I Am The Storm

Chapter Twenty-One

"I heard from Friday that you asked what Christmas was," he said, suddenly turning serious. I glanced up at the ceiling. Friday was, as Peter said, a snitch.

When I didn't answer right away, Mr. Stark continued.

"Pep and I are hosting a small Christmas party on Saturday. You are welcome if you want to come," Mr. Stark stuck his hands inside of the pockets of his jeans, awaiting an answer.

Honestly, I was a bit taken aback. I was told I could come to something if I wanted to. I didn't really know what a party was, but I counted the invitation as a really cool thing.

"What's a party?" I asked quietly. Tony opened his mouth to answer the question, but Friday beat him to it.

"A party is a social gathering of invited guests, typically involving eating, drinking, and entertainment," I nodded.

"We will only have a few people, so it won't be overwhelming. Me, Pepper, Peter and his aunt, Rhodey, and Wanda and Vision if they choose to come. We'll have dinner and watch a Christmas movie afterwards,"

I nodded along. It sounded pretty fun.

"I'll have Friday remind you on Saturday if you want to come," Mr. Stark said with a smile.

"Thanks," I said, before beginning to walk back toward the elevator, but Mr. Stark stopped me.

"You haven't been as awful as I expected you to be," He said. I turned around to answer him.

"Manners are important Mr. Stark. First thing I learned," his smile fell. Manners were important, but I think the way I learned that was more unnerving to the man.

"People are more important. You don't have to be constantly polite," so when I killed people I was being polite? I raised my brow. Mr. Stark rolled his eyes.

"What I'm trying to say is, you're better than where you came from. And that's admirable,"

"I'm not a good person,"

"And neither am I," Mr. Stark shrugged, "But as long as we are better than we were, I'll consider that improvement,"

I nodded before walking back to the elevator. I turned to face Mr. Stark as the elevator doors closed, but he was already inside his lab, back turned to me. I sighed. That was interesting to say the least. I wasn't a good person, I wasn't better than where I came from. I was a killer. Killers could never be good, no matter how hard they tried.

I guess I would just have to live with that.

~~~

The day of the party was rapidly approaching. It was already Thursday and I had no clue what to expect. I had asked Friday so many questions that I was sure she was getting annoyed, though she was an AI and technically didn't have feelings unless Mr. Stark had done some amazing programming that enabled her to have almost human-like processing, which would be pretty amazing. Nevertheless, I still had no idea what to expect.

I had asked Friday what to wear (jeans with a nice shirt or sweater, or a dress if I felt like it), what food would be there (apparently very nice food that I probably wouldn't be able to eat much of), and what activities would happen (movies, eating, talking, maybe a board game). I was still a little confused, but had the basics down. I was guessing it was like how Peter said: I have to experience it to understand.

There was one thing I was unsure about however. Both Friday and Peter had said something about gifts. I doubt gifts by their standard were the same as gifts by Hydra's standard, and I didn't have much to make gifts with anyway.