Father Fury {Discontinued}

Chapter Twenty-Six

A/N: I start writing about Tony's rumination in this one and though I've done some research on it, I'm still not entirely sure how it works so it may not be right, but I'm just saying that it's in here.

Tony walked anxiously towards the canteen, silently sauntering beside Happy and his friend Pepper Potts. Apparently, her real name was Virginia, but she went by Pepper. And Happy's proper name was Harold, though Tony questioned neither about why they didn't get called by their real names. He didn't either, though Tony was more of an obvious nickname for Anthony than the other two had.

Happy and Pepper had led Tony to his classes since first period, having the same ones and all, and by lunch time, the two seemed to have rubbed off the awkwardness and started going about how they'd do things usually, which meant accidentally leaving out a certain Tony who stayed shadowed behind them. He didn't really mind, he just wanted Rhodey.

Happy turned around once they reached the lunch queue. "So, are you going to get anything? Me and Peps usually get hot meals, so we're gonna need to get in the line." Tony shuffled slightly, confused. "But you stood in a line to get into the canteen. Why do you need to stand in another one?"

Thing with Tony was that his birth parents had him homeschooled. And then Sharon hadn't even bothered with schooling, despite it being illegal up to a certain age, but Rhodey simply taught him stuff then. It was stuff that Rhodey already knew plus stuff off the internet since he had decided to do a few online lessons and teach the stuff he learnt to Tony.

"Yeah, but those lines outside were split into the Small Schools - Shakespeare went in first, they are purple small school - all the kids with purple planners; Picasso went in second, they are red small school; and we're all in Mandala small school, since we have green planners. We went in last. Now it's time to line up to actually buy the food. That line was just to get into the building." Happy explained. It was obvious that he'd lost Tony somewhere there, despite him having been requested to move up a couple of grades by all his teachers so far on his first day, even his drama one.

"Just, are you going to buy food, Tony? Cause if not then you can find us a place to sit." Pepper smiled. Tony nodded, looking to the ground. It wasn't that he didn't like these kids, they were nice, he just wasn't sure that if he hadn't been sent to hang out with them, he would've done it off his own back.

Still, he went and found a mostly empty table and placed his school bag down on one seat and his lunch box on the other, refusing to eat til the others came back - he didn't want to appear rude. Howard had warned him that people wouldn't like him and think of him as bratty if he was. Years passed, and still Tony remembered Howard's odd teachings. Though to him, they weren't odd. They were just things he assumed all children were taught by their fathers.

"Tony!" Tony looked up from where he'd been playing BitLife on his phone (his character Chile Williman from Santiago in Chile, had just died at the age of forty from a massive heart attack anyway) to see Pietro and Wanda racing his way. Judging by the voice, it was clearly Pietro who'd yelled his name. The twins sat in the seats opposite him and his school bag.

"Hey guys, where are your hosts?" Tony conversed, politely. Despite having lived them for a couple of months, Tony hadn't really spoken to the twins. He'd mostly just stuck with Rhodey, chattering off to him, though sometimes he managed to hold a steady conversation with Steve, Bucky, Bruce, and T'Challa.

"I lost mine somewhere at the end of lesson. I think she went to the toilet. She's a bit weird." Wanda said, zipping her school bag to grab her lunch box. "Mines hanging out with his friends this lunch, knew I had a twin since Wanda was in my last lesson." Pietro added, copying Wanda's actions. Tony nodded.

"Hey Tony, who are these?" Tony craned his head to now look up in a different direction. It was Pepper who spoke, and she moved his lunch box off the seat so that she could sit on it, placing her blue plastic tray on the table top first.

"These are my foster siblings." Tony explained. "He's Pietro And She's Wanda - they're twins." Pepper nodded and smiled, welcoming them whilst Happy gave them a quick nod as he went to sit on Tony's other side.

"So, are you guys on our grade?" Pepper asked, dragging a fork full of cheese covered pasta to her mouth. Pietro shook his head. "Grade below." He answered, mouth full of cheese sandwich. Wanda elbowed him in the ribs earning a giggle from Pepper.

Tony glared down at his food as conversation stirred up around him, Shuri and Peter joining them at one point; Shuri's host Carina sat with them as well.

He couldn't stomach it. He couldn't stomach any of it. He want to eat it, desperately, but he couldn't. He didn't dare even touch it and get any reminiscence of food on his finger tips. His stomach growled and begged for food, but he just couldn't.

All of a sudden, the heavy weight of bile that he so often had felt began to weigh in his throat. He needed to get out of here before somebody saw him. He couldn't eat the food he had, but he could certainly re-eat the minute amount of food from breakfast.

Tony stood abruptly, all prying eyes from his friends and family staring up at him before he legged it, leaving his bags behind him.

He wasn't sure where the toilets were, but the partly digested food was rising even higher, so he dashed into a storage cupboard, flopping on the floor and leaning his back against a case of new Geography text books.

It all began immediately - Tony's mouth clamped shut. He couldn't afford to spill it anywhere. The food leaped from his throat and smashed against his teeth, all settled down on his tongue in a nasty mush.

The rumination itself was effortless and painless, but that didn't make Tony feel any less of a freak. Sure, lots kids in the household had something wrong with them: Steve had asthma; Bucky had a prosthetic limb; Pietro had ADHD; Bruce had anger issues (IED to be exact); Loki still had minor adjustment disorder, but then again he came from a completely different country; and Scott had trichotillomania, which had startled everyone when they'd found out.

Thing was, even though Tony wasn't the only one with issues, he felt like he was the only one who struggled to deal with them. And he was.