Midnight Racer-Tony Stark's Daughter

forty-five

Nearly three months had passed since Dallas was abducted from the safety of the Avengers Tower. Everyone had been spending their time going back and forth between there and the Compound. In the time that the youngest Stark had disappeared, everyone had had a part of themselves change. They learned to live with the fact that they may never see her again.

Now, with her here. Everything is changing again.

FRIDAY had been able to catch Dallas climbing the shafts, and alerted Clint in time to be able to catch her once she lost consciousness.

That happened yesterday, and since then, she has been in the medical area of the Tower.

After going back and forth with on another with miscommunication and problems before the accident, Tony had a thousand questions, some answers, and minimal closure. So much had gone unanswered, most of which did not matter during the time of the accident and disappearance, but now the genius finds himself left with a giant puzzle he is unable to solve.

Now, here his daughter was. Yet again in a hospital bed, unconscious.

"Anything yet?" Pepper comes up beside him, brushing against his arm before slinging hers underneath it and holding on.

Tony sighs heavily, his left hand goes and pats the arm she linked herself with. "Not yet," He says, "But i'm not leaving."

"I wasn't asking you to." She says.

He can feel her looking at him, watching how his face reacts. It was like he could feel that facade he puts up for everyone else melt away so easily, and the emotional toll he was dealing with was starting to show itself.

"Her, uh," he scratches his head, "charts are just..all over the place. Bruce did some blood tests but, uh, we- we've just never seen something like this. It's like something mutated her cells, must've uh..hap-happened when she was gone." Tony's voice cracks, something he tries to hide with a cough at the end.

"We've got her back now. You'll figure it out, like you always do." Pepper lightly squeezes his arm for comfort, and it helps.

Tony can't take his eyes off of the bed Dallas is in. He fears that if he does, what happened last time will repeat itself and he will lose her forever this time. She just..hasn't woken up yet. Her body seems to have put her into a coma-like sleep.

What was odd was how her wound from Clint had healed already. It had closed itself up in under an hour, and every other injury she sustained here had vanished. Something they see happening with Peter and Steve a lot.

Tony feared the worst, and figured some kind of testing had been done on her. Though, without knowing much of anything, there was no way to reverse it. Bruce was the only one on it, but he was in California still, and Tony couldn't be where he couldn't see Dallas. So, they were at a stump. At least until she woke up and could potentially explain anything that could help.

"I really hope so." Tony responds. "I'm, uh, gonna go in and sit with her."

"Yeah," Pepper accepts, "I need to go do a few things, but i'll be back in a couple of hours."

"Alright." Tony says.

Her arm falls out of his until it's just their hands holding one another.

She gives his hand a squeeze, "Alright."

Then Pepper leaves, and Tony cautiously walks into Dallas' med room.