Tony's Rejection

There was a forest on the outskirt of New York with a small lake in the middle of the forest! This was where Tony built his new home, a wooden house by the lake! 

Even if it was a wooden house, the inside was lavished with technology one could describe as coming out straight of fiction! Nevertheless, it was a place for Tony to escape from the hustle and bustle, a place for tranquility. But today, uninvited guests would come to break his tranquility after a while.

Outside the house, Tony was playing with his daughter joyfully, and that was when he saw Dio, Steve, and the rest of the Avengers walking toward him with complicated looks on their face. 

Tony himself didn't know how to respond to this sudden arrival. He would be more than happy to welcome a visiting old friend, but he knew that it would never be a mere visit when it came to these people, especially if they come together like this. 

"Now, it's time for you to take a nap with mommy!" Tony said to his daughter gently. Dio and the others quietly followed Tony. Although they knew that their arrival disturbed Tony's peaceful life, they couldn't just abandon their goal.

"It's been a long time!" Dio said as he walked towards Tony and saw Pepper lifting off her two-year-old daughter. He smiled at Pepper and shook her hand. "It's been a long time, Pepper. Your daughter is as cute as you!" Dio said with a smile on his face.

"Thank you, Dio!" Pepper said with a big smile on her face before turning to Tony. "Tony, welcome everyone, I will take Morgan to her room." Pepper said enthusiastically. Tony immediately nodded and beckoned everyone to follow him to a lounge before excusing himself to make a tea.

Tony came back with a jar of tea before putting it on the table and quickly looked at everyone.

"It must have been a bad news that brought you all here! But it's too bad, I don't want to listen to any of it!" Tony said while shaking his head dismissively.

"We need you, Tony!" Natasha said as Tony poured the tea into his guests' respective glasses. 

"We know that what we would ask of you may sound ridiculous and exaggerated, but after everything that happened, there is nothing impossible!" Natasha said worriedly. She then started talking about what they were about to do and everything that happened in space with Dio.

"So, basically, you want to break the Planck Scale and trigger the Gierman Effect and create a fluctuation in time?" Tony said with his usual scientific jargon that everyone didn't really understand. "You have a pretty good idea about all this stuff, but sadly, you made one huge error! You wouldn't be able to return!" Tony said coldly.

"No, I already came back from the Quantum Realm twice!" Scott said suddenly. 

"No! you are just a big fluke! If you already came out of the Quantum Realm twice, then you should buy a lottery ticket. You might win yourself a chance to live a wealthy life!" Tony said coldly.

"No, if we can build an equipment that would let us travel through the Quantum Space safely, everything would be alright! Basically, we are hijacking the time and space itself!" Scott said excitedly.

"A time and space hijack! Yes, that is a great idea. Why didn't we ever thought of such a clever idea before? It's because it was a ridiculous idea! It's just an afterthought, a dream!" Tony said frustratedly. 

"Infinity Stones are already a thing of the past! We can't get them back now! But we still have to try our best to bring everyone back!" Steve said solemnly.

"You may make things worse than it is now!" Tony said coldly.

"I don't think so!" Dio said, interrupting Tony completely. He knew that what they were talking about was really far-fetched, but he decided to trust his instinct on this one.

"Aren't you an optimistic one! Aren't you the one who makes things worse yourself?" Tony said coldly, but it was an undeniable truth. Because of Dio's incompetence, Tony has lost everyone. Now that he already had a wife and a daughter, he didn't care about the Snap anymore as he already had people to protect right here!

Dio wasn't even angry at Tony's remark as he knew that he was partly to blame.

"Without a practical method, we couldn't perform the time travel safely, and it would most likely end up in the demise of the entire team!" Tony said coldly, breaking everyone's hope apart.

"But, as long as we strictly adhere to the rules of the time travel, we wouldn't be in any immediate danger! Such as not talking to your past self and not betting in any sports and so on!" Scott said worriedly.

"Stop it, Scott! Do you really think that a plan to save the universe can be copied from the Movie Back to the Future that easily?" Tony said coldly.

"No, of course not, but …" Scott said before being interrupted by Tony once again.

"That's good then! You really scared me just now because what you are talking about is a complete and utter nonsense! Quantum Physics isn't associated with such nonsense!" Tony said frustratedly. 

"Tony, we have to try!" Natasha said sadly. "I know that you have a wife and a daughter now, but we have lost a lot of important people too! Many innocent people! But now you are telling me you don't care about any of them?" Natasha said angrily. 

"Yeah, I don't want to! I can't do this!" Tony dismissively said as he totally refused! At the same time, Pepper showed up as she heard the yelling.

"Hey, are you guys alright?" Pepper asked worriedly.

"Did you already tuck the little princess to bed?" Tony asked quickly. Pepper nodded her head and looked around helplessly as she didn't understand what was happening. "Everything is fine, Pepper! Now, for the rest of you! You can do everything you want, I don't care! I welcome you here, and I'm really happy to see you, but I won't do it!" Tony said firmly.

"Tony, we have a second chance!" Steve said hopefully.

"I'm already living my second chance, Captain! I am sorry, I can not take any more risks!" Tony rejected the invitation immediately. "Please stay and have lunch. We can talk about something else after this!" Tony said firmly. Tony immediately left the room, and everyone was left in silence.

"He is scared!" Steve said exasperatedly.

"Couldn't blame him, everyone has their own choices!" Dio sighed disappointedly, but he didn't blame Tony for rejecting their demand. If Dio and Tony swapped positions, he might also choose the same thing! There was no way he would risk his children and wife for some plan that wasn't guaranteed to succeed!

"So, what should we do now?" Natasha asked with an exhausted sigh.

"Perhaps our princess of Wakanda and the smart green giant can give us some surprise, let's go!" Dio said to the others, and thus, they left Tony's home with regret in their heart. But Tony, who silently watched their departure, wasn't calm at all!