So here's the deal: I'm finishing the damn thing. I'm not the type of person who gets bent out of shape if I don't complete a personal project, but I don't like letting people down when I have the ability to make it better. So I'm going to finish what I started, even if I find myself cringing when I read the story over. I now know what I want to do for the rest of the story, but it might not end the way you guys want it to. To anyone who also reads my other Stony fanfic, I am very excited about what I have in store for it, and there you can find a gratuitous amount of Naked!Tony and look forward to some even more gratuitous smut. If anyone would like to try their hand at writing some Bodyguard!Steve, whether it be a spin-off of this story or a separate story all together I would LOVE to read it and see more of this AU out there !
Steve was out the door and dashing down the long hallway before Jarvis could even finish his warning. His super-human momentum allowed him to launch himself off the concrete wall at the end of the hallway, vaulting up and over the bannister, ignoring the stairs altogether.
"Jarvis!" He commanded, practically ripping a door off its hinges as he made his way to the main floor.
"They have him. Back-up security measures has two down of the five that entered. You have an estimated seventeen seconds before they exit the building."
Steve growled in anger when he realized that the quickest way to the front entrance was blocked by a thick decorative glass display that spanned the length of the room. As though sensing what he was about to do, Jarvis warned "the time it would take you to break through the glass is equal to the time it would take to simply go around it."
Steve was off again in an instant, cursing, "Who designed this Goddammed house!"
He really did rip the next door off of its hinges as he barreled into the main hallway. His eyes went immediately to the weakly struggling figure of Tony being half-dragged, half-carried through the wreckage that was once the front door.
Oh God, he thought, I did that. They got in because of me.
The sound of gunfire only registered to him when a searing pain hit his left arm where two bullets had caught him. He leaped backward and hid around the corner as bullets continued to assault the place where he once stood. A brief pause in the cacophony let him peer around the corner to see a masked man carrying a semi-automatic with a huge magazine standing just inside the building. He ducked back just as more bullets hit the wall, taking out chunks of the marble with each powerful round.
Steve looked around frantically for anything he could use to defend himself, anything he could use to attack. He spotted what looked like a solid led paper weight on a decorative table and grabbed it, waiting for another opening. He heard voices shouting and he took the opportunity to lob the weight at the shooter's head before ducking around the corner again. By the surprisingly loud thunk and the thud of a large body hitting the ground, he knew his aim was true and he launched himself toward the main entrance, jumping over bodies like they were hurdles at the olympics.
Steve's heart dropped through his stomach when he heard the screech of tires. He knew the capabilities of his strength and agility, and that included being able to sprint over twice as fast as the most powerful of athletes. But before he took more than a single leaping step toward the vehicle, a tremendous shockwave launched his body forward, scorching heat and the penetrating cacophony of an explosion following almost instantaneously. He hit the pavement hard, his ears ringing and his skin searing. Steve crawled forward a foot before collapsing onto the pavement, his body overcome by the force of the explosion.
Worst. Hangover. Ever.
Seriously, though, how much had he drunk? The sharp throb in his skull was like no other hangover he had ever experienced. It felt like someone had a vice-like grip over his temples, and they were squeezing tighter with each passing second. Tony gave a drawn-out groan of displeasure, and before he could even open his eyes, he leaned forward and vomited, feeling disgusted when he heard the contents of his stomach splatter against the floor by his feet. Not that he could feel his feet. Or his hands for that matter. What the fuckery kind of hangover was this?
"Jarvis. Water. Lots of water. And turn down those lights."
It was only when there was no response from his AI that Tony realized he was actually in trouble, and not potentially waking up from another kinky sexscapade. He opened his eyes to see that he was sitting...no...cuffed to a chair, his wrists and ankles bound almost pathetically in zip-ties, yet in such a way that rendered his limbs useless. The room he was in was completely empty, with only a thin door set into the grey concrete walls and a dim light hanging from the ceiling. He tried moving is hands and feet more vigorously, and achieved nothing but the sensation of a few pins and needles prickling their way uncomfortably across his skin.
He tried to focus on the walls, willing down the nausea that was making the room spin and blur, but still he saw nothing. Not even a light switch.
In his panic, he began to shout "I don't know who you guys are, or why you want me, but you've just guaranteed yourselves a nice big can of whoop-ass. The longer you keep me, the bigger the shitstorm that's about to rain down on your heads! Not only have you made yourselves an official enemy of the United States, you've - "
Tony swallowed down the bile that had just accumulated in his throat. The moment he had thought of SHIELD, memories of the last twenty-four hours began to flicker across his mind. The betrayal. The lies. Steve...oh God, and Steve was at the center of it, wasn't he? But there was something else nagging at his mind. He closed his eyes and the vision of Steve breaking down his front door surfaced. This time, Tony couldn't hold down the bile that made it's way up his esophagus.
He sat there, head down and breath shaky, trying to recall anything else, any little scrap of information that could help him understand the mess he had somehow gotten himself into, but he could only recall his argument with Steve, and even that was only a dull memory.
He began to wiggle his fingers and toes, trying to get some sensation back into them. If he could only get out of this damn chair...
He grimaced against the throb behind his eyes as he looked up at the light fixture, trying to visualize the materials he could scrounge from it. At the very least, he could yank the whole fixture down, wait by the door, and smash it over the head of his next visitor and try to make a run for it. The odds of that working out in his favour was somewhere around the 0.01% region. Hell, at least it was better than his current odds.
How the fuck had these guys even gotten to him? Granted, he couldn't actually remember if he had been in his house when it had happened, but it was unlikely he could have gotten far from his property by himself when he was about a tequila shot away from alcohol poisoning.
How long had they even had him? He was able to concentrate but he was still definitely feeling the effects of all that alcohol he had consumed. Tony had to wonder if he had even been conscious when he was taken. Oh God, please, please let this be some horrible, remarkably vivid alcohol-induced nightmare.
He was no stranger to feeling pain in his dreams, let alone other sensations like hunger, thirst or nausea. He also really had to pee, and if that wasn't a sign that this was a dream, then what was?
A moment later, the door was opened and bright, blinding daylight was glaring into his face, his hungover brain unable to adjust to the light before a cloth bag was placed over his head and huge, strong hands were holding his limbs in place as he was cut free from the chair. He struggled futilely and received a sharp blow over the head for his efforts.
Tony was dragged out of the room and he felt fresh, blessed air blowing through the cloth sack covering his face before his numb limbs were forced to cooperate.
He couldn't hear anything but the wind and the sounds of their footsteps. No distant traffic, no nearby body of water, nothing to give him any hint of where he might be or how far he was from home. The man dragging his stumbling figure stopped suddenly and Tony pathetically fell forward, the grip on his collar the only thing keeping him upright. The sack over his head was yanked abruptly from its place, and Tony's eyes could only distinguish a single figure standing in front of him from the halos of seemingly blinding light that blocked his vision. A hand grabbed him beneath his jaw and his head was moved to show his profile before the sack covered his head yet again. He heard his captor speak in what he thought might be Swedish, and he could hear a distinct, deep female voice reply.
Suddenly, Tony was shaken roughly before something cold and metal was pressed into his temple. The man holding him spoke viciously, pressing a gun into Tony's skull to emphasize each angry word.
There was a short pause where Tony could feel the thrum of his heart beating against the cold metal at his temple, before the woman's calm voice spoke again, and he could hear a briefcase being opened and then closed a moment later.
A sharp shove pushed Tony forward, and he landed hard on his knees against wet pavement, bits of asphalt digging into his kneecaps.
A moment later, someone was dragging him up by the collar again, his throat protesting against the sharp pressure, and then he was being guided into a car, a hand on his head to push him under the frame of the car door, which slammed shut the instant he managed to get his leg inside. Tony heard another car door slam shut and then a distinctly familiar German male voice spoke from next to him: "Get out of here. Now."
The engine hummed as the car immediately revved to life, and Tony swore as he lurched forward before the velocity of the car had his body pressed back into the seat.
"Idiots," the voice tsked, "look what they have done to you."
Nimble fingers where delicately rolling up his right sleeve, and he felt cold steel press briefly against his wrist before the tight plastic cuff was cut open. Those same fingers began to massage feeling back into his hand and arm, gently, almost lovingly.
"You are, after all, precious cargo Mr. Stark."
Tony couldn't help but give a small pained groan at the sensation of millions of needles penetrating his stiff limb, but the voice, now close to his ear, gave a soft "shhhhh," and those fingers found the way to the back of his skull, flitting easily under the cloth sack and rubbing soothingly at the base of his neck, though he quickly realized that whoever this person was, they were wearing gloves, the sensation of synthetic fabric unquestionable against the sensitive skin of his neck.
Tony couldn't help the full body shudder of revulsion that took over him, but he continued to sit there helplessly as he was pet like an animal.
Before long, Tony's other sleeve was rolled up and he heard another "tsk."
"Perhaps it is best...that you are numb for this."
Tony gave a shout and he was pushed head first into the seat, his left arm held in a painfully tight grasp. He felt cold steel against his skin again, but this time with an added pressure, and before his brain could comprehend what was about to happen, he was being cut into, a blade slicing through his left flexor like it was butter. He screamed in agony, and in the back of his mind he could register the thick, metallic smell of blood and the sound of it dripping grotesquely against the seat of the car.
"Ah, there it is. That was easy, wasn't it, Mr. Stark?"
And then a different kind of pain overtook him, as those fingers pried open his arm and tugged something small and hard from his flexor muscle.
"Such a little thing, and yet capable of so much. Such a tracking device would be useful to our industry," the man gave a dramatic sigh, "but it is more important that we ensure SHIELD can no longer follow us, yes?"
Tony began to breath uncontrollably fast, his heart racing, his head spinning. SHIELD had been tracking him!?
He heard the German speaking again, but his voice was muted and distant. Tony's breath came in quick gasps, and before he could even begin to understand what had just happened, his eyes rolled back into his head, and he was unconscious to the world around him.