Lets play capture the assassin
“Are you kidding me, Mamă!” Tony cries as she pulls up, she’s not even gotten out of the car yet. This is ridiculous.
“It’s fine, dragă, he’s an old friend.” She hums as she gets out and stalks towards the car door his head was at.
“He tried to kill you multiple times!” Tony snaps as she opens the door, she grabs the back of James’ jacket and hauls him out.
“Well, that is his job.” She hums again as she start walking towards the house, dragging him along.
“I… what?” Tony stutters, clearly not expecting to hear that which is odd because he was just protesting about her attempted murder.
“He kills people for a living, dragă.” They’ve crossed the threshold now and Edwin is standing at the bottom of the stairs, radiating disapproval. “And while I thought the month we spent together meant more I should have expected this eventually. I have been pissing a bunch of people off for the hell of it lately.”
She’d remembered why James was familiar on the drive back. A year after Tony had been born she’d been abducted after a Stark expo and taken to a random warehouse in Detroit. She’d spent a month being tortured in everyway she could have imagined while the Russian dick had skulked around in the corner, looking more and more like he was going to go out of his mind and slaughter everyone. Her captors must have noticed his general bloodthirsty air too because at the end of the month they’d forced him to kneel in front of her so they could inject a random substance into him, five minutes before they injected it into her, so she’d be able to see what was going to happen to her.
Nothing happened to him and she ended up with a mild fever but the point of disrespect still stood, so she’d asked him what exactly his orders were then asked him so very sweetly if he’d mind her slaughtering everyone else in the stupid place. He hadn’t minded at all, in fact mid-way through he’d started fetching her weapons. In the end he’d disappeared like a ghost and she’d been left to get herself home.
“I… did you have sex with Bucky?!” Tony chokes as he follows her down the stairs to her lab.
“I’ve not had sex with James Barns or the Winter Soldier.” She assures as she stalks past the opening doors. “Thank you, FRIDAY dear.” She tugs James up to an empty lab table then drags him onto it, pulling another table over so she can spread his arm out.
“When did you meet the Winter Soldier? Why are you making a distinction? If you know who he is then why the hell is he in our house?!” Tony demands.
“I think that might be a conversation for later, Antony. Come, help me get this monstrosity off. Honestly, it’s an insult to decent engineering everywhere.” She grumbles as she drags her tool tray closer.
“This is a conversation for now, Mamă.” Tony growls, he’s so sassy tonight.
“So you’re not going to help?” She asks as she starts assessing the arm, she doesn’t think there will be quick releases but it would sure be nice.
“… Yes, I’m going to help.” He grumbles as he approaches.
“Good, because it looks like there might be some traps that will kill him if we’re not careful.” She tells him lightly which makes him glare. “FRIDAY, could you scan this for me?” A 3D projection springs to life in front of her, the soft pink separating so they could see all the components. “Thank you, dragă.”
“How do you know him, Mamă?” Tony asks as he starts gently removing metal plating on the arm so she has room to disconnect the traps.
He really wasn’t letting this go, fine then. “A year after you were born I was doing a Stark expo in Columbus and I got kidnapped on the way back to my hotel. They took me to a warehouse in Detroit where they tortured me because I refused to build them weapons.” She tells him as she dives in. “When it became clear to them that I wasn’t going to do it and it became clear to me that no one was coming for me they decided to try a new tactic. They called it the random effect lottery. A bunch of fun serums their scientists cooked up, they told me to pick one. I told them to go fuck themselves. So they picked for me after another beating and to show me what would happen they injected the Winter Soldier first. He was decidedly not impressed but he’d been ordered not to kill them so he just got me weapons while I killed them.”
“I didn’t know that happened to you.” Tony says quietly as they continue working.
“Of course you didn’t. Why would I tell you about how regularly I got kidnaped while you were a baby? It wouldn’t do you any good, if anything it would have given you massive amounts of paranoia.” She huffs, disconnecting the last few traps then helping Tony remove the arm.
“Is that why the house is filled with guns?” He asks as she tugs James off of the table and towards a blank wall.
“Among other things.” She hums as she opens the cell she’d designed for James, dropping him in the middle of it while Tony gapes behind her. She shuts it again but leaves it translucent so he can’t try shit.
“What the hell is this? Why is there an apartment under our house?!” He waves his arm at James’ new home away from home [or simply put the place the Russian dick was staying in until he promised not to hurt her son and grandchildren].
“It’s to keep oameni prosti who try and attack us, clearly.” She answers because that is what she built it for, even if that stupid person was just James.
“First the guns, then this? What other things do I not know about?” He cries. “JARVIS, FRIDAY, did you know about this?”
“I was unaware of this extension of our home, father. Nor do I seem to have access to anything inside.” JARVIS says stiffly.
“I had no idea, tata.” FRIDAY adds. “Can I have access, grandma? I don’t like being cut off from part of the house.”
“I will see about getting you linked up so long as you promise to be cordial. At least until I can smack him over the head for trying to kill me so blatantly.” She sighs, she could try and fight it but then JARVIS would call the bots and she’d have to tell them no too.
“I can be cordial.” FRIDAY promises happily. “I will be the most cordial, cordial person you’ve ever met.”
“Thank you, FRIDAY.” She says earning a triumphant flare of the AI’s soul. “Enough about that now, off to bed. You still need to sleep for the board meeting, and I still need to turn up to Peggy’s gala.”
Tony doesn’t move, eyes flickering between the mini apartment under their house that he didn’t know about and her. She stays there, waiting for him to decide whether he wanted to turn this into a fight or go to bed so he wasn’t tired. He doesn’t get the chance because her phone shrills to life.
“Where are you, Helana?” Peggy snaps like she has any right.
“I’m leaving now Pegs. Relax.” She hums before hanging up and stalking past Tony, pausing to kiss his cheek. “Bedtime, lumina stelelor.”
“Mamă…” He starts but she cuts him off with a smile.
“Bed. We can continue arguing about the house’s blueprints tomorrow.”
His fists clench before he sighs. “Fine, tomorrow.”