Age of Charon

“Yes, Mr. Beck. Ms. Potts would like to set up a time…” Bambina spoke with the inventor on the phone as she checked the CEO’s calendar. The office door opened, Benjamin entering with the R&D files Ms. Potts would have to look over during the flight. God, the paperwork. Those children down at R&D probably set their floor on fire more than they actually ever developed anything useful.

She signaled the man to leave the files on her desk, as she continued. “Yes, she is available Thurs—.” A loud clang shut her up. What the—? That sounded like it came from… No, it had to be from the phone, right?

She looked up at Benjamin who also looked surprised. She asked anyway. “Did you hear—?” The sound of shattering glass was loud and clear this time. Bambina hung up.

She started dialing security on her smartphone even as she rose and followed Benjamin out of the door.

“Shit!” He swore before hastily backtracking a couple of steps, hitting her as she advanced before he could consciously stop.

More cracks. Horrid screeching as glass scraped across the floor tiles. The call connected. Still, she pushed Benjamin out of her way. He let her through.

“Hogan speaking.”

There was a man on the floor. Mr.— Mr. Ultron. The 4 o’clock.

Not that he was well-put any longer. His hair had come undone, curls tangled with pieces of what once had been a tall mocha-colored vase as part of the hallway decor. His suit was creased and—and was that a burnt scent she was smelling?

Bambina walked forward. Where was Ms. Potts? Was she still in her office? The acrid odor was now getting stronger.

“Arbogast, can you even hear me?” The Head of SI Security shouted through the phone. And no, she hadn’t really heard him.

The sleeve of Mr. Ultron’s jacket had smoke singing away at it. Could he not feel it? Could necks even bend the way his was? Was she supposed to check his pulse?

“Hogan, come on the executive floor. There’s been a—,” A what? A murder? Had someone attacked him?

Ms. Potts!

She looked at the office doors. A wood and glass compilation, each side about 50 pounds, had come off at the hinges, only the right barely hanging, the other cluttered over the floor.

She ran over it. Benjamin had been faster.

“Ms. Potts!” He shouted once inside the office.

The waiting room was not the mess she thought it would have been. It was reasonable. Wouldn’t she have heard the noise otherwise?

One of the chairs had fallen over. Ms. Potts’ computer was on the floor, its screen broken.

She felt hot and her skin felt dry, even as she was breaking a sweat. She was nervous. That man had died. Virginia couldn’t be—, could she?

“Hogan, there’s a dead man, and we haven’t seen any other attackers. You need to come ASAP—,” she spoke over the department head’s questions.

Why was she smelling campfire?

A shout came from the office. That sounded like Benjamin. No. Virginia, she—.

The younger assistant ran out of the office, right as the fire alarm started screeching all around them. The sprinkler system activated, water drenching her in moments.

“Benjamin!” She shouted as the man hurried out of the waiting room. It was useless, she could barely even hear herself over the alarm.

Why had he left? Was Mr. Ultron’s killer in the office with Ms. Potts? Was he armed? Was she… was she hurt?

Before she could make up her mind over whether to enter the office to check on her boss anyway, someone appeared on the inner entryway.

Relief swarmed Bambina. Ms. Potts. She was OK. But the relief was short-lived.

“Bambi!”

Ms. Potts was on fire. Her skin was blazing a dull red, her eyes bright orange, her suit set aflame at places, burning undaunted by the artificial rain.

She couldn’t believe her eyes. Ms. Potts shouted something. Bambina didn’t hear. Pain burst behind her head. Her sight went black, and she fell on the floor with an empty thud.

*   *   *

Their fight had moved out of the office and into the waiting room. She had taken advantage of Ultron’s hesitation as he handled her to run out and away from the office windows. The easiest way for Ultron to kidnap her and escape would be by flying out that way, and she couldn’t let that happen. Extremis-enhanced strength and still, her knuckles bloodied from the two times she managed to punch him. From his irritated reaction, the heat and fire blazing across metal had been more of an issue than any punch.

She wished she could use more fire. But any more heat and she might self-explode.

Ultron followed her out of the office but flew across the waiting room for the outer doors, blocking her exit before she could make her way through it.

“I must ask Ms. Potts.” he started, “When did you start learning martial arts? Does Tony know about it?”

Pepper took advantage of the pause to calm her breathing. Her skin had started to turn somewhat orange. “Self-defense. After Killian. One kidnapping was enough for me.”

“Wise.” He said as he began moving towards her. “But you can see that you will lose, correct? Why destroy your office in the process?”

“Pride. Why hide your intentions from Tony?”

He smiled, but it was an ugly, disjointed thing. “Pride.” He jumped on her, with greater force than before. She stepped back, circled at his lower side and punched. He parried her blow, with a speed faster than her eyes could follow. On instinct, she charged her skin, the hit of her touch making him hiss as he quickly let go before he could make to grab her arm. She moved forward, her palm pressing on his abdomen and she breathed out. Heat surged from her skin and poured over Ultron’s body. His shirt brunt to cinders in seconds. The acrid smell reached her immediately, a smell she had had to get used to over the past 18 months.

Perhaps her willingness to hurt him had surprised Ultron for he suddenly lost any carefulness in his demeanor and punched on the stomach, her body falling back, knocking a chair in the process. She curled around her core, the tang of blood filling her mouth and vomit at the back of her throat. She had cut her tongue on her teeth. She spat the disgusting taste on the floor as she tried to stand.

“I apologize for that.” Ultron said. “I hadn’t realized that you could reach such temperatures without burning through your own flesh.”

“So?” She said, as she tried to think of something, anything that could delay this. “Will you go for the kill next time I surprise you?”

She needed to somehow let Tony know that Ultron was doing this on purpose. Of all the times to have disabled the cameras. Ultron probably corrupted them for this very reason. And JARVIS was no longer watching 24/7. Dammit.

A phone call. She needed to make a phone call.

“I am trying not to hurt you!” he raised his voice, frustration in every line of his body. “It’s a tad difficult when neither of us has any actual experience of how to go about it.”

He stood over her as he sighed. “Now, I’ll have to kidnap another doctor to help with your injuries.” He reached to carry her, but before he could, Pepper braced against the floor and used every bit of her Extremis to kick Ultron on his chest. Pain raced across her legs as she heard more than she saw Ultron’s body being thrown across the doors and into the hallway.

Immediately, she got up, walls dancing as vertigo made itself known. She ran to the office, grabbing the first phone she saw and called Tony’s number. Her skin was shining scarlet, her skirt was burning and her feet looked like she had 3rd degree burns. She could barely feel them.

The call connected.

“Tony, Ultron—”

“I've got no strings,

To hold me down…”

The Pinocchio song blared on the other side of the phone. What was this? She stared at the screen, before she realized this was not Tony’s Ultron-free invention. Fuck.

She threw the phone away and searched for her other one. The bag! She remembered placing it in her bag.

She had just grabbed it, when she started losing control of her flames. No. No. Not now. Her worry was exacerbating Extremis. She ignored it as she searched for it.

“Ms. Potts!” A shout drew her attention. Despite the lack of time, her attention was drawn.

“Ben?”

The young man took one look at her no-doubt hideous sight and screamed, running out of the office.

“Wait!” She could have him deliver the message. But it was too late. He had left. The faux fur decorating the frame of the bag smelled like plastic as it burned.

The fire alarm activated. Her head throbbed at the noise. Water rained from the ceiling, each droplet a knife of ice on her skin.

Where the fuck was that phone?! She stood up again, barely. She grabbed a pen and one of the files that had fallen on the floor. She opened it, the papers inside —financial reports judging by the tables— at least somewhat dry. She covered them with her body, so they wouldn’t get wet, as she hurried to write her message. She finished quickly, not daring to write too much, in case Ultron came back and saw what she was doing. She placed them back in the plastic file and hid them under her table.

Then she got up to search for her phone again. She should at least show some attempt at a plan when Ultron returned.

The vertigo wasn’t going away and her vision was starting to blurry. Did she have a concussion? She swayed as she walked to the doorway. Maybe it was in the waiting room?

Where was Ultron? Why wasn’t he here yet? How long had it been since she kicked him?

Two familiar figures greeted her in the adjoined room.

“Bambi!” She shouted, voice drowned by the ringing alarm. Ultron stood behind her. The woman hadn’t noticed yet.

“Bambi, careful behind you!” The secretary didn’t seem to hear even as Ultron knocked her out.

“I think this is enough, Ms. Potts.” He said, although his lips didn’t move. Neither did his neck, nor chest imitate breathing as he had been all throughout the meeting. Had she broken or melted something important?

Good, she thought with a sudden surge of vindictiveness.

“Oh, is it really?” She said, letting the door frame hold most of her weight. She might need medical care. “For a second, I thought I was swallowing back the taste of my cherry lip gloss and not my blood.” She couldn’t exactly ask for a doctor after making all that fuss about fighting now, could she? He’d know something was up.

He moved toward her. “Phone didn’t work?”

She gnashed her teeth. “Couldn’t do things by halves, now could you?”

“Nope.” He said as he placed his hands behind her back and her knees to carry her. She tried to protest but every movement of her feet felt like burning all over again.

“I hope it was worth it.”

As the water dripped down her face, she tried to calm her breathing. Tried to rein Extremis in.

“Oh, shut up and go kidnap me a doctor.”