making somewhere to his left. He was going to have to bow out of an orgy of beautiful, flexible people, at least two of whom he'd been fantasizing about for years. Life was not fair sometimes.

He had always loved Tony and Steve. They embodied traits he had always admired, and knew he would never master himself. Tony with his charisma, confidence, and brilliance. Steve with his charisma, confidence, and nobility. Even when they stumbled, dragging Peter’s world down with them, he had loved them. It wasn’t until the second time he shared a bed that he fell in love with them.

Tony Stark lives a double life; he's secretly the supervillain known as Iron Man. But his loving husband Steve has a few secrets of his own, as Tony is about to discover.

Tony blinked at her. "Peter Parker is my roommate. He lives two doors down from here. Why did he feel the need to schedule a lunch appointment with my PA instead of wandering down here around lunchtime and asking if I wanted a burger?" "If I had to guess," Pepper said as she tucked her tablet away and turned to the door, shepherding Rhodey ahead of her, "it's because he's seen how good you are at blowing off other reporters."

Years of searching. Years of disappointment. He’d all but given up on ever finding his mate – and now here he was, standing in front of him. His mate was Captain America.

"Is there a reason you are staring at one of my men?" Darcy knows Agent Coulson is asking her something, but she's almost remembered where -- "Oh." "Ms. Lewis?" "I totally had sex with that guy in a bathroom in Jacksonville a couple of years ago." It's like one of those record scratch moments, because she doesn't say it very loudly, but pretty much everything around them just stops. The lackey who she's just identified as that guy she slept with at the Pickled Parrot (what a shithole of a bar, really) freezes in place, his shoulders up around his ears.

In which Tony Stark and Thor talk about being betrayed by people they trusted and loved, and then get drunk.

"Mr. Parker, you said on the phone that you could put me in touch with Spider-Man." The kid looks up, wide-eyed. "Right. Well- y'see- I'm kind of his... agent."

Tony and Pepper are in a committed relationship, everyone knows that. Tony still flirts relentlessly with Steve, though, and Steve doesn't know what to make of it. Then he starts having weird feelings about Pepper too, and he really, really doesn't know what to make of *that*.

In the ensuing silence, punctuated only by Dummy's soft whirring, Tony had a moment of crystal clarification that usually only came with technical breakthroughs. The love in Steve's voice was achingly deep—but the mirroring anguish was equally strong. Steve needed Bucky right now, and Tony would do anything to give Steve what he needed, regardless of anything else.

Interested in reading up on your favorite Avengers, but unsure where to start? There are official DVD libraries of back issues and Marvel Digital Unlimited on offer, but what to read? Don't want to sit through five issues of Cap hallucinating for no particularly good reason? Now there's an online guide for that! Well, two.

“Like, you’re set really. You have the mustache,” Clint ran his greasy fingers over his nonexistent mustache, leaving a dark line on one half. Tony remained silent on the matter, patting the ground in search of his grease rag. No such luck. He sat up, planting his feet on either side of the creeper so as not to roll away. “Not to mention you’re already sleeping with the Captain friggin’ America. Just set up a camera in your room.”

Phil would just like to state for the record that this was all Tony Stark's fault.

Summary: Romancing Steve Rogers is hard enough. The last thing Tony Stark needs is a rival. In the shape of Iron Man.

"It's not normal to leave bruises on your partner," Steve said angrily. "I can't - how can you think this - "

"It's simple," Bucky said. "You walk up to the girl, say, 'Do you want to dance?' and off you go."

He opened his mouth, intending to reassure Steve, but what came out was, “God, I really want to blow you.” Panic immediately twisted his stomach, but the "Never mind, shit, just forget I said" that stalled at the complete and utter incomprehension on Steve’s face. “Blow me where?” Steve asked. Tony opened and closed his mouth, for once speechless. Steve gave him an uncertain smile. “Is this another superpower or something?”

Steve shrugs. “I know you don’t like me much. Or at least that’s what you said. But I think we’re friends anyway.” He gets up and leaves, before Tony can puncture the moment with a joke.

Tony thinks they needs to talk. Steve isn't sure that's a good sign. Meanwhile, The Avengers prove they really know how to throw a party. [Sequel to Breaking News]

Steve leaned back against the couch and watched Tony's impromptu little dance as he tapped at his phone. He loved Tony like this, excited and happy and practically bursting at the seams with energy. "Marry me," Steve said. Tony's head snapped up and he blinked at Steve. "Seriously?"

In which Tony mouths off to a witch, catches up on his beauty sleep, and learns that True Love might not be such a crock after all. (His status as a princess, however, is still debatable.)

Summary: The reasons not to join the Avengers were many and varied. The problem was that when Captain America smiled at him, Tony had trouble remembering what they were.

Tony is the WWII hero waking up in the future.

Written for the Thor kink meme, Avengers movie-verse. Tony gets a look at his new team mates and decides he needs to sleep with all of them. Thor and Steve take notice and decide to double team him.

Tony vs the tabloids is an ongoing battle. These headlines might be the winning shot.

AU at the end of Ultimates 2. Time passes. The Ultimates try to work out where they're going and what they're doing, with a moderate level of success.

Tony Stark is trying to set up a new superhero team when he's given a sex change, courtesy of Victor von Doom. He copes with that about as well as you'd expect.

In the seven territories built out of the ruins of New York City, no one has managed to match Tony Stark as either a technologist or a unicorn rider. But when Tony's secrets come back to haunt him, even Captain Rogers and his mysterious lover might not be able to save him, or the city.

Summary: Some of the Avengers misinterpret Steve and Tony's actions, and assume they're dating. Meanwhile, aliens are visiting Earth.

"Such things may be discussed later," Thor says finally, quietly, "and while I will not deny that I am angry, you are my shield brother still, and there is precious little in existence for which I could not forgive you." Even Thor, in spite of his godhood, has made at least one terrible error in judgement in the past; an unthinking blow he himself dealt to Steve, for which he has long been forgiven. "I will not leave you here alone."

"'Inside source'?" Luke repeated from just behind Peter, making him jump. When Peter turned to look at him, Luke's face was drawn in disgust. "More like, 'shit we made up on the fly'. Who the hell talks to these people?"

Thor doesn't knock on Tony's front door. Tony had insisted that Thor simply walk in ("After all, old boy, what could you possibly catch me doing that would embarrass me?"), especially since there isn't a point to knocking; indeed, the door is always unlocked by the time Thor reaches it. Tony says that there is a sensor a few feet from the door that recognizes who approaches, and subsequently unlocks the door for friends. Thor cares little for the specifics; it is the meaning that matters. Tony's home is, quite literally, always open to him.

Summary: The New Avengers get their powers switched around. Peter sniffs people. Steve sticks to things. Logan lies around and drinks beer. In a surprising twist, Steve and Tony make out.

It was insane. Three days ago, they'd all walked away without a scratch after taking out a heavily guarded HYDRA compound upstate. Now Tony was in the hospital, and all they'd done was go out to dinner. Steve fought down an irrational urge to protest that there had to be some sort of mistake, that things just weren't supposed to happen this way.

Henry counts ten slow ticks of the clock on his bedroom wall, until Tony says, "I don't have a drinking problem."

Steve let go of Tony’s right hand, freeing his left hand to rest on the small of Tony’s back. It took Tony a moment to recognize the slow-quick step of the foxtrot, and a moment longer to take up Steve’s lead. He hadn’t danced the foxtrot in years, and he was unused to doing it backwards. Steve smiled. “Also, this song is familiar and comfortable, like you. And this song makes me happy, like you do.”