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In the vastness of the hangar, Tony looked small. Before Afghanistan the man had taken up every room he stood in to the point of suffocating everyone around him but now-
-now he looked like he did thirty years ago, panicking at his impending graduation. Back then, Rhodey had wrapped him up in a hug. Now he wasn’t sure what was permitted.
“Please, just listen to me, Rhodey,” Tony was saying. Rhodey had almost written him off immediately when he came in, still angry at his friend for his decision to cut the military off from Stark-made weapons - weapons that have saved the asses of him and his men countless times over the past few years. He understood the shock Tony had received out in the desert, but surely there were better ways to go about this than just whole-sale elimination of the foundation of his company.
But Tony had looked so defeated. There were still cuts and bruises on his face from Afghanistan. Rhodey couldn’t just leave him like that. “You’ve got five minutes, Tones.”
Tony’s eyes gleamed for a brief moment as he slumped in relief. “I - I built something, out in the desert. To escape,” he began clumsily. “An armor.”
“This is insane,” Rhodey said for the thousandth time as he put one armored foot in front of the other. “You built this out in the desert?”
“No, honey-bear, I built that,” Tony laughed, pointing at a display that showed a very bulky version of the armored suit Rhodey had on now. “Nearly killed myself getting out of there - look at you, you’re doing great.”
“Sure you don’t want one of these for yourself?” Rhodey asked. The suit was incredible, sleek and beautiful metal carefully crafted for Jim’s body - like this was Tony’s plan all along.
A shadow passed over his friend’s face. “No. The suit - it’s a good thing, Rhodes.”
So are you, Rhodey wanted to say, but he knew Tony wouldn’t hear it. He hadn’t before and after Afghanistan, it was even worse. “You gotta forgive yourself, Tones. You didn’t know,” he said quietly, moving the armor forward, watching DUM-E out of the corner of his eye.
“I should have,” Tony said darkly. “You would have. That’s why I asked. Do you want it?”
“I-” It wasn’t as if he could say no, was it? The amount of good he could do in this suit, protecting civilians overseas where the fighting was thickest, picking pilots out of the air when dogfights got too intense. “The military will have questions, you know?”
“I know,” Tony said with a shrug. “There will contracts. Patents. Failsafes. I’m only building one, Rhodey.” His brains caught up with what Rhodey was saying, though, and a smile began to form. “You like it?”
“Course I like it!” Rhodey manuevered the suit over to where Tony was standing, testing the strength and response time as he put a hand on Tony’s shoulder. “Tony, it’s amazing. You - you’re amazing.” Rhodey was a rocket scientist, no slouch in the brains department, but even he could never have done this. In a cave, no less. With a box of scraps.
“You wanna take it out, see how it handles?” Tony asked eagerly, turning from underneath his grip to the computer.
Rhodey snorted. He could still barely hover in the thing. “Tony, you ever heard of walking before you run?”
“Oh.” Tony turned, looking just a bit sheepish. “That’s…a good idea.”
The military was thrilled with the suit and easily complied with Tony’s demands. The suit was to be kept top secret for as long as possible, failsafes were added in to prevent the removal of the arc reactor, and Tony retained the rights to take the suit away if he or James Rhodes felt it was being misused.
Rhodey had only taken it out on one mission when he got an urgent call from Tony. “You have to take the suit to Gulmira,” his friend said, sounding out of breath.
“What?”
“Gulmira!” Rhodey flipped on the news, finding the report. “They’re using my weapons. You have to stop them!”
“Tony,” Rhodey said gently, feeling his heart sink. “Tony, I can’t.”
“What do you mean, you can’t? This is why I gave you the suit, Rhodes, so you could save people-”
“I also have to follow a chain of command, Tony,” Rhodey said, keeping his voice even. He could practically hear Tony gritting his teeth on the other end. “The situation over there is delicate. I show up with the suit under the military’s banner and forces over there are gonna lose their minds. People get desperate when their scared. I’ll do what I can, okay? We’ve got men on their way over there as we speak, I’ll try to get permission. But I can’t just go blasting off.”
There was a long pause, and then the line went dead.
He went and saw Tony as soon as he could, finding him dead-eyed in the shop as he listened to the news report relaying the death toll in Gulmira. Rhodey dropped a file down in front of him, relaying new orders from the brass to allow the recently-dubbed Iron Patriot to seek out and destroy domestic weaponry being used by the enemy. “I did all I could, Tones,” he said softly.
Tony was silent as he turned his body so he could bury his head into Rhodey’s midriff. Rhodey wrapped his arms around his shoulders and they just breathed together for a moment. “I know you did, Jim,” Tony said. “I trust you.”
“There might be a problem with icing,” Rhodey mentioned. “I’m having some stiffness at higher altitudes.”
“I’ll check it out,” Tony promised.
Two weeks later he had a new suit, the material and build of it just slightly different. “Should solve the icing problem,” Tony said when Rhodey came to pick it up.
Rhodey eyed him speculatively. “And how did you figure all that out?”
Tony’s smile was mischievous and somehow furtive. “C’mon, boo-bear. I’m a genius.”
He found Tony half-dead in his basement, struggling to put the old arc reactor Pepper had had memorialized into his chest. “Obadiah,” Tony gasped as, together, they got the arc into place. Color began to fill his cheeks at an almost sickening rate. “SI. Pepper’s in trouble. Take the suit. Go. Please, I don’t care what the military-”
“They got something to say, they can kiss my ass,” Rhodey bit out fiercely.
“My man,” Tony said, patting his cheek. “I’ll be right behind you.”
Rhodey forced him back onto the couch. “No. You stay right here. Tony, please,” Rhodey said when Tony began to protest. “I need to know you’re safe. Trust me, okay?”
Tony looked like he wanted to fight about it but then he slumped. “I do. OK. Kick some ass, Iron Patriot.” Rhodey left the lab as he was muttering “Such a dumb name.”
Obadiah was tearing the outer SI building apart in a suit of his own when Rhodey arrived, and they engaged in a fight that spread out into the surrounding Malibu area. “Gimme something,” Rhodey breathed into the UI Tony had installed in the suit as the bigger suit bore down on him.
TAKASHI was in the middle of laying out a strategy when a new voice entered the fray. “Take him high,” Tony said. “He hasn’t solved the icing problem, I can guarantee you. Take him high.”
Rhodes obeyed, and Obadiah fell, and that should have been it, but the fight persisted. Rhodey was losing, nearly out gunned, when a repulsor blast hit Obadiah out of nowhere.
There was Tony, pale as a sheet, wearing a rudimentary exoskeleton with repulsor gloves and thrusters attached, blasting away at Obadiah. “We’re gonna overload the reactor below,” he told Rhodes. “Help me lure him into position.” Together, they blasted Obadiah into the right position, then, at the last moment, blasted off, letting Pepper below fry the bastard.
“Spare parts,” Tony said when Rhodey found him later, standing over Obadiah’s body. The ‘spare parts’ were nowhere to be seen. “Can we leave it for later, Jim?”
Rhodes stepped out of the suit, wrapping his arms around Tony from behind as his friend mourned the only parent he’d had left. “Sure, Tony.”
“You were good in that thing,” he commented much later, as they prepared to go on stage for the press conference. “Maybe you should consider becoming my sidekick.”
“Spare Parts Man,” Tony said with a snort. He folded back the newspaper reading IRON MAN SAVES DOZEN DURING ARMORED RAMPAGE. “Nah. Those people out there think you’re a hero. And they’re right. But that’s…I’m just not the hero type.” He swallowed hard. “Clearly.”
Rhodey didn’t know how to explain that Tony doesn’t have to be a hero, that the suit would do that for him. There was something about the armor, something that made him better, and it came from Tony - surely that meant something.
“Besides, we’ve got you,” Tony said, suddenly bright. “Iron Man.”
During the conference, Rhodey watched Tony work his magic as he set the stage for the suit’s introduction to the public sphere. “And now, I’d like to introduce you to Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes, a personal friend, one of the bravest men alive…and pilot of the Stark Armor, Iron Man.
“Trust me,” he muttered to Rhodey as they switched places at the podium. “Iron Man is way better. And I just saved you from a future of red, white, and blue paint jobs.”
Tony sent Rhodey clippings and articles of every mission Iron Man went on, every inch of coverage. “They love you, honey-bear,” he breathed when they met up for drinks and dinner. The way Tony looked at him was a bit different now, not hero worship like the rest of the world but something genuine. Like he couldn’t believe Rhodey was real. “What you’ve done - I can’t thank you enough.”
“You built it,” Rhodey reminded him, like he always did. Tony never understood how much of this came from him.
“But you’re the one doing all the work,” Tony said firmly. He rubbed his hand over the arc reactor and something dark and sad flashed over his eyes. “I could never have done all this. I’m glad you said yes. I’m glad - no, I’m lucky to have you.”
“You’ve always had me,” Rhodey insisted, reaching over to take his hand. “You always will.” There was something frightening in the way Tony was talking, like he needed to get it all out before he lost the chance.
But not as frightening as the look on his face as he pulled his hand away.
Tony reopened the Stark expo, and Iron Man stopped by for some good press and fun. They wrapped their arms around each other on stage and Rhodey’s worries temporarily melted away at how happy Tony seemed as the crowd cheered.
Then he gave his company to Pepper and retreated back to Malibu. Pepper called multiple times - “There’s something wrong, Jim.” - but Rhodey was out on missions, busy being Iron Man, doing what he and Tony dreamed of.
Then he heard about a threat made towards Tony by some man named Vanko, a man who had just been spotted in California, and he cut the mission off to blaze home.
The mansion was in ruins, Vanko lying face up in the rubble that was once the living room, eyes wide open and unseeing with electrical burns trailing all over his body. Rhodey stepped gingerly over the whips attached to his arms and scanned for lifeforms, praying he wasn’t too late.
He found two down in the basement, and when he stepped through the broken glass door there was a red-headed woman waiting for him, gun trained on the suit. “Try it, lady,” Rhodey snarled, looking around at the giant conductor that had been built - when did Tony do that? Why did Tony do that? “Where is he?”
“Rhodey,” a hoarse voice said. Rhodey whirled to see Tony sitting, obviously exhausted, against one of the conductor’s supports. He was once again wearing the exoskeleton, although more pieces had been added on.
“Spare Parts Man,” Rhodey greeted, and Tony laughed until it turned into a cough.
“Let me introduce Natashalie Rushmanov, my assistant. She’s a Russian spy. Guess what she’s been doing. No, go on, guess.”
“Teaching you crochet?” Rhodey guessed dryly.
“No,” the woman said. “But it’s not a bad idea. You wouldn’t believe the things you can do with a good pair of sewing needles. I’m Natasha Romanov. I work for the Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division.”
“Rhodey-bear,” Tony whined. “Why are governments so terrible at naming things?”
Natasha Romanov smiled. It was not a nice smile. “We call ourselves SHIELD.”
“So, dying,” Rhodey said, trying not to sound sharp as they waited for Nicholas Fury - oh, sorry, Director Nicholas Fury - to meet them. It was too late to worry now. Tony had fixed it. New arc reactor and all.
“Yes. Dying,” Tony replied.
“Don’t do that,” Rhodey commanded, and Tony snorted. “I mean it.”
“Doing my best,” Tony promised with a smile that faded a bit as they maintained eye contact. “Now you know how I feel, every time you go out.”
Rhodey palmed the side of Tony’s neck, feeling the pulse against his palm, basking in it, in Tony, his oldest friend, the dearest person in his life. “Do I?”
Tony’s dark eyes were impossibly bright as he leaned forward to press his lips against Rhodey’s. “Yeah. You do.” He drew back, eyes searching. “Do you?”
“You taste like coconut,” Rhodey said by way of answer, and Tony laughed again as he was drawn back in. “Tastes nice.”
After Fury departed, the Avengers Iniative docket left on the table, Rhodey released the handhold he and Tony had maintained under the table during the whole meeting, keeping each other calm. “You could come out with me.”
Tony shook his head, eyes on the docket. “You heard him. I’m a consultant. That’s - that’s where I belong.”
So, gods existed.
Rhodey was suspicious of literally everyone, even the Dr. Banner that Tony was going ga-ga over (especially Dr. Banner, he thought darkly as the man laid a hand on Tony’s shoulder while they joked), and he wasn’t overly fond of the way Captain America spoke to Tony before Rhodey had corrected a few misinterpretations, but he could agree with Fury’s assessment as to this team’s necessity on stopping Loki, especially after the god nearly destroyed the helicarrier.
Captain America was regarding Tony with a new appreciation now, even under the sorrow of Coulson’s death. They had worked together flawlessly in restarting the damaged turbine, Tony working the control to stop and start the engine as Rhodey removed the impediment while the Captain watched his back, defending him from the attackers that stumbled upon them. “That was some damn fine work, Stark.”
Tony shrugged. Rhodey snickered at his clear embarrassment and Tony flung out a hand, hissing when it hit the flat of the chest plate. “Thank you, Cap,” Rhodey answered for the genius now waving his injured hand. “Tony’s brilliant. Best man to have in a fight.”
Tony hunched even further, cheeks pinking, and a spark of fondness lit up in Cap’s gaze. “I don’t doubt it.”
Tony scoffed at them both and Rhodey couldn’t help but grin; he had heard Cap was stubborn from army talk, and Tony could always use more friends.
He wasn’t so thrilled when Tony insisted on heading to New York with them but it made a certain sort of sense. Tony was a genius and the portal might be tricky to handle. They dropped him and Rhodes off at the tower, Rhodey engaging Loki while Tony snuck off to the machine, and then they lost track of each other.
He could hear Tony every so often call out tips and strategy from his vantage point. The battle seemed endless, more Chitauri pouring out of the hole in the sky every minute, but Iron Man kept firing and moving.
“Rhodey,” Tony broke in at some point. “Rhodey, I’m going to have to do something. You’re not going to like it.”
At the very same time, Natasha yelled over the comms that she could close the portal. Cap ordered a command to do it, but Tony spoke again. “We’ve got a nuke coming in. And I know just where to put it.”
Rhodey froze, letting himself be tackled by a Chitauri. He blasted the alien off him and took to the skies. “And how are you going to do that?”
“Spare Parts Man,” Tony said on a terrible, thin laugh. “Not so spare any more.”
Rhodey could see him, flashes through buildings. A suit, not as bulky as Iron Man, all silver. Tony was inside that. “I’m coming to you. Be ready to hand off the missile.”
“No can do, sweetheart,” Tony said. He sounded out of breath. The other suit began to climb, skating against Stark Tower, rising past the penthouse - their home. “World needs Iron Man.”
“But I need you,” Rhodey pleaded.
Tony managed a tiny “I’m sorry” before the suit disappeared through the portal.
Rhodey screamed and blasted upwards. He was dimly aware of the aliens suddenly collapsing around him, of Cap commanding the portal closed and the thin stream of light connecting the tower to the hole in the sky disappearing, but all that mattered was getting to Tony.
Tony, who had reappeared, falling through the air.
Iron Man caught him five hundred feet above the tower and dropped the rest of the way, tearing off the faceplate and retracting his own. Tony’s eyes were closed. “Don’t you do this to me, you son of a bitch. You said you would try your best.” With a series of commands, he overrode the failsafe protecting the arc reactor and pulled it out of Iron Man’s chest. “I’ve seen your best. This is not it. Wake up, dammit.”
The latches for the chestplate on Tony’s suit were in the same place as his own and he removed it quickly, ripping up Tony’s shirt to get to the dead arc reactor in his chest. “Romanov!” he barked, and she was there in an instant, lifting it out and placing the new one back in.
It lit up and seconds later Tony gasped back into life. Rhodey was on him, kissing him even as he was coughing, holding his head probably just a little too tight between the gauntlets. “Don’t you ever-” And Tony’s hands were on his face now, smoothing, soothing. “Don’t you ever do that again.”
“He’s alive?” Cap demanded over the comms, and when Natasha answered in the affirmative a sigh of relief echoed from several places.
“Rhodey,” Tony was murmuring over and over. “Safe?”
“Yeah, you idiot,” Rhodey said, rocking Tony back and forth. “You saved me.” Tony finally seemed to breathe easier, relaxing.
From somewhere above, Natasha quietly added, “You saved us all.”
TONY STARK BUILDS NEW WAR MACHINE, the headlines read. Rhodey actually threw a glass, but Tony found it funny.
“War Machine,” he repeated. “You know, that’s kinda snazzy.”
“The thing is,” Fury said, his one eyes gleaming. “Iron Man belongs to the military. SHIELD doesn’t really want to get the Avengers tangled in that kinda bullshit - no offense, Colonel.
“But another suit.” He turned to Tony, who was worryingly not making any kind of eye contact. “Well, we could definitely use that kind of firepower.”
“I don’t feel comfortable letting any one else have a suit,” Tony said firmly to his hands.
Fury raised one eyebrow. “Good thing I wouldn’t want anyone but you piloting it, Stark.” Tony’s head snapped up, disbelieving, and Rhodey got to enjoy a rare moment of Tony Stark speechless.
“I second that,” Rogers said after a moment. “I’d be happy to having Tony on the team.”
“Third,” Natasha added. Barton and Banner quickly fourthed and fifthed, with Thor adding a hearty ‘Verily!’ Tony looked all around the room, meeting everybody’s eyes, and slowly his face settled into a tentative smirk.
“I guess. I could do that.” He turned to Rhodey and winked. “You’ll have to show me the ropes, boo-bear.”
Rhodey snorted. “Oh, somehow I think you’ve got plenty of practice, Spare Parts Man.”
“Red and gold?” he asked, chuckling a little that he could still be surprised by Tony’s audacity.
The War Machine armor was beautiful, smoother and sleeker than his own with more power focused on speed and the repulsors. It fit Tony perfectly.
“You like it?” Tony asked, and Rhodey almost gave a sarcastic response until the nervous undertone in Tony’s voice hit him.
He took Tony’s hands in his, admiring their contrasting colors for a moment, before kissing the knuckles, pausing to speak. “Lemme let you in - on a little secret - There are no such things - as heroes.” He pulled Tony to him, placed his hands on either side of his face, and dropped a loving kiss on his lips. “Only brave men in extraordinary circumstances. And that, my dear, no matter what you say, is you.”
“Well,” Tony said, then surrendered to another kiss, then another. His cheeks were hot under Rhodey’s palms. “I learned it all from you.”