After the next day at the Expo wound down, I found myself in Tony's lab once again.

"So, you got that cure working did you?"

I nodded, "I'm working on developing some genetic therapies so that no one will be dependent on injections or anything external like that, but it's looking like I'll have that done in about a week."

"Cool, We've finally sorted out deployment for the Sublime Cure. Over the next three months, we should be able to purge the virus from our entire ecosystem." He informed me.

I nodded, "And the chances of running into Sublime's Avatar?"

"We've focused efforts in Canada, so if he's alive, we should seem him dealt with in the early stages, but the Telepathy detectors you sent me doesn't show any unusual concentrations of Sublime within our range." He noted.

I nodded, "It's been a while since the Weapon X project, so I wouldn't be surprised if sublime decentralised to avoid a crippling attack like that, how goes deployment?"

"We've already purged the upper echelons of government and most medical institutions internationally, and the plague you created is spreading. It's still undetected, so we shouldn't have to worry too much about it in the end."

I nod, "And how goes the hiring initiative?"

"Well, I've picked up quite a few Mutants for work in Stark Industries, and I've begun setting up a charitable organization for the Mutant Cause, you know, raising awareness, getting testing centres ready to make sure that we can prevent the un-controlled expressions of various mutant powers that you warned us about." Tony responds.

I nod, "I'll make sure to ramp up culturing. We shouldn't have any reason to worry about not having enough material for that sort of thing."

"Planning something big?" He asked.

"I've just gotten enough money going on Xandar that I can purchase an FTL craft. Nothing too big, or that fast, but it's enough that I can make a day trip out to Alpha Centauri or some of the other nearby stars." I explain.

Stark stares at me and shakes his head, "I can't believe you can just buy that sort of thing."

"I'm technically not allowed to fly it, but I can own one. I'll need to hire a captain if I intend to use it there…" I trail off.

And Tony shrugs, "But that's not really a problem is it?"

"Yep. I've also done a neural upload for an emergency piloting course, so I can technically fly it, but I don't have the hours in a simulator or as a co-pilot to have an actual license." I explain.

He nods, "So… for the future then?"

"Something like that. But it's a lot easier to arrange a pilot than an entire ship, and I like to keep my operations flexible." I responded.

He nodded, "So, how long until you get your own licence?"

"I need something like three hundred hours in a simulator to get a co-pilot's licence and two hundred hours of that to get a proper pilots licence."

"Damn, that's a lot."

"A little under a year's worth of training, then." JARVIS Mentioned, "What about forks? Or those capable of accelerating time in a sim?"

"For AI like you?" I paused, "I'll have to look up the specifics for forking, but my sim hours are in-sim hours. There are a couple of deep-dive, dream-like systems available in certain markets that allow organics some degree of mental acceleration. I'm planning on studying those next, once I've got a handle on nanotech."

"You're working on nano-tech?"

I nodded to Tony, "Yeah, I've got a few projects running in near-solar orbit in an uninhabited star system. I'm hoping to see a return on investment there in about … six more weeks?"

"Gotta admit, kinda jealous, all that delicious progress that you can just get out there."

I chuckle, "It is pretty awesome isn't it."

"When are you going to share, by the way?"

"Eh, I'm not sure if I'm ever going to share completed tech, but I'm probably going to start releasing base principles in a few months. I'm of the opinion that it gives you a better understanding of the whole process. Might share a bit of FTL tech, but that's about it."

Tony shrugged, "I guess I get what you mean. I'm not sure that I'd have fun with just 'here you go' sort of stuff. But skipping ahead for some base principles would be fun."

I nod, "I'm thinking of sharing some interesting properties of nano-architecture soon, it seems like the most reasonable thing to play with right now."

"Oh come on, I've almost broken the Vibranium Access Barrier, and now you're just going to make it all invalid?"

I cock an eyebrow, "You've already made it that far?"

"Yeah, It's taken me a while, but now that it's a lot easier to get a hold of vibranium I've been running a lot of experiments, and I've got a few proof of concept devices to extract energy from vibranium. It's taking more energy in than I get out at the moment, but I've been making a lot of progress towards that, and it's nearly a hundred percent efficient when it comes to the input, anyways, so once we start making progress, I think I can work towards a good power draw system for my arc-plants."

I nod in agreement, "I'm personally working on something similar. The closest translation for the Xandarian term is a Quantum-Singularity Buffer. It's this weird little quirk of physics that I'm using to control the formation of Hawking radiation so that draw and store energy in singularities, but progress on that front is still pretty slow. I've head of some civilizations that take it a step further and have entire singularity reactors that they just chuck excess matter into that they can pull energy from as needed."

He frowned, "Wouldn't you get a runaway singularity if you ever lost containment?"

"Not… Really? Not at the sizes, I'm working at. I'm using at most, a petajoule per independent unit. At that scale, the singularities evaporate before gathering any significant amount of mass." I reassured him as I reached over to pat DUM-E's manipulator arm.

He shrugged, "As long as you aren't doing it on earth."

"Yeah, you don't need to worry about that. I'm not doing it anywhere near an inhabited world, nothing much is going to happen." I guarantee.

He nods, "By the way, what was that explosion near your facility in India?"

"Oh, nothing much, Wakanda was being pissy about the fact that I'm selling Vibranium on the open market now." I said with a shrug.

"Wakanda?"

"Yeah, now that I've finally gotten my hands on a phased array quantum manipulator, I can really start churning out Vibranium, so I've put it on the list of things I'm willing to sell on the open market. It still costs quite the pretty penny, of course, but as it is, Wakanda can't support their isolationist practices anymore."

He stared at me, "What are you taking about?"

"So you know all the fancy tech that's popping up now that Vibranium is becoming available? Wakanda's had it for ages." I reveal.

"Those assholes."

I nod in commiseration, "Hence why I paid them exactly no mind when I was calculating the price I was going to be selling Vibranium at."

"Serves them right then. Cheating bastards." he grouses.

I wave him off, "So, is there anything that you wanted to talk about?"

"Eh, not much, I guess."

"Not even your date with Pepper tomorrow?"

Tony turned to the Bots, "You ratted me out, didn't you?"

"Well, we did need to borrow a lab from someone…" JARVIS said.

"A lab for what?" Tony asked.

I rolled my eyes, "He wanted a babysitter for DUM-E and U to make sure that they don't try and get involved in your date somehow. I bribed them with access to one of my labs so that they can start work on some new chassis."

He stared for a moment before nodding gratefully, "Yeah, that would be nice."

"So, yeah, have fun and don't make an ass of yourself." I said patting him on the back.

"Spider-Woman told you to say that, didn't she?"

I rolled my eyes, "No, it's what another friend of mine would have said."

"Anyways, I'm sending a drone to bring DUM-E and U over tomorrow morning. They'll be spending the day in my facility in Detroit and they'll be back the morning after. I'll send you any plans or mockups they come up with, but I won't be giving them access to any of the actual fabs, so you can chat about getting them new bodies when this if over.

"Yeah, I think it's a little overdue at this point."