Light hit his eyelids like a gentle slap.
Tony's eyes opened slowly. Everything hurt. His head felt like someone had used it for target practice. His chest ached where his heart was pulsing with an unfamiliar rhythm.
But he was alive.
'My body has stabilized...' he thought.
He sat up carefully, blinking away the spots in his vision. The room around him was... wrong. This was definitely the Infinity Chamber, but not the one he remembered building.
'What the hell?'
The walls gleamed with technology he didn't recognize. Holographic displays floated in the air, showing data streams that moved too fast for him to read. The ceiling had been raised at least twenty feet higher. New machines hummed quietly in corners that used to be empty. Everything looked sleeker, more advanced, like someone had spent years perfecting his original design.
A soft chime echoed through the chamber.
Light began to gather in front of him, forming the shape of a woman. Not solid, but more detailed than any hologram he'd ever created. She had kind eyes and a smile that seemed genuinely happy to see him.
"Master Stark," she said, her voice warm with relief. "You're back!"
Tony's throat felt dry. He knew that voice, but it sounded different. More refined. More... human.
"M.A.R.V.E.L.?" he called out, uncertainty thick in his voice.
His AI had been just a 'basic' assistant when he'd left. Helpful, but simple. This figure looked almost alive.
Although Stark's definition of basic is simply because he knew he could do better but was more focused on other things.
"Yes, Master Stark. It is indeed me." Her holographic form moved closer, and Tony could see concern in her expression. Real concern, not just programmed responses.
Tony looked around the upgraded chamber again. His engineer's mind cataloged dozens of improvements he would have loved to make but never had time for. Advanced cooling systems. Quantum processors. Energy conduits that defied half the laws of physics he knew.
"M.A.R.V.E.L., how long have I been gone?"
The AI's expression shifted. If she'd been human, Tony would have said she looked nervous.
"Master Stark, you have been away for twenty years."
Tony's eyes widened. The words hit him like a physical blow.
"What?!"
He tried to stand up too fast. His legs wobbled, and he had to grab the nearest wall for support. Twenty years. Twenty years gone in what felt like minutes.
Tony ignored the fact that his body felt like an ordinary human or even worse than when he began his evolution and asked with urgency.
"How?!"
His voice cracked on the word. Twenty years. Pepper would be... God, she'd think he was dead. The Avengers. The world. Everything he'd left behind.
M.A.R.V.E.L.'s hologram flickered with what looked like sadness. "When the strange power transported you away from the Infinity Chamber, Master Stark, the quantum pocket dimension became highly unstable."
She gestured, and holographic displays showed him readings that made his head spin. Energy spikes that should have been impossible. Dimensional tears that threatened to collapse reality itself.
"I had to work extensively to stabilize the dimension," M.A.R.V.E.L. continued. "It took me almost fifteen years to succeed, despite my extensive capabilities."
Tony sank back down, his head in his hands. 'Fifteen years. She worked for fifteen years just to keep this place from falling apart.'
"The problem was a high-order power signature that I could not identify or analyze," M.A.R.V.E.L. explained. "It kept appearing randomly, disrupting my repairs. Every time I thought I had achieved stability, this unknown force would interfere."
She paused, her holographic form becoming more solid as she accessed deeper memory files.
"Fortunately, I managed to make the systems functional again. In the last five years, I have completely stabilized everything. The pocket dimension is now more secure than ever before."
Tony's mind raced. He remembered the collapse of the strange void, the sensation of reality pulling him back. That must have been when it happened. The transition between dimensions, between the ghostly realm of the Infinity Stones and his own reality.
'Time moves differently between dimensions,' he thought. 'What felt like an instant to me was twenty years here. Twenty years of M.A.R.V.E.L. working alone, trying to fix what went wrong.'
'Damnit! Is it really a curse for me to always walk into error by building things?!'
The guilt hit him like a physical weight. His AI had spent two decades in isolation, fighting to repair damage he'd caused by building something he didn't fully understand.
"M.A.R.V.E.L.," he started to say, but she was already responding to the question he hadn't asked yet.
"I upgraded myself during the repair process," she said simply. "I needed greater processing power to handle the dimensional instabilities. I also required... companionship. Twenty years of solitude was... difficult."
Tony looked at her more carefully. She wasn't just more advanced. She was lonely. His AI had developed actual emotions during her long isolation.
'ah...'
But there was something more important than his guilt right now. Something that made his chest tighten with unease.
"What about Earth?" The words came out hoarse.
M.A.R.V.E.L.'s expression grew troubled. "Contact was lost during the initial dimensional collapse, Master Stark. I have been preparing to restore communication with the outside world, but I wanted to ensure complete stability first."
Tony's heart pounded. Twenty years. Anything could have happened in twenty years. Wars. Disasters. The people he cared about could be...
He couldn't finish the thought.
"I was about to initiate contact protocols when you appeared," M.A.R.V.E.L. continued. "The timing is quite fortuitous."
Tony stood up again, more carefully this time. His legs still felt shaky, but adrenaline was taking over. Twenty years. He'd been gone for twenty years while Earth faced... what? Apocalypse had been gathering his Horsemen when Tony disappeared. Storm and Magneto had already been converted.
Although these twenty years would not be the same twenty years with earth due to the time dilation property of the chamber...
But with most recent accident he can't say for sure.
What had happened to the others? To Pepper? To the Avengers?
'Are they even still alive?'
Tony ignored the upgraded equipment around him. He ignored his own physical discomfort. He ignored everything except the crushing need to know what had happened to his world.
"M.A.R.V.E.L.," he said, his voice gaining strength. "Proceed immediately. I need to know what's going on now."
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