Tony loved attention, sure. But when he’d told the world he was Iron Man and that Stark Enterprises was changing its focus, he’d only been prepared for the fawning, not for the incessant questioning about his past work and vocal doubts about his sincerity. He certainly didn’t expect the fictional headlines the tabloids had generated, or the salacious—and utterly false—rumors about his friends and colleagues.
He entered the arena, sat down on the grandstand around the dusty center track, and pulled out his phone.
“Call Pepper.”
The screen flickered and darkened. Out of power. Again. He’d have to check the phone team’s progress when he got back to the States. The world needed a Stark phone. He needed a Stark phone.
Something wet and mushy brushed up against Tony’s ear. He jumped and looked up to see a spindly legged camel gazing at him through long lashes. Yuck. Wet camel nose. And what was that on the camel’s back? A type of saddle, but the rider wasn’t human.
There’d been a mention of this in the Expo program, Tony remembered. The latest in robot camel-jockeys were on display. He’d been speaking on a panel and had missed the demonstration. Sensors placed on the camel’s chest, knees, and mouth sent data to the robots and to the camel’s trainer. The robots would then artificially evolve, assessing future moves based on each measurement, every experience, and factors such as wind and sand. To the untrained and unscientific eye, the robot jockeys appeared capable of learning, instead of being piloted remotely by trainers as they had been in the past.
Tony laughed as he saw a plastic Robby the Robot bobble-head on top of the robot. Someone had been playing with a 3D printer. The rest of the robot was just a steel box covered in what looked like a giant tube sock.
“Hold still,” murmured Tony to the camel as he reached up to the saddle. He wanted that robot. Not just out of curiosity—he was dying to get a look at the internal specs—but also because Tony knew that where there was a robot, there was a power source.
He was going to use this robot jockey to jump-start his phone.
Tony loosened the straps that held the robot in place and slid it out of its sock. He unclasped two small metal hooks that held an access panel, then opened up the robot to get to the battery.
“Mister Iron Man. May I be of some assistance?”
A middle-aged Afghani man in a white shalwar kameez, vest, and sandals stood in front of Tony.
“Oh, hello. I’m just going to…borrow your camel pilot for a minute.” Tony flashed a smile.
“Do as you must, Mister Iron Man. I can put my robot back together.”
“Thanks…uh…”
“Call me Ahmed.”
“Thanks, Ahmed. Please call me Tony. You like robots? Or camel racing? Or both?”
“Electronics. I have always enjoyed circuits and robots. But where I am from, we have only a few opportunities in electronics.”
“Funny, isn’t it?” Tony chatted idly while he dismantled the robot with his fingers and a pen cap. He grabbed the battery pack and tugged it from its clip. “Afghanistan has some of the biggest lithium deposits in the world…”
“…but no industry to use it.” Ahmed laughed now. “My brother, he always said this too. He also loved science.”
Tony hesitated now, hearing the regret in Ahmed’s voice.
“Where is your brother now?” Tony spoke softly as he plugged the battery pack into his phone. The phone lit up, the word “charging” flickering across the screen.
“He joined a militia. There were no science jobs. Or any jobs. A defect in his own gun killed him.”
“Was it…was it a Stark weapon?” Tony’s phone was flashing tomorrow’s headlines across the screen now—hacking into newspaper previews was a cinch—along with SMS messages, missed calls, and the time on three continents. But Tony could not look away from Ahmed.
“No, Mister Stark. It was a cheap counterfeit from Pakistan. A fake. A Stark gun would never have exploded.”
Tony tightened his lips and nodded. His innocence in this matter was only a technicality. Tony had participated in the industry of war, profited from the deaths of others like Ahmed’s brother. Ahmed continued to smile, but with the worn look of a man tired of smiling.
Now a headline on Tony’s phone caught his eye. “RED HOT PEPPER POTTS! THE SEXY STORY STARK DOESN’T WANT THE WORLD TO KNOW!”
Oh no, he thought. The World-Star has gone too far. Everything they say about me is partially justified. But Pepper is an innocent.
Tony e-mailed Stark’s legal team with a link to the headline and instructions to threaten the publisher with every possible action if they printed lies about his assistant. Then he called Pepper.
“Tony, where are you? You have meetings with emergent tech experts at three and also a half-hour ago!” She was annoyed but not frantic. She didn’t know about the headlines.
“Paparazzi,” he explained. “Pepper, can you do two things for me? First, I need an extraction. A security detail to get me past reporters, and then on to the plane home. Have Happy set up living quarters for me somewhere safe—try the Coney Island workshop. Tell him to hang around—I’m going to stay there a while, let things calm down.”
“Of course. I’ve been wondering when you were going to need a vacation from this madness. Why you told everyone you’re Iron Man is—”
“Pepper, wait. The second thing. It’s important.”
She paused.
“I have an urgent classified assignment for you. No one else can be trusted with this. Pack anti-malarial meds, your vaccination certificate, rehydration salts, and business clothes to last at least a month. You leave immediately. All communications will be strictly through encrypted Stark satellites. I’ll send you details as soon as I’m on the plane and can plug in. Go.”
Suddenly tired, Tony leaned back on the grandstand. His shoes were ruined and his pockets might never be empty of sand again. Ahmed tinkered with the robot, while the camel sniffed the dirt on Tony’s suit. More alerts popped up on Tony’s phone, so he shut his phone off.
He left it off for a long time.
THE headlights of Nilsen’s gray 1990 Econoline van illuminated the crossroads ahead on the outskirts of Bastrop, Texas.
“Don’t run the stop sign, Nilsen,” hissed Beck from the passenger seat. “We don’t need to get pulled over tonight.”
“Tonight?” The larger man braked, then glared at Beck. “You think I want to get pulled over any night? I got no insurance and a warrant for unpaid parking tickets in San Marcos. I don’t need anyone running my license.”
“You don’t have a license, dumbass,” growled Mallen from the darkened back of the van, where he crouched against the sliding door. “Put on your seat belts. If any unexpected guests show up, we have to split in a hurry. You’re ugly enough without glass in your chin.”
“There’s no security, Mallen. I told ya, my cousin worked there,” said Beck. “Ain’t no one there now. Abandoned since the fires. Creepy. Not even the rats go in.”
“That’s cuz they all died, Beck. When fire burned out the power and the slaughterhouse was blocked off, it’s not like the firemen went in to recover the slabs of beef. The rats gnawed their way in but died from the putrid meat. Dead rats and rancid meat rotting for weeks—not even the illegals go in there. Half of Bastrop reeked for four months ’til the sheriff finally broke in to find the source of the smell.”
“You sure this is a good idea, Mallen?” Nilsen looked back, his shaved head visible in the rearview mirror. “You’ll be stuck in there a week.”
“Three days. They cleaned it up.”
“Yeah, so now it just stinks of ammonia.”
The Econoline pulled up in front of an unlit building. D. R. Cole Slaughterhouse had specialized in grass-fed beef and pasture-fed pork until the Feds had come in with their truth-in-advertising witch-hunt.
“Whatever. We’re not here for the atmosphere. We’re here cuz it’s empty and no one is gonna mess with me.”
> Mallen took a last swig of his Shiner Bock, reached out the window over Beck’s shoulder and hurled the brown bottle at the cracked concrete doorframe of the brick slaughterhouse. The glass shattered against stained graffiti and leftover paste from No Trespassing signs.
“Bombs away,” chuckled Beck.
Mallen unlatched the van’s back door and stepped to the street. The sliding door on the side hadn’t worked since Nilsen had deliberately sideswiped a Volvo station wagon outside an organic grocery in Austin.
“Bring the briefcase,” he said as he walked to the heavy wooden doors of the slaughterhouse and pushed them open. “Be careful.”
Beck and Nilsen followed Mallen into the dark, concrete halls of the empty slaughterhouse, Beck handling the briefcase with uncharacteristic gentleness. Mallen led them into a large cold room—its power long ago disabled, floors and walls scrubbed clean of the remnants of steers, hogs, and rats.
As Beck bent to the ground to open the briefcase, Mallen turned back to the door, glancing one last time at the hallway leading to the exit. The Econoline’s headlights shone faintly from outside, tempting him back, as if the past were still accessible from just behind the door. But if what Beck had in the briefcase did what it was supposed to do, Mallen wouldn’t need the Econoline or his friends or the man he’d been. He’d be stronger, faster, smarter. He’d do what the world needed—help it, in a way. Put it back on track.
He turned away from the door, back toward Beck and Nilsen.
Beck had unlatched the briefcase and pivoted the lid up. The three men stared at the contents: a jet injector and two small black cartridges held in place by gray molded plastic.
Mallen realized he might end up dead from this injection. He watched as Beck assembled the injector, loaded the gas cartridges in one by one to power the liquid jets.
“Mallen, you sure you’re up for this?” Beck hesitated.
“Just do it,” snarled Mallen, more fiercely than he’d intended. He knelt on the concrete floor.
Nilsen towered in front of Mallen, placing a big, steadying hand on either side of Mallen’s head. Mallen focused on the big man’s beer belly, which poked out under a black T-shirt. Nilsen had tried to cover it up as always, under an oversized olive-green zippered hoodie. But there was no missing the gut at the moment, since it was all Mallen had to look at if he didn’t want to stare right into Nilsen’s eyes while his life transformed.
Beck fixed the jet injector against the back of Mallen’s neck, just between Mallen’s brown hair and the tan leather jacket he’d worn steadily for the last decade, even in the summer.
Beck applied pressure to the trigger with his index finger. Pssssht. The liquid squeezed through the injector’s tip, past Mallen’s pores, and then into his bloodstream.
“Aaoooww!” Mallen jumped as the serum mixed with his blood, delivering what felt like a tingling electric shock. The shock grew stronger, until Mallen could barely stand it. His eyes bulged and he bared his teeth as he lunged away from Beck. Nilsen let go of Mallen’s head and jumped clear.
Mallen fell to his knees, spitting with surprise.
“Hnf!” He couldn’t speak. Both his hands involuntarily went to the spot on his neck where the serum had entered his bloodstream.
Take it out. Stop it. Hurts. Mallen seized up, clenched, and then slumped over like a dead man.
For a long moment, Mallen couldn’t move or hear. Then a buzzing began. Where was the buzzing? His own head, he realized. The noise slowed, became his thudding pulse. Then, from a distance, he heard Nilsen, his voice muffled as if he were in the next room.
“Nothing’s happening, Beck. Something should be happening.”
Mallen coughed, moved slightly, and cleared his throat. He started to sit up.
“Hgk.”
“Listen,” said Beck. “I, uh, I guess we were sold a dud. Get your breath back, Mallen. We’ll get back in Nilsen’s van and, y’know, start again. It’s not over yet.”
“Hgkk.” Mallen swore as he struggled to rise, his hand covering his eyes.
Then Mallen felt the serum in every molecule—in his head, his limbs, his guts. And it hurt. He was on fire inside, in wrenching pain.
“HHHEEEGGHH!” He howled, his face contorted, veins bulging, eyes full of blood and fear. His guts were melting, he was sure of it, his organs collapsing and liquefying, turning into a thick black liquid that he violently retched onto the cold-room floor.
Beck bolted; he was halfway to the exit before Nilsen stopped gaping and raced to follow him. Mallen heard the steel door slam shut, heard the brace slide into place, the sounds of footsteps receding back toward the Econoline. And then he heard nothing else over the escalating thumping in his head.
Mallen was alone, locked in the abandoned slaughterhouse.
He shuddered, gasped, and collapsed. Warm liquids streamed from his nose, mouth, and ears. His mouth tasted full, bitter, and a little…metallic? Blood, he thought, but it tastes like dirty pennies.
Lying on the cold concrete of the slaughterhouse, Mallen’s violent body contractions and spasms slowly passed. His head still hurt like hell, but he no longer heard his pulse; his breathing had gone from quick and shallow to barely perceptible. Was this death? How could it not be? He lay silently in a pool of his own steaming, liquefied innards.
Smells like hell, he thought. Should’ve asked Beck to make sure the rats are really gone.
He convulsed one last time and passed out.
Continued in
IRON MAN: EXTREMIS
April 2013
SPECIAL PREVIEW
CIVIL WAR
BY STUART MOORE
Based on the Graphic Novel by Mark Millar
Coming in Trade Paperback
April 2013
P R O L O G U E
W A R R I O R S
SPEEDBALL could barely stand still. That wasn’t unusual. Ever since the accident in the lab, his body had become a barely controlled generator of highly volatile kinetic-force bubbles. His teammates in the New Warriors were accustomed to his constant bouncing around, his inability to stay focused on anything for more than ninety seconds at a time. They barely even bothered to roll their eyes anymore.
No, Speedball acting antsy wasn’t new. But the reason for it was.
“Earth to Speedball.” The producer’s voice was tinny in his ear. “You gonna answer my question, kid?”
Speedball smiled. “Call me Robbie, Mister Ashley.”
“You know the rules. When you’re miked and in the field, it’s code names only. Speedball.”
“Yes sir.” He couldn’t resist tweaking Ashley. The man was such a suit.
“So,” Ashley said.
“So?”
“The villains. How many?”
Speedball brushed crabgrass away from his leg. He leapt up into the air past Namorita, who stood leaning against a tree, bored. He bounced off Microbe’s massive frame—the big guy sat sprawled in the grass, snoring—and came in for a featherlight landing right behind Night Thrasher, their black-cowled leader.
Thrash was all business, his hidden eyes peering through a pair of high-tech binoculars. Speedball looked past him at the house, old and wood-framed, concealed from its neighbors by a high fence. The Warriors—and their camera crew—stood about fifty feet away, hidden behind a pair of big oak trees.
A trio of muscular men appeared in the doorway of the house, all dressed in casual clothes: jeans, work shirts. Speedball touched a button on his earpiece. “Three villains.”
“Four,” Thrasher said.
Speedball squinted, managed to make out a muscular woman with dark hair. “Oh yeah. I see Coldheart in the back, emptying the trash.” Speedball giggled. “Emptying the trash. Man, these guys are hardcore.”
“Actually, they’re all on the FBI’s most wanted list.” Ashley sounded almost worried now. “Cobalt Man, Speedfreek, Nitro…they all broke out of Rykers Island three months back. And they all got records as long as your arm.”
Microbe had shambled up behind them—all 350 pounds of him—dressed in green and white with a thick belt full of compartments. “What’s up?”
Thrasher motioned him to silence.
“Coldheart fought Spider-Man a couple of times,” Ashley continued. “And get this. Speedfreek almost took down the Hulk.”
Thrasher lowered the binoculars. “He what now?”
Microbe scratched his head. “These guys sound out of our league.”
“Out of your league maybe, lardo.”
“Shut up, ’Ball.”
“I told you not to call me that.”
“’Ball,” Microbe repeated, a lazy smile on his face.
“Enough.” Namorita turned her head, barely interested. “What’s the plan?”
Speedball smirked. “Plan is you spend five more minutes in makeup, Nita. You think people wanna see that big ugly zit on your chin?”
She shot him the finger and turned away. Pierre rushed up to her, foundation brush in his hand.
Namorita was a blue-skinned beauty, an offshoot of the royal family of Atlantis. Cousin or niece or something to Prince Namor, ruler of the undersea city. One time, Speedball had tried to get into her pants; she’d held his head underwater for five minutes.
“I don’t know,” Thrasher said. He cast a worried glance back toward the house. “I’m not sure we should do this.”
“What?” Speedball almost jumped up into the air, then realized just in time he’d be blowing their cover. “Think of the ratings, Thrash. We’re dyin’ here. Six months we been driving around the country looking for goofballs to fight, and the best we’ve managed was a bum with a spray can and a wooden leg. This could be the episode that really puts the New Warriors on the map. We beat these clowns and everyone’ll stop bitching about Nova leaving the show to go back into space.”
New Avengers: Breakout Prose Novel Page 20
