The Characters and the plot of this story belongs to Marvel Studios.

Sucker Punch

Liz

Aftermath of the Battle

We won.

Well, won is an overstatement. Half of Manhattan is destroyed, many lost their lives, much more are injured, and I'll probably have PTSD for the rest of my life. But, overall, victory is ours. However, I'll feel much more victorious if I can get to Stark Tower without breaking half my bones. We all decided that the Tower was probably the least damaged building in which we can take refuge in.

So, here I am, walking (drudging) along the broken and battered streets of Manhattan, dragging my even more broken and battered brother along with the help of Steve. It's mostly a silent trip apart from the occasional question about his future consequence of 'trying to be heroic by dying', from my brother.

"Are you sure you're not mad at me?" He asks for the millionth time.

"Yep. I am absolutely positive. I'm too glad you're alive to hold a grudge against you." Which I am. I'm not going to even go in detail on the 30 seconds where I thought my brother was dead.

"But you're always mad at me when I do something stupid. Why is today so different?" He looks at me suspiciously.

"Tony, did you just ask me why is today so different? Because I can think if a million different, ways as to why today was so different. Some of them being that in the last 24 hours, we have battled an alien invasion, conquered a mythical weapon, you went through a wormhole, almost died, and got saved by a green giant, who could have possibly did more harm than good by the way he was holding you. So you know what Tony, I'd like to spend the rest of my life not having to even remotely think about this day, let alone talk about it!" I rant.

It feels good to finally rant. During the last few hours, I was too tired and emotionally drained to think of words to say, so a huge rant was an obvious no. All I want to do is go home, drink a warm cup of hot coco, binge watch The Bachelorette, and never get out of bed. But when is my life ever that easy? What I have to do is go home, stitch up all my teammates, run around the city stitching the injured, check on my hospital, make a press conference, and by then, I'll get some time to sleep before my tiresome schedule amplifies the next day.

Tony

"Starks are not weak. We will hold our heads high and stride with confidence despite our pain."

I remember the words my dad had told me when I fell off my bike for the first time and wouldn't walk back home. I can almost imagine his immense disappointment if he were here to see me limping with the aid of two others.

"I'm proud of you Tony. Not because you're like me, but because you're the opposite. You don't let your pride get in the way of you practicality. You know when you need help and you're not afraid to get it, and that's something I'll never accomplish."

As you can see, there is a lot of controversy about my dad among my conscience. I feel a new, profound surge of pain and I decide that I'll take my dad's pride over his wit.

"Oh. My. God." My sister stops dead in her tracks to stare up at the 'Tark' Tower. Although it's in much better shape than most of the other buildings, it looks extremely dissimilar from how we left it 24 hours ago. Out of the two of us though, it's my sister that took an extreme predilection to the tower, which is the cause of her dramatic reaction.

In all honesty, the Tower doesn't look that bad. It's just...slightly wrecked. The shape is still unmistakably visible, and despite the loose beams and ridges, it looks safe enough to enter. Which is exactly what we do.

"Jarvis?" I tentatively call out, hoping that my machinery hasn't been destroyed due to the battle.

"Yes Sir." I breathe out a sigh of relief, almost sagging on the entrance of the building.

Natasha

"Give me a digital blueprint of the conditions of the Tower, J." Stark commands to nothingness.

But the 3D design of the Stark Tower proves me wrong. It's an odd-looking blueprint; with colours and abnormal lines splattered in arbitrary areas of the model. Banner and Liz inch closer for a better look, seemingly able to understand the complex model and its representations. I see Liz's brows scrunch in distraught and I know that something is off with the Tower (apart from the obvious.)

"What's wrong?" I hear Clint ask from behind me.

"Jarvis' scan detects life form in the top floor." Stark's brows scrunch up in confusion.

Dr. Banner sighs in relief and in exasperation.

"That's Loki. I can vaguely recall the other guy smashing him against your tiles." He grins sheepishly at Liz who narrows her eyes at him (lethally, may I add).

"Let us go and finally end this." Thor says, and although we are exhausted beyond compare, our thirst for vengeance is much stronger.

We all enter the elevator (after Jarvis confirming that it is perfectly safe) and the ride up is tense, awkward and extremely slow. After what feels like an eternity, the doors open and I hear Liz's audible gasp at the condition of the level. The whole place is trashed beyond repair, unless, of course, the Starks decide to redo the entire storey. The windows are shattered, couches knocked over, and the floor covered with debris of itself. Most notable of all though, is the Norse God that is knocked out in the middle.

Led by Liz, we all follow and take our place in front of Loki. Our timing is perfect, because just as we get into a defensive position, (Clint with his arrow, Stark his missile, Steve his shield, Thor his hammer, Bruce 'Hulks out', Liz her ball of energy, and me with the mythical staff) Sleeping Beauty stirs in his sleep and his eyes flutter open.

As soon as he spots us, his face widens considerably and pales in fear. After gulping visibly, he says,

"If it's just the same to you, I'll have that drink now."

I sense, rather than hear Liz's deathly growl before she walks up a few steps, until she is face to face to with Loki and throws a damn hard punch that breaks his nose and sends him back onto the ground, unconscious.

"That's for my Tower."

Even the Hulk backs away when she turns around.

Clint

I have trouble believing that this is the same woman with whom I discussed nicknames and Disney characters minutes ago.

Although that was an incredibly badass punch, I'm slightly disappointed due to the fact that I wanted to be the one who threw the last punch to the bastard, but I get where she is coming from (with her brother almost dying and all).

As if nothing out of the ordinary happened, she smiles (sweetly) and looks at us.

"So... What should we do now?" She asks all of us, but her gaze is directed at her brother.

"Well, you can all help with clean up, because I have no idea how I'm going to explain the man shaped hole in the ground to Pepper."

Pepper?

"Ya...Sorry about that." I turn around to see that the doctor has returned into his normal form and I'm surprised, because I had been told that he was an uncontrollable beast.

He seems to understand everyone's silent doubts when he explains,

"Sometimes, I have the odd rarity of controlling the other guy." The explanation is brief but clear and I don't pry after that.

"Lady Stark, I'm afraid I must go and return Loki to Asgard." Thor says, moving to pick his shit of a brother off the ground.

"Oh no you don't! Put your asshole of a brother back down Thor. You are going to stay here, rest, sort this mess out, and then you can go home. You just fought a massive battle, your brother's is not going to wake up anytime soon, and your planet is just going to have to wait for a few minutes. Alright?" Elizabeth raises one eyebrow.

Probably too afraid to speak, Thor simply nods his head and (not so delicately) drops his brother back down. Tony and Elizabeth walk up to the enormous hole on the ground and stare at it for a very long time, before breaking into a hysterical laughter.

"We...ju...just...had a...Nor...Norse God...attack our...pla...plane...planet." Tony forces out in between splutters of laughter.

"W...we...batt...battled...a bun...bunch of...ali...aliens." Liz continues, in the same state as her brother.

"And...a...joll...jolly...gree...green...gia...giant..." Tony starts,

"Tras...trashed...our floor." Liz finishes.

They break into another heap of laughter and now, there are tears rolling down their cheeks.

"Did Loki mess with your brains too?" I hear the Captain ask from behind me and I internally wince. Although, I know that he is trying to lighten the atmosphere, asking whether Loki messed with their brains is something I can do without.

Liz laughs breathlessly, but we can all see her face crumble when she stares at her brother. She swipes of a tear from the corner of her eye and suddenly hugs Stark, closing her eyes to prevent herself from crying.

"I'm glad you're not dead." She whispers loud enough for the rest of us to hear.

She pulls away and looks around at the mess around her. She takes those few minutes to compose herself before a cheeky smile appears on her face and I brace myself for whatever she thought up.

"Liz..." Tony says warningly.

It seems like I wasn't the only one who noticed, but Stark seems to have an idea of what is about to come. The brunette has a full-on smile now and I watch in fascination as she freezes a tile until it combusts into grainy sand. A river of water appears and drops broomsticks in front of Bruce, Steve, me, and Tony.

"The four off you are on sweeping duty. Thor, Nat and I can crumble the segments into dust. And no, Tony, you can't use your suit to crush. In fact, you're not using that suit or any other suit for the next 48 hours. You do, and I freeze every single one of them, and we both know I've done it before so don't even try it Stark." Liz commands.

The man grumbles something before picking up the broom and sweeping away the pile of dust on the floor, as do we all.

It hasn't even been a full five minutes before Jarvis' (Stark's complicated AI) voice pervades the room.

"Sir, Miss Potts is currently making her way up."

I don't miss Liz's snicker and Stark's muffled 'shit' once the news was erupted. All of us look in confusion at the stifled laughter of Liz and the outright panic and joy in Tony. That is, all of us except for Natasha, who smirks knowingly.

The elevator dings and every single one of us stare at the tear stained redhead that stomps out, the fury in her face evident despite the tears. The two Starks look at each other before Liz scurries to join the spectators (us), and Tony is left alone with the fiery woman whom I recognize as his ex-personal assistant and the CEO of his company.

"Hey Pep. Do you want me to get that for you" Stark cautiously says, referring to the medium sized hand luggage she grips so tightly, her fingers are stained white.

Apparently, she doesn't need him to hold her suitcase (apparently, she doesn't need her suitcase at all) because she glares furiously at him and flings said suitcase at his head, which he barely dodges.

"A missile. A goddamn missile. What the hell were you thinking Tony!" She screams and we all back up.

"Actually I wasn't..." he starts

"What, you weren't thinking? Of course you weren't thinking. When do you ever use your damn head? Are you insane?" She continues yelling.

"You almost died. I almost saw you die, again. On TV. No. You weren't dying. You were attempting suicide!" I want to cover my ears, but I'm afraid Potts will catch on the action and yell at me too.

"Pep, it wasn't that..." Stark tries again, but is interrupted once more.

"And then you call me. You called me Tony, to tell me what? That you were going to suicide? That you were going to die?" Her voice cracks and I know that she has gotten over her preliminary anger.

"Pepper. I'm fine." Stark reassures her quietly.

I look at everyone's confused faces. I'm sure that mine looks the same. We all know who this supposed 'Pepper' is. Virginia Potts, Stark's ten-year employee. So, why is he letting her yell at him, and throw stuff at him? If there is one thing I haven't misjudged about Stark's character, is that he has an ego the size of this planet. So it's a real surprise when he lets someone other than his sister march in the room and start scolding him like a petulant parent. I'm about to clear my throat, but I glare at Natasha who painfully nudges me in the ribs, indicating me to keep quite. Therefore, I am forced into continuing to watch the show.

"You called me. You called me and I didn't answer. I thought...I thought that you were..." Her sobs prevent her from continuing and Stark holds her close, whispering something into her hair while she sobs into his chest. I think I'm going to faint.

I just battled a prince from another planet who brought aliens from another planet, but it's Stark gently consoling and holding this woman as if she was everything, that actually makes me wonder if I'm going insane.

"Honey, I'm flattered over your concern for me, but we kind of have an audience." Stark says after a few minutes of silence, minus the sobbing.

Pepper (I have no idea what to call her) chokes between laughter and tears and wipes her eyes, her head still buried in Tony's chest. She looks up and my broom drops and I stumble over my feet when Stark bends his head down and the two of them kiss for what feels like an eternity before a red faced Thor clears his throat. It causes Pepper to abruptly pull her lips away from Stark and smile professionally at us. She spots Liz who walks up to her and the two of them meet halfway and hug each other.

"Are you okay?" Pepper asks.

"I'm fine Pep." Liz tells her, but it doesn't stop her from thoroughly inspecting Liz who has no serious injuries apart from the occasional cut and bruise.

Tony walks towards the two ladies, places a hand on Pepper's back, and leads her towards us.

"Pep, meet my...colleagues.

A Few Minutes Later

Steve

It's been a long time since I've ever felt belonged somewhere. Here, in a broken Tower, sweeping a pile of rubbish along with others whose pasts are as equally chaotic as mine, I feel for the first time in a long time, belonged. I feel happy.

Most of this has to do with the beautiful dark haired beauty that is currently blowing up the floor with the help of Thor and Natasha. She's just so...bright and fierce, determined and brave. Her kindness is overwhelming and it surely doesn't help when she looks like a goddess with her petite height, luscious curves, and pink, kissable lips. As if she senses me watching her, her eyes clash with mine, and she smiles warmly, despite the ferocious blush that tinge her cheeks. I hold back a groan (I may be from the twentieth century, but it doesn't make me any less of a man) and place the broom right in front of my crotch, not that it does much.

My eyes wide exceptionally when I spot Tony's narrowed eyes at me and I uncomfortably squirm and pretend to go and dust the other side of the room, away from both Starks.

"How bad do you think our rooms have been trashed?" Liz asks loudly to her brother and Pepper (who has been introduced as Tony's girlfriend).

"Looking at the mess of this floor, probably a lot." Pepper tells her.

"Imma go take a look. If any of my picture frames are broken, I'm going to have to punch your brother again Thor." She playfully threatens.

"Be my guest Lady Stark." He responds, causing her to giggle.

Tony joins her as she slowly makes her way up the stairs.

"Here, let me come with you, I'll check on my room too."

"Oh please, you just want to ditch cleaning duty."

Soon enough, the bickering of Tony and Liz are too far away for us to hear.

It hasn't even been a minute since they left upstairs, when the elevator chimes for the second time that day.

Out steps an aged lady, looking around 60 or so.

Her hair has lost its vibrant color, and laugh lines and wrinkles add on to her once flawless face. But her strong eyes and demeanor hasn't changed in 50 years. I'd recognize her no matter how long it's been.

"Peggy."

...

So, here's the thing; I was initially planning to continue this chapter until I've covered the entire 'Peggy' madness (which is the reason why I needed Steve to be trapped in ice for 50 years instead of 70). But as I wrote the final word, Peggy, I realized that finishing the chapter there would make a better ending because of the suspense.

Therefore, this chapter and the next (especially the next) will be shorter than my usual chapter length due to my splitting of one chapter into two.

Nevertheless, thank you to all who have been reading this fanfiction so far. Don't forget to review and leave comments so that I know where most want this story to head towards (because I ain't got a clue!)

Pink Meadow