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[ He takes that in for a moment, nodding softly. Steve hasn't given much thought to what he'll do now, but he imagines it won't look too different from what he was doing before. Demand for counseling is likely to skyrocket, so at the very least he ought to keep the group going. He can rope Sam in, maybe even Bucky.

He sneaks a quick glance at Tony, wondering if he'd be interested. Something to consider.

As for the topic at hand... ] Advisory, huh? You handing the reins over to Rhodes? Or is Carol sticking around?

[ Natasha was responsible for keeping The Avengers running, even if she had to hold the various scattered pieces together herself. Those are big shoes to fill.

(Steve does not, for even one second, consider himself as an option. Leaders who spark insurrection in the ranks are typically disqualified from the role.) ]

[Tony just huffs, and the sound is a combination of wry and amused.] Was I ever really the leader, Steve?

[Not like they'd had a team when he was gone, after all. When it comes down to it, Steve is the Avengers in a way Tony had always hoped for, but never achieved. (He has to admit that his ego really doesn't lend itself to leadership positions.) Tony doesn't know what can be done on the legal side of things, but considering that he's just saved Earth (and the rest of the universe), getting taken off the Most Wanted list should be a given. And if it's not, there's a whole bunch of overpaid lawyers sitting around with nothing to do right now.]

Can't imagine Danvers staying here when she has a whole universe to take care of, anyway. [Plus Carol scares him a little bit.]

[ Steve meant what he said in his letter to Tony, even if there were probably several hundred better ways to say it. He sees The Avengers as a family, yes, but more so Tony's— and especially now, Natasha's— than his. Growing up, it was just him and his mom, and after she died, Steve never overcame his stubborn need to assert independence.

(Sure, he had legitimate legal concerns, and the entire accords ordeal smelled rotten from the start, but Steve knows that he could have tried harder to find common ground with Tony. He expects he'll always live with that regret.)

As for Tony's question, Steve rolls his eyes with equal parts exasperation and self-deprecation. ] I think we've established I'm not the authority on leadership that I was made out to be. You sure you don't wanna give it a shot?

I think that Fury's assessment that I don't play well with others was more accurate than I may have previously admitted.

[Yes, he's just stating the obvious, but Tony's just trying to reach out to Steve here. Sometimes that means acknowledging his flaws, which is also not something he's good at. He can't help it; he's been arrogant his whole life, even after learning a lesson about humility (several lessons about humility, but who's counting?) at gunpoint. It's just who he is.]

Look, if you really don't want to, we'll figure something out. But I think you're the best man for the job.

[Assuming that they still have a team, which is a little debatable.]

[ Tony's words have Steve's head snapping up so fast that he feels it in his injured shoulder, the muscles in his neck pulling just enough to sting. It isn't the violent flare up from earlier but it makes him hiss out sharply.

Steve doesn't know what to make of Tony's seemingly fully restored faith in him. Tony forgiving him because resentment is corrosive is still a ways off from believing he's worthy of leading The Avengers again. ]

Maybe it's a two man job. [ The suggestion escapes Steve before he can think any better of it. It has all the makings of a terrible idea but it would give him a reason to stay, a place to occupy in Tony's life. That's something he was afraid to admit he wanted until it began to seem like an actual possibility. ]

[Tony finds himself rubbing at his neck suddenly, but he chalks it up to - well, everything, basically. Even a nanite suit can't absorb every blow, as much as he might wish otherwise. What's strange is that Steve hisses in pain at the same time. It makes something stir in the depths of Tony's mind, but he can't manage to put it together.]

You think Wilson's leadership material? [he retorts dryly. Nothing against Sam, really, he just wants to fuck with Steve a little, and he's going to leave the elephant in the room alone.]

[ There's enough humor in Tony's voice to keep alive that newly ignited flicker of hope. But first, two can play at this game. ]

Now that you mention it, that's actually not a bad idea. [ Steve gives his best effort to look like he's seriously considering it, if only for the brief time he can sustain it before he's looking back at Tony, shaking his head. ]

But I meant you. Unless you think working well together was just a one-time fluke.

[ His aggressively easygoing tone doesn't betray how desperately Steve is hoping the answer is no. ]

[Sam probably is better leadership material than Tony - he's certainly better at getting along with people (although who isn't?). But Tony isn't going to turn down this olive branch, even though he imagines they'll both end up regretting it in the not-too-distant future.]

As long as you don't nearly kill yourself trying to save my life again.

[They both know it'll happen.]

[ That goes much easier than Steve anticipated, which gives him further reason to believe this isn't just Tony being exceedingly accommodating. If he truly didn't want Steve around, he had every opportunity to object.

Saving the universe went better the second time around. Who's to say the same can't be true for their working relationship?

As long as they're discussing terms, however: ]

Don't jump on any more grenades and I won't have to.

[ Steve Rogers, patron saint of "do as I say, not as I do." ]

You realize that story's in your assessment, right?

[And he's heard it before anyway, but Tony thinks it best not to mention that. He'll just pretend that it's due entirely to obsessively reading the files on Steve - okay, that doesn't sound any better than "my adoptive aunt who's also your ex told me over pancakes at Sunday brunch when I was ten". But at least he can pretend his interest in the files is purely professional.]

I have a suit that's designed to withstand small-scale explosives.

[Not that he wants to test it on a literal grenade unless he gets to incorporate vibranium into his suit.]

Is it? [ That surprises him, but it shouldn't. There were countless servicemen on base that day; any one of them could have relayed the story. (Steve doesn't consider that Peggy could be the source because he is reasonably sure that he has already tracked down every last audio or video recording and print interview she ever gave about him. [The SHIELD therapist that evaluated him back in 2012 called it masochism, but Steve would not be dissuaded.]) ]

"Small-scale explosives," [ Steve repeats, shaking his head. There is sarcasm in his voice now, but it isn't mean-spirited: ] Good thing we never fight anyone with more firepower than your garden variety IED, huh?

[Even after more than a decade, Tony still visibly flinches at the words 'garden variety IED'. He knows Steve doesn't mean anything by it - god knows he's made enough verbal missteps - but Tony still has nightmares about the explosion, about waking up in the cave.

(He wonders for a moment if Steve ever dreams about crashing into the ocean, if he was even conscious for that part, if his memory would concoct it for him.)

Tony takes a drink of water and forces a neutral expression back onto his face.]

Yeah, well, I do the best I can with the materials available. This isn't Wakanda, you know.

[ Steve is familiar enough with his body's panic response to recognize the sudden, unprovoked hammering of his heart against his rib cage and the bolts of pins-and-needles traveling up his extremities. After everything his body has been through, a delayed panic attack sounds perfectly reasonable, but why now?

He made Tony flinch. The last time that happened, Steve was raising his shield over the arc reactor. Maybe he made the connection subconsciously the memory is what set him off.

Steve is more concerned about what triggered Tony, and it doesn't take a genius to pinpoint the exact words. ]

That was... a really stupid thing to say to you. [ He looks directly at Tony, his expression serious. This is the kind of straightforward communication Steve has always failed at, especially when it comes to Tony, and he can't let himself off the hook if he ever hopes to improve. ] I'm sorry, Tony. I should've thought it through.

I talked about explosives first. It's- it's not your fault.

[Tony remembers the panic attacks he used to have - not about Afghanistan, but about riding a nuke into space and knowing the portal would shut behind him. About giving up everything - about the possibility of sacrificing everything and still not being enough. This...this is small-scale, relatively speaking, which doesn't really help calm him down at all. He rubs his thumb over the fingers of his uninjured hand, tries to steady his breathing.]

Talk about something else.

[He needs to divert his thoughts, and he can't do that on his own right now.]

[ Steve opens his mouth to object because he can't stop himself. Aggressively assuming responsibility for even minor missteps is the quickest way to silence the constant dread that he will screw up again, next time in even bigger ways than before. It's hard to trust yourself again when your failures have the direct consequence of eliminating half of all life in the entire universe. That, and the fact that Steve Rogers could never help being dramatic.

But then Tony implores him to change the subject, and the urge to prostrate himself at Tony's feet— see, dramatic— is replaced with the need to fulfill this one very simple thing asked of him.

A conveniently timed growl of Steve's stomach delivers him a perfectly inoffensive change of topic. ]

I could eat. [ His stomach emphasizes that understatement with another gurgling noise. ] What's open for takeout?

[Tony huffs a breathless laugh. Of course Steve's asking about food. The man's practically a human garbage disposal.]

You can always eat. You could eat an entire goddamn turkey by yourself and still find room for a pumpkin pie. [But it's an affectionate tease, or as affectionate as Tony gets.] I think the answer the doctors would want to hear is the hospital cafeteria, but frankly, saving the world oughta be worth at least a cheeseburger and fries.

[He doesn't even bother with takeout - instead he takes his phone and starts tapping out an order, resting the phone in his lap.]

How many for you?

You always leave room for dessert. [ Steve delivers this with a shrug, as if consuming a Thanksgiving spread's worth of food is commonplace. It's remarkable how easy it is to fall into rhythm with Tony's teasing when he isn't taking every word as a personal attack. ]

Two. [ This is Steve's first answer. He rethinks immediately; he couldn't convince himself of that anymore than he could convince Tony. ] No, four.

[Tony goes ahead and throws in a shake and an extra order of fries for Steve - his body is healing, and it needs the extra calories, he tells himself.]

All right, Happy's gotta go and pick it up.

[Happy isn't Tony's bodyguard anymore, but he and Pepper have been taking it upon themselves to keep an eye on Tony in shifts - mostly to make sure he doesn't check himself out of the hospital. And, Tony thinks, if he has to stay here, then so does Steve. (It's a false equivalency: Steve has the serum to boost his healing, so even though his injuries were worse, he'll still probably heal faster. Tony doesn't care.)

He puts his phone back in his pocket and leans back in the chair.]

Your sketch is gone, [Tony says, seemingly randomly. It's probably more surprising that he'd left everything in Steve's office the way it was when he'd been on the run - except not surprising at all, if you know Tony Stark. He'd left everyone's rooms the way they were, like he could somehow atone for wronging them with one simple action - or like he'd wanted to preserve their memories as long as he could.

But the point is, Steve's sketch from the war, that little monkey that had managed to survive decades until it had come into Tony's possession, and then back into Steve's, is gone, and Tony's obliquely sad about it and doesn't know why.]

Pepper's already got him babysitting, huh? [ Steve says more than asks in a dry, commiserative tone. The only person who makes a worse patient than Tony is Steve. Friends hovering outside of hospital suites to make sure they don't vanish against medical advice is standard practice for them both. ]

I haven't sketched anything yet. [ Confusion creases Steve's brow as he retraces the conversation. He still feels dazed enough that the odds of Tony having set off on a new tangent are equal with chances of Steve simply having missed something. ]

Gotta keep him out of her hair somehow, [Tony replies fondly. He's well aware that he gets in the way of running a business much more than Happy does.]

Your sketch from the war, the one of the monkey on a unicycle. [To be fair, Tony absolutely sets off on new tangents without warning and somehow expects everyone else to follow along. This is one of those times, largely because he's grasping for acceptable topics that don't involve, well, everything.]

That was still there? [ Steve never checked, telling himself whenever he was at the compound that there was no time— and it was usually true. Certainly over the past few days. But he was also certain that he'd find the place scrubbed clean, his possessions boxed up in a storage unit somewhere. He certainly never expected everything to be just as he left it. ]

[Tony gives a one-shouldered shrug, trying to act like it's no big deal.] It was when I left, anyway. I don't know what you guys did with the place.

[He does have a reasonably good idea, thanks to regularly pestering Rhodey for updates, but it's best not to mention that.

Thankfully, he's saved by the arrival of food. Tony rises to take one of the bags from Happy and busies himself with setting his own meal up on the bedside table.]

Was hospital food terrible back in the day, too?

[ Steve isn't going to let it go, but he is just as likely to pursue the topic again as he is to drive himself crazy wondering what it means. Either way that can wait until after they've eaten.

Besides, Tony has already changed the subject in the time it took Steve to greet and thank Happy. ]

All food was terrible back in the day. [ Not that they weren't grateful for what they had, but Steve isn't going to sit here and pretend that the 21st century isn't a culinary miracle. ] But yeah, hospital food was even worse.

I'm willing to bet they served boiled newspapers or something during the Depression. [Tony makes a face just before he licks a stray drip of ketchup off the side of his hand.] Don't ask me how you'd boil a newspaper, either. Newspaper soup?

[...okay, now he's just rambling. It may be slightly drug-induced, but he shows no signs of being about to fall over or faceplant into Steve's blankets.]

[ Steve opens his mouth to say something wry about the taste not being too far off from boiled newspaper, actually, but ends up shoving a handful of fries in his mouth instead. The sight of Tony licking his hand has, for unspecified reasons, featured in more of his fantasies than Steve would like to admit. The memory of those fantasies wash over Steve with all the subtlety of a tsunami, and stuffing his face the safest thing he can think to do. ]

Good call on the fries, [ Steve says, a bit over-enthusiastic, and not quite finished chewing yet. ]

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