Man of Iron - Arrival 1.2
Brockton Bay
The Boardwalk
"Will she be alright?" Taylor asked as the ambulance containing Glory Girl roared off its sirens howling with its red and white LED lights strobing as it shot down the street.
"I don't know, neurological shock is an ugly thing. She could come out of it fine or she could be declared DOA when she arrives at the hospital. Still, we probably saved her life, you did a good job under pressure." Tony said and the rail thin girl nodded in response.
"Thanks Iron Man, I," Taylor replied, she really didn't know what to say, a cape had just complimented her on keeping a cool head.
"It's not a problem Taylor, us capes, while we're supposed to be heroes; if we think of ourselves as being above others. Then sometimes we will end up in situations that we can't control or when we ask for help, because of our attitude towards normals, we don't get it. Being humble however, that's another matter entirely for it earns you help from those you protect." Iron Man replied and Taylor couldn't help but feel shocked by how humble those words were.
Behind them came the hearty roar of an engine that was unique. Taylor turned, she knew that sound, everyone in Brockton Bay did, even if you literally lived under a rock - due to how loud the vehicle with that engine was when running at full power.
Armsmaster had arrived with Miss Militia riding behind him on his Motorcycle, a huge behemoth of a monster that the leader of the Brockton Bay Protectorate had built personally - the heavy snarl of its twin turbo-supercharged V8 engine with oval pistons and cylinders with eight valves per cylinder - an engine that supposedly ran on ethanol with a boost system that used Nitromethane.
Iron Man seemed impressed - his armor must have had sensors that allowed him to analyze what the thing could do. "I want one," he declared immediately.
Taylor snickered. "You and every single motorcycle guy ever, that thing is outright insane. The crazy part is that it has a name."
"Not completely insane to name something you're attached to, nor to think that it has its own personality." Iron Man explained - though the jealousy was still very much there.
Miss Militia dismounted, she seemed to be shaking slightly as the woman began talking to Armsmaster.
Taylor was surprised when Iron Man chuckled. "Seems like Armsmaster takes speed limits as strongly worded suggestions. The woman, Miss Militia, is not amused."
"You must have good pickups in your armor." Taylor noted, though she wasn't surprised that Armsmaster took speed limits as suggestions. When the leader of the local protectorate decided to push his motorcycle to its limits, everyone with a couple dozen blocks knew about it.
Armsmaster had his trusty halberd slung across his back as he approached, his face masked by the helmet he wore.
"You Iron Man?" Armsmaster asked.
"I am, but I would prefer it if you call me by my actual name." Iron Man replied.
"Why's that?" Armsmaster asked.
"Because I don't like hiding who I am. Before you ask, I am not from around here, given that there's no town called Brockton Bay in the United States. There's a Brockton, but no Brockton Bay and besides in my Quantum Reality; I've been doing this superhero business since '08 and the public has known who I've been ever since my second major outing as Iron Man." Iron Man replied.
"That's dangerous, you realize that right?" Armsmaster said.
"Not for a Billionaire and former CEO of a company that's in the Fortune Fifteen."
Taylor and Miss Militia whistled and Armsmaster recoiled as if he'd been slapped. "I have to agree with Iron Man, when your position is well, that. You would have to be monumentally stupid to go after someone who is that well known in society." Miss Militia said and Armsmaster nodded.
"Right, but you're not on your Earth anymore." Armsmaster said and Taylor felt like she wanted to facepalm.
"I already figured that out Mister Halbeard considering that there isn't a bay of this size and shape at these coordinates back on my Earth." Iron Man said in what was either an irritated or cheeky tone, she wasn't sure.
Taylor face-palmed and Miss Militia started to snicker. "I can't believe you just said that to his face, Iron Man." the heroine said.
Taylor couldn't believe it either, the expression on Armsmaster's face, from what little she could see was outright hilarious. The man was giving off vibes as if he had just bitten into a lemon or something particularly foul. All Taylor could think was Iron Man hasn't been on Earth Bet for maybe thirty minutes and this is probably going to go viral on PHO.
"Me neither." Armsmaster said, "But there's still the fact that I am not an expert in portals. I've never tried to build one and I am a pretty broad Tinker."
Taylor thought about what she had read on the subject of the multiverse and how the Earth Aelph-Earth Bet portal functioned. "It shouldn't be too hard to build a portal to get Iron Man home, could it? I mean, we just need the Quantum Frequency of his armor and then we can build a portal to connect Earth Bet to whatever universe that Iron Man's from." she noted.
"In theory, yes, that is the case. But it depends a lot on how much difference in frequency between quantum frequencies that Iron Man's armor has. Earth Aelph and Earth Bet are close enough together on the frequency range that powering a portal is doable. But once you are shifting entire frequency points and not tenths or hundredths or thousandths of a point, the power requirement goes from easy to dear god why." Armsmaster replied and Taylor swore she saw Iron Man's shoulders slump.
"So I am stuck here, right." Iron Man looked down at his armor. "First outing and the Mark VII needs an overhaul at least. Yay."
"Miss Militia, can you please get the citizen's statement? I am going to continue speaking to Iron Man." Armsmaster said and Miss Militia nodded in response.
"Iron Man, care to walk with me?"
"Sure."
The two heroes walked off leaving Taylor and Miss Militia alone. The heroine sighed and then fixed her with a stern look. "Name?" she asked.
"Taylor Herbet." Taylor replied, feeling uncomfortable at the intensity of the gaze she was being given.
"Okay, Taylor, what happened?" Miss Militia asked as she pulled out a pen and notepad.
"I was walking along the boardwalk when I noticed a strange occurrence of light over the bay. I didn't get a good look at it since I only caught the tail end of it. But the sky had seemed to invert upon itself before spitting something out, Iron Man, but at the time I didn't know that." Taylor explained and Miss Militia nods.
"Alright, what next?"
Taylor paused to think about it. "I was beginning to get my phone out to call nine-one-one when Glory Girl rocketed overhead pushing herself close to maximum speed. She must have been on an afterschool patrol over the Boardwalk or the Bay and saw the disturbance that sent Iron Man here in full and went to catch him. I continued walking down the boardwalk thinking that it had been solved when I saw another flash of light, this one was more orange. I looked out and watched Iron Man and Glory Girl collide, at speed."
Miss Militia winced even as she scrawled more notes. "How fast do you think they were going?"
"Can't tell beyond not slow; I think that since Glory Girl had been trying to catch Iron Man she was prepared to grab him as soon as she got close enough. Because both of them went tumbling head over heels in a downward arc opposite to Glory Girl's line of travel and then they hit the water. It wasn't pretty, they hit the water just right to bounce, it stopped them tumbling but momentum made sure they hit the water again before hitting the beach and carving a furrow in the beach."
Miss Militia winced again. "I take it at that point you ran over to where they were?"
Taylor nodded. "Yes ma'am, I wanted to see if both of them were okay. Iron Man seemed to be alright, but Glory Girl was a mess. I think the crash overwhelmed her Brute rating, because I expected her to get up and not stay on the ground. I will say this, Iron Man has a decent eye for when someone needs to go to the hospital, it might have been his armor though. We decided to have Iron Man call nine-one-one and I called the Protectorate, I had just finished with the non-emergency call saying we had a new cape who wasn't from Earth Bet when Glory Girl went into shock. At which point, Iron Man began emergency life-saving procedures and had me help him with that." she said.
There was another wince from the heroine even as she wrote more notes. "How long did you do emergency life saving procedures?" Miss Militia asked.
"I don't know, it was all such a blur until the first ambulance arrived. Didn't seem much longer than a minute to me, but it could have been longer." Taylor replied and then after she saw that Miss Militia was done writing notes she asked a question. "Miss Militia?"
"Hmm?" the second in command of the Brockton Bay Protectorate asked.
"Is Glory Girl going to be alright? Because, when the Paramedics took over, as they were doing so, she suddenly looked terrified, I've never seen a cape look as scared as she did as they were working on putting the ventilator on as well as the neck brace." Taylor replied nervously.
"I'll look into finding out personally. Can I have your name and address in case we have any more questions that come up during this? Also, do you mind if I pass it along to Glory Girl's family so that they know of the role you played as a Good Samaritan?" Miss Militia asked.
"Yes ma'am." Taylor replied, before giving both her phone and address to the heroine. "I don't mind if you notify Brandish either."
To her surprise, it seemed like under her bandanna. Miss Militia smiled. "Will do, us capes look after each other and Brandish is a loving mother to boot; she'll be beyond thankful for what you've done here."
"Thank you ma'am."
Tony Stark/Iron Man
"Right, what's your actual name?" Armsmaster asked in a tone of dissatisfaction, as if he wasn't pleased with the idea of him actually telling him his real name.
"Anthony Edward Stark, please call me Tony. Give me a second, popping the faceplate," Tony replied and then popped open his mask. Cool air gushed into his helmet, the air smelled of the ocean, not dissimilar to the port of New York actually.
Armsmaster's body language was that of shock. "Are you insane Mister Stark?" he hissed out slowly in a low tone.
"Probably a little to be perfectly honest considering some of the shit I've done today and it's been a very long day." Tony replied and Armsmaster facepalmed.
"Put the faceplate back on."
"After the day I've had Armsmaster, fighting on the frontline of a war, I honestly need some fresh air that isn't recycled shit from my suit." Tony hissed at Armsmaster and immediately the other man's whole demeanor changed.
"War? Iron Man before you arrived here in Brockton Bay, what were you doing?" Mister Halbeard asked in a tone of confusion and surprise.
"It's a long story, but I can give you the cliff notes version. Essentially we had a demigod, Loki, go mad and he decided to launch an invasion of my Earth with the help of aliens from who the hell knows where. The Chitauri could be from another galaxy or another universe, who the hell knows, but they descended upon Manhattan in their hundreds of thousands. We fought for hours and hours on end, killing them and trying to rescue civilians as we did so as the aliens sure as hell weren't following the Geneva Conventions. But there was just no end to them as we tried to keep the fighting contained to downtown Manhattan, but there was spillover occurring even with the efforts of my team, the Avengers and another team the X-Men helping along with support from the National Guard and USAF. Eventually, some genius decided that the best way to end the fighting was to drop a contact-fuzed W87 on the city with a JSOW - managed to redirect it into the portal to take out the alien mothership, but I had to transition the portal myself to get a clear shot. The physics of it were a bit weird, but anyways the portal must have started closing before I could go and recross. Next thing I know, I am falling over Brockton Bay." Tony explained, usually he would have been a lot more flippant but he was frankly exhausted, he had been fighting non-stop for at least four hours and he just couldn't find the energy to be flippant.
Armsmaster sighed. "Right, well in that case you just earned a full medical workup. Because if you were fighting for hours then I doubt you got out of it unscathed. You could also probably use a shower too." Halbeard said and for once Tony actually felt pretty relieved, someone who was actually talking sense.
"And a bite to eat, is there a Shawarma place nearby by chance? I saw one in New York and want to try it out." Tony replied and Armsmaster frowned.
"There's a few nearby, but honestly Iron Man, we should get you checked out first before you can even start to think about food. Your health comes before your stomach." Armsmaster said and Tony wanted to argue but found that he couldn't fault the logic that the other man was saying.
"Fine, but I have to ask, is something wrong? You're stiffer than Director Fury." Tony asked, he really couldn't believe that someone could be this stiff.
"Because I am the team leader for the Protectorate Team here in Brockton Bay and who is this Director Fury?" Armsmaster replied and Tony wanted to sigh, what a stiff man.
"Director Fury isn't my boss, but an acquaintance, he's the head of the Strategic Homeland, Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division. But he's responsible for the creation of the Avengers Initiative which is what led to the formation of my team. I was hoping that the Avengers would go independent after the whole FUBAR in New York is over, but now I don't know if that is going to happen since I am here." Tony replied as he thought about what Armsmaster had said and decided that the Protectorate Leader probably had issues with being a leader.
"Great, you're affiliated with a team that may or may not be affiliated with what sounds like a division of the Department of Homeland Security. How lovely, managing things between teams is difficult enough when you have an Independent Team and the Wards or Protectorate trying to cooperate in the same city. I can already see the paperwork headaches that's going to happen if we need to cooperate between government organizations." Armsmaster deadpanned and Tony snorted out a laugh.
"So you're hoping that the Avengers go independent or that you never have to deal with SHIELD?" Tony asked, his tone mirthful.
"Yes." Armsmaster replied.
Smartass. Tony thought as he resisted the urge to grin. "Right, so where is this place we need to go too then?"
"If you have a navigation system in your armor, it shouldn't be too difficult for you to find. But here's the coordinates." Armsmaster said before rattling off Longitude and Latitude.
"Right, thanks. I would offer to race you on that motorcycle of yours, but I don't think it can go high supersonic." Tony said and Armsmaster grumbled about high level tinkertech bullshit.
Tony was really curious about what this so-called 'tinkertech' was - he had heard about the term multiple times. He didn't like being left in the dark - but he had to remind himself that he was in an alternate universe. First there had been that teenager flying through the sky with absolutely no tech at all, now he was looking at a man whose armor was well designed, well fitted, and judging by the thickness of the plates was likely at least proof against HMG fire.
"Just don't break too many windows if you go Super in the city - I hear that there used to be restrictions regarding going supersonic over the Continental United States, but those have been rescinded for years." Armsmaster said and Tony nodded, he knew that legally busting the sound barrier without a damn good reason - it had nearly landed him in hot water a few times.
"Good to know, who am I going to be meeting when I get to this headquarters?" Tony asked, he had a feeling that it was going to be a long time before he got to see even a sandwich or a bed for that matter.
"There will be a squad of PRT soldiers as well as a member of the Wards to help guide you." Armsmaster replied.
"What's a Ward?" Tony asked, he was confused by the language here.
"Superheroes in training, most trigger at young ages after a horrifically traumatizing incident. In the Wards we provide therapy if needed along with training on how to control their powers. It's not an easy life, particularly with Endbringers around, but it's something." Armsmaster replied and Tony wanted to swear loudly - kids being superheroes in a dangerous world; he also really didn't like how the phrase 'Endbringer' sounded - it reminded him far too much of what SHIELD classified as Omega Level Threats who could very much be endbringers if something or someone was stupid enough to piss one off.
"Right - since you're worried about me hiding my face, I can tell you right now that the Mark VII Armor doesn't have a detachable helmet - it wasn't designed with that in mind since my identity of Iron Man has been known on my Earth for years." Tony said and Armsmaster sighed again.
"I'll tell PHQ that you have no way of hiding your identity outside of your armor due to your extenuating circumstances. Also - for the love of Christ, if you blab that your Iron Man, you're going to have New Wave trying to recruit you. Hell, they might try and recruit you anyway because of the fact that played a role in likely saving Glory Girl's life and they will likely do the same for Ms. Herbert if she ever triggers and they're all about being open with being Capes." Armsmaster grunted out.
"Right, well is that all Armsmaster?" Tony asked.
The man with the halberd sighed and nodded. "It is Iron Man, you're clear to go."
"Right, thanks." Tony said and then with a thunk, his mask snapped shut and his HUD booted up.
"Jarvis, you got a course to the Protectorate HQ plotted?"
"Indeed sir, showing it on your HUD now. ETA is five minutes." his AI replied and Tony smiled. Yeah, he could fly.
He leaped into the air on a column of orange-white fire as he streaked into the sky; the roar of his repulsors and their jets of plasma carried him higher and higher into the sky. He pitched over and started flying deeper into the city known as Brockton Bay as headed for the Protectorate HQ, a large semi-submersible platform that looked like an old oil rig. The thing was massive, the closest match that his suit's sensors could ping was that of the Thunder Horse PDQ jointly owned by BP Petroleum and Exxonmobil. It wasn't an exact match, if anything the thing was even bigger than that rig, the estimates that his suit threw up was a tonnage of 75,000 metric tons and a displacement approaching 200,000 tons.
"Sir, I am picking up defensive emplacements on the PHQ passively tracking us. SAM systems and laser weapons for the most part - however there are a couple of what appear to be plasma cannons as well. Scans also indicate that the rig is outfitted with an energy shield system of considerable power. With power being provided by a fusion reactor that is roughly fifty percent the power of a single reactor of the planned Arc Energy Plant that's being built in Southern California." Jarvis said, throwing various pop-ups on his HUD, Tony whistled, those reactors were damn impressive, particularly considering that the Arc Reactors being built for those plants weren't unique one-off designs like the ones in Stark Tower or at Stark Industries Los Angeles - but had been designed and built for the express purpose of generating power.
The reactor design being used in the power plant could generate roughly 20-gigawatts of power at nominal load and it had four of them; granted the power plant blew the platform out of the water in terms of power generation - but still, it was very impressive tech. It also meant that the rig was likely packing some absolutely hellish heat in its energy weapons - as in it could likely carve up a Helicarrier like a turkey from beyond visual range heat.
"Attention unknown Power Suit, please state your cape name and intentions." The radio crackled.
"This is Iron Man, requesting permission to land on helipad one."
"Right, you're the new arrival. Permission granted, please speak to Aegis after landing."
"Confirm tower, on final approach now."
Iron Man roared in for landing, he didn't go for a three-point affair as that would be overaggressive though it was tempting. Instead he came in far more sedately, lining up on the pad and then slowly descending. He could see a kid, maybe seventeen years old, wearing a rust-red and silver-white custom made costume, his face almost completely shrouded; the suit that he wore provided protection against ballistic, energy, and explosive threats while the helmet according to scans would provide resistance but not protection against flashbangs, and he wasn't alone.
There were ten figures in black uniforms with the acronym 'PRT' emblazoned on their breasts and likely in much larger font across their backs - they were armed with what appeared to be, according to scans, caseless high-yield plasma propellant weapons ignited by ETC. Impressive, Stark Industries had fooled around with that technology but they could never get it to work properly, the fact that someone did was impressive enough. The fact that the weapons looked almost exactly like Pulse Rifles and Smart Guns from Aliens just increased the cool factor in Tony's own professional opinion.
He hit the concrete deck with a loud thump.
"Iron Man I presume?" the kid in red asked.
"That's me, I assume your Aegis then?" Tony replied.
"You're correct, would you please follow me? Director Piggot wants you out of that suit so we can give you a medical checkup followed by a debriefing on today's events and whatever the hell resulted in you coming here." Aegis said.
"Joy, who's going to be at the debriefing?" Tony asked.
"Director Piggot, Deputy Director Renick, myself, Gallant, Armsmaster, Miss Militia, and Brandish." Aegis replied as he started to lead them inside.
"Whose Brandish?"
"Glory Girl's mother."
"Oh crap!"