Chapter Text
Timeline: 6 Months after CA:CW
“You know…you totally suck at keeping secrets, “ Banner’s voice echoed down the hallway. T'Challa stopped abruptly, plate gripped in his hands. Only years of training kept him upright and the food still on the plate.
“How could you Bruce?” I'm offended you would even think such a thing of me.”
He had never met the man but the thought chilled him to his core. The untold rage and strength of the man was all he saw when he ventured to Johannesburg to assist in relief aid. If that hadn't been enough, the stark terror in the eyes of his victims cemented it fully. Layers of dirt covered nearly everything in the epicenter of the Hulk's rampage and Iron Man's attempt to stop him. The smell of death was so pungent he was still unable to rid it from his thoughts. Citizens lying broken and wide eyed on the ground. He grimaced at the thought. His father wanted him to personally assist with the relief aid to get him acquainted with the new destructive beings in the world.
“Point made, I think,” Bruce's voice carried down the hall. T'Challa stepped into view unsure of whether or not he would actually like the man who carried the Hulk inside of him. This was the man that had sparked his father's belief in the Accords.
Tony sat on a stool in front of a workbench. In his hands he twirled a screwdriver and what could possibly be a War Machine component. At closer inspection it appeared to be a long jointed piece of metal. Several computer components lay scattered across the table and a screen hung in his air over the parts boasting Banner’s tired but amused looking face. He locked eyes with T'Challa and Tony swiveled in his chair, tools and strange contraption dropped to rest on his thighs.
“Security breach! FRIDAY? Am I going to have to donate you along with Dum-E? Hmm?”
Bruce snorted.
“I apologize, Boss. Dr. Banner messaged me that you haven’t eaten since you accepted his phone call over 5 hours ago and that he suspected you we going to forgo dinner as well. Ms. Potts would have sent lunch directly to the floor if her access hadn’t been revoked.”
Bruce scowled at his own ceiling, God knows where, as if Friday were responding in his own home. T’Challa wondered why Pepper Potts had been denied access while Tony began grumbling.
“Traitors! The whole lot of you. I'm wounded! Deeply…hey wait…is that peanut butter?”
T’Challa glanced speculatively at the plate in his hand. When he had arrived at the tower they were sat on the counter without a staff member in sight. Suspicious of the intent he had taken a whiff to try to determine if they were safe when FRIDAY startled him by requesting that he take them down to the workshop and meet her creator there. It seems he had been relegated to delivery boy the moment he stepped foot in the communal floor.
“It would appear so,” T'Challa said and handed off the plate to Tony's eagerly wiggling fingers.
“And to what do I owe the honor of your visit by your royal pantherness?” Tony asked around a bite of his peanut butter sandwich.
“Tony!”
“What?”
“He’s a king! You don’t talk to kings that way!” Banner admonished.
“Actually—” T’Challa started to speak.
“It’s our thing, right T’Challa?” Tony said, with his back to Banner’s screen. He nodded at him while Banner shook his head exasperation clear on his face.
“So, T’Challa this is Bruce Banner,” Tony said, more seriously after he’d swallowed down his bite of sandwich. “He’s...”
“The Hulk, I know,” T’Challa said flatly. “I have seen your work in Johannesburg. Very interesting.”
Bruce pulled back from the screen with a pained expression on his face while the omega man in front of him set his plate down and outright glared at him.
“I aided in the relief effort along side your September Foundation,” T’Challa said, not budging beneath the wilting stare the man gave him.
“How kind of you,” Tony replied. “Bruce, I’m going to have to talk to you about the rest of the project later at our usual time.”
“Later, Tony,” Bruce said. His eyes tinged green along his pupils mingling with the hazel T’Challa saw when their eyes next met. He nodded tightly at him and T’Challa had to take a breath at the grief that flickered across his face before the screen went blank and then disappeared completely. The holographic technology was interesting and he had a dozen or so questions at the tip of his tongue to ask the man behind them. Unfortunately he was met with Tony’s fury first.
“What the hell was that?” Tony’s voice was very barely controlled. The scent of his upset was plain in the air and there was a corresponding itch within T’Challa to whine and try to make it better. He swallowed it back and held his ground.
“I should ask you the same question, Stark,” T’Challa snapped. Tony flinched and turned his back to him to pick up the second half of his sandwich. He was dressed more simply than T’Challa had ever seen him. Faded jeans torn and scorched in random places hugged his narrow hips and a ratty t-shirt that might have once displayed a more clearly visible Starfleet insignia hung off of him. Holes that were either strategically placed or accidentally worn-or torched in one spot- gave T’Challa glimpses of the pale skin beneath. His breath hitched and he adverted his eyes when Tony turned back, shaking his head in an attempt to keep his head. It wasn’t why he was here.
“The UN is still searching for Banner,” T’Challa said.
“Like they’re still searching for the other rogue Avengers?” Tony asked with a smug smile gracing his lips.
Teeth bared and T’Challa momentarily startled he took a bite of his sandwich. T’Challa remembered his father’s old saying. You only eat when you feel comfortable, safe. It galled him. He was for the most part Stark’s ally with the UN but as an Alpha he’d never had an outsider disregard him in such a way. Did the man not see him as a threat? His eyes swept across Tony warily taking in his nonchalant eating and blatant eye roll. He felt like he was floundering.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” T’Challa said smoothly.
He’d only been King for a matter of hours really when he made the decision to bring the rogue avengers to his home. As his sister Shuri liked to remind him, it was an impulsive decision no matter how guilty he felt for having gone after an innocent man with the intent to kill. And now, Wakanda was on the hook for it. They had to nearly close their borders and keeping the fugitives away from the general populace had been more than difficult due to their proclivities towards ignoring direct orders. The young woman with them had decided to walk in a barely passible disguise in one of the small villages near the palace. If the Dora Milaje hadn’t been tailing her she would have been discovered. As much as he wanted to believe his countrymen were all loyal he knew better than to discount human nature.
Tony stared back at him, chewing thoughtfully with his arms folded across his chest.
“Calm down, kitty cat, it’s a good thing,” Tony said as if he’d just told him the sky were blue. Because of course. T’Challa’s jaw clenched to keep from dropping his mouth completely open to gawk at the man. It wasn’t everyday that someone could stump him.
“I’ll explain if you pull up a stool,” Tony said, all pretenses dropped and that look of smug satisfaction was disappearing by the second. T’Challa walked to the next closest stool and took a seat noticeably not moving it closer.
Tony quirked an eyebrow at him and with the plate in one hand and his stool in the other proceeded to make his way over. Very slowly. Dragging the chair in an awful screech behind him. T’Challa quirked his own eyebrow while resisting the urge to cover his ears. His more finely a tuned hearing picked up every painful screech and he was absolutely sure that Tony was more than aware of that fact. Tony stopped right in front of him and set his plate down on the table next to him.
“Ah, there we go. Thought it would be better if I came to you,” Tony said as he perched on the stool, looking into T’Challa’s eyes almost daring him to say something. One leg dangled while he notched the other against the step of his stool and rested an elbow on it.
This close T’Challa could see the deep brown of his eyes and the pinch of worry between his brows. He seemed nervous and yet confident. Both skittish and aggressive. His scent this close was metallic and cinnamon with the underlying scent of oil and grease from his work. It was overpowering his senses. He shook his head and blinked a few times to clear himself of it as much as he could. This was not what he came here for. Yet there he was sitting on a stool in Tony’s workshop waiting patiently for the older omega to speak feeling his heart rate increase at every whiff of the man.
“Are you alright?” T’Challa asked hesitantly. He had heard much from the man’s former teammates and knew he was prone to zone out rudely but his expression was far too intense for daydreaming. Tony’s intense gaze focused on him and there it was again, his heart beating wildly only now he itched to lean forward until he could be at the man’s neck to drag his scent in even further.
“I—T’Challa, listen, here’s the thing.”
“Yes?”
“I know you took them in. Don’t worry I’m not going to tattle on you to the council,” Tony rushed to say as T’Challa tensed up again. Often times a man will show you who he is immediately if you pay close attention when you meet him. His father’s words again and T’Challa swallowed the lump that formed in his throat.
“Because you are also shielding Banner?” T’Challa asked and was thankful his voice remained steady.
“I-yeah well no, not exactly. Even if you were to rat me out about him, they’ll never find him. He’s being looked after by one of my closest associates. I’m not worried about anyone finding him unless he decides he wants to be found.”
“That is very comforting, Mr. Stark,” T’Challa replied still not seeing where this was going.
“I’m trying to tell you that I’m glad you took them in,” Tony said. And now that was a bit of a shock. Tony’s face was open and earnest. Was he being honest?
“They’re not my favorite people in the world but the world will need them someday and if it wasn’t you who took them in I’d be scrambling to find them safe places to land,” Tony said.
“Thank you, your majesty. I don’t know where would go where Tony wouldn’t hunt us down,” Captain Rogers had said when he retrieved the rest of his team. “I don’t know what’s going on in his head right now but I know he’d do anything to get at them now that he knows they’ve escaped.”
“Well, we won’t let that happen,” T’Challa had replied and Captain Rogers left his office to help his team settle in. He fortified the borders expecting an attack without a second thought.
“That’s why you never attacked,” T’Challa said. “I wondered.”
“You knew that I knew?” Tony asked.
“I figured it was only a matter of time,” T’Challa said with a tone of relief in his voice.
“Well, now you know,” Tony said.
“Why?”
“Oh, isn’t that the question everyone keeps asking,” Tony said with the shake of his head. His hair, which had grown out from the short professional cut he’d had when they first met, flopped into his eyes with a few gray strands poking out. He blew the errant piece away with a short puff and leaned his chin on his fist.
“I’d like to start over with you if I could,” he said. “If we can. I’d like for us to be allies for real this time.”
For all his rambling the man sure did know how to cut to the quick.
“Tony, we were, are allies,” T’Challa tried to reassure him. Tony shook his head slowly.
“We may have been on the same side briefly for goals that barely aligned but I think we can do better,” Tony said.
“And how would that work Mr. Stark?” T’Challa asked.
“There’s something coming,” Tony said ominously. “Of the alien variety.”
And he had not been prepared to hear that. Tony smirked and chuckled.
“Yeah that’s how I feel,” he said.
He reached out and one of his holographic screens appeared. He began tapping on it and footage appeared of the Battle of New York. The hideous looking aliens flew over New York City and crawled over buildings destroying everything in their path.
Tony stared at it with wide eyes probably matching T’Challa’s own expression. He hoped he hadn’t shown as much fear as he felt when he looked at the creatures. He could fight off any enemy of Wakanda that wanted to take their lands, their vibranium, and seize their technology to do unspeakable things but this he knew he could not face alone and win.
“I have already seen this footage,” T’Challa said quietly. When he met Tony’s gaze he couldn’t determine which cocktail of emotions lurked behind those brown depths.
“You’ve met Wanda and you know of her powers, correct?”
T’Challa nodded at that. The young woman who had nearly revealed to the whole of Wakanda that the Avengers now sought by the authorities were hiding on their soil.
“Well she used them on me when we went after Loki’s scepter,” the omega replied. “And I saw….the end of everything. Each of us dead in space and those—“
He pointed at the screen. “Those monsters headed to earth by the hundreds.”
“The Scarlett Witch can only show you illusions. Captain Rogers assured me that nothing she shows you is real!”
“Yet,” Tony held up his hand to T’Challa’s next response. “Not in the moment, no. But the things she showed us felt more real than anything any of us had ever felt. And every one of them was connected to our fears and even more to a possible outcome of something that is either already set in motion or already happened. We don’t really know all that her powers can do.”
“But where is the proof, Mr. Stark?”
“You’re one of the smartest people in the world, your majesty. Tell me how armies are built.”
“Gathering support, rallying around a single idea or figure head.”
“Right! And we thought that person was Loki,” Tony said. “I mean why wouldn’t we? The guy had motive and a great backstory! He came to conquer the world his brother swore to protect in the godhood version of a damn sibling rivalry! But what if it doesn’t stop there? How could Loki have amassed that large of a force?”
“He’s the prince of a realm he had to have money or—“
“During this time his entire family thought he had fallen to his death. Where did he go? How did he survive to come back not too long after with an army? The supposedly dead prince? ”
“So you’re saying he had to have a benefactor,” T’Challa said but rushed to continue. “Even then...”
“He finds someone with an army big enough to conquer an entire realm and that person just lets him take his army out for a spin? Nuh uh. Loki is a known trickster so why would they even do that? It had to be a deal mutually beneficial enough for this person to loan him a force that large.”
“But if that person, being, alien…has a force that large why would they send Loki instead of going themselves?” T’Challa asked.
“Who knows? Pick a reason. There’s plenty of ‘em. My favorite is that it was just a dress rehearsal. There’s got to be something here that he wants and I’d bet my life that it’s another infinity stone.”
Tony tapped again at the screen and it brought up a schematic of Vision and focused on the gem embedded in his forehead.
“This is the mind stone. You can probably guess what it might control. It came from the scepter Loki carried with him. I think Loki might have had it and agreed to give both it and the Tesseract to his employer when he won earth. It all went wrong though and now we have the mind stone and Thor has the Tesseract on Asgard. They’re coming for this stone and perhaps another one here on earth.”
“Why do you think another one is here?” T’Challa asked and Tony nodded seemingly understanding his need to be sure.
“Vision says he can feel it. Like the stone in him is calling out to another. He can sense the energy. It’s out there.”
T’Challa cursed in his own tongue and Tony nodded as if he understood. Perhaps he really did. This was not the man described to him by his peers.
“Here’s the thing…I’ve seen some of the most powerful people I’ve ever met in my life dead at my feet and it scared the hell out of me enough to try to create something to fight it off so we might not have to and accidentally created a murder bot in the process. But I don’t think I was wrong, not completely. Someday something is going to take us out whether it’s this thing or something else but that’s the life we chose. We chose to take on larger than life threats but what happens when we’re all gone? Who stands up then? Who fights when we can’t, huh?”
“Anyone who can I suppose,” T’Challa mused but the thought nagged at him. Human armies would fall to such a threat and while the Avengers had originally pulled together for the Battle of New York, to hear it from those involved they just barely formed in time. Without any coordination any thing the enhanced people of earth did to fight would fail.
“We can find them, T’Challa. We can find them and train them and prepare them as much as possible to give our home a fighting chance. We can at least get the next generation ready in case we fall,” Tony said.
T’Challa sat up straight at his words. No matter how Tony said it, this was more than creating a new generation of Avengers. This was building a super powered army. The exact fear and oddly enough once goal of one General Ross. This was how the Captain America, the Winter Soldier, and the Hulk were born. By ambitious people hoping to out gun their enemies. Stark had a point. They could count on humanity rising up to defend themselves. Billions of lives fighting to the last even against near insurmountable odds.
“This is about earth’s best chance T’Challa,” Tony said, a sense of finality to his voice. “We have a chance to do this right and I think we should take it.”
“Why are you asking me? You have more than enough resources and space,” T’Challa said and wished he could take the last bit back at the flash of pain in the other man’s face. It was gone before he had a chance to open his mouth again and replaced by determination.
“Because I need you,” he answered solemnly. “I need someone to keep me in check, to tell me when I’m not making sense, to help me make these choices. I need someone to be there if—when--hmm.”
T’Challa watched the man that was described to him as too prideful, too selfish, too destructive swallowed quickly and exhaled.
“In the very likely and probably rapidly approaching event of my death I need someone to pick them up and make them carry on,” Tony said. “Because that’s our job as Avengers. We keep our home safe right down to the end.”
T’Challa nearly fell off his seat. He looked over the man before him covered in sweat and grease. Callused hands tapped against his knees. T’Challa blinked at his hands and then back at the last half of his second sandwich left uneaten. Another look at Tony Stark and it was like seeing him for the first time. The spark of determination in his words was muted at the fear in his eyes and nearly silenced by the bags beneath them. The rhythm of his fingers ate up the silence in the room. Even as the other man looked him in the eyes appearing otherwise confident T’Challa noted the peakiness of his skin. How had he missed how pale he was, even since he’d last seen him in Washington?
“Boss I detect an elevated heart rate…”
“FRI I’m fine,” Tony snapped. He rubbed at his eyes.
“Mr. Stark are you alright?” T’Challa asked. Tony opened his mouth to answer, probably something to the tune of his world famous snark, but instead wobbled in his seat and pitched forward towards the floor.
“Tony!”
T’Challa thanked the Gods for his quick reflexes as he grasped the man around his shoulders and held him up close to his chest. Right up until Tony began to dry heave and subsequently vomit the remnants of his sandwich and a half lunch all over him. The Alpha grimaced at the smell. He turned to brush the last half of Tony’s food off to the side of the long table when he noticed a robot on wheels nearly half his size already scooting away with the plate clasped in its large claw. Another poked him in the back with its longer arm and flexed towards the table as if pointing. T’Challa hoisted the man up onto it as gently as he could. The man’s limbs dropped limply to the table. He looked even paler against the silver surface.
“Fuck,” Tony groaned, eyes still shut. “That’s just…fuck.”
“Ah—hmm. FRIDAY?” T’Challa glanced at the ceiling. He pressed a hand to the other man’s forehead and frowned at the heat he felt. Tony made no more noise and his eyes remained closed.
“King T’Challa Dr. Cho has been alerted and is on her way up with medical supplies,” she said. He nearly detected a note of concern in her voice.
“How often do you monitor Mr. Stark?”
“24/7, sir,” Friday replied immediately.
“How long have these symptoms been present? Is it recent?”
“Boss has been suffering from intermittent fevers, nausea, stomach inflammation that results in vomiting, insomnia, hallucinations, panic attacks—“
“Since when?”
“7 and a half months ago,” FRIDAY replied matter-of-factly. Since the war.
“It sounds like bond withdrawal,” T’Challa theorized.
“Well, you’d be correct,” a prim female voice, sounded from the doorway. He recognized Dr. Helen Cho from her several conference speeches he’d viewed from over the past few years. She stood straight, duffel bag in hand, a dark look warred with concern on her face. She stepped forward through the open door and walked briskly to his side.
“King T’Challa, I cannot help my patient if you don’t move,” she said sharply. He jumped from her path as soon as she reached the table. She sent a curt nod his way and braced her bag on the stool Tony had fallen from and began rummaging around.
“I’m not sure if he’ll be okay with you being here,” Dr. Cho said without looking up. “You should probably wait in the common room. He’ll be fine he just has a bad habit of ignoring his health.”
T’Challa glared at her, a growl worked it’s way up his throat, but she held a hand up and met his gaze dead on. T’Challa folded his arms across his chest continued to maintain his glare.
“Listen, you’re not a family member or even a friend and I need room to work,” she said.
“I am his teammate,” T’Challa said shortly. “He will want someone here when he wakes up.”
“I think he’s had enough of any sort of teammate, your majesty. Have you ever seen someone go through bond withdrawal?”
“My...father when my mother died,” T’Challa said. Dr. Cho nodded solemnly.
“But he took medication to help him through so that he wouldn’t have to temporarily step down from his duties. Is Tony having a reaction to the medication?” T’Challa asked.
“He won’t take it,” Dr. Cho said. “It was completely his decision and against all of my advice. Now it’s my job to make sure he comes through it as healthy as possible for a man his age that has been through the physical and mental trauma he has. I told him to keep the visitors to a minimum.”
It dawned on him that he had probably been locked down here for who knew how long. Months maybe? Only coming out to forcibly eat even knowing he might get sick from it. Chatting with Dr. Banner probably as one of the only means of social interaction until the withdrawals waned.
“I’m not quite sure I understand?” T’Challa asked. Dr. Cho shook her head at him.
“What do you care?” She snapped loudly. Tony groaned on the table and T’Challa’s eyes narrowed. Though he respected her and her work he demanded answers.
“Dr. Cho I assure you I care a great deal what happens to Mr. Stark,” T’Challa pressed on. “Further more—“
“I don’t know. He won’t really talk about it. Not with me or Ms. Potts or Mr. Rhodes,” she cut him off. Her tone was sharp and meant to wound.
He tore his gaze from her and looked down at Tony. Where were his friends? Someone had to have noticed. Cho was his doctor and he understood her medical need to not overstep but this was so wrong. So hard to look at it physically hurt.
“You really should go now.”
The beta woman stared him down until he stepped further back from the table and walked out of the door. The muscles in his neck strained at his resistance to look back at the man on the table. He stepped into the elevator, pressed the button for the common floor, and let out a surprisingly shaky breath and glanced up once more.
“FRIDAY will you…can you please let me know when she is finished?”
There was a long moment before she answered him while the elevator took him down 5 floors.
“Yes, sir,” FRIDAY answered. The doors opened on his relieved sigh. Okoye, Nakia, and Ayo stood as he approached. Okoye and Ayo were dressed in street clothes while Nakia wore a black pantsuit. They rotated the roles on each visit out of the country but this time Nakia operated as the forward guard while the other two would normally set themselves up to follow behind as the rear guards, seamlessly blending into any crowd they were in. Most of the Doras were alphas but Okoye and Nakia were omegas and two of the fiercest warriors he’d ever seen. They were also too perceptive to leave him to quietly brood. They had known him since childhood and Shuri had taught them too well.
“Trouble, your majesty?” Nakia asked. T’Challa looked to her and she must have read the shock there because she strode to him and examined him closely. She scrunched her nose at the smell but didn't say anything.
“T’Challa?” Okoye queried. “Should we head back to the embassy?”
T’Challa stepped around them and shrugged off his jacket as he went. FRIDAY instructed him to drop it down a chute next to the elevator doors and it would be cleaned. He did as he was told and sank down onto a plush blue couch facing the elevators. He stared resolutely forward almost willing Tony Stark to stride into the room like nothing had happened. But it didn’t. He couldn’t forget the look on the man’s face nor Dr. Cho’s. A bond withdrawal was nothing to be cavalier about.
He didn’t remember much from his mother’s death. He was far too young at the time and barely remembered her warm smile without looking at old photos or paintings. He’d been told to stay away from T’Chaka’s private rooms for a few days after the funeral but was too curious to obey. He was so light on his feet he was able to slip through the palace without his guard knowing. At the time he hadn’t much of a distance between their suites but on small tired feet it seemed like a large adventure. He had to weave his way through the courtyard and up the tallest tree in the palace to reach T’Chaka’s window. He was sure his combat instructor would have been amused at him using his skills to spy on his own father.
From the window he could see several of the Dora Milaje on guard and guiding his father back to his bed. He looked ill with sallow skin and watery eyes. One of the Doras in the room stood at his father’s nightstand grinding something in a bowl with a heavy stone. He noticed a few other bottles filled with liquid and roots on the nightstand were each picked up and added to the mix. The Dora poured the contents into a glass filled partway with water and swirled it around while holding it to her face in a search for perfection. Once satisfied, she handed it to T’Chaka who then swallowed it all down. He heard a rustling on the branches as Nakia landed next to him. The branch didn’t even creak as she shifted next to him, a testament to her own studies.
“I saw you sneaking past my window. Are you unwell?” She whispered.
“Something is wrong with father,” he told her. “He has not been seen for days.”
“Oh, T’Challa,” the sympathy in her small voice had him turning away from the scene in the suite. Where he father was resting in his bed, seemingly calmer than before.
“What do you mean?” He asked. Tears welled in Nakia’s eyes.
“He’s lost his mate,” Nakia said. “He is more than just sad. It will make him sick while he mourns her.”
“Will he get better?” T’Challa asked, fearful for how long it had been going on. He understood his mother was never coming home again and it hurt to think of her. But he was not sick an his father was. He had never seen someone be that sick for that long before.
“The andala root will help him,” Nakia said smartly. “Look.”
She implored him to look back into the room where the lights had dimmed but he could still see his father’s chest rising and falling clearly.
“Your father rests now. Come back to bed before we get in trouble.”
T’Challa had nodded and with one last glance at the man now sleeping peacefully in his bed he ambled back down the thick trunk of the tree and slid into the shadows with Nakia while they made their way across the courtyard.
They never spoke of it again and his father had recovered in less than a month from the sickness but not the broken heart.
Hours passed before FRIDAY’s voice shook him from his thoughts. In the elevator on his way back up T’Challa’s mind drifted the pale body on the table and why anyone would put themself through that. He considered his father to be the strongest man he ever knew and even he had taken medicinal relief rather than bear the natural pain of a body rejecting a bond.
Of course broken bonds were always case-by-case. T’Challa had researched enough into it after his mother’s death and found that it was in the simplest of terms a chemical reaction. One that was often kinder to Alphas than Omegas but still painful. Hormones were thrown into disarray and affected the anterior cingulate cortex and helped prepare the body for another possible bond. Medical advancements helped to keep the physical symptoms at bay while allowing a person to still process the emotional effects. Some of which were produced by a subsidiary of Stark Industries. T’Challa was still wracking his brain for possibilities when the doors opened on the workshop floor and he found himself walking briskly to the door.
Dr. Cho was just packing her things. She pressed a pill bottle into Tony’s hand and shoved past T’Challa with another curt nod. Tony sat on the table he’d been prone on, skin still pale for the most part but a little bit more flushed than before. The back of his neck was a deep red. He wore a clean grey t-shirt. He hopped off the table and patted the robot that was next to him, mopping up the floor in wildly precise swipes.
“Pitiful,” he murmured to the bot then chuckled.
“Mr. Stark I…”
“Please, “ Tony interrupted; finally turning those dark depths towards him and subsequently easing the sharp twist of his gut at the rawness of hurt in his voice. He hopped down from the table with ease. T’Challa released a relieved breath when he didn’t so much as wobble.
“I’m pretty sure after you’ve worn my puke and stopped me from cracking my head open on the floor you’ve at least earned the right to call me Tony,” he said dryly.
T’Challa was unable to keep himself from laughing. Tony grinned at him and joined in and for a moment their laughter filled the room.
“Vomit aside, have you had any thought towards my proposal?” Tony asked once the amusement had dwindled down.
“I could really use your help,” Tony said. He held out his hand beckoning T’Challa forward. He’d be lying to himself if he didn’t admit that he felt drawn to the man. Even so clearly suffering he stood tall. When their hands met and T’Challa’s fingers curled over the hard calluses warmth spread through him like wild fire. Tony’s eyes lit up at the contact.
“I would be honored but I have to ask…why me?” T’Challa answered. Excitement curled around his chest even though he knew he’d get an earful from Shuri when he returned home.
“Because you’re everything I could have been if I were a good kid growing up,” Tony replied meekly. “Oh hey, come on, don’t look at me like that! All frowny.”
T’Challa shook his head at him. Tony smiled at him and shrugged.
“I am sorry for throwing up on you,” Tony said.
“Tony, why won’t you take the pills?” T’Challa asked abruptly. He was afraid the other man wouldn’t answer. Tony had gone completely silent and had begun tapping his fingers on his folded arms. Tony didn’t waste time asking how he knew and swore quietly before answering.
“I want to feel it. All of it,” Tony said and there was something firm in his voice. He was stubborn and clearly digging into this decision wasn’t going to change that but T’Challa pressed on.
“Why? Why would you subject yourself to that? It does not have to be that way, “T’Challa said, getting ready to expound on the more natural remedies in his home country if the pills wouldn’t work for him.
“No, you don’t get it, I need to feel this. I need to know what this is like so I don’t ever entertain the idea of this shit ever again. So that I know this is what’s waiting at the end of the line for me if I do,” Tony said.
“Tony, you could cause permanent damage.”
“Well you’ll be happy to know that Dr. Cho is forcing me to take at least half a dosage a day for the next two weeks to keep the physical strain down. And by forcing I mean she’s called in the big guns, Pepper and Rhodey. They’ll hold me down and make me take them if they have to. I’ll be fine.”
“Are you sure?” T’Challa asked surprising even himself at how much he doesn’t want to leave the omega’s side.
“When I took these before in college I barely felt anything. This was 5 years of my life just gone. I should know what that feels like,” Tony said then said more to himself. “I shouldn’t have held on for so long.”
“5 years?” T’Challa asked with a growl to his voice. Tony winced and shrugged again.
“Yeah, Dr. Cho believes that’s why it’s taken so long for the withdrawal to wear off. Close to an entire year of this mess. At least she thinks it’s almost over. I’m leveling out more and more each day,” Tony said. T’Challa’s smile was tight but reassuring enough for Tony to smile back.
“Onwards and upwards and all that. Your jacket should be ready to pick up. I could walk you down to the in-house dry cleaners,” Tony said. T’Challa nodded.
“I would appreciate that.”