Warnings: Use of the language foul, uncomfortable subjects
Okay, so yeah, I totally meant to post this yesterday morning but because I am distracted easily by other tasks (sorry, sorry!) and Work has been giving me hell, I couldn't. But! I remembered it today, and I hope you enjoy it because I really only read half of it for errors and made sure I got most in a skim of the rest.
I apologize- again.
Disclaimer: Is in the first Chapter, go back and read it if this is important for you to see every chapter. :3
Gold is a dense soft metal, ductile chemical element and its atomic number is seventy nine. It is one of the least reactive chemical elements solid under standard conditions.
Tony managed to express his need for a phone after these people fed him and Starling. They ate like starved beasts and the food was mediocre but it was still good. An older woman managed to get them warmer clothes and both of them changed. Starling didn't mention to them that she had a bullet wound and if they noticed they didn't seem to say anything.
"Phone" Tony said hiding the light in his chest with a blanket he still kept with him. It was ratty but it was still warm. "Can I use your phone?" Tony asked the older woman and she nodded exiting the room and coming back with a phone that looked much too old.
When Tony hit the green button he heard a dial tone and that was enough for him. He dialed, he dialed a number he knew by heart- and it rang. It felt like forever to Tony, as it rang and then a fumbling noise and the familiar but sleepy "Hello" He heard made him want to burst into tears. No butchered accent, no scary Russian or German or whatever the hell it was- nothing but good old English.
"Steve?" Tony questioned and he heard a sharp intake of breath "Tony?!" it was loud and he recoiled from the way the line cracked.
"Tony, where are you, are you okay? I didn't recognize the number, what happened? I've been looking for you- we all have- where are you?!" The questions were rushed on Steve's part and he could hear the man fumbling to get dressed. The time difference was a bitch, Tony knew that much.
"I'm fine- at least as good as I can be. We need a rendezvous point; I'll tell you about it when I get picked up." Tony didn't mean to sound bitter, or hateful or accusing but it was only natural.
It felt good to know they were looking, but it sucked that they couldn't fucking find him. He can't blame them for not being able to, he couldn't actually say it was their fault. Security in the Tower was obviously shitty and needed an upgrade- again.
"Where are you?" The question was firm and Tony felt his chest ache with a sudden need to just sleep, and be rested and be safe. "I don't actually know" Tony offered up feeling like a jack ass "How are we supposed to come get you if…" Steve drifted off the sound of him walking loud on the line. "Russia somewhere, okay?" Tony snapped and cursed himself for his poor mood.
Starling was sitting next to him in a chair and gazed at him "We're in north east Russia. Tell them that we're in a small town and we need evacuation, trace the call if they have to it shouldn't be hard. We'll be five clicks south west of this town, tell them to track the call and do the math." Starling said in a controlled voice both of her hands pressing on her leg.
Tony stared at her for a long while, wondering why he didn't think of that and relayed the message. "Got that?" Tony said to Steve and the man gave him an affirmative. Tony stayed on the phone long enough to allow SHEILD to get a trace on it before hanging up. He wondered briefly how SHEILD got it so quickly- and then the thought dawned on him that Steve was probably staying at one of their bases for any updates, it was like the good captain to do something like that.
"I can't imagine that will take long" Tony said feeling too tired, feeling too much pain to want to travel however far Five clicks is. "It probably won't" Starling nodded her head looking beat to hell, just like Tony felt. She stood and limped over to the older woman and gentleman that helped then and said a few things. The woman smiled and nodded muttering back and Starling gave her a hug before she managed her way back to Tony. "Alright" She said in a voice of finality.
"Take this" The man said his accent and English was awful. He handed Starling a thick stick with a handle on it- a cane- for her limp and she smiled at him tired and paranoid. Tony watched her, and ignored that he could better see her features. He'll commit them to memory later; right now they needed to leave. After the gracious older couple gave them some packaged bread, a canteen of water and some jackets and scarves and hats they were traveling again. South west, five clicks.
Starling had a good sense of direction and Tony didn't question it, it was dark outside but the lights from the houses eased the travel a little.
Tony groaned his lungs felt full of ice and he coughed a few times into his hands, his cold, numb hands. The warm house made all his limbs tingle now that he was out and about in the cold again they quickly numbed and it was painful. He wiggled his fingers to keep the blood flow good and glanced over at Starling who walked in a jerky manner.
Tony couldn't remember a time where he hated his poor judgment when drinking more and silently vowed not to drink so much anymore. Which, in reality wasn't going to happen soon Tony was an addict, that was for sure and his mind had no qualms with reminding him of that fact? He told himself to shut up promptly and scoffed out loud. Starling glanced back at the noise and stared at him as she picked her feet up to walk through a large pack of snow.
It turned out that five clicks was Five hundred feet. Five hundred feet outside of the town; this was about eight houses long and a street. So when they suddenly stopped and entered the woods; a very thick and small bush really, Tony was surprised. "That wasn't far" Tony said looking at her she shrugged "It wasn't intended to be." Starling glanced around and the silence that greeted them was awful. Who knew how long they had to stay here? Who knew how long it would take them to get to Russia, in the frozen wasteland and find them? And then get them home? It could be hours and Tony didn't know if they had hours to wait.
"I hope they come soon damn it" Tony breathed out the shivering starting all over again. Tony was going to forever hate the cold after this; forever. He huddled down next to her his pants getting wet all over again from the snow- he could feel his body go numb where it made contact with it. The cold was painful, too much so and while they waited he fought with himself to keep from complaining too much. "This must have been how Capsicle felt when he went under." Tony joked out loud trying to ease the tension that was starting to build from his anxiety.
Starling just glanced at him- he could hardly see her in the dark but he could feel her arm where it touched his arm, he could feel her shaking and feel his body respond just as violently to the could. Scarves and jackets aside he was still freezing. "You-you think the-they'll find us out here?" No doubt they were still looking, whoever they were and that didn't sit well with Tony.
"Probably" Starling offered her teeth chattered loudly when she opened her mouth. "Most likely the best we can do is keep our eyes and ears out for any movement." She was trying to sound as if she wasn't afraid, but Tony could hear the waver in her voice. He could feel the tense unsure tone under that pretend strength. Even if it was pretend however, Tony appreciated it.
One of them had to be optimistic; Tony wasn't naturally an optimistic person if he couldn't help himself. If he couldn't think of a plan of attack and escape; he tried though, to stay hopeful.
xxx
I've lost all concept of time Tony thought mildly concerned for himself. Soon, he felt, he would be a Tony-icicle. Which, honestly, that didn't sit well with him and he wondered for maybe the tenth time if this was what Steve had felt when he went under. Captain America might not have felt anything though, if he was already unconscious. The thoughts played over and over in his head, running back and forth.
"What was your favorite song?" Tony asked out of the blue feeling like he just wasted the warm breath for no reason when Starling didn't answer him right away. His mind was foggy and felt hot in the cold with fever. He huddled down closer to Starling against the trunk of a small too thin pine tree.
"My favorite song?" She said sneezing and covering her face with the scarf. She had wrapped her hands in it and was rocking herself to try and create heat. It wasn't going over very well. "C-currently it's a tie between two songs" She stuttered and Tony curled closer to her throwing some of his blanket around her. "Not a word" He muttered feeling like he had no legs. Starling didn't speak of it and neither did Tony as she started to explain the two songs.
"It's a song called 'How many times' and between…" She coughed and sneezed again, "and a song called 'it all belongs to me'" Her voice cracked and drifted. It was too dark still to tell what she looked like, but he figured she was turning blue around the edges. Tony himself felt like he was.
He fought on however- he didn't want to die of hypothermia if he couldn't help himself but if he suffered a bit of frost bite for it he'd rather it be his toes then his fingers. He curled the mentioned phalanges around the inside of the blanket and squeezed his –not-legs- closer to his chest. Starling shoved into him and they both shook hard before weird wet feeling warmth surrounded them.
"S-sing some of that song." Tony said his mind felt like it burned but froze at the same time and he let his fingers tug at the ends of the fur hat on his head. Starling let out a wet sounding laugh and blinked at him. He thought she blinked anyways when he looked at her. "Which o-on-one?" She managed to get out and Tony thought back. Did he already forget?
"The second?" The name was lost to him and that disturbed him almost as much as not feeling his legs below the knees did. "O-okay" Starling said to him and Tony felt her move a little and take a deep breath of the wet air inside the blanket.
"Loving you is hard, I feel like I-I-I'm gunna hurt myself, and I d-don-t wanna do it ba-baby." She tried and even with the stuttering from her shivering, she still had a pretty voice.
"A-and loving you is so har-hard an-and the way you act hasn't been n-no help…y-yeah you got i-it sweet don't you" She paused to breath and took another swing at singing a little more.
"Y-you must be bl-blind, you-you must be dumb, you must b-be trippin' you mus-must-t be craz-crazy; you must be out your damn mind…t-to think I'll let you off that easy."
Tony couldn't help himself, listening to the songs words because it was something to focus on- and he laughed too, loudly and the laughter while cold warmed his stomach a little. It might just be an illusion too; because Tony heard when you started to really freeze to death you start burning up and getting delirious. He didn't want to freeze to death, and so he fought the cold, and yet still he could feel him head swimming when he stopped laughing. "Oh, oops, bad idea" He groaned softly ducking his face into the blanket near her head of hair.
"G-go on sorry" Tony shivered hard and his whole body tensed in retaliation. He tried not to move his body too much because the earth was warm where they melted some of the snow. She felt so hot, and he imagined he did too, because she was holding onto his left arm.
"I-I can't remember s-some of the words…" She offered up with a shrug. Tony nodded his head at her, "Just, where-e-ever is fine. F-fuck its cold" He couldn't help it, he had to complain at least a little. It made everyone feel better, and he was no different.
"H-have a fit s-s-slam the door, that sh-shit belongs to me" Starling picked up her voice a ghost of the actual sound it could make. Tony knew nothing about her, except what he was told which wasn't much. He wasn't stupid though he knew she had a stronger voice then that. She sounded almost tired like she was falling asleep.
"Hey, stay awake, don't leave me here." Tony said in a panic, his heart picking up dangerously when he shifted and wiggled his arm. It was a lot warmer with her clutching it like a toy. When he moved she made a disappointed noise leveling on his mostly numb knees. This was harder then he thought it would be and he grabbed her shoulders and shook her violently. "Wake up!" Tony sounded frightened and even to himself-pathetic but he didn't care. The last thing he needed was someone to die because they were helping him again.
"What?" Starling slurred and her voice sounded rough and wet like water was in it. Tony's mind could explain that one she had an infection, she was freezing to death- she was a lot smaller then he was she was dying those thoughts were enough to make him babble on and ignore the painful numbness in his own limbs.
"I'm a billionaire you know? I when we get out of here and better I'll take us both to Hawaii or no, fuck that the desert in California. Where it's so fucking hot the cold can't exist- except you know in the winter, its cold there in the winter but!" Tony's head was spinning in his panic, his heart rushing blood to his face which felt like it didn't exist much either. "Pretend you're there, burning up in the sun and it's not cold at all; it's a nice summer night and, shit, Starling stay awake" Tony was having flash backs of watching Yinsen die on those sacks of cement and other unmentionables. Despite his lingering guilt and building fear he still managed to hear something odd. The forest and snow was so silent, so hearing a noise that wasn't his voice made him tense.
"Did you hear that?" Tony whispered to her pulling himself closer to her, because she was slumping over slightly. He shook her hard and felt bad when her head knocked against the thin tree behind her. "Uh-huh?" Starling slurred and blinked, and Tony swore colorfully.
"We're being hunted, remember?" Tony whispered harshly, the paranoia he developed while being out here; and from before- made it impossible to calm down now. "What if that is them? What if they found us? We're screwed!" Though the thought of getting caught just to escape the biting cold was tempting to say the least he wouldn't do it though, not yet. Not if he could still move "Come on Starling I need your tactile mind, come on…" Tony felt the fear morph into a sense of hopelessness.
"If I have to carry you away from here, I will" Tony said sternly moving her off the tree and pulling her backwards. He tired to stand but fell when his legs refused to help him. "Crap, Starling come on" Tony wined which he heard was completely unbecoming of a grown man to do. He couldn't bring himself to care much. "Hey, hey, Stay awake" Tony shook her again and her body jolted her head lifting before it fell backwards against the snow and tree limply. "T-tony, shut up" Starling said quietly she rose a shaking hand to her face and rubbed her eyes. "Oh thank god you are awake" He didn't know if he wanted to cry or not yet.
He would deny it if he did, though. "…." Tony listened to nothing- no noise; did his mind fabricate that? "Oh god I'm going to die, I'm starting to hallucinate." He said his eyes felt like lead, but he fought it. "Starling I'm going crazy" He said "Like in that song. I must be trippin" The sound of her weak laugh made his chest ache in a small amount of relief.
Tony wasn't going crazy though- as he found out because the next rustle was louder, and closer and he tensed all over again his numb leg and his aching chest and his burning face reminding him that he might die too. Her hand fumbled forward and touched his arm- and even he could tell that her fingers were crazy cold. She couldn't grip his arm like she might have wanted to. Her fingers were bent slightly and just slid down it. "You heard that?" Starling was nodding off again and Tony scrambled back to her his fingers burning when he really grabbed the snow.
It's a tingling pain, much like when you come inside a warm house from being out in the freezing snow to long in New York or Michigan, the only difference is that it's just tingling, and just pain and no warmth.
He was surprised he could even still tell his hands were cold, that he was cold because he swore his arms were disappearing like his legs were. Blankets or not he was moving around too much, allowing the heat to escape.
All he could do was brace himself as he curled next to Starling when the noises got closer. His heart hammered and his head felt heavy. He listened to the noise like a wounded cat curled and hissing against a tree with its dead babies that succumbed to the cold, except, Starling wasn't dead. Or at least not yet- if she did die of hypothermia or something Tony wasn't quite sure how he'd handle that yet.
The bush covered in matted and half melted snow rustled right in front of them and he held his breath and closed his eyes. He heard more rustling and a gasp and he waited. When nothing happened right away he was curious but his shivering from and his tired eyes refused to re-open to look.
"Tony?" A voice asked and he forced himself to open his eyes despite his lethargic state, despite how much he realized when he closed them how badly he wanted to keep them closed and sleep. His vision was at first blurry and he squinted his eyes at a blinding yellow light that landed on him. He would have raised his hand to block it but he was too busy trying to pretend to feel Starling next to him to do so. "Tony, oh my god, hold on buddy" The voice said and Tony nodded slowly at it not sure saying anything right now was really possible.
Clint Barton His mind supplied him and he felt his entire body sag in sudden, unnatural relief. He could hardly feel when Clint grabbed his blanket covered arm- the ratty thing covering the jacket he had. The hat on his head slid over slightly when extremely warm hands touched his neck to check for a heartbeat. "Sh-shit" Tony said with a small gasp his entire body taking up shaking in a really violent display of weakness and cold.
He heard more footsteps and felt alarmed, but at the same time the thoughts 'try and take me now,' where running around in scrambled sentences in his head. "We're going to get you out of here buddy, okay?" Clint was trying to be comforting- was that what that was? Or was it his training in SHEILD that made him steady and composed and made him sound so darn sure of himself.
"S-starling, Don't…" Tony was being pulled up and there were more people suddenly. Despite the amount of people that showed up –maybe five? Tony couldn't tell- they were quiet in working. He thought he heard someone mention breathing problems but Tony couldn't quite keep up as he was lifted onto a metal and fabric Litter- and covered in more blankets. The ride was jerky, at best, and he fought to keep himself conscious while they moved.
He didn't remember falling asleep, hell he didn't even remember hearing any noise at all from that brief moment of delirious muttering he was sure he did, but when he opened his eyes again he was not freezing to death, but he was warm. Tony was also staring up at a slate grey ceiling in a not-entirely too comfortable bed with white and grey sheets and blankets on it.
He shifted and he panicked for about forty seconds sending a heart monitor to his right –why didn't he notice that before? - Into a small fit of harsh beeps. He took a breath and let it out slowly, his chest ached, his lungs burned and his legs felt like lead.
He wiggled his toes and crowed in delight when he could feel them stiffly move back and forth. "Oh sweet Toes did I lose any of you?" His voice was sleep soaked and cracking but he talked to himself anyways.
"No, you didn't lose any limbs, Tony." An amused and softly cautious voice said from somewhere. Tony blinked and glanced around looking for the noise source- his eyes scanning over it before coming back to it. "Dr. Banner" Tony mumbled staring to push himself up on the bed. I am not a lay in bed type of guy, you see But Banner knew that already.
They talked for ten minutes about his condition, how he was doing and Tony nodded at the information he was given. He had no injuries that were serious, cuts and stiff limbs and a fractured foot which was better then he would have anticipated. "I wouldn't be surprised if the skin on your legs remains patchy and red for a little while, Ice can burn skin too you know and walking through snow like that tends to do some damage." Bruce spoke softly; he had taken to sitting on a stool near Tony's bed.
"Yeah, well, you know me. That whole not listening well thing and all" Tony said raising a hand and letting it flop around in the air dismissively before his finally half-woken brain caught up to his situation.
"Where is Starling?" Tony asked his hand slapping the sheets when it landed and the short sound that followed it was all the sound there was after Tony's question. The silence permeated the walls, and Tony grew restless even with the small hesitation. Music, I need lots of music too. The loud kind- black Sabbath, maybe something even more depressing… He'd have to remember that, too.
"Well?" He didn't mean to sound mean, pushy and maybe even hysterically concerned. Though, Tony already had an excuse for it in his head when Bruce gave him a funny look. "Where is she?" Tony started to move to the side of the bed Bruce wasn't sitting on to stand up, pulling wires off as he went.
"I need to thank her and all, you know, I think I really would have been stuck there since no one seemed to be able to figure out where the fuck I was on their own." Yeah, he was bitter.
"Tony." Bruce's voice was stern and stopped Tony from going on a long tangent about how disappointed he was, followed up by hidden anger at them for their incompetence with unnecessarily cruel jokes about their abilities to search for things. He turned his brown eyes onto Bruce and waited with baited breath stuck in his chest as the good doctor pulled his glasses off and fiddled with them. A nervous habit- Tony noticed it before- and he felt something in his mind break a little. "What?" Tony snapped "Come on Bruce, spit it out I'm dying here" Tony pushed waiting his legs dangling over the side of the bed.
"She's alive, but her condition isn't the greatest." Bruce said at once putting his glasses back on to look at Tony sadly. "She's sleeping right now, and you're welcome to see her if you want. She has a really bad infection Tony, it spread pretty quickly…" Bruce's voice trailed off and Tony felt his entire brain halt and reverse four times. "Okay" Tony said slowly, his face remaining blank as he processed that. "Okay."
Bruce frowned at his friend, and shook his head slightly. Tony was worrisome for a few reasons for Bruce, his lack of peaceful sleep, nightmares of some kind he assumed, and his strangely expressionless face. Tony was a rather odd person to be around. It was hard to tell sometimes what he wanted to do or what he was thinking- and if you had any idea how to read those unreadable looks, it was likely you couldn't keep up with them long enough to get a clear message.
Tony had one of those looks now, and Bruce didn't even try to figure it out as he stood from his stool. Tony got back into the bed to his shock and, really, worry, and just laid there staring at the ceiling again. "I'll go check on her for you, get some rest" Bruce said trying to sound happy, confident but he couldn't. Tony gave a muted nod and his brow scrunched as he lay there, Bruce leaving him with his thoughts not sure if that was a good idea or not.
