‹ Prequel: Iron Skye
Sequel: The Bird
Status: In Progress

Iron Maiden

Chapter 9

Tony's stomach was in knots. He had just gotten off the phone with a man that was supposed to be dead, who had just promised to destroy him.

"JARVIS, run a scan on Skye's phone." He couldn't stand to sit there while the thin bar slowly dragged across the screen. He had never really prayed before, but now he was praying that his daughter was somewhere far away from New York.

The thin bar couldn't move slower as JARVIS searched for the homing device he had placed in her new phone.

The map finally came up and he ran a hand through his hair. Her position came up in Flushing, New York.

"JARVIS, pull up the video feed from Stark Expo." Several video feeds came up on the screen. People were filing in to see Hammer's weapons presentation. "Pull up all security cameras by the emergency exits." He watched as a majority of the video feeds disappeared until only a few remained. "Pull up the last one."

.....

The limo had dropped Justin off at the front of the Expo before driving around back. Two big, burley men were standing at the exit doors behind the stage and, thankfully there weren't many people around back to see this, pulled me out of the limo. I struggled against them, trying with all my might to get away from them. I looked and saw a camera above the door and I made desperate eye contact with it, hoping someone was watching and would come to my rescue.

I was pulled through the exit door and down a series of hallways until I ended up back stage at the main pavilion. Justin was there, getting ready to go on stage to give his presentation.

"And here she is. My good luck charm." I bit my tongue, holding back a snarky remark. "If all goes well, we're going out to celebrate. Dinner, maybe a few drinks, go back to my place..." his hand stroked my cheek, but I jerked away from him.

"In your dreams, Hammer."

Music started playing and Justin gave me a smile that could only be classified as extremely perverted before dancing his way on stage. I bit back a laugh at his ridiculous dancing, knowing the two burly men on either side of me wouldn't take so kindly to that.

"Ladies and gentlemen, for far too long this country has had to place its brave men and women in harm's way, but then the Iron Man arrived, and we thought the days of losing lives were behind us. Sadly, that technology was kept out of reach. That's not fair. That's not right. And just too bad." I sighed, rolling my eyes. I knew where this was going. "Regardless, it was an impressive innovation, one that grabbed headlines the world over. Well, today, my friends, the press is faced with quite a different problem. They are about to run out of ink." There were a couple pity claps from the audience as two stage hands removed the podium from the stage. "Ladies and gentlemen, today I present to you the new face of the United States military. The Hammer drone. Army!" The floor opened on stage as eight drones came up out of the floor. People started clapping and I suddenly got a funny feeling in my chest. "Navy!" Eight more drones came out up. Sixteen more drones came up, eight for the Air Force and eight for the Marines. "That's a hell of a lot better than some cheerleaders, let me tell you. But as revolutionary as this technology is, there will always be a need for man to be present in the theater of war. Ladies and gentlemen, today I am proud to present to you the very first prototype in the Variable Threat Response Battle Suit and it's pilot, Air Force Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes."

"Rhodey?" I gasped.

Sure enough, my dad's best friend, or should I say ex-best friend now, came up on stage wearing one of the Iron Man suits, various guns attached to the suit. He saluted and the 32 drones behind him saluted as well. Hammer saluted and they all dropped their hands.

"For America and it's allies, Hammer Industries is reporting for..." Hammer trailed off as a whirring was heard and my dad appeared on stage in the Iron Man suit. The crowd erupted into a standing ovation.

I made to run on stage but two large, beefy hands grabbed my arms, stopping all movement.
My dad stood by Rhodey, waving at the crowd. I could see the anger on Justin's face. My dad exchanged a few words with Justin before all hell broke loose. Rhodey's gun pointed straight at my dad and the "Hammer Drones" pointed theirs at my dad's as well.

My dad shot up through the roof as the drones began firing up at him. The glass roof shattered, raining glass on the crowd. Rhodey and a few of the drones flew off after him. The remaining drones jumped into the panicking crowd and made their way from the pavilion.

The two burly men pulled me back to the hallway leading to the exit. I stopped suddenly, elbowing one of the men in the stomach, stomping on his toe before kneeing the other where the sun don't shine. I took off running through the maze of hallways, the two men cursing me as they ran after me.

I threw open the exit door, running out into the night. I ran around the pavilion to the front, hoping to find some sign of life.

It was like a zombie movie. Other than various Hammer Drones laying around the Expo there was no one in sight. So I did what I thought best.

I ran.

I kept an eye out for a car or something that I could borrow without permission to get away from Stark Expo as quickly as possible.

But curse my poor physical shape. I had to stop and sit for a moment and catch my breath.

Big mistake.

All the drones around me began beeping, and I knew I was screwed. There were drones everywhere so running was out of the question. All I could do was stand there and wait for impact.
♠ ♠ ♠
Hey guys. So I'm sorry for the slow updates but life is hitting me over the head right now, and I'm in a bit of a dilemma right now with this story. There's two ways I could go and I need some help deciding. So my two lines I'm wrestling with are to keep with the movies the way they are or to throw Spider-Man in at the end of IM2 and then make him a minor character in the Avengers, primarily during the battle. But I haven't seen The Amazing Spider-Man so I'd be keeping with Sam Raimi's version, but I'd make Peter Parker younger like he is in The Amazing Spider-Man. I could go either way so I'm putting it up to you guys to decide what you want. The next chapter should be up in the next couple days but it'll be a while before the next one so you have plenty of time to decide. Thnaks you guys. You're awesome!