Notes: An 'albedo' is basically the measurement of the sun's light as reflected from another object. I'm using it here as an allusion to finding out the true nature of people Emory and Tony used to trust. They see evidence of Rory and Obie's duplicity as reflected by their harmful actions. FINALLY, am I right?
One more thing: stressful situations breed insecurity, but that's rarely permanent! So please don't worry, Emory's just Going Through Some Things.
Chapter Twenty-Two: Albedo
It's one thing to dress in the same clothes as a SHIELD agent pretending to be Tony Stark's Morning Assignation. It's something else to picture herself leaving the helicopter on SHIELD grounds and walking into the building dressed like that! Emory chooses anxiety (asking the pilot if she can change clothes in the back of the helicopter) over mortification (having to do a walk of shame across the Triskelion helipad). She ends up having to use the fishnets as a belt to keep Tony's pants on, but she feels less exposed when she sits back down. Now, she thinks to herself, if only the hollow ache in the pit of my stomach would go away! Emory's sure it'll go away once they land and she's settled, but it almost feels like it feeds off of her anxiety.
"Clint has an extra room," Nat says, giving her phone back. "We'll have to finagle some sightings of you, and we'll have to do the rest of your training there, but Fury said yes."
"It's all settled, just like that?" Emory asks, incredulous.
Natasha sees her expression and shrugs. "Sometimes it's easier to ask forgiveness than permission."
88888888
Voicemail Box, Stark, Anthony E.
2.20 PM
Mr. Stark, the FBI agents are here and I can't find you or Harry. You aren't in the bunker, are you? JARVIS won't answer me, and I'll feel very foolish if I have to explain that as your PA I don't actually know whether you're in your father's bomb shelter or not! Please answer your phone.
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3:10 PM
Tony, if they threaten me with obstruction I'm going to be very upset. The agents are saying they might come back with a warrant, and I know it's a federal crime to lie to the FBI so I had to tell them I'd met Ms. Autumn. Please, PLEASE come out? I know you can get phone calls from inside there!
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10:55 PM
Tony, where are you, it's after ten! You only have enough fresh food in there for a few days! I'm… Wait, is that you on Channel- [dial tone]
88888888
11:03 PM
You're at a NIGHTCLUB! It made the NEWS, Tony! What if the FBI doesn't believe me? What if they think I was covering for you!? Do you know how many messages I left on Harry's phone asking where the two of you were? I thought he was in the bunker with you trying to stop you from drinking yourself half to death! BOTH OF YOU COME HOME RIGHT NOW!
88888888
When Tony returns from partying, he buries himself not in blankets and dreams, but files and memories. Stark Industries needs a new niche that isn't weaponry, but draws on that expertise. Emory is at SHIELD's mercy, and he doesn't have any influence there. Is there something he could do that would solve both problems at once?
Some intrepid assistant in the late 80's had digitized Howard Stark's paper files, but they're all mixed together, probably on purpose. He decides to track down the schematics he'd been so dazzled by when he was six and about to be sent away to boarding school; Tony had spent three glorious days digging through a couple of metal briefcases that had been accidentally left in his bedroom instead of the storage study one room over. At the time, Tony had been convinced they were for a secret government thing his dad was doing, and that was why they were sending him away to school. For his protection.
School had stripped away that sense of wonder, and eventually his father's cold demeanor taught Tony to keep his questions to himself. Uncovering those memories is an uncomfortable process best done with the veneer of inebriation, but the physical effects mean he's not very efficient. By dawn, the files are still elusive, and the issues that made him want to go drinking in the first place won't go away.
He decides to sleep on it.
Tony's phone rings as he's carrying the bunker pillows and Emory's left-behind shirt up to his bedroom. His first instinct when he sees the name on the display is to be glad it's not the FBI. His second instinct is to wonder if Coulson has learned how to manipulate people from the same place Agent Romanoff did. The man has to know that Tony was out till 3 AM. The agent probably expects to leave a message with a set of instructions he'll expect to be followed without push-back, or Coulson's hoping to manipulate him while he's sleep-deprived and hung over.
As a result, Tony's barely civil when he answers.
"You better be about to improve my mood, Doctor No."
"Good morning. I have been asked to take over from Director Fury as your primary contact."
"Wow," Tony says. "Tell Boris he was almost the father figure I already had, will you?" Tony needs to yawn, but he holds it back.
"I'm pretty sure that's exactly the sort of message I was assigned to prevent," Coulson says. The man's deadpan delivery doesn't change a whit. "Something's come past my desk that I think you can help me clear up: is it true that you snuck out from under your PA's nose yesterday afternoon to avoid a scheduled FBI interview?"
The rush of relief Tony feels is probably premature, but Coulson is handing him a resolution on a silver platter right now. "Pepper told on me? Look, I deal with a lot of acronyms. I'm pretty sure I'd have remembered if I was supposed to be at a meeting with the CIA." He pauses for dramatic effect, then adds, "Not that I wouldn't have still snuck out. Everybody hates those guys."
"Are you asking me to smooth this over for you, Mr. Stark?"
"Is it illegal for me to say yes?" Tony shoots back. "Because if we're in the plot of Entrapment, I want my money back unless there will be red lasers and hot women in skin-tight black leotards."
He can't help but picture Emory in the iconic outfit, and Tony tightens his hand around the spy shirt she'd left behind. The message he'd gotten from Natasha Romanoff at midnight had been promising, but sharing an apartment with another agent could be worse in the long run. The freedom Emory will gain will be tempered by the possibility of off-hours propaganda and persuasion.
"Sir?"
Oops. Coulson had been talking. Tony gives in to the yawn, making it as loud and obnoxious as possible.
"I was busy picturing that. Go on?"
"I was just saying, if we wanted to trap you, sir? We'd be more subtle. Speaking of which, any word on how long you'll be staying in New York? I'd love to know if I'll need to rent something long-term," Coulson says, still as studiously polite as always, but now with a tiny edge to his tone, sharp as a razorblade.
"I'll be sticking around for as long as your archer plays house with my girlfriend, Phil."
Tony doesn't want to like this guy, mostly because it feels like there are two kinds of people in Phil Coulson's world: the people he's manipulating into liking him, and the people he's screwing over very courteously. Tony's been trying to manipulate the man right back, but it's a delicate balance. Right before he'd left for New York, Tony had found a rare part for the guy's beloved classic car and had it delivered by courier. That had been the carrot, and now, he supposes, comes the stick.
Coulson's extolling the virtues of a particular apartment building he's got an eye on when Tony interrupts. "Say, since you're so good at passing notes, can you ask your boss if he can give me a call? I've got a business opportunity for him."
There's a moment of silence before Coulson wryly asks, "Should I address this message to 'Boris?' Or Director Fury?"
It's a shrewd question, and Tony's too fucking tired to play his usual hard to get. "Go with his official name this time, will you, Junior? Blame the lapse on sleep deprivation. And don't ever call me this early again, or I'll clone your voice with my AI and start releasing shit about Area 51 framing you as the source."
"Point taken, sir. Sleep well."
Tony turns the phone off completely. "Yeah, I wish," he says to no one. Thankfully, his head barely hits the pillow that smells faintly of Emory's hair before he feels oblivion reaching out for him.
88888888
Emory wakes up in an actual bedroom.
Not a secure office dressed as one. Not a fancy hotel that reeks of opulent impermanence. Not a barely habitable cave with a truly embarrassing method of relieving oneself. A bedroom. The room Clint had given her even has a lock.
She'd spent so little time at her apartment while working as Rory's PA that her last 'home bedroom' was pre-Rory, the room in her dad's house. That memory is tainted by the conflict between herself and her parents about Rory's influence, though. The time she got to spend at Tony's mansion hadn't felt like home either. It had passed almost like a daydream, a stolen few hours that, true to form, had ended with her being sent back to reality. When she was with him, Emory had felt like maybe she could belong there, but now, back in the real world, it's hard not to feel foolish.
Rolling over, she buries her face in Tony's shirt as she had so often the night before, picturing him across the room about to climb back into bed with her. It's hard not to wonder how many women have done the same. Most of them were probably tall, glamorous, and rich, better suited to his world than she ever could be. Her rational mind is trying to tell her that Tony Stark is new to the hero business, and she was just a convenient damsel in distress. Her heart's response is to remember the desperate catch in his voice as he screamed in the desert, angry at her for maybe dying and forcing the words 'I love you' from his throat.
Her instinct is to do what she's always done: endure. This time, though, Emory wants to fight for what she wants, as terrifying as it is, as new as that is. She wants to live. She wants to love. How did everything suddenly become so hard?
Groaning, Emory gets up and makes the bed, tucking Tony's clothes under the pillow like she's burying a secret. As she has for the last few weeks, she also buries her instinct to go with the flow, to not make waves, to hide, safe and invisible. It's too late for that. Tony- or Natasha Romanoff -would find her. And if they didn't, well, thanks to the serum, she basically has an expiration date. The effects of her dependency are going to start manifesting themselves soon.
She dresses and slips on the fuzzy slippers Clint had lent her, unlocks her door, and starts up the hallway toward the kitchen. On the way, she sees that his bedroom door is open, revealing a loft bed with a desk underneath, just like a college dorm. Most of the room is taken up by what looks like a built-in climbing wall that curves up onto the ceiling, anchored with some seriously thick cables.
"I'd offer to let you try it out, but I don't actually have a rig, just pads for underneath. Not great for newbies," Clint says from the other side of the hallway. He's sipping from a mug, which he holds up. "I remember you usually avoided the SHIELD coffee. I approve. Want some of the good stuff, or did your cave detox put you in a good place?"
"Give?" Emory says, walking toward him like a mummy. She'd warmed to Barton during her training sessions, and he's even more likeable here in his own home, relaxed and welcoming. The contrast between the way he's treating her after knowing her for a month and the way Rory's treated her for the past nine years is stark, no pun intended.
"Right, what am I talking about? This is probably crap compared to your- To Stark's," Clint says, stumbling over the right way to refer to Tony. Emory can't blame him. Technically, she's not supposed to be Stark's anything.
A stubborn kernel of hope blazes in her chest, as she says, "Honestly, after three solid months of bean soup for every meal, coffee is coffee," and follows him into the kitchen. There's a towel with one of those crochet button clasps hanging from the stove handle.
"Well, in that case, you're just going from one bean soup to another."
Emory takes his proffered cup and watches him walk over to clean the machine he'd made it with, real barista-level equipment. He shoots a look over his shoulder to catch her first sip. It's delicious.
"Agent Barton, this is some high class bean soup. Thank you."
"I made a promise that I would indulge myself every day. This is what I picked," Clint says.
"You mean your overhanging death wall wasn't it?" she asks, walking over to rest her hip on the kitchen island and watch him.
He chuckles. "No."
"Thank you, truly," she tells him after a few more (indulgent is definitely the word) sips. "I didn't know how on Earth I was going to balance my association with Tony and my obligations to the mission. Staying here is the perfect compromise."
"Glad to help," Clint says gruffly, focused on wiping off the counter. "That can be a delicate thing. Worth it, though, if he is."
Emory blows out a long sigh, staring at her feet. "Looking at it from the other way around, I sure hope it is." Across the room, she hears him let out a similar noise and looks over, curious. Clint looks sheepish.
"I wasn't supposed to mention him in case it got you charged up. Sorry about that."
"Hah, so my self-doubt saved your apartment? Does that cancel out the whole dive-bomb rescue thing on the day we met?"
"Let's not get too hasty," he teases, jumping his eyebrows at her. A second later, he shifts into 'agent' mode. "We need to make a 'game plan.' The goal is for you to take a walk and get sighted. The building itself is secure; unofficially mostly government workers and domestic violence survivors live here, but there's an unspoken agreement with the local media about that." His smile is full of promise; whether it's for her protection or for a journalist's destruction if they choose to overstep is unclear.
"Guardians and survivors, convenient," Emory murmurs.
"Exactly." He pulls his phone from his pocket and starts tapping at it as he speaks. "Nat wants you to get groceries today, a courier will drop off a bank card. Says here yours was-" Clint frowns, squinting at the phone in his hand. As he reads, his jaw firms up into a hard frown. "Your account was closed ten days after the initial attack in Afghanistan. By Rory Fall. She showed them Power of Attorney papers."
Shock and dismay lock up her muscles and she sways a little. Clint reaches out and grabs her upper arm to steady her. His grip isn't meant to hurt, she can tell, but right now, everything is heightened, so the skin under his hands burns.
"Look at me," he says. She does, still reeling, both surprised and (horribly) not surprised. "You okay?"
"I've watched her turn on people for years, I just never thought-" Emory shakes her head. Her tear ducts grind to a halt with the dry pain of understanding just how much she's lost, how different her life is. Tears are premium content now, and she's just a regular person.
"Did you make her your POA?"
She shakes her head again. "My parents sent me the paperwork for one. It was their last-ditch effort to- To, crap, to prevent this, to stop Rory from trying to screw me over if we had a falling out. I didn't sign them, but I didn't get rid of them either." Rory must have gone through her things and falsified the documents with her own name instead of Emory's parents'. After all, everything in Rory Fall's life was about Rory Fall. In Rory's mind, Emory's salary was 'her money in the first place,' after she'd been deserted during the most traumatic moment of her life.
Fuck, Emory thinks to herself. Her own 'most traumatic' train is heading downhill, adding events as it goes, but she's still rationalizing, still working to understand Rory's actions. If only her former friend's loyalty had run that deep!
Clint guides her toward his small couch, snagging her coffee cup on the way. "So they're forged?" He sits her down and hands over the mug.
"I would never have given her Power of Attorney over me. In Rory's twisted mind, she probably thinks it's her money if I'm not there to spend it, but-"
He walks away from her abruptly. "No excuses."
She'd been trying to explain Rory's thought process, but the marksman's curt comment hits home.
Emory changes tack. "At least this works out perfectly for SHIELD! It proves I have no money," she says, taking gulping sips of her cooled coffee. He doesn't answer, his head stuck in the fridge, shuffling things around. "What are you doing? Do you have some kind of crazy 'dormant when refrigerated' weapon in there?"
"I'm making a grocery list. One thing at a time."
"That works," she says, sitting back on the couch. As she lifts the mug to drain the last sip, Emory notices the design. It says, 'Fix It Yourself.' The O in 'yourself' is a bullseye, and the sideways word 'it' is made up of several arrows.
The only way to do that involves crossing half the globe and lying to the person who holds her life in the palm of their hand. Emory turns the cup so the words face away, but she knows she'll have to follow its advice anyway.
88888888
The first thing Tony does when he finally wakes up is check on the status of the palladium shipment he appropriated from SI's factory. The weapons ordered prior to Tony's cut-off date of mid-July have been constructed and much of the raw material deliveries have been paused. During their discussions in the limo on the way to New York, Emory had suggested that the company offer a two or three week paid vacation for the factory employees whose jobs are in question. He'd set the thought aside in favor of spending time with her, but now Tony dials up Stane's number to put that in motion.
"Hey, Tony. I see you were finally back to your old self last night!" Obie says, in greeting.
"Yeah, well, keeping up appearances," Tony says. A knot forms in his gut, similar to what Emory had described when dealing with Rory. He's not a fan. "Hey, you still planning to come out this direction next week?"
"Yeah, I have some loose ends to tie up. Why? Did you need something? If you've got some new projects I'd be happy to tell the boar-"
"Still percolating in there," Tony interrupts. "I was looking to get ahold of the palladium we won't be needing. Instead of cancelling it I figured I'd just take the regular shipment. It's just less hassle if you bring it."
There's a sigh on the line. "Tony, I don't think we have any extra right now. Did you order more on top of the standard delivery for the factory?"
"We're not using it at the factory."
"Tony, production doesn't just halt overnight, we-"
"I was very clear about the deadlines," Tony says, standing up to pace. The knot has turned into a lead weight. "We've satisfied our obligations up to the middle of July, which is why I was about to ask you to give the whole factory staff a two week paid vacation while we shift the production lines over to something more benign." He can hear frantic typing on Stane's end. "You didn't halt the lines, did you?"
"Tony-"
"Did you?"
"I thought you were going to change your mind! It's not sound business practice to interrupt production at this kind of scale on a whim!"
He's having trouble swallowing, but it's not because of the anxiety, it's because of anger. "Shut it down. All of it. By the end of this week, or I'll fly out there and give the maintenance guys something to do after I fire a couple of repulsors at every piece of equipment!" Tony slams his hand down on a worktable, knowing Obie will hear the sound through the phone line. "Come on! You knew I wasn't going to budge on this!"
"I needed to know you were serious, and now I know you're serious," Stane says, a hint of the 'make it right' businessman tone returning to his voice. "Tell you what: let me boost the palladium order for this next week so there's enough for both. We'll extend production 'till the end of July, make it a nice round number, give these workers some warning, okay? August is a better vacation month anyway. First of August they'll get two weeks paid vacation, everyone but security."
Tony's jaw is so tightly clenched he can't respond right away.
"Tony? Hey, I know you're passionate about this stuff but we're still a business. A month is a much better time frame to develop a new plan. You know I'm right."
"Do it, then," Tony grits out.
"Good man," Obie says in the fatherly tone Tony's come to despise. "I'll bring the palladium in a week. When I get there, you'll give me some kind of an idea of what we're transitioning to, and the two of us will get the company back on solid ground. See you then."
Stane hangs up without a response.
"JARVIS, was there ever a slow-down in production?" Tony asks, the second he sets his phone down.
"All I can find is an internal memo informing workers that there may be a temporary halt sometime in July."
"Right."
Tony throws himself in his chair, the momentum carrying it away from his desk, which is just as well. He needs to calm down before he makes any of this worse. He briefly considers going upstairs and getting Emory's shirt, since it smells like her, but that reminds him too much of what he'd done at seventeen. He'd had the housekeeping staff pack up his dad's clothes and general belongings to put them in storage right away, but kept his mothers things where they were for months. He'd yo-yo between extremes, partying it up and pretending he didn't care, then curling up on his mother's side of the bed hugging one of her dresses, sobbing.
With a sigh, Tony recognizes that this comparison is toxic; Emory is alive and his, a partner who needs Tony's actions, not his sentimentality. He resolves to work on his secret project for her this evening, as soon as he gets a few things out of the way.
"All right," he says aloud, walking the chair back to his desk without getting up, Flintstones-style. "Do we have the capability to store palladium at our New York office? There are still research labs there, right JARVIS?"
"Indeed there are."
"Order some under the name of the most senior employee with a note that they're to contact me and only me upon receipt, but be diplomatic. I don't want to signal a rift."
"Are you certain they'll believe it was from you, sir?"
"Funny," Tony says. "Next item: I'd like to use Stane's Opposition Strategy on SHIELD, with some modifications. Copy over all related files and analyze them for anything that might get Nick Fury's panties in a bunch if I implement it."
"Estimate ten minutes for full copy, twenty more for analysis. Do you wish me to erase evidence of the copy?"
"Good catch, make it so."
He gets up to make a smoothie, patting Dum-E on the way over. It had been JARVIS who'd suggested bringing his 'pets,' another point in the AI's column of knowing Tony better than he knew himself, sometimes. As the blender spun, Tony thought over what he knew about Stane's Oppo strategy. JARVIS will be more thorough, but there's only so much intuition one can program in. Tony knows he probably relies too much on intuition, but something about SHIELD feels off, and before he throws in his lot with the agency, he wants to know why. It's no different than when they run the program on a company they hope to buy out.
The key part of the Strategy is analysis. That's what Tony wants to use on SHIELD, despite the fact that the data set will be incomplete, given how secret most of their operations are. What he's hoping for is a glimpse into the vulnerabilities of the agency, as evidenced by what the deep dive comparisons that the Opposition Strategy might reveal. That thought prompts another one.
"Hey, J? Do a quick scan through the Not Nows and Not Yets, in projects. I want to know whether anyone's done some poking around in the past two weeks." The blender stops, and Tony adds, "Hell, add the current ones too, note any unusual access."
After a minute, JARVIS says, "Two files show anomalous access, both by Mr. Stane after hours, approximately eight days ago."
The knot is back. "Hit me."
"Multiple copies of the Repulsor technology details and schematics in various places, some encrypted. Single copy of the Sonic Taser, encrypted. Access was from his private residence."
"Obie, Obie, what are you doing?" Tony says, brows furrowed. "Didn't the government threaten us with new legislation if we didn't completely scrap and bury that Taser?"
"Colonel Rhodes likened pursuing the project further to 'peeing on the third rail in public, within a mile of an elementary school,' yes, sir."
"He's just jealous he didn't get a working 'Get Out of Indecent Exposure Charges Free' card from MIT security," Tony laughs. "God bless gender quota hiring." A second later, he freezes in the act of taking a sip of his smoothie. "Son of a bitch. Obie didn't destroy the prototype, did he?"
"Ascertaining that will be difficult, and likely will require physical interviews, which may create more trouble than you may wish to- wait, what am I saying?"
"You're saying trouble is my middle name, JARVIS. Usually you'd be right, but this time I'd like to avoid the consequences if at all-" Tony gulps down the rest of the smoothie over the word 'possible' and sets the cup down for his robot to clean. He points at Dum-E. "If that breaks, I'll let a group of toddlers glue the pieces all over you, wherever they want." He gestures broadly as he back-walks to the desk.
"Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but parents generally avoid letting their small children anywhere near broken glass," JARVIS points out.
"Well, that's boring," Tony observes. "What was I saying?"
"Ironically, you were discussing your desire to avoid consequences."
"Personally, yes. I'll reserve judgement on Stane, though. I want to know what he's up to, first."
He sits down at the desk and thinks about the Sonic Taser. Its function is really limited outside of law enforcement and military use, though he had joked about using it to make the board sit still and listen to him. The thing is inherently antagonistic; the only way to avoid total, temporary incapacitation is to already be wearing earplugs before the device is activated.
"Do they make undetectable earplugs?" he muses aloud. He takes threats to his autonomy very seriously, unless they're hot, wearing spandex, and digging a knee into his lower back.
"You have asked that question a total of three times since my creation, and the answer has been 'no' for two of those times," JARVIS states dryly.
"That's a yes now, then? Order me a pair." Murphy's Law states that if he's prepared for a threat, it'll never materialize, but something about Obie's demeanor lately feels vaguely threatening. He wouldn't put it past the guy to use the Taser to force Tony to listen to him. After Afghanistan, Tony's through being forced to do anything. At that thought, a collage of images cross his mind's eye, all of Emory, and he has to amend his previous assertion to 'almost' anything.
"Analysis complete," JARVIS says, filling Tony's screen with various windows of information. "Advise not exercising official channels to request mission data from the military, but speaking to Colonel Rhodes, instead. Strongly suggest not revealing any knowledge of statistical data when speaking to Agent Coulson or Director Fury. Further conclusions will require an examination of the program results." JARVIS pauses, then adds, "In summary, I predict a high chance of panty bunching. Proceed with caution."
Tony cracks a smile despite himself. "Will do. Run the program, I'll call Rhodes."