The Beginning After The End

Hey, thanks everyone! *Hands out free cookies*

Chapter One: Fury

Three days. Three days since Tony had announced to the world that he was Iron Man. Three days Tony had spent working on repairing and upgrading his suit. Three days and he’d only had the paranoid Pepper and the supercomputer Jarvis for company. Three days and the press was still hounding him for more information.

Three days and Tony was already starting to lose his mind.

He sat in his lab in front of one of the huge computer monitors, staring across the room at the old, battered gold and red suit that had been remade and upgraded and the new suit was now sitting under his garage. He sighed and propped his elbows on the desk in front of him, letting his head drop to his hands and rubbing his temples. He wasn’t aware of the faint clacking from behind until he felt a hand land between his shoulderblades.

He jumped and cursed, but relaxed as he recognized whom it was. Pepper began to massage the knot from his shoulder, following his line of sight.

“No, Tony. You promised you’d stay inside,” she said firmly, directing his eyes away from the busted-up suit.

“Pepper, I appreciate you trying to hold me to my promises. I really do. But I need to get out of this house.”

“What, so someone can shoot you?” she asked in a mocking tone, rolling her eyes.

“Listen, Pepper,” he said, spinning his chair around to face her. “I’ll make it a quick trip and I promise I won’t do anything stupid.”

She snorted. He frowned.

“And besides, I’m the boss,” he argued, raising one eyebrow. She scowled but didn’t have anything to say to that.

“Fine, but you have to go in the suit. You have one hour, and I want a call when you leave and the second you get back,” she commanded, tapping the miniaturized arc reactor in his chest for emphasis. “Or else I’m calling Rhodes.”

He gave her a lopsided smile. “Will that be all, Miss Potts?”

That gave her pause. She blinked.

“That will be all, Mr. Stark," she said after a moment. "And if you don’t need anything else, I’m going to head home. It's getting late.”

He waved her away and chuckled. “I think I know my own house well enough by now. At least I would hope so.”

She nodded and left the room, high heels hitting the stairs with a clack at every step. Tony stood up and stretched, eager at the prospect of getting out of the house. In a way, even Afghanistan wasn’t as bad, because at least then he knew he couldn’t leave without someone killing him for sure. Now, he was confined to his house in a city he knew as well as the back of his hand with, possibly, no one trying to kill him if he left. It was maddening.

Tony climbed the stairs after Pepper, making his way to his room to change into the body suit he had had made specifically for the Iron Man armor so that the hard metal wouldn’t rub against his skin.

“Jarvis?” he called, jogging down the stairs again once he was ready.

“Yes, sir?”

“Has Pepper left yet?”

“She has.”

“Good. OK, time to suit up. Everything functioning properly?”

“Yes, sir. You had me finish the modifications on the Mark IV just earlier today,” replied the crisp British voice of the supercomputer. Tony made it down to his garage and stood still while the floor shifted under him, revealing the new Iron Man suit. It looked exactly the same as the one before it had.

It took only a few seconds before Tony Stark became Iron Man once again.

“Ready Jarvis?”

“For you sir, always.”

With a great whoop of delight, Tony shot out of the garage and into the clear night sky. He was instantly reminded of the first time he had tested out the suit, and he grinned at the memory.

“Hey, Jarvis, connect me to Pepper,” Tony commanded. A few moments later a small picture of Pepper Potts jumped in front of his eyes before moving to the side. A dull ringing followed.

She picked up almost immediately. “Tony?”

“Hey.”

“Where are you?…Nevermind. I see you.”

“You can see me? Wait, where are you?"

Her voice was thick with amusement. “On the street below you. Having fun?”

He gave another whoop in answer and hovered for a moment, hundreds of feet in the air, before diving headfirst towards the ground. He caught sight of Pepper’s car on the quiet back street and hovered a distance in front of the small silver vehicle, only a foot above the asphalt.

“I thought you said you wouldn’t do anything stupid,” she said dryly, thought he still caught a small hint of amusement behind her words.

“Yeah, well, you know me.”

He shot off again and hung up on Pepper, soaking in the freedom before he had to return to his empty home. He would've stayed out longer, but he believed that Pepper would sick Rhodey on him if he was out even a minute longer than he had promised.

“Sir, your hour is almost up,” Jarvis informed, all too soon.

“Thank you, Jarvis,” Tony replied dully. He sighed and turned around, shooting off back the way he had come. He reached his mansion and easily maneuvered the suit back into the garage before letting himself down lightly.

“OK, I redesigned this thing to come off easier than last time. Lets see if it works.”

Tony was right, as always. The armor came off almost as fast as it had been put on. He flexed his arms and made it up to his room to change back in the sweats and t-shirt he had had on earlier. Then it became a frantic search for the phone before Pepper had Rhodey at his door, along with half the military.

“Jarvis!” Tony called, walking into the living room, still searching for the phone.

“Welcome home, sir,” the AI said.

Tony didn’t see the figure standing in the shadows. At least not until the man had spoken.

“I am Iron Man.”

There was a small pause as the man let the mocking words set in.

"You think you're the only superhero in the world?"

One of the few fanfictions on here I was immediatly drawn to, I think because I liked the film alot and it had something a little bit different; as in Tony Stark is not the archetypal hero and I think this is one of the core elements of Iron Man.
For a 13 year old your writing style is superbly developed, I'm really impressed with it; I think these early stages, like a prologue you can't really get much of a "feel" for the story (or know what direction it's heading in) but I think you were faithful to the source materiel and as a piece of writing on it's own, as I said, excellent for someone of your age. I mean it's formulaic but that's the basis of fanfiction so that point is mute.
I liked your Batman inference as well..."that's the day you get to say, 'I told you so'" Nicely done.
I await chapter one!

I love the fact that you took one of you favorite plots from one of your favorite movies and continued it. I love doing the same thing every time I finish a good book or watch a good movie.

I agree that you got the characterization pretty much on the bulls-eye! Stark being carefree, Rhodes worried(as usual), and P. trying not to express what she truly wants to say. (That's just my perspective)

Your grammar is fine, and the way everything is described makes sense. However, even though it is just the beginning, I really would have liked to have read a better "cliff-hanger" at the end, for example his car was attacked or P. passed out mysteriously, or maybe something not quite so dramatic.

If you write another addition, I look forward to seeing where it goes.

I've only seen the Iron Man movie - not read any comics or anything - but from the movie you have pretty good characterisation. That's all I can tell from this short chapter, and there's not much special going on here yet. I know it's just an introduction, but this is pretty much obvious from the end of the movie. Your writing style is nice, but I hope something pretty original is going to happen later on in the fic. Keep going with it though! Your grammar and everything is fine =]