Stark Infiltrations

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I tend to upload drafts of early chapters on there to get people's opinions of them.

I would like to thank my beta, Akisu, for his help in this chapter.

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3rd March 2013, New York City

(Jasmine Sayre POV)

Peter gave me a curious look, "Have you spoken to any of them after the invasion?"

"Yes, but not really. It was mostly business, not social calls. Stark tracked me down a bit after we left, and we let each other know what we were doing so that we don't step on anyone's toes. Truthfully, we're not all that close, outside of Thor that is."

"What about Thor?"

I gave him a cheeky grin, "He's staying at my place."

The teenager choke on his own spit and I could tell that he wanted to ask a thousand questions at once. However, I didn't let him do it, "Would you look at that, we've arrived."

And I was correct, we had just arrived at the tallest building in the city. The kid must have been distracted by our conversation. Well, I wonder how Tony would react when I arrive at his tower unannounced. This was going to be fun…

I have to say that the tower was an ugly building. Yes, I could appreciate that it was modern, eco-friendly, or whatever else the hippies would say. But the building just seemed too ostentatious for no reason. The fact that it was named 'Avengers Towers' while still being the headquarters of a tech industry just rubbed me the wrong way. I don't think the Avengers have ever taken a foot underneath the top ten floors of the building.

Truthfully, I think Stark just decided to do it as a marketing scheme. He's intertwining his company with the concept of the hero team, which is probably why Stark Industries Stock was rising. It might be helpful in the short term, but the moment Tony Stark messes up – and he inevitably will because he's a human being with flaws – in either his company or as an Avenger, then the other will be affected severely as well. It's always better to keep these things separated.

Shaking my head at the man's foolishness, I entered the building alongside Peter and waited in the security line. I could feel the teenager next to me vibrating in excitement. The security there has been very extensive, and far less tolerant than the ones in practically any other tech company.

There was an honest to God luggage scanning machine that looked far more advanced than anything like it on the planet. That's not mentioning some sort of body scanner that detects any illegal contents. Add in the fact that anyone entering needs an ID and fingerprint scanner to be allowed in, and I thought I was trying to get inside the Pentagon, not a tech company of all things.

I could understand why tech companies implement so much security; corporate espionage is very brutal when it comes to the industry, but damn, that was so over the top.

Sure, with the Avengers being a hot commodity even a year after the invasion, and hence, had groupies everywhere in the world, the tower would always be always bombarded by rabid fans trying to meet them. It's sad that it's the employees that suffer from it. I can't imagine waiting in line for so long just to go to my job.

Lucky for us, there was another line geared towards the daily public tours of the tower. It was very competitive and somewhat expensive. They didn't even come close to the tech side of the tower. It was like a museum, really, with memorabilia showcased around. I had no intention of visiting the exhibit, but it was the easy way in.

Well, I could just teleport, but where's the fun in that? The kid and I walked to the line, and I smirked at his questioning look. They were supposed to scan our invitations after the scans.

There were security guards stationed at their posts with their arms crossed over their chests and their eyes scanning every person who passed through. I could feel the kid gulp in panic, and I stifled a snort. I conjured a piece of paper in my handbag, identical to that of the people next to us, and I gave one to the kid.

When it was our turn for our invitation to be scanned, I gave the guards my paper with a bored look and simply walked through the machine. With a little application of my powers, the machine scanning my fake invitation released a green light, meaning that I was free to enter the lobby. I did the same with the kid, and we were both inside the Avengers tower.

I have to admit that my newfound control over technology ever since my ritual was very impressive. I still haven't explored it too much, but so far, it felt like some form of limited technopathy. I'll have to look into this further. As for now, it's enough for me to alter a few sensors without anyone noticing.

The kid walked towards me, and whisper yelled, "What the hell was that?"

I shrugged, "What? I just got us in."

"Illegally. I thought you said you had an appointment." he insisted.

"I could just call Stark and have us brought up, but I want to see the look on his face when he realizes that I broke in."

"You could get us arrested," the teenager protested.

I snorted, "No, we couldn't. The worst case scenario is Stark making a fuss and you could just say that I blackmailed you or something. I'll take the blame."

The kid hesitated, "But…"

I pressed on, "Come on, Peter. You have to admit that this is exciting, isn't it?"

The kid sighed in resignation, "Fine. But you're taking the blame if we get caught."

I shrugged and we joined the rest of the tour where a guide started to prattle on about the history of Stark Industries, and the origins of the Avengers – which I happened to know were mostly wrong.

Funnily enough, the kid was mesmerized by it, for some reason. I knew that he geeked on the Avengers and was a fan of Tony Stark, but I have to say that this tour was extremely boring. So far, they had only seen old photos of Howard Stark.

Finally, even the other visitors started getting bored and the man showed them to a circular room with an exhibit for each of the Avengers. I walked past Stark's exhibit which showcased an obviously fake iron man armor alongside a couple of photos, videos of the fight with the Chitauri, and a plaque with a list of achievements. His past a weapon's developer wasn't even mentioned in the exhibit, which was weird because it's not like it was a secret. Damn, Stark really wants to distance himself from his past actions.

There was one for Rogers as well, which was pretty much the same one from the exhibit in the old museum but only with a fake shield and a few videos of the fight. Thor's was riddled with Norse mythology props, which were thousands of years old and very subjective.

I snorted at the sight of Banner's exhibit which was pretty much a giant green statue of the Hulk. It was sad that most of the information about Ross hunting him down was nowhere to be found. It was the same with Romanoff and Barton's exhibits which were almost entirely wrong. It was logical, no one would look up to the Black Widow if they really knew what she's done in the past.

Parker for some reason pulled me aside towards a particular exhibit and whispered, "Look, there's even one for you."

My eyes widened when I saw the statue of a cloaked woman that looked similar to me when I'm suited up. I almost burst into laughter at the description, which was pretty much speculation to my origins, either as a goddess of a pantheon rivalling Asgard or as a mutant who controlled shadows.

Most of all, it was a message of thanks and mourning for my 'sacrifice'. If I was dead, this would have been considered disrespectful. Stark really tried to commercialize my 'death'. There were figurines of me being sold in the gift store, and even posters of me stopping the nuke being on sale. If I was younger, I would have been angry, but now, I'm just disappointed.

I looked at the kid's excited expression and spoke up, "Alright, everyone's busy. Let's get out of here."

I walked towards a blind zone from the cameras. There wasn't anything of importance there, but I cast a small light illusion turning me and the kid invisible, and I walked towards the elevator. It wasn't connected to Stark's office, but with the proper access card, you could go up to the employee section of the building. It was mostly used by the tour guides and such, but the employee section was also connected to the research and development department and thus Stark's office.

Of course, you needed an ID card to enter. It seems that JARVIS didn't consciously monitor the comings and goings of employees all the time. It was logical, in a way. Stark had to limit any virtual intelligence from self-replicating or forking since it could get out of Stark's control. JARVIS was probably busy with a bigger project elsewhere.

All I needed to make the elevator think was that it had gotten a request to go up from the employee lounge and were golden. With a flick of my fingers, I turned my clothes and Peter's into the tour guides' uniform. Of course, I made sure that the elevator camera was looped and showed an empty elevator being summoned.

Once we arrived at the lounge we walked towards the bathroom and changed clothes to that of the various engineers that we saw in the lounge. I have to say that the kid was awed by my skills. I was a bit proud of my skills as a thief. I was right, this was a lot more fun than just teleporting in.

I swiped an ID card from one of the engineers and I put an illusion on the picture. I conjured a copy to Peter, and we entered another elevator. I scanned my card, and we went up to the Research and Development Department.

The moment we arrived; I knew that this part of the building was different. While the rest of the building was plain, modern, and organized, this section was chaotic with dozens of scientists constantly running around the place, working on some extremely advanced projects. State-of-the-art labs filled with cutting-edge technology to advanced manufacturing facilities could be seen everywhere around us.

Seeing the kid look so excited got me to help him visit every nook and cranny of the place. No one batted an eyelash at us. There were so many people working under deadlines that they just didn't care about anyone observing them as long as they were not interrupted. Alright, I might have cheated a little and got people to ignore us with my telepathy, but it was still too easy to do.

In the end, I had to drag the reluctant teenager to come with me to Stark's office. Funnily enough, the way there was very easy to find. Apparently, the man had a private elevator directly to his office to get involved in any project he fancies. He also tended to use JARVIS to summon scientists under his employ so that he would talk to them.

Believe it or not, while Stark gave up the position of CEO, he was still the CTO of the company and thus involved in the ongoing projects of his company. I controlled the elevator and entered it alongside the kid.

It took a few seconds for the door to open up and we found ourselves at the billionaire's office and I just sat on the couch and mine and Peter's clothes returned to normal. I looped the camera, showing an empty office and conjured a cup of tea. JARVIS should have noticed my intrusion and warned the billionaire of my presence.

I pointed the fidgeting spider themed hero to sit down. The kid was nervous. He did just break into his personal hero's office after all.

His mutterings about his future doom almost made me burst into laughter. When Stark slammed the door open in an iron man suit, the kid jumped away in fear. The armored hero pointed his repulsor at me, "Who the hell are you, and what are you doing here?"

I continued sipping my tea and raised an eyebrow. I could see the recognition and fear settle on his features as he realized who he tried to shoot, "Hello, Anthony Stark. Did you miss me?"