Spencer knew something was happening with Tony, although the playboy billionaire seemed to deny anything was wrong. Spencer and Steve had been living with Tony for more than a month and although California had a lot of cool adventures for both Pikachu and Captain America—nothing could stop the feeling of home-sickness they were beginning to get. Disneyland had been a blast and Spencer knew that trip would be something she would think back to when she was on her deathbed.
Getting back to the ever stubborn Tony, Spencer was watching the playboy while he injected himself with forty-eight injections for a new project thingy he was doing. Spencer honestly didn't look very thrilled by the idea of Tony self-injecting himself but Tony brushed Pikachu's worries to the side.
"Sir, please may I request just a few hours to calibrate…" Jarvis was cut off by Tony growling as he injected himself yet again.
"No," Tony remarked, "Forty-eight."
Spencer winced as Cooper whined at her side. She cooed at her beast, "Don't worry, Cop, he's just a big dummy."
Tony glared at her, "Do I need to kick you out?" He demanded.
Spencer rolled her baby blue eyes and flatly stated, "No, besides I want to see how badly this could go wrong." She grinned widely, loving the idea of something going wrong and potentially pissing Tony off—a mad Tony was a funny Tony.
Tony turned back to his arm and set down the needle with his weird injections, "Micro-repeater implanting sequence complete." He wiped up and down his arm with an alcohol wipe.
Jarvis spoke right after, "As you wish, sir. I've also prepared a safety briefing for you to entirely to ignore." Spencer snickered and Tony casted her a dry glare.
"Which I will," Tony replied nonchalantly, "Right, let's do this." Tony locked his gaze onto poor Dum-E which Spencer kindly renamed Joe, "Dum-E, hi Dum-E. How did you get that cap on your head? You earned it." Tony gets up and walks towards Dum-E/Joe.
"His name is Joe." Spencer reminded patiently.
"His real name is Dum-E." Tony remarked.
"This is abuse." Spencer grumbled.
"Hey, hey, what are you doing out of the corner?" Tony asked the poor robot who was just trying to sweep. Joe/Dum-E gave off a few soft beeps as it swept, "You know what you did. There's blood on my mat, clean it up." Tony ordered the robot.
Dum-E gave a soft beep in reply.
Tony began walking towards the middle of his work room and in front of his main Iron Man Suits that were encased in glass, "Sir, may I remind you that you've been awake for nearly seventy-two hours." Jarvis spoke up politely.
"Trust me, Jarvis; I've been reminding him for three days. I don't think he cares." Spencer replied shooting the playboy a glare. "Tony, you seriously need to sleep."
Tony, like always, pointedly ignores both Jarvis and Spencer. The young assassin sighed but moved up a bit closer to see the show. She made sure to keep herself and Cooper a safe distance and out of the danger zone. "Focus up, ladies. Good evening, and welcome to the birthing suit," Tony addressed the room and the robot holding a camera and waiting to record, "I am pleased to announce the imminent arrival of your bouncing, bad-ass baby brother."
Spencer rolled her eyes and wished she would have slept in like what Steve was doing right now. Tony turns to the robot with the camera, "Start tight and go wide, stamp in the time." He orders before facing the few tables with parts for his Iron Man suit, "Mark 42 autonomous prehensile propulsion suit test. Initialize sequence." Tony raises his arms and hand into the motion to activate the new suit.
He pauses and turns to Spencer, "Drop the needle, Pikachu."
Spencer sighs and walks over to where vinyl record player was and dropped the needle. Instantly, stupid Christmas music begins to play. Tony moves with the music and dances very poorly. Spencer couldn't help but to laugh, "You should be a stripper, Tony!" Spencer snorts.
Tony grins before making the gesture he made earlier towards one of the tables with Iron Man body parts. Spencer tried not to snicker as nothing moved. Tony shot her a glare, "Do I need to remove you? Because I will." He threatens.
Spencer held up her hands with a sly smirk, "Sorry, I'll be quiet."
Tony sighed and whacked the arm that had the injections before turning to another table and repeating the motion once more. One of the parts begins to whirl and lift from the table much to Spencer's barely concealed disappointment. The part flies towards Tony and attaches itself to his hand and extends to his arm and shoulder. Tony smirks into Spencer's direction.
Spencer rolls her eyes.
Tony repeats the motion again towards another table and the part repeats the same process as the other—it attaches to his hand and extends up his arm and shoulder. Tony laughs at his success but Spencer just had a sneaky feeling that something, like always, would go wrong.
Spencer watched as Tony shook his backside at her in a taunting manner before telling Jarvis, "Alright, I think we got this. Send 'em all." In mere seconds, another part flies over and attaches itself to Tony's leg, then as another part flies over it crashes into one of the Iron Man suit glass cages, then another part hurls itself at Tony and Tony deflects it with his arm making it crash into some hanging light and crashing into the ground.
Spencer laughed as Tony looked flustered, "Probably a little fast, right Spencer? Slow it down, just slow it down, just a…" Tony abruptly cuts off as suddenly another part of the suit shoots over and Tony ducks as it narrowly misses hitting him in the head.
Spencer just couldn't help but to laugh.
The other, remaining parts fly over and attach themselves with force to Tony's back and crotch area. He was being pushed and pulled like a rag-doll and when the crotch part hit him with vigor—Spencer was clutching her stomach and laughing hysterically. Tony groans and is almost thrown forward by another part but uses the jets in his hands to pull himself upright again, "Cool it, will you, Jarvis?" Tony asks in a strained voice.
Tony shot Spencer a glare, "Pikachu, this is not funny—"Then all the other parts shoot over and get attached to Tony, except for the final face piece, which swings right past Tony narrowly missing him, and crashes into the small table where the vinyl record was on. The music abruptly stops. The face piece hovers and faces Tony in a mocking manner.
Tony snorts, "Come on, I ain't scared of you." Tony states. The face piece flies over but manages to nick the end of one of the tables and ends up flipping upside down and Tony flips over to grab the piece and finally the Iron Man suit is fully attached to Tony.
Spencer was still snickering.
Tony sighed, "I'm the best." He tells himself.
But Spencer can see the last piece still struggling to get out of the glass to one of his suits. At that moment, one of the stray pieces of the suit shoot over to Tony, knocks him down, which in turn shatter the rest of the suit except for the head piece. Tony is groaning and rolling on the floor as Spencer begins laughing.
"As always, sir, a great pleasure watching you work." Jarvis suddenly says.
The whole commotion brought a sleepy Steve down to Tony's work room. Steve was dressed in his PJ's bottoms and an Invader Zim shirt. His ashy blonde hair was in total disarray. "What's all this noise I keep hearing?" Steve mumbled sleepily.
Spencer just kept laughing and Tony was mumbling profanities under his breath.
Later on, after Tony stopped sulking, the three were gathered in the main living room of the house watching TV. Spencer had finished cooking and was handing out the food when suddenly the show they were watching was replaced with something else. He called himself The Mandarin which was a pretty dumb name, Spencer thought.
He was an international terrorist. He took claim over an attack in the Middle-East and threatened the President with images of a dummy being burned on a stake. "You'll never see me coming." Those few words echoed in Spencer's mind.
She exchanged uneasy glances with her friends—Tony looking disturbed and Steve frowning with unease. "I'm going to call Nick and see if he has anything on this fucker." Spencer stormed off to Tony's office and dialed Nick on her phone.
Tony and Steve looked at each other, "What do we do about this guy?" Steve questioned.
Tony sighed looking like he had the weight of the world on his shoulders, "No idea yet. Give it a day or two before we start getting calls from the Government." Tony muttered.
Nick had nothing.
"What do you mean? He literally hijacked the airwaves and not even Shield can pinpoint his location?" Spencer asked sounding shocked.
Nick dragged out a sigh, "We're working on it, Spencer. Just stay put until I or your father tell you otherwise. Keep your eyes peeled for anything suspicious and try not to go out so much." Nick told her before saying his goodbye since he had a meeting with the President to address this new threat.
It was a few days later.
Spencer and Steve were having lunch with Tony and James Rhodes. It was in a cool bar somewhere near the ocean—where Spencer couldn't be too sure. California was incredibly confusing to her and Steve.
The four were put into a corner away from the people gawking and taking pictures of them—mostly Steven and Tony since they were the most famous super-heroes. Spencer didn't mind and munched away happily on her fries—Cooper was at her feet enjoying a nice nap. She would occasionally drop some of her fries on the floor in front of Cooper.
"The Iron Patriot sounds cool." Spencer mumbled as Tony mocked it.
"It tested well with focus groups, all right?" James told Tony who had a scowl on his face about the lame new name for his suit.
"I am Iron Patriot!" Tony mocked in a gruff voice before muttering, "It sucks." Tony complained like a child.
"I think it sounds cool." Spencer gave her input before nudging Steve who was stuffing his face with this really good-looking burger, "What do you think, Steve?"
The ever-attractive Steve looks up at the other three—Tony looking disgusted, James looking impressed by the amount of burger Steve could shove into his mouth, and Spencer looked amused.
Steve swallowed the food in his mouth and cleared his throat, "I like it."
Tony groaned while James and Spencer cheered, "He's old, don't listen to him—" Tony dismissed Steve and Steve just rolled his eyes at the playboy.
Spencer chuckled, "Tony's just mad that they renamed his lame suit."
Tony shot her glare but took off his sunglasses as he sighed, "So, what's really going on?" Tony questioned James with a bit more secretive tone, "With the Mandarin." Spencer and Steve perked up at the sound of the international terrorist threatening the country.
James sipped on his Diet Coke and remained quiet.
Tony huffed, "Seriously, can we talk about this guy?" Tony said in a firmer voice and grim expression on his face. James looked unsure and casted a quick glance around the bar before turning to Tony, "It is classified information, Tony."
Tony just lightly scoffed.
"Okay, there have been nine bombings." James muttered lowly.
Spencer and Steve look at each other with shock, "Nine?" Spencer whispered out-raged, "We were only aware that there was three." Nick had neglected to tell her this information…again. Spencer felt frustrated now. Why was everyone playing hush hush now?
"But," James started and Spencer tuned him back into focus, "here's the thing, nobody can ID a device." Spencer furrowed her eyebrows in confusion, "There's no bomb casings."
"How is that even possible?" Steve questioned looking disturbed.
"You know I can help, just ask." Tony reminded him before shooting out why he could help, "I got a ton of new tech. I got prehensile suit," He stammers a few times before continuing, "I got a bomb disposal. It catches explosions mid-air." He looked almost half-crazed from how sleep-deprived he was.
Spencer shook her head and sighed. James took notice of the bags under Tony's eyes and how rough he looked, "When's the last time you got a good night's sleep?" He questioned his old friend with evident worry.
Tony smartly brushed James off with, "Einstein slept three hours a year and look what he did."
Steve and Spencer gave each other bemused looks. Tony hadn't been sleeping since Spencer and Steve arrived from New York and no matter how hard Pikachu and Cap tried to lure Tony into sleeping, Tony just couldn't sleep…not with the constant nightmares that plagued him.
James started shaking his head catching the expressions on Steve and Spencer's faces, "We're worried about you, Tony."
"What is this?" Tony looked almost upset now, "This is an intervention or something?" He demanded glancing at his three friends.
"Tony…" Spencer sighed softly.
"We're just worried about you, man." Steve tried.
"We're not trying to be dick…" All attention shifted onto the two kids coming up the table—an older girl and a younger boy. "tators." James awkwardly finishes.
"Do you mind signing my drawing?" The girl asks Tony with a sweet smile.
The little boy remains staring at Spencer with a slight blush on his cheeks—he holds a drawing too but is gripping it tightly.
"Whatcha got there, cutie?" Spencer gave the young boy a cute smile.
The boy blushes a bit more but offers his drawing to her, "I made it for you." He mumbles.
"I loved you in A Christmas Story, by the way." Tony dumbly tells the young boy.
Spencer smacked Tony as he signed the girl, Erin's, drawing. Spencer beckoned the boy to come to her side and he shyly did so. James kept talking not afraid of the kids hearing, "Listen, the Pentagon is afraid."
"Wow, is that you?" Spencer whispered in awe at the drawing he drew for her. She was on her hover-board fighting aliens and he was right beside her.
He nods, "Everyone likes Iron Man or Hulk or Captain American but I liked you the most." He says the last part in a cute whisper. Spencer's heart melts at this adorable boy. She gives him a side hug thanking him.
James keeps whispering to the table but Spencer is too busy gloating her fan drawing to Steve. Steve just rolls his eyes at her antics. She is about to make a drawing of her own for the boy when she heard the sound of a crayon breaking. The hushed conversation between James and Tony was now silent.
Spencer looked up to see what had happened. Tony had broken the crayon he was using to sign Erin's drawing but instead of a signature, there was a message saying, "Erin, help me!" Spencer would've laughed at that had it not been the sharp intake of breath coming from Tony.
He had his face covered with his hand looking suddenly very stressed and upset about breaking the crayon. "Are you okay?" James asks worriedly throwing a quick glance around the room.
"Tony?" Spencer spoke softly with a frown.
"I broke the crayon." Tony says but it is muffled by his hand.
"Are you okay, Mr. Stark?" Erin quietly asks with wide, big eyes.
Tony drops his hand as James pats him on the back asking him to calm down. Tony's eyes grow huge and his face turns almost pale. Spencer could hear the erratic beating of his heart and wonder briefly if he was having some sort of attack.
"Tony, hey, talk to us." Spencer reaches out to touch his hand but he jerks away and pushes himself away from the table causing other diners to look towards the table. "Tony!" Spencer is shocked as he quickly stumbles away with his hand clutching his chest and gasping strangely.
"What the fu—" Spencer caught her words seeing as Erin and the cute boy who drew her a picture were looking quite frightened. James and Steve are rushing after Tony and Spencer reassures the two children that Mr. Stark is fine before grabbing her drawing and running after her friends with Cooper at her heels.
When she reaches the front of the bar, a lot of people were watching James and Steve speaking quietly to Tony who was hunched over in his suit. James was beginning to feel cautious of the crowd surrounding them—all curious as to what was going on.
"Tony?" Spencer grabs at his robotic arm before he could fly off.
Tony halts and glances at her, "I have to go." He says in a strained voice.
She quietly stares at him before letting him go, "You have some explaining to do." She says sternly knowing what must have happened—very little escaped Spencer.
Tony zips off in his suit leaving the crowd to gasp with awe.
The three friends stare after the Iron Man with worry. James sighs and glances at Steve and Spencer, "Need a ride back home?" He asks politely.
Spencer shakes her head, "Thanks, Colonel but we have our ride." Spencer jerked her thumb towards the motorcycle that Steve and she had stolen from Shield HQ, "We'll update you on Tony later when we get home." She gives the man a soft smile.
James gives a slight nod but still looks worried. They bid their goodbyes and James walks back into the bar to pay for their food—even though Steve and Spencer had offered to pay. Steve and Spencer buckle Cooper into the side-car that Tony made specifically for the canine before Spencer and Steve hopped onto the motorcycle and made the ride home.
Spencer couldn't ignore the uneasy feeling in her tummy as she looked out towards the ocean. Something bad was coming their way…she just knew it.
"Wanna stop by the store and get some Christmas decorations?" Spencer asked as Steve pulled up to a red light.
"I forgot Christmas was right around the corner." Steve mused quietly.
"What do you say Cooper?" Spencer asked her pup as she ruffled his head.
He gave a few barks and offered her a goofy look.
Spencer smiled.