Son of Iron Man

I'm back again! Wow, over 100 views! Thanks to everyone who has read, reviewed, followed or favourited the story so far. May there be many more of you to come!

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With that said, I invite you to join Toby on his first day back at school after a day of intensive training. How will the other students react to the news that plain old Toby Stark is in fact Iron Man? How will Toby deal with it? When will I stop asking questions and let you read the story?

Right now!


Chapter Five: Plain Old Toby Stark

Toby awoke that morning with anxiety gripping his heart. Today he would return to school, but he wondered how his fellow students would react to Sarah's article. With disbelief, he hoped, but things never worked out so easily in life. He showered and cleaned his teeth before throwing on some clothes and heading down to breakfast, after which he packed his bag for school and started to head toward the elevator.

"Have a good day, son," Tony called. "Have you got your watch?"

"Yeah," Toby called back. "See you guys later!" And with that, he stepped out into the world.

On the bus, Toby sat beside Ben, ignoring everyone else on the vehicle.

"Did you see who wrote the article?" Ben asked. Toby nodded solemnly.

"Sarah Shilling," he answered.

"The one you saved?" Ben exclaimed. We had agreed to call all of our saves mine in public, since Ben's identity was still secret and he wanted it to stay that way.

"The very same," Toby nodded.

"That witch! What are you going to do?" Ben asked.

"I've already done it," Toby answered.

"What did you do?" Ben asked, a slight hint of dread in his voice

"Nothing bad!" Toby said quickly. "I just reminded her what responsibility is."

"Because you're really responsible," Ben chuckled. "Anyway, how did she respond?"

"She tried to kiss me," Toby replied.

"You're joking, right?" Ben asked disbelievingly.

"Nope," Toby said with a roguish grin.

"So, the message got across then?" Ben said sarcastically.

"If only," Toby sighed. "Something tells me this isn't the end of her Iron Man reporting."


The bus pulled up in front of the school and Ben and Toby walked to their tutor room, ignoring the students who called to Toby in the hallway. Once there, they were greeted by everyone in the room immediately trying to talk to him.

"Settle down, class!" the tutor said. The class at large quieted down, but when Ben and Toby sat down their immediate neighbours immediately started to whisper to Toby.

"Hey, Toby," said Adrian, the boy who sat behind Toby. His father was a renowned physicist, and Adrian was pretty smart himself. Ben and Toby sometime hung around with him after school, as well as his younger brother, Ty.

"What is it, Adrian?" Toby snapped.

"I- sorry, man," Adrian stuttered. "I just wanted to ask if you're available after school tonight."

"Oh…" Toby said, feeling bad for snapping at Adrian. "Sorry. Yes, I'm available," he said, but Ben looked at him pointedly and mouthed the word 'training'. "Actually, no, I just remembered I've got a ton of homework," he added.

"OK," Adrian said dejectedly.


Their first lesson was physics, in which Toby and Ben were partners. While the teacher droned on about nuclear fission – or as some of the less intelligent kids in the class called it: 'nuclear fishing' – Adrian listened with rapt attention. Ben was smart. Toby was smarter. But when it came to physics, Adrian was a genius.

"Now," the teacher, Mrs. Peach, said to the class, "who can tell me which element is used most often in nuclear fission?" Adrian's hand flew up immediately. "Yes, Mr. Banner?"

"Uranium-235, miss," he said.

"Correct! And you got the correct isotope. Well done, Mr. Banner," Mrs. Peach congratulated Adrian, who smiled to himself. A number of the other students sighed, tired of being shown up by him. Ben and Toby exchanged amused smiles over how capable these people were of getting annoyed by the simplest of things.

"Well, today we're going to do a practical about half-life," the teacher continued, ignoring the muttering in the room. "Each pair will take 100 dice and roll them all at once, then count the sixes each time. Remove the sixes and re-roll all the others, and repeat. The instructions are on this sheet, which…" she looked at who was closest to her, "Toby will hand out." With a sigh, Toby stood up, took the sheets and handed them out, starting on the first row before making his way toward the back.

Exactly where Sarah was.

To Toby's surprise, she didn't say anything – just stared at him as he passed.

Once Toby was sat back at his desk, he found that Ben had already collected a box of dice and poured them out over the table.

"OK, you take half and I'll take half," Ben said, sweeping up about half of the dice.

"I don't see how this is going to be helpful," Toby stated as he collected his own dice. "I mean, I see the science behind it, but at the end of the day we're just going to spend an hour rolling dice."

"True, and most of the people in this class probably don't actually understand the science," Ben agreed. He then looked like he was going to say something else, but someone else spoke first.

"Hey, Toby," they said. Toby turned and saw Sarah standing behind them.

"Hello, how may I tell you to go away today?" Toby asked, eliciting a chuckle from Ben.

"Well, that's not very nice," Sarah said. "My partner's not here today, so I was hoping I could join you two."

"No," said both Toby and Ben at once.

"Mr. Stark," said Mrs. Peach, "I hope you're not going to leave Miss Shilling on her own."

"Of course not, miss," Toby said, "she can go with someone else."

"Mr. Stark, I was under the impression that you were more chivalrous than this," Mrs. Peach said. Toby sighed and put his head in his hands.

"Uh, miss," Ben spoke up. "That article about Toby – the one that's pretty much ruined this day and probably more after that – Sarah wrote it."

"Ah…" Mrs. Peach said. She didn't seem to be aware of the fact. "Well then… Adrian, can you let Sarah join you?" Adrian looked up from his dice.

"Sure," he said, though he didn't seem completely convinced.

"There, problem solved," Mrs. Peach said before moving on to help another group. Sarah shot Ben a cold look before storming off to Adrian.

"Poor guy," Ben commented as he watched her go.

"Thanks for that," Toby said.

"No problem," Ben replied. The rest of the dice-throwing lesson passed without further incident, as well as Toby's next lesson, Maths.


Come break time, Ben and Toby were sat outside at a table, trying to escape the public. Many passers-by had already tried to engage in conversation with Toby, but he had shut them out. Adrian suddenly came to sit by them.

"That Sarah is a nightmare, huh?" he asked as he tucked his bag under the table.

"You have no idea," Toby mumbled.

"Have you been receiving much attention from that article?" Adrian continued.

"Unfortunately, yes," Toby said.

"It won't last," Adrian assured him.

"I don't know about that. Superheroes get a lot of publicity, and since people know I'm Iron Man I'll get that publicity. This article's effect will wear off, yes, but there will be more," Toby replied.

"Can Sarah not be convinced to be stop?" Adrian asked.

"It wouldn't matter if she could; she's not the only reporter out there. I just wish she stuck to more conventional methods…"

"What do you mean?"

"Never mind," Toby said.

"Well, look on the bright side," Ben chipped in as he saw desperation creep into Toby's facial expressions.

"What bright side?"

"Girls love superheroes."


Toby's next lesson was PE. After changing into his sports kit in the changing rooms, he headed to the hall with Ben and found their teacher wielding a dodgeball and a whistle.

"Today," he announced, "we're going to play a game of dodgeball. Captains will be…" he looked around. "Jonathan Rodgers" – a muscular boy with blond hair and blue eyes stood up and walked over to the teacher's right – "and Emily Frost." A beautiful blonde girl stood up and made her way through the crowd of students, who eagerly moved out of her way. As always she wore her red-tinted sunglasses which hid her eyes, but she didn't need to reveal them for all the boys in the school to be mad for her. Her father had left the family when she was young – taking the family name with him – but everyone knew that her mother was Emma Frost, the famous X-man. Emily had certainly inherited her good looks – she was widely recognised as the most attractive girl in school.

"OK, we've got our captains," the teacher announced. "Now we need some teams. Jolly, Emily, if you will." Jolly, the nickname of Jonathan, stepped forward first.

"Jack," he said, calling up his best friend in a move that shocked no one. Emily then stepped forward, and all the boys in the room listened out for their names.

"Toby," she said. The whole class turned to stare at Toby with jealousy in their eyes – even the girls, who knew that to be picked by Emily was to be popular. Surprised, Toby stood up and picked his way through the seated students, feeling the eyes of everyone boring into him as he went. "Hey," Emily greeted him softly. Toby returned the gesture with a numb smile before standing behind her, forming the basis of the line. He glanced at Ben and saw him mouth the phrase 'I told you so'. He couldn't help but grin.

The rest of the picking went unsurprisingly, with Emily picking all the girls and Jolly picking the boys. Soon, only Ben and Adrian were left. Neither Jolly nor Emily wanted either of them, but Emily stepped forward nonetheless. She studied the two of them, trying to discern the weakest.

"Ben," she said, leaving Adrian with Jolly. It was highly unfair that Ben was often one of the last to be picked, but Toby was the only one who knew of his true skill and he often purposely threw the match to hide his powers. The only reason he was picked over Adrian was that the latter had a habit of passing out when his heart-rate got too high.

Sure enough, once the game began, Ben was one of the first out with a dodgeball to the chest. That left Toby as the only boy in Emily's team. He dodged the incoming balls with ease and knocked out a few members of Jolly's team. He did notice that whenever a ball approached him a girl conveniently appeared in front of him to take the hit, but that annoyed him more than anything; before long, only Toby and Emily were left. He realised that Adrian was looking stressed, and threw a perfect ball at him that knocked him out of the game. Adrian gave him a grateful thumbs-up before retreating to the sidelines.

All the girls on the bench watched Toby as he ducked and dived, catching the odd ball and throwing plenty. Suddenly, Emily took a dodgeball to the leg and retreated, leaving Toby alone to deal with the four remaining members of Jolly's team. He dodged two balls in a row before picking one up and throwing it at Jolly. It hit him on the shoulder as he tried to dodge, eliciting a cheer from Toby's team. He had just taken out Jolly Rodgers, one of the toughest kids in school.

The remaining three on Jolly's team threw a co-ordinated attack of three balls at Toby – two of which bounced off each other harmless and the third being caught by Toby. Only two remained. Toby jumped over a misguided shot before catching one in mid-air and throwing it back at thrower of the first ball, knocking both out at once.

Toby's bench cheered, and Emily herself ran onto the court and hugged him. He closed his eyes and enjoyed the moment.


After school, Toby returned home and greeted his parents.

"Hey," he called as he removed his backpack. Tony immediately walked into the room.

"How was your day?" he asked anxiously.

"It was better than I expected," Toby said as he remembered dodgeball.

"Good to hear it," Tony said with a smile. "Ready for some training?"

"Always," Toby said, holding up his left arm and the watch upon it.

"Then follow me."


Well, isn't that nice? Toby's life is all going better than he expected, but for how long, I wonder? Sarah's still out there, and she's not likely to lose Toby to Emily or anyone else without a fight. How far will Jameson make her go? And let us not forget the unknown villain who's hiding out there. With all these unanswered questions burned into your brain, I feel somewhat cruel to announce that the next chapter will have nothing to do with Toby! Because guess what, true believers? We're heading to Asgard!

And yes, I did call Steve Rodgers' son Jolly Rodgers. Yes, that is what the pirate flag is called (but without the 's').