Prelude
Tony never liked poetry.
He thought of poets as fanciful drunks, when he had to think of them at all. Poems were nothing but pretty, meaningless words meant to distract you from reality. And in the world he'd been brought up in, reality was the only thing you could focus on if you wanted to survive.
But, as he bled out in his deactivated suit, consciousness finally fading, one verse was dragged to the front of his fuzzy mind. He'd read it in one of the books Edwin Jarvis had willed to him, scoffed, and tucked it away in his bookshelf, never to be seen again.
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.
If he'd had any air left in his collapsed lungs, Tony would have laughed. Ice would suffice, alright. Ice, like the way his blood ran cold at the sight of his parents being murdered. Ice, like the bitter cold feeling of betrayal tearing through him as Steve admitted to knowing. Ice, like the tiny crystals steadily coating his shattered chest plate. He managed a snort as his heavy lids slid closed.
Ice would suffice.