Answers to your reviews :))

afedrigo - Thank you :)) Here it is.

Unajet - I don't blame you, it is sad to think about and something that only really struck me after watching the deleted scene of Iron Man 1 with JARVIS welcoming him home. Thank you! :D Yeah I drew inspiration from watching videos on YouTube about pets and childrens reactions to seeing their owners and parents come home after a long time.

Writer-at-Heart0 - Awww :') *hands you tissues*

Nancy drew 10 - Thank you :) Here is the update now! I hope you enjoy it.

AnhiVann - Thank you :) I do intend on keeping this up for as long as I can. I appreciate every comment I receive and you reading and reviewing means so much to me. I would love to see what you think of this chapter :) You're welcome. I enjoy writing it :)

Guest (1)- Thank you. I do plan to :) I do have plans for all those events and how I see them going.

Ciel Tombe - Thank you and welcome back :) I hope life and school are better for you now. The bots are adorable aren't they? Tony is distrusting of him a little now... the chapter after this one will be where we see some Pepper. I promise :) I do hope you like this one. You're welcome.

Guest (cerezo14) - Wow thank you :) that means I'm doing a good job. I hope you like this chapter :)


No copyright infringement intended...
All Movie Scenes used here belong to Marvel Studios and their respective owners, I'm not out to profit from this work.
I made it purely for enjoyment purposes.


It was almost a relief when instead of a new memory forming, they all found themselves back in the mindscape.

"That was…" Steve mumbled.

"Heavy? Depressing? Heartwarming? All of the above?" Scott asked, in an attempt to raise the mood with the questions, but he found it fell flat. Cap appeared to be too deep in his own thoughts to answer so he looked to Vision.

"All of the above." Vision answered in a slightly jittery voice. "Try overwhelming too. That word would be very apt to describe my head at this moment in time."

"Yeah," Rhodey said softly, he still stared distantly at where Tony had been, during the memory, "I was such a petty idiot, man. I wish I'd accompanied Tony back. At the time I was just too angry and of course, my job came first. Fuck!"

"You know, Mr Stark never held it against you." Vision spoke up, "we can't know what it would have been like had you been there but he did need some time alone with his children." The last word was almost muted as Vision bit his lip.

"The cold man he is now doesn't seem to fit with what he was like back then." Vision looked to Wanda sharply and she elaborated. "Most people don't get that connected to things they don't know for sure are alive. How could Stark be sure that they are? I'm surprised that he's so connected to them."

"They think, they feel. How can you not say they are alive? Do you think I am not alive?" Vision frowned.

Wanda looked down and cringed. "That's not what I meant!"

"No, you believe them to be less than human just because they don't possess a human form or talk like I and JARVIS." Vision nodded and his face appeared to harden.

"But I mean she is right isn't she?" Steve spoke up, "The more human-like they appear the more intelligent Tony made them. That would make sense."

"It would." She smiled at Steve and gained confidence from his words. "The bots seem cute, don't get me wrong, but more like pets -"

"-Please shut up. I can't listen to any more of this." A familiar sharp voice came from Peter's suit.

Surprised, Peter looked down at himself and yelped. "KAREN?!"

The AI made herself known when she projected herself out of drony with a body of rose-red light.

Peter's eyes went wide as a surprised smile spread itself across his lips. When he looked over the familiar form of the young AI, he felt a distinct pang of deja-vu but he couldn't think of where it had come from since it was never there before.

"Surprised to see me, again?" She smirked at Peter before she turned to the shocked eyes of the witch.

"Who are you?" Natasha asked fiercely. Rhodey and Vision were the only ones, other than Peter, who didn't seem wary or amazed by the sudden appearance of the strange hologram.

"I am the youngest of Mr Stark's children and the AI of Spider-Man whilst he's in the suit," she answered in a level, unsurprised voice. Her gaze moved around the room to see; Winter was doing the same as Natasha and red pooled around Wanda's hands. Clint fingered his bow and Steve gripped his shield with a white hand. Thor, she noticed had not gone for his hammer but his expression was one of wonder. "Please put your weapons away. They won't affect my health but it would injure most of the others in this place."

Most of the team let their guard down when Vision confirmed what she said. Natasha and Winter kept their hands on their weapons as their faces remained warped in suspicion.

Sam blinked owlishly, he had never seen an AI project themselves before. "Since when can you do that? Redwing has never projected for me."

"It's the Cogito Protocol that Mr Stark gave his A.I.s to use, should they wish to. He finally miniaturized the tech enough to put it in Spider-Man's suit." KAREN explained softly. "It's nothing to do with intelligence. It's choice. And Redwing doesn't currently have the ability."

"And you chose your form too? I don't know if you existed before my suit but you look my age-" Peter started as he looked over the form of his friend.

"I was created when your suit was but I chose my form," She smiled. "To be your guide I wanted to age with you. However, to create my other features, I took several characteristics from my base that I liked."

"You are a child," Wanda spoke up again vehemently, the anger coloured her tone stronger than before. She thought of how messed up her and her brother became growing up in the Sokovian war zone and something protective and fierce rose in her chest. "Stark should not have put a child in charge of a young adult and then flung them both in danger."

KAREN gave her a rather restrained, bitter sneer as she said. "Most of his older children are dead, or too traumatised, who would you suggest to help Peter? Besides, emotional maturity, intelligence and biological maturity are very different things as you should know, Witch. I wouldn't have assumed you were twenty-eight if I went by how I have known you to behave before this experience."

"KAREN." Vision spoke up stern voice.

"Nephew," KAREN looked at him with an equally hard expression on her holographic face. "If I wanted to hurt her I would have brought up your almost relationship but I didn't… Sorry I didn't reign myself in more. I just watched my dad be tortured and have a breakdown! Then I had to listen to those idiots continue to speak down about my siblings. Despite straight up hearing them communicate, you continue to act like they're lesser just because they don't use human language."

A very tense silence fell before Natasha dared to speak again.

"Who were you based off of?"

At this question, the AI gave a small smile, "Ana Jarvis."

Peter's mouth dropped open a little at the answer as the feeling of Deja-vu finally clicked. He felt rather honoured that Tony would base an AI off of someone he cared for so much and then put her in his suit to help him. "Wow, I-I didn't know that. Why didn't he call you Ana then? Why did he let me name you instead?"

"Because he gave me to you. I am your guide so he thought you should have the honour." She gave Peter a warm side smile that reminded Peter starkly of Tony as she stood in front of him.

Winter tilted his head as his eyes flickered between the two. "You've been here all along, so why chose now to reveal yourself? This was at least a partly calculated decision by you."

She looked at Barnes critically with narrowed eyes before her gaze flickered to Steve and back. "There's something I wanted to see without interference or bias."

"Which was?" Steve asked.

"The truth. Whatever Mr Stark and FRIDAY are hiding from my siblings and me." Her voice turned sharp and determined. "I also wanted to find a way out of here. So that when I found that out you all wouldn't be allowed to invade his privacy more than necessary."

"Any luck on that way out?" Steve inquired, he found he couldn't keep the hopeful note out of his voice if he tried. He hoped if the AI had found out whatever it was that Tony and FRIDAY were hiding, then Siberia would never be shown.

"Unfortunately not." The AI sighed unhappily.

"Why didn't you tell us that was what you were trying to do? My gifts could have helped-" Wanda started.

But KAREN cringed in answer, "I would really rather not have you fiddle with my father's head again. Besides if you haven't thought of a way out by now, then what are the chances you'd be useful?"

Wanda's face turned sour and hardened. "I was only offering to help. I wouldn't hurt him."

"Forgive me if I don't take your words as proof. They don't normally seem to match up with your actions, do they?" KAREN shot back.

Wanda's lip curled at the AI, "I am trying to be better."

KAREN arched an eyebrow at her as an awkward silence came over the group.

Winter internally snorted at the young AI but he kept his outward expression neutral. It wasn't in his nature to be forgiving either especially not to young witches who had volunteered to get their creepy powers from the organisation that tortured him for decades. He distracted himself from his musing and glanced around the mindscape. He was surprised that he couldn't see anything in here that reminded him of Obadiah, the creepy Pierce like figure was a big influence in Stark's life he would have expected at least something. However, it was like Tony had wiped out all memory and presence of the man from his life. Winter wasn't unhappy to see that the manipulative asshole had been erased, but he did wonder what had driven Tony to that.

"I can't see any trace of Stane in here…" He mused quietly.

"Thank God, he hasn't got any of that bastard in his head," Rhodey answered, his face lit up as he examined his surroundings a bit more.

"Key memories, key people have left their mark here," Natasha pondered. "...Either Stane is so unimportant to Tony now that he's deleted all trace of him. Or Pin Tony was so traumatised by what happened he shoved all of it in the sphere or through that locked door-"

"-My money is on the later," Clint quipped in a dark voice. "Slimy fuck couldn't wait to get his hands all over Tony.-"

"-Can we not talk about that please?" Peter cut in over Clint in a deeply repulsed voice as he gave an inadvertent shiver.

"This place is adaptive, so I presume that Tony's subconscious at least knows we are here," Bruce noted in an analytical voice, then he looked to the others stares and speaks up again to clarify. "When is the last time we saw the current Mask?"

"Not since arriving," Scott answered whilst his face creased in concentration. "Not since before the memories began."

"Don't you find that odd? Especially since the other two Tony's seem aware beyond that door." Bruce waved to the door as he paced and a pensive look came over his face.

"Isn't Mask dependant on Pins ability to keep him up? Us being in here could affect that." Steve reasoned.

"If that were the case we shouldn't have even been able to see him at the start. Correct me if I'm wrong, " Bruce gave a look to Wanda and Vision before he continued and directed his next words to Steve. "The way the mindscape adapts, the memories of Tony we seemingly had to break through to at the start. Tony's mind is extraordinary but not magic, no doubt Mask is the only one who knows how deep we are going and didn't like it. So he threw up a defence, tried to shove us out, perhaps even give us the motivation to get out before he lost the power to. Memory magic and mental magic, in general, need an alive, out of action source to take hold, if the Being wanted to hurt Tony as little as possible he would choose the Mask to take all the 'Tony' memories from."

"That is the safest route with mind magics, in my experience…" Wanda frowned, "But there are memories we see here where Mask isn't there. In Afghanistan for example."

"Remember the 'all are one, all are the same' speech the Being gave in regards to those personas at the start?" Bucky asked Wanda in a voice, carefully void of hostility. "It's not like me and Winter, where we actually identify as different people and even Winter and I share our memories. They are all Stark though, they share the same mind, thoughts and memories."

"He's right," KAREN said in answer, as she bit her lip. "Dad's never shown signs of MPD or DID… who knows what Afghanistan did to him though? He never told me any of this."

"If it's any consolation," Visions voice sounded carefully controlled once again yet tender as he looked over at his Aunt. "A lot of this is new to me too."

KAREN bit her lip as she glanced back to her nephew before she saw their surroundings begin to twist in a familiar fashion which signalled the memories were about to begin. So she hurriedly collapsed her holographic form back into Droney and anxiously awaited what was to be shown next.


As the mindscape faded out, their awareness reformed to see Tony huddled in the bathroom connected to the workshop.

Tony was leant over the toilet as the burgers that had been sitting heavily in his stomach made a resurgence. The bile burned as it came up his throat and between each heave he found himself gasping for air.

"Oh man, I didn't want to see that," Scott uttered, the tone was sympathetic but his face was twisted in disgust as he turned away.

His chest ached with the motion and he could swear he felt the titanium housing grinding against his ribs.

The team couldn't help but flinch at the sensation although Rhodey, Sam and Scott could not help but let out a low groan and curl in on themselves.

Tony decided he would stick to the doctor's recommendations of light food for now. Though he still didn't entirely regret the burgers.

He tried to focus on his breathing, each breath harder as it seemed he couldn't get enough air around the heavy heaving. Each deep breath he tried to take made his lungs swell uncomfortably against the reactor and it was a fight to try and calm down his breathing into the shorter breaths Yinsen had taught him, while still getting enough air.

Steve worried his bottom lip as his brow furrowed, some of the worse nights with his asthma, compounded with the chronic colds he would get, often felt like something hard was pushing down on his chest.

At that moment, he wished he could be there with Tony to coach him through the breathing techniques he had learned to deal with his own problems pre-serum.

Tony hoped he could get control of his breathing without sending himself into hyperventilation, although the strangled, restricted sensation of his lungs around the arc made that difficult.

He leant his forehead against the cool porcelain as he just tried to breathe.

Dum-E, U and Butterfingers beeped worriedly around him as Dum-E rolled forward to rub his back.

He flinched violently as the gentle claw touched his back.

"No, Dum-E... do-don't... touch my back," he wheezed.

Dum-E gave a low whine as his arm drooped and he retreated slightly.

KAREN felt a twinge deep within her code when a sense of empathy welled up within her for her Uncle. The times where she didn't succeed to comfort Peter were rare especially as they were so close now but in those rare times, the sense of failure she felt was crushing. She debated whether or not to say anything to the group for a brief moment before she decided against it. Instead, she focused back on Peters vitals and her search for a possible way out from the magic.

Tony wanted to reassure the worried bot, but he didn't have the energy to move from where he sat, hunched, his arms hugged his chest below the reactor and he just focused on his breathing.

He would explain everything and reassure them as soon as he could breathe again.

He pressed his head firmly against the coolness and tried to piece himself back together.

Then he felt the burn rising in his throat again. Tears leaked out of his eyes as the movement pulled at his chest again.

Thor swallowed, 'If this was a chronic issue for Anthony, I have not offered him the respite from it for the entirety of our friendship. Asgard could have healed him.'

This thought caused a sour sensation to rise up like a snake in the back of Thor's mind before he shoved it back. Instead, he tried to focus on being thankful that his friend no longer suffered in such a way, due to his new enhancements.

He looked across to Rhodey, the Colonel's hands twitched and he seemed to vibrate where he stood. It was obvious he was itching to go over there and bundle his best friend into a hug.

Jarred, by the image of Stark in such a similar position to pre-serum Steve, Bucky felt something protective rising in him.

The feeling only started to sink as the memory began to warp in a familiarly discomforting fashion.

'Stark probably wouldn't appreciate the 'pity' anyway.'


Steve was relieved that as the next memory formed, he found himself walking back into the living room as Tony.

The phantom ache across his chest now felt more than ever like someone was pushing his heart out through his back. His right arm held against his chest, supporting both the reactor and the sore limb.

'How pathetic. I'm such a fucking mess, sobbing, puking and now I can't even breathe properly.'

Steve internally cringed at the sensation of bile and the sharp tell-tale tang of sick that was being slowly washed away as Tony sipped from a small mug of tomato soup that Dum-E had happily heated for him.

'You are ill and naturally so! Don't berate yourself for something you can't help.'

He felt Tony's eyes sting harshly as he focused away from the self-hatred and to the gift that he had left sitting on the table.

Lowering himself down to the sofa and putting the mug aside to pick up the gift.

It was an expensive black leather and silver watch, just above it a note was written in Obadiah's telltale spiky hand.

'Thank god It wasn't your time. - Obadiah'

The poetic symbolism of the gift and the note wasn't lost on Steve at all. It left a sour taste in his mouth when he thought about how much Obadiah wanted it to be Tony's time.

Next to the watch was a bottle of fine whiskey and a card signed by his top R&D personnel, the couple of dozen signatures all accompanied by little messages that welcomed him home. There were even a couple of little drawings and smiley faces scribbled around the comments.

Steve felt a pang of shock of how clearly Tony was loved by his company in these well wishes. Weirdly, he had found that he hadn't ever visualized Tony as a proper boss, in the same way, that he had seen Howard and Pepper.

Somehow he'd always thought of Tony as just playing around in his lab.

His breath stuttered as something tightened in Tony's chest and throat. But he soundly forced the emotion back as he got to his feet and clicked the watch on.

Restlessly, he looked out to sea, down into the dark, rolling waves that crashed upon the cliff face. He found himself almost unreasonably glad for the thick glass that separated him from the large body of water.

'I'm with you there, pal.' Steve confessed internally, he had never been particularly fond of large open spaces of water not after he had been frozen and certainly not with what he had seen happen to Tony.

"You have 1,713 New voice messages. How should I categorise for you?" JARVIS asked in a calming voice.

There was a twist on Tony's lips that felt like the beginning of a cringe but his voice sounded frighteningly dead to Steve's ears. He remembered his own voice sounding like that when he thought he had no one left but Peggy - who was married and ill with dementia.

"Most people would be disappointed I'm not dead. I'm not in the mood to deal with bullshit. Delete all."

"Don't underestimate how keenly your loss was felt these months, Sir." JARVIS remained silent before he forcibly softened his tone. "There are others besides Miss Potts, Mr Rhodes, Mr Hogan, Mr Stane, DumE, U, Butterfingers and I that missed you."

"I'll bite JARVIS." Tony stepped back and crossed his arms tightly. "Show me."

Steve felt a little sad that Tony really thought no one had missed him.

JARVIS kept the number count on the screen as it dropped quickly.

1,700

1,300

1,000

500

175

85

40

27

Steve only briefly had time to feel a flash of shock and sadness at seeing such a low number before he felt his consciousness be pulled away from Tony.


He felt his consciousness reform a short distance away behind the coach along with his teammates.

Once they'd all fully reformed, Spider-Man seemed to forget all caution and throw himself on the couch just to the left of where Tony was stood behind. Rhodes did the same on Tony's right.

"Uncle Tony!" Tony's head snapped up to the screen to see the picture of an adorable little girl who bore a strong resemblance to Rhodey on the screen with the name 'Lily Rhodes' underneath. "Uncle Tony pick up! Please! The - the news said you're missing, but you can't be. Please just pick up. Uncle Tony?"

"Lily…" Tony breathed as Lily half sobbed over the line.

Several members of the team looked to Rhodey at the confirmation of this girls identity but he didn't look back. He was too busy focusing on the past version of his niece.

"Come on pick up… I know you're there and the news is lying, so just pick up. Pick up!" She audibly choked back a sob. "Please… Grandpa said Uncle James was hurt and he's in the hospital, so please just tell me your okay… They knew, Grandpa and Grandma knew and they weren't even going to tell me… You-you need to tell them that's not right."

Tony collapsed back onto the top of the sofa and dropped his face into his hands when the girl muttered that everything would be okay as she hung up.

"I-I didn't think that…" He rubbed his face and eyes. "I barely ever even see her… Did she leave any other messages?"

Natasha blinked in surprise that Stark was visibly affected by messages from a child who he barely even saw.

"Four Sir, two text messages, one more missed call, the last is a video call."

Rhodey blew out a harsh breath, he knew that she would have left messages for Tony but not quite that many.

'Ok… Ok, don't cry.' Tony's mouth twitched up into a half smile and his eyes appeared unnaturally bright. "Let's see the text first."

Lily Rhodes-

The news is saying your dead. But Uncle James is out of the hospital and he's been looking for you. I got to talk with him and he said he's going to find you. He promised he won't stop.

"Never," Rhodey promised in a wavering voice. "I needed you back."

As Tony read, there was no mistaking the tears in his eyes. 'Oh my God Rhodey.' "When was this sent?"

"On your birthday, Sir." Tony wiped his eyes harshly when the tears inevitably fell and tried not to think about the second time his chest was torn open.

"O-ok." Tony tried to suck in a deep breath that burned his lungs. "Is the next a text or call?"

"A text a day after the last"

"Show me." Tony's voice came out as a very hoarse and muted whisper.

Lily Rhodes-

I heard Uncle James saying to Grandma that he found a lot of blood at the scene, apparently you were hurt or worse. Please don't be worse.

Tony's eyes look away from the screen to stare at the arc. "Yeah…I can imagine."

Bruce blanched a scary shade of white, he gave the arc an inadvertent look before he forcefully brought his eyes back to the screen.

Shakily he drummed the arc with the fingers of one hand, Tony waved JARVIS on with the other.

"Hey, it's been two months." Lily's voice spoke up again, this time she spoke slow and softly with a tinge of the former panic. "Uncle James cried on the phone yesterday. He said he's still looking. He won't give up until he finds you... alive or dead. He's gonna bring you home."

Tony swallowed thickly. He would have normally teased Rhodey for crying but now the first thing Tony was going to do if Rhodey ever forgave him was hug him tightly and never let go.

Rhodey privately promised he would do exactly that when he got out of here, but he couldn't help the outward blush of embarrassment that came from the knowledge of Lily telling Tony how he had cried.

"Are you ready for her last message Sir?" Tony nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

This time when Lily's face came on screen, she lacked the usual spark in her eyes and the frown that pulled at her mouth made her seem older and sadder than Tony had ever seen her. Even her tight curls seemed to be drooping.

Wanda's lip twitched, having experienced grief at such a young age she knew how it felt to have that childlike faith in life's goodness robbed from you.

"Hi…" Lily gave a shaky wave to the camera which Tony mirrored. "It's been almost three months. I-I'm starting to lose hope that you'll ever get these. I love you - loved you a lot." Lily paused and looked briefly away from the camera. "I don't want to believe that you could really be gone… I'll miss those days we spent working in the garage and you'd show me how to build robots and cool stuff and you'd always listen to my ideas. Uncle James was always worried I'd hurt myself with the tools, but you trusted me to use them right. And if I did mess up or hurt myself, you helped but you didn't make a huge fuss like Uncle James did."

Clint couldn't help but let his jaw drop slightly in shock, he was surprised that someone like Stark had a paternal side to him that extended to actual human children too. With people like Scott that side of them was obvious. He had thought Stark would have been more awkward around them and would have been distantly friendly like Steve was.

She played with her hands that already bore a few small scars. "I liked that." It pained Tony to see her trying and failing to hold back the tears that were falling down her cheeks. "Uncle James is out again. I hope this time he'll actually find you. I don't know what else to say… but I really don't want to say goodbye. Um… get home soon."

With that, the screen goes black and Tony rushed up to the screen. "I've got to call her back! I've got to - Lily!"

"TONY!" She answered immediately, but he was reminded how late it was when he saw that she was hiding under her blanket with a torch and her phone. She had clearly been waiting for him to call. "Oh thank God you're alive! Uncle Rhodey called and said he found you and I wanted to call right away but Grandma said I needed to wait and I shouldn't bother you. Are you OK? You're not hurt right? Do you need to go to the hospital? I saw your press conference, why are you shutting down weapons manufacturing? Isn't uncle James gonna be mad-"

"- Wow slow down a little, Gadget. He is a little. But he'll get over himself soon. No, I'm alright, I got treated before. I'll be fine, trust me." Tony tried to smile but his face felt too tight.

"Well, if you're sure," Lily answered in a small voice, whilst she chewed on a strand of hair. "You don't look alright though… you look too skinny. Like mum before she-" Lily cut herself off before speaking up again firmer. "Anyway, you need to get some food in you. Scoff yourself silly, alright?"

Tony grimaced slightly, he thought about the burgers and how that had ended before a male voice was heard on the other side of the line. "Lily? Are you up? Who are you talking to?"

Scott chuckled softly and shared a knowing smile with Clint. "Busted."

Lily swore to herself, before whispering apologetically to Tony. "Gotta go! I'm glad you're back Uncle Tony. Bye."

Tony waved back to her as she shut her phone off, he didn't trust himself to speak.

He stared at the screen for a long moment as his throat tightened. "Show them all in priority order."

The counter of unread messages dropped to 23 as JARVIS automatically moved it to the edge of the screen.

Notifications in Peg Leg's pastel pink flashed in the forefront of the screen over a couple of the others behind it.

"Oh shit…" Stunned, Tony breathed. "They haven't contacted me in forever. I didn't think they still-" He cut himself off briefly before becoming more concerned. "Is Peggy ok?"

"The messages are regarding you, Sir."

"Oh," relieved, Tony slumped slightly as he moved back and leant against the edge of his sofa. "Bring the first one up J."

"Tony, I just heard what happened on the news. I guess I was calling in the hope that what they were saying is fake… but I guess it isn't. Peg Leg is really worried and they miss you. Peggy… it's not a good day and she didn't really understand what the news was saying, but I know she'd be out there looking for you if she could."

There were a few winces as the team remembered Tony's childhood kidnapping.

"I really hope you're fine out there and we're all worried for nothing." Daniel sighed heavily. "I'm sorry it's taken this long for me to call you. Obadiah told me he thought you needed space and that we should let you contact us first. I shouldn't have done, I know you and I know how you can twist things up and after a while, you would have gotten it into your head it was better to not call at all. I shouldn't have let it get this far, I'm sorry. I missed you a lot. I miss you now. Please be alright."

The call ended there though Tony noticed there were a number of messages between Daniel, JARVIS and Peg Leg. Tony saw that those made up a lot of the twenty-two remaining messages, unbidden he felt a smile rise to his lips, it only grew wider when he noticed some messages from Peggy on her rare good days too.

Steve tensed and blew out a shaky breath, he looked through the messages and felt a spike of anticipation and renewed grief upon seeing that one was a missed call and the other a missed video call. He wanted to ingrain Peggy's face and voice deep, deep into his mind so he could preserve her forever.

"Anthony," hearing her familiar British voice again felt like a wound widening in his chest, the same wound that opened when he first heard Daniel. "I saw the news, I was calling because I hoped Daniel and Peg Leg were wrong… I hoped it was a delusion. For once I hoped I had imagined it. But it's true. JARVIS confirmed it. I'm going to find you, I'm going to bring you home. I've done it once, I'll do it again."

Tony cringed thinking of what could have happened if Peggy tried to follow through with that. She could have ended up lost or hurt trying to help him. He would never have forgiven himself if anything had happened to her.

"Oh god," Steve breathed, "What would they do if she-"

"They'd restrain her," Sam answered, upon seeing Steve's stricken face he hurried to reassure him, "With the least amount of force possible. They wouldn't harm her, man. Don't worry."

The next call was a video message, Peggy looked dishevelled; her normally perfectly styled hair was out of place and her eyes had taken on a manic gleam that showed she was either in the midst of or just coming out of a particularly bad episode. "They wouldn't let me go. I thought they were brainwashed at first, I thought Daniel was too... Then Peg Leg confirmed their sentiments. You can't brainwash an AI and no one would be able to hack one made by you." She was silent for a long moment, before screaming and slapping her palms on her knees. "It's bullshit!"

Steve jolted backwards at her scream, Bucky placed a steadying hand on his arm but he couldn't help the inadvertent reaction of his eyes briefly blowing wide at this uncharacteristic break in persona from his old friend.

Tony was stunned by the uncharacteristic violent swear before he realised her dementia and stress of what happened had clearly mounted up. "I hate just sitting here and doing nothing. I saved you when you were younger. Why can't they just let me try to do it again?" She pointed at the screen vehemently whilst her voice wavered. "You're too stubborn to die. If I can't get you, you have to get yourself home. Hear me?" Her voice had taken on a stern edge and he had automatically nodded in response despite knowing that this call was long in the past. Nonetheless, she gave a brief smile. "Good," she said before she switched the call off.

"Well, she's right about Tones being too stubborn to die." Reflecting on his renewed pride in his best friend's endurance in busting out of the Ten Rings camp, Rhodey felt a small smile spread across his lips.

Tony barely paid attention to the handful of messages between JARVIS and Daniel that flicked by next as he thought about Peggy and Daniel. He'd wondered why it had been so long since he'd heard from them, believing that they would contact him. Eventually, he'd assumed that they didn't want to talk to him anymore, that he'd done something to make them hate him.

He'd have to talk to Obadiah about why he'd told Daniel that, they had lost so much time.

"Tell me we get to see that," Rhodey muttered maliciously. "I'd love to see him sweat."

"Me too," Steve answered, in a hard voice when Rhodey looked to the Captain he saw his eyes reflecting something icy. He wondered briefly if Steve was angry for just Peggy or both of them. After a long moment, he forwent that scepticism, giving him the benefit of the doubt and nodding to him.

The time that wouldn't have been lost if Tony had just called them himself, instead of stupidly wallowing, he grimaced.

He was distracted from his thoughts when he noticed a message from Abraham Zimmer, dated yesterday, waiting on screen.

Abraham Zimmer-

Tony, I just heard that you were found and on your way home. I don't think I've never been so relieved. You had me really worried there. I'm on medical leave at the moment, but I'll see you at work as soon as I'm back.

His brow furrowed in worry as he wondered what had happened to the old Head of R&D.

"JARVIS, why is Abe on medical leave?"

"He suffered a heart attack about three weeks ago and decided to use his built up leave for additional time to recuperate. He's scheduled for another few weeks of leave, Sir."

"Right," Tony sighed, worried for the kind, old man who'd worked for the company since Tony was a child. "I need to send him something. Something he likes. Perhaps a full box set of Star Trek The Original Series?"

Peter perked up in excitement at the mention of Star Trek and he remembered he still had to show Mr Stark the third film but things had been getting in the way and they had less time to sit down and bond now.

"I'll order it right away," JARVIS spoke up again in a soft voice, the tone irked Tony a little.

Scott felt a small shocked smile come over his face, before this he had thought that Stark had ruled his company in the tyrannical, uncaring way that his old boss had done. And that he had bought or blackmailed his way into getting high employee satisfaction ratings. But this, being comfortable enough to use a nickname for a staff member, being genuinely concerned for their health and the bottle of wine he had received painted a very different picture. Clearly, his employees loved and cared about him as he did in return.

He felt his face twitch as he scanned through the few messages from the others that he hadn't read yet.

Vision scans through the names and noticed the ones left were from Ronnie, Reed and his mother. He was glad to see that they had all contacted Tony, even if Reed somewhat surprised him. He knew no one else was likely to know who those names were. Reed might be a well-known scientist, but it wasn't well known that he and Tony knew each other.

Ronnie was only listed with her childhood nickname, not even her last name. He was happy she had at least tried and contact Tony, knowing how little they were ever able to speak.

Tony suddenly felt like he couldn't deal with it. Tony wasn't quite sure how to describe it. There was a deep dark pit in his chest where his heart should have been. Expecting nothing, he had instead arrived surrounded by undeserving affection.

'No one knows I am a monster.

'No one knows of Yinsen, who should have got out.

'Those kids from the Humvee should be alive, but they died protecting me.'

Thor grimaced, he had lost warriors in battle and remembered how monstrous it felt having his brother die to protect him and Jane. He wished, at that moment, that he had been there to empathise with Stark. The God could only imagine how horrific it would have been if he had led the warriors three to their doom in Jotunheim, there it was only thanks to Loki, Heimdall and Odin's quick actions that they hadn't.

Meanwhile, Steve thought of Erksine and how he still carried the memory of that kindly German Jewish scientist with him. He had the luxury of knowing that however bad he had felt for his past actions at times that he was still a good person. He had visible proof of that whereas Stark didn't have that luxury.

Sam swallowed heavily, he flicked his eyes to Steve before he looked at the floor. He recollected his past guilt and self-loathing after Riley's death, he hoped that Stark didn't have to take all of that trauma alone.

Tony made a sudden sharp movement and grabbed at the fine whisky. "Transfer the rest of the messages to my cell, and take the bots to their charging stations. I have work to do."

Silently, Bruce turned his head to watch his friend's figure as he made his way from the room. Meanwhile, a mix of empathy and worry throbbed like a physical swell in his throat. 'No wonder Tony tried so hard to stop me from thinking of myself as a monster.'

His eyes flickered, almost against their will, to the Fine Whisky tauntingly winking at him from his friends hand and he heard the low growl of the Hulk in his head.