Hi everyone! Here at last is a new chapter of Daylight: today's chapter takes place after the events of Avengers, and it's a fun, fluffy look at how Tony might have finally asked Pepper to move in with him. The next chapter concerns a vacation I've eluded to a few times in Love and the Man of Iron (because seriously, after the Battle of New York, Tony and Pepper definitely needed a vacation), so stay tuned for that coming soon!

Disclaimer: I own no part of the Marvel Universe. I'm just very devoted to fanart and fanfic. :)

Daylight 6

Pepper sighed heavily as she took off her shoes and stepped into what was left of the living room in Stark Tower. Tony was already lying on the couch with his feet up; his eyes closed and a drink in his hand, he looked as tired as she felt. After a day of interviews, phone calls and e-mails reassuring the SI board and the rest of the world that Tony wasn't dead, plus a press conference with the mayor of New York (to pledge that Stark Industries would donate whatever time and funds were needed to help rebuild the city), Pepper was exhausted.

"Hi," Tony called, opening his eyes.

"Hi," Pepper said, smiling when he moved his legs so she could collapse on the couch beside him.

"So, how was your day?" Tony asked, sitting up and offering her his drink.

"Mmm," Pepper sighed, taking a long sip of rum and coke, Tony's preferred drink when he was feeling especially tired or moderately stressed. (Major stress called for drinks without any soda or water mixed in.) "Long. And busy."

"Yeah, I saw you on TV a couple times," Tony said, draining the glass when she handed it back to him.

"And how was your day?" Pepper asked, smiling at the thought of Tony's new superhero friends. "I'm guessing the tesseract's gone now?"

"Yup, and so is the Justice League," Tony said.

"Justice League?" Pepper repeated blankly.

"According to the internet, that's what the Super Friends are called these days," Tony said, turning and laying his head in her lap with a contented sigh. "Thor took his brother and the cube home to the other side of space. Captain Rogers, and Agents Romanoff and Barton, rode off into the sunset, and Banner came back here and worked with me for a while in R&D before he caught his flight back to India. Then I did a press conference in DC real quick to confirm that no, as far as I know, the world is not about to end, the Chitauri are gone, and everyone needs to relax so I can go home and fall asleep in my girlfriend's lap."

"Guess I'd be more worried if you weren't still tired after fighting aliens yesterday," Pepper said, running a hand through his hair. "Wow. I wonder how long we're going to have to say things like that before it stops sounding weird."

"It's probably going to take a while," Tony said, closing his eyes and stretching in her lap like a cat.

"You know, all day long, I've been hearing people on the news and online saying how 'the world will never be the same again,'" Pepper said, wondering how he'd react to that.

"Hmm," Tony said, opening his eyes and gazing up at her. "And what do you think about that idea, Ms. Potts?"

Pepper smiled. Sometimes, it seemed that Tony had two reasons for asking her questions: he would do so in the first place because he wanted her opinion, but Pepper suspected that his secondary reason was more complicated.

Tony had never been with anyone as long as he'd been with her, although that wasn't saying much—to the best of Pepper's knowledge, prior to her, he'd never dated any woman for more than two months. Honestly, her longest relationship before this one had only lasted eight months (not counting a boy she'd "dated" in junior high for almost a full school year). So, though she hardly considered herself an expert on relationships, Pepper knew that trusting people wasn't something that came easily to Tony. And when he asked her a question, sometimes it wasn't just because he wanted an answer—sometimes, Pepper strongly suspected, he was looking for reassurance too, looking for some sign that he could rely on her to be honest with him—even when it came to little things—when life had often given him reason to suspect that if he trusted someone, he was going to get hurt.

"Well," Pepper said thoughtfully, "I guess it doesn't really work for me. I mean, now we know that aliens exist, but they existed long before we knew about them. The world hasn't really changed, it's just our understanding of the universe that has. Also, Thor is technically an alien, so I'm not completely sure why people are so surprised. I guess aliens with hammers are old news."

Tony smiled. "That makes sense. What's your schedule for tonight look like?"

"I'm free until tomorrow now," Pepper said, her smile fading when she thought about the memorial service they would both be attending the following day, to honor the people who'd died in the chitauri attack. Tony had his eyes closed, but his expression told her that he was thinking about the same thing. She knew that yesterday, he'd probably seemed like his usual self—today too, though he was obviously tired—but she also knew that his jokes and quips, especially when made at inappropriate moments, were his way of trying to stay sane, of trying to manage the fact that being Iron Man meant being responsible for people's lives.

Despite his best efforts, Tony hadn't been able to save everyone yesterday—even with five other people helping and SHIELD's support, there'd been casualties. And she knew how much he hated that, hated how oblivious he'd been, in all his years of making weapons, to the fact that people had died because of him. Now, when people sometimes died in spite of him, it still hurt.

"Excellent, because I'm free too," Tony said, opening his eyes and smiling up at her. "It's not date night, but how does dinner sound, Ms. Potts?"

"I could eat," Pepper said, leaning down and kissing him on the forehead. "What are we having?"

They decided to make grilled cheese, because that was easy and there was bread and some fancy cheese in the fridge. Tony wasn't much help, since he kept distracting Pepper by kissing her and stealing food, but he did cut the sandwiches in half, which for Tony Stark was quite a culinary achievement.

"Thanks for your sort-of help with dinner," Pepper said when they were finished. (He amazed her further when he helped load the dishwasher.)

"I'm already a renaissance man, but it couldn't hurt to up my cooking repertoire," Tony said with a shrug.

"Yes, you are a very well-rounded individual," Pepper said, rolling her eyes.

"Let's go to bed and discuss that "rounded" stuff some more," Tony said, and she laughed.

"I meant that as a compliment, but if you'd rather take it as an innuendo, that works too," she said, pulling him close and kissing him. She'd been doing this a lot since yesterday, when she'd seen the footage of him flying into the portal. It was such a relief now, kissing him after being so afraid that she'd never see him again.

Pepper took his hand when she finally stepped away from him, and he followed her eagerly as she pulled him toward their bedroom.

"In a hurry to ravish me?" he said, taking back his hand so he could wrap his arms around her from behind.

"Mmm, most definitely," Pepper said, pushing the door shut behind them and then pushing him against it to kiss him. Tony held her tight, and for a few moments they kissed, but then he caught her around the waist and picked her up. Pepper laughed as he carried her to their bed, grabbing his shoulders so that when he put her down, she pulled him along with her.

Tony made short work of their clothes as Pepper dug her heels into his back and sighed when he started kissing his way down her chest.

Pepper always forgot until she was in bed with Tony how inconvenient clothing could be. They spent a few pleasant moments just making out and pressing against each other, but then Pepper decided that Tony's pants were really in the way, so she reached down for his zipper. She spent several seconds fiddling with it (smiling at Tony's happy moans) before she realized it was stuck.

"Hang on," she said, pulling her mouth away from his and leaning her head away from his face so she could try and get a look at the problem.

"Um—can I help with anything?" Tony wondered, gasping when she moved her hand.

"Your zipper's stuck," Pepper announced.

"Oh, I'll get that," Tony said, rolling away from her and tugging at it. "Zippers are—they're technically machines. I'm good at machines."

Pepper snorted with laughter, then rolled on top of him as soon as he'd fixed the jammed zipper. Then they kissed again, and Pepper got a hand between them and slid it under his shirt. She started tracing the muscles of his stomach, then inched lower, which made him moan and grab her hips, which made her moan too. Then she sat up just enough to pull her shirt off, yanking a little when it got stuck on her head—she clearly hadn't undone enough buttons. She could hear Tony snickering as she disentangled herself from the shirt, and then she felt him unzipping her skirt. Then he stopped. Finally free of her shirt, she leaned down to kiss him again.

"Wait, time out," Tony said, fumbling with her zipper.

Pepper laughed helplessly. "Is my zipper stuck now?"

"Yeah…" Tony said, frowning in concentration. "Maybe I need more practice with zippers."

"Maybe we both do," Pepper said, both of them laughing as she finally managed to extricate herself from her skirt. (A lot of shimmying and kicking was required to free herself from the thing.) Finally though, they got all their clothes off, and Pepper managed to maneuver them under the sheets while Tony kissed her chest and ran his hands up and down her legs. She stretched out on her side and Tony followed suit when she pulled him in for a kiss, then he tugged her hips toward him, and she wrapped her arms around him as he slid inside her.

Pepper sighed and kissed him all over his face and neck as he thrust hard, over and over, making them both tremble. Tony groaned when she slid her hands between their bodies to touch his chest, to trace his muscles and the arc reactor before drifting down to his stomach. He rolled onto his back, and Pepper held on, rolling with him then grinning down at him, still tracing his abs. She liked to feel his muscles working as they did this, liked to feel him shudder as he pushed into her, then pulled out again, over and over, driving them both closer and closer until they both tumbled screaming over the edge into an orgasm that left Pepper seeing stars.

After several moments of pleasant oblivion, Pepper sighed and rolled off him. She was sweaty, and her hair was a mess, and as Tony slid an arm around her, she remembered that they had to meet with the contractors tomorrow. Now all she wanted to do was get a quick shower with Tony and go to sleep—

"Hey," Tony said suddenly. "Do you wanna….move in with me?"

Pepper stared at him blankly. "Do I what?"

"Move in," Tony said, still talking faster than usual, like he had to say this quickly or he risked not saying it at all. "With me. Live together. I mean, I like your place, but I thought we could maybe—if you wanted—just live at my place. Together—yeah, I said that already."

"You want me to move in with you?" Pepper said, grinning at him.

"Yes," he said, looking relieved. "I'm glad you got the gist of my nervous rambling just now."

"Why were you nervous?"

"I've never asked anyone to live with me before and I didn't know what you'd say," Tony said. "And, I know I can be…let's call it quirky. And we both like to have our own space sometimes, so I wasn't sure if you'd…want to. But I love you. And I want to—live together. If you're interested."

"I'm very interested," Pepper said, suddenly feeling frantic to kiss him. She all but pinned him to the mattress as she pressed her mouth to his—it never ceased to amaze her that the smartest man she knew could be so clueless about some things, so she decided to make it clear to Tony how she felt about his suggestion.

"So you think it's a good idea," he said, grinning when they finally came up for air.

"I think it's a great idea," Pepper said, smiling down at him. "I love you too, and I would love to live together."

"See, now I can't believe I waited so long to ask," Tony said, shaking his head.

"Well, you can't be a genius at everything," Pepper said cheerfully.

"I think I could—with practice," Tony said. "I mean, we're talking right now, communicating important feelings. That shows emotional intelligence."

"I think you're confusing the concept of a genius with a person who occasionally tells people how he feels," Pepper said. "But I do appreciate you making the effort to communicate better. I like knowing how you feel."

"Yeah?" Tony said, rubbing against her meaningfully. "How do I feel right now?"

"Okay," Pepper said, laughing as she rolled out of bed. "We both have a long day tomorrow, so I'm getting in the shower before you can tell me more about the feelings you're having below the waist."

"Good, okay, good talk," Tony said, following her to the shower. She turned and kissed him as she turned the water on, unable to stop grinning. She was going to move in with Tony. It was a big step, but after the events of the past two days—after almost losing him—it seemed like the best idea Tony had ever had. And maybe saying yes to him would turn out to be the best idea she'd ever had.