A helicopter hovered steadily at an altitude of roughly three thousand meters directly above the Raft.
Iron Man Tony Stark sat in the helicopter's cabin, his eyes fixed not on the Raft prison down below, but rather on the distant twinkling lights of the city.
Suddenly, a series of urgent alarm klaxons blared to life, and Jarvis's voice carried a hint of unmasked shock:
"Sir, a massive monster measuring 16.8 meters in length with a 26-meter wingspan is rushing toward us from twenty kilometers away! Speed exceeds Mach 3!"
Mach 3 was indeed fast, but not overwhelmingly so; the problem was that the entity hadn't been detected by Jarvis until it appeared less than twenty kilometers away from them.
At that range, Mach 3 meant it would close the distance in the blink of an eye.
"Deploy..."
The moment Tony's mouth parted to pop out a single word, Jarvis cut him off directly:
"There's no time, sir! A distress signal has been sent to Peter Parker!"
Tony Stark's armor had already been upgraded to the Mark VIII, capable of independent deployment and donning without the aid of external robotic arms.
Yet that still required time, and this helicopter was not equipped with the Mark VIII.
By the time the Mark VIII flew all the way from Stark Tower and fastened itself onto Tony Stark, Tony would have already gone off to meet his maker.
In comparison, transmitting an SOS directly to Batman was by far the most prudent choice.
Virtually the instant Jarvis's voice fell, a black dot materialized in the sky, and Tony Stark could faintly discern that the black dot possessed a pair of malevolent blood-red pupils.
His heart skipped a beat, and before he could even catch his breath, the black dot had expanded at breakneck speed until it completely enveloped the helicopter carrying him.
In a hazy flash, Tony Stark felt as though he had taken a stroll along the very edge of hell.
Swish!
Appearing a step ahead of the cold sweat was a figure clad in black tinged with deep blue.
This figure seemed to manifest out of thin air right beside Tony, taking a seat on the bench directly opposite him.
Tony always felt that once Peter Parker put on the Bat-suit, that exposed cleft chin of his looked rather awkward.
Yet looking at that very chin right now, he felt an incomparable sense of familiarity. Tony parted his lips to say something, but his brain began processing thoughts ahead of schedule.
Tony's eyes darted sideways, looking first at Batman sitting across from him, and then out toward the massive bat-shaped shadow lingering beside the helicopter:
"Peter, is that your...?"
"My Batwing," Batman said.
"I'd love to go up for a ride," a thought stirred in Tony's heart.
"We'll talk about it later," Batman said. "I came to chat with you about the Maximoff siblings."
"Let me take a ride after we finish chatting," Tony said, glancing toward the Shadow Batwing, which gave its wings a flap and rapidly soared upward to vanish from view.
"Tony!" Batman raised his voice slightly with a trace of helplessness.
He had merely relied out of habit on the Batwing's high maneuverability to rush over at top speed, with zero intention of showing off before Tony.
Who would have guessed that Tony had already set his sights on the Batwing.
"Fine, fine," seeing Batman shift his tone, Tony had no choice but to pull his gaze back and look at Batman instead. "What specifically do you want to talk about?"
"I haven't been able to unearth any information regarding the siblings' so-called father. Can you fill me in?" Batman asked.
"Of course you couldn't dig it up; the internet isn't omnipotent," Tony chuckled.
Naturally, Batman knew the internet wasn't omnipotent either, or else he wouldn't be as clueless about mutants as he still was.
"I caught wind of the sibling pair's origins back in Sokovia; someone told me they were the children of Gypsies... You know gypsies, right?" Tony said.
Batman gave a slight nod:
"Legend has it that Gypsies are born witches?"
That was indeed the case. Similar legends existed in Batman's world, and the same held true for this one.
"That's right, but I later concluded that claim is a rumor; their lineage in all likelihood stems from a mutant descendant," Tony said.
"Do you know that mutant's name?" Batman asked.
"I don't. If I knew, I wouldn't be sitting here sightseeing right now," Tony curled his lip. "I only know he's a hot-tempered old man... having a child late in life and yet abandoning them, heh~"
Tony's tone carried a hint of mockery, to which Batman remained indifferent, though a thought stirred within his mind.
He recalled that Wolverine Logan had also once mentioned a hot-tempered old man to him, whom he met at a bar in Canada.
That old man was a mutant whose power, according to Wolverine's description, was metal manipulation—making him virtually the sole person whose temper was even fouler than Logan's, yet leaving Logan with absolutely nothing he could do about it.
"Who fed you this intel? Why do you believe it's not a rumor?" Batman pondered for a few seconds before asking.
"This is intelligence I covertly pilfered from the hands of Hydra in Sokovia. They've also been trying to snatch the sibling pair away, though they haven't succeeded yet because of the kids' miraculous abilities."
Tony Stark stated:
"As for why I consider it no rumor? Because when I was previously drinking with Logan, he happened to mention a hot-tempered old man to me who was similarly a mutant."
Batman curbed the urge to massage his temples:
"When?"
"When the Wolverine was drinking at a nightclub. I went looking for him once after you," Tony said.
"Sounds like Canada is practically a nation overflowing with mutants," Batman remarked in a dry, deadpan tone.
"Maybe, who knows?" Tony Stark shrugged. "That's why I pitched bringing them out of Sokovia at the cost of helping the siblings track down their father."
"Took a lot of effort?"
"You know how it is—extracting them from right under Hydra's noses wasn't exactly a walk in the park," Tony chuckled.
Batman's mouth twitched, stopping himself mid-word.
The frequency with which the country named "Canada" had been popping up lately was getting a bit too high.
The mysterious address, the pervert filming first-person perspective videos, Wolverine Logan, the Maximoff siblings' lineage, and that mysterious bad-tempered old man.
On second thought, however, Batman decided against bringing up the episode about someone screaming his name while frantically beating off; instead, he pivoted to another topic:
"Sokovia has been occupied by Hydra. Neither you nor I can let that state of affairs persist, right?"
"Huh?" Tony was momentarily caught off guard by whatever he was pondering, failing to react immediately. "What state?"
Yet very quickly, Tony caught on:
"You want to strike first? I've got a good idea."
Batman raised an eyebrow—though the mask concealed the raised brow from Tony's view, Tony had already begun outlining his plan on his own accord.
Once Tony finished laying it out, Batman raised his eyebrow once more:
"That's indeed a sound approach, but are you certain you can pull it off without a hitch?"
--
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