January 2009
January always meant cleaning up and purging from the previous year but this year was particularly arduous when Tony had three months to catch up on from what he missed. Hundreds of memos, Board reports, construction and shipment orders needed to be cataloged and designs that had been signed off without his approval needed to be redone to his standards. Even when Tony couldn't make it into Stark Industries personally, he was still sifting through the rubble from home with the aid of JARVIS.
As Tony delved deeper into the shit left behind, one thing became clearly obvious. Obadiah had usurped power that was not his in Tony's absence and did so with gusto. This scared Tony because he knew damn well what Obadiah was capable of.
The first thing Tony did was set JARVIS to tracking every single serial number from every piece of weaponry that had left his factories since he had been hired. He wanted to track down every shred from start to finish and those that did not have legitimate endings, he wanted to know where they went.
Next on the list was the paper trail or lack thereof. Tony went days without sleep going through documents. With how much Obadiah too easily slipped into Tony's powers as CEO, he began scouring the Board reports. It didn't take long before Tony found several motions from Obadiah to be declared CEO by the Board in his absence and presumed death and an attempt to file an injunction against Tony when it was discovered that he was alive. Most of the motions had been shut down almost instantly by the members of the Board out of respect for Howard and Tony and lack of evidence while he was captured as to whether he was alive or dead.
Ginnie was watching Tony sink into a painful spiral. She watched her husband go between a mixture of anger, rage, depression and obsession as he sorted through every scrap of paper for the three months he was gone. On the nights he would actually sleep, he would be plagued with nightmares that he woke up screaming from. After those, he would refuse to go back to sleep and head down to the garage where he poured himself into work again fueled by caffeine and rage.
Turning on his music hard and loud, Tony went back to finding out the truth in all that happened while he was gone. It was past three in the morning when he started to hack into Obadiah's emails and private folders. It didn't take him long to get inside, especially since he programed the computers' security systems in all of Stark Industries. It might not have taken him long to get in but processing what he saw was a whole different story.
Ginnie did not wake to the sound of her alarm going off but to the sounds of glass breaking several times. She nearly jumped out of bed and almost ran down to the garage to see what happened. Even though she steeled herself up enough to go downstairs, Ginnie still worried about what she may find.
The entire garage was dark and broken glass was all over the floor. All the windows had been shattered as well as the TV and some of the lights. The weapon of destruction – a three foot length of piping – lay discarded on the floor. Tony was sitting on his couch with his head hung low, breathing deeply to probably try to calm down.
"Tony?" Ginnie said softly so he would not be startled by her being there.
Tony looked up at the sound of his name and the rage was gone out of his eyes and all that remained was the pain of betrayal.
Ginnie crossed the room, careful to avoid the broken glass on the floor and stood in front of him.
Tony sighed and buried his head against her belly that was beginning to show the baby that grew inside, his body trembling with anger, rage, sadness and pain. He sniffed once trying to fight what was overwhelming him and he was losing.
Ginnie wrapped her arms around Tony's head and bent over him, kissing his hair as she heard him breaking down against her. She didn't say a word but offered the silent comfort he needed more than anything at the moment.
After a few moments, Tony looked up at Ginnie with bloodshot eyes and silently pulled her down to sit across his legs. His breath was still shuddering as he ran his fingers delicately along her jaw line before running his fingers through her hair. He leaned in and gently pulled Ginnie forward, kissing her deeply before laying his head on her shoulder.
Ginnie wrapped her arms tight around her husband, trying to comfort him as best as she could. "Tony, what happened?"
Tony sniffed. "He was the one who ordered it. He tried to have me killed."
"Who did?" Ginnie asked, even though she had an idea.
"Obadiah," Tony whispered. He set Ginnie down on the couch before he got up and started pacing. "He's my father's best friend and business partner and he paid to have me killed!" Tony screamed as angry tears fell from his eyes.
Ginnie was honestly a bit stunned that Obadiah had gone that far. "Are you sure?" She knew he desired to be number one in the company but even this seemed a little extreme.
Tony turned his computer screen towards her, hit 'translate' and turned up the volume.
Ginnie watched in horror at the small glimpse of what her husband went through for three months and wanted so much for what she was watching not to be real. Her eyes met Tony's and she knew every bit of it was true. "Where do we go from here?"
Tony fell back into a chair. "I'm going to have to tell my father," he sighed. "And the FBI..."
"And them..." Ginnie added as she had JARVIS pull up Agent Coulson's card.
"They will be easy compared to my dad."
A few hours later, Tony showed up at his parents' house in the Hamptons with a 1200 dollar bottle of scotch in his hand to try to soften the blow.
"Good evening, Master Anthony," Edwin said warmly as he opened the door. "We weren't expecting you."
"I know and I'm sorry about that, Edwin," Tony apologized. "Is my father home?"
"He's down in the garage."
Tony thanked the butler and gave him a smile before heading down to his father's workshop. When he got downstairs, Tony saw his father tinkering away at one of the many classic cars he owned. "You're getting too much air in the engine," Tony spoke up when he heard his father rev the car.
Howard looked up and smiled at first when he saw Tony. "That was what I was working on," he stated as he wiped the grease from his hands. "To what do I owe the pleasure?"
Tony walked around to one of the couches, taking notice of the online chess game his father was involved in. "You know...they have you in five moves," he pointed out, not wanting to bring up the real reason he was here yet.
"But I have him in three," Howard corrected. "Now I know damn well you didn't come over here in the snow to talk cars and chess when you have a very expensive bottle of scotch in your hand. What's going on, Tony?"
Tony sighed and handed the bottle to his father who proceeded to pour a drink for both of them. "There's something I need to talk to you about and it's not easy."
Howard handed Tony a glass and sat down next to him. "That's an understatement. It has to be pretty damn hard to bring you out here now."
Tony took a sip from the scotch, trying to find the right words. "It's about Obie."
"Tony, I know the two of you have had your differences but..."
"He's the leak, Dad," Tony blurted out, interrupting his father.
"You can't go making accusations like that," Howard came back quickly.
"Dad, I have proof," Tony replied. "And that's not all..."
"What else could there be?" Howard said sharply.
"He tried to have me killed!"
Howard was dumbstruck for a moment. "Excuse me?"
Tony didn't say anything. He put the thumb drive in Howard's computer and showed him the same video he showed Ginnie that he had hacked from Obadiah's computer.
Howard's face filled with horror as the video played. He downed his scotch and poured another before turning it off.
"I have forwarded all of this already to the FBI, CIA and a few others. I plan on confronting him, Dad, but I'm going to need back up. He's not going to go without a fight," Tony mentioned. "I know he's your friend, Dad, but I need your help. The man who was your friend isn't the same one who we are now dealing with. Please, I need you with me."
Howard downed the second glass. "When?"
Tony smiled. "I plan on calling a meeting with him at the end of the day tomorrow. Most won't be in the building so we don't have to worry about the potential for a scene. We can deal with the business end and then the feds can meet him after with the handcuffs."
"You will then need to issue a statement when the time is right...after SHIELD gives you the go ahead," Howard prompted.
Tony nodded in agreement and then looked up at what his father had said. "How the hell do you know about them?"
Howard laughed. "I helped to create them."
The next morning, Tony went into Stark Industries, giving himself the day to build up the courage he was going to need to confront Obadiah that evening. Finding his schedule relatively clear, he ditched the suit for t-shirt and jeans and told Ginnie that he would be down in R & D to clear his head. Getting his hands dirty was the best way to clear his head.
As the elevator doors opened to the basement, Tony almost wished he had never left his old position. He missed making things.
"It's too damn quiet in here," Tony said with a laugh as he opened the door. "No Ozzy?"
The tech closest to the door nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of Tony's voice. "Mr. Stark?"
Tony slapped him on the shoulder to put him at ease. "It hasn't been that long since I worked down here. What's with all the propriety?"
"You're the CEO now," the tech responded.
"But deep down, I still belong here," Tony said with a smile that faded as he looked around. Many of the stations were empty. "Where the hell is everyone?"
The tech hesitated in answering.
"What are you not telling me?" Tony questioned, his tone getting more serious.
The tech swallowed hard. "Many of them were transferred to the plant in California to work on a major project."
Tony felt his blood pressure tick up a few notches. "Who authorized it?" he asked, even though he already knew the answer.
"Mr. Stane did, sir."
Tony gritted his teeth together as he nodded. "I want all information you have on this project ASAP. I'll deal with this myself."
Back in his office,Tony went directly into the mainframe of the system. If Obadiah was trying to hide something he was going to find it. Tony knew every line of code of his security system and he knew every way in and out of it. Obadiah had no clue that Tony could walk in and out of every employee's login like the public library. It didn't take long before Tony found a ghost drive. He clicked on it and every thing was laid out for him. Two folders marked 'confidential' housed the shipping manifests for every weapon he stole. A folder marked 'top secret' contained blue prints eerily similar to the suit of armor he built in Afghanistan but taken up a few notches. Tony knew he would be making a visit to California soon and seeing what's in sector 16 for himself. Another folder was marked ultra secret. This one contained the video message that Tony had found earlier demanding more money when the Ten Rings found out who their intended target was. Tony copied all of it. He sent one set to JARVIS to store on his private server, one each to the FBI, CIA and SHIELD and one to his father. Obadiah had dug his grave and all that was left was to throw him in it.
As darkness fell and the building started to quiet, Tony put his plan into action. His father had arrived earlier in the day and was waiting for the opportune moment to make his presence known, letting Tony take the lead.
"Mary, would you please ask Mr. Stane to come down to my office?" Tony paged his secretary as he turned JARVIS on remotely on his desktop.
"Right away, Mr. Stark."
A few minutes passed before Obadiah arrived in Tony's office. He quickly tried to hide the look of annoyance that was on his face from being summoned and failed. "I didn't think you were in the office today, Tony," he replied with a false joyous tone. "I thought you were working from home to recoup."
"There are certain things which necessitate a face to face rather than a distance meeting," Tony said coolly as he gestured for Obadiah to sit to try to get him at ease. "I am preparing to address the stockholders about the status of the company and I need some holes filled in due to my recent and unexpected absence."
"You have hard shoes to fill but I did my best under the tragic circumstances that we found ourselves in," Obadiah said almost smugly.
"That's what I need filled in," Tony said as he leaned back in his chair and twirled his pen in his fingers. "First, I would like to know why there has been an increased number of lost pieces...both tech and weapons. The numbers were quite low but have slowly been increasing and experienced a large bump recently despite the extra measures that I instituted."
Obadiah's poker face was unflinching. "That is something I will need to look into," he replied.
"I already have," Tony stated as he produced the folder of shipping manifests of many of the lost weapons. "Explain to me why these have your signature on them."
Obadiah blanched slightly but resumed the unbreakable poker face. "You were unavailable and someone had to keep this company going."
Tony had to try a different tactic. "My second issue come in the form of internal communication and misuse of of the company servers."
"What are you talking about?" Obadiah asked as the annoyance slipped into his tone.
"I had a great deal of reading to catch up with with being out for three months. You know emails and board reports and things like that," Tony mentioned casually as he brought up the video. "Now, most of it was boring as all hell but some of it was quite interesting. I can honestly say that some of the shit that your mistress puts down in writing I have not seen even in Penthouse and if she's willing to put that in writing, I can only imagine what she does in person. The videos were were interesting to say the least. But that wasn't the most interesting. It is a bit worrisome on how easily you slipped into my role...like you had been waiting for it. I told you twelve years ago that if you could not work with me, you could walk out the door. You chose a different path," Tony explained as he turned the computer screen so that Obadiah could see, hit play and watched his reaction.
Obadiah's eyes flashed the rage he was trying to reign in.
"You made a mistake," Tony started in an almost deadly tone. "You thought I would be easy to get rid of. According to them, you paid trinkets to kill a prince and since all of you seemed to realize that I'm not that easy to kill and it was going to cost you more. Tell me Obie, how much is the life of the son of your best friend worth?"
Obadiah couldn't hold back any longer. "You little shit. How dare you summon me in here and accuse me of this? All of this won't hold up. You still haven't learned your place yet and that is under my boot. You are not fit to run this company."
Tony smiled. He got him. "That's where you're wrong. I was born to run this company and you have outlived your usefulness. You're fired."
"You can't fire me. You may be CEO but your father is still the majority stock holder and only he can terminate me and he never will," Obadiah countered.
"Really? Why don't you ask him yourself?" Tony stated as Howard opened the rear office door with a look of cold fury on his face.
As Obadiah opened his mouth to speak, Howard silenced him. "Get out of my sight. You're finished."
"You're actually going to believe this?" Obadiah asks in disbelief. "We have been friends longer than he has been alive. You will take his word over mine?"
"My son has never lied to me," Howard stated. "You disgust me. Good bye," he stated as he opened the door to five federal agents, Agent Coulson among them.
"Obadiah Stane? FBI and you are under arrest for attempted murder, illegal arms dealing and embezzlement," the agent said as he put the cuffs on Obadiah and read him his rights. Coulson gave a nod to both father and son as he followed Stane out of the building.
As the door closed behind the FBI agents, Howard poured a drink for himself and one for Tony. He handed it to his son who watched out of the window as Obadiah was placed inside the FBI agent's car. "Now, what's your next step? How do you plan to clean up this mess?" Howard asked.
Tony downed the entire glass in one swallow. "You fight fire with fire," he said quietly. "I will get everything back that he took or destroy it. My first step, I need to go to California."