Please – as always – enjoy :)
Chapter 7: 28 Kőnigstrasse
It took a few attempts of small talk before you got Doctor Banner to actually answer with a full sentence.
"Please," He tucked his hands in the pocket of his trousers and smiled slightly, "Call me Bruce." You nodded back, feeling that you were finally getting somewhere in your conversation; having been previously calling him 'Doctor Banner' for the past 9 attempts.
"How are you enjoying the Helicarrier so far?" You felt a slight glint of triumph. He would have to answer this with more than one word. He paused, his eyes darting to the abundant amount of security features lurking on the walls and the high-tech brilliance of the craft.
"It's a new experience." He breathed a laugh, "Certainly not what I'm used to." You smiled kindly; at least Steve would be able to relate to that. The Captain was staying exceedingly quiet at Bruce's side. Maybe he was letting you get to know Bruce without him interrupting. Steve was very much for being a gentleman – that was one of the qualities you loved about him; he was so much different from the confident, narcissistic male that was Tony Stark.
"It gets better the longer you stay on it." You mimicked Bruce in tucking your hands into your leather jacket, "But its home for me now."
You gave Bruce a shrug, remembering when you first came to the Helicarrier and how you hated every inch of its elegant design. S.H.I.E.L.D had ripped you from the life you knew and threw you into a world you didn't even know existed. It was hard to cope for the first few years; the non-stop training they had put you under tested every ability you had and pushed you to your limits. It was rigorous to say the least. Armed combat; knives, pistols, staffs, chains – everything you could and couldn't think of, they would train you in. At first it felt like you were their joke. You were so god dammed awful at everything they tried to teach you, that you almost felt like you were the laughing stock. You almost quit. Fury over watched one of your knife sessions, in which you had to go head-to-head and outwit an unknown attacker. If it wasn't bad enough having your boss watch you, there wasn't even the comfort of knowing that if the blade accidently struck you, you wouldn't get hurt. They were real blades, specially made for training purposes, with longer and sharper definition. Their motto was always 'if you messed up here, you would mess up out there.' You got cut up pretty badly that time. You even have some of the scars to prove it. Fury told you to meet him on the flight deck, and when you did, he pep-talked the shit out of you. Some stuff like "I know that girl at the bank is still in there somewhere." You were grateful for him doing that though, because from then on, your progress shot up dramatically. Your armed combat became your speciality. Everyone at S.H.I.E.L.D knew that. 'To tempt (_f/n_) with a weapon in her hands was like mocking death.' You soon moved on to learning a different style of fighting; Filipino Kali. It incorporates hand-to-hand combat and weapon disarming techniques. In some aspects, it was a lot harder to master; after each session, your hands were bloody and bruised, and at one point, you even broke your wrist. "Dedication, (_f/n_), always remember that those who do not succeed, but continue to fight are much more honourable than those who learn first time." Fury's voice rung through your mind, persuading you to carry on with everything you had. After a few months of injury and agony, your open-hand and reflex action wasn't too bad. Luckily, a younger assassin, who was being rehabilitated at S.H.I.E.L.D at the same time you were being trained, took an interest in you. You both found common goals in one another, common interests and common hobbies. Your backgrounds were poles apart however. You were a lowly office worker, just scraping by on the very bottom of the food-chain, with nothing to your name, while she was already a master assassin, with a very particular and very deadly skill set. You told her how difficult it was to learn all of this, and she told you to keep trying. You opened up to her, and in turn, found a friend in the one place where you didn't have any. You told her that you were:
"(_f/n_)(_l/n_), rookie fighter extraordinaire!" She smiled, and told you she was: "Natasha Romanoff, on S.H.I.E.L.D's radar in a bad way." You laughed, telling her that she didn't seem so bad to you. She looked at the table between the both of you: "It's nice to know that one person thinks so." From then on, you and Tasha were inseparable. She was the one who taught you how to read body language, how to tell what people were thinking, how to be manipulative but, most importantly – she said – how to reserve all emotions. "Emotions over-complicate things." She told you, "They blur your vision, and distract you from the task at hand. It's much better to keep them hidden and not allow them to make your judgements for you." It was a good piece of advice that had saved your ass many times. It had tilted the odds in your favour. Though you had no idea why at the time, you did everything and learned everything she taught you. You later came to realise that it was because a friend taught you; and in doing so, they would use techniques that they themselves had perfected, instead of just teaching you 'by the book'. Of course, you were given the rare opportunity to learn how to pilot a fighter jet, and as that had been a secret dream of yours ever since you could remember, you jumped at the chance – loving every minute of it. You became one of the Helicarrier's flight squad in your spare time; flying F22 Raptors and even some of the Quinjets to and from missions and were even asked to be one of the pilots of the crafts which flew beside the airborne Helicarrier, protecting it and looking out for any enemy parties. It seemed that as time passed, you loved your job more and more, and soon came to think of it as your calling. You were one of, and if not the best weapons and jet tester that S.H.I.E.L.D had had in a long time – you knew of all the specification and layouts of every new weapon, and gained the trust of a one Director Fury, and – on his orders – rose to the standard of a super assassin.
Eight years later and here you were; all you're training complete, now a world-class master assassin, with Natasha still one of your closest – and only friends.
Steve saw a look on your face that he knew all too well. You were delving into the history of your own life; where you had flourished, where you had failed, and where you wished you could just forget. He knew because he almost always had that look on his own face.
He turned to Doctor Banner, who was currently watching your face go through different complex emotions and finding that maybe the two of you weren't so different after all. Doctor Banner turned to him and smiled wearily.
"This must all be very new to you." Steve lingered on the question for a moment before answering; "Actually this is all kind of familiar." He waved to the various military stockrooms and armed guards outside important rooms. Bruce nodded understandingly.
You finished the retreat into your darkest memories just long enough to catch Steve and Bruce's conversation, grinning to yourself as they found a subject to relate to.
As the three of you rounded the corner, you stepped in front of them, opening the doors to the Helicarrier flight deck. The noise level was at its optimum; Director Fury standing just behind the control computers, overlooking the flight deck and all his workers. You strode over to him, while Steve looked around, totally in awe of the entire experience as Doctor Banner hung back. You could hear a few higher agents stating the Helicarrier's current condition as you stood beside Director Fury, your hands clasped behind your back.
"Engine output is maximizing, sir, we are stable."
You turned to see Steve glancing up at the levels of the flight deck, a grin spreading onto his face.
"All engines operating. S.H.I.E.L.D emergency protocol 193.6 in effect." Agent Maria Hill turned to Fury, "Were at level, sir." Agent Hill was becoming one of your new friends, though you could tell she was much more interested in her work than becoming your buddy. Nevertheless, you gave her a short wave, and she smiled back at you. Director Fury placed both of his hands on the control grips, "Good." He raised his voice so everyone could hear, "Lets vanish." Stepping forward, you took over on elaborating what he meant.
"Engage retinal reflection panels." You nodded at Agent Hill who presumed giving your orders. You heard the 'whizz' of the panels operating and knew the ship was about to become a whole lot more stealthy. Leaning into Director Fury, you proceeded to tell him that Doctor Banner had arrived safely and was waiting for his orders. Director Fury nodded.
"Reflection panels engaged." The overhead speaker announced loudly.
"Take over please, agent (_l/n_)" You smiled and stood in his place, as he made his way over to Bruce, but not before being stopped by Steve who embarrassingly had to admit defeat and hand over his 10 dollars.
"Gentlemen," He greeted warmly, tucking his newly found money into his jacket and walking over to Doctor Banner. You concentrated on the multiple screens before you; indicating the engine output, the horizon level, the altitude at which you were currently flying and in which direction you were headed. After registering everything was operating normally, you stepped off the podium and made your way to the briefing desk. You noticed Director Fury was about to talk to Doctor Banner, and made your way over to them.
"Doctor, thank you for coming." Both men shook hands.
"Thanks for asking nicely." Bruce mumbled, as if his kind façade hides true pain and hardship underneath. He looked away awkwardly, "So… how long am I here for?"
"As soon as we locate the Tesseract, you're in the wind." Fury nodded truthfully to Banner who took in his current situation. You walked over to the railing across from the briefing table, and leaned over them to watch Phil manage a group of younger agents sweeping for images of Loki and the Tesseract. You watched as Steve made his way around to your line of vision, but staying out of the way of Phil for fear of what happened last time they were close. You heard Bruce ask where S.H.I.E.L.D were on tracking the Tesseract and noticed that they were coming over to stand beside you, Phil looked up from his work and elaborated.
"We're sweeping every wirelessly accessible camera on the planet. Cell phones, laptops; if it's connected to a satellite, its eyes and ears for us." You saw Natasha look over a profile of Clint before she piped in, "That's still not going to find them in time."
"You need to narrow your field," Everyone looked to Bruce, "How many spectrometers do you have access to?" Director Fury shrugged.
"How many are there?"
"Call every lab you know, tell them to put the spectrometers on the roof and calibrate them for gamma rays," You pointed to one younger agent who was watching Bruce with interest, clicked your fingers to the computer monitor she was sitting at and mimed 'do it'. She immediately started to locate every research lab that S.H.I.E.L.D had on file. Bruce continued, taking off his jacket as he spoke, "I'll rough out a tracking algorithm, basic cluster recognition. At least we could rule out a few places." He started to roll up his sleeves and looked around, "Do you have anywhere for me to work?" Director Fury looked impressed and clearly pleased with his choice of bringing Bruce in to locate the Tesseract, and turned to Natasha.
"Agent Romanoff, could you show Doctor Banner to his laboratory please?" She stood up and strode over and past Bruce. You caught her swiftly saying, "Your gonna love it doc, we've got all the toys" and smirked at how cool she could be when the world was on the brink of war. You made your way over to where you could better see the tracking of Loki, and Phil came up to stand to your right.
"Any luck?" You asked tucking your hands into your jean pockets.
"Not yet." Phil replied, "But we're bound to find something soon, right?" You smiled.
"Sure." You waved at Steve to come join you on the platform, "Maybe this would be a good time to ask him to sign your trading cards." You joked teasingly as Steve stood beside Phil.
"Enjoying life on the Helicarrier yet, Steve?" You asked innocently. He sighed, crossing his arms.
"It's certainly something else." You made a noise of agreement as you leaned into Phil.
"Now, ask him now!" You whispered harshly, giggling quietly as Phil turned to Steve.
"Would you," He paused, allowing Steve to turn to face him, "b-by any chance… know of Captain America Trading Cards?" Steve looked confused.
"Trading cards?" Steve repeated sounding almost anxious. He blushed slightly when Phil explained they were all about him and the heroic things he's done.
"People collect them." He went on, "And they're quite valuable…I have some of them –"
"He has all of them." You chirped, making Phil go red. He paused, slowly taking in a deep breath as you stifled a laugh, "Could you sign them for me?" He blurted. Steve looked taken aback and blinked once, twice, before he answered, "Er… Sure," Steve smiled slightly, "Of course I will." You saw Phil swell with pride and grinned, realising that Phil's life dream has been accomplished.
"I mean, if it's not too much trouble." He added.
"No, no. It's fine." Steve answered, crossing his arms again.
"It's a vintage set. Took me a couple of years to collect them all." Steve nodded, his eyes never leaving the air in front of him. Phil crossed his arms and swayed on the spot proudly, "Their mint. That's like boxing around the edges –"
"We've got a hit!" Never before in your life had you been so glad for an interruption than at this very moment. Your heads snapped to the agent who called it, "67% match. Wait, cross match 79%" You all crowded around his computer stall.
"Location?" You asked nervously, knowing that some form of attack was in the near future.
"Stuttgart, Germany. 28 Kőnigstrasse," You planned out a route to Germany in your head as the agent continued, "He's not exactly hiding." You leaned closer to the computer screen, taking a mental image of Loki. He had sleek black hair, and defined handsome features. You noticed that he was dressed in a smart suit and was carrying – what you presumed – was the same staff he had used to override Clint's senses. A wave of anger ignited within you but Director Fury's voice made you suppress your feelings – just as you were told.
"Captain?" Steve looked behind him, "Agent (_l/n_), you're up." You both nodded, as you turned to Steve.
"Time to go to work."