villain | STEVE ROGERS 18+

t h i r t y f i v e

June 13th 2017
Tonys Private House

"Do you want kids?"

Pepper looked at Tony and raised an eyebrow. Sure, they had talked about it, but it was quite random for him to bring it up out of the blue.

"Of course, yeah. But I wanna keep focusing on being CEO right now." Pepper replied, a soft smile on her lips.

Tony nodded, gulping.

"Where's this coming from?" Pepper asked.

"I nearly called Ember my daughter last week." Tony said, his head in his hands, and he let out a long sigh, "That's fucked up, isn't it?"

Pepper moved to sit next to Tony on the couch, and delicately took one of his hands in hers, stroking the back of his hand with her thumb. She knew he'd be an amazing father, but they weren't quite there yet. 

"That's not messed up in the slightest, Tony." She insisted, her voice calm and collected, "I've seen the way you act around each other, she definitely sees you as a father figure. I think you both needed each other, and found each other in times you just didn't expect it."

"She doesn't need a dad though, does she? She's an adult."

"Everyone needs a dad, honey. Whether that's a biological father figure, or someone else they just found along the way."

"I don't just fine without a dad."

"You had Jarvis."

Tony shrugged, "I guess."

"Who knows, maybe Ember will be a good big sister to a kid one day." Pepper smiled at him.

"I think she'd prefer the term cool aunt."

Pepper chuckled and kissed him on the cheek, "Yeah, but we all know the real truth."

June 14th 2017
Steve's Apartment

Steve studied Embers calm face as she slept peacefully next to him. She didn't look nearly as tense and stressed when she was asleep than she did awake. When she slept, her lips were slightly parted (making Steve really want to kiss her, but he'd feel bad if he woke her up) and her arms were sprawled out in a starfish position (Steve had to make sure he didn't accidentally squish her arms when they slept next to each other, although when they slept apart, he always felt the bed felt very empty) and her hair was in tangles all over the pillow. She'd complain about how long it would take to brush it when she woke up.

Today Ember was properly allowed outside of the Compound for the first time in six months. The press conference last week had went alright, Ember and Tony managed to dodge as many questions as they could that didn't seem right to answer. Mostly sexist pigs who didn't think another woman joining the team was a good idea.

It took a lot of persuasion from Tony to get Ember to agree to not setting several reporters hair on fire on national television.

Steve had the whole day planned. They'd go out for a real date, one that wasn't hidden away from the security cameras in the compound. He was going to take her to a real restaurant, nothing too fancy because he knew she'd hate having to follow to many rules, and take a drive past the proper touristy places, like view the statue of liberty from afar (he promised he'd take her out on the boat to see it eventually) and the empire state building (she wanted to know if it was actually as tall as people said it was. Steve said it was. Ember said it was probably a global inside joke and it was actually a foot tall.)

Steve had already been up and out to the gym, and for a run this morning, waking up at 5am to pack everything in, and when he got back, Ember was still sound asleep.