Re: Tony & Pepper
Tony had not been sure what to expect from Pepper Potts. He had long ago grown so accustomed to her facility on those staggering heels, appreciated the cut of her suits and the fall of her hair so often that it was all part of a largely singular whole of pure presence, the pieces of which no longer separated in his mind. He didn't really know how she would go after a "clothes off ASAP" kind of kiss, if she was the shy kind or the competent kind or the go crazy kind. Somehow her good-natured and yet thoughtless reaction of warmth and sweet was not one of his expectations, and the idea that she might simply relax and wind up against him like a particularly delicious red hot spring hadn't been amongst the potential variables.
He was just musing on more explicit thoughts about how that might carry over once they got to the sans-clothes stage when the strange butterfly pressure in his chest turned into a sharp stab, as if a line of pain was drawn by pencil on the inside of his chest and then followed by a straight razor. Tony was unable to hide a sudden cold intake of breath that wasn't lustful at all, and he immediately broke the kiss, turning his head away from her and stepping back without warning, all contact snapping like dry wood. The movement of his lungs under his chest actually increased the stab of pain, drawing the line out further and somehow deeper. It made him stop breathing until he couldn't not breathe, and then the pain stared up again. It all happened fast, twenty seconds, the imprint of Pepper's lips still on the flat of his mouth.
Tony turned from her again, the protective gesture of his arm coming up over his chest entirely hidden by the fact that it was in a sling, and already against his chest. He knew this feeling, knew what it was, even if panic set in as he tried to imagine what could have caused it. Malfunction, he assumed. Something he'd need to fix. Something bad.
He glanced back, already hastily moving in a complete turn to subconsciously conceal his chest from her. "So... it was fun. I will..." He almost forgot what he was saying in his hurry to get out from under her keen gaze before she realized anything was really wrong, "...Call you." It was the absolute worst thing he could have said, because that was what he always said. The elevator wasn't far, but there were more stretches of pain inside his chest now, varied and flexing with every shallow inhale. He made his shoulders sit back on his spine with incredible difficulty and moved hastily away into the elevator, which slid open and then, all too soon, slid closed again.
The departure had taken no more than a jarring forty or fifty seconds from beginning to end.