If They Knew All About You

Too Late To Turn Back Now

The lights in the living room were out by the time, Tony made it back. Pepper had sent messages via FRIDAY, more than once, to make him leave the lab and get some rest but there was work to be done and there would be no real rest until that was finished. FRIDAY had raised the lights in the room to 15%, which was just enough for Tony not to trip over his own feet. There was only one reason that could have kept his girl from storming down the hallway to drag him from the lab herself. His kid.

Quietly, Tony opened the door to the room he had left his boy in. It was completely dark in there. Only the light shining in from behind him gave Tony a chance to see anything at all. Pepper was curled up in the chair next to the kid's bed that he had occupied earlier. The kid himself... Pete. Tony swallowed hard. Pete. He had rolled onto his side, his eyes closed. Tony gave it a second, studied the boy's face. Watched it for any nervous twitches or fluttering eyelashes, telltale signs that he might not be asleep after all. Lip caught between his teeth, he counted to 20, his eyes not straying from his boy. But no, there was nothing. There was no tension in the kid's face, his body calm and relaxed.

Tony's eyes shifted to Pepper instead. She had slightly curled around her middle. Her head had fallen to the side and was barely resting against the back of the chair. It couldn't be comfortable and Tony couldn't help but cringe as a sharp pull in his neck reminded him of the awkward angles he had slept in himself in the last few days. Slowly, he walked up to her. It only took the slightest touch of her arm for Pepper to sit up straight.

"Wha—"

"Shh, honey, it's just me," he whispered. "Come on." Tony tugged on her arm and Pepper rose out of the chair seemingly without a second thought.

"Is... is everything alright," she breathed back, repeatedly blinking like her eyes were trying to see in the darkness of the room.

"Everything's fine. Let's get you to bed, hm?"

He pulled her by one arm and she staggered along with him, her other hand rubbing across the back of her neck. Tony's eyes rested on the kid for a moment and he did his best to breast the pull Pete had on him. The urge just to check if he was okay was hard to resist even though he could see that the kid was perfectly relaxed in his sleep. No need to risk rousing him with his own anxiety over nothing. He was resting. He was fine. Tony closed the door to the boy's room as carefully as possible, praying that his little Spiderling's senses wouldn't pick up the noise.

"What... what time is it?" Pepper mumbled.

"It's just past 2 o'clock." One arm around her waist, Tony pulled her along into their bedroom.

"2 o'clock? I..." She blinked a couple of times like her brain was almost done rebooting from the restless sleep in the chair. "I told FRIDAY to—"

"I know, Pep. I know." Tony blew out a low sigh. "I'm here now, okay?"

"And it's not even 3 am yet or how am I to take this?"

The look she sent him wasn't angry or even really annoyed though. There was no way around the work he had to do right now. They were running out of time. Pepper knew that. The safety of each and every person they cared for would depend on bringing down Ross and everything that was connected to him.

Not that they had gotten far. They had run into roadblock after roadblock. For every single string Ross had ever pulled, the man had planted a convenient pawn in front of himself that would take the fall instead of Mr. Secretary. For hours, Tony had been in the lab with what was left of his team, a video call to DC connecting them to Vision for the majority of the time.

"If we take a shot at Ross, we can't miss." Rhodey stood close to him, arms crossed. "If we want to do this now, we—"

"If?" Natasha was sitting on top of Tony's workbench. "What do you mean, if?"