Chapter 60 – A Roadside Encounter
A/n – Hello everyone :) I'm still writing with one hand so forgive me because I know this is very late. And as for the rush of Glee fics a while back. Those were all written prior to my injury so don't worry about me switching focus. I'm changing things up with replies a little too. If you said something specific I'll reply to you in here but I have too many reviews to reply to all the small ones. But I love you all. I really do.
JazzNProwl's sparklingAriaFyre: Thank you :) I did have a lot of fun on my holiday. I know… tut tut Clint focus on the important stuff.
Tabitha: He'll probably make an appearance in an interlude at some point but I don't know when yet. He definitely won't be watching the movies with them.
chibi heishi: I've seen plenty guys act more "girly" than the way Piper did in that scene but yes I see your point. The foam makes sense if you read The House Is Alive, it's a reference to that.
Post U Later: Yep, still alive. I know :( It's sad but unfortunately that's the way it is with Toni. I get frustrated with her and she's my creation. Although sometimes I think she exists in my head and all I'm doing is writing down what she's telling me to.
Mythfan: Don't worry Steve is going to be on a one step forward, two steps back path for a while because that's just the way I see his character. He'll get it eventually.
BlazeStryker: I love my savvy Toni. And I agree with you about the mutation aspect of the comics and essentially the movies too. It's wrong but it's unfortunately a reality.
domergal'16: It's okay sweetie; I understand why you did it and as you won't do it from now on we're good.
Orangepaint: Well the book needs extensive editing and it's about something very personal to me so I would hope that people would like it. Thanks for reviewing again sweetheart. I think you're one of the sweetest anon reviewers I've ever had. Rambling is good ;)
EmmyR: I am doing my very best not to abandon this story. I can't promise frequent updates anymore but this will never be dropped completely. Never!
TheNightIsDark: I've watched all of the deleted scenes but I decided a while back that I couldn't put any of them in. It's a lot of work just to transcribe everything and going back and forth between movie and deleted scene would be a nightmare. It would have been good though.
The Last One Left 0: Excuse me I'm still crying from how touching this was. I don't agree at all but it was touching nevertheless. And every compliment I get on my Thor is a relief because I'm so scared of writing him.
It took a considerable amount of time before Steve and Thor came back to the room in which time Toni had to confiscate Clint's bow and arrows. He had very nearly fired one of the explosive ones at the screen in the end and she couldn't have that. Not again! Clint looked like he wanted to grab them back but was too scared of Toni to try it. Thankfully the tension was interrupted when Steve came in with Thor following shortly afterwards and they restarted the movie.
As Obadiah got the car above his head he span back to face Toni and laughed darkly, "I love this suit."
"No he didn't," Toni stated, "he liked the power that the suit gave him. And the way it could cause destruction and bend people to his will. He never understood what the suit was actually for. A way to escape and a way to protect innocently people. And he certainly never loved the feel of the suit itself because that's shown through the joy of flying and of the operating systems and I can guarantee he never felt it."
The others looked at Toni a little shocked at her calm statement. It hadn't been said in anger there was just a cool sense of knowing. They'd seen her get passionate about her suits before but they could never really imagine how much they meant to her.
"Put them down!" Toni told him firmly.
"Collateral damage, Toni," Obadiah insisted as he walked steadily towards her with the car still hoisted above his head.
"I think he needs a lesson on the definition of collateral damage," Bruce growled out.
"He's still dead," Toni pointed out.
The lights on the palms of Toni's suit faded out as she gave JARVIS an instruction, "divert power to chest RT." As soon as she gave the order the chest RT began to glow brighter until a burst of light sprung from it and hit Obadiah sending him flying backwards onto a parked car. Meanwhile Toni caught the car Obadiah had been holding in her arms.
"That is very impressive Lady Toni," Thor commented. He always found feats of strength impressive and Toni was remarkably fragile to be doing something like that even with an iron suit. Of course he was smart enough not to say that as he had a feeling Lady Toni would not take it well.
The weight of the car caused Toni to being to lean back as the women and children inside screamed and clutched at each other. Inside the suit Toni let out a little grunt from the weight as the HUD crackled and JARVIS informed her, "Power reduced to 19%."
"That's getting dangerously low," Natasha said worried, "you're not going to be able to fly soon and that'll make getting away difficult."
Toni was tired of pointing out that she was still alive and Obadiah was dead hence this had ended well. So she decided just to stop. For now at least.
The sheer weight of it caused Toni's right leg to buckle and collapse causing her knee to make a dent in the ground. As Toni began to lower the car to the ground the panicked woman slammed her foot down on the accelerator and the wheels began to spin frantically. The minute Toni managed to get it down to the ground the car sped off down the highway with Toni still clinging onto the front.
"Poor woman," Steve said sympathetically. She must have been scared sick after being endangered by a mad man and while Toni had helped her all she would be seeing was just another person in a metal suit that could hurt her and her children.
Toni did shout out for her to stop but the woman was panicking far too much for that. Eventually Toni began to slip off of the hood of the car leaving drag marks behind as she tried to hold on crying, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no!"
"This is not going to end well," Clint said wincing slightly.
Inevitably Toni lost her grip and went flying underneath the car as sparks flew off everywhere. She got stuck at the back as the helmet of the suit was too big to slide through but she managed to lift the back of the car up just long enough for her to roll clear.
"That looks like it hurt," Natasha said sympathetically.
"It wasn't that bad actually," Toni said with a shrug, "the suit took a few dents but it fits so well that I didn't get banged around too much. The real damage would only have happened if I'd been unable to free myself and been dragged along for a while."
By the time Toni was free Obadiah was back up on his feet and sprinting towards her. He launched himself into the air flames blazing behind him before landing in front of Toni who had managed to pull herself to her feet. When a motorcyclist drove between the two iron-clad figures Obadiah grabbed hold of his bike and spun it around using it to hit Toni backwards into a nearby parked car.
"So even though he could have used his own strength to throw you back he decided to at least badly injure someone to do it," Phil said darkly glaring at the screen. Toni hadn't mentioned the small details in the report although that was probably more to do with the fact that the battle would have been a blur and she wouldn't have remembered them rather than deliberate withholding of knowledge.
Toni bounced off of the car setting off its alarm and then clattered to the floor in front of a bus letting out a grunt. The people on the bus seemed to know what was coming as they all began clamouring to get out of it as did people in cars that were even relatively nearby.
"At least the civilians had the good sense to get away from the situation," Steve said relieved. The more innocent people that got hurt the worse the situation was as far as he was concerned and so far Toni was keeping that to a minimum even sacrificing precious power to save that family.
Obadiah bounded over to Toni and shoved her across the ground before turning and getting a firm hold on her. Booming, "for thirty years, I've been holding you up!" he held her up to the sky before dropping her mercilessly on to the ground sparks flying off the suit after the collision.
"Yes it was starting to hurt a little that point," Toni told them after receiving inquiring looks from everyone in the room, "honestly, you'd think you were watching this live."
"I built this company from nothing," he cried as he brought his foot down with a thump straight onto the chest plate of Toni's suit.
"Oh please," Natasha scoffed, "Howard Stark started the company up which meant it was a long way from nothing. And without Toni's inventions you wouldn't have gotten anywhere and the company would have become nothing after Howard's death."
"Thank you for saying it so I didn't have to Tasha," Toni said with a smile for her friend.
Then as Toni tried to push her way up again he grabbed hold of the back of the suit growling, "and nothing is going to stand in my way," as he threw her through the bus.
"Ouch," Clint said sympathetically as several other people in the room winced.
Obadiah took a few steps away from the bus before turning and raising a missile from the back of his suit. His last words before firing it were, "least of all you!" Then the laser sights honed in on the bus and the missile fired sending it up in flames.
"It's ironic that his only worry was apparently the company," Phil said with a slight smile, "and nowadays Stark Industries is more successful than it's ever been in its entire history thanks to Toni's new direction and leadership."
The explosion encompassed the whole road rippling around Obadiah as Toni flew up at the top of it her arms flailing around a little. As she began to tumble back down she activated her repulsors to maintain a steady hover a fair way off the ground avoiding a crash.
"Nicely done," Bruce complimented trying to hide how relieved he was. As a doctor he knew that if Toni had hit the ground after that she would have banged her head around quite a bit in the helmet and probably badly injured it. Fighting with a concussion was not something Toni needed to be doing when she was already having problems with her arc reactor. Or at all really.
"Impressive!" Obadiah laughed genuinely, "You've upgraded your armour! I've made some upgrades of my own!"
"I do not think that this will end well," Thor predicted guessing that Stane's upgrades probably involved flight which eliminated Toni's advantage of being able to take to the sky.
"My question is how did he not notice that Toni was able to fly earlier," Steve pointed out, "she crashed into him from the sky when he was first attacking Piper."
The backs of the boots of the Iron Monger suit lowered with a series of clicks and hisses before a huge amount of smoke and fire began to emerge from them and Obadiah began to slowly lift off of the ground.
"I was right," Thor stated obviously but nobody had the heart to point this out to him. So they simply nodded and offered him a smile which seemed to be the right path to take because he looked rather pleased with himself.
"Ma'am, it appears that his suit can fly," JARVIS told Toni flatly bringing up the specs from the suit up on the HUD.
"Duly noted," Toni said quickly, "take me to maximum altitude."
"That's going to be pretty dangerous," Natasha said worriedly.
"Still alive," Toni muttered under her breath needing to say it even if it couldn't be heard. Honestly, did all logic disappear for the other members of the group when they were watching these movies?
"With only 15% power the odds of reaching that…" JARVIS rattled off as Toni looked down at Obadiah slowly approaching her.
"I know the math! Do it!" Toni shouted over him knowing it was her only option.
"I'm beginning to agree with Piper," Clint admitted, "risky moves do seem to be your forte Toni."
"You have to take risks in my main line of work all the time," Toni said with a shrug, "or nothing would ever get done. So I guess that translates well to when I get suited up. It works too and I've gotten away every single time so far so you shouldn't be complaining about my tactics Robin Hood."
She turned to face up the way and sped off at a much faster speed than Obadiah. Back outside the factory Piper watched on seeing the Iron Monger suit rise slowly above the wall which blocked it off from the highway.
"I have a feeling this is about to get interesting," Phil said remembering the basics of this parts of Toni's report.
A/n: It's short cause of the issues with my hand I'm sorry. But I finally got you a chapter :) Hopefully the next won't take as long.