"Contact left!" The female soldier called out.
A soldier got out of the vehicle but was shot down immediately.
"Jimmy, stay with them!" Said the female soldier as she and her partner also stepped out, guns blazing. But it didn't take long for them to be shot as well.
"Son of a bitch!" Jimmy cursed, opening the door. "Stay in the car!"
"Wait, wait, wait, wait! Give me a gun!" Said Tony.
Too angry and panicked, the soldier ignored him, immediately returning fire with his M249.
To no one's surprise, Jimmy died as well,bullets now pouring into the vehicle through the broken window.
Will slipped out of the car and Tony followed him while stumbling. They took cover behind the terrain while Tony tried making a SoS call. But out of nowhere a missile landed in front of them, with Stark industries logo clear on it.
"Ahmaq! Ta ba hagha woozhnee!" Someone yelled. ( Translation: Idiot! We have to capture him alive!)
Will deeply agreed. Through his watch, he had Iris do the calculations and found that the chances of Tony's survival in that position were 1.76%.
Iris calculated a safe position and he tackled Tony just as the warhead exploded.
Will casually brushed off the shrapnel from his 2-piece suit. Yep, he was unharmed. The suit was actually made of nano-fibre.
But Tony gasped. He tore open his suit, only to see red blood starting to pool on his chest.
[Mission Generated:
Tony Stark is dying and there is no Yinsen.
Mission: Save Tony Stark and Get Him To Make The Arc Reactor Technology While Aura Farming]
Seeing the screen, a grin spread on Will's face.
So, the missions really can be generated by taking the initiative.
.....
"BREAKING NEWS!Two Billionaires, Tony Stark and William Osborn have been kidnapped by Terrorists while closing pitching their new products to the Military in Afghani—"
—Channel change—
"One is the Merchant Of Death, known for dealing with Weapons of mass destruction, and the other is Savior of Lives, known for owning patents to miraculous tech that can even cure cancer."
—Channel change—
"William Osborn is the owner of Horus Visions Limited, which is the parent company of Youtube, Whatsapp, and Facebook. All of which he designed when he was a teenager. He also owns the patents for the White Knight Equipment and the Revolutionary Regeneration Cradle Tech—"
—Channel change—
"Without Stark Industries Weapons, do you think we would have won World War 2? What about Vietnam? Cold war? Do you need me to go on? Even the Afghanistan War that is currently going on would be a lot more difficult than it is now. And that's why they kidnapped him. It's a pity about William Osborn."
—Channel change—
"Samantha, it's not about whether Tony Stark's getting punished for his evil deeds. Otherwise why is William Osborn also kidnapped?"
—Channel change—
"Now the question is, how will the two business empires react to this situation? Tony IS Stark Industries, and William, aside from being the successor to Oscorp, also already has his own Business Empire at the age of 22."
…..
"The fuck is this guy playing at?" Helen muttered, trying out the coms.
While Will had informed everyone close not to worry, but is this, in any way, the kind of situation that she can 'not' worry about?
Gwen, who was beside her, dug her fingers into her palms.
"Is he doing this to find out about the bombing?" She asked.
"What? No…! No, of course not. It has nothing to do with that," said Helen.
"Then is it just a coincidence that a bomb blast similar to the Ninth precinct happened in a town just a few hundred miles away from where he was kidnapped?"
"Look, Will does some very mysterious and unpredictable things sometimes, which often make no sense whatsoever. So don't try to figure out his actions or intentions. It's better for your brain cells," Helen advised, but then she blinked.
"Well, I should take that advice as well," she murmured.
Gwen ignored her words, her eyes unconsciously straying towards various equipment where she had been doing experiments with the spider serum.
A hint of resolve flashed in her eyes.
….
At Xavier's Academy, Jean Grey looked at the breaking news, Will's words flashing in his mind. 'You might hear about the kidnapping of a couple of Billionaires.'
"... So that wasn't a joke."
….
Tony Stark woke up suddenly with a tube up his nose, laying on a cot in a cave.
Pulling it out, he tried getting up from his cot, only to find himself too weak to move.
"Oh, you're awake," said Will, who was sitting nearby, eating his breakfast with a plastic knife and fork.
"Tell me this is a nightmare."
"It is," Will smiled. "But then again, who says nightmares can't be real?"
"Did you just quote Harry Potter? Anyways, where the fuck is this?" Tony asked, surveying the dark and dingy place they were in.
"A cave inside the terrorist base. News Flash: We've been kidnapped."
Tony snorted. "Just great. Kidnapped with an Osborn kid. This really is a nightmare."
Will put down his knife and fork. "Alright, that's enough, Stark. I don't understand what you have against Osborns. Let's clear it out already."
He really had had enough. Especially after all the shit he had been going through just to help this bastard gain enlightenment.
"Don't try to be oblivious here. You and your dad have been hell bent on sucking away all of Stark Industries' wealth."
Will was stunned. "How the hell did you get that impression?"
"Oh, I don't know. My parents were assassinated mysteriously—Guess who benefitted the most from it? It was Oscorp, which directly bought out our newly opened, but yet not profitable Biotech division at a dirt cheap price. Before that you guys were just our chemical contractors."
"Okay, first of all, buying that Biotech division was also a huge gamble at the time, since no one other than your father was optimistic about it. Do you really think Norman Osborn would kill your parents for a slight possibility of profit?
Also, my father never kills someone just for petty business gains. It's just not worth the trouble, according to his words.
And if he does ever kill someone, he does not leave loose ends. The fact that you are still alive means he had nothing to do with your parents death. So, are we clear now?"
Tony still looked unconvinced. "Then why did he target our military contracts? He launched Drone tech that directly chips away most of our fighter jet and bomber contracts."
"Wow, you need to stop thinking everyone is out to get you, Stark." Will shook his head, looking appalled.
"The drone industry was my idea which I got while playing with my toy helicopter. Do you really think I'd think about the Stark Industry at that age? Your company was just a collateral of its success, like many others."
"Alright, those two have a logical explanation. But why even go after the worthless money burning Arc Reactor Tech? Your Oscorp tech division has been researching it for a while now. I guess you'll soon make it yours too, right?"
"Hey, that's just straight up wrong. I don't think arc reactor tech is worthless at all. It has a lot of potential."
Yep, the Scientists under Will have been researching Arc Reactor Tech as well. And of course, they've had little to no success at even replicating the crude and useless version that the Stark Factory has, let alone modify it.
That's why this mission is important. Whoever says Tony Stark doesn't have superpowers is an idiot. Being able to invent such a ground breaking tech in a cave is one of the OPest superpowers one can ask for.
"Well, fake genius, if you had done your research, you'd find that the repulsor tech is a dead end. The cost of building and running it is just not worth the yield."
Will suddenly paused.
'Wait, he doesn't know?'
He thought Tony would at least already have some idea about the potential of Arc Reactor. After all, in the movies, he was shown to have made it quite easily.
'Maybe he's pretending.'
Seeing his silence, Tony smirked. "What? Can't defend yourself on that one, can you? Just admit it, you're just a mediocre wannabe who's jealous of my success."
Will stood up, walking over, which startled Tony.
"Alright, if that really is the case, then explain this," he said, tearing open Tony's bandages.
The rude guy's eyes widened in horror, looking down at the circular metallic contraption embedded in his chest, a wire connected with it. He turned his head, tracing the wires to a car battery stationed out of his line of sight.
"What... have you done to me?"
"Since you're such a genius then you should know the answer. Try to recall the last memory you have before being captured."
Tony thought about it.
"Stark Industries… USM 11676," he muttered. "I got hit by its shrapnels."
"Bingo. And d'you think they can all be taken out with the primitive medical equipment of these terrorists?"
"No... I designed them to kill with no chance of survival." Tony was quick to catch up. "Son of a bitch... how am I still alive?" He muttered as the realization dawned on him.
"You're alive because you were travelling with a mediocre doctor who was trying to be a weapon contractor. I made an electromagnet using the car battery, metal ring and a coil and fixed it in your chest to prevent the shrapnels from entering your atrial septum."
It was Tony's turn to be speechless.
[Aura +100]
[Aura +100]
"I'll be damned… I didn't think of this countermeasure when I designed it."
"Well, good thing you didn't. Anyways, since I have saved your life with so much effort, I'm going to kill you now and take over the rest of the Stark Industries military contracts when I leave this place, just like you said," he said, approaching Tony and putting his hand on the wire connected to his chest.
"Hey, hey, hey, I'm sorry! It was my bad, alright?" Said Tony, holding on to the wire for dear life, literally.
"No, you're right. I am just a non-genius petty fraud who is hell bent on sucking away all of your wealth," Will said expressionlessly, pulling the wire. "I gain nothing from keeping you alive."
"No, I was wrong, damn it! I-I was being a petty asshole, alright? I didn't like your meteoric rise and didn't think you deserve it."
"So, have you changed your mind now?"
"Well, you may not be better than me, but—hey! Wait, let me finish! But you did save my life from an impossible situation. So I think you do have the capability to achieve all those things by yourself. Is that okay?"
"That'll do… for now," said Will, reattaching the wire. "But I wasn't going to kill you either way. They won't let me," he said, nodding towards the CCTV camera.
Seeing the camera, Stark also got serious. "How much do they want?" He asked, finally finding the strength to get up and pour himself a glass of water from the jug.
He was, of course, talking about the ransom money. Money is usually the only reason rich guys like them are kidnapped.
"Oh, if only it was that simple. It's not the money they want."
"Then why else would they kidnap us?" Tony frowned, unable to think of any other reason.
"They want our tech. They need you to build Jericho for them while I need to make the complete White Knight setup."
Yep, this was how it had panned out.
He went along with the Terrorists by telling them only he could save Stark. And after he completed the task, when their commander Abu wanted to get rid of him he told him he was Osborn. The rest was easy.
Of course, these terrorists aren't really a threat to him.
In the past few months, his physique and reaction speed has reached a level that he can easily avoid gunshots by predicting their trajectories.
And he has a full arsenal in his storage space, so, jokes on these terrorists if they didn't act according to his plans.
Tony shook his head. "Well, I don't know about you, but there's no way I'm agreeing to their demands. They'll most likely kill us both even if we did give them what they want."
Just as Will was about to explain why that was a stupid choice, the door-slat opened with a snap and a pair of dark eyes peeked in.
Will stood up, Tony following suit.
"I have a plan. Just play along," he said quickly, just as the door flung wide open and Abu Bakar, the commander of the Terrorist entered, flanked by his henchmen.
Abu looked at the now conscious Tony and then at Will.
"Laqad tamakkanta ḥaqqan min inqādhihi. ʾAnā ʾathiqu bika al-ʾān," he said to Will.
(You really managed to save him. I trust you now.)
Will inclined his head. "Bil-ṭabʿ, al-ʾŌzbōrn dāʾiman yufī bi-waʿdih."
(Of course, an Osborn always keeps his word.)
"You can speak Arabic?" Tony asked in a surprised whisper.
"I can speak more than 10 languages, but of course, that doesn't make me a genius."
"Damn it, you're never going to let me off the hook, are you?"
Abu set his sights on Tony and spread his arms, saying something in Arabic.
"He says Welcome Tony Stark, the greatest mass murderer in the history of America. He is very honored."
Abu looked Tony up and down like a prize horse. He then said something while holding out a photo: a surveillance image of the Jericho Missile launch.
"As I said before, he's saying he wants to build the missile you demonstrated. Just agree for now."
Tony frowned. "I refuse," he said directly to Abu.
Apparently, he still hadn't had enough "I told you so"s from Will.
Abu glanced at one of his henchmen who immediately stepped forward and punched the stubborn genius in the face, saying threatening words in Arabic.
The guy was about to continue but Will stepped in.
"I'll talk to him! I'll get him to agree!" he said in the same language. When Abu nodded, the man retreated.
Will turned to Tony who was on one knee from just a single punch.
"Stark, do you not understand simple logic?" He whispered harshly.
"Yes it's obvious they will kill us even if we fulfill their demands. But refusing their demands will get us killed faster. What we need the most right now is time."
Can you not understand this with your genius IQ or do you need me to explain in kindergarten terms?"
"...."
The logic was faultless. Needless to say, Tony agreed after that.
They were then taken through the winding pathways of the cave until they reached an opening, with sunlight peeking through.
In a bowl of tall mountains, camouflaged tarps are furled, revealing skids upon skids of Stark Industries weapons, some new, some old, dating back to the 80s.
"As you can see, we have everything you need to build the Jericho. You will make a list of materials and start work right away. When we are done we will set you free," said Abu in Arabic.
Tony was stunned as he staggered along the crates. "These fuckers…" He muttered. "Why the hell do they have so many of my weapons?"
Will asked just that, and Abu laughed proudly and replied excitedly in Arabic while making wild gestures.
"He's saying everyone here knows that Stark Industries weapons are the deadliest and they've been using them for decades. One missile can kill at least 50 people, several of them can erase a village."
Hearing Tony's, knees gave out and he sat on the ground, seeming to be hyper ventilating.
"Also, Stark Industries' weapons always have new ways of killing. Sometimes they can hear the people scream while sometimes they just… evaporate. So, you are known as the merchant of death here." Will continued to translate.
Tony began to dry-heave while clutching his chest, nothing coming out of his empty stomach.
But Will's attention was focused on another nameless crate with dark cylindrical objects in it.
"What's that?" He asked.
"That? That is our latest goods. It is not Stark Industry but also very good. Burns everything."
"Oh? How strong?"
"Very strong. Do you remember New York bomb blast? They did it to show everyone."
….
After they returned to the cave the merchant of death was in a daze, still shocked with the previous scene.
Will was not in a better mood. It turns out, Gwen's father was killed in a marketing stunt. Whoever was behind this wanted to demonstrate their product's effectiveness to interest buyers.
Abu had refused to speak further, maybe because he didn't know more. After all, he is just a small leader. Above him is Raza, and Raza is the leader of just this branch of Ten Rings.
He decided to investigate this matter further later. For now, there were other problems at hand. He looked at Tony, who had not spoken since they had returned.
"Don't think too much about it for now. We still need to give them the list of materials."
Tony shook his head.
"There's no point. They'll still kill us and use those weapons to kill more innocents," he muttered. "I'd rather die early."
"Hey, have you already lost hope? If we just die, nothing will change. They will still keep killing civilians."
"What else can we do?"
"We can still escape. And we can wipe out these fuckers so that they can't kill more innocents."
"Don't be delusional, Osborn. There is no escape. I surveyed the area when they brought us out. This place is surrounded with mountains, all mounted with heavy machine guns.
Surveillance cameras and sentries are everything, leaving no blindspot. And also, I don't think I am exactly in a condition to escape while hefting a car battery."
"Come on, Tony. Do you not see it? We have the freedom to choose the materials we need. They want us to make armors, gliders, and weapons."
Tony paused, the gears in his mind starting to turn.
"Perhaps… there might be a chance. But the explosives won't help much, and the White Knight set up is useless since we don't have Bioelectricity and Fuel cells."
He was right, of course. White Knight Suit needs a superhuman amount of Bioelectricity coordination and fine handling and the Glider needs specialized Oscorp Fuel cells that simply cannot be built without multi-million dollar equipment.
Will raised an eye brow. "I'll ignore your dangerously extensive knowledge of White Knight Tech for now. But there's a way we can make this work: Arc Reactor."
Tony snorted, but stopped when Will didn't follow suit. "Wait, are you serious?"
"If it's miniaturized and modified to run stably on its own, it can fill up the energy gap of the suit, and increase it by a mile. We won't need the finesse of Bioelectricity if we can just blast our way out of here in an unstoppable mecha."
"Miniaturize and modify the Arc Reactor… in this cave. Yeah sure, while at it, why don't we also make a Teleportation device and a time machine?" Tony drawled, his tone thick with sarcasm.
Will sighed. It seems that he really doesn't know.
In the movies, Tony Stark was shown to have made the Arc reactor very easily, maybe within a day or two.
But it is also shown that both Tony and Obidah Stane thought that the giant and unrefined arc reactor at the Stark factory, that Tony built by copying his father's design, is just a publicity stunt with no future.
Tony is not stupid. If he had known that building a miniaturized and stable Arc Reactor was possible he would have already done it and started various clean energy projects to cash it in.
Since he doesn't have any moral principles yet, he might have even started selling various weapons and iron man suits powered by it, which would have been much more profitable than selling missiles.
Even in the comics plot, he escaped the cave through other means and only built the Arc Reactor later.
Will sighed. It seems he has to speed things up a bit.
"Well, Oscorp has done some experiments on this. One of the things I've discovered is that miniaturization is actually the right way for the Arc reactor to be designed. The bigger the reactor is, the harder it is to stabilize."
Tony still looked uninterested. "It crossed my mind too but this is an astronomical amount of energy we're talking about. You think something smaller can contain it?"
"Did you think of containing it in electromagnetic sheathing?"
Tony stopped moping around, his mind starting to focus. "Keep talking…"
"Make the reactor power an electromagnet that creates a strong magnetic field which can confine the plasma inside the core. It won't work with a big reactor—"
"But since the reactor is so small, the magnetic field can just be strong enough," Tony finished.
(Radius is inversely proportional to the magnitude of Magnetic Field)
"Okay, hold up… This actually might work out," he said, rubbing his face with both hands, his face full of disbelief.
"It's possible. Only if we somehow build the Self Sustaining Feedback Loop, Quantum Oscillation Regulator, and the Energy Distribution Grid inside this cave, all adjusted to the miniaturized reactor with precise calculations till at least 6 decimal digits."
All these things were the core component for building the Arc Reactor, and the things that Oscorp was unable to design, let alone succeeding in miniaturizing them.
Will honestly didn't know which one was more difficult: Inventing these components, or making them small enough to fit your chest.
But Tony grinned. "That's going to be easy."
"Well, then we better get to work. I still need to destroy these sons of bitches for kidnapping me."
…..
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