Uh...hello? Also PLEASE CHECK OUT MY NEW STORY "The Days That Follow" PLEASE

Chapter Nine: No, I Don't Want a Doughnut

Harry stepped around the rubble carefully, nudging a few remnants of what he remembered to be a very expensive vase with his shoe. That or it might have been the hideously colored cat statue Tony had bought for no apparent reason. In that case good riddance, but he had liked the vase.

He wrinkled his nose in disgust at the wreckage. Harry had expected Tony's 'birthday bash' to be bad, a disaster even. Tony was dying. He was dying and there was nothing he could do about it besides throw everything of value he had left to the people he loved and, apparently, blast the rest into bits and pieces.

No man wanted to die; it went against their basest nature, the core of their very being. Even as much as Tony shouted to the high heavens otherwise - as much as his voice seemed to crave for its next notes to die out even as they rang, to fade into a mere echo of their boisterous song. Some part of Tony, that instinctive human drive that refused to just lie down and let life roll over him, fought back against its fate. It thrashed and bucked like a beast cornered.

But it was fighting against the inevitable.

And so when those two parts collided in a violent battle for dominance, the instinct and the knowledge colliding, it became a cage of Tony Stark's personalized hell. The driven impulse kept trying to force and heave that hellish boulder up the hill even though he knew, he absolutely knew, it would always come crashing back down right when it was almost to the top. He knew it would fall, would eventually crush him underneath its unbearable weight.

But Tony Stark was nothing if not a martyr.

Harry could see the dying struggle in the man now, with this party, this last ditch attempt at shoving everyone he loved away in the name of living life to its fullest – just to save them the heartache of watching him die; too close to look away but unable to do anything. He was tired of trying, so tired of trying and failing. It was the hopeless battle.

Because that one part of still him refused to let the boulder rest on the ground. That unwavering determination – the blind bull-headed resolve – that Harry had respected.

It didn't mean he wasn't pissed as hell right now.

Glancing about (was that…no, he didn't want to know) Harry tried, and failed, not to be disappointed. He took a deep breath, latched onto the ugly feelings (why do this and he should have spent his last birthday with people he loved and why would strangers even care) and shoved them into a dark lock box and tossed away the key.

Yes, for some godforsaken reason, he had expected better of Tony. He had expected better, and got the usual. That kind of mindset wouldn't help right now. Pepper and Rhodey, maybe even Happy, were sure to give the billionaire more than enough hell.

Ducking around one last corner, Harry entered the room that had probably been the center of the party at some point, judging by the fact that it looked by far the worst of any of the previous ones he'd managed to catch a glimpse of. Sure enough sitting center stage, the normally flamboyant red and gold now subdued by dust, grime, and various unmentionable fluids, was Iron Man in all his glory as Tony Stark. He'd seen it flipped, the man as the suit; now he got to see the other side of the coin.

Heaving a sigh, he approached slowly, for once letting the full weight of Tony's situation settle in a hollow cavity inside of him. But he only let the weight settle on his soul, not his shoulders. Those he kept loose, almost even relaxed, under the billionaire's penetrating stare. It never ceased to amaze Harry how remarkably lucid Tony managed to be while drunk.

From the sight of a little glass of water resting neatly on the remarkably still standing coffee table, Stark had likely known he was coming since before he'd stepped foot in the house.

Nonetheless, Tony, with his usual sense of hospitality, raised his own glass of questionable liquid in a mock toast, a sloppy grin twisting on his face in greeting, as if he was genuinely and pleasantly surprised to see the figure standing in the doorway. "Hey th're Harry! You totally missed out." His voice was cracked and slurred, filled with despondent cheer.

Subduing a reflexive wince at the tones, Harry didn't reply immediately, instead quirking an eyebrow and skimming the surroundings with exaggerated admiration. "I didn't realize I was missing out on a redecorating party," Harry replied slowly, "I'm actually a little hurt you didn't invite me. If I had known your tastes were this bad, I would have joined, believe me. The room looked bad enough to begin with; I didn't think you'd actually be able to make it worse." His tone was soft, but not cautious. It was that precarious balance between humor and gravity that Harry was sure he had perfected by now when dealing with Tony.

The man himself, Harry was learning through trial and error, rarely responded to anything that was too serious, too much of a reminder of what exactly was happening to him. He wasn't a coward, probably the farthest thing from it really, but everyone wanted to forget occasionally, Harry supposed. The obvious assortment of random, and empty, bottles smattering the floor testified to it. "And I see you've been drinking plenty." He made his distaste plain at the heavy scent of alcohol.

Tony jerked himself upright, holding up a correcting finger, "Uh, wrong - I haven't been drinking, Houdini. Still am." He picked up another can of beer from the ground around his feet that still apparently had some liquid left in it and shook it with a merry grin, cracked down the middle.

"Hopefully your drinking has at least left its blow-everything-up-in-sight-because-it's-fun stage," gesturing to the entire room, once filled with what many would consider priceless treasures. Figures Tony would see them as more along the lines of target practice. "I don't fancy a place on the ground in pieces, thanks. And, by the way, did you destroy that new vase or the hideous cat statue?"

The man paused thoughtfully for just a beat. "Both, I think. I'll kind of miss that cat statue though. It had a certain charm to it."

Harry snorted, softly though, and with a certain wariness "Yeah, it had about the same type of charm that you do Tony. I wanted to smash the thing the first time I saw it, Pepper did too I'm sure." If the plastered genius lounging in front of him noticed the thin, tightrope dance, which he almost certainly did, he chose not to address it.

Instead Stark took another lazy swig, "Well if you thought of it that way I'm amazed that you didn't take a pipe to it. Certainly went well enough to get your point across the first time you came across that particular brand of charm. But hey," he grinned wryly at the teen, "maybe there's something to your violence. The kiddies seemed to love it."

"Yeah, I'm sure the guests got a pretty good, well placed, red and gold kick in the rear from watching Iron Man make a complete idiot of himself. Mind you, not that he needed much help with that in the first place, after all, he's still Tony Stark."

Tony groaned, staggering to a standing position. "God - not you too, Sherlock. Sorry but the title of king 'killjoy' was already, and very graciously might I add, accepted by Rhodes earlier this evening. Got a trophy and everything. Very shiny. You're welcome to take the consolation prize of 'tattletale' though," he grimaced for the first time, a slight pinched look on his face as he took stock of the room and, well, the entire building really. "After all, someone's gonna have to inform Ms. Potts about this, and it's not going to be me."

Sighing, Harry moved to take the now empty spot on the only remaining piece of serviceable furniture. "Tony, I'm not going to go play mediator with Pepper for you. And she probably already knows what happened here, it's certainly all over the internet now You should know better than to try and hide anything from her. It certainly didn't help last time."

"Not even if I threw in a bigger trophy than Rhodey's? A really big, shinier trophy?"

"Tony, didn't you hear me? It's all over the internet. Like everywhere."

Tony waved it off. "Pepper never checks the internet anymore. She saves that party bag up for a once a month, says it'll kill her otherwise."

Harry snorted, "Really? I can't possibly imagine why." He stopped, eyeing Stark hesitantly. In return, the man squinted at him, nose scrunching in distaste. Silence was awkward, but Tony knew what was coming.

"No," It was a snap shot reaction, an instant sobriety in just a few seconds; a slight sway to Tony's otherwise painfully rigid posture was the only give-away. "I told you to drop it Harry." Too much of a push, apparently.

"I didn't even say anything- "

"Next time we have a charades tournament, I call dibs on you for team 'awesome', but you'd suck at poker" he said. "And they don't need to know."

"No, but they deserve to!"

Tony's face crumpled, but didn't give in. Abruptly a mask of indifference fell, and he gestured vaguely towards the younger and grunted, "We've already had this conversation, kid. I'm not going to tell Pepper, or Rhodey, and just because you know about it doesn't mean you have that right. So leave it. Take the drink of water, call your girlfriend, and go have some fun like a normal teenager - one who doesn't make it his life's goal to annoy a dying man in a fully operational weapons suit."

Harry was fuming. He was beyond tiptoeing around Stark. He hissed through gritted teeth, "I might not have a right to tell Pepper, but she has a right to know. And if you're not going to tell her, I warned you I would." To his immense satisfaction, Tony stiffened, jaw snapping into a hard line. "And that's what I intend to do, so you can take your bloody suit of armor and your pride and shove it where the sun doesn't shine."

Harry didn't even spare a moment for Tony's expression. He whipped around and strode straight to the door, crunching down on the debris underfoot with more force than was necessary. He knew where Pepper would be about now, dealing with the company no doubt, and he had access to her in her office at any time. The Expo's premier night was tomorrow, so she'd be busy, but Harry wasn't going to wait. Ignoring the clanking he heard behind him, Harry continued forward; just let Tony try and stop him.

"You like doughnuts, Houdini?"

What? Harry gasped as his feet suddenly weren't touching the floor anymore and his vision blurred with color from the sudden movement.

"Cause I feel like some doughnuts."

And before he even had a chance to scream, or even punch that stupid bloody prick in his smarmy face, the air was knocked out of his lungs with the sheer force of the take-off, blue and white overtaking his view in a swirl of air and vertigo. For a suspended second, every single function, every thought, every breath seemed paused, frozen in a state of shock.

And the second shattered when Harry screamed.

"OH MY BLOODY HELL STARK! I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!"

Despite his words, he clung desperately to the front of the suit, wrapping his arms around the cold, metallic neck and furiously wishing it were skin so he. Could. Strangle. It! It seemed his body subconsciously was already trying if the whites of his knuckles and the screaming protests of his hands were anything to go by. Glancing down, Harry swallowed back a rise of nausea at the height, and clenched his eyes shut, muttering fiercely under his breath. "I am going to kill you, I am going to kill you, I am soo going to kill you…"

From somewhere above him Tony snorted, mechanized voice somehow slicing through the howling of the wind. "Unless you want to drop a couple hundred feet to a very quick death, I wouldn't suggest doing that. I'm kind of your free airline ride right now. You should be grateful, actually. I can think of about a thousand girls who would die to be in your position right now."

Harry slit one eyelid open to glower at the face plate above him, "Then feel free to go ahead and kidnap one of them inste-"He had to shout the words for them to rise above the wind that was roaring through his ears and then –

Tony Stark took his breath away.

The dive threw a horrible mixture of nausea and butterflies from hell into a Molotov cocktail and set it on fire in his stomach. From the ground it most probably didn't look as impressive compared to the genius' normal stunts, and definitely not to the stuff he pulled at the Expo, but from where Harry desperately clung it was downright death defying. Especially because he wasn't the one in the bullet-proof, metal suit of armor.

"STARK, PUT ME THE BLOODY HELL DOWN!" Harry screamed above the wind.

"No can do. I told you, I'm feeling like doughnuts and seeing as I've misplaced my wallet, you're paying," he replied, "So relax and enjoy the ride."

Mostly out of terror, but with a smidgen of spite, Harry did not.

The entire ride Harry spouted the worst abuse he could possibly think of, even some he'd been able to learn from Rhodey. Until he was silent, staring incredulously at their destination.

A doughnut shop. Tony bloody Stark, had taken them to an honest to god doughnut shop.

And then decided to order doughnuts. In his Iron Man armor.

"You're a bloody idiot," Harry muttered, slapping cash from his wallet down on the counter, since Tony couldn't be bothered to have any on him and the man at the counter refused to take the billionaire's word of reimbursement on good faith. "You are the biggest, most annoying, self-destructive, conceited, condescending, messed up-"

"You want to finish that sentence sometime soon Harry?" Tony interrupted sardonically, "I mean, I know I'm pretty hard to describe and all, but-"

"-narcissistic, lunatic I have ever met!"

The billionaire wasn't listening. "Do you want change back Harry? The guy wants to know if you want the change."

Harry spluttered, "No, I don't want the bloody change!"

Tony turned back to the counter, flashing a compensating smile towards a man who looked like he'd be more at home in a Tim Burton comedic horror flick than in a pink stripped apron filling a box with a dozen or so brightly colored doughnuts. "We'll take the change- "

"I want to go back so I can tell Pepper how much of an idiot you are!"

"Never become a lawyer. You're terrible at winning your case."

"Take me back."

"Ah, no." Harry watched incredulous as Tony completely disregarded him, tossing the money back on the counter. "You know what, keep the change. Can I have some coffee?" He winked and Harry fumed, "Thanks."

"You- you are unbelievable," Harry seethed, "That's all you can do right now? Eat doughnuts while you slowly die from deadly poisoning and your friends don't even know about it?"

"Sherlock, I'm Tony Stark. I'm Mr. Unbelievable, not to be confused with Mr. Incredible, mind you. Now, you can either sulk around like a kid at a book store, or you can forget about telling Pepper anything, behave like a mature adult, and join me in the giant doughnut eating much smaller doughnuts," Tony quickly turned to face the guy at the counter, "That's legal right? I can eat in the giant doughnut?"

The man shrugged, idly picking at a mole he appeared to be enraptured by on his arm.

Hooting, Tony skipped towards the exit. "That's a yes if I ever saw one!" He skipped.

"Tony!"

Pushing past the doors the man didn't wait for Harry to catch up, just expecting him to trail along after him like a lost puppy. Bloody hell, Harry seethed in red hot anger as he was forced to do just that, is this what Pepper and Happy feel like all the time? Dogs on a leash? There wasn't exactly anywhere for him to go, though.

And Tony, the utterly self-absorbed prick, new it too.

"Relax kid," the call came from above him as Harry shoved his way out into the open air, "there is absolutely no reason for you to tell Pepper anything. I thought we've been over this?"

Tony was sitting in the Giant Doughnut. Eating a doughnut. Maybe the man misread what Harry's gaping meant; or maybe he just wanted to not only push, but ram a flaming ten-ton mallet into every single I-have-no-patience-for-this-shit button Harry had. Either way, he spitefully stepped to the side and let the baked good land with a squelch next to his foot, red berry filling gushing grotesquely onto the concrete.

"Now that was just petty. What did that doughnut ever do to you?"

"I'm done," Harry said, faintly, hands running through his hair. No doubt it looked worse than the skunk's nest it usually did. "I am so done with this."

"Ok then," nodded graciously, "this whole '24 hours to live' is getting a little old if you ask me. Let's switch things up a bit, just for kicks. You say I'm keeping secrets? When are you going to open your own dial-a-psychic side business – cause let me tell you, it would have been nice to know I had a murderous psychopath planning to kill me three days before it happened."

Harry froze. His limbs, his fingers, his heart, the voicesalwaysinhishead. Froze. "What- "

Tony's shit-eating grin was legendary. "And don't tell me you got a job because you felt bad for destroying half a dozen light bulbs with your mind. I would pay you to do that."

"How – how did you- "

"You live in a house that is monitored 24/7 by an AI I invented. That and I am a shamelessly incurable snoop, no lie. Wasn't that hard."

"You- " Harry sputtered, near incoherent with what, he didn't know. Fear maybe? Terror was more accurate. "You knew!? All along you knew and you never said anything?" A small part of it felt like rage.

"I repeat, Incurable snoop," he repeated, "And did I forget to mention it between the terminal illness and the psychopath attempting to murder me? Not sure if you've been aware, but there has been a lot going on recently." Tony blinked down at the doughnut in his hand. "My God these are fantastic."

Rage. It was definitely rage. "You absolute- "

"Well," a voice boomed from behind him, deep and it was like drums – the giant ones you see in fancy acrobatic shows that were taller than most of the people – begun to echo in his skull, "I hope you've both enjoyed your donuts."

Harry whirled around the same time Tony groaned long and loud.

A black man stood, firm and proud in way too much leather to be comfortable, with his hands behind his back and a stern expression in one eye. "Because we've got a lot to talk about."

A/N: PLEASE CHECK OUT MY NEW STORY "The Days the Follow". PLEASE

Ok. I just wanted to make that clear. Its been my newest - and I seriously mean new I thought of it and wrote the first chapter just, like, yesterday - muse that I am absolutely obsessed with and I would love feedback. Its from one of my favorite shows.

And now thats out of the way - I am seriously displeased with this chapter. Really not very happy at all. But its been two years and I figured that I might as well shoot this one off. Good news, the next chapter is about halfway written (the latter half of it is the part done, unfortunately, and for those of you still wondering what Harry's mysterious gut feelings are (not the voices) prepare for some insight into it next chapter!) and I really do want to continue this story. Honest. Its just...my muse has shriveled up and died like and old lady under too much sun at the beach. Its just not pretty. But I am trying for all of you faithful followers who keep me going. Once more, I apologize for this chapter - it felt unnecessarily dramatic - and for those of you who are ready for Harry to start being way more pro-active then woot! We are approaching that point. I mean, seriously people, amnesia isn't something you just hop up from happy as a daisy in Spring. It takes time and acceptance. Harry began that in the previous chapter during the conversation he had with Tony - go back and pay closer attention!