New MCU Novella: Chapter Five (PG-13)

Summary:

After Thanos defeats the Avengers, Tony Stark’s spirit is broken. He falls.

But then he finds a reason to rise again — and become the man his family needs.

--*--

Or: Snapshots of Tony’s life in the first year after the Snap.

(In case you missed them: Chapter One // ChapterTwo // Chapter Three // Chapter Four)

(All introductory notes, meanwhile, can be found in Chapter One.)

--*--

Chapter Five

Patchy sure knew how to pick a location for a cuckoo’s nest.

Tony rested his elbows on the porch railing and leaned into the breeze, allowing it to ruffle his hair and whistle past his ears. In the distance, rising above the other ancient peaks of the White Mountains, was the crag of Mt. Washington — a presence rendered even more forbidding by the absence of its usual carpet of lichens and scrubby vegetation. If Tony strained, he could just make out the antennae of the observatory at its summit. 

Even now, it was a hell of a view.

That wasn’t the principal reason Tony had chosen this place over the other options, however. The former SHIELD institution was specifically designed to handle the weird psychological crap its agents picked up on their top-secret missions around the world. And the fact that its true purpose was well hidden - as far as the inhabitants of the surrounding villages were concerned, it was simply a reclusive millionaire’s private ski lodge - was an essential bonus. Tony didn’t need a bunch of press vultures circling the joint looking for one more juicy headline. “After 25 Years,Tony Stark Back in Rehab!” “Shocker: Iron Man IUI!” Yeah, no fucking thanks.

“Mr. Stark?”

Tony turned — and stared. The man who stood in the entranceway was about the last thing he expected to see at a mental health facility. He was at least twice Tony’s size - built like a linebacker, in fact - and his face was grizzled and pockmarked with age. But perhaps the most distinctive thing about him was his prosthetic right arm. Tony’s eyes traced it from the shoulder joint to the two hooks that made up its hand.

“Name’s Dr. Andrew Nolan,” the stranger said, removing a Cuban cigar from his mouth. “I’m basically the only MD left around here, so I’ll be handling your case. I hear ya checked in last night? Came from medical detox?”

“Yeah.”

Nolan harrumphed in approval. “Well, let’s head to my office and have a chat.”

--*--

Nolan lifted his feet onto the coffee table, leaned back, and blew six perfectly round smoke rings into the air above him. “Light too bright in here, Stark?” 

In the opposite armchair, Tony watched his bizarre companion suspiciously. Was this dude for real? Or was some prankster putting him on? “No,” he finally replied. “Not really.”

“Can ya do me a favor and take off the specs then?”

Tony felt something coil and tighten in his stomach. “Why?”

“Cuz I need to see ya.”

Tony hesitated — but then he complied, folding up his sunglasses and laying them in his lap. Nolan nodded, then reached over to snatch a legal pad and a pen from the table. As he chomped on his cigar, he scribbled out a quick note.

“So,” he continued, “I suspect ya feel at a disadvantage bein’ famous and all, so I’m gonna start first. Nick hired me for this place ‘round two-K-five after I’d finished up my medical trainin’” He balanced his cigar on the edge of a jade ashtray and scratched his spiky silver hair. “And what was I doin’ before that schoolin’, ya might wonder? I was livin’ in a gutter. Lost this” — he held up his prosthetic arm — “in an op I still can’t blab about, and the whole shitty experience near ruined me. Worked on picklin’ my liver for years, in fact. Once I got straight, though, I realized I had a callin’ to help other fellas like me. So that’s why I’m here. You?”

“It’s not in my patient file?” 

“PTSD and depression. The intake questionnaires and notes from the detox are there, sure. But I always like to hear it straight from the horse’s mouth.”

Old leather creaked beneath Tony as he shifted uncomfortably under the scrutiny. Hmm. How should I phrase it exactly? “I’m a fuck-up, doc.” Yeah, let’s go with that. Pithy. “Pep told me she had a bun in the oven, and I bolted like a damn coward. Got wasted. Probably would’ve cooked my noggin with my own repulsor too if it weren’t for the built-in safeguard.”

“That the first time you thought about offin’ yourself?”

So he’s going right for the darkest secrets. Tapping his fingers against the armrest, Tony averted his eyes, electing instead to examine the titles on Nolan’s bookshelf. Got a thing for Louis L’Amour, apparently, he observed. That and military history. 

“Stark?”

“No.” Tony could already tell this was going to be painful. Like a root canal. “No, there were a couple other times when I was younger. Never told anyone, though. Figured it was better if they just assumed I’d partied too hard.” And encouraging that reputation was an easy thing to do. It satisfied the gossips for him to be that guy.

“So the black dog’s been stalkin’ ya most of your life probably. And the sleep issues? The panic attacks? How long’s that been goin’ on?”

“Six years, off and on. Since the invasion of New York.”

“After you rode that nuke into space?”

“Yeah.”

“Ever pop any anxiolytics? SSRI’s?”

“Once. Didn’t like how they slowed me down. Felt like they nerfed the creative flow.”

Nolan’s pen continued to scratch. “Well, there are drug-free things we can try. I suggest not ruling out the meds completely though. Might be a good thing temporarily. Just to get ya outta the ditch you’re in.”

Tony was still skeptical. But the doc seemed to know what he was talking about — and more importantly, if his story was true, he could probably empathize. 

Taking a deep breath, Tony turned to once again to meet Nolan’s watchful regard. “So the drug-free things —” he began. “Do we talk about loving my inner child? Examine my potty-training hang-ups? What?”

For a long while, the office echoed with Nolan’s low belly laugh. “Nah,” he said after he’d regained his self-control. “That’s not really my approach. But while you’re in here, let’s circle back to what ya said when we started — about the incident that brought ya here. Do you remember what was goin’ through your brain pan at the time?”

Tony swallowed thickly. “That I was gonna be a disaster as a father.” And uttering it out loud made the possibility all the more real. “That I was gonna fuck up my kid worse than my dad fucked up me.”

“And what got ya gnawing on that bone?”

Isn’t it obvious? “Because I was drinking every night. Because I didn’t think I’d ever be able to get my shit together.” Tony folded his arms across his chest and focused all his pent-up nerves into his leg, thumping his foot against the floor.

“I see. So help me out with somethin’. ‘Bout when you outed yourself as Iron Man, I remember you rejiggered your whole company. Stopped producing the boomsticks, right? Focused on green energy and consumer goods? Humanitarian research? That sort of thing?”

“Yeah.”

“Hmm.” Nolan retrieved his cigar and puffed until the end glowed. “Seems to me you're perfectly capable of change so long as you apply your six-sigma grey matter to the issue.”

Stunned, Tony froze. “Never thought of it that way.”

Nolan waved his real hand with a flourish. “Now that there’s what I do.” He put down the pad. “Ya see, Stark — people sometimes get locked into these destructive thought patterns - the muckety-muck academics call them cognitive distortions - that unmoor ya from reality and mess with your emotions. What you were doing before your meltdown was catastrophizing. You were assuming you were gonna be a failure forever and permanently screw up your kiddo without considering all the facts. My job is to get ya criticizin’ your own internal dialogue.”

“Oh.”

“I’m also gonna hook ya up with the internal AA meetings we got goin’.” Nolan stood and headed for the door. After a pause, Tony followed. “Couple fellas in there have your exact diagnosis. And I’m gonna get ya on a strict routine. Maybe put ya on a work crew if there’s stuff that needs doin’ in the valleys ‘round here. In my experience, men in your situation benefit from that kind of discipline. Gives them somethin’ else to focus on. Makes ‘em feel like they’re accomplishin’ somethin’.”

“And that’ll fix me?”

“Nope. Yank yourself outta that engineer headspace.” Nolan laid one meaty hand on Tony’s shoulder and looked him dead in the eye, his expression suddenly softening. “This ain’t about fixin’ ya — cuz you ain’t broken. In a personal crisis, yeah. A little mentally ill, yeah. But there’s nothin’ troublin’ ya that ain’t troublin’ a whole bunch o’ other folks in this post-apocalyptic hellscape we’ve all found ourselves in. No — this is about managin’ better and gettin’ your ass over your personal finish line.”

“I —” Tony’s eyes burned, his chest filling up with something profound and indefinable. “I want to be someone my family can rely on. I want to give them everything I never got.”

“That’s a hell of a beautiful goal, Stark. And yeah — I think I can get ya there.”

--*--

It was a little like living with Cap again — only without the overwhelming self-consciousness (or the equally powerful urge to rebel just for the hell of it.)

Nolan kept the schedule tight. Reveille at six followed by a healthy breakfast. Exercise in the basement gym with three of Nick’s men who were in to deal with their own capital-I Issues. (Yes, Tony still thought of them as Nick’s men even if Danger Mouse himself had dusted with the rest of the Vanished.)  Then individual sessions, support groups, classes, and two more squares. And finally, at ten, a strictly enforced bedtime. 

Eventually, Tony’s meetings with Nolan evolved into walks through the backcountry or impromptu sparring matches — because, as the doc observed after one particularly challenging discussion, “You’re like a tiger in a cage right now. Ya need to move.”

(And yes: even one-handed, Nolan was a worthy opponent who gave as good as he got.)

Thus, Tony was sitting on a stool in shorts and a tank, unwinding the tape from his fingers and blinking the sweat from his eyes, the morning Nolan first proposed he head into town for the day.

“That storm that blew through last night did some damage down in North Conway. Might be useful to have your alter ego around. And if I’ve got your number, ya probably have that armor of yours stuffed in the back of your suitcase, yeah?”

Caught. “Guilty as charged,” Tony replied, his hands up. Toting the armor was a habit now — and as they say, old habits die hard.

“Chances are high you’ll attract attention bein’ who ya are, but you’ll be okay so long as ya stick to that cover story we worked out.”

“Visiting an old friend. Aye aye, Doc.” Tony favored Nolan with a sloppy salute. 

--*--

Curious onlookers didn’t really begin to gather until Tony, after clearing some fallen trees, touched down in front of Zeb’s General Store on the hunt for a cream soda. He’d planned to park his butt on the porch, make nice with the giant stuffed bear that guarded the entrance, and wait for Nolan, Kinney, and Mitchell to catch up — before, that is, he walked back past the candy counters to the refrigerators at the rear and his sneakers squelched in an unexpected puddle.

“Uh, sorry, sir,” said a young clerk who was rearranging a nearby shelf. “That started leaking yesterday. Haven’t been able to get a guy to —” Then came the light of recognition. “Wait, are you —?”

“Yeah, I am.” No sense in hiding it.

The clerk gaped like a fish — then pinked. 

“It’s all right, it’s all right.” Tony held up a placating hand and flashed his best megawatt smile. “I get that a lot. Can I take a look?” One summer afternoon when he was seven - and bored - he gave Jarvis a fright by taking apart and rebuilding the family Frigidaire. Consequently, he had a hunch or two.

“Jim!”

“Yeah?”

“You’re not gonna believe this. Tony Stark’s offering to fix the cooler.”

“You’re shittin’ me.”

“No, I swear to God!” 

Tony resisted the urge to facepalm, focusing instead on disassembling the fridge’s shelving to get a better look at the back of the unit. “Okay, hon,” he mumbled as he slithered inside, “let’s see if we can figure out what’s got you upset.”

By the time he’d poured warm water and vinegar into the defrost drain and double-checked the flow, he was completely surrounded.

“I’d say you’ve been noticed,” Nolan grunted, offering a hand to pull Tony to his feet.

Next thing Tony knew, he was sitting on the red bench outside holding court with a small crowd of locals. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see his companions looking on with amusement — especially when a toe-headed toddler decided to crawl up into his lap and start drooling on his t-shirt. He felt pinned, but curiously warm — like he was meant to hold a baby in his arms.

That contentment, alas, didn’t last.

“Stark!” shouted a voice from the street. “Stark, you bastard!” A man with long, stringy hair shoved his way towards Tony, his hazel eyes flashing. Tony handed his burden back to the child’s mother and stood, instantly on guard. “You killed her, you son of a bitch!” the man spit, his nose inches from Tony’s own. “You and your buddies killed my Vanessa!”

“Shut up, Jeff!” another man interjected, throwing his arm between Jeff and his target. “You don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

“Don’t I, Bob? Maybe they didn’t pull the trigger, but they sure as shit didn’t stop that alien monster from doin’ it.” Bob started to pull Jeff away, but Jeff continued his tirade. “You’re worthless, Stark! All of ya! God-damned worthless peacocks!”

His throat constricting, his heartbeat hammering in his temples, Tony watched the men go. Then, with quiet deliberation, he walked into the road, pounded his RT, and took flight.

Thirty seconds later, Nolan’s face popped up on his HUD. “Where ya goin’, Stark?”

“Back to the lodge,” Tony snapped. For fuck’s sake, Stark, don’t cry. I’m sick of crying.

“Okay. I’ll meet ya there. Don’t go anywhere else ‘til I get back, ya copy?”

Abruptly, Tony closed the connection.

When he reached his destination a few minutes later, he hit the deck with a clang, strode through the entrance helmet down, and made a beeline for his quarters, slamming the door behind him. Then he proceeded to take the place apart, kicking the nightstand over, splintering the dresser, plowing his fist through the window — shattering anything he could get his gauntlets on until, at length, his energy dissipated like a touched snowflake, and he collapsed.

--*--

By the time Nolan returned and tracked his wayward patient down, Stark had curled up against his wall, his armor stowed, his face on his knees. Nolan took in the wreckage around the room, opened the closet to retrieve a broom and dustpan, and cleared his throat.

“Not sure I’m fond of the way you’ve redecorated, Stark. What were ya goin’ for? Post-modern with a side of mayhem?”

“Go away.” Yep. The fella was miserable.

“Nope. It’d be an ethical breach. And, I think, ya need to talk.”

Stark dug his fingernails into his legs.

“What happened here? Tell me what’s on your mind.”

Then Nolan waited, refusing to move a muscle. Over the past two weeks, he’d learned Stark could be one emotionally constipated S.O.B. — especially if he wasn’t sure he trusted you. Like that moment with the shades in their first pow wow: Stark was clinging to those like they were another set of armor. Evidently, he didn’t feel secure unless he was covered in some way or other — and if the Iron Man get-up wasn’t around, then a persona would suffice.

But Nolan also learned he could draw the real Stark out just by matching his stubbornness. It was almost like the guy needed proof that you weren’t going to up and screw him — or simply disappear.

“He was right,” Stark eventually muttered, conceding the round.

“How so?”

“Everything I’ve ever done — it was all for nothing. And now his wife or girlfriend or daughter or whatever is dead because of me. They’re all dead because of me. Because I didn’t do enough to get ready.”

“Walk this dummy through it. What exactly did you ya know about Thanos, and when did ya know it? Lay out the timeline.”

“I knew after New York.”

“About Thanos?”

“I knew something was coming. But I didn’t know the details.”

“Ah. So ya had an inklin’ based on whatever it was ya saw in that wormhole, but ya didn’t have a clear picture to convey to anyone else.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“When were ya finally able to link Thanos to what ya saw?”

“Just before that donut ship appeared over New York.”

“Okay. So in reality, ya didn’t have much to go on until Thanos was literally on our doorstep. Sounds like a recipe for a lot o’ imperfect decision-making. Makes me wonder why ya think ya should’ve been some sort of fortune teller. Cuz superbrain or no, ya can’t see every possible outcome.”

Stark laughed sardonically, lifting his head, his eyes red. Blood oozed from a cut on his cheek. “There are things I could’ve done better, Doc,” he pointed out. “Unless you actually think Sokovia was a daring triumph.”

“Hmm. We can talk about the Ultron debacle too.” In fact, Nolan strongly suspected there was a lot more going on there than simple arrogance — and that demanded further exploration. “But does Ultron mean Thanos is all your fault? Does the fact that you’ve made mistakes mean that everything that’s ever gone wrong is due to you? Or that you’re just straight-up irredeemable? That’s all-or-nothing thinkin’, Stark. Folks just ain’t that simple.” Nolan leaned the broom against the wall and ducked into the en suite to rustle up an alcohol swab. “The way I figure,” he continued, raising his voice so Stark could hear, “you’ve been walkin’ around this entire time thinkin’ you can control the whirlwind and cursin’ yourself every time ya can’t get your lasso ‘round it. But truth is, even if ya do have one of the highest IQ’s on the planet, you’re still just a man. You’re workin’ with incomplete knowledge just like everyone else — not to mention a whole mess o’ internal BS that clouds your lens.” The little first-aid errand completed, Nolan strode out of the bathroom and handed over his quarry. “So take responsibility for your mistakes, sure. Learn from ‘em. But don’t let ‘em define ya. Cuz take it from an old drunk like me: there’s always a way up and out if you’re willin’ to look for it.”

Scowling, Stark scrubbed at his face with the proffered swab and clunked his forehead back on his knees. Clearly, they needed to work on that insane guilt complex quite a bit more — perhaps at the heavy bag. But first: “You remember why you’re here?” 

“My family.”

“Good. Keep that on your windshield.” Nolan grabbed the broom again and gently nudged Stark’s leg with the toe of his boot. “And get back up. Ya gotta clean your room.”

--*--

Before making her presence known, Pepper stopped at the doorway of the conference room to watch her fiancé.

After a month, Tony looked so much healthier — if a bit tense. His knee bounced in time to the music filtering in from the yard outside, and he was anxiously twirling a pen in his right hand. But he was - thankfully - gaining some real weight back, his normal color had returned, and his Van Dyke was crisply shaven.

“Hey, Tony.”

Tony startled, then practically teleported across the room to bury his hands in Pepper’s hair. His kiss was hard - almost frantic - but far from unwelcome.

When they broke apart for air, Tony pulled back and laid his hand on Pepper’s stomach. “Tony,” Pepper laughed, “you’re not going to feel anything yet. It’s still too early.”

“Is Morgan — ?”

“Dr. Townshend says everything’s perfect so far. Come on, let’s sit.”

Pepper led Tony to the faded brown couch that took up most of the left side of the room. After Tony had taken his seat, Pepper kicked off her heels and curled up beside him, reclining her head on his shoulder. “I think this has been really good for you. I can’t remember the last time I saw you without bags under your eyes.”

“Hm. And what about you? Any morning sickness?”

“Nothing I can’t handle.”

They both fell quiet.

After a long while, Pepper sensed something was wrong. She could feel Tony’s muscles stiffening beneath her cheek — and his knee had once again started dancing. “Hey.” She straightened and tried to stop Tony’s fidgeting with her touch. “Whatever’s going through your mind, it’s not true.”

“I’ve been a shitty husband-to-be.”

A pause.

“Okay, maybe you’re right on that one. A little.” Pepper knew Tony preferred candor over kid-gloves. That had always been his way. Performing for the adoring public was one thing — but Tony always filled his inner circle with people - and even AI’s - who could kick him in the pants whenever he needed it. “But I understand why. You were sick. You were in pain.”

“Still, I have to say it. Out loud. To you. It’s kind of the ninth step.” Tony drew in a breath, his knuckles whitening. “I’m sorry. I wish I was there for you.”    

“Tony, you are there for me… by being here.” Pepper reached out and caressed the back of Tony’s neck. “You know that speech one of the flight attendants always gives before your plane takes off?”

           

Tony shot her a curious look. “I thought non sequiturs were my thing.” 

“I guess after all these years, I’m finally starting to pick up your language.” That elicited a wan smile. Gratified, Pepper ran her hand once through Tony’s hair and continued: “What I’m trying to say is… if the cabin loses pressure, you’re always supposed to put your own mask on first.” She captured one of Tony’s calloused hands in hers and squeezed it tight. “I know you’ll find your way back to us, Tony Stark. Because I know the kind of man you really are.”

His face crumpling, Tony fell forward into Pepper’s lap.

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