Hostile Takeovers (part I of II)
Title: Hostile Takeovers
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Word Count: 12,000 total (6,500 Part I; 5,500 Part II)
Warnings: Violence. Language. Slight sexual content. A villain endorses Nazi Germany's views on race.
Summary: Iron Man is not just the armor.
Author's Notes: A thousand thanks to my lovely betas, niki_chidon and the team of elspethdixon and seanchai . Your guidance and feedback have been invaluable.
Steve is on the couch, attempting to read “The Hobbit”, when he hears Tony's voice. “I want to say one word to you. Just one word. Algae.”
“Huh?” Steve looks up. Tony is standing in front of him, a sheaf of papers in one hand, looking slightly disappointed.
“Come on, we watched 'The Graduate' two weeks ago.”
“No, I get that.” Well, he mostly gets it; Peter and Tony's endless supply of movie quotes is something Steve finds entertaining, if occasionally mystifying. “But algae?”
Tony sighs and flops down on the couch next to him. “You asked me what my meeting was about tomorrow. It's about algae.”
“...I'm still confused.”
“It's the hot new biofuel. Or it will be, in the next ten years.” Tony tosses his papers towards the coffee table and rolls his eyes when half of them immediately slide off. “I'm meeting with a biofuel company that's looking for an investor.” He looks at Steve, gives him a rueful half-smile. “I wish I could come with you instead.”
“You think the meeting will be that bad?” Steve lays his book on his knee and turns towards Tony, laying one arm out casually along the top of the couch cushions.
“Well, their CEO doesn't seem to like me very much. On the other hand, I don't know if she likes anyone very much.” Tony sighs, stretches out until Steve can hear his joints crack. Tony's shed his jacket and tie somewhere and unbuttoned his collar. There's a patch of shadow underneath his chin where the whiteness of the shirt comes up against the muscle of his neck. Steve does his best not to stare. “It'll be fine.” He leans into Steve to nudge him in the side, right beneath where his arm is stretched out. “I just want to help you find your shield. You look like a lost puppy without it.”
Steve sighs. “I just wish I knew who had it. I'm afraid of what they might be using it for.” He slouches a little in his seat and adds, in a small voice, “And I do miss having it.”
Tony leans into Steve, resting his chin on his broad shoulder. “We'll find it,” he says, low and certain. “We will.”
Steve smiles; the way Tony says it, just announces it as a statement of pure fact, makes him feel more hopeful than he has all day. He puts his head down to where Tony is leaning into his shoulder and rubs his cheek against the dark hair, earning a happy noise in response. “We will. Do you want to read 'The Hobbit' with me?”
“Is the Hulk green? Of course I want to read the Hobbit with you. Go to the part with Gollum and the riddles in it, I love that bit.”
“Mr. Stark.” For a CEO, Reva Kazi is young. Yet she handles herself with total certainty, or at least a good imitation of it. She's soberly dressed, in a black suit that matches her glossy hair and a cream scarf that brings out the glow of her dark skin. Kazi had been focused throughout the morning's meetings, dark eyes fixed on Tony. Now that they are alone, her face has grown hard enough to match her eyes. “I find myself in an...unusual situation.” She glances at him, quick and furtive. He leans back, slow and elegant in his chair, and begins spinning a pen between his fingertips. “Greenspring is on the verge of a major breakthrough in our algaculture. Another five years of funding would result in a process that would revolutionize fuel technology worldwide.”
“So you've told me.” He flicks the pen, walks it back and forth across his hands.
“You're not impressed by our work, Mr. Stark?”
He shrugs. “A lot can happen in five years. You have good tech, you need to hold onto your R&D group and start thinking about making the jump to wide-scale production. You're a lightweight in the business world right now. Another bad stock tumble like the one last month and someone like HammerTech could buy you out in a night.”
“I am aware.” Kazi holds herself still; only her knuckles move, a brief flash of paleness against the dark fabric of her suit. “You have prior contracts with Greenspring. The board of directors recommended I approach you with an offer.”
Tony flicks the pen into his mouth and swivels to meet her stare. “The board? I thought you were employee-owned.”
She nods. “We are. The board is made of founding members, including myself. This was the recommendation. In order to prevent the possibility of a hostile takeover, we'd like to offer you an opportunity to purchase controlling stock in Greenspring. An initial investment in the technology now would offer a high probability of profit sharing within a 5 to 10-year period. I have a draft of the agreement, if you would care to examine it at your leisure.”
Tony tilts his chin back, rubs at his goatee, spins in a few circles through the deck chair. “What else?”
“We- the board is prepared to offer additional-”
“No, no, not the stock.” He stops, suddenly, fixed her with a stare. “What else is going on here?”
“I'm afraid I don't-”
“What happened last month? I don't care what kind of news came down the pipeline. Given your profits from the last quarter, you should have been able to hang onto most of that stock, not sell it.”
“That was, I'm afraid, a poor management decision-”
“Last I checked, Stanford wasn't giving out MBAs for free, Ms. Kazi. And I don't think you pulled Greenspring Energy through five years in development to fumble the first stock option you handle. Half of your company's outstanding IPO has been bought up by a dummy corporation in Eastern Europe, did you know that?”
“I...I'm not aware...” Tony sees her jaw clench, but he also sees the faint tremble in it, and feels a twinge of remorse. He leans forward, makes his next words softer.
“I don't know what's going on in your company, Ms. Kazi. If I weren't interested in buying stock in it, I'd leave it alone. But as it is, I need to know what's happening.”
In the silence there, before she opens her mouth to speak, Tony feels the hairs on his neck rise.
“Mr. Stark?” Rava looks at him quizzically. Then she freezes, head still titled to one side, and Tony can see her eyes widen.
Gunshots. One, two, then a popcorn scatter that builds on itself and suddenly snaps off. Muffled voices fill the sudden silence, a mutter of low confusion that swells, quickly, into a spike of panic when someone screams.
Tony doesn't remember moving, just finds himself at the huge double doors, twisting the lock and shoving one of the side tables under the handles. “Is there another way out?”
“What- yes, over there, we can go through the suite-” Kazi instinctively moves around the table, sunlight slipping over her suit.
“No!” She stops dead. “This way- stay away from the windows-” She slides backwards, slow and gentle, and goes around the far end of the room with him.
They're in the back hall of an office suite. Heads are popping out from doors, and Kazi's personal assistant is sprinting around the corner towards them, his jacket flapping. “Rava- Mr. Stark-”
“Ray, there's someone in the building.” Kazi has her shoulder against a filing cabinet; she gives it an experimental shove. “Help me move this.”
“We need to get everyone out of here,” Tony says, dragging at the cabinet. “Gather everyone up, keep them low-”
“Ray, call a code silver- no, wait, round up the suite and get into the small meeting room, the one by the stairs. Start on the north side, I'll meet you there. Keep everybody calm.” Ray nods, strides off at a pace only a hair slower than his earlier sprint. Kazi pulls a phone from her pocket and stabs a few numbers into the keypad, then begins moving down the hall, opening doors as she goes. “Are you all right? Go to the small meeting room. I don't know; I'm getting information now.”
Tony stares at her, then back at the door, now covered by a metal cabinet, and fumbles for his phone.
“Happy, where are you?”
“Tenth floor, boss.” He sounds out of breath. “You OK? What's happening?”
“I'm fine. Don't think the merger's going through today, though.”
There's a snorting laugh. “Glad to hear it. I'm trying to get to the stairs; it's a mess down here-”
“What's going on?”
“Lot of panic.” There's the sound of someone crying close by. “Hey. Hey, it's okay. Get down the hall, get in the break room and stay put.”
“Happy, did you see anything?”
“Uh- your basic SWAT wannabes, lot of black kevlar. No insignia I recognized. Seemed like pros, though. Boss, I'm at the stairs-”
Tony looks down the hall, almost empty now. “Happy, how bad is it down there?”
There's a pause. “No shots fired, but we've got a lot of upset people here.”
“Uh-huh.” Tony is silent. Listens to Happy's panting breaths, the sound of panicked voices in the background. “Do me a favor, stay down there and try to keep everyone calm.”
“You sure?”
Tony closes his eyes. “Yeah. I'm sure. We'll get these people out first, then I'll grab my briefcase and go after these guys.”
Happy is quiet for a moment, then Tony hears another panicky spike of voices come through the line. “Okay. Okay, boss, be careful-”
“I'll call you,” Tony says, and hangs up.
“I can't reach security,” Kazi says as he follows her into the conference room. Tony sees her hands clench into fists again, just for a moment, and she flips open her cell and dials in a long string of codes before lifting the speaker to her mouth. “Rava Kazi. Emergency codes. Total broadcast.” She pauses, takes a breath. “This is your CEO, Rava Kazi. Greenspring Energy is in a Code Silver alert. There may be one or more armed individuals in the building. Please stay calm and follow your crisis plans.” She flips the phone shut and looks around the conference room; Tony can see her counting under her breath. When she reaches Tony, she stares for a moment, unseeing, before recovering and plastering a weak smile on her face. “Mr. Stark. I apologize for the interruption, but it would seem we have to abridge our meeting.”
“I would never have guessed.”
Kazi gives him a real smile that flashes and fades in the space of a second. “Is anyone hurt?” There's a low murmur of 'no's. “All right. Stay down for a little bit, everyone. I'm going to try and get more information.” There's a sudden babble of panicked noise, and she raises her hands against it. “I need you to stay calm and stay quiet. Yes- I know. Please keep calm while we analyze the situation. Ray, can I see you?”
Tony stares at the people huddled on the floor. Most of them are following Reva's advice and staying quiet; they're pressed into tight huddles, coworkers leaning up against each other for comfort. Almost everyone has a phone or PDA out and is typing intermittently at the keyboards; at least the wireless is still up, though God know how long that'll last. Behind him, he can hear Kazi and her assistant talking in low voices.
“-can't reach security either.”
“I have to see if we should call for an evacuation-”
“-but what's safe? Is it just this floor?”
“Happy's on the tenth floor.” They turn to look at Tony; he keeps his voice low. “Same thing there. He says it looks like a paramilitary team of some kind.”
Ray exhales. “Who in God's name-”
“Does it matter?” Reva is stabbing fruitlessly at her phone. “I am getting nothing from Security-”
“What's your security system like?” Tony fishes his PDA out of his pocket and punches in a few commands. “Cameras? Keycard access? Oh, is that a SaiTech logo? Very nice.” His fingers move rapidly over the keys.
“I- what are you doing?” Ray peers over his shoulder at the windows popping to life on Tony's phone.
“Trying...to analyze...the situation. No, you go up there. And- that's a new piece of code, interesting.” More rapid keying. Tony frowns at the phone, uses his fingertips to flick a few windows off the screen.
“Mr. Stark, are you hacking my security system?”
“Not yet, I'm not. Ohhhhhhhh, they fixed that loop, I see.” Tony looks up from the phone briefly, flashes a grin. “Come on. What do you have? Keycarding? Any internal overrides on the locks?”
Reva looks faintly stunned. “Uh. Cameras, in the stairwells for sure, and through both the offices and the labs. Suites and offices are keycard only, all lab access is keycard only. I don't know about overrides...Ray?”
He shrugs, breaking his gaze at Tony's fingers flying over the keys. “What you said. There might be safety override codes?”
“I think we can work with that. If...I remember...correctly...” Tony lets his voice die down and studies the code scrolling up his screen. “There it is.” He flicks his fingers together, taps in a few lines of code. “Let's take a look at those cameras.”
“Did you...you just hacked SaiTech's software with a cell phone?”
Tony grins. “Well, it's more of a microprocessor that can make phone calls.”
Reva rubs her forehead. “We spent how much of last year's profits on that system?”
“Ten percent, Ms. Kazi.”
“I can't believe it.”
Tony grins again and flicks a switch on the phone, covering the far wall with a projection of camera views. “If it makes you feel better, they're the best on the market. Well, aside from me, of course.” He pulls up a chair and begins to filter rapidly through the camera feeds; the far wall of the conference room is a blur of overlapping videos. The room is dim, and quiet enough that he can hear the shiver of fear that rises when a trooper crosses beneath a camera. They're all kitted out in anonymous black Kevlar, like Happy said; faces half-masked with neoprene, eyes shielded behind plastic goggles. It's a squad of five; they move easily through the hallways, almost casual, guns held loosely at their sides, and Tony feels a frisson of helpless fear as one of them gently nudges open the hanging door of an office suite. A woman behind him gasps.
“It's empty.” Kazi's voice is low, steady. “That floor is being remodeled.” Tony finds himself breathing out.
“What floor is that?”
“Six.”
“Six.” He pulls his phone towards him again, pulls the view out into the screen and begins skipping through grainy security film. “Four on six. None on- wait, let's start on one...” Tony's fingers fly through the menus, skimming along screens and occasionally pulling one out to his desktop. “First floor is clean...so is the second floor.”
“You're sure?” Kazi is at his elbow, voice eager and brittle. Tony skips back through the image stream, pulls out another shot and expands it.
“Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure. Third floor is...clean.”
“Can we- Which way-”
“North stairwell.” Ray is suddenly hunched over Tony's shoulder, eyes scanning the display. “Stark, is the north staircase clear? Can we get people out that way?”
“Just...a...second...” The display on the wall shudders and jumps. “Yes. Yes, north staircase is clear right now.” Kazi is muttering into her phone, hitting a button, snapping out more instructions. “Wait, wait, before you do anything, I need to do a full scan, see how many of these guys there are.”
“Okay. Okay.”
“I'm setting up the messaging system,” Kazi says over one shoulder, phone wedged close into her ear. “Tell me when-”
“Couple of minutes.”
Time ticks by. Tony's fingers weave in intricate little dances over the screen in front of him. The output on the wall changes, grows; the video screens accrete in overlapping stacks, then begin to migrate into separate spots in some framework. Ray leans forward.
“That's- is that our building?”
“Mapped the camera positions onto the blueprints. It's a little messy, but it works for now.” Tony sighs and pops out a line of code from where it's scrolling in the background. “Okay, we have fourteen troopers in the building right now- two squads of five, one of four. It looks like they're all generally moving upwards. Right now...” he flips through the camera views one last time. “Right now, there's nobody moving beneath the sixth floor; the squads are all between six and eight.”
“One and two.” Kazi drums her fingers on the table as she waits for her phone to connect. “We'll get them out first.”
“What about the rest of us?” Ray keeps his voice low as he bends forward, pretends to watch the screen on Tony's lap. “What happens when they get up here?”
Tony spins in his chair. He's not grinning, but it's a close thing. “While you were in high school, did you ever pull a fire alarm?”
The phone only gets a chance to ring once before Happy picks up.
“Boss.”
“How's it going, Happy?”
“I've been better. What's the plan?”
“We got most of the building out. You still near the stairs? The squads are heading upstairs. I'm going to wait until they get up top, then hit the emergency alarms and get the rest of the staff out in the confusion. ”
There's silence on the line.
“I know.”
“I didn't say anything.”
“I know you didn't. Look, there's only about fourteen of these guys. We take advantage of the noise, I think it's our best chance.”
More silence.
“Happy, do you have a better idea?”
A resigned sigh. “No. I guess I don't.”
“Thanks, that's a vote of confidence. Wait for the fire alarms to go off, then get everybody down the stairs, I'll meet you outside.”
“Will do. Boss?”
“Yeah?”
“Be careful.”
“Will do, Hap.”
“Stark, how are we looking?”
“Good.” Tony doesn't look away from the display, squinting closely at the screen. “The first seven floors are empty. Looks like...the teams are on nine and ten, now.” He frowns at the video feeds. One of the men looks familiar, somehow; even through the bulkiness of body armor and the further blurring of the video feeds. Tony keeps turning to look at him out of the corner of his eye.
“It's strange.”
“What?”
He taps the desk, lost for words, then finally settles on, “Look, they're headed straight upstairs. They've had plenty of opportunities to break doors, hurt hostages.” Tony is aware of the whole room watching; he pulls up a screen and points to one of the squads. A trooper kneels in front, watching an open doorway, as his team moves past, then backs away, covering their retreat. “They haven't. It's like they're just passing through.”
There's a sense of loosening tension in the room. Most of the staff slouches a little bit, lets their shoulders slump in relief. Tony motions to Ray and Kazi, pulls them in close and speaks low. “So the question is, what do they want?”
The two of them look at each other, searching. Tony keeps staring at the video feeds, flipping restlessly through them. He keeps his voice light and easy as he continues. “What they probably want is me. Maybe you-” he points to Kazi- “but probably me.”
“Stark-”
“Let's stick to the plan,” Tony says, and there's a dizzying moment of deja vu where he smells woodsmoke and old batteries and the acrid stench of a forge. “We'll wait until they're further up, then I'll lie low, give your people time to get out.”
There's a moment of silence. Then Reva breathes out, slowly. “Stark, they're not after you. Or me.”
“Then what...” Tony trails off and leans forward. The familiar trooper, the one he's been watching, has turned quickly at some imagined noise, gun up. He laughs, mutters something to the rest of his squad. Tony doesn't bother to try and figure out what they're saying. His attention is on the bulk of the man, the dark mass the body armor makes over his back. It's not just body armor; he's carrying something big and broad and round strapped over his shoulders, something Tony's seen a thousand times in Steve's hands, and he doesn't even need to see the star to recognize the shield.
He turns and stares at the Greenspring team. Ray simply looks confused, darting glances between his boss and Tony. Kazi looks at him, dark, steady, fathomless, and Tony is aware of the ground shifting under his feet. “You need to tell me what's going on here. Right now.”
“Boss-”
Reva pushes away Ray's hand. “It's all right, Ray.” She sighs. Rubs her hand against her forehead, pinches the bridge of her nose. “It's time.” She pauses, staring at a patch of wall; Tony can see her putting her thoughts in order. “Well. We had an employee. A- a scientist. One of our founding members, actually. He was...”
“An arrogant fuck.” Ray's voice is sharp, deeply angry, and Reva chokes out a laugh.
“Yes. Adler was arrogant, and aggressive, and very, very smart.” She settles down, and Tony can see her reaching for her professional posture. “And he had a great deal of control over the company. Too much control. He had his own department for a while, worked on cold-fusion type energy. We had made an incredible breakthrough with the algae processing- we were going to make this work, all of it, and he didn't want to hear it.” She goes quiet again, back rigid. “He took our funds. He had access, somehow- it doesn't matter. It took us months to figure out the trail, to get him completely out, and the whole time he was bleeding us dry.”
“This has to do with your stock sale, doesn't it?”
Reva gives another laugh, brief and bitter. “I wish it was only the stock. Yes. He bled out our assets; we're still trying to track them down. But we're stable, now; if we hadn't had competitors trying to make offers, we could have made it at least a few more months.”
“It's not only the stock.”
She shakes her head, sighs again. “Before Adler left- a few months before- he made a purchase, God knows from whom. It was- a metal alloy of some kind, I think. He was crazy about it. He rearranged all his research around it; kept talking about how it was going to revolutionize the industry. That was what gave him away, actually; we realized there was only one place he could have gotten the money for that kind of purchase.”
“A metal alloy?” Tony is scrolling again, frantically, punching in lines of code on his screen. “Where did he buy it from?”
“No idea. There's no record of the transaction.” Reva stops short. When she continues, it's in a lower tone. “Adler robbed us blind, Stark. He had his hands on everything, when we finally found him out. At first- when we first uncovered him- my auditors were finding something new every week. Nothing big, you understand; nothing actionable, just some little fix or change or document that tipped things out of balance for us, gave him more control. And we finally get him wrapped in enough legalese to fire him, finally start recovering our losses, and I find that he left some radioactive supermetal in his lab.” She curls her fingers over her hands and shakes them in frustration.
“And then Tosenkraft swept in and made the offer.” Tony offers this quietly, but Reva turns and answers him in a voice barely removed from freezing.
“They did not make an offer, Stark. They're not offering. They're trying to take us to pieces.” She gestures to the security cameras, the squads moving up the stairs towards them. “And now- those men have to be involved with Adler, or Tosenkraft, or both, which means they are in my building. Threatening my employees. And all we can do is run.”
“No.” Tony says this quietly. He stands up and looks up at Kazi glaring at him, jaw set in an iron curve. “The first thing we're doing is getting your people out safely. But then...” He takes a breath. “Ms. Kavi, whatever protections your former employee had- or has- whatever protections Tosenkraft can bring into play- right now, it appears they're trying to steal a radioactive substance. And I know a number of people in the Department of Defense who have a vested interest in keeping things like that from happening.”
Reva stares at him for a moment, recognition dawning. “You mean- this is concrete, we can make this stick.” She draws in a breath that sounds almost joyful. “Forget short-selling our stock- If we can link Tosenkraft, or Adler to an armed theft-”
“The SEC would be the least of their worries.”
“Yes,” Ray says, in a strangled voice. Reva buries her head in her hands for a moment; when she takes them away, her face is lit with joy.
“Okay. Okay. Let's go, let's get everyone out of here.”
It takes the teams another ten minutes to reach the top floor. In the meantime, Reva has called down to floors eight and nine and gotten them from the building. Ray has finally reached someone from Security. The report is that the squads hit the security stations all at once with some sort of synchronized attack; guard booths were filled with tear gas, and at least one person was hit with something like a Taser. There's a head count still in process, but from the relieved look Ray and Reva share nobody's been too severely injured. Tony thinks briefly about calling Happy again and dismisses it; he knows the plan, and he needs to focus on the security teams now. They've spread out over the top two floors, covering entrances and exits and, Tony notes with some dismay, the stairwells.
There's nothing he can do about it now. This is still the best option they have, and they have to do it soon. The troopers apparently aren't content with just waiting around anymore; he can see one of the squads conferring, looking around at the doors lining the hallway. They march off camera. A few seconds later, there's a rattling noise at the main door to their suite.
Tony says something obscene under his breath. The employees are ready; Reva has them gathered in a huddle at the door of the meeting room they're sheltering in. Tony hits a button, making the display on the wall flicker and disappear, and stands up, phone in one hand. He motions for the group to follow him, and they do, trailing behind as he approaches the suite door.
There's another rattle, and the sound of very low voices. Tony holds the phone in one hand; in the other, he holds up three fingers.
Three. Twenty faces, staring at him.
Two. A scraping noise outside the door.
One. Ray tenses behind him.
Zero.
He hits a key on his phone, and immediately the room is dark and filled with deafening sound. Ray grabs the handle, slams the door out, and they're in the hallway, dark indistinct shapes around them, flickering in the emergency strobe lights. They're gathered in close, their guns are useless- he hits one on the face, hard and quick, takes a step back and hits him in the kneecap with his heel hard enough to crunch. Someone closing- Tony gets low, rolls him over one shoulder and slams him into the wall. Dodge, turn, there's a rifle barrel swinging up at him, they're recovering. He flips the gun further forward, twists it out of the trooper's hands and clubs him with the stock. There's a stream of people moving past him, and Ray panting as he grapples with another trooper. Tony uses the gun again, slams him in the back with the weight of it, and Ray takes advantage and head-butts him into the far wall. There's a muffled clang when he hits, like a pan falling on the floor, and Tony is on him as he slumps to the floor, fingers working at the shield strapped across his back.
“Stark-”
“Go,” Tony says, and Ray is gone, sprinting down the hall to the staircase behind the rest of the employees. There's a bungee cord splayed over the shield; he rips clear all the hooks he can find, gives another tug and the shield pops out, black nylon fluttering as it comes clear. Shouts, boots pounding around the corner, and Tony threads his forearm through the handles, hunches beneath the shield and runs for the stairs. Pops of noise- they're firing at him, it feels like a sudden rattle of hail on the shield. Something mushrooms into the ground at his feet, sizzling with electricity. He takes the corner hard, hits the pushbar on the door with his shoulder and tumbles into the ruddy darkness of the stairwell.
Tony picks himself up, readjusts the shield and hits the stairs, taking them two at a time. There's the sound of pounding feet, further down. The shield unbalances him very slightly. He's used to the suit, the stabilizers moving with him. He has to keep a hand out to balance himself; it's dark and shadowed, and there's noise coming from every direction. With the hand not occupied with the shield, he grabs his phone out of his pocket and snaps a few commands to it, bringing up the security camera display again. They'll have to check, make sure the building is clear, see if they can lock off the tactical teams. He needs to find Happy, needs to get the suit and isolate this radioactive mystery metal they have in the labs. The screens flicker past him, snapping between cameras as he snaps out commands, and he looks at the next image and very nearly trips down his next flight. He catches himself at the last second on the railing, spins and staggers to a stop on the landing and just stares.
The man in the screen looks up at the camera, down at the ground, and kicks the black bundle laying there. Tony doesn't want to see this, can't see this, but he's rolling over, face twisted in pain, and it's Happy down there, hands still clasped around the briefcase- they have the suit, they have Happy. The trooper reaches down, hauls up Happy by the scruff of his neck- still struggling, still dizzy from the head wound- and there is a curved bright shape suddenly pressing into Happy's neck, edge sharp and shining, and Happy goes still.
”No,” Tony says, low and useless. The trooper looks up at the camera again. Presses down the knife- Happy struggles away from it- then lets up the pressure until the edge is just skating along Happy's throat. He's pulling Happy backwards, now, one hand still pressed in an awful caressing curve along his chest, and he jerks his head towards the door. Movement- the rest of his team going past, and Happy and his captor last through the door as it swings shut.
Tony stands in the flickering light of the video feed. Someone is yelling up the stairs at him- Come on, Stark, get out of there. Ray, maybe. He doesn't have the suit. They have Happy, and they have the Iron Man suit, and if he doesn't do this right they're going to have radioactive supermetal and probably this company too, this company Kazi has fought them tooth and nail for. It's hard to keep a thought in his head; it's the noise of the alarms, and the spike of adrenaline surging through his system, and the fact that all he can see is the look of breathless terror on Happy's face when he feels the blade at his throat. He has to do something.
The shield bangs against his hip. He has that, at least; he saved Steve's shield for him. Tony splays one hand across the cool surface, tucks his head in, and thinks. He can smell metal and oiled leather, and if he breathes in deep, he can conjure up the faintest touch of sweat. The alarms are still shrieking, but the shield is cool against his skin. It's an anchor, a spot of stillness in the insanity of his day, and he grounds himself against it for a little. A very little, just a few seconds- but it's enough.
“Steve.”
“Tony?” Steve's voice is scratchy. Tony can hear wind buffeting the mouthpiece.
“How was your day at work, handsome?”
“Tony.” He must be on the helicopter; Dugan is probably rolling his eyes at him from across the cargo bay. “No luck on the shield yet, but we picked up some leads; the thief sold it to a group that seems to be linked to a bunch of companies in Eastern Europe.”
“One of them wouldn't be Tosenkraft Energy, would it?”
“...Yes, there was one called Tosenkraft in there; CEO is a Jurgen Haider. You know them?”
Tony can't restrain a wry little chuckle. “I know of them. So I found something you might be missing.”
Even over the bad connection, he can hear the hope in Steve's voice. “You- it isn't-”
Tony lifts one hand from the tangle of wires in his lap and taps his knuckles on the shield, making it ring dully. “Big, round, got a star in the middle? Lot of red and white and blue?”
“You found my shield.” Steve's voice is all delight; he must be grinning right now, eyes sparkling. Tony finds himself smiling in return.
“Yup.” He waits for a moment; he's not disappointed.
“Wait, how did you find my shield? I thought you were in a business meeting all day today.”
“We...had to adjourn a little early.” Tony makes himself a little more comfortable against the wall, rummages through the pile of scrounged supplies at his side. “I'm going to have to borrow some of your gear for a little bit, I hope you don't mind.”
“Tony, what's going on?”
He gives Steve the abbreviated version, hands busy the whole time.
“You don't have your suit and you're going into close-quarters combat with a group of well-armed paramilitary troops?”
“Well, when you put it that way, of course it sounds like a bad idea.”
“You're undergeared for this- you don't have any of your tech, and these men are armed to the teeth, they could kill you-”
“They're not using standard bullets, Cap, they took out the security team with stun rounds of some kind, used the same rounds coming after me. They're trying really hard to not kill anybody-”
“Even then, say they knock you out- now they've got you hostage, and god knows what this company is actually a front for. Stay there, I can be there with SHIELD support in ninety minutes.”
“We don't have ninety minutes. They have free run of the building and access to the alloy, you think they'll hang around for a congratulatory beer after they steal it?”
“Tony-” He can hear Steve gathering up steam for a big attack, to maybe even forbid him to go, and he jumps in ahead of him.
“I can't leave the suit with them, Cap.” Tony takes a breath and says, low, “I really can't leave Happy with them. Not if I have the chance to get him out of there.”
Steve is silent for a moment; the only sound on the line is the wind whipping past.
“Tony, the best way you can help Happy is by using your head here.”
“I am. I'm telling you. I have a hack into the security system here; I can see where these guys are at all times. I can kill lights, lock doors. I can stay three steps ahead. I have the shield, Cap- this isn't a suicide mission. They're not hunting me. I'm hunting them. Trust me on this.” Don't tell me not to go. Don't make me promise. I don't want to have to lie to you.
There's more silence on the line, and then Steve sighs. It's his special Tony-sigh, the one he uses when Tony is about to do something he really doesn't approve of. “I can't stop you from doing this, can I?”
Tony gives him a dry little laugh. “I don't think so.”
“Then- be careful. Is there anything I can do? Anything to help?”
Tony slides the earpiece he's been building over one ear and taps his phone. A display flickers to life, hovering in front of his right eye. He makes a noise of approval and starts shuffling files from his phone onto the display. “Come by as fast as you can. Bring that SHIELD support; I might end up needing it. And can you get one of the bureaucrats to contact Pepper with what they've uncovered on Tosenkraft and Haider?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I can do all that. Anything else?”
“Come here, get your shield and back me up. Beat up some goons with me. We'll make a date of it; I'll buy you dinner afterwards.” Tony tries to keep his voice teasing, but some honest want sifts through.
Steve makes a soft noise in return. “I will. I'll hold you to that dinner.”
“I'd like that.” Tony finds the connection they're on, holds a finger over the 'disconnect' button. “Steve, I have to go now.”
“Okay. Tony?”
“Yeah?”
“Be careful. I'll be there soon.”
“Yeah.”
(Part II)
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Word Count: 12,000 total (6,500 Part I; 5,500 Part II)
Warnings: Violence. Language. Slight sexual content. A villain endorses Nazi Germany's views on race.
Summary: Iron Man is not just the armor.
Author's Notes: A thousand thanks to my lovely betas, niki_chidon and the team of elspethdixon and seanchai . Your guidance and feedback have been invaluable.
Steve is on the couch, attempting to read “The Hobbit”, when he hears Tony's voice. “I want to say one word to you. Just one word. Algae.”
“Huh?” Steve looks up. Tony is standing in front of him, a sheaf of papers in one hand, looking slightly disappointed.
“Come on, we watched 'The Graduate' two weeks ago.”
“No, I get that.” Well, he mostly gets it; Peter and Tony's endless supply of movie quotes is something Steve finds entertaining, if occasionally mystifying. “But algae?”
Tony sighs and flops down on the couch next to him. “You asked me what my meeting was about tomorrow. It's about algae.”
“...I'm still confused.”
“It's the hot new biofuel. Or it will be, in the next ten years.” Tony tosses his papers towards the coffee table and rolls his eyes when half of them immediately slide off. “I'm meeting with a biofuel company that's looking for an investor.” He looks at Steve, gives him a rueful half-smile. “I wish I could come with you instead.”
“You think the meeting will be that bad?” Steve lays his book on his knee and turns towards Tony, laying one arm out casually along the top of the couch cushions.
“Well, their CEO doesn't seem to like me very much. On the other hand, I don't know if she likes anyone very much.” Tony sighs, stretches out until Steve can hear his joints crack. Tony's shed his jacket and tie somewhere and unbuttoned his collar. There's a patch of shadow underneath his chin where the whiteness of the shirt comes up against the muscle of his neck. Steve does his best not to stare. “It'll be fine.” He leans into Steve to nudge him in the side, right beneath where his arm is stretched out. “I just want to help you find your shield. You look like a lost puppy without it.”
Steve sighs. “I just wish I knew who had it. I'm afraid of what they might be using it for.” He slouches a little in his seat and adds, in a small voice, “And I do miss having it.”
Tony leans into Steve, resting his chin on his broad shoulder. “We'll find it,” he says, low and certain. “We will.”
Steve smiles; the way Tony says it, just announces it as a statement of pure fact, makes him feel more hopeful than he has all day. He puts his head down to where Tony is leaning into his shoulder and rubs his cheek against the dark hair, earning a happy noise in response. “We will. Do you want to read 'The Hobbit' with me?”
“Is the Hulk green? Of course I want to read the Hobbit with you. Go to the part with Gollum and the riddles in it, I love that bit.”
“Mr. Stark.” For a CEO, Reva Kazi is young. Yet she handles herself with total certainty, or at least a good imitation of it. She's soberly dressed, in a black suit that matches her glossy hair and a cream scarf that brings out the glow of her dark skin. Kazi had been focused throughout the morning's meetings, dark eyes fixed on Tony. Now that they are alone, her face has grown hard enough to match her eyes. “I find myself in an...unusual situation.” She glances at him, quick and furtive. He leans back, slow and elegant in his chair, and begins spinning a pen between his fingertips. “Greenspring is on the verge of a major breakthrough in our algaculture. Another five years of funding would result in a process that would revolutionize fuel technology worldwide.”
“So you've told me.” He flicks the pen, walks it back and forth across his hands.
“You're not impressed by our work, Mr. Stark?”
He shrugs. “A lot can happen in five years. You have good tech, you need to hold onto your R&D group and start thinking about making the jump to wide-scale production. You're a lightweight in the business world right now. Another bad stock tumble like the one last month and someone like HammerTech could buy you out in a night.”
“I am aware.” Kazi holds herself still; only her knuckles move, a brief flash of paleness against the dark fabric of her suit. “You have prior contracts with Greenspring. The board of directors recommended I approach you with an offer.”
Tony flicks the pen into his mouth and swivels to meet her stare. “The board? I thought you were employee-owned.”
She nods. “We are. The board is made of founding members, including myself. This was the recommendation. In order to prevent the possibility of a hostile takeover, we'd like to offer you an opportunity to purchase controlling stock in Greenspring. An initial investment in the technology now would offer a high probability of profit sharing within a 5 to 10-year period. I have a draft of the agreement, if you would care to examine it at your leisure.”
Tony tilts his chin back, rubs at his goatee, spins in a few circles through the deck chair. “What else?”
“We- the board is prepared to offer additional-”
“No, no, not the stock.” He stops, suddenly, fixed her with a stare. “What else is going on here?”
“I'm afraid I don't-”
“What happened last month? I don't care what kind of news came down the pipeline. Given your profits from the last quarter, you should have been able to hang onto most of that stock, not sell it.”
“That was, I'm afraid, a poor management decision-”
“Last I checked, Stanford wasn't giving out MBAs for free, Ms. Kazi. And I don't think you pulled Greenspring Energy through five years in development to fumble the first stock option you handle. Half of your company's outstanding IPO has been bought up by a dummy corporation in Eastern Europe, did you know that?”
“I...I'm not aware...” Tony sees her jaw clench, but he also sees the faint tremble in it, and feels a twinge of remorse. He leans forward, makes his next words softer.
“I don't know what's going on in your company, Ms. Kazi. If I weren't interested in buying stock in it, I'd leave it alone. But as it is, I need to know what's happening.”
In the silence there, before she opens her mouth to speak, Tony feels the hairs on his neck rise.
“Mr. Stark?” Rava looks at him quizzically. Then she freezes, head still titled to one side, and Tony can see her eyes widen.
Gunshots. One, two, then a popcorn scatter that builds on itself and suddenly snaps off. Muffled voices fill the sudden silence, a mutter of low confusion that swells, quickly, into a spike of panic when someone screams.
Tony doesn't remember moving, just finds himself at the huge double doors, twisting the lock and shoving one of the side tables under the handles. “Is there another way out?”
“What- yes, over there, we can go through the suite-” Kazi instinctively moves around the table, sunlight slipping over her suit.
“No!” She stops dead. “This way- stay away from the windows-” She slides backwards, slow and gentle, and goes around the far end of the room with him.
They're in the back hall of an office suite. Heads are popping out from doors, and Kazi's personal assistant is sprinting around the corner towards them, his jacket flapping. “Rava- Mr. Stark-”
“Ray, there's someone in the building.” Kazi has her shoulder against a filing cabinet; she gives it an experimental shove. “Help me move this.”
“We need to get everyone out of here,” Tony says, dragging at the cabinet. “Gather everyone up, keep them low-”
“Ray, call a code silver- no, wait, round up the suite and get into the small meeting room, the one by the stairs. Start on the north side, I'll meet you there. Keep everybody calm.” Ray nods, strides off at a pace only a hair slower than his earlier sprint. Kazi pulls a phone from her pocket and stabs a few numbers into the keypad, then begins moving down the hall, opening doors as she goes. “Are you all right? Go to the small meeting room. I don't know; I'm getting information now.”
Tony stares at her, then back at the door, now covered by a metal cabinet, and fumbles for his phone.
“Happy, where are you?”
“Tenth floor, boss.” He sounds out of breath. “You OK? What's happening?”
“I'm fine. Don't think the merger's going through today, though.”
There's a snorting laugh. “Glad to hear it. I'm trying to get to the stairs; it's a mess down here-”
“What's going on?”
“Lot of panic.” There's the sound of someone crying close by. “Hey. Hey, it's okay. Get down the hall, get in the break room and stay put.”
“Happy, did you see anything?”
“Uh- your basic SWAT wannabes, lot of black kevlar. No insignia I recognized. Seemed like pros, though. Boss, I'm at the stairs-”
Tony looks down the hall, almost empty now. “Happy, how bad is it down there?”
There's a pause. “No shots fired, but we've got a lot of upset people here.”
“Uh-huh.” Tony is silent. Listens to Happy's panting breaths, the sound of panicked voices in the background. “Do me a favor, stay down there and try to keep everyone calm.”
“You sure?”
Tony closes his eyes. “Yeah. I'm sure. We'll get these people out first, then I'll grab my briefcase and go after these guys.”
Happy is quiet for a moment, then Tony hears another panicky spike of voices come through the line. “Okay. Okay, boss, be careful-”
“I'll call you,” Tony says, and hangs up.
“I can't reach security,” Kazi says as he follows her into the conference room. Tony sees her hands clench into fists again, just for a moment, and she flips open her cell and dials in a long string of codes before lifting the speaker to her mouth. “Rava Kazi. Emergency codes. Total broadcast.” She pauses, takes a breath. “This is your CEO, Rava Kazi. Greenspring Energy is in a Code Silver alert. There may be one or more armed individuals in the building. Please stay calm and follow your crisis plans.” She flips the phone shut and looks around the conference room; Tony can see her counting under her breath. When she reaches Tony, she stares for a moment, unseeing, before recovering and plastering a weak smile on her face. “Mr. Stark. I apologize for the interruption, but it would seem we have to abridge our meeting.”
“I would never have guessed.”
Kazi gives him a real smile that flashes and fades in the space of a second. “Is anyone hurt?” There's a low murmur of 'no's. “All right. Stay down for a little bit, everyone. I'm going to try and get more information.” There's a sudden babble of panicked noise, and she raises her hands against it. “I need you to stay calm and stay quiet. Yes- I know. Please keep calm while we analyze the situation. Ray, can I see you?”
Tony stares at the people huddled on the floor. Most of them are following Reva's advice and staying quiet; they're pressed into tight huddles, coworkers leaning up against each other for comfort. Almost everyone has a phone or PDA out and is typing intermittently at the keyboards; at least the wireless is still up, though God know how long that'll last. Behind him, he can hear Kazi and her assistant talking in low voices.
“-can't reach security either.”
“I have to see if we should call for an evacuation-”
“-but what's safe? Is it just this floor?”
“Happy's on the tenth floor.” They turn to look at Tony; he keeps his voice low. “Same thing there. He says it looks like a paramilitary team of some kind.”
Ray exhales. “Who in God's name-”
“Does it matter?” Reva is stabbing fruitlessly at her phone. “I am getting nothing from Security-”
“What's your security system like?” Tony fishes his PDA out of his pocket and punches in a few commands. “Cameras? Keycard access? Oh, is that a SaiTech logo? Very nice.” His fingers move rapidly over the keys.
“I- what are you doing?” Ray peers over his shoulder at the windows popping to life on Tony's phone.
“Trying...to analyze...the situation. No, you go up there. And- that's a new piece of code, interesting.” More rapid keying. Tony frowns at the phone, uses his fingertips to flick a few windows off the screen.
“Mr. Stark, are you hacking my security system?”
“Not yet, I'm not. Ohhhhhhhh, they fixed that loop, I see.” Tony looks up from the phone briefly, flashes a grin. “Come on. What do you have? Keycarding? Any internal overrides on the locks?”
Reva looks faintly stunned. “Uh. Cameras, in the stairwells for sure, and through both the offices and the labs. Suites and offices are keycard only, all lab access is keycard only. I don't know about overrides...Ray?”
He shrugs, breaking his gaze at Tony's fingers flying over the keys. “What you said. There might be safety override codes?”
“I think we can work with that. If...I remember...correctly...” Tony lets his voice die down and studies the code scrolling up his screen. “There it is.” He flicks his fingers together, taps in a few lines of code. “Let's take a look at those cameras.”
“Did you...you just hacked SaiTech's software with a cell phone?”
Tony grins. “Well, it's more of a microprocessor that can make phone calls.”
Reva rubs her forehead. “We spent how much of last year's profits on that system?”
“Ten percent, Ms. Kazi.”
“I can't believe it.”
Tony grins again and flicks a switch on the phone, covering the far wall with a projection of camera views. “If it makes you feel better, they're the best on the market. Well, aside from me, of course.” He pulls up a chair and begins to filter rapidly through the camera feeds; the far wall of the conference room is a blur of overlapping videos. The room is dim, and quiet enough that he can hear the shiver of fear that rises when a trooper crosses beneath a camera. They're all kitted out in anonymous black Kevlar, like Happy said; faces half-masked with neoprene, eyes shielded behind plastic goggles. It's a squad of five; they move easily through the hallways, almost casual, guns held loosely at their sides, and Tony feels a frisson of helpless fear as one of them gently nudges open the hanging door of an office suite. A woman behind him gasps.
“It's empty.” Kazi's voice is low, steady. “That floor is being remodeled.” Tony finds himself breathing out.
“What floor is that?”
“Six.”
“Six.” He pulls his phone towards him again, pulls the view out into the screen and begins skipping through grainy security film. “Four on six. None on- wait, let's start on one...” Tony's fingers fly through the menus, skimming along screens and occasionally pulling one out to his desktop. “First floor is clean...so is the second floor.”
“You're sure?” Kazi is at his elbow, voice eager and brittle. Tony skips back through the image stream, pulls out another shot and expands it.
“Yeah. Yeah, I'm sure. Third floor is...clean.”
“Can we- Which way-”
“North stairwell.” Ray is suddenly hunched over Tony's shoulder, eyes scanning the display. “Stark, is the north staircase clear? Can we get people out that way?”
“Just...a...second...” The display on the wall shudders and jumps. “Yes. Yes, north staircase is clear right now.” Kazi is muttering into her phone, hitting a button, snapping out more instructions. “Wait, wait, before you do anything, I need to do a full scan, see how many of these guys there are.”
“Okay. Okay.”
“I'm setting up the messaging system,” Kazi says over one shoulder, phone wedged close into her ear. “Tell me when-”
“Couple of minutes.”
Time ticks by. Tony's fingers weave in intricate little dances over the screen in front of him. The output on the wall changes, grows; the video screens accrete in overlapping stacks, then begin to migrate into separate spots in some framework. Ray leans forward.
“That's- is that our building?”
“Mapped the camera positions onto the blueprints. It's a little messy, but it works for now.” Tony sighs and pops out a line of code from where it's scrolling in the background. “Okay, we have fourteen troopers in the building right now- two squads of five, one of four. It looks like they're all generally moving upwards. Right now...” he flips through the camera views one last time. “Right now, there's nobody moving beneath the sixth floor; the squads are all between six and eight.”
“One and two.” Kazi drums her fingers on the table as she waits for her phone to connect. “We'll get them out first.”
“What about the rest of us?” Ray keeps his voice low as he bends forward, pretends to watch the screen on Tony's lap. “What happens when they get up here?”
Tony spins in his chair. He's not grinning, but it's a close thing. “While you were in high school, did you ever pull a fire alarm?”
The phone only gets a chance to ring once before Happy picks up.
“Boss.”
“How's it going, Happy?”
“I've been better. What's the plan?”
“We got most of the building out. You still near the stairs? The squads are heading upstairs. I'm going to wait until they get up top, then hit the emergency alarms and get the rest of the staff out in the confusion. ”
There's silence on the line.
“I know.”
“I didn't say anything.”
“I know you didn't. Look, there's only about fourteen of these guys. We take advantage of the noise, I think it's our best chance.”
More silence.
“Happy, do you have a better idea?”
A resigned sigh. “No. I guess I don't.”
“Thanks, that's a vote of confidence. Wait for the fire alarms to go off, then get everybody down the stairs, I'll meet you outside.”
“Will do. Boss?”
“Yeah?”
“Be careful.”
“Will do, Hap.”
“Stark, how are we looking?”
“Good.” Tony doesn't look away from the display, squinting closely at the screen. “The first seven floors are empty. Looks like...the teams are on nine and ten, now.” He frowns at the video feeds. One of the men looks familiar, somehow; even through the bulkiness of body armor and the further blurring of the video feeds. Tony keeps turning to look at him out of the corner of his eye.
“It's strange.”
“What?”
He taps the desk, lost for words, then finally settles on, “Look, they're headed straight upstairs. They've had plenty of opportunities to break doors, hurt hostages.” Tony is aware of the whole room watching; he pulls up a screen and points to one of the squads. A trooper kneels in front, watching an open doorway, as his team moves past, then backs away, covering their retreat. “They haven't. It's like they're just passing through.”
There's a sense of loosening tension in the room. Most of the staff slouches a little bit, lets their shoulders slump in relief. Tony motions to Ray and Kazi, pulls them in close and speaks low. “So the question is, what do they want?”
The two of them look at each other, searching. Tony keeps staring at the video feeds, flipping restlessly through them. He keeps his voice light and easy as he continues. “What they probably want is me. Maybe you-” he points to Kazi- “but probably me.”
“Stark-”
“Let's stick to the plan,” Tony says, and there's a dizzying moment of deja vu where he smells woodsmoke and old batteries and the acrid stench of a forge. “We'll wait until they're further up, then I'll lie low, give your people time to get out.”
There's a moment of silence. Then Reva breathes out, slowly. “Stark, they're not after you. Or me.”
“Then what...” Tony trails off and leans forward. The familiar trooper, the one he's been watching, has turned quickly at some imagined noise, gun up. He laughs, mutters something to the rest of his squad. Tony doesn't bother to try and figure out what they're saying. His attention is on the bulk of the man, the dark mass the body armor makes over his back. It's not just body armor; he's carrying something big and broad and round strapped over his shoulders, something Tony's seen a thousand times in Steve's hands, and he doesn't even need to see the star to recognize the shield.
He turns and stares at the Greenspring team. Ray simply looks confused, darting glances between his boss and Tony. Kazi looks at him, dark, steady, fathomless, and Tony is aware of the ground shifting under his feet. “You need to tell me what's going on here. Right now.”
“Boss-”
Reva pushes away Ray's hand. “It's all right, Ray.” She sighs. Rubs her hand against her forehead, pinches the bridge of her nose. “It's time.” She pauses, staring at a patch of wall; Tony can see her putting her thoughts in order. “Well. We had an employee. A- a scientist. One of our founding members, actually. He was...”
“An arrogant fuck.” Ray's voice is sharp, deeply angry, and Reva chokes out a laugh.
“Yes. Adler was arrogant, and aggressive, and very, very smart.” She settles down, and Tony can see her reaching for her professional posture. “And he had a great deal of control over the company. Too much control. He had his own department for a while, worked on cold-fusion type energy. We had made an incredible breakthrough with the algae processing- we were going to make this work, all of it, and he didn't want to hear it.” She goes quiet again, back rigid. “He took our funds. He had access, somehow- it doesn't matter. It took us months to figure out the trail, to get him completely out, and the whole time he was bleeding us dry.”
“This has to do with your stock sale, doesn't it?”
Reva gives another laugh, brief and bitter. “I wish it was only the stock. Yes. He bled out our assets; we're still trying to track them down. But we're stable, now; if we hadn't had competitors trying to make offers, we could have made it at least a few more months.”
“It's not only the stock.”
She shakes her head, sighs again. “Before Adler left- a few months before- he made a purchase, God knows from whom. It was- a metal alloy of some kind, I think. He was crazy about it. He rearranged all his research around it; kept talking about how it was going to revolutionize the industry. That was what gave him away, actually; we realized there was only one place he could have gotten the money for that kind of purchase.”
“A metal alloy?” Tony is scrolling again, frantically, punching in lines of code on his screen. “Where did he buy it from?”
“No idea. There's no record of the transaction.” Reva stops short. When she continues, it's in a lower tone. “Adler robbed us blind, Stark. He had his hands on everything, when we finally found him out. At first- when we first uncovered him- my auditors were finding something new every week. Nothing big, you understand; nothing actionable, just some little fix or change or document that tipped things out of balance for us, gave him more control. And we finally get him wrapped in enough legalese to fire him, finally start recovering our losses, and I find that he left some radioactive supermetal in his lab.” She curls her fingers over her hands and shakes them in frustration.
“And then Tosenkraft swept in and made the offer.” Tony offers this quietly, but Reva turns and answers him in a voice barely removed from freezing.
“They did not make an offer, Stark. They're not offering. They're trying to take us to pieces.” She gestures to the security cameras, the squads moving up the stairs towards them. “And now- those men have to be involved with Adler, or Tosenkraft, or both, which means they are in my building. Threatening my employees. And all we can do is run.”
“No.” Tony says this quietly. He stands up and looks up at Kazi glaring at him, jaw set in an iron curve. “The first thing we're doing is getting your people out safely. But then...” He takes a breath. “Ms. Kavi, whatever protections your former employee had- or has- whatever protections Tosenkraft can bring into play- right now, it appears they're trying to steal a radioactive substance. And I know a number of people in the Department of Defense who have a vested interest in keeping things like that from happening.”
Reva stares at him for a moment, recognition dawning. “You mean- this is concrete, we can make this stick.” She draws in a breath that sounds almost joyful. “Forget short-selling our stock- If we can link Tosenkraft, or Adler to an armed theft-”
“The SEC would be the least of their worries.”
“Yes,” Ray says, in a strangled voice. Reva buries her head in her hands for a moment; when she takes them away, her face is lit with joy.
“Okay. Okay. Let's go, let's get everyone out of here.”
It takes the teams another ten minutes to reach the top floor. In the meantime, Reva has called down to floors eight and nine and gotten them from the building. Ray has finally reached someone from Security. The report is that the squads hit the security stations all at once with some sort of synchronized attack; guard booths were filled with tear gas, and at least one person was hit with something like a Taser. There's a head count still in process, but from the relieved look Ray and Reva share nobody's been too severely injured. Tony thinks briefly about calling Happy again and dismisses it; he knows the plan, and he needs to focus on the security teams now. They've spread out over the top two floors, covering entrances and exits and, Tony notes with some dismay, the stairwells.
There's nothing he can do about it now. This is still the best option they have, and they have to do it soon. The troopers apparently aren't content with just waiting around anymore; he can see one of the squads conferring, looking around at the doors lining the hallway. They march off camera. A few seconds later, there's a rattling noise at the main door to their suite.
Tony says something obscene under his breath. The employees are ready; Reva has them gathered in a huddle at the door of the meeting room they're sheltering in. Tony hits a button, making the display on the wall flicker and disappear, and stands up, phone in one hand. He motions for the group to follow him, and they do, trailing behind as he approaches the suite door.
There's another rattle, and the sound of very low voices. Tony holds the phone in one hand; in the other, he holds up three fingers.
Three. Twenty faces, staring at him.
Two. A scraping noise outside the door.
One. Ray tenses behind him.
Zero.
He hits a key on his phone, and immediately the room is dark and filled with deafening sound. Ray grabs the handle, slams the door out, and they're in the hallway, dark indistinct shapes around them, flickering in the emergency strobe lights. They're gathered in close, their guns are useless- he hits one on the face, hard and quick, takes a step back and hits him in the kneecap with his heel hard enough to crunch. Someone closing- Tony gets low, rolls him over one shoulder and slams him into the wall. Dodge, turn, there's a rifle barrel swinging up at him, they're recovering. He flips the gun further forward, twists it out of the trooper's hands and clubs him with the stock. There's a stream of people moving past him, and Ray panting as he grapples with another trooper. Tony uses the gun again, slams him in the back with the weight of it, and Ray takes advantage and head-butts him into the far wall. There's a muffled clang when he hits, like a pan falling on the floor, and Tony is on him as he slumps to the floor, fingers working at the shield strapped across his back.
“Stark-”
“Go,” Tony says, and Ray is gone, sprinting down the hall to the staircase behind the rest of the employees. There's a bungee cord splayed over the shield; he rips clear all the hooks he can find, gives another tug and the shield pops out, black nylon fluttering as it comes clear. Shouts, boots pounding around the corner, and Tony threads his forearm through the handles, hunches beneath the shield and runs for the stairs. Pops of noise- they're firing at him, it feels like a sudden rattle of hail on the shield. Something mushrooms into the ground at his feet, sizzling with electricity. He takes the corner hard, hits the pushbar on the door with his shoulder and tumbles into the ruddy darkness of the stairwell.
Tony picks himself up, readjusts the shield and hits the stairs, taking them two at a time. There's the sound of pounding feet, further down. The shield unbalances him very slightly. He's used to the suit, the stabilizers moving with him. He has to keep a hand out to balance himself; it's dark and shadowed, and there's noise coming from every direction. With the hand not occupied with the shield, he grabs his phone out of his pocket and snaps a few commands to it, bringing up the security camera display again. They'll have to check, make sure the building is clear, see if they can lock off the tactical teams. He needs to find Happy, needs to get the suit and isolate this radioactive mystery metal they have in the labs. The screens flicker past him, snapping between cameras as he snaps out commands, and he looks at the next image and very nearly trips down his next flight. He catches himself at the last second on the railing, spins and staggers to a stop on the landing and just stares.
The man in the screen looks up at the camera, down at the ground, and kicks the black bundle laying there. Tony doesn't want to see this, can't see this, but he's rolling over, face twisted in pain, and it's Happy down there, hands still clasped around the briefcase- they have the suit, they have Happy. The trooper reaches down, hauls up Happy by the scruff of his neck- still struggling, still dizzy from the head wound- and there is a curved bright shape suddenly pressing into Happy's neck, edge sharp and shining, and Happy goes still.
”No,” Tony says, low and useless. The trooper looks up at the camera again. Presses down the knife- Happy struggles away from it- then lets up the pressure until the edge is just skating along Happy's throat. He's pulling Happy backwards, now, one hand still pressed in an awful caressing curve along his chest, and he jerks his head towards the door. Movement- the rest of his team going past, and Happy and his captor last through the door as it swings shut.
Tony stands in the flickering light of the video feed. Someone is yelling up the stairs at him- Come on, Stark, get out of there. Ray, maybe. He doesn't have the suit. They have Happy, and they have the Iron Man suit, and if he doesn't do this right they're going to have radioactive supermetal and probably this company too, this company Kazi has fought them tooth and nail for. It's hard to keep a thought in his head; it's the noise of the alarms, and the spike of adrenaline surging through his system, and the fact that all he can see is the look of breathless terror on Happy's face when he feels the blade at his throat. He has to do something.
The shield bangs against his hip. He has that, at least; he saved Steve's shield for him. Tony splays one hand across the cool surface, tucks his head in, and thinks. He can smell metal and oiled leather, and if he breathes in deep, he can conjure up the faintest touch of sweat. The alarms are still shrieking, but the shield is cool against his skin. It's an anchor, a spot of stillness in the insanity of his day, and he grounds himself against it for a little. A very little, just a few seconds- but it's enough.
“Steve.”
“Tony?” Steve's voice is scratchy. Tony can hear wind buffeting the mouthpiece.
“How was your day at work, handsome?”
“Tony.” He must be on the helicopter; Dugan is probably rolling his eyes at him from across the cargo bay. “No luck on the shield yet, but we picked up some leads; the thief sold it to a group that seems to be linked to a bunch of companies in Eastern Europe.”
“One of them wouldn't be Tosenkraft Energy, would it?”
“...Yes, there was one called Tosenkraft in there; CEO is a Jurgen Haider. You know them?”
Tony can't restrain a wry little chuckle. “I know of them. So I found something you might be missing.”
Even over the bad connection, he can hear the hope in Steve's voice. “You- it isn't-”
Tony lifts one hand from the tangle of wires in his lap and taps his knuckles on the shield, making it ring dully. “Big, round, got a star in the middle? Lot of red and white and blue?”
“You found my shield.” Steve's voice is all delight; he must be grinning right now, eyes sparkling. Tony finds himself smiling in return.
“Yup.” He waits for a moment; he's not disappointed.
“Wait, how did you find my shield? I thought you were in a business meeting all day today.”
“We...had to adjourn a little early.” Tony makes himself a little more comfortable against the wall, rummages through the pile of scrounged supplies at his side. “I'm going to have to borrow some of your gear for a little bit, I hope you don't mind.”
“Tony, what's going on?”
He gives Steve the abbreviated version, hands busy the whole time.
“You don't have your suit and you're going into close-quarters combat with a group of well-armed paramilitary troops?”
“Well, when you put it that way, of course it sounds like a bad idea.”
“You're undergeared for this- you don't have any of your tech, and these men are armed to the teeth, they could kill you-”
“They're not using standard bullets, Cap, they took out the security team with stun rounds of some kind, used the same rounds coming after me. They're trying really hard to not kill anybody-”
“Even then, say they knock you out- now they've got you hostage, and god knows what this company is actually a front for. Stay there, I can be there with SHIELD support in ninety minutes.”
“We don't have ninety minutes. They have free run of the building and access to the alloy, you think they'll hang around for a congratulatory beer after they steal it?”
“Tony-” He can hear Steve gathering up steam for a big attack, to maybe even forbid him to go, and he jumps in ahead of him.
“I can't leave the suit with them, Cap.” Tony takes a breath and says, low, “I really can't leave Happy with them. Not if I have the chance to get him out of there.”
Steve is silent for a moment; the only sound on the line is the wind whipping past.
“Tony, the best way you can help Happy is by using your head here.”
“I am. I'm telling you. I have a hack into the security system here; I can see where these guys are at all times. I can kill lights, lock doors. I can stay three steps ahead. I have the shield, Cap- this isn't a suicide mission. They're not hunting me. I'm hunting them. Trust me on this.” Don't tell me not to go. Don't make me promise. I don't want to have to lie to you.
There's more silence on the line, and then Steve sighs. It's his special Tony-sigh, the one he uses when Tony is about to do something he really doesn't approve of. “I can't stop you from doing this, can I?”
Tony gives him a dry little laugh. “I don't think so.”
“Then- be careful. Is there anything I can do? Anything to help?”
Tony slides the earpiece he's been building over one ear and taps his phone. A display flickers to life, hovering in front of his right eye. He makes a noise of approval and starts shuffling files from his phone onto the display. “Come by as fast as you can. Bring that SHIELD support; I might end up needing it. And can you get one of the bureaucrats to contact Pepper with what they've uncovered on Tosenkraft and Haider?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I can do all that. Anything else?”
“Come here, get your shield and back me up. Beat up some goons with me. We'll make a date of it; I'll buy you dinner afterwards.” Tony tries to keep his voice teasing, but some honest want sifts through.
Steve makes a soft noise in return. “I will. I'll hold you to that dinner.”
“I'd like that.” Tony finds the connection they're on, holds a finger over the 'disconnect' button. “Steve, I have to go now.”
“Okay. Tony?”
“Yeah?”
“Be careful. I'll be there soon.”
“Yeah.”
(Part II)