[It's nice to be able to talk about things like they were real even though they weren't at all, not even a little, tragically and pitifully. At least they map onto psychological realities.] Sounds like you're gonna be top of the class, [he says, smiling. Smirking. Whatever, it's Tony Stark's face, one is the other until Pepper's around and he's not sure that she was

real, either.] You sound almost like Agent Romanoff, except a little less morbid political assassin drama. A little too earnest.

[Though he does remember the Black Widow laying it on pretty thick once upon a giant air-sea SHIELD base this one time. Gotta love that nationalist fervor.] Fury would be proud. [Tony probably shouldn't be talking about Fury. It's not that he Knows; it's merely that Fury has always been okay to talk about. It's Coulson that he wouldn't. Not for an offhanded backhanded compliment, anyway.]