Guys...I cannot tell you how pleased I am at the response I have gotten! So many faves and follows! Ehehehe...it makes me all warm and fuzzy inside.

Fiona plopped down in front of the computer bank in the lab with a sigh, glad to have the weight off her leg. She unbuckled the brace and dropped it on the floor.

"First things first," she mumbled, logging into the satellite image site Tony had created, typing in the coordinates Rhodey had given her- the ones that she had transmitted from the jeep. The live video feed that popped up was empty of life. She manipulated the image, scanning miles in every direction but there was no sign of anything that could help her find her brother. There was no sign of anything in general, just miles of sand and mountains and scrubby bushes.

She searched for hours the first day home. No luck whatsoever. Finally, she convinced herself to take a break and begin planning the other pressing project- her leg. The current brace was bulky, cumbersome and irritating. She opened up a new project file and began calling up images of human leg joints and the nerve systems inside.

She spent almost all of that first month at the computer searching or at the work station building her new project. It was a new brace made, much smaller and less cumbersome than the one the doctors had given her. It was two bands made of a gold-titanium alloy that wrapped above and below her knee. A smaller hinged band reached up between the bands and sat on the injured joint, a tiny circle smaller than a dime sat on her skin above the injured nerves. The circle, powered by the kinetics of her body, sent tiny electrical impulses running through her knee, hitting the nerves and helping them function more normally. It certainly didn't give her full functionality, but it eased the pain that was there if she put weight on it unbraced and was less bulky than the one she had been given, fitting undetectably under her pant leg. The siblings' personal doctor had done the small surgery for her. Fiona knew she could trust him not to go public with the news.

She searched the satellite images relentlessly for a month and a half before she began to get the icky feeling in the pit of her stomach. People would gently bring it up, that maybe it was time to stop searching so much. She would give them a cold stare and the person making the suggestion would trail off and close their mouth, at which point Fiona would walk away without a word.

Even Obadiah, one day almost three months after Fiona returned home, came down into the lab.

"Fiona...it's been two months. I know you don't want to hear this...but the chances that you'll find Tony are getting smaller every day. Maybe it's time to start thinking about how you're going to run the company in a few years."

"No." Fiona didn't turn around. "Obie, he's the only family I have. I'm not going to give up on him." There was a pause before Obadiah's footstep retreated and the door opened and shut. Once he was gone, Fiona let her head sink to the desk.

"They're right, Tony," she mumbled. "Where are you?" She sighed, and the next breath turned into a hitched sob.

Fiona's life abruptly turned around the next day. She was searching a zoomed-out satellite feed when a tiny burst of orange caught her eye. She zoomed in on the orange, which turned out to be an explosion, and saw something rising out of the flames. Not a missile, something different. The overhead view that the satellite provided didn't give a very good idea what it was, but she followed it away from the site of the flames. It flew through the desert for a while before crashing into the sand. She could now see that it was a metal suit, vaguely human-shaped. Her pulse began climbing, though she didn't know why, as the metal suit flailed its arms around a bit, banging them on the ground. The arms fell off, exposing very human arms underneath. The person inside grappled with the mask for a moment before finally succeeding in removing it. Fiona let out a strangled cry, standing up with such force that she sent her chair rolling backwards.

The face behind the mask, albeit bloody and disoriented, was Tony's. Fiona frantically searched her pockets and the surrounding area for her phone, finally snatching it off the desk behind her and dialing as fast as she could.
"This is Fiona Stark, I need to speak to Colonel Rhodes. It's an emergency. Please!" There was a brief pause

"Hello? Fiona? What's-"

"Rhodey, I found Tony!" Silence on the other end. Fiona could hear footsteps increasing in tempo.

"What? How did- where?"

"I'm sending you the coordinates. He- he built some sort of flying armor- type thing and he crashed in the desert. He looks pretty beat up."

"All right, we're on our way." Rhodey hung up and Fiona sank to the ground.

Tony was alive.

The next few days were almost more torturous than the months of searching. Rhodey called and let Fiona know that they had found Tony and he would be on his way home after medical treatment and some assorted standard debriefing procedures. When the day finally arrived, Fiona was waiting with Obadiah at Stark Industries. They watched the limo pull in along the long driveway, coming to a halt in front of the crowd of reporters. The door opened and there was Tony. Fiona left Obie's side like a racehorse out of the gate, dashing towards her brother. He saw her as she approached and his expression changed into one of utter relief and joy as he held out his arms to catch her. The siblings crashed together, pulling one another into a tight embrace. Fiona was crying into Tony's shoulder as he pressed his cheek to the top of her head and stroked her hair.

"They said they left you in the desert, Fi," he said softly, calling her by his special pet name. "I didn't think...I thought you must be dead."

"People said the same about you," Fiona replied, not letting go of her brother. "I didn't want to believe it but I was starting to...to think...you know..." The siblings stayed locked in an embrace for at least three or four minutes. No words were spoken. None were needed. Finally, they separated. As they did, Fiona's shoulder brushed Tony's chest and she felt something hard. She gave him a questioning look but he gave her one back that said not now. She stepped back slightly- only slightly- as Obadiah came up to the duo.

"We were supposed to meet at the hospital," he said, slightly accusingly.
"No, I'm fine." Tony dismissed, before he began heading inside. Fiona followed close behind, Pepper and Obadiah behind her. Tony had apparently wanted a press conference as he split off from the group and headed for the "prep room" as they called it. Pepper and Fiona were about to follow him but a man stopped them.

"Excuse me, Miss Stark, Miss Potts? Can I speak to you for a minute?"
"Um, we're not part of the press conference, it's starting in there soon if you'd like to join it." Fiona pointed to the room where they held all of the press conferences and interviews and the like. The man smiled.
"I'm not a reporter," he said. "I'm Agent Phil Coulson, with the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division." Pepper cocked a brow.

"That's quite a mouthful," she said. The agent smirked.

"We're working on it."

"I don't want to seem rude, but we have already been approached by the DOD, the FBI, the CIA..." Fiona said, trailing off pointedly, but Agent Coulson just nodded slightly.

"We're a separate division with a more specific focus. I need to debrief your brother about the circumstances of his escape."

"I'll put something in the book, shall I?" Pepper said, in secretary mode.

"Thank you." Coulson left, and Fiona and Pepper entered the press room in the back just as Tony came up to the podium, then walked around in front of it.

"Hey, would it be alright if everyone sat down?" he asked suddenly, sinking slowly to sit in front of the podium. "Why don't you just sit down? That way you can see me and I can...a little less formal...and..." The reporters all slowly sat down, thoroughly confused, as were Fiona and Pepper. Rhodey joined them as the reporters got settled.

"What's up with the love-in?" he asked. Fiona shrugged.

"No clue. He seems different. I mean...anyone would be changed after three months of...I don't even know what went on over there." Up at the podium- or in front of it- Tony was speaking.

"I never got to say goodbye to Dad. I never got to say goodbye to my father. There's questions that I would have asked him I would have asked him how he felt about what this company did. If he was conflicted…if he ever had doubts…Or maybe he was every inch the man we all remember from the newsreels…" Fiona winced slightly. She knew that Tony had not always had a good relationship with their father. Tony had been shipped off to boarding school for part of his childhood. Fiona was glad that Tony elected not to do that. "I saw young Americans killed…by the very weapons I created to defend them, and protect them…And I saw that I had become part of a system that is comfortable with zero accountability…" Tony sounded funny, like he was straining slightly as he spoke. Fiona left Pepper and Rhodey and began moving towards the front of the room along the wall.

"Mr. Stark?" said a man loudly. Tony glanced his way.

"Hey, Ben," he replied.

"What happened over there?" Tony was quiet, seeming to pick his words.
"I had my eyes opened. I came to realize that I have more to offer this world, then just making things that blow up..." Fiona was almost at the stage. "And that is why, effective immediately, I am shutting down-" Fiona stopped in her tracks as Tony rose, trying to continue talking over the roar of the journalists. "-the weapons manufacturing division of Stark International until such a time as I can decide what the future of the company will be, what direction it should take, one that that I'm comfortable with and is consistent with the highest good, for this country as well." Obadiah gently pushed Tony out of the way and Tony walked towards the door, no regret showing on his face. Fiona raced after him, catching up with him as he crossed the blacktop to the building that housed the arc reactor. She said nothing, waiting for Tony to explain.

"Are you mad at me?" he asked as he pulled open the door. Fiona laughed.

"Tony...you are impossible sometimes! I'm not mad...Obie looked pretty pissed though." The pair stood at the railing in front of the arc reactor. The door flew open behind them. They turned simultaneously to find Obadiah glaring at Tony.

"Well, that...that went well," he said, the tone in his voice implying that the precisely the opposite was true.

"Did I just paint a target on the backs of our heads?" Tony asked. Obadiah was pacing back and forth.

"Your head? What about my head? What do you think the over-under on the stock drop is going to be tomorrow?"

"Optimistically, forty points," Tony replied.

"I'm going sixty," said Fiona. Tony shot her a look. "Hey, I'm being realistic here." Obadiah crossed his arms.

"Tony, we're a weapons manufacturer."

"Obie, I just don't want a body count to be our only legacy," Tony replied. Fiona raised an eyebrow.

"Who are you and what have you done with my brother?"

"That's what we do. We're ironmongers. We make weapons!" Obadiah stressed the last few words, but Tony was getting that defiant expression on his face, where his eyes hardened and his lips compressed.

"It's my name on the side of the building," he said.

"And what we do keeps the world from falling into chaos!" Obadiah argued.

"Not based on what I saw," Tony retorted.

"What do you mean?" Fiona interjected.

"We're not doing a good enough job- we can do better...we're gonna do something else."

"Like what?" Fiona asked, her interest sparked. Tony hesitated.

"...I think we should take another look into arc reactor technology." Obie made an exasperated face.

"Come on! The arc reactor? That's a publicity stunt! Tony...come on, we built that thing to shut the hippies up!"

"It works," the sibling retorted in unison.

"Yeah, as a science project!" said Obie exasperatedly. "The arc was never cost effective. WE knew that before we built it. Arc reactor technology...that's a dead end, right?"

"Maybe," said Tony. Obadiah scowled and continued his pacing.

"Am I right? I mean we haven't had a breakthrough in what?"

"Thirty years," said Tony, though it seemed to Fiona as though he knew that what he was saying was wrong.

"That's what they say," said Obadiah, his gaze dropping to Tony's chest, the same spot where Fiona had bumped something hard, the same spot where she could see a faint blue glow...

"Tony, what is that?" she asked.

"Who told you, Obie?" Tony asked. "You have such a lousy poker face."

"Never mind who told me, just show me."

"Wait, guys, what are we showing? I'm confused and beginning to freak out a little..." Fiona said, but neither of the men seemed to hear her.

"Rhodey or Pepper?" Tony continued his interrogation.

"Fine, it was Rhodey. Okay?"

"Okay." Without warning, Tony pulled the top buttons of his shirt open. Fiona's hand flew to her mouth as she let out a stifled cry.

"Oh my god...Tony, what happened?"

"It. Works." Tony said flatly. Obadiah looked at him for a moment, meeting his eyes once again.

"Listen to me, Tony. We're a team. Do you understand? There's nothing we can't do, if we stick together, like your father and I…I'm sorry I didn't give you a heads-up, okay?"

"But if I had..." Tony began.

"Tony. Tony. No more of this ready-aim-fire business, you understand me?"

"That was Dad's line," Fiona mumbled.

"You gotta let me handle this. We're gonna have to play a whole different kind of ball now. We're going to have to take a lot of heat…I want you to promise me that you're going to lay low." Tony nodded, after a moment. "Both of you," added Obadiah.

"But- but I didn't-" Fiona sputtered, her words quelled by the look on Obie's face. "Fine." Obie left the arc building, heading back towards the main building of the complex. Tony made to leave as well, but Fiona put a hand on his arm.

"Tony, what is that?"

"It's a miniaturized arc reactor." Fiona sighed.

"Yes. So I gathered. Why is that miniaturized arc reactor in your chest and how did it get there?" Tony looked down at the glowing blue circle.

"The explosion? It put some shrapnel in my chest and it got pretty close to my heart. This little thing is powering a magnet that keeps the shrapnel away."

"What if it...you know, stops working?" Fiona asked hesitantly.

"It won't," replied her brother.

"But-"

"Hey. Hey." Tony put his hands on her shoulders. "When has anything I've made not worked the way it was supposed to? That was rhetorical," he added as Fiona opened her mouth. "Can we move on? Are you okay? I mean...did you get hurt in the explosion at all?"

"I...not really...I'm fine." Tony gave her a look. "A little shrapnel in the leg. Really, it's fine, they got it out and..." The look continued. "Fine. Tore a ligament and a nerve. Probably won't get full function back and the brace they gave me was annoying so I built this." She pulled up the hem of her pant leg to reveal the brace she had created.

"What's the circle do?"

"Slight electric current. Connects the damaged nerves, helps them function." Tony ruffled her hair.

"That's my girl. Now listen to me. I'm home. Everything's gonna be okay." Tony hugged her. "I promise."

Yay! Sibling fluff...I've been wanting to write the homecoming scene since I started, did I do a good job with it? As always, if you liked what you read, please leave a review! And if you want to put in a request or an idea, go ahead! I will try and accommodate everyone's ideas!

Until next update,

-Ophelia