Hello!
Thank you for all the comments so far.
There should be 9 chapters in total for this story.
Understanding the Real Hero: Iron Man
Six
There was a brief shot of an Air Force plane taxiing along the runway before they saw Rhodey talking to a group of cadets about the future of air combat. He was leading them through the hanger, explaining how in his view an unmanned aerial vehicle will never be better than a pilot's instinct.
"Unless they are controlled by JARVIS or FRIDAY," pointed out Tony knowingly. His AI's had successfully controlled the Iron Legion. JARVIS, before he had integrated into what would become Vision, hadn't only just been responsible for controlling and manning the Iron Legion, he had also had a large amount of control over Stark Industries internal servers, giving him more control over the company than anyone else apart from Pepper.
Rhodey had to concede. "Point. We would never have stopped Aldrich Killian without JARVIS."
Tony twisted in his seat to look at Vision. "I know you're not JARVIS, and you are your own person… but… thanks for everything you did as JARVIS."
"You're welcome, sir," replied Vision, gesturing his head downwards in a mark of respect.
Tony walked up behind him asking him why not a pilot without the plane. The Inventor was dressed casually. Rhodey shook his hand and introduced Tony to the cadets. Tony advised the cadets to try to get Rhodey to tell them about spring break in 1987 and the lovely lady he had woken up with. Tony continued to imply that the woman had been a man. Rhodey told him not to continue and Tony obliged.
"Did they ever ask you about Spring Break?" queried Bruce.
"No. They didn't." Rhodey had been relieved the cadets had never dared to ask him. He would have had Tony's head if they had.
Tony grinned. "Shame. It's a great story."
"Can we hear it?" Thor seemed quite eager to hear it. "Tales of drunken nights and fair ladies are just some of the many stories we used to tell on…" His face fell. "On Asgard…" He voice was lower and his jubilant expression had changed.
"Thor, are you alright?" Steve asked, a look of concern across his face.
"I'm fine." Thor's voice was stronger.
Bruce threw him a worried look but didn't say anything else.
The cadets walked away when Rhodey asked them to give him and Tony a few minutes.
Rhodey was surprised to see Tony as he hadn't expected him to be walking around so soon.
"You believed the press, didn't you?!" Tony queried. "That I was laid up in bed?"
Rhodey was embarrassed. "You kept quiet for weeks. Didn't stay in contact."
"Neither did you." Tony pointed out. "I know you were upset about the decision I made with stopping weapons production…"
"I was," admitted Rhodey. He shook his head. "I should have contacted you… I'm sorry I didn't."
Tony was about to accept his apology but Steve decided to butt in.
"Rhodey, there is no need of you need for you to apologise. You did nothing wrong," interjected Steve.
Sam put his head in his heads, probably surprised by Steve's daring to interrupt and declare no apology was needed.
"Shut up, Steve," hissed Bucky.
"Why? By stopping weapon's production, Tony upset a lot of people. He should be the one apologising! He let people down!"
Sam laid a hand on Steve's shoulder. "That isn't how it works in this case, Steve."
Tony was intrigued. Sam's reactions to what he was seeing were enlightening. He wanted to see where this went before stating his own thoughts.
Steve was waiting for Sam to continue.
"Think of what Stark has gone through, what he has witnessed. His best friend didn't speak to him despite spending months searching for him. Stark was the one who suffered. Seeing the terrorists with his own weapons hurt him. He didn't want them getting their hands on them at all, not ever again. Stopping weapon's production was the only way," explained Sam. "He could have done things differently, but Rhodey is supposed to be Tony's friend. He should have considered how much Afghanistan had affected him and supported him through his recovery."
"Sam's right, Steve," interjected Rhodey. "I didn't really think of how Tony was dealing with things after his captivity. I just assumed he would be fine as he seemed okay each time, I spoke to him. I didn't look deeper, and I shouldn't have stayed away because I was unhappy with his decision about withdrawing from weapon's manufacturing. And… Tony's decision could have affected my career, my job with Stark Industries. I was liaison because I knew Tony and could get the best deal from him. My reputation with my co-workers could have been put at risk because I hadn't warned them in advance…" He caught Tony's eyes. "But I never told you that, what your decision could have meant from me personally and professionally."
Thoughtfully, Steve nodded. "I guess it makes sense."
Tony decided now would be the time to speak. "I should have gone about it differently. I should have involved the board before making an announcement. I should have spoken to the military. I should have talked to Rhodey, explained why I had to stop weapon's production. Instead, I acted out because I wanted it to stop straight away. We're both at fault, and we're both sorry." Because he was. On reflection, Tony should have done things differently, but it had all worked out in the end.
Tony implied he was doing a little bit better then walking. Tony informed his friend that he was working on something big. He wanted Rhodey to be a part of it.
Rhodey assumed Tony was about to make a lot of people in the military happy, assuming he had reversed his decision to stop weapon production.
Tony admitted it wasn't for the military.
The Colonel accused him of being a humanitarian and told Tony he needed time to get his mind right.
"See," Rhodey pointed out, "I shouldn't have said that. "What type of friend tells his best friend they need to get their mind right? I just… wasn't… thinking properly then." Rhodey's shoulders sagged.
"Rhodey, its fine," reassured Tony.
Rhodey wasn't so sure but he gave Tony a grateful smile.
Tony smiled, hoping Rhodey wasn't going to continue to rebuff him like this, however his friend disappointed him. Tony merely nodded, his smile fading. Rhodey stepped back informing Tony it was nice to see him. Tony merely said 'thanks' quietly.
"We didn't talk for a while did we, after this?" Tony mused, thinking back.
"We didn't. I don't think either of us wanted to," verified Rhodey. "In fact… the next time we spoke was when-" He stopped, realising it was likely it would be shown. They'd gone months…
"Was when?" queried Sam.
"A while…" replied Rhodey, a bit embarrassed.
"A few months then," Steve deduced.
Tony knew. Rhodey had called him when Tony had been in the air in Afghanistan, hunting down his weapons to stop the terrorists from using them against innocent people. That had happened a few months later. Everything had gone back to normal after Obadiah's betrayal as Rhodey had accepted why Tony had stopped weapon's production and what he offered the military instead.
Tony had spent months working with the military as Iron Man. Through that time, Rhodey and Tony had rebuilt the trust in their friendship, and had become closer for it. Rhodey had been Tony's backer to the military, had urged them to trust him.
Their friendship may have suffered in the months following Tony's captivity, but Obadiah's betrayal had brought them back together.
At Tony's Malibu mansion, Tony swiped his hand over his desktop, bringing up a virtual keyboard, more advanced than on standard computers. He started to press several keystrokes, asking if Jarvis was up. JARVIS responded he always was for him.
"You never slept?" Wanda directed the question at Vision.
The android nodded. "I didn't need to. JARVIS kept everything secure, already monitoring everything. Even now I do not need to sleep myself. I'm always on alert."
Tony leaned back in his chair, his eyes focused on the two screens, one of which had schematics of the first Iron Man suit on it. The other screen was streaming data. Tony said he wanted to open up a new project file and to index it as Mark II. He picked up a computer pen to drag the schematics onto a holographic board. JARVIS asked if he wanted the designs stored on the Stark Industries Central Database.
"Actually, I don't know who to trust right now."
Rhodey looked uncomfortable.
"You didn't trust Stane either?" asked Sam.
Tony nodded. "I didn't. I did before Afghanistan. Not as much as I trusted Pepper or Rhodey. Stane didn't have full clearance to enter my workshop either… but after finding out the Ten Rings had my weapons; I didn't know who I could really trust within my own company. Stane included."
Tony got up from his chair and approached the holographic board, enlarging the image. "Until further notice, why not keep everything on my private server?"
"You had to be careful," noted Steve. "You didn't want this design falling into the wrong hands."
"I didn't." Though it didn't stop Stane in the slightest, mused Tony.
JARVIS enquired if Tony was working on a secret project; to which Tony didn't respond but he stood in front of the image, inspecting the open-up display of the Iron Man helmet and started to move things to the trash can in the corner of the of the display.
"I don't want this winding up in the wrong hands."
Tony rotated the display around, continuing to reject stuff from the design. Tony mused quietly, twisting the design front of the suit to face him. "Maybe in mine, it can actually do some good."
Clint snorted, rolling his eyes. "Does 'do some good' mean betraying your team mates? Sending them to prison, Stark?"
Tony gritted his teeth together. "That. Wasn't. Me." He was trying his best to hold his temper in check. He was waiting for Wanda's bitter remark but none came, but she was biting her lower lip.
"You put Wanda in that collar!" grated Clint, his expression dark as he clenched his fists on the fabric of the sofa. "You put us all in jail! You collaborated with…" Clint spat. "Him!"
"Who is 'him'?" queried Bruce, wondering if they may get some answers now due to Clint's outburst.
Tony sighed, running a hand down his face. "You won't like it, Bruce. Thaddeus Ross."
"WHAT?" Bruce's eyes widened. "What? Why?"
He did not want to be having this conversation right now.
"Things… got complicated after Ultron," admitted Tony. "My fault."
"Too right," muttered Clint under his breath. "Your actions led to the Accords!"
But Sam stepped in. "Clint, the Accords were not made to keep Stark in check. It wasn't just Ultron that led to the world wanting them. It was other things too. We can't blame Stark for everything." He sighed. "I've had a lot of time to think about this. So has Steve. We have to consider how we acted as well. All of us made mistakes, even you. To blame Stark for your imprisonment is…"
"Is wrong," finished Steve. "I asked you to leave your family, Clint. You wouldn't have been involved if I hadn't dragged you away from them."
Tony's eyebrows rose in surprise. Was Steve finally admitting he was at fault? That he did have some responsibility to what had happened to the Avengers? "We all made mistakes," he finally said.
The archer glared at Tony. "No, Stark, you made mistakes. The rest of us didn't."
"How is Mr. Stark at fault for you breaking the law?" interjected Vision, genuinely curious as to how Clint had come to this conclusion.
"Because the Accords only came about because of him!" Clint pointed rudely at Tony.
Tony sighed. "The Accords didn't happen overnight. They were labelled the 'Sokovia Accords' but there was already legislation being discussed, and meetings being held about the Avengers before Ultron happened. Do you think the world took kindly to the secrets of SHIELD being dumped all over the internet? They didn't. It put a lot of people's lives in danger, even those who were not involved with SHIELD! Sokovia was the incident which pushed the Accords quicker, but they were already in motion after SHIELD fell."
"They're still named the Sokovia Accords," muttered Clint. "Still your fault. The Accords should never have applied to the rest of us. Unlike you, Stark, we do things right."
"Over a hundred countries think you are wrong, Barton." Rhodey rolled his eyes. "Amazing how you cannot see how the countries support Tony and call on him for aid, rather than go to a bunch of criminals who do not respect their sovereign right to determine who should cross into their lands and give them aid."
"They'd call on us if they knew we were there," said Steve.
"Unbelievable." Rhodey shook his head in despair.
"Are we expected to take sides when we finally see what happened?" asked Thor. "There are two sides. Bruce and I are stuck in the middle."
Sam sighed, casting his gaze around. "Honestly, its better if you just stay neutral. What happened… I think it may have irreversibly damaged some friendships for good." His gaze focused briefly on Steve and Tony.
"Just have an open mind," added Tony. "It's better that way."
A group of men walked through the desert, some kneeling as they dug up pieces of the abandoned Iron Man suit, Tony had left behind. They carried each piece to a truck to take away. One man picked up the helmet, sand fell out through the eyes and mouth slits. The man yelled in another language.
Raza turned in the hot sun to reveal a scorching burn mark on the right side of his face. The man handed Raza the helmet and he studied it intently.
"That isn't good…" muttered Steve. "Last thing the world needs is people like him going around in Iron Man suits."
"Good thing he didn't then," confirmed Tony.
"But something came of the armour's discovery, didn't it?" Sam noted.
Tony inclined his head in answer. "Yes."
In his workshop, Tony was working on a piece of the new Iron Man suit he was designing. More specifically, the boot. He tried to instruct Dummy to stay in a certain position, as the robot was attempting to help its creator, however Tony soon declared DUM-E was no benefit at all and to move down to the toes.
"DUM-E always wanted to help," mused Tony, "but he always frustrated me. He had very limited… programming. His intelligence could not be upgraded without rewriting his entire system. He wouldn't have been DUM-E if I'd gone through with it."
"How many times have you threatened to dismantle him?" laughed Rhodey.
"Too many." Tony winced. DUM-E had the ability to do most things wrong, even the simple task of getting him a cup of coffee. But he still loved him. DUM-E was part of his family as much as Rhodey was. If it came to it, he probably wouldn't ever made do on his threats.
"I can recall more than ten thousand instances, sir," Vision promptly stated.
"Now, that is scary you still have the numbers," swallowed Tony. And he's not the JARVIS I know either.
Steve frowned. "And a bit worrying you treat your creations like that."
Tony elected not to say anything in reply.
Tony continued to weld before moving to the forefoot, telling DUM-E to move up and then not even to move. He finished welding and Tony pushed a button and the back of the boot opened up.
Now for the tests…Tony was sure the movie would show his first test with the boots. It… hadn't gone well.
Tony was being recorded. He was wearing a boot on each foot and guards on his arms and in both hands, he held two metal handlebars out in front of him.
"Okay, let's do this right." Tony stepped back into the testing square. "Start mark, half-a-meter, and back and centre."
The camera zoomed in.
"Dummy, look alive!" instructed Tony. "You're on standby for fire safety."
Rhodey put his head in his hands. "This is not going to go well, is it?"
Tony kept a straight face, already knowing what was coming. He was sure Clint would gloat when he saw Tony slam into the wall, face-first.
"Did you always test your designs?" asked Wanda, her voice low.
"I do. It's the mark of a good designer to be your own guinea-pig," shrugged Tony. "Most of my designs I tested on myself. I was heavily involved with all the design work with Stark Industries." He knew what he was about to say was a touchy subject for Wanda, but it needed to be said. "Even the weapons I designed were tested at secure sites where they could be used to determine the safety aspects of each. They were only passed into production if they met all the requirements. And, I was very stringent with my pass results. It's how I know the missiles used in Sokovia were not genuine. Everything you considered to be true regarding my involvement with the unrest in Sokovia was not me. It has never been me. But it was my complacency that led to illegal Stark weapons being used. And, I've been trying to atone for it ever since."
Wanda looked thoughtful.
Tony looks over his shoulder towards the camera. "YOU. Roll it."
"You have some odd names for your robots," said Bucky. "DUM-E and YOU?"
"I'm not exactly normal, Barnes," commented Tony.
"He's right," interjected Rhodey. "Tony has never been normal."
Clint muttered underneath his breath. "You can say that again…"
Steve looked torn between reprimanding Clint or agreeing with him.
"In this instance, Rogers, the criticism is fair," explained Tony, speaking softly. "A genius can never be normal."
The camera zoomed out.
"Okay. Activate hand controls." There were sounds of powering up as Tony jiggled on his feet, hands out in front of him clutching the hand controls. "We're gonna start off nice and easy. 10% thrust capacity." Tony began to countdown. "And… 3… 2…1!"
A surge of power propelled Tony into the air. He flipped head over heels and he banged into the ceiling, falling with a crash to the floor.
Everyone burst out laughing, including Rhodey, whilst Tony hang his head in shame. "I was… a bit overzealous in thinking 10% wasn't going to be too powerful."
Clint was whooping with delight. "Can we see that again, please? Seeing Stark make an arse of himself has made my day!"
Tony tried to ignore it.
"We cannot rewind it," said Steve, trying the remote. "Button isn't working."
Thank god. Tony was relieved.
Clint folded his arms across his chest. He didn't look pleased.
You are not here to take the piss out of Tony Stark, but rather to understand who he is and what he has gone through for him to make the choices he did. It is vital you understand this, Barton. The voice, which had stayed silent through the movie so far spoke up. I did not bring you here for you to continue hating him. You will learn. And you will regret your words later.
"Unlikely," commented Clint.
The voice laughed. Oh, if only you knew the truth… At least, to my surprise, Wanda Maximoff, is seeing things differently.
"I am," admitted the Witch. "My hatred isn't gone but I'm beginning to understand that perhaps what I believed was fact, was merely manipulation by others."
You may grow on me yet, Wanda Maximoff.
The voice fell silent and the group resumed watching in silence as Dummy sprayed Tony with the fire extinguisher before the scene changed to Tony sitting at his desktop adjusting the arm portions of the suit, drinking tea, and then using the holotable to review the new designs. He slipped his arm into the digital tube where a ball of light fit comfortably in his hand, symbolising what would become the first flight stabiliser.
"Several weeks are going by, aren't they?" asked Sam. "You didn't make the suit in a few days, did you?"
"No." Tony shook his head. "The first design of the full suit took months. All the time we're seeing now was over days and weeks. Now I can design an Iron Man suit in less than a week and have it manufactured within the hour. But the original suit took a while. It had to be suited for what I imagined it to be."
"And you tried to tell me about it and I didn't want to know," mourned Rhodey.
Tony clapped him on the shoulder. "It's fine. Stop mopping about it."
His friend smiled gratefully at him.
Tony's arm was now encased in the metal skeleton he had earlier designed, and was examining it when Pepper let herself into his workshop. She was carrying a parcel and a cup. Tony finished setting the arm into place around his own as Pepper approached.
"I've been buzzing you," she said. "Did you hear the intercom?"
"Yeah," said Tony distractedly. "Everything's – what?" He fiddled with something on the arm.
"Obadiah's upstairs," mentioned Pepper.
"Great."
"What would you like me to tell him?" she enquired.
"Great," repeated Tony, "I'll be right up." He straightened up, the arm encased in the metal and wire casing held out in front of him, his palm holding the stabilizer as he pointed it towards the wall.
"I can already see this going wrong," grinned Rhodey.
"You're not wrong," whispered Tony, avoiding looking at Clint.
"Trial and error are common in new inventions," explained Bruce. "But you ironed out all the kinks quite quickly to get a working suit within months."
"I'm still improving them." Tony hadn't stopped. The suit still wasn't perfect. It wasn't enough to protect the Earth from what was out there. Something bad was coming. He could feel it.
And he still wasn't ready for it.
Pepper approached his desk. "I thought you said you were done making weapons?"
"Isn't the Iron Man suit a weapon?" Clint pointed out, a glint in his eye.
"All the upgrades I've given you over the years – free of charge, I might add – are they not weapons too? And haven't they all been useful in helping others?" Tony threw back.
Clint glowered, muttering incomprehensibly under his breath.
One could categorise the Iron Man suit as a weapon but Tony didn't believe it was. It was a defence against a wider threat. Something he could use to help protect others.
It can be both a weapon and a defence, thought Tony.
That was the way he saw it.
"It is," Tony swallowed, managing to hold the arm up, despite the heaviness. "This is a flight stabilizer. It's completely harmless." He was breathless as he leaned forward to press a button.
The stabilizer fired and Tony went flying back, crashing into equipment. Pepper covered her ears and winced.
"I didn't expect that…" wheezed Tony, surprise dripping from his voice.
Rhodey chuckled. "I really wish I could have been there for all your attempts to make it work."
Tony shrugged. "It wasn't meant to be. I would have taken advice and ideas from you if you had been there. But I think it is better it all came from me. The suit became what I wanted it to specifically be." Then an idea struck him. "Tell you what, I'm designing the Mark 50 right now. You can come along to my lab and see what the differences are between Mark 49 and 50."
"When this is over with," pointed out Rhodey, referring to the marathon of movies they had to watch.
"Obviously." Tony agreed.
Obadiah sat playing the piano as Tony ran up the stairs from his workshop. Pepper was sitting on the sofa working. Tony wanted to know how Stane's meeting had gone. By the expression Stane gave him, it hadn't gone well. Stane countered that just because he had brought Pizza back didn't mean it had gone badly.
"He's just covering for himself," Sam pointed out. "The meeting went badly."
Tony was impressed by how Sam was analysing things.
Tony sat down, opening the pizza box. Stane informed him the meeting would have gone better if Tony had been there.
Tony said Stane had asked him to lay low and that was what he had been doing, as Obadiah would take care of it all.
"He did," commented Steve. "They wouldn't have expected you to turn up. Surely if it was a meeting you should have been at, Stane should have told you?"
"You would have thought that, wouldn't you?" replied Tony warily. Stane had down his best to manoeuvre Tony out of a position of power. He had nearly succeeded, only to fail at the last hurdle.
Stane walked forward. He elaborated that he meant in public, the press, not on the business side of things as the meeting had been a Board of Directors one. Stane sat next to Tony.
Rhodey winced. "Ouch. You should have been there for that one."
"I know. But he was very clear on what he wanted me to do. If he really wanted me involved in the business side of things, he would have kept me informed. For the most part, I was kept in the dark. Even Pepper wasn't kept up to date with internal information. And she was my P.A and should have been kept within the loop, even though I was off keeping a low profile. Pepper had access to my work emails."
"So, you were kept out of things deliberately," mused Bruce, "to make you look worse."
"I don't trust Stane." Steve's face darkened. "There's something… off about him."
Tony was stunned.
Stane explained the Board was claiming Tony had post-traumatic stress disorder, and they were filing an injunction. The Board wanted to lock Tony out.
"They wanted to get rid of you?" Steve was stunned.
"I was endangering the company if I stayed in charge. Even though I owned the controlling interest in the company, if enough people stood against me, they could have me removed, providing all matters were resolved on a legal basis," explained Tony.
Tony couldn't believe they wanted to do this to him just because the stocks dropped 40 points. They had known this was going to happen after Tony's bombshell announcement.
Pepper corrected him and said the stocks dropped by 56 and a half.
Sam swallowed. "That's a lot of dropped stock…"
Tony winced, scratching the back of his neck. "It was. But I hoped to salvage it when they realised the idea had merit… but I had to prove it to them first that I knew what I was doing."
Tony said it didn't matter as they owned the controlling interest in the company.
Stane tried to reason that the Board had rights too, and that they were making the case that Tony and the new direction he was aiming for wasn't in the company's best interest.
Steve frowned. "You know… I'm just thinking… Stane has never been on board with this… It wasn't the board who filed the injunction was it?"
Tony eyed the Captain. "You'll find out." He was surprised by how perceptive Steve was.
Wiping his face with a napkin, Tony told Stane he was being responsible, and that was a new direction for the company and for himself.
Stane was trying not to laugh.
A hard expression crossed Rhodey's face. "He doesn't believe it." He was one of the only people who really knew what had happened to Obadiah.
"Of course, he wouldn't," observed Natasha. "He wants Stark to fail."
Tony tried to elaborate further. He was trying to be responsible on the company's behalf, however he stopped when he realised it was pointless to counter the argument.
"I just knew at that point there was no point in trying to rationalise what I was trying to achieve," sighed Tony. "They were either going to be with me or against me."
Tony ate a piece of pizza.
Stane tried to stop Tony from walking away with the pizza box, and Obadiah reached for Tony explaining he was trying to turn this thing around but Tony had to give him something to pitch them. He pointed to the Arc Reactor in Tony's chest. He wanted the engineers to analyse it but Tony refused.
Steve frowned. "He's up to something."
"Yeah," Sam agreed. "There is something fishy about him."
"The Arc Reactor is keeping you alive," said Bucky. "Surely his first priority is to keep you safe."
Tony grimaced. "You would have thought that, wouldn't you?"
Stane countered that it would give him something to throw the Board in New York, however Tony was adamant that the Arc Reactor would remain with him. Stane took the pizza box from Tony, deciding it would stay with him, however he did offer Tony another piece, which he took before walking back towards his workshop.
Stane asked if he could see what Tony was doing down there but was refused.
"How many times did you let him into your workshop?" queried Rhodey. "I can only remember a few times…"
"I think… twice?" clarified Tony quietly so the others couldn't hear. "I don't know why I never let him down there. I think it was because I just didn't want him influencing my designs. In the early years, he did try to attempt it, long before I set up my lab. I think a part of me couldn't trust him. Only you and Pepper were ever given access."
Tony was back in the workshop, wearing arm thrusters and boots. It was day eleven, test thirty-seven, configuration two-point-zero, and DUM-E was still on fire safety. Tony warned DUM-E that if he was dosed when he wasn't on fire, he would donate the robot to a city college.
Tony leaned forward; knees slightly bent. "Okay, nice and easy. Seriously, just gonna start off with one percent thrust capacity."
Clint crossed his fingers, hoping everything would go wrong for Tony's next test.
Steve frowned, catching the small movement by the archer. He thought Clint was being too harsh on Stark.
He took a deep breath. "In three, two, one…" The boots and the stabilisers in his hands roared to life, lifting Tony into the air. He nearly lost balance, throwing his arms out to maintain his position. He rose about three metres off the ground, hovering there, very gently swaying to the left and right, before Tony started to descend to land squarely on his feet, arms outstretched.
"Ah, a successful test, my friend!" Thor cheered.
"It had to happen sometimes," admitted Tony. "I will always keep trying until I get the outcome I want."
"Okay." Tony glanced at Dummy and noticed he had the fire extinguisher pointed at him. "Please don't follow me around with it either, 'cause I feel like I'm gonna catch fire spontaneously. Just stand down! If something happens, then come in."
DUM-E retracted meekly.
Tony braced himself. "And again. Let's bring it up to two-point-five. Three – two – one."
"You know it works, why are you testing again?" questioned Thor.
"Tony needs to see how far he can push the thrusters in lifting off without hurting himself," explained Bruce.
"We can program the suit to start off at different speeds. For the most part, thrust triggers are used to get us into the air as quickly as possible, especially when we need to leave an area pronto or pursue a fast-moving target," said Rhodey, explaining to the others what his suit was capable of achieving. "My suit isn't as versatile as Tony's is. He has a lot more features installed than mine does. But his mind can process it quicker. A lot of thought has to go into using our suits. It may look easy but it isn't."
Tony was glad Rhodey had spared him the necessity of having to explain things.
The thrusters and the stabilisers fired once more and Tony gained higher altitude, however he also had a hard time controlling the direction he floated in.
"Very easy to lose control the first few times. Once I got used to the suit's abilities, I was a lot more comfortable with it," noted Tony.
His momentum pushed him over towards the white sports cars, an area he didn't want to be. Managing to alter his direction, though still not in much control, paperwork on Tony's desk scattered everywhere as he flew over it. The effort was exhausting to maintain some control and Tony planted his hands forwards to send him backwards, trying to redirect himself back to the testing area.
"Mind the cars!" cried Sam, clutching his head.
"He can afford new ones!" grated Clint.
"Most of them are out of production," pointed out Bruce, casting a worried look at Clint, concerned by the archer's dislike of Tony. "Not easy to replace if you are a collector of old cars."
"Could be worse," he muttered, "we're fine. Okay." Finally, he was back over the testing area and started to descend, landing on his feet. Dummy raised the fire extinguisher. Emphatically, Tony raised his right hand. "No! Uh-uh-uh-uh!"
DUM-E lowered his arm.
Relieved, Tony knew he had succeeded in setting out what he had wanted to achieve. "Yeah. I can fly."
"Oh no…" Rhodey guessed. "You're going to go all out, aren't you?"
Tony tried to look innocent. "Now why would I do that?"
"Because its you, Tones."
Wanda was curious. "'Go all out'?"
"He's going to get in the completed suit and fly it without running the appropriate tests first." Rhodey was sure on it. "It's the type of thing he does."
Tony grinned sheepishly. He'd never much cared about his personal safety. And taking the suit for its first full flight had seemed a good idea at the time, even without the appropriate tests being run.
Tony stepped into the Iron Man suit as it was screwed onto his body. The suit was silver but easily recognisable. The mask slid into place and the face-plate slid down, obscuring Tony's vision from the outside world.
He asked if JARVIS was there. The AI replied he was and Tony ordered him to engage the Heads-Up Display. Bright lights flashed as the Heads-Up Display booted up, Information scrolled passed as Tony turned his head slightly in different directions, inspecting the interface. He asked JARVIS to import all preferences from the home interface.
"WOAH!" Sam whistled. "How can you keep track of everything in front of your eyes?" His eyes dazzled at the screen as they saw the amount of information scrolling across the readout.
"I'm used to absorbing a lot of information at once and processing," stated Tony.
"Basically, you're a human version of your AI then?" questioned Bucky.
Tony nodded. "You could say that."
Casting his gaze around the garage, the interface continually gave him information about the objects and exits within the garage. Tony walked slowly forward. JARVIS informed him that he was fully uploaded and he was online and ready.
"Tony," Steve started, "JARVIS was the backup, wasn't he? In case something happened to you?"
"He was. JARVIS was able to take control if I was incapacitated, and as long as there was power to the suit from the Arc Reactor."
"Could he interface with Rhodey?" Natasha asked, glancing at Tony's best friend.
"JARVIS wasn't installed within War Machine," spoke Vision. "He could communicate with the suit when the long-range transmitters were functioning."
"War Machine's functions are not as sophisticated as Iron Man's are." Rhodey glanced towards the genius. "No matter how much I bug him, Tony won't upgrade mine to the standard of his."
Before anyone could say anything against Tony for his stance on Rhodey's suit, he decided to explain why. "I do not want my technology falling into the wrong hands. The War Machine suit is the simplest suit I could make. The Military could study the suit – and I'm sure they have had people work on it."
"They have," Rhodey confirmed.
"It's to stop them from finding out the secrets of the suit. Better for me to have it in case the wrong people utilise it."
"It's a fair point," agreed Steve.
Tony wanted to start the virtual walk around. JARVIS imported the preferences and calibrated the virtual environment. Tony smiled gently inside the mask. He wanted a check on the control surfaces which JARVIS complied with.
Pieces on the armour began to move, adjusting themselves from the legs up, as Tony flexed his hands within the suit. The suit was bolting together, completely silver. Tony looked around, blue light shining from the slits in his eyes.
"Suiting up is almost instantaneous now," grinned Tony, thinking of the new suit he was currently designing.
JARVIS announced the test was complete and he was preparing to power down and begin diagnostics.
However, Tony had other ideas. "Oh, yeah. Tell you what. Do a weather and ATC check. Start listening in on ground control."
JARVIS tried to dissuade him. "Sir, there are terabytes of calculations needed before an actual flight is attempted."
Bucky cocked his head to the side. "Why did you try to convince him otherwise?" He directed the question at Vision.
"JARVIS was programmed specifically to follow Mr. Stark's orders; however, his main function was to protect Mr. Stark, but what Mr. Stark wanted to do could not be overridden by the programmes of JARVIS. JARVIS was duty bound to lay out the risks for Mr. Stark, but could not overrule him."
"JARVIS could protest all he wanted, but he could not stop me, only tell me the risks and give me advice. It was up to me to decide whether to follow it or not," added Tony.
"JARVIS. Sometimes you got to run before you can walk. Ready? In three, two, one."
"But not do what you were planning to do Tony," interjected Rhodey. "You could have hurt yourself without those safety tests."
He did have a point.
Boot and hand thrusters fired lifting Tony off the floor. He leaned forward, increased thrusters and he sped out, steering out of the garage driveway and out into the night, flying high, twisting around. Tony whooped with joy.
He lopped back on himself. "Handles like a dream."
He flew past a Ferris wheel and on his heads-up display he saw two young children eating ice cream as they sat in one of the carts. The display showed the wheel on the right side of his heads-up display. The little boy's ice cream fell off the cone as Tony zoomed past.
Tony could still remember the jubilant feelings he had felt at being let loose, being able to fly where he wanted, go as fast as he liked… and not have a care in the world, and allow the suit to take him to places he had never visited before.
It had been thrilling, exciting.
The sensations and memories of his first flight were something he would never forget.
Heading out over the city, Tony directed the suit straight up. "All right, let's see what this can do. What's the SR-71's record?"
JARVIS informed him the altitude recorded for fixed wing flight was 85,000 feet.
Sam groaned. "I really hope you are not going to attempt what I think you are…"
"He will," sniggered Natasha. "He's Stark."
"I'm going to take that as a compliment," said Tony dryly.
Tony smirked, stating records were made to be broken. He boosted his flight even more, zooming higher and higher, ignoring the warning over his heads-up display of ice building up over the exterior of the suit. Even JARVIS tried to warn him of the potentially fatal danger.
"And, of course, you're not listening…" sighed Rhodey. "Tony, what if you had died?"
"No one would have missed me," replied Tony quietly.
Rhodey laid a hand on his friend's shoulder. "I cannot speak for the others but I would miss you. Pepper would miss you. You really underestimate how the world sees you, Tony."
"No matter how many times you say it, I'm not going to believe it." Tony's expression was enough for Rhodey to acknowledge his friend's feelings on the subject.
Tony urged himself to keep going, reach as high as he could. He was determined to break the record.
Ice was beginning to form over the suit, beginning to creak as the Suit was pushed to its limit.
"Uh oh…" Steve winced.
"He's going to fall…" Clint was almost singing.
"Clint, stop it!" hissed Steve.
The Suit began to fail as ice crusted over the helmet and his left foot short-circuited and he lost all display and power to the suit.
Tony screamed as the Suit began to fall, tumbling through the air, head over heels. "We're iced up, JARVIS! Deploy flaps!" Tony had yet to realise he'd lost JARVIS. When nothing happened, only did he realise the ramifications of losing complete power to the suit. "JARVIS?"
"Oh no…" Wanda whispered.
"Concerned for me, Maximoff?" Tony guessed; the surprise evident in his voice. He wouldn't have thought Wanda might start to show concern for him because of this.
Talking to himself, probably as a means to control the fear building up within him, Tony broke the ice off one of his leg plates. "Come on, we got to break the ice!" He twisted a nodule on his right leg and the flaps were deployed, breaking through the ice covering the Suit.
"We know you are panicking because you're talking to yourself," noted Sam. "A common reflex of those facing certain death when you know its coming and you can't do anything to stop it."
Tony didn't want to admit he had considered he'd been about to meet his end at the time because of his stupidity in not listening to JARVIS, and letting his hubris control him.
Now falling belly first, arms out-stretched to slow his descent further, his Heads-up display booting up as JARVIS came online, his thrusters activated as he was about to hit ground level, nearly causing a collision with a car before flying back up and out into the sky, before returning to his mansion, descending onto the roof of his house.
Steve felt relieved. "That was lucky you got the suit back online."
"Kill power," he ordered. The Suit instantly stopped and Tony dropped, crashing through the roof, through the piano on the floor below and then onto the top of his blue vintage car stored in the garage, ruining it completely.
"Did you get the car replaced?" Bruce wondered.
"I decided not to. My workshop changed after I created the suit. It became more of a place to store the suits than the cars," admitted Tony. His car collection had rapidly decreased with the invention of the suits.
Car alarms went off and DUM-E used the fire extinguisher on Tony as he leaned his head back.
"DUM-E to the rescue!" laughed Rhodey. He lightly punched Tony on the right shoulder. "You deserved the fire extinguisher there!"
Tony didn't argue the point.
With an ice-pack pressed to his head, Tony walked towards his cup of coffee and the box Pepper had left for him earlier that evening. Absentmindedly, he picked up his mug of coffee before turning back to look at the package wrapped in brown paper.
A note sat on the top of the box. "From Pepper."
Tony started to unwrap the box, opening it up to reveal a glass box with his first Arc Reactor mounted within it on a short stand. There was a metallic engraving on the casing around the Reactor. The words read: "PROOF THAT TONY STARK HAS A HEART".
Tony tipped it back, a slow smile spreading across his face.
"I still have it. The Arc Reactor in its casing," sighed Tony. "I'll always keep it."
"What changed your mind?" asked Steve. He remembered Tony had wanted it disposed of.
"When I saw what Pepper had done with it, I knew I had to keep it. It meant something to me," explained Tony quietly. "She saw something in me that I didn't see myself, and still don't: a heart."
"I know events of the Accords have caused frictions between us," began Steve, "but you are a big part of this team, even now. I know you care, Tony. You do have a heart, and you shouldn't need an Arc Reactor inscribed to prove it."
Inclining his head, Tony didn't know what to say. Steve Rogers may believe Tony had a heart but Tony was certain not everyone in the room believed it, and he doubted watching movies about his life would ever change their opinion.
Still, I could be surprised.
And Tony directed his attention back to the screen.
To be continued...
Please let me know what you think!
Clint is being quite mean to Tony... He blames Tony solely for Civil War, refusing to take any responsibility himself. Clint will, very slowly, start to realise the truth. Wanda is being less hostile.
It is my understanding Iron Man takes place over a period of months, which is why I've added in about Tony and Rhodey not really talking for several months after Tony returned from Afghanistan.
The mysterious voice makes an appearance... We will learn the identity of the voice but it will be a long time before we do.
The next chapter will be very long. I may make the decision to split it and add an extra chapter to this story, but it depends on how many words the next chapter comes up to.
The next chapter will be posted next Sunday 2nd August.
Until then,
the-writer1988