Tony walked with Harley, a boy in Tennessee who lived in the first house Tony saw when he arrived. They were in the town of Rose Hills in the early evening with Tony dressed in Harley's estranged father's clothes. Harley tried to keep up with the Stark's quick pace and they arrived at the crime scene of Chad Davis.

While Pepper and Sue packed his bags to leave Malibu, Tony spent the last hours in his house searching through The Mandarin attacks. After some digging, he came to an explosion that happened in the small town of Rose Hills in Tennessee. It hadn't been claimed by The Mandarin as his doing, but the heat signature the supposed bomb let off was like the explosions by the terrorist.

'What about The Avengers, can you talk about them?' Harley pried. He was trying to find out about all of Iron Man's adventures, but Tony was reluctant to talk about anything that could give him another panic attack.

'I don't know, later,' Tony rolled his eyes and put his hands out as the boy walked close to his side. 'Hey kid, give me a little space.'

'What about The Invisible Woman?' Harley continued, his eyes wide and full of interest in the superhero. 'She's really hot. Are you guys in love?'

'How old are you again?'

'Old enough. Does she really turn invisible?'

'You're killing me here, slick. Just cool it.'

The brick wall that remained from the explosion pictured shadows of those who were incinerated. Candles and flowers were left from loved ones and friends, creating a orange glow in the otherwise dark alleyway. Pictures of those who died leaned against the candles, making their presence known and to give their remaining shadows a face. A crater domed in the pavement from where Chad Davis, the man who blew himself up, stood at the time of the detonation.

'What's the official story here?' Tony asked Harley. 'What happened?'

'I guess this guy named Chad Davis, used to live roundabouts, won a bunch of medals in the army. One day, folks said he went crazy and made, you know, a bomb. Then he blew himself up right here,' Harley explained.

The two sat down in the snow. Tony counted the shadows and made a comment that there were only five, yet six people were said to have been killed. Harley shrugged and said that he heard that the five went to heaven, and Chad Davies went to hell. Their shadows were a representation of their afterlife. Tony didn't buy it and Harley sneakily slipped in,

'You know what this crater reminds me of? That giant wormhole, in um... in New York. Does it remind you?'

'That's manipulative. I don't want to talk about it,' Tony turned away.

'Are they coming back? The aliens?'

'Maybe. Can you stop? Remember when I told you, that I have an anxiety issue?'

'Does this subject make you... make you edgy?'

Tony's breathing increased and he snapped at Harley, the boy rising to his feet as Tony did the same. His heart raced and the flashes of New York appeared behind his eyes. The feeling of falling out of the portal back down to the city made him wobble on his feet. The thought of never seeing Sue again washed over him like it did when the missile exploded the Chitauri mothership.

'What did I say?!' Harley called after Tony who ran back towards the main road. He dropped to his knees in a pile of snow and took it into his hands, pressing the ice to his face. It melted at the heat from his skin, and he felt his heartbeat begin to slow.

'What the hell was that?' Harley said once he stood in front of him. Tony took the lump of snow from his face and threw it up at the boy. It collided with his cheek, and he shrunk away, his mop of curls now wet around his face.

'Your fault,' Tony gasped, his breath slowly getting back to him. 'You spazzed me out.'

'Sorry...' Harley said sheepishly as he pushed his curls away from his eyes. 'Does she usually help you when that happens? The Invisible Woman?'

'You do know she has a real name, right?'

'Susan!' Harley suddenly remembered. 'Susan Storm, right? Is she your mental support or whatever?'

'She's more than that. She's...'

Tony's chest pinged. He tried not to think about Sue. The flowers he sent was the only contact he had with her. He wasn't sure if the message he left to the Stark Server was received, but he knew Sue was intelligent enough to find a way. Tony missed her. He missed her doe-like eyes that stared up at him and her plump, pink lips that were in a permanent pout. He felt like he didn't kiss her enough and appreciate how gorgeous she was. Sue was someone who kept him sane throughout his complicated life. She was his soul, and he was missing it dearly.

'Okay, back to business,' Tony pulled himself out of his sorrows. 'Where were we? The guy who died... relatives? Mum? Mrs Davis, where is she?'

---

Sue was sat in her living room. Johnny and Pepper were yet to return from dropping Maya Hansen off at her house. The most recent Mandarin broadcast had played on the TV and Sue was yet to rid her mind of the mangled brain of Thomas Richards. The Mandarin had shot Richards, an accountant for the Roxxon Oil Corporation, on live television. The Mandarin asked the president of the United States to call his phone if he wanted Thomas Richards to live. Needless to say, The Mandarin was going to kill him anyway.

She turned the TV to another channel, hoping to watch something more light-hearted. But her attention to the screen was pulled away from the sound of the intercom in the kitchen beeping. The intercom that led down to the office that sat at the bottom of Sue's house was manned by Felicity, her assistant. Whenever someone was there to see Sue or if there were any messages, the intercom would beep, and Felicity's voice would be heard. But Sue waited, and Felicity never spoke.

'Felicity?' Sue pressed her finger against the button on the intercom and said into the microphone. There was no answer and Sue bit her lip. Her assistant was never tardy and if she made a mistake, she would own up to it and make it right. If she had pressed the button by accident, Felicity would have said so.

Another ding rang out through the house and Sue whipped her gaze to the elevator on her right. Felicity was the only one who could authorise the use of the elevator, besides Sue, of course. The silver doors of the elevator retreated into the sides of the frame and all Sue needed to see was the light orange, slicked back hair, of Aldrich Killian.

'Oh, Susan, let's not play this game.'

Aldrich Killian looked around the empty house with a sick smile on his face. The man stepped out of the elevator and looked at the TV that played to itself in the living room. The cushions on the sofa were misplaced and Aldrich didn't need to play hide and seek to find who sat once sat there. He heard Sue's voice through the intercom when he dealt with the assistant downstairs, so it was a simple case of finding an invisible woman. But Aldrich was confident it wouldn't be difficult.

Sue was stood in the living room near the large windows. The floor to ceiling glass panels showed the Malibu moonlight that beamed high in the night sky. A stand-alone lamp that sat next to the sofa was the only source of artificial light, besides the light that was above the stove in the kitchen.

'I trust you saw The Mandarin's latest broadcast,' Aldrich said to what appeared to be an empty room. But Sue hid in plain sight, frozen from the fear of being heard. She didn't trust her light-footing on this occasion. Her palms were slick from sweat, and her breaths turned into gasps, despite her best efforts to be as quiet as possible. She felt pathetic for fearing the man, but the act of turning up at her house and without Tony to call on, she was hilariously frightened.

'I thought it was rather riveting,' Aldrich continued as he walked around the house. 'I have to apologise for the incident at Stark's house. I didn't anticipate for you and Pepper to be there, but I guess that was idiotic of me. I know you're technically Tony's shadow.'

Sue wished she was surprised that Aldrich was the one who destroyed Tony's house. She knew it meant that he was working with The Mandarin, and she assumed that he was at her house to deal with her. What she was most worried about, was the fact that this man was in control of Reed's company that she willingly signed over to him. He tainted the Richards name and she cursed herself for not listening to Johnny in the first place.

At the thought of Johnny, Sue watched as Aldrich walked over to the hallway table where a picture of her and her brother sat. She eyed the man who picked up the frame and looked to the only escape route. The elevator would make its usual ding and would take at least three seconds for its doors to open and to close. It would be naive to think that Aldrich's attention wouldn't be alerted by these, and there was always the chance that her footsteps would be heard. The TV was on mute and the house was silent, it was likely the man would hear her behind him.

'I should thank you, really,' Aldrich smirked and looked to exactly where Sue was stood. At first, she thought he could see her. But his eyes travelled to the left, looking out the window that showed the rooftops of the neighbourhood.

'That company will help me solve a little hiccup that I can't for the life of me fix. Whatever Dr. Reed Richards did to make his mind so brilliant, I will never know. You know I met him at the conference in Switzerland? You were there. That green dress was really something. But Reed, just like the others, didn't see anything in my work. I don't blame him. It was pitiful at the time. And I never speak ill of the dead.'