Serpent - An Avengers Fan Fiction

Prologue - Tony

"I love you Tony."

In different circumstances, Tony would have responded with the traditional reply of 'I love you too' but now, standing amongst the rubble and broken glass on the stop floor of Stark Towers, the words stuck in his throat. It wasn't that he didn't love her. He could just sense the 'but' of her sentence hanging in the air between them.

"But..." she said, confirming his fears, "I'm only one woman. I can only cope with so much, Tony." Pepper stood with her back to him, looking out over New York through the broken glass wall. A cold wind was blowing through the gap, bringing up goosebumps on her arms and lifting her auburn hair off her shoulders. She rubbed her arms to warm them before turning to face Tony. "I'm sorry, Tony. I just can't do it anymore."

Tony frowned, hoping she didn't mean what he thought she meant.

"I don't understand. You love me, I love you - what's the problem?"

Pepper closed her eyes for a moment, trying to think of a way to tell him she was leaving for good without breaking his heart as well as her own. But there was no way. She opened her eyes again and took a deep breath.

"Look at this place, Tony," she said, gesturing to the shards of glass lying all over the room, to the smashed furniture, the rubble surrounding them, the man-sized dent in the floor. "What if you had died today? What if I had lost you?" Pepper's lip trembled and her eyes were threatening tears.

Tony took this as a sign to move and he rushed forward. He pulled Pepper into his arms and shushed her. "But I didn't," he whispered in her ear. "You haven't lost me, Pepper. I'm right here."

It was warmer in his arms, and Pepper suddenly felt very safe. She wanted to remain in that moment forever.

But it was not to be.

Pepper pushed away from him. "This time you survived. But what about next time? I can't be the woman who sits for hours by the phone waiting to hear if her man has survived. I can't take it anymore. That's not who I am." She picked up her bag off the floor beside the elevator. "I'm sorry, Tony."

Tony tried to grab the bag off her. "You can't leave me," he cried, almost yelling. Pepper flinched and held the bag away from him. Tony stepped closer and cupped her cheek with a hand. "Please," he said, softer this time, "don't leave me."

Pepper placed her hand over Tony's and gazed imploringly into his eyes. "I'll still be around. I'm still the CEO of Stark Industries so we will still see each other." As if that would make it any better. "But I am not to be the woman in your life, Tony."

"You are," Tony mumbled. "you are the love of my life."

"No, Tony." Pepper's voice broke and the tears began to fall down her pale cheeks. "I'm not. You'll find someone else to love." She took his hand off her face and pressed the button to call the elevator. Tony felt the panic rising within. She couldn't go. She couldn't leave him.

"I don't want anyone else - I want you!" He tried to follow her into the elevator but she pushed him back.

"Please, Tony, don't make this any harder than it already is."

"If it's so hard then why leave? Stay with me! I can't do this without you!"

Pepper sighed and pulled a tissue from her purse. She dabbed at her eyes, being careful not to smudge her mascara before pressing the ground floor button. Tony stepped back, eyes wide with disbelief.

"Goodbye, Tony."

The doors slid shut, and the elevator carried Pepper down and away.

Tony blinked, trying to come to terms with what had just happened but his mind rejected the memory. He stood staring at the elevator doors for hours, waiting for them to open and for Pepper to jump out and beg for him to take her back. But she never did. The sun set on the world and yet Tony was still standing in the same place long after darkness had fallen.

Finally, when what remained of the automatic lights flickered on, Tony turned on the spot and marched towards the bar - the only part of the room that had not been destroyed. He grabbed a bottle of strong whiskey and poured a little into a shot glass.

"She left me," he said, before tipping back his head and downing the alcohol in one.

Tony poured himself another shot and said again, "she left me," before swallowing.

He had eleven shots all together before the room began to spin and he staggered out onto the balcony into the cold night air. He barely heard J.A.R.V.I.S. advising him to return inside, but whatever he said did not register with Tony.

He stood on the very edge and looked down on the street. New York was still very much awake. Taxis ran around the city below, and the multi-coloured lights of Times Square lit up the sky above. Tony looked out over the city, seeing nothing, feeling nothing. He tipped back his head again and drained the whiskey bottle. As the last few drops trickled down his throat Tony overbalanced and fell back onto the pale stone floor. The bottle rolled away from him as he stared up at the sky, covered with a thick blanket of cloud.

In his drunk stupor, Tony could have sworn he saw the face of a friend looming over him with an expression of concern on his face. The friend carried him to a safer, more comfortable location before giving instructions to J.A.R.V.I.S. and leaving Tony to sleep off the alcohol.