Chapter One

A Predicament

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The world had suddenly gone black. Why had that become more and more of an occurring thing? It wasn't like normal people experienced this on a regular basis—but then again, a man with an arc reactor embedded into his chest wasn't really considered normal, was he?

Something in his ear was coughing; the type of coughing, he identified, that if you would've heard them at a restaurant, you'd be rushing over to perform the Heimlich maneuver. There were people screaming in the distance, too, cries of terror and pain that shook him down to his core—that was also beginning to be something more normal than not, but he wouldn't tell. And then there was static every second or two. Tons of static.

"Stark! Come in, Stark!" The voice was pretty familiar in some strange mix of comfort and annoyance. In between words he seemed to struggle for breath, continuing to gasp. Something was obviously wrong—well more wrong than attempting to dismantle a bomb that was seconds from exploding. The fact was obvious because he himself was in pain. Where and exactly why escaped him.

"Come on… Stark!"

Ah, that would be… the one with the patriotic frisbe—yeah, Capsicle. That's the one, Tony Stark finally concluded. He knew he should be answering, but for some reason, he just seemed too far away. As if they were separated by a clouding fog that numbed his senses. And he hated when that happened.

The words and coughing continued to ring in his ears, persisting in getting an answer out of him, nagging at his senses like Pepper trying to get him out of bed. "Stark, I know you can hear me. Come in! You better say something or… or else… J-just answer, Stark!"

Tony was beginning to realize he could answer. But he could feel the gross, chalk-like dust on his face along with little bits of rubble and then there was that agony radiating from his lower body. His mouth seemed to be covered in a layer of this dry and tasteless stuff, making the texture near close to sandpaper. And yet somehow, he found himself mumbling weakly, "Of all the people to be caught on the wrong side of the wall… it had to be me, didn't it? Out of four other people, of course it was going to be..."

Steve seemed to be quite relaxed at the sound of a response, for a sigh made its way into the Iron Man's ear. With another round of crackling, the leader's voice broke through again, "Just stay calm, alright? Where are y—"

"Mm… Me s-stay calm?" The billionaire chuckled best he could manage, despite the horrible shock of pain that went through his legs and his stomach as he did so. But then again, it sounded like the Captain needed to relax a bit. "Who's the one freaking out now?"

Turns out he wasn't in the mood to have the mood lightened at all, instead responding flatly, "Banner actually."

"Oh… well," Tony responded, shakily, feeling slightly awkward. Even as he could feel another wave of hurt run through his limbs, he asked faintly, "All green and everything?" After all, weren't they trying not to make a mess this mission? Or was that yesterday's…?

"Natasha is calming him down, but that's not the point. Now, where are you?" Steve assured him hurriedly, before forcing his way back to the matter at hand. There was something in his voice; a kind of concern that normally wasn't there. Tony decided he didn't like it, but decided replying quickly would be the best way to make it leave his voice.

"Inside the cavern still. Where are you?"

As he said this, he made a feeble attempt at opening his eye lids. This was pretty stupid to do with a whole mess of ruble and debris on your face, and he quickly learned this as it hit his eyes. Flinching a bit, he tried to blink it away, realizing that all he was seeing was darkness. Wait… are those florescent lights behind me?

"I'm at the entrance with everyone else, Stark. The whole passageway came down on us when we were running out of there. You said you had the explosion handled!"

Ah, that was enough to make him remember.

Hammer had gotten a hold of some of his weapons, again. (Why did that man have to keep coming up on the radar? He truly wasn't even much of a threat… without any explosives, that is.) Of course, Tony was immediately filled with the rage and guilt that tormented him every other week and didn't need to be sent by Fury to go stop any harm from befalling anyone. The rest of the gang was sent along to help him, the situation being unknown. Well, save for Thor, who was still in Asgard.

Eventually they had traced a Stark Industries bomb to some underground cave once used as a mine. It just so happened that there was a small convention built on top of the caverns, and to add to the excitement, it was full of people—including the state senator.

The two agents, scientist, captain and iron man followed orders, sneaking in, taking out the numerous guards, etc. You know— the normal stuff. In the end they had gotten to bottom of the large maze of tunnels to find a large supply of Stark explosives rigged to explode on a timer. Classic.

Naturally, Dr. Banner (in scientist form) and Tony were sent to dismantle it while everyone else took down the surrounding guards. Naturally, they didn't have any time to properly make sure that the bomb would shut off. Naturally, sacrifices had to be made.

He told them it was fine, that he could simply hit it with his repulsor and cause it to turn off, then fly up to meet them at the entrance. It was a lie of course, but they were running out of time, and before Bruce could reveal this fact, another round of guards had come. Tony sent the rest of the team off and managed to redirect the explosion so that the only damage it would cause was to his own self, a willing soldier protected in armor. Of course, he didn't intend for the whole cave to collapse.

"No… nobody got hurt right? The people are safe?" He croaked, now attempting to move his head to the side, thankful to see that he could. Well it definitely ached, but that wasn't the main point here.

After another round of coughing, Steve spoke again, as if irritated, "They're fine—oblivious even to the whole thing. But the problem is you aren't, Stark, you sound injured." Even more static interrupted each word he said, not to mention the loud stomping in the background that could only come from one person. "Oh great… Hold on one minute—"

"HULK SMASH CAVE ROCKS!"

Static, then stomping, followed by more static.

"Natasha—" Steve started, seemingly even more worried.

Another familiar voice spoke up from the background, "I'm working on it."

Whilst this was going on, Tony truly was tempted to crack a joke, or even chuckle, but he found himself unable to. True, his stomach and legs hurt like hell, but there was something wrong about this cave of which was quickly coming into focus. He couldn't place it; only knowing that it was stirring something inside of him and he didn't like it. He wanted out. "You there, Cap?"

After a moment, the bad signal kicked back in again, "Yes, sorry. Stark, are you hurt?"

"Uh yeah," The billionaire replied, risking a glance towards his lower half buried in rock. Vainly attempting to push himself out, he replied through gritted teeth, "Can't really get you any really better descriptions than a whole bunch of rock fell on me. Since I'm in the suit, I'll live, so don't freak out just yet… The problem is some of the metal is bent inwards, crushing my legs… or at least it feels like that." Proof immediately presented itself as he attempted this, sending a shot of agony through his body as he tried to move. Bad idea. I should probably wait for help, he thought, trying to settle back into his uncomfortable position on the ground.

"What happened?"

Tony tried to dismiss his alarm, though he was beginning to feel the pain getting to him. "I'm fine, I'm fine…. Just get me out of here, please."

The team leader seemed to struggle with a proper response to this, contemplating an answer for a moment or two. "If Banner was around, I'd get him to give you advice—in medical terms," he replied, sounding as if he was thinking of something to say that would help him, "But well… you know. Just hold tight. Fury should be bringing the Helicarrier soon, and we'll find some way to get you out of there."

The iron man sighed. In the back of his mind, he knew that it was going to take a while, and he hated waiting. A lot. The fact that he could practically feel the suit beginning to break his left leg didn't help at all, not to mention a very strong sense of being in the same location before… Crap.

"Stars and stripes, do you have a, uh, time estimate for when I'm going to get out of here," Tony asked, feeling a strong sense of nausea as a memories began flooding the vision of his mind's eye. He could practically see the cot in the corner; the table of the Mark I plans… Yinsen making tea.

A ear piercing beep filled his sensitive hearing, causing him to wince, lifting his free arm to remove the small chip. However, he was quickly stopped as more static replaced the sound, "Stark—I can't hear you. What did you say?"

No, no, no. This is a bad time to walk out on me Captain! "When exactly is help going to get here?" He asked, all humor and sarcasm completely disappearing from his tone.

"Stark? This radio's going crazy here! Natasha!"

Crackling, beeping…

"Damn it!" Tony felt a tingle in the back of his neck as panic slowly began to sink in. Trying to press buttons on his ear piece with his metal fingers, he tried to listen for a voice over the static. "Cap? Steve, come in. Steve!"

He paused a moment, glad to find that the ear piece went silent; a sign that someone on the other line was going to speak. But then nothing happened… And then a minute passed, followed by another.

No, he didn't want to be left in a cave that looked so much like one that he knew was still in Afghanistan, especially alone with nothing to do but let his mind wander. It was like falling asleep after a traumatizing experience; you just knew what you'd have a dream about—or in this case, you'd just know what memories would plague you which would probably end up causing nightmares as well. And on the subject of bad dreams, well, it wasn't as if he didn't have enough of those already.

"Please, someone…" The self-proclaimed genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist moaned, throwing his head back, helmet retracted.

He was met with cold, hard quite, of whom he had a feeling he was going to make a very close acquaintance with shortly.

"JARVIS?" Tony tried, now running out of options.

The AI didn't respond, probably because the whole suit had lost power.

"So you're not going to talk to me either? How kind of you…"

He let out a long, heavy sigh, looking forwards once again to rest his chin on the metal surface of his chest. After a couple minutes of simply staring at the rock wall, he decided lying idle was boring. Hurting himself—no, getting out was much more entertaining. Putting his free hand on the uneven floor beneath him, Tony threw his body forwards best he could, pushing down. This movement sent the topmost rocks tumbling towards his head as his arm gave out. And with a loud crash, he was down once again, a good deal more in pain than he was before.

It was quite easy to see that the next couple hours, were going to be incredibly long. And really, a couple of hours was probably the best case senario...

Up Next:

-Tony faces his inner demons in regards of the events in Afghanistan

-Bruce Banner, no longer Hulk, makes an appearance

Thank you to Ruby River for helping me develope this idea- at a water park :)

So yeah, that's the first chapter! Hope you liked it, more is soon to come! Reviews are really appreciated, as is critique. Thank you in advance.