o1 👨‍💻 Nothing like a big bad bridge (open)

[servomotor]

Characters: Tony Stark, CR, & YOU
Summary: A smol average height technologist superhero man goes about his business in the wake of war and random comedic holiday shenanigans. Some closed starters in the comments.
Date(s): Catch-all for January 2018!
Warnings/Notes: Mental illness, manpain, etc. Maybe some sexual content in here eventually!



open;

Whether in this world or the last, Tony Stark manages to be both a highly private person and incredibly easy to find. Most of the time, he can be found in his workshop, where he invents and repairs a range of machinery for people. Lately, he's been working on copying Xistentia's emotional energy conversion technology and turn it into something that the average citizen (or above average, depending on your self-concept) can use. Behold: sewing machines and weaving looms that feed off bursts of emotional inspiration, coffee machines fueled by your addict's desperation, and cars that go a little faster because you really really want them to!

The rest of the time, he might be found out and about, often in the iconic red suit. He's often preoccupied with brokering deals to acquire more scrap from the beach or trade with other people from contemporary worlds. You might catch him in dry debate, negotiating; you might even find yourself waved over and asked for your honest opinion about the value of a piece of chassis or energy source, in the middle of an otherwise incomprehensible technobabble conversation. Just remember: there is definitely a right answer.

However, in his off-hours, you might instead find him at your local liquor establishment or listening to some live multiversal music downtown, wearing an Immensely Doubtful expression on his bearded face. On the other hand, it's Tony Stark. Maybe that's just what his rich white boy face looks like.

Comments

sdgkhlfs how tall is she?!

[servomotor]

[He's not that short. I'm just saying. And his chest is impressively solid under the suit, and under the pat of her hand. He looks at her, with a slickster cool guy Tom Haverford smile as she steps away from him, but the moment her eyes swivel away, he lets out a breath like a stressed out boy at prom, bewitched by the curvature of her body beneath sleek fabric and the smell of product in her hair. He smoothes down his suit, and walks after her.]

No, I like peace too. I'm learning mission-life balance, [he says. He doesn't think to second-guess the new alignment of his tie, not for a second.] In the-- midst of a war, I guess. Because that's how you do.

[Despite the PERFECTLY INSIgnificant difference in the lengths of their legs, Tony arrives at the odd little mini-chamber when she does. He picks up the brandy in its lovely dark bottle and opens it, doesn't bother to watch the translucent curl of vapor come out of its nozzle because he's watching her. The glass walls of the 'hamsterball's how her reflection back to her, translucent and reshaped, but rendered in the proper palette, the red of her hair in contrast to the pale lilt of her collarbones.]

Binarily Augmented Retro-Framing, [he tells her.] Pay no mind to the acronym, please and thank you. [The rim of the glass nudges her hand.] Mark two point oh. Integrating what I could put together from the Temple tech, inscrutable as F.A.T.E.S. wants her 'magic' to be.

['''magic.''']

I built the first model to revisit the memory of the last time I spoke with my parents. Self-help, I guess. Spinning out the situation the way I wish it'd gone down. But I guess these days there's more to life than trauma, and you had a world or five you wanted me to see.

;)

[upside]

( there's an all knowing hum, which is really only partly knowing, because shepard herself is notoriously bad at the balance between a sense of duty and a sense of self, but. as with tony, it's little steps at a time, and most of the time, the mission seems a little bit more important than whatever she has going on in her head or in her heart. right now, with earth so far away and no respectable way of reaching it, it feels a little bit easier. the dread of doom is still looming over her head, as it does, and the threat of a fight is almost always at their ankles with the memories of the red warriors still fresh in their minds like battle scars. but - the war is at least at bay for now, and even if shepard would prefer to feel ... adequately prepared for battles to come, she can't deny that she likes this, too. being with tony, feeling relaxed. small things. balance.

she accepts the glass with her palm, silently trotting over to the mirrored wall of the - B.A.R.F., pressing gentle fingers against it. her head tilts, fiery red hair getting a little bit too long, brushing the top of her shoulder. tali would love this sort of thing. she was always - is always - excited about tech-type things, more likely to spend more hours rattling on about a sexy engine she saw than any of the quarian men on the flotilla. she and tony would get along, definitely. tony would get along with every member of the crew.

he's a book that takes a little more finesse to get the pages open - written in binary so the translation takes a little work, but she's getting through it, piece by little piece. being orphans is something else they have in common, shepard has learned, and her expression is just a little bit soft as she looks back over her shoulder to him. not pitying - understanding. she crosses back to him leisurely, this time with a smile, letting her eyes fall down first, before tracing back over him, toe to head. lavish and smooth. )

How does it work? If it's F.A.T.E.S., then I'm guessing something like, ( she steps in close, a little bit too close, and finds tony's hand with her fingers, lightly tracing over his callouses before interlocking their fingers. ) this?

[servomotor]

Yeah, ripping off F.A.T.E.S.' energy conversion is going pretty well, [Tony answers. 'Ripping off' sounds as sexy as necessary under the circumstances. His hand is dry, not because he isn't excited, nervous, but because the excitement and nerves of a forty-year-old man who's been through Hell tends to look a little different from what it might for a teenage boy who's never kissed a girl before.] But that's just the power. Actually there are two interfaces. One will go off emotional discharge-- still working on it. It's inefficient.

[The other one-- he leans over and kicks the floor. Something metal goes clank, and then begins to move, shifting, a faint buzz of small motors. A panel rises up on a platform, a hand-shaped print settled on the glassy, luminous surface.] The rest, you can power with your powers. You know, superpowers. Kinetic blast from your biotic. It's-- sturdier than it looks.

The rest of the tech is from Earth. My Earth. Made it a year or two back. [His fingers tighten briefly around hers. Steadily, he lifts her captured hand, splaying his callused fingers through hers. He settles her palm on the panel, his own hand behind it. And from the side of the pedestal, he tugs out two more little devices-- they look like they'll clip onto her ears. Which he does now, easy as you like. Click. Click. It's not painful, not even a little. He thumbs her hair back from her temple, the ringlets snagging at his digit.]

You should know this is character development, for me. Once upon a time, a clandestine government operation had me down for 'compulsive behavior,' 'prone to self-destructive tendencies,' and 'textbook narcissism.' As a function of that, I usually drag people into my world. Not the other way around.

[upside]

Glad I could help your character develop. ( the smile over her shoulder is smug, bemused. fondness finds her features like sunshine finds flowers. ) Lets see ...

( it's heat, mostly, that tony will notice. not absurd or unpleasant -- just a tingle of energy that hits his palm, purple static that shepard concentrates in her arm, building it up before surging it on the platform ... the b.a.r.f. lights up. there's no question to where she'll take them first, even if for a little while they're suspended in dark space, sandwiched between stars that are some light years away and still feel as if they're winking against their skin. she regains her bearings, focuses. and then she thinks.

it's a very urban place. the streets are white and clean and with an undercurrent of technology seeping in the very framework of this place, booming with life in every singular corner, respectable and seedy, the whole nine yards. the air is fresh here. artificial. somehow it's cleaner than the real stuff. )

The Citadel. ( shepard explains. it isn't so crowded, but it is certainly busy, with different alien faces to be found at every turn. an asari holds hands with a krogan. a pizza delivery volus scuttles swiftly past them. ) It's a space station that was left from our ancestors, the Protheans, 50,000 years ago. You could consider it the ... capital of the universe. It's where the Council holds meetings, and ambassadors of all the different races make peace. It's also acts like a cultural hub for all different species. I have an apartment over, ( she points across from them, the flower-like structure of the citadel meaning that on one of the petals, you can look across and see another working at it's own opposite gravity. ) there. Technically it was my Captain's, but he gave it to me as a gift.

Want to meet some of my crew? They should be around here ... if I remember right.

[servomotor]

[The pizza delivery volus is not a pizza delivery system that Tony Stark has ever seen before. He gets momentarily, superficially distracted by its rotund figure and glowing eye lenses bumbling off with boxes in hands. But he's still listening, of course. He'd be listening to her through dozens of decibels of rock music, missile explosions, and the noise of his own misery. A pizza spaceboy isn't going to do much.

The Citadel. Sounds grand, monolithic. It's more hospitable than he'dve thought, somehow; simultaneously reminiscent of sleepy, suburban residential zones and sprawling luxury malls the likes of which you only find in the Middle East or East Asia. Up-and-coming cities with governments investing money in monuments of chrome and glass. Except this place feels somehow low-key. Functional. What is that music, some cross between dubstep and-- jazz? It's smooth and friendly, emanating from a shopfront behind him, to go with the sunny glow of light. Vegetation growing everywhere, and near as many people.

It takes him a disorienting second after Shepard describes the petal to realize the way the structure floats through the limitless recesses of space, how they two of them and thousands of others standing on a platform that has its own gravitational pull generated somehow. The nerd in him immediately begins to grapple with the concept. The skeptic in him wonders if she's embellishing, a little, in order to impress the nerd in him.

But mostly he's a boy, slipping his arm around the waist of a girl, wondering suddenly if her friends would like him. Not that Tony Stark is particularly gifted with caring about the opinions of others, but even he, occasionally, will dabble.]

It ain't Malibu, but it's cute, [he says.] Cozy. I should've guessed you're the type who likes to live in a warren. With 'sidewalks.' And 'neighbors.' Soldier of the people, aren't you? [As opposed to him, he means. Descending from his remote high towers only now and then, to attend parties and promotional events in war zones.] Did you have a best friend? I want to meet him first. Or her. Th--whatever genders that space likes.

[He pauses, blinking as a couple of krogans wander by commenting loudly about seafood availability. Looks back at her, his expression pleasantly blank.]