Chapter 12
It took week and a half, but eventually everyone was present inside Stark’s Armory in the New Stark Mansion. And the tension, could be cut with a knife…
Rhodes was in some kind of staring contest with Van Dyne, while Vision was quietly sitting next to him on a chair, playing with his fingers in his lap.
Friday was siting behind a computer, still looking for any signs of her missing father. Carol stayed closely behind the girl, sometimes running a supporting hand on her back.
Barton had been pacing back and forth across of them. He would sometimes look at Vision but then quickly look down in guilt.
Parker was nervously hanging upside from the ceiling.
It made Fury’s blood boil and eye twitch.
“Alright enough!” He snapped and it made everyone turn their attention at him
“Barton stop pacing, you won’t help anybody if you dig a hole inside the floor! And Parker, get your ass down!”
Peter gulped and jumped down, settling himself next to Friday and Barton eventually signed and leaned his back against the nearest wall.
“So what do we know?” Hope asks finally focusing on the topic
“We know that Hydra is under command of Dr. Tarleton or now known as MODOK. Captain Danvers here, was captured few weeks back by them and we didn’t know why. Until now.”
“Until now?” Rhodey questions with raised eyebrow
“I was a bait. They never wanted me. They wanted Tony…” Carol says, her voice going quieter at the end of her sentence.
“But how would they know that it would be Tony… who would come and get you out?” Clint asks, suspicion clear in his eyes
“It was the only logical solution...” Fury mutters and at the confused expression he receives he signs
“There was nobody else I could really contact. Danvers as powerful as she is, was captured and the Avengers were in dust”
Clint flinches at the mention of the Avengers and Vision and Rhodey look down
“Stark was the only possible choice.”
“But why would they want to kidnap Mr. Stark” Peter asks innocently
“Boss was always Alpha Level threat for them. Even without his status as Iron Man they feared him. And MODOK has… personal issue against him.” Friday mutters looking down
“What issue?” Clint asks
“Tarleton is former business partner of Aldrich Killian and scientist for A.I.M. After Killian’s death and A.I.M’s collapse, Tarleton blamed Stark.” Fury answers
“So this is about Revenge?” Rhodey asks looking worried
Fury signs “Unlikely, there are rumors, that MODOK Isn’t the only Leader of Hydra out there..”
“Anything confirmed?”
“No”
“So what do we do?”
“Friday and Jocasta managed to retrieve some information from the date we collected when we freed Captan Danvers” Vision speaks for the first time
“It was mostly corrupted, but there are some locations that could serve as Hydra’s new base of operations” Friday says while waving her hand, making hologram of the globe with Red marks appear.
“And we are sure that Tony is in one of those?” Rhodey asks
“He has to be. Right now these are the only Hydra Bases that are operating.”
“But won’t they move into another location if we attack one of these bases and don’t find him?” Peter questions
“Mr. Parker is correct. Luckily Hydra isn’t aware that Friday and Jocasta managed to find this list…” Vision starts and Fury continues
“So we need to attack them all at once”
“But, how do we do that? There is at least twenty of them” Hope asks
“26 to be exact” Vision corrects
“I got that covered.” Fury says with superiority clear in his voice
“This will be one of the biggest operations since SHIELD’s collapse, so we can’t messed this up.”
He looks at Friday who nods and her eyes glow for a second. Another hologram appears and large base appears
“This is Hydra’s largest and most secure base. No normal forces will be able to conquer it and there is a high chance that it is where Stark is being kept. You guys are going to go there and destroy it.”
“When do we leave?”
“Tomorrow. Get rest” Fury dismisses them and leaves the room
Clint is about to fallow him but Vision’s voice stops him “Mr. Barton?”
Clint signs and turns seeing Vision holding with new Bow and Uniform “Sir created these for you before… everything”
He hands it to Clint and turns to leave
“Vision? I just wanted to say… I’m sorry about what happened at the Compound” Clint says looking guilty
“It wasn’t you who send me crashing underground.” Vision says quietly
“But… It shouldn’t have happened, I wasn’t even supposed to be there! I should have asks questions, not shoot first”
Vision signs “If it helps… I am not angry anymore. Sad yes, but not angry.”
Clint nods and Vision hesitates before he asks “How is she?”
Clint immediately understands who is Vision talking about and signs “From the last time I saw her… Lost. She, like everybody else regrets what happened between us…”
Vision nods and gives Clint one sad smile before he flies away.
“Hope” Rhodey greets
“Rhodey”
“So, I heard you and your Dad are on a run..”
“Yeah… it has been… eventful”
“Did you know? That the Lang guy would join Rogers?”
“No”
Rhodey nods “You know… Tony expected you to call some months back”
Hope’s eyes narrow in confusion and Rhodey chuckles
“I mean right after Lang broke into The Compound and stole that little toy that your Dad created under Howard”
Hope flinches and scratches her head “Right… that…”
“You didn’t seriously thought that he wouldn’t figure it out?” Rhodey says amusement clear in his voice
“Well no…”
“But you wanted him to call you” Rhodey cuts her off with knowing look and she signs, nodding.
“He talked sometimes about you. He missed you”
Hope doesn’t know what to say so Rhodey claps her on shoulder with sad smile and goes to leave.
He stops before the doors and turns “When we find him, talk with him.”
Hope nods, finally returning Rhodey’s smile
“How are you feeling Friday?” Peter asks hesitantly and Carol can see frustration rising in the young female Stark.
“My Father is missing. I feel great!” She snaps sarcastically and Peter flinches at her harsh tone.
She immediately feels guilty and signs “I’m sorry for snapping Pete… I’m just…”
“Scared” Peter finishes for her and she nods
“He will be alright…”
“Will he?” Friday ask brokenly “MODOK hates him and if he doesn’t give them whatever they want from him…”
Peter places comforting hand at her shoulder “Hey, don’t think like that.”
“I’m sorry…” Carol mutters behind them
They both turn to her confused and so she repeats “I’m sorry”
“For what?” Peter asks
“It’s my fault that they got to him…”
“No… It was our fault, that it didn’t even cross our mind, that you could have been bugged” Friday says reaching out towards the dark Blond woman.
“Don’t blame yourself, it wasn’t your fault”
Carol nods and Friday gives her a smile “Come with me”
Carol, confused looks at Peter who just shrugs and fallows behind Friday.
They stop behind some locker and Friday pulls out Red and Blue suit with some Golden details. Carol quietly gasps as Friday hands it to her and Peter is still looking confused
“Wha- How? When?” Carol asks looking at the suit with wide eyes
Friday smiles “Boss designed it when you were returning from your visit to Ms. Foster. He uploaded the schematics to Jocasta who activated fabrication machine. It is also patted with Starkanium”
Both Peter and Carol are looking at her confused and Friday chuckles, secretly wondering if they are related.
“Starkanium is New Element developed by Boss after notes his Father took from The Tesseract. In theory, it could give you a tiny little boost”
Peter’s eyes go wide and his brain maul functioned after hearing “New Element” and Carol is looking between suit inside her arms and Friday with wide eyes
“I don’t know what to say…”
“Don’t say anything. Go try it on!” Friday says and Carol chuckles at the excitement the girl is radiating.
She is happy that she was able to take her mind of the fact that her dad is missing…
“Please… let me out… please…”
“It seems you were right” Viper comments watching the camera footage with smirk
“Of course I was” MODOK says confidently. He feels no remorse for his actions towards the genius or anybody else.
“He broke even sooner then I expected... pathetic”
“Is he ready for phase 2?” Viper asks
MODOK stares at the monitors, carefully watching the broken man beg with satisfaction. “Yes”
“Good. Guards! Follow me!” Viper orders and leaves the room.
On the first day with Hydra, Tony was taken into “The Chair” as Hydra called it.
They tried to use the same method they used on Barnes. It didn’t work.
Tony might not be able to use his technopathy thanks to his shiny new collar, but Extremis is still present in his veins.
They used even higher voltage then on Barnes and Tony could feel himself slipping. So he used every bit of strength that he had and focused on protecting his brain
MODOK apparently figured out what he was doing, because he sent his men to “play” with Tony.
They took him into some kind of torture chamber and cut him with knifes, only for him to regenerate and for them to do it again. Then they beat him up until he was unconscious.
He woke up in dark small box without any light.
On next day they did pretty much the same thing that on the first day, only in different order and they added in… waterboarding.
When Tony saw what they wanted to do he had panic attack.. they didn’t care.
They did this routine for another 6 days.
Every single time, Tony had panic attack during Waterboarding, but he didn’t give up. He couldn’t.
They must have got bored, because the next time Tony woke up, he was in fully white room, wearing only white straight jacket and white sweatpants.
For hours he was waiting for someone to come in but nobody came.
He tried to keep his mind occupied, talking to himself, telling himself stupid jokes or singing.
Then he started having hallucinations.
He saw his parents, the Avengers, and Friends only for them to vanish whenever he blinked.
He was quickly getting desperate.
He tried to hurt himself, and the blood on the floor was helping him concentrate at least on something else then on the white around him.
But whenever he had fallen asleep, thanks to his exhaustion and lack of food and water…
Every time he woke up, the room was again fully cleaned up.
He tried to keep himself together. For Friday, Harley, Katie, Madison, Vision, Peter, Rhodey, Helen, Happy, Jocasta, His Bots, hell… even for Fury
But at the end of the day 12… He finally broke down…
He sit down in middle of room and stated to cry, begging them “Please… let me out… please…”
He didn’t actually believe that anybody would come, but when the doors slipped open and Viper came through, followed by two other guards, Tony felt relieved, to see another person again.
He crawled to her, desperately trying to reach out and she allowed it.
She helped him to his legs and held him when he almost tripped over.
“Are you ready to cooperate now?” She asks in soft voice
Tony just nods and she gives him sadistic grin with lustful eyes “Good”
She places a light kiss to his forehead and mentions for guards to catch him and follow her.
Tony doesn’t try to resist them…