Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Blood...so much blood...so many deaths...all my fault...

My hands...drenched in layers and layers of hardening BLOOD.

My fault...all my fault...nothing I ever do will be enough...

I will never be enough.

Tony jolted upright in an empty bed, his brow drenched in sweat. But he didn’t scream. Or cry, or curl up in a ball. He just, sat there, feeling hollow. Who were all those people? Those people he killed? He braced for the wave of guilt that usually followed after these thoughts only for it to never come, leaving him feeling a numb, tingling sensation all over his body. His eyes started going dry, reminding him to blink.

Shivering despite the warmth of his room, he stood up to get ready. No use letting his emotions control his day, there were too many things to do. He took a scalding hot shower, the usual these days, brushed his teeth and stood in front of the mirror whilst thoughts of hoping to atone in one lifetime for all the people he killed circled around his brain. 

After neatening his hair and beard, he put on a simple black blazer, and after much consideration, put a simple plain black shirt on underneath with matching simple black pants and simple black shoes, and for the finishing touch, slid some simple iron man themed sunglasses into his pocket. Today was just a simple day.

He was about to leave his room when he caught a glimpse of his dead eyes in the mirror through the open bathroom door, and was immediately crushed by the thought of what lay past the door in front of him. The past few months hadn’t been kind to him, and he had already considered the easy way out a few times, but he was determined to find the end of the tunnel that was whatever he was going through. Even if that end was nowhere in sight, he’d make it he hoped.

Tony sighed and slipped on the glasses that were previously in his pocket and opened the door. He was met with an empty, cold corridor, as it had been for so long now. At the end of the corridor he found his way to a small set of stairs that led to a small kitchen and a, now empty, bar (before they broke up, he promised Stephen he’d give up drinking, and he wasn’t one to break a promise). 

They were flourishing as a couple, he doesn’t know where it went wrong. All he knew was that they came to a mutual decision to remain friends with benefits. Gods, why was he so Depressed™️ today?

Probably because of the intergalactic threat headed our way, out to destroy half of all life and court death, his inner voice spat.

Why so aggressive? Isn’t this what we’ve been preparing for for the last six years? 

Making his way into the kitchen, he swiped his phone up from the countertop to check the time, only to choke. May 29th. His birthday. The weight he felt before he stepped out of his bedroom door was back again only ten times heavier, making him stumble backwards into a chair. Along with the date he also saw that it was 10:16am and he had no missed calls or new messages. That should not make him feel as depressed as he felt in that moment.

Oh shut up, the voice snarled. It’s just your birthday, why would anyone celebrate the day you, of all people, were brought into existence.

I could say the same for you, he internally scoffed, even though he knew it was pointless. That voice only existed to remind him of his place and most of the time he couldn’t even disagree with the points it made. Flashes of drying blood and faceless dead bodies appeared in front of his eyes, but he was nowhere near ready to deal with all that so he quickly shook his head and stood to grab himself an apple, nearly falling over in the process as his vision blurred.

Today was not going to be a good day, but he could say that for every day of his pitiful existence, couldn’t he? 

-

There was someone talking, probably saying something important, but he couldn’t hear them over the whispers that took over his thoughts. They all blended together in his mind so that he couldn’t make out what they were saying, and they were just loud enough that he couldn’t focus on the meeting taking place in front of him.

He bit back a scoff. Attending an Accords council meeting on his birthday? He probably deserved it. He didn’t get to have a day off, even if it was his birthday. The whispering voices grew louder at that thought, to the point that he could feel the oncoming headache behind his eyes. He could almost convince himself that they were against his way of thinking. Almost. 

He brought a hand up to his head, now completely distracted from the meeting. The voices weren’t like the other voice in his head that constantly belittled him, instead they whispered promises of comfort and peace, lulling him to a place that didn’t exist, slowly tugging him in a direction he couldn’t go. 

Falling deeper into his mind the voices became clearer, slowly forming words that he could barely make out, his headache growing worse.

‘...You are ready...it is time...follow us...follow us...’

‘Who are you?’ he called back, the headache pulsing between his eyes as he let them fall shut.

‘...Tony...Tony...Tony...it is time...you are ready...you are needed...’

‘Who are you?!’ he repeated, growing frustrated. The fuck kind of vague bullshit...

‘...Tony...Tony...Stark...’

“Mr Stark!”

He snapped upright, not realising he had zoned so far out that he forgot why he was here. Right. Cosmic threat, end of the world, yada yada yada, all that fun stuff. 

“Mhm?” He hummed back to whoever called him, frowning at the sudden lack of the voices. Not even good ol’ Self Hate Voice was attempting to disparage him for zoning out.

“Were you even paying attention to anything that was just discussed?” Oh, it was Ross. The old and angry one. Suddenly he didn’t feel so bad for getting lost in his thoughts. 

“Depends on what you mean by paying attention, if you meant being an active participant in the conversation, no, but if you meant listening to what was being said, then yes, i was listening and i simply decided it was not worth paying attention to.” Thats right, use lots of words. Not even i know what i just said. 

“Mr Stark,” Uh oh, that was one of the UN representatives, the one from Australia if he was to guess by the accent. The accords council was made up of one UN representative from every continent, except for Antarctica (don’t ask him why), Ross, and a representative for the avengers (which he was appointed as after many arguments, because he had more political prowess). 

“You need to be more focused during these meetings, especially in a time like this, if you want to maintain your place on the accords council.” Well maybe i dont want to be on the council, is what he would have replied if he wasn’t a pussy. Too bad he was though as he ended up saying;

“Okay,”

‘Okay’? ‘Okay’!? What do you mean by ‘Okay’!? What kind of a response is that!?

“It won’t happen again.”

His heart beat heavily in his chest, something was wrong. He didn’t answer like that out of embarrassment, he answered like that because something was so. very. wrong. Sweat gathered on his forehead as his breathing picked up. The voices suddenly started again, louder than ever, and suddenly that was all he could hear. His eyes darted around the room, looking for whatever was causing this strange, nerve wracking sensation that flitted over his skin.

“If you would excuse me for a minute,” he rasped, cutting through the discussion that started up again. Even through the heavy static that lay over his ears, he knew he sounded out of breath. 

While his brain sped up, trying to calculate what in the flying fuck was so so wrong that it shook him to his very core, he stood up and walked to the large door, legs going on autopilot, with little to no objection from the other council members. Even a blind person could tell that the meeting was going nowhere. 

As he waded through the hall, the lights becoming blindingly bright in an instant, the voices started up again. 

‘Tony...Stark...Tony Stark...follow...you are needed...’

Mr Self Hate voice would hastily disagree, but it seemed he didn’t have anything to say. All of his senses felt like they were on fire, like something was ripping them apart in every direction. 

‘Who. Are. You.’ he internally ground out once he was seated on the floor in the corner of an empty meeting room, sick of whatever the fuck was happening. These voices (along with the nightmares of blood blood somuchbloodanddeathand-) had been bugging him for weeks now, never giving him an answer. Honestly, he didn’t know why he bothered demanding a name when, even after all this time, they hadn’t given him one. 

But...he needed answers. Never had he felt such dread, let alone while sitting in one of the safest buildings on earth. He had to get to the bottom of this and he had a sneaking suspicion that these voices were the reason. Or maybe it could be the appearance of Thanos, he honestly did not even know anymore. Ah, anyway. The voices never replied to his question, but then again this was the most they’d ever spoken in a day. That’s why he almost jumped through the ceiling when they replied.

‘...Stones...infinity?...Infinity...stones...follow...you are ready...it is time...we are running out of time...’

And back to their bullshit. The voices went about their little spiel, but Tony was still left reeling from that revelation. If the ‘Infinity Stones’, like the ones Thor talked about, the one thing that Thanos was after, were really the things talking to him, then stuff just got a lot more complicated. 

‘...Chosen...you are ready...he is almost here...’

Oh boy.

Chapter Text

K n e e: gguys

K n e e: guys

K n e e: someone

K n e e: hhh pleasde

K n e e: guts

K n e e: guyS

h: WHAT IS IT

K n e e: there are so many voices

K n e e: they’re so loud

Captain America: Uhh...

h: toney are you Okay

K n e e: the stones

K n e e: i am never ok what kind of question is that

K n e e: oh fu c k  theyre getting louder

h: wh

Captain America: Tony, who is getting louder?

K n e e: the stones

Captain America: Please can you just take things seriously for once in your life and stop making things up!

K n e e: 

Captain America: You say nothing yet your silence speaks a thousand words, and for that i apologise for my behaviour.

Spoder: tony !  i forgot to tell you but im heading over to the tower for your birthday right now :)

Spoder: oh is this a bad time? 

K n e e: no pleafse hurry theyre so loud

Captain America: Oh Tony I forgot! Happy birthday!

K n e e:

Captain America: 😩 Sorry.

Spoder: steve no...

K n e e: you know i st

K n e e: wait hold on th

K n e e: theyre saying something important 

Spoder: u rite?

K n e e: 

Chapter Text

PREVIOUSLY

K n e e: you know i st

K n e e: wait hold on th

K n e e: theyre saying something important

Spoder: u rite?

K n e e:

-

Tony clutched his head as his phone clattered to the floor. He was still seated in the corner of the conference room, pressing his back as hard as he could into the wall behind him. The voices - Infinity Stones, apparently - had started screaming suddenly, a stark (hah) contrast to the small whispers that they had been previously.

No...focus...they’re saying something actually worthwhile.

‘...FOLLOW-...NEARING THE END-...’

The screams grated on his ears, and he distantly felt a tug in his chest, trying to guide him somewhere. 

‘What is it?!’ 

He was promptly lifted to his feet by an invisible force, and was pulled into a run as he was yanked out of the meeting room, by what he assumed was the stones, at an alarming speed. Sprinting down the corridor, completely out of control of his movements, he still tried his best to avoid the perplexed looks of people he passed, before he was suddenly jerked to the left, straight into a window.

“Oh fucking hell!” He screamed, while plummeting to the ground from the 42nd floor of Stark Tower, as if this were a regular occurrence. He doesn’t know how he was so calm, after having just smashed through some of the most durable glass he could manufacture and come out unscathed, all while being magically possessed by what was supposedly the infinity stones.

‘We must...have to make haste...’

‘We won’t be able to ‘make haste’ if i’m fucking dead!’

The stones didn’t reply to that so instead he decided to focus on the fact that he was currently in a free fall and his phone was still in the meeting room and oh wow would you look at that the ground is a lot closer than before-

Holy shit, what was he thinking! He was about to die! Tony struggled in the air as he tumbled closer to the road below. He couldn’t call a suit because most of them were out of commission and he didn’t have time to fix them and he didn’t have the watch that calls them on his wrist. Alternatively, he was fucked and it was all the stones fault.

‘Do something you overpowered lumps of rock!’

‘...shh...’

Pressure built up in the back of his mind as he suddenly stopped falling. Suspended in the air about fifty feet from the ground, he noticed that the cars below him stopped moving. Looking around he realised that not only had he stopped moving, everything else had too. All of a sudden, a swirling mass of blinding white light came out of his fucking chest and swiftly enveloped him.

“Ah what in the fuck-" Light should not be able to do that. And yet it did. He hated his life. 

The light stretched over his body, encompassing his arms, legs, hands and finally his neck. Struggling from his suspended place in the air, Tony gasped and desperately tried to swing his unmoving limbs from the glowing embrace, but all of his efforts were for naught, as the light wrapped around his head in an achingly slow manner, almost as if it was regretful. He squeezed his eyes shut against the burning white that covered his vision.

Slowly, the light beyond his eye lids dimmed, allowing him to open his eyes. Taking a peek at his surroundings, Tony found that he was no longer being held in the air, but was instead laid out on his back, slightly submerged in water. He sat up quickly with a yelp, pushing himself to his feet, and went to brush off the water that should have clung to his head and suit, only for his hands to make contact with dry hair and clean material. 

"What the fuck..." Tony barely muttered the words and yet they rung like bells in his ears. He shuddered, it was too quiet here. 

Looking up, he noted that the sky was a deep, unnatural blood red with thin strawberry coloured clouds dotting the distant skyline. He stood in some kind of opaque burgundy liquid that went up to his ankles, but didn't feel wet at all, much to his equal discomfort and relief. He spun around, trying to find anything that wasn't some kind of discoloured water that reached infinitely into the horizon.

There was a large square temple that stuck into the crimson sky, with a long staircase that stretched all the way to the top, situated directly behind him, the bottom of the stairs almost about twenty meters from him. Tony immediately started wading his way through the 'water' without a second thought, he didn't want to be here any longer than he had to. He reached the first step of the temple, and looked up towards the top. There was a small sheltered platform at the end of the long flight of brown, wooden stairs.

"You have to be fucking kidding me." He groaned and buried his face in his hands. All of the voices in his head had been silenced the second he woke up in this gods forsaken place, but even without the nagging voice of the infinity stones, he knew that he had to reach the top of this temple. 

Why was this happening to him? Hasn't he suffered enough already? Still remaining at the bottom of the stairs, he blearily thought back to that one vine.

"I am disgusted, I am revolted, I dedicate my entire life to our lord and saviour jesus christ and this is the thanks i get?" Slowly but surely, Tony started his long ascent to the top of this too-tall temple, in the middle of an unknown world, after being thrown out of his window by the infinity stones and getting eaten by sentient light. 

What the fuck was his life?

Chapter Text

The twisted auburn stairs seemed to stretch infinitely both up and down, the massive platform at the top never getting closer. Tony had been going up one step at a time, and with every second that went by where the top didn't move closer, he got more and more irritated. 

"Fucking hell stupid goddamn stones got me fucking walking up mount goddamn Everest, on my fucking birthday, the fucking audacity-" Tony had taken to rambling to stop his mind from running itself in circles. It had been like this for the past few treacherous hours, and in that time the ground had disappeared behind him as he passed through the cream clouds. 

This place all felt like a lucid dream that was out of his control, his limbs weren't sore and his forehead wasn't soaked in sweat like he would have assumed would happen after walking for so long, and his surroundings most certainly didn't feel real, as it was quiet enough that he could hear his heart beat in his chest, the blood rush past his ears, and the ungodly miscellaneous roars in the distance that reverberated through his bones.

He continued to climb, focusing back on the stupid stairs below him. Tony was sure that the natural swirly pattern that spanned the plank of wood he had just passed was the exact same as several hundred of the previous steps he had crossed. 

"Stupid fucking rocks can't even put in the time of day to make original patterns," Tony muttered with an eye roll, already at terms with the fact this place was most definitely not real, and was clearly fabricated by the Infinity Stones. "I swear to any of the fucking gods willing to listen, I'm gonna lose my goddamn mind if i have to walk any further, fucking he- OH WHAT THE FUCK!" 

Almost as if his prayers had been answered, Tony jumped backwards suddenly, almost sending himself hurtling down the warped stairs, as a massive rumbling started. An ear-splitting screech filled his ears, penetrating his skull, and the staircase below him shifted and creaked. Looking up alarmingly, dread seemed to fill Tony's heart as the temple seemed to shift and groan and the platform moved closer to him, or, rather, he moved closer to it, like a large, ancient escalator.

He didn't dare move a muscle as he got closer, feet planted firmly on the plank under him, and hands held in a position half meant to balance himself and half meant to defend himself should any threats present themselves. 

The top was just a bit disappointing once he reached it, nothing but an intricately detailed hard hill roof, coated in a shade of burgundy red, built on 4 wooden beams was there to greet him. Tony stood frozen, hands splayed at his side and chest heaving deeply as he took in the new surroundings. 

The ground in front of him looked like blood-red bricks, with red sand scattered across the cubic platform, but other than that, fuck all. After a few minutes of nothing he deemed there was no danger, and risked a step forward, easing his right foot onto the brick tile as if it would fall out from underneath him at any moment.

"Huh," He breathed as nothing bad immediately happened, still trying to make sure this wasn't an illusion. Growing confident, he put his other foot on the platform with a self-assured grin- 

"TONY STARK." 

He let out an undignified squawk and stumbled back onto the stairs again, fists raised. Before him, six luminous, humanoid figures fazed into existence before his very eyes, and with the series of events that got him here, Tony thinks he has finally gone insane. He stood there, his mouth hanging open and his eyes as wide as dinner plates with fists still loosely raised; Tony was sure with not a single doubt in his mind that these were the Infinity Stones, the fuckers the pulled him into this mess.

In order from left to right stood; a tall red woman, in a long flowing dress with geometrical shapes that seemed to float over her skin and orbit her body; an elegant orange man with lanky limbs, a smarmy expression and an orderly yet disheveled suit; a yellow man of whom floated a foot above the ground and reminded him an awful lot of vision, with a flowing cloak wrapped around his shoulders; a green woman of short stature, a scowl set on her face, wearing casual jeans, boots and a sweater; a blue boy, appearing barely in his teens, a joyous face that glowed brighter than the rest, who wore a childish, simplified and unlabelled astronaut suit without a helmet, and, finally; a purple, seemingly androgynous figure with bulging muscles, an unreadable expression, adorning a simple pair of leggings, a studded belt, and a tank top. Every single aspect of them, their clothes hair skin eyes, was a singular colour, each of them radiating in ethereal light.

"WE ARE GLAD TO SEE YOU HERE, AT LONG LAST."

Not one of them moved their mouth, but the purple one shifted their stance to cross their arms over their chest. Tony gulped, he was not expecting this in the slightest, and he internally apologised and begged to be back to walking up the stairs. He'd take the stairs any day over this ridiculous scenario that has unfolded in front of him.

"What do you want with me?" He grits out. He was not and will never be ready for this inevitable confrontation. The orange man walked forward, and didn't stop until he was right up in Tony's face. He teetered on the edge of the step, unable to seemingly just walk down the stairs to get away from this awfully intimidating figure. The orange man stood almost chest to chest with him and he fought to keep his breathing in check, but other than that he didn't falter, tilting his head to look up at the man. 

Tony regretted it though, as when he locked eyes with the man, he couldn't seem to look away. The fiery, pupil-less gaze froze him in place. At that point he would have tried to push the man away from him, he had experienced enough in life to know that this was going to end in some form of mind manipulation. Fuck, just the thought made him panic. Desperately trying to pull away, he missed the way the man's brow creased. 

He cried out in anguish, fully panicked now, and yet his mouth didn't open, or emit any noise. His body just wouldn't. Move.

"You're shorter in person." The orange man leered with a joking smirk on his face, breaking the sullen silence. Yeah, he definitely didn't like this guy. There was a cacophony of gasps from the other five, and although they were obscured from his vision, he could feel their shock at the statement from where he was. 

"Soul!" A pubescent voice yelled in exasperation. "He is our host, you can't just say that!"

The orange man- Soul -never let his gaze falter, and Tony had had it up to fucking here. Fuming, he forced his mouth open and past the invisible binds that tried to stop him.

"Fuck you!" He roared, and just like that, the spell was broken, allowing him to tear his eyes from that unearthly stare and take a few staggering steps backwards down the stairs. Tony was seething, he just wanted to be home for fucks sake. Soul returned to his previous position, and he had a look of something like respect in his eyes, as if Tony had passed some kind of test. Tony put two and two together pretty quickly, Soul had been trying to confirm something in him by doing that. Whatever that something was, Tony hadn't a clue. Still didn't mean it was okay.

"Can someone please tell me who you are, what you want from me and why I'm here." He growled breathlessly, finally taking a step onto the platform, chest still heaving. Tony already kind of knew the answer to that first question, but he had to hear it from someone else that wasn't him.

"Oh how terribly rude of us," The red woman took a step forward, gesturing to the right. "We are the Infinity Stones, as you dwellers have adequately named us, although we are sure you have already figured that out."

 
"Please, continue."

"We have all been given seperate names across the eons, aptly named after our specialty's." Pointing to the purple brute at the far end of the lineup she listed a series of names, making her way down the line before ending on herself. "There's Power, Space, Time, Mind, Soul and I am Reality," She finished by returning to her previous position, iridescent ruby dress flowing in a nonexistent wind.

"WE HAVE ALL BROUGHT YOU TO THIS REALM SO THAT WE MAY PRESENT TO YOU AN OFFER THAT COULD VERY WELL DETERMINE THE FUTURE OF THE KNOWN UNIVERSE."

Tony startled at the sudden booming of voices. There they all go, speaking in unison again. Tony scraped his shoes nervously against the tile beneath him, just when he began to understand the situation shit got flipped on it's head again and he was back to square one. Never had he ever felt so out of place.

"Uh. What's the offer?" He barely got to scrape the question from his throat before he was launched into an explanation.

"AS YOU KNOW, THE MAD TITAN KNOW AS THANOS IS MAKING HIS WAY ACROSS THE GALAXY TO COLLECT US, THE INFINITY STONES, AND ONCE HE HAS GATHERED ALL SIX OF US HE PLANS ON  HARNESSING OUR COLLECTIVE POWER TO DECIMATE HALF OF ALL LIFE IN THE UNIVERSE IN AN ATTEMT TO 'BRING BALANCE' TO BEINGS ALL AROUND THE COSMOS AND TO COURT DEATH"

"THIS, SIMPLY, WOULD NEVER WORK. THE UNIVERSE WAS BUILT TO BE SELF SUSTAINABLE AND EVER-EXPANDING. WIPING OUT HALF OF ALL LIFE SIMULTANEOUSLY WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE EVEN FOR US, AS NEW CREATURES WOULD SIMPLY BE CREATED FASTER THAN THEY COULD BE WIPED OUT, CAUSING A PARADOX THAT SPANS SO FAR ACROSS PLANETS AND STARS THAT THE UNIVERSE WOULD SIMPLY CEASE TO EXIST"

"AND SO, ONCE LEARNING OF THE TITAN'S GOAL, WE KNEW THAT STEPPING IN WAS INEVITABLE. OUR ONLY OBSTACLE WAS THAT WE OURSELVES CANNOT USE OUR POWER TOGETHER, ESPECIALLY SEPARATED IN SUCH A MANNER THAT WE ARE. OUR AMALGAMATED STRENGTH MUST BE WIELDED BY AN ENTITY OTHER THAN OURSELVES, AND AT THE POINT OF THIS DISCOVERY YOU HAD ALREADY DRAWN QUITE AN AMMOUT OF ATTENTION FROM US"

"SO YOU, TONY STARK, MUST BE OUR WIELDER, AS THERE IS NO ONE ELSE OUT THERE WITH QUITE AS MUCH A REPUTATION WITH SKILLS TO MATCH. THE FATES DEEM IT SO. REFUSING THE OFFER WILL MEAN INEVITABLE DEATH TO THE UNIVERSE, AS THANOS CAN'T AND WON'T BE STOPPED WITHOUT OUR HELP." 

During the Stones' little exposition, a blazing white light had surrounded all seven of them, growing higher and higher until the roof above them disappeared in the flames and it appeared as if they were in the middle of a spherical tornado of whites and greys, the colours whizzing past him so fast it made him dizzy. Tony simply tilted his head down with a sigh, he couldn't even muster enough strength to give a shit about this increasingly worse situation he had gotten himself into.

"How would you help? How could you possibly stop Thanos if you're spread all across the universe? And no, absolutely not, I am not going a shitty voyage across space in an attempt to beat Thanos in the race to collect you guys."

"WE HAVE THE ABILITY TO SIPHON A PORTION OF OUR POWERS TO ANY CREATURE OF OUR CHOOSING, BUT ONLY ONE AT A TIME. WITH THE COMBINED POWER OF REALITY, SOUL, MIND, TIME, SPACE AND POWER YOU SHALL HAVE EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO DEFEAT THANOS ONCE AND FOR ALL. AND WITH TIME TO SPARE."

"C-can't you get anyone else?? I can list about 100 people, off the top of my head, who would be far more competent than me to do this." He was getting desperate now. Tony did not want to do this, far to much responsibility involved. The Stones' shook their heads solemnly, and the synchronisation of it all made him want to throw up.

"IF YOU DO HAPPEN FAIL THIS MISSION, YOU DIE AT LEAST KNOWING THAT BECAUSE YOU HAD ACCEPTED THIS OFFER, THE UNIVERSE STOOD A FIGHTING CHANCE EVEN IF ONLY FOR A SHORT WHILE."

Tony was, for lack of better words, dumbfounded. It sounded like a daunting task, but did he have a choice?  He heaved a sigh for what felt like the millionth time that day, and closed his eyes. Flashes of his life back home burned in front of him. He didn't know what the Stones' powers would entail, but he knew that nothing  would ever be the same again, wether he liked it or not. 

And so, with one last mental glance at his friends and family who had no idea what he was about to take on, Tony Stark opened his eyes.

"I accept your offer."