"This request isn't unreasonable, is it? Because I just need—"
Seeing Tony about to ruin the delicate emotional balance with another flippant remark, Pepper quickly cut him off. "Okay. Okay, Tony."
"I genuinely need your help, Pep," Tony repeated, his voice softened.
Facing Tony at his most vulnerable, Pepper took a steadying breath and reached out. Her fingers found the correct wire nestled deep inside the port, protected by a thin layer of clear electrolyte gel.
"I found it! I found it!" Pepper exclaimed, a relieved grin breaking through her anxiety.
"Now pull it out, but don't let it touch the side... Ah!"
Before he could finish the warning, a powerful jolt of electricity shot through Tony's body, causing him to shriek and tremble violently.
"I'm so sorry! I'm so sorry!" Pepper cried, finally yanking the wire clear. She was nearly in tears.
Tony, still shaking, looked up at her. "Okay. Now, remember not to pull the bottom part—"
Pepper, highly agitated and nervous, yanked the entire magnet assembly out.
"There was a magnet... ah... never mind, you already pulled it!" Tony looked at her with an expression of stunned disbelief. "Well, I didn't expect that either!"
The machine monitoring Tony's vitals immediately began to sound a sharp, frantic alarm.
Pepper, flustered and holding the copper-wired magnet, cried out in worry, instinctively moving to put the part back in.
"No! Don't put it back!" Tony quickly raised his hand to stop her; he could not endure another shock.
"Okay! What should I do, Tony?" Pepper panicked, her entire focus locked on her boss.
"It's nothing, Pep. Just that your heart is about to stop because you just pulled everything out like you were fishing!" Tony, ever the comedian, still managed a dark joke.
Seeing Pepper's terror, Tony thrust the new reactor core into her hands. "Quickly, take this and replace it with this one. Hurry up!"
Pepper gasped for breath. "Okay! Okay!"
Seeing Tony clearly struggling to breathe, she instantly suppressed her own fear. "Tony, don't be afraid. It's alright."
"What?" Tony looked at Pepper, confused. "In this critical situation, you're giving me a pep talk instead of working?"
"It's okay. I can do this," Pepper insisted, forcibly banishing her physical discomfort. She extended the connector of the new reactor toward Tony's chest, throwing herself entirely into the mission.
In less than two seconds, she found the interface and plugged the new reactor in.
A sudden, sharp electric shock jolted Tony, making him cry out, but this time, he quickly stabilized and recovered.
Seeing the process successfully completed, Tony instantly reverted to his carefree self. "See? That wasn't difficult at all! It was fun, right? You did an incredible job!"
Tony reached up and secured the reactor to his chest. Pepper, finally taking a deep, shaky breath, asked, "Are you alright?"
"Perfect. Are you alright?" Tony asked Pepper, who looked as if she had just run a marathon.
Pepper finally allowed herself a smile after confirming Tony was truly fine. "Never. Never, ever make me do this again."
"Besides you, I have no one else I can trust to help me," Tony said, looking at her with genuine sincerity. She was the only one he felt he could confide in, the only one whose motives were pure.
They stared at each other—one second, two seconds, three, four...
Tony quickly glanced away, clearly uncomfortable with the intensity. "We'll see," he murmured.
Pepper stood up, wiping her hands. She picked up the old, crude reactor. "What do we do with this?"
"That? Destroy it," Tony said nonchalantly, pulling his coat back on.
"Burn it." He pointed to the new, sleek core on his chest.
"Tony, isn't this the model?" Pepper looked closely at the device. "The one you gave me is exactly the same as this!"
She examined the object in her hand closely. "The model Leo gave you, this is it! How did he know about this beforehand?"
"That's exactly what I'm trying to figure out—how he knew," Tony said, walking over.
"It's a perfect match! Leo is so strange," Pepper mused. "You said he found you before you went to Afghanistan, and you didn't even know what it was then, but now you've built the real thing."
"Tony, have you investigated Leo's identity?"
"Jarvis! How is the data collection on Leo going?" Tony called out to the empty room.
"Mr. Stark, data collection is complete," the AI voice responded.
A large, flat projection sprang to life on the workbench. It showed multiple photos of Leo, with huge blocks of scrolling information running alongside.
Tony and Pepper moved to the projection table. They looked at a photo of Leo smiling happily—a school ID picture.
Tony reviewed Leo's academic record, school videos, and past exam scores. "His grades are perfect. He has a completely normal child's record since starting school. Nothing has ever happened to him. It is profoundly strange." Tony quickly swiped past the normal documents.
"Here's the record of the flight to Las Vegas. Jenny and George went too. Their spending records show normal entertainment expenses."
"Tony, there is no birth certificate for Leo here," Pepper noted, flipping through the adoption documents. "His current adoptive parents took him from an orphanage when he was five years old, but there was no record of Leo prior to that date."
"George and Jenny's records are spotless. So where did this metal model come from?" Pepper asked.
"Here," Tony said, clicking a file. He expanded it, filling most of the screen.
"This is a bank card that George helped Leo register. It still has fifty-two thousand and six dollars in it. It was deposited by many different people at various times."
"Jarvis, pull the transaction history for this card."
"Yes, sir." In two seconds, hundreds of tiny, detailed transaction records appeared.
"Summarize the results, Jarvis," Tony instructed, ignoring the many small transactions.
"Leo's largest single incoming transactions were in July 2007: two transactions totaling fifty thousand dollars each. His largest single outgoing transaction was in September 2007, totaling thirty-three thousand dollars."
"The money was transferred to a small company called Fit Steel. There are normal delivery records: six tons of steel, delivered in six installments to the vicinity of Forest Road in Queens, New York, as per the contract."
"Incoming transaction records show that the majority of small deposits, ranging from two hundred to one thousand dollars, originate from online model website platforms. A search revealed twelve hundred public postings across these platforms. A visual comparison shows that 78% of these high-grade models are the work of the same person."
"Do we need to hack into Leo's phone for other information?" Jarvis asked.
Tony glanced at Pepper, who looked apprehensive, and decided against it. "Never mind that for now."
"Tony, so Leo is a prodigious model maker, and this money is what he earned selling his work," Pepper summarized. "It's possible his family just happened to run into you on vacation, and he gave you a model that coincidentally looks like your new Arc Reactor."
"No, Pepper," Tony disagreed, his eyes fixed on the blank space where Leo's early history should have been. "Leo is not that simple."
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Hope u can atleast check my p@treon account, I will be grateful. It needs much more time and resources to upload these chapters. I wish u can understand and support me there to maintain this motivation.
I also updated a separated Marvel fanfics tier there. All 50 extra chapters have been uploaded there.