Guest Review Responses

Muah: Yay, finally! You have no idea how much i have been pining for a chapter! Update soon please! – YAY! You're here! I hope you like this one, too!

Guest: Hey! I was happy when I saw you updated... Then I started reading it and now I'm sad and depressed...*tries to blink away tears* but you will fix it! (You HAVE to fix it)... Noooo Pepper, don't leave - you've already made that mistake before! What happened to Tony? Why didn't he jump of the building? Not that I want him to, but what made him stop? I thought in 'The Fourth Year' you said he took the drop? Are you gonna somehow, magically find away to get the baby alive again? Or was he never dead in the first place? Is Pepper going away? If she is - is it forever? One more question for you... WHY ARE YOU KILLING ME WITH ALL THESE UNANSWERED QUESTIONS!? – I WILL fix it. In fact, half of it will be fixed by the end of this story. The other half will be fixed in the final story of these Last Chronicles. And by fixing I mean GOOD fixing, not breaking-it-more-to-fix-it, kinda fix.

Guest: EEEK! I can't wait for the next chapie! Updaaaaaate pleeeeeeaaaaaaaase! Ah, gotta go, bye! :D – Here it is! Grab a box of tissues, my Faithful Reader!

Guest: Do we need to beg? Very well. I BEG U...PLZ UPDATE... PLZZZZZ. – No, please don't beg! I wanted to update MUCH sooner. I missed the story and you guys too!

Guest: Hope you update soon! – I wish I could've done it sooner, I swear. But… well, here's why I didn't:

A/N: Remember how I had to sell my house and move? And then how I was homeless for the summer, living with relatives? Then I got a job, and I had to move again. And just as I was happy that everything was getting back to normal, my laptop died. And once I got it fixed, I was in a car accident. A lady rear-ended me and my hubby had to drive me everywhere while my car got fixed. And then I got my car fixed, I sat to write this story… and my upstairs neighbor's kids started a fire in the apartment and the sprinklers went off… and my apartment flooded.

I. Kid. You. Not.

But, here I am, back from the dead, flooded apartment still drying, and I hope that this will hold you up until my next update. I've been going back to re-read all the stories that led us here, and I've tweaked and updated TLM. I just finished re-reading TLS and will also update it soon, and I'll start with T1Y very soon. I'll probably have to re-read them all before I can update again just so that I make sure I get all the answers for you guys. All I ask is that you be patient with me… EXTREMELY patient… time wise and plot wise.

Oh, the plot! The plot of this one rivals T2Y. You remember that one? But there will be Pepperony angst only for a couple of chapters here, tops, not the entire story. Silver linings, right?

And now, on with the story!


Chapter 1: January

What a shitty way this was to receive the New Year: completely alone, save for a few bottles of wine and a pack of cigarettes, sitting on the ground on the balcony of your own home – a building with your goddamned family name written all over it – with a great view of the fireworks around the city that celebrated the midnight ball drop in Times Square, with nobody willing to share the scene, the sounds of people singing Auld Lang Syne, and painfully reminiscing about how perfect one's life was a year ago.

A year ago, Tony Stark had been at the top of the world. His company had been thriving. He had reunited with the woman he loved. He had recently asked her to marry him. And they had been readying to have a baby together – a baby he had not known was his in the first place, but was looking forward to meeting and raising as if it were. He had had everything and anything he had always wanted; everything he had planned for the future of his little family, as if nothing could change so drastically in just a few months. Yet, as with many recent experiences in his life, he had been completely wrong about what the future was going to bring.

He was not sure if it was the bitter cold around him, the falling snow, or the combination of city aromas in the air, but he reeked of pity and despair. He smelled like disappointment and defeat, heartbreak and a shattered soul, sadness and hopelessness, cigarettes and liquor, and he perhaps even carried the scent of death. The scent of death was the one that worried him the most, since the rest he could wash off with a load of cash, a good night's sleep or a warm shower. There was no cure for the smell of death; no absolution in any way, shape or form. The scent of death was carried deep within the body, in the innermost parts of the heart and soul, and once it made home of your innards, nothing short of a miracle would make it disappear.

Nothing short of a miracle – and he had already received too many of those in one lifetime, to expect one more.

"Rhodey, please," Tony said, head hung, his right hand holding his weight against the wall. "I want her back," he then lifted his head to stare at Rhodey and placed his left palm onto his chest. "I need her back, Rhodey. What… what do I need?"

Rhodey swallowed hard, and his once-tense shoulders suddenly sagged. He looked away for a second, and when his eyes returned to his friend, he sighed.

"A miracle, man. That's what you need."

Yes. He had received too many of those.

His first miracle ever, had been surviving a plane crash that had been thought to be the cause of his father's death. The second miracle, had been surviving the one too many times his mechanical heart had given up on him. The third miracle, had been finding his father was alive; and, while he was at it, getting him back in one piece. The fourth miracle had been finding Pepper alive after everything she had gone through under Whitney's hands – even after no one thought she was still alive.

The fifth miracle had come in the form of his redhead and him avoiding certain death at different points in their lives, since he had tasked himself with helping Pepper regain the life she had lost after returning from an almost tragic fate. The sixth miracle was Pepper and he making amends after all the mistakes they had made in the past. Being able to be together after lying to each other, playing games and making stupid decisions in a never-ending spiral of misunderstandings and blinding love, was an enormous miracle in and of itself. Perhaps, even big enough to be called his seventh miracle to date.

The eighth miracle was their son: the little boy who had almost not made it due to the difficulty his development and birth had had on the ginger, but who still had made it to this world in the very end. The ninth miracle was the fact that he himself was still alive and breathing even after finding out Extremis was slowly killing him – an issue he was yet to resolve. The tenth and final miracle he could count on for now, was the fact that Pepper was yet to leave his side once and for all, even though being in the same room at the same time had not been something they had been able to do since the day their son had been lost.

Their son. Lost. Gone. Dead.

Dead, Tony repeated in his mind. Dead as the night he was in. Dead as the year that had ceased to exist, just seconds ago. Dead as his hope that he and Pepper would bounce back from this particular challenge; just as they had been able to bounce back from all the other ones before. Dead as his relationship with his beloved, albeit slowly crumbling wife, seemed to be.

Dead.

Gone.

Lost.

Just like their son.

Oh, the humanity! The irony! The cruel joke of it all!

But saying this was a cruel joke of life just did not cut it. It was more than that. It was a carefully calculated punch to the face, the stomach, the balls, the heart, and the soul. It was the final testament to Tony and Pepper's slowly decaying luck. The cards had already been dealt, the hand used, and the aftermath of the struggles, tries, and trail of sweat and tears had led here; to this point in time. To a reality where his first-born child was just another tombstone in a lonely, cold and bitter graveyard.

Just a memory. Nothing more.

"Memories," Tony whispered before inhaling and exhaling his cigarette for the last time, and then threw it on the floor, next to his feet.

As he eyed the leftover sample of the addiction he had taken up and had been abusing for weeks, and the more time that had passed, the more it seemed to the inventor that memories were all he had left of his thriving days. Slowly but surely, the physical proof of his successful life had been taken away from him, leaving nothing more than pictures, mementos, and vague images in his mind of the good things he had worked so hard to obtain.

His mother had died at a young age. His heart had been damaged for years, and the once cure for it was now killing him. His son had died suddenly, without warning and seemingly without reason, and now his wife was slowly detaching herself from the world and from him.

Memories: all he had left. The one thing he had tried so desperately to make Pepper forget. The one thing he himself now held onto for dear life.

Just memories.

Fuck irony, Tony thought with bitterness and rubbed his eyes with his right index finger and thumb. I don't care what anyone thinks or says: Pepper and I don't deserve this.

Unfortunately for him, someone out there thought that they did, and this individual had been, for many years, taking steps against him and the redhead to ensure that they suffered to their last breath – a last breath that Tony had almost taken, weeks ago, when his son had died.

I need some air.

The genius slowly and stumblingly stood up from the floor of the balcony, clinging onto anything he could to keep his ass from slamming onto the concrete ground. It took his brain, ears, and eyes a few moments to focus. Once the vertigo diminished, he began taking small steps towards the balcony rail.

The snow had picked up in intensity in the last five minutes or so, but he just could not give a flying fuck that he was underdressed for the inclement weather. It had been a while since he had felt anything other than emotional pain. After taking one too many beatings as Iron Man, frigid conditions did not make him bat an eye. In fact, he would have preferred taking a physical pounding at the moment; at least those bruises would eventually heal without leaving a mark.

His hands held onto the rail and he looked down. The scene was much more appealing than the one he had witnessed when on the roof of the hospital after pulling James's cold body from Pepper's disbelieving one. He still remembered what had crossed his mind seconds before he had made the decision to let his body fall to the ground. He still felt regret for what he had almost done to himself and to his redhead. He still remembered the words, uttered by his one and only, that had pushed him off the edge, both literally and metaphorically.

"You… swore…" she licked her lips. "You swore you… wouldn't… let anything… anything happen… to him. You lied…you…lied…"

He froze at her words. He knew what she was talking about. He remembered his promise to her; another promise to her that he had broken. Another empty agreement he had failed to fulfill. From all the times he had failed her, from all the ways he had disappointed her, this was the worst one for him.

All he could think of doing now was running.

So he made damn sure that he did.

He ran out of the room, down the hall, up the stairs, and to the edge of the roof. He stood by it; tempted by the sweet release of death that awaited him should he decide to take the plunge. It was so simple, so easy to take the one step, so much easier to just let go of it all than to deal with the aftermath of this living nightmare that would not end. He could do it too, he knew. There was nothing to stop him from doing so, and by the time anyone found out what he had done, it would have been too late.

As late as it was for his son.

As late as it felt for his own life.

Too late, just as it was to keep the promise he had made to her.

His eyes traveled from the long fall to the contiguous land across the street; the despised piece of property that held the final resting places of many lost souls. The poorly located place of mourning. The unfriendly and unwanted next-door neighbor. The motherfucking lot that would soon hold the lifeless body of James Howard Stark.

Devoid of all care and numb to the world, the inventor took the drop.

He closed his eyes so as to not see when the concrete finally split open his skull, but the feeling of freedom never came. He waited and waited, even flinched in anticipation for a few seconds. But when all he felt was the wind hitting his face and his blood going to his head, he finally opened his eyes to realize that he had traveled no more than two feet, at most.

Dangling from the edge of the roof was his body, held tightly from his left ankle by the man that had been both his savior and condemner at several points in his life. The scowl that marred his face was the sure indicator of his infinite disapproval of Tony's cowardly actions, and the only warning Tony had needed before he braced for what was to come.

Gene tightened his grip on the inventor's ankle before he pulled him up from the edge, over his head, and smashed his back against the concrete floor. The hit made the air inside Tony's lungs come out in one swift move, and he was certain that he had also partially hit the back of his head on his way down. Not having Extremis activated in him was starting to hurt. The lack of oxygen burned him from the inside out, and had he not already been in so much pain as he already was, he would have whimpered in agony when Gene picked him up by his throat to hold him at least two feet above the ground.

"What the hell do you think you're doing, Stark?"

"I was about… to ask you the… same thing, Mandarin," Tony replied slowly as he exhaled in sharp breaths. Gene was both keeping him up in the air and choking him lightly with his left hand, but he was not pressing hard enough to entirely constraint the intake of oxygen in the blue-eyed boy's body.

"What does it look like I'm doing, you ass? I'm keeping Pepper from becoming a widow. I didn't save you and her so many times, just so that you could end it all when the going got tough."

"I…" Tony coughed to clear his throat. "I wouldn't call… my current predicament… just a tough situation. In case… you haven't noticed… my wife and I… just lost our son… you fucking bastard!"

"And your wife was about to lose her husband, too, on the same day, because you're an irresponsible and ungrateful son of a bitch!"

Without warning, Gene let go of Tony's neck. The inventor hit the ground; this time, face first. He was able to somewhat cushion the blow by protecting the front of his body with his arms and legs, but the effort would later show itself when bruises formed on his elbows and knees. He remained where he had landed, taking in the much needed air that Gene had deprived him of, and when he finally felt ready to squabble with the man before him, Tony stood up.

"Are you done here?" Tony asked, eyes narrowed, as he cleared his clothes and skin of the dust he had acquired in the last couple of minutes. "I have to go say goodbye to my son."

"I think I should be asking you that question, seeing as you almost didn't get to say goodbye to him, but instead were just about to join him."

"What are you: my conscience, now?" Tony spat and threw his hands in the air. He knew there was no one to really blame for his son's fate, but that did not make the pain go away.

The amount of anger, sadness, and frustration he currently felt could not be released on anyone he truly cared about without running the risk of deeply hurting them. Gene, however, him he could tell off all day long. Gene was the one person Tony had not wanted to see at the moment, but he was also the one person he could unleash his anger against without remorse.

"Don't you have something better to do, Gene? Like, let's say, torturing those new recruits that are not yet Tong-ready material?"

"You're very lousy at giving thanks, Stark."

"Giving thanks? For what?"

"For stopping you from making a mistake, for one. And for two, for my generosity and mercy at not just doing Pepper a favor right now and ridding her life of your petty one."

Tony rolled his eyes. "Is that all you have to say? You sound like a broken record, you know?"

"You should know what that sounds like," Gene smirked. "You've told her the same story, over and over again, about how you wouldn't let anything happen to her or your son, and yet they have both been in grave danger thanks to you… not in spite of you."

Tony held back a growl. "Think you can do a better job than me?"

"I know so. And if it wasn't because Pepper feels so strongly for you, I'd have taken her away with me a long time ago. I should've just found her on my own and let you think she was gone. She should've been with me."

The scowl on Tony's face slowly turned into a look of shock when it finally dawned on him what the Mandarin had meant to imply – when Tony finally understood why Gene had helped them both. All this time, the blue-eyed boy had thought that Gene's protectiveness over the redhead originated from the loyalty Pepper had once had for the Mandarin alter ego. Or perhaps due to the same sense of innate guardianship that had made Happy and Rhodey watch out for their friend.

Tony had been mistaken, however, and he could now see that Gene's feelings for Pepper were beyond those of a simple friendship or brotherly love. Gene had been there for Pepper when Tony had not. Gene had only responded to Tony's inquiries for help when he had learned that Pepper's safety was involved. He had all but tortured Whitney for the sake of Pepper's recovery. He had taken matters in his own hands to assure that the blonde could never harm the redhead ever again. He had been the one Pepper had turned to when Tony had made the wrong moves. Gene had been the one that had done everything in his power to see a smile form on Pepper's face, even if that meant letting her go.

Gene had done, in his own way, the same things that Tony had attempted to do for his one and only, in an effort to right any wrongs. And the only reason that Gene Khan would devote his time and efforts to ensure the happiness of Pepper Potts was the same reason why Tony Stark went to great lengths to protect her. Tony Stark had thought himself different from Gene Khan in many regards. Yet, for the first time since ever meeting him, the inventor now found one truly genuine common denominator in their lives: they both loved Pepper Potts.

And at this very moment, Tony felt that perhaps Gene was better suited for his wife. Perhaps Gene Khan, despite his arrogant nature and power-hungry lifestyle, was the actual perfect match for his redhead. Perhaps, it appeared to him, that Gene Khan was the one person who could give Pepper the one thing Tony Stark himself could never hope to reward her with: a happy, fulfilling, long, danger-free life.

"Thinking of jumping off again?"

Tony closed his eyes and exhaled slowly. The timing was impeccable for his visitor. For a moment, Tony wondered if Gene Khan just knew when to show up. Perhaps he had rigged his tower to have hidden cameras watching the couple's every move. Or perhaps he just had a way of sensing when Pepper was in distress. Whatever the reason or method was, it would never cease to amaze the inventor how in tune with their lives Gene Khan truly was, despite how far away he lived.

"You can say yes," Gene said and walked closer to the rail to stand to Tony's left. "This time, I won't stop you."

"I'm not jumping," Tony finally opened his eyes to stare at Gene from the corner of one of them. "That won't solve anyone's issues."

"You're a slow learner," Gene said.

"But I learn," Tony replied before he closed his eyes again when a memory of his better days, returned to him.

He had spent the last hour pondering the same question over and over again, and there was no solution in sight to his predicament. Pepper had become an indispensable part of his life – both as a friend and as the person he loved romantically – and he could not imagine living his life without her with him in at least one of the aforementioned capacities. Becoming friends again had been easy enough so far, and he had picked up on the possibility that Pepper was starting to see him in a new light, too, but he could not afford to be naïve about it. Pepper was safer not being romantically involved with him; being his friend was already dangerous enough.

His logical side told him, however, that it was not up to him to make this choice for her. They were, or had been at some point, a couple. The decision to stop seeing each other should be one that involved both of their points of view. Nevertheless, given the current circumstances, it was his decision and his decision alone to make.

He knew he would have wanted to have some say in whether they remained together if the tables were turned, but he was a coward and preferred not to delve in the possibility that she would choose to stay by his side despite the dangers, because that would entail her trusting him to make sure nothing got in their away again. He was too scared to break that trust and let her down – again. If she did stay and something even worse happened to her because of it, he would hate himself for the rest of his empty life, which would not be long once Gene Khan found out, anyway. He preferred never to let her that far into his heart ever again than face the fact that he felt inadequate to protect her.

And for that too, he hated himself. Where was the young man that did not back away from a challenge? Where was the young man that had survived in spite of the odds? When had he lost his nerve?

He did not have to think about it much to pinpoint the moment he had lost his nerve. He knew he had lost part of his bravado when he had found her nearly-dead body in the submarine. There he had been, suited up and ready to take on anything, and nothing he had in his large arsenal of weapons could have made it right for her; nothing ever would. He had been lucky that Gene had been around to help him or he would have died searching for her.

However, at the end of the day, all the pondering, all the wondering, all the musings, all the questions and possible worse-case scenarios in the world always came back down to a simple fact; an undeniable truth: he loved her. He truly and absolutely loved her – he loved her too much to let her go.

Maybe I don't have to let her go, he thought. Whitney, Stane and Zhang were the only ones that ever really tried attacking Pepper to get back at me or make me do something I didn't want to do. There are hardly any villains left thanks to Justin Hammer… and the ones that are around… Pepper could take them down on her own if she wanted to…

Oh, how wrong he had been! Again! Letting her go should have been his answer. Letting her go should have been his only action plan. Letting her go, just as Gene had done, should have been his only choice.

"She's not any better today," Tony said when his mind decided to give him a break at remembering all the times he had had the opportunity to prevent this painful life for her that he had forgone. "I'm sure you can break into our room if you wanted to, but I haven't dared to do that. I… I haven't seen her in a week. But I know she's in there."

"How long are you going to let her grieve on her own?" Gene asked in a tone that Tony surprisingly found to not be one of condescension, anger, or accusation, but only of true concern for Pepper's wellbeing.

"As long as she needs," Tony replied when his eyes opened again. "I… I've knocked on the door. I've sent her messages through the pod. I've written her letters and snuck them under the door. I've e-mailed her. I've called her. I've even spoken to her from outside the room. I've told her how I feel. I've told her that I love her and that I miss her and need her. I've… I've let her know that we need to mourn together. But she doesn't answer me. She hasn't said a word to me since the funeral."

The funeral, which had been on December 24th, on top of it all.

"Maybe it's time you barge in there," Gene suggested. "I can't speak from exact experience, but the loss of a loved one is something no one should have to deal with alone."

Tony shifted his head slightly to the left to face Gene, whose eyes were staring into the horizon as he thought about his own mother's death at the hands of Zhang, his face serene. When the genius' head returned to the front again, he instantly remembered all the times he or Pepper had walked away and had let the other deal with pain on their own.

She had run away when she had found out that she was adopted and she had asked him to leave her alone – and he had complied. He had walked out on her in the Makluan Temple when she had been begging him to stay and talk things out. She had walked out of his life after she had realized what he had had Gene do to her memories. He had walked away on her, albeit briefly, when he had found out that she had had Gene affect his memories as well.

And now, Pepper had walked away from him, from the entire world, the moment he had had Nurse Owen drug her so that he could tear their son out of her hands. Tony doubted there was any fixing this particular detachment in a long time, perhaps even at all; mostly because he had no idea how to start making things better for them both.

"You're probably right. A week without seeing her is enough," Tony said. "She may say she doesn't want to see me, but I want to see her. I want to be there for her."

"Then, you should."

"I will," Tony said as he saw Gene become enveloped in the power of the rings to turn into the Mandarin.

"And while you're at it," Gene began, "Make sure she knows that this didn't happen because she was not here enough when she was in school."

Tony's head recoiled.

"She-she thinks that? How do you know that? Did she tell you?"

"No," Mandarin said, three feet above the balcony ground. "She told her box."

Before Tony could truly understand what Gene had meant, the Mandarin was gone in the blink of an eye, leaving Tony to ponder what he could do to help his wife, and wondering if he had just truly had the Mandarin visit him to give him helpful advice, of all things. The inventor then stared at the dying fireworks until they were completely faded. Once the New Year's celebration in the Big Apple started coming to an end, Tony decided it was time to take matters into his own hands.

He turned around in place, headed back inside his home, and made sure that the balcony doors were closed and locked. His once always-pristine, high-rise penthouse had not been cleaned in weeks. The genius had made the living room his new bedroom even though there were plenty of other rooms available in the home. Pepper had refused to let him inside what had once been their room, and Tony had refused to break down the doors or remove the locks to go inside. The last thing Tony had wanted to do was to further pressure the ginger into doing or saying something they would both later regret.

He had been sleeping on the couch since they had returned home after the baby had died, and neither he nor Pepper had dared to go inside the nursery. In fact, all the Christmas decorations, tree and unwrapped gifts included, were still adorning the entire floor. He had tried to clean up the painful reminders of how their first Christmas Eve's day as a family had turned out to be, but the moment he had stared at the gifts below the tree, particularly the ones with James's name on them, he had simply broken down. He did not cry, however; he had not done so at all even if his heart was begging for release. Yet, a meek glimpse at what would have been his son's first Christmas experience was all he needed to abandon the cleaning task altogether.

Many people had come to the funeral even though it had been inadvertently scheduled on a day of celebration and family gatherings. Many more had sent their regards and condolences in the form of letters, cards, flowers and gifts. Tony had been surprised when he had found out that some of the former hospital inmates that Pepper had met when she had woken up after the Whitney-induced ordeal, had sent the couple sympathy gifts as well. Tony had no idea that the impact Pepper had left on the Tripped on the IV Line Guy and the Burst My Spleen Guy had been so powerful. But then again, it had not taken Pepper long to earn his trust and attention, so he figured that the fact that even Glenda Barnes (and many more of the girls Pepper had helped save from the Maggia, and their fiancés who had been forced into the gang), Dr. Betty Ross, Janet Van Dyne, Jean Grey, and Captain Carol Danvers had also sent condolence tokens, spoke volumes of the lives the ginger had changed and touched. Even Maya Hansen and Scott Summers had sent their regrets.

The board members, save for Mitch Richards, had all showed up at the burial as well. Bambi, Happy, Virgil, Diane, Howard, and Trish had all teamed up together and had taken over the company issues for now. They had even been in charge of making sure that the Annual Stark Solutions Christmas Party still took place. The event had not been as lively as the years before; especially when a moment of silence had been observed in the CEOs' honor, but everyone else's lives could not be placed on hold.

Loretta had called several times, and she had even flown from Pittsburgh to New York a couple of times already to talk to her daughter who had refused to acknowledge her adoptive mother, or anyone for that matter, during the funeral and burial of her only son. Loretta's efforts had been in vain, though, since Tony had not allowed the woman to even come inside the living room. The same had been the case for Rhodey and Happy, and not even the stubborn Roberta Rhodes had made it past the stairs that led to the floor they were on.

Jarvis had tried cleaning after them, cooking for them even, but Tony had not allowed the faithful butler to come near his home at all. Everyone in the family had tried showing their support in one way or another, but Tony had eventually left them all out of the penthouse by blocking access to the entire floor. It was not as if he did not need or want their help, but he truly believed that until he and Pepper could work things out, the interference of outside parties would only hinder the already painful road to recovery they both had ahead of themselves.

Gene had been the first and only person so far to have seen him since the funeral, and not even the inventor himself had seen the redhead in days. He had kept a close eye on her vital signs, however, by using the systems he had installed in the home after that night scare when he had thought his son had been kidnapped. The cameras in his bedroom, though, were all covered by whatever Pepper had used to keep him from watching her from afar. She had not been able to do much about the infrared and other sensors, but the live feed cameras she had made sure to kill off almost immediately after Tony had "moved in" to the living room.

Tony knew that Pepper was still alive and breathing, and he had caught notice of certain food items gone missing from the kitchen at certain points during the week, suggesting that Pepper had snuck out of the room to eat when he was not around or asleep. His clothes had also slowly appeared in the living room, and many of his personal belongings that he had kept on his side of the room had also found their way into the living room and/or kitchen. It had only taken her three days to fully kick him out of their bedroom, but the message had been received by the inventor on day one, the moment she had rigged the locks: get out and stay out.

"Enough is enough," Tony walked towards the double doors that kept him from seeing his wife. "We need to talk this out. We need to be together right now."

He stood by the doors for a moment, inhaled deeply, and then knocked on the door. To his surprise, before his words even left his lips, the door opened up when his knuckles made contact with the wood. His gaze then traveled to the knob that had been locked for days. He quickly realized that the bolts were there no more. He lifted his eyes once more to stare at the empty bed before him, and he then slowly and carefully made his way inside the bedroom. He took only a couple of steps inside before he completely stopped and allowed his eyeballs to analyze the scene.

As he had suspected, he found half-eaten snacks, some still in their wrappers, throughout the room. The curtains were open, but the blinds were closed, and upon further inspection of the camera equipment, he came to the realization that Pepper had inked over the lenses with permanent marker. The bed was unmade and littered with clothes. For a second, Tony feared that he had just walked in to Pepper packing up to leave for good.

"Pepper?" Tony gulped. He took a fearful third step and then a fourth, and soon his legs took him to the wall-to-wall closet they both shared. He was partially relieved when he saw that her clothes were still there, as were the luggage bags, but the panic button had already been pressed within him. His fears led him to the bathroom when he saw that the light was on, and when he partly opened the door to said room, he gasped in surprise.

"No!"

He slammed open the door and ran inside, almost in disbelief of what he was seeing. While the chaos in the bedroom had been shocking, it had been more than expected given the circumstances. The utter disarray in the bathroom, however, was indicative of something much more menacing and serious than some dirty clothes on the bed.

"Pepper!" Tony yelled at the top of his lungs while he fell to his knees to analyze the evidence before him more closely. "Pepper, are you in here?"

The shower was clean and dry, but the outer floor was not. Even though various items covered the tiled ground – towels, shampoo bottles, makeup bags, bath sponges, feminine hygiene products and the sort, the three most prominent objects for the inventor were the red locks of hair, the scissors, and the blood. Mostly, the blood.

"No, Pepper. What have you done?"

He grabbed one of the beautiful locks of hair to quickly confirm that it had belonged to his wife. In the years following the Whitney incident, Pepper had been proud of how long her hair had gotten. It had reached her waist, even if she had had it layered, and its wavy shape that Tony loved so much had made its appearance a few times when she did not pull it up or when she did not feel like straightening out her hair in the morning.

The hair on the floor explained the scissors, but it did not explain the reason why the scissors, a few towels, and the floor were covered in fresh blood.

"PEPPER? Pepper! Where are you?"

Even though he was still shaken, Tony stood up from the bathroom floor. He frantically searched for Pepper everywhere in the penthouse; nursery included, much to his sorrow. He briefly panicked when he realized that the security system had been turned off, the cameras rigged, and that her Stark Pod had been left behind, shattered into a dozen pieces scattered on the penthouse lab's floor. It was not until he remembered that he still had a way to find her that he saw the light at the end of the pitch dark tunnel.

Time was of the essence, however, and without the ability to put on his suit, his options to get to her fast and in a hurry were limited. He had no idea how long ago she had left the penthouse. Gene had not said anything about Pepper leaving the building, so her departure must have occurred either just before the Mandarin had arrived or shortly after he had left. He doubted that Gene had aided her in escaping her self-appointed prison but, for a moment, he did wonder if the Mandarin had made good on his promise to keep Pepper safe at all costs.

No, Tony shook his head to clear his silly thoughts. The tracker… the tracker says she's still nearby. I just… I just need to go get her back.

He transferred the coordinates of the location of her arm tracker – the same one he had used on her during the Maggia stakeout – to his Stark Pod. He gave the device a few seconds to name said location, and when he realized where she was, he breathed a sigh of relief. Of course she had gone back to that forsaken place! She had done so the first time she had felt cornered in her life! He had actually forgotten that said location had held a deeper meaning for them in the past before the Maggia had taken it over, but it was simply because it was also another place where Pepper had almost died.

Tony knew that after the FBI had cleared the place of everyone and everything in it, the location had been deemed a condemned property. This fact, however, would not stop anyone from entering the building if they so wished to, especially when that someone wanted to be anywhere except at home. This was exactly what Pepper was looking for: a way out – a place to be that was not her own; a place where she could rest in peace.

As he ran towards the exit of the home, down the hall, and towards the private elevator that would take him to the executive garage, Tony could not help but to worry about what he would find once he arrived at the abandoned warehouse. He did not fear breaking city ordinance by trespassing into a dilapidated building. He did not fear facing the wrath of his wife when she saw him there. He did not even fear the earful he would get from their friends and family when they found out what had occurred.

The only thing that Tony Stark truly feared at this moment was arriving too late. The only thing that the billionaire could not help but to be terrified about was arriving at a scene where nothing could be done for his redhead. Losing her was the only thing that truly frightened him, and the shadow that still permeated his home from time to time – the one that had managed to infiltrate it for many years without being seen – knew that very damn well.

Stay put, Pepper. I'm going to get you back.

xxxXXXxxx

When Pepper had mentioned to him, years ago, that the Stark Bike should be able to fly (or at least his and hers should), he had considered the option as a viable possibility. He had not gotten around to actually working on the design modification until a few months ago. The fact that he had found himself with plenty of time after he had been released from the Helicarrier and had been left with no option but to quit Iron Man business, had led to him creating and modifying many inventions he would have never otherwise made a reality if time had not been on his side.

Strapping on an XS-117 in the RT-149 would soon become one of the best ideas Pepper had ever given him since, unbeknownst to her, she had given him, years ago, the means he needed to search for her now that his suit of armor was not to be touched by him.

Almost there.

The Stark Pod's beeping intensified as Tony's moving location got closer to the warehouse. Had he not seen the cloud of thick smoke that stood out even in the dark, early hours of the New Year, his speed would have not just increased to unsafe limits. Just as the day he had ignored all the warning signs of his armor when he had rushed to the hospital the night he had found out that Pepper was with child, Tony turned off the alarms that told him that flying his Stark Bike at neck-breaking speed was not ideal for the preservation of his life, especially with the amount of alcohol in his system. All he wanted was to get to the warehouse already. As he swiftly and gracefully landed on the ground, he silently prayed and hoped that Pepper was not inside the inferno that had once been their safe house.

He took out his pod from his pocket and quickly made use of it to find the location of the tracker. The fire that was currently ravaging the building was intense; it made his search that much more difficult for him. The smoke wasted no time in affecting his nostrils and eyes, and he instantly regretted ever killing Rhona Erwin, as it had been this action that prevented him from being Iron Man when he needed it the most – just as it was the case now.

Come on, Pepper. Where are you? Please be OK! Please be outside!

He used his pod to scan the area, including the flames that now reached several feet into the air. The falling snow was keeping some of the fire at bay, but it was not strong enough to put out the blaze altogether. The few minutes he had so far spent looking for her felt like hours to him. It was not until he heard an explosion nearby that made him turn around towards his bike that he realized that Pepper was very much alive.

"What the hell?"

At first, he had thought that the small explosion behind him had been instigated by the fire itself. But when he saw that another fire had just erupted – a fire that was now slowly melting away his Stark Bike – and he saw that Rescue was standing near it, his mind could not help but to put two and two together even though the complete picture did not make sense to him; even if he did not want to believe what he was seeing.

"Pepper… why… what are you doing?"

The first response he got from Rescue was a physical one, in the form of her lifting his scorching bike above her head, flying a few feet above the ground, and then all but throwing it into the larger fire that was the slowly collapsing building. The burning bike hitting the blaze caused yet another explosion, one that just added more fuel to the proverbial fire that was about to erupt between husband and wife.

"Rescue, what is the matter with you?" Tony demanded as he watched the armored heroine land three feet before him. "Have you lost your mind?"

"No," Rescue responded behind the helmet before she pulled back the faceplate. "What I lost was my son."

"Our son," Tony corrected her while he put away his pod. "We both lost him, Pepper. We both suffered the same loss."

"No, we didn't," Pepper retracted her suit into its backpack form as she closed the distance between them. "I lost it all. But you, Anthony Stark, didn't lose a thing."

This was the first time Tony had seen Pepper in days, and the first time he had heard her speak since she had screamed at him to not let the nurse take away baby James from her. He could immediately tell, however, that his was not the same Pepper that he had married and whom he loved with every inch of his life. This was not the same Pepper he had made love to, many times before. This was not the same redhead that had saved him a million times over in ways he could not even begin to count.

This woman before him was just a shadow of who she had once been in her life. And if he did not think of something better to do, better to say, he feared that she would forever be lost – forever beyond reach, for him.

"Anthony?" Tony repeated despite knowing better than to question the way she had just addressed him. "What do you mean we didn't, and why… your hair… you… you're bleeding, Pep!"

With the dark skies around them, it had taken the mere foot between them combined with the fire near them for Tony to finally see the consequences of Pepper's actions in the bathroom. Her once extremely cared-for hair was now uneven; the various lengths having no rhyme or reason at all. It was clear that she had tried to cut it without care, and when he saw that the hair did not have the blood he had seen on the scissors, his eyes immediately began scanning her entire form.

Finding the injury was not difficult once he focused on searching for it, and he could not help himself but to hold her right arm in his two hands. Pepper tried pulling away from his hold a few times, but even without Extremis activated in him, he was still much stronger than she was.

"What did you do to your arm, Pepper?" he asked as he took out a handkerchief, one that she had given him many Christmases ago – the only one he had left of the full set after the mutated crow attack had destroyed the rest – and he quickly used it to stop the bleeding on her arm by tying it around the wound.

"Did you cut yourself by accident?"

"Let go," Pepper said and finally pulled her arm away from him. "The tracker. I was trying to cut out the fucking tracker you put in me. But it's now embedded in my tissue because it's been there for so long. I can't get it out without cutting a hole in my damned muscle!"

"I… you…" Tony swallowed hard. "You don't have to cut it out. I can… I can turn it off, permanently."

"I don't want it off!" she spat. "I want it out of me! I want nothing to do with it, or you! And that stupid piece of shit will always lead you to me! I don't want it to! I want it gone!"

"Pepper," Tony said in the calmest tone of voice he could produce despite his racing heart. "Just… just calm down, Pep. Let's talk about this, alright? Let's go somewhere else and talk about it, please."

"NO!" Pepper yelled. "There's nothing to talk about! You betrayed me, Stark! You let Jimmy die! You let MY son die!"

"Pepper! I… I didn't let him die!" Tony shook his head. "He was already gone when we got to the hospital. He was… he was long gone by the time we got there. Remember? Even by the time Rhodey called us… even then he–"

"LIAR!" she interrupted him, days of seething anger finally coming out. "You just didn't want me to be with him. You didn't want me to spend time with him after I finished with school. You wanted him all for yourself! You wanted him to be with you only or with no one else!"

"Pepper, are you hearing yourself?" Tony's hands were up in the air in what he prayed resembled a calming gesture. "You-you… you're not making any sense. Why would I kill my son, Pep? Why would I purposefully hurt him? I loved him, Pepper. Just like I love you. Why would I do that to him?"

"Because, Anthony, that's what you do to the ones you love. The ones you care about. Anyone in your life, for that matter. You hurt them. You put them in danger. You let them die."

Tony opened his mouth to reply, but nothing but a small whimper came out. How could he deny her claims? How could he deny the accuracy of her statements when she had been at the nasty end of the hissy fit of his enemies?

When his attempt at saying anything at all failed again, Pepper took advantage of his lack of retort and continued telling her husband exactly what she thought about him; exactly what she had been telling herself for the past week when it became evident to her that Tony was here to stay, even if she did not want him to. Even if she could not stand his guts.

"Can't say that it's bullshit, huh? You just can't. I know you can't. You can't because you know it's true. Me, your dad, Rhodey, Arthur Parks, Obadiah and Whitney Stane, Maya Hansen… my son…" Pepper shook her head. "All of us, all of your loved ones," she air-quoted the last two words, "You've always found a way to make our lives miserable. You just live for it, don t you? You just can't be happy unless someone else suffers because of you, huh?"

"Pepper… no… I… I don't try… I… I don't want…"

"You don't try to, what? To hurt us? You just have a natural talent for it? You just know what to do, what to say and when, so that we, the ones that had stuck by you your… your entire life, we… we…"

She closed her eyes when tears began to sting and her throat began to close. Tony took advantage of the opportunity to embrace her. He felt her flinch on first contact and, for a moment, he swore she was going to scream or push him away. Instead, she pushed herself closer to him as much as she could. A second after she let out a painful sounding sob that stabbed him in the heart, a flare of fire exploded near them, ending what could have been a tender moment between them – what could have been a swift solution to the misplacement of their heightened feelings.

"NO!" Pepper took a step back, and Tony had enough sense to not force her to stay in his arms. "I can't do this again! I can't just let you off the hook! It's your fault! It's your fault my son is dead!"

"OUR son, Pepper! And how is it my fault? I… we, we weren't even there when it happened! When whatever it was that killed him, did so!"

"That's right!" Pepper nodded in great approval. "We weren't there because Rhodey wanted us to take a break! A break from us trying so hard to fix the fucking virus you injected yourself with just so that you could go on being Iron Man!"

"Pepper, if I hadn't done that, my heart would've given out."

"I know," she deadpanned. "You only did it to help yourself. Just like everything else you do. It's always for your benefit and no one else's."

"I do what's necessary to remain able to protect the ones I care about, Pepper. You should know that. I've done some crazy things, but only because I wanted no one else to have to do them. Anything I've done for the past four years, Pepper… maybe even for the past six, has been to protect my family. To protect you."

"And how successful have you been? Please, tell me about how your ideas have kept me safe! Didn't Whitney take me and you didn't even notice? Wasn't a bounty placed on our heads because of you? Didn't you want me to die giving birth to another one of your kids? Isn't that what your plan was?"

"What?" Tony took a step back and shook his head as if it would help with seeing any heads or tails of what Pepper had just said to him. "How… how can you even think I'd want that?"

"Well, I'm not sure how much I can help with that," she begrudgingly admitted. "Maya's the one who would know what to do there. I can try to replicate it to create an antivirus of some sort, but not until S.H.I.E.L.D. gives us that data we requested can we even think about purging Extremis from you. We don't know what it might do to you at this point. It may undo the repair it did to your heart."

"I know. And thanks to your help, I know I can wait for that, but… but that's not my point."

"OK. What's your point, then?"

"Well," he hesitated again, stared left and right, and then stared at her once more. "If the virus is not in me anymore, and we can find who's behind these break-ins at home and stop him, I'd like to… for us to… have more kids."

"It… it all makes sense," Pepper said in between crazy-sounding chuckles, her hands holding the sides of her head. "You-you know I can't safely have another baby of yours… and yet… and yet you wanted me to do it anyway. That night… that night that Jimmy died… you told me you wanted us to have more kids… you… you knew Jimmy was going to die… and you were getting ready to get me pregnant again so that I would die to. You… you just wanted to get rid of us… you wanted to be freed of having to care for us!"

"Bullshit!" Tony yelled, his anger finally getting the best of him. "Stop coming up with stupid ideas, Pepper! You're just drawing at straws now, out of grief! You know fucking well this is not true. You know I'd rather die before I purposely hurt you!"

"Then why don't you? Then why don't you die!"

Her angry response was followed by the suit coming back to life and covering her body. Tony's jaw dropped when he saw her activate the armor's offensive systems and aimed them all at him. In the blink of an eye, he was a sitting duck, red dots all over his form, and it would only take one of his own weapons touching him for him to be killed. He knew his weapons like the back of his hand, and he knew that Pepper knew them as well as he did. What he had never known until this moment, however, was that Pepper would one day use his own inventions against him. What he had not anticipated – what he had never even considered – was Pepper finally seeing him as the one target that she needed to destroy to save her own life.

He had nowhere to go; nothing to protect himself with. He had no Extremis, no suit and no weapons, no one to call on and, most importantly, he did not have the will to come up with any solution to his current predicament, as he knew that any involvement from anyone else would result in Pepper suffering the same fate he had once endured. S.H.I.E.L.D. would not stand for this. Nick Fury would not let this pass. He would use this to forever get his way out of Stark Solutions. He would use this to make his flying fortress Pepper's new permanent home.

No. He just could not do that to her. He could not let her be the villain in this. He could not let her make the same mistake he had made before, when his anger had blinded him enough to sadistically take someone's life. She was not a killer. She was not a deranged soul. She was not corrupted in the heart as he now was after years of tribulation and despair. She had a choice. A choice he knew he did not believe he had – a choice he did not want to take: letting her go.

He had been here before, many times, staring at the barrel of the gun. Even when he had thought Rhona Erwin would do to him what no else had been able to do before, he had lived through that. It had been thanks to Pepper's interference, sure, but he had found a way out. This time, however, the one person that was responsible for his current predicament was the same one that had saved him from them before. This time, the only way to save his redhead from walking down the same path of destruction he had become a frequent traveler of, was to do what Gene had done: letting her go.

It always came down to that. Letting her go, even if he loved her – even if he would surely be in pain forever because of it, it was the only way to keep her safe from herself, from him… from it all.

He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, partially savoring the moment he knew would come to an end quick, fast and in a hurry. He took in her presence before him, engrained in his mind not the derailed form of her she was presently in, but the happy, collected and loving version of her he had grown accustomed to. The version of her that made him weak in the knees and still made him nervous to be near. The version of his girl, his heroine, his friend, his wife, the love of his life – the version of her he had somehow managed to kill.

"Any last words, Stark?" Pepper asked in a steady voice even though she could feel her body tremble. Tears fell down her cheeks, her lips quivered, and her heart was racing. She was not sure why she was even doing this at all. She did not want to kill Tony… she loved him, with all her heart and soul. Despite it all, despite how much her life had been changed for the worse since she had met him, she still loved him. So very much.

"Yes," Tony swallowed hard and opened his eyes again. "I… I have some last words."

"Well then," she found herself saying even though she knew there was no chance in the universe that she would ever pull the trigger on any of the dozens of weapons she had aimed at his body. "What are they? What do you have to say for yourself?"

"Two things," he began as his knees slowly hit the snow-covered ground and his raised arms ended on either side of his head. His eyes glued to the faceplate's brightly lit orifices that he knew held her eyes… and he wished he could see her hazel orbs one last time. Then again, they were currently filled with anger and hate towards him, and this was not how he wanted to remember them or her.

He took another deep breath and another deep swallow before he finally found his voice once more.

"The first one: I'm sorry. But I think you already know that."

"Yes," she replied, the blazing fire reflecting off her armored suit. "And it doesn't help at all. What's the second?"

"The second: I…" he inhaled through his nostrils, "I want a divorce."

The moment his statement made it to her ears, every single one of her weapons went offline. She slowly lowered her arms to her sides and stood still before him for a brief instant. She opened her mouth to say what had just crossed her mind, but the minute she remembered the fate of their son, she forced herself to eat back her words.

"Very well," she uttered. "You'll get what you want."

Without warning, the ginger took to the skies, hanging in the air for a nanosecond to take in his form, yet he did not even bother to look up at her. When the words he had just said repeated in her mind, she closed her eyes and took off.

Later on, after Happy had been sent to his location with Pepper's jetpack to get Tony Stark back home, and after Tony had arrived back at his penthouse to find that Pepper's belongings were gone, it was then that it finally dawned on him the extent of his last words to her. She was gone, from his life, for better or for worse.


A/N: Fix it, I will. Now leave a review to tell me how much you love to hate me. Pleaseee?