exsiliumlogs | closed | out of suffering, have emerged the strongest souls;

Entry tags:

closed | out of suffering, have emerged the strongest souls;

Date & Time: Moderately close to post date, albeit earlier in the afterevening.
Location: Tony's workshop, dawg.
Characters: Tony and Pepper ~~and potentially Jules?~~ and no one else at all.
Summary: Grilling, baby. And playing 20 questions. It'll be a real party.
Warnings: General warning for Tony.

[ Tony's in his workshop.

It's such a redundant phrase. Tony's usually in his workshop. He's building things, he's smashing others, he's hanging out, he's working out, he's talking to himself, he's singing along to music - he's just, being, in his workshop. But it makes him happy and sometimes Max drops by and sometimes Ros drops by and sometimes someone who needs something drops by - although he's going to at some point probably have to put his workshop in CM somewhere, because it would be moderately dumb to have two with such limited resources and that's where he wants people to be finding him anyway.

But yes. Tony's in his workshop. By this point, he's shown Pepper where it is, shown Pepper how to ping off certain people's locations on the network if you want to find them and they have their device with them. (It doesn't always work, because it's possible to block that, but for the laymen, it's kind of fun. He feels like he's got a cooler version of the Marauder's map, with more buttons.) She's off doing... something, right now, he doesn't remember, but in the meantime, he's just chilling out. He'd had a lot of energy today for some reason, and still does, so every now and then he's up to do some exercise, and then when he's a little calmer, he gets back to business. ]

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[ The something she's off doing is the something he's neglected for what appears to be years. Hardly likely since he'd told her he'd only been in Exsilium "a few months", but she honestly doubts that the more she tries to sort through things and figure them out and add some kind of order to them. What she really needs is to sit him down to discuss them and more (she's made a list), but that's like asking a million impossible things to become probable at once. Which, she knows, isn't going to happen unless she does something to make it happen.

So, she's finding her way back to his workshop in a way that says she's done this so many times before. And she has. If he hadn't been with her or off being Iron Man or a combination of the two, he'd be there. They've had some of their finer arguments in his workshop, their better moments as well. It makes sense for everything to come back to that point anyway, and once she's there, she has her Very Serious face on because this is business. Sometimes, she dislikes it as much as he does, but there's always far less drama attached when she deals with it.

Getting his attention is new since she can't very well start talking - less to and more at - and though it's frustrating, she's bossy enough to get it done with little time wasted. ]

I need you to tell me exactly what it is you've been doing here. And with who. Maybe we should start with that first.

Edited 2013-04-10 07:05 (UTC)

[ It does take a bit more effort to get his attention than it did before - which was admittedly already difficult - but at least now he makes a bit more of an attempt to pay attention to her once he realizes that's what she's doing. Honestly, he's happy she's here, he's just working out of acting the way he was before, and the way he did before... all of here.

However. That.

Well, the fact that he takes it somewhat hostilely is simply testament to the negativity of the way he felt before she arrived, and is still working on, perhaps a guilty conscience now that his conscience is here for him to look guilty in front of, and having what he perceives as his own space invaded to ask something so directly. Almost accusatively.

But he's pretty good at mimicking passivity when he feels like it. ] You want like, a day to day list of actions or can I summarize it in bullet points?

[ She's not entirely sure how he would have gotten any sort of tone from text anyway. It's text; there's no specific pattern to it, not what she's typed out at least. She only gives him a look in response - since that's all she has without her voice - and sets to typing. ]

Don't give me that. I need names if I'm going to arrange everything. I also need to know if you've - [ There's a pause, pursing her lips in an effort to decide how to delicately phrase it. ] - offended anyone.

[ Formal apologies and the like. Or if there are people she needs to avoid simply because he is who he is, and she knows there's at least one somewhere out there. Probably. ]

[ He has a very imaginative mind, okay. He's totally capable of filling in the blanks. Also okay, wow, falling right back into old routines, the pair of them.

Except. ] I haven't - [ He needs to double-check, just a moment. ] I haven't offended anybody. You just want to know about all the people I've interacted with. [ You're not actively... accusing him of anything, okay. He wasn't sure for a second. ]

I can do that. But like. Honestly, half the people are gone. There's not that many who stick around. [ And he's semi-returning to what he was working on, since this is normal again. ] I don't know why. Fate, maybe. Who knows, here. I told you the first few though - do you need them again?

[ There's half a shrug in there somewhere, the look she gives him saying as much. She does want to know about all the people he's interacted with, and she thinks she's, at the very least, entitled to some of that. If not all. ]

No, I don't need those. I remember, even if you listed them [ She deletes that. This is not something worth arguing about, and she has a million other things to ask anyway. ] Just the people who are still here will be fine. Also - [ That pause again, a tilt of her head. ] - We have to settle on a time and place since those are important, so I need you to focus for one second and help me.

[ She doesn't add the 'Because I still don't know enough about this place yet'. ]

[ Well, okay, he's not semi-returning to what he was working on. It's an effort anyway. Mentally, still sort of there, but for the moment his hands aren't moving. It was the italics. ]

I don't care when we do it - whenever's good with everybody's training schedules and stuff. My prior engagements can basically all be switched around enough to accommodate things. The place... [ He considers the people he knows, and how well he feels suggesting a bar will go over. ] There's not really a. Gathering place here. I mean, we could - CM just sort of opened, it's not really a party place, but, it's better than going to Moon or staying in the Hold.

[ She's not so much typing to communicate as she is to make notes. She'll look into CM, doesn't bother putting the Hold on the list at all, and makes sure to look into Moon so she knows what it is and where. Just in case. Always a just in case. Plans for the plans that might fall through. ]

Okay. I'll figure it out first, and we can go over it again later. What about [ There's a second to glance around his workshop, then back at him. ] Has anyone contracted you? Clients? Your time is still valuable, so that's something else to consider.

[ There is so much weird technology and so many other people who seem to know how to use it - even though he's still totally the best, nothing's ever changing that - that he's not totally sure how he finagled everything he's got so far. But he's going to be at least fairly straightforward and just tell her whatever he thinks of, because it's not as though he wants to make any of her jobs more difficult right now. That'll be more for later, whenever this strange patience has worn off. ]

I mess around in the Initiative labs sometimes, but most of my work is contracted out through various exiles. Not really any one particular account, just a whole bunch of different ones - that's why it took so long to build things up this much. Half of this place is built out of shit I found here and on missions. I am more than willing to send you that list too though. I've done a little bit with the transports, but hopefully it'll be CM that gets me the resources to do more in that area.

[ She takes a second, lightly rubbing at her forehead in thought. This is going to take so much more time than she'd figured, even allowing for months, and while not reluctant, it's things she has to fix before it can work properly. ]

Send everything to me. Don't forget, or we'll have to do this again. [ An obvious he might need pointed out. There's time then to lean back and relax, look at him a little. ] Are you [ Delete, delete, delete. ] Have you really only been here a few months?

[ Because it's been bothering her, and she just can't seem to get it out of her head. ]

Look, I'll send it right now, okay, I'm sending it. [ He actually looks like he's going back to what he was doing. Again. He's not touching his tablet, but lo and behold, there's the information she's getting. Whoops.

Reading that makes him pause though, and he looks up at her for a single moment, right in the eye, and it's about as close to a 'no I lied' look as Tony ever gets.

And then he's brushing it off. ] It might have been longer than that.

[ Her mouth drops a bit in accusation because there's that look, and it's right on the tip of her tongue what she's going to ask him. Forget half of the other things they'd just spent talking about. ]

How much longer? [ And it case he doesn't see it the first time, she types it again entirely in capital letters. ]

[ See and it's not fair that he can lie to other people fairly well and not to her, because she's the one he feels like he needs to hide the most of his faults from. He obviously doesn't want to answer this question directly, but he really... He really doesn't want to make things more difficult right now than they have to be already.

So he plays it off a bit. ] Some people would still consider almost twelve to be a few.

[ Sorry, not a good answer. Twelve is a big number. Twelve is a lot, really. She almost drops the tablet, already close to chastising him because how could he lie to her about that. Or why. Why is even better, and Pepper only sucks in a breath, oh my god plainly there in the movement of her lips. ]

ARE YOU SERIOUS [ Backspacing so hard. ] A few months isn't a year. A year... I can't believe you didn't tell me.

[ It's okay, that time he knows what she typed out and backspaced anyway, and he winces a little, trying to mask it in the midst of playing everything else off.

He doesn't have any good responses for that though, and he knows it. ] You already... You already seemed stressed. Figured a smaller number would be easier to handle.

You thought I seemed stress. [ It's meant to be incredulous, lips pressed thin. ] But you didn't think that wouldn't, that I

[ This isn't helping, and she suddenly needs to not be looking at him for a second. She turns her head and closes her eyes after adding something else. ] You should have told me.

[ Clearly, he's made a tactical error here.

That does not, however, prevent him from making more. ]

I just did. [ See but even he can tell that was the petulant thing to say, and he sighs a little bit, because no, think first. ] I really didn't - Look, okay, I didn't know what, like, where you were in the timeline. I still don't. The... reactions, were less -- They seemed like they'd be easier to figure out if the duration was shorter. And, you know, I just sort of didn't want to think about it. I've been stuck here for a year - it's kind of a hard thing to get around. One season, life-changing enough. Four? [ And yeah, now he's talking too much, so. He's going to stop looking at her like he can will her into looking back, and dick around with one of the displays again. It won't yield any real work, but at least it gives him something else to look at. ]

[ She knows he's avoiding even if he thinks he's not, and it only serves to upset her more. When she'd thought things might have been easy, and of course, this proves her wrong. For once, she actually doesn't know what to say to him right away. Whatever he's doing certainly does give him something to look at until he has to read what she's saying though. ]

I know that. You think I don't know that? I'm trying to understand, but I can't do that if you aren't telling me everything. Which you're not. This is NOT the time to be sparing details. [ And the thing about timelines gives her pause, something to think about. She hasn't considered it because it'd felt as though they'd been somewhere on the same page or marginally close. Apparently they're not.

She's less accusing and a bit more sad now. ] I'm worried about you.

[ He has no idea he's avoiding. He's not sure what he even could be avoiding, because he just told her the truth right there. ]

I don't - I just told you everything! It wasn't a few months, it was an almost-year, what else do you think there is to say about that? [ He's not angry, just. What? ]

You don't need to be worried. I've made it this long.

[ But all she does is worry. She isn't going to tell him that because it should be obvious. Isn't it obvious? ]

And you're doing fine. I can see that. [ Which she doesn't feel to be true. Anything else she might have said slips right by her though, typing for the distraction. ] You know I [ Delete. ] I'll just take care of this and whatever else you need me to do.

[ She's done with the conversation anyhow, ready for the work and something else that isn't in this room. ]

[ Well, sort of fine. He feels like he should feel worse about lying to her about that. About things.

And now she's angry, which is... It's just the total opposite of what he wanted. ]

Hey, wait. I just - [ Okay, deep breath. Full attention. She deserves it. Pepper always deserves his everything, even more than his everything, because his everything comes with an awful lot of negatives. ] What do you want me to tell you, Pep?

[ She may or may not be getting a quiet message shortly from JARVIS to check the network's record for Tony's previous posts, but. Shhhh. ]

[ Oh, she gets that message all right, and there's a look down at it, like it's another reminder he's been here longer than she can seem to wrap her mind around. People change. She knows that; she's even seen it first hand. But there's a huge gap between them called Exsilium now.

Pepper shifts, glancing at him from beneath her lashes at that question. She could say 'everything' and get nothing. She could say a lot of things. ]

I don't know. [ An idle tap of her fingers against the tablet, mouth tense. ] If that's really all, I believe you.

[ Pepper that really wasn't enough direction. He doesn't know if she wants to know about everything he's been doing since he arrived in Exsilium or if she just wants to know about recently or if she just wants to know how he feels or if he slept with anyone or what. He's legitimately just not sure what she's asking for.

He can't tell if asking for clarification on that is a good thing or if she'd just get irritated again. He's leaning heavily towards closing off, getting possibly a little pissy and claiming this is her fault, whatever this is right now. But the part of him that's happy to see her, the vast majority, can't fucking stand having made her look that irritated and sad and everything else all at once, this quickly. But he just asked for clarification, and the reply was still vague. Should he ask again or let it drop? ]

I'm just... I can answer questions, but I don't. Get, what, you want from this conversation. [ No wait ] I mean, I get that you want information, I'm just not sure how to give it to you. Which parts are relevant, which parts are the parts you care about. [ Because it can't actually be all of it, right? That's too much. ]

[ She'd been okay until that last sentence, which really just upsets her more than makes her angry. Before, if he hadn't been honest with her, there were ways to find out, people to talk to or countless other methods at her disposal, but it's not like that here. Pepper wants him to know that. She could look back through the network (thank you, JARVIS), but there's only so much there she can read into.

She doesn't know people, though she supposes she could generally inquire. That's not exactly fair; she wants to hear it from him. ]

I care about all of them, Tony! [ Except she isn't saying it. She's typing it and looking at him directly after. Just once since her expression is giving away just how true that is. ] I know everything, but I don't know about this. About this place, what you've been doing. There's so much I still don't understand. It's, I'm trying to fix that.

And I'm sorry I wasn't here. I

[ And that is just too much. She carefully puts the tablet down because she suddenly needs some air. ]

[ If she looks like she's about to leave - not for good, but just leave this conversation - he can't tell. He thinks she does, but he's learned that his anxieties about things like this can make them look different than they are. Honestly, part of this might have been due to a problem like that in the first place.

By this point he's standing next to the place he was working at, facing her, hands clasping crossed elbows, and mostly looking at the ground. He's reading it, but he doesn't respond until she puts down the tablet, glancing up to check her physical bearing. ]

You don't need to be sorry for that. It's the fault of neither of us. When I got here I didn't do much at first. I made some friends - there was a Steve who knew me before I knew him, because the first time I came here was just after all the Vanko bullshit. So I met him, and then he left. Clint and Natasha were here, but he left a long time ago, and she's gone recently. They all knew me but I didn't know them so we didn't get that close. Roslyn and Emma were the ones I talked to the most. Talking with Roslyn happened between drinking our way through all the bars around here - she got all productive though and made a thing about it. Talking with Emma was more along the lines of learning about the alternate timelines. Apparently an alternate me slept with her. She liked to taunt me about it. [ And that's sort of a trace of a smile, because he really really liked Emma. ] She's gone. Roslyn's still here. Max is here now too, and we don't talk as much as I let her use my workshop and beat me up in the name of 'sparring'.

[ He's organizing his thoughts for a moment, still looking down, still trying to figure out how he wants to keep going. ] There was a bombing attack by the United Earth - you know them, right? Okay. - and gas and shit. I had a working suit about three weeks before it hit, so I suited up and started helping people get to the catacombs. The suit wasn't airtight though, and Roslyn, Natasha - I don't like... catacombs, so they knocked me out and dragged me into them to make sure I stayed down there while the gas dissipated. Then there were some monsters or something but that got taken care of pretty fast. That's when Max arrived. There was a masquerade in Versailles that was kind of a hoot if you knew how to have fun and most transports apparently don't, but, hey. [ Thinking, thinking, accessing the network to make sure his timeline is correct. ] A mission to the old west. Drinking, sun fever or something. Then I was... I think six for a few days, which was weird, but weirder things did happen to other people, so. [ Shrug. ] Another mission to get an AI - she's nice. I keep setting up playdates for her and JARVIS and she sort of gives me this look. It's cute. There's another kid with the last name Stark here who claims I can't be one because I don't know that her favourite animal is a wolf or something.

[ He feels like that's it... Oh no wait. ] I made a dating service too. Around Valentine's Day. I didn't really follow through with it though, because all those couples and all that kissing and sex I'd be picturing happening, and then me being... It was mostly a joke anyway. Aaand I was out shepherding people around from fake threats a couple weeks ago because Loki's an asshole. And now I have a new company to build. [ And he glances at her, once, short, and then back to whatever it is he's been staring at, even if his posture looks a little looser. ] That's everything I can think of, Pep. I might've missed something, but it's a lot to remember in the first place.

[ It is a lot. She turns to look at him half way through so she can watch him, read what goes unspoken in his body language, and there's a frown at most of it - the fighting, certainly the fighting since she knows him, knows what wearing the suit means and what it does - and a sort of knowing acceptance at the lack of follow-through as well. There's no blame for that, none whatsoever. Pepper can't quite wrap the thought of so many alternate timelines together either, though she's concerned with how he speaks of them coming, going, and he, there, always staying. No one entirely permanent except for, perhaps, JARVIS and whatever new AI he'd talked about. He doesn't mention her at any point with those people, and it's safe to assume she'd never been here before this. Which...

She doesn't like it. She doesn't like it in the same way she doesn't like the majority of Exisilum, and it's something she won't tolerate with a capital T. Accepting the fact they're in another place, another world is easier to forgive than that. Pepper sighs quietly, emotions draining into something cool and calm. Level-headed in the face of all the information he's just given her sooner rather than later since she doesn't want to jeopardize that honesty, admires that openness and takes it with her own. So, she repays it by erasing the distance between them, resting a hand on his arm, near an elbow, to allow for the stretch she needs to take up the tablet again. ]

The rebuild in New York was almost done, and we were contracting another. Maybe - the details weren't where I thought they should to be. Still sketchy. [ Because he'd asked about timelines, and she didn't think there had been anything else entirely current to mention. She glances at him for a reaction, anything to say he might have known something else. ] But I'm not going anywhere. I'll help you, okay? We'll do this together.

[ Pepper makes sure to underline that word - together - with her thumb, adamant about that more than anything. ]

[ Coulson came and went by too, he's just realized. It was a hilarious rotating ensemble there for a while, and he tries not to think about the fact that he seems to be the central character. He's always the central character, and it generally seems to have this sort of result. The new AI is also relatively, well, new. So mostly him and JARVIS and Ros.

He's uneasy until he feels her hand settle on his arm, glances at it and then her a little more properly because he wasn't sure how she was going to take that, doesn't typically share that much all at once, but it was the thing he needed to do, just then. She felt like she was going to leave and he couldn't handle it and he is capable of changing things, sometimes, to keep ahold of the things that he feels are important. It doesn't mean he's any more comfortable with that level of apparent vulnerability, but Pepper of all people has always been the person he trusted the most with his weak points.

He doesn't want to look hopeful at her words, because that would be stupid. That would be so many levels of stupid, because she can't promise that she's going to stay here, and he knows that, but it's nice to... read the words anyway. He can basically hear her saying them in his head. Pepper's voice is one he hears often, although usually it's not being so reassuring. Usually it's just sighing and saying 'No, Tony.' ]

We're from almost the same time then, I think. Probably not exactly, but near each other. That's -- good. That's good. [ One thing at a time. Processing still. ] It'll be okay. I'm fine, look. All in one piece, no new scars. Well, no big new scars.

[ She isn't going to say that she's still waiting for it to be fine. Things really hadn't been since she'd arrived, and even if that small reprieve in her apartment spoke volumes, it wouldn't make things better. Nothing's ever simple, though Pepper plans to make them as okay as possible. She wants to seamlessly fill the gaps her missing presence had left, even them out so they operated together just as they always had. Like, she hoped, they were going to do now.

The touch becomes a little more firm with his words, trying for comfort and not entirely sure she achieves that. It's enough for now, has to be enough. Until she can fix this situation with her weapon and let him hear it rather than see it, until there's nothing else between them. ]

And I want it to stay that way. You in one piece. I also need you to let me take care of everything. [ The 'even you' goes without saying, fingers moving to take his hand. She's suddenly grateful for her proficiency at one-handing typing. ] Really, I'm here now.

[ He doesn't want to think that a year, a single year, has been that long so as to fundamentally alter the way he tends to do things, but at the same time there's little voices reminding him that the same can happen in only three months, so... But still. He's still him, and she's still her. It'll work out. They always do.

He meets her concern, at least, as he always has: with an easy, practised smile and a deflection. ] I don't think I'd be considered as stunningly good-looking if I were in pieces; don't worry, I've got my own motivation on that one. So what's for dinner? [ If you're taking care of everything. ]

[ She should have expected something like that, had at the start but had been caught off-guard by everything he'd told her without much prompting. So, while it's not what she'd wanted, it's also a bit relieving. Pepper shakes her head in response, frown fading into something that would have been a quiet laugh if she'd been capable. ]

You'll just have to wait and see. [ A little mystery doesn't hurt, after all, and neither does the soft kiss she eventually leans to place at the corner of his mouth. ]

[ He's smiling back at her still, all the way up through the teasing and the kiss, and even afterwards a little bit. But this isn't quite them at normal, this is all new, and he's just got her and he's a little different and he's trying to be a good person and he's a little worried. ]

We're okay though, right? We're good now.

We're good, Tony. [ The presence of his name is used in lieu of that silent 'for now' that's hanging in there somewhere. She can't promise how long it'll actually stay that way, but they're okay. This is acceptable, and she's going to take everything in stride for herself and him too. ] Really, we'll be fine.

[ And levity springs back in an instant. As though they haven't sort of just had a minor fight, as though he hasn't just listed everything he's done without her for a year, or shown how much that year affected him. ] You want a cheeseburger? I know a good cheeseburger joint.

[ That's all it takes, and she's shaking her head at him, unable to hide the smile the question brings to her face. There's no reply, simply the moment she uses to rest her cheek against his shoulder before nodding. She's not sure why she's agreeing - there's so much work to be done, probably more questions to ask later - but she can give him this.

She wants to give him this, and Pepper takes his hand, a cue for him to lead the way. ]

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closed | out of suffering, have emerged the strongest souls;

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talking to tony is emotional whiplash

good thing she's an expert in tony

indeed

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