It's been a week since Bruce Banner moved into Tony's mansion, and Pepper Potts is still in awe.

Usually, when Tony does something odd or weird or bad, there's a precedent for it. If he's drinking, it's likely something has been weighing heavy on his mind, probably something depressing, and there's a fifty percent chance it has to do with his father. If he's been overly snarky and pissing everyone off, he's trying to keep them from figuring something out, something that is clear as day if you know how to look.

But there is no precedent for bringing home super hero scientists, giving them a lab and a room to crash in after work.

Pepper has never known Tony to be trusting or friendly to, well, anyone, so when the Avengers thing first happened and Tony couldn't stop talking about Bruce, she dismissed it as a scientist thing. She figured Tony must've been really impressed with some of Bruce's work.

But being impressed with his work does not mean giving him a place to live in Tony's house. Hiring him, maybe, but making him a roommate is a few steps further. This has never happened before. Lovers have come and gone, and the only friend that has ever stayed the night was Rhodey.

When she met Bruce, Pepper wasn't sure what to expect, but the demure, calm, friendly man she met is not who she imagined. If she were honest, she'd admit she was imagining a clone of Tony, someone who reminded him of himself so much that keeping him around was either a form of masturbation or narcissism. But Bruce doesn't seem to be like Tony at all; he's level-headed, hardly daring or reckless, and studious. Pepper shook his hand and introduced herself, watching him carefully, and all he did was give a small smile and promise to not make a mess.

It is only later that Pepper realizes Bruce must've thought she was staring because of the Hulk. No, she's really not too concerned about that for multiple reasons. She's staring because Tony has a friend. A real, actual friend he didn't bribe, blackmail, or pay off. Someone who apparently is willing to live with the man 24/7. And someone that Tony is willing to live with, too.

No, she doesn't stare at Bruce because she's terrified he's about to go green at any moment. She stares at Bruce because she's terrified he – and any trace of Tony having a normal, healthy friendship – will vanish at any moment.

It has been a whole week, and Bruce has yet to destroy Tony's home.

Though his control has improved vastly since his initial debut as the green giant, he's still a little shocked something hasn't happened yet. His luck doesn't usually hold out this long. Though Tony has insisted multiple times that, if the other guy does make an appearance, he can easily pay to repair the damage, Bruce is not comforted. He's more afraid of the damage which can't be repaired.

The man sighs and removes his glasses, fiddling with them so he'll have something to do with his hands. He was working, but now his mind has wandered to dark places and he's finding it hard to concentrate. The door to his room slides open and he barely hears it, which is a hint to just how far inside his own mind he's gone.

"Knock, knock," It's Tony's voice, of course. Bruce shouldn't be surprised, but he is, just a little. Spinning around in his chair, he places his glasses back where they were and looks at his… friend?

"Hey, Tony," He smiles. "What brings you up out of your lair?"

The other man smirks good-naturedly, though his tone feigns annoyance. "It is not a lair – heroes don't have lairs." He saunters forward, leaning his hip against Bruce's desk. "And why can't I simply visit my greatest friend in the whole world?"

Bruce starts laughing and shaking his head. "I'm pretty sure I'm your only friend."

"Completely untrue, an utter falsehood – I can call up at least two hundred people who will say 'I am happy to by Tony Stark's friend'," For effect, he pulled his touch phone out of his pocket, sliding his thumb across the surface.

"Uh huh. And how many of them are not ass kissers?"

"Just Rhodey. He never had it in him – and they do so like ass-kissing in the military." He sighed forlornly, tucking the phone away. "But what was I saying? Ah!" He clapped his hands suddenly, and if not for Bruce's training, the man heartbeat might've jumped. "I am here to invite you down for dinner, but if you are much too busy poking holes into my social life –"

"Sorry, sorry Tony," He laughs, standing as he does. "Just good fun." The way Tony smirks back tells him the other is unbothered, as usual.

They head downstairs together, still trading good natured barbs, with Tony taking the lead. Bruce isn't quite sure he remembers how to get to the kitchen – this mansion is like a maze – so he lets Tony take point as they walk.

There's a delicious smell wafting down the hall, so Bruce figures they're headed the right way. They head through a double door into a lavish kitchen/dining room, which is both Spartan and futuristic in its appearance.

"Spagetti and meatballs…" Bruce gives a little chuckle, crossing his arms and pausing just inside the doorway. As the chuckle dies away, he gives a soft sigh. "I can't remember the last time I had pasta."

Tony hasn't stopped moving; he's approaching the kitchen, opening drawers and digging around. Bruce watches, fairly sure the man hasn't been in his own kitchen in years. A smile comes over his face as Tony curses and digs through three cabinets before finding the plates.

Bruce approaches to help, but Tony lets out a string of noises that aren't really words and throws his hands up to keep Bruce at bay. Eventually, Tony's got the forks, knives, plates, napkins, and glasses all arranged on the counter, and he's looking pretty pleased with himself.

"Well," He says, "Now you can remember again, 'cause we're having it." He picks up a plate, approaches the food… and realizes there is no serving utensil, and there doesn't appear to be one anywhere within the kitchen. "Ah, shit!"

Bruce can't help it – he's trained to hold down anger, but happiness is a very different feeling, and he can't keep the laughter from bursting from his chest.

Pepper has come across many things whilst working for Tony Stark. Entering the mansion and heading towards his lab, she finds herself hearing something she's rarely heard in his home: laughter.

She changes course, following the sound, carefully approaching the partially opened doors that lead to the kitchen. There's conversation, which she doesn't really follow, interspersed with chuckles and chortles, which are reminiscent of boys at a sleepover. She inches towards the door and glances through, and sure enough, there is Tony Stark, with his new roommate.

They're not at the dining table, which is at this point mostly decoration; they're sitting at the counter, across from each other, talking about something that mostly flies over Pepper's head, but she assumes it's a scientist joke of some kind. She's not really listening. She's paying attention to Tony's relaxed posture, to the bags under his eyes which are always there but seem lighter now. Bruce, too, seems relaxed and at ease. Usually when she sees him he is tight, restrained, as if he's afraid of touching anything. But every so often at the counter, Bruce and Tony's knees will brush and neither seems to care.

Tony's eyes are full of light when he turns and notices her, and recognition passes through them. Not recognition of her, but recognition that she's seen something new in him, something he's not even defined yet. She steps through the door with a smile, announcing her presence with the click-clack of heels on tiles.

"Good evening, Tony, Dr. Banner," She smiles at him, and the shy man – now a little more reserved – smiles back.

"Please, call me Bruce, Ms. Potts."

"Then call me Pepper, Bruce," She looks behind them to the kitchen, to the dirty pots and pans, then back at Tony with a quirked eyebrow. "Cooking, Mr. Stark?"

He shakes his head. "Nope, not me. You know I can't cook water."

"So…" She glances at Bruce, who shrugs.

Tony's now looking at his plate, avoiding eye contact. "That was the chef, of course."

"The chef?" Pepper turns to him, grinning, a thrill of amusement running through her. "I wasn't aware you had a chef."

"Just hired them. Great at making spaghetti, want to try some?" He turns to her now, his eyes pleading, but she just grins wider.

"And where is this chef, now?"

"Um, they are – they were fired. Today. Difference of opinion. They thought mushrooms were a suitable addition to spaghetti, I vehemently disagreed, and they reluctantly agreed to cook mushroom-less spaghetti, but were so distraught at being forced to make what was, to them, sub-par pasta, they quit."

"I thought you said they were fired." That was Bruce, who had a skeptical look on his face.

"Fired, yes, I tried to fire them because having a chef who thinks mushrooms are suitable for ingestion is dangerous, but they had already walked out." He scoffed dramatically, stuffing more pasta in his mouth.

Pepper was beaming, grinning ear to ear, when Bruce looked up at her and cocked an eyebrow. She didn't know if he knew just how out of character it was for Tony to cook and to actually stop and have dinner, especially for a friend, but Pepper knew.

"All right then…" She nodded, turning on her heel. "I'll just leave you boys to it." She shouted a few directions at Tony as to their plans for the next day, and he shouted an affirmative as she headed for the front door. The smile didn't leave her face.

I can't believe it, Pepper thought as she headed into the garage. Tony Stark is willing to cook for Bruce Banner.

And though one might not realize it yet, and the other might never admit to it, that means a whole hell of a lot of something.

Even in his apartment, Steve feels out of place. Antiquated. Outdated. He is older than everything in the room; he remembers the precursors to the technology around him, but hasn't the faintest knowledge how to use any of the gadgets to their fullest potential.

Some things, though, haven't changed; in his hands, he holds a simple pencil, and balanced on his lap is a small sketchpad. He's glad that this hasn't gotten more futuristic, more fanciful. Though he knows art has evolved and there are more technologically advanced ways to draw now, he prefers this. It feels… familiar. Holding a sketchbook and pencil is like holding a piece of home.

His apartment is depressingly Spartan; there is a tan couch and a coffee table, and two bookshelves, relatively filled with books. He's working on improving his collection. There's a coffee machine in the kitchen, and a phone, and the laptop that Fury gave him. It's hardly homey, but it works fine.

Steve sits at the couch, his legs pulled together and in, the sketchpad on his knees. An hour ago, when he started, he wasn't really sure what he was drawing. That was often the case; he'd sit in front of a blank piece of paper and simply let his feelings fall upon the page. Now he was doing the same.

In the top corner was a small, simplified version of Ironman, streaking majestically across the sky. His armor gleamed, and his visor was lifted to reveal a charming smile. On the bottom right, standing on the ground, was a monkey in Captain America's armor, shoulders slouched, the shield fallen useless at his side. Steve is working on the edges of the shield.

It's not the first picture he's drawn since awaking. First, he tried drawing Peggy from memory, then Bucky, then a bunch of faces from his past, most crudely drawn and half finished. He'd given up halfway through shading Dr. Erksine.

Next, he'd drawn a picture of Nick Fury, standing imposingly in the distance, framed by tall buildings and bright lights and futuristic – if badly drawn – cars. Monkey Steve was the in opposite corner, eyes wide and mouth gaping at… everything. He'd tried drawing other members of the Avengers, their faces, their poses. He drew the Hulk catching Ironman, Natasha and Clint standing back to back… he drew Coulson smiling. He's been drawing a lot lately.

Sighing, Steve sets the pad and pencil on the table and lifts a hand to his head, rubbing his brow. What has become of him, that he spends all his time hiding in his apartment or in the training room at SHIELD headquarters? That he uses his free time between saving the world to draw depressing pictures and punch punching bags until they break? He's not even been reading much, though he wants to, because he simply can't set the real world aside long enough to escape into a book.

Reality is weighing heavy upon him. Both the memories of the past and the heavy presence of the present are shaking him. He has a foot in both worlds, and can't fully move into either. He's not ready to let go of his world, his life that he always knew, because it was his life dammit! And though he'd like to move forward, he's not quite ready to embrace everything this strange, fast, lonely new century has to offer.

Letting go means moving on, and moving on means forgetting the ghosts of the past, the shades of people he knew before who are now long since dead. But it also means admitting that he's alone, that he has no one. Everyone from his life before is gone, and everyone new in his life really doesn't care about him.

Fury is a good man, and a fine soldier, but there's no real relationship there. Fury is constantly away and constantly busy, and has more to worry about than whether or not Steve is settling in fine. And the other Avengers? Steve snorts. No. He has no friends there either, not that he blames them.

Steve stands and enters his kitchen, going for the fridge. As he does, he dwells on his comrades, his fellow soldiers. Tony Stark's words – we are not soldiers! – ring through his head.

The man is right. They aren't soldiers, and Steve is, he is the one soldier on a team of spies, gods, and scientists, and he doesn't fit. Sure, he's team leader somehow, and they did manage to save the world, but while everyone else walked off into their happy ending, Steve returned to an empty apartment and emptier memories.

Tony Stark almost died, but he didn't; he got up from the battle that day and returned to his empire, ready to whittle away his hours working on the answers to the world's energy crises and it really shouldn't, but it does bug Steve that that ass is saving the world both in the suit and out, and here is Steve. Drawing.

Then there's Banner, who everyone thought had finally gone off the deep end, but who is apparently now more stable than ever, and happily employed with Stark. There's Natasha and Clint, who were reunited and sent back to work, able to enjoy each other's company and killing bad guys, perhaps at the same time. Thor returned home to his people, but only after going to see the scientists he'd made friends with during his first visit to Earth.

And Steve is here. He has no work to do. He has no friends to fight alongside or create with, no one to visit, no home to return to. He has a small, hardly decorated apartment with some bookshelves and a sketchpad. Steve gives up on finding something to eat in the fridge, his hunger vanishing as the heavier weight of depression settles on him. He looks up and wonders if anything ever changed at all. Sure, he became strong enough to fight bullies, he managed to do some good things – but he didn't change, not really.

He simply became a different kind of invisible.

It's been two weeks since 'the cooking incident', as Tony refers to it, and everything they've eaten since has been ordered in. Seeing as he had to fire the chef, homemade meals are now out of reach, which is why they've had a lot of pizza and fast food recently. (That's his story and Tony's sticking to it.)

He's been working non-stop the past few days though, so Bruce has been eating alone – and he totally feels no guilt about that, no, not at all – but he can't just quit, he is so close to… to something…

To be honest, he can't really remember what the original plan for this thing was, just that it is going to be the coolest thing (since his last coolest thing) and he's relatively close to having it working, if only he could finish a few calculations… but the calculations are taking longer than usual and that might have to do with the fact that he keeps adding wrong. He sees the number 2 five times and it takes him a minute to realize that his vision is doubling. Or… whatever the word is for making five of something.

Coffee. "More coffee," he mumbles aloud, leaning back and rubbing his head, the chair beneath him creaking. Tony forces himself to stand and approaches the counter where the coffee machine is, throwing up a threatening hand as Dummy's head lifts. "Don't even think about touching anything when I am this close or I will let Bruce hulk out and smash you." Again, he's really unsure of what he's close to, and he thinks he should probably remember that. Whatever, he'll just finish the work and then figure out what the hell he's created once he's done.

He pours a little too much coffee into the mug, leaves the spill on the counter and approaches his work again. As he does, JARVIS speaks above him.

"Sir, Dr. Banner is looking for you. He is currently heading towards your bedroom, but I am sure his search will eventually lead him here."

Tony thinks JARVIS is trying to tell him something, but he just shrugs and sits back down, taking a long swig of the coffee. "Mm, that's fantastic." He's back at the numbers, messing with amounts and chemicals and percentages, and he's so into it that he doesn't hear the knocking at the door ten minutes later.

"Sir, Dr. Banner is at the door. Shall I let him in?"

Tony thinks for a sec – which is really longer than usual since he's thinking rather slowly right now – and figures he's far along enough in his work to show it off. "Sure, let him in," Tony waves his hand in the air as a greeting as the other scientist walks in.

"Hey Tony," Bruce says to Tony's back, and Tony grunts. "What are you working on?"

"Hell if I know," He mumbles under his breath, but not as quietly as he thinks. Sitting up, he stands with his coffee and approaches the other. "It's uh… a… thing." He nods towards it.

"A thing?" Bruce quirks an eyebrow, glances at the coffee and then at the 'thing'. "That's descriptive."

"I'm still – I'm still working out the… purpose." Tony nods as if this is normal, taking another sip. "Right now, it's in the… 'why not' stage."

"'Why not' stage?"

"Yeah, as in, 'why not make this mystery creation'? It's like a surprise, only more useful." Bruce chuckled a little, but he fell quiet as he examined Tony's face.

"Tony, when was the last time you slept?"

"That depends. What day is it?" Bruce frowns, and opens his mouth to say something, but then a shrill whistle erupts from the place where Tony's mystery creation is sitting. Suddenly, Tony's eyes go wide and he's more awake than he's been all day; he's realizing that it should've been a 6, not a 9. He knows it's going to explode a second before it does, drops his coffee, and throws himself both on top of and in front of Bruce Banner.

BOOM.