Comments | notawastedlife: [for Pepper] Down to Earth.

notawastedlife

[for Pepper] Down to Earth.

Jan 04, 2011 11:17

It had been a hell of a day. It wasn't exactly over yet, and frankly he'd still be up there if Jarvis hadn't started harping on about the fact that he was running out of residual power and he'd left his arc reactor back with Pepper. Who was probably a little bit... there might be an issue there. Still, he couldn't have come running back immediately ( Read more... )

stark: reassembled, pepper

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wildlyconflictd January 4 2011, 02:20:38 UTC

After the second hour, Pepper had sent Peter home. It had taken some doing, but ultimately claiming that she wanted to be alone had convinced him, and wasn't that appropriate? Wasn't that what people requested when they were in mourning?

Be right back.

Tony hadn't been right back.

For awhile she'd waited, in the workshop and then on the front balcony, first with Peter and then without. She'd waited, time like a vise around her chest, every minute that ticked by tightening it just a little more. Stunned, powerless, she'd eventually wandered into Tony's bedroom, laid down atop the meticulously made bed and stared numbly at the wall.

"I'm not ready yet," she whispered, manicured fingers curling into the coverlet.

wildlyconflictd January 5 2011, 07:28:34 UTC

"I swam to shore from a sinking yacht in the middle of a hurricane," she reminded him, and stepped crisply toward the exit. That she didn't particularly want to swim home was irrelevant. She could do it, if she wanted to.

notawastedlife January 5 2011, 07:33:43 UTC

"It's further than-" he said, catching up. "I'll fly back and borrow a boat, how about that."

wildlyconflictd January 5 2011, 07:39:45 UTC

"That's just ridiculous," Pepper said and stopped so that she could turn back to look at him. "Why did you have to ruin this? Why? It's like a compulsion, with you!"

notawastedlife January 5 2011, 07:41:55 UTC

"Well, obviously I didn't mean to," he said, "I think we can agree on that. It's not- you don't actually think it's on purpose."

She didn't, right?

...it wasn't, right?

wildlyconflictd January 5 2011, 07:52:35 UTC

"I don't know what I think! Maybe it's subconscious, god knows you have enough issues for that!" Pepper shot back, flinging a hand uselessly through the air before letting it drop heavily back at her side.

"You know what my problem is, Tony? You don't try. I understand that everything has just fallen in your lap your entire life, but I thought that for me, you would actually make some kind of effort."

notawastedlife January 5 2011, 08:00:42 UTC

"This is- I honestly think you're getting not trying mixed up with doing a terrible job," Tony said, in all seriousness. "I'm not good at this. Figuring out actual priorities is a new thing, it's still -- I still think this is one, I think this is the right call, here -- I'm still getting the hang of it. I could have arranged it better."

wildlyconflictd January 5 2011, 08:16:15 UTC

"I am not trying to keep you from your space station," Pepper bit out. "Do you honestly think that's what I'm trying to do here? This is not about this place." Which, for the record, was an utterly surreal location to be having this sort of fight.

"When you do a terrible job at this," she motioned from Tony to herself, "it hurts. Because you can say you want to be with me all day long, but it means nothing if you're not acting like it. Has it occurred to you to apologize for what you did today? You just- You just- Gah! Be right back? That's what you say to me when you might die?"

notawastedlife January 5 2011, 08:18:38 UTC

"I wasn't going to- that's what I say when I'm going to be right back!" he said. "I gave you the arc reactor! That was symbolic, that thing is practically my heart, I literally gave you my- you made that whole ornament- no? I thought that was pretty good!"

wildlyconflictd January 5 2011, 08:23:59 UTC

"Oh my god! You threw it at me!" Pepper gaped. "Never mind that had your plan worked out, it would have rendered that one obsolete. And have you forgotten that you weren't right back? How many times did I need to say I thought you were going to die before you clued into the fact that I thought you were going to die?"

notawastedlife January 5 2011, 08:29:53 UTC

"You can't render a symbolic gesture-" he said, then stopped, took a breath, pressed metal-clad fingers to his forehead. Was a little faith that when he said he wasn't going to die, he wasn't going to die too much to ask?

...well, okay, maybe a little too much.

"It wasn't charmingly self-assured? No. Well. I'm sorry you thought I was going to die."

The disclaimer just kind of slipped out at the end. Unfortunate reflex. He had said this wasn't his strong suit.

wildlyconflictd January 5 2011, 08:33:33 UTC

"No." Pepper stared up at him, hands pressed to her hips. "Be sorry that you caused it."

notawastedlife January 5 2011, 08:41:37 UTC

"I... am?" he said, but he didn't sound entirely sure. He firmed up his voice. "No, I am. I don't think it was warranted, but I am. Certainly."

wildlyconflictd January 5 2011, 08:51:30 UTC

"I don't believe you."

Pepper turned and continued striding down the hall, trying to remember which turns they had taken earlier. She hadn't been paying attention as well as she should have been, but then she hadn't expected to have to show herself out. Maybe she should have.

Stopping at an unfamiliar turn, her shoulders slumped. "Please just take me home," she said, her back still to Tony. "I'm tired of trying to bully you into caring about me."

notawastedlife January 5 2011, 08:57:58 UTC

He'd opened his mouth a couple of times, behind her, but closed it because, at this point, there didn't seem like much he could do. Convincing her didn't seem like it was on the cards. He couldn't see a way to do it. He wasn't being bullied into it. Bullied into expressing it, a little, right then, but that was not a distinction he could see working if said.

"...okay," he said, instead. "This way."

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