“Well, fuck,” Tony said as he stared up at the ship hovering over them, the wind from its engines sending tablecloths flying and ripping the carefully designed flower arrangements to shreds. “That just figures. Time for-“ Tony was cut off as Bucky tackled him right before an energy beam sliced through the air with a sizzling sound and blasted a hole in the earth right where they had been standing.
“Come with me,” Bucky shouted over the sound of the ship’s engines, helping Tony to his feet and tugging him towards the dubious safety of the buildings that lined the small clearing where they’d been having the wedding.
“But my suit,” Tony started, glancing backwards at the scattered tables and chairs, but Bucky shook his head.
“Safety first,” he said, urging Tony to move faster. “Suit’s not going to help you if you get blown up while you’re waiting for it to show.” He lowered his shoulder and plowed through the door, sending it flying as they barreled inside. Around them, the building shook as the mysterious ship fired again.
“Where are we going?” Tony said as Bucky led him deeper into the building. “Does this place have a basement or something? Shouldn’t we be fighting back, or-”
“We are vastly outnumbered,” Bucky said, stopping to face Tony, expression grim as he put his hands on Tony’s shoulders. “I don’t want to risk you. We should wait for the others to show up.”
The building shook again, and there was a rumbling sound from far away as something collapsed. “Shit.” Bucky turned his head as if listening for something, and then shook his head. “There’s more of them. Tony, you need to give me the code,” he said urgently, hands tightening.
Tony stared at him blankly. What code? Somewhere in the distance was the sound of more energy weapons going off, and then Tony realized what Bucky meant. After New York, Tony had gotten the go-ahead from the World Security Council to create a planetary defense system that consisted of two dozen satellites that were stationed in geosynchronous orbit around Earth; the right code would activate them and allow certain authorized users to direct the firepower. The code, of course, was a closely guarded secret; only Tony and Fury had it memorized, and the only place it was written down was inside Asgard’s vaults.
“If we’re under attack, then the worst has already happened,” Bucky continued, “and if something happens to you before-”
“Watch out!” Tony heard a warning crack from above and grabbed Bucky’s jacket, jerking him out of the way as part of the ceiling collapsed. He coughed as a cloud of plaster clogged the air, running his hands over Bucky and looking for wounds. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” Bucky said shortly, glancing down where a shard of concrete had ripped his left sleeve and given him a small cut. Tony blinked and stared at the cut as blood welled. “Come on, this place isn’t safe anymore.” He turned away, staring around him as if evaluating their avenues for escape.
“Uh, no. I don’t think so.” Tony took a step back away from the fake Bucky, scanning the room for a weapon.
To his – or her, or its, or whatever the hell this thing was – credit, it knew the jig was up and didn’t try to insult Tony’s intelligence by pretending otherwise. “Bucky’s” skin rippled and turned green, his hair disappearing to a smooth skull and ears stretching out to sharp points. “You will give me the code,” the alien snarled, pulling an unfamiliar weapon from behind his back and pointing it at Tony’s face.
“Or else what?” Tony challenged, taking another step back, out of the alien’s reach. “If you shoot me, I’m definitely not giving you the code.” Tony’s fingers twitched in a very particular way, and back at the wedding venue, hidden under the gifts table, pieces of an iron man suit whirred to life.
The weapon lowered until it was pointing at one of Tony’s knees. “I find that pain is a great motivator,” the alien growled. “If that does not convince you, how about the loved one whose face you followed so trustingly?” This time when it spoke, it was with Bucky’s voice. “Please, Tony,” it begged, eyes cold and hard even as its voice cracked. “Make it stop.”
Tony scowled and opened his mouth but flinched, hands coming up to shield his head, as the wall exploded beside them.
“Hey, darling,” the real Bucky said, rifle on his shoulder and trained on the alien. “Bad timing?”
When the green-skinned alien whirled to face this new threat, Tony punched it in the throat then kneed it in the temple when it bent over and started choking. The alien collapsed to the floor as Tony’s armor finally found him and started assembling itself around him. “Nah, it’s fine,” he said as he kicked the weapon away. “You okay?” He scanned Bucky from head to toe, lingering a little on the way back up because damn, he looked fine in a suit, but despite the alien’s threats, Bucky seemed unharmed.
“Yeah. Someone who looked like Steve came and said that he was arranging a last minute surprise for you, so like a dope I followed him and got ambushed.” Bucky stepped over the body and tapped him on his face mask, so Tony opened it and leaned in for Bucky’s kiss; with his armor on, they were the same height so it was nice to not have to tip his head up for a change. “Guess you were right when you said there was no way we were going to be able to get married without some bad guys interrupting us.”
“Good thing we actually tied the knot last week then,” Tony murmured against his mouth. He kissed him one more time then pulled away in alarm. “Wait, what about the alien ships?”
“That was all a really complicated diversion, it was actually one small ship with a sophisticated hologram. Thor overkilled it with a bunch of lightning and you should have seen the look on his face when he realized he had defeated something the size of a Cessna. So what did this guy want from you?” he asked, nudging the still unconscious, possibly dying bad guy. “Shapeshifter, right?”
“Yeah. It wanted the codes to EDITH.” Tony grabbed the alien and threw him over his shoulder; Fury could have a fun time interrogating him while Tony had his honeymoon.
“Are you ever going to tell me what that stands for?” Bucky asked as they picked their way through the debris to head back outside. If they were lucky they could probably still salvage the gifts.
“Nope,” Tony said, squinting as they emerged back out into the bright sunlight. “If everything goes as planned, you’ll never need to know.”