A/N: Reference to Chapter 2, Siberian Succor


The Pointing Finger

Tony Stark looked at the pile of machine parts on his desk at the New Avengers Facility. To the untrained eye they looked like random pieces of metal and wires, but he could visualize the final product. He unconsciously flexed his left hand as he pictured it.

He reached for the largest piece and accidentally bumped a smaller bit, which rolled across the desk and dove for cover behind the piece of furniture. Tony rolled his eyes.

He shifted the desk forward, tilting it too much. A bottom drawer slid open and the parts on top skittered around like roaches when the lights come on. One piece skittered clear off the edge and dropped neatly into the partly open drawer, as if it had been just waiting for a chance.

Tony huffed at himself. "Typical. You try to fix things and end up making them worse," he said to himself.

He got a box from a shelf, emptied the random bits inside onto the shelf and collected all the parts on his desk. Then he gathered the escapee behind the desk and finally opened the bottom drawer to get the last bit.

He froze.

Inside the drawer, the gleaming bit of metal which looked like (and was) a fingertip, pointed accusingly at the journals that Natasha had sent him a year ago. He'd stuffed them into the drawer and, with a willful effort, forgot about them. Now they were glowering at him with a wintery glare, the glare of the man who had killed his parents.

Tony slammed the door shut. After a couple of calming deep breaths, he opened it again and picked up the metal fingertip, trying not to touch the journals beneath it.

He scooped up the bit of metal and slammed the drawer shut again. He shut it so hard, it rebounded, opening the drawer a crack. Tony put the metal fingertip in the box and took it to the shelf with exaggerated care. He tried to not think about the journals, but his eye kept being drawn back to that crack, an opening to the depths of hell.

Tony was both drawn to it and repulsed. Tony had shut the journals away and successfully put them out of his mind. Now he couldn't escape the thought of them. He was tempted, and Tony Stark had never been able to resist temptation.

He swore under his breath and yanked the drawer open so far it would have fallen on the floor, except for the drawer stopper. He hauled out the stack of notebooks, all helpfully bookmarked with bright red sticky notes.

Tony took a deep breath and opened a notebook.


Pepper Potts was going through emails at the desk in the room designated as her office in the New Avengers Facility.

"Ms. Potts," Friday's Irish accent came from a speaker in the corner. "Could you check on Mr. Stark, please?" The AI sounded distressed.

"What's wrong, Friday?"

"He's … he's crying," Friday answered. Her programming to protect Tony's privacy clashed with her programming to protect him. The conflict made her stutter.

Pepper stood instantly. "Crying?"

"Yes, ma'am." Friday sounded a little like she wanted to cry herself.

"Is he in his workshop?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Pepper hurried to the workshop. She half expected to find herself locked out, but the books had ambushed Tony and he hadn't thought to insure his privacy. Pepper found Tony hunched over his desk with notebooks scattered around.

She deliberately let her heels click on the concrete floor so he would know she was there. "Tony?" She touched his shoulder.

He looked up, wiping moisture from his reddened eyes.

"What's wrong?" she asked.

"Romanoff sent me these notebooks. They were Barnes'. He wrote down his memories as they came to him."

Pepper caught her breath. "And the red Post Its?"

"Romanoff marked the places he mentioned my parents."

"Oh, Tony," she said in sympathy. She rested her cheek on his shoulder.

"They're horrible," Tony said in a choked voice. "He remembered the war years first, how he bought the most expensive bottle of booze he could find to thank Howard for flying Steve into enemy territory to rescue him. Dad made him a custom sniper rifle and they bonded over scopes and car engines. Barnes remembered him fondly. Then later he remembered killing Howard."

Tony slid the journal to Pepper with a finger planted on the relevant passage.

"I killed Howard," the shaky writing read. "He knew me, he said my name, but I didn't recognize him. I beat him to death and then I killed his wife, too. God forgive me. God forgive me, because I'll never forgive myself. I killed my friend."

The words were smudged with water drops, tear drops, Pepper assumed. Most of them were long dry, so they were from the writer, not from Tony.

"There's more," Tony said. "There's lots more guilty memories about people he killed, and good memories about his childhood with Steve and terrible memories about being tortured until he didn't know his own name any more."

More tears ran down Tony face and he wiped at them impatiently.

There were tears of pity in Pepper's eyes. "Who are you crying for?" she asked quietly. "Your parents or Barnes?"

"All of them," Tony answered finally.

Pepper sat on Tony's lap and the two cuddled together for comfort.


After nearly half an hour of silent commiseration, Tony carefully placed the notebooks back in the drawer. He splashed water on his face and then he and Pepper went to find Rhodey and Vision.

Any lingering depression evaporated when they saw the ludicrous sight in the training room.

Wearing his Stark leg braces, James Rhodes trudged doggedly around the perimeter of the glass-walled room. Vision drifted above him, laid out as if paddling a surfboard. The android held the straps of Rhodey's harness, helping the injured man stay upright.

It was like Rhodey had a red-faced guardian angel hovering above him, Tony thought with a chuckle.

"It's cheating, if Vision carries you," he said aloud.

Rhodey's strained, sweaty face gave Tony a monumentally dirty look, but he didn't waste his breath saying anything.

"I am not lifting Col Rhodes," the literal-minded android said. "I am only steadying him. He is doing all the work himself."

"We can see that," said Pepper, ever the peacemaker. "Perhaps he should take a break?"

"Yeah, his face is almost as red as yours, Vizh," Tony said.

Pepper pushed Rhodey's wheelchair forward and he collapsed in it gratefully. He gulped lukewarm water and panted while the others exchanged pleasantries. Tony and Pepper debated what to order for dinner. Rhodey gave them a thumbs up when they mentioned Greek. He was a sucker for falafel.

When Rhodey got his breathing under control, Pepper asked him how he was doing.

"That last surgery really made a difference," Rhodey enthused. "I can feel my toes again. My control is still iffy and my muscles are still weak from disuse, but Dr. Cho said I show improvement every week. I don't understand what you did, Tony, but that new implant is terrific. Dr. Cho said it's revolutionary."

"Hey, genius here!" Tony said with false brightness. He gave a phony PR smile., then clapped his hands. "We should have a dance party!" he exclaimed.

The exhausted injured man and the android gave Tony nearly identical WTF looks that made him snicker.

"Tony," Pepper started.

"Friday, give us some dance music," Tony ordered. "A little Chubby Checkers."

"On it, boss." Loud music blared: "Let's do the twist."

"Tony!" Pepper shouted.

The billionaire held up one finger. In a moment, the music subsided to a conversational level.

"You know that most of our staff spies on us for Ross?" Tony said, not really asking.

"Of course," Vision answered, and the other two nodded.

"Friday is playing music over their microphones, so they can't hear us right now. We have about 10 minutes before they report to Ross and he sends one of them to check on us," Tony said.

"OK, this secrecy has something to do with my surgery?" Rhodey guessed.

"Yeah, I got the idea for bridging damaged nerves from dissecting Barnes' metal arm," Tony said.

"Tony!" Pepper gasped. "How, when did you get the arm?" It was only one of a thousand questions she wanted to ask.

"I've had it all along," Tony answered. "T'Challa captured Zemo in Siberia, then he offered me a ride since my suit was disabled."


"I must deliver Zemo to the task force. May I offer you a lift?" the king asked.

Tony considered and decided that Ross the lesser was the lesser of two weasels. "Always up for a visit to the land of beer and pretzels," he said.

Tony held out his hand and T'Challa helped him up. As he limped toward the exit on stiff armored legs, Tony reached down to snag Cap's abandoned shield.

To T'Challa's questioning look, Tony replied shortly, "Souvenir."

"And what of that?" the sharp-eyed king asked, gesturing at the metal arm lying on the ground.

Tony shied from it instinctively. "It killed my mother," he said hoarsely.

T'Challa nodded. "I doubt this version is 30 years old, but I understand your feelings. Better than most," said the man who had vengefully pursued his father's purported killer. "However, I do not feel comfortable leaving it here for Secretary Ross to find. The man is a menace. Do you want me to take it?"

"No," Tony said instantly, unable to identify his motive for suddenly wanting it. "I'll take it, analyze it." He stepped toward it, but hesitated to touch the thing that killed his mother.

"Allow me," T'Challa said smoothly. He wrapped the arm in a rag lying nearby and offered it to Tony, who was able to take it now that the rag disguised it.

"Thank you," Tony said.

"We all have our demons," T'Challa replied. "Perhaps analyzing the arm will make it less of a monstrosity."

"Doubtful," Tony snarked. "I'll share anything I find, as long as it's just between us," he offered.

"My biolabs are at your disposal. No one named Ross needs to find out."

"Agreed."


"The arm was torn off Barnes by my unibeam," Tony said. "There were places where nerve tissue was still connected."

Pepper looked a little sick at the thought.

"Between T'Challa's lab and me, we thought we could duplicate the interface. And I thought, if we could connect a prosthetic to the nerves, we ought to be able to connect nerves to nerves via an implant. So I brought Helen Cho in and, since Rhodey signed the papers to be a guinea pig for her, we decided to try it out."

"Experimenting on your best friend?" Rhodey griped.

"What are friends for?" Tony joked, then, seeing Rhodey's glare, hastened to say, "Cho assured me there was no way it could make your paralysis worse. At the worst, it just wouldn't work at all. But it did, right? You just said it did."

"I did and it does," Rhodey agreed. "There have to be SOME benefits of being friends with a genius," he said to Pepper.

"That and the designer shoes," she agreed.

Tony started to grumble, but Friday warned, "Incoming, boss!"

When Ross' minion entered the training room with a clipboard under his arm, he found a dance party in progress. The music had segued to "Twist and Shout." Tony was grinding down on the Twist, facing Rhodey, who supported himself with his arms between parallel bars while he gamely swiveled his hips. Laughing, Pepper held Vision's hands while she shook her booty and Vision awkwardly turned from side to side.

"Mr. Stark," the security man called.

"Friday, turn the music down," Tony called.

"Reducing volume," Friday said. Friday acted no smarter than Alexa when Ross' people were around.

"What can I do for you, Rollins," Tony said, no more welcoming than usual.

"It's Robbins, sir, and I need you to sign these." He held out the clipboard.

Tony snapped his fingers. "That's right, Rollins was a Cap-hating Hydra flunky. I don't know why I keep getting you mixed up."

Robbins ignored the insult.

Pepper intercepted the clipboard, flipped through the documents, then offered it to Tony. "Supply forms," she explained. "I'm sure they could have waited until business hours."

"Sorry, ma'am. We like to stay on top of things," Robbins said woodenly.

"I'm sure you do," Tony said ambiguously. He signed off on the papers, then shooed the man away.


When Robbins got back to the security office, he contacted Ross on a video call. "They actually are having a dance party, sir. I think it's a pretense to get Col. Rhodes to exercise," he offered.

"Stark is wasting his time on medical research," Ross growled. "Better he should make more weapons, or a detector to track down Rogers and his fugitives. But at least this keeps him out of my hair," the secretary decided.


Tony watched the door close behind Ross' flunkey.

"I miss the others a lot," he said, getting nods from his friends. "But most of the time I'm glad they're not here. Even though they're fugitives, they're freer than we are."


A/N: Good thing I had this story mostly done when I decided to do The Elder for the holiday. On Monday I fell and banged my hand, which is now swollen and purple, though not broken, yay! I'd better limit my typing to work for a bit. So, no posting for a couple weeks. I should be back by the first Saturday in August. Maybe sooner. It depends. I really miss getting reviews. When I do post, it probably won't be Reconstruction. I have a couple of other pre-Avengers story ideas I need to get out of my head. Not to worry, there are at least four Reconstruction ideas in there, too. But I need a break from this intensity. Follow me and see what I get up to next.