#porcelain
She is made of porcelain, ivory, marble. She looks down on her subjects and gives them wonders beyond their belief, and devastation that wreaks chaos.
Riri Stark is the face of every SI platform on the globe.
Riri Stark is Queen.
She is made of marble, steel, titanium. She looks down on her subjects and protects them from aliens and humans alike, no-one protecting her from the ones who pay for the damage.
Riri Stark is Iron Maiden.
Riri Stark is an Avenger.
But then she’s made of steel again, and marble and then ivory soon after – because General Ross is verdant and unafraid and is a bomb waiting to go off in a different way to Bruce. Guns – political, metaphorical, physical and the soon-to-be-raised are at the heads of her friends, her loved ones, her family, and fuck it, she’s tired, but she has a duty, and Steve is worse than a bull in a china-shop. He doesn’t see the big picture. For all his little sneaky tricks and cheats that come from his Brooklyn upbringing, Steve in no way at all is a politician, or a true chess-player.
Riri digresses.
If Steve had been a chess-player, Erskine wouldn’t have made him a super-soldier in the first place. But that doesn’t matter right now.
Right now, Riri is staring at a pregnancy test.
Ivory turns into porcelain, and then – as her mind turns and turns and turns and turns until rather than jerking cogs, everything is oil – that porcelain turns into diamond.
Her world is terrible and she doesn’t like it. Riri loves the people she leaves behind, but her baby’s welfare is more important than theirs. If she could take them, she would have, but Riri’s couple-dozen arc reactors produced barely enough power for the both of them. Stark Industries was be left in Pepper’s hands, as she had decided decades ago, and so would everything else – with the exception of FRIDAY, who had travelled with her.
The Iron Maiden suits, she had destroyed before leaving. And no way in hell was she letting any more of her children die or become something they were never supposed to be.
“Mother,” FRIDAY speaks through the Bluetooth headset in her ear as she plays with her pancakes with her fork, tearing Morse code for ‘happy birthday to me’ in the top. “I think your presence must have been detected somehow. I cannot tell who their employer is, but they are watching you, for certain.”
“I know,” Riri says, lips unmoving, before eating some of the pancakes. Tapping her Bluetooth, as if beginning a call, she flips through her New York Times and spoke loud enough for a normal headset to pick her voice up. “Nina Carbonell speaking.”
“I’ve secured you a new hotel room to place your belongings in while you’re out. The owner doesn’t like bugs on his clients, so any placed on your suitcase as you go past should hopefully be removed and neutralised.”
“Awesome. Give me directions, babe.” Riri stood, chucking a couple of random bills on the table, and grabbing her case, wheeling it out, feeling like Pepper as her fancy pencil skirt caused her walk to shorten and quicken at the same time. Usually she preferred longer, flowing skirts, either all the way to her ankles, or to her knees, that could flare out if she spun around – but she had to make the right kind of impression.
After all, her counterpart was looking for a PA and if Riri had anything to do with it, ‘Natalie Rushman’ wouldn’t be going near him.
Okay, Pepper was being super professional.
Riri was kind of disappointed.
“-and you’ll meet Tony tomorrow. JARVIS will direct you to where we are at the time, once you arrive at ten am. And I must warn you before you begin as his PA that Stark Industries does not want any form of lawsuit, so please tell me if Tony is being inappropriate.” Pepper grimaced, causing Riri to blanche a bit.
What was her counterpart like, if this was what got told to every close employee?
“I’ll tell you, don’t worry.” Riri pulls a tight smile, not looking forwards to any sort of advances he may make. “I’ll just go now, then?”
Pepper put a hand to her arm, “Have a nice afternoon. I’ll see you tomorrow.” Then she walked off, leaving Riri on her own. Watching her go, Riri began heading in the opposite direction, taking her usual route through the office – which wasn’t much changed from her old one, in the original universe – and finding herself frowning as she saw a dispute between an engineer and technician.
“Hey, what’s going on here?” She questioned, authority lacing her tone. The two men glanced over.
“None of your business, lady – this asshole just won’t fix the vending machine properly.” He jerked a thumb towards it – and indeed, the technician was doing a horrendous job. Making a noise of annoyance at SI property being treated in such a way, she pushed past them both, crouching down in her heels to fiddle with the broken latch.
“What are you doing?” The technician grabbed her shoulder, causing Riri to reach up instinctually to scratch at the offending appendage. He hissed, jumping back as she glared, before continuing to fix the machine – doing so in under a minute, most of that time being spent repairing what the technician had broken. She looked to the engineer.
“Report him. He was just making it worse. The only thing wrong with it was a loose latch into the door. If it doesn’t shut properly, it won’t function, yada yada – report him.”
“Doesn’t need to,” a voice suddenly boomed, sounding intrigued. “He’s fired and you are hired.” Riri tried to place the voice. FRIDAY supportively advised her to look up.
On a balcony, above the busy office warehouse, was her counterpart, staring at her with a grin.
“What you doing here anyway, gorgeous?” Riri couldn’t contain her facial expression at the endearment before she answered.
“Interview. I got it. We’re meeting officially tomorrow.”
“Ooh, you’re the new PA! Why is a mechanic my PA?” Her counterpart was just like in the magazines – brassy and confident, swaggering despite his stillness, at least the first time she looks. The second, Riri can see herself in him. She can see his pain and his demons, the shadows under his eyes prominent but thankfully not echoing his impending doom. “What’s your name?”
“Nina and I was a mechanic long before I got into the assisting business,” Riri replied clearly, before turning her back on him and leaving, ignoring his parting remarks and wishes for her to stay and chat.
She’d see him tomorrow, anyhow.
Natasha is there.
How is she here when I’ve taken her job? Riri stares at the assassin, wondering just what she was doing in the gym with them. Natasha raises an eyebrow.
“Something wrong?”
“…Natasha Romanoff,” is Riri’s clever reply. Natasha turns and gives her a fraction more attention. “What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be somewhere, I don’t know, chasing down bad guys and rescuing fair circus-men?” Natasha doesn’t reply, but does fully turn now, ignoring Tony Stark and Pepper as she looks Riri up and down.
“I have no idea what you’re on about.”
“Really, Tasha?” Riri mutters under her breath, not meaning to say it aloud, even though she does. “What are you doing here?
“I’m the new PA. What about you?”
“Really?” Riri scrunches up her nose, glancing at Pepper. “Are we vying for the position or working together? I don’t know.” She looks to Tony Stark, eyebrow raised in preparation. But Tony Stark himself seems amused.
“Pep? What’s going on?”
“You’re getting two PA’s,” Pepper explains as Riri internally groans. Two assistants? What could be worse? “Until one of them cracks, at least.”
Riri raises her other eyebrow.
Pepper’s got more spunk in this universe.
“Awesome,” Tony Stark replies, seemingly chipper. “What if I want to fire Natashalie because she isn’t a mechanic like Nina, eh?”
“Call her Ms Carbonell, Tony,” Pepper hands Riri a clipboard, which she pages through, only to look up sharply as Tony chokes on his drink.
“Car- Carbonell?” He stares at her with a new interest, eyes wide, if not a little bloodshot. “You look like me.”
Riri blinks.
Oh. He caught on quick.
“I’m your cousin,” Riri replies after a second, and FRIDAY informing her that digital papers were already being laid – but that JARVIS was on her tail, and catching up, and she had better not say anything more on the matter. “And that’s all I’m saying for now. I’d rather just have this job, thanks.”
Tony points at her.
“You’re my cousin? On what side?”
Riri’s eye twitches at his behaviour as FRIDAY informs her that Maria is now her non-existent father’s cousin, once removed. Riri knows her family history well enough to take it from there. But…
“I already said I wasn’t going to tell you anything more right now.” She looks at the clipboard in her grasp, flipping through it again and manoeuvring around Pepper to approach him, tucking a pen into the free hand that holds the disgusting vitamin shake. “Sign. Now.”
“Can we play twenty-questions? Are you even my cousin? Ooh!” he wiggles his boxing glove-covered hand, gasping theatrically. Riri’s lip twitches.
“Sign.”
He pouts, but signs, “Spoilsport.” Riri glances back at Natasha, who is watching her carefully.
I’m going to have to be careful. Very, very careful.