Only six days had passed but Tony felt as though he'd lived through a thousand lifetimes in those short number of hours. He hadn't slept at all, and if he had, he couldn't remember. Fear kept his eyes wide open even when they begged to close for just a few minutes, and his heart racing in competition with his mind made it almost impossible for him to switch off.

He lay beneath the covers of his bed with a t-shirt he'd let Sasha borrow one time, the scent of her perfume still clinging to the fabric the same way his hands did, though as the days turned to nights, it slowly began to fade.

Tony was heartbroken. He couldn't eat or drink unless somebody forced him to and the guilt had surpassed even the level that Peter felt. The young boy had been round at the Stark Tower every day since he broke the news to Tony, helping in any way he could to bring Sasha home safely. He thought he felt guilt, though when he looked into the eyes of Tony, he realised that whatever he felt didn't come close.

There was a vacancy in Tony's mind and in his face. He was there in physical form but spiritually, his mind was somewhere else. Peter began to worry about him, feeling an immense pressure that now not only did he have to save Sasha, he had to save Tony, too.

As Tony worked tirelessly to try and find something, anything to help lead them in the direction of finding Sasha, a haunting from his own past began to creep up on him. He wondered if she was warm enough and in shelter, if she'd been chained up or left to roam free behind bars. He cursed himself when he thought about whether she was hurt or not, whether she was lying in pain on a cold, hard ground with dried tears on her cheeks because she had none left to cry.

He'd seen Sasha broken and bruised in a hospital bed and had decided instantly he never wanted to see her hurt again, promising to her and to himself that he would protect her from the world and everything in it. Though Tony soon realised that he shouldn't have made a promise he couldn't keep, now knowing that this promise had been broken by his own hand.

"Hey," Natasha knocked on the glass door of the room Tony was in, pushing it open with a gentle smile and a paper bag in her hand, "Can I come in?"

"Sure." Tony said, staring at the hologram of Sasha's apartment that surrounded him, analysing every small detail in hopes of finding a lead.

"Brought you some food, you need to eat."

Nat threw herself down by a table in the corner, pulling out a chicken sandwich and fries from the bag and dusting her hands on her thighs.

"Not hungry."

Natasha just scoffed, "I didn't ask if you were hungry. I said you need to eat."

Tony said nothing for a moment, still immersed deeply in his surroundings. He stared at the hologram for a little while longer before swiping the whole thing to the side and walking over to the table, sitting down beside his friend and tossing a French fry into his mouth.

"You've not been sleeping, have you?"

"Didn't sleep anyway. Not when she wasn't with me."

Nat had seen Tony take a hit before, in fact, she'd seen him take multiple. Each time he'd been knocked down, she'd watched him get back up somehow stronger than he was before, rising above everything and ending it all with a smile on his face.

That time, however, things were different. There was no hope in his eyes anymore, no life. Tony was being worn down more by the minute, the soul-destroying level of pain crushing his lungs slowly but surely, his heart wrapped in barbed wire with a tension tightening each day.

"What if she's dead?"

"You can't afford to think like that, Tony."

Natasha tried her best to keep her friend's spirits up, though he just shook his head, picking at the food in front of him with his eyes staring blankly at the wall.

"If I don't have her, I have nothing. Do you understand that?"

Nat tilted her head, "Then you better bring her home, hadn't you."

She knew Tony wasn't being so pessimistic and patronising on purpose, even if most of the time he usually was. He was bleeding out from his heart which was perhaps the worst way to die, slowly and painfully. Natasha watched her friend dissipate more every day, losing hope and himself, all at once.

It was a sad thing to see as a friend, to watch someone that she looked up to weathering away, heading towards giving up completely. Natasha never thought she'd see the day that Tony Stark was defeated, but she feared it was on the horizon.

The glass door was flung open by Fury, hitting the wall behind it with a loud thud that made Tony and Nat jump, both of them turning to look in his direction.

"Hill found security camera footage of a car registered to one of the five convicts parked outside a warehouse in Harlem, west side. You want the address or shall I take a look?"

Before Natasha even had chance to open her mouth, Tony was halfway across the room after tapping his chest, red and gold covering him as he made his way down the hallway towards the landing pad by the balcony.

"Meet me there, send the coordinates."

Neither Nat or Fury had ever seen Tony move so fast. The greyness of his dull skin and tired brown eyes changed faster than the New York weather, as if he'd been rejuvenated by a small piece of news, of hope.

Within seconds, Tony was gone, leaving Nat and Fury stood bewildered as they watched him fly across the sky in the direction of Harlem.

"It'll just about kill him if this is bad news, you know that right?" Natasha said as the pair headed downstairs to the garage.

Fury sighed loudly, unlocking the doors to one of the cars, "I know."

Tony received the location from Fury just as he arrived in Harlem, heading over to the west side. He landed on the roof of a warehouse across the street, scanning the building opposite him.

He wasn't sure if his heart was beating too quickly or not at all as he stood on that roof, panting desperately though feeling like his bones were fixed in place, unable to move.

The area was desolate and rundown, rusting factory doors and broken windows made Tony feel sick when he thought about Sasha being trapped inside a place like that, knowing all too well what being held hostage was like.

"FRIDAY, infrared on the place across the street."

"A weak source is coming from inside, Boss, unable to say whether it's from humans or not."

Tony drew in a deep breath before flying across the street to the roof of the other building, careful to land as quietly as possible before commanding FRIDAY to scan the building again for intel.

"The place is looking empty. You're good to head inside."

If his heart was still beating, it sank to the bottom of his chest at the update from FRIDAY. Tony's pessimism had been scathed by a surge of hope provided by the potential lead, though had been created and shattered within just a handful of minutes.

Nevertheless, Tony blasted the bolt from the door around the back of the building and headed inside, the door hitting the ground with a loud thud that blew dust and shrapnel across the space, echoing piercingly.

There was a circle of computers in the middle of the room, though the monitors had all been smashed and towers destroyed, a pile of what looked like ash from a fire beside a sever rack.

Tony continued to look around with assistance from FRIDAY, scanning through the mess for anything he might've missed. He was soon joined by Fury and Natasha who arrived just a few minutes later, entering the building with guns raised and eyes sharp.

"Anything?" Fury asked, taking a look around himself while Natasha searched the back rooms.

"Not a damn thing. Looks like they were here, though, clearly got what they wanted from the hard drive. Taken what they needed and trashed the rest."

If Tony had had the chance, he wouldn't have hesitated to just hand over the hard drive if it meant keeping Sasha out of the whole thing. He wouldn't have deliberated for even a second, knowing that keeping Sasha's life as safe and pure as possible was far more important than any technology intel could ever be to him.

"Boss, I'm picking up traces of blood to the right, two o'clock."

Tony's head snapped in the direction FRIDAY recalled, immediately lighting up the room with a glow from the palm of his hand, narrowing his eyes as he looked at the ground.

A huge, deep red stain marked the concrete floor, smeared for a length of about twelve feet with spots reaching a small radius around it.

Tony swallowed harshly as he followed the trail of blood, almost choking on his own breath when he saw the snapped pair of handcuffs still attached to an old radiator.

Stepping out of the suit, he bent down beneath the light and let his fingers lift up the handcuffs. He was shaking as the metal touched his skin, noticing that the latch on one cuff was broken.

He could almost feel Sasha as he touched them, his eyes narrowing as he tried to stop tears flooding his eyes and a racing in his chest, a lump in his throat. Tony knew Sasha had been here, and the dried blood on the floor only made him shiver sickeningly, his lip quivering and soul crumbling at the thought of somebody laying a hand on her.

"What is it, Stark?"

Tony choked out a gasp when he turned his head to the left, noticing a small glimmer beneath the harshness of the light from the suit. He wearily reached out and picked up the bracelet from the ground, wishing to not find what he was looking for.

The bracelet was covered in blood, though as Tony turned over the silver bar in the middle of the chain, his guard fell once he read the engraving he'd prayed to not see.

'Yours forever, T'

Tony had gifted Sasha the bracelet for Christmas, remembering how the small engraving he almost chose to not add had reduced his girlfriend to tears. He learned then that as much as she tried to be cold and calculating, deep down, Sasha was a sentimental, old romantic. And he loved her for it, every day.

He cried silently as he held the bracelet delicately between his fingertips, his body shaking as his tears fell against the bloodstained jewellery and floor beneath his feet, feeling so deathly numb that a hand on his shoulder didn't even register.

"Tony, Tony! Listen to me!"

Fury shook Tony by the shoulders before pulling the man to his feet, turning his head with a grip on his face between his thumb and forefinger, staring down at him.

Tony's eyes were red and filled with tears, helpless as Natasha walked over to the two of them, her eyes flickering down to the bracelet in Tony's frail hand and broken man stood before her.

"Hill's tracked the car to a place not far from here, we have to move quickly, you understand me?"

Tony just wiped his eyes, coughing as he nodded, gripping the bracelet tightly in the palm of his hand.

"Are you up to this, Stark? Cause if you're not, I'll send you home. Tell me, are you up to this?"

Fury knew there was no way in Hell Tony was turning his back on this mission, but he wasn't sure that the man stood in front of him had the strength his mind thought he had in that moment, needing to conjure it up from somewhere.

"Always," Tony shook his sadness away before nodding, stepping back into his suit and disappearing behind the mask, a bright blue glow coming from behind the eyes that instilled a reassurance in Fury and Nat, "For her, always."