(Barely) Controlled Chaos #11

(Barely) Controlled Chaos #11

Sorry for the delay, work happened.  Do I want to work 10 extra hours this week? No.  Do I need the money?  Yes.  *sigh*

Anyway, fic.

Warnings for this part: none

March 1996, Stark Mansion, New York

Tony looked at the certificate in his hands.  PhD.  Only 19 years old, and had a PhD.  He was Dr Tony Stark.

Too bad that he was the only one who cared.

Well, that wasn’t entirely true.  Rhodey, who had graduated two years before with a masters degree, had come to his graduation ceremony, and been appropriately worshipful of his achievement (he’d made a lot of jokes about the odd cap Tony was required to wear, and had called him ‘Oh Wise One’ the whole day), and his Pokémon were both very proud of him, he knew that, but it would have been nice if maybe Obie could have been there.  He was the closest thing Tony had to a family, after all, but the man was busy with the company.

The company had become Obie’s life the last few years, and he’d tried to make it Tony’s too.  Tony knew more about Stark Industries now than he really wanted to; he knew enough to be sure that he didn’t particularly want to run it in two years’ time.  Unfortunately, he didn’t have much choice.  On his twenty-first birthday, Tony inherited Stark Industries, and all the problems and paperwork it containted.  He’d met the board of directors twice now, and he thought they were all pricks.  He didn’t want to have monthly meetings with them.  He didn’t want to talk to them at all.

Tony sighed and shook his head, returning his gaze to the framed certificate in his hands.  What was he supposed to do with it now?  He had certificates from his other degrees – he hadn’t jumped directly into the PhD, MIT wouldn’t let him, so he’d picked up three BSc’s and two Master’s degrees earlier, two of them almost by accident – and they were in frames on a dresser in the dining room of his parent’s Manhattan mansion.  Jarvis had cleared the surface specially for them before he died, and Tony had set them up mostly because he knew that the butler would have been proud of him, would have fussed over the papers and kept the frames dust-free, and not just because he was paid to do it.  Tony’s parents probably wouldn’t have cared.  He set the PhD certificate down in its place in line, straightening it so it was at the same angle as the others.  Jarvis would be proud.

But Jarvis wasn’t here.

Tony had finished MIT now, and he was living back in the mansion for the first time since he was fifteen years old.  He hated it.  This wasn’t his home; this was a place where he once lived, and it was haunted by memories of his father, making Tony feel like he was seven years old once more and trying to explain how he’d managed to set the silk curtains in the living room on fire.

He couldn’t live here.  It would drive him insane.

Ditto crawled down from Tony’s shoulder and sat on the dresser admiring the certificates.  Herdier (Lillipup had evolved about a year ago, scaring Tony when he woke up one morning to find his puppy had doubled in size and was now considerably heavier) sat by his feet, leaning against his leg and eyeing Ditto carefully.  The dog had become Tony’s unofficial watcher over the years, and Ditto’s too, because the pink blob had a curious streak a mile wide and little to no sense of self-preservation.  It was also one heck of a prankster which, while entertaining and yeah, Tony encouraged it, did have a tendency to get them both into trouble.  Herdier was probably the only reason Tony hadn’t been arrested yet.

This wasn’t their home any more than it was his.

Tony closed his eyes and turned his back on the dresser.  The certificates could stay there; he didn’t know what else to do with them, and he wasn’t about to hang them on the wall so he could see them every day and be reminded how little people cared about his achievements.  His degrees didn’t matter to anybody except him, because he was Tony fucking Stark, and he was going to be CEO of Stark Industries no matter what he did.  What Tony wanted didn’t matter.

Well, Tony wanted out of this house, and at the very least, he was going to make that happen.  This was not the only property he owned; there was an entire island somewhere in the South Pacific he thought, though he’d never been there, and he knew Howard had brought houses in England and France.  Tony had spent a fair amount of time in the European houses when he was younger, and he recalled being happy in them, the English one especially, though that was because he’d met Jarvis’s family the one time and the butler’s niece had called him adorable and shown him how to play card games.  They weren’t viable options for escape now though, because Obie was expecting him to have an even greater hand in the business now that he was done with college, and Europe was one hell of a commute.  There was a place in Malibu though, right on the beachfront; it had been bought as a holiday home for when France was too far away, and though Tony had been there a couple of times, he didn’t have any strong memories of his family there.  It was a clean place; he could set up shop there quite happily, and New York was only a (relatively) short journey if he needed to get to the main SI buildings for any reason.  That could work.

With a small smile, Tony turned back around and looked down at his Pokémon.

“How do you fancy moving to California?”

(Barely) Controlled Chaos #9

Follows on from last part.

Warnings for this part: none

May 1992, Stark Industries Research and Development plant, New York

Tony stepped out of the limo Obie had sent to meet him at the airport (why a limo?  He wasn’t going anywhere fancy) and stretched, feeling the ache in his lower back ease as he uncurled from the seated position.  He’d spent the previous three nights in the lab, much to Rhodey’s disgust, and the two before that he’d spent partying with the robotics grad students.  Merry (Meredith McCall, but she had threatened to kick anybody who called her by her full name in a very painful place) had been dropping hints in Tony’s direction for some time, starting with the hangover cures she’d provided once, and had taken advantage of his inebriation that week to plant one on him.  Tony genuinely liked Merry, which was why he’d been putting off asking her out, but after her enthusiastic display he’d relented.  He didn’t think she only wanted to go out because of his name, but if it turned out she was like the other girls and only wanted him for one night so she could brag to her friends that ‘I-went-out-with-a-millionaire’, then he would have to deal.  The robotics lab would be awkward for a while, but eventually one of them would graduate.  It wasn’t like they were living together.

Tony shook his head; he had to stop borrowing trouble.  Merry wasn’t going to drop him after one night.  She hadn’t told him to get lost when he’d had to cancel their cinema trip and get on a plane to New York, after all.

Tony dropped his arms to his sides and looked at the R&D building he’d been brought to.  Obie was currently in charge of Stark Industries, because Tony was underage, but he’d decided that the young Stark needed to know what was going on, and it had to be that weekend because Tony’s life was screwed up and fate conspired to make sure that he couldn’t get a date with the girl he actually liked.  And Obie wasn’t free any other time, but whatever; it was mostly the other thing.

Obie walked out of the building and smiled at Tony, clapping the teenager on the shoulder in a fatherly manner.  Tony let himself sway to the side with the touch, hoping it would dissuade the man from doing it again.  Tony’s own father hadn’t been fatherly towards him; he didn’t need it from the man currently running his company.

“Tony!” Obie said, sounding genuinely happy to see him.  “You made it!  I half suspected you wouldn’t show up.”

“I’m here,” Tony sighed, not happy about it.  “You sent a driver to my dorm; I didn’t have much choice.”

At least it had proven to Merry that he wasn’t blowing her off.  They’d have to find another time to catch that movie.

Obie tutted and threw his arm around Tony’s shoulders, tugging him towards the building.  Lillipup, who had been sitting beside Tony’s feet (he had flat-out refused to leave without his Pokémon, and the private plane he’d travelled on hadn’t had a problem with the unexpected passenger.  Sometimes, Tony was very glad he was rich), trotted alongside, close enough that Tony had to watch his feet so as not to step on the dog’s paws.

“You could sound happier about it, Tony.  This is all going to be yours when you turn 21; you have to know what’s going on.  You’ll be running it in a few years.”

“Then I’ll deal with it then.  I had to cancel a date for this.”

Obie shot Tony a look that he couldn’t quite read, then his face smoothed out into a smile.  “Plenty of time for that later, eh?  Lots of women out there; you’re a fine-looking boy, Tony; you’ll have no trouble getting good arm candy.  But business, now, that’s what’s important.  Come on; Howard never showed you around the R&D department, and it’s the lifeblood of the whole system, Tony!  This is where everything comes to life!”

Tony shot a look at Lillipup, who nudged his ankle with his shoulder in a supportive gesture.  Tony sighed and let Obie tug him into the building, holding the door open long enough for Lillipup to enter too.  Obie shot him a disapproving look.

“Now, Tony, there’s a rule about Pokémon in the SI buildings; you know that, your father implemented it.”

“And I’m ignoring it,” Tony said bluntly, shrugging free of Obie’s arm and scooping his dog up into his arms.  Lillipup licked his wrist and glared at Obie.  “Lillipup stays with me.”

Lillipup woofed in agreement.  Obie looked like he might argue for a moment, then sighed and shook his head.

“You’re stubborn, Tony, just like your old man.  Fine, but don’t let it near the weapons; they’re delicate, and we don’t want to damage them, do we?”

Tony was tempted to place Lillipup down in the middle of the department and tell him to run riot, but he held the impulse in check.  Obie was not Howard, and had done nothing to deserve that level of blatant disrespect.  He still wasn’t leaving Lillipup behind.  Obie wouldn’t change the no-Pokémon-in-the-building rule, because the man’s views on Pokémon closely mimicked Howard’s, but as soon as Tony was in charge, he was scrapping it.

He didn’t pay too much attention as Obie showed them around, more interested in the weapons themselves than the area of the building they were currently standing in.  It took maybe half an hour for them to reach the testing area, which didn’t really need an introduction as the firing of weapons was pretty loud and obvious, even from outside the sealed room.  Lillipup winced at the gunshots and buried his nose in Tony’s elbow; Tony scratched at his ears to calm him down.

“Let’s skip this one; I know how to fire a gun.”

Obie looked between Tony and the Pokémon he was comforting, and grimaced, but led them further down the corridor without comment.  Tony sent him a smile in thanks.

I wish my cats were this cool

(Barely) Controlled Chaos #17

Follows from last part.

Warnings for this part: mentions of weaponry, abuse of sarcasm, minor injuries to a Pokemon

September 1997, Stark Industries Main office, New York

Ten minutes later, and Tony was on his way back to the office, alone this time.  He’d left Rhodey flirting with the two baristas, happy enough to meet him that evening for a drink or ten and to let Tony pretend, just for one night, that his only real friend in the world wasn’t heading off to fight a war and might not come home.  Tony couldn’t let that happen; he couldn’t lose Rhodey.  It would break something inside of him, as much as losing Herdier or Ditto would.  Rhodey was a piece of him, and Tony would protect him to the best of his ability.  If that meant drafting up new military contracts and Tony doing most of R&D’s job for them, then so be it.  He had carried the department for the last two years anyway, it wouldn’t be any real change.

God, he wanted a drink.

He stalked into the Stark Industries office building, working out several improvements to the standard body armour provided to the military in his head; it was one of the things he intended to include in the new deal, as SI didn’t currently manufacture it, but they were damn well going to start.  It needed to be protective without being bulky, and that was an issue, but if he could make a few small alterations… he was distracted from his planning by a screech from his left, followed by a lot of yelling and a slew of curses that had him mildly impressed.  None of them were particularly original, but their sheer number spoke volumes about the shouter’s vocabulary.

Tony veered towards the shouts, as they seemed to be of anger rather than ‘oh Holy God we’re all going to die’, which had happened a couple of times when he’d been in the R&D buildings and led to a few people losing their jobs for sheer idiocy.  Tony was not losing staff to an explosion because somebody couldn’t fucking count.

He was right about the shouting; following the voices led him through a few startled workers in the SI cafeteria (Tony made a point to avoid it usually; their coffee was awful and, sad though it may be, that was how he judged these places) to the kitchen.  There, a large man with a very red face was practically hopping in rage, shouting obscenities out of the open fire doors into the alleyway beyond.  Tony stopped in the doorway, watching how everyone else in the kitchen was staying as far out of range as possible, and surmised that this was probably either really out of character, or the guy was a dick and had everyone cowed.  He hoped it was the former, but knowing his luck…

He leaned against the wall and cleared his throat loud enough to draw everyone’s attention.  The chef (he had to be, dressed like that) sneered at him, before realising who he was and trying to appear professional.

“Who do… Mr Stark.  What are you doing here?”

OK, this was the chef’s domain, Tony got that.  He could still do without the ‘get the fuck out of my kitchen’ in the guy’s voice.  Tony decided that option number two was the right one; this guy was a dick.  He raised an eyebrow and affected a deliberately casual tone of voice.

“Investigating a murder on Stark Industries premises.  That is what’s happened here, right?  I can’t think why you’d be swearing so loudly otherwise, unless you got a papercut or something.  Hey, those mothers sting, I’d yell too.  Of course, the whole street probably wouldn’t hear about it, unless I hired a skywriter or something, but you don’t need to, you have like a built-in foghorn or something, really.  Cuts right through the crowds.”

The chef’s face was crimson with rage by the time Tony was finished, and everyone else in the room was muffling smiles and sniggers.  One boy didn’t bother, snickering openly to Tony’s left.  Tony decided that he was awesome and turned to face him.

“So, what did happen, and why do I care?”

The boy sobered quickly and nodded out the open doorway.  “There’s a Nidoran that forages…”  He was talking fast, as though anticipating being cut off.  Tony shot the chef a glare as he opened his mouth to do just that, and was totally unsurprised when it failed to elicit a reaction.  He paid no attention to whatever the idiot was shouting at him, merely waited for him to take a breath before throwing in his own input.

“Wow, you really are a dick.”

That stopped the tirade, and got more than a few laughs from the assorted watchers.  He turned back to the boy, who was grinning at the sight of the stuttering, speechless chef, and nodded.  “You were saying?”

“Right, Nidoran.  It’s been around here for about a week, scrounging food.  I think it’s hurt; it’s been limping, but it won’t let me get close enough to see.  I’ve been leaving food out for it, stuff that would have been thrown away otherwise, you know?  Anyway, Gary found it eating from the bins and went nuts.”

Tony nodded and walked calmly past the now-babbling chef to peer out into the alley.  For a few seconds, he couldn’t see anything, and he hoped the Pokémon hadn’t run out into the road at the far end while trying to escape, but then he caught the glimmer of eyes hiding underneath a skip.  He crouched to look underneath, and a dark shape shuffled backwards as far as it could go.  Tony was struck by the similarity to the situations in which he’d found both Ditto and Herdier, and felt his expression fix.  Alright, now he was pissed off.  He stood up and whirled around, stalking back into the kitchen.  He pointed at a random woman standing close to the door into the main building.

“You, go to my office, tell Herdier that I need him down here, now.  When Pep… Ms Potts tries to stop you, tell her the same thing.”

His voice was flat and toneless.  The woman blanched then ran from the room, presumably to fetch Herdier.  Tony turned to face the chef.

“You’re fired.”  He was in no mood to sugar-coat anything, and he really didn’t want to be nice to this man.  He pointed at the boy who’d spoken to him before.  “Can you cook?”

The boy hesitated for a second, pointing at his own chest as if to confirm that Tony was actually talking to him, then swallowed and nodded.  “I… yeah.  Sure.  Why not?”

“Great,” Tony said, hearing ‘yes’ and ignoring the less-than-enthused tone that accompanied it.  “You’re hired.  Get me a list of whatever you need, I’ll make sure you get it.  The good stuff.  If you find a way to make the coffee here palatable, I’ll get you the really good stuff.”

The boy nodded, much more enthusiastic now, and Tony turned his glare on the ex-chef, who was still standing in the middle of the kitchen looking thunderstruck.  He raised his voice slightly and spoke to the room in general.  “Somebody call security; I want this man removed.  Now.”

There was movement as he finished talking, but he ignored it and went back out into the alley, crouching once again to see under the skip.  The Nidoran had its back pressed to the brick wall behind it, and nothing short of a crowbar was getting it away from what it deemed as safety.  Well, a crowbar or, Tony hoped, Herdier.  Right on cue, his dog appeared beside him, looking at him expectantly.  Tony nodded to the terrified Pokémon beneath the skip.  Herdier knew him entirely too well, because that was all it took for the dog to lie flat on the ground, nose facing Nidoran, and begin making low, calming sounds that eased Tony’s temper as much as they told Nidoran that nobody was going to hurt it.  Wordless communication between Tony Stark and another living being – Tony knew several people who would swear it wasn’t possible, including Tony himself the majority of the time.

It took five minutes and Tony backing off, but Herdier coaxed the Nidoran out from under the skip.  It was purple (male then, Tony thought, looking it over), and limping badly on its front left leg.  The limb was sprained, at the very least, likely broken.  Tony looked over his shoulder to see the newly hired chef watching carefully.

“Call a doctor,” he said, keeping his voice level so as not to undo all Herdier’s work.  “Tell them to go up to my office.  We’ll meet them up there.”

The boy nodded and left, looking between Tony and the Pokémon with an expression midway between curiosity and respect.  Good to see that there was somebody who didn’t regard Tony’s caring streak as weakness.

Herdier nudged Tony’s legs, and he looked down to see his dog carefully pressing as much of his body against Tony’s legs as he could manage without pushing the human over.  Tony caught on to what he was trying to do and slowly bent down to stroke him between the ears and down his spine.  Herdier arched into the touch, which he didn’t usually do, but this was about showing Nidoran that he could trust Tony, so contact was good.  The purple Pokémon slowly, very slowly, limped forward, pausing just outside Tony’s reach.  He eyed Tony warily, then took the final few steps forward and nudged Tony’s knee with his horn.  Tony carefully bent at the knees and scooped the Pokémon up, making sure not to jostle the injured leg, then turned and walked back into the building, Herdier clearing a path ahead of them.

He wasn’t going to make that meeting.

Merry Christmas!

To everyone who celebrates it anyway.  To those who don't, happy whatever-you-do celebrate.

(Barely) Controlled Chaos # 18

Posts on time.  Automatic update is a wonderful thing ;)

Warnings for this part: drunkeness, graphic kissing and groping, but nothing over a PG-13.

September 1997, Stark Industries Main office, New York

Tony was drunk.  He’d gone out with Rhodey, as promised, and the two had spent three hours reminiscing about more and more obscure details from MIT as the number of drinks increased, then Rhodey had waxed lyrical for an hour about his travels, which ultimately led back to the reason Tony was on his tenth drink of the night, even when he knew he’d have to put up with Herdier’s Disappointed Face the next day; the dog hated when Tony got drunk.  Ditto just crawled on him and transformed into a blanket if Tony had had enough to pass out somewhere that wasn’t his bed.  It didn’t happen often, but every time it was a toss-up which was more painful; the inevitable hangover or Herdier’s refusal to look at him until he apologised.  He never promised not to do it again though.  Tony may be a master at lying (growing up in the press does that to a person), but he never lied to his Pokémon.  He would not alienate the best friends he had because his mouth ran away with him, and beside that they wouldn’t believe him anyway, which made it kind of pointless.

Ok, so maybe Tony was very drunk.  He didn’t usually go off on tangents quite that random when he was sober.  But, in his defence, Rhodey was joining the military, and Tony was trying his best not to imagine his best friend on the wrong end of a gun – that always looked like Stark Industries weapons in Tony’s head and he really needed to change the design now, because that was going to haunt him – and the alcohol helped drive the horrifying thoughts from his mind.

The girls helped too.  Tony, by virtue of being Howard fucking Stark’s son, was immediately recognisable to pretty much everybody, and Rhodey was handsome enough to turn heads; the two of them combined were quite enough to have several girls join them, two draping themselves over Rhodey’s lap and another three sitting between the men, one (Tony thought her name was Eleonora, but there were two brunettes in the group surrounding him and they were both wearing green, so he wasn’t sure) slowly climbing astride Tony as she nibbled her way along his collarbone.  He pulled her up into a sloppy, drunken kiss as she finally straddled his lap, and she moaned into his mouth.  The other brunette leaned in against their sides and licked a line down Tony’s pulse and up the other girl’s, joining them in an uncoordinated three-way kiss that was more a collision of mouths than anything else.

This was definitely helpful.  He was going to call it therapy, and justify it as such to Pepper when she found out and got mad at him for risking his company’s reputation.

Besides, Rhodey was having just as good a time with the other three – two redheads and a blonde – and he was supposed to be the good influence.  So, really, this was all Rhodey’s fault.  Tony grinned and tried to refine the kiss to something that wouldn’t leave bruises around his jawline.  It ended up with the girls kissing on his lap while he watched, and he was totally ok with that.  He was moving this party someplace else though, and now, because otherwise he was going to get kicked out of yet another club, and he actually liked this place.

He dragged his attention from the orgy on his lap for a moment to lean over and punch Rhodey in the upper arm.  The older man flinched and pulled back from his groupies, sending Tony a look that said the interruption had better be important.  Tony leaned over and talked loudly into the other man’s ear to be heard over the music and the girls.

“I’m taking the girls to a hotel or something now; see you back at my apartment in the morning.”

Rhodey nodded, grinning, and pulled Tony’s head forwards, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

“Have a good time.”

“You too, honeybear!”

And with an exaggerated wink, Tony pushed at the girls on his lap until they stood, then threw an arm around each of their waists and led them to the door.  The bouncers raised their eyebrows at him, shot each other amused glances, and waved them off, one calling a “good night, Mr Stark!” at his back, which made Tony laugh and pull the girls in closer to his side as he tried to guide them down the street in the direction of a hotel that he knew.  They made it around one corner before stumbling into a small alleyway between buildings with arms and hands and lips everywhere, and ok, they weren’t going to make it to the hotel.  That was ok. 

That was so ok.