Post by Deleted on Nov 16, 2013 19:49:45 GMT
Name: "The name is Anthony Edward Stark, but for your own sake, call me Tony. You should know by now that I'm not one for formality." 44 "I'm the CEO of Stark Industries, but I'm fairly certain you know that. You have seen the building, haven't you? Some of my best work. Anyway, there was a time when I manufactured weapons for the military. Nowadays I seem to find myself fighting crime, saving the world. You know. Iron Man. Of course you knew, there was a press conference." "They've been calling me an Avenger. Still not sure how I feel about that. I don't usually do teamwork." "I'm a genius, for one. Lets be real, that counts for something. I'm not some thawed out, waterlogged super soldier but I do alright. Then of course, I'm rich. A billionaire actually. Also common knowledge. Face it, you could take away my shiny metal suits and I'd still be more powerful than you. Money makes the world go round, you're only as good as what you can afford, yadda yadda yadda. Of course, you can't actually take away my suit. I'm not your whore." Robert Downey Jr. doesn't exist. There is only Tony Stark. |
Tony reclines on the lavish office chair, it's back tipping considerably before stopping. He's donning a t-shirt and a pair of dark jeans, as well as a pair of dark sunglasses, and seems at ease as he kicks his feet up onto the conference table and crosses his ankles. Tony pats around his legs for a moment before pulling a flask from his pocket and twisting it and turning it in his hands. Finally he looks up in acknowledgement, but does not correct his posture. "I'm sorry, are you waiting for something. Who are you again?" He looks around, turning his head over his shoulder. "Pepper? Pepper! Who is this? Pepper?!" Tony's lips turn down in a noticable frown as he tosses the flask forward and it slides across the wood table. The liquid inside it sloshes audibly. He crosses and uncrosses his arms before propping them behind his head. "Oh well. Have a seat." He gestures to the chair opposite him with a jerk of his head head. "And make it quick. I had a long, long night, and your voice will very likely sound like a gunshot." The reporter hesitantly takes the seat, slightly shocked by the informality. He spreads his papers infront of him, quaking under the unseen but easily felt gaze locked on him. "I suppose I'll start with the basic question - what's your name? Your whole name." Tony rolls his eyes. "This again, really? You're going to waste time on common knowledge, waste time and energy on a few extra words you can already find all over the internet and in every magazine, newspaper, and most recent publications that came before you? Surely you can do a little better than that." "Yes, of course, sorry. I suppose age would be out of the question, then?" Tony slides the glasses down his nose and eyes the reporter disbelievingly and says nothing. The reporter gives a nervous laugh and continues on hesitantly. "Would you mind giving an account of well... the incident with Ten Rings and the jericho missile? Tony gives a slight laugh and reclines a bit more, his glasses still hanging low on his nose. "Another story I've told a thousand times, but I suppose I could give it a go once more. In the words of Roxie Hart, 'Anything for the press!' What, you haven't seen Chicago? And you call yourself a New Yorker, for the love all things - ah. Off topic. Ten Rings, you said, right? The bastards knew where I was, why I was there, and they exploited me. What else do you expect from a terrorist organization? People think these foreigners are dumb, or that they're unorganized, but primitive as some of them might be they're far from stupid, believe me." He taps his chest, and a pale blue gleam shines through the fabric of his dark shirt. "I found out firsthand. Of course I was smarter. Quite a bit smarter. I'd say that I can't take all the credit but... this is me we're talking about, and I'm incapable of sharing glory, obviously. Had I been anyone else, this all would have been very traumatic. I, of course, am impervious to such weaknesses." He tries to joke but gets little reaction and sighs, leaning forward. "I got to experience first hand what my company's weaponry did, and the kind of effect it could have. My own missile went rogue and nearly killed me. Shrapnel buried in my chest just a bit too deep to dig it out. This arc reactor is all that's keeping me going now, it's got an electromagnetic component that pulls the metal in the opposite direction and just - it's complicated, you probably wouldn't understand. Anyway, the Ten Rings figured out what had happened, and they used it to their advantage. I was hooked up to a damn car battery to keep the metal from killing me. Again, primitive, but smart. I would have kept me going just long enough for them to get what they wanted out of me. But I built the Mark 1 - not my best work, we'll be honest - and I busted out. There was another guy, another prisoner, Dr. Yinsen. And - off the record, because I swear on my most expensive bottle of whiskey that if you tell anyone this, I will throw you into a cage with Brucey before he has his coffee, and that won't end well for anyone - really, I couldn't have done it without him. But enough about that poor bastard, lets get back to me. That's the story you're here to hear, write, record, whatever it is you loose lipped writer folk do, right? Anyway, I convinced them I was building the missile, right? The whole shebang. Talked them through the whole process using jargon I wasn't even sure I understood and they bought it. The idiots brought me everything I needed to build myself a suit - a supersuit, if you will. The Mark 1, like I said. I killed a few of them with it, and ended up crash landing not far off. Like I said, it was a shoddy piece of equipment and it's nowhere near as flashy as my newer models, but it got me out of there. Dr. Yinsen didn't make it, bless the coot's soul, but all I did for him later, in his name, I like to think that it was a good act of philanthropy, right?" "How did they find you, the Ten Rings. It was your business partner, wasn't it?" "You should let me finish my story. Yeah, it was Obadiah. He'd been dealing weapons to the terrorists behind the government's back, and it was his utterly brilliant idea to have them come after me, and to have them kill me. I figured him out not too long after, of course. But that's getting ahead of myself. Back in the states I started working on the Mark 2. It took time, but it was much more refined. The capabilities of the second model were much more stable, its flight was more reliable, and it was much sleeker. I do love looking sleek. It was around this time that I backed out of the weapons manufacturing - of course, Obediah royally screwed that up for me, but that came to an end soon enough. A boatload of emotional trauma and selflessness later, and I figured out his plan. Pepper helped, of course. Did the searching, scoured his database. She's good like that, Pepper. Smart, quick, and she's undeniably brave. Stupidly so sometimes, but don't tell her I said that. She'll probably "forget" to put sugar in my coffee. Or forget the coffee altogether, and really, I'm not much better than my mean green colleague at that point." Tony laughs and stretches his arms over his head. "Anyway, right before I went public again I replaced the arc reactor with something more reliable. Pepper's got a story about that one, of course, I've never seen a woman wash her hands so much in one damn hour." There's a pause, as Tony thinks, finally tearing his sunglasses off his face and tossing the over his shoulder. They hit the wall and then clatter to the ground. "I built the Mark 3 soon after, I call it the power suit. It's better, stronger, and faster. I flew to Afghanistan in the damn thing. You don't even want to know how uncomfortable that was. Thankfully I have JARVIS to scratch every itch I couldn't quite reach. Oh yeah, the suit can do that. I don't half ass anything, buddy. "But why did you go to Afghanistan?" "My weapons were in the hands of people that shouldn't have had them. I created my weapons to protect my country, not to destroy it. Obediah had been selling them weapons, like I said, and I felt it was my place to stop it. So I did. I saved Dr. Yinsen's village, nearly killed a buddy of mine's subordinate when he was trying to take me down in a damn Raptor. Our air force is no joke, okay? But then, neither is my suit. I gotta say, it ripped a wing off a damned plane. Forgive me, but I've gotta be at least a little bit proud of that. Blah blah blah, long story short this all ended up with Obediah trying to kill me with a mock piece of machinery inspired reconned pieces of the Mark 1 that had been left after I crash landed. That led to another series of messy press conferences, and awkward conversations with S.H.I.E.L.D agents trying to convince me not to go public with my quote, unquote 'alter ego'." Tony makes air quotes with his fingers. "Naturally I didn't listen." And what is S.H.I.E.L.D, exactly? "Look, there's a reason they keep these things hush hush, alright? Trust me, you don't want to get involved in that sort of things. Lets just say they're a group who I have a love hate relationship with. They love bothering me, and I hate when they do. They're still a bit sore over the satellite I blew up." "Sir, you blew up a satellite?" "I don't like it when people try to touch my things. Moving on." The reporter looks flustered and flips through a few of his papers. Tony watches, somewhat disinterested. "You talk a lot about your life as a superhero, but what about your life as a child? What were your parents like? Were you close with them?" Tony heaves a sigh and runs a hand through his hair, combing it with his fingers for a moment before clicking his tongue against the roof of his mouth. "I was an independent kid. I didn't want to be around them much, especially if they were trying to coddle me. Well. My mother would try to coddle me, my father was never really around, but that's a sob story you already know, isn't it?" There's another sigh as Tony finally slides his feet off the tables and rolls his body forward to rest his arms on the wood. His pause is long and contemplative, and he appears to roll his next words around in his mouth before he finally opts to say them. "I always wanted to be closer to my father, of course, because I always had an interest in science and electronics, you know - the family business. He told me stories about it, big, grandiose stories about the fame and glory I might have if I grew up to be just like him. I thought he really had big plans for me, but as I grew older I came to realize that he just wanted to see the company continue to grow. He got more and more distant, busier and busier as the years went on, but that was alright. He could be as cold as he wanted to, because I had learned to be exactly the same way. Well... with a bit more sass. I like to think I'm the life of the party, while he would have been about as boring as that show with Joan Rivers where she talks about fashion choices. You know the one, what's it called? Fashion... something. I don't know, I always fall asleep halfway through it if I can't find anything else to watch." He shifts in his seat, trying to deflect but the reporter's eyes stay glued to him. He gives a soft chuckle and continues, seeing clearly that this one has a bit more nerve than the rest do. "Mom was great. She really was. She learned pretty fast that when I wanted to be left alone, I ought to be left alone. She's the one who fanned the fire when I started building things. Circuits and the like, you know that story too. I was four. She was... she was damn proud of me, I think. She always used to tell me that she knew that I could do great things, and you know, I think she really wanted me to. I wasn't just a legacy to her, I was my own person and I was smarter than your average bear, and smarter still than my old man. All that was proven in '91 when I took over and the weapons changed dramatically. My father was about tradition. He kept things strict and precise. It's a well known fact that I'd rather go with the flow, just ask the steady stream of reporters that started out where you are and ended up in my bed, or all the pissed off journalists who waited at a press conference I decided I didn't feel like showing up to. I've always been that way, and my father didn't like it. We never did quite see eye to eye in that respect. That said, my parents did support me as I advanced through school. I can actually remember the look of pride in my father's eye when I graduated summa cum laude at MIT at the age when most kids are just finally nearing the end of high school. Truthfully, I think that look is the fondest memory I have from him, and possibly the clearest. To be honest after I hit the ripe old age of six I didn't see him much at all - even less than before. I was always too busy, and he was too busy, and it was just better that way." "So you didn't like your father, then?" "I never had a chance to like or dislike him. He had some habits that drove me absolutely batshit, sure. The constant chatter about Captain America? No thank you, didn't like that. Blondie doesn't need anything else to go wide-eyed and gaga over, he's still trying to get to the bottom of the device we call a 'cellular phone'." "You know Captain America, then? What do you think of him? What other superheros are you familiar with?" "I would think that would be obvious. New York did happen, remember? There's Black Widow, the Hulk, Birdbeak -- I mean Hawkeye, Thor the great and powerful thespian, and Cap, who, like I said, is clueless. I'm tempted to put him and the great blonde alien on harnesses. There is nothing healthy about that level of obliviousness and they might be a danger to society... or at the very least themselves. Anyway, Captain America is exactly what everyone says and knows he is. He's good, he's got supposedly perfect morals, he's righteous, and he's whatever other synonyms you think you can find that mean 'wholesome'. He hasn't got a girl as far as I know, but I wouldn't be surprised if they slept in seperate beds that's how straightlaced this guy is. He struts around in his spandex throwing a shield back and forth like a damn boomerang. Who does that? In short, he's alright, I guess. I remain of the belief that he'd be better suited for an after school special, but hey, what do I know?" "You have all this power. Has anyone else approached you to help them?" "The military wanted me to work with them for a time, but that would have required me to obey orders. Not a team player, like I said, and I continuously went ahead and did what I wanted when I needed to. I was in the business of saving people, not sitting on the sidelines. I still am. If people are dying, I'm there. Anytime, anywhere, no matter what. I'm done letting innocent people die on my watch, and I like to think I've made that quite, quite clear. If I need to take drastic measures to make sure that these people are alright, I will. I don't care what it takes." "So you would kill? Isn't that kind of counterproductive?" Tony gives a huff and shifts a bit before folding his hands into a steeple in front of him. "Maybe, but certain things have to be done. When things pose more of a threat than they do a helping hand, there are actions that must be taken. The needs of the many versus the needs of the few and all that. I don't like killing by any means, but if it means saving dozens, hundreds, or thousands of more lives, I will. If you've never been in that position you can't understand it. I wouldn't wish this on anyone, not even my worst enemy. I might be cool and collected, but watching a man die isn't easy, Bucko, especially when you're the one who landed the killing blow. Isn't there something else you can ask about?" Tony is clearly more than a bit flustered by this line of conversation, and his eyes plead for a change of topic. The reporter obliges, finally relenting to Tony's discomfort. "Of course. I understand that you appointed Virginia Potts as CEO of your corporation in what was it, 2009? 2010? Why?" "I was dying. Rather, I assumed I was dying. The arc reactor I had placed in my chest after removing the faulty first one was powered by a technology that was poisoning me slowly, painfully, and would undoubtedly kill me. JARVIS and I worked to figure out a new source of power and, of course, ultimately - eventually - succeeded, but in the meantime the shit hit the fan. I'm sorry can I say that? You'll just replace it with some less offensive word in the final product, I'm sure. Anywho, the senate was pissed at me - granted, I probably deserved it - and they wanted my technology for the military. No thanks, once again, my stuff, my rules, no touching. It's unlikely any of them would have been able to recreate it anyway, but that is truthfully neither here nor there. Well, I suppose it is, because boasting about my own personal brand of genius is wonderful all on it's own, but I can always do that later. One bitch-ass senator decided, stupidly, of course, thought trying to turn Rhodey - that's Lt. Colonel James Rhodes of the U.S. Airforce - might be a good idea. Naturally that backfired, mostly because Rhodey is practically my bitch. Burly black man, you'd know him if you saw him-- What was I saying? Ah! Bitch-ass senators, right. How could I forget that slimy little shithead with an armada of crappy ideas? Somehow my main business competitor Justin Hammer got involved and he also ended up humiliated. It was a clusterfuck of... what's the word kids these days are using? 'Ratchetness'? I'm not hip to the utterly idiotic slang they're using nowadays, forgive me. They were especially unhappy when I rubbed it in their faces, in many more words, that I am smarter than them, and that it will take the years, possibly decades to even come close to replicating my arc reactor." "But from what we understand someone succeeded. Ivan Vanko, I believe." "Christ, you're well-informed. I don't have much to say about Vanko except that he's a jealous brat who was lucky enough to have a parent in my own father's company. See, the arc reactor's technology was originally my father's. He had a prototype and Vanko's pops was around when all that was happening. Long story short, Papa Bear got deported back to the then-Soviet Union, and Kiddo Von GrudgeHolder decided all this was my fault. But he was locked up safe and sound in prison and I was still kicking, so all was well." "But Mr. Stark, Ivan escaped." Tony grits his teeth and groans through them. "Is this really a line of questioning you want to go down? Can't you just ask me 'boxers or briefs' like a normal reporter and get on with it?" Once again the man across from Tony is steadfast. Tony gives him a begrudged look, unhappy to have to continue this story. "Fine. He talked to Hammer and Hammer invalidated my suits with his own. I got crazy, okay? The pressure got to my head and I went overboard. I acted out, I did things that no one in their right mind ought to do and I got away with it. For a while, I became the man I kept swearing to protect people from. Rhodey set me straight, but I know that I lost it. I wanted to go out with a bang, and I very nearly did. Now, I was dying. And I knew it and the world knew it, even if they didn't know they knew it. A friend of mine, a government Agent whose name I won't say - if only because I'll likely get a slap to the back of the head if I do - gave me some notes from my father. I found out a lot that day, but... well... that's personal. I cured my poisoning with the information, and that's what's important, isn't it? I'm here, alive and kicking. Woop dee doo." "And the events of the Stark Expo that year?" "You just don't quit, do you? Rhodey ended up playing ball with Hammer, and he was donning a suit based on the Mock 2 which, at time time, was already quite obsolete, but it served the purpose they needed it to. Vanko took control before I could warn Rhodey. Luckily, as much as I hate admitting my own inability to control a situation, another agent friend of mine managed to seize control and save the day. Anticlimactic, I know, but it did get spicy not long after. See, Ivan got away through all this. Hammer, he got nabbed, but Ivan was a bit smarter than that. He came after us in another suit, Rhodey and I handled that with a few basic repulsor rays, no big deal, nothing to shout about. He went down quicker than a whore on Rodeo Drive. Luckily for my conscience, he took the easy way out and blew himself up." Tony looks more uncomfortable now than he did before, and his voice lacks a bit of his usual confidence. It's quite clear that he doesn't quite believe or even like what he's saying, but he gives no verbal hints towards this. "In the end Rhodes left with the armor, and I didn't stop him. Pepper stepped down from her position. She and I got romantic... that's a long story in and of itself." "I've got time." "I'm sure you do, just look at that stack of papers. Look, if you're trying to find out if Pepper and I are still... together, the answer is no. After recent events I just... it's better off that she just resumes her position as my personal assistant. We know how to be as professional as we ever were, and that's that. Now let me take a guess - you're going to ask about New York next?" "I'm beginning to think you might be a little bit psychic, Mr. Stark." Tony offers a bit of a laugh and a charming smile to that. "Either that or you're just painfully predictable." The reporter nods in defeat, and gestures for Tony to get on with the story, no questions necessary. "There's not much I can say about New York that the press doesn't already know. I can't talk about the behind the scenes fiascos. Confidentiality means confidentiality... most of the time. That said, I will say one thing: we knew. We knew something was coming, but we didn't know what. We knew that it was going to be a fight, and we knew that Loki had every asset available to him in order to defeat us. In my personal opinion, what we did in New York was luck and a little bit of genius thanks to myself and Dr. Banner." He waves a hand dismissively. "Mostly myself, of course." This time when Tony laughs it's clear that he's just joking around, and it's obvious that he does hold Bruce's intellect and ability in high esteem. His laugh fades into something more morose rather quickly and he casts his gaze downward. "New York changed a lot of things. The battle of New York was... haunting. Almost dying is - it's something that doesn't just go away. You don't stand up and walk away and resume living your life like nothing ever happened. Some people say you start looking at every second like a gift but me? I don't know if I'm looking at every waking moment as a gift or as a curse, because now I know what's out there, and it knows me. Everything that goes bump in whatever realm it comes from knows me as the guy who shoved the Chitauri back to wherever it is they came from, and they're all going to be out to get me. I can feel it, that impending danger. There's no rest for the wicked, and in their eyes, the Avengers and I? Well we're probably just as wicked as they come." The reporter looks taken aback and seems to have something to say, but Tony does not allow a moment and quickly resumes speaking. "After that I designed new rooms in my tower. Specialized rooms to suit the needs of my team. Yes, my team. I think I've earned the right to claim the damned thing, okay, as least when they're not listening. And I've managed to restore the building. And I built a new suit of armor for Rhodey. And you know, I've been being a general badass as per usual." "And recently?" Tony gives a shrug, tired of this biographical interview he seems to have undertaken without realization. "I'll try to make this quick. Hopefully we can get past the whole boring 'what's your story' part of this, yeah? I'm not really interested in this anymore. Look, like I told you, New York changed me. I pulled away from everything and everyone and went to work on my armor. I made a whole array of new ones, and they've all got their own jobs. It's a pretty nifty system if I may say so myself. Anyway, I had night terrors, I had panic attacks, Hell, sometimes I cried. It wasn't pretty, but it was what it was." What Tony doesn't say, however, is that these nightmares still plague him from time to time. That, at least, is his secret, and he refuses to acknowledge it aloud. No one knows, not even Pepper, and he'd like to keep it that way. "Another terrorist came to arms and I'm sure you know already, but I issued a very public warning. People didn't like that, and I got chewed out more times than I can count on my hands and my feet, by dozens of people who thought I was, as usual, being rash and stupid. I told you before, and I will happily say it again - I don't take kindly to people hurting others. They hurt my body guard and I wasn't happy about it. It was bad enough that they were inflicting harm onto others but once you touch one of the people I'm close to? You had better run, hide, and pray to whatever deities you believe in that I don't find you. Because when I do - and I always do - you're going to rue the very day you were born and the very filth that turned you into the beast you have become." The anger that had written across his face faded slowly, and he took a deep breath, held it, and let it out. He repeated this several times before finally acknowledging the man across the table from him and continuing his story. "The Manderin attacked us. At least, we assumed it was him. Them? I protected Pepper with my armor, got her to safety, and proceeded to take it back. Mind you, fighting off a damn fleet of helicopters isn't easy but like I said, I do what I have to do to protect people. It's part of the superhero job description. The people of America, and hell, even the World expect something from me and it's my job to not let them down, no matter what. I've paid my price, and I'm sure I'll pay more. But that's not the point, is it? I can't just give up because things get tough. If my father had done that, Stark Industries would have gone under, and who knows what I might have become. I lost my house that night. It might not seem like much being as I have so many, but when you put hundreds of thousands of dollars - if not millions into making your homes everything you could ever want or need, personally spending hours designing them, losing them is comparable to... I don't know. Losing a family pet or I suppose, in my case, a child. I haven't got any so my technology is my baby. Losing it actually phyisically pains me. Sure I could do it all over again, but why? Why would I want to replicate something that I poured so much of myself into? It loses value that way, don't you think? Anyway, the house collapsed right on top of me and I got dragged into the water with it. I escaped, managing to get away just a fraction of a second before death had me again. I'm starting to count my blessings, because I know they won't last. I know that better than I should. JARVIS took over. I ended up in Tennessee - that's where I thought the Mandarin was. I found out later that he was hiding out in Miami all along. Plot twist! Are you ready for this? The bastard wasn't even a terrorist. It kind of pissed me off in the long run to find out he was some snobby British actor with what was essentially too much time on his hands. I know, I know, shocking. Now, I knew a bit about the Extremis situation - not enough, mind you, but I knew it was bad. I broke into the house and watched him kill one of my friends. Wasn't long after I realized he had Pepper." There's a long pause. "In the end I did what I thought I had to do. I promised Pepper I would find I cure, and I destroyed everything. I finally had surgery to remove the shrapnel and the arc reactor, and I threw the damn thing into the ocean." The reporter looks at the faint blue glow beneath Tony's shirt, and Tony gives a smile and a shake of his head, answering the unasked question. "I very quickly decided all of that was a bad idea. I had, at the time, thought that Iron Man was the man and not the suit, but I realized quickly that I couldn't just give it all up. You remember how I said earlier that I couldn't just give things up because it got tough? Well something's coming, and it isn't good. I said it once, and I know it now more than ever - the suit and I are one. I am not Iron Man without the suit, and the suit is little more than iron at all without me. I've rebuilt it - stronger, better, faster, more optimized. I like to think Pepper understands, and she acts like she does... but... I know it's hard for her. I did what I had to do. There are no options and no second guessing. That's it." Tony looks exhausted and visibly slumps in his chair. The reporter hesitates a moment, before speaking. "I think that's enough, Mr. Stark. Thank you for your time..." |
GRANT | 18 | EST | im just here dude