Kay, this chapter is going to jump to when Tony first woke up after Yinsen saved him.
Tony woke up having trouble breathing, realising there was a tube stuck up his nose he started to pull it out. Rolling over he tried to reach for a drink of water, knocking it onto the floor. He tried to move further but he was stuck. He tried to pull away but someone spoke up.
"I wouldn't do that if I were you."
Tony looked at what he was attached to and saw the car battery. He grabbed at a wire and followed it to his chest. Groaning he pulled at the gauze and found a metal device on his chest. "What the hell did you do to me?"
"What I did is to save your life. I removed all the shrapnel I could. But there is a lot more and it's heading towards your atrial septum." He picked up a tube, shaking it, "Here, you wanna see? I have a souvenir. Take a look." He passed the tube to Tony.
As Tony looked at the shrapnel the man spoke again, "I have seen many wounds like that in my village. We call them the walking dead because it takes them about a week for the barbs to reach the vital organs."
"What is this?" Tony wanted to know what was keeping him alive to try to get back to his daughter.
"That is an electromagnet hooked up to a car battery. And, it's keeping the shrapnel from entering your heart." Tony looked at the electromagnet before zipping up the sweater he was wearing. He looked up and saw a surveillance camera, the man looked over and saw that Tony was looking at the camera, "That's right. Smile. We met once, you know, at a technical conference in Bern."
"I don't remember," Tony replied, looking around the room they were being held in.
"No, you wouldn't. If I had been that drunk, I wouldn't have been able to stand, much less give a lecture on integrated circuits."
"Where are we?" Tony asked, trying to plan his escape. (Random question, how many of you have changed the way you say escape because of Finding Nemo?)
The door clanged a few times before they heard a man talk in a different language. The man walked over to Tony, "Come on, stand up. Stand up!" They both stood up, the man looked at Tony and advised him to do what he was.
As the two of them stood there with their hands up, three men walked into the room. Tony looked at the guns they we armed with and saw that they were Stark weapons. "Those are my guns. How did they get my guns?"
"Do you understand me? Do as I do." the man hushed Tony.
The leader of the three men that entered the room greeted them in his native language and nodded to the man to translate what he had said for Tony. "He says, 'Welcome, Tony Stark, the most famous mass murderer in the history of America. He is honored. He wants you to build the missile. The Jericho missile that you demonstrated." The leader handed Tony's fellow prisoner a picture and he showed Tony, "This one."
Tony thought for a second. If he built the missile, these guys would most likely kill him after and he would never see his daughter again. If he refused, they would keep him alive and probably torture him till he agreed to build the missile. And he would have time to try to plan an escape. He looked at the leader, "I refuse."
They did not like his answer, they put a sack on Tony's head and dragged him to the real leader.
They dragged him to a barrel filled with water, dunking his head under the water, holding him there till he was close to drowning before they pulled him out, letting him almost catch his breath before dunking his head in the water again.
Every time Tony felt as if he was going to give into death, he heard the voice of his little girl, 'Daddy, don't you die on me. Daddy, you better hold on. You gotta come home to me.' Each time he heard his daughter's voice, it gave him the strength to fight.
After they got bored with the water, they put the sack back on his head and dragged him somewhere else. After about five maybe ten minutes, the sack was taken off again, Tony was then momentarily blinded by the sunlight. Looking around, he saw a multitude of men that were holding him captive. He was shoved forward, his fellow captive following behind him. As they were walking, Tony saw just how many of his weapons his captors had.
The supposed leader spoke again, his fellow captive translated, "He wants to know what you think."
"I think you got a lot of my weapons," Tony answered.
"He says that they have everything you need to build the Jericho missile. He wants you to make a list of materials. He says for you to start working immediately, and when you're done, he will set you free." He translated again. Tony was hesitant at first, but the leader pulled out a picture from his pocket, and then handed it to Tony, "He says, If you don't, they will have her hunted down, kidnaped, dragged here, and then make you watch as they torture her."
Tony looked at the picture, it was a picture of his daughter. Tony was now furious, how in the world did these guys find out about Bella. "I'll do it."
When they got back to the cave slash room they were being held in, Tony sat by the fire, trying to figure out how they found his daughter or if someone betrayed him.
"I'm sure they're looking for you, Stark. But they will never find you in these mountains. Look, what you saw, that is your legacy, Stark. Your life's work is in the hands of those murderers. Is that how you want to go out? Is this the last act of defiance of the great Tony Stark? What about that woman? Are you going to let them hurt her? Or are you going to do something about it? To protect her?"
"Why should I do anything? They are going to kill me, you, either way. I have something set up to protect her already. New identity, emergency fund, relocated all set up a long time ago in case something like this were to happen. And if I do, I'll probably be dead in a week anyway." Tony answered, not looking away from the fire.
"Well then, this is a very important week for you, isn't it?" The man asked. "You're going to let that woman's last memory of you as a man who didn't fight back. A man who just welcomed death and let her be cut off from all she knows."
Tony didn't answer. As they both were getting ready to go to sleep, Tony recalled the last thing he had said to his daughter, 'Always.' Always. Meaning he always made it home safe for her. A constant promise between the two of them from the first time he had met her. A promise that he had never broken. He wasn't going to break that promise. Before he went to sleep, he made that list. When he was about to go to sleep, he muttered that promise to himself, "Always."
The next day.
"This is going to be my workstation, I want it well-lit. I want these up. I'm going to need welding gear. I don't care if it's acetylene or propane. I need a soldering station. I need helmets. I'm going to need goggles. I would like a smelting cup. I need to sets of precision tools." Tony ordered as his fellow prisoner translated.
Later on, when Tony was taking apart one of his missiles, Tony started to talk to his fellow inmate. "How many languages do you speak?"
"A lot." He answered, "But apparently, not enough for this place. They speak Arabic, Urdu, Dari, Pashto, Mongolian, Farsi, Russian."
As Tony pulled the mainframe of the bomb out he asked, "Who are all these people?"
"They are your loyal customers, sir. They call themselves the Ten Rings." The man answered. "You know, we could be more productive if you include me n the planning process."
After taking the bomb further apart, he took a piece of it and carelessly threw the rest of the bomb behind him. "Okay, we don't that."
"What is that?" the man asked, referring to the piece from the bomb that Tony required.
"This is palladium, 0.15 grams. We need at least 1.6, so why don't you go break down the other eleven?"
Later on, they were handling the melted palladium, Tony spoke up as his partner carried the melted product to the work area, "Careful. Be careful, we only have one shot at this."
"Relax. I have steady hands." As he poured the melted palladium he added, "How do you think you're still alive."
Tony put the battery that he was attached to and asked finally asked what the man's name was.
"My name is Yinsen."
"Yinsen. Nice to meet you."
"Nice to meet you too."
To when the mini-arc reactor is finished
"That doesn't look like a Jericho missile," Yinsen said as he crouched beside the desk.
"That's because it's a miniaturized arc reactor. I got a big one powering my factory at home. It should keep the shrapnel out my heart." Tony explained what they had made.
"But what could it generate?" Asked Yinsen.
"If my math is right, and it always is, three gigajoules per second," Tony answered.
"That could power your heart for fifty lifetimes."
"Yeah. Or something small for fifteen minutes." Tony replies, showing him what he had planned. Then they got to taking off the car battery and replacing it with the mini reactor.
Later on in the night, they got to talking again. Tony spoke, "You still haven't told me where you're from."
"I'm from a small town called Gulmira," Yinsen answered, rolling the dice he was holding for the game they were playing. "It's actually a nice place."
"Got a family?" Tony asked.
"Yes, and I will see them when I leave here." Yinsen looked up from the game, "And you, Stark? That young woman must mean something for the way you reacted when she was threatened. I mean, you have another life set aside for her in case anything were to happen to you. I hear you every night you know. The last thing you say each night is Always."
Tony was quiet before answering. "She's my daughter."
"Oh." Yinsen said quietly, "And her mother?"
"She doesn't have a mother. Just me." Tony took the picture out of his pocket, "I saved her from trigger happy soldiers when she was about three years old." Tony handed the picture to Yinsen.
"She's beautiful," Yinsen said placing the picture on the table. "Why were they going to shoot her?"
"I was in Russia. I don't remember what for, but on our way back to the base, she was in the middle of the road, poorly dressed for all the snow. The soldiers, they that she was part of a trap. An ambush. But there was no trace of life within twenty miles where we were. She looked as if she was starved, she was a nasty blue because of the snow. With all the cuts and bruises she had, she looked as she had traveled for some time on her own." Tony took a deep breath before continuing, "She was a three-year-old little girl and those men were going to kill her."
After a few more minutes of quiet, their game completely forgotten, Yinsen spoke again. "What's her name?"
"Isabella." Tony remembered the locket, "She had a locket on her. On the back, it had D, Isabella Vanira. I searched and searched for that name. Just to see if she had any family out there but she didn't. After a month of living with me while I searched for her family, I adopted her. She is now, Isabella Maria Stark."
"That is very honorable of you Tony." Yinsen praised. "What does the always mean, if you don't mind me asking."
"It's, uh, it's a promise between the two of us. Whenever I had to leave her to go somewhere else, she would make me promise that I would come home safe for her. It will always be the last thing we say to each other. Never goodbye or I love you. Goodbye, to her, means going away forever, and I love you seems to be like you're preparing for the worst. Always means that I will always make it back home to her."
Their heartfelt moment ended when the decision to turn in for the night.
Then next day, they were working on the suit when they were interrupted by, who seems to be the real leader of the Ten Rings.
"Relax." He said, motioning for them to put their arms down. "The bow and arrow was once the pinnacle of weapons technology. It allowed the great Genghis Khan to rule from the Pacific to Ukraine. An empire twice the size of Alexander the Great and four times the size of the Roman Empire." The leader walked to the table, picking up the plans that Tony had drawn up, "But today, whoever holds the latest Stark weapons rules these lands. And soon, it will be my turn."
While still looking at Tony, the leader started to talk to Yinsen, who was becoming agitated. After a few more words were said, the leader started to walk towards the fire, pulling out a lump of coal as Yinsen was pushed down on his knees being interrogated. Tony only understood one word, Jericho.
"What do you want? A delivery date?" Tony asked walking forward, only to have all of the other men raise their weapons at him. After a few moments of silence, "I need him. Good assistant."
The leader seemed to have mercy and dropped the coal on the anvil, not far from Yinsen's face. He turned to Tony, "You have till tomorrow to assembly my missile." As they all start to walk out of the room, the leader stopped in front of Tony, "I'd hate to have to hurt that beautiful daughter of yours." He muttered so only Tony could hear.
