"Um, hi Tony, its Rhodey. I just wanted to see how you were doing. Friday told us that you'd returned to the Tower, so…um…. I hope that's going okay. I just want to tell you that I'm…sorry. About everything I said before. I really don't blame you for what happened, it was a freak accident and that's all. It wasn't Sam's fault, Vision's fault, or yours. I don't expect you to forgive me right away – or at all. But I know what you do with guilt Tony, and I need you to know that it's really not your fault. I- "

"Okay Fri, you can stop it know." The voice mail immediately silenced leaving the workshop in silence. Tony had listened to the voicemail four times since he'd woken up. So many emotions swarmed through him that he wasn't entirely sure how to feel about it. Tony fell back onto his bed and stared up at the ceiling. "What should I do Fri?" Friday didn't answer right away, seeming to consider the question.

"I don't know Boss," was the response. Tony thought back over the last few years, Rhodey had always been a really good friend. Until the civil war they had hardly ever fallen out – except for his birthday party a couple years ago, but he wasn't counting that - and it wasn't like either of them had been in a good mental space at the time, Rhodey had lost the use of his legs for god's sake. Even if he'd got the prototype which allowed him movement, which didn't stop the trauma that went along with it.

"Fri, ring Rhodey,"

"Of course Boss," Tony pushed himself of the bed and struggled into clean clothes, he'd never realised how difficult it was to put clothes on with a cast, if what Friday said was true and his arm wasn't actually broken then hopefully, he could rid of it today, though he'll probably have to call Dr. Cho. He didn't think using one of his machines would be a good idea. He stumbled into the main workshop area, blatantly ignoring the mess that was the area where the bots had tried to make him smoothies. Finally the call connected and Rhodey's voice sounded from the speakers in the ceiling.

"Tony? I didn't think you'd call back,"

"Me neither." Tony approached the bench with the blueprints on it, suddenly unsure about what he wanted to say,

"Is everything okay?" asked Rhodey, finding the silence worrying,

"Oh yeah, um… I just wanted to say that I…er – I won't forgive you yet, I don't think I can, but… I would like to still be friends…" his sentence trailed of, felling awkward.

"Me too," was Rhodey's relieved reply, "I'd promised that I wouldn't betray you like so many others have, and I broke that promise so maybe we can start over?"

"yeah sure, do you want to come round tomorrow?"

"Sounds good, see you then?"

"Yeah, I guess," the call ended leaving Tony smiling down at the bench. So far, other than waking up at the compound, nothing too bad had happened. Yet at least. Tony sat down at one of his benches and stared absently at the opposite wall. So much had happened, and now he wasn't quite saw what he could do now. He didn't want to be Iron man anymore, so he should probably return to SI. He could maybe send some designs in later on or something, maybe a big project to really show that he was back in business. He smiled at that, he was no way near the man he had been less than a decade ago, but he could still appreciate and flash entrance. Speaking about inventions, Tony gently rubbed against the arc that still sat heavily but mostly unnoticed in his chest.

"Fri, there won't be any damage if I take the arc out, will there?"

"No, the arc reactor has simply broken through the synthetic skin and is resting safely in the metal cylinder, if you were to take it out it wouldn't cause you any damage." Now that he thought about it, Tony could hardly remember when it got put back into his chest. All the memories he had left of his time in hydras hold were blurry shots of dark hallways and phantom pain that only found him in his nightmares – yeah, his first proper sleep without medication hadn't exactly been pleasant – not that he was complaining really, he was traumatised enough by the Ten Rings.

"I don't happen to have any synthetic skin lying around, do I?"

"There is some in the cupboard next to the coffee machine," Tony slipped of the bench and headed to the coffee area, which was unfortunately also were the smoothie machine was kept. Tony expertly avoided all the puddles of motor oil and what was probably one fruit juice and reached into the cupboard. He found the small box behind the coffee grounds in a sterile container. He couldn't help grinning to himself,

"I am a genius," he declared to himself, as he absently switched the machine on. He deserved a good coffee after everything.

"Of course, Boss," came Friday's voice directly from the coffee machine causing Tony to jump,

"Since when have you been able the get into the coffee machine,"

"Since you reprogrammed it Boss," Tony narrowed his eyes and pulled out his coffee,

"You better not have tampered with it or you're going to be stuck in the elevator for a month,"

"Of course not," Tony suspiciously sniffed the drink before taking a sip and immediately grimacing,

"Decaf. Of course." Tony briefly though about tipping it down the sink, but decided against it, he was too impatient for that. Instead he took it back to where he'd just been sitting and sat down the mug and the box.

He quietly got to work, pulling down his shirt and twisting the arc reactor until it hissed, and he took pulled it out. He then dismantled it slightly until all that was left the bottom which was much like a plug and secured it into his chest once again. Now nothing could get in and fall into his chest cavity, before he placed the skin over it, using spray on adhesive to meld the fake stuff with his real skin. Glancing at the reflective metal of the work bench he looked over the application. Running his hand over it, he wasn't surprised that it was quite bumpy, but with all the scar tissue around it that was to be expected. He grabbed the paper he had scribbled some ideas on last night and added a couple more bullet points.

Awesome, another thing off his check list, next thing to get done was probably the cast then he would need to go to SI, see how it was doing from the inside. If he proposed the new ides he had, he believed that SI could see an increase of stock rather quickly. Before then though, he thought he could relax a bit and do a bit of tinkering;

"Okay Fri, can you pull up Rhodey's old brace design and the new ones and compare them side by side please," the holograms lit up the room and Tony rolled his shoulders back, he'd never done this with one arm before but the best thing with being a futurist is that he already had a solution to that problem. "Okay, pull up the arms and I think we should get these built in 2 hours and some extra time for adjustments, what'd'ya think?"

"Approximately 2 hours and 35 minutes for build time Boss,"

"Great, we should get started then."