Author's Note: This chapter is two spliced together mini-chapters; they aren't long enough to be separate. They're also present tense – this is what's going through Tony's head as Fin Fang Foom tries to kill them and as Gene betrays them. This is Tony's epiphany of light in contrast to Gene's dark one. Although, as always, it's still all dark in the literary sense. :P
Ordinary morality is for ordinary people. – Mandy, from The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy
I understand now. If I don't want to see something, I just need to open my eyes. And I realize that everything in front of me is part of something important. Even if seeing it is... very painful. – Tsukasa, .hack//sign
A true friend stabs you in the front. – Oscar Wilde
"It'll be okay."
Clay colored eyes meet storm ones shakily. There's terror written all over her face. She's wrapped around and into Gene as if trying to ground herself somehow. Atomic orange hair, now messy, clings to her face. She stares at him as if he's gone mad – and he has, he really has. He meets her gaze unflinchingly, not shaking, not wavering, just looking fondly at her. Pepper doesn't understand how he can say those words right now. She's never understood him or the way his mind works.
It's going to be okay. Sacrifice. He understands now, he does. He feels like he's on the threshold of something in this moment. He sees time through the lens of a scientific mind, sees the major events of his life laid out in front of him as if spread on a table. Ever since his mother's death there had been a dark passenger, a cold dead weight that had clung to him, trying to drag him down. For so long he'd thought it was a burden that was his and his alone. It isn't, he sees that so clearly and perfectly now. There is a weight upon everyone's lives, an old shame they fight to overcome for years if not forever. His father had one in the form of his old weapons. Pepper has one in the form of her family's internal collapse. Rhodey has one in the pressure of never being allowed to make an error.
There is no one individual dark passenger. It's not a curse only he has to live with. Everyone struggles like he does, everyone claws their way up to the top from the bottom just like he does. Some people might fall farther than others, but everyone's flawed. Everyone is waging a war just by being alive. There's a powerful light in Tony's eyes when he speaks to Pepper. He's in the middle of a revelation, he'll be back in a moment, he thinks calmly – everything has gone serene and collected in his mind. This isn't the right time. A giant stone dragon is attempting to murder them. Now is not the time to attain full Buddha. But he can't help it. His dark passenger is completely gone, having been silenced forever now that he understands.
He understands that the past cannot be undone. There is only the present and future. He destroyed one of the people closest to him out of anger and jealousy. He can save every random stranger in New York City and it won't matter because they're not close to him like his mother was. In order to eliminate his guilt, his shame, all the tormenting nightmarish memories, he has to save those closest to him. Iron Man can't save them because that doesn't count. Tony Stark has to be the one to save their lives so he'll finally be at peace. His salvation is in his hands, staring him in the face, and it's going to be okay.
It's okay. It's all going to end. He's going to make peace with his past forever. He looks at Pepper and Gene, who clutch each other close, not having attained the dissonant serenity he's basking in. Pepper's face is flushed as she fights back tears. Her eyes are wide and fearful as her unsteady fingers clutch Gene's arm. She is seconds away from breaking down completely. Gene is still and unreadable. His eyes are hidden by his glasses, but nothing can hide the tensing of his body, the cold sweat dripping off of him. His breathing is rigidly controlled, an odd contrast to Pepper's hyperventilating. They don't understand what's happening or how simple the test is or they wouldn't be like this. They think they're going to die. They don't realize he won't let that happen.
"It's going to be okay," he repeats to Pepper, calmly. The Irish girl looks at him as if she's in shock. "You're getting out of here."
He launches himself forward. He yells. The dragon chases after him. And Tony isn't scared at all. He isn't even nervous about dying, not now that he knows he's made up for everything. He's okay with dying now that he's been freed from his inner demons and he's fine with this being it. If his career as an inventor ends here, okay. He'll have gone down saving lives which means he won't regret it, not even a little. His eyes are like cut sapphire, clear and steady in the heat of chaos. The situation is so fantastic and bizarre he should be having a panic attack. Yet he's not, he's under the influence of some kind of emotional peace that nothing can pierce right now.
It's going to be okay. It's not a survival mantra or a madman's chant. It is his Truth, and he suddenly feels rejuvenated and electric, restored and powerful. Let the world go mad all around him. Tony Stark doesn't need to be Iron Man to be alright anymore. He needs no crutch, no extra personality, no thick armor plating. He can live his own life and die his own death without the split anymore. Tony is not scared, or even thinking anymore. He simply is moving, living. Sacrificing. He is free. His guilt is gone. He feels complete. He thinks he's done it, realized what all this love nonsense is about. This is his family and he is their protector. He grins a lunatic's grin for a fleeting moment as the dragon roars, feeling the sound's vibrations shake the very floor beneath him.
He's not just okay. He's whole for the first time in eight years, and Armageddon couldn't touch him now.
They never found the body.
He'd seen his father on the ground – with a large wound in his back. Claw marks, like he'd been fighting with something. But that wasn't a fatal wound, just one that could knock the man unconscious. Tony's suit had been busily engulfing him and saving his life while his father passed out. In the haze of his own rapid blood loss and pain Tony had thought he was dead. He wasn't and somehow after Tony's suit had flown him away his father's body had vanished altogether in spite of how physically impossible such a thing was. It baffled the FBI and it disturbed Tony. Now it all made sense. There was no body because Gene had grabbed the unconscious Howard Stark and teleported off with him, leaving no evidence behind.
Gene's dark passenger is the one in control. There were maybe some moments, some brief days where he was, but the darkness inside him has overtaken everything. He sees it in the Chinese-Mongolian boy's eyes, the amber flecked tawny brown Pepper used to adore so much. Something's wrong with them. The light inside him has gone out. All of that wit, that camaraderie, the confidence that made Gene who he was, is gone. The dark, cold part of him that follows twisted and insane trails of logic and feels no remorse is all that is left. Good and snarky Gene is dead. The Mandarin is dead. There is only vengeance, power thirst and a sinister agenda left to rule over this body right now. There's no trace of humanity left in him.
Those who fight monsters should take care they don't become monsters. And if you look into the abyss, the abyss looks back into you. Who knew something taught in English class would hold so incredibly true in the real world? He'd laugh if he wasn't so furious right now. Not hateful, never again hateful. He does not hate Gene Khan. Gene is a broken and shattered version of Tony, Tony minus support and love. Gene is a pitiable failure, a large scale mistake, a loser. Tony doesn't hate him, doesn't want to kill him. All of that has faded now; the voice of hate and vengeance that used to threaten to overtake him has been silenced. All he wants is to protect those close to him, at all costs. He has found his call in life.
That is his purpose in life. He is Iron Man and he is Tony Stark. No longer is he juggling between them, he's both and neither is a pushover. He is a hero, a son, a friend, a brother and there is no force on this Earth powerful enough to stand in his way. His gaze locks into Gene's and sears into him with so much force the other boy shudders, seeing what he has unleashed. He hasn't broken Tony by telling him he's got his dad, he's unleashed a Pandora's Box of righteous fury and relentless determination. There is something blazing inside Tony that makes Gene's dark, twisted mind recoil. Tony is operating on pure selfless love and his calm in the midst of this chaos confuses his enemy.
He will not let this monster hurt his family anymore than he already has. He's already processed what's happening. His mind has somehow switched Gene over from the category of friend to monster, which would be an unreasonable judgment if Tony didn't know him so well. But Tony does, oh God he knows where Gene's coming from, where Gene's at. He's hurting, he's angry, he's desperate and he's haunted by something that Tony can't identify. He doesn't have to know details. He can see the brokenness written all over his former friend's face like a script. Betrayal, pain, abuse, vengeance. He's a pitiable monster, but he's still a monster nonetheless. A bad past is not a get out of responsibility free card. He could have chosen a different path than this, could have saved himself. Instead he let the weight of whatever happened to him crush him altogether. He's relinquished control of his life to his insanity.
He's a ticking time bomb. Bombs could only be disarmed one of two ways: slowly rewiring them or using brute force to snap them in half. They had almost defused Gene by sheer love and friendship. Almost. Unfortunately there is no such thing as an almost harmless bomb, there is only dangerous and dead. When Tony wakes up in his room, he looks into the eyes of his friends, broken hearted, shell shocked Pepper and solemn faced Rhodey with his quiet suffering. He does not tell them, but he makes his decision based purely upon their pain.
No one else will be hurt like this.
The next time he sees Gene Khan, he will kill him.
