The night was like ink, and the stars were like diamonds.
High above the Pacific Ocean, two streaks of light cut through the tranquil night sky.
One was silver-white like a meteor, the other golden-red like the dawn; they intertwined and circled, painting a fleeting picture across the black, velvet-like dome of the sky.
Tony Stark hovered at an altitude of seven thousand meters, his silver-white Mark II armor gleaming with a cold, metallic luster under the moonlight.
Beneath the faceplate, most of his face was obscured by the shadow of the helmet, but those eyes—eyes that shone astonishingly bright even in the darkness—were gazing fanatically at the landscape unfolding below.
The lights of Los Angeles were like an overturned jewelry box, scattered stars covering the entire basin.
On Highway 405, the traffic formed two ribbons of light—red for taillights, white for headlights—stretching all the way from Santa Monica to the San Fernando Valley.
The high-rises of Century City looked like Burning matchsticks, and the Villas of Beverly Hills looked like scattered diamonds.
Further away, the darkness of the Pacific Ocean was boundless, with the lights of cargo ships occasionally moving slowly like fireflies.
"Hahahaha—" Tony's laughter exploded in the communication channel, unbridled and exhilarating, like a child who had just learned to run, or a teenager who had just received his driver's license.
In that laughter, there were no shadows of the past few days, no pain in his chest, no tense confrontations in the boardroom, and no overwhelming mockery from the media.
There was only pure, primal, unadorned joy.
"Jarvis! Did you see that?!" he shouted, his voice cracking slightly from excitement.
"I'm flying! I'm actually flying!"
"Yes, sir," it replied, its voice as calm as always.
"I am recording all data. Your speed has ascended to Mach 1.2, altitude 6,743 meters. Systems are operating normally. However, I must remind you that the Mark II has not yet undergone complete flight testing. I suggest you maintain current parameters and do not—"
"Don't be a killjoy, Jarvis!" Tony interrupted, his tone devoid of real dissatisfaction, carrying only a childlike willfulness.
"I'm used to doing things first and talking later!"
A memory flashed through his mind: that summer, when he was in his teens and had just received his driver's license.
Howard had given him a Porsche as a birthday gift; it was one of the fastest production cars of that year, capable of accelerating from zero to one hundred in just five seconds.
He had driven that silver-gray sports car, speeding along the coastal highway of Long Beach with the top down, the wind messing up his hair, leaving Maria's screams and Howard's roars far behind.
That was the most freedom he had ever experienced in his memories.
Now, he had found that feeling again.
No, it was even better than that.
A sports car could only run on a two-dimensional plane, forever bound by the road, always needing to turn, brake, and obey traffic lights.
But now, he could fly upward, dive downward, pass through clouds, and hover in mid-air to look down upon all living things.
The road was gone, the rules were gone; there was only the sky itself, vast and boundless, without borders.
Mavuika flew about five meters behind and to his right, maintaining the formation distance he was accustomed to.
His posture was incredibly relaxed, with golden-red flames dissipating from all over his body, yet they were not hot at all, only forming a warm halo around him.
His long golden-red hair whipped in the wind.
"Not bad, Tony," he said, his voice entering Tony's communication channel directly through some method of his own, as clear as if he were speaking right into his ear.
"This is my favorite among all your inventions."
Tony couldn't suppress the curve of his lips.
To be praised by Mavuika—not out of politeness, not for Howard's sake, but with genuine appreciation—felt better than signing a multi-billion dollar contract or appearing on the cover of Time magazine.
"This is just the Mark II, it counts as a prototype!" he tried to make his voice sound less carried away.
"Wait until I build the Mark III, add the paint job, perfect the weapon systems, and optimize the energy efficiency; you'll like it even more!"
"I look forward to it," Mavuika smiled.
Tony took a deep breath. He couldn't feel the airflow through the armor, but the action itself calmed him down and made him even more excited.
"Let's try maximum speed!" he suddenly said.
Without waiting for Mavuika's response, Tony pushed the throttle to the limit.
The nozzles of the thrusters on his soles and palms suddenly contracted, then burst forth violently!
It wasn't a gradual acceleration; it was an instantaneous ejection.
A blue-white plasma stream exploded into two streaks of light in the night sky, and a sonic boom cloud burst into a ring shape behind Tony, like the moment a cannonball leaves the barrel.
His body was pressed tightly against the suit by the immense thrust, the gravitational acceleration pulled his cheeks backward, and the edges of his vision began to blur.
The suit's computer system displayed a stream of data: Mach 1.3, Mach 1.5, Mach 1.8, Mach 2.0...
"Sir!" it said, its voice having a rare sense of urgency.
"Structural stress exceeds design limits! Recommend immediate deceleration!"
Tony did not decelerate. His eyes were fixed ahead, on that boundless darkness, those increasingly bright stars, that horizon that was forever receding and forever impossible to reach.
He spread his arms, as if to embrace the entire sky.
Then he turned his head.
Mavuika was flying on his left, less than three meters away from him.
His posture hadn't changed at all, as if this speed put no pressure on him whatsoever.
His amber eyes looked at him calmly, as if he were accompanying a younger brother who had gone wild playing.
"Mach 2.2," Mavuika said, his tone as if he were reading a weather forecast: "Can you go faster?"
Tony's excitement froze for a moment, then turned into even louder laughter.
"Are you provoking me, sun goddess?"
"I'm just curious," Mavuika smiled: "How fast your armor can fly."
Tony gritted his teeth and pushed the speed to the limit.
Mach 2.3, Mach 2.4, Mach 2.5...
The armor began to tremble—not a slight vibration, but the entire structure resonating at a high frequency—and the metal fatigue sensors emitted a harsh alarm.
Tony's vision blurred completely, gravity squeezed the blood from his brain toward his lower limbs, and his consciousness began to drift away...
Just at the moment before losing control, he eased off the thrust.
The speed plummeted.
2.0, 1.5, 1.0... The armor regained stability, and Tony gasped for air, cold sweat soaking his bodysuit.
Mavuika was still flying beside him, his breathing rhythm unchanged.
"Not bad speed," he said, this time with sincere appreciation in his tone.
Tony gave a bitter smile: "You don't have to comfort me; I know that when it comes to speed, I'm afraid I'll never be able to beat you in this lifetime."
"Alright, enough racing; let's try maximum altitude!"
He turned upward, toward the edge of the deep blue dome, where the stars were gradually becoming sparse, toward the final boundary of the atmosphere.