Chapter Text
Tony is preparing to step out onto the MIT stage when the call comes.
He can see the stage manager giving him the signal that he’s on in five, and he gives her a nod as he pulls out his phone. Honeybear calling.
“You got four minutes. Platypus, then I have to go inspire some hopeful twenty-somethings that make me feel far too old for comfort.”
“Tony, we’re in trouble.”
The playfulness is instantly gone from Tony’s voice. “Where?”
“How quickly can you get to Berlin?”
Tony is already moving, ignoring the panicked stare he gets from the stage manager as he hurries towards the exit. Pepper is at his side in an instant, her face questioning. “Fast,” Tony tells Rhodey. “How much trouble are we talking?”
Pepper nods in understanding, giving his hand a squeeze before hurrying off to assuage the frantic MIT staff. God, he doesn’t deserve that woman.
The phone line crackles and Tony can hear the sounds of an explosion before Rhodey’s next words. “Does that answer your question?”
Tony’s out the door and signaling to Happy, who is already moving to retrieve the suit Tony keeps in his car trunk at all times. “Whole team?” Tony asks.
“They ambushed us, Tones. It was a trap and we walked right into it.”
“Anyone hurt?”
“Sam was down last time I saw. They separated us, and now—”
A second explosion, closer than the first one, makes Rhodey curse.
“Rhodey?” But there’s nothing but static on the other end of the line. Tony thinks he’s lost him, is about to hang up when—
“Tony. Hurry.” Then the line goes dead.
Tony’s in the suit and in the air in an instant. “FRIDAY?”
“Hello, Boss. My schedule indicates that you should be giving a talk at MIT at this time.”
“Yeah, something came up. I need coordinates—War Machine’s last known location.”
There’s a pause as the AI considers then— “The War Machine armor has been compromised.”
Tony clamps down on the flare of panic that roils in his chest. Not the time for that. “Who else you got for me, Fri? Who can I track?”
There’s a brief pause then: “I have located Vision. Locking in coordinates now.”
“Full speed, Fri. Put everything we got into the thrusters.”
“Anything else, Boss?”
Tony’s mind is racing, conjuring up every worst-case scenario of what he’s going to find in Berlin. He can feel his breath getting shorter, his chest getting tighter. “Call Pepper.”
“Calling Pepper Potts.”
She answers on the first ring. “What’s going on?”
“Team’s in trouble.”
“How can I help?”
He loves this woman so much. “I don’t know how bad it is, Pep. Rhodey cut off before he could tell me.” His voice is laced with anxiety that’s threatening to boil over and he can’t let it. A panic attack will only slow him down, cost him and the team time.
“You’ll get there in time, Tony. You always do. And they’re superheroes. Whatever it is, I’m sure they’ve handled worse.”
Tony exhales. In. Out.
“A shame about your talk,” Pepper continues, her voice low and calm. “I thought it was good.”
“Yeah? Seemed a bit sentimental to me. Not my thing.”
“I think it was just the right amount of sentiment. Why don’t you give it to me now?”
“So I get called in for an Avengers emergency on another continent, and I still don’t get out of doing this talk?”
“Tony. Do it.”
He does. He does it three times and is two-fifths of the way through the fourth before FRIDAY alerts him that Vision’s comms are now in range.
“Pep?” There are so many things he wants to say to her. There’s always so much he wants to say to her.
“Come home safe, Tony,” she says, and then she’s gone.
“Vis?” Tony gets nothing but static back. Cursing, he lets FRIDAY fly the suit towards Vision’s—and hopefully the rest of the team’s—location.
The panic Pepper had helped keep a handle on until now rears its head as he sees that his AI is taking him towards a collapsed mess of a building.
“The structural integrity of this building is compromised,” FRIDAY says in his ear.
“Yeah, no kidding,” Tony mutters as he hovers never to the wreckage. “Any…any signs of life?”
“Only Vision is detected.”
“Take me to him.”
Tony follows FRIDAY’s instructions as she guides him through the wreckage, pausing when they come across a pile of bricks and metal. It takes Tony a moment to grasp the situation. “He’s under that?”
“Yes, Boss.”
As carefully as he can, Tony starts lifting rubble, trying not to cause a landslide of debris. It’s a good twenty minutes before he sees the edge of a familiar gold cape poking out from under the pile. “Vis? If you can hear me, I’m coming.”
Clearing the rubble around Vision takes even longer, as Tony has to be careful to not shift anything that will cause more wreckage to fall and trap the synthezoid. “FRIDAY, scan for the others again. As far as your range will allow.”
“On it, Boss.”
Tony shifts a heavy block of cement and then he can see Vision’s face. He bends down beside him as Vision’s eyes flutter open. “Tony?”
“The one and only. I’m getting you out.”
“Wanda…the others…”
“Let’s worry about you first. What if I free your arm? Could you help me?”
“Tony…I can’t move.”
“I know. I’m getting this stuff off you as fast as I can. Anything, Fri?”
“I cannot locate any other Avengers at this time.”
Tony exhales and focuses on Vision instead, the problem he can fix now. “Who were they?” Tony asks.
“We don’t know,” Vision replies. Tony succeeds in freeing one arm, and moves on to trying to clear some of the weight off the synthezoid’s chest. “We thought it was HYDRA, but their weapons…”
“Alien?”
“Perhaps. Advanced.”
Tony manages to clear the wreckage from Vision’s torso. Even so, the synthezoid still doesn't sit up. “They took them,” he states. “All of them.”
“Better than dead,” Tony replies, managing to pry Vision’s right arm free as well. “There. Can you help me get the rest of it off?”
Vision doesn’t move, looking at Tony with a fear in those blue eyes that Tony has never seen there before. “Tony…it’s not just the rubble. I can’t move.”
Dread settles in Tony’s gut, but he swallows it down. “Let’s get you out of here, then I can take a look at that.”
It takes another fifteen minutes before Vision is completely freed. “Did this happen before or after the building?” he asks.
“Before. Their weapons…they did something to me. I couldn't help the others at all”
“Can you feel?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. That’s good.” Was it? For what feels like the thousandth time, Tony curses Bruce’s absence. Bruce would know. Bruce knew a lot of things he didn't.
“Tony.” Vision’s face is set. “Leave me. Go after them.”
“That’s a negative, buddy. What if they come back?”
“That is not as important as you retrieving our team from enemy hands.”
“Hard disagree.” Tony hesitates even as he says it. He can’t leave Vision here, but every moment he waits is another moment his team is getting further away from him, and their hopes of survival grow slimmer.
No. He can't think like that. “You came here in a quinjet, yeah?”
“We did. I do not know if it has been compromised.”
“One way to find out. Fri, location on the quinjet?”
“I cannot locate it, Boss.”
Tony curses until Vision says, “It was in stealth mode. Even your systems shouldn’t be able to locate it.”
Tony makes a mental to fix that oversight later. “Do you remember where it is?”
“I do.”
“Okay. I’m going to carry you—you give me directions. Ready?” He doesn’t give Vision time to answer before he’s scooping the synthezoid into his arms and putting as much distance between them and the destroyed building as possible.
Even with the Iron Man suit, Vision is heavy. Tony only gets a few feet before he’s panting, and the obvious solution comes to him. “Vis? I’m going to put you in the suit.”
“You will be exposed.”
In more ways than one. “I’m pretty sure our baddies of the week are long gone. They start shooting, I’ll pull the suit back to me." H e recalls a time when his own body was betraying him, palladium from the device keeping him alive slowly poisoning him. He had never felt so helpless, not even in Afghanistan. “I know. It sucks.”
Tony lets the suit wrap around Vision, commanding FRIDAY to follow his directions. They finally reach the quinjet, the stealth mode disengaging with Tony’s voice command, and Tony gets Vision safely inside before wrapping the suit back around himself.
“Vis, I need anything you got, bud. Where do you think they took them?”
“Wanda…” Vision gets out.
“I know, I’m going to get her back, all of them. I promise.”
“No, Wanda,” Vision says again, more firmly. “You can track her magic.”
“I can?”
“The energy signature…”
Of course. “Vis, you’re a genius. You get that, Fri?”
“Already on it, Boss.”
“While you’re doing that—call Pepper.”
“Calling Pepper Potts.”
A brief ring, and then Pepper’s voice is in his ear. “Tony? What happened? Did you find them?”
“Not exactly. I’m sending a quinjet to the Compound. Can you be there to receive it?”
“Why do I get a sense that you won’t be on it?”
“I’m not done over here yet. I found Vis, he’s hurt—bad. Get Cho to have a look at him.”
“Helen Cho? She’s a geneticist, Tony, it’s not as if Vision is exactly…organic.”
“He was built in her Cradle. It’s a place to start.”
“Okay. Tony?”
“Yeah, Pep?”
“I called Clint. He’s on his way.”
Clint. Of course. In his haste to rush after Rhodey's phone call, he hadn’t even considered the other Avenger who was still walking free. “Thanks, Pep.”
There’s a weighted moment before she says, “Will there be anything else, Mr. Stark?”
“That will be all, Miss Potts.”
No sooner has he hung up than FRIDAY’s voice replaces Pepper’s. “I’ve located a high energy signal synonymous with Scarlet Witch’s abilities in Belarus.”
“Thanks, Fri. Forward that on to Pepper, tell her to send it to Clint. I’ll meet him here. If he has time to bring in New SHIELD backup, I'll take what I can get.”
Tony approachs Vision one more time before he takes off, laying a hand on his shoulder. “You going to be okay?”
“I will be once you have them back.”
“Fair enough. See you in a bit.”
Then he’s off, into the skies, in pursuit of his team.