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The Sage of the Mind: Chapter 17

Manhattan [October 2008]

–Axle Riddle–

Welp, it’s been three months now. On the date.

Yet, still no news of Stark. Even most of the news channels had stopped reporting on his absence and he had all but been declared dead. The thing was that Stark was not just an ordinary Billionaire weapons manufacturer. If he had been, the government would have abandoned him and started dealing with the next snake that took his place.

No, it was not Justin Hammer who was abducted by terrorists. No, it was Tony Stark. The one man capable of creating weaponry so fart ahead of the rest of the world that it was not even funny.

So, until the government had definitive proof of him being dead, they would not stop looking. In that direction, they had taken multiple steps, foregoing most of the standard procedure in the process.

Thus far, the news had leaked that they had destroyed over a dozen insurgent bases but had yet to find any intel on Stark. Probably killed many civilians in the process as well but for them, Stark was more important than the combined lives of civilians in that entire region, so they kept looking.

It was probably this aggressive approach that led to the Ten Rings, well, the remnants of it anyway, going deeper into their hole and hiding from the military, at least until Tony built them the Jericho missile and once they extracted the know-how from him, they would dispose of the American and start the war anew with the forces stationed there.

He did not know exactly where Tony was being kept and when he would break out of his imprisonment but he did remember that it was somewhere around the three months mark so he had been waiting. It had been 3 months and 3 days since Stark was kidnapped and so far, the SI Stock that he had been buying wholesale, had stopped dropping and had now stabilised, more or less, at the lowest valuation it had been in since Tony Stark took over.

Master Wu had been hesitant to give him over 100 million dollars to bet on Tony Stark’s return but after assuring him that Tony Stark would return and he had guaranteed intel, Master Wu relented. It would seem that he had pretty deep pockets considering he didn’t have to think much or take more time to arrange that amount of money.

He spoke to Master Wu yesterday and today he had the money, which he then promptly poured into the stock. Sure, he was nowhere near a majority shareholder but if he played his cards right, he might just get a meet-and-greet from the man himself.

So far, all he had done was expand his range to the edge of his prison. Which had surely left the analysts at SHIELD scratching their heads as they looked for him. He was sure they must have had some outrageous ideas like interrogating everyone or looking for the blood samples for the entire population and they might just have been successful had the mayor not been cunning. He realised that Manhattan was currently the golden goose it was because of his existence.

Otherwise, it would have been rich, sure, but also infested with crime, drugs, murders, gang wars, etc. Now though, it was as if every Billionaire and multi-hundred millionaire in New York lived in Manhattan, under the umbrella of his protection.

If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Cops somehow sought transfers to Manhattan because they knew the workload would be less and the danger would be almost zero.

Anywho, he was currently in his apartment, practising his powers. Not his TK, no, that was not the focus of his current exercise. Currently, he was practising his spatial awareness. He had recently crossed his range over the barrier that surrounded Manhattan in a meaningful way. Now, he could actually focus on the people and the objects there and affect them to a degree.

He could not use his full strength beyond the curtain, obviously but he could use it to some degree. In the absence of overwhelming force, he had to get creative. Applying just enough force at the foot of a person to make them either stumble or outright fall on their face.

Shove someone with enough force to push them a couple of steps ahead until they regain their balance or make them fall down immediately.

Take hold of a small rock and then float it far above in the sky and then drop it so that it would gain high velocity when it impacts something, thereby increasing the damage.

Sadly, he could not do much about the bullets or even knives as the force behind humans was too much for his powers to stop completely. Knives could be deflected and he could always apply the entirety of his available powers at the crotch of people to disarm them but that did not always work.

He even had to resort to stashing tools in secure corners and then using them on thugs in his range. The news must have spread fast in the underground crime rings because after a few times, he had stopped crimes, gangs stopped coming to the edge of his range.

From then on, he had worked on increasing his range, mainly because there was not much crime happening in Manhattan and the amount that was happening was being easily handled by his subconscious. It was ridiculous that the evolution of his powers led to a second “mind” of sorts that he could assign tasks to, even while he was asleep.

So, now he was in charge of the protection of the city 24/7 and that..did not help one bit. The number of traumatic events he had witnessed were far beyond the norm.

The amount of attempted murders, rapes, Overdoses, and much more had dropped drastically ever since he took over. He could not even imagine the scenario on the other islands.

So, he had been hard at work, expanding his awareness range to the max. In the beginning, his awareness expanded very smoothly but once it crossed the curtain around the city, it crawled to a halt. It was as if it had turned into a very viscous fluid and moving it felt like a herculean task, if he was being honest with himself.

Many times, he found himself bleeding from his nose but apparently, the boost he got to his body helped in that regard as well because, after weeks of trying and exerting both his mind and body, he no longer bled after overusing his powers.

The good news was that the effects of trying so hard with his spatial awareness had paid dividends even inside the curtain of the city. Now, he could even predict if a portal was about to be opened in a certain area. His awareness, while still unable to penetrate the wards of the Sanctum, was now able to tell him that the Sanctum was present in that place and the wards did exist on that building.

He could see the wordings but the meaning of them still eluded his mind. He had hoped to understand and maybe someday use the Mystic Arts but apparently, his body and soul were not exactly the ideal specimens for becoming a practitioner. Also, forcefully practising them might have hurt his original abilities and that was a big no-no.

So, here he was, practising the only tool in his arsenal, hoping to bring them to greater heights so that one day, when his prison collapsed, he could go out and assemble the most badass backup for the Avengers once Thanos came knocking.

……

…..

…..

“Breaking NEWS! Tony Stark has been found and rescued by the US Military. Details on his rescue have been scarce although the news has created waves in the financial markets, prompting analysts to update their predictions for Stark International’s Stock prices.

Stay tuned for more details.”

He smiled as his phone began ringing, probably from Master Wu’s great-grandson who ran the company these days. They bet a 100 million dollars on this and now, now it was time to cash in.

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