Author's Notes: Well, it's safe to say I'm glad that exam's over. My God it was hard! R&R!
I'm thinking of either later in this story or in another story, writing what actually happened to Tony, from when he went missing to the streets to coming home, from his POV [still in third person but his focus]. Not sure whether to incorporate it into this though. Let me know what you think?
Super fast update from me XD wasn't expected, was it? The end of this chapter kinda wrote itself, I wasn't planning for what happens to happen, and it just decided that was what he was going to do. Ah well, I'm sure it'll let me know what it's doing soon…
Chapter Six
He wasn't sure why the suit had triggered the flash. But God it was a horrible flash. He felt as if he was really there, but he had no idea where 'there' was. He felt burning; there was always heat, painful heat, and the feeling of metal piercing flesh. He'd cried out, and was vaguely aware that Pepper came to him, but couldn't focus on her soothing words when he was feeling this much pain. Eventually, the pain became too much, and he fell into a blissful black abyss.
But even that couldn't last for long, for the dreams came.
In the dreams, there was always that haunting voice…
"Short shallow breaths. You'll recover quicker."
It was always the same voice – telling him he'd recover, but from what he wasn't sure. Then there was shouting. He couldn't make out the words, there was just noise. Faintly he saw what looked like a mummy's tomb. He felt himself panicking from it. The next scene consisted of him waking up on what seemed to be a hospital bed.
Opening his eyes slowly, Tony saw the worried eyes of Pepper staring down at him. He tried to smile, but it came as more of a grimace.
"Want to write it down?" she asked him, handing him a pen and the notebook. He had, he wrote all of what he'd seen and felt down.
It was a few days before the media got wind of Pepper "hiding" someone in Tony's house, and there were even a few clever reporters who speculated that it could be Tony himself. Pepper herself refused comment.
It was a few weeks before she saw the scars. She'd accidentally walked in on Tony while he was changing his top, and promptly dropped everything she was holding, gasping.
"What?" he'd asked, then noticing her stare, said; "oh, those. I don't know how I got them. They look like they might be something to do with what I keep seeing but I don't remember getting them."
Covering Tony's back were numerous round scars, about three centimetres in diameter. The same shaped scars were on his chest too. There was evidence that at some point, he'd had to have stitches around almost all of his back.
The shock of the scars had worn off, much like seeing the Arc Reactor for the first time had.
It was a month before she noticed that he wasn't sleeping. She'd stayed living with Tony to offer him some sort of comfort and not leave him alone in a world he no longer knew, and had often thought she'd heard him up late at night, but passed it off as her imagination. But the black circles around his eyes told her a different story.
It was six weeks until he admitted to not being able to sleep, and it was seven when he admitted the nightmares that still plagued him.
And so, Pepper took to staying in the room next to his, listening out for him at night. One the few occasions that he did make a noise, he always screamed. On the quieter nights, she would check on him periodically. Those nights, he was either not sleeping, or muttering quietly under his breath.
"Short shallow breaths. You'll recover quicker."
"No-one can hear you in there. We'll see you in an hour."
He'd always mutter pleas for freedom, seemingly arguing his innocence. On those nights Pepper wouldn't awake him. Those nights he was calmer, and although fitfully, he would sleep all night through. So she left him, praying he'd get better soon.
It was 8 weeks when he first broke down. He'd been in the workshop, working on some project or another, muttering things as he worked. He looked so much like the old Tony that Pepper had instantly assumed he was remembering things.
"It's coming back then?" she'd innocently asked.
In a second his whole mood changed. He threw down whatever he was holding and stood, whirling to face Pepper.
"No it's not fucking coming back! I can read and write and I know all this techno-fucking-babble but at the same time I know nothing and I'm completely fucking useless! I may as well be dead my memory is that bad. I forget my own fucking name every day I wake up, and it's only when you call me that I start to remember the last couple of months with you! I can barely remember being on the streets and I'm damned if I wanna know what actually happened to me when I went fucking AWOL!"
Eyes brimming with tears at the unexpected outburst, Pepper had run from the workshop and then the house. Frustrated and angry at himself for upsetting her accidentally, Tony kicked what he was working on, making Dummy wince. He ignored the robot, and stormed up the stairs, fully intent on finding Pepper, regardless of whether the damned media would see him, and regardless of whether he'd get lost in the process.
She was worth it.
