[1] Taeyong Lee-Stark and the League of Heroes

09 - Going out for our First Test Drive

PREVIOUSLY ON: League of Superheroes

Tony decides to attend one of the many parties funded by Stark Industries. He had been on the lay-low for a while now and it's about time he's made himself more public. In doing so, he runs into Christine, a reporter who accuses him of selling behind closed doors to the people that kidnapped him.

It's there that Tony finds out the truth, Obadiah is behind everything.

***

The news reporter seemed to be doing a good job in assessing what was currently taking place in Gulmira. Taeyong was wearing a headset whilst he watched his father work on his gauntlet controllers and then on the plasma television mounted on the wall, which was a live feed of what Tony Stark was doing. Breaking News! Tragedy in Gulmira.

"The ten mile drive to the outskirts of Gulmira can only be described as a descent into Hell, into a modern-day Heart of Darkness." Taeyong arched his brow and snickered at the reporters' overly dramatic monologue of what was going on.

"Paying attention?" Tony asked.

Taeyong quickly scrambled and put the headset mic closer to his mouth, "Yep! Your levels look stable."

The journalist continued to report. "Simple farmers and herders, from their homes at the butt of Western rifles and the turrets of modern tanks. Displaced from their lands by Warlords and insurgent groups emboldened by their newfound power—a power fueled by high-tech weapons easily purchased with Poppy money on the black market—and further destabilizing a fragile region which for decades has been a tinderbox of tribal feuding and ethnic hatred-"

Taeyong flinched when his father aimed the gauntlet at some light fixtures and gave them a good RT blasts. They spark and fall from the ceiling, crashing over the floor, whilst the young boy simply rolled his eyes and pulled up a notes page on the holograph. "Type in shopping list: light bulbs."

The News continued, "the villagers have been taken shelter in whatever crude dwellings they can find - in the ruins of other razed scrublands, or in the remnants of an old Soviet smelting plant. Our translator relayed to us one human tragedy after another. A seven year-old boy-" Taeyong sat up and lifted himself up with the help of his father's desk. His eyes widened as a graphic image of a boy, only a year older than Mark cried around dead bodies whilst holding out an old photo like a crumpled 'lost' poster. "-thin a scarecrow, clutching yellowed photographs and holding them out to anyone who would stop, with a child's simple question: where are my mother and father?"

Tony adjusted his guantet again. This time Taeyong noticed that his father had raised the power level, blasting a window in the lab, shattering the glass and managed to also knock one of Taeyong's least favourite paintings off the wall. "A woman, begging for news of her husband, who'd been kidnapped by insurgents—either forced to join their militia, to be shot without reason—with no political will or international pressure, there is little hope for their newly-formed refugee's. Refugees who can only Wonder one thing: is the world watching?"

Taeyong flinched and fell back in his father's big chair when Tony blasted his gauntlet at the TV. "Tony!" he shouted, "I was watching that!"

Both Taeyong and Tony stared at each other in silence with Taeyong glaring at his dad for shooting at the TV. Pepper quickly came inside, "are you going to tell me what's going on?" she asked exasperated, looking around at the broken lab.

"Get my home in Dubai ready. I want to throw a party. Taeyong, you stay with Mark and Johnny for a while—"

"I'm staying here," Taeyong said, still glaring at his dad. "Jarvis, add a new TV to the shopping list would you?" he spat out, taking off the big headset and thrusting it on the table before jumping off the chair and stomping out of the lab.