Avengers Imagines

Promise of the Waters

A/N: Another imagine about Tony's death because I'm freshly upset about it. I'm also sad in general right now.

Loosely inspired from Runaway by Aurora, so props to her for making a sad person sadder.

(tw: suicide)

The hot, salty water lapped in and out, depositing sand between your toes. Steve was wrong — it was not at all therapeutic to be at the beach this wednesday afternoon — but he was old, and so he was excused.

The tide rose yet again, and brought to you a pebble, roughly the size of your palm and it's color a surreal blue. A familiar blue. A blue that used to pump the most beautiful eyes you had ever known; the most beautiful smile; the most beautiful heart.

You squeezed your eyes shut, fighting the memory. The water knew neither friend nor foe, it took the stone away with the same indifference, quick enough for you to be able to bind the moisture behind your eyes.

Besides that, not much. The heat from the sand had travelled up to your stomach, to your throat. Swimming under your eyes was smoke. What had gone by was gaining on you, and you could only run.

Your feet sank in the shore, one step after another, but you were running in a barren battleground that existed years in the past. The coast stood empty — no one to run to — but you were running toward an evocation. Toward a man in broken armor. Burnt.

Until your knees gave way. You were close enough to feel his fleeting gaze on you, to hear his labored words. Trapped in the cage of your own mind, you were denied touch, even the slightest solace to deem it your reality.

There was a faint ringing in the distance. In your head? Smoke filled your lungs. He was dying. He was going to die! And then just like it had before, the world turned dark.

When you awoke, it could have been days, it could easily have been months. It was becoming difficult to tell the difference even on a good day. Not that it mattered. The world needed to be saved. You needed to be saved.

-

Bucky finally managed to coax you into therapy, big talk for a man who did not fully believe in the concept himself. Withal, it helped some, much in the way necromancy helps the dead. Sure, it supposedly works but at what cost?

The canvas in front of you held shades of red, brown and peach. To the outside observer, the colors would hold no meaning but to you, they were him. The picture was him.

Dr Kinsley had told you it would help — rendering your emotions onto paper. You weren't sure how much credit to give her, she wasn't exactly spot on, although it did bring a smile to your lips — the shades blending together, almost his face. Almost.

A giggle escaped your throat, with just enough virtue to restrain it from crossing over to maniacal. You reached out to touch him, to feel him again in some way and your hand came back wet. Red.

No! The smell of sizzling flesh invaded your nose. You were sitting by him afresh — forced to watch, no one to help. The hounds from hell could rip your still beating heart out of your chest and it would hurt less.

All but at will, you forced your eyes to roll back, for your consciousness to shut down. Every bit of resilience holding your body and mind together gave way.

It would have been hilarious — had you been awake — to see Steve struggling in his wheelchair, trying to bend low enough in order to shake you, to confirm you were all right; and then less hilarious when blind panic set in and he called out to Sam, who brought smelling salts, and then hilarious again because where did Sam find smelling salts but even so, you were unconscious and no one laughed.

Upon wakefulness, it was unclear where your mind had been. In a way, it was still there, and if you sought just enough, you could feel the tranquility. You could feel...was it that easy?

Sam helped you sit. In his hands was a glass of juice. “Drink this. What was the last time you ate something? Yesterday at breakfast?”

He was right. Outside, the sun had begun its descent in very much the same colors as your juice. The leaves had also turned gold, discarded by the trees and regularly disarranged by the wind. Had summer already passed? When?

It did not hurt. Or even if it did, the ache was subdued under a different desire, something you had not felt in years. Hope. Whilst the machinery churned in your head, your eyes were locked on Sam; not really seeing him but the look they had in them would haunt him for all his days.

Behind the tears and the decomposed smile — there was fanatic ecstasy. Like a lion who had tasted blood for the first time. It would stop at nothing to have more.

Breaking free, you ran. It was the one thing that had been consistent for so long — running — running from your mind, sleep, an ounce of critical thought. Finally your running had a purpose. It would take you somewhere you truly wanted to be.

Dry leaves crunched under your feet. A single set of bloody footprints glowed in your wake. It was clear you had torn your skin on some discarded branch, not to you though. Those who have a purpose seldom heed distractions.

A witch's hand shredded your face. You turned around. No, just another branch. Your tears turned red. You ran until you were at the edge of the world. Cool waters raced under the cliff. This was not the beach, this was different. The beach brought you pain. This was different.

You turned around — nothing, no one, nowhere. It was only you and the water and its promise. Spreading your arms wide, you shifted your weight from the balls of your feet to your ankles until gravity pulled you down.

The tranquility came with endeavor. At first it was chilly water burning your lungs. You did not fight, the alternative was no better. Air escaped your mouth like multiple glowing suns disappearing in the darkness.

It was darker as you went down, colder. Before you could no longer see, there was a moment of terror; apprehension of a promise falsely made. But who had made it?

It should have been impossible to have sight at the bottom of the ocean but possibilities only applied to the living. You watched yourself forsaken on the ocean floor, among other things lost or forgotten, with a strange sense of detachment. That was not you. You were you.

And you were not alone. The realization did not come with dread. It was the man you had died to lay eyes on — restored, uncorroded, nothing like what your mind had forced you to remember.

Tony held out his hand and you took it. Sun broke through the surface of the water, illuminating a path. With him, it did not seem so bad — that ‘it’ could entail just about anything. Anything at all.