Chapter 3
“Pepper, you're killing me. Remember the moment? Enjoy the moment.” Tony says as he lands on the newly light ‘STARK’ Tower.
“Then get in here and I will.” Tony can hear the fond smirk in her voice as he’s taking off his Iron Man suit through a hi-tech gauntlet of gadgets.
Giovanni swims up to greet him, adjacent to Tony and although he can’t turn to see his octopus, Tony still greets him. “How’d I do buddy? Did you like it?”
Giovanni does his little wiggle of yes, and Tony nods, satisfied.
“Sir, Agent Coulson of SHIELD is on the line,” JARVIS adds, and oh doesn’t that dampen the mood a tad.
“I'm not in,” Tony says, as the helmet comes off, “I'm actually out.”
“Sir, I'm afraid he's insisting.”
Tony waves him off, “JARVIS, the schedule’s full. I got a date.”
Pepper’s face is highlighted by blue hologram and the watery shadow waves from the aquarium that fall onto her face, “The levels holding steady—” She bites her lip,”—I think.”
“Of course they are! Wouldn’t expect anything less.” He grins.
God how did Tony get here? With her? The only thing missing is Rhodey, but alas duty calls.
“R&D may beg to differ,” Pepper teases.
Tony gasps dramatically, “R&D are my children and they would never betray me like this. You—” He pokes her nose, as she smiles and laughs, “—must be mistaken.”
“As CEO, my sources are to be trustworthy.”
“Was it Jennifer? I bet it was Jennifer.”
Her head is tilted as she looks at him, “I plead the fifth.” Tony trails after her as she pulls away from him and walks to the couches, bare feet on the floor.
“I swear to you, Pep, she’s just salty that Shane and his gangly limbs knocked over Merdieth’s vial and ruined her prototype. I’m the innocent one here!” Tony and her bicker as they walk around, him gesturing animatedly and her smiling fondly.
“Should I get Rhodey here as referee?” Pepper comments as she pulls out the bottle from the ice bucket and moves to pour it. Her tone was that of an adult consoling a child, and Tony pouts.
“If you can get Honeybear off work, I would give you the stars, Boss lady.”
Pepper’s eyebrows raise dramatically with that, “Oh really?” She asks as she pours herself and Tony a glass of champagne. Smiling unconsciously, as they sit down.
“I'll tell you what. I’ll go up there and write STARK INC on the moon with a laser.”
“Hmmm, write Potts,” She drawls, out with a nod, and goes to click their flutes of champagne in ‘cheers’, but Tony pulls away playfully.
“Call your mom, can you bunk over?” He says with faux-innocence, and she chuckles.
“I don’t know,” She plays along, “Is James ok with it?”
“JARVIS, should I call Platypus?” Tony asks, moving back in to cheers with Pepper.
Instead of answering that, JARVIS says, “Sir, the telephone. I'm afraid my protocols are being overwritten.”
“Stark, we need to talk,” Coulson’s voice filters in, Tony sighs as he picks up the phone and looks at the profile picture.
“You have reached the life model decoy of Tony Stark, please leave a message.” Pepper laughs and ducks her head.
“This is urgent.”
Tony raises an eyebrow, “Then leave it urgently.” And just as he goes to hang up, the elevator door opens and Coulson appears.
“Security breach!” He points to Pepper, “Should Giovanni get Julian’s water cannons?” Pepper ignores him.
“Mr. Stark,” Coulson says, as he pockets the phone into his suit.
“Phil!” Pepper exclaims as she rises from the cousins, “Come in.”
“Phil?” Tony looks incredulously at them as they talk, “Uh, his first name is Agent.”
“I can't stay,” Coulson smiles, not shrugging though the tone clearly implies it, though Tony does detect the stress lining his form.
“Come on in, we're celebrating!” Pepper beckons with a smile, as they walk over.
“Which is why he can't stay,” Tony mutters, but still smiles widely at the man. “Did you say ‘Hi’ to Giovanni? He missed you.”
Coulson’s face does the near exasperated twitch that Tony’s familiar with, but still turns to the blue aquarium to look at the octopus. Giovanni lays on the seafloor, his tenceles splayed out lazily. “Hi, Giovanni,” Coulson says, the tone best compared to that of a parent who says ‘hello’ to an inanimate object alongside a young child.
“Come on, ‘ Phil ’,” Tony teases, gesturing with his glass, “Say it like you mean it! You’ll hurt his feelings.”
“ Tony ,” Pepper laughs.
“He’s fine,” Coulson waves off, then turns with serious eyebrows. “We need you to look this over,” Coulson holds out a suspicious black file towards him, which Tony’s been eyeing for a bit, “Soon as possible.”
Tony makes a waving gesture with his hands, with a ‘ what can you do ’ smile on his face. “I don't like being handed things.”
“That's alright, 'cause I love to be handed things,” Pepper—being the goddess she is—interjects smoothly, “So, let's trade.”
She passes her glass of champagne to Coulson, takes the file from him, then takes Tony's glass of champagne while passing the file over to Tony, “Thank you.” She smiles.
Tony sucks in a breath, then gives his customer service face, “Official consulting hours are between eight and five every other Thursday.”
“This isn't a consultation.”
“Is this about The Avengers?” Pepper asks, then backtracks when Couslon looks at her questioningly, “Which I—I know nothing about.”
“The Avengers Initiative was scrapped, I thought.” He notes as he walks away, then adds, “And I didn't even qualify.”
“I didn't know that either,” Pepper says, innocently. Tony snorts.
“Yeah, apparently I'm volatile, self-obsessed, don't play well with others.”
“That I did know.”
“Wow, rude.”
“This isn't about personality profiles anymore,” Coulson states.
“Hmm, sure. Miss Potts, got a minute?” Tony waves her over as he places the files into his own databases.
“You know, I thought we were having a moment.”
“I think you’re mistaken, Mr. Stark,” Pepper replies, and Tony tsks, “There it is.”
Looking back at Coulson, she adds, “This seems serious, Phil's pretty shaken.”
“Yeah, I thought so too, also why is he ‘Phil’?”
She ignores it and then gestures to the screen, “What is all of this?
“This is, uh—” Tony swipes up and expands his arms, making different profiles appear in holographic form floating in the air in front of them, “Well—This.”
The screens show different profiles, Captain America in a black & white film. On the left, a huge green being called the ‘Hulk’ roars as he attacks the army at Culver University. Another screen shows someone labeled as ‘Thor’, a large blond man fighting something in New Mexico. Another is labeled ‘Loki’ and is a man in green with long black hair with a specter and a glowing blue cube.
“I'm going to take the jet to DC tonight,” Pepper breathes, still looking at the screen with wide eyes.
“That might be best,” Tony mutters. Something gives him a bad feeling.
“You've got homework. You've got a lot of homework.” Pepper shakes off.
“Unfortunately,” Tony sighs, “Bummer.”
“Well, Mr. Stark, if you finish—” She whispers something in his ear, and Tony gasps. In the corner of his vision, Coulson looks away in embarrassment.
“Ms. Potts, you tease,” He whispers back, and she giggles. “Well, Rhodey’s gonna come home soon, so—”
“True,” Tony points out, “Let’s—uh—not tell him about this yet?” He gestures to the screen. Pepper raises an eyebrow. “Best not to worry him,” Tony clarifies.
Pepper pretends to think, then leans in to kiss him, “No promises.”
She leaves with Agent—talking about dates and such. Tony grabs the blue cube—no—the ‘Tesseract’ in holograph form and examines it, worried.
Giovanni swims up in front of him, moving in a way similar to a cocked head. Keeping away from the tesseract but still with curiosity.
“Yeah buddy, me too.” Tony sighs, and pulls up a document.
Tony lands his suit and allows JARVIS to unsuit him. Loki looks up at him, glowering. Eyes on eachother, Loki walks in the penthouse, holding the scepter, while Tony casually walks down the steps, towards the bar.
“Please tell me you're going to appeal to my humanity,” Loki mocks, a disinterested scowl on his face as he steps with determination into his home, Tony’s home.
Tony, aiming to play along in an effort to stall, “Uh—actually, I'm planning to threaten you.”
“You should have left your armor on for that.” Loki points out.
Ok arsehole , you aren’t very threatening either if it weren’t for the wand.
“ Yeah —it's seen a bit of mileage, really. You've got the blue stick of destiny. Would you like a drink?” Tony offers, going behind the bar to pour himself one.
Shaking his head, Loki chuckles condescendingly, “Stalling me won't change anything.”
Well, he’s right about one thing, at the very least. Now, Tony’s gotta wait till the heat of the conversation.
Tony shook it off, “No, no, no, not stalling! Threatening.” He points, “No drink? You sure? I'm having one.”
“The Chitauri are coming,” Loki threatened, spreading his arms, “Nothing will change that. What have I to fear?”
“The Avengers,” Tony said with a head tilt, his tone aiming for casual.
Loki looks at him, confused.
Swallowing a sigh, Tony reaches for a bottle, Typical.
Tony sniffs, as he pours out a glass, “Eh—It's what we call ourselves—sort of like a team. ‘Earth’s Mightiest Heroes’ type of thing.”
“Yes, I've met them,” Loki drawls.
Tony smiles, “Yeah, takes us a while to get any traction, I'll give you that one.” He points out, but then leans his hands on the counter for emphasis, standing a bit on his tip-toes.
“But—uh—let's do a headcount here. Your brother, the demi-God; a super soldier, a living legend who kind of lives up to the legend—”
As Tony rambles, Loki turns around. Bingo, baby.
Hello~ heat of the moment. From underneath the bar table, Tony pulls on his suit’s honing device. Voila, colantotte bracelets. What now, Loki?
“—a man with breath-taking anger management issues; a couple of master assassins, and you—” He points to Loki, “—big fella—” And takes a sip.
“—you've managed to piss off every single one of them.”
“That was the plan,” Loki replies.
Tony refrains from making a face, both from what Loki said and from the fact that his drink turned out to be apple juice. Whoops, wrong bottle.
No, it’s not. And if it was, it’s a stupid plan. It’s more like a flare.
“Not a great plan. When they come, and they will, they'll come for you.”
“I have an army.”
True. But is it your army, honey?
Tony sniffs, “We have a hulk.”
“I thought the beast had wandered off,” Loki mumbles.
“You're missing the point. There's no throne, there is no version of this, where you come out on top.”
And Tony means this literally. That’s the thing with villains on Earth, it’s stupid how they thing over-lording will be an effective form of supreme ruling. Humans hate being told what to do. Just look at America.
It’s why democracy pleases the masses, despite the fact that voting actually goes through the electoral college. Ugh, politics. Such a fickle thing.
Loki slowly walks up to him, raising the scepter as Tony speaks. Tony’s eyes latch on to it, feeling the humming in the air, and he near struggles to keep his voice even.
Tony continues his—stalling—threat, “Maybe your army comes and maybe it's too much for us, but it's all on you. Because if we can't protect the Earth, you can be damned well sure we'll avenge it.”
“How will your friends have time for me, when they're so busy fighting you?”
Tony flinches as Loki taps his scepter’s point on the arc reactor with a ping .
Oddly, nothing happens. Confused, Loki tires again, “It should work.”
“Well, performance issues. You know?” Tony mutters, trying to keep his breath even.
Loki near growls and moves to grab at Tony, but before he can a loud splash comes from the side of them. They turn rapidly and an orange blur comes barreling towards them.
In a blink, Tony is baffled to see Giovanni on Loki’s face, wrapping his eight tentacles tightly around his head. Loki fails around, Giovanni muffling his confused and alarmed protests.
“J—JARVIS?” Tony asks.
The only response is the elevator opening and a red pod shooting out towards Tony.
The pod laser signals the bracelets, just as they should and quickly the Mark VII involves him.
Tony shoots out a hand and captures Loki’s wrists—careful to avoid Giovanni—with cuffs that come out of the suit. Giovanni lets go of Loki to jump back onto the couch. Loki hits the back of it and falls to the floor, the scepter skidding across the floor away from the god.
“And there's one other person you pissed off!” Tony stands in front of a fallen Loki, “His name was Phil.”
Loki makes a face, opening his mouth, but Tony repulsors him across the room. Loki hits his head and goes limp.
“Sir, there seems to be new signals from the roof,” Jarvis reports. Tony tilts his head in consideration.
“Alright, I’m on my way. Oh—and JARVIS? Help Gi-Gi back into his room.”
“Of course, sir.”
Before he leaves, he turns back to look at Giovanni, “Gi—hey!” And pops his faceplate up again, “No, naughty octopus!” Giovanni stops in his movements, halfway between the couch and the slumped figure of Loki.
“No, don’t do that.” Giovanni looks admonished enough so Tony relents and adds, “But great job, buddy! I’m proud of you!”
Giovanni curls his tentacles, happily.
“Now, back to the tank with you!”
~ FIN ~
TONY AND GIOVANNI MAY RETURN?
Giovanni & Tony Art - Insta link
Giovanni & Ironman Helmet - Insta Link
Giovanni & Ironman Helmet - Tumblr Link
Giovanni & Tony Art - Tumblr Link