11091/New Projects

New Projects
Date of Scene:	18 February 2020
Location:	Basement, Avengers Mansion
Synopsis:	Kitty checks in with Tony about projects.
Cast of Characters:	Iron Man, Shadowcat

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Iron Man has posed:
It's been two weeks since all of the missing Avengers returned from their individual kidnappings through the portals to other worlds. Both Tony and Steve spent a great deal of time in Avengers medical, though soon enough Tony returned to his tower for the last of his recovery. He's been out of main areas, other than a more recent press release about how amazingly healthy he is and glad to be back. He's hard to catch.

But today, Tony is at the Avengers mansion, down in the lower labs, doing some type of major overhaul of the facility, and a lot of the lower area is in disarray of robot helpers all over the place. Two labs remain untouched: for the moment.

Shadowcat has posed:
Kitty likes to multi-task. She needed to stop off and check on Peter Parker's latest bloodwork, making sure that designer neuro-toxin he was hit with hasn't left any lingering effects. Then there was the new costume design she wanted to talk to Janet about. Kitty hoped Janet would jump at the opportunity to actually design it. Or even, let Kitty use that $10 million 3D virtualization computer she has in her design room for it. But Kitty would be happy with just advice. The jokes over her roller skate costume continue even today.

Plus, she got word Tony might be cornered here. So it is after leaving medical, Kitty follows the sounds of whirring robots down the hallway. "Is there a Boss Stark down this way?!" she calls out as she nears the room JARVIS had pointed her towards. "Sort of like Boz Skaggs but not as smooth of a voice!"

Iron Man has posed:
"Depends what you want from him," Tony's easygoing tone responds, clear and loud, over the sounds of his robots. He's standing towards the far end, hands loosely on his hips, surveying the robot army at work. Tony's dressed to Make Stuff: the tank top is on. Kitty may not recognize the 'work' uniform from before (few see it), but perhaps the association will begin starting now. There's a soft flare of his arc reactor from under the tank top, also something almost always hidden. He also has work glasses on, tinted a light red, and work gloves: he gets into things, he doesn't just let the robots do it all. He's sweaty and pleased, so his look sideways to Kitty as she arrives in the construction zone is friendly enough.

"You're allowed if you bring me a drink," Tony adds, pointing to her left. Medical is there. Presumably it has a fridge. Almost everywhere /does/.

Shadowcat has posed:
"Right, drink," Kitty replies with a single finger gun towards Tony. She sidesteps a robot as it rolls through the door, dancing past it and disappearing back over towards medical. She's gone but a few moments before she's returned with a frosty beverage, having asked the doctor on duty there which ones Tony normally goes for.

She cross over to where he is, setting the drink down on the nearest clear table or counter. Then moves over to another to hop up on to be out of the way of the orchestrated dance of robots. "Kind of like The Sorcerer's Apprentice meets Ex Machina in here," she comments, eying them all before looking back to Tony.

Kitty says, "Wanted to ask about some work stuff. Been working with the satellites, and at this point the guidance systems are rewritten and auto-avoidance, tracking of space debris, pretty much everything on the department's priority list. Was wondering if there might be another area I could go cut my teeth on then," she says. If Tony's eyed any reports on her, Kitty has a voracious appetite for learning new things. There might have been a complaint or two from related departments about the number of questions they got. But they usually are followed up with some mention of improvements that resulted.

"I know you've got the R&D further upstairs. And, I've been privately poking around machine learning and AI since an encounter with a certain Cybertronian. More for the, preventative side. But I didn't know if you've got any projects in that area that might be a good fit, if you're ok with me switching departments?"

Iron Man has posed:
"Don't even think about it," Tony is saying to two robots that start to cross paths with where Tony is. They beep a little and go to do other tasks. Tony strolls across to pick up the drink where Kitty'd left it, pulling one of his gloves off and tossing it onto the spot where the drink /had/ been. A nice trade.

"Ah, the satellites. Sure, shoot," Tony invites, rubbing the edge of his thumb against his nose. As Kitty outlines her interests, she seems to have maybe seventy-five percent of Tony's attention: the rest is in a mix on the robot monitoring and, of course, the drink that he's enjoying, tilting it to swirl the ice.

"I do have something, actually. Some of the pieces of Sebastion have been cracked, we've got some backups from Vision that tie into it. It's gonna be slow going, to warn you; as much fun as that thing rebooting itself really could be. If we're not careful he'll be back up and running. So this isn't minor leagues, Kitty."

Shadowcat has posed:
When Kitty sits up straighter and leans forward, it's not intellectual enthusiasm on her face. Kitty looks serious as she nods. "I've heard what his future is like. Or, if not his future, one like it enough, keeping that from happening is key. Sort of even had my mind pulled into... I can't call them memories. More like psychic trauma nightmares of it. Anyway, keeping that from helping, high on my priority list. So yes, uber caution is the need. I'm your girl there," she says.

She crosses her legs as they swing lightly as she watches the robots going about their work. "Tracked a truck back towards Canada, incidentally, trying to figure out where he was working out of. But ran into dead ends after that. Getting you and Steve and company back sort of turned our focus away."

She rests her hands on her knees. "But yes, that sounds like something I'd like to have a hand in. And if anyone involved ISN'T careful you can be sure I'll be all over it like Thor on a pair of board shorts." Yeah. Because she saw those.

Iron Man has posed:
"I know it feels like I'm sending you out to play in the weeds, but it's better to not have everybody in on this portal thing: we need a bit of a split, because otherwise that cyborg'll creep up and bite us in the ass," Tony observes with a rueful laugh and shake of his head.

"And I, for one, have had enough things on my ass lately." Tony rubs his fingers against his left eye up under the protective glasses, and has another big drink of the liquor.

"Might have more on those trucks. JARVIS'll point you. But I'd rather your focus be on the main program first. If you're wanting to bat that mouse around, anyway. I've kept it in stasis, but he keeps trying to adapt and weasel out. Good thing I'm me: just saying." Tony smirks.

Shadowcat has posed:
Kitty gets a soft grin, but it's tempered by her thoughts of what would happen should he get free. "Full precautions," she agrees. "And yes, I'll follow up on the trucks. No idea how much autonomy his minions have but their numbers could keep growing. Hopefully the government is making it tough for any kind of sizable purchases of some of the rarer materials they know go into Sentinels. Not that I'm going to hang my hopes on federal bureaucracy," she says with a sigh.

Kitty hops down from the table. She glances around the room and says, "You know, you should probably get a dog. Or, you know. Build one. Iron Rover?" she says thoughtfully. "Anyway, we've got a golden retriever. Came from Mystique originally, given to Rogue. No cortical bombs. Checked. Also, not Mystique herself. Checked that too. Anyway, great distraction at the right moments."

Kitty draws a deep breath. "Anyway. Glad you and Cap are back. Was worried about you. I'm good leaving the portals and all to you guys. But if you need support we're there."

Iron Man has posed:
"No thank you on the pets; we're full up here," Tony declines, putting his empty glass down and pulling his glove back on with a sort of showy flair. "Oh -- the trucks thing -- led us more towards cyborg nonsense than towards Sentinels themselves. Mind checking through what the X-Men have on cyborgs, see if we've missed an obvious link? Some brutual team-up of villains going on behind the scenes? Rather be ahead of it before it starts roll," Tony says offhandedly. He's being casual, but it's not a minor problem. Sentinels plus cybernetics? That could be truly bad.

"Mind telling Spidey to drop by, too? Been ages since he's paid tribute," Tony jokes. He lifts a hand, though, giving her a tip of a cocky wave, and then starting to steer robots again. "Work in tandem here. Come on now, you're asking for a reset...."

Shadowcat has posed:
Kitty nods and says, "We'll see what we can find. I might poke Rachel about if she was aware of anything like that happening in her timeline, with the cybernetics." She walks over towards the door, pausing to watch the robots and catch Tony's request about Peter.

"Will do. He's been friendly neighborhooding it a lot. Haven't made any progress on the attack on him either, though we questioned the ne'er-do-wells involved. And, beat up Scorpion a second time, actually." Kitty waves. "Reminds me, going to talk to Janet about a costume I can wear patrolling with him. I've already done about every color combo I think there is, so time to turn to the Queen," she says with a laugh. "Thanks boss, I'll get my satellite stuff handed off and get with JARVIS on Sebastion then."