Warnings: gay bromance stuff, heavy violence, explicit scenes, bad words, basically everything that makes life fun. Enjoy!
Note: This is not my first fanfic, but I am returning from a very, very long pause from writing. Also, I am very slow to update. I try to deliver quality rather than quantitiy. I really do appreciate reviews, criticism is welcome yet encouraged to be phrased to help rather than destroy. Thanks :)
Tony screamed as his aching body hit the cold ground. He tried to move but his broken leg wouldn´t let him. He was on the verge of freaking out himself but he needed to pull through this, for him, for both of them to live.
„BRUCE!", he yelled.
The Hulk turned and sniffed over the blood stained body.
„You need to calm down, Bruce! Here, come here!"
Tony reached his good hand out for the Hulk to react to it.
„Come on, big guy, the party is over, I need the human."
The Hulk screamed at him and Tony was still so afraid, so broken in his soul that the terrifying sound shook his body to the bones. With a deep breath he reached for the Hulk´s hand.
„Bruce, I need you, come on, buddy."
The Hulk let out a few angry breaths, then let his body drop onto the frozen leafs and stones right next to Tony.
With a few very painful movements Tony robbed over to him and started touching him more. He needed Bruce to stay conscious, he knew he could pass out any minute now from his blood loss and just everything. Just everything. If it wasn´t his injuries it would be the next panic attack to take him out. So he needed Bruce to mutate back without loosing consciousness. This last challenge. Only this last thing and everything would be alright.
He softly stroked over the green skin on the broad arm to see Bruce´s eye color slowly turning back to normal. He started shivering violently and within moments the big body shrank into the usual almost tiny frame.
Cold sweat on every part of his body, Bruce reached out for Tony and Tony answered the request without hesitation. Bruce was always like this when he came back. Timid and insecure, very much needing the touch of another human. Heavily panting he took Tony´s head into his hand and asked: „What happened? Did I hurt you? Did I do this?"
„No. Don´t worry. You saved me. Thank you."
„You need a doctor."
Bruce eyed Tony thoroughly.
„You do too."
There they lay, both exhausted and injured, Bruce with only a pair of pants on his body, Tony with a few pieces of cloth that used to be a tailored white shirt before the knives had cut it open along with his skin, and shivered in each others arms on the frozen forest ground as the light of the day started to die down over the next hill.
Tony reached for his mouth, opened it as far as he could, pulled at his tooth with force until, with a painful growl, he had pulled it out and raised it over the two of them.
„What is that?", Bruce asked, still quite dizzy and confused.
„It´s a tracker, it´s gonna save us. When you break it open the circuit inside snaps and lets off an emergency signal."
„Why didn´t you do that in first place?"
„I was out when they took me. And then I couldn´t get it out with only my tongue. I had no chance. They even removed my arm tracker."
He held his arm up and showed the wound where they had cut his skin open to take it out. It still bled a little.
Tony felt his senses slip away slowly.
„Bruce, listen." He said. „I am gonna pass out any minute now. Break the tracker and stay awake. Do you hear me? I need you to stay awake till my suits or the others or whoever gets here, ok?"
Bruce nodded and took the tracker from Tony. He hugged Tony closer to keep them warm and broke the little metal tooth between his fingers.
Tony laid his head down onto Bruce´s chest and actually enjoyed the security the guy exuded through his embrace in that moment. He listened to Bruce´s heart beat and closed his eyes.
Bruce felt Tony slip away ever so slowly as his breathing started to flatten out and his body started to shiver slightly more by the minute. He let his eyes wander over the broken body of his friend and felt tears well up inside his throat.
They had cut and beaten him, broken his thigh bone, had taken away everything from him and given him only pain and nightmares to come. His shoulder was graced by a bullet which Bruce pretty sure had been intended to kill him during their escape and a dark spot on his forehead reminded of what Bruce had seen of Tony´s abduction on the surveillance tapes of the house.
He cradled the unconscious Tony inside his arms as he wept about what he hadn´t been able to prevent and hoped for someone to come pick them up in time to save Tony.
Tony woke up to the familiar interface of one of his suits, mid-air over water, dark in the night. His entire body ached without end and he closed his eyes to escape the nausea.
„Jarvis?"
„Good to have you back, Sir."
„Where am I?"
„Over Lake Michigan, Sir. Would you like to see a map of the route?"
„No, just tell me where we´re going."
„We are going home, Tony, taking you to the hospital. Your plan worked", answered Bruce through the comm. It was only then that Tony recognized another remote controlled suit beside him, assumably carrying Bruce.
„My plans always work. At least I design them to work."
Shortly after, Tony dozed off again.
Bruce looked at himself in the mirror. All he wanted was to sleep. Every muscle in his body hurt and he still tried to puzzle together what little memory he had of the incident itself. As he washed Tony´s blood off his chest and arms under the hot shower, he recognized dark spots on his skin. They must have given the other guy a lot of trouble.
He pieced together the last thing he remembered from before, dark images of a car battery and loose power cords on the filthy floor and a big bucket of water, or at least it might have been water from the consistency, not the color which was way too dark for water.
He remembered the anger poisoning his veins and the sight of Tony in all of this, tied to a column in the middle of the room, blood dripping from his hanging, unmoving head over a strand of his dark hair to the small spot between his legs, sprawled out over the uneven floor.
Bruce broke down onto the neatly tiled floor of the shower and tried to hold onto something, anything on the too even and smooth walls as his body constricted painfully and he vomited onto the beautiful tiles.
He had seen ugly scenes before. He had been in difficult situations before. He had not remembered before. Why did it bother him so much now?
This was about Tony, not the incident itself. This was about Tony.
Tony had gotten so important to him that he very much feared the other guy would ruin it. And he had been heartbroken, seeing his best friend in this state, he had been so afraid to loose him, he still was and would always be.