Steel Meets Iron

Chapter 12

"Rae, what are you doing?"

Raven had wanted to be in his lab while he worked, not because she was interested in what he was tinkering with rather she liked to be around him. He was a little apprehensive about it, since she had this thing with robots. As always she surprised him and began playing with Dum-E, she literally began playing with the bot. Now she looking at a magazine, one with him on the cover. Where in the hell did she find that? He really had to stop turning his back on her.

"Reading. You're daddy's called Howard?" He forgot that she liked to read. "You used to make weapons too?"

Before she got to anymore interesting points he took the magazine from her. "You know if you wanted to ask me about my work you don't have to read about it in a magazine. You could ask me."

"You looked busy."

"I'm never busy for you."

"Unless it's S.H.I.E.L.D. or super important," she countered with a thought.

Smart ass, he thought pinching her nose, "That was a low blow."

She rubbed her nose. "Fine, then do you still make weapons?"

"Not like I used to, I'm very careful about who I sell them to. If I sell them at all. That's it?"

"Did your daddy make weapons too?"

"Yes he did." He hoped that was all she wanted to know about his dad.

"So you have his company now?" He nodded. "So it's like a..." She searched for the word mumbling under her breath. "An inheritance?"

"That's right."

"So when you die am I supposed to make weapons to?"

He dropped the tool in his hand. It suddenly made sense. Raven never did anything without reason, with the presence of S.H.I.E.L.D and Fury offering to take her on a tour of HQ. Why she was reading about the company before Pepper became CEO. She was trying to find her place.

"Who told you that?" He knew she couldn't have come to that conclusion by herself. She wasn't that smart. If she was, he needed to give her an IQ test.

"I read it in the newspaper," she pulled the ripped article from her pants pockets. "So is it true?"

He took the article and read it himself.

Billionaire, super hero Tony Stark a.k.a Iron Man has a new addition to his family. Not that we figured this wouldn't happen. He has enrolled his daughter (from a previous relationship, mostly a fling) into a very prestigious private school in the heart of the Upper East Side. Nothing but the best for the Starks. Will this little elfin beauty be the future owner of Stark Industries? Hard to imagine this little doll manufacturing weapons. Or would she don her father's famous Iron Man suit?

Sons of bitches.

Raven looked at him waiting for his answer. An elfin beauty, a doll, they called her. She was more than that. "I thought you wanted to be a composer?"

"I do," she was curling in. "But... am I supposed to make weapons because I'm a Stark?" She walking on eggshells. "Or be a superhero like you?"

"I'm asking you Rae."

"But..."

"No buts," he rolled up the article and threw it away. "I want you to be you, and if being Raven Rocher-Stark is all about music then go for it."

"Really?" She deflated in relief. "I don't think I would have been good at it anyway." She scratched her head giggling. "I'm really bad at Battleship." She then had an idea, "Maybe if you and Pepper have a baby, it would inherit your company."