What Is Dead May Never Die
Title: What Is Dead May Never Die
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: while this could totally be real, it's just my imagination
Pairing: pre Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, implied Pepper Potts/Tony Stark
Summary: Post The Avengers movie verse, Thor takes Loki back to Asgard and all is quiet enough for the team to split up on their own. Steve takes a road trip and Tony keeps an eye on him. Also Monument wordporn.
Word count: 3,921
Once they all split up and go their separate ways, Tony thinks that that’s it. No more missions for them as a group, nothing that needs them all at full attention and full power, just things they can all handle on their own. Assassinations for Clint and Natasha, whatever happened with Loki and on Asgard for Thor, being science bros for him and Bruce, and Steve... he wasn’t sure what it was Steve was doing. Going off on his own to find himself probably, some soul searching thing he would have made fun of just to get under his skin because Steve seemed to be the type that took himself all too seriously and well, Tony couldn’t have that. Besides, seventy years was a long time to be frozen and there was a lot he had missed out on, he probably had to do something like rediscover America only to realize that she was crumbling in on herself with big business and a lack of local jobs and idiots in charge of running things. He’d come back crying and begging to be frozen again probably, and little jabs at him like that were what helped ease the ache in Tony just slightly.
It wasn’t that Tony hated Steve. Hating Steve seemed kind of impossible really, even if the words he had spat out at him had left him a little wounded, hurting more because they came from Captain Goddamn America rather than anybody else in the world. He didn’t even dislike the guy, it was just... he was Captain America. The same guy that Tony had grown up hearing about from his father when he was drunk enough to want to talk to his son, the same guy that Tony had kept posters of locked in his closet where no one else could see them and he wouldn’t get in trouble. The same guy that Tony had spent most of his time fantasizing about when he discovered just exactly how skilled his hands were. Those big hands, those soft pink lips, those perfect straight white teeth, those blue eyes that seemed to have so much weight behind them... that had kept Tony going for a lot of years, and to see it in person, to see those eyes look at him in disdain, to look at him and see only Howard... of course he had reacted the way he did. Loki’s scepter had helped make everybody a little crazy and angry, but Tony probably would have said those things anyway, just like Steve would have too. He knew that, knew that even with the chaos injected in the room there was something powerful and angry between the two of them, a kind of history with each other they didn’t want to acknowledge.
It wasn’t all Steve’s fault exactly, Tony could give him that at least. He had been angry since he saw his file, that somehow Fury managed to keep that all a secret, that they had found Cap alive and frozen and brought him back, kept him hidden in SHIELD headquarters until they were ready to do something with him. He remembered Howard’s expeditions to try and search for him in the ice, always coming home empty handed, and he thought that he should have been notified, that Howard’s projects were his too, since his father was dead and he was in charge of the company and all. But then again, he had never known about Howard and SHIELD, so maybe there was a lot more about his father that even he didn’t know, and that hurt, because Tony was a genius and he felt like he should know these things, that he was letting down people by not knowing these things. But it didn’t make it annoy him any less, staring at the file, the pixelated version of Cap’s face, those blue blue eyes, those pink lips, that soft blond hair. Captain America was alive and Tony knew there was no way he was going to handle meeting him well. And he didn’t, did he, too nervous and angry and affected by Loki’s scepter and he had to open his mouth. “I don’t work well with others” flew out so fast he didn’t even have time to register what he was saying until he saw the flash of anger in those eyes he imagined so many times as a kid. And Cap knew the punches to pull with him, to make his words cut like knives. Or, at least he imagined Cap knew what he was doing, that he could see through Tony’s facade of uncaring and uninvolved genius and that he wasn’t a fucking mess and that he didn’t fucking hate himself more than anybody else ever could. Hearing it from himself was one thing, but from Captain Goddamn America, the person he had always admired most... it cut down deep.
When it came down to it they worked well together, Tony had to give him that. Steve was out of touch with the current world, sure, but Cap did his job and he did it well, and when they were sitting together in the shawarma place afterwards, together, a team, Tony had felt kind of nice. Like, hey, maybe this is someplace I belong, maybe these are people I can finally trust who don’t hate me for being smarter than them or richer than them or all the things I am. I’m playing well with others, he thought, and it made a smile quirk on his lips as he glanced at Cap, cowl pulled back and his hair a mess and his hands even messier as he ate. Tony didn’t hate Steve, he realized, he didn’t even hate Natasha even if she made him uneasy and he was constantly watching her hands to make sure she wasn’t secretly trying to kill him under Fury’s orders. Friends, they could do, all of them.
Bruce came back with him to the tower to rebuild and invent and do science things because despite the whole green rage monster thing, Tony thought Bruce might just be the most awesome person he met outside of Pepper and Rhodey and Happy (and Cap, Tony tacked on but tried to forget he did, because holy shit he had fought with Captain America and that was going to haunt his dreams for maybe the rest of his life). Hulk had saved his life and he thought he really had Bruce to thank for that, because you know, friends, friends are a good thing, friends had always been a luxury that Tony had never been able to buy. Hell, he had half wanted to invite them all back to the tower, but Clint and Natasha had the whole spy thing, and Thor (god he loved Thor) had to go back to Asgard, and that left Steve. But Steve... Tony hated that he couldn’t put his finger on what was wrong with him, that he was broken and in need of being fixed but there wasn’t anything Tony could do for him. He had wanted to offer a place at the tower for him, but Bruce had told him not to, that there were things that he needed to do before Tony frightened him to death with how advanced everything Tony did was in comparison to what he had known. Helicarriers and jet planes and alien invasions aside, Steve was still stunned by flatscreen tvs and cell phones, so there was a lot of work that really needed to be done with him. The Great American Roadtrip, Bruce had suggested and Steve had thought that was a swell idea (no really he had said swell and Tony had to bite his cheek until there was blood to keep from laughing) and he had been off.
SHIELD was monitoring Steve, everybody knew that. They weren’t going to let Captain America go off on his own on a motorcycle without keeping a close eye on him, which meant that Tony could too, with a simple hack and an app for his phone (he called it Cap Watch, Pepper and Bruce called it stalking a national icon) and he had coordinates for where the bike was, visuals whenever there were cameras or a strong enough satellite signal. He had JARVIS alert him whenever he was working on something, where he was, and if he was in any trouble. There wasn’t much though, just Steve and his bike seeing the new America of the twenty first century, the country he had tried to sacrifice his life to protect. His face had been all over the news, all over posters since the 40s, but no one really hassled him, not the six foot two powerhouse of a man with a kind face but a kind of sadness and anger in his eyes that only came with losing everything he had ever known and held dear. Tony watched him because it was all he could do, and if it came at a price, he didn’t realize it until it was too late.
Summer was fading into fall before Steve made his way back to the east coast. He had seen it all and Tony had kept a close eye on him, bonding in a way he hadn’t thought possible, even if Steve hadn’t been aware of it. Or maybe he had, Tony wasn’t sure with him and that irked him, got under his skin and made him itch because he wanted to know everything Steve was thinking, wanted to get inside the brain of the super soldier and see how everything had changed him, see how the serum had affected the way his brain worked and remembered things. And he had maybe said that aloud once or twice, because there was a nagging Bruce voice every time he thought it, the “he’s a human, not a robot, Tony” or “he’s your friend” popping up low and aggravating and reminding him that he would never be able to pick at Steve’s brain, because Tony was always going to be Steve’s last resort when it came down to it. He wasn’t Howard, he was too fast, too brash, too selfish, wasn’t the model soldier that Steve seemed to want to work with. The anger that flashed in him with those thoughts didn’t make him want to stop though, because Captain America was alive and Tony was going to be damned before he let him fall out of his sights.
It was late September when Steve hit Washington DC, and Tony canceled anything he had planned for the next few days to watch. It was kind of wonderful how much the American government distrusted its citizens, it made it so much easier to keep an eye on Steve as he rolled into town. He looked the part of the all American guy, jeans and boots and the brown leather jacket, his blond hair tucked into a baseball cap. He watched as he checked out the monuments, knowing what he was saving for last as he zipped through traffic on his bike, hitting the Jefferson, the Washington, the Lincoln. Lincoln meant Korea and Vietnam, and Steve was slow walking through those, and Tony didn’t need to be a genius to catch the way his shoulder slunk with the weight of what these monuments were for as he sat down to sketch the statues of soldiers walking into combat of the Korean War Memorial, watched him as he walked the length of the Vietnam Memorial and traced some names with his fingers, staying long enough to see if there were any he recognized. He left it after some time to get lost in the maze of the FDR Memorial, realizing with some sadness that Steve had actually met FDR, that it was just another person on the long list of people that Steve had known that was gone.
Tony knew that Steve had to steel himself up to get to the World War Two Memorial. That took a kind of energy he didn’t exactly have, despite the super soldier serum, and it was going to take a lot of out him. He watched with baited breath as Steve approached it, knowing that New York was just a short ride away from DC, that he could make it in the suit in no time at all. Sure, there were things he needed to do, but Steve... he wanted to be there if Steve needed someone, if he couldn’t take the weight of what he was walking into. They were a team, Tony decided, his team and he was going to be there if he needed him. It was a beautiful memorial, not that it really mattered in the moment. The pillars representing all the states that had lost citizens in the war, the memorial split in two to represent the two arenas of war: the Atlantic and the Pacific. If he knew Steve (and really at this point from watching him for most of the summer he was pretty sure he did), he knew that if this was anything else he would be trying to sketch it, trying to take in how beautiful they had made it to remember those who had died, so they would never be forgotten, but even through the shitty quality of the cameras he saw how this was affecting him. His movements were slow and deliberate and sad, taking it all in with shaky shallow breaths. He took in the pool in the center of the memorial, stood on one end to look across at the other. He walked through the columns of the states slowly, found New York and put a hand on it, because this was everyone he grew up with, this wreath, this pillar, this stands for them. Tony swallowed as he watched him, knew it was taking everything Steve’s had to go on from this point, that it’s only going to get worse. Steve traced his fingers over Truman’s words engraved in stone, trying to sink them into his skin, to remember them forever. “Our debt to the heroic men and valiant women in the service of our country can never be repaid. They have earned our undying gratitude. America will never forget their sacrifices.” Tony could read Steve’s lips, watched him recite the words and close his eyes and his soft “they have”. He didn't stop at the wall of stars yet, no Tony watched as Steve took in the fountains on either side, the major battles of both arenas etched in the stone. So many battles, so many lives lost, Tony thought, aware that he’d never taken the time out of his schedule to visit these monuments to great men, to men who gave everything and for what? It made him feel small and insignificant and guilty when he remembered that he created weapons and all of the destruction and devastation they had caused. He had a flicker of hatred for Obie again for selling his weapons to people who used them against American forces, against people like these, that one day there’s going to be a monument in DC for all those kids too. He swallowed back those thoughts and watched Steve again, watched him trace over the scenes of battle etched in metal, saw how hard he was trying to keep this all together. Atlantic arena, Tony made a note of it, these were all things Steve has seen first hand. Steve made his way to the stone slab in the front of the pool and reads it, not to let his eyes dart across the pool to the wall of stars, overlooking it to see Lincoln’s monument in the distance, Washington’s stood behind him. “Here in the presence of Washington and Lincoln, one the eighteenth century father and the other the nineteenth century preserver of our nation, we honor those twentieth century Americans who took up the struggle during the second world war and made the sacrifices to perpetuate the gift our forefathers trusted to us, a nation conceived in liberty and justice.” Tony saw the setting sun hit the wet lines of tears falling down Steve’s cheeks even on the camera, saw him brush his hand quickly over them because those words, this monument, it was what made Steve Captain America, it was what made him the man standing there today. He gave Steve credit for not caring what people around him were thinking, his walk slow and steady but Tony could see it breaking as he made his way around the pool to finally take his look at the wall of stars. The price of freedom, they called it on the plaque, each star representing a hundred American men who died or went missing during the war. There were 4,048 stars, Tony knew, Tony read on the pictures he brought up alongside the feed of Steve at it, that the number for those stars included Steve, included his best friend Bucky. He watched Steve, watched as it all overwhelmed him. Watched him drop down to his knees and let out a shuddering sob because this was Steve’s generation, these were Steve’s friends, this was what he was supposed to make a difference for. Tony left the feed linger for a minute more before closing it, because this was more than he could take. He called Pepper and told her he’d see her in DC, told Bruce to make himself at home.
Tony’s in DC before morning.
Steve was easy to find of course, what with Tony stalking him (watching him and making sure he didn't get into trouble, he corrected himself). Tony’s in Washington under the pretense of work, and somehow actually wound up doing some before he could get away to go after Steve. He checked the feed during a meeting, saw Steve at the Iwo Jima Memorial in full military alpha uniform. Cap’s going to Arlington, he realized, the olive green coat lacking any medals, just his captain’s insignia. Tony turned his attention back to the meeting quickly, because staring at Cap in his service uniform for too long meant that nothing was going to get done.
When he was able to get out, he hightailed it to Arlington, knowing that even the few hours he spent in the meeting wasn't going to be long enough for Cap to get his fill of the cemetery. He knew why he was saving this for last, why he couldn’t do this and the World War Two memorial on the same day, it was too much. It was a big place, Arlington, but Tony bought a ticket for the trolley and hoped that no one realized that he was Tony Stark and that Captain America was on the premises. It wasn't really like him to do things that way, but he wanted to be inconspicuous, wanted to blend in with the rest of the people touring the cemetery, or maybe just someone there to pay his respects. He found Steve on a bench near his own statue, a memorial to the hero he was back in the war, his head in his hands. He didn't look up as Tony approached, too defeated and weighed down by all of this, and just broken, and all Tony wanted to do was fix him, to hold onto him and beg Steve to let him fix him.
Instead of begging or talking at all, Tony just slid up next to him, taking a seat on the bench close enough that their thighs were touching, his arms sliding over the back of the bench, one casually behind Steve’s back. Steve's head lifted up for the first time and Tony could feel how tense he was, how much the past few days in Washington had really weighed on him.
“Sir...” Steve started before he saw who was next to him, confusion etched in the quirk of his eyebrows, the way his mouth almost turned up, but didn't exactly, almost too fast to catch, but Tony managed to, because he’d been reading Steve like a book for months now. “What are you doing here?” His words weren't accusing, just wondering, not understanding how Tony was there, or why. Of course Steve didn't know that he’d been watched his entire trip and Tony wasn't going to admit to it, but Tony just smiled at him, a shrug of his shoulders.
“You look like you could use a friend.” It’s all Tony offered and Steve took it with a small smile, his tense shoulders relaxing just slightly. Tony brought his hand off the bench and brushed it over the short strands of hair on the back of Steve’s neck, taking what he could that his cap wasn't covering. Steve leaned into it, eyes closed and body uncoiling under the touch, because it was obvious he was tight like a spring, just waiting for a chance to open. They didn't talk about it because it was easier not to, because if they talked about it Steve would have to talk about how he hated it here, how this wasn’t home, how he had nothing left anymore, that he was better off frozen. If they talked about it, Tony would have to tell him about his issues, how he wished more often than not that he had died in Afghanistan, how he hated what his life had become and sometimes the only reason he woke up in the morning was because he couldn't hurt Pepper and Rhodey and Happy. He couldn't tell Steve that they were all he had for the longest time, that he felt more alone in the world than Steve did, because Steve’s a man out of time, Steve wouldn’t understand. They shared the silence of the lonely and the broken, for minutes, for hours maybe. Tony didn't keep track for once, because while his time was valuable and precious, Steve was even more so.
“Come home?” Tony offered after some time, when the sky started to darken with clouds, the threat of a thunderstorm rolling in with them. The air was changing, charging with electricity, and Tony thought Thor for a moment, but it wasn't, he knew, he knew when the first of the fat rain drops started to fall on them.
“I don’t have a...” And Tony saw this coming, had it all prepared anyway because he knew Steve would say this, that he doesn’t have anywhere, doesn’t have anything.
“With me. In the tower, you know, the one that Loki tried to take over the world with? Anyway, we’re rebuilding it and it’s nice and I’m putting in spots for everybody because we’re a team, right, this wasn’t a one time thing, and anyway it’s great you should come, it’s me and Pepper and Bruce and you’ll love it. If the big green guy does, you know it’s good for you.” He talked fast because people tended to say no less if he didn't give them a chance to. He was pretty sure the only word Steve really caught was team anyway, because for the first time in days he’d seeing Steve’s mouth curve upwards into a smile. And cameras really never did do it justice, Steve’s smile in person was a sight to behold, even with the rain dropping down onto them both, ruining Tony’s all too expensive suit and well probably making whatever horrible blend of fabrics Steve’s uniform was incredibly uncomfortable.
“Yeah, alright. I’ll come home.” There was a warmth in Tony’s chest that didn't occur very often, and he made a mental note to try and figure out what it is.
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: while this could totally be real, it's just my imagination
Pairing: pre Steve Rogers/Tony Stark, implied Pepper Potts/Tony Stark
Summary: Post The Avengers movie verse, Thor takes Loki back to Asgard and all is quiet enough for the team to split up on their own. Steve takes a road trip and Tony keeps an eye on him. Also Monument wordporn.
Word count: 3,921
Once they all split up and go their separate ways, Tony thinks that that’s it. No more missions for them as a group, nothing that needs them all at full attention and full power, just things they can all handle on their own. Assassinations for Clint and Natasha, whatever happened with Loki and on Asgard for Thor, being science bros for him and Bruce, and Steve... he wasn’t sure what it was Steve was doing. Going off on his own to find himself probably, some soul searching thing he would have made fun of just to get under his skin because Steve seemed to be the type that took himself all too seriously and well, Tony couldn’t have that. Besides, seventy years was a long time to be frozen and there was a lot he had missed out on, he probably had to do something like rediscover America only to realize that she was crumbling in on herself with big business and a lack of local jobs and idiots in charge of running things. He’d come back crying and begging to be frozen again probably, and little jabs at him like that were what helped ease the ache in Tony just slightly.
It wasn’t that Tony hated Steve. Hating Steve seemed kind of impossible really, even if the words he had spat out at him had left him a little wounded, hurting more because they came from Captain Goddamn America rather than anybody else in the world. He didn’t even dislike the guy, it was just... he was Captain America. The same guy that Tony had grown up hearing about from his father when he was drunk enough to want to talk to his son, the same guy that Tony had kept posters of locked in his closet where no one else could see them and he wouldn’t get in trouble. The same guy that Tony had spent most of his time fantasizing about when he discovered just exactly how skilled his hands were. Those big hands, those soft pink lips, those perfect straight white teeth, those blue eyes that seemed to have so much weight behind them... that had kept Tony going for a lot of years, and to see it in person, to see those eyes look at him in disdain, to look at him and see only Howard... of course he had reacted the way he did. Loki’s scepter had helped make everybody a little crazy and angry, but Tony probably would have said those things anyway, just like Steve would have too. He knew that, knew that even with the chaos injected in the room there was something powerful and angry between the two of them, a kind of history with each other they didn’t want to acknowledge.
It wasn’t all Steve’s fault exactly, Tony could give him that at least. He had been angry since he saw his file, that somehow Fury managed to keep that all a secret, that they had found Cap alive and frozen and brought him back, kept him hidden in SHIELD headquarters until they were ready to do something with him. He remembered Howard’s expeditions to try and search for him in the ice, always coming home empty handed, and he thought that he should have been notified, that Howard’s projects were his too, since his father was dead and he was in charge of the company and all. But then again, he had never known about Howard and SHIELD, so maybe there was a lot more about his father that even he didn’t know, and that hurt, because Tony was a genius and he felt like he should know these things, that he was letting down people by not knowing these things. But it didn’t make it annoy him any less, staring at the file, the pixelated version of Cap’s face, those blue blue eyes, those pink lips, that soft blond hair. Captain America was alive and Tony knew there was no way he was going to handle meeting him well. And he didn’t, did he, too nervous and angry and affected by Loki’s scepter and he had to open his mouth. “I don’t work well with others” flew out so fast he didn’t even have time to register what he was saying until he saw the flash of anger in those eyes he imagined so many times as a kid. And Cap knew the punches to pull with him, to make his words cut like knives. Or, at least he imagined Cap knew what he was doing, that he could see through Tony’s facade of uncaring and uninvolved genius and that he wasn’t a fucking mess and that he didn’t fucking hate himself more than anybody else ever could. Hearing it from himself was one thing, but from Captain Goddamn America, the person he had always admired most... it cut down deep.
When it came down to it they worked well together, Tony had to give him that. Steve was out of touch with the current world, sure, but Cap did his job and he did it well, and when they were sitting together in the shawarma place afterwards, together, a team, Tony had felt kind of nice. Like, hey, maybe this is someplace I belong, maybe these are people I can finally trust who don’t hate me for being smarter than them or richer than them or all the things I am. I’m playing well with others, he thought, and it made a smile quirk on his lips as he glanced at Cap, cowl pulled back and his hair a mess and his hands even messier as he ate. Tony didn’t hate Steve, he realized, he didn’t even hate Natasha even if she made him uneasy and he was constantly watching her hands to make sure she wasn’t secretly trying to kill him under Fury’s orders. Friends, they could do, all of them.
Bruce came back with him to the tower to rebuild and invent and do science things because despite the whole green rage monster thing, Tony thought Bruce might just be the most awesome person he met outside of Pepper and Rhodey and Happy (and Cap, Tony tacked on but tried to forget he did, because holy shit he had fought with Captain America and that was going to haunt his dreams for maybe the rest of his life). Hulk had saved his life and he thought he really had Bruce to thank for that, because you know, friends, friends are a good thing, friends had always been a luxury that Tony had never been able to buy. Hell, he had half wanted to invite them all back to the tower, but Clint and Natasha had the whole spy thing, and Thor (god he loved Thor) had to go back to Asgard, and that left Steve. But Steve... Tony hated that he couldn’t put his finger on what was wrong with him, that he was broken and in need of being fixed but there wasn’t anything Tony could do for him. He had wanted to offer a place at the tower for him, but Bruce had told him not to, that there were things that he needed to do before Tony frightened him to death with how advanced everything Tony did was in comparison to what he had known. Helicarriers and jet planes and alien invasions aside, Steve was still stunned by flatscreen tvs and cell phones, so there was a lot of work that really needed to be done with him. The Great American Roadtrip, Bruce had suggested and Steve had thought that was a swell idea (no really he had said swell and Tony had to bite his cheek until there was blood to keep from laughing) and he had been off.
SHIELD was monitoring Steve, everybody knew that. They weren’t going to let Captain America go off on his own on a motorcycle without keeping a close eye on him, which meant that Tony could too, with a simple hack and an app for his phone (he called it Cap Watch, Pepper and Bruce called it stalking a national icon) and he had coordinates for where the bike was, visuals whenever there were cameras or a strong enough satellite signal. He had JARVIS alert him whenever he was working on something, where he was, and if he was in any trouble. There wasn’t much though, just Steve and his bike seeing the new America of the twenty first century, the country he had tried to sacrifice his life to protect. His face had been all over the news, all over posters since the 40s, but no one really hassled him, not the six foot two powerhouse of a man with a kind face but a kind of sadness and anger in his eyes that only came with losing everything he had ever known and held dear. Tony watched him because it was all he could do, and if it came at a price, he didn’t realize it until it was too late.
Summer was fading into fall before Steve made his way back to the east coast. He had seen it all and Tony had kept a close eye on him, bonding in a way he hadn’t thought possible, even if Steve hadn’t been aware of it. Or maybe he had, Tony wasn’t sure with him and that irked him, got under his skin and made him itch because he wanted to know everything Steve was thinking, wanted to get inside the brain of the super soldier and see how everything had changed him, see how the serum had affected the way his brain worked and remembered things. And he had maybe said that aloud once or twice, because there was a nagging Bruce voice every time he thought it, the “he’s a human, not a robot, Tony” or “he’s your friend” popping up low and aggravating and reminding him that he would never be able to pick at Steve’s brain, because Tony was always going to be Steve’s last resort when it came down to it. He wasn’t Howard, he was too fast, too brash, too selfish, wasn’t the model soldier that Steve seemed to want to work with. The anger that flashed in him with those thoughts didn’t make him want to stop though, because Captain America was alive and Tony was going to be damned before he let him fall out of his sights.
It was late September when Steve hit Washington DC, and Tony canceled anything he had planned for the next few days to watch. It was kind of wonderful how much the American government distrusted its citizens, it made it so much easier to keep an eye on Steve as he rolled into town. He looked the part of the all American guy, jeans and boots and the brown leather jacket, his blond hair tucked into a baseball cap. He watched as he checked out the monuments, knowing what he was saving for last as he zipped through traffic on his bike, hitting the Jefferson, the Washington, the Lincoln. Lincoln meant Korea and Vietnam, and Steve was slow walking through those, and Tony didn’t need to be a genius to catch the way his shoulder slunk with the weight of what these monuments were for as he sat down to sketch the statues of soldiers walking into combat of the Korean War Memorial, watched him as he walked the length of the Vietnam Memorial and traced some names with his fingers, staying long enough to see if there were any he recognized. He left it after some time to get lost in the maze of the FDR Memorial, realizing with some sadness that Steve had actually met FDR, that it was just another person on the long list of people that Steve had known that was gone.
Tony knew that Steve had to steel himself up to get to the World War Two Memorial. That took a kind of energy he didn’t exactly have, despite the super soldier serum, and it was going to take a lot of out him. He watched with baited breath as Steve approached it, knowing that New York was just a short ride away from DC, that he could make it in the suit in no time at all. Sure, there were things he needed to do, but Steve... he wanted to be there if Steve needed someone, if he couldn’t take the weight of what he was walking into. They were a team, Tony decided, his team and he was going to be there if he needed him. It was a beautiful memorial, not that it really mattered in the moment. The pillars representing all the states that had lost citizens in the war, the memorial split in two to represent the two arenas of war: the Atlantic and the Pacific. If he knew Steve (and really at this point from watching him for most of the summer he was pretty sure he did), he knew that if this was anything else he would be trying to sketch it, trying to take in how beautiful they had made it to remember those who had died, so they would never be forgotten, but even through the shitty quality of the cameras he saw how this was affecting him. His movements were slow and deliberate and sad, taking it all in with shaky shallow breaths. He took in the pool in the center of the memorial, stood on one end to look across at the other. He walked through the columns of the states slowly, found New York and put a hand on it, because this was everyone he grew up with, this wreath, this pillar, this stands for them. Tony swallowed as he watched him, knew it was taking everything Steve’s had to go on from this point, that it’s only going to get worse. Steve traced his fingers over Truman’s words engraved in stone, trying to sink them into his skin, to remember them forever. “Our debt to the heroic men and valiant women in the service of our country can never be repaid. They have earned our undying gratitude. America will never forget their sacrifices.” Tony could read Steve’s lips, watched him recite the words and close his eyes and his soft “they have”. He didn't stop at the wall of stars yet, no Tony watched as Steve took in the fountains on either side, the major battles of both arenas etched in the stone. So many battles, so many lives lost, Tony thought, aware that he’d never taken the time out of his schedule to visit these monuments to great men, to men who gave everything and for what? It made him feel small and insignificant and guilty when he remembered that he created weapons and all of the destruction and devastation they had caused. He had a flicker of hatred for Obie again for selling his weapons to people who used them against American forces, against people like these, that one day there’s going to be a monument in DC for all those kids too. He swallowed back those thoughts and watched Steve again, watched him trace over the scenes of battle etched in metal, saw how hard he was trying to keep this all together. Atlantic arena, Tony made a note of it, these were all things Steve has seen first hand. Steve made his way to the stone slab in the front of the pool and reads it, not to let his eyes dart across the pool to the wall of stars, overlooking it to see Lincoln’s monument in the distance, Washington’s stood behind him. “Here in the presence of Washington and Lincoln, one the eighteenth century father and the other the nineteenth century preserver of our nation, we honor those twentieth century Americans who took up the struggle during the second world war and made the sacrifices to perpetuate the gift our forefathers trusted to us, a nation conceived in liberty and justice.” Tony saw the setting sun hit the wet lines of tears falling down Steve’s cheeks even on the camera, saw him brush his hand quickly over them because those words, this monument, it was what made Steve Captain America, it was what made him the man standing there today. He gave Steve credit for not caring what people around him were thinking, his walk slow and steady but Tony could see it breaking as he made his way around the pool to finally take his look at the wall of stars. The price of freedom, they called it on the plaque, each star representing a hundred American men who died or went missing during the war. There were 4,048 stars, Tony knew, Tony read on the pictures he brought up alongside the feed of Steve at it, that the number for those stars included Steve, included his best friend Bucky. He watched Steve, watched as it all overwhelmed him. Watched him drop down to his knees and let out a shuddering sob because this was Steve’s generation, these were Steve’s friends, this was what he was supposed to make a difference for. Tony left the feed linger for a minute more before closing it, because this was more than he could take. He called Pepper and told her he’d see her in DC, told Bruce to make himself at home.
Tony’s in DC before morning.
Steve was easy to find of course, what with Tony stalking him (watching him and making sure he didn't get into trouble, he corrected himself). Tony’s in Washington under the pretense of work, and somehow actually wound up doing some before he could get away to go after Steve. He checked the feed during a meeting, saw Steve at the Iwo Jima Memorial in full military alpha uniform. Cap’s going to Arlington, he realized, the olive green coat lacking any medals, just his captain’s insignia. Tony turned his attention back to the meeting quickly, because staring at Cap in his service uniform for too long meant that nothing was going to get done.
When he was able to get out, he hightailed it to Arlington, knowing that even the few hours he spent in the meeting wasn't going to be long enough for Cap to get his fill of the cemetery. He knew why he was saving this for last, why he couldn’t do this and the World War Two memorial on the same day, it was too much. It was a big place, Arlington, but Tony bought a ticket for the trolley and hoped that no one realized that he was Tony Stark and that Captain America was on the premises. It wasn't really like him to do things that way, but he wanted to be inconspicuous, wanted to blend in with the rest of the people touring the cemetery, or maybe just someone there to pay his respects. He found Steve on a bench near his own statue, a memorial to the hero he was back in the war, his head in his hands. He didn't look up as Tony approached, too defeated and weighed down by all of this, and just broken, and all Tony wanted to do was fix him, to hold onto him and beg Steve to let him fix him.
Instead of begging or talking at all, Tony just slid up next to him, taking a seat on the bench close enough that their thighs were touching, his arms sliding over the back of the bench, one casually behind Steve’s back. Steve's head lifted up for the first time and Tony could feel how tense he was, how much the past few days in Washington had really weighed on him.
“Sir...” Steve started before he saw who was next to him, confusion etched in the quirk of his eyebrows, the way his mouth almost turned up, but didn't exactly, almost too fast to catch, but Tony managed to, because he’d been reading Steve like a book for months now. “What are you doing here?” His words weren't accusing, just wondering, not understanding how Tony was there, or why. Of course Steve didn't know that he’d been watched his entire trip and Tony wasn't going to admit to it, but Tony just smiled at him, a shrug of his shoulders.
“You look like you could use a friend.” It’s all Tony offered and Steve took it with a small smile, his tense shoulders relaxing just slightly. Tony brought his hand off the bench and brushed it over the short strands of hair on the back of Steve’s neck, taking what he could that his cap wasn't covering. Steve leaned into it, eyes closed and body uncoiling under the touch, because it was obvious he was tight like a spring, just waiting for a chance to open. They didn't talk about it because it was easier not to, because if they talked about it Steve would have to talk about how he hated it here, how this wasn’t home, how he had nothing left anymore, that he was better off frozen. If they talked about it, Tony would have to tell him about his issues, how he wished more often than not that he had died in Afghanistan, how he hated what his life had become and sometimes the only reason he woke up in the morning was because he couldn't hurt Pepper and Rhodey and Happy. He couldn't tell Steve that they were all he had for the longest time, that he felt more alone in the world than Steve did, because Steve’s a man out of time, Steve wouldn’t understand. They shared the silence of the lonely and the broken, for minutes, for hours maybe. Tony didn't keep track for once, because while his time was valuable and precious, Steve was even more so.
“Come home?” Tony offered after some time, when the sky started to darken with clouds, the threat of a thunderstorm rolling in with them. The air was changing, charging with electricity, and Tony thought Thor for a moment, but it wasn't, he knew, he knew when the first of the fat rain drops started to fall on them.
“I don’t have a...” And Tony saw this coming, had it all prepared anyway because he knew Steve would say this, that he doesn’t have anywhere, doesn’t have anything.
“With me. In the tower, you know, the one that Loki tried to take over the world with? Anyway, we’re rebuilding it and it’s nice and I’m putting in spots for everybody because we’re a team, right, this wasn’t a one time thing, and anyway it’s great you should come, it’s me and Pepper and Bruce and you’ll love it. If the big green guy does, you know it’s good for you.” He talked fast because people tended to say no less if he didn't give them a chance to. He was pretty sure the only word Steve really caught was team anyway, because for the first time in days he’d seeing Steve’s mouth curve upwards into a smile. And cameras really never did do it justice, Steve’s smile in person was a sight to behold, even with the rain dropping down onto them both, ruining Tony’s all too expensive suit and well probably making whatever horrible blend of fabrics Steve’s uniform was incredibly uncomfortable.
“Yeah, alright. I’ll come home.” There was a warmth in Tony’s chest that didn't occur very often, and he made a mental note to try and figure out what it is.