Disclaimer: I make no claims to the known characters in this tiny work of fiction. I do not own Iron Man, still. I also do not own Rag'n'Bone. What I do own is half a ChapStick and a bulk bag of SweetTarts. Make of that what you will.

Prologue: Round the World

Rag'n'Bone- Only Human

Ivan rested his back against the bed frame, legs stretched out along the floor of his dim, cave-like rooms in Moscow. Behind him on the thin mattress his father's corpse was growing cold.

Calloused fingers wrapped around the neck of a half empty vodka bottle. Flexing his heavily tattooed arm and raising his chin, he brought the drink to his lips and tipped it almost vertically. A flood of smooth, icy liquor poured over his teeth to hit the back of his throat. He swallowed, bringing the bottle back down, all without his eyes moving from the screen in front of him.

His steady gaze locked onto Tony Stark's pleased smile. Iron Man - Ivan's lip lifted into a sneer - a hero.

In his mind, his father's dying lament festered - 'That should have been you.'

The man who had been Anton Vanko had been murdered years before. He had been spurned by his country, hollowed out and ruined by a Stark. And though the catalyst for his father's destruction was long dead, Tony Stark was his father's son. He was a thief and a murderer, sitting atop his stolen fortune and basking in the public's adulation.

It would take but a tap to crack the other man's carefully curated persona.

Ivan wiped his mouth with the back on his hand, feeling the grim smile that had grown there. Spread across his lap lay a blueprint. Neatly printed at the bottom were two names: Howard Stark and Anton Vanko. It was all that his father had claimed he had to give him.

From the corner of his eye he could see a pale, frozen hand. Ivan's fingers squeezed around the neck of liquor bottle.

Just a tap.

…...

Quentin Dooley was kicked back at the coffee shop a block over from one of his targets, piggybacking off the poorly secured wifi connection. He'd been in Cleveland for over three months and yesterday was the first time Stane had missed their check in.

He wondered if it meant the man's house of cards had finally toppled. He'd be unsurprised, not that he would have called Stane out on his poor planning.

In his youth Quentin had made the mistake of haste, of misreading the people around him. It had cost him eight years in jail, any hope of a career, and part of his face. Meanwhile the smug bitch responsible rose swiftly in power and prestige.

Angela Harper; He remembered the way her false ease had evaporated, how horror had painted it's way across her face. His fingers twitched on his keyboard. Her pulse had beat against his palms like a trapped bird, but it had only lasted a moment.

Her eyes had sharpened, her jaw jutted and there had been an explosion of pain. He was pinned to the floor under some long haired security guard before he could retaliate. The fear and helplessness had been his, then.

When Stane had found him he'd been back to basics, making or augmenting tech, selling information. The cesspool the older man claimed to have dragged him from was, in reality, a front office. Stane had known his price, however, and presented him with yet another convenient third party.

Quentin should have known better. He'd taken a few swipes at Harper through proxies in the past, but it'd never worked out. The woman could be paranoid and vicious.

Next to him the chatter from a group of college age kids huddled around a laptop rose in volume. His attention caught on the words 'Stark' and 'robot battle.' One of the girls turned to her friend. "Do you think there's people in all of them? I mean if Tony Stark is in one…"

Frowning, Quentin navigated to a news site for the LA area. He watched through a few video clips which culminated in a report about an explosion at Stark Industries and a press conference. The timing could have been a coincidence, and the news hadn't said anything about Stane, but Quentin thought it might be a good time to reconsider his plans, again.

He was tired of losing.

…...

Mike finished his meeting with the family of the man he'd just performed a bypass on. It was one of the good ones where, barring anything unforeseen, the man should make a full recovery. The family was overjoyed and, after they left, he lingered in the meeting room soaking up the good vibes. Through the open door the chattering from the main office slowly gained his attention.

The group who ran the front office of Surgery were usually a subdued bunch in deference to tense loved one's in the waiting area across the hall. Raised voices from them meant there was something worth knowing. Curious, Mike rose to his feet and made his way out toward the service desk.

When he got close enough to pick out words, one of the customer service reps exclaimed, "Just because Stark stopped some psycho robot on the freeway doesn't make him a hero."

Mike's steps momentarily faltered.

"I don't know." Arjun spun his chair toward the rear of the desk, caught sight of Mike, and jerked his chin in greeting. "I think saying that 'he stopped a psycho' anything would qualify him for hero-ship," he argued.

"That thing was throwing around cars with people in them," Becca, a nurse, pointed out. She tapped one of her fingernails on the desk top and cocked a hip.

Throwing cars? A feeling of dread burrowed its way into Mike's stomach. He forced himself forward on stiff legs.

"It was his company's robot," the service rep, Sarah, argued.

"So they say, but he still stopped it," Arjun pointed out. "Personally went out there and stopped it."

"Stark?" Mike circled the desk to stand beside Becca. "Tony Stark?" The last he'd heard his sister was staying with the man, which brought its own set of concerns as Stark was fairly well known for - a lot of things - chief among them bad decisions. He had a horrible feeling he wasn't going to like whatever had the front office buzzing. "What's going on?"

Sarah rolled her eyes. "So apparently there was some big explosion at Stark Industries Los Angeles last night."

Mike's eyes flew wide.

"No, no," Arjun shook his finger. "Start from the beginning."

"Was anyone hurt?" Mike's chest squeezed in concern. With the internal restructuring at SI his sister was working out of a satellite lab. There was no reason that he could think of that she'd be at the factory, but then Genie was often places she shouldn't be.

"No. I mean there was property damage, and a couple people on the freeway had some minor injuries, but no casualties," Sarah informed.

He tried to mask how much relief he felt at that statement.

"Which is amazing after seeing that metal monstrosity blowing up a bus," Arjun enthused.

Cutting his hand through the air, Mike stalled the renewed chatter. "Back up. What happened?"

Becca pulled her cell from the pocket of her scrubs. Mike gave it a disapproving side eye. "What?" She asked defensively. "I'm on break." She queued up a video and set it to play. "So last night there was this fight on the 110 between a giant silver man-shaped robot, which was apparently an SI prototype, and two smaller red and gold robots. Except one of the red and gold one's wasn't a robot. It was a suit of armor."

Mike listened as Becca laid out what facts the news channels had put together. When she started talking about the second red and gold figure his shoulders stiffened as premonition rolled down his spine. Even Genie couldn't be that crazy, right?

"See, look." She paused the video and pointed to the smaller of the brightly painted machines. "Look at the way the waist nips in, look at the structure of the torso." Her eyes darted challengingly toward Sarah. "That is a woman."

Sarah rolled her eyes. "I wasn't arguing with you about that. I was pointing out that you have an absurd crush on a celebrity you have never met in real life and it's coloring your opinions. It's sad."

"Anyway," Becca dismissed the other woman and started the video again. The tiny. undeniably female, red and gold figure took off into the sky. "The news has been all over it since Stark came out as the pilot for the other suit."

Mike bit back a noise of dismay and nodded stiffly. Becca cast a quick, confused glance at him and then continued, pausing to show him the press conference Stark had held.

By the end of it Mike thought he might vomit. Counting backwards from ten did nothing to take the edge off his temper, neither did repeating the exercise in French and German. He needed to call his sister. He needed to call Molly.

"Hey, you alright?" Arjun leaned up toward him. "You're red, man."

He needed to get out of the current conversation. Mike wasn't the type of man to share his personal life around work. He certainly wasn't going to be the type who had a melt down in-office. Besides, until he heard from Genie he couldn't be sure she was involved. A bitter, sarcastic part of him laughed in the back of his head. It was just the sort of thing his sister would get involved with.

"Yeah, just starting to feel the come down from the op," he lied. He planted his hands on the desk top and pushed away. "I've got another consultation coming up and I need to check in upstairs. Thanks for the gossip."

It was more abrupt then he would have liked, but he needed to get away and think about things. Heading for his office, he decided he'd call Molly first. She should be free between lectures.

…...

"Oh, I heard all about it," his wife sighed. "I could barely keep my second class under control, and I swear half of them still weren't paying attention."

Mike ran a hand down his face, tilting back in his chair. "Yeah, I walked in on a debate about whether Stark is a hero or not. Almost couldn't get the gist of what happened because of it."

"It's interesting how polarizing the issue is," Molly agreed. "I'd love to sit in on an ethics, government, or sociology lecture today."

"Molly," he groaned.

"Fine, spoil my nerd moment," she huffed. "That wasn't what seemed to be distracting my class today anyway, it was more speculation about who the woman with Stark was."

The noise that escaped him would not be out of place if he was dying a dramatic death.

"There was some talk that it was an android, but Stark Industries has been suspiciously mum on the topic. It makes me think they're protecting someone. Stark coming out certainly seemed unscripted," she mused.

"You're calmer than I expected," Mike commented, trying not to dwell on his desire to fly to Malibu. It was only a five hour flight. He could get there, punch Stark's teeth in and be dragging his sister back to Cleveland before morning.

She gave a huff of disagreement. "Don't mistake me, if it is Genie then I am going to be furious. This is going to come out, Mike. And then what?"

"They'll dig into her background," he postulated miserably.

"And they'll find us," Molly agreed. "How long before the reporters show up? And with them will come the crazy people. They're already holding back a mob in front of Stark Industries Corporate."

He could hear the frustration in her voice and felt horrible that his sister potentially put them in that situation. He knew he was jumping to conclusions, but with the way Genie had been acting… She was into something far bigger than her, and he knew she wouldn't stop until she saw it through.

Last time he'd talked to her she had seemed alright. She had been tired and sounded somewhat discouraged. It was only in hindsight that he realized how quick she'd been to switch the conversation off of herself.

"What do you think we should do?" He wondered, hoping his wife could work her magic and stifle his steadily building ire.

"Well, I think the first thing is to call your sister. We could be working ourselves up over nothing," Molly cautioned.

True, but… "You don't think its nothing," he prodded.

There was a long silence from her end of the phone. "I think Genie is prone to acting before she thinks at times." With a sigh she assured him, "She's not being malicious, hun. Genie has always tried to do the right thing. Remember how she acted when she found out Professor Holden was hassling me?"

He grunted again in displeasure. "I still can't believe you told her before me," he griped.

"I didn't tell her," she denied, "She pieced things together. She's good at that, you both are. The point is, that instead of thinking about the consequences of ruining the man's career, she simply did it. I'm not saying it didn't work out," she demurred. "It's just that her desire to fix things gets away from her. She's not exactly delicate when she comes up against a problem."

"I know." He leaned forward and rested his arms against his desk. "I do, but I am so angry with her right now. How many times am I going to have to just go along for the ride with her? I've tried talking to her and it's like she just dismisses my concerns. And it's getting worse."

Molly hummed in agreement. "She's had some traumatic instances recently. Things are shifting for her. You know she would never purposefully put us in danger, especially the kids. If I didn't keep tight reigns on the two of you, you'd both spoil them rotten."

Mike's head shot up from where it had sagged over his arms. "Back up. What?"

His wife took in a long breath and gave a tisk, something he'd come to associate with her believing she'd said something out of turn. "We're both upset. I tell you what, I'll cancel my last class. We'll see if Alisse can take the kids for a few hours."

He cut off her prevaricating. "Molly, why would our kids be in danger?"

There was another long moment of dead air before Molly carefully explained. "She was almost kidnapped. You said it was because of the thing keeping her alive. You were vague on it."

"Because she was vague on it," he defended.

"Well, exactly," she pointed out. "Did it never cross your mind that the reason she was so tight lipped was because it was dangerous? That's how I took it. If what you think is right and it really is her, don't you think people are going to want that tech too?"

"Son of a bitch," he whispered, eyes wide and shoulders tense. He could feel the flush run up his neck.

"Michael," Molly warned.

"Damn it! You weren't joking about the crazies! I'm gonna kill her!" He swore.

"And there goes your temper," she chided.

Mike ran a hand roughly through his hair. Molly was right. Reporters were disruptive enough, and he always knew there were bad people in the world, but the presence of those people had been very recently brought home.

They'd held his sister at gunpoint over suspicion of new tech. The whole world just saw that there was tech out there beyond their dreams. Stark was going to be under constant threat of people trying to steal it from him. Some of those people would have no qualms over getting violent. And his blind, bull-headed, sister had possibly just thrown herself right into the middle of it.

Molly was talking again. He tried to steady his breathing and listen. "Go home," she ordered. "You're in no state to be doing your job."

"I have consults," he muttered.

"Have Jordan do them. He owes you for covering for him last month," she commanded in her no-nonsense voice. "I'm cancelling class. I'll pick up the kids and meet you at home."

He dithered over her suggestion, but his heart was pounding in his chest and his free hand was still clenched tightly into a fist. "Jesus, I'm gonna…"

"Go home is what you are going to do," Molly scolded. "We both need to calm down and we need to talk about this. Rashness will not help."

"No, she's the only one that gets away with that." He wasn't angry at Molly but he couldn't stop himself from lashing out. He'd reached his breaking point. Knowingly or not, his sister had put his family in danger.

"Don't convict her without a trial. You haven't even talked to her. You don't know she was involved," Molly cautioned. "No one knows she was involved."

"Yet," he argued. "It's a matter of time."

"Maybe," she conceded. "I'm packing up now. Go find Jordon and then come home."

"Right." Given his marching orders, Mike bid his wife goodbye and stood from his desk. He clenched his fist around his cell phone, still feeling the Dugan family temper raging through him. He should have seen it coming. He just couldn't believe his sister had been so irresponsible.

With a frustrated grunt he grabbed his jacket and went in search of his colleague.

…...