[ If for whatever reason someone ever tasks Tony with describing his life to them as succinctly yet meaningfully as possible, he'll either go with 'a series of elaborate cosmic jokes told in an incredibly tasteless manner with deeply unsatisfying punchlines' or just scream at the top of his lungs for, like, five minutes straight. Because it just has to be now, right the fuck now, when Tony has just barely crawled up from the lowest fucking low he has ever been in a lifetime of very low fucking lows, that he just so happens to quite literally run into--by sheer unbiased coincidence--the man who'd murdered both of his parents, standing there at the vending machine like the world's most normal dude.
And talking to him. Like the world's most normal dude.
Is Tony just going crazy? Like, is that really what's happening here? After all, the last time Tony saw Barnes was when he'd been red-blind with fury and firing fucking tank missles at the guy's face at point blank range; there's no way he's looking at Tony right now cool as a cucumber like he's a just some particularly odd-looking passerby at the subway station. Does Tony really look all that different? It's a distinct possibility that the guy just doesn't recognize Tony's current visage, corpselike as it is.
But hang on. There's another possibility, isn't there? The same one that explains how he and Strange are both here after having been plucked from different points in time. Barnes could be from the past or future or even some other reality if all this magic shit is to be believed, but (surprising exactly no one) that doesn't make Tony feel any better. If anything, it's all an even bigger cumulative clusterfuck now.
All of this whirrs through Tony's brain in the scant few seconds that it takes for Barnes to start and then finish speaking, screeching to a halt when the man finishes his sentence and Tony is presented with a series of conundrums: Does he still ask the guy for caffeine? Does he try and mow him down with his wheelchair? Does he spin around on the spot and speed the fuck out of there like a bat who just passed by Ozzy on its way out of hell? Decisions, decisions. ]
You son of a bitch, I'm in
And talking to him. Like the world's most normal dude.
Is Tony just going crazy? Like, is that really what's happening here? After all, the last time Tony saw Barnes was when he'd been red-blind with fury and firing fucking tank missles at the guy's face at point blank range; there's no way he's looking at Tony right now cool as a cucumber like he's a just some particularly odd-looking passerby at the subway station. Does Tony really look all that different? It's a distinct possibility that the guy just doesn't recognize Tony's current visage, corpselike as it is.
But hang on. There's another possibility, isn't there? The same one that explains how he and Strange are both here after having been plucked from different points in time. Barnes could be from the past or future or even some other reality if all this magic shit is to be believed, but (surprising exactly no one) that doesn't make Tony feel any better. If anything, it's all an even bigger cumulative clusterfuck now.
All of this whirrs through Tony's brain in the scant few seconds that it takes for Barnes to start and then finish speaking, screeching to a halt when the man finishes his sentence and Tony is presented with a series of conundrums: Does he still ask the guy for caffeine? Does he try and mow him down with his wheelchair? Does he spin around on the spot and speed the fuck out of there like a bat who just passed by Ozzy on its way out of hell? Decisions, decisions. ]
I was. A very short time ago. Semantics.
[ Oh. Apparently he's just. Replying. Okay. ]