July, 2008
The Wyvern took on a life of her own. Maggie kept on with her work and just got better at it, now deep in the world of secrets. But she wasn't a nomadic backpacker travelling any longer. She moved from target to target across the world, travelling namelessly in fast cars and jets, covering her tracks every step of the way.
Maggie Stark was still travelling, of course, so every now and then she popped up very obviously to have her photo taken at a party in Manila or a resort in the Maldives before fading away again.
She went after people on most wanted lists and kill lists, those who governments and agencies believed were too dangerous or too fast to bring in. She slipped in and kidnapped these people, and delivered them neatly packed. And she found that now she signed her work as the Wyvern, she did indeed have a few regulars who sent cases her way. Some offered to pay her, but she didn't accept. Occasionally she did accept equipment or vehicles for specific missions, since she didn't like to use Stark Industries resources for her work. She had a few online drops set up with different agencies in Europe and North America, and had made something of a name for herself in the world of counterintelligence.
No one knew anything about her other than the name Wyvern, and the rumour that if you had an untraceable criminal, or a case that had gone beyond the boundaries of what your agency could do, you could reach out to her and she might help you. Not a mercenary or a vigilante or an assassin - just the Wyvern.
Maggie realised that she had turned the Wyvern into a ghost, just like the Winter Soldier. She wondered if that meant he could be someone like her: a blank faceless entity, behind which lived a person with a whole other life.
Maggie killed her first man on a hot summer night in Amsterdam. He was an assassin, wanted by Interpol, and he had caught Maggie sneaking up on him on his hotel rooftop. He pulled out a knife. They fought, and Maggie wasn't able to knock him out quickly like she did everyone else - he was skilled, a lifetime fighter. They'd grappled on the floor and the blade nicked Maggie's fingers and teased at her throat.
She had heaved against him and pushed him back, breaking free. But when she rolled to her feet and looked down, she saw that the knife had lodged itself deep in his throat. A dark pool of blood lay gleaming on the rooftop, and the man was already dead.
Bile had risen in Maggie's throat, constricting and hot. But she'd repressed the urge to be sick. Shaking, she sent her tipoff to Interpol. She didn't get rid of her Wyvern signature. This man and his death were a part of who she was, now.
Later, as Maggie washed off the blood and cried in the shower, she realised she wasn't sorry that man had had to die so she could live. But she knew, deep in her bones, that she didn't want to be the person who killed, instead of incapacitated. She had heard through the grapevine that some of her contractors would prefer her to kill her victims, instead of turn them over to justice. But for her, a trial was miles better than a funeral.
August, 2008
Minsk, Belarus
Maggie stood in a trashed studio apartment with her hands on her knees, panting. The shackled woman on the floor in front of her lay groaning, the broken glass under her crinkling slightly. Maggie had had to break the woman's ribs to keep her down, even after she'd got the handcuffs on.
Maggie peeled up the bottom of her face mask slightly so she could wipe the blood away from her busted-open lip, then glanced down at the dark haired woman on the ground. "I thought you were an investment banker," she said in weary Russian.
The woman rolled onto her back and laughed. She was only a few years older than Maggie, wearing a rumpled black dress and smudged red lipstick. "I am." She spat blood onto the floor. "That was fun, kotyonok, let's do it again."
Maggie glanced around at the woman's apartment. The plate glass window was smashed, the curtains billowing in the cool air, the bedroom door hung precariously off its hinges, there were cracks and body-sized holes in the plaster walls, and nearly every ornament on the coffee table and bookshelf had been smashed to smithereens. The digital TV had three bulletholes in it.
"Where did you learn to fight like that?" Maggie asked, still panting. She'd come after this woman because her competition in the banking market had been mysteriously dying. Maggie had thought the woman was hiring assassins to do her dirty work, but she was pretty sure she'd found the main culprit now. That was the hardest fight she'd ever fought. At least four times she was sure she was about to die. It was a good thing she'd learned to quickly incapacitate fighters more skilled than herself.
The woman's lips curved dangerously. "Who are you, with your strange clothes and your mask?"
Maggie just eyed her.
"Oh, go on," the woman pouted. For a woman with at least three broken ribs who'd been recently electrocuted, she seemed remarkably composed. "I accept you've beaten me, and you're clearly not going to kill me. So tell me who you are, before you hand me over to whoever you work for."
"You'll be going to the police," Maggie said in a hard voice.
The woman raised her eyebrows. "Well I didn't expect that. Go on then, who are you, goody two shoes?"
"Who are you?" Maggie challenged.
"I am Zoya."
That wasn't the name in Maggie's file, but for a woman who could fight like that, she wasn't surprised she was going by a fake name.
"And where'd you learn to fight like that?"
Zoya cocked her head, her dark hair sliding over broken glass. "You really don't know? I thought that's why you came." She eyed Maggie's black mask and goggles as if she could see through them. "Hm. Well I come from the Red Room, not that that matters any more." She smiled at Maggie's continued silence. "My my, you haven't even heard of the Red Room? What are they teaching baby agents these days?"
"Alright, that's enough out of you." Maggie aimed her wrist-mounted blaster downward and knocked Zoya out with a point-blank bolt.
The silence was blissful.
A week later, Maggie stood in a crater.
Or at least it looked like a crater: Maggie could tell it had once been a grand old building with a marble staircase, stone pillars, and crystal chandeliers. But now it all lay in smashed and blackened rubble, a scar in the small Russian city she had come to.
It turned out the Red Room was more or less common knowledge amongst intelligence agents. It didn't use to be, but last year the whole organization had crumbled suddenly. Now, agencies had figured out that the Red Room was an assassin training facility for young girls, disguised as a ballet academy.
Maggie spotted a single, dusty ballet shoe in the rubble as she paced through it. From what she could tell, there was nothing left of the Red Room's organization: the leaders had been killed in the bomb blast that had decimated this building, and the youngest recruits, frightened young girls, had arrived at a nearby children's shelter in tears. Maggie had dug into all the information she could find, trying to see if anyone had escaped, but whoever had taken down the Red Room had been thorough. Maggie had done her research to see if this was someone she should look into, but it seemed they were a ghost like her. She always came up blank.
Maybe there were other people out there like Zoya, but Maggie already knew that she would not be able to find them unless they wanted to be found - Zoya had admitted as much to Interpol, claiming she'd gotten bored of living on the legal side of life.
Maggie sighed, her nostrils full of the smell of burned wood and dust. There was nothing left here. No leads for her to follow.
Whoever had put an end to the Red Room had made sure it would never rise again.
The Triskelion, Washington D.C.
"Alright, next on the list…" Fury clicked down on the list of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s low-level observation targets, rubbing his temple. "Margaret Stark." He glanced back up at Agent Coulson, who sat opposite his desk with a tablet on his lap.
Coulson reviewed the notes before meeting Fury's eye again. "Again, not much news, sir. We've seen her in the company of some pretty powerful and dangerous people abroad once or twice, but she keeps herself to herself and we don't really know what she's doing with these friends." He scratched his head. "Something's definitely up, but other than theories we can't be sure."
Fury leaned back. "Theories?"
"We thought maybe she had a secret boyfriend or a family or something," Coulson shrugged. "Another agent thought it might be drugs. But it could just be that she really, really values her privacy."
Fury pinched the bridge of her nose. "So what do you think? Should we move her up a category?"
"I can't say, sir. It's hard to pin her down. I think it's definitely worth still keeping an eye on her where we can."
Fury waved a hand. "Keep her on the list then." He clicked over to the next target, sighing. "I do not want to mess with the Starks."
September, 2008
Maggie came back to California for another week, and realized that she did not fit there any more. Her mind was focused on her work, and Tony noticed her distraction. He kept trying to convince her to stay - not by directly asking, but by trying to invite her to plans in two weeks, a month, a year. He told her to stay with everything but his words, and Maggie didn't know how she possibly could.
She spent time with Happy in the boxing ring in Tony's gym, but found she had to hold back. She'd learned so much more than boxing. Happy had a good time, but keeping secrets from him always made her miserable. Rhodey invited her out to the airbase, but she turned him down. They went out for coffee instead, and Maggie realised that there was no one here who knew her anymore. Even Pepper, who at least seemed to understand Maggie's desire to get back out into the world, looked at her with concern whenever she thought Maggie wasn't looking.
Maggie tried her best to playact as the woman who did fit there, and she did enjoy it. The time spent working quietly with Tony in the workshop, or eating takeout together on the balcony, felt precious. But the world kept creeping back in. She told herself to enjoy the time she had here, because she always missed Tony when she was gone. He missed her too, but she began to think he was missing a little girl called Maggot who kept her anger pressed so deep down that no one ever saw it, not even her.
On the last morning of Maggie's visit, Tony woke up at dawn and spent a few hours in the workshop, surprised to find that she wasn't down there. Normally they spent the first part of the morning together. Finally his stomach started growling, and he padded upstairs toward the kitchen.
He walked in and noticed the fridge door was open. Below the open door were two legs. Two fully human flesh legs. Tony stopped dead, staring.
The woman looking into his fridge stepped back, and it definitely wasn't Maggie: this woman was blonde, wearing shorts and a loose shirt, humming softly to herself as she unscrewed the milk bottle lid and started pouring herself cereal. Her hair was mussed up, and as she turned Tony spotted a purpling hickey on her neck.
He frowned. "I don't know you." And this wasn't his usual 'oops I forgot your name now the alcohol's worn off', he genuinely had never seen this woman before.
The woman yelped and spun around, then went bright red at the sight of him. Her hands folded over her chest. "Oh god, Mr Stark, I'm so sorry - she said you wouldn't be up here for hours, I-" as she spoke she scrambled to put the milk away and shut the fridge, clearly eager to flee.
Tony's expression cleared. He felt… uncomfortable. Beautiful woman in his house? Normally the start of something fun. Beautiful woman who'd just been thoroughly seduced by his little sister? Yikes.
"You, ah-" Tony stammered over his words as he stumbled backward. "No worries." He backed out of the kitchen and fled back down to the workshop.
A couple of hours later, Maggie walked down the stairs to his workshop, back in her travelling clothes.
"I'm off again, Tony," she called as she poked her head in, then spotted him nearly neck-deep in one of his cars. "I know you said you have to be at SI so don't worry about driving me to the airport."
He glanced up. "Oh… okay."
Her eyes glinted. "Caitlyn said she ran into you."
Tony dropped his spanner with a clank. "Yeah, yep, you… good catch, Mags." He winced.
A smile grew on her lips. "I'm sorry, I should have asked before inviting company over. It is your house-"
"Nope, its's fine," he said shortly. "It's your house too, anyway. Is…" he sighed. "Is she likely to be round again soon? Just don't want to be… ambushed again."
She shook her head. "No, I'm leaving, and she's off to Afghanistan in a week."
His brow furrowed. "Uh, why?"
"She's a soldier." Maggie crouched to tighten her shoelaces. "We met at MIT, she's a detonations expert."
"Fun company."
"She is, actually. A good friend."
Tony started revising the shovel talk in his head. Maggie checked her watch, then darted across the workshop to wrap him in a brief hug. "I've got to go, Tony, see you next time!"
He watched her go. He didn't bother asking when next time would be.
January, 2009
After months of missions, mostly in central Asia, Maggie got an email from Tony (composed by J.A.R.V.I.S., she guessed).
Hey,
I don't really know where you are right now but you mention Europe in your phone calls sometimes, and I'm going to be in Marseille on Saturday for an SI International conference. If you're in the area, swing by. I'll buy you a car or something.
- Tony
Maggie was in India, but she quickly replied:
See you Saturday. A cup of coffee would be fine.
- M
Come Saturday, Maggie found herself striding toward a cafe in the heart of Marseille, her hands in the pockets of her winter coat and a scarf wrapped around her neck. She smiled when she spotted Tony, already sitting inside the cafe at a window seat. He looked so out of place here, as he did most places. He could never really blend in. He wore a fine charcoal suit with a bright striped tie, and seemed to be contemplating the contents of his coffee cup. He didn't notice Maggie until she slipped inside and tapped him on the shoulder.
"Bonjour," she smiled.
He jumped up. "You're here!" he gestured at her as if not sure what to do with her, then reeled her in for a hug.
Is this what an adult sibling relationship is? Maggie wondered as they hugged and sat down together. She and Tony were always strangely codependent or completely distant.
"Where's all your things?" he asked.
"Oh, I left it all at my hotel." More or less true - she travelled light these days, since she had stashes of clothes and supplies in several countries, and a few safe houses.
A waitress came over and Maggie ordered a coffee. They made pleasant small talk for a few minutes, talking about Tony's conference and how Happy, Rhodey, and Pepper were doing. Maggie told Tony lies about her travels.
She wasn't ready for it when Tony set down his cup with a clink and met her eyes. "When are you coming home?"
She blinked at him. "Well I was thinking about coming back for your birthday again-"
"No," he said, firm. "When are you coming home. For good."
Maggie stared at him. His expression was utterly determined, and his words measured. He planned this.
Tony's jaw ground as she kept her silence. "You really don't want to come back, do you? All this time I've been telling myself this was some extended break, like a gap year, but-"
"I don't know, Tony," she said, suddenly frightened by the hurt she could see in his eyes. "I don't have any fixed plans-"
"You've been gone two years," he said, his voice shaky. "I thought this would be temporary. When are you coming back?"
"I… I don't know." Maggie had faced the ringleader of a child trafficking organisation last week, but her heart was pounding twice as fast now as it had then. A sick feeling swirled in her gut.
Tony drew in a sharp breath. "What is it that's keeping you away? I can fix it, Maggot." His eyes were desperate now. "Did someone hurt you?"
"No, nothing like that-"
"Is it me?" he asked, and the hurt in his eyes crystallised. He finally broke their eye contact. "Because I - I know I wasn't the best… guardian, or whatever, when you were a kid, but-"
"Tony, no," Maggie said, and her voice cracked on the words. "It's not that. You're the reason I go back."
"But not for good," he bit out, still not looking her in the eye. "And you won't tell me why."
"Tony…" her mouth opened, then closed once more. She could tell him exactly why, but she knew he wouldn't understand. Besides, saying the words out loud would make her a traitor to the family name, a traitor to their parents. How could she explain this new person she had become, anyway? She'd kept the truth so hidden for so long.
Maybe Tony didn't really know her anymore. Her heart lurched.
"I don't understand what you're doing, Maggie," Tony said frustratedly, his voice low even though the cafe was empty. "I've been patient, I've waited for you to see sense and come back home. What will it take?"
Like a kindling fire, anger spiked in her gut. "See sense?" she echoed, straightening in her chair. "Tony, I am doing what I" - what I'm good at - "what I enjoy. I don't understand why that's a bad thing-"
His voice rose to match hers. "What, you're going to live as a backpacker your whole life? No job, no friends, doing god knows what and carrying a gun around-"
"Oh I knew this was about the gun, why are you so-"
"It's not!" he snapped, and Maggie shut her mouth. "I am worried about you. I wish you would just come home and cut out this - this quarter life crisis bullshit. The company needs you-"
"Oh, the company-"
"Yes, Stark Industries," he shot back, almost shouting now. Maggie felt like poisonous snakes were churning in her gut. "Stark. I don't know why you get that look on your face whenever I bring it up, you loved working there! You were making a future there. But now you're… you're throwing your life away, Maggie, and I don't know why."
Maggie gripped the edges of the table so she wouldn't hit him. For a few moments they just stared angrily at each other as Tony's words hung between them.
Finally, she let out a bitter laugh. Tony's brow furrowed. "You know, I just realised who you sound like," she said. He frowned further. "You sound like dad."
Tony jerked back, his eyes tightening. Maggie clamped her mouth shut.
They stared at each other for what felt like an eternity. Maggie could feel crystalline fragments of broken things piercing the air between them, piercing her chest. Her heart pounded as if she'd just run a race.
Tony broke the silence. "Fine." He stood up, fished in his pocket, and threw money on the table.
"Tony-" she began.
"No, no, it's fine." He straightened his tie, not looking her in the face, his jaw clenched tight and his eyes gleaming. "You want to live your life. Well go ahead, Maggie. I won't get in your way." He turned and walked away. The cafe door slammed shut behind him.
And Maggie knew she could chase after him.
But she didn't.
February, 2009
Tony and Maggie didn't talk.
Maggie kept an eye on him the best way she could - by reading the headlines. And it seemed he was doing fine. He threw half a dozen parties in the space of a month, and then Science Weekly reported that he was about to become the winner of the Apogee award.
Tony did not know where Maggie was. But he'd never really known, anyway.
On the morning of her birthday, Pepper drove herself down the driveway to the Malibu mansion, sipping coffee from her to-go mug. As she parked, what felt like half a million things were running through her head. She had the dry-cleaning in the back and a stack of forms and the art dealer's call and the MIT commencement speech and the fact that Tony was currently supposed to be at the private airfield outside LA.
She swung her legs out of the car, picked up the dry cleaning and her clipboard, and headed to the door. There was another dark sedan idling in the driveway, and a delivery truck.
Pepper didn't bother feeling annoyed by her mile-long to do list anymore - in fact, she found the longer she had the job the more she enjoyed the challenge of it, juggling all the tasks and keeping Tony in line.
Though recently he'd been testing even her. He'd been bad ever since whatever happened between him and Maggie in Marseille last month. Pepper knew they'd met up, but Tony had come back surly and angry and refused to speak about it. She knew they hadn't spoken since.
Pepper had never really known the two to fight like this before. They squabbled, certainly, and had disagreements, but they never refused to speak to each other. Pepper wanted to fix it, like she fixed everything else, but she knew this one wasn't up to her.
At the door, Pepper pulled up short at the sight of a uniformed courier with a package under at his arm, crouching down to peer at the door panel. Oh.
"Hello?" she called.
The courier turned, looking flustered. "Ma'am, this robot voice thing keeps telling me to go away-"
"Don't blame J.A.R.V.I.S., he's just the messenger unfortunately," Pepper sighed, and shifted her clipboard under her arm. "I can sign for that." It was probably more parts for Tony, since he'd been on an engineering binge recently. At least when he wasn't out at the casinos with Happy.
"I've been instructed that only the recipient can sign for this," the courier said, glancing down at the package to read the label.
"Trust me, neither of us wants him to come up here to do that-"
"Says here the recipient is… Pepper Potts?"
Her mouth snapped shut. "Oh." She blinked. "That's me."
They took a few seconds for Pepper to sign for the package and tuck it under her arm, before the courier headed back to his truck and Pepper strode through the door of the mansion.
She opened the package as she walked inside, frowning. Who would send her a package here? Brown paper pulled away to reveal a book - crime fiction, damn, someone knows my weakness - and a voucher for a spa day. Her eyes boggled at the location; this was one of the most exclusive spas in LA, it needed to be booked months in advance and cost more than she could afford on her salary.
Pepper's eyes narrowed. There was no way that Tony arranged this, and if he had then she was going to have him checked out by a doctor. Plus, she would have to return the dress she'd bought on his behalf.
Then a note slipped out of the book and down to the gleaming floor. She crouched down to retrieve it, then read the neat handwriting:
Dear Pepper,
Please, for the love of god, take a day off. If anything blows up then that's on me.
Happy birthday.
- M
Smiling, Pepper set the gifts down by the front door. She's okay. Maggie always sent a present to Pepper on her birthday, and Pepper was relieved to see that whatever argument she and Tony had had, Maggie hadn't completely cut herself off.
As Pepper headed into the living area, she decided it would be best if she didn't mention this to Tony.
In the main living area, with its wide windows looking out over the glinting ocean, Pepper spotted a blonde woman wearing nothing but one of Tony's red shirts padding around barefoot and round eyed. She hadn't spotted Pepper yet.
Pepper watched as the woman paced over to a side table and opened a book, then peered at a framed photo of Maggie and Tony at Maggie's high school graduation.
When the woman tried to access the stairs down to the workshop, the door panel flashed red and J.A.R.V.I.S. spoke:
"You are not authorised to access this area."
The woman flinched back. "Jesus."
"That's J.A.R.V.I.S., he runs the house," Pepper said, and the woman turned to stare at her. Pepper lifted the garment bag. "I've got your clothes here, they've been dry cleaned and pressed, and there's a car waiting for you outside that will take you anywhere you would like to go."
The woman's eyes glinted as she got over her shock. "You must be the famous Pepper Potts." She paced toward her.
Pepper forced a smile. She wished Tony wouldn't bring journalists back here. "Indeed I am."
"After all these years, Tony still has you picking up the drycleaning," the woman said, with a smile that said exactly what she thought of Pepper.
For a moment Pepper was taken aback at the woman's catty smile. But only for a moment. In return her smile grew and a mask of cool professionalism slid over her face. "I do anything and everything that Mr Stark requires," she responded. "Including, occasionally, taking out the trash." She smiled and batted her eyes. "Will that be all?"
The woman left a moment later with her tail between her legs, still wearing Tony's red shirt. One for the expense report, Pepper thought with a sigh as she took a phone call and headed downstairs to the workshop.
Sure enough Tony was in there, shoulder deep in a hotrod engine and his music blaring. Pepper asked J.A.R.V.I.S. to turn down the music just as she got off the phone and pushed open the door.
"Please don't turn down my music," Tony called over without looking around.
Well, at least he's still using his manners.
"You are supposed to be halfway around the world right now," Pepper told him as if she hadn't heard him.
"How'd she take it?" Tony shot back, as if he hadn't heard her.
Pepper sighed. "Like a champ."
The Next Day
Kunar Province, Afghanistan
When an explosion went off in front of the military Humvee and the situation around him fell apart into screaming and gunfire, Tony thought: Maybe I should've taken Maggie seriously when she told me to carry a gun.
But then a shotgun blast sprayed through the window and the world went a bit fuzzy.
Tony didn't think of Maggie again until a minute later, when he looked down to see blood soaking through his shirt and the world went black.
As always guys, let me know what you think!
Reviews
DBZFAN45: Maggie is indeed growing up, with lots of secrets and missions. I'll see what I can do about your Steve/Maggie request but no promises! Happy new year x
The1975Love: I love that you called her Magnolia lol, I've been having fun throwing out nicknames and that's one of my favourites. I can't wait until we meet Bucky either, but you guys will have to bear with me!
MyCelestialFury: She's become the Wyvern! I'm glad you liked the flight scene, I do enjoy those. Hope you enjoyed the taster of Iron Man above, I'm excited to dig into it more next chapter :)