Dreams
As they entered the bed room, Stephen could see how huge the room was (there was even a long comfortable looking sofa here - i mean - who needs a sofa when there was already a bed?).
Tony let's go if his wrist and moved towards the bed while Stephen had already decided that he if he was staying for the night here, he was going to stay in the sofa. He inched closer to the sofa at the corner.
Tony was still grinning like an idiot until he sees Stephen inching to the sofa and frowns.
Tony seems like he was about to say something, so Stephen spoke first.
"No. If I'm going to stay here, then I'm staying on the sofa." He said with a sound of finality, that he wasn't going to take no for an answer.
Tony pouted, "I haven't even said anything yet."
Stephen decided to ignore the pouting billionaire and went to settle himself on the sofa. The sofa - as the looks suggest - was really comfortable. So Stephen smiled in satisfaction.
"Now then, you should sleep while you can." He said looking at Tony who was busying himself with the blanket.
"Fine" the other man sighed, disappointed.
.
He was out of breaths and he was still running. From what? He doesn't know.
Everything around him was cold the silence was deafening.
When ever he turns to look back at what's chasing him, he sees huge eyes, it was cold and field with malice.
He forces himself to look forward he doesn't know where he was, he doesn't know how long he's been there either. It feels like he's been there for eternity.
As he looks back forward he sees something. Someone.
The other person was laying on the ground the right side of the body was scared badly.
At that point Stephen knew the man was dead.
Stephen was still running, running towards the body.
But just before he could get there the ground beneath him changes and formed a spike that plunges into his chest,
Then - then -
He woke up, desperately gasping for breath.
He felt like matter how much he breaths it still wasn't enough.
It was than that he noticed the other man's presence looking at him worriedly, unsure of what to do.
So Stephen willed himself to calm down. Breath, Stephen. Breath, it was just a dream. He told himself.
Tony was woken up by the sound of groaning and movements. His self defense was the first thing that reacted upon the foraging noises.
He shot up on his bed to a more defensive position, and it was then that he realized there was nobody else around. So he looked around the room to find that the noise were coming from the doctor.
He frowned at first, that was until he realized that the doctor was having a nightmare.
Shit, he curses to himself and went out of the bed to the doctor's side.
The doctor was mumbling something he couldn't identify and he was starting to sweat more than Tony would like.
Tony didn't know what to do, he had never been on this side of things. Usually, it was him that was having nightmares or panic attacks and JARVIS would wake him up and calm him down.
Wake up, yes. He needed to wake the doctor up, he may not know the doctor too well but the doctor was suffering and he had to do something, anything.
"doc, hey. Wake up, it's just a dream." he merely spoke and did not touch the doctor in case the doctor might wake up and preserve him as a threat and attacked him.
Tony was still frowning as it seems like the doctor didn't hear or noticed him at all. Tony was getting really worried.
He was contemplating on just shaking the doctor so wake up cuz it was getting rather bad, it was then that the doctor woke up with a gasp.
He then proceeded to breathe rapidly as if he couldn't get enough air in his lungs.
Shit, is he going to have a panic attack?
Tony sure as hell doesn't know how to calm someone who's having a panic attack, especially since he didn't know the doc well enough to help with calming words.
Thankfully he didn't have to do anything as the doctor calmed himself down.
His eyes were still clouded as he looked at Tony and his skin was a bit too pale.
"Tony," the man said, his voice was still ruff from the nightmare.
"Sorry. I must've had woken you up."
Tony frowned at that. It was a nightmare. Why should he apologize for that?
"It wasn't your fault, doc. You can't possibly control your dream." Tony said, looking at the doctor with a frown and worry in his eyes.
Now that Tony got a good look at the doctor. The doctor's eyes seem tired, old.
It wasn't his face, no. His face looks young, and he didn't have any eye bags that could only have been caused by sleep deprivation.
But the look in his eyes says a different thing. If Tony didn't know any better he would've thought that it was his soul that was old and tired.
But those such things don't exist.
Right?
He thinks so anyway.
The next day he woke up, the doctor was long gone.
"JARVIS?" he called out to his AI.
'Yes sir?' the AI replied.
"When did the doctor left?" he asked
'He left about an hour after you sleep sir, at 4.38 A.M.' came JARVIS's reply.
an hour? Tony wondered if the doctor even slept again through the time. He doubt it.
"Did he do anything JARVIS?" Tony trust the doctor wouldn't do anything, but he still couldn't be to careful.
'I would have woken you up if he had sir.' JARVIS said sounding insulted that Tony thought JARVIS would have sat by and did nothing.
"Alright, thank you JARVIS."
'As always, sir.'
He felt better than before. He didn't know what the doctor did, but the poisoning was out of his blood system.
Tony streched on his bed, he had to get ready for the day. He wasn't going to waste the extra time the doctor bought for him.
Time to do some reaserch in inventing a new element, Tony thought
Tony had spent the entire day locked up inside his house - specifically the lab - to work out the elements. Every single combination he had tried so far, there was always something missing that he can't quite figure out.
He had told JARVIS to not let anyone or anything disturb him while he worked, the only exception being if there were any sightings on the doc.
So, when the next day, he got information that the doc was at a local donut store, he told JARVIS to ready the car and drove straight there.
Stephen had just went to the local donut store to get some lunch. He hadn't checked on Tony since 2 days ago, but he was sure that the engineer was locked up in his own lab, busy trying on making a new element.
So he didn't think it would harm anyone to get some donuts. Of course, nothing happened to him, but just after he entered the mirror dimension (yes, he basically lives there now) he saw an expensive-looking car come in.
The driver parked it at a place that Stephen was pretty sure wasn't allowed. From it, came out Tony Stark.
hmm, he had thought that the man would still be locked up in his lab.
he walked closer to Tony, knowing that the other man wouldn't be able to tell that he was there.
"Where is he, JARVIS?" Stephen heard Tony say to his earpiece.
He wasn't sure what the reply was, but he could guess it would be that he had just left mere moments ago and was no longer in any available tracking device or something similar.
Tony sighed, but just when he was about to enter his car, a dark-skinned man wearing an eyepatch at his left eye walked up to him.
Tony eyed him but went inside the store with the other man anyway.
"I told you I don't want to join your super-secret boy band." Tony started, as they settled themselves on one of the tables beside the window.
Stephen stood by them, close enough to somewhat hear their quiet conversation. He tuned out their conversation for a bit when he saw a ginger-haired female walking in.
"Wha- how did you?" Stephen heard the surprised voice from the eyepatched man - which he thinks is Nick Furry. Stephen had turned his head around to see Furry examining the nonexistent marks on Tony's neck.
Tony smirk, "A magician never reveals their secrets." he recited from the night when Stephen had said it. Stephen couldn't help but snort himself.
Furry, on the other hand, just looked more confused.
Just then, the ginger-haired woman came upon them and said some things that Stephen hadn't bothered to pay attention to.
"huh, you're fired." Tony drawled.
Now that Stephen had gotten a better look at her...
Isn't that one of the Avengers? he thought. I think she had died collecting one of the infinity stones to reverse the snap, didn't she?
point was that he didn't know her all that much.
She was then introduced as agent Romanoff and was told that she was assigned to Tony by Furry.
They talked some more about stuff that Stephen didn't bother to pay attention to, pretty much annoying Tony.
When Tony had asked what they wanted from him, Furry ended up lecturing him.
The conversation ended in Furry telling Tony that there was another element he hadn't tried.
So this was how he found the element? Stephen mused himself
Stephen looked at Tony who was throwing stuff from the box that he couldn't identify. Nick Furry had left the box with Tony and had left after more conversation.
Tony then came upon a tape recorder, it was an old style.
When the tape was played, the face of Howard Stark appeared.
He had talked about technology and piece and stuff that Stephen had deemed unimportant. That was until it got a bit too personal for Stephen's opinion and had ended up leaving Tony alone in the room.
"I have been assigned to New Mexico." Agent Coulson had said.
New Mexico? that was where he had sensed a Bifrost appeared a while ago. Stephen had checked it when it happened, it was Thor. He doesn't think that he should interfere with any of Thor's events since the last time nothing majorly bad happened, he thinks. He was going to just let it play out.
After Coulson had left, Tony continued building the necessary equipment.
A few more adjustments here and there... and... done. Now it's time to start. Stephen had a feeling this was going to be dangerous so he decide to cast a protection spell on Tony and the room.
And Stephen was right to do so. Just as Tony turned on the machine, a laser shot out of it. If Stephen had not cast a protection spell on the room, he was sure that the wall would be destroyed.
Tony didn't seem to realize that or didn't question the fact that his walls didn't get destroyed like it's supposed to.
Stephen counted that as a win and watched as Tony created the new element and put it on his arc reactor, hearing the AI's voice saying that the arc reactor had accepted the new core.
'All good things must come to an end' isn't that what they always say? Stephen thought to himself as he flew beside the ironman armor.
The guy from Monaco had just called and Tony had decided that he wouldn't need to test the new arc reactor and just put it on. It resulted in a light show.
Stephen sighed to himself, Tony's way too reckless. At his thoughts the cloak moved the tip of it as if in agreement.
Tony arrived at the stadium? and drew everyone's attention to himself, Stephen chose to remain somewhere at the back in the shadows as he left the mirror dimension.
Tony started saying something, but Stephen was too far back to hear what it was. Suddenly all the bots moved on their own and Tony flew out of the building just on time as the bots started to shoot after him.
CRASH
The glass on the ceiling started falling down at the crowds of people and Stephen grimaced.
He started casting a spell to make sure that none of the glass fell on an area that would be fatal for them. the crowds started screaming and running out of the place as one of the machines took off after Tony.
Stephen frowned at the loud noises around him, he need to focus on his spell. The drones that were on the podium started moving towards the civilians, Stephen cursed to himself.
The cloak moved him into a safer position and a position where he could see inside as well as outside.
He cast another spell to make the attacks miss but not unnaturally, he can't draw attention to himself so they can't get suspicious. Unfortunately, that would mean that there would be people that will get injured.
As much as Stephen wanted to protect them, Stephen also had sworn an oath to not reveal the existence of the order. So he focuses on the 2 spells his casting while casting another one to make him invisible.
they had started firing... fireworks-looking weapons that Stephen had to contain the blast to not injure anyone. He looked up to see Tony being chased by some of the drones.
Damit, he cast another spell of protection on Tony. Great, just great, the drones that were on the ground now started firing on Tony as well.
Stephen cast a stronger protection spell on Tony as Tony flew around dodging as much as he can.
the drones fired around at the buildings as it hits the crowd, or would have, Stephen, made sure it didn't hit anyone.
He saw as Tony flew farther away from the crowd of people, bringing the drones with him.
Stephen heard explosions came from where he had last seen Tony go and hope that Tony was fine, he had to trust Tony's skills and his protection spells if it came down to it. For now, the civilians are his main priority.
after a while the drones started moving to where Stephen thinks is Tony.
Stephen looked around once more to make sure everyone was alive and somewhat alright.
He then flew off following the drones.
Seems he's a bit late to the party, as he saw the gunshots. He made sure he wasn't caught on any cameras - from the drones or CCTV or the two ironman armor in the middle - and started using some offense spells at the drones.
He heard Tony saying something that sounded like 'get down' so he ducked just in time to see lasers shot out from Tony to the rest of the drones.
Stephen took the chance to went back to the mirror dimension.
A few moments later another drone came in. No. That's not a drone, that's a suit.
It started to whip the two ironman suits.
It didn't look good for them, but as Stephen was about to step out off of the mirror dimension, he heard Tony had an idea.
So Stephen waited to see the outcome. Of course, Tony was reckless. He came up a plan to redo the explosion that happened last time.
Really, why did Stephen bother, he kept the protection spell around Tony and added another one around the other ironman suit.
They began to shoot at one another, the energy built up once more until it exploded.
When the dust finally cleared, he could see both ironman armor are doing fine, barley any damage from the explosion (he just hopes that Tony didn't think that the ironman armor was good enough to withstand the explosion alone).
He could see that the other armor - Vanco - was on the ground, burnt.
beep
beep
beep beep
"all this drones are rigged to blow, we gotta go."
beep beep
all the drones.
beep beep beep
there were still people that could be in range of the explosion.
beep beep beep
Stephen flew out of the mirror dimension as fast as he could with the help of the cloak, trusting that the 2 people he had just left would be able to take care of themselfs.
beep beep beep beep
He flew to a rooftop that was high enough to see the drones but dark enough so no normal passerby can spot him easily.
BOOM-!!
He cast the spell just on time as it explodes (he silently sent his thanks to the cloak that helped him moved so fast).
Stephen curses to himself as he had consentraited far too much on the protection spells to noticed Stark had seen him on the roof top.
The only warning Stephen got was the sound of Stark's irion man repulsor coming closer to the building.
Stephen knew he could always just earase Stark's memories, but maybe if the other man had known about magic now, the next few decades would feel much kinder to him.
The explosions had died down to a more manageable level, so Stephen stopped casting his spell just on time as Stark landed on the rooftop.
Being able to finally see him more clearly, he finally noticed that St-Tony was carrying another person with him.
He'd seen her before, hasn't he? Yes, she was at Tony's house a while ago, she was also one of the people that was in the black car in Monaco. Peper, he had heard.
As she shook Tony off, but then she stopped just when she opened her mouth. She seem to finally notice that they were not alone on the rooftop.
Tony had ignored all that and had all but thrown his helmet off. He walked with purpose towards Stephen and questions burning in his eyes, there was something else in his eyes that Stephen could not decipher.
Stephen prepared himself for the questions he knew were going to come.