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According to people Stephen was too polite to namedrop (cough Christine Palmer cough), Stephen Strange had always been ‘a bit of a hoarder’.
He saw nothing wrong with the idea of being a committed collector of things he enjoyed, but people (again, cough Christine cough) seemed to think that this habit of his was, somehow, a flaw.
According, yet again, to people (maybe at this point he should just say Christine) he was as possessive with his things as he was with his partners and this was also somehow not a good thing.
In Stephen's opinion she simply didn't get it.
After the car accident, he had had to give away all of the things he had used to collect. Even the things he hadn’t necessarily needed to give away had been thrown away, because there was nowhere he could keep them in after he had lost the penthouse: so bye bye cars, watches, stamps, original lyric sheets, vinyl records, books, and everything else he might have had/collected.
He had gone from a 'hoarder' to suddenly having nothing, and he hadn’t exactly loved this experience.
But then Stephen had arrived to Kamar Taj and there Christine argued he had started to hoard knowledge. Stephen did not really see how hoarding knowledge was possible, considering he had access to the same books and the same 24 hours everyone else at Kamar Taj had, but Christine hated being wrong with a passion and was stubborn as a mule.
Sure, he went through books and information faster than the sorcerers around thought was healthy, and he did attempt to bribe the librarian or steal from him when his back was turned, but that meant nothing.
He had done the same in medical school, after all, and he was ready to bet everyone else had too.
Plus, could anyone really blame him, if he was indeed ‘hoarding knowledge’? He had gone from having priceless non-magical artefacts in his possession and the most expensive and rarest of collections, to having nothing but dusty books and a roof over his head that he did not pay for.
Maybe he needed it.
It wasn’t as if he was hurting anyone.
... And then Dormammu happened.
Despite Christine’s words and thoughts, Dormammu was when the real problem started.
He came and went, and Stephen changed.
Wong insisted that the problem had always been there and they had simply not realised back then, but Stephen was certain he was only saying that because he didn’t want Kamar Taj to get sued.
Permanence: the state or quality of lasting or remaining unchanged indefinitely.
The lack of permanence in Dormammu’s dimension had gotten to him. To watch everything the demon surrounded himself with remain the same, while everything Stephen created or summoned only remained for a while before being destroyed... it had taken a toll of him.
Was it not reasonable, therefore, that even after that he worked overtime to make sure that the things he had were not going to disappear again?
It was reasonable in Stephen’s opinion.
So reasonable, that he saw no need to ask anyone’s opinion on his thoughts or on his subsequent actions.
Nobody noticed anything, at first. Stephen started discreetly, taking things that technically already belonged to him. He took his favourite bowl, his favourite cup, his favourite glass. Small things that no one would really realise were missing, or think much of if they asked for them and Stephen informed them he was keeping them in his bedroom.
Christine had not been the only nor the last person to call him possessive.
Wong might have noticed when the coffee table disappeared from the New York sitting room, but he did not complain or investigate.
There was some confusion when relics started going missing around the Sanctum. And there were some eyebrow raises when Stephen was always the one to locate them; but mostly it meant that now, whenever something was missing, Wong just went to Stephen and asked him to locate it, rather than bothering to try and find it for himself.
Nobody complained. Nobody really noticed anything.
Stephen lived his life with his not-problem, and Wong and the sorcerers lived theirs.
And then Wong destroyed the status quo by walking into Stephen’s bedroom.
“Strange, wake up, we- Oh, Vishanti.”
Stephen looked up from his book to Wong, who was standing in the doorway and looking inside with an horrified expression painted all over his face.
“Wong?”
The sorcerer looked away from the room to Stephen himself, his expression not changing. “Strange... what in the name of Mephisto is all this?”
Stephen looked at the way his hands made a general gesture encompassing all of his room.
“My... room?” clarified Stephen, still a little confused.
“Are you somehow unable to see everything you have stolen and put in your room?” asked Wong, looking around disconcerted. “This is the amulet of Diomedes. That’s the basket of Erythrinas. That is... Is that the sitting room table?! And is that the glass chest from Sol Rama’s room?”
Stephen put a hand over it, a little possessively. “It’s not like he’s going to need it,” he protested. “He has never used it.”
“I have used the coffee table!”
“And yet it has been here for days and you did not notice it was missing,” pointed out Stephen, twitching slightly when he saw the man grabbing one of the cups on the side. “What are you doing with them?”
“I did notice, but I just thought we had a gnome infestation,” said Wong, looking at him accusingly. “This is the Ancient One’s cup.”
“Nobody uses it,” pointed out Stephen. “And it’s not like she is ever going to use it.”
“That is deeply inappropriate.”
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
Wong did not do that, because he knew Stephen was right. Instead, he said, “Stephen, I am starting to think you have a problem.”
Stephen rolled his eyes. “I don’t have a ‘problem’.”
“True, you have several,” agreed Wong, “But this is the most pressing, as of now. I think you have something called hoarding dragon syndrome.”
“Just because I gathered a few things in my room-”
“Stephen, you have more than one table in your bedroom. You have someone else's glass chest. Several cabinets you have no use for. And is that a laundry basket? Where did you even get one of those?”
Stephen stubbornly refused to answer that question.
“I don’t have a problem. I am fine.”
“You are fine,” repeated Wong, clearly not believing him.
“Yes.”
“Yes?”
“Yes.”
“So, if I were to take this cup,” he said, indicating the Ancient One’s cup, “And Sol Rama’s chest-”
Stephen bounced his knee irritatedly as Wong picked up the items.
“And this diadem-”
Stephen clenched his fist.
“And oh, this book-”
Stephen’s lips remained pressed in a tight line.
Wong turned to him, arms filled with stuff. “If I took all of this stuff, this would be fine with you?”
Opening his mouth was strangely hard, fingers almost flexing in his fists. “Yes,” he still ground out. “It would be fine.”
“And I could just walk away, with all of this stuff that was yours and is now mine-” Wong trailed off, watching the door that had magically closed before he could step out with a raised eyebrow.
He turned back to Stephen, who was suddenly right next to him, not any more impressed.
“Fine, you win, just give me back my stuff,” complained Stephen, re-appropriating the items from Wong’s arms.
The sorcerer did not fight him on it, though he still looked very judging.
Stephen put everything back where it had been before, feeling much more settled and satisfied once all of his things were right there, in his dom- room.
When he turned back to Wong, the judgement was still there.
“Are you planning on giving me back the band you stole from me or not?” he asked, pointedly looking at the clutched object in Stephen’s hand.
Stephen looked at it, and then back at Wong.
“I have a problem,” he admitted.
“No shit.”
Thankfully, this ‘hoarding dragon syndrome’ was not particularly dangerous to Stephen or other people.
It was manageable, and by far not the worst trauma he could have obtained from spending lifetimes in the Dark Dimension with Dormammu.
Feeling fiercely possessive of a few trinkets from around the Sanctum and also becoming slightly overinvested in the platonic and non relationship of exactly two people in his life was not so bad. Especially since one of those people (Stephen would allow for one guess as to who the person was) countered that dragon syndrome was just Stephen using a fancy word to describe his possessiveness.
Sometimes people gave him weird looks when they saw him putting a nice bracelet from his 'hoard' on Wong’s wrist or noticed him scowling at them from over Christine’s shoulder, but it was still manageable.
A non issue.
Stephen would have even said he had learnt to deal and live with it.
Then, as he was wont to do, Tony Stark happened.
The first thought in Stephen Strange’s brain when he saw Tony Stark was ‘He is shorter than I expected; he must wear insoles’.
His second thought, when the man did not immediately come with him and instead started questioning him was ‘he is annoying’.
His thoughts remained in ‘he is annoying’ territory up until they started fighting the squid from space and his friend. Then they turned into ‘he is useful’, and again into begrudging respect, after he (and Spider Man) came for him on the spaceship and saved him (and also almost killed him).
The annoyance remained there in the background, however, especially as their previous arguments restarted and they continued to antagonise one another.
But then Stephen made the mistake of looking in the future to find out how to defeat Thanos.
He closed his eyes.
He opened his eyes fourteen million six hundred and five futures later to Tony standing right in front of him, and one new thought in his mind.
‘Mine’.
“So what exactly is hoarding dragon syndrome?”
“Exactly as the name implies. You feel compelled to create what one would call a dragon hoard, because you have already lost too many things and don’t want to lose any more. To ensure this, you keep everything you hold dear close to you, hoarding stuff that you consider ‘yours’.”
“That doesn’t sound too bad. What’s the catch?”
“There is no catch.”
“There’s always a catch.”
“From what I know, the only dangerous thing that might come from this syndrome is a very serious attachment to the things in your hoard. You won’t lose control and kill someone because they took something from you, but you will be very angry with them for it for a very long time. Which is not very different from how you already are - hence why it took me so long to realise.”
“Doubt on the second part but... That’s it?”
“I told you. All in all, hoarding dragon syndrome is relatively innocuous.”
“From what I know, the only dangerous thing that might come from this syndrome is a very serious attachment to the things in your hoard,” said Stephen in a very accurate imitation of Wong's voice, barging into the sorcerer's room.
The sorcerer was perusing the mirror of sights, and relaxed when he saw Stephen in front of him.
As touching as this would normally be, Stephen was not going to entertain it right now.
“You won’t lose control and kill someone because they took something from you, but you will be very angry with them for it. You won’t lose control and kill someone because they took something from you, but you will be very angry with them for it for a very long time. Which is not very different from how you already are - hence why it took me so long to realise.” He made his voice normal. “Doubt on the second part but... That’s it?” He continued his imitation of Wong’s voice. “I told you. All in all, hoarding dragon syndrome is relatively innocuous.”
Then, he scowled at the man in front of him.
“Has anyone ever told you that your recollection of past conversations is sort of creepy?” asked Wong, brows furrowed.
“You have, multiple times. And I told you, multiple times, that I don’t care.”
“Thanos has been dealt with?”
Stephen sighed. “Yes. It was touch and go at some parts, but we managed to rally together and deal with him. Still have the Time Stone and everything. Don’t change the subject.”
“I don’t know what the subject is.”
“You told me that the worst that could happen was me forming an attachment to the things inside of my hoard. You didn’t tell me about the other thing!”
Wong’s confusion did not abate. “What other thing?”
“Tony Stark,” finally said Stephen, sitting down on the bench. “I want Tony Stark as part of my hoard.”
“You want- wait, what?”
“He is mine,” explained Stephen, trying not to sound whiny. “And Peter is tangentially mine. And I looked at him, and his shiny armour, and I want him to be in my room-”
“Please don’t-”
“As part of my hoard, Wong. Get your mind out of the gutter.”
Though it was not as if Stephen wouldn’t want Stark in the other way too.
He could just imagine it: Stark, draped in the gold and jewellery from Stephen’s hoard and nothing more, just sitting pretty in his bedroom with all of his other things, waiting for Stephen.
Wouldn’t that just be great?
“Stephen, people are not things you can own,” chided Wong. “Tony Stark cannot therefore be part of your hoard.”
“You said that before, but I have you and Christine already. What’s one - and half - more?”
“Me and Christine are the unfortunate recipients of your friendship,” corrected Wong.
“And part of my hoard,” said Stephen. “You started as just friends, and then you became more mine. I mean, why do you think I gave you that bracelet from my hoard?”
Wong blinked. “I’m sorry, what.”
Stephen ignored him, realisation hitting him then. “Of course,” he said, snapping his fingers together as he stood up and wincing at the pain that brought him. “We start as friends like I did with the two of you, and then it will be easy and seamless to get him into my hoard. You are right Wong, this is a great idea!”
“That is not what I- Strange, get back here!”
Stephen did not.
Becoming friends with Stark Tony was by far easier than Stephen had expected.
Stephen did not even have to lie or even go after him. He had just started his plan on how to casually not really bump into the ex Avenger when Tony showed up at the Sanctum with Peter in tow, claiming that the kid had been hounding him to come see their 'friendly neighbourhood magic man'.
And maybe that had been the real reason he had bothered to come visit. Maybe Peter had 'convinced' him.
But even though Stephen did not yet really know Tony, fourteen million futures had given him an idea of who the man was. And Stephen doubted that if Tony had really not wanted to see him he would have come. The fact that he was here meant that he did not hate Stephen despite the rocky start of their relationships - which meant only good things for Stephen and for his hoarding dragon syndrome.
A fact that turned out real soon enough as Tony - with and without Peter - came to see Stephen more and more often, growing their 'allyship' into an almost friendship.
Soon enough they weren't just meeting to discuss threats and talk about Accords, but actually hanging out with one another for fun, with Tony coming to see Stephen and Stephen going to see Tony.
Stephen was allowed almost everywhere in Tony's home/tower/Compound, including the inside of his workshop, and Tony was soon allowed into almost every room in the Sanctum (much to Wong’s disapproval).
There was only one room in the whole of the Sanctum that Tony was forbidden from entering, both by Stephen and Wong: Stephen’s bedroom.
Wong’s reason was that nothing good could possibly come from letting a person his ‘lizard brain’ believed belonged to him in the room with the rest of the other things he believed belonged to him.
Stephen’s reason was that he had yet to tell Tony about the whole ‘hoarding dragon syndrome’ situation - mostly, because he was embarrassed and did not want the judgement.
Not that Tony had expressed any desire or interest in getting inside of his bedroom.
Sure, Tony had flirted with him. But he was Tony Stark: he flirted with anything that was legal and had a pulse. It was his natural state.
Tony was one of the few people that saw Stephen’s asshole stick and did not immediately run away or try to change him. Even Christine had tried to change him, at the beginning, before she had ended up accepting him as he was.
But Tony had not done that. Tony had taken a look at his asshole self and basically decided ‘I am a bigger asshole, and I respect your grind to try to prove me wrong. Let’s be assholes together’.
... Or something like that.
And sure, at first Stephen had only thought ‘Mine’. That had come fully from his hoarding syndrome, with little to no input from Stephen himself.
He had felt Tony was interesting, and he had liked most of what he had seen of him in those millions of futures.
But then he had gone ahead and gotten to know him, and now Stephen could not blame his obsession on him on the dragon syndrome anymore.
Because Tony was an asshole, but he was also funny, and interesting, and kind, and mean, and conceited, and selfless, and a total bastard, and a hero, and Stephen’s perfect type.
And that was unfortunately a problem.
But Stephen was master of avoiding uncomfortable situations. He knew what to do with things he was uncomfortable with, knew how to deal with annoying feelings and repressing part of him.
He had done it with Christine for years, after their last break-up.
Hell, the way he reacted around Christine and Wong was nothing compared to how he really wanted to react.
He knew how to control himself.
So he’d do what he had to do.
He’d simply manage it.
It turned out that the whole romantic aspect of Stephen’s feelings for Tony were not conductive to his ‘simply manage it’ approach.
That was a guess, based on the fact that Stephen was now standing in the middle of his bedroom with Tony laying on his bed, still half clad in his armour.
To be fair, this had not been planned.
Stephen had not even realised what had happened until he had located Tony and found him sitting on his bed still in his armour and curiously poking around Stephen’s hoard.
“Hey,” said Tony, smiling when he saw Stephen was now in the room. “This your room, right?”
He had the golden coins of Talokan in his hands, and the diadem of Aphrodite on his head.
It looked perfect on him.
He looked perfect right where he was.
Stephen did not say that, though, nor did he answer out loud. Instead, he nodded.
If Tony found this weird, he was too distracted to acknowledge it.
“You are either delightfully messy or you are a hoarder,” continued Tony, touching everything he could. Normally he was more careful with magical things that he did not know the origins of, but apparently not today.
It made something in Stephen’s stomach twist, this clear show of trust on Tony’s part. This clear show that he knew Stephen would stop him, if there was something dangerous, or that he wouldn’t portal him somewhere where there could be something dangerous.
“Wong has called me a hoarder,” he ended up saying, slowly moving to sit down on the bed, closer to him. “But I just keep my favourite things in here. Sorry for portalling you away like that.”
“Like a hoard,” joked Tony, putting a necklace around his neck. “And it’s always fun when I am about to fall to my death and someone saves me,” he continued, waving him off. “Though I’m gonna have to figure out what the hell did Doom use, that managed to mess with my tech.”
“Probably a magical artefact,” said Stephen. “With the arrival of the Asgardians on Earth, I would not be surprised if a bunch of their things wasn’t sold or given up to others for money and shelter. You’re not mad?”
“Again, why would I be? I was falling to my possible death. You portalled me to safety instead. I’ll say I was surprised to find myself on your bed instead of portalled closer to the ground so that I didn’t break my fragile human bones, but the battle was already won by that point anyway. What is this?”
There was no hint of a lie on his face.
Sure, Tony did not truly understand what was going on here. Stephen had not told him about the whole dragon syndrome, and while Tony had guessed ‘hoarder’ he did not know about the rest of it.
But still, the level of trust on his face, the level of comfort that he so easily displayed...
It was addictive.
Stephen liked it a little too much.
And it was fine, he decided. He had made a mistake by bringing Tony here, but he could work up from here. Tony had not guessed the truth of what happened, and when Stephen made sure this didn’t happen again, he’d be golden.
Wong would never know that he had mistepped, and everything will return to its usual state.
Simple as.
Following that, Stephen managed to keep Tony out of his bedroom for exactly three days.
Considering he had wanted him back as soon as he had sent him away, Stephen considered this a win.
And he consoled himself by saying that the first time he had done this, nothing had gone wrong, per se. Tony had stayed for a while and then been ready to leave, and Stephen had let him leave. He had not physically stuck him in the room and demanded that he never left so clearly, he was fully in control.
Could he have gone to Tony's compound, when Tony had asked that he joined him for lunch three days later? Sure.
Could he have simply portalled Tony to the sitting room or literally any other room in the Sanctum a few days after, when he had needed a consult? Also, yes.
But there was nothing inherently dangerous or bad about Stephen portalling Tony in his room. It was convenient. His room had chairs, a table, food and drink, and now Tony.
Stephen had proven before that he could let Tony out whenever Tony wanted to, and Tony had proven that he did not mind being in Stephens room.
And sure, Wong had looked suspicious the day before when he had seen the necklace around Tony's neck - a necklace Stephen might or might not have given him as a gift before taking him back home - but that was basically nothing.
Stephen had it all under control.
Stephen became aware that he might not have it all under control when he woke up and found Tony awake and laying beside him on his bed.
Last thing he remembered was being in another dimension, fighting for his life alongside surprisingly kind-hearted golems. And now he was laying on his bed, still feeling the injuries on his body while Tony was half laid under the blankets beside him, a Starkpad in his hands.
“Hey,” said Tony, becoming aware of Stephen when he did not stop staring at him in utter confusion. “You’re awake.”
“I’m awake,” agreed Stephen, too confused and tired to even bother sitting up. At the very least his clothes were on, and so were Tony’s. “Why are you in my bedroom?”
“Didn’t think you’d remember,” said Tony, not appearing very surprised. “And actually, I don’t really know. You walked into the Compound yesterday, standing in front of your portal and looking like a sad puppy who forgot all of his words until I followed you into your bedroom. Then you sort of caveman tugged me to your bed and fell asleep half on top of me.”
Stephen, who’s face had become increasingly warmer the more Tony spoke, stared at him in utter mortification.
“Thankfully, I had this with me,” continued Tony, showing him his Starkpad, seeming to have no intention of sparing Stephen and his feelings. “So I was not totally bored. Wong is probably thinking that we are sleeping together, because he came in at some point and looked very unimpressed at the sight of me here.”
“Oh god,” said Stephen, letting his head fall back against the pillow.
So now Wong knew.
Fantastic.
“There, there,” said Tony, and Stephen startled slightly at the feeling of his hand in his hair. Tony’s attention was back on his Starkpad, which he was now operating with one hand. “I had him bring you aspirin and some of your nasty magicman tea, so you should be fine. It’s almost time for lunch anyway, and I am feeling like that weird sandwich you had me try last time I was here.”
He could have left, it suddenly occurred to Stephen.
Stephen had clearly been passed out and, by the way he had woken up, he had not been all around Tony like an octopus (he had never been one for night time cuddles).
Wong had even walked in, and Tony had spoken to him without waking Stephen.
At any point after Stephen had fallen asleep due to the exhaustion that had sent him to deliriously bring this man back to his place, Tony could have left. Hell, he could have simply been too weirded out and refused to come with him.
There was no reason for Tony to have stayed.
There was no reason for Tony to have stayed, and for him to look so relaxed in Stephen’s bed, doing his work after Stephen had basically abducted him, and still being willing to hang out with him.
“I have hoarding dragon syndrome,” he blurted out.
Tony did look up from his Starkpad at that. He glanced at Stephen, appearing confused.
“I’m sorry, what?”
“Hoarding dragon syndrome,” repeated Stephen, awkwardly sitting up. “It basically means that I hoard things that I believe my own the same way a dragon would hoard treasures in the olden days.” He made a general gesture to indicate the room. “Everything in here and a couple of things that are not here are part of my hoard. Or otherwise considered my own.”
Tony had never been stupid.
He glanced at the things in the room, and then at the necklace around his neck.
His eyes narrowed, as he looked back at Stephen, who had started to cringe.
“Am I part of your hoard?”
Stephen tried not to squirm under those eyes. “Sort of? I mean, people are not really things for you to own,” he started, echoing Wong, “But... I watched so many futures of me and you working together to defeat Thanos and, at a certain point, I started to consider you sort of... mine. And then I started to care about you in a different way than I cared about Wong and Christine, until even the non dragon part of my brain started to sort of want you to be mine, and I just...” he stopped talking, trying to not look too dejected about the disgust and annoyance he knew was bound to follow. “Sorry.”
Tony liked him as a friend, that was true. But this? This was too much.
Too weird, too confusing, too-
“You like me,” ended up saying Tony, still looking at him with narrowed eyes.
Stephen did not think this needed an answer, but he still nodded.
“I am not yours just because your lizard brain decided I am,” said Tony, as Stephen expected. “But I will allow you to take me out and date me until I decide to be.”
Of course, Stephen had-
Wait.
That was...
That was not what Stephen had expected.
“And I’m keeping the necklace,” added Tony, getting a hold of his Starktab once more.
As if he had not just wreck havoc upon Stephen’s life with two little sentences.
Had he just said-
Because it sounded like he had just said...
But it made no sense.
Right? It did not.
It should not.
But-
“Are you saying you don’t... what?”
Tony rolled his eyes. “Stephen, you brought me to your room in the middle of night and then fell asleep and I did not leave. Yes, I like you. Get with the program and let me do my work now.” He thought about it for a second, then he leant over and pecked him on the lips. “Thanks for the necklace, babe.”
Stephen was too startled to fully kiss back, but not enough so that he did not hear those words and actions loud and clear.
Tony liked him.
Tony liked him back.
Tony liked him back and did not think that the whole ‘hoarding dragon syndrome’ was too weird.
Tony liked him back!
“You still have to speak to Wong,” reminded him Tony.
Ah, crap.
Still.
Could have gone worse.