Chapter 36: New Virus — The V-Virus
Compared to three months of managing armed militants in the Middle East, a roomful of journalists was approximately the same difficulty as coming home.
Despite several pointed looks from Stane, Tony sat down on the floor of the press conference stage, pulled a burger from his jacket, and started eating. He looked out at the assembled journalists, all of whom were looking back at him with varying degrees of confusion, and waved a hand.
"Hey. Everyone sit down, all right?"
"That's it. Just like that."
He chewed. "You can see me, I can see you. And I think you understand that someone who just got back from where I've been is not in the best position for standing."
The journalists sat. So did Stane, which cost him something.
Tony, at this point, still had no idea that the man beside him had arranged the ambush. There was no visible distance between them. Stane remained the trusted senior colleague who had kept the company together in Tony's absence, and Tony was treating him as exactly that.
"Good to see you," Tony said, looking at him.
The stone Stane had been carrying in his chest went down a size. "Likewise."
Tony turned to face the room.
Three months of a specific kind of thinking had produced a backlog he needed to clear.
"I know what you all want to ask. Just let me say something first."
The room was quiet. The journalists who had been raising their hands put them down.
Tony's voice was worn down but had not lost the quality that made people listen to it.
"You know, when I was young, I didn't get to see my father before he died. Which left me with a few questions I'd always wanted to ask him. Questions about what he thought of the company. Whether he ever had doubts. Whether he ever had to live with the things the company made."
He paused.
"In those three months, I watched young men get killed. Killed by weapons built by my company. Weapons that were supposed to protect people."
He stopped again, longer this time.
"That's when I realized I had become part of a comfortable class with no accountability for what it produces."
The mood in the room had shifted. The journalists had been expecting a triumphant return narrative. This was something else.
"Mr. Stark, can you tell us what actually happened out there?"
"What happened." He sat with the words for a moment.
Then he stood up.
"The short version: I woke up."
His voice came back at full strength.
"I have capabilities that go well beyond building things that destroy and kill. And because of that, I am announcing the immediate shutdown of Stark Industries' weapons manufacturing division."
"Effective now."
The room erupted.
Beside him, Stane was wearing the expression of a man who had just had something expensive broken in front of him and was performing the reaction of someone who hadn't.
He had expected Tony to come back and cause disruption. He had not budgeted for disruption at this scale.
Shut down the weapons division.
He had paid to have this man killed and this was the result.
The weapons division was what kept Stark Industries running. And the company was not Tony's alone. He couldn't just announce something like this in front of cameras and call it done.
Stane stepped forward, moved Tony aside with the practiced warmth of a mentor managing an unstable protégé, and began talking to the room.
In the car afterward.
"You dropped quite a bomb in there," Matthew said. The tone was mildly amused.
Tony rubbed his forehead. "Necessary. All of it." He looked out the window. "I'm done with the business of building things that only exist to kill people."
Matthew didn't say anything to that.
It was Tony's path and Tony's choice. Not his to redirect.
After a brief tour of the Stark Industries campus, Matthew had Happy take him back.
Outside the Umbrella building.
Walrus was at the entrance in his new security uniform rather than the patrol blues. When he saw Matthew coming, he straightened immediately and snapped a salute.
"Boss!"
"Walrus." Matthew gave him a small smile and put a hand on his shoulder as he passed. "The uniform doesn't quite fit. Go talk to the captain and get a size up. Tell him I said."
"Yes sir!"
Matthew walked on.
Walrus stood where he was for a moment, his hand going to the shoulder Matthew had just touched.
He had never thought a man like this would remember his name. He was no one in particular. He had been a patrol officer eating a donut. But Matthew had looked at him today as though he were someone worth looking at.
He decided the uniform could wait a minute.
He decided the shoulder patch was getting framed.
[System: +5 points. Walrus holds you in exceptional regard.]
Matthew glanced at the notification and kept walking.
Eleanor was waiting by the elevator.
"Birkin came up to find you while you were out, sir. Would you like to go see him now?"
"You didn't ask what he wanted?"
They stepped into the elevator together. The doors closed. In the clean overhead light, Eleanor reached over and began straightening the wrinkles in his jacket as she answered, doing it the way someone does a thing they've done many times.
"I did ask. He wasn't inclined to discuss it with me. He said he only wanted to speak with you directly."
Her voice carried nothing about how she felt about being told this by someone she had just asked a civil question.
"Understood."
He wasn't bothered by it. Birkin was a rare talent, and rare talent came with its own terms. A preference for speaking only to the decision-maker was a minor eccentricity in that context.
The elevator opened onto a long glass corridor.
This was the level Matthew had had built to RE specifications. The laser corridor. Security on this floor operated differently from the rest of the building.
[Identity verification in progress. Do not approach.]
[Verification complete.]
The electronic voice filled the corridor and faded.
They walked through.
The heavy sealed door released with a pressure hiss. Inside, researchers who had been deep in their work looked up at the sound. When they saw it was Matthew, the greetings came from several directions at once.
Matthew nodded as he passed and went directly to Birkin.
"Dr. Birkin. I heard you were looking for me."
Birkin, who had been bent over a microscope, straightened slowly. He didn't speak immediately. He turned to the cryogenic safe beside him and removed a vial with both hands, handling it the way you handle something you've worked a long time to produce.
The liquid inside was clear, brilliant, catching the lab light in a way that suggested red amber.
"What is this?"
Birkin smiled. That was exactly the reaction he had been aiming for.
"The V-Virus. A new variant."
He held the vial to the light.
"T-Virus base, recombined with selected genetic sequences from the vampire specimens. The product of their interaction and subsequent mutation. In essence, a significantly advanced strain of the T-Virus."
"I asked you here because I wanted to show you this breakthrough in person."
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