Perfectly Suited

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

Tony Stark was too old to play games. Every time he ran hot and cold with his partner was never a calculated power play so much as a deeply embedded habit built around mitigating whatever anxiety he’d built up. Even the old days full of ninja crawling out of bed just to avoid the morning after spiel were motivated by the intimidation (in part) of having them at all.

He’d gotten better at that part, though. Far better. Tony was curled up on the side of the long-suffering pink couch that wasn’t bearing a warped arm rest caused by some make-up rapporto sessuale from earlier in the evening, followed by a shower and the ceremonial poptart.

“You know—“ Tony brushed off some crumbs from his dark sweater, “You are terrible for my diet.”

Comments

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor's good eye closes slightly as Tony runs his hand along the patch of skin beneath it.

"I'm still not sure what I have to offer when we get back out." Tony had said as much -- he was the sugar daddy in this particular relationship. "But if you figure something out, let me know."

Thor still subscribes to the theory that they've just created a number of alternative timelines, but he knows himself well enough to know that even if Tony survives Thanos and encounters a Thor who doesn't remember this place, he'd still say yes to almost anything he would ask for.

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

Tony shrugged one shoulder, trailing his hand down to his chest before letting it fall. "Then there's for in here." He stepped back over a rock wedged in the sand, facing the ocean as it lapped the beach. The air was as fresh as any Tony had ever known--free of smog and light pollution. Ah, what wonders the lack of civilization brought.

"A son with a good head on his shoulders. A room only a bat could love. A robot delivery service." Tony gestured out at the sight of the sky above and the waters below. The white stars dappled the sky and the vibrant arm of the Milky Way stretched into the infinite horizon. The ocean reflected it back, creating a vision of heaven on earth. "And this sight. That's everything--that's all I have to give."

[st_ormbreaker]

"That's plenty." Thor places a hand on the side of one of Tony's arms and pulls him in, his eyes cast up at the night sky.

"When we go back home -- when all of this is over -- let me take you to Norway."

There was a real and distinct possibility that one or the other or both of them might be dead by the end of it all, but if there was anything that Tony had taught him, it was that he needed something there on the horizon to look forward to.

Here, he had plenty to look forward to. But back home, the only thing he really had was the promise of a chance that he might be able to kill Thanos -- and an even slimmer chance to reverse the damage Thanos had done when he used the stones.

Thor needed more to look forward to than just that.

He wanted to look up at the night sky and take in the sight of the aurora borealis with someone beside him.

He wanted that person to be Tony.

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

"I've been. But not with a god for a husband." Tony nudged Thor's waist with his elbow, leaning back against him. "A nice memory it'd make."

[st_ormbreaker]

"I think so too," Thor says, smiling. "1500 years and you're the first that I've married." The ends of his lips quirk up a little higher.

"I hope you remember that. I'm pretty selective about who I'll wed."

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

"That's me." Tony's eyes fell shut, breathing growing steady. The combo of his insulated suit and being wrapped up in the giant heater of a man was second to none. "Starting a legacy. Speak humbly of me to whoever comes next."

[st_ormbreaker]

"I didn't know humble was a word in your dictionary," Thor says. "Though if we're being fair, it's never really been in mine, either."

True, he'd matured into a man of less ego, but the ego was still there and it still flared up from time-to-time.

"I'm not sure I'd want to see any child we made together." Not that that was possible, but if it were...

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

"All I'm saying is that it's in bad taste to compare spouses. Especially to your spouse." For however many more millennia Thor would live, Tony felt fairly certain he'd marry at least once more. Hopefully for life--his.

"Alright. Non-weird question between partners. Do you wish we could?"

[st_ormbreaker]

"Of course," Thor says, as if it's the most obvious answer in the world. "What about you?"

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

"Right here? Right now? If we could. Again, not weird." Tony tilted his head back far enough to make eye contact--at least until another spray rained down and splattered his glasses.

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor lets out a hum, then carefully removes the glasses from Tony's face.

He leans forward and presses his lips against Tony's and them straightens so he can wipe the lens of Tony'd glasses clean with the hem of his shirt.

"Fortunately, it is not one of my numerous abilities, though I have a reputation as a God of Fertility."

He pulls Tony's glasses away from his shirt, then lifts the lenses up to his eye level. Apparently satisfied, he moves to slip the glasses back onto Tony's face.

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

"I'll take that as a yes." Tony blinked as his vision was restored, feigning a look of innocence. He'd gotten insidiously good at the puppy eyes. "Assuming you're the mom in this scenario."

[st_ormbreaker]

"I wouldn't have a problem if I were the mother or the father," Thor says. "I assume from your response the last time something like this came up, you wouldn't want to carry?"

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

"Yeah, see...I'm an engineer. I build things. Having something just sit there gestating independent of my frontal lobe involvement is just..." Tony cringed, letting his wishy-washy hand gestures finish the thought for him.

[st_ormbreaker]

"You just like being in control," Thor says playfully. "Most of the time, anyway. It's a lot harder to control the production of something inside of you than it is out."

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

"I mean, I could." In theory. Gene therapy technology was always progressing, and his wealth ensured he'd have access to what was truly state of the art. "Apart from embryos, I've got my vision for my suit. Taking it to its logical conclusion, nanites stored in my body instead of on it."

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor turns and blinks at Tony.

"So a nanite baby?"

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

“Not a—no. We’re on a different subject. The armor.” Tony patted his cheek.

[st_ormbreaker]

"I was going to say, we already had a non-organic child." If Vision were to be counted, and perhaps he should have.

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

“I dunno.” Tony bumped his head against the bottom of Thor’s chin. “Nothing stopping me from running a composite about what our mish mash of genes would end up looking like.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor's smile is slight.

"I'd like to see that." It's hard for Thor to imagine what an imagined child of theirs might look like -- Thor's lighter hair, Tony's darker; Thor's larger, taller build, Tony's shorter, smaller one.

Thor tilts his neck so his lips touch the top of Tony's head.

"I'm sure they'd be beautiful. And charming. And they'd probably mouth off a little too much."

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

“If it’s only a little, I’m not doing my job right.” Even when Peter was annoying Tony out of his skull with his dogged stubbornness, he was proud of the boy for it. Heroes didn’t just accept what others gave them, after all.

“I’ll tweak some of F.R.I.D.A.Y’s features. See what comes up.”

[st_ormbreaker]

Thor runs a hand over the back of Tony's head, down to his neck. He lets his hand settle comfortably there. The surf crashes a few times not terribly far from them. Thor briefly wonders how deep the ocean goes -- if eventually he'll hit some arbitrary depth and then be able to go no further, just as he and Tony reached some arbitrary height before they were stopped before.

"I'm glad that we could meet here," he says. Thor would get into the specifics, but there were so many of them and none of them all that cheery when you thought about it. "With all those alternate realities out there, I'm not sure there'd ever be another where we'd end up together."

[st_arkravinghazelnut]

Tony’s look softened at both the tender touch and even more tender words. Thor could have asked for anything in that moment and he’d have embarked on a mission to hand it to the man on a silver platter.

“Probably not. I’d put money on there being far more with you trying not to stomp out my guts.”

[st_ormbreaker]

"I think you'd probably have been fine unless you created another MurderBot," he says, using Bruce's word for Ultron.