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“It’s a training exercise, Stark. You’re expected to participate,” Nick Fury declared, grinding his teeth in exasperation.
Tony Stark narrowed his eyes. To all observers, he was cool and collected, but his anger was clear. Inside, he was doing a victory dance at cracking Fury’s composure.
“Lemme get this straight,” he paused for effect. “You want to do a training exercise in which I play villain? As what? An assessment of how hard to beat I’d be if I go rogue?” Tony rolled his eyes.
“All of your teammates will be doing one. You just have the good luck to be first,” Fury replied.
The rest of the Avengers (with the absence of Bruce Banner), who had been observing the tense standoff between the two, saw fit to pipe in then.
“Yeah, Stark,” Clint Barton said, playing with an arrow. “It’ll be fun! For me, at least.”
“Aye,” Thor agreed. “I would love to best the Man of Iron.”
Steve Rogers gave Clint and Thor his patented Captain America is Disappointed in You look. “It’s a good training exercise, Stark.”
“It’s dickish is what it is, Cap. He ,” Tony said, pointing at Fury, “is taking this seriously. He wants to know so he can change their emergency contingency plans from the utter bullshit they have now in case I go to the dark side.”
Fury kept a poker face, but surprise was clear in the lines of his body. “You shouldn’t have clearance to access those, Stark,” he grumbled, clearly just a token protest, because nothing in invention could block Tony and JARVIS when they wanted into a server.
“You honestly think you could use Pepper to stop me? She’d be on my side, obviously. I’m unfit to rule, I just do the taking over the world portion. And,” Tony said, voice dropping low. “if you even thought about touching her, I wouldn’t hesitate to kill every single one of you.”
“Just do it, Stark,” Natasha Romanoff said with finality. The other Avengers chimed in their agreement.
***
Tony, being a mature adult, stuck out his tongue at her.
“How are we doing this?” Tony said to the assembled team, resigned.
“I’m glad you asked,” Phil Coulson, the Avengers’ handler, replied, pulling up a powerpoint. “Rules are simple. No death, no maiming, and no attempts to cause permanent injury. You have access to all of your normal gear, keep it nonlethal. You get shot with one of these,” he held up a paintball gun, “in a deadly place, you’re out. Treat any shot like a bullet wound and act accordingly, please. Winner is whoever kills Stark. Or, if he kills all of you and takes Fury’s nameplate first, I guess he wins.”
“It's all of us versus Stark, right?” Clint asked.
“That’s how it starts, yes. He is allowed to try to make allies, and you’re technically allowed to commit treason against SHIELD and the Avengers.” Coulson responded.
“Join my team,” Tony said dryly. “I don’t kill my minions.” His face changed and he held up one finger for silence and pointed to his earpiece with another.
Whatever news he got seemed to be good, because he gave the group one of his megawatt smiles that he normally saved for the press. He clapped his hands. “When do we start?”
Natasha looked suspicious. “Why so eager now, Stark?”
“Oh, just some good news, nothing to worry about.”
Coulson looked like he was praying for strength. “The exercise starts in five minutes. Avengers, wait for orders. Stark,” he started. “already left. Okay then. I’d like it noted now that I’m saying this will be a massive disaster.”
Clint scoffed. “He’s one guy, how hard can it be?”
***
As it turns out, it was very hard.
The Avengers had received their orders; Clint was crawling in the vents with a sniper rifle and Thor was patrolling the airspace around the SHIELD building while Natasha and Steve led ground teams of SHIELD agents. They were wary- ten minutes into the exercise and there had been no sign of Tony.
Tony, for his part, hadn’t been sitting idly. He was also in the vents, on his way to another server room. He had been slowly but surely jury-rigging bombs of paint to go off any time someone tried to log into their terminals. He knew Clint was in the vents with him somewhere, but he wasn’t concerned.
Tony stopped at a grate when he heard movement below him. He risked a peek and saw Natasha’s ground team right below him.
“This wasn’t the plan,” he muttered, already adapting. His hands were twisting wires to make another bomb even as he complained.
“Hawkeye, status?” Black Widow called out to the vent, having heard Tony’s movements.
JARVIS pulled up a clip of Clint’s voice to respond so that she wouldn’t shoot before he was ready. “Clear so far, you?” the clip said.
Tony took a minute to appreciate JARVIS. He finished the bomb and signaled to JARVIS with sign language what he needed.
“I’m coming down for a sec,” JARVIS-as-Clint said. “Don’t shoot me.”
Natasha nodded, gun trained down the hall, where she thought she heard movement. She didn’t notice that the hand lifting the grate was a few shades too dark to be Clint’s. Tony lifted the edge just enough to toss his bomb down before scuttling (which was very undignified, and he’d deny it if anyone asked). He knew by Natasha’s (equally undignified) shriek that it worked.
“Suckers! Teach you to go against me!” Tony called, pausing for a moment to admire the sounds of chaos from the hallway below him.
He heard Natasha radio in to Steve. “Cap, all of my baby agents and I just got blown up. I’m going to murder him.”
The team, having lost their resident tech genius, didn’t know how to change the channel of the coms. Tony could hear everything. He stifled an evil cackle; there would be time to mess with them over the coms later.
“Half the goddamn tech department got blown up, too, how come no one watching the security feed saw him?” Cap cursed.
“Language,” Natasha chided. “He probably looped the feed, it isn’t that hard. Have one of the surviving techs fix that and get eyes on him. He was in the vents, but I don’t imagine he’ll stay in them for long. We want to see where he goes after. Widow out.”
She turned off her coms and started shouting at the baby agents. Tony figured it was time to hightail it out of there before she realized that the paint he used was not water soluble and shot him, rules be damned. He gulped. She’d probably use a real gun.
***
Back in Fury’s office, Coulson and Fury monitored the situation.
“Is he even taking this exercise seriously?” Fury growled. Stark had, along with the bombs, programmed every computer to show the only video in existence of Nick Fury falling over the hem of his trench coat any time anyone tried to log into the system.
“Serious or not, he is winning,” Coulson reasoned. “He’s already taken out half of our available agents and the Black Widow.”
“Has anyone seen him? It’s not like him to be subtle,” Fury said, ignoring Coulson’s point.
“His damage to the surveillance system is a little more complex than we thought, so we can’t get a visual,” replied Coulson. “He hasn’t attempted to make contact with anyone on his team, not even taunting.”
“ His team ,” Fury breathed, realizing something. “Coulson, call Pepper Potts. She knows what’s going on, I guarantee it.”
***
Pepper Potts was a busy woman. She was CEO for one of the most powerful companies in the world and her workload reflected it. When she got Tony’s call, however, she cleared her schedule for the day.
“Pep, dearest, light of my life,” Tony cajoled when she answered the phone.
She cut him off. “What did you break this time?” she asked with the patience of a goddamn saint, thank you very much.
“Nothing relevant,” he replied dismissively. “I need you to be my impulse control today.”
“Like I am every day?” she said sweetly.
“Dearest Nicolas and Agent are making me do a training exercise in which I try to take over and the team tries to stop me,” Tony said bluntly. “I need you to do what you do best and order me around so that I don’t just run in there, guns blazing.”
Pepper sighed, looking at her packed schedule. “Let me see what I can clear. I’ll have J let you know when I’m free.” She was messing with him, and he knew it. She’d never pass up the chance to take over the world.
To help the Avengers train. Obviously.
“You’re the best,” Tony cried, pleased.
“I know.” Pepper disconnected the line. Fury had it coming, anyway, and they probably weren’t using live ammunition. She hoped.
***
“Phil, I’m a very busy woman. I certainly don’t have time to help Tony with some game.” Pepper had expected a phone call sooner, to be honest. Tony couldn’t take over a paper bag without her.
“He’s kicking our collective asses, Pepper,” Only her years as CEO kept her from bursting into laughter at the petulant note in Phil’s voice when the responded. “Fury is pissed off, he thought all the Avengers could subdue Stark and maybe knock him down a few pegs. I tried to tell him this was a dumb idea, but he didn’t listen.”
Pepper did laugh that time. “Phil,” she said, her voice warm. “No one who tries to subdue Tony ever gets what they want. Even I only get what I want from him 75% of the time. And I’m scarier than you.”
“Did he come to you at all for help?” Phil asked, a tad desperate. “Or would you be willing to come in and help us?”
“You mean, play bait?” her voice was dangerously calm. She wasn’t really angry, but she liked messing with Coulson.
“I told Fury it was a bad plan,” Coulson tried to salvage the conversation.
Pepper heard a soft beep- Tony was calling. “Phil,” she said, finger hovering over the ‘end call’ button, “I haven’t heard from Tony and I will not be coming in to play bait. Goodbye.” She picked up the other line. “Whatever you’re thinking of doing, don’t.” she said to Tony.
“I was definitely not thinking of piping irritating music through the coms channel that they didn’t lock me out of, sweet Tesla they’re hopeless, to irritate the few survivors. I was actually thinking anything but that.” Tony babbled.
Pepper sighed. “Cost-benefit, Tony. You can hear their plans, or you can irritate the shit out of them. Which is better?”
“I know which one you want me to say and I can’t in good faith say it.”
Pepper wisely ignored him. “Who is still standing?” she asked, snapping into CEO mode.
“Cap and Thor, Barton should be dead in 3, 2, 1, yep, he’s gone,” Tony replied. “I rigged his rifle to blow up. Like, weeks ago. I really expected this to happen earlier.”
“Thor still on air patrol?” At Tony’s affirmative response, she continued. “He should be easy enough to catch unawares with either the suit or some sniping, up to you. Steve should be your priority, and he’s probably with Coulson. Two birds with one obnoxiously painted stone.”
She could hear Tony’s grin in his answer. “Should I do it Tony Stark Style?” he asked. “Because I have the best plan, if I can throw subtlety out the window.”
Pepper tried not to let it get to her head that one of the most powerful men on Earth was asking her advice on battle plans. “Tony Stark Style,” she agreed. “Hit Phil extra for me, will you?”
“Affirmative, Pep. Iron Man out.”
***
Tony Stark was a dramatic man, on principle. He was showy because he damn well deserved to show off, and he knew it. Even he could admit, though, that filling three empty Iron Man suits with paint balloons and confetti was a little much.
Putting on a suit, Tony went over (Pepper’s) plan in his head.
First, he would fix the security feed, letting everyone see four Iron Man suits roaming around the building. JARVIS would be directing the three dummy suits, so that Tony could focus on the important things in life; namely, chaos.
Next, he would take Thor out of commission. The Asgardian would be sad to miss a battle, but Tony had bigger fish to fry.
By then, JARVIS should have engaged Steve with one of the dummy suits, so that would blow up in his face. On video. For morale boosting, obviously. Pepper could always use a pick-me-up in the form of someone else’s utter annihilation. Maybe he’d send Rhodey a copy.
The other two dummy suits were mostly for general mischief; he planned to have them fly around and shoot people, but not actively target anyone.
That was as far as his plan went, even though he didn’t have an end designed for Nick Fury yet. Tony wasn't worried, he figured he’d know what to do when it was time to do it (because winging it always worked for him).
Holy Lovelace, this was easier than it should’ve been. He could never become a supervillain, he reasoned, because this was how the team fell apart without him!
Tony flew up near SHIELD headquarters, taking a deep breath before hitting play on his music.
“Showtime.”
***
Thor was bored. He had chosen to provide air support to his comrades, because they were fighting the only other flier, and he thought Tony would’ve engaged by now.
What was the point of a flying suit if you didn’t try to fight in the air? Thor was perplexed. He had sat down on the roof after hearing of Clint’s untimely demise, figuring the fight would stay indoors for a while longer. Especially when he’d heard over the coms that three suits were zipping around the halls. So, of course he was shocked when he heard the loud music and saw a blur of red and gold.
“Man of Iron!” he called out, overjoyed. “Have you come to engage in battle?”
“No can do, Point Break,” Tony said. “I have a building to take over. You know, the usual.” A paintball shot out from one of his shoulder guns before Thor could respond, taking him out of the game.
Thor looked like a kicked puppy. “I’ll fight you later, just don;t give me those eyes!” Tony cried out as he left.
Thor did his best to hide his smirk behind his puppy dog eyes as Tony flew away. It was all going according to plan. “Good Captain!” he said over the coms. “Friend Stark is in the older version of the armor, not the most recent. Good luck in your endeavors!”
***
Inside the building, Steve Rogers was fighting a particularly scrappy JARVIS. Because Tony wasn’t in the suit, it could take hits without any regards for how a human in pain would react. Steve had been waiting for Thor’s confirmation of which suit Tony was in before he let loose, and it came just in time.
The fight up until then had been tough, with JARVIS mercilessly catching all of Steve’s punches. Luckily, he had been saving his trump card for the assurance that Tony was not, in fact, in the suit he was currently attempting to disable. Because a vibranium shield to the chest wouldn’t be fun, even in full armor.
Steve threw his shield hard, angling it so that it lodged under the chest plate. He heard a hissing noise, not unlike a tire losing air. His eyes went wide when he realized what was happening. “Shit,” he muttered, diving for cover.
“Language, Captain,” JARVIS replied. Then the suit exploded in a burst of paint, drenching Steve in a mix of red and gold. To add insult to injury, there also seemed to be a large amount of confetti coming out of the repulsors of the armor and sticking in the wet paint.
Steve would never admit it, but he was in awe of Tony, and a little terrified. How long had it taken the engineer to change his repulsors to fire confetti of all things? Add that to the fact that Tony didn’t even have to be in the suit to have the suit cause damage, and Steve was suitably scared.
They were all fucked if Tony decided to become a supervillain, no doubt about it.
***
“Sound off,” Fury barked into the coms. “Who is still standing?”
“Barton and I are down,” Natasha said, pissed. “I still can’t believe he killed me first.”
“I, too, find myself out of the game,” Thor added. “Lady Natasha, if you are so inclined, perhaps we could spar? I did not get much of a battle, unfortunately.”
“How do you get this paint off?” Steve said wearily. “Water’s only making it worse, and I have approximately a metric ton of it on me.” At the ensuing silence, he explained, “One of the suits JARVIS was piloting was a bomb. A large one. With confetti.”
“Bad news, team,” Tony interjected. A chorus of angry voices started, but Tony cut them off. “You really need to learn how to change the coms channel. It's embarrassing. Really, I’m embarrassed.”
“What the fuck?” Steve yelled.
“Language!” the whole team shouted as one. At least they were still united on the important things.
“Could you hear us this whole time?” Steve asked, teeth gritted.
Tony sounded annoyingly chipper. “Yep!”
Fury chose that moment to interject. “Stark,” he sighed. “Exercise is over. You killed your team. Now how do they get the paint off?”
Tony tutted. “I haven’t won yet, are you giving up? I’m hurt, Nick, truly.”
“You killed all the Avengers, you’ve won.”
“Yeah, but I haven’t gotten you or Agent, and Agent said I had to take your nameplate to win,” Tony reasoned. “And the paint should flake off in approximately 36 hours from application. I didn’t get to test this batch much, but I highly suggest you stay away from open flames.”
“The exercise is over, Stark. Meet us in briefing room 3 to go over the results,” Fury growled, about to shut off his coms.
“Um, Director?” Tony said. “You kinda deserve this.” Tony, unbeknownst to all, had been crawling through the unoccupied vents to Fury’s office. At his word, a single paintball hit Fury in the center of the forehead, fired from a stolen paintball rifle (he didn’t bring his own and he didn’t have time to build one).
Tony swung down from the vents and grabbed Fury’s nameplate. “I win,” he crowed. The office door opened, revealing four paint splattered and angry Avengers and one resigned Agent. “Spoke too soon! JARVIS, evac!” Tony fired a repulsor from his gaultet at the window and jumped out, without a suit. The Avengers stared worriedly (but still angrily) out the window until a red and gold suit encased the falling engineer and flipped them all off as it flew away.
“That could’ve gone so much worse?” Coulson said hesitantly.
“Really, Coulson? Could it have?” Fury rose, wiping paint off of his forehead. He turned to address the gathered Avengers. “You all better treat him right. If he goes dark, we are all fucked.”
***
36 hours later, when all the Avengers were depainted and calm, they cornered Tony with questions. They all boiled down to one main one.
“How?” Clint asked incredulously, for the fifth time.
“Pepper,” Bruce responded sagely.
“Pepper,” Tony agreed. “And, of course, my own genius. She’s the impulse control, I’m the brains and muscle.”
“Would you be able to take us out that easily, for real?” Steve pressed, sobering all the Avengers up.
Tony stopped to consider the question. “I don’t know,” he said finally. “Would you deserve it? I’m not in the business of killing for killing’s sake, Cap.”
“Define ‘deserve’,” Natasha said.
“I’m a mechanic, not a dictionary, Itsy Bitsy.”
“Don’t get me wrong, Stark, but I really didn't think you could beat us. I still think it was a fluke,” Clint said arrogantly. In the blink of an eye, there was a paintball explosion in his face. Nobody had even seen Tony move.
“Birdbrain, I could beat you blindfolded with my hands tied behind my back. Didn’t we just prove that?” Tony asked, saccharine sweet. “I’m leaving now to concoct evil plans. No one bother me, thanks.”
Clint gulped as Tony sauntered away to his lab. “Did anyone else know he could do that?”
“Mr. Barton, I’d advise you not to bet against Sir,” JARVIS said, a note of humor in his robotic voice.
“Damn,” Natasha said, echoing what they all were thinking. Tony Stark could run circles around all of them before they even realized he was moving.
“Damn,” Cap repeated softly.
“Language!”