Either Tommy was really excited to have devised his own way to depower Billy, or he really did think himself making these kind of calls was identical to Billy's personal choice. Tony couldn't see how else he had come up with that delineation between their proposals--it wasn't Tony that had outlined that personal choice difference. And Tony really hadn't expected Tommy to be open to the concept of turning off his powers after the sheer amount of defensive pride he took in his mutant identity. Tony had to nod slowly, very aware that he wasn't a mutant or even a metahuman, and while he was frustrated that Tommy didn't consider his experience as a superhero valuable, this was a very different experience that Tony would never be privy to. The way Tommy talked about his powers sounded so much like the ways Tony had heard people with disabilities talk about their barriers, and in a lot of ways that wasn't very surprising; Tommy's environment was at odds with his needs. But Tommy could also interact with the environment far beyond the abilities of any baseline human.
It definitely wasn't in the best interest of Tony's ongoing physical integrity that he pursue a discussion about a switch to turn off mutant powers, or comparing mutations to disabilities. None of the rest of this conversation suggested to him that Tommy had some misplaced trust in Tony to think he should be engaged like that, but that Tommy just didn't consider Tony enough of a threat not to say it.
"Okay," Tony said slowly, navigating through that tangle of wires to get back to the source, "but we're not talking about having a beer and playing Mario Kart. We're talking about Billy when he is his most vulnerable, with a mechanism attached that will suppress his ability to fight back. Whether or not its intended use is an ideal situation where only Billy has control of that mechanism, the fact that it exists makes it exploitable. Just like making that mechanism for you exist, means all those fellas in congress who make big robots and collars to keep the X-Men quiet will have something to point to to fix them."
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It definitely wasn't in the best interest of Tony's ongoing physical integrity that he pursue a discussion about a switch to turn off mutant powers, or comparing mutations to disabilities. None of the rest of this conversation suggested to him that Tommy had some misplaced trust in Tony to think he should be engaged like that, but that Tommy just didn't consider Tony enough of a threat not to say it.
"Okay," Tony said slowly, navigating through that tangle of wires to get back to the source, "but we're not talking about having a beer and playing Mario Kart. We're talking about Billy when he is his most vulnerable, with a mechanism attached that will suppress his ability to fight back. Whether or not its intended use is an ideal situation where only Billy has control of that mechanism, the fact that it exists makes it exploitable. Just like making that mechanism for you exist, means all those fellas in congress who make big robots and collars to keep the X-Men quiet will have something to point to to fix them."