The stealth armor appeared out of thin air on the rooftop. Nick Fury turned around, glanced at the silver armor, and frowned slightly: "Stark."
"Sorry, but Mr. Stark is not home right now." The Iron Man armor tilted its head, and a voice came from the speaker, "I am Mr. Stark's bodyguard. If you have any business, you can talk directly to me."
According to superhero comic traditions, protagonists generally do not easily reveal their secret identities. Although Iron Man broke this tradition by revealing his identity from the first movie, it was not like this in the early original Iron Man comics.
In the early comics, the traditional Tony did not publicly announce that he was Iron Man. But of course, as a superhero, Iron Man flew around the world fighting every day, covered from head to toe in hundreds of Stark-exclusive patented technologies. Even if Stark didn't admit it, any fool could see that this armor definitely had countless ties to the Stark family.
So in the comics, Tony simply claimed to the public that Iron Man was his hired bodyguard. Although the armor indeed used Stark technology, the identity of the wearer was never made public.
There were rumors that it was a retired S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, and also rumors that it was never just one person, but a whole team taking turns wearing it.
But in short, Iron Man's true identity remained a mystery. For a long time, even within the Avengers, it was not known that Iron Man's wearer was their biggest financial backer, Tony Stark himself.
Tony felt that compared to the self-exposure in the movies, handling it this way would probably be safer for him, so he also planned to refer to the comic Iron Man's approach.
However, Nick Fury didn't seem to buy it: "We all know it's you inside the armor, Stark. Only your arrogant head can fit into that helmet, and I don't think you would allow anyone else to wear this armor."
Tony had long guessed that this bodyguard story probably wouldn't fool S.H.I.E.L.D. After all, ever since Tony Stark fought his way out of the cave wearing the Mark I, he had been a key focus of S.H.I.E.L.D.
But it didn't matter. Whether the other party believed it or not was their business; he just continued his act regardless.
"Please do not speak ill of Mr. Stark, Director Fury," Tony said rigidly.
"Fine, whatever you like."
Fury didn't dwell on exposing the other party's identity, and instead asked:
"How did you find this place? Did you track Natasha? That's not an easy thing to do. As far as I know, no one has ever successfully tracked her until now."
Tony: "There's a first time for everything, isn't there?"
Tracking by conventional means was of course impossible. After all, Natasha was one of the world's few super agents; counter-tracking was the most basic of basics.
But while Tony was a layman in tracking, he was top-notch globally when it came to high-tech.
Not long after Natasha left his villa, she was bitten by a mosquito.
It was summer, a time when mosquitoes were dense. The Stark mansion was also a villa by the sea. Passing through that area, insects were rampant, so getting bitten was extremely normal and hard to raise suspicion.
But what bit her was not an ordinary mosquito, but an electronic mosquito Tony had deployed around the villa early on, essentially a micro-drone. On one hand, it could monitor the situation around the villa, and on the other hand, it could silently implant a nano-tracker into any intruder.
Tony spent some time specifically researching this. At this stage, the nanotechnology in the Marvel world was not as mature as in the later movies. Trying to use it to develop armor, heavy weapons, and transform freely like the Mark 50 nano-suit in Infinity War was still a bit far off.
But if it was just injecting a tracker effective for twenty-four hours into a target's blood vessel, this level was completely achievable.
This also belonged to high-tech; the number of people in the world who could make such a thing, including Tony, could be counted on one hand. So even the most experienced and seasoned agent would have no way to guard against technology she had never even heard of.
But of course, Tony couldn't leak such trade secrets, so he immediately changed the subject: "Mr. Stark is very curious. Is S.H.I.E.L.D.'s daily mission to indulge in surveillance and espionage activities on outstanding taxpayers? Or can you really not find anything else to do?"
"You have become my problem, Stark," Fury said grumpily. "I have much more important problems to deal with in the Southwest than you. But I have to save your little life. By the way, no need to thank me."
Fury turned around, looked the armor up and down, as if trying to see Tony's expression through that cold faceplate.
"Also, have you started experiencing some health issues recently, Mr. Stark?" Fury asked.
"Yes, regarding this part, Mr. Stark also expresses his willingness to talk to you in detail." Tony paused, emphasizing, "Especially regarding the legacy his father, Mr. Howard Stark, deposited with S.H.I.E.L.D."
Fury remained calm on the surface, but was secretly shocked.
He sent Natasha to monitor Tony, get close to him for assessment and observation, and ultimately did plan to return the materials Howard left with S.H.I.E.L.D. to Tony.
Because those were Tony's things to begin with, and only in Tony's hands could they be valuable.
In the last century, Howard Stark had already discovered a way to find a new element. He called it the "key to the future."
But unfortunately, limited by the era he lived in and the overall level of technology at the time, Howard Stark did not have enough technology or tools to extract the new element he discovered.
So he left these with S.H.I.E.L.D., and left a video for his son Tony Stark, instructing that when the time was right, these must be given to Tony. Only Tony had enough wisdom and technology to complete the unfinished business of his time.
However, all of these should have been S.H.I.E.L.D. secrets.
Although Fury intended to tell Tony these things, he hadn't said it yet, right?
How did the other party know?
Fury's gaze was sharp, but his eyes, adept at capturing micro-expressions and seeing through anyone's heart, were completely useless against the silver-white hunk of iron in front of him.
Could it be that this guy Stark... has spies inside S.H.I.E.L.D.?
Fury pondered for a few seconds, temporarily suppressing the doubts in his heart: "Fine. Then you... notify your arrogant boss to wait at home. It seems we need to have a good talk."
Fury paused, emphasizing: "Without the flashy armor."
Since things had come to this, the timing was about right. Fury thought about it; his original plan was to have a good talk with this problem youth sooner or later anyway. There was no better day than today, so he might as well have someone bring Howard's data over today.
And he was also getting a bit tired of talking to this guy playing dumb through the armor like this.
"Okay, I promise to deliver your message, Director Fury." Iron Man said, ripples appearing on the armor again as it returned to stealth mode. "Mr. Stark is already waiting for you at home. You know the address."
After speaking, he disappeared.
Nick Fury sighed.
Tonight was truly going to be a sleepless night.