Strength (A Steve Rogers Tony Stark Love Story)

Welcome Readers! This is a new story full of feelz and struggle for love. The title speaks for itself really, so sit back and relax and watch this crazy roller coster take flight. Enjoy and thank you for reading :) Hugs to you!

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The cut below his eye, still freshly stitched together, the slump in his shoulders and strain in his heart. Like a bullet had riddled poetic shapes into his tortured soul. The pain with each breath, a small hitch and shudder with each passing moment. But nothing compared to the pain in his heart.

It should have been him. 

If he smelt of alcohol, nobody had mentioned it. If his hair was sticking in every direction with black bags under his eyes, nobody even glanced. If anything they too thought it should be Tony laying in that coffin. 

Flashing images blurred his vision as he couldn't see anything but Peppers falling form. His broken promise falling from his lips: Lies. The only person who had ever believed in him, he had literally let slip through his fingers. Her screams echoing in Tonys mind. The way she had desperately called out his name, with fear he had never heard. All for what? He could've reached just that much further. He could've. These were the reasons his eyes were black and blood shot. A flask of scotch inside his black suits pocket.

He looked down at his hands. Black soot from working in the shop days on end. That was all he could do. Maybe if he built a better suit before, Killian wouldn't have been able to look at Pepper without him blasting a good one through his face. You're all I have too you know. He remembered when she said that. How much she cared for him like he actually meant something. But as a single tear fell on his hands, he quickly recoiled and shoved them in his pockets.

He should try harder, he should... For Pepper. She would have scolded him playfully at the site of a unshaven Stark with a wrinkled black suit. He could feel her soft touch gliding along the crinkles, smoothing down like only she knew how to. Fixing him like it was the easiest thing to do. And now? Now she was dead. 

He cringed as he heard the soft but heartbreaking thump of the dirt hitting the coffin. 

He had put her in harms way and she had always worried that he would be the one to not survive the mission. The missions he took to paint away his sins, to make a difference. Now the only difference was that instead of bettering the world he had taken away one of the smartest, kindest women to ever grace his path. 

Tony's eyes traveled over the solemn forms around him. No iron suits of armour, no weapons, no shields, no heroes, just people. People grieving over a person who took time to know their names, to ask them about their  day. A friend. 

Natasha held a passive face, and to someone who didn't know her, you'd see just that, but for Tony he saw a grieving assassin, unable to show the true emotion she felt after years of training herself not to. He saw her stiff set jaw, equipped with the same black sunglasses Clint was wearing. Posture straight but with one hand linked with Clints, his thumb rubbing against her hand. Clint was sad sure, but he had hardly known Pepper, meeting her in brief passing, but Natasha had worked with her for months. 

Tony had read both their files, he knew this wasn't their first funeral, the first comrade to have fallen.