Short Skirt, Long Jacket (Karen Page/Pepper Potts/Kate Bishop)
“I’m so sor—oh my God, you’re Pepper Potts.”
The woman stops gathering scattered papers and stares at Pepper.
“That I am,” Pepper forces a chuckle, tries not to appear overexcited. She's heard a few iterations of the words written along her spine in the past few years. “And I’m very late for an interview, so if you’ll excuse me—"
“An inter—wait. Uh, this is probably going to sound like a line, but—"
“Soulmates?” Pepper tries to sound professional and breezy, as if this happens all the time.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” A balding man with glasses—Pepper recognizes him as Mitchell Ellison of the New York Bulletin. “This is incredible. We’re going to get the best interview—”
“Ellison,” the woman hisses. “I’m not going to use being soulmates as leverage for an interview!”
Ellison looks disappointed for a few seconds before brightening. “Well, when you two go public, I get the exclusive.” He looks positively gleeful as he sticks his hand out to Pepper. “Mitchell Ellison and Karen Page of The New York Bulletin. Ms. Potts, a pleasure.”
Karen rolls her eyes skyward and Pepper can see her mouth fuck at the ceiling.
“I’m sorry about that,” Karen says two hours later. “Ellison—"
“Was just doing his job,” Pepper cuts her off. “I’m not offended, Ms. Page, really.”
“Karen,” she corrects. “Please, call me Karen.”
“Karen, then.” Pepper checks her watch—Kate is probably still in the air, so they’ve got some time to get to know one another—“Karen, would you like to get something to eat with me?”
“Yeah, uh—" Karen looks nervous. “There’s no good time to ask this, but do you have…two soulmarks?”
Pepper can feel her smile get wider. “Karen, I think we’ll get along just fine.”
Pepper’s phone beeps about halfway through dinner with a text from Phil
Mission went, to quote “ever so mildly FUBAR” & Hawk is coming home w/several injuries and a concussion. Dr. Cho flying in to administer low dose of EX-P25; she’ll come by your place when she gets in
Pepper taps out Please tell her there is no such thing as “mildly FUBAR”. Thank you for the update.
“Well, if you wanted to meet our third tonight and don’t mind staying up past midnight, you’re welcome to visit our place,” Pepper tucks her phone away, Karen staring at her curiously before nodding.
“Pe-e-eee-ep,” the high-pitched whine comes from the door of their apartment—floor—their abode. And the tone means only one thing: Kate is not taking the pain pills prescribed to her.
Again.
“Oh my God,” Karen Page says when Kate shambles into the living room. “What happened to you? Are you okay?”
Pepper tries to hide her smile in her coffee cup at finally hearing the words scrawled along Kate’s hip.
Kate, for her part, has the audacity to look mortally offended.
“What, like you’ve never seen someone who got pushed off of a two-story building before,” Kate snaps, glaring with the eye that isn’t swollen shut. Her arm is in a sling, her lip is split, and she’s walking with a limp and probably shouldn’t even be out of medical yet, but Hawkeyes aren’t exactly known for their stellar record following medical advice.
Kate continues to glare as she swings around, narrowly missing the wall, before making her way to the kitchen.
“Is she okay?” Karen stares after Kate.
“For a Hawkeye,” Pepper assures Karen, standing shoulder to shoulder with her.
“For a what?” Karen’s head snaps around so fast her hair whips Pepper’s cheek.
It takes Pepper a moment to realize her slipup, for a round of curses to start echoing through her brain.
“Pepper where is the coffee?” Kate’s voice rings through their home before Karen can question her further. There’s a muffled curse and then the low tones of JARVIS, before—
“Ms. Potts, Ms. Bishop would like you to tell me where the coffee is, since shouting makes her head hurt.”
“Of course it does,” Pepper mutters. “Please tell Kate that she doesn’t need coffee, it’s eleven o’clock at night and she has a concussion.” Karen side-eyes her and Pepper shrugs. “JARVIS is an excellent mediator—"
Kate skids out into the hallway. “Wait a minute.” She stares at Karen. Stares at Pepper. Back to Karen. “Hang on.” Her forehead wrinkles. Pepper never had a concussion; since Extremis, it’s almost impossible for her to get one, but she can sympathize. Anything that jars Kate’s memory into taking so long is severe, and Pepper hopes Dr. Cho gets here sooner rather than later.
Kate takes a few cautious steps toward Karen, jabbing her lightly on the shoulder. “Are we soulmates?”
In response, Karen lifts her hair up off her neck and turns. Pepper can see a familiar scrawl across the back of Karen’s neck.
“Huh,” Kate says, and sways hard, Karen steadying her just before Kate hits a wall.
“Maybe you should sit, or something?” Karen suggests.
“Huh,” Kate says again, as if this idea hadn’t occurred to her. “Yeah, okay.”
Which is how Karen Page winds up with Kate’s head in her lap. Kate's fingers are tangled with Pepper's, clutching at her hand like it's a lifeline--which means the mission was something slightly south of "completely awful".
“Hey, what’s your name?” Kate asks about five minutes later. “Calling you Goldilocks seems weird.”
“Goldi—" Karen starts, cutting herself off when Pepper shakes her head. Concussed Kate-logic isn’t a rabbit hole anyone needs to go down. “Right.” Karen goes back to stroking Kate’s hair. “I’m Karen.”
“Karen, hi. I’m Hawkeye.” Kate’s eyes drift closed for a moment before snapping back open. “Fuck! I mean, I’m Kate. Dammit.”
Karen swallows a laugh with a fair amount of success. “It’s okay, your secret identity is safe with me. You aren’t the first superhero I’ve met.”
“Well, duh,” Kate mutters. “I mean, shooting arrows isn’t as cool as healing yourself with fire like Pep, but…” she trails off, her breathing evening out.
“Fire?” Karen’s eyes seek out Pepper’s.
“It’s a long story,” Pepper shrugs. “Too long for tonight. Maybe tomorrow?”
Karen rubs Kate’s eyebrows before nodding. “Tomorrow. Dinner?”
“Wait a minute,” Kate snaps back to consciousness. “If you didn’t know about Pepper then what superhero do you know?”
“Oh, uh,” Karen turns red. “I dated Daredevil, for a while.”
“Oh,” Kate settles back. “Well, that’s nice. I’ve met him before, he’s got a nice—"
They never find out what Daredevil’s got that’s nice, because Kate falls back asleep.
“Does this happen often?” Karen asks.
“Oh, hang on!” Kate’s eyes pop back open. “Oh, no, wait, he told me about you! You’re the investigative journalist who always finds the super dangerous stories! Oh man,” Kate snuggles back against the couch. “We’re going to get in so much trouble, it’s going to be great.”
(Kate is, of course, entirely correct.)