Chapter 77 – A Villainous Interlude

A/n – I'm sorry for the long wait for this chapter but about a million things came up at once and I couldn't handle writing on top of everything. I hope everyone had a great Christmas or whatever other holiday you celebrate. Thank you everyone who worried and to the people who were rude I'd just like to say that I am under no obligation to finish this story and insulting me is hardly going to make me more inclined to do so.

Quill – That is unbelievably flattering. I love the original Tony quite a bit but the fact that you think my Toni should be in the movies instead is an incredibly nice thing for you to say :)

Danny Hellcat – I probably won't because I transcribe straight from the movies so going into deleted scenes kind of breaks up the flow of my writing process.

Ro781727 – Involving Sif like that was my plan because I feel like I need to introduce a few new characters.

"Suddenly I'm looking forward to the next section of this even less than I already was," Bruce sighed. He remembered Natasha's comment from the Avengers movie that Toni didn't trust her anymore so he knew something terrible must be about to happen between the two considering how it couldn't have been the fact that she was SHIELD that put Toni off Natasha. After all she had known about that all along and still become her friend.

"That's probably advisable," Phil said almost hoping that he would be able to leave the room too. He probably wasn't going to come off well in this next part. While he had only been trying to save his friend he probably hadn't been going about it the right way. And he was a little more aggressive than he needed to be because he got a little testy when he was worried.

"I'm not exactly looking forward to it either but let's just get it over with," Toni sighed wishing she had brought one of the drinks from downstairs up with her now. It really would have come in handy for this part too although she thought she could probably get through it. It wasn't quite as bad as the party.

The scene changed back to the Hammer Industries warehouse where Vanko was working. Hammer came walking in accompanied by another man who was carrying some kind of bag. "Hey, hey, hey," Hammer said cheerfully, "Special delivery. Candygram."

"Oh look the creep is back and is still managing to be extra creepy," Natasha sneered, "why does he always pick the worst way of saying something?"

"Because he's an immature idiot with zero social skills," Toni pointed out.

"That would explain it," Natasha agreed.

"I'm not entirely sure that it covers everything," Steve interjected, "some of the things he says go beyond simply being stupid."

Vanko put aside the tools that he had been using to fix up the prototype suit and climbed down the ladder towards Hammer. "I brought you something," Hammer said sounding like he was trying to suck up to Vanko, "oh yeah!"

"I recognise that tone," Toni said with a disgusted look on her face, "it's the exact same one that he used on me every single time that he talked to me when we were younger. Our parents were quite keen on matchmaking us so we could merge the two companies."

Everyone in the room got a look on their face that made it look like they were just about to puke. Toni could understand that. The mere thought of her ever ending up in a relationship with Hammer was enough to make her want to throw up. It's why most of the time she tried to forget about it.

The other man put the package he was carrying down on the table and pulled the cover off the top revealing that it was a cage containing a pet cockatrice.

"I am truly surprised that the man managed to get even a simple task done," Thor boomed.

"He has plenty of other people to do things for him," Toni said with a shrug, "They can't all be incompetent so he must have used some of them. Although there is the possibility that Hammer's trying to pass off another cockatrice as being the same as Vanko's. If so I look forward to seeing him crash and burn yet again. It's the only good thing about these movies. Seeing people I hate do stupid stuff that I wasn't around to witness."

"We got you the bird pal!" Hammer exclaimed happily.

"This is not my bird," Vanko said crossly.

Everyone in the room laughed as they realised that Toni was right. Honestly, how Hammer thought he was going to trick anyone that was smarter than him was a mystery. Especially since that was practically everyone in the world.

"What do you mean?" Hammer said panicked, "That's the bird. This is the bird. Yeah! Pulled a lot of strings to get this bird. This is a great bird."

"I don't think I've ever heard someone say the word bird so many times before," Clint snorted, "instead of just owning up he's turned into a rambling idiot. Oh wait! He already was one in the first place."

This got him a high five from Toni who was just happy that someone else enjoyed mocking people like Hammer as much as she did. She didn't know why she and Clint hadn't talked more before this whole thing started.

"It's a beautiful bird," the other man interjected.

"We got this bird all the way from Russia," Hammer insisted.

Vanko had clearly had enough as he hit the table in anger and exclaimed, "Hey, man, this is not my bird."

"Like he was going to change his mind over those pitiful attempts at persuading him," Bruce scoffed.

Hammer took in a deep sigh and seemed to finally give up saying, "Well, listen, even if it's not the bird, I mean, this is a gorgeous bird. I mean, you know, look, don't get so attached to things. Learn to let go."

"That's a good thing for him to learn too," Natasha and Toni chorused knowing that the man was close to losing all of his creature comforts to the harsh reality of jail. Only nobody liked him enough to break him out.

Vanko stared at the bird as if considering this as it squawked at him.

Hammer peered around Vanko to look at the suits Vanko was working on and seemed to realise something, "Wait a minute. Jack, what is that? Is that…? That's not helmet. What is that?"

"So he didn't even manage to actually make an Iron Man suit in the end then?" Bruce said with a laugh.

"Nope," Toni confirmed with a smug look, "just a whole load of robots."

Hammer climbed up the ladder beside the suit and pulled the headpiece of the robot out of its casing.

"Well that was stupid even if it didn't do anything," Phil scoffed, "you should never do something like that without asking first unless you have no other choice. And he had the creator of the things in the room with him."

"Um…" Hammer said peering into the hole that had created, "Ivan… What's this? Jack." Here he passed the head component down to Jack. "Is that a helmet? It doesn't look like a helmet to me." By this time Hammer had climbed down and was talking rather angrily, "How… How are you supposed to get a head in there?"

"We really should have saved some of the popcorn," Clint snickered.

"But the scene where Lady Toni was in her hearing required it all Friend Barton," Thor pointed out, "and I'm sure you could get more."

"Jack, could you put your head in there?" Hammer continued when Vanko failed to answer.

"No," Jack answered meekly..

"Try to put your head in there," Hammer said, "Go ahead. Try to put your head in there." Jack touched it to his head but it obviously didn't work.

"I would feel sorry for him if he wasn't obviously one of Hammer's toadies," Natasha snorted.

"See Ivan?" Hammer sighed, "He can't put his head in there. That's… That's not a helmet. It's a head. I need to put a guy in there. I need to fit a person in that suit. You understand?"

"Yeah, he's just not capable of doing it," Toni said with a smirk.

Vanko had finally turned to acknowledge the fact that Hammer was talking. He simply replied, "Drone better."

"Hardly," Toni scoffed, "well if it was controlled by an AI it would be the same as if a person was inside it but I know for a fact that he never got that far in developing them. I doubt he would have even been capable of it. A person is more intelligent than a drone and they have the benefits of instinct and the ability to change their mind once they realise their original plan isn't going to work. A drone doesn't have any of that."

"What drone better?" Hammer questioned, "Why is drone better? Why is drone better?"

"People make problem," Vanko said, "Trust me. Drone better."

"I suppose if they were working for Hammer Industries then anyone flying the thing might be the problem," Steve said cautiously wondering if saying this was going to get him in trouble with Toni. But Toni simply tilted her head as if considering his point and then gave a shrug.

"Ivan, you know," Hammer said, "I like you. I got you the bird. You said 'No problem!' That's what you said to me. You said 'No problem.' Now I need suits. The government wants suits. Like Iron Man. You understand?"

"Watching other people's incompetence is always fun," Toni said with a smirk, "Although it does get a little tedious eventually. I find that out every time I go out looking for new employees to poach from other companies and see how bad the rest are."

"That's what the people want," Hammer continued, "That's what's going to make them happy."

There were simultaneous scoffs from around the room even from those who didn't know for sure that that hadn't been what the people wanted.

"Public opinion was still swayed towards Toni," Natasha confirmed, "Most people who live in this country don't really trust the government. Politicians are pretty high up on the list of the most hated people in the country."

"Hey, man," Vanko said obviously fed up with his rant, "Don't get too attached to things. Learn to let go."

This resulted in several minutes of fanatical laughter in the room because even though nobody there liked Vanko they couldn't help but find that hilarious. Especially since it was at Hammer's expense.

Vanko took the head of the drone back as Hammer finally gave in. "These drones better steal the show, Ivan," he said as he began to walk away, "Better rock my world, Ivan."

"Yeah, I'm not really sure that he was happy with just how much they rocked his world," Phil said with a smirk, "you could almost say they turned it upside down."

A/n – Yep this is short. It's just to let you know I'm back. I would like everyone to remember that I type all of these one handed so it takes some time on occasion. Please be considerate because I want to finish this story but I won't if I feel like I'm only doing it because you'll be rude to me if I don't. This isn't everyone of course but it is some people.