47: Iron-Man?

—

While Peter was busy with his training, school, dates with Gwen, his games, some small projects, sex, and selling the ruby, Tony Stark was hammering the helmet of his suit. A suit he was making so that he could get out of this place. Tony had learned many lessons by getting kidnapped, and somewhere in his heart, he was grateful that he was kidnapped, otherwise, he wouldn't have woken up.

"You have till tomorrow to assemble my missile"

The words of Raza, the head of the Ten Rings, echoed in Tony's mind as he shoved the helmet down in the water to cool it down before setting it on the table in front of his recent buddy, Yinsen.

"It's time, Yinsen," Tony said, getting ready for the final showdown. He'd stayed in this place for long enough, the leader of the Ten Rings had given him a deadline, which was approaching, and he hadn't created the missile for him. Tony hadn't even started working on the earlier process of the missile.

He had never started working on it, nor would he ever will. Not for the Ten Rings. Tony might be many things, an alcoholic, a playboy, a bad man, a billionaire, but he'd come to realize that his tech was being used for something wrong. And he wasn't going to make another one of those missiles for these terrorists.

He'd had enough.

Someone was using his name to move shipments of his tech, and Tony didn't know who. He had his suspicions, of course, but those weren't really all that believable.

Tony wrapped his hands up as Yinsen lifted the suit—which Tony had built, along with an Arc Reactor which was working like his heart right now, In this cave—and helped Tony suit up.

"Okay? Can you move? Okay, say it again." Yinsen said, making sure Tony remembered everything right.

Tony nodded, "41 steps straight ahead. Then 16 steps, that's from the door, fork right, 33 steps, turn right."

Meanwhile, Raza, the leader of the Ten Rings, noticed that Tony Stark couldn't be seen on the security footage he was receiving

"Where is Stark?" he asked, speaking in fluent Arabic.

"Uh," The man beside him squinted at the screens. "He was here a moment ago."

"Go look for him," Raza ordered, feeling as if something was wrong, so very wrong.

The men rushed to the cell Tony Stark had been kept inside. They had guns in hand, and were ready to shoot at a moment's notice.

"Yinsen! Yinsen! Stark!" One of the men shouted, thumping against the metal door, hard.

On the other side of the door, Tony Stark was finally showing some signs of panic.

"Say something!" he hissed. "Say something back to him!"

"But he's speaking Hungarian," Yinsen said, looking at him as if he was dumb. "I don't…"

"Then speak Hungarian!" Tony hissed again, and Yinsen nodded heavily, walking up to the door.

"Okay, I know."

"What do you know?" Tony asked.

The men from the other side continue shouting through the door, and Yinsen shouted something back at them. As the door opened and exploded, Tony and Yinsen got back to the suit-up process.

Time was running out, and they needed to hurry the fuck up.

"Initialize the power sequence," Tony said, sounding rushed. "Now!"

"Okay. Tell me." Yinsen said, and Tony began giving him instructions. The progress bar on the screen started moving.

[09%]

Tony and Yinsen were quite stressed at the progress. More men were swarming, they could hear the muffled shouts from outside.

[17%]

"Make sure the checkpoints are clear before you follow me out, okay?" Tony asked Yinsen for confirmation. He'd made a friend here, and he wasn't leaving without him. He refused to leave without him.

[26%]

"We need more time," Yinsen said, staring at the progress bar.

[39%]

"Hey," Yinsen called out. Tony stared at him. "I'm gonna go buy you some time." Saying so, Yinsen walked up to a dead man and picked up his gun.

[50%]

"Stick to the plan!" Tony hissed.

[76%]

"Stick to the fucking plan!" Tony yelled as he watched Yinsen running out of the cave. "Yinsen! Yinsen!"

[91%]

Tony stared at the progress bar move while Yinsen aimlessly shot at the cave walls as he ran, scaring the men. Yinsen killed many men but was stopped at the mouth of the cave by a group of men.

[100%]

The progress bar finished loading, causing the lights to dim, and the suit to be powered up. A lot of men swarm inside with guns in hand and start shooting at Tony, but their bullets get deflected by his suit. Tony had enough of their shit, so he attacked them using the suit, killing each and every one of them before he made his way out of the cave while attacking more men. As Tony got up to the mouth of the cave, he spotted Raza, that fucker.

But Tony couldn't focus on him. no. Tony couldn't, his attention was swept by the bloody figure of Yinsen. He'd been shot. Tony's eyes flared up in anger.

"Yinsen!" he shouted, running up to the man.

"Watch out!" Yinsen cautioned as Raza tried to shoot at Tony. Keyword tried. The fucker couldn't even aim properly, and he missed Tony. Tony, however, had had enough. He took aim at Raza and shot back, hitting the wall behind Raza, which subsequently caused a mini explosion. The explosion erupted, knocking Raza out.

"Come on," Tony said, walking up to Yinsen as he opened the helmet. "We got to go. Move for me, come on." Tony stared at Yinsen. "We got a plan. We're gonna stick to it."

"This was always the plan, Stark." Yinsen wheezed out.

Tony didn't like the sound of that.

"Come on, you're gonna go see your family. Get up." Tony growled, causing Yinsen to smile.

"My family is dead. I'm going to see them now, Stark. It's okay. I want this. I want this." Yinsen whispered.

"Thank you for saving me." Tony lowered his head.

"Don't waste it. Don't waste your life." Yinsen's words hit Tony hard as he watched life seep out of Yinsen's eyes.

Tony stared at his newly-found friend, and couldn't help but get angry. Enraged. He heard a commotion at the mouth of the cave and got up to look at what it was; more men, who shot at him. Honestly speaking, it was getting old for Tony. He was getting bored with all this.

As the men took shots at him—which were totally ineffective, by the way—Tony only spoke two words, "My turn." And hell broke loose

Tony raised his hand, and flamethrower—which he'd attached to the suit—came out, and started spewing fire at the men and their camp. The men, however, didn't relent and continued to shoot at him, causing some damage to the suit. After noticing the damage his suit was receiving, Tony killed a few more men before Tony flipped a button on his suit and flew up in the air akin to a rocket.

He started breathing erratically before the fuel runs out and he fell hard into the sand on the other side of the mountains. The suit broke apart, and Tony ruffled out of the sand, huffing.

"Not bad," Tony muttered, falling back into the sand to catch his breath and get some small rest before started wandering through the desert, exhausted. Just when he was about to collapse, Tony heard the sounds of helicopters.

Adrenaline rushed through his veins as he looked up, and smirked.

"Hey!" Tony shouted, waving at the helicopters. "Hey!"

Peter yawned, typing at the keyboard at a fast speed. His eyelids were drooped over his eyelids, and he was extremely bored and tired of typing code for hours upon hours—but what could he do? This was important, or he'd die otherwise. Probably.

As he was typing continuously, without a break—since his body didn't really desire one—, a notification on his phone made him stop. He looked down, his phone was set to inform him of any big kind of breaking news, and it seemed that something big had happened that his phone buzzed.

So, he quickly looked over the notification, which caused his eyes to widen slightly, but only for a jiffy before he turned to his computer and typed for a bit. And just in a few seconds, live footage on a conference was being broadcasted on his pc.

"Hey, would it be all right if everyone sat down?" said Tony Stark, sitting down in front of the podium. "Why don't you just sit down? That way you can see me, and I can... A little less formal and..." he took a bite of his cheeseburger as every sat down on the ground, taking notes of his every action.

Peter chuckled; this was the same scene he remembered seeing in [Iron-Man]. though this scene also had some implications.

"Good to see you." Tony said, copied by Obadiah Stane. "I never got to say goodbye to Dad. I never got to say goodbye to my father. There's questions that I would have asked him. I would have asked him how he felt about what this company did. If he was conflicted, if he ever had doubts. Or maybe he was every inch the man we all remember from the newsreels. I saw young Americans killed by the very weapons I created to defend them and protect them. And I saw that I had become part of a system that is comfortable with zero accountability."

"Mr. Stark!" a reporter called out.

"Hey, Ben."

"What happened over there?" Ben asked.

"I had my eyes opened," Tony said solemnly, standing up before he moved behind the podium. "I came to realize that I have more to offer this world than just making things that blow up. And that is why, effective immediately, I am shutting down the weapons manufacturing division of Stark International until such a time as I can decide what the future of the company will be."

There was quite a commotion caused by Tony's words, and Obadiah quickly stood up, moving beside Tony. "I think we're gonna be selling a lot of newspapers."

Ignoring Stane, Tony continued talking. "What direction it should take, one that I'm comfortable with and is consistent with the highest good for this country, as well." Saying so, Tony walked off stage.

Obadiah's face was something to look at, and Peter even chuckled as the old coot came up and tried to calm the situation by diverting everyone's attention.

"What we should take away from this is that Tony's back! And he's healthier than ever…"

Peter closed the window; he wasn't going to listen to Obadiah's farce. Peter leaned back on his chair as he rubbed his eyes. [Iron Man] was coming, and it was coming fast. Peter was stumped by it a bit, as it indicated the start of the changes taking place on Earth. Changes that would give Peter a headache. He was also more than annoyed at the fact that the timeline, too, was fucked up beyond prediction.

For one, Tony had been kidnapped way early than in the movies, more so, he'd come out early too. Peter sighed; this only meant opportunities for him, at least. He could steal some tech or something. He didn't really know what he was supposed to do here.

And this is only the start too.

Peter hunched back into the chair, worried for his loved ones.

Maybe it was time to start training Gwen? Sure, she was pregnant, but she was a spider, and learning about her powers and their use in-depth would only help her further. She could protect herself if he wasn't there. Peter needed to learn some protective spells too; he'd place them on everyone he was close to. Just like he'd placed mind protection spells on them.

So much to do.