Discimer - All the owners have their respective rights. I only own the characters that came from my addled brain (don’t worry, I am pletely sober).

  L.A.

  –Jack Sullivan–

  Okay, going with Stark’s crazy good employment offer was clearly the right decision. Looking at the opulent suite that had been given to him the first night he had in LA was crazy. Even in both of his lives bined, he had never even been close to such a pce. Sure, in his first life, when he had paid off his debts and was iing aggressively for his future, he could have afforded this pce if he went pletely off the rails for that month’s budget but it was never realistic or practical for him to be living and lounging in such a huge hotel room. In fact, calling it a room would be doing it disservice. It was more like a penthouse built into the building of a hotel along with housekeeping and room service. It was like the best home ever. He could live here forever.

  And therein came the problem, Jack thought to himself, sighing. He could not live here, in this safe fortable abode, cut off from the rest of the world. It would be too muxiety, living here and not knowing what was going on outside and then preparing for it. He khat, eventually, the shit would rht down into his p anyway so why not be in the know from the beginning so that he prepare for it. He khat Stark had some other reason to help him apart from his powers but he was not really worried about that. Sure, Stark had his fws but it was also undeniable that he was, more often than not, on the good side, and to the current him, that’s all that mattered.

  So, there he was, sitting in his bathrobe, a very expehrobe, on an equally expensive couch with a gss of wine in his hand, ging els on the very rge TV that the suite had two of when the bell rang. He quickly put down the gss ao the door, very excited about the ice cream he had ordered. He was told that it was “out of the world” by the room service guy and so far, the room service guy had not disappointed him even once so he was ined to believe him.

  “Ah!” He very much did not yelp when Tony Stark, the man himself, appeared at his door, dressed in a three-piece suit at 2:00 in the m. So great was his shock that a green c promptly appeared on top of his exposed extremities. He had practiced all the time he was awake on the pn to try to turn off the primary barrier that seemed to cover every portion of his skin and was finally able to do it at 1 in the m. That was the reason he had waited so long to have a nice long hot shower in the absolutely opulent multi-shower head bathroom that was there in the master bedroom of his suite. And now that he had finally coaxed his body and powers into rexing, this happened. One of his heroes just up and appeared in front of him.

  “Ahem,” He coughed in an effort to make himself fet that anything appeared and then stepped bad gestured for Tony to ehe suite. Tony nodded as he looked at him weirdly and theered the suite. He made no effort to sit on the couch, instead, he went to the tall ceiling-high windows and stood in front of them.

  He just stood in the back awkwardly, not knowing where to pce his hands. Finally, he tightened his bathrobe and the straight to the kit to get himself a gss of water.

  “You need something?” He asked Tony on his way. He closed his mouth when Tony just waved his hand and the on his weird sightseeing of the street below.

  “Alright then,” He mumbled to himself and promptly gulped down a gss of water. “Ah, that hit the spot,” He sighed in relief. Sometimes, a gss of cold crisp water is all you o shock your system back to ess.

  “So,” he began as he went bato the living room with another bottle of water, just in case he , “-What I do for you, Mr.Stark? I thought I was supposed to be trained before I could begin w for you.”

  “Ah, teically,” Tony said before snatg the bottle right out of his hands and then gulping it down, “I began paying for you the moment you sat in my jet and came to the US illegally, I might add,”

  Ah, so that’s how he was going to py it.

  “I see,” He nodded slowly and the back to sit on the sofa, Tony followed suit to sit in front of him. “I repeat, what I do for you, Mr.Stark?”

  “Nothing,” Tony said briskly before looking at his watch, “At the moment, nothing. I want you to e by my house tomorrow so that I do some checks on you.”

  He was about to nod before he was interrupted by Stark, “Do you know you are always emitting trace amounts of gamma energy….”

  “Jack,” He said once he realised that he had old Tony or Javis his name. In his defe had never e up. He had figured that the hotel would ask for some form of identification but apparently, once you have Stark level of money, even hardened ws are mere suggestions. “Jack Sullivan is my name. I don’t remember anything else from before I was falling in the snow but this name. Jack Sullivan,”

  “Right, Jack, yeah. So, as I was saying, you are stantly emitting trace amounts of Gamma radiation which are startlingly simir to ohat I have entered once before. Also, the moment yreen skin or armour, whatever it is you call it, activated, that amount exploded expoially. You are lucky that I own most of the facilities nearby that have gamma sensors and thus, am able to hide you. But even that ot be a long-term solution.”

  “So, you are saying I o not use my powers to hide better? But then how will I do my job of proteg the person you wao protect?” He questioark, mindful of the fact that he was not yet told of the identity of the person he was supposed to proted he ying the part of an amnesiac kid for sympathy points. He was not sure how far that would take him but he was ly a tactical genius, even in this new life so he went with the first thing that came to his mind. He was still assimiting the memories of Jack Sullivan and had e across a very iing tidbit. His appearand his body had been ged immensely from the person he was before he was experimented on. He had grown about 5 inches and gained dozens of pounds in muscle mass. Not to mention, he had also been de-aged somehow so he looked more like a teenager and less like the 30-year-old he was.

  “No, No No No, You don’t have to worry about that. I will whip up something to help you tain the gamma leakage and mostly, the normal radiation you emit is overpped by background radiation anyway so unless someone has your specific signature to look for, they would not be able to find you. It’s like finding a needle in a haystack. Once you use your powers though, if they are looking for you, finding you bees very simple. I am not an expert on powers and you don’t seem to know much about them either. How did you turn off the green skin part though?” Stark went on a ramble and theioned him.

  “Ah,” He stuttered and then raised his right hand, creating a small regur sheet of green colour that then floated around the entire room before ing back to his hand, a handle f out of thin air before he held onto the handle, creating a makeshift shield for him, “I practised a lot. I finally turned off that annoying skin an ho so that I could take a shower. It takes some trating to do iime so it activated because I was surprised to see you at my doorstep at 2 in the m,” His unvoiced question was clear for Stark to see a, he glossed over that question with the ease of a seasoned politi and focused on the shield that was resting on his right hand.

  “May I?” Stark looked at him as he extended his arm towards the shield. “Yeah, sure,” He nodded and then released the shield to him.

  “Surprisingly light,” HE muttered before snapping his fingers, causing a suit to appear behind him with a shimmer of light.

  “Whoa,” He jerked ba surprise, pletely caught ft-footed in the presence of one of his suits in the room. He was pletely unaware of that and could have been easily killed by him had Stark wished so. Damn, he had great stealth teot that he was looking for it, his rexed mind and body not actively looking for threats anymore.

  Tony ignored his surprise and then handed over the shield to the suit which immediately opened up to reveal a whole host of traptions that immediately began sing and w on the small shield he had given Stark.

  “So, you still trol that?” Stark asked him without looking back as a remote hologram of some sort appeared in front of him that he immediately began w on.

  “Uh, yeah..” He said trailing, unsure of the dire Stark was taking this meeting.

  “Try and move it,” He raised an eyebrow at Stark’s order before he willed for the shield to e to him. He could see the suit’s hands jerk for a bit before it stopped, the sounds of servos whirring eg in the room. He raised an eyebrow at that and looked at Stark who motioned for him tain so he did, with increased focus. The hands jerked once again and the servos began making even more the shield did not move so he, like an anime character, raised both his arms towards the shield and just..pulled.

  He pulled with all his might and smiled because the servos finally gave out, pulling the robot towards him before his smile dimmed as the robot then simply activated repulsor arrays that were somehow embedded in his shoulder bdes, creating enough thrust to ter his force. Even then, he didn’t give up and pulled more and more until the robot was forced to run the repulsors at full bst. At this point, the jets were causing gusts of wind in the living room, scattering any paper and dropping vases left and right, a, he didn't stop pulling. Finally, with a herculean roar of effort, he pulled the shield..and the arms of the suit straight out of its sockets.

  “Shit!” Stark excimed but he had no time to even duck before the suit which had its repulsors arrays at full bst came barreling towards him. At the st moment, all he had was the shield he had taken from said robot which he raised in front of him, into which the robot crashed. There was a dull gong in the room as he was thrown straight into the window and then slid down like a cartoon character, looking at the smoking heap of suit that was attempting to stand up on its two legs before Stark snapped his fingers which finally caused the suit to go limp.

  “Stark, What the fuck!” He cursed out, looking at his semi-cracked shield. In the first pce, it had been under a lot of stress due to all the pulling done on it and then the suit had crashed into it at who knows eed, causing it to develop cracks. With a sigh, he willed the shield to disappear and stood up from the ground, and looked at Tony who was busy looking at the s that was being projected from his smart watch.

  “Not bad. More than expected. I see, so that’s what happened,” Stark tio mutter to himself, causing his ao increase until he created a barrier and covered the smart wat it, closing the holographic s. Stark stopped midair, looking ical as he had his hands drawn as if he was writing on an invisible s, only that he had no s to speak of at the moment.

  “You couldn’t wait just one more minute, huh?” Stark deadpa him, causing him to snort.

  “So, what data did you get from ruining one of your, no doubt, million-dolr suits, oh, wise Lord Stark?” He asked him snarkily, his mood a bit off because he was supposed to be rexing and sleeping in that bed that was so fortable it should be illegal.

  “Okay, first of all, I pay you, so the snark is not appreciated. Sedly, try multi-million dolr suit and thirdly, the data is something that will help you too so I don’t uand why a little lost sleep is making you so ky,”

  “The thing is Stark, I have not slept or rexed in over 24 hours, and just when I was about to sleep, you showed up with your killer robot suit which is now just a smoking heap of garbage in the living room floor,” He said to Stark in a calm manner yet his anger was radiating out the same.

  Stark paused and looked at the dition of the living room with a broken suit on one end, broken decorations like vases strewn about, and raised his finger, “You know what, you have a point. I have already collected some preliminary data and might have something for you tomorrow. Meet me at my house iernoon. I will send someoo pick you up. Now, good night,” Stark said before he gathered his smartwatd snapped his finger, causing another suit of his to reveal itself from its stealth mode which then promptly picked up the other suit a invisible as well.

  “Really, do I have to worry about another one of those staying after you leave and then killing me in my sleep?” He deadpa Stark.

  “Good night, Jack,” Stark waved him goodbye and marched out of the door. The suits presumably followed after him and closed the door, causing him to colpse on the couch with a sigh of relief and exhaustion.

  He took one look at the mess in the living room and decided it was the headache of the housekeeping services and dragged his body up to the bedroom and just colpsed ierly fortable bed. With a will, another barrier appeared above him whied across the room and turned off the lights, engulfing the room into the blissful darkness where he slowly drifted into the sweet lull of sleep.

  Word t - 2556

  Upto 15 extra chapters - P*treon