"Mr Stark? Can we pick up now where we left off? Mr Stark, please?" Senator Stern asked, trying to get the mans attension. He was facing away from the panel, exchanging looks with Pepper Potts.
"Yes dear?" Tony asked and everyone present in the room chuckled.
"Can I have your attension?" Stern asked, growing frustrated.
"Absolutly." Stark smiled.
"Do your or do you not pocess a specialised weapon?" The Senator questioned.
"I do not." Tony said bluntly.
"You do not?" Stern asked.
"I do not, well it depends on how you define weapon." Starks admitted.
"The Iron Man weapon." Stern replied.
"My device does not fit that description." Anthony stated.
"Well, how would you describe it?" Stern asked.
"I would describe it by defining it as what it is." Tony answered.
"As?" Stern asked.
"Ah, it's a, it's a high tech prosthesis. That is, actually, the most apt description I can make of it." Stark admitted. Another round of chuckles erupted from the room.
"It's a weapon. It's a weapon Mr. Stark, I think we can all agree on that." Stern reinforced.
"Please, if your priority was actually the well being America." Stark began, before being cut off by the Senator.
"No, my priority is to get the Iron Man weapon handed over to the people of the United States of America." Stern stated, coldly.
"Well, you can forget it. I am Iron Man, the suit and I are one. To turn over the Iron Man suit would be to turn over myself, which is the equivilant to servatude or prostitution depending on which state your in. Can't have it." Tony replied. The room again erupted into laughter.
"I'm no expert." Stern began.
"In prostitution? Of course not, your a senator. Come on." Stark quickly said before turning around to the room and throwing up his signiture peace sign.
"I'm no expert in weapons, but we have somebody who is. I'd like to call Justin Hammer, our current primary weapons contracter." Stern said looking at Hammer.
"Let the record reflect that I observed Mr. Hammer enter the chamber and I am wondering if and when an actual expert will be in attendance." Tony joked. The room grew with the sound of quiet chat and whispering.
"Absolutly, I'm no expert, I'd refer to you Anthony, your the expert. Senator, if I may, I may well not be an expert. But you know who was THE expert? Your dad. Howard Stark. Really a father to us all, and to the military industrial age. Let's just be clear, he was no flower child. He was a lion. We all know why were here, in the past six months, Anthony Stark has created a sword with untold possibilities and yet he insists it's a shield. He asks us to trust him as we cower behind it. I wish I were comforted Anthony, I really do. I'd love to leave my door unlocked when I leave the house. But this ain't Canada. You know, we live in a world with great threats. Threats that Mr. Stark will not always foresee. Thank you, God bless Iron Man, God bless America." Justin Hammer stated, causing most of the panel members to clap their hands.
"That is well said Mr. Hammer. The commitee would now like to invite Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes to the chamber." Stern said. The Senator was playing his ace in the hole and Eddie knew it.
"Rhodey?" Tony asked, surprised. The people in the room turned to watch the Colonel enter. Tony stood up and moved to greet his friend. The two sat down after exchanging a few quite words that the committee couldn't hear.
"I have before me, a complete report on the Iron Man weapon compiled by Colonel Rhodes and Colonel, for the record, could you read page 57, paragraph 4." Stern said.
"Your requesting that I read specifics selections from my report senator?" Rhodey asked.
"Yes sir." Stern nodded.
"It was my understanding that I going to be testifying in a much more comprehensive and detailed manor." James replied.
"I understand, a lot of things have changed today." Stern said, straightening his tie.
"You do understand that by reading a single paragraph out of context does not reflect the summary of my report." Rhodey stated. The Colonel had more or less just destroyed the chance of Sterns plan to discredit Tony.
"Thank you." Stern nodded, hiding his anger well.
"Very well. As he does not operate within any definable branch of the government, Iron Man presents a potential threat to the security of both the nation and her interests. I did however go on to say that the advantages of Iron Man far out way the liabilities and that it would be in our interest to fold Mr. Stark into the exsisting chain of command." Rhodey finished, even though Stern had been telling him to 'shut up'.
"I'm not a joiner, but I'll consider secritary of defence, if you ask nice. We can emende the hours a little bit." Tony said, leaning forward. A few more chuckles broke from the crowd.
"I'd like to go on, if I may, the imagary that's connected to your report." Stern continued.
"I believe that it may be somewhat premature to reveal these images to the general public at this time." Rhodey protested.
"I understand Colonel, if you could jsut narrate these for us please." Stern nodded.
"Put the images up." James ordered before taking a sip of his water. The screens all around the room changed from showing the seal of the United States Senate to an image of an arieal view of a large complex.
"Intellegence suggests that the device shown in these photos are in fact attempts at making manned copies of Mr. Starks suit. This has been collaborated by our allies and local intellegence, on the ground indicating that suits are quite possibly operational." Rhodey finished.
"Hold on a second there buddy. Let me see. I've comindered your screens, I need them. Time for a little transparancy." Tony said before holding his PDA or phone up to the screen. Muttering and gasps leapt from the crowd as Tony took contorl of the monitors.
"What is he doing?" Stern asked as he leaned forward.
"If I could direct your attension to sed screens, I believe that's North Korea." Tony narrated. A video of a large two legged maching walked out of a hanger and fell over before it's weapons activated.
"Can you turn that off?" Stern said as he rose from his chair and pointed at the monitor. Justin Hammer was straight out of his seat to examine the monitor as blood splatter hit the camera that was recording the video.
"Iran. No grave, imediate threat here." Tony said as a video of a suit conducting a test flight started. The Navigation system was no doubt imcomplete as the suit flew straight into the camera man.
"Is that Justin Hammer? How did Hammer get on there? Justin, your on TV." Tony smiled while a video of Justin giving instructions to a test pilot played out. Mr. Hammer increased his speed, trying to turn the screens off faster. Committee members all began to whisper and converse about the footage.
Eddie couldn't see the screen, but from all the gasps of shock and watchign Justin finally just unplugging the monitor, he knew it was bad.
"Wow, I'd say most countries five or ten years. Hammer Industries, twenty." Tony joked.
"I'd like to point out, that test pilot survived." Justin quickly said upon returning to his seat.
"I think we're done, is the point he's making." Stern said, completely stood up. Eddie just smiled to himself as he stood up and left the room. If Edward knew Tony, the next few minutes were bound to be full of truthful gloating.