Tony held Pepper's hand with one hand and tried to comb down his unruly hair with the other. They'd just gotten out of the car and were walking towards the Tower entrance. It was around 6:30, a little after

Tony opened the big glass door for Pepper, then himself. He hadn't had any anxiety attacks on the way there and hoped to keep it like that... maybe hopefully forever. He tried to keep his eyes forward, hoping it would keep him from seeing things that would trigger his memory.

Tony paused when he saw something that would definitely be a trigger. A figure sat in one of the couches by a lit fire in the Tower's lobby, his profile all too familiar. But no... Tony thought. It couldn't be...

Bruce Banner stood up and turned to face them with raised eyebrows.

"Ah, there you guys are..." Bruce faded off, catching Tony's eye who couldn't even fine words to say. At first he thought it was because of an anxiety attack coming on, but this was a good surprised, Tony realized. Something about having someone there to know what Tony was going through was a felief.

"I'm guessing you didn't tell him?" Banner said, looking at Pepper. She opened her mouth to answer but Tony interrupted.

"Wait, you knew about this?" Pepper smiled guiltily at Tony.

"Soooooo, that wasn't some guy from the financing department that you were talking to ?" Tony asked her, already knowing the answer.

"Hey, you do listen!" Pepper exclaimed, slightly amazed. Tony rolled his eyes and walked over to Banner to shake his hand which just turned into a hug.

"Good to see you, Banner.' Tony said. Banner nodded and clapped Tony on the shoulder.

"Always a pleasure, Tony. Heard you were here and I was close by so I stopped by. Need any help with that anti-serum?"

Pepper, Tony, and banner spent a nice evening together in the living room of Stark Tower, or "A" tower as Bruce had pointed out. Tony had been much too busy to even worry about putting the letters back up on the front of the building.

"A..." Tony had muttered to himself, deep in thought about something. "Avengers..."

"Yes, Tony. Avengers starts with an A." Pepper had told him. Tony sighed and rolled his eyes at her.

"What I meant was, what if I made it Avengers Tower, it could be sort of like our headquarters. That way SHIELD can't boss us around too much." Tony said, looking over at Banner. Bruce raised his eyebrows and nodded.

"I like it."

They'd just gotten Chinese take out food and caught up with each other by the fire for the rest of the night. Banner had been around, he'd been working with SHIELD for a while with a few experiments and was always trying to find better ways to maintain the Hulk.

"Man, I'm exhausted." Banner finally announced around midnight. They'd been eating popcorn while watching some action movie with Bruce Willis that was on TV. Tony wondered if this is what it felt like to be normal, he couldn't even remember.

"You need anything else in your room, Bruce?" pepper asked as she set down her glass of wine on the coffee table. "Sorry it's a little empty right now."

"No, it's perfect. Thank you." Bruce assured her.

"Well if Potts forces me to sleep in for a while tomorrow, which I'm sure she will, I'll probably be down at the workshop at 8." Tony told Banner.

"8am is sleeping in?" Banner asked, amazed. Pepper rolled her eyes.

"Don't even get me stared." she muttered. With that, Bruce nodded and said good night before retiring to his room on the 21st floor.

"Come on, Iron Man. Another long day." pepper said while pulling Tony up from the couch and to his feet.

"Does Iron Man get anything from his lovely girlfriend in return?" Tony asked, giving her a mischievous smile. Pepper grinned and kissed Tony on the tip of his nose.

"Iron Man just had fun on the plane!" she reminded Tony.

"Oh come on, nothing stops Iron Man." Tony argued. Pepper sighed as if she was reluctantly giving in, but Tony knew better.

"Alright, fine. As long as you make breakfast tomorrow."

"Oh don't act like you don't want to. I know your mind tricks, Potts." Tony grinned knowingly. Pepper smiled at him and raised her lips to his. He could taste the wine on Pepper's lips and tongue while Tony ran his hands up and down her sides.

"Let's go." Tony whispered against her lips. Tony lifted Pepper up so her legs were wrapped around his waist. He locked his arms behind her back and they kissed all the way to the bedroom.

We're close here. Tony. Real close." Banner said, engrossed in a microscope. His sleeves were rolled up to his elbows and the front was unbuttoned on the top two buttons. He looked the same as he had when working on finding the tesseract a few months back. Was it really only a few months back?

Tony slowed his scribbling on the scrap piece of paper that was filled with compounds and equations. The workshop was littered with papers like this as well as small bottles of solutions. Holograms surrounded the two men in their work. They'd been at it for two hours now, and Banner was right, they were close to finding the anti-extremis serum.

"This moved along faster than I thought, thanks for helping out." Stark said, keeping his eyes on one of the holographic projections.

"Hey, it's no problem. I find myself missing the team anyway." Banner told Tony, finally taking his eye off the microscope image. "Plus with everything going on, I thought you might like a fellow college... or a friend too." Bruce said. Tony looked over at him this time, realizing he knew about the anxiety. How did everyone all of the sudden know?

"Sir," Jarvis said before Tony could respond. "Miss Potts wants to know if you need a drink break." Tony looked around at the work spread across the room and sighed... he could use a drink.

"Sure, why not." Tony answered.

"Banner, you want anything?" Tony asked, pointing over at Bruce, waiting for an answer.

"A coke or pepsi would be great." Banner said, taking his glasses off to rub his eyes.

"You don't drink, do you?"

Banner shrugged.

"Another perk of being a big green fighting machine." He said sarcastically.

"Alright, just a coke for me too then." Tony said, assuming Jarvis would tell Pepper. Tony zoned out while looking at the ground and Banner rubbed the stubble on his chin. They sat in silence for an uncomfortable moment before Tony spoke up.

"So how'd you find out?"

"Fury." Banner simply said. Tony was done with questioning SHIELD and just passed them off as that annoying co-worker that you just couldn't get rid of.

I'm getting better." Tony said, finally looking up at Banner with a matter-of-fact look. "I guess it just all hit me at once." Banner opened his mouth to say something, but at that moment Pepper walked in, the two bottles of coke in hand.

"How's everything going?" She asked them. Tony put on a less-serious face and clapped his hands together on his lap.

"Pretty well." Tony said. Pepper handed Bruce a coke who thanked her and uncapped it. Pepper walked around a desk to get to Tony and hand him his drink while standing behind his chair.

"Thanks, honey." Tony said, taking the drink and resting it on his knee before tilting his head up to look at her. Pepper gave him a quick kiss on the forehead and rested her hands on his shoulders.

"You could stick around, you know." Tony told her as he uncapped his coke.

"It's ok. I've got tons of work upstairs. I'll let you have your guy time." Pepper told Tony. She gave his shoulder a gentle squeeze before starting to walk out.

"Thanks again, Miss Potts." Banner said before she left.

"Pepper." she called back over her shoulder, mimicking how he'd done the same to her. Bruce chuckled and nodded.

"Alright. Pepper it is then."

Tony waited until Pepper's footsteps faded before turning back to banner.

"I am fine, though. Really." Tony tried to assure him. He knew there was no way of keeping the troubled look out of his eye, however. Banner raised an eyebrow at Tony and then finally moved out of his chair and around the big desk separating them. Banner reseated himself in one of the chairs closest to Tony and held his hands together in his lap.

"So go on, tell me about it." Bruce said. He had expected a brief summary of the things Tony has been going through, but he did not expect to sleep through an hour of Tony reciting everything back to the so-called "Good old days". Banner was in for a long nap.

"And the fact that you've been able to help me process…you with me?" Tony asked, looking over at Banner when he realized he wasn't all there.

"I was, yeah." Bruce said, jerking up into attention.

"Are you actively napping?" Tony asked him, raising his eyebrows. Busted.

"I was... I drifted." Banner stuttered.

"Where did I lose you?"

Banner paused and tried to think back. "Elevator in... Switzerland?"

Tony's face fell as he narrowed his eyes. "So you heard none of it?"

"I'm sorry. I'm not that kind of doctor. I'm not a therapist. It's not my training. I don't have the.."

"What? The time?"

"Temperament." Banner corrected.

"Now, that I think about it. Uh, God, my original wound, 1983 alright, I'm fourteen years old, I still have a nanny, that was weird."

Banner threw his head back and got ready for another hour, making Tony laugh.

"Alright, aright. I'm kidding! Not about the nanny though, that part is true... But you've slept enough." Tony gave in, sitting up in his chair. Let's get this finished."

Maybe Tony letting everything out cleared his head, even if no one was actually listening. Or maybe Banner's nap had refreshed him. Either way, within a matter of twenty minutes, Tony and Banner had a break through that had them making a celebration toast to their hard work.

"Man, we are good." Tony grinned, looking down at the small glass of liquid before him. They had taken the original extremis serum and manipulated just the right variables... hopefully. The only problem was that there was no way of testing the solution first. Administering the serum to a non-extremis personnel could drop their body temperature to deadly low temperatures... it had to be used straight on Pepper. Usually Tony would be extremely confident seeing that he directly was part in making the serum, but since it was Pepper on the line, he couldn't help but feel a bit nervous.

"Now, there will be some side effects. " Banner reminded Tony.

"She'll have to adapt to her body temperature dropping to normal temperatures, won't she?" Tony asked, already knowing the answer. Banner took a swig of his drink and nodded.

"She'll feel a piercing chill throughout her body for 5 or 10 minutes. There's nothing you can do besides be there for her: it's all internal.

Tony nodded and drummed his fingers on his leg. be there for Pepper, he could do that.

"Hey Jarvis, where do we keep any type of fluid injectors?"

"The cabinets on the West side of the room should have the item you're looking for." Jarvis answered. Tony swung his head around to look at the cabinets before getting up to walk to the West side of the giant workshop.

"Damn, Tony I've gotta run." Banner said, glancing down at his watch. Tony grabbed a small injector from the cabinet and turned back to Bruce.

"Yeah, no problem. You need a ride?"