InsaneJournal

No one wanted to talk about alternative sources of energy or car engines during a war. And that was essentially what it was now, wasn't it? This was no longer a conflict. Congress hadn't declared war officially and they probably wouldn't, but the Pentagon and the joint chiefs weren't clogging his phone lines for nothing. The wanted their weapons. They could get weapons anywhere, but America had been winning wars and crushing natives with Stark Technology since Roosevelt's run on Cuba. They wanted Stark weapons.

But there was a hole in Tony's chest these days.

They'd called him unpatriotic before attempting gentle negotiation tactics, saying that maybe they could just take half their former orders. Maybe just the hand-helds instead of that 'repulsor bomb' he'd once shown them the plans to. Maybe he could just work on tweaking Agent Orange, the mustard gas, and a few other chemical agents for them. Couldn't he do anything?

Well, there was plenty he could do. But he had a hole in his chest.

Tony left the office early after one last phone call. He'd spoken with Johnson himself and he hadn't said no. Because even Tony Stark wasn't at the point where he would say 'no' outright to the President of the United States of America. He wouldn't say no, but he could certainly leave the office an hour early and not tell anyone where he was going. He needed a walk to clear his head and then a drink to slow the myriad of thoughts that insisted on running through it. Who could have guessed that having a conscience would be do difficult or so loud? And so painful? The scars around his chest almost felt as if they were burning, never mind the fact that they hadn't hurt since he'd returned from his first --and only- trip to Vietnam.

He headed into the park. It was still light out and Tavern on the Green was a good enough walk away to give him the time to think about what he was going to do. It also had a bartender who called him by his first name and a hostess who was intimately familiar with the interior decoration of his apartment at the Dakota. Always good to have a dependable source of stress relief if he found that, over the course of the evening, he didn't feel up to flirting his underneath another woman's skirts.

If he'd been a smoker there would have been one firmly between his lips by now, but instead he just walked. Quickly, with the knowledge that the alcohol would also dull the phantom burning that was his conscience.

Tony sat down on the last bar stool at the bar and signaled discretely to the bartender. One quick whiskey followed by a Manhattan or two or five and he would be well on his way out of his moral dilemma.