Note: My roll has slowed a little, but I am sensing that I've retained my grip on my hyperfocus enough to continue with the manic writing phase (albeit less quickly than 6k words a day, which, okay, fine, that was nuts anyway)! Things are looking up!
Have some ~~FEELINGS~~ and some superpowers, my friends!
ALSO: Thank you So, SO much for your encouragement. It really helped, and I feel a renewed love for this story, and it's all thanks to you. Thank you so much!
Chapter Ten: Солнечный лучик
Tony's constant low-level sexual frustration is, infuriatingly, good for his progress on the suit he's building, he finds, especially as he has started on the wiring. Because the wires themselves are so lightweight and valuable, he can't risk Emory being anywhere near him while he's working, so he'd had to ban her from his side of the cave. Yinsen's almost finished cooking, though, which means they have a dilemma.
"Would it be ridiculous to just take the table and chairs over there?" Tony muses.
"That depends on how willing you two are to curb your enthusiasm. I have no wish to clean bean stew from my suit," Yinsen says, stirring at the pot without looking over.
"It's not that bad," Tony objects.
Now Yinsen looks over. Tony doesn't like how perceptive his expression is, so he makes the command decision that yes, they're moving the table.
"Well I'm going to do it. You'll just have to regale us with tales of your youth," Tony tells him.
Emory's under her blanket doing her singing exercises when Tony picks up the table. His instinct is to call out and tell her what's going on, if only so he can see the expression on her face as she watches him come over. The problem is, if he sets her off so soon before eating, there will definitely be bean stew to clean up.
His compromise is to carry over the chairs first. The sound will alert her to something going on without any direct interference from him.
Tony loves being a genius.
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A sound of metal clinking together pulls Emory out of her singing practice. She drops the blanket to see Tony setting down some chairs.
"Thought we'd eat over here. Just in case."
He doesn't hold her gaze long at all, but there's a playful light in his eyes that has Emory captivated. As she watches, he picks up the table they eat at and walks it over, turning sideways when he sets it down (she's certain he's doing it on purpose) so she can see his arms to best effect.
"You are so completely transparent," she laughs.
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Tony protests as he arranges the chairs, but he glances over at her with a broad smile. Emory had spent all morning learning what it felt like to hold onto the odd second skin of potential power that happens when she feels a particularly strong emotion. The longer she holds on, the thicker that skin feels, and after a while there's feedback, as if a small percent of what she's gripping frees itself to affect her personally. She'd held on long enough for her hair to start blowing around (despite being dirty and weighed down by grime) and her clothes to ripple. Emory hasn't had a chance to share that information with Tony yet, but something about the way she's already having to focus on holding back tells her he'll be observing it himself by the end of their meal.
Considering she can feel it starting to build and the food isn't even ready yet, Emory realizes she probably ought to focus this afternoon on learning how to dissipate the energy in a benign way.
That gives her an idea, and she hops to her feet. The other thing she's been trying to practice is being able to tell the distance she's 'throwing' the energy, which she'd tested by standing further and further back from the string contraption Tony'd built for her.
"What's up?" he asks, coming over with three cups of water.
"Had a thought about how to disperse the energy. In case I need to."
Tony's lips curve into a smile that is at least fifty percent powered by whatever is going on between them. Just seeing it is enough for her hair to start lifting off of her neck.
"Okay, let me just-" Emory says, backing into the corner where she's been retreating to test her abilities. She has enough banked not to need to look at Tony, but the temptation is too great. She craves the look of surprise and approval she's certain she's going to see on his face if she succeeds. To start, though, she closes her eyes.
Taking in a deep breath, she focuses on the layer of power she's sheathed in, picturing it as less of a scabbard than a cushion, one she can rotate. If Emory's right, instead of projecting the energy, she should be able to circle it around herself. She starts slow, wishing she'd tied a shirt around her waist to see whether the ends start to flutter. The pants she's been wearing for over a month are quality material, and the airflow against them doesn't really register, early on.
She can feel her hair lift and twist, and that's when Emory opens her eyes. Tony's standing with one hand resting on the back of a chair, eyes fixed on her, clearly fascinated.
"You're making your hair spin, do you feel any force turning you, or are you able to hold it far enough away?" he asks.
"It's like a cushion around me, like I'm protected in a cylinder, or something," she answers, feeling the rotation as she eases more of the power into the already existing spiral. Soon she feels the force that Tony had hinted at; the wind wants to turn her. The only way that won't hurt her is if she lifts up a little, but even then, Emory doesn't want to get dizzy, just spin the potential energy around herself and away, rather than building it up until she's a powder keg. "I wonder…" she says, and directs almost all of the energy down, meaning to see if she can levitate, even just a little bit.
"Emory?" Tony asks, seconds before she starts to lift up.
"Don't worry, it's just a little-" she says, but even as she says it, she realizes she's wrong. It's a lot. Emory fights to keep the power she can feel surging under her feet from winding up onto her legs and spinning her in a dangerous, uncontrollable way. She can sense that this is possible, now, as if she can see a tiny bit into the future of where the energy can go, if she pushes or pulls it just the right way.
"Send it out, send it wide, you're going to-" Tony says, coming forward, reaching.
Emory looks up and throws her hands up to protect herself against the array of jutting rock and dug-out hollows that make up the cave's ceiling. Instinctively, she brings the cushion of air she'd spun beneath her up, allowing it to turn as it whooshes up and away. She starts falling faster than she'd expected to, but Tony is there, so she sends all the air up instead of retaining it to cushion her landing.
She trusts that he'll catch her. The alternative is to knock him down with the force of the energy.
Tony does catch her; he ends up crouched with her in his arms.
"How does it feel to defy gravity, Elphaba?" he asks. He sounds impressed but shaken.
"Terrifying," she says, hiding her face in his neck.
"I've got you," Tony says, his voice quiet but reassuring. His arms tighten around her for a few seconds, one hand coming up to stroke her hair once, before he straightens, and Emory draws back with no small amount of reluctance. She'd felt so safe in those stolen moments, as if Tony's strength was something she was entitled to. However, his reference to the musical Wicked reminds her of the duet that the character Elphaba sings with her love interest. 'As Long As You're Mine' stings, in context. The male lead, Fiyero, starts the musical wealthy and narcissistic, after all. The song plays in her head as she backs up. 'And if it turns out it's over too fast, I'll make every last moment last… As long as you're mine.'
"Thanks," Emory says, tongue-tied.
"Food is ready. Come, eat." Yinsen sounds stressed out, and Emory guesses that he probably is. If what she'd just done had been visible on the camera, they would be in a serious mess.
Emory sits across from Yinsen, thinking that it would be better than across from Tony. She'll have to turn her head to look at him, maybe that will help?
"I think you're on deck, sir," Tony tells Yinsen. "In the interests of preventing any spinning stew bowls."
She bites her tongue, resisting the urge to defend herself. Right now, just hearing Tony's voice is fraught with power and passion, as much as she'd like to pretend otherwise.
"Do you want to talk about your children? I don't think you've said anything about your family before," she says to Yinsen.
The interpreter looks down at his bowl, holding himself uncharacteristically rigid. "I-" He lifts his head. There's a misery there that makes Emory catch her breath. "I think that might be too painful. To be reminded, the responsibility I have to keep them safe. To have failed so completely."
"I'm so sorry," she whispers. "I wasn't thinking. I didn't want to give the impression that we didn't care about what's important to-"
Tony's hand comes to rest on hers, and Emory's words dust in her mouth.
"The worry is ever present, do not fret. Distractions only last so long. I could speak about my wife. There's no escaping reminders of her, here."
As always, Yinsen's voice sounds gentle even as his words slice through all pretense, striking with unerring accuracy.
"Please," Tony says, pulling his hand away.
Emory makes note of the fact that she had been caught up by feeling guilty, and thus didn't store up any energy from the touch. It tells her that she might want to figure out a way to test the effects of fear on her newfound abilities. For now, though, she refocuses on Yinsen.
She wonders what he could mean that it's impossible to escape reminders of his wife here of all places.
"My marriage wasn't what you would call arranged in the typical use of the term, but the meaning of the word is very appropriate. Our families planned for us to marry, you could say."
"How old were you?" Tony interrupts.
Yinsen's expression is singularly amused, as he answers. "Oh, we were past thirty. This wasn't a situation of young people, new to the world, being guided. Though, we were guided, most certainly. Adult professionals making their hopeful mothers weep for the lack of grandchildren." He stops to take a few bites of his stew, but Emory saw that there had been a hitch in his breathing on the word 'grandchildren.' She wonders if there's something awful that he's been hiding from them, about his children.
Ever since discovering that she actually has ended up with powers that she can actually influence, and hopefully learn to better control, Emory's felt guilty about having 'stolen' them from Yinsen's son. In order to survive here in the cave, she's pushed away all the thoughts of danger as far as is reasonably possible. Dying isn't as distant as she wishes, though- and Yinsen is nothing if not pragmatic. He had made the choice to use the injections on her in the hopes that they can all better survive this ordeal… but the cost and the rarity means that he'll likely never have the chance to obtain more.
Emory almost wishes she could know: does Yinsen expect to survive? Did he give her the injections because he is more certain of dying than not?
Tony's mid-sentence before she breaks out of her reverie. "-order the two of you to get married, or what?"
Yinsen sets down his spoon, an enigmatic smile on his face. "Nothing so direct. No, our families and a few others met for a week-long celebration. They didn't tell us about their plans, just sent Jalila and I to collect food from an underground storeroom. The door closed behind us and we were trapped together for quite some time."
At first, Tony seems confused. "But you said they planned it, what did they plan? For you to be-"
He trails off, and Emory looks down at her bowl. She understands, because the same forces have worked on her, if she's understanding Yinsen correctly.
"They knew it would be a bonding experience," Yinsen says. Emory can feel his eyes on her, but something about the certainty in his voice is setting her off.
"It's not a given," she protests without looking up. "How long were you in there?"
"Many days."
"Did you figure out what they were trying to do?" she pushes. "Didn't that, I don't know, make it… didn't it make you stubborn? Resistant?"
"Your reaction is a common one," Yinsen says. The amusement in his voice makes her look up, even though she knows that he's always incisive, always perceptive, and now is the worst time for him to demonstrate that, at a moment where her private feelings are so clearly illustrated by his tale. Just as she expected, he's looking at her, and there's understanding in his eyes. Emory grits her teeth, ready to push back on anything he might say in reference to herself and Tony.
"What reaction?" Tony asks. She looks over to see that his brows are furrowed, and he's looking between the two of them.
"Do you want to explain?" Yinsen asks her. He's enjoying putting her on the hot seat, Emory realizes. She glares at him.
"Not really, but I'm not sure I'd trust your take on it," she tells him truthfully. Yinsen laughs at that.
Tony frowns. "Seriously, what am I missing here?"
"Many people to whom I tell this story believe that if they were in the same situation, they would resist forming an attachment because falling in love was the material purpose of our families confining us together like that. A romantic bond via a shared traumatic experience"
Tony starts to cough, takes a sip of water. When he puts the cup back down, it sloshes a little.
"I'm saying that if you knew someone was trying to force you into something, it's human nature to resist it. Especially if they have power over you! So it's completely different, if you knew," Emory argues. "Anyway, it's not a given."
"Oh, certainly not," Yinsen laughs.
They eat the rest of the meal in silence.
Emory spends the day studiously ignoring the implications of Yinsen's story and what Tony might have gleaned from her reactions to it. She positions herself with her back to him, ostensibly so that she doesn't change the conditions of her testing. After all, if she re-ups her emotional boost from her feelings for him when she's in the middle of trying to dissipate the energy, won't that just make it more difficult to learn how?
It's always great when circumstances mean that the thing you already felt like doing ends up the better choice.
By the evening, she's confident that she has the concept of dissipation down, but in practice, it's still a bit difficult. There are two things she can do, and one of them might preserve the energy in a way she can 'regather' to use again. It's hard to know for sure, because she has to hide in the corner to test it, and Emory has the feeling that she has a greater capacity than would be safe to fiddle with in the cave in the first place.
More than once she'd let herself dwell on her feelings, leaning into a future she doesn't expect is very realistic, and felt like she could tug on the air around her to pull it in. Obviously that would have a very different effect in the open than it would in their enclosed space.
"How's it going over there, Dorothy?" Tony calls out, when she's finally starting to get tired.
"Come over and see," she says, looking down at herself. There really isn't much indication of what's going on, but she leans over and picks up a handful of the ubiquitous dust from the floor, so she can show him.
Tony's pulling on a button-up shirt over his black tank top when he walks over. For once, she doesn't tease him about it, because she's too busy looking forward to his reaction.
"You might stop calling me Dorothy after this and start calling me the twister," she says, grinning at him. Her hair's in a rare ponytail at the top of her head, for once, because the motion of the air she's meticulously wound around herself had sent her hair into her eyes so often she'd considered chopping all of the red locks off.
"Oh?"
"Watch."
She holds the handful of dust at chest level and drops it. The multiple vortexes of air chasing around her body catch the flow, taking it along for the ride.
"Holy shit," Tony says, staring.
Emory grins, feels the potential she's carrying rise, and twists a fourth vortex around herself. As soon as she does it, though, she can tell it was too many.
"Okay, uh, stand back, that-" she says quickly.
Tony stays put, meaning he gets pelted with dust when Emory essentially plucks one of the 'packages' of energy-wrought air from its position winding around her to 'toss' it onto the floor in between them. The result is like throwing a localized, miniature tornado; it spins up into the ceiling to scour its surface with the materials it'd picked up on its journey.
"Nice! The culmination of what I did today was hooking up the air compressor on the arm of my suit, something I can't test without toasting the two of you," Tony laughs.
"You and your flamethrowers!" Emory says, laughing.
"So, question," Tony says, advancing on her with one hand outstretched. "Do your vortexes maintain integrity until they come into contact with something? Can you use it for defense?"
"What do-" she starts to say, but Tony's got a determined scientist look on his face. He snakes out an arm and pulls her up against him, giving Emory a thrill from the decisive movement, right up until he is thrown into the air and spun sideways before landing on his back on the floor.
"Tony!" she says, starting toward him.
"Wait!" he says, holding up both hands. "Just a jolt. Are they still there or would you have to refresh them? Cyclone Armor, Emory. Think big."
"I hate to point this out, but that name is way too grand for someone of my stature. It would be more like Downspout Armor or something." She skids to a halt and 'feels' the air around her. One of the 'packages' is gone, another one is at less intensity than it held before. "It knocked out one of three, and the second one is at half strength."
Emory tosses them into the corner and watches as they spin dust up and dissipate into the ceiling. Then she goes over to where Tony is still lying on his back. He's got his hands behind his head and one knee up, the other leg crossed over it, looking for all the world like he's resting peacefully on a beach instead of in captivity in the mountains.
"What if," he says, pointing at her with one shoe, "You spun a hundred of them around you? Could you deflect projectiles?"
"In theory. In practice, I'd run out of patience for creating them at around ten, and likely they'd just collide mid-stream and knock me around. Are you going to get up or do you want me to check you for broken bones?" she asks. Emory knows that she's got to get a handle on her power generation, and that the longer she's het up, the more she'll have to control, so why not go hard and fast?
"I am overdue for a thorough, line-item inspection of all of my parts," Tony says immediately, holding both hands angled back, palm up.
"What-"
"Palm to palm, one leg on either side," he instructs.
"Do you want me to hurricane this entire place into a disaster area?" she says, walking closer dubiously.
"No, which is why you're going to do this now instead of arguing with me." He shakes both palms expectantly.
Emory steps over him and, loving the encouraging anticipation she can see in his brown eyes, rests a palm on each of his.
Then, they both start laughing. Her hands are quite small in comparison to Tony's. Emory slides her hands up so she can link their fingers, and the searing want that slide engenders weakens her knees. Once they're locked together, Tony lowers his hands, keeping his knees behind her at just the right angle to support her. His arms don't shake at all. Tony's expression is serious and direct, and Emory can barely hold his gaze. There's so much that he's promising in that look, and she wants every single second of it.
Just inches before their bodies touch, Tony swears under his breath and surges up, pulling her arms up to his neck and disentangling their hands. He cups the back of her head and Emory's right there with him, sliding her fingers into the sweat-damp hair at the base of his neck right as their lips meet. It's as if he's breathing life into her. Everywhere they're in contact, her skin sings, as if the friction of their touch sparks the chemical reaction of pure joy.
Tony's other hand grips her hip, and his thumb is brushing across her cheek, the sensation almost as sensual as the kiss itself. Every signal he's sending her is exactly in line with what she wants to send to him. Emory's fingertips trail her heart through his hair. Her heartbeat under his palm beats in a rhythm of want, I want, I love, I love you, love you. She's surrounded by him, and the new but familiar echo of those feelings as manifested by her new powers surge forth. Emory sends them spiraling around them, begging for a delay, a few more seconds with Tony, a few more, just a few more.
Every other time he'd kissed her, Tony had broken the kiss by now, but she can sense his own reluctance to stop in the way his hold on her keeps tightening, as if he's physically fighting the message his conscience might be sending. Finally, he squeezes the hand at her hip too tight and she lets out a little sound of pain, pulling back and laying her forehead on his shoulder.
"What, you're not made of metal? Sorry," he quips, nosing a caress of an apology onto her hairline. She compensates for the way that makes her shiver by slipping her arms up under his, around his back. As she does, Tony starts stammering in seeming confusion. "Uhh. Okay, that's- Was that, is that just from that short time? Gonna give me an ego here."
"You already have one of those," Emory says, but she lifts her head.
Spinning closely around them is a blurred column of dust and pebbles from the floor of the cave. Before she can stop him, Tony reaches out two fingers to touch it, but instead of breaking the structural integrity of her spontaneous vortex, he simply causes a traveling void where he's swept away the particles. He pulls back his hand, and seconds later the void 'heals,' the dust and dirt redistributing throughout the tunnel.
Tony looks at her, and Emory turns her head back toward him. He jerks his thumb at the rotating phenomenon. "This? is sincerely amazing. But, promise me: no more strange injections, okay?"
Emory's had that song from Wicked running through her head all afternoon, especially the part where one of the self-centered rich man's line includes the words 'there's no future for us as a pair.' She's pushed back her powers in a bid for more time with him, why not push back on the rest of it?
"Why, Mr. Stark, are you… invested?"
Tony leans back and tips his head sideways. The man is seriously attractive, despite being scruffy and dirty after five plus weeks in their cave. More than that, though, is the draw of his quick wit, his genius mind, his gentleness one minute and arrogance the next. Even if someone had told her ahead of time that their plan in confining them was for her to fall for Tony, the very scenario that she'd told Yinsen she would have resisted with all her might? She doesn't think she would have succeeded in that resistance. Tony narrows his eyes at her, an obviously impish crinkle around them.
"Is this confidence I'm detecting?"
She knows he's teasing, and it's an affectionate tease, but it still rankles. "You don't have to heckle me!"
"I'm not!"
"Tony," she dangles, but he interrupts her.
"Not heckling. And-" he pauses, lets out a little breath, and flashes her a vulnerable smile. "-yes."
Emory's on the verge of asking what the yes is for when it hits her. She'd pulled back to talk to him, but now she reaches out, presses her hands flat on either side of the glowing power source in his chest. Seeing how naked his expression is right now, the way he just admitted something she isn't sure she's brave enough to be so blatant about- it's making her feel guilty. If they survive this crazy adventure and he's serious about being invested, however deeply that word is buried into the vulnerability that shines on his face, he'll be leaving with at least two obvious liabilities.
The least she can do is try to keep him alive with her new powers as much as the reactor in his chest does.
"Sorry about that," she whispers.
"One step forward, two steps back? Stop waltzing, Emory. Tell me why exactly you think you should be sorry?"
He sounds almost stern, and she looks up from the compelling bright circle under the edge of her thumbs to his face. Tony's expression is kinder than the tone of his voice, at least.
"For giving you another responsibility, I guess?"
"Oh yes, you're quite helpless." To her utter shock, Tony reaches out, spearing his hand into the still spinning column around them, flattening his hand and smacking some of the dust and dirt right in her direction.
"What on-" she gasps, shaking her hair. She has to pull the cloth she'd tied it up in free to get all the dirt out, and since she's sitting on him, it all goes onto Tony. He uses his other hand to protect his head, and she reaches out, having to brace herself on his shoulder to reach, so she can splash some dirt from the vortex onto him, too.
"Oh, it's on," Tony says, tilting sideways to knock her off of his lap.
"Don't make me drop it on your head!" Emory threatens, but she's giggling.
"That would be cheating, and you'd feel guilty for days, admit it, Mother Teresa!"
They spend the next few minutes jumping around hitting each other with slaps of debris from the whirlwind around them until there are only a few sections of dust left. Emory can barely see. She's completely covered in dirt and pebbles, and Tony's not much better.
"I'm practically blind," he complains dramatically, wiping his gritty hands on her back before leaning over to drag his face on the fabric of her shoulder to wipe it off.
"Not fair! And aren't you supposed to keep dirt away from the reactor? Shit!" she says, brushing his chest off.
"Oh shit," Tony says, his tone deep and regretful. It pulls Emory back from the amused abyss with a sharpness that fills her with fear. When she looks over to where Tony's looking, though, she doesn't know whether to laugh or feel even more guilty.
Yinsen is standing on the other side of the waning vortex with his arms crossed. He looks like a school headmaster catching them as they sneak back into their dormitories drunk as hell.
Emory supposes their behavior isn't that far off.
"I only hope this was not visible," Yinsen says in a clipped, disapproving tone.
She can sense that its power is mostly sustained by momentum, so Emory reaches out and mentally dispels the rest of its lateral movement. It's enough for the whole structure to collapse into nothingness.
"I'm sorry," she offers, dropping her gaze and her arms to her sides.
"I'm sure you will be, since it has been quite a while since they've bothered to offer enough water with which to wash."
With that, Yinsen turns on his heel and walks away, shaking his head as he goes.
"It took every single fiber of my being not to toss this handful of dirt at him," Tony says, stretching out one large hand to show her.