Light of my Life (STONY)

We'll be back

About a week after the last incident, Tony was much more careful about what he was doing, where he was going, the light volume, etc. He wasn't usually caught out at night, and if he was, he covered his ass as soon as the accusation was made. 17-year-old Tony Stark was most definitely not going to be told off for being up at 5 in the morning. But, of course, he can't move out. He needs this house, the tools, and his mother.

Today was a Friday, and he was down in the lab (it was about 7 in the evening so he'd observed) his precious father waltzed in. Tony looked up and groaned - he hated being interrupted.

"Your mother and I are going out of town for a few days. Obadiah's watching you, we'll be back on Tuesday at some point."

"Why?"

"You know the rules, Tony-"

"Don't ask questions," muttered Tony in a mocking voice.

"Captain America never made fun of me like that. It's impolite." The boy rolled his eyes.

"Bye dad. Don't die."

"I haven't yet." And he turned and left.

"JARVIS, where's my mom." The AI replied with 'the Jaguar' and he sprinted all the way there. He was out of breath, but he pushed through and made it there without stopping. But, he was too late. They'd left. "Shit," he muttered. Once back in the lab, he grabbed his stupid little flip-top phone and dialled her phone number.

"Hi honey, is everything okay?"

"I didn't get to say goodbye before you left, so, um... love you, mom. Be safe."

"Love you too, Tony. You dad says the same."

"Bye, mom."

"Bye honey." She hung up.

With a huge weight taken off his shoulders (apart from the lie about his dad saying he loved him), he went back to tinkering and grabbed himself a coffee from the bottle of cold brew he'd been storing in his fridge.

"Tony?"

"Obi, hi." Tony set down his mug and looked up, pushing his hair out of his eyes as he did. Obadiah Staine was tall, probably at about 6'1, 6'2, and was Howards assistant. Tony'd known him his whole life. It was like his own personal bodyguard.

"I'm looking after you until your parents get back, which means no lab time. Sorry kid, you need to spend more time in the real world."

"Hilarious," replied Tony, tightening a screw to install a shelf on the wall.

"I'm serious, Tony. What, you spend almost 6 or 7 hours a day in here, then 6 hours a day in school, another hour each way to travel so 8 hours, that's 14 or 15 hours a day at least just working! When was the last time you had a family meal?"

"Mom's birthday," Tony replied, setting the shelf on the stand he'd built into the wall. He then put a few random tools on it and slumped down into his chair. "Obi, what do you want."

"I want us to go get pizza and have a talk about you." Obadiah crossed his arms and Tony rolled his eyes.

"I'm not that hungry," Tony muttered, tapping away at his computer. "JARVIS, analyse this I need to add to your mainframe," he added.

"Of course, sir. Predicted time - 2 and a half hours," replied the AI. The progress screen popped up on the monitor and Tony switched it to his screensaver.

"Well, I'm getting pizza and you're coming with me. You don't have to eat but I'd rather you did." Obadiah threw Tony a zip-up hoodie that he found on the kitchen counter but Tony let it fall to the floor. "What?"