creature called the Minotaur With the rest of the team busy and with no one else available to handle the emergency Stark donned his armor and took to the skies to fight fire with iron Fighting an oil rig fire may not be as fun as fighting the Minotaur Tony thought to himself But it's not nearly as embarrassing as having to tell everyone that I fought a guy who calls himself the Minotaur Up ahead he could see thick black smoke on the horizon The oil rig in question belonged to a company called Roxxon Tony had dealt with Roxxon in the past they were a shady corporation engaged in lots of shady business They had even sponsored the creation of some Super Villains like Orka and Manticore For all Tony knew the oil rig might not even really be an oil rig Maybe it a cover for some ominous experiment Nah Tony thought I'm just being paranoid But remember what they say Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get you Rerouting power reserves to his repulsors Iron 2
Man accelerated toward the billowing clouds of black smoke Soon the oil rig itself came into view growing closer with each passing second Iron Man came a voice over Tony’s communications system The sudden unexpected sound startled Tony This is Iron Man I’m not here right now so if you could leave your name and number at the This is the Coast Guard said the voice urgently We’ve taken everyone off the rig except for one person They refuse to leave Can you save them Iron Man glanced at the ocean below and saw two Coast Guard cutters loaded with rescued oil workers They were heading away from the burning rig which loomed ahead of the armored Avenger flames burning brightly as the black smoke billowed upward The centerpiece of the rig was a tall tower Activating his visual scanners Iron Man could make out the figure of a person at the top of the tower waving their arms First stop the tower Iron Man said He flew 3
through the dense smoke and cut the power to his repulsors coming to a soft landing on a platform atop the tower He saw a man wearing a white jumpsuit with a full head mask it immediately struck Tony as odd The guy looked like he should be working in a laboratory studying strange diseases not working on an oil rig I hear you don’t want to leave shouted Iron Man over the din of the fire How about you tell me why after I’ve rescued you He extended his right gauntlet toward the man To Iron Man’s surprise the man backed away They left me the man said nearly hysterical They left me Now he’s coming He pointed beneath them Who’s coming Iron Man said sharply You mean there’s someone else We’ve got to get them They’ve set him free We have to leave now the man shouted If you’re at all confused imagine how Iron Man must have felt Set what free he shouted as flames licked the bottom of the platform they were 4
standing on He moved to grab the man but as he did so something swiped Iron Man from behind It knocked the Avenger off his feet and onto the hard metal surface Shaking it off Iron Man looked up just in time to see an enormous hairy hand reach for him Before he could act the hand grabbed Iron Man The golden Avenger tried to break free but the giant hand shook him like a rag doll leaving Iron Man thoroughly disoriented What in the he said as he struggled to get a look at the thing that was giving him the worst case of vertigo since that time he rode the world's largest roller coaster with Hawkeye Catching his breath Iron Man looked quickly at his helmet's heads up display The HUD showed exactly what he thought Whatever was shaking him to pieces was wreaking havoc on his armor's systems This had to stop now Iron Man fired a few rapid repulsor bursts at the hand and he heard something shriek The sound was booming The hand let go and Iron Man activated 5
