"How'd your meeting go?" asked Bella, stepping forward to meet Tony, as he'd insisted she call him, as he stepped through the front door.
"Well, long story short, they want me as a consultant for the Avengers Initiative, not a member. I agreed on two conditions. One, that they find a presenter when for Rhodey and I are honored in Washington. Two, that they don't bother you anymore."
"Thank you, Tony."
"Fury actually gave me an apology for what happened. Said that they just wanted to make sure you weren't up to anything before calling me, and then, when you told them, some of the scientists there started stalling things because they wanted to run a few tests and knew they wouldn't be able to because I'd be there as soon as I found out. There were other things too, but I think you get the picture."
Bella didn't completely believe all of that, and judging from his tone, Tony didn't seem to either.
"They sent me with a letter for you. I assume it's of apologies and pleas for you to come work for them." He handed her an envelope. "Do you actually want to read it? You know what's going to be in there anyhow, and we could go make those modifications on your suit that you've been asking about."
Ever since her time at the S.H.I.E.L.D. base, Bella had wanted to modify the suit into a suitcase, so it could be transported more easily, and could be available to her at all times. She couldn't simply ignore whatever they had to say, though. She sighed. "Might as well take a look."
She opened it.
It was, indeed, full of apologies and pleas for her to come work for S.H.I.E.L.D., offering to train her as an agent if she wanted it. They even suggested that she might be entered as a reserve member of the Avengers Initiative, at some point in the future, now that she had a suit of armor similar to Tony's. Bella studied it for a moment, then set it down on the nearest table and sighed.
"They don't take no for an answer, do they?" she asked.
Later on in the day, she found herself sitting on the roof, out of the suit. The view of the ocean was simply unbeatable.
Footsteps sounded behind her.
Bella spun around. It was Agent Barton.
"Oh. It's you," she said. "I thought S.H.I.E.L.D. agreed to leave me alone."
"They did. I didn't, though."
Bella groaned inwardly. If it was one more request from them for her to come work for them and build weapons… "Did you need something?"
"I wanted to watch the sunset, and this place has as good a view as any. That and I wanted to see you to see how you were doing after what happened, since I'm leaving soon."
He was right about the sunset. This was the best view of the sunset Bella had ever had in her life. "I'm doing fine, thank you for asking. And please tell me S.H.I.E.L.D. didn't ask you to come up here and offer me work yet another time. I have no interest in it."
"Don't worry, they didn't, they probably don't even know I'm here. Quite a secret you were hiding. I understand why you didn't want tell us though, though. It's not something that should get around."
Bella stiffened. "Who told you?"
"No one. I figured it out on my own. It wasn't hard to do, to be honest. Once you told us you'd helped build the arc reactor, well, there are only so many teenaged girls out there who'd be able to pull it off. You're from one of those programs where they program information into kids' brains and sell them off. We've heard rumors, but no believed them. We'd never found any real proof – much less anyone from the programs – until now."
"Who else knows?"
"As few people as possible. That was a part of Stark's deal, that it didn't get around to anyone who didn't absolutely need to know. Or know about it already. He shouldn't have worried about it. It's not as if we'd be spreading the news. Like I said, it's not something that should get around."
"Did you know about S.H.I.E.L.D. bringing me in? Why didn't they tell Tony about it?" Bella knew the reason Tony had been given, but wondered if Agent Barton might have a different one.
"Yes, I did know. And they didn't call because Director Fury said not to. If you were some sort of terrorist, S.H.I.E.L.D wanted minimal interference from Stark. How is Mr. Stark? His new arc reactor working fine?"
Bella supposed their decision did make sense, although she didn't agree with it. If she had been a terrorist, Tony might still have tried to keep her out of trouble, and just made things more difficult. That reason still wasn't good enough to excuse it, but she understood why they might decide that it would be better to keep him out of it. "Yes, as far as we can tell, the reactor is no longer poisoning him. He's stopped his crazy stunts, for the most part. And he's dating Pepper now."
"Pepper?"
"Miss Potts. She's back to being his personal assistant now."
There was more silence.
"So, you have an Iron Man suit. Have you picked out some kind of superhero name?"
Bella shook her head. "I'm not a hero, Agent Barton. I spent my life building weapons for people who didn't exactly use them for good causes. Just a person didn't pull the trigger themselves doesn't mean they're not responsible. I knew what the people were going to do with them, knew it was wrong." A hero was supposed to someone people can look up to. Bella certainly wouldn't want anyone imitating her. "I designed a missile for a terrorist group when I was nine. Before they got rid of me a few months later, they had killed hundreds of people with it – some of them no older than I was at the time." Somehow, it was easier to tell him than she would have expected. Maybe because she'd already shared some of it with S.H.I.E.L.D. Or maybe because, aside from Tony, he was the closest thing she had to a friend. She and Tony never talked about her past. "That's just one case out of hundreds in my life. And I didn't refuse to stop."
"Which would have gotten you killed, right?"
"Better I die than all those people. You said you were leaving?" said Bella.
Barton looked a little surprised at the abrupt change in subject, but seemed to sense she didn't want to discuss her life any further. "Yeah. I've been reassigned, along with Coulson," said Agent Barton. "I figured I'd come to say goodbye before I left, they want me in – oh, can't tell you where, sorry."
"Is this a case of 'I'd tell you but then I'd have to kill you'?"
He chuckled. "Something like that, yeah."
"Have fun in New Mexico."
He walked to the edge of the roof. "See you."
"Goodbye."
He jumped off the edge of the roof.
Bella yelped and ran to the edge.
As he fell, he fired an arrow into a nearby building and swung away, waving with the hand that wasn't holding the rope that was extending from the arrow.
She waved for a moment, then headed downstairs. Tony would be wondering where she was, and she had work to do on her suit.
And so, we reach the end of Iron Man 2. Up next: The Avengers. And, after that (hopefully) Iron Man 3. And after that, who knows?
Oh, and for those of you who enjoy my work, may I suggest checking out my newest story We Don't Belong Here.