Enjoy :)

They were all sitting in the conference room, discussing what they must do now about Thanos. They were trying to put together all the pieces of information they had about what happened, most of it being provided by Nebula, as they discovered the strange blue lady was called, and Thor. But they were going around in circles and getting nowhere. And Tony was just about done with it all. He hadn't been able to wash his hands, couldn't bring himself to get rid of the last part of the kid he had. He sat staring at the ashes that remained on his hands. Peter's ashes. The thought sent a jolt of pain through him as it brought the lump back to his throat and tears to his eyes as he slammed them shut and clenched his fists. He took a deep breath, years of hiding emotions behind a careful mask coming in handy, but as he listened to his former- and now current- teammates go on in circles, he felt himself getting restless. Another few minutes more and he felt his patience snap.

"This is getting us nowhere" he huffed, trying to bring some level of nonchalance to his voice. They all turned to look at him. Steve frowned, "We're trying to put together what happened. We have to figure that out before we can even start to think about how to bring everyone back"

"What's there to figure out" Tony snapped "Thanos has some powerful pebbles and a glove and turned half the universe to dust. That's all we need to know about what happened"

"It's not that simple Tony" Steve tried to rein his temper back in. It was no use getting angry with each other now.

"It is that simple!" Tony barked. Tensions were running high as the rest of the team watched the two snap at each other. Steve looked around. Pepper, Rhodey even Happy were all alive and fine, sitting in the room watching the argument take place and Steve felt his anger begin to rise again. Tony had no right to be rushing this along, he hadn't lost anyone, all the people he cares about were in the room with him right now. He, on the other hand, had lost his best friend, had lost Bucky. A sudden understanding filled him.

Tony grimaced as a patronising look came to Steve's eyes. He had seen Steve's eyes flicker not so discreetly over to Pepper, Rhodey and Happy and had a feeling as to the conclusion that he had come to.

"Tony," Steve began, as a parent to a child. Tony flinched. "I know you feel guilty about what happened, but we can't just rush into things without knowing what we are getting into just to appease your demons" Steve finished before turning back to the others as if dismissing him. Tony lost the little control he had managed to get hold of on his temper as he stood up. Tony Stark did not get ignored.

"You think that this is just about me blaming myself for this mess? That this is just another opportunity for my demons to run wild?" he yelled furiously. Everyone's attention was instantly on him again. "No. It's the fact that he took so much. Too much."

"He took half the universe, Tony," Natasha said eyeing the fuming man.

"He took the entirety of mine" the fight seemed to drain out of him and he slumped back into his seat and put his head into his hands. The -former and now back- Avengers looked at each other.

"But-" Steve started but Tony's head snapped up and he glared at him.

"You think that just because I didn't lose Pepper or Rhodey or Happy, that I didn't lose anyone. But you're wrong. I lost the most important person in the world to me. He was everything and I just-" Tony broke off and buried his face in his hands again, breathing heavily and willing the tears not to fall. Pepper gasped suddenly. The Avengers looked at her and saw her eyes filling with tears as her hand came up to cover her mouth. "Tony" she choked "how do you know- but he can't be- how could you know that" Tony looked up at her, tearful eyes mirroring hers.

The Avengers shared confused glances. They had never seen the great Tony Stark break like this before and they still had no idea who caused it. It was obvious Pepper knew, even the usually emotionless Happy looked horrified.

"Who are you talking about? Who did you lose?" Bruce spoke up from where he was quietly watching the scene play out. Tony's response wasn't one any of them saw coming.

"My Kid" the words were barely whispered but everyone heard them in the nearly silent room. The Avengers froze. The shock was almost tangible in the room and if it were any other situation, Tony would have laughed, but as it was, laughter was the furthers thing from his mind considering his heart had died right along with the kid he had grown to care about more than anything or anyone else. Then the questions started raining down.

"You have a kid?!"

"Since when!?"

"How long was I gone for!?" that last one has Bruce's incredulous voice and it was almost enough to bring a smile to his face. Almost. Tony sighed.

"He isn't biologically mine," he said answering most of the questions. "But he's basically mine in every other sense of the word so it doesn't matter" he tried not to get swept up in memories of the kid, one of the only people to get a genuine smile out of him. Peter had brought real joy into his life for perhaps the first time ever and had made it stay there. But now the kid was gone, and with him, all of Tony's happiness. A sudden determination filled him, laced with anger as he looked up again. "That kid meant- means- everything to me. There is no power or force in any timeline, world or realm that can stop me from getting him back. So, either we start getting somewhere with coming up with a plan to defeat Thanos or I'm going to consider you useless and an obstacle and find a way to reverse the Snap myself"

The team looked at Tony. Really looked at him. They saw his ashen face and bloody hands, they saw the pain in his eyes as they hardened with determination and there was no doubt in any of their minds that he would do whatever it takes to get his kid back. Whatever it takes.

"I've never been one to allow myself to be called useless" Natasha began, and Tony eyed her warily. Her lips quirked, the closest she has come to a smile for a while. "We had better start coming up with a plan"

Author Note

Hey everyone, how was that? I was thinking that I could either make this a multiple chapter story if you liked this one or just have a couple of one-shots about Tony, Peter and I may throw in some of the avengers too. Which do you think?

Until next time