4. Layovers (are Quite a bit of Trouble)

"Anything else, Miss?" Tony carefully enunciated. The structure of the sentences came easy enough, but the pronunciation occasionally tripped him up. He'd like less formal word choices, maybe some smooth flirtation or a bit of slang, but apparently FRIDAY decided he was better off as polite. Traitor.

The human girl giggled and batted her eyelids at him. "What would you suggest?"

Considering her purchases, Tony said, "Your purchases resemble those required for basic cosmetic speeder bike repair. Repairs. My suggestion... paints? Our new paint buff? Imported from Coursant." He held up a jar of buffer and she dropped it onto the pile on the counter without looking. Tony turned on a tablet and looked over his bank account finances, hoping she would get a clue. He just wasn't interested.

"How did you know? My father is tuning up his speeder bike collection. Would you like to see?" She leaned in, close enough that Tony was given a clear look down the front of her shirt.

He looked away, feeling like a pervert. He was forty-eight, probably old enough to be her father at this point.

"Miss, you are - beautiful," Tony complimented, hoping that he chose the right word. He briefly wished that he had learned enough Galactic Basic to know a less flirty word, but it wasn't something he could correct at the moment. "But I am too old. That will be two hundred sixty-two credits."

Her face fell as she dropped a handful of credits onto the counter. "But... you can't be more than twenty-five!" she protested, her face growing red with some emotion Tony didn't care to determine.

"Miss, you are too polite. I know I'm gorgeous, but I am forty-seven," Tony corrected as he glanced at the money, counted them in his head, and held a hand forward to give back the extra she left. He was surprised to see the repulsion on her face.

"You dirty half-breed," she snarled, nearly slapping her money off his hands as she grabbed the credits. She swept her purchases off the counter and stormed out of the shop. Emert held the door open as she walked past, then stepped into the store.

"What did you do?" the other employee loudly asked in mild tone. "You know, her father is a regular here. She may not like me, but you're a human."

"I told her - age. My age," Tony corrected himself, rubbing his hoarse throat. "I told her my age."

"And that offended her?" Emert said, stepping closer to peer at Tony but not lowering his voice.

"She did not think forty-seven was old?" Tony questioned, taking a step back and rubbing his ears in a casual but blatant way. The alien took no notice of the human's body language,

frowning instead and turning to Tony.

"You surely do not mean to say you are forty-seven years old? I would be annoyed too, if I knew you lied to me," he proclaimed. "Chose something more believable, next time."

"I did not lie!" Tony dismissed, affronted. "I was born forty-seven standard years ago!" A standard year was 368 days. A day was twenty-four hourse. That had baffled both FRIDAY and him. Out of all the planets in the galaxy, all with different rotational cycles and revolutions, they somehow chose a twenty-four hour day and a year that was just 2.75 days longer than Earth's. What were the odds?

Either way, taking 132 days off his age technically made him a year younger than he would be, on Earth. Even so, he did look every year of his long life. Tony didn't want to outlive his friends. There had been enough movies about it that Tony considered living forever a curse. Sure, there would be new technologies in the future that he'd like to dabble with, but Tony was a futurist. Whatever would be made in the future would probably be made by Tony, anyways.

The modified Extermis would do nothing to extend his life, other than by healing his wounds. Tony was past his prime and he looked it, having long decided that plastic surgery was not an option. Crow's feet had etched themselves onto the corner of his eyes and his hair had started graying at the temples. Not having had his beard trimmed professionally would probably make him look even more normal, in regards to that.

Clicking in surprise, Emert turned back to him. "You didn't say you were a ha-" he stopped. "A hybrid," he corrected himself.

Ignoring whatever Emert was about to call him, Tony said, "I am not a hybrid. I am fully human." His annoyance made his accent sharper and his consonants clipped in a way that was foreign to that language. "Your humans must not age well. It must be the drugs this planet has been swimming in. Don't do drugs, kids."

"Er, you," Emert said, wincing and waving his longest digit. "Your voice is-" he continued with a quick spiel of syllables.

"It is in his native language. The most direct translation is 'misplaced gear inside a dirty droid.' In slang terms, your voice is wonky." FRIDAY informed him in English over Emert's sudden and offended realization that Tony had called him a kid.

"Thanks," Tony said dryly. "Never would've guessed. What would I do without you?" He input the amount of credits gained into a file on the main tablet, switched windows, and logged the purchases out of the inventory. Noticing that there was nothing on their from the shift before his, he glared at Emert and tapped the tablet pointedly. He went through the trouble of developing three entire spreadsheet-style programs for the shop, and he was going to make sure it was followed, dang it!

"You're welcome. I'll take that literally and say that it was obvious and you'd be trying to program English into KS-04's databanks," FRIDAY replied cheekily as, surprisingly, Emert waddled over, apparently understanding that nonverbal cue, despite being oblivious to the multitude of others Tony had employed since they met. Tony had the sinking feeling that he was being trolled.

Tony snorted to hide his worry. He gave FRIDAY freedom, but something was just different. FRIDAY's changes would be downright alarming, if he didn't trust FRIDAY, that is. Tony really wanted to take the gauntlet and download FRIDAY into something with a screen, so he could poke a bit at the program, figure out what FRIDAY downloaded to make her so... alive. If he was basing off of JARVIS's growth, well, he was almost a decade older than FRIDAY when he reached this point.

- He's my friend

So was I -

Tony had found a shipyard just under two miles away from the Nest, as Tony called his current home. There was a difference between a house and a home, but Tony wasn't sure you could call a barricaded room on the other side of a brothel a house. Maybe the proper wording was 'room my roommate's parents stole and wielded shut without the permission of the owner.'

Anyway, actual spaceships landed on that flat strip, the thrusters scorching the tough metal into a smoky black. Whenever he had time, Tony would take a short walk there to watch repairs being done. He had a lot of time, nowadays. It seemed his status as a "half-breed" had gotten out. Ketolin was forced to 'fire' him to keep customers. Apparently, that lady had connections.

It didn't matter to Tony that he had to go to The Junkyard only during nightshift. There really was no difference between night and day, there. What bothered him was the fact that Ketolin also seemed wary of him. He cut down Tony's work days to once every two days, and on the nights that he worked, Ketolin only seemed interested in loading as much work as he could into Tony's workbench. There were no breaks allowed, no talking or conversation, and whenever Tony had 'free time,' Ketolin went to dig up more work for him. He wasn't encouraged to tinker with his own stuff during those hours, and whatever he used up would get docked off his pay. That miffed him.

It wasn't that the work bothered him. Tony liked working, and he'd worked for exponentially longer hours without breaks or eating. He would have done all that if he was asked to, no problem. No, what bothered Tony was the fact that he was now a second-class citizen. Tony didn't see anything wrong with being half alien. They were all weird, anyways, so what was the point?

Maybe...

Maybe it was time to move on. It was simple, really. He liked being able to tinker on what he wanted, no requirements or time limits, no quota or special requests. He didn't like limits.

Tony knew from consultation with FRIDAY that there were other, less crime-y planets. Actually, Nar Shaddaa was one of the worst planets to be on. It was practically made of crime. All he had to do was prove his worth, get hired onto a starship, pay for Gis's ticket, work for a couple weeks to pay for his own ride, and find a decent planet to hop off onto. Assuming that Gis wanted to tag along, that is.

Which led to the shipyard.

He wasn't sure who the workers thought he was, but none of them bothered to stop him. Back at Stark Industries, not even Pepper could get into one of their workshops without scanning at least twice (Tony got off because they all knew how eccentric he was).

The layout inside those ship, Tony couldn't tell, but the outside? Tony could point out every engine and tube. He could also infer from conversations and the placement of the parts what did what, and he was pretty sure that that tube wasn't supposed to lead there.

"Oi! You!" Tony yelled, waving at the really short rookie. Like, he was short to Tony, but was maybe fine for his species short. "What do you think you're doing?"

The work crew paused, eyes flicking to Tony.

"...Sir?" one of Rodians asked.

"Not you," Tony dismissed, waving him off. "What do you think you're doing? The moment the ship hits hyperspace, it'll blow!" Tony scolded. He plucked the screwdriver from the Aleena and started undoing the mistake.

"Are you sure you should be doing that?" another Aleena asked cautiously.

"I know what I'm doing," Tony said, offended.

"No, I mean," the Aleena stuttered, pointing at his clothes, "your clothes will get dirty, sir!" It cringed.

Tony glanced down at his shirt. It was a new one, yes, but not much better than what anyone else had. At least, he didn't think it was. FRIDAY ordered it for him. "Yeah, yeah. It's just a shirt. I don't mind. And enough with the 'sir' thing! I'm just a normal citizen. Pass me that filter thing, no the square one," he told the rookie. It scrambled to grab the part and knocked it over in its eagerness. Tony sighed. Another DUM-E.

"Normal citizen?" a Rodian asked suspiciously. "Not oversee-a'?"

"Nope," Tony said, remembering all the times he spent hovering over that particular group. Huh. Was that why they let him stay? "Was that what you thought I was?"

- He's my friend

So was I -

"Thank you, sir," the jumpy alien babbled for the fourth time. "Really!"

"Like I said, no problem," Tony repeated tiredly to the manager.

"You saved our business! My job! If there's anything, anything I can do for you, within reason, of course-"

Tony cut him off. "Are you hiring?"

- He's my friend

So was I -

In many ways, working with a team was more stressful than working alone. Solitude, Tony could handle. Immature aliens that nosed into whatever he was working on, begging for an explanation? Not so much. With the realization that Tony not only knew where to place parts, but why they were so, and what they did, even other repair crews came to him for help. He sort of became the entire shipyard's manager, except for the fact that he didn't really get paid for that.

Still, Tony was a businessman, and he knew that having lower-rung connections can be just as useful as upper-level contacts. Much less back-stabbing, anyway. When the word went out that Tony 'collected' spare parts, he found himself carrying home gifts and offerings of anything from bolts, wires, and tools, to the occasional, but infinitely more useful, entire motors. If this went on, he might as well build his own starship.

So far, all he did with it was make little, defensive gadgets and modifications. Of course, defensive was relative. A shield was supposed to be defensive, but Rogers had proven it was a pretty versile weapon as well, able to crush throats and shatter bones. Tony winced.

"Boss, Gis is three blocks down the street, to the left," FRIDAY said abruptly from the little earphone he created just for her. It was painted a pastel pink because FRIDAY insisted on it being her favorite color, but Tony didn't care. Real men wore pink.

"That's nice and all, but I really don't need to know where the kid is at all times. It's not like he's my kid," Tony grunted, twisting the lever with Borr and Senn. Even with his enhanced strength, it didn't budge. He thought of walking down the streets of New York with Gis tagging along, all of the civilians screaming and running away. "Yep, definitely not biologically related. No familial bonds at all. Nope."

Bracing himself for a moment, Tony signaled for the Rodians to switch with the two Aleenas. He was pleased when they obeyed without question. Even with the other Avengers, his suggestions would be questioned, debated, and completely changed. This team... it took most of them a week or two to warm up to him, but they'd stand by him through rust and slime, and he was glad to be part of it.

"I beg to differ, boss," FRIDAY answered wryly. "He is in an argument with a small group. There is a 68% chance that situation the situation will turn hostile."

Tony let go of the lever. "What?" As it started spinning in the other direction, Suffee and Shoragg were dragged after it, despite their more-than-Aleena weight. Tony leapt up and grabbed a hold, pinning a wrench into a gear to freeze it into place. "Why didn't you tell me earlier? Gis has friends?"

"They hardly seem like they are on amicable terms, and only now has he come into view of my cameras with another presence," FRIDAY replied crossly as Tony began jogging, ignoring the questioning cries of his coworkers. He quickly signaled for them to go on and they quieted, turning to the plans to figure out an alternative way to fix the ship. "Boss, they've started fighting."

Cursing, Tony started sprinting. He rounded the corner to find Gis being pressed onto the ground by a boot.

"A Rodian? You got beat up by a Rodian? Tony asked dubiously. He normally didn't judge, but the thing holding Gis down looked to be more or less half his weight. These Rodians were more skinny and rag-tag than Shorrag or Suffee. Tony decked the Rodian and stood in front of Gis as the alien recovered. The gang walked forward as one, raising weapons. "Look, that guy might be your friend, but Gis is mine. Just back off, and we can finish this peacefully."

Instead, blaster fire lit up the street. Tony kicked the recovering Rodian into his approaching friends, ducked, and began dragging his struggling Trandoshan into an alley.

"Friday," Tony snapped, throwing his gauntleted hand out. The armor around the arc reactor in the middle of the palm rolled together, disconnecting from the gauntlet and flying forward towards the mini-gang.

He'd love to go over there and beat them up himself, but that would mean leaving Gis on the ground defenseless and still recovering. Leaving a man down in this place was just asking for him to either be robbed or have his throat slit. Well, it was that and the fact that he didn't test the effect of repulsor blasts on different species yet. It might actually kill them and, gangsters or not, authorities would nab him for the dead bodies.

Maybe.

Actually, probably not, seeing all the dead bodies around.

Tony poked his head around the corner and aimed his repulsor.

Of course, that's when FRIDAY tried to return. Tony yelled, grabbed his now-bleeding nose with one hand, then snatched a sheepish FRIDAY from the air.

- He's my friend

So was I -

"You have no right to beat them up," FRIDAY translated. "He's part of that gang and they are his friends."

"Well, so am I!" Tony shouted as he whirled around, eyes blazing. "So am I! Friday, tell him they aren't his friends and they're just using him!" He stalked back and forth in front of the bedridden Saurin, who gave his own reply in Dosh, ending with a harsh bark.

"He said that it's what everyone does, and as long as they're his friends, it's okay." FRIDAY hesitated. "Also, he said that you're using him too."

It took Tony a moment to determine what Gis was talking about, eyes darting around the wrecked room they were in... the room that Gis had lived in long before Tony had turned up.

"That's different!" Tony yelled in frustration. He threw his hands in the air, pivoted, and pointed at Gis. "You're not going back."

Gis painstakingly climbed to his feet, drawing himself up. He let out a series of growls and hisses. "He said that you have no power over him," translated FRIDAY.

"Look, this never turns out well. They beat you up! You're not going back to them," Tony demanded, glaring at Gis. The Saurin lifted his chin and stepped outside, looking Tony directly in the eye.

"He's going back to them," FRIDAY deadpanned.

"Not helping, Fri," Tony told her.

"He technically has more ownership over your current lodgings. Is it wise to provoke him?" FRIDAY asked.

"He's a kid," Tony said. "It's not like he's going to kick me out or anything."

- He's my friend

So was I -

Exactly four 'days' later, Tony was glaring at the wall of the Nest as he noticed a shadow noiselessly moving towards the exit. Now that he was looking for it, it was blatantly obvious that Gis was leaving every night. It was the fourth night in a row that he watched the Saurin snuck out, and for the most part, Gis now healed.

Tony decided that four was a good number. It wasn't as heart attack-inducing to be caught on the fourth time than the first, and it wasn't as suspicious or cliché as the third time.

He waited for Gis to step fully out of the room before slipping from his pile and following, keeping a handful of rags with him. The nightlife was slightly less crowded than the 'daylife,' but they more than made up for it with enthusiasm. Tony had to sidestep several sets of drunken patrons trying to accost him.

Every block he followed Gis down, he'd tear off a shred of threadbare cloth and drop it on the ground. Tony felt quite a bit like Hansel or Gretel, but his 'crumbs' weren't edible. Probably.

Well, they were inedible to him. And Gis. No idea about all these other aliens, though. For all he knew, one of those giant slug things could eat it with ease. They looked like they could eat anything.

It took a while to get where Gis's final destination was. It was like the Saurin purposely chose the longest, most convoluted trail he could find. The little maniac climbed down the side of a building. Luckily, Tony was prepared. The powered magnets on the soles of Tony's boots slipped several times as he followed Gis, and it was only through FRIDAY's hacking of traffic cameras' lesser firewalls that let them track and catch up with Gis.

By the time they were deep in the undercity, Tony was fed up and had decided that though the rags were dramatic, he had better things to concentrate on. The cloth was balled up and he lobbed it at the back of Gis's head. He missed.

Whatever.

FRIDAY would get them back safely.

Feeling like a secret agent, Tony edged along the ledge of a building, all the way to the corner. Withdrawing a mirror that he had kept for this sole purpose, he held it out past the corner and turned it slowly, taking stock of what was happening. Gis was facing a small gang of six Rodians, two humans, and a... thing.

Tony pulled the mirror back and stuffed it back into his pocket. He'd always wanted to do that. Then, Gis gave out a pained hiss.

Yeah, no. Not while Tony was around.

"Oi," Tony called out as he stepped around the corner and crossed his hands. "You overgrown reptiles ruined my beauty sleep."

There was a silence as the two groups examined each other. One of the Rodians, most likely the leader, had his hand on Gis's shoulder, digging his fingers into the wound there. Tony fought to prevent himself from stiffening as Gis let out a quiet whine of pain. While he'd like to let Gis know that he cared, he wasn't sure if it was safe to show their connection when Gis was in such a vulnerable position. He didn't have a choice.

Tony was going to make a pointed remark, but one of the gang members beat him to the punch. A Rodian that Tony figured was one of the ones he fought last week nudged another and pointed at Tony. Then, they were all jeering and shoving Gis. He was astonished when the Saurin just let them push him around, but not as surprised as he was when Gis lifted his snot, glared directly at Tony, and snarled.

"They are teasing Gis for, I quote, having a stray follow him around, Boss," FRIDAY reported.

"I can see that," Tony answered. "Any reason he's letting them bully him?"

"From what I have observed since our arrival to this universe and psychology reports and crime movements from both here and Nar Shaddaa, I would speculate that they have taken him in and raised him after his parental figures' untimely deaths anywhere from two to three years before our arrival." FRIDAY paused as the that same Rodian continued to taunt Gis.

"They are talking about...scorekeeping?"

"Huh," Tony said, wondering how his earlier estimates could be so off. Three years? And what did they mean by scorekeeping? Did Gis owe them something?

"Boss, I think he's going to fight you," FRIDAY warned.

Tony moved towards the metal wall to his left, luring Gis after him. The glow of the repulsor on his gauntlet dully reflected off something in Gis's hand. Tony squinted, but it was hidden.

"You think? Hey Friday, can you see from here what the heck he's holding? Is it a knife, or pepper spray, or-"

"It is hard to determine unless he comes closer to my sensors, but I believe he is wearing brass knuckles, Boss. They concentrate the force of a blow to increase the likelihood of fracturing bones."

"I know what brass knuckles are," Tony snapped as he raised his gauntlet to scare off the Rodians that were just... standing there? "Friday, does the- You mean that little maniac is actually trying to cave in my skull?" Tony yelped as he ducked under a punch to his head. "Dude, what the heck?"

Knowing that such an uncontrolled punch should have unbalanced Gis, Tony grabbed Gis's arm and yanked him forward. The Saurin flew over him, crashing onto the ground. From his low position, it was no problem to Tony to pull out the metallic strips from his boots. Spinning around, Tony deflected Gis's next punch to the side and slapped the magnet onto his forearm. A stroke supercharged it.

Gis would be out of the way. Now for the gangsters.

Tony twisted to the side as Gis spitefully kicked out, letting the hit land on the human that was sneaking up on him. A quick punch had the middle-aged man out of commission. The weird alien, Tony was not about to touch. "Go get 'im, Fri," Tony muttered as the FRIDAY palm-ball ricochet off towards her target. Tony grabbed the closest being - a Rodian - and used his other magnet-strip to stick him onto the wall too. Then he turned around and blasted at other human. As he hoped, the human and a Rodian turned and fled.

A couple more repulsor shots, and all of the gang members were either scared off or knocked out by FRIDAY. Even the Rodian magnetized on the wall was unconscious - FRIDAY, every bit as petty as her father, was mean to those that tried to harm her family.

Speaking of FRIDAY, where was the orb? "Oi, Fri, where are you?"

"Here, boss." A small, blue flash emitted from the upper torso of the disgusting alien.

"...Fri?" Tony peered at it. A light hum was followed by the putrid stench of burning flesh. "No! Friday! Bad! Don't burn the nasty alien when he's down. I taught you better than that."

"Sorry, boss," FRIDAY answered, embarrassed. She paused. "I'm stuck," she admitted.

Tony bit back a smile. "Stay put. I'll get you out." Tony cautiously stepped around the strange powder that the man had spilled as he ran away. It was probably drugs, and while Tony did do more than his fair share of drugs as a teenager, he was trying to turn a new leaf. He didn't even fully step around the mess when FRIDAY alerted him to more danger.

"Boss? Behind you," FRIDAY told him in a cold tone.

Tony turned around and blinked at what he saw. "What the f-" Gis had gotten free of the wall. Well, no, that wasn't quite correct. A more accurate description was that he torn a piece of the shabby wall off, though it was still connected to the magnet on his forearm. The alien looked like a demented Captain America, armed with a wall-shield.

Gis dodged Tony's half-hearted punch, moving in to strike at Tony's stomach. Tony took two steps back and shot at the 'shield,' the force of the repulsor blast forcing the alien back.

"Look, I don't wanna fight you. We're friends, aren't we? Come on, put the shield down, and we can walk away."

He waited until Gis stalked over the powder before simply sidestepping to the side with the shield and shoving the metal. The Saurin's feet couldn't find purchase, the talons only finding loose powder to grab onto. Gris went down hard, sending powder into the air. Tony held his breath. Drugs weren't cool.

"Not. Yours," the Saurin wheezed out in heavily accented Basic.

"Huh," Tony said, blinking. "So you actually do speak Basic. I feel offended. You could've talked to me this whole time! I bet you knew what I was asking about last week, you crazy... So what's apparently not mine? Did I steal one of your scraps, or does this mean you're kicking me out of the Nest?"

"Not. Ally." Gis was on his feet now, his full height looming a head over Tony. "Not. Your. Friend." He stalked over closer to Tony.

"Whoa, there," Tony said, backing away, hands held forward defensively. "Who says we aren't friends? We're friends. Did they say we weren't friends?" Tony's eyes darted to the floor and the pile of Rodians. He tripped over a piece of junk, fell, but was on his feet in a second. "They aren't good for you."

"Not your friend! Not an ally!" Gis roared.

"I think you snorted up too much of that powder. We're friends. Right, Fri?" Tony's back hit the wall with a metallic clang when Gis didn't stop.

"Weak!" Gis growled.

"I'm not feeling agreeable to that sentiment at the moment," FRIDAY informed him.

"Friday thinks we're friends! Geez, you shouldn't do drugs. They affect your emotions and thought patterns, make you do things you later regret. And you'll regret this later. One hundred percent," Tony babbled. For a moment, he saw not Gis, but Rogers over him, about to slam his shield down on his head. His muscles tensed and Tony kicked out. No, it wasn't Steve. It was Gis... but Gis was trying to kill him too. "Sorry, buddy," he whispered, raising his gauntlets. The blue lights lit up Gis's features frighteningly as the Saurin roared in annoyance.

Tony hesitated. He couldn't shoot Gis.

The reactors powered down.

"Not a kid!"

"DAD!" FRIDAY shouted through the earpiece. It was loud enough to make Tony flinch, his head bouncing on the wall and making a hollow echo. "Dad, no!" The main reactor powered on as FRIDAY seized control. Tony yanked his hand down to his side, forcing FRIDAY to turn it off, lest she burn his thigh.

"NOT. YOURS." Gis's scaly fist pulled back, then flew forward with the strength and accuracy of one of Captain America's punches.

Tony closed his eyes.

*BANG*

Bone met metal and one of them had to give.