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[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

[Pre-shatterverse - warning for spoilers for Iron Man]

It starts in the sky, several hundred feet up. There's a light and a bang, and something appears.

It's metal (though not actually iron), and roughly man-sized (and -shaped), and its colouring is a bright mixture of gold (an alloy, actually) and red (hot rod). It's also falling.

And shouting. "JARVIS–!"

As it tumbles towards the Earth various rockets and stabilizers fire and misfire, with pfft! pfft! sounds like fireworks going off. They do very little – something's been knocked about, jumbled. Internal systems are scrambling to pick up navigational landmarks, satellite signals, air traffic transmissions, anything that would give a clue as to where here is and how far down is down. But there's nothing to pick up. It's like the whole world's gone radio-silent.

Locked in an uncontrolled spin, something within the metal man shouts, "Stabilize, damn it, stabilize!" It throws its arms up to fire palm-mounted boosters: coupled with flaring back-mounted spoilers, these halt the spin, but not the fall. Which means that the metal man now has a really good view of the ground that is rushing up to meet his face.

This is going to hurt.

Comments

[mahdokht.livejournal.com]

Someone else is flying, it seems, on wings of gold.

She is contemplating saving him.

Or seeing how big a hole in the ground he makes.

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

It is possible that the metal man boggles at her as he falls past (though it's hard to tell, considering the mask).

That was an angel, he is thinking, So I'm about to die, and incidentally lose Pascal's Wager.

[mahdokht.livejournal.com]

Beat.

Beat.

Be-

She snaps out a hand, magic to freeze him mid-air.

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

– Oh. Not dying anymore.

Not flying, either. Running on automatic, the suit's boot-rockets fire a couple more times (pfft! pfft!), utterly useless.

As the metal man attempts to twist about: "Okay. What caught me?"

[mahdokht.livejournal.com]

Josh swoops closer - a curvy girl who looks like she wouldn't be out of place anywhere in the Middle East. At least, as far as that dark skin and hair is concerned.

The jeans are just a bit too tight and that blouse just a little too short-sleeved, really.

"Me."

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

The red-and-gold head pivots towards her, taking her in with glowing eyes. "Okay, hello." He doesn't sound nearly as freaked out as he probably should, this high off the ground. Probably thanks to the tight jeans.

"Thank you for not letting me die. Unless this is the part where I sit here while my life flashes before my eyes. Because I'd rather skip that."

[mahdokht.livejournal.com]

She looks amused.

"Sadly, outside of my powers. I can show you how you are going to die, but that's always depressing. Care to be on the ground?"

[untidiness.livejournal.com]

Well, fuck.

That is majorly unusual.

The wind blowing against his metal shell turns strange for a moment, and then there's a woman there, floating quite impossibly underneath him and trying to hold him up with arms made of directed air.

It doesn't work very well. He slows, but not enough.

Damn bloody quirky mortals and their damn bloody quirky armour.

"What the hell," says Sky, all in one breath because air spirits don't need your paltry mortal lungs, "are you hi I'm Sky and if I can get through that damn helmet I can stop you going splat."

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

If there's an appropriate way to react to being caught in mid-air by an attractive translucent blonde, Tony doesn't know it.

"You're not an F-22," he tells her, voice made to echo and growl by the suit.

[untidiness.livejournal.com]

"I'm an air spirit, and you're in a hermetically sealed tin can falling too quick for me to catch you properly, open up if you want help."

For the record: translucent, no. Intangible, yes. And all right, a little blurry at the edges. It's the speed.

[ooc: unless the suit isn't airtight. She'd know; I wouldn't. XD]

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

Tony considers the possibilities.

On one hand, he may have been struck upon the head, and this is all part of the subsequent hallucination. Which would mean he'd be opening his helmet for no reason, except maybe to go unconscious from lack of proper oxygen before hitting the ground. (Which could be a good thing.)

On the other, this is real, and he should – no, no, this is definitely an insane hallucination.





...But just in case, maybe he should open up anyway. He's kind of low on other options. And he could just close the helmet again anyway. (Also, she's cute.)

"Okay," he says, hesitantly. "I'll let you in. But for the record, if you're not real, I'm going right back to trying to get the stabilizers to work properly."

There's a brief hiss – carried away by the rushing wind – and the suit's faceplate slides back.

[untidiness.livejournal.com]

And Sky darts her head forward and kisses his cheek.

It's... hardly even perceptible under all the other air movement going on here, to be honest.

But the effects are noticed immediately; for one thing, he stops falling as though his line to gravity has just been cut.

"Hi," she says cheerfully. "Again."

The other noticeable effect is that now she can... sort of touch him. Sort of. Her presence has an effect on him slightly more tangible than 'the wind is blowing in your direction', at least, though it's very much not easy to tell through that suit.

"Now that I've given you an air-blessing and saved your life, do I get to know your name?"

[ooc: And you are free to have him keep the little green lip-print on his cheek and accompanying ability to flip the finger to gravity at whim for as long as you like! In his business it will probably come in handy!]

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

Tony, frankly, is not surprised by the kiss. This isn't the first time a random woman has made romantic advances out of nowhere, although this is probably the furthest lengths any of them has gone to do so.

...And the first time any of them has had that effect on him. (The floating, that is.)

"Okay, not falling. Hoping this is real. I – you don't know who I am?"

[untidiness.livejournal.com]

"Should I? You some kind of celebrity back home?"

Sky... grins.

"That's kinda cool."

...DAMMIT WHY CAN SHE NOT STOP FLIRTING WITH THE MORTALS.

[divisiblebynone.livejournal.com]

The good?

There's someone there to catch him, sweeping in at the last moment to catch Tony in a cradle hold.

The bad?

He's nowhere near as attractive as the other two rescuers. On the young side, male, dressed only in a pair of jeans, his bear chest bearing a scar that looks remarkably like a super heros emblem.

"Maybe you should leave flying to those who are naturals at it."

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

It takes a moment or two before Tony has recovered enough from the shock to respond to respond.

"I didn't realize there were people who were naturals at flying." There's a pause before he adds, "You are kidding me with this, right? Carrying me around like some damsel in distress?"

[divisiblebynone.livejournal.com]

"You prefer I sling you over my shoulder? Or maybe I should've-" No, a hero doesn't threaten people with dropping them. You're a hero Clark, no matter what they've done to you.

"You should be grateful I saw you fall."

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

"Oh, I'm grateful, don't get me wrong, I'm grateful. I'm also very acutely aware how this must look to impressionable youths or... young ladies who might otherwise look up to me. You know. Gotta maintain a good image for the people."

Tony will put this thought into practice at his next press conference, where he will do his best not to sit on the floor, eating cheeseburgers.

[divisiblebynone.livejournal.com]

Clark comes to a rest on the ground, setting Tony down. "Interesting outfit you've got there. Does it help you make a 'good image?'"

He's interested. He had armor, once, no twice. Lovely stuff.

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

Ahhh, wonderful, wonderful ground. Tony bounces a bit on the balls of his feet in celebration, rolling his shoulders and twisting his neck to make sure everything's still functioning.

"You know, I don't know. Haven't really thought about that. It certainly looks pretty heroic, at least since I painted it red and gold. Though maybe that's reminiscent of the USSR with some people, who knows."

He shrugs.

[victoryisboring.livejournal.com]

Giant metal things (of whatever construction) plummeting from the sky are the sort of things which draw Mai's attention. Also... that looks painful.

She checks the blades in her sleeves and then ensures that her sleeves are pulled down to cover them before approaching. Being heavily armed while appearing to be a harmless teenager has been useful a few times in this world already, after all.

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

After the noise and dust start to settle down, a long furrow in the Earth becomes visible. The trail of overturned grass and soil stretches for about a hundred metres from where it begins, to where it ends in a large mound of dirt and metal man.

The mound is groaning.

[victoryisboring.livejournal.com]

"Well," Mai says to herself (though might just happen to be loud enough to be heard from the mound), "That looked like one of the most intelligent th ings I've seen anyone do around here."

[its-ironic.livejournal.com]

The groans stop.



"I don't know who or where you are, but you are very funny."

A helmeted head slowly stretches up, and eventually cranes towards Mai. Dazedly, "Oh. There you are."

[victoryisboring.livejournal.com]

... Mai answers.

"Do you do this often?"