Ch34. You are making...

Tony was in his workshop, working on something that resembled Iron Man suit quite a bit.

After the trouble in New York, he understood that he was way too lax. Just because no trouble would happen for a few months yet didn't mean he could continue putting constructing one off.

He wasn't happy with being sidelines when it came to dealing with the gang that stole from him. But he could admit that while his nanobot clothes would protect him from bullets, they lacked weaponry. At most, they could give him a blade at their current stage because Tony would first have to make an Iron Man suit for the nanobots to be able to mimic it and transform themselves into it.

Since there was no Iron Man suit created in the world yet... tough luck.

Not to mention it had to be a specially made suit because there were some technologies nanobots could not fully imitate. Just because they could take the necessary shape did not mean the inner workings would actually work.

Frankly speaking, Tony's nanobot Iron Man suit was one of the most complex technologies Tony ever developed in his life because they were simply a shell of his suit. A very durable and incredibly flexible shell but a shell nonetheless.

Creating the shell was simple as he demonstrated by making the nanobot clothes. Making this shell be capable of being powered up by the Badassium-based arc reactor while ensuring that everything would work as it should? Now that was the real problem.

Comparing the nanobot Iron Man suit to the nanobot clothing was like comparing a real-life skyscraper to a tower made from lego.

When he first developed this nanobot technology, he had to completely redesign his suit to make it compatible with it.

Hence, what he was doing now.

It galled on him to be sidelined but unfortunately for him, his close combat abilities were... well, he thought they were passable but the number of times he ended on his back during his spars with Natasha apparently disagreed.

If he wanted Natasha to not protest his participation the next time a fight breaks out, Tony needed his suit back.

Sure, he could use magic... and admitting this was a bit embarrassing for Tony... but he did not focus on combat 'spells' all that much.

What? There was simply far too much magical crafting to be explored! Artificing and Alchemy, for example! How could anyone opt for learning some insignificant combat magic when there was a way to make bonafide magical trinkets... Tony simply couldn't understand how the low IQ folks thought.

Why invest time into learning a spell that can blow things up when you can invest it into creating a magical weapon capable of blowing things up. Repeatedly.

No brainer, really.

While Tony worked the door to his workshop suddenly opened and Natasha walked in, holding some documents.

She looked around the workshop and stopped in her tracks when she saw a...

"Is that an Iron Man suit?" She involuntarily asked in surprise.

She did not expect Tony to really construct one. From what she saw, he held some subconscious aversion to it from his past. The Iron Man suit symbolized his hero days and he definitely did not want to be a hero again. That's why Natasha thought the Mystic Arts was his new 'niche' and the Iron Man suit became just a distant memory for him.

Seeing Tony working on one really shocked her to the core.

Natasha blinked, recollecting herself, and smiled in amusement when she realized Tony was so immersed in his work he did not hear her exclamation. Shaking her head in exasperation, she quietly walked behind him... and abruptly dropped her free hand on his right shoulder with an audible 'pam'.

Tony instantly flinched before slowly pulling his hand towards his chest, "You almost gave me a heart attack." He breathlessly uttered, instantly realizing who was behind him.

"You should be more aware of your surroundings." Natasha lightly rebuked and Tony rolled his eyes at her.

"I have JARVIS for that." Tony bit back but then he realized it was quite a weak excuse considering how close she got to him without J warning him. "Speaking of which... J are you slacking?"

"No, Sir. Miss Romanoff was deemed to be safe, maybe even beneficial for your continued well-being." JARVIS snarked and Tony's jaw dropped at the cheekiness of his A.I.

"You... You conspired against me! I thought I raised you better than that." Tory exclaimed in a mock-outrage, looking between Natasha and the place from which JARVIS's voice was coming.

"Negative, Sir. I am acting according to the protocols you have set." JARVIS replied and Tony looked at Natasha in disbelief.

"Would you believe that?" He asked her, causing her to laugh at him and give him a sympathetic look but her following words were anything but.

"Listen to your A.I., Tony. He got a point."

"Of course, you would say that! He was praising you!" Tony cried out.

Natasha just shrugged and pushed the documents in her hands in front of him, "Stark Industries documents. Pepper needs your approval for some things."

"Hmm? Sure." Tony took them from her hands and started reading what he was about to sign.

"You are making yourself a suit again?" Natasha idly asked as she sat down on a nearby chair

"Nope." Tony grinned at her in excitement, "I am doing magic!"

Natasha's eyebrows raised at that and she gave the Iron Man suit a searching look. A companionable silence spread through the workshop while Natasha attempted to use her minuscule knowledge of the Mystic Arts to unveil what was Tony doing with the suit while Tony was dealing with the documents.

"So, found it yet?" Tony cheekily asked when he finished the boring paperwork. Half an hour passed so he gave her a fifty-fifty chance that she would find something.

"You are incorporating the kinetic wards you used for the clothes and... knowing you, that's not all but I have no idea what else." Natasha spoke with dissatisfaction lacing her tone. She wasn't happy with her inability and lack of knowledge.

The kinetic ward, as Natasha later found out in one of her meetings with the Ancient One, they hit it off pretty well, was something never before seen yet. Wards were always anchored to a place. They could not be just... put on a ring and moved with said ring. That was not how warding worked.

Or so the miffed Ancient One explained to Natasha as she complained about Tony's ideas and capability to make them reality even though he had no idea what he was actually accomplishing most of the time.

"Eh, good guess." Tony praised, "I should have expected that considering you already saw the kinetic ward in action once. But..." He paused for suspense, and Natasha softly slapped his upper arm in response, causing him to pout at her for not playing along.

Seeing that she was quite impatient, Tony snorted and pulled off the chest plate from the Iron Man suit in front of him and revealed that the inside was not exactly hollow.

"I am experimenting with Alchemy and Warding. Since I anchored the kinetic ward, I got curious if I mayhaps could do more than that. When I was fishing for answers, I found one nice book about Golemancy which is a branch of Alchemy that is really simple. I would term it magical robotics. And here we are now." Tony proudly said, almost preening.

He did work on the suit he needed for his nanobots but nobody said he couldn't swat two flies with one shot and merge two projects!

"You are not making a suit." Natasha spoke in silent bewilderment as a realization hit her, her brain telling her that no matter how ridiculous it sounded, it was the truth. "You plan to make an army."

She remembered Tony's Iron Legion from the past but they were basic at best. He spent more time improving his own suit rather than upgrading his droids.

This time, however, magic was involved and Natasha had the distinct feeling this was not just a side project for Tony. No... from the way he was focused on it, he considered this something important.

"Golems." Tony corrected her.

Natasha turned towards him and tilted her head, "What?"

"I like the term golems. It sounds so... archaic." Tony quipped. "Plus the book calls them golems so they are golems."

"Right... you do you, Tony. I have my documents and think it is high time for me to stop thinking about your mad magical science projects." Natasha gave Tony an exasperated smile and was about to leave when she suddenly stopped as she realized why she felt she was missing something.

"Droids need a form of sentience. A.I. to control them at the very least. Last time JARVIS did the job but your past droids were basic at best." Natasha distractedly spoke, turning to look intently at Tony. "How exactly are you planning to solve that?"

She got a bad premonition that she won't like what he was about to say next and from the wide smile that appeared on his lips... she was probably correct.