Four years later.
The mansion was silent except for the metronomic tick-tock of a grandfather clock in one corner and the gentle thrum of machines working from Howard Stark's workshop. In the big library, a little boy sat in a leather armchair with a book nearly as big as he was in his lap. He turned the page, focused solely.
Jack—no, Tony—had come a long way since that surreal day when he first realized his new reality. He wasn't the type to wallow in existential crises or waste time asking why or how this happened. Instead, he accepted it with surprising ease, figuring he'd been handed a second chance and might as well make the most of it.
Still, adapting wasn't easy. At first, his infant body was frustratingly weak and slow. Everything—sitting up, walking, even talking—required grueling effort. But once he mastered his tiny limbs and started speaking, things became interesting. Maria and Howard Stark were often busy, but their affection for him was genuine. Maria, in particular, doted on him, while Howard offered the kind of distracted yet proud admiration you'd expect from a genius with limited parenting skills.
It was Howard's library, however, that became Tony's sanctuary.
As Jack, he'd never been a prodigy, but here? Something about this new brain was... different. He discovered it by accident, one lazy afternoon when he'd been aimlessly wandering the mansion. Stumbling into the library, he was struck by its sheer size. Shelves upon shelves of books lined the walls, filled with titles that screamed "high IQ only": Advanced Theoretical Physics, Mechanics of Flight, Quantum Field Theory.
He didn't expect to understand any of it. Philosophy had been his thing—though not by choice—and his knowledge of science or engineering had been average at best. But curiosity led him to crack open a book, and as he read, the words made sense in a way they never had before. Concepts he vaguely remembered as impossible hurdles in school—like thermodynamics and electromagnetism—suddenly felt... obvious.
At first, he thought it was a fluke, but the more he read, the clearer it became: his mind was wired differently now. Ideas clicked into place with almost mechanical precision, each piece of information slotting neatly into a growing framework of understanding. By the time he reached the third chapter of Introduction to Advanced Robotics, he wasn't just reading; he was visualizing, planning, innovating.
His small hands turned the page with a calmness that belied his racing thoughts.
"So, if I run current through a coil and suspend it in a magnetic field... right! That's how you get rotational motion," he muttered under his breath. His voice still carried the high-pitched timbre of a child, but his tone was all business.
"Tony?"
The voice startled him. He looked up to see Maria standing in the doorway, smiling softly.
"Yes, Mom?" he asked, closing the book with a sheepish grin.
She chuckled, walking over to him. "Are you reading again? You spend more time in here than your father does in his workshop." She tousled his hair gently.
"It's fun," he said honestly. "I like figuring things out."
Maria crouched beside him, her eyes soft but searching. "You're such a curious little boy. Just promise me one thing, Tony."
"What's that?"
"Don't just sit all day reading, try to play some games or maybe do some running around in the garden," she said softly, smoothing a strand of hair from his forehead. "You have all the time in the world to read. For now, just be a kid, okay? I don't want you to drown in tons of work all the time, like you Dad."
He nodded, but inwardly he knew he couldn't stop. Not now. Not when his mind felt like a furnace, constantly forging new ideas, new possibilities. Being "just a kid" wasn't an option; he had too much to learn, too much to do.
Later that evening, Tony sat at the dinner table with his parents. His father was unusually animated, talking about his latest project for Stark Industries.
"It's a revolutionary propulsion system," Howard was saying, gesturing with his fork. "If we can perfect it, it'll change aviation as we know it."
Tony leaned forward, his small face scrunched in thought. "What kind of propulsion? Jet? Rocket? Or something else entirely?"
Howard blinked, surprised. "That's... pretty specific for a four-year-old."
Tony shrugged. "I read about it in your library. Jets use combustion to generate thrust, but rockets carry their own oxidizers, so they're better for space travel."
Maria laughed lightly. "Howard, you've created a monster."
Howard stared at his son for a long moment before breaking into a smile. "You're going to give me a run for my money, aren't you, kid?"
Tony smirked. 'Oh, you have no idea.'
The next day, Tony decided to put theory into practice. He snuck into the workshop while Howard was out, marveling at the array of tools and materials. Everything he needed was here: wires, soldering kits, scraps of metal.
He started small. Using what he'd learned from the library, he rigged a simple circuit, then moved on to building a crude motor. By the end of the week, he had created a working model of a miniature electric car. It wasn't perfect; its movements were somewhat slow and little heavy on the back, but it worked.
As he saw the little car splutter into action, Tony felt a sense of satisfaction.
That was just the beginning.
...
Howard Stark was not a man to be easily surprised, but Tony Stark—his four-year-old son—was a rare exception.
Howard had always been proud of his ability to recognize genius. He had seen it in himself, in his colleagues, and now, unmistakably, in his son.
The electric car model had been the tipping point. Howard had found it on his workbench one evening, neatly assembled from scraps. It wasn't perfect, but the fact that a child had built it at all was staggering. Yet, Howard said nothing. He merely stood there, holding the tiny car, feeling a strange mix of pride and dread.
He knew firsthand the cost of brilliance. His own intellect had brought him wealth, fame, and success, but it had also brought enemies, isolation, and endless pressure. Howard had long feared that his son might inherit this burden. Seeing Tony's creations only confirmed it.
Howard resolved not to intervene, at least not yet. He'd keep an eye on Tony, guiding him subtly when needed, but for now, he would let his son enjoy the innocence of childhood.
...
The following week, Tony wandered into Howard's workshop again. It was filled with half-finished projects, blueprints, and prototypes, as usual. Despite its cluttered appearance, everything had its place. Howard placed them according to their importance.
It was here that Tony found it: a blackboard covered in a chalk diagram. The structure was unfamiliar yet intriguing, a lattice of concentric rings and interwoven lines that seemed to hum with potential even in its incomplete state. Next to the board, a stack of notes lay scattered across the desk, covered in Howard's precise handwriting.
Tony climbed onto the chair and grabbed the notes, his small hands carefully flipping the pages. It didn't take long for him to realize what he was looking at: an early concept for what would one day be known as the Arc Reactor.
His heart raced.
The notes detailed Howard's vision for a compact, self-sustaining energy source, free of fossil fuels and capable of revolutionizing the world. But they also highlighted the flaws—instabilities in the energy output, inefficiencies in the containment field, and equations that didn't quite add up.
Tony couldn't help but smile. He wasn't just reading; he was understanding. His mind worked through the equations like a knife slicing through butter, and ideas sprang to life with startling clarity. He saw where Howard had gone wrong, where the calculations needed tweaking, and even how the design could be improved.
"Dad, you're good," Tony muttered to himself, "but you're overcomplicating things."
He grabbed his notebook and began sketching. His small fingers moved with the precision of someone far older, drawing a revised design based on Howard's notes and his own memories from his past life. The movies and comics about Iron Man had given him enough of a blueprint to work with, and his new intellect filled in the gaps.
For hours, Tony worked in silence, his head bent over his notebook. He didn't just recreate the Arc Reactor; he refined it. He even simplified the magnetic confinement field equations, adjusted the old energy core dimensions for better energy stability in a new palladium-based core, and even added a failsafe against possible overload.
At the end of it, the notebook was full of diagrams, equations, and annotations. It was not a perfect design - he did not have access to all the materials or tools with which to build such a functioning reactor - but it was a solid foundation.
Tony sat back in his chair, gazing at his creation. A satisfied shiver rolled over him. This was more than the school science fair or childish doodle-and this was real, something to change the world.
And he wasn't even five years old yet.
...
Unbeknownst to Tony, Howard had been watching. He'd come into the workshop earlier, intending to grab a file, only to find his son engrossed in the blackboard and the notes. At first, Howard was alarmed—those designs weren't meant for a child's eyes—but then he saw the way Tony worked.
Howard stayed hidden, watching from the shadows as his son corrected equations and sketched new designs with a focus and precision that were almost frightening.
When Tony finally left the workshop, clutching his notebook, Howard stepped out of the shadows. He approached the blackboard, studying the additions Tony had made. To his astonishment, they were... correct. Not just correct, but better than his own calculations.
"Hahahah!" He laughed, shaking his head. "Tony, what am I going to do with you?"
Howard knew, at that moment, that he wouldn't be able to hold his son back. The genius he saw in Tony had already begun to show, and it was only a matter of time before it would manifest itself in bolder, more ambitious projects.
"You might as well join me, kid," Howard murmured.
But Howard also knew the world wouldn't let brilliance like that go unnoticed. If Tony continued down this path, he would face challenges and dangers Howard wasn't sure he was ready for.
For now, Howard decided, he'd let Tony have his moment. He wouldn't stifle his son's creativity, but he would keep a close eye on him, guiding him subtly and shielding him from the harsh realities of the world.
"God help me," Howard murmured, running a hand through his hair. "This kid's going to outdo me before he's even a teenager."
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