Iron Man (2026 series) #10

2 Whiplash's have been sent against Iron Man by AIM. Citizen V helped our hero but then revealed himself to Tony Stark's friend Happy Hogan who's supposed to be long-dead.

We start with Happy remembering his history with Tony. Stark crashed his racing car and Hogan rescued him from the burning wreck, so Tony hired him as his chauffeur (all in Tales Of Suspense #45). He discovered Tony/IM's secret and helped him many times. But he also met Tony's secretary Pepper Potts and they got married (but he doesn't mention that they later divorced).But during the Civil War event Happy wound up in a coma after fighting Spymaster (in IM(2004)#14). Tony and Pepper knew he would hate living like that, and someone switched his life support off (and he was buried in a grave). But somehow he wound up alive again in a place with lots of Stark-related stuff, including the Citizen V costume. And a message appeared on a computer screen asking him to save Tony from Iron Man.

In the current action the original Whiplash (Marco Scarlotti), also inexplicably alive, has Iron Man trapped attached to a big bomb while he menaces Tony's latest girlfriend Luna Lucia and her young son Hugo, with Happy, Pepper and another Whiplash (Anton Vanko) look on. But he hands Hugo back to Luna because they're all going to die anyway because he's going to set the bomb off. However Vanko objects to this because he wants to live to collect the money they've been offered, and he also wants Stark alive to suffer the loss of everything he holds dear. Scarlotti counters that rich guys like Stark always recover if you let them live.

While the bad guys are arguing Tony gets Pepper to trust him and activate the bomb. His armour is connected to it, and as it powers up he steals the power to trigger a new feature of his current metal suit which he now reveals he calls the Aura Armour. It absorbs all nearby tech, including the Whiplash suits, and adds it to the IM armour. This enables him to break free and disable the bomb before forcibly asking WL(AV) who hired him. He says it was AIM, Madame Masque and some kid.

Tony doesn't know the the 'kid' is 1 of his proteges Adam Ware, another person he thinks is dead. We see Adam, Masque and AIM goons ransacking Tony's California cliff-top house. MM points out that Stark hardly ever uses this place now and his real home is the old Gamma Base in the New Mexico desert. Ware says that's their next target.

So we go there to see James Rhodes looking after the place and its occupants, Tony's other proteges. 1 of them. Melrose Morrison, is miniaturising IM tech into rings which she thinks should be accessible to everyone. Rhodey's definitely not fond of this idea. Security Chief Melinda May complains that her day off has been interrupted by a command from Potts to come pick up the 2 Whiplash villains.

Tony sees Luna and Hugo into a car to take them home. Hugo has found the day exciting but I think Luna may be rethinking her choice of boyfriend. Happy and Pepper are taking comfort in each other's arms when angry Tony joins them, demanding to know how long Pepper has known about Happy/Citizen V. Happy says he told his ex-wife as soon as he 'woke up'. Stark's response is to fire her but she says he can't because as CEO of Stark Industries she's *his* boss.

Tony now accuses them of spying on him, and they admit it because they're worried about him. He's changed, possibly because of the times when he's 'died' or possibly because someone's messing with his head. For instance he used to think his (deceased) father Howard Stark was a bad guy but nowadays he won't hear a bad word sais against him. Pepper also points out that he's not creating stuff anymore just taking other people's tech, and his new armour exemplifies that. Happy also admits that he contacted other friends of Tony to keep an eye on him (the group we met in #1). And now 2 of those friends show up, Invisible Woman and Mr Fantastic, who think it's time for a chat.

Meanwhile Melinda May's plane taking the Whiplash's to the Raft super-prison has been diverted to the Vault. The pair are threatening to kill each other as they're all greeted by the new Warden Karla Sofen, psychiatrist but also ex-villain Moonstone. May expresses concern that a lot of Iron Man's old enemies have been gathered here. (And she's right to be worried.)