Vanessa drove them to Stark industries and parked near the front. They walked in and rode the elevator up to the top floor.
"Everyone should be out for lunch right now." Vanessa said as the doors dinged opened and they were rewarded with an abandoned office floor. They quickly walked into the main office after checking to see if it too was clear. Vanessa stood behind Pepper as she got on the computer and plugged in Tony's USB then started to search the files.
"Sector 16? What are you up to, Obadiah?" Pepper said softly as she looked over all of the different information in the files.
"Click on that one." Vanessa said and a video of her father in captivity came onto the screen. She leaned over Pepper and typed in translate.
"You did not tell us that the target you paid us to kill was the great Tony Stark as you can see, Obadiah Stane..."
"Oh, my God." Pepper and Vanessa said at the same time. The room started to shake as Vanessa gripped the back of Pepper's chair hard her anger boiling violently inside of her.
"Vanessa, you need to stay calm." Pepper said placing a comforting hand over Vanessa's who managed to stop the room from shaking and calm down a bit.
"Sorry." Vanessa gritted out.
"... your deception and lies will cost you dearly. The price to kill Tony Stark has just gone up."
Pepper clicked out of the video and started to copy everything down.
"So, what are we going to do about this?" Obadiah's voice asked causing them to startle. It took every ounce of Vanessa will power not to smash him repeatedly into a wall as he walked over and made himself a drink. "I know what you're both going through." Obadiah said as he swirled his drink and took a hit. "Tony. He always gets the good stuff, doesn't he?"
"Why not, he can afford it." Vanessa said carefully as she sat down on the desk moving the paper over the USB discreetly and making sure she was between Obadiah and Pepper at all times. Pepper switched the computer over to the screensavers hiding the copying that was still taking place.
"I was so happy when he came home." Obadiah continued. "It was like we got him back from the dead. Now I realize, well, Tony never really did come home, did he? He left a part of himself in that cave. Breaks my heart."
Vanessa tensed as he walked over on the other side of Pepper.
"Well, he's a complicated person." Pepper said tensely. "He's been through a lot. I think he'll be all right."
"You are a very rare woman." Obadiah said looking from Pepper to Vanessa. "Tony doesn't know how lucky he is to have you both."
"Thank you." Pepper said as she took the paper and USB at the same time standing to her feet. "Thanks. We'd better get back there."
"Catch you later Obi." Vanessa said as she followed Pepper to the door, her voice sounding more like a promise than a good bye.
"Is that today's paper?" Asked right before they reached the door.
"Yes." Pepper said as he walked over to them.
"Do you mind?" Obadiah said taking the paper.
"Not at all." Pepper said.
"Puzzle." Obadiah said with a smile.
"Of course." Pepper said with a nod.
"Take care." Obadiah said as they left. Vanessa made sure the door closed behind them as she rushed Pepper to the elevator and down the stairs reaching the lobby. Looking up she saw Obadiah starring down at them, he knew.
"Pepper, he knows, we need to get out of here." Vanessa said taking hold of Pepper practically pulling her along.
"Ms. Potts? We had an appointment." Never in all of her life had Vanessa been so glad to see Phil Coulson. "Did you forget about our appointment?"
"Nope, right now. Come with me." Pepper said also relieved.
"Right now?" Coulson said standing up and following. "We're going to have it right now."
"Yeah, walk with us." Pepper said.
"Okay." Coulson said still confused, but willing to wait for answers.
"I'm going to give you the meeting of your life. Your office." Pepper said as they walked.
Once they were clear of the building and had calmed down Vanessa pulled out her phone and dialed for her dad. He answered, but then a high frequency note sounded and nothing else.
"Dad? Dad, are you there? Hello?" Vanessa called out desperately, but then the phone went dead. She re-dialed, but got nothing. She dialed a different number and was answered right away.
"Rhodey!" Vanessa said gratefully into the phone.
"What do you mean, he paid to have Tony killed?" Rhodey asked as he listened to Vanessa. "Vanessa, slow down. Why would Obadiah... Okay, where's Tony now?"
"I don't know. He's not answering his phone." Vanessa said urgently. "Please go over there and make sure everything's okay." Vanessa paused listening to the answer. "Thank you, Rhodey." Vanessa hung up. "Rhodey's going to him now, but we need to get to Obadiah now and find out what he's up to."
"I know a shortcut." Pepper said and instructed Phil who was driving where to go. They arrived outside of the arc reactor and walked in.
"Section 16. Section 16. There it is." Pepper said walking over to the door and trying to open it with her card. "My key's not working. It's not opening the door." Phil came up and put a tiny black box on the door's lock. "Oh, wow! What's that? It's, like, a little device? It's, like, a thing that's going to pick the lock?"
"You might want to take a few steps back." Phil said as he pulled her over to the other agents. Rolling her eyes Vanessa reached out and placed a small shield over the lock bomb containing the blast.
They walked over opening the door and the agents poured inside. They walked down a flight of stairs to another unlocked door and cautiously entered guns ready. It was dark with chains hanging everywhere. An eerie blue white low light was the only illumination. They spread out looking over the room coming up to a crude suit.
"Looks like you were right. He was building a suit." Phil said looking it over. Vanessa looked closely at it realizing that something was off as she ran her fingers of the welding.
"I thought it'd be bigger." Pepper said.
"Something isn't right." Vanessa grumbled looking around until her eyes landed on a small computer and Agent was currently looking at.
"What's wrong?" Pepper asked.
"That's not factory welding, the whole suit it to crude to have been made here." Vanessa said as she walked over to the computer and started to type furiously. The others continued to look around for clues as Vanessa typed then her eyes widened in shock. "That wasn't the suit."
"What?" The agent next to her asked.
"That wasn't the suit." Vanessa snapped just as Pepper let out a scream. "Pepper!"
Vanessa ran over to her grabbing her hand and pulling her out of the facility as the agents shot at Obadiah. With her shields up she ran getting Pepper out just before Obadiah could get to them, having been too big for the door, once outside Pepper and Vanessa's earpieces rang.
"Vanessa! Pepper!" Tony called out.
"Dad." Vanessa said in relief.
"Tony, are you okay?" Pepper asked.
"I'm fine. How are..." Tony started to ask.
"Obadiah, he's gone insane!" Pepper said cutting him off.
"I know." Tony said. "Listen, you'd better get out of there."
"He built a suit." Vanessa said running a hand through her hair. Then the ground started to rumble as Obadiah forced his way up through the ground next to them.
"Get out of there right now!" Tony ordered.
"Where do you think you're going?" Obadiah said as he held out a large machine gun arm. "Your services are no longer required and one less freak in the world."
"Pepper, go, I can hold him off." Vanessa said as she formed her shield and got ready to fight.
"I'm not leaving you here!" Pepper said.
"I can handle myself now GO!" Vanessa snapped but Pepper didn't budge.
"So much for the little hero." Obadiah said and got ready to fire.
"Stane!" Tony yelled as Stane fired shifting from the girls to Tony, some of the bullets bouncing off of Vanessa's shield. Tony rammed into Stane and they crashed through the facility and into the highway.
"I love this suit!" Obadiah said as he listed a van over his head.
"Put them down!" Tony ordered.
"Collateral damage, Tony." Obadiah said.
"Divert power to chest RT." Tony blasted him back and caught the car.
"Power reduced to 19 percent." JARVIS said as Tony fell to one knee. The lady started to take off with Tony clinging to the hood.
"Lady!" Tony yelled, but she kept on driving until he fell and was dragged under the van. "No, no, no, no, no, no!"
Finally he came rolling out from under the car and skidded to a stop. Obadiah ran over to him using his rocket for a boost grabbed a passing motorcycle and his Tony with it. Then he proceeded to bash Tony into the ground.
"For 30 years, I've been holding you up!" Obadiah said. "I built this company from nothing! Nothing is going to stand in my way." Obadiah threw him into a bus. "Least of all you!" He blew the bus up and Tony was propelled into the air, but managed to catch himself midair. "Impressive! You've upgraded your armor! I've made some upgrades of my own!"
"Sir, it appears that his suit can fly." JARVIS said as Obadiah's suit started to take off.
"Duly noted." Tony said. "Take me to maximum altitude."
"With only 15% power, the odds of reaching that..." JARVIS started warn him.
"I know the math! Do it!" Tony ordered as they took off with Obadiah closing in.
"Thirteen percent power, sir." JARVIS said.
"Climb!" Tony urged shooting higher into the air.
"Eleven percent." JARVIS said.
"Keep going!" Tony replied.
"Seven percent power." JARVIS said.
"Just leave it on the screen! Stop telling me!" Tony said and was suddenly grabbed by his leg and pulled into Obadiah's grip.
"You had a great idea, Tony, but my suit is more advanced in every way!" Obadiah bragged.
"How'd you solve the icing problem?" Tony asked.
"Icing problem?" Obadiah repeated as his suit went dead.
"Might want to look into it." Tony said as he hit Obadiah on top of the head sending him hurtling back to earth. Suddenly he began to drop as well.
"Two percent." JARVIS said as Tony began an awkward stop and go descent. "We are now running on emergency backup power."
Her stumblingly landed on the roof of the arc reactor and started to take the suit off.
"Potts! Nessa!" Tony said.
"Tony! Oh, my God, are you okay?" Pepper asked as she and Vanessa shared relieved looks.
"Where are you?" Vanessa asked.
"I'm almost out of power. I've got to get out of this thing. I'll be right there." Tony said when Obadiah suddenly landed behind him.
"Nice try!" Obadiah said. Tony ducked the first punch and went to fire his stabilizer forgetting that he had taken it off before he was back handed. Recovering quickly he jumped into the air landing a punch across Obadiah's face only to get grabbed in the process.
"Weapons status?" Tony ordered.
"Repulsors offline. Missiles offline." JARVIS listed off.
"Flares!" Tony yelled and the flares shot out blinding Obadiah and giving Tony a chance to slip away.
"Very clever, Tony." Obadiah said as Tony hid on the other side of the stairwell.
"Nessa? Potts?" Tony whispered.
"Dad/ Tony!" They said in relief.
"This isn't working." Tony said. "We're going to have to overload the reactor and blast the roof."
"Well, how are you going to do that?" Pepper asked.
"You're going to do it." Tony replied. "Go to the central console, open up all the circuits. When I get clear of the roof, I'll let you know. You're going to hit the master bypass button. It's going to fry everything up here.
"On it." Vanessa said then pulled Pepper back into the building and up to the controls and got to work. "Pepper, flip those toggles up over there." Pepper ran over to the machines against the wall doing as she was told before coming back. "Almost done."
"Make sure you wait till I clear the roof. I'll buy you some time." Tony said as he came up behind Obadiah and ripped out some wires. "This looks important!"
Obadiah managed to grab Tony despite the hindrance and through him on the glass panes. Obadiah held up Tony's helmet which he had snatched during the struggle.
"I never had a taste for this sort of thing, but I must admit, I'm deeply enjoying the suit!" Obadiah said as he crushed the helmet and through over to Tony who was struggling to get up. "You finally outdid yourself, Tony! You'd have made your father proud!"
"It's ready, Tony! Get off the roof!" Pepper said as Tony struggled to his feet. Suddenly there was a spray of bullet fire and glass rained down on Pepper and Vanessa. Vanessa covered them with her shield and looked up fearfully to see her dad dangling on the frame. "Tony!"
"How ironic, Tony! Trying to rid the world of weapons, you gave it its best one ever!" Obadiah laughed.
"Nessa! Pepper!" Tony called out.
"And now I'm going to kill you with it!" Obadiah said as he fired a missile that missed. "You ripped out my targeting system!"
"Time to hit the button!" Tony yelled.
"You told me not to!" Pepper said.
"Hold still, you little prick!" Obadiah snarled.
"Just do it!" Tony yelled nearly falling.
"You'll die!" Pepper said.
"Not if I can help it." Vanessa said as she started to levitate.
"Where are you going?!" Pepper called out as Vanessa flew up.
"To save my dad." Vanessa said taking off.
"Push it!" Tony yelled and Pepper pushed the button as Vanessa shot up into the air grabbing her dad and forming a shield around them just as the arc reactor over load hit sending them both flying.
Obadiah was electrocuted and fell down into the reactor causing it to explode. Vanessa lay on top of Tony putting all of her will power into her shields as Tony held her close. The blast ripped through them, minimized by the shielding, but still painful leaving them both unconscious.
"Tony! Vanessa!" Pepper called out.