Author's Note: I recently wrote a piece over in the Iron Man category about how Pepper Potts came to be such close friends with Phil Coulson. (That story is called "The Doors Between Them," and can be found under my profile page. Pepper and Tony both reference the events of that story in this, but you don't necessarily need to have read it to understand this one.) After posting the final chapter to that story, I got a number of requests to write the story you're about to read. So, I dedicate "The News" to all of my fabulous readers who asked for it. I hope you guys like this!

This story takes place after the Avengers, but before Iron Man 3.

Also, thank you once again to my fabulous beta, kaheels. You're the tops!

Okay, deep breath in...deep breath out...here we go!

After the Battle of New York, Tony was content to bury himself in his work. Of course, he helped with the city's recovery as much as he could. Pepper helped organize relief efforts all across the city and Iron Man was very good at lifting heavy things. Thanks to the paranoia of a government organization like S.H.I.E.L.D., all evidence of an alien invasion was gone within a couple of days. That included all the remains of the attackers, as well as any technology or weaponry they brought with them. What that didn't include was all the rubble and damage sustained to the city itself. Of course, S.H.I.E.L.D. aided in that recovery as well, but it was like 9/11 all over again, and it would be a while before the city of New York could fully bounce back from the blow.

When Tony wasn't working on recovery, he was busy poring over details for the next Stark building project. Pepper allowed the distraction. She could tell he was really shaken after last week's events. And truth be told, she was too. The whole world was.

When they were first reunited after the attack, though he wore a fine dress shirt and slacks by the time she saw him, the scratches and bruises all over his face told stories of his trauma. The look in his eyes told even darker stories. And she kissed him, hard and long, careless of who was watching, until that dangerous look in his eye was replaced with one of love and relief.

In the days that followed, Tony wasn't very interested in talking about his experiences with the Avengers. She picked up little pieces, most of them from the news, but she let Tony keep his thoughts to himself, knowing that he would need some time to process everything before he started to let her in. In the meantime, he was more focused than ever on his work.

Even now, he sat hunched over a pair of magnifying glasses as he toyed with a tiny piece of computer hardware, a pair of tweezers in one hand and a soldering iron in the other.

Pepper approached him with a list in her hands. "Getting ready for the relief benefit we'll be hosting at the end of the month. I need you to approve the guest list." She laid the papers next to him.

Tony gave them a passing glance. "Looks great, hon. I approve."

She rolled her eyes. "You didn't even look."

"I didn't even have to. I trust your judgment. Besides, I'm a little...busy, at the moment." The last few words sounded more absent than his first as his attention clearly shifted back to his work.

She picked up the stapled papers and used them to swat Tony on the shoulder. "Tony please," she said exasperatedly, "It'll take you five minutes, and these invitations need to go to print today."

He didn't budge and didn't answer. So Pepper sighed and held up the list in front of her. "Fine, you just listen. Tell me if I'm missing anyone..."

She started reading off the list of names and Tony allowed himself to half listen as he concentrated on the movements of his hands.

She was about thirty names in when she suddenly caught his full attention.

"Annabelle Carter, Jeffrey and Charlotte Christov, Hector Coleman, Philip Coulson-"

Tony snapped his head away from the magnifier and looked at her suddenly, shock registering on his face.

"Don't give me that look," Pepper said with a glance before looking back to her paper. "Of course we're inviting Phil."

Tony's voice was soft. "No, Pepp-"

"Don't 'No Pepper' me either. Phil is one of our dearest friends. He should be there. Besides, with all the madness going on right now, I'll bet S.H.I.E.L.D. is working him into the ground."

Tony winced at the phrase and turned to face her more fully on his stool.

"I'm sure he could use the break," she mumbled, trying to find her place on the list again. She was just about to resume reading when Tony's hand grabbed the top of the papers and gently pulled them out of Pepper's grip. She looked at him again, prepared to be irritated, but noticed the sincere, regretful look on his face. She was caught off guard by that look.

"What is it?" she asked, now a little worried.

Tony put the papers on the desk and took her hands in his. "Pepper," was all he said. He looked down at their hands and shook his head solemnly. He didn't have the words. He had been looking for them for a week now, and he still didn't have them.

"What's wrong Tony?" Her brow was furrowed in a low expression and her voice became more desperate. Her mind was filling in a million scenarios, all of them horrible, all of them uncertain.

Tony looked up her, sympathy pouring from his eyes. "Babe...Phil..."

She pulled her hands from his and used them to cover her mouth. Her eyes already started to moisten, just from the look on his face. She knew what was coming, even as her heart tried to fight it.

Tony grabbed her elbows, feeling the absence of her hands and wanting still to comfort her somehow. "Phil didn't make it," he whispered.

There was a choked cry when she finally heard the words. "What?" she asked, over and over, her voice high from the emotion that gripped her in the throat. "How? W-When?"

"Before the..." he circled a disk into the air with his finger.

"Before the portal," Pepper supplied. She knew he still had trouble talking about things, especially the portal. Even in her grief, she appreciated how hard this must be for Tony to tell.

"Yeah," he said. "Before any of that got started, Phil...S.H.I.E.L.D. had Loki in custody, the guy who brought the invasion. But he escaped. And...during his escape, Phil challenged him." Tony looked up at her. "It didn't go his way," he finished sadly.

Pepper's hands stayed clasped over her mouth in shock. Her mind tried to desperately translate that information. It felt like Tony had told her all of that in a different language, and her brain had to work overtime to try to understand each individual word. "Oh my god," she finally gasped. "He's gone?" Somehow, it didn't seem true. None of it seemed true.

How could it be true? She had just seen that man a few days ago. He had stood in that very room, driven her to the airport afterward. She had teased him about the lip-shaped air-freshener hanging from his mirror, and he had defended the choice by claiming that it was the only one that didn't make him sneeze in the store. She just talked to him. How could he be dead? That's not how things were supposed to work.

Tony just nodded sadly, his fingers tenderly stroking from her elbows up her upper arms and then back down again. He didn't know how to help her through this. He had never been good with tears.

"This...Loki..." she began, her voice tiny and fragile. "What did he do to him?"

Tony instantly started shaking his head and he dropped his gaze from her. "No, Pepper. No. That's not important."

"Tony, please." She was almost begging now.

His head continued to shake. Immediately, his mind was flooded with images of Loki's staff piercing through the agent's back and emerging from his chest. Tony had seen the security footage at least a dozen times before Jarvis finally deleted it from his server, without orders. He could still see the grainy image of Agent Coulson's form, hunched against the metal wall, the pixels changing just enough to show each ragged breath as he sat there, alone, for nearly ten minutes before Fury finally came into frame. And Tony had watched each of those ten minutes tick by on the footage timestamp. He wasn't sure why he had sat through the whole ten minutes, and not just once, but several times. Maybe he felt like he was doing Coulson some kind of favor, giving him the companionship he had been denied for the last few moments of his life. Maybe Tony was just subjecting himself to it as some sort of punishment. A punishment for not being there. Whatever the reason, it was probably good that Jarvis deleted it.

"No," Tony repeated again, his voice weak, and his head still shaking lazily back and forth.

Pepper reached out and placed her hands on his shoulders. "Was he in pain?" she asked quietly. She wanted so desperately for that answer to be 'no'. She wanted to hear that it was quick and painless. That he was at least comfortable. She knew that hearing those things wouldn't actually do anything to calm the aching she felt in the pit of her stomach, but right now, her heart was hungry for even the smallest of consolations.

Lie to her, Tony's instincts told him. Tell her he didn't feel a thing. Even as his mind's eye watched the agent bleed out against that wall, the small voice in the back of his head persisted, and he tried to formulate the words 'No, he wouldn't have felt it.'

Instead, he looked up into Pepper's eyes, exposing his own tears to her for the first time, and answered in a hoarse voice, "Yeah...he was."

Her face instantly contorted and she brought one of her hands back up to her mouth. She let out the first sob as she clutched Tony's shoulder harder with her other hand. She continued to cry, her eyes pinched tightly shut, as she felt her knees give out. The same instant, she felt Tony's hands circling her waist as he held her to him and lowered her gently, coming off his stool to accompany her to the ground.

They kneeled that way on the floor for a while, Tony's shirt growing damp as it caught all of her tears. Amidst her sobs, quiet words came repeatedly from her lips. "How? Why?" Tony didn't try to respond. He had no answers for her.

He heard Jarvis lock the door for them, and the two were left in privacy for the next several hours.

A long period of time drew out before they both released each other from their tight embrace. Their knees were screaming at them by the end of the hug and they both repositioned themselves to be sitting on the floor. Tony mirrored the woman, with one hand propping himself up while the other one was tangled in Pepper's.

Pepper released his hand long enough to wipe the wet trails from her cheeks. She sniffed as she ran her hand over her skirt to get the moisture off and then held hands with him once again. "Why didn't you tell me?" she asked, her voice deep and stuffy from crying.

He hiked his shoulders. "I don't...I don't know." He shook his head softly.

A straggler of a tear slipped down his face and Pepper reached out to catch it. It slipped onto her finger and she pulled it away from his cheek, holding her finger up to examine it tenderly. She wondered how many tears had been shed for Phil Coulson. She was certain the number would be great. She was also certain that the number would have surprised Coulson during his life. He probably never even knew how dear he was to so many people.

She recalled a conversation she had once had with Phil, about how most people never celebrated his birthday. Her heart had broken then, dumbfounded that such an amazing man could go by, year after year, and see his birthday come and go without even a "Happy Birthday, Phil," spoken in passing. She wondered how many of those people, who never felt the need to celebrate his life, would be mourning his death right now. Pepper found herself angry at those people. And yet, she knew some of them would be crying, just as she cried today.

"Oh my god," she said, as something suddenly dawned on her. "Does Audrey know?"

Tony looked surprised. "The cellist? I don't know."

"Someone has to tell her. Poor woman."

Tony nodded, "Were they pretty serious?"

Pepper was thoughtful for a moment before answering. "Yeah, I think so. Hearing the way he talked about her, seeing the way his face lit up...I think he was probably very serious about her. I've never seen Phil act that way with anyone else."

Pepper's heart broke again as she thought of the kind woman she had only met once. But she had heard Phil talk about her more than that, and each time, she would smile tenderly at the affection he showed.

There was a time, briefly, when Pepper had come to recognize a certain look in Phil Coulson's eye. It was the look he had when a woman truly captured his attention. It was the look he had when he was falling for someone, when he desired someone. Pepper saw that look up close and personal on a few occasions, and then, for a while, it disappeared entirely.

She didn't see it return to his eyes until one night when she and Tony happened to run into the agent at the symphony. She watched him in the crowd as a cellist played on the stage. Even in the dimness of that concert hall, Pepper saw it. That tiny look, the briefest and fiercest of flashes that rippled across his eyes as he watched her play. Pepper smiled then, from her place in the crowd, because at that moment, it was the clearest thing in the world: Phil Coulson had found someone to love. And later that evening, when Pepper got the chance to meet Audrey face to face, it was clear that the woman was just as taken by the handsome agent with the striking eyes and debilitating smile.

It was obvious they were serious about one another. There wasn't anything that Phil took lightly, and the relationships he had with the women in his life were certainly matters he handled with all seriousness. It had been a relationship Pepper had been observing from a distance with a great deal of interest. Now, to have it suddenly cut short, and with the cruelest of tools, Pepper's heart ached for this woman on the opposite side of the country, who probably didn't even remember her name.

During the next several days, Pepper did everything she could to get a hold of someone at S.H.I.E.L.D. who would give her answers. She finally discovered that Phil's remains had already been attended to but that a memorial service was currently in the planning process. Pepper volunteered immediately to help.

While trying to design the invitations, she made a startling discovery.

"Tony!" she said, bursting into his workshop, eyes glued to her phone as she thumbed through the images thereon.

Tony jumped from his work and spun around in his chair to face her. "What?" he asked in alarm. "What is it?"

"Do you have a picture of him?"

Tony scowled in confusion. "What?"

"His picture! Do you have one?"

"Who are we talking about?"

"Phil!" she answered in frantic frustration. "I don't have a single one, can you believe it? I never once thought to take this man's picture. How stupid can I be?"

"Hey, hey, easy." Tony said, reaching out to grab the phone from her hands. He set it on the desk and pulled her to him. "Jarvis," he called, spinning her around and then pulling her into his lap. "Pull up all the pictures you can find of Agent Phil Coulson. Keep it clean, though. There are ladies present." He smirked up at Pepper and she shot him a small smile over he shoulder, the kind of smile that tried to look more disapproving than it actually was.

A few seconds later, there was a ding on Tony's computer.

"Images of Agent Philip Coulson, sir," the AI responded as the pictures popped up on the screen one at a time, in high resolution.

Pepper breathed out a small sigh of relief when she saw them, and she smiled gently at the screen. She wasn't sure what she had been so afraid of, but seeing those kind eyes and that tiny smirk again was like reminding Pepper's very soul of something vital that she'd almost forgotten. The pictures continued to scroll, most of them being official identification images, but occasionally, the candid, after-hours images would flash on the screen and she'd see him smile, see those little wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, the ones that identified one of his real, honest to goodness laughs. She placed a hand over her heart as she watched the silent slideshow, and remembered.

She felt the soft kiss on her shoulder and she leaned back into Tony's embrace as they both watched the pictures flick by. "I never would have expected to miss him this much," she said quietly. "I mean, all things considered, we would go months at a time without seeing the man. And then, when he'd turn up, it'd usually only be for a couple meetings or something and, next thing you knew, he'd be gone again."

"Yeah," Tony mused, adjusting his grip around her stomach. "But for a twitchy little guy...he sure leaves an impression."

She gave a quiet snort at the description and pushed back against the ground gently with her foot, causing them both to bob up and down in the desk chair.

Tony smiled against her shoulder. After a moment, the slideshow came to its end and was frozen on the final image in Jarvis' bank. It was a more typical depiction of Agent Coulson, one in which he wore both his trademark suit and patented smirk. The man stared at the camera with a certain knowing look in his eye, almost as if he could see through that camera lens and through time itself, to be staring Tony and Pepper in the eyes as they mourned. And he would judge them. Judge them for their silly sentimentality. The image felt like it would move any moment now and Phil would say, "Seriously, you guys? Snap out of it. I'm dead. So what? Big deal. You had your cry, now brush yourselves off and get back to work."

Tony breathed out a small laugh and shook his head when he found himself almost responding, "Screw you. You're not the boss of me." He caught himself, of course, before the words actually came out. But then he looked back at the image, and noticed a twinkle in the agent's eye, almost like he heard him anyway.

Tony's expression grew serious again as he continued to watch the image. There had been a question, a little question with a potentially big answer sitting in the back of Tony's mind now for the better part of two years. He had never asked it before, partially because he wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer, and partially because he didn't know what it would say about him if he was questioning this kind of thing. But there it was, just sitting in a corner of his brain, waiting to be answered, and this seemed as good a time as any.

"Hey Pep?" he began.

She made some kind of noise in response, signifying that she heard him.

"Can I ask you something?"

He could feel her tense up slightly in his grasp. He wondered for a second, if she knew what he was going to ask and if that was why she tensed up. There was only one way to find out.

"Sure," he heard her reply.

"Did you and Coulson...did you ever...I mean, I know that you guys were friends but...did it ever go beyond that, for you two?"

For a second, he thought he heard her laugh, and she sat up, causing him to release his hold across her stomach and watch as she repositioned herself so that she was sitting sideways on his lap.

"Somehow, I knew that was what you were going to ask," she said, scratching an itch on her forehead. She turned and looked at Tony seriously. "What would it change if the answer was yes?" she asked.

He cocked an eyebrow at her. "So that's basically a 'yes', then."

She hiked her shoulders. "No I'm just wanting to know, what difference does it make? The man is dead, so you clearly don't have any competition anymore, assuming that you had it in the first place, so why are you asking this now?"

She seemed a little more defensive than what he had been anticipating. He wasn't trying to rile her up, but now that he saw her reaction to the question, he was almost certain of its answer. "No, it's not like that," he said. "I just...there have been a couple times, and a couple things that I've noticed and..." He huffed as he tried to articulate himself. "It feels like you, he and I have all been dancing around this issue for a while now and, I just...don't see the point in dancing anymore. I promise I won't throw a fit, I just want to know: Were you two ever...involved?"

She looked at him sincerely, regretting her defensive response a moment ago, and took in a deep breath. "Yes," she said, looking him in the eyes. "But it was brief, and it was before you and I really got together. In the end, Phil and I decided that friendship was the better choice for us."

She watched Tony's reaction closely. He nodded his head, pursing his lips ever so slightly and trying to look controlled. She was impressed with how well he was handling this, even though she could see the quietest marks of jealousy crackle underneath his gaze.

He took in a slow breath, eyes watching Coulson's image on the screen as he asked, "Did you two ever..." He felt her hand gently cup his cheek and he was forced to look back at her.

She smiled at him, the kindness in her eyes radiating out at him like warm breeze. "No," she answered in all honesty as she leaned in and delivered a reassuring kiss to his forehead. She felt him let loose a relieved sigh as she kissed him.

"Good," he said as she pulled away from him and he sent a little smirk up to her. He looked back at the screen as she reached up to play with his hair affectionately. Tony watched Phil with scrutiny in his eye. He wasn't sure he could see the two of them together. In fact, Tony couldn't really picture the rigid agent in any kind of romantic relationship. He just didn't seem to have a particularly warm personality, and it made Tony wonder what Pepper had seen in him. There must have been something.

"So what was it?" Tony finally asked.

Pepper stopped playing with his hair and looked at him curiously.

Tony elaborated, "What was it about him? What made it click?"

Pepper nodded when she understood his question, and a small smile came over her face.

Even though he knew that another man was bringing that smile to her lips, and that Tony really shouldn't be glad about that, he couldn't help the quiet mirror of a smile that spread across his own face as he watched her. She was just radiant when she smiled. And Tony was strong, but he wasn't strong enough to withstand that.

She hiked her shoulders after a moment of consideration. "I don't know exactly. He was just very...kind. There was a certain, unassuming quality about him. He...he had a goodness in his heart." Pepper paused and placed her hand over Tony's heart, her hand covering the glowing, metallic disk in his chest. She pressed it just enough to emphasize her point. "Something I find very attractive in a man," she concluded.

Tony looked back up at her, giving a quiet laugh at her sweet implication. "So," he said, running a hand up her leg protectively. "Did he treat you good, then?"

Pepper smiled at him lovingly and brought both hands up to grab the sides of his face. She nodded at him. "Yeah, he did."

Tony gave a single nod in approval and looked back at the screen as Pepper placed a kiss on his jaw and then nuzzled into his neck. "Thanks, Phil," Tony told the screen, grateful to the other man for having treated his girl well while they were together. He knew he should probably feel protective of Pepper, or perhaps even unsettled by the face staring back at him from the computer monitor, but he wasn't. If anything, he actually found himself feeling a certain sense of gratitude to the fallen agent. Sure, he was glad that Coulson hadn't been a jerk to Pepper, but it seemed like the agent had also had the class to bow out gracefully in the end. If Phil had put up a bigger fight, and refused to let Pepper go, then perhaps Pepper would have stayed with him. Perhaps Tony's life would have looked very different.

Tony's expression sobered at the thought. He felt his heart start to race a little faster as something primal started to panic deep within him. Even as the woman he loved burrowed further into the crook of his neck, Tony found himself dreading the very second she would break away from that embrace. It was an earth-shattering moment for him. He realized something he had never realized before.

"Never go, Pepper," he said, almost out of nowhere.

He felt her brow furrow against his neck. "What?"

"Never go anywhere. I never want you to leave."

She hugged him a little tighter, in promise. "I don't want to leave you either, Tony."

That helped, but it still wasn't enough. He was being selfish, but he needed more from her. "Then move in," he said.

She pulled away from his grasp and looked at him seriously. "What?" she asked.

Tony was kind of shocked by his request too. He had to gulp once and take a deep breath before restating his request. "I want you to move in, with me. My place back in Malibu."

"Tony," she began, stunned. "That's a big step-"

"But it's the perfect step. It's the next one. Pep, don't you see? We can't count on anything anymore. Gods, aliens, portals in the sky...a person can be here, living and breathing one second, and be a posthumous face on someone's computer screen the next." Tony gestured flippantly towards the screen. He regretted his careless choice of words when he saw her wince as she looked at her late friend.

Tony sighed and tried to refocus his words. "In so many ways...it feels like my world is...came very close to falling apart, and, some of the beams are still shaking. My life is the craziest it's ever been and right now, the only thing in it that makes a lick of sense is you."

She looked at him, her eyes heavy with all seriousness.

"I want you around, Pepper. I...I love you."

He saw a tear slip down her cheek. He had been seeing a lot of those lately, but this time, he felt like this one was somehow hopeful, a good sign. She grabbed the sides of his face again and dipped her head down to kiss him.

Soft. Tender. Promising. Forgiving. That kiss did so many things while staying so small. She pulled away from him and tipped her forehead against his. "I love you too," she answered.

Tony smiled up at her. "So...that's a yes?"

Pepper beamed at him and then dropped another kiss on his lips.

And there it is. I hope you enjoyed this story and I will be excited to hear whatever thoughts you'd like to share in the reviews. Thanks for reading!

-Monker