00162. Government contracts.

00162. Government contracts.

Once the deal with Fury was completed. Theo showed Fury all the houses he currently owned in the neighborhood and said, “Just pick whatever one you want. But you won’t be able to move in for about a year.”

Fury nodded as he looked over the map before he pointed to a house a couple blocks away from where Theo lived. It was one of the larger plots of land and had a two story house already built on it.

With that out of the way, Fury said goodbye and Theo decided to take a day off from training. After being exposed by Fury, he just wanted to relax a little and decompress. So the first thing he did was go visit Tony. Was it the best way to do that? No. But Theo always found enjoyment whenever he messed with Tony.

Within ten minutes Ezekiel stepped out of a portal and into Tony's lab, where he found Tony and Pepper. They stood incredibly close to each other as they talked and for a moment Ezekiel thought they might embrace. Ezekiel couldn't help it as he smirked to himself as he watched them for almost a minute. They were so engaged in their conversation, that the rest of the world didn't seem to matter to them.

Ezekiel finally let out a loud, disappointed sigh when he realized nothing was going to happen though. That sigh made both of them jump and step away from each other before Tony asked, “Ezekiel? When did you get here?”

“A while ago. But I saw something interesting, so I waited to see if anything else would happen.” Ezekiel said.

Pepper was slightly flushed as she said, “It's nice to see you, Ezekiel.”

Ezekiel smirked before he said, “It’s good to see you too, Pepper.”

Pepper turned to Tony and handed him the documents in her hand as she said, “Remember to read through those for the meeting tomorrow.”

Pepper with her face still flushed said, “Sorry I can’t stay and chat, I need to go take care of something. Bye, Ezekiel.”

As she moved towards the door Ezekiel said, “It was nice to see you too.”

“Welcome back, Ezekiel.” JARVIS said as Pepper left the room.

“Why don’t you ever greet Ezekiel when he arrives?” Tony asked as he moved towards his main workbench with the documents.

“Because Ezekiel instructed me not to greet him until after someone else notices him, unless the room is empty.”

Tony frowned slightly as he asked, “What? Where is your loyalty, JARVIS?”

“It is of course towards you, Mr. Stark.”

Tony placed the documents down as he said, “Then how come you listen to him more then me?”

“To be fair, you also listen to me a lot.” Ezekiel said with a slight smirk.

“That’s because it normally turns out to be fun. Speaking of fun, what brought you by today?” Tony asked with interest.

“Not much. I just wanted to see if you were working on anything interesting and new.”

Tony sat down in his desk chair as he said, “Nothing you haven’t seen already… Well I have a couple of military contracts, but I’m not sure if they will pan out. The R&D branch has worked on them for a while now and haven't gotten out of the initial concept phase.”

“I’m pretty sure they will get canceled in a few months. But Obie wants me to personally look into them first.” Tony said as he pulled out his phone and started to play on it.

Ezekiel moved closer before he sat on top of one of the tool carts and asked, “What kinda projects?”

Tony, immersed in a phone game, pointed to the documents on his desk as he said, “Both of the project details are in those folders. I need to review them and help consult with the teams tomorrow and hopefully give them some direction.”

Ezekiel spun his hand in a small circle in front of himself and created a portal next to the documents on Tony’s desk before he reached through it and grabbed them. Once he had them he started to look through them both. The first project was for a new type of sonic/sound based weapon.

Ezekiel thought about it for a few moments and realized this is the contract that made Tony build that device Stane used in the first movie. It was some type of sonic noise device that stunned people. Ezekiel glanced over the current ideas and concepts for the device. It looked like they had a few ideas for it, but everything in the documents was large and bulky in their theoretical designs.

Ezekiel set the first project aside and picked up the next one. It was a request to design a new type of body armor. They wanted it to weigh less than the standard military body armor, be more breathable and of course be cost efficient. Actually they wanted it to be as cheap as possible, since the US was currently just ramping up its ‘war on terror.’

Ezekiel scanned through the idea's Stark R&D came up with and shook his head. They had a few ideas on what they could change or modify. Unfortunately it was basically the same thing the US government already used. Some different types of material and some changes to the design to help it breathe and wick away sweat better. But overall it was the same thing already being used since they couldn’t come up with anything better than kevlar.

Ezekiel placed the documents down before he pulled out his tablet and started to look for some files on it. After a few moments he selected a few files and copied them before he sent them to Tony’s computer as he said, “Check your share folder, I sent you something.”

“Uh? What?” Tony asked as he looked up from the phone game he was playing.

Ezekiel pointed to the computer as he said, “I just sent some files to your shared folder.”

Tony placed his phone down and started to look at his computer as he asked, “What’s this for?”

Ezekiel lifted up one of the project folders as he said, “Help for this.”

Tony scanned through the files for a minute or two before he asked, “Spider silk?”

“Yup.”

Tony’s eyes narrowed slightly as he frowned lost in thought before he said, “I don’t see how this could work.”

Ezekiel used his tablet for a few moments before he sent another file to Tony as he said, “Take a look at that.”

Tony glanced at it then looked at Ezekiel with a flat look as he said, “I already know that. The problem is creating it and the fact that spider silk wouldn’t be strong enough to stop bullets.”

Ezekiel sent another file to Tony as he said, “That’s the formula to create different types of spidroins and an easy way to mass produce it using a modified 3D printer. It hasn’t been tested yet, but the theory is sound.”

Tony started to read through everything as he said, “This could work, but the issue would still be its ability to stop a bullet properly.”

Ezekiel shrugged as he said, “Just intermix it with something else and then layer it a bunch. Spider silk should be able to absorb three times as much energy as Kevlar before breaking. Actually, if you play with those formulas a little, I’m sure it could be even stronger.”

Tony was still reading as he nodded along and said, “Maybe build the 3D printer to intermix the spider silk with a thin layer of carbon fiber…”

“I don’t know if that would be a good mix. Wouldn’t the carbon fibers make it stiff and ruin the flexibility?” Ezekiel asked.

“Only if we added resin to it. But just the fibers themselves will be fine and the spider silk would hold it all together.”

Tony smiled as he looked up at Ezekiel and said, “Portal us to Stark Industries, we need to do some shopping.”

Ezekiel smiled back as he dropped off the tool cart and created a portal. About an hour later they returned with a couple of carts full of parts, equipment and other things Tony said he needed. As Tony started to direct Ezekiel on where he wanted stuff, the door to the workshop opened and Happy walked in. He frowned slightly as he said, “Why did you take off and leave me here?”

Tony waved off Happy’s comment as he said, “We just went to get a few things.”

“But I’m your head of security. How can I do my job properly if you take off without me?” Happy asked.

“It’s fine, we just went to the company. Plus I was with Ezekiel.” Tony said as he placed a box of parts on his desk.

Happy let out a sigh before he said, “While I have no doubt Ezekiel could easily protect you. It would be nice to be able to do my job properly and not be left behind.”

Ezekiel tried to change the subject as he asked, “How are things going with Anna?”

“Great! We have a small trip planned next week when she is finished shooting her next movie.” Happy said with a silly grin on his face.

“That’s good to hear, I’m glad everything is working out for you two.” Ezekiel said as he finished unloading his cart.

“It’s all thanks to you. If you didn’t force me to talk with her at the launch event, I doubt we would be together.” Happy said.

Ezekiel shook his head as he said, “I didn’t force you to do anything. I just sat at her table with you and helped make an introduction. You did everything else.”

Before Happy could respond Ezekiel’s phone went off as Let’s Dance by David Bowie started to play. Ezekiel went to answer his phone as he said, “Just a second Happy.”

Ezekiel answered the phone as he said, “What do you want Madara?”

“Of course I know what time it is, but I told you, I’m not training today.”

Ezekiel pinched the bridge of his nose as he said, “Just go spar with Guy or Hashirama.”

“I’m not coming, I already have plans.” Ezekiel said with a sigh.

“No, if you’re really that bored, put on a body cam and go test it out. Just make sure you don’t kill anyone or destroy anything.”

“Fine, if you do a good job we can spar later tonight when I get back... Alright, bye.” Ezekiel said before he hung up his phone and put it away.

“Who was that?” Happy asked.

Ezekiel shook his head as he said, “Someone annoying, just like Tony. Except while Tony cares more about cool technology and having fun, that guy only cares about fighting.”