Pepper Potts (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
handing) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
entrancelogs2014-04-28 11:34 am
handing) wrote in entrancelogs2014-04-28 11:34 am
(no subject)
Who: Pepper Potts and Natasha Romanoff; Pepper Potts and OPEN
Where: The mansion starting on the seventh floor, potentially anywhere.
When: April 28
Rating: PG?
Summary: Pepper wakes up in Wonderland.
The Story:
Part One: Locked to Natasha
She’s never needed long to wake up; too many days with more to-dos than hours have made Pepper both an early and a quick riser. Granted, coffee usually also plays a role in that, but panic serves as a good substitute. Her mind is quick to recall those last moments of awareness before she’d blacked out: the tightness of Killian’s fingers around her throat, leaving her unable to breathe or to scream. The frustration in Maya’s voice where there should have been fear, except she wasn’t a friend after all. The realization that they were going to use her to lure Tony into a trap, and that she was absolutely helpless to stop them.
Pepper pushes herself upright with a gasp, eyes wide as she looks around the darkened room. She can’t see much, but she’s been lying on something soft—a sofa, maybe. It’s kinder than she would have expected Killian to be, and Pepper moves a hand to her neck, still able to feel the way he’d gripped her. She can’t see anyone else, and precious seconds, maybe minutes tick by, marked only by the too-loud sound of her own breathing as Pepper tried to piece together where Killian or his henchmen are. Why would they leave her alone?
She’s so preoccupied with looking for some sign of her kidnappers that it takes Pepper too long to realize something vital: she can move. Not only her hands, but her entire body. She stares down at herself in wonder as she stands, scarcely able to believe she hasn’t been tied up. Then again, Killian had been the picture of confidence when they’d met in her office. Maybe arrogance isn’t that far of a leap for him.
Or maybe he doesn’t think she’ll be able to make it out of the room regardless; Pepper’s gaze turns toward the opposite wall, and the closed door that presumably leads outside. Would she need to be restrained if there’s a guard in the hall? If Killian hadn’t thought so, that will be his mistake. She isn’t a superhero, but Pepper also isn’t a damsel in distress. There’s a statuette on a nearby table, something solid and heavy she can use to knock out whoever is waiting for her. Maybe if they haven’t realized she is awake, maybe if they aren’t paying close attention…
Maybe she’ll get herself killed. But in her mind, she can hear Tony’s screaming at her to just go, and Pepper knows she has to try regardless of the risk. She can’t let herself freeze again.
She creeps over to the door with her makeshift weapon in hand, leaning as close to it as she dares to try and listen for some sound of movement beyond. It’s hard to convince herself that they won’t hear her the way her heart pounds in her chest, ruining her plan before it even starts. But if there is someone waiting she can’t tell, and Pepper worked up enough to open the door. No reaction from outside, no rush to restrain her. With no sign of anyone around, she carefully makes her way into the hall.
Part Two: Open to All
So this is Wonderland. It’s…well, frankly, it’s impossible to believe. Pepper makes her way through the mansion almost in a daze, feeling like she has to remind herself with every other step of what Natasha’s said. It’s not that the Agent wouldn’t lie; their first introduction had been comprised entirely of falsehoods, after all. But she’s fairly sure Natasha isn’t insane.
So she wanders the halls, trying to get her bearings and maybe find someone to give her answers. Despite how deeply unsettling this is, she does her best to keep those emotions in check. She hates when things feel out of control, and right now she’s been put in a situation where the only thing she can keep a handle on is herself. Regardless of the utter impossibility of it all, Pepper refuses to break down or to let panic grip her. It won’t accomplish anything if she does. Of course that doesn’t mean she doesn’t look as lost as she is; Pepper’s never been a good liar. That mixed with what she’s been through the past couple of days has left her more frayed than she cares to admit.
Where: The mansion starting on the seventh floor, potentially anywhere.
When: April 28
Rating: PG?
Summary: Pepper wakes up in Wonderland.
The Story:
Part One: Locked to Natasha
She’s never needed long to wake up; too many days with more to-dos than hours have made Pepper both an early and a quick riser. Granted, coffee usually also plays a role in that, but panic serves as a good substitute. Her mind is quick to recall those last moments of awareness before she’d blacked out: the tightness of Killian’s fingers around her throat, leaving her unable to breathe or to scream. The frustration in Maya’s voice where there should have been fear, except she wasn’t a friend after all. The realization that they were going to use her to lure Tony into a trap, and that she was absolutely helpless to stop them.
Pepper pushes herself upright with a gasp, eyes wide as she looks around the darkened room. She can’t see much, but she’s been lying on something soft—a sofa, maybe. It’s kinder than she would have expected Killian to be, and Pepper moves a hand to her neck, still able to feel the way he’d gripped her. She can’t see anyone else, and precious seconds, maybe minutes tick by, marked only by the too-loud sound of her own breathing as Pepper tried to piece together where Killian or his henchmen are. Why would they leave her alone?
She’s so preoccupied with looking for some sign of her kidnappers that it takes Pepper too long to realize something vital: she can move. Not only her hands, but her entire body. She stares down at herself in wonder as she stands, scarcely able to believe she hasn’t been tied up. Then again, Killian had been the picture of confidence when they’d met in her office. Maybe arrogance isn’t that far of a leap for him.
Or maybe he doesn’t think she’ll be able to make it out of the room regardless; Pepper’s gaze turns toward the opposite wall, and the closed door that presumably leads outside. Would she need to be restrained if there’s a guard in the hall? If Killian hadn’t thought so, that will be his mistake. She isn’t a superhero, but Pepper also isn’t a damsel in distress. There’s a statuette on a nearby table, something solid and heavy she can use to knock out whoever is waiting for her. Maybe if they haven’t realized she is awake, maybe if they aren’t paying close attention…
Maybe she’ll get herself killed. But in her mind, she can hear Tony’s screaming at her to just go, and Pepper knows she has to try regardless of the risk. She can’t let herself freeze again.
She creeps over to the door with her makeshift weapon in hand, leaning as close to it as she dares to try and listen for some sound of movement beyond. It’s hard to convince herself that they won’t hear her the way her heart pounds in her chest, ruining her plan before it even starts. But if there is someone waiting she can’t tell, and Pepper worked up enough to open the door. No reaction from outside, no rush to restrain her. With no sign of anyone around, she carefully makes her way into the hall.
Part Two: Open to All
So this is Wonderland. It’s…well, frankly, it’s impossible to believe. Pepper makes her way through the mansion almost in a daze, feeling like she has to remind herself with every other step of what Natasha’s said. It’s not that the Agent wouldn’t lie; their first introduction had been comprised entirely of falsehoods, after all. But she’s fairly sure Natasha isn’t insane.
So she wanders the halls, trying to get her bearings and maybe find someone to give her answers. Despite how deeply unsettling this is, she does her best to keep those emotions in check. She hates when things feel out of control, and right now she’s been put in a situation where the only thing she can keep a handle on is herself. Regardless of the utter impossibility of it all, Pepper refuses to break down or to let panic grip her. It won’t accomplish anything if she does. Of course that doesn’t mean she doesn’t look as lost as she is; Pepper’s never been a good liar. That mixed with what she’s been through the past couple of days has left her more frayed than she cares to admit.
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“Confused doesn’t begin to describe it.” In truth Pepper suspected she had simply gone numb after listening to Natasha continue on about closets and kitchens, all of which were apparently capable of manifesting objects out of thoughts. She pressed her lips together in a fine line, then looked back to Natasha.
“Why did you want to know the date?” Because as nonsensical as all of this still felt, Pepper couldn’t help but try and connect it somehow. Being in Wonderland, surrounded by magic: none of that explained why Natasha had been so insistent on Pepper saying what day it was. Maybe it was a small thing in the grand scheme, but she just wanted to feel like she had a grasp on something right now.
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"I arrived here a week ago, just as unexpectedly as you. I was in DC before that. It was April. 2014."
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Still, she couldn't entirely blame the woman. There were way too many impossible things to cope with, and Pepper crossed her arms over her chest. "I'm guessing you have a way to prove that too?" She couldn't assume it was real. She just couldn't, not when it felt like she was taking her sanity and throwing it out the window.
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Still, she chuckles, her arms crossed over her chest as she shakes her head. "No, not really, although I could try, I suppose. We had brunch in February, if that makes you feel any better, but that's something else you'd have to take my word for."
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She didn’t offer much for evidence from being from the future, but Pepper realized she didn’t really want proof in that moment. When Natasha casually threw out their brunch date, it implied something drastically important to Pepper. “In February. So that means I’m okay? Or I will be.” That she made it through Christmas and Killian alive, and she couldn’t help the hopeful note that found its way into her voice. “What about Tony? Is he all right?”
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She expected questions like that, especially if Pepper's in the middle of what Natasha suspects and she's nodding before the woman even gets all those outs. "Yes. Yes, you're fine. As is Tony. As well as Tony ever is, at any rate. You've actually both been in New York, working on renovating the Tower. From what you said, he had some very... ambitious plans."
She avoids details for the moment about what happened in December in particular, because there's somewhere in the back of her mind that's worried about how all this playing with timelines might actually affect something or someone, but if Pepper wants more than that, she'll do her best to think of something.
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But there was some good news; if Natasha was right, both Pepper and Tony would live past Christmas. Tension bled out of her posture as Pepper let that wash over her; whatever Killian had planned, they would make it through. She would be okay to have brunches by February. In light of what she’d experienced only a short time before, that was a relief to hear.
“I’ve never known Tony’s plans not to be ambitious.” She still hadn’t decided how much of what Natasha had said she could believe, but she’d accepted enough to relax some. Enough to poke a bit of fun at her lover, and even to grin a bit while she did. “Usually to the point of ridiculousness.”
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She moved towards one of the chairs Pepper's office had so thoughtfully provided. "So. I'm sure you have a million and one questions and I'll be happy to answer them if you'll forgive me for answering 'I don't know' to about half of them."
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She followed Natasha's lead, taking a seat in the same place where she always did when she had a meeting in her office. Another thing that still felt crazy, and one Pepper decided she couldn't think too much about. "Especially any that do with the 'hows' of this place?" How things work, how it's all possible, how they ended up here to begin with: she ticked off each in her mind as either unanswerable or unable to be understood, since Pepper suspected it was all very complicated and advanced.
But she could shift to the traditional w's of curiosity, and Pepper crossed one leg over the other, her posture so much like it would be on any other day at work. "I guess I'll move on to why, then. Why are we even here in the first place?"
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She inclines her head at that in agreement, taking a deep breath. "Yes, that's pretty much right. The closest I've gotten to an explanation on how is 'magic', which is a pretty crappy explanation if you ask me, but it's what we've been given to work with. The why... as close as I can gather, it has to do with the fact that this place seems to feed on memories."
That sounds ridiculous and also a little terrifying, so she's quick to explain what she's been told. "Apparently there are... they call them events here, they happen every few weeks apparently. Strange things, anywhere from the strange and benign to the potentially dangerous. If you stumble across anyone randomly breaking into song today... well, lets just say it's been an interesting few days. But after these events people will sometimes be missing a memory. A word, or so I'm told. I haven't witnessed firsthand evidence of this myself yet but the person who explained it to me said it happened to him, told me he can think of a place, can remember being there, but he doesn't have a name for it anymore."
"As for why us specifically?" Natasha lifts her hands as she shrugs, her expression rueful. "We're back to the 'I don't know' portion of this conversation."
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"Maybe they got tired of saying 'I don't know.'" Because to Pepper it felt like the two might as well be interchangeable. Magic or a lack of explanation: either one left them stuck here.
Of course it went beyond simply being trapped, in equally unfeasible ways. Pepper struggled to keep her jaw from actually dropping as the explanation went on, to events and stolen memories, and the frequency with which they happened. Pepper stayed silent throughout; what could she even say to something like that? But the horrified look in her eyes likely spoke volumes regardless.
Ironically enough, the next time she found words was when Natasha again claimed uncertainty. Why them specifically, and Pepper slowly shook her head. "Maybe whoever is responsible has a twisted idea of supply and demand." After all, if they're just being brought here, their world could have been seen as a missed opportunity for now. To meet their demand for memories, those in operation of Wonderland created a supply. Their group had a vast array to choose from.
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"There's still a lot of information I'm trying to sort through, but I'll answer what I can for you. We're contained here within a confined area. I'm not sure how far it extends exactly, but I've been told when you reach the end, you're either turned back or you pass out and wake up back where you started. This includes going up, apparently. There's the mansion here, which you've woken up in, where most people caught here live. Outside, there's gardens, a stable, orchard. An ocean and forest to two sides of us, although from what I've heard, the forest doesn't sound very safe. Steve and I have been working towards getting a better feel for our surroundings, but we got a bit of a late start, he had some healing to do when we first arrived."
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Thankfully Natasha chose that moment to continue on, and Pepper once more turned her focus entirely to the other woman. Basic geography and exploration, things that were good to know that Pepper might be unlikely to discover for herself. But then Natasha casually lets the fact that Steve had been hurt out, sparking her concern.
"Steve needed to heal? From what?" She knew well that enhanced recovery was on the list of benefits granted from the serum; to think that he'd had an injury bad enough to prevent him from exploring wasn't a comfort.
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Where does she even start? How do you just drop this on someone who wasn't there to live it and not make it sound... completely crazy and terrifying? She took a deep breath, then sighed heavily, tucking her hair behind her ear as she chose her words carefully.
"Things happened. There was an attack on Fury and then there was an attack on Steve and... We followed the information to the source. It wasn't pretty. Hydra wasn't destroyed back in World War II when Steve destroyed the Red Skull. We all thought it had been, but it's irritatingly more resilient than that, apparently. It's been hiding within SHIELD all this time, growing stronger. No one knew it was there, that they were there. Not even Fury. We found... some nasty evidence. In the end, the two were so deeply entangled that we couldn't expose Hydra without exposing a lot of SHIELD too. Not to mention Hydra wasn't overly willing to cooperate."
"Steve... it was a tough fight," she finally concludes, glancing over at the woman across from her, her expression serious and grim. "We might have made a mess of DC a bit. At this rate, we're going to get ourselves banned from the east coast for laying waste to all the major cities."
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But even with the certainty that things had gone horribly wrong, Pepper didn’t have a chance of being prepared for what Natasha told her next. Her lips parted in shock as she revealed that Hydra, an old organization history proudly proclaimed defeated, not only still existed but had taken over one that carried the responsibility of global security. SHIELD and Hydra intertwined, and Pepper slowly shook her head, her gaze going distant as she tried to reconcile even that much.
“The west coast isn’t exactly better off.” In the end, she simply couldn’t. Hydra and SHIELD being so deeply connected, and what it implied about so many people she had met and known? Destruction of major cities was far easier to absorb, and didn’t that speak volumes about what she’d just heard. “The Chinese Theater just got blown up…are you okay?” Because it occurred to Pepper in that moment Natasha didn’t say anything about herself. Steve had needed time to recover, so what did that mean for the woman who wasn’t a super soldier, but had been just as deeply involved.
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She brushes off Pepper's question about herself with a casual flick of her fingers. "I'm fine. I had the easy job, I suppose. Playing hacker again." Which completely minimized the other dangers they had faced, but she and Steve had agreed to keep those quiet for Bucky's sake.
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Like Natasha, she brushed off the thought of her house and Tony's mistakes with a wave of her hand. "He got us out of there. That's what's important." He'd used that armor to protect her rather than himself, only calling it back when she and Maya had been safe. He'd come so close to dying that the public at large thought he had. Pepper too, until she got that message.
But that was still too recent, only a few hours in her past. Pepper collected herself again, focusing on Natasha rather than her own situation. "That's fortunate. I'm glad you're all right." That another person she knew hadn't ended up in the hospital, helpless and clinging to life.
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Everything else was still a mess of course, but...
"Me too. And now we're here. Never a dull moment."
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"No, I guess not. And Tony hasn't even shown up." Pepper almost, almost added a yet to that. Years of experience had conditioned her to expect Tony to show up in the most blaring, inopportune, and brilliant ways. But there was no guarantee he would. The part of her that prepared for eventualities reminded her of that, her own practical nature that Pepper didn't care so much for at the moment.
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"At least it's a simple process." If a highly unorganized one, which Pepper disliked on principle. In this case, however, she was tired enough to appreciate a lack of red tape to go through. "Which floor are we on, anyway?"
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"We're on the seventh floor. These rooms are ones we've already staked out," she adds, pointing to the ones chosen by the rest of them that had shown up here so far. "But there's still plenty around here that are unoccupied. Help yourself."
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She closed her eyes, forced a particular image to her mind. It wasn’t the room she and Tony shared, but rather her own apartment from before, spacious and modern in design. She opened the door a moment later, sighing out in silent relief when she saw exactly what she had pictured rather than the rubble that had once been Tony’s mansion.
“There’s no place like home, I guess.”
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