tony stark whump

"that will be all, miss potts."

tony's saying his goodbyes and no one is catching on

set after civil war; following movies don't apply cuz hes dead lol

tw: ptsd, suicide

~NO POV~

Tony Stark was a man who had lots of stories to tell to his future children. Whether it was how he ended up with an arc reactor in his chest, or how he ended up fighting with the Earth's Mightiest Heroes, and then how he lost his AI and ended up disbanding his team. He had a lot of stories to tell, but he wouldn't be able to.

Because after he lost his team, after everything he loved and held dear came crashing down on him, he realised he might not want to live long enough to have kids. Or live at all.

Tony was strong, and he'd gotten through a lot of shit. He'd survived an assassination, escaped a terrorist group without making the weapon they tried forcing him to make, created a suit and saved a lot of people from said terrorists, and then used variations of that suit to keep saving people.

And a lot of that scarred him. But he was good at compartmentalising, and that meant he wouldn't realise how bad all of the things he went through actually was.

After New York, he started getting nightmares and anxiety attacks, but that was fine. It was just about New York, and it wasn't very likely that there'd be another hole in the sky leading to floating alien headquarters. It was easy to get over that. (He forced himself to - he didn't want to look weak in front of his team.)

Speaking of that team, he missed them an unbelievable amount. He loved them so fucking much, and he only realised it when he lost them.

When he lost a part of himself.

He wouldn't ever admit it, but that night in Siberia, something died. When Captain America destroyed his arc reactor, a part of Tony died. He thought he was going to die, but then FRIDAY's emergency distress signal saved him. And he came back to America, injured, but alive.

Still, a part of him was missing.

Tony was heavily injured. He hadn't realised how badly he was injured until Rhodey cried by his bed- in a wheelchair. Fuck, Tony forgot his best friend was now paralysed. He decided then, that as soon as he could, he would build Rhodey legs. 

"I thought you were dead, man." Rhodey said. "They told me your sternum was broken, along with five of your ribs, and you could've punctured a lung. But with your history, because of the arc reactor, you were so much more vulnerable. They thought you were going to die."

Tony didn't know what to say, because to be honest, he was so high on morphine. The doctors were allowed to give him drugs, just this once, because of how bad the injuries were. No one knew Iron Man was so weak, even with the suit. At least, they didn't know he was so weak against Captain America. 

No one ever expected to see them fight.

Tony was discharged from the hospital a week later, transferred to the medical floor in the Tower, because Tony hated public hospitals. He was kept on morphine for a few weeks, doses getting lower and lower to wean him off. Tony didn't want to get addicted, so he didn't argue, even though the pain was still unbearable.

On several occasions, he considered ripping the IV out carelessly, knowing that if he didn't do it properly he could get a blood infection or let air into his vein, which could kill him. But then he remembered he had to build Rhodey legs. The only thing keeping him going was building Rhodey legs.