Written for the 2018 Marvelously Magical Fanfiction Bingo
Square: G2 / Pairing prompt: Tony Stark/Hermione Granger
Consequences
She had warned Tony a thousand times to stay out of her lab. In fact, she had gone so far as to ban him from entering, even though it was technically located in his building. However, that was mainly because he just couldn't seem to keep his hands to himself. He was used to working with the more mechanical and hands-on side of things and always wanted to touch her experiments or potions-in-progress to see if he could figure out how they worked. No matter how many times she tried to relieve his curiosity by showing him her process, though, the scientist in him simply would not take "It's magic!" as an answer as to how it all came together to make such potent products at the end. Consequently, he continued his nosy incursions and had set off several explosions in the past – one of which had been a volatile potion that took hours to clean up by hand because it would have been just too dangerous to use magic. Fortunately, even though he had not been wearing a full Iron Man suit, he did have the rare foresight to don some protective gear on that occasion. Therefore, he was not injured. The scare did not deter him long, though. In fact, she caught the indomitable man in there again the very next week!
Tony's antics in her lab actually made her nostalgic for the old days in Potions class with Neville. At least her friend had been predictable in his accidental destructiveness - while Tony continued to be sneaky about his. Consequently, she had the idea to set up magical alarm wards whenever she left that part of the tower – especially since he could easily disable the mechanical ones - or get Jarvis to electronically bypass them entirely. Therefore, she just sighed and shook her head when she heard the alarm sound all the way up to the penthouse apartment that she had shared with the snarky genius ever since they became a couple shortly after she had joined the Avengers team as their magic expert. She was not even surprised when the sound of a small explosion soon followed the alarm.
"He did it again, didn't he, Jarvis?" she asked wearily and briefly pinched the bridge of her nose in exasperation. The man was definitely as stubborn as he was sexy. Well, she couldn't say that Pepper had not warned her…repeatedly. In fact, the two women had become excellent friends over the past year – and had shared many amusing conversations about Tony along the way - much to the man's consternation.
"Yes, Ms. Granger. I'm afraid so," the disembodied voice of the resident A.I. answered her question. "I would have warned you, but…"
"He told you not to," she finished for him knowingly as she headed out the door to see what disaster Tony had instigated this time! Honestly, the man got into more trouble by himself than Harry and Ron ever did together…and that was certainly saying something! Fortunately, she knew that none of the potions that she was currently brewing were dangerous, per se, but some of them could have caused some interesting side effects if Tony had managed to interrupt them at a crucial stage. Therefore, it was with quite a bit of trepidation that she made her way back down to the lab to survey the damage. Once she arrived and caught sight of the scene in front of her, however, all of her irritation instantly disappeared and she found that she just could not contain her laughter. In fact, she actually laughed until her sides hurt!
"Whenever you're finished…" Tony commented in a dry and unamused tone – just as if it was not his own fault that he had been caught in such an interesting predicament.
Hermione managed to catch her breath long enough to say, "Well…do you want the good news or the bad news first?"
A slightly uneasy look crossed over Tony's face. "What? This stuff isn't poisonous, is it?" he asked in a worried tone until Hermione's calm manner convinced him that nothing was seriously wrong with him – not below the surface anyway. "Very funny…and I thought that you were supposed to be the Good Witch. How did I end up with the Wicked one, instead?" He bemoaned his fate in his usual overdramatic style, but Hermione was not amused by his efforts to turn the blame away from himself.
"No, it's not dangerous. That's the good news," she replied curtly as she retrieved the medical scanner that he had helped her to redesign in order to use in magical situations like this. She then utilized it to closely examine him and the mess that he had made – just to be completely sure. "It's not toxic at all, so you will live to see another day."
"What's the bad news then?" he eyed her suspiciously until he realized that she had replaced the scanner in her hand with her cell phone, instead - and had taken several pictures of him.
"The bad news…" she stated as she tapped on her phone for a moment before she turned her attention back to him, "…is that I just sent the pictures to the rest of the team. Oh, I can't wait until Bruce sees them! He is never going to let you forget this - not after all of the grief you have given him," she exclaimed as her smile came back and her laughter commenced again as she conjured a full length mirror so that her lover could see that he had managed to knock over the one potion in the lab that could turn his entire body, clothing and all, into a brilliant shade of green!
Tony stared at his reflection for just a moment before a broad smile crossed his face. Then he started to flex his muscles and strike ridiculous poses in front of the mirror before he turned his usual knee-weakening grin on her. "The difference between me and the Hulk, though," he said, "is that I make green look good!"
"Yes, that you do – even though his green covers considerably more muscle," Hermione smirked as she stepped very close to him and placed a hand on his chest. Her voice turned low and seductive at that point. "I can't complain, though. In fact…speaking of muscles…why don't we go back upstairs, take those potion-stained clothes off of you, and see if everything underneath is green, as well?" Hermione's lips twisted up again as Tony's immediately noticeable physical response showed his enthusiastic approval for her idea. Then her eyes twinkled even more fervently as she summoned a mop and handed it to him. "After you clean up this mess, of course!"