(Barely) Controlled Chaos Is Now On AO3!

(Barely) Controlled Chaos is now on AO3!

So, I've done it.  Started the upload on AO3.  They'll be full chapters, rather than the smaller chunks posted here, and less often, but it's begun!

Now I need to start writing again, make sure I stay ahead of the posting...

So, this is the FanArt that inspired the Pokemon/Avengers crossover fic I'll be posting here.  It will be a series - titled I Choose You, because I'm a dork like that - and the teams I use are not the same as the artwork, but kudos to the artist and credit where it's due.  Go check it out!

Selpa, looksee here!

just a little southeast of Phoenix, AZ, this is how the Outback Steakhouse restaurants line up.

i’d hate to be staying at a hotel right in the middle of delicious steak pentagram OH WAIT

(Barely) Controlled Chaos #1

So, this is part one of the first installment in the I Choose You 'verse.  (Barely) Controlled Chaos will be from Tony's pov, contains lots of angst, some humour, many many swear words and descriptions of torture and sexual scenes - nothing too explicit, and nothing worse than shown in the films, but if you don't like that, this may not be for you.  The Iron Man 1 and 2 films will come into this, as will The Avengers, so if you don't like spoilers, check the warnings at the top of each section before reading.

Warnings for part 1: mentions of physical and mental abuse, mentions of alcoholism

Disclaimer: I own nothing.  Please don't sue me.

***

Tony was not allowed Pokémon.  His father was very clear on that fact.

His mother had one, an old Persian that she’d helped to raise when she was a teenager.  Tony didn’t know if her luminous silver fur was like that because she was close to 40 years old, or if she had been born that way, but it didn’t matter; she was still the most beautiful thing the six-year-old had ever seen.  He loved the cat because his mother loved it; sometimes he thought that she favoured the Pokémon over him, but that was alright, because sometimes Tony did too.  Tony did bad things, and his father shouted at him; Persian only ever got petted and given treats.  His mother was right to like the Good Girl more than the Bad Boy.

Persian was his mother’s constant companion; that was one thing that didn’t change as he grew older.  Tony became a prodigy, which made his father behave as if he loved him, at least in front of the cameras.  At home, Howard was too busy trying to beat his son’s genius that Tony was mostly treated with indifference and sometimes he was outright ignored.  By both his parents.  Tony wasn’t a cute little boy any more, and his mother seemed to lose interest in him more and more as he grew towards his teenage years.

He’d overheard his parents argue on more than one occasion, but never about him.  They didn’t care enough to argue about their son.  No, Persian was usually the topic of their arguments; Howard Stark was of the opinion that the house was no place for pets.  Maria always countered that with ‘Pokémon weren’t pets, they were friends’.  You couldn’t just pick a Pokémon up and take it home with you; it had to choose to be with you.  These arguments were ultimately circular and ended up with both his parents drunk while Tony tried to get close enough to Persian to pet her.  The cat didn’t like Tony very much, and he was yet to get in stroking range, but he held out hope.  Pokémon have to like you to stay with you; Tony’s parents didn’t like him, but Tony thought that maybe, if he was very nice to Persian, she might like him one day.

Then the Pokémon died, and Tony’s stable-ish family life went to hell.

Without her companion, Maria became depressed, and more than once Tony had returned home from school to find her unconscious in her own vomit.  He took care to never mention these incidents to his father, who drank just as much, but handled it better.  Or worse, depending on your point of view.  Locking himself in his garage or office and passing out on a desk was not Tony’s idea of a good time.  By the time Tony turned fifteen, the only member of his family he actually liked was Jarvis, the butler, and he was technically a servant.

All in all, when his school finally got sick of him and let him take his exams early, he was ecstatic for a chance to get out of the house.  MIT accepted him (who wouldn’t, with his grades?), he filled out all the paperwork himself – he put himself down for communal living arrangements, just because he knew Howard would hate it and he was feeling petty at the time – and then he was out of there.

He grew to regret his hasty decision.

Not about MIT – that was awesome, even if he did know more about his classes than most of the Professors – but about the dorm living.  His accommodation was a small room on a corridor, sharing a communal bathroom and kitchen.  At first, he thought it would be fun – sure, it was a step down from what he was used to, but he was paying for it with his trust fund and he knew that Howard wouldn’t shell out for these living arrangements, so he wanted to stretch his budget.  He was a few years younger than the other students, but that wouldn’t matter.

Except it did.

His dorm-mates were four other boys – men really, given their age – and they sneered at him when he tried to introduce himself.

“What do they think they’re doing, letting a kid in here?” was the nicest greeting he got.  Tony assumed they doubted his right to be there and promptly aced every test put before him, in one case getting a better mark than two of his dorm-mates put together.  They didn’t take it well.

As Tony was expecting, Howard threw a fit when he found out where his son was living (it took almost six weeks, and Tony thought that maybe his parents had only just noticed that he was no longer living in the mansion), but as Tony was paying himself there wasn’t much he could do about it.  He made vague comments about Tony learning his lesson and coming back for help before slamming the phone down.  Tony was almost vibrating with rage; when had his father ever given him anything, except a black eye that one time when he’d gotten very drunk and Tony had said something sarcastic?  Howard had apologised when he sobered up – the only ‘sorry’ he’d ever given anyone, Tony thought – and it had never happened again.  That didn’t mean that Tony forgave the old bastard.  Help, indeed.  Everything Tony had, he’d gotten on his own.  Sure, the money was Howard’s, but the brains and ambition were Tony’s, and he would not let his father belittle that.

That was when Tony decided that, no matter how bad his dorm-mates were, he was sticking it out.  He would not prove his father right.

Thinking back, that was probably where his stupid stubborn streak really kicked in.

Odd Things To Happen At Work #3

So, the England game was on at work this evening, and we were winning by some amount (I do not care about football.  At all.), and the guy I was serving got very excited.  So much so, that he asked if I would marry him if we won 5-0.

This is not the same guy who proposed to me yesterday.

WHY DO STRANGERS KEEP ASKING ME TO MARRY THEM???

Halloween Shopping

Work does dress-up nights every month, and this months is Halloween themed, so I bought my costume(s) today.  They were cheap, and consist mostly of wings and a very short rag skirt, but I can make the rest up from my wardrobe anyway.  So, win, I think :)

The thing that confused and scared me was the Christmas stuff.  The sheer amount of it that is out in the shops already is ridiculous.  IT IS OCTOBER.  There are over 9 weeks until Christmas.  Enough already, people.  It is one day, do not drag it out for months on end.