Afghanistan. May, 2008.
The explosion shook the earth. Sand scattered into the air like ash. Metal screamed. A convoy of Humvees burned in the midday sun as gunfire rang out in the desert pass. The Ten Rings moved in—swift, brutal, efficient.
Among the wreckage, Tony Stark lay broken and bloody, his designer sunglasses shattered, his tailored suit torn. The metal shrapnel embedded in his chest ticked time toward death.
This was the moment the world would change.
This was when Iron Man would be born.
Victor Ashburn already knew it.
---
Los Angeles.
Half a world away, Victor stood in a skyscraper suite that didn't exist in any public records. Floor 33 of a financial firm's headquarters — a floor bought, cleared, and remade by shadowed hands. The lights were dim. The windows blacked out. Monitors lined the walls, each one tracking data, surveillance, and stock fluctuations.
A shadow soldier stood at attention behind him, silent and still — once a data broker who had sold secrets to terrorists. Now repurposed.
Victor didn't turn from the monitor showing Stark's convoy in ruins. The footage had been scrubbed from public view, but Victor had his ways.
> [SCAN COMPLETE – Subject: Stark, Anthony Edward]
Status: Critically Injured
Location: Kunar Province, Afghanistan
Timeline Event: Divergence Imminent
He exhaled slowly.
"So it begins."
---
Victor's empire had grown, unseen, in the four years since his arrival. Over 200 shadow soldiers operated worldwide — assassins, spies, hackers, financiers, even former intelligence officers.
Each one an echo of a fallen sinner.
Each one now a loyal instrument of Victor's will.
And each one helped push the world toward its inevitable shape — without ever being noticed.
---
He paced across the dark floor, his coat trailing behind him.
Stark's capture meant Obadiah Stane would move soon. SHIELD would start poking around. And Victor had no interest in being noticed by Nick Fury—not yet. But watching the Avengers form? That he intended.
He tapped a monitor. A holographic interface appeared with flickering data.
> [Shadow Asset: "Wiretap" – former CIA mole]
Embedded in: Stark Industries
Status: Active
"Wiretap," Victor said calmly. "Update me."
The soldier's voice came from a nearby speaker, low and metallic. "Stark went dark 12 hours ago. Obadiah's covering it up. Internal communications locked down. Board's panicking."
Victor nodded. "Begin acquiring more shares. Push through dummy investors. Quietly."
"Understood."
He turned to another monitor.
> [Inventory Assets: $1.9B (liquid), 6.7% Stark Industries holdings (hidden)]
It was time to invest more heavily.
---
That night, Victor walked through the industrial ruins of East Los Angeles.
A gang war was brewing between a cartel faction and an offshoot of the Ten Rings operating on American soil. It was too convenient to ignore. The Ten Rings were never just a local issue—they were tied to Stark's story. To the power vacuum that would ripple through the world once Stark built his first suit.
Victor stepped into the abandoned refinery and let the shadows rise.
The Ten Rings soldiers inside barely had time to scream before their weapons were pulled from their hands by shadow tendrils. Their bullets hit nothing. The darkness swallowed them.
He didn't speak. He didn't show his face.
When the blood stopped flowing, he stood in the silence of the corpses, eyes glowing violet.
> [Shadow Extraction Available]
> Shadow Soldier Created: "Rama" – Ten Rings Lieutenant
Shadow Soldier Created: "Ash Fang" – Explosives Expert
He looked at Rama. "How deep does your network go?"
"All the way to Gulmira, master," Rama rasped, his voice like gravel dragged across stone. "That's where they're holding the genius."
Victor smiled. "Keep feeding me data. Do nothing yet. Let the story unfold."
He turned to leave. "But watch him."
---
Weeks passed.
The world assumed Tony Stark was dead.
Victor knew better.
Through shadow-routed surveillance, he watched Stark survive the cave. Watched Yinsen sacrifice himself. Watched the man hammer together a crude iron suit under torture and scrutiny.
It was beautiful.
Messy. Imperfect. Human.
But most importantly — it was inspiring.
Victor didn't want to stop Iron Man.
He wanted him to shine — because he knew what came next. Thor. Cap. Loki. Ultron. The Snap.
Victor wasn't here to play hero. He was preparing for everything after them.
---
In the shadows of a downtown parking garage, Victor met with a man named Devon Knox — or rather, the shadow of him. Knox had been a weapons dealer for both sides of the Afghan conflict. Now, he was dead, and his shadow served Victor.
Together, they stood over crates of captured Ten Rings weapons.
Victor opened one and pulled out a prototype missile shell. He scanned it.
> [Weapon: Jericho Missile (Stark Tech)]
Status: Unstable Prototype
Trace Signature: Authentic
Obadiah Stane Acquisition Chain – Confirmed
So Obadiah had been selling Stark's weapons under the table. Just as Victor expected. He could expose him, but that would disrupt the timeline too soon.
Instead, he let it all play out.
He whispered to Knox. "Leak this crate to a SHIELD contact. Just enough to make them curious."
"As you command."
Victor placed the shell back in the crate and turned toward the night. His soldiers melted into shadow, leaving no trace.
---
One month later, Stark escaped the desert in fire and thunder. The world watched in shock. Obadiah fumed. Pepper panicked. SHIELD took notes.
Victor?
He simply watched it all from a rooftop across the ocean.
In the darkness, his system pinged.
> [Adaptation Progress: 5.4% – Now Immune to IR Scanning, Bone Fracture Recovery Accelerated, Nanometal Familiarity Level: 1%]
Each step forward Stark made in tech, Victor mirrored in silence.
His shadows infiltrated R&D labs. His scan ability allowed him to study advanced machinery without touching it.
He didn't need a suit.
He had death as his armor.
---
On a silent night in June 2008, Victor stood in the vault of a dead billionaire's compound. His bodyguards were now shadows. His secrets? Absorbed. His collection? Stored.
In his inventory now rested hundreds of rare metals, schematics, and AI prototypes Stark hadn't even dreamed of yet.
And in the middle of it all, Victor finally spoke aloud:
"The world thinks its story begins with Iron Man."
He looked at the darkness swirling around him.
"But the shadows began moving long before that."
---