Arc 2 - External & Internal Affairs (5 - 6)

"Yowch!" you cried as you pulled a jagged piece of shrapnel out of your skin, wincing as blood gushed down your arm before you slapped on a bandage. The metal shard was actually a piece of the suit - a segment that had torn off, partially molten, and had then been forced right through the rest of the armor. Admittedly, you were a little impressed that it had pierced so deeply, even if it hurt like a bitch.

"Would you stop that?" the S.H.I.E.L.D. nurse complained, nose upturned as if she were perpetually smelling something disgusting - which admittedly was possible, given the fact that your own nose wasn't working terribly well at the moment. Such were the hazards of breathing in entirely too much potentially toxic smoke; everything had the vaguely nauseating scent of cooked ham. "You're going to bleed out if you keep at it," she continued. "It's no skin off my nose, but the Director would be annoyed."

"That sounds terrible." You smirked as you moved on to the next bit of metal that had torn through your armor, glad that all of the damage was superficial. Evidently, meeting an electron-beam head-on with a repulsor was a bad idea, and the fact that your arm had been closest to the explosion was probably why it had ended up so mangled. On the bright side, you weren't dying. And you had a hot nurse!

"Stop complaining," she muttered.

"Get off my back. I know some basic medicine, you know - I read stuff. A lot," you complained. "Did you people call Pepper yet? She's my secretary. Babysitter. She answers to both." You glanced across the docks to the other two nondescript trucks that had pulled up barely five minutes after you'd blown up the better part of the harbor.

S.H.I.E.L.D. had been rather late to the party, but they'd mobilized an impressive little army, with more than two dozen heavily-armed troopers pouring out to find that one enemy was out for the count - and the other gone. Honestly, you were a little embarrassed for the group as they trudged back to their trucks to deposit their heavy armaments without getting to use them. You were all too aware how attractive things that went boom could be.

"Agent Coulson agreed to handle your contacts personally," the nurse said with a flat stare, and you vaguely wondered if she really was a nurse, or secretly a super-hot spy babe with medical skills that was interrogating you. It didn't really matter, but it was neat to think about those things while you were trying to distract yourself from the pain in your arm. There were a lot of neat things to think about when it came to the nurse, actually. "Soooo… Are you going to think of an excuse for staring at my chest?" she wondered.

Yikes, she had noticed. "...You have nice boobs?" you tried.

She smiled, and the expression seemed downright genuine. "I do, don't I?" she commented happily, but then yanked at the next piece of shrapnel with rather more force than was necessary - you yelped at the stab of pain, and felt properly chided. "You have a habit of ending up like a pincushion, it seems," she continued easily, as if nothing happened. "Dangerous habit. I might not always be around to tend the boo-boos."

"Whatever you say. I'm still alive," you argued. "The radiation probably didn't do wonders for my health, but I've cracked more complicated problems than cancer. Probably. Sounds like it'd be fun." You stretched slightly, relieved to find that the flush on your skin was receding - for a little while, you'd feared that you'd ruined yourself, that you'd overlooked something. "Anyway, I pretty much punched out a nuke, and that's what matters. I won!"

"Hm. By some definitions of winning."

You scowled. "Hey, I blew up the guy that was trying to kill me - that constitutes a victory in my book! Oh, did I mention he was trying to kill me? Talk about getting into habits, that's one I really need to break away from." You frowned at the nurse's amused expression. "What's so funny?"

She shrugged easily. "You seem so surprised by all this. What did you honestly expect would happen when you strapped yourself into several tons of metal and laser-guns? You play in the nuclear bathtub, you're gonna get wet and glowy…"

"Har har." You looked over the destroyed waterside and the huge debris-filled crater at its heart, now surrounded by rather flimsy tape and a small army of suited gentlemen. It was a marvel that the mercenary with the big gun had survived the explosion - even with your suit, you'd taken quite a beating. Wherever he'd been shipped off too, you weren't sure. Didn't really care, either. What interested you far more were the bits and pieces of something scattered everywhere around you - the remains of the nuclear rifle that'd nearly done you in. Now that was something you could sink your teeth into, especially since Jarvis wasn't being his annoying self anymore, warning you of every rise in beta rays. The radiation source was gone.

"Look, I know that I tend to run before I can jump, but you guys were slow as molasses so I had to do something," you said at last. "When can I speak to Fury? This - mess - can't get a repeat performance. Given that I've ended up in situations like this three times in as many months, I think it's probably time I get some arrangement going. If only so I won't end up scrapping another perfectly good suit on its first time out."

You pouted as you looked back on the smoking remains of the Mark 1 suit - aside from its dented appearance, with large tears running down one arm and entire segments missing, the whole thing had caught fire not long after you'd managed to get yourself out, as electrical systems finally gave up and sparked into oblivion. The interior systems had not been fireproofed - until now, you hadn't really expected to take the thing into battle in this state. It was looking more and more likely that you'd have to rebuild the whole armor. You didn't mind that - but it was the principle of the thing that counted.

The sight of your poor, ruined armor brought you back to that moment when everything had died down, when the last of the bits and pieces of suit and gun had rained down around you, and everything went silent. Then Peter had sent a message - and carried out Obadiah as if he weighed nothing in his arms, arms hanging limply as blood seeped from his mouth.

"How is - Obi?" you asked, when it was clear that no answer was forthcoming about Fury's whereabouts. "You have him in ICU, right? He didn't look very good, last time I saw him..."

The nurse shrugged. "Well, he's lost a lot of blood, so time will tell the real extent of his injuries," she said calmly. "It's likely that he was exposed to the same nuclear source that you were - without any protection. There's some evidence of interrogation or torture, too. Beyond that..."

You'd heard those words before, half an hour earlier, but you still couldn't quite mesh that with what you'd seen. It sounded too clinical, too simple. Obadiah had looked like he'd been sliced to bits when he was carried out of that ship by Peter. There had been blood everywhere, and if the man had a pulse, you hadn't been able to feel it with your shaking hands. Whatever it was that these criminals wanted with Obi - he hadn't gone willingly, that much was clear.

That observation, at least, convinced S.H.I.E.L.D. that you hadn't been talking out of your ass about his loyalty. You honestly didn't care for the vindication, not right now.

"He will survive, won't he?" you inquired again, rather weaker than you'd intended.

The woman's features softened as she nodded, the tiniest of smiles darting across her face before she turned away. "I think so - our doctors are the very best. Right now, you should be worrying about yourself. With this much gunk in your blood, you'll be on antibiotics for weeks. Nuke's never been one for hygiene."

"Nuke," you said, more a statement than a question. "The big guy, huh? Fitting nickname."

"Yeah, it's been mentioned. It's never been this apt before," the nurse argued with a nod. "He's been on the files for a while, at least since the nineties. Never was a part of your company, as far as we can tell - but then, he's never been mentally stable, either. Odds are Masque was manipulating him. It's her thing." She glanced back at you, frowning. "You attract some dangerous enemies, Stark."

"Such are the perils of fame," you said lightly, smiling thinly. "Where's Rhodey? And - Spider-Man?" You'd almost said Peter. This secret identity thing was going to take some getting used to. "When that explosion went off, I thought I saw... I'm not sure what I saw. But they saved me from the blast, right?"

You didn't get an answer, but her vague wave towards the other trucks made it clear enough where you could find your allies.

"They're not in trouble, I hope?" you asked, realizing that you were being awfully demanding, even if you weren't getting answers to half your questions. "This was all clearly my idea. Neither of them are mad enough, I think, to do anything quite like this. Rhodey would probably have shot the guy in the head, no questions asked. And Spidey - well, he'd do whatever a spider can, I guess."

The nurse looked away, sighing. "I'm not the one to argue with. Director Fury will be around any minute now to debrief you and the boy," she said simply. "Until then - try not to get involved in any more tussles with dangerous criminals, please." She glanced up, smiling impishly. "Although I've heard you like to play dangerously. Vegas, huh?"

"That was self-defense," you argued, frowning.

She leaned back, smiling. "Yeah, I remember the last time I set someone's face on fire in self-defense," she replied lightly. "Ah, those were the days…" She slapped your bruised arm, and clearly enjoyed your awkward wince. "You won't die soon, so I'll bandage the rest in a bit - maybe the pain will keep you from doing anything too crazy."

As she walked off, clearly exaggerating the sway of her hips - you certainly weren't complaining - you couldn't help whistling. "Hello, nurse…" you whispered.

"I'm not a nurse. Call me Natasha," she said, twisting around slightly as she narrowed her eyes, and you felt a chill run down your back at that expression. "Or else."

Idly, you wondered if you had any room for another secretary.

Fury finally joined you almost an hour later, after you'd been ushered inside one of the trucks, where a rather lavishly decorated facsimile of a meeting room had been installed behind a big steel door. The first few steps inside had felt claustrophobic, and you'd distantly wondered why that feeling would emerge now, when you never felt like that before - until you remembered Afghanistan. This place reminded you of the weapons container you'd locked yourself into with Yinsen, just before you'd set off the Pyre.

You shuddered in disgust, rubbing your arm and marveling at the lack of pain. After endlessly complaining, you'd gotten something for the stabs of sharp agony that still make their way up your nerves, and the stuff was heavenly - like morphine without the dulling effect on the mind. Clearly, it was the proper good stuff, and you determined that you were going to stock up on it after all this was over - just in case. You were getting hurt an awful lot of late.

"Mr. Stark," the Director announced with a disapproving glare, and you realized it hadn't been the first time you'd been called. Perhaps the stuff was dulling your mind a little, then? Whatever. "Spider-Man," he continued easily as he glanced at your neighbor with a dull expression that was offset by his piercing gaze. "You two have made my day very difficult."

"Any particular reason you omitted the third part of our little party?" you asked warily. "Rhodey's probably the most qualified to talk to you…"

"Mr. Rhodes is not my responsibility," Fury said shortly. "You two, however, are a different matter."

"We totally apologize," Peter tried, still clothed in full costume, and he was probably much more at ease because of that. "We promise we won't kick giant super soldier ass for you again, okay? Fair?" He raised his hands in mock-surrender. "Oh, do you guys have those neat neuralizer things in real life? Because I could totally use one of those sometimes."

Fury simply glared. "As of an hour ago, I've had to terminate three news broadcasts covering the events of this evening, which means that there is video evidence of the events in question. Although the only footage is distant and indistinct… it's there. This is, needless to say, a problem."

Peter hesitated. "Am I…?"

"Jarvis?" you asked lightly, leaning back in your chair. "Do you have an analysis?"

There was a brief silence - then the radio propped up at the side of the room crackled. "Yes, sir. All released footage is isolated to the last stage of the battle and only prominently features the armor, sir. The final explosion caused a localized electromagnetic pulse, and recordings terminate shortly afterwards. Spider-Man nor your person are visible."

"Well, that's something," you murmured. "Good job, Jarvis. Lock up the footage you caught, and delete all local feeds."

"Already done, sir."

Fury sighed, rubbing his forehead as he glared from his single visible eye. "Dare I ask how you hacked into a top-security frequency that you could never have encountered before? Or any of the rest of it?"

You raised an eyebrow, smiling enigmatically, and a silence lingered.

"Seriously, guys?" Peter asked at last. "I get that you're posing to be cool, and you're probably doing some kind of dominance contest thing, but can we get on with this? Because I have - stuff to do, and getting captured by the government isn't really my style."

"We'll come to you, boy," Fury said coolly, steepling his fingers together. "Stark - I commend you for warning S.H.I.E.L.D. about something that even our considerable surveillance systems had not yet picked up, but your handling of the situation was - troubling to me."

"Why?" you asked, mystified. "Everyone survived, except maybe some hirelings with a death wish that wandered into the electron beam of facemelty death," you protested. "That's not troubling, that's awesome! Spider-Man took out like two dozen guys for you to question, and the Nuke guy is my gift on top! I'd like to see you try and do the same without sacrificing half a dozen of your army dudes!"

Fury frowned. "Due to your actions, Mr. Stane is in a coma - something that might have been avoided if you had not forced Madame Masque to act sooner than expected," Fury said shortly, eye narrowed. "She poisoned Stane with something - and we aren't sure what concoction she used. Without a sample of the toxin and her delivery mechanism, we can only flush it out of his system every so often and hope that it stops reemerging."

"Some kind of self-replenishing poison?" you wondered. "How is that possible?"

"We don't know - but we've seen it before. We might have found out the details, had you not jumped the gun," Fury responded darkly. "Although your actions were understandable, I must insist that any future activity is coordinated with S.H.I.E.L.D. You were very nearly killed, and blundering into other operations could be a lot more dangerous still."

"Almost killed again - old hat," you said lightly, thinking back to the image you'd seen in the desert, that figure which held your body - Death. Between that and the strange near-death experience of the white that tingled below your skin, it was pretty clear that your decision to build armor had come none too soon. You couldn't really say you were sorry for anything that happened, though. You'd saved multiple lives, now, by putting your own on the line. It was a remarkable thought that you were even capable of something like that. "I'm not afraid, Director." It was the truth, remarkably.

"You should be," the one-eyed man snapped back. "You seem to believe you are some lone ranger in this crazy world," Fury spoke slowly, leaning forward in his chair as he glanced to Peter. "You do not realize that you are part of a larger universe, even when you see it unfold before you. Technology that would not have been dreamed of in science-fiction is now science fact, and the world is filling up with people that we cannot control - who cannot be controlled. We are approaching a breaking point."

You thought about that statement for longer than you expected. "Why?" you asked, unable to contend the point after your run-ins with Deadpool, Peter and Nuke - such data points that were unmistakable. Something was going on. "Why is that happening?"

"The reasons are many. But the truth is, it was inevitable," Fury said, sounding tired. "Your father saw it coming. He foresaw a flood of problems caused by this revolution in the way the world worked, back when he was working on - secret projects. I don't know how he realized what would happen, but sometimes it seemed as if he could peer right through to the heart of things, and grasp what nobody else could…" He tapped the large bird-shaped logo on the table. "This is why S.H.I.E.L.D. was founded in the first place. It is only through our head-start that we've been able to keep up with the changes of the world."

"Well, my father's come up a lot when speaking to you guys," you noted. "Is he the reason why you lied to me? Why you had Coulson make up some nonsense connection between the attack in Vegas and my kidnapping in the Middle-East?"

Fury glared with narrowed eye. "Mr. Pym was truly the primary target. Though we misrepresented the intent behind that attack to ensure that we had more information on your activities, it is incorrect to say that there is no connection. Pym was made a target due to his connection to certain classified dealings perpetrated by his former employer, Dr. Elihas Starr. Those dealings, I'm afraid, are very much connected to the weapon thefts from your own company."

"You are certain of that?" You raised an eyebrow. "Because I clearly recall you accusing Obadiah of that an hour or two ago."

Fury nodded tiredly in acknowledgement. "Starr is in custody - and now so is Mr. Stane, who we believe may have more information on the crime ring that's responsible, even if he is not as important as we suspected. Although S.H.I.E.L.D. has run into multiple mercenaries that can trace their employment back to the same source, which has proven very hard to pin down." He reached into his jacket and retrieved a thin file, filled with short biographical data. He tossed it onto the table and grimaced. "These are the known people connected to this particular syndicate. You may recognize a few."

"That's Deadpool," you murmured, recognizing the ugly mug that topped the page. Nuke, Madame Masque and a fellow by the name of Bullseye followed, and you curiously noted that Peter started at the last. The next few faces weren't nearly as recognizable, most of them wearing various outlandish costumes and paraphernalia - but one of them stood out. A severely burned and evidently comatose figure hooked up to a respirator, the only picture in the set that wasn't a mugshot. The photograph was recent, too. You pulled it out with a trembling hand. "This…"

You remember that face, burned as it was - you'd seen it before, just before you'd dragged Yinsen along to safety, away from wild gunfire in a sea of gas. This man had been the ringleader of the Ten Rings that had captured you out in the desert. He'd been out in the open in the end, right in the path of the greatest firestorm you'd ever unleashed - he had been caught in the heart of the Pyre.

And he was alive.

"How in the hell?" You asked strongly, staring at Fury with piercing eyes. You were certain the man knew what you'd done - his gaze betrayed his contempt. The terrorist had to have blabbed - and even without all the details, it was damning enough to know that nerve gas was involved. Either him, or Yinsen - and you couldn't imagine that.But if the secret of Pyre's existence was out... "How did he survive that?" you asked, and Fury's sharp look was enough to confirm your suspicion. He knew.

"There are - theories. Mr. Raza is in some ways unusual," Fury said after a long moment, glancing to Peter again. "We will not speak of that here and now. Suffice to say, he's secure."

"Yeah, until he breaks out and hunts me down for revenge," you said in annoyance, and you balled your fists before releasing them again, the slight shocks of pain that managed to pierce through the haze of painkillers keeping you on a necessary edge. "If this is all connected, then do you know why this group is after me - or their source? Why don't they simply kill me, since they've had plenty of chances to do so?"

"Hm. Evidently, they need something from you," Fury suggested enigmatically. "What they need - I do not know. They were willing to murder Hank Pym to silence him, but they've never struck directly against you. The kidnapping was the closest they've gotten, and even then they clearly intended to use you as a bargaining chip." He grimaced. "Needless to say, in light of these events I must insist that we keep you under closer guard, at least until we know the real culprits."

"So you want to keep an eye on me every day?" You pretended to consider that for a long moment. "Yeah, I'm thinking I'll do what I want, and it's not that. But I'll be generous - if you keep attention away from my friend here…" You glanced to Peter, smirking. "And you give me whatever's left of that gun outside to study - then maybe I'll play along for a bit."

"That gun is gone," Fury said mildly, not interested in the mention of Peter. "You destroyed the device, as you recall."

"Come on, I didn't destroyit," you protested. "I disassembled the thing. There's a difference! It's just a matter of getting the bits together, and some basic Lego-style reconstruction..." You shrugged. "Anyway, I'm game for having someone who can kick ass around, if you really think it'll help - as long as they're hot." You paused. "Is that nurse available, maybe?"

"...Nurse?" Fury repeated confusedly, eyebrow raised. "You will be informed." He glanced aside, his cyclopean gaze coming to rest on Peter, who fidgeted in his chair. "As for you…"

"I volunteer for ass-kicking duty?" Peter squeaked, clearly uncomfortable at being singled out and a little twitchy from being locked inside a metal box. "Well, as long as it can be somewhere in commuting distance, I can help out!" he continued. "Plane rides are expensive, you know..."

"I have jets to spare," you offered, rolling your eyes. "Anyway, let me take care of that. In return, you get to explain things to Pepper. And I'm warning you - that's gonna smart like you won't believe." You smirked. "Good luck."

"She wouldn't hit a harmless teen, would she?" Peter asked, miming a faint. "Surely your secretary is not that cruel?"

You sighed. "Yeah, good luck with that act. Idiot."

"And you're a smeghead," the boy muttered in return, crossing his arms.

Your incredulous gaze was mirrored by Fury's.

"...What? Don't you guys watch Red - Ugh, cultural barbarians."

"Would you consider moving to California?" You asked later as you lounged in the back of the car, amused at the uneven wobbling as the armor stored in the back was dragging the car down until it nearly scraped the road when you went uphill. The huge pile of little itty bitty pieces of gun didn't help, either.

Happy was driving as usual, and the bullet-proof, sound-proof shield was up between the cabin and the back, given you some much-needed privacy. It had taken more than two hours to come to arrangements with Director Fury - most of those had been spent haggling and making foul expressions You were honestly done with negotiating for the day.

Ah well. If needs must.

"Peter?"

The boy didn't answer immediately, staring out the window blankly - well, with the mask on there weren't a lot of other emotions you could detect, but you were pretty sure you were dead-on. Finally he turned slowly, and sighed. "No."

"Excellent!" you crowed, and the wide-eyed stare that erupted on the Spidey-mask was all too telling. "Honestly, I was kinda worrying you'd cave - because I think stealing the one proper superhero that the Big Apple has would be criminal."

"Hey - there's like - Daredevil, and Iron Fist, and Power Man - or whatever he's going by these days…" Peter objected. "And there's - a few other friends. They count."

"You would classify a guy going around in a fetish Halloween costume above you?" You shook your head. "Seriously?"

"He's like - broody and stuff," Peter protested. "And Luke - that's Power Man - has this whole fighting for hire thing going on. He's pretty much a badass."

"Yeah, I think I'll vote for the guy who just tied up a few dozen people without even getting hit once.Why did I give you that bulletproof vest again?" You grumbled. "I could have used that thing for the extra protection…"

"You can have it back."

You waved vaguely. "Nah, I'll trade it for you when I've figured out something cooler. Keeps me busy, anyway. Or you could sell it - Reed would give up a few months of funding to get his talons on some of the tech in that thing…"

Peter cocked his head to the side. "Reed Richards? You wouldn't mind?"

"I wasn't serious," you complained, rubbing your arm. "Look, I won't ask you to move again - but I'm still offering you a job. Because I'm pretty sure you're a genius." You smiled. "I mean, I saw what kind of stuff you pulled out there - and that's amazing. Adding to that the fact that you're a science geek, and honestly I want to see what you can do with a lab. I suck at chemistry, it'd be nice to have someone around who is smarter than me."

"...You suck at it?"

You grimaced. "Don't tell anyone - but back in MIT, I got aB. Minus.Dad wouldn't stop talking about it for…" You hesitated. "Anyway, I tried to improve on that, but the last time I spent any time working with chemicals I didn't have someone else design was, oh -" You thought back to mice and rabbits dying, one by one, as the gas reached them. "- twenty years."

"Tough," Peter murmured. "So what about this stuff?" He tapped his chest curiously.

"ThatI shamelessly stole from Roxxon. Don't tell anyone." You leaned back, closing your eyes. "And by steal, I mean reverse engineer, of course."

"...Are you sure you suck at this?"

You opened one eyes, smirking. "You reverse engineered artificial spider-silk, didn't you? Infinitely more impressive. So you tell me." You smiled at his silence. "A subsidiary of Roxxon recently went under in New York, and they've elected not to reuse the property. In fact, I doubt they want to get in a fight with Oscorp on home territory. That's probably why it was so cheap to buy."

You could feel Peter's stare through his mask, even with your eyes closed.

"Horizon Labs is not a subsidiary of Stark Industries," you said lightly. "It's just an empty building now, of course - but with a little money and some rebranding, I think I can make it work. I've been looking for a change of venue, anyway. Tired of the West Coast - too many murderous assassins in these parts."

"Are you serious?" Peter demanded.

"Not generally," you noted airily. "But in this case? Yup. There's a few projects I'm working on - and I've been setting up a new company to house them, one that doesn't have the stigma of the current one. I'm working off seed money from my own pocket, and I've got plenty to spend." You smiled at Peter's bafflement. "If you can't come to Stark Industries - I guess itwill have to come to you."

"That's kinda creepy..."

"Says the guy in the bug pajamas," you returned blithely. "I'll get a bunch of people from my other labs to move over to New York - I've got personnel to spare, and I probably will move in. So if you agree, I'll toss you into that tank, too. You can start with - say - ten people working for you? How's that sound?"

The boy stared blankly through his mask. "...You're crazy."

"It's been said." You raised an eyebrow. "I have only one demand. Whatever you make - and honestly, I really don't care if it's spider-stuff or something - I want it to be humiliating."You gave him a thumbs up. "You know to whom, of course."

Peter nodded slowly.

"Right! That settles it. Welcome to -" you hesitated. "Right. We need a name."

"Webhead Industries?" the boy joked, sounding rather out of it.

"No - and don't get a big head over this! Mine's large enough."

"...Too late."

You arrived home to an empty house, long after the sunset - it was probably four in the morning if not later, and even Jarvis was sluggish to answer. The armor, or the parts of it that still worked, has been stashed in the garage by the helpful lackeys of Director Fury, and you were only partially done getting rid of all the superfluous bandages that S.H.I.E.L.D.'s hot nurse had wrapped you in for even the tiniest cut.

"I don't suppose I get a day off after this mess?" you murmured as you crossed the threshold, tossing your jacket and shirt aside as you made your way towards the bedroom, reluctantly diverting towards the kitchen as your stomach grumbled. "I feel like a ton of bricks right now, you know…"

"You have gone to bed at stranger times," Jarvis quipped lightly."Might I suggest - skipping the afternoon press conference? S.H.I.E.L.D. offered to handle it."

"Hm. Maybe that's just more reason to go myself," you replied, scratching the edge of the Arc Reactor in your chest as you hobbled to the refrigerator. It hadn't taken any direct hits during the battle with the latest adrenaline-fueled steroid monkey, but the jostling of the magnet wasn't particularly comfortable while the suit wasn't attached tightly, and your ribs ached from the stress. More shock dampeners were a given if you wanted to take it out for another spin.

Taking a long, disgusted gulp from the green gloop that Jarvis had cooked up for you - the funky mixture of radiation-treatment meds tasted like something that tried very hard to be custard, but gave up partway between artichoke and regurgitated bile. Basically, ew. Although it couldn't, of course, prevent cancer, the stuff went a long way towards preventing any other symptoms of radiation poisoning. It was also incredibly expensive to make - but then, you were rich for a reason.

"Jarvis, see if there's any television coverage, will you?" You said, dropping your cup in the sink. "I want to know if I should start looking over my shoulder all paranoid. More than I already do, I mean. And maybe I'll have to arrange a settlement for Peter or something. Like, an actual small village where he can live or something - he'd skin me if I got him unmasked."

"There has been some coverage, sir, but none has linked Stark Industries to the explosion at the harbor. There was a brief mention of Mr. Stane's collapse in an unrelated bulletin, but that is the extent of current reports."

"S.H.I.E.L.D.'s hard at work I see," you noted as you dropped your shoes somewhere in the middle of the hallway, hopping towards the door as you pulled on a stubborn sock. "Do they have a cover story for everything ready yet? The one in Vegas sucked,so..."

"I have heard nothing yet, sir. Mr. Coulson is somewhat annoyed with me."

"Because you didn't answer all his questions?"

Jarvis hesitated. "He wanted to have a shot at the man you defeated, sir."

"Heh. Good for him." You rubbed your eyes as you lost your pants somewhere in the journey to a warm bed, and then the rest of what was left. You thought distantly that you could really use a nice warm blanket - it was cold out, and your eyelids were drooping. The former might have had something to do with your lack of covering, but you were too tired to care.

"Wake me at eight - and not a minute earlier," Tony called. "Night, Jarvis."

"Sir -"

"I said: Night, Jarvis!" you called again, stumbling into your room.

"Mr. - Stark?!" Pepper's scandalized gasp finally clued you in as to Jarvis' hesitance, and you pressed your eyes closed. It took an extraordinarily long time by your standards to realize that you'd just committed a bit of a social faux-pas. In your own home.

Oh. Right. You were naked. And it wasn't a Friday.

You brought up your hands defensively, eliciting a second outraged sound. "Look, this isn't what it looks like - I mean…" You glanced down. "Okay, I promise, it was just a bit chilly outside, I swear!"

"What do you think of - hm…" You leaned back, still half-clothed and leaning against the backboard of the bed lazily. "Stark - Superior? Nah, sounds like I've gone full-on egomaniac, doesn't it? How about Stark's Totally Awesome Random Krap? With a K? It spells out my name, see?"

"You could have died, Tony, and you're talking about company slogans?" Pepper blurted, her hands steepled in front of her, trembling slightly in evidence of her thinly-veiled anger. "You want to save your crazy epiphanies for the morning, and focus on the important things for three seconds? You are a self-destructive moron,and I can't just let my boss go up in flames!"

"...Yeah, that would cut into your salary," you agreed after a moment. "Also, I'm pretty sure you would be a suspect number for my murder, given your usual omniscience about what I do, so it would be a mess…" You rubbed your forehead. "I'm not dead, Pepper. I didn't die to random murderers the last two times, either. Yes, I have an uncanny knack for running into these idiots - but I also get myself out again."

"And how many times do you have to get lucky before you realize the next time might be the unlucky one?" she asked strongly. "You can't keep doing this to yourself."

"That's kinda why I built a big metal suit of badassery," you confessed after a while. "Rhodey told you about all that, didn't he? I figured he'd beat me here by half a night."

Pepper nodded, wiping her disheveled hair out of her eyes. "Yes. He's - told me pretty much everything, I guess. You, he, and your mystery guest went and saved Obi's life." She looked away. "I - I'm glad he's alright, Tony, of course. And I know that you'd do anything for some people in your life - for Rhodey, for me. But… don't you realize this is all crazy?"

You stared at her for a long moment, which stretched to half a minute. "Ever since the cave, I haven't really been - the same," you said at last. "Call me crazy - maybe I am. Maybe I got a few screws knocked loose in there. But I think I'm sane, and awake, and these last few months have just been glimpses of things I'd never even thought about before. It's like…"

"Tony?"

"It's not me that's breaking, Pepper. It's the world." You sank backwards. "In the last two months, I've run into several reminders of my dad's old work - ancient stuff, from the Second World War. Someone's continued it into modern times, it seems, and might still be making super-soldiers, people that can do the utterly impossible. There's whole spy organizations dedicated to that sort of stuff now, and a conspiracy to keep the details secret - and it all links back to my family. It has to mean something."

Pepper swallowed thickly. "And why is that?"

"It wouldn't make sense, otherwise. You've already guessed who my 'mystery guest' was, I'm sure," you murmured. "You'd be stupid if you hadn't, especially after Rhodey's involvement. Peter's way is one possible answer. He's a -" You waved your hand vaguely. "Call him a superhero. He's got a gift, all of that. He uses it to save kittens from trees, help grandmas across the street, who knows what else. He makes lives better, at the cost of having a dead-end job as a freelance photographer with scheduling issues." You paused. "And you won't ever breathe a word of that, understood? It's kind of a secret."

"Of course I won't…" She halted, staring. "Wait, you want to be a superhero?" she demanded then, incredulous. "I know you're like a moody teenager in an adult's body, but that's just - crazy!"

"Or fantastic?" you inquired slyly. "I didn't say that I was going to take his way. I just said it's one possible answer to the question I'm dealing with. The one that everyone's always dealing with, whether they acknowledge it or not." You smiled. "What's next?"

"Right," Pepper murmured dubiously. "...So, you're not going to be playing a superhero again?"

You smiled. "Not playing, no. But that's a question for another time, when my masterpiece armor isn't a pile of rubble that's ripe for the scrapyard. Right now - I have to deal with fallout. Not literally, thankfully."

You dragged yourself off the bed, the linen just barely hanging on as you strode across the room, pulling a few papers from under a pile of boring tax receipts. "I told you I wanted to start a new company before - for a myriad of reasons. Most of them are cool, though. I've got most of the paperwork drawn up already, because I've been thinking about this thing for a while. It's just that I want to make it happen, now."

Pepper sighed. "The Board's not that satisfied with you, Tony. That device you showed them is remarkable, but it'll take a long time for the expenses to be recouped. A year or two before all these experimental designs can be trusted enough to replace the grid. You've been given breathing room - not carte blanche. Especially with Obi out of the picture…"

You scowled. "He's not dead,Pepper. Some things would be simpler if he were."

"...Tony?!" she asked, startled.

You looked up and rolled your eyes at Pepper's horrified expression. "Oh, come on, you know I wouldn't wish that on the guy," you protested. "I just meant… with the company. Pardon me for focusing on the pragmatic. Obi gave me the key to his share of the company. in case he ever died. I've been thinking about that."

She blinked, surprised. "He… did? I didn't think you two trusted each other that well."

"He encrypted the data stick to hell and back, so it's not really a trust thing," you said, narrowing your eyes. "Odds are he's set someone up to monitor what's going on at the company, and he'll send the key after it's clear that Obadiah croaked. Seeing as Obi probably didn't plan on getting knocked out, his share is effectively useless for now. Until there's some ruling on it, it'll be me against the board."

Pepper studied you for a long moment, her gaze studiously remaining focused on your face all the time - she had a will of iron. "So, what do you want to do? Start a new company, at one of the worst possible moments?"

"The new company won't be under the board's direct control," you began lightly. "No oversight committee beyond the one I personally assemble, no contracts with government entities, clandestine or otherwise, without my express permission. In fact, it won't be a for-profit corporation at all, beyond the fact that I'll probably profit from it.The end goal isn't the biggest possible income - but a high technology turnover rate. The vast majority of earned cash will go back into R&D, and particularly successful mass-producible projects will be brought onto the market with the help of various contractors."

"That's…"

"A Think Tank with a set of balls," you agreed. You smiled at her stunned look. "Pepper, I want to start on wholly new things, on projects beyond weaponry, and I have the money to make that happen. My personal fortune will go in as seed money, alongside a portion of profits from SI's non-military projects, hopefully. The entry price for high-tech is - well, high." You shrugged. "The Board won't like this stuff, of course, but they'll see the flip-side soon enough. In exchange for letting me go on this midlife-crisis soul-searching mission, if you will, they'll lose my direct influence on their actions as I'm busy elsewhere. Even if Obi wakes up again soon, they'll still have control."

"...And that's a good thing?" Pepper asked dubiously. "I know you've never gotten along with them, but you've been building in-roads. If you ignore SI…"

You winked. "Oh, the Board of Directors won't dare do anything drastic in the first few months, lest I come running back to save things - I'm still CEO. They'll get comfy as I stay away for long periods without messing with things, and aim for replacing me. Only then, when they're nice and calm and confident, they'll start to realize that I set up a yearly renewal for the rights on nearly all of my personal inventions. Of which they use a lot.They'll end up paying mefor the right to use their own designs, or they'll be forced to backtrack to the eighties..."

"You did that?" Pepper said, evidently impressed despite herself. "That's…"

"One of Dad's better ideas," you said, sighing. "He had other reasons to need a steady flow of cash to his person - but the idea was solid. The legality is murky, but nobody's actually dared to sue me over it. Probably since they don't know. The Board will try and toss me out as the CEO, of course - but at that point, I have no intention of still being the one doing that job." You glanced at her, shrugging. "They won't be able to touch my new gig anymore; I'll be more than ready then to break off, if need be, and let SI crumble in favor of my own alternative. It's foolproof."

Pepper shook her head. "...You really are crazy, you know that?"

You met her eyes and grinned. "Hey, how much do you want to bet that I'll build a bigger company in five years, than dear old Dad ever managed in his lifetime? C'mon, I'll bet you twenty bucks. I know you have some on you, I can see those babies hanging out between your -"

"Tony."

"Fine, it's actually fifty bucks - I wanted to make it seem like I hadn't been staring too long." You raised an eyebrow. "So, what gives? Are you in?"

"Stark… Ascendant." You stared up at the sky, tracing the lines left behind by airplanes in the distance, the stars nearly lost in the glare of the city lights. Even here, a little ways away from the really light-polluted center, there wasn't much to see at night. The Moon was there, and occasionally a few of the planets - but nothing too exciting besides. The last time you'd seen the Milky Way had been out in Utah of all places. "Stark… hm. Maybe ditch the Stark entirely?"

"You can take it out of the name," Rhodey said lightly. "Doesn't mean you can take it out of the company. Unless you go full hands-off and never associate SI with this new thing of yours at all, you'll get the backlash of your involvement whichever way we slice it. Might as well just take it on the chin and own it, right?"

You glanced over to him. "Probably. By the way, you were surprisingly lenient over getting on this roof..."

"I heard about it from Pepper," Rhodey said. "I think she's secretly a fan of this place - she does say you don't get enough fresh air. I suppose the top of your house is a better place to go than the usual." He shrugged. "Strip clubs get boring, I guess?"

"Not really," you protested. "I've just been…" You paused. "You know, every explanation I can give will probably reflect badly on either my masculinity or my age, so…" You made a gesture as if zipping up your mouth. "If you need something to pump the image back up to testosterone-fueled levels, you can think of that suit downstairs as the first step towards femme fatale sexbots, if you like."

"...Knowing you, that's not a joke," Rhodey muttered.

"Eh, the suit's a hobby. I wasn't planning on getting in a fight with it - the fact that I had it around was just fortuitous timing. If this mess had all happened a week or two earlier, I'd probably have arrived with Dad's old six-shooter and a taser. We got lucky."

"You got lucky," Rhodey said candidly. "I was nearly a mile away, there was smoke and a crazy guy flinging around on wires, and I still popped twelve with about thirty rounds total between them. All but one were non-lethal. I'll put that on my resume any day. Officially, I was never there. Unofficially, I got a commendation."

"And I got shouted at for six hours by the nanny of the our nanny-state," you muttered sourly. "The world's not a fair place, Rhodey."

"Says the guy who is rolling in money, can get any woman he wants, and is playing superhero on the side while building his dream-company. You're telling me things aren't fair?" He scoffed. "Where is my jet-pack, Tony? I'm waiting."

You smiled languidly. "It's in development. If everything works out, the first Stark equipment will be arriving in New York as we speak, and hopefully Muntz can handle the start-up issues without me. With a bit of luck, I'll have the Board's cash approval by Monday, so I'll be ready to spend a little time overseeing it right away. I - still need to tell Pepper, though."

"You haven't told her?" Rhodey asked slowly. "...You told me, but not your secretary?"

"It's - she's flexible, she really won't mind," you defended. "It's just that I was sort of thinking that since I'm moving away from my usual role as very visible CEO - she could take over some of my old duties… Just a few. Because I kind of realized she'd been doing a lot of them already. I was thinking - all the other ones, maybe."

Rhodey stared. "You want to make Pepper the CEO of your company?"

"I'm thinking about it," you said quickly. "There's other options, and I want to get a grip on this whole smuggling and assassination angle before I even dare put her on that stage - but I can kinda see it happening. Seeing as I fully intend to spend some time with my crazy ideas, and Obi's down for the count, it seems like a good idea to have a trustworthy and capable person in that role. I am probably neither, anyway."

Rhodey crossed his arms, frowning. "All of this isn't because of that - hothead reporter kid with secrets, is it? I note that he's from New York..."

"Peter?" You shrugged. "Not entirely, but I kinda suspect he's more like me than I realized. I mean, we already have the whole fast-talking thing going for us, and that's fun, but I think there's more at play. Like, I get the same vibe that I used to get from Reed, before he turned out to be a tool. I've got a good feeling about his performance."

"You hate Reed Richards," Rhodey observed dryly. "He's also a fast-talking smart-ass, come to think of it. I just realized that means you kind of, sort of, hate yourself. Shocker."

"Shut up," you grumbled. "Reed's an ass, but he's very intelligent. He has some good ideas, and given the right circumstances - I would totally hire him to pour me coffee or something." You smirked at Rhodey's expression. "Of course, the two of us have a bet going, and I figured it might be a good place for my new company to start. You know, a little friendly competition between two budget-limited organizations?"

"...Yeah, good luck with that," Rhodey said, sighing as he walked away to the edge of the roof, peering out into the evening sky.

The idea for owning up to the bet had been growing for a while, ever since the sneer-filled banter between you and Richards at the disastrously fated conference that never truly got off the ground. You'd joked about Reed's intentions, but in truth you couldn't fault the man from trying, again and again, to get his ideas out into the world. They tended to be impractically expensive and time-intensive, but they were, nevertheless, brilliant.

Reed's choice of focus wasn't a bad one, either - for the past few years, there had been rumblings in the space-travel community, dominated for decades by government activities. NASA and its foreign equivalents had done great things, but the inevitable result of bogging down exploration with a bloated bureaucracy, state politics and pork barrel projects, was that decline set in. Although things still happened, the timescales were stretched beyond recognition. Without the Space Shuttle, there was precious little in the way of manned work going on outside the Space Station.

Once upon a time, when NASA was young, and vibrant, and had more money than it had ever held on account of the space race, Man had landed on the Moon. It was an accomplishment that had been repeated half a dozen more times in the subsequent years - and then never again. The faucet of money ran too dry for such a huge project to be set up within a short timescale, like the Apollo project had been, and such expensive plans would never survive a political upheaval such as an unfavorable election. It was difficult to keep the James Webb Space Telescope project running - the successor to wonder-child Hubble. That said quite enough on its own.

That left, as always, the private sector. The reason that they had not already stepped in to do the job was the difficulty, and the expenses. Almost nobody had the cash to pour into space travel on a private level save a few eccentric billionaires, and progress was slow. The Holy Grail of cheap access to space had been a mantra since the dawn of the space age, since even Wernher von Braun's first concept for a three-stage launcher was fully reusable, and was expected to be recycled for launch in only 11 days. And yet - it never materialized.

The reasons for the stupendous price tags were many, but none were quite as staggering as the cost of the rockets themselves, the machines that turned an object on Earth into an orbiting one - the barrel of the gun. The tyranny of the rocket equation demanded that a huge amount of energy had to be spent to get a relatively small amount of mass up to speed, and that energy was transported in the form of gigantic towering canisters of fuel. And for each additional volume of fuel to take along into the stratosphere and beyond, one would need to account for the mass of thatfuel as well. And it all had to be stable, and functional, and perfectly calibrated for the right orbit. And if things went wrong…

"I have a few calls to make," you commented idly, and Rhodey grunted in acknowledgement, sitting on the edge of the roof, looking down at the pool directly below and probably considering jumping in. It was still on the warm side - you wouldn't blame him. You dialed the first number you could think of that would be relevant.

Until this moment, only nations had really been playing the rocket game. There were some startups that tried, of course, but nobody could break the tyranny, nobody could end the stalemate between the spirit of exploration and the spirit of economic sustainability. There was probably one of those, you figured.

But now - now you had the repulsor. It needed development, and work - but you had just the company in mind for that. The repulsor didn't use fuel to make thrust, it didn't need an outside source the size of a building to blast off. You held the knife, the weapon that could end this enduring tyranny. And you'd do it by stabbing the king that was Gravity in the kidneys. A lot.

"Yes, hello?" the phone blurted.

"Hey there, Elon. You told me to call you when I had something to propose," you said lightly. "Well… I have something to propose. How's Wednesday at three sound to you?"

"What's this about?"

"Oh, nothing much, really." You smirked. "Just that the crown is mine. I cracked the impossible." You hung up. "Hah! That was satisfying. He was probably in the office, so I'll have Jarvis fetch the video later."

"I am already recording, sir,"Jarvis' voice sounded from somewhere below you. "Mr. Musk seems agitated."

"I bet he is - he just lost a thousand bucks - let's make it a two-fer. Give me the number for Branson, will you? I'll Skype him. And you know the drill there. If he's nude, please don't show me anything." You shuddered. "I never want to stumble across that again. Ugh."

"Of course, sir. I'll be sure to delete this morning's local footage too."

You pouted. "Did Pepper put you up to that?"

"You know the answer to that question, sir."

"Hmmm, 'Advanced Idea Mechanics' - you said this suddenly came to you?"

You nodded, stretching. "Yeah, I was just brainstorming, and I had to pause on that one. It's not really very Stark-y, but I think you can make lots of fun pokes at my old profession with an acronym like 'Aim' - as in, 'AIMing to the future, now' or something. Also, it has my profession in the name, which is awesome." You smiled. "What do you think?"

"It's pretty good," Pepper said with a fake smile. "So good, in fact, that somebody else already thought of it. About ten years ago." She rolled her eyes. "You must have heard the name come by somewhere, it's pretty big in biotech and the like. You're not nearly as original as you think."

"Do you think we could use like a variant on the name?" You offered. "I dunno, go with Advanced Ideas Mechanics? Maybe something else with the acronym - like, um, Artificially Intelligent Masters?" You sighed. "I'm joking, sheesh. Guess that puts me back with my number two again. Which isn't really…"

"Stark Ascendant sounds decent," Pepper agreed. "Bit preachy, maybe. You know, ascension…. People get a temper over possible religious references, and you're not really known for your, ahem, tact."

"I'm rich, I voted for Bush - both of them - and I love my guns so much I make my own. If that's not enough to get me in the door with the South, kissing the cross won't help any," you mused. "So, not going with Ascendant, then. We could do Stark Solutions, maybe? Revolutions?"

"Sounds like a cleaning product and domestic terrorists respectively," Pepper said blandly. "Anything more interesting than the first, and less so than the second?"

You sighed. "Stark Resilient has been knocking around in my head…"

"Too - honestly, it's too on-the-nose," she argued, scowling. "Everyone will make the connection with all the stuff that's happened to you recently, and they'll think it's all some sort of acting out over that. Probably not a good idea to remind people that you get shot at regularly. Bad for stocks."

"And for us." You stopped momentarily as a thought came to you. "...I think I know what to call it. Not Ascendant - but close. How about we go with Stark - Transcendent?"

"Yeah, that's not preachy at all," Pepper deadpanned.

"You can see the metaphor, right?" you asked. "Rising above the previous limits, over the very top of what people believe. Technological progress that breaks expectations, that changes things fundamentally. That's the kind of stuff I want to work on. Not guns - not anymore. An enlightened perspective, I should think."

"Yeah, you're pretty much Buddha now."

You smirked. "No need for sarcasm. You can tolerate the name, then? Stark Transcendent? I kinda need to know since I have to get the signs made." You raised an eyebrow. "Oh, and Miss Potts? You'd better start packing. We leave in two days."

"...Leave?" she asked. "Where?"

You grinned broadly at her baffled expression. "We're moving to the Big Apple!"

She stared long and hard before she finally turned without a word. You were pretty sure she'd be over it by morning. Right around the time she found out that half the building would be opened up again to reverse the computer upgrade that'd been installed just a week before - because you weren't going to leave your buddy's main core behind.

You hoped both Pepper and Jarvis would forgive you soon.