This takes place during Iron Man 3. Which means this contains spoilers for Iron Man 3.

Thanks to my beta, irite, for helping me recover from IM3 enough to try to salvage the remnants of my canon.

I do not own The Avengers. Or Iron Man 3. Or anything of any worth whatsoever.

Right before Christmas, Bruce took an impromptu vacation.

It was not a vacation he had planned on, and it was not any fun at all. He might actually describe it as 'miserable,' if asked.

Not that anyone did.

After that whole thing with the alien invasion in Manhattan, Tony Stark had invited him to live at Stark Tower. Well, what was left of Stark Tower. To be fair, most of it was left. The top few floors had sustained damage, but on the whole, the building was sound. R&D was untouched, and that was what mattered.

Bruce hadn't meant to say 'yes.' Tony had actually kind of tricked him into it. It started with a lab tour, and Tony dangling state of the art lab equipment in front of Bruce's nose. How could Bruce say no to that, really? And once Tony managed to hook him, reeling Bruce in was a snap. It was easy to find him a guest room, to get him a couple of research assistants, to get him on the company payroll (and Bruce wasn't sure how Tony had swung that—he was pretty sure he was still on the army's watch list—but he wasn't about to ask any questions).

Of course he tried to object, but Tony had a strange habit of going deaf whenever people tried to turn down his generosity. Bruce figured this out after a few days of attempted protest and just gave up. He settled in quickly, finding shops he liked, tea, clothing, a barbershop, and every other possible amenity he could want. And after all that, it seemed pretty futile to try to leave.

Tony stuck around for a few weeks that summer, overseeing the reconstruction effort, but then he headed back to his house in Malibu. He came back to New York a couple of times a month—perk of having a private airplane as well as flying suits of armor—and during his visits, he always made sure to check in on Bruce's research. They'd talk about what the rest of the 'Avengers' were doing. Well, the ones they knew about, anyway; Thor was pretty out of touch and Clint and Natasha were 'classified,' although that didn't often stop Tony. When he couldn't visit, he'd video chat, or call, or send messages via JARVIS. He stayed connected.

Whether he was physically present or no, Bruce actually found himself getting along remarkably well with Tony. It was the closest thing he'd had to collaboration in years. And soon it was more than that. Soon, they were what one might describe as 'friends,' in that Tony irritated the hell out of Bruce and Bruce did his best not to smash him.

Okay, it was a lot more amicable than that. Having a friend—a real, honest to god friend—who knew what he was and accepted him anyway...that was unprecedented.

It hadn't happened a lot since the accident, after all. Or before, if Bruce was honest with himself.

Over the next six months, though, Tony's visits slowly became less frequent. Shorter. And when he did visit, he was tense. Fidgety. Bruce, so well versed in remaining centered, could see it immediately. Something was wrong. Different. But Tony sure as hell wasn't going to talk about it, and Bruce wouldn't have known what to say if he had, so whatever it was, it went unaddressed. They were friends, sure, but Tony had a pretty solid wall around him, and Bruce wasn't one to pry. So he pretended not to notice, and Tony pretended like everything was fine.

By November, Tony wasn't visiting at all. Or video chatting, or JARVIS-messaging. He wouldn't return calls. He returned e-mails. Sometimes. When he did, they were pretty vague. He'd reference a new project he was working on, but honestly, he changed projects so often that Bruce lost track. He couldn't tell if Tony was actually finishing everything he started, or if he was just flitting from project to project in a manic fit of 'must get this done.'

And he admittedly didn't know Tony very well, despite the friendship growing between them. Bruce didn't know Tony well enough to know if this was normal or not. It didn't seem normal, though. It seemed...frantic. Like he was trying to plan for every contingency, trying to ward off some unknown evil through sheer productive force.

By the third week of December, Bruce hadn't heard from Tony in a while.

When he finally did, he wished he hadn't.

Bruce had seen the stuff on the news about the Mandarin, but he never, ever thought that Tony would somehow get mixed up in it. That's what SHIELD was for, after all. So why would he? Tony was busy building his nine-thousandth suit or something, too occupied with his own blossoming neurosis to get involved with a terrorist.

But then, there he was. On the news. Threatening a terrorist.

Bruce watched that particular newscast with his mouth hanging open in disbelief. First, because Tony looked like hell coming out of that hospital, dark sunglasses doing little to disguise that fact. Second because of the sheer audacity of what he was saying. Giving out his home address on national television? What the hell was he thinking? His words were reckless and stupid, but his bravado had that same manic edge that had been becoming more pronounced for months.

Someone needed to do something about this.

But Bruce didn't know if he was that someone. Still, he resolved to at least try to call again, kicking himself for not doing so sooner.

He never got the chance, though. Because Tony died.

At least, that's what the papers said, when he saw them, later. And Bruce found it kind of hard to disagree with them, since he'd watched Tony's house get blown up on TV.

Which had been the impetus behind his vacation. Well. 'Vacation.'

He'd been alone in the lab, all of his assistants having gone home for the night (Christmas was fast approaching, and they all had things to do, he understood that), when he'd seen the 'breaking news' alert flashing on the television that he kept on in the lab, mostly for white noise. And then they'd shown the wreckage. The headline: 'Tony Stark's Home Attacked.' Then they'd shown the video of the attack.

Bruce didn't see all of it. He saw some of it. Enough of it.

Enough to make him very, very angry.

When he came back to himself, he was lying on a beach. It was dark. He was mostly naked. And very, very cold.

This situation was non-ideal, and it prompted Bruce to sit up in a hurry, reaching around himself for the tattered remnants of his clothing.

It didn't amount to much. No shirt, no shoes, only a suggestion of pants. And no lights visible in any direction.

Wonderful.

Slowly, Bruce began walking away from the water. He assumed he was heading west, assumed he was on the east coast of the country, but aside from that, he had no idea where he was. Well. He was somewhere that was pretty damn cold in December. But not as cold as New York.

That narrows it down.

As he made his way up the beach and through the trees, hoping to find a road, he tried to get a sense of how long he'd been out. As usual, he didn't remember. He didn't know how he'd gotten here, how much damage he'd done and he didn't know—

Tony.

Tony might be dead.

And suddenly, he was fighting against himself again, struggling to hold on because damn it, he wasn't going to do anyone any good if he just kept rampaging across the country. He needed to get back to New York, needed to find out what he could do to help. If he even could do anything. If nothing else, he had to get back to New York and face up to whatever he'd done after he'd transformed.

After wandering through the forest in what had to be the most remote area on the East Coast until dawn was breaking, Bruce finally found a road. It was another hour until a car went by. It was another forty-five minutes after that until a car that was willing to pick up a near-naked hitchhiker came by.

Bruce thanked the driver (young, maybe a college student heading home) exuberantly for the ride, for the t-shirt, for the loose pajama pants and flip flops. The kid dropped him off at the first town they came across, and Bruce didn't blame him at all—he thought he was lucky the kid had picked him up at all. But if anyone was going to understand the phrase 'I had a rough night,' it would probably be a college kid.

Making his way to a nearby diner, Bruce tried to ignore the stares his current fashion statement (and lack of a coat) were evoking. Honestly, if they thought this was bad, they should have seen him seven hours ago. This was a massive improvement—he was no longer in danger of being charged with public indecency, after all.

Everyone in the diner looked up at him as he entered, but Bruce resolutely made his way to the cash register.

"What can I do for you, honey?" the woman behind the counter asked him, barely glancing up from the money she was counting.

"I, uh. I was wondering if I could make a phone call."

"Local or long distance?"

"Long distance." At least, Bruce assumed as much.

"Sorry, hun. There's a payphone a couple of blocks down, though, near the courthouse. You can't miss it."

"Thanks. But, I, um. I don't have any money."

She finally looked up, taking in his appearance. "No, I don't suppose you do." Then, with a sigh, she took a couple of dollars' worth of quarters from the cash register. "Here, honey."

Bruce thanked her, struck for the second time that day by the kindness of total strangers. It was a small comfort in what was otherwise an awful day, but he was grateful nonetheless.

The payphone was really impossible to miss. Its very presence was strange, since Bruce had thought that most of these things had gone the way of the dodo bird. But he wasn't going to question his luck. He just fed a handful of quarters in the machine.

He dialed one of the two useful numbers that he actually knew. One was his own cell phone number, but that thing was probably gone for good, since it had been in his pocket. The other was the number for his lab. That was what he dialed. He needed to talk to someone, and maybe one of his assistants would be in.

The phone rang a couple of times before someone answered. "Hello?"

That was not a voice he'd been expecting. "Natasha?"

"Dr. Banner?"

"Um. Yeah. Look, I—"

"Where are you?"

Bruce glanced around, but there weren't any overt signs trumpeting his location. "Not sure."

"Okay. Stay there, wherever 'there' is." Bruce heard someone typing, then Natasha continued, "We're working on getting this mess cleaned up. But we don't have the manpower because of the thing with the Mandarin...I just got called in to handle this because we've worked together."

She sounded hassled, and he hated to ask, but he had to. "Natasha...do you know anything about the Mandarin?"

Natasha paused. "That's classified."

Seriously, she was going to pull that? "Really, Agent Romanoff? Tony's dead, and—"

"I'm sorry, Bruce," she cut him off, "But I don't have the time for this. I've traced your location. SHIELD will send a car to collect you in the next twelve to twenty-four hours. Be ready."

With that, she hung up the phone.

Leaving Bruce to wonder what he could do in a small town in God-knows-where with no money, no clothes, and no place to stay.

He ended up going to the library. Which is where he finally saw the newspapers proclaiming Tony's death. That was hard to handle. Almost impossible, but he'd had time to get used to the thought. Time to get some distance. Enough distance that the Other Guy stayed mostly quiet.

Probably just tired, Bruce thought bitterly. We both are.

He hung out at the library until they closed at 9:00 PM, and Bruce then began to desperately hope that he'd be 'collected' in twelve hours and not twenty-four.

It was pretty cold out that night—a few degrees above freezing—and he was shivering on a park bench around midnight when a sleek black car pulled up on the road next to him and idled. In the light from a nearby streetlamp, Bruce could see the SHIELD logo on the door.

He sighed and stood, questioning where he should go before opening the passenger's door and getting into the car.

Natasha was driving. She met Bruce's eyes as he slid into his seat. "Bruce."

"Natasha." Bruce wondered if there was a way he could get her to turn the heat up.

Apparently reading his mind, she did just that. Then she said, "Merry Christmas."

Bruce looked at the clock on the dashboard. So it was. He returned the sentiment, then added, "Not exactly what I had in mind for today."

"You and me both," Natasha muttered, turning onto a freeway on ramp.

They drove in silence for a few minutes before Bruce got up the courage to ask the first of two pressing questions. "Uh, how bad is it?"

"The damage to New York?" Natasha clarified.

"Yeah."

"Minimal," she said dismissively. "Most of the damage was contained to your laboratory and the street below where you...landed. Seems like you headed straight out of town." Then, anticipating his next question, "You're not in trouble, Bruce. SHIELD's got the situation under control."

That was a small relief. Still, the more pressing question remained. "What about Tony? Is he..."

"We haven't heard from Stark since the attack on his house."

Bruce felt his stomach sink. Sure, he hadn't really thought Tony was still alive—it was stupidly optimistic to think so—but he'd hoped.

"But," Natasha added, "There's been suspicious activity in Tennessee and Florida. A group of Air Force One passengers claim to have been saved by 'Iron Man' in Miami after being thrown from the plane by a terrorist."

Hope flared again in Bruce's chest. "You think he's alive?"

"I don't know," Natasha admitted. "SHIELD's trying to keep this whole thing under wraps, it's hard to get any good information right now. We're doing what we can to avoid panic and figure out what's going on. It seems like a lot of the information we've gotten regarding the Mandarin was inaccurate."

"I thought this stuff was 'classified,'" Bruce observed with a wry smile.

Natasha shrugged. "A lot's classified when you're surrounded by rookies and civilian lab geeks, Banner."

After that, conversation died down between them, and it wasn't long before Bruce fell asleep, exhausted from his crappy vacation.

He was awakened some time later by the sound of Natasha talking on her phone.

"You're kidding me." A pause. "He didn't." Another pause. "Yes, sir. Of course." She ended the call, then glanced over at Bruce. "Sorry for waking you."

"It's fine. What's up?" Because Natasha looked irritated, but also almost...pleased. Not quite, but almost.

Natasha chewed on her lip a minute, then stated bluntly, "Stark's alive. He foiled some massive plot apparently. His girlfriend is on fire or something, I didn't quite catch that part, but she's fine. The Mandarin's a fake. Fury needs me back at the office to start working this shit, so I'm going to drop you off at the Tower as soon as we're back in the city. You'll be debriefed on your situation later, once things have cooled down a bit."

"Uh, sure," Bruce answered, overwhelmed by the amount of information that had just been dumped on him. "Tony's alive?"

"Yeah."

That was good news. Great news. Amazing news. But all Bruce could say was, "...Do you think he'll mind what I did to his tower?"

Natasha just laughed, and after a moment, Bruce managed a small smile.

Bruce didn't hear from Tony immediately, though. Which was understandable. He was busy being not-dead, no doubt, and taking care of all the sorts of stuff that one has to take care of when their house gets blown apart and their girlfriend turns into a roman candle. So Bruce didn't mind when he didn't even get a phone call or an e-mail for another couple of months.

Nope, he didn't mind at all.

Okay, he did mind. A lot. But he was so surprised when he finally did hear from Tony that he forgot about it. For the most part.

Because Tony didn't call or text or e-mail. He just showed up, bounding into Bruce's lab and demanding a hug (which he'd never done before). The hug was the first surprise. The second surprise was that Tony could no longer serve as a stand-in for a night light.

"It's gone?" Bruce asked, somewhat (in his own opinion) stupidly, noting the lack of blue glow.

"Yup!" Tony answered cheerily, seemingly back to his old self, that manic, frantic edge filed away by his recent experience. He dragged Bruce over to a chair and tugged a nearby couch over, rushing in his haste to start spilling his guts—something else that never would have happened before. Bruce sat down, somewhat dazed, and Tony went on, "And you're not going to believe what else happened."

Bruce thought that he probably would.

Which was why, as Tony launched into his story, he felt absolutely no guilt at all about falling asleep.

After all, Tony had saved the world and had a grand adventure for his Christmas.

Bruce had just gotten a crappy vacation.

Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed.

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