What's this, another chapter?! To anyone still here, thank you for your patience, I can only apologise for my sporadic updates. In my defense, exam season is almost upon us and I have had an awful year (I knew coming back from the gloriously long summer holiday was a mistake!) so have to work like crazy to salvage my grades. Which is heaps of fun. Migraines suck. T

his story is almost finished, it will all be concluded in one or two chapters time, which is very exciting! A few people have mentioned across my fics that my chapters are too short; yes, they are, it's one of the many things I need to improve on as a writer- I hadn't realised how much I needed to expand upon my ideas until I joined this sight and saw how pitifully short my work actually was! Thank you for your constructive criticism, this chapter still isn't as long as maybe it should be but I have endeavoured to make it more substantial. Writing is a journey, and I'm all for picking up advice and acting upon it on the way, so do please leave a review to let me know what you think.

Sorry for the long AN, I'll get to the story now!

Disclaimer: Don't own; it all belongs to Marvel.

Part 5

"Tony?"

Black. So much black and then the stars, shining so brightly that he had to squint. Even then, they were imprinted on the backs of his retinas. This was it. Space. This was it. Death. There was no coming back from this; he had known it as soon as he started his ascent. As soon as Pepper didn't pick up.

Call failed.

Failed.

Pepper, why didn't you pick up?

The missile slides out of his grasp and then he's falling…

"Tony!"

…falling, his body going limp and crumpling in on himself. There's a small part of him screaming at him to do something, to save himself but the darkness is tempting and he's so tired and hasn't he done enough? Doesn't he deserve this release? So he keeps falling and his suit keeps failing…

"What's happening, what's wrong with him?"

"He's having a panic attack. Tony, can you hear me?"

…failing just as he needs it most. He's falling faster and further than he ever should and there is nothing, nothing he can do to stop it. Even Jarvis has gone silent now and he knows he will die alone, falling into the darkness as he falls out the sky.

"Tony. Breathe."

And then his vision clears and the voices inside his head stop screaming. He comes back to the present to see his friends staring at him with almost identical faces of shock and worry. It would be amusing if it wasn't so embarrassing and they weren't all still chained to the walls of a dingy storage room. The silence stretches on between them as Tony becomes more and more aware of his surroundings. Normally it's him who breaks the silence with a witty comment but he doesn't really feel like it so it stretches on to the point of awkwardness until Steve takes the initiative and clears his throat nervously.

"So, er, what was that about?"

Tony debates feigning ignorance but judging by Natasha's warning glare (seriously, can she read minds?!) that wouldn't be the smartest plan.

Nonchalance, on the other hand, has always been a good one.

"Well, you know, New York's still kinda a touchy subject."

"A touchy subject?" Bruce retorts. "If you call that a touchy subject, I'd hate to see your idea of a crisis."

Clint sniggers. Natasha's glare intensifies.

"So when exactly were you planning on telling us you suffered from panic attacks then Tony?" she asks sweetly, in that odd mix of concerned and terrifying Tony's pretty sure is unique to her.

He recoils from her gaze (as much as possible when you're hung up in a small storage room).

"Erm, when it came up? Which I was hoping it wouldn't? "

He can sense a group team rant at him coming on and, keen to avoid it, changes the subject.

"Look, much as I'd love a heart-to-heart, can we do this later? Much as it's fun hanging out with you all, literally, I did actually come here with a job to do."

"Oh, so you do have a plan?" Clint mutters. "And you were planning on telling us that, when?"

Tony glares at him.

"Please, Barton. I'm Tony Stark. Of course I have a plan."
He turns to look at his friends, his team-mates and wonders how he could ever have thought of leaving them. Maybe he didn't need an Arc-Reactor sticking out of his chest and a bunch of (admittedly quite cool) tin suits to be a hero. Or even a super-hero.

The suit doesn't have to make the man.

He knows there will be questions, interrogations and too much concern and team-building emotions to bear thinking about when they're out of here (the thought of which is almost enough to make him want to stay) but that's not what's important right now.

He grins and pretends not to hear Steve groan in fond exasperation.

"First things first. Anyone know how to get out of these handcuffs?"

An hour, two sets of confusing instructions from two master assassins and two bruised, bloody wrists later and Tony's free of the handcuffs. He massages his wrists with a grimace before looking up as a thought occurs to him.

"Hey, wait a minute! If you two know how to get out of handcuffs, why are you still in them?"

"Apart from the whole 'we were drugged and injured' part?" Clint retorts.

Tony scoffs.

"Oh please. Like that would stop you."

Natasha grins. It's terrifying.

"We can get out the handcuffs easily enough. We just can't fully escape without S.H.I.E.L.D backup. There's no point half escaping if we're just going to be sitting pretty and a little underestimation on the part of your adversaries works wonders when you finally decide to move."

"Ah. Right. That makes sense."

Natasha smirks, then focuses on him with an intensity born from years in the field.

"Right now, you're the S.H.I.E.L.D backup Stark. This plan had better be good."

It's Tony's turn to grin as he produces from a back pocket the communication device he'd pick pocketed from the guy with the iron bar.

"Give me half an hour and I can have this thing sending a signal directly to S.H.I.E.L.D. A two-way signal, by the way. We can talk to them. Fury's probably missing me already."

The team is silent.

"What?" Tony demands. "I did build the original Iron Man suit in a cave with a bunch of scraps. Not just a pretty face."

He gratified to see that even Natasha looks impressed.

Half an hour, in retrospect, was a little generous. He's done in twenty minutes, by which time, not only have both Natasha and Clint almost effortlessly freed themselves from the handcuffs (quite an achievement given the state they're in; Clint's fingers are purple and swollen.), but they've thoughtfully freed Steve and Bruce too. It's the moment of truth as he presses a few buttons. At first, there is only silence. And then, faintly, he hears it.

"Stark? Is that you? It's about time."

"Fury! Knew you'd miss me."

He can hear Fury sigh on the end of the line.

"Enormously. Are the rest of the Avengers with you?"

"Yes. And we'd really quite like to get out of here."

"We'd like to have you out. We're tracing the signal, a plane's just been sent out. I'll keep you updated."

He's just about to reply when he feels Natasha stiffen behind him. It takes a moment for him to source what's caused her sudden alarm but then he hears it too. Footsteps. Close.

When the door opens, it's a group of them, back for another round of 'taunt the superheroes'. They weren't expecting the superheroes to be ready to fight back.

Ready, but in no condition to and they know even as they launch into the fight that it's only a matter of time. They're the Avengers and the best at what they do and it's a damn long time until they're finally subdued. Nobody, except Tony, notices that in the commotion, Natasha and Clint have disappeared. By the time the kidnappers notice, they're long gone.

Tony hopes they have a plan, because he's all out of ideas.

"So Mr Stark. It appears we've come full circle. Give us the Arc Reactor, and you and your friends can go free. If not…"

Looking back, he really shouldn't have been surprised at how things turned out. Of course everything would fall to shit with his goddamn luck and of course the only thing that could buy their freedom was currently sitting at the bottom of the ocean. Damn it. Damn it all to hell.

He hears a click of a gun being prepared and forces himself to look up and discover which of his friends' temples the cold, unforgiving metal is pressed against…