Chapter Text
Tony Stark built Dummy first.
He started working on the prototype after mid-terms. Wasted the days down in the workshop while Rhodey walked in and out and bitched about this and that and made sixteen year old Tony feel stupid when he accidentally put the blue wire on the red wire and vice versa.
His parents died on the day he finally finished.
"DUM-E." Rhodey had announced weeks after the funeral, patting the mess of gleaming metal fondly. "For the patent. Because it sounds the closest to Dummy. I still can't believe you called him dummy right when he woke up, you dick."
Tony laughed hoarsely, ignoring the way Dummy whirred at his name, cameras shuttering like an eye blinking, watching them both. "Who cares, right? We finally did it!"
They did, but nobody would know besides Edwin Jarvis, Obadiah Stane, and later on Happy. Then Pepper would find out, followed years later by the Avengers.
Next came You and Butterfingers - twins, if ever there were AI twins - smart and obedient and more like the general vein of AI's than their predecessor. Dummy had more personality - if you called an obsession with all fire extinguishers and smoothies ‘personality’ - but the other two were calmer, eager to please and adorable.
Rhodey slapped a hand over Tony's mouth after You came out, and chose Butterfingers' name, because he'd been a prick back then and even worse than Tony. Those five years were known amongst them both as the 'dark ages', because wow, a Rhodey in his mid twenties had been a huge asshole.
JARVIS was, and to this day still is, his greatest pride. Tony's always been a bit iffy on calling his babies creations, because they're not, because they're more than just things that had been created. No, they'd been made. With his sweat and flesh and bones and tears and even blood. He'd spent years on Dummy, learning everything from scrap, then another year on You and Butterfingers, refining the code and fixing everything to perfection, but JARVIS...
JARVIS had been a whole different level. JARVIS had been five years of expanding on the basic code he'd implemented for Dummy, You and Butterfingers. JARVIS had been – no, was – Tony's standing respect to a man that had taken care of him more than his own flesh and blood parents ever had.
"Done." Tony breathed, snapping the final plug into place.
Beside him, on a computer screen, Rhodey's face turned excited as he fidgeted with his brand spanking new military uniform in his brand spanking new military base. "'Bout time, I don't have all day you know."
"Aaw, have a little patience, buttercup," Tony crooned, grinning impishly at the screen as he scrambled up to his feet. "Alright, let's do this thing."
A switch. A pass code. Silence.
"JARVIS... You up?"
Bzzzt.
"Affirmative."
Rhodey burst out whooping in delight as Tony laughed, loud and strong, and JARVIS ran through his diagnostics for the first time ever.
Everything was perfect, in order, and Tony was done.
#
Tony Stark built Mark I first.
It was big and silver and clunky and lame. It was heavy and ungraceful and packed to the brim with flame-throwers. It was Afghanistan, conquered. It was Afghanistan, escaped.
Yinsen died on the day he finally finished.
"Next time, you ride with me." Rhodey threatened, hugging him fierce and tight and so painfully grateful. "I don't give a shit if it's a funvee or a shitvee, you hear me?"
Tony's throat was dry, parched, not even a drop of saliva present to swallow down and ease the ache, but he still forced out an affirmative, because the funvee had turned out to suck to high heavens.
Next came Mark II, then III, then IV and V and Tony stopped using Roman numerals soon after, because wow did he not have time for that shit. They grew sleeker, prettier, faster and deadlier. They were pieces of art, of everything that made Tony the man he was; the Merchant of Death; a Genius, a Billionaire, a Playboy, a Philanthropist. It had all his money (because holy shit did those titanium alloys cost money), it had all his intelligence, it had all his perseverance, his stubbornness, and his sheer stupidity, because any normal person would've given up after their muscles started screaming from carrying the heavy weight that made the suit what it was today, if nothing else, but not him.
Rhodey took War Machine - all part of Tony's master plan, thank you very much - JARVIS hid the schematics and blueprints for Rescue, the dangerously fast suit Tony had built with Pepper in mind, even if he'd never told her about it. He could just as well give it to Natasha if she ever really needed it, but until that emergency came around, Tony would keep it warm and ready for Pepper, even if she never wanted it.
He thought long and hard about making one for Happy, but Happy slapped him upside the head and reminded him about just how much he hated flying. Tony laughed and gave the guy one of his cars instead, because he knew for a fact Happy loved fast cars. Especially Tony Stark modified cars.
Then Killian happened. Extremis. Pepper. Protocol Clean Slate. JARVIS. Dummy. His Malibu home.
Thank God (or Thor) You and Butterfingers had been at the tower right then.
(Stane, technically, came before all that. But Stane didn’t deserve a mention.)
But it got him thinking- actually, scratch that, Rhodey got him thinking, because Rhodey crashed out on his sofa and complimented JARVIS on his expert driving of the suits. JARVIS gave a dry reply, unable to accept a compliment just like Tony; like father and son, and holy shit did that get Tony thinking.
Because he was Tony Stark. He was great, sure. He was a genius billionaire playboy philanthropist. He was the Merchant of Death (even if he didn’t want to be). He was Iron Man. He was an Avenger. He was human.
And humans died.
But AI's did not.
He would die. Rhodey would die. Pepper would die. Happy would die. And then who was left? The Avengers? Steve, Natasha and Bruce might survive a bit longer, but Tony was pretty sure they weren't immortal. Clint was human just like Tony, no matter how many times he jumped off high buildings pretending he could fly.
Thor was a God.
Thor would live.
-Until he was slain in battle, anyway.
So no, the Avengers would die soon too. Everybody would die. Fury would die.
And that would leave his babies all alone.
He took Rhodey out for dinner a week later, somewhere he knew JARVIS had no eyes on. Sat his best friend, his brother, his partner in everything but romance (and maybe even in that, Tony wasn't sure what the hell 'romance' actually meant), sat him down in front of him and told him everything.
Asked him what he should do.
Rhodey stared at him, then down at his drink, then up at Tony again.
"Shit." He finally said, finishing the rest of his beer in one gulp. "This is one of those conversations."
"Rhodey," Tony whined, dropping his head on the table. "I don't know what to do. What do I do?"
Rhodey thought it through, like he always did, like Tony could always count on him to do, and suggested, "Didn't you say there was a way of turning immortal like Thor?"
"Yeah," Tony affirmed, raising his head to rest his chin on the table, eyeing Rhodey suspiciously. "A golden apple of immortal goodness. From some chick named I-don’t or something. Why?"
"Then why don't you get it? Eat it? Stay immortal along with them. I remember you wishing you could reach the year three thousand back in MIT. You know, by singing that song by the Brits, what were they called...? Bursted? Busted? Blistered?"
"Oh my god," Tony groaned, hiding his face in his hands, embarrassed. "We did not come here to reminisce, so shut up about that. And there're flaws with the apples anyway. A) How would I get the apples? B) What ramifications would come of eating them? C) How would the human population react to me becoming immortal and practically a god? People already hate my guts, they'd claim the power of immortality would be like giving Loki the keys to Mjolnir. Also, would becoming immortal mean I'd have to move to Asgard? Cuz no offence, but Asgard sounds like it never changes. Ever."
Rhodey nodded, scratching at his chin. "I see your points, and I raise them by three. One; You've done enough to earn Asgard's gratitude, including saving them from Loki, Amora, and Thanos. They can't afford to refuse you anything you ask. Not unless they're bigger pricks than I thought they already were. Two; Who gives a shit what the rest of the world thinks, you're in this for Dummy and the others. And three; Any biological ramifications of eating the apple can be dealt with. Don't act like you don't already have a rough idea of a worst case scenario and how to counteract it."
Tony mulled the words over, then quietly admitted the truth, "What if I don't want to be immortal?"
Grinning, Rhodey stole a fry from Tony's pile of food, and popped it into his mouth. "The truth, it arrives." He drawled knowingly. "You don't have to if you don't want to. It's as simple as that. I knew you wouldn't want to be immortal - Pepper owes me five hundred."
"You guys bet on me?"
"Yup. She thought you'd jump at the idea of living forever."
"I've had enough trouble living for forty years," Tony grouched. "Like hell I could handle an eternity."
Rhodey laughed. It only lasted for a moment, but Tony revelled in the sound of it. "Then have you ever thought of giving them their own means of survival? Teaching them how to be on their own?"
"What bullshit do you speak off, platypus?"
"They're siblings," Rhodey answered patiently, far too used to the nicknames to even be bothered by the weird stares it always got them. "Brothers; four brothers who'll live until the very end. You should teach them to depend on each other rather than on you."
Tony stared at him, absorbing the words, letting them soak into him and settle somewhere around his arc reactor. Then he stuffed a whole fist full of fries in his mouth, threw a wad of cash onto the table, and ran out like hellhounds were nipping at his heels.
Rhodey cursed, sorted the money out so Tony wasn't paying nine hundred dollars more than usual, and ran after him.