The Corrupt and the Pure; Chapter 18: The Bystander
[INFO]Title: The Corrupt and the Pure
Author: Del Rion (delrion.mail (at) gmail.com)
Fandom: The Avengers & Captain America (MCU)
Timeline: post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Genre: Drama, action, hurt/comfort
Rating: MA / FRAO
Characters: Steve Rogers (Captain America), Tony Stark (Iron Man). Also: Bruce Banner (Hulk), James “Bucky” Barnes (Winter Soldier), Clint Barton (Hawkeye), J.A.R.V.I.S., James “Rhodey” Rhodes (War Machine), Natasha Romanoff (Black Widow), Thor, Sam Wilson (Falcon)
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Summary: When the Steve Rogers from an alternate universe appears in the middle of the Avengers Tower, two worlds are about to collide: one where Captain America became the tool of HYDRA and fell into a relationship with the hero Iron Man - and one where Tony and Steve are tentatively getting along. The latter are forced to reconsider their relationship when the Commander kidnaps Tony to replace his dead lover.
Complete.
Written for: A story commissioned by Susanne (ChickenHax @ AO3 / starkred @ Tumblr).
Warnings: Rape/non-con, major character death (alternate universe), graphic canonical violence, M/M sexual content, language.
~ ~ ~
Chapter 18: The Bystander
Although they still couldn’t agree on how to proceed in their obvious conflict of interests, one fact didn’t require negotiating: Tony needed to eat.
After Tony’s injuries had healed and he was no longer reeling from that experience, his body promptly notified him it was lacking sustenance. The Commander had pulled some kind of power bar from his pocket, but Tony was leery of that and it wouldn’t have been enough to feed the two of them anyway.
So, the Commander accepted his role as provider and went out in search of more food.
Tony, unsurprisingly, found himself chained to the wall. To foil any escape plans, he was actually secured to something quite solid instead of simply having his hands tied, and in the pitch black it was impossible to see whether he could work himself free once the Commander left. Nonetheless, he attempted to feel his way around, but it ended up being one fruitless attempt after another.
As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, there was not much to see. The walls were too far apart from each other to actually be seen, and the echoes supported Tony’s theory that he wasn’t in a simple tunnel anymore. A decommissioned subway station seemed a likely option.
That information, if indeed fact, might narrow down the possibilities of his current location. Tony cursed himself for not being able to place the motel, but none of the street names he had been able to glance at had rang a bell - not that it was surprising because Tony had more important things to remember than back street addresses.
It didn’t help that he wasn’t sure how long he had been out after the Commander messed with Extremis. It could have been anything from minutes to hours, even days.
He had been so close to being freed, though…
Banging his head back against the solid wall, he cursed his newfound talent for being a damsel-in-distress. One of his armors had been close enough for him to hear it, so why hadn’t he made his presence known? To hell with the bruises the Commander would have inflicted upon him; he would have been located and rescued and this whole ordeal would have been that much closer to ending. He’d had a window of opportunity, but instead of seizing the moment he hadn’t been able to make the most of it. Now he was stuck here, wherever ‘here’ was, biding his time once again. Furthermore, he had blown his one chance to pretend he was playing along with his kidnapper; the Commander would not be giving him any more liberties anytime soon.
Tony felt stuck, and he didn’t like that.
“Hello?!”
Tony jerked at the sudden introduction of noise. Also, the voice calling out didn’t belong to the Commander - or anyone Tony thought he knew. The final syllable echoed on the walls, telling his brain it wasn’t just a hoax.
“This tunnel is closed!” the same voice yelled; a man, probably pushing seventy. Far, far away, Tony imagined he could actually see a weak flicker of a flashlight approaching. “If you don’t get out, I’ll have to call the cops,” the man added. He sounded a bit uncertain, but that could just be a combination of the echo and his age.
“Hey!” Tony yelled back to him. “I need a little help here!” He wasn’t exaggerating, but he also hated the whole needing-to-be-rescued bit, so he was trying to play it cool.
The flashlight moved across the walls, betraying the size of the tunnel he was coming from. “Hello?” he called out again.
Tony wondered if the man was half-deaf or something, or just not having expected to find someone who needed his help; a homeless person or some kids venturing into the tunnel was a far likelier option.
“Here!” Tony shouted. He knew they had limited time before the Commander came back. How the man had even known someone was in here, he didn’t know, but perhaps this was the break he needed to get out of this deeply unpleasant situation.
The shape of a man emerged from the tunnel and into the open area of the station. His flashlight was the only source of light, which didn’t give much to go on, but Tony could tell he was indeed an elderly man. Perhaps he was earning a couple bucks a night, patrolling an area where no one was supposed to be hanging out, seeing as there was no other reason he would have ventured into the tunnel.
“Sir, if you could just hurry up a bit,” Tony called out.
“You shouldn’t be in here,” the man said, pointing the light towards him, searching for the source of the voice. Clearly he hadn’t actually spotted Tony yet, just his voice.
“I will get out just as soon as you untie me,” Tony promised.
“Untie you?” the man asked, slowly climbing onto the platform from the tracks. “What the hell are you doing down here?”
“It’s a long story,” Tony said, knowing it was just a matter of seconds before Gramps got a good look at his face and recognized him. “Just get me free, okay, and we’ll both walk out of here.”
The man finally came close enough that they could more or less see each other. Grayed and wearing a faded uniform, the old man looked just like Tony had imagined him, and he congratulated him on having the guts to actually venture into the tunnels on his own.
Upon seeing Tony, the man frowned. “You’re not the fellow I saw running into the tunnel.”
“No, he’s not,” came a voice from the darkness, and then the Commander was there, appearing like a shadow come to life, and Tony opened his mouth in a shout just as the supersoldier reached out and seized the old man’s head, snapping his neck in an instant.
“Fuck!” Tony yelled. “You didn’t have to kill him!” he added as the Commander let the body drop.
The flashlight clattered to the floor, released from limp fingers, casting shadows on the nearest wall.
“He would have called it in,” the Commander said matter-of-factly, crouching over the body. Wasting no time whatsoever, as if this was a routine task for him, he went through the man’s pockets, tossing items on the floor; phone, wallet, keys, a whistle.
Tony stared at the dead man, realizing just then that he kept forgetting one important thing about the Commander, even though it was right there: he was a villain. Having been brainwashed by HYDRA for years, this was exactly the kind of thing he would do without hesitation. Killing an innocent man just because he happened to spot him sneaking into the tunnels.
He wondered whether the man would have ended up dead if he hadn’t found Tony. If he hadn’t been so keen on doing his shitty, low-income job just this one time…
The Commander picked up the phone and cracked it in half in his hands, then dug out the SIM card and snapped that one, too. “I found something for you to eat,” he stated, as if there was no dead guy lying right there.
“I’m not hungry,” Tony said woodenly, still staring at the body.
The Commander glanced up at him, then at the body, connected some invisible dots and then stood up, hauling the dead body with him. Tony watched as he took it to the edge of the platform, and although the flashlight’s beam barely reached there, it was obvious he just tossed the body onto the tracks. Then he turned and walked back, all but rubbing his hands together after a job well done. “Are you hungry now?” he asked, as if the absence of the body changed that.
“No,” Tony told him, voice cold.
“He was a threat,” the Commander stated, as if that made it all better. Perhaps it did, in his head.
“He was a guy doing his job. Probably couldn’t survive with his pension alone so he had to take this job to cover the costs of living - or he had too much of a work ethic beaten into him that he didn’t want to stop being useful to society until he died. You should know: you come from the era when people knew how to work.”
The Commander snorted. “Like you would know anything about it.”
“Just because I live in an ivory tower doesn’t mean I’m blind to the suffering of others,” Tony snapped. “Most of my life I’ve worked to improve living conditions of those in hostile environments; to give them pure water and crops to feed them. Not to mention putting my life on the line to protect people and their seemingly insignificant lives.”
“A true hero,” the Commander said, not without making it sound like an insult. It was so strange, hearing it come from Steve Rogers’ mouth. Sure, he wasn’t above questioning Tony’s integrity and intentions, but he would never, ever question whether people deserved to live, no matter what kind of conditions they were born into.
It was clear the Commander didn’t care - or even if he did, on some level, it was all shoved back in favor of focusing on getting Tony back.
Problem was, his Tony was dead and this one was a very poor substitute. The Commander was too stubborn to accept it - and unwilling to move on even if he did, because in his eyes even a poor substitute was better than none.
to be continued…
Story info
Author: Del Rion (delrion.mail (at) gmail.com)
Fandom: The Avengers & Captain America (MCU)
Timeline: post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Genre: Drama, action, hurt/comfort
Rating: MA / FRAO
Characters: Steve Rogers (Captain America), Tony Stark (Iron Man). Also: Bruce Banner (Hulk), James “Bucky” Barnes (Winter Soldier), Clint Barton (Hawkeye), J.A.R.V.I.S., James “Rhodey” Rhodes (War Machine), Natasha Romanoff (Black Widow), Thor, Sam Wilson (Falcon)
Pairing: Steve/Tony
Summary: When the Steve Rogers from an alternate universe appears in the middle of the Avengers Tower, two worlds are about to collide: one where Captain America became the tool of HYDRA and fell into a relationship with the hero Iron Man - and one where Tony and Steve are tentatively getting along. The latter are forced to reconsider their relationship when the Commander kidnaps Tony to replace his dead lover.
Complete.
Written for: A story commissioned by Susanne (ChickenHax @ AO3 / starkred @ Tumblr).
Warnings: Rape/non-con, major character death (alternate universe), graphic canonical violence, M/M sexual content, language.
~ ~ ~
Chapter 18: The Bystander
Although they still couldn’t agree on how to proceed in their obvious conflict of interests, one fact didn’t require negotiating: Tony needed to eat.
After Tony’s injuries had healed and he was no longer reeling from that experience, his body promptly notified him it was lacking sustenance. The Commander had pulled some kind of power bar from his pocket, but Tony was leery of that and it wouldn’t have been enough to feed the two of them anyway.
So, the Commander accepted his role as provider and went out in search of more food.
Tony, unsurprisingly, found himself chained to the wall. To foil any escape plans, he was actually secured to something quite solid instead of simply having his hands tied, and in the pitch black it was impossible to see whether he could work himself free once the Commander left. Nonetheless, he attempted to feel his way around, but it ended up being one fruitless attempt after another.
As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, there was not much to see. The walls were too far apart from each other to actually be seen, and the echoes supported Tony’s theory that he wasn’t in a simple tunnel anymore. A decommissioned subway station seemed a likely option.
That information, if indeed fact, might narrow down the possibilities of his current location. Tony cursed himself for not being able to place the motel, but none of the street names he had been able to glance at had rang a bell - not that it was surprising because Tony had more important things to remember than back street addresses.
It didn’t help that he wasn’t sure how long he had been out after the Commander messed with Extremis. It could have been anything from minutes to hours, even days.
He had been so close to being freed, though…
Banging his head back against the solid wall, he cursed his newfound talent for being a damsel-in-distress. One of his armors had been close enough for him to hear it, so why hadn’t he made his presence known? To hell with the bruises the Commander would have inflicted upon him; he would have been located and rescued and this whole ordeal would have been that much closer to ending. He’d had a window of opportunity, but instead of seizing the moment he hadn’t been able to make the most of it. Now he was stuck here, wherever ‘here’ was, biding his time once again. Furthermore, he had blown his one chance to pretend he was playing along with his kidnapper; the Commander would not be giving him any more liberties anytime soon.
Tony felt stuck, and he didn’t like that.
“Hello?!”
Tony jerked at the sudden introduction of noise. Also, the voice calling out didn’t belong to the Commander - or anyone Tony thought he knew. The final syllable echoed on the walls, telling his brain it wasn’t just a hoax.
“This tunnel is closed!” the same voice yelled; a man, probably pushing seventy. Far, far away, Tony imagined he could actually see a weak flicker of a flashlight approaching. “If you don’t get out, I’ll have to call the cops,” the man added. He sounded a bit uncertain, but that could just be a combination of the echo and his age.
“Hey!” Tony yelled back to him. “I need a little help here!” He wasn’t exaggerating, but he also hated the whole needing-to-be-rescued bit, so he was trying to play it cool.
The flashlight moved across the walls, betraying the size of the tunnel he was coming from. “Hello?” he called out again.
Tony wondered if the man was half-deaf or something, or just not having expected to find someone who needed his help; a homeless person or some kids venturing into the tunnel was a far likelier option.
“Here!” Tony shouted. He knew they had limited time before the Commander came back. How the man had even known someone was in here, he didn’t know, but perhaps this was the break he needed to get out of this deeply unpleasant situation.
The shape of a man emerged from the tunnel and into the open area of the station. His flashlight was the only source of light, which didn’t give much to go on, but Tony could tell he was indeed an elderly man. Perhaps he was earning a couple bucks a night, patrolling an area where no one was supposed to be hanging out, seeing as there was no other reason he would have ventured into the tunnel.
“Sir, if you could just hurry up a bit,” Tony called out.
“You shouldn’t be in here,” the man said, pointing the light towards him, searching for the source of the voice. Clearly he hadn’t actually spotted Tony yet, just his voice.
“I will get out just as soon as you untie me,” Tony promised.
“Untie you?” the man asked, slowly climbing onto the platform from the tracks. “What the hell are you doing down here?”
“It’s a long story,” Tony said, knowing it was just a matter of seconds before Gramps got a good look at his face and recognized him. “Just get me free, okay, and we’ll both walk out of here.”
The man finally came close enough that they could more or less see each other. Grayed and wearing a faded uniform, the old man looked just like Tony had imagined him, and he congratulated him on having the guts to actually venture into the tunnels on his own.
Upon seeing Tony, the man frowned. “You’re not the fellow I saw running into the tunnel.”
“No, he’s not,” came a voice from the darkness, and then the Commander was there, appearing like a shadow come to life, and Tony opened his mouth in a shout just as the supersoldier reached out and seized the old man’s head, snapping his neck in an instant.
“Fuck!” Tony yelled. “You didn’t have to kill him!” he added as the Commander let the body drop.
The flashlight clattered to the floor, released from limp fingers, casting shadows on the nearest wall.
“He would have called it in,” the Commander said matter-of-factly, crouching over the body. Wasting no time whatsoever, as if this was a routine task for him, he went through the man’s pockets, tossing items on the floor; phone, wallet, keys, a whistle.
Tony stared at the dead man, realizing just then that he kept forgetting one important thing about the Commander, even though it was right there: he was a villain. Having been brainwashed by HYDRA for years, this was exactly the kind of thing he would do without hesitation. Killing an innocent man just because he happened to spot him sneaking into the tunnels.
He wondered whether the man would have ended up dead if he hadn’t found Tony. If he hadn’t been so keen on doing his shitty, low-income job just this one time…
The Commander picked up the phone and cracked it in half in his hands, then dug out the SIM card and snapped that one, too. “I found something for you to eat,” he stated, as if there was no dead guy lying right there.
“I’m not hungry,” Tony said woodenly, still staring at the body.
The Commander glanced up at him, then at the body, connected some invisible dots and then stood up, hauling the dead body with him. Tony watched as he took it to the edge of the platform, and although the flashlight’s beam barely reached there, it was obvious he just tossed the body onto the tracks. Then he turned and walked back, all but rubbing his hands together after a job well done. “Are you hungry now?” he asked, as if the absence of the body changed that.
“No,” Tony told him, voice cold.
“He was a threat,” the Commander stated, as if that made it all better. Perhaps it did, in his head.
“He was a guy doing his job. Probably couldn’t survive with his pension alone so he had to take this job to cover the costs of living - or he had too much of a work ethic beaten into him that he didn’t want to stop being useful to society until he died. You should know: you come from the era when people knew how to work.”
The Commander snorted. “Like you would know anything about it.”
“Just because I live in an ivory tower doesn’t mean I’m blind to the suffering of others,” Tony snapped. “Most of my life I’ve worked to improve living conditions of those in hostile environments; to give them pure water and crops to feed them. Not to mention putting my life on the line to protect people and their seemingly insignificant lives.”
“A true hero,” the Commander said, not without making it sound like an insult. It was so strange, hearing it come from Steve Rogers’ mouth. Sure, he wasn’t above questioning Tony’s integrity and intentions, but he would never, ever question whether people deserved to live, no matter what kind of conditions they were born into.
It was clear the Commander didn’t care - or even if he did, on some level, it was all shoved back in favor of focusing on getting Tony back.
Problem was, his Tony was dead and this one was a very poor substitute. The Commander was too stubborn to accept it - and unwilling to move on even if he did, because in his eyes even a poor substitute was better than none.
to be continued…
Story info