Chapter 11- Tony POV
Tony POV
Tony was unsure which had been more surprising. The Aliens that arrived with Thor, Clint apologizing (probably because of Laura), or Wanda acting less Wicked Witch of the West towards him (probably because of Vision). It didn’t really matter right now. The suit vanished into his arc reactor as Tony began to walk back to the lab. Whether it was conscious or not he took a route specifically avoiding the hall the Rogue Avengers were staying in.
“What time was the meeting again?” he asked FRIDAY glancing at his watch.
“16:00 boss.” 5 hours then, “Speaking of time, I must insist you take your medication.” Tony sighed.
“Now, now, FRIDAY, drugs are bad for you.” he could practically feel FRIDAY rolling her A.Eyes. (A/N: I’m sorry I had to).
“Only ones not required and prescribed by a Medical Professional.” Tony stayed silent turning a corner to cross through the common area and see if T’challa had coffee, he was almost out. “It would help with your discomfort.”
“That would be true if there was any discomfort,” Tony replied rummaging through the cupboards and ignoring the painful aching from his left arm.
“Boss, I must insist.” Tony rolled his eyes pulling out a bag of coffee beans and standing to continue to the labs.
“FRIDAY, I took the pills for ages after being prescribed them. My arm doesn’t even hurt anymore.” He examined the bag, Wakanda has some weird smelling coffee.
“Taking the medicine for 23 days is not ages and ignoring your obvious lie, long-term symptoms of frostbite include chronic pain which you have mentioned in your… drunker… moments.”
“You seem to be taking personality from Pepper,” Tony grumbled putting down the weird smelling coffee. I’ll just find buy some. “Have you guys been having secret conversati- Jesus! Romanoff?! Give me a heart attack why don’t you.” Turning to head to his lab he had found Natasha standing by the door and looking at him, the usual unreadable expression on her face. Tony walked towards the door that led to his lab.
“Fri, can you send someone to find more coffee? American coffee not whatever this Wakandan stuff is.” He passed Natasha who followed him with her eyes. How much had she heard? Enough that her eyes darted to his arm.
“Tony.” He stopped and looked at her, mask in place.
“Mm-Hm?” That stupid panic coming back and clawing at his insides.
“Are you okay?” Remain calm, remain calm.
“Course I am, I’m Tony Stark.” He raised an eyebrow smirking. She glared at him looking almost as if she was sad. Turning quickly Tony continued on his way down to his lab.
--
“Boss you’re meeting is in 30 minutes,” informed FRIDAY. Tony nodded and swiped aside the plans he had been making for a new type of nanobot that would be more durable than his current ones.
“Has someone found coffee?”
“Yes, there is coffee in the kitchen,” FRIDAY replied. Tony smiled and standing up headed to the kitchen where FRIDAY had already started making the coffee.
“You know Fri, maybe I should make a holographic thing for you so you can have a body.” Tony pondered pulling out a mug and watching the dark liquid as it bubbled in the pot.
“I don’t understand the need for that, however, it seems a reasonable plan,” she replied. The reason? So I don’t have to be so alone.
“Add it to the To-Do list would you Fri?” He said pouring the now finished coffee into the mug and heading back to his lab.
“Of course Boss. Also, Colonel Rhodes is waiting for you in your lab.” Tony hummed in understanding as he drunk, Ah Coffee, a drink of the gods.
“Hey, Rhodey,” Tony said as he entered his lab and saw Rhodey sitting on a stool.
“Tony. We should head to the meeting, Princess Shuri has already headed up.”
“Did Peter go as well?” Rhodey nodded.
“I think so, he seemed interested in some aliens that Thor brought back.”
“The Guardians of the Galaxy” Tony downed the last of the coffee and pulled on his black and orange jacket.
“You okay Tony? I haven’t seen you these past few days.” Tony put on a pair of sunglasses connected to Friday and smiled at Rhodey.
“Been working, which reminds me, I have a new prototype for Warmachine.” Rhodey looked at him worried, attempting to hide the excitement in his eyes.
“How much have you been sleeping?”
“Funny you should ask, Pepper, asked me that just yesterday.”
“That’s not an answer Tones.”
“I have slept enough, besides we need to be prepared for the evil space dude intent on killing us all.” Rhodey sighed and stood up. Tony smirked, “Let’s head out then, better not keep the Lion King waiting.” Rhodey rolled his eyes and followed Tony out of the lab. As they walked up to the room that T’challa said the meeting would be in Tony explained the new suit.
“It’s got some alien inspired weaponry, like based off what I gathered after the Chitauri invasion and from the infinity stones, use their tech against them and stuff like that.” Rhodey was nodding along looking around for the room.
“Which room are we going to again?” he interrupted.
“Some media room, apparently he wants to show some videos.”
“But where is it?”
“Take the next right and it is the third door on your left,” instructed FRIDAY. Following her instructions, they entered the room to find a smallish cinema and everyone there except T’challa. Peter immediately bounced up to them.
“Tony, Tony! The aliens that Thor brought back are so cool! The one that isn’t actually an alien but is from Earth is also called Peter!” Tony immediately smiled at the kid's excitement.
“That’s pretty neat,” he was carefully avoiding Steve’s eyes. “Apparently they’re the Space Avengers.” Peter nodded eagerly and was about to say something else when T’challa walked in with Shuri who was carrying a box.
“It is good to see that everyone’s here.” He looked at the Guardians interest in his face. “For those who don’t know, Thor has recruited the Guardians of the Galaxy to help u fight Thanos.” After a quick round of introductions, T’challa continued, “Four of the Infinity Stones are in our possession and in the Wakandan Vaults and the Time Stone is with Dr Strange.”
“Are we really ignoring the elephant in the room?” asked Loki who Tony now noticed was leaning against the wall near Thor.
“Which one of them is an elephant?” Tony heard the blue guy, was his name Drax? mutter.
“Which elephant do you mean Reindeer Games? There are so many it’s hard to tell,” asked Tony.
“The fact that Gamora here is the daughter of Thanos, the person we are currently fighting.” Following these words, there was a dead silence. Quill moved protectively in front of Gamora who swatted him away hissing at him in some alien language.
“That’s pretty rich coming from someone who worked for Thanos,” growled Gamora at Loki who scowled.
“I was a fool blinded by emotions. You, however, seemed perfectly capable of standing up to Thanos.”
“He wouldn’t have cared.”
“That’s not the point.” They had begun to move towards each other and somehow Loki had gotten his hands on some daggers.
“Loki…” warned Thor moving towards his brother.
“Thanos is no father of mine.” snarled Gamora glaring at Loki.
“How do we know we can trust you though.” countered Loki.
“Um, guys. Can you stop that now?” asked Quill, hand near his gun.
“Get me near Thanos and I’ll kill him myself. Gladly,” growled Gamora ignoring Quill.
“What if you kill us first?” Loki lifted a dagger, that was enough for Thor who stepped in between them.
“Brother, you of all people should know that families can be tough and filled with hatred most of the time. We allowed you to turn over a new leaf so we should allow Lady Gamora.” he then promptly plucked the daggers out of Loki’s hands and dragged the angry god back to the edge of the room giving an apologetic look at Gamora.
“So we trust you? I guess,” said Scott slightly confused.
“Well Thor trusts you and even though his judgement can be odd sometimes you seem okay,” Clint said glancing pointedly at Loki when saying this.
“Moving on, my brother found this package on his desk the other day,” stated Shuri holding up the package.
“Indeed, I got a letter accompanying it that said the disks that I found inside the package won’t play without the other Avengers here and also another Letter which appeared to be under the same circumstances, so…” He opened the package and pulled out an envelope that seemed to have a soft glow to it.
“That’s definitely magical,” stated Strange intrigued. T’challa opened the letter and began to read out loud.
“Dear Avengers & Co. Glad to see you managed to gather together to watch the videos. On these disks are details on the Avengers, Guardians, and so on. More specifically the people hiding things that could damage the team and take away your ability to work well together. Included are things such as Origin stories,” Tony tensed at that. “Important events or battles, or information that may help in your battle against Thanos. The room is enchanted so no one can leave now that you are in here and I got some help from a friend to enchant the room so that each day you spend in here is a second outside the room. I have also made it so the adjoining room that is normally a bathroom is now connected to not only a bathroom but also several bedrooms and in the room are some other… relaxants… for those who have painful memories in the videos and would prefer not to relive those moments. Happy Watching! Sincerely Syn.” At the end of the reading, Tony along with everyone else had stilled in either shock, worry, fear, or surprise. In Tony’s case, it was all four. He immediately moved towards the door and attempted to open it.
“Well, Syn wasn’t lying about the door thing. FRIDAY? Any chance of getting this open?” There was no reply. “FRIDAY?” still nothing, “oh crap.” Tony formed a gauntlet around his arm and activated the repulsor. The beam of energy didn’t even touch the door instead dissolving into some magical shield. “Well, we aren’t leaving anytime soon then.” he turned to find everyone looking at him the same expressions on their faces that had appeared after the reading.
“Who’s Syn?” asked Wanda confused.
“The name sounds familiar,” Thor said thinking.
“Do you not remember Brother?” smirked Loki, “Syn was the Goddess of Truth, she left Asgard to go on an expedition before we were born. No one heard from her since.”
“Of course, you always did pay more attention in our lessons.” smiled Thor. “Do you know her Brunhilde?” Valkyrie sighed.
“Yes, she helped your father with some stuff in Hela’s time. She seemed trustworthy.”
“We should watch the disks then.” decided Wong. Strange nodded in agreement.
“If they are about the people in this room it will be simple to tell if they are lies,” stated Vision from where he floated near Wanda. They may have made up noted Tony.
T’challa picked up the disk labelled 1 and moved towards a DVD player in the wall beside the giant screen of the cinema. Everyone took seats. Tony sat near the back with Rhodey, Peter, Bruce, T’challa, Shuri and several of the others. The Rogues others sat in front of them. The screen lit up to reveal white words on a black background.
I forgot to mention. The disks cannot be removed once place in the player. Sorry about that, precautions you know? The First video is an origin story. The person that it’s about, I’m sorry, this will be bad, really quite bad.
“Who has the worst origin story in the room?” asked Scott looking around.
“That could mean at least half of us,” said Barnes, the worry clear on his face. Crap, crap, crap, crap. A bad origin story, check, the source of distrust and confusion in the team? Check, please don’t be about me, please don’t be about me, please… Tony chanted in his head mask firmly in place, Rhodey glanced at him in worry, he might’ve put the pieces together, or maybe it was because Tony had become unnaturally stiff and still.
Remember you can leave the room at any time. Again I’m sorry. Without further ado, here is the origin story of IRON MAN. -Syn.
Fuck.