Hey, this is just a one-shot. Let me know what you think :)
He woke up to something burning in his chest. It felt as though each individual rib was on fire, sending more blisters coursing through his body with every beat his heart took.
The cold air he gulped down soothed the pain, like ice being placed on a bruise.
He shut my eyes and lay heavily on the hard, concrete floor. He could feel the sharper points of the concrete not mixed into the original substance properly sticking into his skull like some sort of acupuncture.
He hoped that if he kept his eyes closed; this whole scene would fade away and he'd have nothing, except the thoughts scuttling around his head and the thudding of his heart beat. Although he longed for that to stop now too.
Deciding that the floor was no longer a comfortable place to lie, Tony hauled himself up and over, if he wanted to he could have easily collapsed from this sudden movement coupled with the sort of press up, but he was determined not to give them the satisfaction.
'Them' were people he didn't know.
They observed via a camera in the corner of the room, which bleeped once and a while. He had tried to read the time off it from the distance of the beeps between each other, but his genius plan hadn't prevailed. Instead he was left more confused and bewildered than before, and gave up in the idea quickly.
His captors amused him however. Not once did he lay eyes on them, and he couldn't ever recall being taken by them in the first place. When he first awoke in the concrete room and caught sight of the mould ridden sink he thought that he had had one too many and stalked New York, crashing out for the night in a public toilet. No such luck. For when he woke he was in this dump, and his immediate plans for escape weren't matched by actually escaping through the door- which was locked.
Despite all this however, one thing confused him most: no one had come yet. But he wasn't just talking the people who put him here, but there seemed to be no efforts in allowing his release through the form of the Hulk smashing down the wall, or Captain America kicking down the door, or Hawkeye shooting an arrow at the door and allowing it to blow up. But that was because they were here with him.
The full story was not clear: Steve with his buttoned up blue pyjama top and bottoms, lying sprawled face down on the floor. He wasn't hurt though. Tony could tell by his snoring. But Bruce looked like something else, wearing a simple, yet effective suit and bow-tie. The meaning of which he didn't know. He couldn't for the life of him work out where they were at the time or their capture. As to where Clint, Natasha and Thor were, he had also no idea.
It burned as he breathed outwards, as his diaphragm lifted and caused my lungs movement. He could still hear his heart pounding in his ears, but none the less he wasn't worried. As he breathed in hid lungs became cool. Tony smirked into the darkness as door clicked open.
He was neither shocked nor prepared for the sight that greeted him.
Bruce was standing in the door way, but only just. He was slouching, with his chin lolling on his chest. The figure supporting him was bent low and Tony couldn't get a glimpse of her face, but he knew who it was.
Walking over briskly, to help more than anything, Tony stretched out his hand to hold Bruce, but stalled and raised his hands as a gun jutted out from over Bruce's other shoulder, warning him not to come any closer. He didn't particularly feel like getting shot.
The door slammed shut as Natasha fell in the room, Bruce almost landed on top of her, but she didn't seem to care.
"Natasha?" Tony calmly walked over to her and prodded her in the face. She grunted but made no attempts to open her now shut eyes.
Instead he moved over to Bruce, who had lost his party attire and was wearing shorts and a t-shirt instead.
"Bruce?" He prodded him too. Usually he'd be wary of the Hulk turning up and smashing his face in, but he was pretty sure that himself and Natasha would be the least of the Hulks problems. Judging by the door, Tony had guessed that the walls had to be easily 30cm thick. Easy for the Hulk. Not so easy for a guy wearing jeans and a t-shirt and a blue thing in his chest.
Bruce didn't move, Tony put my finger under his nose and waited for the breeze of carbon dioxide to come out of his nose. When it came, he stood up straight, brushed himself off of the dust he'd accumulated somehow and dragged Natasha to the opposite side of the room, and then he did the same with Bruce.
Admiring his handy work, Tony straightened up before marching to the opposite side of the room to where the metal door was and rapped across it hard.
"Hey." He called, not troubling to keep his voice down. "Anyone there?" He faltered when nobody replied, then decided to continue knocking. "Oi! Do you have a pillow or something? These guys don't look very comfortable... Bruce's necks all twisted, you don't want to make that guy grumpy when he wakes up. That's guys the Hulk, you know."
Tony grinned as the door clicked open for the second time, and several men's shadows were cast over him through a light outside the room. Tony blinked to allow his eyes to settle against the new harsh light, and then observed these men.
There were four in total. Two of which had their face almost completely covered by a camouflage mask. It only allowed for a mouth, two nostrils, and two sets of eyes. One of the masked men was also wearing a sombrero.
The other two weren't so outrageous with their clothing choices. One of the men, who seemed to be thinning dangerously with tufts of white hair attempting to reclaim the scalp, was wearing jeans and a plain t-shirt. The other man was almost wearing exactly the same, except he had added a poncho and looked in his mid twenties.
"So... Are these guys getting a pillow or what?" Tony asked, and pretended not to be a little wary of the machine gun he'd just spotted in Bald's arms.
"No." Poncho spat at the floor, and wiped it away with his foot. Tony pulled a face. Spitting was gross. "Does that bother you?" Poncho asked innocently, Tony scowled but reclaimed his cool grace.
"Whatever, it's not me you're infecting with your germs." Tony flinched as a ball of saliva collided with his cheek. "Nice. You know, you really need to work on your manners." The other man sneered, before grinning crazily and pointing a stubby finger at Tony.
The men stepped calmly into the room and someone behind them shut the door. Tony remained firmly planted on the ground. Then the first blow hit.
The fist collided with his check bone and the surge of energy it produced coursed itself sharply through Tony's nose where it dispersed as quickly as it had come.
The second happened almost immediately afterwards, and Tony stumbled backwards as he heard his jaw crunch. He could feel his teeth smack off one another and it made his gums feel weak, as though he'd been chewing on toffee all day.
He stumbled backwards. He was better than this. Why was he letting these men punch him? He was Iron Man, for crap sake.
The man who had punched him stood sneering a few footsteps in front of the others, but each of them were sneering menacingly.
Clutching his jaw, he moved it slowly from side to side, and to his great relief it wasn't broken. Baring that in mind, he flung himself forward, as he did so he lift up his leg in a paying mantis style, before bringing it straight back down above the mans knee cap. Tony was so grateful that Natasha had taught him that move.
He watched as the man crumpled with the pain that was undoubtably soaring through his leg. The other men's sneers had vanished, being replaced instead with three, penetrating scowls.
Tony dived at the man on the floor and wrenched the gun the man was grappling with out of his hands. He pulled the catch back, and seriously hoped he didn't look like an idiot. It was common knowledge at Stark Towers he was terrible with guns.
"You've had a sedative, you're not thinking straight, put the gun down." One of the men said. His voice was laden with a thick accent Tony couldn't recognise, but he got the general gist.
"If you get out of my way, tell me where Captain America, Hawkeye and Thor are, I won't shoot you in the face." Tony said calmly, ignoring the other mans request.
"Who do you think you are? You're not going anywhere." The third man said, pulling his gun from his belt and pointing it at Tony. The bullet left Tony's gun.
The man's the gun clattered to the floor as thick, red blood came pouring out of his now partially severed finger.
Tony hadn't actually meant to shoot the guy. It was suppose to go over his shoulder as a warning shot.
"I actually didn't mean to do that." Tony said slightly apologetically as he watched the man yell out in pain as the realisation of what happened suddenly hit him. However, he then pointed the gun at the other two men and shot away at their feet, and they scarpered.
Poking his head through the door, Tony observed the corridor.
It was long, and a metal door almost identical this cells was situated the same width apart from one another. Someone yelled.
"Who's been shot?!"
"Steve?"
"Steve's been shot?!"
"Clint?!"
"Clint's been shot too!"
"I haven't been shot."
"Neither have I."
"Nor have I." Thor's voice boomed through his door. "Incase you were wondering."
Tony had to chuckle at their little discussion. From what he could hear, Clint and Thor were in the same cell, and Steve was by himself.
"Stand back." Tony yelled, and carefully (this time) pointed the door at the lock of the closest cell to him. He pulled the trigger and the door swung open to reveal Steve, sweating furiously and looking agitated. Steve stormed out and took the gun from Tony's hands.
"Thank you might be nice." Tony pointed out, but Steve was too busy thinking to take any notice. Instead, Steve pointed the gun at the second cell, pulled the trigger and Thor and Clint came strutting out in all their glory.
"Thanks Steve." Clint nodded at Steve who nodded back, still looking grim.
"Excuse me, I'm the one who got rid of the guards!" Tony said angrily. He wasn't going to let Steve take all the credit.
"No, you sent two away, and the other two are snivelling in your cell. The other two will be back, and this time there'll be more of them." Steve pointed out, and Tony frowned.
"How the hell do you know all this? What makes you say they'll be more?" Tony asked curiously.
"Because this is our 27th escape plan."
"27th?" Tony repeated disbelievingly, watching as Thor came strutting out of Tony's cell with Natasha over one shoulder and Bruce over the other. Both of whom were still unconscious.
"Yeah, this is the only one you've been awake for." Steve said simply, bending down and pulling another gun off the still snivelling man.
"Wait- what?"
"Thanks though, we weren't going to try again till tomorrow." Steve added, completely ignoring Tony's bewilderment.
"Oi, Nat, wake up." Tony turned around to see Clint rubbing something under Natasha's nose, and her stirring slowly.
"Is it time?" Natasha asked, looking around. "Hi Tony, so you're awake then? At least that's one thing we don't have to worry about..." She trailed off.
Tony was standing there in disbelief as he watched his fellow team mates get ready, and as Bruce stood up and started brushing himself off. They all started talking loudly to each other.
"Do you think you should be talking to loudly?" Tony whispered, scanning both ends of the corridors.
"Relax. They probably don't know we're out yet." Steve said calmly, waving a hand at Tony as the rest of team discussed their escape routes.
"There were four men, two of them have run off, and I couldn't have been asleep the whole time, because I remember trying to tell the time." Tony pointed out. He frowned as he realised no one was listening to him.
"This way Tony, come on." Steve called, and Tony realised they'd all run off down the corridor.
He watched as the five figures pelted their way along the corridor in front of him, but something still wasn't right.
A bird flew over his head.
What was a bird doing inside? He thought, following the bird with his eyes and watching as it clattered to the floor just short of where Bruce's leg was two seconds ago.
The building erupted as the grenade went off, and Tony felt himself being blown backwards and onto the cold hard floor.
He couldn't see through the thick smoke that was engulfing the corridor, and the pieces of rubble. Needless to say, the explosion hadn't done his jaw any favours, and it ached so much.
He closed his eyes, and through the ringing in his ears he could hear heavy footsteps behind him drawing closer. He only hoped that if they found him first, it would allow for the others to get away. If they were able to.
"Ignore him, he's out. Go for the others." Someone said as footsteps slammed past him, Tony kept wanting to flinch as several feet came down dangerously close to his head. Once he was sure they'd all gone past, he opened his eyes.
The smoke and dust had almost vanished, and through the fog he could make out a hoard of men carrying several bodies, coming ever closer to him.
Not wanting to waste a moment, Tony quickly got up and wrenched open a cell door, before slipping inside and leaving the door open. He then hid behind the wall, and jumped. With his outstretched arm Tony grabbed the CCTV camera and pulled it from the wall, leaving only wires dangling in its place. Then he waited.
The door was opened wider and a body was thrown inside, followed by another, and then another. Soon, everyone was in there.
"Where d'ya s'pose Starks gone?" A low voice spoke.
"Dunno. He'll turn up though, he won't go far."
As the man leaned forward to shut and lock the door, Tony jumped out and plunged the camera into the mans shiny bald forehead.
Sparks flew as the wiring crumpled, and the man looked around in confusion and saw just in time as Tony lashed out, kicking the man hard in the nose. The crunching sound was sickening.
A gush of red poured from the mans nose, a hot sticky substance that dribbled in the mans mouth, where it ran across the gaps between teeth and into the gum line. The grin was enough to cause the Hulk to have the creeps.
"Oo yuh fink yuh am?" Said the man thickly through a mouth of blood. Tony couldn't decipher what he was saying so instead rounded on the second man; punching him squarely in the chest. He would have aimed for his face, but the chest was easier for Tony to reach. The man was very tall after all.
The man pounced and attempted to make a pancake of Tony's head as two dinner plate like hands clashed together where Tony's head had been half a second previously.
Ducking, Tony swiftly kneed the man between the legs and he doubled up, wheezing. The man with the blood filled mouth looked slightly uneasy.
Doing a strange pirouette, Tony lifted himself up and kicked the man hard in the side. The impact caused the man to tumble to his side and Tony almost lost balance, had it not been for pride.
As both men lay snivelling on the floor, Tony searched them.
His heart skipped several beats as he found a mobile phone in the inside pocket of the leather jacket. Flicking it open, he dialled a number.
"SHIELD Headquarters..." A woman drawled through the phone line and Tony rolled his eyes.
"Yeah, I don't care. This is Tony Stark. Tell Fury to come pick us up." Tony said, before ending the call and sinking on to the floor where he could nurse his jaw.
It wasn't much, and he knew that if anyone else had tried they'd have done it better, but none the less, he was happy with his result.