Marvel: Incursio

A lot was going through Tony's mind as he stared at the cubes. Not only did he have many questions for Liam, but he was also thinking about what he could create with the vibranium.

'It won't be enough for a full armor,' he thought. 'But I could integrate it into the armor, likely making it partially indestructible.'

'Using around half a pound could upgrade the arc reactor, possibly even allowing it to supercharge. Energy density would increase by five- to sevenfold. The important part is its energy-absorbing property—no more energy wasted on heat since it will reabsorb it, I also won't need freezing systems anymore. Not to mention, with more efficient use, it'll allow me to fight a lot longer.'

Tony analyzed. 'Overall improvement—at least sixfold compared to my current arc reactor. That's without including other changes made possible by the remaining nine and a half pounds.'

Having analyzed many possible improvements, Tony made a decision.

"25 million per pound," Tony offered, expressionless.

"90." Liam countered, knowing Tony had bid far below what it was actually worth.

Tony looked at Liam for a second, then started laughing. "I can tell you now, no one's going to pay that much per pound," he said. "Best I can do is 50, and even then, Pepper will skin me."

"Are you sure no one will pay more? Even SHIELD?" Liam asked, not falling for Tony's tricks. "80 is the lowest I'll go."

"60," Tony countered again.

"75," Liam said firmly.

"62."

Both of them understood they wouldn't fall for the usual tricks, so they didn't bother with them anymore. They haggled a few more times before finally reaching an agreement on the price.

"68 million per pound it is," Liam said, standing up to shake Tony's hand.

"Pleasure doing business with you," Tony said, shaking Liam's hand.

Internally, he was even more pleased. The auction price for vibranium would have been much higher, possibly reaching 100 million per pound. He doubted Liam didn't know that— so far, Liam didn't seem stupid.

'There's likely another reason behind it,' Tony thought, walking back over to his wine cabinet after shaking Liam's hand. 'Whatever it is, doesn't matter to me.'

"To celebrate, this bottle of 1945 Romanée-Conti," Tony said, holding it up while grabbing larger wine glasses from the cabinet.

This particular wine had three bottles auctioned for over 500,000 per bottle, with Tony winning all three bids at a total of 1.5 million dollars. Since then, he had only saved it for important events and deals.

While Tony poured wine into both their glasses, Liam couldn't help but feel satisfied. Naturally, he also knew that selling it at an auction would earn him more money. But there were two negatives to that—the possibility that it would land in the wrong hands and the time it would take.

'I would've been lucky if all ten pounds had been sold by the end of next year,' Liam thought, taking a sip of his wine. 

"Good wine," Liam said, raising his glass in the air before lowering it and taking another sip.

"One of the strongest there is," Tony said, doing the same.

After drinking an entire glass of wine, they made some small talk until Tony suddenly asked a strange question.

"How'd you know?" Tony asked, taking a sip of his second glass of wine.

Curious about Tony's strangely normal behavior, Liam kept observing him.

"Know what?" Liam asked, confused.

"Justin Hammer," Tony answered, spinning his wine glass between his fingers. "After you pulled your little disappearing act at the Expo, I did some digging."

"Turns out, the same day you executed Ivan, an explosive-grade compound was found in the possession of two prison guards. You know, the kind that would be great for a breakout," Tony said, glancing at Liam.

Liam simply smiled. He hadn't expected there to be any real clues which would justifying him killing Ivan back then—that's why he hadn't argued or tried proving anything.

'I don't know exactly what Tony found, but this is good for me,' Liam thought, looking at the smirking Tony, who continued talking.

"Now, here's where it gets interesting. These two guys? They'd been seen hanging around Hammer's facilities outside of work. And guess what? Right before their shift that day, they both had some very generous deposits put into their bank accounts."

Tony leaned slightly forward now. "So, you're not gonna tell me this is all a coincidence?"

"It wasn't," Liam replied simply, taking a sip from his wine glass. "As you might have expected, Hammer wanted to use Ivan to copy your tech."

Nodding, Tony leaned back again. "I assume Ivan is the one who would 'claw his way back up to hurt me,' then?"

"How'd you figure that out?" Liam asked, a little surprised to hear Tony refer to something he had said right after killing Ivan.

"Hammer's an idiot. He wouldn't be able to make… well, anything. Even with a hundred-year head start," Tony said, taking another sip. "Ivan, on the other hand, built that suit by himself with barely any materials. If he got his hands on Hammer's tech, he could've likely made stronger versions of his old suit."

Liam nodded. In the movies, it was a little different since Ivan also used drones, but this world wasn't a movie anymore. Who knew what would've really happened?

"I still don't think killing Ivan then and there, based on speculation, was the right move," Tony said, staying true to his opinion. But he no longer held a bad impression of Liam—he could see now that there had been a real reason behind it.

Tony's opinion about Liam had changed little by little over the past few months. At first, he had a very bad impression of him because Liam had killed a defenseless man and then refused to explain himself. That impression only worsened when Jarvis reported more incidents.

Naturally, the fight between them didn't make Liam look any better either. Especially after leaving him and Rhodey bound for half an hour, thinking back about it still annoyed Tony regularly.

Once he cooled down, he investigated Liam more deeply. While doing so, Jarvis showed him footage of arrests inside the same prison where Liam had killed Ivan. Finding the situation somewhat odd, he looked deeper into what had happened and discovered Hammer's involvement.

From that point, Tony realized many things weren't adding up. He remembered the red light flying through Obadiah's head before Obadiah could shoot him. With Liam being near the vicinity, Tony couldn't see another person who could've helped him.

Then, the car collision supposedly caused by Liam. Why 'supposedly'? At first, he couldn't understand or find any good reasons for what had happened, outside of Liam running onto the road and fleeing afterwards. But after seeing what had happened at SHIELD with Hydra, things fell into place.

Finally, the one thing he couldn't solve was the murders in London. There was absolutely no proof that Liam was connected to the crime scene at all. But something just wasn't adding up—scorch marks, eaten flesh, sudden explosions, and scratches found later. He couldn't explain what had happened there.

After investigating all of this, his impression of Liam became questionable for a while. He had no idea what Liam's real goals were. It didn't help that Liam disappeared for months, even years at a time, only to show up whenever an incident happened.

But then, a few months ago, something major happened—news from Greece that hit every station worldwide and had people talking about it for months. That gave Tony even more to think about.