Chapter 22
Percy
Ok so maybe catching a fight with Triton by pissing him off and making him believe he was lying for power wasn't Percy's greatest idea. Not that he would ever admit it out loud, anyway.
So, Percy was currently contemplating what the Hades he could do to end the fight in less than four hours. His brother didn't seem close to giving up and he needed to go back to the tower to practice all the new skills he watched him do. Of course, the time limit didn't have anything to do with Tony's threat. Absolutely nothing.
Percy had the sudden mental image of his dramatic teammate flying around the city and then swimming through the water covered in a lot of glitter and asking every single conscious creature around him if they had seen him, even if he wouldn't understand the answer. He shuddered. That thought was enough to make him want to hurry up.
"This is boring. Seriously, we've been at this for like half a day already," Percy said a little annoyed and trying to rush the fight to its end.
"What, are you tired of your pathetical attempt of a fight against me?" Triton asked with a sneer, though he was actually the only one looking tired.
"Not of the fight, no. I'm getting tired because keeping barriers up is draining." Triton stopped his attacks with the trident for a second and then stepped back when he saw Percy wasn't attacking any more, though both of them stayed in a defensive position.
"What barriers?" he asked cautiously.
"Those." And Percy spread his arms around them, showing his brother the tall, strong ice barriers surrounding the palace and city, as well as little ones scattered around the area where shoals were. They weren't truly ice, because that would mess up the creatures living conditions, but it was something similar with just enough consistency to protect everyone. They had been covering all the surrounding places and creatures from the violent currents caused by Triton, as well as preventing him from feeling their presence and summoning them, getting them involved in a fight they wished to avoid. "You know, one would believe that the god of the sea would take care of Poseidon's palace, their domain and the creatures under their protection but..." Percy seemed irritated. Triton went pale.
"This was all your idea, wasn't it? All along you were trying to make me look-" That was the last straw.
"For fucks sake, grow up!" Percy yelled while frowning. "It doesn't matter why I'm here or what I said, you should never put your pride over your people!" He took some deep breaths and continued speaking once he had calmed down slightly. "The only reason I didn't call you out before is because the literal fate of the world relies on me knowing what to do with my powers once we're in the battlefield. I wonder if you would have as much as thought about the war before killing one of its warriors," Percy said, exasperated.
"You are in no position to accuse-" Triton started, but stopped once he saw the tired smile on Percy's face.
"You're too proud to see it, aren't you?" He sighed and looked away, spotting a lone squid in which he fixated his gaze. "I want you to mention one moment, only one, where I actually looked like I was fighting and not just defending and analyzing." Percy was met by silence. He tore his gaze from where it laid and stared back at his brother. "I know you're powerful and I know that, to some extent, you were trying to protect everyone, but the fact is that there's nothing to protect them from other than the war right now, and killing me won't do them any good.
"I have a plan, you know?" Percy continued silently. "I will protect everyone as much as I can, so these barriers were good training after all. However, I also need you to understand that I can't do that unless I know how to." He looked down at his hands, bare since he chose to improve his powers and not his sword technique. "The problem is that I can't- won't leave knowing that you are willing to sacrifice all the sea creatures here for one foe while their god is sleeping."
Triton had the decency to look ashamed and conflicted.
"Rage won't get you anywhere, you saw that. I need you to promise that you will think things through before giving in to emotions."
And, surprisingly, Triton complied.
.ψψψ.
"I'm back! Tony, there's no need to-"
"You're late," Steve informed him and looked at him with almost pity. Percy groaned.
"JARVIS, can you please tell Tony that I'm already here? I'm begging you, JARVIS," Percy said while hopefully looking at the ceiling.
"Right away, sir," a voice sounded through the room from seemingly nowhere and a grin appeared in the god's face.
"Yey, I'll keep my dignity!"
"If you keep on coming back late, you won't," Tony said while arriving through his suit entrance on the ceiling. Percy smiled sheepishly.
"I was fighting with my brother, I couldn't just drop out." Tony raised his brow at the answer.
"For half a day?" the billionaire asked.
"Gods can be annoying," Percy retaliated. Both Steve and Tony raised one eyebrow but nodded in acceptance because it was true after all. Thunder sounded outside in warning. "Can you deny that, though, Drama Queen?" He asked the sky with a chuckle, and another thunder was heard; 'Don't push it' was the clear meaning. Percy rolled his eyes but was evidently amused.
"So, who wants pizza?" Tony asked.
"Not until you take off that suit. I can't take you seriously while you're dripping in pink and gold glitter," Steve told him. The genius made an indignant noise while putting a hand above his chest in mock hurt.
"You wound me! This suit is absolutely stupendous." Tony crossed his arms and pouted. Yes, he pouted. "This material is better than anything I've ever had the pleasure to work with. It allowed me to make some... interesting additions to the suit that were scientifically impossible with any common metal. What I'm trying to say, Capsicle, is that I can now shoot a beam at you that makes you both doped and drunk, in between many other things I'd love to experiment... So be careful," Stark warned with a mischievous glint in his eyes. Steve was horrified to say the least, but didn't ask any further.
"Oh, I'd love to try that later." Percy said with the same glint, already planning which monsters would be their victims.
Tony
The billionaire stared at Percy for a second, deciding if it would be better to only tell him the news he had. In that exact place and moment, Tony decided that he was done with secrets.
"Right now, however, we have other problems at hand," Tony said gravely and proceeded to call the rest of the Avengers for a meeting.
The group settled down considerably fast for a surprise meeting, but taking into account the situation they were in, they had to. They all sat around a round desk and interchanged nervous glances, waiting for Tony to start talking.
"So, you said there was a problem?" Bruce asked Tony, who looked down.
"Yeah... Well, when I was improving my new suit with Celestial Bronze, I discovered that it is incredibly easy to manipulate and therefore to work with. But I also discovered another thing." He finally looked up again and was met with his team's expectant gaze. "It is so fickle in a predictable and useful way, that it will work with any kind of other material you mix it with. I started experimenting a bit, just enough to see if Celestial Bronze would be better for my Arc Reactor than the metal it has now. I ran some tests, tried some things out and then... I was surprised to find out that both metals were one and the same."
"You're saying that you somehow got Celestial Bronze when you didn't even know it existed?" Natasha asked with her eyes slightly squinted in thought.
"No, I'm saying that someone has been trying to keep me alive," he concluded and a heavy silence fell upon the room.
"This better not be other of Hera's little stunts..." Percy muttered.
"Can you please elaborate, Tony?" Steve asked him. "Specifically the part about the importance of this godly bronze in your Arc Reactor; why is that relevant exactly?" Tony sighed.
"I never told you guys but before I got this particular Arc Reactor, I was condemned to die poisoned by the power source that also kept me alive. It was one hundred percent useful with technology, powering absolutely everything you could need, but it was poisonous for the human body. The situation was ridiculously easy: either I used the Reactor and died slowly, or I didn't use it and died immediately." He stopped narrating for a second, lost in his memories. "But then the answer came to me, brought to me by my beloved father; turns out he had discovered a new element that could work for the Reactor without poisoning me."
"So the answer was the new element, not the metal that held it. We're back to Cap's question; how does it matter?" Percy spoke this time, thinking intently.
"Because it never would have worked hadn't I ran out of bronze after all my failed attempts. I tried once with the last piece of common metal I had, but it was melting not a second after touching the element," Tony explained. "Why didn't I have more? That's because I was desperate, I was dying, so I tried and tried and tried until I found the cure and had no more material to work with. Or so I thought, but then I found a piece of bronze at the bottom of the bags with material that had last been delivered. I was sure that hadn't been there before, but there wasn't anything too suspicious about it until I tried to work with it and it was five times more useful and compatible." Tony closed his eyes while sighing. "I don't know who put it there nor why, but they are the only reason I'm still alive."
"Don't you have millions of those apparatuses, Man of Iron?" Thor asked in confusion after a couple of minutes.
"Yes I do, but this one," he poked the one in his chest, "is unique. The rest you see on the daily powering the tower or the devices I give you have a palladium core, meaning that they work perfectly for those purposes but would kill me if I were to put one in my chest."
Everyone remained quiet for a while, still processing all the new information that Tony provided. Then, Percy spoke.
"Oh, man, we're screwed."
"And why is that exactly?" Clint dared ask.
"Because it means that us meeting and the war were planned a great while ago. It means that there's more reasons to it than we know about, and that changes everything."
.ψψψ.
The Avengers were all laying in the living room, some on the floor and others on couches, all wallowing in self-pity.
"Oh, come on. Stop sulking, for gods'-" Tony started but was cut off by a person in red and blue smashing the window and falling into their living room- "sake," he finished with a small voice.
The stranger, who had fallen near Clint and Nat, sat up quickly whilst breathing heavily. "That was one mean mutant spider." You could hear the pout through the mask. "Why a spider, though? Does nothing against the already existent prejudices." They sighed and only then seemed to notice the fact that they were invading someone's home. They looked around for a second and stopped moving abruptly when they saw Tony (who was currently staring at the intruder open-mouthed).
"I'm Spider-Man, by the way." And then he blacked out.