A/N Originally, this did take place in the shawarma place, but I thought that wouldn't be very nice, considering. Is this my first Avengers fic? I think it is... Enjoy!

Pepper watched the news, everything beyond the picture on the screen fading in a dull roar as she watched Tony fall from the sky. Frantically, she grabbed for her phone, fumbling with numb fingers as she tried to turn it on.

One Missed Call.

Tony.

Please, please no.

They hadn't gone for shawarma. Tony was complaining about this, but from his designated heal-from-your-recent-death location. He had complied with this order only because Cap' had given Clint and Natasha permission to use cruel and unusual punishment to keep him there. He had then bound off to help the rest of the team and the National Guard. Tony was left shouting after him, but not quite daring to get up. Natasha and Clint had exchanged delighted glances at the Cap's permission; Tony didn't want to know what kind of painful tactics they'd be willing to use, and besides... someone had taken his suit.

"My suit!"

Natasha rolled her eyes. "We know, Tony."

"That is personal property. Property that is, by definition, mine, and no one elses', so it should be... with me. Where'd it go?"

"You would have flown off in it," Clint said, raising one hand and then the other as he made his points. "You were dead. Fury seems to think the latter of those statements makes the first... what was it?" he asked Natasha.

"Fucking stupid," she supplied without looking from her phone.

Clint nodded sagely. "Fucking. Stupid."

Tony stared at the pair of them. "Fury can go – "

Tony's attention was caught by something behind his guards and he stopped talking, paling. The combination had Clint spinning around towards the threat.

Clint didn't see a threat. He saw a thin red-haired woman in a business suit walking briskly towards them, her expression intent. Natasha pulled Clint out of her way. Tony jumped to his feet to meet her as she stomped up to them, her heels clicking on concrete.

"What were you thinking," Pepper shrieked, her pitch rising into the range usually left for near-death experiences and utter rage, making Tony cringe.

"I did call you."

"You were in space. With a missile – a nuclear missile –"

"It's not my fault you didn't pick up –"

"A nuclear - what were you thinking? You could have died!"

"I did."

"You died?!"

"Only for like... a minute."

"You dying at all is kind of important, Tony!"

"I did call you."

"And that is supposed to mean what, exactly? What were you going to say that could possibly make you flying out into space through a – a magical hole in the sky with a nuclear missile seem okay to me?"

"'I love you.'" Tony said. Pepper froze.

"What?"

"That's what I was going to say. 'I love you. I'm sorry.'"

Pepper stared at him. His lips twitched to the side, half smirk, half self-deprecation. She stepped into him, tucking her head in under her chin and he wrapped his arms around her, steadying her shaking frame. Natasha was the only one who had expected this; Clint just stared, mouth open. He looked to Natasha and back to this utterly unexpected incarnation of Tony Stark in bewilderment.

"Please don't do that to me again," Pepper said softly, her voice too low to carry.

For once, in the face of her on-the-verge-of-panic pain, Tony had no wise-crack in reply.

"Shh, love. It's all right," he murmured into her hair.