little piece of heaven (tony stark's daughter)

9

rosie's p.o.v

"here's the plan" dad is crouched in front of me, we're both ducked behind a garden wall in miami. over that wall, past the tens of guards, is the mandarin. well, supposedly, my senses are telling me otherwise but jarvis thinks it's here so we'll go with it. besides, i can't always just trust my powers, for all i know they could be being dodgy or trying to tell me something different entirely. "you get in there, be all cute, use your powers and clear the way for me to come and get them with our baubles". he nods towards the bag containing our homemade weapons.

i nod, a small smile on my face. we've never worked together like this before and as bad as it is, i'm kind of excited. i'm excited to do something bad-ass whilst also using my small stature and long lashes to my advantage. if they underestimate me, that's their problem, they have to deal with the fallout. i'm just doing what i have to do. "got it" i nod. dad and i have rubbed some dirt on my face for effect, the more lost and pathetic i look the better. the various cuts that i've gathered over the last few days really round off the look.

"good, be careful, don't get killed" he pats me on the head and i put myself into stealth mode. come on rooster, you've got this. i flip my hair over my shoulder and dad lifts me up so i'm sat on the wall. sending my dad one last innocent smile, i hop down to the ground and make sure my curls splay around me. then it's showtime. i take a deep breath and force tears out of my eyes. i'm satisfied as soon as a few have run down my cheeks and i can feel my cheeks flush. dad told me it's scary how easily i can cry when i demonstrated to him in the car, but i couldn't do it before i had my powers so i think it's something that came with that.

i can almost see the smirk on dad's face as i intensify my crying and take myself up the path towards a guard who hasn't noticed the bawling child on this 'heavily guarded' property. when he does notice me, however, a gun is pointed right at me. on instinct, i cry harder, realising that i could easily just be shot right now. i look younger than eleven, so i've decided to play on that too, anything to make them underestimate me more than they already will is a major advantage to me.

"how did you get in?" the man barks, his gun lowering a little when he deducts that i'm not much of a threat. if i wasn't crying i'm sure i would have laughed. it isn't hard to climb the wall, even without help from my dad, and i'm eleven. it's a shock to me that this doesn't happen more often. they should expect it, especially whilst supposedly housing a terrorist. several other guards have realised that i'm here by now, and gather around me, all pointing weapons at me.

"i lost my mommy and daddy" i bawl loudly, taking a few of them by surprise. one even takes a step back and drops his gun completely which proves quite amusing to me. it's funny how absolutely terrified of an emotional small child people are when they aren't parents. to be honest if any other child did this i think dad would have a small heart attack too. one, however, clearly is a parent because he squats down in front of me, gun dropped to his side.

he has kind eyes, so i resolve to hurt him less than the others. with direct eye contact, he puts a hand on my arm and searches my face "hi, i'm paul, what's your name?". i'm thankful that this guy at least isn't waiting for an excuse to blow a hole through my abdomen, and i don't really want to mess with him. the thought makes me feel a bit bad, but then i'm reminded that he's here working for a terrorist who's threatening our country and our president, and i suddenly don't even remember what guilt is.

deciding to have as much fun with this as possible, i widen my eyes to an acceptable level of innocence and answer his question "lucifer". it takes everything within me to keep up the snivelling act as all of the guards back away a little on instinct. they're so gullible it's hilarious, i told them my name is lucifer and they assume that i'm the literal devil. i suppose it doesn't exactly calm them down when i allow my eyes to turn purple and my antlers to sprout, my wings unfolding behind me, the usual pure white feathers a crimson red. with a flick of my right hand, i send them all to the ground before calling my bow to me.