If You Had This Time Again

Thanks, Ironic Man

Tony was brought out his creative haze by a persistent beep followed by a tug at the hem of his shirt. A quick glance at the clock showed it was close to noon, which meant he had been down in the lab for almost six hours. A pathetically short period of time compared to his previous work sessions but now it was the maximum length of hours before he had to take a break, stretch his legs, or take a breath, as instructed by Pepper, Rhodey, and Bruce respectively. Despite his griping and grumbling, Tony rather enjoyed the attention.

JARVIS and the bots were, predictably, in full support of this new rule. DUM-E had taken it upon himself to act as the official alarm, hence the noise and the manhandling.

"DUM-E, it's only been five hours and fifty-six minutes." Tony sighed but pushed himself away from the work bench all the same.

DUM-E gestured at the clock on the microwave, which apparently ran four minutes fast.

Tony groaned. "Seriously? Out of all the tech around you, you chose that to tell you the time? The clock's not even the microwave's primary function." He linked his hands and raised his arms overhead as he stood, back arching and popping pleasantly with the shifting motion.

U pointed to the empty pizza box in the trash with a victorious ding.

"Yes, its primary function is to reheat food. Good job, U." Tony made his way to the door, where he was intercepted by Butterfinger with a bottle of water clutched tightly between two clamps. It took some wiggling to get the bottle out of the ironclad grip, Butterfinger was quite determined not to live up to his name.

"Sir, the delivery from Ray's has arrived. Dr. Foster and Ms. Lewis are en route to the kitchen."

"Damn it." Tony muttered. "Slow the elevator, lock the doors, do whatever you have to do to keep Darcy away." The last time Darcy had gotten to the food first, she had sprinkled the salad over the pizza and smugly informed a horrified Tony that this was how she planned to get more greens into his diet.

"I will do my best to deter and detain your guests, Sir." It shouldn't be possible for JARVIS to sound sarcastic, but there it was in his electronic voice.

Tony was hit with an ache of overwhelming pride and fierce relief, in the tender space behind the arc reactor. It throbbed with every beat of his heart. All he had lost. All he had regained. He twisted off the cap of the water bottle with shaky fingers and took a hasty gulp.

"Sir?" JARVIS sounded concerned.

"I'm good, just thirsty. Hydration, yay!" Tony saluted Butterfinger with the bottle. "Alright, I'll be back. Don't do anything I wouldn't do." With one last wave at his bots, he headed upstairs.

*

Tony had just slid two slices of pizza onto his paper plate, because no one living there was going to load and unload the dishwasher, when Darcy and Jane walked in.

It had been an experience having the two of them around for the past two weeks.

Jane was a delight, her knowledge of astrophysics was only overshadowed by her dedication to the pursuit of it. Tony and Bruce had a blast trading theories and Jane enjoyed the freedom in using scientific jargons instead of translating her studies into layman's terms.