The Invinicible Iron Man #5

[Spider-Man Beyond]

The Invincible Iron Man #5
The Mandarin Part 3 of 3

Written by Timothy Eklund (Rodan)
Edited by Daniel Dyer (Spider-Man Beyond)

Stark Industries Building, New York
The Past

Tony Stark stood alone in the rising elevator. He was dressed in his best suit and watched nervously as the floor number rose. Eventually the elevator stopped at the top floor, and the silver doors opened smoothly. He found himself in a large, luxurious room with floor-to-ceiling windows that revealed a magnificent view of Manhattan. A young, red-haired secretary sat behind a large wooden desk, typing at a computer. She looked up at Tony.

“You’ll have to wait. Mr. Stark is in a meeting,” she said, looking back at her computer.

“Oh, it’s okay,” said Tony confidently as he strode towards the desk. “I’m his son.”

“You’ll still have to wait. Howard doesn’t like being disturbed.”

Tony leaned on the desk, positioning his head as close to the computer screen as he could. “So, what’s you’re name?” he asked coolly.

The secretary didn’t look at him. “Potts,” she said shortly.

“What do you say we have some coffee together later?” asked Tony, grinning slyly.

The secretary turned towards him, her eyes flaring, but before she could say anything else, the large wooden doors opened and several important-looking people in expensive suits came pouring out of the office. Tony quickly straightened and the secretary went back to her work.

After all the others had disappeared into the elevator, Tony walked into the office. It was a huge office, with floor-to-ceiling windows, potted plants, and a long meeting table leading to a large, luxurious desk with a computer on top, behind which sat Howard Stark. Howard Stark was busy at work. He was a fairly old man, in his late fifties but he still had a full head of silvery hair, and his slightly wrinkled face was still quite handsome. He hacked a little, before finally noticing Tony.

“Ah, hello, Anthony,” he said. He stopped typing and got out of his chair with a little effort.

Tony stood still. “Hello, Father.”

Howard Stark paced around the long table towards Tony. “I, I’ve called you here to discuss the company.” He walked up to Tony, who still stood perfectly still. “I’m going to give you the company.”

At this, Tony was shocked. “What? Dad! But this company is practically your life!”

“I know, I know, but I’m getting old, and sick, and I think you have enough experience in handling a business.”

“Well, um, thanks, I guess. This is, unexpected,” said Tony, regaining his composure.

“We can do the necessary paperwork now or later…”

—

[Spider-Man Beyond]

Somewhere in China
Now

Tony rode up a luxurious elevator in his grey Iron Man armor, dented a little from the fight. He was about to confront the villainous Mandarin and bring him to justice.

Eventually the elevator grinds to a halt and Iron Man disembarks. He is in the hallway on the top floor, where he briefly encountered the Mandarin. He wandered down the hallway. His breath soon became visible, and frost slowly appeared on his armor. He shivered as the temperature dropped and dropped. His armor wasn’t very insulated, and he briefly considered turning back when he reached the end of the hallway. He opened the door and immediately a darkness descended upon him that was impossible to see through.

He stumbled blindly through the room when he suddenly heard the Mandarin’s voice, as if through an intercom. “How can you hit what you can’t see, Stark?”

Suddenly he felt a strong metal arm deliver a punch across his jaw that he felt through his armor and sent him reeling into the wall. Another pair of metal hands gripped him by his arms and threw him into the opposite wall. He fell to the ground, groaned with pain, and rose to fight his combatants. He swung wildly, but his flailing arms struck nothing. The metal hands gripped him again and threw him to the ground. Tony groaned with pain as he smashed into his iron armor. Two pairs of metal legs began kicking him repeatedly in the stomach with a metal clanging sound, but Tony barely felt it through the armor. He summoned up as much energy as he could, and unleashed a repulsor ray that enveloped the whole room. His assailants were torn apart and the robots’ components clattered to the floor. Suddenly the room lit up and the door onwards opened automatically.

Tony made a mental note to add night vision to his armor, and continued on through the door.

—

[Spider-Man Beyond]

The Past

Tony Stark sat in his new desk, in his new office. He remembered how just a few days ago he had walked in to see his father in this office, and now it was his. He stared at the long table happily.

Just then he heard a knock at the door. “Come in,” he called. His father walked into the room.

“You know it’s costing me a lot to do this,” said his father. “I had to pull a lot of strings to give a 25-year old with barely any experience complete control of my billion-dollar company. It’s making a lot of people angry as well.” His father looked out over Manhattan. “But I trust in you. I’m confident that you will do the best job possible for this company. Do not disappoint me.” He looked sternly at Tony.

Tony looked nervously away. “I won’t.”

“Good.” He walked out of the office and closed the door behind him. Tony looked around aimlessly for a while before looking over some files.

A little Later, Ms. Potts walked into the office. “I thought you might want to see this article, Howar-.” She looked up from a paper she was holding, saw Tony, and stopped dead in her tracks. “What are you doing here?”

Tony spun in his chair a little and smiled coolly. “I’m your new boss. I just gained control of the company. Didn’t my father tell you?”

The secretary looked thoroughly annoyed and stormed out of the office.

—

[Spider-Man Beyond]

Now

Iron Man found himself in a long, chrome room, with a high ceiling. At the end of the room was the Mandarin, in a glistening green robe encrusted with jewels. He sat in a beautiful golden throne, with his fingers steepled, showing off ten bejeweled golden rings that seemed to pulse with power.

“Hello, Iron Man,” he said, smirking. “I take it you beat the prototypes? Excellent. I hoped you would.” He leaned forward in his chair. “You see, it was never your planes I was interested in. You inventions are… ingenious, but,” he smirked, “I prefer mine.”

Iron Man lunged. Suddenly, jets of flame shot out of the walls and nearly cooked him in his armor, which began to glow. He yelled in surprise and pain and fell backwards.

The Mandarin laughed. He stood up and began to pace, his green robe and long black hair flowing behind him. “I’m only interested in you. To be the crime lord of China- of all of Asia- is one thing, but to be the crime lord to kill a so-called ‘super hero’ would instill fear in the entire world! And with your armor I’ll have enough power to rule the world, and your head will don my flag!” The Mandarin laughed maniacally.

Iron Man became uneasy. This man was clearly insane, drunk with power, or rather, the thirst for it.

“I’ll see you in the next room,” said the Mandarin as he turned, and exited through a door beside the throne.

Iron Man hesitantly stepped forward. Again, jets of flame shot out of the walls, and he stumbled backwards. Okay. I can do this. I have to do this, he assured himself. He Stepped back towards the wall, then launched himself with full force towards the end of the room, beginning to fly with his boot-jets. He managed to barely outrun the fire, and was nearing the throne when suddenly a stone weight swung from the wall to his right, hit him square in the chest, and sent him flying into the opposite wall. He barely had time to realize what had happened when a stone pillar shot down from the ceiling and pinned him to the ground. Despite his armor, he could feel a bone or two crack. The pain was tremendous. He summoned up all his strength and managed to get a grasp on the pillar. He used his repulsor rays combined with what little strength he had to slowly raise the pillar above his head. When it got to a certain distance, he rolled out from under it, and it struck the ground with a thud, before rising back into the ceiling.

Tony lay panting face-up on the floor, but before he could catch his breath, he saw another square stone pillar come shooting out of the ceiling towards his face. He rolled away, and ran for the throne as pillars began falling all around him. He dove for the throne, just as the last pillar fell into place. The way he had come was now blocked by a thick, stone wall. His gray armor glistened with sweat and blood, was covered in cracks, partly melted, and running out of energy. Tony himself was in even worse shape. The only thing that was keeping him alive at all was the last remnants of energy from his armor. The way back was blocked. He had no choice but to go on and fight the Mandarin. He stumbled through the door…

He emerged into another, large, square room covered in chrome. There were four pillars, and in the center of them stood the Mandarin. “Finally. I was beginning to think you were dead,” said the Mandarin, grinning.

That was when Tony’s suit’s power gave out. His heart stopped, and he fell to the ground with a clang.

“Oh, come now,” said the Mandarin, distastefully. “It’s too easy that way.” He pointed, and electricity arced from his left middle finger into the power circuits of the iron suit.

Energy flowed into its mechanisms, and it automatically began the proper procedures to bring Tony’s heart back into working order. It gave a few shaky beats, and then stabilized. Tony slowly stood up, shaking a little.

“There. All better?” asked the Mandarin, sarcastically. He gave out a laugh.

The suit was now brimming with energy, but it still wasn’t working at its peak performance, and Tony still felt pain whenever he moved.

Tony regained as much composure as he could, and said with all the confidence he could muster, “You’re insane.”

The Mandarin laughed.

Iron Man lunged, but was knocked back by a concussive force. He glided back and landed on the ground in front of the Mandarin. He shot a quick repulsor blast, but it was blocked as well. The Mandarin laughed again, and Tony was shrouded in complete darkness. Blasts of heat and concussions began hitting him on all sides, and he stumbled to the ground, and released a blast of energy that dissipated the cloud of darkness.

Before he could attack, Tony was hit by a vortex of air, and he flew into the air, before crashing into the ground. The whole time the Mandarin just stood there, laughing maniacally.

Suddenly two strange creatures sprouted out of the ground. They were faceless, made out of rock, and had blades instead of hands. Tony stared at them and they began to advance. He blasted one with a repulsor ray, and it smashed into pieces. The second one swiped at him, but he ducked. It slashed again, and nicked a small cut in his armor. He then grabbed it’s arm, and smashed through it, severing it with his other arm. He then smashed its head in with a powerful smash to the head. The stone reverted back to chrome and fell to the ground. “That all you got?” asked Tony, grinning despite himself.

The Mandarin laughed, and pointed his finger at Iron Man, and ice shot out of it, encasing the iron hero.

Tony shivered, and managed to activate his repulsor ray, shattering the ice.

The Mandarin scowled, and shot concussive blasts at Iron Man.

The armored hero managed to dodge, and started flying around the room, dodging the many blasts. Eventually he saw his chance. The Mandarin had let his guard down. He flew towards him, and knocked the Mandarin off his feet. One last blast shot out of his finger and missed Iron Man by a centimeter. It struck the ceiling, and a patch of it disintegrated, revealing blue sky and sunshine.

Then a rage came over Tony. He punched the maniacal genius across the face with all the force he could muster, concussive blasts shooting out of the Mandarin’s fingers, until the crime lord lay, bleeding and unconscious. Iron Man inspected the rings on the Mandarin’s hands. They looked like nothing he’d ever seen. He put two and two together, and realized the source of Mandarin’s immeasurable power. He tried to pry them off, but they were impossible to remove. He realized grimly what he had to do. He reached for a sharp shard of chrome…

—

[Spider-Man Beyond]

Iron Man grimaced in shame under his mask. What had he done? Surely there was another way! There’s never a need to permanently mutilate anyone, even an insane criminal. He sighed. He had told the police how Tony Stark had been kidnapped, and how he had flown to the rescue. He told of the Mandarin’s nefarious plot, but not of the final battle. He told nothing of the Mandarin’s powers. He told of a freak accident involving a shard of falling rock. He told of how Tony was already on a plane back to America. Now he was on a military plane headed for New York, his mind troubled by his deeds that day. He tried not to look out the window (he hated flying), and he ordered a lot of booze.

—

[Spider-Man Beyond]

Half a day later, when he finally arrived in New York, Tony Stark returned to Stark Tower, got in the elevator and went all the way up to his private office. He hadn’t slept at all; he had dark bags under his eyes, and an arm in a sling. He looked terrible. The elevator dinged. He disembarked. Odd. Pepper wasn’t there. But he didn’t want company anyway. He walked into his office, closed the door, and walked towards a wall safe that kept his darkest secret. He opened it. Inside were the torn remains of his memories of his first adventure as Iron Man. Inside he grimly placed a morbid package, wrapped in torn green fabric. The package contained the Mandarin’s hands. He’d treated them so they wouldn’t rot, and kept them against his better judgment. He told himself it was to research the rings, and maybe it was, but maybe it wasn’t. He closed the safe, walked into a separate room, his living spaces. He collapsed on his mattress.

Before he could get any rest, however, there was a knock on his office door. He groaned.

“Mr. Stark! It’s urgent!” came Pepper’s voice.

Tony sighed, and walked to the door. He opened it to reveal Pepper, her face covered in tears.

“Tony!” she sobbed. “It’s Howard! You father, he’s- he’s DEAD!”

To be continued...