When it was time, Sally walked to the podium. She held her notes tightly in her hand. She paused, adjusting the microphone. Her eyes scanned the crowd, looking for the one person whose opinion in this mattered. The one person who she did not dare let down. Sally found where her mother was sitting. Toni looked at her, raised her chin in the familiar, stubborn way that Sally knew so well. She nodded once, and Sally nodded back.
"Ladies and gentlemen," she said softly. "I would like to take this moment to introduce you all to the woman who brings me here tonight. Not Maria Stark, but Ms. Toni Anne Stetins. My mother." Sally pointed, and the unknown person crewing the spotlight obligingly turned to follow. Toni smiled at Sally while the audience applauded briefly. Politely.
"It's not that I'm ungrateful to the Maria Stark Foundation," Sally continued as the applause died away. "It's merely that I know where the money for this scholarship originates. And while I have nothing but pride in and gratitude towards Toni Stetins, I have nothing but contempt for the policies that Stark money supports for our nation and the world."
The crowd went still. Sally glanced at her notes for a moment. She didn't need them. She looked at her mother again. Toni gave her a firm, possibly emphatic, thumbs-up. Sally set her notes flat at spoke directly to the crowd, her voice louder. Stronger.
"The patents and technologies produced by Stark Industries could benefit the world. Instead, Stark monies and products are used to arm SHIELD, a grievously mis-named organization that enforces American foreign policy on the world. At the point of a gun -- or, now, the threat of metahuman intervention. These policies are equally imposed on the domestic front, where Stark and SHIELD have embarked on a program of arresting and registering people based not on their acts, but on accidents of birth."
Sally looked directly at Tony Stark. "Bolivar Trask and Robert Kelly would be very proud," she said. "But I have read your mother's biography, Mr. Stark. I don't think she would feel the same." She looked away. "I thank the Maria Stark Foundation for their generous gift. I hope to make good use of it. I hope to make something that Maria Stark would view with approval. Thank you all for your time."
Sally stepped away from the podium and turned to find her seat.
Tony was only surprised for a second. It wasn't the kind of speech that a man expected to hear from a girl to whom he had just arranged to give a large amount of money and, potentially, a job. But it was the kind of speech he should have expected to hear from the girl he remembered raising for almost sixteen years.
The implications of this thought are still swirling around in his brain, when Sally finishes, and Pepper speaks into his brain. My God, Tony, you did hit on her!
"Have a little faith, Pep," he said, out loud. He patted her arm, then got to his feet. There was a smattering of applause, and a few catcalls after Sally spoke, but mostly dead silence. Except for the reporters, in the back, buzzing on their cell phones. They had been expecting a routine event. What they were getting was yet another Tony Stark public relations train wreck. But, as Tony approached the podium, he couldn't stop smiling. His hadn't felt this clear for a long time.
"That, my friends," he said, taking the mike in hand and looking in the girl's direction. "That is Sally Stetins. Because she is, as you have repeatedly been told by tonight's speakers and by the people I employ to beg you for money, one of America's best and brightest. Because she is sixteen, she might also be under the impression that she's saying something I've never heard before. And --" Using his organic tech, he scanned the crowd and picked out one of the dozen camera phones busy filming this, flashed a smile. "If this isn't all on YouTube in half an hour, I don't know anything about America. Now -- I guess I ought to have something to say for myself."
Apparently, Tony did know a thing or two about America. Another dozen camera phones came out as he watched. He could have used Extremis to blow them all to hell, but that wouldn't be very sportsmanlike. Politics was politics, and as he had recently told Jean Grey about a not entirely dissimilar situation, it was your own fault if you let somebody beat you at your own game.
Tony smiled for the cameras; all of them.
"But," he continued. "I'm not on this stage to talk about myself. I'm not even on this stage to talk about young Miss Stetins, formidable though she may be. My place at this point in the program, is to talk about a man who was very important to my life, and to the Maria Stark Foundation. Mr. Harold Hogan who --" He thought he had been ready for this, but in all the conflicting emotion of the past minutes, his voice caught "--who died last year. If I could have Alex Ramirez stand? This young man from Red Bank, New Jersey is the recipient of the newly endowed Hogan Scholarship." After waiting for applause, he gestured to Pepper. "And this is Pepper Potts, executive secretary of the foundation, and the woman Happy had the good sense to marry -- we called him Happy, you know if you knew him, because he wouldn't crack a smile if his life depended on it. Only, this lady -- this lady could get one out of him, and he knew a good thing when he saw it, and he -- Sorry."
Tony dabbed at his eye, and the tears were completely genuine; so was the feeling that, if Sally was really still the Sally he knew, she was feeling like at least a little bit of an asshole. He cleared his throat and prepared for the homestretch.
"I've been trying to think --" Tony spoke in a clear voice, tears disposed of. He pulled the prepared speech from his breast pocket and began to unfold it. "I've been trying to put into words exactly what that quality was that Happy Hogan possessed. Loyalty is an easy one -- he stuck with me through more disastrous schemes than I dare to recount." A few laughs rose from the audience. He wasn't sure whether they were laughing at him, or with him, but at least they were recovering from the earlier silence.
"You know what, though? It's not about loyalty. Unthinking loyalty, pardon my French, doesn't get you shit. What set happy apart, what made him one of the -- very rare, very important people in my life. Happy was a close friend. He was also an employee. He never forgot who signed the checks, but, when push came to shove, the man just didn't care. He said what he thought. A man in a million. 'The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,' et cetera --" This time Tony didn't think about the tears he was wiping away.
"The Quakers have a name for this -- this quality that my friend possessed. They call it --" and now his gaze turned subtly toward Sally "-- speaking truth to power. Now." He coughed. "Miss Stetins." And now he turned full-on to look at her. "Miss Stetins believes she has taken such a step. I -- well, I cannot agree, on the subject of truth. I believe that the things I do are right; I believe that the choices I make are the best choices. Otherwise, I would not make them. However. Putting aside the nature of truth, and of power, for the moment -- it takes a lot of guts to speak your mind to the man who signs the checks. You're a brave young lady, Sally Stetins. Thank you for your words." He tapped the podium, and turned one last obliging smile at the sea of cameras. "Thank you for support. Excelsior."
Sally held her mother's hand, her grip painfully tight. As Mr. Stark, spoke, though, she glanced at Toni, quickly. confused. Her mother leaned over. "I told you he'd think it took guts, kiddo," she whispered. Sally stared at the man through his speech. When he looked at her, she reluctantly nodded. Not agreement. More like, a truce.
"Ladies and gentlemen," she said softly. "I would like to take this moment to introduce you all to the woman who brings me here tonight. Not Maria Stark, but Ms. Toni Anne Stetins. My mother." Sally pointed, and the unknown person crewing the spotlight obligingly turned to follow. Toni smiled at Sally while the audience applauded briefly. Politely.
"It's not that I'm ungrateful to the Maria Stark Foundation," Sally continued as the applause died away. "It's merely that I know where the money for this scholarship originates. And while I have nothing but pride in and gratitude towards Toni Stetins, I have nothing but contempt for the policies that Stark money supports for our nation and the world."
The crowd went still. Sally glanced at her notes for a moment. She didn't need them. She looked at her mother again. Toni gave her a firm, possibly emphatic, thumbs-up. Sally set her notes flat at spoke directly to the crowd, her voice louder. Stronger.
"The patents and technologies produced by Stark Industries could benefit the world. Instead, Stark monies and products are used to arm SHIELD, a grievously mis-named organization that enforces American foreign policy on the world. At the point of a gun -- or, now, the threat of metahuman intervention. These policies are equally imposed on the domestic front, where Stark and SHIELD have embarked on a program of arresting and registering people based not on their acts, but on accidents of birth."
Sally looked directly at Tony Stark. "Bolivar Trask and Robert Kelly would be very proud," she said. "But I have read your mother's biography, Mr. Stark. I don't think she would feel the same." She looked away. "I thank the Maria Stark Foundation for their generous gift. I hope to make good use of it. I hope to make something that Maria Stark would view with approval. Thank you all for your time."
Sally stepped away from the podium and turned to find her seat.
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The implications of this thought are still swirling around in his brain, when Sally finishes, and Pepper speaks into his brain. My God, Tony, you did hit on her!
"Have a little faith, Pep," he said, out loud. He patted her arm, then got to his feet. There was a smattering of applause, and a few catcalls after Sally spoke, but mostly dead silence. Except for the reporters, in the back, buzzing on their cell phones. They had been expecting a routine event. What they were getting was yet another Tony Stark public relations train wreck. But, as Tony approached the podium, he couldn't stop smiling. His hadn't felt this clear for a long time.
"That, my friends," he said, taking the mike in hand and looking in the girl's direction. "That is Sally Stetins. Because she is, as you have repeatedly been told by tonight's speakers and by the people I employ to beg you for money, one of America's best and brightest. Because she is sixteen, she might also be under the impression that she's saying something I've never heard before. And --" Using his organic tech, he scanned the crowd and picked out one of the dozen camera phones busy filming this, flashed a smile. "If this isn't all on YouTube in half an hour, I don't know anything about America. Now -- I guess I ought to have something to say for myself."
Reply
Tony smiled for the cameras; all of them.
"But," he continued. "I'm not on this stage to talk about myself. I'm not even on this stage to talk about young Miss Stetins, formidable though she may be. My place at this point in the program, is to talk about a man who was very important to my life, and to the Maria Stark Foundation. Mr. Harold Hogan who --" He thought he had been ready for this, but in all the conflicting emotion of the past minutes, his voice caught "--who died last year. If I could have Alex Ramirez stand? This young man from Red Bank, New Jersey is the recipient of the newly endowed Hogan Scholarship." After waiting for applause, he gestured to Pepper. "And this is Pepper Potts, executive secretary of the foundation, and the woman Happy had the good sense to marry -- we called him Happy, you know if you knew him, because he wouldn't crack a smile if his life depended on it. Only, this lady -- this lady could get one out of him, and he knew a good thing when he saw it, and he -- Sorry."
Tony dabbed at his eye, and the tears were completely genuine; so was the feeling that, if Sally was really still the Sally he knew, she was feeling like at least a little bit of an asshole. He cleared his throat and prepared for the homestretch.
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"You know what, though? It's not about loyalty. Unthinking loyalty, pardon my French, doesn't get you shit. What set happy apart, what made him one of the -- very rare, very important people in my life. Happy was a close friend. He was also an employee. He never forgot who signed the checks, but, when push came to shove, the man just didn't care. He said what he thought. A man in a million. 'The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,' et cetera --" This time Tony didn't think about the tears he was wiping away.
"The Quakers have a name for this -- this quality that my friend possessed. They call it --" and now his gaze turned subtly toward Sally "-- speaking truth to power. Now." He coughed. "Miss Stetins." And now he turned full-on to look at her. "Miss Stetins believes she has taken such a step. I -- well, I cannot agree, on the subject of truth. I believe that the things I do are right; I believe that the choices I make are the best choices. Otherwise, I would not make them. However. Putting aside the nature of truth, and of power, for the moment -- it takes a lot of guts to speak your mind to the man who signs the checks. You're a brave young lady, Sally Stetins. Thank you for your words." He tapped the podium, and turned one last obliging smile at the sea of cameras. "Thank you for support. Excelsior."
And he took his seat.
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The reception should be interesting.
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