101 Dr Who? -99

"You have until tomorrow."

Those words were as heavy as a death sentence to the three people left alone in the room. They knew that while close to having the suit done, it wasn't there just yet. Even working all night might not be enough.

"I guess we aren't getting much sleep tonight then." Conner said sadly as he went over to a box containing packs of tasteless but very nutritious jelly.

The good doctor, as Tony has jokingly called them, due to the brand name of Dr Jelly, had been a godsend in this godforsaken cave.

With what little food they were given by their captors, only the extra nutrition from the jelly has allowed them to keep working hard without getting sick or loosing too much weight.

"Alright then, eat up, we are going to need every bit of energy we can get if we want to survive to see sundown tomorrow." He said, throwing a pack to Tony and Yinsen.

"When I get out of here, I'm going to buy this company and shut them down for making this tasteless slob." Tony said with a grimace as he finished the pack as quickly as possible to get it over with.

"If you have time to complain, you clearly aren't working hard enough, Tony. If you want to live, get working." Conner said as he wasted no time in getting to work.

Tony sighed and got to work, hammering out the metal pieces one by one while both Yinsen and Conner were starting on the mess of wires and electronics that needed to be done to get the suit moving once assembled.

As the hours wore on, the cave was filled with the incessant clanking of metal, the buzzing of arc welders, and the soft clicking of circuit boards being assembled.

Yinsen's hands moved with a surgeon's precision, carefully connecting the electronics that would control the suit's critical functions. Every so often, he would adjust his glasses, his brow furrowed in concentration, aware that even a small mistake could prove catastrophic under the circumstances.

Conner was by his side doing the same. However, he needed to be told what to do since he didn't understand this kind of science like the other two. Yet he was very good once he got going and did cut down the time needed by a good amount.

"Hey, Yinsen, make sure those servo motors are synchronized. I can't have this thing locking up on me when we're trying to make a break for it," Tony shouted back, wiping sweat from his brow with the back of his armored glove.

 Yinsen nodded, replying with a calm assurance that only made Tony work faster. "I've double-checked them, Tony. Just focus on your part. We need this suit fully operational by morning."

As night deepened, the sense of urgency grew. They knew their captors would not be merciful if they discovered the true purpose of what was being built in the shadows of the cave. Every moment counted, and the pressure was palpable.

Finally, the time came to put it all together, finally came the time to make their move and take back their freedom. However, as they were busy fitting Tony into the suit, what they feared happened.

They had gotten the attention of their captures. While they didn't yet know what was happening, it would only be a matter of moments before the cat was out of the bag, and once that happened, Tony needed to be in that suit and fully operational.

Frantic, Conner and Yinsen worked with desperate speed, securing the final plates of armor as the distant shouts of their captors echoed through the cave. "They're coming!" Yinsen hissed, his eyes darting to the entrance as he tightened a bolt at Tony's wrist.

Suddenly they started banging on the door, screaming in a foreign language. "What are they saying?" Tony asked.

"I don't know, they're speaking Hungarian." Yinsen stammered nervously.

"Then speak Hungarian!" Tony no less nervous than the others, requested such an absurd thing as speaking a new language all of a sudden.

Whatever it was, Yinsen did say, it certainly didn't do the trick as moments after the door was opened and the improvised explosive attached to it went off. Killing the two terrorists outside, blowing the doors off their hinges, and very much alerting all the other terrorists that something was wrong.

"Quickly initialize the power sequence." Tony hurried them off, and Conner quickly started typing away on the keyboard, and within moments, the progress bar appeared.

As the bar slowly started to fill up, agonizingly slowly, they heard shouting outside the cave.

"More are coming!" Conner warned, his eyes wide as he glanced at the entryway, the damaged door hanging precariously. He continued to frantically type commands into the interface, accelerating the initialization sequence as much as the system would allow.

Tony, now partially suited up, could feel the suit powering on, the familiar hum of the reactor blending with his accelerating heartbeat. "Speed it up, Conner!" he barked, glancing over the interface readouts himself.

Yinsen stood guard by the improvised entry, picking up a fallen weapon from one of the incapacitated terrorists. His hands, though accustomed to the delicate work of electronics and surgery, now gripped the cold metal firmly, ready to defend their last stand.

As the shouting grew louder, the harsh beams of flashlights started sweeping into the cave, casting long shadows that danced across the rough walls. Tony could see the fear and determination in Yinsen's eyes as he turned back to him. "It's almost ready, Tony. Just hold them off a little longer."

"We won't make it." Yinsen whispered as he realized that they wouldn't have enough time like this. Looking back at Tony, a man he had once hated for the horrible weapons he had made, yet learned to respect and see as a new person after his stay in this cave.

"I'm going to buy you some time!" He yelled and ran out, firing wildly around him as he ran through the cave. Ignoring Tony's shouts to stick to the plan.

"Fuck" Cursed Stark as everything started to fall about.

"No plan survives first contact with the enemy." Muttered Conner as she shut his eyes and took a deep breath.

"No time to wait, Stark; get out of here, make a change if me and Yinsen get out good, but if we don't, then ensure your legacy isn't one of death and terror." Conner said as he placed the helm and mask on Tony's head.

"Not you as well, Conner; we are all getting out of here together." Tony said, though whatever it was to himself or Conner, he wasn't sure about.

The chaos in the cave reached a crescendo as Conner finished fitting the last piece of the helmet onto Tony. The shouts of their pursuers grew louder and closer. Tony's suit powered up fully.

 "Tony, you need to move now!" Conner shouted over the noise, his urgent but calm voice a stark contrast to the pandemonium outside.

Yet before Tony could reply, the air shook from the sound of gunshots ripping through not just the air but also Conner's body. Sending a mist of blood through the air.

Tony stood shocked and unable to react as the shooting came to an end. From where the terrorists stood, they couldn't see Stark as he stood there frozen at the sight of someone who had saved his life dying like that.

One of the terrorists went up to check the body. Something snapped Tony out of it, and he attacked him, sending him flying through the air with broken bones from the sound of it.

The others opened fire and emptied their clips into the dark room, which gave Tony a perfect chance to eliminate them without a problem.

Once the area was safe, he quickly checked on Conner; sadly, there was nothing he could do; he wasn't responsive.

This merely reinforced his determination, and after a silent prayer, Tony went off to find Yinsen, hoping he would find him alive.

As he navigated through the cave, he encountered resistance. Armed guards, startled by his appearance—something out of their worst nightmares—fired wildly. But the suit, designed for both defense and assault, held firm. Tony dispatched them quickly.

He didn't find Yinsen until he was almost at the exit and rounded a corner. Seeing him lying down and wounded allowed Tony to get distracted for a moment. At this point, the terrorist leader fired a grenade at him. Thankfully, it missed, and Tony returned with a rocket, which took him out.

Stark quickly kneeled down at Yinsen's side.

"Stark" He weakly said.

"Come on, we got to go." Tony urged and opened up the face mask, allowing him to properly see the state Yinsen was in.

"Where is… Conner?" Yinsen asked.

"He… He didn't make it, but we will. Move for me, come on. We got a plan. We're gonna stick to it." Stark said, pushing aside the loss of Conner for now.

"This was always the plan, Stark."

Stark, not wanting to lose another friend, tried to urge Yinsen to move. "Come on, You're gonna go see your family. Get up."

"My family is dead." Yinsen admitted. "I'm going to see them now, Stark."

"It's okay, I want this. I want this…."

Tony could only sigh, knowing that he couldn't do anything, knowing that he had failed yet another friend. "Thank you, for saving me."

"Don't waste it. Don't waste your life." Were his last words, his last wish for Stark.

"Thank you," Tony whispered, his voice thick with emotion. He adjusted Yinsen's head to rest more comfortably. Standing up, he closed the mask of his armor, the metallic click echoing starkly in the now silent cave.

Walking to the mouth of the cave, he saw the sky for the first time in a while. He also saw a large amount of terrorists lying in wait for him.

They also saw him and opened fire, yet thankfully, the suit held, and he was unharmed. As he returned fire, they, however, weren't as lucked as they burned alive.

It wasn't pretty, but it was effective and allowed Tony to fight his way through their lines. Screams and explosives filled the air, and pullets whipped all around.

The sheer amount of firepower the terrorists had available to them was pushing Tony's suit to its limit. At one point he even found himself trapped and kneeling in the sea of fire of his own making.

It was at this point he was happy that Conner had insisted on adding some extra insulating padding to the suit when showed the plans for the flame throwers.

He had scuffed at the idea, found it a waste of time and recourses, yet now he was glad that he had allowed Conner to add it. Or he really might have had his eyeballs burned out from the eyeholes in the mask.

As it was, even with the extra padding and glass to protect his face, he was still struggling with the heat.

Thankfully, the fire was spreading wildly around and forced the terrorists to ease up their shooting to get away. Which allowed Tony to get back up and activate the primitive flight capabilities of the suit.

It was just in time, moments after the fire caused all the ammunition and weapons to explode. The massive explosion that followed aided him in getting air as he was thrown high into the sky.

Not that he stayed in the air for long. Another thing Conner had pointed out could happen. Tony quickly pulled the cord to release the parachute.

Which sadly had burnt quite a bit, so it only slowed his fall down a tiny bit before he fell into the sand. The suit pretty much disintegrating on impact.

 However, it had done its job. Tony was alive, and he had escaped. Clawing his way out of the suit, he started to wander through the desert, hoping to find help soon.

He was in luck, as just some 15 minutes later, he spotted the large helicopters flying straight towards him. He screamed and yelled, waving his arms above his head in excitement as they landed not far from him.

Exhausted but relieved, Tony stumbled towards them. However, as he got closer, he was surprised to see that they didn't come out toward him. Instead, they seemed to be unloading some stuff.

When he finally got there, he stepped onto a large carpet they had rolled out and fell under the shade of a large parasol. A sun lounger and a small table had also been placed.

"Good to see you alive Mr Stark." One of the men dressed in a black suit said as he came up and shook the confused hand of Tony Stark.

"It looks like you have seen better days, come, have some water." He continued as if everything was normal and handed Tony a glass of cool ice water.

Tony, for one, just took the glass, too confused to fully react until he felt the cold in his hand. At which point, he greedily drank the water and enjoyed the ice on his tongue, and he crushed them up.

"We got plenty more where that came from. Though first, maybe a quick shower?" The man once again confused Tony as he pointed off to the side where some of his men were sitting up at a small portable pool.

Some 20 minutes later, Tony lay down on the sun lounger, having just cooled down in the cold water they had filled the pool with, and put on some new clothes—his size at that.

To one side of where he lay was a small table, the other one of his own Stark ice coolers, the kind he had brought down here months ago for the weapons demonstration.

This one just as equally filled with fine liquor. Pouring himself a drink, he couldn't help but sigh as the taste washed over his tongue. "Got anything to eat as well?"

"Just some chips, I'm afraid." The same man as before answered and waved another one over with a few bags of chips in his arms.

"Guess it will have to do for now." He muttered while opening the bag. If it hadn't been for the dull glow on the reactor on his chest, barely hidden by the shirt he was wearing, he almost looked like nothing had happened.

"Can I offer you some sun jelly?" The man asked after a moment and held out yet another item. Tony normally didn't like being handed things, but stress and confusion reigned for now, and he just took the small plastic item.

 It wasn't until he looked at it and saw a familiar face, one that had haunted him for months now, that he properly reacted. "Who are you people?" he said as he looked up from Dr. Jelly's smiling face.

A/N

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