A Day of Playing

"He is..."

Not wanting to provoke someone he shouldn't, Rhodes asked in a low voice.

"I'm sorry, Colonel Rhodes. I can only tell you this: don't ever provoke him. Otherwise... even your general won't be able to protect you."

Rhodes's expression changed slightly.

"Hey, I'm saying—are you just leaving us stranded at the airport? Get someone over here. I need rest. I'm tired. Food first, then we'll talk." Kino was already letting loose over there.

Inside a cave somewhere in Afghanistan.

Tony Stark, who had narrowly survived the disaster, held an iron box in his left hand while touching the strange device on his chest with his right. Feeling the vanished warmth in his chest and... that maddening emptiness, he looked like he had seen a ghost.

"What did you do to me?"

"Me? I saved your life."

The good-natured Yinsen was fiddling with some unidentified ingredients that looked more or less like pig feed.

Oh, damn!

Could anyone even eat this stuff?

"I removed as much shrapnel as I could, but there's still a lot left. It's moving through your blood toward your heart. Want to see it? A souvenir for you. Look!"

"People in my village suffered wounds like this. We called them the living dead. Within a week, the shrapnel would pierce their vital organs."

"And the device in your chest is an electromagnet connected to a car battery. It holds the shrapnel in place and keeps it from entering your heart."

Tony slowly pulled up his zipper. He didn't know what to say, or rather—he didn't know what else he could say. Even if the shrapnel was held in place, it would still corrode as blood flowed over it. The toxins from that corrosion might be weak, but accumulated over time, they could still kill him.

Just then, the sound of a heavy iron bolt being pulled open rang out.

Yinsen's expression changed. He quickly instructed him, "Hurry, stand up. Get up. Do as I do!"

A group of freedom fighters slowly walked in.

"Hurry, hands up!"

The leader of the freedom fighters walked over and rattled off a long string of words.

"He says—[Welcome, Tony Stark, the most famous murderer in United States history!... He is honored... and he wants you to help them build missiles, the Jericho Missile you demonstrated!]"

Yinsen acted as translator.

"He says they have all the materials needed to make the Jericho Missile. He wants you to list the materials. He wants you to start working now. When it's done, they'll let you go."

Tony gave a disdainful smile. "He won't let me go."

Yinsen said, "He definitely won't."

After a round of tinkering, a day passed. Tony had finally created, as Kino wished, an "Iron Man flashlight."

Yinsen said, "That doesn't look like a Jericho Missile."

"Because it's a miniature Arc Reactor. This can stop the shrapnel from entering my heart."

"How's the power output?"

"If I calculated correctly, three billion joules per second."

"That's enough for you to live fifty times over."

"Yeah, or enough to power a big guy for fifteen minutes."

As he spoke, Tony took out three simple blueprints he had drawn. He placed them against the light and aligned them, forming a—robot that looked like it was made of steel.

"We're getting out with this."

Yinsen frowned. "This...?!"

--

While one side was feverishly building an escape plan, Kino on the other side was snoring away.

James Rhodes, the future "War Machine," paced back and forth anxiously. If Coulson hadn't stopped him, he would have rushed over and punched Kino.

"Like this?"

James Rhodes wanted to kill someone. Just like this? A group of people guarded him and watched him sleep?

Coulson looked embarrassed. He didn't know what Kino was doing either. Since arriving in Afghanistan, Kino had done nothing. He was either sitting cross-legged on the bed in a daze or lying down and snoring, not even eating.

No one could figure out what he was doing.

He had seriously spent an entire day playing around.

"Colonel, please be patient. He isn't sleeping," Maria Hill said, shaking her head.

"Ah..."

Now it wasn't just War Machine. Even the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents felt something was off. If he wasn't sleeping, then what was he doing?

Kino smiled. Not bad, Hill understood him pretty well.

He truly wasn't sleeping. He was merely wandering beyond the body. Uh, not the kind of absentminded wandering—it was more like Doctor Strange's out-of-body experience. Of course, it wasn't his soul leaving his body, but his mind. If that was still hard to understand, think of it as a mental body, or—a thought body.

Fine, that probably made even less sense.

Just one explanation: this pure mental body allowed his mental abilities to be unleashed to their fullest effect.

Yeah, Observation Haki.

His brand-new Observation Haki, fused with psychic abilities, was sweeping across Afghanistan's desert mountains again and again like a high-precision radar scan!

Suddenly, his brows furrowed. He had found Tony Shitaker.

"He's already drawn up the first-generation Iron Man blueprints?"

"Should I go now?"

"Forget it. I'll wait until MK1 is built."

Although the blueprints had appeared, Tony had yet to experience the sense of accomplishment that the Iron Man armor would bring him. After all, one was something that would help him escape alive, while the other was merely an idea that existed in theory.

The proof of the pudding was in the eating!

What if the "Iron Man" plan got shelved before it was ever tested?

So Kino decided to wait a little longer.

His brows relaxed, and his mental body returned.

Maria Hill frowned and said, "Now he's asleep!"

"Huh?"

The group looked at one another, their expressions seeming to say—are you fucking kidding me?

She had lived with Kino for over half a month. Her daily task was to observe him. She had come to understand some of his microexpressions, movements, and habits. When she caught the slight frown and relaxation of his brows just now, she knew he had not been asleep at all.

Although she had no idea what that guy was doing, she inexplicably believed Kino.

Seeing everyone doubt her, Maria Hill became a little annoyed. Her brows tightened as she reached out and... viciously twisted Kino's arm.

—A full 360 degrees.

But he still didn't wake up!

Maria Hill got angry. "Colonel Rhodes, please bring over a basin of ice water!"

"Sure, no problem!"

He had wanted to do that ages ago. If Coulson hadn't stopped him, then even if doing so meant losing his uniform, he still would have done it!

Unfortunately, his wish was destined to fail.

Before he could even turn around and take a few steps, Kino abruptly sat up, stretched, and yawned.

"I'm saying, Hill, don't be so heartless, okay? You lived at my place for half a month. Everything you ate, wore, and used was paid for with my money, right? Even if you don't care about me, you should at least show some respect for my hospitality. There's no need to dump ice water on me, is there?"

"Hmph!"

Maria Hill crossed her arms and turned away.

"Mr. Marcus..." Seeing that the atmosphere was off, Coulson hurried over to smooth things over.

"I told you to call me Kino."

"Uh, Mr. Kino, about Mr. Stark... what do you think?"

Kino lay back down and said with a smile, "Don't worry. I've already found where he is."