"You asshole!" A fist collides with the jaw of a teenage boy, a few drops of blood spurting from his mouth as this happened.
"Dude, what's your problem?!" the boy that was just hit yells back angrily, clutching his throbbing head in his hands. The other boy charges forward, grabbing a fistful of his shirt and shoving him against a wall.
"You know what you did."
Three weeks.
Three weeks of torture for poor Tony Stark.
"Hahaha, Gene, you're so funny!" Tony watched a ginger girl as she blissfully held hands with an older Asian boy, both of them walking down the hallway at school.
"No Pepper, you're so funny. Did that really happen?" When she bit her lip in an attempt to hold in a smile, he knew it did.
Gene rolled his eyes, a light smirk playing on his lips as he walked into the science room with his girlfriend. Tony eyed them, a hopeless expression on his face, the corners of his mouth tugging downwards into a frown.
"Come on man, let's get to class," Rhodey said, walking over to his friend. "The bell just rang."
Tony shut his locker, nodding his head in acknowledgment of what his friend just said. "Yeah." He clutched his science book in one hand and walked off to class, his friend trailing not too far behind him.
They entered the same classroom that Pepper and Gene had entered earlier, taking their seats at their usual lab station. Gene and Happy sat in front of them, talking nonchalantly as Pepper sat in the far end of the room next to a girl named Amanda.
"Ok class, let's begin." The professor started his daily lecture, and Tony didn't think too much of it. He dropped his head on the lab station in front of them, making a clunking sound as he did so. It's not like he ACTUALLY needed to listen to this advanced physics stuff. He was already at advanced advanced advanced advanced physics.
Someone in front of him scoffed as the other one laughed. Tony lifted his head off the desk. Happy and Gene were passing notes in front of him. Tony squinted at it, recognizing a word written on it… 'Pepper'. It was said more than once, too.
What was up with Gene and Happy talking about Pepper? Tony reached into his pocket, pulling out his phone. He looked up at the professor, who was writing something on the board and facing the other way. He clicked a button on his phone, bringing it to picture taking mode.
After zooming in a considerable amount and aiming it at the piece of paper, he snapped a picture and brought his phone back under the table. He went to his menu and browsed through to the folder that said 'My Pictures'. He clicked on the most recent one, and after it loaded he snuck a peak at it and read the conversation between them.
"My house, tonight, drinks, sex, Pepper, taking advantage of, when she's drunk, dump her, after it's done…"
He used the few words he could make out and connected them together in his brain. He was going to bring Pepper to his house tonight, get her drunk, and then take advantage of her.
Rage bubbled up inside of Tony. What? How could Gene do that to Pepper?
The bell rang, and Tony dashed out of his seat and followed Gene down the hallway to his locker.
Tony pushed Gene harder against the wall.
"Stark, what the fuck?!" He kicked Tony in his shin, making him drop him and bend over slightly.
"You were going to invite Pepper over to your house tonight, give her alcohol, take advantage of her, and then dump her." Gene blinked confusedly at Tony, whose face was flushed red in anger.
"How did you know about that?" Tony just snarled and punched him in the stomach. Gene coughed, a few more drops of blood coming out of his mouth.
"Hey, look! Khan and Stark are fighting!" A huge group of students gathered around them, chanting the word 'fight' over and over again.
A few more minutes passed of fighting, and at the end of those minutes, Gene had spilt blood and Tony was badly bruised. Tony swung a fist blindly at Gene's head, who ducked and then rammed him into the wall.
Tony struggled for a bit, trying to get away from Gene pinning him down to the wall. Gene smirked, even though his lip was cut.
"I don't know how you found out about my little plans for tonight, Stark, but you'd better give up. Get real, look who's winning … I'm stronger, bigger, and hey, I've got the girl." Tony let out a low groan, still struggling against Gene. He was right; Gene had won, he had lost. It was over. He slammed his eyes shut in defeat.
"Tony?" That voice… Tony would recognize that voice anywhere. He slowly opened his eyes; pain had almost completely taken over his body. Almost.
He saw Pepper's pretty face among the crowd of student; terror and fear were etched into her facial expression. Eyebrows knit, her mouth in a frown… how much he would give to see her smile again.
"And hey, I've got the girl." Gene's words were like poison to repeated over and over in his head, and as he looked at Pepper, he realized that he DID 'have' her. But she was so much better than this guy; she was so much better than this scum.
"No Gene. You're not winning; you're not bigger than me, stronger than me, and you definitely don't have the girl. She's smart, she'll realize you're just as bad as any common criminal, and then? She'll dump your ass." With those being his final words, he shoved Gene harder against the wall before backing up and swinging one fist at him.
Gene pushed himself off the wall, his vision blurred and his head spinning, before he collapsed onto the ground in front of Tony.
Everyone cheered, clapped, wolf whistled, and hollered. "Nice job Tony!" "Man, that was great!" "Awesome, Stark!" Things were being shouted at him through all the excitement, but he didn't hear any of them or notice anyone but Pepper. She wasn't smiling, she wasn't happy, she didn't even show emotion. Didn't she get what he'd just done for her?
But no, she didn't know the full story. All she saw was her best friend beating up her boyfriend.
Pepper ran.
He had to fix this.
"Wait!" He chased after her. She ran up, up, up. Up all the flights of stairs in the school, up all the hallways, up every floor, until she reached the roof.
And Tony followed her. He ran up, up, up. Up all the flights of stairs in the school, up all the hallways, up every floor, until he reached the roof.
"Pepper, let me explain." Tony said this as he burst through the doors of the roof. He found his female companion not too far away, her arms crossed and her back towards him as she looked over the edge and sniffled.
"He… he didn't deserve you. He isn't who you think he is." Pepper turned around solely, her eyes looking at the ground.
"You both… you both look horrible. Him even more than you. You're both beaten up and bloody and bruised and... why?" Tony sighed, swinging his legs over the edge of the roof so he was sitting down. Pepper followed suit.
"He was just a jerk." Pepper glared at him from behind her hair, which was hanging in front of her face because of her downward cast.
"You have no reason Tony." She said calmly. She was taking this a lot better than he thought she would; no yelling, no screaming, no hurting him in anyway. Just a calm question of explanation.
He hesitantly pulled out his phone from his pocket. He brought up the picture of the note him and Happy were passing. It stared back him for a few minutes before he gave it to Pepper.
Her eyes met his for a moment as she reached for the phone. She turned her head to look at the picture, and he could see her eyes moving from left to right as she read through it.
Her eyes glazed over, and she inhaled a shaky breath before shutting it and handing it back over to Tony. She stood up and walked to the other side of the roof, looking over the railing while she tried to prevent Tony from seeing her crying.
But Tony wasn't stupid. He knew what she was doing. Not because he could see or hear her, but because he sensed it. He knew his friend needed him right now.
He got up and walked over to her, putting a hand on her shoulder.
"He's not even worth your tears. You're so much better than him, Pepper. Don't ever think otherwise." Some how, his comforting words only made the tears come harder and more plentiful. But maybe all she needed right now was to cry.
Pepper turned around, rubbing her eyes softly with her knuckles, before burying her head in his shoulder and wrapping her arms around his waist. Tony was a bit taken back by this, but nonetheless, wrapped his arms around her shaking shoulders and rested his cheek against her hair.
The two stood their for who knows how long, him just comforting her the best he could. Sure, Tony wanted more out of this hug. He wanted to hear her say she wanted to be with him instead of being upset over a guy that she actually wanted to be with. He wanted to hear her whisper his name and smile for him, not hear her whisper Gene's name angrily and frown because of him.
He wanted her to love him like he loved her, not her love Gene and Gene not return that.
He wanted her to be more than a friend.
But right now, all she needed was a friend, and he was going to give her just that.
A/N And I'm back!!!! Sorry for those who have been sending me mesasges asking for me to continue "reality TV". I still am working on it, I've just been really busy lately. As an apology to all of you, I give you this Tony and Pepper one shot. Heh, I think this is actually my first IMAA oneshot. I've written multi chapter fics for IMAA, though.
One thing I didn't like about this is that I made Happy agree and go along with Gene's little plan. We all know Happy Hogan is awesome, but I had to morph him a little bit to suit this fic.
I was inspired by Your Guardian Angel by The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. It's a great song, so addicting and calming and soothing. You should really listen to it.