The Devil Or The Deep Blue Sea (Comp/ Editing)

Chapter 3

Were they still in one piece? Bruce? Natasha? Rhodey? His thoughts consumed him too much that after he fixed up the arm, he promptly fell asleep, worrying about who was left on Earth, after telling Nebula to wake him up when they were in the atmosphere of Earth.

Nebula also had fallen asleep after setting the ship's alarm to wake her up after two hours, the exhaution and fatigue of the day catching up with her. So, two hours later, both of them were woken up by the blaring alarm signalling that they had identified an unidentified object floating near the ship.

Tony had immediately taken off with his armour and caught up with the object, which turned out to be a man who was barely alive. He immediately brought him in and tried to fix up all his injuries as much as he could, the body was burnt badly but fortunately none of the organs were touched. He also had a bruised neck.

The moment Tony and Nebula had cleaned up the face off the soot and blood, Tony was shocked that the face was somewhat familiar, and seemed to be muttering something about stone men and warrior women. 

Not wanting to leave the guy somewhere in space, he decided that he should tag along with them to get proper medical attention. So they continued the journey to Earth with the man sleeping in one of the beds that had straps available so that he would not roll off and hurt himself more. 

The duo too soon fell asleep after treating the guy how much ever they could with the medical supplies and knowledge they had with them. The next interruption was the alarm blaring to signal that they were in Earth's atmosphere.

"Set the coordinates to Wakanda. I am going to try to call up any one of them to see if they respond." Tony said and activated his suit, sighing in relief to hear FRIDAY's voice again. "Contact Rhodey FRIDAY, Its great to see you. "Great to see you too Sir. Contacting Colonel Rhodes immediately." she said and Tony sighed in relief when he picked it up immediately.

"TONY!! Are you alright? Where are you? Are the others who went with you Ok? Bruce told that the last he saw you was when you guys went out of space with spidey and sorcerer. What happened?" Rhodey quickly ranted out.

"I am alright here Rhodey. A lot happened and as you guessed, we failed in keeping Thanos from getting the time stone. You are in Wakanda I hope. Myself and some others are currently on our way there. Would've informed you earlier but suit went down. Just signal us where to land ok? We will be there in a few. Oh! And get a medical team ready." Tony said and cut the call.

Rhodes, who had put the whole conversation on the speaker was almost ready to cry out happily at the prospect of his friend being alive but sobered up immediately at the thought of having to deliver the news of Pepper's death to him. He quietly motioned the team to follow him to an open field to meet Tony and the other survivors.

The group had actually just assembled to attend the coronation of the new king when Tony had called up. The team immediately went and informed the princess and the to be king about the new situation before they all went to the field to wait for Tony and the other survivors from there.

Soon, the jet had landed and everyone were waiting in bathed breath on who would come out. The ranch(?) opened and out stepped Tony and a metal lady, both carrying someone between them.

The medical team immediately rushed the person to the hospital to treat him while Rhodey approached Tony slowly and hugged him, who hugged him back immediately, ignoring the pain on his side momentarily. "I'm glad that you are alive" they both muttered over and over again.

Tony broke the hug and asked one question that he shouldn't have asked then. "Where is Pepper Platypus? What happened to Happy?" He asked. Rhodes went silent, answering Tony's along with that.