For notes and acknowledgements (aka: the boring bits), see the end of the story please.

THE ROAD TO HELL

2. Good intentions

"Back in my day, we did not have showers in our planes."

Refreshed, casually clothed in khaki slacks and a crème turtleneck, Stark dropped himself in the luxurious passenger chair across from Jones and waited a moment for one of the flight attendants to deck out his lunch for him on the little table in between their seats.

"You're really hamming up the old man routine, aren't you?"

"In part." Jones touched his hand to his glasses and pushed them a bit firmer on his nose, closed the booklet he had been researching and held up the little plastic cup, lid firmly closed, that held the innocuous black rock the two men had flown the breadth of America for twice in as many days. The frosted plastic hid he little lights inside the rock that looked like a child's collectible like this. He shook the cup and watch the stone rattle around.

Stark´s jet was a stylish affair, the inside decorated in clean whites and warm natural browns. The passenger cabin could hold eight at the most, had a little bar at the side and could be used as a movie theatre . In the back Stark had a bedroom with all the creature comforts, like that shower. And somewhere in the bowels of the plane he apparently housed a fully staffed kitchen. Jones knew a bit about airplanes, he had become a pilot in WWI, and to carry the water for a nice little shower was taking on a lot of dead weight you had to lift and carry. That cost engine power and fuel. So obviously, you also needed the capacity to store and carry the extra fuel. Besides all that and even much more impressive, was that the jet was some kind of supersonic affair that would bring him from Nevada to Connecticut in under two hours which was ridiculously fast. The aircraft looked like a big flying triangle with a downturned snout and was some kind of prototype Stark was haggling with various European governments about to sell them- even the Russians were involved it seemed. But there were problems with friction and aerodynamic heating, structural distortions caused by the high speeds and other things Jones had no knowledge of but really wished Stark had not elaborated on, just after they had taken off.

"A plane like this is going to kill you one day."

Stark just shrugged and chewed his salad and chicken. Jones already ate. He was tired but too high on adrenaline to actually sleep right now. He had lost track of time. Stark had come to him- what was it, last night? At about ten P.M. to demand him to come with and collect the cursed gem he now held. Jones had finished his research on it about a week ago and it was a sighn of Stark´s eagerness and impatience he had been able to drop everything on his schedule he was working on, for him, short notice. What had led to his wife having a fit and entering in that ridiculous bet that if she would drink Stark under the table, he would just leave and come back on Indy's own good time. Not being able to keep up with those two and well under a long time before they had finished, Jones noticed Marian had lost when three hours later she furiously threw both men out of her house, aiming the empty bottles at Stark's head in the hallway, which he ducked, and a half packed suitcase aimed at Jones' chest, which he caught with an 'oomph' while the force of the throw landed him on his backside. When he had pulled himself together and had left Stark waiting on the driveway to say goodbye and get his documents on the stone, Marian had made it very clear he either stay home or stay away for a few days because she was –that- furious with him for letting Stark walking all over him. Again. Jones had smiled at her and kissed her and fled her after collecting his books, and had told Stark he'd be staying with him at his New York Mansion for a couple of days. Jones had gotten some sleep in the plane on the way to Nevada, and in the Phantom Stark had waiting for them there at the airfield. Now it was about eleven A.M. Nevada time what meant they would arrive at Stark's mansion somewhere late afternoon New York time- He could still call Marian and apologize-and then drop dead for a few hours.

He was so whipped.

Stark had been rummaging in the briefcase at his feet, already consumed with paperwork from his company, and Jones attention moved from the stone to his friend and employer. CEO, inventor, the greatest engineer of his generation. Ladies man, war hero dash profiteer depending on your political views. Brat. Sorcerer apparently, if he ever wanted to commit himself to the occult. Family man, if he would ever give himself the chance. Stark looked up at him with a question in his eyes. Jones shrugged and rattled the cup a bit more. Stark turned back to his papers while he ate, and Jones to the documents he had collected on his little rock.

"So," Stark said, swallowing the last of his chicken and sinking back in his chair, nursing the Chardonnay that had come with their lunch, "what now?"

Jones held up the booklet with his notes. "Legend has it that soul stones are the crystals formed at the bottom of a well of hatred. Somewhere in the world in a place dedicated to all gods of evil, the earth spits out a drop of hatred every time a human being commits a notorious act."

Stark smiled, eyes drifting to the plastic cup. One of his attendants took his plate away and made herself scarce after a look of his, so the men where left alone to talk. "And every time a child lies a fairy dies."

Jones nodded with a slight grin. "True, but we have no proof of that." Stark toasted the notion and held his head to the side, listening attentively.

"To demon kind these wells are supposed to hold the finest ambrosia and they just drain them and they get drunk on it and nothing much happens. But when a human being sips from these waters, or even just touches them, all the fury, the madness and the power of the hatred poured into the well, will transfer into that human, and they will become a creature of pure hatred themselves. A demon, in effect. Supposedly immortal and crazily powerful. These crystals are what is left after the well is drained. You can only get to them after the well has been drained."

Stark nodded. "And once upon a time a long long time ago this happened and somewhere out there is an evil critter that once was human, and they left us this.", he said, indicating the cup.

"Not quite. There have always been special people in this world, heroes and saints and secret organizations, to ward off threats like that."

"People like Steve?"

"No, not really. Steve Rogers was a man made wonder. I'm talking about a kind of half-gods like Samson and Hercules and the brave ones who fought giants with God on their side like David. They pop up all through history. Young girls with extreme fighting skills, men like the wizard Merlin, Angels come down from heaven to fight dragons. Usually the myths speak off either the forces of good finding a way to deal with the demon, or more usual, finding a way to deal with the well before something earth shattering happens. Most of the time the saint or saintly figure is sacrificed in the struggle. Within the ancient Roman cult of Juventas there was a secretive branch that dedicated itself to seeking out these wells and dealing with them. Which they did quite successfully, actually. After one of these wells is destroyed, the Earth still needs to get rid of all the evil poured into her. Another one will take its place God knows where. But these people had found a way to deal and survive. Because apparently there is one good thing you can do with all the hatred in the world."

"Which is?"

"I have no idea. It's not recorded in any of my sources. Unfortunately, or at least for them, this offshoot of the Juventas cult became the guardians of the soulstones they found. I've found traces of contacts with other sects with whom they tried almost desperately to break the stones once they noticed that under certain circumstances a person's soul could be literally sucked into them. In the Scandinavian countries there was a sect dedicated to Baldur they apparently often consulted, and they had links to Tibet and Indonesia. But their temples were raided and the stones they guarded disappeared. This particular one was discovered in Greece at the dig in Herculaneum in the second half of the 17th century. It was stolen and made it's rounds through various satanic sects who were trying to use it, and saintly monasteries where the monks were trying to hide it. Until about seventy years ago a would be psychic in London stuck it to the end of a divining rod and claimed to be able to find missing persons with it. It did not work for him. The people he did find, were the people he had abducted by a street gang. But a real psychic, a certain police inspector by the name of Frederick Abberline, arrested the fraud and, with the divining rod, found a child the criminals had stowed away. Apparently he was also a very intelligent man, researched the instrument, made notes, got afraid of it and handed it over to some Free Mason contacts he had. Who eventually brought the douser to the USA were it got stuck in the warehouse where we took it from. People must have examined it, because the rod has disappeared."

Stark put down his now empty glass, picked up the plastic container, held it to the light from the window beside him and peered inside. All he could see was a black little stone with an nastily pointed side.

"It still looks like the top of a weapon to me. Not an arrowhead. Some odd slim spear of some sort."

"Could be. You have to bleed on it, again with the blood, to get inside of it."

"You better watch it with your hand then."

Jones looked at his now bandaged right hand and shrugged.

"It probably needs a ritual."

"But what is the purpose- I mean, it is a terrible device and an horrific notion that this unobtrusive looking little piece of rock can tear a man's soul away. That it might hold some poor lost souls inside right now. I can see the use as threat to ward of your enemies, but I cannot think of any practical applications."

"Life is force, power. Energy. It is said the energy that little thing contains can be used to give fuel and power to very dark magic."

"But you are talking about the transformation of energy. Like electricity to light, or in this case better put, coal to heat or movement. In which the original material is transformed and for all intent an purposes, lost."

"That was the biggest curse I found. If these people are used, they are used up. It is a complete and utter death. Nothing remains to either go to hell or heaven."

Stark shivered and made a face as if he'd eaten a lemon. He put the container down again.

"Can we free them?"

"No. I don't think so. Abberline tried. He entered in some meditative state and tried to project his mind inside. His idea was to act as a guide to the outside world so the imprisoned could escape through him. Apparently he did get some look inside, went mad from what he found and two weeks later they found him dead in some opium den. That was what the Hindu's of the time apparently had advised the Juventas Cult, hence the surviving records of the method. He wrote down what he found inside and I read it and it is an absolute nightmare of cold, loneliness and darkness. These people seem to be self-aware, but not of each other. They have been left alone in the dark for perhaps thousands of years. The Scandinavians of the Baldur sect were talking about exploding the stone with fire from the heavens."

"These guys were probably big with lightning, having a god of thunder and all. It might even work."

"What do you mean?"

"The ancients could not harness the power of electricity like we can. I can probably come up with generators strong enough to make the energy blast to crumble this- thing. Or imitate lightning if that is an absolute necessity. But the main question is, would we harm the people inside if we use it to find Steve?"

"It is a consideration, but I can find no evidence of it. Still, we have to be, very, very careful with this. There are a lot of sick people in the world who would not hesitate to come after us once it gets out we have it- And the holy ones would not exactly be too appreciative either, I guess."

"Not to mention the government."

"Noo- not to mention them."

"Jones- I know I have commissioned you to help me find a way to bring back Steve, but using a thing as diabolical and dangerous like this goes a bit beyond that."

Jones smiled. "You are a puzzle, Howard. I wanted to know why you wanted it so badly."

Stark tiredly sank back into his chair. "Well I told you, so now you do."

"I also owe him my life. Many people do."

"You admired him as much as I."

Jones pulled his ear absently and rubbed his face before he answered.

"If we do not find him, Rogers runs the risk of becoming a very interesting archeological artifact himself. In fact he's already half way there. You are a man touched by a vision that he is still alive- And from what I have seen you do back in that warehouse, you might even be right. You might have the right feelers for this. But when you came to me I took your commission because if he is just dead and all we'll ever find is his deep frozen corpse, then at least our generation will give him a decent burial because we remember what we owe him. I've been called just another graverobber a great many times in my career and not undeservedly. My successors might not be as considerate with the Captain's remains as you or I would be. And he deserves a hell of a lot better than ending up like some mummy in a museum."

The two men fell silent and stared at the innocent little plastic cup and the shadow within for a moment. Stark picked it up and hid the cup away in his briefcase, not to leave it in sight of even his own people, took to his papers again and Jones buried his nose in his notes, waiting for the plane to start it's decent.

Traffic caused the men to arrive later than the doctor had anticipated and Jones felt wrung out when Stark´s limo finally pulled up at his New York Fifth Avenue mansion. The house was an impressive affair, a city block wide, including the gardens, three stories high. It was build just before WWI and set in stone that lit up a sweet pastel yellow in the afternoon sun. The grounds were circled by a high thick wall with a tall iron gate at the front and a solid steel sliding door at the back, that opened up to the underground garage. Where the two men were awaited by a matching set of uniformed young gentlemen who busied himself with their luggage. Stark's male secretary was just leaving the lift at the other side of the basement and hurried over to his boss, checking his clipboard and babbling about missed meetings and contracts that needed to be signed.

Jones had noted Stark always surrounded himself with people. People who cooked and cleaned for him. Who guarded his home and safety. Who polished his cars and his shoes and made sure he kept his appointments. The bodyguards were white and the maids were black. Jones, who for all his patriotism, was more a man of the World than of any nation, had learned long ago that the worth of a man, or woman for that matter, lay in their actions, not their tone of skin. His travels and cultural studies had broadened his mind to a place where he truly could not care less. Captain America had been the commander of a racially mixed group of soldiers, possibly the only one at the time, giving Jones the impression Rogers had been of a same mind as he was. To be honest, he had been too busy running for his life to think about anything much during his misadventure with the Howling Commando´s. But it had given him pause in later years, when at times he, albeit in a modest way, added his own voice to the chorus for racial equality and had been very supportive of black students at his university. And silently wondered what the Captain might have made of burning crosses.

Stark, for all his futurism, was still very much a man grown from the thirties and though his own travels had brought him to war-torn Europe in his younger years, he now usually did not see more of a foreign country than an airstrip and a boardroom. Western Science was dominated by white Anglo-Saxon males and Stark simply did not have the toolbox, so to speak, to look past ingrained every day racism. He secured his staff's loyalty unconsciously with his natural charm, and consciously by overpaying them. He did not reason beyond his own needs and could not care less that his money helped black kids through college. He just needed to be able to blindly trust he would be taken care of like the true modern-day aristocrat he was. World-politics were his field. And as long as either side of the struggle for equality did not resort to massive terrorism with bombs in public places, that struggle was of very little importance to him.

With half his mind buried in work already, Stark appointed one of his people to play valet to his houseguest and Jones found himself escorted to the upper levels of the house and to a suite of rooms on the second floor where his luggage had been brought. The servant started to unpack for him and told the doctor that dinner would be at eight. Jones threw down his hat on a chair, kicked of his shoes and asked where the phone was. It was only half past six, so sock-footed he rang Marian and explained to her he was staying in New York, while tugging off his tie. He apologized and she told him to bring his ass to her back in one piece because she worried about him. Smiling he rung off, fell face down on the four-poster and did not wake until ten and he was hungry.

Refreshed from sleep and a quick wash-and-shave in the en-suite bathroom, Jones made his way to the kitchen, his notes in an old and saggy leather briefcase on the stone. It was not the first time he spend a few days at the mansion and he was familiar with its routine. The female staff and the old gardener would have gone to their respective homes . The butler, the chef, most of the guards and the driver would have retreated to their bedrooms on the third floor. Two men made hourly rounds through the building and the grounds and there was a third operative manning the security camera's in a safe-room across the hall from Stark's study. There was a valet on call in the kitchen for as long as Stark would be awake and working and might demand refreshments.

Jones was more used to snooping around in houses like this, so his first reaction when he heard voices coming toward him was to look for cover- but he relaxed, shook his head and when two bulky young men in tastefully neutral suits rounded the corner and entered his part of the hallway, they politely wished each other a good evening and he felt more than a bit silly.

"Jarvis is waiting for you in the kitchen with your supper Sir. Mister Stark has requested your presence when you are ready." Suit One told him. Did he know where the kitchen was? Jones nodded and made his way, glad off the familiarity. Marian might have been insulted that he was directed to the kitchen to eat, guest as he was in this house. But to Jones it meant he was trusted.

The kitchen was large enough to serve a middle-sized restaurant and still capable to allow a table where all the staff could comfortably eat at lunchtime. Modern electric stoves had replaced the their gas using counterparts, but they were still standing under an old brick arch that housed and hid the modern cooker hood. Old-fashioned cupboards lined the walls and showed crockery, shining copper pots ready to be used were stowed away on shelves. Fresh herbs grew in pots in the windowsill and Jones had the odd feeling that the kitchen was one of the few places in this house that actually lived.

At the table reading the New York Times and with a cup of coffee at his elbow, sat the footman Edwin Jarvis who readily stood and moved to one of the ovens.

"Good evening, Sir. I've taken the liberty of keeping a plate hot for you."

"Thank you, mister Jarvis."

"Just Jarvis please, Sir."

Jarvis was a special one and Jones had remembered him. The footman was a born and bred Brooklyn boy with an odd British accent he told people he picked up in London during the war. He was round faced and balding, probably about Stark's age but somehow one could not really tell and there was an edge behind his unflappable demeanor. He was a not a tall man and easily overlooked, but Jones had the sad suspicion this guy could be more dangerous with a duster than any bodyguard with a gun. Some people you just did not ask what they had seen during the hard times. Especially when you already had enough nightmares of your own.

So he sat, put his briefcase down near his feet and allowed him to be served some excellent veal dish and weirdly felt a bit like the young boy he once was, sitting at the kitchen table of his elderly neighbor who acted as the honorary neighborhood grandmum and fed all the kids waffles.

Creepy,

The little stone was very definitely creepy.

His work abandoned, Howard Stark had taken the plastic cup and placed it in front of him on his wide desk. For the last fifteen minutes he had been staring at the damned thing now, and he just knew it was staring back at him. He was growing impatient for Jones to wake up, for something to happen. He had not wanted to have the archeologist woken for dinner for he had seemed dog-tired. So he ate alone, made short work of his meal and went back to work again. But he had had it now. He rose, shuffled the papers on his desk into an unruly stack, stuck them into a folder, opened a desk drawer and threw the folder in almost without looking. At the other side of his study was a special case where Stark kept the sheaths with the nautical maps he had used in his search for the Captain. He walked over, hesitated and took the one with the smallest scale, showing the largest stretch of the Arctic and rolled it out over his desk. It immediately curled up, and with a little flip of the map's corner, dumped the cup onto the floor where it rolled under the desk. Cussing Stark went on his knees, grabbed blindly and retrieved the damn thing. Carefully he placed the cup at the far side of his desk, rolled the map out again and used his desk lamp to secure a corner, a rather colorful paperweight for the next and fought the telephone cord to move the telephone on the third. Pushing down the fourth he reached blindly behind him and caught some book from the bookcase at his back. It was red, something about economics and would do fine. Stark took the cup, removed the lid, rattled the cup as if it were a dicebox and let the stone fly over the map. It just rolled where the motion took it, too far north to be a reasonable site to go look. Stark fell back into his wheeled desk chair and drifted back a little

"Like that would help," he muttered.

Something inside the little stone moved, But it had to be a trick of the light. Stark reached over and put out the desk lamp. Definitely something moving. He switched the lamp on again and went to the door of his study to throw the two switches that controlled the ceiling lamp and the scones against the walls. Only the floorlamp near the window in the far corner and the one on his desk were still lit, and the latter he switched off when he seated himself. The white paper of the map threw too much of a reflection. Using his letteropener Stark carefully moved the stone back into the cup, pushed the book and the phone away and helped the map curl in on itself. He turned the cup on the green leather inlay of his desk what made the black thing almost invisible in the darkened room. The tiny pinpricks of light inside the stone however, shone brightly.

Stark leaned his elbows on his desk, chair rolled back a little and lay his chin on his wrists. His narrowed eyes were almost at the same level as the dancing lights.

"Who are you?" he whispered. Trying to imagine what it had to be like inside. A prison of total darkness.

There were patterns inside. Some dots went up and down and up and down, some drew lazy circles, an others shot wildly round as if out of control. One of the lights pulsed. Like breathing in, and breathing out. Breathing in, breathing out. In. Out.

In.

Out.

The longer Stark looked, the more dots he saw, he could not count them anymore.

In.

Out.

-HELP ME-

Stark shot up with a sharp intake of breath. His chair rammed the bookcase behind him and a book fell with a dull thud on the floor. Trembling, one hand on his chest and the other for support on the desk, Stark tried to get his breath under control again. Something had touched him. A voice had reached out inside his head. He had not heard it, he could swear, and yet it had been there.

Stark swallowed. "Okay-" he said. "Okay I hear you."

There was nothing. Silence. Sounds of the house and traffic outside.

Stark's breath went heavy and he felt as if he'd been running for hours.

"How can I help?"he whispered to the darkness. Nothing came back to him.

Stark grabbed the armrests of his chair and pulled it back under him. "So what just happened-", he reasoned. He had been staring into the stone, concentrating on the stone. No- not the rock. The darkness of it pushed him away and whatever it was he touched just now had not been pushing, it had been reaching. One of the little dots had noticed him. Stark felt like Christmas come early, exited and thrilled. One of the ghosts inside had found him. He concentrated again on the flickering lights and formulated the question inside his head this time.

-How can I help?-

All movement stopped. The dots stilled and the stone lit from the inside like a diamond caught in sunlight.

-OUT-

A clear spike of pain shot through Stark's mind.

-Not so loud- please, You are too loud!-

-OUT-, the voice repeated and Stark shook his head, blindly pushed himself away from the desk and broke away violently. His lamp fell, the phone rattled to the ground with a ping and the rolled up map made a swipe over the desk to land on the other side. There was a wetness on his face.

"Too loud-" he whispered. He stumbled away from the desk, stood dazed and fought his way to the door, sluggish, on feet of clay. He threw the door to the hall open and the light spilled in. For a moment he just hung in the doorway, catching his breath. Bringing a hand to his face and staring at it when it came away bloodied.

"Damn!"

A nosebleed. And yes- some drops had already soiled his front. Angrily Stark looked back at his darkened study and his desk and the mess he made but could not see clearly. He pinched his nose closed and craned his neck. With a snap he threw the switch beside the door and the lights came back on. Awkwardly with his head back he went to the bathroom two doors down the hall, put the door on its hook, and fumbled for the faucet. The water started running and he let go of his nose to wash his face. The cool water made him shiver and he felt like waking. What the hell just happened in there?

Stark dried his face and his hands. Water had spattered over his chest. He wetted a corner of the towel and dabbed at the blood on his clothing, but that only made the stains bigger. Annoyed, the engineer turned off the water, threw the towel in the sink, looked at himself in the mirror, straighten himself and drew back his shoulders.

"Okay, that was a mistake. Let's not do that again."

Stark sniveled a bit an felt his nose but the bleeding had stopped and he was fine, just bloody annoyed. He would put the rock back in its cup and be done with it until Indy woke up and somebody who had an idea on how to handle the damn thing could make sense of this little mess. At least he had found out that something inside was clearly conscious of itself- and they just might be able to communicate with it. That had to count.

Stark returned to his study, surveyed the mess he made with his hands in his sides, picked up his phone and put the hook in its cradle. Picked up the map, rolled it op tight and put it back in its protective covering. He laid it down over the desk, straightened his lamp and switched it on, but something had broke and it refused to light. Stark picked up the plastic container- but the stone was not there. Not sitting in the middle of his desk where he had left it. He rolled his eyes, went to his hands and knees, ass in the air, an peered under the desk. Yup- there it was just almost out of reach in the middle. He pushed his arm under as far as it would go, ticked the stone with the tips of his fingers a bit towards him and finally closed his fist around it.

"Gotcha!" he said.

-YES-

Notes and acknowledgements, also called: the boring bits. Read at your own risk.

Darn, this chapter fought back!

Paramount Pictures, Marvel Entertainment and Marvel studio's own "Captain America, The First Avenger". Paramount Pictures, Lucasfilm ltd and Steven Spielberg own "Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull", and the other Indy movies I've pilfered. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation (as Twentieth Century Fox) and Underworld Entertainment (as Underworld Pictures) own "From Hell" from which inspector Frederick Abberline was lifted.

Somewhere in Greece is a muse laughing her socks off for sending me this story and causing me al the work to write it down, forcing me to take the blame for it but also graciously allowing me the credit.

In 'Captain America, the First Avenger' the Red Scull made a remark about Hitler seeking treasure in the desert, hitting my Indy-alarm button full force. I just HAD to intertwine the tale of my favorite archeologist with the one about my favorite futurist (Tony, not his dad) after that one.

One of the most wonderful things about Marvel is the way they 'play' with their own continuity and throw in an alternate universe every other year or so. I am aware that Dr. Jones' story was continued well into his old age with the television series "The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles". But in the (video/dvd) release of said series they apparently cut out the old Indy who bookended the stories. Well, I thought, if canon can take that liberty, why not me? So should you find things amiss with how they are 'supposed to be' within the continuity of the movie/television-verses, please be kind and assume I'm not some ill informed crazy fan girl that does not know what she's writing about, but that I'm just another proud flag-bearer of the above mentioned honored tradition of alternate realities.

The 'crazy fan girl' denomination on its own however, is acceptable.

And yes- the 'the young girls with extreme fighting skills' Indy mentions, are in fact, Slayers. Or at least the way I imagine myself Buffy's predecessors, pilfered from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, copyright Twentieth Century Fox. Joss Whedon FTW! If people did not want me to throw some of Whedon/Buffy into the mix, they should not have let this fantastic storyteller direct the Avengers movie! Duh!