He had PS to spare thanks to the uproar caused by Tony's kidnapping.
A wide margin.
Eric opened the editor on his phone.
> [Channel selected: Marvel Shorts]<
Length: 3:12
Title: one word.
LEGACY
Black screen. Then white letters. And then a voice.
>[Is it better to be feared… or respected?
And I say: is it too much to ask for both?]
The world held its breath.
The missile fell from the sky like divine judgment, STARK INDUSTRIES stamped across it with obscene clarity.
The explosion swallowed the screen.
Tony Stark went flying, framed against his own creation.
The emotional impact hit instantly.
—"IS THAT… HIS?"
—"STARK MADE THAT?"
—"OH MY GOD…."
>[We have to start at the beginning.]
Cut to black. A cave.
>["What did you do to me?"] Tony.
Yinsen's voice answered, calm and steady.
>[What did I do? I saved your life.]
The montage continued.
>[Listen. What you saw… that's your legacy, Stark. Your life's work is in the hands of those thugs. Is that how you want to be remembered?]
The audience wasn't watching a trailer anymore.
They were witnessing a moral trial.
>[Is this the final act of rebellion from the great TONY STARK?] Yinsen.
Hard cut to Tony hammering, sweat and rage and genius fused into one brutal rhythm.
Then Tony holding Yinsen.
>["Thank you for saving me."]
Yinsen smiled.
>[Don't waste it. Don't waste your life.]
The internet detonated.
—"OH MY GOD, IT LOOKS SO REAL."
—"THIS ISN'T GOVERNMENT PROPAGANDA."
—"STARK WAS ACTUALLY KIDNAPPED."
—"IS IT EVEN OKAY TO UPLOAD SOMEONE'S PRIVATE LIFE LIKE THIS WITHOUT CONSENT?"
The video rolled on to Tony speaking to Pepper, and the entire vibe shifted again.
>[I shouldn't be alive… unless there was a reason. I'm not crazy, Pepper. It's just that I finally understand… what my mission is.]
No longer the arrogant magnate.
A man clawing for meaning, trying to find himself.
Then the armor. The music rose. The suit lifted.
>[And I feel it in my heart… that it's the right thing to do.]
Across millions of screens, people smiled without realizing it.
And then…
The press conference.
>[The truth is… I AM IRON MAN.]
Total blast radius.
—"HE ADMITTED IT."
—"HE'S NOT HIDING."
—"THIS GUY IS REAL."
But Eric didn't let the moment breathe.
Cut.
The Stark mansion. Nick Fury's silhouette filled the frame like a threat with manners.
>[Mr. Stark, you've become part of a bigger universe. You just don't know it yet.]
Tony, thrown:
[And who are you?]
[Nick Fury. Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. I'm here to talk to you about the Avengers Initiative.]
Global silence.
Then digital screaming.
—"INITIATIVE WHAT?"
—"AVENGERS?"
—"A TEAM?"
—"THAT'S THE DIRECTOR OF THE AGENTS WHO SHOWED UP IN THOR, I HAVE NO PROOF BUT I HAVE NO DOUBT."
—"AGREE WITH THE PERSON ABOVE. SO THEY'RE CALLED S.H.I.E.L.D."
---
S.H.I.E.L.D.
In a windowless room, Fury watched the video loop…
He didn't blink.
Beside him, Natasha Romanoff stood perfectly still, arms crossed, expression unreadable.
"So…" she murmured. "The world knows."
Clint Barton let out a disbelieving laugh.
"We just got publicly recruited and I didn't sign a damn thing."
Fury didn't answer right away.
The video kept going.
Howard Stark appeared in an old recording.
>[This is the key to the future. The technology of my time limits me… but one day you'll figure it out… and when you do, you'll change the world.]
A beat.
[But what is and always will be… my greatest creation… is YOU.]
All over the world, people swallowed hard.
Tony on screen:
>[Almost twenty years dead… and you're still teaching me lessons.]
> [Thanks, Dad.]
Clint rubbed the back of his neck.
"Okay. I'll admit it. That lands."
Fury folded his arms.
"Howard always believed in him. In his own way."
The video delivered its final blow.
The Battle of New York. Chaos everywhere. The Avengers together.
The world didn't understand… but it felt it.
>[THE IDEA WAS TO FIND AND BRING TOGETHER A GROUP OF EXCEPTIONAL PEOPLE… AND TURN THEM INTO SOMETHING MORE.]
Tony redirected a missile into space.
>[To see if they could work together when we needed them… to fight the battles we never could.]
Dead silence.
Then the internet exploded again.
—"THAT'S SPACE… MORE IMPORTANTLY THAT'S NEW YORK."
—"OH MY GOD… ARE WE GOING TO BE INVADED BY ALIENS?"
—"LOOK, THAT'S THOR FIGHTING NEXT TO IRON MAN. WHO ARE THE OTHERS?"
—"A GROUP TO DEFEND EARTH FROM EXTERNAL THREATS… DOESN'T SOUND BAD."
—"WAIT… THAT SUIT, THAT CAN'T BE… CAPTAIN AMERICA…."
—"HE'S ALIVE? HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE?…."
Then came the final scene.
Tony, unloading on Pepper.
>[I'm a mess, I'll admit it. Gods, aliens, other dimensions. I'm just a man in a can.]
He smiled, exhausted.
>[The only reason I don't lose my mind is because you live with me now. And I love that. I love you. I'm lucky.]
A pause.
>[But, honey… I can't sleep.]
End of video.
Everyone reacted differently.
But there were no immediate jokes. No instant conspiracy spirals.
There was something stranger.
Support.
After witnessing a city getting torn apart, even in a short clip, plenty of people recognized New York.
—"If this is real… count me in. I'd rather have an honest genius than governments lying. If threats like that are coming, we need people like that."
A lot of viewers already assumed gods existed. No one bought the government's press conference.
And now, this only locked the belief in place.
—"National propaganda? Aliens? Seriously?"
Plenty of skeptics remained, though. Their logic was simple: if it were real, why hadn't the government erased the channel? It looked like they didn't care at all.
Except by now, a swarm of hackers had confirmed it publicly:
the site was impossible to take down.
---
Brazil
In a quiet favela, a tired man with a scruffy beard and brilliant eyes stared at a small screen, stunned.
Bruce Banner.
"Avengers…" he whispered.
He recognized the green figure instantly, the second it appeared.
And what shook him wasn't the destruction.
It was the fact that he was fighting with a team.
He'd tried everything to get rid of the green guy. Everything.
Even suicide.
It hadn't worked.
So he'd chosen exile. Total distance from civilization.
Until now.
He rewound. Watched the battle. Watched the team lock in.
Watched Iron Man fly into space with grim certainty.
"At least…" Banner murmured, "I won't be alone in this."
He shut the screen off.
But he couldn't stop thinking about it.
---
Back at S.H.I.E.L.D., Eric closed the editor on his phone.
Not before leaving one final announcement.
[COMING SOON: IRON MAN – FULL MOVIE]
The counter climbed like it was possessed.
Thousands. Tens of thousands. Hundreds of thousands.
But Eric didn't smile for that.
He smiled because he'd called it.
"Now they're supporting them," he murmured, amused. "Before they even need them."
"And others still don't believe it's real. Either way… more profit for me." Eric dragged a hand down his face while he watched his earnings.
The system answered in silence.
[Collective shock: massive]<
[Public approval: historic]<
[PS: 30,000]<
Eric leaned back in his chair.
Yeah.
Uploading that video had been a very good idea.
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