Grace stood in front of her mirror criticising her body the same way she did every morning. She described herself as 'lumpy' in comparison to the glamourous woman on the 'Real Women Have Curves!' billboard that dominated the bus stop several stories below. She had been well programmed by the beauty industry to think of herself as the type of girl who was 'not his type'.

She flipped off the mirror and grumbled, "Well fuck you, beauty industry," before tugging on her undergarments and digging through her messy closet to find something to wear. She always waited too long to do laundry and so it was an adventure every morning to find out if she actually had pants. She threw out a pair of wide-leg jeans and a snug t-shirt. It was not a fancy day, no need for fancy clothes.

As she left the closet there came a knock on the door, "Gracie, babe, I've got a meeting in ten minutes and my secretary bailed- something about influenza. Can you help me out?"

She sighed and flipped off the door, this time with two middle fingers, "Sure, Tony. But don't expect anything fancy."

"Thanks, sweetheart!"

She stepped into the jeans and pulled on the shirt- if whoever he was meeting with didn't like Skid Row, they were just going to have to deal with it, she wasn't finding a different shirt- she wasn't actually sure she even had a different shirt clean. She ran her fingers through her cropped fire-engine red hair, put on her brown bakelite horn-rim glasses, and grabbed her denim purse from where she had thrown in on the dining room table the night before, stuffing a portable cassette player into it before leaving the apartment.

Life in Stark Tower was certainly never dull.

Grace approached the meeting room, hoping that the men in suits were not all there for Tony's meeting. She was feeling very out of place when she recognised one of them.

"Good morning, Miss Stark."

"Morning, Phil. You all here for whatever Tony's meeting is?"

He nodded and smiled kindly, "Yes, we are."

"Jesus, do I want to know why you're all here?"

"Probably not."

"And for the last time, Phil, just call me Grace."

Phil did not have time to respond as Tony rushed up behind Grace and hugged her from behind, "Oh, you're a lifesaver, kid. Come on, I'll fill you in." He dragged her into the conference room and Pepper brought her a cup of coffee as she settled into the seat he indicated, "So S.H.I.E.L.D. has some kind of news for us. The rest of the A-Team will be here in a few minutes to be briefed on our monster-of-the-week scenario. I need you to take notes so we don't miss anything while we argue with them about how we're supposed to do whatever it is they're asking us to do."

Grace settled in and wrote in large letters across the top of the notepad Tony had left for her, 'MEETING FROM HELL' along with the date.

A few minutes later, the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents filed into the room followed by Hawkeye, Natasha, Bruce, Steve, and Tony. Pepper settled in next to Grace and set up her laptop.

Phil called the meeting to order and began describing the situation, "We've gotten a few unusual energy readings in the past week, one of them in the United States. Director Fury had us look for any signs of paranormal activity in the area of each of these readings. Our agents discovered a face we know you'll all just be thrilled seeing- Loki is in Michigan. Detroit, to be exact."

Tony snickered, Bruce sighed, and Steve asked, "What's so funny about Detroit?"

"Well let's just say it's not exactly the thriving metropolis it was when you were a kid, Steve," Tony replied, "As in, it's pretty much the poster child for everything you can do wrong in a city." Grace wrote on her notepad 'DETROIT IS AWESOME. SUCK IT, TONY.'

And then the bickering began. Grace tried to keep up with note-taking, attempting to catalogue all the suggestions for how to retrieve Loki from Detroit. She finally gave up, writing 'FUCK THIS MEETING' across the page.

She threw her pen down, "For shit's sake, guys, I'll go get him!" The room went silent, "Pepper, get me transportation."

Tony pressed his fingers to his forehead, "No, no, no...this is not going to happen. I'm not letting you-"

"No. Fuck, Tony, you guys can't figure out how to intercept him when S.H.I.E.L.D. has his every movement for the last two weeks mapped. It's not like he's been doing a lot of world-threatening or we'd know about it. In fact-" she checked Pepper's monitor, "-it looks like he's probably headed back to the same restaurant he's been eating lunch at for two weeks solid. And frankly, lunch sounds like a great idea, especially since I'm here and not eating breakfast. So get me a jet and I'll meet him- besides, I think I'm the only one in this room who has actually been to Detroit this century."

"Gracie, this man's dangerous."

"I know that, Tony, I live in New York, too. So surround the place with S.H.I.E.L.D. agents in case something gets hairy and be an eye in the sky. It's not like you haven't spied on me during dates or anything. I know you can do this. Some guy gets a little fresh at the club and BAM, you're right there. I doubt you'll have any trouble getting to me if you think there's a problem." Grace looked around the room, "So somebody tell me how this plan is inferior to you all standing around and bitching for the next three hours." Nobody made a sound, "Good, Pepper, get me a jet. I've got a date in Detroit."