Chapter Text
Fact: there are certainly worse places to have an Avengers team meeting than in an over the top luxury suite at the Aria in Las Vegas. But there are also, logically and circumstantially speaking, better places to have an Avengers team meeting. Like, for example, maybe somewhere that didn’t unintentionally lead everybody to believe Tony and Loki just got married, and this was a weird kind of elopement wedding reception where the dress code was “superhero business casual”.
“Really?!” Tony asks as all the faces of people who should definitely know better stare back at him. “That’s why you thought I asked you here? Because I’m getting married?!”
Rhodey looks at Bruce, who looks at Steve, who looks at Natasha, who looks at Clint. “I mean…” Rhodey begins. “Why else would you want us all to meet you in Vegas?”
“Why would I ask you to bring your Avengers gear?!”
“I don’t know. Superhero theme wedding?”
Tony points at Clint. “Why would I invite him to my wedding?!”
“Pity? Free gift?”
“Same sex marriage isn’t even legal in Nevada!”
Natasha snorts. “Since when has something not being legal ever stopped you?”
Okay, fair. But also beside the point. In fact, so far off to the side that it’s no longer even in the vicinity of the point. “Look, it’s not for a wedding,” Tony tells them. “This is entirely business related.”
“Then why are you wearing that fancy suit?” asks Steve.
“This is how fashion icons such as myself normally dress.”
“And why is he wearing a windbreaker and cutoffs?” asks Rhodey, jutting a thumb over at Loki, who has thus far been sitting sullenly and silently off by himself. “Only a windbreaker and cutoffs?”
“Fantastic question,” Tony replies. “It’s because he doesn’t want to be here.”
“I don’t want to be here,” Loki growls in confirmation.
“He’s trying to punish me by wearing something embarrassing, but joke’s on him, because I am virtually impossible to embarrass.”
Loki makes his patented political prisoner/perpetually distressed teenager face. “These are your clothes.”
“Not clothes I wear out of the house. Though I will admit, you look way cuter in those shorts than I do.”
Steve, rudely ignoring Loki’s cuteness and getting right back down to dad-like business, shifts his weight in his chair. “So why are we here? Your message only said to meet you in Las Vegas, bring our gear, and that you had news.”
“Well, my brother, my captain, my king,” Tony says, and he turns from Steve to speak to the assembled group. “It turns out I do have news. And you lot are going to be sorry you Pete Bested me out of the band in favor of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Iron Man over here-”
Rhodey objects to that with an offended, “Hey.”
“-because the one and only, indispensable, irreplaceable me has successfully managed to do the one thing you couldn’t.”
“Which is?” asks Natasha, who looks like she’s getting ready to scoff derisively at whatever he says.
Well, she’ll just have to put that scoff on the back burner and prepare to be amazed. “Behold,” says Tony. And with a press of a button on his phone, the computer display he set out on the coffee table sparks to life. A ghostly hologram of a man rises up to hover a few inches in the air. Slowly, the view zooms in to clearly show his face.
Steve, quickly recognizing what they’re looking at, leans in. “Wait is that…”
“Aldrich Killian?” Tony replies. “The guy S.H.I.E.L.D.’s been struggling to find for the past four months? The one who got away? Yeah. I just tracked him down for you. No biggie.”
“How…” Bruce begins, but doesn’t finish the question.
“Actually, it was Loki who did all legwork on this project, so you can be sure to thank him for his effort.” Gesturing over to Loki, Tony wonders if it’s wishful thinking on his part to hope that Loki might acknowledge and join in the conversation. And the answer is yes: that is indeed wishful thinking. Loki, still committed to not wanting to be there, turns away and stares at the wall. “Loki was able to use a tie Killian left at Pepper’s place to track down his unique energy signature like a magical GPS.”
There’s a brief pause as everybody takes a second to adjust to the idea of magical GPS being a real and valid concept. Then Rhodey is back on track. “And I guess that means he’s here? In Las Vegas?”
Tony presses another button on his phone, and the hologram changes. This time it’s a map, complete with a classic X marking the spot in glowing red over one particular building. “Bingo. We tracked his location to an old office low-rise near the industrial area. Name on the lease is Theorist Holdings, but that name led to nothing but a dead end in the Cayman Islands. Our guy is keeping a low profile and hiding well. Turns out Vegas is a good spot for him. He can be isolated, nobody’s going to notice anything weird amid all the other weirdness already going on in the city, and even the huge energy draw his operation needs isn’t going to make a blip on the radar in a place like this. That’s why nobody could find him. He’s hiding exactly where he knew he wouldn’t be seen. Too bad he didn’t factor Asgardian magic into the equation.”
Slowly, Natasha nods. “We need to tell Fury.”
“Wow, yeah,” Tony agrees. “If only I’d thought to do that several hours ago. Oh wait! I did. He and the whole S.H.I.E.L.D. entourage are on their way now to form our backup dance squad and secure a perimeter or whatever it is they do. I only saved the big reveal for you guys, because I care very deeply about important team-building exercises. Anyway, here’s the agenda.”
He does a quick scan of eyes to makes sure they’re all looking at him. They are. Good. (Well, Loki’s not, but Loki has special space-papal dispensation to pretend to ignore everything.)
“Go-time is in one hour. We roll in, we take down Killian, I blow some stuff up because I haven’t done that in a while, you all thank me profusely for making this possible, S.H.I.E.L.D. cleans up the loose ends we can’t be bothered with… Am I forgetting anything?”
“We go home?” Loki mutters from his realm of solitude over in the depths of the periphery.
Tony sighs. “Honeypants, this suite is very exclusive and I had to bribe the concierge to give it to me on short notice. Don’t you want to at least stay for one night? You can do nothing in Las Vegas just as easily as you can at home.”
Unforgiving and stubborn as ever, Loki just says, “No.”
What a waste of a perfectly good Vegas trip. “Sure, fine,” says Tony, not wanting to argue and risk the rest of the mission by annoying Loki into further inaction. “We’ll just save the world and then go straight home. No afterparty.”
“And what’s our strategy?” asks Steve.
“Uh, undecided?” says Tony. “General melee? How much strategy do we need to go in, beat up a bunch of hired goons, and grab the prize pig?”
Steve shakes his head. “Not good enough. These guys are pretty much super soldiers. Whatever Killian and A.I.M. did to them… they’re dangerous. Killian himself most of all. We need a plan. And what I think the best course of action would be is-”
“Hang on,” Tony interrupts. “Since when are you the boss of my idea?”
“Since your idea seems to be just go in with guns blazing, which isn’t going to work.”
“No, my idea is to go in and play it by ear, since having a big master plan when we don’t know what’s going to happen feels kind of pointless.”
“Tony,” Steve sighs. And he puts on one of those faces like Tony’s lack of deference causes him physical pain. Maybe it does. Maybe that’s a side effect of super soldier serum: getting a literal pain in the ass whenever somebody doesn’t bow down to your superiority. “As the leader of this team, I-”
“Wait, back up,” Tony has to say. “Why are you the leader?”
“I was appointed by-”
“Wouldn’t Rhodey be the more logical choice for leader? He outranks you.”
“Aw, come on, Tony, no,” Rhodey groans. “Don’t do that. You’re making this weird.”
“What? I’m trying to be in your corner. You’d be a way better boss than Captain Kangaroo here.”
“Yeah, well I joined S.H.I.E.L.D. in 1941,” counters Steve, “so I think I have seniority by about seventy years. Now can we stick to the topic, or do you have more ways to derail this conversation?”
Clearly Steve has absolutely zero experience in the complicated field of Starkology if he thinks that’s all Tony has in terms of derailment tools. “What about Dr. Banner?” Tony asks. “He’s a smart guy, and under the right circumstances, could literally flatten all of us. Why isn’t he the leader?”
“Uh, no, nobody wants those circumstances,” says Bruce. “I’m happier not getting involved. At all. As in: I’m out for this mission, and you all can follow whichever leader you like, because I’m going to be watching from the safety of a S.H.I.E.L.D. van behind the scenes. I’ll have a look at Killian after he’s captured. Until then…”
“Until then,” Steve interjects, “we’re going to listen to me.”
“Or you could listen to me,” Natasha says standing. “Sorry, but I’m getting bored with this dick-waving contest, and you all need to woman up and get to work. Bearing in mind,” she adds as Tony opens his mouth, “any complaints you lodge at this point will come across as sexist garbage, so consider keeping those to yourself.”
“Is it sexist garbage to point out that I’m way too rich and powerful to want to listen to somebody who was born in 1984 and is therefore, in my mind, still an actual child?”
She smiles at him. “Yes.”
“Unfair.”
Over on the couch, Clint raises his hand. “I vote for Natasha as leader.”
And Bruce jumps right on that bandwagon. “I also vote for Natasha as leader.”
“This isn’t up for debate…” Steve sighs.
“I am shocked and appalled that Captain America holds the democratic process in such contempt,” says Tony. “Therefore, I also vote for Natasha. And assuming Natasha votes for herself, that means she takes the majority.”
“Thanks, I’ll be sure to write a really good victory speech later,” she says. “Now if we can quit wasting time? Stark, do you have blueprints for this building?”
“Yep.” The view changes with another tap of a button, switching to a translucent 3-D structure showing walls, rooms, and hallways over three floors. “All I could pull up from the city were the original plans from when it was built in 1972, which I’ve digitized here. There are no major renos on file, but that doesn’t mean Killian hasn’t illegally changed anything off the books. So keep that in mind. However, aerial shots confirm that all exterior windows and doors are still in the same place, so we at least have that.”
“Good,” says Natasha. She does a half-circle around the table to look at the plans from all angles, frowning in thought as she does. “I have an idea.”
ooo
As far as ideas go, Natasha’s plan is probably exactly in line with what Tony would have done if left to his own devices. But since it was Natasha who told him to do it, his contrary brain is telling him that just walking into the Evil Lair™ and looking to pick a fight with the Big Bad may not be a foolproof course of action.
“Stark, Rogers, and Rhodes will go in first,” Natasha had told them. “Rogers and Rhodes because of what happened at Christmas, and Stark because our files indicate Killian holds a personal grudge against you from his past. You three are in charge of luring him out. Distracting him. This guy loves to talk, and he loves to show off how smart he is. Encourage that. Meanwhile, Barton and I will hang back with small number of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents to guard the exits. They’ll have all kinds of surveillance in there, and we want to make them believe we’re all the backup you have. The rest of the S.H.I.E.L.D. team will stay well back, out of range or up in the air. Your job will be to keep the fight going as long as you’re able, and push Killian to call in all his troops. Once you have them all together… immobilize as many as you can. Take down Killian if possible, but only after you’re sure he has everyone out in the open. S.H.I.E.L.D. will be waiting to make sure nobody escapes. If things get out of hand, call us in.”
When phrased that way, Tony hates it. Who wants to be the sacrificial bait? Although, he reminds himself as he tries the front door, finds it locked, and gently maneuvers it open by way of a lovingly placed repulsor blast, Natasha’s plan did involve the implied option of firing a missile directly into Killian’s face. He could always do that. Really, he should do that. Otherwise, who’s going to take credit for nabbing the bad guy? Steve Rogers? Unacceptable.
He could be in any basic cop procedural TV show, stepping into that deserted foyer. Except, maybe, for the fact that he’s wearing a full suit of high-tech armor, and is followed by Rhodey, Steve, and Loki. That may tip everything more into joke setup territory. (Iron Man, War Machine, Captain America, and a space wizard wearing a promotional Stark Industries golf windbreaker walk into an office building that seems like it’s stuck in a time capsule from the early 90s…) To his left is a security desk covered in a thin film of dust, looking like it hasn’t been used anytime recently. To his right is an elevator with a faded OUT OF ORDER sign taped to the door. To the far right, a set of stairs. Straight ahead, a wide hallway leads to office doors that look like they haven’t seen action in years.
“Jarvis, what do we have for signs of life in here?” Tony asks. “Movement? Heat signatures?”
“This level appears to be empty,” Jarvis replies. “But I’m sensing abnormal heat signatures on the second and third floors.”
Of course. These jerks couldn’t be considerate and meet him down here. Instead, they’re going to make him trudge up the stairs in his suit. All of this is really pointing toward a quick missile to Killian’s face. “Second floor,” he tells the others. “Keep eyes up, and-”
“Assume they already know we’re here,” Steve says, talking over him and stepping forward as if to take up the leadership position. “Be on the lookout for anything.”
“And remember,” says Tony, quickly moving in front of Steve. “Every corner and doorway can hide a trap. I’ll take the lead and-”
Steve, unencumbered by full armor, is quicker. He takes the stairs up to the first landing three at a time. “I got this. Follow me.”
“Hey!” Tony calls up to him. “Pretty sure we all voted back at the hotel that you’re not in charge, champ!”
“This isn’t the time for in-fighting, Stark,” Steve replies, as if he has some kind of physical moral high ground up there at the top of the stairs. “We’re here for one thing. To complete this mission. Can you do that?”
With a quick burst of flight power, Tony rockets right up to the landing so he can continue this inane bickering toe to toe. “Sweetie, the mission would be completed already if I didn’t need to waste so much time babysitting you.”
“What a great team player you are. I’m honestly shocked that Fury replaced you.”
“I work better alone.”
“So why call the rest of us in, then, if you think you can handle this?” Steve asks. “Unless it’s because you hate the idea of not being included. You can’t stand that we don’t need you. So you’re going out of your way to worm back into the thick of things, all because S.H.I.E.L.D. told you ‘no’. Bet you don’t hear that word a lot.”
Oh, fuck this guy. Tony takes a step back and looks over at Rhodey, still standing at the bottom of the stairs. Rhodey’s expressionless metal face mask lends nothing in the way of support. And Loki is just leaning grumpily against the wall, staring down at the scuffed and dirty terrazzo-look cheap vinyl floor. Well, without backup, there’s only one valid response to such a bullshit accusation. “Bite my shiny metal ass.”
At that, Steve leans in, folds his arms over his chest, tilts his head cockily to the side, and speaks directly to Tony’s face: “It doesn’t look so shiny to me.”
And Tony, finding himself momentarily paralyzed in a short-circuit of crossed brain wires, finds he can only stand there like a slack-jawed yokel as Steve moves on ahead up the stairs to the second floor. “Rhodey,” he eventually manages to whisper, once Rhodey has robotically trudged up the stairs to meet him.
“Yeah?”
“Did that just happen or did I hallucinate it? Did Captain America quote Futurama at me? How does he know what Futurama is?”
“I dunno, why would the guy who was frozen and emerged into a strange new future watch a cartoon about a guy who was frozen and emerged into a strange new future?” Rhodey asks. “That’d be weird.” And off he goes, up the stairs.
“I don’t like this,” Tony says, following him. “It’s unnatural. Captain America pop culturing at me is against the laws of physics. And by the way,” he adds to Steve, as they reach the top, “my ass is very shiny. It has three layers of automotive-quality metallic paint.”
Steve slowly nods. “That’s not really the brag you think it is.” Then he looks off down the empty hallway. “But we don’t have time for this. We need to check every door. One by one, make sure they’re clear.”
Tony can already see that they are, all down this row, as Jarvis turns on infrared scanning. But he’s not going to tell Steve that. Captain America can play through a whole round of good ol’ fashioned Cincinnati Time Waste. Tony, making sure that Loki is still grudgingly following him, pushes on ahead and rounds the corner. There’s a faint heat signature up ahead, largely blocked by walls and doors, but it’s something. Before he can make too much progress toward it, though, an unfamiliar voice comes over the low-quality PA system.
“Is that Tony Stark here to see me?”
Tony stops where he stands, reflexively looking around even though he knows he won’t be able to see anything. “Yep,” he says. “In the flesh, and also armor, here to have a nice, friendly chat with you. Aldrich Killian, I presume?”
“So you remember my name.”
“Uh, remember? No. Read it recently in a S.H.I.E.L.D. file? Yep. Am I supposed to know you?”
There’s a pause, and Tony hopes it’s because he scored some kind of petty little point there. “Why don’t you come upstairs,” the PA voice says. “Maybe I can do something to jog your memory. And bring your friends, too. Rhodes and Rogers. I’m looking forward to having a reunion with them. You can also ask if the eight S.H.I.E.L.D. agents outside want to join us.”
So that aspect of Natasha’s plan seems to be working, at least, if he didn’t mention the few dozen other S.H.I.E.L.D. agents waiting outside the perimeter. Up ahead, a door opens and five people step out. They don’t advance on Tony, though. All they do is open a door to what must be the fire stairs, look back as if they’re inviting him to follow, and head on up.
Rhodey and Steve appear at his side just in time to watch them go. “Third floor?” Rhodey asks.
“Yeah,” Tony tells him. The infrared scanners aren’t picking up anything else on this level. Still though, Steve pushes open every door as they make their way toward the stairs, doing a quick check in each room. No signs of life. There’s some bizarre-looking equipment that Tony wonders if he’ll have a chance to check out later, but no more people. “Jarvis, can you boost sensors to get a count of how many henchmen we might be facing up on three? I don’t know what kind of material he put on all these walls and floors, but it’s really dampening what I can see.”
“Adjusting settings,” Jarvis replies, but before he can supply anything further, Loki answers from the back of the pack.
“Twenty-seven total, including Killian himself.”
Tony turns around. “You can-” he starts, but then remembers a little tidbit of something important. Once upon a time, under the influence of the scepter back on Asgard, he could sense the presence of others. Faintly, but he could tell when somebody was there. Loki, with all his immense powers, must be able to easily do the same. With far greater accuracy. “Good to know,” he says instead. “And you can tell from here which one Killian is? By his energy?”
Loki doesn’t say anything, but he nods.
“Okay. Twenty-seven. Not a very even fight, but at least we know what we’re up against.”
“Twenty seven,” Steven repeats into his comm to relay the information to S.H.I.E.L.D.. “All on the third floor. We’ll keep them contained and take down as many as we can. Stand by for updates.” Then he turns to the group. “Let’s go slowly. They may try to ambush us in the stairwell.”
But that’s not the case, as Steve pushes open the door and Tony follows. The dull concrete stairwell, lit by dim green-hued fluorescent lights, is empty. And Tony trusts Loki’s disinterested reaction to tell him this isn’t just a trick. Nobody’s about to come flying down or leaping up, or bursting out through the third-floor door. If they were, Loki wouldn’t be lagging behind and dragging his feet like a kid who really doesn’t want to get on the school bus.
“Any time this year, slowpoke,” Tony tells him.
For the first time since their arrival, Loki actually meets Tony’s eyes. And he’s put on a special glare of annoyance for the occasion. “This is stupid and I want to go home,” he says through clenched teeth.
“Yep, soon. Just gotta head upstairs for a minute and flush out the villain infestation. Then I promise we can go home.”
Loki mumbles something that sounds like, “I hate this.” But, to his credit, he does continue on up the stairs, one lead-footed, trudging step at a time. When they all finally reach the landing, Steve pauses only long enough to nod at Rhodey and receive a nod in return before opening the door.
They walk out not into another level of offices, but into a completely wide-open space, interrupted only by metal support pillars and beams here and there throughout the structure. It appears to be… some kind of training gym, if Tony had to guess? Mats on the floor, weights in one corner, an array of hand to hand combat weapons along that wall… Between the insufficient lighting and blacked-out windows, it looks like something either from a gritty urban crime thriller or a sad comedy. Is this where Killian trains his super soldier army? In this shabby dump?
At least it’s obvious where the twenty-seven people are. All of them stand in a long, clustered line at the far end of the room, some holding knives or baseball bats or other crude weapons, but more just lazily smirking in contempt at the small, rag-tag band of heroes sent in to defeat them. All but one are dressed in sweats and tank tops and similar workout gear. The one who isn’t, the one who’s wearing a crisp, deep blue suit, must be Aldrich Killian himself.
Tony releases his helmet, letting it fold back away from his face so he can get a clear look and speak directly. What he chooses to say is, “Hey.”
Killian steps forward into what looks like the suspiciously placed ring of a spotlight, meant to show him off to his best advantage. “Tony Stark,” he says through a grin. “You know, when I saw the Iron Man suit come through our front door, I was almost worried it’d be somebody else. Or maybe even you just controlling it remotely.”
“Nope, here I am,” Tony replies. “I wouldn’t dream of missing out on this… grunge gym? Is that what you have going?”
“I admit, it’s not the highest end of places. But it does the job. It lured you here, didn’t it? And your friends, too.” His smarmy grin widens as he looks at Rhodey and Steve. “Rhodes and Rogers. I’m honored. Again.”
“Yeah, the feeling’s definitely mutual,” says Rhodey.
“We’re giving you a chance to surrender now, Killian,” says Steve, clearly unable to read a room. “You got the upper hand last time. It won’t happen again.”
“You know, I’d be hurt by that,” Killian says, “if I cared at all. But I don’t. And you know why?”
“This is the douchebag Pepper found charmingly irresistible?” Tony mutters to Rhodey over his headset.
“Yeah,” Rhodey answers. “I don’t get it either.”
“Because you’re old news, Rogers,” Killian continues. “And none of this was ever about you. It was always about our pal Tony here.”
“Yep, that’s me, perpetual center of the solar system,” Tony says. “Except maybe you can fill me in on why and how? Sorry, but I just suffer from this affliction of not knowing who you are. I’m sure you’re great, but.” He shrugs as best he can in the armor.
“You don’t remember me,” Killian tells him, and that sounds like the opening to a long and boring tale Tony doesn’t give two shits about hearing. “I don’t blame you. I wouldn’t remember me either. Back then, I was a nobody. Not like the great Tony Stark. Everybody knew you. You were the talk of the town. And really, I should thank you, because it was my desire to get back at you, to prove myself better than you, that led to…” He pauses briefly to do a showy turn as he gestures to their surroundings. “All of this.”
“Wow, yeah, great story,” says Tony. “Except, uh, what part of being in a run-down 70s office building in the Las Vegas industrial area makes you better than me, exactly?”
“Science. Pushing the envelope. Evolution. You can laugh at my humble surroundings all you want, but all that really matters is the results. And that’s what I have here. I’m the first person in the world to successfully hack into the human brain and deliberately trigger improvements. All these people here in the room with us today are testament to the efficacy of my program. My innovation.”
“So why try to overthrow the government?” Steve asks, moving forward. “You staged a fake terrorist attack to try to assassinate the President. The Vice President was in the scheme, ready to step in as your puppet. Why? Why do all that when you could use all this technology you have to better the world instead of trying to rule it?”
Killian’s stupid little chuckle grates on Tony’s nerves far more than any of Steve’s heartfelt speeches ever could. “Oh, you got me, Captain America. It’s my one flaw. I want more. Bigger. Better. Power. What man wouldn’t take it all if he could?”
“Okay,” Tony says to Rhodey, “so he’s, what, just a garden variety mad scientist megalomaniac?”
“Ehhh… not so much garden variety,” Rhodey replies. “But mad scientist megalomaniac: yes.”
“How much longer must we listen to this idiocy?” Loki hisses.
“Not long,” Tony promises. “I’m waiting for the opportune moment to shoot him in the face.”
“I want to go home.”
“I know, I know, it’s just-”
“-which is where you come in, Tony,” Killian’s suddenly saying. And Tony’s forced to look at him again and listen to his drivel.
“Sorry, what was that? I wasn’t paying attention to your supervillain origin story.”
“I need you,” Killian says.
Tony nods. “Thanks, but you’re a little late. I’m taken.” He pats Loki on the butt. “Do you get the E! network here? It was a big scandal a couple weeks ago.”
“I’m not too proud to admit it,” Killian goes on, really milking that false humility. “I need your help. What I’ve accomplished so far is exceptional, and beyond anything anyone could have imagined. With a little help from you? It could be perfected.”
“Okay,” Tony groans. “I don’t know why in the name of God’s green Earth you think I’d want to work with a dickweed like you, or how you’d-”
“You came here today, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, to kick your ass.”
“Four of you against…” He glances around at his gym-rat entourage. “All of us?”
“I know it’s a little unbalanced, but in the interest of a fair fight, I can ask Captain America to leave.”
Killian’s toothy, wide grin is growing more offensive by the second. “That’s something I appreciate about you, Tony: your bravado. It’s inspiring. Unfortunately for you, but fortunately for me, I have you right where I want you. You’re trapped. There’s no way out of here. I’m going to kill your friends, take you prisoner, and then we’ll see if we can work out a deal. There may be some torture involved. That’ll be up to you.”
“Can you shoot him in the face now?” Loki asks.
Tony has to admit that Loki may have a point there. “You know what? Yeah. I’m tired of this one-trick pony.” It’s time to move on to bigger and better things. Like, honestly, anything but listening to this guy yammer on. He raises his arm, quickly firing off a small missile that locks on Killain’s ugly mug.
And fast as lightning, one of the gym rats leaps into action, snatching the missile straight out of the air with her bare hands like a cat taking down a bird.
Of all the things Tony had been expecting to happen, from best- to worst-case scenario, that particular possibility… didn’t even make the long list. He’d read in the S.H.I.E.L.D. files about the specific condition of these alleged super-soldiers. He just didn’t read it very thoroughly. Or, uh, entirely believe what he read.
He looks over at Loki, who seems to be as stunned as he is by this turn of events, then at Rhodey. “Not garden variety,” he whispers.
Rhodey shakes his head, no.
“I think you’ll find none of your usual tricks will work here,” Killian calls out.
“That was only a warning shot,” says Tony. He has more firepower up his gold-titanium alloy sleeves. Doesn’t he? Yeah. All he needs is a second to figure out what might work. Repulsor blast wouldn’t do much except knock them off their feet, and not even that at this range. Plasma cutter, maybe. Except that’s also more of an up close and personal kind of deal. Save it for later in case things get hairy. All missiles, all at once? That might be fun to watch. It’d get him his explosion, if nothing else. “But hey,” he says to Killian in a cheap stall for time. “This is why you went for Pepper, isn’t it? Use her to get to me?”
Again, Killian chuckles in that patronizing way he has. “I’ll admit, her ties to Stark Industries were the main draw. But come on, Tony, you have to admit: she’s a beautiful lady. Just my type. I’m always drawn to those women who look so put-together and respectable. But when you get them alone… they can be real freaks in the bedroom.”
“Okay, that’s enough!” Steve shouts, lunging another menacing step forward and brandishing his shield, ready to strike.
“Is that jealousy, Captain Rogers?” Killian laughs.
“Nope, not jealousy,” Tony says, because this is a distraction he can take full advantage of. “He’s just confused about the grown-up talk because he’ still a virgin.”
“Shut up, Stark!” Steve snaps (in a very un-Captain-America-like way).
“Hey, it’s nothing to be ashamed of. Some of my best friends were virgins. In high school.”
“You’re not as funny as you think you are!”
All attention in the room seems to be on Steve. Good. Now if Tony can just blast the floor under Killian’s feet with everything he has, collapsing that end of the building… “I’m being serious. I support your noble vow of chastity.”
“You don’t know anything about me!”
“So you’re not a virgin? Wait – do you have a girlfriend?”
“That’s not-”
Judging by the open wall structure, there’s probably a load-bearing beam running right beneath Killian himself. Perfect. That’ll explode nicely. “What’s her name? Palmela Handerson?”
Steve lunges forward again, though this time it’s toward Tony, shield raised like a guillotine blade. But when Tony doesn’t flinch, he stops. Something, clouded by the rage in his face, seems to be reconsidering. He shuffles back, and then, of all things… smirks. “You’d love to know, wouldn’t you,” he says.
And doesn’t that just put a damper on the energy of the whole place. They’d been building up to such a lovely peak of antagonism, only for it to be toppled and flattened out into a minor bump of disinterest with one ill-planned course change. Everything is entirely silent for one, then two breaths.
In the stilted pause, Loki, ever the master of impeccable timing, says, “Tony, just annihilate this cretin already.”
“Which cretin: Killian or Rogers?”
Loki doesn’t specify. “I want to go home.”
“Yeah, I know, I just-”
“I want to go home. Now.”
“Yeah, Tony, why don’t you just do it?” Steve asks. “Finish everything yourself? Since that seems to be your style.”
“As entertaining as this is,” Killian shouts over them to interrupt, “I actually have dinner plans tonight, so I’m going to have to cut this short.” Gesturing Lumpy Space Henchman forward to join him, he loudly says, “Take Stark alive. Eliminate the others.”
And thus the plan is ruined thanks to Steve’s inability to follow a basic distraction narrative. The second the gym rats start running, it’s all ruined. Anything Tony shoots now, they might deflect or, worse, kick back at him. They charge forward too quickly for him to shoot out that safely distant area of the floor. So what are his options?
(Great question, self! And what an ideal time to take a nice, long while to think about that!)
Missiles are out. Basic spray of bullets is in. It’s not the nicest, cleanest, or most high-tech or elegant solution, but it’s what he has to work with before these jerks close the gap in approximately 1.6 seconds. “Target all,” he says to Jarvis as he raises both arms.
As he hears the successful beep of a target lock in his ear, all runners in the front row simultaneously twitch as if shocked, stumble, and fall flat on their faces.
And Tony is… 99% sure he didn’t even do anything yet.
The second row twitches, stumbles, and falls. The stragglers in the third and fourth rows do the same. A messy scattering of bodies litters the ground in the miniature, localized warzone between Tony and Killian, all either dead or maybe unconscious. Impossible to tell.
Was that something Killian did? Some kind of self-destruct maneuver? No, judging by the dawning look of unpleasant surprise and confusion on his face. It wasn’t anything Tony did. Nor was it anything Rhodey or Steve would even be able to do. Which leaves…
Loki, scowling with an unholy combination of exasperation and scorn on his face, his stance conveying absolutely zero visible fucks left to give, slowly crosses his arms across his chest.
For the first time since the showdown began, it seems like nobody can think of a single coherent thing to say.
“Uh…” Tony manages.
Rhodey gets as far as, “What the…”
And Steve just looks at Tony, as if Tony might have any idea what just happened. Or at least a more comprehensive idea than ‘Loki did a thing’.
Loki, meanwhile, starts walking forward. In his ridiculous outfit and bare feet, he steps over and between fallen henchmen. Towards Killian. Killian raises his fists in preparation for a fight, but that doesn’t do him any good. Because in the blink of an eye, Loki disappears, reappears behind Killian’s back, grabs him by the ears, and turns his head clear around. One hundred and eighty horrifying degrees.
“Holy-” Steve yells, while Rhodey finishes that thought with a classic addition of, “Shit!”
When Loki lets go, Kilian’s body crumples and thuds to the floor.
“Is that…” Rhodey stammers. “Did he… all the…”
“Yeahhhh,” Tony says, breathing out the word. “He, uh. Important fact here. He recently learned that he was born to be the new god of death, and since then he’s discovered a whole array of exciting and frankly terrifying new powers. And I think we just annoyed him enough to make him use them.”
“Your boyfriend is… the god of death.”
“Uh-huh. It’s a little ironic, if you think about it, considering how often I almost die.”
“I want to go home now,” says Loki, picking his way back through the goons.
Tony answers that in the only way he can, having been issued a request by the god of very active and present death. “Okay,” he whispers.
Looking at Steve, Loki gestures at body-strewn floor. “You can call S.H.I.E.L.D. in now to clean up all this.”
“Are they… dead?” Steve carefully asks. The apprehensive shape to his mouth says he doesn’t really want to know.
Loki pokes one with his bare toe. “Unlikely. Yet. But I wasn’t being particularly careful when I turned their brains off, so…”
“Will… will their brains come… back on?”
Loki’s blank expression is neither a satisfactory nor informative answer to that question.
Nodding weakly, Steve touches his earpiece. “All clear,” he says over the comm. “Lots of… uh… lots of hostiles down. We’re going to need…” He drops his head with a sigh. “I don’t even know what we’re going to need. Just get up here, now.”
Whoever’s on the other end must have asked him what happened, because his next words are, “I don’t know what happened! You get up here and maybe you can tell me!”
“Just for the record,” Tony asks Loki, “what, um, did happen?”
“Everything was taking too long,” Loki tells him. “I was tired of waiting for you.”
“And you couldn’t have done this at the beginning to save us all the trouble?!”
“Yes, of course,” Loki says. “But it seemed important to you, so I wanted to at least give you the opportunity to complete your mission on your own. So you’d feel accomplished.”
“Well I don’t feel accomplished now that you’ve said that!”
“Because you wasted too much time and didn’t do anything!”
“Oh, this is like the worst group project in the world,” Rhodey mutters. “The two alpha jackasses fight all semester, then I end up with a bad grade because the weird kid decides to redo our whole presentation at the last minute.”
“Right, yeah, you’re going to get a bad grade in Superhero because Loki stole all our XP,” Tony snaps at him, even if that’s unfair. None of this debacle is Rhodey’s fault. Nor is it Loki’s, come to think of it, but now he’s just annoyed.
“We’re going home,” Loki says, grabbing his arm.
“Fine,” Tony agrees. “We’re going home. That’s exactly what we’re going to do, completely of our own free will and volition, because we want to. Not because we’re being coerced or threatened or anything.”
“You chose this,” Rhodey tells him, making a weird eyebrow-raising expression in Loki’s direction.
“We’re going home,” Loki repeats. “And we are going to stay there.”
“Sure,” says Tony.
“Undisturbed.”
“Yep.”
“With no distractions, and absolutely no more world-ending catastrophes.”
“Agreed.”
“We will not leave the house.”
“Definitely not.”
“For twenty days.”
Oh, that devious fucker. “Ffffff… Fine,” Tony growls. “Allow me to be the bigger person here and skip past the part where you continue to threaten and possibly blackmail me into agreeing to that, and just agree to that. Twenty days. Sounds great. Absolutely stellar. I have zero regrets already. But hey, can we maybe have angry fight sex when we get home? Violent kissing, tearing clothes, I throw you up against a minimum of three distinct walls?”
“Obviously that’s the entire point of going home,” says Loki.
“Good, because I didn’t get to blow anything up, and I need a consolation prize.”
Except. On second thought…
He raises his arm, does a quick manual aim, and shoots off a small missile at the far end of the room over Killian’s no-longer-a-threat body. It hits the wall, which explodes into a satisfactory cloud of rubble and dust, shattering the two flanking windows. Better.
“Let’s go.”
“I hate this new team,” he hears Steve mutter as Loki tugs at his elbow and he’s pulled into a sideways wormhole of teleportation.