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The four of them stood in a tense, silent circle around the bubbling cauldron, the mundane, cheerful decor of Randy's Donuts a surreal backdrop to the medieval alchemy unfolding within. Hermione worked with a focused, clinical precision, pouring shimmering, mysterious liquids into the pot and adding ingredients that made Tony's stomach turn.
He watched in abject horror as she picked up what looked disturbingly like a dessicated frog brain from the slightly sticky floor, blew the dust off it, and dropped it into the brew.
"Are you insane?!" he finally yelped. "You can't just—that's not sanitary! The five-second rule doesn't apply to experimental chemical compounds!"
"Relax," she said without looking up. "The magical properties are inherent to the material. A little Muggle dirt won't affect the efficacy."
That is not the part I am concerned about! Tony screamed in his head.
She pulled out a small, unlabeled vial and added a single, shimmering drop to the mixture. There was a soft FUMP, and a thick, green-tinged cloud of smoke in the perfect shape of a grinning skull puffed up from the cauldron before dissipating. To test the potency, she dipped a steel spoon into the brew. When she pulled it out, the bottom half of the spoon was simply gone, dissolved into nothingness. She nodded, satisfied.
Everyone else's eyes widened in terror.
"It's done!" she announced cheerfully. She ladled the dark, viscous, vaguely shimmering purple liquid into a bottle and shoved it into Tony's hands. "Drink up."
Tony stared at the bottle. It looked less like a cure and more like a bottle of concentrated, liquid death. He swallowed hard. "Before I drink this… this sludge," he said, his voice strained, "you're going to tell me what, exactly, it is."
"It's an antidote," Hermione said, as if it were obvious.
"I'm suffering from heavy metal poisoning, kid, not a snakebite," he argued, his scientific mind rebelling. "You can't just brew a universal 'antidote' for radioactive isotope decay!"
"Who cares what kind of poison it is?" she retorted, her patience clearly wearing thin. "This is a magic potion. It removes things that are harmful to the body. It doesn't follow your boring Muggle rules. Now, are you going to drink it, or not?"
Tony forced a weak, brittle smile. "How about… you take a sip first? For quality control."
"Don't be ridiculous," she scoffed. "This is an incredibly precious potion. I'm not going to waste it on a healthy wizard. It's for the sick."
He just stood there, clutching the bottle, paralyzed by indecision. That was the last straw. Her cheerful, professorial demeanor vanished, replaced by a cold, hard fury. She lunged forward, grabbed him by the collar of his t-shirt, and pressed the tip of her wand to his temple.
"You are trying my last nerve, Stark," she hissed, her eyes flashing with a dangerous, otherworldly light. "I spent hours brewing this for you. Now. Drink. It."
Tony looked desperately to his allies for help. He looked at Pepper. Her expression was cold as steel. "Drink it, Tony," she commanded.
He looked at Natasha. Her arms were crossed, her gaze stern and unyielding. "Drink."
He looked at his last hope, Nick Fury. The Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. just gave him a single, curt nod. "Drink."
Betrayed on all sides, his will to live warring with his instinct for self-preservation, Tony Stark gave up. He closed his eyes, thinking a final, fond farewell to Pepper, and chugged the entire bottle in one gulp.
Goodbye, cruel world… wait. Is that… mango? And a hint of cinnamon?
His eyes snapped open. "Hey," he said, a look of genuine surprise on his face. "That's… that's actually delicious." It was infinitely better than the foul, green sludge of kale and spirulina he'd been forcing down his throat for months.
"How do you feel?" Pepper asked, her voice tight with a nervous hope.
Tony blinked. He took a breath. And for the first time in months, it didn't feel heavy. The chronic, low-grade ache in his bones was gone. The faint, metallic taste that had been a constant companion on his tongue had vanished. A fog of pain and weakness he hadn't even fully been aware of was lifting from his body. He quickly pulled out his personal palladium detector. He stared at the screen. 0%.
"It's gone," he whispered, his voice full of a raw, quiet awe. "The palladium poisoning… it's completely gone."
Hermione just sniffed, a smug, self-satisfied look on her face. "Of course it is. I'm an excellent potioneer. Some people just have to be difficult about it."
Pepper let out a choked, happy sob and threw her arms around Hermione, lifting the small girl off the ground in a fierce, grateful hug. Tony, feeling a surge of energy and life he hadn't felt since before the cave, was already thinking ahead.
"Great!" he said, his old bravado returning in a rush. "Now I can get back to work! The Mark IV isn't going to build itself!"
Hermione, her face squished against Pepper's shoulder, tapped his arc reactor with her wand. "Hang on, genius," she said, her voice muffled. "This potion only removes the toxins that are already in your body. It's not a permanent immunity. You keep using that palladium-core reactor, you'll just get poisoned all over again."
"So?" Tony said with a dismissive wave of his hand. "We'll just have you brew up a new batch. How much? A million a bottle? I'll buy ten or eight a month. Keep me topped up."
Hermione pushed herself out of Pepper's hug, her expression a mask of pure, unadulterated fury. "A million a bottle?" she shrieked, her voice echoing in the small donut shop. "Are you an idiot?! Did you not hear me when I said it was precious? I didn't say it was expensive! Some things in the universe can't be bought with your dirty Muggle money!"
"To make that potion," she continued, her voice trembling with a rage that made everyone in the room flinch, "the primary binding agent is unicorn blood! Do you have any idea what that is? It's a substance of pure life, a key ingredient in the Elixir of Life itself! Wizards have lived for centuries on it! And you want me to use it to brew you a monthly supply of vitamin supplements?!"
Elixir of Life?
The words hit Fury and Natasha with the force of a physical blow. Immortality. It was the stuff of myths, the ultimate prize, the one thing that could destabilize the entire global order.
"Miss Granger," Fury began, his voice low and urgent, "that information… you must never reveal it to anyone else. You cannot underestimate the lengths that ordinary people, that governments, will go to for the promise of eternal life." He wasn't worried for her safety. He was worried for the safety of any poor, stupid politician who was foolish enough to try and take it from her.
"I know," she snapped. "I'm not an idiot. I've seen TV."
Tony, however, was no longer listening. He was staring at Hermione, a new, profound, and deeply humbling understanding dawning in his mind. Unicorn blood. The Elixir of Life. She hadn't just given him a cure. She had sacrificed a piece of a literal miracle. For him.
The gift wasn't a transaction. It was an act of profound, if deeply grudging, friendship. He looked at the small, angry, terrifying girl, and for the first time, he saw her not as a curiosity, a weapon, or a child, but as an ally.
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