Disclaimer: Unfortunately, I do not own them outside of wild fantasies...

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She's dying.

That's the first thought that springs to her mind once awareness begins to seep through the never-ending aches and blistering heat. She has to be dying because there's no other rational explanation for the throbbing ball of pain that might have been her body at some point. Groaning, Pepper creaked open her eyes, vaguely aware that all she's seeing out of her left orb's a slim sliver of light, one that's piercing her cranium with enough force to send aching throbs throughout her skull.

She's definitely dying, she thinks and then her world flips around once more, leaving her breathless and disoriented.

"Time to go, Miss Potts," a voice thunders, the words rolling together into one incomprehensible mass of syllables, a foreign language to her pounding mind. An iron grip jerks her towards her feet, though her legs drag more than stumble forward once he starts to move, the bare soles colliding with jagged rocks and pebbles.

Clenching her teeth, Pepper tried to remember what's happened, memories piercing together with an abominable, unforgivable slowness. There had been some sort of presentation, hadn't there?

On the…

The Jericho missile?

That's right, she thought, I was going to let Tony go alone because…because of what?

There had been a special occasion, some important event she hadn't wanted to miss. It had been…

Pepper's eyes narrowed in concentration, before cutting off her train of thought with a breathless gasp and a sharp jolt of pain. Tripping, Pepper's captor kept up his relentless pace, dragging her past shadowed corners and leering eyes, the stench of festering bodies and the coppery tang of dried blood filling her nose and mouth. Concentration lost, Pepper's scattered thoughts fumbled out of reach yet again, leaving her alone in the jumbled mess of her mind, agony searing a ruthless path through her body.

Then, her captor halted his tirade, feet digging into dirt with enough force to send her reeling into the wall, the air driven from her lungs.

"Now then, Miss Potts," he murmured, pinning her with browned, callused palms. Here, she could see the sweat pooling down his naked forehead, the manic gleam to his piercing, chestnut eyes. Here, she was trapped, a cornered animal in a foreign world with no way out.

"Here is what will happen," he continued, "Mr. Stark has unfortunately refused our demands once. With your life as part of our generous bargain, I doubt he shall make the same mistake."

He paused, eyes boring into hers. Gasping in shuddering breaths, Pepper forced herself to pay attention, to thread together the deep, guttural whispers of sound weaving through her skull. Clenching the tattered, ebony remains of her pantsuit in her fist, Pepper dredged up the coherency to respond, memories flooding back as they painted a fearsome picture through her mind's eye.

"That won't work," she croaked, cursing hell and high water that Obadiah had specifically requested she accompany her boss on what should have been and in-and-out operation, a two-minute stop on the speedway that was Tony Stark's life.

"I'm-I'm only Mr. Stark's assistant," she continued, trying to block out the faded touch of Tony's arm wrapped firmly around her shaking form, the heat of his body searing through her skin and her terror. "He won't care. You'd have better luck threatening his last hook up. They get closer than I ever have."

Iron laced her last words, bringing back old steel to her spine and eyes. Damn it, she was Pepper Potts, and she would not let herself be used as some whimpering damsel in distress with no purpose other than as a sniveling, bruised bargaining chip.

Instead of cowering, though, his grin simply broadened and for a moment, fear spiked through her, leaving behind the bitter dregs of terror bound with panic.

"I believe I will differ," he whispered, breathe hot against her face, "For personal reasons, you will find."

For a moment, they stood at an impasse, Pepper's hands grabbling against the ragged surface of the wall before her quivering legs gave out from under her. The smile tugging at his lips widened, giving her a second of warning before he leaned in, lips a hairs breadth away from her own.

"You will play the part you have been given, Miss Potts," he murmured, raising a callused finger to trace a trail down her cheek, "And if you do not…"

His hand reeled forward, snapping her face towards the wall and leaving behind the fragile start of an aching bruise.

"Well, I am certain my men shall find some use for you."

--

Stumbling over rocks and his own feet, orientation came slowly for him. Dust dominated the feeble supply of oxygen filling his lungs, leaving in its wake hacking coughs and watering eyes. Too sluggish for his own likes, the puzzle pieces of his life fit together again, meshing together in ways nothing else would. There'd been his half-assed presentation, practiced theatrics covering what sunglasses and four Tylenols couldn't, and then his favorite brand of hair of the dog with only the resonating clash of AC/DC and the familiar click of Pepper's typing to cover what in retrospect was probably a foreboding silence.

After that, his memory went a little hazy; the stiletto beats of his heart and the numbing taste of fear filling in the blanks.

With an all too abrupt halt that left him fairly sure his stomach was still being dragged on ahead, the starch bag covering his head flew up, leaving the gut-clenching truth of the presentation's aftermath as stark and blinding as the sun searing across his eyelids. Breath gone from his chest, Tony plodded forward long enough to soak in the heat blistering over his skin before another hand clamped around his bicep to whirl his face back towards the mouth of the cave.

There, Tony saw what he half-hoped was a figment of his imagination, half-prayed was as tangent as the car battery weighing down his hands.

A burden he hadn't even known existed lifted from his chest in that minute, replaced with the cooling touch of relief and the acrylic bite of anger meshed with fear. The steel-lined spine of Pepper Potts had been bent, and for a brief moment he thought that the impossible, indomitable will of what had been his driving force for years had broken. Then, he caught sight of the strength lurking behind her gaze and knew that the only wounds that had pierced were the ones he could see with his own eyes, wounds that started up a slow boil in his stomach.

--

Like an avenging angel, Pepper strode towards Tony, sheer determination making up for battered limbs and the fingers gripping her wrist. Raza – whether that was a title or a name, she wasn't quite sure – had followed up his threats by continuing his rampage towards what she now saw as the mouth of the cave, barking orders out in a variety of languages, most of which she couldn't recognize as more than Eastern in origin.

The fact that her heart's beats became staccato notes once she saw Tony was nothing more than relief, and certainly not fear at the start of the game she had become a part of.

"Tony Stark," he announced, dragging her to his chest, "I have a small gift for you."

She tried locking eyes with him, but while Pepper knew she held Tony Stark's full attention for one of the few times in her life, his gaze didn't quite settle on her. If she had ever wondered what it would be like to have Tony's eyes run over her body, skim his canyon-deep gaze along her curves and pliant skin – and she had, though she'd immediately banished the thought as if it had never happened – it had not been like this. Not with a look she could never remember seeing before seething through his eyes, eyes filled with fury and shock and fear and something almost like confusion.

She felt his breathe glide along her neck, raising hairs despite the obvious heat. In that place, the reality of his fingers imprinting into her skin and his stench filling her nose overpowered her, and she could almost imagine the smile playing along his face at his next words.

"Consider it an opening payment for our bargain."

Then, Pepper went flying forward once again, only this time with no jagged walls to stop her flight.

--

The tick in his jar and clenched fist, nails digging white crescents into his palms, served as his response. The fury building beneath his stomach allowed no other answer. When he shoved Pepper forward unceremoniously, Tony lunged to catch her, one arm tightening her waist as he entangled his fingers in the ragged, unbound strands of her hair, half of his body held stiffly beside her with the car battery in hand. Breathing in the familiar scent of flowers, masked by the copper tang of blood and the stench of dust, the knot in his stomach loosed, reassured by what sight alone could not comfort.

Until he'd seen her face, alive and as fiery as the last, Tony hadn't quite known how much of his panic stemmed from the distinct lack of Pepper in his life.

"Come," the smaller, fatter man announced, gesturing towards the mouth of the cave before trudging forward.

The guns at his back provided enough reason to follow, however grimly and however slow. Only then, hobbling forward with one hand encircling Pepper's waist, did Tony notice his apparent roommate, the man eyeing them with an unrecognizable look. Later, he promised, he would question more deeply what had just happened.

--

Outside, sand stretched as far as the eye could see, an impenetrable prison built by nature's own hands. The chill rushing down her beck sent a grimace to her face, cold breathing down her neck in spite of the swelling heat. Up until now, she'd held onto the slim hope of escape, but to where? Dune's held under the tumultuous winds control? Caves their captors likely knew as home?

Suddenly, in spite of the Tony's reassuringly firm hand on her waist, Pepper fell back into fear's embrace, her fingers clenching on Tony's wrist.

Wincing, Tony tore his gaze away from whatever entrancing sight he'd laid eyes on, piercing Pepper with dark eyes.

"Are you all right?" he murmured, "Did-"

He caught himself, green tinting his too pale face.

"Did they hurt you?"

She almost wants to laugh at the way he stumbles over his words, choked whispers replacing the normal eloquence of Tony Stark. She's also fairly sure that's the shock talking, the part of her still convinced this is a terrible, terrible dream, that she didn't just spend her birthday knocked out in the middle of the desert, covered with sand and blood and a tattered suit instead of a backless silk dress and her favorite, over-priced perfume.

Her first instinct wars to protect him, to answer no, but if the bruises haven't blossomed already, they will, and most of all, he needs to be prepared that she's become the other side's best bargaining chip, a turn even she still struggles to admit.

But if Pepper's always been anything, it's logical, and she can look at the situation either like it's a boardroom meeting or an old 50s flick, both versions give her the same answer.

'They just knocked me around a bit," she replied, first instinct dominating enough to soften the blow, "Nothing more than that."

Just beat her to the point she didn't know up from down, until laughter bubbled instead of sobs and reality shifted towards kaleidoscope dreams. That had been all. But as usual, her job and her life, as it had become, was the well-being of one Tony Stark, which meant that as long as they were here, keeping the worst from happening mattered the most now.

She knew she was off-the-clock. She knew that, but she also knew just as inexplicably that her gut instinct, first and foremost, had been to protect.

She didn't want to – refused to – think about what that meant or why she was still following that instinct.

Breaking her eyes away from his unfathomable stare, Pepper took in what had held his attention for those first seconds outside and felt her own breath lock outside of her chest.

"Oh god," she whispered, broken nails digging into Tony's muddied skin, "Oh god, oh god, please tell me that's not what I think it is."

Tony didn't respond, just gripped her waist hard enough to leave marks.

Stark Industry Weapons filled the tents in front of them, a veritable amount that could easily take down an entire city if she recognized them accurately. Most she remembered as newer prototypes, weapons from Tony's last line that hadn't included the new repulsor technology. Scattered here and there were older models too, one or two back from when she'd just started as Tony's assistant, metal rusted and dull with age. People milled through them with the ease and quick footsteps of shoppers on Rodeo Drive, all their gazes inevitably flickering to the flaming brightness known as Tony Stark.

Somehow, the familiarity of the scene just added to the impossibility of the here and now.

When their guide began to talk, albeit in garbled Arabic, relief blossomed at the distraction from the frightening land mine they were strolling along through.

"He wants to know what you think," a man questioned, so close to her ear that Pepper gasped at the unfamiliar voice. Squirming, she pinned her eyes on the battered form of a man, weariness clinging to his frame like an old friend, shadowing his eyes and his words. Whoever he was, this was a man who'd given up hope, allowed bitterness to harden his every movement in ways Pepper had never seen before.

Whoever this man was, she knew he wasn't one of their captors.

"I think you've got a lot of my weapons," Tony replied, poker face in place. His grip on her waist hadn't slackened, if anything, grown stronger, but that was the only glimpse she could get into his hardened eyes.

More Arabic followed. More calm translations with all the personality of an automated recorder. More dark looks.

"He says, um, they have everything you need to build the Jericho missile. He wants you to make the list of materials. He says, uh, for you to start working immediately and when you're done, he will set you both free."

Tony's eyes went black for a second and a bitter grin curled at his lips before he shook their smiling captor's hand.

"No he won't," he announced, clinging her closer.

"No he won't," the man agreed politely, blandly.

The words had barely left Tony's mouth when she felt the butt of a rifle digging into her back once again. Back into the cave they went, her spine tense and rigid against his skin, his jaw firm and severe in the sun's light, neither of them ready to handle words over actions.

Overhead, Raza watched on.

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