Arc and Ki

by Miklagaard

A certain mysterious and beautiful Japanese redhead comes knocking at Tony Stark's Malibu mansion with insights into an equally mysterious power. Pepper has concerns, but Tony was sure this would be amazing anyway because: Redhead! Which ever way it played out... it was going to be one hell of a ride.

6. A Day at the Obnoxious Display of Wealth

Disclaimer: This is a work of fan-fiction and no ownership of any intellectual property is claimed or implied. Quotes from original sources are included, but rather than disrupt the flow of the story, I will acknowledge them in general here. All instances of irony are likely intentional.

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(Chapter theme song: Whiplash – Metallica)

(...please forgive me)

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Ranma was tapping the Soul of Ice lightly as she opened the limo door for Tony. Mr. Hogan did the same for Pepper on the other side. This place they had brought her... the district was called Monte Carlo, which was part of a tiny kingdom called Monaco... or was it the other way around? Either way, the entire country was barely more than three kilometers long, and had less than a twentieth of the population of just the Nerima district alone. That was practically a rounding error compared to the population of Tokyo proper. Despite the tiny size of the nation, she was pretty sure the place was still twenty times richer than her previous district of residence. Just the front of the Hotel de Paris looked like it cost more than everything the Kunos owned. She might have been exaggerating that, but she didn't think it was by much if she was. It sure as hell represented more wealth than she had ever expected to see in her life.

Honestly, the screaming crowds fenced off to the side of the entrance were the only thing that fell within her comfort zone. They were almost homey, reminding her of all the spectators to her fights or ravening mobs howling for her blood she had encountered in the past.

Intellectually, she knew Tony had the kind of money it would take to buy the entire building without even twitching, but the examples of that wealth she had seen up until now hadn't struck her the same way. Big as it was, the Malibu mansion's architecture and interior design was simple, tranquil, and a little whimsical. The plane was probably very expensive, but she had no clue how to estimate its cost. Here, on the other hand, every single square foot practically screamed: 'Rich Hereditary Elites Only! No Proles Allowed!' Even with her emotions covered by a layer of cool Ki, she was feeling pretty tense as they entered the 150-year-old hotel and headed toward the restaurant inside that was their destination. Fortunately, her Dairokkan showed some solace was on the way.

"You know," Tony suddenly announced as he breezed through the doors from the lobby into Le Bar Americain, "it's Europe. Whatever happens the next twenty minutes? Just go with it."

Pepper looked worried and confused while Ranma worked her Ki-technique a little harder to suppress nervousness. "Go with it? Go with what?" the CEO asked.

"Sorry, Ms. Potts," Ranma apologized as she felt the familiar aura of her new friend change direction to head directly toward them. She felt guilty in her part in hiding it from the older woman... but if she were to be honest, she'd have to admit she had been just as eager as Tony to keep the other redhead around. 'Natalie' was a very sympathetic ear and a genius at explaining social cues and strategies to her in ways she could immediately understand. She wished she had met the other woman long before... particularly before she encountered the endless string of fiascoes that was Nerima.

The way the older woman could raise the temperature of a room with just a quirked eyebrow sure didn't hurt how much she'd enjoyed their time together, either.

"Mr Stark?" 'Natalie' called out, flicking her eyes to Pepper's annoyed expression for a moment as she inadvertently presented the answer to the CEO's question.

"Hey!" Tony answered brightly.

"Hello. How was your flight?" She shot a brief, more genuine smile of welcome at the martial artist before returning her attention back to Stark.

"It was excellent. Boy, it's nice to see you," he commented as he gave her a once over and stepped in close to the infiltrator.

"We have one photographer from the ACM," the dark-red haired woman told them, "if you don't mind. OK?" She guided Tony and Pepper to stand side by side as a photographer began snapping of shots of their slightly uncomfortable expressions. Ranma's face was caught in one picture before she managed to step aside, looking back at where Happy had wandered off. She wondered if she should have followed him, but since she hadn't been dismissed, she decided to keep following her new boss.

"When did this happen?" Pepper gritted out of the corner of her mouth while enduring the flashbulb of the camera.

"What? You made me do it" Tony claimed innocently.

"I made you do what?" she growled through a wooden smile.

"You quit," the eccentric industrialist said simply. "Smile. Look, right there," he nodded slightly at the camera. "Stop acting constipated. Don't flare your nostrils."

"You are so predictable," Pepper hissed when the photographer finally moved on. Ranma raised an eyebrow at the cameraman when he snuck in a full frame picture of her in passing.

"That's the amazing thing," Tony said smugly. For all his 'predictability,' he still kept getting away with shenanigans.

"Right this way," 'Natalie' interrupted as she guided them to the dining area.

"You look fantastic," Tony complimented her red dress, significantly eyeing the lacy undergarment proudly edging out from the low neckline.

"Why, thank you very much," the assistant acknowledged with a friendly tone.

"You look great, too, Ranma," he added. "In case I didn't say anything."

"You don't have to say anything, Mr. Stark," she assured him cheerfully. Then the corner of her mouth lifted in a smirk. "I always look good."

While Stark laughed, 'Natalie' looked over the other redhead. "That's quite the effective outfit," she agreed, making Ranma preen a bit.

"It's an Edna Mode creation," Pepper explained with a little pride, surveying the new bodyguard again. "Designed for Ranma on her birthday and delivered just in time for this trip."

Ranma was wearing a bodysuit as was becoming habitual in the last few days of her new life. This time it was dark gray with a few glints of silver threads that highlighted every curve. The bodysuit was sleeveless, leaving her smoothly muscled arms entirely bare except for dark brown leather bracers on her forearms. Integrated into the feet were black polymer nubs on the soles and sides for traction. Straps of more brown leather crisscrossing her calves were entirely decorative, not functional, as they gave the impression of sandals she wasn't actually wearing. Over the ensemble was a forest green tabbard with gold embroidery done in a faintly Asian motif that started out a bit wider than her shoulders, then narrowed throughout its length until it was five inches wide where it stopped just below her knees. A thin black sash was tied around her waist. Tony had muttered something about 'sexy Sub-Zero' when he saw it. In sum, her look was as decorative and militant as the display of a fine sword, and many of the snobbish, elite attendees present were giving her second and third glances.

The high-tech Stark HUD she wore didn't really fit in with the motif, but she still made it look good.

"Edna Mode?" 'Natalie' asked in surprise. "Doesn't she do a lot of costuming for films as well as the red carpet?"

"That's right," Pepper confirmed. "We wanted someone with some... mental flexibility. Fortunately, we were able to get her to put us at the head of the line because she was intrigued."

"Because of Ranma's other state?" Natasha suggested.

"Oh, you know about that?"

"Mr. Stark had me assist Ranma with orientation... and some language practice... it was astounding how fast she improved her English, by the way." The new CEO's mood improved briefly at that. She felt her judgment was validated in seeing such swift results to her insistence on education. "So we spent a good portion of yesterday together. She showed me the change during that time. It was... fascinating... and educational for us both," she looked over at the younger woman with a tiny smirk.

"Aiyahhhh..." Ranma muttered, looking like she wanted to massage her head but trying to maintain her new professionalism. "Yeah, it was 'educational' alright. Don't know why you thought I needed to know all that... stuff." The flirting lessons had been fun at the time, but she got all embarrassed again afterward when she remembered some of the things she did. Stark and Potts looked rather curious about what they were talking about, but neither redhead was inclined to answer.

Smoothly deflecting the questions before they could be asked, Natasha pointed out: "I can see how that outfit would work on a guy as well with a little adjustment. Perhaps we should try that out here?"

"Let's not," Stark spoke up. "Skin-tight clothes should only be worn by women... especially redheaded hotties with legs like that," he tilted his head for a better view of the indifferent martial artist. "But that's unprofessional," the inventor suddenly declared... completely unconvincingly. "What's on the docket?"

"You have a 9:30 dinner."

"Perfect. I'll be there at 11:00."

"Absolutely," 'Natalie' acknowledged as if that were a reasonable statement. Her complete lack of irritation wasn't because of her professional facade, but because the more chaos Stark introduced, the easier her real job was.

"Is this us?" Tony waved at a corner table that had a sign on it that most certainly did not read 'Stark'.

"It can be," his new assistant agreed readily.

"Great. Make it us."

"OK," Natasha instantly set to arguing with a bespoke-suited staff-member of the restaurant in his native French.

Ranma gave her a vaguely impressed look at how smoothly her companion from the previous day was speaking a third language, but then ignored it otherwise. It wasn't likely she would be needed to stongarm the man, and she would refuse even if ordered... bodyguard and thug were very distant from each other in her lexicon. She followed Tony and Pepper as they greeted some of their acquaintances. Tony and some other guy were talking about something to do with electric jets... she had a brief vision of airplanes on really long extension cords before she shook it off and decided she had misheard.

"You want a massage?" Tony offered his dear friend and keeper as they left his colleague behind.

"Oh, God," Pepper answered testily. "No, I don't want a massage."

"Ranma could take care of you later," he persisted, waving at the martial artist who was standing nearby and surveying the crowd as they sat at the bar. "Hell... she can take care of you now... I bet nobody would complain about watching that. I'm sure Natalie could arrange a massage bed for you."

The strawberry blonde had started to look more than a bit tempted. That temptation dried up as soon as her newest headache was mentioned. "I don't want Natalie to do..."

"...Don't want you tense," Tony interrupted. "By the way, I didn't mean to spring this on you," he added implausibly.

"Thank you very much," Pepper answered sarcastically as she saw a guilty look from Ranma that proved her bastard ex-boss damn well did mean to spring it on her.

"Green is not your best color," Tony murmured, confusing Ranma since Pepper was wearing a navy blue dress. JARVIS, having monitored her expression change, sent text explaining the reference, making her raise an eyebrow and give the Americans a thoughtful look.

"Oh, please," Pepper said dismissively, continuing the low-volume argument.

Before she could quietly tear into the man-child further, she was interrupted. "Anthony. Is that you?" someone called out.

"My least favorite person on Earth," Tony muttered under his breath, causing Ranma to focus on the new guy with a frown.

"Hey, pal," the frail-looking newcomer said with an unctuous tone and expression that might as well have been a neon sign reading 'annoying dink' to the martial artist's eyes.

"Justin Hammer," Tony announced with a faux-friendly tone and gritted teeth.

"How you doing?" Hammer asked as he approached and made as if to slap Tony on the back. Only to bounce off the sudden appearance of the short, but immovable wall that was Ranma Saotome. "Woulph..." he exclaimed in surprise as he staggered back. "What the...? W-who's this?" he asked as he took in the stern-faced beauty.

"Ranma Saotome. She's a master martial artist from Japan and she's my new bodyguard," Tony explained with a cheerful grin. "I needed someone to step up now that Happy's working for Pep. She's very protective of me," he claimed in a confidential tone as he brought his hand down on her shoulder. A hand which he lifted quickly when Ranma shot him a flat look. Unbothered by the rejection, his smile turned a bit more mocking as he said: "It's OK, Ranma. Justin's no threat. At all. And I'm sure he has some kind of reason to be here." Ranma nodded and backed off a step.

"I certainly do. You're not the only rich guy here with a fancy car," Hammer mentioned as he cautiously sidled past the little redhead whose dense muscles were showing clearly in her crossed arms. "You, uh," he picked up the thread of his previous attempt at one-upmanship again. "You know Christine Everhart from Vanity Fair?" He waved to the side. "You guys know each other?"

A blonde wearing a light green dress who had been watching the previous small drama with interest walked up, her gaze switching back and forth between Tony and Ranma. "Hi! Yes."

"Yes," Pepper agreed with an indecipherable tone.

"Yes, roughly," Tony piped in.

"We do," Pepper concluded as she gave Stark one of her long-practiced looks.

"B.T.W.." Obnoxiously, Hammer spelled out the acronym instead of just saying the three syllables 'by the way' as he pointed at Pepper. "Big story. The new CEO of Stark Industries."

"I know, I know," Christine told them with a genuine smile.

"Congratulations," Hammer added with practiced sincerity.

"My editor will kill me if I don't grab a quote for our Powerful Women issue," the reporter half-pleaded.

"Oh?" Pepper wasn't too impressed by the blonde, but the theme got her interest.

"Can I?" Christine's last interaction with the famous, or infamous, Ms. Potts had not been entirely civil, but she truly wanted that quote and tried to project earnestness and contrition as she bit her lower lip.

"Powerful Women issue?" Pepper repeated with a mysterious smile as she looked over at Ranma. "That doesn't quite have the same meaning to me as the last time we met, but... sure." The blonde woman shot the redhead another blatantly curious glance, but then went back to giving Pepper a grateful look.

"She's actually doing a big spread on me for Vanity Fair," Justin Hammer tried to get the conversation back on track to what was truly important in his mind: him. "I thought I'd throw her a bone, you know. Right?"

"Right. Well, she did quite a spread on Tony last year," Pepper brought up, not willing to let a business competitor get ahead in any way, shape, or form.

"And she wrote a story as well," Tony tacked on with a tinge of mischief.

"It was very impressive," Pepper said with a tone rich in meaning to the three who had been there that one awkward morning. She had found herself unable to resist going along with the joke, and truthfully having a sense of humor about Stark's flings was a survival trait. Everhart's suffused expression made it oh so worthwhile.

"That was good," Tony complimented vaguely.

"It was very well done." Pepper pretended not to know what really impressed Tony.

"Thank you," Christine said with a slightly frozen smile. Even Ranma was starting to suspect something was up as shown by her furrowed eyebrows, but Hammer remained completely clueless.

"I'm gonna go wash," Pepper announced before she could be drawn upon for more of Tony's amusement.

"Don't leave me," Tony implored in quiet panic, but his friend just smiled and walked away.

"Hey, buddy. How you doing?" Hammer slid onto the abandoned bar stool.

"I'm all right," the inventor murmured as he looked for an escape route. Unfortunately, Ranma hadn't been with him long enough to pick up cues like Happy would have. Oh well... at least she was looking out into the crowd so he could enjoy the rear view as she ignored the photographer that had returned for more pictures of her.

"Tony... Tony... Tony..." Hammer interjected with a chiding tone as his eyes traced where the other industrialist was looking. "Bodyguard? Really? I know how you like your eye-candy, but it kind of shows how your judgment is falling off when you hire a little girl like this. Is she even twenty?" He shivered a bit at a sudden chill and looked up at the ceiling. "What are they doing to the air-conditioning in this place?"

"Eighteen as of a couple days ago," Tony revealed shamelessly. Smirking, he ordered: "Ranma! Do something impressive! Keep it small-scale, though. Something I won't have to pay for."

"Yes, Mr. Stark," the petite warrior shrugged as she turned and reached for the top of one of her bracers. Sliding out a kunai, she flipped it so she was holding the blade and offered it hilt-first to Hammer. "Bend this," she demanded.

"Ah...heh..." the weapons dealer scoffed a bit as he took it, "should a young lady like you be running around with something like this?" Testing with his thumb, he added: "At least it doesn't have an edge." Obediently, he took the kunai in both hands and tried to bend it, grunting a bit as it he failed. Shaking the pain out of one of his hands, he handed it back. "Sorry, someone would need some tools to bend that. Why do you need... Jeez!" he exclaimed in shock as the thick wedge of steel crumpled between two fingers and the thumb of Ranma's right hand. Several of the posh crowd looked on in awe when their attention was drawn to the scene and they saw the weapon continue to deform with faint squeaks and groans of abused metal.

"Careful. Is hot," she warned as she plunked the contorted kunai onto a glass ashtray on the bar.

Poking tentatively at the thing, Hammer quickly jerked his finger away from the torsion-heated steel. "Ow!" he complained as he sucked on his fingertip for a moment. "Jesus, Tony... are you making cyborgs now?"

"Hah!" the goateed reprobate was startled into a genuine guffaw. "That's not a bad idea, now that you mention it! Getting Stark Industries into making prosthetics, I mean. We've been making a lot of headway into medical scanning technology, we can capitalize on that." Seeing Hammer wince a little at the idea of Stark Industries invading yet another market, Tony smirked and said: "But no... Ranma's no cyborg." Seeing the confusion of his employee, he explained: "Mechanical body parts. Like Battle Angel Alita." Ranma wasn't actually familiar with that series, but JARVIS projected enough information on her tech-glasses to explain the reference.

Ranma sneered contemptuously now that she understood. "Mechanisms..." she thickened her accent as she slowly enunciated the word. "Mechanisms are good for some stuff, but not to make you strong. I am a martial artist. Much stronger than... mechanisms." She packed a lot of disdain into that one word. Justin, Christine, and pretty much everyone in earshot who understood English stared at her incredulously while Tony surreptitiously bit his knuckle to keep from bursting into wild laughter.

"Not even a fully operational battlestation can compare to power of the Force," Tony misquoted in as deep a voice as he could manage. "What?" he asked when people swung their gazes back to him. "I'm out of the offensive weapons business. What better bodyguard than one who doesn't even need, or want, guns... much less any more advanced combat technology?" Not getting any acknowledgment yet, he waved Ranma toward him and Hammer. "C'mere a sec. Let Justin feel your hand to prove it's real." Ranma Saotome was not one to back down from a challenge, so she immediately held the hand that had done the demolition out.

"Jesus, Tony..." Hammer repeated as he slowly shook his head, but he accepted the offered limb. Ranma deliberately relaxed her muscles and her Ki as much as she could as the man poked, prodded, and flexed her palm and fingers. "Whoa," Hammer commented, "her muscles are seriously dense, but I can feel the bones under them. She definitely works out. The skin of the palm is really thick, but smooth. Maybe I should ask what products you use? Do you sand down the callouses or something?"

"Something like that," Ranma shrugged.

"Well... it'd take an X-ray to be really sure, but it feels like real flesh and blood to me," Hammer concluded. He turned the back of young lady's hand upward and raised it toward his lips. "Aw..." he pouted playfully when the appendage suddenly disappeared from his grasp.

"Nice try..." Tony waggled his eyebrows at him. "Ranma's here to kick ass... if necessary. Not play smoochy games." The braid-wearing redhead nodded approvingly at that.

Christine was looking back and forth between the eccentric futurist and his new employee again. The new bodyguard was definitely news, but she had no idea what angle to approach it from. Was it as straightforward as Stark claimed? Or was it in reality a scandal between a teenager and a man over twice her age instead... as would be decidedly in character for the industrialist? And what was the deal with the girl's strength? Government biotechnology experiment? Granddaughter of Steve Rogers's secret love-child? Sheer, unadulterated Grrl Power? Realizing they were going to be there for hours before the race even started, she mentally shrugged and put the mystery of Ranma aside until she had more time to think about it. Perhaps look for a chance to get her alone for a few questions later?

With that in mind, she turned to the two men to ask: "Can I ask you... Is this the first time...?"

Justin shook himself and stared at her blankly for a moment, befuddled by recent events. "Huh? What?"

"Is this the first time," the reporter repeated, "that you guys have seen each other...?"

"We're not seeing each other," Tony interrupted with a joke.

Christine grimaced, but plowed on. "Listen... is it the first time you've seen each other since the Senate...?"

"You mean since he got his contract revoked...?" Tony gleefully clarified.

"Actually, it's on hold," Hammer insisted hastily.

"...When he was attempting to..." Tony, paused, then abruptly changed tacks. Far be it from him to turn down a chance to mock his self-declared rival a new way when the idiot gift-wrapped it for him like that. "That's not what I heard! What's the difference between 'on hold' and 'canceled?' The truth?"

Christine also pounced on the opening. "Yes, what is it?"

"No!" the man on the spot protested with a faint whine in his voice. "The truth is... Why don't we put that away?" Hammer flailed at Everhart's voice recorder, but Ranma's shoulder somehow got in the way, earning a grateful smile from the blonde. "The truth is," he tried again, "I'm actually hoping to present something at your Expo," he nodded at Tony.

"Well, if you invent something that works, I'll make sure I get you a slot," Tony offered with bogus generosity.

"Mr Stark?" Natasha interrupted.

"Yes?" Tony smiled at her for several reasons as he stood up.

"Your corner table is ready," she told him, ignoring Hammer's muttered protests in the background. They walked off with Ranma bringing up the rear and looking around carefully like a good yojimbo should.

"Hammer needs a slot, Christine!" Tony called back suggestively, ensuring he got the last word. "So... what was this 'education' Natalie was giving you?" he asked his new guardian. Ranma's only response was to press her lips shut even tighter and look away steadily.

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"Your name is Ranma, isn't it...? And... wow they keep the A/C up in the bathrooms, don't they?" Christine Everhart commented with a shiver as she turned on the sink faucet, moving the lever all the way to the left in hopes of warmer water.

"Yes, that's right," Ranma answered tonelessly as she quickly dried the water droplets off her hands before they could freeze. She really didn't want to be in the ladies room at all, but not even a superhuman body could avoid all inconvenient facts of biology, and this wasn't Nerima where she could get away with ducking into the guy's side. The Soul of Ice was going quite strong. Not only to conceal her sizable discomfort but to make sure no hot water touched her.

"Hey... hold up!" Christine requested as she hastily wiped off her hands with one of the fancy towels before hurrying after the redhead who had abruptly turned on her heel and walked off. Once out of the restroom, Ranma deigned to slow a little and allow the blonde to catch up. "I just wanted to check with you about some things."

Traces of the Soul of Ice still lingering, Ranma answered coolly: "All questions can be directed to the public relations department of Stark Industries." That was the formulaic response she had been told to use if reporters asked her something classified or that she wasn't comfortable in answering a question. Of course, being very new to both her job and the entire western world, she wasn't very comfortable with any questions.

"Whoa... hey! I wasn't planning to ask you about company secrets or something," Christine protested. "Your accent got a lot better, by the way," she added.

"It comes and goes," Ranma admitted. "I'm practicing a lot, but sometimes I forget if I'm in a hurry or I get mad."

"And Justin Hammer is good at pissing people off," Christine said sympathetically When Ranma's expression closed down further and went shifty-eyed behind her Stark HUD, she objected: "Oh come now... Hammer being a jerk isn't exactly confidential information at his own company, much less Stark's." Ranma laughed ruefully. "That's better," Christine encouraged with a charming smile. "I do have a few questions, though. Don't worry, I'll go easy on you and I'll send anything I might write about you to Pepper Potts before I publish. That's assuming my editors want me to bother writing anything at all. Think of it as practice before a reporter seriously goes after you." She upped the wattage of her smile. "Please?"

Ranma grimaced and sighed in exasperation. {"Still a sucker for a pretty girl's smile... I need more training... maybe Natalie's 'education' can prove useful for that after all..."} she muttered to herself in Japanese. Switching back to English for the sake of the politely perplexed journalist, she said: "Fine. I'm getting food for Mr. Hogan and me, then I'm taking it out to the car. You want to walk and talk? You can ask what you want."

"Great," the blonde said cheerfully and hooked her arm through Ranma's elbow to prevent her from easily running away or even walking too quickly, inadvertently lowering the martial artist's mental defenses that much more. "I don't think I've heard anyone call him 'Mr.' Hogan before."

"He's sort of my boss, too. Him, Ms. Potts, and Mr. Stark. Anyway, he's been teaching me bodyguarding... so I say 'Mr,'" Ranma explained casually.

"What he's been teaching you?"

"Uh... procedures, security policies... when to do things or not do things," the younger woman said vaguely.

"Not how to fight?"

"Hah! Heck no... I'm a much better fighter than him."

"Really? He was a professional boxer back in the day," Christine pointed out.

"Phh... boxing..." If anything, Ranma's tone was even more dismissive that it was when she spoke of 'mechanisms' earlier. "Boxing's only good when you have 16-ton weights chained to ankles and your fists glued closed. I learned real fighting."

"Oh? Right. Stark did say you were a martial artist. Where did you learn? Who taught you?"

"Oyaji... my dad... at first. Then lots of places. Temples. Dojos. Whatever we find on the road."

"What, did you spend summer vacations on martial arts trips or something?" Christine tried to fit Ranma's description into the conventions she was familiar with.

"Or something. Summer, fall, winter, and spring. Every day. All day."

"Do you mean before you went to school? When you were a young child?"

"That too... I think I started when I could walk. Can't remember a time I didn't train. School...?" Ranma grimaced and looked away. "Oyaji's kind of stupid, so he didn't let me go to school as much as he should have. He got in trouble for that too when Mr. Stark's lawyers started helping me."

Christine raised her eyebrows at that. Uneducated country bumpkin plus infamous lothario swooping into the rescue made a worrisome combination. Ranma seemed tough and independent, but misplaced gratitude could lead her to a bad place. For that matter... with Stark, even hostility and relentless denunciation could lead a woman to a bad place, as Christine had found out for herself a year previously. Much to her embarrassment. Shaking off her recollections, she asked: "Was it true you turned eighteen two days ago?"

"Yeah."

"Happy birthday! Eighteen is such a nice age," she said a bit cattily, though that flew right over the bodyguard's head. It was more directed at the man who wasn't present, anyway. "When did you start working for Mr. Stark?"

"Two days ago, same as my birthday."

"So he hired you the instant it was legal?"

"Yeah, pretty much." It seemed clear Ranma had no notion that could be taken as unseemly.

"Hmm... so he must have met you before that," Christine deduced. "How did that happen?"

Now this was something Pepper had coached Ranma in, so she didn't hesitate to answer: "He was in the Iron Man armor, flying around, and he saw me fight. He was impressed," Ranma smirked at the true, if misleading, answer.

"You're from Japan, right?"

"Hai."

Christine nodded at that. While Iron Man had never conducted any operations in Japan, he had in Southeast Asia, Indonesia, and the Philippines; and he would frequently swing by Japan to make the local fans go nuts before heading back to California. "Did he take off his armor that day?"

Ranma looked at her strangely. "When he went home...? What else would he do?"

"I meant before he went back to his home."

"No...?" Ranma answered, still confused. "Well, he took off his glove."

"Why did he do that?"

"To read something," Ranma replied easily. "I had my master's certificate right nearby when we met."

"Master's certificate?" Christine prodded. The only match she could think of in her experience was maritime certifications.

"For my school. Of martial arts," she puffed out her chest a little. "I am a master of Musabetsu Kakuto Ryu... call it 'Anything Goes' martial arts if it's easier. Not sure if he could really read it," she confided, "but I think he sent a picture to somebody to read it for him."

"Ah," the reporter said, enlightened. "So you had actual documentation of your qualifications handy. That was lucky."

"Not really. I always have that when I travel around," Ranma shrugged, "I have it here, too." Then she grinned and asked: "Want to hear a funny story?"

"Sure, of course."

"He handed me the glove after he unbolted it. I think nothing about it until someone says 'hey... dangerous blasty palm thing is dangerous!' Then I'm like... Ah!" she held out her free hand at full extension and mimicked a fearful expression as she pressed into the blonde as if looking for safety.

Christine had to smile at the mental imagery and the irreverent description of Iron Man's weapon system. She was also suddenly very aware on the quality of feminine body that had pressed against her for a moment. Shaking off the sudden distraction, she asked: "Was it really dangerous?"

"Nah... the power was unplugged," Ranma told her as she cheerfully strode on, their elbows still linked. "Oh... thanks! Er... merci beaucoup!" she said with a decent accent to the waiter who had met them part-way as they nearly reached the bar and offered two sizable cloth bags with the hotel's logo. The scent of three-Michelin-star-quality food wafted from the openings.

"Certainement, mademoiselle," the tall young local replied with a smile, struggling not to let his eyes linger on the exotic beauty... and failing.

"This smells really good, I forgot how good French food could be. Right... need to get this to Mr. Hogan and the rest so I can eat too," Ranma said with determination. Christine continued to walk with her as she made her way to the side door leading to where the limo was parked. "So what was I saying?"

"The 'dangerous blasty palm thing' wasn't actually dangerous," the reporter reminded her.

"Oh right... still was glad to give it back. It is expensive. Anyway, we talked for a bit about things and Tony said I'd be a good bodyguard. A while later, I met with Tony's lawyers in Tokyo and got a few things set up. Then I came here! I mean..." she shook her head and corrected herself, "I went to America."

"Sounds exciting," Christine nodded encouragingly, getting a happy nod back. "So you call him 'Tony?"'

"Ah..." Ranma paused with her mouth open for a moment, looking like she didn't know what to do with herself. "Shimatta... I'm supposed to say 'Mr. Stark' when on the job." She grimaced in embarrassment "I'm not too good at being formal and all. I'll have to work harder."

"It's OK, I only mentioned it because I wanted to warn you about something."

"Oh, thanks for the reminder," Ranma looked grateful.

"That... isn't what I wanted warn you about. Ranma... dear..." the master martial artist stopped and looked at her with a wide-eyed, quizzical expression as Christine let go of her elbow and put a hand on her shoulder. "Tony Stark is a user," she warned with a gentle tone.

"Yeah... he's a weapon user..." the shorter woman gave the reporter an odd look. "That's OK, he never had a chance to learn to really fight."

"That's... no..." Christine shook her head in frustration. "He's a user of women. You need to watch out for yourself around him."

Ranma didn't say anything, but she looked profoundly dubious.

"Ranma... he might tell you how special you are... you might be flattered how persistent he can be... lord knows he can be damnably charming at the most unexpected times... but if you let him have his way, he will not respect you in the morning. Trust me on this. He will be completely done with you." She huffed an annoyed breath. "Everybody is pretty sure the only reason he values Pepper Potts is because she has never, ever slept with him."

"No, that's not what's going on here," the teenager denied.

"Trust me, it will be. Has he ever invited you to stay the night at his place?"

"Well, yeah... but I never did. I have a nice new house," she enunciated pridefully, "all to myself. Mr. Stark and Ms. Potts helped me get it set up." Her Japanese accent was asserting itself a bit more as she got annoyed.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that was mostly Ms. Potts driving that," she said cynically. "That was her trying to protect you," Christine raised her voice a little when Ranma shook her head impatiently in dismissal, "there's a reason for her to do that!"

"Look," Ranma growled slightly in irritation, "thanks for the warning, but it won't ever be like that with me and Tony..."

"I bet I can find a half-dozen women in this very town who used to think the same thing," Christine interrupted condescendingly.

"Just... hang on," Ranma said in frustration as she pulled her shoulder free from the other woman and turned to face her while setting her bags down. Taking a moment to figure out what to do, she remembered what the woman she knew as 'Natalie' had taught her the day before. And how well it worked. It would have been nice if the other redhead herself was present to make sure she did this right, but her adventures during the shopping trip and with the Stewardess Trio before gave her confidence she could pull this off.

"Look... Christine? Can I call you Christine?" she asked as she pressed forward insistently, her eyes fixed on those of the taller woman with a compelling stare.

"Uh... sure..." Christine agreed as she unconsciously backed toward the wall behind her, wondering where Ranma's HUD had disappeared to. She hadn't seen the younger woman remove it, but there was nothing between her and those big blue eyes at the moment. Some of the attendees were starting to pay attention to the tableau. Murmurs in various languages arose as people passed on translations of what the two women were saying.

"The reason me and Tony won't have a problem..." Ranma explained as she slowly stalked the blonde with her hands clasped behind her, keeping herself strictly in look-don't-touch mode. "...Is that he's a guy. I told him that the only way I'd ever be in his bed was because I chucked him out the window and took the best bed for myself. Or maybe for someone else who wasn't a guy." She briefly looked away from the blonde, then looked back at her with a calculated tilt of her head that somehow suggested intimacy.

Christine bumped up against the wall as her eyes opened wide and stared down at the redhead. "Oh," she sighed with an enlightened tone.

"'Oh,'" Ranma echoed with a smile as she took one last step closer. She wasn't touching her, or even getting particularly close, but Christine found herself hyper-aware of the heat of the elfin martial artist's body and of every little movement she made. Just watching the redhead breathe made the reporter forget how to exhale. "But it was really nice of you to try to look out for me like that. Is there any way I can thank you?" Ranma asked as she slowly rose up on her toes to bounce and sway, her lips pursing suggestively. Her eyes were absolutely mesmerizing... were they glowing?

"I'm..." Christine squeaked. She coughed and resumed in a normal voice: "I'm flattered..."

"I haven't flattered you," Ranma pointed out truthfully. "Yet. I sure could though if you want me to."

"I..." Christine shook herself and regained her train of thought. "That is... I'm not into women!"

"Oh? OK?" Ranma stopped and backed off slightly. Solemnly she looked the blonde in the eye. She didn't say a thing, but the look in her eye broadcast a 'you would be!' as clearly as if she'd shouted it.

"Uh... I..." the jaded reporter blushed and stammered. She was very aware of how she had somehow ended up in Tony Stark's bed in spite of her goals, her opinion of the man, or even her self-image. She was feeling on the edge of the same loss of control now.

"I need to get going," Ranma suddenly announced as she picked up the bags of food again. Confident that every listener now knew Tony had absolutely no shot with her, no more than any other man, she turned on her heel and strode away on the balls of her feet with a cat-like strut, her hips swaying hypnotically. "Ms. Potts has your number, yes? I will call you for more of an interview, yes?" Blue eyes twinkled puckishly over her shoulder as she caught the older woman watching her backside. Several others, men and women, were looking too, but she couldn't care less.

"I'll call you instead," Christine tried to regain control of the situation, then winced as she realized she failed miserably given the words she had actually chosen. "I'm straight!" she called after the departing fighter. "I think..." she trailed off dazedly when Ranma disappeared through the doors. Glancing around, she saw all the male onlookers, and a surprising number of females, were looking at her with a mix of sympathy and envy. "Yeesh," she sighed and picked up a Glenlivet of a passing tray, throwing it back and setting it back on the platter. While the man who had actually ordered the drink exchanged rueful smiles with the waiter and waved off any objection, she hurried away to find Justin Hammer again, unconsciously fanning her face with one hand.

Unseen by her, or anyone else, Ranma's fist was pressed to her mouth in soundless glee and horror at the prank she had just successfully executed. As much fun as it was to entice the beautiful blonde, it was a little scary to her how effective Flirt-Fu was. Holy crap... that thing in the hedge maze with Nabiki would have gone way different if she knew how to do that before.

Which was frankly terrifying now that she thought of it. She shuddered at the idea of being tied down to the unrepentant grifter. She'd have to talk to Natalie to see if there was such things as control exercises. Shaking her head, she put her HUD back on and continued on to track down Mr. Hogan's Ki signature.

############

Tony Stark had managed to find himself alone at last in one of the hotel's luxurious washrooms. His tie was gone and his dress shirt open a bit to show the Arc reactor mounted in his chest. His reflection looked almost as utterly exhausted as he felt as he leaned heavily on the sink.

He had distracted himself admirably with all the hijinks with Ranma and Natalie. However, one sexy redhead had been less-than-subtly driven off to maintain a discreet distance by Pepper, and he was too prideful to summon the other sexy redhead from wherever she and Happy went for lunch just to hold his hand. Without their diversion, and with Pepper there to unknowingly remind him of his troubles as he debated within his mind about telling her of them, his circumstances had come crashing back down on him.

The last few hours had worn on him more than he had expected. The obligatory pageantry... the constant fake smiles... the verbal sparring... the goddamn schmoozing... No matter how many years of practice he had with it all, keeping up a front while pretending his world wasn't ending was scraping him down to the bone. And this was supposedly a relaxing vacation.

His custom-built monitoring device stabbed a needle into his finger and took a sample. Waving his finger a couple of times before sticking it in his mouth, he watched the results display. Forty-nine percent showed for an instant before switching to an even fifty, where it held steady.

His own personal half-life. Except his decay was accelerating.

It was better than JARVIS had projected before he met Ranma. The martial artist's Reiki massages had measurably slowed the palladium contamination. But the key word was 'slowed...' not stopped. Maybe if they had met half a year ago it would have been as good as a cure, but too much damage had accumulated first.

He put the device away and ran his fingers tiredly through his hair. He'd like to say this situation was nothing compared to The Cave. Frantically trying to scrape together some way to live one more day with Ho Yinsen. Both of them literally under the gun. Day after day. Week after week. Month after month. Waking up each morning surprised to still be alive when any pig-ignorant thug could splatter his magnificent brain across a wall whenever he felt like it. Luxury hotels and ultra-rich spectacle made it almost seem as if he were on a different planet entirely compared to his captivity. Yet in a way, he never escaped The Cave, and Ho sacrificed himself for nothing. The Ten Rings looked like it would end up killing him after all, it would just take nearly a year and a half after the actual kidnapping to do it.

Leaning on the sink again, he looked his reflection in the eye. "Got any other bad ideas?" he asked sarcastically.

Maybe something on his bucket list?

############

"Ranma! Are you there!" Pepper Potts's frantic voice sounded over the HUD Ranma wore.

Ranma pressed her finger to the earpiece of her visor because that's what she saw people do in movies and TV shows, but there was no real point to doing so. Given her near complete ignorance of all things technological prior to arriving in California, Stark had set up the HUD to be controlled remotely by himself, Pepper, or Happy via apps on their phones. So they could make it accept calls as they saw fit, which Pepper had done in this case. "Yeah, Pep... Ms. Potts! I'm here! What's up?"

Happy Hogan straightened up from where he had been leaning against a wall near the Stark limousine. They had managed to acquire a folding table for a stand-up picnic of sorts in the hotel garage, sharing food with some of the other drivers and/or bodyguards while they all waited for their respective employers. Tony wouldn't have thought of it, but Pepper had made arrangements for them to be fed and to gain a bit of goodwill from people who where close to some of the richest and most powerful (politically, not physically) people in the world. The various other employees had been entertained by Ranma's frequently off-the-wall responses to Happy's lectures and stories, though some of them had to get translations from the ones who knew English.

"Thank god this thing worked. I couldn't reach Happy on his phone, so I sent Natalie your way before I remembered your HUD." Pepper explained, speaking quickly. "Tony is being a reckless idiot! Again! He decided to drive the Stark racecar instead of letting the professional, insured driver do his job."

"Driving the car is bad?" Ranma asked, a little confused. Happy couldn't hear the other half of the conversation, but he knew his friend and former boss all too well. He slapped a hand over his eyes and muttered imprecations.

"Professionals have gotten hurt and died in these races sometimes, and Tony's an amateur!" Pepper yelled at her. "So yeah! It's bad!"

"OK, you want me to go after him and grab his car off the road?"

"No, I want you and Happy to... wait... you can do that?" Pepper asked incredulously.

"Those things can't weigh all that much more than regular cars! I can pick it up and carry it over my head! Easy!"

"Actually, they weigh quite a bit less... do you really think you can catch up and do that?" the CEO asked with burgeoning hope as she remembered the feats of strength and speed Ranma had demonstrated.

"I heard the silly things can only go a couple hundred kilometers per hour. I can go faster than that in jumps as long as I have a clear path! Also... I can go over rooftops! They can't! I can catch him!"

"Great! He'd deserve the humiliation after the stunt he's pulled. Send Happy to bring the car out front where he dropped us off to meet me, then you go get Tony! Once you get his tires off the ground, see if you can carry him to the pits... that's where all the mechanics and spare parts are. Otherwise just set him to the side and make sure he doesn't drive off again." JARVIS helpfully displayed a map view of the track with a glowing dot marking Tony's position, not that she needed it with her Ki-sense.

"No problem!" Ranma acknowledged. "Mr. Hogan..." she looked at him, "Ms. Potts wants you to go to her with the car. Out where we entered the hotel. I'm gonna chase down Mr. Stark. Natalie is looking for you too, but I don't think you should wait around."

Happy nodded and started moving. "Right!" he said as he checked his phone, grimacing at the lack of signal bars. It was lucky Ranma's visor was set up to use a lot more than standard cell-phone communication. "You get going, too!" he ordered as he hastily dove into the limo and started it up, checking to make sure the 'football' was still shackled to the eye-ring inside the car where he'd left it for lunch.

"On it!" Ranma launched off the ground like a rocket, bouncing from pillar to pillar to a chorus of startled shouts from the other salary-class workers in the garage. She cast out her Dairokkan to find her boss, easily locating the beacon that was the Arc reactor on top of his aura. Once she cleared the garage, she sprang from lamppost to awning to roof as she headed northeast. Tony's car didn't seem to be going real fast at the moment since he was coming out of a turn, but he was accelerating quite a bit in her direction now. She would be on top of him in just a few more seconds. Actually... shouldn't he be in view already?

"Shimatta!" she yelled as she realized he had seemed to be as low as he was because he was below the weird honeycomb-looking building she was sprinting over, not beside it. She skidded to a halt and reversed direction. Her boss caught up and passed under her as she was trying to get back up to speed.

"What! What is it!" Pepper yelped into her ear, still listening to her visor's feed.

"Tunnel surprised me," Ranma explained shortly, the advanced technology picking up her voice despite the passing wind. "He got ahead of me. Hang on... I'm catching up. I'll... hey!" she looked up across the harbor ahead of her. Her senses had pinged off a power source even stronger than the idling reactor in Tony's body. "Did you guys turn on the Iron Man suit already?"

"No! Why?"

"Someone just powered up an Arc reactor! Ahead of Tony! Urrrgh!" Ranma had no more breath for words as she put her full strength into acceleration.

############

"Oh my god..." Pepper echoed the television announcer's shocked comment that blared out over the confused and babbling crowd. She stood and looked around at the various screens. Some showed a man in the smoldering remains of an orange jumpsuit with glowing whips trailing behind him as he strode into the raceway. Others showed the view from a desperately tracking camera as it tried to keep up with the redheaded Ki-adept bounding from streetlamp to streetlamp above the howling F1 cars, outrunning them as she hurtled forward in a charge toward the new threat.

Her desperate eyes found Happy as he rushed into the bar. He immediately picked her out of the crowd and held up the suitcase-armor. Pepper's fear found a little relief in the sight of him and she hurried over.

############

Ranma made a prodigious leap across the harbor, setting a hideously expensive yacht to rocking gently in its moorings when she ricocheted off the top of its mast to angle herself back down toward the asphalt. The man with sparking mechanical tendrils in the middle of the raceway was the obvious threat, and she vectored toward him. She was just about to punch the man's lights out when he brought his plasma whip down on the hood of the car passing him. The weapon sliced cleanly through the front of the vehicle at an angle, cutting off one of the front wheels and sending the car flipping into the air like a hundred-yen coin.

In mid-air, Ranma flipped around feet-first and instead of striking the attacker, she used his shoulders as a springboard to leap up after the tumbling automobile. The man in the high-tech harness was sent skidding back-first onto the roadway while the redhead grabbed onto the edge of the cockpit of the airborne car and planted her feet on the chassis.

She scraped her free hand's fingertips across the safety belts holding the panicked driver, the vibrations from her nails amplified and focused by her Ki to cut through and leave mirror-smooth edges. Then she grabbed him by the front of his nomex suit and shucked him out of the falling racecar. Pulling him into her arms and ignoring his flailing, she waited until the spinning car brought them to face the direction she wanted and kicked off powerfully. The ruined vehicle catapulted out and away from the spectators while she and the driver hurtled down to the bleachers. She tapped down as lightly as a cat on the back of a now-empty seat, ignoring the mass of her passenger entirely, then set him down in it as she sprang away again. The stupefied driver wavered where he sat as he peered about and tried to figure out what just happened. One of the audience members had the presence of mind to help him take off his helmet and check for injuries.

The entire rescue had taken seconds, but instead of lying still and enjoying his road-rash, the guy with the whips was back on his feet and getting ready to attack again... just as Tony Stark came barreling around the famous Tabac turn.

############

"Yeah, it's me," Natasha said on the phone as she watched Potts and Hogan tear off in their car. Mindful of her unsecured location, she spoke circumspectly. "I'm at the Monaco Grand Prix. You and Cy need to turn on the news and watch this." 'Cy' being 'Cyclops...' or Colonel Fury. "There's some crazy people on the track." Pausing as if she were listening to someone else talk to her instead of the hasty orders called at other people in the background that she really heard, she continued: "I'm not in the middle of it, but I can't go anywhere with everybody panicking. Literally all I can do is watch and pray." Having ensured her true employers were aware of the situation, she said: "Yeah, I'll call you later to let you know I got out of here OK."

############

"Chikusooo..." Ranma cursed and aimed a Ki-blast at the assailant's back. Then shifted her targeting a little to the side and down just before she fired it off. She did not know what a Moko Takabisha would do to an active Arc reactor, and she did not want to find out how explosive it could be. Instead, the glowing blue bolt detonated with a concussive wave once it hit the road beside the whip-guy's feet just as he swung at Tony's car. The man went flying, but the white-hot tip of one of his weapons tagged a tire in passing.

The tire exploded violently with the transferred heat, sending the speeding vehicle skipping and spinning toward the wall that separated the track from the screaming onlookers. Tony fought for control fruitlessly as the wheels left the road and it looked like he was going to go over the top of the barricade. Just before impact, the car lurched in mid air. Continuing to revolve drunkenly, it seemed to stagger away from the innocent people, the spin slowing down. Abruptly it came to a halt, but Tony could see the tires were still off the ground. Then the car tilted as it was lowered back onto the surface. A mussed and scowling martial artist appeared from underneath. "Stay there!" she yelled as she pointed at Tony, then she ran off. "Shimatta!" he heard her frustrated scream doppler away just before an explosion.

"'Stay there' like hell," Tony grumbled as he hastily unstrapped himself and clambered out of the car, chucking his helmet into the cockpit. Turning to look he saw what became of his new hire. He saw three more cars had crashed and were on fire, two of them cartwheeling down the track.

As he watched, Ranma jumped away from one of them, carrying a helmeted man over her shoulder and trailing a chain behind her. They landed on the other tumbling car and soon there was a second driver draped on the martial artist's shoulder. Suddenly the flying cars were yanked together by the chain into a more compact wreck. An instant later, the entire mass of twisted and burning metal and polymers was booted over the divider and into the bay as Ranma came down for a landing. Setting the two taller men on their feet sort-of gently, she made urgent pointing gestures toward where the emergency crews were trying to decide if it was safe to charge in yet. They dizzily staggered in the indicated direction, supporting each other, while Ranma bounded to the third car whose driver was struggling to free himself from the blazing wreck.

Sprawled out face down on the ground about a hundred feet away, his whips sparking and hissing on the ground, was the instigator of the whole fiasco. Even from that distance, Tony could see the small bloodstain halfway up the concrete divider in front of the man and the distinct imprint of a delicate foot traced in oil and grime on the seat of his pants. It looked like his bodyguard had kicked him headfirst into the wall in passing.

"You son-of-a-bitch!" Infuriated, Tony hollered at the attacker as he jumped down from the wreck of his car. "How do you like that? Huh?" Taking long strides, he headed over to the downed man, pulling off his gloves and plucking at his race-suit's sleeves to try to roll them up

Unexpectedly, the heavily muscled and even more heavily tattooed criminal heaved himself to his hands and knees, then staggered upright. He turned around, blinking and shaking his head to clear the blood and sweat from his eyes since his hands were still occupied by his weapons.

Wide-eyed, Tony stopped and stared as the white of one eye was revealed from under the gore, fixed right on the inventor. "Whoa... damn, you're tough!" he muttered and started backing away from the seemingly unstoppable zombie. The mysterious attacker gave a crimson-dripping grin and started lashing his whips back and forth as he stalked toward his target.

"Shit!" Tony's heel caught on some debris and he fell on his backside. He looked back up just in time to see a descending plasma whip and quickly spread his legs to let it land on the asphalt between them. The stench of melted petrochemicals and the two-inch deep gouge in the roadbed made it very clear he did not want to get hit by one of those things, and the inventor frantically tied to get purchase for his feet in order to scramble away. The second follow-up whip was on its way down to finish the job when it was knocked away by the lash of a steel chain. Somehow, the plasma flux that sliced through entire motor vehicles like a blowtorch through butter didn't even singe the plain metal links.

"We need to talk later, Mr. Stark," Ranma said in an annoyed tone, chains whirling in her hands as she stepped between him and the enemy and stopping yet another attack to prove the previous time hadn't been a fluke. The mystery man scowled and backed away with slow, careful steps, his whips spinning rapidly in front of him as a shield. Ranma moved with him to make sure he kept retreating.

"I thought you had him down for the count!" Tony exclaimed defensively as he managed to stand up again.

Ranma rolled her eyes, though Stark didn't see it. "I did! I tagged the shiatsu point to keep him down! I have no idea how he's back up so quick! And you...!" She fixed her gaze on her opponent. "I've been trying really hard to not kill you by accident, baka! Lie down and give up already!" She was very aware of how squishy the man was despite his harness, and he had an ominously glowing Arc-reactor strapped directly to himself, so simply pouring on enough speed to dance around the whips and hit him was a little chancy. Having a low-power alternative made things a lot easier. Her chains had started out as a way to piss Mu Su off as she countered him with his own technique, but she'd found them pretty useful for crowd control... as in roping off crowds so the Nerima pinheads didn't get themselves killed spectating her fights. They'd been coming in pretty useful since leaving coming to the west, and she made a mental note to put more effort into Hidden Weapons.

"Excuses... excuses... Just deal with this mook already, huh?" Tony griped. A honking car horn got his attention and he looked down the raceway to see his Rolls-Royce approaching from the wrong direction. He huffed a laugh at how much confusion that must have caused and trotted over to the slowing limo.

"Are you out of your MIND!?" Pepper shrieked out the open window at him as Happy put the car in park.

"Better security!" he yelled back while pointing at her with a tactic developed over years: loudness and counter-accusations to avoid lectures. "I was attacked! We need better..." he was interrupted by a high-pitched squawk of pain. He turned and saw that once he was out of range, Ranma had knocked away the attacker's whips and grabbed his wrists. The man was posed in a painful rictus with his legs squeezed together as his feet descended back to the ground. Apparently the tiny redhead had kicked him hard enough in the crotch to make him briefly airborne. WHAM! As soon as his feet touched the ground, Ranma flattened him with a vicious head-butt.

"OK... I guess our security is fine as it is. Or it is now, anyway." Tony drawled with deep amusement. "That was my idea, you remember," he gloated as he pointed at the miniature juggernaut he had hired.

"You OK, Tony?" Happy asked as he got out of the car and pulled the case containing the Mark V armor out. He looked over at the new bodyguard approvingly.

"Yeah, I'm fine, actually," Tony said with a little surprise as he looked himself over and patted himself down.

"Hey!" Ranma yelled back at them from where she was standing over the maniac and wiping his blood off her forehead. "Is there an off switch or something for this suit?! The stupid thing is making the shiatsu point wear off faster!"

"What?! Uh... hang on!" Stark called back. "Gimme the 'football,' I need the sensors."

"You got it," Happy hurried over and set the case in front of him.

The inventor stamped on the release switch, then grabbed and turned the handles that popped out of the case. As he straightened up, the Mark V unfolded and wrapped around him. In seconds, he had assumed his persona of Iron Man, getting a cheer from the watching people, and he gave them a reassuring wave. "Oh... that's so much better," he murmured to himself. Turning, he scanned the ambusher's equipment. "So he's powering that thing with a... oh shit..." Tony trailed off as he read the results compiled by the onboard computer. That... sure looked a lot like an Arc reactor. It was a lot less refined and powerful than his, but really, really looked like an Arc reactor. Dammit.

"Just... uh... just yank the glowing round thing off his chest," he told the martial artist. Ranma promptly dug her fingers into the chest-piece, the steel parting around her finders like dough, and yanked the power source free. As soon as she did so, the harness went dead. "Toss it over here," he instructed and caught it when it was lobbed over her shoulder. While Ranma ripped the still unconscious man out of his weapon system and a bunch of police in SWAT gear labeled with 'CRS' in white lettering on their backs ran up to arrest him, Stark made a deeper scan of the power source, hoping against hope that it would deny the evidence of his own eyes.

Jostled awake by the rough handling as his arms were handcuffed behind his back, the attacker woke up and peered about blearily as he was pulled upright. Spotting Stark, he started chuckling madly. "You... you lose..." he rambled in a barely coherent rasp. "You lose, Stark!" he called out more clearly as he was dragged away.

"We lose?!" Ranma asked incredulously. "Ya want I should kick you in the balls one more time? Is that winning?"

"That's not what he meant," Tony told her grimly as his scan finished and confirmed his waking nightmare. Then he crushed the fully functional, miniaturized version of an Arc reactor with his gauntleted fingers.

############

Standing alone in front of the shocked and murmuring crowd in Le Bar Americain, long since abandoned by the pretty blonde reporter who had run off in a cloud of weak excuses, Justin Hammer looked up at the television. He smiled in a way that someone would have found quite disturbing had they been paying him any attention.

#############

Tony Stark strode through the darkened hallways of the small prison operated by the Principality of Monaco. Being a country that devoted itself to the service of the ultra-wealthy in many ways, the local police hadn't even needed to be bribed to either hand over the details of their ongoing investigation or allow him to confront his attacker.

The welcome for Ranma was just as open, though for very different reasons given how unsubtly the staff of the station were maneuvering themselves for better looks. Tony was pretty sure attention was as much for her impressive performance on the racetrack as it was for her exceptional looks.

The inspector walking with him recited what his department knew in French: {"We ran his prints. We got nothing back, not even a name."}

{"Where are we going?"} Tony asked, eager to seek answers for himself. Being French (in culture,) the locals took it as given that a wealthy and sophisticated man spoke their language. Ranma, however, had been gratifyingly surprised. And took it as a challenge, apparently. She was following the conversation with her HUD well enough, so she didn't need to understand herself, but she was still murmuring French phases under her breath as she tried to learn on the spot.

{"Over there. We're not even sure he speaks French, Italian, or English,"} the business-suited policeman warned. {"He hasn't said a word since he got here."}

{"Five minutes,"} the billionaire demanded curtly.

Opening the door, the officer agreed: {"Five minutes. No more."} He shut the door after Tony and Ranma entered. Ranma was there in case the man nutted and tried to kill Tony again, as a proper bodyguard should, but it seemed very unlikely her services would be needed.

The enigmatic antagonist that had terrified the crowds Monaco sure looked pitiable now. He was clad only in briefs and handcuffs, huddled on the bench either from cold or shame. In the one-way mirror the man faced, Tony could see his face and the front of his body were littered with bits of tape and gauze. Seeing them in the reflection, the man stiffened and squared his shoulders, visibly bracing himself.

"Pretty decent tech," Tony admitted as he slowly walked across the room. "Cycles per second were a little low. You could have doubled up your rotation." He turned and moved toward the bench the man was sitting on. "You focused the repulsor energy through ionized plasma channels. It's effective. Not very efficient. But it's a passable knock-off," he concluded as he sat down just outside lunging distance. "I don't get it. A little fine tuning you could have made a solid paycheck. You could have sold it to North Korea... China... Iran... Or gone onto the black market. You look like you got friends in low places."

The tattooed man looked the the industrialist up and down. "You come from a family of thieves and butchers," he said slowly with a slavic accent, a faint smile growing on his face. "And now, like all guilty men, you try to rewrite your own history. And you forget all the lives the Stark family has destroyed."

Tony frowned and asked: "Speaking of thieves, where did you get this design?"

"My father. Anton Vanko," he intoned reverently.

Taking the man's steady gaze as a challenge, Stark looked him in the eye and said: "Well, I never heard of him."

"My father is the reason you're alive," Vanko briefly glanced down at the reactor that glowed in the inventor's chest.

"Ranma here is the reason I'm alive," Tony countered as he tilted his head toward his bodyguard. "You had a shot. You took it. You missed. You got your balls kicked up around your ears."

"Did I?" Vanko's faint smile made a brief reappearance. Before Tony could reply, he went on: "If you can make God bleed, the people will cease to believe in him. And there will be blood in the water. And the sharks will come."

When Vanko paused, Tony scoffed. "Well, usually it's women who think I'm god... I suppose I'm flattered. But you hardly made me bleed." He inspected his fingernails conspicuously. "I didn't even scuff my manicure!" Looking back up he smirked. "It was you bleeding all over that road, as I recall."

"This?" Vanko asked, gesturing vaguely at his wounds with his chained hands. "This is nothing. This is not the blood I am talking about. I am talking about the blood that makes you exist. That... which makes you powerful. That makes people think you are he-ro," he drug out the word contemptuously. "Your life's blood. That is spilling out... right before my eyes."

"Very poetic. Really. You know?" Tony cocked his head quizzically. "I bet they have great drug rehabilitation programs around here! You should look into..."

"You were saved..." Vanko interrupted as he leaned toward the billionaire with a vicious smile, then jerked his head toward Ranma, "...by a little girl..."

"More man than you, dipshit," Ranma interjected.

"This is true," Tony chimed in with a smirk.

"Tssssst," the prisoner shook his head as he hissed out an impatient should. "She show you're a lucky fool when she defeated me. She is Chinese?" Before Ranma could correct him, Stark held up a hand to stop her. "She is youxia. We in Russia know of them," he chuckled darkly. "I certainly know of them. Her strength has nothing to do with your work... your technology. Just money to hire. And lots of fools have just money. You are not In-vin-cible Iron Man... that is all I needed to show. Now the world sees your weakness," he chuckled. "All I have to do is sit here and watch as it will consume you."

"Uhhh-huh... where will you be watching the world consume me from?" Tony asked spitefully as he stood. "That's right... a prison cell. I'll send you a bar of soap... whoever the hell you were." He walked toward the door with Ranma following him.

"'Ey, Tony," Vanko called over his shoulder, making Stark turn to look at him again. "Before you go... Palladium in the chest," he tapped his breastbone. "Painful way to die," he declared with ghoulish amusement.

#############

"Oh my god... there are already memes," Pepper groaned as she tapped the screen on her tablet while riding in the Stark supersonic jet. Though she wasn't really surprised, the Internet had had over 24 hours to react to the attack in Mote Carlo, after all. Opening a link, she watched a GIF showing Tony as he approached the collapsed terrorist, obviously pulling up his sleeves aggressively. The caption read: 'Ima gonna beat you gud!' The next GIF was of her former boss backing away as the other man stood, alarm writ large in his body language. That caption read: 'Dudes! You're on your own!' She groaned again and clicked on another link.

"Oh now that's just not fair..." she murmured. The picture was from when Ranma picked up Tony's car to keep it from plowing into the barricade and had some unfortunate timing. It was as just the right angle to have a clear view through Tony's helmet visor to show his panicked eyes. It also showed the bottom half of Ranma in mid-air as she pirouetted to scrub momentum, and the angle had her legs looking like they were clumsily flailing instead of the demonstration of super-human grace a moving video would have shown. The text underneath read: 'This is the way we race our car~ Race our car~ Race our car~!'.

"Ugh..." she grunted disgustedly and clicked through just in hope of something less obnoxious. "Whoops, that wasn't it." This one showed Ranma and Iron Man side by side as the attacker was dragged away, but they had dark green masks photoshopped onto their faces. Iron Man had a fedora as well while Ranma had a chauffeur's cap. The sub-title was 'Another dastardly villain brought to justice thanks to...' Then it had a crossed-out 'Green Hornet' that was ostentatiously replaced with: 'Kato! The real hero!' "Ouch," she commented in a whisper.

Hating herself a little, Pepper tapped another example of click-bait. "Hmm... that's a good one. I can show this to Tony," she said aloud. This was another two-panel meme. Someone from across the harbor must have gotten the shots with a telephoto lens since this one showed the attacker from behind as he faced toward Ranma and the spectators alongside the speedway. Vanko was labeled '21st Century' and both glowing energy whips could be seen spinning around him. Ranma faced the camera with a implacable expression and was swinging her steel chains. '1st Century' was pasted above her head. The next pic was of Ranma standing over the prone villain with the words '!***1st Century Wins***!' in an arc over the scene with star-bursts and flowers. As a bonus, Tony couldn't really be seen in either snapshot except for parts of his blue nomex suit. She forwarded it to his address to hopefully cheer him up a little later.

The next click caused the CEO to flinch, then twist her lips in a reluctant, rueful smile. This was another pair of pictures, the first was of Ranma standing over her defeated enemy with her legs posed just a little more than shoulder-width apart and her back to the camera. Someone must have used a decent SLR since the camera picked up every curve and muscular line of her highly-trained form. She looked like the Hollywood version of a warrior princess... down to the clenched fists, the tails of her tabbard streaming in the breeze, and her face showing in partial profile as she checked on Tony out the corner of her eye. A blue rectangle with the white letters 'Woman Did The Work' had an arrow pointing to her. In the second picture, a red rectangle similarly had an arrow pointing to Iron Man facing the crowd as he waved toward the camera. That text said: 'Man Took The Credit.' After a few moments of indecision, she saved the link in her home folder. It was cruel... but also kind of true... and something she could emphasize with after several events in her own career.

Guiltily, she closed the web-browser and and set her computer aside. She looked up at the television showing the news. On it was one of the Stark circle's least favorite politicians: Senator Stern of Pennsylvania. "It's just unbelievable," he declared sanctimoniously. "It proves that the genie is out of the bottle... and this man has no idea what he's doing. He thinks of the Iron Man weapon as a toy! I was at a hearing where Mr. Stark, in fact, was adamant that these suits can't exist anywhere else. Don't exist anywhere else. Never will exist anywhere else... at least for five to ten years..." Pepper sighed mournfully as she recalled being convinced of that very claim. "...And here we are," the elected official continued, "in Monaco realizing: 'Uh-oh... These suits exist now!'"

With some blathering narration, the program switched to another talking head with immaculate silver hair and an expensive dark suit speaking with a cultivated southern accent. "Quite aside from the armor weapons, I think we need to be concerned with this new so-called 'bodyguard.' The girl outran race-cars! She picked up and held one of those very cars above her head! She launched a missile or something like the Iron Man's ray guns out of her hand! Is it even a girl...? Or a thing? Certainly, Stark is the sort of man who would meddle in things God did not intend man to..."

"Mute," Tony instructed the computer system as soon as he entered the cabin, cutting off the sound. "They should be giving me a medal. That's the truth," the wealthy playboy asserted as he set a covered plate on the plane cabin's table and pulled a napkin and silverware out of his pocket to set next to it.

Ranma followed him in expressionlessly and sat off to the side, picking up his own computer to put some time in on his GED homework. He had to use a tablet instead of the Stark HUD when he was male because he tech-glasses were set to focus on the narrower-set eyes of his female body's smaller head. While Tony was perfectly capable of adding a function to switch foci depending on the form, Pepper hadn't got around to twisting his arm to make him do so.

She was surprised to see Ranma in male form still, though she knew he had switched to it and a conventional suit and tie to avoid media attention when he wandered around while they made arrangements to leave that morning. She supposed that the present time didn't count technically as work time, seeing as he was studying, but it showed how off-balance Tony was that he didn't insist on a change anyway. Not that she was going to point it out. Not only was it not fair to Ranma for her to do so, but she kind of liked some eye-candy too. Of the male variety, specifically. She acknowledged privately that the new bodyguard was eye-candy regardless of gender.

"What is that?" Pepper set aside the topic of Ranma's form and peered dubiously at Tony's delivery.

"This is your..." he lifted the cover, "...in-flight meal!"

The lady executive leaned forward with interest. "That looks good. And Japanese. Did you just make that, Ranma?" she asked, recognizing some of the Japanese staples of rolled omelets and rice, though she wasn't sure if the stir-fried vegetables were traditional to Japan or not.

"Hey! I made this!" Tony protested. "Where do you think I've been for three hours?"

"Learning from Ranma." It wasn't a question. The corner of her mouth quirked up in amusement.

"Well... yeah," Tony temporized, "but this in front of you was all me!"

"Really?" She looked over at the martial artist. Ranma's lips pressed together in a tight line and he looked more intently at the tablet. She got the impression Ranma was about to start whistling innocently in response to her question as he carefully did not look her way. "Well, thank you very much, Tony," she said warmly regardless of what the truth might have been. It was reminiscent of a child presenting a Mother's Day breakfast while the other parent swore he hadn't contributed a bit to it.

Rather than preen at her compliment or shrug it off with a joke, Stark slumped wearily in his chair.

She examined him carefully for a few moments, ignoring the appealing food. "Tony," she asked quietly, "what are you not telling me?"

Tony turned away from the window to look at her, his expression unreadable. "I don't want to go home," he finally admitted. "At all. Let's cancel my birthday party and... We're in Europe. Let's go to Venice! Cipriani! Remember?"

"Oh, yes," Pepper agreed with a little smile. As stressed as she had been recently, the first-class Venetian hotel and spa sounded very tempting indeed. If only there wasn't urgent work to be done.

"It's a great place to be healthy," Tony pointed out hopefully.

Pepper shook her head with a bit of confusion. "We left Europe behind a while ago. We're probably about to pass over the east coast soon. Hell... Venice was back the other direction from where we left, anyway. Besides... I don't think this is the right time. We're in kind of a mess."

"Yeah, but maybe that's why it's the best time," he claimed a bit desperately. "'Cause then we can..."

"Well." She gave him a sympathetic look. "I think as the CEO I need to show up." She was starting to understand why Ranma was still a guy without complaint from her problem man-child. While the martial artist was even worse at deception in that form than when he was female for some bizarre reason, one thing she had noticed early on was that he repressed his emotions more easily when male. Tony himself wouldn't have wanted the pity that would have been shown by the petite girl. It occurred to her that the inventor needed some masculine bonding time... she would have to make sure Rhodey came by soon after they got back to Malibu.

"As CEO, you are entitled to a leave," he made little encouraging gestures at her.

"A leave?" she asked flatly.

"A company retreat," Tony nodded.

"A retreat?" Pepper rolled her eyes. "During a time like this?"

"Just a ride!" He tried a casual tone. "Well, I'm just saying... to recharge our batteries and figure it all out."

"Not everybody runs on batteries Tony." She tried to change the subject from goofing off. "We don't even all run on whatever you do, Ranma," she nodded at the martial artist.

"Uh... I run on food and water, just like every one else," the black-haired teen corrected, looking up with a perplexed expression on his face.

"Yes, but we don't get as much out of it as you do. You might as well have your own fusion reactor in your belly with what you do. Which is good... you're going to need it," she told him earnestly.

"Why's that...? Oh... because of Reiki? So I can give you and Tony some Ki?" Ranma guessed. "That's not as good as real sleep, by the way."

"That's not what I mean..." Pepper corrected him.

"Hey... let's not go crazy here," Tony interrupted. "I like my sexy redhead massages. You like them too when he's like that," he jerked a thumb at the currently male bodyguard.

Looking apprehensive, Pepper hastened to amend: "Make that I don't only mean Reiki. You're going to need your energy for other things... more important things. That's if you agree, that is."

"You expect a fight when we arrive?" Ranma perked up with an intrigued look, setting the computer aside.

"No... well, yes... of a sort. A PR battle," she stated.

"Pepper..." for a change, Tony was the one with a warning in his voice when his friend looked like she was getting ahead of herself.

"No. Listen to me! This is important! Stark International's stock took a nosedive and took the Dow for a ride with it before the markets closed..."

"That's because most traders are superstitious fluff-brains!" Tony cut in.

"Yeah! They are! So what? Shut up, Tony!" the CEO riposted in annoyance. "You might have the majority of voting stock, but those traders are still the ones who give us operating capital when we make new offerings! And there's still a board watching how the company is doing! Unless we want to take another multi-week drubbing in less than a year, we need to get in front of this! There were exactly two bright spots for us in that whole debacle. First: nobody but the terrorist got really hurt. Second: Ranma was there front and center to show Stark employees were on top of things. However...!" she raised a finger to make her point, "...the benefit we get from Ranma can turn into a liability if we let others control the narrative."

"What do you mean?" Ranma frowned at the suggestion that having him on someone's side was anything but the best advantage in the world.

Pepper set her hands in her lap and leaned forward to give Ranma a serious look. "At the moment, you are a hero who was able to deal with an Iron-Man level threat. That's absolutely good by itself, but there is a bigger picture to consider. We've been hearing over and over that Tony isn't a reliable protector..."

"Which is fucking nuts," Tony interrupted with a scowl. "Seriously? What exactly have I have I failed to do, anyway?"

"Yeah, it's more about agenda and getting media attention than reality. The overwhelming majority of people still have favorable opinions of Iron-Man, but there's this persistent, vocal minority who bash him constantly." Pepper sighed. "And now we're hearing from them all. Again. Which means the rest of the press will be piling on as well."

"Not that they are in any way intellectually consistent," Tony pointed out. "They either complain I don't do enough or they complain I shouldn't do anything! Sometimes in the same sentence!"

"Say what now?" Ranma looked even more confused.

"It's... complicated," Pepper sighed. "Some of of the criticism is from legitimate, fervent Tony Stark haters who have had it out for him since before he stopped dealing in weapons. However, a lot of it is driven by resentment and greed. And the resentment crowd has a lot of money and influence. So their... well, I can't even call it opinions, since they're concealing what they really want... but their spin always gets airtime." Pepper grimaced at the sheer annoyance such a small number of people could create. "So they also get to drum up more antagonism because people start to think that since the subject comes up so often, there must be something to it."

"And the media likes their controversy, so they never point out how disproportionate their coverage is. Pure bullshit is given equal weight to reasoned analysis. They sure as hell never try to pin anyone down on their motives, their inconsistencies, or just what the actual facts in general are," Tony added sourly.

"Rightly or wrongly," Pepper persisted past the interruptions, "the image of Iron-Man is inextricably linked to the image of Stark Industries. So basically, when Tony looks bad, we look bad, and that affects how well we can do business. We do depend on outside companies for a lot of things, and anything that makes them less willing to deal with us makes things more difficult. The fact you stepped up like you did could let us reverse that if we also link you to the image of Stark Industries. However, that plan wouldn't work if new controversies are created around you. For instance, if we let them, people might decide you are some kind of mad-scientist's experiment... like a bioengineered mutant or robot from the future or something," Pepper explained.

"Or a cyborg like Hammer was saying," Tony quipped.

"Ugh..." Ranma groaned. "They'd think I was like... like Ghost in the Shell?"

"Would that really be a bad thing? Maybe we should try it for real and make some fem-borgs!" Tony asked humorously. "Wasn't there a sub-plot where Motoko and the other girls kept making illegal lesbian porn with each other? Or something like that? I can't remember the details, do you?"

"Uh..." Ranma opened his mouth to answer, only to freeze like that with a distant expression and a blush.

"Illegal lesbian porn? Do I want to know what you two have been watching?" Pepper wondered faintly with distaste.

"Hey! It's a perfectly cerebral set of science fiction movies and TV shows," Stark claimed. "It's about a dystopian future ruled by a corrupt police-state that gives free rein to many of humanity's worst traits. Suppression of lesbians being the worst of all!"

"You... would say that," Pepper groaned. "Let's... just forget I asked. Please? We are not making 'fem-borgs.' Anyway, we could claim Ranma was the like the bionic man... made with Stark technology," she admitted reluctantly, "but then we'd have to be able to produce things that could account for him. Not to mention faking up a back-story."

"No, I was just kidding," Tony shook his head. "For me to build something that could match his abilities? Impossible. Well... impossible in the next year... or two... or... hmmm." His eyes unfocused as he mentally mapped out research and development tracks. "I might be able to manage an android that could be a reasonable facsimile in maybe... four to six years? Depending on if Ranma will be as much of a help as I expect and if we get as far with N-dimensional technology as I hope."

"Bullshit," Ranma declared flatly.

"No bullshit!" Tony looked a lot more animated as he expounded on the subject. "Imagine you spent all that time updating JARVIS's combat databases while I came up with better and better ways to use Arc technology and built a seriously tough frame. Or better yet... I figure out a way to reinforce the servos with Arc energy like you say you do with Ki? The Iron Man armor does something like that already! And that whip-guy's rig gave me some more ideas along those lines. With a super-fast AI running the body... all that power and technology.. don't you think it could give you a run for your money?"

"No," Ranma deadpanned.

"Heh..." Tony chuckled at that. "OK... maybe it still wouldn't be a match, I admit. No wind blades, crazy tornado kicks, or other secret techniques for one thing." After the fight with Ku Lon, the Americans had pretty much given up on assuming there was any limit to the number of tricks up Ranma's sleeve... his protestations of not quite yet mastering Hidden Weapons aside. The inventor continued his analysis: "Robot wouldn't have your inherent creativity, either. But couldn't it be good enough that people who didn't know better couldn't tell the difference until you actually fought against it?"

"Eh... maybe," Ranma agreed with a sour expression. "If they were really, really stupid."

"So we'd fool Senator Stern," Tony stated with a smirk. "But don't worry about it for now. This would be the culmination of a lot of work on a whole bunch of different things. It'd take multiple departments of Stark Industries years just to..." Tony's face blanked as he remembered he was likely not to have that much time. "Forget it," he said a bit grimly. "Even if it ever happened, it wouldn't do anything for us now. Scratch playing the cyborg card... what else you got, Pep?"

"The next obvious thing people might believe is that Ranma was created or enhanced with biotech. Genetic tampering or something like the super-soldier programs. There is the family history, after all," Pepper mentioned delicately. She knew full well about Tony's tumultuous relationship with his father, and how much he blamed those issues on a long-dead man.

"Super-soldier!? As in Cap'n Flag-Face!?" Ranma exclaimed loudly in outrage, startling and confusing the Americans.

Tony made the connection first. "Captain Flag-Face!" he howled in laughter. He slid out of his chair rolled and on the floor, pounding his fist and laughing all the while.

Sighing at friend and former employer's reaction, Pepper asked: "Are you..." She paused and then spoke up louder to be heard of Tony's continuing hilarity. "Are you talking about Captain America?" Even though she herself was thinking about the World War II hero before Ranma spoke up, she couldn't quite believe he was using such a disparaging term without confirming it with him first.

"Yeah... him...!" Ranma spat out venomously. "Stupid cheating guy. Take medicine or magic thing or something and suddenly be strong! Stupid! I'm not like him! I work to be strong!" His remarkably improved accent and vocabulary in English fell off a cliff as he ranted.

"Wow... you're really mad about this!" Pepper commented, blinking in surprise.

"That guy... that stupid guy! Aho! Kusomajime! Unko no nioi kagu hito! Feh!" Ranma looked like he wanted to spit, but couldn't find a safe place to do so in the luxurious aircraft. "That guy... in the war, it was 'tall, blond, blue-eyed Flag-Face good!' and 'filthy, short, dark-haired Japs bad! It's OK to nuke them!' Don't forget, they also said 'Germans are bad because they think only tall blond people good!' Was stupid! Who was on whose side?"

Pepper winced as she recalled a few unpleasant facets of historical propaganda. Tony just laughed even harder.

"I'm really sorry," Pepper got up and stepped around her former boss to set a hand on Ranma's shoulder. "Really sorry," she repeated sympathetically. "I never thought how Captain America would appear from your perspective."

Ranma jutted his jaw forward, staring straight ahead with a furious expression over crossed arms for a moment. Then he took a deep breath and closed his eyes before exhaling. "Yeah... don't worry about it," he told her more calmly, his developing command of English reasserting itself. "Didn't think I would get that mad either. Guess maybe because of all those instant power-ups people used back in Nerima sort of added to it. Those really pissed me off. Especially that damn dougi." He patted her hand reassuringly. "Just so nobody thinks I'm super-soldier, it's all good."

"Thank you, Ranma," She smiled down at him before she went back to her chair.

"Oh god..." Tony gasped as he clambered back into his own seat. "Oh god... Whew!" He wiped tears from the corners of his eyes. "I needed that. Wow. So not a fan of the Star-Spangled Legend, huh?" Ranma shook his head with curled lip. "That's cool... I had my own issues with the guy." He waved off the bodyguard's inquisitive glance. "There was this thing with my dad... never mind. Where were we? Picking a story for Ranma?"

"What's wrong with the truth, anyway?" Ranma asked with a frown.

"That would be my preference, actually," Pepper stated. "I don't know how we went off on all those tangents. Tony's fault, probably." The overgrown delinquent clapped a hand over his chest with mock dismay, but didn't verbally object. "The truth, or a carefully curated abridgment of the truth, would be simpler to maintain and wouldn't come back to bite us later. The only concern is that while you may be a representative of Stark Industries, you don't actually represent anything unique about our company except for the fact that we hired you."

"Huh?" Ranma grunted in perplexity.

"I get it... you mean that since we could pay Ranma to work for us that... well..." Tony shrugged helplessly at his train of thought, "...anybody could pay Ranma to work for them. It'd just be money any idiot (*cough*Hammer*cough*) could spend." He lost the last vestiges of his brief good mood at the recollection of Vanko's words on that very subject. The man had a point... crazy, murderous thug or not. One of the prominent aspects of being Tony Stark was that he made things and did things no one else could. Someone like Hammer had no real brains himself... he paid others to do the real work in producing the designs his company made. Tony hiring Ranma wasn't like that, since the Ki-adept was intended to be more of a colleague in terms of combat and technological development, but the broader public couldn't be expected to grasp that distinction.

"Exactly," Pepper confirmed with bleak satisfaction.

"Hey!" Ranma protested. "You guys have really helped me out! Why would I work for anybody else?"

""Thank you, Ranma,"" the two older adults chorused at him with smiles. Then they grinned faintly at each other for a moment before Tony motioned for Pepper to proceed.

"As glad as I am to hear you say that, there's a very good reason you might want to quit," she quickly raised her hands, palms out, to stop any objections. "We'll keep helping you as much as we can if you leave, and we'll set you up somewhere else, don't worry about that. But before we go any further with this, there's something you need to think very carefully about. The best way to answer the question 'is Iron Man protecting us as well as he used to?' is to be able to say 'Iron Man is protecting us better than ever!'"

"O... kay?" Ranma's face and tone showed how lost he was.

"She wants to make you my... Iron Man's... understudy," Tony explained.

"Your partner, actually," Pepper corrected, making the man pout. She could tell he wasn't truly offended, however. "We would equip and support you, Ranma, so you could do a lot of the same things Tony has done as Iron Man. Either together with him, or alone."

"Welcome to the superhero club," Tony smirked.

Ranma sat and blinked several times in silence. "You say what now?!" he blurted at last.

Tony raised his eyebrows and grinned at the reaction. "Is that really such a surprise? You fought me to a draw... so 'super.' You've rescued and protected people, so 'hero.' truth to tell, you joined the club yesterday as far as the world is concerned."

"Huh..." Ranma murmured as he stared off blankly into space.

"So you never thought of yourself that way?" Pepper asked sympathetically. "You've been superhuman for years, now."

Ranma rolled his eyes at that comment. "Anybody can do what I do if they train long enough. Might take them a hundred years longer than me, though," he buffed his knuckles on his shirt in self-satisfaction. "Still, not really superhuman if it's anybody, right?"

"That's... sort of true for me too," Tony mused. "I mean, it's possible someone else could match my designs eventually. In two-hundred years, maybe," he grinned at the unimpressed look the martial artist sent him as he doubled down on the time estimate. "I'm still a superhero, though. Ask anybody."

"Superclown, maybe," Pepper interjected.

"Anybody but her," Tony amended. "Anyway, I'm qualified to judge, and I say you meet the criteria. You disagree?"

"Yare, yare," Ranma muttered. "I guess... not?" He shook his head in disbelief. "I get what you're saying, but it's really weird to think of myself like that. I mean... the idea of being a martial artist has the whole idea of being a hero, too. Rescue a village from a corrupt official or bandits or something like in the stories. Never thought of myself that way. Was just trying to get out of stupid messes, really."

"I am fairly certain that's true of most heroes," Pepper pointed out. "It is something you should give careful thought about. You particularly give a lot of thought to if you want to be a public hero. For if we send you out with Iron Man or even instead of Iron Man? We'll be making you an international hero. And that means you'll be an international celebrity!"

When both the men looked confused, she explained: "Most people think being famous is this wonderful thing, and Tony grew up with this, so he doesn't know any better, but actually being famous can be pretty awful. It means your day-to-day life goes under a microscope and reporters will be looking into your history. It means a significant fraction of the populace will obsess over what you say, who you date, where you go, what you wear, and even what you eat. It'll mean you won't be able to walk into a convenience store without people hounding you for selfies or autographs. For that matter, you can expect half-a-dozen cell-phone camera's aimed at you at all times as soon as you set foot into a public space if you aren't in disguise. Remember how people were acting around Tony yesterday? How they acted around you? That would become permanent. Some celebrities wallow in the nonsense," she pointed at Tony, who waved happily in acknowledgment. "And some do everything they can to dodge it, but either way you will need to manage it. That means you will need a publicist and an assistant of your own at the very least. And you will need to listen to them."

"Oh..." Ranma said blankly. "I've never hired... anybody... before. Am I making enough money to do that?"

"We would hire and pay them," Pepper clarified, "as you would be representing us. Current Stark Industries employees can cover those functions in the short term, but it would be a really good idea to get dedicated people within the next month or two."

"OK," Ranma slowly nodded. "That kind of does sound like a pain in the ass, but if I've got experts helping me, it wouldn't be so bad. The public thing? Well... I'm really good at disguises as a girl for some reason, so... wait... hold up..."

"Oh right!" Pepper perked up. "You've got the perfect disguise in your male form!" That very morning in Monaco, he had shown how well the scheme would work. Ranma had first gone out as a girl, and was promptly mobbed by new fans and reporters before escaping vertically up the side of the hotel. He tried again as a guy and managed to get some unhindered personal time to explore.

"Yeah!" Ranma agreed happily. Then his face fell. "Kuso... I forgot something I wanted to ask about. Natalie said I might have trouble being a guy in public because of police or something."

"Why would...? Oh! Right! Legal identity, right?"

"That's what she said."

"Hold it!" Tony raised a hand to interrupt. He frowned in concentration. "No, never mind. I can't see a way that works as a punchline."

Pepper groaned a little. "Ignore him," she said in the face of Ranma's befuddlement. "So she thought it might be a problem if you didn't have a legal identity as a male?"

"Yeah. My passport is for my girl side. Trying to explain why guy-Ranma has girl-Ranma's ID would be a mess. She said the ID's are very important everyday."

"Well, not everyday," Pepper muttered. "But I see her point." She thought about calling the assistant, who was still up front with the other staff, to add her two cents, but decided against it. "I didn't think about this as much as I should have. It was vaguely in my mind that we'd just explain the change to the government and let them figure out how to handle identity, I suppose."

"That would definitely blow up any chance of keeping the secret identity secret," Tony opined. "Not if we went through the usual channels, anyway. And you're a hell of a lot more optimistic about them doing more than running in circles and shouting even if we tried to get them to handle the unvarnished truth about Ranma's gender."

"Eh... true." Pepper winced as she considered the point. "Hacking again?"

"Don't see any other way," Tony shook his head. "Hell, I had to create most of Ranma's legal identity from scratch anyway with how far off the grid he was. Might as well do it again. But we'll need a name."

"Hmm... I don't suppose we could create a second 'Ranma Saotome' identity for his male form, could we?" Pepper asked rhetorically.

Tony answered anyway. "Not now that the name is so public. It's not anywhere close to common."

After thinking it through, Pepper grimaced sympathetically. "In retrospect, we should have gone with the 'Ranko Tendo' identity to completely separate your male and female personas, but it's really too late now. As far as the public is concerned, 'Ranma Saotome' is a woman."

"Ugh... yeah..." Ranma tilted his head and frowned. "Yeah, I think you're right. Kuso."

"Is that going to be a problem for you?" Pepper asked.

Ranma bobbed his head and looked upward as he pondered the question. "I don't think so? I'm a little annoyed I did the world TV thing as a girl, but I'm stuck with it now. If I'm gonna be that famous a martial artist, I want it as 'Ranma Saotome.' The name matters more than the body." He paused for thought once more. "I like attention, but that was a lot of attention for my girl-side back there. I like being able to do my own thing, too. Public-guy and private-girl would have been better, but not so much better that I'm really mad about it. Just annoyed."

Pepper nodded slowly. "OK, though that still might be something you bring up with the therapist."

"Eh... this again?" Ranma sighed.

"It is a condition of your employment," Pepper reminded him. "Don't worry. We'll pick a respectable doctor. The kind who will absolutely tell us we're wasting their time if in fact we're wasting their time and you don't need to consult with them. If that's the case, then you won't have to deal with it anymore."

"Alright." Ranma raised his hands in surrender.

Pepper rubbed her eyes wearily. "I was hoping we'd reduce the reasons to talk to a psychologist, not add to them, but here we are."

"Here we are," Tony agreed more sanguinely. "We're going to need a name for him, though. I vote 'Bruce Lee.'"

"Oh, hey!" Ranma perked up at the suggestion.

"We are not naming him 'Bruce Lee,'" Pepper said repressively. "How about... 'Ran...dall?' 'Randall?'"

"'Lee,'" Tony concluded firmly. "'Randall Lee.' That's it."

"Not that I mind," Ranma responded, "but I'm not Chinese."

"Not like people in this country will know the difference," Tony shrugged. Seeing the dubious looks on the other two's faces, he revised himself. "Or... since your English has been coming along really well... boy, I designed JARVIS better than I thought," he shamelessly took credit.

"Tony..." his long-time friend prodded.

"Anyway. Thanks to my brilliant programming skills, your English will soon be good enough to pass as American-born, or maybe Canadian to explain it if you miss a cultural cue. If we make your ID American or Canadian, it's easy to claim a Chinese dad and a Japanese mom if somebody actually sees any difference. Or a mix of a bunch or nationalities. Also, it wouldn't hurt to claim a different country of origin to separate your identities more. What do you think?" Tony asked.

"I think..." Ranma nodded slowly. "Yeah. That's not bad. I can live with 'Randall Lee.'"

"Cool," Tony threw his hands into the air. "We'll work out the details sometime... family history, job school history, etc... and I'll set it up."

"If we're going to go that far, maybe we should go through official channels?" Pepper suggested. "Perhaps SHIELD?"

The corner of Tony's mouth quirked up in a sardonic grin. "You mean... in order to avoid having to make up a false identity for Ranma, we'll ask SHIELD to make a false identity instead so that we can owe them a favor and give them an excuse to mess around with our business even more?"

"Right, never mind," Pepper immediately backtracked, though she gave him a look that showed her lack of appreciation for the sarcasm.

############

In the staff section of the plane, Natasha did not do anything so unprofessional as flinch, curse, or otherwise twitch. She didn't even bite her tongue. That said, she did wish she was alone in a secure location so she could do at least one of those things as she listened to the private conversation. It was rather annoying to have a potential bargaining chip taken away.

############

"Should we worry about people associating Ranma with his male form anyway?" Pepper continued to consider possible issues. "Remember that Mr. Maeda and the rest have multiple active cases and Ranma may very well need to testify in person. That will raise his profile there even more. Like I said, reporters will be looking."

"American reporters kind of suck at finding real facts. Especially from international sources," Tony replied flippantly.

"It won't be just American reporters," Pepper pointed out. "And not all American reporters are that bad."

"The ones the big networks like to use most sure are!"

"Still..."

"Mm... maybe," Tony shrugged after a bit. "Yet... Internet, and satellites, and jet planes aside... countries still tend to be a bit more provincial than they want to admit. What's suspected about Ranma Saotome in Japan won't likely carry over to Randall Lee in America. And it's what's known in America that matters as long as he lives here. Between my efforts and what the Japanese government did to the official record before, things are pretty muddied now. Add JARVIS keeping an eye out for queries, and we can keep the split-identity thing pretty well shielded." He chuckled, and asked: "What would somebody who figures it out gonna do, anyway? Call up the US press and yell 'Ranma Saotome's a guy! She's a guuuuuy!'?"

Pepper opened her mouth to respond, then closed it with a click as the looked thoughtful. "That's a good point. Someone would have to come out to California and hit Ranma with hot water in public, or cold if he's male. And even that would not be very convincing if we simply refused to confirm it. Magic springs are not a thing as far as 99.999999% of the world is concerned."

"I can use the Soul of Ice to stay girl by making any water that hits me cold," Ranma offered. "I had it ready to go in Monaco, though I didn't really need it. Staying guy?" He grimaced and admitted: "I can grab heat from other stuff, but it all goes into my Ki. Have to send it out afterward to heat up a canteen or something. Takes time." He shrugged. "If we had Water-Proof Soap, that would do the job to keep me stuck as guy or girl for a while."

"Wait. 'Water-Proof Soap'?" Tony looked at him strangely. "As in soap that doesn't dissolve in water? How does that even work? Much less do you any good?"

"Oh, uh... it actually works like real soap from what I remember, and you can clean with it. I guess it's called that because it protects you from magic being triggered by water, so Jusenkyo-cursed people don't change for a while. It wears off after a few hours, though, and I heard its rare and expensive."

"Huh," the famous genius started stroking his goatee thoughtfully. He made a mental note to have JARVIS track down and buy every bar of the stuff he could find. It would help with his keep-the-scenery-female goal.

"Anyway," Ranma lifted his palms in a broad shrug. "So I got the Soul of Ice. I got disguises. I got some other ideas, too. I think I got the bad parts of being famous handled. And doing this superhero thing will help you guys, right? So let's do it. I maybe even will get some good challengers out of it!"

"We're... going to have to come up with a way to avoid Nerima-style challengers, I just realized," Pepper said worriedly.

Ranma shook his head. "It won't be that bad. Challenged dojo can set terms. Oyaji and Tendo-San were lazy and didn't bother since they could just tell me to fight. Real problem in Nerima was the nuts making up most of the rules."

"Let's try to come up with some kind of procedure, anyway," the lone responsible adult in the cabin said cautiously. "That aside, it is very kind of you to accept, but I insist you think about it more. You can back out any time before you do anything public, and that won't be for a couple days at the earliest."

"Didn't I just do something pretty public?" Ranma jerked a thumb toward the back of the plane.

"Yes," she answered slowly, "and it might be too late already. However, it would be a lot easier to let people forget a one-time event where you disappear afterward. Doing more public events will take that possibility away, especially if we promote it like we will."

"OK, I get it," Ranma raised his hands in surrender. "I'll think about it. Maybe call Hokkusu-sensei and ask him for advice." He also planned to talk to 'Natalie,' though he didn't admit this to the woman who even he had noticed tended to get prickly when it came to the redhead.

"That sounds like an excellent idea," the CEO nodded. "Now if we do go through with this, then you would essentially be doing an endorsement of Stark Industries. That will help things, but only so much," she went on. "However, I would be much happier if it went farther than that. Specifically, if you were using a high-profile product of ours while performing missions. The Stark HUD is a bit too subtle for that."

"Ohhh... yeah..." Tony eagerly rubbed his hands together. "Go girl again! We can start designing the new 'Iron Woman' armor right now!" Not only would this be fun in its own right, but the inventor had been entertaining concerns about a successor recently. He had toyed with the idea of Rhodey taking over, but the man was too loyal to the Air Force to be what Tony thought was needed. The current possibility under discussion could definitely be a solution for him.

"'Iron Woman?' Really, Tony?" Pepper shot down the name idea disdainfully while Ranma looked at him like he was crazy.

"'Iron Maiden?"' Stark suggested with a grin. "That might have some copyright issues, though. Then again, we've got the licensing negotiations with record labels down to a science by now."

Ranma had a sardonic look on his face, but he was drawn into the game anyway. "Iron Fist," he joked.

"What? Really?" Tony blinked at him.

"No, not really!" Ranma fake-yelled in reply. Then he smirked and explained: "There are like a dozen techniques that could be called 'Iron Fist.' It'd be like naming yourself 'Snap Kick' or 'Head Butt.' Only an idiot would call themselves that." They all laughed a bit when Ranma made his point. "Forget the name. Are you talking about cramming me into armor like yours?"

"Yeah." The engineer nodded as if it were obvious.

"Forget it," the fighter denied. "I couldn't do anything with armor! The resistance suit is fine for training, but there's no way I could fight for real with metal bits weighing me down. I'd be better off naked."

"Get some cold water and you can fight as naked as you want," Tony instantly proposed.

"Let's not start this again," Pepper sighed.

"I'd like to point out..." Tony smiled fiendishly, "...jailbait is no longer in effect."

"Maybe not, but indecent exposure sure is," Pepper said firmly. "Tangent again," she noted with annoyance. "I appreciate what you're saying, Ranma, but is there really nothing about the armor you can use?"

"No speed. No flexibility. I wouldn't be able to feel the battleground or the opponent," Ranma shook his head. "That just won't work for me. And I might blow up the stupid gloves throwing a Ki-blast or something."

"Wha'd'ya mean 'no speed'!?" Tony complained. "My armor peaks out at Mach 3!"

"Running?" Ranma asked.

"Well no... not running. Not even close to the ground, if I'm being honest," Tony grumbled. "I have to be at somewhat high altitude to hit that speed. But still... Mach 3!"

"You're talking about like how fast this plane goes, right?" Ranma checked.

"Nah, I'm talking about the suit being almost twice as fast." Tony corrected with a self-satisfied smirk.

"OK, that's a different kind of speed than I'm talking about," Ranma told him patiently. "I'm talking the kind of speed that let me dodge when you were trying to blast me."

Tony gave that some thought, then waved his hand somewhat aimlessly to acknowledge the facts of the matter. "OK, I see your point. Also, there's no way I wouldn't have tagged you if you were wearing armor like mine back when we sparred. The radar tracking would have made it dead easy."

"Yeah... your kind of speed is good for a vehicle to go places. I can't do that so well," Ranma mentioned in an attempt to be generous. "I'm still hitching a ride, not running, right?" He looked all around himself to indicate the plane they were riding. "Maybe you wanna give me that other jet I rode on?" he kidded.

Pepper raised an eyebrow at that. Fond hopes of some people aside, she knew perfectly well what went on in the Party Plane. She almost brought the boys to task, but decided that... rough-edges and naivete aside... Ranma had the kind of life experiences that meant he wouldn't have been affected adversely by some bare skinned dancers.

"Ha! You wish," Tony looked amused. He tilted his head and looked up in thought. "How about a flexible suit instead? I mean one like your bodysuits but with however much gear I can pack into it?"

"That might work," Ranma pursed his lips as he considered it. He nodded amicably. "That's a good idea if it can move with me like clothing."

"Sure," Tony promised. "I think I might be able squeeze a few billion transistors into it to support a link to JARVIS. Some sensors in the suit itself. Add an improved Stark HUD, and that'd be a quarter of the capability Iron Man suit right there. I could even make it a little bulletproof... probably. Might be a good thing to make one for me, too," he said musingly. "It'd give me a little extra protection until I could get in my regular armor."

"You know bullets aren't a problem," Ranma scoffed.

"You're bulletproof!?" Pepper blurted incredulously. "Never mind... 'of course you are' is getting to be a catch-phrase for you."

"We didn't mention that earlier?" Tony asked. "I could have sworn it came up before. Especially after we tested it in the basement." Seeing his friend and keeper turn a narrow-eyed look at him, he hastened to point out: "She was fine! He was fine! Ranma has absolutely no holes not provided by nature!"

"I've been shot at a bunch of times before," Ranma added helpfully. "Especially in North Korea and China. Taking hits from guns is not a big deal. Getting hit in the same place twice in a row might hurt, and maybe getting hit a bunch of times would be a problem, but I'd never hold still for that."

"Do you have to be ready to take the hit first?" It suddenly occurred to Stark to wonder more practically about the mechanics of Ranma's durability. "Would a surprise hit do more damage?"

"Uh..." Ranma eyed him sidelong, looking a bit offended. "The only times bullets hit me for real were when I was surprised. I'd dodge, block, or catch them otherwise. So no problems with surprises."

"Well... it still wouldn't hurt to have the suit be able to stand up to gunfire, anyway. If nothing else, I can use the technology I'd end up developing for it for other purposes."

"That's all well and good," Pepper interrupted, "but a bodysuit and visor are not exactly as brandable as I was hoping. Nor is an airplane. Could you do the soft suit and visor with Iron Man's regular boots and gauntlets? Or just the boots?" Ranma grimaced reluctantly so she went on with a persuasive voice: "You said yourself it would be good to have a means of traveling long distances."

"There is no way the flight systems would work with just that," Tony contradicted her. "There are control surfaces built into almost every square inch of Iron Man's exterior. Sorry."

"It's too bad I can't have something like those things in those movies you forced me to watch because I didn't know what 'The Force' was," Ranma commented absently. "The Jedi dudes were kinda weak and slow, but those hovering motorcycle things in the big forest? Those were pretty cool."

Tony's neck popped as he swung his gaze rapidly to Ranma. The futurist leapt to his feet and pointed at the combat expert for several seconds with his mouth working soundlessly. Pepper dimpled and bit her lower lip as she realized what realization had just bitten Tony.

"What?" Ranma blinked cluelessly.

The inventor's hands smacked on top of his head, grabbing handfuls of hair, his eyes wild and his mouth gobbling unintelligibly. Stumbling backward, he crashed into the bulkhead of the plane behind him then fell into his seat again. "Ahhh!" he shrieked in a tiny, high pitched voice. He froze in place and stared off into the distance for a moment, then shrieked again with the same small, broken voice as if he had seen an eldritch abomination. "Ahhhhhhhh!"

The Neriman escapee just looked at the madman with raised eyebrows. "You want me to get you a pill or something, man?"

"Great... Scott!" Tony rasped hoarsely as he continued to over-act, repressing a laugh at the quip lest he ruin his performance. His entire body dipped and swayed histrionically as he turned to face his successor CEO. "Pepperrrr!" he wailed despairingly. "Why haven't I made a speeder-bike yet?!"

"I don't know, Tony..." her peevish voice belied the smile she was fighting to smother. Though she still made his name sound synonymous with 'dumbass' with her tone. "Why haven't you?"

Tony's head clunked against the window and he looked outside liked he hoped to find salvation amongst the clouds. "Haaaah! Haaaah!" He gulped great gasping breaths in fine melodrama while trying to trace dozens of lines of thought at once. "Reactionless drive... Dedicated vehicle... Multiple stages and configurations possible..." he muttered crazedly to himself. Suddenly he looked up at his old friend again. "Pepperrrrrrr...!" he wailed once more. "Why haven't I gone to space yet!?"

"You did, Tony!" she replied sarcastically. "Remember? You kept bragging how high you went in the Iron Man suit!"

"I-I mean... I mean with an X-Wing! Or an A-Wing! That would be better! Pepperrrrr...!" he trailed off in utter sorrow and mortification. "Listen! Do you hear?" he asked in a low, stricken tone. "That is the sound of ultimate suffering!" Ranma looked around worriedly while Pepper gave her erratic friend a skeptical look. "My heart made that sound when I realized I could have been making totally awesome, mind-blowing gear..." his voice fell to a harsh, hollow whisper, "...and I didn't!"

"Ranma?" Pepper looked over at the martial artist, who was looking a little wild-eyed. "Could you go up front and tell Happy that Tony needs his CAD-pad?" she requested calmly.

"Uh... sure...?" Ranma agreed hesitantly as he slowly stood. "Is he alright?"

"Tony always goes a bit psycho when he gets really creative," Pepper said brusquely. "He's also playing up the mad-scientist act like a little ham since it's the first time you've seen this." Stark frowned at her for a moment before going back to his distraught expression, but Ranma still caught the break in character and smirked at his odd employer. "Just fetch the computer so we can hand it to him and back away slowly. He'll be OK once he can start doing something productive." She looked at him and smiled cheerfully. "Then we'll go up front to participate in the traditional Stark-employee game called: 'Let's Figure Out if We're Getting Paid Enough for this Shit!'"

"Right," Ranma confirmed faintly as he walked quickly away.

############

On the afternoon of Tony Stark's return, James Rhodes, 'Rhodey' to his friends, stormed into the Malibu mansion, the security having been set to give him full access without needing to announce himself. In the living room Pepper and 'Natalie' were speaking on separate phones, with three laptops open between the two of them, and three different news programs blaring out from the screens on the wall. The disordered scatter of paper notes and empty drinks showed they had been there for a while. The smart-glass windows had all been darkened, giving the mansion the feeling of a bunker under siege.

"Yes, but the fundamentals of the company are still very, very strong despite the events in Monaco," Pepper was insisting. "And we have been expanding our security precautions, which proved effective today."

'Natalie' spoke into her own phone: "Yes, of course." Meeting the CEO's eyes she said: "The AP wants a quote."

Pepper covered the receiver of her phone and whispered: "Don't tell them. Fax them..."

"Where is he?" Rhodes intruded on their crisis management.

"He doesn't want to be disturbed," the new assistant informed him.

Pepper instantly contradicted her: "He's downstairs." Then she returned to her call with: "Yes, but..."

Looking up at the TV, the light colonel listened in for a moment as the woman on the screen said: "...But his continuing erratic behavior may lead many people to ask themselves, 'Can this man still protect us?"'

Almost as if she were answering the TV directly, Pepper said into her phone: "Iron Man never stopped protecting us! He's protecting us better than ever with backup! The events in Monaco proved that!"

Shaking his head at the obvious spin, Rhodey turned to go down the stairs.

############

Tony Stark, unknowing of who was about to descend on him, moaned delightedly as he pressed the side of his head into the pillow. "Damn, you're good, Ranma," he declared. "I love how you decided to cheer me up! This is the best I've ever... oh, shit!... had." His unclothed body writhed in pleasure, though he tried not to move too much so not to risk disrupting the redhead's ministrations.

"Query complete sir," JARVIS announced, distracting him. "Anton Vanko was a Soviet physicist who defected to the United States in 1963. However, he was accused of espionage and was deported in 1967. His son, Ivan, who is also a physicist, was convicted of selling Soviet-era weapons grade plutonium to Pakistan, and served 15 years in Kopeisk prison. No further records exist."

"That's him, alright," Ranma stated as she looked up at the displayed picture. "Never thought I'd have to battle scientists." She pulled away from Tony, making him issue a quiet, despondent whimper. "We got company coming down. He's mad, but Pepper let him through without a peep."

"It is James Rhodes, sir," JARVIS contributed.

"Rhodey?" Tony sat up and looked. "Oh, yeah, there he is," he said absently as he saw his friend descend down the stairs. "He does look a little peeved, doesn't he?" Since the garage bay was darkened and the glass vestibule Rhodey was in was well lit, the visitor couldn't see them yet. Tony smirked at the sight his best friend was about to walk into. "Hand me my clothes, would you?" he requested as he set the towel covering his privates aside. Ranma grabbed them out of the basket she had set them in and offered him his underpants first, but he reached for the shirt instead to conceal his damaged chest.

Rhodey finished coding himself through the security door and strode through, demanding: "Tony, you gotta get upstairs and... Goddammit Tony!" he yelled as he looked at the pants-less inventor getting dressed with a flushed and happy expression on his face and a curvy beauty at his side. "The entire world is losing their shit because of you and you're down here tomcatting with your new bodyguard?"

"A massage, Rhodey," Tony told him dryly, pulling up his trousers. "I was getting a massage. Or didn't you notice that Ranma's fully clothed?" He gestured at the girl wearing her Stark HUD, both a tank-top and a t-shirt, all over a bodysuit that Rhodes assumed was impossible to get in or out of quickly. The redhead scoffed wordlessly at the Air Force pilot as she wheeled the massage table away.

"A massage... right..." Rhodey said skeptically.

"Reiki massage," Tony confirmed while slipping on loafers. "Very relaxing and yet energizing. Promotes good health, don't you know. Totally wholesome and Pep-approved. I had half-a-dozen more massage beds delivered as soon as I knew what Ranma could do with her hands. Pepper and Natalie have gotten massages, too. Though I think poor Happy's been left out."

"He's not a girl... or paying me," Ranma explained flatly as she walked over to them. She came to a halt in arm's reach of her employer and crossed her arms as she eyed the officer mistrustfully. She could still feel his antagonism, and he wasn't on the list of people allowed to get mad at Tony as far as she was concerned.

"True, true," Tony nodded sagely. "Speaking of people who will never know the rapture of your hands, this is Colonel James Rhodes of the United States Air Force... or 'Rhodey' to most. He's been my best friend since MIT. Rhodey, this..." he swept an arm toward the redhead while introducing her with a boastful tone, "is Ranma Saotome. You know how I made half the US military obsolete? She'll be the one to cover for the other half."

"I know who she is," Rhodes snapped. "And this isn't the time for stupid boasts. Whatever... you gotta get upstairs," he repeated, "and get on top of this situation right now. Listen. I've been on the phone with the National Guard all day, trying to talk them out of rolling tanks up the PCH, knocking down your front door and taking these." He pointed emphatically at the row of armor suits on display at the back of the room. "They're gonna take your suits, Tony, okay?"

"'Tanks'?"Ranma interrupted. "As in sensha? Big bulldozer things with cannons on top of them?"

"Yes... that's right," Rhodey said with a slightly relieved tone at how the new hire was emphasizing the danger.

"Feh..." she sneered, shattering that sense of relief. "Mechanisms. Send them! I'll smash 'em all!"

"What!?" Rhodey yelped as Tony chuckled appreciatively. "No! You can't do that!"

"Sure she can," Tony assured him cheerfully. "I've measured her strength. Just think of her as a walking, talking, 2,000-pound bomb that never stops exploding! She can scatter them like toys!"

"No! I mean they're the government! Even if you have the boogie-woman of Asia," he jerked his head toward Ranma, "on your side, it won't do you any good!"

"She's a boogie-woman?" Tony echoed blankly. "You're a boogie-woman?" Tony asked his bodyguard with feigned awe.

For her part, Ranma had been leafing though possible interpretations that JARVIS fed her though the HUD with all the speed her mystically enhanced eyes could manage to find out what the hell a 'boogie-woman' was. She didn't answer verbally or even uncross her arms, but she looked at employer and twitched her hips into a distinct 'cha-cha-cha' motion. Tony threw back his head and laughed, only stopping when he felt a twinge from the reactor housing in his chest.

"Be serious," Rhodes demanded. "The brief I got from my superiors was that she was a loose-cannon as bad or worse than you, Tony," he revealed. "She was somehow involved in the destruction of several sites in East Asia, culminating in the collapse of a hotel in Hong Kong, and that's just one of the few things they could tell me! There's a hell of a lot redacted in her file! All I know is she makes the brass seriously worried, but legally they can't do anything about her!"

"Huh? 'Culminating?' As in the biggest thing I've done?" JARVIS had once again filled in the blanks for her. "Just a hotel? And in Hong Kong?" Ranma's back straightened in indignation. "I didn't wreck any... oh wait... yeah," she relaxed again. "That one time Nabiki sold me to the Triad. They deserved that." Tony looked highly amused at her confession, but their visitor just looked further incensed.

"See what I mean! Just..." Rhodey stopped and looked at her oddly. "Sold you?" The descendant of kidnapped and enslaved people himself, that struck a chord. Though as nonchalant as she was, he wasn't certain how seriously he should take her words. "Never mind that! Listen to me! You can't just fight them head on!" The military man waved his hands at the Ki-adept, whose expression was profoundly unconvinced as she looked up at him. "Even if she's never been charged with anything for what I have to assume is a good reason, having someone as infamous as her adding to the chaos will only make things worse for you!"

"Wow, somebody's selling somebody a serious line of bullshit," Tony commented, not explaining what he meant.

"Governments. Bandits. Greedy drunk pandas. Whatever. They all are just thieves if they try to take what's not theirs," Ranma declared uncompromisingly before Rhodes could follow up on Tony's statement. "My job is to stop them. Hard."

"Unlike bandits or... pandas...?" Rhodey gave her another strange look before he decided that was a mistranslation on her part. "...Governments have a duty to protect their citizens. If they think the only way to do that is to gain control of a dangerous technology, they will. They could decide to treat these suits like WMD's." He waved toward the wall of suits again. "Even if they can't fight their way in, they can lay siege to this place and every other building that Tony owns." While the other two were focused on each other, Tony grimaced as he felt a wave of burning weariness wash out from his chest, spreading through his body. Ranma shot him a quick look, but turned back to keep arguing.

"Tony made these things. With his own hands. They're his," Ranma insisted stubbornly.

"And when it was just Tony, that could be managed!" Rhodey told her. He turned back to his friend. "You said nobody else would possess this technology for 20 years! Well, guess what? Somebody else had it yesterday! It's not theoretical anymore and they're sick of the games! Are you listening to me? Hey..." his tirade stalled as he noticed Tony was touching his chest and looking worried. "Are you okay?"

"Uh... yeah..." Tony muttered as he carefully walked toward his desk, "I'm fine." He sat down and slid a flat wooden case toward himself. "Can I... uh... talk you two into stepping upstairs for a minute?"

"Sure," Ranma agreed and grabbed Rhodey's elbow, dragging him along.

"Whoa! Leggo!" He tried to stop her or pull his arm free, but he had as much luck as he would arm-wrestling a hydraulic press. "H-Hey, man... hey, Tony!" He looked back over his shoulder. "You all right? There's something wrong, isn't there!?" Ranma's stride hitched for a moment, and she pointedly turned her face away from the officer. He pounced on the clue. "There is! It's got to do with that high-tech crossword puzzle on your neck, right?" Ranma's gait was still slowing, so he kept talking: "She knows, doesn't she?" he accused, jerking his head toward the teenager. "But you haven't told me? I'm your best friend, man!"

Tony regarded him resignedly for a moment, then said: "Fine. Come on back" As the two went to his desk, he added: "Ranma doesn't know everything." He popped the reactor module out from under his shirt, letting the capacitors of the mounting keep running the magnets, and feeling a bit of relief when the source of his malaise was removed. "She doesn't know about this," he triggered the release to open up the module and eject the core matrix.

"Is that supposed to be smoking?" Rhodey asked as he and Ranma peered at the fuming, burnt-looking core.

"If you must know, it's neutron damage. It's from the reactor wall," Tony told them sententiously. He opened the wooden box and pulled out one of the four remaining silvery rectangles. "It's palladium," he explained as he swapped out cores.

"You had this in your body?" Rhodey asked incredulously while examining the desiccated and charred thing discarded on Tony's desk. "It's killing you, isn't it?" he asked softly.

"It might be... eventually," the technologist agreed less than honestly as he put the reactor module back in, patting it home. "It's not too bad until the core reaches the end of its lifecycle," he claimed. Then he picked up his container of chlorophyll and drank some down. Glancing up at the concerned onlookers, he asked defensively: "What are you looking at?"

"We're looking at you," Rhodes said gently. "You wanna do this whole lone gunslinger act and it's unnecessary. You don't have to do this alone."

"He's not alone," Ranma interjected.

"That's right!" Tony gestured to her with his drink. "Ranma's been helping a lot! Not only does she have my back when an Iron Man-level threat shows up when I'm out of the suit... which worked exactly as planned yesterday, I'd like to point out... but she's also been helping with my health. The Reiki? It's been slowing down the contamination."

"You said 'slowing,"' Rhodey immediately countered. "Not curing. Does Pepper know about this? What about Happy?"

"No!" Tony said firmly. "And they don't need to know!"

"Not for..." Ranma paused to calculate, "twenty-four more days."

"Oh... right," Tony grimaced at the reminder, "that promise. That just means I have over three weeks to figure something out before I have to say anything."

"And yet you told this girl you met a few days ago," Rhodey grumbled.

"She figured it out on her own!" the billionaire protested.

"Yeah, as soon as I felt him out of his armor," she nodded.

"'Felt him'?" the military man asked archly.

"With her Ki... like Son Goku," Tony explained. Ranma helpfully held up a fist and let her aura shine out around it. Rhodes jumped back with an alarmed look, making Tony smirk at him.

"Christ, Tony... the things you get into..." James shook his head in disbelief as he stepped forward carefully. The hasty briefing from military intelligence he had been read in on had mentioned a mysterious power, and the proof seemed to be in front of his eyes, but he still had trouble accepting it. "That isn't a hologram or something, is it?"

"For for fuck's sake." Tony heaved an exasperated breath. "No, it isn't a fake. Yes, Ki is real. Ranma really does use it. She really did pick up a car and carry it around because of Ki. She really did block plasma whips with plain ol' hardware store chains because of Ki. We were in the same dorm. I know you watched Dragon Ball too."

"That was a cartoon..."

"Anime when it's from Japan," Tony corrected obnoxiously.

"Whatever." James demonstrated his own exasperation. "The point is: she isn't an anime character."

"Well of course I'm not," Ranma spoke up. "I'm much more awesome."

Rhodes gave her a long-suffering look. "OK, now I know why you hired her. She fits right in here at Casa Arrogance."

"You know... a lot of people named their mansions, but I never saw the point before," Tony said musingly. "But that sounds like a great..."

"Shut. Up. Tony." The colonel longed for the blessed balm of military structure where nobody gave each other this kind of back-talk. "OK... I'm just... going along with it. I'm going along with it. Fine. So this 'Ki' let you know he had a problem as soon as the metal suit wasn't in the way?"

"Not the metal," Ranma corrected, "the Arc reactor."

"What?"

"Arc energy feels a lot like Ki to me," the redhead said. "The reactor in his suit covered him."

"Huh..." Rhodey said absently. "Wait... he's got a reactor in his chest. Wouldn't that shield him even more?"

"No," Ranma shook her head. "The chest Arc kind of... blends in with his Ki? Arc energy is... tasteless? Colorless?" She shrugged. "It has no identity to it, kind of like what you'd feel from the sun. When it is inside him, it soaks up some 'flavor' from Tony and shows what his Ki shows. The armor Arc absorbs nothing from him. It's just like a glaring white light."

"Hold it..." Tony raised a hand. "The Arc energy is mixing with my Ki? Why haven't you mentioned that before?"

"I... uh... whoops?" Her face contorted in embarrassment "Meant to say something, but we kept talking about other stuff... and the shopping... and the new place... and hiding Natalie from Pepper..."

"OK... OK... I get it," he waved to stop her.

"Whoa- whoa- whoa..." Rhodey interjected. "Are you telling us you're a natural Arc reactor?" he asked Ranma skeptically.

"Uh..." Ranma thought it over. "No? Yes? I have Ki. You have Ki. The sun has Ki. Animals have Ki. Plants have Ki. Rocks and dirt and water hold a little Ki, but don't really own it or use it. But I have no idea for sure how it all ties together. So either everybody is a little Arc reactor, or nobody is and it was the sun feeding us Ki all along. People in the martial-arts world have been arguing it out for thousands of years."

"So the Arc reactors are like artificial life-force generators? That doesn't quite seem to fit the previous data," Tony said thoughtfully.

"Arc is like Ki," Ranma repeated. "It is not exactly Ki. It's close enough to fight off the sleep point I hit that whip-guy with when the reactor was running. What Arc really is?" She shrugged dramatically. "No clue. But I also don't know where Ki comes from. I just know we all have it and I know what I can do with it."

"I see..." Tony looked very intrigued at this point.

"Are you seriously buying into this, Tony?" Rhodes frowned at his friend.

"Dammit, I hate falling behind the curve..." Tony ignored the officer as he steepled his hands in front of his mouth for a bit, then looked up with realization. "Hey, Ranma? Stress affects Ki, right?"

"Everything you feel affects Ki," she said flatly.

"Oh... oh, oh, oh, oh!" Stark muttered as he started working rapidly on his computer. "The cores have been depleting faster and faster over time, but I couldn't figure out why! My chest reactor has one job... keep my heart beating without the shrapnel in my chest shredding my entire circulatory system from the inside out. The load never changes significantly... I stopped using this reactor for anything else once I realized the palladium poisoning was a problem. Yet it was getting used up faster, but it was never at a rate that made any kind of sense based on the load." He pointed at one monitor that showed a jagged, yet ever rising graph line. "I set JARVIS to constantly monitoring my health. I thought at first it corresponded to my activity levels, but the increase slowed sometimes when I engaged in vigorous physical activity. Especially sex." He paused and nodded sagely. "I need to have more sex, obviously. How much do you want to help me stay healthy?" he asked Ranma hopefully.

The martial artist did not look impressed or amused.

Shivering melodramatically, he lamented: "So cold. So cruel. So anyway..." he continued brightly. "Let's see what happens when I plot it against the biometric readings indicating stress..." another graph appeared below the first. "And... bingo!" he said triumphantly as the computer analysis started drawing vertical lines between the peaks and troughs of the stress readings and changes in accumulation rate of the toxicity. "Looks like the more hassle I've got, the worse off I am. Deterioration spiked after the goddamn senate hearing. Stress tends to build on itself over time, too... Holy Shit!" he exclaimed as he slapped both hands onto his forehead.

"What?" his old friend asked.

"Fucking Vanko!" Tony hissed in frustration as he glared at the man's picture on the monitor. "That bastard knew the palladium in my chest was a problem! How did he know that? I didn't know that until it started happening! Shit!" He smacked himself on the head again. "He said it himself! 'I know all about YOUXIA,'" he quoted with a bad Slavic accent.

"The hell is a Yoxa?" Rhodes wondered.

"Youxia," Ranma corrected. "Me." She pointed to herself. "It's a Chinese word used for people like me."

"Exactly! I need to talk to him again! Looks like there was a benefit to being stuck out in Siberia! His dad may have failed to do anything useful with the plans he stole, but Junior looks to have been discovering some serious shit about Arc energy! Fuck... that pisses me off! I gotta go!" He stood up as if he was going to leave immediately.

"Whoa! Whoa! Hold up!" Rhodes yelled while holding his hands up in a time-out sign. "You're going after Vanko again? You can't!"

"The fuck I can't," Tony spat stubbornly. "The suit is faster anyway, so I'll go full Iron-Man on his...!"

"He's dead!" Rhodey shouted him down.

"What!?"

"You can't talk to Vanko," Rhodes said tiredly. "He's dead."

"WHAT!?"

"There was some kind of prison riot or escape attempt or something," Rhodey shook his head. "A little over an hour ago. He died in an explosion."

"He...!" Tony gaped blankly at his friend. "He was only arrested...!" He glanced at a time display on one of the monitors. "Jesus Christ! TWENTY-NINE HOURS ago! How the hell is he dead?!"

"I just told you..." Rhodey trailed off wearily. "Don't ask me to explain it. Obviously someone fucked up royally."

Tony sat down heavily and stared off into empty air. "Christ, that's inconvenient!"

"Look... it happened. Just move on. We need to deal with that thing in your chest. The whole no-stress thing you were talking about... is that a means to a cure?" Rhodey asked hopefully. He wasn't ready to credit the eastern spiritualism, but if Tony Stark was able to graph it, there was something real there to pursue.

"Uh..." Tony shook of his fugue and focused on the computer displays again, zooming in on the low-stress portions. "...No," he concluded after a minute. "It is, however, a way to buy even more time if I can reduce the aggravations I have to deal with. For instance if I get attacked by fewer Russian loonies..." he nodded at where Vanko's face was still shown on the large display, "or get blamed less often for what those loonies do on their own... or not have to deal with pointy-headed investors... or..." he looked at Rhodey significantly, "...if fewer best friends show up to get on my case... well..." he sighed. "If all that happens, I'll be positively peachy. How likely is that?"

Jim Rhodes winced. He was not happy with the idea he had been shortening his friend's lifespan, however inadvertently. "Not very. My superiors are not going to let up when there is a clear and present danger. Is that why you haven't been going out as Iron Man as much recently?"

"Partly that. But the other reason is a lot of the bad guys are holing up right now rather than get my attention. Meaning the suit hasn't even been needed anyway. Still... Ranma," Tony tilted his head toward her, "is going to get up to speed on the jobs I've been doing as Iron Man. I'm going to build something for her to use to get to hot-spots fast in the next couple of days. If I get time to train her," he eyed the lieutenant colonel with another emphatic look, "I can send her out as soon as there's something that needs doing."

"That... does sound like it would help a lot," Rhodes said thoughtfully. "But I'm not sure it would be enough. Firstly, the fact that others are now producing super-armor is still a problem. Secondly, Ranma is a foreign national, and the brass definitely would want someone home-grown as your backup."

"I thought they were saying terrorism was a global problem that needed a global solution?" Tony asked with false innocence.

"Yeah... they say a lot of things." Rhodey rolled his eyes. "Apparently that only counts when we want other countries to let us in to do our thing, not the other way around."

"I tell you what." Stark leaned forward in his chair as he met his friends eyes. "How about a bone?"

"A bone?"

"Just a little one," Tony held up his hand with the thumb and forefinger an inch apart. "A bone to toss at the people pulling your strings. JARVIS! How have Rhodey's scores in the simulator been?"

JARVIS promptly answered: "Lieutenant Colonel Rhodes has attained sufficient proficiency to safely operate the Mark II armor in flight and on land."

"Awesome, prep it and the Mark IV for launch." Tony rose to his feet and clapped his hands on his suddenly grinning friend's shoulders.

"Wait... he's getting a reward?" Ranma asked peevishly. "After all that crap?"

"Well, I was actually planning to do this anyway," Tony placated her. "Hell, I would have done it sooner if Stern and the rest hadn't been chapping my ass." He turned to shoot his long-time friend a significant look. "Feel free to pass on that little tidbit later. For now, let's get ready to grab some sky!"

"Are you serious?" the pilot asked eagerly. Then his smile fell. "Wait, you plan to go with me? What about..." he nodded toward Tony's chest.

"This is for fun, not combat," the engineering genius declared, "it'll do my stress levels good. Not to mention it would stress me out more if I wasn't nearby in case you screwed up."

"Alright then... alright!" Rhodey agreed.

"Alright!" Playfully, Tony put his friend in a headlock and dragged him to the launch area. "Just remember, I'm not giving you the armor, you'll have to bring it back here any time you want to use it, but we can start getting you rated on it and you can tell that to your bosses."

"That will work," Rhodey nodded agreeably, "I can definitely keep the brass happy with that."

"Great! Let's fly!"

############

"I want to make Iron Man look like an antique," Justin Hammer said eagerly as he sat at the expensively appointed table he'd had set up in the hangar for him and his prospective employee to eat at. "I wanna go to that Stark Expo, I wanna take a dump in Tony Stark's front yard! You know what I'm talking about?"

Ivan Vanko looked at the fool who had sneaked him out of prison. He felt no gratitude. He only felt contempt for the sniveling idiot who obviously had no clue what a marvel the Iron-Man system truly was. The moron thought he could simply copy it like it were merely a matter of reverse-engineering a mass-produced car rather than go through the effort to develop new and different methods to oppose it. As much as he hated Stark, he would never deny the man's genius. Vanko thought he might be the only man in the world who could truly understand that genius. Still, useful idiots had been one of the keys to Russian power for many years, and this one would serve his purposes well. For now, the plan was to reel the fool in. "I can do that. No problem," he produced a convincing grin and chuckle.

"Yeah?" The fully grown man looked like a child given a candy. "Hey, fabulous! I love it! Hey, this is our guy!" He gesticulated energetically at the physicist as he looked at his attendant. "Didn't I tell you? I had a feeling!" He enthused, not noticing the cold look in Vanko's eyes. Nor did it occur to him for even a fraction of a second that the Russian man was pursuing his own, very different, goals.

############

Author's notes: In canon, Ranma did display the ability to slice through objects cleanly, even without the Yamasenken; though the mechanism was never explained. I figured something like one of the Sinanju techniques from The Destroyer series would be a good explanation.

Yes I know the reason for Motoko's splash panel being illegal was something else entirely, but all Tony would remember would be the travesty of lesbians being shut down.

No, I'm not a Danny Rand fan. Why do you ask?