Anthony Edward Stark (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
starkingenuity) wrote2014-06-30 12:34 pm
starkingenuity) wrote2014-06-30 12:34 pm
The Not So Silent Hill
[Continued from: here]
Staring at the little house, Tony was noteably unimpressed. The child and other half of a god (however loosely you wanted to use the term) really ought to have not been so...small. He was expecting more, and the way he stood with his hip out and arms crossed proved it. They'd take a quinjet to the nearest open field and one of Tony's smaller cars after that, loaded into the back of the plane after he'd ripped out a few seats.
With Extremis stable enough to exist in several now fire-breathing and extra strong mice rampaging through specially designed cages to contain them, JARVIS' databases and hacking ability getting them the information they needed to arrive here, and Alessa more or less content with the nurse she and Banner picked out, this had been the next logical step. Even so, he expected it to be a little more difficult.
Wearing a black t-shirt and dark jeans that only accentuated his somewhat femininely proportioned hips and backside, Tony Stark was still Tony Stark and flashiness and he went hand in hand.
Like a brand name.
It didn't help that the yellow convertible was parked across the street, in direct contention with the overall look and feel of the neighbor around it.
"You can knock." He wasn't too keen on touching things other people did.
Staring at the little house, Tony was noteably unimpressed. The child and other half of a god (however loosely you wanted to use the term) really ought to have not been so...small. He was expecting more, and the way he stood with his hip out and arms crossed proved it. They'd take a quinjet to the nearest open field and one of Tony's smaller cars after that, loaded into the back of the plane after he'd ripped out a few seats.
With Extremis stable enough to exist in several now fire-breathing and extra strong mice rampaging through specially designed cages to contain them, JARVIS' databases and hacking ability getting them the information they needed to arrive here, and Alessa more or less content with the nurse she and Banner picked out, this had been the next logical step. Even so, he expected it to be a little more difficult.
Wearing a black t-shirt and dark jeans that only accentuated his somewhat femininely proportioned hips and backside, Tony Stark was still Tony Stark and flashiness and he went hand in hand.
Like a brand name.
It didn't help that the yellow convertible was parked across the street, in direct contention with the overall look and feel of the neighbor around it.
"You can knock." He wasn't too keen on touching things other people did.
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"Offer for cooking lessons still stands." Bruce slid onto the bed next to Tony, kissing the corner of his mouth. "Thank you."
Then he started to nibble on the saltines first. Yes, they were just stale crackers with butter, but there was love there, so he could work with it.
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"If I do that, you might decide it's okay to up and leave." It was actually a real concern of his. What tied Bruce here? The man had been running for seven years. Maybe longer if you counted 'emotionally' running. So yeah, actually, it kind of terrified him to think that he could wake up one day and poof, no more Banner.
He had Alessa now...but what if Alessa went with him? Now there was something to be said about the massive insecurities this all was inducing, so he stole a cracker and half choked on it.
"Shit. I'm not trying to kill you, honestly!"
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Bruce would by lying if he said there was no possibility of him leaving. There was always a chance he would have to pack up and leave. The military was getting more aggressive every day. They called him a military secret, their property, something they needed in the fight against terrorism and aliens. He was scared of being chased out of the United States all over again, and he wouldn't dare take either Tony or Alessa with him, because Tony was too recognizable and would never last, and Alessa was a little girl and on the run was no place for a little girl.
Bruce rolled his eyes, giving Tony a gentle nudge with his elbow. "It takes more than stale crackers to kill me, Tony."
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Bruce's words, his tone, and the fact that he was even trying to eat this slop pretty much left Tony with too much emotion welling up in his chest for one man to endure. He found his fingers creeping across Bruce's elbow and shoulder as he rested his head on his bicep. It made eating difficult, but this wasn't gourmet stuff and he was trying to give Bruce an out.
"We're the smartest men in the world. We've got to be able to figure this out."
Curing Banner of his condition might never come to pass but there had to be something to let Tony fit his way inside of him-- He just had his release but the thought was making him half hard again.
He needed to just breathe.
"Otherwise, that's just embarrassing. We might have to join Mensa or something!"
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"We can figure it out. There was a man who was able to temporarily raise the action threshold of the transformation. We might be able to find his work and build on it."
Bruce tried to pretend he didn't notice Tony's erection. He wouldn't be able to last through a second round.
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"Moved to the top of the list," Tony said affectionately and nuzzled the underside of Bruce's chin. That was not like him. He knew how he behaved normally and nothing he and Bruce did was normal at all. It made him wonder if that was significant. If this was what he had been waiting for since he was a child to fill his loneliness.
The meal forgotten, Tony busied himself lightly stroking patterns into Bruce's skin until they both fell asleep. Morning might well be brutal. There was no telling how stable Alessa was just yet though her vitals were good. That did not dismiss the potential for a other episode--
Tony just hoped that he would be woken gently by JARVIS rather than to the house burning down around them.
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Alessa woke up before them. She decided to take her new body out for a spin. She didn't remember how to walk, so she just ended up rolling out of bed onto the floor.
If the yelp she made when she fell wasn't enough to wake everyone up, there was a lot of dust on the floor, and she sneezed. She sneezed fire, actually. She could now breathe fire, and the fire caught on her sheets.
She rolled away from the fire (it wasn't the ideal time to remember how to crawl), then just projected herself downstairs to grab a bucket of water. She had some trouble finding a bucket in the unfamiliar surroundings. Her pillow caught on fire. She found a bucket and waited for it to fill in the sink. The bed posts caught fire. She took the filled bucket upstairs and dumped it on her bed. She shorted out the lamp on her bedside table and nearly electrocuted herself.
Her one comfort was JARVIS bear. All the excitement made him fall from her windowsill right on her head.
Day one of having a body: not off to the best start.
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It wasn't the smell of burning that roused him, he'd had his nose buried in Bruce's soft curls. It wasn't even the alarm because when he slept (which wasn't too often), he was dead to the world and little noises like sirens never bothered him. No, it was JARVIS' voice and Bruce's stirring that caused him to open one brown eye in annoyance.
"Sir, the sprinkler system is failing to turn on. I believe the pipes have melted."
Tony groaned. "Melted?" An image of Alessa's not so little room fire appeared on the wall and after wrestling with the sheets around his ankles, Tony was to the door.
No doubt, Bruce was ahead of him. The trouble was that in the lab, there weren't exactly windows. And the fire extinguisher in the kitchen had expired two years ago. Ooops.
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Every lab was equipped with a fire blanket. Even if Tony's fire extinguishers were expired, Bruce had made sure that there had been a fire blanket in the lab.
Alessa, for her part, had a very cranky expression on her face as she tried to psychically quench the fire. Why the hell did she try water in the first place?
The fire was resisting her attempts to make it go out completely, but it wasn't spreading anymore.
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Scooping up the angry seven year old ended up being one of those things that might end up falling into the 'stupid' column of things to do, much like separating two dogs fighting over a bone, but Tony did as he was told and high stepped right on out of his lab, out of the building, and to the beach where there was nothing inherently flammable.
He let Bruce deal with the mess inside and plopped down in the white sand with Alessa, grinning at her scowling. It only took one mention of 'burping' or 'breathing' fire for Tony's eyebrows to shoot up and his hand to go with it.
He wanted a high-five. Only Tony Stark, a man wholly capable of blowing himself up several times in any given day because he ignored his own safety protocols would think it cool to find out that his daughter could sneeze and catch her room on fire.
So sue him.
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But she didn't move her hand away from his. Instead, she traced her fingers along his, feeling the grooves and calluses of adult hands, then grasped his palm like she'd never let it go, while her other hand dug into the sand, running grains through her fingers and getting them under her nails.
Her expression didn't move from its scowl, but her eyes filled up with tears. She hadn't had a chance to enjoy the diversity of touch, the feeling of the sun on her skin, in so long. It was baring down on her now, not through a window or in the shade, but right on her face.
"You're really stupid for someone so smart." Her speech was barely comprehensible, with how clumsy her tongue was. She didn't acknowledge the tears, even when they overflowed her lashes and ran down her cheeks. She could smell the ocean. She could feel the sun, the sand, and her new guardian's hand. It was a lot to take in.
I'm going to try to be so much better about tags from now on! <3
"You wouldn't believe how many people have said that," Tony replied, glancing only once over her shoulder to be sure that the whole mansion wasn't up in smoke. Banner was doing a good job playing fire marshal, sure, but Tony needed him to be out here, needed him to come and experience this with them.
It wasn't quite like baby's first words or baby's first step but it was pretty damned close.
And Tony was so proud of her...so proud of them...and of what they could accomplish.
"Maybe tomorrow we'll go for a swim."
Take your time! <3
She didn't like how her tongue stumbled in her mouth. It felt all wrong. But she could feel, and she was crying, and she could feel his fingers on her face. She traced her fingers against his beard, feeling the coarse hair before following the curvature of his face, completely lacking in any attempt to ask permission or express shame. Once upon a time, she wouldn't have touched anyone like him. Now she just wanted to grab and never let go. She just might.
It took a few minutes before Bruce eventually came out, the question of how the sheets had been set on fire in the first place on the tip of his tongue, only to recede when he saw Alessa's tear-stained face and her little hand pawing at Tony's face.
Instead of asking questions, he just settled next to her, keeping her between him and his boyfriend.
"You should have sunscreen. Your skin is still too new to deal well with too much direct sunlight.
Re: Take your time! <3
Tony had to laugh at the girl, not because of how she sounded (he thought she sounded beautiful) but because of her wit. Still such a sharp little thing. She fit in so well. He kept wiping at he tears before Bruce joined them, looking just fine in all honesty. Tony was relieved at that but he didn't make it a big deal.
"If I'm just going to drown her tomorrow, we don't have to really worry about the sunscreen," Tony joked, but he did get to his feet and lifted Alessa all too easily into his arms to carry her about thirty feet towards a set of chairs with an umbrella over most of the spot. She could sit in the sand and have her cry and Banner would be pleased that they avoided skin cancer.
He paused as he watched Bruce get up to join them and put a hand to his chest as if to stop his progress before he leaned in to kiss him. Hard.
"You help me make such beautiful things," he murmured. Bruce needed to know how thankful he was. Even if poor Alessa probably would roll her eyes.
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Bruce tried to stand, but Tony's hand stopped him, and then his mouth. Bruce briefly grasped at Tony's arms, kissing him back, feeling the intensity and love and tension--
Alessa made a loud gagging noise, even as she was forced to sniffle from tears. Bruce pulled away from Tony with a laugh. "I'm telling you, Alessa. You're going to do the same thing one day."
"If I do, I'm doing it in front of you guys." Yes. Yes, Alessa was just that spiteful.