Disclaimer: I do not own the original canon nor am I making any profit from writing this piece. All works are accredited to their original authors, performers, and producers while this piece is mine. No copyright infringement is intended. I acknowledge that all views and opinions expressed herein are merely my interpretations of the characters and situations found within the original canon and may not reflect the views and opinions of the original author(s), producer(s), and/or other people.

Warnings: This story may contain material that is not suitable for all audiences and may offend some readers. Please utilize understanding of personal sensitivities before and while reading.

Author's Note(s): This fic contains references to the likely fall out of not curating a massive file dump of an international intelligence organization with active ops being ran around the world. It also contains references to the comic tie-ins and shows, which are parts of the MCU that people like to deny. I assume because they don't like just how useless/ineffective MCU has made certain characters.

Courtesy Warning: In case y'all are new to my works, I tend to not assume that characters have the same motivations as they do in other runs of Marvel. I go by what motivations they are given in the MCU, even when that makes me less than the hero they are in other versions. This means that a lot of my work ends up being Not Friendly to certain characters, particular members of "Team Cap". If this offends you, it would be more productive to rant to a random telephone pole than to review telling me.

Challenge Block:
Stacked with: Winter Bingo; Final Frontiers; Shadows of Consequence; Paranormal Phantasm; Lessons Learned; Not Commonwealth; Terms of Service; By Any Other Name; Fem Power Challenge
Space: 4C
Prompt: Fire/Torch/Candle
Representations: Boundary Pushing; Choice Fallout; Largescale Civilian Death; Learning a Secret; Tony Stark; Heroes; Stark Cis; ANA & IRIS
Bonus Challenges: Lovely Coconuts; Second Verse (Not a Lamp; Nontraditional; Wabi Sabi; Middle Name; Tomorrow's Shade; Unwanted Advice; Endless Wonder; Sitting Hummingbird; Misshapen Pods; Uncivil Obedience; Casper's House; Machismo – Emotional)
Word Count: 2045

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Paper Promises
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It never ends till the end, then you start again
That's just the way of the world
That's just the way of the world
– Sabrina Carpenter, "Thumbs"
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"Sir, I am registering an activation of the ANA protocols."

"Location?" Tony was already moving from the circuitry work he had been doing to a holoscreen terminal. If something had activated ANA, then something was breaching the outermost layer of JARVIS' firewalls. As J provided most of the firewall protection for all of Stark Industries and its subsidiaries, a breach couldn't mean anything good. He still ended up staring at the screen for a long moment in confusion. "J? When did we get a farm or database in DC? I thought Rhodey nixed that idea."

"Colonel Rhodes does have many of the organizations of the city on the Priority A list. However, after my installation into the Helicarrier's database during Loki's incursion, I felt it prudent to continue my investigatory measures. As a gesture of good will, I also allowed ANA to shore up the protections of key locations."

"One of which is in DC?"

"The Triskelion, Sir. It serves as one of the more important bases for SHIELD. ANA has been tracking accesses since her implementation that while authorized and routine do appear unorthodox. Today's access meets the threshold necessitating human intervention."

"I recognize this hacking style," Tony announced, having been reviewing the ongoing attack. Though he would admit that word wasn't very accurate. It was a prefabricated worm that gathered everything with the parameters given to it and sent it to a new location. He had written better version while asleep when he was in high school. The greenest SHIELD grad from SciOps could probably write better. It didn't change the fact that Tony recognized this particular way of hacking. "That's Nat's style. And she's using biometric permissions from Fury and Pierce. Why did ANA flag this?"

"It appears that Ms. Romanoff is copying files and decrypting them far above what her security clearance would normally allow." There was a pause, pregnant with potential. Tony paused in his rapid typing and swiping, sensing that JARVIS had something he was uncertain about adding. Just as he was about to prompt the AI, JARVIS spoke again. "Sir, Ms. Romanoff is in the process of uploading the entirety of SHIELD's operational files onto publicly accessible servers, particularly those connected to Twitter and Wikipedia. There are no indications of curation beyond the mass decryption."

"Oh, shit," Tony said, unable to even breathe as the ramifications hit him. Unable to stop it, his lightning fast mind had already calculated the potential impact. It was Not Good (capitalization fucking necessary). "Can we—we need to—we have to—J."

"ANA is currently scrubbing personnel files of familial contacts and removing inactive agents from the release, but Sir, the files are already being accessed, including current and ongoing operations. Permission to deploy the Iron Legion for the purposes of extraction?"

"Yes, god, yes," Tony replied. It did little to settle the sickening swirl in his stomach, but at least he could breathe again. He may not particularly like SHIELD and found their methods to be heavy-handed and more than a bit rapey, but the thought of all those people who were being put unsuspectedly in harm's way when their missions were already dangerous enough, well, it actually hurt a bit. Rhodey had always been the idealist, full of long lectures about the power of togetherness that being part of an organization. Tony ran his fingers through his hair several times only end up scrubbing his face with them, unable to reconcile the betrayal of that ideal with the woman who had judged him 'not a team player'. "J, can you get me onto any active SHIELD comms outside of known SHIELD bases? They deserve to know that their ops just went to shit."

"Right away, Sir." JARVIS threw up a counter in the corner of the main screen. Unable to just do nothing, Tony returned to helping ANA curate as many personnel files as possible. Some names caught his eye, but the sheer volume of them left him very little time check if Barton related to his favorite archer or if Jones and Falsworth were Howlies like he suspected. The way his stomach lurched at multiple instances of the names Carter, Jarvis, and Wilkins was bad enough because he knew for certain those were probably people he had known personally. When the counter dropped a notch, JARVIS interrupted the increasingly frantic work. "Sir, I suggest doing your announcement in batches. We just lost a ground team."

"Okay, baby boy," Tony agreed, barely pausing. "Patch me through."

"You're live, Sir."

"Agents of SHIELD, this is Iron Man. For some unknown reason, Black Widow and Fury have elected to dump the operational files uncurated onto the open web. I have no intel on why the fuck they thought this was a good idea, but consider your ops sandwiched. Un-ass or whatever lingo you lot use for 'get the hell outta dodge'. Safe houses are probably compromised; extraction is unlikely but I'm working on it as fast as possible. I'm doing what I can but I'm flying just as blind as you at the moment. Stay alive, agents. Iron Man out."

"Broadcasting recorded message as comm units located, Sir. Reports of unidentified vessels launching over Theodore Roosevelt Island. Triskelion evac in progress; Security logs confirms the presence of the WSC on location along with STRIKE team Delta. Sir, a Level 1 alert was issued for Steve Rogers yesterday with Pierce's authorization. This appears to be related to Project Insight."

"Fury's helicarrier fleet? Why the hell would that make Colonel Super Spy pull a Full Monty?"

"There appears to be several anomalies concerning the project, not the least of which is unauthorized use of proprietary repulsor technology. Mark IV Series."

"Natashalie," Tony snarled, knowing exactly when the designs would have been stolen. "Did they lock my backdoor, J?"

"It seems they didn't even look," JARVIS informed smugly. Then his tone shifted. "Sir, I have a recording a PA made by Steve Rogers approximately fifteen minutes ago. Playing now."

"Attention all SHIELD agents, this is Steve Rogers. You've heard a lot about me over the last few days. Some of you were even ordered to hunt me down. But I think it's time to tell the truth. SHIELD is not what we thought it was. It's been taken over by Hydra. Alexander Pierce is their leader. The STRIKE and Insight crew are Hydra as well. I don't know how many more, but I know they're in the building. They could be standing right next to you. They almost have what they want. Absolute control. They shot Nick Fury. And it won't end there. If you launch those helicarriers today, Hydra will be able to kill anyone that stands in their way. Unless we stop them. I know I'm asking a lot. But the price of freedom is high. It always has been. And it's a price I'm willing to pay. And if I'm the only one, then so be it. But I'm willing to bet I'm not."

"What the—"

"Sir, Legionnaires are taking heavy fire. Mission objectives increasingly compromised. Authorization for force required."

"Granted. Authorization code Echo-Yankee-Mike-Aught-Six-Two-Four Supra."

"Retreat location?"

"Fuck if I know, J—SHIELD's COPs are going to be right out if Cap is even half-right." Tony scrubbed his face with a hand. His other hand stilled from the algorithm it had been tapping out. He took a deep breath, trying to push through the tension making his stomach queasy. He was getting too old for this kind of shit. "Okay. Here's what we're gonna do. Extract to SI transport locations. Prioritize getting the agents back stateside in as large batches as possible without risking leaving people stranded. We can use the old testing facilities as staging grounds until we get this situation figured out. Meanwhile, we'll focus on scrubbing and isolating what we can of the files."

"Priorities, Sir?"

"The Legionnaires, J," Tony ordered without hesitation. "You know I have the utmost faith in your capacity, but if you have to choose, you abandon all other projects. Let me and ANA take care of this end, baby boy. You bring as many of our people home as possible. Oh, and J?"

"Yes, Sir?"

"Back up the Legionnaires, so that we don't lose 'em either."

Tony didn't hear if JARVIS replied, already busy opening his back door into the program necessary to control his repulsor tech. Even as he sent the landing sequence to the three carriers, he sent a command to scrub the onboard computers after duplicating the data into a secured server. In the window Tony had open, he saw the massive carriers begin their slow return to land. Unfortunately, it seemed that Rogers had a different plan. The scrub routine had barely initiated when the onboard guns had targeted another helicarrier, which would have been fine if they were in the air above the Potomac where civilians were going about their day.

"Fucking fuckity fuck," he cursed, scrabbling to override the guns that preparing to fire. Had no one briefed Rogers on the Geneva Conventions and Protocols? Those were civilians in a noncombat zone. They had a duty to lessen the impact on them as much as possible! If those carriers blew over the river, hundreds could die and for nothing. If they had control enough of the ships to retarget the onboard systems, surely they had control enough to land them? He immediately redirected his attention from trying to override the powering up of the guns to getting the carriers back to the ground as quick as possible. If he could just lessen the potential impact—

The guns fired, making the carriers all explode to rain still-burning debris onto everything below them.

"Sh'ma Yisra'eil Adonai Eloheinu Adonai echad," he chanted, shocked back the comforting rituals of his earliest childhood memories. Some of the debris had landed on boats. They had gone under the water instantly. They were undoubtably luckier than the people who had been on a shore when the wreckage had landed on them. They were trapped and might be for hours. Some might be impelled, not by large and easily located chunks, but tiny pieces that would cut them to shreds from the insides.

"We call them the Walking Dead."

Tony scrabbled for his wastebasket as the warning bile rose in the back of his throat. How many? How many would die, alone and in pain, because Steve fucking Rogers couldn't be bothered to pick up a goddamn phone? How many would die because Tony hadn't lived up to yet another person's expectations of Howard Stark's son? Why hadn't he dug deeper about Fury's pet project? What hadn't he pushed more against the shadowy nature of SHIELD as whole?

"You had better stop pretending to be a hero."

"What about your other name: the Merchant of Death?"

"Starks are made of iron, boy. We bend for no one."

Tony spat one last mouthful of vomit into the bin and wiped his mouth. His eyes were burning, both from the tears he refused to shed and the rage now pounding his veins. He wanted nothing better than to punch Rogers in his mouth, to put on the suit and go a few rounds. If the stupid lab rat had been in front of him in that moment, Tony probably wouldn't have been able to hold back.

But Rogers was in DC and there were others who still needed Tony's help.

Those people only had Tony and ANA to protect them and every moment just increased their danger.

Tony picked himself off the floor, wiping his mouth again out of habit. His hands were trembling slightly, but he returned to his interface just the same, thankful that it didn't require as much force as a regular keyboard to use. First command he typed in was for the fabrication systems, to churn out more generic Legionnaires to increase their forces. They needed numbers if they were going to save as many as possible from this FUBAR situation. A quick glance over the open screens revealed that ANA had pulled in IRIS to help with the curating. That was good. They could use the extra help.

Burning with determination, Tony did what he always did.

He cut the damn wire.

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An Ending
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