Khris stood there with his arms crossed against his chest. He was in a rusted warehouse like building, surrounded by the various tools and resources that were being used by his henchmen. His head was tilted up, giving all of his attention to the small television in front of him.
The channel two news was giving reports on the missiles that were planted in the deserts of Nevada.
"Nevada citizens have been given the signal. Thanks to our hero, Captain America, the missiles have been cleared as okay, and are being escorted in the hands of the United States military. No one knows how it got there, and the military refuses to make any comment on it. The government will be making their speech today regarding this matter." One of the news anchors announced.
The other news anchor spoke up. "Captain America will not be attending the press conference. Instead, the government will be giving a general speech and will not be taking any questions from the press. All, and any, news about the press conference will be covered."
Khris rubbed his chin in frustration and began to grit his teeth together. One of the henchmen approached him.
"Stark did not show."
"Obviously." Khris rolled his eyes, and walked away from the television screen.
"What should we do now?" The henchman followed him through the production lines of the warehouse.
It was a mass production line. Every henchman was busy building something out of the scraps of resources they got. They weren't each building individual and identical products. They were building add-ons to the same product.
"We keep building our weapon." Khris responded. "We can only assume that Stark is incapacitated."
"Then we should strike while we're ahead!" The henchmen whispered loudly. "We'll have the upper hand—an advantage over Iron Man! We must take it!"
Khris began to chuckle at the man's proposition. "I want Iron Man to be at his best when I fight him. What sort of rival would I be if I killed him when he's at a disadvantage?"
REPAIR; CHAPTER 25
Pepper walked through the front door with her purse in her hand and her blackberry in the other. She wore her usual grey business outfit and high heels. She semi rushed down towards Tony's workshop to check up on him. Once she got through the glass door via access code, she looked up and saw the doctor inspecting Tony's arm.
She furrowed her eyebrows in worry. "How is he, Doctor Anders?"
The doctor looked behind him with a small smile. "He's just fine." The man was the same height as Tony. He was fairly old, considering he's been with SHIELD for some time. He was in his mid fifties. He had grey hair and an average haircut. He looked very handsome for his age, and really professional. He had a pair of black slacks and a white dress shirt on. "Although, he needs to cut back on the cholesterol."
"Hey." Tony snapped, pressing his lips together. "You're a doctor, not a doctor for physical therapy."
"I assume you two are getting along nicely." She walked over to them. Tony was sitting on a stool while the doctor examined his arm.
"Does this hurt?" Anders moved Tony's arm up, and he saw him flinch a little.
"Nope." Tony looked over at him, and then at his girlfriend. She gave him a small glare.
"Just because you want to get back into your Iron Man suit doesn't mean you should lie, Mr. Stark." Anders beamed a look at him and smiled when Pepper came up from behind him.
"Tony…" She growled at him lowly.
"This guy doesn't know what he's doing, Pepper." Tony tried to tell her.
Anders quickly took his arm and twisted it certain ways, only making Tony clasp his mouth shut and grunt in pain.
"Ow!—" He yelped, glaring at the doctor.
"Well." Anders smiled. "I believe my work is done here."
"So, I can fly the suit?" Tony looked up at him.
"In your dreams." Pepper murmured to him.
"Like Miss Potts said, your arm is still healing, and I'm afraid it'll take some time for the pain to subside. After that, you will have to contact Doctor Kijo. He's SHIELD's physical therapist. He will have to work with you to make sure that your arm is in fit shape and ready for whatever you put it through." He widened his smile and took out a card from his shirt pocket. "If there are any problems, please, don't hesitate to call."
Pepper took the card and nodded pleasantly. "Thank you, Doctor Anders."
"My pleasure." The doctor gathered his things and contently walked out of the workshop, and up the stairs.
Tony quickly turned his head to face Pepper. "Does this mean I can suit up?"
She rolled her eyes at him and placed the business card on top of his desk. "Did you not pay attention to a word the doctor said?" She picked up his blue sling that was near his monitors and handed it back to him.
"Honestly, you're asking me that?" Tony raised an eyebrow up at her, leaping off the stool and accepting it from her."Hey, Dummy." The robot rolled towards him with a compassionate gesture using its robotic arm. "Can you put this stool back to where ever you got it from?"
Tony walked out of the way while Dummy tried his best to grapple one of the stool's legs. He carefully placed his sling back on using his left arm. "Do I really have to put this thing back on?"
"What did the doctor say?"
"I don't know." He shrugged.
"I swear, Tony, you have the attention span of a dog." She rolled her eyes at him.
"So I can take this thing off?" He looked up at her, questioningly.
"I would rather you not, and given what the doctor said, I don't think you can fly the suit for at least a few more weeks." Pepper said with a small frown.
"What?" He practically shouted. A split second after, Dummy's grip on the stool had loosened, thus making the stool crash onto the concrete floor with a loud bang. Both Tony and Pepper looked over at the mechanical sidekick, both giving it a questioning look. Dummy solemnly looked away, using its claw, and tried to pick up the stool again.
"There are people that need Iron Man right now, Pepper." He tried to tell her, but his argument wasn't very plausible, even in his head.
"What kind of argument is that?" She furrowed her eyebrows at him, walking over to a section of the workshop to retrieve some of her art pieces.
"It's a… very…" he paused, obviously not please with the way his argument was going. "… It's a personal… argument-ish matter… ish."
"Nice try, Boss." She rolled her eyes. "You are not getting in that suit and I doubt director Fury would even let you near it."
"Don't call it an 'it', Pepper." He glared at her. "It's my baby." He flashed a small smile at his showcase of suits that were against the wall.
"I thought your hotrod was your baby." She shouted from the corner of his workshop, looking down at an art piece that she had purchased from a well known seller a few months ago.
"It is." He nodded to himself. "And do you know who else is my baby?" He grinned in her direction.
"If you think your clever comments will ease your way into my good side, you are sadly mistaken." She huffed at him, picking up the framed art piece.
He walked over to her and leaned against one of his machinery. He tucked his good arm in his pants pocket and carefully eyed her. He tried his best to flash a innocent, pleasing, and handsome smile. When she finally glanced at him, she had to quickly look away. She half thought of comparing Tony to Medusa… only male, and much more attractive.
"Okay, fine." Tony slowly nodded. "I'll listen to the doctor and wait a couple more weeks."
"A few." She snapped back, picking up another framed piece of art. "I thought you donated all of this to the Boyscouts of America."
"A couple." He grinned at her, trying to push her buttons. "… And I didn't donate all of them."
"Fine." She pressed her lips together and glared at him. "You're waiting two weeks—but right after, you are contact Doctor Kijo and going through physical therapy."
"My god, that'll take forever!" Tony groaned, beginning to pout in front of his girlfriend.
"Patience is a virtue, Mr. Stark." She beamed back at him.
"Patience leads to old age." He shot back at her, looking away.
Pepper put the artwork down and rested her hands on her hips. "Well if you think about it – how many dates can we go on until your two week wait?"
"Fifteen." He breathed. "That'll give us negative one days break time."
Pepper widened her smile at him and tried not to laugh. "Negative one day?"
"Yup." He shifted towards her, making her back into the wall space that stood behind her. Tony glanced down at her lips and then at her eyes – her beautiful cerulean colored eyes. One could only drown one-hundred and a dozen times in those special eyes of hers.
"I do have a lot of work to do on the weekdays, Tony. I don't think we'll be able to have one every day." She teased him; she watched him carefully, and slowly, walk towards her.
He stopped a few centimeters in front of her and felt her hands grasp his hip. After a few moments of drowning in her perfume, he felt the need to trap her body between his, and the wall, using his arm. He pressed his palm against the cool concrete wall behind her, right beside her head.
"I can always build a time machine…" He breathed, leaning in closer.
"I think that's illegal." She smirked up at him.
"Please." He grinned. "I'm Tony Stark. The world 'illegal' isn't even in the Stark Dictionary."
"Egotistical?"
"I love it when you talk dirty." He widened his smile, and began to brush his lips against hers.
Pepper pressed his body against his and kissed him slowly. Their tongues danced for about a split second before they heard another loud crash that originated behind them. Pepper and Tony both pulled away. When their gaze reached the center of the workshop, they saw Dummy's robotic claw look down at the stool that had crashed onto the floor, again.
Tony pressed his lips together and turned back to Pepper. "So, what were you saying?" He asked, leaning in, again.
"Tony—" She smiled up at him. "—I think Dummy needs help."
They heard another crash.
"He's fine." He tried to tell her.
"No, I think—" She tried to tell him, but he immediately cut her off.
"Pepper, there have been a history of people – objects even – that have interrupted us. Please, don't make me write down Dummy as one of them." He furrowed his eyebrows at her, and tried to flash a hurtful look.
He certainly wasn't wrong. Ever since they've gotten together, there have been a number of people, and objects, that have conflicted with their personal life. There was that incident with Captain America.
"Mm, Pepper—" Tony kissed her sensually. Pepper was leaning against his desk (practically sitting on top of it), while he was in between her, kissing her stress away. They were having a wonderful evening, until Captain America's face flashed on the screen.
Captain America looked on at the couple and widened his smile. Pepper started to wrap her arms around Tony's neck, and Tony gripped her waist. He began to kiss her harder.
"Um—I'm sorry—I don't mean to be a… um… rooster blocker, but—"
Pepper and Tony immediately separated themselves. He angrily grumbled and looked at the huge monitor behind them. She turned around and immediately gasped.
"Hi, Steve." He huffed.
"I should—I'll go." Pepper muttered and proceeded to climb off his desk. He backed away and continued to glare at Captain America, whom was still smiling.
"I did say I was sorry—I mean there are other words for 'rooster'—" Steve tried to tell Pepper.
"We get it, Steve." Tony angrily grumbled.
And then there were plenty of times when Fury and Natalie interrupted them. God, there were so many times… Pepper mentally shook her head and began to rub circles into Tony's hip.
"I'll go help him." She whispered.
Tony frowned deeply as his girlfriend slipped under his arm, and out of his grasp. He hung his head low and heavily sighed. All he wanted was a moment of uninterrupted peace with his girlfriend. He should really install some sort of blocker for phone calls and conference feeds. Sure, because of a picture of a rubber band or a sock will definitely shoo Fury—or whoever—away. He sarcastically thought to himself.