Stark Wars: Chapter 2 - Glitch

The armored mercinaries known as the Raiders are attacking a military air transport bringing equipment to a nearby airbase. When boarding the cargo jet, they toss one of the crew out the door. Luckily, Iron Man is there to save him. The hero is out hunting those who have incorporated stolen Iron Man tech into their armor and the Raiders are the next targets on his list.[1] The Raiders, unaware of Iron Man’s mission, look forward to this rematch after they almost beat him during their last encounter in Dallas.[2] In the protracted battle, Iron Man manages getting a negator pack onto all three of the Raiders, bricking the electronics inside their armor and rendering them helpless.

The news of the Raiders arrest soon reaches Edwin Cord, the man who backed their creation. He is furious that Iron Man has once again interfered in his affairs.[3] Now that Iron Man’s crusade is starting to generate negative press, Cord believes that he now has the opportunity to get Project: Firepower off the ground and finally get his revenge.

Returning to Stark Enterprises, Tony changes out of his armor and decides to take some time to relax and then focus on his fledgling business. He calls Jim Rhodes, who is down in the hanger, and asks him to come up and meet with him. That’s when Bambi Arbogast comes into the room with a stack of messages that have came in while Tony was away. They are mostly from lawyers suing Tony Stark for Iron Man’s recent heavy handed treatment of their clients and media inquiries. When Jim finally arrives he has a number of Stark staff following in behind him. Chief among them is Tony’s lawyer Bert Hindel who is concerned about the lawsuits leveled against the company by both Stilt-Man and the Controller’s cult, both of whom Iron Man had recently attacked. Marcy Pearson, Tony’s head of public relations, is also concerned over Iron Man’s actions as they are creating negative publicity for the company. Tony deflects their demands and after a call from Abe Zimmer, his resident hacker, says he has private business to conduct. Jim is forced to follow along, leading to Marcy become frosty when he asks if they are still on for their date that evening.

Tony and Jim fly to Accutech, a subsidiary of Stark Enterprises, where Abe operates. He has parsed the information they stole from Justin Hammer and parsed the list of people he sold stolen Iron Man tech. However, there was a glitch in the data and so Tony cross-references the information with the West Coast Avengers’ database to find out who it might be. Although there are a number of uncertain variables, the computer matches the information with Stingray, a government operative. This puts Tony in a dilemma because even though Stingray isn’t a villain, he can’t be certain that he can keep the technology of his suit out of enemy hands.

That’s when Tony gets a priority message from the West Coast Avengers and he heads out as Iron Man to find out what they want. At the Avengers Compound, Hawkeye has called a meeting because they are concerned by Iron Man’s recent actions. He can’t go into details about his plan, but Iron Man assures them that it is important and asks them to trust him.

As he leaves, Tony gives a call Rae LaCoste and asks her out on a date. They two meet up to play some tennis together. However, when Rae brings up Iron Man’s recent activities, Tony suddenly loses interest in their game anymore. Meanwhile, Jim is having his date with Marcy Pearson. However, when she pressures him to convince Tony to let her meet with Iron Man, Jim gets evasive. This leads to an argument between the pair, and Marcy decides it would be better if they leave. While Jim has struck out, Tony ends up spending the night with Rae. After a relaxing evening, Tony has finally made up his mind regarding Stingray and decides to act.

Later that day, Tony has Jim fly him to Hydrobase, the East Coast Avengers headquarters where Stingray operates.[4] Approaching Stingray as Iron Man, Tony tries to reason with him. However, since his suit is government property, Stingray refuses to hand it over. This leads to a battle in the ocean, giving Stingray the advantage. However, despite being in his native element, Iron Man manages to incapacitate Stingray. Upon closer examination, he discovers that the Stingray suit doesn’t contain any Iron Man tech and he made a horrible mistake. Bringing Stingray back to Hydro-Base, Iron Man apologizes. This doesn’t do anything to prevent Stingray to report what happened back to the government.

When Tony Stark returns to his company, Marcy and Bert are demanding answers regarding Iron Man’s attack on a government agent. With the situation growing out of hand, Tony calls a press conference. Its here that Tony tells the media that Iron Man has gone rogue and is acting on his own and announces that he has fired the Avenger as his spokes person.

Recurring Characters

Iron Man, Raiders, Stingray, Jim Rhodes, Bambi Arbogast, Abe Zimmer, Rae LaCoste, Marcy Pearson, Bert Hindel, Justin Hammer, Edwin Cord, Stingray, West Coast Avengers (Hawkeye, Mockingbird, Wonder Man, Tigra)

Continuity Notes

1. Tony Stark discovered that his technology was stolen by Spymaster and sold to Justin Hammer, who in turn sold components to other armor wearing individuals. This revelation was discovered last issue.

2. Iron Man and the Raiders previously clashed in Iron Man #145.

3. Edwin Cord ran afoul of the hero in Iron Man #145 and 156 respectively and did a little bit of jail time as a result.

4. At the time of this story, the eastern Avengers team relocated to Hydrobase following the destruction of Avengers Mansion by the Masters of Evil. See Avengers #273-278. This will remain the status quo until Hydrobase is sunk in issue #311.

Topical References

• Jim states that he needs to use Lava to wash the engine grease off his hands. This should be considered topical as this is a real world product.

• Marcy Pearson refers to Iron Man’s as having a new Dirty Harry image. Dirty Harry is a franchise of films about Harry Callahan (played by Clint Eastwood) a no-nonsense cop who shoots first and asks questions later. Most of these movies, while entertaining, are authority power fantasy movies. However, this is a dated reference because the last Dirty Harry movie came out in 1988. The character was considered a bad-ass in the 80s, but not so much by today’s standard.

• Tony and Rae name drop the tennis champs that they play with. They are Martina Navratilova and Ivan Lendl. These name drops should be considered topical at 65, Navratilova retired from playing professional tennis in 2006. Lendl retired from tennis in 1994.

• After their evening together, Rae brings Tony a bottle of Perrier bottled water. This is topical as it is a real world product.