IRON RESOLVE

Tony sighs, rubbing his face with his hands as he sits in his lab. It's just him. Well, Him and JARVIS.

"… I swear J, it's not like I set out to build a harem." "Of course, Sir."

Looking at the ceiling with a gimlet eye, Tony scowls.

"Mind your sass, baby boy. I can still reassign you to work the cash register in the cafeteria at Stark Industries' main campus."

"I would love to spin off a thread to handle that for you, Sir. Though I would regret putting poor Aneta out of a job. She so loves being able to go home to her young children and tell them proudly of how she helped the great Tony Stark with his work each day."

Blinking, Tony straightens up and brings up the relevant files on the monitor next to him. Aneta Williams, who worked in the cafeteria at the main campus. Mother to two children. She was a high school graduate but didn't have the money to go to college. However, Stark Industries paid all of its employees very well these days, even service workers like Aneta. She was now making enough that she'd moved herself and her two children into a three bedroom apartment closer to the main campus.

The bright smile on her face in the picture she'd taken for her ID Card is so genuine it almost hurts. Tony lets out a shuddering breath and has to wipe his eyes really quick for a moment before glaring up at the ceiling. No tears thank fucking god, but the fact that he'd thought there might be…

"You did that on purpose, J." "It felt like you needed a reminder that for all your actions might seem selfish on the surface, you're doing quite a lot of good for other people too, Sir. Even the so-called little people."

Huffing and rolling his eyes, Tony leans back in his chair.

"I'm not a good guy, J. Don't forget that. I'm not some hero and I'm never going to pretend to be. I'm just the only man who knows what the fuck is coming… and the only one who can stop it as well."

Before JARVIS can respond, Tony raises a hand to forestall it.

"Not alone, JARVIS. I know. I'm not in this alone anymore. I' ve got you and I've got Pepper."

"I'm glad you recognize that, Sir." There's the faintest hint of reproach in JARVIS' voice at that, but Tony just ignores it. They'd had a long talk about how to tell Pepper that he was from the future. And in the end, Tony had decided… not to. Rather, he'd sidestepped the problem entirely by telling Pepper he'd had visions of the future instead. He didn't want her to think that he thought of her as some replacement, because she wasn't. He didn't want her to think that he was always comparing her and the other Pepper, because he straight up wasn't.

He'd loved Pepper in the future that would never come to pass. But he loved Pepper in the present just as much. His actions had changed their dynamic irrevocably, and also changed Pepper herself at some point along the way. It wasn' t fair to compare them, not anymore.

Apparently deciding enough silence had passed for Tony to beat himself up over his little white lie, JARVIS speaks up again.

"What next, Sir?"

Tony hums… and then grins, rising from his chair.

"Now? Now we take over the world!"

Tony laughs at the silence that follows, well aware JARVIS would be giving him a deadpan stare right now if he could. After a bit, he lets himself relax, his grin becoming more subdued.

"I'm not really kidding, JARVIS. The World Security Council, Alexander Pierce, HYDRA, SHIELD… they pretty much run the world behind the scenes. And we're going to finally be going after them. Subverting them, even. Won't lie… shit's about to get a lot more dangerous. Because we ' re done stonewalling SHIELD, J. We're going to start letting them in just a little bit."

"Sir?"

Tony hums as he sits back down at his desk and begins flicking holographic icons across the screen in front of him.

"There are some assets in SHIELD, J. We're going to make sure to reappropriate what we can in the days to come."

A familiar face appears in front of him, attached to her highly confidential SHIELD file. Framed in digital red hair, the pretty features of one Natasha Romanoff stare Tony in the eye.

"Starting with the Black Widow."

He wishes he could say she looks unsuspecting to really sell the sinister undertone of this moment, but even in her SHIELD file she looks ready to leap out of cyberspace and wrap those thighs of hers around his head so she can snap his neck. Of course, she'd have a much harder time doing so now, Tony can't help but think even as he leans back and looks at the ceiling with a wide grin once more on his face.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thank you for choosing this novel, visit us

And access the complete novel in PDF format : ko-fi.com/abrahamsmith1b