Heeey XD Awhh, with all my 'Her Story' hype, I forgot about this story for a bit D: but now I gotz time to update!
Tony rested his head in is hands as he rested his elbows on the ledge; stress was getting the best of him. As he studied the computer screen more, he felt more and more compelled to shirk this task and relax for once. It was a rare occasion, of course, but nonetheless it was not ignorable. He minimized his current window and walked away from the computer with a large sigh. Pulling out his phone, he scrolled through his contacts and found Pepper's name. He tried texting first, since he knew she'd be mad.
Please forgive me? He removed his shirt and plugged in his charger as to waste a few minutes. No response. He sighed and tried calling her. He heard it ring once, then a pause. Twice, then it stopped. He sighed. He knew what that meant. She was really mad at him. He exited the lab and started on his way to sneak her house in hopes that she would at least talk to him. Before he could reach the door, there was a large flash of light in front of him and then his path was blocked. Tony stepped back to see the Mandarin.
Tony grimaced at the large obstruction as he removed each ring from his finger and slid it onto the string that he dawned on his neck. Tony crossed his arms and he observed the motion.
"What are you doing here?" Tony asked in an unwelcome tone. Gene laughed lightly but maliciously before he spoke his explanation. Tony felt nervous at Gene walking a bit closer to him, but managed to hide his nervous expression so Gene would not notice.
"Don't you remember, Stark? I'd expect you have a good memory. You know what I'm here for." Gene said with a smile still painted on his face. Tony tried not to show Gene that he was secretly a bit scared of him now, and tried not to make it evident how much it hurt to look at Gene anymore. He tried to ignore the pain that was brought to his heart (emotionally, of course) when he saw the smug look on Gene's face. He tried to hide it all; luckily for him, he knew just the way to do that.
"What do you want me to do? I don't have a map to the sixth ring. I don't have any clues. I don't know anything more about the rings. That's all you." Tony was proud of how completely serious he sounded, but he kept the thought to himself.
"Look, Stark, we can get this done the easier way or we can make it difficult by disagreeing all the time. Which would you prefer?" Gene folded his arms. They were silent as Tony contemplated Gene's statement. As true as it was, it was going to be hard to say with words that he agreed.
"Fine. I'll cooperate. But don't expect it to last too long because the minute you're done with me, I'm done with you." Gene laughed a bit at this.
"Fine, have it your way. Because once I'm done with you I'll be too busy getting anything I want with my unlimited power. You'll be finished, period." Tony showed an expression of anger now. There was no end to his ruthlessness, Tony thought. The room was silent only for a slight moment now.
~…~
"Tony, are you crazy?" Rhodey could just barely refrain from yelling.
"What?" Tony asked defensively as they walked into Tony's room and shut the door.
"You're going to help him? That's the worst mistake you could possibly make!" This time Rhodey pretty much was yelling. His expression was evidence that he was getting mad at the young inventor that he called his best friend.
"What choice do I have? This is the only way I'll get my dad back." Tony tried to be quieter than Rhodey was, but it was failing as he wanted to yell back, but was trying to be calm.
"Tony, there's got to be another way. There's always another way. You just don't care to think of one." Rhodey was quieter with his tone as he heard the front door open and close, meaning his mother was home from work and he did not want her to hear him yelling; which would make her come upstairs and ask what all the commotion is about, and he didn't want to have to scrape up some sort of stupid lie that wasn't true in any way, shape or form. That and he didn't want to have to lie to his mother about Tony's actions any more than he was already.
"Well there's not this time, okay?" Tony, sitting on the edge of his bed, laid back as an effort to try and relax; yet with the way Rhodey was yelling it was quite impossible to be relaxed.
"Tony, you're only thinking of yourself. You're just assuming that Pepper and I would want to help you deal with Gene. Do you really think that we want to put ourselves through that again? Are you really getting that selfish, Tony?" Rhodey exclaimed. Tony sighed. This conversation was going south. When he'd said he was working with Gene to find the last five rings, he said it in hopes that somehow Rhodey would at least understand his motives.
"It's not like I want to! It's the last thing I want. But if I tell him no he can just get his Mandarin power out, destroy my armor, kill my friends and then kill me. And I just can't risk that, okay? I'm not being selfish!" Tony tried to make it sound as innocent as he could, but it was not working. There was no way Rhodey would see or hear a trace of innocence by now. He was feeling alone and he was getting the sense that he was going to have to deal with this by himself.
"Tony, you're not listening to me! I'm trying to tell you that this is a mistake but you're not hearing me. And if you're not going to listen to your friends, then I'm not going to help you. You're on your own." Rhodey walked out of Tony's room. Tony ran his hands through his hair and sighed with heavy stress piling on top of him. With the silence in the room, Tony heard footsteps on the stairs and a light knock on his bedroom door. He didn't respond, so after a moment Roberta carefully walked into the room, as if trying not to shatter something delicate; perhaps Tony's hardened shell of emotion.
"Tony, is everything okay?" She asked quietly. Tony was silent for a moment as he contemplated his response. He didn't bother to sit up straight and look at her, but instead remained gazing at his ceiling.
"Yeah, I'm fine. Rhodey's just mad at me because he thinks I'm associating with someone we had a bad experience with." Tony picked his words carefully, as not to reveal anything about his past experiences. Roberta remained in the doorway to Tony's bedroom, leaning on the doorknob.
"Are you sure?" She asked. Tony sat up on his bed, but faced away from her and towards his computer desk and looked to his feet.
"Yeah, I'm sure. It'll be okay." Roberta nodded, knowing Tony would not look up to see it and gently closed the door behind her on her way back downstairs to prepare dinner; which she didn't expect him to eat. She knew he was feeling down about something, just not what it was that was depressing.
Tony scrolled through the contacts on his phone and saw all the names of the people he felt he had let down in some way or another. He felt alone in the world as he had post-accident. He had friends once, but now he didn't; all because he would do anything to get his father back. It was disgraceful; then the thought of what would happen when he did get his dad back; he wouldn't need school anymore, so he wouldn't need friends. Everything could just go back to normal, the way they were before the plane crash.
Tony decided to get up and take a walk. He closed his bedroom door behind him, put on his coat (he had noticed it was a windy fall day outside), stuffed his hands in the pockets, and began his walk through town. He walked past Stark International and noticed the train track that led past the building and remembered his first adventure as Iron Man. He remembered how he'd stopped the train from destroying the building, but sent it into the middle of the city. He remembered how he'd shown bravery and strength when he showed his iron mask to the citizens of the city. He remembered how he'd shown everyone that he was their protector and their savior; now he was nothing.
Tony walked to the edge of the city, towards Jersey. He found the site where the temple was that they'd explored months back. He walked past the giant hole in the ground; far past it. As he grew further away from it, so did his memories fade. He forgot that day and everything it had wrought. It was too heavy on his mind as he was trying to relax.
As he walked further into the desert-like area, pieces of some sort of metal were shown protruding from the sandy ground. As he stepped further into what looked like wreckage, the shards of metal started to look more and more like plane parts. He clutched his hands into fists in his coat pockets as he shut his eyes tight. He saw a discarded wing to the plane, and different large pieces that read 'Stark International', each piece only holding a few letters and scattered all around the area. Tony stood in the middle of the wreckage and turned to see the metal casing that he had stored his armor in.
Tony saw everything as he remembered it from that fateful day. No one had bothered to pick anything up or fix anything. No one cared to even come by the spot. He had been on his own from that day on, and it would be that way the rest of his life because he wanted to save his father from the harmful grasp of Gene, the person he had once trusted with his father's secrets, information and his own secret. He had trusted Gene with the secret that he thought he was slowly starting to like his redheaded friend more and more each day. It hurt him to know that he trusted people too easily, and it only made it worse that he knew it's true. He knew that it was all true. He trusted people too easily, and there was probably, if not some, at least one person who wasn't going to be too kind to him in the future because he didn't care to see a negative side of anyone and that could result in someone else he trusted with at least some secrets to betray him in some way like he was.
Tony decided to leave, as being at the crash site made him too depressed and that wasn't helping him de-stress. He wasn't under the impression that he could fully and completely relax and de-stress, but at least a little would be nice. Tony walked back into town, slowly pacing himself and thinking about different things as he passed different places. Different memories came as different building passed his view. It hurt him to be in this city, as he felt he made too many mistakes that caused just a pinch more misery to pile up slowly. But leaving was out of the question. There were things that he needed to get done here.
It also helps that there's that one person that I just can't leave behind…
Chapter twooo. Took me long enough…(only due to the fact that I went outside and made a snowman in the middle of the chapter XD) but it's done. Poor Tony is so saaad D: review!