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Ethan rushed over in panic, rapping his knuckles against Tony's faceplate. "Tony! What's your status? Are you injured?"
The faceplate snapped open with a mechanical hiss, revealing Tony sprawled flat on his back, staring at the ceiling with profound existential defeat. "I'm perfectly fine. FRIDAY, upload my pedestrian locomotion data immediately. Now—stand me up!"
Ethan swore he heard an ominous mechanical grinding sound as he watched Tony rise from the floor like a rigid plank, accompanied by a bone-chilling wail of agony. Ethan shuddered involuntarily—thank God he had zero interest in this contraption and wouldn't be testing it personally. Just listening to it sounded excruciating.
After extensive recalibration, Tony could finally wave his armored limbs without toppling over. He ran his tongue across his lips with growing excitement. "So... shall we attempt flight?"
Ethan immediately yanked his hands away from the control interface. "Absolutely not, Tony! You haven't even mastered walking yet!"
"No, no, no, Ethan—you must understand that sometimes you need to learn flight first!" Tony's eyes blazed with unwavering determination. Just as he prepared to issue commands to FRIDAY, Maria's voice cut through the laboratory: "Ethan! Remove me from this workbench immediately—what if he destroys me in the process!"
"Oh, Mom, don't be so pessimistic," Tony deflated instantly, opening his faceplate to gaze pleadingly at Maria's portrait. "What if I achieve perfect success on the first attempt?"
"I'm not forbidding experimentation," Maria replied, barely restraining herself from rolling her painted eyes. "However, shouldn't you implement proper safety protocols before attempting aerial acrobatics?"
"DUM-E! Fire suppression systems at the ready! FRIDAY, prepare emergency medical contacts—oh, and insurance verification! Where's our medical kit? Excellent, right here. Ethan, did you bring any life-saving potions? Outstanding! Safety preparations complete!" Tony surveyed his laboratory with manic enthusiasm. "FRIDAY, power systems ready—thirty percent output!"
"Wait!" Ethan had barely vocalized his protest when Tony launched like a malfunctioning firework, spinning wildly before crashing spectacularly into the adjacent garage bay. "Bloody hell, I knew this would happen!"
Ethan dragged DUM-E toward the wreckage, unleashing a torrential spray of fire-suppressant foam across Tony's prone form. "Status report!" he shouted over the mechanical chaos.
"I'm absolutely fine! Magnificent, actually! I've identified the calibration error!" Tony declared, leveraging himself upright against the nearly flattened luxury vehicle. "Cease fire, DUM-E! That's quite enough!"
The foam barrage finally subsided. Tony retracted his faceplate, gasping for clean air. "Simple computational miscalculation—completely manageable! Ethan, escort DUM-E to a safe distance. Round two!"
Ethan shrugged resignedly, dragging the reluctant robot back toward Maria's portrait. He lifted the painting carefully, angling it toward Tony so Maria could observe the impending disaster clearly.
"FRIDAY, import complete facility schematics, verify all operational systems, and cross-reference current weather patterns with air traffic control data," Tony commanded with military precision.
"Sir, our systems remain insufficiently prepared for flight operations!"
"Sometimes revolutionary progress demands bold leaps forward. Initiate launch sequence!" Tony refused all caution, delivering his final directive with absolute authority.
Brilliant white energy erupted from his palm repulsors and boot thrusters as Tony rose majestically into the air. After releasing a triumphant whoop of pure exhilaration, he rocketed through the garage tunnel into the open sky.
Ethan carried Maria's portrait via the internal elevator to the mansion's roof, watching Tony—now merely a distant silver gleam—execute graceful aerial circles while occasionally emitting ecstatic battle cries.
"Tony! You've achieved it!" Ethan established communication through FRIDAY's network.
"HAHAHA! Ethan! Are you witnessing this?! Mom, are you seeing this?! I've done it! I'm actually flying!" Tony's voice crackled with unbridled joy. "Next objective: determining maximum altitude capabilities!"
"Don't attempt anything reckless!" Ethan suddenly felt profound dread, shouting his warning as Tony severed communications entirely.
"FRIDAY! What's the SR-71 Blackbird's altitude record?"
"Maximum recorded altitude: eighty-five thousand feet, Sir."
"Let's shatter that record!" At Tony's command, his boot thrusters blazed with nuclear intensity as he began a vertical ascent toward the stratosphere.
Ethan had already retrieved his tablet, tracking Tony through Stark Industries' private satellite network. Observing his trajectory, Ethan immediately comprehended his suicidal intentions.
"No, no, NO! Don't do this, Tony—this is absolutely fatal!" Ethan sprinted toward the fireplace while frantically scribbling an emergency message. He hurled Floo Powder into the flames and tossed his note into the green fire. "All-Purpose Shop!"
"Sir, high-altitude icing will create catastrophic system failures," FRIDAY warned with increasing urgency.
"Continue ascent!" Tony completely ignored the warning, climbing relentlessly toward the frozen death zone.
Ice crystals began forming across the Iron Man suit's exterior surfaces. At higher altitudes, the ice layer thickened dramatically. The suit's connection to FRIDAY suddenly severed due to complete system freeze, and Tony screamed in terror as he plummeted from maximum altitude like a metallic meteor.
Ethan burst onto the rooftop, gasping for breath while monitoring Tony's free-fall trajectory on his tablet screen. Panic consumed him entirely. "What do we do?! Dear God, what do we DO?!"
After falling through several thousand feet of atmosphere, FRIDAY finally reestablished connection. Tony desperately struggled to restart his frozen systems—he could see Ethan on the rooftop with his naked eyes! Time was running out!
CRASH!
"AHHHHH!"
Ethan stared upward in bewilderment. Why had he heard a distinctly female scream?
Gemini fought desperately to control her flying carpet, which had been her transportation method for visiting Tony today. She'd heard his research project was nearing completion and, having been confined indoors for weeks, decided to witness his long-bragged-about invention firsthand. Unfortunately, just as she reached the airspace above Tony's mansion, an unidentified projectile had crashed directly onto her carpet! The combined velocity and mass had crumpled her magical transport into a compressed bundle—if the carpet hadn't been oversized, Gemini would have been flattened into a pancake.
Tony's suit systems finally rebooted successfully, allowing him to extract himself from the tangled carpet wreckage. Seeing the rapidly approaching ground and Gemini perched precariously on the carpet's edge, he didn't hesitate—rolling sideways off the magical transport as FRIDAY instantly reactivated flight systems, sending Tony soaring once again.
Gemini managed to pilot her damaged carpet in an unsteady landing on the Stark mansion's rooftop. Ethan rushed to assist her just as Tony descended slowly above them, preparing for ground contact.
Before Gemini could draw her wand for a proper hexing, Tony's armored feet touched the roof surface. Instantly, he vanished completely—followed by a thunderous crash as multiple car alarms began wailing throughout the neighborhood.
Ethan and Gemini approached the massive hole Tony had created, peering down into the devastation below. Tony lay amid the wreckage in his Iron Man suit, faceplate retracted, grinning up at them with idiotic satisfaction.
"You saved my life again, Gemini! You're absolutely my guardian angel!"
Gemini swept her disheveled hair away from her face, glaring down at Tony with glacial fury. "That'll cost you ten thousand Galleons—and I don't accept Muggle currency!"
"HAHAHAHA! I'll transfer payment tomorrow!" Tony gave them an enthusiastic thumbs-up from his crater. "Now, could you possibly assist me? I appear to be thoroughly trapped!"
"You deserve this completely!" Despite her harsh words, Gemini still used her battered flying carpet to transport Ethan down through Tony's impact crater into the basement level. Several precise Transfiguration spells later, she had successfully extracted Tony from his self-created disaster zone.
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