Tony could no longer remember how many days he had spent in the cave.
At first, he had kept count. He had carved marks into the stone wall with a missile fragment, but stopped at the thirtieth mark, discovering that counting the days was itself enough to drive a man insane.
Three months? Four? All he knew was that it had been spring outside when he came in, and now even taking a piss was hot enough to kill him.
Time was not linear here. Time was the click whenever the electromagnet in his chest latched onto the car battery. Time was Yinsen handing him a bowl of unidentifiable mush and saying, "Eat it while it's hot." Time was the lines revised countless times on the blueprints, the turns of a wrench tightening screws, the frequency of sparks flashing in the darkness and dying out.
Tony Stark, head of Stark Industries, worth tens of billions, cover man of the year for three magazines, was now wearing a ragged shirt reeking of sweat and motor oil, crouched in a cave tightening the final screw.
He had been tightening that screw for ten minutes.
Not because it was difficult. Because once he finished tightening it, the Mark I would be fully assembled. And this iron shell cobbled together from missile scrap and discarded parts was his only hope of leaving the cave.
Tony set down the wrench and took a step back.
The dim yellow bulb overhead cast the Mark I's shadow onto the stone wall, its outline as rough as an unfinished stone statue. There was no streamlined shell, no JARVIS system, none of the refinement and elegance any of his past creations should have possessed. This was a beast pieced together from scrap iron, cumbersome, ugly, covered in welding scars.
But it could stand up. It could walk out.
Tony stared at the suit of armor, tightening his grip on the wrench, then loosening it, over and over.
"Nervous?"
Yinsen's voice came from behind him. Tony did not turn around, merely shrugged.
"Nervous?" Tony snorted, his voice echoing through the cave. "I'm Tony Stark. Why would I be nervous?"
Yinsen said nothing. He simply rose from the corner, walked over to the Mark I, and knocked on its breastplate. The sheet metal gave a dull reverberation, like a battered drum.
"The welding is fine," Yinsen said. "I'm worried about the power system. The battery won't last long."
"It just needs to last long enough."
"How long is long enough?"
Tony did not answer.
It just needed to last long enough-of course he knew that was nothing but reassurance for himself. He did not know how many men were outside, how many guns they had, how many bullets this armor could withstand, or how far he could walk. The only thing he knew was that this armor's power system had been designed to the standard of "one step at a time," because there were only so many parts, and he could not squeeze any more capacity out of them.
But he had to leave.
Not because he feared death. Because of Yinsen.
Of everyone Tony had met over the years, Yinsen was the last person who deserved to die in a place like this. A man who had saved a stranger's life, operated on him with a scalpel and parts stripped from a missile, and given him half a bowl of mush every day while drinking thin soup himself. Yinsen had never asked him, "When can we get out?" Not once. But Tony knew it was not because he did not want the answer. It was because he knew there was no answer.
Tony tossed the wrench onto the table with a sharp clang.
"Tomorrow. We're leaving."
Yinsen turned around. The bulb's light fell directly on his face, illuminating the wrinkles these past few months had added.
"First thing tomorrow," Tony repeated, his voice steadier now. "During their shift change. You put on the powered armor, I'll wear the protective suit. You charge out, and I'll-"
"I'll stay."
Tony turned his head, his expression shifting from confusion to fury in an instant. He had argued with Yinsen about this proposal at least ten times already. Every time, it ended with Yinsen saying "no" in that infuriatingly calm tone, until they parted on bad terms, only for him to talk to Tony the next day as if nothing had happened.
"If you wear the armor, you can get out alive." Yinsen walked over to the wall and sat down, resting his back against the stone and closing his eyes. "Even if I get out, I won't be able to keep up with you."
"Bullshit." Tony forced the word through clenched teeth. "I'm not abandoning you." His eyes reddened as he turned away. Yinsen shook his head and watched Tony with a smile. After these months together, Yinsen already regarded him as his own child. How could he let him take that risk? Fortunately, there was still plenty of time, enough to talk Tony around properly.
Just then, the entire cave shook violently.
The bulb swung wildly, sending light whipping across the stone walls. The wrench rattled off the table, and a pile of screws rolled off the parts rack, clattering against the rocks. Fine sand and dirt rained from the ceiling, falling into Tony's hair, onto the Mark I's iron shell, and into Yinsen's wide eyes.
Then chaotic shouting came from outside. It was in the local dialect Tony had heard for three months and could now understand a few words of, its tone shifting from shock to fear, from fear to screams.
Gunfire, then more gunfire.
There was a dull thud as something struck the stone wall, like someone slamming an entire sack of cement against it. Then silence for one second. Two seconds. Three.
Finally, an exceptionally loud voice rang out in an exceptionally familiar tone: "Shit!"
Tony stood where he was, one hand braced on the table, the other pressed against the faintly glowing reactor in his chest. He listened for three seconds, then turned to look at Yinsen. Yinsen was still leaning against the wall, but his eyes were now fully open.
"...Am I fucking hallucinating?" Tony said.
Yinsen did not answer. Because he had already picked up a steel pipe and started toward the cave entrance.
Tony pulled out the homemade stun gun he had hidden beneath the table for three months and followed. The two edged outward along the stone wall. Iron bars blocked the entrance. Tony peered through them, and his expression froze.
Outside had been the Ten Rings' camp. A few adobe watchtowers, a pickup truck, an antiaircraft machine gun, and over a dozen armed militants. This was the scene he had seen through the bars every day for three months. He could have drawn it with his eyes closed.
Now a crater had blasted open in the middle of that scene. A pillar was embedded in it. Standing atop the pillar was a man two meters ten tall, bent over and swearing about things like "Tao Pai Pai," "Flight Technique," and "Newton, die sooner and reincarnate sooner," none of which sounded remotely like English.
The man wore a garish blue bodysuit with red underwear on the outside, sunglasses perched on his nose, and hair blown into a bird's nest. Most absurd of all, a strip of black lace was still wrapped around his left wrist, fluttering gently in the night breeze.
Lin Xiao finally stopped swearing. He straightened up and looked around, seeing at least a dozen dark gun barrels trained on him. There was no panic whatsoever on his face. Instead, he wore a look of resignation that said, "Fine, business first."
He grinned at the gun-wielding militants, looking very friendly.
"Don't be nervous," he said. "I'm here to find someone."
No one understood what he was saying. But everyone instinctively took a step back.
Lin Xiao jumped off the pillar, crushing a rock beneath his foot as he landed. He looked up toward the cave and met Tony Stark's eyes through the iron bars.
Tony was still holding up his homemade stun gun, his mouth open like a goldfish out of water.
At the sight of him, Lin Xiao first froze, then his expression changed from "friendly" to a "genuine smile." His gaze shifted down to the blue-glowing reactor in Tony's chest, and his smile stiffened again for a moment.
"Tony." Lin Xiao's voice suddenly became very serious.
Tony said nothing, because he had yet to recover from trying to determine whether the person in front of him was a hallucination.
"What's that thing in your chest?" Lin Xiao took a step forward, casually slapping a militant blocking his path and sending him flying. "Pretty cool. Make me one sometime."
For the first time in ages, something stirred in Tony Stark's eyes, and his hand loosened on the stun gun.
He watched the big lug who had once stolen his thunder at a press conference, competed with him in drinking at a hotel, and accompanied him to a presentation under Afghanistan's blazing sun, standing in the center of a crater in a bizarre bodysuit with his underwear on the outside... Fucking hell, this bastard's still playing Superman. Tony had wanted to curse him out, but his throat was so tight that he could not say a word. His eyes stung terribly, and he turned away to rub them hard...
Meanwhile, Lin Xiao was knocking another militant armed to the teeth flat on the ground, his movements as casual as swatting a fly.
After an unknown amount of time, footsteps sounded outside the cave.
"Can you open the door?" Lin Xiao shook the blood off his hand, then wiped it on his pants with a look of disgust. "That pillar's made of lousy material. My knees hurt from standing on it the whole way."
Tony stood behind the iron bars, silent for a long while.
Then he laughed. It was laughter squeezed from deep within his chest, carrying three months' worth of motor oil and despair, and laughter of relief. He laughed for a long time, laughed until he bent double, laughed until he nearly dropped the stun gun in his hand. He laughed so hard that when Yinsen asked, "Are you all right?" behind him, he had no time to answer.
He straightened up, wiped the dust from his face, and spoke with his old composure restored:
"Lin Xiao, what the fuck are you wearing?"