It had started with a headache.
After trying to pick a fight with Captain America and The Winter Soldier, Tony was hardly surprised that his head was hurting. In fact a sore head was the least of his problems.
Sprawled awkwardly against the hard concrete in the confines of the Iron Man suit, he was too exhausted to do anything but just sit there and watch as the snow cascaded outside. The wind was starting to intensify, with visibility becoming poorer by the minute.
Stark was no amateur when it came to aviation.
Like so many skills which he'd acquired during his life so far, he'd dabbled briefly in aeronautics somewhere along the way.
According to the media, his colleagues, foes and friends, Tony Stark was many things.
They called him an eccentric genius, a billionaire, playboy, philanthropist, an inventor, narcissistic, and his least favourite title of them all, the merchant of death.
But before all these things he was just a mechanic.
It was in his nature and in his blood. It wasn't just enough to accept that things just worked- he had to know why and more importantly, how? The truth was there was nothing he liked more than to pull things apart and put them back together again, but it wasn't enough to just to reassemble the puzzle pieces.
It was the permanent itch that he could never seem to scratch.
There was always room for improvement, and that's what he did, improve.
That was the new vision for Stark Industries, to make something better to try and revolutionise the world. There were too many companies trying to replicate and recycle the same old ideas, making their fortunes off of things that were heading towards the same dead end to nowhere.
Tony saw nothing but white, the horizon quickly disappearing behind the heavy snowfall.
He didn't want to stay there, but he had little choice.
No one in their right mind would attempt to fly in these conditions. Not even the best pilot in the world with decades of experience would attempt such a feat.
There was nothing he could do but wait for the worst to pass.
It just wasn't worth it.
It was undeniably true that he was infamous for making rash decisions. In other circumstances perhaps he still would have attempted the flight, but not today. He hadn't made it through one of the worst days of his life just to die in a helicopter crash, especially when he hadn't told anybody where he was going.
The great Tony Stark, lost to the ocean forever.
It was said that with age came responsibility.
Tony could feel that he was at a turning point in his life. He wasn't young and invincible anymore- he'd learned that lesson the hard way. He had scars to remind him of that.
Beneath the confines of the Iron Man suit the brunette could feel his bones aching and not just from the cold either. Under the battered chest plate he was convinced that he'd fractured something. Each new breath bought a fresh wave of pain as his lungs jostled his injured ribs.
Wriggling his fingertips, Stark grit his teeth as his arm protested fiercely.
It was looking like he'd be back in the sling for a while.
Fortunately for him the adrenaline was masking the full extent of the pain, and combined with the bitter cold it was the best he could have hoped for without any pain relief.
The Vibranium shield lay beside him, its presence an ominous weight at his side. It was face up on the ground, its patriotic paint job mocking him.
Each time he glanced at it all he could see was Steve baring over him, shield raised high above his head and pure fury in his baby blue eyes. When the shield had come down on him with a powerful swing, Tony had honestly thought for a second that the star spangled man was going to murder him.
There were numerous times in his life when Stark had experienced a brush with death. People always wanted to know what it was like to cling to the very edge of existence, reaching the end of a dead end road with seemingly no way back.
It wasn't anything like the movies.
Afghanistan, the Malibu Mansion attack, Ultron- so many times he could have died, yet when he'd been tangled in the heat of the moment, the billionaire hadn't even given potential death a second thought.
Getting a chest full of shrapnel had been the worst for sure so far, although launching a nuke into space hadn't exactly been a walk in the park either. Taking a one way ticket through the worm hole Tony had been so focused on getting rid of the nuke that he'd had little time to contemplate being permanently erased from existence.
He still remembered falling through the air as the suit went offline, realising finally that he was utterly alone. Plummeting through the depths of space Iron Man had little choice but to accept his fate, closing his eyes and waiting for death- but a blessing or a curse, it had never arrived.
He'd relived that moment in his dreams for what had seemed like a hundred times, slipping through the infinite atmosphere again and again, only this time slower. Every second felt like an hour, watching the explosion unfold in slow motion as he slipped further and further away- only in the dreams, he never managed to escape.
It was strange.
He'd survived so much worse yet when the shield had swung down towards him, Tony had really thought that this was the last nail in the coffin.
It was often speculated that in a person's last moments they clung to the thought of several things, fragments of their life flashing before their very eyes. Places, faces, sights and sounds….
There was little time for reminiscing when the avenger thought he was going to be snuffed out like a birthday candle. For Tony, there had only been one thing on his mind.
Betrayal.
Then suddenly he was back in a sweltering cave in Afghanistan, crouching beside a dying man.
It was Yinsen laying on the ground, bloodied, defeated and waiting for the end. He was waiting for the reaper to take him, to be reunited with his family again.
'Don't waste it… don't waste your life.'
Just when he thought he'd had nothing left to give, Tony managed to summon the remaining strength he didn't realise he'd had.
While Steve had still managed to nail him hard in the head, the philanthropist's quick reflexes had managed to save him from an instant death sentence.
With his good hand he reached out to the offending object and turned it over, where it remained face down in the snow. In the end it seemed that Iron Man would live to fight another day- or at least he would if he didn't perish from exposure.
He hoped that the world wasn't in immediate danger any time soon, because if it was, it would have to wait until he'd finished nursing this killer headache. Then there was the fractured wrist, questionable damage to his ribs, and the gash on his temple that was going to need stitches.
"Friday, how much power are we on?"
"Seven per cent Boss," the AI replied, usual chirpy Irish accent distorted with the draining power supply.
"Have we got enough for some heat?" the billionaire replied, aware that his teeth were starting to chatter. Even in the suit Tony wasn't immune to frost bite. The last thing he wanted was to lose a couple of digits, and with the tingling in his fingertips he couldn't decide if it was the break in his arm that was responsible or his skin starting to freeze.
"The suit has been severely compromised-"
"Really? I had no idea."
Barnes had all but destroyed the arc reactor but there was still life in the old dog yet. Friday was right, the suit was badly compromised, but there was still a small spark of life. It was just a spark, but it was enough to keep the AI online.
"You know every time you speak, it drains the battery, so do me a favour Friday and please just answer the question."
"Just enough to take the edge off."
"I don't remember programming you to be so stingy," he complained.
"I'll pretend I didn't hear that Boss."
There was a welcome surge of warmth that began to pulse through the Iron Man suit and although it was weak, it was enough to return the sensation to Starks frozen extremities. His comfort was soon short lived when his icy fingers started to sting. Without a second thought he tried to wriggle the burning digits- on the wrong hand.
"Son of a-"
Suddenly the ache in his head returned with vengeance and Stark could only wince as his head began to pound. A wave of nausea swept over him as his stomach clenched. For a moment he really thought he was going to hurl right over Caps- no, Howards shield.
He hoped that the summersaults his stomach was doing were just a passing faze. The last thing he wanted to do was open his visor to be sick and let out all of the heat.
"Boss?"
He couldn't feel the cold anymore. There was only the sudden agony in his head, unlike anything he'd ever experienced before.
He tried to breathe in a haze of panic but his protesting ribs wouldn't allow it.
Tony had sustained enough concussions in his life to know that something was seriously wrong. He could feel his heavy eyes betraying him as he sunk deeper and deeper into unconsciousness.
He tried to cling to Friday's voice as the AI began to panic, but he wasn't strong enough to fight it.
Or maybe he just didn't have any fight left in him anymore.
