66 Ch66. Stealing the Destroyer

Tony and Natasha spent in the restaurant two hours already, talking and waiting for the Destroyer to finally show up.

For the pinnacle of the Asgardian technology, the crappy automaton was taking its sweet time...

It was afternoon when Tony and Natasha heard a commotion and looked out of the window of the restaurant, finally seeing a tornadolike cloud of dust gathering outside of the city.

"It looks a bit more impressive in reality." Natasha said as the first gadget of Tony activated, sending them a mental image of what was happening there.

"Yeah, I'd rate this entrance 4/5. The only thing it lacks is a cool phrase." Tony added, his eyes looking into the distance.

Natasha chuckled at that. "Loki would be delighted to get such ratings from you, I am sure."

"I don't give a shit what Loki would or wouldn't be." Tony mock scoffed, "But I am grateful to him for bringing me a new toy."

"So? How are we going to do this?" Natasha asked.

"Hmm..."Tony looked at the street, noticing Thor and his companions readying themselves up for a fight and his eyes gleamed. "Let's wait a bit. No reason to fight when we have such fine warriors about to take care of the 'getting smacked around' part." He spoke in a tone full of sarcasm.

They ordered another serving of french fries with ketchup from the frantic and panicking waitress as they waited for the dramatic fight to unfold.

The only thing missing was popcorn.

...

Seeing the fight between the Destroyer and Thor's friends was quite astonishing for Tony and Natasha. The Destroyer was trying to blast things and for the most part, he was succeeding with his opponents having no way to stop him.

Unfortunately, Tony's wards were not strong enough to prevent damage. It would have taken a lot of energy to stop these blasts of Destroyer too. Instead, Tony focused his arc reactor powered ward to transport every normal person on the border of the ward, far away from the fight.

At least there won't be any civilian casualties this way. Only a few tens of confused people swearing they teleported.

Well, the mental asylum workers would be jumping from joy, at the very least.

Tony was glad he decided to observe first. The Destroyer was like a better version of his Iron Man armor that didn't need a pilot.

His pride was deeply hurt.

No wonder Thor was not very impressed with Tony's armor in the past. Tony only now realized it wasn't that Thor thought Clint and Rogers to be better warriors. It was simply that Tony's armor was nothing new for him since he already saw a better version.

To compare the two, Tony could not match these blasts of energy. He could barely produce one before his arc reactor would need time to recharge and yet, the Destroyer was blasting things right and left without a care in the world.

That left a sour taste in Tony's mouth but it also showed him he was still a tad bit too arrogant for his own good.

His arrogance definitely stemmed from the fact Thor was not his favorite Avenger but he quickly understood he was not strong enough to face off Asgardians yet. Not directly, at least.

His army of golems could possibly cause massive casualties for Asgard in an all-out fight but Tony realized he would not win such a conflict. Not yet.

A fire was lit in Tony's gaze and his resolve to get the Destroyer's remains only strengthened.

Tony knew the big part of Destroyer's strength was Asgardian's magic and their particular type of energy and he won't be able to replicate it fully. He also knew it was the Asgardian's energy that was making the Destroyer so strong.

It had nothing to do with technological knowledge or engineering genius. It was a simple armor hooked on a superior energy source powering a multitude of powerful enchantments. That much Tony could tell even from far away.

He also could tell the creator was an idiot.

There were just so many ways to make the armor better but no. This was simply brute-forcing it and making use of the strength of the power source to the highest degree. With the level of energy contained in these blasts, the Destroyer should have been capable of blasting an entire street to smithereens if it was powering up sufficient weapon systems rather than just condensing it into a single beam.

The fight went mostly how Thor described it to Tony in the past except for some embellishments that didn't happen but who doesn't exaggerate their actions nowadays?

Tony really couldn't blame Thor for that.

When Thor regained his powers and summoned the storm, both Tony and Natasha had their eyes twitching, wondering why he didn't do something like this against Chitauri. It would have definitely helped a lot...

But his power also made Tony that much more convinced he had to finish his current research on the way Extremis connected a person to a dimension. When Thor lifted the Destroyer into the air, Tony realized that having an army of golems was fine but without personal strength, it would be for nothing.

The Destroyer was defeated soon enough, signaling for Tony the start of his own operation.

He looked at Natasha who nodded back and left the restaurant as Tony activated an illusionary ward anchored by four rods powered up by an arc reactor that encompassed the entire town.

Thor confidently walked towards Jane Foster, pride swelling in him at how easily he defeated the Destroyer. Unlike other times, he was also filled with a big sense of purpose. He had to get home and find out what was going on!

But then he suddenly felt energy fluctuation from behind him and abruptly turned around.

The cloud of dust was instantly dispersed by a powerful gust of air and Thor only had a glimpse of the Destroyer's remains disappearing in a portal of some kind as a grey-skinned noseless alien of a race he didn't recognize regally stood in front of him.

Tony was channeling the mannerism and appearance for his illusion from his encounter with Ebony Maw.

"Where did you take the Destroyer, stranger? Return it! It doesn't belong to you." Thor spoke.

"It does now, oh, pitiful meaningless animal." Ebony Maw said with a completely straight face that made The Warriors Three and Sif bewildered while Thor's expression faltered.

Realizing a fight was the only way to regain the Destroyer, Thor spun his hammer and threw it at the grey-skinned newcomer...

Only for his eyes to widen when the hammer went straight through his opponent's body, dealing no damage as if he was not there.

Thinking it was some kind of illusion, the same as Loki was fond to use, Thor bellowed, "Come and face me, you coward!"

Ebony Maw just raised his eyebrow at Thor as if mocking him.

"Hmph. I don't have to do anything, you muscle-headed retard." He genially and calmly quipped as if talking to an unruly slow child, "It is called tactics, something your thick head will never understand so don't try."

Thor tried to attack again, throwing his hammer into Ebony Maw only for it to once again just harmlessly pass through him.

"You don't learn easily, do you?" The Ebony Maw chuckled, "This is just a projection. I am not really here, you slow-witted failure. Alas, my mission here is finished. Goodbye."

And with that, he disappeared into a thin air in front of Thor's angry eyes.

In reality, Tony just dissolved his illusionary ward since a long confrontation was meaningless. Natasha already retrieved the Destroyer into a heavily warded underground base on Mars where no tracking or scrying magic would be able to find it.

The cloud of dust Thor caused by dropping the defeated Destroyer onto the ground was certainly very helpful in that regard.

Sighing to himself and happy that his plan worked, Tony also dissolved the ward preventing Heimdal from looking into the town.

There was no way the Asgardian gatekeeper would be able to locate the Destroyer with his sight. He didn't see the portal and will have no idea where the Destroyer was taken so that was another failsafe.

All in all, the plan went off without a hitch while Tony got several eye-openers about his current place in the world.

And he definitely did not like the realization of how weak he currently was.