Storm ≛ Tony Stark ≛

81.

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Hey, Susan... Sue. If you find this recording, don't post it on social media. It's gonna be a real tear-jerker. I don't know if you're ever going to see these. I don't even know if you're... if you're still... Oh god, I hope so. Today is day twenty-one, uh twenty-two.

You know, if it wasn't for the existential terror of staring into a void of space, I'd say I'm feeling better today. The infection's run its course, thanks to the blue meanie back there. You'd love her. Very practical. Only a tiny bit sadistic.

Some fuel cells were cracked during battle, but we figured out a way to reverse the ion charge to buy ourselves about forty-eight hours of time. But it's now dead in the water. We're one-thousand light years from the nearest 7-11. Oxygen will run out tomorrow. And that'll be it. And Sue, I... I know I said no more surprises, but I was really hoping to pull off one last one. But it looks like... well, you know what it looks like.

Don't feel bad about this. I mean, if you grovel for a couple of weeks, and then move on with enormous guilt. You'll have Morgan. Even though she's a reminder of the amazing, cunning, handsome man you once knew, she'll be someone for you to think about.

I should probably lie down. Please, know that... when I drift off, I will think about you. Because it's always you. It's always been you.'

---

The Avengers Headquarters was a safe house. If a safe house was considered somewhere that isolated its inhabitants from a world that was in disarray, then it was the pinnacle of a safe house. But no one felt safe in the compound. Far from it. Every warm aspect that used to serve as a comfort, was cold and left a bad taste in the mouth. In fact, the bad taste was constantly present. Like an ulcer that didn't go away.

Susan Storm's appearance was a rarity to the team. They were too afraid to let her go back to the house in Maine. If there was still a functioning mental-health sector within the American government, she would be placed under suicide watch. But with the world in its current state, the team had to monitor her themselves.

It wasn't like the woman even wanted to go back to the house. There would be no one there, anyway. No one to talk to, care for or be annoyed by. At least at the headquarters, Susan could be monitored even if it was casually. No one had the strength nor the desire to physically check on the Storm who stayed in her allocated room for days on end. FRIDAY kept some tabs, notifying the team that Sue moved to the kitchen and back again. But that was the extent of it.

None of the team could even begin to imagine how she must be feeling. After losing Tony, she then lost the last two people on the Earth that were her family. It's unknown whether her father, who was still in a maximum-security prison in England, had been blipped, but they knew she ceased to consider him family. Everyone knew that Johnny was her family, and with him gone, Sue was on the brink of collapse. And then there was Morgan, who initiated the fall.

Losing a child was one of the world's worst horrors. Natasha was the one who felt that the most. The woman had never been lucky enough to have the choice of bearing a child. And seeing someone lose there's was unthinkable. The Romanoff had tried to sit with Sue a few times, but when she realised her words were bouncing off the lump under the blankets, she stopped. She also wasn't in the spirits to console someone else, but she tried. Sue wasn't in the right mind to appreciate Natasha's efforts, but her words were heard.

Steve had tried as well, but in different ways. He lost not only Johnny, but Bucky as well. However, two good friends were nothing compared to what Sue lost. He left meals on her nightstand and would tell her what he made to entice her to eat. It didn't work for the first week, but the Storm's starvation soon made her cave. He was relieved to collect the plate one day and find three-quarters of a meal left, and it only got better from there. Soon it was a half, and then a quarter.