He'd snuck out of the workshop a little after 8am, when it had suddenly dawned on him that he actually had places to be, and things to be doing. Loathe as he was to admit it, this was not a morning he could spend sitting around just watching Tony sleep.

Although he planned to pen one of those into his schedule as soon as possible.

"Are you even listening to me?"

Looking up, Steve nodded to the last of his 'things to be doing' of the morning, although to be honest he actually had no idea what Director Fury had just been saying.

From the look on Nick's face, it seemed that the man was well aware of this, although it remained to be seen whether he gave enough of a shit to call him on it.

"Mhmm, right. Well, just make sure you tell that armour clad imbecile of yours. And make sure he knows that it's not a suggestion. " Fury answered, so apparently not.

Getting to his feet, Steve replied, "No Problem. If that'll be all, sir?"

Already turning his attention to the gargantuan pile of paper on his desk, Fury waved him out of their weekly report with a dismissive gesture and a half muttered, "… Fuck! Will you people stop doodling in the margins of your reports! What is this shit- is that supposed to be Banner?" followed him out the door.

Making his way down the Hellicarrier corridor toward the flight deck, Steve chuckled to himself. He pulled out his phone and sent Natasha a quick text, 'Fury very impressed by chibi- Bruce. Thor next?'

He grinned at the immediate response of '…and Loki. Braiding each other's hair.'

Steve was pretty sure that Fury knew he was the culprit, but seeing as how they kept alternating whose report the little additions made their way onto each week- well, there was no proof.

Slipping his phone away, Steve bounded up the narrow staircase and out onto the deck, heading toward the departure area, wondering who he'd be able to flag down for a lift to back to the city.

It was the name that grabbed his attention.

"…Stark. I'm telling you, I heard the security department talking about it. At one o'clock - he'll buzz the carrier, so they activate the new tech. Then Ironman will try to puncture the shield with a supersonic dive. It's gonna be so awesome!"

Steve wasn't sure of the speaking agent's identity, but he recognised his companion by the shocking tuft of bright yellow hair that whipped about in the high winds of the deck.

Agent Duckling, the name courtesy of Tony, of course.

Steve couldn't, for the life of him, remember the man's actual name, thanks very much Tony, and so it was Duckling who spoke in his head as he heard the man's response, "But…Why? I mean, isn't there…safer ways of testing the tech?"

If the men were saying what Steve was picturing in his head, Steve wanted to know the exact same thing.

"It's Stark. Who they fuck knows. Maybe he just wants to piss Fury off." replied the first Agent, and then added excitedly, "Look, there he is!"

Even without having heard the exchange, Steve would have recognised the tell-tale sound of the repulsors anywhere, and he looked up in time to see the streak of red and gold as Ironman buzzed the Hellicarrier at a ridiculous speed.

"God-damn it Tony. I'm going to kill you!"

It matched Steve's sentiment pretty well spot on, but the words hadn't come from his mouth. Turning, Steve quickly pinpointed the source as the dark skinned man hurrying out onto the flight deck from one of the nearby bays.

"Rhodey?" Steve called, moving in the Captain's direction, watching as Rhodey's head turned from scanning the sky to lock eyes with him.

"Steve! Are you here with that idio- Aaah, okay, by that look I'm going to go with no. " Rhodes asked as he jogged over to meet Steve.

"Yeah, that's a no. You didn't know about this either?" Steve asked, eyes skyward, searching for wherever red and gold might appear.

"Oh, I know all about this. And I told him he was an idiot and that I'd kill him if he did it." Rhodey snapped back, shaking his head in disgust.

Steve had a rather foreboding sense of dread sitting heavy in his stomach as he asked, "Okay, what's going on?"

Rhodes looked visibly pained as he answered, "He's developed a new shielding technology, something about buoyancy repelling matter or...anyway, the science doesn't matter. Point is, he's going to test it himself."

"And by test…you mean ram himself into it." Steve surmised, the images that accompanied the words through his mind not any he was particularly fond of.

"That's pretty much the picture." Rhodey replied, but before either of them could say anything more, let alone think of a way to stop their idiot mutual best friend from trying to pancake himself against the Hellicarrier flight deck, the familiar drone of repulsors approaching caught their attention.

Approaching fast.

6.2 seconds later it was all over.

It had felt like an hour to Steve, as he'd watched, head craned backward to look almost directly up, as Ironman had rocketed toward the deck surface, at what Steve would estimate was nigh on top speed.

And then, barely a meter from the deck, Ironman had simply slowed with such abrupt finality, that it had been an almost immediate halt. A slow forward push brought the face plate closer to the hard surface that Steve was in anyway comfortable with…

And then he'd bounced backwards.

Bounced. There was no other word that did justice to the slow rolling motion that had sent Ironman backwards into the sky a good 10 feet, and left him hovering, without a mark, 20 feet above the Hellicarrier surface.

Silence hung in the air, notwithstanding the wind that roared at the high altitude, and then a whoop! from further along the deck broke the atmosphere. Flipping the faceplate up, Tony punched a fist into the air, adding his own shout of triumph to the sudden cacophony.

Steve had to physically make himself draw a deep slow breath, a rising tide of fear, anger and adrenaline scribbling red across his vision.

Beside him he felt Rhodey snort a long stern breath through his nose, and he could practically feel the man vibrating with anger from where he stood.

Unable to contain himself, Rhodey shouted, his voice deep and entirely too commanding to be ignored, "GET YOUR ASS DOWN HERE!"

Steve saw the instant that Tony heard the shout, the second he recognised the voice, because even in the suit, Steve could see the way the other man cringed, his shoulders rolling up into his ears as he shrunk away from the well-deserved anger directed at him.

Watching as Tony pirouetted higher away (did Tony think Rhodey had the ability to jump 20 feet into the air?), brought Steve's mind to stuttering halt, decimating the anger as he admired the smooth lines of the armour.

The absolute precision and control that Tony exerted over the suit, like it was an extension of his own soul, was something beyond anything Steve had ever seen.

Sketch book after sketch book dedicated to only one subject, in sharp angles and sweeping lines of red and gold, spoke to his slight obsession with the gorgeous piece of machinery, made only more fascinating by the man within.

So much so, that even as furious as he was, his heart still thumping madly in his chest, the sight of Tony in his element, was almost enough to make him lose all perspective of the situation.

And then he saw the moment that Tony's skittering eyes, in an attempt to avoid Rhodey's lasers of doom, fell upon Steve.

He dropped a foot in the air and physically blanched, his skin washing to a pale chalky grey before a scattering of blotched red appeared high in his cheeks.

Tony's own guilty reaction brought his anger back to the forefront of Steve's mind, and he felt no sympathy as he added his own 'front and centre, Mister' look to Rhodey's continuing shouts of gruesome reprisal.

As he watched Tony all but slink through the air, before suddenly ducking beneath the lip of the carrier and disappearing toward the city in a streak of red/gold. Steve wasn't sure if it was reluctant amusement or exasperated frustration that he was feeling, but whatever the case, he turned and grabbed Rhodey's shoulder as the man blustered toward the edge of the deck, the grating sound of the War Machine powering up somewhere behind them.

"Let him panic for a while, dig himself into an even deeper hole. How about a lift back to the tower?" Seeing Rhodey wavering, Steve added, "He's got to come home sometime…."