The day after Tony came out to the world as Ironman, he finally surpassed Nightcrawler on Vibe. The difference wasn't massive, only around fifty thousand more followers. But he was ecstatic, while governments around the world panicked about the possibility of Tony making suits for the US military.
It wasn't just governments though, as organizations like Shield, Hydra and others were now scrambling to get any information they could about the suit. While Theo didn't have electric surveillance fully embedded into most of Hydra. He had it around a lot of the main leaders in Shield and easily obtained information from them. As of now they were using Shield and the US military as a way to obtain a suit created by Tony. If that didn't work they planned to use governmental means to try and succeed. But if those failed they were already making plans to obtain it through force.
As for Tony, he didn't care about any of that and used his increased fame to announce Stark Expo. It was scheduled to start at the beginning of next year and would run for the entire year. Each month would feature new exhibitions and events, along with a carnival and other attractions. Tony already talked Ezekiel into sponsoring a Vibe booth for the whole year.
Ezekiel agreed but only with the stimulation that he was able to add a ride attraction too. Tony had no reason to refuse, and when he heard Ezekiel's idea for something similar to MarioKart using go karts. Well Tony didn't just agree, he wanted to help design and test everything. While the concept Ezekiel had in mind couldn't be fully realized because of technology limitations. Mainly Tony hadn't figured out how to make nanotechnology yet.
They were still in the idea phase of the design, but they'd already figured out a way for the 'combat' system to work. The cars and the track itself would be covered in the alien holographic protectors Tony reversed engineered. It would be slightly expensive, but it would allow the combat system to work, since all of it would be tied to holograms.
Placed around the track would be cubes you could drive through. They would be a see through hologram that would shatter apart when you passed through it. Then the driver would have a pop up on their dashboard that would scroll thought possible weapons till it randomly stopped on one. Once their 'weapon' was installed, the button for it would become activated and they could use it to hopefully disable another car.
The great thing about using holograms was if a driver used a weapon, they could see it shot out or be dropped behind them. As for what happened to the go karts hit by the weapons? They would spin out, flip in the air or do a handful of other things that were still in the concept phase. As for how that would be possible, each go kart would be equipped with a small anti grav system.
Not only would it be used for making the go karts spin out or flip in the air. It would also be used to make the go karts drive on the track when it flipped upside down. The track design itself was pretty crazy so far with almost a quarter of it being upside down, jumps, loops, a corkscrew and a handful of other things that would be impossible without an anti grav system.
They still had a bunch of other things to figure out with safety being the highest priority. But they still had seven months before it needed to be done and both Tony and Ezekiel were excited about the idea. Other than that, it was actually pretty quiet for Theo and his family as summer approached. Only two things happened just before summer vacation, the first was Happy and Anna had their first child.
It was a healthy baby girl named Riley Ann Hogan who was born on April 5th 2009. Happy and Anna were both over the moon and were having a great time with their new baby. The next big event that came up was the wedding for Aleksei Sytsevich and his wife Oksana Sytsevich.
They had hit it off after Ezekiel introduced them to each other and had been seriously dating and living together for a while now. As for the wedding itself, Ezekiel decided to cover the whole thing for them since he basically played match maker. Plus his whole family was invited since Aleksei was good friends with his dad and uncle. That meant Theo would be in attendance along with a clone being Ezekiel.
The wedding itself was small, besides Theo's whole extended family. There weren't that many people, since the bride and groom didn't have big families. They did invite some friends, but the whole thing was less than fifty people. After the wedding, they went on a luxury cruise for three months paid for by Ezekiel. Aleksei was concerned about his business since the honeymoon would be so long. But Ezekiel promised to run the place while they were gone… Well it would be a clone doing it, but he didn't plan to explain that to Aleksei.
The wedding itself took place right after Theo and the others got out of school for the summer. So when Aleksei and Oksana went on their cruise, Theo and his family went on summer vacation. With the ability to portal they just decided on a day to day basis where they were going. They would give out a few ideas each day before it would be voted on. Then they would portal over and explore whatever place they picked. Sometimes if the place was small or boring they would teleport to the place with the second highest votes.
Not only was it his family, but Hela was brought along since Theo's mom invited her to every family gathering. She also invited Tao, Agatha and Hulk along as well, Hulk always needed to use a henge for disguise. But Tao and Agatha didn't since they wouldn't stand out like Hulk does. That being said, Tao and Agatha did have things to take care of so they didn't join them every day.
But two other people did, even though they were part of Theo's inner circle. Peter, after talking with his parents, invited MJ and Jean along. Theo wasn't going to complain since apparently they were all dating, at least that was his understanding and the fact they all held hands constantly. It was almost always Peter in the middle sandwiched between the girls, but sometimes Jean or MJ would be in the middle. As for how the relationship truly worked, no one decided to ask and just enjoyed their vacation together.
After school started up again, Peter made a new friend who transferred in from being home schooled by his parents. Harry Osborn met Peter and Theo in a science class on the first day and Peter hit it off with him. Theo was also friendly with Harry, but it wasn't the same way. Needless to say, another person joined their friend group at school. But over the first couple of weeks Harry never joined them after school to do homework together at the shop.
It was also around that same time that Doom approached Ezekiel about something. He sent him a message asking if they could meet up to talk and when Ezekiel arrived in Doom's laboratory, he found him hunched over a table. Ezekiel approached the man and noticed his furrowed brow before he said, "Afternoon, Victor."
Doom glanced up from the table with a frown before he looked back down at it as he said, "Ezekiel… Thanks for coming."
"No problem, so what did you want to discuss?"
Doom didn't respond but slid a tablet across the table to Ezekiel who caught it before he glanced at it. Playing on the tablet was the video of what looked like a prison camp filled with malnourished people. Ezekiel watched it for about a minute as it showed small clips from a couple of different places along with video clips of mass graves. Ezekiel frowned as the video ended before he glanced at Doom and asked, "How recent is this video?"
"Yesterday."
Ezekiel frowned slightly because his surveillance network should have heard about something like this. Not only did he have Tony's phones, JARVIS and access to Shield's network along with twenty other organizations. Yet Ezekiel didn't know something like this was going on at all, otherwise he would have stopped it. Ezekiel sent the video file to JARVIS before he asked, "Where is that at?"
"My home country of Latveria… It's always been bad." Doom said as his fists clenched hard enough to turn pale white before he added, "But after a plague destroyed almost half the country's grain harvest this year. People have been starving and protesting in the streets."
Doom gestured to the tablet as he angrily said, "Those are the results from the government crack down on the people. Almost half the population is now locked in camps doing forced labor in mines until their bodies give out."
Ezekiel nodded slowly as Doom continued, "I'm portaling to meet with Boris, my adoptive father after this to start planning a revolution. He's the one who sent me that video and told me about what was happening."
"Alright, I get why you contacted me… But where exactly do I fall in all of this?"
"I know I can do this alone, even with my magic currently being so weak. You even showed me different versions of me who did it…" Doom said in a low voice before he let out a deep breath and then locked eyes with Ezekiel as he said, "But you also said I should make friends who can help me…"
Doom and Ezekiel stared at each other in total silence for over a minute before Doom finally asked, "Will you help me free my country? Free my people?"
Ezekiel smiled slightly before he stuck out his hand and said, "I would love to help you Victor."
Doom didn't hesitate, he took Ezekiel's hand and gave it a firm handshake as he said, "Thank you… Friend."
Ezekiel smirked slightly before he said, "Let's go plan a revolution."
Doom nodded before he opened a portal to a snow covered field with a small log cabin a few feet from the portal. After they stepped out of the portal, it closed behind them as Doom pounded on the thick door. A few moments later a bear of a man answered the door and surprisingly enough he was covered in a bear skin cloak. He was aged, with his face being covered in wrinkles while his hair and massive bread that hung to his belly was grayish white.
He took one look at Doom and pulled him into a hug as he said, "Victor! How did you get here so quickly?!? I just sent you that video the other day…"
Victor quickly returned the hug as he said, "I used a new magic I learned."
The man didn't even question it as he stepped out of the way and ushered them both inside as he said, "Tell me about it after you come inside and warm yourselves by the fire before you introduce me to your guest."
Once inside the cozy cabin, Doom gestured towards Ezekiel and said, "Boris, this is, my friend Ezekiel… Ezekiel, this is Boris Karela, my adoptive father."
Ezekiel and Boris shook hands and greeted each other before Boris asked, "So why did you rush home Victor? What is your plan?"
Doom shared a glance with Ezekiel as he said, "That's what we came here to discuss."