49|| tony talk

"Kid, you're not an adult. You can't deal with these things alone anymore."

Midtown High, Queens, New York, November 2016-

"Hello Midtown Tigers, and welcome back." A half smiling Betty Brant spoke over the TV monitors of Midtown High, sitting next to Jason Ionello. "Finals are soon approaching, so make sure to get some rest and study hard."

An awkward news logo popped up, showing the words "Breakout Breaking News." A loud noise that was common with the change of a story on the news show blared, the kids awkwardly hidden behind the huge logo. When the glitching logo finally disappeared, Betty Brant and Jason Ionello were still sitting behind the screen.

"Earlier this weekend, local superhero and vigilante Breakout sent out a message to all New York residents." A fuzzy screenshot of the video of the superhero popped up on the screen, covering Betty's face as Jason spoke. "Later that day, the superhero was seen at Queens Theater in the Park, fighting against a supervillain named Absinthe. We have video from the scene from one our our journalist-" Jason was cut off by Betty clearing her throat, interrupting the boy. "Witnesses on scene."

The video started small in the corner, poorly edited to slowly zoom up on the big screen. It was from the perspective of Jess Cabelo, surprisingly sober and not hungover from Thanksgiving. The video, shot selfie style, showed Breakout on top of a cop car, trying to get witnesses away. "The craziest thing just happened! Breakout just- well she, she just kind of zoomed on in and-" The phone video was cut off, a scream sounding over the video as the visuals went black. The sound of glass shattering could be heard before the video cut out.

"Luckily, no one was hurt in the big showdown, and minimal damage occurred." Betty stated, cutting Jason off before the boy could even start to speak. A picture of the now pretty damaged Queens Theater was shown, Betty looking at it in slight shock. Clearing her throat, the girl clasped her hands on the table, her eyes darting away from the camera.

"Now to a new segment on the show, Behind the Mask." Jason smiled, his lips pressed into what could be described as the most unwelcoming smile. A crappy logo with Spider-Man and Breakout twisted onto the screen, transitioning the scene. People were being interviewed about who they thought Spider-Man and Breakout were, no one listing explicit people. Familiar and unknown faces flew past, no one listing anyone that they suspected. That is, until Michelle Jones appeared on the screen, saying that she had her suspicions, and then looking out over to where Alison, Peter, Skylar, and Ned sat.

The breaking news logo appeared again, the segment quickly over. The two began talking about some new thing in the cafeteria. Alison had tuned out the two awkward kids by then, unlocking her locker with a sigh. Chucking her backpack carelessly into the locker compartment, she took a deep breath out, her shoulders still on the mend from Friday afternoon.

Alison was exhausted. She had sent Christa home (on a flight this time) back to Iowa Sunday afternoon, spending the rest of the day out fighting crime with Peter. She had to wear her old suit, with a half-assed poorly crafted mask until Peter swooped in and saved the day, whipping her up a domino mask that matched the colors of her suit from the battle in Leipzig. After getting a costume upgrade, the two had spent the rest of the night fighting smaller crimes in the Queens area, getting back to their apartment complexes early into Monday morning

Shutting her locker with a silent yawn of irritation and exhaustion, the girl grasped the two books she had for her next class in her right arm, walking away from the busy area. The news blared all over the school, the little TVs tucked in each hallway all saying the same news. Alison walked out of the upstairs hallway that her locker was in, taking each stair by two until she made it down onto the main level.

Looking around her and seeing none of her friends in sight, Alison made her way through the busy hallway, trying to keep clear of the busy center of teenagers. One kid, who was running through the hall, barged straight into Alison, bumping straight into her left shoulder. Ali let out a yelp of pain and shock, swearing a string of curse words under her breath. The pain from the burns and the cut still lingered, although it wasn't as bad as the days before.

Sucking in a deep breath, Alison pressed on through the hallway, making it to her first class. Ali slid in right before the bell rang, taking the seat next to Peter. The class was sitting next to their partners for the project, as they would be presenting throughout the week on who they chose as a mathematician. "Hey Peter." Alison greeted, a small smile on her face as she set down her books.

"Hey Alison." Peter greeted groggily, yawning as he watched her sit down next to her. "Nice to see you, bright and early." Rubbing his eyes, Peter stared up at the board. "I brought the project." Tucking his right fist underneath his chin, the boy looked over at Alison for a split second. "Not that it matters too much though."

"Grades are important." Alison protested, almost catching the yawn bug that Peter had thrown out into the classroom atmosphere. "Although I would say I had more fun Sunday hanging out with you than I did on Friday and Saturday on the project."

"Ready to present?" Peter asked, switching the topic from their superhero counterparts to school, pointing with his free hand up at the board. "We're on the list for today." The boy was right, as the first half of the alphabet (going by last names), A-M was going today, and, of course, Alison's last name fell under that category.

"Great." Alison groaned, opening her math textbook to the page where she had lazily stuck the notecards she had made for the presentation. Pulling them out, she placed them on the center of the table, slapping it softly. "Got the notecards ready for whenever we have to present."

"We're fifth, so we've got a little bit of the period to prepare." Peter stated, his eyes flitting up to the clock, and then to the teacher. "Miss Warren said she'd give us five minutes to prep, and we can talk during the other presenters, because they're all probably going to be on-"

"Wigner and Neumann." Alison spoke at the same time as Peter, laughing as he turned beet red. "You know, we had this talk a few days ago about how our project is different and not on some simple physics mathematician. You don't have to be worried, Pete. Even if other people did Noether, they wouldn't put in as much effort as we did." She nudged Peter reassuringly, a reassuring look on her face.

"Okay." Peter took his right hand from underneath his chin, reaching over to grab the notecards. "How do we want to divide this up? You do main achievements and I do the explanations of what they are? You do the background information on her and I do..." The boy checked the last of four notecards, seeing the words plastered on it. "Weapons planning?"

Realizing what notecard that she had accidentally misplaced inside of her textbook, Alison grew embarrassed, taking the notecard quickly before Peter could read anymore of it. "Oh! No. That was for Friday." Shoving the notecard back into the textbook, Alison cleared her throat, looking back over at Peter. "I-uh-grabbed the wrong notecard. Everything was so scattered in my room that-uh- kind of lost track of where some of the stuff was. I remember what the last part was, though, it was-"

"Important terms and vocabulary?" Peter interrupted, chuckling at Alison's scramble to hide the weapon that Skylar and Christa were designing with her for that fateful Black Friday. "Yeah, I remember it too. I have extra notecards, so let me just write some of the important information down."

"Great." Alison smiled, feeling a lot less embarrassed and worried about not having the last notecard. Watching Peter jot down the important terms and their definitions on the notecard (in handwriting neater than the girl herself), it wasn't long before the five minutes of prep were up.

"Alright class." Miss Warren called the class to attention, looking at the chattering sophomore and junior students in front of her. "Our first group going today will be Jenna and Sophia, and they will be presenting on Christiaan Huygens."

The groups went by quickly, the fourth group starting their presentation on Albert Einstein, which made everyone groan. The matematician was the most presented on, as he was the most well known physics matematician. As the group babbled on and on about E = MC2 and other relatively well known theories, Miss Warren walked over to Peter and Alison, tapping Alison on the shoulder.

Turning to see the teacher, Alison was rather surprised. "Miss Warren, can I help you?" She asked, trying to disguise her surprised look. "Peter and I were just trying to work out the last kinks of our presentation, I swear we weren't-"

"No." Miss Warren chuckled, seeing the extra work the two were doing on their presentation's note cards. "Although I'm very happy to see the both of you still working hard on improving your presentation, I'm afraid to say that you'll have to present tomorrow. Someone is here to pick you up, Miss Marnell. Something about a doctor's appointment?"

Alison, not knowing anything about a doctor's appointment, just nodded, deciding to play it cool. It was probably Strange wanting to check up on her or something to do with her uncle. "Yeah, I distinctly remember something about that. I thought they were picking me up after this period, though."

The teacher offered the girl a shrug, handing her the call slip. "Don't ask me, the person picking you said that it was rather important that you come out as soon as possible. Maybe your appointment got bumped up a bit."

Grasping the piece of paper, Alison looked up at her teacher. "Maybe." She muttered, grabbing her textbooks off of the table. Ali turned to Peter, giving him her two notecards she had been refining. "I'll see you tomorrow, I guess?" She whispered, the presentation still going on in front of her.

"Tomorrow." Peter confirmed, grabbing her notecards and neatly stacking them with the rest. "Whatever's going on-" He whispered even more quietly than before, looking side to side at the scene around him. "Stay safe. I know that look doesn't mean anything good about 99.9% of the time."

"No promises." Alison smirked, standing up from her chair and pushing it in with one final wave goodbye. "See you tomorrow, Pete." Placing the call slip on top of her books, Alison ducked underneath the view of her classmates, making her way to the door, escaping out into the hallway.

Checking where the call slip told her to go, Alison walked away from the location it said to go, the office, instead deciding to put her math books away. If she had no clue where she was going, might as well grab her backpack with her makeshift suit and other important snacks in it- right? Scaling the Midtown high hallway steps by two, Alison's vans shoes quietly squeaked against the floor as she ran to her locker.

Ali opened her locker door, still not bothering with locking the thing. Not so carefully placing the textbooks inside, Alison snatched her backpack, slinging it over her right shoulder every so gently. Shutting the locker with a silent click, the girl was on the move again, booking it back down to the office, the green call slip still in her hand.

When Alison had finished her run to the office, she saw a familiar face leaning outside the hallway, sunglasses still on his face, even inside. Slowing down to a stop, Alison just stared at the man in front of her, confused as to why he was at her school.

Tony Stark looked up at the dumbfounded Alison, a snarky smile coming to his face as he pushed off of the hallway wall. "Ah, Miss Marnell, nice for you to finally show up. Come on, we've got somewhere to go and not that much time."

Turning to walk towards the exit doors by the office, Tony didn't even look back at the girl until he was at the door, almost about to push the thing open. His head moving ever so slightly, he gestured to the door. "You coming or not?"

Alison, realizing that there was nothing she could do but follow Tony, ran over to the door, following the man out into the sunlight. The November air, almost chilling down to the bone, was no excuse for the sun not to be shining brightly in the Queens borough. Alison, seeing that there was no huge limo or expensive car in the pick up lane of the school, realized that she wasn't going anywhere- anywhere not by foot, at least.

Waiting for Tony to say anything, one word at all, Alison made her way to Tony's side, looking at him expectantly. "Are you going to talk, or is this going to be some awkwa-"

"You know, I thought after everything that happened on Coney Island, that you would be okay. You and Peter were finally working as a team, I was finally getting you and Peter to open up, to be honest about what you were actually doing in the suits, and then-" Tony stopped, sighing as he took a deep breath in. "Then I see your face all over the New York news. You, you hacked all news channels, got past one of my encrypted firewalls, and, to top it all off, you have a villain that you've been fighting since before Coney Island that you didn't tell me about that almost kills you in the Queens Theater in the Park."

Alison, hearing how angered Tony was, kept her mouth shut, walking down the path that led to the Queens streets with a silent scuffle. She wasn't sure of what to say, but she most certainly hadn't expected this. Sure, she knew that man had seen the broadcast that she had sent over all New York news channels, she even expected it, but for him to get so angry... Ali had only heard stories of the man getting mad from Peter and Skylar, and she knew it meant nothing good.

"You know, I tried. I tried to get Skylar to tell me what was going on, hell, I even tried to get Peter to tell me, but it took me hours and hours of waiting for responses before I got one, and that was from your cousin, my employee, finally fessing up about the situation." Tony snapped, trying to keep some piece of his composure as he continued to walk with Alison. "So, my question is- why, why would you even do something so irrationally idiotic and not even bother to tell anyone? Anyone that counts, that is. Because Peter and Skylar and whoever else you worked with does not count."

Alison, attempting to bite back a sarcastic comment, didn't speak for a moment. It wasn't long, however, before the girl's comment slipped out. "Actually, I did tell someone, and that someone was my-"

"Nu-uh." Tony shook his head, stopping his walk, as the two had hit a crosswalk that required a stop light. "That was a rhetorical question. I don't want to hear how you told literally anyone- anyone! but me, and how you didn't think that I would be of any help in this situation."

Alison wasn't sure what to say, or how to even start to say what she wanted. "I was- I was scared." Alison admitted, brushing a piece of her hair out of her face. "Because if I got you involved, if I got you or Peter involved, it meant that you would become a target. That woman- Absinthe, she was going to stop at nothing to accomplish what she wanted to achieve."

"And what was that?" Tony asked, a small bit of venom laced through his voice. He was slowly starting to lose his angered facade, however, realizing that Alison had been backed into a corner he had been backed into many times before.

"To kill me." Alison said quietly, looking up at the light, which was now the walking sign. Not leaving any time for Tony to react to her last sentence, Alison walked straight across the road, making it over to the other side without looking back.

Tony stopped in his tracks on the other side of the road, the words Alison had just spoken echoing through his head. Alison had been told she would die, and the fact that she had felt so scared to not be able to talk to anyone for it- it was startling. Finally shaking out of the frozen position he was in, Tony ran across the street, barely making it. "K-kill?" He repeated, the idea still shocking to even comprehend.

"Yeah." Alison chuckled, not scared of what those words meant anymore. "And me, worried for what would be the consequences of my actions, of bringing others in, didn't want to risk it. The woman, Absinthe, had told me that if I brought anyone else in, they were doomed to the same fate I was. And I didn't want you, or Peter, or anyone else to get involved, but-"

"Some people got hurt anyways." Tony realized, getting a nod of confirmation of Alison. "Jesus, kid, I-" He stopped, placing his hand to his mouth, unsure of what to say. "Why didn't you just try to tell me? Just telling me, telling me or-" Realizing that there was nothing he could do about the past decisions of Alison, just sighed, dropping his hand. "You know what, what's in the past is in the past."

Alison nodded, unsure of what to say. "It's over now, is what matters. She's gone, and I'm okay. We're all okay. Me, Peter, Charles, everyone, we're all okay." She tried to reassure Tony, unsure of what else to do.

"You know, in some sort of weird way, I'm kind of proud of you. Doing what you did is in no way mentally healthy, but you fought someone almost entirely on your own, without relying on anyone else for help." Tony realized, looking over at the teenager that was only a few inches shorter than him. "And while that might not be the best thing for a teenager to do, you did it. You looked in the face of danger and said, Screw You."

Tony paused, stopping to think about what he was going to do next. "You know, I was about ready to take your suit, for real this time. I was ready to give a lecture about following the law and being responsible, but I realize that you did what you thought was right." His mouth quirked into an expression that only Tony could give, the man pulling something out of the back of his pocket. "Also that my original design for your suit? Not the best. When I was watching your little Breakout Broadcast, not a bad name by the way, I realized that the people need to look into the eyes of their hero, and be able to see them for who they are, and not just a visor."

Handing Alison a small silver box that looked like a Nordstrom's package, Tony placed it in her hands. "Just- don't open it now, okay? It's a surprise better left for home. And as for your suit? If it's all banged up, send it with Skylar, I'll have it repaired and sent back to you." He stated, his wave of anger and emotions over. Placing a hand on Alison's right shoulder, Ali wincing from the impact, Tony looked her in the eyes. "Just promise me you'll be safe. And more open, from now on."

"Promise." Alison said, her hands still tightly gripping the box that Tony had given her. Looking straight into Tony's eyes, her expression was genuine, a promise that she agreed to now becoming a promise she was set on keeping.

"Now, while this lecturing thing has been fun." Tony let go of her shoulder, looking st the Queens neighborhood. "I am famished. Why don't you fill me in on everything that happened and we take a food tour of your little borough?"

"Sounds amazing." Alison agreed, her stomach grumbling at the thought of food. "Let's start with local area treats. If you want a killer cup of coffee, you have to go to Delights. It's the best place in the borough." Gesturing for Tony to follow her, Alison started to lead the man around her second hometown, the two walking off towards what promised to be a better time than what either had expected out of the day.

<~*~>
wow it's resolution time, one more chapter to go
I'm not 100 percent loving the ending, but that's okay, I'll fix it later

anyways we're down to the last 5 days, and one chapter to go / write. there's not much else left to say.

I hope y'all enjoyed, and I'll see you in the next one!

bye

-ash