Pidge Gunderson always makes the (mutinouscomment) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2019-09-25 21:27:00 |
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Entry tags: | pidge gunderson, tony stark (iron man) |
Who: Pidge Gunderson and Tony Stark
What: Showing Pidge proof
When: Before the dragon smushed Stark Tower a few months ago
Where: Stark Tower
Rating/Warnings: None really that I can think of. Well I mean Tony is shirtless for a while so that.
Status: Complete when posted
The trip to see Tony’s collection of ‘proof that Orange County was, in fact, really strange’ had been rescheduled several times due to this or that issue. But finally, Tony had some real proof. Proof he could hold in his hand, because… well, he had no other choice. It was literally attached to his body, and he had no other choice but to carry it around with him.
If he hadn’t dreamed far enough to know that the battery wasn’t a permanent solution, he might have thought about crafting up some kind of carrying case for the thing, like an elaborate fanny pouch. But for the moment, he was A-Okay with the concept of simply carting the thing around. Maybe because he was still amused by the looks he got.
It was really the only funny thing about all this, but he clung to that like a life raft.
He was waiting for Pidge in the lobby, and he held up the battery as she came through the front door. “Hey there, kid. Check out my shiny battery.”
***
Pidge had changed buses a couple of times, and ridden past the stop a couple of times because they’d been lost in their phone playing a game but they were there now. Walking through the door of Stark Tower and stopping for a moment to look around and then laugh at Tony’s greeting. “What have you been doing? Polishing it?” Pidge couldn’t help but ask because the battery did seem to be shining somehow. “Where’s the other part?” Okay maybe it was a little rude but it wasn’t as if Tony didn’t know that Pidge was blunt.
***
"Which other part? The part attached to my chest?" Tony asked, glancing down at the wire from the battery that was currently running up his sleeve and under his shirt. The battery was definitely shinier than it had been, since Tony had changed it out for a new one. That had been an extremely intense thirty seconds that he hoped he'd only have to repeat once more. When he installed the new arc reactor.
Assuming it ever showed up.
***
“Yeah. Right now all you’ve proven to me is that for some reason you’re carrying around a car battery.” Pidge said, following the wires that they could see. There could be something they were attached to that was true. But it could also be that Tony just had the wires running up there attached to clothing. Not that Pidge actually thought Tony was lying to them but proof before believing anything anyone said. That was the attitude Pidge had adopted toward the military and what had really happened with that expedition. Why not use it for other things?
***
Tony raised both of his eyebrows at Pidge, but he honestly didn't know why he was so surprised. Pidge had always been the type to take what was going on in Orange County with the largest grain of salt, and that was probably a healthier way to approach life than his was.
He shrugged one of his shoulders and motioned towards the elevators. "Alright, come on. I'm not about to take this shirt off in front of like... god and everyone. I'm supposed to be in charge here or something."
Without waiting to see if Pidge was following, Tony started heading towards the elevator that was off in its own area. It had a very large sign on it that stated it was for Tony's private use. "All aboard."
***
Pidge followed Tony towards the elevator marked just for his use, taking in everything they could see as they walked past, eyes widening at some of the technology and fingers practically twitching with desire to poke around some of it. But that would have to wait for later.
“What no company beach trips?” Pidge asked, leaning back against the elevator wall and eyeing the man.
***
"We call those 'retreats', and they usually happen for... just about everyone else. I actually get my best work done when no one's in the building." Which was why a lot of the time, Tony was up late at night. He figured if he ever lived with someone else that would annoy the hell out of them. Surprisingly, Kitty had been okay with it for the brief time they'd been stuck together.
The elevator brought them smoothly and quietly up to his penthouse on the top floors of the building, and he waved for Pidge to head on in before following them into the suite. The first floor was an impressive open layout with seating arrangements, a bar, a waterfall rippling down the side of one face made entirely of stone, and grooves in the floor that suggested things popped up and out of it. One side was entirely comprised of glass looking out over the city. "No worries. It's one way glass. No one can see in. So here we go - I'm taking the shirt off."
Tony headed over to his bar and set the battery down on it, then started working at his shirt. "It's kind of a process."
***
Pidge raised one brow as Tony explained that he didn’t go on the trips. “So...you pay for your employees to go on vacation so you can work? Wouldn’t it be less expensive to just downsize the company to achieve similar results?” They asked curiously.
“Why would I be worrying? I’m not the one taking off clothes.” Pidge said, confused and turning their attention from looking over the room to watching Tony’s movements by the bar. “Don’t go pulling out any cords.” Just in case the battery was actually attached to something and not just a prop.
***
"We're doing a lot of stuff, kid, you need the right people for that. Plus, those people get paid really well and I bet their lives would kind of suck if I just let them all go so that I could have a quieter building." Tony replied, his head muffled by the shirt he was still pulling off.
"And... I don't know. Some people just don't like a whole big row of windows. You never know who's looking in. From up here it's probably just birds, but still." His overshirt was finally off, and he took a little extra care as he started removing a tank top he wore under it. But it was clear at that point that the wires - which he'd secured here and there with medical tape just so they wouldn't end up coming loose - were definitely coming out of something in his chest.
***
“Why don’t you just go to a separate lab? Somewhere with less people? It would probably still be less expensive.” Pidge said with a shrug.
Even without being able to see what it was in Tony’s chest yet, Pidge could tell that there was more going on than just some wires strapped to him connecting to a battery for no reason. They took a step towards the bar, curiosity and concern mingling on their face. “What’s that in your chest?”
***
Tony shrugged a shoulder, focusing on the topic at hand and trying not to read the partial concern on Pidge's face as... well... concern. It only made him worry about his own condition more, and that was simply not helping. It was distracting.
He glanced down at his chest, and shrugged a shoulder. "That... is an electromagnet. In there, just kind of hanging around. It keeps the metal bits that are all in there away from my heart, which, you know, is up around here somewhere." He motioned to the anatomically correct area that one's heart actually was, just in case Pidge hadn't studied their anatomy. But he figured Pidge was a smart kid, and probably didn't really need to visual.
***
Pidge stopped just short of actually touching the electromagnet in Tony’s chest. “And you just woke up with this going on?” They asked, looking up from it into Tony’s face.
***
Tony's lips puckered, and he nodded his head. "Yup. Had a crazy dream about being blown up, some kinda... camera in my face, super dimly recall being operated on. Then I woke up like this. Exactly like this, it was actually pretty intense."
***
“That doesn’t sound like a good dream. Did you go to get it checked out here?” Pidge asked, taking a step back to make it easier to resist the temptation to just poke at the device.
***
"Hah-ha..." Tony half chuckled, then shook his head. "Who do you even go to for that? You can't exactly walk up to a hospital and say 'Hi, I have a battery attached to my chest as a life-saving device."
One of his shoulders shrugged, as if he considered this entire situation to be some kind of casual joke, and he added. "Besides, I kind of hate doctors. They're dicks. I'll be fine."
***
“I figured that you’d have someone on staff for something like that. Don’t all you billionaires have private doctors?” Pidge asked before Tony clarified that he hated doctors.
“You better be. Who else is going to let me hang out in their penthouse?” Laurence’s apartment was nice but not penthouse nice. Plus Pidge would miss Tony if he was gone.
***
Billionaires probably did have private doctors. Tony might have even had a few on file, but at the moment he couldn't recall. And it was just as well, since he hadn't had a physical in years and hated even going to the dentist.
In the end it didn't really matter, all things considered.
Tony squinted one of his eyes and shrugged a shoulder again, "I'm sure you'd find some other rich bozo who'd let you hang out in their penthouse. But since I've got you here - why don't I give you a tour of the rest of the place? You're gonna flip your lid over my computers."
He motioned back towards the elevator that would lead them away, and picked his battery back up. Pidge was probably going to walk out of there with a new rig or two later on that evening.