The Ancient Warrior [Hiatus]

A Very Dangerous Stunt

"When nothing goes right, go left."- Martha Cecilia

Percy's POV

The mansion was amazing. Of course, I knew that Tony had an amazing mansion, he had mentioned it once or twice, but the way he talked about it didn't give it enough credit for how it looked. I was given a quick tour before Tony and I headed down into his car garage, which also happened to be his workshop. That was where I met JARVIS.

"Jar, can you recognize Percy as someone who can freely come into my workshop?" Tony spoke to the ceiling. If I hadn't been expecting the voice, I might have been a lot more surprised than I was at what he was doing.

"Of course, sir. Shall I write more safety protocols about your new condition for you to completely ignore?"

"You do that, Jar and I so will be ignoring them."

"You're really letting me in here any time I want?" I asked him, my confusion clear in my words. The way he had talked about his workshop before made it seem like it was his safe space, the place where he can go when he needs to get away from everything else. Being let into a space like that is surprising.

"Yeah, it's as much your workshop now as it is mine." He said as he waved it off, going over to a wall which had some kind of advanced technology computer faces on it. "You don't have to stay in it if you don't want, but after you've been around for us building things," He tapped on the faint glowing circle that emanated from behind his shirt. "It'll be almost incomplete without you at least being able to be there if you choose to be."

Him tapping on the ARC reactor reminded me of what I wanted to talk to him about earlier. "You should probably look into new materials to use instead of the palladium for the ARC reactor." I told him, and I couldn't stop an undertone of worry from entering my voice.

He turned away from what he was pulling up on the computer screens to me. "Does it have anything to do with how you said that the people were right when they said ARC reactor tech was a dead end?"

I slowly nodded my head and an apologetic look came over my face when I looked at him. I pointed at the circle of light and told him. "Palladium in the chest? It's a very painful way to die. So, unfortunately, the device that's keeping you alive is also slowly killing you."

Tony took that in for a few seconds before saying, "You've got that, right Jarvis?"

"Yes, sir. I'm searching for compatible alternatives for it as we speak."

Tony then turned to me. "In the meantime, I'm going to need help making another one. It's nice to have an extra set of hands."

I smiled a small smile and together, we both set to work making another ARC reactor. It was maybe three hours later that it was done and Tony had decided to put in the new ARC reactor now.

"Tony," I said, my face one of concentration as I felt the danger lurking in his blood. He turned to face me as he was about to sit down on the chair. "There's residual leakage from the palladium in your blood." I told him and he took on a thoughtful expression.

"How do you know? Is that like, a thing you can do?" He asked. We both spoke while doing what was needed for this, me placing the pads across his chest where he indicated. I just shook my head.

"I actually don't know how, but I can feel it moving around in your blood. It's not a lot of it, but if it's left there, it can be dangerous." I told him before looking at him in the eyes. "I might be able to remove it, but it's going to be tiring and it could hurt you if I lose concentration."

"You mean like how you manipulated the lava back in that cave. You can do that with more than just lava." He asked, though it was more a statement than anything. I just nodded. "Alright then, lets do this." Tony turned the ARC reactor in his chest and I looked down inside it.