Daisy ran the numbers one more time, then turned to Obadiah. "Do you have any size requirements for the reactor? How small does it need to be before you're satisfied?"
She had to ask upfront. If Obadiah wanted something the size of a coin, she genuinely couldn't deliver that.
Obadiah's expression brightened. The question itself confirmed she could actually improve on the design. It hadn't been a wasted day for a man in his sixties—he'd sat through all of it without budging.
Even a man as experienced as him couldn't quite suppress the lift in his mood. And beneath it was a quieter feeling, harder to name—something like relief.
He'd long since stopped thinking of Tony Stark as family. He'd even sent men to have him killed in Afghanistan. But feelings didn't vanish cleanly. After twenty years, you'd get attached even to a cat or dog—let alone a person.
Ordering someone else to have Tony killed far from home, and doing it himself—those were two very different things. He knew he still hadn't fully crossed that line.
He'd come here ready to fight for the reactor and take it by force if necessary. Daisy's question gave him a reason to step back from that edge.
He caught himself drifting and refocused when she asked again.
"How small can you make it?" Obadiah asked.
Daisy crossed her arms and gestured roughly—about the size of a large mixing bowl. Not laziness. The reactor was a precision instrument. Nuclear fusion carried no explosion risk, but below a certain scale, she simply couldn't maintain the necessary accuracy.
In that regard, she had to acknowledge she wasn't in the same league as the Stark men.
Obadiah frowned slightly. He'd seen the compact arc reactor in Tony Stark's chest—small, elegant, self-contained. What Daisy was describing was clearly a step below that.
But he wasn't in a position to be picky. A mixing-bowl-sized reactor was workable. Iron Monger was a massive suit of armor to begin with. A larger power source might even make the whole thing look more imposing.
He nodded on the spot. Fine. We'll do it your way.
He clapped his hands. "Alright, that's enough for today. Get some rest. Whatever else can wait until tomorrow."
Daisy, powered by her ability, barely registered the day's strain. Dr. William looked like he'd been wrung out and left to dry. And Obadiah himself—a man in his sixties who'd been sitting in the same spot all day—felt like certain parts of his anatomy were filing formal grievances.
Everyone needed rest.
The next morning, Daisy arrived with a long materials list—a full night's work organizing it. Obadiah held up his end: the supercomputer contract was revised and the initial installation fee was waived entirely.
He took the list. Even without knowing the first thing about nuclear physics, the sheer density of material names and unit measurements made him wince. "This much?"
Daisy kept her expression neutral. Yes. That much.
What she didn't mention was that she'd doubled every quantity. One reactor for Obadiah. One for herself.
She didn't have Tony Stark or Ivan Vanko's ability to build a nuclear reactor from a welding torch and a hammer. Howard Stark had spent twenty years developing substitute materials to eventually make the reactor viable for civilian use—cost-cutting solutions buried in design documents Daisy had never seen, and she had no time to test them. At this stage, she had no choice but to use rare materials and skilled labor and push through it the hard way.
Most of the materials on the list were subject to sales and transport restrictions. Her Skye Data network was thin on those kinds of connections. Stark Industries, however, had spent decades brokering weapons contracts—wide reach, deep relationships, the kind of network that could source restricted materials with a few phone calls.
Obadiah saw through the doubled quantities without comment. He didn't care. Stark Industries wasn't legally his anyway. Some materials and manpower? He waved it through without hesitation.
What followed was a clean exchange: Daisy worked on the reactor; Obadiah personally led a crew to help assemble the supercomputer. He bumped the original 36 server racks up to 40.
Initial setup and calibration would happen at Stark Industries. After that, Daisy would need her own facility—she couldn't leave a supercomputer in someone else's building indefinitely.
"Forty racks, 1,024 processors each, 260 cores per processor. Whatever calculations you're running, this machine can handle it. But you need to sort out a location soon." Obadiah reminded her.
Daisy studied the racks—each one slightly larger than a standard double-door refrigerator. Forty of them, needing a soundproofed, secure, climate-controlled space. Her current apartment and office couldn't handle any of those requirements.
The idea of buying property surfaced again. Not an emergency yet—initial setup and calibration would take about two months, and pulling her funds together from accounts scattered across the country would take roughly the same time.
She told her maid to keep an eye on the property market.
Fifteen days later, Obadiah had his reactor.
Honestly—compared to Tony Stark's palm-sized model, Daisy's wasn't pretty. It wasn't elegant or compact; it just looked brutally sturdy. Set aside the internal fusion components, and the outer casing alone could kill someone if you threw it at them.
Stark's model weighed a few pounds. Daisy's clocked in at around 33 lbs (15 kg).
But Obadiah thanked her anyway.
Compared to the original installation—over 16 feet (5 meters) wide and 10 feet (3 meters) tall—shrinking it to a 16-inch (40 cm) diameter was the work of a genuine prodigy. Whatever its limitations, that kind of miniaturization was extraordinary.
He pointedly ignored the second, identical reactor in Daisy's hands as he walked her out of Stark Industries. Then he turned back to find his chief scientist.
In the private lab, workers fitted the new reactor into Iron Monger's frame. Obadiah watched, nerves coiled tight, forcing himself steady while the diagnostic data came in.
Power on. Boot sequence. Testing.
Thirty minutes later, Dr. William came back smiling.
"Remarkable—look at these readings. This is the most advanced combat platform humanity has ever produced!" He was practically floating.
Obadiah didn't share the enthusiasm. His expression stayed flat.
"Does it hit the kinetic performance targets?"
"Completely. The design is genuinely inspired—"
Obadiah cut him off. "With the full weapons systems integrated?"
"Same result. Fully operational. Meets initial design specifications across the board—"
"You spent fifteen days working alongside her." Obadiah lowered his voice. "Can you replicate this reactor yourself?"
The real question. He was an arms dealer. He needed weapons that could be mass-produced. Only then would the Department of Defense take him seriously. Only then did real money—and real standing—follow.