Duty (An Armorer/Paladin Story)

Come on, this has to be rock bottom

"No," I said. "Mr Stark wouldn't have done that. Wouldn't have restarted the Super Soldier program. He knew what the risks to the individuals were. He told us what they were," I said, gaining confidence. "He said that the last trials were inhumane."

"Oh, would you stop?" Tony turned on me. "He was no saint, despite what you want to believe. He stuffed the Super Soldier program in the Weapons division.  The subjects were studied, after, in Division O.  As were other mutants--some of the scientists were mutated, like you, in accidents or as a result of their work. Do you remember Lester Grierson?" I nodded dumbly; he'd been in plastics during my rotation there. All of a sudden he retired; feelings were kind of hurt because we didn't get a chance to send him off, and he was only in his early 50s. "His work in plastics apparently mutated his skin like yours was, only his skin was inflexible. He ended up literally unable to move his muscles, couldn't sweat, couldn't eat too much at a meal or gain any weight. He ended up in O. Probably fortunately for him, he died soon after; he had cancers grow that they couldn't treat on top of all that. The only reason you weren't stuck in O when you asked for help is because your mutation is nothing compared to that. My father knew about what they did there, all the testing, and they tried to reproduce the more useful mutations. He encouraged it, for useful results. I looked at the company records; the Super Soldier program was continued in secret once it was officially closed because if they could reproduce the successful formula it would have been extremely lucrative."

It was too much to take in. I shook my head reflexively. "Your accident was no accident," Stark continued, still enraged. "Steiger"--my old nemesis in the lab, that little weasel--"got ahold of Grierson's records, duplicated the mutagen to the best of his ability, and paid that asshole to dump it on you. You thought the guy was fired with you, but he wasn't. He went back to work the next day.  Steiger ended up promoted to Deputy Chief of Division O. You're lucky the Asgardians were able to treat you. Point is, my dad made all that possible. And if you'd mutated while he was around, he still would have locked you up in O, knowing what would be done to you. He might have visited, but he wouldn't have let you go until every milligram of information had been squeezed out of you. Because it might be useful down the road. He was all about the business and the profits, my dad," he said bitterly. "You weren't as special as you thought you were. You were just like performing monkeys he had a fondness for. You produced results." He pulled out his phone, poked around, and produced a projection of security footage of the lab. I saw myself, concentrating on my latest project, Steiger looked at me and nodded at the other guy, who picked up the tray, started toward me. The 'accident.' Then security footage, older, Mr Stark and a couple of guys I didn't recognize in an observation room, going through results of some testing on Super Soldier serum victims.  He was irritated about a lot of things, including the lack of progress in eliminating  lesser mutations, but felt that the latest formulation could be made to work. The time stamp was days before his death. I didn't want to see more; I got to my feet, moving quickly down the stairs, leaving the third floor without stopping, going out into the woods until I needed to stop. My dogs found me sometime later.

I returned, reluctantly, to the housing complex after dark, sick at heart, too upset to eat or think straight. At some point, I went to sleep. I woke up late the next morning to a faceful of fur; Torburn had curled around my head like a hat and his tail was draped over my nose and mouth.

After I extracted myself from the dogs, the first thing I did was to get the ring Mr Stark had given us--the ones we thought made us part of something special--and threw it into the recycling. Then I changed my mind and put it in the trash. It didn't deserve to be reused. I took a shower, my mind starting to move again. If Steiger tried to replicate the mutagen that killed Grierson, that might mean that the current resurgence of my mutation was merely the harbinger of things to come. Jesus, I hadn't even considered the possibility of cancers. I threw some clothes on, not bothering with makeup or grooming past pulling my hair into a pony tail, and went to see Nick.