Send away for a perfect world,

One not simply, so absurd

In these times of doing what you're told,

Keep these feelings, no one knows

Whatever happened to the young man's heart,

Swallowed by pain, as he slowly fell apart

And I'm staring down the barrel of a .45,

I'm swimming through the ashes of another life

There's no real reason to accept the way things have changed

Staring down the barrel of a .45

"I just can't understand it," Pepper sniffled again, wiping away the brim of tears from her eye with a Kleenex. She stood with few others, all dressed in black in the drizzling rain. Not many people still counted themselves as friends of Tony Stark, and fewer cared to pay their condolences to the man. "Why did any of this have to happen." It had been a year since Tony and Steve were returned to them, and in that time the two men had closed themselves off from the world. Neither returned to their former roles in the Avengers Initiative, and the team soon fell apart without them.

Bruce stood in silence for a long moment after she'd spoken, his heart ached and his head felt stupidly heavy on his shoulders. Black was never a colour he liked to wear because it reminded him of exactly this, standing with all of the others in their dark attire in mourning. Mourning. He hated the word. He wished he could get angry then but the rage didn't even fizzle inside him, instead tears stung at his eyes as he struggled to keep them back. He wished he'd had an answer for Pepper, wished he'd had an answer to any of it. He could wish all he wanted but it'd never change a damn thing.

After a longer period without words, the silence filled with more silence and possibly the sound of someone crying distantly. "We found him." Bruce finally said, "Trevor Hudson, we found him..." He took his glasses off and pinched the bridge of his nose, scrunching his face to stop the emotions from making him waver. "His drones didn't stand a chance against the other guy... He didn't... I don't know what happened, he didn't seem like a man in his right mind, how could he psychologically tortured to this point?"

Pepper supposed that she should take some solace in that, but she felt nothing. Her face was almost stoic in light of the news, "It's too little too late now," she murmured coldly. What good was the man dead now that Tony was already gone, had already taken his own life?

Bruce sighed and put the glasses back on his face, "Regardless... he's dead. Clint and Natasha had cornered him, pinned him down but I just couldn't let him live..." He would have gone into detail about how he'd crushed the man's body like a toothpaste tube, starting from his feet, but decided that they weren't in the right place for that, even though part of him thought Tony might have wanted to hear it. Assuming he could hear at all, a philosophical question to be sure.

Tony had suffered mental damages on top of the psychological trauma. His focus never returned to what it used to be, and neither did his drive. He suffered from frequent nightmares, and commonly complained of a ringing in his ears. He'd tried once to return to work, to lose himself in the technological world of mechanics and ones and zeros, and it had ended in failure. He couldn't think and he couldn't problem solve, answers that would've been plain as day required him to look back at previous projects to see what he had done, and he was further frustrated by the fact that he didn't understand why he'd done it.

Following his failed return to work, Tony had soon after lost his holdings in Stark Industries. These things had happened in the past, and every time Tony was able to work his way back in, or if need be, he would've been able to build a new company up from the ground under 'Stark Limited' or 'Stark Co.' But that was a different Tony Stark, an intelligent, tenacious business man. Tony lacked the flare, lacked the charisma and lacked the genius required to continue with his career.

And then they were here, what few people Tony hadn't managed to turn away or turn against him now stood gathered around his open grave, mourning the loss of a truly great man. In the month prior to his passing Tony had been forced into psychiatric care, a psychiatrist was hired to live in Stark Tower and meet with him daily. He'd been writing in a journal, a recommended exercise to help deal with the insomniac inducing night terrors. There was no doubt that those gathered here wondered what Tony's last entry might contain, or what his last words had been to Steve. Steve, the man he'd left behind in the world of the living, who he'd promised he'd never quit, was now left alone to fall to pieces.

Steve stood in complete silence all the way through to the end of the funeral, his face turned down and a constant stream of tears freshly wetting his cheeks. He didn't sob or make a sound, his shoulders didn't tremble and his eyes didn't shift their focus from Tony's coffin. The dirt had been placed over top the hole, burying the love of his life, forever.

He'd never see those big brown eyes again; hear the tired excuses of a man who just wanted to finish his work. He'd never see that excited look as an idea came to a brilliant mind, the need to do something right now. He'd never again feel the warm touch, never see him move again.

He'd never see those big brown eyes again.

Steve finally moved, his stiff body becoming like a wash of motion as he crumpled to his knees, hands digging into the dirt, just a little. "You stupid..." he whispered, the tears dripping down off his nose and into the soil. He wished he was in a fairy tale and not a nightmare, that there'd be some kind of magic in his anguish and bring his lifeline back to him. "I'm still here," His voice sounded like he'd eaten shards of glass moments before speaking, "I'm still here, Tony. I never gave up... I cried and I showed emotion but I never gave up." Steve slammed a fist into the dirt.

"You can't let go, alright?"

An unsteady stare.

"Promise me, Tony."

"I won't if you won't."

"We had a deal, goddamn it!" He shouted and hit the ground again, wishing he could wake the dead. "You promised me!"

"Tony?" Steve stood in the doorway of Tony's room in a slight panic, he'd woken up on the couch and Tony had vanished from his lap, he hadn't even woken.

The strange way Tony moved was already scaring him.

"Tony? What did you-" Steve's eyes widened when he saw the gun in the other man's hand. Tony didn't even seem to hear him as he screamed for him to stop.

"You quit! You... You..." Steve gasped for breath as his forehead touched the grave soil, an anguished scream shattering the remainder of silence and breaking down into quiet sobs.

"I loved you." He squeaked pathetically, lifting his head though it hurt too much to even bother. "I should have said it instead..." Steve's hand extended and touched the grave top tenderly, "I should have said anything instead of nothing... Tony... I am so, so very sorry..." His words were slow, just falling out of his mouth as they came to mind. He had no time left to say anything now, it was all far too late. He was too late. His shoulders slumped again as he hardly had the energy to pay attention to the world. He didn't flinch when he heard steps behind him, recognizing and knowing they were Bruce's just by chance, he didn't know how, possibly because he'd always have that sense in his head.

"You still can say something, Steve." The man said quietly, "Tony... he made his choice, it's not a fault to be put on anyone so don't hurt yourself."

Steve shook his head, "I was the one he needed, I was the one that he trusted and I should have been the one to save him."

"You can't expect to be able to save everyone, Cap." Natasha approached just as silently, her face as stone cold as she could make it though it was clear she was fighting back tears of her own. "We couldn't..."

Clint draped his arm around her back, a comforting hand on her shoulder pulling her just a little closer. Her hatred of public displays of affection be damned, she needed the support. "There's nothing more that could've been done, Steve. You did everything you could and then some."

Steve slowly pulled himself from the dirt and turned a heart broken gaze at the people he once knew as his team, their expressions filled with more worry than he'd ever wanted aimed his way. They were scared he'd do the same, frightened that they'd lose two in this tragedy. And they should be. He was falling apart, a mess of what he used to be and now he'd just lost the only anchor he'd had. He needed to talk, needed to tell them what happened and get over it so he didn't follow Tony into oblivion.

"I'll never leave you."

"I'm with you, I'll always be with you, don't be scared Tony."

But somehow he just couldn't find the words to say a single thing.

Zafona's Notes:

I am sorry to do this to you guys and I was so sad to write it too. Matsu's idea, I assure you, though I'm the one who wrote most things that had to do with Steve in this chapter so for that I apologize. And this was one of those quiet stories that sort of fades off at the end, was never meant to have the giant climactic scene, just to drift away quietly.

So that's it for this story. I really appreciate all the support and reviews and would love, even if you're reading this forever after we posted it, to get your feedback on it. I look forward to getting your reactions to the ending, please let us know how we did :)