His ears were ringing loudly. Blood was flowing from his eyebrow. He was disoriented, confused. The air was thick with dust, making breathing difficult. He remembered sitting in one of those conference chairs as comfortably as he could, bracing himself for a series of dull speeches. Tony was doing his best to appear interested, and in truth, he was. There were simply more efficient ways to go about things. People loved to hear the sound of their own voices. Tony may have had an ego, but it would appear that he had found people worse off than he was.
Natasha was present as well. Her red hair and spy demeanour was unmistakable. Now that he knew her, it was difficult for him not to see her tactics for what they were. So much for being discrete and blending in the crowd. She was talking with the son of the king of Wakanda. Tony had a feeling this would be a problem sooner or later. He was acting as though he hadn't noticed anything. Things tended to be easier for him when he was underestimated. Romanov was as confident in her abilities as she had always been. Tony didn't have time to think about the implications of Natasha's presence. There was an explosion.
The world suddenly seemed to restart at full speed as everything that had happened came back to him. People were screaming, terrified and confused. He had to help as much as he could. Loki and Agatha would be better suited for those kinds of things, but he didn't have time to think about it. He went from person to person, giving his all every time. Unfortunately, for some of them, it was already too late. Tony would have to figure out where the explosion came from and how he was still alive at some point.
Rhodey would arrive quickly. He had been dispatched with a contingent of officials along with General Ross. The colonel was directly impacted by the accords being a superhero himself and would be one of the first to sign the document as a gesture of goodwill from the United States. Perhaps more than any of them, the military man believed in rules and regulations.
"Tony! Do you hear me? Are you alright?" Rhodey shouted in the comms.
He received no response. Tony couldn't be reached, not even by Jarvis. War Machine couldn't get to his friend soon enough. Rhodey had never felt so relieved than to see Tony trying to help the people around him. The feeling was quickly replaced by worry about the whole situation at hand. Still, he went to his friend quickly to get some reassurance.
The blast had been quite powerful. The sheer force of it had knocked out a lot of people. This was a scene of total chaos. Stumbling around because he had been so close to the explosion, Tony had simply lost his earpiece and, in all that confusion, had not even realised it. The piece of technology was most likely buried beneath the rubble. Of course, those things weren't supposed to happen, Tony had worked on that quite intensively. Then again, the genius had never planned on being so close to an explosion. Considering what his life was, he really should have.
The emergency services had been called in and took over anything Tony was doing. Unfortunately, there were a lot of casualties, and King T'Chaka was one of them. The genius never really liked the man, but he also didn't want him to die either. None of this should have happened and yet there they were.
Rhodey and Tony always carried spare earpieces for one another. The armour had a little compartment dedicated especially for them. As soon as he was set again, the genius sent his AI on the trail of whoever had done such a horrible thing. Jarvis had more capacities than all other computers on Earth. If anyone could find the culprit, it was him.
"Are you hurt Anthony?"
Loki had just materialised seemingly out of thin air. Tony and Rhodey had grown used to it by this point, but it would never cease to amaze them. The wizard quickly performed a healing spell on the genius. It felt good to know that his team was supporting him in every way. Of course, he didn't want to worry them. It was supposed to be a dull day of meetings. He shouldn't have been a concern for them.
