Simply put, the reason Pepper Potts and Tony Stark work is that they are made of the same stuff. At the very core of them, once you dig past the pleasantries and diplomacy and killer heels on her side, and the layers and layers of masks and misdirection on his, dig deep enough and you hit a core of pure iron. Something that won’t budge, something that can’t budge, something that when you push it pushes back, harder.
It’s that part of her which, when Happy reaches to open the car door for her and instead crumbles in front of her eyes like wax, races through oh god what the fuck what the fuck what the fuck what is happening oh god this is why tony left this is what he was fighting he lost tony doesn’t lose he doesn’t stop but he lost that must mean he’s- and lands right on no. unacceptable. tony isn’t dead because i haven’t allowed it. time to work cleanup.
It’s the part of her that lets her grit her teeth and invite Steve Rogers into her home, and the same part that won’t hear his apologies.
In the next weeks, maybe she’s shorter with people than she would have been, maybe she isn’t quite as patient, maybe she seems a little cold. But she’s running on iron and nothing else. When you’re running on iron, soft is a synonym for breaking.
So Pepper lets May Parker cry on her shoulder, and invites the kid from Tennessee and his sister to the compound when they have nowhere else to go, and she gives the Avengers back their old rooms, which Tony never allowed her to clear out even during the remodel. She doesn’t cry. She twists her engagement ring around on her finger and pours money into stabilising New York’s crumbling infrastructure, and then when that’s done she fiddles with the shrapnel pendant and sets up foundations to do the same across the world.
Sometimes she feels like she’s fossilising. Pepper lies in their big empty bed in their big empty bedroom in a compound that is too full of people she doesn’t want to see and wonders if there is a similar word to petrification for when something is being turned to metal. She stretches her hands out in front of her and imagines them coloured red and gold.
Then she gets up and has FRIDAY reactivate the Iron Legion.
Jim is worried about her. She can tell and she doesn’t care. He should remember how it works from Afghanistan. They don’t stop until Tony gets home. They don’t pretend for a second that he isn’t coming back. That’s how this works.
That’s how Pepper stays functioning.
She’s in the kitchen when it happens. Steve and Natasha are also there, and neither of them are quite able to look her in the eye as they fix their breakfasts. Pepper considers that solely their problem, iron doesn’t feel awkward.
FRIDAY’s alert sounds as she is pouring her second cup of coffee, and she starts and spills some onto the counter. She is too focused on the AI to clean it up.
“Miss Potts, I’m receiving a transmission from off-planet!”
Pepper’s heart leaps into her throat and it’s hard to force the words out around it.
“Play it please FRIDAY,” she says.
A network of blue lights dance in the air in front of her, projecting an image of Tony. He’s mid-sentence, tapping what must be his helmet as he talks.
“-thing on?” He leans back against a wall and Pepper’s gut clenches at just how awful he looks. awful but alive alive alive.
“Hey Miss Potts,” he says and Pepper can’t place his odd expression. Natasha and Steve have stood and and moved to stand either side of her, like some kind of guard detail. They watch the message grimly.
“If you find this recording don’t feel bad about this.”
no. Pepper’s heart drops from her throat to the pit of her stomach.
“Part of the journey is the end,” he continues and irrationally she wants to tell FRIDAY to stop, to pretend that she isn’t looking at his goodbye. “Just for the record being adrift in space with zero promise of rescue is more fun than it sounds.”
He’s trying to be brave for her. She can see it in his face, in the way he’s not looking at the helmet, in the set of his jaw.
“Food and water ran out four days ago, oxygen will run out tomorrow morning... that’ll be it.” His voice breaks and his mask slips and she can see how scared he is. Then he leans forward and something like peace settles into his eyes. That acceptance might be the most terrifying thing of all.
“When I drift off, I will dream about you,” he says with absolute conviction. “It’s always you.”
Tony reaches out and the message cuts off. The finality of it hits her like a blow to the stomach.
Pepper blinks and stares for a moment and is dimly aware of Steve and Natasha exchanging a panicked look. She delves down deep inside herself, searching for that familiar iron. She needs something to lean on, something strong to hold her up as she struggles with the weight of his words, but there’s nothing there. Nothing but an endless starry expanse and somewhere out there, Tony Stark struggling for breath.