When Tony invited them to bunk over – he hinted that it could be made a permanent arrangement if they wanted, which saw a mini-migration of superheroes with duffel bags into the same radius – he said the Tower wasn't a prison. No curfews, no special house rules whatsoever, because he assumed everybody knew how to behave like normal, sane being in his not-so-humble abode. Natasha and Clint were a bit wary about JARVIS at first considering that the omnipresent voice always responded to their prompts seamlessly, as if he had been there beside them all along. Tony told them not to worry about it because even if JARVIS had all the information on his server, he wasn't coded to act malevolently on it. Kind of like using Google; it tracks your movements, learns your preferences, and then come up with an algorithm to serve you better. Tony then grinned ear to ear, short of giving the Avengers two thumb ups and Natasha's eyes rolled so far back she looked like Storm.

Anyway, the point being, nobody was bound by any rules for the entirety of them taking up residence in the Tower. That means, if someone were to go somewhere for two days straight, being highly functional adults, that shouldn't be a problem at all.

So when Tony Stark left for work on Monday morning but still hadn't returned home by Wednesday evening, nobody raised any alarm. When he was still absent from Friday's breakfast, Clint asked if Tony was away on SI's business and that was about it. The most they did was turned to Steve for enlightenment but even the Captain himself shook his head. By Sunday morning, Steve finally asked JARVIS, "What's his coordinates?"

"I have been tracking Sir's whereabouts ever since he left the Tower. I assure you Captain, that Sir is still alive and well."

"Then why isn't he back yet?" Steve asked testily as he paced the front of his bedroom.

"I'm sorry, Captain. I am unable to answer that."

"So at least let me know where he is."

"I'm sorry, Captain, I cannot answer."

Since JARVIS refused to provide anything useful no matter how Steve paraphrased his questions, he resorted to more pacing as he stewed over it when his phone rang in his pocket. One glance at the caller's ID and he swiped it so hard the screen almost cracked.

"Where the hell have you been?"

"Steve…"

"You couldn't have dropped us a note?"

"God… Steve, can you come?"

Steve's forehead pinched. Now he began to hear the misery underlying Tony's somewhat distant voice, and the heavy breathing that accompanied the pauses between words.

"OK, where are you?"

The cab ride lasted just 20 minutes from the Tower's lobby. The fact that Tony was just hiding under their nose for the past week yet didn't think it was important to check in with the team at all was not consoling. After paying his tab, Steve slammed the cab's door a bit too roughly the hinge almost come apart as he simmered at the main entrance of a rather sleazy looking motel. Two ladies looking barely legal stood coyly by the door. As Steve approached, they almost as good as pounced on him, taking him by the arms.

"Ma'am, excuse me. This isn't a good time –"

"Oh, then when is?" the blonde one purred. She tossed her curls over her shoulder and leaned purposely into Steve. "Anytime that's good for you is good for me."

"Ma'am, I'm sorry, I need to go right now. Would you –"

"Grouchy, grouchy – ooh."

Steve somehow managed to pry those manicured hands from his biceps. With a curt, impatient nod he hurried through the door. The whiff of old cigar and brandy hit him in an instant and he almost back stepped into the open again for clean air. The man at the register cocked his head up when Steve came into the vicinity and he eyed the super soldier with mild interest. Guess Steve was looking far too wholesome for the establishment.

"Morning, Sir," Steve greeted as he rested his forearm against the counter. "I'm looking for Tony Stark. He's a friend."

"I'll bet," the man quipped under his breath. He fumbled around the logbook, ran a bony finger down a column and finally said, "Nope. No Tony Starks around here. You wanna try another name?" And he snorted at the little joke.

Steve didn't find that all amusing. "What other names? He's Tony Stark."

"And I'm Steve Rogers. Look, I've worked here for thirteen years. I'm tellin' ya, multibillionaires just don't swing by places like this."

"Fine." Aliases. Someone really didn't want to be found out. "Try Edwin Jarvis."

Steve didn't think it would work, just something that came up top of his head. Tony was far too smart to leave flimsy trails like that. Mutual acquaintances, really? But at this point Steve was ready to try anything. If he had to run through every single one on the friendship list to get to Tony, he would. And holy cow, Edwin Jarvis scored a hit.

"Room 14. That's three doors down the hallway. Keep the voices down, if you fellas don't mind."

Steve muttered a thanks and started hunting for Room 14. He calmed himself forcibly because with the storm brewing in his brain right now, he wasn't sure he could restrain himself from full-on screaming at Tony when he finally found him. He'd expected more of his team mate. They were all on-call for SHIELD this month; Steve expected everyone to be battle ready at a moment's notice if and when the order come through. The Avengers couldn't fight with Tony down, now their only flyer since Thor was still away in Asgard sorting out the mess that was Loki. He just couldn't justify this blatant show of irresponsibility and it translated to him pounding on the door so hard it (and the neighbouring room's one) rattled in its frame.

"Tony, open the door dammit! I swear I'll break it down –"

The door opened unexpectedly that Steve's next pound was going straight into the other man's nose. His first response was to say sorry for threatening forced entry, but then he remembered he was supposed to be angry at Iron Man, but all his pent-up anger nonetheless evaporated at the sight of Tony's flushed skin, dark ringlets around his eyes and conspicuous tremors raking his unkempt form. His dress shirt looked damped and crumpled like he'd fallen asleep in it and sweated a bucket over the night. He swayed where he stood and Steve steadied him by the arms.

"You look terrible. What happened?"

"Haha, Cap. So good to see you. Come on in!"

Tony turned around to stumble into his room. Steve followed, but not before shooting a furtive glance at the man behind the counter. Said man's head did a violent jerk towards the computer screen as if the guestbook was the most interesting article he'd ever seen. Steve sighed and closed the door with a smart tap behind him.

Tony had sunk into his bed, cradling his head in his hands. Saying the whole place was a pile of mess was an understatement, it looked more like he'd set a pack of wild dogs loose for the night with meat-bait hidden in the closet. The bedsheet lay in an ugly heap on the floor, furniture misplaced – chairs weren't supposed to be lying upside down at the far corner of the room – shards of glass near the window and the mirror was not a mirror anymore, just a black piece of wood. As Tony massaged his forehead forcefully, Steve noticed the bloodied knuckles and dried bloodstains on the cuffs of his shirt.

He knelt before the billionaire, taking him by the wrists gently, all manner of wrath completely gone.

"I got you, all right? I'm taking you home, and we'll work everything out later."

"Whoever said there's a problem?" Tony wrenched his hand meekly from Steve and returned to cradling his head.

Steve pulled the upturned chair from the corner, carefully swiping stray glass dust from it and sat down directly in front of Tony. He leaned forward, his hand clasped and fingers intertwined.

"I'm not leaving you alone, Tony."

He thought he heard a slurred "Might as well" and in the next second Tony lifted his head with seemingly huge amount of effort. There was an astonishing volume of clarity in his eyes but when he spoke, Steve cringed at the rawness of his voice.

"How was it like? When you woke up after… so long?"

It sure didn't feel like "so long" to him. At first there was ice, and pain, and then numbness washed over him as the undercurrent of the Artic Sea pulled him lower and lower. Then there was light. Warmth. The stupid radio playing the ball game from 3 years before, and the lady agent, so brave, who stood her ground as he gained on her, demanding the truth of his current whereabouts. Before he knew what he was doing, he'd thrown two men into the walls and ran all the way out, out to modern New York now an unfamiliar territory.

"God, it was strange," Steve replied slowly. "We tried to sort things out. Nick had a debrief package sent down to my room after the whole fiasco. There was confusion. Lots of questions. SHIELD worked with me for two months, getting me back on track. It was a soldier life again until they set me up with my own place. Of course they sent Agent Carter undercover to babysit me, but I wasn't supposed to know that."

Steve paused, regarded Tony pointedly again. He was back to kneading his temples, his eyes trailing the carpet, a veil of terror behind them.

Steve continued, "They sent me a laptop with some old propaganda tapes – video clips, I mean. And the updated status of people from the time. Good men whom I've fought with in the war. All dead."

He thought of Bucky. His body wasn't ever discovered apparently, so his status was merely documented as "unknown", before it was updated some twenty years ago as "assumed deceased". Steve felt a surge of anger when he saw that. Bucky deserved better. A closure. Acknowledgement for all the heroic deeds he'd done when in service. Not like this, a single record forgotten, stashed somewhere in a database.

"My first love – we were gonna go on a date. A dance."

A small smile crept on Steve's face. The edge of Tony's lips curled up, but it looked sadder than anything as if he too was sympathising with all that could've been but never did for Steve.

"She's still around. She's still… she's back in England. I miss her. But I can't do this to her.

"The next profile I picked up was Howard's."

Tony visibly stiffened at the name. Steve's attention flicked back to the billionaire, noticing the tension in his shoulders.

"I got to say, that's irony at its best. Your father had absolute trust in the machines he built. Can't imagine a car accident actually did him in. I'm sorry for your loss, Tony. Howard was a good friend of mine, a good man –"

"Bet he is, Cap."

Tony jolted off the bed and strode to the window. He glared at the coffee table like it'd offended him so much so he looked like upending it now was a good idea now that it was within striking distance. Steve decided that was his cue to steer the topic away from the elder Stark.

"Your profile was next. They gave me your current phone number and address. You won't believe this, but I actually took the train down to the Stark Tower."

"Yeah?" Tony's cracked voice interjected, a note of amusement behind it. He turned to face Steve fully. "I thought the first time I saw you was on the Helicarrier."

"It was. I didn't make the call, or the visit."

"Right. Were you skulking at a corner café somewhere, hoping you'd bump into me or something?"

Steve chuckled.

"Right, don't answer that."

"I lost everything in that crash, but, if I get to come back then I better make this count."

"Make this count… make this count? Make this count?"

Tony was getting more and more agitated as he paced the expanse of the room, getting louder as he chanted those words like they were the only thing grounding him to sanity. Steve wasn't at all surprised when the coffee table finally flew into the wall. Tony heaved, hunched as he braced his knees.

"Sorry," he strained out, crumpling to the floor in a miserable heap. "I got a brother, Steve."

"What?"

"A brother," he repeated. He closed his eyes tiredly, resigned, as if repeating the words made this whole situation seemed more real. Was that why he more than thrashed this room? How long had he known this? Tony didn't look like he'd accepted the fact, like it hadn't sunk in, what more happy aboutit.

"I was going through some of Dad's old stuff. Thought of binning whatever crap still kept in there, wanted to make more room for the lab. Hell I don't even know how those things got into the mansion in the first place. I looked through the family records. And I found him.

"He's kept hidden all these long years in a hospice, funded by Mom's Foundation. I don't know how I missed it, I sign the yearly expenditure report."

"OK. That's good, right? I mean, I've never had a brother, but I can't imagine it to be a bad thing."

Tony grimaced, but he quickly hid it behind his hands again.

"No, he's in a pretty bad shape. He's been paralysed all his life, that's some 40 odd years. On life support. It's a long story, almost like science fiction. I still find it unbelievable."

"You've seen him?" Steve's curiosity piqued. He'd only realised a second too late that he might've overstepped the line and his lips pursed. This was Stark family business, private affairs. Steve wasn't going to poke his nose into it.

"I saw him last week. Couldn't help myself. He knows who I am. Turns out Mom and Dad used to visit him, spoke to him about me. Sure sounds like an awesome family trip 'cause I don't know I'd a fucking brother hidden somewhere, you'd think someone might've wanted to clue me in on the agenda!"

He looked like he wanted to fling something again. Steve was by his side in an instant, resting a reassuring hand over his shoulders. Fettered fury still churned behind his dark eyes, but at least he wasn't breaking something else.

"What am I supposed to do?" he finally asked, a mere whisper ghosting his dry lips. "This isn't right… God, this is so messed up. I've got to set things right. I've got to give this all back to him." He gripped Steve's biceps, a weak grasp as though seeking reaffirmation for his pronouncement. "I'm giving it back. He's been kept away –"

"Tony, you're not making any sense –"

"He's the real son of Howard and Maria Stark. I'm… not."

Steve might've had this foolish gape on his face, because when Tony took one look at him, he laughed mirthlessly and flopped even more miserably on the floor.

"Yeah. News flash. Tony Not-Stark. That's gonna look awesome on the papers tomorrow." He then turned his face away and spoke in rapid undertones. Steve was starting to feel a bit fearful for his lucidity. "But stock's gonna fall… 20, tops, maybe. God, they're gonna want to see him, that can't – but he'll be fine…"

"Stop, Tony. Look at me."

Steve figured maybe that was why Tony chose to hide himself in this god forsaken hell hole – away from everything he'd grown up knowing and believing. But screw this all, because Tony wasn't going to be defined by all the monies and reputation he'd inherited from Howard. He'd had them all taken from him before; his suit, his wealth, his company. Knocked down to the ground, stripped to his very bones but he never stopped getting up. This was nothing more than a dent in the suit. Tony was going to fix it. Build something new. Something better.

"I know, Steve. I know what you're thinking, but believe me, it's not all that simple."

Tony rearranged his feet under him. Steve held him tighter, but he shrugged it off and rose to his feet, adamant to put more distance between them. His knees gave way half-way through his ascend and he sagged unceremoniously onto Steve.

"OK, we can talk later. I'm taking you home now, we all miss you –"

"No. No, I got to do this now. Don't you understand? I've taken… so much."

Then his shoulders drooped. He shook, and Steve tightened his hold on the other, pulling him closer. And that was when Tony lost it. His face felt hot with tears falling and he couldn't get enough air as each sob racked his body.

"At first it was just white hot rage. He said someone was gonna come for him after he was born, so Dad hid him, erased his existence from the world. Too bad the birth of a Stark scion isn't exactly a page eight material. The entire country was celebrating. It was too late. So they brought me in."

Tony seemed to curl into himself. He fisted the front of Steve's shirt and started tugging lightly at it. Steve let him, but he felt the urge to remove them both from the environment. Get Tony somewhere safer, warmer. Friendlier. Somewhere that reminded him how much he meant to the rest of them, Stark or not. Steve still had trouble wrapping his head around the news but this much was certain, that whatever Tony learned from the hospice, it would never change the man he was inside.

"I am a decoy for Arno Stark. Nothing more. Maybe that's why Dad was never happy with me. I was never his to begin with."

He choked, and his upper body rattled with the force. There was a sudden gush of wetness and hotness on the front of Steve's chest. Given any other day he would've offered his handkerchief rather than sacrificing his shirt for snots and tears, but Tony didn't need reminding of how embarrassing this whole thing looked. He canned it, and rubbed soothing circles on the billionaire's back.

When Tony pulled back, his grip in Steve's shirt yielding, he gasped, "Oh… oh no…"

"Don't worry about it –"

"No, Steve, it's –"

Then he started hacking. Tremors returned to his hands. Steve frowned and looked down and realised it wasn't just snot and tear stains soiling his shirt.

Blood. Bright red blood blossoming horrifyingly on a spot near his breast pocket. More was running down Tony's chin; he was stemming them with both hands futilely as dribbles of bile and blood escaped between his fingers with each cough. He was turning paler than paper and there was a swoon to his posture.

Steve might've cursed. He wasn't sure, maybe he did, but Tony didn't admonish. He wasn't OK, he was heaving fucking blood, how was any of this fine – Steve hooked two strong arms under Tony's knees and armpits and ran. He ran pass the counter, pass the man sitting behind it who'd started yelling at him about something but promptly shut up when he saw the blood between the two.

"I'll return after this for the bill," Steve promised before dashing madly down the pavement.

The one good thing that'd gone right this morning was how he managed to flag a cab in mere minutes. Even then Steve was half-expecting it to just drive away; he didn't think people would feel particularly inclined to ferry two bloody guys in the backseat at peak hours. One did. Sure didn't help make the ride any less difficult though. It felt like it wasn't going fast enough, but then again nothing was going to be fast enough when there was a not-responsive Tony Stark leaning boneless against him.

The drive dredged on until they reached emergency, and then it was all a flurry – he'd lowered Tony, still unconscious, on the gurney and watched him wheeled into a room. A nurse asked Steve to fill in some forms when finally all that was left to do was wait.

Bruce was the first, and only other visitor aside from Steve; before the medic wheeled a patched-up-Tony into a private suite, Steve managed to text the Avengers on the updated status of their missing team mate. Clint and Natasha had yet to reply while Bruce promised to be there in half an hour. Turned out that Hawkeye and the Widow were dispatched to Romania on a no-notice assignment, leaving them both the only immediate guardians of Tony.

While Steve sat motionless in the armchair, Bruce spoke to the doctors and studied the clipboard dangling from the bed. He explained the situation as best he could to Steve; it was gastric ulcer gone out of control because Tony wasn't taking care of it. Bottom line was Tony was going to be fine, but that didn't mean Steve was going to let this slide. He'd carried Tony to the medic one too many times, all of which cases could've been avoided if he'd cared to pay more attention to himself. He wanted Tony to wake up this very moment so he could lay it all into the man, but a miniscule part of him illogically wanted to just wait until never.

Tony started showing signs of gaining awareness three hours after losing it. At first it was a vague twitch of his index finger, and then it was a scratchy groan like he was actually annoyed to find himself waking up to the increasingly familiar scent of bleach and white-washed ceiling.

"Steve?" he croaked.

This time, Steve didn't hover above him in concern. This time, Steve stood stonily by the bed, his blue eyes hard and inscrutable. He didn't acknowledge the call for his name, but he did fold his arm across his chest and look at a point around Tony's ear.

"You're mad," Tony tried again. He winced, and the hand that was not intubated crept closer to his stomach. "OK, definitely mad. I'm sorry, all right? For messing up. Come on, stop ignoring me."

"I don't know what else to do with you, Tony. Honestly."

"You've done enough, Cap. Thanks for saving my ass again. Pardon the language."

"I don't know how to get through to you. Why do you keep doing this to yourself?"

That was the proverbial last straw that broke the camel's back. Steve knew better, this should wait until Tony got better. But there he went running his mouth, and maybe it was a combination of painkillers and lack of sleep, because Tony was beyond pissed by now even when he looked like death warmed over.

"I'm trying my best, aren't I? Or is this me screwing up so bad again that – all my life, I'm doing all I can to redeem myself –"

"No, Tony! This is exactly what I mean! You don't have to keep putting yourself down, thinking that you're, what, unworthy? I don't know how to get you to understand that all these self-sacrificial, self-harm crap, it's eating you up. It's eating us up. Blood isn't the only thing that defines you. So what if your name is half real? All these, what we share, what I know of you, these are real."

They stared at each other. Steve looked like he was inches away from punching Tony stupid and adding more reasons to keeping him warded. If Tony could sink lower into his mattress he would. He guessed all these touchy feely shit actually did something because the way Steve was looking at him so earnestly in the eye, he thought maybe he did deserve some liberation after all. He didn't know for sure if he did, but Steve thought he did, and he trusted Steve.

So he said simply, "OK."

"OK?"

"OK. I hear you, Steve."

"Right, because if I have to haul your ass into a hospital one more time, I –"

"Hey, you're up. How're you feeling?" Bruce had just walked in, one hand on the knob while the other a cup of coffee.

Steve hung around in the background as they spoke in soft voices, with Bruce reassuring the other that the lab was fine, and everyone was fine, but deeply missing Tony and had made him promise to come home. The reserved man he was, Bruce didn't ask too many questions, didn't pry and Tony didn't elaborate, so that was that. By 8.30 p.m. a nurse came in to usher all his visitors off. Steve didn't linger long; after Bruce exited, he casted one last look at Tony.

There were no hugs, no cheers, no words traded between them, but before Steve took another step away Tony reached out for his wrist. He held the Captain momentarily, firm while it lasted.

He'd said, "Thank you."