little piece of heaven (tony stark's daughter)

6

tony stark was rescued three months after he disappeared, making his return by jet with the military. he insisted on walking, his best friend supporting him from the side as he descended into the airport. a ridiculous amount of people had gathered around the tarmac, excitedly shouting questions and words of praise. tony ignored them, in fact he probably didn't even notice they were there. all he was interested in was his daughter. his eyes scanned the crowds for rosalie, his brows furrowed when he spotted his assistant but not his little girl.

she was probably in the car, or at home, but he wanted to see her now. as he approached pepper, one question made it through his mental wall and hit him.

"mr stark, how are you dealing with the news about rosalie?"

he froze, searching the faces for the reporter who shouted the question. although he couldn't identify them, he did notice how pepper squirmed, exhaustion shadowed her face. he marched towards her, his heart thumping in his chest. something wasn't right at all.

rosalie was shaken enough when he left, when she'd screamed and cried. when she'd predicted what would happen in afghanistan. it was freaky, to say the least, but that was it. what had happened now?

the words left his mouth before he'd even really registered that stray tears were rolling down her cheeks "where's rosalie?".

thirty minutes later he's sat at her bedside.

"she was in the icu, but after two months of no change we were allowed to bring her home" pepper explains, sat across from him. her hair is a mess, her eyes dry of emotion and her usually beautiful nails bitten down to stubs.

it's nothing compared to rosalie though.

her face has a large bruise and a slice along one side, other small cuts littering her tiny body. she's pale, her complexion resembling that of paper, a harsh contrast to her dark hair and lashes. she's lifeless, and has been for almost three months according to tony's assistant.

he breathes out a heavy sigh, rubbing his face with the palms of his hands.

he thought everything was okay, that it was fixed. he couldn't have been more wrong. all he had been thinking about in that cave was getting home to rosie, seeing her eyes light up as she ran towards him, hearing her say his name or giggle or even just cry. he just wanted to see her.

well here she is.

"how did it happen? what exactly happened i want every detail" tony grits his teeth, a hint of aggression bleeding through his words.

pepper shakes her head "jarvis run the footage again". she's seen the video so many times that she could recreate it if she wanted to, the same sequence of events tattooed onto her brain.

tony watches as his daughter finishes her drawing, looking at the time and frowning. he himself frowns, so much about this image is wrong. for starters, it's almost midnight, and then the picture she's drawn.. looks uncannily like gaia.. but with wings? hologram rosalie flinches suddenly, watching something that neither of the two adults can see, because there's nothing there. the child scrambles to her feet and starts to back away. she pauses, staring, and then opens her mouth "mama?".

the word shoots like a bullet into tony's heart, a painful reminder of the woman he lost eight years ago when rosie was brought into the world. he watches as the small girl stares at something that isn't there, reacting to words that aren't said. then as if by some form of twisted magic, the mirrors lining the walls all shatter. shards of glass rain down on rosalie, who suddenly collapses into the sea of small daggers.

"she wasn't breathing, i couldn't find a pulse" tears have begun to fall down the ginger's face which she wipes away quickly "the doctors said it could be grief or the fact that she hadn't eaten in a couple of days, which would possibly explain her collapsing and the hallucinations, but it doesn't explain the mirrors or her outbursts before you left" pepper pauses as if in thought for a moment "i can't help but feel as though something else is happening".

they sit in silence for a moment, before tony's eyes glance over the cut on rosalie's cheek again. "she already had the cut before she collapsed, where did it come from?".

pepper looks at the cut and quickly looks away again "she insisted on going to school, the day after we told her you were missing. she wanted to be with adam and.. lib?"

"liv" her boss corrects her and she nods before continuing.

"yeah, liv, that was it. she wanted to be with adam and liv and i wasn't going to stop her so i let her go in" pepper stops, reluctant to tell tony what happened.

"come on potts, spit it out" he grows impatient to know who gave his daughter the bruise and cut that disrupts the smooth skin of her face.

"a kid asked her how it felt to be an orphan, she flipped and punched him, i suppose the kid hit back. it's weird, none of her cuts have healed, they're exactly how they were three months ago".

tony runs a hand through his hair, sighing deeply and shaking his head. "thank you" he lifts his head and looks pepper in the eyes "for looking after her. go get some sleep". pepper stands up with no more than a subtle nod and leaves the room, pausing in the doorway as if to say something but deciding against it, her footsteps continuing again.

so he's alone with rosalie, just him and his unconscious daughter. now pepper's left, he takes a moment to look around rosie's room. a heart monitor sits next to her, the steady beep driving him slightly insane, not that he isn't glad it's beeping. a drip is next to that, the tube trailing along the floor and up into rosalie's arm. according to pepper, doctors are almost stumped. though she seems to be in a coma, rosie doesn't have any apparent signs of illness. she's just sleeping, but they can't wake her up.