Disclaimer: Marvel and Disney own Iron Man. I don't know who own The Heavy, but it's not me. I just put them both in a trash compactor and used the cube as outdoor seating. Probably should by some rust guard.

Chapter 17: Do It Yourself

The Heavy- Short Change Hero

By the time she settled back into Tony's guest room it was half passed five in the morning. That unhappily put it at just the right time on a Saturday to call Mike. Within a handful of rings he answered.

"Morning, Genie." Mike's voice sounded fully caffeinated. She was jealous.

"Hey, Mikey. How's things?" In the background from his end she could hear the sound effects for some cartoon.

"My house is under attack by heathens. Hold on a second." There was a rustle and then she could hear her brother mutedly scolding, "Feet off the table, butt in the seat." There was a pause before his voice dropped a register. "Now," he commanded sternly. The phone shuffled again before he came back on. "Sorry about that."

"Attack rebuffed?" The levity in the conversation was welcome while it lasted.

He let out a rough chuckle. "For the moment, but I can see them reforming their battle lines. So, you're making a habit out of getting up early," he teased.

"Yeah." Damn, she didn't want to ruin his Saturday. "Hey, if you're busy I can call you back," she offered.

"Nah, Molly's got the fort for a minute. Besides, you have 'I'm not gonna like this' tone," he accused. "What's up?"

She hesitated, debating the best way to get into the heavy bit of the conversation. Blowing a breath out the side of her mouth she finally just announced, "My apartment was broken into last night."

"What?" Mike sputtered. "Jesus Genie, are you alright? Were you home?"

Squeezing her eyes closed, Angela thought she really had to stop springing unexpected peril on her brother. "Yeah," she drawled. "You might want to head outside," she warned.

There was some very sotto voice cursing. "Start talking," he ordered in the same timbre he'd just used on his kid.

Starting with the video call, she walked Mike through the events of the night. Slowly the quality of silence on his end of the phone changed. Around the time she told him about being forced to show her arc reactor, a door on his end closed forcefully. When she described her maneuver with the gun, he growled.

At the end of her tale there were several more beats of silence before Mike summarized flatly, "You fought off a kidnapper." Judging by the lack of inflection in his voice, he was trying very hard not to shout at her.

"Yeah," she agreed wearily, ignoring the sound of her call waiting. "Look, I'm sorry to drop this on you, but…"

"No." He cut her off with a strained note in his voice. "Don't apologize for telling me instead of letting me find out. You fought off an attacker, that's good." She could hear his breathing, deep and rhythmic. "That's much better than what could have happened." And then his voice rose. "Because he had a gun and you could have been killed!"

Angela briefly closed her eyes, harshly brushing the hair off her forehead. It wasn't like she had wanted to have a gun shoved in her face.

"Did you have to get involved in another dangerous situation? You just got through the last one," he scolded, exasperated.

"I did not ask for someone to break into my apartment," she defended.

"You sure about that?" He sniped. "You're attempted kidnapper's name sounds awfully familiar."

Rearing back, offended, she rebuked, "Don't you act like I deserved this. I may have gotten myself into a bad situation, but damn it, I saw what was going on…"

He cut her off. "And you couldn't leave it alone. You know you have a bad habit of only seeing the things you want to see," he accused.

"And what would you have me do differently? I'm not just going to turn a blind-eye!" A tension headache radiated up the back of her neck and settled above her eye.

On the other end of the phone Mike sucked in a deep breath and let it out in a long, controlled stream. The phrase 'blind eye' was a direct quote from the judge in their parents' wrongful death suit.

"That was mean," he warned lowly.

"It was true," she pointed out. "And you weren't exactly being polite either."

"You don't hold the sky up, Genie." After a pause, neither one of them willing to apologize, her brother switched topics. "What are the cops doing about this? SI?"

Angela kneaded her forehead and allowed the change in conversation. "The last I heard SI's still rooting out the issues." It occurred to her that it'd been awhile since she'd heard any update about the investigation. "As for the police, they're working my case. It'll all take time, but," she tapped her fingers on her knee, hesitating.

"But?" Mike prompted.

"I didn't tell the police about his interest in my arc reactor," she admitted.

On the other end of the line there was a sudden hissing. The green house sprinklers, she assumed.

Her brother grunted in frustration. "Explain," he demanded tightly.

"Beyond the fact that the arc is proprietary technology," she began.

Mike cut across her with a clipped, "Don't hide behind your NDAs."

"Those NDAs are there for a reason," she warned. "If this gets out I will never be able to leave the house again."

"You're a prisoner in your boss's house now," he pointed out.

She covered her eyes with her hand. They felt hot and gritty. "Because somebody has suspicions, but it's not the whole world, and they can't really know anything about what it does."

Silence fell between them before he finally asked, "Does he know?"

Angela bit her lip. She hadn't actually talked to Tony about what happened. "No," she answered quietly.

"You have to tell him." His next words were spaced like careful footfalls. "I've put enough together from our conversations to guess at some things. He needs to know."

Her head fall back on her shoulders and she stared grimly at the ceiling. "I know."

Mike sighed again. She imagined him toeing at an uneven cobblestone. "Jesus, what a mess."

With a grunt, Angela conceded that was accurate. She glanced out the windows and wished her room had a balcony.

"Look, I get the reluctance, okay?" Her brother broke into her thoughts. "But this is not going to work. Come clean with Stark about what Bein really wanted, then go tell the police the rest of the story," he advised.

"No." The denial was immediate and visceral. She did not need anyone picking specifically into the arc reactor technology.

"Genie, you cannot do this yourself and you can't hide in Stark's house forever." His voice had taken on a tone of deep frustration. "Ask him for help. I'm sure the two of you can come up with a way to let the police do their jobs while still protecting his proprietary technology."

The derisiveness attached to the last phrase pricked at her still simmering temper. She raised her eyebrows at his attitude. He didn't get it. He didn't understand the disastrous potential of the thing keeping her alive. "I can't do that," she murmured. Voice gaining strength, she continued, "We can't do that."

"Why?" He ground out in barely leashed irritation.

Angela huffed in annoyance and deflected, "I'm not drawing undue attention to something that is keeping me alive."

"What else are you going to do? Its not like you can hunt this person down yourself," Mike rebutted.

Her head tilted to the side in consideration. Eyes going distant, she reviewed the scant few days she'd dug into the SI records before Afghanistan. "Maybe I can," she mumbled to herself thoughtfully.

A choked squawk of disbelief drew her attention back to her phone. "No!"

Ignoring her brother's protest, she mused aloud, "I've already looked into this, I just need to dig deeper."

"What you need is to back away from this, not get more involved," he snapped. "What would you even do if you found the guy, give the information to the cops? 'Cause then you're right back at what you're trying to avoid now," he pointed out. With a noise of exasperation, he lectured, "You need to start thinking about what you're doing. Use that twisty brain for something other than engineering or getting one up on someone. Take a minute to consider the consequences of your actions," he pleaded. "This is not your problem to fix! Let the cops do their damn jobs!"

'Ouch,' Angela thought. "Now you're being harsh," she complained.

"It's true," he countered, throwing her words back at her. "You are not a one woman fix-it team and Stark Industries problems are not yours to solve."

"I'm not trying to solve their problems. I'm trying to solve mine," she refuted.

"This wouldn't even involve you if you hadn't bulldozed into the middle of it," he argued heatedly.

She bared her teeth at the ceiling and made a claw of her hand, shaking it in frustration. Once she released some of her tension she put the brakes on the conversation before they started screaming at each other over the phone. "We're arguing in circles."

Her brother huffed.

"I'll consider what you said, alright?" She drew her hand away from her chest when she realized she'd begun unconsciously rubbing her knuckles against the rim of the arc. "For now Bein is in custody. It's possible the police will get him to roll over."

Mike hummed skeptically.

"And I'll talk to Tony," she conceeded.

Finally her brother seemed to calm down. "Good. Just, do that, and don't do anything reckless." She gritted her teeth at his assessment of her behavior. "I'm glad you're alright. It's just that it seems like you end up in situations like this too often." He added in under his breath, "Though usually not quite this serious."

Angela felt her resolve to end the fight wavering and hurried to wrap up the call.

…...

After she and Mike said their goodbyes Angela saw she had another missed call from the same unknown number as before. She dialed her voicemail and the government Agent's smooth tone spoke again, asking her to get in contact with him to schedule a meeting. Glancing at the time, she decided that his request was a bridge too far for her at the moment.

Instead she tapped out a quick text message to Pepper and Happy, asking them to stay mum about being in contact with her and where she might be staying. She didn't wait for a text back before muting her phone and tossing it onto the nightstand.

Without bothering to get undressed, Angela flopped back on the covers and finally let herself get some sleep.

…...

Obadiah casually rested his ankle on his opposite knee. Leaning back in his chair, he set his empty breakfast plate aside and pulled out his burner phone. Dialing the only number on it, he waited.

"Dooley," a male voice answered.

"How's our guest?" Stane asked jovially. At the long pause in response he uncrossed his legs and sat up. "Quentin?" He prompted.

"Things didn't go as planned," Dooley hedged.

Obadiah closed his eyes. Rolling his jaw, he warned tightly, "If she's damaged to the point she can't work I'm going to be very upset with you."

"No, it's not that. Jay screwed up," the man confessed. "She got away."

Stane's eyes flew open in disbelief. "What?" He bit out. In mounting anger, he clenched his teeth and listened as the other man explained.

"I did my part. Jay had a straight in and out," Dooley was quick to defend. "Before I got out I was able to see the cops take him down. Jay didn't knock the bitch out. I don't know why. She got his gun off him and he got arrested."

Stane's face crumpled into a furious scowl. Personal vendettas as motivation aside, he never should have picked cons. That was twice now his plans to kill or incapacitate the woman were bungled by the people he chose to carry them out.

"You were supposed to be with him on the way out," he accused.

Regardless of the woman being conscious, he couldn't see how the two of them wouldn't have been able to overpower her. Hell, one of them should have been enough.

Dooley made a noise of displeasure. "I had to distract some kid on the third floor. Didn't know things had gone tits up until I heard the sirens."

Fisting his hand against his thigh, Stane watched his knuckles turn white. "Do you know why I got you out of that cesspool you were rotting in, Quentin?"

There was a moment of hesitation before the man replied. "You needed things done right," he paraphrased.

"And was this your version of things going right?" Stane snarled. He rose to his feet and paced the floor.

"Jay screwed up," the man insisted. "I had a backup plan. I got a GPS tracker on her car now."

Stane shook his head, slowly calming. The woman was obviously more slippery than he expected. It'd taken two weeks for her to show her face the first time. In a way, that had been a boon. If she'd been accessible before that then Stane's hit on her would have been carried out. Though, considering their failure to kidnap her, that might not have been the outcome.

"You're going to send me the access for that tracker," he ordered, "Then pack a bag."

…...

Tony found himself exceptionally glad he was not partaking in the pow wow upstairs. Pepper had come demanding answers to a text she'd gotten from Angela, and she'd brought Happy with her. Tony wondered when it became okay for people to storm his house when they weren't there for him. Though, not being the one in trouble was a novel sensation.

An hour later Angela keyed open the shop security door. She looked tired.

"Hard labor or community service?" Tony wondered.

"Hard labor," she admitted, settling herself into a chair near his workstation. "Happy busted me back to basic."

"Ouch." He winced in sympathy.

She sighed and fidgeted. Darting a few quick glances at her from the corner of his eye, Tony watched her struggle. "I need to talk to you," she finally said.

Nothing good ever started with that phrase. He was instantly wary. "You are." He fit together another section of the frame for the stabilizer. "Right now you're talking and not working. Why are you not working?"

"Because this is important," she started.

"And you can't multitask?" Tony swiveled in his chair and grabbed the rivet gun. "I thought you were all about multitasking. You said you had a system."

"And I can't talk to you about what I need to talk to you about," she continued, her voice taking on a sing-song, annoyed quality.

"There was a lecture about it." He talked over her. "I had to listen. You turned off my music." Tony felt his irritation swell in remembered outrage. He'd only been checking the voltage her generator could produce. He hadn't expected it to overheat and start smoking.

"If I don't have your full attention," she finished raising her voice slightly. "This is hard for me, and you're bringing up things that I thought we already covered." She rolled her eyes and said in an aside, "But apparently you're still angry about."

"Yes. Yes, I am." He finally turned his head to look at her. "You blocked the door." She'd refused to let him escape.

"Because, like now, you weren't listening," she complained. "And we're way off topic. You do this on purpose," she accused. "I'm trying to tell you that I didn't tell the police everything last night."

Tony paused, his suspicion confirmed. "You lied to the cops?"

She crossed her arms over her chest. "I omitted." He studied her posture. She was being cagey.

"What'd you leave out?" He wondered.

Angela's face, which had been flushed, paled and then flushed again. Tilting her chin down, she dropped her gaze. Tony's attention sharpened on her further.

Finally she admitted, "Bein made me show him the arc reactor." Tony froze. "Had me lift my shift before we left the apartment," she continued. "I'm fairly certain he wanted confirmation. It disappointed him. He wanted to kill instead of kidnap."

There were a lot of things in what she said that made thought trails spiral off in Tony's mind. One of them seemed more immediate than the others. His memory brought forth a flash of her on the video call they'd shared. She'd only had her wrap draped around her shoulders. Tony had been enjoying the view of Angela without a bra on.

Eyes narrowed and teeth clenched, Tony thought Bein was lucky he was in jail. He wondered if maybe he should visit. Angela apparently thought his anger was directed at her because she hastily apologized. Tony waved her off. "You didn't flash him for fun." He winced when her jaw tightened at his comment.

A scowl crept over his face as he switched thought tracks. "How did he know?" Tony wondered.

Angela shook her head. "I'm not sure. I have a theory." She licked her lips before explaining, "I've gone over all the times I've been in public. I can't think of a single instance where even the glow of the arc would have shown. Even if it had, only someone who knows about tech would think it might be valuable enough to kidnap me for." She paused to run a hand over her chest. "But there are people who know about the electromagnet. The SI legal department for one."

Tony took a moment to follow her reasoning. "There's only a handful of people who might see the arc's value, be able to spring Bein from jail, and choose him as an enforcer in the first place."

"All the one's I could think of work for SI," she solemnly concluded. "What I showed you on the plane - all that and only four people arrested? I haven't heard of anything further about it for over two months. Have you?"

"No," he grumbled. He'd left the investigation to Obie while he did his best to stay low. In truth, he'd gotten wrapped up in the Mark II. "You don't think the police are going to catch the ringleader," he speculated.

One of her deceptively small hands rubbed across her face. "Do you?" She asked.

He didn't. If the man spotted on the third floor of Angela's building was an accomplice, then the police may catch him. But unless they got one of the men to talk, they probably wouldn't catch the mastermind.

"You know this means you're in danger too, right?" She pointed out.

Tony nodded. He did. Getting to him was significantly harder than getting to Angela, however. He watched the way she hugged her arms around herself and felt his jaw twitch.

She'd shown multiple times that she would fight to defend herself and she had a willingness to do things other people might see as crazy. Tony couldn't stop people from seeing her as the easy way to get to the designs for the arc reactor. But maybe he could give her the tools so that Angela could do it herself.

…...

Tuesday morning Tony found Angela on the couch in the living room. She was crunched forward, her dark hair spilling over the hands holding her head.

He stifled an impromptu yawn as he walked towards her. "You awake?"

In response she drug her hands down her face and sat up. Tony was immediately struck by her expression of contempt. "Detective Carlton called." She gestured toward where her phone was sitting on the coffee table. "Bein's dead," she announced flatly.

Tony's brain stuttered. "How?"

With a resigned shake of her head she explained. "He was denied bail, so they remanded him to the Los Angeles County Jail. He was found dead in the showers this morning." Her lips pressed into a grim line and she rubbed a hand under her eyes. "It gets better," she warned.

Sinking down onto the couch next to her, he quipped, "I'm reluctant to ask."

"The other three are dead as well." She raised her eyebrows at him and Tony took in the implications.

"Well, shit," he cursed.

…...

A few days later Angela got down to the lab to see a second set of stabilizer parts waiting for assembly. Glancing over at Tony, she saw him deep in wiring the one he was working on.

Her thoughts during the conversation with Mike in mind, she gathered up the pieces for the stabilizer and settled at the workstation next to Tony. His dark eyes looked up at her in surprise at her choice of location. She usually worked as far away from his twitchy fingers as she could.

Angela thought she caught a hint of an expectant expression on his face. She frowned at him in consideration but brushed it aside in favor of finding out what she needed to know. "Do you have a backdoor into the SI mainframe?" She dropped her eyes from his and busied herself organizing the parts by stage of build.

"Yes," he answered slowly.

Angela focused on the parts again with greater attention. Something was off. "What's wrong with these?"

"Nothing."

She looked back up at him. He was watching her with a little grin on his face. Angela frowned and held up a piece. "It's too small," she declared, comparing the piece to Tony's half finished build.

Tony shook his head. The grin was edging toward a smile. "No, it's not," he rebutted flippantly.

Angela squinted at him and then looked back to the part. In her mind she scaled the stabilizer down to a size that would fit the piece in her hand. Her lips parted in realization.

"Tell me you don't want to fly," he challenged.

She couldn't. "I thought you wanted to keep this project to yourself?" She asked.

"This is as much your project as it is mine." He reached out and gently tapped her shirt and the arc reactor underneath. He drew his hand back and turned to continue working. "Plus you can't stay out of trouble. It should help."

Angela stared at the man, equal parts shocked and touched. He'd said a lot of offhand things about her using the armor, but this… Despite the fact that he obviously didn't want to discuss it, she felt compelled to lean over and brush her lips against his temple. Dark eyes swung back to her, a little wider than normal. "Thank you, Tony."

A slight shocked smile danced around his lips. "Sure," he dismissed.

Happy said Tony's trust was rare, that he needed more people who saw him as a good man. Angela thought what Tony really needed was people to trust him back. In the pool of sharks he inhabited, Tony probably couldn't often share a fish without getting bit.

"Why do you want to know?" He asked.

"Know?" Angela scrunched her brows in confusion.

"The back door?" He prompted. She thought she could see a little smirk on his face.

Giving herself a mental shake, she explained. "I want to look at current SI records to see if things are still going missing."

He hummed in consideration. "You have to log on to an SI computer in IT, my office, or Obie's office in order to do any administration." He explained.

Angela frowned. She would be able to access normal work files, but anything hidden would stay that way unless she went to SI.

"You think someone's still stealing tech?" The man next to her had given up on working and had his full attention focused on her.

When she sucked on her bottom lip in displeasure, she noticed he followed the gesture with his eyes. "Maybe," she said. His gaze snapped back to hers and she explained. "I've gone through my old records. I'm convinced the leader is still with the company. If weapons are still going missing it gives me additional chances to tag him."

After a few moments of consideration Tony got up from his workstation and walked over to his computer bank. He raised a hand and beckoned her over.

Angela pushed back her stool and joined him.

"Input the parameters of what we're looking for," he gestured to the keyboard. "We'll have JARVIS run it. It'll be faster and it'll keep you on the Mark II."

She immediately leaned forward to start typing. Angela was going to find the person responsible, and when she did, they were going to end up on the wrong end of her temper.