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The Sage of the Mind: Chapter 80 [November 2010]
Manhattan
–Tony Stark–
"So, how goes SCIENCE! My boys?" He added after seeing the deadpan stare from Dr.Cho and Dr.Simmons, "--and ladies?"
The ladies turned around without addressing him, seriously his charisma had dropped dangerously ever since everyone in the lab came to know that the reason he was unable to come to the Manhattan Tentacle Fest was because Pepper didn't let him.
It was BLASPHEMY! It was a huge spot on his otherwise clean sheet of honor but alas, the lady sayeth and he do as the lady sayeth.
"Ah, Mr.Stark, you are on time. We are just about to process the fibres, once again," Bruce emphasised on the once again did not go unnoticed by him.
Yeah, they were redoing the entire thing from scratch. That is, they were taking the already made vibranium fibres, melting them down, and then recreating them exactly, except with just one difference. The time difference in getting all that done was getting on Bruce's already frayed nerves.
That one thing would, if successful, make all the difference in the world.
"I am not sure if the hocus pocus liquid will even work, Mr.Stark," He deadpanned at Cho who actually used those words in a professional setting. It meant that his unique brand of snark was being imprinted on her.
Nice!
"I don't know about you guys but Bruce and I were there to see it, and we know that it should be something." He said, not knowing how to explain the call hijacking that was done, with no trace whatsoever. The real kicker was the small bottle, made from nearly indestructible glass (Jarvis was still trying to break, shatter, melt, dent, or otherwise change the shape of the bottle in any meaningful way), containing a yellow and white liquid.
One would think that those two colours would mix and give rise to light yellow but now, it was as if the liquid itself was completely mixed with each other, but the liquid sometimes emitted yellow light and sometimes white light.
"Did you get anything from your reports?" Bruce asked him and his mind went back to the weird behaviour he noticed, from himself. He had immediately asked Jarvis to get him checked out, his paranoia meant that he had a full medical suite installed in his workspace down in the basement in LA.
State of the art, top of the line equipment with custom code written for everything meant that the chances of failure were pretty low. So, he had been feeling extremely peppy when he had gotten himself checked out, and apparently….
"Yup, Bruce. That lady just gave us some sort of miracle liquid. I am sure that if I drink that, I will become 20 years younger, back to my peak."
And that was true. Bruce nodded back in confirmation.
After all, Bruce was the one who received the documentation about the liquid and how to use it properly. He just received the liquid itself.
Why the segregation he did not know but after seeing the information about the liquid, he was sold on the fact that the Invisible Man was not alone and was probably working with some sort of organisation, in a bid to do something but becoming the de-facto King of Manhattan must slot into their plans somehow.
He had noted it down in his head because apparently, they could hack anything and everything, going through painfully built and rebuilt firewalls as if they were not even there, and then leaving no trace behind whatsoever of their intrusion.
God, what a nightmare from a cybersecurity perspective. That lady could probably just go into a bank's systems, or log into hundreds of banks worldwide, and get herself a small amount, like a million dollars, and then fuck right off, as the banks scrambled to find the data.
"I know that. I was there when we conducted the experiment. What I want to know is did you get anything negative from your reports? And just because it worked properly with you does not mean it will work well for Betty. She is also pregnant," Bruce began pacing around in front of him, something that he did when he was nervous, which was always nowadays.
Especially since the attack on him. He still did not know who that was, and how they got past the all encompassing presence of the Invisible Man, and how that tentacle monster was able to overwhelm the Invisible Man enough for him to actually come out and fight him, with his powers.
He had seen footage of entire buildings being dissolved into dust just because of a wrong demolition somewhere. The tentacle monsters were big but not too much on the scale of things that the Invisible Man could handle.
Then there was the blue glowlight he became and how he disappeared just as fast, after doing honest to god magic. Well, sufficiently advanced science would be just as indistinguishable from the normal person.
It galled him to admit that for the person capable of maintaining awareness over an entire city, he must really look like a caveman in comparison.
"Bruce, have some faith. We will be conducting tests before we do anything. And the Invisible Man should be back in just three more days. Everything is going to be fine," He reassured Bruce even though he himself was facing some of the heat right now.
The presence of NYPD in Manhattan had to be quadrupled after the news of the Invisible Man coming back in a week reached the seedy underbelly of New York.
The criminals who had avoided Manhattan like the plague had come back in droves. Jarvis was currently out there, piloting two remote suits and busting drug rackets, day after day.
People were scared to come out. Thankfully, the Congregation of the Invisible Man was also somewhat armed and they had taken it upon themselves to guard the city in their patron's absence as well.
So, that was good. The kitchens were working fine, nobody wanted to hit that.
Jarvis predicted that if the Invisible Man did not return on the exact specified day, crime would skyrocket on top of the rates they had right now. Right now, they are just risking it and taking advantage of a rare window that had opened for them.
If they think that the city is completely devoid of protection. Well, then, let's just say the government coming in and trying to take away Betty would be the least of their concerns.
Oh yeah, Betty. Bruce and Betty found themselves being the very first semi permanent residents of the warehouse they were in. Both were pretty shaken and having an Iron Man suit on hand, along with SHIELD security gave them have a peace of mind.
"Alright," Bruce muttered to himself and then turned around to look at the beauty of a machine making the fibres. Damn, just where in the hell did the Invisible Man get the data for that machine, he would love to know.
Only if they had the means and the Vibranium to actually study, experiment, and waste the metal, could they make such a sophisticated piece of machinery. Nobody in the world wanted to waste what little Vibranium one could find on hand. Hell, last he heard, he had the second biggest stockpile in all of America, outside of the US government.
"Oh, there we go," He said as the machine began glowing yellow. The machine was supposed to be completely isolated from the rest of the world, only opening when the fibres were done but the solution that lady had given him did not conform to the standards of the world, so what did he know?
"What?"
Oh right, he hadn't told anyone else of the why of today's process.
"Oh, Dr.Cho, this is a special process developed for some truly phenomenal effects. Please, once it is done, you will be the first to test it." He told the bewildered doctor and then went back to watching the machine do its work.
The light seemed to brighten and brighten, until most of his vision was just a big splotch of light, even after wearing sunglasses.
"GLORIOUS!" He didn't know what overtook him at the moment but he ended up shouting that out as he flipped the switch on the sunglasses, turning them into goggles that covered his entire face from the nose up.
And yet, despite the intense heat that should be followed by such bright lights, all he could feel was….
"Oh, this is so gooood," He almost moaned out in relief as the light hit every part of his body, and reduced pains that he didn't even know existed. It was as if the light was healing everything about him.
Unfortunately, the light soon reached its crescendo and began dimming down. The glow was then concentrated on a single location that was moving.
The fibres, he realised. They were done.
With the entire rest of the team still in shock, and a shocking number of the scientists now sporting guns in their hands, he walked forward, Bruce right behind him, as they unloaded the machine, and had to immediately stop looking as the fibres were bright.
Immensely so.
After a moment, the glow died down and as he looked at the fibres, the difference was night and day.
It was completely yellow and white, interchanging colours at the drop of a hat.
"Son of a bitch, it worked," His neck snapped to the side as he heard Bruce swear. Bruce never swore!
"Yeah, it did." He giddily said as he entered the suit that had silently reached behind him. Why would he need tongs or industrial safety equipment when he had the safest suit of them all?
He gingerly took the fibres and dipped them into a specialised container made, just for this. Once the container was nicely sealed, he looked to the warehouse and saw that everyone was looking at him, probably for some sort of explanation.
"What are you looking at? Get back to work!"
Ah, he always wanted to say that.
And look at them, they scrambled back to work even. Did they not know that they were employed by Fury and not him?
"Anywho, let's begin the testing, Dr.Cho. I assume you have suitable mutilated animals on hand to test their healing effects?" He asked Cho who looked very bewildered and confused about the whole thing.
Ah, he forgot she was not from around here.
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