Iron Woman - (Fem Iron man X Pepper)

Chapter 26 - Stark Tower

2012

It's been a couple years since the fight with Ivan....I had rebuilt my home in Malibu. Built a building in New York...named it "Stark Tower." Pepper and I were doing great....god I loved her. She still gets worried about others judging us...because we are both women....but in the end, we don't care.

We were just about done with the Tower, I just had to put an energy reactor in the ocean on a pipeline.

I had my suit on as I cut the pipe, replacing the cut with the Reactor I smile and fly right out of the water, past a yacht and all the way to Stark Tower....she was so beautiful.

"You're good on this end. The rest is up to you." I say to Pepper as I near the tower.

"You disconnected the transition lines? Are we off the grid?"

"Stark Tower is about to become a beacon of self-sustaining clean energy." I say.

"Wow. So maybe our reactor takes over, and it actually works?"

"I assume. Light her up." I smile as it powers up...the Stark sign shining brightly.

"How does it look?"

"Like Christmas, but with more... me." I smile.

"Gotta go wider on the public awareness campaign. You need to do some press. I'm in DC tomorrow. I'm working on the zoning for the next three buildings."

"Pepper, you're killing me. Remember the moment? Enjoy the moment." I chuckle.

"Then get in here and I will." I fly down and land on the small pad, walking as my suit gets taken off me.

"Ma'am, Agent Coulson of Shield is on the line." Jarvis says.

"I'm not in. I'm actually out." I smile.

"Ma'am, I'm afraid he's insisting."

"Grow a spine, Jarvis. I got a date." I smirk as I walk inside.

Pepper stares up at the hologram nervously, "Levels are holding steady... I think."

"Of course they are, I was directly involved. Which brings me to my next question: how does it feel to be a genius?" I ask.

"Well, ha, I really wouldn't know now, would I?"

"What do you mean? All this came from you." I smile.

"No. All this came from that." She points to my Arc Reactor, shining through my shirt.

"Give yourself some credit, please. Stark Tower is your baby. Give yourself... twelve percent of the credit." I nod.

"Twelve percent?"

"An argument can be made for fifteen." I shrug.

"Twelve percent? For my baby?"

"Well, I did do all the heavy lifting. Literally, I lifted the heavy things. And sorry, but the security snafu? That was on you." I laugh.

"Oooooh."

"My private elevator..." I point.

"You mean our elevator?"

"Was steaming with sweaty workmen. I'm going to pay for that comment about percentages in some subtle way later, aren't I?" I ask.

"Not gonna be that subtle." She smiles as she pours champagne.

"I'll tell you what. Next building's gonna say 'Potts' on the tower." I smirk.

"On the lease."

"Call your mom, can you bunk over?" I joke.

"Ma'am, the telephone. I'm afraid my protocols are being overwritten." Jarvis says as I sip my champagne.

"Stark, we need to talk." Coulson says.

I pick up the phone and look at Coulson, "You have reached the life model decoy of Y/N Stark, please leave a message."

"This is urgent."

"Then leave it urgently." I say, at that moment the elevator door opens and Coulson appears. "Security breach." I point and turn to Pepper. "That's on you."

"Miss. Stark"

"Phil! Come in." Pepper jumps up.

"Phil? Uh, his first name is Agent." I say, annoyed as I follow her.

"Come on in, we're celebrating."

"I can't stay." Coulson nods.

"Which is why he can't stay." I nod.

"We need you to look this over." He holds out a file towards me. "Soon as possible."

"I don't like being handed things." I sigh.

"That's alright, 'cause I love to be handed things. So, let's trade." She pases her glass of champagne to Coulson, takes the file from him, then takes My glass of champagne while passing the file over to Me. "Thank you."

"Official consulting hours are between eight and five every other Thursday." I say as I walk away.

"This isn't a consultation."

"Is this about The Avengers? Which I...I know nothing about." Pepper shakes her head.

"The Avengers Initiative was scrapped, I thought. And I didn't even qualify?" I ask.

"I didn't know that either."

"Yeah, apparently I'm volatile, self-obsessed, don't play well with others." I roll my eyes.

"That I did know."

"This isn't about personality profiles anymore." Coulson says.

"Whatever. Miss Potts, got a minute?" I ask. Pepper walks over to Me as I place the file into my database. "You know, I thought we were having a moment." I sigh.

"I was having twelve percent of a moment. This seems serious, Phil's pretty shaken."

"How did you notice? Why is he Phil?" I ask.

"What is all of this?"

"This is, uh..." I expand my arms and different profiles appear in holographic form floating in the air in front of us. "This."

Screens appear of Captain America in action, the Hulk roaring as he attacks the army at Culver University, and Thor fighting the Destroyer in New Mexico. Another is of a strange man and the Tesseract.

"I'm going to take the jet to DC tonight."

"Tomorrow." I shake my head.

"You've got homework. You've got a lot of homework."

"Well, what if I....didn't?" I ask.

"If you didn't?"

"Yeah." I nod.

"You mean if you finished? Well, um...then." Pepper bites her lip as she leans forward to whisper in my ear......I'll save the dirty details for later.

"Square deal. It's the last date." I nod.

I smile as Pepper softly kisses me, she giggles as my hand slides down to her ass, "Work hard." She pulls away.

I watch her leave....then turning back to my work.