It's a Terrible privilege.

“I will never regret this friendship, Tony. I will never regret meeting you.

i am literally so on board with both of these omg. i feel like tony would be simultaneously excited/delighted and horrified and he’d keep waffling back and forth between being like OH MY GOD ARE YOU OKAY and HOLY SHIT I PUNCHED THE BLACK WIDOW IN THE FACE AND LIVED I AM TELLING LITERALLY EVERYONE THIS IS GOING ON MY RESUME 

and natasha is simultaneously exasperated/amused and PROUD AS ALL GET OUT because hell yeah that was a punch and secretly a tiny bit relieved because now she can relax slightly knowing tony can hold his own and she’d just be grinning all over the place with terrifying bloody teeth

i imagine thor clapping tony so hard on the back he almost breaks him because he’s so happy for tony and proud of him for his new skillz

FUCKING SIGN ME UP. SIGN ME TF UP. NATASHA/TONY BROTP 2KFOREVER

Ok but Natasha rattling off to Bucky in Russian, “this motherfucker actually punched me,” & Bucky just looks at her, “get the fuck out, no he didn’t. Are you sure it wasn’t Steve,” says Bucky jokingly. 

“No, idiot, we were sparring.” 

She shrugged, “blowing up cities doesn’t exactly excite hunger within me. Actually, it kind of turns me off to the whole idea.”

She closed her hand into a fist, leaving the rest of the pieces of the lab untouched by her. She didn’t need a physical reminder of how broken everything was. The steady beat of her heart reminded her enough.

Leaning against the nearest counter, she slowly folded her arms across her chest. “What do you think happens next, Stark?”

“Fair enough. I don’t remember the last time I ate something, so four pizzas should do.” He honestly couldn’t remember what the Tower looked like not a week ago, a quiet party bringing it to life. It was a monument of crushed glass, now. A reminder that every time Tony tried to make something for himself, a home, friends, anything, it always shattered in his face.

She decided not to point out the fact that she didn’t plan on eating. That she couldn’t eat. That the mess of emotions rollercoasting their way through her body made it impossible for her to eat.

“Can JARVIS be brought back? I mean, isn’t he Vision? And besides, don’t you have your girl FRIDAY now?”

Natasha was intelligent, but even she didn’t understand the inner workings of Stark’s AI’s.

She shook her head, “no one’s coming for you. No one’s every going to come for you. No matter how much you want them to. No matter how much you need to be found worthless, just so you can go look in a mirror and tell yourself your father had been right. He wasn’t. He isn’t. The world needs you, Stark. Far more than they ever needed your father and far more than you ever needed him.”

Natasha glanced down at her perfectly manicured nails, for what felt like hours, before glancing back up at Stark. “I haven’t the faintest idea. Cap wants me to help him run the Avengers Facility. Fury wants me to go after Banner. And Hawkeye wants me to fucking babysit.”

“I’m not…quite sure. I mean, yes? No? Vision isn’t Jarvis. He doesn’t treat me the same, for a start. I’d like to think that no matter how crazy I am, Jarvis will still love me. Jarvis was an AI, and Vision is…as far as I can tell…not? And Jarvis dumped all of his data when Ultron tried to kill him, so he’s…he’s gotta be out there.” Tony Stark may be a proponent for change, and an advocate for human advancement, but he was also possessive as all hell. Not sentimental. Just viciously protective of what’s his. “Friday’s great - you’re awesome, Friday - but she’s not Jarvis.” There was a lot that went unsaid with a sentence like that, but he trusted Natasha to figure it out, if anyone else could.

He didn’t quite know what to say to that. Perhaps he was needed. But he had also proven just how dangerous he was. Just how much terror took hold of him and overrode all other sense. Just how fucking terrified he had been of losing what he thought was a family. He may have lost it anyway in his desperate attempts to save it, haunted by ‘Why didn’t you do more?’ “Maybe someone should,” he said, more to his forceps than to Natasha.

“Sounds like everyone has a job for you,” Tony said, looking up at where she stood, and gesturing to a chair that was less full of glass than the rest. “Though the babysitting one sounds like the worst by far.” He shrugged. “If none of those employment options sound good, well. Your access codes don’t expire. And I’ve got…well, it needs a little fixing, but I’ve got the best anti-paparazzi tech there is.” You can stay here and no one will bother you. Except me, of course. But perhaps that was presumptuous of him - she was probably less wanted than him, and she certainly hadn’t gone off the rails when Wanda did…whatever she did. 

Natasha listened to Stark ramble on about JARVIS and understood all the things he wasn’t saying. JARVIS loved Tony for exactly who and what Tony was. He never asked him to pretend to be something he wasn’t. He never required him to be someone he wasn’t. JARVIS loved Tony completely. The good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly, and Tony missed that. Tony needed that.

Natasha understood that need, even if she couldn’t remember ever feeling it.

She sighed. “Stark, if you want me to arrest you, if you want me to lock you away in some super secret jail cell - just ask. I still know people. Hell, I even know the wannabe new head of HYRDA. One phone call and I can have you shipped away, never to be heard from again.” Her eyes leveled with Stark’s. “Just know, if I make that call, if I do that, it’s not because someone wanted it to happen, it’s because you wanted it to happen.” She shook her head. “You’re better than all this self-doubt and self-pity, Stark. I know it, and I know you know it too.”

Tilting the seat Stark offered her forward, she watched as the broken shards of glass tumbled to the ground. They looked beautiful reflected in the sunlight, until she lifted her head and again saw the damage they were a part of.

“People think the Avengers are an idea, but I never saw them as that. I saw the Avengers as a group of specific individuals. Us, Thor, Cap, Hawkeye, Hulk.” She shook her head again. “Cap’s heart is in the right place and his idea is solid, but it’s his vision and I don’t see it like he does.”

She laughed at the idea of her babysitting. She loved Hawkeye’s children as if they were her own flesh and blood, but that’s where it ended. She didn’t want to have a hand in raising them. That she’d always leave to their parents.

She smiled. “Thanks, Stark. I may just take you up on that offer.”

Her mind had already accepted his offer. Knowing that, at least for now, staying at the tower with Stark was exactly where she wanted to be.

Her eyes closed at Tony’s question, weighing her options. She knew she didn’t have to to tell Stark what she saw. That he would accept that she didn’t want to tell him, and leave it at that.

“Yeah yeah, you know how it is. Haven’t had a scotch in a day or two, haven’t talked to anyone except Friday, etcetera etcetera. It almost sounds like you want to get me hired for the villains.” Alcohol and pain meds didn’t exactly mix, and although Tony usually ignored those kinds of warnings, he’d been on a lot of pain meds for a while now.

“Cap is a Gryffindor - what he says is just is right, and nothing can change his mind. Luckily, for the most part, those have been good things. Sort of.” Steve hadn’t been the same since the whole debacle with the winter soldier, and Tony couldn’t help but wonder if he was in such a hurry to train his shiny new team to go hunt down his old friend. 

Tony shrugged. “It’s not like I can take up twenty floors by myself.” It had been too quiet with the Avengers gone. A solitude he’d more than likely have to get used to. As usual.

She shrugged. “Maybe I do. Maybe I miss you when you’re not around.”

And she did. They had a bond, an understanding, that Natasha didn’t have with anyone else. It ran deeper than trust and respect, and it wasn’t written in an owing of debts. It was something coated in blood and guilt and self-doubt.

“You hate yourself too much to ever be a villain, Stark.” She said, sliding into the now glass free chair. “You wouldn’t last a day.”

She sighed. “Steve’s a good man. One of the best. It’s easy to trust and believe in him. It’s easy to lose yourself in him. To see yourself as worthy, as a hero, as his equal.” She shook her head. “But then you wake up and remember you’re you and not him. That you’ll never be him. And suddenly, his cause isn’t yours anymore. His team isn’t yours anymore.”

It wasn’t that Natasha disagreed with what Steve was doing. The world needed the Avengers more than ever. But the Avengers weren’t really the Avengers to her anymore. They were… Team Captain America.

Her face dropped as if offended. “That’s why you want me to stay here? Because you have twenty unused floors?” She frowned. “And here I thought it was because you liked having me around.”

She shook her head. “It wasn’t survival. It was selfishness. It was a desire, a need, to be the best. It was a fear of failure.”

Natasha watched Stark move the glass around on the table, as he spoke.

“Tony,” she said softly, once he had fallen silent.

She opened her mouth a handful of times, but found herself at a loss for words. How do you convince someone their not responsible for something that hadn’t happened?

He froze when she wrapped her arms around him, a little startled but more in shock at how much he had needed the touch, the comfort of a friend. He’d thought his list of friends had shrunk to five after the recent events (Pepper, Rhodey, Happy, Friday and Jarvis). It was...kind of shattering, to realize he still had Natasha. “No, but you could have been, and it would have been my fault anyway.” Perhaps just how afraid he was had been lost on Steve, the unflappable golden boy of America that he was. Perhaps losing everyone you knew, loved or hated, made you unafraid of dying for a cause. Perhaps Tony was just selfish and weak, like his father had always said. He reached up, squeezed Natasha’s arm gently, and moved to disengage himself. As much as he reveled in the comfort of touch, it was...easier, to step back into the old Tony’s shoes, the Tony who couldn’t be hurt by anything.

“Well, when you put it that way, I would like to inform you that I would absolutely last more than a day if I was doing it out of spite. I can do anything forever if it’s out of spite,” he huffed, half-laughing as he stood up slowly, moving slowly as if every bend of his muscles pained him. There was sweet sweet pizza waiting in the elevator though (Friday had buzzed his phone to let him know), so he went for it anyway, only half attempting to compose himself in front of Natasha.

She shrugged, “blowing up cities doesn’t exactly excite hunger within me. Actually, it kind of turns me off to the whole idea.”

She closed her hand into a fist, leaving the rest of the pieces of the lab untouched by her. She didn’t need a physical reminder of how broken everything was. The steady beat of her heart reminded her enough.

Leaning against the nearest counter, she slowly folded her arms across her chest. “What do you think happens next, Stark?”

“Fair enough. I don’t remember the last time I ate something, so four pizzas should do.” He honestly couldn’t remember what the Tower looked like not a week ago, a quiet party bringing it to life. It was a monument of crushed glass, now. A reminder that every time Tony tried to make something for himself, a home, friends, anything, it always shattered in his face.

She decided not to point out the fact that she didn’t plan on eating. That she couldn’t eat. That the mess of emotions rollercoasting their way through her body made it impossible for her to eat.

“Can JARVIS be brought back? I mean, isn’t he Vision? And besides, don’t you have your girl FRIDAY now?”

Natasha was intelligent, but even she didn’t understand the inner workings of Stark’s AI’s.

She shook her head, “no one’s coming for you. No one’s every going to come for you. No matter how much you want them to. No matter how much you need to be found worthless, just so you can go look in a mirror and tell yourself your father had been right. He wasn’t. He isn’t. The world needs you, Stark. Far more than they ever needed your father and far more than you ever needed him.”

Natasha glanced down at her perfectly manicured nails, for what felt like hours, before glancing back up at Stark. “I haven’t the faintest idea. Cap wants me to help him run the Avengers Facility. Fury wants me to go after Banner. And Hawkeye wants me to fucking babysit.”

“I’m not…quite sure. I mean, yes? No? Vision isn’t Jarvis. He doesn’t treat me the same, for a start. I’d like to think that no matter how crazy I am, Jarvis will still love me. Jarvis was an AI, and Vision is…as far as I can tell…not? And Jarvis dumped all of his data when Ultron tried to kill him, so he’s…he’s gotta be out there.” Tony Stark may be a proponent for change, and an advocate for human advancement, but he was also possessive as all hell. Not sentimental. Just viciously protective of what’s his. “Friday’s great - you’re awesome, Friday - but she’s not Jarvis.” There was a lot that went unsaid with a sentence like that, but he trusted Natasha to figure it out, if anyone else could.

He didn’t quite know what to say to that. Perhaps he was needed. But he had also proven just how dangerous he was. Just how much terror took hold of him and overrode all other sense. Just how fucking terrified he had been of losing what he thought was a family. He may have lost it anyway in his desperate attempts to save it, haunted by ‘Why didn’t you do more?’ “Maybe someone should,” he said, more to his forceps than to Natasha.

“Sounds like everyone has a job for you,” Tony said, looking up at where she stood, and gesturing to a chair that was less full of glass than the rest. “Though the babysitting one sounds like the worst by far.” He shrugged. “If none of those employment options sound good, well. Your access codes don’t expire. And I’ve got…well, it needs a little fixing, but I’ve got the best anti-paparazzi tech there is.” You can stay here and no one will bother you. Except me, of course. But perhaps that was presumptuous of him - she was probably less wanted than him, and she certainly hadn’t gone off the rails when Wanda did…whatever she did. 

Natasha listened to Stark ramble on about JARVIS and understood all the things he wasn’t saying. JARVIS loved Tony for exactly who and what Tony was. He never asked him to pretend to be something he wasn’t. He never required him to be someone he wasn’t. JARVIS loved Tony completely. The good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly, and Tony missed that. Tony needed that.

Natasha understood that need, even if she couldn’t remember ever feeling it.

She sighed. “Stark, if you want me to arrest you, if you want me to lock you away in some super secret jail cell - just ask. I still know people. Hell, I even know the wannabe new head of HYRDA. One phone call and I can have you shipped away, never to be heard from again.” Her eyes leveled with Stark’s. “Just know, if I make that call, if I do that, it’s not because someone wanted it to happen, it’s because you wanted it to happen.” She shook her head. “You’re better than all this self-doubt and self-pity, Stark. I know it, and I know you know it too.”

Tilting the seat Stark offered her forward, she watched as the broken shards of glass tumbled to the ground. They looked beautiful reflected in the sunlight, until she lifted her head and again saw the damage they were a part of.

“People think the Avengers are an idea, but I never saw them as that. I saw the Avengers as a group of specific individuals. Us, Thor, Cap, Hawkeye, Hulk.” She shook her head again. “Cap’s heart is in the right place and his idea is solid, but it’s his vision and I don’t see it like he does.”

She laughed at the idea of her babysitting. She loved Hawkeye’s children as if they were her own flesh and blood, but that’s where it ended. She didn’t want to have a hand in raising them. That she’d always leave to their parents.

She smiled. “Thanks, Stark. I may just take you up on that offer.”

Her mind had already accepted his offer. Knowing that, at least for now, staying at the tower with Stark was exactly where she wanted to be.

Her eyes closed at Tony’s question, weighing her options. She knew she didn’t have to to tell Stark what she saw. That he would accept that she didn’t want to tell him, and leave it at that.

“Yeah yeah, you know how it is. Haven’t had a scotch in a day or two, haven’t talked to anyone except Friday, etcetera etcetera. It almost sounds like you want to get me hired for the villains.” Alcohol and pain meds didn’t exactly mix, and although Tony usually ignored those kinds of warnings, he’d been on a lot of pain meds for a while now.

“Cap is a Gryffindor - what he says is just is right, and nothing can change his mind. Luckily, for the most part, those have been good things. Sort of.” Steve hadn’t been the same since the whole debacle with the winter soldier, and Tony couldn’t help but wonder if he was in such a hurry to train his shiny new team to go hunt down his old friend. 

Tony shrugged. “It’s not like I can take up twenty floors by myself.” It had been too quiet with the Avengers gone. A solitude he’d more than likely have to get used to. As usual.

She shrugged, “blowing up cities doesn’t exactly excite hunger within me. Actually, it kind of turns me off to the whole idea.”

She closed her hand into a fist, leaving the rest of the pieces of the lab untouched by her. She didn’t need a physical reminder of how broken everything was. The steady beat of her heart reminded her enough.

Leaning against the nearest counter, she slowly folded her arms across her chest. “What do you think happens next, Stark?”

“Fair enough. I don’t remember the last time I ate something, so four pizzas should do.” He honestly couldn’t remember what the Tower looked like not a week ago, a quiet party bringing it to life. It was a monument of crushed glass, now. A reminder that every time Tony tried to make something for himself, a home, friends, anything, it always shattered in his face.

She decided not to point out the fact that she didn’t plan on eating. That she couldn’t eat. That the mess of emotions rollercoasting their way through her body made it impossible for her to eat.

“Can JARVIS be brought back? I mean, isn’t he Vision? And besides, don’t you have your girl FRIDAY now?”

Natasha was intelligent, but even she didn’t understand the inner workings of Stark’s AI’s.

She shook her head, “no one’s coming for you. No one’s every going to come for you. No matter how much you want them to. No matter how much you need to be found worthless, just so you can go look in a mirror and tell yourself your father had been right. He wasn’t. He isn’t. The world needs you, Stark. Far more than they ever needed your father and far more than you ever needed him.”

Natasha glanced down at her perfectly manicured nails, for what felt like hours, before glancing back up at Stark. “I haven’t the faintest idea. Cap wants me to help him run the Avengers Facility. Fury wants me to go after Banner. And Hawkeye wants me to fucking babysit.”

“I’m not...quite sure. I mean, yes? No? Vision isn’t Jarvis. He doesn’t treat me the same, for a start. I’d like to think that no matter how crazy I am, Jarvis will still love me. Jarvis was an AI, and Vision is...as far as I can tell...not? And Jarvis dumped all of his data when Ultron tried to kill him, so he’s...he’s gotta be out there.” Tony Stark may be a proponent for change, and an advocate for human advancement, but he was also possessive as all hell. Not sentimental. Just viciously protective of what’s his. “Friday’s great - you’re awesome, Friday - but she’s not Jarvis.” There was a lot that went unsaid with a sentence like that, but he trusted Natasha to figure it out, if anyone else could.

He didn’t quite know what to say to that. Perhaps he was needed. But he had also proven just how dangerous he was. Just how much terror took hold of him and overrode all other sense. Just how fucking terrified he had been of losing what he thought was a family. He may have lost it anyway in his desperate attempts to save it, haunted by ‘Why didn’t you do more?’ “Maybe someone should,” he said, more to his forceps than to Natasha.

“Sounds like everyone has a job for you,” Tony said, looking up at where she stood, and gesturing to a chair that was less full of glass than the rest. “Though the babysitting one sounds like the worst by far.” He shrugged. “If none of those employment options sound good, well. Your access codes don’t expire. And I’ve got...well, it needs a little fixing, but I’ve got the best anti-paparazzi tech there is.” You can stay here and no one will bother you. Except me, of course. But perhaps that was presumptuous of him - she was probably less wanted than him, and she certainly hadn’t gone off the rails when Wanda did...whatever she did. 

She shrugged, “blowing up cities doesn’t exactly excite hunger within me. Actually, it kind of turns me off to the whole idea.”

She closed her hand into a fist, leaving the rest of the pieces of the lab untouched by her. She didn’t need a physical reminder of how broken everything was. The steady beat of her heart reminded her enough.

Leaning against the nearest counter, she slowly folded her arms across her chest. “What do you think happens next, Stark?”

“Fair enough. I don’t remember the last time I ate something, so four pizzas should do.” He honestly couldn’t remember what the Tower looked like not a week ago, a quiet party bringing it to life. It was a monument of crushed glass, now. A reminder that every time Tony tried to make something for himself, a home, friends, anything, it always shattered in his face.

“Seriously though, food? Friday, get me a menu or five. The usual places.” Tony waved Natasha into the room, not quite sure why she was here and not with the rest of the Avengers, but not being openly against it - quietly, he was glad to see her.

“I’m sorry, boss. It seems that that information was part of a packet that Jarvis dumped. I have not recovered it yet.” Tony attempted to suppress a flinch at the words, aware of Natasha watching him, but it wasn’t entirely successful.

Natasha cracked a smile, as if she knew a secret the world wished it knew, and stepped over the threshold into Stark’s workshop.

Everything was everywhere, evidence that Ultron had been real and not a terrible nightmare. She ran her hands over upturned tables and broken pieces of metal that so resembled what the Avengers had become. Before they had been organized chaos, now, Natasha wasn’t even sure they were a ‘they’ anymore.

Natasha’s voice was a surprise, and his hands shook for a moment as he looked at the ruins of the floor, at the empty room, and at the very-alive assassin at the door.  

“Well, you know how it is, one minute you’re staying to exchange pleasantries, the next they’re putting handcuffs on you. Are you…here to do that?” he asked suddenly, spinning around in his chair and putting down the forceps in his hand. 

“Seriously though, food? Friday, get me a menu or five. The usual places.” Tony waved Natasha into the room, not quite sure why she was here and not with the rest of the Avengers, but not being openly against it - quietly, he was glad to see her.

“I’m sorry, boss. It seems that that information was part of a packet that Jarvis dumped. I have not recovered it yet.” Tony attempted to suppress a flinch at the words, aware of Natasha watching him, but it wasn’t entirely successful.

They held the door for him, but he just shot off into the sky with a jaunty wave. 

“Friday, cut the radio chatter.”

“Yes, boss.”

And then it was quiet. No more Steve yelling, no Hulk roars to wake him from the nightmare - but this one was real - no Hawkeye to snark at him, no Natasha seeing right through him. He thought he’d had something. He thought he’d had a home.

It was clear how quickly a vision of the truth tore that to shreds.

So he flew home to his damaged tower, irritated at the Avengers A plastered on the side, tempted to set it aflame with a tank missile, but ignored it and set down on the landing pad. It was only after getting the last piece of armor removed from him that he realized just how many injuries he’d collected over the last few days, and he very nearly stumbled to his knees.

Instead, he went to his workshop, sat down heavily, and pulled up the towers’ systems. “Friday, find me…gather everything you can find on Jarvis. Find his memory dumps, his protocols, everything. I’d say his naptime is over.” 

“You got it, boss.”

Natasha’s voice was a surprise, and his hands shook for a moment as he looked at the ruins of the floor, at the empty room, and at the very-alive assassin at the door.  

“Well, you know how it is, one minute you’re staying to exchange pleasantries, the next they’re putting handcuffs on you. Are you...here to do that?” he asked suddenly, spinning around in his chair and putting down the forceps in his hand. 

At her greeting, just like his back in Stuttgart, he couldn’t help but smirk lopsidedly and look up. “You look like you’ve been busy these last couple days. Found some pictures of you pretending to be married to Steve.” It had been amusing, watching that pop up on the internet, the night after it had happened. Some shrewd teenager had seen through their - admittedly shoddy - disguises and snapped some pictures for the rest of the world. 

"But you know it’s just not the same without you here. No constant danger, except for well…me." He looked up at her, putting down the screwdriver in his suit, the repulsor whirring in reply to the end of his work, pulsing with a hum in his hand. 

She smirked, “I thought dating Rogers would be good for me. Make the world believe I was turning over a new leaf.”

She had read some of the headlines herself. Most of them proclaiming the worlds deadliest assassin had left the world of murder and manipulation and had joined her “hero” boyfriend as an Avenger. She had even believed it long enough to help Rogers take down HYDRA and SHIELD alongside it.

She ran her hand along one of the many metal tables in the room, as she shrugged. “All my secrets are out, Stark. Not just some or most of them, but all of them. Every lie, every manipulation, every everything. Everyone knows everything there is to know about Natasha Romanoff.”

Which wasn’t completely true. Natasha’s secrets had secrets, and some of them were hidden so far down that even Natasha didn’t know them. But on the surface, she had become transparent. Everyone could see her for exactly who she was - which was whatever anyone had needed her to be.

He tracked her movement across the room with his eyes, watching her blend into the shadows of the dimly lit room as if she belonged there, even in her civilian clothes and out of her catsuit. Tony's desk lamp spread a small halo of light into the workshop, but the rest was illuminated by the blue in his palm and the muted blue in his chest. 

Tony would be lying if he said that JARVIS hadn't grabbed the information as soon as it was put live, taking everything that they did not already have and storing it in a file somewhere. Not that he planned to read it anytime soon, but...just in case.