📍MALIBU, CALIFORNIA
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(Y/N) couldn't help but feel a strange pit in her stomach after making the choice of leaving her usual home and joining Tony Stark in his enormous mansion, but it was too late for turning back now. A bit of irony was in her thoughts too, considering that she had already been inside the house but undercover with an alias, now, the doors were wide open to receive her and her true identity.

The white colored and window covered mansion still looked the exact same way it did almost two years ago, standing by the edge of a cliff with a downward view to the ocean. (Y/N) would be lying if she said that it wasn't a beautiful house.

After parking the car near the huge door entrance, Tony guided her inside the house while (Y/N) shouldered her duffel bag and looked around the details to see if anything had changed. Of course, the broken furniture and windows from his last birthday party fiasco were already replaced, but besides that, everything was easily the same.

As (Y/N) walked deeper around the house, an unexpected voice with a thick accent echoed through the walls of the house. "Welcome back home, sir. Is that Miss Vance on your side?"

Tony eyed her from the corner of his eye at the memory of her fake surname before answering his AI. "The lady here doesn't go for that name anymore, JARVIS. What do you suggest we call her?"

(Y/N) knew the look of mischief behind Tony's eyes, and she spoke up before he could voice his inner thoughts. "No! Don't think about turning your AI against me."

"I was just thinking of a suggestion," he defended, crossing his arms. "What was the short version for Lieutenant? Looey?"

"Don't you dare."

He huffed a laugh. "As much as I love bickering with you, we have work to do."

(Y/N)'s playful glare turned into a mixture of confusion, her eyebrows furrowing. "What do you mean?"

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If (Y/N) knew that in the half hour of being in the same rooftop as Tony Stark would end with her being tied up to wires that connected various machines, she wouldn't have come in the first place.  The beeping sound of the machines every time her heart beat were slowly driving her insane, and because of the wires with duct tape that were glued to her temples, she could barely move her head and see what Tony was doing.

He had offered to restore her long forgotten memories, a part of him still grasping to the hope that she could remember at least half of the friendship they'd held together before she disappeared. (Y/N) found his ambition sweet at first, but after Tony dragged her downstairs into his workshop in the basement, now she was a bit hesitant.

(Y/N) tried calling his name once or twice, but he was too focused in rummaging through his workshop to pay attention to her at all. He was muttering to himself and searching through every cardboard box that was in his line of sight, until he stopped moving and held up a vinyl in his hands with a loud 'aha!'.

"Why do you need that?" (Y/N) asked him now that he was making his way back and placing the vinyl down on the record player. She knew what the object was, she just didn't know why he needed it.

"This, (Y/N), may be the key to helping you," Tony said dramatically, and she resisted the urge to roll her eyes at this. "Studies confirm that music helps in retrieving stored memories."

(Y/N) felt a tingle of hope at his words, maybe he was right, and she could finally get back all those memories that were still shut down with lock and key in the back of her brain. She wanted to know more of her old life so badly, and Tony had offered to do what other people in her life didn't. But a part of her was still doubting it would work, since her eyes caught the vinyl and she wasn't sure if she would recognize the song recorded in it.

Tony seemed to read her doubt. "This was your favorite song. I've kept the record since then."

(Y/N)'s face softened and noticed the slightest hint of worry in his eyes, anxiety written all over his face if this was going to work out or not.

He cleared his throat. "JARVIS, drop my needle."

Without a word, JARVIS followed his command and dropped the needle down to the vinyl, and the first beats to the Queen song We Will Rock You started blasting loudly in the basement. At first, Tony laughed at the shock of the loud beat in (Y/N)'s face before he moved his focus on the machines to see if her heartbeat was still stable. If her heart beat began racing, he would drop anything and try with another method.

(Y/N) tried to help too, closing her eyes in concentration to see if any recollection of her life flew past her eyes, and tapped her finger down on the table to the beat as a way to help her relax.

"Tony. . ." He immediately perked up at the sound of his name. "Can you tell me what happened that day? Maybe that will help?"

"Well, I took you to the restaurant where they served our favorite cheeseburgers to ease down your nerves before you left. You cheated on the pinball machine competition we used to have."

He laughed nostalgically, and (Y/N) could already see flashes of the stuff he was mentioning. Images of herself and him drinking down the sodas and eating down the greasy french fries, she wished they were clearer and lasted longer.

"I can remember," (Y/N) informed him, and the song was still playing in the background. "Tell me more, please."

"Sure," Tony nodded, tugging his sleeves down to his elbows. "Before you left for the flight, you gave me the jacket because you saw how nervous I was. Even my dad was worried, God, he always liked you better."

(Y/N) saw how a hurtful look flashed in his face when he said the last sentence, but that was a question for another time. Parts of the moments he was narrating were fresh in her mind, since the machine from the Skrulls had brought those memories out to the surface. If she remembered correctly, that same face with a short mustache was the person she saw every time she spoke to the Supreme Intelligence.

Tony glanced back at her after trailing off and noticed how she stared off into nothing, and he jumped up. "Is it working?"

(Y/N) nodded eagerly. "It is. But I'm starting to get a massive headache."

Tony took this as a hint to remove the vinyl from the record player and started to remove the wires connected to (Y/N)'s temples and forearms.

(Y/N) watched how he worked and she helped in removing the wires connected to her. A question was eagerly waiting to be voiced in the back of her throat, so she cleared her throat to catch his attention and make him look at her.

"Why are you helping me?" she asked.

She swore she saw his irises soften. "Because I don't want my friendship with you to go away."

soft moments between these two <3
i love them so much and this act is going to be filled with small moments of them.

-see you soon, bex