*C69 - Tony Stark has returned.

'Inner dialogue/thoughts'

"Normal dialogue"

[System]

[Diary entries]

(Word Count: 2,663)

~ The following morning with Luke, in the Peach Blossom Café ~

The Peach Blossom Café opened its doors to a quiet morning, the remnants of yesterday's battle casting a sombre shadow over Los Angeles. Outside, the streets still bore scars from the confrontation, though the bodies had been cleared. Construction work was already underway to repair the damages from the battle.

As the world questioned and had conversations on the battle, both Luke and Crystal sat by the counter in comfortable silence in the cafe. With Crystal in a daze, Luke decided to stay close, offering silent support. "Another cup?" Luke asked, turning toward Crystal sitting beside him, her hands wrapped around a mug that had already gone cold.

"No, I'm okay." She murmured, her tone sounding disinterested. Moreover, as she spoke, her eyes remained unfocused while her fingers danced around the mug, signalling that she was in deep thought over something.

Luke gave a small nod, as the silence enveloped them once again. The café had been opened for almost an hour, yet aside from the employees, there were no other occupants within the café. Luke had wanted to close the café for the day to allow his staff to process their emotions from the prior day, however, the employees had collectively agreed to not take the day off in a bid to return to normalcy.

'These guys. . .' Luke thought to himself.

Suddenly, Luke's phone began ringing. Glancing at the screen, he saw that it was Natasha who was calling him. Answering the call, he greeted in a low and steady voice to not disturb Crystal's quiet contemplation, "Hey, Nat. What's up?"

"Luke," Came Natasha's voice, her tone tinged with urgency, "I won't be able to cover my shifts for the next few days. I've been called in."

"Oh, sure. I'll let the guys know you won't be around." Luke replied. Natasha did not need to elaborate any further as Luke knew about the sensitive nature of her job. 'She's probably been called for a physical debriefing of the battle.'

"I will, thanks. Keep an eye on things, okay? Especially on Crystal. She's the most affected from what I could determine." Natasha spoke, her voice started in gratitude before shifting into worry.

"Will do. Stay safe out there." He said before ending the call.

A few moments later, a burst of light swept through the café as the door swung open while the jingles of the doorbell echoed within the café. The source of the disturbance, Pepper, came walking in with a presence that contradicted the sombre mood within the café and the streets of Los Angeles.

"Good morning!" Pepper chimed as she approached the counter. However, as she walked across the café, she noticed that even the atmosphere within the café resembled the one outside, 'This won't do. Not when I finally get a piece of good news recently.'

"Good morning yourself, Pepper." Luke acknowledged with a small, surprised smile. "What can I get for you today?" He asked as he moved behind the counter. Her high spirits were infectious, and despite the gravity of recent events, he found himself feeling a shade lighter.

"Just the usual, Luke. Could I also get a set of Pain au Chocolat, please?" She requested, her eyes sparkling with an unspoken excitement.

"Coming right up." Luke said and began working on her order. As he worked, his curiosity piqued. It was unlike Pepper to be so buoyant, especially after everything that had happened regarding Tony's kidnapping and the battle yesterday. "You seem. . . particularly bright this morning. Any special reason?"

"Oh, you know." She started, leaning over the counter with a hint of mischief in her eyes, "It's just one of those mornings where you wake up on the right side of the bed, that's all."

At her response, Luke just gave her a deadpan stare. "Alright you listen here. Take a look around." Luke started, "Whatever optimism and enthusiasm that is currently plaguing you is in a critically low supply right now. So, if you don't want me to add mint into your beverage, you'd better start spilling the tea." Luke ended, his tone heavy with mock threat.

Deciding to play along, Pepper narrowed her brows as she asserted, "You wouldn't dare."

Reaching underneath the counter, Luke took out a mint candy and held it in front of her eyes threateningly, "There are no rules against chocolate mint, Pepper. Try me."

Both of them engage in a stare-off, which was abruptly ended when April cut into their conversation. "Pepper, please do not feed his immaturity. But he's right, spill it. You wouldn't stop telling me that you have good news to tell me but that you wanted to do it in person."

Seeing as April had appeared, Pepper knew that the time for games was over. Placing a hand over her heart, the corners of Pepper's mouth lifted further as she spoke in a relieved tone, "I got a call last night, it was one of Tony's friends from the military. A pretty high ranking one too." Pepper stated as she let the silence build the tension for her big reveal.

"They've found him. He's alive, and they're bringing him back!" Pepper exclaimed excitedly.

"Truly?" Luke asked rhetorically, "Well, in that case, breakfast is on the house today!"

April clapped her hands together, a broad smile breaking across her face for her friend as she went for a hug, "That's amazing news, Pep! Finally, some good news in these times!"

"Yeah, it's been a tough few months, and after what happened yesterday. . . But finally, things are starting to look like they are going to go back to normal." Pepper relievedly sighed.

While a semblance of normalcy and a round of congratulations spread amongst the café employees, April noticed that Crystal sat quietly, not paying attention to their conversations and looked to be deep in thought.

"Crystal?" She called softly, but Crystal seemed lost in her own world. The rest of the staff began to worry for her as they looked towards Luke to cheer her up.

Sensing the gazes of his friends, Luke inwardly complained as he nudged his head toward April, 'Why does it have to be me? April's closer to Crystal.'

However, the only reply he got was April waving her hand in front of Crystal's face, which did not stir any reaction from her. Sighing, Luke decided to address whatever the issue Crystal was currently facing.

"Hey, Crystal." He spoke, gently placing his hands on her shoulder.

This had gotten Crystal to snap out of her daze. Looking at her surrounding, she saw that her friends were looking at her with worry etched on their faces. "What's going on?" She asked in confusion, "Oh, hey Pepper. When did you arrive?"

Seeing that Crystal did not even register that Pepper had been with them for the past few moments, Luke knew that something was troubling her. "She's been here for a while now."

"Crystal. . ." At this point, April intervened and spoke as her eyes softened.

 "I'm okay guys, really." Crystal started, "It's just. . ."

"It's just?" As she hadn't spoken for a moment, Luke asked inquisitively.

Taking a moment to deliberate within herself, Crystal finally decided to speak about what was bothering her. "It's just that, have you guys read the news? Seen the pictures?"

"Yeah." Luke said in a low tone, "They're saying that whatever happened yesterday was like the doomsday from the bible or something with how the creatures just suddenly appeared and the destruction they've caused."

Crystal shook her head, "No. I'm not talking about that." Taking out her phone, Crystal began looking through her phone before showing the rest a picture, "I'm talking about this. Last night, I was looking through the news on the websites when I came across an interesting topic from the battle."

On her phone, a picture of Luke, who was in his armour, was shown. Switching through the pictures in her gallery showed different angles of the armoured person in almost every single fight in the battle zone.

"Not everyone evacuated the place apparently, and some of them had managed to capture images and video recordings of this person. They're saying that they personally saw how easily he dispatched the creatures, which took the Police officers and Military soldiers a long time to kill." Crystal said, her tone a mix of awe and curiosity.

"But towards the end, something happened." For the final picture, Crystal showed the moment where the armoured man was encased in a sphere of water, rampaging through the creatures with practised ease.

"He just went, berserk. Not caring for whatever was in his path. But the weirdest part of it all was how he was able to control water while in that state. WATER!" She exclaimed. "That's a fundamental element of nature, and he's able to control it!"

Pepper suddenly spoke up to add her own thoughts on the matter, "Wait, I came across something about that last night too. If I remember it correctly, when he stopped his berserker state or whatever it was that you mentioned, a giant creature had appeared out of nowhere."

Crystal searched online and found the moment that Pepper was speaking of, "That's right! Look at this." She said as she showed a blurry and unstable recording of the fight between Luke and the giant Messenger.

As the rest of the staff watched on in awe, Luke, the man in the video himself, was deep in thought for a separate reason. 'Well, this looks mighty suspicious. Only images of me in the armour are circulating from the looks of it. Nothing else about Natasha or the rest of the STRIKE unit. And all these images look like they were taken from a very convenient angle.

This has to be the work of Fury. Looks like he had some eyes all around the battle. The question now is why? Is he trying to build a positive image of me? No. . . If that was the case, then he would not have released the images of me going berserk and destroying everything in my path.' Luke thought amusedly, feeling a deeper conspiracy that ran behind the scenes.

A look of realization dawned on Luke's face, 'I see. So that's his game. I have to give him some props, this is a pretty good move on his part.'

Thankfully, none of the staff noticed the look on Luke's face as they were all impressed by the skills of the armoured person in the recording. "Look how easily he was able to manipulate the water. And that ending move with that giant swirling sphere? That could be like a finishing move and it's probably a finishing move by what the person shouted. The Chou Oodama Rasengan! So cool!" Crystal spoke in amazement.

"The only time I've ever come close to reading about real superheroes was with Captain America, and he's been dead for a long time now. But yesterday, when the whole of Los Angeles was under attack, a new superhero emerged! He even has a cool nickname going around for him!"

Hearing that, Luke's interest was piqued, "Nickname? What do they call him?"

"They're calling him, Red Hood. How cool is that! It even matches the colour scheme of his armour!" Crystal exclaimed.

However, even though Crystal was in an excited state, it still did not escape April's keen senses. "That's nice and all Crys, but then why were you out of it all this time? If you were so excited about this, I would have thought you would be going around as excited as you are now, but you weren't. So, tell us, even knowing all this, what's got you thinking?"

Crystal smiled at April's intuition. "Well, it just got me thinking. The last time a hero popped up, the world was at war. And now, a new hero popped up, and it looked like there was a small-scale invasion that happened here in Los Angeles. It made me wonder about the future, that's all." Crystal revealed.

"Like where did these creatures come from? Are there more of them? Who was the person in the armour? What would this battle change in the world? Are there other bad guys hidden in the world? Will more superheroes appear?!" She started in a curious tone before exclaiming at the end.

Seeing that Crystal was finally back to being herself, Luke audibly sighed in relief, "I was worried for a moment there, but I guess it was just a false alarm."

"Worried? For what?" Crystal asked, not getting what Luke was hinting at.

"Nothing, oh by the way, Pepper just revealed to us that Tony Stark's been found and he's on the way back, safe and sound." Luke spoke swiftly, aiming to change the topic before he accidentally caused Crytal to go into another depressed state.

Turning towards Pepper, Crystal's face lit up with joy, "REALLY?! IS THAT TRUE?!" She said, almost screaming in close proximity to Pepper.

"Yeah, they found him last night and he's doing fine. I was told personally by a close friend of ours from the Military." Pepper reiterated, chuckling at how easily Crystal's mood could change in a moment's notice.

"Congratulations!" Crystal exclaimed as she too gave a hug to Pepper. With Crystal as the catalyst, the atmosphere within the café seemed to have returned to normalcy as time passed by.

~ A few minutes later ~

Looking at the time, Pepper decided that she should take her leave. "I have to go. Tony's return needs a lot of preparation within the company and for his personal affairs, so expect me to come around with more stress to relief in the upcoming days guys."

"You're welcome with us anytime, Pepper." Luke reassured. "By the way, since he's coming back after a long time being kidnapped, maybe you should put something together for Tony? A welcome back gift, perhaps?"

Pepper paused, her lips curving into a smile, "That's a wonderful idea, Luke. Thank you." She tapped a finger against her chin thoughtfully. "I'll have to think about what to get him. Something that says, 'welcome home' without making too much of a fuss."

"Maybe something personal?" Luke suggested. "He has been trapped in God knows where for almost 4 months now. Imagine the food he had to eat."

Pepper's eyes widened, "That's brilliant! I know just what to get him. Thanks again for everything, Luke." Pepper said as she made her way out the café after saying her goodbyes to Crystal and April. As he watched Pepper leave, Luke sat in silence, pondering to himself of the implications of Tony's escape.

'So, it truly begins now. The start of multiple battles to come, and the beginning of the Age of Heroes. Tony Stark has returned.'

- End of Chapter 69 -

Next time in C70 - Tony Stark.

"Hmm, your eyes are red. Few tears for your long-lost boss?" Tony commented as he stood before her.

With a smile, Pepper replied in an equal manner, "Tears of joy. I hate job hunting."

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[Author's Note]