Marvel-ous Ninjutsu

00184. Tony needs advice.

Another week passed by before Ezekiel received a text message from Tony asking for help. Since Tony didn't go into detail again, Ezekiel was positive it had to do with Pepper. It was something Tony texted him about almost every day. Ezekiel ignored most of them or sent a quick reply most of the time, but he figured he would finally visit Tony in person since he hadn't seen him in over three weeks.

Ezekiel portaled into Tony's workshop to find him slouched in a chair as he gazed blankly at his computer screen. Ezekiel moved closer to see what Tony was looking at and found it was open to a website with baby names. Ezekiel smiled and patted Tony on the shoulder as he said, “This looks like a positive step in the right direction.”

Tony turned to look over at Ezekiel as he said, “I guess… But Pepper doesn't really talk to me right now.”

Ezekiel let out a sigh as he asked, “What happened this time?”

“She said I need to grow up and start acting more mature.”

Ezekiel nodded along as he said, “I've been telling you that since I've met you.”

Tony punched Ezekiel's shoulder as he said, “You act more childish than me most of the time.”

“Which means I'm a great judge on who acts like a child.” Ezekiel said as he grinned back at Tony.

Tony tossed his hands up in the air as he said, “Fine, I act like a kid… What's so wrong with that?”

Ezekiel rubbed his chin as he said, “From Pepper's perspective as a soon to be mother… Everything. I'm pretty sure she wants someone who can help her raise a child, not act like one themselves.”

Tony let out a frustrated sigh as he asked, “And how am I supposed to do that, when she barely talks to me unless it's about the business?”

“Do I really need to explain this to you?” Ezekiel asked with an annoyed tone.

“What can I say, I've only ever had flings. I've never been in a serious relationship and have no idea how they work.” Tony said helplessly.

“Are you being serious?”

Tony nodded his head as he said, “I can easily wine and dine a girl and make sure they are satisfied in bed… But that’s all I’ve ever done.”

Ezekiel shook his head as he said to himself, “Even I know how to date a woman…”

Ezekiel let out a sigh before he sat on Tony’s desk and said, “Apologize to her first and foremost and tell her you’re a huge fucking idiot when it comes to relationships.”

“I’m not an idiot!”

Ezekiel leveled a flat look at Tony as he said, “You are literally asking me how to fix your relationship problems.”

Tony rolled his eyes before he said, “Fine… I might not know how to have a normal relationship.”

“Good… After you apologize, you just need to be honest with her, tell her how you feel… If things go smoothly, do something romantic for her and show you actually care about her.”

Ezekiel focused on Tony as he asked, “You do actually care about her, right?”

“Of course I do!”

“Alright, since that's the case I'll help you out if you need anything. Since you seem to suck at dating more than Happy.”

“I do not.” Tony said as he crossed his arms over his chest.

“Happy's never asked me for advice about his relationship and he and Anna are doing great.”

Tony wanted to reply before he stopped himself and after a moment said, “Fine, I guess he is better at keeping a relationship together… But I am better at picking up chicks.”

Ezekiel smacked the back of Tony's head as he said, “And that's one of the reasons Pepper isn't talking to you. She probably feels like this might just be a fling to you and is scared thinking she is gonna be a single mom.”

“Pepper isn't a fling… She means more to me than something like that.”

“Then go tell her and don't brag about how easy you can get other women when you do it.” Ezekiel said as he shook his head slightly.

Ezekiel spent about an hour as he chatted with Tony and basically called him an idiot whenever he had stupid ideas. Once Tony was confident he left to go meet Pepper and try to fix his fragile relationship and hopefully med it.

Ezekiel had nothing to do himself so he went back to training since nothing important was going on currently. Actually he had one project he wanted to do, but he would need Tao's help to accomplish it. He wanted to go out and collect the other infinity stones.

He mostly needed to get the power stone and soul stone. He would worry about the reality stone when the convergence happened. As for the mind stone, he was pretty sure Thanos had it… Maybe. If he had that mind control staff that he would give to Loki when he invaded Earth… If that even happened this time. With that in mind, Ezekiel decided to finally ask and get the project underway. Well if Tao agreed to help, if not he would need to find another way to do it.

After Ezekiel portaled back to his training room and switched back into Theo. He went over to Tao and said, “I want to collect the other infinity stones and I'll need your help to do it.”

Tao glanced up from her book as she said, “I was wondering how much longer you were going to wait to ask.”

Theo smirked as he asked, “Am I that easy to read?”

“At least for this, yes. Yes you are… I expected you to ask me for help right after we collected the space stone.”

Tao placed her book down and asked, “So what do you need my help with?”

“Mainly transport to the planets where the stones are located. I would also need something like what you created for the space stone to contain them.”

Tao nodded in understanding before she asked, “If you take the power stone, won't that throw off the timeline?”

“I was planning to replace it with a fake like we did with the Tesseract.”

Tao stood up from her seat as she said, “I'll go talk with Agatha since she helped me make the last one. If everything goes smoothly we should have them finished in a couple weeks.”

With that Tao left Theo alone to train, well he wasn’t alone for long. Theo had to collect his training partners only an hour later and then spent the next few hours sparring before he switched to fuinjutsu practice. He finished up with magic practice before he called it a night and went to bed.

The next day after Theo came home from school he received a text message from Tony asking for help again. Theo shook his head and let out a sigh before he went to his room, created a clone and switched with it. About two minutes later Ezekiel was in Tony's workshop but Tony wasn't there and he was greeted by JARVIS who said, “Welcome Ezekiel, Mr. Stark is currently upstairs in his bedroom.”

“Thanks JARVIS. How are you doing by the way?” Ezekiel asked as he headed towards the door.

“I am fine sir, thanks for asking.”

Ezekiel quickly made his way upstairs to Tony’s room before he stopped and knocked on the door frame and said, “You better not be naked.”

“I’m not… But I am trying to figure out what clothes to wear.”

Ezekiel glanced in the room and found Tony standing in front of his bed with three different outfits laid out. Ezekiel moved into the room as he asked, “Do you really need my help to pick out an outfit?”

“Yeah… I mean no. I need you for something else.” Tony said and he picked the outfit in the middle which was a simple black suit with a blue undershirt and no tie.

Ezekiel glanced at the outfit for a moment before he asked, “So I guess Pepper is talking with you again?”

Tony smiled as he moved towards his closet and said, “Yup. We are even going on a date tonight… Which is why I need your help. I wanted to take her to Genosha for dinner and possibly stay there for the week. You think you could get us a room?”

Ezekiel let out a sigh as he pulled out his tablet and started to type on it as he said, “I see how it is, you only use me for my connections.”

“Like you haven't done the same to me.” Tony said from inside his walk in closet.

He came out a few minutes later with a small travel suitcase and placed it next to the bed as Ezekiel finished up on his tablet. Ezekiel glanced up from his tablet as he said, “Alright, I booked you at that restaurant Pepper likes and then got you one of the presidential suites at the cliffside hotel.”

“Thanks, I appreciate it.” Tony said with a smile.

Ezekiel put his tablet away as he asked, “When do you guys want to leave?”

“Whenever Pepper gets here. What time did you book our dinner reservation for?”

“I just put you on the list. You can show up whenever you like.” Ezekiel said with a smile.

“Miss. Potts just entered at the main gate.” JARVIS said.

Tony grabbed the clothes he was going to wear and asked, “Can you greet Pepper for me while I change?”

Ezekiel shook his head slightly but left the room and headed downstairs to meet Pepper at the door. When Ezekiel reached the door and opened it up, Pepper was just parking her car. Ezekiel stepped outside and once Pepper got out of the car he said, “Hey Pepper, how have you been?”

Pepper smiled before she said, “Good, considering everything that's been going on. How about yourself?”

“I've been good… So you're giving Tony a chance uh?”

Pepper nodded as she pulled a small suitcase out of her back seat and said, “Yeah… We talked things out and we agreed to see what happens.”

“Good. I think everything will work out fine for you guys.” Ezekiel said as he took the suitcase from Pepper and walked her inside the house.

Tony came downstairs with his suitcase a minute later and after a little bit of small talk, Ezekiel portaled them to Genosha. After seeing them off Ezekiel decided to go get food and go visit Hela. Once he bought food, he contacted Tao and met her in Genosha so she could portal him to Hel where he stepped out of the portal and greeted Hela. He ended up staying in Hel for almost eight hours as they watched a few movies before they played some board games together.