Marvel Novel Series 06 - Iron Man - And Call My Killer ... Modok!

by William Rotsler

  After the guerrilla chieftain had left, Stark helped the old man to a seat before his improvised workbench. “Professor Yinsen, in college I read your books. You were the greatest physicist in the Orient, perhaps the world! Everyone thought you had died. How did you—” Starked stopped, embarrassed.

  “How did I become a mere manservant to a petty tyrant?” The elderly Oriental sighed and held his battered head. “I’d have been better off if I had died. When I refused to help them on their atom bomb and other projects, they . . . imprisoned me and . . . did other things.” The old man sighed. “Do you have some water?”

  Stark quickly fetched some water and held the tin cup to the wrinkled lips. “When they gave up on me, I was pressed into a slave-labor battalion by the Reds. I was a long way from my home in Hong Kong. I had no friends. No one would help me—they were afraid. Eventually, I fell into the hands of Wong-chu.”

  The old man looked around. “I will not help you, whoever you are. This could all be an elaborate ruse . . .”

  “Professor, I’m Tony Stark.” In a few words Stark told the story of his wounding and capture.

  “I took a medical degree, Tony Stark, but that was many, many years ago. I do not have the skills, the eyesight, or the equipment to operate on you. I’m sorry.”

  “That’s all right, Professor Yinsen.” Stark hesitated. He had come to a crucial decision. Since he could no longer work in secret he had either to abandon his idea . . . or to reveal it to the professor—who could be a ringer.

  Stark took a deep breath and made his decision. He had to trust this human being. “Professor, look, let me show you this.” Stark pulled the tattered, rumpled sheets of rice paper from their hiding place and laid them out on the workbench. The old man looked at Stark suspiciously, but his own curiosity got the better of him. His eyes widened as he grasped the first significant idea. Then his bony hands shuffled the irregular sheets quickly, peering closely at numbers and designs.

  He clasped his hands with delight. “An iron man! Fantastic! A mighty electronic body to keep your heart beating after the shrapnel reaches it! We might just succeed!” He looked up at Stark and the American saw life in his eyes for the first time. “Think what a creature we could create, Tony Stark! What wonders he could perform!”

  Stark gestured around the shed. “And the Reds themselves have given us all the materials we shall need.”

  Yinsen grabbed Stark’s arm. “Yes, Tony Stark, I will help you! The idea is magnificent—and it will strike back at them!”

  Thus a dying man’s desperate race against time took on new life. They cannibalized radios and Stark rebuilt them, redesigning them to perform new functions. Yinsen concentrated on the mechanical aspects of their project. “All activity must be coordinated perfectly,” Stark said. “The iron frame must duplicate every action of the human body.”

  “It shall, my friend, it shall,” promised the old man. “This shall be the crowning achievement of my life!”

  The hours passed into days. Every hour brought the fragment of shrapnel closer and closer to Tony Stark’s heart. The rugged American fought it as much as he could, but even the strongest body has a weak link.

  “I can feel the pressure,” he muttered as he took a break Yinsen had forced upon him. Gray-faced, Stark looked at the old man. “My time is running out. We must work faster!”

  The old man did not answer. He was bent over, welding a final piece of metal in place. Then he stood up, turned off the hissing torch, and slapped the curving plate. “There! The self-lubrication system is complete. Just a little longer, my American friend. You must have courage.”

  Stark nodded weakly. He had courage. What he didn’t have was strength. Every movement brought him pain, every breath brought him a touch closer to the ultimate fade-out. He moved slowly . . . and began to make mistakes. More time was taken up correcting them. Then Stark collapsed.

  The thin professor got him to rest, but two hours later he dragged himself up and stood weakly, bracing himself on the workbench. He had never felt so bad, so weak, nor so close to death. The old man worked feverishly, bent and gnarled over the electronic interior of a curving piece of metal. Stark’s knees shook. He was dangerously close to collapse, and this time he didn’t think he’d get up.

  Professor Yinsen threw a screwdriver into the clutter of the workbench, then lifted the heavy, metal slab. “The life-giving heart of your iron body is ready, Tony Stark,” he said. “Quickly! Clamp it around your chest!”

  Stark looked over with pain-wracked eyes, saw the breastplate’s interior, it’s electronic maze designed to do a great variety of things. The foremost and most important of these was keeping him alive. He reached with quivering hands for the heavy metal plate. The old man helped him strap it on, but before it was finished Stark fell back, staggering.

  The cot almost collapsed under his crashing weight. The old man kept at his work with hard-faced determination. He clamped the less sophisticated parts of the metal suit around Stark’s unmoving figure. He glanced at Stark’s gray face, at the beads of sweat on the pale flesh. Stark was dying.

  Then the final piece of the suit was in place. “There, it is done,” the old man said. “When I activate the machine, it will send the power into your amazing design. Your own fantastic suit will keep your heart beating as long as the iron body operates.”

  Yinsen crossed the room and his bony hand grasped the switch, pulling it to the ON position. The generator would soon build up enough energy to furnish all the power Stark’s new iron suit would need. The electricity flowed and the Chinese scientist watched as the transistors and other electronic gadgetry within the suit began to function properly.

  Blink. Blink. Blink.

  The narrow eyes of the old man opened in fear. The small red light they had installed to give them advance warning of the approach of anyone along the walk to the shed was blinking. “It must be Wong-chu!” The guerrilla leader visited them daily, his suspicious eyes roaming over the parts of the iron suit—which they kept separated in order to confuse him—and, if he found the suit assembled, Yinsen knew all their work would be in vain.

  Quickly, Yinsen checked the generator and the wiring that ran to the iron suit. “My life is of no consequence,” the elderly scientist thought. “But I must gain time for the iron man to live!” Yinsen moved quickly to the door and peered out. “Wong-chu must be kept away until the electronic body begins to function! Stark’s heart must be kept working!”

  Yinsen threw open the door and ran out, closing it behind him. “Death to Wong-chu!” the old man cried. “Death to the evil tyrant!” Yinsen shook his fist at Wong-chu, then started to run toward the hut where the ammunition was kept.

  The soldiers leveled their guns, then looked to Wong-chu for orders. The burly guerrilla snarled. “He has gone mad! After him!” he commanded. “End his miserable life before he can do any damage. He is of no further use to me.”

  Wong-chu watched as the rumpled, khaki-clad figures ran down the space between the sheds after the disappearing Yinsen. Then slowly, thoughtfully, Wong-chu turned and started toward the hut where Tony Stark lay near death.

  The sound of gunshots made Wong-chu stop and look toward the ammunition shed. Three shots. Just right. The old fool had not done any harm, and he had been stopped.

  Inside the shed, the life-sustaining machine built up more and more power in the iron suit. Tony Stark’s heart still beat and he began to come back from the semiconscious state in which his injuries had placed him. He had been too weak to stop Yinsen, but as he heard Wong-chu’s shouted command to drag the body away, Tony Stark, using his new name for the first time, made a solemn vow.

  “You will not have died in vain, my friend! I swear it! The Iron Man swears it!”

  The machine was keeping him alive. His experimental design was working. And the part of it that had been the most experimental was also working! The transistor-powered circuits were coordinating with his brain waves, picking them up in a three
-dimensional matrix from critical points around the interior of his helmet. He lifted an arm and looked at his metal-covered hand.

  In his weakened condition he should not have been able to lift the heavy metal arm, but with the electrically powered circuits and the ingenious handcrafted hydraulics the arm lifted as easily as his own would have, had he been in perfect health.

  “My suit works . . . The machine controls it just as any living human brain controls its own body.” He sat up and swung his feet to the floor, then with a gasp, stood up.

  But the suit was overreacting and Stark lost his balance. He crashed to the floor with a thud that shook the shed. Outside the metal shed Wong-chu heard the crash and his meaty fist turned the doorknob. But the door did not move.

  “Why is this door locked?” the guerrilla snapped, not knowing of the snap lock his two prisoners had installed. He turned to the soldiers approaching, dragging the bullet-riddled body of the old scientist by the heels. “Come here!” he commanded. “Break this door down!”

  Inside, Stark was getting to his feet. His head was dizzy, and there was a faint pain in his chest. He knew that without the all-important chest plate he would now be dead.

  “I’m like a baby learning to walk,” he thought desperately. “But I don’t have time! I must learn now, quickly, before they get in and overpower me!”

  Stark fought desperately, trying to get the knack of controlling the massively heavy, immensely complex, and potentially very powerful device he was wearing. The brain which had mastered some of the most important fields of contemporary science was also capable of mastering a new body.

  Even as Stark heard the first blows thudding on the door he began to walk. Feeling like Frankenstein’s monster, Stark thought, “I have it now . . . I can stand and walk without toppling . . .”

  “Smash it in!” Wong-chu growled. “I must know what has happened in there!”

  Stark was still moving around like a baby, awkwardly thumping back and forth. “They’re coming,” he thought, knowing he was not yet ready to fight. He could stand and walk, but little more. Each movement was likely to be an overreaction. “This is the greatest test—sheer survival. Can this thing I created survive? The . . . thing which is less than human, yet far more than merely human! This thing which is now an indispensable part of Anthony Stark!”

  Through the eye slits Stark looked at himself in a cracked mirror. He looked like a robot, smooth and thick limbed. The metal was anodized yellow—a golden life form. “My brain still thinks,” he told himself. “My heart still beats! But in order to remain alive must I remain forever within this iron prison?” His eyes, staring out at himself, were filled with pain. The Man in the Iron Mask. Frankenstein’s monster in steel. A flexible golden coffin.

  Blam! Blam-blam-blam!

  The shots into the lock of the door brought Stark back from his thoughts to the bitter realization that he must do something now, this very second, and never mind what tomorrow might bring. Knowing he was still too weak and too unskilled in the use of his new iron suit to fight them, Anthony Stark knew he must conceal himself.

  But where! The shed was not large. They would search. Then inspiration struck. The iron suit had been cleverly constructed. There were a number of attachments and built-in devices that could be used. Swiftly, Stark picked off the workbench a pair of large suction cups and fixed them to his hands. Then he activated the air-pressure jets of his boots and shot into the air.

  “They work!” Stark thought exultantly as he fastened his hands to the metal roof. He was hidden away in a shadowed part of the ceiling. And none too soon, for at that moment the door sagged open and several gun-bearing guerrillas charged in. Wong-chu strode in arrogantly behind them. The guerrillas quickly looked behind every bench and opened every large box.

  “The Yankee has gone,” Wong-chu growled. “He built us no weapons!” He gestured to the outside. “He cannot be far! He must have run when his sniveling companion did. Find him and dispose of him as you did the other who dared defy me!”

  Above his head Tony Stark smiled thinly. They hadn’t thought to look over their heads, and now the safest place Stark could be was in the shed.

  “While you hunt down the Yankee, I shall amuse myself at my favorite sport,” Wong-chu declared as he left. The soldiers departed and closed the wrecked door behind them.

  Stark waited in the shadows. He knew what Wong-chu’s favorite sport was: hurting defenseless prisoners. They were forced to fight him hand to hand and he easily defeated each one, punishing them ruthlessly with his fists and feet.

  “They killed the professor,” Stark thought with still-growing anger. “A man who never harmed anyone in his life! The murdering swine, the—” He broke off his anger. Revenge, to be effective, must be done in cold blood, in measured, thoughtful, carefully controlled action. “They’ll pay for his death,” he thought. “I swear it!”

  Stark dropped to the floor, his air jets controlling his descent so he did not crash to the ground. At that moment Anthony Stark saw himself, encased in his metal armor, reflected in the cracked mirror. He lifted a metal fist and used his new name, the name which came easily and naturally to his lips.

  “Iron Man swears it!”

  Stark moved to the window and cautiously lifted the curtain. Wong-chu was already at the prisoners’ cage, calling out for “volunteers” to fight him. There was nothing Stark could do for them now and he dropped the curtain.

  “Yes, Wong-chu,” he muttered. “Amuse yourself . . . while you still can! For our moment of reckoning is almost at hand!”

  Stark moved around the room, moving his arms and legs, gaining better control by the moment. He heard the gasp of the prisoners and the scream of pain from a “volunteer.” Stark’s head came up. Ready or not, he was going to have to act.

  With his metal-gloved hand Stark reached for the dirty, blood-flecked trench coat he had been wearing when wounded. He struggled into it. It was a tight fit over the armor. He heard Wong-chu’s arrogant voice demanding another challenger. Stark picked up a hat and put it on. Then he left the shed.

  In the area before the prisoners’ cage Wong-chu had just dashed his frightened “challenger” to the ground. Uttering a snort of contempt Wong-chu shouted with pride. “I win again!”

  “None can defeat the mighty warlord!” a soldier shouted and others joined in. They knew how to keep their commander happy.

  “I say he is a coward!” a voice from the edge of the crowd said. “I challenge Wong-chu!”

  The big guerrilla’s head snapped around. “Who dares speak thus to Wong-chu? Show yourself! Let me see the face of the one I am about to destroy!”

  A shadowed figure came through the crowd. Taller than the Oriental guerrillas, dressed in an oddly fitting trench coat, the figure came into the cleared area. “As you wish, tyrant,” the figure said. His hands swept the hat from his head and then, with disconcerting ease, tore the trench coat from his body.

  Wong-chu stared, his mouth gaping in surprise. “Why do you stare, Wong-chu?” Anthony Stark asked. “What is wrong? Have you never seen an iron man before?”

  Golden armor. Thick boots. Rounded, skull-like head. Eye slits, featureless mask. A faint aroma of oil and the ozone of electronic gear.

  “You . . . you are not human!” Wong-chu said, his hand shaking as he pointed. “You are a machine!”

  “And you are the heartless man of evil who is about to pay for his misdeeds!” Iron Man took a step toward the uniformed Wong-chu. It was not the man’s political views he was about to fight, nor the fact that he was a leader in an unconventional war. Iron Man was about to fight a murdering, merciless tyrant.

  Wong-chu’s trained responses came into play. He attempted to defend himself, but the power of Iron Man struck right through his defenses, which were powered only by ordinary human muscles. Before the startled eyes of the Red guerrillas, and before the amazed gaze of the imprisoned Vietnamese, two electronically powered arms seized the guerrilla leader
and lifted him high in the air as easily as a toy!

  “You are not facing a wounded, dying man now,” Iron Man growled as he twirled the helpless Wong-chu over his head. “Or an aged, gentle professor!”

  The powerful golden arms straightened and Wong-chu tumbled awkwardly through the air to crash into the jungle. “This is Iron Man who opposes you, and all you stand for!”

  Wong-chu, hurt and angry, felt he was far enough out of the fire zone. The strange metal man had made him lose face, but there was no human that could not be destroyed, one way or another. “Guards!” he commanded. “Open fire! Destroy that, that iron man!”

  Tony Stark had a moment of fear. He had engaged Wong-chu when he was still not perfectly at ease in his life-support armor. Now he faced the bullets of a small army of jungle-trained guerrillas. They responded obediently. Their guns blasted. At this close range they could hardly miss.

  And they didn’t.

  Lead slugs ricocheted off the golden armor, whining away into the jungle air. Stark reacted automatically, almost cringing as the powerful lead bullets struck him. But almost at once he realized his suit was even better than he had thought. Not only was it strong enough to withstand even the close-order firing squad, but its electronic defenses compensated for the massive blows being struck to the golden armor. Realizing this, Stark stood straight, taking the thundering volley with an almost exulting pride.

  Iron Man could take it!

  Blam! Pinnng! Ka-pow! Pow!

  “Get grenades, you fools!” Wong-chu shouted. “Bring bazookas! Quickly!”

  But Iron Man was too swift, too powerful for the small guerrilla force. Wong-chu retreated to a nearby building and attempted to take control by broadcasting his commands over the camp loudspeakers. But it was easy enough for Iron Man’s new suit to create enough electrical interference to drown out his words with static.

  Iron Man then took over the loudspeakers. “Desert Wong-chu! Flee into the jungle! None can defeat Iron Man! Flee, before he slays you all!”