In Deep

Receiving an encrypted e-mail asking Tony Stark to meet out in the Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Australia, Iron Man goes to investigate. He soon discovers that he has been summoned by his old friend the Black Widow. Natasha explains that she has contacted him in secret because it plays into per of her current mission. Stripping off his armor to relax, Tony asks Natasha if she wants to talk about what happened to the Avengers after the Onslaught incident. However, Natasha doesn’t want to talk about it and changes the subject othe mission at hand.

She explains that she has been hired by G.W. Bridge of SHIELD to investigate the disappearances of five scientists across varying fields over the past six months. She now wants to use Tony Stark as bait for whoever is kidnapping the scientists. However, there is only one caveat to this plan: Tony can’t use his Iron Man armor.

The next morning, in New York, Happy Hogan arrives for work at Stark Solutions after going out for breakfast with Doreen, a woman he has been casually seeing since he and his ex-wife Pepper got divorced.[2] Naturally, Pepper is jealous of this new woman and is concerned how Doreen is always around, particularly since they need to maintain a high level of security. As Happy tries to convince Pep that there’s nothing untoward going on, nobody notices when Doreen plants a bug under one of the desks.[3]

A week later, Tony and Natasha are staying at one of the finest hotels in Syndey. There they go out for some ballroom dancing in the hopes that the kidnapper takes the bait. As they enjoy their evening, Natasha admits that she enjoys her return to spy craft, having decided that she was unfulfilled playing the role of a superhero, particularly after leading the Avengers to their greatest defeat.[4] That’s when she notices the notorious German assassin known as Iron-Hand Hauptman has entered the room.[5] When Natasha confronts the war criminal he tries to attack her his with armored fist. While everyone is watching the fight, someone sneaks up behind Tony and knocks him out with a chloroform soaked rag and drags him away. Meanwhile, Natasha tricks Hauptman into ramming his fist into the punch bowl causing electrical feedback from his weapon and knocking him out. It’s only then that Natasha notices that someone has kidnapped Tony.

When Tony stark wakes up he finds himself in a cell of a secret facility somewhere out in the Australian outback. He is greeted by Araoha Tepania, the woman in charge, and takes him on a tour. He discovers that the kidnapped scientists are being forced to toil in an electronics facility to design servomechanisms and control systems for some mysterious project.[6] She explains that once all the needed work is completed, the scientists will be freed and that those who refuse to work will be put to death. Tony Tries to pump Tepania to find out who her employer is, but she sees right through this attempt. With his tracking device removed, Araoha tells Tony that there will be nobody to save him. He is then sent back to his cell to await for his work detail. Tony realizes that they are working on the designs for a battle station he uncovered in Switzerland, tying this outfit to the Arm’s Merchant who Tony has been hunting down.[6]

Biding his time over the next five days, Tony is put to work in the engineering pit working on some kind of manipulating armature. He is working next to Nigel Dabuta, a Kenyan inventor who specializes in surgical micro-assemblies. He questions Dabuta why he and the other scientists don’t fashion some kind of distress beacon so the outside world knows where they are. Nigel warns Tony that they are carefully watched by the guards who make sure every component used is accounted for. As they are discussing this, Tony is secretly rigging up just such a beacon, hidden in one of the parts he is assembling, using standard components. Sure enough, the moment the beacon is activated, the Black Widow picks up the signal. It takes until lunch time before she leads a SHIELD squad to raid the facility, prompting Tony’s captors to sound the alarm. When one of the guards escorts Stark back to his cell, he quickly incapacitates the man and takes his gun. He then heads to the sound of battle and finds the Black Widow is leading the charge.

Joining the fight, Tony and Natasha are shocked when Araoha Tepania suddenly transforms into a massive reptilian creature called Tuatara. The Widow tells Tony to get to cover, saying that Iron Man is on his way. That’s when he spots his briefcase on the ground nearby and realizes that Natasha smuggled it in for him. Grabbing the case and running for cover, Tony quickly changes into his armor and rejoins the fight. Iron Man keeps Tuatara busy while the Widow and SHIELD deal with her soldiers. Iron Man quickly discovers that Tuatara is incredibly strong and resistant to his weapons. Still, he manages to lure her outside, but the battle still isn’t going in his favor. Luckily, a squad of SHIELD helicopters arrive on the scene to bring reinforcements. Realizing that the battle is already lost, Tuatara decides to retrea and quickly burrows into the ground. Iron Man attempts to follow after her, but she is smart enough to collapse the tunnels behind her to prevent pursuit.

Later, Tony and Natasha are having dinner and discussing the situation. Although Stark is no closer to uncovering who the Arm’s Merchant is looking for he has decided that he is no longer going to take a passive stance on finding out who is responsible as Iron Man will be taking the offensive from now on.

Recurring Characters

Iron Man, Iron-Hand Hauptman, Black Widow, Happy Hogan, Pepper Potts, (in flashback) SHIELD (G.W. Bridge)

Continuity Notes

1. The majority of the Avengers were seemingly killed during the final battle with Onslaught in Onslaught: Marvel Universe #1. After wards, as detailed in Avengers Annual 1999, Natasha attempted to keep the Avengers going but a number of logistical issues arose forcing her to shut down the team and the mansion. Shortly thereafter, the heroes who were believed to have died where discovered existing in a pocket dimension and returned to their proper reality, as seen in Heroes Reborn: The Return #1-4. The Avengers were reformed in Avengers (vol. 3) #1-4, but Natasha — still sore after her inability to sustain the team in the absence of its founders — decided to go off on her own.

2. Happy and Pepper had been married since Tales of Suspense #91. However, more recently their marriage fell apart, leading to a divorce as explained in Iron Man (vol. 3) #4.

3. Little does anyone know that Doreen is actually a spy working for the Mandarin vis-a-vie the Spymaster and his Espionage Elite. She has been hired to bug the Stark Solution’s office which will happen in Iron Man (vol. 3) #6. This will bite Tony in the ass as it will inadvertedly lead to Spymaster and his group to learn his secret identity in issue #8.

4. She’s referring to Onslaught again. She also mentions how she was once a Russian spy but defected to the United States. Natasha was a Russian spy since her first appearance in Tales of Suspense #52. She would later defect to the United States in Avengers #30.

5. You might remember him as a member of the Red Skull’s Exiles, as was the case during his first appearance circa Captain America #102.

6. These devices will be used in the Mandarin’s new dragon shaped flying fortress as we’ll see in Iron Man (vol. 3) #9-10.

7. Iron Man has been investigating the Arm’s Merchant since Iron Man (vol. 3) #2-3.