#that it didnt even pipe up while I was engaging in this ridiculousness

[faillen]

.

[inawickedlittletown]

Walking The Wire (107/?)

Summary: Tony Stark always knew about Peter Parker. He didn’t know that Peter was going to get superpowers and become Spider-Man, but he always knew about Peter because Peter was his son.

This will span from pre-Iron Man up through the rest of the MCU (eventually including Infinity War) and will be for the most part canon compliant except where I’ve taken some liberties and interpreted canon a certain way.

Pairings: Pepper/Tony, Tony/Steve (endgame), Tony/Mary (past)

A/N: If you want me to tag you when I post new chapters let me know. This fic is also on AO3

I used Collider’s MCU timeline to stay canon and the title of this fic is an Imagine Dragons song that is just so fitting for Peter and Tony

@findmeinthestarss

Masterpost

Chapter One Hundred Six

It wasn’t until it was almost summer that Tony actually had to speak out in Barnes’ defense. Pepper was the one to make the call on the timing and Tony agreed that it was the right time. It was mostly to do with how the public viewed Barnes and Ross. Since clearing the air in Wakanda, Tony had started to take more interest in the man that was Steve’s best friend. He’d gone as far as to offer Barnes a new arm even if the process would entail Tony returning to Wakanda to make it happen. Barnes hadn’t seemed too interested and Tony realized fairly quickly that it was because for the time being he preferred not having the arm and either way Shuri assured him she had something in the works for him.

Speaking to Barnes had made things a little easier for Tony. He didn’t blame the man anymore and he didn’t dream about him or Siberia all the time not that it stopped Tony from having nightmares all together about his mom dying but they weren’t about Barnes. Not really. Some things were never going to stop and for Tony there would always be nightmares.

In the end, Tony’s statements about how much he didn’t blame Barnes and how he didn’t personally hold Barnes accountable for the deaths of his parents had the effect of making people aware of how much Hydra had had to do with everything The Winter Soldier had done. But it wasn’t just Tony’s word but all the proof they had to show what Hydra had been up to.

It didn’t stop Ross from continuing to try to get his way and make it near impossible for Barnes to ever get out of hiding without being arrested if he did. But the arrest would only lead to a trial and Tony was confident that it was a trial that Barnes would win. Ross seemed to have figured that out too, because he wasn’t as pushy with the stuff about Barnes which just made Tony worry and he’d have something else up his sleeve. Either way, with Barnes not planning on leaving Wakanda any time soon the whole matter was put the rest and Tony had his lawyers ready for when anything changed. He was hopeful that his name would be cleared when the time came.

Tony had a million other things going on too like the planning of a wedding. The thing of it was that flashy wasn’t what they wanted or needed. In all actuality, the whole marriage thing was a bit unnecessary in and of itself. Still, they wanted to have it happen and make it official.

It was Peter that seemed to want to make a big deal out of it which Tony thought was him trying to really make it clear how okay he was with him getting married which was sweet. Ever since they’d had that discussion over apple crostini, Tony had realized that he really needed to make sure Peter never felt left out of any of it. It helped that Steve adored Peter and loved his input and probably welcomed Peter in more than even Tony did.. If it was up to Steve, he probably would just let Peter have his way with all of it.

“But you have to have a big wedding,” Peter said one morning. “Just think about all the good it will do to all the gay teens out there who look up to you. You’re Iron Man and Captain America. You’re both public figures.”

Rhodey thought the whole thing was hilarious, but somehow Peter got him on his side. Mostly, Tony suspected that Rhodey just wanted to watch him suffer.

“No one even knows we’re together, Pete,” Tony had tried to argue one afternoon while Peter did some maintenance on K-9.

“But they should. I don’t really get why you’re keeping it a secret in the first place. You’re not going to hide it forever. It’s like -- I know I have a secret identity, but one day everyone’s going to know who I am. And they’re also going to know that I’m your son. I’m not ashamed of being Spider-Man or the son of Tony Stark even if it’s easier to keep that quiet at the moment. ”

It took a few weeks of convincing and since Peter was eventually out of school for the summer he had plenty of time to harp on the subject which was a bit amusing mostly because he even had Karen and Friday piping in on how much they needed to make a big deal about the wedding. In the end, Tony figured that Peter was right. Secrets weren’t a good thing and as horrible as the media coverage could get, Peter was right in saying that they might help young LGBTQ kids and teens and adults too probably by being open about it. That was what finally truly convinced Tony -- but also, it was sort of nice to share with the world that he and and Steve were going to be husbands.

But then, another reason reared its head when Tony got a call from Ross. The calls had stopped a while back, but Friday still put Ross on hold for a while before Tony picked up.

“Oh, sorry, I didn’t realize there was a call,” Tony said. “What can I do for you?”

“Stark, you’ve done an amazing job at stonewalling me time and time again.”

“Getting the right information to the people is stonewalling you? Getting our heroes back and under house arrest as punishment for their actions? General, I have followed every letter of the law and every clause within the amended Sokovia Accords. So unless you want something, I don’t understand the nature of this phone call. I’m a very busy man.”

Which was when Ross said the last thing that Tony expected him to say: “I know you have a son. Swings around New York City as Spider-Man, right? I bet the people would love to know about him -- after all, everyone seems to be wondering who he is.”

Tony went cold. It didn’t seem like Ross actually knew who was under the Spider-Man suit, but he knew that it was Tony’s son. He knew that Tony had a son at all.

“Ah, I see I found something to keep you quiet,” Ross chuckled.

The question was how did he know?

“Did you know that The Accords and who signed them are public. Even if they weren’t I would have been able to take a look and Spider-Man is a minor who needed a mentor of sorts to take responsibility for him. And you did that for him which was enough to make me interested.”

It still begged the question how he had figured it out and how he wasn’t mentioning Peter which worried him. Did he know it was Peter or not? Peter had signed as Spider-Man not as Peter Parker so maybe--

“Everyone’s been speculating,” Ross said, “I may as well give them some sort of answer. Tony Stark allowing a teenager to run around as a hero -- that would make the front pages.”

But not if Tony had a bigger story to sell.

---

The pictures were taken in the tower because of the house arrest and they were absolutely ridiculous. Steve didn’t know how Tony had managed to convince him to pose that way. They were both on chairs and Tony’s was balancing on two legs. Steve’s leg was resting on Tony’s shoulder and Tony was actually holding on to it. Steve actually couldn’t believe that they hadn’t fallen while taking the picture. There had been a bunch of other ridiculous poses made that day and it was lucky that not all of the pictures were used in the article. Only a few of them were of a serious nature. The one where Tony had just kissed his cheek, or the one where they had gotten a bit caught up in staring at each other and the photographer had just taken a few shots of them. There were also individual ones. Vanity Fair was running a whole issue mostly devoted to them, it was kind of insane.

The interview had been almost nice though, mostly because he’d gotten to talk about Tony a bit and because it was the first time that Steve was getting to really be public about The Accords and the house arrest. He’d even gotten to mention Bucky for a bit of it.

The one area where Steve had been surprised was when Tony decided to disclose that he had a son. Peter wasn’t mentioned by name, but he casually mentioned that his son and Steve got along really well. Steve had been sitting next to him when the topic came up and he had frozen in place out of surprise until Tony reached for his hand and griped it before he said:

“I know it’s a bit of a surprise to everyone to learn that I have a son, but since we’re announcing this other important life event I figured everyone should know that I am a very proud father to a teenager. He hasn’t always been in my life, but he’s made a difference in it in the time he has been. I am unwilling to talk about who he is for privacy concerns, but I guess it was time to be a little more open with the world.”

When the final version of the whole article and pictures arrived for their approval, Steve was a little floored by how good they both looked. How happy, too. The main picture was the chair one but it was followed by a picture of Tony fixing a strand of Steve’s hair and Steve looking down at him. Steve wanted that picture framed. Vanity Fair didn’t go out of their way to highlight the mention of Tony having a son, but everyone knew that the media was going to pick up on it and run with it.

Steve skimmed the article and it really was perfect. The writer captured them and really weaved in the narrative of their story from how they labeled their sexualities to how their relationship had come about to why they had decided to come forward with the truth. It was actually kind of nice and Steve didn’t regret doing it.

--

“Tony Stark is dating Captain America?”

“Wait — they’re engaged.”

“Did you hear?”

“I didn’t know that HE was Gay? Did you?”

“This is nuts.”

“Wait, and is it true that Tony Stark has a son?”

“Do you think they’ve been together this entire time?”

“But didn’t Stark date his assistant for forever? I thought they were still together.”

“They’re getting married, though.”

“I wonder how long they’ve been together…”

The questions and comments were endless and Peter was sort of amused every time he heard something. He tried to stay away from actually discussing anything with anyone unlike Ned who was absolutely keen on getting his two cents in, but then Peter had expected that from Ned. Ned was also trying to get Peter to talk to him about how he felt about Tony mentioning that he had a son. Peter didn’t want to discuss it.

The timing of the article was perfect, though, because it came out just a day before the last day of school and Peter knew he wouldn’t get a chance to actually get tired of hearing about the article. It wasn’t just that everyone was talking about it, either, but that some of them just went up to Peter to ask him about it since he had the Stark Internship and everyone wanted to know if he’d known beforehand and if he’d met Steve. In one case someone asked if Peter had met Tony’s son. Peter tended to just give those people a shrug and a, “I’m just an intern.”

Ned’s reaction had still been the best after he’d had a chance to process the whole thing. “This -- this means that freaking Captain America is going to be your step-father.”

“Yup, Ned. That’s how that works,” Peter said.

Ned had laughed nervously for a while. “How are you not freaking out?”

“Because I’ve had plenty of time to get used to it.”

The media coverage was kind of insane after the article was released, though. Mostly it was a rehashing of what the article said but there were segments on the news, talk shows, and those celebrity news shows. A lot of them highlighted the mention of Tony having a son and everyone seemed to be questioning who it might be. Only one article mentioned the possibility of Tony’s son being Spider-Man and it was almost said in jest which was funny because everyone seemed opposed to the idea because of how secretive Tony had been about having a son in the first place.

Since the publishing of the article, Friday had also started to deal with a high volume of calls for interviews that were all declined. Peter hadn’t expected it to be so crazy, but his dad and Steve were handling it.

“But we’re talking about Iron Man and Captain America getting married. Two Avengers marrying each other. It’s crazy.”

Peter sighed. “I’m aware. They’re also normal people. You’ve met them.”

“It’s still crazy, though.”

Michelle’s response had been to shrug. “It’s nice that they’re making a difference by making their romance public. Doesn’t really concern me though.” He really should have expected nothing less from her except that then she had turned and stared right at him and said, “Peter Stark.” And promptly walked away.

---

“I’m kind of glad I’m on house arrest now,” Steve said. He was playing with K-9 and Dum-E with a ball and Tony was in the middle of not watching some snapshots of the media coverage of their engagement. It had been created by Friday for them just so that they were on top of everything being said about them, but Tony had it on while he worked on something or other.

“Hmm, yes, they would be following you everywhere,” Tony said.

Tony for his part hadn’t really left the tower. They’d announced their engagement over Twitter the morning the article came out and it had been kind of funny how many people thought that Tony was joking. They thought so even when Steve tweeted about it. There had even been some that were convinced it was a misdirect from Tony and Pepper getting engaged or even full on married. Then, everyone got wind of the article and the messages changed to surprise. A lot were pleased and congratulatory but then there were the homophobes who were obviously completely offended by it but Tony didn’t care about engaging with people like that. There were fewer at first that mentioned Tony’s announcement of also being a father.

“Why, um, you haven’t explained why you mentioned having a son.”

He hadn’t mentioned the call from Ross. At first because he had so much to set up to screw up Ross’ plans, but also because he knew that Steve would feel guilty about it somehow.

“Ross knows my son is Spider-Man. I’m not -- I don’t know if he knows it’s Peter but he knows something so it made sense to announce it myself in a way.”

“Which is why everything was rushed,” Steve said.

The funny part was that after the article had come out and other coverage of it by the media got all of the information right there were still a bunch of rumors and stories to deal with. It was just so much information and no one really knew what to focus on. It was sort of brilliant to mix in Tony having a son in the middle of all of it.  

“Are they really saying that you made this a condition to have me back in the states?” Steve asked with a grin, looking at the screen.

“Apparently so. You know how they are — they want to paint me as the bad guy and in a lot of those people’s eyes I’m not good enough for you.”

“Those people have no idea how amazing you are,” Steve said

K-9 barked to get attention. The dog really was a great addition to the tower. Peter loved him of course, but so did Steve who was the first to just drop to the ground and roll around with the dog when he had time.  

“Get rid of all that, Fri, it’s useless.” The screen went dark. “Is there anything else that needs my attention? Otherwise I’ll get back to figuring out the housing unit for the nanotech.”

Friday seemed to take a moment to search and then, “I have surveillance footage of Thor and Loki in the city. There are also Instragram pictures of Thor.”

Steve dropped the ball at his feet and he straightened up, joining Tony to look at what Friday had been able to pull up. The video wasn’t all that grainy but it didn’t show much since it was them facing some sort of demolition. The video wasn’t even centered on them but they stood there for a while and it was definitely Thor and Loki even if they were both in regular human clothing and not their usual Asgardian gettup. It was also not enough to hide them from people on the street who seemed to stare at them from afar.

“What got demolished there?” Steve asked.

“Shady Acres Care Home,” Friday said.

“The real questions is why they are there and why Thor hasn’t thought to contact us if he’s back on Earth,” Tony said and it was worrisome because it meant that Thor wasn’t just back for leisure but that he was after something. That Loki was with him -- that might mean more problems for everyone.

They watched as Thor was approached by a bunch of girls -- which explained the origin of the pictures on Instagram and Twitter. And then just moments later Loki disappeared. Probably one of his tricks. Even Thor seemed surprised that his brother was gone -- and wasn’t it just even more worrisome to have Loki disappear like that? They watched as Thor picked something up off the ground and then he walked off.

“He’s here for a reason,” Tony said. “Have there been any more sightings?” Tony asked.

“I’m afraid not,” Friday said.

“So what do we do? There’s still no way to contact him so…”

“We wait,” Tony said. “And we can only hope that Loki isn’t up to something. Friday be on alert for any sighting of either.”

“Sure thing, boss.”

Tony just hoped that nothing would come of Thor’s return to Earth.

Tony looked back at the unit for the nanotech. He hadn’t told anyone yet that it was probably going to mean that he was putting something back in his chest -- that this housing unit would have to be on him somehow and it’d be better for it to be in him. Thor showing up made him even more positive that he needed to do it.

“I’m sure it’s nothing bad,” Steve said. “He would have come to us if it was.”

Tony sighed. Loki had been with him and after the last time they had encountered the God of Mischief, Tony wouldn’t discount that he wasn’t up to anything. Although, it was a bit of a surprise to see him when Thor had been adamant that Loki was dead the last time they spoke about him. It made Tony wonder about what might have happened for Loki to be alive and for Loki and Thor to be together and not showing signs of not being on the same side. Tony understood that they were family, but he also knew that there was a lot of contention there. He just hoped that none of that would affect the people of Earth.

Chapter One Hundred Seven