FYI: I went back to chapters 8-9 and made some adjustments. Nothing major; just added some more descriptions and fixed some boo-boos.

Enjoy!

Chapter 10

Twenty minutes after Tony had guided Steve on how to reboot his suit, the genius was feeling the lost sense of control finally returning to him. With Coulson only half an hour away from his destination and the Iron Man suit's system restored, he felt even closer to finding his wife and getting them all the fuck out the jungle and into the safety of their California home.

Next time, no matter what, he was personally attending the missions with her and not just as an empty suit of armor either. As much as it pained him to leave his kids behind, Ms. Smith had proven to be effective in taking care of the little twins, and he was certain Pepper would agree that his presence would be needed in Extremis soldiers corralling missions until testing of the virus's vaccine began.

And, even at that point, she was not leaving his sight.

"Is it working now?" Steve asked Iron Man as it began piecing itself together; giving way to the form the Avengers were accustomed to seeing.

"Yeah, I think I'm back online," Tony's voice said through the speaker of the helmet as he performed a quick scan of the surfaces of the suit. Once he checked his flight stabilizers were up and running, his only thought drove his acts. "Can you guys find your way to the village? I gotta find Pep."

Steve nodded to him, understanding the amount of desperation that was befalling the usually carefree man. If there was something the Avengers had learned about the seemingly selfish Tony Stark, it was that Pepper Potts-Stark was the one mainstay he could not live without.

"We'll meet you there, Tony."

"If you find her first…"

"We'll holler."

With a final grateful nod, the recognizable sound of the repulsors and thrusters starting up was the last thing Steve and Hulk heard before Tony took to the skies.

xxxXXXxxx

Natasha held onto the side of a tree, heaving out the protein bar she had eaten before arriving to Congo. She was not certain what was happening to her, but her body was nearing complete shutdown. She did not know how Clint was still up and about as energetic as ever, seeing he had been deprived of rest as much as she had during these week-long missions.

When she finally stopped throwing up, Clint handed her his handkerchief once more. She eyed the delicate piece she knew belonged to Barton's grandmother, not wanting to tarnish the heirloom with disgusting vomit.

"It can be washed, take it," the archer offered as if reading her thoughts.

Her eyes remained on the cloth for one more second; eyeing it with regret as she finally accepted it, and wiped her mouth clean. She folded the handkerchief in half and placed it inside one of her pockets, making a mental note to not return it to Clint until she was sure the item was completely sanitized by the most delicate means possible.

"How much farther until we get there?"

"Two, maybe three, miles?"

She nodded, agreeing with his estimation. "I can walk the rest of the way; give your back a break," she said, using the back of her hand to remove what she hoped was nothing but plain sweat from her face.

"Are you sure? I've carried heavier things than you," he asked with a lopsided smile, but internally being unreasonably distressed with the possibility that his –girlfriend, (perhaps) was hiding a more ominous disease behind her almost stoic façade.

"Yeah, I'll be alright as long as," she cut her statement short as her ears picked up a familiar sound "…uh…do you hear that?"

Both assassins became eerily quiet attempting to identify the sound approaching them. The hum grew louder as it flew above them, and with the same swiftness it had grown closer, it disappeared in the direction they were heading.

"Rhodey or Tony?" she finally asked once the natural sounds of the jungle were the only ones that remained.

"Not sure. Maybe heading to the village, too?"

"Let's hurry it up."

xxxXXXxxx

The infrared had picked up several heat signals lurking below him as he flew above the dense jungle, but it had not been until Jarvis had picked up the location of the GPS of War Machine next to a very radiant heat source that Tony felt some sort of relief, even though he felt his heart was going to beat out of his chest.

I'm almost there, Pep.

The tall trees ended abruptly ahead of him, and the clustered panorama was replaced with one of open land made by a large mass of water. He noted the village was less than three miles away from Rhodey's current location, and he could only hope Pepper was as close to the landing site as his friend was.

As he approached the location Jarvis had marked for him, his eyes became set on the scene before him and made him gasp. He did not allow his brain to connect all the dots, or rather his heart reacted faster than his mind, and before he knew it he was flying down at neck-breaking speed. The only thought in his mind was saving the screaming Pepper from Rhodey's repulsor attack.

xxxXXXxxx

Hulk was tired of falling behind, and he was no longer willing to walk next to the slow Steve. The angry man's solution to his predicament was to place Steve under his arm and run like hell toward the direction of the village, despite the Captain's attempts at slowing him down.

He ran for less than a minute, and just when Steve was certain he was going to throw up, Banner stopped, dropping his cargo onto the ground without so much as a warning or second thought.

"Hey, what the hell, Bruce?" Rogers complained as he stood up, picking off stubborn leaves from his suit and hair. "Why did we…oh, my God…It can't be…"

Steve took a tentative step toward the wreck before them, an action mirrored by the Hulk. Both man and monster stared at each other, wondering and fearing the true meaning of their finding: just a few feet away from them lay the still burning remains of the Quinjet.

xxxXXXxxx

The work had to be precise, fucking surgeon-precise, or he would only assist in speeding up Pepper's demise. She had been against the idea at first –pain and tiredness speaking for her, but after being reminded that she still had a long life ahead of her, and that her kids and Tony would surely miss her presence, she agreed to give Rhodey's suggestion a try.

Even with the immense pain she was feeling as Rhodey burned through her skin, she could not help but admire Bruce's and Tony's handiwork. The compound was beautifully designed, and she could only imagine how much more pain a regular Extremis soldier would feel if she herself was having to hyperventilate to keep her from passing out.

So far, Rhodey had removed a good chunk of her hip, making sure to cauterize the skin before she grew back the destroyed body part. Replacing the dead skin was not as easy as it would have been under different circumstances, as she had to grow back enough organs and tissue to keep her bodily functions intact, but not enough as to connect with the other dead parts of her body and spreading the damage again.

"I'm almost done chopping off your leg, Pepper. Are you ready to grow it back?"

"Yes, I am…UGH! SHIT!" she moaned as she felt the ray crack her femur bone in half. She did not know if it was all in her head, or if the ice compound had an unknown side-effect of heightening discomfort, but replacing body parts had never hurt her so severely, or at all.

Even with his current encouraging and calming demeanor, Rhodey was sweating bullets. He had never before had to use his hand repulsors in this way –he had not even considered the possibility; they had just not been designed to carefully cut through skin and bones, and he wished he could just hurry up the amputation process if for no other reason than to reduce the agony for his friend lying below him.

"Let's work together, Pepper," General Rhodes said as the repulsor ray approached the end of its road. "Three… two… ARGH!"

The General's countdown was interrupted when he felt his body fly over Pepper's and skid on the wet ground. Before he could make sense of what had hit him, he found himself being lifted from the ground only to be tossed against a tree. In the blink of an eye, Iron Man's left hand was crushing Rhodey's neck, pinning him to the trunk and aiming his right-hand repulsor to James's unprotected face.

"Tony? What the fuck are you doing?" Rhodes asked, feeling the constriction on his throat growing stronger and wondering when had Iron Man become stronger than War Machine. The billionaire, however, was blind with rage, his only thought being saving Pepper's life from whomever or whatever threatened it. "Tony, man…I can't…breathe…"

"TONY! Listen to me!" the woman near them said. "Stop! STOP IT! TONY!"

If Tony had been physically present, Rhodey knew exactly what expression he would have seen on his face the moment his deathly grip subsided. The suit remained motionless for a moment and James took this opportunity to slide himself from between Iron Man and the tree. He then bent forward, placing his hands on his knees as he took in deep breaths and swallowed hard to make sure his throat was still working. He looked back over his shoulder to stare at the still shocked Iron Man, shaking his head in disapproval.

"I don't have time for this shit, Stark. Why don't you help me with Pepper?"

The sound of her name shook away his stupor. He turned around and follow Rhodey's path with his eyes, and it was then that he realized the severity of her situation.

"Pepper, Honey, no…"

He walked up to her, kneeling down on her right side and facing her, his back against the direction of the village. Her eyes were filled with tears that cascaded down her cheeks, and he could identify chunks of ice on the ground near her that he was certain had once been attached to her body. The smell of burning flesh was not at all lost to his olfactory sensors, and it only made his stomach flip.

"God! Pepper, how?" was all he could ask, even though the details did not matter at this point.

"Let's leave that for later, alright?" Rhodey interrupted as he began cutting the last inch of leg off her. "She needs help, Tony, fast. She's been fighting the necrosis since the storm. Get it together, alright?"

Four hours, was Tony's single thought. For more than four hours Pepper had been trying to overcome the effects of the weapon he had created to protect her, and he had not even been there to prevent the obvious backfire. Not for the first time, however, one of his weapons had placed her in harm's way.

He winced as he heard her scream when Rhodey pulled the chunk of dead leg off her. For some reason, the compound was making it difficult for her dead cells to detach from her healthy ones, leaving James with no option but to pull as hard as he could.

Tony felt as useless as he had felt when he had let her fall to her apparent death back at the oil rig. Neither he nor Bruce had bothered to devise a compound to counteract the effects of the Black Ice, and it now seemed as the stupidest oversight of his life.

"I'm sorry, Pepper. I'm sorry I wasn't here with you," he told her, holding onto her right hand and wishing he could touch her bare skin with his. She tightened her grip on his, screaming as she worked to regrow her left leg and attach it to her cured hip.

"You owe me…a month…of attending meetings, Stark."

Tony swallowed hard, wanting to find humor in the situation, but failing to do so.

"Yes, baby. Whatever you want, just…hold on…" he told her and he meant it, fearing this would turn out to be the last time they ever spoke again, and not wanting one of their joking banters to become the final memory of her.

The again, bantering was better than watching her plummet to her death.

Pep…you gotta let go, now…I'll catch you, I promise…

The words he had spoken to her back then still burned his skin; they reminded him that he had uttered a promise he had not been able to keep. Here he was, more than a year later, keeping from stating them again even though right now words were all he had to offer. There was nothing else he could do for her, and he did not trust himself to do Rhodey's task.

As soon as Pepper's leg and hip returned to normal, Rhodey returned his attention to his chore. "Alright, Pepper. How are we doing this now?"

She inhaled in heaps, staring down at her torso and arm, or as much as she could with half her throat and face covered in Black Ice. She detached her right hand from Tony's, giving him a reassuring smile before she began pointing at the path she wanted Rhodey to follow.

"Start where the hip's still dead and cut everything except the throat, face and near the heart," she said as her pointing finger avoided the vital areas. "Go around them, and we'll see what's next after that."

"Are you sure?" The General asked, sparing Iron Man a glance.

"Yes, and hurry up."

"What? Why?" Tony asked, fearing she was about to tell him her heart was getting close to failing her.

"Because," she began, pointing behind them with her right hand, "The soldiers are coming this way, fast."

xxxXXXxxx

The flames were intense, and if anyone had survived the crash, Steve knew they did not survive the inferno. Even after Hulk's attempts at putting out the fire, the charred remains had no heads or tails to them. The Quinjet was nothing more than a pile of crap, surrounded by even more unrecognizable crap.

"How did we not hear it crash?" The Captain asked aloud, looking up to the blue skies. He knew they could have not been too far from where the craft had landed, so he could not explain the lack of an explosion sound alerting them of the tragedy, or least the whistling of the fall.

"Bruce, let's hurry up to the village," Rogers said dejectedly. "I don't think we can do much here."

The gamma-ray born hero, however, remained silent and unmoving, not reacting at all to the Avengers leader's orders, causing Rogers to walk closer to him and wave his hand as close to Hulk's face as he could.

"Hulk, did you hear me?"

Hulk sniffed loudly before a menacing smirk plastered on his face.

"Smash."

xxxXXXxxx

"How close are they?"

"Two miles, maybe less," Pepper told her husband, who was now getting up from the ground and stood a few feet away from her head. He aimed his repulsors in the direction Pepper had pointed, ready to blast the shit out of any soldier who dared to come near her.

Rhodey continued his laser surgery, carefully avoiding the areas Pepper had listed for him.

"One mile," she said between clenched teeth, shutting her eyes and trying to keep her screams from coming out for the sake of Tony's sanity.

"I can see them," Tony said, zeroing on his targets.

"500 feet."

"Save it, babe. I've got…them? Oh, SHIT!"

Tony's panicked tone made Rhodey stop the amputation of Pepper's arm and turn to where Iron Man stood. The empty armor took a step back, but did not lower his beaming repulsors as if measuring his chances against the incoming attack. The initial handful of approaching Extremis soldiers were now more than the 17 they had been originally chasing, nearing three dozen in total.

"Pepper! Rhodey! Get out of the way!" he yelled as he abandoned his plan of blowing up anyone for the more prudent plan of not being in the path of the trampling army. It was not just that the grown group was approaching them at a fast pace that had startled him into retreat, but it was the predator that was chasing the soldiers that scared him the most.

"Up!" was Tony's only order as he picked up Pepper in his arms and lifted his body above the ground with a confused War Machine close behind. From their view at the top, they saw the insane-looking heated-up soldiers burning down everything in their path in an effort to stop the raging beast attempting to smash the hell out of them.

"ARRGGGHHH!"

The loud roar scared off the nearby resting birds, which immediately flew for their lives away from the trees. Hulk's figure crushed the landscape below them as he followed the Extremis soldiers to the village nearby. In a matter of seconds the mob was gone, leaving behind a path of destruction worthy of the strongest member of the Avengers.

"Where the hell did they come from?" Rhodey asked as he slowly descended back to land. Iron Man followed Rhodey's lead, bringing down with him a shocked Pepper Potts-Stark. Neither man said anything for an instant until their similar thoughts were uttered by their female counterpart.

"Tony, put me down."

He complied immediately, eyeing her up and down and noticing her eyes were now glowing. This could only mean she was also concerned about the well-being of the villagers and the memories of the Mexican Peninsula were overriding her current pain.

"Maybe you should stay behind," Tony said, not really realizing that he had said it out loud until Pepper shook her head.

"We're not having a repeat," she answered knowing she did not have to clarify her statement. She looked down at her dangling dead arm, and without indecision she pulled it off and threw it on the ground.

As she began her trek toward the village –or at least following the path the Hulk had left behind, her left arm was already growing back again at a much faster rate than her leg had. The two suited-up Avengers noted, however, that despite her angry pose, Pepper was still breathing hard. The necrosis was still trying to travel to her heart and throat, and she was still fighting to keep it at bay.

For him it had been shrapnel, for her it was dead cells, both with his name all over it.

The irony of it all.

"Pepper, stop. I'm sorry but I can't let you go fight like this."

Pepper's eyebrows rose. She had not expected Rhodey to be the one to try and stop her from performing her duty, but his serious face and tone told her he was willing to try. "I've just spent an hour chopping you to pieces to save you. I'm not letting your pain go to waste."

"Rhodey, I…" she began, but had nothing to say. "I can't just…"

The awkward conversation was interrupted by the sudden appearance of the Star Spangled Man with a Plan, tripping over his feet and landing face-first on the wet ground just a few feet from where the trio stood.

"Steve!"

"Cap!" Rhodey called out to him, walking near him and crouching beside the man. "Are you alright?"

The only response Steve could utter was nodding while his face still kissed the ground and raising his left arm to give them a thumbs-up. Tony's snicker was not far behind the gesture, and Pepper scolded her husband by narrowing her eyes at him.

"I'm not even sorry, Pep," he admitted. "Aren't you supposed to be a super soldier or some shit like that?" he added, not wanting to pass on the opportunity to make fun of Steve's despair.

Steve moved his head to the side, facing them with angry eyes, but not able to do much else. "When was the last time you chased after the Hulk?"

"I'd fly all over his ass…"

"On FOOT!"

Tony opened his mouth to retort, but Pepper's hand on his shoulder stopped him. "Tony, piggyback riding on poor Happy does NOT count."

"You're no fun," he mumbled. "Anyway, we have a village to save, Cap. You coming?"

Steve groaned, feeling every muscle in his body screaming in pain. "I'll…be right behind you…"

"You sure?" Rhodey asked.

"Yeah, just give me a minute."

"Last time I gave you a minute I was almost shredded to pieces by one of the Hellicarrier's engines," Tony chided.

"I hate you, Stark."

"Get in line," Tony responded before turning around, grabbing Pepper by the arm and pulling her to the side. Behind them, Rhodey checked on a slowly recovering Steve, giving the couple some much needed privacy.

"Look, I know I can't stop you from going there, but please, Pepper, don't do something stupid, OK?" he pleaded with her, holding her face with his suit's armored hands, carefully avoiding placing any pressure on the dead part of her face.

"Tony, you know how this goes. Do you really think I did this for fun?" she asked, pointing to her marred face. She knew once they were back to California she and Tony could get her fixed, but at this point they did not know how long it would take to get back home, and every second her body battled the necrosis it became weaker and weaker.

"Your heart is not at its best. If I see you pushing yourself too hard, I'm dragging you out of there, got it? I'm serious, Pepper. I'm not losing you again."

Pepper closed her eyes, knowing she could not guarantee anything to him. It was moments like these that she understood why he risked his life every day as Iron Man. "Let's go."

Rhodey stood up from the ground when he heard her, and ran toward the already fleeing couple. War Machine and Iron Man took to the skies, and Pepper ran on the ground below them.

"Tony?" Rhodey called out to his friend.

"Yeah?"

"We're on our own. Tell Fury the Quinjet didn't make it."

Silence was the only answer Rhodey received from Iron Man.

xxxXXXxxx

"What do you mean we lost contact with Coulson?" Fury asked his second-in-command, clearly upset at the devastating news. "Is the rainforest the new motherfucking Bermuda Triangle?"

"There was no weather anomaly accompanied with the loss of communication, sir. The Quinjet simply dropped off the radar."

"Hill, how the hell does a jet that big just drop off the radar? Get me some answers, and get me Stark on the line."

xxxXXXxxx

Following the growl of the Hulk and the sound of repulsors, Black Widow and Hawkeye found themselves reaching the edge of the village. By the time they had joined the superhero party, Steve, Rhodey, Pepper, Tony and Hulk were already ambushing the new 36 Extremis 1.0 soldiers that had appeared, standing between the human furnaces and the people clumping together by their huts.

Without needing to wait for an invitation, the two S.H.I.E.L.D. members ran toward the middle of the village where a circle of Avengers surrounded the Extremis group, keeping them from reaching the villagers who stood around them. The natives held desperately onto their young ones and watched in confusion as the dysfunctional team of heroes held their ground against the fiery, desperate group.

"Had a nice trek, Widow? You look like shit," Tony asked her when she neared the group, pulling her pistol from its holster. With two more members, the team adjusted the positions in the circle, making it possible to narrow the exits that stood between them.

"So, what's the plan?" Hawkeye asked, having already pulled his bow from his back and aiming one of his arrows at the anxious soldiers.

"This is the plan," the Captain retorted. "The only backup that was on its way went up in flames just a while ago," he added, conveniently leaving out the part that Agent Coulson might have gone down with the jet.

Natasha loaded her gun with the Black Ice bullets, understanding they were on their own. She observed their current positions, attempting to come up with a better plan than just spending the rest of the night staring down the soldiers clumped in the middle.

To her left she had Tony, and to her right she had Hawkeye. To Clint's right was Rhodey, and next to Rhodey was a beat-up Steve. To Steve's right stood the Hulk, cracking his knuckles and smacking his chest in barely contained excitement at having the opportunity to kick some ass. To Hulk's right –and Tony's left, stood Pepper, who looked as if she was about to pass out, constantly taking her right hand to hold her left breastbone.

"I've got 8 rounds of the compound. What do you have, Clint?" the Widow asked, knowing that the stakes were too high and they would be left with no choice but to kill their targets after all.

"I've got a dozen," the archer responded as he double-counted the male and female furnaces looking for a way out.

"I still have my four," Tony said.

"I've got two," Rhodey added.

"I've got one," Steve said.

"I've lost mine," Pepper said. "But, I think Hulk and I can take the rest of them barehanded. Right, Bruce?"

Hulk's affirmative response came in the form of a grunt.

"Call it, Steve," Rhodey said, loading up his two ammos of Black Ice, making sure he aimed them at the soldiers nowhere near Pepper.

"On three…"

xxxXXXxxx

"Stark! We lost contact with Coulson. Can you see him?" Fury's loud voice echoed off the walls in Tony's lab.

"Uh, Nick, that's like, yesterday's news. Where you've been?" Tony answered as he waited for Steve's count to finish so he could jump into action. The vital signs were still not showing on his screens, but he at least had his and Rhodey's camera feeds, and the map pinpointing the location of the village, the Avengers and the overly violent Extremis soldiers was back to life.

"I could ask you the same thing! What's your 20?"

"We're all accounted for, but we're gonna need some back up. Major backup," Tony responded, staring at the 36 bouncing red dots on the infrared screen. The math simply did not add up: 36 Extremis soldiers against 7 Avengers protecting a village of at least 200 people behind their backs.

"We're getting on the carrier right now and heading there. I can't afford to lose more men."

"Yeah, next time do that before -" Tony began his scolding of Fury but the image before him shut him up in the middle of his rant. He took a step forward toward the map screen, blinking rapidly just to make sure he was not being betrayed by his eyes.

"Stark?"

Tony ignored Fury's call.

Via the ROI he could see the Extremis soldiers beginning to cheer, throwing off Steve's countdown due to the unusual response. The other six Avengers did not know it yet, but Tony knew –could see, why the soldiers were chanting victory ahead of the beginning of the battle.

Tony swallowed hard, his left hand reaching over to grab Pepper's, causing the woman's head to snap to her right. Iron Man was unmoving, save for the tight grip on her hand, and it was then that she felt what he was seeing on his screens.

The picture of the infrared map had changed in the blink of an eye. The Avengers, who just moments ago had had the advantage of surrounding the 36 red dots, were now surrounded themselves by at least 200 red dots slowly appearing behind them, circling them, just as they had rounded up the soldiers themselves.

The hunters had just become the hunted.

Pepper closed her eyes as she tightened her grip on Tony's hand. When she opened her eyes again, the overly familiar glint of the distinct red-orange glow of her eyes -characteristic of Extremis 2.0 soldiers, was being reflected back at her in every single pair of eyes that comprised the villagers. Her current inability to detect Extremis 2.0 soldiers was perhaps going to cost them all nothing less than their lives.

A/N: Damn. That's all I'm gonna say about this chapter. Thoughts? I wonder if I'm writing for myself at this point, all sadistic and such. Anyway, hope you're still enjoying the fic! Drop me a line!