Chapter Text
It was Tanjiro’s day off from his restaurant, Fire God, so he was currently relaxing in his apartment, eating some cup noodles. He was flipping through channels on his TV when he ended up on a news channel covering a hearing between Tony Stark and Senator Stern. From what he knows about these types of things, they’re pretty serious. But from what Tanjiro can see, Tony is making a fool out of both Senator Stern and some pompous dude trying desperately to charm the onlookers. It was honestly kind of funny to watch.
Watching this, Tanjiro couldn’t help but think of his meeting with Tony a month ago.
***
“Quaint little place you got here.” Tanjiro looked up from his newspaper to find Tony Stark right in front of him, looking around. “Got any good food?”
Tanjiro was silent for a second, surprised to see Tony Stark at Fire God. Last he knew, Tony Stark was still in California. “Oh uh… Of course. Some pretty great food if I say so myself. What would you like?”
“Got any noodles? I’ve been craving noodles recently.”
"Noodles, coming right up." As Tanjiro went to prepare Tony’s meal, Tony looked around the place, taking it all in. As Tanjiro came out with Tony’s food, Tony couldn’t help but make an observation.
“You know, I didn’t know people still read newspapers,” Tony commented as he took the plate from Tanjiro.
“Well, what can I say? I’m old-fashioned.” Tanjiro smiled at his inside joke. “Plus, I find it easier to read the news myself than to have someone explain it to me.”
“Wouldn’t know, I have news told to me by JARVIS. I just hate all the pages and the flipping. Exhausting.” Tony shook his head as he took a bite of his food. “Wow! This lo mein is amazing!”
“It’s stir fry noodles.”
Tanjiro could tell that Tony was only half listening. “Yeah, well whatever it is, it’s amazing. Did you make this? Cause if you did, I’ll have to try to get you to work for me.”
“You couldn’t afford me, Mr. Stark.” Tanjiro challenged, and Tony could smell a challenge a mile away.
Tony looked up from his stir fry, smirking. “Is that a challenge, Whatever-your-name-is? Cause trust me, I can afford anyone.”
“The name’s Tanjiro Kamado, and I don’t doubt that you can. But I can’t be bought.”
“We’ll see about that, Kamado.” Tony continued to eat his meal.
As Tanjiro talked with Tony, he could faintly smell something toxic coming off of Tony. It was so faint he almost couldn’t smell it. He decided not to bring it up since it was so small, all humans give off a slightly toxic smell when they’re sick.
“Have to say Kamado.” Tony finished the last of his stir fry. “That was probably the best lo mein I've ever had."
“Stir fry.”
“Cool. Anyway, this was amazing. You sure you don’t want to work for me?”
Tanjiro smiled. “I’m sure Mr. Stark.”
"Dang." Tony got up. "Well, I'll just have to convince you another time."
And with that, Tony paid for his meal and left.
***
Just like Tony implied, that wasn’t the last time Tony came to Fire God, he came by another three times. The second and third went mostly the same as the first with Tony trying to hire him as a chef as he prattled on about recent things in his business. Though the fourth, and most recent, time was unique.
***
It was another dead night when Tony showed up, every night he showed up was dead, Tanjiro noticed. Though, Tanjiro noticed another thing about these visits. Every time Tony came in to have a meal, the toxic smell coming off of Tony would get stronger. It was after Tony had his meal that Tanjiro finally decided to voice his concerns.
“Are you alright Mr. Stark?” Tanjiro asked. "I've noticed that you've been looking under the weather recently."
Tony looked surprised when Tanjiro asked that, maybe a little nervous.
"Uhm, yeah. Of course." Tony deflected. "Just been really busy lately, what with my business and setting up the Stark Expo."
"Stark Expo, you mean that huge science convention thing that's happening in a week?" Tanjiri heard of it, and it sounded great.
“So you’ve heard of it.” Tony looked smug. “Yeah, it’s just this little thing I’ve been working on. And it’s not just some ‘science convention thing’, it’s a year-long event where the best and brightest men and women of nations and corporations around the world will pool their resources and share their collective vision. Oh, I should use that as the opener.”
Tajniro was impressed. “Year-long, huh? That’s pretty impressive.”
“I know, right?” Tony suddenly pulled out a ticket. “And for being my noodle guy, here is a ticket.”
“Wha- really?” Tanjiro was shocked by this. “But why?”
“You make the best noodles I’ve ever had.” Tony sounded like it was obvious. “Plus, I’ve been enjoying my time here and I wanted to thank you.”
“Mr. Stark, you don’t have to do this-”
“Too late. The ticket is actually just a formality.” Tony smiled as if he won a battle. “JARVIS already scanned your face and made it so the entrance booth at the Stark Expo will automatically let you in. No need to thank me.”
“Thank you?”
“You’re welcome. Also, food and drinks are free.”
Tanjiro didn’t know what to think. “Y-you didn’t java to do this for me, Mr. Stark.”
“Well, I wanted to.” Tony looked serious for a second. “You’ve been good to me, Kamado, and I wanted to thank you.”
Tanjiro’s willpower left him after that.
“We-, I-” Tanjiro sighed as he smiled at Tony. “Thank you, Tony.”
“Don’t mention it.” Tony got up. “Now I have to leave and deal with finishing touches for the Stark Expo. Have a good night Kamado.”
Tony waved as he left the restaurant.
***
Tanjiro was pulled from his thoughts as the hearing between Senator Stern and Tony Stark came to an end. As Tanjiro changed the channel to something else, he thought back to his Stark Expo pass. He honestly wants to use it, but he probably won't be able to go for another 3 weeks.
As he thought about the pass, his thoughts drifted to Tony. He was pretty worried about him since he could tell Tony was lying about his sickness, but there wasn't really anything he could do about it.
As he mulled over this, he cleaned up his lunch and continued on with his day.
***
Tanjiro was glad that he was able to hire more people for Fire God since it gave him more time away from his restaurant. He was back in his apartment, mulling over recent events.
It's been a little over 2 weeks, and Tanjiro hasn't seen Tony at the restaurant once, and he can see why. A few days ago and exactly 2 weeks after the hearing, Tony was attacked by a man with advanced weaponry during the Monaco Grand Prix. This was a big shock to Tanjiro and all of America since Tony promised that everyone was 5 to 10 years away from weapons like the weapons the man who attacked Tony had.
Tanjiro was worried since this gave Senator Stern reason to forcefully take the Iron Man suit away from Tony, which is what he did. And to make matters worse, they gave the suit to the same pompous dude, Tanjiro later learned his name was Justin Hammer, in the hearing over 2 weeks ago. The same man who announced he was doing a showcase at the Stark Expo in 3 days.
That's honestly perfect for Tanjiro, he was planning on going to the Expo anyway, so might as well try to figure out what's going on between Hammer Tech and Tony.
***
It was a good thing Tanjiro brought a bunch of blood pills with him because Tanjiro did not do well in areas packed with a lot of humans. While he can act perfectly fine on the outside, his demonic instincts start acting up while around large areas filled with many humans. Thankfully, taking a blood pill whenever his instincts acted up helped them calm down.
As Tanjiro was walking around, taking in the sights, he noticed a lot of people heading toward one of the presentation halls.
'This must be where Justin Hammer is doing his presentation.' Tanjiro thought as he walked into the hall. It was massive with a giant stage front and center. It seemed like Tanjiro arrived just in time.
“Ladies and gentlemen, for far too long, this country has had to place its brave men and women in harm’s way, but then the Iron Man arrived, and we thought the days of losing lives were behind us. Sadly, that technology was kept out of reach. That’s not fair. That’s not right. And it’s just too bad,” Justin Hammer stated. “Regardless, it was an impressive innovation, one that grabbed the headlines the world over. Well, today, my friends, the press is faced with quite a difficult problem. They are about to run out of ink. Get that out of here. Ladies and gentlemen, today I present to you the new face of the United States military. The Hammer drone.”
With that statement, dozens of armored and weaponized drones rose from the ground, separated by type of division. It was honestly kind of terrifying to see them all in person. Any normal person wouldn’t stand a chance against those things.
“Ladies and gentlemen, today I am proud to present to you the very first prototype in the Variable Threat Response Battle Suit and its pilot, Air Force Lieutenant Colonel James Rhodes.” Tanjiro was knocked out of his thoughts by the appearance of what looked like an Iron Man suit with a bunch of weapons strapped onto it.
‘So this is what they did to the stolen Iron Man suit, Huh?’ Tanjiro thought. Though, before he could continue his thought, he smelled probably the cleanest thing he’s ever smelt coming toward the Hall. When it appeared, he was surprised to find it coming from Tony Stark, no more toxic smell, who landed on the stage and was posing with the Colonel.
When Tony and the Colonel started posing and looked to be whispering to each other, Tanjiro had a bad feeling. His bad feeling was confirmed when the Colonel suddenly took aim at Tony. He was surprised since he was pretty sure they were close until the Colonel started shouting.
“I’m locked up! Get out of here. Go! This whole system’s been compromised.” The Colonel started to fire at Tony who shot off into the air, with the Colonel and some drones following after him.
Every person there started to run out of the hall when the remaining drones started walking off the stage, toward the people. Tanjiro headed to a remote location as everyone ran past him.
“Thank god I packed extra blood pills.” Tanjiro grabbed a few of his pills and swallowed them. After ingesting those pills, he allowed his demonic side to come through. His hair grew wilder, his red eyes went plum pink with slitted pupils, his fang teeth grew longer and sharper, his nails turned to claws, his flame mark grew, and finally, in the center of his back, he grew razor-sharp tendrils made of bone.
Using his, he ran out of the presentation hall. He weaved through the crowd with practiced ease, too fast to be seen by the naked eye. It was a mess outside, the drones were aiming and firing at the crowd of people.
Tanjiro ran towards the group of drones that planted themselves onto the stairs leading to the hall and used his bone whips to slice through the closest ones. With the first row taken care of, he sprinted towards the next drone, using his claws to tear into its body and ripping it apart while using his bone whips to pierce the bodies of the two drones next to it. After dealing with the second row, he started being fired upon by the last drone. While the drone tried to pierce Tanjiro’s durable skin, he used his bone whips to cut the drone into many pieces.
As Tanjiro dealt with his last one, he watched as the remaining drowns flew off, towards the direction of Stark's scent. Not wanting to draw people's attention, he quickly ducked into an empty alley, released his demon traits, and quickly exited the area.
As he was heading back to his apartment, he saw a place had a news program on. On the news they were talking about the recent attack of the drones and thankfully, Tony was able to stop them and make it out ok. Tanjiro had a sigh of relief as he arrived back at his apartment and went to bed.
***
It’s been nearly 2 weeks since the battle at the Stark Expo and not a lot has happened since then. The only notable event was an award ceremony where Tony and the Colonel were awarded for their work at the battle at the Stark Expo. Tanjiro thought it was funny that it was Senator Stern who gave them their awards.
Today Tanjiro was at his restaurant working as a server. It was a fairly steady night, not too many people were in. A news program about Tony was currently on when a customer walked in.
“You know, I never would have thought that a normal person could take out a bunch of murder drones.” Tanjiro looked at the man as he sat down at his table in the middle of the room. He was a dark-skinned man wearing a dark suit with a dark leather jacket and a black eyepatch.
“Well, I wouldn’t really call Tony Stark a normal guy.” Tanjiro smiled, he really wouldn’t.
“I wasn’t talking about Stark.” Every person in the restaurant except for the dark-skinned man then got up, pulling out weapons pointed at Tanjiro.
“You know, when we saw that there were destroyed drones that were nowhere near where Stark was, we decided to investigate.” The tv suddenly showed some camera footage showing a single frame where Tanjiro was just barely visible. “Imagine our surprise when we find out that they were destroyed by the owner of a restaurant popular with the locals.”
Tanjiro can feel his demonic side stirring.
“Now, the way I see it, there are two explanations. Either you have unregistered, advanced weaponry, in which case I will signal all the agents in this room as well as the two dozen men and women stationed outside ready to fire at a moment's notice to arrest you, take your weapons, and lock you in the deepest, darkest cell on earth. Or you aren’t exactly a normal human.”
Tanjiro couldn’t hold it in anymore as his eyes became plum pink, irises became slitted and some of his veins started to bulge around his face. All the agents in the room took an involuntary step back when they saw this. All except the man sitting on the table.
“What happens if I'm the latter?” Tanjiro forced out.
“Well, usually we would do the exact same thing as the former. But given how there are zero other incidents that we can trace back to and the only time we actually did you were saving people, I’d like to give you an opportunity. And if all goes well,” The man smiled. “Then I’ll give you an invitation.”