As Tony settling in with his newest friend, the glorious lord Blackwood. In another part of the city, within the mansion of the Ricci family, Alexander Ricci, a man who was well known to be dead, was very much alive, and very busy.
As one of the leaders of the SCP Foundation, Alexander Ricci, also known as Alexander the Great, Iskandar the Conqueror, and O5-1, Alexander had plenty of work to deal with. With hundreds of thousands of people under his command.
Dealing with the anomalous wasn't easy. They didn't follow the rules, or any rules, really. Simple things could be dangerous, and dangerous things could be harmless. A key could be a door, and a door a cake. When it came to SCP objects, nothing was set in stone.
As such, dealing with the objects required an open mind and the willingness to accept the impossible as possible. Not everyone could do that, which was why the Foundation kept the knowledge of SCPs away from the world.
This one was one of the major tasks that took a lot of resources on a daily basis. Alexander, as the head of dark operations was deeply involved with this particular part of the Foundation's mission.
He was the one that would step in a do what had to be done, all while keeping the truth of the Foundation's involvement hidden even from the members of the Foundation itself.
So when the organization of interest, Marshall, Carter, and Dark Ltd, held an auction, there was a risk that normalcy would be breached and knowledge of anomalous objects spread along the masses.
Normally, Marshall, Carter, and Dark Ltd wasn't a high-risk organization. They, too, stayed in the dark, sneaking around and only really showing up when they held an auction. And even then, they showed plenty of restraint.
Their guest list was small, and they were very discrete in their dealings. This means that the only risk is the objects themselves, for Marshall, Carter, and Dark aren't afraid of selling dangerous things.
And thanks to O5-3 and his rather hostile takeover of Blackstone, Alexander was sitting with a list of items, and who had gotten their hands on them.
SCP-714: the jade ring. Newest owner: Norman Osborn.
An object with little risk, both to the world around it and to the veil of secrecy. It was understandable why the agent sent in hadn't bothered getting his hand on that. It was perfectly safe to leave it in Osborn's hand until they got around to pick it up.
The other item Osborn had won, the fragment of SCP-682 was a lot more interesting. Firstly, was the question of how they had gotten their hand on such a thing. The battlefield had been cleaned up by the Foundation, and they had ensured that nothing remained.
Something that was giving a lot of annoyance for a lot of people within the world's militaries. While Alexander wasn't personally the one in charge of leading those around by the nose, he still knew enough about what was going on there to know that they all wanted samples.
And many people were angry that they didn't get anything, so it was surprising that Marshall, Carter, and Dark had gotten a sample.
Personally he assumed that rather then finding something after the battle with Banner, they must have found SCP-682 first. That object was one worth a whole lot of money; given his power, he was better than even the most powerful nuclear weapons when it came to bringing destruction.
Sure, it wasn't as fast as a nuke, but SCP-682 would continue to bring down everything around him, kill everyone around him until he stopped, something which was very, very difficult.
So, if they had found the object, they would likely try to capture it. Such an attempt would likely end in failure; after all, even the Foundation only had so many ways of dealing with the immortal beast.
So Alexander suspected that they had gotten their hands on the sample from such an encounter. Though he was surprised they hadn't alerted the Foundation about the location of the object.
Even Marshall, Carter, and Dark knew better than letting something that dangerous wander around freely. While they were by no means aligned with the Foundation's goals, they still needed money to be worth more than the paper it was printed on.
And if normalicy was breached, if the masses well into chaos, if human society itself fell into chaos and madness, then those shady merchants would find themselves in a bad spot.
So, it wasn't unusual for them to inform the Foundation about truly dangerous things. Since their interests sometimes aligned with the Foundation.
Shaking his head, Alexander stopped thinking about that and instead looked back onto the list.
SCP-662: The Butler's Hand Bell. This item had been acquired by the Foundation, which was good. The bell, and the butler that spawned from using it was dangerous, even for people like himself.
The amount of enhancements he had used on himself made it very difficult to kill him; even having his head blown up wasn't enough to kill him, thanks to the ring of life.
But that didn't mean that someone using that bell couldn't harm him. That damned butler could appear anywhere, able to bypass every defense in the world. Allowing him to go right in and mess with him.
Rather than the perfect assassin, he was the perfect thief and spy, able to sneak in and out of everywhere. And while the chance of someone sending him after members of the O5 council, the same couldn't be said for his public persona, which was recognized as the richest person in the world.
Not publicly, but in the circles that mattered.
So having anything that could pose a threat to himself or the others back in containment was welcomed with open arms.
Another item back in containment was SCP-738. The Devil's Deal Desk. This one was even more dangerous then the Butler's Hand Bell. After all the Butler wasn't overly dangerous. Alexander feared no poison, and a knife in the back would do little.
Only something like a powerful gun could harm him at this point. And while a skilled Butler, he wasn't some master marksman, and wouldn't use such tools.
The desk, however, was something that very much could threaten him. While it was far from the ideal wish granter, and it really did twist wishes to the extreme, to the point that it was hardly worth the risk. Much less worth the price.
A foolish wish could indeed cause a good amount of harm, more so in the hands of the kinds of people that attended that event. After all, they were all rich and powerful, famous, beautiful, they had a lot of things the desk could take in return for granting wishes.
Even the wish itself might not be as big of a problem as the price itself. For while money was hardly important to the entity on the other side of the desk. It liked more important things.
That didn't mean that money wasn't important, and to someone rich, money might be their entire life. And if the desk was to demand their wealth, that might be a problem in of itself.
For if someone like Stark, Osborn, Hammer, Musk, or Gates were to lose their money, then that would send ripples down the wider society, potentially triggering market crashes and economic turmoil on a global scale.
The Devil's Deal Desk wasn't just a threat to the person who made a wish—it was a threat to the entire economic stability that many in the Foundation worked to preserve. Having it back under lock and key was a relief, knowing that it wouldn't be in the hands of a careless bidder who could set off disasters on a whim.
Alexander continued down the list, feeling a mixture of satisfaction and unease as he reviewed each item's fate. There was SCP-268, the Cap of Neglect, a subtle yet powerful item that rendered the wearer nearly invisible to those around them. In the hands of an opportunist, it could allow unchecked infiltration into places that should remain secure.
It wasn't a dangerous item, not when compared to the other two, but it did have the possibility to be hard to get back. As if the winner wore it, even the Foundation would struggle to find them. So it's better to get it back quickly before it disappears and gets used to something nefarious.
Tony Stark had once again gotten his hand on a SCP object. Alexander figured it was only a matter of time before he would have to allow him to know about the world of SCPs. With the way he kept encountering them, it wouldn't be possible to keep him in the dark forever.
The whole time traveling kids thing with the new reactor and other major events had kept him from getting too interested in those few items. Not that he didn't have Jarvis looking for signs of the old AI.
No, Stark would learn soon enough, the only question was how he would find out, and what would happen once he did.