Fic: The Altar of Human Sacrifice Chap. 3, PG-13

[tresmaxwell.livejournal.com]

Universe: Movie
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Violence
Beta: None
Summary: In which many things are not what they seem and there's an audience of millions.
Pairings/Characters: Steve/Tony, pre-established
Word Count: About 6,000

Chapter Two - LINK

Chapter Three - Streaming Live!

Tony hated calling SHIELD in the middle of the night. He had to get patched through three or four people before he could ever speak to Fury, and they always warned him that it was extremely late as if Tony wasn't aware normal humans were asleep. He'd already been through two operators and was listening to hold music while he hacked into SHIELD's databanks on his bedroom window.

Steve watched him from the middle of the bed, Annika asleep on his chest. Upright and intensely alert, Steve cradled their daughter with one arm and held his shield in front of them as though he was waiting for an attack. It would've been a bit more intimidating, if Steve wasn't in his patriotic underwear and some tube socks. Tony had told him twice to put down the shield, but knew it wasn't going to happen.

Wondering why SHIELD had jazz music for phone holding, Tony typed the final lines of a ghost retrieval package into his coding. It ran, flashing feedback as it hunted through SHIELD's security network. They'd made some decent upgrades to their firewalls since the last time Tony had broken in to the database, and he'd encountered more than his share of problems before. He analyzed the stream from the protocol, seeing it stick and reroute as it bounced against the firewall.

"Mr. Stark," a voice came on over the speaker, sounding annoyed. It was another operator, not Fury. "The director is asleep, this-"

"You know, I do own a clock. I know how late it is. If you don't patch me through to him, I'll have your ass for target practice, am I clear?" Tony snapped, keeping his tone sharp but quiet so he didn't wake Annika.

There was a lengthy pause broken by muffled voices and the operator said, "Hold on, please."

The jazz music came back.

"I swear to..." Tony edited himself by closing his mouth, his anger boiling just under the surface. "Why doesn't he have a cell phone? He has to have a cell phone, why wouldn't he? But the bigger question is why don't we have the damn number to it?!"

"I know. It's not right," Steve said softly.

Tony could tell he was humoring him, but appreciated the attempt to calm him. Burning off steam by bitching was the best way for him to get rid of it, even if he hated the concept of bitching, "I mean, even you have a phone. This guy wants to consider himself our boss, but we can never get a hold of him."

Steve said some other 'you're absolutely right, honey' kind of acquiescence, but Tony wasn't listening anymore. The feedback from his program gave him an idea. Terminating the iteration, Tony made a few adjustments to the coding and sent it off again. The more aggressive program drilled through the security barriers, setting off every alarm and warning it touched. Rows of files jumped onto the floor to ceiling windows that made up a wall of the master suite. They filled from end to end with glowing folders bearing SHIELD's emblem.

Within a second of Tony's success, Fury growled on the speakerphone, "And just what do you think you're doing, Mr. Stark?"

"Thought you were asleep," Tony sniped, earning an eye roll from Steve.

"I'm awake now and you have my undivided attention. Is there a particular reason why you've infiltrated files that are none of your business?"

"It's my business now; these people have been in my home. We need to know what we're up against."

Conducting his screens like an orchestra, Tony flipped through numerous layers of files with broad sweeps of his arms until he found the one he wanted. The file was innocuous, a green silhouette of a folder with 'The Brotherhood' under it in an unassuming font. Tony tapped the file and it expanded on the window. A few long-lens photos mingled with sterile blocks of text, people that were tinted red and blue and green or were wearing costumes that bordered on absurd. Tony skimmed through the information. Repeated over and over through the text were the words 'Class Five Mutant'. It wasn't a familiar term.

Videos cued up and began to play, most of them short, shaky handheld footage. Tony couldn't quite wrap his head around what he was seeing. They were human, or at least they resembled humans, but they were doing things Tony had never witnessed before. There was no footage of the leader, just some of his underlings. A man with red skin and a long, whip-like tail disappeared in a burst of smoke, while a few files over, a woman with dark hair expelled some sort of energy out of her hands. Since he'd started working with the Avengers, Tony had encountered more than a few enemies that went beyond his analytical understanding of the world.

"What am I looking at here, Fury?" Tony asked, his eyes flicking to another video of a silver-haired youth they had to film in high-speed to get a clear shot.

Steve unfolded from the bed, gently laying Annika on the mound of decorative pillows before he joined Tony. As Steve gaped at the incredible footage, Fury answered, "Some, namely Erik Lensherr, believe that they're the next step in the evolutionary chain."

Tony lifted his chin to see the photograph at the top of the file, a gray-haired man with deep grooves trailing the sides of his mouth. Magneto, the file read under 'codename'. There was a certain dignity about him. Tony could read it in the high angle of his head and the menacing glint of his eyes. Erik Lensherr was no one to trifle with.

"They aren't engineered?" Steve questioned as he touched the file link for the mutant called Azazel. A dozen photos opened on the window to the left and Steve followed to look through them. The red-skinned man peered directly at the photographer in most of the shots, his grin wide and yellow. "Tony, it says this one can transport himself anywhere. He might be the one that…" Steve trailed off as he read the information.

Tony gestured at Lensherr's file to open it. Suddenly, the windows went blank, and then lightened until the view of New York's glittering sprawl came through. Tony's brow creased and he slowly lowered his hands to his sides.

Fury said, "I'm sorry, gentlemen, but I don't need the two of you going rogue on this. The Brotherhood is a menace SHIELD has been following closely for nearly a decade and I know for a fact you two can't deal with them alone. You especially, Tony."

"What's that mean? If you have information we need-"

"Let me assure you, you'll get it, but not before the team is gathered. I know how you are, Stark. I don't need you running off on your own."

Steve glanced over at him, "He's right."

Tony growled, "Traitor," under his breath.

"We'll be in the area by 0930 and we'll send you a transport. Do you think you can postpone your research until then?" thick with annoyance, Fury's voice told Tony how exasperated his was. Fury sighed and was silent for a moment, possibly thinking, probably cursing how difficult his Avengers were, "They do need to be dealt with. It concerns me that Raisa is with them, but you will need your teammates. Just, stay put until we have them. Agreed?"

"Yes, sir," Steve said immediately.

Tony growled, his body a solid block of tension. He stalked away from the windows and over to the bed, sitting on the edge. While he adjusted a blanket over Annika's shoulders, his thoughts tumbled wildly over what The Brotherhood would want with a mind like Golovin. The possibilities were disturbing.

When Tony didn't answer, Fury pressed, "Stark?"

Tony nodded and Steve spoke for him, "He agrees."

"Good. Now, I have work to do, if you would excuse me."

Fury's end of the line went silent and Tony looked at his sleeping daughter. The only time she acted her age was when she slept. With her thumb in her mouth and her intelligent eyes closed against the night, she could've been a normal child. Her dark, wavy hair spilled over her cheek like ink on an otherwise untouched page. Tony brushed it away with the back of his hand. This wouldn't be about Annika, but Tony knew Raisa's price would be her daughter's return. They would try to take her and Tony had to be prepared for it. He couldn't stand not knowing how The Brotherhood would attack.

The bed dipped behind him and Steve's left arm snaked around his waist. His palm came to rest on Tony's reactor over the shirt, gently caressing the raised metal through the cloth. "I know you won't get any sleep, but I'm obligated to suggest it," Steve whispered against his ear.

"No, I think I'm going to go work on something in the shop… You'll stay with-"

"Of course."

As Tony started to get up, Steve's hold tightened to keep him where he was. Confused, Tony turned his head and Steve caught the corner of his mouth with a kiss. It was chaste. Tony twisted to feel more of the plush lips. Giving Tony a light squeeze, Steve broke away.

"Go clear your head. I'll be here," Steve said against his mouth.

Tony saw Steve settled and turned off the light as he left.

For several hours, Tony fought to get back into SHIELD's network. He didn't have any plans on running off in the middle of the night after a group of mutants, but he wanted to know more about them. Whether they'd blocked his IP, or reorganized the firewalls, Tony couldn't get through. Thirty minutes into rerouting his computer through an off-site server to hide his IP, Tony decided to focus on his equipment. He hadn't checked his suits since the last time he took one out on a mission.

Rearming his tech consumed him. Not once did he glance at the clock while he installed smart missiles and recharged his cutting lasers in the MARK VIII. According to the army of blue wireframes standing to attention at his desk, the other suits were up to date. He rarely used the previous models, just the briefcase unit, but he'd rather have them in working order.

It had taken weeks to find all the parts beneath the wreckage of Raisa's warehouse and months on top of that to get them all repaired. They were restored to their wall bays, with new security implementations that ran on a separate network from Jarvis. As much as he trusted the computer to run everything in the tower flawlessly, he couldn't risk a repeat of Raisa's success in shutting down the AI.

As he was oiling a knee joint in the early hours of the morning, his stereo dropped to a murmur and he caught the smell of coffee, "Thanks, babe, I was just thinking about-"

"I'd prefer you didn't call me 'babe' anymore, Tony," Pepper's voice said crisply behind him.

Tony rotated in his chair to find his ex in her trademark black dress with a to-go cup and a stack of documents. While he considered her, he wiped his hands off on a rag. Temporarily postponing his curiosity as to why Pepper was at the tower, Tony took the offered coffee and swallowed some down. It was an organic blend that came from a shop near Union Square, so Tony knew the redhead had bad news. Rolling his tongue around the rich flavor, Tony set the cardboard cup down at his workstation and said, "Spill. What do you need me to do so badly that it requires a trip to Everyman?"

"I take it you didn't get my message," it was a statement, no shock registering on Pepper's petite features. Her lips pursed and one carefully groomed brow dipped, but it was enough for Tony to read. She might as well have screamed, 'You're a technology mogul, but you never check your goddamn messages!'

Since their breakup, Pepper had gone right back to being his sharp, unmovable secretary while simultaneously running his company. She'd scared Tony when she first left because she'd put in her resignation the same day, but after consideration, she'd asked to return to the position. More CEO than secretary, she didn't see him unless it somehow related to the welfare of the company. Tony had expected some kind of change between them, for moments like this to be more awkward, or for her to avoid confrontation, but it was as if they'd never shared a life. It made part of Tony sad.

"You left a message?" is what he ended up asking.

"Several. Your press conference is in an hour."

Tony nearly knocked the cup off the table when he reached for it. Glancing up with wide eyes, Tony questioned, "What press conference? I have to be at SHIELD by ten, I'm not doing a press conference."

"The one explaining to the nation why you've been keeping your marriage a secret so we don't lose favor with the Liberal party. Yes, you will be going. You told me to set it up, I set it up, now you're going to go upstairs and get dressed," Pepper was no nonsense and firm about it, handing him a deck of cue cards that he shuffled through and tossed in the trash. She followed the cards with her eyes, scowling slightly when he threw them out. "You could've at least considered looking over them."

"Pepper," Tony turned to his machine and started piecing together the gold-titanium plates, "I really don't have time for this. Push it to next week."

"Anthony Edward Stark! I've told you what this scandal is doing to our company and you ARE going to fix it or so help me."

Tony sat up a little straighter at the use of his full name, setting down his screwdriver as he looked over at her. Pepper's stance was tight, her arms cross over her chest and her shoulders square. There wasn't going to be any room for argument, not without getting into a socioeconomic debate that Tony would rather avoid. With a grumble, Tony picked up his coffee and shuffled upstairs.

"Fine, but this had better be done by nine."

Pepper followed him through the penthouse, absently straightening a statue on one of the end tables as they passed through the living room, "It's live, but we can push on them to start a little early. Does Steve have something he can wear?"

Tony stopped within sight of the kitchen. He hadn't considered that Steve would be part of the conference. The other man could handle it, he'd wooed bigger crowds when he was selling bonds, but Tony knew he didn't like being out in the open as Steve Rogers. The soldier had mentioned it more than once, that Captain America could be in the limelight, but he preferred to keep his other identity personal. It was a little late to avoid that.

Watching Steve putter around the kitchen working on breakfast, Tony decided not to make his husband deal with all that scrutiny. If Tony asked, Steve would go, even if he didn't want to be part of it and that was enough. He caught Steve's eye and the soldier smiled, "Good morning, Tony, Pepper. Do you want some breakfast?"

"Just a protein shake, thanks babe," Tony replied.

When Steve raised his brows at Pepper, she waved her hand, "I'm fine, thank you. I ate before I came over."

Once Steve was occupied, Tony lowered his voice to speak with Pepper, "Look, I don't think he's going to want to be in the spotlight like that. They'll just have to be satisfied with me."

"Tony, he really needs to be there."

"No, he really doesn't and you know it. The one they want to hear from is me, since it's my company. Stop forcing this. I'll play up the position Stark Industries already has on offering gay partnerships health benefits and tell everyone I'm a happily married man. They'll throw out a few questions, I'll smile for pictures, and Steve can come to an event later so people don't think I'm keeping him locked up in a basement."

Though she didn't look happy about it, Pepper didn't pursue the suggestion, "Is he at least going to be there, even if he doesn't sit for questions? It would be good if people could see him with you."

Shaking his head, Tony continued toward the kitchen, "No, I don't want Annika exposed to the press yet. He'll stay home with her."

"But-"

"Why are you making this such an issue?" Tony snapped.

He was done with the topic and he didn't understand why Pepper was jabbing at him about it. The press was predictable. If Steve was there, they'd get stirred into a frenzy, prying into their personal lives more than either of them would feel comfortable with. If Tony went alone, it would be about his stance on equal rights and a handful of questions about his husband. Steve would eventually end up swimming with the sharks, but Tony could protect him for a little while. Not that he needed protection. Tony actually felt bad for the sharks.

Pepper stayed quiet as they entered the kitchen. Steve was bent over the blender, cussing in his own way as he struggled with it, and Annika was unsuccessfully trying to hide a mischievous grin behind her hand.

"Tony, are you sure you fixed this darn thing? I can't get it to come on," Steve groused as he fiddled with the buttons.

Tony swore Annika's smile got wider. As he scrutinized her, the expression morphed into an innocent look Tony didn't believe for a moment. He reached to help Steve with the blender and it roared to life when his fingers made contact with the base. The giggle that came from the far side of the island confirmed Tony's suspicions.

"You're being sabotaged. I don't think the blender is the problem," Tony told him and left a kiss on the soldier's high cheekbone. After draining the rest of his coffee, Tony pointed an accusing finger at Annika, "Be nice, you know your papa is technologically challenged."

"But… how could she have done anything when she's across the room?" Steve asked as he turned off the blender and poured the viscous shake into a glass.

Tony exchanged coffee for protein shake, barely acknowledging Pepper as she tapped at her watch, "Remote control, I'd bet."

Annika ducked her head, pushing her cereal around with her spoon. There was always something going on with one of the appliances, but only when Steve was the one operating them. Tony was still on the fence as to whether it was user error on Steve's part, or if Annika really had found a way to remote operate them. When the toaster started spitting toast like it was launching rockets, Tony took it apart to solve the problem, but didn't find any unusual devices inside. In fact, it looked as if it was in perfect condition.

At least the blender wasn't making a mess. He didn't have time to figure it out today. With Pepper threatening him with her eyes, Tony chugged the chocolate-flavored shake and put the cup in the sink.

Steve leaned against the counter, his long, muscular body flexing and becoming a major distraction for Tony, "Are you headed out?"

"Yeah, I have to do a press conference about our marriage, win back the liberal vote, yada, yada."

"Tony, it's more serious than that," Pepper griped.

Tony rolled his eyes and continued to soak up his husband's perfect form, "I'm not a politician, Pepper. I shouldn't have to explain everything I do." Stepping close enough to feel Steve's body heat, Tony gave him a lingering kiss on the mouth and said, "I'll be back in plenty of time to go with you to SHIELD."

"Ew," Annika complained at the kiss.

Steve's eyes grew serious and he caught Tony's waist before he could move away, "Should I be going to this thing? I mean, if it's about our marriage-"

"Only if you want to. They'll be perfectly content to ask me a million questions if you don't show."

Considering Tony's offer of anonymity, Steve let his gaze wander to Annika then back to Tony, "If it's all the same..."

"It's fine. I'll be back in a flash," Tony pat his chest and went over to ruffle Annika's hair, "Be good."

With Pepper breathing down his neck, Tony was dressed in a grey suit, perfectly groomed, and out the door in twenty minutes. Happy waited by the car, the MARK V strapped to his wrist like always. Tony and Pepper piled into the back seat and she finally noticed that he'd managed to get out of the house in sneakers instead of dress shoes. Her groan made Tony laugh.

As they drove through the city, Tony spotted the same clinic going in on several different blocks. None of them were open yet since they were still under construction, but beneath the logo, it proudly proclaimed being 'New York's Answer to Medicine'. After Tony had seen three different locations, he finally asked, "What do you know about these medical facilities? They're building so many of them."

Pepper barely glanced up from her PDA, "They're free clinics sponsored by an independent cooperation. Some sort of statement, I'm sure."

They passed one more before they got to the venue Pepper had chosen for the interview. It was a lot like the pressroom he had back at Stark Industries in California, with large windows and skylights. Tony could see the podium from the street, though there were almost two hundred people clustered inside. The spidery shapes of camera tripods marched along the back wall, their operators milling aimlessly while they waited.

Happy took them around the side of the hotel where the conference room was housed, and parked in an underground garage. A collection of hotel staff waited to guide them upstairs. Assuming the lead, Tony considered what he was going to say as he walked. It was a habit to troubleshoot potential questions before anyone ever asked. When they stepped out on the main floor, Tony had considered the most obvious questions and even a few of the uncomfortable ones.

Just to the left of the podium, Pepper adjusted his tie while someone announced him. Behind the rows of reporters, the cameras stood sentinel, the red lights glowing like eyes. No matter how many of these things Tony did, he always had a knot of apprehension low in his stomach. He hid it well since public speaking was second nature to him, but when it had something to do with his family, it wasn't the same. Announcing a business decision was easy. Exposing a hidden part of his life was more difficult.

His phone buzzed in his pocket.

"Ignore it, you'll be on a second," Pepper told him and smoothed the tie with her palm.

Tony fished it out anyway. Pepper's face was on the screen with her name above the photo. With a grin, Tony showed her, "You're pocket calling me."

"Oh shoot," she slung her tiny, kidney-shaped purse off her arm and dug through it. "Just go, I'll get it."

As he flicked the button to end the call, the man doing the introductions stepped away from the podium and Tony walked towards it. The phone was halfway into his pocket when it buzzed again, this time a text message. Tony was going to ignore it, but something made him look down. The message was from Pepper.

'I'm in Florida. Who is that?'

Tony stared at the message, not sure what to make of it. Somewhere to his right, the announcer asked if he was all right, his voice absurdly loud in the hushed silence of the room. While he was looking at the short line of text, another message came in.

'That's not me. Get out. Now.'

The crowd of reporters seemed to lean in at his distress, each and every one dying to know what kind of text could put Tony into such a state of confusion. Rotating his upper body, Tony glanced back at Pepper. She mouthed 'what?' at him and motioned at the podium with both hands. Uncertainty flickered through him. He took another step and the phone vibrated in his palm.

'5 is not the only digit in your social security. She's a fake.'

When Tony met the woman's eyes again, the familiar blue-grey irises melted to yellow and Pepper's persona faded. A dark, emotionless mask slipped over the imposter, a look Tony had never seen the real Pepper wear.

She strode towards the podium, her heels clacking on the marble floor. As she approached, her skin grew thousands of blue frills that layered over her clothes and flesh. They moved in a rhythmic wave that started at her breastbone and traveled down her extremities. Behind the wave was bare flesh, deep blue and ridged like snakeskin across her arms and legs.

Tony recognized the mutant from her file even before she'd finished her metamorphosis. Raven Darkholme, codename Mystique. Pandemonium erupted from the crowd. They pressed forward instead of away, shouting questions as if one of the most dangerous mutants alive hadn't walked into the room wearing his secretary's skin. The cameras kept rolling, the live feed going to every news station across the US. A few bolted for the door, but Tony only counted three.

As Mystique made the three steps that led up to the podium, Tony put distance between them. He didn't have the chance to get into her file, so he wasn't going to let her get too close without knowing what she was capable of. The thought that she was standing in his kitchen, chatting with his family, put a burning coal in his stomach.

"Do you have any idea how insufferable you are?" Mystique bit out over the roar of the reporters. "For five months, I've fetched your dry cleaning and brought you coffee when I should've been throttling you in your sleep."

Tony went numb. Five months ago was when he'd made amends with Pepper. It was when they'd first reestablished a friendship after the break up. The real Pepper was in Florida, for what that was worth, probably still trying to forget the name Tony Stark and all that went along with it. She cared enough to warn him. That was something.

"Mr. Stark!"

Tony separated Happy's voice from the din, following it to the wall beside the podium. His driver held up the briefcase suit, already unlatched from his wrist, the front open and waiting for the access code. Sensing Mystique's movement, Tony dropped under her flying roundhouse kick. Inhumanly fast, the mutant fell from the kick to a leg sweep that knocked his feet out from under him. Tony landed on his shoulders, using the momentum to roll away from Mystique and off the podium.

Hitting the ground at a run, Tony snatched the briefcase out of Happy's hands and crouched to set it down. "See if you can't get some of these idiots to leave," Tony ordered, motioning at the crowd of reporters snapping photos. "And then get out of here."

Happy ran into the media, shouting and pushing people towards the door. It wasn't terribly effective. Most of them completely ignored him, too hungry for the next big story to fear for their lives.

Mystique didn't seem to be in a hurry. She smiled as he typed the code into the MARK and grabbed the handles. Hesitating, Tony wondered if he was missing something. No enemy was ever pleased when he got armed. As she leapt nimbly off the platform and approached, Tony pulled the armor to his chest.

It hummed as it booted up, clicking down around his shoulders and back. Tony held his arms out to the side to let the metal close over them and lifted his head for the helm to bang shut. The HUD flared to life, a crosshair appearing over Mystique as Jarvis bid him good morning. When he felt the last of the suit fall into place, calm slid over Tony's alarm. The suit could handle anything a shape changer could throw at him.

Mystique stopped a few feet from him, her vivid yellow eyes roaming over the MARK. She smirked and said, "Impressive. Does it come with a can opener?"

Tony rolled his eyes at her flippancy, raising his palm so she could see the repulsor glowing, "I think you're in too far over your head to be making jokes. What does your boss want with Raisa?"

"Why don't you ask him?"

The room-length skylights above them exploded as the metal support beams suddenly ripped down the middle. The screech of metal overwhelmed even the terrified screams of the reporters. Tony gaped while metal piping as big around as his arm curled up like leaves that had caught fire.

Shaking his disbelief, he turned his microphone on its highest setting and shouted at the stubborn news people, "Get out of here! Go!" His voice boomed across the conference area, sending them in a panicked herd to the door.

A plume of red smoke burst in front of the exit, a man with ink-black hair and bright crimson skin standing in the midst of the dissipating cloud. His appearance brought new screams from the reporters and sent them back the other way. Some broke away from the group and bolted for the windows, but a young man with a curdling sneer and a woman with white-blue energy crackling at her fingertips barred the way.

Tony knew them all from the files. Azazel, Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver. The only one that was missing was Magneto. The suit automatically switched into battle mode, his HUD going from white to red as the targets increased.

"Everybody get down!" Tony shouted, pleased that the press actually listened for once.

When his sights were clear, Tony shot a pair of repulsor blasts at the two by the window, spinning to launch another at the demonic creature by the door. Nothing hit. Scarlet Witch lifted her hands and the pulses rebounded off a protective shield of blue energy. Azazel phased out just before the strike and the blast hit the wall behind him. Bits of drywall showered the video equipment.

He couldn't use anything bigger with all the civilians in the room, especially since it was likely to meet with the same result. In order to get a solid hit, he was going to need to catch them off guard.

"I think you might be in over your head," Mystique said beside him.

Tony jerked back to avoid her strike, lifting his hand. The high-pitched whine of the repulsor heating only made her smug. As the bolt left his palm, something grabbed his wrist and forced it over his head. The blast disappeared through a broken windowpane, nearly impossible to see once it got into the open air.

Tony didn't understand what had him. There were no proximity warnings, no body anywhere close to him aside from Mystique. He jerked at the hold, his suit cranking and whining from the effort. It lifted him off the ground as if the MARK weighed nothing, his feet left kicking the empty air.

"I don't think so," Tony growled, putting all of his thrusters on full. He wasn't going anywhere.

Below him, a few hundred frightened faces waited for him to get the fight under control. Some were already losing their hope, their eyes dropping to the floor or skittering over the Brotherhood as if they were looking for a way out. All turned to the broken skylight as a shadow crossed over the sun. Tony lifted his head, the helm adjusting to the UV with a filter so he could see what was coming.

Without any kind of equipment, Magneto floated down into the conference room, a black cape billowing from his shoulders. The man's head and face was mostly covered by a smooth helmet, only his eyes and mouth visible through the narrow opening. Those eyes stuck on Tony, a smirk curving the corner of his mouth as he landed at the podium.

At the twitch of his hand, the invisible hold on the armor tightened and dragged Tony closer to the stage. Cursing, Tony tried everything he could think of to break free. He sent the control surfaces flaring and used the auxiliary boosters at his back and calves. The air around him shimmered with heat.

"Be still," Magneto told him, expanding his fingers. At the slight movement of his hand, the armor straightened forcefully and Tony cried out as his tense body straightened with it. One by one, something crunched inside the boosters and they flickered and died. When the only sound was Tony panting inside the helmet, Magneto nodded, "That's better. I suppose it's true you never leave home without that magnificent piece of machinery. Pity you'll have to die in it."

Bewildered, Tony asked, "What are you?"

As Mystique and Azazel got the cameras in the back repositioned, Magneto put both hands on the podium, speaking into the microphones that would take his voice to every state in the nation, "We are the next step in human development. We are the evolutionary leap that will wipe homo sapiens off the map." The mutant glanced over at Tony with his next sentence, the words sending a chill down Tony's spine, "And there are more of us than you know."

Magneto lifted his hands into the air, speaking into the cameras that were still rolling, transmitting feed live to dozens of news stations, "Bothers! Sisters! It is time to shake off the shackles of the homo sapien! We are the answer! We are the cure! Even as we speak, men in Washington are trying to pass a decree stating that all mutants must be recorded and catalogued like cattle, so that we might be hunted and destroyed. We will not submit to this."

One of the mutant's hands closed into a fist and Tony screamed as pain tore through him. The armor flexed far beyond his body's capacity, hyper extending his elbows and knees and pulling at his limbs until Tony felt as though he was being drawn and quartered. The metal groaned at the treatment, not designed to bend any way his body couldn't handle. Damage warnings flashed all over the HUD.

"Sir, the suit will not sustain this kind of pressure," Jarvis told him.

When black swarmed at the edge of Tony's vision, it suddenly stopped. With his helmet facing the ceiling, Tony couldn't see Magneto anymore, but his speech came through loud and clear, "These Avengers are their protectors. They are nothing in the light of a true mutant. Do not be afraid to stand with the Brotherhood. They have us outnumbered, but we are worth a thousand times what they are. To be free, you must fight. Trust me when I say, you will not stand alone."

Tony realized as Erik Lensherr spoke that he wasn't talking about mutants standing on equal ground with humans. He was talking about genocide. The genocide of the human race.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

TBC…

Holy crap, Batman! I know. Cliffhanger. I'm the devil. But I swear there will be more soon, so hold on tight and think of Tony and Steve having hot sex when this is all over. Because you know they will.

Chapter Four - LINK