The next morning, Tony Stark was found sitting in a doughnut. It was a very large doughnut on top of Randy's Donuts shop. Nick Fury confronted him, in all his African-American, black leather, eye-patched glory. Biela and Natasha watched from a surveillance van outside, along with Phil and Clint. The other tac team was in the second van. "Sir," Fury yelled at him. "I'm gonna have to ask you to exit the doughnut." Phil and Natasha both hid smirks. Clint chuckled. Biela laughed straight out.
Tony looked down and lowered his sunglasses, obviously not believing his eyes.
Inside the shop, Tony sat across from Fury in a window booth. Biela was watching from the wings. "I told you, I don't want to join your super-secret boy band," Tony remarked. Fury chuckled. "No, no, no, see, I, I remember you do everything yourself. How's that working out for you?" He took a sip of coffee. "It's, it's it's, it's…" Tony took a sip of coffee himself. Then he put the cup down. "I'm sorry, I don't want to get off on the wrong foot, do I look at the patch or the eye?" Fury only looked at him. Tony continued, "Honestly, I'm a bit hungover, I'm – I'm not sure if you're real or if, if I'm having…" "I am very real," Fury interrupted. "I'm the realest person you're ever going to meet."
"Just my luck," Tony replied. "Where's the staff here?" Fury reached out and touched the exposed poison on Tony's neck. At the same moment, Natasha walked in to report to Fury. Biela followed her."That's not looking so good." "Been worse," Tony replied. Their heels clicked on the tiled floor as they approached, though neither man turned to look. "We've secured the perimeter, but I don't think we should hold it for too much longer," Natasha reported. Tony sat down his coffee and then looked at her over his glances in complete shock. Natasha as the Black Widow was sort of scary-awesome, and she was like the only person ever to pull that uniform off. Fury smirked at Tony's surprise. So did Biela, though Tony hadn't noticed her yet.
"You're uh…fired," Tony said. "That's not up to you," Natasha shot back as she sat down beside Fury. Tony took his glasses off. "Tony," Fury said, wrapping his arms around the stoic agent. "I'd like you to meet Agent Romanoff." "Hi," Tony said. "I'm a SHIELD shadow," she said. "Once we knew you were ill, I was tasked to you by Director Fury." "I suggest you apologize," Tony said. "She doesn't need to do anything of the sort," Biela said, sitting down beside him. Like Tony, she was in her full Bee suit, minus the helmet.
"Bee?" he asked in total shock. "Are you sure I'm not hallucinating?" "You're not hallucinating, and I'm a psychologist, so you'd better believe it!" she fired. "It is you," Tony said. She hit him in the back of the head. "That's for blowing up the house." She hit him again. "That's for changing your will without telling me or Pepper." She hit him again, the hardest of all. "And that's for lying about DYING!" she screeched. She sobered up. "Dad, why didn't you tell me?" Tony was silent, dumbstruck. "You called me dad," he said.
"You've been very busy," Fury said. "You made your girl your CEO, changed your will so your daughter inherited everything, you're giving away all your stuff, you let your friend fly away with your suit! Now, if I didn't know better…" "You don't know better," Tony interrupted. "I didn't give it to him, he took it." "Whoa, whoa, whoa, what now, he took it? You're Iron Man and he just took it? The little brother walked in there, kicked your ass, and took your suit. Is that even possible?" Fury asked, as he looked to Natasha.
"Well, according to Mr. Stark's database security guidelines, there are redundancies to prevent unauthorized usage," Natasha replied. "And Miss Stark made sure that the technology cannot be downloaded, dissected, or reproduced without her permission." "Miss Stark?" Fury asked. "True and true. Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes was authorized to use the Mark II armor and the Mark II armor only. Attempted usage of any of the other Marks would have resulted in lockdown of his clearance and immediate expulsion from the Stark property, as well as immediate notification sent to me, Mr. Stark, and Miss Potts."
Fury gave Tony a look. Tony sighed. "What do you want from me?" "What do we want from you? Nuh-uh-uh, what do you want from me? You, have become a problem, a problem I have to deal with. Contrary to your belief, you are not the center of my universe! I have bigger problems than you in the southwest region to deal with!" Natasha gave back, handed something to Biela, and sat down next to Fury. "Hit him," Fury ordered. Biela injected him behind the ear.
"Yaagh!" Tony yelped, sitting up straight. "What, are they planning next, to steal my kidney and sell it?" Natasha grasped his chin and turned his head so that they could see the poison retreating. He looked at Fury. "Could you please not do anything awful for…five seconds?" "What'd she just do to me?" he asked Fury. "What did we just do for you," Fury corrected. "That's lithium dioxide, it's gonna take the edge off, we're trying to get you back to work."
"Great," Tony muttered. "Give me a couple boxes of that and I'll be right as rain." "It's not a cure, it just abates the symptoms," Biela informed him. "Doesn't look like it's gonna be an easy fix," Fury remarked. "Trust me, I know, I'm good at this stuff, so is Bee, I've been looking for a suitable replacement for palladium. I have tried every combination, every permutation of every known element." "Well, I'm here to tell you, you haven't tried them all."