Manhunt, Part 4

Tony Stark, aka Iron Man, is in a lot of trouble. One of his old weapons was used to blow up the Chinese Embassy in Washington, DC. After a failed hit put Happy Hogan in the hospital, Tony finds himself being investigated by SHIELD and the FBI. All evidence points to Stark being bribed by North Korea to attack China. However, Stark suspects that this is a frame job orchestrated by Temugin, the son of the Mandarin. Although he himself is injured, Tony has gone AWOL so he can try and clear his name.

After Iron Man fled custody, FBI agent Neil Streitch has threatened to arrest his closest confidants, Pepper Potts and Happy Hogan, even though Hogan is still in a coma. Pepper, feeling betrayed after by Tony,[1] has given Agent Streitch a device that can deactivate Iron Man’s armor. She asks him to do her one favor, don’t humiliate Tony when they bring him in.

Meanwhile, Iron Man has captured a man named Jang who was being tortured by Kang-ho Soek, a North Korean businessman who has also been implicated in the frame job. Iron Man briefly collapses on a rooftop because he is still recovering from gunshot wounds. When Jang tries to escape, Iron Man uses a repulsor blast to break his hand. He then crushes his victim’s ankle. Stark threatens to torture Jang if he doesn’t reveal who is really behind everything. Jang keeps on muttering about the “ten rings”, adding to Tony’s suspicions that this is the work of Temugin.[2] Before his prisoner can confirm this, his head suddenly spontaneously combusts, killing him instantly. After patching up his wounds and making repairs to his armor, Tony determines that the kill switch in his minion’s head was activated by an old UHF signal. He just needs to set his helmet scanner to wait for someone using that frequency again and pinpoint their location.

Not knowing how long this will take, Tony rents out a cheap room. Since he is a fugitive of the law, Tony bleaches his hair and shaves off his facial hair in an effort to disguise himself. Over the next few days the manhunt for Tony Stark intensifies as his company’s stock plunges. The media is also anticipating that Captain America, on behalf of the Avengers, might make a public appeal for Iron Man to turn himself in. Using his armor to hack into the phone grid, Tony tries to call Rumiko Fujikawa. She pretends the call is from her aunt because the FBI is currently turning over her apartment. She is relieved Tony is calling her, but begins to tear up when she learns he is only calling to find out how Pepper and Happy are doing.

At Founder’s University Hospital, Pepper sits by Happy’s bedside. Tearfully, she instantly regrets betraying Tony because this is easily the worst thing she has ever done to him. When Happy suddenly wakes up, it startles Pepper that she recoils. However, when he reaches out to her, she puts her hand out.

Three days later, Tony finally narrows down the strange signal. He fellows it to an alley in Chinatown where two men are making an exchange. That’s when he spots two things. The first is a strange advertisement that reads “KCI” and a phone number. That and FBI Agent Streitch pulling up on the street. The latter is easy enough to explain since the FBI are tailing people. When Neil looks in Tony’s direction, he panics and runs. This prompts Streitch and his partner to give chase, but Stark manages to lose them in an abandoned building scheduled for demolition. While fleeing from the FBI, Tony noticed that Streitch had the kill switch for his armor and realizes that even Pepper has turned against him, although he can’t really blame her.

Once he has lost the FBI, Tony decides to call the number for the strange posters he saw earlier. He agrees to meet with Yu, the man who answers the call to talk about who hired him to ruin Tony’s life. Yu is willing to meet as long as Tony agrees to not be wearing his Iron Man armor. Tony agrees and reveals to Yu that he figured out the coded message on his posters because KCI is the chemical composition for potassium chloride, the poison that an assassin tried to kill him with when he was recovering in the hospital. Yu admits that he hired that assassin and confirms that he is working for Temugin. When Tony asks why he is turning on his master, Yu explains that his family worked loyally for the Mandarin and he for Temugin. They did so loyally in the hopes that they would one day be granted permission to meet the master. He also has another surprise for Tony: The plans for Tony’s old torpedo schematics were found on a surplus government hard drive that the Pentagon neglected to whip.

Not sure if he can entirely trust Yu, Tony tells him about how Jang’s head exploded when he tried to interrogate him. While Yu never trusted Po — Temugin’s right hand man — wanted to implant him with a transmitter. Stark fakes him out, claiming that he has been jamming the kill signal since they met. He then tosses Yu a device he claims will keep jamming the signal until he can get to a hospital and have the implant removed. However, this is all a trick, the device is a remote taser that knocks Yu out so he can search his car for more clues and information. After find a bunch of parking tickets, Tony tips the FBI on to where they can find Yu’s car.

Tony goes to the location on all the parking tickets and scans the area for a building that is sending out any strange signals. The key source is a office building. Changing into Iron Man, Tony comes crashing into the building, and sure enough, it is a criminal hideout. As he searches for his foe, Temugin manages to get the drop on him. Iron Man is struck with enough force that he realizes he shouldn’t have come charging in while he’s still recovering from injuries. Temguin, now wearing his father’s Ten Rings of Power, is prepared to finally fulfill his destiny by destroying Iron Man.

Recurring Characters

Iron Man, Neil Streitch, Pepper Potts, Happy Hogan, Rumiko Fujikawa, Mandarin, Po

Continuity Notes

1. Pepper and Happy were struggling to have a child. When Pepper finally got pregnant, she suffered a miscarriage when she was attacked by one of Tony’s foes in Iron Man (vol. 3) #54. She didn’t want to tell Happy and swore Tony to secrecy. The secret drove a wedge between Happy and Pepper. Not wanting to see his friend spiral into alcoholism, Tony revealed the truth to Happy in issue #65.

2. Iron Man states here that the Mandarin is dead, at least that is what he believes after their last encounter in Iron Man (vol. 3) #9-10. However, the Mandarin is still alive and will turn up again in Iron Man Director of SHIELD #16. In the meantime, his son — Temugin — has taken his place, as seen in Iron Man (vol. 3) #53-55.

Topical References

• The TV in Tony’s rented room is depicted as a CRT model that uses an antennae to pick up signals. This should be considered a topical reference as this is now an obsolete technology.

• Tony contemplates spoofing John Ashcroft’s private line to call Rumiko. Ashcroft was the Attorney General at the time this story was published. His tenure in the role ended in 2005. As such, this reference should be considered topical.

• Rumiko’s cell phone is depicted as a flip phone with physical buttons and an antennea to pick up signals. This is another example of obsolete technology.