Tony Stark woke up the same way he had for the past several years.

He woke unsettled, the remnants of a nightmare — this time of Penny Parker, slipping out of his clutch, eyes full of tears and a broken smile on her face before she slipped away into dust, as she always did in Tony's dreams. 

Tony felt the urge to pull himself out of bed, run to find her , to grip his kid in his arms, to make sure she was still there, never to leave him. 

To make sure the Blip hadn't happened again in his sleep.

But he stilled, blinking out of the sleepy haze that had come over him upon his wake.

Then he paused, still sat in bed, and frowned. 

Something felt wrong — something felt different. 

It was like he was waking up in the normal routine...and yet, something was off. 

It wasn't quite right.

The room was too clean, possibly that was it. 

None of his clothes were scattered across the floor as they often were.

Because he wasn't in his room.

That jolted him to be more alert and went to stand from the bed when his arm screamed against the action, forcing him to sit back down.

Tony reached over with one arm to roll his shoulder around.

He ran his other hand down it then clicked his thumb and his middle finger together to try and stop the sudden jabbing pain in his arm, and the memories rushed back at him.

The time travel.

The battle — the final battle. 

Bruce bringing everyone back, everyone alive again — everyone who had gone, he'd seen them for the briefest second.

Hope van Dyne.

Stephen Strange.

Penny Parker. 

He'd gripped Penny in his arms in the way he hadn't been able to for the past five years.

Five years without her.

Five years of swallowing the cold truth that he thought of Penny Parker like his daughter in the time that he had known her and had lost her on an alien planet.

His only remorse knowing that May had been blipped as well and that he didn't have to tell the kid's aunt that Tony had lost her, and there was nothing he could do to get her back.

And then — Stephen Strange.

Holding up that damned finger.

The realisation that there was no other way.

That there had only ever been one way and it had always been for him to die setting in.

Glancing at Penny, the stabbing pain inside of knowing he'd never get to see his kid — his kids, Morgan and Harley included — grow up.

Tony Stark had snapped his fingers, arm encased in the gauntlet with the most powerful stones in the universe.

And watched with something akin to joy at watching the son-of-a-bitch alien who'd haunted him for years in his mind turn to dust the way he'd seen his daughter turn to dust when he held her in his arms five years prior. 

He'd smiled, then, and had felt it — felt the impending death.

And yet...there he was, sat in bed, alive and kicking, after everything.

He swallowed.

God, it wasn't right, him being alive. 

Something had happened, some glitch in the matrix, and there he was.

It wasn't right, but Tony sure as hell wasn't going to waste it.

 He glanced at himself in the mirror, noted the scarring on his arm and opened the door.

He padded down the stairs slowly, a frown covering his face as he took it in, the familiar place.

But what was familiar about it?

An object shattering made Tony snap his head to the direction to see Stephen Strange looking at him as if he'd seen a ghost.

Maybe he had.

"Anthony," Stephen chokes out at last as he stares at him.

Tony raised his eyebrow, "Wizard. I don't recall telling you to call me that."

Strange was still looking at Tony as if afraid he was a dream and from the eyebags under the sorcerer's eyes, maybe he was.

The newly revived man stepped forward to check if his less awesome facial hair bro was going to collapse from how pale he was turning, when the sorcerer snapped out of it and walked to Tony.

Stephen's hands shook as he touched Tony's face before Tony took his shaking hands in his own and asked, "Wizard? What's up?"

The wizard in question only shook his head and grabbed Tony by his hands and sat him on the sofa.

Tony sat before a fireplace for a while before Stephen came back with a floating tray with a piping teapot. 

Quietly, Stephen poured in the tea for himself and sipped it sighing before making eye contact with Tony and began to talk.

"There is no easy way to say this but before I begin, may I ask what you remember?"

Tony squinted his eyes at Stephen before answering, "Everything. From Titan to the battle and dying. I remember accepting my death. So what's up with that? Am I a ghost or something?"

Stephen shook his head, "You are very much alive, Anthony. There is no easy way to say this but it's November 2025. You snapped on October 2023. And was placed into a coma to preserve your life."

Tony cut in, "I've been in some kind of magical coma for nearly two years?!"

Stephen, hearing the desperation in Tony's voice as if asking Stephen to say it was a joke, only nodded his head.

Tony let out a tired sigh and rubbed his hand over his face.

Unknowingly to Tony, Stephen went to console him but immediately retracted his hand as if burnt.

"Wizard. You never did answer my question. Why are you calling me Anthony?"

Blue eyes snapped up to stare at him with the same intensity as they did back on the spaceship.

But there was something inside them.

Was that fear?

What was Stephen Strange afraid of?

Tony shook his head and moved on from the conversation seeing as Stephen wasn't going to answer, "Fine. But can you at least tell me if I'm allowed to go back home. I really want to see my wife and kids."

This time the blue eyes shuttered in pain but went back to warmth as he turned to Tony and nodded.

"I'll send you back to the cabin but I wont's be able to come because I have to go find out what spell I did to make me forget about what happened a year ago."

This piqued Tony's interest as he followed Stephen who walked to one of the many cabinets lining the walls.

"So, what do you remember?" 

"I'm not sure," Strange admits, pulling something out of a tiny set of drawers that Tony's pretty sure is designed to hold spices. "It's... blurry. I don't remember where I was coming from. I know I cast a spell but I'm not sure what. Every time I try to think about it, my mind starts wandering somewhere else. It's like I'm looking at an image out of focus."

"Would someone else know?" Tony suggests. "Maybe not everyone forgot. What's that other guy's name, Wong? You could ask him."

"I'm not asking Wong," Strange growls. "I can figure this out myself." 

He opens a small portal into what looks like a library and reaches through to pull a map of New York City off the wall.

"What are you doing?" asks Tony. 

Just because he doesn't understand magic doesn't mean he's not curious. 

He's a scientist, he's naturally inquisitive, sue him.

"Tracking recent residual magical energy. Trying to figure out where I was when I cast the spell." Strange spreads the map out on the table and sprinkles the stuff from the drawer across it. 

It looks like granulated sugar, or possibly salt. Maybe the drawers really do hold spices.

"How do you know you were in the city?"

"I don't," says Strange with a shrug, and then he closes his eyes and raises his hands over the sugar. 

The sugar starts to shudder, then shake, then all of a sudden it glows bright orange and rises off the table. 

Strange spreads his fingers and the sugar swirls like a tiny sandstorm, spinning faster and faster until Strange closes his fists and it abruptly stops moving and drifts gently back down to the table.

Tony finally stands up to get a closer look. There's sugar all over the map, but there are two distinct areas that it spirals out from. Strange points to one of them. "That's here." He points to the other. "And that's—"

"The Statue of Liberty," Tony murmurs, begrudgingly impressed.

"The Statue of Liberty," Strange agrees. "Where I cast the spell." 

He pulls out his phone and does a quick google news search, Tony leaning over his shoulder.

SPIDER-WOMAN DESTROYS NATIONAL MONUMENT is the first headline that comes up, from a newspaper Tony's never heard of called The Daily Bugle. 

Strange scoffs and scrolls to the next one before Tony can read the subtitle. "Bugle's always full of shit, only thing that idiot Jameson cares about is taking Spider-Woman down and he'll make up anything to do it."

Tony is torn between concern that Penny has somehow actually destroyed the Statue of Liberty and anger that some asshat has apparently been slandering his kid, but before he can respond Strange speaks up again.

"Witnesses report lightning, sandstorms, and vast purple chasms in the sky."

Tony looks down at the phone again. Strange is reading off an article from the New York Times. "Vast purple chasms in the sky? What the hell does that mean?"

"Nothing good," mutters Strange, scrolling further down the article. 

Strange walks back over to the table and unceremoniously shoves the map off of it and onto the floor. He places an engraved metal sphere on the table.

And then he stands there and does nothing.

"Observe the wizard, pondering his orb," Tony whispers dramatically.

"What the fuck are you talking about?" groans Strange.

"It's an internet thing. Penny showed me."

Strange squints at Tony in confusion and opens his mouth, but before he can say anything his cloak comes back carrying a scroll. 

"Ah, thank you." Strange takes the scroll, and the cloak settles back around his shoulders. 

He unrolls the scroll and starts reading. 

Tony quietens down and ponders the orb.

He had been lying when he said Penny showed him the meme. 

Penny had been dead at the time. 

Or dusted, blipped, whatever people called it. 

Gone. 

Tony had found the damn thing himself, because so help him God he was going to stay up-to-date on internet culture. 

At first it had been because he was frighteningly lacking in other ways to feel connected to Penny. 

Eventually it had become a habit. 

Later, years later, when there was suddenly hope again, Tony had actually been excited about it.

The kid would have five years of memes to catch up on and Tony would know them all. 

For once he would be the cultured one and Penny would be the one confused.

Of course, he hadn't gotten the chance to show off his knowledge.

Five years. 

Five years without his kid, and then when Tony had finally gotten her back, he'd had about five minutes. 

One hug, and then some alien punching, and then Tony was the one dying. 

He'd never really gotten her back at all.

Fuck, Tony wants to go home.

"Hey, um, Stephen?"

Stephen snaps his head up in worry and asks with concern, "What's wrong?"

OK.

That was weird.

What happened to the sorcerer who was willing to give up his and Penny's life without hesitation?

Tony shook his head, "I should probably go and see Pepper. She'll probably kill me if she finds out I've been alive for nearly an hour and I haven't gone to see her."

Stephen tenses at hearing his wife's name, making Tony narrow his eyes at him but Stephen nodded his head and stood up, dropping the scroll onto the table.

"I'll catch up with you later to check up on you." 

He opened a portal behind Tony and said, "Go home to your family, Anthony."

When Tony turned to see a perfect image of his living room and walked through the portal, he missed the heartbroken expression on Stephen's face and how a tear slid down his face at watching the man go.

Tony drinks the whole place in as if he was a starving man.

That's his living room. 

Those are Morgan's toys on the floor. 

There's one of Penny's robots on the shelf. 

That's Pepper's favourite sweater on the couch.

Home.

And then he caught a glimpse of Pepper.

There she was, breathtaking as always, sat at the kitchen table, stacks of papers around her, on the phone, speaking like she was the most important person in the world (she was). 

Always hard at work, so dedicated, dedicated in the same way Tony was to his tech, in the same way Howard had been to the company when Tony was a child — but Pepper wasn't like Howard, no, never. 

He waited for her to hang up the phone before speaking.

"Pep," he said, intent on making her turn around but not scaring her.

Pepper had been sorting documents, but she froze and then spun in her chair immediately, his name tumbling out of her mouth. "Tony?"

Tony had expected surprise, he hadn't expected the harrowing look on her face, a look that held shock but also grief, delight but also immediate confusion. 

He set about calming her.

"Hey, Pep," he mumbled again, a smile dancing across his face. "Wake up time for me."

Pepper's face went pale, she stood up, grabbing at her necklace — where her wedding rings were placed on — and took a step towards him.

"Tony—you—this can't be real." She spluttered, shook her head, squeezed her eyes closed, turned away from him.

Tony had planned to encase her in a hug, an embrace, but he faltered. 

She didn't seem—pleased. 

Not as he'd expected.

And then—

His little girl ran into the room and Tony's throat was tight, tighter than it had been since he'd woken. 

His girl.

His Morgan.

She was tall, much taller than he last remembered. 

How fast did kids grow, at that age? 

Was it really that fast?

The arc reactor doesn't power his body anymore but it's still connected to his nervous system, and in that moment Tony could swear it glows brighter for how much his heart aches.

"You're gone," Morgan whispers. She's shaking like a leaf. "Mommy said you were gone."

"I was," chokes Tony. "I'm so sorry. But I'm back now."

There are about three seconds where they both just stand there frozen, staring at each other across the room, and then Morgan rushes forward and flings herself into Tony's arms.

Tony drops to his knees to catch her.

"Shh, shh, hey, I'm here, I'm okay sweetheart, it's okay," Tony says, clinging to his daughter and rocking her back and forth.

"Are you gonna go away again?" Morgan asks into his neck.

"No," Tony swears, "No Maguna, I'm staying right here, I promise. I'm right here."

Pepper's voice is cold. "Step away from my daughter."

"Wha—Pep, it's me."

"Morgan," she said, voice wavering slightly, looking at him with so much pain but addressing their daughter, "We don't...we don't know that's him."

She didn't think it was real—she didn't think Tony was Tony.

In retrospect, Tony definitely should have expected this. 

He raises his hands into the air slowly and tries to move away from Morgan, but she wraps her arms tightly around his legs and refuses to budge.

"Morgan, honey, come over here please," says Pepper her voice wavering even more.

"No!" says Morgan, voice muffled by Tony's knees. "Daddy, don't leave!"

"Morgan, I need you to listen to me, that's not Daddy." Pepper takes a step forward but Morgan ignores her.

"Don't leave," she begs, and Tony wants to sob. "You can't leave again. We miss you and we love you and you promised you'd stay. You promised."

"I'm not leaving," whispers Tony. "It's okay Maguna, I'm not going anywhere. Why don't you let go and go over to Mommy?" Tony gently tries to pry her off his legs. "C'mon sweetheart, it's okay. I love you too. I love you 3000."

Pepper makes a noise like she's in pain and Tony looks back up at her. 

She has a hand over her mouth. "How do you... who...?" 

"It's me, Pep," He promised again, gently removing Morgan from his legs to face his wife.

"Tell me something," Pepper looked resolute in her decision, confident, steadfast. 

She was strong— always strong, had always been stronger than him. 

Tell me something only we would know/

"Happy carried our engagement ring since 2008," Tony blurted out. 

And then, well, in for a penny and in for a pound, after all. "You gave me my original arc reactor back in a frame to prove I had a heart, and that heart belonged—belongs to you, always has, always will. You're my world, it's me, it's really me, I promise."

"Tony..." Pepper's face was—well, Tony couldn't describe it exactly. It was a combination of too many emotions. 

"Hey, Pep," Tony whispered, and encased her in a hug. 

Pepper clung to him — there was no other word for it — it was the kind of hold that made you think she would never let go, the same hold as when he'd clung to Rhodey after his best friend found him wandering the sandy deserts of Afghanistan after months of torture.

"It's you," she murmured into his shoulder, her body relaxing as Tony did his best to comfort her.

He shot a look at Morgan, who was keeping a close eye on them. 

She looked like she wanted to run over and join the hug, so he waved his hand in a come forth motion and she attached herself back to his leg.

Pepper let out a small laugh and sank to her knees, pulling Tony down with her so they could hug their daughter.

Tony kissed his girls heads.

If he was dead, then this would be heaven for him.

Holding his family.

Safe in his arms forever.

He would be the armour over the world.

And this was his world.

Something nagged at him, though, something inescapable. 

Penny. 

Pepper hadn't mentioned her, hadn't said a word about her, and it was one of the only things he could think about. 

Tony had eyes on two out of the three people he most cared about in the world, but the kid with the same self-sacrificing trait as him was no-where to be seen.

"But..." Tony paused, biting his lip. 

Pepper turned her head and stared at him, mouth pursed for his next words, as though she could sense something was wrong. 

And it was. 

"Where's Penny?"

Tony let out a chuckle after the question left his mouth, before Pepper could respond.

"God, she must be...thinking about college by now or has even graduated from college. That kid had always been way too smart. Could be even smarter then me. Her name would be published in newspapers. May must be proud. Probably gloating how the Parkers are more better than Starks."

He nudged his daughter playfully, missing the confused expression on Pepper's face, and asked, "And what about you, little miss? Are you finally happy that you have your cool older sister?"

Morgan only looked up at him in confusion, "What sister, daddy?"

Tony let his girls out of the hug to look at his youngest daughter in confusion as to how she didn't know Penny.

Every night, Tony had spent hours telling her bedtime stories of her brave, brave sister the superhero. 

Morgan had always asked where Penny had gone, when she would get to meet her, and Tony had told her that she was on a very important mission. 

Every time she asked, and every time he lied to her about it, he always stumbled into the bathroom and cried in secret.

"Tony," Pepper said softly, slowly, making him snap his head to her.

Her eyes were tinted with concern, a frown laced across her face. "We don't know who you're talking about."

"What do you mean—Pep?" 

Now it was Tony's turn to stare. 

He looked at his wife in alarm, a bad feeling racing through his stomach.

"Who's...Penny?" Pepper said, slowly. "May? The...Parkers, did you say?"

Ice-cold racing through his veins, a sinking feeling.

"Pen—Penny." Tony stammered. "Penny Parker, SpiderWoman, my...kid, our kid." He said it fiercely, a fierce correction, because Pepper loved Penny almost as much as he did, had always seen her as a daughter, had never cared that they weren't related. 

Because there was no way she would ever forget the kid with the wide smile and cheerful attitude.

Pepper's face contorted into a pained expression. "Our only kids are Harley and Morgan, Tony."

Tony shook his head. "That isn't funny, Pep."

"Tony, I'm being serious."

He blinked and stood up. "Penny—about this high," he held his hand up to Penny's height, "Brown, curly hair, self-sacrificing, loves the lab, smart as a whip? Swings around New York? Superhero?"

Pepper shook her head at that, "We don't—SpiderWoman's identity was never revealed. I didn't know you ever worked with her—ever even met her."

"No, that's not possible," Tony shook his head. "Pepper, you met her. You loved her. She was what convinced us we'd be good...at this." He gestured to Morgan, swallowed. "Parenting."

How was it fucking possible that Pepper had forgotten Penny? 

How was that at all possible? 

How could someone forget a whole person?

"I don't know her, Tony," Pepper said, so soft, softer than before, an attempt at comfort.

"No, look, we have a photo together," Tony said, and dashed over to the kitchen without hesitation, reaching for the photo of him and Penny—the photo he knew existed, because it was what had motivated him to even consider the possibility of the time travel.

The overwhelming desire, the need, to get Penny back was what had been his main motivation for bringing the other half of the population back, and Pepper had somehow forgotten she'd existed.

He reached for the photo, pulled it down, and was met with a photo of himself standing in front of the Stark Industries, holding up a peace sign. 

It was awkwardly posed, but there was only him in the shot, no-one else, no Penny.

A.N. Image there's only Tony in the picture

Tony's heart skipped a beat. 

What?

"I'm not crazy, Pep," Tony put the picture frame down on the countertop, turned back to his wife.

"I never thought you were." Pepper sighed. "If this—if you think this is serious, this is real, that you're somehow missing a kid, that we've...forgotten her. We should speak to Stephen." Pepper said, grabbing her phone.

"Stephen?" Tony asked.

"Stephen Strange," Pepper looked at him oddly. "You haven't forgotten him, have you? Dr Strange, went to Titan with you, saw millions of futures and chose this one. Stephen."

Tony froze.

 what spell I did to make me forget about what happened a year ago

 what spell I did to make me forget

 what spell I did 

spell I did 

Anthony hasn't even been gone for an four hours before he's calling Stephen. 

Stephen lets it ring. 

He's in the middle of yet another test to try and figure out what was tearing apart the multiverse to make sure that it won't happen again; Tony Stark can wait for three minutes.

The call rings out, then starts back up again, and Stephen curses the universe in his head and answers the phone. "What."

"Get your magical ass to the lake house. Now.," hisses Stark, and the amount of venom in his voice actually elicits a flinch out of Stephen.

"Right, okay, I'm coming over."" says Stephen, trying not to let his nerves bleed into his voice before cutting off the phone.

This is his mess, and he is going to damn well clean it up, no matter what it takes. 

He used to be the Sorcerer Supreme. 

Tony Stark doesn't scare him. 

"Reverse the spell," says Stark the moment Stephen steps into his kitchen. 

There's broken glass and ceramic all over the ground, and Stark's hands are bleeding. 

Despite the livid expression on his face, his voice is more desperate than angry. "Reverse it. Now."

Stephen looks resolutely away from Stark. "I can't."

"What do you mean you can't, you're the fucking Sorcerer Supreme—"

"I'm not," says Stephen, and tries to ignore the sting of the words. "Not anymore. And that's not why, anyway. I'm perfectly capable of reversing the spell—"

"Then do it."

"I can't!" yells Stephen. "I wish I could, Tony, I really do, but I told you, reversing this spell would literally destroy the fabric of reality!"

"It's a memory spell!" Stark yells right back. "Isn't that what you said? How could a memory spell possibly destroy reality?"

"I don't know!"

Tony stalks towards Stephen and slams him against the wall, anger burning in his eyes.

"Well you better figure it out because my kid is out there alone."

"Morgan?" Stephen whispers, and he's not scared of Tony but he's very abruptly scared of this.

Gods and spirits and stars, what has he done?

"No, not—Morgan's fine, not Morgan. Penny."

Stephen really doesn't want to ask, but he knows he has to. "Who—who is Penny?"

"Penelope Mary Parker," Stark bites out, emotion Stephen's never heard before saturating his voice. "SpiderWoman. Kid from Queens. Se—Jesus, she'd be twenty-one by now. Have a job or graduated college. You know her. We went to space together with her, she died on Titan, she—" Stark cuts himself off, breathing heavily, and releases Stephen from his clutches and slumps on a chair.

He stares at his hands, "Penny is my kid. And right now, she is all alone."

Stephen leans against the wall, catching his breath, "Surely she must have some fam-"

Tony cuts him off, "Parents died on a plane crash. Uncle died in her arms. I 'died' two years ago. And May Parker, her aunt, the last living family member she had, died nearly a year ago."

Happy entered the kitchen and sighed at seeing Tony's bloodied hands.

He got the first-aid kit and went to work on bandaging the hands.

Tony still didn't look up from his hands, "This is Happy. He's my friend. I left him in charge of Penny. I called him. That's how I found out that May Parker was dead."

Happy flinched at hearing his ex-partners name but still didn't stop working on Tony's hands, Tony carried on talking, "And he doesn't remember Penny either. So it got me thinking, maybe the entire world doesn't know who Penny Parker is. So I searched the internet. The kid was on Decathlon team and was in the news. You know what I found."

Tony looked up to stare at Stephen with unshed tears, "Nothing. I found nothing of my kid. I checked everywhere even her friend's accounts. Not a single picture of her. My kid- my daughter, Stephen had been erased from reality. And all that remains of her is SpiderWoman.

"Penny Parker is SpiderWoman but SpiderWoman isn't Penny Parker."

What? "That makes no sense, Tony." Happy says, cautiously.

"SpiderWoman is, is a persona, it's the show she puts on for everyone when she's in the field, right? But, the bit that makes SpiderWoman so special, such, such a hero, the bit that makes the city love her, it's... pure concentrate Penny Parker. And SpiderWoman's just the reflection, the parts she filter through the mask." He shrugs with one arm and let out a bitter smile, "She's got a great sense of humour, but she shows it more as SpiderWoman than Penny Parker. But when she's alone with people that she cares about? Penny beats SpiderWoman everyday. And that's the problem. Because there can't be one without the other. So how is there SpiderWoman with no Penny Parker?"

No answered the question.

Pepper slowly opened the door holding her laptop and showed Tony.

"There's an apartment in Queens, registered under the name Penelope Summers."

Tony stares at the screen, (the picture of his daughter, eyes dim with so much pain he wants to take away, no smile in place, using the maiden name of her aunt) as if it's the only thing keeping him sane.

And maybe it is.

Maybe that's why Stephen spoke up, "I can portal you there if you want."

A.N. We'll be meeting Penny Parker in the next chapter with other characters.

This will be after MOM

Btw she was 18 in Civil War 2016

Spent nearly 3 years with Tony (from 2016 to 2018)

2016, 2017, 2018

So she was on a field trip to relax from the stress of the exams and her graduation was coming up anyway

Missed 5 years cuz she blipped

Came back in 2023

Graduated without Tony but was with Aunt May

Started interning under Matt Murdock

Can I just say Matt Murdock is fine as fuck.

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH

Back to Penny

She was in Europe to celebrate and she turned 22 in Europe 

Then Mysterio shit happened and well now in 2025, she's 23.

I am so excited to introduce her to you guys