To Tony's surprise, Peter was not waking him up at 5AM. In fact, he slept until 8:30AM and only woke up because Pepper got out of bed.

Taking his time, he made himself some coffee, putting a candy cane in after Pepper offered it to him. By 9AM though, he was getting a little concerned about Peter. Surely the kid had to be excited. It was Christmas morning. Peter didn't seem in a hurry to wake up, though, so Tony called the team in to see if they wanted to come up and spend Christmas morning with them and meet the kid who was (hopefully) going to get up soon.

It had been a last-minute sort of thing to have Peter stay with him and Pepper in the Tower. Only a few days before, May had won a surprise vacation paid for by her company that would keep her away for two weeks. Seeing as she would miss Christmas, she had sent Peter over to the Tower so he wouldn't be alone. He'd stayed over before, but since it had been Christmas Eve last night, he and Tony had spent a few extra hours in the lab. Clearly, the late-night was taking its toll as Peter still hadn't woken up when the team arrived.

Rhodey stepped out the moment the lift doors opened, leaving the rest of the team to follow after him.

Opening his arms as he approached, Rhodey grinned and exclaimed, "Tony!"

"Platypus!"

Tony stood up and dragged him into a hug as Steve delivered a bag of presents under the tree.

"Merry Christmas, Tony," he said in passing, nodding at him as he joining them and Pepper in the living room. "Hello, Pepper."

"Hey, Steve," she replied before turning to face Natasha.

While Natasha and Pepper chatted quietly at the end of the couch, Rhodey, Steve, and Sam settled around the living room and turned to Tony.

"Got enough presents under your tree?" Sam asked, motioning towards the giant tree.

Tony grinned at the stack of presents. He'd had his bots wrap them all night so the wrapping wasn't the best, but at least Tony didn't have to pull an all-nighter just to wrap them all after Peter had finally gone to bed.

"Yeah, they're not actually for me."

Half of the presents were for Peter while twelve were for Pepper, three for each of his teammates, and then three from Pepper to him. There were also two that Peter had wrapped and stuck under the tree: one for Pepper and one for Tony. When he woke up and discovered the team was there as well, Tony knew he would be upset when he didn't think to get them presents too. Luckily, the kid would likely get over it quickly.

"Oh yeah?" Rhodey teased, glancing at the stack. "They for me?"

Tony snorted. "You wish."

Rhodey rolled his eyes.

"Half of them are mostly evenly divided between the team and Pep," Tony told him, waving towards the presents that weren't dedicated to Peter. "The rest are for—"

"Merry Christmas, Dad!" Peter screamed, running into the room in his pyjamas.

It had started off as a joke: Peter calling Tony 'Dad'. Four months ago when he'd accidentally said it after getting hurt, Tony admitted he liked it and Peter never stopped. However, he did stop abruptly when he noticed the Avengers sitting in the living room, staring at him in shock and confusion.

Tony smiled. "Hey, kid."

He patted the couch cushion beside him and Peter slowly walked over and sat down.

"Kid, this is the team. Team, this is... my kid."

"You have a kid?" Steve asked, smiling at Peter as he sat beside Tony.

Peter fidgeted with his hands and looked up at Tony for the answer.

"Sure," Tony shrugged, smiling at Peter. "He's not biologically mine, but I've sort of unofficially adopted him."

The team looked to Pepper for clarification.

"Peter stays with us when his aunt is gone," Pepper said, smiling lovingly at both boys. They gave her identical grins. "He likes to come over to have nerd nights with Tony."

"Not nerd nights!" Tony objected heatedly, "Just nights where we watch movies like Back to the Future, Star Wars, and that sort of thing."

"Nerd nights," Pepper repeated, giving him a look.

Tony glared at her and she just laughed softly.

"The point is, Peter might as well be our son."

"Well, it's nice to meet you, Peter," Steve smiled.

Peter gave him an awkward smile and nodded.

"You too, Captain."

In hopes of helping Peter feel less uncomfortable, Tony directed him to help organise presents. When he got down to the pile left for him, he turned and scowled at Tony. As he opened his mouth to protest, Tony shushed him.

"I burned the receipts!" he declared, holding out an accusatory finger. "No take-backs. You have to keep it all."

Peter huffed, looking around at all his presents.

Grinning at Peter, Tony said, "You get to begin!"

And thus began their first Christmas with Not-Dad Tony and the Avengers team. Ned was so totally jealous.