4357/Opportunities and Lunchies

Opportunities and Lunchies
Date of Scene:	09 December 2020
Location:	Food Court: Triskelion
Synopsis:	Peggy talks to a Stark about her time travel troubles.
Cast of Characters:	Tony Stark, Peggy Carter
Tinyplot:	Times That Bind

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Tony Stark has posed:
"Right there, yep," answers the dark haired, sleekly dressed Stark, with a flare of hand as one of the Triskelion staff members brings out the plate and assorted ordered items on a metal tray. With a simple nod, the plates and the warm mug of coffee are all set down. It's a little unusual, as normally the place is a buffet style, but Stark tends to create his own ambiance of how things work!

He's relaxed at a side booth table, but still in relatively easy view from the door. His assistants that he'd brought along are at their own table out away from the wall, laughing and enjoying some chatter, while Stark himself rests his chin on one hand. In a way, that pose may bring a lot of shadows of the past in - not only is he covering his lower goatee, but it is a pose Stark senior was prone to. Not that Tony thinks about that -- he's mostly ignoring his food while he finishes up with what he'd been doing: fingers flicking across a tablet in front of him in smooth little motions as he scrolls down through the data dump that had been flung his way on arrival at the Triskelion.

Peggy Carter has posed:
While Peggy hadn't been spending a lot of time at the Triskelion since her latest HYDRA hunt started in earnest months ago, the disappearance of Melinda May has kept her close to 'home' far more often, always on call if Fitz or Simmons figures out some other experimental try to going back to where she knows May to be. She's got a letter in her hand now, on old fashioned legal paper that is so aged it's yellowed. She's rereading it for the third time, a deep frown set into her lips, so she's not quite watching where she's going as she steps into the post-lunch rush, somewhat empty cafe. That means when she looks up, she's already halfway across the room and enroute towards Tony's table.

But for a moment, it's not Tony there. It's Howard. She just blinks, that facial hair hidden by his hand and the slightly slouched, thoughtful pose one that is near identical to the same pose she saw Howard in most afternoons for years. She nearly drops the letter, staring, but then shakes her head clear. Tony. She knows Tony, even if they aren't close. She's probably staring uncomfortably long at this point, so she forces her eyes away as she turns to go pick up a cup of the mediocre tea they have on hand. The original goal of ocming down to the cafeteria. She tosses another dark eyed look over her shoulder towards Tony, as if she's still working on confirming it's *him*.

Tony Stark has posed:
Tony doesn't have all of his attention in the letter, and felt the gaze on him. It's a little bit of ships passing in the night, though: he looks up after Peggy has already forced her gaze away. They'd met, but it was months ago. Still... she's in those old photographs, those old memories that generally are put away. It doesn't take more than a beat for him to determine who she is...

And their eyes will meet when she tosses another look his way. He doesn't move -- he hasn't really moved, other than to have lifted his eyes, and she gets a questioning little quirk of eyebrow. Tony's shameless, and doesn't politely back out of situations like this! He'll directly look back at someone, with his open, confident way.

Peggy Carter has posed:
Peg looks a bit different from the photos nowadays -- her previously always long, softly curled hair is now in a curly, rather short bob around her ears. It's far closer to a modern style than she's ever worn before and it mostly hides the healed burn scars along the left edge of her face -- possibly the reason her hair has been chopped. But she's in the same shade of red lipstick she's worn for 80 some years, an old fashioned cut deep green dress and matching T-strap heels. She definitely doesn't look like your regular SHIELD agent. As she catches Tony's eyes on that second look, she gives him a smile that is doing it's best to hide the ache of nostaglia she's been feeling, but probably doesn't totally succeed. She's not been sleeping well lately. It puts her a bit off the emotional game. Or maybe that's just how Starks get to her.

Still, she's also not someone to back down from such a situation. So, letter and tea in hand, her high heels carry her smoothly over to Tony's side. She gives a slight tilt of her head towards the seat across from him. "Expecting someone else, or up for a touch of company? Don't know that I've seen you properly about here before..."

Tony Stark has posed:
"The seat is open, though you may make others jealous: in that scheduling a sit-down with me can be a ...challenging... and rare treat," Tony teases, relaxed, with an open hand spreading across as if he were revealing the seat like a game-show host revealing a new car.

Tony pushes his tablet aside for the moment, snaring the food that had been dropped off, to pull it in front of him, which also drops his other hand away from his face. Still, Tony looks a lot like his father, though most people don't think of it or identify him with that anymore. Not since time passing since Howard's loss.

"And you'll have to witness me eating," Tony warns her. But gestures to the soup he was brought. "Soup?" He'll share, he has a salad he wants more than the soup that came along for the ride. "Unknown flavor."

Peggy Carter has posed:
A husky, muted sort of laugh escapes her throat as he offers the soup and she gives him a gentle shake of her head, "No, no, tea would be just fine. And I learned ages ago actually *scheduling* a sit down with a Stark is an act of foolishness. In fact, it was nearly guaranteed a way to make certain Howard *didn't* remember to show up." Peggy smirks fondly at the thought, amusement behind her dark eyes as she settles in there, crossing long legs neatly beneath the table.

Up close, it's definitely a faint line of burn scars along the left side of her face, and there's edges of her hair beneath the cut which are far shorter, probably burned away as well. But she's artfully hidden the worst of it with make up and doesn't seem self conscious about the matter. It's just a change from those old photos. She sets the letter down, folded shut, both her hands instead wrapping around the mug of tea before her. "What brings you by today? I cannot imagine you came for the thrill of a cafeteria salad. You've better taste than that."

Tony Stark has posed:
"I never thought it was particularly /intentional/," Tony answers about Howard's inability to keep a meeting time. "But no, making time was not really his forte." There's a smooth quality to Tony's indifference about it, but that the words were said at all marks of some deeper scars. A son that doesn't get time with the father leads to some stress, even if Tony's playing it off as it it didn't really matter to him. Of course it did.

"So many call me tasteless; I appreciate your vote of confidence," Tony laughs. He glances at the letter but doesn't ask about it at all. If she explains it, she does. "No, delicious salads aside, some software updates for some systems I designed for SHIELD. Boring visits are the only kind Fury likes with me, looking forward to his sunny face," Tony says, over his own coffee and slight flare of eyes, well aware of how unlikely it will be to get any sunniness from Director Fury when it comes to a Stark visit. For some reason Fury finds Stark to be obnoxious a lot of the time.

Peggy Carter has posed:
A highly skeptical brow is arched in Tony's direction as he comments on Fury's sunny face. Another chuckle follows it, "I do not know that I would use the words 'Sunny' to describe Nicholas Fury. Nor boring." But the thought amuses Peggy. She's studying him a little deeper now, the profiler in her all too easily catching the cracks behind the commentary about Howard. She doesn't push it, but there's a momentary flicker of something bittersweet on her face.

"...well, since you are here, perhaps I can make your visit a touch less boring. If you are up for a challenge..." Her dark eyes flicker down to the aged letter that now rests on the table between them. It's a good distraction from her putting her foot in her mouth again over Howard, or letting herself drown in the nostaglia of missing him just by hearing Tony's voice. Even their language was so similiar. "But... I do know you are a busy man. And time travel is... complicated on the best of days..."

Tony Stark has posed:
Indeed, in Tony Peggy can see something of a reflection of someone else also deeply affected by the loss of Howard Stark. In Tony's case, extremely close family, his father figure. Not that it has stopped Tony from still seeking something in making his dad proud, even if he will never have that pride confirmed.

"Challenge is a word people seem to like when they want to manipulate me via my ego into doing something that is, in reality, probably something I've already done," Tony says amiably, his arrogance certainly in the front. Being arrogant doesn't make Stark /wrong/, though.

"Time travel?"

Tony reacts with a 'yuck' expression. "You wouldn't prefer a ride to the airport? Also terrible," he teases her, making a face. "While obviously not impossible, you can't actually go back and fix something you don't want to have happen; reality isn't like in the movies, like Back to the Future." He made a guess about what her time travel item might entail.

Peggy Carter has posed:
The older woman's nose wrinkles slightly itself at the commentary on time travel, "Trust me, I am incredibly not thrilled at the possibility. It was one of the things I quite FIRMLY forbid your father from considering, and he actually listened. I wouldn't care to think about it at all, however..." Peggy carefully opens the letter, neat red nails flashing on fingertips that smooth over the delicate, old paper's folds as she turns it in his direction to share. If she trusts any mind on these things when she's desperate, well, it's a Stark mind.

"A few days ago, May and I were investigating the site of the first Nitramene Implosion in 1946. The city has received money -- some of it from Roxxon itself -- to do revelopement in the area. There was a distortion discovered and, as we were just starting to investigate, a set of what I can best call six 'goons' tried to threaten us away. A fight ensued. We took care of them but, sadly, May got pulled into the distortion towards the end of the altercation. Along with one of the enemy combatants. Now... I vaguely remember encountering a man who seemed to be wearing black pyjamas, rambling on about the future, back in the late 40s. I thought he was insane at the time. Now..." Peggy sighs deeply, staring down at the upside down letter.

Tony Stark has posed:
"You probably shouldn't have memories of something that occurred in this new time shunt that may have been created. But it could be you're linking something that was from the past and thinking it's related, now, due to your own distortions... Eeeh." Tony's listening, but also continuing to eat. A few of his assistants are looking over, as if to try to guess how long they still have. They resolve that it may be some time, as Tony's relaxed and eating, so they continue to chat and leave them be, for now. If Tony gets closer to his appointment and doesn't seem to notice, they'll remind him then.

"So, nutshell - you've lost an agent into some sort of distortion, which most folks have assumed is this timeline. Honestly, on first glance, that'd be the thing that I'd have your team question. That assumption that it isn't a separate thread, like there is one timestream that you can travel back and forth on like a road." Tony picks up his straw, laying it out like a timeline, and gestures back and forth. "But.."

Tony rips the straw wrapper in the middle, and slides the straw out enough to where it can burst out of the center, and the wrapper creates a lower tangent, "You're probably down here."

Peggy Carter has posed:
The woman is listening attentitively, her head tilting a bit as he comments on the possibility of it being a different timeline. Her red lipped frown only deepens as she looks from the straw he's used to demonstrate and then back towards the letter in his hand. "Alright. I'll concede that might be a possibility here, that we've created an entirely different timeline that Agent May has been sent back to. However... How does that explain the letter?" Peggy asks, fingertips resting at the top of the neat, old stationary and the legal firm that it came from.

"As far as I can tell, and I confirmed with the firm, this has been in their files since 1948 just waiting to be sent. And I have... I swear I can remember bits and pieces. This woman trying to get in touch with me. I'll give to you that it might be my mind filling in gaps from different incidents because it was over 70 years ago, 40 of that I was awake and functional so... there's a lot to remember up here. But Fitz is still a little stymied on it and every passing day we don't get her back..." Peggy falls quiet, not able to hide the guilt from her features so she just scoops her tea up instead. "Well, not worth thinking on yet. We will get her back."

Tony Stark has posed:
Tony hadn't really looked at the letter; his hands are on his food, and he wasn't going to just pick up the old parchment while he had food on his hands. Still, it isn't extremely messy: just a sandwich, but he takes a moment to suck a bit of mayo off his thumb, and then uses a napkin to clean off his fingers.

He clears his throat, giving her a semi-dramatic 'one moment please' lift of a finger, and plucks up the letter to actually give it his attention.

And promptly prove that he can multitask with a perhaps surprising effectiveness. "Okay. So at the very least, distortion going backwards, or re-writing in the splinter we witness -- none of this is great. I'd need more data though, really, to make sense out of it."

Peggy Carter has posed:
"...I know you're busy, and you didn't plan on it, but I'm certain I could get Fitz to share the data we've collected. If you... If you're willing to come on for some help." Peggy gives im a bittersweet smile that isn't doing all that well to conceal the genuine hope behind it. "Truthfully, I'd considered calling you before but... as you said, your appointments are tight. But the first one I'd call for anything like this would have been your father and... Well, if everything I've heard and seen is right, you're as brilliant as he was. If not more so. I could use a Stark's help on this."

Peggy's words are completely earnest, even if she's bracing a bit for a possibly poor reaction to that. It's the first attempt to step into the waters of seeing just how Tony might feel about his father, or how badly messy that passed relationship is now. Peggy's care for the dead man is abjectly clear, she's not bothering to poker face any of this conversation. She's going for the honest route.

Tony Stark has posed:
Tony gives her a doubtful stare, looking at her critically with an upwards angle from under his eyebrows, while he'd had his face still inclined down towards the letter's contents. But then he gives a deep, relaxed laugh: another time where he sounds like Howard. It's the close genetics. He folds the letter and hands it back in two fingers.

"Flattery can get you everywhere, though don't think I don't see what you're doing; I just choose to be flattered," Tony teases her, permissive of it. "Kelly," Tony says, to one of the women at the assistant table. All their chat stops and Kelly turns and gets up to come over attentively. "Agent Peggy Carter, Audrey Kelly. She'll collect all your materials for me, coallate, and bring back to the Tower. I don't intend to go for a dinner salad here."

Audrey Kelly immediately smiles and nods, businesslike, to Peggy. She's on it. "Let me know anytime, Agent."

Peggy Carter has posed:
While it might be flattery, Peggy also seems genuinely a bit more relaxed to know that Tony is willing to work with them on the situation as well. It wasn't just her flattering him, she wanted a Stark mind on the project. Her smile comes a bit more at his laughter, a tumble of memories behind her eyes, but he seems fortuantely too caught up with the task at hand to notice.

Peggy then turns her eyes towards Kelly and offers a her hand for a brief shake, "Ms. Kelly? A pleasure. If you don't mind coming along now, I'll happily get you all the readouts and work that's happened so far. I probably should introduce you to Fitz and actually warn him we've got another set of eyes on the trouble." With that, Peggy stands smoothly, claiming the letter back so it can go into the file. "Thank you again, Tony... I really do appreciate the help. Enjoy your mystery soup." She gives him a little wink then moves to head off with Audrey.