Fic: If You Want Blood, Ch. 3

[mytay]

If You Want Blood, Chapter 3

By: Mytay

Rating: PG-13

Summary: Revenge is proving to be a difficult path for the morally grey Tony Stark, especially since the Captain he brought along to act as his counterweight isn't the clean-cut, no-grey-area hero Tony believed him to be.

Disclaimer: Marvel and its characters in no way belong to me - Disney owns almost all of my childhood. The story and chapter titles belong to songs by AC/DC.

Spoilers: For Captain America: The Winter Soldier, if somehow you haven't seen that yet.

Notes: This story is also posted here on AO3 and here on fanfiction.net.


Chapter 3: Night Prowler

"Would you have stopped me if I had sent him back home to die?" Tony knew exactly what the outcome of his actions would have been; he neatly stored what remained of his conscience away for later dealings.

"No." And that was it, plain and simple. But coming from Captain America, it was plainly and simply disturbing.

"Jesus, Steve." Tony did not know what to do with a morally ambiguous Captain America. Not when Tony was on the verge of taking years of pain out on his next target. He'd almost done it to Dweck, and a part of him regretted not doing so.

Steve then helped assuage some of his concern with a softly exhaled breath and further elaboration. "If you had tried to kill him yourself, I would have stopped you. If you hadn't given him a choice, I would have stopped you. But you did give him a choice. He made the right one. It all worked out."

"That's . . . not your usual modus operandi."

All he received in return was a faintly curious expression. "What is that to you, Tony? I'm not here to have my motives questioned at every turn - I made my position pretty clear at the start."

He had, but Tony was a little uncomfortable seeing it in action. The man he had fought with in New York had not been this cold, and the man his father had regaled him with stories about had not been this calculated.

It was disconcerting. It was tugging at him in ways he couldn't qualify. And he didn't have time to overanalyze it all right now.

"Okay, Cap - we're off to Spain."

"Sounds nice," Steve said companionably. "And how are we dealing with this one?"

"I've already been dealing with him from a distance. All that's left is the finishing blow."

Federico Burlington was a quiet man, not unlike Nizar/Dweck had been. Burlington understood what it meant to lay low. He never made extravagant purchases with his considerable wealth; he forwent the use of his formidable assassination skills; he completely cut off all ties with the criminal underground and various spy organizations.

His lovely family, which included his first and only wife (twenty-six years married) and four kids, vacationed at the beach annually. Burlington had elected to stay behind this year.

His stress was killing him, and no wonder, since Tony had been methodically taking his life to pieces.

The man's considerable wealth was being investigated by the A.E.A.T. (the Spanish equivalent of the I.R.S.), who was secretly in cahoots with Interpol; they were using a series of convincing tax-related lies to keep Burlington grounded. Tony knew Burlington had a money stash in a safe on his property, and he made sure that Interpol knew it too.

Burlington's career as an editor in a large publishing house was in jeopardy, as Tony had spitefully sabotaged a few of his works and prevented him from taking on new talent by way of professional slander. His safe deposit box, where Burlington kept the heirlooms of his family, jewellery and letters, had been stolen in a heist, or so the bank claimed - the box had been turned in to Interpol as well.

His legacy was in tatters, his future unclear, and Tony wanted to let the man know exactly why. Tony could have turned over everything all at once, given Interpol everything they needed, but Burlington's crime demanded a slow and systematic destruction.

Hydra had labelled him as Operation Bold's lead agent.

Steve took in this information with a nod. "What are we going to do?"

Tony glanced up from his coffee, pressing his lips together to hold back a shark-like grimace. "He doesn't get a choice in the method of his destruction. It's already done. I just want to be there to see it."

Steve sipped at his own drink. "Who's taking him into custody?"

"Likely Interpol. In this case, I don't have them waiting in the wings. They're close enough to accruing the evidence they need to bring him in. They'll arrest him in a couple of days, possibly sooner. We just need to sit back, wait for the arrest warrant to go out, and then get there before Interpol does. I want a private face-to-face before he goes down." Whether Burlington was alive or not when the agents arrived was largely irrelevant to Tony.

"So we just wait?" Steve glanced around them. "You got any tourist spots we can check out? I've only ever seen a couple of dark alleys, maybe a bar or two, during the war."

Tony raised his cup. "You sure you want to hit the town with me, Cap? It takes a hardy constitution and distinct lack of shame. Like, you need to have been born without the ability to feel shame. It's part of the whole sex, drugs, and rock and roll thing - sorry, if I just offended your old-timer sensibilities."

Steve sighed. "Sex and drugs were not recent inventions - the rock and roll is though." He grinned then, and Tony grinned back without hesitation - he didn't think he'd ever seen the Captain this laid-back before, at least not with him. Also, sex and drugs and Captain America? Tony was so going to dig up more on that later. "Been working my way through the classics. Gone through most of our American legends. I've got a thing for the Brits right now."

"Hell, everyone has a thing for at least one British rock group, most of them were swoon-worthy - you gotta hit up Australia next. And the Canadians, they had a few greats." Tony was already planning on creating a playlist with the only rock and roll songs Steve would ever need to hear.

He glanced down at his watch - six in the evening was early for dinner by Spanish standards, but he could use a good meal right about now, and Steve deserved to see the better side of Spain. "Let's introduce you to some awesome food. I know a great place, and they've never had me thrown out before . . . possibly. Huh, having trouble remembering - there was a crapload of sangria, and somebody's poodle caught on fire. Maybe I should call ahead."

It was actually a little nice to have a brief window of downtime, or it would have been, had Burlington not been tipped off by an old contact. He knew that Interpol was coming to get him.

"Shit, he's going to disappear if we don't get to him first." Tony had JARVIS tracking Burlington's car. The man was making quick stops - the bank, the post office, the electronics store.

Steve's eyes were blank once more. "His last stop will be to get to his safe at home. I say we wait for him there."

That night, Burlington burst into his living room to find Tony Stark, sans armour, and Steve Rogers, also in civilian clothes but with his shield on one arm, waiting for him.

Tony watched the man take them in, and then turn around quickly, maybe to run. A woman and four children came in even as Burlington tried to tell them to turn back.

"Damn it, Federico, just tell me what is going on!" shouted Burlington's wife, (Miranda, age forty three, Tony recalled), sounding both frazzled and annoyed.

"Nothing, just get back in the car, for God's sake!" he said in return, trying to push them out of the door.

Tony stared at a young boy (remembering that the eldest son was sixteen years old, an honours student, wanted to be a history professor) as he pushed forward, standing in front of his family, between them and Iron Man. His eyes lit upon Captain America's shield, and then he said, "Are you here to help us?"

Steve flinched. Tony didn't.

"No, we're not," he replied back, his own Spanish flawless. "I'm here to speak with your father."

Burlington's face was switching from panicked to dangerous. Tony was not going to let this man get away.

"I have nothing to say to you, Mr. Stark." He had switched to English.

"I think you do," Tony countered in Spanish, because his sadistic streak was not going to be buried this time. "I think an apology might be a start. Insofar as one can apologize for murder."

Miranda whipped around to stare at her husband. Steve immediately moved towards the kids, the youngest being a girl of seven. He smiled brightly at them, and in his own slightly accented Spanish he asked if they wanted to try throwing his shield around. The girl immediately said yes, glancing towards her mother. Miranda nodded once, and Steve gathered the kids, taking them out to the backyard.

The eldest boy refused. Tony mentally flipped through his information on Federico Burlington and found the oldest child's name - Gabriel.

"You were young for a lead agent," Tony said once Steve was gone. "Apparently, you were one of their precious stars."

"Mr. Stark, please," Burlington said, speaking in English again and moving to stand beside his son. "I understand why you are here, but it has been more than twenty years -"

"Tony Stark?" Gabriel interrupted, his eyes brightening as they had when they spotted Captain America's shield. "You're Tony Stark! I'm so stupid, I mean, not really, I just don't pay attention to the news that much but everyone saw what happened in New York, and then to your house and -"

"Gabriel, Miranda, go outside," Burlington cut him off. "Please, this is not for your ears."

"Haven't you wondered why the streak of bad luck, Federico?" Tony said casually, ignoring the boy's protests and the wife's adamant refusals to leave. "Why it all came crashing down? It's not a good feeling, having your entire life wrecked overnight, is it?"

Silence fell. Burlington clearly understood within seconds what Tony was implying, his eyes wide in astonishment.

The surprise came when Miranda raised a hand to her mouth, her own expression displaying the same comprehension as her husband's. She was intelligent, it made sense that she might put all their sudden misfortunes together and see that it was all no coincidence.

But Tony suddenly wondered how much she really knew as she immediately confronted him. "Are you saying that you have . . . the taxes, and his work, the thieves stealing his great-grandparents' treasures, all of it was you?"

Burlington grabbed his wife's hand. "Miranda, stop -"

"What right do you have?" she said, full of righteous indignation. Her light brown eyes were narrowing, and she marched right up to Tony, her hands gesticulating wildly. "Because you are wealthy, powerful, you feel you can control the world, don't you? You can do what those horrible people did, what Hydra did, and manipulate and cheat and steal from those you consider inferior!"

Miranda Burlington was a professor of sociology. She was both media and computer savvy. Tony cocked his head as he observed her flushed and angry face. Tony was very familiar with denial - Miranda Burlington reeked of it.

"Hydra took from me first, Señora Burlington." Tony looked over her shoulder. "Ask your husband what they took from me. Ask your husband what he took from me."

"Dad, is this why we're leaving? What is he saying, what's . . ." Gabriel trailed off, his confusion and fear plain on his features.

"Fedi, what is this? How does Tony Stark come to be here, come to destroy you? Tell him he's wrong, tell him he's made a mistake." Miranda was desperate. Oh, she definitely knew, maybe not at all of it, but she knew.

Burlington stared at his wife, saying nothing. Any lie he spewed out would be immediately destroyed, and he knew it. Tony felt a vicious thrill at being here to see this.

"You only need to search his birth name, which isn't Federico Burlington." Tony reached into the purse she'd thrown onto a nearby armchair, fished out her phone and tossed it to her. She grabbed it out of the air. "Ignacio Borell will lead you to Agent Pedro Escobar. Three names, one and the same person. Agent Pedro Escobar made the lead on Operation Bold. Operation Bold was a successful mission, went off without a hitch. Your husband was a very good assassin."

Gabriel choked on whatever words he'd been about to say. His mother was motionless, and so the boy reached over and ripped the phone from her hands. He tapped frantically as Miranda faced her husband, the denial falling away, heartbroken resignation rising to take its place. She shook her head and clutched at her shirt, at her hair, and behind her, her son was reading the truth, his face paling more and more as silent minutes passed them by.

A bright laugh cut through the tension. Tony could see through a crack in the curtains a flash of silver, blue and red. Through the slightly open backdoor Tony could hear children shouting, giggling, and Steve issuing orders in a warm, affectionate voice. A cool night breeze swept through the room.

Gabriel abruptly sat down on the nearest surface, an end table next to the armchair, and his hands hung listlessly in his lap. His gray face was slack with shock. When he spoke, it was hardly more than a whisper. "Dad . . . you . . . your name. You're not . . . you killed people for them. For . . . for Hydra."

Tony watched this family fall apart. His sadistic gratification simmered beneath his calm veneer, but rising up with it was a sick sensation, equally hot and potent.

"I did what I did because I thought it was best," Burlington spoke at last in his native tongue. Tony was mildly impressed. The man stood up straight, his features gone hard and cold. A gun had appeared from seemingly nowhere. There was the assassin Tony had come to see. "I had to believe it then, though I may not believe it now. I will not apologize because I know it will not serve anyone but myself, and that is not what they need to hear right now."

Burlington moved to stand next to his sobbing wife, but she stepped away, reaching out for her son who immediately fell into her arms. Burlington acted as though this did not faze him, and maybe it didn't, Tony couldn't tell. "Your father was a threat. I did what I was told. He was not the first nor was he the last. And I cannot allow you to destroy me now. I got away for years, Mr. Stark, and I will get away again."

"Dad, no, no, please!" Gabriel ran between Tony and his father again - but this time the threat was clear. Burlington's gun did not tremble when aimed at his child.

"If you think you can point a gun at me with Captain America less than twenty feet away" - and that wasn't mentioning Tony's own little surprises, one resting beneath the carpet, and another one up his sleeve - "you are not a very smart assassin. Been a few years for you, right? It's a little different, I imagine, killing someone in front of your family."

"Dad, stop!" Gabriel, brave kid that he was, walked right up to the gun, let it press into his chest. "I don't care, I don't care what you've done, but if you do this now, I - I -"

"For the love of God, Federico!" Miranda cried out. "Enough bloodshed, it is over, please, do not make us watch you -"

Steve appeared in the doorway leading out to the backyard. His shield was poised to be thrown. Everything stopped.

The gun in Burlington's hand finally shook. Then it drooped. And then it fell to his side. Gabriel actually hugged his father, fiercely and unreservedly. Miranda was wiping away tears, looking as though she had aged a century.

Gabriel turned to Tony then, steely resolve in his eyes. "Please, Mr. Stark. Let us leave."

"No." Tony had never heard his voice sound so harsh. "No, not going to happen."

"It was so long ago, Mr. Stark, and I'm sorry. But I don't want to grow up without my father." Gabriel's words cracked in the middle. "He promised, you know, to be there when I graduate. He's going to publish my first book on the Spanish Civil War. We've been designing covers and arguing about font size for years."

"And you can keep doing that while he's in a cell." Tony was not moved.

"Mr. Stark." A tear slipped down the boy's face. "Please -"

"Did you read your father's file? Do you understand what he's done, what he's gotten away with?" The gauntlet concealed under Tony's sleeve was warm. "Do you know that my mother had a punctured lung? She didn't die right away, she drowned in her own blood with my father's still-warm corpse to keep her company -"

"Tony." Steve's commanding tone wasn't enough.

"I was never allowed to tinker with my dad's cars," Tony said to the air above Gabriel's head, not sure who he was talking to now, "only old junkers he bought for me to take apart, but maybe if I had broken that rule, considering that I broke so many of his other rules, your dad might not have succeeded. Do you think years of doubt and guilt, of re-reading the crash report and imagining every single painful scenario, all of that somehow becomes null and void because you don't want to lose your father? God damn it all, I didn't want to lose my parents either!"

An explosion. Tony hadn't realized his gauntlet was up and pointed at Burlington, which meant he definitely didn't see Steve fling himself, shield first, in front of Tony's outstretched arm, redirecting the blast over their heads. The smoke bomb Tony had concealed went off a split second later, at the same time as Interpol broke down the door.

Screaming children came pouring in from the backyard. Burlington had thrown himself on top of Gabriel; Miranda had been running towards Tony, but she tripped when the smoke bomb went off. She was on the floor, next to her husband, and kneeling up to gather her frightened younger children into her arms.

The Interpol agents didn't seem to know where to point their guns, but once the smoke had cleared a little, they spotted Steve, who was clearly recognizable because of the shield.

"Thank you, Captain," said a tall muscular woman, her strong hand reaching to shake Steve's. "We found our mole. We'll take Burlington into custody."

The man in question was already being cuffed. Gabriel was standing up, no longer pleading for his father, just silently standing guard over his mother and his younger siblings. The other kids started crying as the agents led Burlington out the door. The smallest girl clutched at her father's coat, little hands tugging.

Steve leaned down and gently pried her fingers loose. "Go to your mother, Ceci."

Burlington looked back at his family, his eyes wet, but no tears fell. When his gaze fell onto Tony, there was nothing there. No anger, no remorse.

"We should leave," Steve said.

Interpol agents were speaking to Miranda now, helping her off the floor. Gabriel ushered his brother and sisters out of the living room. Before he left, he turned to Tony. Much like his father, his eyes held no anger, no regret, but he did have something else to offer.

"I'm sorry," Gabriel whispered. "He wouldn't say it, but I will. I'm sorry."

Tony didn't need any more prompting to leave after that.

When they reached the private hanger where Tony's jet was waiting for them, Tony stopped before entering the plane. He stared at the wing over Steve's head. Then he asked, "When did you call them?"

"About two minutes after I took the kids outside. JARVIS gave me the information on who tipped off Burlington. I called Interpol and made sure to talk directly to the head investigator of the case. They should have gotten there faster."

Finally a hint of disapproval, but it wasn't directed at Tony. "You could have stopped me, Steve, you could have damn well stopped me at any goddamn point."

"I did stop you when you lost control," Steve pointed out. "And I called Interpol because that was the original plan, to have them be the ones to take him in. Or were you planning on something else?"

Tony considered lying. But he had an inkling that Steve already knew what he was going to say. "I did have a back-up plan. The gauntlet and the smoke bomb. It was meant to be quick. And his family wasn't meant to be there."

Steve exhaled slowly. "All right. It's done now. We move on to the next target."

"Are you fucking kidding me, right now?" Tony erupted, flushing and gearing up for a fight. "What's happened to you, Rogers, why are you -"

"You don't actually know me that well, Stark," Steve said, his voice veering into his battlefield command tone. "I was a soldier. I was a leader, and I had a squad of talented men that I was responsible for. We killed people when we had to, and maybe a few times when we didn't - when after the smoke cleared, it wasn't a man with a gun, but someone waving a white flag. I know there's evil, true evil, in this world. But I also know that there are bad people that aren't bad to their families. That love dogs or cook up a mean omelette for their kids."

Tony reeled back from these words, more words than Steve had ever spoken to him in one sitting, and then he came back swinging. "And what kind of naive schmuck do you think I am? I was the Merchant of Death, Steve. I killed a half dozen men all at once to save the women and children they held hostage." And spent the entire night afterwards kneeling in front of the toilet because the wet explosion of skull and brain matter had left him feeling so satisfied. "I killed Obadiah Stane. No due process, no day in court. I'm already a murderer, so tell me why, when it's this damn personal, why I can't fucking finish it."

Steve grabbed one of Tony's arms, preventing him from pacing or pulling away. He waited patiently as Tony struggled for a second, realized the futility, and then stilled. Tony pulled in a long breath and lifted his gaze to Steve, who seemed to take that as his cue to keep going.

"You're not a bad man, Tony, you're a hurting one. The people we're after right now? They're bad, and we're going to get them. But I will stop you from killing them. They are waving white flags at you. You've already beaten them. Exorcise whatever demons you have, tear them down in front of their kids if you must" - there it was, at last, a distinct note of sadness - "but keep your hands clean and when this is done, maybe you'll sleep better. I don't know if I will, but I can at least know that Howard's killers are finally paying for their crimes."

Steve seemed to deflate a bit after that long speech, taking in a deep breath and shrinking on the exhale. "And Tony, you killed those men because you had to. Stane didn't leave you a choice either. But you don't - and I hope you never do - know what it is to kill someone deliberately. Intimately. It does something to a person, and trust me, I've seen the damage up close. I've fought against it, long before you were born."

Captain Steve Rogers looked every bit of his ninety years of age then.

Out of nowhere, Tony wondered how, if Steve did end up finding Barnes, he was going to help the Winter Soldier rationalize decades of cold-blooded murder.

It wasn't Barnes' fault, insofar as one didn't blame a gun for the act of pointing and firing; Barnes was a living, breathing weapon. But Tony thought that finding the Winter Soldier and reminding him of his humanity would be, perhaps, a far worse punishment than what any court could devise. Would it satisfy the families of his victims? Tony felt a sick twist in his gut as considered what he would have done if Barnes had been responsible for his parents' death.

Tony contemplated being as remote and unfeeling as the Winter Soldier, so he could finish balancing out his equation as if human lives could be reduced to numbers and letters on a page. Could he escape the personal penalty of deliberate murder if Tony felt he was right? He wasn't an assassin tortured and brainwashed, he didn't have any excuse other than revenge. Justice. Keeping bad people from doing bad things.

Tony's moral compass rarely gave him clear readings on his best days.

But Tony had shivered and vomited for hours after murdering men who killed women and children, even though he had felt completely justified in doing so. There had been nothing left of Obadiah after the reactor overloaded, but Tony made sure the man had a funeral, a headstone, and he'd visited once.

Fuck it, this was too much thinking for one day and not the kind of thinking his brilliant mind was accustomed to. Tony couldn't waste precious energy trying to puzzle out the moral conundrums that had baffled humanity for ages.

He offered up a small, pathetic smile. "Cap, you wanna join me for some drinks on our way to London?"

Because alcohol. Full stop, no elaboration required.

Steve's answering smile was bittersweet, his eyes gazing at something Tony couldn't see. "My metabolism burns it up before I can get a good buzz going."

"Pfft, that's only because you've never had one of my cocktails." He gestured awkwardly towards the plane, and Steve walked in ahead of him.

They talked for the entire plane ride. The conversation was stilted, it was strange and it sometimes stuttered to halt when Tony accidentally stepped on an old memory involving Bucky, or when Steve tried to tell happy stories about Howard that Tony simply couldn't relate to.

But it was all truth, all groundwork, and Tony could see himself following this man into battle. Again. And considering how broken his moral compass was, maybe he could trust Steve to point him instead.

Though Tony reserved the right to forget everything and just pull the damn trigger to end this, once and for all. Tony always did have a talent for self-destruction.

Author's Note: It's been a very long day for me, and I think it shows in this chapter. Please let me know if there are any mistakes, I didn't proofread as much as I normally do. The angst levels rose rather high in this one, higher than I originally planned, but it felt right.

Okay, third chapter down, two more to go. And then hopefully I'll get to watch Age of Ultron at some point this weekend.

While you may be sick of hearing it, I have to say thank you again for reading! Hope you enjoyed today's installment, and see you tomorrow :)

Here is the next part: Chapter 4: If You Want Blood (You Got It)