Marvel Transports: Chapter 1 – The Rush from Stark Tower
The city was buzzing.
Not in the usual way New York buzzes — the metallic clatter of subway cars deep below, the sharp trills of impatient taxi horns, the endless stream of chatter and footsteps. This was different. The air itself felt charged, as if the concrete had been infused with static, and somewhere in the tapestry of skyscrapers, something was moving fast…and wrong.
High above it all, Stark Tower gleamed in the last burnished light of the setting sun. Inside, Tony Stark was muttering to himself as holographic displays flickered across the panoramic glass walls. He'd been in the middle of recalibrating his Mark LXXXV-B armor — a variant sleek enough for urban flight, tough enough for battlefield chaos — when FRIDAY interrupted him.
"Boss, I've got something," FRIDAY said, her voice crisp but edged with urgency. "Energy readings on Fifth Avenue. Non-terrestrial origin."
Tony groaned, rolling his shoulders as micro-servos tightened the gauntlets around his wrists. "Let me guess… Fury needs me for a 10 out of 10 emergency, but wants to call it a coffee meeting."
"Actually, Director Fury hasn't called yet."
That made Tony pause. "Hasn't called? Well, that's unsettling."
The HUD inside his faceplate lit up with three ominous, pulsing red markers scattered across the city grid. No alien invasion sirens yet, no panicked news reports. Whatever was happening, it was still under the radar. Tony's kind of problem.
Without hesitation, the floor platform beneath him rotated toward the open-air launch bay. With a familiar hydraulic hiss, the armor panels sealed around him — chestplate snapping into place, helmet folding over, HUD alive with scrolling data. His eyes tracked the waveforms on the map.
"FRIDAY, run me flight path optimization. Let's catch this before it makes the evening news."
And then, in a burst of white-hot repulsor fire, Iron Man shot into the sky.
From the upper atmosphere of midtown, New York was a hyperactive circuit board — streets flashing with the glowing beads of brake lights, buses lumbering like data packets between neighborhoods, and tiny swarms of pedestrians feeding the city's veins. Two hundred feet up, the roar of the streets melted into a deep, resonant hum.
Then a blur of red and blue swung into view on his left.
"Hey, Mr. Stark!" came Peter Parker's voice over comms, breathless with excitement. "Uh… are you going where I think you're going?"
"If you think 'where I'm going' is Fifth Avenue, then yes," Tony replied, banking sharply to avoid a sightseeing chopper. "And before you ask — no, you're not skipping whatever AP homework you have tonight. This is quick."
Peter landed on the edge of a high-rise just long enough to launch himself again. "Quick like patrol quick, or quick like stuff blows up quick?"
"Kid," Tony said, "nothing in my calendar is ever 'patrol quick.'"
The HUD zoomed in, focusing on a cluster of moving dots threading their way between office towers. As they approached, resolution sharpened — armored aerial drones the size of motorcycles, matte-black with angular plating that seemed to swallow light. Some carried what looked like magnetic clamps gripping metallic crates. Others were escorting tighter formations, weaving evasively.
"Those are not standard issue," Tony muttered. FRIDAY's scans confirmed as much. Unknown alloy. Energy cores running cold, as if they were cloaked from thermal sensors. Whoever built them knew how to hide.
"They're fast," Peter reported, dropping into a rapid web-spin to keep pace. "And uh… they're splitting up!"
Sure enough, the swarm broke apart like mercury, half zipping toward the East River, half diving into the labyrinth of midtown backstreets. Others rose higher — toward Stark himself.
"Alright, split job," Tony called. "You take east and play friendly neighborhood Spider-Interceptor. I'll cut off the high-flyers."
Peter saluted mid-swing. "Web you later!"
Iron Man accelerated, Mach 1 in the blink of an eye. The wind shear roared, neon billboards becoming streaks of color as the cityscape blurred below. He fired a pair of micro-missiles — not to hit, but to herd the drones upward toward open sky where civilians weren't at risk. They responded in kind, forming a loose attack wedge.
"Predictable," Tony said — until one barrel-rolled, split into three smaller drones, and shot in different directions.
Now that was new.
Above and below, the city's transport arteries throbbed. The hum of subway rails beneath the sidewalks. The long honk of a ferry on the Hudson. Taxi headlights whipping past like tracer fire. Every piece of the city was in motion, and somehow, he knew, this strange intrusion was going to use those motions against them.
From a rooftop camera, someone was watching. A shimmer of light — as though bending reality — and the observer was gone.
Tonight, New York's traffic was about to become a battlefield.