"The Future" (#521–527)
Tony Stark is missing and finds himself captive in Mandarin City, along with various members of his rogues gallery, forced to work on Titanomechs for the Mandarin. Stark later finds out his 'base code' was compromised by the Mandarin due to the backup drive used to restore him in "Stark Disassembled" being compromised itself. In captivity with him is Ezekiel Stane, who has gone from being the Mandarin's ally to his pawn. Slowly reversing the modifications the Mandarin has made to Zeke to make him more obedient, Stark plots his escape from Mandarin City, away from modern technology. As he works, the War Machine, Pepper Potts and other allies of Stark look for him and launch the Stark Swarm, a computing platform on an atomic scale, powered by miniature RT nodes. While working, the Mandarin supervises him by hacking into his biology or flat out just torturing him and Zeke. Stark secretly patches the compromised code as the first step to his eventual escape from Mandarin City.
Stark and Stane puts their escape plan into action and convinces the Blizzard, the Living Laser, and Whirlwind to join forces with them to escape Mandarin City. Stark completes his armor and they begin escaping. Stark is located by his allies, due to his usage of the Stark Swarm and the Triumph Division and the Dynasty arrive to provide support towards the end of the battle. The Mandarin reveals the Titanomechs are designed to give a physical body to the spirits trapped in his ten Makluan rings and plans to sacrifice Earth in order to let the Titanomechs launch.
The battle turns in Stark's favor as he weaponizes the Stark Swarm and uses it as a cannon to destroy the various Titanomechs. Stane kills the Mandarin and Bethany Cabe returns them to the United States. Upon returning, Stark is interviewed by Maria Hill and reveals how he was compromised. Stane goes missing, and Stark realizes that he is depressed and needs to clear his head. However, he later learns that Stane has gone missing and calls Justine Hammer to warn her. Stark theorizes that Stane and Sasha Hammer will assassinate Justine Hammer for betraying them to the Mandarin. However, Justine chooses to ignore Stark and is later assassinated by Sasha and Zeke in her car. Stark continues his return to operating publicly as Iron Man, using the Model 3 armor, having borrowed it from Avengers Tower.
Stark repossesses both the Rescue and the War Machine armors from Pepper and Rhodes to melt down into parts. He later reveals he has built a new Space Armor.
The next morning, Stark tells the Resilient team that he is bored of the 'same old problems' and wishes to change the world and see new sights in order to obtain a paradigm shift. He apologizes to the Resilient team, and promises to do better next time, before he launches into space.
