"Jesus Christ!" The dark haired man rushed over to the window and looked out at the extraordinary events that were taking place in front of him. A blue beam was racing towards the cloudless sky from the top of the Stark tower and all of Manhattan seemed to have taken a break from their mundane lives to gaze fearfully at the unusual sight. "I knew that arrogant asshole was up to something ever since he said he spent his free time in a tin can chasing criminals," said a gravelly voice from next to him. The dark haired man tore his eyes away from the astonishing sight to defend his idol.
"Hey, watch what you're saying, Sammy! Tony Stark has done more for this city than you ever will."
"Jeez, cool it Danny!" The gravelly voice replied. The owner of said voice was a short, chubby man in his late 40s who looked like he spent more time at the doughnut store than he did with his family. Providing he had one that is, Danny couldn't think of any girl he knew that would be willing to get within ten feet of him. Ever since his first day at the office, two months ago, Danny had disliked the opinionated, lazy co-worker of his. Danny had kept his cool and tried not to make a bad impression as Sammy – or Mr Stines as he kept insisting on being called – was his superior.
Today, however, Sammy had crossed the line. He had insulted Tony Stark. For any normal person this wouldn't have been a big deal but for Danny, it was bad. Five years before the events at Stark tower, Danny had been in a mess. Drugs, alcohol, unemployed; you name it, he had it. One day, after weeks, months of depressive nothingness, the TV had turned to a chat show. Danny reached for the remote to turn it off – he would like nothing less than to listen to some self-important movie star whine about their life – the guest was introduced. Tony Stark. A charismatic, good looking man strutted onto stage and shook the hand of the host. Typical, Danny thought. He pressed the red 'power off' button on the remote. Nothing happened. Pressed it again. Still nothing. The batteries must have died again. The TV kept nattering on in the background. Apparently Tony uses Lynx deodorant. "Who gives a flying fuck?" swore Danny as he rooted around in the side of the sofa for a battery that might work.
After ten minutes of looking, Danny had just resigned himself to watching the crap that was on TV as he nothing better to do. He sat back. "Today is gonna suck." The audience were now being invited to ask Tony questions. The usual ones were asked – favourite movie, favourite meal, will you marry me? Danny lost faith in humanity at the latter. Why would anyone want to marry that pretentious douchebag? Then it was time for the last question and a nerdy looking kid stood up. Yippee, Danny thought. Another hideously boring question about the latest 'Iron Man' suit of course. In contradiction to Danny - and everyone else's – expectations, the kid cleared his throat and asked "Mr Stark, how do you manage to cope with your alcoholism?" The host looked noticeably uncomfortable. "Tony, you don't have to-"
"It's okay, don't worry. I'm happy to answer." He looked straight in the camera and delivered the most humble, inspiring and incredible story of temptation and redemption that Danny had ever heard. This was when everything changed for Danny Mallory. The next day, he went out and found himself a job, applied for law school, and joined the local AA group. Within a year he was studying to be a lawyer and within four he had a job at a large law firm in the Manhattan. And he owed it all to Tony Stark.
The turquoise beam of energy had now reached a point a few hundred metres up and a black pit was opening up in the sky. "What they hell is going on?" whispered Sammy, scared. Danny remained silent, still furious at Sammy for his earlier comments. As they watched, along with the rest of the city, out of the blackness came a number of small objects. As people attempted to figure out what they were, more and more of them poured out of the portal until the whole sky was thick with them. Suddenly a red shape shot away from the Stark tower and began firing at the mysterious flying creatures. "It's Iron Man" a female voice squealed. "He'll save us from the… the… whatever they are."
Even as they fell to the repulsors of the New York's knight in shining armour, more of the creatures spewed out of the hole in the sky. By now, the creatures had reached ground level and were wreaking havoc on the good people of New York, with cars and citizens being blown to smithereens left, right and centre. A number of them pursued Iron Man down a street where they were promptly ripped apart by what, to Danny, looked like some fighter jet out of Star Wars. The jet then fired upon something on Stark tower which, unfortunately fought back, knocking the jet out of the air. Soon after the jet disappeared, in flames, behind a building a giant beast that can only be described as a space whale flew out of the portal and between the buildings. "It's heading towards us!" somebody shouted. The whole office began to panic as everyone dashed towards the elevator as fast as they could.
Having been near the window, Danny was at the back of the congregation around the doors of the elevator and could only watch in horror as a blast of azure hurtled towards him. Instinct taking over, he dived to the left to avoid incineration and succeeded in taking refuge under a desk. Bolts of blue fire shot over his head and he was forced to look away by the sight of most of his co-workers being systematically disposed of by these grotesque humanoid aliens that, as soon as the 'space whale' had passed, appeared to be everywhere.
Fighting back tears, Danny crawled away from the massacre that was taking place behind him and tried to reach the window. Maybe he could attract attention from someone, anyone? Then he saw the monsters covering every other building and began to despair. Waving his jacket out of the window and calling for help seemed like the best option for survival so that's what he did. Unfortunately, a creature on a flying jet ski saw his attempts to call for help and unleashed an onslaught of blue energy at him. It missed. Danny breathed a sigh of relief as the creature had flown off to torment and kill elsewhere. But Danny was safe.
Then the floor moved. Slowly at first but getting faster and faster. Danny realised that, even though the alien's bombardment had missed him, they had destabilised the floor below and that now, the ground he was sitting on was literally crumbling beneath him. Grabbing on to an exposed power cable for dear life, Danny closed his eyes and prayed to the god that he'd given up on years ago. "Please God, if you exist. Let me survive this and I will make the best use of my life that I possibly can."
The ground shifted more. "Come on, one more fucking chance." The girders and concrete fell away beneath him, leaving Danny clinging on to the increasingly frayed cable. Driven to desperation, Danny screamed "PLEASE, GOD! JUST ONE MORE CHANCE!" The cable snapped and Danny plummeted to the ground.
The deafening roar of a rocket thruster. A blur of red and gold. The ear-splitting blast of a repulsor. Then blackness.
"Hey man, I gotcha." a metallic voice reassuringly said. Danny opened his eyes and for a split second was blinded by the brightness of the sky. Into focus came a familiar face, surrounded by red and gold metal. "You're… you're Tony Stark." Danny mumbled, disorientated.
"That's Iron Man to you, kiddo." winked the man in the suit. "That was a hell of a fall, I thought I'd check on you to make sure you're okay."
"What happened?"
"To quote my good friend, the Cap; we won." Another wink. This guy didn't seem like the man Danny spent five years idolising. He just seemed like a… normal guy.
"Good." said Danny. "Thank you. For saving my life."
"Just doing my job, kid." Again, so normal. Nothing like the superhero he'd been made out to be by the media. Danny sat up and saw the full extent of the devastation. There was rubble everywhere, there wasn't a building to be seen that wasn't pockmarked with bullet holes. The streets were strewn with overturned vehicles and corpses, both alien and human.
"What were those things?" Danny asked, attempting to make sense of the insanity. This was like nothing he had ever seen before and, he had to admit, he was frightened.
"The Chitauri. An army of aliens led by the Norse god, Loki." Tony shuddered.
The name Loki brought back memories of Danny's high school history class. Those were the days, he thought. The time before the he got in with the wrong crowd and was introduced to the drugs and alcohol that ruined his life for the best part of a decade. Thinking back, he remembered the aroma of freshly mown grass rolling in from the football field and the glimmer of sunlight reflecting off the glasses of old Miss Lacey. That was the last time he was truly happy. That afternoon of the 15th of June 1996. When he arrived home that evening, everything changed. Danny couldn't quite remember the details of what happened, only that it ended with his father leaving. And never coming back. Danny pushed that memory to the back of his mind and attempted to recall all he knew about Loki. "He was the brother of Thor, right? And something about giving birth to a horse?"
Tony scoffed. "I think that may have been slightly exaggerated. But the first part's true."
How was this possible? First, the alien invasion then the revelation that a Norse god was behind it! Danny was having trouble believing it, as any sane person would. The sceptical look on Danny's face made it obvious to Tony what was going on in his mind.
"What's your name?" Tony asked, smiling. His rugged yet gentle features were easy to trust and made Danny feel safe, even amongst the chaos that was unfolding around him as the survivors of New York searched for missing loved ones and attempted to recover the shattered remains of their previous lives.
"Uhm… Danny Mallory." Suddenly, Danny couldn't hold it in any longer. Tony had made him feel so comfortable and secure that Danny just had to tell him. "And, uh, you know this isn't the first time you've saved my life, right?"
"What do you mean?" asked Stark, quizzically. "Were you at the race track in Monte Carlo?"
"No, no. You saved my life five years ago, before you became Iron Man." Danny explained. This was really important to him and he needed to get it out in the open. "I was in a really bad place but when I saw your speech about how you coped with your alcoholism everything changed. You inspired me, Mr Stark, to do something with my life and I can't thank you enough for it. From that day forwards, you became my idol. The man I strived to be like. So thank you."
Stark looked taken aback. "You saw that? And it had an effect on you? All my PR guys told me it was terrible and that my reputation would never recover. I- I'm really pleased I was able to help you." The corner of his mouth curled into a smile. "How about you come by the Stark Tower sometime, after all this is over. My cook makes the best calzone you've ever tasted. I'll show you the R&D levels where I work on my suits. What do you say, huh?"
"Mr Stark, I-" Danny stuttered.
"Please, call me Tony"
"Okay, Tony, I don't understand why you're doing this? I mean, I'm flattered and everything but, why me?" For the last five years, Danny had been dreaming of the day he would meet Tony Stark but now it had finally come, he wasn't sure why he had been chosen.
"Why you? Because I'm trying to do a bit of good in the world and you seem like a nice guy. Also, it's always nice to meet a fan." He winked. Again.
Danny took a deep breath to calm himself down and said "In that case, I'd love to come round sometime."
"Fantastic. I'll send a limo round to pick you up then." Tony stood up and started to walk away.
"Wait! How will you know where I live? Or when I'm free?" Danny exclaimed. Admittedly, it didn't matter when he was free as he would drop anything for the chance to visit Stark tower. But Danny didn't want to appear over-keen so he decided to tone it down a bit.
"Don't you worry, Javis is already scanning your calendar. And he just ran a search for all the Danny Mallorys living on the East Coast then matched a picture of your face I just took with CCTV footage of all the addresses he found. You live at 33 Orange Street, New York and you're free on Friday night. See you then, Danny." Tony gave Danny a final wink and a casual salute before walking slowly away.
Danny tried to get his head around what just happened before failing to do so and walking home, confused and shaken but happy.