Across America, a Mandarin transmission was interrupting everyone's TV's and radio's.

"Mr. Vice President, I think you should see this." an aide got his attention.

"Oh god, not again. Is the President getting this?" he asked while Ellis was flying on Air Force One, watching it.

"Mr. President. Only two lessons remain and I intend to finish this before Christmas morning. Meet Thomas Richards. Good strong name. Good strong job. Thomas, here, is an accountant for the Roxxon Oil Corporation." he was pointing a gun at a man lying by his feet.

"But I'm sure he's a really good guy. I'm going to shoot him in the head, live on your television in 30 seconds." he threatened.

"No!" Thomas sobbed.

"The number for this telephone is in your cell phone. Exciting, isn't it, imagining how it got there? America, if your president calls me in the next half-minute, Tom lives. Go!"

"How did he hack my phone?" Ellis asked as the number appeared on the screen.

"We can't allow terrorists to dictate..." the Chief of Staff began but Ellis interrupted him.

"I have to make this call." he argued.

"I'd strongly advise against that." he countered.

"This is the right thing to do." he began calling it.

The phone was heard ringing on the TV as everyone held their breaths but The Mandarin shot Thomas anyway, shocking everyone.

"There's just one lesson left, President Ellis. So, run away, hide, kiss your children goodbye. Because nothing, not your army, not your red, white, and blue attack dog, can save you. I'll see you soon." the transmission ended.

"Tell Rhodes, find this lunatic right now." Ellis ordered.

"Sir, we tracked the broadcast signal. We have a possible point of origin in Pakistan and the Patriot is ready to strike." a general told him.

"Right now!"

After hearing the transmission on the radio, Tony and Laura were driving down the road.

"So about earlier…" Tony asked but she put her hand up.

"I don't wanna talk about." she said quickly.

"Uh, I was gonna ask about the spear. There's something you're not telling me." he accused bluntly.

"I won't confirm nor deny anything." she crossed her arms.

"Fine. Here, go through these." he threw the files in her lap.

She began going through them but saw AIM on one of them.

"AIM? That's Killian right?" she asked him.

"Yeah, something doesn't add up here." he agreed as he began calling someone.

"Who are you calling?" she saw it on the infotainment system.

Meanwhile, in Pakistan.

Rhodey barged into a building in Pakistan and aimed his wrist rocket at a group of men.

"Don't move!" he threatened but his phone began ringing.

"Uh... Hang on a second. Hello?" he answered it.

"You ever have a chick straddling you and you look up and suddenly she's glowing from the inside out, kind of a bright orange?" Tony asked casually.

"Yeah, I've had that. Who is this?" he asked.

"Gross. The both of you just gross." Laura spoke up unamused.

"Laura?" he asked in shock.

"And me, pal." Rhodey smiled.

"Now, last time I went missing, if I remember correctly, you came looking for me." he joked.

"Hey, I helped." Laura put her hand up and Tony swatted it away.

"What are you doing?" he asked.

"A little knock and talk, making friends in Pakistan. What are you doing?" Rhodey asked.

"Ooh, ooh, Laura began bouncing in her seat excitedly.

"Did you shoot the terrorists with patriotic confetti like the 4th of July Iron Patriot!" she joked and Tony laughed.

"And that's another one liner." she added smugly.

"I'm busy Laura." he said annoyed.

"Your redesign, your big rebrand, that was AIM, right?" Tony asked.

"Yeah." he answered.

"I'm gonna find a heavy duty comm sat right now, I need your login." Tony asked.

"It's the same as it's always been, "WarMachine68." he replied.

"And password, please." Tony asked.

"Well, look, I gotta change it every time you hack in, Tony." Rhodey said with annoyance.

"It's not the '80s, nobody says "hack" any more. Give me your login." he asked again and Rhodey sighed.

"WAR MACHINE ROX" with an "X," all caps." a man laughed and Rhodey aimed his big gun at him while Laura laughed hysterically.

"This is the best day of my life!" she yelled while wiping tears from her eyes.

"That is so much better than "lron Patriot." Tony joked as the two laughed and he made a handbrake turn.

They pulled up to a beauty pageant in Chattanooga as Tony put on a cowboy hat and Laura put up her hood.

They snuck into a news van as a "judge" gave a contestant a perfect 10.

They began to download the files but saw the slow internet speeds.

"That ain't gonna cut it." Laura said as the door opened.

"We talked about this. Excuse me, sir. I don't know who..." they turned around and Tony shushed him.

"Mom, I need to call you back. Something magical is happening. Tony Stark is in my van." the cameraman said excitedly.

"Shh. Keep it down." Laura hissed.

"Tony Stark is in my van!" he ignored her.

"No, he's not." he tried shushing him.

"I knew you were still alive! And Laura Watson you're great as well don't get me wrong." he added quickly.

"Come on in. Close the door." Tony gestured him to come in and he stepped in and closed the door.

"Oh, wow. Can I just say, sir..." he began rambling.

"Yep." he sighed.

"I am your biggest fan." the cameraman smiled.

"Ok. First, is this your van? Is anyone else gonna come in?" Tony asked.

"No, no, no. Just us." he answered.

"Great. What's your name?" Tony asked.

"Gary."

"Gary?" Tony began shaking his hand.

"Oh, wow." he said overwhelmed.

"Right, there is fine." he asked.

"Ok." Gary nodded.

"Ok? I get a lot of this, it's ok." he smiled.

"Oh, good. Can I just say?" Gary began.

"What do you want?" Tony began losing his patience.

"Yeah. I don't know if you can tell, but I have, like, patterned my whole look after you. My hair's a little..." he removed his baseball cap and Laura tried maintain a straight face.

"It's fine." he ignored him.

"It's not right, cause there's no product in it." Gary clarified.

"Right." he tried getting to his point.

"I don't want to make things awkward for you, but I do have to show you... Boom!" Gary revealed a tattoo of a face on his arm.

"This day can't get any better. It just can't." Laura mumbled to herself.

"A Hispanic Scott Baio. I'm sorry. Is that me?" Tony pointed at it.

"Yeah. It's... I mean... I had them do it off a doll that I made, so it's not like it's off a picture. So, it's a little bit..." he rambled.

"Gary. Listen to me, ok? I don't want to clip your wings, here. We're both a little over-excited. I got an issue. We're…" he gestured between him and Laura.

"Are chasing bad guys. I'm trying to grab a little something from some hard-crypt data files. I don't have enough juice. I need you to jump on the roof... Right? Recalibrate the lSDNs. Pump it up by about 40%." he asked.

"Got it." he nodded.

"All right? It's a mission." Tony asked him seriously.

"Tony needs Gary."

"And Gary needs Tony."

"Be quiet about it. Go." he asked again.

"Yeah." Gary grabbed his equipment and walked out of the van.

"I'll never let you live this down." Laura joked and Tony rolled his eyes.

Gary recalibrated the ISDN's on the roof and knocked on the van to let them know.

They were able to download the files, used Rhodey's login to access the AIM files and began playing through the videos on a laptop.

"What would you regard as the defining moment of your life?" Killian asked Chad Davis.

"Well, uh, I think that would be the day I decided not to let my injury beat me." Tony brought up another video.

"Will you please state your name for the camera?" Killian asked the "agent" from earlier.

"Ellen Brandt." Tony brought up "Phase 1" of Extremis.

"Ok. So, the injections are administered periodically. Addiction will not be tolerated. And those who cannot regulate will be out from the program. Once misfits, cripples... You are the next iteration of human evolution. Everybody, before we start... I promise you, looking back at your life, there will be nothing as bitter as the memory of that glorious risk you prudently elected to forego. Today is your glory. Let's begin." they saw Brandt's missing arm beginning to "grow" back in shock and another patient glow orange and scream in pain and exploded, engulfing the room.

"Those weren't bombs. They were misfires." she realized and he nodded in agreement.

"And he sold it to The Mandarin. Even if it doesn't always work. It's faulty, but you found a buyer, didn't you? Got you, pal."

Meanwhile, Pepper and Maya were hiding out in a hotel room.

"What happened? Fun fact. Before he built rockets for the Nazis, the idealistic Wernher von Braun dreamed of space travel. He stargazed. Do you know what he said when the first V-2 hit London? "The rocket performed perfectly. It just landed on the wrong planet." See, we all begin wide-eyed. Pure science. And then the ego steps in, the obsession. And you look up, you're a long way from shore." Maya explained.

"You can't be too hard on yourself, Maya. I mean, you gave your research to a think tank." she tried comforting her.

"Yeah, but Killian built that think tank on military contracts." she countered.

"That's exactly what we used to do. So, don't judge yourself." Pepper reassured her.

"Thank you, Pepper. I really appreciate that." she thanked her someone knocked on the door.

Pepper let room service in but Killian snapped his neck from behind.

"Maya, run!" she began to run but Kiillian grabbed her arm, spun her around and slapped her against the wall while grabbing her by the throat.

"Hi, Pepper. So, you want to tell me why you were at Stark's mansion last night?" he asked Maya.

"I'm trying to fix this thing. I didn't know you and the master were gonna blow the place up." she justified.

"Oh, I see. So, you were trying to save Stark when he threatened us?" he asked unamused.

"I've told you, Killian, we can use them." she indicated Laura as well.

"Ah, Watson. She can be useful." he agreed and looked over to Pepper struggling in his grip.

"Pepper. Pepper. Pepper."

"Look, if we want to launch product next year, I need the two of them. They just lacked a decent incentive. Now, they have one."

Rhodey was flying towards another possible Mandarin broadcast signal.

"This is support team Blue-Zero. Sending coordinates for a suspected Mandarin broadcast point of origin." his radio was heard.

"Copy." he barrel rolled in its direction.

He kicked down the door of the location and aimed all of his weapons.

"Nobody move!" he threatened a bunch of women in burka's in a small factory.

"Oh." he disarmed his weapons.

"Support Blue-Zero, unless the Mandarin's next attack on the U.S. involves cheaply made sportswear, I think you messed up again." the women began to leave and shake his hand gratefully.

"Yes, you're free, uh, if you weren't before. It's... Of course. Yes, ma'am. Iron Patriot on the job. Happy to help. No need to thank me, ma'am. It's my pleasure." the last woman began shaking his hand but it heated up, glitching out is suit, knocking it to the ground.

"Savin? I've acquired the Patriot armor." she told him while removing her burka.

"If you want this suit, you're going to have to pry my cold dead body out of it." he threatened.

"That's the plan, Colonel."

Laura and Tony were driving down the road while on the phone with Harley.

"Harley, tell me what's happening. Give me a full report." he asked.

"Yeah, I'm still eating that candy. Do you want me to keep eating it?" Harley asked.

"How much have you had?" he asked.

"Two or three bowls." he said while eating it.

"Told you that candy was a bad idea." Laura told Tony.

"Can you still see straight?" she asked Harley.

"Sort of." he said nonchalantly while eating it.

"Uh…" Laura said with a finger raised.

"That means you're fine. Give me JARVIS. JARVIS how are we?" he ignored her and Harley put the cell phone next to the helmet.

"It's totally fine, sir. I seem to do quite well for a stretch, and then at the end of the sentence I say the wrong cranberry." he explained and Laura snorted and Tony gave him a look.

"And, Ms., you were right. Once I factored in available AIM downlink facilities I was able to pinpoint the Mandarin's broadcast signal." he added.

"So where are we talking? Afghanistan, Libya, Iran, Pakistan, Syria? Where is it?" she asked.

"Actually, Ms. it's in Miami." he answered.

"That can't be right." she frowned in confusion.

"Ok, kid, I'm gonna have to walk you through rebooting Jarvis's speech drive, but not right now. Harley, where is he really? Just look on the screen and tell me where it is." he asked.

"Um, it does say Miami, Florida." Harley saw it on his laptop.

"Not the terrorist hotspot I was expecting like last time." Laura said confused.

"Ok, first things first, I need the armor. Where are we at with it?" Tony asked.

"Uh, it's not charging." Tony slammed on the breaks and pulled over.

"Geez." Laura held onto the arm rests as Tony tried catching his breath.

"Actually, sir, it is charging, but the power source is questionable. It may not succeed in revitalizing the Mark XLll." JARVIS reassured him.

"What's questionable about electricity? All right? It's my suit, and I can't... I'm not gonna... I don't wanna... Oh, God, not again." he stumbled out of the car.

"Tony?" Laura got out and ran around it towards him.

"Are you having another attack? I didn't even mention New York." Harley said.

"Harley!" Laura yelled.

"Right, and then you just said it by name while denying having said it." Tony began breathing heavily.

"Tony it's me. You're not there. You're in Tennessee." Laura put a reassuring hand on his shoulder and he looked over at her.

"God, what am I gonna do?" he asked while panting.

"Just breathe. Really, just breathe. You're a mechanic, right?" Harley asked.

"Right." he nodded.

"You said so." Harley added.

"Yes, I did." he agreed.

"Why don't you just build something?" he suggested.

"Thanks kid." they got back in the car.

"We're wrecks aren't we?" Laura sighed.

"Yep. Let's go shopping. I've got an idea." they drove to a hardware and Laura waited in the car as Tony got a bunch of supplies.

They built a bunch of homemade devices out of them and began driving towards Miami.

"So, taking our talents to South Beach huh?" she joked.

"Apparently." he saw the destination on the satellite navigation.

"Should've brought a bikini." she said while looking back at the box of devices in the backseat

"Can't believe you're going home alone on this." she joked amused.

"Yeah well it's the best I've got and enough with the pop culture references. You're getting worse with those as you get older." he said annoyed.

"Thanks for the compliment Kevin. But I'll stick with the spear." she joked and he rolled his eyes.