CH 18: Turning 16

The next day…

After completing his recruitment of AIM and Dr. Connors, Marcus finally had the time to visit his company headquarters.

He was the CEO of his company and many decisions were pending due to his sudden absence.

Marcus got into his SUV with Barnes and was driven to his headquarters by his driver.

And due to Barnes' complaints, he had tweaked the Mark I Armor a little to be better fitted for him.

After a while, the car stopped in front of a tall building with the Hunt Industries logo on it.

Marcus and Barnes stepped out of the car as the gate was held open by the guards at the front door.

And then Marcus walked through the front door to the elevator surrounded by his guards who stopped anyone trying to approach him when suddenly his eyes caught the figure of a man in crutches with long hair and glasses.

Marcus smiled at the inevitable success of his plans and nodded towards Killian, who instantly turned happy after getting recognized by Marcus.

After reaching his office, Marcus called the receptionist and asked her to send Aldrich Killian to his office. The receptionist complied, "Mr. Killian, Dr. Marcus has asked to meet you in his office. The office is on the 23rd floor, after exiting the elevator, you have to turn right and you will see the office. And here, take this VIP visitor's card otherwise you wouldn't be allowed on that floor."

Killian excitedly took the card and rushed towards the elevator, after reaching the 23rd floor and showing the guards his VIP visitor's card, he was allowed to go to Marcus' office.

Killian reached the office, but before heading in, he patted down the dust from his coat, tightened his tie, and entered after combing his messy hair.

"Hello Mr. Killian, pleasure seeing you here."

Killian felt flattered and nervous at the same time, "No, No, the pleasure is all mine, Dr. Marcus. You invited me to your office even after I rejected you like that last time. I am very sorry for that. I wasn't in my right mind at the time, and as you said, I needed to take a rest as working day and night is really harmful to the body. And you were right, it didn't just affect my body, it also affected my mind, I nearly threw away such a god-given opportunity. I thank you for your generosity in giving me the time to rethink my decisions regarding my company…"

And Killian went on a rant of apologizing and how he was willing to work under Marcus.

Marcus just smiled politely, knowing fully well that the current behavior of Killian meant that the seed had completely sprouted. Although he knew it would happen, he didn't think it would happen so fast. In the hindsight, Killian did have his insecurities and the seed probably played its tricks and manipulated them for Killian to be this way.

But rather than letting his rant go on, Marcus stopped it politely and said, "I am happy that you retraced your thoughts and clearly thought about my proposal. We can sign the contract right now. I have the papers ready."

Marcus brought out acquisition papers with Albert's signature on them, as he was the current legal guardian and his parents had trusted him with everything in case something happened to them.

Killian didn't even flinch and signed the papers excitedly. Apparently, he was currently the highest shareholder of his company and was also the CEO, mainly because he didn't get much investment as most investors didn't think he would be worth anything as his research were still in its initial stages.

After the acquisition papers were signed and ready, Marcus ordered a bottle of vintage wine to celebrate the occasion.

The glasses were filled with wine and the aroma tingled their noses, they swirled the wine and took a sip and only swallowed it after keeping it in their mouth for a few extra seconds to fully experience the taste of the Vintage wine.

After the pleasantries were done, Killian left with a copy of acquisition papers. He went back to AIM to organize his company and announce the acquisition.

The reason behind Marcus acquiring the company instead of just recruiting Killian and Maya as scientists was; that Marcus had plans of performing human experiments to research and stabilize the Extremis virus as fast as he could.

And if the things ever did come to light, he could clear his name by shirking the responsibility on AIM and claiming that he didn't know about the human experiments, now that was still not enough to clear his name but that could be done by a good enough lawyer who could win the jury.

Meanwhile, throughout the whole conversation, Barnes, who was posing as the bodyguard, kept standing in the corner and only sat down on the sofa after Killian left.

"Hey, kid, who allowed you to drink at such a young age? You shouldn't touch alcohol until you are 21, now give me that bottle real quick."

Barnes walked up and picked up the wine bottle from the table even before Marcus could react and proceeded to gulp it down in one go.

"HEY! Do you know how expensive that is? Not that it matters to me but still…"

"Huh! It tastes quite good but it wouldn't cost much would it?"

"That bottle alone is worth half a million dollars! And I liked its taste too, you drank it like a fucking beer, damnit! Ahhh!"

Barnes was stunned after hearing the price of the almost empty bottle of wine in his hand. He regretted his decision of drinking it after taking it away from Marcus.

"Wh-what? Y-you're kidding, right? O-oh! This is one of your pranks, isn't it? Hahaha! I have seen through it now, you can't deceive me, kid."

Barnes felt confident after coming up with his explanation because his old brains could never justify the price of half a million dollars for a single bottle of wine.

"No, it isn't a prank...Hais! I can't blame you, you were just looking out for me. Sorry for my previous outburst, it was unwarranted. Just don't do that from now on."

Marcus sighed and calmed down, his outburst was only because he never really found a good-tasting wine or alcohol even in his previous life, but when he finally did so and decided to use his luxuries to fulfill his desires, Barnes came in and gulped it like it was a bottle of water.

Barnes was also feeling a little guilty because of the price of the wine he drank, so he apologized and reprimanded Marcus to not drink alcohol until he turned 21.

After that was over, Marcus spent his whole day going through different documents and papers related to the problems in different divisions, Marcus cleared all of them after working the whole day as most of them only required money and more workforce.

He had also recruited some more prestigious scientists for his new division of research and assigned them under Dr. Connors.

And finally, at midnight, Marcus went back home to meditate and practice his ki.

For the next few days, Marcus worked on inventing a new type of gaming console, which was more affordable, for the game related technological division of his company.

He shared the design with the software engineers working there to optimise the software for the new version of console.

The console was put into production almost instantly and was released in the market after a month.

By that time, the Armors were also ready and were delivered to the military as per the contract.

In that month, Marcus had worked with Killian and Maya to stabilize the virus even further and the human experiments were to start from the next month.

Marcus knew that Maya could betray him as she did Killian in the movies, so he had used his powers on her too.

Dr. Curt's research was also going on smoothly but Marcus didn't have time to work with him yet as he was working on the Extremis.

Marcus had planned to stabilize the virus in the upcoming months and inject himself with it to get a much needed powerup for the upcoming events.

But before all that, August 25th 2003, Today was Marcus' birthday, the day he turned 16. In the past months, due to working out and cultivating his Ki, Marcus had grown to 5'10".

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU MARCUS, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU."

Marcus wanted to celebrate his birthday with his friends, family and colleagues. So, the birthday was arranged in his headquarters, where most of the scientists and engineers worked.

After cutting the big 5 layered cake, Marcus fed the first piece to Albert who was standing by his side, signifying their close relation.

The next piece was fed to Barnes, who was introduced as Marcus' uncle, to the employees.

Barnes had slowly stopped wearing the full body Armor and instead wore a camouflage cap and glasses whenever he visited Marcus. Marcus had told him to safeguard Albert as he was more vulnerable than him.

After that, the cake was cut and distributed among the employees and a small party was organized. Pizzas and cold drinks were delivered in large numbers to the headquarters building, for the employees to eat.

And that's how Marcus' birthday was celebrated….