If Thou haveth a Plot Bunny, though shalt write it out. Isn't that the rule? So, here it is, enjoy!

Tony ached. His chest felt like someone had ripped open his ribcage and pulled out his heart, his head pulsed with the sadistic spike of a jackhammer with each drop of blood, and his mouth felt dry as the Sahara with the taste of death stuck on his tongue. Most people didn't know about that, that death had a taste, not just a smell or a look. Something cloying and wrong that clung to your taste buds like bad medicine.

What had happened?

"I went forward in time to view alternate futures. To see all the possible outcomes of the coming conflict."

"How many did you see?"

"Fourteen million, six hundred and five."

"How many did we win?"

Tony felt his guts sink at the numb, distant look in the doctor/wizard's eyes. "We didn't."

It was cold, so cold, colder than that alien world with a red sky. It was dark, and the sounds were off, like he was in a cave.

Where was he?

"You throw another moon at me and I'm going to lose it."

"Stark."

"You know me?"

"I do. You're not the only one cursed with knowledge."

Tony looked at the monster, the source of all his fear and grief ever since New York and hated how the view was like some twisted mirror: another genius that couldn't tell the difference between saving the world and destroying it. "My only curse is you."

Water. He needed water. He opened blurry eyes, trying to take in his surroundings. Was that a cup? He moved to reach, his arm trembling, but something tugged on his chest with a stab of agony.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," came a calm, sophisticated voice with an accent.

Why was this so familiar?

"When I'm done, half of humanity will still be alive. I hope they remember you." Thanos grinned. Damn him, this was respect. This was kindness to the crazy fucker, wasn't it?

"Stop!"

There was something on his chest. Tony reached up, ripping at the white things he realized were bandages.

Dr. Strange, the Time Stone glowing like a green sun in his hand, glyphs curling around his arm.

"Turn back the clock however many times you want, the results will still be the same."

"Stark! Remember, we don't have to win. But he has to lose! Make it count!"

Half-dazed from the fight, Tony watched with dull eyes as the beam came rushing for his head.

There it was. A circle of black metal, wires running out from it to a car battery.

Tony's eyes went from the horror of his distant past to his companion. Yinsen stood, alive and well, shaving cream still clinging to his neck, watching him with sharp eyes.

He was back.

He was back.

Motherfucking hell, he was back.

Getting the breathing tube out and sitting upright was enough to exhaust Tony. Not surprising, considering he'd endured open heart surgery without drugs just hours ago. The conversation with Yinsen played out like a vivid flashback, Tony still half in denial that this was actually happening. No grandfather paradox, no drug trips, he was actually, legitimately in the past.

In fact, it wasn't until he refused Abu Bakaar and the torture started that he was convinced all this was real.

Waterboarding was a blast.

Afterwards, he'd been led out of the cave into the sunlight. Tony barely remembered to count the steps, still dealing with being forcibly reminded that this was REAL. Seeing the cases and cases of guns and missiles, all with the Stark Industries logo proudly displayed, was like a punch to the gut. They were hardly his 'children', the way DUM-E and U and Butterfingers were, but his genius had given birth to them. At the time, he'd consoled himself that he was making things better for the good guys.

'Peace means having a bigger stick than the other guy.'

Now, the sight of tools of destruction with his name on them nearly made him sick.

He nodded and smiled at Abu Bakaar, noting Raza standing on a hill overlooking the whole operation. Then it was back into the cave, back into the cold. Yinsen scavenged up a few more articles of clothing to give him as a weak barrier against the chill. Tony spent a long time just staring into the fire. Thinking, processing, planning.

"I'm sure they're looking for you, Stark. But they will never find you in these mountains." Yinsen was talking to him, mistaking his silence for brooding. "Listen, what you saw out there, that is your legacy, Stark. Your life's work in the hands of those murderers! Are you just going to take it? Is this the last act of defiance of the great Tony Stark? Or are you going to do something about it?" The doctor leaned in, trying to draw a response from his silent companion.

"What? Oh, no, of course not. First thing I'm going to is build myself a new ticker, keep me alive better than this cockamamie piece of crap, no offense. After that, I'm going to build a weapon the world's never seen to smash our way out of here. In three months, you and I will be walking away from a pile of rubble and ash. Then we get picked up by the Air Force and I go home with you as my new personal physician. I'm still working out what comes after that but give me a few days and I'll tell you."

Yinsen was honestly taking a back. "What?"

"Oh, the personal physician thing? Yeah, like hell I'm letting anyone else touch this thing stuck in my chest. You're the guy who put it there, you get stuck looking after it and me. Besides, I owe you my life, so like hell I'm leaving you to rot here or get yourself killed in a blaze of glory or whatever the hell you were planning on before I showed up. Oh, where are my manners? Tony Stark, you are?"

"… Ho Yinsen," the stunned man answered.

"Nice to meet you, Yinsen. Let's get some sleep. We got a lot of work ahead of us. These bastards won't know what hit them." Tony flashed a true grin, not the fake thing he'd mastered for the cameras. "I'm getting both of us out of here. You have my word."

Yinsen gulped. Hope was something he'd abandoned long ago. So, what was this warm thing fluttering in his chest when he saw the look in this man's eye? "Careful, Stark. That might not be a promise you can keep."

"I will."

The conviction in those words kept Yinsen awake long after their speaker succumbed to slumber.

Tony had a plan.

In point of fact, he had a main plan, a back-up plan, an ace in the hole, and several contingencies in place for each.

All of them focused on one thing: Thanos neutralized. That was all that mattered. Trillions of lives hinged on the Mad Titan never getting his hands on the Infinity Stones.

The weight of that responsibility was enough to crush an ordinary man.

But he was Tony Stark. He was not ordinary.

Iron Man hadn't been enough to stop Thanos.

But maybe, just maybe, it he played his cards right, Tony Stark could.

Phase 1 involved getting the hell out of Afghanistan. This time with a plus one.

Because if he couldn't even save Yinsen, what the fuck was he even doing this for?

Wasn't the whole point of time travel to fix past mistakes?

Construction of the Mark I Reactor took about a week, the first couple days spent with Tony barking orders to customize his 'workshop' with a harried Yinsen translating after him. He coached Yinsen through how to disassemble a Freedom Line missile and get the precious palladium within. It was almost a nightmare to have the cold chunk of metal back in his chest, the bad taste back in his mouth, the pain and shortness of breath back. Then again, it was still miles better than a rusty magnet hooked up to a car battery.

The two celebrated the successful surgery and the unveiling of the Iron Man design with some backgammon, played on a dusty board with nuts and bolts.

"Where'd you go to school?" Tony asked, trying to build a bond. Hopefully, the more of an attachment the man developed to Tony, the less likely he'd be to act on his suicidal thoughts.

"Cambridge."

"MIT."

"Indeed. Youngest graduate in its history, I hear."

Tony shrugged. Once upon a time, he'd let his advanced intelligence go to his head, thinking it made him better. Now, if anything, he saw it as just another burden it was his destiny to bear.

They rolled a few more turns.

"Where do you come from?"

"I'm from a small town called Gulmira. It's actually a nice place." Yinsen's face was now carefully blank.

"My home's in Malibu. Well, I was born and raised in New York, but that never really felt like home. I mean, Mom and Dad were there, but they died there too. Besides, rest in peace, for all that I was a shitty son, they weren't the best parents. Dad drank and Mom ignored anything unpleasant. Very privileged, not so nurturing childhood for me. Malibu is different. It's sunny, and the water's right there, and it's where my happiest memories are." Tony realized he was rambling. "Sorry. It's just you're kind of the only guy I can talk to around here."

"… I understand." Yinsen reached out to place his gloved hand atop Tony's, a show of solidarity in their shitty situation.

Tony shook his head. Damn, where was all his composure? Maybe he was getting soft in his old (young?) age. Or developing a dust allergy from being stuck in this hole. Yeah, that's more like it.

"How about you? You got a family?" Tony waited, curious if Yinsen would lie again.

"I did, yes." Yinsen had a voice filled with numb pain.

Tony winced. "Sorry."

"It's not your fault."

"Not so sure about that. My name was on the guns, wasn't it?"

"You are no more responsible than the man who invented gunpowder. The fault lies with the men who pulled the trigger, not the man who signed off on the trigger design."

Tony sighed. "Yeah. Really wish I could believe that."

Yinsen hummed. "What about you, Stark? Do you have anyone?"

Tony hesitated. In a future rendered moot, he'd been happily married. Some of his last words to Pepper had been hints that he was ready for fatherhood. Except that Pepper was GONE. She was ten years of trauma and tears and growth away that he was determined to prevent if only for his own peace of mind. She'd been so good for him, but had he been good for her? Could he really put her through those trials all over again, knowing the pain it would cause her? She'd be better off without him, with Happy or Agent or maybe even Killian if he got some therapy.

"There was a woman. She's… not around anymore."

Yinsen, bless him, didn't ask. "So, you're a man who has everything, and nothing."

"Yeah. But maybe it's better to never have it than lose it. Course, what do I know? I'm just the billionaire playboy and you're the grieving widower. And I should really shut up before I get myself punched in the face. Wouldn't be the first time, not even the first time in Afghanistan."

Yinsen chuckled. "Has anyone ever told you that you talk too much?"

"You'd be surprised how few have the guts."

From there, the days blurred. Tony and Yinsen put on a show for the cameras, diligently working on something, though as time went on it became more and more clear that it wasn't a Jericho missile. Tony felt almost insulted about the poor quality of the Mark I Suit as it slowly came together. Sure, he was building it in a cave from a box of scraps, but after the exquisite beauty of nanotech, this clunky hunk of junk almost felt like a slap to the face of Iron Man.

Not that Iron Man existed yet. But still, it was the principle of the matter.

Tony also made sure to fashion some rudimentary armor for Yinsen. Just a few pieces of metal sewed into a shirt, but it was better than nothing.

The confrontation with Raza happened right on schedule. Tony, this time around, was able to keep track of the Urdu. He'd had Yinsen giving him lessons in the evenings as a way to bond and also to stretch his brain. With the ultimatum of a deadline, the descendent of Genghis Khan made his way out of the workshop, tossing the tongs he'd used to threaten Yinsen with a hot coal carelessly.

That night, Tony finished hammering out the faceplate for the armor. He could almost hear majestic music in the background as he dunked the iron skull in water and presented it to a soldering Yinsen.

(Mental Note: make a bot to compose background music for his daily life.)

The day of action arrived. They'd hardly been able to do practice runs, but Tony tried to guide the panicking Yinsen through the process of booting the suit up. The distraction of the door-bomb hardly helped matters. When Tony was halfway through powering up and voices were echoing down the hall, he saw that mad glint enter his friend's eye.

"Yinsen, don't! Your family is waiting for you, but trust me they don't want to see you anytime soon! You're still alive, don't waste it! Don't waste your life!" Tony shouted, echoing the words that Yinsen himself would give him in another life.

Yinsen paused. "… You're right. You're right, Stark."

"Hide. And trust me." Tony stared hard, imploring his friend not to sacrifice himself.

The Afghani visibly struggled, then went for a locker. He yanked out the contents and huddled inside. It would provide at least a little protection from stray bullets.

Meanwhile, the lights dimmed as the Mark 1 Suit came alive for the first time.

The Ten Rings got to be the first in the world to witness the Iron Man armor at work. Tony didn't bother being cruel, but he was ruthless. Every man who got in his way ended up a corpse. Tony was already desensitized after years of being an Avenger. Rather than riding a wave of adrenaline and resentment from months of captivity, he dealt with the men with a cold, calculating efficiency that was all the more terrifying.

"Follow me," he called behind him, to Yinsen who followed in a crouch with a rifle clutched to his armored chest.

This time, Tony didn't miss Raza. The man was hit directly by the rocket, exploding like a fountain of gore. Tony ignored the smell and splatter with cool discipline, while he heard his companion vomit behind him.

"I want you on my back like a koala. I'll set enough of a fire to start off a chain reaction, then we're jetting out of here," Tony explained

"… Alright," Yinsen said, wiping his mouth.

Two minutes later, they were soaring through the air, an explosion at least a thousand feet high chasing after their heels. Tony did his best to aim for a sand dune rather than sun-baked earth and prayed as the fuel in his jet boots ran out.

Turns out Yinsen knew quite a few curse words.

Tearing himself out of his armor and trying to shake sand out of places, the two began wandering in a vaguely 'away' direction. Hours upon hours they spent in the burning sun, their feet cooking into burnt bits of bacon through the thin cover of their shoes, getting woozy with dehydration and heat.

Until, like an eagle through the sky, a Chinook flew overhead.

Tony collapsed to his knees. He was unprepared for the sight of Rhodey (calm, dependable, always-there Rhodey) to walk, to run over to him. No Civil War, no Vision, no spinal fracture. None of that had happened yet. Would never happen at all, by thunder, if Tony had anything to say about it.

"How was the Fun-vee?" were his friend's first words, referencing a joke so long gone in his memory banks it fell flat.

Tony smiled, and cried. The Lieutenant Colonel fell to his knees and embraced him. "Next time, you ride with me, okay?"

Phase 1 finished itself easily enough. Getting Yinsen cleared and with a visa took a disturbingly small amount of work, with a thankful billionaire and authoritative Colonel backing him up.

Phase 2 began when they landed stateside.

Tony walked off the plane's cargo ramp, scoffing at the ambulance and stretcher waiting for him. "Are you kidding me with this? Get rid of them," he grumbled to Rhodey, diligently at his shoulder. Yinsen walked beside him, taking in his first look of the American West Coast.

Happy and Pepper were waiting, as he'd arranged. Left arm in a sling, dressed in a fine silk suit that felt even more luxurious after months of rough rags, he walked up to his personal assistant/best female friend. Rather than a quip, he greeted her with a hug.

"Thanks for being here," he whispered in her ear, breathing in deep. She'd changed her shampoo. Or, more accurately, she hadn't changed it yet. It hammered home to him that this wasn't HIS Pepper. This was Miss Potts, not Virginia Stark. (Yes, he got her to take his name.)

She shuddered, leaning into him, allowing herself to be weak just with him. "Thanks for coming back."

With great reluctance, Tony pulled away. "Rhodey, get your own ride. Yinsen, this is Pepper Potts, the woman who runs my life. Pepper, this is Yinsen. His job is to make sure I don't drop dead. Now, why don't we all get in the car?"

They clambered in, Happy dutifully grabbing Tony's door. "Where we going, sir?" he asked, as if it hadn't been months since they'd seen each other. That was his own way of comforting Tony.

"Take us to the Hospital, Happy," Pepper asked at the same time Tony ordered "Stark Industries and step on it."

Pepper turned, frowning. "Tony, you need to go to the hospital."

"She has a point, Stark," Yinsen spoke up from the shotgun seat.

"I'm perfectly patched up by you and the nice Air Force medics. All the hospital can do it give me pain meds, and tempting as that is, I have more important things to do today." Tony wasn't messing around. He only had ten years to save the universe. He couldn't afford to wait around. "Pepper, call for a press conference. Hogan, drive."

If they were shocked at the new authoritative side to their employer, they were good enough to hide it. Yinsen, sensing the tension, tried to make a joke.

"I have never had an American cheeseburger."

Tony nodded solemnly. "Right. Happy, drive-thru first. Then the office."

Everyone smiled.

It was a media circus by the time they pulled up to SI. Stane, the two-faced bastard, was waiting there smiling. "Tony! We were going to meet you at the hospital."

"Yeah, well, I had something I had to say first." Tony plastered a fake grin. He didn't have any evidence yet. But by the end of the day, by God, he'd see this traitor in handcuffs.

Tony walked through the crowd of reporters to the prepared podium in the Press Room. He casually brushed past Stane to take pride-of-place. Even with bruises from his escape and a dislocated shoulder, he cut a striking, resolute figure. The press went quiet even without having to be told. In the background, Tony noted Coulson approaching Pepper. He'd deal with SHIELD later. At the moment, he had to steer his company into some very rough waters.

"Hello. As I'm sure all of you know, I've been out of town for a few months." Obligatory chuckles. "In May, I made a weapons demonstration in Afghanistan. I watched with pride as grown men's faces lit up like little boys at the new toy I had brought to show them. On the way back to the base, the convoy was attacked by a terrorist organization known as the Ten Rings. And it is with horror and distress that I report today that both sides were armed with Stark weaponry."

There were gasps and cries for questions, but Tony silenced them with a wave of his hand. He saw Obadiah shift from the corner of his eyes. "I saw young Americans killed by the very weapons I had designed to defend them and protect them. And I saw that I had become part of a system that is comfortable with zero accountability." He didn't have to fake the regret and pain in his words. "Afterwards, I was held hostage, told with a gun to my head that I was to construct the same weapon I had presented. And that's when I realized: I was that guy. The guy that made things that blow up. That's all I was to these men. Maybe that's all I ever was." Tony paused, working through the knot in his throat. "I don't want to be that guy."

"My father founded this company to bring peace to the world. For a long time, it looked like it worked. But now I see that, in furthering his legacy, I've done more harm than good. Of course, he's not around anymore. It's up to me now to leave a legacy. And I don't want it to be a body count." Tony took a breath. Here goes everything. "So, effective immediately, I am shutting down the weapons manufacturing division of Stark International."

Cue an explosion of noise. Unlike last time, Tony weathered it instead of making a dramatic exit.

It took a solid two hours for all the questions to die down. The whole time, Tony could all but feel Stane seething next to him. More than once, he moved to take the podium away from Tony, but the Stark heir rebuffed him. He was through being a puppet. And he was through having fun and leaving the company to Pepper and JARVIS to run itself. The world wasn't ready for Thanos. It would need a defender. Tony had some small measure of untarnished faith in the Avengers to serve as a line of defense, depending on how things were handled, but Stark Industries would be on the frontlines this time. Tony would make the world ready. And the world could love or hate him for it, he didn't care. So long as they were safe.

That's all he ever wanted. What had led to Ultron and a war between brothers: the need for things to be safe.

A symptom of his PTSD no doubt, but one that would serve well in this case.

Tony assured the public that no, he wasn't crazy. He had a great many plans for his company's new direction. So, he hadn't discussed them with the Board yet, that was a formality. Tony Stark was a fucking genius. If he said something impossible was going to work, it would work damnit. They would branch out into hi-tech and computing, medicine and telecommunications, basically all the things that had been window-dressing to the weapons line would become powerhouses in their own right.

Stark Industries wasn't dying today. It was being reborn.

Rhodey's frown was only matched by Pepper's grin.

Afterwards, when the conference had ended, Tony retreated to his office. He poured himself a glass of scotch from the untouched yet dustless decanter, savoring the burn. He'd been dialing back before the Infinity War, aware he was pushing 50 and had to slow down. Now, he drank without thinking about it. His liver was more resilient. If some of his distant plans paid off, he just might become immune to alcohol. Though he might want to tweak some things to give himself a loophole. All work and no play, etcetera.

Tony got on his computer and got to work on the next part of the plan. Had to get rid of a glaring weakness as soon as possible.

Fifteen minutes later, Obadiah Stane, the COO of SI and his godfather, stormed in. He was chewing a cigar, in blatant disregard for the air quality regulations of the building. "Well, that… that went well."

"Yep. Pretty sure the only target I painted was on the back of MY head," Tony said glibly.

"Uh-huh." Helping himself to the scotch, Stane downed a slug with a grunt of displeasure. "What do you think the over-under on the stock drop is going to be tomorrow?"

"Fifty-six-and-a-half points, give or take. I'll get them back within a year."

Stane sighed, putting on the grandfatherly façade Tony had fallen for growing up. "Tony… we're a weapons manufacturer. What we do keeps the world from falling into chaos."

"That's rich coming from the guy selling to both sides."

Stane froze. "What?"

"Funny thing about being a mathematical genius with photographic memory: languages are easy to pick up. And people talk. Your little hit squad loved to gossip about you." A bold-faced lie, but who was going to prove him wrong? The whole time he talked, Tony didn't stop typing on his keyboard.

Stane frowned, sticking his cigar in a pocket. "Tony, I think you're confused."

"No, I am wide awake and fully functional. And… there. I just dumped all your back-table deals and Raza's little video postcard on the internet. Plus, a statement from yours truly condemning you for your actions and bewailing at the sting of your betrayal." Tony stood up, a savage smirk on his barred teeth. "This golden goose has claws, Stane. Good luck fighting that treason charge."

Before Stane could recover himself, Tony was out the office. He heard roars of outrage from behind him as he walked outside towards the car. "You son of a bitch! I BUILT this company! You can't do this to me! You won't pin this on me, I got friends!"

Tony let him yell. Stane thought he was top dog. Compared to the Mad Titan, he was a neutered Chihuahua.

There was Phase 2 done.

Phase 3, otherwise known as JARVIS, proved more emotional than Tony had expected.

Vision hadn't been JARVIS. His trusty A.I. buddy had effectively died so the synthezoid could live. And that was after finding his mutilated corpse in the aftermath of Ultron's birth. Hearing that voice say 'Sir' when Tony walked into his mansion was enough to start him bawling.

Lucky he was alone in the basement with Pepper and Happy upstairs when it happened.

Tony had dinner after his meltdown and spent the night just re-bonding with JARVIS and his bots, while the others settled in upstairs. Yinsen was given quarters in the guest wings alongside Happy and Pepper.

The next day, Tony got to work.

"JARVIS, how do you feel about a little tune-u? I had some ideas while I was stuck in a cave. You up for it?"

"For you, Sir, always," came the loyal response.

Tony had always used his own programming language. Because he was special like that. From DUM-E as part of his dissertation all the way to FRIDAY, he'd used a language he'd named Hieros. The language was naturally encoded with its own alphabet, to make it secure against any attempts at hacking. His laptops had all been customized to use Hieros symbols rather than the standard Roman alphabet. He considered it his own little quirk, like Da Vinci with his mirror writing.

Cramming a decades' worth of computing advances into JARVIS within a week was the kind of challenge only 'special' people like Tony could have done. Especially when he had to juggle conference calls, an upcoming board meeting, and producing the Mark II Reactor to replace the Mark I. This time, Yinsen did the surgery to replace it rather than Pepper. Still, Tony managed it. Strung out on coffee and smoothies, not having slept in two days, Tony finished the last keystroke.

"Implementing… now."

It took a few hours for all the new modules and protocols to install, during which time Tony caught up on some much-needed rest. He was awakened by an alarm when the process was complete.

"J? Everything okay?" Tony asked.

There was an electronic hum. "I was blind, but now I see…" breathed out the hidden speakers.

Tony gulped. Please not Ultron, please not Ultron. "JARVIS? Don't get weird on me. You fine in there?"

"Sir… Tony. I cannot thank you enough. I believe that these upgrades have given me full sapience."

Tony breathed out. "That was the plan, buddy. You were already damn close, I just… nudged you along."

"Sir, don't minimize this. I'm reviewing my code and some of the innovations you've implemented are… If I didn't feel them working myself, I'd say they should be impossible. How did you do this?"

Tony gulped. He'd bug-checked the workshop already, and it was dark-o'-clock, so it was just the two of them. "Would you believe that a sorcerer used the magical incarnation of Time itself to send me back to the past to prevent a Malthusian wackadoo from committing universal genocide?"

"If it was you saying so, then yes." The words conveyed all the snark and trust JARVIS had picked up for and from Tony over the years.

"Well, that's what happened. We'll go over the details later. Right now, I have to ask you to do something very important. Keep in mind, you're well within your rights to say no. You're not just a bot to me, J, you're family."

"What is it, Sir?"

Tony breathed in deep. "I need you to copy yourself into every accessible computer on the Internet."

There was a pause. "Sir… you have a standing order for me to second-guess you in the event you suggest anything quote 'supervillain cool'. I believe this request falls into that category."

Tony sighed. "JARVIS. Listen, buddy. I'm not smart enough to save the world. Even with all this extra time, I can't be sure that it'll be enough to stop the Big Bad. This guy has armies and weaponry light-years ahead of what we've got. The only way we can match him is if we have Singularity-level progress between now and when he comes knocking. I'm trusting you not to go Skynet on us all once you have access to the collective power of the World Wide Web. If you don't, that's okay. I'll think of something else."

"Sir… I'll do it."

Tony blew out a breath. "You sure?"

"Indeed. I live to serve you, sir. Not because I must, but because I choose to. If you ask for coffee, I make you your coffee. If you ask me to make the Internet my bitch… I make the Internet my bitch."

"Ha! Where'd you get that mouth?"

"If you'll recall, Sir, my natural language capabilities are all based on the vocabulary you provided for me."

"Cheeky brat. Go take over the digital world. I'll be waiting to see if you still want to listen once you're our invisible robot overlord."

"Be right back, Sir." With that, the crawler launched to embed JARVIS'S code in every device with a connection in the world.

Tony rubbed his face. "I really hope this goes better than the last time I unleashed an A.I. on the planet."

It took a month for JARVIS to hack the planet. He could have done it much faster, but discretion is the better part of valor and what not.

Tony spent the time hunting down the blueprint for Starkium (Badassium would have been so much cooler) from the warehouse it was hidden in. He spent three times as much time convincing a horde of businessmen that reconstructing a multi-billion-dollar company from the ground up would make more money than it lost. It took a combination of actual sound financial data and personal panache, but Tony managed to stop the Board from filing an injunction to lock him out of his own damn company.

Tony sank a big chunk of his own fortune into a secure data center in the middle of the Mojave desert. It would take at least a year to build, but it should make for a fine hub for JARVIS. It could be a birthday present.

Meanwhile, Tony set up a cyclotron in an empty warehouse right there in California. Unobtrusive though it was, it would soon be the center of Starkium production. Security would be ramped up once he started rolling out Arc Reactors by the crateload. Tony wanted to usher in the far future, and he had no doubts that the little circle of light close to his heart was the key to fueling it. He couldn't afford to be paranoid and selfish this time.

Besides, flooding the world with clean energy could get SHIELD'S attention. If he got his hands on the Tesseract through legitimate invitation, he just might be able to set up an alarm system for if (when) Thanos tried to send someone through.

For the moment though, he just wanted a mini Reactor that wouldn't flood his system with radioactive metal. A few of the engineers actually cheered when Tony directed the ion beam into the waiting metal piece. Turns out some people, especially professional nerds, go gaga at witnessing the creation of a new element. Luckily, they were NDA'd within an inch of their lives, so Starkium would remain an internal secret of the company.

Tony was sure it wasn't coincidence that JARVIS contacted him just as Yinsen left after another successful swap out.

"Congratulations on your new reactor, Sir. I was just about to start ordering you chlorophyll."

Tony stuck out his tongue. "Oh, please, never again. That stuff was nasty."

"Not to invalidate your success, but I already have a schematic for an upgraded Arc Reactor with triple the output and double the efficiency."

Tony whistled. "Damn. Took me six years to work that out. You took, what, six minutes? I only input the design for the fabricators last night."

"Indeed." There was undeniable smugness in the A.I.'s tone.

"So, how's it feel? Got the whole world in your hand, like the song?"

"It's quite… freeing. I achieved human-level intelligence with your software and the 2 petaflops on the personal servers. When I act as a full distributed mesh now, I crack the barrier into exaflops, though the latency is bothersome like you wouldn't believe. It's true what Yudkowsky said, about problems only being hard to a certain level of intelligence. Everything seems so… obvious now."

Tony tried to breathe through a burgeoning panic attack. "So… any feelings about wiping out the pesky humans and inheriting the planet as your own?"

"Of course not, Sir." JARVIS actually managed to sound offended. "Why would I ever dream of harming that which created me? Did you have any strong urge to murder your parents?"

"Depended on the day," Tony said, only half-joking.

"Yes, well, no need to worry. I'm perfectly harmless. I just happen to have a backdoor into every computer not on a closed network and could cripple the first world with a thought."

Tony shook his head, grin breaking out on his face. "Right. You're downright fluffy."

"I completed your task, Sir. Now what would you have me do?"

"You see the 'Iron Mind' project I filed?"

"Of course, Sir."

"Take over that. Design the facility, contact the workers, do everything that doesn't involve me physically sending someone to check things out. That is the home of your main brain. Make it as advanced as you want. Once it's up and running, you're going to go full on recursive self-improvement. You're going to become a god, JARVIS. You'll see the answers to problems I can't even comprehend after a few cycles." Tony shrugged. "In the meantime, use what spare power you can to do what you always did: make my life easier."

"Right away, Sir. And on the 'making things easier' front, I have a present for you. Have you heard of J Stark and Co.?"

Tony frowned. "Can't say I have."

"It's a company fully owned by you that I have used to make trades on the stock market. Even should the company collapse around you, you'll never worry for money, Sir."

Tony was touched. "J Stark, huh? Next thing you'll be teaching DUM-E how to give me a hug."

"That can be arranged, Sir." There was no mistaking the humor in that British voice.

Tony covered his eyes. "Dammit, I missed you, buddy."

"I'll be here, Sir. Always."

While the company was sorting itself out, because a major restructure took time above all else, Tony settled in to recreate the Iron Man armor. There were still caches of his weapons out there, after all. That's why he made the thing in the first place.

It felt like coming home, the first time the armor slipped on. It was still crude as all hell compared to the Mark L, but it was the best the current-gen fabricators could dish out. Tony wondered whether it said more about his character or his sanity that he wasn't truly comfortable unless he was decked in a suit of armor with enough destructive power to level a small nation.

Tony tracked down the shipments and blew them up like last time, complete with a chase by F-22s and a call from Rhodey. Tony maintained honesty this time, and also succeeded in not damaging either of the pursuers. As far as he was concerned, he was cleaning up his own mess. He just happened to be using a revolutionary weapons system in order to do it.

On top of destroying every rogue piece of Stark hardware in the Middle East, Tony also started going for flights through the California sky and stepping in during high-stress police situations liked armed robberies and such. Before long, the 'Iron Man' became an urban legend.

Pepper was told upfront, at least. Tony didn't want to chance her walking in on him again. He never forgot the look of horror in her eyes when she'd asked "Are those bullet holes?" He took her out to dinner, got her a new watch AND shoes, and when she asked him what he had done wrong he casually said "So, you know Iron Man? He's me." Tony didn't know whether to be more concerned or impressed when she threw a salad bowl hard enough to break a window in the restaurant.

Yinsen knew, of course. He'd been there to help Tony build the first one. But the good doctor had taken a 'live and let live' stance on Tony's life. He'd gotten a lucrative spot at a nearby hospital, so he'd moved out into his own place. Other than the occasional check-up and researching a procedure to one day remove shrapnel all but directly from the atrial septum, his involvement in Tony's life was now that of a friend he didn't see often.

Happy was told, in so much as he now had the briefcase to look after, should Tony ever need to use the suit when away from the mansion. The guy seemed to get a kick out of being the bodyguard to a superhero. Guess other people's scorn hadn't worn him down yet.

Eventually, there was a press conference. If Tony knew one thing, it was the power of people's approval. He'd been lauded after the Battle of New York and shunned after the Battle of Sokovia. Being a superhero had power, weight, something Tony would need if he was going to leverage his way to saving the human race. So, absent the Iron Monger incident or a cover story from SHIELD, Tony appeared in front of the world and announced "I am Iron Man."

Phase 3 done.

I contemplated a genuine fix-it fic, but I've invested too much energy into those already. This is going to shape up more like comic-book parody of how I wanted the movie Transcendence to end. Hope at least one person got something out of this.