Chapter 28 Plans for the future (demise of my enemies)

I was sitting next to Burstein on a couch in my "lobby" as we stared in silence as across the room, Melvin Potter was eating his lunch.

Or trying to, anyway.

The process of actually bringing the sandwich that Betsy had packed for him to his mouth was made significantly more difficult by a petulant dinosaur trying to get said sandwich for herself.

Even though she had raided the fridge we kept in the workshop not even ten minutes ago.

A lot of people were giving Burstein the stink eye as they held him responsible for all of their lunches now being inside the blazing insides of a baby T-Rex, but while the scientist was morosely hanging his head and watching the noses of his sneakers, I could spot some of the men and women slip the little dino some snacks under their desks, careful not to show Burstein.

A fire breathing juvenile T-Rex was a headache and a half, and something that had no place in modern society.

She fitted in just fine in my workshop, if the little smiles she kept getting were anything to go by, as she strutted around, warbling at people as her curious eyes took in her surroundings.

Currently however, the little T-Rex had eyes solely for Melvin's sandwich.

The blacksmith of course just went on with happily munching on the lunch his girlfriend made him, completely ignoring the fire breathing dinosaur sitting at his feet.

Said dinosaur didn't take too kindly to that apparently, judging by the low growl coming from her.

With a sudden leap, she jumped at the sandwich in Melvin's hand, her jaws snapping shut mere inches away from her target, as the blacksmith calmly held her back with his other hand.

"No! Bad dino!"

Angry at being denied her prize, the T-Rex instead decided that the hand on her body was a much more accessible target, and with a yowl of victory she threw herself on Melvin's hand, her jaws chomping away with glee.

Melvin, being superdurable, took this as calmly as one would take a newborn kitten batting away at them, lifting his hand as he stared at the dinosaur with a raised eyebrow, as she kept clinging on with just her jaw, her legs dangling off the floor.

Giving a little shake, making the T-Rex swing side to side, Melvin's brow furrowed as he tried to lose the reptile that was clinging to him like a limpet, her teeth scraping across his unbreakable skin without leaving a mark.

"Bad dino! Let go!"

Not taking my eyes off this spectacle, I started talking with Burstein, who looked on with something between resignation and panic clear in his eyes.

"You do realize why making her was a bad idea, right?"

"I told you, Michael, I never actually expected this to work! I mean, honestly, creating a dinosaur?! That's impossible!"

I inclined my head pointedly at where Melvin had given up on gently shaking the T-Rex loose, and instead had just decided on giving a wide swing with his arm, making the dinosaur sail off further into the workshop with an indignant yowl.

She'd be fine, Extremis combined with her natural toughness, even at such a young age, would make sure of that.

"And yet…"

"I know. I know, okay!"

"I mean, I put up a sign and everything…"

"Look, turning my theories about manipulating the genetic structure of an organism into practical experimentation was a bad idea, I get that now and it won't happen again, I promise."

I was about to respond when I saw the little T-Rex come flying through the air in an impressive leap at Melvin's sandwich, jaws opened wide, but the blacksmith turned away with a surprising amount of grace, letting the dinosaur sail by with an indignant squawk.

Melvin of course just kept eating like nothing happened.

"It's not that you put your theories into practise that pissed me off Noah. I'll be honest, your research is pretty amazing and the fact that you could actually pull it off blows my mind. But making a dinosaur? It's not something we can afford to deal with right now Noah. Hell, it's something we can never really afford to deal with! T-Rex was estimated to weigh in at around 8 tonnes, do you have any idea what an animal like that can do when juiced up on Extremis, with brains to boot?"

Watching numbly as the little dino decided to tackle Melvin himself instead of his illusive sandwich, I could do nothing but look on as an extinct reptile the size of a medium dog barrelled into the unbreakable blacksmith, toppling him from the couch he'd been sitting on.

"Why couldn't you have experimented on something smaller? Like mice? Fluffy cute little mice. Everyone uses mice, you know."

Burstein's amused snort takes me off guard, and I glance at him from the corner of my eye in question.

"You'd prefer Extremis-enhanced rodents? Really?"

Turning to look at him fully (thereby blissfully avoiding having to look at the wave of heat and angered yelling that's now firmly out of my view) I give my answer in the sternest voice I can manage.

"I'd prefer all animals not on Extremis in the first place, thanks."

Seeing the scientist look down in guilt I let out a deep sigh.

"Look, like I said, the research itself is incredible. Not only mapping the genome as extensive as you did, but manipulating it as well… the medical applications are through the roof. If you could make this work on humans, then we could make designer babies a reality. An entire generation of humanity that will never have to suffer from genetic diseases. A generation that will always be at the peak of health, one that could live for centuries."

"You know people are going to protest us changing humanity in such a large way."

"A minority. A vocal one, true, but still. The majority of the people will want in on this, and the more important minority, the one at the top, the one with actual power, they'll pay and do anything for perfection."

"It's one step closer to the Omni-Cure."

For a moment, both me and Burstein are silent, as the true ramifications of what he has done start to sink in with us.

"I'm pulling you away from our indestructible armour production. You said it yourself, the procedure is as good as it can be with the facilities that we have here, and Melvin knows enough about it to lead that team on his own. It's only about six people and they all like him, it shouldn't be a problem."

"Then what will I be doing?"

"Take over from Sterns. My meeting with Hogarth went very well, and most of what we came up with in order to stay ahead of Stark I will put in the hands of Mason, he's probably the best of us at tech, even better than Sterns. He and his team can handle the workload, after all we just need enough for proof of concept and personal use, we'll sell the designs for mass production to the big companies anyway."

"You want me to take over from Samuel? Alone?" Burstein asked, his tone an odd mix of hopefulness and nervousness.

Before today, I had only ever allowed Burstein to assist on Sam's various projects, with the egghead always taking the lead. Noah had always been fine with this, recognizing that even brain boosted as he was, Sterns raw intellect still outclassed his by several levels. Both being geneticists, they generally got along pretty well whenever I put them to work on something, like the Rejuvenation Serum that had turned out instrumental in getting Hogarth on my side.

Other than the leather-production though, he had never headed any such projects on his own.

And considering his own independent foray let to Melvin rolling around on the floor of the warehouse, tangling with a live dinosaur as he desperately pushed her nose away from his sandwich, well…

I could understand why he was surprised that I was essentially promoting him.

"I trust you to come up with a solution whenever I present you with a problem. Sam himself told me that you could handle the stuff I currently have him working on for me on your own. He's much more interested in the Pym Particles. Or soon to be Cross Particles, I suppose. He wants to see if their unique properties allow for cold-fusion. Applying that level of tech to the Arc Reactors…"

"Since when is Samuel an expert on low-energy nuclear reactions?"

I couldn't help myself.

"Since last night."

Seeing his incredulous stare, I chuckle and elaborate, desperately trying to ignore the way that Melvin just grabbed the T-Rex by the tail, swinging her around his head a couple of times, before throwing her back into the workshop again.

"Ever since I told him that I wanted to get on board with Pym Technologies, he's been researching it on his down-time. So around two to three weeks or so. Most of the theoretical research has been done already, but nobody out there knows how to put it into practice. Sterns might."

Getting an understanding nod from my scientist we both turned back towards the couch on the other side of the room, Melvin sitting down with a contended sigh as we did, smoke coming from his shirt.

As we watched, a bedraggled, exhausted looking dinosaur trudged over towards him, climbing onto the couch with some difficulty due to her short hands, before she finally settled on the cushion next to Melvin, resting her head on her tail with a pout.

It was the first time I'd seen a dinosaur mope.

Then again, before today I had never seen a dinosaur at all, so for a while it would be a time for a lot of firsts, I suspected

"Are you… are you going to, you know? Terminate her?" Burstein asked hesitantly, afraid of my answer, but willing to abide by my decision all the same.

I meant what I said to him. We can't afford a distraction like a fire breathing dinosaur. Maybe not ever, but definitely not now. Not when Stark threw me for a loop by stepping into the corporate ring with me, willing to play ball and showing in his opening move that he was far better and more experienced with it that I was. Not when Hogarth was leaning on me to release tech that would end up pushing the way humanity lived forwards by at least a decade.

Not when the Hand was out to drastically and permanently increase the distance between my head and my neck.

Preferably by using a sword.

No, I definitely meant what I said. It was the smart thing to do. There would be people out there that would argue that it was the right thing to do as well. And after all the blood that was already on my hands, what more was one animal, especially one that could monumentally disrupt my plans?

And yet…

As I looked on, I couldn't help but smile as Melvin raised what was left of his sandwich to his mouth, before he looked over at the sad little dinosaur sitting next to him. And of course, being the gentle soul that he was, Melvin gave a sigh and held out his lunch towards the T-Rex.

The little murderlizard looked up in surprise, looking closely at the blacksmith with a calculating gaze, wary for any traps. Then, fast as lightning, the sandwich disappeared into her fiery gullet, the T-Rex having an immensely pleased expression on her face as she licked her chops.

As Melvin let out a hearty laugh when the dinosaur burped, spouting forth a torrent of flames, I turned towards Burstein with a half-smile.

"No. She's ours now. We'll just have to deal with it, I suppose."

Seeing his relieved expression, I give him a pat on the back (sending him nearly flying from our couch) as I stand up and start walking over to my desk, throwing a last barb over my shoulder as I see Melvin leaning back into the couch, patting the little dinosaur on her sleepy head.

"You're going to walk her though! And feed her! And clean up after her!"

"What?! NO! Michael! Michael, you can't do this to me! She'll eat me alive! Michael!"

"Have fun you two!"

"MICHAEL!"